Who is Sarah Palin:GOP VP Candidatebv

Who is Sarah Palin?

* She was elected Alaska's governor a little over a year and a half ago. Her previous office was mayor of Wasilla, a small town outside Anchorage.1
* Palin is strongly anti-choice, opposing abortion even in the case of rape or incest.2
* She supported right-wing extremist Pat Buchanan for president in 2000. 3
* Palin thinks creationism should be taught in public schools.4
* She's doesn't think humans are the cause of climate change.5
* She's solidly in line with John McCain's "Big Oil first" energy policy. She's pushed hard for more oil drilling and says renewables won't be ready for years. She also sued the Bush administration for listing polar bears as an endangered species—she was worried it would interfere with more oil drilling in Alaska.6

Alaskans were asked about their governor. Here's a sample of responses:

She is really just a mayor from a small town outside Anchorage who has been a governor for only 1.5 years, and has ZERO national and international experience. I shudder to think that she could be the person taking that 3AM call on the White House hotline, and the one who could potentially be charged with leading the US in the volatile international scene that exists today. —Rose M., Fairbanks, AK

She is VERY, VERY conservative, and far from perfect. She's a hunter and fisherwoman, but votes against the environment again and again. She ran on ethics reform, but is currently under investigation for several charges involving hiring and firing of state officials. She has NO experience beyond Alaska. —Christine B., Denali Park, AK

As an Alaskan and a feminist, I am beyond words at this announcement. Palin is not a feminist, and she is not the reformer she claims to be. —Karen L., Anchorage, AK

Alaskans, collectively, are just as stunned as the rest of the nation. She is doing well running our State, but is totally inexperienced on the national level, and very much unequipped to run the nation, if it came to that. She is as far right as one can get, which has already been communicated on the news. In our office of thirty employees (dems, republicans, and nonpartisans), not one person feels she is ready for the V.P. position.—Sherry C., Anchorage, AK

She's vehemently anti-choice and doesn't care about protecting our natural resources, even though she has worked as a fisherman. McCain chose her to pick up the Hillary voters, but Palin is no Hillary. —Marina L., Juneau, AK

I think she's far too inexperienced to be in this position. I'm all for a woman in the White House, but not one who hasn't done anything to deserve it. There are far many other women who have worked their way up and have much more experience that would have been better choices. This is a patronizing decision on John McCain's part- and insulting to females everywhere that he would assume he'll get our vote by putting "A Woman" in that position.—Jennifer M., Anchorage, AK

Sources:

1. "Sarah Palin," Wikipedia, Accessed August 29, 2008
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Palin

2. "McCain Selects Anti-Choice Sarah Palin as Running Mate," NARAL Pro-Choice America, August 29, 2008
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17515&id=13648-6099075-Nley4dx&t=1

3. "Sarah Palin, Buchananite," The Nation, August 29, 2008
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17736&id=13648-6099075-Nley4dx&t=2

4. "'Creation science' enters the race," Anchorage Daily News, October 27, 2006
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17737&id=13648-6099075-Nley4dx&t=3

5. "Palin buys climate denial PR spin—ignores science," Huffington Post, August 29, 2008
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17517&id=13648-6099075-Nley4dx&t=4

6. "McCain VP Pick Completes Shift to Bush Energy Policy," Sierra Club, August 29, 2008
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17518&id=13648-6099075-Nley4dx&t=5

"Choice of Palin Promises Failed Energy Policies of the Past," League of Conservation Voters, August 29, 2008
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17519&id=13648-6099075-Nley4dx&t=6

"Protecting polar bears gets in way of drilling for oil, says governor," The Times of London, May 23, 2008
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17520&id=13648-6099075-Nley4dx&t=7

Battle right-wing spin on pro-labor law

As Karl Rove and his cronies have shown us, right-wingers are very good at spinning against mainstream liberal initiatives with rhetoric that gives liberals pause. Here’s a good corrective on the current Republican spin on the Employee Free Choice Act. This is the provision that Democrats support in Congress, and have actually passed, allowing a bargaining unit to be formed and certified simply with a majority of workers signing a card. Obama, of course, supports it. Right now, employers can then demand a secret ballot, and proceed with all the goonish and quasi-legal tactics some employ – firings, threats, interrogations, moles, spies and forced attendance at job-threatening diatribes -- to put massive pressure on employees and prevent unionization at any cost. A whole dirty industry of consultants, organizations of “scab” (replacement) workers, and pro-management labor groups within major law firms and has been built up to help destroy unions wherever possible.

Liberals, of course, like most Americans, believe in a secret ballot. Cleverly, the so-called “Right-to-Work” P.R. industry has developed the argument that giving legal recognition to the card check process would interfere with the right to a secret ballot. Their theory, of course, is the thoroughly elitist notion that only workers have “goons” who would force workers to sign the cards. But despite its surface appeal, the argument is completely bogus: the workers themselves still have the right to demand a secret ballot. It would only take away the employer’s right – and why on earth should it be any business of the employer whether workers want to let their signed cards speak for themselves or be able to vote in secret?

Remember that: it doesn’t take away the right to a secret ballot, only the right of employers to demand one as a delaying tactic for gearing up the anti-labor machinery that has worked very well in many cases in a time of job scarcity.

Bush gets a do over

It looks like God has decided to give Bush a do-over on Katrina.

NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) - Three years after Hurricane Katrina slammed into the Louisiana coast, New Orleans residents on Wednesday again confronted the prospect of an evacuation as Tropical Storm Gustav loomed.

Not since Katrina struck on August 29, 2005, have residents faced a forced departure from their homes and businesses as many still struggle to rebuild their lives in a city famed for its jazz clubs and Mardi Gras festival.

Storm levees broke under the onslaught of Katrina, flooding 80 percent of New Orleans and killing almost 1,500 people in the city and along the Gulf of Mexico coast. The hurricane caused $125 billion in wind and flood damage.

With Tropical Storm Gustav swirling near Cuba and likely to enter the Gulf of Mexico as a hurricane this weekend, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal said an evacuation could begin as early as Friday -- three years to the day after Katrina inundated New Orleans.

This time, they'll evacuate the City, the storm will hit somewhere else, the Bushies will ignore the place that was devastated by the storm but will crow about how well prepared they were in New Orleans, and, like everything else, McCain will get a boost in the polls.

Is McCain another George W. Bush?

By Jack Cafferty

Note: Jack Cafferty is the author of the best-seller "It's Getting Ugly Out There: The Frauds, Bunglers, Liars, and Losers Who Are Hurting America." He provides commentary on CNN's "The Situation Room" daily from 4 p.m.-7 p.m. You can also visit Jack's Cafferty File blog. Jack Cafferty says John McCain shows virtually no intellectual curiosity, emulating President Bush

NEW YORK (CNN) -- Russia invades Georgia and President Bush goes on vacation. Our president has spent one-third of his entire two terms in office either at Camp David, Maryland, or at Crawford, Texas, on vacation.

His time away from the Oval Office included the month leading up to 9/11, when there were signs Osama bin Laden was planning to attack America, and the time Hurricane Katrina destroyed the city of New Orleans.

Sen. John McCain takes weekends off and limits his campaign events to one a day. He made an exception for the religious forum on Saturday at Saddleback Church in Southern California.

I think he made a big mistake. When he was invited last spring to attend a discussion of the role of faith in his life with Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, at Messiah College in Pennsylvania, McCain didn't bother to show up. Now I know why.

It occurs to me that John McCain is as intellectually shallow as our current president. When asked what his Christian faith means to him, his answer was a one-liner. "It means I'm saved and forgiven." Great scholars have wrestled with the meaning of faith for centuries. McCain then retold a story we've all heard a hundred times about a guard in Vietnam drawing a cross in the sand.

Asked about his greatest moral failure, he cited his first marriage, which ended in divorce. While saying it was his greatest moral failing, he offered nothing in the way of explanation. Why not?

Throughout the evening, McCain chose to recite portions of his stump speech as answers to the questions he was being asked. Why? He has lived 71 years. Surely he has some thoughts on what it all means that go beyond canned answers culled from the same speech he delivers every day.

He was asked "if evil exists." His response was to repeat for the umpteenth time that Osama bin Laden is a bad man and he will pursue him to "the gates of hell." That was it.

He was asked to define rich. After trying to dodge the question -- his wife is worth a reported $100 million -- he finally said he thought an income of $5 million was rich.

One after another, McCain's answers were shallow, simplistic, and trite. He showed the same intellectual curiosity that George Bush has -- virtually none.

Where are John McCain's writings exploring the vexing moral issues of our time? Where are his position papers setting forth his careful consideration of foreign policy, the welfare state, education, America's moral responsibility in the world, etc., etc., etc.?

John McCain graduated 894th in a class of 899 at the Naval Academy at Annapolis. His father and grandfather were four star admirals in the Navy. Some have suggested that might have played a role in McCain being admitted. His academic record was awful. And it shows over and over again whenever McCain is called upon to think on his feet.

He no longer allows reporters unfettered access to him aboard the "Straight Talk Express" for a reason. He simply makes too many mistakes. Unless he's reciting talking points or reading from notes or a TelePrompTer, John McCain is lost. He can drop bon mots at a bowling alley or diner -- short glib responses that get a chuckle, but beyond that McCain gets in over his head very quickly.

I am sick and tired of the president of the United States embarrassing me. The world we live in is too complex to entrust it to someone else whose idea of intellectual curiosity and grasp of foreign policy issues is to tell us he can look into Vladimir Putin's eyes and see into his soul.

