Strathlachlan

Reagan Laid to Rest

The week-long ceremonies honoring Ronald Wilson Reagan, the 40th President of the United States, concluded on Friday with emotional ceremonies that appeared to be drawn from a Hollywood movie script. The moving eulogies in a raining Washington, D.C. gave way to a spectacular sunset interment ceremony at the Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California. The final scene of Reagan's public life gave way to a private moment with his family.

Nancy Reagan, the former president's wife of over 52 years, provided many of the most stirring images throughout the week. Mrs. Reagan wept over the casket of her husband before being escorted by Army Major General Galen B. Jackman, Commander of the U.S. Military District of Washington, to an awaiting car. Reports say that the car remained at the entrance to the presidential library for some time before finally departing.

Ronald Reagan's 400-pound solid-mahogany casket was one of the last "Marsellus Masterpiece" caskets ever produced by Marsellus Casket Company. The 131-year-old Syracuse, New York-based company closed in 2003, but crafted the casket in advance to the Reagan family's exact wishes. This included a distinctive small, turned, solid-wood pilaster, or post, on the end of the casket.

The casket was completely hand made, with even the screws being put in by hand, and took about six months to make. The final polish required 16 hours of hand-rubbing to create its soft-glowing appearance. The interior of the casket was done in hand sewn beige velvet, and a small gold label on the exterior denotes the Marsellus name. Presidents John F. Kennedy and Richard M. Nixon were also buried in Marsellus caskets.

Following the private ceremony Reagan's casket was moved inside the library out of public view while the underground burial tomb was prepared. A small tent and artificial lights were erected as two gravediggers prepared the 8-foot-by-4-foot subterranean crypt. Reagan's casket was moved one final time and placed inside a 3,000-pound bronze burial vault with his head pointing toward the west. The Wilbert Bronze Triune Special No. 34 oversized burial vault was brought from Iowa earlier this week after having President Reagan's name engraved on the outside.

The task of carving Reagan's headstone, a Georgian gray granite slab, with the words "Ronald Wilson Reagan," along with his dates of birth and death, was given to 82-year-old Nathen Blackwell. The English-born stone carver had already produced several carvings throughout with the Reagan Presidential Library. Blackwell also carved a black granite presidential seal to replace a discolored bronze version on the outside of the 20-foot-wide, horseshoe-shaped memorial site. The headstone was stored in the library basement before being set into place just before dawn on Saturday.

Following her own passing, Nancy Reagan will also be placed next to her beloved husband inside the crypt. It is then expected that the curved limestone walls will be encased with granite of tans and browns to protect against deterioration. Perhaps Nathen Blackwell will be called on again to re-carve the quotation Reagan made in 1991 when the library opened: "I know in my heart that man is good. That what is right will always eventually triumph. And there's purpose and worth to each and every life."

The Great Communicator is now Silent

Ronald Reagan was my president. The president I grew up with. The president that changed America and the world I was living in. The president that shaped my views about politics. The president that I will measure all other presidents against for the rest of my life.

President Reagan's innaguration in 1981 was the first I remember seeing as a 5 year old kid. The attempt on his life was the first major news event I remember in my life. Mostly because I remember how it interrupted my afternoon cartoons. Some of the biggest moments of my life happened while Ronald Reagan was President of the United States of America. The Iran Hostages, KAL 007, Beirut, Pointe du Hoc, Challenger, Libya, Chernobyl, Reykjavik, Brandenberg Gate, Lockerbie, and the end of the Cold War.

Thanks for everything Mr. President. Thank you from a grateful nation and a fellow frater. Thanks Frater Reagan. Until then I remain...YITB.

Weapons of Mass Distraction

The continuing adventures of Dick "Bureaucrat-for-Life" Clarke and Condi "60 Minutes" Rice is just the typical Washington smokescreen that happens during an election year. Last year it was Kobe Bryant, Scott Peterson, and shark attacks that kept everyone distracted from real issues.

