John McCain is so gosh-darn patriotic and mavericky that he'll do anything to save our economy. Why, he'd even dress up in a tutu and perform Swan Lake on the White House lawn if that would help. Steve Douchee and one of the Fox Barbies ask him if he'll consider selflessly suspending his campaign again to show leadership:
McCain is so darn bipartisan that he only mentions tax-and-spend, economy-destroying liberal Obama on Fox News -- right after calling for bipartisanship on the MSNBC (Marxist Socialist National Broadcasting Corporation). He's got yer "Country First" swingin', my friends.
[Via TPM; cross-posted at Rumproast]
Fox News: Suspend again?
The next stunt
Will the McCain-Palin campaign rip a page from the script of The Birdcage and attempt to distract voters from the campaign’s falling fortunes by staging a pre-election shotgun wedding between two teenagers on the tundra? According to TPM, this British paper seems to think so:
In an election campaign notable for its surprises, Sarah Palin, the Republican vice-presidential candidate, may be about to spring a new one -- the wedding of her pregnant teenage daughter to her ice-hockey-playing fiancé before the November 4 election.Honest to godz, nothing from the McCain-Palin campaign would surprise me at this point. Will McCain dress in fatigue pants, a black wife-beater shirt and a headband ala Rambo and parachute into Waziristan with a knife between his teeth to personally hunt down Osama bin Laden? Wouldn’t surprise me. Will Palin cancel the debate with Biden to instead kill a moose and half a dozen wolves with her bare hands on live TV while dressed as Xena, Warrior Princess and? It could happen.
Inside John McCain's campaign the expectation is growing that there will be a popularity boosting pre-election wedding in Alaska between Bristol Palin, 17, and Levi Johnston, 18, her schoolmate and father of her baby. "It would be fantastic," said a McCain insider. "You would have every TV camera there. The entire country would be watching. It would shut down the race for a week."
How would the proposed shotgun wedding play? Well, who knows. You’d hope that after an incredible week in which WaMu ATMs failed to disgorge cash to the portly, smug remnants of conservative intelligentsia, after the fidgety, darty-eyed moron who is the titular head of this nation gave two addresses that failed to reassure a frightened citizenry, as multi-gazillion-dollar congressional bailout talks roiled on the rocks of egomaniacal, partisan meddling, as some unfortunates foraged for edible roots in foreclosed, weed-choked gardens and angry protesters converged on Wall Street, people would be looking for serious answers instead of bread and circuses.
But bread and circuses masquerading as an electoral process is what we’ve got -- an absurd big-top farce in which Machiavellian strategists conspire in one ring, and packs of overly barbered poodles twirl around on their hind legs and yap into microphones in the second and troupes of shady lobbyists juggle bags of cash in the third.
Heck, the media could spend at least a week discussing whether or not the bride-to-be will wear white! I say the McCain campaign goes there. They can say all the wedding planning keeps Palin from being available to the media and her preoccupation with the upcoming event is why she sounds like a blithering idiot during interviews. Millions of heartland mothers would identify with that, right?
[Cross-posted at Rumproast]
Oooooooo, shiny!
Is there anything duct tape can’t fix? It can come in handy during a terrorist attack. The Apollo 13 astronauts used it to rig up a carbon dioxide filter during their ill-fated 1970 voyage. It’s an invaluable car repair tool -- fixing broken tail lights and patching torn upholstery. And it can help the McCain and Obama campaigns too.
Senator McCain, stupid is leaking out of your running mate’s head every time she opens her mouth. I don’t know if it’s because she was always a moron or if your Rove pups stuffed her so full of cue-carded talking points that they just tumble out willy-nilly when she opens her pie hole these days. But in either case, duct tape may be able to help.
Senator Obama, Bill Clinton wants you to lose. Nearly every time he opens his yap, it’s to damn you with faint praise or laud McCain to the skies for his mavericky selflessness. Maybe Bill’s still pissed off about your yanking the First Black President honorific out from under his cracker ass. Perhaps he’s still sulking about the blow-back from his Jesse Jackson dog whistle. Or maybe he just can’t make things right with the missus until she’s back in the White House -- this time as president. But there’s a two-word solution: duct tape.
In other news, the largest bank failure in the history of the US planet took place today while McCain was grandstanding in what he hopes will become his eighth ninth house. I don’t know jackshit about how Wall Street operates. But my guess is the markets will tank tomorrow, and not even duct tape can fix that.
[Cross-posted at Rumproast]
Somehow, they did it without McCain...
From MSNBC:
Lawmakers: Wall Street rescue accord reached
Dodd, Frank: Agreement in principle, expect passage of bill within days
McCain just a couple of hours earlier at the Clinton Global Initiative:I cannot carry on a campaign as though this dangerous situation had not occurred, or as though a solution were at hand, which it clearly is not. As of this morning I suspended my political campaign...Obama at that same meeting:
Congressional leaders have made progress in their negotiations, and appear close to a deal that would include these principles.Damn. I gave McCain a little more credit -- I figured he rigged up something with Bush and the GOP congresscritters to make it appear that he rode in on a white stallion to save the day. But this just makes him look like a posturing, melodramatic buffoon.
Tampa, Tampa, Tampa
Last night on Countdown, David Shuster alluded to Tim Russert's famous characterization of the 2000 election end game -- Florida, Florida, Florida -- and said this year it may be even more specific: Tampa, Tampa, Tampa. (Here's the vid, which you have to endure a 15-second commercial prior to viewing. Sorry.)
The thing is, Obama is ahead in Florida according to a recent poll by just two points, 47% to 45%. But if you dig a little deeper, the gap is attributed to a 49% to 43% Obama lead in the Tampa Bay area, which is generally a reliable bellwether for how the rest of the state will swing.
As a resident of the boonie fringe of the Tampa Bay area and an Obama campaign volunteer, I got the willies when I heard Shuster call out my little patch of the US. I remember our volunteer trainer briefing us on the campaign's impressive get-out-the-vote strategy and imploring us to believe that every single person we register or drive to the polls could make a difference. I didn't really believe it, to tell you the truth. But maybe she was right.
If Obama's lead in Florida holds, it will be attributable to a couple of other factors as well. MSNBC's Chuck Todd explains that Florida has been hurt worse than most other states by the housing decline and credit crunch, and that's true.
He also cited the shifting Hispanic vote, which tended in the past to be dominated by GOP-leaning Cuban exiles in Florida:
Also potentially troublesome for McCain in this must-win GOP state, he leads by just six among Hispanics (49%-43%), which in Florida is made up of a majority of Cubans. (If Obama does pick off younger Cubans, he may close the overall gap thanks to his large lead among non-Cuban Hispanics in the I-4 corridor.)As I chronicled here back in January, all the GOP candidates made their pilgrimages to Miami to curry favor with the exile bloc by blasting Castro, vowing to uphold the sanctions against Cuba and insinuating that the Dems would greet Fidel at the Miami airport with a bottle of premium rum and a box of Cohibas.
