We have a Bush Dog Congressman from Georga, John Barrow, who is facing a primary challenge from Regina Thomas, a State Senator. Barrow was endorsed by Obama the same day that the House voted for the passage of FISA. Barrow joined with the Republicans on this issue.

We have a choice of a better alternative in Thomas who is actually closer on the issues to Obama. So you can donate to her and take out your anger on Barack. By doing that you can do something constructive while at the same time not hurting our chances for a Democratic White House. I am all for a unified party in the fall, but this is our chance where we can get rid of someone who does not represent their constituents.

It's a clever idea to raise some more money right? The primary is a week from Tuesday and any bit you can give will help her in a primary where 70% of the voters could be African Americans and she definitely has a shot.

Donate here

Thanks

The Progressive Electorate

I have been hearing the story of the Palestinian who went on a rampage with a "bulldozer".  Tonight I saw the video on the BBC's This Week.  Imagine my surprise when I saw that he was not driving a buldozer.  He was driving a front end loader.  Does no news room in the world have a fact checker?  Am I asking to much to expect them to get the simple facts straight?

If you are like the journalists and do not know the difference I have posted a picture of each peice of equiptment with the video so you can compare the one that was involved in the incident with the pieces of equiptment.  Check it out at The Working Class Heretic.

Reading all the posts here and in other blogs about accusations of shifting to the centre, sellouts or principled pragmatism, one recent one even citing Kantism, I was fascinated then to read an article in the British Globe and Mail entitled `Why Barack Obama May be Lonely in 2009` and musing that  `When Barack Obama lands in Europe for his first big international tour this month, the Democratic presidential candidate may be shocked to find himself standing in the middle of a vast, blood-soaked plain littered with the bodies of his political allies.  He will see left-wing parties that have reached their lowest popularity levels in a generation and in most cases have all but slid into non-existence. And it's getting worse. If he becomes president, by the end of 2009 Mr. Obama almost certainly will be the only left-wing leader remaining among the Group of Eight nations and one of only two or three left-leaning heads of state in the Western world. Once again, America will be going it alone.`

But there's much more to it.  Whilst the article documents the demise of the left across the continent,  reading on I was intrigued to find that European politics is now dominated by right wing leaders adopting left wing policies!  More market regulation, more social welfare.   Go figure...

Check it out: it's really interesting stuff.  in fact it's quite extraordinary.

We're in the living room again, and the wine is flowing.  I've got my feet tucked up underneath me on the couch, facing a few who have joined me there.  There's soft music in the background.  Some of you are leaning, quietly listening.  Some are on the floor, crosslegged with a couple of pillows and fully engaged.  Lights are low, munchies on the coffee table.  The dog is sleeping on her bed in the corner, snoring just a little bit.  There's a soft rain falling outside, we can hear the grumblings of thunder far in the distance.

It's been yet another long and active day.  Let's talk, relax and maybe laugh for awhile.  We deserve it.

Here I am, with these thoughts of calm friendship.  Just kinda feel like talkin to 'ya.  What's on your mind?

Thanks for the thought, Aunt Sam.

I ask this in all sincerity.

If I were a Repub big-wig, which I obviously am not, I would be looking for a way to replace the current presumptive nominee with someone else---almost ANYONE else.

Could this scenario become reality?

MyBlog: http://ProteanPerspectives.blogspot.com

Here we are barely into the general election campaign and one of the candidates has already imploded.

On a personal, human, level, it's kind of sad, disquieting actually, to watch a man wither away in the most public of venues possible: the glare of full-bore media coverage in a presidential election.

While Obama has had some stumbles himself over the last fortnight or so, they have generally been policy focused, not personal. He's still composed, still intelligent, still in command. Not so, John McCain.

He's no longer the shoot-from-the-hip, swaggering ex-Navy pilot; he's a guy who can't deliver a pre-written speech without stumbling over his words; he's a guy who makes off-the-cuff remarks that tend to indicate he's not quite aware of who's who or what's what in the game he's playing. He comes across on that all important medium of television as a cross between Capt. Queeg and the stoic Capt. of the Titanic. Either way, it's obvious his ship is taking on water.

He's now on his THIRD campaign management team; Barack remains with his original crew virtually intact and adds to it with stars from HRC's professional army, while McCain is forced almost back to square one.

In sports, there are those guys that are unquestioned Superstars in the Minor leagues or College who, when they make it to the Big Leagues, fold like a house of cards.

It would seem that the Republicans are stuck with running one of the all time great Minor Leaguers in the biggest league of them all:  the contest for the Presidency of the United States.

One question for those more acquainted with the Rules: Can the Repubs nominate anyone other than McCain at their convention, or are they completely locked in to him?

MyBlog: http://ProteanPerspectives.blogspot.com

Mary Beth Buchanan is a US Attorney, formerly the director of the Executive Office of US Attorneys.

Buchanan asserted she directed FBI agents to conduct "hom interviews" of Wech Jury Members.

Yet, we have a different picture when it comes to the firing of US Attorneys, and FBI agents at Guantanamo. FBI agents were told not to retain war crimes records.

When Buchanan was asked about her involvement with the US Attorney firings, her attorney and GOP said she "wasn't involved".

War crimes have been documented on FBI agent 302. Those forms are missing. Addington and CIA General Counsel Rizzo visited Guantanamo to review the POW interrogation. MajGen Teguba asserts this Administration did direct an effort to commit war crimes.

War crimes are offenses against civilians, unarmed combatants, and people who are protected under the Geneva Conventions.

The public should find out what role Buchanan had in reviewing the war crimes evidence from Guantanamo. She may not have been involved with the US Attorney firings, but she should have been in a position to hear something. She was connnected, indirectly, with Attorney General Ashroft who asked that discussions about war crimes be kept out of the White House.

Buchanan had led a prosecution against someone for obscenity. The public should ask Buchanan how her views of the Guantanamo inerrogation might change if the President had detained young children, or abuse women in Iraq.

Oh, wait. The President did detain young children, and US combat forces have sexually assaulted women and children in combat zones and in non-combat zones.

Buchanan's role as a prosecutor isn;t merely to narrowly look at her jurisidication. It is to provide leadership, where it is absent, for the Department of Justice. The public has a right to know what role Buchanan had in reviewing detailed descriptions of POW interrogations.

It is one thing to enforce the laws of war, quite another to do something when reading in emails detailed descriptions of those horrific abuses during interrogations. Buchanan should shed light on what information she has about POW abuse, her connections with the CIA General counsel, and what information she as Director EOUSA had access related to POW abuse, prisoner logs, and FBI descriptions of abuses committed against POWs.

Buchanan's made a name for herself for providing lega insight on FISA issues and conduting high profile litigation. Buchanan should disclose what information she has about the obscene war crimes her President directed, and what information she and others were reading in the JCON database related to prisoner abuse.

It's one thing to get upset when someone writes about obscenity. It's quite another to do something about obscene war crimes. The questoin is whether Buchanan did what she should have done; or, as with the US Attorney firings, she "had no role" in taking action to ensure US personnel did not engage in any obscene abuses of the Geneva Conventions.

When Buchanan cooperates in disclosing what information she had access to during obscene, repulsive prisoner interrogations, the public might take seriously her efforts to confront obscenity at home.

For the past few weeks, as Barack Obama has moved to solidify his nomination among the party faithful while, at the same time, reaching out to the most crucial voting bloc of 2008--Independents and disgruntled Republicans--I've watched the Democratic Party begin to split upon its usual ideological lines, much as it did, say, in 2000 and in 2004.

At first, I tried to find one word to sum up what Obama is trying to do, as well as one word to describe the thousands of angry Democrats who have risen up in righteous indignation at what they consider to be an ideological betrayal over such issues as the recent FISA bill.

So I went to the dictionary and looked up:  PRAGMATIC.

It said, "concerned with the practical consequences of actions or beliefs."

Practical consequences.  Of actions or beliefs.

But I wanted one word to sum up what that meant, so I went to the Thesaurus online, which provided its own definition of the term:  "having or indicating an awareness of things as they really are."

THINGS AS THEY REALLY ARE.

Hmmm.  Interesting.  The Thesaurus listed such synonyms as:  "down-to-earth, hardheaded, matter-of-fact, practical, tough-minded, unromantic."

Yes, that makes sense.  A pragmatic person takes an unromantic outlook on life and deals with things as they really are.  That is not to say that a pragmatic person does not dream of things as they can be, but he or she knows that, in order to bring about change, it will have to be done incrementally.  Baby-steps, if you will.

Pragmatically.

This is because human nature recoils at the idea of dramatic change all at once.  Most people consider dramatic change to be threatening to the social order upon which they depend.  When dramatic change is threatened--as we saw in the '60s--most rank and file people react by doing such things as electing Richard Nixon president, if for no other reason than he promises to keep things as they are.

Yeah.  That about sums it up.

So then, I wanted to find a word that would describe IDEOLOGICAL.

Because it seemed to me that the opposite of pragmatic is ideological--when one puts his or her ideals above pragmatism, standing on principle, as it were, to the expense of all else, in order to make a grand point or gesture.

So I asked my online Thesaurus to provide synonyms for "ideological."

And it was stumped.

It said, "Do you mean...ILLOGICAL?"

In other words, to an online provider of synonyms for most words in the English language, the best it could do to come up with a word that meant the same thing as "ideological" was "illogical."

And this is perfect, actually, because right now, we have what may go down as the MOST ideological administration in this country's history, and there is none, believe me, that has ever been more illogical.

(Even Richard Nixon's.)

But I kept digging because hey, words are my life.  I found a word that seemed close enough to "ideological," so I decided to see what kinds of synonyms were listed for IDEALISTIC.

Yes, someone who is ideological is, by definition, idealistic.  It was, after all, highly idealistic for George W. Bush to actually think that if he basically forced democratic elections on violent third-world countries that somehow they would come up with Thomas Jefferson for a president or prime minister.  Instead, in Palestine and in Iran, to name a couple, they elected the most violent extremist candidate on the roster.

Oops!

So I looked up the definition of "Idealistic," and came up with this:  "not compatible with reality."

In other words, if you are highly idealistic in your politics, your views are most likely not compatible with reality.  Synonyms include:  "quixotic, romantic, starry-eyed, unrealistic."

Which brings me to Ralph Nader.

Ohhhhh, how soon we forget, eh?

That's the problem with revisionist history. 

Although I am not disputing that George W. Bush stole elections from both Al Gore in 2000 (Florida) and John Kerry in 2004 (Ohio), the truth is that--especially in 2000--the vote-count was razor-thin close.  Ridiculously close.  Close enough that the only way for him to really win was to steal it.

But you see, it didn't HAVE to be that close now...did it?

Because as I recall, especially in 2000, what I heard was many many disgruntled Democrats such as Michael Moore and legions of others, claim that they didn't like Al Gore's middle-of-the-roadness as they saw it.  They thought he was betraying liberal ideals.  They thought he might even be TRIANGULATING.  And they were pissed, really pissed.

So they decided to teach the Democratic party a lesson.

Yeah, I know you think the Hillary supporters came up with that one all on their own, but sorry.  We've seen it before.

Everybody knew--I mean EVERYBODY--that there was no way Ralph Nader and his "Green" party could possibly win the elections of 2000 and 2004.  Even he set as his highest goal, 5% of the total vote.

But he kept yammering on and on about how there really was no difference between the Democratic and Republican parties...Remember that?

Or are you too young?  Because if you are, please allow me to enlighten you.

His main premise was that major party politics was so corrupted by big corporations and so much alike in their basic platforms (uh-huh) that the only way to REALLY change politics was to elect a third-party candidate, a true Independent, which is what he presented himself as being.

And all these disgusted, disgruntled liberals decided hell with it...I'm tired of seeing the Democrats tack to the center.  They can't count on my vote, the corporate hacks.  I'm voting for Nader.

That'll show 'em, you said. 

I heard you.  Don't deny it.

So you taught the "centrist" Democrats a real lesson there didn't you?

Nader received almost three million votes in the 2000 election.  Estimates are that 40% of those votes would have gone to Gore.  I think that is a low-ball estimate, but to be fair, I'll go with it.

In Florida, the key state, Nader received 97,488 votes.  If only 40% of those went to Gore, that would still be 38,995 votes, which would have been enough to give Gore the state, since the final count, conducted by a nonpartisan newspaper after the Supreme Court decision, gave Bush Florida by only 537 votes.  So Gore still would have won by well over 38,000 votes in Florida--and that's not even counting the rest of the 1,160,000 votes nation-wide that represent the modest 40% of Nader's votes that would have gone to Gore had he not run. 

(More, if you think 40% is low, and I do.)

And if THAT had happened...Well, Bush couldn't have stolen the election then, because he'd've had to own the secretaries of state in a whole helluva lot more states than just Ohio and Florida...wouldn't he?

So...I've got a question for all you idealistic Nader-voters and the younger 2008 counterparts:

HOW'S THAT WORKIN' OUT FOR YA?

You made your ideological point.  You protested by voting for a man you knew could not be elected.  And we got George W. Bush, who has proceeded to destroy everything you and I ever believed in--law by law, war by war, preserved wilderness by preserved wilderness, hurricane by hurricane, Supreme Court justice by Supreme Court justice.

People who complain that they will protest-vote for McCain because their candidate didn't get the nomination, or who complain that they will no longer support Obama because he voted for or against something that, earlier, he had voted against or for, are highly idealistic--make that--illogical, because of two reasons.

ONE:  He won't be able to do ANYTHING except vote on bills in the Senate if he is not elected, period. 

And in this election, he can't get elected without the Independent vote.  McCain is the only Republican candidate with a tinker's chance in hell of getting Independent voters, and he is already Roving himself up to snatch those folks into the Republican fold.

In 2004, Bush took a 50-plus-1 majority and used it as a MANDATE to do as he pleased after four years of, well, doing as he pleased.

The results have been horrific for our country.

Already they are painting Obama as a flaming liberal so far to the left he's practically a socialist, because they know that Independents are moderates by nature...CENTRISTS, if you will.  Independents and disgruntled or moderate Republicans fear extremists on either side, and as Bush/Rove have proven time and again...as an electorate...they are easily fooled.

And TWO:  So many of our electorate is too young to know what it means to have a functioning Congress that actually works together to get things done.  There was a time when congresspeople and senators would argue bitterly on the House or Senate floor, then get together afterward and go out for drinks, where they would hammer out compromise on legislation before the body.  There were many close friendships between political rivals.

THIS is how we got landmark legislation such as the Civil Rights Act.  Don't assume that because we had a Democratic president then and a Democratic congress that it was all some sort of kubaya cakewalk, because it was not.  Conservative Dems and Republicans lined up against liberals all the time.

But what was understood was that, without compromise, THERE IS NO GOVERNMENT.

There HAS to be pragmatism in politics in order to get anything done.

And when you have pragmatism...then you have a situation where conservatives and liberals will not be happy because the bill that results is not exactly what either of them wants.

But it will be a bill.

When Newt Gingrich and Tom DeLay and their cronies came in with their so-called "Contract With America," they threw out all that.  It was idealism all the way down, with ideologues controlling the agenda AND the media message.

Over the course of the years, moderates of both parties were forced out, and we were left with GRIDLOCK.  Opponents on either side of the aisle screaming at each other and MONTHS going by with nothing getting done on ANYTHING.  Literally calling one another names on the floor.  Regarding rivals not as opponents, but as ENEMIES.

This is what happens when ideologues rule.  Rigidity.  Inflexibility.  Inability to compromise.

I've even invented a little word for it:  NADERISM.

Obama has stated repeatedly that the bills he has agreed to vote for now are not the same bills he opposed earlier.  Many of the details he did not like have been removed.  And no, he's not happy with them as they stand.  But he knows that if he takes one ideological stance after another during this campaign--lining himself up solidly with idealistic liberals hungry for their shot--he will alienate millions of voters who will worry that an Obama administration would come in and sweep away the American way of life in a dramatic change they're not comfortable with.

He promises change.  And he will deliver change.

But he can't do that if his own party drags him down.

If you prefer Naderism to pragmatism, you are being, well, unrealistic.  It is unrealistic, first of all, to expect him to even get elected in the first place, and it is highly unrealistic to assume that even with a Democratic congress and senate that he will get everything he asks for if he does so along ideological lines.

Not all Democrats are the same as every other Democrat, and plenty of them come from Red states where they're hanging on for their political lives.  They will compromise when asked--as they did on the new G.I. Bill--but when rammed up against the wall, they will bow their necks and stiff out their arms as surely as the worst conservative out there.

Baby-steps, boys and girls.  Baby-steps.

I've read so many blogposts and op-eds calling into question Obama's principles and moral stamina, accusing him of triangulating and calculating and betraying all we hold dear in order to get elected.

"We thought he was different!" they whine.

He is different.  But he is not stupid.

Chris Dodd and Russ Feingold, for example, are fine senators, and they can afford, politically, to stand on principle when it comes to the FISA bill, among other things. 

After all, they aren't running for president. 

Dodd WAS running the last time he filibustered FISA, but he's not running now, why?  He couldn't get the votes.  It is no reflection on the man; I am a big fan of his--BUT, in the pragmatic world of politics, you HAVE to do some calculations on occasion if you truly want to get elected.

You have to make some sacrifices.  You have to back down once in a while.  You have to be willing to compromise at some point.  This is the real world of politics.

Am I saying that you should never show political courage?  Of course not.  But you have to pick your battles.  You have to weigh, in your own soul, which battles mean the most to you and which you would be willing to fight even if it cost you the presidency.

Recently, political enemies have accused Obama of compromising on his promise to end the war.  He is not and he has not.  He is making a realistic assessment of the situation as it exists, but he will not back down on bringing the war to an end, period.

He will back down--for now--on FISA.  He believes that there are safeguards in the new bill to strengthen it.  Critics say they are not strong enough.  Maybe not.  But if he is elected president, then those safeguards will at least be ENFORCED.

This is the real world of politics.  There is always room for idealism and ideals, of course.  But at some point along the line, we've got to GOVERN.

Half of the country does not agree with the liberal point of view.  If we want to get anything done in this government other than curses hurled across the aisle, that has got to be taken into consideration.  THEY are going to have to compromise.  WE are going to have to compromise.  Some on both sides will never be happy, no matter what.

But the vast majority of people in this country WILL. 

And that, my friends, is a democracy.

So grow up.  Forget about protest-votes or withdrawing your support from our candidate. 

Put your real-world glasses on, and vote for the man who really will bring about change, but only if he gets elected first...and then, he'll do it bit by bit.

Pragmatically.

But he WILL do it eventually, and that is what we all want in the long run...isn't it?

Each week I've been doing Monte Carlo simulations of the general election based on data from the Votemaster's www.electoral-vote.com. In addition to a simulation using a 4% margin of error for the polls, for the past few weeks I've been using a wider margin of error,  this week about 12.5%, taken from a regression of 2004 polling data errors compared to the final results. For each margin of error, I've run 10,000 simulated elections. This week's results:
4% Margin of Error
Obama wins 99.5%, averages 308.4 EV
McCain wins 0.5%, averages 229.6 EV
No electoral ties

12.5% Margin of Error
Obama wins 93.4%, averages 307.3 EV
McCain wins 6.2%, averages 230.7 EV
Electoral tie 0.4%

McCain is doing a little better than in the last two weeks because he leads by 7 in the most recent Florida poll, a Rasmussen poll from June 26th. It's not clear that this poll represents a genuine shift - the previous Rasmussen poll actually gave McCain a larger lead (by 8), whereas Obama led in the latest Florida polls from ARG and Quinnipiac. The Votemaster's algorithm (which I use) averages the latest poll with any other polls from other pollsters within 7 days of that most recent poll. Since the ARG and Quinnipiac polls were a little older than that, they're ignored in my analysis, which makes Florida swing from a toss-up to quite likely McCain. If McCain is taking a large lead in Florida, it's certainly good news for him.

Obama's good news for the week is taking a 5 point lead in Montana. Sure, it's only 3 electoral votes, but it's yet another formerly solid red state where Obama may well be competitive. This is the advantage of the 50-state strategy: the more states Obama might be able to pick up, the less dependent he is on winning previously key swing states like Florida, Ohio, or Pennsylvania.

Pollsters may well differ on Georgia: Insider Advantage gives McCain just a 2 point lead this week, and their prior poll in mid-June had McCain up 1. By contrast Rasmussen's last poll gives McCain a 10 point lead, the same lead he had in their poll in early June. I suspect that they're differing in how they weight the samples, and that the race is probably more like a 4-7 point difference that has remained rather stable, rather than swinging between a 10-point McCain lead and a virtual dead-heat. Georgia (and Montana) should be solid McCain country if he's going to win; that he's perhaps in trouble in both is certainly good news for Obama.

