Isaac Hayes & David Porter

Growing up in Memphis, I was lucky to work with some of the greats in the music business there. I once recorded for Estelle Axton, and at one time or another gigged with wonderfully talented sidemen who knew a thing or two about making great soul music.This NPR piece highlights two of my favorite writers from that era, David Porter and Isaac Hayes. This is fun stuff, folks.

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The Noose Tightens

Thanks to Jonathan Tepperman for this Newsweek exclusive.

"Michael Ratner, president of the Center for Constitutional Rights and author of "The Trial of Donald Rumsfeld," points out that over 20 countries now have universal jurisdiction laws that would allow them to indict U.S. officials for torture if America doesn't do it itself. A few such cases were attempted in recent years but were dropped, reportedly under U.S. pressure. Now the Obama administration may be less likely to stand in their way. This doesn't mean it will extradite Cheney and Co. to stand trial abroad. But at the very least, the threat of such suits could soon force Bush aides to think twice before buying plane tickets. "The world is getting smaller for these guys," says Ratner, "and they'll have to check with their lawyers very carefully before they travel." Jail time it isn't—but it may be some justice nonetheless."

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More Media Scandal; Whitewater Redux

Thank you, Jamison Foser, for this piece in Media Matters.

"To anyone who lived through the media feeding frenzy of the 1990s, during which the nation's leading news organizations spent the better part of a decade destroying their own credibility by relentlessly hyping a series of non-scandals, the past few days, in which the media have tried to shoehorn Barack Obama into the Rod Blagojevich scandal, have been sickeningly familiar."

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Down in the Valley to Pray

Doc Watson, Ricky Skaggs, and Allison Krause.

Simply beautiful.

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Rules for Writers

I stumbled across this website belonging to a professor from Princeton.

RULES FOR WRITERS



1. Verbs HAS to agree with their subjects.

2. Prepositions are not words to end sentences with.

3. And don't start a sentence with a conjunction.

4. It is wrong to ever split an infinitive.

5. Avoid cliches like the plague. (They're old hat)

6. Also, always avoid annoying alliteration.

7. Be more or less specific.

8. Parenthetical remarks (however relevant) are (usually)

unnecessary.

9. Also too, never, ever use repetitive redundancies.

10. No sentence fragments.

11. Contractions aren't necessary and shouldn't be used.

12. Foreign words and phrases are not apropos.

13. Do not be redundant; do not use more words than necessary;

it's highly superfluous.

14. One should NEVER generalize.

15. Comparisons are as bad as cliches.

16. Don't use no double negatives.

17. Eschew ampersands & abbreviations, etc.

18. One-word sentences? Eliminate.

19. Analogies in writing are like feathers on a snake.

20. The passive voice is to be ignored.

21. Eliminate commas, that are, not necessary. Parenthetical

words however should be enclosed in commas.

22. Never use a big word when a diminutive one would suffice.

23. Kill all exclamation points!!!

24. Use words correctly, irregardless of how others use them.

25. Understatement is always the absolute best way to put forth

earth shaking ideas.

26. Use the apostrophe in it's proper place and omit it when

its not needed.

27. Eliminate quotations. As Ralph Waldo Emerson said, "I hate

quotations. Tell me what you know."

28. If you've heard it once, you've heard it a thousand times:

Resist hyperbole; not one writer in a million can use it

correctly.

29. Puns are for children, not groan readers.

30. Go around the barn at high noon to avoid colloquialisms.

31. Even IF a mixed metaphor sings, it should be derailed.

32. Who needs rhetorical questions?

33. Exaggeration is a billion times worse than understatement.



And finally...

34. Proofread carefully to see if you any words out.

Letterman Skewers McCain

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Palin Caught Lying

[Click on Image Above to Enlarge]

In a September, 2007 press release, Palin states that it is congress that has lost interest in the project, not that she thanked them but turned the money down. That original press release has been "disappeared" from the official State of Alaska website, but Google still has a "snapshot" of it in its cache.

“Despite the work of our congressional delegation, we are about $329 million short of full funding for the bridge project, and it’s clear that Congress has little interest in spending any more money on a bridge between Ketchikan and Gravina Island . . . ”

So much for her claim that she stood up to congress and said, "Thanks but no thanks."

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Train Wreck

If McCain's choice of a running mate is any indication of the decision-making he'll do as president, he seems unfit for office.

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What a Catch!

This gal runs up the wall! Amazing!

Wait, it only SEEMS like she does. Turns out it was a hoax.

But fun to watch anyway.

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Biking

I'm getting a kick out of bicycling.

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Oh Happy Day

Great God Almighty!



Oh, and The Big Dog gets in on the act too.

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Bluegrass Gospel

Praise God. I love the grey-haired lady on bass. Is that kid on mandolin good or what?

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I Love My Crocs

I Love My

Navy Crocs.

Create your own Crocs Widget at LittleRubberShoes.com

Blue Rondo ala Turk

I don't know who this kid is, but my hat's off to him.

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War Crimes

Retired General who investigated Abu Ghraib accuses Bush officials of "war crimes." From McClatchy News:

"WASHINGTON — The Army general who led the investigation into prisoner abuse at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison accused the Bush administration Wednesday of committing "war crimes" and called for those responsible to be held to account.

The remarks by Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba, who's now retired, came in a new report that found that U.S. personnel tortured and abused detainees in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, using beatings, electrical shocks, sexual humiliation and other cruel practices.

"After years of disclosures by government investigations, media accounts and reports from human rights organizations, there is no longer any doubt as to whether the current administration has committed war crimes," Taguba wrote. "The only question that remains to be answered is whether those who ordered the use of torture will be held to account.""

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Press Sold the War

Another interesting Media Matters piece. This one talks about press complicity in Bush's selling of his war.

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Is the Honeymoon Over?

