“When I heard about the story, I had to figure out what was going on for myself,” said Mark Ellis, the chairman of the Maine Republican Party. “When I found out what this was about I had to ask, ‘Boy, what’s the big deal here?’ because there wasn’t any.”
Alabama Republican Committeeman Paul Reynolds said the fact the Saltsman sent him a CD with the song on it “didn’t bother me one bit.”
Republican Party officials say they will try next month to pass a resolution accusing President Bush and congressional Republican leaders of embracing "socialism," underscoring deep dissension within the party at the end of Mr. Bush's administration.
Those pushing the resolution, which will come before the Republican National Committee at its January meeting, say elected leaders need to be reminded of core principles. They said the RNC must take the dramatic step of wading into policy debates, which traditionally have been left to lawmakers.
Banks that have their hands out in Washington this year were handing out multimillion-dollar rewards to their executives last year.
The 116 banks that so far have received taxpayer dollars to boost them through the economic crisis gave their top tier of executives nearly $1.6 billion in salaries, bonuses and other benefits in 2007, an Associated Press analysis found.
That amount, spread among the 600 highest paid bank executives, would cover the bailout money given to 53 of the banks that have shared the $188 billion that Washington has doled out in rescue packages so far.
Democratic challenger Al Franken for the first time took a lead over Sen. Norm Coleman in an ongoing recount in Minnesota, the Star Tribune reported.
According to the paper's running tally of ballot challenge results, Franken held a 112-vote lead as of midday Friday.
A 55-year-old Texas man faces charges of sexually molesting children after a young relative wrote a letter to Santa Claus asking him to stop the abuse as a Christmas gift to her.
The man was arrested after authorities were alerted to the letter written as a class project by a nine-year-old girl, the McAllen Monitor newspaper reported.
The girl pleaded with Father Christmas to put an end to the abuse, which she said was also occurring to her 10-year-old sister, the paper said.
It did not say how the man was related to the two girls.
The man, who has worked for the local school district for 11 years, allegedly abused one girl from 2004 to 2008 and the other from January to December, the criminal complaints said.
If convicted he could face at least 50 years in prison.
Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich has gained notoriety for his involvement in a pay-to-play corruption scandal -- but is it possible that he was once a petty criminal?
Attorney and former police officer Robert Cooley claims that back when he was doing undercover work for the FBI in the late 1980's, Blagojevich was a bookie on the North Side of Chicago who was making payoffs to the mob.
Cooley said in a web interview last week, "I observed Rod, the present governor, who was running a gambling operation out in the western suburbs, he was paying street tax to the mob out there."
KARL: Did you authorize the tactics that were used against Khalid Sheikh Mohammed?
CHENEY: I was aware of the program, certainly, and involved in helping get the process cleared, as the agency, in effect, came in and wanted to know what they could and couldn't do. And they talked to me, as well as others, to explain what they wanted to do. And I supported it.
KARL: In hindsight, do you think any of those tactics that were used against Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and others went too far?
CHENEY: I don't.
KARL: And on KSM, one of those tactics, of course, widely reported was waterboarding. And that seems to be a tactic we no longer use. Even that you think was appropriate?
CHENEY: I do.
Iraqi TV al-Sharqiya just reported on the news that AL-Zaidi is transferred to Camp Cropper prison [the Airport prison, managed by the American forces].
The TV Channel announced that Al-Zaidi is in a difficult condition, with broken ribs and signs of tortures on his thighs. Also he can not move his right arm.
P.S.
I am just telling you what I heard on TV.
A. Marriage in the United States shall consist of a union between one man and one or more women. (Gen 29:17-28; II Sam 3:2-5)
B. Marriage shall not impede a man's right to take concubines in addition to his wife or wives. (II Sam 5:13; I Kings 11:3; II Chron 11:21)
C. A marriage shall be considered valid only if the wife is a virgin. If the wife is not a virgin, she shall be executed. (Deut 22:13-21)
D. Marriage of a believer and a non-believer shall be forbidden. (Gen 24:3; Num 25:1-9; Ezra 9:12; Neh 10:30)
E. Since marriage is for life, neither this Constitution nor the constitution of any State, nor any state or federal law, shall be construed to permit divorce. (Deut 22:19; Mark 10:9)
F. If a married man dies without children, his brother shall marry the widow. If he refuses to marry his brother's widow or deliberately does not give her children, he shall pay a fine of one shoe and be otherwise punished in a manner to be determined by law. (Gen 38:6-10; Deut 25:5-10)
G. In lieu of marriage, if there are no acceptable men in your town, it is required that you get your dad drunk and have sex with him (even if he had previously offered you up as a sex toy to men young and old), tag-teaming with any sisters you may have. Of course, this rule applies only if you are female. (Gen 19:31-36)
You are reading the headline correctly. Bill O'Reilly really has no material to work with on his phony "War on Christmas" theme-based show, so he's resorted to just making sh&t up. F&F's Gretchen Carlson is all fired up too over the big Christmas crisis so far. The only incident that he's been really passionate about because -- there ain't nothin' to complain about anywhere else -- is in Washington state. David gives you the back story:
According to Bill O'Reilly, it's the fact that an atheist group was permitted to erect a holiday display alongside a Nativity scene at the state Capitol in Washington state...read on
What really got Gretchen was a possible exhibit for the great "Festivus" holiday from Seinfield being proposed too. Hey, she can take only so much.
NASA administrator Mike Griffin is not cooperating with President-elect Barack Obama’s transition team, is obstructing its efforts to get information and has told its leader that she is “not qualified” to judge his rocket program, the Orlando Sentinel has learned.
In a heated 40-minute conversation last week with Lori Garver, a former NASA associate administrator who heads the space transition team, a red-faced Griffin demanded to speak directly to Obama, according to witnesses.
In addition, Griffin is scripting NASA employees and civilian contractors on what they can tell the transition team and has warned aerospace executives not to criticize the agency’s moon program, sources said.
The attorney for Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich said the governor will be vindicated and has no plans to resign.
"He didn't do anything wrong," attorney Sheldon Sorosky told reporters after Blagojevich appeared in court on Tuesday. "A lot of this is just politics."
Blagojevich should be in the office on Wednesday, Sorosky added.
So, reporters asked, he doesn’t intend to resign?
"Not that I know of, no," said Sorosky, who added that the governor was "surprised" by the day's events, but his spirits are “good.”
Blagojevich was arrested before sunrise Tuesday on corruption charges and had a bond hearing at 2:30 p.m. the Dirksen Federal Courthouse.
Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich of Illinois was arrested by federal authorities on Tuesday morning on corruption charges, including an allegation that he conspired to effectively sell President-elect Barack Obama’s seat in the United States Senate to the highest bidder.
Mr. Blagojevich, a Democrat, called his sole authority to name Mr. Obama’s successor “golden,” and he sought to parlay it into a job as an ambassador or secretary of Health and Human Services, or a high-paying position at a nonprofit or an organization connected to labor unions, prosecutors said.
He also suggested, they said, that in exchange for the Senate appointment, his wife could be placed on corporate boards where she might earn as much as $150,000 a year, and he tried to gain promises of money for his campaign fund.
If Mr. Blagojevich could not secure a deal to his liking, prosecutors said, he was willing to appoint himself.