George Bush's record as a student, military man, businessman and leader of the free world is one of constant failure. And the part that troubles me most is he seems content with himself.

He will leave office with the country $10 trillion in debt, fighting two wars, our international reputation in shambles, our government cloaked in secrecy and suspicion that his entire presidency has been a litany of broken laws and promises, our citizens' faith in our own country ripped to shreds. Yet Bush goes bumbling along, grinning and spewing moronic one-liners, as though nobody understands what a colossal failure he has been.

I fear to the depth of my being that John McCain is just like him.

Obama Suggests $2 Billion In New Funding for NASA

By Marc Kaufman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, August 19, 2008; Page A04

Sen. Barack Obama has detailed a comprehensive space plan that includes $2 billion in new funding to reinvigorate NASA and a promise to make space exploration and science a significantly higher priority if he is elected president.

Campaigning in Florida yesterday, Sen. John McCain responded by telling business leaders that Obama has changed his position on some key questions of NASA funding in recent months and should not be trusted to support the program.

While Obama's ambitious plan embraces President Bush's 2004 "vision" to send astronauts to the moon by 2020 and later to Mars -- a plan McCain co-sponsored in the Senate -- the Democratic presidential candidate said the administration's "poor planning and inadequate funding" have undermined the effort and jeopardized U.S. leadership in space.

Comment:
I find this interesting because yesterday I saw a McSame ad claiming that Obama was going to cut funding for the space program.

McCain Doctrine

There was a lengthly article recently in the New York Times titled, "Response to 9/11 Offers Outline of McCain Doctrine."

Now, as Mr. McCain prepares to accept the Republican presidential nomination, his response to the attacks of Sept. 11 opens a window onto how he might approach the gravest responsibilities of a potential commander in chief.

What follows is 2,800+ words about John McCain advocating taking out Saddam Hussein on September 12, 2001, praising the performance of Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney, his support for Ahmed Chalabi and the Iraqi National Congress, tying Iraq to 9/11 and the anthrax attacks, praise for Bill Kristol and David Brook's vision, and of course, WMD, WMD, WMD. In other words, the McCain Doctrine is to be rash, a poor judge of character, hyperbolic, and of course, wrong, wrong, wrong.

The article finishes with McCain saying:

I believe voters elect their leaders based on their experience and judgment — their ability to make hard calls, for instance, on matters of war and peace. It's important to get them right

SO MUCH FOR THE LEFT-WING PRESS PUMPING UP OBAMA.

From Political Animal
August 23, 2008

FOURNIER IS AT IT AGAIN.... The latest piece from Ron Fournier, the AP's Washington bureau chief and the man responsible for directing the wire service's coverage of the presidential campaign, on Joe Biden joining the Democratic ticket, is drawing a fair amount of attention this morning. More importantly, McCain campaign staffers are pushing it fairly aggressively to other reporters, in large part because it mirrors the Republican line with minimal variation. By choosing Biden, Fournier argues, Barack Obama is showing a "lack of confidence," and is siding with "the status quo."

There are two ways to consider Fournier's piece: substantively and in the broader context. First, on the substance, Fournier's analysis seems a little lazy. By his logic, any potential running mate shows a "lack of confidence" -- picking Hillary would mean Obama lacked confidence in his ability to win over women voters; picking Bayh would mean Obama lacked confidence in his ability to win over independents and conservative Dems; picking Webb would mean Obama lacked confidence in his ability to win over voters concerned about national security; picking Kaine would mean Obama lacked confidence in his ability to win over voters in the South; etc. For that matter, "the status quo" in Washington has been conservative Republican rule. Biden may be an old pro and a DC insider, but he's anything but "the status quo."
Second, in context, Fournier's objectivity covering the presidential race continues to look shaky. We are, after all, talking about a journalist who, as recently as last year, considered working for the McCain campaign.

Before Ron Fournier returned to The Associated Press in March 2007, the veteran political reporter had another professional suitor: John McCain's presidential campaign. In October 2006, the McCain team approached Fournier about joining the fledgling operation, according to a source with knowledge of the talks. In the months that followed, said a source, Fournier spoke about the job possibility with members of McCain's inner circle, including political aides Mark Salter, John Weaver and Rick Davis.

We learned not too long ago that Fournier exchanged emails with Karl Rove about Pat Tillman, in which Fournier wrote, "The Lord creates men and women like this all over the world. But only the great and free countries allow them to flourish. Keep up the fight." Fournier was also one of the journalists who, at a gathering of the nation's newspaper editors, extended McCain a box of his favorite donuts ("Oh, yes, with sprinkles!" McCain said). It's led to a series of AP reports that can, at best, be described as "questionable."

In March, for example, Fournier wrote an item -- whether it was a news article or an opinion piece was unclear -- that said Barack Obama is "bordering on arrogance," "a bit too cocky," and that the senator and his wife "ooze a sense of entitlement." To substantiate the criticism, Fournier pointed to ... not a whole lot. It was basically the Republicans' "uppity" talking point in the form of an AP article.

But much of the AP's coverage has deteriorated since. There was a slam-job on Obama that read like an RNC oppo dump, followed by a scathing, 900-word reprimand of Obama's decision to bypass the public financing system in the general election, filled with errors of fact and judgment.

When Obama unveiled his faith-based plan, the AP got the story backwards. When Obama talked about his Iraq policy on July 3, the AP said he'd "opened the door" to reversing course, even though he hadn't.

The AP's David Espo wrote a hagiographic, 1,200-word piece, praising McCain's "singular brand of combative bipartisanship," which was utterly ridiculous.

The AP pushed the objectivity envelope a little further with a mind-numbing, 1,100-word piece on Obama "being shadowed by giant flip-flops."

The AP flubbed the story on McCain joking about killing Iranians, and then flubbed the story about McCain's promise to eliminate the deficit. It's part of a very discouraging trend for the AP that's been ongoing throughout the campaign.

And then, within hours of Obama announcing his running mate, there's Fournier again, writing up another piece -- whether it's a news article or an opinion piece is, again, unclear -- that the McCain campaign just loves.

Sandy Johnson, the former DC bureau chief of the AP, was asked about Fournier and the bureau when she was forced out as part of a staff shake-up. "I just hope he doesn't destroy it," she said.

Was McCain tortured in Vietnam? Bush says "no"

by kos Andrew Sullivan
Wed Aug 20, 2008 at 10:07:18 AM PDT


In all the discussion of John McCain's recently recovered memory of a religious epiphany in Vietnam, one thing has been missing. The torture that was deployed against McCain emerges in all the various accounts. It involved sleep deprivation, the withholding of medical treatment, stress positions, long-time standing, and beating. Sound familiar?

According to the Bush administration's definition of torture, McCain was therefore not tortured.

Cheney denies that McCain was tortured; as does Bush. So do John Yoo and David Addington and George Tenet. In the one indisputably authentic version of the story of a Vietnamese guard showing compassion, McCain talks of the agony of long-time standing. A quarter century later, Don Rumsfeld was putting his signature to memos lengthening the agony of "long-time standing" that victims of Bush's torture regime would have to endure. These torture techniques are, according to the president of the United States, merely "enhanced interrogation."

No war crimes were committed against McCain. And the techniques used are, according to the president, tools to extract accurate information. And so the false confessions that McCain was forced to make were, according to the logic of the Bush administration, as accurate as the "intelligence" we have procured from "interrogating" terror suspects. Feel safer?

Next New Deal?

Invest in America's Future: Our Plan for Security, Opportunity and Prosperity

A faltering economy and sudden spike in basic cost of living expenses, skyrocketing health care costs, tens of millions of Americans uninsured, inequality in the education system with soaring fees for college education, a costly and misguided war, increased economic pressure due to global competition, an unhealthy environment, and energy dependence -- these are the most urgent and pressing problems of our time. Invest in America's Future effectively tackles these issues, turning critical dilemmas into positive rewards for America. Our current economic system relies on "bubble" markets that eventually "burst," causing recession and fueling further insecurity. The IAF plan will provide durable, lasting economic gains for families, businesses and the nation as a whole by making health care and education more affordable, creating a new clean energy economy, and ultimately strengthening our work force.

Invest in America's Future [IAF plan] focuses on the changes American families and businesses need:

Guaranteeing quality, affordable health care for everyone,
Granting all children access to high quality education from early childhood through college,
Developing a clean energy economy and independence from oil.
The public investments proposed in the IAF plan will pay off. Federal support for health care will ease the financial burden on employers, providing greater capacity for businesses to generate new jobs and provide better benefits for existing workers. Investing in preventive health care will result in a healthier, more productive workforce, expanding America's human capital. Public investments in education will enable all of America's young people to become formidable global competitors. Greater outlays in education will also cut crime rates, reduce the public burden of an exhausted prison system, and generate new revenue from higher salaries, resulting in lasting economic benefits. Investments in clean, renewable energy sources will not only effectively address the climate change crisis, but they will also give American businesses the chance to once again lead the world in fresh and innovative technologies and spawn millions of new jobs. Investing in clean energy will also increase our exports, stabilize growth and energy costs, and reduce our dependency on oil and natural resources.

Rather than spending billions of dollars on a war overseas or on tax cuts for millionaires and big corporations, this plan invests in our own families and in our own children. The plan addresses the budget deficit -- which makes public investments seem unfeasible -- by rooting out waste from private contracting, eliminating unfair tax cuts for millionaires, closing corporate tax loopholes and saving billions of dollars by ending the war in Iraq. These policy changes address our budget crisis and revitalize our economy in the short term while the public investments create a robust and sustainable economy that ensures a healthy, competitive, and clean America for decades to come.

