The Place Where Sarah Palin Earned Her Awesome Executive Experience

Are you f---king kidding me?

Right Out of the Box, Palin Lies

An Alaska blogger has the story here. (BTW, check this guy's whole site out--it's really good.)

Palin: No-Class, Two-Bit Jackass

She is one ugly human being:

An Andrew Sullivan Reader Absolutely Nails It

It's so good that I'd like to steal--er, quote it--in full:

I had been reluctant to acknowledge how flawed and dead the conservative movement has become; that's over now. No more excuses, no more clinging to old visions of rational discourse and principled debate. I really have witnessed the death of conservatism and its replacement by a kind of toxic babbitry which would be merely laughable or cringeworthy if it were not also so extraordinarily dangerous.

This election year has been a series of revelations and disillusionments--the crudely ugly tactics of Limbaugh and Hannity (and--worse--their embrace by Buckley's heirs at National Review), the thinly-veiled racism and nativism of the campaign against Obama, the transparently cruel and God-hating ideology of movement Christians; but--even though dismayed by McCain's bizarre campaign--I had retained some illusions as recently as this morning. I believed McCain to be at least a patriot, sincerely concerned with issues of national security.

His nomination of Sarah Palin ended that illusion, too.

No remotely serious politician--no honest patriot--would think of placing this individual a heartbeat away from the Oval Office, however admirable she may be, however lively her biography.

Moreover, the elation on the right regarding Palin's nomination made clear to me that none of them has ever been remotely serious about national security, either. On the contrary, as the left has insisted for years, for them it really has all been about political advantage, noise and bluster and ugliness with no core of principle, no genuine strategic commitment.

The very same people who, only yesterday, insisted that Obama's resume was too dangerously thin to entrust him with the oversight of our national security, today are celebrating Palin's accession as a triumph for conservatism (evidently this is because she is hostile to both abortion and polar bears). Their hypocrisy is staggering--they truly do believe in nothing but their own entitlement to power by any means.

And I'm very much afraid I must conclude this is as true of McCain as it is of his ghastly cheerleaders, the Limbaughs and the Hannitys. Nothing else could explain the elevation of a woman so singularly unqualified in every aspect save gender.

29 August 2005

What the people of New Orleans were doing:




What John McCain was doing:

This is Who McSame Thinks is Qualified

"What is it exactly that the vice president does all day?" --

Sarah Palin to CNBC anchor Larry Kudlow LAST MONTH.

ANTI-MC CAIN E MAIL: McCain's LOUSY Choice for VP

TOP TEN REASONS SARAH PALIN SHOULD NOT BE ELECTED VICE PRESIDENT

#1: Palin opposes a woman's right to choose what to do with her own body, opposing the right to an abortion even for rape victims.

#2: Palin believes that Creationism should be taught in public schools, which runs both counter to well-settled evolutionary science, and to the Constitutional separation of church and state.

#3: Palin is a global warming denier, who (as with her views on evolution) has expressed skepticism about the well-settled science.

#4: Palin opposes listing polar bears as an endangered species, because it means oil and gas companies might have to be just a little bit careful out there.

#5: Palin is rabidly dedicated to drilling in the Artic wildlife refuge, known as ANWR.

#6: Palin is in the midst of a growing ethics scandal, involving the alleged abuse of her gubernatorial power to punish a State Trooper who is her sister's ex-husband, firing a State Commissioner who refused to go along.

#7: Palin called Hillary Clinton a "whiner", even as she cynically tries to woo Clinton voters to the McCain ticket.

#8: Palin has very little experience for the Vice Presidential job, serving less than two years so far of her first term as Governor of a state with fewer residents than Fort Worth, Texas. (Previously, she was Mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, pop. 8,500.)

#9: Palin has no foreign policy experience at all, so little in fact that her supporters are reduced to citing Alaska's proximity to Russia.

#10: Palin is virtually untested, unvetted and unknown to Americans, a fact which throws into relief the hypocrisy of the many unfair criticisms leveled at Barack Obama during this campaign.

BONUS REASON, #11: Palin only recently said that she doesn't even know what the job entails, saying on the CNBC show Kudlow and Co. that:

"[A]s for that V.P. talk all the time, I’ll tell you, I still can’t answer that question until somebody answers for me what is it exactly that the V.P. does every day?" (July 2008)

(end)


[Courtesy of Hudson at DKos]

Sarah Palin? Is That Supposed to Be a Joke?

McCain thinks the Governor of our 47th most populous state, someone who's been in office a year and half, is qualified to run America? McCain thinks that someone with no foreign policy experience who has hardly ever even left Alaska could deal with the world situation? And does he think women in this country are stupid and don't recognize an obvious, condescending pander when they see one? And why did McCain pass over women like Kay Bailey Hutchinson of Texas or Olympia Snowe of Maine, women who have long careers in Congress? Palin is a creationist. Palin thinks that if your 14 year old daughter is impregnated by a rapist that she should be forced to go through with the pregnancy. (She also makes no exception for incest or the life of the mother.) Palin is also embroiled in scandal in her home state, a scandal that is not going away:




Palin's selection is an atrocious pick, an act of desperation by a candidate who knows he's losing, especially after last night. It's a slap in the face to women, and it's an insult to the entire country. McCain is 72 and has a history cancer. Two years ago, Sarah Palin was mayor of a town in Alaska with 9,000 people. Can you imagine her having to deal with the world? This pick is worse than Bush trying to put Harriet Miers on the Supreme Court. It's worse than Barry Goldwater picking William E. Miller. It's more ludicrous of a choice than Dan Quayle was in 1988.