Louisiana may be in the same situation, but with different pollsters: here Rasmussen's two last polls were showing McCain up 9 and 11, wheras Opinion Research shows a 16 point McCain lead in their last two polls. Unlike Georgia, no pollster shows this a close race, so these fluctuations don't affect the simulations at all.

Most of the other changes this week favored Obama, although none had a significant effect on the simulations. Obama increased already large leads in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Massachusetts and Rhode Island. And while McCain still leads in Alabama, the last poll shows a 15 point lead, down from 20-30 point leads in earlier polls.

I'll add the usual caveats: we're still four months away from the elections, and much can and will change. McCain's chances of winning are probably more like 30% than 5% or less, but the current polling certainly still favors Obama. Despite currently losing Florida, he still projects to win by about 80 EVs.

McCain is shaking up his campaign staff, giving more responsibility to Karl Rove protege Steve Schmidt. Current polling data suggest some sort of change is needed.

Here's an open line to positivity guys.  Let's go back to the beginning.  What was the moment you knew, (If you ever did) that Barack was the candidate who you'd vote for?

Mr. Rove lavished praise on his party’s presumptive nominee on Friday. He spoke glowingly of Mr. McCain and his wife’s decision to adopt a child from an orphanage in Bangladesh.

Awwww! How sweet. Of course, it t'was not always thus.

We continue to mourn the passing of one of the most ardent supporters of progressive ideas and values in Jesse Helms. Anyways, we really remember Jesse Helms for the most part for his race baiting, opposition to funding for the Arts, opposition to funding for AIDS and his challenges in the 1990's by Charlotte Mayor Harvey Gannt.

This is one of my earliest rememberances of electoral politics and the nastiness in political ads. I also remember being betrayed when world basketball superstar and businessman Michael Jordan failed to endorse the liberal Progressive Black Mayor of Charlotte over the icon of Republican Rural Values and Antagonistic Ideas in Jesse Helms. He simply said , "Republicans Wear Sneakers Too."

I was real interested to find out if anyone replayed this comment or if Jordan every issued an apology, etc. I found this article this morning regarding Jordan learning of the passing of Helms. click here to read

Jordan said,  

"What I said was true - Republicans buy sneakers. And usually full retail. But I've since realized that there are more important things than money, or market share or the Jordan brand."

Jordan was brought back on track when asked if he'd ever met the five-term Senator.

"A number of years back, I was in Raleigh at some function and I was introduced to the Senator. 'Hello Senator Helms, nice to meet you,' I say, offering my hand. He looks up at me, sizes up my hand, and smiles like he's addressing the help back at the plantation: 'Nice to meet you too, Fred.' I'm like, Fred, huh? No, it's Michael, Michael Jordan, the basketball player. He just goes, 'Nice to meet you Fred.' That's one crazy mother (muffled)."

Someone later told Jordan that Helms had a "humorous habit" of calling all black people "Fred."

"Yeah, humorous. Hilarious. It was then that I realized I made a mistake, I should have come out to support the brother. Let him know, if he runs again, give my office a call, we'll hit the campaign up with all the Air Jordans and Jordan brand apparel they need. On the house. It would be my honor to be the official sponsor - along with Gatorade and Hanes -- of Harvey Gantt's next campaign."

About a decade or two late. I reflect upon what might have been had Jordan supported Gannt. Would he have finally ended the career of this homophobic, racist bastion of the Republican Party in the South.

Just my reflections on the Jesse Helms/ Harvey Gannt election that may or may not have changed politics in this country.

Interesting to note that in 2008 we have several celebrities and sports personalities that get involved in the Presidential election.

While the media stir up a dust cloud chasing the tail of the next president’s Iraq strategy story it strikes me that for any candidate to commit to a strategy would be premature if not foolhardy for several reasons. In the first place January 2009 is a long way away, and any strategic plan would have to be loosely arranged to accomodate the changing situation in Iraq for implementation somewhere around March at the very earliest (giving six weeks for the new president to digest unvarnished information and roll out a plan). 

But far more importantly, are not both Senators McCain and Obama working with the same historically thin and stilted information the Bush administration has controlled and released at its whim since before the invasion? Whether it's cherry-picked NIE's, unaccounted-for billions invested in secret bases around the country (how smart will it look to leave those behind now that we've spent all that money on them?), or simply the Bush administration's ongoing efforts to classify and control all information to maximize political gain, why would anyone trust the available Bush-filtered information as a basis for sound policy? Trying to construct good strategy from bad information is foolish. 

Finally, as the Bush administration began to tip its hand last year showing its Stay-in-Iraq-Forever plan, clearly this is a political strategy where Bush's successor will be "stuck carrying Bush's turd", as a TPM commenter so succinctly put it. Given Bush's propensity for controlling information, it would be naive to think that Bush isn't trying to make things look as rosy as possible through the end of his term, hoping to make all blame for failure to achieve VICTORY fall on his successor. A wise policymaker would leave lots of room for adjustment (“recalibration”) for any strategy that hoped to deal with Bush’s stinking legacy in Iraq.

All this talk about strategy pisses me off. Devising an effective strategy in Iraq begins the day Bush leaves office. Wouldn't Obama be better off emphasizing his general principle that the American occupation in Iraq is the problem not the solution? There could be no clearer distinction between him and McCain than that. And rather than be suckered into devising a strategic plan based on Bush's lies and subject himself to the slings and arrows of a thousand armchair patriots, Obama could draw attention to Bush's malfeasance (and McCain's ostensible continuation of such) and pledge that his administration would use of intelligence and information to make good policy, not good politics.

 

Ted Bucklin

 

In the history of America, the concept of an honest politician has seemed somewhat more concept than reality. However, two of our most revered presidents were at least historically remembered for their integrity - George "I cannot tell a lie" Washington and Honest Abe Lincoln.

Our current White House resident can make no such claims - understatement of the year - but his erstwhile successor likes to be known as John "Straight Talk" McCain, with a little "maverick" thrown in. Now, I won't debate Obama's honesty quotient at the moment, other than to say that I believe it soars far above that of Mr. Straight Talk.

There are numerous examples of McCain's duplicity and lack of candor, but one that stands out for me, mostly because it means that you and I will have to suffer through yet another election cycle marred by base, incomprehensibly nasty lies, distortions and smears. So here McCain's promise of a clean, honest campaign, while it was never really believable, was something I really would have liked to have seen.

But it's clear from the recent changes in McCain's campaign leadership, his absolute lack of follow-through on his promise to reign in the 527 groups, and his own campaign's recent response to Gen. Wesley Clark's statements that the McCain strategy is going to be more of the Rovian McSame.

On the issue of Wesley Clark's statements, I think we see a real example that casts shame on McCain. The willful distortion, misrepresentation and vindictive attacks on Clark are incomprehensible coming from a fellow Vietnam veteran and, at least by his own account, loyal soldier such as McCain. To disagree is one thing. To villify and demean a 4-star general, ex-commander of all NATO forces, and a war hero in his own right is a violation of all that McCain claims to stand for.

Clearly, McCain is scared that if Clark's statements - the real ones - were to be believed, it would cut the legs out of his biggest claim of superiority over Obama - namely, that he has the better claim over our security and military matters by virtue of his military service. So it's not too surprising that, like a cornered animal, McCain struck out at Clark with such vehemence. But what is suprising is that this so-called patriot would reduce himself to lie and misrepresent another military officer who has simply stated the truth as he sees it.

Let's face it, despite what the MSM and McCain camp say, Clark is a very credible source, and he has been martyred to McCain's ambition. And I, for one, think McCain should be thoroughly ashamed of having treated someone of Clark's accomplishments in this way. He should apologize immediately if he wants to continue to have any moral stand. But, alas, morality is no longer McCain's strategy, if it ever was, and we're in for a very ugly campaign.

Get out your barf bags.It's going to be a bumpy ride.

Much of what we see on the news mirrors what we see everywhere on television. They're playing procedural police dramas, home improvement shows and "reality-based" contests all day on their network. We will, too.

They're reporting that Obama is a lying, weaselly flip-flopper on their network. We will, too.

And this mirrors American culture in general- a world filled with WalMarts, fast-food and really loud movies with lots of explosions and/or fart jokes.

Ecologist Gordian Orians coined the term "Homogecene" to describe the human-driven trend toward monoculture, toward a landscape where everything looks exactly the same. He was talking about the loss of biological diversity, but we humans have a general lack of tolerance for any kind of real diversity, biological or cultural. Change sucks.

Change is scary. Scary sells, but only if framed as scary. McCain does not represent change. There’s no story there. You and I may see McCain as scary, but that’s scary in the future, like Global Warming. Obama is scary now like Cubans drilling for our oil off Key West.

The Media reports on the race between Obama and McCain as if it were WWF Smack-down because that model fits what they believe their main demographic is (18-35 males). But they also over-report the Obama negatives, because like West Nile virus and a Bird Flu they can play up scary. Scary gets us into a different demographic ballpark. Top this off with a generous helping of Rupert Murdock and Sun Myung Moon who are genuinely trying to drive opinion is a specific direction.

We can’t fight the “McCain as scrappy, maverick underdog” sport metaphors in the press as long as he remains behind in the polls. The press loved him in 2000, because he was a scrappy loser and they’ve been given no immediate reasons to re-frame the mythos.

The only real tack left to us is to make McCain look scarier in the now than Obama and we are obliged to do it in the non-corporate press loudly enough that appears to be homogenous opinion, because the press only reports on that which appears to be monocultural.

Corporate media will not pick up a story just because it’s news. It has to be old news.

Amy Goodman: It's not the man, it's the movement

Amy Goodman  —  7/03/2008 5:37 am

I was on a panel at the Aspen Ideas Festival in Colorado this week when Newsweek's Jonathan Alter asked me, "Is Obama a sellout?" The question isn't whether he is a sellout or not -- it's about what demands are made by grass-roots social movements of those who would represent them.

The question is, Who are these candidates responding to, answering to? Richard Nixon's campaign strategy was to run in the primaries to the right, then move to the center in the general election. Bill Clinton's strategy was called "triangulation," navigating to a political "third way" to please moderates and undecided voters. This past week, Barack Obama has made some signal policy changes that suggest he might be doing something similar. Will it work for him?

Take the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, for example. A Dec. 17, 2007, press release from Obama's Senate office read: "Senator Obama unequivocally opposes giving retroactive immunity to telecommunications companies and has cosponsored Senator Dodd's efforts to remove that provision from the FISA bill. Granting such immunity undermines the constitutional protections Americans trust the Congress to protect. Senator Obama supports a filibuster of this bill, and strongly urges others to do the same." Six months later, he supports immunity for the companies that spied on Americans.

I asked Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., about Obama's position on the FISA bill. He told me: "Wrong vote. Regrettable. Many Democrats will do this. We should be standing up for the Constitution. When Senator Obama is president, he will, I'm sure, work to fix some of this, but it's going to be a lot easier to prevent it now than to try to fix it later."

Feingold and Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., are planning on filibustering the bill. It will take 60 senators to overcome their filibuster. It looks like Obama will be one of them. Disappointment with Obama's FISA position is not limited to his senatorial colleagues. On Obama's own campaign Web site, bloggers are voicing strident opposition to Obama's FISA position. At the time of this writing, an online group on Obama's site had more than 10,000 members and was growing fast. The group's profile reads: "Senator Obama -- we are a proud group of your supporters who believe in your call for hope and a new kind of politics. Please reject the politics of fear on national security, vote against this bill and lead other Democrats to do the same!"

Then there were the recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions on gun control and the death penalty. Obama supported the court in overturning the 32-year-old ban on handguns in the nation's violence-ridden capital. It's the court's most significant ruling on the Second Amendment in nearly 70 years. And in a blow to death-penalty opponents, Obama disagreed with the high court's prohibiting execution of those who were found guilty of raping children.

In a Jan. 21, 2008, primary debate, Obama called the North American Free Trade Agreement "a mistake" and "an enormous problem." He recently told Fortune magazine, "Sometimes during campaigns the rhetoric gets overheated and amplified ... my core position has never changed ... I've always been a proponent of free trade." This, after the primary-campaign scandal of the alleged meeting between Obama economic adviser Austan Goolsbee and a member of the Canadian consulate. A Canadian memo describing the meeting suggested Obama was generally satisfied with NAFTA. Goolsbee described the accounts as inaccurate. Now people are beginning to question Obama's genuine opposition to NAFTA and "free trade."

Then there is the floating of potential vice-presidential candidates. Jonathan Capehart of The Washington Post was on the Aspen panel and noted that he has been receiving e-mails from gay men who angrily oppose former Sen. Sam Nunn as an Obama running mate. They can't forget Nunn's key role in shaping "Don't Ask, Don't Tell," which prohibited gay men and lesbians from serving openly in the military. The e-mails trickled up, prompting the writing of an influential Capehart column, "Don't Ask Nunn."

It may be the strategy of the Obama campaign to run to the middle, to attract the independents, the undecided. But he should look carefully at the lessons of the 2004 Kerry campaign. John Kerry made similar calculations, not wanting to appear weak on the war in Iraq. Uninspired, people stayed home. There are millions who care about the issues from which Obama is distancing himself, from FISA to gun control to gay rights to free trade to the death penalty. Rather than staying home, they should recall the words of Frederick Douglass: "Power concedes nothing without a demand."

Amy Goodman is the host of "Democracy Now!," a daily international TV/radio news hour airing on 500 stations, including WYOU cable access TV and WORT radio here. You can read her podcast at captimes.com.

There was a show on TV for many years called "To Tell the Truth." Contestants with fascinating personal stories appeared with two impostors. A panel of celebrities questioned the three people to guess who was the real contestant. The show always concluded with host prompting "Will the real (NAME HERE) please stand up."

And so it is, these days, with Sen. Obama. I am a staunch supporter of his, but I admit to the same unease that other TPM posters have expressed about Obama's moves to a centrist position.

For what it's worth, here's my take:

I like the Barack Obama who was daring and willing to lead by refreshing candor and foresight. I like the candidate who spoke of lofty goals and shared sacrifices and uncompromising principles.

The centrist Obama doesn't inspire me so much. He's moved out of political expediency to positions that aren't so daring, lofty or uncompromising. And he's bogged down in the minutiae, so his speeches don't soar as often as they used to.

No, telecom immunity doesn't make me happy. It probably doesn't sit well for any of us here, though we might understand the box he's in. But on other issues that don't polarize us as much, Obama has also demonstrated a willingness to soften his position more than I would like to see. It's not that I even necessarily disagree with the refinements of his positions. It's just that I sense him moving too much — fairly or unfairly, he's gaining a reputation as a flip-flopper.

From backing off an "undivided Jerusalem" to his new willingness to approve capital punishment to numerous lesser issues, Obama is abandoning the moral high ground in favor of the broad field of battle.

On the other hand, the press has been remarkably dense in its inability to distinguish between a flip-flop and, for instance, Obama "refining" his plans for Iraq. To refine is to enhance, to smooth out, to perfect. No flip-flop there.

But putting aside the reasons for or against any perceptible shift in policy positions, whether those shifts are real or trumped up by a voracious press, there is something less enthralling about the Obama campaigning today. I don't feel as energized as I once did.

Others feel that way, too. So while moving to the center may be necessary now, there has to be a point where it stops and Obama's positions become immutable. Not to say that he should become doctrinaire or absolutist, but that he should propel his positions, not retreat from them.

I like the Obama that stood for change we can believe in. And I would ask that Obama to please stand up again.

We owe a tremendous debt of gratitude (but not money) to BMW Direct. Any organization that dedicates itself to bilking right-wing idiots with loose checkbooks is performing a major patriotic service and should be lauded.
What they've done is not much different from what's done by other so-called conservative fundraisers, but they've accomplished it without adding to the campaign clamor.

This short essay can be viewed as a codicil to Chronospark's excellent reflection on the role of absolutist thinking on the two fringes of the political spectrum.

Our candidate has come under a lot of criticism from disappointed civil libertarians for his stance on the revised FISA legislation as well as other so-called "moves to the center".

There is a charge floating about that his candidacy is buoyed by a species of irrational enthusiasm--a political counterpart to religious messianism, and that these "centrists" positions that Obama has adopted, put the lie to the hyper-idealist image that many of his supporters have of him.

Both the charges and the images are misleading and actually damage the national celebration of this remarkable candidacy.

The German idealists of the nineteenth century made the remarkable equation: Enthusiasm is Beauty.  There was, they believed, a fundamental virtue in the very quality of enthusiasm.  In a sense, they would have rejected the idea that irrationality was a pejorative when applied to enthusiasm.  Enthusiasm was by its very nature, pre-rational, a direct sensing of, and reaction to, Nature.

Barack Obama generates a tremendous outpouring of this enthusiasm.  But it is not because, he himself, is somehow a revolutionary or a zealot or a fanatic or what would be slightingly called an enthusiast,

No it is because he is both principled and practical, an almost perfect balance of idealism and realism, that he so stirs people's approval, generates such fervor in his supporters.

And he has always been thus and his recent positions should surprise no one.

We are enthusiastic about this candidacy in many ways, but not irrationally.  It is a consequence of  the candidate's strengths of principle, pragmatism, ideals, and compromise that stir us even if we don't articulate to ourselves exactly why we are so stirred.

Practical political action without ideals is amoral, but ideals without practical political actualization are idle theories to refashion Kant's phrase.

Principled pragmatism as practiced by our candidate is the realization of the truth of the Kantean dictum: ideals must be grounded in practical political expression and in a democracy as opposed to an autocracy such an expression must of necessity be a compromise of the good and the possible.

And to those absolutists who despise the very thought of compromise and bring up the pejorative descriptor compromising-- we have just gone through 8 years of uncompromising leadership and see what a pass that brought us to.

The discourse of absolutism that Chronospark so ably dissected, leads to an impasse; to exclusion of the political other. Red states and Blue states

The open horizon is in the path of dialogue and inclusion.

Barack Obama is the candidate of the open horizon and yes we are very enthusiastic about his rise to the highest office.

Take another look at Obama's past,  connect it with the present and see what we can look forward to. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/02/03/obama-weakened-nuclear-sa_n_84651.html

Bob Herbert writing in today's New York Times...

"David Boren, a former U.S. senator who is now president of the University of Oklahoma, has written a short book that he called, “A Letter to America.”

"His sense of alarm in the opening paragraph could not have been clearer. “The country we love is in trouble,” he said. “In truth, we are in grave danger of declining as a nation. If we do not act quickly, that decline will become dramatic."

"I couldn't agree more. The symbols of patriotism — bumper stickers and those flags the size of baseball fields — have taken the place of the hard work and sacrifice required to keep a great nation great.”

"As Al Gore reminds us, this is the first time in American history that “the executive branch of the government has not only condoned but actively promoted the treatment of captives in wartime that clearly involves torture, thus overturning a prohibition established by Gen. George Washington during the Revolutionary War.”

"There are signs galore of the nation’s turn for the worse. We are fighting a debilitating war in Iraq without any idea of how to pay for it — or how to end it. No one has any real idea about how to cope with the devastating energy crisis, or how to turn the economy around."

"We can build spectacular new stadiums for football and baseball teams (the Yanks, the Mets, the Giants and the Jets are all getting ready to move into staggeringly expensive new homes) but we can’t rebuild New Orleans or reconstruct the World Trade Center site destroyed almost seven years ago."

"Patriotism has its place. But waving a flag is never a good substitute for serious thought and rolling up one’s sleeves."

Herbert has really hit the nail on the head. The centerpiece of Bush & Co.'s master plan to strip away the rights and freedoms that we Americans have enjoyed since the Constitution became the law of the land has been the use of distraction, misdirection, fear-mongering, and the occasional sop like $600 "incentive checks".

And with the news this week that many of Karl Rove's chief acolytes have signed on with the McCain campaign, it means that those policies will remain in force in a McCain administration.

While thousands of young men and women were being killed or physically and mentally maimed for life, while the economy was being driven into the ground, while gas prices and the cost of food were soaring, while the Constitution was being slowly negated, while the powers of the imperial presidency were growing exponentially, we allowed ourselves to be bamboozled and flimflammed by these masters of deceit.

And just how effective have these ploys been? The news story last week that the major American oil companies have been awarded no-bid oil contracts in Iraq thereby confirming the long-held belief by most Americans that it was always about the oil could not muster the faintest flicker of outrage.

And McCain is able to draw upon the dual forces that make these deceptions possible.

