I strongly support President Obama's three principles for real health care reform and urge you to do so too. Any plan Congress passes must reduce health care costs, guarantee choice – including a public insurance option – and ensure quality care for every American.
If President Obama's healthcare plan gets changed to exclude a public option like Medicare, then it is not real healthcare reform. Real healthcare reform depends on whether the American public is allowed to choose a universally available public option or not. If we are allowed to choose a Medicare-like option, the healthcare bill will bring true healthcare reform. It will ensure choice, competition and will reduce costs.
One reason given for opposing a public option is that private insurance companies won't be able to compete in the marketplace if we have a strong public option.
But why should we deny people the right to get healthcare through a public option like Medicare just to put corporate profits ahead of people’s health?
If we're denied a public option, we won't achieve real healthcare reform at all. It's time to stand up to the special interests and enact real reform that includes a public option.
Please support a public option in healthcare reform and urge Congress to do the same.
To see where members of Congress currently stand on the public option and to contact them, see this link: http://standwithdrdean.com/where_congress_stands
Thanks!
We have a new website where you can hear all about our activities- check it out at
www.ofasierrafoothills.org
We have had our rest, now it is time to change hope into action!
~Christa Darlington and the Sierra Foothills team
The California Democratic Council is offering a free workshop covering a variety of different topics that activists should learn about if they want to become more involved with the party.
Whether you are a candidate or a volunteer, these topics will help prepare you for rising in the ranks of the Democratic Party.
The next workshop is on March 21, 2009 and will be held in Folsom, CA.
For full details, check out the event listing:
http://my.barackobama.com/page/event/detail/gptp5l
Please not that you must register here: http://www.cdc-ca.org/Training/
Don't miss out!
WoW! I am hosting an event and we have reached capacity with over 50 people!
This tells me that people are HUNGRY for change and they are HUNGRY to help President Obama move forward with his agenda. I am really excited to see this and I most of these people are new voices who were not involved before.
Congratulations to all of us grassroots workers! We did it, we changed the nation and we now have the most wonderful president! President Obama! Thank you to all that helped out and thank you to all of the wonderfull Obama volunteers here in the foothills. You are fantastic! Thank you BARACK OBAMA for teaching us all to be community organizers and to care about our country again.
PEACE AND LOVE TO ALL,
Arry
An interesting perspective.....
Marc Andreessen's post on Obama
An hour and a half with Barack Obama
I've tried very hard to keep politics out of this blog -- despite nearly overpowering impulses to the contrary -- for two reasons: one, there's no reason to alienate people who don't share my political views, as wrong-headed as those people may clearly be; two, there's no reason to expect my opinion on political issues should be any more valid than any other reader of what, these days, passes for the New York Times.
That said, in light of the extraordinary events playing out around us right now in the runup to the presidential election, I would like to share with you a personal experience that I was lucky enough to have early last year.
Early in 2007, a friend of mine who is active in both high-tech and politics called me up and said, let's go see this first-term Senator, Barack Obama, who's ramping up to run for President.
And so we did -- my friend, my wife Laura, and me -- and we were able to meet privately with Senator Obama for an hour and a half.
The reason I think you may find this interesting is that our meeting in early 2007 was probably one of the last times Senator Obama was able to spend an hour and a half sitting down and talking with just about anyone -- so I think we got a solid look at what he's like up close, right before he entered the "bubble" within which all major presidential candidates, and presidents, must exist.
Let me get disclaimers out of the way: my only involvement with the Democratic presidential campaigns is as an individual donor -- after meeting with the Senator, my wife and I both contributed the maximum amount of "hard money" we could to the Obama campaign, less than $10,000 total for both the primary and the general election. On the other hand, we also donated to Mitt Romney's Republican primary effort -- conclude from that what you will.
I carried four distinct impressions away from our meeting with Senator Obama.
First, this is a normal guy.
I've spent time with a lot of politicians in the last 15 years. Most of them talk at you. Listening is not their strong suit -- in fact, many of them aren't even very good at faking it.
Senator Obama, in contrast, comes across as a normal human being, with a normal interaction style, and a normal level of interest in the people he's with and the world around him.
We were able to have an actual, honest-to-God conversation, back and forth, on a number of topics. In particular, the Senator was personally interested in the rise of social networking, Facebook, Youtube, and user-generated content, and casually but persistently grilled us on what we thought the next generation of social media would be and how social networking might affect politics -- with no staff present, no prepared materials, no notes. He already knew a fair amount about the topic but was very curious to actually learn more. We also talked about a pretty wide range of other issues, including Silicon Valley and various political topics.
With most politicians, their curiosity ends once they find out how much money you can raise for them. Not so with Senator Obama -- this is a normal guy.
Second, this is a smart guy.
I bring this up for two reasons. One, Senator Obama's political opponents tend to try to paint him as some kind of lightweight, which he most definitely is not. Two, I think he's at or near the top of the scale of intelligence of anyone in political life today.
You can see how smart he is in his background -- for example, lecturer in constitutional law at University of Chicago; before that, president of the Harvard Law Review.
But it's also apparent when you interact with him that you're dealing with one of the intellectually smartest national politicians in recent times, at least since Bill Clinton. He's crisp, lucid, analytical, and clearly assimilates and synthesizes a very large amount of information -- smart.
Third, this is not a radical.
This is not some kind of liberal revolutionary who is intent on throwing everything up in the air and starting over.
Put the primary campaign speeches aside; take a look at his policy positions on any number of issues and what strikes you is how reasonable, moderate, and thoughtful they are.
And in person, that's exactly what he's like. There's no fire in the eyes to realize some utopian or revolutionary dream. Instead, what comes across -- in both his questions and his answers -- is calmness, reason, and judgment.
Fourth, this is the first credible post-Baby Boomer presidential candidate.
The Baby Boomers are best defined as the generation that came of age during the 1960's -- whose worldview and outlook was shaped by Vietnam plus the widespread social unrest and change that peaked in the late 1960's.
Post-Boomers are those of us, like me, who came of age in the 1970's or 1980's -- after Vietnam, after Nixon, after the "sexual revolution" and the cultural wars of the 1960's.
One of the reasons Senator Obama comes across as so fresh and different is that he's the first serious presidential candidate who isn't either from the World War II era (Reagan, Bush Sr, Dole, and even McCain, who was born in 1936) or from the Baby Boomer generation (Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, Al Gore, and George W. Bush).
He's a post-Boomer.
Most of the Boomers I know are still fixated on the 1960's in one way or another -- generally in how they think about social change, politics, and the government.
It's very clear when interacting with Senator Obama that he's totally focused on the world as it has existed since after the 1960's -- as am I, and as is practically everyone I know who's younger than 50.
What's the picture that emerges from these four impressions?
Smart, normal, curious, not radical, and post-Boomer.
If you were asking me to write a capsule description of what I would look for in the next President of the United States, that would be it.
Having met him and then having watched him for the last 12 months run one of the best-executed and cleanest major presidential campaigns in recent memory, I have no doubt that Senator Obama has the judgment, bearing, intellect, and high ethical standards to be an outstanding president -- completely aside from the movement that has formed around him, and in complete contradition to the silly assertions by both the Clinton and McCain campaigns that he's somehow not ready.
Before I close, let me share two specific things he said at the time -- early 2007 -- on the topic of whether he's ready.
We asked him directly, how concerned should we be that you haven't had meaningful experience as an executive -- as a manager and leader of people?
He said, watch how I run my campaign -- you'll see my leadership skills in action.
At the time, I wasn't sure what to make of his answer -- political campaigns are often very messy and chaotic, with a lot of turnover and flux; what conclusions could we possibly draw from one of those?
