The McCain Presidency: Day One

Hilarious. And terrifying.

McCain's Economic Plan For Nation: ‘Everyone Marry A Beer Heiress’

McCain’s Economic Plan For Nation: 'Everyone Marry A Beer Heiress'

New Palin Interview With Marge From Fargo

Funny.

Art for Obama

Metrowest Daily News: Jim Walker
Artist Mike Mandel has created a seven and a half foot tall tile mosaic of Democratic Presidential candidate Barack Obama in front of his home on Maplewood Street in Watertown.

Metrowest Daily News (Framingham, MA): Watertown artist creates Obama mural

Check out Mike Mandel's website, which has links to some of his other pieces in the righthand sidebar.

Video of Mike Mandel discussing his mural:

Watertown artist creates Obama mural from steve bagley on Vimeo.

Sarah Palin is George W. Bush in Lipstick

Keith Olbermann shows that Sarah Palin's handlers have put George W. Bush's deceptive words in her lipsticked mouth:



Winker/Wanker '08

Hit Him Again, Hit Him Again, Harder, Harder

New Obama ad on McCain's healthcare plan:



McCain's healthcare plan would be the largest middle class tax increase in history.

Jon Stewart on the Bailout

Clusterfuck to the Poor House.

A Few Laughs On a Fine Saturday

Winker/Wanker '08

The unholy triumverate.

HuffPo: Who is the Biggest Winker of Them All?

New Obama Ad: "Prescription"

This is a great issue to attack John McCain on. His health care plan is a joke, a gift to the greedy health insurance industry. How does a $2,500 tax credit help me, paying over $5,000 for health insurance this year (probably over $6,000 next year)? And he's going to tax what benefit I do get from my employer as income. And if he taxes benefits, taking away the tax benefit employers get for providing health insurance, that is the death knell of employer-provided health insurance.

The Perfect Marriage

They Think We're Stupid

NYDaily News: McCain's Latin American foreign policy experience, in 1957.

Miami Herald: Old flame cited as part of McCain's Latin experience

Sen. John McCain's senior foreign policy advisor cites a steamy romance 50 years ago with a Brazilian babe among the things that illustrate the candidate's decades-long interest in Latin America.

Speaking at an Americas Conference panel discussion Friday on the next U.S. president's Latin American policy, McCain advisor Richard Fontaine started out by mentioning an old Brazilian flame of McCain's, who recently emerged in the press.

''Talking a little about his personal experience, he was famously born in Panama and has traveled all over the hemisphere for many years.'' Fontaine said. ``In fact, I saw, I guess it was last week, that his old girlfriend in Brazil has been found from his early days when he was in the Navy and was interviewed. She's a somewhat older woman now than she was then, but it sorta speaks to the long experience he has had in the region -- in the most positive terms.''

Hey, why didn't we elect Wilt Chamberlain President? He slept with 20,000 women, he must had had foreign policy interests all over the world.

Sheesh.

Are You Registered to Vote?

This is the time to check. Voter registration deadlines differ among states, and many end this week.

Check your state's voter registration deadlines, how to register, where to vote, etc., here.

You may have voted before, but the Republican National Committee is making a concerted effort to knock voters off the rolls. It's worth your time to check to make sure you are still registered.

In Montana the Republicans are challenging everyone who filled out a change-of-address card in the last 18 months in seven Democratic-leaning counties. If you've filled out a change of address card recently, go check your registration.

In Virginia, the Republicans are challenging college student's residency, asking for tax returns for registration, and warning students (falsely) that they will lose their financial aid or health insurance if they vote in Virginia. If you're a college student, go check your registration.

In Mississippi, a local election official purged 10,000 voters from the rolls from her home computer. If you are not on a first-name basis with your local election officials, go check your registration.

In Georgia, 700 voters were purged from the voter rolls even though many of those 700 had never committed any crime, never even received a parking ticket. If you've never committed a crime, go check your voter registration.

Don't the ratfuckers prevent you from voting.


Senator Edward M. Kennedy, dailykos: Are you registered to vote?

The McCain Campaign's Fatal Mistake

Pissing off David Letterman was a very, very stupid thing to do.

Some special messages from Sarah Palin:


Top 10 Messages on Sarah Palin's Answering Machine:


Bwahahaha.

