INTERNATIONAL
ARAB TIMES, SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 6, 2008
15
Resumes
Commendable but limited
GOP ‘inflates’ Palin’s resume
ST. PAUL, Minnesota, Sept 5, (AP): Being a mayor of 9,780 is nothing like leading 305 million. Living next to Russia does not make you a foreign policy whiz. And presidential competence is rarely measured in square miles. But listen closely. Such unexpected comparisons are everywhere as Republicans scramble to inflate the commendable but limited public service resume of vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin. Who knows what you might hear next? “She’s got an incredible resume,” John McCain said of his running mate Wednesday. He added an unusual qualification for vice presiBlunt dent: “a wonderful, loving, caring family.” Here’s Palin’s resume as it happened: ■ Governor, state of Alaska: Dec 2006Present. ■ Chair, Alaska’s Oil and Gas Conservation Commission: 2003-2004. ■ Mayor, Wasilla, Alaska (population: 9,780): 1996-2002. ■ City Council, Wasilla, Alaska: 19921996. ■ University of Idaho; television sports and family fishing business. ■ Miss Wasilla: 1984 Here’s her resume as McCain and his fellow Republicans have been casting and constructing it this week. ■ McCain: “Alaska is right next to Russia.” “Well, the people of Alaska have vetted her.” “She’s commander of the Alaskan National Guard.” “Of course, it helps to be mayor.” ■ Missouri Gov Matt Blunt: “You could make a strong case that her experience exceeds any others in the race.” That’s a hard case to make when Senate veterans McCain and Joe Biden, Barack Obama’s running mate, have 58 years of congressional experience between them. ■ Former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani: “She’s got an 80 percent approval rating.” ■ Hawaii Gov. Linda Lingle: “You can fit more than 250 states the size of Delaware within Alaska’s border.” Biden, Palin’s Democratic rival for vice president, represents Delaware in the Senate. This is not to suggest that Palin is unqualified to be vice president or even president. That’s for voters to decide after they process what they learn about her record in Alaska. And there’s the less substantial but no less important gut-level judgments people make about politicians and products. Experience is just one element by which voters judge a candidate. It does, however, hint at an intensive strategy to find traits about Palin that will make voters happy – and offer deep contrasts with Obama. It’s not lying, and it’s not exaggeration, actually. It’s more like they’re using non sequiturs to build up her image. Resume padding – which this may or may not be, depending on one’s point of view – seems to be a uniquely American trait. People of other societies inflate their background but nobody does it quite like people in the US, according to David Callahan, author of “The Cheating Culture: Why More Americans are Doing Wrong to Get Ahead.” Americans see themselves as hardworking strivers who judge each other by the number of rungs they climb at work, a trait that compels some of them to embellish their places on the ladder. Palin passed her first gut check Wednesday night, lacing her convention address with smiles and sarcasm. That brings us to Obama’s resume. Though a bit longer than Palin’s – he’s about three years older and graduated from Harvard Law School – it’s not quite what he claims it to be. For one, Obama says he spent “20 years in public service,” a time frame that includes his law-school days. In his first general election TV ad, Obama says he “passed laws” to move people from welfare to work, cut taxes for working families and extend health care for wounded troops. In fact, he sponsored only one of the three bills mentioned and co-sponsored another, according to FactCheck.org. Two of the three laws were accomplishments of the Illinois legislature, not the US Senate. And here’s one resume bullet point to avoid: Biden was driven from the 1988 presidential race for passing off former British Labour Party leader Neil Kinnock’s life story as his own. Exaggeration is a fact of American life. The reality of a hyper-competitive global economy leads some people to stretch the truth to get ahead. Some 80 percent of all resumes include misleading information, Callahan says, and a review of 2.6 million job applications in 2002 found that 44 percent of them contained “at least some lies.” So nobody should be surprised when McCain exaggerates the significance of Palin’s command of the Alaska National Guard. Nor should voters be shocked by Obama’s liberal interpretation of his public service. Both candidates are, after all, Americans – and American politicians to boot.