I predicted that the media "French-kissing" of Obama would end once they'd torpedoed Clinton's campaign. Are we beginning to see this now? Check out this piece from Media Matters.

"Media figures also often portray Obama as un-American or unpatriotic. Dick Morris says that "the question that plagues Obama is ... Is he pro-American?" and that the presidential election hinges on whether "we believe" Obama is "sort of a sleeper agent who really doesn't believe in our system." Investor's Business Daily asks, "Would Obama put African tribal or family interests ahead of U.S. interests?" On Fox & Friends, host Steve Doocy says Obama has "patriotism problems." MSNBC's Chris Matthews thinks "it's a hard thing for someone like Barack Obama" to express a "gut sense of Americanism" and describes Obama as "almost Third World in his sort of presentation." Jonah Goldberg falsely claims Obama "dodg[es] the word and concept of patriotism." And countless news reports -- not just in the right-wing media -- have obsessed over the fact that Obama often does not wear a flag pin (Fox News' Sean Hannity particularly loves this line of attack -- despite the fact that Hannity himself often appears on television without such a pin) or have passed along ridiculous claims about Obama and the Pledge of Allegiance, as CBS News and The Washington Post (among others) have done."

http://mediamatters.org/items/200806130006?f=h_latest

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Take Five

It's MUSIC time!

Dig Joe Morello on drums.



And some kids doing "Blue Rondo A'la Turk." Dig it. *S*

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"Get Over It"

When the USSC in December of 2000 stopped the counting of the votes in Florida, effectively handing the White House to the loser, Bush supporters told us, "Get over it." Shortly after taking office, Bush took a vacation, ignored a memo warning him of bin Laden plans to strike inside the US, and the nation watched in horror as over 3000 were murdered on 9/11.



"Get over it."



Then, Bush told us he'd hit "the trifecta," and he trumped up a bogus war against Iraq -- sending over 4000 of our troops to die over weapons of mass destruction that didn't exist.



"Get over it."



Where was our Washington press corps during all of this? They played along with Bush the whole time. They played along during the press war against Gore in 1999 and 2000. They played along during the recount in Florida. They played along when the recount commissioned by the press found that Gore had won in Florida -- lying to us -- and helpfully explaining how Bush had "won" if we don't count all the votes.



"Get over it."



They played along in Bush's build up to war, revising history -- telling us in 2002 that Saddam had "kicked out" UN inspectors from Iraq -- after reporting to us in 1998, that it was the UN who ordered the inspectors out of Iraq.



"Get over it."



Then, comes the swift-boating of Kerry in 2004. The press knew the swift-boaters lied, but they played along anyway. After all, Kerry was too "French," and he might even undo the big tax breaks the millionaire press pundits enjoyed under Bush.



"Get over it."



Now comes the primary of 2008. The press plays along, helpfully explaining to us that McCain is a "straight-shooter" and a "maverick." Don't worry about his flip-flops or about his gaffes.



"Get over it."



CNN tells us what a "gracious" and well "intended" guy Obama is -- ignoring his campaign's  playing the race card in their effort to defeat Clinton. The press pretended instead, that it was Clinton who played the race card.



"Get over it."



The press decided the outcome in 2000, and they decided the outcome of the Democratic primary in 2008.

'At the same time, says Lowry, "the press hates Hillary. There's real glee over the prospect of being done with the Clintons."' - Source - Howard Kurtz, Media Reporter, Washington Post



“Am I feeling bitter? You bet. Not because Hillary Clinton seems more likely than not to lose — I can live with that pretty easily — but because of how she's likely to lose. Because the press doesn't like her.” – Kevin Drum, Washington Monthly



"More than six years ago, long before Hillary Clinton began running for president, the Philadelphia Inquirer magazine reported that, according to an MSNBC colleague, Matthews had said of Clinton: "I hate her. I hate her. All that she stands for.""



‘’The media's apparent belief that it is acceptable to say any damn thing they want, true or false, as long as they say it about the Clintons, has become known as the "Clinton Rules of Journalism."’’

"Get over it."



Well, no. I won't get over it. I didn't get over it in 2000; I didn't get over it in 2004, and I'm not going to get over it in 2008 either. The press destroyed Gore's chances in 2000, just as they destroyed Kerry's in 2004, and Clinton's in 2008; and I fear that they'll also turn on Obama and destroy his chances later this year after they "get over" the "thrill" that French-kissing him now sends up their collective leg.

"It's part of reporting this case, this election, the feeling most people get when they hear Barack Obama's speech. My, I felt this thrill going up my leg. I mean, I don't have that too often." - Chris Matthews - February 13, 2008

Boys and girls, is this the kind of reporting we want deciding the future of our nation? Not for me. I, for one will not "Get over it."

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Obama's Clothes

Back in December of 2006, I noted the media's return to the clothing theme they used so effectively against Gore in 2000. Since Obama's apparently sealed the nomination, I've noticed a sudden interest from around the US and Europe on the matter of Obama's Clothes.

I wonder why the sudden interest? I'd appreciate comments on this.

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Disrespect for the Flag

United States Code: Title 4, Chapter 1
Section 8: Respect for the flag

No disrespect should be shown to the flag of the United States of America;
the flag should not be dipped to any person or thing. Regimental colors, State flags, and organization or institutional flags are to be dipped as a mark of honor.

[. . . ]

(g) The flag should never have placed upon it, nor on any part of it,
nor attached to it any mark, insignia, letter, word, figure, design, picture, or drawing of any nature.

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Superdoss

 

Superdoss

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Weenie

 

Weenie>

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Natchez

Natchez is bad news for the right wingers.

 

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War for Oil

McCain's on record verifying that we are in Iraq because of oil:

''My friends, I will have an energy policy that we will be talking about, which will eliminate our dependence on oil from the Middle East that will - that will then prevent us - that will prevent us from having ever to send our young men and women into conflict again in the Middle East. ''

 

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Bush Accused of Rape

It doesn't pay to cross Bush.