That strategy has reliably delivered the exile bloc to the GOP for decades. But this year, it's different. And of all things, it may be due to the recent hurricanes:
LOS PALACIOS, Cuba - A pair of devastating storms have prompted new calls for the United States to end its long isolation of Cuba, including from hard-line exile groups that are pushing for the Bush administration to loosen restrictions they had long favored...The importance of such a shift in Florida's electoral politics cannot be overstated. Believe me when I tell you I sincerely hope the 2008 race doesn't come down to Florida. I still have nightmares about 2000. But if it does, I like our chances a whole lot better than I did two weeks ago.
Some perspective
Via First Read by way of Instaputz:
Just how big is the proposed Wall Street bailout? Let's look at how it compares to some other numbers...Jesus, Mary and Joseph, that's a pile o' dough. I love what Obama had to say about the bail-out:
- $700 billion: proposed Wall St. bailout
- $695.4 billion: GDP of Taiwan. If the bailout were a country it would be the 21st largest GDP, larger than most nations.
- $580 billion: cost of Iraq war (so far)
- $515.4 billion: proposed 2009 Pentagon budget
- $315 billion: McCain's nuclear energy plan
- $295 billion: amount Pentagon overspent original budgets by.
- $150 billion: Obama's energy plan
- $50-$65 billion: Obama's health care plan, per year
- $59.2 billion: proposed 2009 U.S. education budget
- $10 billion: McCain health care proposals, per year
- $38 million: Hank Paulson's post-2004 salary as Chairman, CEO of Goldman Sachs
- 16.1 million: number of median Ohio household incomes ($43,371 as of 2004) that would add up to the bailout -- or about THREE Ohios.
The President's stubborn inflexibility is both unacceptable and disturbingly familiar. This is not the time for my-way-or-the-highway intransigence from anyone involved. It's not the time for fear or panic. It's the time for resolve, responsibility, and reasonableness.Damn straight. I cannot wait to vote for this man.And it is wholly unreasonable to expect that American taxpayers would or should hand this Administration or any Administration a $700 billion blank check with absolutely no oversight or conditions when a lack of oversight in Washington and on Wall Street is exactly what got us into this mess...
Now that the American people are being called upon to finance this solution, the American people have the right to certain protections and assurances from Washington.
First, the plan must include protections to ensure that taxpayer dollars are not used to further reward the bad behavior of irresponsible CEOs on Wall Street. There has been talk that some CEOs may refuse to cooperate with this plan if they have to forgo multi-million-dollar salaries. I cannot imagine a position more selfish and greedy at a time of national crisis. And I would like to speak directly to those CEOs right now: Do not make that mistake. You are stewards for workers and communities all across our country who have put their trust in you. With the enormous rewards you have reaped come responsibilities, and we expect and demand that you to live up to them. This plan cannot be a welfare program for Wall Street executives.
Second, the power to spend $700 billion of taxpayer money cannot be left to the discretion of one man, no matter who he is or which party he is from. I have great respect for Secretary Paulson, but he cannot act alone. We should set up an independent board that includes some of the most respected figures in our country, chosen by Democrats and Republicans, to provide oversight and accountability at every step of the way. I am heartened that Secretary Paulson appeared to be softening on this position in his testimony this morning.
Third, if taxpayers are being asked to underwrite hundreds of billions of dollars to solve this crisis, they must be treated like investors. The American people should share in the upside as Wall Street recovers. There are different ways to accomplish this, including putting equity into these firms instead of buying their troubled assets.
But regardless of how we structure the plan, if the government makes any kind of profit on this deal, we must give every penny back to the taxpayers who put up the money in the first place. And after the economy recovers, we should institute a Financial Stability Fee on the entire financial services industry to repay any losses to the American people and make sure we are never asked to foot the bill for Wall Street's mistakes again. We can ask taxpayers to make an investment in the stability of our economy, but we cannot ask them to hand their money over to Wall Street without some expectation of return.
"Not subject to discussion"
This is how democracies hold elections? Even Queen Elizabeth II holds press conferences. But not Sarah Palin. Hell, she won't even allow reporters to accompany her to the UN:
NEW YORK - Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, who hasNow why on earth would the McCain campaign ban reporters from Palin’s meeting with world leaders? Are they afraid the press would report it if Palin tells Karzai how much she admires his country’s quaint blanket crocheting industry? Do they fear an embarrassing slip-up with Uribe about the Ivy League elitists who infest "Colombia" University? Are they worried Palin will greet Kissinger with, “Duuuuuude! I thought you died when I was, like, in second grade!”?not[never] held a press conferencein nearly four weeks of campaigning[fixed! --ed.], on Tuesday banned reporters from her first meetings with world leaders, allowing access only to photographers and a television crew.
CNN, which was providing the television coverage for news organizations, decided to pull its TV crew, effectively denying Palin the high visibility she had sought.
Palin planned to meet Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Colombian President Alvaro Uribe in New York on Tuesday as the United Nations General Assembly convenes this week. She also was expected to meet with former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger…
At least two news organizations, including The Associated Press, objected and were told that the decision was not subject to discussion.
Well, good for CNN for refusing to play along with this fucking travesty. And shame on any media lapdogs who show up for the pageant photos.
This woman could conceivably be president in January if McCain wins and takes an early dirt nap, which is not a stretch by actuarial standards. And aside from revealing the astonishing vastness of her ignorance in a tame chat with Charlie Gibson and failing to distinguish herself even during a toe-sucking session with servile toady Sean Hannity, she has had no press exposure. It’s fucking outrageous. I hereby propose we change the GOP's official name to "The Banana Republican Party."
[Cross-posted at Rumproast]
McCain and the Sarcastic Plankton dude
Is the sarcastic voice-over announcer the same guy who provides the voice of Plankton on Sponge Bob Squarepants? He certainly sounds like him.
Say no to blank checks
Via Matt Stoller at Open Left, here's an excerpt of an email from a Democratic lawmaker regarding the massive financial bail-out proposal currently under consideration:
Paulsen and congressional Republicans, or the few that will actually vote for this (most will be unwilling to take responsibility for the consequences of their policies), have said that there can't be any "add ons," or addition provisions. Fuck that. I don't really want to trigger a world wide depression (that's not hyperbole, that's a distinct possibility), but I'm not voting for a blank check for $700 billion for those mother fuckers.The Republicans are going to try to steamroll this bail-out through on the grounds that any delay will cause the Great Depression II. And I think just about everyone sees that drastic measures are needed quickly. But to let the people who caused this problem off the hook completely is unacceptable.Nancy said she wanted to include the second "stimulus" package that the Bush Administration and congressional Republicans have blocked. I don't want to trade a $700 billion dollar giveaway to the most unsympathetic human beings on the planet for a few fucking bridges. I want reforms of the industry, and I want it to be as punitive as possible.