As I said, is this supposed to be a joke?

An AMAZING Speech by Our Next President, Barack Obama

Watch it our read it here.

As I said on DKos, I've been watching political speeches since I was 12, in 1964. Barack Obama's speech tonight was the most brilliantly powerful political speech I have ever seen. Never have I seen an individual make such a powerful case for himself, his party, and above all, the people of our beloved nation. I have never been so fired up with enthusiasm for a political leader in my life as I am right now.

Just before Super Bowl XX, Steve McMichael of the Chicago Bears threw a folding chair at a blackboard, smashing it to pieces. He then said, "I'm ready." For the first time, I understand what he meant.

Take It From an Ex-Republican: Learn to Fight Dirty

Any reasonably alert observer knows the vicious, unprincipled depths to which the Radical Right, i.e., the modern Republican Party and its hacks, will sink in their attempt to destroy Barack Obama. In case you need to see them all in one place, these are attacks that McCain and his thugs have ACTUALLY made:

Obama is a traitor

Obama may just be the AntiChrist.

Obama is a secret Muslim pro-terrorist Manchurian candidate.

Obama is a Marxist.

Obama is just a paper-thin "celebrity"

Obama hates the troops.

Obama is an ally of terrorists here in America.

Obama is an elitist who despises white middle class Americans.

Obama is simply an "affirmative action" candidate.

Obama is soft on crime.

Obama wants to kill live babies.

And the list goes on an on and on.

These observers have also seen, with varying degrees of outrage and disbelief, how McCain's huge fan club in the Corporate Media is doing everything it can to put McCain in the White House. (CNN's atrociously bad coverage of the convention is just one of a thousand examples). Republican hacks like Giuliani are allowed to spread lying bullshit with impunity. Right wing hate radio has gone into overdrive. And millions of ugly, lying emails are circulating. Since I was a Republican up until 1991, none of this surprises me, but I continue to be surprised by the inability of many of my beloved Democratic friends to understand something:

YOU NEED TO FIGHT DIRTY TO BEAT THESE REPUBLICAN ASSHOLES. Allow me to explain.

By "fight dirty" I do NOT mean make up lies about the Republicans.

I do not mean to ally ourselves with idiots like the so-called "Vietnam Veterans Against McCain".

I mean, we have to be willing to tell the ugly truth about this son of a bitch again and again and again

We need to hit him on his philandering, lying, and cheating on his loyal first wife HARD. A lot of Americans hate people who cheat like that, including many social conservatives. Mention it AGAIN AND AGAIN.

We need to call McCain what he is: A DAMNED LIAR who will do or say ANYTHING to win. And yes, we need to use the word LIAR. The Swiftboat Assholes used that term against Kerry EXPLICITLY. It was a falsehood coming from them. When we call McCain a liar, it is simply the bare truth.

We need to call McCain a CROOK, because it's true. From his wife's Mob-infested family to his connections with shady underworld figures In Arizona to his corrupt land deals to the Keating Five scandal to covering up 95% of the Abramoff evidence, McCain is simply a slimy, two-bit hustler. Start hitting him in those terms.

We need to remind people of how McCain has basically simply defecated on veterans in America, highlighting his atrocious, anti-veteran voting record. We need to remind people of how McCain has attacked POW-MIA groups. And we need to remind people that REAL heroes don't run around reminding people of their heroism every 5 minutes. I had four uncles who served in the Pacific in World War II. I never ONCE heard any of them brag about their service--not once. McCain is dragging every veteran through the mud every time he uses his POW card to deflect any criticism. That shit has GOT to stop.

And we need to stop the constant genuflecting to McCain's service. Remember the fucking Purple Heart bandages from the 2004 Republican Convention if you don't agree.

I know what some of you will say. You'll say things like "We don't lower ourselves to their level" and "we take the high road". My God, I just shake my head in disbelief when I read or hear stuff like that. When I was a Republican we used to LOVE to run against Democrats like that, because they didn't have the spine and the guts to stick up for themselves. They didn't do what needed to be done. And they lost--again and again and again. Republican views are perverse and atrocious, but Republicans will do ANYTHING to win. That's why this Ayers shit might stick. It's why the Radical Muslim shit is still circulating.

Take it from an ex-Republican: the Republican Convention next week is going to be a NON STOP HATE FESTIVAL AGAINST OBAMA. There will be NOTHING but the crudest, most vicious attacks on him. You and I both know it. And if, by 5 September, McCain is in the lead nationally, it will be very hard to overturn that lead. And don't give me this crap about the debates, because the Corporate Media will set the bar impossibly high for Obama and ridiculously low for McCain. If McCain doesn't keel over or wet himself, he'll be declared the winner. Remember the first 2000 Debate if you don't buy that argument.

Too many of my fellow Democrats are just too G-d damned NICE. It's part of why I love you. You have decent instincts and a sense of fair play. But we're in a WAR we must win. The Republicans are your ENEMIES. I guarantee that's how they see you and talk about you. Many of them hate you. Some of them actively advocate killing people like you. (Michael Reagan called for Howard Dean to be killed, for example. Limbaugh has called for the killing of liberals. Exterminationist rhetoric is very common on the Right.) If these people win again, in what should be a Democratic landslide year, the consequences will be tragic. Every loyal, patriotic kid who is killed in the wars McCain will start will, in one sense, be blood on our hands because we weren't willing to tell the ugly truth--that John McCain is a mentally unstable, lying crook.

