While we await the election results I wish to remember GWB for the following:
The prompt invasion of Afghanistan and dislodging the Taleban about two years after IC 814 hijacking.
Recognizing the roots of Islamic terrorism originating from greater Middle East.
Seizing the initative in Middle East by his Iraq invasion. Yes aftermath was mixed.
Recognizing the need to bring India back into the gamut of nations to balance Asian stablity.
Lastly for proposing and seeing through the nuke deal wich returned India to the high table.
The biggest failing was not understanding TSP is the linch pin of modern Islamic Sunni terrorism-Listenting to Colin Bin Powell.
The next is not pre-empting the Wall Street collapse - Listening to Paulson.
11-05-2008, 05:07 AM
(This post was last modified: 11-05-2008, 07:14 AM by dhu.)
IMO, it would be good for India to return to semi-hostile status with Americans (Democrats), at least until realpolitik mindset returns to GOI. "Friendly" relationship with massa has been disastrous in terms of Nuke deal and increased missionary/marxist subterfuge.
<b>Barack Hussien Obama landslide victory. </b>
<b>McCain concede.</b>
<!--QuoteBegin-Mudy+Nov 5 2008, 12:57 AM-->QUOTE(Mudy @ Nov 5 2008, 12:57 AM)<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Barack Hussien Obama landslide victory. </b>
[right][snapback]89781[/snapback][/right]
<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Yes, welcome to the American Caliphate. Barak Hussien Obama will be sworn in over Koran by some grand mufti and Michelle's ordered designer burka for inauguration ball.
Election analysis...IMHO: I was proven wrong by McCain winning a lot more states than I had expected (refer to my post in this thread from last week of Aug, the day he announced Palin) so he fared better than Mondale-Ferraro.
SurveyUSA had done a poll two years ago of hypothetical McCain-Obama stand-off giving McCain 510 (Obama just snagging Hawaii, Illinois and DC). Just two years ago!! What does this say about nation as a whole - all campaign talking points and slogans aside?
11-05-2008, 07:21 PM
(This post was last modified: 11-05-2008, 07:38 PM by Capt M Kumar.)
<!--emo&  --><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/sad.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='sad.gif' /><!--endemo--> <b>And Now and now, my latest blog:
http://whymacnotback.blogspot.com/</b>
Comparative study:
Financial squeeze
From the start, his biggest problem was finding the money to compete with Barack Obama's $650m (£403m) campaign juggernaut. By accepting federal funding (which Mr Obama declined) he capped his general election campaign spending at $85m (£53m).
Cannot play media.You do not have the correct version of the flash player. Download the correct version
Republican supporters: 'I love John McCain...I think he's awesome'
Of course much more than that was spent by the Republican National Committee and other pro-McCain groups, but Mr McCain could never seriously challenge Mr Obama's ability to dominate the TV airwaves - even in states that were traditionally Republican.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/us_ele...008/7704246.stm
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Election analysis...IMHO: I was proven wrong by McCain winning a lot more states than I had expected (refer to my post in this thread from last week of Aug, the day he announced Palin) so he fared better than Mondale-Ferraro.
<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Palin saved him. She was able to brought 90% GOP to voting booth.
ACORN, Money, Hispanic, immigrants, blacks, students made the difference.
After financial melt down. it was over for McCain.
Now lets talk about future -
We have to watch for fairness doctrine. I hope Democrats keeps their hands off.
His cabinet.
Spread the Wealth around, how deep that will be.
Foreign Policy -
How much pressure he will put on Indian PM who wear UN Pagri on Kashmir
How much new conditions on N-deal?
Middle East to watch.
How many new war zone will open?
China ????
Russia already warned new administration and it comes with action. (new missles deployment)
Global
US had moved Left, not sure how far it will go.
Europe is moving towards Conservative government e.g. Germany, France
India, not sure.
Pakistan moved left
Mudy,
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Spread the Wealth around, how deep that will be.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Who can complain if wealth that's been spread around in Pakistan and Iraq is diverted back to ghettos and trailer-parks locally? The GOP base of Joe the <i>Dumber </i>types will flap their mouth about taxes/wealth-spreading while shamelessly collecting welfare checks. Dems increasing control in House and Senate is not good news overall but should wake up the GOP. Unless they do some honest soul searching, they'll have to sit in opposition for a while.
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Palin saved him. <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
She opened one door for McCain and but closed another. With Palin pick, the independent Maverick died. Palin might run in 2012 - but it's a long way.