What if the McCain campaign had run ads using footage of Barack Obama dancing with Ellen DeGeneres to show his coziness with celebrity? Or followed up on its Paris Hilton ad with others featuring Donald Trump and Jessica Simpson? All of that was on the drawing board of Fred Davis III, the advertising whiz that John McCain has used for almost all of his campaign media and one of the most talented conservative political operatives in America. Oh yes, he also had an Internet ad up his sleeve that would attack Obama's celebrity by associating him with Oprah. But in the end, he scotched that one. "We decided you don't really fight Santa Claus or Oprah," he says, "so we removed her."
Could Caroline Kennedy, considered to be among the most private members of the Kennedy clan, be tapped to fill Hillary Clinton's Senate seat?
Kennedy — who endorsed Barack Obama in February before the Super Tuesday round of primaries — is said to be considering the possibility, according to an ABC News report.
New York Gov. David Patterson, the man tasked with picking Hillary Clinton's successor, is remaining mum on the process, but a spokesman for Barack Obama issued a statement in the wake of rumors the president-elect is quietly lobbying Patterson to choose Kennedy.
"President-elect Obama has a very high regard for Caroline Kennedy," said Obama spokesman Stephanie Cutter. "But he has not spoken with Governor Paterson or Caroline Kennedy about the race, and has no involvement in this process."
Bill O'Reilly has formally confirmed he's giving up one of the most successful syndicated radio shows in the country, saying he has just run out of hours in the week.
O'Reilly said the radio show, which he launched in May 2002, will end "in the first quarter of next year." Most of the time he saves, he said, will go into his top-rated Fox News Channel show.
Gov. Sarah Palin’s traveling makeup artist was paid $68,400 and her hair stylist received more than $42,000 for roughly two months of work, according to a new campaign finance report filed with the Federal Election Commission.
Ms. Palin’s makeup artist, Amy Strozzi — who was nominated for an Emmy award for her cosmetics work on the television show “So You Think You Can Dance?” — was paid $32,400 by Senator John McCain’s presidential campaign between Oct. 16 and Nov. 24, the period covered by the most recent reports filed with the commission.
This amount came on top of the $36,000 she had already been paid in previous reports, dating back to September.
In addition, Ms. Palin’s traveling hair stylist, Angela Lew, was paid a total of $42,225, with $23,400 coming during the period covered by the latest reports to the commission, which were due at midnight on Thursday.
Al Franken's campaign announced on Wednesday that, for the first time since the Minnesota recount began, the Democrat has actually pulled ahead of Republican Sen. Norm Coleman.
Speaking on a conference call with reporters, Franken's chief counsel Marc Elias said the campaign's own internal count showed them up 22 votes, a jump from the 13 vote deficit that they faced on Tuesday.
President-elect Barack Obama announced Monday that Robert Gates would remain as defense secretary, making President Bush's Pentagon chief his own as he seeks to wind down the U.S. role in Iraq. Obama picked former campaign rival Hillary Rodham Clinton as secretary of state.
At a news conference, Obama also introduced his picks of retired Marine Gen. James Jones as White House national security adviser, former Justice Department official Eric Holder as attorney general, Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano as secretary of homeland security, and Susan Rice as UN Ambassador.
Looking back on his eight years in the White House, President George W. Bush pinpointed incorrect intelligence that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction as "biggest regret of all the presidency."
"I think I was unprepared for war," Bush told ABC News' Charlie Gibson in an interview airing today on "World News."
"In other words, I didn't campaign and say, 'Please vote for me, I'll be able to handle an attack,'" he said. "In other words, I didn't anticipate war. Presidents -- one of the things about the modern presidency is that the unexpected will happen."
The technology can generate electricity in water flowing at a rate of less than one knot - about one mile an hour - meaning it could operate on most waterways and sea beds around the globe.
Existing technologies which use water power, relying on the action of waves, tides or faster currents created by dams, are far more limited in where they can be used, and also cause greater obstructions when they are built in rivers or the sea. Turbines and water mills need an average current of five or six knots to operate efficiently, while most of the earth's currents are slower than three knots.
The new device, which has been inspired by the way fish swim, consists of a system of cylinders positioned horizontal to the water flow and attached to springs.
As water flows past, the cylinder creates vortices, which push and pull the cylinder up and down. The mechanical energy in the vibrations is then converted into electricity.
I no longer recognize marriage. It’s a new thing I’m trying.
Turns out it’s fun.
Yesterday I called a woman’s spouse her boyfriend.
She says, correcting me, “He’s my husband,”
“Oh,” I say, “I no longer recognize marriage.”
The impact is obvious. I tried it on a man who has been in a relationship for years,
“How’s your longtime companion, Jill?”
“She’s my wife!”
“Yeah, well, my beliefs don’t recognize marriage.”
A Miami judge has struck a blow against a Florida law banning adoptions of children by gay people.
Miami Dade Circuit Judge Cindy Lederman ruled Tuesday there was "no rational basis" for prohibiting gays from adopting children.
The ruling will allow 47-year-old Martin Gill to adopt two young brothers he has cared for as foster children since 2004.
Florida has one of the strictest bans on gay adoptions in the country. A judge in Key West ruled in September that the ban was unconstitutional, but that ruling has had limited legal impact.
As we wrote yesterday evening, the ever-increasing number of challenged ballots in Minnesota is making it more and more difficult to determine the extent to which Al Franken is in fact gaining ground in the state's recount process. An analysis of precinct-by-precinct returns available on the Secretary of State's website, however, suggests that Franken's position is somewhat stronger than it appears, and that he may in fact be the favorite to prevail in the recount process.
The four Iowans arrested while attempting to perform a citizen’s arrest of Karl Rove during a visit to Des Moines in July were found guilty of trespassing today in Iowa District Court in Polk County.
Methodist minister Chet Guinn, 80, as well as three Des Moines Catholic Workers, Edward Bloomer, 61, Kirk Brown, 25, and Mona Shaw, 57, were arrested at the Wakonda Country Club where Rove was scheduled to speak at a Republican Party fundraiser.They accused him of felony murder, election fraud, conspiracy to commit offense or defraud the United States leading to the war in Iraq, as well as treason, sedition and subversive activities.
Sally Frank, attorney for the defendants, said in court that she will file a motion to set aside the verdict and that the verdict will be appealed if the motion is denied.
Judge Colin Witt sentenced three of the defendants to the minimum $65 fine plus court costs. The fourth, Brown, said he could not in conscience pay the fine and was sentenced to one day in jail instead.
Just in time for the holidays, we bring you the latest YouTube sensation: A video of Sarah Palin talking to reporters on a turkey farm yesterday while, in the background, a farm worker slaughters turkeys and drains their blood.
The gruesome footage was shot at a farm in Gov. Palin's hometown of Wasilla, Alaska. She was there to grant the traditional Thanksgiving pardon to one turkey.
You can watch what happens to the turkeys who weren't pardoned below. But be warned: it is not for the faint of heart.
Hillary Rodham Clinton has decided to give up her Senate seat and accept the position of secretary of state, making her the public face around the world for the administration of the man who beat her for the Democratic presidential nomination, two confidants said Friday.
The apparent accord between perhaps the two leading figures in the Democratic Party climaxed a week-long drama that riveted the nation’s capital.
U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe said Saturday that Congress was not told the truth about the bailout of the nation's financial system and should take back what is left of the $700 billion "blank check'' it gave the Bush administration.