Well, as any political expert will tell you, it turns out that the Obama campaign has been one of the best organized and executed presidential campaigns in memory. Even Obama's opponents concede that his campaign has been disciplined, methodical, and effective across the full spectrum of activities required to win -- and with a minimum of the negative campaigning and attack ads that normally characterize a race like this, and with almost no staff turnover. By almost any measure, the Obama campaign has simply out-executed both the Clinton and McCain campaigns.
This speaks well to the Senator's ability to run a campaign, but speaks even more to his ability to recruit and manage a top-notch group of campaign professionals and volunteers -- another key leadership characteristic. When you compare this to the awe-inspiring discord, infighting, and staff turnover within both the Clinton and McCain campaigns up to this point -- well, let's just say it's a very interesting data point.
We then asked, well, what about foreign policy -- should we be concerned that you just don't have much experience there?
He said, directly, two things.
First, he said, I'm on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, where I serve with a number of Senators who are widely regarded as leading experts on foreign policy -- and I can tell you that I know as much about foreign policy at this point as most of them.
Being a fan of blunt answers, I liked that one.
But then he made what I think is the really good point.
He said -- and I'm going to paraphrase a little here: think about who I am -- my father was Kenyan; I have close relatives in a small rural village in Kenya to this day; and I spent several years of my childhood living in Jakarta, Indonesia. Think about what it's going to mean in many parts of the world -- parts of the world that we really care about -- when I show up as the President of the United States. I'll be fundamentally changing the world's perception of what the United States is all about.
He's got my vote
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2008/10/24/florida_voting/print.html
To print this page, select "Print" from the File menu of your browser
By Mike Madden
Oct. 24, 2008 |
Sure, Ted Ravelo likes Barack Obama. But two hours is a long time to stand in line to vote, especially considering that it's still October. "This has to be remedied," Ravelo, 72, said Wednesday morning, shaking his head, as he gave up on voting early -- at least that day -- at the North Miami Public Library, where a couple of dozen voting machines and their operators were struggling in vain to keep pace with a flood of citizens. "Something has to be done." A line stretched two blocks from the building, as other voters doggedly stood -- or sat on the folding chairs many of them had brought along -- for up to two hours while waiting to cast their ballots.
It may have been a bit too much for Ravelo. He said he'd probably have to give it another shot on Election Day, and that his daughters -- who have to work on Nov. 4, and who sent him to scout out the wait time -- might not get to vote at all. But compared to Monday here, when early voting opened, two hours on Wednesday was a breeze; on the first day, officials and community activists said, the wait was three times that long.
A visit to Florida in the waning days of the 2008 presidential campaign threatens to evoke a certain sense of déjà vu for another late October eight years ago. Once again, polls show the state is deadlocked -- and once again, there's a very real possibility that a lot of people who support the Democratic candidate could have trouble voting.
This time, of course, it won't be butterfly ballots or Brooks Brothers riots that get in the way, and there's no chance Pat Buchanan will pick up any votes from confused elderly Jews in Palm Beach or any other county (if only because he's not running). But even so, a combination of heavy turnout and widespread confusion over new ID laws at the polling places could overwhelm the system again. "I don't believe that anybody's going to be ready for the onslaught of voters," said Roger Weeden, an Orlando lawyer who's working with Election Protection, a national coalition of civil rights and public interest groups that will monitor problems with voting around the country through Nov. 4. The new law -- known as "no match, no vote" -- says you need identification at the polls, and you can't vote if the address on it doesn't match what's in state or federal databases. Rumors are flying, especially in minority communities, that the law is even more restrictive. On Tuesday night, Miami's "Hot 105" soul station spent a good 30 minutes during the evening rush hour discussing potential voting problems.
Another difference this time around, though, is that Obama's campaign seems to be ready for problems. Part of the reason early voting has been so busy (nearly half a million people voted in Florida in the first three days) is because the campaign isn't shy about telling supporters to get out and vote ahead of time. "You can vote early right here and right now," Obama told about 30,000 people at a downtown Miami rally Tuesday night. Aides were concerned enough that some of the wilder rumors would suppress turnout that they sent a campaign lawyer out to warm up the crowd before Barack and Michelle Obama appeared. "How many of you have heard the rumor that you won't be allowed to go to the polls and vote if you're wearing a Barack Obama button or T-shirt?" the lawyer asked, getting a big roar from the crowd. "Well, guess what -- that's just not true."
Obama's team has been gearing up to turn people out, focusing especially on getting them to vote early and avoid the crunch on Nov. 4. More than 100 field offices are set up around the state; deputy campaign manager Steve Hildebrand and his consulting partner Paul Tewes, the duo who engineered the field strategy for Iowa and other early primary and caucus states that helped Obama win the nomination, moved to Florida a few weeks ago to help run their massive operation here. So far, it looks effective: More than 54 percent of the early ballots in have been cast by registered Democrats, according to state statistics, which might help offset a Republican edge in requests for mail-in absentee ballots.
Judging from what some people were saying -- at the Tuesday night rally and among those voting the next morning -- Obama's campaign didn't have to scare anyone into participating early. "I didn't want to take a chance of something happening and me not getting my vote in," said Rony Francis, 43, who directs operations for a transportation company. He waited 90 minutes to vote at the North Miami library, where most of the voters who joined him were Haitians and other immigrants.
"It's always in your mind, especially after eight years ago," said Al Morrell, 51, a truck driver, also from North Miami. "So you gotta be a little wary."
The night before, Tasha Thomas, 26, who works at the University of Miami's veterinary school, had told me she'd been besieged by weird, panicky questions from supporters since she started volunteering at the Obama field office in her Miami neighborhood. People thought they couldn't vote if their voter registration card was starting to fade, or thought they had to go back to the state where they were born to vote, even if they lived in Florida now. "It was eye-opening, how much wrong information so many people have," she said.
Election Protection plans to have lawyers roaming from polling place to polling place around the state on Election Day, ready to help voters who can't find their precincts or have questions about the process. (Though the group is officially nonpartisan, there's not much doubt that anyone working hard to increase turnout is probably sympathetic to Obama.) "Voter suppression is something that anybody who has any sense of commitment to democracy or civil rights would want to fight against," said Weeden, a criminal defense lawyer who also helped monitor election sites in 2004. Back then, he and other volunteers encountered people who had been called and told their polling places had changed, or found suspicious characters lurking outside precincts with clipboards, asking people if they had met rigorous requirements to vote that went above and beyond what the law says.
While McCain is contesting the state as furiously as he is any other battleground -- he made several stops on a bus tour along Interstate 4 on Thursday, crossing from the Atlantic coast to the Gulf of Mexico -- his top surrogate, Gov. Charlie Crist, hasn't been entirely on message when it comes to issues surrounding the ballot box. (Some local Republicans say prospects for the McCain campaign here are looking dim anyway.) In most states, Republicans are busy whipping up a frenzy about alleged voter fraud, mostly trying to tie it to the community organizing group ACORN (which is a member of Election Protection) and, by implication, accusing Obama of trying to steal the White House.
Crist, though, isn't buying the party line on that one. "I don't think we anticipate much of a problem with voter fraud," he told reporters on a conference call organized by McCain's campaign Tuesday afternoon (which it probably regretted later). So far, the state government in Tallahassee hasn't moved to block a ruling that says voters whose IDs don't match their registration information can correct the problem in person on Election Day, rather than having to go to another office and fix it before their ballot is accepted. Perhaps as a result of Crist's calm, even McCain's die-hard supporters at a Thursday morning rally in Ormond Beach didn't seem too worried about voter fraud. Of course, that's a matter of degree; several insisted that Democrats always get away with some fraud, but they didn't expect things to be worse than usual this year.
