Be Patient? Tell That to My Landlord

Barack Obama is urging a nervous public to be patient.

In his radio address yesterday, the president claimed that the stimulus plan had "pull(ed) our financial system and our economy back from the brink." Now, he said, Americans must be patient.

Stay the Course Redux, anyone?

I understand what Obama is saying when he says his stimulus plan was designed to work over the next two years, not in a matter of months. I went to college. I didn't study economics, but I comprehend what he is saying.

And I think most unemployed people probably understand it, whether they went to college or not.

In fact, most of us probably would be willing to be patient. I can't speak for everyone, of course, but I do believe that is so.

But it would be a lot easier to be patient if we could see evidence that things are moving in the right direction.

And it would be easier to be patient if the president would urge bill collectors to cooperate with those who are struggling.

In my case, I'm talking about my landlord.

But I suspect that most landlords only care about getting the rent money on time.

I've been living in my apartment for almost 10 years. I've always paid my rent on the first of the month. I've never been late. I've never missed a payment.

During most of that time, though, I had a job. Around Labor Day, I joined the ranks of the unemployed. A few months ago, I met with my apartment manager to explain my situation. My lease will expire soon, and I wanted to know when I would need to notify them that I would need to vacate.

Did the manager say, "Don't worry about that. We know that these are difficult times for many people. You've been a valued tenant for nearly a decade, and we'll work with you until you can get back on your feet?"

No.

She said, "How long can you afford to pay your rent?" Then she charged me a $50 fee for a gizmo that would permit me to continue to have access to the laundry room.

The clear implication of the conversation was, as soon as I can no longer pay my rent, I'm on the street. It doesn't matter if I've been paying my rent every month like clockwork since the Clinton administration.

As I say, I understand what Obama is saying when he asks people to be patient.

But, as a practical matter, does he have any insights to share about how to keep a roof over your head or put food on the table while we're being patient?

Supreme Court Spin

A little while ago, I went to the CNN.com website to see if there was any breaking news. And I found an interesting report about the approaching confirmation hearings for Supreme Court justice nominee Sonia Sotomayor.

Well, actually, the story isn't about the hearings, which will begin on Monday. It isn't, for example, about the members of the Senate Judiciary Committee or the current feelings of the members of the Senate.

It's about a poll in which 1,026 people were asked if they felt Sotomayor should be confirmed.

Now, this poll was conducted by CNN/Opinion Research Corp. I've heard things that cast some doubt on the reliability of the results of the organization's surveys. So I suggest that you take the findings with a grain or two of salt.

According to the poll, 47% of respondents favored her confirmation, 40% opposed it and 13% were not sure. The survey's sampling error is plus or minus three points.

Therefore, the poll is suggesting that, as of June 26–28 (which is when the survey was conducted), the best–case scenario for Sotomayor's opponents was that she was narrowly favored in what might be nearly a statistical tie. The best–case scenario for her supporters was that she could be comfortably ahead — but those who are undecided still hold the key.

The link on CNN's home page said, "Poll: Sotomayor confirmation favored," which may be accurate, but it still sounds slanted to me. After you click on the link, you get a much more realistic headline — "Poll: Nearly half support Sotomayor's confirmation" — with the story.

I think we'll get a good idea of Sotomayor's likelihood of being confirmed once the hearings begin.

But the point that the story sought to make is what I find really intriguing.

The story (which was written by CNN's Deputy Political Director Paul Steinhauser) quotes CNN Polling Director Keating Holland as saying the opposition to the nominee's confirmation is the highest from the party that is out of power in two decades. And that suggests the confirmation hearings "could turn into a partisan battle."

Two–thirds of Republicans oppose Sotomayor. In contrast, 53% of Democrats opposed Harriet Miers. And only 32% of Republicans opposed Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

The article doesn't indicate which nomination in the last 20 years was the most contentious prior to this one. But my guess would be that it was either George H.W. Bush's nomination of Clarence Thomas in 1991 or Ronald Reagan's nomination of Robert Bork in 1987. Thomas was narrowly confirmed and still sits on the Supreme Court. Bork was defeated in the Senate.

I'm inclined to think it was the Bork nomination. His role in the "Saturday Night Massacre" during the Nixon presidency was still remembered and resented, and Democrats had just regained control of the Senate when Reagan nominated Bork. Thomas' hearings were contentious from the start because of his conservative views, but the opposition did not turn vehement until Anita Hill's explosive testimony. Democrats controlled the Senate during Thomas' hearings as well.

