Content by Ben Domenech
Posted at 10:51pm on Jul. 9, 2008 Redstate Roundtable: Obama's Unending Psychology of Change
That's a lotta flipflop
By Ben Domenech
Let's sit down next to the couch for a moment to discuss this. Five questions for Contributors (and you!) are at the end.
Over the past few months, a strong meme has developed regarding Barack Obama: that his loyalties to a position are only as strong as they 
need to be given the demands of the moment. His eagerness to throw close associates or even mentors like Jeremiah Wright under the bus if the press or the political right demands it is second to none in the history of presidential politics. He has no qualms about shifting positions - such as on meeting without preconditions with the leaders of enemy nations - if it will squelch a media storm or make it easier to win a state. He has not a stubborn bone in his body, it appears - and is, to put it simply, not a fan of inconvenient truths.
But in the month since Obama cinched the Democratic nomination, this stream of flipflops has become a torrent. A brief summary:
-Obama said the D.C. handgun ban and the almost as restrictive Chicago ban were constitutional and supported handgun restrictions, but now he says definitively that it was unconstitutional.
-Obama promised he would accept public financing when he thought he'd need it, but then decided he'd rather not.
-Obama opposed welfare reform while in Illinois, but now says he supports it.
-Obama opposed the death penalty on principle and supported a moratorium on capital punishment - even implying that Osama Bin Laden should not be "martyred" by it - and now he believes it is justified not just in the case of homicide and terrorism, but also of child rape and other circumstances.
-Obama opposed legal immunity for telecom companies for cooperating with government security surveillance, but now he claims to support it.
And just this past week came two of the largest flipflops - certainly the greatest ones I have ever witnessed DURING THE COURSE of a presidential campaign:
-Obama supported immediate day one withdrawal of troops from Iraq, but now says he'll "refine" his position and listen to the commanders on the ground if they tell him to phase out the troops slowly, while still claiming to support an impossible mark of 16 months to a total withdrawal. You can read the three different versions of this new Obama position on Iraq here.
-Obama supported unlimited access to abortion, including taxpayer funding and opposing born alive infant protection, but now he says he supports states rights to restrict and even prohibit all late-term abortions, and have now requirement to have a health exception that allows for the (overwhelmingly used) basis of "mental health."
The story is here, and his inevitable attempt to refine further is here. As for the original interview, the full text is here, and below the fold.
Read on for the questions and responses...
Posted in 2008 | Abortion | ANWR | Barack Obama | Redstate Roundtable — Comments (12)/ Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 7:56pm on Jul. 9, 2008 Let Our Congress Tweet
By Ben Domenech
Well, that didn't take long. The Sunlight Foundation has launched Let Our Congress Tweet, and posted a fairly good statement on the matter. Good for them. Go sign up to follow their feed.
Posted at 4:46pm on Jul. 9, 2008 Culberson is mad as hell about the prospect of losing his Twitter
By Ben Domenech
Following up on the Directors post on this issue, Rep. John Culberson is staying on top of the Congressional online authorization fallout, and sharing his outrage via his very active Twitter feed.
You can read the letter that started the whole process here, focused primarily on video content, but stretches to more than that, covering all content produced by members that appears on outside websites. As Culberson summarizes it: "my post would have to meet "existing content rules" and would need a disclaimer (140 characters at least!)"
This is just silly, people. A Congressman shouldn't have to put a disclaimer on YouTube: the American people know it's YouTube. They're not going to call up and say "How dare you link to some videotape of a dog on a skateboard! That's against the laws of nature! Dog on a skateboard - I swear, this whole planet's going to heck in a handbasket."
Let's hope the transparency groups like Sunlight and OpenCongress start talking about this...they've been disturbingly silent thus far.
Posted at 10:15am on Jul. 4, 2008 Jesse Helms 1921-2008
By Ben Domenech
Jesse Helms, a warrior for the conservative cause, passed away this morning.
Jesse Helms was a controversial figure to the American left, but he was beloved by his colleagues and by many of his ideological foes. Madeleine Albright kissed and danced with him. Joe Biden loved him. Elizabeth Edwards said her husband was just like him. Helms considered Bono a personal friend.