If Florida were expected to go as easily for McCain as it did for George W. Bush four years ago (if not eight years ago), the issue might not matter that much. But the more people who show up to vote, the better the night is likely to be for Obama. Democrats are paying close attention. "We have a chance this year, as a nation, to go past that horrendous 48 percent of eligible voters who participate in presidential elections, with the unprecedented number of young voters, independent voters, minority voters, that are participating in this," New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson told Salon prior to appearing at an early-vote rally for Latinos in Kissimmee, Fla., on Wednesday. He noted that he's heard reports of rumors about voting problems among Hispanic communities in Nevada, Colorado and New Mexico as well. But, he said of expected record turnouts, "It's very healthy for our democracy, and we should take advantage of it, not engage in negative tactics and voter suppression."
Obama's most passionate supporters, meanwhile, say they're ready to show up no matter what they hear. "We're smart," said Sherrie Kendrick, a retired phone operator from Miami, who will turn 54 on Election Day. "We may not look it, but we're smart."
-- By Mike Madden
It's looking good according to the newest polls from the battlegrounds! But like the song says "...you can't trust freedom when it's not in your hands when everybody's fighting for their promised land." With this in mind, we can never underestimate the power of the republican disenfrancizing machine. VIGILANCE!!!
From Chuck Todd, Mark Murray, Domenico Montanaro, and Carrie Dann*** Swing states swinging to Obama: Most of the national polls -- including our NBC/WSJ survey -- are now showing Obama with a double-digit national lead. And here come a slew of brand-new state polls that also suggest Obama is in command of this presidential contest. The University of Wisconsin’s Big Ten Battleground polls have Obama up 10 points in Indiana (51%-41%), 13 points in Iowa (52%-39%), 22 in Michigan (58%-36%), 19 in Minnesota (57%-38%), 12 in Ohio (53%-41%), 11 in Pennsylvania (52%-41%), 13 in Wisconsin (53%-40%), and nearly 30 in Obama’s home state of Illinois (61%-32%). Meanwhile, there are new Quinnipiac surveys that show Obama up five points in Florida (49%-44%), 14 in Ohio (52%-38%), and 13 in Pennsylvania (53%-40%). And finally, new CNN/Time surveys find Obama ahead by five points among likely voters in Nevada (51%-46%), four points in North Carolina (51%-47%), four in Ohio (50%-46%), and 10 points in Virginia (54%-44%). The lone state survey that shows McCain ahead: CNN/Time’s West Virginia poll, where McCain’s nine (53%-44%).
ROBERT F. KENNEDY JR. & GREG PALAST
These days, the old west rail hub of Las Vegas, New Mexico, is little more than a dusty economic dead zone amid a boneyard of bare mesas. In national elections, the town overwhelmingly votes Democratic: More than 80 percent of all residents are Hispanic, and one in four lives below the poverty line. On February 5th, the day of the Super Tuesday caucus, a school-bus driver named Paul Maez arrived at his local polling station to cast his ballot. To his surprise, Maez found that his name had vanished from the list of registered voters, thanks to a statewide effort to deter fraudulent voting. For Maez, the shock was especially acute: He is the supervisor of elections in Las Vegas.
Maez was not alone in being denied his right to vote. On Super Tuesday, one in nine Democrats who tried to cast ballots in New Mexico found their names missing from the registration lists. The numbers were even higher in precincts like Las Vegas, where nearly 20 percent of the county's voters were absent from the rolls. With their status in limbo, the voters were forced to cast "provisional" ballots, which can be reviewed and discarded by election officials without explanation. On Super Tuesday, more than half of all provisional ballots cast were thrown out statewide.
This November, what happened to Maez will happen to hundreds of thousands of voters across the country. In state after state, Republican operatives — the party's elite commandos of bare-knuckle politics — are wielding new federal legislation to systematically disenfranchise Democrats. If this year's race is as close as the past two elections, the GOP's nationwide campaign could be large enough to determine the presidency in November. "I don't think the Democrats get it," says John Boyd, a voting-rights attorney in Albuquerque who has taken on the Republican Party for impeding access to the ballot. "All these new rules and games are turning voting into an obstacle course that could flip the vote to the GOP in half a dozen states."
Suppressing the vote has long been a cornerstone of the GOP's electoral strategy. Shortly before the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980, Paul Weyrich — a principal architect of today's Republican Party — scolded evangelicals who believed in democracy. "Many of our Christians have what I call the 'goo goo' syndrome — good government," said Weyrich, who co-founded Moral Majority with Jerry Falwell. "They want everybody to vote. I don't want everybody to vote. . . . As a matter of fact, our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down."
Today, Weyrich's vision has become a national reality. Since 2003, according to the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, at least 2.7 million new voters have had their applications to register rejected. In addition, at least 1.6 million votes were never counted in the 2004 election — and the commission's own data suggests that the real number could be twice as high. To purge registration rolls and discard ballots, partisan election officials used a wide range of pretexts, from "unreadability" to changes in a voter's signature. And this year, thanks to new provisions of the Help America Vote Act, the number of discounted votes could surge even higher.
Passed in 2002, HAVA was hailed by leaders in both parties as a reform designed to avoid a repeat of the 2000 debacle in Florida that threw the presidential election to the U.S. Supreme Court. The measure set standards for voting systems, created an independent commission to oversee elections, and ordered states to provide provisional ballots to voters whose eligibility is challenged at the polls.
But from the start, HAVA was corrupted by the involvement of Republican superlobbyist Jack Abramoff, who worked to cram the bill with favors for his clients. (Both Abramoff and a primary author of HAVA, former Rep. Bob Ney, were imprisoned for their role in the conspiracy.) In practice, many of the "reforms" created by HAVA have actually made it harder for citizens to cast a ballot and have their vote counted. In case after case, Republican election officials at the local and state level have used the rules to give GOP candidates an edge on Election Day by creating new barriers to registration, purging legitimate names from voter rolls, challenging voters at the polls and discarding valid ballots.
To justify this battery of new voting impediments, Republicans cite an alleged upsurge in voting fraud. Indeed, the U.S.-attorney scandal that resulted in the resignation of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales began when the White House fired federal prosecutors who resisted political pressure to drum up nonexistent cases of voting fraud against Democrats. "They wanted some splashy pre-election indictments that would scare these alleged hordes of illegal voters away," says David Iglesias, a U.S. attorney for New Mexico who was fired in December 2006. "We took over 100 complaints and investigated for almost two years — but I didn't find one prosecutable case of voter fraud in the entire state of New Mexico."
There's a reason Iglesias couldn't find any evidence of fraud: Individual voters almost never try to cast illegal ballots. The Bush administration's main point person on "ballot protection" has been Hans von Spakovsky, a former Justice Department attorney who has advised states on how to use HAVA to erect more barriers to voting. Appointed to the Federal Election Commission by Bush, von Spakovsky has suggested that voter rolls may be stuffed with 5 million illegal aliens. In fact, studies have repeatedly shown that voter fraud is extremely rare. According to a recent analysis by Lorraine Minnite, an expert on voting crime at Barnard College, federal courts found only 24 voters guilty of fraud from 2002 to 2005, out of hundreds of millions of votes cast. "The claim of widespread voter fraud," Minnite says, "is itself a fraud."
Allegations of voter fraud are only the latest rationale the GOP has used to disenfranchise voters — especially blacks, Hispanics and others who traditionally support Democrats. "The Republicans have a long history of erecting barriers to discourage Americans from voting," says Donna Brazile, chair of the Voting Rights Institute for the Democratic National Committee. "Now they're trying to spook Americans with the ghost of voter fraud. It's very effective — but it's ironic that the only way they maintain power is by using fear to deprive Americans of their constitutional right to vote." The recently enacted barriers thrown up to deter voters include:
Since 2004, the Bush administration and more than a dozen states have taken steps to impede voter registration. Among the worst offenders is Florida, where the Republican-dominated legislature created hefty fines — up to $5,000 per violation — for groups that fail to meet deadlines for turning in voter-application forms. Facing potentially huge penalties for trivial administrative errors, the League of Women Voters abandoned its voter-registration drives in Florida. A court order eventually forced the legislature to reduce the maximum penalty to $1,000. But even so, said former League president Dianne Wheatley-Giliotti, the reduced fines "create an unfair tax on democracy." The state has also failed to uphold a federal law requiring that low-income voters be offered an opportunity to register when they apply for food stamps or other public assistance. As a result, the annual number of such registrations has plummeted from more than 120,000 in the Clinton years to barely 10,000 today.