"It is just outrageous that the American people don't know that Congress doesn't know how much money he (Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson) has given away to anyone,'' the Oklahoma Republican told the Tulsa World.
"It could be to his friends. It could be to anybody else. We don't know. There is no way of knowing.''
Rep. Eric Cantor of Virginia, poised to ascend to House Republicans' No. 2 leader this week, said the Republican Party in Washington is no longer "relevant" to voters and must stop simply espousing principles. Instead, it must craft real solutions to health care and the economy.
"Where we have really fallen down is, we have lacked the ability to be relevant to people's lives. Let's set aside the last eight years, and our falling down in living up to expectations of what we said we were going to do," Mr. Cantor told The Washington Times in his district office outside of Richmond. "It's the relevancy question."
As chief deputy whip, Mr. Cantor, 45, was the logical choice to move up when Republicans' current whip, Rep. Roy Blunt, stepped aside - something Mr. Blunt announced days after Republicans lost at least 20 seats in the House.
The ENQUIRER's exclusive bombshell expose as Sen. John McCain's wife, Cindy, is caught with another man!
Not only that but multiple witnesses have caught the pair lip locking on several other occasions.
"I couldn't believe I was watching Cindy McCain passionately kissing and hugging another man!"
That's the stunned reaction of an eyewitness who says he watched in shock - and snapped photos - as the former presidential candidate's wife romantically kissed a long-haired man who resembles "a washed-up '80s rock musician."
It was among the juicier post-election recriminations: Fox News Channel quoted an unnamed McCain campaign figure as saying that Sarah Palin did not know that Africa was a continent.
Who would say such a thing? On Monday the answer popped up on a blog and popped out of the mouth of David Shuster, an MSNBC anchor. “Turns out it was Martin Eisenstadt, a McCain policy adviser, who has come forward today to identify himself as the source of the leaks,” Mr. Shuster said.
Trouble is, Martin Eisenstadt doesn’t exist. His blog does, but it’s a put-on. The think tank where he is a senior fellow — the Harding Institute for Freedom and Democracy — is just a Web site. The TV clips of him on YouTube are fakes.
Democratic challenger Mark Begich leads by 814 votes in his bid to oust incumbent Alaska Senator Ted Stevens, according to the state's elections division.
Alaska is still counting absentee ballots from the Nov. 4 election. Anchorage Mayor Begich had been trailing Stevens by 3,257 votes until state officials started counting approximately 90,000 absentee ballots yesterday, a process that may stretch in to next week.
Begich now leads Stevens 132,196 votes to 131,382 votes, according to the Alaska Division of Elections Web site.
We've found that certain search terms are good indicators of flu activity. Google Flu Trends uses aggregated Google search data to estimate flu activity in your state up to two weeks faster than traditional systems
"It may sound a bit crazy and off base, but the thing is, he's the one who proposed this national security force," Rep. Paul Broun said of Obama in an interview Monday with The Associated Press. "I'm just trying to bring attention to the fact that we may -- may not, I hope not -- but we may have a problem with that type of philosophy of radical socialism or Marxism."
Broun cited a July speech by Obama that has circulated on the Internet in which the then-Democratic presidential candidate called for a civilian force to take some of the national security burden off the military.
"That's exactly what Hitler did in Nazi Germany and it's exactly what the Soviet Union did," Broun said. "When he's proposing to have a national security force that's answering to him, that is as strong as the U.S. military, he's showing me signs of being Marxist."
A judge cleared the way Wednesday for gay marriage to begin Wednesday in Connecticut, a victory for advocates stung by California's referendum that banned same-sex unions in that state.
Couples immediately marched to New Haven City Hall to get marriage licenses, and less than two hours after the final court hearing, Peg Oliveira and Jennifer Vickery were married in a brief ceremony next to New Haven City Hall.
"I feel so happy," said Vickery, a 44-year-old attorney who has a 3-month-old baby with Oliveira. "It's so much more emotional than I expected."
And while he concedes his behavior was "extraordinarily stupid," he remains somewhat unwilling to accept full public scorn.
These were 17-year-olds, just months from being men, he insists.
"There was never anywhere in those conversations where someone said, 'Stop,' or 'I'm not enjoying this,' or 'This is inappropriate'
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Senate Democrats move on healthcare
Email|Link|Comments (1) Posted by Foon Rhee, deputy national political editor November 12, 2008 01:00 PM
A key Senate Democrat unveiled a healthcare reform plan today -- the first move by congressional Democrats to push President-elect Barack Obama to move on the issue quickly after his inauguration.
The proposal from Finance Chairman Max Baucus of Montana -- whose staff has reportedly been working for months with the staff of Senator Edward M. Kennedy, of Massachusetts -- echoes key elements of Obama's campaign proposals, including expanding Medicaid and the children's healthcare program. It also is similar to the landmark plan in Massachusetts.
But like the plan offered by Obama's former rival, Hillary Clinton, it requires people to get coverage while offering subsidies to those who can't afford it. Obama didn't include the individual mandate in his campaign proposals, saying it was more important to make coverage affordable so that people would get it without a requirement.
Baucus told reporters that he talked to Kennedy this morning, and while he wouldn't disclose the conversation, he suggested they are on the same page.
President-elect Barack Obama has informed party officials that he wants Joe Lieberman to continue caucusing with the Democrats in the 111th Congress, Senate aides tell the Huffington Post.
Obama's decision could tie the hands of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who has been negotiating to remove Lieberman as chair of the Homeland Security and Government Reform committee while keeping him within the caucus. Lieberman has insisted that he will split from the Democrats if his homeland security position is stripped.
Former Vermont governor Howard Dean, who rose to national prominence during a failed bid for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2004, will not seek a second term as chairman of the Democratic National Committee, clearing the way for a loyalist of President-elect Barack Obama to be named to the soon to be vacant post.
"These are good decent steady men who don't go around flipping people off or screaming 'fuck you' at the top of their lungs," Scarborough said, (about the 2:30 point in the below video).
The host apparently was oblivious that he had let the word slip; he was praising Barack Obama and the president-elect's stable of campaign advisers, contrasting them with the bare-knuckled approach of incoming chief of staff Rahm Emanuel.
Keith Olbermann, the anchor of “Countdown,” will remain at MSNBC through the next presidential election season, the cable news channel announced Monday afternoon.
The announcement came less than two years into Mr. Olbermann’s current four-year deal. MSNBC essentially tore up his February 2007 contract (reported to be worth up to $4 million a year) and wrote a new one, according to two employees with knowledge of the agreement. The new contract is valued at about $7.5 million a year, one of the people said.
John McCain’s running mate was also said to have stunned aides by turning up at an important briefing at her hotel in just a towel.
Devastating leaks about Palin, 44, emerged on Fox News as McCain aides tried to blame her for the crushing election defeat.
The story of the campaign and this historic moment has been your story. Share your story and your ideas, and be part of bringing positive lasting change to this country.
I have a confession to make.
I did not vote for Barack Obama today.
I’ve openly supported Obama since March. But I didn’t vote for him today.
An exasperated McCain has been telling friends in recent weeks that Palin is even more trouble than a pitbull.
In one joke doing the rounds, the Republican presidential candidate has been asking friends: what is the difference between Sarah Palin and a pitbull? The friendly canine eventually lets go, is the McCain punchline.
