The unpardonable Mr. McCain

[Image by Victoria]

What's with this clown? He wanders around like he's in a fog, muttering about how the Repubs got it right and the Dems got it wrong, and HIS new budget is the real McCoy and why doesn't anyone pay attention to him anymore; he was the Republican nominee for president for Christ's sake!

Almost makes one feel sorry for the old coot. I said, almost!

McCain has pulled off so much chicanery in his lifetime, that one just can't feel sorry for him; his sins, unfortunately, are unpardonable.

Maybe that's why he is pushing President Obama to issue a presidential pardon for Jack Johnson: so he can enjoy a pardon vicariously.


Now, you're supposed to ask, who the hell is Jack Johnson? Jack was the first American black heavyweight boxing champeen! But Jack, back in 1913, got into a lot of trouble (yup, 1913!) by screwing around with a white woman. He took her across a state line and so they got him on the Mann Act. But this was no one-night stand; the woman later became his wife.

All this turmoil (he ran off after his conviction for a number of years, but later ended up serving 10 months) wrecked his career. He was killed in a car wreck in 1946. He was 68 years old.


I have no problem with Obama pardoning Johnson. That's fine, even if presidents have rarely pardoned dead people, thinking, I suppose, that's a job for the deity. But if it would clear his name from what were most likely racially-motivated, trumped up charges, then go ahead and do it.

Won't help him any, of course, 'cause he's dead and gone. But it might make his survivors feel better.


The real question, though, is why John McCain is fooling around with this? I thought he was busy telling the Republicans how to win elections, praising Sarah Palin, and, because he still doesn't realize he lost the election, writing his own budget, which will be read by two people, he and his wife.

The world economy is in the tank; the depression is deepening everywhere as more and more people lose their jobs and their homes; we're still screwing around in Iraq; Afghanistan is become a deeper quagmire; Pakistan has nuclear weapons and is unstable as hell; the crazy fool in North Korea is planning to shoot off a missile into the sky which maybe, might could reach the U.S.; Mexico is falling apart and the drug dealers may well take over the government; Iran is, well, Iran; hunger goes unabated across the globe; McCain's wife still wears too much makeup ... all of this and McCain is spending his time on trying to get a presidential pardon for a guy who's been dead almost 100 years!

And what about all those other black folks who received a raw deal from racially-motivated, trumped up charges? Shouldn't they get pardons, too? Or is a pardon just for an prominent athlete and the rest of us don't count?


Oh, that's right. We're talking about John McCain. The rest of us really don't count!

John McCain, the talking widget and his budget

All one can do when watching this performance is thank the gods that this clown was not elected president. He has a budget proposal because Obama's budget is just terrible - it doesn't give tax breaks to the ultra-rich, and Obama actually plans to help people other than the military, and Obama's budget sends the deficit into the stratosphere.

Heh. Heh.

But listen to McCain - a lobbyist's best friend, a serial adulterer, one of those corrupt five who tried to get a Congressional committee to take the pressure off their S&L guy who cost the American people billions of dollars - and what he says about HIS budget proposal. By god, his budget won't cut taxes on the rich, that's for sure! And it won't cut defense spending, even if a large portion of defense spending is wasted on corruption and shoddy products. And the Repugs want a bi-partisan commission to study Social Security and Medicare (read: do away with Social Security and Medicare, which has been their goal since the 1930s!) And, by golly, gee, McCain's budget will result in a mere $3.3 trillion deficit - ooops! He meant $2.3 trillion.

But, hey, what's a trillion dollars these days?

As someone asked: Didn't this guy lose the election?

Thanks to Video Cafe.

John McCain and generational theft

John McCain, poor man, is probably a bit senile. He just can't seem to remember the last eight years when for the most part he gave his willing support to the "almost worst president in history" whose policies have damn near destroyed our country.

Financially, it would hard to find a president with less talent and more ability for screwing up than George W. Bush. But old McCain was right there the whole time, backing him up. Yup, tax cuts and more tax cuts - well, for the rich. That's what we need - so's the rich will stop buying yachts and houses in Cannes and will put up factories right here in the good ol' U.S. of A. where they will hire American workers at a fair wage and produce wonderful products that everyone around the world will rush to buy, and won't it be wonderful, all this trickle-down shit?

Not so. Just didn't seem to work out that way. They took their factories overseas, hired locals and paid them a pittance, hid their shenanigans and profits in off-shore banks and the rest of us got screwed!

But ol' John's still tooting that same horn, still riding that same bandwagon, still just as full of crap as a Christmas goose.

Obama did not include Republicans in writing the stimulus bill, whines old John. Really? Sheesh, then how were Republican freaks able to remove several key items from that bill which will result in the loss of thousands of jobs. Or is John thinking of other ways the Republicans could have "helped"?

It's a damn good thing that the Republicans were not more involved! We would have ended up with more tax cuts for the rich, and nothing for anyone else. In fact, the Republican-sponsored alternative "stimulus bills" had nothing but tax cuts for the rich!