Under the Help America Vote Act, some states now reject first-time registrants whose data does not correspond to information in other government databases. Spurred by HAVA, almost every state must now attempt to make some kind of match — and four states, including the swing states of Iowa and Florida, require what is known as a "perfect match." Under this rigid framework, new registrants can lose the right to vote if the information on their voter-registration forms — Social Security number, street address and precisely spelled name, right down to a hyphen — fails to exactly match data listed in other government records.
There are many legitimate reasons, of course, why a voter's information might vary. Indeed, a recent study by the Brennan Center for Justice found that as many as 20 percent of discrepancies between voter records and driver's licenses in New York City are simply typing mistakes made by government clerks when they transcribe data. But under the new rules, those mistakes are costing citizens the right to vote. In California, a Republican secretary of state blocked 43 percent of all new voters in Los Angeles from registering in early 2006 — many because of the state's failure to produce a tight match. In Florida, GOP officials created "match" rules that rejected more than 15,000 new registrants in 2006 and 2007 — nearly three-fourths of them Hispanic and black voters. Given the big registration drives this year, the number could be five times higher by November.
The Help America Vote Act doesn't just disenfranchise new registrants; it also targets veteran voters. In the past, bipartisan county election boards maintained voter records. But HAVA requires that records be centralized, computerized and maintained by secretaries of state — partisan officials — who are empowered to purge the rolls of any voter they deem ineligible. Ironically, the new rules imitate the centralized system in Florida — the same corrupt operation that inspired passage of HAVA in the first place. Prior to the 2000 election, Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris and her predecessor, both Republicans, tried to purge 57,000 voters, most of them African-Americans, because their names resembled those of persons convicted of a crime. The state eventually acknowledged that the purges were improper — two years after the election.
Rather than end Florida-style purges, however, HAVA has nationalized them. Maez, the elections supervisor in New Mexico, says he was the victim of faulty list management by a private contractor hired by the state. Hector Balderas, the state auditor, was also purged from the voter list. The nation's youngest elected Hispanic official, Balderas hails from Mora County, one of the poorest in the state, which had the highest rate of voters forced to cast provisional ballots. "As a strategic consideration," he notes, "there are those that benefit from chaos" at the ballot box.
All told, states reported scrubbing at least 10 million voters from their rolls on questionable grounds between 2004 and 2006. Colorado holds the record: Donetta Davidson, the Republican secretary of state, and her GOP successor oversaw the elimination of nearly one of every six of their state's voters. Bush has since appointed Davidson to the Election Assistance Commission, the federal agency created by HAVA, which provides guidance to the states on "list maintenance" methods.
Even if voters run the gauntlet of the new registration laws, they can still be blocked at the polling station. In an incident last May, an election official in Indiana denied ballots to 10 nuns seeking to vote in the Democratic primary because their driver's licenses or passports had expired. Even though Indiana has never recorded a single case of voter-ID fraud, it is one of two dozen states that have enacted stringent new voter-ID statutes.
On its face, the requirement to show a government-issued ID doesn't seem unreasonable. "I want to cash a check to pay for my groceries, I've got to show a little bit of ID," Karl Rove told the Republican National Lawyers Association in 2006. But many Americans lack easy access to official identification. According to a recent study for the Election Law Journal, young people, senior citizens and minorities — groups that traditionally vote Democratic — often have no driver's licenses or state ID cards. According to the study, one in 10 likely white voters do not possess the necessary identification. For African-Americans, the number lacking such ID is twice as high.
Even intrepid voters who manage to cast a ballot may still find their vote discounted. In 2004, election officials discarded at least 1 million votes nationwide after classifying them as "spoiled" because blank spaces, stray marks or tears made them indecipherable to voting machines. The losses hit hardest among minorities in low-income precincts, who are often forced to vote on antiquated machines. The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, in its investigation of the 2000 returns from Florida, found that African-Americans were nearly 10 times more likely than whites to have their ballots rejected, a ratio that holds nationwide.
Proponents of HAVA claimed the law would correct the spoilage problem by promoting computerized balloting. Yet touch-screen systems have proved highly unreliable — especially in minority and low-income precincts. A statistical analysis of New Mexico ballots by a voting-rights group called VotersUnite found that Hispanics who voted by computer in 2004 were nearly five times more likely to have their votes unrecorded than those who used paper ballots. In a close election, such small discrepancies can make a big difference: In 2004, the number of spoiled ballots in New Mexico — 19,000 — was three times George Bush's margin of victory.
In 2004, an estimated 3 million voters who showed up at the polls were refused regular ballots because their registration was challenged on a technicality. Instead, these voters were handed "provisional" ballots, a fail-safe measure mandated by HAVA to enable officials to review disputed votes. But for many officials, resolving disputes means tossing ballots in the trash. In 2004, a third of all provisional ballots — as many as 1 million votes — were simply thrown away at the discretion of election officials.
Many voters are given provisional ballots under an insidious tactic known as "vote caging," which uses targeted mailings to disenfranchise black voters whose addresses have changed. In 2004, despite a federal consent order forbidding Republicans from engaging in the practice, the GOP sent out tens of thousands of letters to "confirm" the addresses of voters in minority precincts. If a letter was returned for any reason — because the voter was away at school or serving in the military — the GOP challenged the voter for giving a false address. One caging operation was exposed when an RNC official mistakenly sent the list to a parody site called GeorgeWBush.org — instead of to the official campaign site GeorgeWBush.com.
In the century following the Civil War, millions of black Americans in the Deep South lost their constitutional right to vote, thanks to literacy tests, poll taxes and other Jim Crow restrictions imposed by white officials. Add up all the modern-day barriers to voting erected since the 2004 election — the new registrations thrown out, the existing registrations scrubbed, the spoiled ballots, the provisional ballots that were never counted — and what you have is millions of voters, more than enough to swing the presidential election, quietly being detached from the electorate by subterfuge.
"Jim Crow was laid to rest, but his cousins were not," says Donna Brazile. "We got rid of poll taxes and literacy tests but now have a second generation of schemes to deny our citizens their franchise." Come November, the most crucial demographic may prove to be Americans who have been denied the right to vote. If Democrats are to win the 2008 election, they must not simply beat John McCain at the polls — they must beat him by a margin that exceeds the level of GOP vote tampering.
Contributing editor Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is one of the nation's leading voting-rights advocates. His article "Was the 2004 Election Stolen?" [RS 1002] sparked widespread scrutiny of vote tampering. Greg Palast, who broke the story on Florida's illegal voter purges in the 2000 election, is the author of "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy." For more information, visit No Voter Left Behind and Steal Back Your Vote.
We, In South LAke Tahoe are fired up & ready to go!
A Big turnout for Tahoe to watch debate!!!!
http://www.tahoedailytribune.com/article/20081017/NEWS/110179984/1068&ParentProfile=1056&title=Presidential%20politics%20play%20out%20at%20South%20Shore
A horrified America watched John McCain stagger up from his debate chair last night and turn into a monster. He almost caught our Barack Obama! What was happening? Clearly, the special anti-monster juice McCain drinks before public appearances was starting to wear off. They got him in the titanium-lined SWAT van just before he fully transformed. But fully transformed into what?
HORRIBLE MEDIEVAL WEREWOLF: This would actually explain a lot, including, probably, why McCain is always talking about medieval Ireland, when he was a boy, before he was bitten by a werewolf, which put a terrible end to his happy carefree days of being a Celtic warrior who always crashed his horse into the enemy’s village.