No Comment

yahoo: Republican vice presidential candidate Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin winks as she speaks during her vice presidential debate against Democratic vice presidential candidate Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., at Washington University in St. Louis, Mo., Thursday, Oct. 2, 2008.
(AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

Oops - "Famous Person" Loves Palin!

Actual shot of an McCain/Palin web ad this morning.

dailykos: Famous Person loves Palin!

(It was supposed to be La Nooners)

Gotta Run

yahoo: A 'Palin Bingo' card sits on a counter at a debate watch party at a tavern in Seattle Thursday evening, Oct. 2, 2008. People watched the televised debate there between vice presidential candidates Republican Sarah Palin and Democrat Joe Biden and filled out game cards based on comments made by Palin.
(AP Photo/Elaine Thompson)

My real life keeps intruding on blogging!

Read elsewhere:

Palin screwed the pooch on the bankruptcy question last night. She said she and McCain weren't opposed to changing current bankruptcy laws regarding first mortgages. Problem? McCain does indeed oppose changing the law. Current bankruptcy law doesn't allow bankruptcy judges to rewrite mortgage terms on first - primary - residences. But if you're a rich fuck like John McCain, bankruptcy judges have the power to protect your 2nd house, your 3rd house, your 4th house, your 5th house, your 6th house, your 7th house, your plane, your yacht -- but not the primary residence for millions of ordinary Americans. Palin basically adopted Obama's position in her answer, and McCain's camp is flailing. Smell the hypocrisy. Team of mavericks, my eye.

Washington Post reports that McCain has hired a new aide: Mark Buse, who was hired by Freddie Mac in 2003 and 2004 to lobby.....wait, this gets better....to lobby John McCain!

Jane Hamsher skewers Wrinkly/Winky '08:

She does not know what "achilles heel" means. Watch it. She Does. Not. Know. What. It. Means.

Forget the tight stripper skirt, forget the metallic eyeshadow inappropriate for anyone over the age of 40, forget the cloying sitcom delivery, the lies, the cruel and calculated needling of Biden by calling his college professor wife a "school teacher" and saying "she'll get her reward in Heaven" (to a man whose first wife died in a car accident) -- she's an idiot.

I cannot believe that we are seriously thinking of placing this dodo bird within reach of the Presidency.

Sarah Palin's 18 lies, from Americablog.

New Obama Ad: "The Ultimate Bridge to Nowhere" *Updated*

I jumped off the couch when Biden delivered that line last night. Great line, a huge weakness of McCain's that we need to exploit. McCain's healthcare plan would kill employer-funded health insurance -- and he has no back-up plan. We should all marry a beer heiress. Or get one of those (dwindling because of Republicans) good union jobs with good benefits.

UPDATE: My brother calls me to tell this story. He watched the debate with my three nephews last night. They all liked the "ultimate bridge to nowhere" line. The 9-year-old said, that was the best line of the debate, dad! And when said 9-year-old woke up this morning, he rolled over and said, "The ultimate bridge to nowhere."

My nephew is a political genius! The kid has a future in politics. He knows way more about foreign policy than Sarah Palin. He can name every country in Africa. I'd like to see those two debate Africa. My nephew would wipe the floor with her. Heck, he could wipe the floor with her in any debate. Being nine, he would take the cuteness factor off the table, and when you take away the winking and the folksiness, what does she have left? An empty dress, that's what.

Free Us From Health Insurance In Our Old Age

Larry DeWitt: Figure 2: Cover of AMA record album, author’s copy

The record the American Medical Association produced for its "Ladies Auxiliary Association" grass roots campaign to kill Medicare - 1961.

Jonathan Chait, The New Republic: Palin Channels Reagan

Palin's final quote was from Ronald Reagan, warning that without vigilance, "you and I are going to spend our sunset years telling our children, and our children's children, what it once was like in America when men were free."

In fact, Reagan was not warning about a general lack of vigilance about freedom, he was warning what would happen if Medicare was enacted.

Really, if you have a little time, read the entire Larry DeWitt piece. The right has always used folksy spokespeople -- like Sarah Palin -- to kill progressive legislation that would benefit actual folks.

Don't get fooled again.

Nudge, Nudge, Wink, Wink

Watched the debate tonight. Biden was great. The best I have ever seen him. I wish whoever prepped him for this debate had prepped him for the hearings on the last few Supreme Court nominations. He could have beaten Roberts & Scalito if he had been this focused and on-message.