Invest in Quality, Affordable Health Care for All

Invest in America's Future will revamp the ailing health care system to make it work for everyone. All of us benefit from healthy communities, where we all have access to affordable, quality health care from a provider of our choice, at the time we need it, at a cost we can afford. Our mutual goal is affordable, quality health care for everyone.

To achieve that goal, a uniquely American solution to secure our families' health and a healthy economy is what we need. All of us - individuals, employers and government - have a shared responsibility to realize comprehensive reforms in our health care system. Individuals must use health care services responsibly, pay a reasonable share of expenses and focus on prevention, wellness, and disease management as best they can. Employers must provide a fair percentage of health care costs for employee coverage. Our government's responsibility is to guarantee quality, affordable health care for everyone in America and it must play a central role in regulating, financing, and providing health coverage. We can no longer wait for insurance companies and HMOs to provide us with the quality, affordable health care that Americans need and deserve.

In the IAF plan, people can keep the insurance they have and everyone will have the choice between private insurance and public insurance, with standard, comprehensive benefits that meet our needs, paid for on a sliding scale based on income.

Public investment in health care would ease the coverage burden that plagues the private sector. In addition, big corporations as well as small businesses would become stronger competitors in global and local markets. The high cost of health care in America is a major reason why we have trouble competing with other countries (e.g. the American automobile industry spends more on health care than steel ). An effective and efficient health care system will pay for itself over time through reduced administrative costs and healthier people who require less expensive care. The expansion of a healthy workforce would greatly benefit our economy due to higher production and increased revenue.

Invest in Education: Early Childhood through College

Invest in America's Future makes education a key long-term investment to guarantee lasting, sustainable economic growth. America needs to support early childhood education programs, improve the quality of public schools and make college education accessible, so that all kids have a real opportunity to achieve the American dream. Success in the competitive global economy of the 21st Century requires the creativity and talent of every young person in America.

Our communities need a public education system that provides all children the opportunity to succeed, including in early childhood and after school education. Public schools must graduate more high school students with the education and skills necessary to prepare them for college and the job market. No student should be priced out of the college or advanced technical training they need to prosper in our society, as a college diploma has become necessary, in many instances, to obtain even an entry-level position. In the 19th century, primary school education became a birthright for every American. In the 20th century, secondary school education became a birthright for every American. Now in the 21st century, higher education must become a birthright for every American.

Federal support for education must not be viewed as a drain on our budget, but instead as an investment that gives back. Educators and economists agree that investing in education provides a positive economic rate of return not just for the individual, but for the entire nation as well. Initial public investments in education to modernize schools and hire more teachers will create new jobs. Providing a quality education to all will lead to an educated workforce, a higher per capita income and greater tax revenue. Ensuring access to good child care and afterschool programs will give working parents the support they need.

Invest in Clean Energy: A New Economy for a New World

Invest in America's Future will take advantage of the incredible and unique opportunity before us today. By investing in a clean energy economy, we can produce innovative new technologies, create millions of new jobs and generate billions in public revenue while at the same time becoming energy independent and effectively tackling the climate change crisis. Today, the U.S. gets less than two percent of its energy from clean, renewable sources, like wind, solar, geothermal, and co-generative biomass. A commitment to clean energy and reducing our oil dependence requires a significant expansion of the use of renewable sources of energy, increased gas mileage in our cars and trucks, and broad public investments in energy-efficient retrofits, green buildings, and advanced technologies to create good jobs and support sustainable economic growth. The government must also regulate harmful emissions to curb greenhouse gas pollution and generate new revenue streams.

Solar, wind, biomass, and other clean energy technologies have the potential to be robust industries in the 21st century, with the ability to drive our economy the way steel, automobile, manufacturing and IT industries did in the 20th century. The IAF plan of public investments, tax incentives, and government regulations will propel American corporations into the forefront of these new industries while at the same time dramatically reducing our harmful environmental footprint.

Economic Policy: Fairness, Accountability, and Fiscal Responsibility

Invest in America's Future will shift the paradigm of our fiscal policy from one that is founded on unstable bubble markets to a strategy for building a durable and sound economy. Substantial investments are required to bring about the lasting economic benefits that the IAF plan guarantees. Instead of calling for additional government spending which could increase the $9.4 trillion national debt, the plan promotes fairness and reform that will help pay for initial spending, balance the budget in the short term, provide long-term economic security, and make our government and corporations more accountable.

A strong majority of Americans support an agenda that, along with plans to roll back tax breaks for corporate interests, bring down the deficit and make government more accountable, would ensure:

High-quality, affordable, comprehensive education for all from early childhood through college; Guaranteed quality, affordable health care for all; and
A clean energy economy and reduced dependence on oil.
The time is now to make a bold move for a future of opportunity and prosperity

Son of Swiftboat 2

Attorney Bob Bauman's view:

I have no way of knowing the merits of the Berg lawsuit v. Obama, but the U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly ruled that American citizens retain their citizenship when there is no clear intent to end that status.

The Court has also supported American citizens' right to hold dual citizenship. Those rulings would seem to protect Senator Obama's American status, although he might qualify as a "dual national." Dual nationality simply means that you are legally a citizen of two countries at the same time, qualified as such under each nation's law.

You could automatically receive this status if you're born in a foreign country and one of your parents is a U.S. citizen. In that case, you would become both a U.S. citizen and a citizen of the country where you're born.

Or you could become a dual national from an operation of law. For example, as a U.S. citizen, you could marry a foreigner and become a citizen of your spouse's nation. Or if you were a foreigner who was naturalized as a U.S. citizen, you can still retain your citizenship from the country of your birth.

The point is acquiring and using a foreign passport does not endanger your U.S. citizenship in any way. In fact, it's pretty common to retain two passports depending on your circumstances.

Some countries won't permit their citizens to hold a passport from another nation. This was the case in the U.S. until 1967, when the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the right of U.S. citizens to hold a second, foreign passport. Before that time, the official rule was that a person acquiring second nationality automatically lost U.S. citizenship.

Since 1967, the government generally presumes a U.S. citizen does not intend to surrender citizenship. You have to produce proof of that intention before the U.S. government will officially let you give up your U.S. citizenship (i.e. "expatriate"). The burden of proof then falls to the government to prove U.S. citizenship. This presumption is set forth in a U.S. Department of State publication, Advice About Possible Loss of U.S. Citizenship and Dual Nationality, (1990).

As a matter of policy, the U.S. Government recognizes dual nationality, but does not necessarily encourage it.

Son of Swiftboat?

Now comes one Philip J. Berg. He is a former member of Pennsylvania's Democratic State Committee and former deputy attorney general of Pennsylvania. Berg also happens to be a highly disgruntled Hillary Clinton fan, who was backing her for president.

Berg filed a lawsuit last week in U.S District Court. He is asking the court to declare Obama ineligible for the presidency because he is not a natural born American citizen. He has asked the court to prevent him from running for the position.

The Berg lawsuit claims that Obama's eligibility is doubtful on several grounds, including some Obama family members' allegations that he was born in Kenya. Berg is also questioning Obama's parents' citizenship status which he claims prevented them from automatically granting Obama U.S. citizenship. He also questions the authenticity of Obama's Hawaii birth certificate.

Berg has also alleges Obama was a citizen of Indonesia as a child and Obama retained that foreign citizenship into adulthood without recording an oath of allegiance to the United States. That's a requirement to retain your American citizenship. The legal tangle that can befall an innocent infant born to American parents in foreign lands can be extensive.

Yes, sometimes the odd circumstances of a foreign birth can call into question a hapless child's American citizenship. Let the federal court decide whether Barack Obama fits into this category or not.

Still Rethuglicans so Play Hardball

They "continue to level dishonest attacks"? Well, maybe that's because it continues to work, while the only thing you disgracefully spineless wimps seem able to do in response is calmly observe that they're doing it. Americans are sick of Karl Rove's scum? Really? They sure seem to keep guzzling it down. McCain's trying to "mislead the American people"? Oh, no! Say it ain't so!

Four years ago Americans were desperate to be rid of George W. Bush. Not only could the Democratic convention have safely eviscerated him, the country was waiting for it to happen. Instead, the party offered barely a peep of criticism and wasted four days lionizing John Kerry's Vietnam service, then sat there helplessly gaping as Rove and his ghouls turned that service into a liability, allowing the race to be close enough for them to steal another election and give the worst American to ever hold power four more years to continue his devastation of the country.

And now, those four years later, nearly 80% (1-20% approval rating) of Americans DESPISE this hijacker of the presidency like they've never personally hated a politician. The nation's contempt is the only thing Bush has ever honestly earned. He is loathed for his incompetence, his ignorance, and his arrogance, and John McCain is wearing a neon sign saying "MORE OF THE SAME." If that doesn't make the Democrats - not just Barack Obama, but dozens if not hundreds of his surrogates - feel safe enough to go on a rampage against those who are destroying the future of the country as we've known it, then please, let's stop pretending the party stands for anything. If the Democratic convention continues like day one without a Republican bloodbath, then it's way past time for the party to go the way of the Whigs.

This isn't a game. It's life or death for America as we know it, and if that isn't worth fighting for as viciously as necessary, then the wrong people are on the front lines. If Obama can't work up some genuine outrage about what's happened to this country over the past eight years and demonstrate a willingness -- no, an eagerness -- to do whatever it takes to stop this grotesquerie from continuing for another four, then maybe the superdelegates should take it away from him and give it to Hillary. Say what you will about the Clintons, they're killers, and nothing less is needed now.