John, in a fit of senile jealous rage, claimed Obama is off to a bad start. It [the stimulus bill] was a bad beginning to his presidency." The stimulus bill will leave us with big, bad debt - "generational theft," he called it. Wonder what he calls the trillions wasted by Bush on wars and payoffs to his corporate buddies?

Obama promised to "sit down together," and cries ol' John, we didn't do that.

So what would John have us do?

"Let's start over now and sit down together."

Heh. Heh.

I wonder if he knows that Obama's signing the bill today?

Too little, too dumb and too late -- one more time, John! Maybe it's time to retire to one of your 16 homes. If you can remember where the hell they are!

Why McCain lost - one more reason

No matter how hard John McCain tried to play the "cool" dude with energy to spare; and no matter how many times John McCain said he was "ready to lead," and no matter his insistence he had the experience to start from "day one," the impression he often gave was of a somewhat confused, older man, out of touch with the reality of the world in which he lived.

In the February 2 issue of Time magazine, managing editor Rick Stengel takes note of the massive technological changes that have occurred in the past 47 years:

"In 1961, when TIME showed on the cover a photograph of John F. Kennedy taking the oath of office as the nation's 35th President, it was the first time we had put a presidential Inauguration on the magazine's cover. At the time, it was also the fastest cover close in the magazine's history.

"The photo was shot and processed in Washington in about three hours, then the art director took the transparencies on a plane to Chicago, where they were taken to TIME's central printing plant, where a color engraving was produced. Then those images were taken by air to printing plants in Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Washington and Albany, NY. All in all, about 36 hours.

"Now it's almost instantaneous and done completely digitally."


When I read that, one difference between John McCain and Barack Obama became starkly obvious. John McCain did not know how to send an e-mail which gave many the impression he was technologically challenged. Barack Obama, as it turned out, is technologically savvy and hired people who were technological geniuses and put together a campaign that was fueled and driven in large part by the Internet.

John McCain always gave the impression he would be much more comfortable and "at home" if it was 1963 again.

And it may well be that is one more reason John McCain lost the election.

Jim DeMint doesn't get it, either

Jim DeMint, in case you've never heard of him, is an ultra-conservative senator from South Carolina.

At the moment, Senator DeMint is pissed off. He has publicly chastised his fellow senator, John McCain, for blowing the election by blowing off and "betraying conservative principles." The Republican Party should, according to de candy man, DeMint, "represent freedom, religious-based values and limited government."

"Religious values?" Does this clown have a clue? Whose religious values? How about Muslim religious values? Or Hindu religious values? Or Wiccan religious values? Or the values of the Cult of Death?

Anyway, de candy man held up a laundry list of McCain's failings at a speech in Myrtle Beach. And these, he said, were what brought down the party of god, religious values and freedom:

"McCain, who is a proponent of campaign finance reform that weakened party organizations ... His proposal for amnesty for illegals. His support of global warming, cap-and-trade programs that will put another burden on our economy. And of course, his embrace of the bailout right before the election was probably the nail in our coffin this last election. And he has been an opponent of drilling in ANWR, at a time when energy is so important. It really didn't fit the label, but he was our package."

Poor John. Day after day he's gonna look out over the Senate floor and there he'll see the candy man, all glum and crochety, glaring at the "loser."

DeMint, who sometimes doesn't know the difference between Ted Kennedy and Ted Stevens, could not be more wrong. McCain didn't lose because he betrayed conservative principles, but because he didn't have any principles.


Peter Beinart has an article in the latest issue of Time, titled "The New Liberal Order." A couple of paragraphs in that article summed things up rather well, even though his assumptions regarding the "liberal cultural agenda of the 1960s" may be a bit out of whack.

"Starting in the 1990s, average Americans began deciding that the conservative agenda was a bit like the liberal cultural agenda of the 1960s: less liberating than frightening. When the Gingrich Republicans tried to slash Medicare, the public turned on them en masse. A decade later, when George W. Bush tried to partially privatize Social Security, Americans rebelled once again. In 2005 a Pew Research Center survey identified a new group of voters that it called 'pro-government conservatives.' They were culturally conservative and hawkish on foreign policy, and they overwhelmingly supported Bush in 2004. But by large majorities, they endorsed government regulation and government spending. They didn't want to unleash the free market; they wanted to rein it in.

But here's where I think Beinart is really on target:

"Those voters were a time bomb in the Republican coalition, which detonated on Nov. 4. John McCain's promises to cut taxes, cut spending and get government out of the way left them cold. Among the almost half of voters who said they were 'very worried' that the economic crisis would hurt their family, Obama beat McCain by 26 points.

"The public mood on economics today is a lot like the public mood on culture 40 years ago: Americans want government to impose law and order--to keep their 401(k)s from going down, to keep their health-care premiums from going up, to keep their jobs from going overseas--and they don't much care whose heads Washington has to bash to do it."


The candy man is blowing in the wind. I mentioned McCain didn't have any principles -- that was hyperbole. He and his sidekick, Palin, ran precisely on the Republican "principles" that DeMint claims they abandoned: "freedom, religious-based values, and limited government."

