A Time to Fight

I'm not sure how I missed this but our favorite Senator Jim Webb has written a new book: "Jim Webb—the bestselling author and now the celebrated, outspoken U.S. Senator from Virginia—presents a clear-eyed, hard-hitting plan of attack for putting government to work for the people, rather than special interests, and for restoring the country's standing around the world. Webb exposes how America has entered a dangerous, unprecedented cycle of seemingly unsolvable unknowns. Our economic policies, particularly in this age of globalization, have produced widely divergent results leading to a country calcifying along class lines. Our demographic makeup has been altered dramatically and is set to keep on changing, through both legal and illegal immigration. Our editorialists and politicians talk about the American dream, and some urge us to bring democracy to the rest of the world. But more than two million Americans are now in prison, by far the highest incarceration rate in the so-called advanced world. Our foreign policy is confused, without clear direction; increasingly vulnerable to such largely unexamined long-term threats as China's emerging power while it has become bogged down in the never-ending struggles of the Middle East. As this drift toward societal regression has taken place, America's leadership has largely been paralyzed, unable or unwilling to stop the slide. 'Where are the leaders?' Webb asks. 'Has our political process become so compromised by powerful interest groups and the threat of character assassination that even the best among us will not dare to speak honestly about the solutions that might bring us back to common sense and fundamental fairness?'" Looks like I've got something to read once I finish Fareed's book. Speaking of Jim Webb, Slate has an article about the possibility of him becoming Obama's VP and it just happens to feature...ME! (Only in the fifth paragraph, no less.) Despite his protestations to the contrary, this book is perfectly timed to coincide with the start of the "Veepstakes". (Although, apparently, John Edwards is interested in VP - I think he would be better as Attorney General, though.) I think it would be an unstoppable combination. [Sign the Draft Jim Webb for VP petition.]