State of Play

We've passed the 100-day-until-the-election mark and everyone is taking stock of the current state of play. Here are a few articles The Omnivore likes!

Lies The Parties Are Telling Themselves
Leading the pack is an article that looks at the lies each party is telling itself about "why it'll win." Here's the short list:
Democrats

1. Bain will carry the day. Probably not--although it's not a stupid line of attack.
2. The 2008 electorate will return for Obama (with enthusiasm). Unlikely: the youth vote will go back to sleep as they always do. Democrats are somewhat demoralized by the economy. NOTE: This is why I think they will ditch Biden for Hillary. I'm not a giant Hillary supporter--but I think her presence would energize that 2008 demographic.
3. Voters will forgive Obama as he was dealt a "bad hand." Maybe a little--but not so much. The state of the economy is gonna cost him.

Republican

1. Outside spending will save us! Maybe--they'll have an edge--but there's only so far ads can move the dial and there's still a saturation point.
2. Romney doesn't need to be liked. A biggie. The other truism is that you don't win by having people vote "against" someone. I think if Romney were as likable as Huckabee he'd be beating Obama by double digits right now.
3. No issues matter except the economy. No issue matters as much as the economy--but the idea that every moment spent not talking about the economy is wasted is myopic.
4. No president can win election with the economy this bad. Well, no. That's "wishful thinking"--not "moneyball."

This is a good article because it does a good job of looking at the BS-lines that both the parties and their adherents are spewing / swallowing. Read any message board and you'll see stuff like "Independents always break for the challenger" and "The current American demographics make the white-male-vote meaningless" and this is all garbage designed to comfort the speaker and / or make them sound smart. The truth is there's no white-knight for either party in this. Obama has a thin lead and saying anything else is failing to look at reality.

July 27th: Polls Show Trouble For Romney In Ohio

Keep in mind, however, that "thin leads" can have a disproportionate impact because of the way the electoral college works. Nate Silver notes that Ohio is probably the key state in this race:

Oh, Oh, Please Let It Not Be Florida Again--Once Was Enough!

You don't have to ask the squishy, lefty 538--ask the (apparently) right-leaning RealClearPolitics (note: I don't find RCP to be right-leaning and was surprised to see it included on the list of top "conservative sites" by a conservative site ... but there you go).

Not Going In The Right Direction

Now, these are all squsihy left-leaning Democratic Oversampling polls (except for Rassumssen which puts Obama up by +2 points)--but the key here is that if the Republicans lose Ohio they have to pretty much run the table everywhere else. That's a big deal. Ohio matters. The post is missing from Power Line but here's the excerpt from a blog post where Paul Mirengoff speculates about what Ohio might mean (from July 6th):

To the limited extent that I do think about the Electoral College, I worry that it favors President Obama. This concern may reflect a pessimistic frame of mind, but it’s mostly about Ohio. As a historical matter, Republicans don’t win presidential elections without carrying Ohio. And George W. Bush would have lost in 2004 despite winning the popular vote, if Ohio had gone for Kerry, as it almost did.

On the other hand, maybe they don't have anything to worry about:

Wall Street Already Betting On Who Wins In November

I included this because it's astounding to me: Wall Street rallies and the conclusion? The markets must think Romney's gonna win. It's the only explanation!

One analysis concludes that last week's sharp three-day market surge can only mean that Wall Street is banking on a victory from Republican Mitt Romney.
That's the logical interpretation one can draw from a rally amid conditions that otherwise would demand a selloff, Morgan Stanley chief U.S. equity strategist Adam S. Parker said in an analysis that asserts there is no other reason now to like stocks than a Romney win.

Of course InTrade, an actual election market, still puts Obama at around 60%. This is an example of wishful thinking: the Wall Street markets know something that no one else knows--hey, maybe it's like that LIBOR thing? In any event, I think there can be plenty of other explanations for a 3-day rally other than that investors, 100 days out, believe Romney has a lock. I think any clearheaded article would think so to--so this one is so fuzzy it's amazing!

What Do I Think?

The 100-day mark is a fuzzy, arbitrary deadline without any real significance. The debates may move things. The VP selection choices could have some impact (I'll go with Rubio as, why not?). Perhaps there will be a really nuclear gaffe on someone's part? (Don't count on it). The sure-to-be-constant ad blitzes might have some impact--but overall? This thing goes where the economy goes right now: if it continues like it is? Obama has maybe a 60% chance.

Calculated Blowback: Did Romney Intend To Upset England?

The Official Logo for the Lodnon Oimplycs!

(The above is a "pirate logo" that's being used to mock the London Olympics 'Brand Police').

Romney made a few high profile "gaffes" at the kick-off of his world tour. The biggest was suggesting that London is "not ready" for the Olympics due to some shortages of staff and other issues. He also apparnetly disclosed a meeting with the head of MI6 which is, apparently, a no-no and he (maybe) forgot Ed Milbrand's name during his press appearance (calling the Labour party's leader by the name "Mr. Leader.") While this has provoked mockery from the English press and a few funny tweets probably the worst of it was a little return fire in the form of Cameron questioning Romney's own Olympic success story:

“We are holding an Olympic Games in one of the busiest, most active, bustling cities anywhere in the world,” Cameron noted. “Of course it’s easier if you hold an Olympic Games in the middle of nowhere. Inevitably, you’re going to have challenges.”

What Do I Think?

I think there is at least a chance all this is calculated. Romney is no idiot and while he's as gaffe prone as Obama, this trip has been as carefully prepared for as anything he's ever done. Compare this to Obama's own high-risk world-tour back in '08. The 08 Team Obama pulled off a tricky multi-country tour with a tight schedule and thronging crowds. Those very same crowds made it into McCain attack ads showing Obama adored by foreign nationals.

I think Romney is interested in some of the reverse here. While I do doubt that he wanted the degree of push-back he got, the reality is that Team Romney (correctly, IMO) assesses that America doesn't much care about what's being said in overseas papers.

“No, the reality is, we’re not worried about overseas headlines. We’re worried about voters back here in America,” Jindal said. “I think the focus needs to continue to be on what’s happening here at home. That’s what’s important to voters.”

So I suspect this is a chance for Romney to look tough and "shoot straight" an highlight his own Olympic resume--what better way to do that than cast some (light) doubts on another countries attempt at the same?

The Fall Election: An Immovable Object ...

In search of an unstoppable force. Nate Silver holds that for months the race has been essentially unmoved:

We’ve now been running our presidential forecast model for almost two months, but very little has changed in our analysis of the race. Each day, we have shown Barack Obama as a modest favorite to win re-election.

RealClearPolitics' Sean Trende sees something similar and holds that to move the polls Romney must go positive. While 90-percent may have made up their minds already (what the Pew poll he's talking about shows), the remaining "undecided voters" want to know more about Romney (Quote set identical to that in Andrew Sullivan's The Daily Dish):

Third, among independents -- who are almost certainly the lion’s share of those who have not yet formed a strong opinion of Romney -- 42 percent say they want to know more about his record as governor, 37 percent want to know more about his record as CEO of Bain Capital, and 35 percent want to know more about his tax returns. Just 21 percent of independents want to know more about his wealth, 19 percent want to know more about his family and upbringing, and 16 percent want to know more about his religious beliefs.

This stuff, Ed Kilgore says, is exactly the list of things Romney doesn't want to talk about!