Henry Waxman has suggested corporate government reforms, including CEO compensation, as the price for this. Some members have publicly suggested allowing modification of mortgages in bankruptcy, and the House Judiciary Committee staff is also very interested in that. That's a real possibility.
We may strip out all the gives to industry in the predatory mortgage lending bill that the House passed last November, which hasn't budged in the Senate, and include that in the bill. There are other ideas on the table but they are going to be tough to work out before next week.
I also find myself drawn to provisions that would serve no useful purpose except to insult the industry, like requiring the CEOs, CFOs and the chair of the board of any entity that sells mortgage related securities to the Treasury Department to certify that they have completed an approved course in credit counseling. That is now required of consumers filing bankruptcy to make sure they feel properly humiliated for being head over heels in debt, although most lost control of their finances because of a serious illness in the family. That would just be petty and childish, and completely in character for me.
I'm open to other ideas, and I am looking for volunteers who want to hold the sons of bitches so I can beat the crap out of them.
McCain and Palin were on the trail this weekend absurdly trying to claim that McCain was a force for financial reform rather than a deregulationist who -- along with his pal Phil Gramm -- is directly culpable for this nightmare. I also didn't hear one peep about the Keating 5 scandal all weekend on the political talking head shows (though admittedly, I didn't watch that much -- too many important football games to watch instead). It's relevant, and it needs to be discussed at length.
I know the name of St. Ronald the Reagan is sacrosanct, but maybe it's time to take a second look at what his "movement" (in which McCain often proudly calls himself a "foot soldier") has wrought. Honestly, at this point, I don't know if that's a winning or losing strategy for the Democrats. But it's the goddamned truth, which should maybe count for something.
Pay it backwards
Fairly recently, parenthood has begun to pay off. Just the other day, I cursing the wretched state of my house, wondering when I would ever get off my ass and vacuum, unload the dishwasher, fold the clothes in the dryer, etc. And then it occurred to me -- I don't have to do all that shit -- I can make my kid do it!
Damn, this must be how it feels to be Lady Lynn Forrester de Rothschild. Only with one 10-year-old servant and a 1,500-square-foot house instead of dozens of full-grown servants tidying up multiple estates. Still, it's pretty heady stuff. I believe I'll ask young Miss Cracker to peel me a grape...
Amy Winehouse calls Obama a drunken crackhead
Well, not really – but something equally ridiculous has happened: Corpulent, drug-addled race-baiter Rush Limbaugh accused Obama of “stoking racial antagonism” in an editorial published in the pages of today’s Wall Street Journal. Limbaugh is whining about the use of his own words in a Spanish-language Obama ad. A couple of unintentionally hilarious excerpts:
Much of the media that is uninterested in Mr. Obama's connections to unrepentant 1970s Weather Underground terrorist William Ayers and Rev. Jeremiah Wright have so far gone along with the attempt to tie me to Mr. McCain. But Mr. McCain and I have not agreed on how to address illegal immigration. While I am heartened by his willingness to start by securing the borders, it is no secret that we have fundamental differences on illegal immigration.The media is uninterested in Ayers and Wright? Not in this universe. And while it’s true Limbaugh used to slam McCain non-stop for having an insufficiently harsh stance on immigration, the point is, McCain and other Republicans who supported McCain’s immigration bill caved in to the pressure Limbaugh and his Dittohead zombies brought to bear.
McCain repudiated his own bill – said he would no longer vote for it – to secure the nomination. He had to because Limbaugh set his party’s many xenophobes howling for McCain’s head on immigration. It’s just one of the numerous principles the so-called “maverick” jettisoned on the way to the nomination. McCain bowed down and kissed Limbaugh’s fat ass, just like he made a pilgrimage to kiss Jerry Falwell’s ring after rightly terming the now deceased bible-humper an “agent of intolerance.” So it’s perfectly fair to tie McCain, Limbaugh and the Falwells of the world all together with a big fat bow. That’s what happens when you compromise your principles. More from Limbaugh:
And more to the point, these sound bites are a deception, and Mr. Obama knows it. The first sound bite was extracted from a 1993 humorous monologue poking fun at the arguments against the North American Free Trade Agreement… As for the second sound bite, I was mocking the Mexican government's double standard -- i.e., urging open borders in this country while imposing draconian immigration requirements within its own borders. Thus, I took the restrictions Mexico imposes on immigrants and appropriated them as my own suggestions for a new immigration law.I suppose in Limbaugh’s reptilian brain, those “monologues” were the greatest bit of satire since “A Modest Proposal.” Only Limbaugh isn’t Jonathan Swift. He’s not Stephen Colbert either. He’s a monumental hypocrite who has made a handsome living chiefly by inflaming the passions of ignorant white folks against people of color, the poor and anyone else Limbaugh deems insufficiently American.
Limbaugh is a draft-dodger who questions the patriotism of heroes who don’t blindly support Bush’s wars. He’s a former dole recipient who rails against the relative pittance the US bestows upon the poverty-stricken – as if that amount of money weren’t laughably small in comparison to the trillions lavished on the war machine. The hypocrite concludes:
We've made much racial progress in this country. Any candidate who employs the tactics of the old segregationists is unworthy of the presidency.The racial progress we’ve made has been despite the best efforts of race-baiting demagogues like Limbaugh. It is he who has made a career of employing the tactics of the old segregationists, which is why it’s laughable for him to accuse anyone else of racial antagonism.
In a truly enlightened society, such a hypocrite and xenophobic shit-stirrer would find his microphone cut off for lack of funds, and yet Limbaugh recently secured the most lucrative radio contract in history. I consider that a measure of how much further we have to go.
[Cross-posted at Rumproast]
The Real McCains
Some shocking facts you didn’t know about the McCains:*
When John McCain goes skeet shooting on one of his many baronial estates, he instructs his staff to hurl homeless puppies and kittens into the air rather than clay disks and uses a gold and mother of pearl inlaid, $2.4M shotgun that once belonged to Czar Nicholas II to blast them out of the sky*Of course, none of this is actually true (as far as I know…), but since McCain has ignored my repeated entreaties to join me for a series of town hall debates, well, I had no choice but to go negative. Sorry if anyone was offended.
.
