Showing posts with label InDecision '08. Show all posts
Showing posts with label InDecision '08. Show all posts
Normally, the pressure has been to keep partisanship to a bare minimum on this day every year.
But with this year's anniversary of 9/11 -- the seventh year since that infamous day -- falling during not one but two North American elections, 9/11 will almost certainly become a topic of some importance today.
Particularly with an American election in which no incumbent can be returned to the White House, the question of 9/11 and how another such attack can be prevented will be a pivotal issue. In 2004, voters knew first hand President George W Bush's views on how to avert terrorist attacks. In 2008, they don't have that luxury in comparing the anti-terrorism plans of John McCain and Barack Obama.
But to truly understand the events of 9/11, and truly understand how another such attack can be prevented, it's important to understand how the event unfolded in the first place.
As such, today The Nexus presents (with brief commentary) the documentary Inside 9/11: Zero Hour:
It's remarkable how ineffective pre-9/11 security was at detecting the 19 terrorists, even when a number of them were selected for additional security. The very rules set by the FAA actually facilitated the hijacking by allowing the hijackers to carry their weapons on board.
It's also disconcerting how, even after the hijacking was known, the eventual disaster was still unable to be prevented.
The FAA's inability to communicate effectively with F-15 fighter jets that had been scrambled to track American Airlines flight 11 and the literal impossibility of fighting a fire at the height in question point to the obvious ill-preparedness of the American transportation infrastructure, military and civil authorities to deal with the events of that day.
One would almost excuse ill-preparedness to deal with events previously considered almost unimaginable. But on the very day of the events in question, novelist John Grisham told CNN that he had proposed events remarkably similar to 9/11 as a national security scenario to Pentagon officials.
The events of 9/11 weren't as unthinkable as we may like to believe.
The detail with which the film portrays the events of 9/11 is shocking, but underscores the reality of the event -- and reminds us why a repeat of that catastrophe must be averted.
Confusion began to set in as the FAA and air traffic controllers literally lost track of which planes were still in the air, and which planes had already reached their target.
Particularly chilling is the deception the hijackers employed with their passengers. Knowing full well that they were all going to die upon reaching their target, one can't help but treat the deception -- and the false hope it promises -- as unnecessarily cruel.
Then again, perhaps it could be said that any hope in the heart of a suicide bomber is false hope indeed.
Part of dealing with any event such as 9/11 requires a response plan -- something evidently lacking on that date in 2001. It pains any rational person to criticize the response of emergency services -- men and women doing their jobs under extremely difficult circumstances.
But there is little question that their jobs were made unacceptably more difficult by the lack of a response plan. When building a 100-plus story building, it isn't unreasonable to expect that civil authorities will plan for a possible evacuation of that building in the event of a catastrophe -- particularly when that building has been the target of a terrorist attack before.
The lack of a realistic plan to deal with fires such as those burning in the WTC becomes immediately apparent. The film notes that the average firefighter takes an hour to climb 25 stories, meaning the firefighters being sent to fight the fires -- each carrying 100 pounds of equipment -- would take four hours to reach the fire.
The fires, meanwhile, were beginning to soften the support beams, which had been stripped of their fire-proofing by the impact of the planes.
The lost four hours could have potentially prevented the collapse of the towers -- if there were a plan in place to help get firefighters to the impact floors in a reasonable amount of time.
Only the determination and dedication of the firefighters in question served to avert further loss of life that day where disaster planning effectively failed.
The film also presents some of the smaller human tales amidst the tragedy, such as that of Usman Farman, a Muslim man who a Jewish man helped escape from the debris cloud following the WTC's collapse.
Zero Hour also imparts on the viewer the culpability of basic human hubris for the loss of life that occurred on 9/11. Individuals less fortunate than Pasqual Buzzelli who were instructed by building security to remain in their offices despite the fires raging so far above died simply because of the apparent inability of WTC security staff to comprehend the inherent mortal hazard of the situation unfolding.
Once again, a complete evacuation should have been part of any disaster response plan. That there was no evacuation is simply a tragic testament to the lack of an effective plan.