Whether it was Bork or Thomas doesn't really matter. What seems apparent to me is that the Sotomayor confirmation hearings have the potential to drain the administration of any momentum it may have — and that can have a severe impact on its ability to push through legislation dealing with health care or the environment or anything else.

Does Obama Have What It Takes?

This morning, I have been reading an article by Eleanor Clift in Newsweek that wonders, candidly, if Barack Obama is up to the job of being president.

Clift, for those who don't know, is hardly a conservative critic. She leans so far to the left that, during the Clinton administration, she was nicknamed "Eleanor Rodham Clifton" because of her rigid defense of the former first lady and now secretary of state.

When she complains about "Obama's Zen–like avoidance of confrontation," he needs to pay attention.

I've written about the same thing, but I used different words. Back in the days when the economic stimulus package was being debated in Congress, I wrote about Obama's misguided efforts to achieve bipartisanship. Obama and the Democrats in Congress nevertheless permitted so many concessions and so many compromises that we were left with an expensive, pork–laden package that has been ineffective in dealing with the urgent problems that needed to be addressed.

Sure, it has provisions that are aimed at long–term goals, and we won't see the benefits of those efforts for years. But the package has done virtually nothing to address the immediate problems that are strangling Americans. It may have slowed the rate of job losses, but it hasn't shown any sign of reversing that ominous trend. We're still losing hundreds of thousands of jobs each month when (taking into account population growth) we need to add at least 100,000 jobs each month just to stay even, and the current 9.5% unemployment rate is well above the 8% rate Obama and the Democrats said would be the plateau when they passed the stimulus package.

Clift says Obama needs to "get in touch with his inner LBJ," who was known for bullying and cajoling and threatening lawmakers to get his way by using "the treatment," a tactic Lyndon Johnson honed in his years as majority leader in the Senate, "but so far the signs don't look good."

I don't know if Obama has an aversion to criticism or what, but more than one promising presidency has been shot down by an irrational desire to stay on everyone's good side. That simply isn't possible in politics.

In case you haven't noticed it, Obama is a polarizing figure. He remains personally popular — but voters make a distinction between liking the president and liking his policies. Presidents Reagan and Clinton served two full terms in the White House and, despite leaving the presidency with high personal popularity, were loathed and despised by their opponents, largely (but not exclusively) on the basis of their political philosophies.

It's also worth pointing out that, although both Reagan and Clinton went on to win second terms, they suffered setbacks in their first midterm elections — in Reagan's case because of mounting unemployment. Remember his pleas to a chastened public to "stay the course?"

And, of course, in Clinton's case, the backlash was so severe that the Democrats lost control of both houses of Congress for the first time in four decades.

Voters haven't been as charitable when asked about Obama's policies as they have been when asked about the president himself. Clift observes that Obama's objectives are in danger, and that there is a short window of opportunity for him.

"With unemployment climbing and 12,000 people a day losing health insurance, Obama cannot allow universal health care to slip away yet again," she writes. "If a Democratic president with commanding majorities in both the Senate and House can't make it happen this Congress, the Democrats will take a hit in the 2010 congressional election, and the losses will be deserved."

This is Obama's "LBJ moment," Clift writes. And the window is still open for him. But she observes that the "steadily increasing number of people without jobs and health insurance is scary and their cry for change will only grow louder. The true unemployment rate is probably twice what the government records as people get discouraged and fall from the statistics."

That is the reality. It is what Obama and the Democrats were elected to do something about.

Interesting, isn't it, that Clift uses the word "change?" Last year, a majority of Americans responded favorably to the slogan "change we can believe in," but many are finding it harder to believe in change now.

The sniping between the parties hasn't changed. What's changed is which party is in the majority. When Republicans were in the majority, they liked to ridicule the Clintons and Al Gore. Today, with the Democrats in the majority, they enjoy doing the same thing to George W. Bush and Sarah Palin.

When the stimulus package was passed in February, Democratic Sen. Ben Nelson said those who hammered out the congressional compromise should be called "the jobs squad" and Obama, when signing the legislation, said it "mark[s] the beginning of the end — the beginning of what we need to do to create jobs for Americans scrambling in the wake of layoffs; to provide relief for families worried they won't be able to pay next month's bills; and to set our economy on a firmer foundation."