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They Called Him "Loserman"

Remember back when the right wingers HATED Lieberman?

 

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Character Is the Issue

Remember when they said that character counts? Boy, does it!

 

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Michelle Malkin

I stumbled across this pic of Michelle, and had to grab it. :)

 

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Maundy Thursday

Yes, we do foot-washing at our church.

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The Race "Card" in the Campaign

A lot has been made of President Clinton's allegedly "playing the race card" in South Carolina. For a look at one of the discussions, we need go no further than Chris Matthews' Hardball:

MATTHEWS (3/17/08): I was amazed to see Bill Clinton—I always say that somewhat sarcastically; I don’t mean to be sarcastic—I saw Bill Clinton on Good Morning America this morning said that he had nothing to apologize for when he compared Barack Obama’s victory in South Carolina with that of Jesse Jackson. He wasn’t marginalizing the minority candidate. He was doing nothing wrong. Whereas Hillary said, if I did something wrong or my husband did something wrong, please forgive him. Different points of view, obviously, here on the campaign trail by Bill and Hill.

GILES: Absolutely. And the funny thing to me is, if you watch and you remember the moment when sort of standing there saying, “Jesse Jackson won South Carolina, Jesse Jackson, Jesse Jackson;” he never said anything about him winning with a biracial coalition like he claimed this morning. He just kept repeating “Jesse Jackson” in this kind of wild-eye crazy way [emphasis added] like, remember, “Jesse, Jesse.” It’s totally disingenuous for him to say that today, I think.

Interesting. By now, everyone knows that President Clinton "just kept repeating, 'Jesse Jackson, Jesse Jackson'..." Great job, Chris. We're glad you brought on a guest to tell us what Clinton said, and just how "wild-eye crazy" he acted.

But wait! Is that what Clinton REALLY said? Let's take a look at the transcript and see for ourselves. Be sure to do a text search on "Jesse Jackson" so you can see how Clinton kept repeating that name over and over all "wild-eye crazy." View the transcript here.

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That Crazy, Wild-eyed Clinton

Here's the transcript of what Clinton REALLY said. Do a text search and see how a "wild-eye crazy" Clinton keeps repeating "Jesse Jackson, Jesse Jackson," over and over and over. To help you count the times, I've bolded all those instance of our "wild-eye crazy" former President's repeated mentions of "Jesse Jackson, Jesse Jackson" over and over. Count them for yourself. What a wild-eye crazy, eh?

"Bill Clinton: Wow. Hi, Everybody.

Reporter: How’s it going for you this morning, Mr. President?

BC: Oh, good. You know, I like election days and I think it’s interesting they vote on Saturday here, it makes it easier for working people to go. You know, there’s really not much you can do to change a lot of votes, but by stirring around you may induce people who are for you to go ahead and vote when they might not have.

Reporter: You proud of what you’ve done here in South Carolina?

BC: Oh yeah, we’ve done our best, and we’ve had, I particularly have enjoyed, you know, my role here has been almost exclusively to go around and do town meetings and answer questions, that’s most of what I’ve done, and I’ve really enjoyed that. I think it’s been immensely impressive to me to see in the audiences whether they were predominately African American, predominately white, or totally integrated, there has not been a great deal of difference in the questions people ask.

If the voters really are intensely interested in what we can do to change the economic direction of the country, what we can do about healthcare, what we can do to restore our country’s standing in the world.

And there doesn’t seem to be even a great deal of difference in the questions asked, depending on who they’re supporting, so I’ve – I like that, because, you know, I just answer questions. They know I know some things about this stuff, I make the case for Hillary as best I can, but basically I just tell them why I’m for Hillary, and then I answer their questions.

Reporter: That said, some of the folks in your own party have accused you of race baiting here.

BC: Yeah, well I would refer them to what John Lewis and Andrew Young – two people left who were with Martin Luther King every step of the way – said. I don’t have to defend myself on civil rights, and John Lewis and Andrew Young said what needed to be said about that. There’s nothing left for me to say.

Reporter: Mr. President, Senator Kerry that – had some critical comments too about some of the things that have gone on this week. He said being a former president doesn’t give you a license to abuse the truth. Just wanted your reaction to that.

BC: Yes, but did you notice he didn’t specify anything? You notice that? They never do. They hurl these charges, but nothing is specified. I’m not taking the bait today. I did what I could to help Senator Kerry every time he needed me, and every time he asked me, and I have no -- he can support whomever he wants, for whatever reason he wants, but there’s nothing for me to respond to because I don’t believe in labeling, I think he should have specifics, so today we just want everybody to vote.

David Wright: What does it say about Barack Obama that it takes two of you to beat him?

BC: [Laughs] That’s just bait, too. Jesse Jackson won South Carolina twice, in ‘84 and ‘88. And he ran a good campaign, and Senator Obama's run a good campaign here. He’s run a good campaign everywhere, he’s got a, he is a good candidate, with a good organization.

DW: He says he is sometimes not sure who his opponent is, you or his wife.

BC: That is bait, too.

DW: Your wife, rather, sorry.

BC: I am working for my wife because I believe she’d be the best president. If weren't married, I'd be working for her if she asked me to. And his wife’s done a good job for him, and --

DW: She’s not an ex-president of the United States, though.

BC: I know but that doesn’t mean that – I’m still a citizen now, when, you know, I can't wait to get back to my foundation work. I’m not a direct, directly involved in politics but I am concerned about my country and I think she’d be the best president.

And I would be working for her if we had never been married. She’s the best qualified person I’ve had a chance to support for president in my lifetime. For, because of the variety of experiences she’s had but because of the things she has done in every stage of her life to change other people’s lives for the better, and that’s what I say, my message has been 99.9 percent positive for 100 percent of this campaign.