There are many things the Republican party did not seem to prepare for in the current election cycle. Economic catastrophe, youth voter turnout, dressing their VP candidate without dropping six figures. But by far their biggest hurdle has been presented by one unexpected tactic of the elite liberal media: the follow up question.
Sarah Palin was done for when asked for specific examples of what she read, believed, and had done in office.
And now, John McCain spokesperson Michael Goldfarb goes on CNN to make allegations about Barack Obama's anti-semetic friends, but then fails to come up with one name when pressed by Rick Sanchez.
"I think that there's a certain segment of hardcore Sean Hannity fans that probably wouldn't want to go have a beer with me. But I think for the average voter, they're saying to themselves, 'What's all this stuff about? I'm trying to think about hanging onto my house.'"
"I said today that I think they found proof that when I was in kindergarten I shared my toys with some friends, and that's clearly a sign of subversive activity. But the socialism thing doesn't fly too well."
Cavuto: Frankly, neither of your numbers adds up. But I’ve come to see a consistent pattern in Obama's. For the life of me, Senator Straight Talk, I see no such straight thing with yours.
{snip}
You rail against big government, yet continue to push cockamamie spending plans that make a mockery of it. That's why you're losing right now, Senator McCain.
Not because you don't have the courage of your convictions. But because on economic matters, you have no convictions, period
The virus causes haemorrhagic disease - meaning it can cause internal and external bleeding. The first victim was a woman from Zambia flown to South Africa for treatment. A paramedic who accompanied her and a nurse from the clinic where she was taken also died.
CBS News has obtained a copy of the complaint that Frank Gwartney, a retired lineman in Anchorage filed last Friday, with Alaska’s Attorney General, Talis Colber in Juneau. “Palin ran on the platform of ethics, transparency and anti-corruption. I’m tired of the hypocrisy that exists in Government and people need to know the truth,” said Gwartney.
The complaint against Governor Palin, alleges Misuse of Official Position: “Gov. Palin attempted to and in fact did use her official position for personal gain by securing unwarranted benefits for her daughters...” All the allegations contained in the complaint are related to state reimbursed travel.
The cast of "The Wire" needs you to get out and get involved at http://NC.BarackObama.com/
Federal judges have ordered Georgia elections officials to stop using Social Security numbers and driver's licenses to check voters' immigration status until the U.S. Justice Department decides whether to approve the process.
Georgia is one of several states that needs federal approval before changing election policy because of a history of discriminatory voting practices.
The three-judge panel's 27-page ruling Monday orders Georgia officials to make "diligent and immediate" efforts to notify voters who have been flagged as ineligible.
It also blocks the state from removing flagged names from voter lists unless voters say in writing that they are ineligible.
For the past two months, a major American magazine and an allied news service have been engaged in a legal battle with the United States Navy over records that they believe show that John McCain once was involved in an automobile accident that injured or, perhaps, killed another individual.
Vanity Fair magazine and the National Security News Service claim to have knowledge "developed from first-hand sources" of a car crash that involved then-Lt. McCain at the main gate of a Virginia naval base in 1964, according to legal filings. The incident has been largely, if not entirely, kept from the public. And in documents suing the Navy to release pertinent information, lawyers for the NS News Service allege that a cover-up may be at play.
Former Governor William Weld of Massachusetts is the latest Republican to cross over and support Democrat Barack Obama for president.
Weld held a press conference in Salem, N.H. to announce his endorsement. While Massachusetts is a slam dunk for Obama, neighboring New Hampshire is a competitive state.
"Senator Obama is a once-in-a-lifetime candidate who will transform our politics and restore America's standing in the world," Weld said in a statement. "We need a president who will lead based on our common values and Senator Obama demonstrates an ability to unite and inspire. Throughout this campaign I've watched his steady leadership through trying times and I'm confident he is the best candidate to move our country forward."
Weld supported former Bay State Governor Mitt Romney during the Republican primaries.
Early this week, Sen. John McCain's brother Joe, while in Alexandria, VA, called 911 because he was irritated with traffic. When the operator asked him if he was really calling the emergency line to complain about highway conditions, Joe McCain responded, "F--k you" and hung up.
Let's count the hits she's taken in the past 24 hours:
* There's her $150,000 wardrobe. It's hard to run as Joan of Six Pack when your wardrobe alone almost qualifies for an Obama tax increase. (Even when you're a millionaire, anyway.)
* Sarah Palin, constitutional scholar, resurfaced this week when she was asked about what her job would be as vice president. The veep, she said, is "in charge of" the U.S. Senate and "can really get in there with the senators and make a lot of good policy changes." Umm. Shouldn't someone have explained to her by now what the vice president does? The vice breaks ties in the Senate. That's it. Being a Washington outsider is fine, but being a constitutional ignoramus is another matter entirely.
* The AP reports today that Palin charged Alaska for her kids to travel with her, even when they weren't conducting official state business. Palin might have bilked the state? I'm shocked. (Hey—speaking of state rules, her new wardrobe qualifies as a gift, right? She'll have to declare it in her next ethics report per Alaska law, right?)
* Then there's yesterday's Wall Street Journal/NBC poll, which showed that Palin's lack of qualifications to be president is voters' No. 1 concern regarding John McCain. She's an even bigger drag than is George W. Bush. Wow.
Asked by a third-grader what a vice president does, Republican candidate Sarah Palin responded that the vice president is the president's "team mate" but also "runs the Senate" and "can really get in there with the senators and make a lot of good policy changes."
“Al-Qaeda will have to support McCain in the coming election,” declared one commentary on a password-protected site, al-Hesbah, which has been linked to the terrorist organization.
The commentary argued that a last-minute terrorist strike could galvanize American voters behind McCain’s hard-line positions and bring about a McCain administration that would follow the “failing march” of George W. Bush.
An agreement announced today by Obama for America, the Republican National Committee, the Democratic National Committee, the Michigan Republican Party, the Michigan Democratic Party, the Macomb County Republican Party, the Macomb County Democratic Party, and plaintiffs Duane Maletski, Sharon Lopez, and Frances M. Zick protects the voting rights of foreclosure victims. The settlement acknowledges the existence of an illegal scheme by the Republicans to use mortgage foreclosure lists to deny foreclosure victims their right to vote. This settlement has the force of law behind it and ensures that Republicans cannot disenfranchise families facing foreclosure.
Tracy: I can't imagine a President of the United States being named President Obama. I really have a problem with that and I'm not the only one.
Q: Because that means what to you?
Tracy: His background. A mother that was atheist. Huh, that really gets to me. A father that was a Muslim. That should get to everyone.
In my own state, I have voted, along with the vast majority of Alaskans who had the opportunity to vote, to amend our constitution defining marriage as between one man and one woman. I wish on a federal level that's where we would go, because I don't support gay marriage. You know, I'm not going to be up there judging individuals, sitting in a seat of judgment, telling them what they can and can't do, or should and should not do, but I certainly can express my own opinion here and take actions that I believe would be best for traditional marriage, and that's casting my votes and speaking up for traditional marriage. That instrument, it's the foundation of our society ...that strong family, and that's based on that traditional definition of marriage.
How big is your iPod? Bet it’s not 500 terabytes, but it soon could be, thanks to researchers at the University of Glasgow.
The clever Scots have created new nanotechnology that’ll cram 500,000 GB (or just under 500 terabytes) onto a single chip just one inch square.
That’s enough space to store a mind boggling 127 million songs on a device as small as an iPod shuffle.
