Does Drudge even listen to what he links?

It isn't nuts if the context is understood. The campaign operatives Sen. McCain inherited from George Bush have been intent from the start on running a campaign like the ones Bush ran, one focused on getting the hard-care Republican base excited even at the expense of turning off other kinds of voters.

In fairness, it could well be that McCain could have won the GOP nomination this year in no other way; most Republican primary voters still admire Bush. Most general election voters are sick unto death of this President. They don't like, respect or trust him, and the best line for a Republican candidate this fall would therefore seem to be runnnig as the anti-Bush beginning right after the convention. McCain, obviously, didn't feel he could do that, having embraced Bush's positions on most major issues during the primaries. The question is whether, even if he wanted to run as an anti-Bush Republican, the people running his campaign would know how to make that work.

I don't think they would. McCain's campaign operatives are mostly Bush people. Their experience is with Bush, and their ideas about what works are based on what worked for Bush. Doubling down on the idea that Sen. Obama is a wild liberal, even a socialist, is the kind of thing that a Bush campaign would have done. The Republican voters who still like Bush will, most of them, eat this up, and to Bush Republican campaign consultants this means the "socialist" charge is working. Obviously, it isn't, not in this election. But college quarterbacks who have spent their whole careers running the option wouldn't be expected to do well if thrust into the West Coast offense, and this is no different. Ideally, people would do whatever works, but it's more common for people to do what they know how to do.

[...] little rant comes in inspired by Daniel Drezner quoting David Bernstein at Volokh: Based on this interview, it seems unlikely that Obama opposes [...]

Y'know, I try to give Drudge credit, but his in-the-tank-itude has been pretty bad this cycle. Last week I wrote about his artful misquotation of Colin Powell's endorsement of Obama, re: Scotus

Should there be a ? at the end of the last sentence? Just as you accuse Drudge of exerpting, aren't you a bit guilty as well. I believe it goes something like this - "if you pay someone not to work , they won't. A trivializing of Mr. Friedman and political economics.

The simple way to remove any ambiguity is for Sen. Obama to have a free and open press conference some time. Maybe the news woman from Florida could ask the questions.

What I heard Obama say was that it was a tragedy that the civil rights movement did not use the best methods available to get redistributive policies into place. In other words, there should be (or should have been, whatever) more redistribution. So mulling over whether he thought the courts should institute such policies or legislatures is missing the main point.

If it's just me, so be it, but when you want to take money from one group of people, and directly hand it to another, I have no problem calling that socialism. I can appreciate a significant difference between giving people goods and services, and actually giving people money. I don't think the government should *ever* take money from one person and simply hand it to another.

By this criteria, Milton “negative income tax” Friedman was also a socialist.

Except that Milton Friedman didn't propose the negative income tax in order to increase the amount of redistribution that was going on. He proposed the negative income tax in order to reduce the staggering effective marginal tax rates that people on welfare often face-- the "welfare trap" where any extra income massively reduces benefits and provides an incredible disincentive to work. He also proposed replacing the entire patchwork of welfare programs with one so as to manage these effective tax rates and prevent traps.

He certainly didn't propose it because he thought that there wasn't enough redistribution going on; he thought that the redistribution was extremely poorly targeted and encouraged people to stay in poverty.

[...] Here’s CONSERVATIVE political scientist Dan Drezner, Tufts professor: [...]

Justin: "If it’s just me, so be it, but when you want to take money from one group of people, and directly hand it to another, I have no problem calling that socialism. I can appreciate a significant difference between giving people goods and services, and actually giving people money. I don’t think the government should *ever* take money from one person and simply hand it to another."

Why are goods and services different from money? Are you saying you might favor universal healthcare, but would oppose Social Security?

Obama's position was made clear in that disputed interview. The point is not how he would like to see wealth redistributed, but that he does hold that position. Does anyone (with a brain) doubt that he would pursue both the legislative and judicial routes to do it? More liberal, illuminati sleight-of-hand. What else is new?

Dan,
Geeez... i know that you ve been a Hyde Parker too.. but give it a rest, trying to defend Obama.

Obama is as close as you can be to a socialist in the world's biggest capitalist country.

"Why are goods and services different from money? Are you saying you might favor universal healthcare, but would oppose Social Security?"

For one, the same reason you might want to give food to a homeless person instead of $10. Giving money allows the recipient to spend it how they see fit, rather than how the giver sees fit. The less attractive the recipient considers the goods and services they are being given, the more incentive they have to earn money instead, to do with as they like.