Political Animals

It's good to know that Republicans have tax problems as well. In September, The Washington Post reported that then Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin had billed her home state for nearly $17,000 in meals and living expenses, while choosing to live at home in Wasilla, rather than in the Governor's Mansion in Juneau. When the money caused some political drama in the campaign, Palin's administration asked the government's financial offices to treat the money as income. And because of this, the IRS is sending Palin a new W-2 and a letter instructing her to pay back taxes on the seventeen large. Palin spokesman Bill McAllister told CNN that Palin, "will abide by all IRS regulations and rulings and will pay what she owes. That number, though, is not a matter of public record." And he's right. It doesn't matter what the taxes are as long as they're paid, and it sounds like Palin's doing the right thing here (after doing the wrong thing before, but still...). It's just nice to know that the Democrats aren't alone.

Speaking of Palin, The Common Man wouldn't feel right if he didn't praise young Bristol Palin for her interview on Fox News the other day. Palin discussed her decision to have her son, emphasized that being a young mom can be a slog, and broke with her mother's support of abstinence-only education. Bristol told Van Sustren that simply telling children to refrain from sex is "not realistic at all." The interview was Bristol's idea, and she told her parents about it the day before it happened and that she wanted to use the opportunity to be "an advocate to prevent teen pregnancy because it's not, like, a situation that you would want to strive for, I guess." The most disappointing part of the interview was Sarah Palin's intrusion. Apparently not trusting her daughter to answer the softball questions Van Sustren was lobbing in there, Palin shows up a few minutes into the interview and proceeds to refuse to give her daughter any opportunity to answer the questions. Look, The Common Man knows that parents are inherently protective of their young. And he knows that the governor has (marginally) more experience dealing with the media than her daughter. But if you can't trust FoxNews, Sarah Palin, who can you trust? You ended up standing awkwardly in a hotel room for 10 minutes, rambling, while your poor daughter had to sit there thinking, "God, Mom, stop embarrassing me on national TV." And seriously, Bristol was doing fine before you came in and turned the interview into a train wreck. But your paranoid need for spin control turned what could have been a triumphant moment for your daughter into another funny Sarah Palin clip. Good job. Bristol, Grandma there's ready for the home.

See! The Common Man totally told you so.

But Travis wasn't the only monkey causing trouble in the last couple days. The New York Post ran a cartoon today (click this link to see it, The Common Man can't find it to reprint here) that may or may not have been referring to Barack Obama as a monkey. The cartoon tried to combine the runaway Stamford chimp story from yesterday (already The Common Man can tell you that this cartoon is in bad taste. Dude, a woman got her face half-torn off. You stay classy, NY Post.) with the federal stimulus bill championed and passed by Barack Obama. The Common Man is willing to give the Post a pass on the racism charges, assuming they meant that the stimulus bill was so bad it had to have been written by a team of trained monkeys. Rather, the Post is guilty of bad satire. The two stories seem to have nothing to do with one another, and it takes a significant amount of explanation to get from one to the other. The cartoon isn't inexcusable because it's racist. It's inexcusable because it's terrible and opaque. Seriously, even the New Yorker's cartoons make sense if you think about them. This one, the more you think about it, the less it makes any kind of logical sense. Which basically reinforces two of The Common Man's sweeping generalities that he's going to assume are true in any and all cases: conservatives are not funny and the New York Post is for idiots.

Not Tripping

Since he got a sore throat yesterday, The Common Man chose not to travel to Minnesota with The Boy this week. It would not be good to inflict illness on his 90 year old grandmothers. Instead, The Common Man is gearing up to watch the debate tonight between Vice-Presidential contestants, Joe Biden and Sarah Palin. And he isn't even a little disappointed that The Office is being preempted. Because what this failing and flailing dewmocracy needs most, The Common Man thinks, is an honest, forthright, intelligent exchanging of ideas between intellec...ok, that's as far as The Common Man can get without laughing. C'mon, did you see the Couricinterviews???

Yet, as George W. Bush proved in 2000 and again in 2004, what matters in these debates isn't who wins and who loses. Rather, what matters is how a candidate does based on the expectations the public has for them going in. And, thanks to Palin's Boom Goes the Dynamite-esque performance on CBS News, anything short of Palin curling up in the fetal position, sucking her thumb, and repeating "lipstick, lipstick, lipstick" quietly under her breath while clicking her heels together and hoping she magically wakes up back in the governor's mansion in Juneau might be considered a net gain for the Republican ticket and help them in the polls. Indeed, if more Americans (and more importantly, the press) turn away from tonight's coverage saying, "oh, she wasn't that bad," it may translate into a small Republican gain in the polls.