The first is the lingering images of 9/11/2001 which have been seared into our collective memory. The real "shock and awe" of that day coupled with Karl Rove's extremely effective co-opting of that catastrophe as a political tool keeps the fear of another attack and terrorism in general alive and well even today.This allows McCain to continue to insert that lingering fear into his political bio and create the illusion of being the only one who can keep the fight alive until "victory" is achieved. As I have noted in previous posts, his entire rhetorical bag of tricks always includes reference to his military and war experience. (And he never lets us forget the POW part.) This is one reason why he seems to continue to poll so closely to Obama. And more importantly, this allows him to continue his forceful support for an extremely unpopular war and the delusional quest for ultimate victory. He runs contrary to every issue noted above. But yet there he is.

And it is the second factor which is what makes the first one work. And that is the tone of reverence and respect with which the so-called mainstream media treats McCain. They have bought into his self-manufactured image of the "maverick", the guy who can't be bought, the guy who has the guts to go against his own party, the anti-politician politician. But the fact is that the mainstream media are as gullible as the Vegas audience at a David Copperfield performance. They ooh and aah over every thing he does forgetting all the while that the reality is that it's just smoke and mirrors.

And along with the smoke and mirrors, he has rolled out the promise of more bread and circuses which Bush & Co. have used so effectively.

We cannot allow them to win again.

So yesterday, I go to the mailbox. Nothing inside. Nothing but a folded flier on white paper, badly reproduced, that somebody -- not the mailman -- had stuffed inside.

The flier is entitled "The Holocaust Controversy, The Case for Open Debate," and strikes a tone of reasonable discussion and sincere academic inquiry. It provides links to three websites, which I will not republish here. But of course, the weasel who stuffed it into my mailbox didn't include his name.

I hate Nazis. I hate neo-Nazis. I hate Nazis posing as scholars. I hate the KKK. And I won't weep over Jesse Helms.

Desi. 
Where are you? What are you doing? Are you making a new movie/pic? It's lonely here without you. Can you show yourself--as chimp. or id, or fragmented particles?

Posters: If you miss Des, rec this piece. You don't even have to comment. If you really miss him, ask him to come home.
Come on chimpo. It's a zoo here without you.
Cypher

The greatest scam ever perpetrated against the American taxpayer (bigger even than the global warming hoax) is the idea that there is an energy shortage in this country. We have enough coal to meet our demands for at least a thousand years, enough uranium to meet all of our electrical needs for even longer, and enough oil in the gulf, offshore, in ANWR, and in oil shale to eliminate any need for middle eastern oil imports for many decades. We have abundant supplies of energy. Unfortunately, we also have an abundant supply of idiots, and many of them are in Congress. The Democratic party (where most of the idiots congregate) is completely subservient to the environmental extremist lobby. So, they prevent us from drilling for oil. They block the construction of refineries. They prohibit the use of coal, and oppose building nuclear plants. They even oppose hydroelectric power, the cleanest energy source possible. The only sources of energy they support are those that don't exist, aren't cost effective, and can't meet out needs. Which is really the point, they don't want to meet our needs. They want us to do with less, to live like the third world. There is no shortage of energy in this country, just a shortage of intelligence.

There has been a lot of talk about how the Press loves McCain and as evidence we all often site the latest example of how they simply parrot McCain's talking points about Obama to prove their love for him.  I'm not sure that this is actually the root cause and if I'm right the real reason us much uglier for the health of our little democracy here.

As soon as some of the polls starting showing a decent lead for Obama the press in general knew that if this road continues the general election is going to be hard to cover since it is going to be a blowout.  So they start doing what they did for a period of time during the Dem Primary race and that's give the candidate that is down a free pass and a huge microphone.   They are giving McCain's camp a chance to lead the news of the day nearly every day and then not holding them account for the loose use of facts they are using in their spin.

The media doesn't just like a horser ace, but rather they need one for their own financial gains.  The ratings during the Dem Primary season were huge for the political news shows and since then there has been a fall off of engagement that they are desparate to get back.  So they will fill the news with "is Barack in trouble" stories knowing full well that there is little to nothing of importance in the story they are spending this time covering.

05 Apr 2007

Dear Diary,

Today I became a Rovian troll. Yes, I who have voted for every Dem presidential candidate since Hubert Humphrey, including the DLC's Bill Clinton and the "radical" George McGovern, have decided that I cannot vote for Sen. Hillary Clinton. She's just too willing to support horrible policies for political gain, too likely to lurch to the right if she thinks it'll get her elected. Since she is sure to become the Dem candidate, there is no choice for me but to vote for someone I actually consider honest and progressive, and that's not Hillary.

Everyone at TPM says this makes me a selfish, stubborn traitor. What can I do? I want them to like me, but I just CAN'T vote for her.

Tankard

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

06 Feb 2008

Dear Diary,

I may not have to become a complete Republican after all! Yesterday's Super Tuesday primaries show that Sen. Clinton may not be as "inevitable" as the MSM would have us think.

Sen. Obama looks like a capable, sincere politician, and best of all, it seems he is even slightly left of center! He's definitely opposed to the war! He has said that he would invade Pakistan without Congressional approval and I can't see this policy as anything but unconstitutional, but I'm thinking he'll back off that misguided statement, so I think I will support him.

Does this make me a flip-flopper? The TPMers say that I was a Dem, then a Rep, now a Dem again, after all. Well, I guess being a flip-flopper is better than being a traitor, and I do want those people to like me.

Tankard

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

22 Apr 2008

Dear Diary,

I'm depressed. Now, a lot of people at TPM say that I've been hypnotised and have become an Obamabot, a Kool-Aid drinker, a stubborn, mindless zombie. Honestly, I can't think what I can do to make them like me.

I also can't see how I could be a flip-flopper and a stubborn ideologue at the same time, but those people at TPM are very smart so I guess there's a lot about politics I just don't understand.

How to make myself likable, dear Diary, and get out of this emotional funk?????

Tankard

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

1 Jul 2008

Dear Diary,

This is really confusing. Let me tell you what's happening. It seems that Sen. Obama is not as eager to support the Constitution as I thought. In addition to the Pakistan thing and supporting a FISA bill that is designed to cover-up criminal behavior and make it easier for the Feds to intrude on our privacy, the Senator is now backing Bush's unconstitutional support of religion -- wants to expand it even!

Here's my question, dear Diary: I've been a ideologue, a flip-flopper, then an ideologue again. Do I dare become a flip-flopper again by withdrawing my support for Sen. Obama?

Will the TPMers like me if I change, or if I stay? I just don't know what to do!

Tankard

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

5 Jul 2008

Dear Diary,

I am such a political dope and so terribly, terribly dumb! Those really astute people at TPM tell me that now I'm an ideologue again! How can this be, diary? Every few days, I change from being way too wishy-washy -- a traitor, even -- to being way too rigid and stubborn! How can I just be consistent about whether I have no backbone or too much?

It's going to be really, really hard to do this but I just HAVE to find a way to fix my inconsisency so that all those nice, smart people at TPM will like me. This is a terrible character flaw I have, but I know I can fix it. I know I can! I have to so that they'll like me!

Tankard

 

I want to see more posts start, "I support Barack Obama for president, but..."

It's better than leading with the "but," isn't it?

You may have noticed Democrats seriously attacking Obama, since the General Election got underway. At first I thought it was an oversensitive minority, the PUMA's of progressive politics. But enough riled liberals are crying out to fill a lot of inches--and minutes--in our mainstream media.

Examples: Netroots break with Obama over FISA compromise. Pro-choice groups decry Obama for third-trimester limitations. Separation of Church and State advocates recoil at proposed continuance of Faith-Based initiatives. Who knew Justice Scalia and Obama would agree on so much? And did you see--he's even wearing a flag pin now! (The sell-out)

Also? Just as many Democrats worry that these attacks weaken America's chances for a Democrat into the White House to change at least some of Bush's overstayed course. They call on the malcontents to shut up, at least until November, lest they undermining what progress we've made. Support Obama or else! Not very diversity friendly, perhaps, but pragmatic.

It hasn't been pretty. Or inspiring. Or particularly useful.

So how's this? Do both!

QUESTION #1: Do liberals have the right to voice their outrage, even their sense of betrayal?

Absolutely! Obama himself said as much regarding supporters on his website who reject his FISA compromise. He says: "when citizens join their voices together, they can hold their leaders accountable. I'm not exempt from that. I'm certainly not perfect, and expect to be held accountable too. I cannot promise to agree with you on every issue."

He says: "I understand why some of you feel differently about the current bill, and I'm happy to take my lumps on this side and elsewhere" and that "Democracy cannot exist without strong differences. And going forward, some of you may decide that my FISA position is a deal breaker."

Most importantly, he says: "that is the kind of White House that I intend to run as President of the United States -- a White House that takes the Constitution seriously, conducts the peoples' business out in the open, welcomes and listens to dissenting views, and asks you to play your part in shaping our country’s destiny." 

QUESTION #2: Is an Obama who compromises on FISA, limits third-term abortions, reaches out to the Christian right, favors some gun ownership and doesn't reject the death penalty for non-capital crimes--an Obama who might even (omigod) shift his position on certain issues--still a better candidate than John McCain?

Abso-freakin-lutely! Those people who say "I cannot support a man who would [condone the FISA compromise/accept the death-penalty/flip-flop/whatever]" are lying to themselves, much less the rest of us. Because what reasonable choice do they have? Where do they plan on finding a candidate who has consistently held positions better than these?

Obama is in a race against John McCain. One of them will win.

Of course you have the right to feel betrayed--especially if you didn't realize that even the most transcendent of politicians is going to come with some sticky clay feet. But this election is damned important, probably, hopefully, the most important in our lifetime.

But consider this: On his worst, flippiest floppiest day, Obama's positions remain significantly better than those of John McCain III.

Is McCain talking even about criminal liability for the telecoms? How long has it been since McCain was pro-choice, even for the first two trimesters? McCain courts the religious right far more aggressively, and he's not even particularly religious! McCain called the Supreme Court's recent ruling on Habeas Corpus "one of the worst decisions in the history of this country." And you want to talk flip flops? How about the issue of torture? How about that business about the US being greeted as liberators?

No matter how angry you are at Obama--and I'm not denying your right to be so--can we at least agree that Obama is better than McCain?

If not, go back and read those quotes from his website.

Can you really imagine McCain encouraging dissent? Do you honestly think McCain will seriously ask people to hold him accountable?

I've got to believe that, in this light, you do support the Democratic candidate, at least marginally, no matter how grudgingly, over the Republican. So how about including that little tidbit in your critiques of him? Just to be clear to the MSM vultures who keep looking for reasons to downplay Obama's electibility.

"I wholly support Barack Obama for president. But I think he could do better, and I hope that he does. I intend to do my part to ensure that he gets elected, and that he therefore gets more chances to do better."

That is how we will continue to unite, as a party.

That is how we'll win this election.

The press' love for McCain seems likely to be as big a factor as we thought it would be.  I think the only way there's a chance of the press adopting anything like neutrality is if Obama personally distinguishes between McCain's war heroism and the ability to make good policy decisions.  I suggest this refrain:

"John McCain is a war hero, and I honor his service, but he has made one disastrous decision after another about the war in Iraq. 

"John McCain is a war hero, and I honor his service, but he wants to keep American troops in Iraq until the Iraqis stop shooting at each other and at our troops.  And after that happens - however long that takes - he's fine with keeping our troops there for another 100 years on top of that.

"John McCain is a war hero, and I honor his service, but he has flip-flopped on whether we should be torturing people:  first declaring his opposition to it, and then voting against legislation that would repudiate George W. Bush's embrace of torture.

"John McCain is a war hero, and I honor his service, but for economic advice he turns to Phil Gramm -- the man who engineered the reckless deregulation of financial markets that has helped to create the economic problems we are living with now, including high gas prices."

And so on. 

I think Obama should use the phrase "John McCain is a war hero, and I honor his service, but..." so often that (a) the relevance of heroism is sharply and obviously limited (b) it is clear that Obama cannot be painted as being unfairly critical, and (c) people lose interest in hearing about war heroism.

I don't think this should be left to surrogates, and I don't think Obama can rely on the press to see the obvious.  Unless Obama personally drives the point home forcefully and repeatedly, the press will continue acting as surrogates for McCain, pretending that "war hero" necessarily translates into "good president" and that any questioning of that equation is an act of slander.

Like so many, I spent the first part of this holiday at work.  A long, tiring day.

I spent the second with the man and the dog I love.  No, not one and the same, although sometimes...never mind.  We shared a dinner of bass that he caught and then prepared for us (although the dog doesn't care for fish), then watched fireworks on television.

Sitting in the living room on the couch, sipping a glass of wine with friends and conversation.  That's what  I try to do here after a long day of everything else.  It's what I did tonight.

Happy Independence Day, everyone.

How did you celebrate?

Hahaha! Goo... .

Jesse go bye bye. Smelly. Mean. Bye bye. Haha!

Bozo go bye bye. Bozo! Funny. Bye bye. Whaaaaaaaaa!

Why is Florida's gay governor, Charlie Crist announcing his engagement?

Yes, it's true. Charlie Crist has announced that wedding bells are in his future after a whilwind courtship of only 9 months. And surprisingly, Crist's partner-to-be is a woman.
This can mean only one thing. Crist will be John McCain's running mate. After 30 years as an unmarried gay man, he has found a woman who will provide him with the cover he needs in the Republican party.

Either that, or he's marrying her for her money. She's got a lot more of it than he does. That worked for McCain, so it would only raise his respect for Crist.

Bon vivant, Charlie!

Dear Mr. Marshall:

I am eight years old. Some of my little friends say that there is no Fourth Amendment to the Constitution. They have teased me horribly because I said that I believe in it.

I said, "There must be a Fourth Amendment, or else how could there be a Fifth Amendment?"

One of the boys (it was that nasty Georgie W.) said, "Dummy, what makes you think there is a Fifth Amendment?"

I kicked him in the nuts, which was very satisfying, but it got me sent to the principal's office. The principal (we call him Mr. O), used to teach constitutional law. He said that there was a Fourth Amendment, but that it hadn't meant anything in years. In fact, he said the Founding Fathers just meant it to be an ideal, like that phrase "all men are created equal" and wasn't really supposed to be taken literally.

After I got home, I asked my cranky Uncle Dick if there was a Fourth Amendment. Frankly, he was kind of a prick about it. He said, "Shut up, kid, or I'll send you to Guant, Guantan, I mean Cuba, and have them waterboard you."

When my papa got home, I asked him. He said, "If you see it on TPM, it's usually the truth. At least if you stick to the staff-written articles. The other stuff, you're on your own."

So, Mr. Marshall, please tell me the truth; is there a Fourth Amendment? Does it mean anything?

Sincerely,

Virginia C.

McCain followed his father and grandfather into the service -- and it seems he did so kicking and screaming a bit.  It's not like he CHOSE it freely because he was noble.  It was like a kid following his father and grandfather to Harvard.  So his choice of the military was somewhat unimaginitive, to say the least. That he suffered in Vietnam no one can or should deny.  But it seems to me he was like the legacy students at the Ivies, and that he doesn't deserve praise for getting his college education via the military, nor did  military training give him anything special in the way of the ability to govern in a civilian society. Nor does it give it to anyone else or we would have lots of famous and worthy presidents from the military. Actually, the Ivies have given us more presidents, though of course not all of them are so great, either.

Obama said prohibitions on late-term abortions must contain "a strict, well defined exception for the health of the mother."

Obama then added: "Now, I don't think that 'mental distress' qualifies as the health of the mother. I think it has to be a serious physical issue that arises in pregnancy, where there are real, significant problems to the mother carrying that child to term."

There seems to be wide spread misconceptions about what Roe v Wade actually said as well as what the current policy concerning abortion in the US is. At least that's how it appeared when last this subject came up. Abortion is not an unfrettered right in the US. Roe v Wade gave the states the right to ban all abortions in the third trimester except if the life or health of the mother is threatened. Mental distress, mental health or psychological issues are accepted as falling under the health of the mother exception. Over 40 states now ban abortions in the third trimester except where the life or health of the mother is threatened.

Figures vary but I have never seen any number relating to the amount of third trimester abortions that exceeds 1% of the total of yearly abortions. There is no clear information as to why these abortions have been done.

The pro choice contingent plays up those instances where there are severe medical problems to the mother, the fetus, or both. In these examples its clear that the late term abortion was necessary. The pro life movement plays up those instances where there is not a physical cause and claims that the mental distress exemption has been abused. Obama appears to be echoing the argument set forth by the pro life movement that the mental health exemption has been abused or quite possibly should be eliminated or greatly restricted. This would increase the states ability to restrict abortions in the third trimester. But wait, its not just the third trimester.

To further complicate matters there is a flaw in Roe v Wade that has been somewhat corrected, but to the detriment to those who are pro choice. A rather arbitrary line was set at the beginning of the third trimester. At the time of the decision that was pretty close to the time that a fetus was viable outside the womb with reasonable medical attention. Anyone with even a small amount of knowledge about the advances in medical science could see how easily that line of viability could be broached. And, of course, it has been. Its quite possible that a fetus at 4 1/2 months could be considered viable.

In a court case, Planned Parenthood v Casey, the court refined the third trimester rule and replaces viability as the line at which the state could ban abortions to protect the life of the fetus. Again, excepting when the life or health of the mother is threatened.

As decided by Roe v Wade and refined by PP v Casey states can ban abortions at any time that the fetus is viable given reasonable medical attention. This could easily mean abortions can be banned at 4 months or, as medical science shifts, sooner. If the standards for mental health as it falls under the "life and health of the mother" exemption are tightened as obama seems to propose women could find it increasingly difficult to find an abortion provider early into the second trimester as they now find it in the third trimester.

  RIP JESSE HELMS I always wonder what it is that makes someone do harm to people who've done nothing to them; where does that hate come from? In other words, what was it inside of Jesse Helms that made him spend so much energy trying to hurt gay people?

I asked the same about Rick Santorum, all those guys who seem to have enough intelligence that evolution is a possible outcome. I don't mean big "E" evolution. I mean the kind of evolution that comes from humility and an ability to examine one's prejudices and see them for the bigotry they are.

I have to say that, in my four-plus decades of life, I've yet to find anyone who's desire to harm others is anything but a misplaced desire to kill something inside themselves.

I remember watching "B-1" Bob Dornan attack with a violent demeanor a gay activist he was debating on one of the networks. I watched him react to the activist's calm statements with "vein in the forehead" screaming. And I realized: Bob Dornan is gay. He can't stand it and he has to attack all those who ARE gay to help kill it inside himself.

I remember when I was in high school, all the guys who announced most loudly their conquests with women, in every case, they wound up coming out of the closet later on down the road.

It's pretty much a spiritual axiom that any time one is bothered by someone else...that person has to look inside him or herself to see what's REALLY bothering him or her. It's such a simple truth.

So back to Senator Helms. What was it inside of him that he was able to express not only satisfaction, but genuine glee at hurting gay people? He always seemed happiest when he was hurting people. It was painful to watch and think of all the pain inside of him that made him so happy to spend energy on hurting gay people.

And all that energy spent by people to hurt gay people, who have never been anything, but, ahem, Christian to them, has an effect. It does the trick it's asked to do; it means that gay people grow up and come of age wondering about their own existence. Then they hide and, in their hiding, they come to loathe themselves, and in their self-loathing, they discover a gnawing need to do harm to others in order to kill that part of themselves.

In other words, I've just outlined how we wind up with Gay Republicans.

I hope Senator Helms has found his inner peace. I have to figure that God welcomed him and said, "It's OK Jesse; all is forgiven."

How many TPMers have ever heard of 'Relevant Magazine?'

That's the mag O granted an interview to.

It's the mag where he enunciated his latest position on abortion. That position is something like, "I don't consider mental distress of the pregnant woman an adequate justification to 3rd semester abortions."

It's part of the so-called reach-out campaign to evangelicals (or as I call it, the religious schtick) of the O election strategy.

I had never heard of this magazine, so I visited its website. From there, under What We Believe, I came away with this gem:  "But we do believe. We believe that eternal life and the ONLY true freedom is found in Christ." (emphasis added by me)  There are more remarks from the publishers similar in nature to this one on the site.

It's said with a smile by the twenty-somethings that publish the mag.

Does The Candidate believe the same? Do his many supporters here on TPM believe the same?

Here's the link to What We Believe from Relevant Mag:

http://www.relevantmagazine.com/misc_beliefs.php

MyBlog; http://ProteanPerspectives.blogspot.com

Below is a link to an Editorial, not an article, from today's NYTimes:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/04/opinion/04fri1.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

I have no particular problem with the more centrist positions O has recently taken.

I have always had a deep-seated problem with the religious schtick, and still believe it is going to come back to haunt him. (Those Wright tapes have not been erased by Nixon's secretary.)

Happy B-Day, USA!

MyBlog: http://ProteanPerspectives.blogspot.com

Everybody remember when the ABC News reporter pissed McCain off by asking how getting shot down was a credential?
 Good.