Helms in person was very unlike the caricature the left painted of him. He was strongly opposed to the United Nations and what he saw as encroachment on American liberty, and yet was one of the first Republicans to endorse a strong worldwide foreign aid policy on AIDS relief. He never graduated from college, and never shook off his lower class upbringing, but through hard work and commitment earned the respect of his friends, his colleagues and even his enemies.
Ever a fighter against the encroachment of bureaucracy and ever-expanding big government, Helms was an old school conservative in that regard. Once, when facing the prospect of a government shutdown, he is supposed to have said to his colleagues: ""Every day these buildings are closed, the Republic grows stronger." And he certainly believed it.
He was a warrior and a patriot. The date of his death is fitting indeed.
RIP.
Posted in Jesse Helms | Republicans | RIP — Comments (65) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 2:00pm on Jun. 30, 2008 Re: Jindal Vetoes Pay Raise
By Ben Domenech
Neil, I - like many of our readers - have enjoyed the Club for Growth blog's (and particularly their Communications Director's) evenhanded, charitable, and unbiased coverage of Gov. Bobby Jindal over the past several months. I can hardly contain my eagerness to read their nine separate posts detailing the political courage of Gov. Jindal's decision, as he now risks the success of his entire reform agenda within the state legislature on this one point, standing up to members of his own party. I am sure it will only rival their excellent coverage of his school choice plan, his total overhaul of the state ethics laws, his business tax cuts, etc.
Perhaps - bless my soul - they'll even speak about him using the same vocabulary they reserve for that magnanimous god among men, Mark Sanford. Ah, but the heart flutters as I type his name!
Posted at 5:44pm on Jun. 25, 2008 Gov. Bobby Jindal Signs Bill to Chemically Castrate Sex Offenders
Not Even Slightly Veiled Translation: Hey SCOTUS, Suck It
By Ben Domenech
On the heels of today's SCOTUS decision in Kennedy v. Louisiana barring the death penalty for sex offenders, Gov. Bobby Jindal released a statement calling the ruling an "affront to the people of Louisiana" - and what's more, vowing to do whatever possible to amend the state’s laws in order to maintain the death penalty for child rape.
But that's not all he did.
Today, Gov. Jindal signed the "Sex Offender Chemical Castration Bill," authorizing the castration of convicted sex offenders. They get a choice: physical or chemical. Oh, and they don't just get castrated and leave - they still have to serve out their sentence.
More below the fold:
Posted in Bobby Jindal | Breaking News | Crime | Death Penalty | Louisiana | scotus — Comments (51)/ Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 7:29pm on Jun. 20, 2008 Out of Toilet Paper? Use Newsweek Polling Data!
By Ben Domenech
Have you heard? It's over! Barack Obama has a 15 point lead on John McCain! Game over man, game over! You might as well mock up the logo!
Oh, wait. Newsweek surveyed 1014 *adults*.
That's adults, not even Registered Voters, let alone Likely Voters. I wonder how many of them had even heard there was another candidate in the race?
Rasmussen's daily tracking poll questions roughly 3,000 Likely Voters - they've got it at 4 percentage points. USA Today/Gallup has it at 6 points; Fox has it at 4 points. Newsweek's poll isn't even in the Margin of Error for any of these other polls. (Edit: Actually, Gallup has it even closer.)
We're conservationists here, and that's a waste of good paper. Put it to use in your toilet instead.
Posted at 12:35am on Jun. 19, 2008 If Only We Had Cars That Ran on Magic
By Ben Domenech
I had the pleasure of participating in a BBC debate this afternoon on the World Newshour show with Daniel Weiss of the Center for American Progress. We had an extensive discussion with the host on the President's announcement today in support of offshore drilling and other energy initiatives. Feel free to listen, and then a few points after:
Ben Domenech on BBC Radio (6:00 Minute Mark)
Posted in ANWR | Biofuels | Energy | ocs | oil | Oil Prices — Comments (17) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 9:19pm on Jun. 17, 2008 Do Not Screw Around with Ramesh
By Ben Domenech
I wrote an oped on Doug Kmiec and the Flight of the Obamacons over at the Washington Times last week - you might want to read it before taking in this testy yet amusing little exchange.
Over at the Corner, Ramesh posted this here, questioning Kmiec's decision to support Obama, as well as raising the question about independent sources backing up Kmiec's tale of denial of communion on the basis of politics. In response today, Kmiec writes the following: