The GaitherLodge

Bob Cesca: Insane Republicans Reveal An Insane Budget Plan

2009-04-02T10:20:00.001-07:00

Bob Cesca: Insane Republicans Reveal An Insane Budget Plan

Frank Schaeffer: Open Letter to the Republican Traitors (From a Former Republican)

2009-03-09T15:16:00.001-07:00

Frank Schaeffer: Open Letter to the Republican Traitors (From a Former Republican)

The Crisis of Credit

2009-03-09T15:06:00.001-07:00

The Crisis of Credit Visualized from Jonathan Jarvis on Vimeo.

Five Minutes with Mitch Hedberg

2009-02-28T06:38:00.001-08:00

Bye, asshole - 236.com - News

2009-01-23T11:06:00.001-08:00

Bye, asshole - 236.com - News

Mavrik

2009-01-23T08:53:00.001-08:00

Heil Cheney

2009-01-11T20:16:00.001-08:00

H.E.R.B. - Had Enough Religious Bullshit !

Cheney Taunts Bush, Pardon Me or Else

2008-12-17T09:55:00.001-08:00

David Latt

Emmy-Winning Television Writer, Producer
Huffington Post, December 17, 2008 | 09:22 AM (EST)

With his ABC interview Vice President Dick Cheney put a smoking gun on the table. He admitted that he, along with other top administration officials, personally approved the CIA's waterboarding of prisoners. That he said it unapologetically is merely his low-keyed way of declaring open war.

President Bush has been working on his legacy by circulating an upbeat, 2-page talking point memo with a description of his successes in office. Bush likes to white-wash and obfuscate. Cheney prefers a more aggressive approach.

Always blunt, two-fisted, and condescending, the question is, why admit that he approved waterboarding? And why now? Maybe it was egotism, pure and simple, his own version of a legacy campaign where he takes credit for a policy that he asserts made America safe. But to his detractors it is an admission of guilt that is prosecutable, as damning as Jack Kervorkian's 60 Minutes interview that landed him in prison.

What he is responding to is the accusation in the just released Senate Armed Services Committee Report on the Treatment of Detainees in U.S. Custody that condemns the Bush administration in no uncertain terms:

A major focus of the Committee's investigation was the influence of Survival Evasion Resistance and Escape (SERE) training techniques on the interrogation of detainees in U.S. custody. SERE training is designed to teach our soldiers how to resist interrogation by enemies that refuse to follow the Geneva Conventions and international law. During SERE training, U.S. troops --- in a controlled environment with great protections and caution --- are exposed to harsh techniques such as stress positions, forced nudity, use of fear, sleep deprivation, and until recently, the waterboard. The SERE techniques were never intended to be used against detainees in U.S. custody. The Committee's investigation found, however, that senior officials in the U.S. government decided to use some of these harsh techniques against detainees based on deeply flawed interpretations of U.S. and international law.

The Committee concluded that the authorization of aggressive interrogation techniques by senior officials was both a direct cause of detainee abuse and conveyed the message that it was okay to mistreat and degrade detainees in U.S. custody.

There are those who argue that the Bush administration committed war crimes during their prosecution of the War on Terror. Nothing could be done during their tenure, but as January 20th rapidly approaches, some are already making the case, asking how these abuses of power could not be prosecuted. In his book "How to Break a Terrorist," in interviews and articles, a former interrogator, Matthew Alexander, has argued that the abusive interrogation techniques the administration approved didn't make us safer, they actually cost American lives.

Scott Horton in Harper's Magazine takes the argument one step further by characterizing the Bush administration as "The Torture Presidency". Glenn Greenwald in Salon examines the number of detainees who died of "heart attacks" and concludes that,

There are countless...episodes...of human beings in American custody dying because of the mistreatment -- authorized by Bush, Rumsfeld and others -- to which we subjected them. These are murders and war crimes in every sense of the word. That the highest level Bush officials and the President himself are responsible for the policies that spawned these crimes against humanity

There are those who see the vice president's admission as part of a strategy to force the president to pardon him and all those named in the Senate Report: Rumsfeld, Meyers, and Rice. If Bush doesn't pardon them, they will certainly be pursued by those in the new administration who will not let-bygones-be-bygone.

Since Bush has been famously reticent to grant pardons both as governor and president, then Cheney's ABC interview with Jonathan Karl is a way of provoking Bush to act while he still can. If Cheney is pardoned then he'll have it both ways: maintaining that what was done was legal and being protected from prosecution.

Fembot True

2008-12-11T12:35:00.001-08:00

ABC News: Watch: Rev. Wright TV Ad That McCain Would Not Run

2008-12-08T11:30:00.001-08:00

ABC News: Watch: Rev. Wright TV Ad That McCain Would Not Run

Posted using ShareThis

23/6: Bush's Legacy-O-Tron

2008-12-05T08:00:00.001-08:00

ecember 04, 2008

The Defending Bush's Legacy-O-Tron

It's easier to remember the things that he didn't ruin.

During a panel discussion of Bush's potential legacy last night, Karl Rove defended Bush's decision to go to war saying, "We wouldn't have gone to war if the intelligence was better." He of course neglected to mention that he's talking about intelligence that they fabricated.

The revisionist legacy builders are kicking it into high gear. But finding the silver lining in the Bush cloud is gonna be pretty difficult. So to help conservatives defend their guy, we provide this handy Defending Bush's Legacy-O-Tron, with all the excuses, concessions, and outright lies one might need in their effort to convince somebody that Bush wasn't the worst president ever.

Click here for the Legacy-O-Tron.

Rhambo

2008-12-03T15:32:00.001-08:00

Slow Moving Energy

2008-12-02T15:03:00.001-08:00

Ocean currents can power the world, say scientists

By Jasper Copping Last Updated: 2:39PM GMT 29 Nov 2008

Existing technologies require an average current of five or six knots to operate efficiently, while most of the earth's currents are slower than three knots Photo: AP

The technology can generate electricity in water flowing at a rate of less than one knot - about one mile an hour - meaning it could operate on most waterways and sea beds around the globe.

Existing technologies which use water power, relying on the action of waves, tides or faster currents created by dams, are far more limited in where they can be used, and also cause greater obstructions when they are built in rivers or the sea. Turbines and water mills need an average current of five or six knots to operate efficiently, while most of the earth's currents are slower than three knots.

The new device, which has been inspired by the way fish swim, consists of a system of cylinders positioned horizontal to the water flow and attached to springs.

As water flows past, the cylinder creates vortices, which push and pull the cylinder up and down. The mechanical energy in the vibrations is then converted into electricity.

Cylinders arranged over a cubic metre of the sea or river bed in a flow of three knots can produce 51 watts. This is more efficient than similar-sized turbines or wave generators, and the amount of power produced can increase sharply if the flow is faster or if more cylinders are added.

A "field" of cylinders built on the sea bed over a 1km by 1.5km area, and the height of a two-storey house, with a flow of just three knots, could generate enough power for around 100,000 homes. Just a few of the cylinders, stacked in a short ladder, could power an anchored ship or a lighthouse.

Systems could be sited on river beds or suspended in the ocean. The scientists behind the technology, which has been developed in research funded by the US government, say that generating power in this way would potentially cost only around 3.5p per kilowatt hour, compared to about 4.5p for wind energy and between 10p and 31p for solar power. They say the technology would require up to 50 times less ocean acreage than wave power generation.

Click here to read the full article on Telegraph.co.uk.

Obama's Use of Complete Sentences Stirs Controversy

2008-11-20T12:50:00.001-08:00

In the first two weeks since the election, President-elect Barack Obama has broken with a tradition established over the past eight years through his controversial use of complete sentences, political observers say.

Millions of Americans who watched Mr. Obama's appearance on CBS's 60 Minutes on Sunday witnessed the president-elect's unorthodox verbal tick, which had Mr. Obama employing grammatically correct sentences virtually every time he opened his mouth.

But Mr. Obama's decision to use complete sentences in his public pronouncements carries with it certain risks, since after the last eight years many Americans may find his odd speaking style jarring.

According to presidential historian Davis Logsdon of the University of Minnesota, some Americans might find it "alienating" to have a president who speaks English as if it were his first language.

"Every time Obama opens his mouth, his subjects and verbs are in agreement," says Mr. Logsdon. "If he keeps it up, he is running the risk of sounding like an elitist."

The historian said that if Mr. Obama insists on using complete sentences in his speeches, the public may find itself saying, "Okay, subject, predicate, subject predicate -- we get it, stop showing off."

The president-elect's stubborn insistence on using complete sentences has already attracted a rebuke from one of his harshest critics, Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska.

"Talking with complete sentences there and also too talking in a way that ordinary Americans like Joe the Plumber and Tito the Builder can't really do there, I think needing to do that isn't tapping into what Americans are needing also," she said.

Andy Borowitz is a comedian and writer whose work appears in The New Yorker and The New York Times, and at his award-winning humor site, BorowitzReport.com.

Global Climate Change: "A New Era"

2008-11-19T08:16:00.001-08:00

Obama Supporter? No Communion For You

2008-11-13T19:41:00.001-08:00

COLUMBIA, SC (AP) - A priest at a South Carolina Roman Catholic church says his parishioners shouldn't take Holy Communion if they voted for Barack Obama because of the Democrat's stance on abortion.

The Rev. Jay Scott Newman said Thursday church law doesn't allow him to refuse parishioners the sacrament at St. Mary's Catholic Church in Greenville.

But he said his congregants shouldn't take Communion until they do penance for supporting "the most radical pro-abortion politician ever to serve in the United States Senate or to run for president."

Newman's decision was first reported by The Greenville News.

In their annual meeting, the nation's Roman Catholic bishops vowed Tuesday to forcefully confront the Obama administration over its support for abortion rights.

Why Palin Matters: From the Daily Dish

2008-11-13T19:38:00.001-08:00

A reader writes:

Your post on Sarah Palin moved the ball. The issue is whether the media and the political class in the country can break through the persistent delusion of normalcy that has gripped our politics for too long. The delusion is that whatever happens is normal, simply because it happened. No historical perspective, no sense of proportion. Everything is just part of the normal give and take of politics.

It is too clever by half.

What is missing is the step of coming to judgement, drawing a conclusion, letting go of the self-willed inconclusiveness.

Actually, what was most infuriating about the election was watching people on TV pretend to not know what they knew. You could tell that numerous analysts and pundits knew that Sarah Palin was unqualified to be President, that McCain was not running a serious campaign, and that he was headed for a serious loss, yet none of that could be said aloud. It was like living in house where Daddy passed out every night, but everyone pretended that he liked to turn in early.

It is Bill Kristol's shtick: this world-weariness to outrage. Abu Ghraib was not normal; it is not normal to fabulize the case for war; it is not normal to pick a delusional know-nothing as a potential president. And it isn't sophisticated to pretend that none of this matters. It is craven.

Mark on Proposition 8

2008-11-11T17:27:00.001-08:00

It's God's fault

The cruel success of Prop. 8? Not Newsom, not gays. Blame You Know Who

By Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist

Friday, November 7, 2008

Michigan just legalized medical pot. Liddy Dole is gone. John Sununu is gone. The Dems picked up at least six Senate seats. North Carolina went blue for the first time in more than three decades. A teen girl in California, for the third time now, won't be forced to notify her parents if she wants an abortion.

Mark Morford

More Mark Morford »

South Dakota easily beat back, for the second time, the most repellent anti-choice legislation in the nation. Colorado was close behind, trouncing an insidious proposition that would've deemed a zygote a whole little person. California will get high-speed rail. The smart black dude actually won.

It's almost a grand sweep. It's almost the most forward-thinking, thoroughly stunning election in American history, so much dead wood and so many old evangelical poisons swept from the national dialogue, it's as though we just swallowed a grand emetic of possibility, and purged like never before.

Almost.

Amid the glory and the disbelief and the Obamapalooza, the thorn. The nail in the pudding. The kidney punch during the massage.

Some say the inglorious success of Prop. 8, the brutally regressive measure that removes the rights of very specific people who love very specific other people from ever marrying them, can be blamed on multiple factors.

Some say it was Gavin Newsom's smugness and political recklessness. Some blame Feinstein for daring to support Prop. 8's defeat. Some blame the black and Latino communities for their shocking and rather heartbreaking support of what essentially amounts to a civil rights abuse of the very kind they themselves fought so hard to overcome.

Or maybe it's all those sad, white, central portions of the state, the huge chunks of voters who live in places without much culture or perspective or major universities, who only hear certain strains of spiteful rhetoric and thin fearmongering, whose general lack of education means they apparently still believe certain flavors of love will poison everyone's soup and ruin the sanctity of the time-honored 50-percent heterosexual missionary position Christian divorce rate.

And I must say -- and you might not want to hear this -- a big chunk of blame for 8's passage has to go to the No on 8 campaign's initial arrogance, followed by their utterly limp reaction when the Yes campaign started attacking and gaining real steam. As one of my politically savvy Chronicle colleagues put it, "No on 8 was a bad campaign. Bad bad bad. Inept, amateurish, incompetent and, above all, guilty of committing the first and worst sin of politics: taking the voters for granted."

But I don't think it stops there. Because when you peel back all those surface factors, when you trace the line of quasi-reasoning back to its source, to the "real" reason many people voted for Prop. 8, I think the real blame lies with, well, the Almighty himself.

That's right, I blame God.

Wait, check that. Let me say it with the proper intonation and slant: Imagine my voice trembling, the very earth beneath my feet rumbling, the very letters you are about to read appearing in enormous gothic capitals, dripping with fire and smoke and Budweiser logos, all surrounded by scowling cherubim armed with poorly printed pamphlets and a severe dislike of throbbing techno: GOD.

What, too much? I don't think so.

Who stabbed marriage equality to death, again? The Mormon Church. Catholic groups. Evangelicals. Militant fundamentalists. Reclusive, sickly, notoriously right-wing billionaires like Howard Ahmanson, a guy who also funded a radical Christian theologian madman who himself endorses stoning gay people to death. The mother of Eric Prince, CEO of the notorious Blackwater thugs-for-hire company.