Now, does anybody remember how he responded when he regained composure? I can't find the exact quote, but it was something like "it taught me to love America by taking it away." Now, this is all well and good, but it leaves one question: what does that say about his feeling toward America before he was shot down?

Here’s your Green Party candidates for president, 2008:

1. Jesse Johnson, 2006 US Senate candidate and 2004 gubernatorial candidate for the Mountain Party in West Virginia (now affiliate state party of the Green Party of the United States); filmmaker.

2. Kat Swift, Kat Swift, Texas Green organizer; former Campus Greens leader; activist with Clean Money San Antonio and San Antonio Democracy Now.

3. Kent Mesplay, 2004 candidate for the Green presidential nomination; former president of Turtle Island Institute; environmental engineer, alternative energy activist; California Green organizer.

4. Cynthia McKinney, former member of the US House of Representatives (Georgia), 1993 to 2003, 2005 to 2007; former member of the Georgia House of Representatives, 1988-1992.

Cynthia McKinney? Stereotypes and smears related to 9/11 aside, her temper, and sense of entitlement, do concern me a little bit. She also (and this coming from someone who doesn’t come close to supporting the Israel lobby) can flirt with the boundaries of something approaching anti-Semitism.

Per the first sentence in the paragraph above, her indulgence of 9/11 “truther” crackpot theories, as articulated when she was in my area, in Fort Worth, in February, also concern me.

But, she’s got name recognition, and as a female candidate, might appeal to Clintonites who have a political brain, as well as anti-Obama anger, rather than Clintonites deluded enough to join a GOP-flacked PUMA group. And, yes, I could accept her as presidential material.

But, let’s also look at the not-so-famous candidates.  

Mesplay, with his background in alt-energy, has a strong “core Green” issue, and one of importance. He favors Instant Runoff Voting (and please, flacks for other alternative voting systems, I know IRV is not perfect; do not inundate me with comments). And, Mesplay, with Blackfoot Indian heritage, also brings minority background to the table.

I have a bit of familiarity with Swift. Clean money is a good emphasis. However, her website has had little updating in months, and, it’s not too much above the amateur level as far as layout, etc.

I know less about Johnson; he’s run for U.S. Senate and the governor’s mansion in West Virginia.

And, for Nader-bashers (not that I'm a Nader-defender), you will note that he is NOT a Green Party candidate. He may continue to run as an Independent, but that's a different thing.

As you noted, and as I have read elsewhere, Black arranged Washington junkets for Jonas Savimbi in the 1980's through his lobbying firm. I have also read unconfirmed reports that Savimbi practiced cannibalism. Have any of these reports been confirmed? If so, I guess cannibals need lobbyists too.

There is something that I have realized this election, more than anything else, and it's bound to piss a lot of people off, but it really needs to be said.

Let me begin by saying that I am about as far left as one gets in terms of my political ideology and my policy beliefs. I've been verbally attacked, criticized, abused, hurt, and almost beaten down because of the liberal and progressive ideals that I hold. And for the longest time, I felt that my ideas above everyone else's against me, my staunch, unwavering support for far left positions and policies, was the only true way to think and be. In many ways, it's still hard for me to think otherwise, and to think outside of my own emotions and feelings.

I attend Bard College, which, for anyone that knows about it, is arguably the most liberal college in the country, and certainly on the east coast. The Princeton Review ranked it as the #2 most politically liberal college in the country, and with good reason.

When I got to Bard, I thought I would be perfectly at home, because there would be so many people who shared my far left views on things. I was right, to an extent. But I was wrong in anticipating that most would agree with my views. Instead, they prescribe to an even more leftist view. I like to say there's more Commies than Dems. at Bard, and it would probably be true.

Something I soon realized was how closed-minded many of the far leftists that I met were, to the point of attacking me for my views, which in my life I always believed were further left than normal (and I'm from Vermont of all liberal places). There was a childish immaturity that came into any discussion that did not adhere to their opinions and beliefs, to the point of absolutist doctrines and agendas. "My way or the highway" attitudes that we all know so well, and have for the past seven and a half years criticized unendingly.

Since Obama won the nomination, I have been unable to find much of, if any difference with this absolutist doctrine I see from the far left at my college, and the way in which the far left netroots present themselves online. All dealing in absolutes, all dealing in "my way or the highway," "I know better than anyone else" agendas.

There's no middle ground, and no compromise, and the far left netroots are happy with it being that way, even at the expense of actual progress taking place. As long as you hold to (their idea of) "principles," the world is gonna be OK. Kos recently gave a big "fuck you" to anyone that didn't like his refusal to contribute (talk about reasonableness). And then we have the rhetoric that on first read might not sound so bad, but upon maybe a second or third, really starts to come into fruition. One person (rightly) pointed out on a blog that, (and I'm paraphrasing here), "to the right, if you support choice, you're a murderer. If you support the ACLU, you're unpatriotic and hate America. On the left if you don't think FISA is the end of the world you hate the constitution.

It all deals in absolutes. These are rhetorical devices not used simply by the far right, but by the far left that criticize the far right for that very nature. I wonder how anyone thinks they can enact change and spread progressivism when dealing in such strict absolutes. When did absolutism accomplish anything? Especially in the United States, which founded itself on the concept of "checks and balances"? (I can just see the comments deriding me and Obama for eroding such checks and balances). But things don't work in absolutes. The world isn't so black and white, cut and dry. Such reductive ideology is juvenile in its very nature.

It's amazing to me that such hypocrisy exists, where the far-left criticizes the far-right for saying McCain is too liberal (Ann Coulter was outspoken for this talking point), but then goes ahead and criticizes Obama for being too conservative. Or maybe he's just too black. Or too white.

It doesn't help that once-respected bloggers such as Arianna Huffington and (most especially and disgustingly) Glen Greenwald have prescribed to such an absolutist ideology. Compromise just doesn't exist.

Yet it doesn't matter that the constitution itself was written through years of long, hard-fought battles which resulted in scathing compromises for practically every side. No one got everything they wanted. Many of the founding fathers were furious with the result, but through such compromises, real and true progress was made. But to such absolutist netroots, none of that matters. Compromise is unacceptable. Anything less than their idea of what's right is wrong, without question, without a second-thought.

One of the most eye-opening and rational pieces I've ever read was on The Huffington Post, by Bob Cesca (I would encourage you all to read it).  He rightly pointed out, quoting a diary from the DailyKos,

Russ Feingold may have been the lone voice standing up to the first Patriot Act, but he voted for the confirmations of John Ashcroft and John Roberts.

Paul Wellstone was a strong liberal voice in the Senate, yet he voted for DOMA and the Patriot Act.

Dennis Kucinich, aside from being on the political fringe, was a lifelong pro-lifer until he decided he wanted to run for president.

Chris Dodd may do quite well on constitutional matters, but he voted for the Iraqi war, the Patriot Act, and is too beholden to the big banks and the hedge funds which he oversees from the Senate Banking Committee.

Talk about hypocrisy from the left concerning Obama's stances and votes. He followed by saying,

You and I could wait a lifetime for a skeleton key presidential nominee to come along who flawlessly interfaces with each of our pet issues, and, consequently, we'd probably die a politically disappointed and overly cynical death.

Honestly, he's right. And so is Obama. We need change. And if he's a "centrist" for his stance on gay rights (for which my gay father and friends cheer him on), and a centrist for his pro-choice and women's rights stance (for which my feminist friends love him), or his stance on energy and the environment (for which my green hippie friends praise him), or his stance on technology and net-neutrality (for which my techie computer geek friends applaud him),  then I guess I'll have to consider myself a "centrist" too.

www.nytimes.com/2008/07/04/opinion/04fri1.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

Senator Barack Obama stirred his legions of supporters, and raised our hopes, promising to change the old order of things. He spoke with passion about breaking out of the partisan mold of bickering and catering to special pleaders, promised to end President Bush’s abuses of power and subverting of the Constitution and disowned the big-money power brokers who have corrupted Washington politics.

Skip to next paragraph The Board Blog

Additional commentary, background information and other items by Times editorial writers.

Go to The Board » Readers' Comments

Readers shared their thoughts on this article.

• Read All Comments (152) »

if (acm.rc) acm.rc.write();

Now there seems to be a new Barack Obama on the hustings. First, he broke his promise to try to keep both major parties within public-financing limits for the general election. His team explained that, saying he had a grass-roots-based model and that while he was forgoing public money, he also was eschewing gold-plated fund-raisers. These days he’s on a high-roller hunt.

Even his own chief money collector, Penny Pritzker, suggests that the magic of $20 donations from the Web was less a matter of principle than of scheduling. “We have not been able to have much of the senator’s time during the primaries, so we have had to rely more on the Internet,” she explained as she and her team busily scheduled more than a dozen big-ticket events over the next few weeks at which the target price for quality time with the candidate is more than $30,000 per person.

The new Barack Obama has abandoned his vow to filibuster an electronic wiretapping bill if it includes an immunity clause for telecommunications companies that amounts to a sanctioned cover-up of Mr. Bush’s unlawful eavesdropping after 9/11.

In January, when he was battling for Super Tuesday votes, Mr. Obama said that the 1978 law requiring warrants for wiretapping, and the special court it created, worked. “We can trace, track down and take out terrorists while ensuring that our actions are subject to vigorous oversight and do not undermine the very laws and freedom that we are fighting to defend,” he declared.

Now, he supports the immunity clause as part of what he calls a compromise but actually is a classic, cynical Washington deal that erodes the power of the special court, virtually eliminates “vigorous oversight” and allows more warrantless eavesdropping than ever.

The Barack Obama of the primary season used to brag that he would stand before interest groups and tell them tough truths. The new Mr. Obama tells evangelical Christians that he wants to expand President Bush’s policy of funneling public money for social spending to religious-based organizations — a policy that violates the separation of church and state and turns a government function into a charitable donation.

He says he would not allow those groups to discriminate in employment, as Mr. Bush did, which is nice. But the Constitution exists to protect democracy, no matter who is president and how good his intentions may be.

On top of these perplexing shifts in position, we find ourselves disagreeing powerfully with Mr. Obama on two other issues: the death penalty and gun control.

Mr. Obama endorsed the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn the District of Columbia’s gun-control law. We knew he ascribed to the anti-gun-control groups’ misreading of the Constitution as implying an individual right to bear arms. But it was distressing to see him declare that the court provided a guide to “reasonable regulations enacted by local communities to keep their streets safe.”

What could be more reasonable than a city restricting handguns, or requiring that firearms be stored in ways that do not present a mortal threat to children?

We were equally distressed by Mr. Obama’s criticism of the Supreme Court’s barring the death penalty for crimes that do not involve murder.

We are not shocked when a candidate moves to the center for the general election. But Mr. Obama’s shifts are striking because he was the candidate who proposed to change the face of politics, the man of passionate convictions who did not play old political games.

There are still vital differences between Mr. Obama and Senator John McCain on issues like the war in Iraq, taxes, health care and Supreme Court nominations. We don’t want any “redefining” on these big questions. This country needs change it can believe in.

We've heard this stuff for years. Cheap Oil will "eventually" run out. Our deficits will "eventually" need to be dealt with. Foreigners will "eventually" get tired of buying our debt. Global warming will "eventually" cause real problems...

The US has been stumbling blindly into an absolutely epic train wreck the last few years. Hear that *thwack* sound just lately? That's the brown matter finally hitting the in-room air-mover. Gasoline is now over 4 dollars a gallon (in some places, well over). "Eventually" is now here. There are a number of urgent, and very expensive, things that are needed right away if the United States is to survive as a first-tier country in the world. A few of the more urgent items on the agenda:

1. We urgently need passenger rail service to be massively expanded. In an ideal world with non-cowardly Democrats in congress, a big Rail bill would pass right now, over Bush's veto - It would be better not to wait until Obama takes office. The ever-upward trend in fuel prices means air travel is about to become both much rarer and far more expensive; air travel as a mass consumer activity is deep, deep trouble. This means that we will need electric high-speed rail between major Metro centers, and pronto, or pretty soon no one except for the very rich going to be able to get around the country in anything resembling an efficient way.

2. Suburbs, especially more-distant suburbs, are probably going to be effectively abandoned on a large scale shortly (30-mile commutes with $10+ per gallon gas? $12 per gallon? If you make six figures, maybe: If you're the vast, vast majority of us that don't make six figures - Um, no. And all those "creatively" financed McMansions currently being repo'ed and sold at a loss will add to and accelerate this process) All those ex-suburban folks are going to need an affordable place to live that's closer to where they work; and they will need massively expanded public transit (street cars and light rail) to take them to work. Many smaller cities will be too broke (in part due to the cratering housing market) to finance even a substantial fraction of this: they are going to need Federal help. Taxes need to go up. Substantially. Especially the top marginal rates.

3. Interstate trucking is currently reeling, and its precarious situation going to get much, much worse. Interstate trucking relies on now-unobtainable cheap diesel fuel to work as it has up until now. It is hard to overstate the extent to which  contemporary commerce depends on trucks to deliver supplies - everything from food delivery to your local supermarket, to the loads of cheap, lead-laced crap imported from China and delivered to Walmart from the ports of entry comes on trucks: we need to find alternatives. Moving food and other goods shorter distances (i.e., using local sources rather than China and South America) is going to become mandatory when trucking collapses.

This diary just scratches the surface, but I'm not despairing. Americans have, in the past, come together to face problems at least as daunting as the ones we're facing now. That said, our survival will depend on the bullshit ceasing, and people facing the situation squarely and realistically.

Finally, a good general link, for further reading on peak oil:

http://www.theoildrum.com/

In response to observer2's excellent post on netroots overreach, I had the following observation about Glenn Greenwald, who's been making frequent trips to the local ExxonMobil for gasoline to keep the fire roaring.
"Yep, he's becoming a perfect example of the intolerant childishness. I rec'd one of his patented, churlish attacks in response to my saying at this point in time, lefties can be part of the problem or part of the solution. Naturally he equated this with "You're either for us or against us," and then extrapolated out that obviously I was proposing genuflection before the sainted, perfect, transcendent one and never mind the jack-booted thugs coming in the middle of the night.
So, I thanked him for making my point, which was that as an analyst I value him, but when he starts drawing conclusions he gets absolutist and hysterical.
But now he's staked out a position, can't back down, and is vested in raising the ante and becoming a standard-bearer, reveling in his own newfound 'power' and the adoring posts of his own acolytes. Instead of talking people off of ledges, he's keeping them up there and essentially encouraging others to join.
But that's all okay, because he's principled, don't you know, and is happy to play the martyr. What would be a lot more useful is if he, mighty constitutional lawyer that he is, would draft sample legislation that would address the worst excesses of FISA and forward it to Obama. You know, try to be part of the solution."

I don't mind the principled objections. I don't mind cogent analysis. I'm not proposing that anyone just "shut up and get with the program and leave your doors unlocked so the Nazis don't have to waste time knocking." But I really wish he'd try to use his pulpit to turn the conversation more toward, "This is why I think the bill stinks, and here's what I'd like President Obama to do about it. He could still have his data mining tools AND protect our civil liberties, and this is a concrete proposal that would help him live up to his promise to safeguard our 4th Amendment rights."

We need to be able to embed videos and photos. Rick has a nice video today where he thanks the netroots. We

We have it up at The Progressive Electorate.

Also remember to donate to Rick in the $17.76 money bomb. as we must continue to keep Rick and Texas in play this cycle.

According to the wiki on Wecht, there is some inconsistent information floating around about the Wecht Trial. Some have said that jury polling is permitted; and that the FBI agents were engaged in lawful interviews.

Defense counsel contends an individual "jury poll" -- interviews by a judge of the jury members during trial during deliberations -- never occurred. According to the defense:

"The procedures violated were that the judge failed to poll jurors individually to ensure they were, in fact, deadlocked, failed to ask the attorneys if they consented to a mistrial, failed to show the attorneys the final note from the jurors that said they were "essentially" deadlocked, and failed to question the jury foreman."

This language above explicitly links "jury poll" with an in-court action, during trial, before the jury reaches it's conclusion. A "jury poll" as the defense counsel is using the term, has nothing to do with post-trial interviews.

The court of appeals has stayed the second trial pending a review of defense motion that a second trial of Wecht would be double jeopardy.

The first trial is over. There is no set date for a second trial.

The court said prosecutors were allowed to record the names of the seated jurors.

The government has no adeuately explained how did the FBI agents get the names of the seated jurors to conduct post-trial home interviews, different than a jury poll.

Sen Obama has said from the start that, "We must be as careful getting out of Iraq as we were careless getting in." He has said it so much that it is almost as much a theme of his campaign as Hope and Change. He has said that he intends to remove all American combat forces from Iraq as quickly as possible. He has said that he has been informed that two brigades a month is as quickly as is prudent and that if you remove troops at that rate you will be out in 16 months. It is also his contention that part of the problem with the current administration is their refusal to adjust to changing realities. He is not going to stubbornly stick to a plan regardless of the reality on the ground.

He has said this again and again. Check out the links or the embedded video at my blog The Working Class Heretic. Here he is explaining this position in march on Anderson Cooper. Here he is explaining it yesterday (7-3-8). During the primaries and now his position has been the same. But the know nothing reality denying punditry accuses him of waffling on both occasions. What is the deal with that?

(Cross-posted here.)

I've seldom been more tempted to actually delight in a man's death as I am right now.

Jesse Helms is dead.

As recently as April, this deeply bigoted man was still at it, this time targeting Barack Obama:

The North Carolina Republican Party -- forged by the hand of Dixiecrat segregationists like Jesse ("White people, wake up before it is too late. Do you want Negroes working beside you, your wife and your daughters, in your mills and factories?") Helms -- has never been cautious about playing the race card. When North Carolina Democrats nominated Harvey Gantt, an exceptionally-qualified moderate African-American candidate against Helms in a 1990 U.S. Senate race, the North Carolina Republican machine countered with a series of ads that emphasized Gantt's race and played on fears and prejudices.

Because the media tends to be afraid of calling racists out, Helms and the North Carolina Republicans had no trouble running a blatantly racist campaign. And, when Helms was reelected over Gantt, a powerful lesson was learned.

Under the guise of opposing the a pair of Democratic gubernatorial candidates who have endorsed Barack Obama for the party's presidential nomination, the state party is airing a commercial designed to do exactly what the Helms campaign's anti-Gantt ad did back in 1990: scare white voters away from an African-American candidate they might otherwise support.

If the material in the current ad was accurate in its portrayal of Obama, the North Carolina Republicans might have a defense. But it's not.

Sigh. This about sums it up:

Unlike many of his Republican counterparts, Helms has changed little over the past 50 years. Long before Rush Limbaugh, Helms pioneered the use of television to rally public sentiment. While Ronald Reagan was losing primaries to Gerald Ford, Helms mobilized the religious right and built one of the most profitable political fundraising machines ever. And long after die-hard segregationists like George Wallace and Strom Thurmond began courting black voters, Helms fueled white fears by opposing a national holiday in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., whistling "Dixie" while standing next to Senator Carol Moseley-Braun, and supporting apartheid in South Africa.

"His racial politics are deeply held convictions, not simply politics of convenience," says Christopher Scott. "He has a view of a fundamentalist Christian society in which everyone is not welcome. If you could pick up the South Africa of 20 years ago and transplant it to America, that's what he would do."

I need to pray on this. No one should be cursed in their death.

But that doesn't exactly mean anyone should be shedding tears, either.

As I said, I need to pray on this.

I love the Fourth of July.  It may be my favorite holiday, and not because of fireworks, since I am neither a fireworks or bombs bursting in air sort of guy.  (On the other hand, the advent of the internet has allowed me to listen to Jean Shepherd's 4th of July story about Ludlow Kissel and his bomb every year, which I will do.)

But this post is not about that.

No, I love, the Forth of July because of what it  commemorates.

I am sadly aware of the sin with which we were born and, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/01/opinion/01schaller.html?scp=7&sq=july+01+2008&st=nyt">as we were reminded again this week</a>, about which we still suffer, but despite it all, this is the day which marks the date on which the Declaration of Independence was published, a document written by very young men who convinced the people who counted in these "united states" to try, by risking their "lives, their fortune and their scared honor" to assert that government requires the assent of the governed.

It is such a <a href="http://www.ushistory.org/declaration/document/index.htm">great document </a>. It is truly laughable that the political right claims superior ownership of the thing, since it stands for almost precisely the opposite of what these latter day Tories would impose on us.

The New York Times gives up one of its full page back of the section display ads to republish it on the Fourth.  A paragraph back is a link to its text.  It is so worth reading, as if it were a diary and, it deserves rec's from everyone on this site particularly.

Last year, I posted elsewhere what appears under a few dashes, which some may think celebrates more the Constitution---some fifteen years in the future when the Declaration was published  ---- but I don't think so.  I think, instead, that what the Declaration of Independence stood for is under assault today despite the protections included when the Constitution was finally promulgated.

