Monday, January 14, 2008
Morning News 1.14.07
Posted by Josh in Barack Obama, Democrats, Election 2008, Golden Globes, hillary clinton, Iraq, Michigan, Republicans, South Carolina
First, this story is why the morning news is not getting posted until 2 pm.
The Presidential campaign continues unabated. The New York Times put out a new poll that shows the race for both the Democratic and Republican nominations are in flux. Remember how last week, all anyone cared about was Iowa and New Hampshire? This week all anyone will care about is South Carolina and Michigan. The song is pretty much the same, just replace references to Farm Subsidies with references to Auto Makers and the new “Alternative Energy” Economy.
In the race for the Democratic nomination, the knives are starting to come out. People affiliated with the Clinton campaign have begun making veiled, and not-so-veiled comments about Obama and race. The most egregious comments are coming from people very loosely affiliated with the campaign. Having worked in campaigns before, I can briefly attest that sometimes whisper campaigns like this are started by the campaign itself, but more often then not prominent campaign supporters feel that they are “helping.” You have to make the judgment for yourself on which you think this is.
Iraq is showing some signs of political progress. That progress is in the form of patronage jobs. The short summary is that the majority of the insurgents are unemployed young men. If the government can provide them jobs, they will have money, something to do, and be less likely to try to undermine the government that is signing their checks. Garbagemen and Toll Booths = Political stability.
Finally, the Golden Globes were last night. There was no televised spectacular because of the ongoing writers strike. Not that anyone cares about the writers, but the Screen Actor’s Guild (The Actors Union) said that none of their members would attend out of solidarity. And what would the point of the awards show be without celebrity presenters and George Clooney on the Red Carpet. The only bit of interesting news from the awards themselves was that the major networks (ABC, CBS, NBC, and FOX) won, in total, 1 award (for Tina Fey and 30 Rock).