However, with the downturn in the economy, and the failure to pass the bailout plan through the House, Obama's lead has solidified in the past few days. Key battleground states, such as Michigan (one McCain staffer was quoted by CNN.com as saying it "isn't even a longshot" anymore), Pennsylvania, Colorado, New Mexico, and Washington have gone solidly blue, and Ohio, Florida, and Virginia have a bluish lean to them, according to the latest projection from fivethirtyeight.com. Even North Carolina, Indiana, and Missouri are on the verge of switching to Obama.

Still, if there is one lesson to take away from this election season, it's that the political winds can shift on a dime. And you shouldn't be surprised if a competent Palin, vastly improved from a week at debate camp, makes a decent showing tonight. Indeed, the best strategy for Democrats is undoubtedly to hang back and not take pleasure in any and all struggles that Governor Palin may or may not have. Biden must not engage her and must be impressive in giving his own answers. And Democratic strategists and pundits must focus on Biden's answers and performance in their post-debate analysis. Indeed, it's the only way they can avoid the appearance of piling on or (worse yet) of trying to minimize what may be an acceptable performance in the eyes of some Americans. If Democrats can manage to stay out of their own glib, smartass ways over the next 24 hours, they will be rewarded with either a) a monumental victory or b) no real change in the status quo. Either must be regarded as a victory for Obama and Biden at this point, especially with just over a month to go.

And since The Common Man is ordering you not to enjoy any Palin gaffes over the next 24 hours, here's one from September by uber-douche Sean Hannity to tide you over. Enjoy watching Sean claim that the economy is doing just fine less than three weeks ago:

Here's Mud In Your Eye

Sometimes timing is everything. And sometimes, the week after Barak Obama's spokesman said that John McCain is "cynically running the sleaziest and least honorable campaign in modern presidential campaign history," The Common Man finally gets around to finishing Anything for a Vote, Joseph Cummins reader-friendly guide to dirty Presidential politics. So is Obama's spokesman right? Where would this election cycle rank on Cummins "Sleaze-o-meter?" And is this book worth your time?

Cummins argues that dirty politics is an American tradition, and ingrained within the American populace, the nation's psyche, and the political process. "Without smears, innuendo, and thievery tainting our electoral system," he writes, "what would we have to connect us to our quickly vanishing past?... We're Americans, after all. A nice, dirty election runs in our blood." It's a provacative statement, and one that Cummins backs up by systematically examining every single election since 1789. Indeed, he concludes that "probably the only clean election in American history was the first one...in which George Washington ran unopposed." Since then, there have been a steady progression of dirty tricks and ugly accusations in Presidential races, including Davy Crockett's claim that Martin Van Buren dressed in ladies' corsets, Hoover supporters asserting that the Holland Tunnel led straight to the Vatican (as Hoover's opponent, Al Smith, was a practicing Catholic), and Rutherford B. Hayes supporters claiming his opponent, Samuel Tilden, "had contracted syphilis some years earlier from an Irish whore on the Bowery, and that his venerial disease not only affected his actions, but made him susceptible to blackmail."

In all, Cummins does demonstrate that running for President has invited mud and smears, and that candidates knew what they were in for. But, while dirty politics may have been part of the game since the bitter 1800 election between Jefferson and Adams, he gives his highest "sleaze" ratings to elections in 1960, 1964, 1972, 1988, 1992, and 2000 (and with the second highest rating to 2004). Prior to that run, only 3 elections reached the pinnacle of sleaze, the aforementioned 1800 election, 1879 (Hayes v. Tildon), and 1928 (Hoover v. Smith). So while the dirty pool is nothing new, the intensity seems to have ratcheted up in recent years, and become increasingly vindictive. So it's entirely plausible that this year's cycle will see the most vitriolic, ugly, and disgusting attacks in campaign history. And it validates the idea that, in bygone days, politics wasn't so rancorous and off-putting as it is now, and that when Obama and McCain talked about getting back to a more civil style of politics they weren't idealizing and romanticizing the past.

So far, The Common Man would put this election cycle up at a 8 or so on Cummins' "sleaze-o-meter." News networks have openly speculated that Barak Obama is Muslim (a similar charge dogged unsuccessful 1856 candidate John Fremont, who was accused of being a secret Catholic), and one blatantly false McCain ad has suggested that he wants kindergarters to have "comprehensive sex education." He's also been drug through the mud because of his tangential associations with Reverand Wright, Father Pflager, and William Ayers. And he and his wife have openly had their patriotism questioned because sometimes he chooses not to wear an American flag pin and his wife has been honest enough to bring up that life in America is often more difficult for people of color, particularly if those people are women.