Not only about her, but about the other candidates. And I think that when I think she’s being misrepresented I have a right to try to, with factual accuracy, set the record straight, which is what I have tried to do.
Andy Fies: Do you feel that you’re more actively involved than you ever thought you’d be at this point?

BC: Not exactly, I just –

AF: Or out on the trail more?

BC: No, I just, you know -- before what I was doing was trying to help her raise funds and not make any public impression, because I wanted America to have time to get to know her, the way New Yorkers have, the way people in Arkansas do. You know, she’s doing terrifically well in the polls down there because they know her. She did well in the Republican as well as Democratic areas of New York because they know her. She’s done immensely well in the U.S. Senate, passing bills with Republicans with stunning levels of success because they know her.

So - but now, you know, what happened is there’s so many elections happening so fast that you need all your family members, I mean I think Chelsea’s working in a way I’m not sure she thought she would be, we just all wanted to be hands on deck and I think it’s been the right thing, it’s kind of a family affair. My 88-year-old mother-in-law is working harder than she thought she would, but she likes it.

Oh yeah, I like this, I like the one thing I’ve been criticized for that I think is accurate - I have not said anything that is factually inaccurate and that’s why when people say I have they never specify because they know I’ll win the fight. But the - but I do think that the difference between now and running when I ran for myself, shoot, when I ran in ‘92 I could have cared less what anybody said about me.

Really, I didn’t. I mean, you just go right on, you’ve got your positive message, you stay on message, if somebody has an argument, you have an argument. When it’s your, spouse I think it’s harder to take when you hear people say things and call them names for months. That’s harder, you know, and I think I was a little hot in New Hampshire, and I think I got criticized for that, and one person said to me, she said, I talked to one person who had been critical, who said, look you told the truth, everything you said was true, but people don't want to see you mad about it. Just relax, chill out. And I think that’s, that was right, and I think that’s advice that I should have taken and I have tried to take.

David Wright: That’s Congressman Clyburn said too, chill out.

BC: Yeah, but he, Congressman Clyburn is a good man and he, he didn't dispute the accuracy of what I said, he just said that, that, people, we don’t want to get mad, and I agree with that, I don’t – I agree with that. We have got to try and hold everything together here because we’ve got a big campaign to win in the fall, whatever happens in this primary, and our side wants to change the economic and foreign policy direction of this country. And in order to do it, we’ve after – we’ll have a vigorous primary fight then we’ve got to put our party back together. And I am looking forward to that. I --

DW: But is that going to be tougher to do after the ugliness of South Carolina?

BC: No, man you've never been in very many campaigns if you think this was ugly, this was a cakewalk. This is not any big deal. This is a, you know I -- ever since, when I first stared running for president I was used to people just mauling me. You know, in some ways it hasn't been as ugly as Iowa was, you know it just didn’t get, the ugliness just was not publicized. The differences were not publicized.

[Crosstalk]

Well, I mean Hillary was called untruthful, manipulative, changing her position on everything, you know, a lot of things. You’ve just got to blow through this, that just all happens, it’s just part of politics, and you just shouldn't take the bait, you should be positive and go on and make our cases. But when it’s over, if you listen to - the most important thing to happen in that debate, that achieved no notice, was when they all sat down and cooled down, in the second part of the debate here in South Carolina, and all of them observed that they were all discussing their different approaches to issues that weren't even being discussed in the Republican primary. That’s the most important thing, because keep in mind, you have -- I am not being critical. But you have to cover this race as a horse race between candidates, but the really, the thing that matters to the people who are going there and voting is how their lives are going to change. So in the end the election is really about the American people and how their lives will change.

So for me as a citizen the most important thing that happened in that last debate was to see Senator Obama and Senator Edwards and Hillary agree that they were talking about things and caring about things that were not even being discussed in the other primary and that keeps saying to America we need to make a change and that means that whoever we nominate in this process can still be elected in the fall, that’s what we’ve got to do.

We’ve all got to hold it -- They should argue, it’s healthy, heck, let them argue about who’s got the best healthcare plan, who’s got the best stimulus plan, let them do that. But the main thing is to do it in a way that makes it clear to the American people that our party represents the fundamental departure in American needs, and that’s what I think’s going to happen. I basically feel good about it. But, you know, by the standards of southern politics and what I went through in the ‘80s at home, and even the ‘92 campaign, this has been a walk in the park there’s not much negative. We just need get this show on the road and get back to making our positive cases. All of us.

Staff: Thanks, guys.

Reporter: [unintelligible]

BC: Yeah I think they both did a good job, if you look at it, the campaign, the debate ended on a positive note and nearly as I can tell from just the press coverage I read, you know, I mean he put a few licks on her, and other people said what they said, but both of these, these campaigns are making a very -- three different distinct, positive appeals to their voters. [Crosstalk] And that’s what I think, and I think you’re going to it because I think we’ll have a good turnout today, but I -- you shouldn’t, you guys, you know, that stuff happens, but it’s very bad to have 100 percent of the interpretation of the campaign come out of 2 or 3 percent at most of what is said. If you look at the general thing, the Democrats offer a rather dramatic change in economic and foreign policy from the Republicans. And that’s what the American people are looking for. And I say -- Ok, so you’re going to change, so how will the healthcare deal work, how will the economic deal work. I’ve been going -- all I do is go to these meetings and let people ask questions, so I know how they look at it. And that’s good for us. And we’ll keep it together, it’ll be fine.

BC: Thank you."

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Memphis Underground

The LP version of "Memphis Underground" was done at American Recording on Chelsea in North Memphis. If you listen to the title track --- there's an interesting story that goes with it. Selecto-Hits is right across the street from American -- Herbie and the boys went across the street and bought some records. They were trying to figure out something to record. Herbie never identified the record, but I'm sure I know which one it is. They hit on one they liked -- and Herbie asked the session players if they could work that same groove.