DeMint doesn't get it, either, just like the other religious neanderthals in the Repugnican Party. I also said he was pissed off, but it very well may be that the reason he's angry with McCain is not that McCain abandoned conservative principles for he did not. It may be that de candy man is mad because McCain didn't choose him to be the vice presidential candidate. I mean his name did float above the Republican coffin for a brief period. And I'm sure DeMint thinks he would have done a much better job than that lying hockey mom from Alaska.

It's kinda fun to see the Repugs implode, though!



Watch de candy man in action in 2007 with McCain at his side. He praises McCain as a champion of reform and he derides earmarks such as the "Bridge to Nowhere." It's hilarious!

John McCain and Vietnam's MIAs

Sydney H. Schanberg, "a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter ... [who] has reported extensively on the POW story ... " tells the story how John McCain has for years blocked information on military personnel "missing in action" in Vietnam.

In an article, "Why Has John McCain Blocked Info on MIAs?", which appeared in The Nation on September 17, 2008, Schanberg details McCain's inexplicable efforts "to hide from the public stunning information about American prisoners in Vietnam who, unlike him, didn't return home. McCain has quietly sponsored and pushed into federal law a set of prohibitions that keep the most revealing information about these men buried as classified documents."

This is very strange, says Schanberg.

And there is a great deal of material. "The sum of the secrets McCain has sought to hide is not small. There exists a telling mass of official documents, radio intercepts, witness depositions, satellite photos of rescue symbols that pilots were trained to use, electronic messages from the ground containing the individual code numbers given to airmen, a rescue mission by a Special Forces unit that was aborted twice by Washington and even sworn testimony by two defense secretaries that 'men were left behind.' This imposing body of evidence suggests that a larger number--probably hundreds--of the U.S. prisoners held in Vietnam were not returned when the peace treay was signed in January 1973 and Hanoi released 591 men, among them Navy combat pilot John S. McCain."

From what Mr. Schanberg says, it appears that the issue snowballed out of control for various reasons until it simply wasn't politic to release the accumulated information. For example, a transcript of a senior North Vietnamese general's briefing of the Hanoi Politburo noted that "Hanoi was holding 1,205 American prisoners but would keep many of them at war's end as leverage to ensure getting reparations from Washington."

On February 1, 1973, President Richard Nixon, in a formal letter to the Pham Van Dong, Hanoi's premier, "pledged $3.25 billion in 'postwar reconstruction' aid."

The North Vietnamese didn't believe Nixon and held back prisoners. The pledge was never honored.

Although a huge mass of evidence was collected down through the years that a number of prisoners were indeed "left behind," that evidence was covered up and played down. Nobody wanted to fess up to such a scandal. And the man in the middle of the cover up was John S. McCain.

"An early and critical attempt by McCain to conceal evidence involved 1990 legislation called the Truth bill, which started in the House. A brief and simple document, the bill would have compelled complete transparency about prisoners and missing men. Its core sentence said that the 'head of each department or agency which holds or receives any records and information, including reports, which have been correlated or possibly correlated to United States personnel listed as prisoner of war or missing in action from World War II, the Korean conflict and the Vietnam conflict, shall make available to the public all such records held or received by that department or agency."

The bill was "bitterly opposed" by the Pentagon and McCain. It was introduced the following year but disappeared. Then McCain came up with a new bill, which "created a bureaucratic maze from which only a fraction of the documents could emerge--only the records that revealed no POW secrets. The McCain bill became law in 1991 and remains so today."

Additional legislation in following years which would have provided information about POWs was also fought by McCain, including the Missing Service Personnel Act. McCain was able to attach "a crippling amendment to the act, stripping out its only enforcement teeth, the criminal penalties, and reducing the obligations of commanders in the field to speedily search for missing men and report the incidents to the Pentagon."

Not only has McCain fought transparency and openness with regard to Vietnam's missing POWs, but "has insisted again and again that all the evidence has been woven together by unscrupulous deceivers to create an insidious and unpatriotic myth. ... He has regularly vilified those who keep trying to pry out classified documents as 'hoaxers,' 'charlatans,' 'conspiracy theorists' and 'dime-store Rambos.' Family members who have personally pressed McCain to end the secrecy have been treated to his legendary temper. In 1996 he roughly pushed aside a group of POW family members who had waited outside a hearing room to appeal to him, including a mother in a wheelchair."

McCain's motive for this behavior is unknown. He claims he is afraid releasing POW information "would only stir up fresh grief for the families..." But that makes no sense. The families have been dealing with grief all along and merely want closure. Most of them say not knowing is what grieves them.


The mainstream media has largely avoided this story for unknown reasons. But it is an important story, and the POW-MIA problem is still an open wound for hundreds of our citizens. McCain's role in hiding pertinent information should be publicized and McCain should be questioned as to his motives, and the information should be released. We are a long way from 1973!