Limbaugh: We know that technological advancement is going along at light speed. And yet during this period of time, whether it be the last 57 years or be it the last 20 years, it seems that a majority of the black population has remained angry, frustrated, and behind. They've been left behind. They are acting like they've been left behind, and of course we've heard that this is because of racism, natural systemic institutional racism in America, that we are unfair, that this country is just horrible and rotten.
"Let me give you the state of the race today. We have 22 days to go. We’re 6 points down. The national media has written us off. Senator Obama is measuring the drapes, and planning with Speaker Pelosi and Senator Reid to raise taxes, increase spending, take away your right to vote by secret ballot in labor elections, and concede defeat in Iraq. But they forgot to let you decide. My friends, we’ve got them just where we want them."
When you hold the mouse pointer over a state, you see a display of the latest "trend estimate" numbers from our charts of all available public polls for that race. The numbers for each candidate correspond to the most recent trend estimate -- that is the end point of the trend line that we draw for each candidate. If you click the state on the map, you will be taken to the page on Pollster.com that displays the chart and table of polls results for that race.
It appears Sen. John McCain will take Sen. Barack Obama up on his challenge.
In an interview on a St. Louis radio station, McCain said Obama's comments that "I didn't have the guts" to talk about William Ayers in the last presidential debate have "probably ensured" that the former 1960s radical will come up in Wednesday's debate.
Best cautioned that the poll did not ask anything about a question on the state ballot on Election Day about whether the state should hold a constitutional convention. That question appears on the ballot every 20 years. But it is particularly timely this year because opponents of gay marriage are urging a "yes" vote in the hope that the convention would allow for direct initiative. Under that scenario, all voters could cast ballots in a statewide referendum on whether Connecticut should allow gay marriage.
But both proponents and opponents said the Nov. 4 question is only the first step in a multipronged process that might never lead to a statewide vote on gay marriage. Delegates would need a two-thirds vote from the Democrat-controlled legislature to gain a seat at the convention, and then those delegates would decide which issues would be addressed. They could decide, for example, to avoid talking about gay marriage at all.
The Supreme Court released its historic ruling at 11:30 a.m. Citing the equal protection clause of the state constitution, the justices ruled that civil unions were discriminatory and that the state's "understanding of marriage must yield to a more contemporary appreciation of the rights entitled to constitutional protection."
"Interpreting our state constitutional provisions in accordance with firmly established equal protection principles leads inevitably to the conclusion that gay persons are entitled to marry the otherwise qualified same sex partner of their choice," the majority wrote. "To decide otherwise would require us to apply one set of constitutional principles to gay persons and another to all others."
Barack Obama is buying 30 minutes of airtime on the major television networks just days before the presidential election, the Obama campaign confirms.
Sources with the Obama campaign say half hour blocks have been purchased on Wednesday, October 29 on CBS and NBC. The campaign is also in negotiations with Fox, though that day will conflict with the World Series if there is a game 6.
The buy was first reported by the Hollywood reporter earlier Thursday.
Evan Tracey of Campaign Media Analysis Group, CNN's consultant on ad spending, said it was unclear how much the blocs of air would cost, but noted 30 seconds alone in primetime usually runs between $80,000 and $125,000.
"This is a big platform, this is a big megaphone, the interest level is clearly there and people will watch," Tracey said.
According to Fontaine, the real "original maverick" was her grandfather, Maury Maverick, "a radical politician from San Antonio who served two terms in Congress (1935-1939). There, he led a bloc of progressive Democrats who sought to push Roosevelt and the New Deal to the left. The press quickly labeled this group 'The Mavericks.' While hugely popular with the the many poor Hispanics in his district, Maverick was far too liberal for the conservative Texas Democratic establishment. In 1938 he lost the Democratic party primary after being slandered as a communist."
"Grandfather Maury was no coward," Fontaine told Huffington Post's Charles Karel Bouley. "He chased the Klan right out of San Antonio once, stood up to the mob... Maury was burned in effigy in San Antonio, for his defense of members of the Communist Party's right to assemble, for his defense of the Hispanic community, support for those who didn't have a voice."
It’s no wonder that the slightest incitement from Sarah Palin or John McCain will turn one of their rallies into a lynch mob. Just talk to the folks who attend.
My camera was rolling for literally seconds before people happily said to me, on camera, that Barack Obama is a terrorist. If I hadn’t spent most of my time at the event inside, waiting for the candidates to show up, I could have gotten dozens of these people on tape.
Sarah Palin was on the verge of inciting a race riot in northern Florida yesterday. At her rallies, the Republican faithful hurled a racial epitaph at a black sound man, and screamed "kill him" and "treason!" at Barack Obama.
"Boy, you guys just get it!" Palin responded. This reaction, presumably, was what Palin had in mind when she urged John McCain to "take the gloves off."
The McCain campaign initially took her advice, sending out three emails about Obama and Bill Ayers yesterday and pushing the angle hard on the news media. But by the time McCain got to debating, he made no mention of Ayers or Jeremiah Wright or Tony Rezko. For once, McCain knew better. His campaign looked supremely silly the day before, ranting about domestic terrorists from the 1960s when the Dow was plunging 800 points.
A growing perception that Republican presidential candidate John McCain is outright disdainful of having to share a stage with -- let alone losing to -- Barack Obama is gaining more traction after McCain dismissively referred to his opponent as "that one" during Tuesday's debate.
Andrew Sullivan pronounced it "the moment the contempt spilled over."
Crooks and Liars Nicole Belle wonder if McCain was "going to yell at him to get off his lawn next."
Multiple police agencies responded to the Republican congressman’s West Chester office and began an investigation.
After an X-ray analysis, investigators determined the package contained bacon.
Boehner voted twice last week for a $700 billion bailout of the financial industry, which passed Friday and was signed into law by President George W. Bush.
On the eve of the penultimate presidential debate, a new TIME/CNN poll shows John McCain still struggling in states won by George W. Bush in 2004, a sign that last week's vice-presidential debate had little effect on voter opinion.
"In order to change the dynamics of this race, we anticipate that McCain will launch his nastiest attacks and continue to lie about Barack Obama’s record and his vision to fundamentally change our country," Bill Burton, Obama-Biden press secretary, wrote in a memo to reporters. "We don’t know if McCain will continue his refusal to even look at Obama on stage -- like in their first debate -- but we fully expect that his 'turn the page' strategy to ignore the economy will be seen in full view for 90 minutes of character attacks against Barack Obama."
"Well, that's not a surprise because, you know, the polls are showing we're not doing as well there evidently as we would like to," Palin said. "But I read that this morning also. I fired off a quick email and said `Oh, come on, you know, do we have to? Do we have to call it there?'"
How sequestered from her campaign's workings is Palin, anyway? To be fair, she has been holed up in debate prep for days. But still, this was a major, major campaign decision. It's odd that she appeared to have heard nothing about it, let alone having been in any sort of discussions about it.
Netflix on Wednesday promised to release a product by the end of the year which will enable Mac users to use the service’s “Watch Instantly” feature.
Netflix is best known for its DVD rental service, which enables users to manage an online queue using a Web site. For a flat monthly rate, the company mails you DVDs or Blu-ray Discs, which you then watch and return without worrying about late fees.
During your debate with Senator Biden you said you welcomed the opportunity to speak directly with the American people, "uncensored" by the media. That sounds great. In fact, I'd like to challenge you to a debate: one regular American, me, versus you, the Governor of Alaska.
