What Happened to Libya?

The most striking thing about the Third Presidential debate is that it led off with a question about the attack in Libya, seemingly tailor made for Romney to go after Obama on this, and he did not.

I think he was wise not to.

That was the one question and the one attack Obama was most expecting. He would certainly have a well-rehearsed answer prepared, and walking into it risked giving Obama a slam dunk first thing in the debate, starting the debate on the wrong foot for Romney. If Obama did not have a zinger, at best, it would be too easy for him to wriggle out of responsibility. It would have just been a wasted exchange.

There is a problem with ever going after a sitting president on any specific aspect of foreign policy: he has access to secret intelligence that the challenger does not have. This gives him a huge automatic advantage. Even if the intelligence supports the challenger, the incumbent can lie about it and never got caught. Or at least not until thirty or fifty years later.

And Romney STILL Wins the Focus Group

Three words: likability, likability, likability.

Obama Wins One

Stock photo of Obama smiling. But why?

The post-debate snap polls show a clear win for Obama this time.

Will it matter? Maybe not. First, given the economic situation, Americans are not thinking much about foreign policy. All Romney needed to do in those circumstances is come across as plausible, and as someone who would not start a war. That seems to be what he concentrated on in the debate, and he succeeded, by all accounts. Had he gone hard after Obama, all he might have done is shift the focus of the campaign to foreign policy, which is not his best argument. Winning the debate as a debate, for him, might have been a losing strategy.

Obama, on the other hand, may have lost some campaign ground in exchange for winning the debate. He was aggressive once again; people are talking about his “death stare.” This will cost him likability, and likability is, I have argued, the most important ingredient in American electoral success.

I don't know whether Obama had a better strategy available to him. If he had stayed calm and presidential, the debate would probably have been dull, and the focus would have remained on the economy. He needed to wave some red flags to try to get the bull to charge. But then, everything hinged on Romney being rattled into making some obvious blunder, like Ford saying Poland was not under Soviet domination back in '76. Or at least sounding angry and warlike. He didn't.

So the debate probably won't by itself cause any big shift in the campaign dynamics, but it will confirm Romney as a safe choice.

Going into the debate, Romney had the momentum. This debate was the last obvious chance to switch that momentum. Unless there is a late "October surprise" or gaffe by either candidate, that momentum in a tight race looks likely to carry Romney over the top; RealClearPolitics's poll of polls currently has Romney at 47.6 vs 47.2, even with the widespread apparent pro-Democratic bias in the polls. 

I note, though, with interest and surprise, that the InTrade market, usually extremely reliably, still leans strongly toward an Obama win. Does somebody know something about an October surprise we don't know?

On to Debate Three

Teddy Roosevelt: "Speak softly and carry a big stick."

Now comes the third debate. I think this one is the greatest challenge for Romney; it is not his field, and his best strategy throughout has been to keep the focus on the economy. So how does he approach this?

His biggest concern has to be to prevent any perception that he would be likely to get the US engaged in any more wars. Obama will surely make the claim, the memory of G. W. Bush's two wars will make it plausible, and the US is sick and tired of war.

After that, he must simply sound knowledgeable on foreign policy. He must convince people that he would be a capable hand at the helm.

Only after that, he should take the opportunity to go after Obama on Libya and on the shambolic situation in the Middle East.

Statue of Ronald Reagan in Warsaw. With flowers.

His best theme is “peace through strength,” citing how Reagan ended the Cold War not by open combat, but by improving the US economy and boosting US weapons programs (Remember Star Wars? Remember the “Peacekeeper missile”?) to the extent that the Soviet Union could no longer compete financially.

Peacekeeper Missile in silo.

Romney should project the idea, not that the world is a dangerous place, but that the US is intrinsically far stronger than its likely opponents. Within a few years, North America can be self-sufficient in energy and oil. Iran is a third world country with an unstable government. China, an economic if not a military threat, is facing demographic doom. North Korea is starving, for goodness sake. These guys are angry pygmies. All the US needs is resolve. But visible weakness is the worst way to avoid war. Becoming deeply indebted to China is thew worst way. Gratuitously bowing to foreign leaders is the worst way. Broadcasting a date of departure is the worst way. Saying we (they) are shifting away from a region is the worst way. It makes future war more likely, because it emboldens America's enemies to do something foolish.

Strong at home; strong abroad.