There is much more in Schanberg's article, and you can read it all here.

John McCain is not a man of honor

John McCain's campaign for president proved that, if at some time in the past he was a man of honor, he is no longer so.

This sorry saga is still unfolding.

McCain has been in Georgia to push for the re-election of Saxy Chambliss to the United States Senate. In 2002, the incumbent Senator from Georgia was Vietnam veteran, Max Cleland. Max had the misfortune to lose three limbs in that war. Chambliss' campaign that year painted Cleland as being too cowardly to deal with a world threatened by terrorism. A now famous Chambliss ad pictured the face of Osama bin Laden merging with the face of Cleland.

The best thing one could say about the ad was that it was despicable!

John McCain, at the time, said this: "Putting pictures of Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden next to a picture of a man who left three limbs on the battlefield -- it's worse than disgraceful, it's reprehensible."

BuzzFlash reminds us that if anyone was a coward, it was Chambliss, who "received five student deferments and one medical deferment ... entirely avoiding service. Yet he can often be seen stumping in military gear and on bases around his home state."

Chambliss also "voted repeatedly against the new GI Bill as well as funding for necessary armor and equipment for our troops and other measures meant to help out our men and women fighting overseas. In fact, Chambliss voted against our troops at least 23 times in his short tenure in the Senate. The Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America rated Chambliss as a D- in 2006."


This year Chambliss was challenged by Democrat Jim Martin. Because he did not receive 50 percent of the vote as required by Georgia law, a run-off must be staged, said run-off to be held on December 2.

Jim Martin spent two years in Vietnam. "He's been campaigning with vets that actually support our troops, such as Jim Webb."

John McCain, however, has thrown his support behind Chambliss. About 1500 people showed up to hear him urge Georgia voters to also support Chambliss, claiming that the Democrats will increase taxes and cut defense spending. He was also to appear at a Chambliss fundraiser.


We can only conclude the following:

* McCain's "maverick" stance and his touted bipartisanship are bullshit; it's all politics, all the time. McCain believes its better to have a reprehensible Republican than a decent Democrat in the U.S. Senate.

* McCain is trying to revive his image among the Repugnican rank and file after running such a miserable campaign.

* John McCain is not a man of honor. He is just another typical Repugnican hypocrite who puts party above the country. Or as we said before about his campaign slogan: "Country First, my ass!"

Joe Lieberman - what to do?

A lot of Democrats are calling for the head of Senator Joe Lieberman. They want to strip him of his chairmanship of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, and they want him tossed from the Democratic caucus.

At least four Democrats are trying to save his ass: Chris Dodd (D-Conn.), Ken Salazar (D-Colo.), Tom Carper (D-Del.), and Bill Nelson (D-Fla.).

President-elect Obama told Harry Reid that he believes Lieberman should be allowed to remain in the Democratic caucus. Jesus Christ! That sounds like Jesus Christ!

According to Paul Kane at the WaPo, "Obama said that expulsion of Lieberman for his support of the Republican presidential ticket would send the wrong signal after Obama's promises to set partisanship aside ... "

Those who wish to retain Lieberman stress that in spite of his fawning over McCain, he has voted with the Democrats most of the time. Obviously, the desire is to retain that vote.

But...but...maybe retaining Lieberman would send the wrong signal. Bipartisanship goes both ways. And, any way you slice the apple, Lieberman is a slimebucket and a traitor. He didn't just "support" McCain and Palin by giving a speech like Colin Powell "supported" Obama, he spoke for McCain at the Republican National Convention, he toured with McCain, he stood there in silent assent when the McCain camp went off the rails and viciously attacked Obama with scurrilous and untrue allegations, and when Palin riled up the rednecks and racists to the extent that Obama's life was being threatened by McCain/Palin supporters.


But...but...maybe Obama is right. He is the duly elected president-to-be and his wishes must be considered. If Lieberman remains in the Democratic caucus, however, there has to be some way to make him pay for his treasonable actions. Furthermore, we know he is a traitor, which means he cannot be trusted.

Maybe he can be turned over to the CIA for a little "rendition treatment" in Egypt.

Nah...

The education of Tom Brokaw

Frankly, I never gave Tom Brokaw much thought. He was an anchor on NBC News and seemed to do his job fairly well, and he wrote a book about how great people were during WWII, and, well, he was a TV fixture...

...who I thought was "fair and balanced," unlike, say, those folks at FOX News...


Then John McCain ran for president. And I realized that Tom Brokaw really liked John McCain. When he interviewed McCain, Brokaw fawned all over him, lobbed him easy questions, and neglected to challenge McCain on his falsehoods. Brokaw wanted McCain to be president!


Then this from Eric Alterman at Altercation:

"Brokaw is back at it -- he said on Morning Joe that America is a center-right country because a majority of land area in the United States, if you measure it on the county level, voted for McCain."

Huh?

Alterman asks, incredulously: "When do they name that replacement?"

And, "Did he really say that? Does land vote? Is it possible for someone in Tom Brokaw's position to be that stupid? Of perhaps a better question is, 'Is it necessary?'"