I mean a genuine debate, where we exchange ideas back and forth, and we are each expected to actually answer the questions asked by the moderator. Not like anyone would want to know what I have to say, but this would give you a real chance to talk directly to the American people (instead of being badgered by pesky reporters like Katie Couric!).
During coverage of the October 2 vice-presidential debate on PBS' Charlie Rose, Rose asked, "Did either of them make any mistakes that you noticed?" National Public Radio senior news analyst Cokie Roberts responded that Sen. Joe Biden "talked about the Bosniaks." Roberts later said: "[I]f [Gov. Sarah Palin] had said 'Bosniak,' everybody would be making a big deal of it, you know." In fact, Biden correctly referred to certain residents of Bosnia and Herzegovina as Bosniaks. According to the U.S. State Department, as of 2002, the population of Bosnia and Herzegovina consisted of the following ethnic groups: "Bosniak 48.3%, Serb 34.0%, Croat 15.4%, others 2.3%."
Sarah Palin has committed yet another political blunder after claiming she had held talks with a British ambassador - talks that never actually took place.
In an answer to questions about her foreign policy experience ahead of tonight's make-or-break vice presidential TV debate, her aides listed numerous contacts with foreign officials - including Britain's ambassador to Washington, Sir Nigel Sheinwald.
However the meeting never occurred. Officials at the embassy swiftly contacted the McCain-Palin campaign to inform them of the discrepancy.
A British Embassy spokesman said the error arose after Sir Nigel's name was listed among those who had attended a US Governor's meeting in July.
A CBS poll of 473 uncommitted voters produced equivalent, if less dramatic, results. In an incomplete tally on Thursday night, 46 percent said Biden had won the debate -- compared to 21% who thought Palin had won -- and 18% said they were now committed to the Obama-Biden ticket.
In a CNN poll of voters in general, not only did Biden outscore Palin by 51% to 36%, but almost half of those who felt Palin had exceeded expectations still believed she was not qualified to be president.
* Florida: Obama up 49 - 43 percent pre-debate and 51 - 43 percent post-debate;
* Ohio: Obama up 49 - 42 percent pre-debate and 50 - 42 percent post-debate;
* Pennsylvania: Obama ahead 49 - 43 percent pre-debate and 54 - 39 percent post-debate. Pre-debate surveys ended at 8 p.m. Friday with post-debate surveys Saturday-Monday.
John McCain is such a maverick! He cares so much about working families that he may do them the favor of ending his race for the White House. After all, his election would be an absolute disaster for those people. Apparently , McCain still thinks he can singlehandedly solve our country's economic problems--even those yesterday's House vote was, if nothing else, a sound rejection of the premise that McCain's gambit in DC had any positive impact on getting the compromise bill past.
Yet this morning, seemingly at the encouragement of Fox News anchors has not suggested that he "might suspend his campaign again"...yes, you heard that right. McCain apparently thinks it worked the last time...
A new advertisement released by the Republican National Committee may undercut GOP presidential candidate John McCain’s message.
Politico’s Ben Smith reports: “The Republican National Committee’s new advertisement critical of the the Wall Street ‘bailout’ was produced and sent to television stations in key states before the package failed, officials at two stations said.”
The ad, entitled “Worse” begins, “Meltdown. Wall Street Squanders our money. And Washington is forced to bail them out with — you guessed it — our money. Can it get any worse?”
Smith writes, “The ad taps into deep resentment of the plan, but it comes at a time when the candidate it supports, John McCain, is urging its package, and asking that it not be referred to as a ‘bailout,’ but a ‘rescue.’”
NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander has detected snow falling from Martian clouds. Spacecraft soil experiments also have provided evidence of past interaction between minerals and liquid water, processes that occur on Earth.
A laser instrument designed to gather knowledge of how the atmosphere and surface interact on Mars has detected snow from clouds about 4 kilometers (2.5 miles) above the spacecraft's landing site. Data show the snow vaporizing before reaching the ground.
As recently as Monday morning, only minutes before the House's stunning vote, McCain suggested that his call for a White House summit meeting Thursday, and his visit with unhappy House Republicans that preceded it, had helped clear the way for the bill's passage.
"I went to Washington last week to make sure that the taxpayers of Ohio and across this great country were not left footing the bill for mistakes made on Wall Street and in Washington," he told a crowd in Columbus, Ohio. "Some people have criticized my decision, but I will never, ever be a president who sits on the sidelines when this country faces a crisis."
On NBC's "Meet the Press" Sunday, top adviser Steve Schmidt said McCain managed "to help bring all of the parties to the table, including the House Republicans, whose votes were needed to pass this."
The comment suggested that McCain took responsibility for rounding up the needed GOP votes, "and that was probably a stupid thing for him to promise to do," said Democratic adviser Jennifer Palmieri.
On Monday, only 65 of the House's 199 Republicans went along. The defeat dealt a major blow to President Bush and threw another twist into a presidential campaign already drawing record numbers of Americans for rallies and televised events.
If BS were currency, Palin could bail out Wall Street herself.
If Palin were a man, we'd all be guffawing, just as we do every time Joe Biden tickles the back of his throat with his toes. But because she's a woman -- and the first ever on a Republican presidential ticket -- we are reluctant to say what is painfully true.
What to do?
McCain can't repudiate his choice for running mate. He not only risks the wrath of the GOP's unforgiving base, but he invites others to second-guess his executive decision-making ability. Barack Obama faces the same problem with Biden.
Only Palin can save McCain, her party and the country she loves. She can bow out for personal reasons, perhaps because she wants to spend more time with her newborn. No one would criticize a mother who puts her family first.
Do it for your country.
Here are ten claims to watch for from John McCain tonight:
Washington Mutual, the giant lender that came to symbolize the excesses of the mortgage boom, was seized by federal regulators on Thursday night, in what is by far the largest bank failure in American history.
Regulators simultaneously brokered an emergency sale of virtually all of Washington Mutual, the nation’s largest savings and loan, to JPMorgan Chase for $1.9 billion, averting another potentially huge taxpayer bill for the rescue of a failing institution.
“I didn’t know I was going to be the referee for an internal G.O.P. ideological civil war,” Mr. Frank said, according to The A.P.Thursday, in the Roosevelt Room after the session, the Treasury secretary, Henry M. Paulson Jr., literally bent down on one knee as he pleaded with Nancy Pelosi, the House Speaker, not to “blow it up” by withdrawing her party’s support for the package over what Ms. Pelosi derided as a Republican betrayal.
“I didn’t know you were Catholic,” Ms. Pelosi said, a wry reference to Mr. Paulson’s kneeling, according to someone who observed the exchange. She went on: “It’s not me blowing this up, it’s the Republicans.”
Mr. Paulson sighed. “I know. I know.”
Combining polls it conducted in August and September, Pew found that of people under age 30 with only cell phones, 62 percent were Democrats and 28 percent Republicans. Among landline users the same age that gap was narrower: 54 percent Democrats, 36 percent GOP.
Similarly, young cell users preferred Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama over Republican nominee John McCain by 35 percentage points. For young landline users, it was a smaller 13-point Obama edge.
Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) said that "nobody mentioned McCain" during the several-hour-long meeting on the $700 billion market rescue plan, other than Frank and that his Republican colleagues "winced" when he did.