Winston Churchill: Forearmed is Forewarned.

Late Thoughts on the Second US Presidential Debate

Obamney.

I do not have TV currently. Last night, I finally got to watch the second US presidential debate for myself. I think, on balance, it will help Romney.

Scored as a debate, it was a draw, or possibly an Obama win. But that does not account for context. Obama had great responses for everything; but the fundamental problem was that he was largely defending his record of the last four years, and his message was that everything was great. This is not going to work, because everyone looks around and sees things are not great. They can see it on the gas pumps. Romney nailed it, drawing out this perception, by saying Obama was a great speaker, but his record shows he does not get things done.

As a result, even Obama's best arguments are likely not to stick to the target. Worse, the contrast between what he said and the perceived reality gives him an aura of mendacity, which hurts him on the essential likability factor.

This is made worse, I think, by his flashes of anger during the debate: most notably, his attempt to shut down all criticism on the Libya debacle by declaring it “offensive” to suggest he or anyone in the administration lied about it. Anger is not generally attractive; and he was, to some extent, expressing anger at voters themselves—the many among them who have indeed been suspecting the administration lied for two weeks about the nature of the Benghazi attacks.

And I think Obama's likability suffers again from the open partisanship of the moderator. Her intervention to endorse Obama's claims on Libya was, to me, absolutely jaw-dropping.

We know from many polls and surveys that most Americans no longer trust the media. The fact that Obama and the moderator were acting in consort—this is an observable fact, not some kind of conspiracy theory—actually tarnishes Obama as the candidate of the media. It will anger many who do not like to feel manipulated.

And the intervention itself probably did no good. Anyone who has been keeping abreast of the news knows full well that the Obama administration was saying for two weeks that the Benghazi attack was spontaneous and not terrorism.

The attempt to wiggle out by bombast, tricks with words, and collusion with the media, instead cements the impression that Obama's claims and promises, on anything, are not to be trusted.

Obama's energetic defense of his record will probably energize his base, and prevent him from being embarrassed on election day. But his base, in poll after poll, is under 50%; it alone will not get him reelected. He did not reach out to undecideds, and his debate strategy did not seem to be designed to reach out to undecideds. A defense of his record is not going to accomplish that; he has to give them a positive reason to vote for him, a vision for the future.

Obama did not do that in this debate, and he has not done that in this campaign. It is, of course, a difficult thing for an incumbent to do—the inevitable question becomes, “if this is your plan, why didn't you do it over the last four years?” Still, others have pulled it off; and it seems to be the approach best tailored to fit this candidate's oratorical skills. Why has he not done this?

I think it is further evidence that he does not really want to be president. He does not like to even think of the task of governing for four more years. His game now is to protect his legacy, and retire with some dignity.

That was his tone throughout this debate.

Here's Someone Who Sounds Like He Knows What He Is Talking About

... saying two surprising things about the polls:

1. Obama has been trailing all along;

2. The Vice Presidential Debate really shifted the polls to Romney.

In saying he sounds as though he knows what he is talking about, I'm really saying I buy his arguments. Point 2 especially rings true to me: never underestimate the likability factor. As I said, Biden seemed to swing a wrecking ball on the likability of his entire ticket.

Professional Journalism

Heading West.

A question inspired by Candy Crowley's mismanagement of the second US Presidential debate: why has journalism grown so bad, and so corrupt? What caused this?

For many years, I had the strong sense that newspapers and newsmagazines in general had tumbled far downhill since my youth. But I could not be sure. It might have had to do with the more jaded eyes of age. But now, with the Internet, there can be no doubt: the amateurs in the blogosphere do far better than the professionals.

And that last word may tell the whole story. I think it was a terrible error to turn journalism, during my own lifetime, into a “profession.” Journalists just a little older than I tended to have only a high school education, if that—they got into journalism because they could do it, because they could write, and tell a story interestingly. Now they get into the profession not because they can write, but because they have taken the required courses. The same awful process has also, over about the same time period, destroyed the teaching profession.

There is a basic principle here that is too often overlooked. Whenever you introduce standards to any area, you are eliminating two things: the bottom, the substandard, but also the top, the exceptionally good. That is the essence of professionalism: standardization—in other words, conformity. It is fine in areas in which simple competence is sufficient for all or most purposes--technical areas. But in areas, like writing or teaching,that require some element of creativity in order to work at all, it is going to damage, and ultimately destroy, the field.