But we all understand why Romney hasn’t “gone positive,” don’t we? Just look at the things Pew’s independents say they need to know more about: Mitt’s gubernatorial record is a snake pit for him, featuring accomplishments that he dare not talk about for fear of offending his party “base” and/or exposing flip-flops. He clearly doesn’t want to talk about his taxes. And whether or not you think the attacks on Bain Capital have “worked” so far, they have certainly neutralized that part of Mitt’s life as a clear positive.

Can That Work?
As I've said, I think that Romney's plan is to simply wait for the economy to melt down and collect his winnings. If the economy melts down it'll work. If it doesn't--or doesn't badly enough--it won't. But until then he has to avoid looking too scary to moderates and not alienate his base and so that means keeping his mouth shut. That, and going negative: if he can keep Obama from talking about his Bain tenure and manage to have the conversation be about something other than his tax returns, he can presumably keep the vote to a failing economy referendum.

That has its perils too, of course: Scott Walker called out Team Romney for being "too cautious."

What Do I Think?
Apparently Team Obama thinks they have a winning hand with the Bain attacks and despite some early stumbles they've never wavered from their preferred mode of attack. There's some historical credence to this approach against Romney:

From what I understand, he tried to tout his Bain credentials in his 1994 Senate run against Kennedy and was brutalized for it. Eight years later, he began his gubernatorial campaign by running on his biography and quickly fell behind by 10 points; only when he went harshly negative did he close the gap. Four years ago, he tried to remake himself as a social conservative warrior in the Republican primary and he fizzled before CPAC. This year, he went nuclear against Gingrich and then Santorum and cruised to the nomination. That’s a lot of reinforcement for the idea that the path to victory lies through keeping the focus on the other guy.

In the end, I think that Romney has a Kerry Problem (The poll shows Romney at 35 / 40 favorable / unfavorable):

It turns out that Kerry, according to NBC polling, never had a net-negative favorability rating. At this point eight years ago, he was 42/35. Even after his September 2004 Swiftboating, he stayed above water 43/42, and was 44/43 right before the election.

For all the comparisons with 2004, that's one big difference—Kerry was far better liked than Mitt Romney. And Kerry wasn't exactly beloved.

Romney is a reasonable candidate for president. He checks all the boxes and has, if only barely, enough credibility with the base and enough moderate tonality to win with the more moderate electorate--but he lacks charisma and, to a degree, actively works against it when we see his massive wealth and his apparent inability to keep quiet about "his friends who own NASCAR teams." Team Obama is right to try to get their "introduction" of him in before "the election starts." Indeed, if it's true that 90% of the electorate has "made up their minds" then despite what the conventional wisdom says, the election not only has already started ... maybe it's almost finished.

The Massacre and Gun Control

The NRO publishes an excellent article on writing about gun control for (left wing) reporters. It lists things such as:

1. Before offering gun-control as an "easy answer" try to think of a real gun-control law that might've made a difference (in this case? Maybe extended magazine laws--but maybe not, either).
2. Make sure your framing matches the information in the article (he lists a case where the headline and the article basically say two different things).
3. Verify facts before reporting them. If you think the utterly false Tea Party "connection to the shooting" report was disgraceful is a right wing view, consider that if you hate the Tea Party you ought to find it even more disgraceful.
4. Don't forget that gun bans won't stop a pre-planned massacre. India has fairly strict gun control laws and they certainly did nothing to stop the Mumbai massacre.
5. If you cite a gun-control law, make sure you get it right. People on the terrorist watch list are allowed to buy guns because the threshold for being on the watch list is bloody low.

These are excellent points and I think that left wing or right wing there's no excuse for lazy or sloppy reporting--especially in the aftermath of a tragedy when the facts are usually in short supply and all to easy to get wrong. 

That's one thing I think.

Here's the other ...

A Template For Successful Terror

The armed assailant methodology has proven successful and scary. Norway's shooter and Aurora's used a very similar methodology (explosive rigged to, theoretically, draw or kill police, body armor, selection of helpless victims, high powered weapons, etc.). This echoes the Mumbai massacre I referenced above. Bombing--even suicide bombing--has an appeal to would-be terrorists as it either leaves you a chance to get away or ends your personal narrative right there (the suicide option).

Shootings end with either a bullet to the head (probably emotionally harder than a suicide vest trigger) or being captured (unthinkable for many). However, the model has appeal even there if you want a soapbox to expound on your views: in an American trial? You'll get it.

The problem that I see, however is this: bombings are comparatively hard. They are hard to make--they require specialized skills and materials. Trying to get that skill or material sets off intelligence trip-wires. They are not "flexible." A bomb once set cannot trigger itself. Bombers cannot react to new information easily. Bombs have chemical signatures and can be found by dogs. Large bombs--more effective ones--require more than a vest to hide. They require cars which, in turn, require outdoor venues. 

Most importantly, bombs fail. Yes: they often work--but just as often they fail and when they do, we go about our day, pretending we are safe. We're not--we're just lucky.

There are bad people out there who want to hurt us--this is a template for doing so. It is scary. It is effective. It is comparatively invisible and light-weight. We have seen it work very effectively as an instrument of international terror once and now that, again, we have seen it work on American soil our enemies have to be thinking the same thing I am: If that guy can do it ...

That's what scares me about this whole thing. I'm not worried about copy cats. I'm worried about students.

The Politics of Mass Murder (The Batman Shootings)

I am going to assume that if you have gotten here you are sufficiently informed about the Aurora Batman shootings that you will not need links to everything. I'm writing on my laptop and don't have the wherewithal to annotate everything. You've read it all (or seen it on TV) already.

What I want to talk about for a moment is the politics of Mass Murder itself and a little about my take on it.

The Politics Of Mass Murder
 For certain there is a political corona around the Aurora shootings even if the core is politically empty. ABC suggesting that, hey, maybe it's the Tea Party guy with the same name directly echoes the Giffords shootings. Yes: Palin had a flier with crosshairs on it. Yes: when you do that--and then some psychopath shoots up the Congresswoman you targeted you look bad ... the optics are bad. So maybe you shouldn't just go do that even if it fires everyone up. On the other hand to suggest with a straight face, as many did, that (a) It might be directly responsible or that (b) even if Laughtner hadn't seen the flier that he was absorbing right-wing rhetoric and turning it into bullets is about as classy as theater etiquette self-appointed hall monitors going off on the fact that there were young kids in the theater.

There's a time and a place to examine that stuff and in the midst of a massive human tragedy is NOT it.

It's also clear that the gun-control advocates have, again, come out to let us know that their policies would've or could've prevented this. Australia's gun control laws do seem to have cut down on gun violence there--so why not here? Certainly having a policy proposal that might have prevented loss of life is more acceptable a topic than theater politeness etiquette but even advocates seem to have a resigned nature: Americans don't seem to connect gun ownership with extreme violence (perhaps because so many Americans own guns and so few commit mass murder--especially the kind of non-crime-related mass murder Aurora saw).

There has been some questions about violent movies: did Batman have anything to do with it? We don't know yet--but as far as I can tell, other than some usual suspects this question doesn't have a lot of traction either. We're saturated with violet media and the kind of violence Aurora represents is still noteworthy enough that the president flies in to console the families of the dead. If violent media is the primary cause it isn't doing a very good job of it ...


On the other end of the political spectrum there is the suggestion that this Will Be Used to grab guns. Stats and history showing that Obama doesn't seem to care about guns is Just Further Proof He's Laying In Wait. This is the kind of circular logic-proof thinking that leads people to read "You Didn't Build That" as talking about the business instead of roads and bridges. Was his statement ambiguous? Yes--but knowing what he meant because you already know what he meant is the kind of argument that unerringly convinces the already convinced. 