"He’s been irrelevant to the process. He remains to be," said Frank. "I was afraid that his dropping in here, like Andy Kaufman’s Mighty Mouse—'here I am to save the day'—I thought that would slow things down. I didn’t see any sign of our Republican colleagues paying any attention to him whatsoever."
Franks went on. "Nobody mentioned him. The man’s irrelevant to the whole process. No Republican mentioned his name. I’m the only one who raised his name. They winced when I did," he said.
But besides the direct bill handed to taxpayers for this gigantic con, there is the fact that adding that much to the national debt is also going to drive the dollar down precipitously against foreign currencies. We’re already seeing that happen, even while they’re just talking about the bailout. The dollar is falling against all major currencies—the Euro, the Yen, the Renminbi and the British pound. And it will continue to fall as the details of the bailout come out.
This will add to already powerful pressures in countries like Saudi Arabia and China, which hold huge quantities of US dollars and US dollar-denominated debt, to shift out of dollars and into other currencies—particularly the Euro and the Yen. Last week, an article in China’s People’s Daily, which like Pravda in the old Soviet Union, is the official voice of the leadership in China, called for just such a move. Russia is also calling for an end to the dollar as the underpinning of the global economy.
For some years now, many economists have been predicting an end to the dollar as the world’s reserve currency, but this latest plan by the US Treasury will push such a shift forward from “some day” to “now.”
David Letterman tells audience that McCain called him today to tell him he had to rush back to DC to deal with the economy.
Then in the middle of the taping Dave got word that McCain was, in fact just down the street being interviewed by Katie Couric. Dave even cut over to the live video of the interview, and said, "Hey Senator, can I give you a ride home?"
Earlier in the show, Dave kept saying, "You don't suspend your campaign. This doesn't smell right. This isn't the way a tested hero behaves." And he joked: "I think someone's putting something in his Metamucil."
"He can't run the campaign because the economy is cratering? Fine, put in your second-string quarterback, Sarah Palin. Where is she?"
"What are you going to do if you're elected and things get tough? Suspend being president? We've got a guy like that now!"
Why does John McCain suddenly want to suspend his presidential campaign and postpone Friday's debate? His campaign surrogates are saying it's a typical "maverick" move, that McCain is simply "putting country first." Let's look at the evidence:
Mark this day down. Today – last night, actually – the New York Times and Roll Call reported (it's hard to see who was first) what may be the biggest political story of the campaign. How big? John McCain might have to fire his campaign manager. Big enough?
The story is this. The lobbying firm of Rick Davis, the manager, was being paid $15,000 a month by Freddie Mac until last month. That fact is a direct contradiction of words McCain had spoken Sunday night. At that time, responding to a Times story being prepared for Monday's paper revealing that Davis had been the head of a lobbying consortium led by Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae until 2005, McCain said Davis had done no further work for either mortgage giant.
Someone's lying – either Davis to McCain, or McCain to the public. I trust you see the problem here.
Frankly I have had it, and I know a lot of other women out there who are with me on this. I have had enough of the sexist treatment of Sarah Palin. It has to end.
She was in New York on Tuesday meeting with world leaders at the U.N. And what did the McCain campaign do?
They tried to ban reporters from covering those meetings. And they did ban reporters from asking Gov. Palin any questions.
I call upon the McCain campaign to stop treating Sarah Palin like she is a delicate flower who will wilt at any moment.
Connecticut Democrats who are upset with Sen. Joe Lieberman's very public support of Republican presidential candidate John McCain plan to debate a resolution that censures Lieberman and asks him to resign from the Democratic Party.
It's unclear whether the Democratic State Central Committee will vote after Wednesday's debate. Nancy DiNardo, the state party chairwoman, says some members are concerned a censure by the state party could distract attention from the upcoming presidential election.
Lieberman, a close friend of McCain, was re-elected to the Senate as an independent after losing the Democratic primary in 2006. Despite the loss, he remains a registered Democrat.
A phone call seeking comment from Lieberman's office was not immediatly returned.
By a 2-to-1 ratio, Americans blame Republicans over Democrats for the financial crisis that has swept across the country the past few weeks, a new national poll suggests.
Sen. Barack Obama holds a lead in four key battleground states, but it appears that the candidates' handling of economic questions in coming debates could be the key to their fates there.
Sen. Obama holds slight leads over Sen. John McCain in Michigan, Minnesota, Colorado and Wisconsin, where Quinnipiac University has conducted separate, new polls for The Wall Street Journal and Washingtonpost.com. But his leads aren't commanding, and all the states appear to be in play.
At the insistence of the McCain campaign, the Oct. 2 debate between the Republican nominee for vice president, Gov. Sarah Palin, and her Democratic rival, Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr., will have shorter question-and-answer segments than those for the presidential nominees, the advisers said. There will also be much less opportunity for free-wheeling, direct exchanges between the running mates.
McCain advisers said they had been concerned that a loose format could leave Ms. Palin, a relatively inexperienced debater, at a disadvantage and largely on the defensive.
Senator John McCain’s campaign manager was paid more than $30,000 a month for five years as president of an advocacy group set up by the mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to defend them against stricter regulations, current and former officials say.
A 2004 photograph from a report by the Homeownership Alliance, an advocacy group for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, shows John McCain with Ken Guenther, a former chairman of the group, left, and David Lereah of the National Association of Realtors.
Mr. McCain, the Republican candidate for president, has recently begun campaigning as a critic of the two companies and the lobbying army that helped them evade greater regulation as they began buying riskier mortgages with implicit federal backing. He and his Democratic rival, Senator Barack Obama, have donors and advisers who are tied to the companies.
Liberalism always seemed to me to be a system of “oughts.” We ought to do this or that because it’s the right thing to do, regardless of whether it works or not. It is a doctrine based on intentions, not results, on feeling good rather than doing good.
But today it is so-called conservatives who are cemented to political programs when they clearly don’t work. The Bush tax cuts—a solution for which there was no real problem and which he refused to end even when the nation went to war—led to huge deficit spending and a $3 trillion growth in the federal debt. Facing this, John McCain pumps his “conservative” credentials by proposing even bigger tax cuts. Meanwhile, a movement that once fought for limited government has presided over the greatest growth of government in our history. That is not conservatism; it is profligacy using conservatism as a mask.
Today it is conservatives, not liberals, who talk with alarming bellicosity about making the world “safe for democracy.” It is John McCain who says America’s job is to “defeat evil,” a theological expansion of the nation’s mission that would make George Washington cough out his wooden teeth.
This kind of conservatism, which is not conservative at all, has produced financial mismanagement, the waste of human lives, the loss of moral authority, and the wreckage of our economy that McCain now threatens to make worse.
The Hopi Elders Speak
We Are the Ones
We've Been Waiting For
You have been telling the people that this is the Eleventh Hour.
Now you must go back and tell the people that this is The Hour.
And there are things to be considered:
Where are you living?
What are you doing?
What are your relationships?
Are you in right relation?
Where is your water?
Know your garden.
It is time to speak your Truth.
Create your community. Be good to each other. And do not look outside yourself for the leader.
This could be a good time!
There is a river flowing now very fast. It is so great and swift that there are those who will be afraid. They will try to hold on to the shore. They will feel they are being torn apart, and they will suffer greatly.
Know the river has its destination. The elders say we must let go of the shore, push off into the middle of the river, keep our eyes open, and our heads above the water. See who is in there with you and celebrate.
