Cheeblogger!

It seems every presidential political season gives pet words and phrases that become super-repetitive, particularly to political junkies like myself.

Follow up:

In 2000, one of those words was "gravitas". Now, in 2008, it is "double down". This gambling term is being thrown around by more established media types than I can never remember some phrase capturing such ubiquitous usage in such a short time. Every other column one reads from an established media source, typically liberal, uses the term at least once. What is going on?

And I know exactly what they are doing.

A recent editorial in the Washington Post is the perfect case in point.

First, Obama used the phrase in his standard stump speech. The next thing you know, every column by the likes of Dionne, Alter, Matthews, and the like keeps applying the term "double down" everywhere you turn and for a myriad of different unrelated purposes except for one common target, John McCain.

It is unclear how coordinated this is but it is striking how quickly liberal news outlets have jumped on this phrase using profusely. They right columns often with no particular embedded thesis other than a circuitous argument twisted in such a way that the "double down" metaphor can be used. It is almost as if an English teacher has given them an assignment to write an essay that uses the phrase "double down". It is actually getting rather laughable.

They apply it to all manner of things they don't seem like about John McCain, such as his VP Pick, his early support of the Surge, etc.

This is an obvious code word. Regardless of how coordinated it is, it is. The purpose is clear. The idea is to plant in the minds of voters of casual interest that John McCain somehow represents a doubling down of whatever are considered to be the current problems of the day and George Bush. Whenever the media applies the term "double down" with regard to McCain, it simply is intended to make you think McCain does not represent change.

Yet, after the Vice Presidential pick of Gov. Sarah Palin, the experience debate has stormed to the forefront again. The real irony here is that, if you really dislike President Bush, then does Obama really represent the full doubling down?

All of the litany of George Bush shortcomings, mistakes, misjudgments to be believed must stand all in large measure as a result of President Bush's initial lack of experience.

If you say Bush is a liar, would more experience have shown him he could not have gotten away with it?

If you say Bush hurt the economy by getting us into the war and driving up gas prices, wouldn't more experience have helped avoid this?

If you say Bush fumbled the response to Katrina, wouldn't more experience have helped him not make those blunders?

If you say Bush spent too much money and busted the budget, wouldn't more experience have helped him be more prudent in the face of pork-barrel spending and realize that the American people would have understood?

It really is an ironic epiphany to realize that Obama represents the real doubling down. If you are a moderate and are disgusted with the mistakes of G.W. Bush, then why in the heck would you ever vote for Obama? Why would a moderate hand the office over to yet another newbie to make another series of mistakes just because he can give a good speech?

The real "double down" is Obama. As a conservative, it is difficult to admit that Bush could have benefited from more experience. But Bush has neither been conservative nor experienced until recent years. Did John McCain not warn people in 2000 that G.W. Bush was too inexperienced? Do you think he might have been right, in hind sight? If so, why would one "repeat the process" and expect a different result by electing Barak Obama, a man that has less executive experience than Gov. Palin.

Is it not plausible for a moderate voter to say "Can't we just, for once, elect a grown-up to be President and avoid all these mistakes in judgment?" If so, why would one like ever consider voting for Obama.

A moderate voters voting for Obama is like a gambler losing at craps and thinking he would do better at roulette. If you are a disenchanted Bush supporter and that he was too inexperienced to be President and that lead to all sorts of problems in his tenure, then why would one go and vote again for essentially the game at a different table but with the same odds?

Think McCain is NOT change? Think about this: No president has EVER been a carbon copy of his predecessor whether they were "hand picked" or not, just ask Teddy Roosevelt. The reason is that the success of a presidency is rarely the pure result of their political philosophy so much as the perceived result and response to things that just seem to happen, like 9/11 or Russia invading Georgia etc.

So change is coming whomever is elected, but an Obama vote is the real gamble. A voter that voted for Bush that now intends to vote for Obama is clearly the one doubling down.