Barack once said, "If they bring knives, we'll bring guns." Well, buddy, unholster those guns already and start firing. Otherwise, stop wasting our time, stop taking our money and stop raising our false hopes.

Polling: Disaggregation Tells the Story

Here a website based on each state polling that tells you based on state polls who's ahead for President. Go to
http://www.pollster.com/

Fannie and Freddie Need to be on Dems Agenda

From the DC underground regarding the coming Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac bailout.

Will the Dems raise hell over the fact that
1. this bailout is due over the subprime mess which happened during a Republican Administration which doesn't want the government to regulate anything.

2. that the subprime mess was created by McSame's economic advisor, Former Sen Phil Gramm, who wrote the bill repealing the Glass Steagel Act allowing the architects, investment banks, to get into the mortgage business back in 2002.

3. Alan Greenspan and other believers of " Greed is good" philosophy encouraged CEOs at Bear Stearns, CitiBank, and now Fannie Mae/ Freddie Mack to take unbelievable risks on loans they never should have been making. Regulating this industry was, of course, not the purvue of the Fed.
Of course, all of these CEOs will walk away with golden parachute severance packages to ensure that they, their kids, their grandchildren never have work a day of their lives. Why isn't the invisible HAND working? Where's justice?

If it happened with a democratic admin, you can betcha that Karl Rove etal would be working overtime to get out the message that this was all due to misguided liberal efforts to help poor people and that is now costing taxpayers hundreds of billions of dollars and our current economic problems. And will raise your taxes. Those liberal DO GOODERS!

Politics of Fear

Hullabaloo

Sunday, August 24, 2008

There will be no honeymoon
by Dover Bitch

On the eve of the Democratic Convention, I think it might be a good idea to remind ourselves what happened after the last one and prepare ourselves for how quickly the Republicans will try to change the subject.

On Thursday, July 29, 2004, John Kerry had a modest lead in the polls and Democrats were energized as the convention came to a close. Delegates, activists and party leaders returned home, ready to re-engage with their communities. But before Monday rolled around and anybody had a chance to gather at the water cooler, Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge emerged with an important announcement:


Secretary Ridge: Good afternoon, ladies and gentleman. President Bush has told you, and I have reiterated the promise, that when we have specific credible information, that we will share it. Now this afternoon, we do have new and unusually specific information about where al-Qaeda would like to attack. And as a result, today, the United States Government is raising the threat level to Code Orange for the financial services sector in New York City, Northern New Jersey and Washington, DC.

Since September 11th, 2001, leaders of our commercial financial institutions have demonstrated exceptional leadership in improving its security. However, in light of new intelligence information, we have made the decision to raise the threat level for this sector, in these communities, to bring protective resources to an even higher level.

Code Orange!

It was still 2004, so millions of Americans who know now that the Bush Administration will tell them absolutely anything were still willing to accept that there was a legitimate threat and action needed to be taken immediately. It wasn't just Republicans, after all. When crazy Howard Dean suggested there may be politics involved (YEARGHH!), George Bush's favorite Democrat took to the airwaves with outrage:

SEN. JOE LIEBERMAN (D), CONNECTICUT: I don't think anybody who has any fairness or is in their right mind would think that the president or the secretary of Homeland Security would raise an alert level and scare people for political reasons.

Perish the thought. This was "specific credible information" and Sec. Ridge had no choice but to come right out that particular Sunday and deliver the grim news. After all, the information they had was, uh, three years old.

Ridge hadn't exactly divulged that the information was in their possession for a long time and was more along the lines of surveillance notes rather than attack plans. But any reporter -- or citizen -- with the ability to think rationally when the government screamed "TERROR!" might have noticed that this is a strange thing to see when you bring your camera to a building that's about to be attacked by al-Qaeda:

Naturally, when there is "specific credible information" that a building is about to be attacked, the Presidential Playbook instructs him to send his wife and children to the target for a photo op with the mayor and governor. Bush's decision was textbook.

It is as clear in retrospect as it should have been to any observer back then: The Bush/Cheney/Rove operation would play on America's fears to win the election. Keith Olbermann has documented this strategy well with his Nexus Of Politics And Terror.

It's also important to note that there is a steep cost to us all when this happens. Not just the psychological damage that comes with an electorate whose judgment is clouded by fear and not just the damage done to our nation when a population ceases to trust a government that cries wolf. According to the American Public Transportation Association, "[e]very day on Orange Alert costs transit systems at least $900,000 a day."

In 2003, New York Governor George Pataki explained that Code Orange isn't free:

GOV. GEORGE PATAKI (R), NEW YORK: Well, there's no question that being at this heightened level of alert has cost New York State hundreds of millions of dollars.

MESERVE: Neighboring New Jersey says maintaining threat level orange costs $125,000 a day. And the city of Baltimore estimates its costs at $300,000 a week.


The U.S. Conference of Mayors in 2003 (PDF) wrote:


[W]we estimate that cities nationwide are spending nearly $70 million per week in additional homeland security costs due to the war and heightened threat alert level. If the war and/or threat alert level continue for six months, cities would incur nearly $2 billion in additional costs.

We stress that these costs come ON TOP OF existing homeland security spending already underway or planned since 9/11. In addition, this survey only asked cities about DIRECT costs, new money that had to be allocated for homeland security because of the war or threat alert. These figures do NOT account for the huge INDIRECT costs cities are experiencing.


In the case of this "limited" Orange Alert in New York, many of those indirect costs were paid by ordinary citizens:


''Anything that slows down the city in general has economic impact, and anything that affects the financial institutions that are still our most important industry also has an impact,'' said Ronnie Lowenstein, an economist who is director of the city's Independent Budget Office. ''It is hard to imagine that these kinds of warnings don't have any impact.''

Rob Kotch, who runs Breakaway Courier Systems, a business that like much of New York's economy depends on speed and mobility, put it another way.

''The cost of all this security is friction to the economy,'' Mr. Kotch said. ''You consider the cost of a driver is $45 an hour. Do the math. If you put a dollar amount on waiting time sitting in traffic for security checks, it can be huge.''


Millions of dollars for the First Lady and Twins to "reassure" the people working in one building. Millions of dollars to make everybody in America afraid. Mostly taxpayer dollars. That Aug. 1 Orange Alert remained in effect for 102 days, through the RNC in New York City and until after the election.

And the cost was actually much steeper. It wasn't simply a financial loss America took to change the subject away from John Kerry's convention:


But what's more disturbing, perhaps even more than the new details of al-Qaida's twisted plotting, is the Bush administration's outing of an undercover al-Qaida agent in its rush to justify raising the terror alert. This move, whether politically motivated or rooted in incompetence has terrorism and security experts shocked and dismayed for the harm inflicted on intelligence operations against al-Qaida. CNN reports today that the administration "may have shut down an important source of information that has already led to a series of al-Qaida arrests" when officials revealed Muhammad Naeem Noor Khan's identity to journalists last week (Khan is the computer expert who "flipped" last month and was operating as a double-agent for the Pakistani government). Do we have so many plugged-in al-Qaida double agents that we can afford to lose one and with him all of his connections and leads? Of course not.

Juan Cole looks at the consequences: British intelligence agents scrambled last week to arrest 13 members of a London al-Qaida cell before they fled after learning  from the Bush administration!  that Khan had been arrested. "The British do not, however, appear to have finished gathering enough evidence to prosecute the 13 in the courts successfully," Cole writes. And even worse: 5 got away. "If this is true," Cole says. "It is likely that the 5 went underground on hearing that Khan was in custody. That is, the loose lips of the Bush administration enabled them to flee arrest. Of the 13 taken into custody on Aug. 3, two were released for lack of evidence and two others were 'no longer being questioned on suspicion of terrorism offences.'"


It may be another election, but George Bush is still president, Dick Cheney is still VP. Karl Rove's team is advising John McCain. Joe Lieberman and Tom Ridge are on television every day as McCain surrogates and potential VP picks. The polls are close and all the talking heads believe (as does McCain, evidenced by his reaction to events in Georgia) that anything involving threats to America will help the GOP.

I'm glad Barack Obama already had a week to have fun in Hawaii. There will be no honeymoon after this convention.

UPDATE: By popular demand, here is a 2005 USA Today story about the source of Ridge's announcements:


WASHINGTON — The Bush administration periodically put the USA on high alert for terrorist attacks even though then-Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge argued there was only flimsy evidence to justify raising the threat level, Ridge now says.

Ridge, who resigned Feb. 1, said Tuesday that he often disagreed with administration officials who wanted to elevate the threat level to orange, or "high" risk of terrorist attack, but was overruled.

His comments at a Washington forum describe spirited debates over terrorist intelligence and provide rare insight into the inner workings of the nation's homeland security apparatus.

Ridge said he wanted to "debunk the myth" that his agency was responsible for repeatedly raising the alert under a color-coded system he unveiled in 2002.

"More often than not we were the least inclined to raise it," Ridge told reporters. "Sometimes we disagreed with the intelligence assessment. Sometimes we thought even if the intelligence was good, you don't necessarily put the country on (alert). ... There were times when some people were really aggressive about raising it, and we said, 'For that?' "


For the record, I'm not predicting that there will be a terror alert next week. I'm merely pointing out that this crew will go to serious lengths to change the subject and we might as well prevent the element of surprise from being a factor (and bust out the popcorn).


Dover Bitch 8/24/2008 01:24:00 PM Comments (33) | Trackback (0

Politics of Fear

Hullabaloo

Sunday, August 24, 2008

There will be no honeymoon
by Dover Bitch

On the eve of the Democratic Convention, I think it might be a good idea to remind ourselves what happened after the last one and prepare ourselves for how quickly the Republicans will try to change the subject.