If The Fast And Furious gun-walker plot to Overturn The 2nd Amendment hasn't garnered enough press for low-information voters to even know what it is, there is no reason to think this will work. 


What Do I Think?
First and foremost: the execution of this slaying was frightening. He bought a ticket, entered the theater normally, went down to the bottom and exited--propping the door. He suited up with a bullet proof vest and gas mask. When he entered he threw two tear-gas grenades (or something similar--were they home-made?) and then fired into the ceiling (from an eyewitness). When the predictable stampede away from the shooter began the patrons were "herded" to a choke-point (the door) where he opened fire with his higher capacity weapons.


He had booby trapped his apartment with incindaries or explosives explicitly to kill police. There has yet been no manifesto found to explain his motives.


This is a "professional job" in my opinion. He is certainly deranged but not disordered. I draw correlations to Breviek--the Norway shooter who operated at a similarly high capability level in his planning.


The second thing I think is that these tragedies are like Rorschach ink-blot tests: they bring out what's inside of us since the act itself is such a bank-template of nonsense it's the psychological equivalent of the white screen The Dark Knight Rises was playing on in the theater. We can project our fears onto his motives and our beliefs onto the consequences.


I suspect the reality will be a hash of meaninglessness and outrage. In the end these things accomplish nothing as they teach a lesson we already knew: There are bad people out there who will do bad things. They are the exception, not the rule, and the learnings are more around how we put ourselves back together than how we change our lives around their disease.

The Politics Of: The Newsroom

Taken From HBO's Website: Who Did I Cut? The Minority Actor (Neal Sampat)

HBO is on a roll right now and they've shown they're not afraid to get political (except for that Game of Thrones thing with Bush's head on a spike--they were kinda scared by that). In this case we're talking about Aaron Sorkin's The Newsroom--his spiritual heir to The West Wing. It's going into Episode 5 of a 10 episode season so this is a great time to jump in! NOTE: There will be spoilers.

The Show
The Newsroom takes place in the office of Atlantis Cable News (ACN) where bland but popular media star played by Jeff Danies is generally phoning it in night after night (he's called "Leno" mockingly because Jay Leno offends no one). The opening episode has him asked a question about why America is the greatest country in the world and, after two unconvincing non-answers he sees / thinks he sees his ex-girlfriend in the audience holding a legal pad up with the words IT ISN'T and BUT IT COULD BE and he, inspired (or maybe just tripping on vertigo medication) goes off an an explosive rant about, well, why it isn't--but maybe could be again! This traumatizes the poor college student who asked the question and goes viral.

When his boss (played by Law and Order's Sam Watterson who not only shines in the role but is notably the other Law and Order guy to get a decent gig on HBO ... and seemingly a longer lasting one than Christopher Melon's run on True Blood as he just got, um, staked) decides to run with his new infamy he goes behind Daniel's back and hooks him up with his ex-girlfriend (Emily Mortimer) who will now be the show-runner!

This would be a recipe for absolute disaster in the real world, but in the Sorkin-verse the sexual tension between the two (and another, similar love triangle) propels the Speak-Truth-To-Stupid new show to great heights of integrity and insight.

That is, if you agree with Sorkin's politics. If you don't you probably stopped watching ... HBO altogether. Maybe? Well, okay--you're still watching Game of Thrones, but that's different.

Sorkin is a master of witty dialog matched only by Joss Wheedon and he gets his lectures crisp (but still lectures) and his venom biting (but still funny). He educates you (or "educates" you) while keeping things moving with the verbal equivalent of raging rapids. His characters are drawn well enough to make gruff and unlikable still be likable and adorably dorky, well ... adorable (for some measures--the show has drawn fire for its portrayal of the female leads as, well, 'adorkable.' I'll talk about that below).

I'd read a lot of critics hating it or at least finding it a major disappointment and I'd gone in skeptical. But I came out a believer--the show manages its powerful moments, seems--really seems--to know its stuff (I feel like I'm learning things about how a news room works) and has managed to keep my attention even when it's obviously being manipulative.

But, well, then there's Sorkin's politics ... which is what we're gonna discuss next.

Bottom line? I like it. HBO manages, after Game of Thrones ended, to keep me looking forward to Sunday night which, if you think about it, is a pretty amazing feat all things considered.

Let's do the politics!

The Politics of The Newsroom
Let's start with the genius of The Newsroom: it starts in 2010. This isn't out of nostalgia for the last two years--it's so that he can cover real news. That's right: you get to watch them cover the Deepwater Horizion disaster, the 2010 elections, the Gifford shooting, and so on. This is brilliant--Sorkin knows you know those stories better than the characters and plays off it. He can have his people make all the right moves with 20/20 hindsight which, although it's artificial intelligence (to re-purpose a derogatory term from The New Yorker's negative review linked above) it's still intelligence.

This really works. You get to re-live those stories and it creates not only unparalleled verisimilitude (Sorkin does not have to create "fake news") but it also gives you a chance to look a little deeper as he does his homework on each one. You get Sorkin's idea of what a "perfect newscast" would look like for each event. I cannot tell you how engaging this is for me. That's easily the best thing The Newsroom pioneers!

On the other hand ... I gigged ABC's Scandal for having a "Republican president" who was basically a Democrat with a right-wing VP. The Newsroom does the same thing albeit more intelligently. Daniels is, he keeps saying, a registered Republican (as is Watterson) who, in his words, "Just sounds like a Democrat because he believes hurricanes are caused by high barometric pressure instead of gay marriage."

This is called lampshading where the show's creator takes something that snaps your suspenders of disbelief and calls attention to it ("hanging a lampshade on it"). Daniels is Sorkin's mouthpiece (all the characters are--but Daniels most specifically) and, well, he sounds like a Democrat because Sorkin is a Democrat. To think otherwise is plainly naive.

Certainly there are some Republicans who do believe that gay marriage could be causing extreme weather but (a) that's not most of them and (b) that's not a part of the Republican platform (get rid of gay marriage to stop the drought!). It would be a bit more correct to say that he sounds like a Democrat because he undoubtedly believes that mankind is causing global warming and that global warming is causing extreme weather rather than naturally occurring cycles which may not be impacting weather that much.

But Sorkin can't say that because for all its focus on truth in news he isn't interested in giving "both sides" the same level of voice.

What do I think about that? Well, I'll tell you: I believe it would be 'statistically fair' to have Sorkin, say, take 1000 of the most highly acclaimed climatologists in the world and pick, say, a few at random, and get their take on what's going on with global warming ... and present THAT as Daniel's argument.

I believe he could do that and not change a word of his dialog (and those big lists of climatologists who "dispute global warming"? Yeah--tell me about those again I'm here all day!). So am I offended by his stance? No--I'm not--but neither do I think it's "even handed"--it's just Sorkin.

Similarly, while Watterson and Daniels take on the Tea Party (with numerous real quotes making various Tea Party candidates look like idiots) and are in "some good company" with the GOP "establishment" (and I'll note he doesn't just hit O'Donnell over and over--Sorkin stays away from the easy marks), this is still just going through the motions. Jeb Bush aside, what Daniels and Watterson are today are RINOs (Republicans In Name Only). You can lament, as they do, that maybe the party has moved on--but it still isn't "honest."

Sorkin isn't a real Republican launching criticisms of the party from the inside: he's faking it. Having Daniels painfully defend Sarah Palin's remarks--trying to kinda explain them to the audience doesn't make it any more realistic: if he hates the Tea Party (as co-opted by the Koch brothers) why does he like Sarah Palin? Uh-huh.