Behind it all, it's God. No, not the god you and I understand as a universal, non-gendered, asexual, love-drunk energy coursing through all things at all times everywhere without the slightest wisp of prejudice or geographical preference, but that famously small, myopic version, the one that encourages a literalist interpretation of very carefully selected Bible verse (to the complete disregard of myriad others) -- a version that, in short, has been drilled into the consciousness of far too many voters for far too long.

Is it not true? Once again this election, in pulpits across America, the call rang out: We must stop the gays. We cannot allow them entry into the sanctuary of Eternal Hetero Love. After all, marriage is (these people believe) the last upstanding Christian stronghold, the final barrier preventing America from becoming some sort of Sodom-iffic nipple-pierced polyamorous rave party where anyone can marry anything and pets are running scared and people stick parts of their bodies into other people's parts for sexual pleasure. The horror.

And yes, it must be said: Sad indeed to imagine many of those black pastors up there, cheering Obama's win and deeming this a new dawn for blacks after so many years of struggle for basic civil rights, while in the next breath talking up the wrath of God that will strike parishioners should they allow homosexuals to register for stemware at Crate & Barrel. Talk about disingenuous.

Let me suggest it outright: The vast majority of Yes on 8 voters seem to have been motivated, at least in part, by this sad misunderstanding of God, this harsh spiritual slant that supports a discriminatory, micromanager Almighty who fully endorses marital bliss, but only for some.

(Interestingly, I believe this is the same God who, until recently, didn't allow whites to marry blacks. Or women to vote. Or slaves to be free. Or people to get divorced. Or women to become priests. Or humans to wear condoms. Hmm.)

Then again, when you put it that way, the ugly fight for Prop. 8 makes perfect sense. After all, hetero marriage is all organized religion really has left, their last vestige of power and control. Everything else they fought so hard to inject into the national agenda -- intelligent design, God's war against Muslims, the end of reproductive choice, more prayer in schools, abstinence education, et al -- not only failed, but failed spectacularly. No wonder they're clinging to this rigid, outdated idea of marriage so violently.

So let me correct myself. I don't blame God. I certainly don't blame the kind of fluid, open-throated spiritual awareness that promotes, rather than denigrates, all forms of consensual love, that understands the human soul is ever in flux and must, like the society that forms around it, be allowed to grow and evolve lest it stumble and atrophy and vote Republican.

I do not blame God. I blame a very gloomy, revisionist version of the divine, a sour and demeaning mindset that believes in restriction, constriction, dread.

The good news is, I think Prop. 8's desperate, last-gasp victory merely reveals that this hollow, homophobic version of God is waning, sliding, fighting for its last taste of relevance, soon to be replaced by something just a bit more dynamic and open-hearted and, well, truly divine.

The bad news is, it's just going to take a bit longer than we'd hoped.

Thoughts about this column? E-mail Mark.

The Secret Service Blames Palin for Obama Death Threats

2008-11-10T12:20:00.001-08:00

(from the Oxtown Gazette)

The Secret Service is blaming Sarah Palin's hateful campaign speeches for a dramatic increase in the number of death threats against now President Elect Barack Obama.

The attacks provoked a near lynch mob atmosphere at her rallies, with supporters yelling "terrorist" and "kill him" until the McCain campaign ordered her to tone down the rhetoric.

But it has now emerged that her demagogic tone may have unintentionally encouraged white supremacists to go even further.

The Secret Service warned the Obama family in mid October that they had seen a dramatic increase in the number of threats against the Democratic candidate, coinciding with Mrs Palin's attacks.

There is no excuse for the hate and racism that was displayed at many Republican campaign events and I would find it hard to believe that Palin did not know what she was doing (although she apparently didn't know that Africa was a continent so the point is debatable). As crowds at her rallies shouted racial slurs directed at Obama, racist signs and even nooses were displayed on numerous occasions, she did nothing.

Sarah Palin is not the only one to blame. At any point during the election season, someone in the campaign could have said something. For the most part, that did not happen. McCain did seem to have one moment of clarity however. Possibly he realized what he and Palin had created was out of control and arguably responsible for their plummeting poll numbers. It proved to be too little too late.

There is one other phenomena that can be attributed to, or blamed on, Palin's rhetoric -- landslide defeat of the GOP. But I should stop playing the blame game.

Will the GOP learn a lesson from this election? Somehow I doubt it.

As you sow so shall you reap.

P.J. O'Rourke: We Blew It

2008-11-10T12:14:00.001-08:00

Let us bend over and kiss our ass goodbye. Our 28-year conservative opportunity to fix the moral and practical boundaries of government is gone--gone with the bear market and the Bear Stearns and the bear that's headed off to do you-know-what in the woods on our philosophy.

An entire generation has been born, grown up, and had families of its own since Ronald Reagan was elected. And where is the world we promised these children of the Conservative Age? Where is this land of freedom and responsibility, knowledge, opportunity, accomplishment, honor, truth, trust, and one boring hour each week spent in itchy clothes at church, synagogue, or mosque? It lies in ruins at our feet, as well it might, since we ourselves kicked the shining city upon a hill into dust and rubble. The progeny of the Reagan Revolution will live instead in the universe that revolves around Hyde Park.

Mind you, they won't live in Hyde Park. Those leafy precincts will be reserved for the micromanagers and macro-apparatchiks of liberalism--for Secretary of the Department of Peace Bill Ayers and Secretary of the Department of Fairness Bernardine Dohrn. The formerly independent citizens of our previously self-governed nation will live, as I said, around Hyde Park. They will make what homes they can in the physical, ethical, and intellectual slums of the South Side of Chicago.

The South Side of Chicago is what everyplace in America will be once the Democratic administration and filibuster-resistant Democratic Congress have tackled global warming, sustainability, green alternatives to coal

and oil, subprime mortgage foreclosures, consumer protection, business oversight, financial regulation, health care reform, taxes on the "rich," and urban sprawl. The Democrats will have plenty of time to do all this because conservatism, if it is ever reborn, will not come again in the lifetime of anyone old enough to be rounded up by ACORN and shipped to the polling booths.

None of this is the fault of the left. After the events of the 20th century--national socialism, international socialism, inter-species socialism from Earth First--anyone who is still on the left is obviously insane and not responsible for his or her actions. No, we on the right did it. The financial crisis that is hoisting us on our own petard is only the latest (if the last) of the petard hoistings that have issued from the hindquarters of our movement. We've had nearly three decades to educate the electorate about freedom, responsibility, and the evils of collectivism, and we responded by creating a big-city-public-school-system of a learning environment.

Liberalism had been running wild in the nation since the Great Depression. At the end of the Carter administration we had it cornered in one of its dreadful low-income housing projects or smelly public parks or some such place, and we held the Taser gun in our hand, pointed it at the beast's swollen gut, and didn't pull the trigger. Liberalism wasn't zapped and rolled away on a gurney and confined somewhere until it expired from natural causes such as natural law or natural rights.

In our preaching and our practice we neglected to convey the organic and universal nature of freedom. Thus we ensured our loss before we even began our winning streak. Barry Goldwater was an admirable and principled man. He took an admirably principled stand on states' rights. But he was dead wrong. Separate isn't equal. Ask a kid whose parents are divorced.

Since then modern conservatism has been plagued by the wrong friends and the wrong foes. The "Southern Strategy" was bequeathed to the Republican party by Richard Nixon--not a bad friend of conservatism but no friend at all. The Southern Strategy wasn't needed. Southern whites were on--begging the pardon of the Scopes trial jury--an evolutionary course toward becoming Republican. There's a joke in Arkansas about a candidate hustling votes in the country. The candidate asks a farmer how many children he has.

"I've got six sons," the farmer says.

"Are they all good little Democrats?" the candidate asks.

"Well," the farmer says, "five of 'em are. But my oldest boy, he got to readin' . . . "

There was no need to piss off the entire black population of America to get Dixie's electoral votes. And despising cracker trash who have a laundry hamper full of bedsheets with eye-holes cut in them does not make a man a liberal.

Blacks used to poll Republican. They did so right up until Mrs. Roosevelt made some sympathetic noises in 1932. And her husband didn't even deliver on Eleanor's promises.

It's not hard to move a voting bloc. And it should be especially easy to move voters to the right. Sensible adults are conservative in most aspects of their private lives. If this weren't so, imagine driving on I-95: The majority of drivers are drunk, stoned, making out, or watching TV, while the rest are trying to calculate the size of their carbon footprints on the backs of Whole Foods receipts while negotiating lane changes.

People are even more conservative if they have children. Nobody with kids is a liberal, except maybe one pothead in Marin County. Everybody wants his or her children to respect freedom, exercise responsibility, be honest, get educated, have opportunities, and own a bunch of guns. (The last is optional and includes, but is not limited to, me, my friends in New Hampshire, and Sarah Palin.)

Reagan managed to reach out to blue collar whites. But there his reach stopped, leaving many people on our side, but barely knowing it. There are enough yarmulkes among the neocons to show that Jews are not immune to conservatism. Few practicing Catholics vote Democratic anymore except in Massachusetts where they put something in the communion wafers. When it comes to a full-on, hemp-wearing, kelp-eating, mandala-tatted, fool-coifed liberal with socks in sandals, I have never met a Muslim like that or a Chinese and very few Hispanics. No U.S. immigrants from the Indian subcontinent fill that bill (the odd charlatan yogi excepted), nor do immigrants from Africa, Eastern Europe, or East Asia. And Japanese tourists may go so far as socks in sandals, but their liberal nonsense stops at the ankles.

We have all of this going for us, worldwide. And yet we chose to deliver our sermons only to the faithful or the already converted. Of course the trailer park Protestants yell "Amen." If you were handling rattlesnakes and keeping dinosaurs for pets, would you vote for the party that gets money from PETA?

In how many ways did we fail conservatism? And who can count that high? Take just one example of our unconserved tendency to poke our noses into other people's business: abortion. Democracy--be it howsoever conservative--is a manifestation of the will of the people. We may argue with the people as a man may argue with his wife, but in the end we must submit to the fact of being married. Get a pro-life friend drunk to the truth-telling stage and ask him what happens if his 14-year-old gets knocked up. What if it's rape? Some people truly have the courage of their convictions. I don't know if I'm one of them. I might kill the baby. I will kill the boy.

The real message of the conservative pro-life position is that we're in favor of living. We consider people--with a few obvious exceptions--to be assets. Liberals consider people to be nuisances. People are always needing more government resources to feed, house, and clothe them and to pick up the trash around their FEMA trailers and to make sure their self-esteem is high enough to join community organizers lobbying for more government resources.

If the citizenry insists that abortion remain legal--and, in a passive and conflicted way, the citizenry seems to be doing so--then give the issue a rest. Meanwhile we can, with the public's blessing, refuse to spend taxpayers' money on killing, circumscribe the timing and method of taking a human life, make sure parental consent is obtained when underage girls are involved, and tar and feather teenage boys and run them out of town on a rail. The law cannot be made identical with morality. Scan the list of the Ten Commandments and see how many could be enforced even by Rudy Giuliani.

Our impeachment of President Clinton was another example of placing the wrong political emphasis on personal matters. We impeached Clinton for lying to the government. To our surprise the electorate gave us cold comfort. Lying to the government: It's called April 15th. And we accused Clinton of lying about sex, which all men spend their lives doing, starting at 15 bragging about things we haven't done yet, then on to fibbing about things we are doing, and winding up with prevarications about things we no longer can do.

When the Monica Lewinsky news broke, my wife set me straight about the issue. "Here," she said, "is the most powerful man in the world. And everyone hates his wife. What's the matter with Sharon Stone? Instead, he's hitting on an emotionally disturbed intern barely out of her teens." But our horn rims were so fogged with detestation of Clinton that we couldn't see how really detestable he was. If we had stayed our hand in the House of Representatives and treated the brute with shunning or calls for interventions to make him seek help, we might have chased him out of the White House. (Although this probably would have required a U.S. news media from a parallel universe.)

Such things as letting the abortion debate be turned against us and using the gravity of the impeachment process on something that required the fly-swat of pest control were strategic errors. Would that blame could be put on our strategies instead of ourselves. We have lived up to no principle of conservatism.

Government is bigger than ever. We have fattened the stalled ox and hatred therewith rather than dined on herbs where love (and the voter) is. Instead of flattening the Department of Education with a wrecking ball we let it stand as a pulpit for Bill Bennett. When--to switch metaphors yet again--such a white elephant is not discarded someone will eventually try to ride in the howdah on its back. One of our supposed own did. No Child Left Behind? What if they deserve to be left behind? What if they deserve a smack on the behind? A nationwide program to test whether kids are what? Stupid? You've got kids. Kids are stupid.

We railed at welfare and counted it a great victory when Bill Clinton confused a few poor people by making the rules more complicated. But the "French-bread lines" for the rich, the "terrapin soup kitchens," continue their charity without stint.

The sludge and dreck of political muck-funds flowing to prosperous businesses and individuals have gotten deeper and more slippery and stink worse than ever with conservatives minding the sewage works of legislation.

Agriculture is a business that has been up to its bib overalls in politics since the first Thanksgiving dinner kickback to the Indians for subsidizing Pilgrim maize production with fish head fertilizer grants. But never, since the Mayflower knocked the rock in Plymouth, has anything as putrid as the Farm, Nutrition and Bioenergy Act of 2008 been spread upon the land. Just the name says it. There are no farms left. Not like the one grampa grew up on.

A "farm" today means 100,000 chickens in a space the size of a Motel 6 shower stall. If we cared anything about "nutrition" we would--to judge by the mountainous, jiggling flab of Americans--stop growing all food immediately. And "bioenergy" is a fraud of John Edwards-marital-fidelity proportions. Taxpayer money composted to produce a fuel made of alcohol that is more expensive than oil, more polluting than oil, and almost as bad as oil with vermouth and an olive. But this bill passed with bipartisan majorities in both houses of Congress and was happily signed into law by President Bush. Now it's going to cost us at least $285 billion. That's about five times the gross domestic product of prewar Iraq. For what we will spend on the Farm, Nutrition and Bioenergy Act of 2008 we could have avoided the war in Iraq and simply bought a controlling interest in Saddam Hussein's country.