"Work that groove?" they laughed. "Hell, it IS our groove."

Listen closely, and you will hear Wilson Pickett's version of "Mustang Sally." Admittedly, it's hard to pick up on this live version, but it's unmistakable on the LP.

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This is an interesting look at where the immigration debate has taken us. From AARP's Bulletin:

"Bernice Todd's Choctaw family roots are sunk deep in the soil of Oklahoma, a state whose very name is Choctaw for "red people." But in the middle of a debilitating battle with cancer, Todd, a 39-year-old who cleans homes at a trailer park and baby-sits for a living, lost her state Medicaid health care coverage because, although she's a Native American, she could not prove she is a U.S. citizen.

While Todd's case is rich in irony, she is one of tens of thousands of Americans who are falling victim to a new federal rule—aimed at keeping illegal immigrants off the Medicaid rolls—requiring that recipients prove their citizenship and identity with documents many don't have."

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Ferraro in Context

The news media have been very careful to "disappear" one of the telling comments uttered by Geraldine Ferraro recently to Jim Farber of The Daily Breeze. And that has to do with the way the press has been uniquely hard on Senator Clinton. Considering the context, this adds a bit of a different take as to the point Ferraro was attempting to make. Indeed, compare the treatment of Obama by the media to that of Clinton - and it's apparent that there is something unique in the way they go after her, but give him a free ride. I have to agree that there is a lot of truth in what Ferraro had to say.

""I think what America feels about a woman becoming president takes a very secondary place to Obama's campaign - to a kind of campaign that it would be hard for anyone to run against," she said. "For one thing, you have the press, which has been uniquely hard on her. It's been a very sexist media. Some just don't like her. The others have gotten caught up in the Obama campaign.

"If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position," she continued. "And if he was a woman (of any color) he would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be who he is. And the country is caught up in the concept." Ferraro does not buy the notion of Obama as the great reconciler.

"I was reading an article that said young Republicans are out there campaigning for Obama because they believe he's going to be able to put an end to partisanship," Ferraro said, clearly annoyed. "Dear God! Anyone that has worked in the Congress knows that for over 200 years this country has had partisanship - that's the way our country is.""

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Obama Dumps Pastor

If there is something wrong with Wright's views -- why did it take Obama until now to realize it?

I'm trying to imagine my distancing myself from our parish priest. I just can't see it.

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Some States Are "More Equal"

Gene Lyons addresses the matter of which states are more important in the Democratic Primaries. He compares the race to a 7-game series.

"And if nobody’s won after seven? Well, the rules say the superdelegates get to decide. And when they do, they’ll be looking at the stats, such as Obama losing 83 of Ohio’s 88 counties; the fact that so far Clinton has won states totaling 263 electoral votes to Obama’s 193; or which one polls ahead of the GOP nominee, Sen. John McCain, and where."

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Why Didn't Clinton Deny That Obama Is a Muslim?

Asked on CBS 60 Minutes if she believes Obama is a Muslim, Clinton replied without hesitation, "Of course not. . . There is no basis for that . . . "

NBC's Meredith Vieira later asked Senator Clinton, why she hadn't answered, "No."

I'm not kidding. you.

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Nicholson Ad for Clinton

Ya' gotta love ol' Jack! *S*

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Obama Played the Race Card

The New Republic's Sean Wilentz writes a piece entitled "How Barack Obama played the race card and blamed Hillary Clinton."

"Misleading propaganda is hardly new in American politics --although the adoption of techniques reminiscent of past Republican and special-interest hit jobs, right down to a retread of the fictional couple, seems strangely at odds with a campaign that proclaims it will redeem the country from precisely these sorts of divisive and manipulative tactics. As insidious as these tactics are, though, the Obama campaign's most effective gambits have been far more egregious and dangerous than the hypocritical deployment of deceptive and disingenuous attack ads. To a large degree, the campaign's strategists turned the primary and caucus race to their advantage when they deliberately, falsely, and successfully portrayed Clinton and her campaign as unscrupulous race-baiters--a campaign-within-the-campaign in which the worked-up flap over the Somali costume photograph is but the latest episode. While promoting Obama as a "post-racial" figure, his campaign has purposefully polluted the contest with a new strain of what historically has been the most toxic poison in American politics.



[ . . . ]



''A review of what actually happened shows that the charges that the Clintons played the ''race card'' were not simply false; they were deliberately manufactured by the Obama camp and trumpeted by a credulous and/or compliant press corps in order to strip away her once formidable majority among black voters and to outrage affluent, college-educated white liberals as well as college students. The Clinton campaign, in fact, has not racialized the campaign, and never had any reason to do so. Rather the Obama campaign and its supporters, well-prepared to play the ''race-baiter card'' before the primaries began, launched it with a vengeance when Obama ran into dire straits after his losses in New Hampshire and Nevada--and thereby created a campaign myth that has turned into an incontrovertible truth among political pundits, reporters, and various Obama supporters. This development is the latest sad commentary on the malign power of the press, hyping its own favorites and tearing down those it dislikes, to create pseudo-scandals of the sort that hounded Al Gore during the 2000 campaign. It is also a commentary on how race can make American politics go haywire. Above all, it is a commentary on the cutthroat, fraudulent politics that lie at the foundation of Obama's supposedly uplifting campaign.'' [emphases added]

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Dowd Improves on Clinton Speech

Campaigning in Texas, Senator Clinton delivers a zinger at Bush.

''You know, there's a great saying in Texas -- you've all heard it. 'All hat and no cattle.' . . Well, after seven years of George Bush, we need a lot less hat and a lot more cattle."

Hey, that's pretty good. But what makes for a better line? Hell! Easy. Just pretend she said it about Obama instead of Bush.

That's exactly what Maureen Dowd did.