HORRIBLE CHILD-EATING DEATH CLOWN: No wonder McCain’s handlers try to get him away from those debate audiences so quick! He was just moments away from turning into this evil-ass thing, the New Hampshire Primary Murder Clown, Rich Uncle Pennywise! Imagine being stuck on Secret Service duty with this campaign. Imagine having to bury the bodies every night.
EVIL GORGON MEDUSA: Walnuts has always roamed the Earth, in his various guises, but by night, he shows his true death’s head, the GORGONEION from Hades, where he spent Five and a Half Million Years. (This is also the face he makes when he has sexytime! Your tax dollars pay for his Viagra!)
DISGUSTING CLASSIC-ROCK GIMMICK CAR: There is nothing more hideous than 700-year-old arena rocker Gene Simmons, so it stands to reason that John McCain is the demon father of the KISS monster. Legend says shitty ‘71 Volkswagen Beetles with home paint jobs and huge styrofoam monster skulls/tongues were frequently on the scene before the Crusaders lost Jerusalem to the Arabs led by Bill Ayers the Terrorist Muslin.
EVIL SILENT-MOVIE GERMAN VAMPIRE: And now, a quote from Bram Stoker’s Dracula: “As the Count leaned over me and his hands touched me… a horrible feeling of nausea came over me, which, do what I would, I could not conceal. When the Count saw my face, his eyes blazed with a sort of demonaic fury, and he suddenly made a grab at my throat.”
Yes, that sounds about right.
THE BEAST: But our demonic experts here on the Wonkette staff finally concluded McCain was turning into this hell-beast of yore, as seen here in a 16th Century woodcut. These demonic shit-monsters once roamed the Eastern Seaboard, until they were captured by Benedict Arnold in 1776 and taught Naval Command skills at Annapolis. The creatures spawn a single fetus from the “egg duct” every hundred years; the fourth spawn of the cycle is always a crazy, self-obsessed idiot who has no military skillz.
Come on John, whose really in charge over there. It’s no good blaming Steve Schmuk Schmidt your campaign head. You are the candidate
Dear John
Yes, I’m talking to you John McCain. With your baggage of age and that infamous rage. You are, That One, the one that’s running on empty, bereft of ideas, and bereft of sage. Now hear this John, the United States of America is about to turn the page. John, when that hallelulah day arrives, the people of America will owe you big time. Why you ask? For conducting a rotten campaign of course. John, your campaign is in such bad shape it’s beginning to look like you’re running dead. You seemed to manage better when you were on your own. Just like the good old days at the controls of your plane, even though you managed to crash five times. A record I believe.
The Running Mate
But as bad judgement would have it, in looking for a running mate, you went and got “impalined” by lipstick. An Alaskan red on a pitbull look, I believe. A little too aggressive for Estee Lauder cosmetics to sell. John since you’ve been palinised you now seem paralysed. Why in the name of Arizona John, would you choose a running mate like Sarah Palin, aka, Barracuda? She’s not only a wolf killer by nature she’s also a vote loser with her dodgy record and radical views. Your deputy’s been in town just five weeks and already the Alaska legislature has found her guilty of unlawful conduct back at their ranch. Is that a first for a VP running mate?
Playing with Fire
By the way John have you noticed, she’s the one demanding in your name “who is this Barack Obama” and worse. Come on John, whose really in charge over there. It’s no good blaming Steve Schmuk Schmidt your campaign head. You are the candidate - “my friend”. Now you’ve got me saying it. Why are you just standing back waving and turning a crowd into a mob, letting her whip up hatred, racism, smears and riotous behaviour.
Country First?
I hear that the Secret Service is interested in discussing this with you. That would be another dubious first John. Incitement to riot it’s called. Is this the sort of behaviour Americans should expect from you as a potential President? I think not. Where are your policy plans John? Has Barack Obama got you running scared on economic policy? It certainly looks that way when all you offer as your ticket to the White House is mainly a platform of smear and inuendo. Is this the John McCain who promotes the idea he is an American hero. Is this the McCain way of putting the country first?
John that’s strike one against you!
Steering a new Course
John I appreciate that you wouldn’t want me to be the one to mention your POW experience. That’s to be expected, lest we forget, it is your pet subject. Your meal ticket in lieu of policy ideas. John Sidney McCain the third, your father was an Admiral, your grandfather was an Admiral, both were honoured and distinguished men. It appears that the third generation curse and the imperfections it endows must have touched you John? It’s the hand destiny dealt to you and the Navy board signalled this when they rejected your application for further promotion, suggesting career wise”you’ve gone about as far as you can go”.Reminds me of the lyrics from”Everything’s up to date in Kansas City”. So you got up and went, — into politics.
McCain’s irresponsible claims about Iraq … 6 min 36
Stormy Waters
How do I read the tea leaves for November 4th? Wouldn’t know how. But I do observe your fellow republicans.They’re jumping off your campaign ship faster than rats down the mooring lines.Your colleagues have seen the way the wind is blowing. They’ve wet their fingers John. This is what some politicians do. You’ve probably abandoned the political ship from time to time over the years yourself. As an ex navy man you understand the real meaning of, “any port in a storm” and “fair weather friends”. Fair weather friends, rather sums up your relationship with the jailed savings and loan crook Charles Keating, doesn’t it John McCain.
No Foreclosures Here
Keating handsomely rewarded your political services in his dealings and you happily lapped up the benefits while his multi-billion public scam lasted. How many senior citizens lost their life savings as a result of that disgraceful and dishonest financial debacle, John McCain? Do you remember? You couldn’t even remember when a reporter recently inquired how many houses you currently own. I will concede that was a tough question for someone who placed 795th out of a class of 800 at Annapolis. Barack Obama had to answer the same question as it applied to him. His answer, one house and one car. John, it turns out that the media after checking advised that you have 11 houses or condos and 13 cars. Is this is what you meant when you complained that the media doesn’t know enough about Obama?
John, that’s strike 2 against you!
The View from Afar
John, do you realise that if Australians were eligible to vote on November 4th, that Barack Obama would win the election in a landslide according to the latest Readers Digest poll. Australians and those in other countries have valid reasons to be interested in the calibre of the person who occupies the Oval Office and the reason is clear. What happens in America touches every corner of the world. Senator McCain, your good friend George W Bush, whose policies you have enthusiastically supported 90% of the time, has done enormous damage to Australia. His rash decisions have cost Australian lives in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. More fool our former Prime Minister John Howard, for trusting Bush. This is no way to treat a friend and ally.
A reminder of American sacrifice in all wars
The Battle Hymn of the Republic .. Americans in World War Two .. 3 min 54
Australians don’t trust you either, Senator McCain. The one redeeming feature about the length of the Presidential selection process is that it provides people with the opportunity to get to know more about the candidates. In your case John, an opportunity to investigate the myth of McCain, to expose the real McCain and to see with our own eyes, how you perform under pressure. John I am now able to tell you what I have learned after all of the primaries, and with the general election only days away? John McCain, I have learned that you are not equipped to be President of the United States. Senator Barack Obama is, and the rest of the World agrees.
John that’s strike three and you are out!
Will ye no come back agin McSame?
John, a few suggestions to work on should you decide to make a comeback at 76 years of age in 2012. A little self improvement work. Enrol in an anger management course, take classes in personal and professional ethics, accept responsibility for your actions, stop trying to be someone you are not and remember, respect has to be earned. One more thing John, try telling the truth, you’ll find it a liberating experience. Perhaps your pitbull protege Sarah Barracuda, will be keen to have another tilt at republican rabble rousing now you have whetted her lipstick. Some people never learn.
Goodbye John.