Yes, we got a few tax breaks during the regimes of Reagan and W. But the government is still taking a third of our salary. Is the government doing a third of our job? Is the government doing a third of our dishes? Our laundry? Our vacuuming? When we go to Hooters is the government tending bar making sure that one out of three margaritas is on the house? If our spouse is feeling romantic and we're tired, does the government come over to our house and take care of foreplay? (Actually, during the Clinton administration . . . )

Anyway, a low tax rate is not--never mind the rhetoric of every conservative politician--a bedrock principle of conservatism. The principle is fiscal responsibility.

Conservatives should never say to voters, "We can lower your taxes." Conservatives should say to voters, "You can raise spending. You, the electorate, can, if you choose, have an infinite number of elaborate and expensive government programs. But we, the government, will have to pay for those programs. We have three ways to pay.

"We can inflate the currency, destroying your ability to plan for the future, wrecking the nation's culture of thrift and common sense, and giving free rein to scallywags to borrow money for worthless scams and pay it back 10 cents on the dollar.

"We can raise taxes. If the taxes are levied across the board, money will be taken from everyone's pocket, the economy will stagnate, and the poorest and least advantaged will be harmed the most. If the taxes are levied only on the wealthy, money will be taken from wealthy people's pockets, hampering their capacity to make loans and investments, the economy will stagnate, and the poorest and the least advantaged will be harmed the most.

"And we can borrow, building up a massive national debt. This will cause all of the above things to happen plus it will fund Red Chinese nuclear submarines that will be popping up in San Francisco Bay to get some decent Szechwan take-out."

Yes, this would make for longer and less pithy stump speeches. But we'd be showing ourselves to be men and women of principle. It might cost us, short-term. We might get knocked down for not whoring after bioenergy votes in the Iowa caucuses. But at least we wouldn't land on our scruples. And we could get up again with dignity intact, dust ourselves off, and take another punch at the liberal bully-boys who want to snatch the citizenry's freedom and tuck that freedom, like a trophy feather, into the hatbands of their greasy political bowlers.

But are we men and women of principle? And I don't mean in the matter of tricky and private concerns like gay marriage. Civil marriage is an issue of contract law. A constitutional amendment against gay marriage? I don't get it. How about a constitutional amendment against first marriages? Now we're talking. No, I speak, once again, of the geological foundations of conservatism.

Where was the meum and the tuum in our shakedown of Washington lobbyists? It took a Democratic majority in the House of Representatives 40 years--from 1954 to 1994--to get that corrupt and arrogant. And we managed it in just 12. (Who says Republicans don't have much on the ball?)

Our attitude toward immigration has been repulsive. Are we not pro-life? Are not immigrants alive? Unfortunately, no, a lot of them aren't after attempting to cross our borders. Conservative immigration policies are as stupid as conservative attitudes are gross. Fence the border and give a huge boost to the Mexican ladder industry. Put the National Guard on the Rio Grande and know that U.S. troops are standing between you and yard care. George W. Bush, at his most beneficent, said if illegal immigrants wanted citizenship they would have to do three things: Pay taxes, learn English, and work in a meaningful job. Bush doesn't meet two out of three of those qualifications. And where would you rather eat? At a Vietnamese restaurant? Or in the Ayn Rand Café? Hey, waiter, are the burgers any good? Atlas shrugged. (We would, however, be able to have a smoke at the latter establishment.)

To go from slime to the sublime, there are the lofty issues about which we never bothered to form enough principles to go out and break them. What is the coherent modern conservative foreign policy?

We may think of this as a post 9/11 problem, but it's been with us all along. What was Reagan thinking, landing Marines in Lebanon to prop up the government of a country that didn't have one? In 1984, I visited the site where the Marines were murdered. It was a beachfront bivouac overlooked on three sides by hills full of hostile Shiite militia. You'd urge your daughter to date Rosie O'Donnell before you'd put troops ashore in such a place.

Since the early 1980s I've been present at the conception (to use the polite term) of many of our foreign policy initiatives. Iran-contra was about as smart as using the U.S. Postal Service to get weapons to anti-Communists. And I notice Danny Ortega is back in power anyway. I had a look into the eyes of the future rulers of Afghanistan at a sura in Peshawar as the Soviets were withdrawing from Kabul. I would rather have had a beer with Leonid Brezhnev.

Fall of the Berlin wall? Being there was fun. Nations that flaked off of the Soviet Union in southeastern Europe, Central Asia, and the Caucasus? Being there was not so fun.

The aftermath of the Gulf war still makes me sick. Fine to save the fat, greedy Kuwaitis and the arrogant, grasping house of Saud, but to hell with the Shiites and Kurds of Iraq until they get some oil.

Then, half a generation later, when we returned with our armies, we expected to be greeted as liberators. And, damn it, we were. I was in Baghdad in April 2003. People were glad to see us, until they noticed that we'd forgotten to bring along any personnel or provisions to feed or doctor the survivors of shock and awe or to get their electricity and water running again. After that they got huffy and began stuffing dynamite down their pants before consulting with the occupying forces.

Is there a moral dimension to foreign policy in our political philosophy? Or do we just exist to help the world's rich people make and keep their money? (And a fine job we've been doing of that lately.)

If we do have morals, where were they while Bosnians were slaughtered? And where were we while Clinton dithered over the massacres in Kosovo and decided, at last, to send the Serbs a message: Mess with the United States and we'll wait six months, then bomb the country next to you. Of Rwanda, I cannot bear to think, let alone jest.

And now, to glue and screw the lid on our coffin, comes this financial crisis. For almost three decades we've been trying to teach average Americans to act like "stakeholders" in their economy. They learned. They're crying and whining for government bailouts just like the billionaire stakeholders in banks and investment houses. Aid, I can assure you, will be forthcoming from President Obama.

Then average Americans will learn the wisdom of Ronald Reagan's statement: "The ten most dangerous words in the English language are, 'I'm from the federal government, and I'm here to help.' " Ask a Katrina survivor.

The left has no idea what's going on in the financial crisis. And I honor their confusion. Jim Jerk down the road from me, with all the cars up on blocks in his front yard, falls behind in his mortgage payments, and the economy of Iceland implodes. I'm missing a few pieces of this puzzle myself.

Under constant political pressure, which went almost unresisted by conservatives, a lot of lousy mortgages that would never be repaid were handed out to Jim Jerk and his drinking buddies and all the ex-wives and single mothers with whom Jim and his pals have littered the nation.

Wall Street looked at the worthless paper and thought, "How can we make a buck off this?" The answer was to wrap it in a bow. Take a wide enough variety of lousy mortgages--some from the East, some from the West, some from the cities, some from the suburbs, some from shacks, some from McMansions--bundle them together and put pressure on the bond rating agencies to do fancy risk management math, and you get a "collateralized debt obligation" with a triple-A rating. Good as cash. Until it wasn't.

Or, put another way, Wall Street was pulling the "room full of horse s--" trick. Brokerages were saying, "We're going to sell you a room full of horse s--. And with that much horse s--, you just know there's a pony in there somewhere."

Anyway, it's no use blaming Wall Street. Blaming Wall Street for being greedy is like scolding defensive linemen for being big and aggressive. The people on Wall Street never claimed to be public servants. They took no oath of office. They're in it for the money. We pay them to be in it for the money. We don't want our retirement accounts to get a 2 percent return. (Although that sounds pretty good at the moment.)

What will destroy our country and us is not the financial crisis but the fact that liberals think the free market is some kind of sect or cult, which conservatives have asked Americans to take on faith. That's not what the free market is. The free market is just a measurement, a device to tell us what people are willing to pay for any given thing at any given moment. The free market is a bathroom scale. You may hate what you see when you step on the scale. "Jeeze, 230 pounds!" But you can't pass a law making yourself weigh 185. Liberals think you can. And voters--all the voters, right up to the tippy-top corner office of Goldman Sachs--think so too.

We, the conservatives, who do understand the free market, had the responsibility to--as it were--foreclose upon this mess. The market is a measurement, but that measuring does not work to the advantage of a nation or its citizens unless the assessments of volume, circumference, and weight are conducted with transparency and under the rule of law. We've had the rule of law largely in our hands since 1980. Where is the transparency? It's one more job we botched.

Although I must say we're doing good work on our final task--attaching the garden hose to our car's exhaust pipe and running it in through a vent window. Barack and Michelle will be by in a moment with some subsidized ethanol to top up our gas tank. And then we can turn the key.

P.J. O'Rourke is a contributing editor to THE WEEKLY STANDARD.

We're Not Retarded (23/6)

2008-11-07T09:29:00.001-08:00

American voters to world:"WE'RE NOT RETARDED!"

Woo hoo! We know how to not destroy the world!

Last night, American voters proved themselves to be very different than what most of the world had assumed. Since 2000, the world was certain that the majority of Americans were of such low intelligence that we needed constant care. Last night, we sent out a message loud and clear: "Despite our decisions as an electorate for the past eight years, we, as a people, are actually not severely retarded. Sorry for the misunderstanding and, um, those wars."

Based on McCain's campaign, no one bought into this assumption of our mental deficiency more than the GOP. Strategists for the McCain campaign clearly decided that any voting population that could elect George Bush twice obviously has some severe developmental disabilities and should be catered to as such. Yesterday, we proved them wrong.

Here are just a few intelligence tests that we passed with flying colors yesterday:

In electing Barack Obama, we proved that...

We can tell women apart - The GOP saw that many Democrats were big supporters of Hillary Clinton, who is a female. So someone decided, "They want a woman. Let's give them one of those." Someone else most likely asked, "Which woman should we get?" to which Steve Schmidt replied, "Who cares? They'll never know the difference."

We knew the difference.

We are aware that racism isn't the answer to everything - If the McCain campaign had one, overriding message, it could be summarized as, "The only way to solve all the problems facing this country is to vote against a black person." While the message appealed to many Americans, far more of us responded with, "Normally, I'd agree with you. But this time, racism just might not be the way to go." We took the gamble and won.

We can tell catchy three-word chants apart - A lot of stuff got chanted this election, because chants are fun and everyone should join in on one if they get the chance. But yesterday we proved that while all men are created equal, that's not the case with catchy three-word chants. Thus did 63 million Americans go into voting booths yesterday and declare that "Yes We Can" is a way better chant than "Drill Baby Drill."

We know that old people don't wanna change a goddamn thing - Americans have been around old people long enough to know that they don't like to change stuff. So when an old person started telling us about all the stuff he plans to change, we knew he was lying, and we responded the way we did when our grandfather went into that home. We ignored him.

We know not to do everything our plumber tells us to do - Actually, that's an overstatement. 63 million Americans know not to do everything our plumber tells us to do. For 55.8 million of us, however, when a plumber says jump we say how high. Still a good, not-that-retarded margin.

We know that when something might cause a global apocalypse, we should find another way - This, ultimately, was the true demonstration of our nation's level of intelligence. Each of us went into the booth thinking, "I can either vote for Obama, or the entire world will be reduced to ash and cinders before next Easter." Again, 55.8 million of us opted for the annihilation of Earth. But the other 63 million? That's right. Not retarded.

What Now for Obsessive Obama Supporters?

2008-11-07T06:59:00.001-08:00

Obama Win Causes Obsessive Supporters To Realize How Empty Their Lives Are

Big Tent

2008-11-06T10:07:00.001-08:00

obama redneck.JPG (JPEG Image, 500x450 pixels)

The Revolution Has Begun (A Letter to the Red States)

2008-11-04T12:25:00.001-08:00

Dear Red States:

We've decided we're leaving. We intend to form our own country, and we're taking the other Blue States with us. In case you aren't aware, that includes California, Hawaii, Oregon, Washington, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois and all the Northeast. We believe this split will be beneficial to the nation, and especially to the people of the new country of New California.

To sum up briefly: You get Texas, Oklahoma and all the slave states. We get stem cell research and the best beaches. We get the Statue of Liberty. You get Dollywood. We get Intel and Microsoft. You get WorldCom. We get Harvard. You get Ole' Miss. We get 85 percent of America's venture capital and entrepreneurs. You get Alabama. We get two-thirds of the tax revenue, you get to make the red states pay their fair share.

Since our aggregate divorce rate is 22 percent lower than the Christian Coalition's, we get a bunch of happy families. You get a bunch of single moms. Please be aware that Nuevo California will be pro-choice and anti-war, and we're going to want all our citizens back from Iraq at once. If you need people to fight, ask your evangelicals. They have kids they're apparently willing to send to their deaths for no purpose, and they don't care if you don't show pictures of their children's caskets coming home. We do wish you success in Iraq , and hope that the WMDs turn up, but we're not willing to spend our resources in Bush's Quagmire.

With the Blue States in hand, we will have firm control of 80 percent of the country's fresh water, more than 90 percent of the pineapple and lettuce, 92 percent of the nation's fresh fruit, 95 percent of America's quality wines, 90 percent of all cheese, 90 percent of the high tech industry, most of the U.S. low-sulfur coal, all living redwoods, sequoias and condors, all the Ivy and Seven Sister schools plus Stanford, Cal Tech and MIT. With the Red States, on the other hand, you will have to cope with 88 percent of all obese Americans (and their projected health care costs), 92 percent of all U.S. mosquitoes, nearly 100 percent of the tornadoes, 90 percent of the hurricanes, 99 percent of all Southern Baptists, virtually 100 percent of all televangelists, Rush Limbaugh, Bob Jones University, Clemson and the University of Georgia. We get Hollywood and Yosemite, thank you.

Additionally, 38 percent of those in the Red states believe Jonah was actually swallowed by a whale, 62 percent believe life is sacred unless we're discussing the war, the death penalty or gun laws, 44 percent say that evolution is only a theory, 53 percent that Saddam was involved in 9/11 and 61 percent of you crazy bastards believe you are people with higher morals then we lefties.

Finally, we're taking the good pot, too. You can have that dirt weed they grow in the South.

