As usual, McCain was great today on the Bloggers' Conference Call. We got a bit beyond Iraq, which had been the focus of the first Call I participated in.

I like the fact that he feels the GOP has to get California back in play, and/or at least actively campaign there. He's right: not communicating here only perpetuates the problem. He maintains that he can make a difference here, that he can talk to us as a fellow Westerner. Maybe. The problem is, he's never done that well with libertarians, and most of us who fall right-of-center here have strong libertarian leanings. We'll see how it goes.

It was nice to see him discuss domestic issues such as tax reform, pork spending, revamping Social Security and Medicare, at the same time he's as well-versed in military matters as he ever was.

More later.

Posted by: Attila Girl at 01:53 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Much as one doesn't want to like Senator McCain, the politician (for we all love John McCain, the hero—and that's as it should be), sometimes it's impossible not to. I know that a lot of us have resistance to McCain's candidacy for two very good reasons:

1) McCain-Feingold;
2) the mainstream media's lionizing him as a maverick.

But the media no longer regard him as their darling; they no longer need him as a counter-balance to Bush. And he is an educated voice standing up for the necessity of finishing the action in Iraq properly, rather than abandoning good people to repression and mass murder, like we did with—say—the Vietnamese and the Cambodians.

He is also willing to educate the public about how to do what is required to win, and that makes him, frankly, a bit seductive. It's no secret that the major failure on the part of the Bush Administration in the conduct of this war has been on the public relations side. There is plenty to "sell" in terms of standing up to tyranny and making an example of one country, so others in the region will understand that the U.S. is still capable of playing for keeps. But neither Bush nor anyone on his team has really been out there, making that case, over the past four years.

For all my quarrels with him, I think McCain would.

Anyway, I'll be on a conference call with him tomorrow on the heels of his recent official announcement. (Yeah, like that was news. I'm sorry: Fred Thompson announcing a candidacy will be news. McCain announcing his? Dog bites man.) I'll be sharing my impressions briefly, before I head out to work, and then in a more extensive form later in the weekend.

[Copyeditor alert: I know that title case doesn't require the definite articles in my headline to be capitalized. But it just didn't look right the other way. I claim poetic license, and the fact that this is my blog. It turns out that the house style of Little Miss Attila requires capitalization of "the" when its editrix so mandates.]

Posted by: Attila Girl at 03:09 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Maybe. I sure tried to get Condi to run, back in the days before diplomacy made her hands so dirty, Neptune's seas may never wash them clean.

And I do believe George W. Bush got drafted; I was never convinced he really wanted the job, deep down.

But it's kind of a crappy job, if you think about it: the pay sucks, and you have to deal with Islamofascists. Plus, everyone blames you for things that have nothing to do with the Executive Branch. Including the damned economy . . . whassup with that?

On the other hand, this sure makes for good theater.

Posted by: Attila Girl at 08:39 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Fred Thompson's gun record looks pretty good.

Via Glenn.

Posted by: Attila Girl at 06:06 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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Hackbarth has the scoop on Tommy Thompson's formal announcement that he's running.

Sure, he has more executive experience than anyone else in the GOP field. So superficially, he would seem to be a strong candidate. But as a crack investigative journalist, I checked IMDB, and found, shockingly, that the former Governor of Wisconsin only has two credits to his name.

Some might say that problem-solving at the state and federal level left him little time to work on his credits—but that strikes me as a cop-out. I mean, surely there are community theatres around Madison, and small Indie production companies. There had to be some kind of opportunity to burnish his repertoire—even if it meant just doing voice work on local radio shows, or filming commercials.

The comparison is highly unflattering. How on earth are we supposed to take Tommy Thompson seriously as a candidate?

Posted by: Attila Girl at 03:26 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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I don't think he has to announce soon. He may not even want to run; he might only be thinking that he ought to if the top 3-4 guys can't generate just a little bit more excitement.

But the fact is, should he decide to run he's got a couple of huge advantages over the other candidates. (And it ain't just "the actor factor," either.)

At this point, McCain, Giuliani, Romney—and Gingrich, if he's actually serious—had better be bringing their "A" game onto this "pre-primary" testing ground. Because if they don't, Thompson could swoop down like a hawk. And let's face it: with his connections (political and entertainment-industry) and his charisma, his fundraising is going to go a lot more quickly than anyone else's has, and Sean's concern about "the money primary" WRT Thompson is probably a bit misplaced.

Posted by: Attila Girl at 03:05 AM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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