Barack won't do it. The Democratic Convention won't do it. The fierce language of truth will be up to us, the soldiers in the campaign trenches, to use. Our country is dying. If we don't win this because we wanted to play nice, it will be the ultimate betrayal.

Trust me on this--I've seen this kind of right wing hate campaign from the inside. It's part of why I had to leave. But you know something:

It works.

Get used to it. And roll up your sleeves.

And G-d damn it, FIGHT DIRTY.

It's Like Hillary Said

John McCain: "Philanderer, War Pimp, Bush Policy Clone, and Neocon Liar"

I don't much like the original website, but I can't disagree with a single word of this:

John McCain totally destroyed my respect for him with the uncaring, selfish, cold-hearted betrayal in how he dumped [his first wife]. Indeed, I will never forget nor forgive him for the cruel way he showed his true colors. He quickly threw Carol aside and replaced her with Cindy Hensley, his new rich sugar mama, with whom he was having an affair. Hensley is a spoiled home wrecker, worth approximately 100 million, bred from the loins of a staunch Republican father who conveniently helped elevate Johnny boy within the DC realm. I'm not into Freud, but it's easy to wonder who came so ruthlessly after McCain -- Cindy...or her father?

And this self-righteous, self-serving animal wants my vote? Well, it will have to be a Hell's-Kitchen-burning-white-hot-winter November day in Bullhead City, Arizona before I would even consider putting a checkmark next to his pathetic name in the 2008 Presidential Election. Catch my meaning? Good.

Read the whole thing. It's worth it.

ANTI-MC CAIN E MAIL: The Senator and the Terrorist

THE SENATOR AND THE TERRORIST

This terrorist is as evil a man as America has ever given rise to.

He originated a plot to destroy the American political system.

He has told people the best way to kill Federal agents.

He has made death threats against public officials.

He has called for mass murder and says American soldiers should be trained to fight like "the Waffen SS"--i.e., he wants them to fight like Nazis. No surprise, since Adolf Hitler was his earliest political inspiration, by his own admission.

The terrorist is called G. Gordon Liddy.

And the Senator who supports him and has lavished praise on him is

JOHN MC CAIN.

McCain has appeared on Liddy's hate radio program. Liddy has organized fund raising for McCain. And McCain counts himself HONORED to be Liddy's friend.

Can you trust ANY public figure that calls scum like Liddy his friend?

BTW, if you don't believe me, check out the EVIDENCE here:

http://jamillerrampant.blogspot.com/2008/08/
john-mccains-terrorist-friend-g-gordon.html

McCain's Tax Plan: Keep Showering Money Down on the Top 1%

From the L.A. Times (click to enlarge):

John McCain's Terrorist Friend: G. Gordon Liddy

In light of the completely unsurprising news that McCain is going to try to tie Barack Obama to Bill Ayers, I thought it might be fun to look at John McCain's much more dangerous, much more violent, much more radical friend: G. Gordon Liddy, notorious even in the lawless Nixon White House for his fanaticism and his unbelievable lack of any moral restraint whatsoever. Chicago Tribune columnist Stephen Chapman brought the issue up this spring (the article is not online, unfortunately) but HuffPo picked up on it. Read along with me, dear friends, as we dive into the muck of Liddy, the Ultimate Right Wing Republican and die-hard McCain supporter.

Let's start by establishing their connection:

In 1998, Liddy's home was the site of a McCain fundraiser. Over the years, he has made at least four contributions totaling $5,000 to the senator's campaigns--including $1,000 this year.
Last November, McCain went on his radio show. Liddy greeted him as "an old friend," and McCain sounded like one. "I'm proud of you, I'm proud of your family," he gushed. "It's always a pleasure for me to come on your program, Gordon, and congratulations on your continued success and adherence to the principles and philosophies that keep our nation great."

And what kind of man is Liddy, exactly?

[Adolf Hitler] was G Gordon Liddy's first political hero. Liddy was a sickly, asthmatic child when he grew up in Hoboken, New Jersey, in the 1930s. The town was full of ethnic Germans who idolized Hitler. Liddy was made to salute the Stars and Stripes Nazi-style by the nuns at his school; even now, he admits, "at assemblies where the national anthem is played, I must suppress the urge to snap out my right arm." His beloved German nanny taught him that Hitler had -- through sheer will-power -- "dragged Germany from weakness to strength."

This gave Liddy hope "for the first time in my life" that he too could overcome weakness. When he listened to Hitler on the radio, it "made me feel a strength inside I had never known before," he explains. "Hitler's sheer animal confidence and power of will [entranced me]. He sent an electric current through my body." He describes seeing the Nazis' doomed technological marvel the Hindenberg flying over New Jersey as an almost religious experience. "Ecstatic, I drank in its colossal power and felt myself grow. Fear evaporated and in its place came a sense of personal might and power."

Read the whole terrifying interview with Liddy here.