Peace out,
Blue States

MSNBC Live Results

2008-11-03T13:50:00.001-08:00

SuperBarack

2008-11-03T07:08:00.001-08:00

Intrade

2008-11-02T17:19:00.001-08:00

Candidates as Trains

2008-11-02T14:25:00.001-08:00

Ben Affleck as Keith Olbermann

2008-11-02T08:11:00.001-08:00

Oh. My. God. Could She BE More Frightening?

2008-11-01T10:27:00.001-07:00

ABC News reports:

In a conservative radio interview that aired in Washington, D.C. Friday morning, Republican vice presidential nominee Gov. Sarah Palin said she fears her First Amendment rights may be threatened by "attacks" from reporters who suggest she is engaging in a negative campaign against Barack Obama.

Palin told WMAL-AM that her criticism of Obama's associations, like those with 1960s radical Bill Ayers and the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, should not be considered negative attacks. Rather, for reporters or columnists to suggest that it is going negative may constitute an attack that threatens a candidate's free speech rights under the Constitution, Palin said.

"If [the media] convince enough voters that that is negative campaigning, for me to call Barack Obama out on his associations," Palin told host Chris Plante, "then I don't know what the future of our country would be in terms of First Amendment rights and our ability to ask questions without fear of attacks by the mainstream media."

Salon's Glenn Greenwald explains why this argument is frighteningly wrong:

If anything, Palin has this exactly backwards, since one thing that the First Amendment does actually guarantee is a free press. Thus, when the press criticizes a political candidate and a Governor such as Palin, that is a classic example of First Amendment rights being exercised, not abridged.

This isn't only about profound ignorance regarding our basic liberties, though it is obviously that. Palin here is also giving voice here to the standard right-wing grievance instinct: that it's inherently unfair when they're criticized. And now, apparently, it's even unconstitutional.

According to Palin, what the Founders intended with the First Amendment was that political candidates for the most powerful offices in the country and Governors of states would be free to say whatever they want without being criticized in the newspapers. The First Amendment was meant to ensure that powerful political officials would not be "attacked" in the papers. It is even possible to imagine more breathaking ignorance from someone holding high office and running for even higher office?

Campaign: 2 Weeks in 2 Minutes

2008-10-31T18:05:00.001-07:00

My Friends -- The Musical

2008-10-31T17:48:00.001-07:00

Final Wishes to the McCain Campaign

2008-10-31T15:58:00.001-07:00

Have fun storming

Wassup?

2008-10-31T10:41:00.001-07:00

Vote for Obama? Welcome to Hell

2008-10-31T10:15:00.001-07:00

You cannot be a Christian and vote for Obama

Posted: October 28, 2008
1:00 am Eastern

© 2008

To all those who name the name of Christ who plan to willfully disobey Him by voting for Obama, take warning. Not only is our nation in grave danger, according to the Word of God, so are you.

First, the facts on life: On July 17, 2007, Barack Obama spoke to Planned Parenthood and said:

On this fundamental issue of [abortion rights], I will not yield and Planned Parenthood will not yield. ... The first thing I'll do as president is sign the Freedom of Choice Act. That's the first thing that I'd do. ...

And what is the "Freedom of Choice Act"? It would completely federalize the abortion issue and strike down all state laws from parental notification to the Woman's Right to Know Laws to bans on partial-birth abortion, declaring them null and void with the stroke of an Obama pen.

In one week, America will make a choice. And to those who call themselves "Christian" who are planning on voting for Barack Obama, put down the Obama talking points and read God's voter guide before you go to the polls:

I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, that both you and your descendants may live (Deuteronomy 30:19).

But you think this issue doesn't matter? God felt so strongly about it that he carved it in stone:

You shall not murder (Exodus 20:13).

Think you can love God and still vote against life? In John 14:15, Jesus said:

If you love Me, keep My commandments.

Yes, and "Thou shall not murder" made the top 10.

Barack Obama and many of his followers claim to be Christian. But Isaiah 29:13 says:

Therefore the Lord said: "Inasmuch as these people draw near with their mouths and honor Me with their lips, But have removed their hearts far from Me, And their fear toward Me is taught by the commandment of men" (Isaiah 29:13).

And Matthew 7:20:

Yes, just as you can identify a tree by its fruit, so you can identify people by their actions (Matthew 7:20).

Knowing that, here's another command from Proverbs 31:8:

Open your mouth for the speechless, in the cause of all who are appointed to die.

To you who are pretending that you don't know this, Proverbs 24:11 speaks directly to you:

Rescue those who are unjustly sentenced to die;
Save them as they stagger to their death.
Don't excuse yourself by saying, "Look, we didn't know."
For God understands all hearts, and he sees you.
He who guards your soul knows you knew.
He will repay all people as their actions deserve.

It's not just about "hope" and "change." Proverbs 6:16-22 states there are some things God hates.

These six things the LORD hates,
Yes, seven are an abomination to Him:
A proud look,
A lying tongue,
Hands that shed innocent blood,
A heart that devises wicked plans,
Feet that are swift in running to evil,
A false witness who speaks lies,
And one who sows discord among brethren.

Obama-Biden are pro-death. McCain-Palin are pro-life.

Now choose life that you and your children may live.

On marriage, Mark 10:7 reveals what Jesus had to say about it:

For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife.

Notice, the man doesn't leave his father and mother to be joined to his domestic partner. In his Oct. 22, 2008, WorldNetDaily column, Matt Barber outlined Obama's position on marriage:

In 2004, Obama called DOMA (the Defense of Marriage Act) an "abhorrent law" and said, "The repeal of DOMA is essential. … For the record," he continued, "I opposed DOMA in 1996. It should be repealed, and I will vote for its repeal on the Senate floor. I will also oppose any proposal to amend the U.S. Constitution to ban gays and lesbians from marrying." Obama also came out earlier this year in favor of the May 15 California Supreme Court decision that unilaterally redefined natural marriage in that state to include same-sex duos. "I want to congratulate all of you who have shown your love for each other by getting married these last few weeks," Obama gushed. Despite assurances otherwise, these are not the words or policies of a man who opposes "same-sex marriage."

No, this election is not about race. It's not about the economy. It's about obeying God.

Even Martin Luther King Jr. said it's not about race:

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

To those who call themselves by the name of Christ who ignore what God says about life and marriage, who and are clinging to a fantasy of economic gain, think again.

Obama will use your tax dollars to kill innocent children, and then he'll take your paycheck and use it to "spread the wealth around." Don't believe me? Don't believe Joe the plumber? Hear Barack Obama for yourself in an 2001 interview about his goal to try what the Soviets proved does not work.

This is not a discussion of whether or not to redistribute the wealth; it's a discussion of HOW Obama wants to do it.

Be forewarned: If you willfully disobey God on life and marriage because of race or false hope for the economy, you will usher in the kind of change that brought the Soviet Union to collapse.

But the warning goes far beyond that. To those who think that God's grace gives them license to willfully disobey Him without consequences – think again:

Not everyone who says to Me, "Lord, Lord," shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, "Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?" And then I will declare to them, "I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!" (Matthew 7:21-23)

That deals with your eternity. Matthew 7:26-27 says if you don't obey God, prepare for a crash even sooner that that:

But anyone who hears my teaching and doesn't obey it is foolish, like a person who builds a house on sand. When the rains and floods come and the winds beat against that house, it will collapse with a mighty crash (Matthew 7:26-27).

I just hope you won't take the rest of the nation with you.

If the word of God matters more to you than your perception of personal gain, Joel 2:12 issues a call to repentance I pray you will heed:

"Now, therefore," says the LORD, 'Turn to Me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning'" (Joel 2:12).

Then obey Him in the voting booth

and out of it. If not, do us all a favor and quit calling yourself a Christian.

Voter guides can be found at www.f2a.org.

John McCain's Memo to His Brother Joe (by Jon Friedman)

2008-10-31T09:17:00.001-07:00

John McCain did not think it was necessary to get so specific with his brother Joe about things NOT TO DO during this historic election. However, in light of recent events he was forced to send him this memo:

Dear Joe,

I know how you can get cranky when you have to wait around and aren't able to get to where you want to be when you want to be there but I have to remind you to please try and be patient during this final week of the election. If you do find yourself calling 911 again (which I truly hope you will try not) please remember to NOT say, "fuck you" to them. Yes, even if they say things like, "this line is to be used for emergencies only" or "you're tying up the line for someone who may be in actual trouble" or even, "the health of a woman is at risk" or what have you.

Let's say, for example, you do find yourself on a really long line at the grocery store and in a force of habit you happen to accidentally call 911 to complain. Please don't use words like dumb bitch and/or slutty whore at all during the conversation. You've seen me do my best to refrain from calling Cindy (or anyone else) a cunt during the election and I would ask you to do the same. Once the election is over we can go back to doing whatever we damn well please but for now we have to pretend the poor, the stupid, the brown, the blacks (especially), and women are all just like us.

If you feel anything boiling up try some of the tips that I have learned:

1. Instead of saying things like cunt say "my friend(s)."

2. If someone you hate is speaking to you (or is near you) try not looking at them and simply roll your eyes and laugh. Smile hard.

3. Use air quotes to convey that you think something is totally ridiculous (without actually saying that it is).

4. Travel around with an idiot (and have them say what you can't).

Also, remember to wear pants when visiting that elementary school on Thursday. (Hahaha, I'm just kidding of course you'll wear pants.)

Only one more week to go! You can do it. I am proud of you little brother. I promise I'll let you push one of the buttons when we fire bomb some assholes!

Love,
John

P.S. Air quotes are when you make rabbit ears with both hands and then curl them up. and down in a repeating motion. Practice doing that while saying things like: good, decent and man.

Michael Goldfarb What? Holy Smokes

2008-10-30T17:00:00.001-07:00

Rasmussen's Sort-Of Final Projections

2008-10-30T11:35:00.001-07:00

The Last Word -- Almost

Christopher Hitchens on McCain and Palin

2008-10-30T11:01:00.001-07:00

The most insulting thing that a politician can do is to compel you to ask yourself: “What does he take me for?” Precisely this question is provoked by the selection of Gov. Sarah Palin. I wrote not long ago that it was not right to condescend to her just because of her provincial roots or her piety, let alone her slight flirtatiousness, but really her conduct since then has been a national disgrace. It turns out that none of her early claims to political courage was founded in fact, and it further turns out that some of the untested rumors about her—her vindictiveness in local quarrels, her bizarre religious and political affiliations—were very well-founded, indeed. Moreover, given the nasty and lowly task of stirring up the whack-job fringe of the party’s right wing and of recycling patent falsehoods about Obama’s position on Afghanistan, she has drawn upon the only talent that she apparently possesses.

It therefore seems to me that the Republican Party has invited not just defeat but discredit this year, and that both its nominees for the highest offices in the land should be decisively repudiated, along with any senators, congressmen, and governors who endorse them.

Ronald Reagan Revived: Are You Better Off?

2008-10-29T13:40:00.001-07:00

NY Times: Your Brain's Secret Ballot

2008-10-29T13:20:00.001-07:00

By SAM WANG and JOSHUA GOLD

Published: October 27, 2008

AS we enter the final week of a seemingly endless election campaign, opinion polls continue to identify a substantial fraction of voters who consider themselves “undecided.” Although their numbers are dwindling, they could still determine the outcome of the race in some states. Comedians and other commentators have portrayed these people as fools, unable to choose even when confronted with the starkest of contrasts.

Read the full article here.

The Finish Line

2008-10-29T08:06:00.001-07:00

McCain of 2000 Would Do Much Better in 2008

2008-10-29T08:03:00.001-07:00

Oct. 29, 2008 | Just over the horizon lies an alternate universe in which John McCain is locked in a tense nail-biter of a presidential race with Barack Obama, one in which the polls gyrate daily and "too close to call" describes most of the contested political landscape. To create this what-if Republican fantasy, only one thing needs to be changed -- and that mystery element has nothing to do with a mythical Barack Obama scandal or an inexplicable surge in George W. Bush's approval ratings. All that would have been required to achieve electoral parity and a plausible road map to the White House would have been for the Republican nominee to have transformed himself into ... (Warning: Mind-bending content ahead) ... the John McCain of the 2000 primaries.

Read...

Our Greatest Fear

2008-10-28T17:28:00.001-07:00

John McCain's Blah-Blah-Blah-O-Tron

2008-10-28T14:00:00.001-07:00

At a recent rally in Iowa, John McCain lashed out at his opponent, not just because of Obama's position on nuclear power, but also seemingly because he can express it in a clear, grammatically correct way. Said McCain:

You know, the other night in the debate with Senator Obama, I said his eloquence is admirable, but pay attention to his words. We talk about offshore drilling and he said he would quote, consider, offshore drilling. We talked about nuclear power, well it has to be safe, environment, blah, blah, blah.

Ah, yes. Blah blah blah. Truly, you are running a respectful campaign, Senator McCain. Who needs nuclear power to be safe, anyway?

Is this going to be McCain's new tactic for the final seven days before the election? Outright mockery of Obama's verbal statements? If so, get the jump on McCain's next public appearance with 23/6's John McCain "Blah Blah Blah"-o-Tron.

Click here to play.

McCain's Downward Spiral

2008-10-28T13:25:00.001-07:00

Overview

Barack
Obama leads John McCain by a 52% to 36% margin in Pew’s latest
nationwide survey of 1,325 registered voters. This is the fourth
consecutive survey that has found support for the Republican candidate
edging down. In contrast, since early October weekly Pew surveys have
shown about the same number of respondents saying they back Obama. When
the sample is narrowed to those most likely to vote, Obama leads by 53%
to 38%.

A breakdown of voting intentions by demographic groups shows that
since mid- September, McCain’s support has declined significantly
across most voting blocs. Currently, McCain holds a statistically
significant advantage only among white evangelical Protestants (aside
from Republicans). In addition, Obama runs nearly even with McCain in
the so-called red states, all of which George W. Bush won in 2004.

Just as ominous for the Republican candidate, Obama holds a 53% to
34% lead among the sizable minority of voters (15%) who say they have
already voted. Among those who plan to vote early but have not yet
voted (16% of voters), 56% support Obama, while 37% support McCain.