Finally I want to talk about the gender politics. There are two major female leads: Alison Pill (a junior staffer who gets two unexpected "field promotions" and starts doing news) and Emily Mortimer who plays a veteran news expert (who reported from multiple war-zones) and is Daniel's ex ... and she cheated on him but now loves him and he hasn't forgiven her ...

In both cases the women are shown as easily flustered and for the most part making poor romantic decisions (Pill suffers panic attacks--the same way that veteran soldiers do--but they were shot at, she's just in a meeting). To be sure the men come off badly too to a degree--but they do not in general come off as weak. I think that Sorkin is doing a specific thing--he knows how to make a certain kind of character resonant and he's doubling down on that (the ACN owner played by Jane Fonda is not 'adorkable'--she might be a villain and she sure isn't weak--but she's also a bit part).

If you are inclined to be disappointed or worse by the gender roles in the show, for my money you have sufficient room there. It's definitely a liberal-leaning show--it's supposed to be enlightened--and I'm not sure it lives up to its ideas or even passes the Bechdel Test.

Conclusion
With The Newsroom Aaron Sorkin is back. If you liked the West Wing you should definitely check it out. He's still quick witted and spry with his characters and ideas. If you're a Republican who isn't horrified by your party in 2012 you're not going to think much of the show's 2010 Republicans and I doubt you'll even credit Sorkin or "making the effort" but despite its shortcomings the show delivers.

The Moneyball Campaigns: Strategic Data In Politics

The movie Moneyball is about how data-analysis changed baseball. It's a true story and it details how a team with almost no funding made it to the playoffs after losing not just one, but three of its super-stars. The baseball-genius economist behind the theory threw out conventional wisdom and looked at nothing but numbers--and one specific number at that: how often each player got on base.

In the age of data political campaigning is changing--it's becoming more data driven. The major campaigns are playing moneyball instead of 'baseball.'

Getting To Know YOU ...
The key to winning "baseball" was getting players onto the bases. Forget about stealing. Don't worry about home-runs. Even fielding takes a back-seat to the all-important getting on base. In political terms that translates to:

1. Getting your partisans to the polls
2. Finding new voters who are yours ... and getting them to the polls.
3. Persuading voters who might be persuadable ... and getting them to the polls.

Number One is all about motivation: send messages that get the right people fired up and combine that with reminding them to go vote (studies have shown that simply reminding people to go vote--without any political message at all--works--so just make sure that everyone on your call / door-knock list is gonna vote the way you want them to).

Number Two is about finding young people or unregistered voters and going through the work-intensive process of getting them signed up. That means understanding demographic trends that lead people to your party and engaging them.

Number Three is similar to Number Two but the message is even more important. Where as #2 you can, for example, simply sign up minority voters and assume that they'll vote in general the way their minority votes (or older wealthier people who, for whatever reason, might not be voting?). However, message can also hinge on key specific issues. For example, Snowmobiles:

This year [2006] the GOP is going after the 260,000 residents of Michigan who ride snowmobiles (since the state keeps records of licenses, finding out who owns a snowmobile is easy.) Snowmobilers are particularly angry that Democratic Gov. Jennifer Granholm's pro-environmental stance has held up the creation of a trail that would link the communities of Gaylord and Cheboygan, and would likely be receptive to promises by Republicans to take their side on the issue.

That was 2006. Compared to 2012, it's the stone age.

Who ARE You?
 In order to execute on this strategy the campaigns are ramping up their analytics expertise. On the part of Team Obama:

The Obama campaign has hired a corporate data mining expert, Rayid Ghani, to serve as the campaign's "chief scientist." Ghani has previously researched how to use a retailer's record of customer purchases topredict what a particular customer will buy during a given shopping trip -- the same kind of data crunching that Target has apparently used to predict whether shoppers are pregnant. The campaign is continuing to hire "analytics engineers" and other data experts.

Team Romney is going lower-tech: they are monitoring the Obama campaign's moves and trying to reverse engineer what they know from that:

In the primaries, Romney’s advisers had little confidence that there was much logic at all behind his rivals’ moves, and the two-time candidate outmaneuvered analyticallyamateurish opponents with well-plotted discipline and attention to detail. Now forced to play catch-up against a savvy incumbent, Romney’s team acknowledges they are not aiming to match what Obama has built in Chicago: A unique, in-house analytical empire that has developed an unrivaled capacity to churn through voter data and translate insights into tactics. Because of this capacity, Romney advisers assume that what they see the president doing in public must have a good deal of sense behind it. "The Obama team had the luxury of knowing exactly what they'd be doing on July 1, 2012 because they've been planning for six years—definitely three-and-a-half years,” says Zac Moffatt, Romney’s digital director. So instead of devoting their analytical energies to out-strategizing the president, Romney’s advisers are trying to hack Obama’s code and turn it against him.

What Do They Know?
What do they know about you? Well, they're not going to tell you that. After all, it's proprietary data. But keep in mind that it can change things far more subtly than just whether you get an email or not. Look here for an example of the same email sent with multiple subtle variations based on what they (their computers) thought the recipient would respond to. But let's see some more interesting and colorful examples!

Which Web-Sites Do You Like?

I know a guy who likes XKCD who just blew a neuron!

And here's some more micro-targeting graphs for your viewing pleasure!

Blue Moon is Republican High Turn-Out!? And ... Michelob Ultra!?

Do Those WWE Watchers ... Think It's For Real?

My People, The UFC Fans, They Do Not Go To The Polls :-/

Republicans Don't Internet Date? Family Values, I Guess. But YAY for You Tube!

If Only Obama Had Anyone On MySpace--Maybe He Could Motivate Those Voters!?

What's The Definition Of Redundant? A Bumper-Sticker On a Prius!

Diet 7UP Might Very Well Be The Most Boring Soft Drink Known To Man (And I'm Glad The High Information Republicans Are Going Easy On The Caffeine)

Denny's is Democrat-Skew!? But ... But ... OLD PEOPLE!?!? Cracker Barrel Surprises No One.

Justice Is Clothing For Little Girls. What The Heck!?

Those Guys Watching MTV Take Breaks To Update Their MySpace Page ... Clearly.

What Do I Think?
All things being equal if Romney is not hitting the data-mining as hard as the Democrats that should translate into an advantage for Team Obama. I suspect that there is more going on in Boston than the Slate article gives credit for. The GOP were, it's easy to forget, pioneers in early data-driven campaigning and while they may not be as young / hip as Team Obama portrays itself as I think that 'Stupid Party' jokes aside, it would be an error to conclude they are less intelligent.

Brutal Obama Attack Ad: Firms

What you see above is the latest salvo in the Obama-Bain onslaught. It's an ad called "Firms." It is an attempt (another attempt in a seemingly endless stream) to paint Romney as a wealthy 1%-er job destroyer.

The Ad
The ad is a 30-second slot and will be playing in saturation mode in the key battleground states. The only sound is Mitt Romney singing America the Beautiful ... off key. It begins in some Romney venue (apparently for a few weeks during the primaries he sung America the Beautiful quite a bit) and then moves us to an empty factory where a "paper" image (creased so we can see it is supposed to be paper--like a newspaper) gives us block-letters about Romney outsourcing jobs to Mexico. The quote is from the LA Times.

We take a car-ride by a closed factory. The sun is going down behind it and the yard is desolate through a chain-link fence. The paper says that Romney's firmed shipped jobs to Mexico and China. Romney's voice swells here--but it gets a tin-sounding echo and reverb thrown in ... because now he's supposed to be singing in that vast empty space.