On Thursday, July 29, 2004, John Kerry had a modest lead in the polls and Democrats were energized as the convention came to a close. Delegates, activists and party leaders returned home, ready to re-engage with their communities. But before Monday rolled around and anybody had a chance to gather at the water cooler, Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge emerged with an important announcement:


Secretary Ridge: Good afternoon, ladies and gentleman. President Bush has told you, and I have reiterated the promise, that when we have specific credible information, that we will share it. Now this afternoon, we do have new and unusually specific information about where al-Qaeda would like to attack. And as a result, today, the United States Government is raising the threat level to Code Orange for the financial services sector in New York City, Northern New Jersey and Washington, DC.

Since September 11th, 2001, leaders of our commercial financial institutions have demonstrated exceptional leadership in improving its security. However, in light of new intelligence information, we have made the decision to raise the threat level for this sector, in these communities, to bring protective resources to an even higher level.

Code Orange!

It was still 2004, so millions of Americans who know now that the Bush Administration will tell them absolutely anything were still willing to accept that there was a legitimate threat and action needed to be taken immediately. It wasn't just Republicans, after all. When crazy Howard Dean suggested there may be politics involved (YEARGHH!), George Bush's favorite Democrat took to the airwaves with outrage:

SEN. JOE LIEBERMAN (D), CONNECTICUT: I don't think anybody who has any fairness or is in their right mind would think that the president or the secretary of Homeland Security would raise an alert level and scare people for political reasons.

Perish the thought. This was "specific credible information" and Sec. Ridge had no choice but to come right out that particular Sunday and deliver the grim news. After all, the information they had was, uh, three years old.

Ridge hadn't exactly divulged that the information was in their possession for a long time and was more along the lines of surveillance notes rather than attack plans. But any reporter -- or citizen -- with the ability to think rationally when the government screamed "TERROR!" might have noticed that this is a strange thing to see when you bring your camera to a building that's about to be attacked by al-Qaeda:

Naturally, when there is "specific credible information" that a building is about to be attacked, the Presidential Playbook instructs him to send his wife and children to the target for a photo op with the mayor and governor. Bush's decision was textbook.

It is as clear in retrospect as it should have been to any observer back then: The Bush/Cheney/Rove operation would play on America's fears to win the election. Keith Olbermann has documented this strategy well with his Nexus Of Politics And Terror.

It's also important to note that there is a steep cost to us all when this happens. Not just the psychological damage that comes with an electorate whose judgment is clouded by fear and not just the damage done to our nation when a population ceases to trust a government that cries wolf. According to the American Public Transportation Association, "[e]very day on Orange Alert costs transit systems at least $900,000 a day."

In 2003, New York Governor George Pataki explained that Code Orange isn't free:

GOV. GEORGE PATAKI (R), NEW YORK: Well, there's no question that being at this heightened level of alert has cost New York State hundreds of millions of dollars.

MESERVE: Neighboring New Jersey says maintaining threat level orange costs $125,000 a day. And the city of Baltimore estimates its costs at $300,000 a week.


The U.S. Conference of Mayors in 2003 (PDF) wrote:


[W]we estimate that cities nationwide are spending nearly $70 million per week in additional homeland security costs due to the war and heightened threat alert level. If the war and/or threat alert level continue for six months, cities would incur nearly $2 billion in additional costs.

We stress that these costs come ON TOP OF existing homeland security spending already underway or planned since 9/11. In addition, this survey only asked cities about DIRECT costs, new money that had to be allocated for homeland security because of the war or threat alert. These figures do NOT account for the huge INDIRECT costs cities are experiencing.


In the case of this "limited" Orange Alert in New York, many of those indirect costs were paid by ordinary citizens:


''Anything that slows down the city in general has economic impact, and anything that affects the financial institutions that are still our most important industry also has an impact,'' said Ronnie Lowenstein, an economist who is director of the city's Independent Budget Office. ''It is hard to imagine that these kinds of warnings don't have any impact.''

Rob Kotch, who runs Breakaway Courier Systems, a business that like much of New York's economy depends on speed and mobility, put it another way.

''The cost of all this security is friction to the economy,'' Mr. Kotch said. ''You consider the cost of a driver is $45 an hour. Do the math. If you put a dollar amount on waiting time sitting in traffic for security checks, it can be huge.''


Millions of dollars for the First Lady and Twins to "reassure" the people working in one building. Millions of dollars to make everybody in America afraid. Mostly taxpayer dollars. That Aug. 1 Orange Alert remained in effect for 102 days, through the RNC in New York City and until after the election.

And the cost was actually much steeper. It wasn't simply a financial loss America took to change the subject away from John Kerry's convention:


But what's more disturbing, perhaps even more than the new details of al-Qaida's twisted plotting, is the Bush administration's outing of an undercover al-Qaida agent in its rush to justify raising the terror alert. This move, whether politically motivated or rooted in incompetence has terrorism and security experts shocked and dismayed for the harm inflicted on intelligence operations against al-Qaida. CNN reports today that the administration "may have shut down an important source of information that has already led to a series of al-Qaida arrests" when officials revealed Muhammad Naeem Noor Khan's identity to journalists last week (Khan is the computer expert who "flipped" last month and was operating as a double-agent for the Pakistani government). Do we have so many plugged-in al-Qaida double agents that we can afford to lose one and with him all of his connections and leads? Of course not.

Juan Cole looks at the consequences: British intelligence agents scrambled last week to arrest 13 members of a London al-Qaida cell before they fled after learning  from the Bush administration!  that Khan had been arrested. "The British do not, however, appear to have finished gathering enough evidence to prosecute the 13 in the courts successfully," Cole writes. And even worse: 5 got away. "If this is true," Cole says. "It is likely that the 5 went underground on hearing that Khan was in custody. That is, the loose lips of the Bush administration enabled them to flee arrest. Of the 13 taken into custody on Aug. 3, two were released for lack of evidence and two others were 'no longer being questioned on suspicion of terrorism offences.'"


It may be another election, but George Bush is still president, Dick Cheney is still VP. Karl Rove's team is advising John McCain. Joe Lieberman and Tom Ridge are on television every day as McCain surrogates and potential VP picks. The polls are close and all the talking heads believe (as does McCain, evidenced by his reaction to events in Georgia) that anything involving threats to America will help the GOP.

I'm glad Barack Obama already had a week to have fun in Hawaii. There will be no honeymoon after this convention.

UPDATE: By popular demand, here is a 2005 USA Today story about the source of Ridge's announcements:


WASHINGTON — The Bush administration periodically put the USA on high alert for terrorist attacks even though then-Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge argued there was only flimsy evidence to justify raising the threat level, Ridge now says.

Ridge, who resigned Feb. 1, said Tuesday that he often disagreed with administration officials who wanted to elevate the threat level to orange, or "high" risk of terrorist attack, but was overruled.

His comments at a Washington forum describe spirited debates over terrorist intelligence and provide rare insight into the inner workings of the nation's homeland security apparatus.

Ridge said he wanted to "debunk the myth" that his agency was responsible for repeatedly raising the alert under a color-coded system he unveiled in 2002.

"More often than not we were the least inclined to raise it," Ridge told reporters. "Sometimes we disagreed with the intelligence assessment. Sometimes we thought even if the intelligence was good, you don't necessarily put the country on (alert). ... There were times when some people were really aggressive about raising it, and we said, 'For that?' "


For the record, I'm not predicting that there will be a terror alert next week. I'm merely pointing out that this crew will go to serious lengths to change the subject and we might as well prevent the element of surprise from being a factor (and bust out the popcorn).


Dover Bitch 8/24/2008 01:24:00 PM Comments (33) | Trackback (0

Faux News

The report of a recent media viewing poll that 33% of Faux News viewers are Democrats is not credible. People with brains don't watch Faux News because it isn't news. Faux News folks compare themselves to the Daily Show, and the Daily Show is comedy. News is supposed to be about what is going on in the world. With the Faux folks it is all about them

Press bias

Following up on scatablog piece on press bias, on Saturday, the Associated Press (whose articles are published in thousands of newspapers nationwide) wrote a story about Barack Obama's vice presidential pick that sounded more like right-wing FOX than an unbiased news organization. Under the headline "Biden pick shows lack of confidence," the AP wrote:

The candidate of change went with the status quo. In picking Sen. Joe Biden to be his running mate, Barack Obama sought to shore up his weakness—inexperience in office and on foreign policy...He picked a 35-year veteran of the Senate—the ultimate insider...The Biden selection is the next logistical step in an Obama campaign that has become more negative."


This isn't an isolated incident for the AP reporter who wrote this story, Ron Fournier—who was recently appointed as the AP's Washington, D.C. Bureau Chief. A recent study by media watchdog group Media Matters found that Fournier's presidential coverage has consistently smeared Democrats and favored John McCain.

The Long Chain

ETHICS -- CHENEY LINKED TO TED STEVENS' CORRUPTION TRIAL: Newsweek reports that in a conversation "secretly tape-recorded by the FBI on June 25, 2006," scandal-clad Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK), who was recently indicted on allegations that he hid major financial gifts, "discussed ways to get a pipeline bill" through the Alaska Legislature with Bill Allen, an oil-services executive accused of providing the senator with about $250,000 in undisclosed financial benefits." In the conversation, Stevens promised Allen, "I'm gonna try to see if I can get some bigwigs from back here and say, 'Look...you gotta get this done.'" Two days later, Vice President Cheney undertook the unusual move of writing a letter to the Alaska Legislature urging members to "promptly enact" a bill to build the pipeline. The letter was unusual because the White House rarely contacts state lawmakers about pending legislative matters. "We wanted the federal government to tell the state to act quickly on it," Stevens said, confirming that he did ask Cheney to write the letter

Shut her up

Just watched Nancy Pelosi on Press the Meat, and, though I know I've said this before, I feel compelled to say it again. Somebody should tell her to never, never, never get in front of a TV camera again. She's just terrible.