Of course, Obama's not alone as a target, nor is he entirely innocent of the mudslinging. Obama's campaign has lampooned John McCain for being unable to use a computer, when it's possible that his POW injuries won't allow him to sit at a desk and use a keyboard. Hilary Clinton was called shrill, a harpy, and the epitome of a bitchy feminism. Sarah Palin has been accused of faking a pregnancy to cover up her daughter's illegitamate child, and now it seems that daughter has a baby on the way. In all, it's an impressive list. The Common Man was tempted to give it a 10 so far (and someday, when books are written on this election, it might rank that high), but there are still a couple of months to go and The Common Man wants the candidates and their supporters to have a notion to shoot for (perhaps this election will go to 11).

Cummins's book itself is a fun read, and, as The Common Man mentioned, very reader friendly. And it's a very informative, quick, and breezy run through American history. It is not, however, a serious work of political science or scholarly research. There are no footnotes, nothing to suggest Cummins's sources. And his politics seem to come through in his recounting of the 2000 and 2004 elections (but really, who doesn't think that those didn't go well for this country?). Casual fans of politics will find it right up their alleys.

Saturday Beer Review: Moose Drool Brown Ale

He knows, you've all been waiting with baited breath to see if The Common Man will show today. Well, here he is, boys and girls, in all his glory. Behold and admire him. He's sequestered in his mancave, watching the manliest of sports, pro football, and enjoying many a fine carbonated malt beverage. The world is a strange place: Brett Favre is wearing a different shade of green (since he's a Jet), former LaDanian Tomlinson caddy Michael Turner has 196 yards on the ground for the Falcons (in related news, once again the Lions suck), and the lowly Kanses City Chiefs are keeping it close in New England.

And since this is a topsy-turvy, bizzarro world, The Common Man felt it was appropriate to crack open a Moose Drool Brown Ale in honor of the GOP's vice-presidential nominee, Gov. Sarah Palin.
Palin, of course, has burst onto the political scene in the last week and a half. She has transformed public consciousness, making phrases like "hockey moms," "moose hunting," and "Alaska" part of the national discussion. Indeed, Palin's ability to rally her base and to label herself at once a loving mother (and soon-to-be grandma) and a pitbull has been particularly impressive.

Like Sarah Palin, Moose Drool comes from the northwest part of the country. Brewed in Missoula, Montana by Big Sky Brewing Co., Moose Drool understand the world from which Palin comes, with its harsh winters, its imposing terrain, and its "hockey." Of course, Moose Drool's origins lie further south and east than Palin has tended to roam, but still comes across as a manly, big brew for men who need a lot of flavor in their beer. Indeed, Moose Drool is nothing like the Yard Beer that Kevin, at Return to Manliness, wrote about a month back.

Anyway, like Palin herself, Mosse Drool presents several contrasts. It's name would imply that it's disgusting, yet the label, a serene painting of a moose swimming in a mountain pond, suggests a cleaner, fresher beer than you're used to. And, like Palin herself, it combines that sweetness with a killer hoppiness that is very bitter. It's the first beer The Common Man has profiled here that's almost better warm, or at least cool. The chill tends to accentuate the beers hoppiness while killing some of the chocolate and carmel flavors that sweetens the aftertaste.

This is a sipping beer, best to have before a good meal, as it will dominate the food you're trying to enjoy. And it's a good beer to drink with a sole friend at dusk. The Common Man, for instance, was introduced to Moose Drool by his good friend, Alto, who is essentially like Arnold Schwarzenegger to The Common Man's Danny DeVito. As they sat at The Common Man's cabin, on the deck overlooking the lake, thinking about the work they had done and the times they had seen together, they both knew that life was good. And that the beer was too.

So, in honor of Sarah Palin, go get yourself a sixer of Moose Drool and enjoy the rest of your weekend. You've worked hard to get to where you are. Or, maybe you're a cynical appeal to two demographics who you think you need to energize in order to win an election. Either way, you deserve it.

Also in honor of Governor Palin, The Common Man presents another installment of Stupid Man Tricks:



That seems to be a poor strategy for hunting moose, being 10 feet away and shooting one in the neck. Also, The Common Man loves how his buddy tries to call the moose back after it a) has just been shot and b) almost killed his companion. That is the definition of friendship, right there, trying to get your pal trampled a second time.