-----------------------------------------------------------

Today is a day to read not only the Declaration of Independence but <a href="http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/cgi-bin/getcase.pl?court=us&vol=343&invol=579">Youngstown Co v. Sawyer</a>, 343 U.S. 579 (1952), since it is among the most important cases the Supreme Court has decided, and particularly because it delineated the powers of the President and those of the Congress. Reading it again is again a civics lesson appropriate to this holiday in this time of abject lawlessness, and the attempt of the Executive to assume the powers that the Crown itself lost many centuries ago.

Justice Black, speaking for the Court, explained the arrangement clearly and concisely, in a way that the current President, and a vast majority of the press seems not to understand, as elemental and fundamental as it is:

<blockquote>"In the framework of our Constitution, the President's power to see that the laws are faithfully executed refutes the idea that he is to be a lawmaker. The Constitution limits his functions in the lawmaking process to the recommending of laws he thinks wise and the vetoing of laws he thinks bad. And the Constitution is neither silent nor equivocal about who shall make laws which the President is to execute. The first section of the first article says that 'All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States . . . .' After granting many powers to the Congress, Article I goes on to provide that Congress may 'make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.'"</blockquote>

So Happy Fourth, in the year leading to the renewal of that which has made this nation the last best hope for mankind, as the founders intended.

So Rick Noriega released his fundraising numbers for Q2 yesterday. Click here to read full release from campaign.

I think the campaign realizes this total was below National expectations by its headline and lead paragraph focusing on the total amount of donors and the on-line prowess.

To me 980k in Texas will hurt as it is such a big State to cover with so many different media markets. With so many other races that the DSCC can put focus into in terms of bang for the buck, I'm a little concerned with almost half the money coming in from ACT Blue donations.

That being said, we will need to do more and contribute more to make this race stay viable. There was good news last week with the lead in on-line fundraising and some close polling numbers.

As I was reminded earlier, we are still in this race and we should only offer constructive criticism and not just whine. So I have added Rick to my $17.76 money bomb. Please take the time and Donate. We are going to need to raise 750k on-line or more next quarter for Rick. It can be done and it will be done.

I've been assured that other efforts have been stepped up as well as reminded that Rick lost two weeks due to being on Active Duty.

(Cross-posted here.)

I'm normally no conspiracy theorist (save JFK), but the Associated Press' brazen PR effort for John McCain seems to finally be getting some notice.

While the AP's been serving McCain donuts (literally), they've taken a sharp turn against Obama, hammering him in the vein of McCain's PR sycophants. I've gone on about it as recently as yesterday, and this is only the second time (first was Jed) I've seen something similar ripping them for their obvious bias:

Since then, I can’t help but notice that the AP hasn’t exactly been neutral. A month ago, the AP ran an article about the “people who might complicate Obama’s campaign,” including Tony Rezko and Jeremiah Wright. The piece not only read like a slam job, it actually resembled an RNC oppo dump, which for all I know, it was.

Two weeks ago, the same reporter who made sure McCain had coffee to go with his donuts wrote a scathing, 900-word reprimand of Obama’s decision to bypass the public financing system in the general election. It was filled with errors of fact and judgment, and ignored the fact that McCain has illegally played fast and loose with the public-financing system this year.

And just to add insult to injury, the AP praises McCain’s record of bipartisanship on issues like tobacco and immigration reform, without noting that McCain completely reversed course and no longer believes in the position the AP is touting.

The Associated Press is one of the most widely read, if not the most read, sources of news in print journalism in the U.S. If it could at least pretend to be objective in the presidential campaign, I’m sure we’d all appreciate it.

It might be nice if we knew the Associated Press weren't either in the tank for one candidate, or trying to manipulate it to service their readership totals. One of the two is happening. It's time that folks got wise to this.

Yes, this is another post about Obama's stance on telecom immunity.  No, I am not encouraging anyone, including myself,  to vote for Mcain instead. 
But Obama's response to the anti-immunity group on his blog is transparently misleading and underestimates the intelligence of many of his supporters.  (Many of us against telecom immunity are not as far left as the media would lead you to believe.  I'm center-left. ) 
Here is Glenn Greenwald's assessment:  http://utdocuments.blogspot.com/2008/07/obamas-new-statement-on-fisa.html
And for those of you that say, "hey, at least he took the time to address those who oppose his view".  Has communicating with the electorate become so rare that it is now considered an indulgence for a politician to go out of his way to talk to voters?  
That's ridiculous.  
The more Obama, or any other politician, is asked to explain his or her positions, to justify his or her points of view, the more transparent that justification becomes.  
Thus, a position either holds up under scrutiny and is reinforced with logic, reason and fact, or  a position doesn't.  
Obama's response to his supporters is coherent and presents some good points, but  in some ways, his response is transparently misleading.  And that is what outrages me the most.  
Too many politicians are only one talking point deep. When they try to explain themselves, they can't.
I don't believe Obama strengthens his chances of winning this election by weakening his positions.   
The democrats are already perceived as spineless.  








 

According to www.wral.com, former North Carolina senator Jesse Helms died early this morning.  Helms was a former commentator for WRAL.

I have to give credit for TPM covering the Timeline of Obama's flip on FISA. Rimjob at FreeRepublic would have never allowed the same on McCain's flip. It is sad seeing these young voters, new people to the process who sent money to Obama abused in trust, to see the "icecream fall off the icecream cone" of their idea that laws mattered, that there was a set of laws for all to adhere to. I will give TPM credit where it is due, they essentially retracted allot of what was implied negatively about Glen Fine, and covered this flip-flop on the blog. Democracy would be improved if the GOP had the same ethics and a well managed forum to do the same. Happy 4th of July.

I'm not saying we're there yet, but what would be the signs that so-called "Netroots" has moved from a smart, savvy, often prgamatic and energetic movement to push progressive reform into hubris and power-hunger?

Some suggested signs:

* Start making lists of enemy Democrats you want to defeat -- instead of Republicans

* Requiring all Democrats to kiss their ass publicly and bow down and grovel (sort of like the Religious Right does).

* Liberal use of threats: Defy us and you "will pay!".

* Forget that we've only won a single election cycle (One!) and in many cases by slim margins (VA)

* Act like you are the voice of "The People", when in fact still a minority voice

* Conflate America's souring on the GOP with America becoming suddenly very progressive in all things

* Say things like "Hey, you're 12 points ahead, he can afford to lose a few points of [insert pet issue]"

* Spend all their time threatening/punishing/harassing/badgering politicians for not making unpopular decisions that are losers at the ballot box instead of trying to convince the larger public on the issue (making it easier for the politician to do the right thing)

* Anything that smells like Naderism: the sanctimonious, leftier-than-thou sneering that labels anything too popular or sensible or -- gasp -- winning as "too corporate/mainstream for me". 

* Intolerant attitude towards healthy criticism (Kos' recent remark that if you don't like his refusal to contribute money than "fuck you")

Any others?

Dan Quayle served two terms in the House, and was in his second term in the Senate when he was nominated to be Vice President. The press immediately declared he was too young and inexperienced for such an important job (a job that even Al Gore was able to handle!) The press had a field day every time Quayle made the smallest mistake, like when he said he had visited 57 of the 60 states, or the time when he acknowledged the fallen heroes that he saw in the audience for his memorial day speech. Oh, wait! No, it was Obama who made those gaffes. Obama, the man who has a grand total of three years of experience yet is declared by the media to be a 'rock star' of politics. Quayle was ridiculed for not correcting a spelling mistake made by someone else. There is no indication that he didn't know how many states are in the union or that a fallen hero is a dead one, but he was made a laughing stock while Obama is lauded as an eloquent speaker and a 'brilliant' politician. This would be yet another example of the bias of the media that liberals constantly refuse to admit exists, like Katie Couric crying on election night, to those that wore black the next day, to the insults CNN put in the crawler, to calling the president a monkey on CNBC. These examples don't even include the more important bias of slanting the coverage, trying to set the agenda and frame the debate around the liberal point of view, or the use of symbolism to change perception. My question, has anyone considered the Red State/ Blue State issue? During the 80's, the political maps always showed the Republicans as Blue, and the Democrats as Red. Suddenly this changed, and the change was adopted consistently by all media sources.  Was this because Democrats objected to the imagery of their supporters being labeled 'red', given their long flirtation with socialism/communism?

    Bozo the Clown (Larry Harmon) has died.  Bozo the President (George W. Bush) has two hundred days left in the White House.

I assume everyone at this point is aware of the recovery of Ms. Betancourt, the 3 American contractors, and 11 other captives from FARC guerillas in  the jungles of Colombia.

I bring this up because I can find no conspicuous mention of this dramatic story anywhere on TPM. For the record, it's certainly possible I missed it -  I only did a brief scan of headlines and titles, and a cursory search. It DOES seem fair to assume from my efforts that this has not been a major subject of discussion here at TPM, in the sense that it is not nearly that difficult to find references (for example) to FISA, or to Obama's Iraq position: These subjects are actually hard to AVOID.

It seems  to me (in sincere good-faith) that this revelation really MATTERS (at least a little), because it's another example of the tone-deafness of a certain important segment of today's Democratic Party. This would seem to be the ultimate, genuine "feel good" story: Good besting evil, in a potentially violent cloak-and-dagger  operation we'll surely see replayed in a Hollywood movie - a risky, complicated, audacious plan, executed to perfection, with the perfect Hollywood outcome. It has REAL action heros. It has inherent "grab",  in its fundamental appeal to so many aspects of our complex and diverse American character. 

I think our relative silence on this story gives a clue as to one of the reasons we've suffered so many recent ballot-box disappointments, in spite of having the best of the intellectual argument: We have become progressively and increasingly disconnected from too many of the things that excite the hearts of ordinary people. I think it is entirely possible to be appropriately RESPECTFUL of this dramatic development, without going completely over-the-top into Fox News hyperbole.

 I'll admit, I don't know it that dynamic still holds. The Bush Administration and its many enablers have made such a mess of things,  that we have a good chance to win by default, if for no other better reason. Still, I think it remains a potential source of danger for progressive thinkers. I can only imagine what the great communicators of our recent past would have made of this story - Reagan, or even Clinton. They would have grasped INSTANTLY that this is "win/win" in every sense of the word, and would have acted immediately to get ahead of the parade

It seems to me it would be not only a GOOD thing, but a SMART thing, if Sen. Obama and his supporters would unleash some of his considerable rhetorical skills to address this matter. It may not seem exciting in the classroom or at the policy seminar, but there are only so many votes you can get in those places. Many more are available in places where this story has positive power to legitimately stir people.

Today Greg Sargent posts a piece titled "Obama Reiterates: Combat Troops Out Of Iraq In 16 Months".

No ifs, no buts.

But Claire McKaskill told MSNBC Tuesday, as reported yesterday by the Kansas City Star, the following:

“Barack Obama has never said this is written in stone,” ...“He’s always said ‘I will obviously take into account what commanders on the ground say.’ ”

Obama, then, shouldn't be saying that it probably take 16 months to withdraw, because of course, commanders on the ground might disagree with the 16 month plan.

Who to believe?

Can't something be done about this? I'm starting to think Repugs are fighting a war of attrition by registering here.

http://tpmelectioncentral.talkingpointsmemo.com/profile/tbhull

Whatever happened to Valdron anyway? I'm starting to miss the old site.

Your defence to the MSM line about Obama "altering" his views on Iraq is that he really has not altered anything and he has always said A, B and C? Great, perfectly true.

But you already lost.

You  have accepted the MSM premise that Obama in fact meant he would change his plans, and at that point that becomes the argument.

Obama said he would refine his plans. "Refine" has a simple, meaning and it is not "alter." It is "improve" or "to make more specific" or "to remove unknowns/uncertainties/ambiguities." A mathematician could refer to it as "reducing."

I plan a visit to Marxland, a solidarity themepark with egalitarian rollercoasters. As the visit approaches, I refine my plan to consist of 7 days. I can further refine it by deciding that I will take People's Airways there instead of hitchhiking. If I should like to extend my visit to two weeks, I can revise my plans.

Really. The "low-information voters" the media likes to disparage understand what "refine" means. Why does the media not?

To Govern a Republic, One Must Know the Minds That Created It.

"...while a nation goes speculation crazy the people neglect to think of fundamental principles."

These were the words of Franklin Roosevelt in the months leading into the Democratic National Convention of 1932. Roosevelt knew that the fight for the United States Presidency was not simply a game of political machines and punditry, but that this coming fight demanded a leader who understood the historic enemy of the United States and the founding principles of the nation.

http://www.larouchepac.com/news/2008/07/02/1932-video.html

Okay, I took the $17.76 added a couple threw back in Barack and just put Rick Noriega in the mix.

So help me and let's see what we can do. This is the first time I donated to Barack since he secured the nomination. I had been waiting and no better time than the 4th of July.

I threw Rick Noriega in the mix because of his patriotism and stance on veterans issues. We need a veteran in the Senate who will stand up for our veterans and not just provide lip service.

Donate here

I have never seen such god-awful, terrible, stupid, sad displays of journalistic incompetence since the reporting in the lead up to the invasion of Iraq. These past few days in particular I have been watching the cable news anchors float the "fact" that Obama had shifted his position on Iraq. They also seem to think this upcoming visit will be his first ever. Campbell Brown said "first time ever" tonight and I nearly croaked. That was the first time I had seen her broadcast.. obviously it will also be the last.

It occurred to me that the majority of these talking heads do not care one bit about the news, or the world, or people. They can't, if they did they wouldn't do such a poor job, no? I understand if you are hosting a live daily news program you can't be expected to know everything, but this is nothing short of taking McCain campaign talking points and passing them off as actual news.

Still, shouldn't something as basic and important as to whether or not the Democratic nominee for POTUS has in fact changed his position on Iraq? And if you don't know and you think it's true because John McCain's campaign keeps saying it in print; don't you think that's something you should check on before saying it on your live television news broadcast? News shows ya know? The kind of show people watch with the understanding that you are telling them the facts?

Coming up next; Barack Obama shifting his position on ending the war? His comments today seemed to say so. You decide when we get back!

So today they all got exactly what they wanted. Barack Obama was talking to the press like they were adults! Clearly this was something the press is not used to. (Did you know McCain's plane has a couch!?) They jumped on his words as breaking news, Obama has flipped on Iraq. The McCain campaign naturally had been waiting for this and the press played right along. Later we got the story of the second press conference and the was reported was something like this.

OBAMA SAID WE ARE STAYING IN IRAQ FOREVER

THEN HE SCRAMBLED

AN UNHEARD OF RIDICULOUS SECOND PRESS CONFERENCE!

REALLY TRIED HARD TO CONVINCE US

NOPE, NOT BUYING IT

BUT YOU MAKE UP YOUR OWN MIND

It's a basic outline of the same script they all used. Then we had the next story: John McCain is Awesome in Columbia!

How sad. I miss Tim Russert. At least he cared.

What does www.barackobama.com tell us about Obama's plan to withdraw our troops from Iraq?

Obama will immediately begin to remove our troops from Iraq. He will remove one to two combat brigades each month, and have all of our combat brigades out of Iraq within 16 months. Obama will make it clear that we will not build any permanent bases in Iraq. He will keep some troops in Iraq to protect our embassy and diplomats; if al Qaeda attempts to build a base within Iraq, he will keep troops in Iraq or elsewhere in the region to carry out targeted strikes on al Qaeda.

Do you see any reference to the importance of the opinion of generals on the ground? No, because this plan was written during the primaries, wherein the main target were liberals, as opposed to the General Elections, where moderates are seen as the most important block.

Obama is your typical politician.

Senator Obama, your words;

“ Your organizing, your activism and your passion is an important reason why this bill is better than previous versions. No tool has been more important in focusing peoples' attention on the abuses of executive power in this Administration than the active and sustained engagement of American citizens. That holds true -- not just on wiretapping, but on a range of issues where Washington has let the American people down.
 
I learned long ago, when working as an organizer on the South Side of Chicago, that when citizens join their voices together, they can hold their leaders accountable. I'm not exempt from that. I'm certainly not perfect, and expect to be held accountable too. I cannot promise to agree with you on every issue. But I do promise to listen to your concerns, take them seriously, and seek to earn your ongoing support to change the country. That is why we have built the largest grassroots campaign in the history of presidential politics, and that is the kind of White House that I intend to run as President of the United States -- a White House that takes the Constitution seriously, conducts the peoples' business out in the open, welcomes and listens to dissenting views, and asks you to play your part in shaping our country’s destiny. 

After all, the choice in this election could not be clearer. Whether it is the economy, foreign policy, or the Supreme Court, my opponent has embraced the failed course of the last eight years, while I want to take this country in a new direction. Make no mistake: if John McCain is elected, the fundamental direction of this country that we love will not change. But if we come together, we have an historic opportunity to chart a new course, a better course.

Senator Obama, you fail to see the real problem with your decision to vote for the FISA bill over what the ‘people’ want.
 
It’s not so much about what the bill will or will not do, while that is very important, what’s more important is your (and Dr King's), “the fierce urgency of now”, the American people need to feel like they are finally being listened to.
     
You just told them, while very eloquently I might add, why you disagree and thanks but I’m voting the way ‘I’ think is best.  In other words, you’ve just told us that ‘you’ will be our next “Decider” – not the American people!

Senator Obama, President Bush, his administration and the Republican Party have snubbed their noses at American’s for the past 8 years, now your are doing it again.
 
President Bush, like you, said that we American’s needed to hold our leaders accountable.  Bush, like you, said he loved hearing dissenting views and seeing demonstrations in the streets of America, after all, that’s what Democracy’s all about he said.

Dissent all you want folks; but I’m the Decider!

To repeat Senator, your words, “No tool has been more important in focusing peoples' attention on the abuses of executive power in this Administration than the active and sustained engagement of American citizens……. if we come together, we have an historic opportunity to chart a new course, a better course.”
 
Senator, why should American’s stay “engaged” if their wishes are consistently ignored?  Why should they “come together to chart a new course” if that course will be 'decided' – by just President Bush or a new, President Obama?

You are right Senator, our goals this election or more alike than apart, however sir, on this issue -- you are wrong.

I hate to be a killjoy before the dream of a no-immunity party even begins. However, we might succeed in having immunity dropped from the FISA legislation only to find we have overlooked even worse aspects of this legislation. The more I read about this issue, the more it appears the immunity problem may be doing double duty.  It serves as both a significant issue that does warrant attention, and as a distraction from other even more objectionable aspects of the FISA Amendment legislation that will expand government power to spy on U.S. citizens.

For those who haven't already read this, below is a really nice excerpt from a diary post at the Daily Kos. It was written by a former criminal defense attorney called "NCrissieB." Among other things,  NCrissieB specialized in litigating Fourth Amendment rights cases having to do with search and seizure, so his expertise is quite on point. NCrissieB's main argument is that the Patriot Act already did away with our Fourth Amendment rights.

Perhaps he is even right  when he says that the immunity issue " is not the hill to die on," with respect to Obama. However, there is no time like the present for voters to send a message to all members of Congress that we not only expect them to nix immunity and refrain from creating any more unconstitutional laws, but we also expect them to amend any questionable laws that already exist.

The more laws on the books that degrade the same constitutional rights, the less powerful the argument that they are unconstitutional will be in the future. This is especially true with some of the Supreme Court members we've got today.  So better to pay attention to this now.

It is understandable that to we failed to fully safeguard our democracy in the aftermath of 9-11 when the Patriot Act went through. We can still demonstrate to our lawmakers in Congress that now we are paying much closer attention to the laws they propose-- and especially any loopy parts that erode our Constitutional rights.

You can read NCrissieB's whole post here: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/6/26/62819/0991/926/542170   
--------------------------------------------------------------

NCRISSIEB's TAKE ON CURRENT STATE OF Y|OUR FOURTH AMENDMENT RIGHTS:

Thu Jun 26, 2008 at 04:46:30 AM PDT

Your telephone number pops up several times on the call list of someone the FBI believe is involved with Al Qaeda.  The FBI go to the FISC, and ask for a warrant to wiretap your telephone.  The wiretap reveals nothing about terrorism - turns out they were wrong number calls - but the FBI do hear you talking about who will bring the weed to your backyard barbeque.

Based on that, the FBI get a warrant to raid your home on the day of the barbeque, and in they swoop, charging you with possession with intent to distribute.  That's a felony.

"What gives you the right to storm into my back yard?" you ask.  The FBI agent presents you with the warrant, and its affidavit, and you see that they've been wiretapping you.  "What gives you the right to spy on my phone calls?" you demand.

"We have a FISA warrant," the agent answers.  And off you go to trial.