Bidening

I was kind of lukewarm on the Biden choice until I heard him give his speech today in Springfield, IL. That's exactly what Obama needs to be saying. They're going to have to take this fight to McCain instead of pussyfooting around him the way Obama has been doing. Maybe Obama will learn something from Biden. I certainly hope so.

Iraq agreement undermines Obama, not McCain

A number of people are saying that the new security agreement Bush has struck with Iraq undermines McCain because it agrees to a timetable for US troops to leave. Quite the contrary, in my view. It undermines Obama because it takes the war off the table as an issue. If Obama had anything going for him on the foreign policy side it was the Iraq war. Now, that's off the table and war with Russia (and Iran and Syria and ...) is on the table. McCain wins hands down on those issues, not because he is right but because Americans love belligerence, particularly if its a war we haven't lost yet.

An adult foreign policy

The theme on McCain's foreign policy should be that it's childish, naive. Only a dreamer out of touch with reality could imagine we could stay in Iraq for 100 years with the Iraqi people happy about it. "Tough talk" is middle-school rhetoric, silly King-of-the-Mountain stuff. It's time for a foreign policy for adults.

Obama's people should not forget to stress the team part of this election: he will appoint advisors who actually were successful, not the Bush-bred stable of complete failures that McCain will have to draw from.

Democratic passivity, Part 212

There’s an email floating around falsely accusing Obama of refusing to shake hands with the troops during his visit to Iraq. Another such example of sheer stupidity is one that says the “liberal press” refused to report an occasion where troops voted for McCain over Obama 54-2. These things are, indeed, circulating widely throughout the internet, and as far as I can tell nobody on the Democratic side is doing anything about them. Bob Somerby, The Daily Howler, hits the nail on the head. He has been a lonely voice in the wilderness when it comes to recognizing the cowardice of the liberal press in refusing to identify mainstream pundits and reporters who have sold out to the Republicans.

Of course, there’s no way to keep every damn-fool voter from believing every damn-fool story he hears. But the Democratic Party has been massively harmed in the past two White House elections by false accusations against its candidates. Our question: Have you seen the party make any effort to bring this general problem to the attention of regular voters? Have you seen the party develop messaging urging voters to doubt the things they get told? Have you seen the party discuss Jerome Corsi—who is back, of course, with a new, nasty book? Have you seen the party make any effort to discuss the false claims about Gore?
Have you seen the party show any sign that it prefers to win elections?
Readers; it’s a great bumper sticker: Friends don’t let friends believe rumors! For years, we’ve urged the Democratic Party—and “career liberal” elites—to pro-actively tell people like Stickles [the main who got the shake-hands email, but didn’t have time to check into it] that they are being played for fools by deliberate purveyors of falsehood and bull-roar. Most people don’t like to be deceived; we’ll guess that Stickles may be such a person. But has anyone ever told Ivan Stickles that he has been played, again and again, by powerful elites who seek to deceive him? Did it enter his head, when he met these new rumors, that these forces might be at it again?

Indeed, where is the multi-million dollar ad campaign that identifies exactly how the Republicans and a subservient, anti-Democratic mainstream press do this election after election after election -- Gore's sighs (deliberately amplified by the press) and "lies" (deliberately fabricated by the press, including Maureen Dowd, Frank Rich and other so-called "liberals"), Kerry's medals, and more recently, Kerry's "disrespect" for the troops in Iraq ? And clearly identifying why: the fact that they must distract attention because their extreme right wing ideology is anathema to most Americans?

Trying to get it across in sound bites the media may or may not show -- usually not -- or to people who actually show up and listen to the speeches -- most of whom are already in the choir -- will not do the job. TV advertising, radio advertising, local newspapers: that’s the only way the Democratic Party will ever build critical mass for making effective counter-attack possible.

McCain's Disconnect

By Robert Greenwald

John McCain is soaring to new heights of hypocrisy on his wife's personal jet. He flies around the country bent on duping the public into believing he's "one of them," a regular guy who can empathize with Americans facing an overwhelming economic crush. What's more, he disparages those who oppose his ridiculous policy proposals as "elitist." But who's the real elitist?

The REAL McCain is a multimillionaire who owns ten luxurious homes. The REAL McCain backs President Bush's tax cuts for big corporations. The REAL McCain empathizes only with the interests of our nation's wealthy minority, not its money-strapped majority. But far too many are buying into McCain's deceit because the corporate press won't present the whole picture, so we created this video to educate the public about the REAL McCain.

As Frank Rich noted in his recent NY Times column, 40% of Americans hear too little about McCain from the mainstream media, meaning "the public doesn't know who on earth John McCain is.

AFL-CIO President John Sweeney summed it up best when he said McCain "simply doesn't understand the challenges America's working families are facing because he isn't remotely affected by them." It's up to us to tell people who McCain really is, a jet-setting elitist more concerned with corporate lobbyists than hard-working Americans.

It's a long downhill slide to oblivion from here

This is what happens when you go on vacation to a foreign country:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - In a sharp turnaround, Republican John McCain has opened a 5-point lead on Democrat Barack Obama in the U.S. presidential race and is seen as a stronger manager of the economy, according to a Reuters/Zogby poll released on Wednesday.

McCain leads Obama among likely U.S. voters by 46 percent to 41 percent, wiping out Obama's solid 7-point advantage in July and taking his first lead in the monthly Reuters/Zogby poll.

Of course, this is Zogby, who is frequently way wrong, but a 12 point swing in one month must show something.

No more Mr. Maverick guy

Good line to shout over and over and over and over: “The John McCain of 2000 would never vote for the John McCain of 2008.” Maybe it’s been used before, but it’s the first time I’ve seen it. It also reinforces the notion of McCain as sell-out to the right wing extremists who control the Republican Party, with a theme behind the accusation of "flip-flopping":

OK.

“The John McCain of 2000 would never vote for the John McCain of 2008.”
“The John McCain of 2000 would never vote for the John McCain of 2008.”
“The John McCain of 2000 would never vote for the John McCain of 2008.”
“The John McCain of 2000 would never vote for the John McCain of 2008.”
“The John McCain of 2000 would never vote for the John McCain of 2008.”
“The John McCain of 2000 would never vote for the John McCain of 2008.”
“The John McCain of 2000 would never vote for the John McCain of 2008.”
“The John McCain of 2000 would never vote for the John McCain of 2008.”
“The John McCain of 2000 would never vote for the John McCain of 2008.”
“The John McCain of 2000 would never vote for the John McCain of 2008.”
“The John McCain of 2000 would never vote for the John McCain of 2008.”
“The John McCain of 2000 would never vote for the John McCain of 2008.”
“The John McCain of 2000 would never vote for the John McCain of 2008.”
“The John McCain of 2000 would never vote for the John McCain of 2008.”
“The John McCain of 2000 would never vote for the John McCain of 2008.”
“The John McCain of 2000 would never vote for the John McCain of 2008.”
“The John McCain of 2000 would never vote for the John McCain of 2008.”

Making civil liberties "popular" again

Glenn Greenwald has been closely following the doubts about the FBI’s accusation that Bruce Ivins, who committed suicide recently, was the anthrax culprit in 2001 after 9-11.

On the liberal side of blogosphere, the focus is on the awful possibility that Bruce Ivins was wronged. It seems to be an unfortunate fact that nowadays, a majority of Americans really couldn’t give two hoots about someone being wrongly accused. There they go with that softie protect-the-criminals stuff again.

Thinking politically, how does one connect with the most people on the need to avoid false accusations of crime? By appealing to their better natures to protect innocent people (assuming they are not guilty of something else)? Uh, no. What’s in it for them? How about reminding people of the elementary logic they have forgotten: If Bruce Ivins was not the right guy, that means, duh, the anthrax terrorist and murderer is still out there.

Losing the war

This post at the Left Coaster, notwithstanding its questionable grammar, just about captures my thoughts exactly:

Ambivalent about the idea of a vacation in the middle of the one chance we have to save the country, I’ve now come to the conclusion giving up any chance to drive the media narrative and checking out of a presidential race is a terrible idea, the whole campaign went to mush and everyone is bored as hell. The semi-official media (as Billmon calls them) is terrible at political coverage, McCain and the Republicans will deliberately lie about it and ruin it, so doing nothing is just asking for trouble.

Trouble we have, Krugman saying he can’t believe the economy is not a central narrative and Drum bullet pointing suggestions for attacking McCain. Just the very existence of these two posts is outrageous, it almost defies belief they ever could have come into existence at all. Rich writes that the Obama campaign is “excessively genteel” and Digby that “they don’t want to be involved in negative campaigning.”

Ten days off sure worked some magic, eh? I am furious, seriously angry to yet again see a Democratic candidate taking a high road to oblivion as he’s chopped to bits and reduced to ridicule in an environment he doesn’t understand.

Or does he? Josh Marshall reports Obama came out swinging on his first day back, but we’ll see what’s on the news tonight, it will take more than one day of fighting to get the narratives back on a more favorable ground. Yeah, NBC FirstRead, you’re not the only one to wonder if Obama is having a “Jon Lovitz-as-Dukakis SNL moment.”