''Hillary says Obama is “all hat and no cattle.” You’d think she’d want to avoid cattle metaphors, so as not to rile up those with a past beef about her sketchy windfall on cattle futures. She could simply say he’s all cage and no bird.''

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Where's Obama's Voice on Misogny?

Excellent piece by Tom Watson on Obama's acceptance of misogyny in the campaign against Clinton.

"Obama's breakthrough says something wonderful about the state of racial politics in our nation - or perhaps the lack of racial politics - and the involvement of young people in politics. But his silence in the case of the cynical media lynching of Hillary Clinton by a national press corps obsessed with her gender is telling. And unless Barack Obama speaks out, his campaign's chilling acceptance of the gender bias stirred by our national media will also remind many of Ronald Reagan's acceptance of the race-baiting southern strategy - because if Obama accepts the presidency, at least in part, because of abject sexism, a brutal gender attack on a female rival - the most famous female Democrat in history - he will set feminism in our country back a generation.""

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Limbaugh Says McCain Is Nuts

Huffington Post did a piece on Limbaugh predictions regarding the upcoming general election campaign:

"We're going to get the worst pictures of McCain. We're going to get him looking tired. We're going to hear references to his forgetfulness. "Isn't it just a shame?" And if that doesn't work, then they're going to do stories on the fact he's nuts. Just mark my words."

Interesting. Rush doesn't tell us that they going to allege that he's nuts; suggest that he's nuts; hint that he's nuts; no, they're going to point to ''the fact'' that McCain IS nuts."

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Matthews Reportedly Hates Hillary

Thanks to Eric Boehlert for this:

"More than six years ago, long before Hillary Clinton began running for president, the Philadelphia Inquirer magazine reported that, according to an MSNBC colleague, Matthews had said of Clinton: "I hate her. I hate her. All that she stands for.""

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More Misogyny from MSNBC

We showed you earlier footage of MSNBC's Chris Matthews engaging in some of the most sordid and ugly misogyny ever aired on a news network.

Not be out-sleazed, here's Matthews' colleague, David Shuster, trying to outdo the king of misogyny. This is disgraceful, folks.



DAVID SHUSTER: Bill, there's just something a little bit unseemly to me that Chelsea's out there calling up celebrities, saying support my mom, and she's apparently also calling these super delegates.

BILL PRESS: Hey, she's working for her mom. What's unseemly about that? During the last campaign, the Bush twins were out working for their dad. I think it's great, I think she's grown up in a political family, she's got politics in her blood, she loves her mom, she thinks she'd make a great president --

SHUSTER: But doesn't it seem like Chelsea's sort of being pimped out in some weird sort of way?

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McCain is a Democrat?

Our friends at Fox Noise are up to their old trix again. For one reason or another, they want us to think John McCain is a Democrat.

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Let's Boogie!

Are these guys good, or what? The dancers, I mean. And the piano isn't bad either.

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Krugman on Medicare

In this piece Krugman dispels the myth that government provided health care is necessarily less efficient.

"The great advantage of universal, government-provided health insurance is lower costs. Canada's government-run insurance system has much less bureaucracy and much lower administrative costs than our largely private system. Medicare has much lower administrative costs than private insurance. The reason is that single-payer systems don't devote large resources to screening out high-risk clients or charging them higher fees. The savings from a single-payer system would probably exceed $200 billion a year, far more than the cost of covering all of those now uninsured."

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Krugman on Health Care - Clinton vs Obama

Paul Krugman had this to say about Clinton's health care proposal vs Obama's.

---

The principal policy division between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama involves health care. It’s a division that can seem technical and obscure — and I’ve read many assertions that only the most wonkish care about the fine print of their proposals.


But as I’ve tried to explain in previous columns, there really is a big difference between the candidates’ approaches. And new research, just released, confirms what I’ve been saying: the difference between the plans could well be the difference between achieving universal health coverage — a key progressive goal — and falling far short.

Specifically, new estimates say that a plan resembling Mrs. Clinton’s would cover almost twice as many of those now uninsured as a plan resembling Mr. Obama’s — at only slightly higher cost.

Let’s talk about how the plans compare.

Both plans require that private insurers offer policies to everyone, regardless of medical history. Both also allow people to buy into government-offered insurance instead.

And both plans seek to make insurance affordable to lower-income Americans. The Clinton plan is, however, more explicit about affordability, promising to limit insurance costs as a percentage of family income. And it also seems to include more funds for subsidies.

But the big difference is mandates: the Clinton plan requires that everyone have insurance; the Obama plan doesn’t.

Mr. Obama claims that people will buy insurance if it becomes affordable. Unfortunately, the evidence says otherwise.

After all, we already have programs that make health insurance free or very cheap to many low-income Americans, without requiring that they sign up. And many of those eligible fail, for whatever reason, to enroll.

An Obama-type plan would also face the problem of healthy people who decide to take their chances or don’t sign up until they develop medical problems, thereby raising premiums for everyone else. Mr. Obama, contradicting his earlier assertions that affordability is the only bar to coverage, is now talking about penalizing those who delay signing up — but it’s not clear how this would work.

So the Obama plan would leave more people uninsured than the Clinton plan. How big is the difference?

To answer this question you need to make a detailed analysis of health care decisions. That’s what Jonathan Gruber of M.I.T., one of America’s leading health care economists, does in a new paper.

Mr. Gruber finds that a plan without mandates, broadly resembling the Obama plan, would cover 23 million of those currently uninsured, at a taxpayer cost of $102 billion per year. An otherwise identical plan with mandates would cover 45 million of the uninsured — essentially everyone — at a taxpayer cost of $124 billion. Over all, the Obama-type plan would cost $4,400 per newly insured person, the Clinton-type plan only $2,700.

That doesn’t look like a trivial difference to me. One plan achieves more or less universal coverage; the other, although it costs more than 80 percent as much, covers only about half of those currently uninsured.