We're in an empty boardroom. The lights are on, but no one's home. The paper has the Boston Globe saying  Romney outsourced jobs to India.

We go outside again. The sky is sunny--but dim. From the left--is that a flag? It is--the Swiss flag--waves over a river. The paper tells us: "He had millions in a Swiss bank account." (ABC News). We hear the flag as Romney's voice dims a little.

Then we're looking out over a sea with palm-trees in our view (no beach). The paper says: "Tax havens like Bermuda" (Vanity Fair) ... And the Cayman Islands (the view shifts). Now we see the empty beach and beautiful blue-green ocean. The edges of the view are always dimmer than the center creating an encroaching sense of gloom and now the screen goes black.

MITT ROMNEY'S NOT THE SOLUTION says the text at 27 seconds. HE'S THE PROBLEM appears.

What Does It Mean?
In this case it's pretty obvious: there is very little 'subtext' here: Romney, singing a patriotic song off-key with a little help by audio manipulation verbally portrays his "distance" from the the graveyards of destroyed jobs with little 'official-looking' placards to help you along. Part one is: he out-sourced to the most hated of the usual subjects (Mexico--for illegal immigrant traction, China for our-next-enemy traction, and India for tech-support-rage traction). Part 2 is his supposedly-vast Richie-Rich over-seas holdings which are, of course, 'shady' (the Swiss Bank Account in cinema signifies illicit holdings even as the Swiss banking system was reformed quite some time ago).

The use of the Swiss flag (with flapping sound) calls attention to the fact that Romney, for his alleged patriotism  is placing his money where his mouth (in this case literally) isn't. The glittering beaches are exotic vacation destinations that the target demographic (white blue-collar workers) will never visit. This is the same imagery that was used, for example, in the dystopic thriller Repo Men as their "virtual vacation paradise."

Is it effective? We don't know yet.

A Romney Pollster speaks out to assure Republicans the ads are not gaining traction and Rasmussen holds that there has been little movement--Nate Silver seems to agree but notes that as of now, Team Romney is reacting defensively:

In recent days, however, Mr. Romney’s campaign has begun to behave like Bain Capital is more of a negative factor than a positive or even neutral one. Instead of pointing to successes like Staples — and pointing out that some of Mr. Obama’s claims about the outsourcing that has allegedly occurred at some other Bain investments is factually dubious — they have instead begun to behave as though Bain Capital’s track record is nothing to be proud of.

On the other hand, Andrew Sullivan looks at some trend-reporting in the two uber-key swing states of Florida and Ohio (plus Virginia):

Ohio Over a Year

Ohio Last Month

These make at least a case that things are not moving in the direction Romney would want.

Whether or not Team Romney is "defensive" may well be a matter of opinion--but their return-fire ad was just pulled from YouTube for legal reasons around the song-rights (it has Obama singing Al Green ... perfectly on key).

What Do I Think?
I'm down with the theory that the problem here is not so much that "the ads are devastating" but rather that there are two specific problems for Romney here. The first is that he's not an especially good singer and the implied mockery of the ad--the inherent goofiness of him singing the song with a sign that looks like it's from a kid's birthday party in the audience--is a direct hit in the presidential gravitas. This is the sort of thing that, maybe, stuck with Dukakis and the tank:

Not a winner

The second problem is that it plays into a narrative with the base that Romney, although willing to trash and thrash is Republican rivals will play like a school-boy in the general:

The strategic decision by the Romney campaign not to define him personally—not to inoculate him from inevitable attacks—seems a perverse one. Given his campaign’s ample financial resources, the decision not to run biographical or testimonial ads, in effect to do nothing to establish him as a three-dimensional person, has left him open to the inevitable attacks for his work at Bain Capital, on outsourcing, and on his investments. It’s all rather inexplicable.

And here:

What’s incredible is that the attacks are coming on these questions. This was Romney’s chosen narrative—that he has special business skills, expertise, and acumen. So it is odd that he and his team seem so flat-footed. Stranger still is that this is not his junior varsity season. He already had several clashes on this exact turf with his Republican opponents in the primaries. That was supposed to make him all the more ready for this highly predictable attack.

So I think this ad combined with its context / climate can be damaging in ways the specific allegations are not. I want to close with a brief discussion that the ad is dishonest. The Bain attacks have certainly been called so by fact-checking organizations (which Republicans are usually dubious of). I agree that the major thrust: that "Romney outsourced" is misleading as he was on a leave of absence when most of this or all of it occurred--however, I think this Hot Air article does a good job of making it clear why some people find this relevant:

Those siding with the President must lay claim to the following:

• A person who is working full time on another project, is on a leave of absence, and has turned over all day to day management of operations to a group of former associates is the personal architect of whatever strategies are put in place by that firm.

It’s the most common defense we’ve seen and there’s some logic in there which is pretty hard to argue with when you put it that way. But before you get too happy about it, I also noted that Mitt’s defenders were going to have to go out in the public square and defend this doozy:

• The President, CEO and sole shareholder of record at a large corporation bears no responsibility for the actions of that company.

This is a good comparison: Both arguments have certain problems--especially as each side will hypocritically try to reverse the positions when it is expedient (Obama holds Bush responsible for the economy ... still).

Conclusion
I don't grade ads based on how much I like the message or how true it is--the grade is on how effective a political weapon it is. In this case, "Firms" is an exemplar model of efficiency. It is bare-bones. It is almost spare in its use of manipulation. It is confident: it needs no voice over--no narration. It is clear and powerful: it paints Romney as a hypocrite and mocks him as clueless at the same time. It powerfully groups its allegations in threes (Mexico, China, India and Switzerland, Bermuda, and the Cayman Islands). In short, it uses its construction expertly.

Rating: A


EDITED TO ADD: If you want to see a hilarious Mitt-Romney-Sings Saturday Night Live parody, click here.

Whither Condi?

The Omnivore got a question about Condoleezza Rice as a potential Romney VEEP. The question was "What do you think?" The Omnivore LOVES questions!

What Do I Think?
Two things. The first is that the answer is "No, it won't be her."

I don’t know who is hitting the crack rock tonight in the rumor mill, but bull shiitake mushrooms.

Condelizza Rice is pro-abortion.

She worked for George Bush for eight years.

In those eight years at National Security and then at State, our relations with Russia deteriorated though she was an expert in that field. Central and South America went to pot as well, the ramifications of which still have not been sorted out. She was one of George Bush’s most trusted advisors and her supporters would have you believe that everything bad that happened, happened because of Cheney and Rumsfeld.

That was Erick Ericson of Red State who may not have the last word but is certainly plugged in. Nate Silver finds that there are no really good female candidates (they are either too old, too inexperienced, too extreme, or too related to Bush ...). In any event, despite the general blogular consensus is against her, I was dubious BEFORE IT WAS COOL!!

Why? Because she simply does not do for Romney what he needs to do for his ticket. That's the other thing I think ...

The Other Thing I Think (Part 2)
The other part to what I think is that Condi is, to be honest, a pretty "exciting" VP pick for someone either (a) in the middle or (b) to a sub-set of the base who is more tactically inclined and somewhat less ideological. I think the distinction here is pretty telling so I'm going to try to tell it!

She's Exciting!
She certainly didn't seem all that exciting to Erick Erickson (Bull shiitake mushrooms) but it is undoubtedly true that if she were picked it would (a) garner a lot of press and (b) appeal to the set of folks who, for example, want a female VP or want a minority on the GOP ticket. There are lots of these people--those who fret about the GOP's image with certain subsets of voters. So, hey: she'd mix it up.