Remember that $300K outfit Mrs. McCain wore to the RNC? The gazillionnaires paid for the opulent gold frock and diamond-encrusted accessories using funds they embezzled from a Calcutta orphanage.
You know John McCain’s $500 loafers? They’re made from hand-clubbed, endangered baby seals.
McCain is notorious for lurking around Sedona street corners and rushing out in the crosswalk to kick the canes away from old ladies and jam metal rods into the spokes of disabled citizens’ wheelchairs as they attempt to cross the street. Then he stands on the sidewalk and laughs as his hapless victims attempt to dodge semi-trucks and speeding cars after the light changes.
When McCain found out one of his hooker girlfriends was pregnant, he personally performed a partial-birth abortion with a coat-hanger and then barbequed the fetus and fed it to reporter friends at his Sedona estate.
[Cross-posted at Rumproast]
Off message
McCain probably wishes Carly Fiorina would just shut her pie hole already. First she said Palin wasn't qualified to run a major corporation, and now she says neither is McCain (Obama and Biden too):
Meanwhile, on the same day, Palin is announcing that she and McCain are embarking on a mavericky reengineering of the entire US economy:
Carly Fiorina is probably a little pissed about that "golden parachute" barb. After all, her gilded chute allowed her to float down into the McCain campaign after HP gave her the boot."We're going to reform the way Wall Street does business and stop the golden parachutes for CEOs who betray the public trust," [Palin] said.
This was the first time Palin had mentioned Wall Street in her stump speech. Mostly, she tends to reprise large portions of her nomination speech from the convention. Palin, herself, may not be the most authoritative spokesperson on such issues. In the past, when she ran for Alaska governor, she freely admitted to a reporter that she got a "D" in macroeconomics in college.
McCain has been touting much the same message on the campaign trail today, and the campaign has debuted a new campaign ad titled "Crisis."
What precise reforms would Palin like to make, to better protect U.S. investors? Unfortunately, there's no way of knowing for sure. The candidate is not taking questions from the press.
[H/T: TPM for the Fiorina vid. Cross-posted at Rumproast.]
I personally believe U.S. Americans...
I knew the Paultards would come in handy! Here's an interesting mash-up of McCain and Miss Teen South Carolina:
Rove: McCain ads not altogether truthful
So Karl Rove was on Fox News spinning the usual web of lies when suddenly, a bit of truthiness accidentally popped out:
Well, McCain has gone in some of his ads — similarly gone one step too far, and sort of attributing to Obama things that are, you know, beyond the 100-percent-truth test.Wow. That's like Amy Winehouse accusing someone else of being the town drunk. It's like being called "pervert" by Michael Jackson. It's like Bill Kristol pointing out an error in someone else's column.
Forget the Hadron Collider opening up black holes to swallow the solar system -- the cognitive dissonance set in motion by Rove calling out another campaign for scurrilous lies might rip a hole in the space-time continuum that causes the entire universe to implode. At least we won't have to worry about the collapse of the economy anymore.
His sacred honor and integrity
It's well documented (by McCain himself) that nothing sends McCain on a rage-o-holic rampage like a perceived challenge to his honor. McCain lied again on TV today about the lip-sticked pig, and the ladies of The View (bless their hearts) didn't let him get away with it:
Neither did the Obama campaign. Here's their statement on The View lie:
Today on "The View," John McCain defended his campaign's latest ad campaign, which has been debunked repeatedly as both false and sleazy. In running the sleaziest campaign since South Carolina in 2000 and standing by completely debunked lies on national television, it's clear that John McCain would rather lose his integrity than lose an election.ZOMG! Look for the McMushroom cloud in 3...2...1....
The real journalists are on The View
The View ladies take McCain to school on the bogus pig and sex ed controversies. See the vids here. Shorter McCain:
Obama called Palin a pig using eloquent black magic, and I wouldn't have to be such a gigantic, Rovian douchebag if only Obama had agreed to my staged town hall strategy. It's all his fault.What a disgusting puke this guy is. He's George W. Bush with a good back story.
Update: Josh Marshall is a real journalist too:
We're all Georgians now
As a lifelong resident of Florida, I'm obviously an expert on Georgia. Not just the one Sherman torched -- the one that's somewhere near the Black Sea (or is it Baltic?) too. It's an osmosis thing. And as a casual reader of newspapers and politically oriented blogs, I'm clearly an expert on campaign strategy too.
Therefore, I'd like to give some advice to the Obama campaign, and Mssrs. Plouffe and Axelrod damn well better listen up, because this kind of expert counsel isn't offered free of charge every day.
McCain thinks he scored points with his "We're all Georgians now" comment and tough-guy stance back when Russia invaded. After his wartime experiences (which despite protestations to the contrary, he's about as reluctant to discuss as Billy Mays is to yammer on about OxiClean), Georgia is McCain's favorite topic. He even worked in a reference to the plucky little republic during last night's service forum:
"They [Americans] understand the challenges that we have in this world. They see the Russian invasion of the little country called Georgia. They see the problems in Afghanistan growing larger. They see a whole lot of things happening in the world that's going to require us to serve, and that opportunity has to be provided to them."Awww, what a sweet little country it is, too. McCain even directed Palin to rattle the sabers at Russia in last night's interview with Charlie Gibson. But here's the thing -- I bet not one American in 5,000 could locate the Republic of Georgia on the map. And I bet not one in 10,000 gives a rat's ass about it.
McCain seems interested in rekindling the Cold War, probably because it's a conflict he understands. There are no pesky religious sects to keep straight, and the lobbyists who run his campaign are experts on countries like Georgia because they are paid bazillions of dollars to put Georgia's feedstaw in our wallets.
As surely as the sun will rise tomorrow, as surely as McCain will invoke his POW experience with a Tourettes-like compulsion, he will preen about his reaction to the invasion of Georgia during the upcoming presidential debates.
Obama should be ready. All he has to do is ask how saber-rattling about the Republic of Georgia helps the people in our Georgia and the other 49 states deal with the wrecked economy, two wars and tattered international standing Bush is leaving to his successor. Then Obama should ask if a conflict in Georgia was among the "other wars" McCain envisioned:
It's a trap he will absolutely walk into, and Obama should spring it to point out that not only is McCain a doddering, warmongering old fool, he's more interested in the Georgia that is shoveling money into his lobbyist-advisors' pockets than the one directly to my north.
Big Dan Teague and the power of denial
Remember the scene in O Brother, Where Art Thou? in which Big Dan Teague schools loquacious vagabond Ulysses Everett McGill on the disadvantages of trusting first impressions? (Haven’t seen O Brother? Go see it immediately! It’s one of the funniest movies ever made.) The scene takes place at a picnic in a secluded spot. Teague, the evil, cycloptic bible salesman pictured above, lures McGill and his faithful companion Delmar to the spot to rob them.