Good news: Convicted Stevens could be elected (don't believe it's called yet) and Democrats might just have the Chanakiyan cunning to NOT throw him out of the Senate. Doing so enables a lame duck scared Senator hanging around could affect Alaskan politics (read possibility of Palin being sent from Anchorage back to Wassilla or her PTA board). On other hand if Stevens is chucked out of Senate, Palin could appoint herself Senator and be in national limelight for next 6 years. Stevens issue is the most interesting to watch.
On global issues:
Hopefully stuff like Rawanda and Darfur will be prevented in future - African roots/ties will come in handy here. (Personally would like those Nigerian spammers dealt with firm hand, but on scale of things it's low)
Chinese usually have a cosy relationship with GOP since they overlook human-rights/sweatshop type issues over economic gains, so things could get a little testy with Dems in control all over.
On Pakistan, BO will for sure try to hypenate Ind-Pak and 'seek solution' in J&K, but expect those foggy notions to be squashed after the honeymoon period, lest India reconfirms the current Sonia plant who has even questioned holding on to Saichen. All the more to chuck incumbents in India out now. There's real concern of new administration looking one way for Paki action against jihadis on western border while turning blind eye to jihadis on eastern border. Indian security hawks will have to burn some midnight oil on this.
On middle east - let's see how he's tested in first year (Clinton and Bush both had to deal with major attacks on US soil during first year).
On Europe, I had earlier somewhere on this board listed of a growing shift in age demographics (Mark Penn's book), there will be a divergence in views between US and Europe in coming years.
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Chinese usually have a cosy relationship with GOP since they overlook human-rights/sweatshop type issues over economic gains, so things could get a little testy with Dems in control all over.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Majority of Democrats had business interest in China through their spouse or kids. Don't forget election reform bill came out when China was funding Democrats election
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Alaskan politics (read possibility of Palin being sent from Anchorage back to Wassilla or her PTA board).<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Day before yesterday Independent ethic board cleared her.
Regarding GOP future -
They are already busy popping up Bobby Jindal and Sarah Palin, big chunk favors them. Rockefeller branch favors Rommey. Some are for Pawlenty, Virigina Sen (name ???)
Now there will be big move to kick out McCain, Dole, Lindsay type of GOP leader to sit on back benches and don't show up again anywhere.
Lets see how left media will treat Bobby Jindal, whether they will drag him down with religion or family or Indian origin. I don't think they will say his family story is so beautiful as Obama. It will be good comparision
U.S. House: California 27 <b> - Lost election</b>
Navraj Singh
Status: Candidate
Party: Republican
Source: The Associated Press
<b>The Republican candidate is Navraj Singh, a former captain in the Indian army. Singh is a former restaurateur who now owns a small hotel in Beverly Hills. He supports tax cuts, development of nuclear power plants, additional offshore oil drilling and deregulation of the health care industry.</b>
Los Angeles
9:57 a.m. EST, Nov 5 '08
Sherman (Incumbent) 119,233 69%
Singh 42,722 25%
He gave very good fight when GOP candidates were facing uphill task.
Obama Offers Rahm Emanuel Chief of Staff
Kerry for Secetary of state
<img src='http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y80/ShyFire/countymapredblue1024.png' border='0' alt='user posted image' />
How red is country
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Brahma Chellaney
Asian Age, November 5, 2008
When the 1989 fall of the Berlin Wall symbolized the end of the Cold War, there was common hope that the world would finally reap the peace dividend. But nearly two decades later, potent new dangers and divisions confront the world. The credit for making the world more unsafe and divided goes largely to President George W. Bush, who will go down in history as an extraordinarily reckless and blundering leader. The greatest damage from his cowboy diplomacy was to Americaâs own interests and international standing. Little surprise he is leaving office as the most unpopular president in the history of U.S. polling.
The unprecedented mess that has occurred on Bushâs watch crimps his successorâs options. This raises the troubling question whether things could get worse before they start becoming better.
After all, America has not only exported its financial crisis to the rest of the world, but also is still waging war in Iraq and Afghanistan and trying to avert war with Iran and North Korea. Iraq is in a mess even if the number of monthly deaths has dropped to its lowest since May 2004. A resurgent Taliban is tearing apart the U.S. military strategy in Afghanistan. A nuclear-armed, terror-wedded Pakistan is sinking. Osama bin Laden is still at large. And international terrorism is on the rise. All this has happened when U.S. neoconservatives (or âneoconsâ) were boasting that America has a monopoly on power unrivalled since the Roman Empire.