At trial, your attorney moves to exclude the search warrant that let them into your backyard, on grounds that you're not a terrorist, there is no conceivable evidence to suggest otherwise, thus no FISA warrant should have been issued, thus the wiretap is illegal, and all information gained from it is "fruit of the poisoned tree."  But there's a problem:

Not even your trial judge can see the FISA affidavit.  It is classified, "sources and methods" information.  The prosecutor can show the judge that a FISA warrant was indeed issued, but that's as far as it goes.

Because you can't see the factual allegations underlying the FISA warrant - not even the trial judge can see that - you cannot challenge the validity of that warrant.  It's not reviewable.  Not at trial.  Not on appeal.  Not ever.

Which means they could have said anything they wanted.  They could have had only the flimsiest pretext of probable cause.  They could even have lied outright.  You'll never know, so you can't challenge it.

Oh, and the FISC has refused fewer than five of the tens of thousands of warrant requests submitted, in the past 19 years.  The FISC is, quite literally, a rubber-stamp court.

This is the "protection" offered by FISA.  This is the "constitutional safeguard" so many of you are so up in arms to preserve.  It is no safeguard at all.

Your constitutional rights exist only so long as you or your lawyer can challenge their violation in court.  If FISA is the last bastion of the Fourth Amendment, the Fourth Amendment is already a dead letter.

In terms of constitutional safeguards, the current FISA bill is a non-issue.  Yes, it allows telecoms to raise "color of law" immunity as an affirmative, threshhold defense.  And yes, that means the telecoms very likely will never be held to account for violations of FISA.  But the secrecy of FISA warrants themselves voids the Fourth Amendment, if information gained from those warrants can be used in a criminal trial.

I'm convinced that Barack Obama recognizes this.  I'm sure he recognizes that this bill is a classic political bait-and-switch, wrapping telecom immunity in the mantle of "safeguarding our constitutional rights," when in fact those rights are already voided by use of secret, non-reviewable FISA warrants to gather information for criminal cases.  I'm sure Barack Obama realizes that this petty knoll is not "the hill to die on."

"The hill to die on" is the USAPA's breaking down the wall of separation between intelligence-gathering and criminal investigation.  And that is not even at issue yet.  We'll need a Democratic president, and at least 60 Democratic senators, to fight that battle.

So please, folks, let's keep this bill in context.  If you're counting on FISA to safeguard your Fourth Amendment rights ... they're already gone.

© Kos Media, LLC
Site content may be used for any purpose without
explicit permission unless otherwise specified.

---------------------------------------------------------
(Excuse the lines. The block quotes haven't been working for me.)

I have a few more user-friendly documents about  FISA that I hope to post soon.

Have a great 4th! Don't drink and drive.

Cities are in many senses, organic, full of life and always changing.  New York City, in this case, Manhattan is no different.  Within every city, sub-communities chart out turf and call it their own, not realizing that their lease is only temporary.  Perhaps they are pioneers.  Regardless, here's a story on a restaurant in downtown Manhattan that closed this week and a few voices who shared their thoughts on the state of NYC....a place that has become increasingly more difficult to exist in, unless of course you happen to be very wealthy.
LINK TO A STORY ABOUT FLORENT and REAL ESTATE

Some of us may be a bit tired of this topic already, but let's face it: The FISA issue is just too good to let go and forget. EVER!

Therefore I predict that there will soon appear a number of dedicated sites with angry FISA protesters declaring that they will now vote for McCain.

Here's a list of sites that are likely to appear:

demsagainstfisa.com
save-our-freedom-stop-obama.com
barackobamadoesntspeakforme.com
justsaynofisa.com
activistsagainstobama.net
obama-sold-out.biz
obama.betrayed.us
demsagainstpussies.com
middle-is-for-losers.org
johnis44.com
no-big-ears.com (my personal favorite)

Most of these domains are still available, so feel free to grab some of them before others do.

I had a cat named Bozo.  A horse named Red.  I have a dog named Sox who is ten now.  I love them all in the present tense, including the ones I've lost.  I always will because they are part of me.  Without words, without reason and without a second thought they love, and did love, me.  To be loved by an animal, to experience that kind of devotion and absolute friendship, is beyond description.

Thanks, wwstaebler, for my thought tonight.

As an outspoken opponent of the current FISA bill, I would like to reiterate a few things that I have said in the past:

1.)  The current FISA bill does little to nothing to help the intelligence community.  The current FISA courts have been doing their job admirably for the last thirty or so years.  There is no need to overhaul the system.  If you need further proof, please see Mr. Greenwald.

2.)  The current FISA bill is not a compromise.  The needed checks and balances (which this "compromise" contains) for the FISA courts are already included in the original legislation.

3.)  The ability to take someone to court is a core priciple of democracy.  Demeaning that priciple undermines what makes this here old U.S. of A. the light of the world, and furthers the civic backslide that the GOP has been perpetuating for a generation.

4.)  Obama has nothing to gain by voting for the legislation.  Those that are familiar with the bill detest it, and those unfamiliar with the bill won't care if Obama votes "nay" on it.  The Republicans are going to paint Obama as "soft on terror" whether or not he votes for the FISA bill.  There is literally no purpose, politically, institutionally or militarily, to vote "yay" on the bill.

I regret I haven't been as active here as I should be.  This is a big issue, that strikes at the very core of what it means to be an American.

I am a supporter of Obama.  I am invested in his campaign.  However, for someone to govern well, we need to let him know what is important, and what he needs to change.  Obama has released a statement addressing people like me, but I simply cannot trade rights for public statements.  I will keep letting Obama know that this issue if important, and all other civically-minded voters should do the same.

Thank you for reading, and please take some time to let the Senators and Representatives that voted "nay" on the FISA bill know of your gratitude, in whatever way you can.

Okay.  As tomorrow is the 4th of July, let's take a break from the day-to-day micro campaign issues and think about bigger issues.

An op-ed article in the NYT spurred thoughts that I have harbored in my mind:

1) The Founding Fathers were imperfect;

2) The Founding Fathers were fighting the Revolutionary War, not the Status Quo War.  

I suspect that the FF would feel most flattered if we honored Independence Day by asking, "What Would You Change in the Constitution?"

(Note: My ideas were influennced by the book "A More Perfect Constitution," by Larry Sabato)

To start things off, I would:

1) Increase the number of members in Congress;

2) Limit the terms of SC judges to 15 years.

I hope LizB reads this so that she bartends.  If not, here is my signature drink for the evening:

Chartini - 4 oz vodka or gin, 2 oz Green Chartreuse, 1 oz simple syrup (equal parts sugar and water)

As for the opening music, I recommend a download of an Umphrey's McGhee podcast.

Happy 4th of July!

Two ominous developments have me pretty worried. One is the elevation of  Rove's henchman Steve Schmidt in the McCain campaign hierarchy and the other is a federal court's upholding of  FL's hinky new law that allows the state to deny a voters right to vote due to the no match no vote rule!

Think there are going to be any more screw ups like the infamous "green screen" speech or the alternative energy appeal to Texas Oilmen incidents? I don't think so, These guys are scarred and they don't want to screw up the 8 years of unlimited power and feasting at the Washington trough so they are going to start getting really good at slinging the mud. Get ready for some serious Rovian BS and be ready to respond with appropriate derision and humiliation as necessary.

The FL law really scares me because as a 12 year FL resident, I have seen how Republicans can steal elections down here faster than you can say Jeb Bush. In FL most voter registration is done at the DMV when you obtain or change the address on your FL drivers license. Anyone who has spent time in the DMV knows the potential for errors with this process. Think about it! Did you resister as William or Bill? Did you use your full middle name or just the initial? Are you a Junior or a III?

Does anyone remember the FL Felon Voter Purge before the 2000 election? I sure do!

I'm just sayin!

I hope Obama will take a lesson from this.  Yes, any adult understands that you can't say with absolute certainty what you will do in Iraq a year from now.  Something big might happen to make your firm intentions unwise or otherwise unattainable by the time next year rolls around.  Much of the press probably understands this.  But they also understand (as we all do) that politicians routinely say they are committed to something when they aren't really, and they will later ditch their previous position by invoking a change of circumstances.
Had Obama not just flip-flopped spectacularly on FISA, he would not now be facing suspicions that his Iraq war position is hollow.
(And no, I don't think it's the substance of immunity from civil suits for the telco's that is the big thing here -- not for me, anyway.  It's that Obama announced a firm position during the primary to gain favor with the left base, and unceremoniously ditched it a couple weeks after clinching the nomination.  If you pull that kind of shit, you can expect your credibility to suffer in general.)

My family is Republican.  For the most part.

Other parts of my family are not.  For the most part.

But we try to get along despite of our differences.

Sometimes, in spite of our differences.

I know I am the family black sheep, yet all members of my family keep trying to assure me otherwise.

They love me.

If I wasn't a member of the family, though......would they even give me a second glance?

Discuss.

Because I'm too bewildered by my family, and even myself, tonight, to discuss.  I will let you all do it for me.

Hugs and kisses,
Lis B.

Wesley Clark's inept challenge of John McCain's "executive" capabilities by minimizing--some might even say, trivializing--the candidate's military career have cost Clark any chance he had the the O-VP.

But through a fortuitous bit of timing, it may have opened up a space for Team Obama to raise some serious questions regarding McCain's ability to manage a large organization.

The complete top-down reorganization of the McCain campaign is a real issue.

Neither Obama nor McCain have any real "executive" leadership experience. That's a concrete fact that one cannot get around.

Their first tests of running a complex organization has come in the campaign itself, namely, running their own campaign organizations.

How have they done? (Should this be rhetorical question, as the answer is so obvious?)

The most expert and objective critique of O's performance would come from two people who share the same last name and were his adversaries just a short month ago: Hillary and Bill.  Barack ran a tight ship and kept its command structure intact during the primary season, and continues to do so today.

McCain?  He was forced during the primary season to do a draconian overhaul in his campaign management as his ship was sinking. Now, early in the general election phase, his ship has again begun to take on water. And again, commanding officers are replaced, strategic management structure is fundamentally revised, "outside" help is brought aboard.

If there's going to be a debate about who is the better executive, who is more adept at putting together and leading a winning team, the campaign thus-far has put Obama far in the lead on this issue.

Now, O's PR group has to find a way to exploit this, without a word about the Navy; in other words, it should not be done with blunt instruments like Wes Clark...but it should be done.

MyBlog: http://ProteanPerspectives.blogspot.com

I had the experience of being scolded and punished for bad behavior on TPM over the past couple of days.  I was restricted from posting comments on reader posts for a time.  It was (mostly) not fun, but it was educational, so I thought I would share.

For context, all the gory details are here. 

Primarily, I had my first direct experience with censorship, and it was unpleasant.  I did not like it when it was imposed on me in the form of a comment restriction, and I should not have liked it when I imposed it on someone else.  In the cold light of day, posting a 93 page comment on a thread does tend to shut down conversation, and this is a form of censorship every bit as much as restricting my ability to comment.  In this case, I think the punishment did fit the crime, as I was only restricted from posting comments on reader posts.  I was still permitted to write my own posts, and to comment on center-column posts.  This indicates to me that Lila's intention was to take away only the medium in which I had behaved badly, not to completely cut off the ability to express thoughts.

As a result of this experience, I have also learned that the TPM community is a really cool group of people.  I don't mean to make myself out to be Spartacus here, but many of you guys put yourselves right out there to stand up for me, regardless of whether or not we agree on the usual issues.  I'm glad I had my wife calling me a geek for being so bothered about not being able to post on "that stupid blog thing" to keep my head from swelling as I read through the thread.

I also learned that something about my profile, avatar or tone makes people think I am a "she." I am, at last inspection, a "he." 

Finally I learned that Josh and Lila are good, fair people.  They both came right out and explained directly, listened to all of the feedback, and assured us that the communication will be better next time this happens.  I can't think of a better outcome. 

Thanks for indulging me the post mortem, and a special thanks for CaliforniaPaige and everyone else on Lingr the other night. 

Some are aware to what I refer.

And it STILL bothers me.

On 17 July, 2008 the QBR will hold the the 10th Annual Harlem Book Fair.  It is one my favorite events. I really like the discussion panels they have each year. This is year is going to be particularly interesting because Tom DeWolf  of the DeWolf's of Bristol, Rhode Island is participating on a discussion panel.

Who is Tom DeWolf? Tom DeWolf is the cousin of Katrina Brown who is responsible for Traces of the Trade. which appeared on P.O.V. 24 June, 2008. Mr. DeWolf was on C-SPAN 14 January, 2008 discussing the book, his cousin's film and various other topics surrounding his family's involvement in the trade. I enjoyed the discussion of his book in Rhode Island in January and look forward to seeing the discussion panel at the Harlem Book Fair.

The C-SPAN link is Tom DeWolf discussing his book 14 January, 2008.  It is one hour and fifteen minutes long. Use the flash (red ) button to start the video.

There has not been a new refinery for crude oil built in America for 30 years, but the Obama campaign is doing a lot of refining these days. First he refined his position on campaign financing, becoming the first candidate to opt out of the system for the general election after previously pledging to abide by it. Then he refined his position on the FISA bill, voting for it after condemning it during his primary campaign. He has refined his position on abortion. Now he is refining his Iraq position, hinting that maybe he won't withdraw all troops in 16 months as he campaigned on, then again later re-refining his position to say that he will withdraw them in 16 months, but may leave some behind for an indefinite time. Of course, it would be wrong to call these policy reversals 'flip-flopping'. He, like Valero, is just a refiner.

Weekly Voting Rights News Update

By Erin Ferns

In the aftermath of the presidential primaries, stories of unprecedented voter registration and turnout are drifting to the back burner. But with an exceedingly imbalanced electorate, the fight to create access to the voting rolls and enforce the voting rights of all Americans continues. With historic voter registration drives underway and a preview of the types of problems that could occur in November, the focus of the media is beginning to shift towards the less sexy, but crucial elements that work to maximize voter participation while ensuring eligible voters can cast their ballots and have them counted. In Project Vote’s view, this is a welcome development since many of the potential issues require more time to sort out than is available if problems are noted only weeks in advance of the election. This week, election officials, advocates and a presidential candidate worked to assist in or restore voting rights for hospitalized veterans in Connecticut, minority citizens in Georgia, and former felons in Tennessee.

In protest of a ban on voter registration drives issued by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs in May, Connecticut Secretary of State Susan Bysiewicz and state Attorney General Richard Blumenthal held an impromptu registration drive outside of a VA center on Monday, according to the New Haven Register. Last week, Bysiewicz's office had been verbally denied access to the VA centers to conduct registration drives on site.

“I believe that there is a concerted effort going on to suppress voter registration,” [said] Bysiewicz, pointing to the department's directive, and a separate ban issued for Indian reservations, because they are on federal property,” the Register reported.

“To ban voter registration drives is a slap in the face to veterans like Mr. Onieal, who have served and sacrificed greatly for our country and for the basic freedoms that we have here,” Bysiewicz said, referring to  Martin Onieal, a World War II veteran and one of a “handful” of VA patients that she registered Monday.

But state-by-state interpretation of the new directive creates more worries. According to Roger Johnson, director of the VA Connecticut Healthcare System, nonpartisan voter registration drives are indeed acceptable and Bysiewicz's denial was a mistake. Other states deny all voter registration activity, according to the Register.

“What you have here is either a colossal misunderstanding, or an unconscionable misreading of this directive,” said Blumenthal. “The VA has to have its act together when it is talking about basic rights.”

Those basic rights are being defended on behalf of former felons in Tennessee, according to theTennessean. The lawsuit challenges the constitutionality of the state's felon voting rights policy that bars ex-felons from voting if they owe child support or court-ordered restitution, a measure that advocates argue comes “dangerously close to a poll tax.”

With the urgency of the upcoming presidential election, the number of requests to restore voting rights has more than doubled since last year. “African-Americans, disproportionately arrested, charged and convicted of crimes, are a major part of the surge to get their rights restored,” the Tennessean reports.

An estimated 90,000 adults have lost their right to vote in the state due to felony convictions – just a fraction of the 5.3 million nationwide, according to the Tennessean.  Tennessee is one of 48 states to strip felons of voting rights and one of 11 that make it more difficult for former felons to reintegrate into society by not automatically restoring their civil rights upon completion of his or her sentence.

With less than half of all eligible Americans participating in the electoral process, one would expect public policy to encourage access to voter registration, rather than making it more difficult to obtain. This problem particularly affects minority and low income citizens whose over representation in the criminal justice system and  high residency mobility rates appear to contribute towards low registration and voting rates.

In the 2006 midterm election, 52 percent of eligible citizens did not participate, most of whom were simply not registered, according to Project Vote report, Representational Bias in the 2006 Electorate. Particularly, minority voters lag at least 10 percentage points behind White voters, perpetuating the imbalance in the electorate.

However, once registered, voters in general are more likely to actually participate, as illustrated in the 2006 election with more than 70 percent of registered voters casting ballots. The participation trend continued on Super Tuesday when Black and Latino voters showed tremendous increases in voter turnout in several states, surprisingly including Georgia, a state with a history of low turnout from voters of color.

The state's boost in voter registration is significant with more than a 20 percent increase since the last presidential election, according to the Atlanta Journal Constitution. The recent surge is largely attributed to the Obama campaign, which is targeting Black and young voters. Black voter registration in particular has increased one percent since November 2006.

Quick Links:

Urbina, Ian. “V.A. Ban on Voter Drives Is Criticized.” New York Times. June 13, 2008.

“Out of Step with the World: An Analysis of Felony Disfranchisement in the U.S. and other Democracies.”ACLU. May 26, 2006.

Hess, Doug R. “Representational Bias in the 2006 Electorate.” Project Vote. September 2007.

In Other News:

Republican Campaign Against Likely Democratic Voters Begins: The GOP’s latest accusations are long on rhetoric but short on fact – AlterNet 
Across the country and on the Republican National Committee website, a handful of GOP office holders and party officers are trying to discredit recent voter registration drives and record-setting turnout by Democrats in 2008 primaries, saying efforts seen as benefiting Democrats are rife with "voter fraud."

N.Y. Voter Turnout Among Lowest in the Nation – The New York SunNew York State has some of the lowest voter turnout numbers in America, according to a report released yesterday by the U.S. Census Bureau.

Erin Ferns is a Research and Policy Analyst with Project Vote’s Strategic Writing and Research Department (SWORD).

Back in 1992 I was part of a group that set out to change the way the media worked. You are currently using the result - its called the World Wide Web.

The fact that politics played a major part in the design and deployment of the Web has been pretty much ignored by every media pundit since. Everyone assumed that we were just a bunch of pointy headed geeks who didn't really understand the full implications of what we were doing. And those of us who knew exactly what we were trying to do were certainly in no hurry to make our intentions known.

The first thing I did when I returned from meeting Tim Berners-Lee at the Annecy conference where the Web was first shown in public was to tell the people running the Clinton-Gore '92 campaign about it. You think that Dean invented online campaigning? Not true, take a look in the Google News archives of Usenet from '92 and you will find the press releases that the team at the MIT AI lab were sending out for the Clinton, Perot and Green campaigns.

Most net users would say that the US 'mainstream' media has become much worse over the past ten years. I say nonsense.

In the first place, stop talking about the 'mainstream' media as if the Web is a minor player. Today the Web is just as mainstream as cable or network TV. Its not the scope of the media that is the issue, it is who they answer to. The term 'establishment media' is far more accurate. Fox News is no more accurate when it is online rather than on TV.

The Establishment media has not become any worse over the past ten years. The change that has happened is that we are much more aware of how bad it has always been.

In particular the headline that caused me to see the need to break the power of the establishement media was 'It was the Sun what won it' in Murdoch's London paper after the Tory party was re-elected in the spring of 1992. True or not, it was a plausible claim. Murdoch is not a UK citizen and clearly puts his own interests before those of the UK so why should we allow him to choose our government?

Murdoch won the '92 campaign for the Tories using the same tactics that it is generally believed Karl Rove invented: smears, lies and innuendo endlessly repeated, a one man echo chamber.

The idea we had in '92 was not to replace the established media, the Internet was far too small for that to be possible, a computer capable of running a decent Web browser cost in excess of $5,000 and there were no public ISPs. We didn;t think we could replace the establishment media but we could introduce a feedback loop so that the lies and distortions would be exposed.

So now 16 years later the Associated Press greets their faovrite candidate with donuts with sprinkles, gives fawning coverage and then proceeds to ambush his opponent.

Did we fail? I don't think so. In the post Web media landscape there is room for every type of media outlet from partisan to independent. But what there is no room for is media outlets that sell themselves on their independence while being covertly partisan.