The film also briefly addresses the policy shift following the attack -- explained by talking head David Frum -- and the policy and administrative failure in the lead-up to the attack.
"We were shocked at the carnage, but we certainly weren't surprised," explains J Coffer Black, a CIA analyst.
"I don't think anyone who worked on this problem expected anything less than what happened on 9/11," explained Michael Scheuer. "If the policymakers expected anything less, than shame on them."
There's a disturbing irony in the chirping of the firefighters' electronic locators -- devices once used to find a firefighter in the midst of a blaze, instead marking their graves amidst the rubble of the World Trade Center.
Even seven years after the event, the losses on that day stagger the imagination.
The film concludes with a brief summary of the events following 9/11: the invasion of Afghanistan, the fall of Kabul, the invasion of Iraq -- basically, the rest of the story thus far. It outlines the continuing challenges of the post-9/11 world.
With elections underway in both the United States and Canada, it will be hard to keep the legacy of 9/11 separate from the political and partisan considerations at the very heart of these contests -- even if one agrees that it should be kept separate.
If the legacy of 9/11 really is to be dragged into the middle of either election -- and for the record, this author prays it won't be -- we will owe it to those lost on that day to postulate wisely on the topic, and ensure that it leads somewhere constructive.
To do anything less would trample their memories.
But with this year's anniversary of 9/11 -- the seventh year since that infamous day -- falling during not one but two North American elections, 9/11 will almost certainly become a topic of some importance today.
Particularly with an American election in which no incumbent can be returned to the White House, the question of 9/11 and how another such attack can be prevented will be a pivotal issue. In 2004, voters knew first hand President George W Bush's views on how to avert terrorist attacks. In 2008, they don't have that luxury in comparing the anti-terrorism plans of John McCain and Barack Obama.
But to truly understand the events of 9/11, and truly understand how another such attack can be prevented, it's important to understand how the event unfolded in the first place.
As such, today The Nexus presents (with brief commentary) the documentary Inside 9/11: Zero Hour:
It's remarkable how ineffective pre-9/11 security was at detecting the 19 terrorists, even when a number of them were selected for additional security. The very rules set by the FAA actually facilitated the hijacking by allowing the hijackers to carry their weapons on board.
It's also disconcerting how, even after the hijacking was known, the eventual disaster was still unable to be prevented.
The FAA's inability to communicate effectively with F-15 fighter jets that had been scrambled to track American Airlines flight 11 and the literal impossibility of fighting a fire at the height in question point to the obvious ill-preparedness of the American transportation infrastructure, military and civil authorities to deal with the events of that day.
One would almost excuse ill-preparedness to deal with events previously considered almost unimaginable. But on the very day of the events in question, novelist John Grisham told CNN that he had proposed events remarkably similar to 9/11 as a national security scenario to Pentagon officials.
The events of 9/11 weren't as unthinkable as we may like to believe.
The detail with which the film portrays the events of 9/11 is shocking, but underscores the reality of the event -- and reminds us why a repeat of that catastrophe must be averted.
Confusion began to set in as the FAA and air traffic controllers literally lost track of which planes were still in the air, and which planes had already reached their target.
Particularly chilling is the deception the hijackers employed with their passengers. Knowing full well that they were all going to die upon reaching their target, one can't help but treat the deception -- and the false hope it promises -- as unnecessarily cruel.
Then again, perhaps it could be said that any hope in the heart of a suicide bomber is false hope indeed.
Part of dealing with any event such as 9/11 requires a response plan -- something evidently lacking on that date in 2001. It pains any rational person to criticize the response of emergency services -- men and women doing their jobs under extremely difficult circumstances.
But there is little question that their jobs were made unacceptably more difficult by the lack of a response plan. When building a 100-plus story building, it isn't unreasonable to expect that civil authorities will plan for a possible evacuation of that building in the event of a catastrophe -- particularly when that building has been the target of a terrorist attack before.
The lack of a realistic plan to deal with fires such as those burning in the WTC becomes immediately apparent. The film notes that the average firefighter takes an hour to climb 25 stories, meaning the firefighters being sent to fight the fires -- each carrying 100 pounds of equipment -- would take four hours to reach the fire.