Liddy was the originator and leader of the Watergate break-in, about which he is utterly unrepentant. (He wanted to kill columnist Jack Anderson for writing critcal articles about Nixon, as well.) Liddy did his absolute best to undermine American democracy, for which he has the deepest contempt (being a Nietzschean)and yet he hides behind the First Amendment to say things like this, which is from a 1994 exchange on his radio show:

Liddy: When the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms thugs come to kill your wife and children, to try to disarm you and they open fire on you. When they come at the point of a gun, force and violence, when you're going to defend yourself, use that Gerand [M-1 rifle]. That thing is 30-06, and it'll take 'em right out.

Caller: And yes, aim for the head.

Liddy: Absolutely.

If Bob Dole, Newt Gingrich or Oliver North missed the Sept. 15 show, the Sept. 6 show would have helped them understand this Republican supporter's character.

Liddy: Arm yourself. Get instructed in how to shoot straight.

Caller: I've got weapons.

Liddy: Absolutely. And don't give 'em up, and don't register either.

Caller: No way. And I'm aiming between the eyes.

Liddy: There you go. That way their flak jackets won't protect them.

For the listeners to Liddy's 250 stations, appeals for the election of Republican candidates were sandwiched between frequent depictions of the Clinton administration as an evil that needed to be resisted with deadly force. That may explain why Liddy was invited to be the guest of honor at the Republican Party's "Salute to Talk Radio."

Now, maybe McCain likes and admires Liddy because Liddy, like McCain, knows how to win wars. Here's Liddy, from the Media Matters article, on Vietnam:

While the Nixon administration was spraying tonnes of napalm and poison over Vietnam, he complained the policy was "too soft." He says now, "I wanted to bomb the Red River dykes [sic: dikes]. It would have drowned half the country and starved the other half. There would have been no way the Viet Cong could have operated if we had the will-power to do that."

"... What I'm saying is we had better embrace the horror of war. If you aren't tough, if you don't pull out all the stops, you lose." So all of the conventions created in the wake of the Second World War - the Geneva Conventions, the very concept of war crimes - these are all just polite fictions to be crumpled? "Of course. The Seventh Infantry Division in 1945 used to drive their tanks around with the heads of defeated Japanese solders displayed proudly on the front. That's what we need to train our present-day soldiers to be." Returning to Vietnam, he adds that the French -- the colonial power preceding the Americans -- succeeded in Vietnam because "they were using the Foreign Legion, then manned almost completely by veterans from the most disciplined, ruthlessly efficient practitioners of all-out warfare in history: the Waffen SS."

Of course, what did you expect from someone who said:

G. Gordon Liddy's comment in 1995, when discussing how he'd used stick figures of the Clintons for target practice. "Thought it might improve my aim," he said.

Yes, this is John McCain's good friend and supporter. Liddy is the darling of the Freepers and the other right wing lunatics. He's a violent enemy of our nation, a traitor, a pathological liar, and a true domestic terrorist. He's also heard on 238 radio stations every weekday. So if Johnny Boy wants to play rough, I suggest we go G. Gordon Liddy on his ass.

Since McCain Can't Remember How Many Houses He Owns, Here's a Handy Guide

Click to enlarge!!

By Bush and Cheney's Standards, John McCain Was Never Tortured

Andrew Sullivan lays out the devastating case here. All of the horrifying and barbaric things done to John McCain have been called NOT TORTURE by Bush and his lawless criminal thugs. And here's the terrible truth:

But the actual techniques used on McCain, and the lies they were designed to legitimize, are a matter of historical record. And the government of the United States now practices the very same techniques that the Communist government of North Vietnam once proudly used against American soldiers. When they are used against future John McCains, the victims will know, in a way McCain didn't, that their own government has no moral standing to complain.

Now the kicker: in the Military Commissions Act, McCain acquiesced to the use of these techniques against terror suspects by the CIA. And so the tortured became the enabler of torture. Someone somewhere cried out in pain for the same reasons McCain once did. And McCain let it continue.

These are the prices people pay for power.

He Just Wants It, That's All

John McCain:

"I didn't decide to run for president to start a national crusade for the political reforms I believed in or to run a campaign as if it were some grand act of patriotism. In truth, I wanted to be president because it had become my ambition to become president. I was sixty-two years old when I made the decision, and I thought it was my one shot at the prize."

Ten years later, it's still the only reason he can think of.

More on McCain, the Anti-Veteran Veteran

Seems the only veteran John McCain gives a rat's ass about is himself.

What kind of low life bastard votes against the interest of disabled veterans 80% of the time?

The Anti-Veteran Veteran

Get a look at McCain's LOUSY, ANTI-VETERAN voting record here

To me, what's especially outrageous is this:

AFTER FIGHTING TOOTH AND NAIL AGAINST JIM WEBB'S GI BILL, MC CAIN TOOK CREDIT FOR IT WHEN IT PASSED!!

We have GOT to beat the hell out of this phony, lying, two-faced SOB.

Anti-McCain E-Mail Marches On!

Senator Do-Nothing, The D.C. Fraud

 

You’d think that if someone in the Senate was running for president, he’d at least have DONE something in his time there to merit consideration.

 

You know, that he’d be someone who has actually ACCOMPLISHED SOMETHING.

 

Yes, it’s really too bad that John McCain is a do-nothing fraud running for an office he doesn’t deserve.