Fox News makes no real secret of their partisan leanings, they only deny them as yet another way to annoy liberals. They can survive on partisan coverage for as long as their ratings hold. But AP sell themselves to newspapers as providing an unbiased view. The fact that their reporters deliver coverage with sprinkles for their favorite canidate McCain has been noted and that will damage the AP brand going forward.

Many on the Right use flag pins, patriotism, as a proxy for race. I believe now we are seeing phenomenon on the Left only it's called the "FISA issue".

At first I thought the intensity of opposition is understandable, we are talking about the Constitution after all.

But then came the character assassination and now for reason the issue remains at the forefront on the minds of many.This leads me to believe that for a percentage of people, their is more than "patriotism" on their minds.

 Now we have veered off into retracted support,and  withholding support. In other words, people are saying they don't want him to win.When you mess with money and support, you increase McCain's chances and so it becomes an open question as to whether or not you want Obama to win.

I thought one thing Progressives had learned from all these years of defeat is that single-interest politics becomes cannon fodder use to caricature our candidates and smooth the path to victory for Republicans.

In fact, I know we've learned this lesson, I've read many a diary here that said so. I read the many comments agreeing with those diaries. So what is really animating this attack?

Like it or not, most Americans are not going to vote on FISA. We are going to vote on the economy, the war, health care, education policy, investment in infrastructure, etc...

In order to make this happen, with the hurt of 8 years of Bush still ongoing, we allow our candidate to have a very wide swath. We say let him do what he feels he needs to do to get elected. Especially on an issue that is symbolically at best.

We understand quite well that the Constitution is in jeopardy. We believe the best way to secure it is by having a Democratic Congress working with a Democratic President (who taught Constitutional Law).

We also understand that the courts have yet to weigh in on this law. In other words, we are a long way from the dire declarations that many here are two weeks into repeating daily.

It is clear then that, like flag pins, something else is going on besides looking at the big picture. Principle you say? Perhaps. But those who stand on principle do not then take actions that further imperil that principle!

No "my friends", there is something else going on here and it's time now to call it what it truly is. Leave it to Democrats to always wound their candidate.

<em>Washington Post</em> columnist David Broder donned his rubber gloves and plucked from his inbox a report from the right wing Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation.  The organization fears that "America's national identity is eroding under the pressure of population diversity and educational slackness."   Broder, on the other hand, sees no cause for alarm.

The report points out that American identity rests, "not on a common ethnicity, but on a set of ideas," and bemoans the fact that those ideas are no longer central to the American mindset.  Per the report, "84 percent of Americans believe that we 'share a unique national identity based on a shared set of beliefs, values, and culture.'"   However, younger citizens are less likely to believe in a binding national identify.  Meanwhile 63 percent of Americans believe that our national identity is growing weaker.

As remedy, the report prescribes more education in American history that promotes "informed patriotism:"

There are dangers to certain kinds of patriotism, but there are equal dangers to no patriotism at all.  There is a middle ground, a "patriotism of principles," to use the language of the American Federation of Teachers, based on a "common core of history [that] binds us together."  Americans should embrace an informed patriotism that expresses our devotion to our country and our bond with our fellow citizens."

A couple of fallacies popped to mind -- fallacies that might account for the lack of education in American identity and ideals.  First, for most of this nation's history, full American identity was, in fact, based on "a common ethnicity."  It was based on being "white."  If you were not, you were not a full citizen with a full citizen's rights, despite all the high ideals ingeniously put forth on those yellowing sheets of paper.  

Prior to those horrible 1960s (you know, when all good things like the unquestionability of white male privilege came to an end), this omission did not matter.  This disconnect was insignificant because its victims were invisible.

Once America was forced to confront the stark division between its actions and its ideals, a splintering began.  Suddenly visible, minorities demanded to be seen.  In reaction, the majority recoiled.  The Nixonian politics of division took root and they have been with us ever since.  "The silent majority" and "law and order" became codes for us versus them.  

Ever since being forced to acknowledge that we had betrayed our ideals, we've been sulking.  For decades, America has been trapped in this protracted adolescent posture that makes it impossible for us to agree on what America is, much less effectively teach it.  

We have not progressed to the point where we can teach our history in full -- warts and all. To study "the bond with our fellow citizens," demands that we also study where and how those bonds have broken down throughout our history.  Organizations like the Bradley foundation make it impossible to do that.  They blame "a neglect of America's heroes and dramatic achievements" for a lack of interest in America's history.  

"Too often," they write, "students are taught more about America's failings than its successes.  Absent are those 'mystic chords of memory' that Abraham Lincoln believed held our country together."

Both Lincoln and the report's authors fail to acknowledge that those memories can strike dissonant chords -- both "mystic" and "cryptic."

The report's authors still insist that America be taught to the rousing accompaniment of fife and drum.  They don't realize that that version is boring; it's unidimensional and obviously false. (Yo! Over here!  Black guy. See?)  They insist that American identity is dependent on the lie of an enlightened exceptionalism as opposed to the truth of a flawed, continual tug-of-war between transcendent ideals and their spotty implementation.    

Broder illustrates the point with the only genius he knows -- inadvertent:  

I have not worried about the fundamental commitment of the American people since 1974. In that year, they were confronted with the stunning evidence that their president had conducted a criminal conspiracy out of the Oval Office. In response, the American people reminded Richard Nixon, the man they had just recently reelected overwhelmingly, that in this country, no one, not even the president, is above the law. They required him to yield his office.

That is not the sign of a nation that has lost its sense of values or forgotten the principles on which this system rests. And that is something worth celebrating on more than the Fourth of July.

Since 2003, it has become increasingly apparent that the sitting American president lied to the American people, this time in order to justify an unprovoked, unilateral attack against a sovereign government that posed no threat to the United States.  Hundreds of thousands of people have died in the resulting conflict.  Over 4000 American soldiers have died in the resulting conflict.  Tens of thousands of American soldiers have been wounded in the resulting conflict.  That same American president has honored himself with the Stalinesque right to spy on American citizens without warrant, to arrest and indefinitely detain American citizens without trial, and to authorize the torture of suspects.

American tsked and yawned.

"That is not a sign of a nation that has lots its sense of values or forgotten the principles of which this system rests."

David Broder speaks.

Has anyone noticed this?

I am stealing an idea I just saw to raise $1776 for Obama. I loved it. I want to carry this down to some candidates I am supporting because it is a briliant idea.

This is not only in honor of the birth of our country, but the birth of progressive ideas and progressive values.

Donate here to Darcy Burner

We need $17.76 for Darcy Burner who just lost her house to a fire. For every day she cannot campaign she must raise $5,000. Let's raise some more money because she is a netroots favorite and supports our issues. Look at that shirt she was wearing in protest of the war while her house was burning down.

Donate here to Regina Thomas


We need $17.76 for Regina Thomas who is fighting Bush Dog John Barrow and has less than two weeks until that primary. Bush Dog John Barrow who supported the telcom industry and not the people on FISA. Regina is the true Democrat in this race.




These are two candidates that are relying on the netroots to help them raise the money they need to be competitive. Please do what you can. If you cannot do $17.76 split it in half and do 8.88 in two installments. or 4 installments of 4.44.

The Progressive Electorate

Come back to us, Fake Sinbad.  Come back.

OK--first things first, so I'm a little bit old school.  And I don't particularly care to think about Wesley Clark of FISA today.

To wit, one of the first rap concerts I ever attended was in 1986; at the Sun Dome in Tampa, Florida.  It was headlined by Run DMC, although there were four acts overall.

The other three were Whodini [anyone remember 'Friends' or  'The Freaks Come Out at Night' or, my personal favorite 'I'm A Ho'?], The Beastie Boys [who opened and, I believe, only had two songs: 'She's Crafty' and 'Girls'] and LL Cool J.

I mention this because: [1] I am extremely old; and, [2] heard the LL Cool J song "Radio" played on the local "oldies" rock station [I know--rock? but that's for another time] last night.

So, feeling incredibly bored and slightly nostalgic last night, I culled my eight favorite LL Cool J song lyrics from his catalogue [I'm using that term relatively loosely].

I'll list these in reverse order [and would love to hear anyone's comments if they feel I have snubbed a truly awful LL Cool J lyric].

[8]Suckas on my jock when I walk down the block I really don't care if you're jealous or not

[7]You lied about the lies that you lied about You even lied to your aunt when you went down south

[6]I'm the type of guy to make her say, "Why you're illin, Bee?" ...You're the type of guy to say, "My lower back is killin me"

[5]You can scratch my back, we'll get cozy and huddle I'll lay down my jacket so you can walk over a puddle

[4]See something's smellin' fishy and they say it's you All I know is that you made it with the whole damn crew

[3]You're the type of guy that gets suspicious I'm the type of guy that says, "The puddin is delicious"

[2]I'm the type of guy to cold put on a pamper You're the type of guy to say, "What you talkin bout?"
I'm the type of guy to leave my drawers in your hamper

[1]Cut Creator's good, Cool J. is good-good
You bring the wood pecker, I'll bring the wood!

Indeed.

My excitement for The Dark Knight is not cable of being measured.  Don't believe me, then feel these nipples...

As some of you may already know, Senator Patrick Leahy (D, Vermont) is a huge Batman fan.  He did some voice work on Batman: The Animated Series and had a cameo in 1997's campy craptacular, Batman and Robin.  

Well, Leahy has a cameo in The Dark Knight too -- he's visible in the full trailer that came out a few months ago.  He doesn't just have a cameo, he has a speaking part.  And let me just say, he is one tough cookie.

The clip of Senator Leahy's scene is up on YouTube.

Barack Obama has a growing enthusiasm gap.  Not with John McCain mind you; his support would have to completely flat-line before it would sink below the enthusiasm of McCain's supporters who have the collective enthusiasm of a group going for a root-canal.  

No, the enthusiasm gap is with his own supporters [myself included]; and their view towards Sen. Obama during the primary campaign compared to their view of him at the moment.

Sure, I don't think anyone has abandoned Sen. Obama.  I still write the occasional blog in support of Barack and will certainly cast my vote for him in the fall.  However, the frequency with which I'm donating to his campaign and expending energy on his behalf has markedly decreased.

I've been disappointed with Sen. Obama's rightward tack since clinching the nomination.  I understand why he's doing what he's doing [although I disagree with the political effectiveness of the strategy and strongly believe he is doing incredible damage to his political brand].  It seems to me that the Obama campaign, which to now has been quite forward thinking, has allowed itself to be drawn to the "center" based on what constituted the "center" in previous elections.  Unfortunately, the "center" in American politics has drifted increasingly rightward over the past thirty years; it's somewhat of a false floor.  And the only way to have the debate on Democratic Party turf is to strongly advocate progressive positions and pull the "center" back to a more traditionally center place.

Prior to this year's campaign I was a fairly apathetic [at least politically] registered independent  that leaned towards the Democratic Party, although I did not always cast my votes for a Democrat.  I gave money [for the first time] to the DCCC in 2006; a whopping sum of $50.

This year I have given the maximum $2300 during the primary campaign, blogged, did volunteer work and raised an additional $1500 through my Obama Fundraising Page.  In short, I have expended a considerable amount of time and energy; time and energy that could easily be allocated to any number of other endeavors in my life.

I did this [such as making some contributions on my credit card--I know, I'm not a smart man, but that's for another diary] because Barack was able to tap into the general dissatisfaction with the political process that many people genuinely held.  I think there are millions of others out there that were there for the political taking, but just didn't see anything worth getting excited about.  Barack expertly tapped into that dissatisfaction with Washington in general, and, politics specifically.

I started my Obama page in January.  This is what I wrote then:

Barack Obama and I are committed to changing the political process with a campaign built on a broad base of support from ordinary Americans.  We believe the only way to bring about lasting and needed change in our government is by rejecting the typical Washington-style slash and burn politics; by seeking to inspire voters by highlighting our possibilities rather than preying on our fears; and, by tapping into the hard work and ingenuity that has served us so well.

But this can only happen with your help.  Today, I ask you to stand with me and believe that government can be more than driving up your opponent's negatives; that government can be more than lowest common denominator partisanship.  Our government is a direct reflection of who we are.  Our elected leaders represent us.  It is not enough to merely replace a president with an "R" next to their name with someone with a "D" next to their name.

Those words seem kind of overly simplistic and, frankly, silly now.  Maybe that's for the best.  Maybe the old adage that 'Democrats fall in love & Republicans fall in line' is correct.  I certainly wouldn't take any pride in some dreamy, wide-eyed idealistic losing campaign.  The most important thing is to win.

However, I have quite a bit to do during my day.  Like most people, I'm quite busy.  I also have about $100K in law school loans and can't really afford to give any more money away.  So, it's not too difficult to find an excuse not to donate to Sen. Obama's campaign.  And not that I'm a harbinger by any stretch, but I think there are a lot of people out there like me.  Sen. Obama isn't going to lose our vote.  But he can lose our enthusiasm.  In the end, that might be just as bad because it was the enthusiasm that allowed Barack to prevail over Sen. Clinton in the primary.

Maybe I'm wrong, but if I were with the Obama campaign, I'd be concerned.

Three strikes you’re off the air or out of the news for seven days or more.

That should be the new rule for all those in the media business, including political pundits.  Whenever they report something that ends up being false information or pass along rumors without facts to back them up.

The FEC should force the ‘television or radio show, magazine or newspaper’ that made the mistake, to be taken off the air or out of print for at least seven days or a month depending the type of media, whenever they pass along bad information.

How many times have we been given information from so-called experts in the news, only to be told later it wasn’t true or completely true?

Enough already!

If we wrote or said something that wasn’t true about someone, that person could sue us.  The media it seems is getting blanket immunity for doing just that. 

It all started, it seems, with the Clinton administration.  Lies and rumors were repeated constantly on the news.  Along came the Bush administration and the media completely ignored their jobs and allow the administration to take us to unprovoked war in Iraq.  It doesn’t matter that American’s at the time supported President Bush.  What matters is, the media and press report the ‘facts’ – they failed to do this.

To this day they continue to report rumors.  They don’t bother getting two or more sources before reporting a story. 

The story about Barack Obama turning down an offer from a kid to hand bump is a pure example.  The story that Obama doesn’t put his hand over his heart during the Pledge of Allegiance was also ignored and allowed to spread. 

These stories, while minor in content, can actually hurt the candidate.

Just this week I watched a video on CSPAN of Peter Hart (pollster) interviewing a voter's focus group of the general public on all the presidential candidates and the issues of today.  There were three men that actually believed Barack Obama refused to put his hand over his heart during the Pledge.  They also believed Obama was a Muslim.  The pollster didn’t bother correcting the men’s views.

Now if the media were doing their jobs, and I mean all of them, including your local stations and newspapers, Americans’ would know the above three accusations were false. 

It took almost a full day for the story about the fist bump to be debunked.  By that time of course, I’m sure another thousand people turned against Obama, politically, for being so rude to that child – missing the stories that it was a false report.

Three strikes you are out for at least 7 days or a month depending on what kind of media your work in – period.

Without having to face consequences, how else will they learn to ‘trust but verify’ their stories?

Right now, the second and third "top headlines" on the Yahoo homepage read as follows:

-Obama: Patriotism means 'faith in one another as Americans'

-McCain: Patriotism is 'putting the country first' before all else

I did not read the articles. I refuse.

But I submit this as further evidence that we are all, in fact, in third grade. The teacher has just handed out the construction paper and asked the students to tell us all "what patriotism means to me."

You have ten minutes and if you finish early, please sit quietly at your desks and wait until the others are done. Then we'll have a snack and play some kickball.

There is so much evidence of this that I don't know where to start. Not just the inane flag lapel pin questions, or, for that matter, the entire ABC debate (the final one) between Obama and Clinton, but in all forms of national "journalism."

Anyone see the recent network interview with the Iranian official? (I believe it was the Foreign Minister, but I only caught a snippet.)

I sat aghast as the interviewer basically said "There's rumors Israel is considering an attack on your country. What will you do if they attack?"

What?!! This is journalism? Diplomacy? Now I didn't catch the whole thing and there might have been a more substantive discussion somewhere, but this was the "money question."

"Psst, that guy over there said he can kick your ass. What you gonna do about it?"

I'm not so sure this is an insult to Americans' intelligence. I'm starting to thing this kind of crap really resonates with the majority of people. Are they just giving the people what they want? I'm thinking they're TELLING the people what they want and THEN serving it up to them, all the while reassuring them that they are, in fact, "thinking for themselves."

So tell me, class, what does patriotism mean to you?

I'll start: Not answering fatuous, inane leading questions.

There's a great article on this over at http://www.amconmag.com/larison/2008/07/02/is-there-anything-worth-defending/ of all places.  Directly addresses the point of whether the matter is trivial, damaging, or worthwhile to debate among Obama partisans.  Definitely worth your time

There's no need for Obama nor anyone else to vote on the FISA bill now, it's unnecessary thanks to a Bush-appointed Appeals Court judge.

Judge Reject Bush's View on Wiretaps

Highlights from the article:

A federal judge in California said Wednesday that the wiretapping law established by Congress was the “exclusive” means for the president to eavesdrop on Americans, and he rejected the government’s claim that the president’s constitutional authority as commander in chief trumped that law.

He said the rules for surveillance were clearly established by Congress in 1978 under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which requires the government to get a warrant from a secret court. “Congress appears clearly to have intended to — and did — establish the exclusive means for foreign intelligence activities to be conducted,” the judge wrote.

 “Whatever power the executive may otherwise have had in this regard, FISA limits the power of the executive branch to conduct such activities and it limits the executive branch’s authority to assert the state secrets privilege in response to challenges to the legality of its foreign intelligence surveillance activities

What's the problem with FISA anyway?

Let me be upfront about this: what follows will be interpreted by some of you out there as further apologia for Obama. I don't see it as such. Obama's FISA position concerns me, though it's not for the "constitutional" reasons that seem to upset many people in these parts.

You see, I'm not too worried about the Constitution here. It's true that the Fourth Amendment prohibits warrantless searches. But the Constitution's protections are limited to people inside the Country, not people outside the Country. If I'm calling my next door neighbor, I should be able to rest assured that my rights and my privacy are protected. But if I'm calling someone in Zimbabwe, there's a portion of this conversation that is occurring outside the United States jurisdiction. Is such an international conversation protected by the U.S. Constitution?

The answer is, it's unclear. Perhaps this is why FISA was enacted in the first place in 1978. Faced with the unclear scope of the Constitution, Congress decided to render the question moot by legislatively imposing warrant requirements on the interception of foreign communications. The current FISA bill loosens those warrant requirements, which makes the question relevant again: does the Fourth Amendment require warrants for these searches?

As I say, this question doesn't leave me sweating at night. There are legitimate, tenable arguments for both positions. The truth is, this seems to be a question without a non-arbitrary answer. And quite frankly, whichever way the issue is resolved, the Constitutional implications are virtually insignificant. It's a fuzzy boundary problem.

But what about the erosion of the Constitution?!? Isn't this simply the first step to dictatorship!!? This slippery slope argument, which I hear on this site a fair amount, is Constitutional alarmism. There's a difference between a legitimate question as to the limits of the Constitution, and a total erosion of rights clearly established by the Constitution. The best response to alarmist slippery slope arguments was that given by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes. In response to a plaintiff who alleged that a ruling against it would pave the road to countless civil rights abuses, Holmes simply said, "Not while this Court sits." I think the Constitutional concerns about FISA fall in the same boat.

At this point, I've got a lot of Obama supporters on my side, and a lot of suspicious people lined up against me. But here's where the going gets tough for me: FISA and Guantanamo are the same issue.

The problems faced by those held at Guantanamo (not counting the legitimate torture problems) relate to the Sixth Amendment rights to a fair and speedy trial, and the Constitutional right to habeas corpus. But do these rights apply to foreign nationals held by the US Government on foreign soil? It's another fuzzy boundary problem, and the resolution of the question has no broader Constitutional implications.

This is where people start demanding that I be thrown off the internets. And this is also where I begin the difficult work on redeeming myself.

For me, the problem with FISA, and the problem with Guantanamo, is not the US Constitution. It is Article 9 of the International Covenant of Civil and Political Rights, ratified by the United States in 1992. It is the Third and/or Fourth Geneva Convention, ratified in 1949. And it is binding customary international law.

The Covenant prohibits the United States from conducting illegal searches and seizures upon anyone. And the Covenant grants habeas rights, and fair trial rights, to everyone. Similarly, the Third and Fourth Geneva Conventions require fair trials "affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples." There are no fuzzy boundary problem here. The United States is not "eroding" international law around the edges: the United States has abandoned it wholesale. The United States is in open violation of customary international law.