The fires, meanwhile, were beginning to soften the support beams, which had been stripped of their fire-proofing by the impact of the planes.
The lost four hours could have potentially prevented the collapse of the towers -- if there were a plan in place to help get firefighters to the impact floors in a reasonable amount of time.
Only the determination and dedication of the firefighters in question served to avert further loss of life that day where disaster planning effectively failed.
The film also presents some of the smaller human tales amidst the tragedy, such as that of Usman Farman, a Muslim man who a Jewish man helped escape from the debris cloud following the WTC's collapse.
Zero Hour also imparts on the viewer the culpability of basic human hubris for the loss of life that occurred on 9/11. Individuals less fortunate than Pasqual Buzzelli who were instructed by building security to remain in their offices despite the fires raging so far above died simply because of the apparent inability of WTC security staff to comprehend the inherent mortal hazard of the situation unfolding.
Once again, a complete evacuation should have been part of any disaster response plan. That there was no evacuation is simply a tragic testament to the lack of an effective plan.
The film also briefly addresses the policy shift following the attack -- explained by talking head David Frum -- and the policy and administrative failure in the lead-up to the attack.
"We were shocked at the carnage, but we certainly weren't surprised," explains J Coffer Black, a CIA analyst.
"I don't think anyone who worked on this problem expected anything less than what happened on 9/11," explained Michael Scheuer. "If the policymakers expected anything less, than shame on them."
There's a disturbing irony in the chirping of the firefighters' electronic locators -- devices once used to find a firefighter in the midst of a blaze, instead marking their graves amidst the rubble of the World Trade Center.
Even seven years after the event, the losses on that day stagger the imagination.
The film concludes with a brief summary of the events following 9/11: the invasion of Afghanistan, the fall of Kabul, the invasion of Iraq -- basically, the rest of the story thus far. It outlines the continuing challenges of the post-9/11 world.
With elections underway in both the United States and Canada, it will be hard to keep the legacy of 9/11 separate from the political and partisan considerations at the very heart of these contests -- even if one agrees that it should be kept separate.
If the legacy of 9/11 really is to be dragged into the middle of either election -- and for the record, this author prays it won't be -- we will owe it to those lost on that day to postulate wisely on the topic, and ensure that it leads somewhere constructive.
To do anything less would trample their memories.
Mallick comes unhinged at Sarah Palin's ascension to Vice Presidential candidate
In the ongoing American Presidential election, one of the unfortunate epithets flung at Republican Presidential candidate is that of "crazy".
But what is one to make of such epithets when those so prone to flinging it themselves act "crazily"?
Thus unfolds the sad episode of CBC online Columnist Heather Mallick's "analysis" of John McCain's selection of Sarah Palin as his running mate.
In the course of her column, Mallick comes across as frantic, vicious and generally unhinged as she vents all of her left-feminist rage at a woman who clearly refuses to be prodded into the cookie-cutter identity laid out for so-called "liberated" women.
Palin isn't the first target of Mallick's seemingly intractable rage. When the Ottawa Senators "Better Halves" accepted the First Place Pregnancy Centre as one of the beneficiaries of their Christmas tree raffle, Mallick had this to say:
"I hate picking on women. We're born at a disadvantage and in our wild flailing to stay afloat, we make such easy targets. But really, do the wives and girlfriends of the Ottawa Senators have to dress up in matching pink team sweaters and call their ad hoc union "The Better Halves?"Her condescension for these particular women, who apparently offend Mallick's left-feminist ideology, she lashed out at them for the inexcusable crime of dating or marrying a hockey player.
It's bad enough that these women have hooked up with bruised artist-athletes with careers of inevitably brief span, sold by hockey corporations as if they were cans of Spam, shipped around the continent without notice, thus dooming their wives' careers from the start."
Apparently, Mallick imagines that hockey players the world over should remain permanently single just so the world's women can appease her disturbingly authoritarian view of feminism.