Senator Barack Obama,☼ you are campaigning with the future of the United States, and likely the planet, with this election. Not one more minute off, sir, everything has been handed to you in the environment for this federal contest, you get the fuck out there and fight with everything you have, Jesus, it’s not about you!

I think back to Ned Lamont, who went on vacation right after defeating Holy Joe Lieberman in the primary and lost the war after winning the battle. It's looking like Obama wants to follow in those footsteps.

Absurd

Obama gets more absurd every day. Now, he's banned Wesley Clark from the Democratic Convention just because Clark said McCain's POW status was not a qualification for the presidency. I frankly am getting very troubled by the tenor of this man. He shoots his friends and sucks up to his enemies. Do we really want somebody like that as president. Unfortunately, the only alternative is thousands of times worse.

The question of the day

Is Obama the anti Christ?

CNN has that question posted on it's screen.

Bushonomics

Bushonomics

A new Center for American Progress report released today -- Understanding Bushonomics: How We Got Into This Mess In the First Place -- documents "the extraordinary transfer of wealth that took place between ordinary households and the extremely well-to-do and the effort by this administration to address the consequences of that problem without addressing the root cause." Senior Fellow Scott Lilly argues that while the "economy did in fact grow at a reasonably strong pace through most of the Bush presidency" and "the hourly productivity of American workers" increased by "more than 19 percent," average Americans did not reap the benefits of economic expansion. Instead, President Bush's economic policies redistributed wealth to the richest Americans and left the majority with stagnating wages and declining household incomes. The transfer "drained the American consumer of the resources needed to keep the economy humming" and led the administration to stimulate the economy by expanding credit -- an action that only weakened "our long term capacity for growth," he concludes.

WEALTH GOES TO THE RICH: The Bush administration directed its economic policies and the benefits of economic growth towards a narrow segment of the population, the wealthiest Americans. Looking at the effects of the first three Bush tax cuts, the Congressional Budget Office concluded that "the percentage by which the effective tax rate was cut for high-income families was nearly twice the rate cut for those in the middle of the income spectrum." Meanwhile, the administration's failure to raise the minimum wage coupled with its poor enforcement of federal wage and hour laws, trade agreements, and union rights further undermined the economic security of middle and lower-income Americans. Consequently, between 2000 and 2006, "those among the top 10 percent of all households on average increased their income by about 2 percent, while those in the bottom 90 percent lost more than 4 percent." The "biggest beneficiaries of U.S. economic growth that occurred between 2000 and 2006 were U.S. corporations," the report concludes. While corporate profits grew "at a little less than two-thirds the growth rate of the gross domestic product" during the second half of the 20th century, between 2000 and 2006, "corporate profits grew nearly four times as fast as GDP," increasing by an estimated 66 percent.

NO TRICKLE DOWN: The newfound prosperity of the top 10 percent of families, "which accounted for 95.3 percent of the nation's income growth between 2002 and 2006," did not trickle down the economic spectrum, and left most Americans incapable of absorbing the rising output of consumer products. Recognizing the precarious condition of the U.S. consumer, corporations retained their extra profits, invested little in new commercial structures such as factories and office buildings, bought back their own stock, and "increased dividends rather than expand capacity." High-income individuals absorbed some of the extra output by consuming luxury items, but most of their "increased income went to savings rather than consumption," Lilly writes.

A POOR FIX FOR DEMAND: With families unable to absorb the extra production, the Bush administration tried to keep the economy growing by ordering the Federal Reserve to drastically lower the Reserve's Discount Rate, "the interest rate charged by the Federal Reserve to member institutions for short-term lending." By 2002, the Fed Reserve Discount Rate dropped to 0.75 percent and "the dramatic reduction in the cost of money to member banks began a frenzy of economic activity." The biggest effect was in-home mortgage refinancing. "Extremely low interest rates...made it possible for hard-pressed consumers to maintain and even improve their living standards by taking equity out of their homes," Lilly notes. But "the dramatic expansion of credit created excessive debt and distorted the price of housing. It also weakened the dollar, pushing up oil prices."

Most companies in US avoid federal income taxes

Report says most corporations pay no federal income taxes; lawmakers blame loopholes
JENNIFER C. KERRAP News
Aug 12, 2008 05:31 EST

Two-thirds of U.S. corporations paid no federal income taxes between 1998 and 2005, according to a new report from Congress.The study by the Government Accountability Office, expected to be released Tuesday, said about 68 percent of foreign companies doing business in the U.S. avoided corporate taxes over the same period.
Collectively, the companies reported trillions of dollars in sales, according to GAO's estimate.
"It's shameful that so many corporations make big profits and pay nothing to support our country," said Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., who asked for the GAO study with Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich.

An outside tax expert, Chris Edwards of the libertarian Cato Institute in Washington, said increasing numbers of limited liability corporations and so-called "S" corporations pay taxes under individual tax codes."Half of all business income in the United States now ends up going through the individual tax code," Edwards said.

The GAO study did not investigate why corporations weren't paying federal income taxes or corporate taxes and it did not identify any corporations by name. It said companies may escape paying such taxes due to operating losses or because of tax credits.

More than 38,000 foreign corporations had no tax liability in 2005 and 1.2 million U.S. companies paid no income tax, the GAO said. Combined, the companies had $2.5 trillion in sales. About 25 percent of the U.S. corporations not paying corporate taxes were considered large corporations, meaning they had at least $250 million in assets or $50 million in receipts.
The GAO said it analyzed data from the Internal Revenue Service, examining samples of corporate returns for the years 1998 through 2005. For 2005, for example, it reviewed 110,003 tax returns from among more than 1.2 million corporations doing business in the U.S.
Dorgan and Levin have complained about companies abusing transfer prices — amounts charged on transactions between companies in a group, such as a parent and subsidiary. In some cases, multinational companies can manipulate transfer prices to shift income from higher to lower tax jurisdictions, cutting their tax liabilities. The GAO did not suggest which companies might be doing this.

Higher inflation brings lower standard of living

With prices up and wages flat, consumers have to make do with less
ANALYSIS
By John W. Schoen, MSNB

Last Thursday's report on consumer inflation helps to confirm what many American households have suspected for months — that rising prices are forcing consumers to lower their standard of living to make ends meet.

U.S. consumer prices shot up faster than expected in July, fueling the biggest year-over-year jump in more than 17 years, according to the latest government data. Prices were 5.6 percent higher in July than they were a year earlier. Energy prices were up 29.3 percent for the year and food costs were 6 percent higher.

Excluding volatile food and energy items, the so-called core CPI rose 0.3 percent in each of June and July, slightly above forecasts for a 0.2 percent gain in July. On a year-over-year basis, core prices rose 2.5 percent in July, slightly more than the 2.4 percent rise that was forecast.
A separate set of data showed just how hard those prices rising are hitting household budgets. After adjusting for inflation, the average weekly paycheck dropped by 0.8 percent in July from June, extending an ongoing slide in real income. That left real earnings 3.1 percent lower in July than they were a year ago.

ACLU Scizo

From the DC underground:

An interesting component here is that the Liberal Commie ACLU is supporting gun owners and the Constitution against the Law and Order Conservative Police. Connecticut is one f-ed up state. This is an example of preemptive strike mentality, like "we think they have WMDs so we will invade just in case."
http://tinyurl.com/5l4bgd

August 04, 2008WorldNetDailyA new report to the Connecticut state legislature shows police have used the state's unique gun seizure law to confiscate more than 1,700 firearms from citizens based on suspicion that the gun owners might harm themselves or others.The state's law permits police to seek a warrant for seizing a citizen's guns based on suspicion of the gun owner's intentions, before any act of violence or lawbreaking is actually committed.The law was first proposed in 1998, following a mass shooting at the Connecticut Lottery Corporation that left five dead, including the gunman. Since the law went into effect Oct. 1, 1999, according to new Office of Legislative Research report, police have made more than 200 documented requests for warrants to seize firearms from citizens, and only two of the requests have been denied.The law has remained hotly debated since its passage, as some point to possible murders and suicides it may have prevented, and others worry that police would abuse the law."It certainly has not been abused. It may be underutilized," Ron Pinciaro, co-executive director of Connecticut Against Gun Violence, told the Waterbury Republican American. "The bottom line from our perspective is, it may very well have saved lives." [PVC: I'll bet if Mr. Pinciaro's private property was snatched up at will by the police, he'd be squealing like a stuck pig.]Attorney Ralph D. Sherman, who has represented several of the gun owners whose firearms were confiscated under the law, disagrees."In every case I was involved in I thought it was an abuse," he told the newspaper. "The overriding concern is anybody can report anybody with or without substantiation, and I don't think that is the American way."Joe Graborz, executive director of the Connecticut Civil Liberties Union, an affiliate of the ACLU, told WND the law "continues to invest unusual and far-reaching powers in police authority that does not belong there" by requiring "police to act as psychologists in trying to predict and interpret behavior.""What is the standard of proof on this?" he asked. "The way this law is written, it can and will be easily abused by police."Under the statute, dubbed the "turn in your neighbor" law by opponents, any two police officers or a state prosecutor may seek a warrant, following a specified process of investigation, to confiscate guns from people deemed a risk to harming themselves or others. The vast majority of cases, however, begin when a person -- usually a spouse or live-in, according to the OLR report -- file a complaint.Shortly after the law was passed, Thompson Bosee of Greenwich, Conn., had his guns and ammunition seized by police. Bosee told WND in 1999 he suspects a neighbor, with whom he has had words regarding the neighbor's driving on Bosee's property, might have reported him."They had a warrant for my guns, they arrested my guns," said Bosee.A member of both the NRA and the American Gunsmithing Association, Bosee said he works on his guns in his garage and is not ashamed of it.Although Greenwich Police would not comment, they released a list of the guns and ammunition they seized from Bosee, including six handguns, three rifles, one shotgun, one submachine gun and 3,108 rounds of ammunition.The new OLR report shows that in most cases, relatives or neighbors of the gun owner filed the complaint when they feared for their own safety or feared the owner was suicidal. In a case from Southington, however, a man had his gun taken for threatening to shoot a dog.Attorney Ralph Sherman told WND the law's cruelty to animals justification for gun seizure worries him."If I throw a rock or a newspaper at a dog in my yard or in my garden, that doesn't mean I'm mentally unbalanced," he said. "What if a neighbor doesn't like me and sees that?"In October 2006, according to the Republican American, police obtained a seizure warrant after a man made 28 unsubstantiated claims of vandalism to his property. The police application for seizure described the man as paranoid and delusional, citing extensive self-protection measures installed on the man's property, including alarms, cameras and spotlights.Four months after the man's guns were taken, a judge ruled that police had failed to show the man posed any risk and ordered the guns returned. According to the ruling, the gun owner had no history of documented illness, criminal activity or misuse of firearms. "In fact, the firearms were found in a locked safe when the officers executed the warrant," the ruling said.The law dictates that courts hold a hearing within 14 days of a seizure to determine the eventual fate of the guns. In most cases, according to the OLR report, the guns are held for a period of up to a year, destroyed or sold. The Republican American reports that in 22 of the more than 200 cases, the guns were ordered returned.Connecticut State Rep. Michael P. Lawlor, House chairman of the Judiciary Committee and one of the chief authors of the law, told the Republican American he wasn't aware of any pending challenges to the law's constitutionality."The whole point was to make sure it was limited and constitutional," he said.Sherman however, said the law hasn't been challenged yet, simply because it is used sparingly and a test case would prove too costly for the average gun owner.