Anything that comes out of Clarke or Rice's mouths are not going to bring back the people killed on 9/11. And as much as some people would like to believe it, The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (aka 9-11 Commission) will not prevent another attack from occurring. People sitting in comfy leather chairs and armed with probing questions and television cameras don't prevent terrorism.

This is a political blame game and nothing more. That doesn't mean there aren't people to blame for 9/11, but the blame can probably be spread across several administrations, several decisions, and several pencil pushers. There is no single person responsible for why the US didn't prevent 9/11. The culpability is everywhere including, let's not forget, the terrorists themselves.

Meanwhile, gas prices are averaging $1.75 per gallon, terrorists are still trying to blow stuff up abroad, and apparently out-sourcing jobs actually creates jobs. Real issues, real problems, and real situations that these policy wonks would rather not deal with right now.

Another possible story the US media are missing this week, and it's no big surprise, is the possibility of terrorism at the Grand Prix of Bahrain this weekend. This is the first ever Grand Prix to be held in the Middle East. The brand new $150 million circuit will host thousands of team members, foreign press, guests, and over 50,000 on race day. That attendance is low by F1 standards, but understandable given the location and high temperatures, and it will still be the largest sporting event in the region. Add to all of this the 300 million worldwide viewers on television and the event could be a potential terrorist target.

The government of Bahrain has put in place extra security measures for the weekend, and everyone in the F1 Paddock appears to be taking things a little more seriously. The race itself stands to generate over $74 million in revenue for the region over the next few days. Let's hope the positive attention that the region will receive is enough of a deterrent.

Howard Dean Ends Campaign

Latest breaking news this morning is that Howard Dean will end his campaign for the presidential nomination, according to the Associated Press. It's all over but the crying for the Dean campaign. The report notes that Dean was to announce his plans at a news conference Wednesday afternoon.

The real winner here is John Edwards. After narrowly loosing to John Kerry in last night's Wisconsin primary, Edwards will probably pick up a lot of Howard Dean supporters. As if those folks are gonna vote for John Kerry. Let's be honest here. Edwards could make a strong late run against Kerry with "Super Tuesday" still left and a lot of delegates to be had. Stay tuned...

Trainwreck Spotting

Matt Drudge 's report on an alleged infidelity scandal in the John F. Kerry campaign broke about an hour ago. Fact or fiction, I've been having fun watching the impending trainwreck. Wonkette and Instapundit [11:46 AM] were the first mainstream bloggers (Did I just say that???) to post something about it.

The wonderful thing about the Internet and weblogs are the timestamps. Here's the moment the story broke on Howard Dean's Blog for America:

second and check out DRUDGE! HERE IT COMES!!! Posted by barry in va at February 12, 2004 11:37 AM

Google's news search had just two articles ("Will Press Pounce on Drudge's Kerry Rumor?" and "Media investigating alleged recent infidelity Democrat rivals...") as of 12:30 PM. Though one outlet is for journalists and the other is something I'd put in the right-wing category to say the least.

I guess at the moment I am much more interested in how this unfolds from a media coverage perspective, than whether or not there is any truth in the story. Either way, this is going to be a trainwreck for either Kerry or the sharks that get caught chasing nothing more than blood in the water.

At the moment, much of bloggerdom appears to be silent. Either they're getting real work done or waiting to see which direction things turn. As of 1 PM there's no word from Dave Winer, Doc Searls, Jeff Jarvis, or David Weinberger on the story. More importantly, I don't see anything from Mickey Kaus, Joshua Marshall, or Eric Alterman. Nothing from Jim Romenesko either but Andrew Sullivan has a very brief mention of the Drudge story in the Daily Dish.

Perhaps the real story and commentary is unfolding on the campaign blogs themselves. The Dean Blog has been on fire with comments and the John Kerry Blog has comments full of back-and-forth between Kerry and Dean supporters. The John Edwards Blog has comments that read like kids on Christmas morning.