While
Obama’s support levels have not increased much in recent weeks, a
growing percentage of his backers now say they support him strongly.
Currently, 74% of Obama voters say they support him strongly, up from
65% in mid-September. A much smaller majority of McCain backers (56%)
say they support him strongly, which is largely unchanged from
mid-September.

The latest national survey by the Pew Research Center for the People
& the Press, conducted Oct. 23-26 among 1,500 adults interviewed on
landline and cell phones, for the first time includes minor-party
candidates Ralph Nader and Bob Barr. Few voters support either
candidate, and their inclusion does not substantially affect the
margins of support in the Obama-McCain race.

The survey finds that the proportion of Americans who disapprove of
Bush’s job performance has hit a new high in a Pew survey (70%); just
22% now approve of the way Bush is handling his job. Since January,
when Bush’s job rating was already quite low, at 31%, his approval mark
has declined by nine points.

As disapproval of President Bush’s job performance has edged upward,
fewer voters say that McCain would take the country in a different
direction from Bush’s. Currently, more voters say McCain would continue
Bush’s policies than say he would take the country in a different
direction (47% vs. 40%). Just a week ago (Oct. 16-19), voters were
divided over whether McCain would continue Bush’s policies or not (44%
continue, 45% take new direction).

Favorable ratings for the Republican Party, which rose sharply
following the party’s convention in early September, have declined to
about their previous levels. Currently, 50% say they have an
unfavorable opinion of the GOP, while 40% express a favorable opinion
of the party; in mid-September, about as many had a favorable opinion
of the Republican Party as an unfavorable one (47% favorable vs. 46%
unfavorable).

By contrast, a solid majority (57%) continues to express a favorable
opinion of the Democratic Party, while 33% have an unfavorable
impression. Majorities have expressed positive opinions of the
Democratic Party for the past two years (since October 2006).

Obama-McCain Matchup

Coming out of the party conventions in September, Obama and McCain
were running even. As the campaign enters the final stretch, Obama
maintains a solid lead over McCain, with few significant changes since
mid-October among key voter groups.

In mid-September (Sept. 9-14), McCain held significant advantages
among those earning more than $75,000 a year, white evangelical
Protestants, whites who have not completed college, and white men.
Today, he maintains a significant advantage only among white
evangelical voters, and has lost the lead or seen it shrink in most
other categories.

For example, among voters earning $75,000 a year or more, McCain
held a 53% to 39% advantage in the Sept. 9-14 survey. Now, Obama leads
by 52% to 41%. After the conventions, McCain held a 52% to 38% edge
among white voters. Today, he and Obama are running evenly at 44% each.
In September, McCain held a 56% to 34% advantage among white
respondents with some college education. Now, the candidates tally 46%
each.

Meanwhile, the latest survey shows Obama continuing to dominate
among his core support groups. Nearly seven-in-ten voters younger than
30 (68%) say they support the Illinois senator, compared to 24% who say
they support McCain. Among women, Obama leads by 20 points (54% to
34%).

Fewer See McCain Taking ‘New Direction’

Since
last spring, American voters have been divided over whether McCain
would continue President Bush’s policies or take the country in a new
direction, should the Republican nominee become president. In the
current survey, however, a plurality of voters (47%) say the Republican
nominee would continue Bush’s polices while four-in-ten say McCain
would take the country in a new direction.

Independent voters have become substantially more likely to say
McCain would continue Bush’s policies (37% in mid-October, 48% now)
than to say he would take the country in a new direction (50% in
mid-October, 38% now). By comparison, there have been no significant
changes in opinion among Republican voters or Democratic voters: The
vast majority of Republican voters (74%) say McCain would take the
country in a different direction, while nearly as many Democratic
voters (69%) say he would continue Bush’s policies.

Who Would the Candidates Favor?

Half of voters say that, if elected, McCain “would do too much for
wealthy Americans.” Far fewer – just 17% – believe that Obama “would do
too much for African Americans” if he is elected. These opinions are
largely unchanged since mid-September.

Whites who have not completed college are more likely than white
college graduates to say that Obama would do too much for blacks (24%
vs. 8%). Nearly half of whites (46%) who have not finished college say
that McCain would do too much for the wealthy.

Among all white voters, 19% say, if elected, Obama would do too much
for blacks; roughly twice as many (39%) say that McCain, if he is
elected, would do too much for the wealthy.

Who Are The Undecideds?

A
week before the election, nearly one-in ten voters (8%) remain
undecided in their choice for president and there is little to suggest
that these voters will move strongly to one candidate or the other on
election day.

When undecided voters are asked whether there is a chance they might
vote for McCain or for Obama, only 14% indicate a preference for one
candidate over the other (7% for McCain and 7% for Obama). More than
three-quarters (78%) of the undecideds continue to express uncertainty:
about three-in-ten (29%) say they might vote for either of the two
candidates, while almost half (49%) say that they do not know if
there’s a chance they might vote for either Obama or McCain. The
remaining 8% say they will vote for neither candidate.

Undecided voters are less educated, less
affluent, and somewhat more likely to be female than the average voter.
Nearly half of undecided voters (48%) say they attend religious
services at least weekly, which is same as the proportion of McCain
supporters. Fewer Obama supporters (31%) say theyattend religious
services at least once a week.

On most issues, the positions held by undecided voters fall between
those of Obama and McCain supporters, although they are somewhat more
similar to McCain supporters on the issue of illegal immigration.
Overall, these voters are more likely than supporters of either
candidate to say they don’t have an opinion about most issues.

Undecided
voters do clearly distinguish themselves from supporters of both McCain
and Obama in their lower levels of participation and interest in this
election, and partisan politics in general. A majority (51%) of
undecideds do not identify with either the Republican or Democratic
parties and fewer than half (48%) report having voted in the primaries
this year; by contrast, 63% of both Obama and McCain supporters say
they voted in a primary.

Fewer than four-in-ten undecided voters (37%) say they are following
news about the election very closely. By contrast, majorities of both
Obama supporters (56%) and McCain supporters (55%) say they are
tracking election news very closely.

One Week to Go

2008-10-28T01:57:00.001-07:00

POLITICO's 2008 Swing State Map

Click here.

Comparing Obama to Gore, Kerry and Dole

2008-10-28T01:25:00.001-07:00

A fair bit of attention has been paid in the blogs today to the assertion of McCain’s chief strategist Steve Schmidt that “The McCain campaign is roughly in the position where Vice President Gore was running against President Bush one week before the election of 2000.” It’s met a good dose of scepticism. The WaPo drily annotated the quote as follows:

McCain’s team dismisses the most dire polls — those showing the race nationally with a double-digit lead for Obama. Advisers believe the contest’s margin is in the five-to-seven-point range, about the same deficit, they say, that then-Vice President Al Gore faced at this time eight years ago against then-Gov. George W. Bush. (A Washington Post poll at the same point in the 2000 race showed a tie.)

NBC’s First Read similarly remarked:

[T]he NBC/WSJ poll right before the election found Bush ahead by three among likely voters (47%-44%). But our most recent poll shows Obama up [..] 11 points among likely voters (53%-42%).

In addition, Marc Ambinder points out that the margins are “way different” state-by-state: “Obama’s doing much better in 2008 than Al Gore was in 2000 in the battleground states.”

Now I had a graph up here a week or two ago charting how Obama’s current Gallup numbers compare with the lead or deficit that Kerry, Gore and Clinton faced in the previous three presidential elections. In the days since, Googlers have found this site through at least 27 permutations of searches involving some combination around Gore, Bush, polls, October, historical, 2000, elections, tracking and Gallup. So this is a good occasion to update that post and expand it, not just looking at the Gallup numbers but also those from the ABC, Zogby and TIPP daily tracking polls from 2000, 2004 and 2008.

First off, that chart from last time, based on the Gallup polling numbers from the last four elections. Here’s the update:

What does this graph tell us in general? That Obama is running well ahead of Gore and Kerry, but that comparisons with the 1996 race are still overenthusiastic. But also that in comparison with the Democratic candidates in 2000 and 1996, Obama’s margin over McCain is remarkably steady. Clinton’s lead over Dole lurched up and down between 9% and 23% in October, while Gore went from 11 points up to 11 points down, and then again to 1 point up to 13 point down. Obama’s Gallup poll lead over McCain, on the other hand, has remained within a relatively narrow bandwidth from 4% to 11%.

What does it indicate about Schmidt’s assertion? A week before the 2000 elections, Gore was down some 3-5 points, compared to Obama’s lead of 6-8% in the last three days. So that suggests some wishful thinking on the part of Schmidt. With the exception of one particularly bad day, Gore was steadily behind by 2-7 points throughout the last two weeks of polling, averaging out at -5%. Two weeks and one day before the last polling day, he was actually ahead by a point. In comparison, McCain’s average performance in the past two weeks hasn’t been much worse (-7.6%), so point to Schmidt there - but McCain hasnt been ahead in a Gallup poll since 16 September.

Gallup’s hardly the only poll though. Scouring pollingreport.com for pollsters that conducted daily tracking polls in all the last three elections, I found three. There’s Zogby; the ABC poll (whether or not conducted together with the WaPo); and TIPP. You may not have heard of TIPP, but it’s conducting a daily tracking poll for the Investor’s Business Daily, and in previous cycles did so for IBD and the Christian Science Monitor.

Schmidt is in luck here, because of the seven daily tracking polls out there now, TIPP and Zogby are among the three having shown the smallest Obama leads in the last two weeks. TIPP can tout having come second closest to the actual results among independent pollsters with its final poll on the Bush/Kerry race, so let’s start with that one:

Again, Obama’s doing clearly better than either Kerry or Gore were doing at this time - his margin vis-a-vis the Republican opponent is some 6 points better. Considering Gore won the popular vote and Kerry ended up down just 3 points, that’s always reassuring to note, especially considering this is the poll that’s been showing the smallest leads for Obama of all the seven daily tracking polls out there. Still, it’s not exactly a killer of a lead.

Schmidt’s argument works for this poll. A week before the elections, Gore was down some 4-5 points, and he’d still drop to -9 during that week. So McCain’s not doing any worse than that now.

How do the ABC(/WaPo) polls match up?

The ABC/WaPo daily tracking poll has only started a couple of days ago, so there’s not a whole lot of data available here yet, though we have an additional ABC/WaPo poll from back on 11 October. The picture’s clear anyhow: Obama is far ahead by about 10 points, while Gore was never down more than 5. Nothing to see here, Mr. Schmidt.

Zogby doesnt have the best of reputations, but let’s see the comparison for his daily tracking polls:

Zogby’s tracking poll started off very cautiously, with an Obama lead distinctly smaller than what most of its competitors were showing, but it’s had him surging the last few days.

This graph is again a good reminder, like the graphs above, that Kerry was behind pretty much throughout the endgame of the last elections; for some reason a lot of people think Kerry was ahead and take that ‘memory’ as proof of why you can’t trust polls. As for Steve Schmidt’s assertion, it obviously doesn’t hold up for the Zogby poll; McCain’s behind 10 points now, while Gore was never behind more than 5 in the last month.

All in all, then, Schmidt didn’t exactly lie; you can find a poll for which his assertion holds true. But cherry-picking is what you need to do here, so we’re firmly in the department of grasping for straws here. Not to mention, of course, the inconvenient detail that Gore lost the elections…

Giving Good Phone for Barack

2008-10-28T01:04:00.001-07:00

Patricia Zohn

Posted October 28, 2008 | 03:04 AM (EST)

The phone and I have always had a complicated relationship. There was a time when I liked it: my fondest memories are of the white Princess phone. (For those of you too young to know what that was, here is a picture.)

This was the chic object you were supposed to cradle lovingly in your hand as you lolled on your low slung striped sofa (I had one of those) with your feet kicked in the air behind you a la Gidget and gossip with your friends. I happily complied. It was the most private, let's just say, erotic object I had ever had my hand on, and on it I had the first tentative, breathy phone calls with boys with whom I could never have been so open with in person.

Its quality as sexual surrogate has somewhat dissipated now that there are cell phones which people use on the subway and email which favors time-release and allows you to be cool or warm and possibly too honest.

But the phone is still an intimate instrument. Voice is inflected; you can hear the pauses, the struggle for words, the self-conscious laugh, the desire to connect, or disconnect, as the case may be.

All this came rushing back at me as I spent more time than I have in years on the phone, dialing for Barack to Nevada this past weekend. I was surprised at how many people were willing to talk with me about this election since I usually am furious when people have my number. But over fifty percent of them gave me more than a few sentences. And many of them say they are still on the fence and won't decide until they walk into that booth.

One man told me he was on a ladder and I panicked thinking that no vote was worth making this guy fall off from a great height as he attempted to politely multi-task with me. But most who ducked were either about to go to the market, or just annoyed about hearing about the election yet one more time. (In California and NY we are not swing and have no concept of the onslaught that voters residing in states still considered in play are experiencing)

I was tempted at one point after a couple of hang ups to use Slydial, that wonderful new free phone service that allows you to jump directly to someone's voice mail, thus avoiding actual contact --so all the freedom of email plus the charm of voice. It's horrible being rejected even if the person doesn't know who you are.

But the elderly and the young, especially, were open to talking about themselves and how their families were voting, and I felt I made more progress than I had in person going door-to-door on the ground for Kerry just four years ago. The Obama campaign is so organized on the internet, phone dialing is a snap, and I made the commitment to spend an hour every day from now until the election reaching out to touch someone, even if it were a 84 year old, dare I say it, ex-plumber from Reno.

It is a lot easier than you think it is, and I urge everyone to sign up and dispel the nightmare of waking up the day after election day only to find out (gulp) that the polls were wrong.

Ads for phone sex still populate late night television, so there must be some people who still rely on the phone for a turn on.

But I don't think there could be anything more satisfying than using the phone to turn out a vote for Obama.

Greg Palast and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for Huffington Post

2008-10-28T00:59:00.001-07:00

How Cries of Voter Fraud Cover Up GOP Elections Theft
Fired US Prosecutor levels new charges against GOP operatives.

Virtually the entire mainstream electronic media drank ACORN Kool-Aid this month brewed up by the Republican National Committee. Almost no one seriously challenged John McCain's comical assertions that ACORN, a grassroots voter registration group, "is now on the verge of maybe perpetrating one of the greatest frauds in voter history in this country, maybe destroying the fabric of democracy."