McCain seems to propose martial law for US

Not sure if he said what he meant, but answering a question about his approach to combating crime, John McCain suggested that military strategies currently employed by US troops in Iraq could be applied to high crime neighborhoods here in the US. McCain called them tactics "somewhat like we use in the military...You go into neighborhoods, you clamp down, you provide a secure environment for the people that live there, and you make sure that the known criminals are kept under control."Link to the audio:http://tinyurl.com/559dtt Article:http://www.reason.com/blog/show/127881.html

NYT Off Shore on Obama Energy Plan

HUFFINGTON POST
The New York Times' Absurd Attack on Obama's Energy Plan
Posted August 10, 2008 07:01 PM (EST)

The lead editorial in Sunday's NYT, "Energy Fictions," is a misguided and misinformed smear of Obama's outstanding energy proposals. It harshly criticizes a few tiny pieces of Obama's energy plan that deal with short-term oil strategies, in particular, his willingness to compromise on offshore drilling, and then ends:
Here is the underlying reality: A nation that uses one-quarter of the world's oil while possessing less than 3 percent of its reserves cannot drill its way to happiness at the pump, much less self-sufficiency. The only plausible strategy is to cut consumption while embarking on a serious program of alternative fuels and energy sources. This is a point the honest candidate should be making at every turn.

The NYT would seem to be accusing Obama of being dishonest -- even though it is the McCain campaign whose insatiable dishonesty now extends to climate-destroying [and soul-destroying] disinformation (see "Will McCain's cynical lies destroy the chance for serious energy and climate policy?").

Did the NYT even bother listening to any of Obama's speeches or reading his plan online, rather than, say, listening to the cable news version -- or worse, the Republican National Committee version? Obama has a detailed a plan to "cut consumption while embarking on a serious program of alternative fuels and energy sources" -- more serious and more comprehensive than any presidential candidate of either party has ever put forward (see "A real energy plan for America: Efficiency now, 10% renewables by 2012, and one million plug-in hybrids by 2015").

And Obama has said over and over again that offshore drilling will not have any significant impact on US oil production or prices at the pump. But he recognizes that the Republicans have decided to drown out all debate by endlessly shouting the new Newt Gingrich mantra"Drill Here. Drill Now." As long as the media keeps miscovering the subject, any serious political leader will have to agree to some meaningless drilling to get a serious clean energy program passed.
[As an aside, the NYT helped rehabilitate the eco-image of the virulently anti-environmental Gingrich last year, calling his new book, " A Contract on the With the Earth," part of a "move to the pragmatic center on climate and energy." As if. Gingrich fooling the media by disguising himself as an eco-friendly centrist is about as pathetic as Radovan Karadzic wandering around Belgrade disguised as a New Age doctor.]

But I digress. The entire editorial is as intentionally misinforming as a typical Wall Street Journal ed, but you expect that from the WSJ. The NYT writes of Obama's energy plan:
The Democrats' presumptive nominee has made a poor choice of weapons, beginning with his proposal to tap the petroleum reserve, an idea that Mr. McCain has wisely resisted. True, some usually responsible Democrats have been urging the release of as much as 70 million barrels of oil from the 700-million-barrel strategic reserve. And tapping the reserve on several earlier occasions -- including the home heating oil crisis in 2000 and after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina in 2005 -- did in fact cause oil prices to drop.
Uhh, no. First off, Obama did not propose to tap the reserve -- he proposed a small "swap of light oil ... for heavy crude oil." The total volume of oil would stay the same. It'd be nice if the NYT got simple facts right in their lame hitjob.
But these were the kinds of genuine emergencies for which the reserve was designed in the first place.

Uhh, no. Bush's father released oil during the first Gulf War when prices had begun to drift up slightly -- to $32 a barrel [!!! -- ah, the good old days, when a war in the Persian Gulf coupled with a $32 a barrel price constituted an energy crisis].
High prices -- even $4 for a gallon of gasoline -- do not, in our view, constitute such an emergency.

That would be funny if it weren't coming from the so-called "paper of record." We have a world market for oil -- oil embargoes, the raison d'être for the reserve, have been replaced by price shocks. That is, the way that supply shocks will manifest themselves today is in high prices. Today we again have a war in the Gulf, but this time oil prices are 4 times higher than they were when Bush's father released announced he would sell 34 million barrels from the reserve -- and oil prices dropped by one third in 24 hours. And he didn't even have to sell all of the 34 million barrels. And we have more than 700 million barrels in the reserve. And in over a quarter of a century we've never even sold a combined 70 million barrels. But the NYT mindlessly repeats a long-dead shibboleth about the "responsible" use of the strategic reserve during some hypothetical emergency -- which somehow doesn't include two wars and record prices, which means the reserve can basically never be used.

As I testified to Congress last month on this subject, "If oil prices did drop [after releasing maybe 70 million barrels], that would vindicate this strategy. If oil prices did not drop, that would demonstrate how useless the strategic reserve is.(They may even be salutary: according to the Federal Highway Administration, Americans drove 30 billion fewer miles in the first five months of this year than they did last year. Consumers are moving briskly to the more fuel-efficient cars they probably should have been buying all along.) Ah, now we see where the NYT is coming from. They want higher oil prices. Well, they obviously never ran for office or in fact tried to govern this country. I wouldn't call higher oil prices "salutary." I have, however, predicted for years they are "inevitable" given our myopic energy policy. But to the extent that higher prices in the short term are partly due to speculation, I certainly think it's worth releasing a little oil from the reserve to find out -- and then using that money to jumpstart the transition to a clean energy economy.

The rest of the NYT editorial is even more illogical, if that's possible, in a bizarrely consistent way:The windfall tax idea seems exactly the kind of populist gimmick Mr. Obama has been trying to avoid, and could be counterproductive. It is true that oil company profits have reached obscene levels, largely as a result of oil prices. It is also true that oil companies receive tax benefits that they do not need and that ought to be repealed. But rebates would encourage consumption, leading to higher prices at the pump and hurting the very consumers Mr. Obama is trying to help.

[In voice of Jon Stewart] Oh mavens of the most respected newspaper in the world, why do you mock me? That last sentence is one of the dumbest thing ever published in the NYT. Yes, they are arguing that if you give struggling people a rebate during economic hard times, they might actually spend the money, and some of that spending would go toward consuming oil (perhaps 8%, in fact), which in turn might raise oil consumption (perhaps 1%, in fact), which in turn might raise oil prices (perhaps microscopically and just temporarily, in fact), which in turn might hurt the very consumers Mr. Obama is trying to help (and monkeys could fly out my butt, in fact, but they probably won't). Somehow I suspect most Americans probably would take the rebate and not worry too much about whether their stimulus will cause price inflation that eats slightly into the value of the rebate.

And one more thing, the five biggest oil companies are poised to receive $33 billion in taxpayer-funded subsidies over the next five years -- and last year put more than $60 billion of their profits (a stunning 55% of the total) into stock buybacks (see "Follow your money"). That is beyond obscene.

Has the New York Times ever published such a lame editorial? Let's hope not. It ends:
A toxic combination of $4 gasoline, voter anxiety and presidential ambition is making it impossible for this country to have the grown-up conversation it needs about energy.
Not surprisingly, the NYT left out the key ingredient in the toxic stew -- the media's blatant miscoverage of the energy issue. That's the real reason it is impossible for this country to have a grown-up conversation on energy.

If the ref doesn't understand or enforce any of the rules, the game inevitably becomes fixed, and one side, typically the one employing Karl Rove or his disciples, realizes that repeatedly lying to the public may well be a winning strategy (see ""Note to media: Are you going to allow McCain to just make up stuff on oil drilling?"). The paper of record is now the paper of discord.