Go Obama / Biden Yes we can
This really scares me about America, the hate and fear right below the surface. I lived through the Freedom Marches against racism in the sixties and look what followed: Martin Luther King, Bobby Kennedy and even John Kennedy before them all killed.Fast forward to today as Obama seems poised to win this presidential election, we have GOP ... Read Moresupporters calling for killing him at McCain rallies. This is beyond the pale. Civilized people do not behave this way. Did I spend my whole life believing that Education makes a difference and here we are facing HATE fueled by Racism, Partisanship and a fear of the OTHER!
Don DePasquale
Bipartisan Concern About the Dangers of McPalin’s Hate-Mongering
Posted by Emptywheel, Firedoglake at 3:43 PM on October 10, 2008.
Former McCain Campaign Chair John Weaver:
John Weaver, McCain’s former top strategist, said top Republicans have a responsibility to temper this behavior. “People need to understand, for moral reasons and the protection of our civil society, the differences with Sen. Obama are ideological, based on clear differences on policy and a lack of experience compared to Sen. McCain,” Weaver said. “And from a purely practical political vantage point, please find me a swing voter, an undecided independent, or a torn female voter that finds an angry mob mentality attractive.”
John Weaver, McCain’s former top strategist, said top Republicans have a responsibility to temper this behavior.
“People need to understand, for moral reasons and the protection of our civil society, the differences with Sen. Obama are ideological, based on clear differences on policy and a lack of experience compared to Sen. McCain,” Weaver said. “And from a purely practical political vantage point, please find me a swing voter, an undecided independent, or a torn female voter that finds an angry mob mentality attractive.”
“Sen. Obama is a classic liberal with an outdated economic agenda. We should take that agenda on in a robust manner. As a party we should not and must not stand by as the small amount of haters in our society question whether he is as American as the rest of us. Shame on them and shame on us if we allow this to take hold.”
Republican advisor David Gergen:
COOPER: There’s also the question of ruling after this, and bringing the country together. It’s going to be all the more harder to do that whoever wins with all this anger out there.GERGEN: This—I think one of the most striking things we’ve seen now in the last few day. We’ve seen it in a Palin rally. We saw it at the McCain rally today. And we saw it to a considerable degree during the rescue package legislation. There is this free floating sort of whipping around anger that could really lead to some violence. I think we’re not far from that.COOPER: Really?GERGEN: I think it’s so—well, I really worry when we get people—when you get the kind of rhetoric that you’re getting at these rallies now. I think it’s really imperative that the candidates try to calm people down. And that’s why I’ve argued not only because of the question of the ugliness of it.
COOPER: There’s also the question of ruling after this, and bringing the country together. It’s going to be all the more harder to do that whoever wins with all this anger out there.
GERGEN: This—I think one of the most striking things we’ve seen now in the last few day. We’ve seen it in a Palin rally. We saw it at the McCain rally today. And we saw it to a considerable degree during the rescue package legislation. There is this free floating sort of whipping around anger that could really lead to some violence. I think we’re not far from that.
COOPER: Really?
GERGEN: I think it’s so—well, I really worry when we get people—when you get the kind of rhetoric that you’re getting at these rallies now. I think it’s really imperative that the candidates try to calm people down. And that’s why I’ve argued not only because of the question of the ugliness of it.
Republican Frank Schaeffer:
John McCain: If your campaign does not stop equating Sen. Barack Obama with terrorism, questioning his patriotism and portraying Mr. Obama as "not one of us," I accuse you of deliberately feeding the most unhinged elements of our society the red meat of hate, and therefore of potentially instigating violence. [snip]Stop! Think! Your rallies are beginning to look, sound, feel and smell like lynch mobs. John McCain, you're walking a perilous line. If you do not stand up for all that is good in America and declare that Senator Obama is a patriot, fit for office, and denounce your hate-filled supporters when they scream out "Terrorist" or "Kill him," history will hold you responsible for all that follows. John McCain and Sarah Palin, you are playing with fire, and you know it. You are unleashing the monster of American hatred and prejudice, to the peril of all of us. You are doing this in wartime. You are doing this as our economy collapses. You are doing this in a country with a history of assassinations. Change the atmosphere of your campaign. Talk about the issues at hand. Make your case. But stop stirring up the lunatic fringe of haters, or risk suffering the judgment of history and the loathing of the American people - forever. We will hold you responsible.
John McCain: If your campaign does not stop equating Sen. Barack Obama with terrorism, questioning his patriotism and portraying Mr. Obama as "not one of us," I accuse you of deliberately feeding the most unhinged elements of our society the red meat of hate, and therefore of potentially instigating violence.
[snip]
Stop! Think! Your rallies are beginning to look, sound, feel and smell like lynch mobs.
John McCain, you're walking a perilous line. If you do not stand up for all that is good in America and declare that Senator Obama is a patriot, fit for office, and denounce your hate-filled supporters when they scream out "Terrorist" or "Kill him," history will hold you responsible for all that follows.
John McCain and Sarah Palin, you are playing with fire, and you know it. You are unleashing the monster of American hatred and prejudice, to the peril of all of us. You are doing this in wartime. You are doing this as our economy collapses. You are doing this in a country with a history of assassinations.
Change the atmosphere of your campaign. Talk about the issues at hand. Make your case. But stop stirring up the lunatic fringe of haters, or risk suffering the judgment of history and the loathing of the American people - forever.
We will hold you responsible.
Retiring GOP Congressman Ray LaHood:
LaHood supports the McCain ticket, but doesn't like what he sees at some of the McCain-Palin rallies: When Barack Obama's name has been mentioned by Sarah Palin, there are shouts of "terrorist," and LaHood says Palin should put a stop to it. "Look it. This doesn't befit the office that she's running for. And frankly, people don't like it." Congressman LaHood says it could backfire on the Republican ticket. He says the names that Obama is being called, "Certainly don't reflect the character of the man."
LaHood supports the McCain ticket, but doesn't like what he sees at some of the McCain-Palin rallies: When Barack Obama's name has been mentioned by Sarah Palin, there are shouts of "terrorist," and LaHood says Palin should put a stop to it.
"Look it. This doesn't befit the office that she's running for. And frankly, people don't like it."
Congressman LaHood says it could backfire on the Republican ticket.
He says the names that Obama is being called, "Certainly don't reflect the character of the man."
Ta-Nehishi Coates:
When the McCain campaign cast the spell of diabolical jingoism, they have no idea of the forces they are toying with. We remember Martin Luther King's murder as a sad and tragic event. Less remembered is the fact that ground-work for King's murder was seeded, not simply by rank white supremacy, but by people who slandered King as a communist. This was not some notion bandied about by conspiracy theorist, but an accusation proffered by men who were the pillars of the modern Republican Party:
When the McCain campaign cast the spell of diabolical jingoism, they have no idea of the forces they are toying with. We remember Martin Luther King's murder as a sad and tragic event. Less remembered is the fact that ground-work for King's murder was seeded, not simply by rank white supremacy, but by people who slandered King as a communist.
This was not some notion bandied about by conspiracy theorist, but an accusation proffered by men who were the pillars of the modern Republican Party:
As late as 1964, Falwell was attacking the 1964 Civil Rights Act as "civil wrongs" legislation. He questioned "the sincerity and intentions of some civil rights leaders such as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., James Farmer, and others, who are known to have left-wing associations." Falwell charged, "It is very obvious that the Communists, as they do in all parts of the world, are taking advantage of a tense situation in our land, and are exploiting every incident to bring about violence and bloodshed."
Falwell was not alone. These men didn't kill Martin Luther King, but they contributed to an atmosphere of nationalism, white supremacy and cheap unreflective patriotism that ultimately got a lot of people killed. Confronted with Aparthied South Africa, men like Helms and Falwell used the same "communist" defense. While Mandella wasted away in prison, they dismissed the whole thing as a communist plot.