She admits openly in the article that she doesn't know any of the Senators Better Halves. She certainly doesn't know why any of them chose the companionship of a hockey player, yet having done so transformed them from women into outlets for her contempt -- supporting a charity that doesn't fit neatly into the ideological camp supporting Mallick's pro-abortion agenda was apparently merely the icing on the cake.
So imagine that a woman accepts the Vice Presidential nomination for the Republican party. In doing so she would become the first female Vice Presidential candidate in American history. One would think that a so-called feminist like Mallick would be encouraged by that.
But, no. Apparently not. Instead it seems to be, as the kids say, on:
"I assume John McCain chose Sarah Palin as his vice-presidential partner in a fit of pique because the Republican money men refused to let him have the stuffed male shirt he really wanted. She added nothing to the ticket that the Republicans didn't already have sewn up, the white trash vote, the demographic that sullies America's name inside and outside its borders yet has such a curious appeal for the right.Which is a rather curious way for a self-described feminist to open a column about the aforementioned first female Vice Presidential candidate in American history.
So why do it?
It's possible that Republican men, sexual inadequates that they are, really believe that women will vote for a woman just because she's a woman. They're unfamiliar with our true natures. Do they think vaginas call out to each other in the jungle night? I mean, I know men have their secret meetings at which they pledge to do manly things, like being irresponsible with their semen and postponing household repairs with glue and used matches. Guys will be guys, obviously."
Apparently, Palin could only appeal to the "white trash vote". In no way could she possibly appeal to women.
In fact, Mallick suggests, Palin isn't even a woman at all:
"But do they not know that women have been trained to resent other women and that they only learn to suppress this by constantly berating themselves and reading columns like this one? I'm a feminist who understands that women can nurse terrible and delicate woman hatred.Apparently, in Mallick's fevered mind, Sarah Palin isn't a woman at all, as if she had somehow simultaneously sprouted a penis the second she accepted the Republican VP nomination, and apparently by simple virtue of not holding a lifetime membership in the Bra Burning Brigade.
Palin was not a sure choice, not even for the stolidly Republican ladies branch of Citizens for a Tackier America. No, she isn't even female really. She's a type, and she comes in male form too."
No. In Mallick's mind, Sarah Palin -- despite everything she accomplished despite being a woman "born at a disadvantage" is nothing more than pure white trash:
"John Doyle, the cleverest critic in Canada, comes right out and calls Palin an Alaska hillbilly. Damn his eyes, I wish I'd had the wit to come up with it first. It's safer than "white trash" but I'll pluck safety out of the nettle danger. Or something.If that particular passage doesn't seem shrill enough, just take a look at how Mallick follows it up:
Doyle's job includes watching a lot of reality television and he's well-versed in the backstory. White trash — not trailer trash, that's something different — is rural, loud, proudly unlettered (like Bush himself), suspicious of the urban, frankly disbelieving of the foreign, and a fan of the American cliché of authenticity. The semiotics are pure Palin: a sturdy body, clothes that are clinging yet boxy and a voice that could peel the plastic seal off your new microwave."
"Palin has a toned-down version of the porn actress look favoured by this decade's woman, the overtreated hair, puffy lips and permanently alarmed expression. Bristol has what is known in Britain as the look of the teen mum, the "pramface." Husband Todd looks like a roughneck; Track, heading off to Iraq, appears terrified. They claim to be family obsessed while being studiously terrible at parenting. What normal father would want Levi "I'm a fuckin' redneck" Johnson prodding his daughter?Just to ratchet off a tirade about how the first female VP candidate in American history so utterly offends Mallick's feminist sensibilities, why not accuse her of dressing herself up like a hussy?
I know that I have an attachment to children that verges on the irrational, but why don't the Palins? I'm not the one preaching homespun values but I'd destroy that ratboy before I'd let him get within scenting range of my daughter again, and so would you."
Hell, don't even stop there. Take square aim at the woman's daughter, too. And let's drag her pregnant teenage daughter's relationship with her boyfriend -- himself also a hockey player -- through the mud while we're at it.
Mallick spends the next few paragraphs of her ill-concieved little frantic tirade to admit that she didn't really watch Palin's speech, and instead watched A Mighty Wind on Bravo.