We're Not Racist!
The other thing that is good about Condi is that her presence on the ticket (near the top!) is that it would prove ("prove") that the GOP isn't racist / sexist like some people say. To be sure, Republicans are fairly sensitive about allegations of racism and, frankly, I'm not surprised. This is because (a) no one (especially the, uh, party of Lincoln) likes to be called racist and (b) well, you know.

The prospect of Herman Cain kung-fu schooling elite liberals while deflecting the hurled race-cards like Neo brushing off Agent Smith's bullets was so attractive it was, I have to think, integral to what made him a front runner for his time in the Not-Romney sun. In a similar fashion, having Rice on the stump backing up Romney appeals to a lot of people and well it should: the GOP has its gay members and its black and minority members and that should be at least some evidence that faith-in-markets, traditional marriage-positive, and patriotic policies can and do exist outside of any racial context.

That doesn't mean the racism thing isn't a sore spot and that Condi would be thought to help.

But she's not gonna happen.

Condoleezza!
Romney has several key things in picking his VP. Winning a state isn't one of them--unless he picks Rubio in which case maybe it was. He needs to (a) reach out to moderates and (b) solidify his base. That means threading a pretty damn fine needle. He needs someone with Tea Party credibility who otherwise appeals to moderate voters. Condi would likely appeal to moderate voters but would not work with the more radical base (the same way Bachmann would be the reverse).

I think either Pawlenty or Jindal work for this--and on the outside Rubio and Ryan do too--but after that the list is, well, narrow--and Condi isn't on it.

Obama: The Charisma Factor

As three recent articles point out, in the coming November election, Mitt Romney has a specific problem running against Obama that he might not have against other potential Democratic candidates: the charisma factor.

As teams that have tried to attack Obama before have realized, a key stumbling block in hammering him is that despite a lot ("everything?") people like him. From the attack plan that was going to use Reverend Wright against Obama lamented: "But, they still "like" him."

I suspect the "like" is in quotes not because it is contrasted to Obama's incompetence (so how could you like that!?) but because the authors themselves just see no rational way anyone could actually like him. In their heads, they mean it the way you do when you hit the Facebook LIKE button for someone's sad story to show support ... Obama is getting about 50% of the vote and to the other 50% that's baffling.

It also could be the crucial few percent that determine the election. All things being "equal" (which they never are) presidents tend to get about the share of the vote as their approval rating. For Obama that's around 47%. But Nate Silver notes that in this case (and it's kind of a rare one) the approval rating is lower than the president's favorability rating. That is: more people like him than think he's doing a good job. This could be important:

[It] seems as though the small set of voters who take a favorable view of Mr. Obama but do not approve of his job performance are very much worth fighting over for the campaigns. The split between the two sets of ratings may reflect a sensible enough reaction from voters, who have ample reason to be dissatisfied with the direction of the country, but may be more sympathetic to Mr. Obama as some of the problems began before his tenure.

This is echoed by Peter Beinart who compares Obama to Romney (noting that Bush won the likability war with Kerry and defeated him):

The contrast with Mitt Romney could not be starker. According to the June Pew, while Romney leads on the economy, Obama enjoys a 31 point advantage on “connect[ing] to ordinary Americans.” He leads by 19 points on being “willing to take [an] unpopular stand.” By a 14 point margin, Americans consider him more “honest and truthful.” According to Gallup, Americans deem him more “likeable” by a whopping 17 points.

Conservative pundit Michael Medved draws a sort of reverse conclusion from a similar starting point. He discusses finding an old "Clintonopoly" board game when cleaning out his kid's closet and looking at all the hysterical Clinton-conspiracy material it was based on. He concludes, years later (and from the right) that all that emotional churn was destructive. He thinks that Team Obama's jabs at Romney are similarly destructive:

As always, the electorate will determine whether continuing the current course leads to prosperity and security, or more frustration. Except for already committed partisans to the Democratic cause, they will show less interest in the Romney family road trip with the dog on the roof, or the candidate’s alleged bullying of a high school class-mate, or the purported predations of Bain Capital some 20 years ago. The Obama team shouldn’t require the rediscovery of some forgotten remnant of a scandal-mongering past to reach the recognition that Romneyopoly—like Clintonopoly—is a loser’s game.

What Do I Think?
Charisma is a powerful and dangerous asset because it is so poorly understood. On paper Carter should've trounced Reagan--in person, when they were on stage together? If you were alive and even mildly political at the time you remember what happened. If not, you can read about it. There is no good metric to compare the charismatic appeal of Obama to Ronald Reagan but even Obama's strongest detractors generally agree that he paints a powerful public image.

This creates a sort of "teflon shield" where thrown mud doesn't stick (the public still blames Bush for the economy--something that frustrates Republicans to no end). It makes personal attacks boomerang: Remember that awkward RNC call where the party heads had to kind of gently beg people not to call Obama a Socialist in public because while they had to kind of 'admit' that, you know, 'he totally is' the public--you know--the low information voters--they still like him. And they don't like all that socialist-talk.

So, yeah: Obama has charisma. It might be worth a couple of points in the general and if it is, and Europe doesn't financially collapse that could win it for him.

The Lethal Presidency: Drone murder and Obama

Tom Junod has written a lengthy and thoughtful piece on president Obama and the use of drones in targeted killing for Esquire. He is not pleased with it. He makes several points--that the killing of an American without judicial process is a new act for a president. That ,targeted killing,' the term the administration uses, is not a new thing (it began under Bush) but has become the signature trademark of the Obama administration and the key element of America's war on terror. He points out that Al-Awaki ... and his son, also killed under a Yemini night sky--were human beings.

Awaki was certainly an enemy of the state--but he also walked--or tried to walk--the line between being a inspiration and an actual conspirator. He tried to stay, Junod seems to make the case, within the bounds of freedom of speech.

Finally, Junod says this:

Of course, the danger of the Lethal Presidency is that the precedent you establish is hardly ever the precedent you think you are establishing, and whenever you seem to be describing a program that is limited and temporary, you are really describing a program that is expansive and permanent. You are a very controlled man, and as Lethal President, it's natural for you to think that you can control the Lethal Presidency. It's even natural for you to think that you can control the Lethal Presidencies of other countries, simply by the power of your example. But the Lethal Presidency incorporates not just drone technology but a way of thinking about drone technology, and this way of thinking will be your ultimate export. You have anticipated the problem of proliferation. But an arms race involving drones would be very different from an arms race involving nuclear arms, because the message that spread with nuclear arms was that these weapons must never be used. The message that you are spreading with drones is that they must be — that using them amounts to nothing less than our moral duty.

This is powerful stuff--and to be sure, not thoughtless.


On the left, opponents of the targeted killing program: They call it drone murder.


What Do I Think?
Let's first take a look at "drone murder" itself. What is objectively scary about drones--as opposed to other forms of weapons is twofold:

1. They can stay airborne for a long time. The still-in-development Solar Eagle can stay aloft for five years. Thus they can "loiter" for extended periods of time--far longer than, say, a military fly-over would last. Longer, by far, than, for example, a helicopter would stay aloft.
2. Unlike (most) conventional aircraft (as opposed to very expensive spy planes) they carry amazingly sophisticated sensory gear. They can see things (and even see through walls in some cases) that an ordinary pilot could not. They share this information with intelligence analysts in real-time allowing for instant responses when something is seen.

Drones are "scary" for a few other reasons as well.