As with any economic analysis, Mr. Gruber’s results are only as good as his model. But they’re consistent with the results of other analyses, such as a 2003 study, commissioned by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, that compared health reform plans and found that mandates made a big difference both to success in covering the uninsured and to cost-effectiveness.

And that’s why many health care experts like Mr. Gruber strongly support mandates.

Now, some might argue that none of this matters, because the legislation presidents actually manage to get enacted often bears little resemblance to their campaign proposals. And there is, indeed, no guarantee that Mrs. Clinton would, if elected, be able to pass anything like her current health care plan.

But while it’s easy to see how the Clinton plan could end up being eviscerated, it’s hard to see how the hole in the Obama plan can be repaired. Why? Because Mr. Obama’s campaigning on the health care issue has sabotaged his own prospects.

You see, the Obama campaign has demonized the idea of mandates — most recently in a scare-tactics mailer sent to voters that bears a striking resemblance to the “Harry and Louise” ads run by the insurance lobby in 1993, ads that helped undermine our last chance at getting universal health care.

If Mr. Obama gets to the White House and tries to achieve universal coverage, he’ll find that it can’t be done without mandates — but if he tries to institute mandates, the enemies of reform will use his own words against him.

If you combine the economic analysis with these political realities, here’s what I think it says: If Mrs. Clinton gets the Democratic nomination, there is some chance — nobody knows how big — that we’ll get universal health care in the next administration. If Mr. Obama gets the nomination, it just won’t happen.

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Media Hatred of Clinton

Oftentimes when I remind our conservative friends that the media hates the Clintons, they reply with the standard tired line about everyone knowing that the press adores the Clintons.

Not any longer, folks.

Finally the National Review editor Rich Lowry admits ''the press hates Hillary.''

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F*cking Matt Damon

This is hilarious.

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Obama Violates Pledge in Florida

Accoring to a report in the Tampa Bay Online Obama violated his pledge not to campaign in Florida. Then he had the audacity to accuse Senator Clinton of planning to break that same pledge. I'm beginning to wonder about this guy.

"TAMPA - Barack Obama hinted during a Tampa fundraiser Sunday that if he's the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, he'll seat a Florida delegation at the party's national convention, despite national party sanctions prohibiting it.

Obama also appeared to violate a pledge he and the other leading candidates took by holding a brief news conference outside the fundraiser. That was less than a day after the pledge took effect Saturday, and Obama is the first Democratic presidential candidate to visit Florida since then."

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Rule Change

Whoops! Seems there has been a last minute rule change. For this debate the MSNBC moderators will NOT - repeat -- WILL NOT pile on the front runner. After all, the front runner is a republican.

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Pile-on the Front Runner

In the Democratic debate of October 30, 2007, MSNBC moderators Brian Williams and Tim Russert facilitated what could charitably be called an attempted "gang bang" of Senator Clinton. It moved the NY Times to note that Russert played the role of an "opponent" during the affair.

In response to the firestorm of criticism MSNBC received for the blatant ganging up on Clinton, MSNBC trotted out NOW's Kim Gandy to helpfully explain that they "always" "pile on" the front runner in such situations.

So, tonight, some of us are anxiously awaiting the Russert and Williams double-team to "pile on" front-runner John McCain. This should be a sight to behold. I can't wait.

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Obama's Getting Desperate

I'm having serious doubts about Obama. The other day he criticized Hillary Clinton for not spending more time in SC - that is to say - she's not taking it seriously.

Yet later he criticized her for "pulling out all the stops" to win in South Carolina -- claiming that she will "say and do anything" to win it. (Sound familiar? The right wing smear machine said the same thing about Gore in 2000.)

So which is it, Obama? Is Clinton taking SC too seriously? Or not seriously enough?

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Senator Barak O'Lieberman

What in Sam Hill was this guy thinking?

"I think it is fair to say the Republicans were the party of ideas for a pretty long chunk of time over the last 10, 15 years. . . "

Was O’Lieberman – I mean Obama – referring to the Reagan years? No. Bill Clinton was president 15 years ago (1993) -- and was still president 10 years ago - in 1998.

Clearly Obama referred to the Clinton years. Then, when Sen. Clinton challenged Obama on his remarks about the time her husband was president, Obama pretended he was really talking about the period 19 to 27 years ago instead of the period he stated -- 10 to 15 years ago. The media knew to play along with Obama's deception.

For instance – dig this distortion by Chris Matthews: “Why does Hillary Clinton deny, almost like in high school, I didn’t say Reagan’s name, when she clearly was talking and knocking Obama for what he’d said about Reagan?”

Uh, Chris. Reagan was elected 27 years ago – not 15 years ago. She clearly wasn’t talking about Reagan.

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Matthews' Misogyny

Am I the only one who wonders why MSNBC doesn't fire this man?



And replace him with this lady.

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Why Bush Must Go - By George McGovern

Why I Believe Bush Must Go
Nixon Was Bad. These Guys Are Worse.
By George McGovern
Washington Post; Sunday, January 6, 2008; Page B01

As we enter the eighth year of the Bush-Cheney administration, I have belatedly and painfully concluded that the only honorable course for me is to urge the impeachment of the president and the vice president.

After the 1972 presidential election, I stood clear of calls to impeach President Richard M. Nixon for his misconduct during the campaign. I thought that my joining the impeachment effort would be seen as an expression of personal vengeance toward the president who had defeated me.

Today I have made a different choice.

Of course, there seems to be little bipartisan support for impeachment. The political scene is marked by narrow and sometimes superficial partisanship, especially among Republicans, and a lack of courage and statesmanship on the part of too many Democratic politicians. So the chances of a bipartisan impeachment and conviction are not promising.

But what are the facts?