While the Republicans had the distracted media searching for links between Obama and ACORN, RNC operatives were busily completing one of the most massive voter suppression and purging efforts in American history, stealing hundreds of thousands of Democratic votes across the embattled swing states and striving to arrange chaos and endless lines at the voting booths next week.

First the facts about ACORN. Months ago, we obtained, as part of our investigation for Rolling Stone magazine, the Republican's list the GOP alleged were the very worst cases of vote and registration fraud by ACORN and similar groups. We went through the names the GOP asserted were "obviously, undeniably and clearly fraudulent" voter registrations.

First, there was Melissa Tais, a dubious ACORN registrant. Her two voter registration forms show, admittedly, suspiciously different signatures. Republicans suggested Melissa was part of a massive fraud to allow Democrats to vote twice.

They were wrong. Ms. Tais, a Cerrillos, New Mexico, waitress, told us she had signed one form on a table and one form holding the paper in her hand. Hence, a second, wobbly signature.

Then there was Patricia White, who Republicans claimed was a fictitious voter. When we filmed her at home in Albuquerque, she seemed real enough.

And so on, through the entire GOP list -- not one fraud. And these were their best cases out of the five million "illegal voters" who Republican leaders claim have infiltrated America's voting rolls.

The overblown histrionics about ACORN do not surprise those of us who have been watching the RNC's election manipulation antics. For eight years White House operatives have been trying to gin up press stories about voter fraud. David Iglesias of New Mexico was one of seven U.S. Attorneys fired by the White House for their refusal to bring voter fraud prosecutions. "We took over 100 complaints," from the GOP, he told us, "We investigated for almost 2 years, I didn't find one prosecutable voter fraud case in the entire state of New Mexico."

Iglesias, a McCain supporter, has, for the first time, leveled a new and serious charge: Despite finding none of the 200 voters guilty, he says the White House nevertheless ordered him to illegally prosecute baseless cases against innocent citizens, just to gin up voter fraud publicity. His refusal, he says, cost him his job. "They were looking for politicized -- for improperly politicized US attorneys to file bogus voter fraud cases."

Read the rest of the article at HuffingtonPost.com.

Blind, Deaf and Dumb: Republican Ostriches

2008-10-27T15:06:00.001-07:00

A Right-Of-Center Blogger Poll On The Election

Right Wing News emailed more than 240 right-of-center bloggers and asked them to answer questions about the election. 76 blogs responded.

The bloggers were asked to select answers to the following questions (because some bloggers skipped particular questions, gave answers that weren't listed, or gave answers that were difficult to categorize, there are not 76 responses to each question.)

1) Who do you think is going to win the election?

A) John McCain: 53% (39)
B) Barack Obama: 47% (34)

2) Do you think Sarah Palin has been a plus or a minus to the ticket?

A) Minus: 9% (7)
B) Plus: 91% (68)

3) How do you feel about Sarah Palin as a candidate?

A) I really like her!: 80% (61)
B) She's so-so.: 12% (9)
C) I'm not a big fan!: 8% (6)

4) The Republican Party did poorly in the 2006 election and even if McCain wins is on track to do poorly again in this year's Congressional races. If you had to choose between these two options, do you think that's because they were...

A) Too conservative: 9% (7)
B) Not conservative enough: 91% (67)

5) Do you believe the mainstream media's coverage has been...

A) Relatively fair and even handed.: 0% (0)
B) Slightly biased in favor of Barack Obama.: 4% (3)
C) Slightly biased in favor of John McCain.: 0% (0)
D) Heavily biased in favor of Barack Obama.: 96% (72)
E) Heavily biased in favor of John McCain.: 0% (0)

6) Do you think Barack Obama is...

A) Honest (Yes or no?)

Yes: 11% (8)
No: 89% (66)

B) Patriotic (Yes or no?)

Yes: 24% (18)
No: 76% (57)

C) Qualified to be President (Yes or no?)

Yes: 12% (9)
No: 88% (66)

North to Alaska (We're Going North the Rush is On)

2008-10-27T14:47:00.001-07:00

Sen. Stevens found guilty on corruption charges

Jurors decide Alaska lawmaker lied about home renovations, other gifts

Video

updated 11 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - Sen. Ted Stevens was convicted of corruption charges Monday in a trial that threatened to end the 40-year career of Alaska's political patriarch.

Stevens, 84, was found guilty of all seven felony charges he faced of lying about free home renovations and other gifts he received from a wealthy oil contractor. Jurors began deliberating last week.

Visibly shaken after the verdicts were read, Stevens tried to intertwine his fingers but quickly put his hands down to his side after noticing they were trembling. As he left the courtroom, Stevens got a quick kiss on the cheek from his wife, Catherine, who testified on his behalf during the trial. He declined to talk to reporters waiting outside.

Story continues here.

Lose Ohio, Florida and Pennsylvania and Still Win?

2008-10-27T09:07:00.001-07:00

MSNBC: Obama Crosses 270 Electoral Vote Threshold

By Greg Sargent - October 27, 2008, 10:34AM

Chuck Todd and the gang at MSNBC's First Read become the latest electoral-vote crunchers to decree that Barack Obama has crossed the 270 threshold without any of their designated toss-up states:

After moving the battlegrounds of Colorado and Virginia from Toss-up to Lean Obama, the Democratic presidential nominee now has crossed the 270 Electoral Vote threshold in NBC's electoral map. One week before the election, Obama leads McCain 286-163, up from his 264-163 advantage a week ago. As we pointed out on Friday, the significance of moving Colorado and Virginia into Obama's column is this: If Obama wins those two states, plus Nevada, he can still get to 270 -- even if he loses Florida, Ohio, and Pennsylvania.

And that's a pretty huge "if," given that Obama has double-digit leads in Pennsylvania and is narrowly ahead of McCain in Florida and Ohio in many polls.

Read the complete story here.

Reunited

2008-10-27T09:00:00.001-07:00

Unbelievable: Biden Owns Worst TV Interviewer Ever

2008-10-25T21:22:00.001-07:00

The Sunday Telegraph

2008-10-25T20:40:00.001-07:00

Republican fears of historic Obama landslide unleash civil war for the future of the party

Senior Republicans believe that John McCain is doomed to a landslide defeat which will hand Barack Obama more political power than any president in a generation.

By Tim Shipman in Durango, Colorado
Last Updated: 12:37AM BST 26 Oct 2008

Aides to George W.Bush, former Reagan White House staff and friends of John McCain have all told The Sunday Telegraph that they not only expect to lose on November 4, but also believe that Mr Obama is poised to win a crushing mandate.

They believe he will be powerful enough to remake the American political landscape with even more ease than Ronald Reagan did in 1980.

Read the story here.

The Daily Show: Who the F@#K is That Guy?

2008-10-25T08:54:00.001-07:00

Joe the McCain Calls 911

2008-10-24T18:09:00.001-07:00

Ten Worst Ads (and the Best) of the Campaign Season

2008-10-24T17:20:00.001-07:00

Politico put together this list and compilation of the ten worst political ads of the 2008 season. If you don't have time to watch all of them, scroll to the bottom and watch Mike Gravel's viral and bizarre best ad of all time. OK, sure, I've been a huge Obama supporter and have invested my heart and soul in his candidacy, but how can you not write in Gravel for president after watching this ad?

Watch here.

Bush Endorses John McCain in the Oval Office

2008-10-24T08:58:00.001-07:00

The Choice: Comment: The New Yorker

2008-10-23T17:37:00.001-07:00

Never in living memory has an election been more critical than the one fast approaching—that’s the quadrennial cliché, as expected as the balloons and the bombast. And yet when has it ever felt so urgently true? When have so many Americans had so clear a sense that a Presidency has—at the levels of competence, vision, and integrity—undermined the country and its ideals?

The incumbent Administration has distinguished itself for the ages. The Presidency of George W. Bush is the worst since Reconstruction, so there is no mystery about why the Republican Party—which has held dominion over the executive branch of the federal government for the past eight years and the legislative branch for most of that time—has little desire to defend its record, domestic or foreign. The only speaker at the Convention in St. Paul who uttered more than a sentence or two in support of the President was his wife, Laura. Meanwhile, the nominee, John McCain, played the part of a vaudeville illusionist, asking to be regarded as an apostle of change after years of embracing the essentials of the Bush agenda with ever-increasing ardor.

Read: The New Yorker

$400 vs $150,000

2008-10-23T17:30:00.001-07:00

Opie Likes Obama

2008-10-23T16:56:00.001-07:00

See more Ron Howard videos at Funny or Die

Conservatives for Change

2008-10-23T16:55:00.001-07:00

David Sedaris in the New Yorker on Undecideds

2008-10-22T13:24:00.001-07:00

I don’t know that it was always this way, but, for as long as I can remember, just as we move into the final weeks of the Presidential campaign the focus shifts to the undecided voters. “Who are they?” the news anchors ask. “And how might they determine the outcome of this election?”

Then you’ll see this man or woman— someone, I always think, who looks very happy to be on TV. “Well, Charlie,” they say, “I’ve gone back and forth on the issues and whatnot, but I just can’t seem to make up my mind!” Some insist that there’s very little difference between candidate A and candidate B. Others claim that they’re with A on defense and health care but are leaning toward B when it comes to the economy.

I look at these people and can’t quite believe that they exist. Are they professional actors? I wonder. Or are they simply laymen who want a lot of attention?

To put them in perspective, I think of being on an airplane. The flight attendant comes down the aisle with her food cart and, eventually, parks it beside my seat. “Can I interest you in the chicken?” she asks. “Or would you prefer the platter of shit with bits of broken glass in it?”

To be undecided in this election is to pause for a moment and then ask how the chicken is cooked.

I mean, really, what’s to be confused about?

When doubting that anyone could not know whom they’re voting for, I inevitably think back to November, 1968. Hubert Humphrey was running against Richard Nixon, and when my mother couldn’t choose between them she had me do it for her. It was crazy. One minute I was eating potato chips in front of the TV, and the next I was at the fire station, waiting with people whose kids I went to school with. When it was our turn, we were led by a woman wearing a sash to one of a half-dozen booths, the curtain of which closed after we entered.

“Go ahead,” my mother said. “Flick a switch, any switch.”

I looked at the panel in front of me.

“Start on the judges or whatever and we’ll be here all day, so just pick a President and make it fast. We’ve wasted enough time already.”

“Which one do you think is best?” I asked.

“I don’t have an opinion,” she told me. “That’s why I’m letting you do it. Come on, now, vote.”

I put my finger on Hubert Humphrey and then on Richard Nixon, neither of whom meant anything to me. What I most liked about democracy, at least so far, was the booth—its quiet civility, its atmosphere of importance. “Hmm,” I said, wondering how long we could stay before someone came and kicked us out.

Ideally, my mother would have waited outside, but, as she said, there was no way an unescorted eleven-year-old would be allowed to vote, or even hang out, seeing as the lines were long and the polls were open for only one day. “Will you please hurry it up?” she hissed.

“Wouldn’t it be nice to have something like this in our living room?” I asked. “Maybe we could use the same curtains we have on the windows.”

“All right, that’s it.” My mother reached for Humphrey but I beat her to it, and cast our vote for Richard Nixon, who had the same last name as a man at our church. I assumed that the two were related, and only discovered afterward that I was wrong. Richard Nixon had always been Nixon, while the man at my church had shortened his name from something funnier but considerably less poster-friendly—Nickapopapopolis, maybe.

“Oh, well,” I said.

We drove back home, and when asked by my father whom she had voted for, my mother said that it was none of his business.

“What do you mean, ‘none of my business’?” he said. “I told you to vote Republican.”

“Well, maybe I did and maybe I didn’t.”

“You’re not telling me you voted for Humphrey.” He said this as if she had marched through the streets with a pan on her head.

“No,” she said. “I’m not telling you that. I’m not telling you anything. It’s private—all right? My political opinions are none of your concern.”

“What political opinions?” he said. “I’m the one who took you down to register. You didn’t even know there was an election until I told you.”

“Well, thanks for telling me.”

She turned to open a can of mushroom soup. This would be poured over pork chops and noodles and served as our dinner, casserole style. Once we’d taken our seats at the table, my parents would stop fighting directly, and continue their argument through my sisters and me. Lisa might tell a story about her day at school and, if my father said it was interesting, my mother would laugh.

“What’s so funny?” he’d say.

“Nothing. It’s just that, well, I suppose everyone has a different standard. That’s all.”

When told by my father that I was holding my fork wrong, my mother would say that I was holding it right, or right in “certain circles.”

Oh This Just Makes Me Happy

2008-10-22T13:12:00.001-07:00

GOP Pulling Its Ads From Bachmann's Race, Media Buyers Say

Five days after Rep. Michele Bachmann went on a McCarthy-esque rant suggesting Barack Obama was unpatriotic and urging the major newspapers of the country to investigate anti-American sentiment in Congress, the national Republican political parties are running for cover.

Two sources aware of ad buys in Minnesota say that the National Republican Congressional Committee is pulling its media purchases from Bachmann's race. If true, it is a remarkable fall for a congresswoman who, until recently, seemed relatively safe in her predominantly conservative district. The race had become closer in recent days -- the NRCC had transferred funds from Rep. Erik Paulsen (MN-03) to Bachmann a little over a week ago.

In the days following her appearance on Hardball, however, Bachmann has watched as her challenger, El Tinklenberg raised more than a million dollars off her incendiary remarks. That surge in fundraising put Bachmann's re-election in a far less certain position. Bachmann tried to stem the bleeding by telling the press she was sorry for her remarks. But with the national party now apparently pulling the plug, the situation has gone from bad to worse.