McGill is so bamboozled by Teague’s friendly manner, attention and flattery that he doesn’t even realize he’s in danger when Teague casually breaks off a tree branch during their affable conversation and wallops Delmar over the head with it. McGill appears unable to change his perception of Teague even as Big Dan swings the club at McGill’s head.
So it is with McCain’s media fan base: There are Delmars who only have to see one clubbing to realize who they’re dealing with, and there are McGills, who apparently will continue to believe in Big Dan until the clue-by-four connects with their own noggins. Joe Klein, former McCain fan, is a Delmar:
A new rule here: Rather than do the McCain campaign's bidding by wasting space on Senator Honor's daily lies and bilge--his constant attempts to divert attention from substantive issues--I'm going to assume that others will spend more than enough time on the sewage that Steve Schmidt is shoveling and, from now on, try to stick to the issues.Bravo, sir. Andrew Sullivan is a Delmar too:
We are being asked to believe that [Obama] called Sarah Palin a pig. If the people making that accusation have half a brain they know it's not true. This is not a question of interpretation. It is a fact. So we now find out again that John McCain is prepared to tell an absolute lie - in public, verifiable, uncontestable. He does not have the minimal public integrity to be president of the United States.But Chris “Tweety” Matthews can’t bring himself to admit the truth:
See, it’s only the campaign that’s bad. McCain himself would never say such a thing. After all, he accompanied Tweety to Villanova and has appeared on Hardball numerous times. Tweety is a McGill.
Crazed fetus look-a-like James Carville is another McGill:
Carville refuses to believe McCain even knew about his sleazy, lying sex education for kindergartners ad.
WHAP!
So what metaphorical tree-trunk will have to slam down on the heads of Tweety and Carville to convince them that the honorable, mavericky, straight-talkin’ ex-POW they thought they knew is really just a scummy politician who will stoop to any scurrilous lie in his quest to park his withered ass in the Oval Office? If the lip-sticked pig incident and the thoroughly misleading, reprehensible sex ed ad wasn’t enough, I guess there’s just no limit to their credulity.
But suppose for a second we’re living in some alternate universe in which Tweety and Carville are right about McCain. He’s still not fit to be president – if he can’t control the Rovian thugs he hired to run his own campaign, how on earth can he be trusted to run Wasilla, Alaska, let alone the United States of America?
Holy Sow! Obama really DID call Palin a pig!
Speech excerpt that contained Obama’s pig remark:
“John McCain says he’s about change, too — except for economic policy, health care policy, tax policy, education policy, foreign policy and Karl Rove-style politics. That’s just calling the same thing something different.”
“You can put lipstick on a pig; it’s still a pig. You can wrap an old fish in a piece of paper called change; it’s still going to stink after eight years.”
Notice how the sneaky bastard mentioned McCain and Rove? That was just to throw you off the scent. The object of the pig remark was clearly Palin, who is inextricably linked to lipstick and who undeniably forms the subtext of any reference to lipstick in any context (even Revlon commercials). But Obama didn’t just use lipstick to smear Palin – he used CODES. Reexamine the speech excerpt above:
“John McCain says he’s about change, too — except for economic policy, health care policy, tax policy, education policy, foreign policy and Karl Rove-style politics. That’s just calling the same thing something different.”
“You can put lipstick on a pig; it’s still a pig. You can wrap an old fish in a piece of paper called change; it’s still going to stink after eight years.”
Now put all the bolded letters together. This is what it says: “Sarah Palin is a pig.”
Wow. Just. Wow. I won’t even touch the stinky fish metaphor. I’m sure the few remaining objective feminist groups out there are on the case.
But seriously, folks…For reals, though, people: If you oppose sexism, don’t make charges about it when it’s not warranted. When you throw unwarranted charges of sexism around like the McCain campaign is doing now, it cheapens the term. Hillary Clinton was subjected to a revolting level of sexism, and even people who didn’t support her candidacy (like me) spoke up about it at the time.
The TRUE Agenda, Part Deux
As part of an ongoing effort to expose GOP ratfuckery, today I’m calling out once again a group that calls itself The New Agenda, which I’ve concluded is a motley scrum of Hillary dead-enders and Republicans (pardon the redundancy) masquerading as a non-partisan organization devoted to the cause of advancing women’s rights. Here’s one of the group’s spokeswomen introducing the group blog and outlining their mission:
To get us started, I’m posting the video of Harriet Christian’s appearance on the Neil Cavuto Show this afternoon. Harriet is a member of The New Agenda, and she very cleverly managed to insert a mention of our group in the interview!
Yes, that would be Harriet “Inadequate Black Male” Christian, the pro-McCain, paranoid, racist tosspot who made a complete ass of herself at the Rules Committee meeting back in May:
The intro goes on:
A reminder, though: our group is non-partisan. We as a group do not endorse John McCain and we do not endorse Barack Obama. Our individual members are a diverse lot, and include voters of every persuasion. The New Agenda’s job is to fight sexism wherever we find it and to work together to advance women’s rights, regardless of political affiliation.
Uh huh. The group’s proud association with a pro-McCain, paranoid, racist tosspot and other members of the Hillary or Mass Cult Suicide contingent raised my suspicions about their true agenda, so I left the following comment in their feedback section:
Betty Cracker on September 6th, 2008 1:41 pm
I posted a question at the original incarnation of this blog. It never made it out of moderation, and I don’t have much confidence that this will either if moderation is enabled, but I’ll give it another shot:
If this group is founded to combat sexism, in part in reaction to the sexism to which Senator Clinton was exposed, why are so many of its promoters eager to vote for and/or work with McCain?
McCain is awful on women’s issues, and I don’t just mean Roe vs. Wade. He opposed the Ledbetter Amendment for equal pay, he voted against coverage for birth control pills, etc. He was also hideously disrespectful to the Clintons (the “Chelsea is ugly because Janet Reno is her father” joke) and apparently enjoys yucking it up about rape.
Why then would you think Chris Matthews (a sexist pig, I agree) should be fired, but view McCain as someone you may be able to work with when he has been far more offensive to women and the Clintons than Matthews?
Also, despite your claims to non-partisanship, you seem to be affiliated almost exclusively with PUMAs or conservatives. Do you have any founders or contributors who are supporting Obama? Will your blogroll remain exclusively PUMA or conservative?
I’ll give them credit – they allowed the comment to appear this time, which is a departure from the usual PUMA tactics. But here’s the lame-ass response:
Violet Socks, Editor on September 7th, 2008 12:28 am
We are non-partisan, and as a group do not endorse any candidate. For what it’s worth, I believe the majority of our founders and members are not planning to vote for McCain.