At 2 PM there's nothing from CNN, although it appears as though Ken and Barbie are breaking up, Fox News isn't going near the story at the moment, and MSNBC is covering human cloning and the "battle" over gay marriage.

Of course, all of this is very early in terms of coverage and reaction. But it reminds me of past alleged scandals where the big voices let someone else like Drudge break the story and then pounced. Not only are most of the big media not covering this one but the tech bloggers turned political bloggers (and the just plain political bloggers) are no where to be found. Granted, there are a few exceptions.

Leave it to one of my daily reads, The Scotsman, to run the first mainstream story: "Mystery of Kerry and the Intern". It's essentially a rehash of the original Drudge story, but it leads with "Allegations against Vietnam war hero John Kerry today threatened his runaway presidential campaign." Something tells me the over-the-pond tabloids are redoing tomorrow's front pages as we speak, but what about The New York Times or The Washington Post?.

The original Drudge story alleges that "A serious investigation....has been underway at TIME magazine, ABC NEWS, the WASHINGTON POST, THE HILL and the ASSOCIATED PRESS." So is Drudge just lighting the match on a lot of gasoline that's already been spilled?

As of 3 PM the most active discussions about the story are happening at the Howard Dean Blog, the John Kerry Blog, the John Edwards Blog, and even the now defunct Wesley Clark Blog has something to talk about. Although they appear to be more interested in the actual news report that Clark will endorse Kerry tomorrow.

Nick Denton's latest micro-content blog, Wonkette, has some additional posts this afternoon. Editor Ana Marie Cox reports that ABC radio in DC has reported the story and she also links to a NewsMax.com article from April of last year titled "The Hill: Boston Globe to Probe Kerry Private Affairs". Instapundit's Glenn Reynolds has a few more links up, including one back to this site. Now I'm finally starting to see the blogosphere abuzz like gangbusters over the story.

Mickey Kaus finally chimes in [11:23 AM PT] and references a September 2, 1998 Boston Herald story about Kerry and a young Georgetown grad. Looks like he's writing, linking, and thinking fast and furious right now. Eric Alterman has also just referenced the story but notes that "I don’t ipso facto believe anything I read on Drudge, so I’m not going to make a big deal about its hypothetical implications."

This all reminds me of those Tootsie Roll pop commercials growing up as a kid. ("How many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Roll pop?") The new questions is this: How long does it take for a potentially major story to hit the mainstream blogosphere? It looks like 2 1/2 to 3 hours. It could take that many days to reach the mainstream media. Blog on the rumor and print on the news? Perhaps not for everyone. Even some of the well known bloggers now have too much to loose by moving too quickly on a story. The cycle repeats itself. Stay tuned...

Heartbreak Hotel

Getting into a committed relationship with a politician can only end one of two ways: Inauguration or heartbreak. Your candidate is either going to win the big game or end up a historical footnote. Anyone still pining for Gore, Dole, Dukakis, or Mondale these days?

It's a lot like cheering for your favorite sports team. You hope they can win it all, but if they don't there's always next year. But for politicians there is rarely a second chance to grasp victory. That happens in local elections or state-wide races, but presidential campaigns are a much different story.

In fact, the further you get in the political playoffs the less likely you are to ever get another shot at the title. Once you get the nomination the number of potential jilted supporters goes through the roof. People start tying a lot of hopes, dreams, and dollars to their relationship with candidates, and coming back empty handed is a hard thing to swallow.

For example, the best thing for John Edwards might be to make a good showing, perhaps win South Carolina, and then drop out before Kerry and Dean jump the shark. Edwards isn't running for his Senate seat in North Carolina, which means he'd have plenty of time to prepare for 2008. Wesley Clark is probably the only candidate that needs to go for broke this time around.

Now, I don't have a dog in this fight yet. It's too early to care, like watching the early rounds of the NBA playoffs. But everywhere I look these days a lot of people are getting too serious too fast, and they are going to get their hearts broken. Howard Dean comes in third in Iowa, and suddenly a lot of his supporters are crushed because of their crush on him.