Palin didn't have any horrible gaffes, but she was so weird. The cutesiness really puts me off. You're running for Vice President, not prom queen, for crying out loud. (I think this is why she does better with men than with women.) My mom called me after five minutes and said she just couldn't watch her any more. How can anyone take her seriously?

Jed Lewison notices the weird winking:



It was so obvious that she was just stringing together her talking points. She avoided several questions by giving answers about lowering taxes.

Biden's best moment for me was when he stated, then stated again, that what the US spends for three weeks of the Iraq War is the TOTAL of what we have spent on Afghanistan in the past seven years. While I think sending more troops to Afghanistan is insane, I think it is important to point out how far off track Bush & McCain sent the US after the 9/11 attacks, and how much money we are wasting on Bush/McCain's war of choice.

The worst moment for Palin for me was when Biden choked up talking about losing his first wife and daughter. It was the most emotional moment of the debate. And she stood there and listened to that and ignored it, went right back to her canned chirpy bullshit. A man had just stood next to her and relived a devastating loss -- his wife died, his daughter died, his two boys are near death in the hospital -- and she did not react. She did not care. To me that proved that she wasn't really there. She was reading her notes and reciting her canned answers, but she didn't even hear what Biden said. That was cold and uncaring. It made it pretty clear that Palin caring about Biden's son going to Iraq was a talking point. She didn't give a shit.

The post-debate polls are pretty uniform in giving the edge to Biden.

Jacoby!

yahoo: Boston Red Soxs' center fielder Jacoby Ellsbury makes a diving catch in the 8th inning against Los Angeles Angels Mark Teixeira during Game 1 of their MLB American League Divisional Series playoff baseball game in Anaheim, October 1, 2008.
REUTERS/Danny Moloshok (UNITED STATES)
Soxs'?

Ellsbury was awesome in the Red Sox win over the Angels last night, from his 3 for 5 night from the plate (which should have been 4 for 5 as one of his hits was deemed an error by the scorer, depite the centerfielder never laying a glove on the ball), 2 stolen bases, a run, an RBI, and a great, great catch in the 8th inning. Watch the catch here on MLB.com.

The picture of horizontal Ellsbury reminds me of this famous picture of Bobby Orr (wikipedia):



And Jacoby has a blog! Jacoby Ellsbury's Postseason Blog

Boston Globe: Ellsbury stole some of the spotlight
Rookie is off and running again (there's a post-game interview with Ellsbury at the top of the article)

NYTimes: Pesky Ellsbury Beats Angels at Own Game

Boston Herald: Jacoby Ellsbury does it all
Comes up big at the plate, in the field

McCain Says "I'm Not a Rich Man"

Except, of course, that he is,as Sarah Palin would say, very, very rich (LIAR!) Jed Lewison reminds of how very rich John McCain is:

Confronting Racism

Great speech by AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard Trumka.

Fairytales

Rolling Stone: Make-Believe Maverick
A closer look at the life and career of John McCain reveals a disturbing record of recklessness and dishonesty

McCAIN FIRST

This is the story of the real John McCain, the one who has been hiding in plain sight. It is the story of a man who has consistently put his own advancement above all else, a man willing to say and do anything to achieve his ultimate ambition: to become commander in chief, ascending to the one position that would finally enable him to outrank his four-star father and grandfather.

In its broad strokes, McCain's life story is oddly similar to that of the current occupant of the White House. John Sidney McCain III and George Walker Bush both represent the third generation of American dynasties. Both were born into positions of privilege against which they rebelled into mediocrity. Both developed an uncanny social intelligence that allowed them to skate by with a minimum of mental exertion. Both struggled with booze and loutish behavior. At each step, with the aid of their fathers' powerful friends, both failed upward. And both shed their skins as Episcopalian members of the Washington elite to build political careers as self-styled, ranch-inhabiting Westerners who pray to Jesus in their wives' evangelical churches.

In one vital respect, however, the comparison is deeply unfair to the current president: George W. Bush was a much better pilot.