The Body Language of Loss

From distributorcap NY ... couldn't have said it better, myself!

Well, at the risk of sounding cliche - the page has finally turned. We can actually countdown the days to the end of the Bush-pierre Reign of Terror (well he still has 70+ days to do a lot of damage).

It was quite a night. Obama's speech was amazing. He is a once in a lifetime figure when it comes to oration and inspiration. But now the hard work comes. The vitriol and nastiness has already started - just listen to the diarrhea hitting the crapper from Morning Dump with Joe and Pat and his assorted sidekicks. They cannot wait for Obama to fail and tell everyone "we told you so."

Be that as it may - there is plenty of time to deal with them. And they can be the news source of material for the Blogworld Comedy Hour.

But first to John McCain. No amount of good will from him - or even that gracious concession speech will EVER absolve him for running the angriest, meanest and most divisive campaign in history. He can be humble and give his hand in peace - but we will NEVER forget how nasty he and Mooselini were to Obama - from saying he palled around with terrorists, that he was a socialist, to labeling him that one, and finally being called a celebrity and elitist. You name it, McCain and especially Sarah Palin called Obama everything but the word they really wanted to use - and we all know what that world is. We will not forget. McCain and Palin - you deserved to lose and lose bad -- because both of you really SUCK. This loss was not only a repudiation of the awfulness of George W. Bush, but also of John McCain, his nasty campaign and his unleashing of Sarah Palin on the American public.

May all three of them rot.

Speaking of body language. Look at McCain at the end of his concession speech. Look at his body language with Palin. It is SO obvious he is angry and blaming her for the loss. And you know, he should be -- she was a BIG reason he lost. He could barely acknowledge her - and watch how he greets/embraces her. It is quite telling.

On the flip side, so look at how ANGRY Caribou Barbie is -- she is not humbled (like McCain) or caught in the moment -- she is fuming that they lost -- and she blames McCain. She is not going gently into that good night.

What a team - they hate each other and blame each other for this demoralizing and overwhelming loss. You can't write this script.

The McCain/Palin debate

I'm hoping Sarah Palin will go away. Forever! But this video was just too good. One last look at the two Repugs who dared to, not only appear in public, but run for president and vice president.

Thanks to the Huffington Post.

Why Andrew Sullivan is voting for Obama

Andrew Sullivan, erstwhile writer for The Atlantic and author of the delightful "The Daily Dish," has written an essay detailing why he is voting for Barack Obama. The particulars involving the sins of the Bush administration and the details as to our country's present perilous condition are well-known. But Sullivan succinctly ties them together in all their gory perversity to argue that McCain offers more of the same.

Sulllivan speaks of 9/11 and the "war on terror" as that has taken shape in Iraq and Afghanistan. It isn't merely that most of the U.S. military has been trapped "in an unending counter-insurgency in one country [Iraq] where al-Qaeda was weak before 2002," or that "Islamist factions in Pakistan's government are horrifyingly close to nuclear technology," or that "Iran has gained in power and influence in the Middle East..." but that all these things derive from the incompetence and mistakes of our leaders.

"These mistakes," writes Sullivan, "were compounded - and in large part created - by what I believe will one day be seen as the core event of the last eight years: the collapse of constitutional order and the rule of law fomented in a mixture of hubris and laziness by the president himself. It is now indisputable that the president and vice-president of the United States engineered a de facto coup against the constitution after 9/11, declaring themselves above any law, any treaty, and any basic moral norm in their misguided mission to rid the world of evil. ...

"Cheney and Bush, unlike any presidency in American history, have dangerously pushed constitutional government to the brink of collapse. ...

"No economic mismanagement can compare with this attack on the basic institutions of our democracy and the constitution. No incompetence in conducting an occupation can be deemed comparable with this level of criminality and indecency. No reaction to a natural disaster, however hapless and negligent, is as grave as this crime. No financial crisis eclipses it in gravity. The president's oath is to protect the constitution from enemies foreign and domestic. Instead, the president himself became an enemy to the constitution he swore to uphold."

McCain won't do, says Sullivan, for "...in the end, McCain [...] when push came to shove ... acquiesced to the legalization of America's use of the very same torture techniques once used against him. And in this campaign, we have seen how no Republican candidate can escape the logic of bigotry, fanaticism and xenophobia that now grips and motivates the Republican party base."

McCain, says Sullivan, will follow the same road as Bush/Cheney. While in some ways, Obama's policies "are too liberal" for Sullivan, he believes "McCain is not serious on spending. But he is deadly serious on not touching taxes. So, on the core question of debt, on bringing America back to fiscal reason, Obama is still better than McCain."

But, the "task of restoring the rule of law and Constitutional balance" is the most vital thing. "Unlike McCain, Obama has never wavered on torture or habeas corpus or on keeping the executive branch under the law. His deep understanding and awareness of the Constitution eclipses McCain's."

