There’s a lot of buzz about Carly Fiorina being part of John McCain’s inner circle and how she might be a candidate for Veep. Now, being that she hasn’t been elected to any office I doubt she’ll start at the top, most likely she’ll be in a support role much like Condoleeza Rice is currently. Still, that is pretty important since McCain himself has said he’s not adept at financial matters. The first time I heard about Carly Fiorina was in a report from Jay Nordlinger’s Davos Journal in 2004. Here’s what he said:

On to Carly Fiorina: She is CEO of Hewlett Packard, and she speaks in crisp, clear English. It is almost completely devoid of international-conference-speak, which is refreshing. She is like a cool glass of verbal water.

But what is the content of that water? She says that “the fundamental objective” of her company — the fundamental objective, mind you! — is not “to make money” but “to do good,” “to be a good international citizen.” When she says “make money,” she makes it sound so dirty. She borrows the old Quaker business about not just doing well but doing good.

Fine and dandy, of course, but I find myself wishing — not for the first time — that businessmen would be a little less defensive and more self-confident. They have nothing to apologize for. Does Hewlett Packard want to do good? Then let it invent and manufacture products that people need — or want, or that make their lives better — and sell them at affordable prices. That is doing good.

I hate to be more pro-Hewlett Packard than the CEO of Hewlett Packard, but . . . I tell you, I would wet my pants with joy if one of these people, at one of these conferences, said, “You know? People like Henry Ford and Bill Gates have done more for humanity than any thousand soi-disant benefactors-of-humanity put together.”

Except for the wetting of the pants I would agree with Jay.

Here’s a couple of snippets from wikipedia on Fiorina’s performance at Hewlett Packard.

HP’s services continued to lose market share to IBM, and HP continued to rely on its lucrative printer division to remain profitable

…

As HP’s performance slowed, the Board of Directors became increasingly concerned. In early January 2005, the HP Board of Directors presented Fiorina with a four-page list of issues the board had with Fiorina’s performance.^[22] A week after the meeting, the plan was leaked to the Wall Street Journal.^[23] The board proposed a plan to shift her authority to HP division heads, which Fiorina resisted.^[24]

On 9 February 2005, Carly Fiorina was dismissed as chairman and chief executive officer of HP.

…

After her departure from Hewlett-Packard in 2005, the company prospered, overtaking Dell as the biggest computer maker in the world. Her defenders, as well as some critics, credit her with laying foundations for that prosperity.

All in all I’d say lukewarm CEO at best. Ladies and Gentleman our next Secretary of Commerce!

Real quick…does anyone know what the DNC website and GOP website have in common?

That’s right, a big picture of Obama on the front.  I have not seen a picture of John McCain on either site for weeks.

Someone tell me why that is? Why is that the GOP has virtually NOTHING to say about their candidate for President on the main website, and instead has article after article after picture after “expose” about the Democratic candidate?  Does anyone else see something weird about that?

Thomas Sowell has a hit piece out on Savior, uh, Senator Obama.  While I think he is a little over the top on the fear mongering, the last two lines are killer:

Senator John McCain has been criticized in this column many times. But, when all is said and done, Senator McCain has not spent decades aiding and abetting people who hate America.

On the contrary, he has paid a huge price for resisting our enemies, even when they held him prisoner and tortured him. The choice between him and Barack Obama should be a no-brainer.

Ouch! BTW did anyone notice Obama lost South Dakota after winning all surrounding states? Funny things have been happening since Super Tuesday.

The Obama campaign is as of this moment 4 delegates short of clinching the nomination before the polls have even closed in Montana and South Dakota.  Rest assured the next 48 hours (or few weeks) will be a consistent (and at least partially understandable) media orgasm on the Democratic party electing our nation’s first African American Presidential Nominee from a major party.  And rest assured there will be about 10 times as much talk about the historical nature of the nomination as about the real issues.

(This is just a very brief aside, but I just heard Wolf Blitzer suggest to the McCain campaign that they should just “let Obama have his night.”  What a pompous ass.)

But that honeymoon will wear off, and EVENTUALLY, MAYBE, we’ll be able to have a real conversation without fear of being branded as racist, insensitive, or politically incorrect.  My only contention is that it is at THAT point that we will can say we’ve made some progress as a nation on the issue of race.

Can’t wait.

An article from the American Spectator touting Jindal’s credentials for vice president. I spoke with the Oracle of Esther the other day and in general I think it is a bad idea. It would look like a desperate attempt by McCain to put a brown face on the ticket.  (Speaking of McCain, isn’t the timing of Nancy Reagan’s endorsement interesting, given she’s about the same age as Barack Obama’s typical white grandmother?) Electorally, it doesn’t gain him anything, and Bobby is still green. Most importantly, we need him to clean up in Louisiana before he makes his run in 2016…heh.

Nevertheless, here’s a good blurb.

Maybe some think that this is going to be an election about health care? Jindal’s the man. In 1991 he was a young Hill staffer working for U.S. Rep. Jim McCrery. One day McCrery asked him to look over some Medicare plans being proposed in committee. A couple of days later, he brought back to the boss a totally revised system that was so impressive McCrery introduced him to Louisiana Governor Murphy J. Foster Jr. A few years later, Jindal, at the age of 24, was appointed Secretary of the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals. He took hold of the state’s Medicare program, which was running at a loss of $400 million, and in three years produced a surplus of $200 million. He later became chairman of the National Bipartisan Commission on the Future of Medicare. In 2001, he was nominated by President George W. Bush and approved by the U.S. Senate to be Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation of Health and Human Services. If Jindal gets a chance to debate Hillary Clinton, Hillary will be fumbling for her cue cards.

I know a lot of pundit-conservatives don’t like McCain because he had the audacity to run against W in 2000, which is not a valid reason. That he has attempted to rein in free political speech may be more valid. Regardless, I’m apt to listen to what Phil Gramm has to say because I respect him a lot, and wish he had got the nod in ‘96 instead of Bob Dole.