Our group has presented our agenda to both the McCain and Obama campaigns.
This is not a PUMA organization, nor a conservative organization. We are non-partisan. Our agenda is women’s rights.
Our blogroll is tiny because we’ve just started adding links to it. The distribution of blogs listed there means nothing; it was fairly haphazard. Actually we haven’t even decided what we’re going to do with our blogroll.
Uh-huh. And David Duke will be adding the NAACP, Southern Poverty Law Center and Klanwatch to his blog roll just as soon as he has a moment.
The New Agenda’s blog roll is indeed tiny, and it’s made up entirely of PUMA and anti-Obama blogs, including Riverchucky’s The Confluence, a hotbed of racist, paranoid, anti-Obama freakazoids who also lionize (or PUMA-ize) pro-McCain, racist, paranoid tosspot Harriet Christian. What a co-inky-dink.
But surely, as a non-partisan group with a majority of founders and members who are not planning to vote for McCain, The New Agenda would feature an even-handed editorial stance, right? Wrong. It’s all pro-McCain-Palin pimpery. Here are the current front-page features:
So much for front-page non-partisanship. But maybe a few non-partisan blog entries made it through? Nope:“Harriet Christian mentions The New Agenda on Fox” [a video of pro-McCain, racist tosspot Harriet Christian on The New Agenda’s favorite news network]
“The New Agenda Demands an Apology from Senator Harry Reid” [Outrage because Reid described Palin’s RNC speech as “shrill and sarcastic,” which it was. I guess they’re trying to make “shrill” the new “uppity.” It won’t work. I like shrill. I am shrill.]
“Sarah Palin and Sex Education” [Apologetics for Palin’s self-documented abstinence-only sex ed stance]
“Matthews & Olbermann Demoted [An attempt to link the Obama campaign to Matthew’s sexist comments]
“The X Factor” [An outright endorsement of McCain-Palin on the grounds of gender]
“I read that she’s racist, conniving, manipulative, vicious, arrogant, corrupt…” [More gender-resentment stoking on behalf of Palin]
“Two Candidates, Two Standards” [Even more gender-resentment stoking from a self-proclaimed conservative]
I could go on, but you get the idea. I wasn’t cherry-picking – these are the most recent blog posts in the order in which they appear. The rest are no different – it’s all Obama-bashing and Palin-pimping all the time at The New Agenda, which is nothing new at all – it’s the same old tired coalition of PUMAs and GOP ratfuckers under a different banner.
During my New Agenda research, I noted an odd resemblance between self-proclaimed conservative New Agenda blogger “Stiletto” and the so-called PUMA “Democrat” site “Hireheels.”
It goes beyond the cutesy obsession with shoes and the similar pointy-pump logos, and at first, I thought maybe the two were the same person. But it was once my unhappy duty to evaluate freshman English composition papers, and as a result, I developed an ability to spot differences in writing styles. I think the similarity results from two writers with a shared desire to channel Carrie Bradshaw as a literary inspiration.Carrie fucking Bradshaw? I dunno about you, but that’s not feminism I can believe in. And neither is The New Agenda. I think I’ll stick with my Birkenstocks and NOW, thankyouverymuch.
EXCLUSIVE: McCain Campaign Memo to Charlie Gibson of ABC News
To: Charles Gibson, ABC News
From: Rick Davis, McCain Campaign Manager
Subject: Upcoming interview with Governor Palin
Charlie, as we discussed, this interview is granted only on the condition that you treat Governor Palin with respect and deference. As a reminder, we’re granting access to the governor over a series of interviews; if you launch into a hatchet job like you and your pal Stephanopolis pulled on Obama during one of the final Clinton-Obama debates (check’s in the mail), you’ll find your access denied. Remember – we’ve always got Fox News.
Anyway, to help acclimate you to your new role as McCain campaign surrogate, here is a list of pre-approved questions for use in your upcoming interview. Please stick to the script:
Governor, the McCain campaign, which has consistently battled the scurrilous sexism of the left-wing media, declined to allow this interview until you were “comfortable.” Are you comfortable now? Would you like a blanket? Can I bring you some lemonade?Charlie, please don’t worry about the last part of the script. As you know, your testicles are safely in the possession of the McCain campaign as a condition of our granting you this exclusive interview, so it won’t hurt a bit. Best of luck with the interview, and as I mentioned, the check’s in the mail.
Governor, I’m going to ask you a question that’s of utmost importance to all Americans: Is John McCain as heroic and mavericky in person as he is on TV?
There’s a controversy surrounding one of aspect of your life in Alaska, America’s mavericky frontier. Please settle it for us once and for all – do you like A1 Steak Sauce or Heinz 57 on mooseburgers?
Governor, every American man, woman and child was riveted by John McCain’s war stories and account of his life as a POW during the recent Republican National Convention. As we all know, he’s very reluctant to talk about that aspect of his life. In fact, it’s been reported that campaign operatives have to beat President McCain (heh, I mean Presidential Candidate McCain, heh) with bamboo sticks to compel him to talk about his war experiences – he’s that reluctant to discuss them. What is your favorite McCain imprisonment or war story?
Another controversy that has been widely reported in the far-left media concerns your disposal of a state-owned jet when you took office as governor. Can you detail your plan to auction Air Force Two on eBay and wipe out the national debt when you become Vice President?
Governor, the American people are fed up with pork-barrel spending and government waste. As we all know, you heroically told congress to stick those Bridge to Nowhere funds where the sun don’t shine and cleaned up government operations in Alaska. A two-part question on that: How does it feel to co-lead a revolution in government with a mavericky war hero? Secondly, what steps will you and President McCain take to ensure the Democrats don’t once again seize power and run up deficit spending?
As you know, Barack Obama’s baby mama has been a controversial figure, making statements on the campaign trail that some have interpreted as the loony blather of a wild-eyed black nationalist. I’d like a one-word answer to this question: Have you always been proud to be an American?
Possible Black Panther Michelle Obama has some interesting associations in her past life. So does your husband, Todd Palin. Can you tell us about his ties to the snowmobile racing circuit?
Governor, you’ve been subjected to the most base, disgusting speculation in the Marxist media that dominates this country. We’ve witnessed the most indecent invasion of a politician’s private life in the history of the United States. To close our interview, I’d like to make a symbolic gesture of atonement as an American journalist, a gesture that will be familiar to hockey moms – and pit bulls – nationwide. As you see, I’ve brought a special “McCain-Palin” hockey stick with me. As I stand here before you in a Larry Craig wide stance, please take this hockey stick and hit me in the nuts with it as hard as you can. C’mon Governor, give it your best shot.