 

What’s the record, you say? I’m glad you asked:

 

When Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal—a REPUBLICAN--was asked if he could think of ANY big idea McCain is campaigning on, he COULDN’T THINK OF ONE! Look here:

 

http://thinkprogress.org/2008/08/17/jindal-stumped-when-asked-to-new-big-ideas-that-mccain-is-proposing/

 

Former Governor Mitt Romney—a REPUBLICAN-- said he can’t think of ANY idea John McCain has ever had on energy policy. (But that’s OK—McCain just approved of whatever Bush and Cheney told him to.)

 

And legislative accomplishments? McCAIN’S OWN WEB SITE ONLY LISTS ONE IN ALMOST 22 YEARS IN THE SENATE—a law McCain no longer stands by!!

 

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/14582.html

 

The truth is, McCain has done virtually NOTHING in Congress. He talks big, but in the end, he simply supports Bush 95% of the time.

 

 

And you can’t tell what be believes, either. He’s FLIP-FLOPPED positions on major issues OVER SIXTY TIMES.

 

Here is a list of  SOME of the issues that McCain has FLIP FLOPPED on:

 

Social Security (he wants to PRIVATIZE it!)

The Iraq troop withdrawal

Tax Cuts

Roe v. Wade

Gay Marriage

Offshore drilling (he OPPOSED it until 2 months ago!)

Equal pay for women

 

HE’S DONE NOTHING. HE CHANGES POSITIONS LEFT AND RIGHT. HE STANDS FOR NOTHING. HIS POSE OF BEING A “MAVERICK” AND AN “INDEPENDENT” IS A FRAUD!

 

YOU CAN’T TRUST THIS GUY!!

Anti-McCain E-mail is ROCKIN'!

Check this one out!

Job Killer, American Dream Killer

You’ve seen him all over the place. He’s been on Saturday Night Live and Entertainment Tonight. He’s really quite a celebrity, one of the best known people in America. And he’s known for other things, too. Like owning eight (or is it ten?) houses, jetting around in his $12 million plane, wearing his $500 shoes, being worth $100 million…

and helping to kill American jobs.

It’s none other than the lobbyists’ best friend, John McCain!

In Ohio, one of McCain’s lobbyist friends (he’s got a LOT of them) helped arrange a buyout of Airborne Express by a German company. The lobbyist was paid almost $600,000 by the Germans. McCain pushed the deal hard in the Senate. Now it looks like 10,000, maybe THIRTY THOUSAND PEOPLE in Ohio will be out of work.

But the lobbyist who helped arrange it is doing just fine. He’s McCain’s campaign manager now. The details are here:

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-campaign8-2008aug08,0,6428374.story

But McCain has a LONG RECORD of being one of America’s top JOB KILLERS. The story is here:

http://firedoglake.com/2008/08/14/mccain-red-white-and-outsourced/

And think your Social Security is safe?

TOO BAD McCAIN WANTS TO LET THE BIG MONEY BOYS RUN IT!

Yes, McCain wants to PRIVATIZE Social Security. DON’T BE FOOLED BY HIS LIES WHEN HE SAYS HE DOESN’T WANT TO. THE FACTS SAY OTHERWISE!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bill-scher/mccain-lies-about-social_b_106862.html

And are you having trouble with your mortgage? You can give a big “thank you” to McCain’s chief economic advisor, Phil Gramm—the ULTIMATE WASHINGTON INSIDER—the guy who, more than ANYBODY, caused the subprime mortgage mess! The story is here:

http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2008/07/foreclosure-phil.html

Yes, McCain is willing to outsource your jobs, privatize your Social Security money, and let his rich cronies and campaign contributors wreck the housing market. He’s voted with Bush NINETY-FIVE PER CENT OF THE TIME, too.

McCain would be a DISASTER for America’s economic future and a DISASTER for its working people.

Hey, but he’ll be OK. He’s really rich, so guess what? He doesn’t care.

He doesn’t have to.

Foreign Policy Idiot McCain Strikes Again!

Did you know that the Russo-Georgian War is THE FIRST FOREIGN POLICY CRISIS SINCE THE END OF THE COLD WAR?!? John McCain said so. Josh Marshall is on the case (again):

John McCain says: "My friends, we have reached a crisis, the first probably serious crisis internationally since the end of the Cold War. This is an act of aggression."

Let's run-down the list. Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, followed by the US expulsion of Iraq from Kuwait. Collapse of Yugoslavia and subsequent wars of aggression between successor states. US invasion of Afghanistan. US invasion of Iraq. There are a slew of other examples of serious international crises over last 16-18 years.

Yes, this is the absolute moron that the Republicans want us to put in power. He'd like us to forget the last eight years. But guess what? We're not going to.

The Absolute Depths of Right-Wing Insanity

The not-so-subtle attempt to portray Barack Obama as the AntiChrist (!!!!!!!!) is aimed at stirring up fear and hatred in the evangelical voters that McCain must have in November. Time magazine has the story here. Excerpts:

Two months ago, [Mara] Vanderslice founded a Democratic PAC called the Matthew 25 Network and soon noticed that the negative e-mails she received from conservative Christians fell into two general topical categories: abortion, and the assertion that Obama is the Antichrist. The cataloging of similarities Obama shares with the Antichrist began nearly two years ago. But it picked up steam in February 2008 after he racked up a string of impressive primary victories. A Google search for "Obama" and "Antichrist" turns up more than 700,000 hits, including at least one blog dedicated solely to the topic. A more obscure search for "Obama" and "Nicolae Carpathia" yields a surprising 200,000 references.