After a long section of why Barack Obama offers a kind of last "hope" for our country, Sullivan concludes with this:

"I endorse Barack Obama because I will not give up on America, because I believe in America, and in her constitution and decency and character and strength."


This is a superb article. Please read it in its entirety here.

McCain back to the POW thing

John McCain likes to tell people he doesn't like to talk about his POW experience, then he proceeds to tell them, again, all about it.

At the beginning of McCain's struggle for the White House - god, so long ago - and especially since the Republican National Convention, most of what we heard from John McCain and friends, was related to his time in Vietnam in a prisoner of war camp. Everytime he opened his mouth, he was yammering about how he spent five long years away from home, and blah, blah, blah...as if that experience, in some magic way, qualified him to lead the most powerful nation on earth.

He neglected to tell folks that one of the reasons he sat in that camp (and he was not tortured for five years, no matter what Fred Thompson says!) in Vietnam was because, once again, he ignored Naval regulations and was flying 1000 feet lower than he should have been, thus giving the North Vietnamese a better target, which resulted in his being shot down.


For awhile, the POW thing went away. We heard about it occasionally, but not all the time. Well, John must feel he's up against the wall, 'cause the POW thing is back. In Columbus, Ohio, joined by that great Prussian intellectual, Arnie Schwarzenegger, the POW thing again reared its "patriotic" head.

Arnie, bulging his muscles, told the faithful assembled: "John McCain has served his country longer in a POW camp than his opponent has in the United States Senate. I only play an action hero in the movies, John McCain is a real action hero."

Sound good? Well, it's bullshit! Hell, McCain probably sat in that camp longer than Arnie's been governor! What does that have to do with anything? Furthermore, just how did he serve his country while a POW? He told the North Vietnamese everything they wanted to know in order to get treatment in a hospital. I'm not criticizing him for that as few people can withstand mental or physical torture for very long. But that's not heroic. Hundreds of other prisoners were treated as badly or worse than McCain and did not give more than their name, rank and serial number.

This POW, "heroic" stuff has long been part of the carefully cultivated narrative of one John McCain - perhaps the lousiest Navy pilot since the birth of Naval aviation. It's the stuff of legend, and most of it is just that - legend.

McCain, who doesn't like to talk about his POW experience, told the rally in Columbus:

"I've served my country since I was 17 years old. And spent five years longing for her shores. I came home dedicated to a cause greater than my own."

"...longing for her shores"??? Who wrote that sentimental claptrap? He was a crazy sailor, for god's sake. Can you imagine McCain sitting in his little cell saying, "Oh, I long for my country's shores"? He'd be much more like to say, "Goddamn, I can't wait to get out of this hellhole and set my ass down on the California sand, chase up a little poontang and get shitfaced!"

But even the press buys this crap (always has!). The AP article describing this rally relates almost breathlessly how McCain "was shot down, held and tortured for more than five years..."

Finally, the cause greater than his own must have been Charles Keating's savings & loan operations. Or maybe McCain is refering to all the lobbyists and friends and donors he's done favors for over the years.


The whole POW thing reeks of desperation.

McCain's health care plan - oops!

This from Joe Sudbay at Americablog three days ago:

On CNNMoney.com, McCain's top economic adviser said:

"Younger, healthier workers likely wouldn't abandon their company-sponsored plans," said Douglas Holtz-Eakin.

"Why would they leave?" asked McCain's senior economic policy adviser. "What they're getting from their employer is way better than what they could get with the credit."


Hmmm. The wheels really are coming off the straight-talk express.

The Obama campaign responded thusly:

"'This morning, the McCain campaign's top economic policy advisor unleashed an October Surprise of straight talk when he finally admitted that the health insurance people currently get from their employer is 'way better' than the health care they would get if John McCain becomes President. Independent studies have shown that under John McCain's health care plan, at least 20 million Americans will lose the insurance they rely on and be forced to buy health care coverage on the individual market that costs more than $12,000 with a tax credit of just $5,000. Senator McCain has been trying to cover this up for months, but his advisor's brutal honesty today is certainly better late than never, and it should give every American pause about electing a candidate who has proposed such radical and dangerous changes to our health care system,' said Obama-Biden Spokesman Bill Burton."


Yup!

The desperation of John McCain

It's almost over for poor ol' John, the man who sold his soul to become president of the United States; the man who will go down in history as one of those sad characters who never lived up to what he imagined himself to be; the man who caved when it counted; the man who traded integrity and responsibility for opportunity and bigotry.

But, in these waning moments of his long battle against his own demons, John McCain, desperate now, continues to operate in a discredited attack mode, and from the shadows of his campaign, throws darts of derision at his opponent, which, as has happened more often than not, boomerang to strike and illuminate the inner core of the man he is.


John's latest and newest television ad, is essentially the same as his first and oldest television ad. It aired two days ago. You may have seen it. Here's what it said:

The narrator: "Behind the fancy speeches, grand promises and TV special lies the truth. With crises at home and abroad, Barack Obama lacks the experience America needs. And it shows. His response to our economic crisis is to spend and tax our economy deeper into recession. The fact is, Barack Obama's not ready yet."