The abdication of American values has been epitomized by Bushâs establishment of the infamous prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and the revealed network of illegal CIA detention camps elsewhere. That has helped undermine Americaâs real strength â its ability to inspire and lead. The United States, after all, won the Cold War not by military means but by spreading the ideas of freedom, open markets and better life that helped drain the lifeblood from communismâs international appeal.
Had Bush not landed his country in costly, intractable military quagmires in Iraq and Afghanistan, he may have been tempted to unleash Americaâs untrammelled power elsewhere â by going after the next fire-snorting dragon on the neoconsâ target list, be it Syria, Iran or North Korea. Thus, a silver lining of his blunders was that some countries were saved and that <b>the initial neocon triumphalism gave way to a hard-to-conceal erosion of U.S. soft and hard power, with much of the world seeing Iraq, Afghanistan, Hurricane Katrina, the Patriot Act and Guantanamo as symbols of such decline.</b>
The epoch-shaping U.S. presidential election marks the end of the misbegotten Bush era. Not unsurprisingly, the liberation from Bush is bringing a collective sigh of relief in the world.
Bushâs flub diplomacy was fashioned by the neocons, for whom 9/11 came as a blessing in disguise to gain ascendancy in policymaking. Given Bushâs provincial background, his knowledge of foreign affairs was minimal when he came to the White House. Indeed, after becoming president, he once confessed that âthis foreign policy stuff is a little frustratingâ.
The neocons were the architects of the Bush Doctrine, founded on the belief that aggression pays and that naked aggression pays handsomely. The core tenets of the Bush Doctrine were fourfold: the United States should pursue pre-emptive strikes where necessary; it should be willing to act unilaterally â alone or with a âcoalition of the willingâ â if it cannot win the United Nationsâ sanction; the primary focus should be on politically transforming the Middle East; and Iraq ought to be the cornerstone in bringing about region-wide democratic change.
Enunciating the doctrineâs most-controversial tenet â pre-emptive action â Bush, in his June 2002 address at West Point, had said deterrence and containment were no longer enough to defend U.S. interests and America thus âmust take the battle to the enemy, disrupt his plans and confront the worst threats before they emerge. In the world we have entered, the only path to safety is the path of action. And this nation will actâ.
The neocons, in views expressed through the Project for the New American Century, the American Enterprise Institute, the journals Weekly Standard and First Things, and their own website, had for long vented their messianic ambition to remake the Middle East and then the rest of the world. Their rise in policymaking accentuated their estrangement in the Republican Party from conservative realists, whose mouthpiece, the National Review, once ran a mocking headline: âYou canât spell âmessianicâ without messâ.
The ascendance of the neocons, many of them Jewish, was facilitated by their intellectual partnership with the Christian Right â a constituency dear to Bush, a born-again Christian, and his wife, Laura. <b>A foreign-policy focus on the Biblical lands meshed well with the neocon and Christian Right worldview.</b>
<b>Yet, such were the simplistic calculations that an occupied Iraq was visualized as a profit hub for U.S. energy, infrastructure, construction and other firms and as an everlasting American military outpost. </b>Occupation, however, turned out not only to be a huge financial burden on the United States, but also has transformed a stable, secular Iraq into a failed state whose ruins fan Islamist trends. <b>No thought was given to how, in an era of globalization, imperialism moulded on conquest could be practiced, even if under the garb of democracy promotion. </b>Democracy, in any event, centres on the exercise of free choice, which presupposes that the state enjoys sovereignty.
<b>The neocons advocated â and Bush blithely accepted â an expansion of U.S. military bases across Eastern Europe, the Horn of Africa, the Middle East, and Southwest and Central Asia. </b>Using the war on terror as justification, Bush exerted pressure on several states to win permission for US forces to set up bases for the long haul. The new bases have helped establish the largest-ever U.S. military presence overseas since World War II.
But all that assertiveness and interventionism only made the United States unpopular. The Bush Doctrine, in its zeal to identify and target ârogueâ states, helped turn â as American commentator Nicholas Kristof has put it â âa superpower into a rogue countryâ.
From Bushâs refusal to back family planning through the UN Population Fund to his wifeâs missionary diplomacy against the Burmese military regime, Christian fundamentalist beliefs have played havoc with U.S. foreign policy.