There seems to be — to put it mildly — a disconnect between the rhetoric of February and the reality of summer.

As Clift urges, Obama must spend his political capital. She acknowledges that "Obama is on pace to exceed Clinton and even LBJ in getting Congress to vote his way, in part by carefully picking his fights."

And she observes that "[v]ictory born of caution falls short of expectations but beats defeat any day."

That's true. But there is a fine art in being an effective president. Can Obama learn it in time?

Or is this the best you can hope for when a community organizer is elected president?

Did I Make a Mistake?

A few days before the Fourth of July weekend, I received an e–mail from an individual who works for Salon.com.

He told me that he had seen my blog on the internet, and he enjoyed reading what I had written. He specifically mentioned a couple of articles I had written that he liked. He wanted me to sign up with Open Salon, where my blog posts would be automatically posted and would be available to a wider audience.

As I have mentioned in this blog before, I am unemployed and I have been hoping to use it to attract the attention of an employer. Open Salon sounded like a way to get some additional exposure so I agreed to sign up.

Now, I was already familiar with Salon.com, which is the parent site for Open Salon, and I knew that some top–notch writers have written articles about current events that have appeared there. But, in hindsight, perhaps I should have taken a closer look at Open Salon first. At least, that is what I find myself wondering now, about a week since I signed on.

Why am I wondering that?

Well, here's a rundown of the headlines on the articles that have been selected — apparently by the editors — to appear on Open Salon's main page today (by the way, it is currently about 2 p.m. Central on Friday, July 10):

• Becoming a woman, ending a relationship


• Just re–opened: Birds–eye view


• All my wife's Facebook friends are men: Should I be worried?


• New study: Vibrators are everywhere


• Are you all functioning alcoholics?


• Yes, there's a baby bird in my bra


• Prominent yogi offers to cure homosexuality with yoga


• British family loses dog, sprinkles urine over town


• An open letter to Sarah Palin


• What's real on "NYC Prep"


• In support of "indefinite detention:" Just imagine what Palin could do with it!


• A freelancer's defense of print


• My first TV writing credit — and my meeting with Alan Thicke


• Did GM damage the American bankruptcy system?

Now, let me be clear here. I have nothing against any of these articles. I haven't even read most of them.

And I will say that I have found most of the articles I have read at Open Salon to be literate and engaging. I've been writing most of my life, and I have a very high regard for the written word. With almost no exception, I have been favorably impressed with the skill of those who write for Open Salon.

But I have been writing this blog for nearly two years. As of this minute, I have almost 900 posts at Freedom Writing. And I have some regular readers who should have an idea what I am likely to write about. So I'd like to ask them something: How many of those headlines sound like headlines for articles that I would be likely to write?

I'm not gay nor am I transsexual. I certainly don't use a vibrator. I'm not an alcoholic. I'm not sexually dysfunctional, and I'm not married, so my wife's Facebook friends are of no concern to me.

I had a dog once, but he was struck and killed by an SUV when he darted into a street about 15 years ago. I didn't sprinkle his (or anyone else's) urine anywhere then. Indeed, I've never gone around any town sprinkling anyone's urine, be it human or canine.

I will concede that there are some stories that could have been penned by yours truly.

That "bird's–eye view" story is apparently about the reopening of the crown of the Statue of Liberty. I haven't read the article, but there is a drawing with the article that certainly appears to be the face of Lady Liberty — and, as readers of this blog know, I wrote about the reopening last weekend.

I have written about Sarah Palin — in fact, I wrote a couple of posts about her in the last week, since her stunning announcement that she will resign her position later this month.

I haven't written about GM's bankruptcy, but I have written about a number of economy–related topics. It's not outlandish to imagine me writing about it if I have something I want to say.

But, clearly, most of these subjects are just not my style.

And that has been typical of my experience with Open Salon. I'm not saying that there isn't a market for this kind of material. But most of it isn't the kind of stuff that I've been writing.

Before I ask you something else about Open Salon, I'd like to mention something I saw on the CNN.com website earlier today.

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If you look closely, the headline on the article says "Do American care if Obama smokes?" The letter "s" would turn "American" to "Americans" and make it grammatically correct, yet in spite of several comments left by readers, no one at CNN.com has made the correction. It makes me wonder if anyone at CNN.com bothers to read the comments — some of them contain valuable tips for the copy editors.