I've read Plato, Aristotle, Machiavelli, Locke, Hobbes, Hume, Rousseau, Voltaire, Burke, Wollstonecraft, Paine, Mill, Marx, O'Rourke, and everyone in between. They talk a lot about the nature of politics and how people engage in the political process. There's not a lot of literature on the emotional attachments people make during the political process. Something tells me Dr. Phil might be the only person to help heal these soon-to-be-wounded supporters. I hear there's a different kind of support group forming in the Dick Gephardt camp.

Affirmation, Baby!

Right after the first Democratic Presidential Candidates Debate in September, I made the following comment:

"Howard Dean won't win because all of his rhetoric requires nothing but bad things for the good old US of A.....Should any rays of sunshine begin to loom on the horizon the Dean campaign is toast. And if the sun manages to melt the ice in New Hampshire earlier than expected he could even loose to one of the Democrats." - "The Debate Team"

Howard Dean's run for the Democratic Party's nomination might not be over, but it probably won't be the slam dunk everyone thought it would be. Ed Cone's comment today that "Another Internet bubble popped" really hit the nail on the head on a lot of levels.

I tuned into the train wreck only a few times last night, but I heard Jeff Greenfield make a comment on CNN that summed things up nicely: "They dated Dean, they married Kerry." Iowa isn't everything and Dean's comments a few years ago about the screwed up format were spot on. He was being honest about how silly the whole caucus is to begin with, and Iowa rarely plays kingmaker.

Honestly, there's still only a certain portion of the electorate that even cares at this point. Hell, I was one of the millions of people who was watching American Idol and My Big Fat Obnoxious Fiancé last night. I'm a political junkie at heart, but there's already enough drama in my own life these days. Wake me up when there's only three serious candidates left on the island.

Bush's Surprise Iraq Trip

I woke up early this morning as my body forgot to tell my brain I had the day off. The usual morning news programs were on the tube, and Thanksgiving 2003 was of course the big topic of the day. I scanned the dial to see what else was on and decided to kick back on vegetate on the news for a while.

I caught a piece on Fox News with Geraldo Rivera interviewing Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY). The senator was visiting US troops in Afghanistan and they had video footage of everyone dining on turkey with all the fixings. I thought about how Sen. Clinton was visiting a unit from Fort Drum, New York, and while it was a clear political power play, that was OK by me.

And then I joked out loud what a it would be like if President Bush showed up in Iraq today. (Scout's honor!) After recovering late in the day from a tryptophan overdose I jumped on the Internet to see what the movie listings were for the weekend. It was then that I caught the headline on Yahoo! that read "Bush surprises U.S. troops with Iraq trip", and got a grin from ear to ear.

Then I jumped over to The Drudge Report because I knew Matt Drudge would have the whole scoop. The headline link was "HOW IT ALL WENT DOWN: DETAILED REPORT OF BUSH'S SECRET TRIP" and had notes from The Washington Post Mike Allen. Here's the beginning of a very detailed description of Bush's trip to Baghdad:

"The President left Waco secretly Wednesday at 8:25 p.m. Eastern (7:25 p.m. Texan) with a small pool, stopped at Andrews to pick up a few staff and a few more poolers, change planes and then head to Baghad. Both flights were what we think of as the normal Air Force One, Boeing 747 with the normal marking. The President landed in darkness at Baghdad International Airport at 9:31 a.m. Washington time (5:32 p.m. local) on Thursday, Nov. 27, Thanksgiving Day. He took off at 12:03 p.m. Eastern time, so was in Baghdad roughly 2.5 hours." - Mike Allen, The Washington Post, Private Notes

Was it a political chess move? Yes. Was it probably a logistical nightmare? Yes. Were there huge security risks? Yes. Will most people wake up tomorrow with huge surprise? Yes. Will this be the headline on nearly every major newspaper in the world? Yes. Will a lot of media talking heads be miffed that they will have to come into work this weekend? Yes. Will President Bush get criticized for the trip? Yes. Was it a morale boost for the troops? Yes. Will this send a message to the insurgents? Yes. Was the bigger surprise that they could actually keep the whole thing a secret? Yes. Will anyone care about Sen. Clinton's trip? No.