The extent to which Bush was influenced by his religious beliefs can be seen from the manner his relationship with Vladimir Putin bloomed the moment the now Russian prime minister told Bush in 2001 that he had been given a cross by his mother. According to Bob Woodwardâs Bush At War, Bush instantly said to Putin: âThat speaks volumes to me, Mr. President. May I call you Vladimir?â Bush then said publicly: âI looked the man in the eye. I found him to be very straightforward⦠I was able to get a sense of his soulâ. The curmudgeonly John McCain also claims to have looked into Putinâs eyes and seen not soul, but three letters: K-G-B.
<b>By contrast, if there is anyone who claims to have got a sense of Bushâs soul it is Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, now preparing for his last Bush White House darshan. </b>Singh looked into Bushâs eyes and ostensibly read three words: love for India. History may spell those words differently: trouble for India.
With the end of the loathed Bush era, it is curtains for Americaâs neocons. But what about Indian neocons who hailed the Bush Doctrine, cheered on the invasion of Iraq, advocated the dispatch of Indian forces to aid the US occupation of Iraq, pushed for aligning Indian policy with the misguided Bush stance on Pakistan, Iran and Burma, and until recently wanted New Delhi to consider sending troops to Afghanistan? Will they disown their past, or change colours, or simply wait to latch on the next U.S. presidential doctrine? <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Where do Sarah Palin, Republican Party go from here?
10:51 PM CST on Wednesday, November 5, 2008
By WAYNE SLATER and GROMER JEFFERS JR. / The Dallas Morning News
wslater@dallasnews.com
gjeffers@dallasnews.com
PHOENIX â After John McCain completed his concession speech Election Night and the crowd had gone, Sarah Palin came back out on the lawn of the hotel where the campaign ended.
A small group of people spotted her and began chanting: "2012! 2012! 2012!"
Ms. Palin, the once and future candidate, finds herself at the center of a Republican Party battered in Tuesday's election and divided over its future. While she has avoided talking about a White House run of her own, Ms. Palin represents the battle over what the GOP has been â a party dominated by social conservatives â and what some want it to become.
Four years after GOP strategist Karl Rove envisioned an enduring Republican majority, the party is at a low ebb, shrunken to a base of white, older voters concentrated mostly in the South and Midwest.
Barack Obama will follow President Bush in the White House, and the GOP, already a minority party in Congress, lost more seats in Tuesday's Democratic landslide.
Today in Virginia, a group of leading conservatives will discuss how to rebuild the party. But the conversation is only beginning â expect tough assessments in the coming weeks from insiders about the party, the McCain campaign and the Bush White House.
Some party members and experts said Wednesday that the solution is simple â a return to strict conservatism on spending and strict adherence to social conservatism. Others say the party must offer more solutions to Americans' everyday problems.
"As far as social conservatives go, the party can't abandon that because they're an important part of the base," said Jack Pitney, a political science professor at Claremont McKenna College in California. "But that can't be the headline, not the sole basis of the party's appeal."
At the heart of Republican success over the last two decades has been a coalition of grass-roots activities and economic and natural-security conservatives. But the alliance has begun to fray.
Many religious conservatives were lukewarm about Mr. McCain as the party's standard bearer but enthusiastic about Ms. Palin, who brought a populist, blue-collar appeal to the ticket.
At the same time, the party's intellectual elite were uncomfortable with the so-called culture-warriors in the GOP base and dismissive of Ms. Palin as ill-prepared and unworthy of the nomination.
And with no clear front-runner for 2012, Ms. Palin will, at least for a time, become the focal point of discussion about the GOP's future.
David Frum, a former Bush White House speechwriter, said Wednesday that Ms. Palin symbolized a problem bedeviling the Republican Party.
"In the eyes of many college-educated white people, the people who Bush got in 2004 and whom the Republicans owned in the 1980s, the Republican Party has become a party of culture war. It's the party of 'drill, baby, drill,' so no environmental agenda," Mr. Frum told CNN.
"It's a party that has an economic message that just doesn't work," he said.
Reconciling the party's disparate wings â or redefining the GOP in more voter-successful terms â will be on the agenda at this week's GOP strategy session, the first of many as the party seeks to rebuild its message and infrastructure in response to Mr. Obama's success.
After Tuesday's disappointing performance, party loyalists, talk radio hosts and listeners, and others began working through the list of options for a shrunken, fractured GOP.
Few seemed inclined to fault Mr. McCain directly. Mark Salter, a senior McCain campaign adviser, said the financial crisis would have doomed any Republican nominee. Getting back on top, he said, would require discipline and a return to conservative principles.