It's not hard to see how some Obama haters might be tempted to make the comparison. In the Left Behind books, Carpathia is a junior Senator who speaks several languages, is beloved by people around the world and fawned over by a press corps that cannot see his evil nature, and rises to absurd prominence after delivering just one major speech. Hmmh. But serious Antichrist theorists don't stop there. Everything from Obama's left-handedness to his positive rhetoric to his appearance on the cover of this magazine has been cited as evidence of his true identity. One chain e-mail claims that the Antichrist was prophesied to be "A man in his 40s of MUSLIM descent," which would indeed sound ominous if not for the fact that the Book of Revelation was written at least 400 years before the birth of Islam.

The speculation reached a fever pitch after Obama's European trip and the Berlin speech in which he called for global unity. Conservative Christian author Hal Lindsey declared in an essay on WorldNetDaily, "Obama is correct in saying that the world is ready for someone like him — a messiah-like figure, charismatic and glib ... The Bible calls that leader the Antichrist. And it seems apparent that the world is now ready to make his acquaintance." The conservative website RedState.com now sells mugs and T shirts that sport a large "O" with horns and the words "The Anti-Christ" underneath.

If the sane and rational part of America cannot beat back the insane and irrational part of it, I really don't see much of a future for our country. The McCain campaign is plumbing the lowest depths of moral degeneracy here. McCain has accused Obama of being both a traitor and the representative of Satan. If this works--and it just might--it will show just how far down this nation has sunk intellectually. I will continue to fight like hell against McCain in my own tiny, little way. I hope you will help me, my dear readers, by contributing to Obama, circulating anti-McCain emails, and helping to register voters, fight against Republican vote fraud and vote suppression. This is the most important political fight of our lives. If we lose this one, we might not get America out of the death tailspin the conservatives have put it in--ever.

Wow! Yeah! VIRALIZE, Baby!

GREAT New Anti-McCain Mailer

From our allies and friends at the AFL-CIO

Lying Son of a Bitch Jerome Corsi Smearing Obama

The New York Times has the story here. Corsi, an ultra-right wing pathological liar, published a similar bullshit, lying hit job on John Kerry in 2004. I say it's time to cut this bastard off at the knees (metaphorically) and hit him back--hard.

Bush-McCain Economics at Work

This article here provides a useful summary of what's been happening in America under right-wing government. The rich have a greater concentration of wealth than at any time since 1928--the year before the Great Depression struck.

Further evidence of the situation the Republicans have put us in:

Over the last quarter-century the portion of the national income accruing to the richest 1 percent of Americans has doubled. The share going to the richest one-tenth of 1 percent has tripled, and the share going to the richest one one-hundredth of 1 percent has quadrupled. In 2005, the wealthiest 1 percent of the country earned 21.2 percent of all income, according to IRS data, while the bottom 50 percent of all Americans earned just 12.8 percent of all income, down from 13.4 percent a year earlier. For working people, wages and salaries now make up the lowest share of the nation’s gross domestic product since the process of collecting this data began more than 60 years ago; meanwhile, in the period since 2000 the number of Americans living below the poverty line has increased by nearly a third. (Those statistics can be found in Why We’re Liberals.) [Eric Alterman, author.]

This is the glorious economic program that John McCain promises to continue.

How can any rational person vote for such a man?

"Dangerous and Unstable"

Josh Marshall gets it exactly right. I feel compelled to steal, er, I mean, share his post today in full:

DANGEROUS AND UNSTABLE

I know I've made this point in various ways in several posts over the last day or so. But watching John McCain speak about the Georgian crisis in the video below should deeply worry anyone interested in a sane US foreign policy -- or the safety of their children. One arch joke from the earlier part of this decade was that the one good thing about the neocons obsession with getting into a war with Iraq was that it distracted them from their much bigger obsessions -- ratcheting up Cold Wars with China and/or Russia.

The people that are pulling McCain's strings are the people who want to push us into a new Cold War with the Russians -- and ironically and a bit improbably with the Chinese too. But the Russians are probably more willing to oblige us since their power remains limited to oil reserves and military power. In other words, they're people McCain's folks can understand and vice versa.

McCain is going out of his way to cast this as a replay of 1938 and 1939. Is it really in our interest to get into a renewed Cold War with Russia right now? Do we have the military resources for a proxy/advisor war in the Caucasus at the moment? Should we find ourselves in the situation where the Russians want to reassert their sway in Eastern Europe, we would have some very serious and consequential decisions to make. But this just is not that. The key is that McCain, both in terms of policy and temperament, wants to court that result.

It's sort of funny when he's just an unhinged senator. But think for a moment where we'd be if this man were president right now, as he may well be in six months. This man takes the counsel of the people who got us into the Iraq War. On foreign policy, he is in league with the people who were so extreme they've now largely been kicked out of the Bush administration. People like John Bolton and others like him.

It's beyond Obama or political strategy or dinging McCain on this or that policy.

This man is simply too dangerous and unstable to be president. People need to wake up and get a look of the preview he's giving us of a McCain presidency.

Random Thoughts

*The anthrax attacks in the autumn of 2001 killed 5 people and helped whip up a frenzy of support for the so-called Patriot Act. We were led to believe foreign terrorists had unleashed the attacks. Now we find the anthrax originated from a U.S. government lab. Glenn Greenwald has been ALL over this, and you should read his superb pieces on the subject. BTW, it's his opinion that the poor dead schmuck that's been blamed for all this might not have done it by himself--or even at all.