CNN is a big company. Surely it employs a staff of copy editors.

This is of interest to me, you see, because I worked for almost 10 years on the copy desks of daily newspapers. It was not our function to gush over the prose (no matter how much we might admire what we read) but to catch mistakes — and typographical errors were just as important as errors of fact, even if they weren't as likely to lead to a lawsuit.

And typos in headlines seemed to jump out at you. If a copy editor permitted a headline typo to end up in print, there was hell to pay.

Well, this problem is not unique to CNN, but this is the most egregious example I have seen today. In its defense (and it is a weak defense, in my opinion), if CNN has reduced or eliminated its copy desk, it certainly doesn't appear to be the only one — in cyberspace or the real world.

But that's a subject for another time.

And now, back to Open Salon.

Open Salon allows people to send messages to the writers of these posts. That was something I wasn't aware of when I signed up. When I got my first message, I thought to myself (before reading it) that this might be an opportunity to have useful dialogues with people who could give me some constructive criticism that might help my writing.

But it turned out to be a come–on from a female (or someone posing as a female). This person appeared to be from overseas and appeared to be looking for someone to serve as her/his sponsor in this country.

I've received three more messages since I got that one. They've all been pretty much the same.

So I'd like to ask those who are reading this on Open Salon: Has that been your experience as well?

The Thousand-Yard Stare

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In many ways, I guess, it was timely that Robert McNamara died earlier this week.

Some of you may not know the name, but he was the secretary of Defense during the Kennedy and Johnson administrations in the 1960s. In fact, it was often said that the Vietnam War was McNamara's war — not unlike the way that the Iraq War has been linked to Donald Rumsfeld, although George Bush and Dick Cheney deserve their portion of the blame, as does Colin Powell.

McNamara defended the U.S. presence in Vietnam for a long time, but late in his life, he sought to atone, in an interview and the voiceovers for archival footage in a 2003 documentary about his time as secretary of Defense called "The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara."

I saw that movie a few years ago, and I can recommend it. When I saw it, we were still about two years away from the next presidential election, and I felt that the people who had the most to gain from seeing it, the ones who could influence U.S. policy right away, probably would never watch it.

McNamara's atonement came too late for many Vietnam vets, but his death reminded me of something that I used to hear mentioned fairly frequently during the days of Vietnam — the "Thousand–Yard Stare." That's the phrase that was given to the somewhat vacant stare that one often sees in a serviceman who has been through a horrific battle.

I think it was first widely used to describe veterans suffering from "battle fatigue" (now called "post–traumatic stress disorder") during World War II. As a child, I heard the phrase used to describe Vietnam vets.

Since McNamara's death — in between network reports on Michael Jackson — I've been thinking about the "Thousand–Yard Stare" — and I have been wondering if it is due for a comeback. Perhaps it will be applicable to many of those who have had to serve in Iraq or Afghanistan, but the phrase actually refers to a reaction to intense stress, which is not necessarily confined to combat.

So it's my guess that we'll start seeing the "Thousand–Yard Stare" in the faces of people who have been unemployed for a long time or who have lost their homes.

I'm sure Barack Obama and Joe Biden have been trying, and I know that improvements in the employment picture typically lag behind everything else, but after six months and the passage of an economic stimulus package with a price tag of nearly $800 billion, I had hoped to see better than a one–month reversal of the hemorrhaging of jobs from the economy.

Am I expecting too much? Maybe. But, when Biden tells a Sunday TV audience that the administration "misread" the economy and Obama says they received incomplete information, I just can't help feeling Obama and Biden are in over their heads. Maybe anyone would be.

I hope I'm wrong. Dear God, I hope I'm wrong.

A Second Stimulus?

Earlier this year, conservatives squawked loudly about the Obama economic stimulus package. Too costly, they said. Meanwhile, those on the left, including the Nobel Prize–winning economist Paul Krugman, argued that it wasn't enough.

But now, unemployment has already exceeded what the administration anticipated. Last month's unemployment figures were sobering following the prematurely giddy reaction to better–than–expected numbers in May (not "good," as I have observed before, just "less bad").

And, following Joe Biden's admission on Sunday that the administration "misread" the economy (don't you love that word? It reminds me of the 1970s when the folks in the Nixon administration said they "misspoke" on a whole range of things of which some knew little and others knew more than they were letting on), Kevin Hall and David Lightman of McClatchy Newspapers are speculating about the need for a second stimulus package.