Let me be clear--This is the ghost that McCain Campaign is summoning. This is the Ring Of Power that they want to wield. The Muslim charge, the "Hussein" thing is nothing more than today's red-baiting, and it is what it was then--a cover for racists.
David Frum:
Those who press this Ayers line of attack are whipping Republicans and conservatives into a fury that is going to be very hard to calm after November. Is it really wise to send conservatives into opposition in a mood of disdain and fury for a man who may well be the next president of the United States, incidentally the first African-American president? Anger is a very bad political adviser. It can isolate us and push us to the extremes at exactly the moment when we ought to be rebuilding, rethinking, regrouping and recruiting.
Joe Klein:
But seriously, folks, I'm beginning to worry about the level of craziness on the Republican side, the over-the-top, stampede-the-crowd statements by everyone from McCain on down, the vehemence of the crowds that McCain and Palin are drawing with people shouting "Kill him" and "He's a terrorist" and "Off with his head." Watch the tape of the guy screaming, "He's a terrorist!" McCain seems to shudder at that, he rolls his eyes... and I thought for a moment he'd admonish the man. But he didn't. And now he's selling the Ayres non-story full-time. Yes, yes, it's all he has. True enough: he no longer has his honor. But we are on the edge of some real serious craziness here and it would be nice if McCain did the right thing and told his more bloodthirsty supporters to go home and take a cold shower.
But seriously, folks, I'm beginning to worry about the level of craziness on the Republican side, the over-the-top, stampede-the-crowd statements by everyone from McCain on down, the vehemence of the crowds that McCain and Palin are drawing with people shouting "Kill him" and "He's a terrorist" and "Off with his head."
Watch the tape of the guy screaming, "He's a terrorist!" McCain seems to shudder at that, he rolls his eyes... and I thought for a moment he'd admonish the man. But he didn't. And now he's selling the Ayres non-story full-time. Yes, yes, it's all he has. True enough: he no longer has his honor. But we are on the edge of some real serious craziness here and it would be nice if McCain did the right thing and told his more bloodthirsty supporters to go home and take a cold shower.
Digby:
We are entering a turbulent period in our country. Validating a bogus accusation that your political rival is a terrorist in our current environment is the most irresponsible thing I've seen a campaign do in many a year. They know they are very likely going to lose this election. And McCain certainly knows that the main reason he is losing is because of the dramatic failures of fellow failed Republican George W. Bush. But even knowing that his candidacy was always very likely doomed is not stopping him from releasing this poison into the bloodstream of the body politic, a poison which will be with us for a long time to come. I guess that's what McCain means when he says that Americans should fight for a cause greater than themselves. That cause, evidently, is him.
Andrew Sullivan:
McCain and Palin have decided to stoke this rage, to foment it, to encourage paranoid notions that somehow Obama is a "secret" terrorist or Islamist or foreigner. These are base emotions in both sense of the word. But they are also very very dangerous. This is a moment of maximal physical danger for the young Democratic nominee. And McCain is playing with fire. If he really wants to put country first, he will attack Obama on his policies - not on these inflammatory, personal, creepy grounds. This is getting close to the atmosphere stoked by the Israeli far right before the assassination of Rabin. For God's sake, McCain, stop it. For once in this campaign, put your country first.
McCain and Palin have decided to stoke this rage, to foment it, to encourage paranoid notions that somehow Obama is a "secret" terrorist or Islamist or foreigner. These are base emotions in both sense of the word.
But they are also very very dangerous. This is a moment of maximal physical danger for the young Democratic nominee. And McCain is playing with fire. If he really wants to put country first, he will attack Obama on his policies - not on these inflammatory, personal, creepy grounds. This is getting close to the atmosphere stoked by the Israeli far right before the assassination of Rabin.
For God's sake, McCain, stop it. For once in this campaign, put your country first.
John Sweeney:
Sen. John McCain, Gov. Sarah Palin and the leadership of the Republican party have a fundamental moral responsibility to denounce the violent rhetoric that has pervaded recent McCain and Palin political rallies. When rally attendees shout out such attacks as "terrorist" or "kill him" about Sen. Barack Obama, when they are cheered on by crowds incited by McCain-Palin rhetoric -- it is chilling that McCain and Palin do nothing to object.
Paul Krugman:
The crisis isn’t the only scary thing going on. Something very ugly is taking shape on the political scene: as McCain’s chances fade, the crowds at his rallies are, by all accounts, increasingly gripped by insane rage. It’s not just a mob phenomenon — it’s visible in the right-wing media, and to some extent in the speeches of McCain and Palin.[snip]What happens when Obama is elected? It will be even worse than it was in the Clinton years. For sure there will be crazy accusations, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see some violence.
The crisis isn’t the only scary thing going on. Something very ugly is taking shape on the political scene: as McCain’s chances fade, the crowds at his rallies are, by all accounts, increasingly gripped by insane rage. It’s not just a mob phenomenon — it’s visible in the right-wing media, and to some extent in the speeches of McCain and Palin.
What happens when Obama is elected? It will be even worse than it was in the Clinton years. For sure there will be crazy accusations, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see some violence.
Greg Sargent:
To my knowledge neither McCain nor Palin has uttered a single syllable of protest as their crowds indulged their fear and loathing of Obama. It's hard to overstate how reckless and lacking in leadership this is -- and how dangerous this is, too. [snip]But neither McCain nor Palin has taken a single step to do anything like that. Surely that's the big story here.
To my knowledge neither McCain nor Palin has uttered a single syllable of protest as their crowds indulged their fear and loathing of Obama. It's hard to overstate how reckless and lacking in leadership this is -- and how dangerous this is, too.
But neither McCain nor Palin has taken a single step to do anything like that. Surely that's the big story here.
In 1994 this interview with Dick Cheney shows how right his assesment of the war in IRAQ was. Look at the video, was he precient on what: paste the URL in your webbrowser.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YENbElb5-xY
George W Bush was equally precient when he stood on the aircraft carrier right after Saddam Husein was deposed and said: "Mission Accomplished".
Dick Cheney and his friends at Hallburton had gotten what they were after: The Oil in Iraq.
Chilling is it not that exactly all Dick Cheney warned about in 1994 come true in 2003.The only difference was a weaker Bush in 2003 compared to his father in 1994, and the injection of Big Oil Companies interests and the climate of 9/11 paranoia.
Meet Sarah Palin's radical right-wing pals Extremists Mark Chryson and Steve Stoll helped launch Palin's political career in Alaska, and in return had influence over policy. "Her door was open," says Chryson -- and still is. By Max Blumenthal and David NeiwertEditor's note: Research support provided by the Nation Institute Investigative Fund. For Salon's complete coverage of Sarah Palin, click here.Oct. 10, 2008 | On the afternoon of Sept. 24 in downtown Palmer, Alaska, as the sun began to sink behind the snowcapped mountains that flank the picturesque Mat-Su Valley, 51-year-old Mark Chryson sat for an hour on a park bench, reveling in tales of his days as chairman of the Alaska Independence Party. The stocky, gray-haired computer technician waxed nostalgic about quixotic battles to eliminate taxes, support the "traditional family" and secede from the United States. So long as Alaska remained under the boot of the federal government, said Chryson, the AIP had to stand on guard to stymie a New World Order. He invited a Salon reporter to see a few items inside his pickup truck that were intended for his personal protection. "This here is my attack dog," he said with a chuckle, handing the reporter an exuberant 8-pound papillon from his passenger seat. "Her name is Suzy." Then he pulled a 9-millimeter Makarov PM pistol -- once the standard-issue sidearm for Soviet cops -- out of his glove compartment. "I've got enough weaponry to raise a small army in my basement," he said, clutching the gun in his palm. "Then again, so do most Alaskans." But Chryson added a message of reassurance to residents of that faraway place some Alaskans call "the 48." "We want to go our separate ways," he said, "but we are not going to kill you." Though Chryson belongs to a fringe political party, one that advocates the secession of Alaska from the Union, and that organizes with other like-minded secessionist movements from Canada to the Deep South, he is not without peculiar influence in state politics, especially the rise of Sarah Palin. An obscure figure outside of Alaska, Chryson has been a political fixture in the hometown of the Republican vice-presidential nominee for over a decade. During the 1990s, when Chryson directed the AIP, he and another radical right-winger, Steve Stoll, played a quiet but pivotal role in electing Palin as mayor of Wasilla and shaping her political agenda afterward. Both Stoll and Chryson not only contributed to Palin's campaign financially, they played major behind-the-scenes roles in the Palin camp before, during and after her victory. Palin backed Chryson as he successfully advanced a host of anti-tax, pro-gun initiatives, including one that altered the state Constitution's language to better facilitate the formation of anti-government militias. She joined in their vendetta against several local officials they disliked, and listened to their advice about hiring. She attempted to name Stoll, a John Birch Society activist known in the Mat-Su Valley as "Black Helicopter Steve," to an empty Wasilla City Council seat. "Every time I showed up her door was open," said Chryson. "And that policy continued when she became governor."