"That means having common sense and not spending like crazy," he said. "We need to get back to competent, disciplined leadership. We haven't been looking too competent over the last few years."
Rep. Jeff Flake of Arizona, a leader among House conservatives, said the way back to dominance would be getting back to Republican basics, like limited government.
"We've hit rock bottom," he said. "But getting back to our core ideals will bring us out of the wilderness."
This week's electoral debacle is not the first time the GOP has found itself in the wilderness. During the 1960s, '70s and early '90s, the party was periodically out of power and used those periods to hone policy alternatives such as revenue sharing and the Contract with America.
"One of the few luxuries of being in the minority is that you have absolutely no responsibility," said Mr. Pitney. "You're basically a spectator, and you have the time and flexibility to do some creative thinking."
He said the GOP also needs to find something in the new Obama administration to rally against.
"Obama is going to have to make a lot of decisions, and inevitably some of those decisions are things that unite the party in opposition â maybe something on taxes or foreign policy," he said.
The Illinois senator won the White House with a message that promised an alternative to the unpopular Bush administration.
Mr. Bush will be gone in January.
"It's a perfect time to purify," said Kelly Shackelford of the Plano-based Liberty Legal Institute, "and get back to first principles."
Wayne Slater reported from Austin; Gromer Jeffers Jr. reported from Phoenix.
wslater@dallasnews.com;
gjeffers@dallasnews.com
SPLIT ON PALIN
Sarah Palin, the Republican vice presidential candidate, was a big factor in the voting â in both directions, according to an exit poll of voters by The Associated Press and TV networks.
Pro-Palin: More than four in 10 Republicans and about the same share of conservatives said John McCain's choice of the Alaska governor as his running mate was an important factor in their Election Day decision. Underscoring how well she fired up the party's base, both of those groups leaned lopsidedly toward Mr. McCain.
Anti-Palin: About four in 10 independents said the selection had an important impact on them, too, and a narrow majority of them ended up backing Barack Obama. About the same number of moderates also said her choice was a factor â and almost six in 10 of them were Obama voters.
Experience: Overall, just shy of four in 10 said Ms. Palin was qualified to become president if necessary, while two-thirds said the same about her Democratic counterpart, Joe Biden.
<b>Indian Americans set for key roles under Obama</b>
Preeta Bansal - I think she was the won who is linked with FOSA and anti-Modi gang
link
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle chose Bansal for the bipartisan United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) in 2003, at which time she also rejoined private law practice in New York at Skadden, Arps. The USCIRF investigates freedom of thought, conscience, and religion or belief abroad and recommends countries for designation as Country of Particular Concern by the United States Secretary of State. Her fellow commissioners later chose her as Chair, and she has been reappointed twice to the USCIRF by Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid. As Chair of the USCIRF from 2004-2005, she presided over nationally and internationally acclaimed Commission studies on human rights guarantees in the national constitutions of predominantly Muslim countries, and on the expedited removal process for U.S. asylum seekers<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
link
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, a body chartered by the U.S. Congress, expressed a significant concern about the visit through a statement by its Chairperson, Preeta Bansal , who is herself of Indian origin. <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin-Mudy+Nov 5 2008, 10:16 PM-->QUOTE(Mudy @ Nov 5 2008, 10:16 PM)<!--QuoteEBegin-->
How red is country
<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Yea every red county has 500 hillbilly rednecks. That doesn't count.
<!--QuoteBegin-Mudy+Nov 5 2008, 01:48 PM-->QUOTE(Mudy @ Nov 5 2008, 01:48 PM)<!--QuoteEBegin-->Lets see how left media will treat Bobby Jindal, whether they will drag him down with religion or family or Indian origin. I don't think they will say his family story is so beautiful as Obama. It will be good comparision
<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Hope it never happens. It will be the worst for NRIs to have a traitor EJ as possible candidate.
Jindal already started process, He was on Hannity yesterday, he is making round on right radio shows. He will be key speaker coming CPAC meeting. McCain is not invited. But next election is quiet far, lot can happen.
If you guys can download today's Rush radio show. (Thursday 6, Nov) You can ignore Sarah part etc but in 2nd hour of programme he had liberal media anaylsis of Obama. Listen to what liberal media (Rush calls them drive byes) is saying. They are comparing Obama with "Hitler" (not with direct words), Charlie Rose show snippets are very interesting and his acceptance speech and his body language on stage etc. Tom Brokaw is saying we don't who is Obama. Now liberal media who promoted him is really worried. They are not ready for totalorian/communist rule.
Download or read transcript.
link
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