The Magic Touch (Just Don't Ever Quit or Die)

2008-10-22T13:08:00.001-07:00

How Much of Apple's Value Is Steve Jobs? 20%+

Henry Blodget | October 22, 2008 9:23 AM

Apple's single biggest corporate priority is (or should be) to diversify its dependence on Steve Jobs. In the past month, investors have gotten two stark reminders of just how much value the market attributes to Steve's ongoing health and presence:

A fraudulent report that Steve Jobs had had a heart attack (10% drop in stock in 10 minutes)
A surprise appearance on Apple's quarterly conference call yesterday (stock immediately up about 10% in after-market)

Neither of these stock moves illustrates the market's full estimate of Steve's value to Apple. If he were to leave the company, for whatever reason, the stock fall could easily be double the move in the hour after the heart-attack report--or more.

20% of Apple's value is a lot of money: $20 billion at a $100 billion market cap (which Apple enjoyed only a couple of weeks back), more at a higher market cap.

Steve and Apple need to find a clear, strong No. 2 soon, and then Steve needs to start sharing the stage with him or her. This person can come from within Apple or outside of it, but investors need to know who it is. The sooner the better.

Living in the Fake America

2008-10-21T16:32:00.001-07:00

Another Olbermann Special Comment: The Real America

2008-10-21T13:24:00.001-07:00

Here We Go Again

2008-10-21T13:20:00.001-07:00

Another GOP Rep: "Liberals Hate Real Americans"

Warming up a crowd in North Carolina on Saturday, Republican Rep. Robin Hayes offered the diagnosis that "liberals hate real Americans that work and achieve and believe in God."

His remarks came shortly after he had said he would "make sure we don't say something stupid, make sure we don't say something we don't mean."

Hayes had followed Rep. Patrick McHenry, also a North Carolina Republican, who laid out the choice between McCain and Obama.

Read the whole Politico story here.

And You Thought ACORN Was Serious

2008-10-21T08:44:00.001-07:00

Analyst: GOP voter fraud scandal 'really serious'David Edwards and Muriel Kane
Published: Monday October 20, 2008

The Los Angeles Times reported on Saturday that dozens of voters have complained they were duped by a firm working for the GOP into switching their party registration to Republican while being told they were signing a petition for tougher penalties on child molesters.

The switches could impede Democratic get-out-the-vote efforts and could prevent those affected from voting in next year's Democratic primaries. Some of the voters were even switched to absentee status, meaning they could lose their vote entirely if they show up at the polls on Election Day without bringing an absentee ballot.

The story began last summer, when California Democrats noticed sudden, unexplained turnarounds in Republican registration in certain counties and obtained a list of the new registrations from the San Bernardino County registrar's office. They found that more than 75% of the phone numbers given were invalid, and of those voters who could be reached, over 80% said their registrations had been switched to Republican without their knowledge.

Read the whole story here.

NY Times/CBS Poll

2008-10-21T06:46:00.001-07:00

Obama Appeal Rises in Poll; No Gains for McCain Ticket

By MEGAN THEE

As voters have gotten to know Senator Barack Obama, they have warmed up to him, with more than half, 53 percent, now saying they have a favorable impression of him and 33 percent saying they have an unfavorable view. But as voters have gotten to know Senator John McCain, they have not warmed, with only 36 percent of voters saying they view him favorably while 45 percent view him unfavorably.

Even voters who are planning to vote for Mr. McCain say their enthusiasm has waned. In New York Times and CBS News polls conducted with the same respondents before the first presidential debate and again after the last debate, Mr. McCain made no progress in appealing to voters on a personal level, and he and his running mate, Gov. Sarah Palin, had alienated some voters.

Personal appeal is an intangible element in voters’ decisions. Each voter has a personal reason for connecting with a candidate or not. But the percentage of those who hold a favorable opinion of Mr. Obama is up 10 points since last month. Opinion of Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr., Mr. Obama’s running mate, is also up, to 50 percent last weekend from 36 percent in September.

In contrast, favorable opinion of Mr. McCain remained stable, and unfavorable opinion rose to 45 percent now from 35 percent in September. Mrs. Palin’s negatives are up, to 41 percent now from 29 percent in September.

Mr. Obama’s favorability is the highest for a presidential candidate running for a first term in the last 28 years of Times/CBS polls. Mrs. Palin’s negative rating is the highest for a vice-presidential candidate as measured by The Times and CBS News. Even Dan Quayle, with whom Mrs. Palin is often compared because of her age and inexperience on the national scene, was not viewed as negatively in the 1988 campaign.

The nationwide telephone poll was conducted Sept. 21-24, with re-interviews completed Friday through Sunday of 518 adults, 476 of whom are registered voters. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus five percentage points for all adults and voters.

Among the voters who said their opinion of Mr. Obama had improved, many cited his debate performance, saying they liked his calm demeanor and the way he had handled the attacks on him from the McCain campaign.

Of those who said their opinion of Mr. McCain had been tarnished, many cited his attacks on his opponent, the choice of Ms. Palin as his running mate and his debate performance.

“Even though I am a Democrat, there was a strong possibility I would have voted for McCain,” said Yolanda Grande, 77, a Democrat from Blairstown, N.J. “What pushed me over the line was McCain’s choice of vice president. I just don’t think she is qualified to step in if anything happened to him.”

Do Schools Today Kill Creativity?

2008-10-20T15:55:00.001-07:00

TEDTalks

Dance Monkey Dance

2008-10-20T15:43:00.001-07:00

Feel the Excitement!

2008-10-20T09:35:00.001-07:00

McCain at the Alfred E. Smith Dinner

2008-10-20T09:29:00.001-07:00

Alfred E. Smith Dinner

2008-10-20T09:28:00.001-07:00

Play Palin Bingo!

2008-10-16T17:27:00.000-07:00

Every time Sarah Palin or somebody in her audience uses one of those tried and true Republican catch phrases -- terrorist, arab, kill him, maverick, Putin's head -- check off that square on your bingo card. There are four cards to choose from. Have fun!

Play here.

Crazy

2008-10-16T10:08:00.001-07:00

America is Ready for the Obama Effect

2008-10-16T09:17:00.001-07:00

Donna Brazile says the country is poised to elect a nontraditional candidate -- Barack Obama.

(CNN) -- After two years of talking about the 2008 presidential campaign ad nauseam, I still get one question repeatedly: Is America ready yet?

My firm answer after being on the road nonstop and witnessing the crowds of ordinary people standing together for a cause greater than themselves is that the country is poised to write a new American chapter.

All the polls say Sen. Barack Obama is leading and that his rival Sen. John McCain should be very, very worried. From mid-single digits to low double-digits, some pollsters and pundits seem to believe that Obama has got this election in the bag.

But anyone who's been in this game for more than a round or two knows not to pop the bubbly too early. Who knows what can happen in the final weeks, days and hours of a presidential election? October has earned its reputation for surprises.

Read the full article here.

McBush

2008-10-16T07:24:00.001-07:00

Electoral Map Predictor (from Intrade)

2008-10-15T14:59:00.001-07:00

Trailer: Sustaining The World, by Robin Moore

2008-10-15T11:31:00.001-07:00

An Angry Keith

2008-10-15T10:42:00.001-07:00

MoveOn.Org: Registering Young Voters

2008-10-15T10:37:00.001-07:00

McCain Ad: Unethical

2008-10-15T10:07:00.001-07:00

In the Game

2008-10-14T17:07:00.001-07:00

Ads for Obama campaign: ‘It's in the game’

Presidential candidate is the first to buy ad space inside a video game

By Devlin Barrett

updated 1:55 p.m. PT, Tues., Oct. 14, 2008

WASHINGTON - Too busy playing video games to watch presidential ads on television? Barack Obama has found you, too, by becoming the first presidential candidate to buy ad space inside a game.

Read the full article here.

The American Promise

2008-10-14T16:53:00.001-07:00

Name Game

2008-10-14T16:47:00.001-07:00

MC Yogi

2008-10-14T15:20:00.001-07:00

Washington Post/ABC News Poll

2008-10-13T12:05:00.001-07:00

Obama up by 10 points among likely voters

Poll: McCain favorability ratings fall just 3 weeks before Election Day

By Anne E. Kornblut and Jon Cohen

updated 3:43 a.m. PT, Mon., Oct. 13, 2008

With just over three weeks until Election Day, the two presidential nominees appear to be on opposite trajectories, with Sen. Barack Obama gaining momentum and Sen. John McCain stalled or losing ground on a range of issues and personal traits, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

Overall, Obama is leading 53 percent to 43 percent among likely voters, and for the first time in the general-election campaign, voters gave the Democrat a clear edge on tax policy and providing strong leadership.

McCain has made little headway in his attempts to convince voters that Obama is too "risky" or too "liberal." Rather, recent strategic shifts may have hurt the Republican nominee, who now has higher negative ratings than his rival and is seen as mostly attacking his opponent rather than addressing the issues that voters care about. Even McCain's supporters are now less enthusiastic about his candidacy, returning to levels not seen since before the Republican National Convention.

Conversely, Obama's pitch to the middle class on taxes is beginning to sink in; nearly as many said they think their taxes would go up under a McCain administration as under an Obama presidency, and more see their burdens easing with the Democrat in the White House.

The poll was conducted after Tuesday night's debate, which most voters said did not sway their opinions much. Still, voters' impressions of Obama are up, and views of McCain have slipped.

Nearly two-thirds of voters, 64 percent, now view Obama favorably, up six percentage points from early September. About a third of voters have a better opinion of the senator from Illinois because of his debate performances, while 8 percent have a lower opinion of him. By contrast, more than a quarter said they think worse of McCain as a result of the debates, more than double the proportion saying their opinion had improved. McCain's overall rating has also dipped seven points, to 52 percent, over the past month.

With the final debate set for Wednesday at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y., McCain faces a narrowing window in which to reverse course.

Among the reasons McCain's path to victory seems steeper is that the percentage of "movable" voters continues to shrink. Thirteen percent of all voters are now either undecided or may change their mind before Election Day, down somewhat from recent polls.

Relatively high numbers of movable voters this year have led to poll swings. While McCain and Obama ran nearly even in Post-ABC polling for months, the financial crisis began to accelerate in mid-September -- and so did Obama, stretching to a nine-point lead. That lead narrowed slightly, to four points, after the first presidential debate, then widened again to its current 10 points.

Adding to McCain's burden as the standard-bearer for the party in power is an unprecedented grim view of the country overall: Ninety percent of Americans now see the country as headed in the wrong direction, the worst rating in polls dating to 1973.

There is also near-universal concern for the direction of the nation's economy over the next few years, growing fear that the stock market will perform poorly, and worry that household finances will suffer, factors that contribute to President Bush's approval rating hitting another low.

Video

Twenty-three percent of all adults -- and 18 percent of political independents -- gave the president good marks, putting him within a point of Harry S. Truman's record low in a February 1952 Gallup poll. The low ratings continue to have a dampening effect on McCain: More than half of voters, 51 percent, said that McCain, if elected, would largely continue to lead the country in the direction Bush has, and those voters overwhelmingly prefer Obama.

While there are few signs of progress for McCain in the poll, recent history suggests that mid-October leads are vulnerable, although turning around a late double-digit deficit would be unprecedented in the modern era. At this stage in 1992, Bill Clinton held a 14-point advantage over incumbent George H.W. Bush in Post-ABC polling, and it was as high as 19 points before the election, which he won by six points. In mid-October 1976, Jimmy Carter had leads as big as 13 points in Gallup polling; Carter defeated incumbent Gerald Ford by two points.

After weeks of international financial turmoil and a steep Wall Street plunge, there continues to be remarkable consensus among voters that the economy is the campaign's top issue. More than half of all voters, 53 percent, volunteered in an open-ended question that the economy and jobs constituted the most important issue in their choice for president.

With the airwaves in battleground states reaching saturation level and coverage of the campaign intensifying, 59 percent of voters said that McCain is mainly on the attack, a marked increase over the 48 percent who said the same in August. And 35 percent of respondents said McCain is addressing the issues, in stark contrast with the 68 percent who said Obama is doing so.

That follows a report issued last week by the University of Wisconsin Advertising Project that found that nearly all of McCain's television spots in early October were negative ads, compared with about a third of Obama's.

On taxes, an issue that often benefits Republicans and that McCain has worked aggressively to highlight, Obama holds a significant lead for the first time as voters gave the Democrat an 11-point edge on whom they trust to handle tax policy.

Nearly as many said they think McCain would raise their federal taxes as said so of Obama, an apparent repudiation of Republican efforts to portray Obama as a tax-and-spend liberal and one that follows an intense advertising barrage by Obama asserting that McCain would tax health-care benefits.

Nor has there been evident progress for the GOP campaign to label Obama as an extreme liberal: Fifty-five percent of voters see the Democrat as "about right" ideologically, and although 37 percent see him as "too liberal," that is about the same as it was in June. By contrast, the percentage seeing McCain as "too conservative" is up to 42 percent, higher than it was four months ago.

Obama continues to dominate on the question of who better understands the economic problems facing the country. Both candidates have sought to connect with voters on the issue, and 58 percent said Obama is more in tune with their beliefs, more than double the number who said the same of McCain.

More broadly, there were few signs that McCain's attempts to reinvigorate his standing on economic matters have gained traction. McCain lags 17 points behind Obama on protecting the Social Security system, 28 points behind on helping the middle class and 29 points behind on health care.

McCain's efforts to portray Obama as a risky choice do not appear to have worked, either. In fact, voters are likelier to describe the Republican candidate that way, and although 29 percent said they consider Obama a "very safe" choice for president, 18 percent said the same for McCain. Voters were evenly divided on the question of whether McCain is safe or risky; 55 percent said Obama is safe, while 45 percent described the Democrat as risky.

McCain did make progress in two areas. He reclaimed ground on the question of who is more honest and trustworthy, nearly matching Obama on that question after trailing by 11 points three weeks ago. And he cut into Obama's lead on the issue of standing up to lobbyists and special interest groups.

McCain has also retained his strong support among white Catholic voters, up 13 points over Obama in that group, the same margin that Bush held in 2004.

Yet on the broader question of leadership, voters gave Obama a 14-point advantage, saying, by 54 percent to 40 percent, that he is a "stronger leader" than McCain. The two were about tied on that question in late September, and McCain held a 13-point edge on strong leadership in early March before the Democratic nomination battle wound down.