The single obvious reason why the US dominates the contemporary world, culturally, technologically, and politically, is because of its tradition of nonconformity—aka “rugged individualism'” if you like. Those who found the local society too constraining in its demands could always escape to the frontier; and the doctrines of individual liberty on which the country was founded reduced the demands of conformity in the first place. There was also always the sense that this was the “New World,” which need not ever be constrained by the habits of the old.

The same secret led to the strength of Britain. On top of a strong innate social tolerance for, indeed glorification of, eccentricity, robustly expressed by John Stuart Mill, Britons needing breathing room could always take to the sea, and long had the ready option of shipping out to the Empire. There is nothing like the expatriate existence for freeing oneself from social pressures.

Sailing Before the Wind: The Jeanie Johnston.

This alone ensures that professionalization will be a disaster in most instances. On top of this, the creation of a profession creates a group consciousness, and a sense of common interests. This is not good. As Adam Smith observed, you cannot expect a group of people in the same trade gathered together, even for recreation, not to immediately turn to ways to conspire against the public interest for their own benefit. That is what a profession does, perfectly—a thing we would hold illegal in the corporate world. Now journalists all come up through the same schools, have many friends on rival papers, and attend the same parties, on top of their inevitable time together in the newsroom. They are a clique. Membership in the clique comes to be based not on ability, but on reliable commitment to the interests of the clique.

Fortunately, just when everything seemed to be going Stalinist, the innate rebellious genius of the Anglosphere created a new frontier: cyberspace. We have the bloggers, now, and the online educators, shaming and exposing the cliques and recovering the option of excellence. It is no accident this all first came from California, the last post on the Westward march; and, in the case of the WWW, from a Briton who had opted to live abroad.

Looks Like Romney Won Debate 2

Obama Held His Own

I think I called debate #2 pretty well: I said the best Obama can hope for is, unless Obama manages a TKO, or Romney makes a serious blunder, the headline "Obama holds his own."

That seems to be the generic headline today.

Later: No, I'm being too easy on myself. I fudged it a lot, but I was really expecting a narrow Romney win. This one seems to have been a tie.

The Female of the Species

A merry widow.

 There are many complaints this morning that Candy Crowley was blatantly partisan in her moderation of the Obama-Romney debate last night. Most notably, she interjected to defend Obama against the charge that he misrepresented events in Benghazi--which, of course, he did.

Rudyard Kipling could have explained why it is intrinsically a bad idea to have a woman moderate a debate:

She is wedded to convictions - in default of grosser ties;
Her contentions are her children, Heaven help him, who denies!
He will meet no cool discussion, but the instant, white-hot wild
Wakened female of the species warring as for spouse and child.

...

Proof of evil in nature.

So it comes that Man, the coward, when he gathers to confer
With his fellow-braves in council, dare not leave a place for her
Where, at war with Life and Conscience, he uplifts his erring hands
To some God of abstract justice - which no woman understands.

Though stated in a painstakingly gentlemanly way, what Kipling says here is outrageously politically correct. But ask yourself, isn't it nevertheless true?

 
The first wave of feminism insisted that men and women were identical except for the dangly bits. That was so obviously absurd that no feminist would say it any more today. Now we have so-called "difference feminism." Which means, necessarily, that men may be emotionally and intellectually better suited to some situations than are women, and women may be better suited to some situations than men. Feminists themselves insist on this when, for example, they claim that women are more "nurturing," or less "competitive."

Hello, sailor!

But hang on a moment. If there are differences, they cannot always be in favour of women.

Men read maps better than women. Men are better at abstract spatial reasoning. And women are far more partisan than men.

Prediction for Second Debate

Lifelike image courtesy DonkeyHotey. CC license.

Since I did so well on my prediction for the First US Presidential Debate, I am emboldened to make a prediction for Debate #2.

I think Romney will win again.

It should not be as one-sided as the first debate—that win was historic. The odds are against that; though I think even this is possible.

President Obama will certainly try to do better this time; his pride is on the line. But if I am right that he fundamentally, in his heart of hearts, is sick of the job and does not want to be re-elected, he can be more or less counted on to self-sabotage in some way. Just as he seems to be self-sabotaging on the growing Libya scandal by trying to scapegoat both the Clintonian State Department and the intelligence community—two groups you really want to have on your side.