Who did this? And why were two Democratic senators targeted? Why has this act of RIGHT WING TERRORISM been ignored?

*Ron Suskind has uncovered solid evidence that the Bush Administration FABRICATED EVIDENCE to gain support for the catastrophic Iraq War. Want to bet whether anyone in the corporate media will make a big deal out of this?

*John McCain continues to lie with impunity in every phase of his campaign. He has lied about every single one of Obama's positions, and hired the same group of Karl Rove trained sewer rats and vote suppression experts Bush used in 2004 and 2000 to STEAL THOSE ELECTIONS. McCain is a dishonorable man running a dishonorable campaign. If we elect this reckless, irresponsible clown to office, we deserve to go down the drain as a nation.

*By the way, McCain has virtually no legislative accomplishments of any kind to show for his almost 22 years in the Senate. The McCain-Feingold campaign finance law is universally reviled by right wingers. Other than that, nothing of any significance.  However, it should be noted that even knowing that there were no WMDs in Iraq he would still vote to do the whole g-d damned thing all over again. It should also be noted that McCain has more lobbyists and right-wing fruitcakes working for him than almost anyone else ever has.

*Someone will have to explain to me how a guy who was raised by a single mother, earned scholarships by his excellent academic work to go to good schools, made his money by his own writing and owns one house is an "elitist" while another person who was born into a powerful and influential family, got into Annapolis as a legacy, was almost kicked out (and would have been if he had been anyone else's kid), finished fifth from the bottom, married a wealthy young heiress after callously dumping his first wife, is worth $100,000,000, has eight different homes, and wears $500 shoes is a "regular guy".

*If you're a Democrat, Independent, or fed-up Republican and you haven't contributed to Obama, now is the time. Hit it right here, baby!

What's At Stake in This Election

Please, please, please spread this video around:

Cokie Roberts is a G-d Damned Idiot and a Lying Republican Shill

She has actually criticized Barack Obama for going on vacation in Hawaii because it's too "exotic" and it will offend average Americans.

I guess nobody told Roberts that Obama was born in Hawaii, went to high school there, and still has family there.

I further guess that no one told Roberts that Hawaii was admitted to the Union almost 50 years ago.

In truth, there is NOTHING that Obama can do that the McCain loving whores of the national media like Roberts will NOT criticize or smear him with. Roberts gets a lot of speaking fees from corporate interests, and she is now simply one of their many mouthpieces in the national media. In other words, she's a lying right-wing hack. There are so many of them, however, that you may not have noticed.

Fox "News" STILL Trying to Smear Obama With "Muslim" Charge

Fox "News" never lets up, never stops lying, never stops smearing, never stops the false attacks, never stops the outright bullshit.

Screw these Fox assholes. Seriously, screw every damned one of them.

I'm Glad We Didn't Nominate Edwards

The revelation of his affair would have been a disaster for the Democrats. My faith in Edwards was misplaced, and I feel a sense of anger and betrayal.

Yes, Edwards' political career is over.

So why isn't John  McCain's? He cheated on and dumped his seriously injured first wife to marry a rich heiress, allowing him to finance his political rise.

But I guess it's OK if you're a Republican.

Anti-McCain E-mail On the March!

Don’t Like Women? That’s OK, Neither Does He

You ever get the feeling that some guys just really don’t like women at all, or care what they think, or respect them?

Seems John McCain is one of them.

He’s decided that a woman shouldn’t be able to end a pregnancy EVEN IF IT’S GOING TO KILL HER. The story is here:

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/Vote2008/story?id=4824779&page=1

Yes, he’s going to let the right-wing radicals who run the Republican Party push for outlawing abortion even if a woman has been brutally raped.

Even if she’s a 14 year old violated by her own father.

Even if she might die if the pregnancy is brought to term.

And speaking of rape, McCain thinks a joke about a woman being beaten and raped is just hilarious:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/07/15/sources-recall-mccains-jo_n_112955.html

And it’s not just McCain’s determination to overturn Roe v. Wade. On a whole host of issues, he’s against women’s rights:

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/06/07/mccain-and-womens-issues-its-more-than-just-roe/

He voted against requiring health care plans to cover birth control (3/22/03).
He voted against comprehensive, medically accurate sex education (7/25/06).
He voted against international family planning funding (3/14/96).
He voted against funding to prevent teen and unintended pregnancies (3/17/05).
He voted against public education for emergency contraception (3/17/05).
And he voted against restoring Medicaid funding that could be used for family planning for low-income women (3/17/05)



Of course, McCain cheated on his loyal, devoted first wife and dumped her for someone with a lot more money. His first wife wasn’t attractive to him any more. But I guess being in a car wreck does cut down on your sex appeal.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1024927/The-wife-John-McCain-callously-left-behind.html

And this whole “equal pay for women” thing? McCain says he’s for it—but when the chips are down he votes against it:

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2008/04/24/by_juliet_eilperin_washington.html

And much worse even than that...McCain VOTED AGAINST the Violence Against Women Act!!

http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=103&session=2&vote=00295


Yes, McCain thinks that women are basically 2nd rate people who can’t be allowed to make their own decisions. But there’s one way McCain puts his wife out front and center:

He said she should enter a topless beauty pageant.

http://digg.com/political_opinion/McCain_Sturgis_Miss_Buffalo_Chip

Wow. What a guy. Just what we need.