Granted, I think the violations are clearer with respect to Guantanamo: US obligations under the Covenant may be limited by Article 2 to those under the "jurisdiction" of the United States, which clearly includes those being held at Guantanamo, but does not seem to include those at the wrong end of an international phone call. But there is a very real reason why I prefer to point to the ICCPR, instead of the US Constitution, as the source of my FISA/Guantanamo concerns:

For far too long, the United States Government, and its citizens, have assumed that they are above international law. (It's a mindset that is only reinforced in American law schools.) But we will be allowed to ignore international law only so long as the rest of the world agrees to look the other way. And while we flagrantly violate the law, we may be justly and roundly criticized, not for violating our own Constitution, but for renouncing the moral and legal principles that the entire world has adopted.

Here's what I've found in various places around the "Internets."  If there are more, or new, instances, feel free to add them in the comments.
* McCain supported the drilling moratorium; now he’s against it.http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/20... 
* McCain strongly opposes a windfall-tax on oil company profits. Three weeks earlier, he was perfectly comfortable with the idea.http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/06/18/mccains-offsho... 
* McCain thought Bush’s warrantless-wiretap program circumvented the law; now he believes the opposite.http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/15781.htm... * McCain defended “privatizing” Social Security. Now he says he’s against privatization (though he actually still supports it.)
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/15863.htm... * McCain wanted to change the Republican Party platform to protect abortion rights in cases of rape and incest. Now he doesn’t.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/05/10/mccain-flips-o... 
* McCain thought the estate tax was perfectly fair. Now he believes the opposite.http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/15825.htm... * He opposed indefinite detention of terrorist suspects. When the Supreme Court reached the same conclusion,he called it “one of the worst decisions in the history of this country.”
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/15864.htm... * McCain said he would “not impose a litmus test on any nominee.” He used to promise the opposite.
http://www.americablog.com/2008/06/now-mccain-is-flip-f... 
* McCain believes the telecoms should be forced to explain their role in the administration’s warrantless surveillance program as a condition for retroactive immunity. He used to believe the opposite.http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/20... 
* McCain supported storing spent nuclear fuel at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. Now he believes the opposite.http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2008/may/28/mccains-abo... /
* McCain supported moving “toward normalization of relations” with Cuba. Now he believes the opposite.http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/15617.htm... * McCain believed the U.S. should engage in diplomacy with Hamas. Now he believes the opposite.
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/15557.htm... * McCain believed the U.S. should engage in diplomacy with Syria. Now he believes the opposite.
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/15564.htm... 
* McCain supported his own lobbying-reform legislation from 1997. Now he doesn’t.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/05/20/mccains-97-lob... 
* He wanted political support from radical televangelists like John Hagee and Rod Parsley. Now he doesn’t.http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/15633.htm... * McCain supported the Lieberman/Warner legislation to combat global warming. Now he doesn’t.
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/15699.htm... *McCain pledged in February 2008 that he would not, under any circumstances, raise taxes. Specifically, McCain was asked if he is a“‘read my lips’ candidate, no new taxes, no matter what?” referring to George H.W. Bush’s 1988 pledge. “No new taxes,” McCain responded.Two weeks later, McCain said, “I’m not making a ‘read my lips’ statement, in that I will not raise taxes.”
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/14761.htm... * McCain is both for and against a “rogue state rollback” as a focus of his foreign policy vision.
http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/2008/04/mccain-... 
* McCain says he considered and did not consider joining John Kerry’s Democratic ticket in 2004.http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/14818.htm... *In 1998, he championed raising cigarette taxes to fund programs to cut underage smoking, insisting that it would prevent illnesses and provide resources for public health programs. Now, McCain opposes a $0.61-per-pack tax increase, won’t commit to supporting a regulation bill he’s co-sponsoring, and has hired Philip Morris’ former lobbyist as his senior campaign adviser.
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/15033.htm... * McCain has changed his economic worldview on multiple occasions.
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/15337.htm... * McCain has changed his mind about a long-term U.S. military presence in Iraq on multiple occasions.
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/15370.htm... * McCain is both for and against attacking Barack Obama over his former pastor at his former church.
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/15358.htm... * McCain believes Americans are both better and worse off than they were before Bush took office.
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/04/19/mccain-economy-bloo... /
* McCain is both for and against earmarks for Arizona.http://thinkprogress.org/2008/01/06/mccain-earmark /

*McCain’s first mortgage plan was premised on the notion that homeowners facing foreclosure shouldn’t be “rewarded” for acting“irresponsibly.”His second mortgage plan took largely the opposite position.http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/15176.htm... * McCain vowed, if elected, to balance the federal budget by the end of his first term. Soon after, he decided he would no longer even try to reach that goal.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/16/us/politics/16mccain.... * In February 2008, McCain reversed course on prohibiting waterboarding.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/04/10/emtimeem-has-m... 
* McCain used to champion the Law of the Sea convention, even volunteering to testify on the treaty’s behalf before a Senate committee. Now he opposes it.http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2007/oct/31/mccain-... /
* McCain was a co-sponsor of the DREAM Act, which would grant legal status to illegal immigrants’ kids who graduate from high school. Now he’s against it.http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2007/oct/31/mccain-... /
* On immigration policy in general, McCain announced in February 2008 that he would vote against his own legislation.http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/14447.htm... *In 2006, McCain sponsored legislation to require grassroots lobbying coalitions to reveal their financial donors. In 2007, after receiving“feedback” on the proposal, McCain told far-right activist groups that he opposes his own measure.
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/9658.html * McCain said before the war in Iraq, “We will win this conflict. We will win it easily.” Four years later, McCain said he knew all along that the war in Iraq war was “probably going to be long and hard and tough.”
http://electioncentral.tpmcafe.com/blog/electioncentral... *McCain said he was the “greatest critic” of Rumsfeld’s failed Iraq policy. In December 2003, McCain praised the same strategy as“a mission accomplished.” In March 2004, he said, “I’m confident we’re on the right course.”In December 2005, he said, “Overall, I think a year from now, we will have made a fair amount of progress if we stay the course.”
http://thinkprogress.org/2007/08/18/mccain-greatest-cri... /
* McCain went from saying he would not support repeal of Roe v. Wade http://mediamatters.org/items/200610310003 to saying the exact opposite.http://thinkprogress.org/2006/11/19/mccain-abortion /
* McCain went from saying gay marriage should be allowed, to saying gay marriage shouldn’t be allowed.http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2007/02/mcc... * McCain criticized TV preacher Jerry Falwell as “an agent of intolerance” in 2002, but then decided to cozy up to the man who said Americans “deserved” the 9/11 attacks.
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/6988.html * McCain used to oppose Bush’s tax cuts for the very wealthy, but he reversed course in February.
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/6731.html * On a related note, he said 2005 that he opposed the tax cuts because they were “too tilted to the wealthy.” By 2007, he denied ever having said this, and insisted he opposed the cuts because of increased government spending.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/03/us/politics/03mccain.... *In 2000, McCain accused Texas businessmen Sam and Charles Wyly of being corrupt, spending “dirty money” to help finance Bush’s presidential campaign. McCain not only filed a complaint against the Wylys for allegedly violating campaign finance law, he also lashed out at them publicly. In April, McCain reached out to the Wylys for support.
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/story?id=1880630&page=1 
* McCain supported a major campaign-finance reform measure that bore his name. In June 2007, he abandoned his own legislation.http://www.nysun.com/national/campaign-finance-effort-r... /
* McCain opposed a holiday to honor Martin Luther King, Jr., before he supported it.http://news.yahoo.com/s/usnw/20070115/pl_usnw/dnc__mcca... * McCain was against presidential candidates campaigning at Bob Jones University before he was for it.
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/8313.html * McCain was anti-ethanol. Now he’s pro-ethanol.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15637887 /
* McCain was both for and against state promotion of the Confederate flag.http://mediamatters.org/items/200610310003 * McCain decided in 2000 that he didn’t want anything to do with former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, believing he “would taint the image of the‘Straight Talk Express.’” Kissinger is now the Honorary Co-Chair for his presidential campaign in New York.
http://thinkprogress.org/2006/12/19/mccain-kissinger /
* McCain used to think that Grover Norquist was a crook and acorrupt shill for dictators. Then McCain got serious about running for president and began to reconcile with Norquist.http://thinkprogress.org/2006/12/19/mccain-kissinger /
* McCain took a firm line in opposition to torture, and then caved to White House demands.http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/20... * McCain gave up on his signature policy issue, campaign-finance reform, and won’t back the same provision he sponsored just a couple of years ago.
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/8066.html 

* In 2006, McCain sponsored legislation to require grassroots lobbying coalitions to reveal their financial donors. In 2007, after receiving “feedback” on the proposal, McCain told far-right activist groups that he opposes his own measure.

In honor of America's birthday, i'm looking to raise $1776.00 for Barack Obama.

I'm asking for donations in theamount of $17.76

Donate here.

The RNC and John McCain are busy raising money and the RNC has a huge money advantage over the DNC.

If Obama can't keep up, and with many of you threatening to withhold your money, its entirely possibly he won't be able to, then this country may be heading towards four more years of disaster. 

Since Obama has opted out of public financing, donors like you and I are the SOLE source of funding for his campaign. If you abandon him now, the consequences for our country could be dire.

Senator Obama often speaks of the "fierce urgency of now". He needs your support. And he needs it now.

Today.

Please, please give it to him.

Yesterday this post appeared on TPM.  It generally berates the stupidity of the typical American, and a good time was had by all.  After all, it's fun acting smug and superior.

However, this ignorance berated by many here is perhaps not so stupid. 

1) In this presidential election, something on the order of a 100,000,000 votes will be cast.  An individual voter's vote will, to first approximation, have a 0.0000001% chance of affecting the outcome (your actual number will vary by state). 

2) It takes time to become acquainted with the issues.  Let us make a conservative estimate that 10 hours of learning will suffice.  Let us further suppose that the opportunity cost of these 10 hours is about $10/hr (overall, a bit low, and again your actual numbers will vary).  Therefore, the opportunity cost of getting up to speed is approximately $100.

3) To be rational, the benefit of doing so must exceed the burden.  The burden is $100.  The benefit is the probability that the voter's work will make a difference times the actual benefit.  Denoting the actual benefit as "B," the inequality becomes

$100 < 0.00000001 B

or

B > $10,000,000,000 (10 billion dollars).

Now, no one is going to believe that the benefit of changing the outcome of an election will exceed 10 billion dollars.  Therefore, it is rational not to spend the time to get up to speed on the issues. 

The lottery is supposed to be a "stupid tax," as the expected value of the benefit does not come close to the cost.  However, in the case of the lottery, at least it is the same order of magnitude. 

If the lottery is a stupid tax, what does that say of the opportunity cost spent here at TPM?

Josh, I don't think it is possible for Obama to shift his position because it was never set out as clearly as the McCain people claim. Obama's position has always been that his objective is to withdraw from Iraq and that plans for withdrawal will begin to be put into effect the minute he takes office. But he has never committed to any timetables, specific troop reductions or even to have all troops out of Iraq by the end of his first term as far as I am aware. This is entirely consistent with what I believe is the consensus amongst his netroots base: 1) The US SHALL NOT establish any long term presence in Iraq or control of Iraqi resources. 2) The US SHOULD take whatever measures are necessary to avoid further Iraqi casualties in the short term. The real difference between McCain and Obama is that establishing a long term presence in Iraq is an objective for McCain's people. They want to have a military base in the region that allows them to plan their next wars against Iran and Saudi Arabia. I am not joking on the last one, I have a very very well known neo-con tell me how it would be necessary to deal with the Saudis over lunch a couple of weeks back. All things being equal the netroots would probably tolerate long term bases in Iraq on the South Korean, West German or Japanese model if their likely use was limited to protecting the civilian population during the transition to a more stable form of government. The reason they are not going to stand for them is precisely the reason that the neo-cons want them: the real purpose of wanting those bases is to start the next war. The neo-cons have already cause the deaths of between half a million and a million Iraqis and they care so little about that fact that they don't want anyone to even count the number they have killed. This is the problem with the US believing itself to be the worlds only superpower. Fools like Bush and Cheney will believe themselves to be invulnerable and start a whole series of unnecessary wars for no other reason that they can.

Another absurd tale from down in the rabbit hole. In the first court review of the Bush Administration's secret evidence for holding a detainee at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, it was revealed that the government claimed the accusations presented in its secret documents should be considered truth — not because there were hard facts backing them up — but because the accusations were repeated in multiple government documents.

Thankfully the federal appeals court has unanimously ruled that the claims supporting Huzaifa Parhat's six-year detention in Guantanamo were “bare and unverifiable.” The absurdity of the Bush Administration's argument was not lost on the court. Reports the New York Times: “The court compared [the government's argument] to the absurd declaration of a character in the Lewis Carroll poem 'The Hunting of the Snark': 'I have said it thrice: What I tell you three times is true.' 'This comes perilously close to suggesting that whatever the government says must be treated as true,' said the panel of the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.”

This is just another example of the Bush Administration tossing aside objective fact in order to create a world where they make their own rules; it's just another stop on our country's journey from Human Rights Watchdog to Human Rights Abuser. And it just goes to show how the mere existence of Guantanamo flies in the face of the Constitution. The Bush Administration has lost a string of Guantanamo Bay court decisions. But it's simply not enough to try to counteract these injustices as they happen; we need to start at the source. We need to close Guantanamo Bay Detention Center and do what we can to reverse this smear on the human rights history of the United States. You can start by signing our Close Guantanamo Petition and telling your friends.

Is John McCain the 50 Cent of politics?

posted on my Vibe.com blog

Every four years I feel as if I'm trapped in an urban version of the movie "Groundhog Day", finding myself regurgitating the same desperate pleas to friends and loved ones about not voting for a third party candidate. Admittedly, their counter-arguments are always more persuasive than my "You're throwing your fucking vote away!" histrionics. I mean, how are you supposed to argue against claims of a broken two-party system, Democrats who routinely cave in to even the slightest hint of opposition, and my personal favorite, thumbing their collective noses at election day pragmatism and not settling for the "lesser of two evils". Just like Bill Murray in the aforementioned "Groundhog Day", who slowly slipped into madness after waking up to the same song every morning, and having the same inane conversations with people on the street - for the last 8 years my argument in favor of a "lesser of two evils" approach has remained virtually identical. Basically equating voters to a prison inmate who has the option of rooming with someone who may possibly drive them nutty from their incessant chatter, or another prisoner whose main hobby is aggressively engaging in rather intimate "Top Bunk" style romances. Not exactly the most eloquent way of stating a case, but that was my stock argument every time I endorsed electing a politician who would be less of a historical nightmare. That's until 50 Cent came along that is.

Its true, when 50 Cent dropped "Get Rich or Die Trying" I found his his rhyme delivery to be a monosyllabic snore fest, his lyrical first person accounts of the emotional rough terrain surrounding the drug trade were both hamfistedly clumsy and unimaginative, and since only supreme lyricism can make a Hip Hop snob like myself excuse gratuitous murders on wax(see Kool G Rap), the Queens rapper was off to a rather bad start with this particular chubby wordsmith. But, in the same way the catholic Church's silence during the slave trade was equivalent to consent, I kept my criticism of 50 to myself - only because he and I shared a core belief that the much greater evil had to be wiped off of the musical landscape. Jah Rule. But like the time I got the chance to date a local porn actress and suddenly realized that my germaphobia wouldn't let me get within a few feet of her without wearing riot gear and doctors gloves, the old saying "Be careful what you wish for" seemed to rear its ugly head in that case as well. As we all know by now, the "lesser evil" turned out to be just as bad as the guy he replaced. "Second Verse, same as the first" like a motherfucker.

50 Cent came to mind this week as I talked to a group of disaffected Hillary supporters who claimed that they were voting for McCain come November. After the extremely friendly group did all they could to convince me that their vote wasn't a product of racism but of Obama's inexperience, an argument that I still find a bit suspect, their main talking point was that McCain would at least be better than Bush.(..a bar set lower than midget limbo contests mind you.) There it was, my "lesser of two evils" argument coming home to roost. My own anecdotal comparison of John McCain and 50 Cent aside, there is another striking similarity between the two men that is just downright uncanny.

At the height of 50's career, whenever I would antagonize some of his misguided fans by sarcastically questioning his street credibility, more times than not I'd find myself on the business end of an extremely strong rebuke. With that person usually arguing their case like a seasoned trial lawyer, their main argument being that 50 Cent survived multiple gun shot wounds, smirking as if they had just nailed the landing on a Perry Mason style closing argument. No matter how many times I'd question that brand of logic, the intelligence insulting suggestion that failed murder attempts that leave holes in your respective ass somehow makes a persons street credibility beyond reproach, always puzzled me whenever one of his supporters would act as if going after his main narrative was off the table.

In terms of John McCain, everyone respects his fine service to this country, and if most people are honest with themselves for even a moment they will readily admit that if faced with the same hardships that McCain faced in that POW camp - they'd spend half of their time soiling themselves, and the other half offering their captors a complimentary reach around in hopes of preferential treatment. John McCain is a bona fide war hero. That being said, I reject the media's misguided narrative that Obama cedes all ground to McCain on everything Foreign Policy solely based on the fact that the Arizona Senator spent time at the Hanoi Hilton. Even attempting to respectfully question whether or not being a prisoner of war qualifies you to be president is often met with fierce resistance, with the offended party acting as if you had just wiped your ass with the American flag right in front of them. My question is, because John McCain constantly cites his service in Vietnam when on the campaign trail(..don't buy into the media's notion that he's resistant to do so, that's horseshit) - why can't we have a both respectful and substantive debate on how that does or does not relate to being a commander in chief? I'm not in any way talking about denigrating the man's service or his time as a P.O.W, I'm not even talking about citing irrefutable facts like him graduating 884 out of 889 in the Naval Academy, the fact that he crashed 5 different planes as a pilot, was known to disobey orders, and owes his military advancement largely to family connections(His father and grandfather were both admirals in the Navy) I'm just suggesting that we challenge the silly notion that John McCain's foreign policy cred is beyond reproach because of his time in captivity - its almost like someone making the "Wait a minute, his mother was white!" argument whenever some bumbling pundit discussed Obama's one time perceived problem with white voters during the Democratic Primaries. That simply doesn't work.

See, if Wesley Clark had simply said that John McCain is the 50 Cent of politics he wouldn't be taking so much shit from our incompetent, hyperventilating press - who seems to be coddling McCain ever so gently, like a wounded baby bird that some good Samaritan decided to take care of before it could fly on its own again. Jesus Christ, the media can obsess over flag pins, Obama being a fucking Muslim, his ties to a man that did something bad when Obama was 8 years old, they can even take racism off the table even though Stevie Wonder could see its prevalence in West Virginia - but somehow questioning how John McCain's service relates to being a Commander in Chief is an abomination against god? But all this has given me a great idea though. The next time Stephen King comes to my hometown for a book signing, I'm going to heckle the shit out of him, call him a hack, talk about his mother, you name it. The way I figure it, antagonizing a world famous writer into administering me one hell of a public asswhipping would forever make my writing abilities beyond reproach. People couldn't call me a "hack" without being mercilessly shouted down, on top of everyone in earshot looking physically repulsed by their misguided opinion. "Go HumanityCritic, its your Birthday!" Okay, maybe not.

I read this article interviewing a bunch of troops about their opinions on the success of the surge and it was fairly eye-opening in the sense that their assessment was rather similar to my own. Basically, a lot of people keep touting the surge as a transformational success in that it has significantly lessened the violence in Iraq and made 'victory' possible. My own thoughts have been and were at the time the surge was proposed that at best it would provide nothing more than a temporary lull in the absurd violence which was consuming the country and at best allow an opportunity for political reconciliation to occur. I think it did about as much as could possibly be expected. I think it also definitively debunked the Rumsfield doctrine of a lighter, swifter force being all that was necessary for this undertaking and thoroughly vindicated Gen. Shinseki and his estimate of required troop strength to do the job right.

Either way, I find it telling that when asked their opinions about it some of the same troops who are being touted as having saved our possible 'victory' (in quotes because we have no widely agreed upon definition of what victory means currently and whatever that definition is it will be different than what it was defined as being when this conflict started) have many of the same misgivings about the transient nature of their success. The basic point being that we've bought time which appears to have been wasted since the real difficult political decisions are still being punted down the road by the Iraqi political leadership. Until basic things like the nature of the government and the relative power of the Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish groups are settled the possibility of and potential for wide-scale sectarian violence is very much still there. By this I don't mean another document without weigh but a real political agreement and understanding by all the parties that truly encompasses what their split of the power and economic pie is going to be without one feeling they can still get a better cut through violence.

Just something to think about the next time you hear some politico spouting off about how the surge has worked and 'victory' in Iraq is right about the corner. Just think about how many times we've 'turned a corner' in Iraq over the last five years and ask yourself why we're still on the same street...

Meanwhile, in Afghanistan things are going from bad to much worse very quickly...