1. Their operators are remote and they, themselves, are robots. No one cries when a drone is killed. The servicemen and women who fly them are safely at home--in the US. A sign at the gates of one facility reminds them to drive safely: going home is the most dangerous part of their day ... for them.
2. They are armed. Drones typically carry Hellfire missiles, a  106lb rocket with a 20lb warhead.It has a causality radius of sixty feet. Under good conditions they are very accurate. This kind of weapon can obliterate armored vehicles (hit from above) and wipe out entire groups if they are not very dispersed  / dug in.

This makes drones precision low-risk (in terms of human capital) weapons that allow for an unprecedented level of decision-making (coupled with analysis) and response. This, however, does not necessarily equate to almost no collateral damage--that still happens--what it more likely means is that war-making personnel find drones far superior to anything else they could field in terms of giving them a combination of intel, strike capacity, and lack of concern for the unit. In short: in a lot of cases they are the "ultimate weapon."

The Future

The future of drone-war is going to be even more intense. Soldiers will launch personal units. Weapons will become more sophisticated, and sensory gear will expand greatly. If Israel, armed with modern American drones, makes war again the way it did against Hezbollah the outcome will likely be very, very different. Armed with unprecedented asymmetric battlefield information they would, likely, get a very different outcome. Drones are going to make war more appealing rather than less.

Drones will also eat into--or entirely take away--the edge that 4th generation warfare gave to the insurgencies in a battle. Irregular forces could force western armies to either inflict massive civilian casualties or else suffer a rolling series of defeats. Where an American trooper has to carry some 100lbs of gear an insurgent needs almost nothing: when he blends with the populace he is not "operating away from his base"--he goes home to dinner.

Drones are going to change that. Possibly dramatically (Fifth Generation Warfare: cyber-war may give back some advantage to lower-funded distributed forces--but in a very different way).

So What Do I Think?

Junod asks what he thinks is a telling question:

The former official in your administration — the one familiar with targeting — has suggested a question intended to encapsulate the danger represented by the expansive nature of the Lethal Presidency: "Ask the administration if the president himself is targetable."

I think herein lies the place where I fundamentally diverge from his point of view: the answer is clearly "yes." The Commander in Chief of any armed force with whom you are at war is de facto a legitimate target. It is the job of the army he commands to keep him alive. That isn't--or at least shouldn't be--a surprise. It shouldn't be new information--and that's where Junod, I think, falls down.

When there exists a real, extant state of war--which, against Al Queada there certainly does--and, for most people, a just war at that--then it is incumbent on any general to (a) defeat the enemy (usually by killing them) and (b) protect his populace and then his soldiers in that order. If the most efficient way of doing that is drones then it is not the actions of the Lethal President that legitimize that but rather the moral calculus of war itself (oh, they will to some--people who would've rejected Bush doing it--but not Obama--but those people are not thinking hard about this--they're just looking at the color of each man's jersey). 

Put it another way: if Obama eschewed drone warfare, what is he to tell the parents, spouses, and children of every soldier who comes home, unnecessarily, in a body bag?

However, that doesn't mean there aren't some ancillary good points:

Collateral Damage

One might ask what Obama is to tell the parents of children wrongly killed by drone strikes. The answer is that he, unfortunately, has the same thing to say that every general has always said: that it is unfortunate--that this happens in war--and that we must always--always--strive to do better. This is no comfort to them (of course) but it is no less true for it.

Special forces troops that can be deployed deep into countries we have tenuous relationships with, who always-get their man, and do not have tremendous political blow-back exist only in the movies. Instead, if the administration conducted a series of "Bin Laden Raids" we would have parades of special forces coffins. The training for that mission was something incredibly special and complex. It does not scale.

The other conventional alternative: piloted aircraft bombing is probably even worse. Most aircraft cannot operate at the altitudes (low) in the time frames (hours) that drones can. They are faster, higher, and use larger ordinance. There is no reason to think replacing drone attacks with conventional airstrikes would result in fewer causalities--rather the reverse.

The Optics

We are assured the optics of drone strikes "look bad." We are told that Americans are cowardly for attacking from over-seas. We are told that drones in the sky raise people against us. That collateral damage creates more terrorists than it kills--and so on. While I'm dubious about the numbers here (I think they do not exist save in various people's imaginations) I do know that America operating inside Muslim nations does upset a lot of people. I know that the injustice of the killings (perceived injustice) is a recruiting call.

That's all true.

But it would be true anyway, whatever we did. If America were to attack with nothing but human soldiers and our army was routed and massacred and defeated? That would be the most successful call to arms our enemies could imagine. If we were to pull out and cede the playing field to them? That too would be a Public Relations victory. Stopping the fight or fighting ineffectually would just encourage the global radical jihad: everyone loves a winner.

I also want to note than in a surprisingly un-Orwellian move the operational descriptor, "targeted killing" is not a euphemism. It's what it says on the tin: killing. Obama's decision not to shy away from that speaks volumes.

Basically? I think the optics here, however bad they are, are as good as they get if we wish to conduct effective operations against distributed enemy targets.

The Rule of Law

Junod points out that the administration pointed out that American citizens are promised due process under the Constitution and not judicial process. The killing committee (a real Death Panel) gives extra consideration to American citizens. I think this is more or less "in the right direction." I don't make a lot of distinction between Al-Awaki and anyone else doing service for Al Queada. 

Do I trust the government on this? I don't have to--Awaki made no secret of his plans and his position. He promoted the Fort Hood shootings and the Christmas Day (would-be) underwear bombing. Imagine a plane falling from the sky on Christmas morning: that's this guy. He was a human being--yes--but he was an enemy of the state and his persuasive charisma was as much an active ingredient as the explosive in the guy's pants.

So I think that given the options: either allow him to continue or do what is necessary to stop him? I think it's necessary to stop him.

Conclusions

We were told that the dominance of the American military would see an end when we ran into dispersed fighting forces. Indeed, we suffered some serious losses starting with Vietnam and continuing to Iraq where we defeated the conventional military easily and had to fight essentially hand-to-hand with the insurgents. Then technology caught up with them (or almost has). As our enemies are not evolving into less lethal, less hateful partisans (although they are getting globally less popular than they were in the early 2000's) I can't see this as anything but a good thing.

And I think it comes down to Junod's quoted question: is the president a target? Yes, he is--and moreover, whether or not I think so, we all know that he's going to be. You can answer that question yourself however you want: How Bin Laden answered it? He wanted Obama dead so he could exploit the weak and slow Joe Biden so it doesn't really matter if he had drones or not--he was coming for us with everything he had.

Using drones to kill his commanders off seems a rational, even measured response.

The Politics of ABC's Scandal

ABC's political drama Scandal has been picked up for a second season. Let's talk about it! There will be spoilers!

The Show
Scandal follows a team of crisis-experts (who consider themselves "gladiators in business suits") run by Olivia Pope (Kerry Washington) who 'fixes' political problems. She does this by any-means-necessary but generally does it by savvy communications control and legal maneuvering. Pope is a genius salvage expert who can turn a dire situation around--and has. People come to her for help from everywhere and if she takes the case (if she feels they deserve it) she's all in.

Her team of expert-misfits have been assembled from the wreckage of their various lives and so, as they were rescued by her, they're ultimately loyal. Each episode tends to have a drama-of-the-week and an arc which deals with, well, scandal in the white house.