[Cross-posted at Rumproast]
Step Outside, You Nazi Cow
Peggy Noonan, who literally called bullshit on McCain for choosing Sarah Palin as his running mate right before The Speech, is now a convert. Why? Palin put Noonan in danger of soiling her granny panties in the same way St. Ronnie did a couple of decades back: Palin is just so gosh darned American:
Much has been said about her speech, but a few points. "The difference between a hockey mom and a pitbull? Lipstick" is pure American and goes straight into Bartlett's. This is the authentic sound of the American mama, of every mother you know at school who joins the board, reads the books, heads the committee, and gets the show on the road. These women make large portions of America work.Speak for yourself, Pegs. I have met this woman before, but I don’t like her. She’s not the one who reads the books – she’s the one who tries to get them banned, or, failing that, tries to shit-can the librarian who won’t knuckle under.
She has the power of the normal. There is something so normal about her, so "You've met this person before and you like her."
She’s one of the many power-mad mombies who elbow their way to the top of the trash heap that is most small-town PTA organizations and then go on to intimidate city councils and run roughshod over school boards in an eternal quest to stamp communities with their particular brand of morality.
She’s the braying jackass who insists on giving Genesis equal time with Charles Darwin in biology class and wants to make sure no 3rd grader is ever corrupted by Heather and Her Two Mommies and that no middle-school student takes in the subversive message of The Catcher in the Rye. She’s Beulah from Field of Dreams:
BEULAH: Your husband plowed under his corn and built a baseball field. The weirdo.Yeah, I’m in the PTA, and I know the Beulah-Palin type alright. True story: each year, my kid’s elementary school takes a yearbook photo in which all of the kids come together on a field wearing shirts of some pre-determined color to form a message or picture, which is photographed from high atop the school. One year it was an American flag (my kid was part of a red stripe). One year it was the school’s initials.
ANNIE: At least he is not a book-burner, you Nazi cow.
BEULAH: At least I'm not married to the biggest horse's ass in three counties.
ANNIE: All right, Beulah, do you want to step outside?
BEULAH: Fine!
ANNIE: All right, I've got a better idea. Let's take a vote. Who's for Eva Braun? Who wants to burn books? Who wants to spit on the Constitution of the United States of America? Anybody? All right. Now, who's for the Bill of Rights? Who thinks freedom is a pretty darn good thing? Come on! Let's see those hands! Who thinks we have to stand up to the kind of censorship they had under Stalin? All right. There you go. America, I love you. I'm proud of you.
And one year – about three years ago -- the principal proposed that the kids form a peace sign. This came up during a PTA meeting, and our own contingent of Sarah Palins flipped out. A slap in the face to our troops! A political message against our glorious leader, George W. Bush! A capitulation to Osama bin Laden himself! It was unbelievable.
The poor principal, backed up by a few moms (including yours truly), tried to explain that peace wasn’t exactly a controversial subject. But the Palins and Beulahs wouldn’t budge. Rather than sit in undersized elementary school cafeteria chairs and argue about it all night, the principal and teachers proposed that the students form the school mascot – a dolphin – instead. In that year’s photo, it looks like an amoeba.
So yeah, I know Palin, alright. And the thought of her being an erratic 72-year-old heartbeat away from the presidency scares the living shit out of me.
[Cross-posted at Rumproast]
Operation Rat Chastity
FROM THE URBAN DICTIONARY:
2. ratfuckWe Democrats aren’t particularly adept at ratfucking, having a tendency to foolishly focus on, you know, boring old issues instead of, say, suggesting that a white primary opponent fathered a black love child to swing a race.
Politics: Formerly known as "the double-cross," it refers to infiltration and sabotage of the opposition party, particularly during (but not limited to) an election campaign. The second half of "All the President's Men" describes ratfucking done to 1972 Democratic presidential candidates by employees of the Committee to Re-Elect Nixon.
That’s why most Americans are not familiar with John McCain’s nickname at the Hanoi Hilton – “Songbird” – and why last night’s claim that McCain never turned his back on America during his captivity (despite the fact that he made more than 30 propaganda films for the Vietnamese) likely sailed over most viewers’ heads without a hint of cognitive dissonance.
Let me be clear: I would have made 3,000 propaganda films if I were in McCain’s shoes, and my captors wouldn’t have had to severely torture me to get my cooperation either. Lighting a match, blowing it out and threatening to touch me with it probably would have done the trick.
But the point isn’t whether or not McCain’s actions were wholly understandable – they were – it’s that probably not one in a thousand voters even knows about them. Why? Because Democrats don’t operate that way. And you know what? That’s okay with me. It’s more than okay – it’s one of the reasons I’m proud to be a Democrat.
To paraphrase the Holy Christian Bible (Mark 8:36, as right-wing Christianist loon Governor Palin would surely know), “For what shall it profit a party, if it shall ratfuck its way to electoral victory, and lose its own soul?” Can I get an a-fucking-men? But does this mean we can only turn the other cheek (Matthew 5:38) while ratfuckers go wilding on our candidates and not offer a peep in protest? To paraphrase Jesus, “Not!” (Matthew 5:42).
I propose we lift another page from the fundie playbook. I say to prevent ratfuckery, we hold a rat purity ball. Oh, I know purity balls don’t always work, but that’s merely a flaw in my metaphor, not a fault in my plan: Unlike hormonal teens, political rats can’t get it on if they’re exposed for what they are. Call it Operation Rat Chastity.
Like any cause festooned with military imagery, Operation Rat Chastity needs a mission statement:
To expose anti-progressive organizations attempting to sow discord within the Democratic base as the GOP shills and/or tools that they are.My friends, we are in a target-rich environment, what with the PUMA organizations casting about for another cause under which to rally (and raise money) and finding that – surprise! surprise! – they like the cut of the feisty Governor Palin’s jib.
This surprises no one who has been paying attention. Kevin K. at Rumproast has done more than anyone to reveal the PUMA PAC founder, fake Hillaryite Darragh Murphy, as the avid McCain supporter she has been for at least eight years. But we need more rat chastity belts, folks.
I think I’ll start with The Denver Group, which was founded by former Taylor Marsh pimper and bovine apparel aficionado Heidi Li Feldman, a woman so incredibly pretentious that she signs each blog post as “Heidi Li Feldman, J.D., Ph.D.”
I’ve been watching this group for awhile because I find it galling that they are using ActBlue, a fundraising tool designed to promote progressive candidates, to trash Obama. I had an email exchange with ActBlue about this in mid-July, and they informed me at that time that there was nothing they could do about The Denver Group using ActBlue to raise funds since the group had not formally come out against the Democratic nominee but was instead agitating for a roll call vote for Senator Clinton. Fair enough, if not entirely accurate since the group was relentlessly trashing the presumptive nominee long before the convention.