Republican presidential candidate, Sen John McCain and his wife, Cindy, walk across the stage on the last night of the Republican National Convention after McCain accepted the nomination of his party at the Exel Convention Center in St Paul, Minnesota, Sept 4. Inset: McCain waves while making his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention in St Paul, Minnesota. (AP)
Politics Hillary gives first damning judgement on McCain’s VP pick
‘Reinforcements’ sent to blunt Palin’s impact
John McCain embraces his mother Roberta at the end of his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention in St Paul, Minnesota, Sept 4. (AP)
Bristol
Lieberman
America
Palin affair ‘vicious life’: John
McCain’s campaign threatened to sue a supermarket tabloid Thursday for printing the “vicious lie” that his vice presidential pick had cheated on her husband. The National Enquirer is generally dismissed as poorly sourced gossip but has gained credibility in recent weeks after it broke the news of former Democratic hopeful John Edward’s affair. The story also comes days after the revelation that Alaska Governor Sarah Palin’s 17year-old daughter Bristol is five months pregnant and plans to keep the baby and marry the father. The campaign said it was forced to reveal the pregnancy in response to false reports on liberal blogs that Palin’s four-month-old son was actually Bristol’s child. McCain senior advisor Steve Schmidt dismissed the allegations of Palin’s affair with her husband’s business partner as “categorically false.” “It is a vicious lie,” Schmidt told CBS news. “The smearing of the Palin family must end,” Schmidt added. “The efforts of the media and tabloids to destroy this fine and accomplished public servant are a disgrace. The American people will reject it.” The Enquirer story was based entirely on unnamed sources and the tabloid is known for paying sources for information, something considered unethical by mainstream media outlets. “Sen McCain and Gov Palin look forward to discussing the issues that Americans care about, fixing broken government, creating jobs, making our country energy independent and securing the peace for the next generation by bringing the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to a victorious end,” said Schmidt. “Legal action will be considered with regard to this disgraceful smear.” McCain will officially be crowned the Republican presidential nominee for the November 4 elections on Thursday evening. (AFP) ❑ ❑ ❑
HARRISBURG, Pennsylvania, Sept 5, (Agencies): Barack Obama’s campaign plans to employ high-profile female supporters in an effort to blunt Republican US vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin’s potential to persuade women to vote for her party. Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, Arizona Governor Janet Napolitano and Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius all were scheduled to campaign for Obama in the coming weeks. Republicans say they hope Palin, who made her national debut with a feisty speech on Wednesday, could put some female voters in play. “We respect her. She’s a skilled politician, as she proved last night,” Obama strategist David Axelrod told reporters aboard the campaign plane Thursday. “She’s deft at going on the attack.” But it’s not clear exactly how Obama and his running mate Joe Biden should respond. They keenly remember how women rallied around one-time Democratic front runner Clinton when they perceived she was a victim of sexism. They don’t want to appear with a weak response, either, and certainly they also don’t want to send independent women flocking to the Republican Party. The solution, at least in the short term, will be to have top-tier female supporters vouch for Obama to largely female audiences and keep the candidate himself away. Sebelius started on Thursday, linking Palin to the unpopular President George W. Bush.
“She mastered the words written by the Bush speechwriters and delivered them well. But what we didn’t hear was what people talk to me about every day,” Sebelius told reporters.
Rejected
Hillary Clinton on Thursday rejected John McCain’s Republican convention address, and gave her first damning judgement on his vice-presidential running mate Sarah Palin. “To slightly amend my comments from Denver,” the former first lady said in a statement as soon as the Republican nominee finished his speech. “No way, No How, No McCain-Palin,” Clinton said, reprising her top applause line from last week’s Democratic convention. Clinton said that only Barack Obama, who beat her in the bitter Democratic primary and his running mate Senator Joseph Biden, “offered the new ideas and positive change” that America needed. “After listening to all of the speeches this week, I heard nothing that suggests the Republicans are ready to fix the economy for middle class families,” Clinton said. She also commented that McCain offered no plan for quality affordable health care for all Americans, to guarantee equal pay for equal work for women, or to “restore our nation’s leadership in a complex world or tackle the myriad of challenges our country faces.” Obama has taken in a record $10 million in campaign cash since Republican vice-presidential pick Sarah Palin’s scorching assault on the Democratic
White House nominee. “Palin’s attacks have resulted in our campaign raising over $10 million — a one day record — I hope she gives a speech every day,” said Obama spokesman Bill Burton. The Alaska governor has electrified the conservative Republican base vote since she was named to the ticket by White House nominee John McCain. But the avalanche of cash into Obama’s campaign suggests that her withering assaults may have also energized Democratic voters as well, raising doubts about her ability to bring crucial swing voters McCain’s way. Earlier Thursday, Palin sent out a fundraising email accusing Democrats of orchestrating attacks on her after a week which has seen fierce scrutiny of her past record and the revelation that her unwed teenage daughter is pregnant. “Unfortunately, as you’ve seen this week, the Obama/Biden Democrats have been vicious in their attacks directed toward us,” Palin wrote. “The misinformation and flat-out lies must be corrected.” Democrats however challenged the Republicans to name an occasion when either the presidential nominee or his vice-presidential pick Joseph Biden had ever attacked her family, after speaking out against such attacks. “The only ‘flat-out lie’ is this ridiculous claim, and it proves that John McCain has wasted no time in teaching Sarah Palin the ways of the Washington he’s inhabited for the last 26 years,” said Obama spokesman Bill Burton.