Notice the note of jealousy in the first sentence. It must drive the old man up the wall to learn that over 23 million people tuned in to Barack's "infomercial," and that thousands upon thousands of people, some of which come from far distances, show up to hear Barack Obama describe his message of hope with concrete proposals for change. It must drive the old man further up the wall when Obama fails to even mention his name, as if he doesn't count, as if it's all over, as if McCain's candidacy is of so little value that it does rate so much as a sneer.

It must further drive the old man up the wall when leaders of the Republican Party, his own Party, denounce his character attacks on Senator Obama; when they express full-throated disdain with regard to his vice presidential pick; when they say that he's the one who's not ready; when they quote statistics that show that it's McCain's economic proposals which are likely to deepend the recession; when they reject McCain's response to our economic crisis and our crises abroad. He's the "warrior," for Christ's sake!


We've previously mentioned two Obama rallies at which some 100 thousand people showed up. Other rallies have been almost as impressive, with 75,000 in attendance at one in Missouri. In Pennsylvania, Obama had the "gall" to stand in the rain and present his message to thousands of supporters who came and huddled under umbrellas, while McCain cancelled his rally due to "inclement" weather! (Better inclement weather than lack of interest!).

Then, on Wednesday night, in Kissimmee, Florida: People began lining up early in the morning for an event that wouldn't begin until 11:00 P.M. By the time Barack Obama and Bill Clinton made their way to the stage, some 35,000 to 40,000 people crowded around to listen to their messages of hope. Some people had been waiting for 14-15 hours!

Compare that to another McCain rally which boasted 6,000 in attendance. That was mediocre in itself, but became embarrassing when we learned that 4,000 of those were school children who were brought to McCain's rally in school buses.


It appears quite likely that McCain's desperation and McCain's pain (Palin?) will be over on Tuesday night.

John McCain fighting - but going down!

[Photo of McCain supporters waiting to be roused]









From telegraph.co.uk news:

"In heated exchanges the Republican presidential candidate made clear that he will not tolerate the blame game that some of his aides have engaged in over the last week as Barack Obama retains a comfortable lead in national and swing state polls.

"Mr. McCain's aides have been labelled 'incontinent' for leaks last week that revealed failing morale in his inner circle and mutual recrimination about his lacklustre campaign. Mr. McCain has now rolled out a defiant new stump speech in Colorado, where he roused a 5,000 strong crowd with a call to arms, making clear that if he to to go down, he will go down fighting."


Several things:

How can you run anything BUT a lacklustre campaign when you have a lacklustre candidate? The only people really excited about John McCain seem to be the racists and haters, the anti-gays and super-Christians who see McCain, not as a viable candidate, but the only one to stop the "Muslim terrorist" Obama who, they fear, will bring an end to the American way of life [read "white rule"].

It is never good to blame the people (many of which are volunteers) when things go wrong. McCain should shoulder the blame himself and express sympathy for those who have worked all these months to see it all go up in flames.

Obama, without any recruiting, attracted 100,000 people to a rally in Denver, and seemed almost stunned by the turnout. McCain, the lacklustre candidate, "roused a 5,000 strong crowd" -- soporific, no doubt, from reading McCain campaign literature.

I really don't care how McCain goes down -- sleeping, scratching, clawing, crying, fighting -- just so long as he goes down!

Is Sarah Palin a socialist?

[Drawing of the Alaska State House in Juneau]

That may sound like a silly question. Of course, Sarah Palin is no socialist! She is a capitalist from Nome to Rome (Georgia, that is!).

Or maybe she doesn't know the difference.


Lately, we've heard Ms. Palin take off on Senator Barack Obama for his off-hand statement to Sam the Plumber (who hasn't paid his taxes!) about "sharing the wealth." Obama's comment was perfectly legitimate as it was in reference to the place of taxes in a democratic society, but it has been mutiliated beyond recognition by the McCain campaign in another attempt to slur Obama and paint him as a "socialist" who would take money from your pocket to give to the lazy and undeserving poor.

Palin's rallying cry of late has including mocking Obama for wanting to "spread the wealth." She curls her lip and sneers about "Barack the wealth spreader."


Steve Benen at the Washington Monthly says these attacks are filled with irony, for as noted by Ryan Powers:

"Just last month, in an interview with Philip Gourevitch of the New Yorker, Palin explained the windfall profits tax that she imposed on the oil industry in Alaska as a mechanism for ensuring that Alaskans 'share in the wealth' generated by oil companies. [...]

"In fact, Alaska's Clear and Equitable Share (ACES) program, which manages the redistribution of oil wealth in Alaska, brings in so much money that the state needs no income or sales tax. In addition, this year ACES will provide every Alaska with a check for an estimated $3,200."


Back to Benen: "I realize that even McCain, Palin, and Fox News don't take this 'socialism' nonsense seriously, and that this is just rhetoric borne of desperation. McCain has always struggled with new ideas and a changing world, so it stands to reason he'd rely on a red scare as his closing argument.