And I note with arched eyebrow that the debate prep this time is once again at a golf resort. Not the venue you want if you want Obama's full attention; sounds like another carrot for a reluctant horse.

Romney, on the other hand, won the first debate largely because he was so very well briefed. He is not going to become un-briefed. And as hard as Obama might be running now to catch up, Romney is likely to be running just as fast; he's not going to stop and wait for Obama.

I expect in any case that unless Obama scores a TKO, or Romney commits a gaffe, the news stories will be, at best, “Obama held his own.” Perhaps the news media would like the story “Obama closes the gap” better for partisan reasons, but it's really not as good a story yet as “wheels come off the Obama bus.” Problem is, there is hardly and gap to be closed yet. First they have to establish the gap. Obama has to go down further before his comeback becomes a good story.

Clint Eastwood as Prophet

Elijah ascends to heaven in his chariot of fire.

Several commentators are amazed at the prescience of Clint Eastwood. He imagined Obama as an empty chair in his speech at the Democratic convention, and that is just how Obama came across to many at the first Presidential debate. Suddenly there are all kinds of cartoons, including a New Yorker cover, showing Obama as an empty chair behind the debate lectern. It rings true. Then Eastwood, in the same speech, described Joe Biden as “a grin with a body behind it,” and now everyone is commenting on Biden's constant smirking in the VP debate. It rings true.

So what is going on? Is Eastwood clairvoyant?

Yes and no. Eastwood is an artist. Artists have a special, and an especially close, relationship with the imagination.

And the contents of the imagination are not random or meaningless. The imagination is a window on the spirit world.

I'm not the first to say this. It's not just my idea. Thomas Aquinas said it, and it is taken as a given in most cultures. Welcome to the real world: the spirit world.

The character type who becomes an artist in our modern Western culture is the same character type who would have been a shaman in an earlier culture, or, in ancient Judea, a prophet. He can see things hidden to the visible world.

You want another example of artistic prophecy? Did you know that Jack Kerouac's On the Road, written in 1949, at one point imagines its antihero, Dean Moriarty, driving relentlessly toward New York City, as an "Arab" intent on blowing up its towers?

Not all artists speak with the voice of God. There are false prophets. That does not mean they cannot prophecy. We know there are many spirits, good and bad. Jim Morrison, for example, believed he was possessed by the ghost of an Indian killed in a traffic accident. Phil Ochs believed he was possessed by a person named John Train. Bob Dylan, I recently read somewhere, believed he was possessed throughout the Sixties by a spirit who coincidentally had the same name as he did, Robert Zimmerman. No kidding. You may not believe it, but the artists themselves did.

These spirits in any given case might be benevolent, or they might be mischievous, or they might be malicious. It seems as though the spirits who possess rock stars are generally on the shady side. But all artists have a “genius.” That is a spirit guide—same root as “genie.” The greatest artists, surely, have God as their guide. These are the true prophets.

Not sure about Eastwood. Could be.

I Called It, Didn't I?

Image by DonkeyHotey under CC license.

I've never seen a clearer morning-after consensus: Romney scored a TKO in the first US Presidential debate, it seems. I see comparisons to Kennedy-Nixon or Reagan-Carter, the two most decisive presidential debates in televised debate history. And more than one commentator has noted that Obama did not look as though he wanted to be there. I think it confirms my suspicions that Obama does not really want to be president any more.

The next debate should be tougher for Romney. Whether or not Obama still wants to be president, he has his pride. And he will be concerned about his legacy. He's going to come more pumped for the next one.

As to the narrative here, the best new story for now is "challenger closes the gap." However, since the gap is already pretty narrow, that will not do for long. And "Romney campaign collapses" has already been done to death. Ergo, if events make it in the least possible, the obvious "big news" story to come is "wheels fall off the  Obama bus."

Look for it.

I think Romney-Obama best compares to Reagan-Carter. Folks are dissatisfied with the record of the current president, but they had doubts about the challenger. The Obama campaign has hung their hat on that one by running lots of ads going after Romney, rather than talking about the President's record.

Now, just as Reagan did in the Carter debates, Romney has managed to come across as capable, presidential, and likable. This blows the heart out of the Democratic campaign strategy, so it may do maximum damage. They may have to scramble for a plan B. There may not be a good plan B available.

I think there is real potential for this to morph into "wheels come off the Obama campaign." Into a real poll surge for Romney.