P.J. O'Rourke in Iraq

Paul Boutin points out some interesting articles in the December issue of The Atlantic Monthly. Included in the articles is a great piece by P.J. O'Rourke titled "The Backside of War" ($2.95). O'Rourke was "Mr. Outside" in Kuwait and Mike Kelly was "Mr. Inside" in Iraq covering the war for The Atlantic Monthly. Kelly was killed on April 4th, 2003, in Iraq and O'Rourke was allowed by the Department of Defense to become an unofficial embed in Kelly's unit.

While you can't read O'Rourke's piece online for free there is, however, a good interview with O'Rourke called "Man on the Street: An Interview With P. J. O'Rourke" that is only available online. The interview is classic P.J. and his observations from Kuwait and Iraq are, as always, insightful. Here are some choice cuts:

"If we're going to be successful in transforming Iraq, a lot of structure is going to be required. Some of it of the authority type—lots of soldiers, lots of police—but some of it needs to be social structures. Their civil society has been completely destroyed. It has to be rebuilt, or we have to somehow allow or encourage it to rebuild itself. It's not going to be easy. This is not a "laissez faire, tear down the wall to East Berlin and the East Berliners will figure it out" type of situation. Don't think Czechoslovakia or Poland or East Germany. Think Romania in terms of the chaos, or the Ukraine, Georgia, Azerbaijan. This place has really been destroyed."

"These people are tough and resourceful, and they've been through all this crap before. So they deal with things a little bit better than New Yorkers during blackouts. It's a funny two-edged sword: in terms of social organization and civil society, they're sort of helpless and pathetic. But in terms of getting the pilot light re-lit on the furnace, they're not helpless at all."

"When you look at a chaotic region like the Middle East, what you're really seeing is most of human history, and some parts of America and some parts of Europe and a few parts of Asia are glaring exceptions. The kind of peaceful, productive, incredibly wealthy life that we live in these few areas around the world—this has only been going on for a nanosecond as time goes. It's so exceptional I'm not even sure what it means. The whole world might degenerate back into the Middle East, because that's what it's always been. And you can't solve the problem of the Middle East, because it's not a problem, it's a condition. It's the normal condition of mankind." - P.J. O'Rourke "Man on the Street"

Howard Dean: Behind the Weblog

Ed Cone goes inside the Howard Dean campaign in his new article for Baseline magazine. I've read a lot of stuff on how the Dean campaign is transforming politics using technology, but Cone's piece finally gets it right. Not too praising. Not too skeptical. Not too gushing over the power of weblogs. Not too dismissive either.

"Even if Dean fails to capture the Democratic nomination, he has made internetworking technology an integral factor in national campaigns for the foreseeable future. Not since the televised Nixon-Kennedy debates has there been a comparable shift in the art and science of running a campaign." - Ed Cone, "The Marketing of a President"

The big takeaway is that the Dean campaign is acting more like a business than your typical political campaign. They have a strategy and they are utilizing specific technologies to extend the reach and broadcast power of their message. Technology is not the lead dog, as some might have you believe, but instead obeys the commands of its master. By using a weblog and the Meetup service they can get the word out, mobilize supporters, and do it all on the cheap. A lesson that start-up companies learned long ago, or at least the ones still in business.

Ed Cone's point seems to be that the days of just kissing hands and shaking babies are over in politics. Technology has to be a piece of the puzzle from the very start of a political campaign, and you'd better know what you're doing. This is not amateur hour stuff. I also think Cone hints that all the technology in the world can't save a candidates who's message doesn't connect with voters. Yet another truth of the business world coming into play in politics.