"Only about a tenth of the money has been spent so far, and only about half of it will have been spent by October 2010, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office," they write.

"Meanwhile, the unemployment rate stands at 9.5% and is headed higher. More than 6.5 million jobs have been wiped out since the recession began in December 2007. Home foreclosures continue at record rates, despite a flurry of government programs. Remember those toxic assets clogging bank balance sheets and resulting in a credit crunch? Treasury's program to deal with them still isn't producing results.

"This wasn't what the administration envisioned."

Frankly, I find it hard to believe this is what the American people envisioned when they went to the polls last November.

But it's what they've got. And, as Hall and Lightman point out, the Obama administration has made its task much more difficult by "fostering unrealistic expectations." And now we're hearing talk about a second stimulus package.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer talks about being open to the idea, but Hall and Lightman observe that it will be easier said than done in the Senate, where "there's less appetite for additional stimulus — and little chance of getting the 60 votes needed to push one through."

It seems clear to me, though, that this time, if there is going to be a second stimulus package, it absolutely must focus on job creation. Long–term goals, like health care and alternative energy, are important, but we've squandered nearly six months that could have been used to put America back to work but have failed to do so. In that time, unemployment benefits have expired for many, and hundreds of thousands of people feel as if they have slipped through the cracks.

It's too late for some and getting close to it for others.

Back in February, Sen. Ben Nelson said the members of Congress who worked out a compromise on the stimulus package should be called "the jobs squad."

Well, where are all those jobs now, senator? If your compromise had delivered as advertised, we wouldn't need to have this conversation right now, would we?

Jack Cafferty of CNN has been asking his viewers if they think a second stimulus is needed.

But, you know, maybe the problem here is in the name. It needs a name that will address what is really the objective, and you aren't going to stimulate the economy until you start putting people to work.

As Mike Lux writes at Open Left, we need a jobs package, not a stimulus package.

My Apology to My Readers

I'm not going to take a lot of time with this, but I feel I owe it to you, particularly those of you who are regular readers of this blog.

Ordinarily, I try to write something every day. I will admit, my reasons for doing so are not entirely altruistic. I happen to be one of the millions of unemployed Americans — I've been unemployed since around Labor Day — and I've been trying to use my blog as a tool for my job search. I've been hoping to land something that would give me the chance to put my degrees in journalism to good use.

But I'm interested in my country and my world, and I like to be able to express my opinions in this setting.

Anyway, over the weekend, I found what I thought was the perfect job opening for me. It was an adjunct journalism teaching job at a nearby community college.

Now, when one has been out of work as long as I have, one is apt to have had some disappointments. And, I will concede, I have had my share. I have learned, among other things, that, because so many people are looking for work these days, employers can pick and choose. If you don't meet every single requirement, you're likely to be passed over. There doesn't seem to be any room for learning curves.

But, in this case, I could go down the list of requirements and confidently check off each requirement. I felt there was a good chance that I could at least get an interview, and those have been hard to come by.

Even so, when I found this job opening on Saturday, I didn't apply for it immediately. I sought the input of everyone I could think of — and they all encouraged me to apply for the job. I wouldn't call myself a devoutly religious person, but I have been going to church since February. And, this past Sunday, I went to church — we have communion on the first Sunday of each month in the Methodist church — and I prayed about this job during the service.

And I concluded that it was what I should do. All signs indicated that.

So, when I got home, I went online to submit my application. But, when I clicked on the link, nothing happened.

I fired off an e–mail to a woman in the H.R. department. She interviewed me for a web writing job back in April, and she had encouraged me to keep looking for job leads in the community college district in the future, even though I didn't make the cut for the second round of interviews for the other job. I felt she might be able to explain to me what the problem was. I didn't know if the job board had jumped the gun (it was, after all, a holiday weekend) or what.

While I was waiting for her reply, I tried again on Monday. This time, I got a message saying, "Sorry, this job is no longer available."

A few hours later, after some e–mail exchanges, I was told that the job posting was an error. Apparently, there had been such an opening but it was filled.

Anyway, for the last 30 hours or so, I simply haven't felt motivated to write about anything.

There have been a lot of things to write about, and maybe I will get back in gear tomorrow and feel like writing about the events of the day. Today, though, I have just been overwhelmed by a feeling of hopelessness, a sense of futility.

