Crossed Wires

A teenager from Iceland claims that he reached a private White House phone line while pretending to be the president of his country. If so, he would not be the first ordinary person to get through. On May 14, 1965, a Denver couple accidentally interrupted a call between LBJ and Abe Fortas. Story and audio here.

Interesting Take on Romney's Speech

Maureen Dowd wrote a column in today's New York Times comparing Romney's speech last week to JFK's speeches regarding his Catholicism. While many people have drawn strong comparisons between Romney and Kenendy, Dowd argues that Romney's speech was quite different because he is trying to appeal to the religious right, while Kennedy was trying to assure the voters that his religion would not be a major factor in his presidency.

Click here for the article.

Habeas Wrapup, Huck Oppo, the Future of the Presidency

In class, I promised more information on the writ of habeas corpus and "court-stripping." Click the links for that information.

See Geoff's post below on Huckabee's "Welcome to the NFL" experience, which is now happening with considerable fury:

• LA Times headline: "Parole officials: Huckabee pushed rapist's release."
• AP headline: "Huckabee Wanted to Isolate AIDS Patients."

In class this week, we shall consider the following questions:

• Who will be the next president?
• What legacy will Bush leave to his successor?
• How are changes in economics, technology, and international relations likely to affect the institution?

Giuliani jokes

Click here for some funny jokes about Rudy Giuliani. One highlight:

"Iran's president ... wanted to lay a wreath at Ground Zero, but his critics said, 'No, no. You are trying to exploit Ground Zero for political gain, and that is Rudy Giuliani's job.'" --Bill Maher

Geoff

Iowa

Here is a great Politico overview of the Iowa Caucus. This is a good supplement to the Clinton video we watched. It is interesting to note that the Democratic and Republican caucuses are different. The Republican system is not like what we saw in the Clinton video. Instead, Republicans write down a candidates name on a blank piece of paper. Democrats also give more weight to rural districts.

The author has some interesting and humorous insight into the strategy Dems use in the caucus. Bribing people with snow shoveling and babysitting is perfectly normal. There is a lot of fighting that can potentially go on on caucus night, and neighbors can leave pretty mad at each other. The whole system seems so foreign to me and at the same time this strange process will be crucial to this election.

Oppo on Huckabee Already in Play

Huckabee's opponents did not wait long to pull the trigger with the oppo research. This article in the New York Times details the first issue: A convicted rapist that was released while Huckabee was governor later sexually assaulted and murdered a woman in Missouri. Huckabee had written a letter to the rapist while he was incarcerated saying "My desire is that you be released from prison."

The article drew parallels to the way strategist Lee Atwater smeared Michael Dukakis in 1988 with the Willie Horton debacle.

As Prof Pitney says, "welcome to the NFL".

Geoff

Cheney's Bold Iraq Predictions

Politico.com interviewed Cheney about the situation in Iraq in an article today, in which he boldly predicts that Iraq will be self-governing by January 2009. By then, he says, we will have "in fact achieved our objective in terms of having a self-governing Iraq that’s capable for the most part of defending themselves, a democracy in the heart of the Middle East, a nation that will be a positive force in influencing the world around it in the future." Good to see he's still right on line with his reputation for impossible and sometimes wholly false predictions. Congressional Democrats' responses aren't online yet, but I think we can read their minds.

The article also discusses the new White House belief that Iran poses no nuclear threat. Despite confidence in U.S. intelligence, he concedes that "there are things [intelligence officials] don’t know. There’s always the possibility that circumstances will change. But I think they’ve done the best job they can with the intelligence that’s available."

Note that a contributor to the article is John F. Harris of our very own The Way to Win.