By Max Blumenthal and David Neiwert
Editor's note: Research support provided by the Nation Institute Investigative Fund. For Salon's complete coverage of Sarah Palin, click here.
Oct. 10, 2008 |
On the afternoon of Sept. 24 in downtown Palmer, Alaska, as the sun began to sink behind the snowcapped mountains that flank the picturesque Mat-Su Valley, 51-year-old Mark Chryson sat for an hour on a park bench, reveling in tales of his days as chairman of the Alaska Independence Party. The stocky, gray-haired computer technician waxed nostalgic about quixotic battles to eliminate taxes, support the "traditional family" and secede from the United States.
So long as Alaska remained under the boot of the federal government, said Chryson, the AIP had to stand on guard to stymie a New World Order. He invited a Salon reporter to see a few items inside his pickup truck that were intended for his personal protection. "This here is my attack dog," he said with a chuckle, handing the reporter an exuberant 8-pound papillon from his passenger seat. "Her name is Suzy." Then he pulled a 9-millimeter Makarov PM pistol -- once the standard-issue sidearm for Soviet cops -- out of his glove compartment. "I've got enough weaponry to raise a small army in my basement," he said, clutching the gun in his palm. "Then again, so do most Alaskans." But Chryson added a message of reassurance to residents of that faraway place some Alaskans call "the 48." "We want to go our separate ways," he said, "but we are not going to kill you."
Though Chryson belongs to a fringe political party, one that advocates the secession of Alaska from the Union, and that organizes with other like-minded secessionist movements from Canada to the Deep South, he is not without peculiar influence in state politics, especially the rise of Sarah Palin. An obscure figure outside of Alaska, Chryson has been a political fixture in the hometown of the Republican vice-presidential nominee for over a decade. During the 1990s, when Chryson directed the AIP, he and another radical right-winger, Steve Stoll, played a quiet but pivotal role in electing Palin as mayor of Wasilla and shaping her political agenda afterward. Both Stoll and Chryson not only contributed to Palin's campaign financially, they played major behind-the-scenes roles in the Palin camp before, during and after her victory.
Palin backed Chryson as he successfully advanced a host of anti-tax, pro-gun initiatives, including one that altered the state Constitution's language to better facilitate the formation of anti-government militias. She joined in their vendetta against several local officials they disliked, and listened to their advice about hiring. She attempted to name Stoll, a John Birch Society activist known in the Mat-Su Valley as "Black Helicopter Steve," to an empty Wasilla City Council seat. "Every time I showed up her door was open," said Chryson. "And that policy continued when she became governor."
WORLD VIEW
Fareed Zakaria
Palin Is Ready? Please.
McCain says that he always puts country first. In this important case, that is simply not true.
Published Sep 27, 2008
From the magazine issue dated Oct 6, 2008
Will someone please put Sarah Palin out of her agony? Is it too much to ask that she come to realize that she wants, in that wonderful phrase in American politics, "to spend more time with her family"? Having stayed in purdah for weeks, she finally agreed to a third interview. CBS's Katie Couric questioned her in her trademark sympathetic style. It didn't help. When asked how living in the state closest to Russia gave her foreign-policy experience, Palin responded thus:
"It's very important when you consider even national-security issues with Russia as Putin rears his head and comes into the airspace of the United States of America. Where--where do they go? It's Alaska. It's just right over the border. It is from Alaska that we send those out to make sure that an eye is being kept on this very powerful nation, Russia, because they are right there. They are right next to--to our state."
There is, of course, the sheer absurdity of the premise. Two weeks ago I flew to Tokyo, crossing over the North Pole. Does that make me an expert on Santa Claus? (Thanks, Jon Stewart.) But even beyond that, read the rest of her response. "It is from Alaska that we send out those ..." What does this mean? This is not an isolated example. Palin has been given a set of talking points by campaign advisers, simple ideological mantras that she repeats and repeats as long as she can. ("We mustn't blink.") But if forced off those rehearsed lines, what she has to say is often, quite frankly, gibberish.
Couric asked her a smart question about the proposed $700 billion bailout of the American financial sector. It was designed to see if Palin understood that the problem in this crisis is that credit and liquidity in the financial system has dried up, and that that's why, in the estimation of Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson and Fed chairman Ben Bernanke, the government needs to step in to buy up Wall Street's most toxic liabilities. Here's the entire exchange:
COURIC: Why isn't it better, Governor Palin, to spend $700 billion helping middle-class families who are struggling with health care, housing, gas and groceries; allow them to spend more and put more money into the economy instead of helping these big financial institutions that played a role in creating this mess?
PALIN: That's why I say I, like every American I'm speaking with, were ill about this position that we have been put in where it is the taxpayers looking to bail out. But ultimately, what the bailout does is help those who are concerned about the health-care reform that is needed to help shore up our economy, helping the--it's got to be all about job creation, too, shoring up our economy and putting it back on the right track. So health-care reform and reducing taxes and reining in spending has got to accompany tax reductions and tax relief for Americans. And trade, we've got to see trade as opportunity, not as a competitive, scary thing. But one in five jobs being created in the trade sector today, we've got to look at that as more opportunity. All those things under the umbrella of job creation. This bailout is a part of that.
This is nonsense--a vapid emptying out of every catchphrase about economics that came into her head. Some commentators, like CNN's Campbell Brown, have argued that it's sexist to keep Sarah Palin under wraps, as if she were a delicate flower who might wilt under the bright lights of the modern media. But the more Palin talks, the more we see that it may not be sexism but common sense that's causing the McCain campaign to treat her like a time bomb.
Can we now admit the obvious? Sarah Palin is utterly unqualified to be vice president. She is a feisty, charismatic politician who has done some good things in Alaska. But she has never spent a day thinking about any important national or international issue, and this is a hell of a time to start. The next administration is going to face a set of challenges unlike any in recent memory. There is an ongoing military operation in Iraq that still costs $10 billion a month, a war against the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan that is not going well and is not easily fixed. Iran, Russia and Venezuela present tough strategic challenges.
Domestically, the bailout and reform of the financial industry will take years and hundreds of billions of dollars. Health-care costs, unless curtailed, will bankrupt the federal government. Social Security, immigration, collapsing infrastructure and education are all going to get much worse if they are not handled soon.
And the American government is stretched to the limit. Between the Bush tax cuts, homeland-security needs, Iraq, Afghanistan and the bailout, the budget is looking bleak. Plus, within a few years, the retirement of the baby boomers begins with its massive and rising costs (in the trillions).
Obviously these are very serious challenges and constraints. In these times, for John McCain to have chosen this person to be his running mate is fundamentally irresponsible. McCain says that he always puts country first. In this important case, it is simply not true.
© 2008