But predictably, after the DNC concluded, The Denver Group shifted gears, and it has currently raised nearly $40K -- via ActBlue -- to run ads in swing states urging voters to help defeat Obama to “send a message” to the DNC. Today, I called ActBlue’s attention to this latest twist, and they were, shall we say, a bit more receptive.
We’ll see what comes of it, if anything. Maybe Heidi Li (J.D., Ph.D.) will be forced to raise money via PayPal instead. Maybe she’ll have a harder time getting access to the money while ActBlue investigates the group’s status. Maybe nothing will happen at all and the group will be allowed to continue to use a progressive fundraising tool against the most progressive candidate in the presidential race.
But the point is, my friends, we can be flies in the ointment, monkeys in the wrench. If nothing else, we can expose the GOP operatives and dupes for what they are to whatever audience we have. Next up, a group that styles itself as The New Agenda. Stay tuned.
UPDATE: I have just been informed by ActBlue that they will be giving The Denver Group the heave-ho! Suck on that, Heidi Li Feldman, J.D., Ph.D., Esquire!
Red-Headed Sasquatches for Jesus
Governor Palin and I have something in common – and it’s not just our lady plumbing. We were both raised under the influence of a particularly cuckoo strain of Christianity. It didn’t take in my case, perhaps because my exposure was intermittent, occurring only when my mom flaked out and fled for the ashram or took an EST course or something, leaving my poor siblings and me in the care of her Southern Baptist missionary parents.
But Palin continues to drink the cuckoo Kool-aid, as evidenced by these excerpts from a speech she gave in June to a graduating group at her family’s church:
While describing her family, Palin told students about her oldest son, 19-year-old Track, who is set to be deployed to Iraq this month with the U.S. Army. She urged students to pray “that our leaders -- that our national leaders -- are sending [soldiers] out on a task that is from God.”
“That's what we have to make sure that we are praying for: that there is a plan and that that plan is God's plan.”
About God's role in her work as governor:
“I can do my part in working really, really hard to get a natural gas pipeline, about a $30 billion project that's going to create a lot of jobs for Alaska. … [but] I think God's will has to be done in unifying people and companies to get that gas line built, so pray for that,” she said. “I can do my job there in developing our natural resources, in doing things like getting the roads paved and making sure our troopers have their cop cars and their uniforms and their guns, and making sure our public schools are funded. But really that stuff doesn't do any good if the people of Alaska's hearts aren't right with God.”
It wasn't all serious, though. At one point during the address, Palin praised the graduating class as “a bunch of cool-looking Christians.” Then she picked out one student in the crowd and said with a smile, “Ben, I don't know you well enough yet, but looking at you, I'm thinking, people are going to interested in Jesus Christ through you because of the way you look - this red-headed Sasquatch for Jesus. You look good!”
Apparently, this speech was posted on the church’s website (I get a 404 when I try to access it at the MSNBC site, but you can view the scary details here), but McCain’s campaign didn’t know about it. Hmmm.
In addition to Palin’s biblical bigfoot reference, her pastor seems to have outdone Jeremiah Wright:
A review of recorded sermons by Ed Kalnins, the senior pastor of Wasilla Assembly of God since 1999, offers a provocative and, for some, eyebrow-raising sketch of Palin's longtime spiritual home.
The church runs a number of ministries providing help to poor neighborhoods, care for children in need, and general community services. But Pastor Kalnins has also preached that critics of President Bush will be banished to hell; questioned whether people who voted for Sen. John Kerry in 2004 would be accepted to heaven; charged that the 9/11 terrorist attacks and war in Iraq were part of a war "contending for your faith;" and said that Jesus "operated from that position of war mode."
So, how will it play? The Palin pick seems to have galvanized the theocrats who were tepid about McCain. Will it scare away the independents McCain needs to win? In a sane world, picking a clueless, inexperienced, unvetted scandal machine would doom a ticket that was already tethered to the albatross of an historically unpopular incumbent, an economy in shambles and a wholly unnecessary, ruinous war.
So why is it even remotely close? Because it was always going to be incredibly difficult to elect a black man in this country. Let’s be honest about this – if Barack Obama were the exact same candidate except that -- instead of a black man, he was a white man named Ben Overton or something -- he’d have a 20 point lead in the polls right now and would be cruising to a landslide victory. There was an excellent post about the race factor at the Driftglass blog last week. If you didn’t see it, I encourage you to read the whole thing. Here’s an excerpt:
…100 years from now, the Tale of Election 2008 will be the story of several million ignorant, white, working-class voters – both Democrats and Independents (the Republicans are a lost cause who will remain an unashamedly morally bankrupt open-sewer for at least another 30 years) and which way they turned.
If the Republican brand wasn’t so thoroughly trashed right now, there’s no doubt in my mind which way they’d turn -- to the guy who looks more like them. It’s not 1960. We’ve come along way. But we’re not a post-racial society, not by a long shot. This was brought home to me vividly a few months ago when I was visiting my hometown (it’s just down the road from a little place called Rosewood – perhaps you’ve heard of it), and one of my relatives spotted the Obama sticker on my car and asked if I were really going to vote for “that coon.” In the ensuing rather heated conversation, I learned that this relative used the word “coon” in deference to my tender sensibilities, since I’d asked him previously to refrain from using the “n” word in my presence.
People like him will never vote for Obama, of course, no matter how horrendously bad for their personal interests continued GOP misrule would be. And fortunately, he and his ilk are dinosaurs lumbering toward the tar pit. But my fellow Democrats, let’s not be lulled into a false sense of security, no matter how much crazy continues to spill out of the Palin volcano. Crazy is normal to a whole lot of people, as are red-headed sasquatches for Jesus.
[Cross-posted at Rumproast]
What do they call people who rely on abstinence-only education for their kids?
Question: Will you support funding for abstinence-until-marriage education instead of for explicit sex-education programs, school-based clinics, and the distribution of contraceptives in schools?Palin: Yes, the explicit sex-ed programs will not find my support.
For the record, I don't think it's nice to cast aspersion on parents whose teenage daughters get knocked up by self-described "fuckin' rednecks." Lord knows, it happens in the nicest families -- my own existence is proof of that.
However, insofar as such an incident has implications for public policy, it becomes our business. So I'm kinda hoping the moderator of the upcoming vice presidential debate brings up the abstinence until marriage only question. I also hope he or she asks if Governor Palin, as an avid hunter, can assure us that she will refrain from shooting elderly lawyers in the face if elected.
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