To go back to the 19th century.

Oh, and don't miss these HILARIOUS examples of John McCain dealing with women:
"How do we beat the bitch?"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WLQGWpRVA7o

"Why is Chelsea Clinton so ugly?"

http://www.salon.com/news/1998/06/25newsb.html

"C--t" (to his own wife):

http://rawstory.com/news/2008/McCain_temper_boiled_over_in_92_0407.html

Obama Makes a Fool of the Idiot Republicans

And laughs while doing it. I love it!

Barack Obama Hammers McCain's Energy Lies

John McCain said that our energy crisis was 30 years in the making. In regard to that, Senator Obama responded:

"What Senator McCain neglected to mention was that during those thirty years, he was in Washington for twenty-six of them," said the Senator. "And in all that time, he did little to reduce our dependence on foreign oil. He voted against increased fuel efficiency standards and opposed legislation that included tax credits for more efficient cars. He voted against renewable sources of energy. Against clean biofuels. Against solar power. Against wind power. Against an energy bill that -- while far from perfect -- represented the largest investment in renewable sources of energy in the history of this country. So when Senator McCain talks about the failure of politicians in Washington to do anything about our energy crisis, it's important to remember that he's been a part of that failure."

Yes! More of this, please, Senator. Like every day from now until 4 November.

Just Call Him Oily John

Because McCain is totally, utterly, and completely in the pocket of Big Oil. The slick details can be found here.

BTW, McCain's campaign contributions from Big Oil really took off when he switched positions on off-shore drilling (which MIGHT yield 1% a day of our needs by 2020).  McCain's lips were applied to Big Oil's ass, and Big Oil's money started to grease old Johnny Boy's palms. 

Quite a trade.

On the Death of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, who had more to do with stripping any trace of legitimacy from the Soviet system than any other human, died yesterday at the age of 89. Solzhenitsyn had lived a life so remarkable that it almost defies belief. Born in 1918 into a world convulsed by revolutionary upheaval, Solzhenitsyn later served in the Red Army as an artillery officer in the Second World War, and saw war in its most brutal form. Arrested for a trivial criticism of Joseph Stalin (in a letter), he spent eight bitter years in the hideous Soviet penal system and three more in internal exile. Diagnosed with cancer during his term of exile, he experienced the full depths of Soviet "medical care".  Utterly transformed by these experiences, he decided to take on the profoundly evil and corrupt Soviet government. He began a remarkable career as a writer. He exposed the brutality of the Soviet camp system, especially in his massive, epic work, The Gulag Archipelago, one of the great achievements of the 20th century. Gulag opened the eyes of millions of people everywhere to the obscenities of Stalinism and delegitimized Communism more thoroughly than any other written work ever has. For that reason alone Solzhenitsyn would be remembered as a significant historical figure. But he also won the Nobel Prize for literature in recognition of his towering novels, such as Cancer Ward.  Exiled from the USSR in 1974, he continued his campaign, from his new home in the United States, against the alien system that had devastated his native country . After Communism's long overdue collapse, he returned to Russia to live out the rest of his life.

In his latter years, Solzhenitsyn became increasingly anti-democratic in his orientation, more a traditional Russian Orthodox figure in many ways, and a harsh critic of the "degenerate" West. But none of this should detract from his greatness. Solzhenitsyn was able to achieve what he did because he was afraid of absolutely nothing. And really, after all he had been through, what terrors could life throw at him? He will always be remembered as a giant of world literature and one of the great figures of his time. I will always be grateful to him, and he will always stand with Andrei Sakharov as one of my heroes in the struggle for human decency and human justice.

A Stunning New Ticket

McCain's Lying, BS Campaign

A Great Anti-McCain Email I Saw

I encourage all of you to circulate it as widely as you can. Just cut 'n' paste, baby!

How to Cheat on Your Wife and Profit From It

A lot of people only see John McCain’s fashionable, glamorous blond wife, Cindy.

You know, the one that buys him the $500 shoes and says that you just have
to have a private plane to get around a state the size of Arizona.

They don’t see the woman McCain dumped to marry her.

You know, his first wife, Carol.

The one that waited for him while he was being held captive, the one that
raised their children by herself during that time.

And the one that was severely injured in a terrible car accident in late 1969.

You can read all the sad details here.

Carol was no longer attractive enough for McCain, I guess. Personal loyalty doesn’t seem to be his strong suit. Not long after they were reunited, McCain began running around with other women. In 1979 he met Cindy, carrying on an adulterous affair with her. Cindy was young, beautiful, and part of a family that was super-rich.

I guess Carol didn’t stand a chance. McCain even applied for a marriage license to Cindy while still married to Carol. That’s low. McCain’s friends, including Ronald and Nancy Reagan, were shocked by McCain’s actions.

Once married to Cindy, John McCain was able to use her vast wealth to finance his rise to the top. Guess Carol wouldn’t have been very good at that.

Ross Perot, who paid Carol’s medical bills, put it best:

McCain is the classic opportunist. He’s always reaching for attention and glory,’

‘After he came home, Carol walked with a limp. So he threw her over for a poster girl with big money from Arizona. And the rest is history.’

Just thought you should know what kind of “honorable” man McCain really is.