Things may not be better tomorrow or next week or next month, but I hope to be back on track after a good night's sleep.

I feel that I owe it to my readers.

I know that I owe it to myself.

Speed vs. Accuracy in the Digital Age

On the eve of Michael Jackson's much anticipated memorial service, I find it interesting that Marisa Guthrie writes, in Broadcasting & Cable, about the "flurry of incomplete and at times inaccurate reports" surrounding the "King of Pop."

Guthrie acknowledges that "speed occasionally trumps accuracy" in the digital age. Personally, I would say it happens more often than "occasionally," and, while I write three blogs, I worry about the future of news reporting when much of it appears to be destined to be in the hands of the so–called "citizen journalists," most of whom are answerable to no one.

"[T]he media has given a platform to an endless cycle of hangers–on and business associates who have emerged with all kinds of claims," Guthrie writes, "and the blogosphere has served to further gin up the rumor mill."

This is why I have warned my fellow bloggers against presenting something as fact until they have attributable sources to support their conclusions. Those in the modern news business still feel that desire to "scoop" the competition, but far too many give in to the temptation to do so without verifying the accuracy of what they report. It is a recipe for disaster.

The players in news reporting are changing, but the rules are still the same, as far as I can see. I fully expect a proliferation of libel suits as communications law struggles to catch up. I also expect many bloggers to be caught by surprise when they find themselves at the center of these legal actions.

In broadcasting, it's still about the ratings, as Guthrie observes.

"[W]hile a Pew Research Center survey conducted June 26–29 found that almost two–thirds (64%) of the public says news organizations gave too much attention to Jackson's death, TV ratings tell a different story," Guthrie writes. "CBS' 48 Hours Michael Jackson special Picking Up the Pieces, hosted by Katie Couric, won its time slot on June 30. More than 10 million viewers watched NBC Nightly News on June 25, the day Jackson died. On June 29, ABC's Nightline, which included reports about Jackson as well as Bernie Madoff, out–rated NBC's Tonight Show and CBS' Late Show. NBC's Today posted more than 6.5 million video streams on its website June 26, a new record."

Perhaps we needed the death of someone like Michael Jackson to focus some attention on the shortcomings of modern news delivery methods and ask some important questions. Traditional media outlets — newspapers, radio stations, TV networks — already have asked themselves these questions and realized that accuracy is more important than speed. That is why, on the day Jackson died, CNN refused to report that he was dead until it was able to confirm the information.

It's still better to be safe than sorry — even if being careful seems boring or hard work.

Internet journalism is still in its infancy. Perhaps it has to learn some of these old lessons the hard way. Perhaps it will take a few setbacks to gain credibility.

Taking the time to confirm the accuracy of a story will almost certainly result in the debunking of some outrageous — and, undoubtedly, enticing — stories.

But ask yourself this: Wouldn't you rather be right than be on the short end of a multimillion–dollar lawsuit?

P.S. At his blog You Don't Say, John McIntyre, a longtime editor for the Baltimore Sun, has some intriguing observations about "journalistic integrity."

It would be well worth your time to read it.

What Better Time to Make That Climb?

For the first time since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, visitors to the Statue of Liberty in New York were permitted to go all the way to Lady Liberty's crown on Saturday.

Surely, there was no better time to do that than on Independence Day, although it was apparently quite warm for those who were allowed to scale those lofty heights. And there were, apparently, a few obstacles to overcome along the way.

"For the privilege of being the first people in nearly eight years to climb the 354 steps to the crown of the Statue of Liberty, 30 visitors on the sun–kissed morning of July 4 had to first endure a bit of bureaucracy: red tape and stiff security," write Liz Robbins and Colin Moynihan of the New York Times.

"No wonder by the time these huddled masses reached the top of the hot, sticky and narrow staircase, they were indeed yearning to breathe free."

The New York Daily News published the winning entries in its Fourth of July essay contest, and reading them brings back memories of the thoughts that went through my head when, as a child, I visited the Statue of Liberty with my parents and my younger brother.

I don't remember if we climbed to the crown that day, but we probably didn't. I do remember standing at the statue's base and staring up into the sky to catch a glimpse of the crown and the torch. And I remember purchasing a souvenir miniature Statue of Liberty that somehow got misplaced over the years.

But I've never lost my faith in freedom and independence.