Obama also continues to stay above the 50 percent mark on the key question of his experience: 54 percent in the new poll said he has enough experience to serve effectively as president, putting him about even with where Bill Clinton was on this question in early October 1992.

The poll was conducted by telephone Oct. 8 to 11, among a random national sample of 1,101 adults, including interviews with 945 registered voters. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points for the full sample, and 3.5 points for the sample of 766 likely voters.

Nightmare

2008-10-13T11:13:00.001-07:00

Hockey Mom Not So Popular in Philadelphia

2008-10-12T07:38:00.001-07:00

San Francisco Chronicle Editorial

2008-10-11T13:33:00.001-07:00

McCain and Palin appeal to the ugly side

Friday, October 10, 2008

With just 3 1/2 weeks before the election, John McCain and Sarah Palin have decided against trying to swing votes through policy arguments or even character arguments. Instead, their idea of how to win an election that's not going their way is to incite the mob.

How else can they explain the scenes at their recent rallies, where they stood silent and smiling while supporters shouted "Terrorist!" and "Kill him!" about Barack Obama? How else can they excuse their refusal to shut down rally speakers who thunder about "Barack Hussein Obama"; how else can they explain why their campaign rhetoric, which has been nasty enough over the last several months, has now sunk into McCarthyism?

"This is not a man who sees America like you and I see America," said Sarah Palin at a rally this week, before she went on to (incorrectly) accuse Obama of "palling around with terrorists."

McCain and Palin are wrong to use this playbook for two extremely important reasons. The first one is that it will not help them win. As desperate as McCain is to distract voters from the economic disaster that's unfolding, voters understand what's at stake: their jobs, 401(k) plans, and standards of living. And they're terrified. The polls are showing us that their fright at losing those things far outweighs their fright at electing an African American guy with an unusual name. It has helped that Obama has calmly, steadily assured voters that he's ready to move forward while McCain has wasted time with attacks that seem more irrelevant by the day.

The second reason is that this is still America, and our fraught and violent past is never that far from our uncertain present. Inciting the mob is always reckless for everyone involved. At the very least, it will poison McCain's legacy and add to the divisions that have plagued our country during the Bush presidency.

If McCain is interested in keeping the "honor" he always talks about, then he needs to tone down his own rhetoric and stop inflammatory words as soon as he hears them. Palin, who likes to pretend that she's an "outsider," needs to understand that there are rules of decorum even in politics. One of them is that you don't stand by smiling while your supporters threaten your opponent.

This Won't Turn Out Well

2008-10-10T18:21:00.001-07:00

Palin Report

2008-10-10T17:32:00.001-07:00

The Palin Investigation Report (PDF)

Anti Smear Ad

2008-10-10T17:23:00.001-07:00

Not Quite Book Smart

2008-10-10T11:31:00.001-07:00

By Daniel O'brien at cracked.com

2008-10-10T10:12:00.001-07:00

5 Presidential Elections Even Dumber Than This One (Somehow)

By Daniel O'Brien

"Politics sure have gone down the shitter this election," is what you've probably been saying to yourself for the last 15 months. But you know what? You're wrong.

Dead wrong.

Oh, it's not that politics aren't in the shitter. It's that they were already there. With one month left, the current candidates might have to kick it into overdrive if they hope to out-crazy some of pioneers of absurd campaigning.

#5.

Misleading Attacks

Where You See it Today:

Have you seen the McCain ad about Obama wanting to teach sex education to kindergarteners?

Who Made it Cool:

The very first few elections in American history were fairly tame (who's going to run an attack ad against George freaking Washington?) and even the election of 1796, the first between Adams and Jefferson, was pretty straightforward. Complex issues were at stake, sure, but there were a lot of well-thought-out and articulate pamphlets circulating to try to inform the voters about the various candidates. Issues were discussed.

When the election of 1800 rolled around, again between Adams (now president) and Jefferson (his vice), someone stood up and said "How about we just make up shit about the other guy?" A revolutionary idea was born, and it changed American politics forever.

So President Adams' team sent out pamphlets saying if Jefferson was elected he would destroy Christianity, and that, "prostitutes...will preside in the sanctuaries now devoted to the worship of the Most High."

"Guys, I want you to meet our new Pope. She's a Virgo. Loves anal.

When the threat of an all-hooker church wasn't effective enough to destroy Jefferson's career, Adams' Federalists stepped up their game, explaining that Jefferson's America would involve the "teaching of murder robbery, rape, adultery and incest". Thomas Jefferson wants "murder robbery" taught in our elementary schools, people!

Jefferson knew that the Federalists were hurling bullshit and, not to be outdone, he actually went out and hired a professional bullshit-hurler, James Callendar. Armed with nothing but an incredible imagination and a total lack of morals, Callendar effectively convinced a good portion of America that Adams "desperately wanted to attack France" and would if reelected (Americans still liked the French back then, for helping us with the Revolutionary War and all).

James Callendar Man.

This election set the standard for filthy, misleading campaigning. The technique of taking a real quote (Jefferson saying he believes the current religious institutions lead to corruption) and exaggerating it to the point of absurdity (Jefferson wants to blow up Christianity and eat the baby Jesus) was born, and used in every single election since.

#4.

Attack the Family! (Ignore the Issues)

Where You See it Today:

Here's a story about Sarah Palin's daughter. And here's one about Obama's wife.

Who Made it Cool:

John Quincy Adams was happy to inherit the mudslinging smear tactics pioneered by his father years earlier. Adams was going up against Andrew Jackson and, since Adams was pretty corrupt himself, he figured the best approach was to smear Jackson's family and accuse him of murder. The man did not do things half way.

Adams' campaign distributed the Coffin Handbill, a pamphlet which claimed Jackson (being a lunatic) killed six innocent soldiers in New Orleans for absolutely no reason. Now in reality Jackson was a little insane and, sure, he probably personally killed a ton of people for no reason. But in this case the soldiers were guilty of robbery, arson, mutiny and desertion. They were tried, found guilty and executed, as was the custom of the time. None of those details were considered important enough to include in the pamphlet, of course.

Still, deliberately misleading voters by ignoring details wasn't enough for the Adams side, so they resorted to cheap, schoolyard dickery. The Cincinnati Gazette was sent an "anonymous" tip (which it promptly printed) saying "General Jackson's mother was a COMMON PROSTITUTE," (capital letters theirs, not ours), and that his father was "a MULATTO MAN."

Worst of all, the Gazette broke a story about Jackson's wife, Rachel. The paper explained that Jackson and Rachel got married even though Rachel was still married to some other guy, making both of them adulterers. In reality it was just a matter of confusion over the divorce papers, but still the accusations of adultery were so hurtful to Rachel that she eventually became ill and died as a result of the stress and humiliation (so, uh...point Adams, we guess).

"I'll kill your wife, I don't even care."

Finally, in what has to be the least subtle negative ad technique in history, Adams' people distributed flyers that said, "Jackson is to be President, and you will be HANGED." It's true! Jackson is running for president on a platform of Murdering Everyone. That he even got the nomination in the first place is just a shocking oversight on everybody's part.

Jackson did win the election, but became bitter and, if possible, even more crazy than he already was as a result.

#3.

Elitists = Shitheads

Where You See it Today:

There's a new story every week about how Obama is too smart or well-spoken or generally too "elitist" while some other story points out how accessible McCain seems, or how Sarah Palin's functional retardation makes her more relatable.

Who Made it Cool:

Whenever a presidential candidate speaks well or seems particularly clean, the immediate strategy of that candidate's opponent is to trash them as elitist, someone who thinks he's better than the hardworking, God-fearing general public.

In 1840, this was taken to an awesome, hilarious extreme. The nominee for the Whig party, the old-as-shit William Henry Harrison, gave himself the label of the "Log Cabin and Hard Cider candidate." Basically Joe Six Pack. The plan of course was to make the opposing Democrats and Martin Van Buren look like a bunch of elitist aristocrats.

Van Buren, seen here drinking champagne. As a cartoon.

There were fliers of Harrison positioned next to log cabins to demonstrate his down-to-earth authenticity. They had parades full of log cabin floats to celebrate Harrison. The business of log-cabin-shaped whiskey flasks fucking exploded. Had "I keep my shit real" been a relevant expression at the time, Harrison would've been widely acknowledged for the extreme realness with which he kept his shit.

"So real, you guys."

The people absolutely loved it.

But here's the thing: Harrison's shit was far from real; it was practically hologram shit. Harrison didn't live in a log cabin or drink hard cider. He had acres and acres of land. He lived in Ohio. In a mansion. Did that stop anyone from praising his log-cabin-ness? Absolutely not.

People were so excited about how real Harrison kept his shit, no one seemed to care that he didn't actually run on a platform that expressed a single view or opinion about anything. Honestly. His campaign manager's main strategy was "Let no committee, no convention, no town meeting extract from him a single word about what he thinks now or what he will do hereafter." That is a direct quote.

So, with all this praise for Harrison, what was being said about Van Buren, the incumbent president? Well, his opponents launched the most scathing attacks imaginable when it was revealed that Van Buren installed a bathtub in the White House. Apparently in the 1840s, only pimps and vampires bathed. Or you'd think so seeing how the public lost their shit over this.

You had to be there.

As absurd as it is to attack someone for regularly bathing, it worked. In the end, 78 percent of the voters chose Harrison. Van Buren left the White House after one term, disgraced and offensively clean.

But the joke was on everyone, because, after taking office, Harrison died inside a month and his successor, John Tyler (described as a "poor, miserable, despised imbecile" and given the nickname "His Accidency") took over the White House. Tyler was one of the most hated presidents of all time and was nearly impeached.

Why did we bring that up? No reason at all. Really.

#2.Elections Can Be Stolen

Where You See it Today:

Well, we're gonna have to wait about a month to know for sure on this one. Sorry, but if you're desperate to find an example of a modern stolen election, we just don't know what to tell you.

Who Made it Cool:

1876 saw the end of the Grant administration, one of the most corrupt in American history. At a time when reform was important, the Democrats responded by nominating Samuel Tilden, the governor of New York who was already an established successful reformer and an enemy of corruption.

At the time Republicans weren't as fond of words like "successful" and "reformer," and preferred to nominate "some guy." Hey, look, Rutherford Hayes is some guy. Okay, him.

If Hayes had any opinions, he kept them to himself. Hayes was chosen not for his policies or his ability to speak or his track record, but because, up to that point, he hadn't stolen anything or pissed anyone off. Hayes was described by Henry Adams as "a third-rate nonentity, whose only recommendation is that he is obnoxious to no one." Not obnoxious? What more can we ask for? Let's make him president.

For Hayes' Vice President, Congressman William Wheeler was chosen despite the fact that Hayes had no idea who he was and the two had never met until weeks after the nomination. Why not? They really just didn't give a shit.

So the results start coming in on Election Day, and Tilden is winning. Several newspapers announced Tilden's victory. Hayes even wrote a letter of concession. Sure, there were, like, four states left to count, but it was estimated that they would almost certainly favor Tilden. The election was in the bag!

Not quite. Republican agents were mobilized to make sure everyone voted in those states, with most of the agents armed with hundreds of thousands of dollars to make sure everyone voted correctly. Some votes in favor of Tilden were disputed, and by "disputed" we mean they were thrown in the trash (in Key West, Florida, for example, an entire box of votes that had Tilden ahead of Hayes 401-59 were tossed).

Tilden, seen here staring at a trash can, where the Tilden votes were "stored."

After weeks of bribery and madness, a committee was chosen to decide the election. The committee just happened to feature eight Republicans against the seven Democrats, and they just happened to vote in favor of Hayes. So, nominated for his history of not stealing, Rutherford B. Hayes stole the shit out of the presidency.

#1.

The Presidential Election is a Total Crap Shoot

Where You See it Today:

Uhh...everywhere.

Who Made it Cool:

Incredibly, none of the above have gone down as the dumbest campaign in history. The one that takes the title got a lot of help from the political media, which was just as sensationalizing and incompetent 124 years ago.

In 1884 the insanely corrupt James G. Blaine ran against the Grover "The Only Thing Anyone Remembers About Me From History Class is that I Served Two Nonconsecutive Terms" Cleveland.

Here's Blaine, beating up some Chinese people for no reason.

For a while, all that was said of Grover Cleveland was that he was remarkably fat (which was true) until the Buffalo Telegraph published a story detailing Cleveland's dark history. According to the article, he had an affair with a widow named Maria Halphin, who had borne a child. Suddenly, Cleveland wasn't fat anymore. He was an adulterous, drunk, bastard-producing bastard with "no business running for president." (Also, fat.)

The media, ever the short sited and loud mouthed guardian of the political system, took this and ran with it, maintaining that, if elected, Cleveland would bring his "harlots" with him to the White House. Soon, every fatherless child was believed to be Cleveland's, with mothers everywhere coming out of the woodwork with sob stories. It was getting closer to election time and it looked like Blaine was going to win, even though he was horribly corrupt and inept as a politician, because that was still better than some fat, drunken bastard-machine.

Whoremonger.

The truth was that Halphin did have a kid. Cleveland didn't know if it was his or not, but he still paid child support to Halphin regularly, just in case. He never claimed anything to the contrary. But, that story wasn't as loud and juicy and boob-filled as the story that his opponents were spreading, so it simply didn't stick.

It almost worked, too. The electoral votes had Cleveland at 183 and Blaine at 182, with New York still left to count. Blaine was the heavy favorite to win New York, while Cleveland was just heavy. And then a miracle intervened.

On Election Day, a remarkably huge rainstorm hit upstate New York, home to tons and tons of Republican voters at the time who, as a result of the pouring, stayed home instead of voting that day. Blaine lost New York and the election.

So, in American Politics, even when one candidate is honest, decent and fit for office, he can't beat a corrupt, manipulative inept politician for the highest office our country has to offer on his own. He needs a bizarre weather pattern to back him up.

So ... were we supposed to learn something from this? What's the lesson, here? Pray for rain? Anyone can grow up to become president, provided they have a weather machine? Maybe the lesson is just that the system doesn't work. In which case, no, no we haven't learned a thing.

McCain Mortgage Plan

2008-10-09T17:16:00.001-07:00