Bush and Cheney are clearly guilty of numerous impeachable offenses. They have repeatedly violated the Constitution. They have transgressed national and international law. They have lied to the American people time after time. Their conduct and their barbaric policies have reduced our beloved country to a historic low in the eyes of people around the world. These are truly "high crimes and misdemeanors," to use the constitutional standard.

From the beginning, the Bush-Cheney team's assumption of power was the product of questionable elections that probably should have been officially challenged -- perhaps even by a congressional investigation.

In a more fundamental sense, American democracy has been derailed throughout the Bush-Cheney regime. The dominant commitment of the administration has been a murderous, illegal, nonsensical war against Iraq. That irresponsible venture has killed almost 4,000 Americans, left many times that number mentally or physically crippled, claimed the lives of an estimated 600,000 Iraqis (according to a careful October 2006 study from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health) and laid waste their country. The financial cost to the United States is now $250 million a day and is expected to exceed a total of $1 trillion, most of which we have borrowed from the Chinese and others as our national debt has now climbed above $9 trillion -- by far the highest in our national history.

All of this has been done without the declaration of war from Congress that the Constitution clearly requires, in defiance of the U.N. Charter and in violation of international law. This reckless disregard for life and property, as well as constitutional law, has been accompanied by the abuse of prisoners, including systematic torture, in direct violation of the Geneva Conventions of 1949.

I have not been heavily involved in singing the praises of the Nixon administration. But the case for impeaching Bush and Cheney is far stronger than was the case against Nixon and Vice President Spiro T. Agnew after the 1972 election. The nation would be much more secure and productive under a Nixon presidency than with Bush. Indeed, has any administration in our national history been so damaging as the Bush-Cheney era?

How could a once-admired, great nation fall into such a quagmire of killing, immorality and lawlessness?

It happened in part because the Bush-Cheney team repeatedly deceived Congress, the press and the public into believing that Saddam Hussein had nuclear arms and other horrifying banned weapons that were an "imminent threat" to the United States. The administration also led the public to believe that Iraq was involved in the 9/11 attacks -- another blatant falsehood. Many times in recent years, I have recalled Jefferson's observation: "Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just."

The basic strategy of the administration has been to encourage a climate of fear, letting it exploit the 2001 al-Qaeda attacks not only to justify the invasion of Iraq but also to excuse such dangerous misbehavior as the illegal tapping of our telephones by government agents. The same fear-mongering has led government spokesmen and cooperative members of the press to imply that we are at war with the entire Arab and Muslim world -- more than a billion people.

Another shocking perversion has been the shipping of prisoners scooped off the streets of Afghanistan to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and other countries without benefit of our time-tested laws of habeas corpus.

Although the president was advised by the intelligence agencies last August that Iran had no program to develop nuclear weapons, he continued to lie to the country and the world. This is the same strategy of deception that brought us into war in the Arabian Desert and could lead us into an unjustified invasion of Iran. I can say with some professional knowledge and experience that if Bush invades yet another Muslim oil state, it would mark the end of U.S. influence in the crucial Middle East for decades.

Ironically, while Bush and Cheney made counterterrorism the battle cry of their administration, their policies -- especially the war in Iraq -- have increased the terrorist threat and reduced the security of the United States. Consider the difference between the policies of the first President Bush and those of his son. When the Iraqi army marched into Kuwait in August 1990, President George H.W. Bush gathered the support of the entire world, including the United Nations, the European Union and most of the Arab League, to quickly expel Iraqi forces from Kuwait. The Saudis and Japanese paid most of the cost. Instead of getting bogged down in a costly occupation, the administration established a policy of containing the Baathist regime with international arms inspectors, no-fly zones and economic sanctions. Iraq was left as a stable country with little or no capacity to threaten others.

Today, after five years of clumsy, mistaken policies and U.S. military occupation, Iraq has become a breeding ground of terrorism and bloody civil strife. It is no secret that former president Bush, his secretary of state, James A. Baker III, and his national security adviser, Gen. Brent Scowcroft, all opposed the 2003 invasion and occupation of Iraq.

In addition to the shocking breakdown of presidential legal and moral responsibility, there is the scandalous neglect and mishandling of the Hurricane Katrina catastrophe. The veteran CNN commentator Jack Cafferty condenses it to a sentence: "I have never ever seen anything as badly bungled and poorly handled as this situation in New Orleans." Any impeachment proceeding must include a careful and critical look at the collapse of presidential leadership in response to perhaps the worst natural disaster in U.S. history.

Impeachment is unlikely, of course. But we must still urge Congress to act. Impeachment, quite simply, is the procedure written into the Constitution to deal with presidents who violate the Constitution and the laws of the land. It is also a way to signal to the American people and the world that some of us feel strongly enough about the present drift of our country to support the impeachment of the false prophets who have led us astray. This, I believe, is the rightful course for an American patriot.

As former representative Elizabeth Holtzman, who played a key role in the Nixon impeachment proceedings, wrote two years ago, "it wasn't until the most recent revelations that President Bush directed the wiretapping of hundreds, possibly thousands, of Americans, in violation of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) -- and argued that, as Commander in Chief, he had the right in the interests of national security to override our country's laws -- that I felt the same sinking feeling in my stomach as I did during Watergate. . . . A President, any President, who maintains that he is above the law -- and repeatedly violates the law -- thereby commits high crimes and misdemeanors."

I believe we have a chance to heal the wounds the nation has suffered in the opening decade of the 21st century. This recovery may take a generation and will depend on the election of a series of rational presidents and Congresses. At age 85, I won't be around to witness the completion of the difficult rebuilding of our sorely damaged country, but I'd like to hold on long enough to see the healing begin.

There has never been a day in my adult life when I would not have sacrificed that life to save the United States from genuine danger, such as the ones we faced when I served as a bomber pilot in World War II. We must be a great nation because from time to time, we make gigantic blunders, but so far, we have survived and recovered.

anmcgove@dwu.edu

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