“The continued dishonesty and divisiveness from John McCain’s campaign has made a complete mockery of the reform and bipartisanship he’ll boast about tonight,” Burton said, ahead of the Republican nominee’s primetime acceptance speech.
Also: ORLANDO, Florida: Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama received his first intelligence briefing as a candidate Tuesday, and Republican John McCain has not yet requested one, says the government’s top intelligence analyst. The analyst denounced past misuse of intelligence by government officials to promote their political agendas and strenuously defended the intelligence agencies against attacks on their competence. Politicians have used intelligence reports “as a club with which to bludgeon opponents on issues,” Tom Fingar, the deputy director of national intelligence for analysis, told a conference hosted by the Intelligence and National Security Alliance. He did not criticize any politicians by name. Obama’s briefing was conducted by National Intelligence Director Michael McConnell, who met Obama at the FBI’s Chicago field office. McCain was notified of that meeting, Fingar said. Fingar promised the intelligence community would not favor one side over the other: Each campaign is being notified when the other asks for or receives intelligence briefings, he said.
Sen. Joe Lieberman, who called Barack Obama an untested candidate beholden to Democratic interest groups in a prime-time Republican National Convention address. Lieberman, a Democrat-turned-independent and a close friend of Republican presidential candidate John McCain, still works with
Democrats, which allows them to control the Senate with a 51-49 majority . A spokesman for Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Democrat from Nevada, indicated Thursday that Lieberman may no longer be welcome. “Lieberman went too far when he distorted
Sen. Obama’s record,” said Reid spokesman Jim Manley. “From Reid’s perspective, (Lieberman) has every right to give a partisan speech to whomever he wants. But he doesn’t have the right to distort Sen. Obama’s record like that. Sen. Reid was very disappointed in
Lieberman’s speech.” Added Manley: “The Democratic caucus will likely revisit Lieberman’s situation after the November elections.” Asked if Reid was putting Lieberman on notice, Manley replied: “Without overplaying it, the answer is, yes.” (AP)
Can I be VP?
Thousands stake claim to Palin’s job
WASHINGTON, Sept 5, (AFP): Griffin DuBois of New York is one of thousands of people who think their foreign policy credentials make them more qualified to be vice president of the United States than Alaska Governor Sarah Palin. “I live above a Greek family and next to an Egyptian family. I’m more qualified than Sarah Palin,” DuBois said in a message posted Thursday on the “I have more foreign policy experience than Sarah Palin” group on Facebook, the social networking site. As of Thursday afternoon — six days after Republican presidential Palin candidate John McCain unveiled Palin as his choice for the number two spot in Washington — the Facebook group founded by University of Washington student Timothy Goyder had more than 17,000 members. And some 100 new adherents from around the world were joining every 10 minutes. Ed Rooney of Vermont claimed to be the man for the job that has gone to a woman for the first time in the history of the Republican Party because: “I recently ate Chinese food which makes me an expert on US-China relations.” “I’m from Taiwan. Can I be VP?” asked David Wang, a high school student. Others mentioned how often they have eaten at US fast food chain, the International House of Pancakes, italicizing the word “international.” According to posts on the “I have more foreign policy experience than Sarah Palin”, the 44-year-old governor of Alaska only got a passport last year and has visited three foreign countries.
Lieberman risks payback: Senate
Democrats hinted at payback Thursday for
Democratic presidential candidate Sen Barack Obama, gestures while speaking at the Voith Siemens Hydro Power Plant in York, Pennsylvania, Sept 4. (AP)