At this time in history, we are to take nothing personally. Least of all, ourselves. For the moment that we do, our spiritual growth and journey comes to a halt.
The time of the lone wolf is over. Gather yourselves!
Banish the word struggle from your attitude and your vocabulary.
All that we do now must be done in a sacred manner and in celebration.
We are the ones we've been waiting for.
—The Elders Oraibi
Arizona Hopi Nation
The Republican presidential nominee's responses in a recent interview with a Spanish language radio station suggest the answer to those questions might in fact be no. Either that or the 72-year-old candidate became confused after a series of questions about Latin America, or he was simply snubbing a US ally that decided to end its involvement in the Iraq war.
During an interview with Radio Caracol Miami conducted Wednesday, McCain was asked whether he would invite Spanish Prime Minister José Luis RodrÃguez Zapatero to the White House. McCain's noncommittal answer seemed to suggest that he did not know who Zapatero was, as he immediately pivoted to talking about Mexico then referred to his commitment to Latin America.
Republican presidential candidate John McCain, a day after flatly rejecting the idea of a taxpayer bailout for American International Group Inc., said Wednesday that the government had been "forced" into proposing an $85 billion loan to the nation's largest insurer.
A decade ago, Sen. John McCain embraced legislation to broadly deregulate the banking and insurance industries, helping to sweep aside a thicket of rules established over decades in favor of a less restricted financial marketplace that proponents said would result in greater economic growth.
Now, as the Bush administration scrambles to prevent the collapse of the American International Group (AIG), the nation's largest insurance company, and stabilize a tumultuous Wall Street, the Republican presidential nominee is scrambling to recast himself as a champion of regulation to end "reckless conduct, corruption and unbridled greed" on Wall Street.
Asked what work John McCain did as chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee that helped him understand the financial markets, the candidate's top economic adviser wielded visual evidence: his BlackBerry.
"He did this," Douglas Holtz-Eakin told reporters this morning, holding up his BlackBerry. "Telecommunications of the United States is a premier innovation in the past 15 years, comes right through the Commerce Committee. So you're looking at the miracle John McCain helped create and that's what he did."
Gov. Sarah Palin may eventually have said ''no thanks'' to a federally funded Bridge to Nowhere.
But a bridge to her hometown of Wasilla, that's a different story.
A $600 million bridge and highway project to link Alaska's largest city to Palin's town of 7,000 residents is moving full speed ahead, despite concerns the bridge could worsen some commuting and threaten a population of beluga whales.
Local officials already have spent $42 million on plans to route traffic across the Knik Arm inlet, a narrow finger of water extending roughly 25 miles northeast of Anchorage toward Wasilla. The proposal exists thanks to an earmark request by Republican Rep. Don Young, whose son-in-law has a small stake in property near the bridge's proposed western span.
Now comes Dick Armey, once House Majority Leader, who described a classified one-on-one briefing in the vice president's hideaway office in the U.S. Capitol where he says Vice President Dick Cheney went beyond that into outright deception.
According to a new book on Cheney called "Angler," by Washington Post reporter Barton Gellman, Armey, a Texas Republican, had spoken out against the war. Cheney was trying to change his mind. So the vice president told him the threat from Iraq was actually "more imminent than we want to portray to the public at large." In Armey's account, Cheney told him:
Iraq's "ability to miniaturize weapons of mass destruction, particularly nuclear," had been "substantially refined since the first Gulf War," and would soon result in "packages that could be moved even by ground personnel....We now know they have the ability to develop these weapons in a very portable fashion, and they have a delivery system in their relationship with organizations such as Al Qaeda."
"Did Dick Cheney ... purposely tell me things he knew to be untrue?" Armey said. "I seriously feel that may be the case...Had I known or believed then what I believe now, I would have publicly opposed [the war] resolution right to the bitter end, and I believe I might have stopped it from happening."
Obama aides described the new revisions to Palin's account as part of a growing pattern of deception. "The McCain campaign said Governor Palin opposed the Bridge to Nowhere, but now we know she supported it. They said she didn't seek earmarks, but now we know she hired a lobbyist to get millions in pork for her town and her state. They said she visited Iraq, but today we learned that she only stopped at the border. Americans are starting to wonder, is there anything the McCain campaign isn't lying about?" Obama campaign spokesman Tommy Vietor asked in a statement e-mailed to reporters.
A short time later, the Obama campaign circulated a new Bloomberg story that questions whether the McCain campaign has been sending out false crowd estimates.
On two occasions since Palin joined the ticket, McCain aides have cited law enforcement sources in claiming enormous crowds -- but law enforcement officials interviewed by Bloomberg denied having given such estimates.
Senator Barack Obama will intensify his assault against Senator John McCain, with new television advertisements and more forceful attacks by the candidate and surrogates beginning Friday morning, as he confronts an invigorated Republican presidential ticket and increasing nervousness in the Democratic ranks.
Mr. McCain’s choice of Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska as his running mate and the resulting jolt of energy among Republican voters appear to have caught Mr. Obama and his advisers by surprise and added to concern among some Democrats that the Obama campaign was not pushing back hard enough against Republican attacks in a critical phase of the race.
Some Democrats said Mr. Obama needed to move to seize control of the campaign and to block Mr. McCain from snatching away from him the message that he was the best hope to bring change to Washington.
After back-to-back attack ads by Mr. McCain, including one that misleadingly accused Mr. Obama of endorsing sex education for kindergarten students, the Obama campaign is planning to sharpen attacks on Mr. McCain and Ms. Palin in an effort to counter Mr. McCain’s attempt to present himself as the candidate of change with his choice of Ms. Palin.
I never thought I would live long enough to see the day when the Republican presidential candidate would cite membership in the PTA as evidence of executive experience, when the far right would laud the full-time working mothers of newborns, when social conservatives would stare down teenage pregnancy and replace their pursed-lip accusations of promiscuity with hosannas about choosing life.
The Republican Party has undergone a surprising metamorphosis since Sarah Palin was chosen as its vice presidential candidate. In Palin I recognize a fellow traveler, a woman whose life would have been impossible just a few decades ago. If she had been born 30 years earlier, the PTA would likely have been her last stop, not her first. Her political ascendancy is a direct result of the women's movement, which has changed the world utterly for women of all persuasions. It is therefore notable that Palin has found her home in a party, and in a wing of that party, that for many years has reviled, repelled and sought to roll back the very changes that led her to the Alaska Statehouse
Sarah Palin made her bones as a self-proclaimed Republican reformer in Alaska when she turned on a Republican Party state chairman who had had been accused of wrongdoing. In 2003, that GOP leader, Randy Ruedrich, was one of three members of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission; Palin chaired the commission and served as its ethics officer. After the news broke that Ruedrich had hosted a Republican fundraiser with several oil company executives and had sent out an email notice for a different Republican fundraising event, critics demanded he resign.
Leading the anti-Ruedrich pack was Palin. She threatened to quit the commission unless Ruedrich resolved his conflicts. "It was a very simple issue," she said at the time. "It was black and white." And after Ruedrich was forced out, Palin, acting at the behest of state investigators, examined his computer files and found emails and documents showing that Ruedrich had used his state office to conduct partisan work for the Republican Party. The records Palin unearthed became evidence in a state investigation that led to a settlement under which Ruedrich paid a $12,000 fine.
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