I am grateful for the sacrifices that were made by the soldiers who fought and died to keep America free. When I was a child, they fought in a distant land called Vietnam and were not treated well when they returned, even though they did not choose where they were sent. Since then, they have fought and died in many places to preserve the rights that are all too often taken for granted.

We owe them a debt we can never repay.

Trying to Figure Out Palin's Motives

Today is Independence Day.

In some places, there may be writers who are reflecting on the 233rd anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, but it seems that nearly everyone is speculating instead about what Sarah Palin's announcement yesterday that she intends to resign as governor of Alaska really means.

I guess it is inevitable that some people see her decision as a precursor to a presidential campaign in 2012. The arguments, both pro and con, are compelling, but none are persuasive — yet.

• In Palin's home state, Erika Bolstad of the Anchorage Daily News writes that the announcement "did nothing to shake what GOP pollster Whit Ayers called the 'lightweight' monkey on her back."


• Be that as it may, Jonathan Alter of Newsweek writes that, in Palin's speech, he heard the opening shots being fired in the 2012 campaign for the presidency.


• Jay Newton–Small offers, in TIME, some reasons why he believes Palin made this move, but he acknowledges that "[i]f her goal is to position herself for higher office, the stagecraft and timing of her announcement left Republicans scratching their heads."


• Jim Geraghty of National Review didn't hear the opening shot of the race for the GOP nomination. Geraghty observes that he was skeptical about Palin seeking the presidency in 2012 before yesterday's announcement, and he is even more skeptical now.
  
  "[T]he moment she expresses an interest in a presidential bid," he writes, "every rival, Republican and Democrat, will uncork the ready–made zinger: 'If elected, would she serve the full four years, or quit sometime in the third year again?' "

That will certainly be an effective argument — assuming Palin does not, as I wrote yesterday, seek another office in Alaska in the interim. But if she does run for the House or the Senate, even if the campaign is unsuccessful, it will, at the very least, give her an opportunity to polish her response to that kind of criticism.

• And Geraghty is quick to point out that he doesn't think the door to the presidency is completely closed for Palin. He cites three examples from recent history.
  
  "People thought Richard Nixon was through after the 1960 election. When Ronald Reagan failed to dislodge President Ford in 1976, people thought he had blown his best chance at the presidency. People thought Bill Clinton destroyed his political future with an endlessly long–winded speech at the 1988 Democratic National Convention."
  
  It is worth noting that, in spite of those initial public verdicts, Nixon, Reagan and Clinton each went on to be elected president twice.


• Ed Morrissey writes, at Hot Air, that it was "easily the most bizarre resignation I've seen, and just about senseless."
  
  He adds that "[t]he lame–duck explanation was the most incoherent part of the entire statement." In fact, he contends that she "destroyed her own credibiity in a single day."


• Andrew Malcolm of the Los Angeles Times observes that, even for an "unconventional politician" in changing political times, it's a tough move to comprehend. Is it a timeout or a flameout?
  
  "On the other hand," he writes, "in this political age, 60 months ago who'd have predicted a little–known state senator out of the Chicago political machine with a proclivity to vote 'Present' would be a U.S. senator, let alone the White House occupant?"

But, if some observers are bewildered by Palin's decision, others are not.

• John Batchelor is certain, in The Daily Beast, that yesterday's announcement makes Palin the front–runner for the 2012 nomination.


• On the other hand, Jazz Shaw is absolutely convinced, at Pajamas Media, that Palin has committed "political suicide."


• Dan Balz of the Washington Post sees it as further evidence that "one of America's most unconventional politicians" is "following an unpredictable path to an uncertain future."

Well, truth be told, the future is uncertain for everyone. After all, a year ago on Independence Day, how many people outside of Alaska had ever heard of Sarah Palin? Today, the whole country knows who she is.

For that matter, things are changing rapidly in America, and the conventional wisdom is not proving to be as valid as it once was.

It was once thought that a college education was a ticket to a lifetime of security, but today you will find as many college graduates as high school dropouts seeking employment in low–paying jobs.

It was once thought that newspapers could survive any economic downturn, but today the news business is collapsing before our very eyes, and it is quite likely that, before the year is over, there will be major cities across America that have no newspaper at all.

So who knows what will happen? Who can say, with any certainty, that he or she knows what is going through Palin's mind or whether her strategy (if that is what it is) is correct?

Time will tell. A mere 24 hours after Palin's out–of–the–blue announcement is not enough time. Let's give it more time and see what happens.