"But the truth is, Sarah Palin's Alaska is about as close to socialism as America gets. ..."

McCain's falsehood about founder of eBay

From Satyam Khanna at Think Progress.


We have all heard McCain brag about one of his "economic" advisers, eBay CEO Meg Whitman. McCain has even suggested that he might chose her to be Secretary of the Treasury.

We have all heard McCain speak of Ms. Whitman as the "founder" of eBay.

We have come to realize that much of the time, McCain doesn't know what the hell he's talking about.

In fact, as reported by the Huffington Post: "Whitman joined eBay as CEO in 1998, three years after it was founded by Pierre Omidyar, a Barack Obama supporter."

Defending the indefensible - Sarah Palin

On yesterday's talk shows, Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham "defended" the indefensible Sarah Palin.

John McCain on "Meet the Press" with Tom Brokaw, said, among other things:

Sarah Palin has already returned a third of the clothes bought for her by the RNC. (Wait, Sarah said most of them were still on the plane! And to where did she return them? Needless to say, Brokaw, who thinks McCain's the "best," did not ask those questions.)

Sarah Palin lives a "frugal" life, said McCain. She and her family are not wealthy. (Remember, now, that wealthy to John McCain means you make $5 million a year!)

"I don't defend her, I praise her," said McCain. "She is a role model to millions and millions and millions of Americans." (McCain did not elaborate on what kind of role model she was.)


Senator Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), was even more fawning that McCain. But then, Graham is a bit...you know...fawning himself. Actually, it appears that Graham is living in some alternative reality. On ABC's "This Week with George Stephanopoulos," he said that Palin has actually benefited the GOP ticket! "Sarah," said Graham, has "energized our base better than anybody we could have picked, and we needed that."


Oh hum.

Let's see how Palin is energizing the base ("base" being a euphemism for "mad dogs"). Sam Stein, writing at the Huffington Post put it this way:

"Sarah Palin had a few memorable moments during her campaign stop in Des Moines, Iowa, on Saturday. But the most eye-opening of them all came, it would appear, when the Alaska Governor somehow drew a connection between Barack Obama's tax policy and an encroaching, nightmarish, communist government. The Illinois Democrat, she hysterically suggested, would, through his proposals, create a country 'where the people are not free.'"

Here's part of Palin's speech:

"See, under a big government, more tax agenda, what you thought was yours would really start belonging to somebody else, to everybody else. If you thought your income, your property, your inventory, youir investments were, were yours, they would really collectively belong to everybody. Obama, Barack Obama has an ideological commitment to higher taxes, and I say this based on his record ... Higher taxes, more government, misuing the power to tax leads to government moving into the role of some believing that government then has to take care of us. And government kind of moving into the role as the other half of our family, making decisions for us. Now, they do this in other countries where the people are not free. Let us fight for what is right. John McCain and I, we will put out trust in you."



I'm not sure if Mr. Stein is aware that these are the talking points of the extremist Christian right. This is the crap (and it is all CRAP!) that comes right out of the James Dobson camp. Sarah Palin is simply mimicking what her mentors want her to say, those mentors who believe God is helping them put Sarah Palin in the White House (eventually) to preside over the "end-times" when Jesus comes back to kill all the infidels and establish a righteous government.


Mr. Stein points out how ignorant Palin really is. The McCain/Palin ticket supports a progressive tax system..."In fact, back in 2000, the Arizona Republican said rich people paid more in taxes because they could affort to do so.

"'I think the first people who deserve a tax cut are working Americans with children that need to educate their children, and they're the ones that I would support tax cuts for first."

Hmmm. Maybe McCain's changed his mind. While he still supports a progressive tax system, it shouldn't be too "progressive." He has vowed to extend the Bush tax package which brings relief to the rich on the backs of the poor and middle class.


In the end, though, you have to jump through a lot of insane hoops to defend Sarah Palin. It would be hard to find a vice presidential candidate within recent memory who is as sullenly and stubbornly ignorant and hateful and deceitful as she is. Even Dan Quayle doesn't come close.

Barack went to Denver...

Senator Barack Obama went to Denver, Colorado...to Denver's Civic Center Park.

ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND people showed up to see him and hear him speak about hope and politics without fear, and the kinds of changes which will provide "real" Americans -- that's all of us -- the opportunity to once again live in peace upon the land and share in the American dream.


Meanwhile, John McCain, in a TV interview with his dear friend and defender, Tom Brokaw, said the McCain/Palin ticket was going to win this election. McCain was serious. I think. It's hard to tell, because those hard, black eyes keep blinking and twitching and staring into space, and his face goes through myriads of contortions...

Then, right after the interview with Brokaw, McCain stepped outside to be greeted by a throng of two and a half, quite rumpled, people. They held up little tin cups. McCain shoved past them, knocking them to the ground, got into his limousine and drove away.

Nah...I made that last part up. Just funnin' folks. You know, like a real Amurrican.

But it could have happened that way.