The Scandal
The scandal is that POTUS Fitzgerald Thomas Grant III (who plays a Republican president--but one with a gay chief of staff who is pushing The Dream Act) isn't in love with his wife--he's in love with Olivia Pope (who saved his campaign). They slept together on the campaign trail and someone (it turns out vice president's assistant) got an audio tape of it (the president with the mystery woman--but presumably NOT his wife) and so, as the political temperature of America heats up the secret starts coming out. He also (maybe) slept with an intern (sound familiar) and she's (maybe) going to talk.

Is it true? At first it's hard to say (the president categorically denies it and Pope believes him). The intern, it turns out, was pregnant. Then she's dead. There's a double black-mail scheme, leaks to the press, and layered secrets. This all comes to a head when the vice president's aide decides to go public with what he has ... and things look like they might exploded and bring down the administration!

It's hard to tell who the good guys and bad guys are--it's a nuanced cast of characters, all of whom are fallible. The show's creator Shonda Rhimes did Grey's Anatomy and knows how to keep a drama taut and sexy (my wife, a physician, has specially cut 'Grey's Anatomy' lab coats designed for the show but now worn by real doctors). It's a competent effort and does at least a network-TV credible job of showing insight into politics and control of the narrative.

I found her cast to be a bit too ... twee? Is that the word? Each of them seems to have had their own scandal and it's not clear that they'd be both in-need-of-rescue and "super experts." To be fair, one of them was a used car salesman--and has yet to show any incredible expertise (we've also never seen him sell a car on the show) but it still smacked a bit of putting the scooby gang together. Washington, however, is ultimately watchable and carries the show even when Katie Lowes (the "new girl on the team") sort of brings the narrative down because she, like us, doesn't seem to be quite sure what she's doing there (note: the actress is fine--but the character seems to be one dimensional: a person who has some deep secret we're not in on who has clearly been traumatized and is recovering as she helps the super friends fight crime, etc.).

In any event, Scandal may not be transcendent TV but it's smart and watchable. It isn't as smart as The West Wing and it isn't as watchable as, say, Buffy The Vampire Slayer--but it holds its own well enough.

Let's do the politics!

The Politics of Scandal
Making the president an ex-governor of California doesn't, in 2012, even remotely excuse his politics. In the show's narrative he was running against (and losing to) the ultra-religious, ultra-right wing Kate Burton who lost to him after Pope got involved and became his vice president. While she opposes him on things like gay marriage and the dream act she's still up there lending him credibility because she wants to be the next--and first woman--POTUS.

This, folks, is a pipe dream: specifically it's a liberal pipe dream. I don't know Shonda Rhimes' politics but, man, I can guess. Let's count the problems with this:

1. The idea that, in today's age, a Republican president would not just support but champion gay marriage and immigration rights is the kind of wishful-thinking that made Obama think he could just sit down with "folks across the aisle" and work things out. Unh-uh. The country is pretty divided right now and those are not currently on the 'R side of the ticket.
2. The idea that you'd get a "unity ticket" composed of the primary winner and the next-runner up as VP. There's a reason we didn't see this with Obama and Hillary and won't (probably) see it with Romney and Santorum. The problems are two-fold: first, in today's primaries, both candidates have spent a lot of time and money trashing each other. After all those attack ads it's going to look unseemly for, say, Santorum to really get out there and promote Romney (who he's called the White Obama). Would he do a good job of it? Yes--and that's the problem: seeing our politicians lie expertly isn't a good feeling. The second reason is that they're pretty far apart on policy (Obama and Hillary, not so much--which is why she might be able to be VP next time around). The idea of the VP is that they're a "hot backup" for the president--not a regime change or a consolation prize for the losing faction.
3. Having a gay chief of staff goes even beyond gay rights. It's true that people don't vote based on who your chief of staff is, as a rule, but no one thinks, for example, that Huntsman wouldn't be a reasonably good statesman. He tanked because, amongst other things, he didn't have the right line on global warming--and was chummy with the Obama administration when he was ambassador to China. These connections would be fatal.

I conclude that Scandal takes place in an alternate universe where Republicans were the "opposition party" the liberals wished they were.

My second issue with Scandal's politics is all the killin'. In this case two parties have access to killers: Olivia Pope employs an ex CIA / NSA (he's a computer intrusion genius) assassin--and it turns out the Chief of Staff has one too (he sends his assassin to kill the innocent / sympathetic intern--this is a major reveal in the last episode).

I'm willing to accept that both these guys "happen to know black bag wet-work operators from their previous lives:" if Olivia Pope can rescue the car salesman who is raw material for an 'Olympic-level' crisis team it is no less preposterous that she can 'rescue' a black-ops guy and turn him to good (?) on her side. The Chief of Staff is probably ex-military and maybe commanded those guys? I don't know.

However: although the show does get it right in that the president, even facing the end of his career, isn't ordering people killed (that, see, is done for him by a subordinate--although in this instance he really didn't know and wouldn't have allowed it--he's sleeping around in a love-less marriage--he isn't a psychopath) I think it requires almost super-human capabilities on the part of these operatives and an unrealistic level of trust in them.

The intern is pregnant and sequestered in Pope's high security home. It takes a very special guy to be able to break in and do this. The guy you have to have access to must:

1. Know security systems, locks, breaking-and-entering
2. Be able to handle the surveillance (he must be sure there is no one else home) commit the murder (the easy part), leave no evidence (a bit harder--maybe impossible if things go slightly wrong), and then move the body alone and dispose of it by himself (this is very hard--consider how many people are caught when bodies wash up, etc.).
3. Be completely trustworthy at the point of hire and then later since he can easily have evidence about what was done and if the "money is transferred" (as it is discussed in the show) it will leave an electronic trail.
4. Finally the risk (you go to jail forever or are executed) must be worth the benefit (having a gay-friendly  administration so they can adopt a baby). NOTE: Washington DC, where they presumably live, already allows gay adoption / second-parent recognition (so what the heck!?)

I want to compare this to another TV show Rubicon. The show Rubicon was one of the smartest conspiracy shows on the air and it involved a scene where the conspiracy's expert killer (no less expert than the guy in Scandal) goes to kill off the main character. He does everything mostly right and gets unlucky. The killer winds up being killed instead by a guy with no combat training and no handy weapon all because something minor went wrong.

That's reality. How do I know? Look at the raid on Bin Laden's compound: the very best--the very best guys in the world trained for months as a team to cover contingencies and surprises and to ensure that it worked. It almost didn't (the helicopter crashed). Look at Carter's rescue of the Iran hostages? That did not go well (the helicopter crashed). If you don't believe me, ask an expert: the question on a mission is not if something will go wrong--it's what will go wrong.

That is why you don't see too many expert solo operators.

So I think that Scandal's politics are made for Hollywood and its action-adventure part of the show is made for TV. On the other hand, you know, it's still exciting.

As a third and final issue, the thing that Scandal gets really, really right is that crisis management is critically about controlling the narrative. You have to, when the crisis breaks, get a good solid story together (overnight, literally) and get it in front of the press and (now) social media. That's critical. You can bet Toyota wishes they had when the stories about the accelerators sticking were going around. You know the Vatican wishes it had when its own scandals broke. Getting the right story (denial may not be an option--and you don't know in the first 'golden hour' of the crisis) is hard--that's why you need experts.

Scandal does a decent job of this and it's fun to watch.

Conclusion

Scandal was picked up for a second season and I'm glad: it needs a few more shows to see if it can develop its cast into something truly special. It already met the bar for interesting TV and whatever compromises it made, I suspect it's smart enough to know they were compromises. It falls a little short of Game Change's verisimilitude but it doesn't insult the knowledgeable viewer (save for the liberal-Republican thing) like Ides of March did. I'll keep watching.