Then she dropped this particular little nugget:
"I know that red states vote Republican on social issues to give themselves the only self-esteem available to their broken, economically abused existence."Certainly, in Mallick's mind, the pitiful little mud people of the red states -- "white trash" as she herself so succinctly put it -- only vote for Republicans to build up their pathetic existence.
And as for the Republicans and their objections to the tax increases that, yes, Obama has practiced, it couldn't be an honest disagreement over whether or not the taxes in question are necessary (although, with the current state of the American federal budget, it's hard to imagine how they could disagree). No, instead, it must be racism. If not racism, then outright elitism:
"But surely they know Barack Obama is not planning to finish off the ordinary hillbilly when he adjusts tax rates. He's going to raise taxes on the top 2% of Americans and that doesn't include anyone at the convention beyond the Bushes and McCains and random party management. So why cheer Palin when she claims otherwise?No hope?
Is it racism? I'm told that it is, although I find racism so appalling that I have difficulty identifying it. It is more likely the dearly held Republican notion that any American can become violently rich, as rich as those hedge funders in Greenwich, Conn., who buy $40-million mansions unseen and have their topiary shaped in the form of musical notes.
When Palin and Rudy Giuliani sneered at Obama's years of "community organizing" — they said it like "rectal fissure" — the audience ewww-ed with them. Republicans dream of a personal future that involves only household staff, not equals who need to be persuaded to vote.
So I'm trying to imagine the pain of realizing, as they all must at some point, that it is not going to happen for them. It's the green light at the end of the dock. It's the ship that never comes in, gals, as Palin would put it. But she won't because the lie works for her. It helps her scramble, without compassion, above all those other tense no-hoper ladies in the audience."
No hope, precisely, for what? It would be kind of pointless for Palin to run for Vice President if she had no hope for the future -- be it no hope for herself or no hope for the betterment of women in general.
It would be kind of pointless for all those "no hoper ladies" to support a woman for VP if they had no hope for the future. One simply has to wonder if Mallick so much as stopped to think for two seconds about what she was writing, or if she simply allowed her extreme ideological predispositions seize control of her while flailing frantically away at her keyboard?
In the end, it becomes immediately apparent. It isn't so much that Palin "isn't even female really" as she is the wrong kind of woman to be a Vice Presidential candidate:
"American politics isn't short of smart women. Susan Eisenhower, Ike's granddaughter, who just endorsed Obama, made an extraordinary speech at the Democratic convention (and a terrific casual appearance on The Colbert Report as Palin was speaking). The Republican party has already consumed nearly all of its moderate "seed corn," she said aptly. Time to start again.So, in the end, what is it about Sarah Palin that Mallick finds so utterly repulsive?
Eisenhower, a scholar and journalist, has a point. Or am I only saying that because she's part of the thoughtful demographic that I'm trying to reach here? Think, Heather, think like a Republican! The Skeptics, shall I call them, are my base, and I'll pander to them as ardently as the Republican patriarchs tease their white female marginals."
It isn't that hard to figure out. Sarah Palin is a woman. Who is anti-abortion -- perhaps even shockingly so, as she once announced she would oppose an abortion "even if her own daughter had been raped".
Palin also supports absinence-only sex education in schools.
Both these positions have implications that are of obvious concern for feminists, and very well should be.
But perhaps Palin's greatest offense is being a member of Feminists for Life, a feminist group that opposes abortion.
Interestingly enough, Feminists for Life supports the establishment of support networks on College and University campuses for single mothers -- infrastructure such as on-campus daycare and appropriate housing facilities.
Feminists such as Heather Mallick should support and voraciously applaud such a policy position. But couple that with opposition to abortion, and suddenly all bets are off. "Feminists" like Heather Mallick seem to derive from this a bizarre need to strip women such as Sarah Palin of their "feminist cred", so to speak.
The message remains crystal clear: within the feminist movement, there is no room for disagreement on the topic of abortion. Even a hint of the wrong opinion on that particular topic, and not only can that particular woman not be accepted as a feminist, she can't even be accepted as a woman.
It's a bizarre tendency of the most extreme members of the left-wing feminist movement -- that any feminist possessing conservative political beliefs must not only be rejected as a feminist, but also thorougly re-gendered.
One could consider it a rather bizarre form of post-feminist feminist-chauvinism. Perhaps its the cognitive dissonance that makes Heather Mallick seem so utterly unbalanced.
Queen's U prof finds John McCain to be a straight talker
As human history progresses, computers are doing more and more incredible things.
One day, some fear, computers may destroy us all. But until Judgement Day arrives, computers will remain our faithful servants, bound to do all kinds of nifty things for us.
Like analyze political speeches. Queen's University computer science professor David Skillicom has announced that, using a computer, he's analyzed the speeches from the Republican National Convention and the Democratic National Convention, and essentially discovered that, essentially, Republicans are among the most and least deceptive of the speakers.
By analyzing the language of each speech, Skillicom has produced a list of the speakers, and ranked them from the least deceptive -- those that employed the least "spin" in their speech -- to the most. He ranked the speakers as follows:
1 (least). John McCain - Republican
2. Mike Huckabee - Republican
3. Joe Biden - Democrat
4. Joe Lieberman - Independent
5. Sarah Palin - Republican
6. Michelle Obama - Democrat
7. Barack Obama - Democrat
8. George W Bush - Republican
9. Bill Clinton - Democrat
10. Hillary Clinton - Democrat
11. Fred Thompson - Republican
12. Rudolph Giuliani - Republican
13 (most). Mitt Romney - Republican
As one can see from this list, four of the five least deceptive speakers at the conventions were either Republicans, or independents supporting Republicans (Joe Lieberman, who is supporting John McCain).
Meanwhile, three of the most deceptive speakers were Republicans. The other two were Bill and Hillary Clinton.
If one can put any significant amount of stock into Skillicom's new tool, this could revolutionize political analysis. In fact, politics will probably never be quite the same again.
Of course, there remain significant limits to what a computer can do. And until the day that they grow to the point where they can wipe us off the face of the Earth, the necessity for human intuition and judgement will always remain.
As human history progresses, computers are doing more and more incredible things.
One day, some fear, computers may destroy us all. But until Judgement Day arrives, computers will remain our faithful servants, bound to do all kinds of nifty things for us.
Like analyze political speeches. Queen's University computer science professor David Skillicom has announced that, using a computer, he's analyzed the speeches from the Republican National Convention and the Democratic National Convention, and essentially discovered that, essentially, Republicans are among the most and least deceptive of the speakers.
By analyzing the language of each speech, Skillicom has produced a list of the speakers, and ranked them from the least deceptive -- those that employed the least "spin" in their speech -- to the most. He ranked the speakers as follows:
1 (least). John McCain - Republican
2. Mike Huckabee - Republican
3. Joe Biden - Democrat
4. Joe Lieberman - Independent
5. Sarah Palin - Republican
6. Michelle Obama - Democrat
7. Barack Obama - Democrat
8. George W Bush - Republican
9. Bill Clinton - Democrat
10. Hillary Clinton - Democrat
11. Fred Thompson - Republican
12. Rudolph Giuliani - Republican
13 (most). Mitt Romney - Republican
As one can see from this list, four of the five least deceptive speakers at the conventions were either Republicans, or independents supporting Republicans (Joe Lieberman, who is supporting John McCain).
Meanwhile, three of the most deceptive speakers were Republicans. The other two were Bill and Hillary Clinton.
If one can put any significant amount of stock into Skillicom's new tool, this could revolutionize political analysis. In fact, politics will probably never be quite the same again.
Of course, there remain significant limits to what a computer can do. And until the day that they grow to the point where they can wipe us off the face of the Earth, the necessity for human intuition and judgement will always remain.
McCain performs well with "workman" like speech
As John McCain took to the stage at the Xcel Energy Center in St Paul, Minnesota, he certainly had an uphill battle to fight.
Barack Obama's speech at the Pepsi Centre in Denver, Colorado a week before had been masterful. The Republican faithful were counting on McCain to deliver a speech, if not quite the equal of Obama's, at least one fairly competitive.
In his own way, McCain did precisely that. Although he didn't perform quite as spectacularly as many Republicans must have hoped for, he may have done even better in a way few would have expected.
McCain had many questions to answer at this, the acceptance of his nomination for President. One way or another, he answered them all.
McCain continued his perplexing strategy of moving closer to George W Bush by thanking him for his leadership during "dark times".
McCain promised Obama not only a contest, but also his respect and admiration, insisting that being American has imbued them with more similarities to unite them than differences to divide them.
McCain continued to promise reform in Washington, and introduced Palin as the Vice President who would help him control special interest groups. He also promised to wrangle corrupt politicians and pork blatant barrellers, promising to "make them famous."
"You will know their names. You will know their names."
McCain's list of political enemies is one that may not necessarily endear him to either extreme of the political divide in the United States: Tobacco companies, trial lawyers and union bosses, only to name a few. But at least the American people can say with some degree of certainty exactly who the "special interests" he plans to corral really are.
McCain pledged to take "the party of Lincoln, Roosevelt and Reagan back to the basics." In the name of this, he played to some typical Republican cards, promising to cut taxes, cut spending, and warning against socialized health care.
Some of McCain's promises seemed vaguely contradictory. He noted that while Obama wants to bring back lost jobs by "wishing away the global market", McCain's government would help workers who have lost jobs that won't return by helping them find new jobs "that won't go away".
Of course, in guarantee to ensure those jobs "won't go away", McCain would essentially have to "wish away the global market."
Most strikingly, McCain promised a national project that would stop the Americans from "sending $700 billion annually overseas to countries that don't like [them] very much" with an ambitious new energy plan. New oil developments (presumably including drilling in currently protected Alaskan fields), nuclear energy and clean coal would be coupled with electric and hybrid vehicles to make the United States more self-sufficient in terms of energy.
On the foreign policy front, McCain spoke of Iran as the top state sponsor of terrorism and the reemerging Russian colossus. While promising to maintain good relations with Russia, he promised to stand up to Russian aggression and expansionism, such as that recently seen in their invasion of Georgia.
For the good or ill of his candidacy, McCain once again reiterated his commitment to the war in Iraq. But dismissed by many as a hawk, McCain established solid credentials as what Fear's Empire author Benjamin Barber would instead describe as an "owl" -- an individual not predisposed against the use of force, but wary of the potential consequences.
"What matters is not that you can fight, but what you fight for is the real test," McCain insisted.
McCain only reiterated his awareness of the consequences of armed conflict when he spoke of his childhood years spent being raised by his mother while his father fought in WWII, of the death of his grandfather (of exhaustion) during the war, and of lost friends in Vietnam.
McCain also spoke of his own time as a Prisoner of War in Vietnam. He spoke of how mistakes made as a fighter pilot led to his capture in Hanoi, and spoke of the strength and solidarity he found in his fellow POWs.
In the end, he said, he emerged not as his own man wrought with "selfish indepenence", but rather as his country's man.
For a man with a war record as pronounced as McCain's (as well as that of his family) it may be fitting that fighting was so thematic of McCain's speech -- fighting corruption, fighting irresponsibility, fighting America's enemies.
Fighting to regain America's trust.
McCain's speech provided a remarkable contrast between himself and his Democrat opponent: Obama's speech was filled with passion, enthusiasm and emotion. McCain's, by contrast, was calm, collected and confident. Obama came across more as a man who has yet to make his case for the Presidency of the United States. Meanwhile, McCain came across as a man who is confident that his case has already been made.
Certainly, McCain's speech was less than spectacular. But that very well may be the point: McCain's candidacy isn't about grand spectacle -- it's about doing the business of the United States of America. Part of McCain's plan for doing that business involves change -- or reform, if you will -- but McCain is the businesslike candidate in the race.
Unsurprisingly, McCain promised a bi-partisan administration, reaching out to both Democrats and Republicans.
Which is precisely what he'll have to do if he wants to be President.