Be sure to read the two other essays Rolling Stone has on Old Spice/Bible Spice '08:

The Double-Talk Express
From tax cuts to torture, John McCain has flip-flopped on a host of issues - including his own immigration bill

Mad Dog Palin
The scariest thing about John McCain's running mate isn't how unqualified she is - it's what her candidacy says about America

McCain's Temperment

Olbermann last night on McCain's temperment:




To me this was the most telling exchange, about the ad McCain ad claiming Obama was in favor of comprehensive sex education for kindergartners. (a bill supported by the PTA, btw).

Q: How can you go about building trust, without, I would content, absolute 100% truth?

McCain: "Because I have always had 100% absolute truth, and that's been my life of putting my country first. And I'll match that record against anyone's, and I'm proud of it, and an assertion that I've ever done otherwise, I take strong exception to. And you'll have to provide better proof than a bill that Senator Obama supported, that clearly called for the teaching of sex education to young children, so....

And be sure to watch for the tongue-jutting. Creepy.

Running Scared

Politico: McCain pulling out of Michigan

John McCain is pulling out of Michigan, according to two Republicans, a stunning move a month away from Election Day that indicates the difficulty Republicans are having in finding blue states to put in play.

McCain will go off TV in Michigan, stop dropping mail there and send most of his staff to more competitive states, including Wisconsin, Ohio and Florida. Wisconsin went for Kerry in 2004, Ohio and Florida for Bush.

Are you better off today than you were eight years ago? Not in Michigan, for sure.

Debate Prep

For your debate prep, I assign you to watch this "Sarah Palin Greatest Hits" tape:



In what respect, Charlie?

Feel the Gibberish

Reality check: Sarah Palin preparing for the debate, with foreign policy adviser Randy Scheunemann playing the role of Senator Biden, at the McCain ranch in Arizona. Photo: AP

Can't wait for the debate tonight? Generate your own Sarah Palin gibberish answers to questions here:

InterviewPalin.com

The Real John McCain

On display at the Des Moines Register Editorial Board yesterday:



Sarcasm, anger, barely controlled fury. That's the real John McCain.

Notice the tongue-jutting after he defends the "Obama wants to teach 5-year-olds sex ed" commercial, at about 37-40 seconds on the tape, and at the end after he claims that the only conservatives who don't like Palin are "Georgetown cocktail party conservatives".

You can watch the rest of the videos at the Des Moines Register site.

Two Interesting Analyses of McCain

FiveThirtyEight.com: The Tongue Jut

Last night on The Colbert Report, Dr. Stephen T. Colbert (DFA) noted that John McCain was doing something peculiar with his tongue. The upshot of the joke was that McCain was repeatedly sticking his tongue out like a reptile.

[]

Retired FBI agent Joe Navarro, a Bluff Magazine columnist and author of Read ‘Em and Reap, a book on poker tells culled from his professional interrogation experience, has written about the “tongue jut,” which is exactly what McCain was doing in the Colbert debate clips. Its significance?

Tongue-jutting behavior is a gesture used by people who think they have gotten away with something or are “caught” doing something. I have seen this behavior in flea markets both in the United States and in Russia, among street vendors in Lower Manhattan, at poker tables in Las Vegas, and in business meetings. In each case, the person made the gesture – tongue between the teeth without touching the lips – at the conclusion of some sort of a deal or as a final nonverbal statement. This behavior has several meanings – depending on specific situations – but is usually associated with one of these: I got caught (taking candy from a drawer), gleeful excitement (look at what I just did, Mom), I got away with something (and I didn’t get caught), I did something foolish, or I am naughty.

Read the rest to see exactly at which points in the debate McCain gave us this telling "tell".

BAGNewsNotes: Finally Taking His Turn, Mac Suffers Palin Too

Michael Shaw dissects six still images from the weird John McCain/Sarah Palin joint interview with Katie Couric

It's one thing to watch interviewers respond to Sarah Palin's odd mixture of bravado and gibberish. It's another to observe McCain along for the ride. As such, I offer you a breakdown of McCain's "micro reactions" in the first first forty-four seconds of last night's interview with Katie Couric.

Off the bat, Couric asks Palin about her statement, made over the weekend, that "the U.S. should absolutely launch cross-border attacks from Afghanistan into Pakistan" given McCain's admonition that you don't say that kind of thing out loud.

In the first shot, McCain's eyes bulge, then he shoots a glance to someone off camera, after Palin quickly and presumptuously launches in with: "We had a great discussion with President Zardari..."

[]

Palin Can't Name One Newspaper or Magazine She Reads

More from her soon-to-be-written book "How I Committed Suicide on the CBS Evening News"

COURIC: And when it comes to establishing your worldview, I was curious: what newspapers and magazines did you regularly read before you were tapped for this to stay informed and to understand the world?

PALIN: I've read most of them, again with a great appreciation for the press, for the media.

KC: But, like, what ones specifically? I'm curious.

SP: All of 'em, any of 'em that have been in front of me over all these years.

KC: Can you name a few?

SP: I have a vast variety of sources where we get our news too. Alaska isn't a foreign country, where, it's kind of suggested and it seems like, 'Wow, how could you keep in touch with what the rest of Washington, D.C. may be thinking and doing when you live up there in Alaska?' Believe me, Alaska is like a microcosm of America.

Sarah Palin was a journalism major. Sports journalism, but still.

Jack Cafferty Skewers Palin -- Again

Jack has a title for Palin's post-election book:

"How I Committed Suicide on the CBS Evening News"

John McCain Is No Feminist

John McCain's campaign registered and opened a website called, get this, VoteForTheMILF.com.

Vote for the MILF.

Owned by the McCain Campaign, the website directed you to a speech by Sarah Palin.

For those of you unfamiliar with the acronym "MILF", it stands for "Mother I'd Love to Fuck".

Fuck you, Johnny Mac. Just fuck you.

So don't let anyone tell you that the nomination of the comically unqualified Sarah Palin was anything but an insult to women. They further insulted her by buying this IP address.

I wonder if the website "JohnMcCainHasaTinyPenis.com" is available? I'd like to register that one.

John McCain can kiss my feminist ass. He'd probably like to as he can't look at a woman under the age of 70 without twisting his wedding ring and thinking about his days of running amok in the pheromone pool.

Keep his wrinkled old man ass out of the White House.

"The Fundamentals of Our Economy Are Strong"

'The Fundamentals of Our Economy Are Strong"

McCain said that every time he was asked about the economy, all the way down the rabbit hole we're in now. Don't believe me? Listen to him:

Just One More on the Coming Palin Debate Disaster

This is too good.

Rochelle Riley, Detroit Free Press: Sarah Palin? Leave the race before you further hurt women

Her whining about answering a question she wasn't prepared for makes it clear she's not ready for prime time. But her month-long Bumble Across America Tour, during which she has displayed an increasingly clearer level of ignorance about the world and politics, shows she's not ready to represent women.

[]

Palin is setting the gender back by decades. The next time a woman runs for any national office, her opponents will have sound bites galore from the Palin ditz reel, the last time a woman ran. That reel will grow if Palin participates in a vice presidential debate that will be funnier than the "Saturday Night Live" parodies that already have aired.

McCain cannot drop her; to do so would be political suicide. He cannot cancel the debate. He failed to do that with his own. But I cannot imagine that Palin really wants to continue with this campaign just because she doesn't like to lose. This isn't a beauty pageant or a mayoral run or even a gubernatorial campaign among the moose.

This election comes at a time when our country is globally hated and financially imploding. What person in their right mind still thinks that this is politics as usual?

Sarah Palin, go home.

The Bumble Across America Tour! Teehee.

Palin Disaster Watch

Should be a fun debate:

Wall Street Journal blogs: Game Plan for Palin Is Retooled Ahead of Debate
Top McCain Aides Oversee Preparation After Recent Flubs

[I]n recent days, Gov. Palin flubbed quasi-mock debates in New York City and Philadelphia, some operatives said. Finger-pointing began, and then intensified after her faltering interview with CBS anchorwoman Katie Couric. However, she performed better when she took questions from the press after touring Ground Zero and remarked about her parents' visit there after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

Her performance also sparked negative responses from some conservative pundits, and she has slipped in some polls. Last week, nearly half the respondents in a Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll said she is unqualified to be president, while one in three said they were "not at all" comfortable with the idea of Gov. Palin as vice president, up five points from a poll in early September.

Ruth Marcus, WaPo: McCain v. Palin

McCain's fundamental argument in pursuit of the presidency is that he has the background to do the job. He made this point again and again Friday night. "I've been involved, as I mentioned to you before, in virtually every major national security challenge we've faced in the last 20-some years. There are some advantages to experience, and knowledge, and judgment." Or, "The important thing is I visited Afghanistan and I traveled to Waziristan and I traveled to these places and I know what our security requirements are."

And so therefore I picked a running mate who didn't have a passport two years ago? Asked about that by Katie Couric, Palin explained that "I'm not one of those who maybe come from a background of, you know, kids who perhaps graduated college and their parents get them a passport and a backpack and say, 'Go off and travel the world.' "

Instead, Palin said, "the way that I have understood the world is through education, through books, through mediums that have provided me a lot of perspective on the world."

This would be more reassuring if Palin had demonstrated more evidence of having read extensively about history or world affairs. Asked in an interview for PBS's Charlie Rose show last year ( http://www.charlierose.com/guests/sarah-palin) about her favorite authors, Palin cited C.S. Lewis -- "very, very deep" -- and Dr. George Sheehan, a now-deceased writer for Runner's World magazine whose columns Palin still keeps on hand.

[]

"Very inspiring and very motivating," she said. "He was an athlete and I think so much of what you learn in athletics about competition and healthy living that he was really able to encapsulate, has stayed with me all these years."

Also, she got a Garfield desk calendar for Christmas 1987 that made a big impression.

Rebecca Traister, salon.com (you have to watch an ad): The Sarah Palin pity party
Everyone seems to be oozing sympathy for the fumbling vice-presidential nominee. Please. Cry me a freaking river.

Sarah Palin is no wilting flower. She is a politician who took the national stage and sneered at the work of community activists. She boldly tries to pass off incuriosity and lassitude as regular-people qualities, thereby doing a disservice to all those Americans who also work two jobs and do not come from families that hand out passports and backpacking trips, yet still manage to pick up a paper and read about their government and seek out experience and knowledge.

When you stage a train wreck of this magnitude -- trying to pass one underqualified chick off as another highly qualified chick with the lame hope that no one will notice -- well, then, I don't feel bad for you.

[]

I don't want to be played by the girl-strings anymore. Shaking our heads and wringing our hands in sympathy with Sarah Palin is a disservice to every woman who has ever been unfairly dismissed based on her gender, because this is an utterly fair dismissal, based on an utter lack of ability and readiness. It's a disservice to minority populations of every stripe whose place in the political spectrum has been unfairly spotlighted as mere tokenism; it is a disservice to women throughout this country who have gone from watching a woman who -- love her or hate her -- was able to show us what female leadership could look like to squirming in front of their televisions as they watch the woman sent to replace her struggle to string a complete sentence together.

In fact, the only people I feel sorry for are Americans who invested in a hopeful, progressive vision of female leadership, but who are now stuck watching, verbatim, a "Saturday Night Live" skit.

Palin is tough as nails. She will bite the head off a moose and move on. So, no, I don't feel sorry for her. I feel sorry for women who have to live with what she and her running mate have wrought.

Joan Walsh, salon.com (you have to watch an ad): Could Palin possibly leave the ticket?

Palin "didn't blink" when McCain asked her to join the ticket, didn't think twice, because she's a supremely self-confident woman with a limited worldview, impressed with her own greatness and not terribly curious about anyone else. She reaps what she sows. I'm with conservative Kathleen Parker and Zakaria: I believe Palin would be a menace as commander in chief, and she's got to get off the GOP ticket.

Philly.com: Couric having a field day
Palin is not the only one in her sights.

Palin's joint appearance last night with running mate John McCain on The CBS Evening News With Katie Couric was a public-relations disaster, conveying the impression of a father coming to the defense of his naïve daughter who had gotten into trouble at school.

"I'm so proud of the work she is doing," said the beaming poppa.

New Obama Ad: "Same Path"

I've seen this ad several times on the Boston TV stations (which are the primary stations for most of New Hampshire.) It think it's very effective, showing Obama at his calm, wonky best.

"I Can See Russia From My House!"

This week's New Yorker cover:

A Vote for McCain is a Roll of the Dice

Another fabulous video by Jed Lewison: "The Dice Thrower v. The Poker Player".

As a poker player myself, I really appreciate this. Dice v. poker is pure chance v. skill. I vote for skill every time.

Roger Ebert on Presidential Debate

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: Guess who's not coming to dinner

I do not like you, John McCain. My feeling has nothing to do with issues. It has to do with common courtesy. During the debate, you refused to look Barack Obama in the eye. Indeed, you refused to look at him at all. Even when the two of you shook hands at the start, you used your eyes only to locate his hand, and then gazed past him as you shook it.

Obama is my guy. If you are rude to him, you are rude to me. If you came to dinner at my house and refused to look at or speak with one of my guests, that would be bad manners and I would be offended. Same thing if I went to your house. During the debate, you were America's guest.

What was your problem? Do you hold this man in such contempt that you cannot bear to gaze upon him? Will you not even speak to him directly?
Do you think he doesn't have the right to be running for President?
Were you angry because after you said you wouldn't attend the debate, he said a President should be able to concern himself with two things at the same time? He was right. The proof is, you were there. Were you angry with him because he called your bluff?

I do not like green eggs and ham.
I do not like them, Sam-I-am.

I Can't Wait To See This

Can you name any significant Supreme Court cases?

I can, of course, because I'm a lawyer.

But my nonlawyer family could probably come up with Brown v. Board of Education, Plessy v. Ferguson, Bush v. Gore, and several others. You know, the famous ones. And none of them are running for political office. They could all name athletes with Supreme Court cases. How about Curt Flood and Muhammad Ali?

Bible Spice could only name one Supreme Court case ever. And then there's a looooooooong silence in the interview.

Guess which one? And your first two guesses don't count.

HuffPo: Latest Palin Gaffe: Can't Name Supreme Court Case Other Than Roe V. Wade

Maybe She'll Bring Johnny Mac to the Debate to Run Interference

No more interviews alone for Sarah Palin. Tonight John McCain interposed himself as a human shield between Palin and the very very tough interviewer Katie Couric:



It is an insult to all women that she can't even be allowed to do her own interviews alone. John McCain may as well be holding her hand.

That's a creepy visual.

Fareed Zakaria on Palin: "Utterly Unqualified"

Fareed Zakaria torched Sarah Palin's "qualificationd" at the beginning of Wolf Blitzer's show this afternoon. Sorry that this video makes you listen to Leslie Blitzer pontificate, and some generic CNN reporter give a "on the one hand, on the other hand" report (god forbid you should say, she's a farce. But Fareed does.). Fareed Zakaria starts right after 3:20 on the tape.

Zakaria is much more conservative than I am, but he's concerned about her knowledge level, not her politics.

This is my rough transcript of the last two minutes of the video:

Fareed Zakaria: "They [politicians] have to be able to govern....What has become absolutely clear watching Sarah Palin, in her responses to interviews, and the Katie Couric interview was the last straw frankly, there were others, is that it's not that she, when she's asked these complicated questions or difficult questions, it's not that she doesn't know the right answer, it's that she clearly does not understand the question. This is way beyond anything we've ever seen from a national candidate.

[Wolf defends her; she has executive experience.]

Fareed Zakaria: Well, you know, if you delve into that, you discover that the executive experience is running a very small town. Alaska itself is an unusual state. 85% of its budget comes from oil revenues, basically you're just distributing oil revenues that are being provided for you by digging holes in the ground. This is good training to be President of Saudi Arabia, not the United States. Look, what is absolutely clear is we are dealing with very very difficult issues. The financial crisis is probably the most complicated financial crisis we have experienced yet. And it was absolutely clear, the most scary answer in the Katie Couric interview was not on foreign policy. The foreign policy stuff was funny. The scary answer was on the economy, the one you displayed, switching back and forth between Saturday Night Live, because it was absolutely clear that she simply did not understand any of the issues involved, she did not understand the question. This is a woman who is going to be, as the phrase goes, a heartbeat away from a 72-year-old man if McCain wins. The actuarial odds of her becoming President are very high, they are actually significant, about a one in five chance."

Republicans Bail on Bailout Bill

Took credit for the bill before it passed; spent rest of day backpedaling furiously.

The massive Wall Street bailout bill failed, as only 1/3 of House Republicans voted for the bill. Democrats are shocked! shocked! that the Republicans (Lucy) pulled the football away again.

I'm not, but I expect nothing more than the worst from Congressional Republicans.

The stock market promptly fell 777 points, a one-day record. For want of a $700 billion dollar bill, Wall Street investors lost $1.1 trillion dollars. And that's just today. Hold on the reins, it's going to be a bumpy ride.

At least the media seems to realize that it is the Republicans who blew up the bailout bill, and the economy:

Chris Matthews, MSNBC:


Ed Henry, CNN:


John Boehner (Boner) claimed that Republicans couldn't vote for the bailout bill in the end because Nancy Pelosi gave an exceptionally partisan speech just before the vote. Barney Frank was incredulous at this explanation:


John McCain wins the McHypocrite award for this ridiculous statement:

"Now is not the time to fix the blame."
"Senator Obama and his allies in Congress infused unnecessary partisanness into the process."

Actually, he blamed first, then said no blame.

No blame. Blame. His head is spinning around like Linda Blair's in The Exorcist.

Anything to get you to ignore McCain's first statement of the day. From Politico:

McCain takes credit for bill before it loses

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and his top aides took credit for building a winning bailout coalition – hours before the vote failed and stocks tanked.

Shortly before the vote, McCain had bragged about his involvement and mocked Sen. Barack Obama for staying on the sidelines.

“I've never been afraid of stepping in to solve problems for the American people, and I'm not going to stop now,” McCain told a rally in Columbus, Ohio. “Sen. Obama took a very different approach to the crisis our country faced. At first he didn't want to get involved. Then he was monitoring the situation.”
McCain, grinning, flashed a sarcastic thumbs up.

“That's not leadership. That's watching from the sidelines,” he added to cheers and applause.

He'd say or do anything to win.

New Obama Ad: "Parachute"

Nice. Hit McCain in the Cara Carleton Sneed plexus -- the woman pinkslipped 20,000 workers, halved the value of the company, and H-P still paid her $42 million to walk away. Obcene.

And Carly Fiorina was one of McCain's chief economic advisers, until she made the fatal mistake of saying that Sarah Palin couldn't run a corporation.

John McCain's Response to Financial Crisis: Katrina-Like

Obama nails McCain on the economy in Michigan yesterday:



Jed Lewison, HuffPo: Obama: McCain's Economic Crisis Response "Katrina-Like...Just Sorta Stood There"

"Senator McCain just doesn't get it. He doesn't understand that the storm hitting Wall Street hit Main Street long ago. That's why his first response to the greatest financial meltdown in generations was a Katrina-like response. Sort of stood there. Said "The fundamentals of the economy are strong." That's why he's been shifting positions these past few weeks, looking for photo ops, trying to figure out what to say and what to do."

Chris Rock on Bill Maher

I like the analogy of Barack Obama as Jackie Robinson.

I Hate The Bailout Bill - But I Support It

Yes, the bailout bill sucks. Yes, it sucks that Congress is going to throw $5000 of my hard-earned money at the Wall Street thieves that the Bush Administration let run wild over the past eight years.

But I support the bill. Why? Two reasons, mainly:

(1) I don't have a traditional pension, I have a 401(k) that is invested in the market, in bonds and stocks, in mutual funds and bond funds. I had a traditional pension 25 years ago, when my firm hired a smart MBA from Dartmouth who read the screw-the-workers financial papers and persuaded my employers that it would be cheaper to move the firm's pension plan into a 401(k) plan. Cheaper for them. Much more risky for me. So now I am exposed to the market. I'm in the market.

The bailout will cost me $5000, but a 20% drop in the market will cost me many times that.

(2) I don't know anything about macroeconomics except for a class I took in 1976. But Paul Krugman, an economist I respect, supports the plan. That's enough for me.

Side note, I turned on C-Span this morning to see my Congressman Jim McGovern running the House session from the floor for the Democrats. This makes sense; he's wildly popular in this liberal district and there's no way he loses his job for publicly supporting this hated bill. Plus he's got guts and does what he thinks is right.

Tina Fey Was Using Palin's Own Words

CNN giggles about Sarah Palin and the Saturday Night Live skit:



From governor of Alaska to national joke in one month. Heckuva job, John McCain!

Enjoyed Eight Years of Bush? Thank John McCain

This ad, produced by an independent group, will start running in swing states this week.

Putin Rears His Head

"We have trade missions back and forth. We-- we do-- it's very important when you consider even national security issues with Russia as Putin rears his head and comes into the air space of the United States of America, where-- where do they go? It's Alaska. It's just right over the border. It is-- from Alaska that we send those out to make sure that an eye is being kept on this very powerful nation, Russia, because they are right there. They are right next to-- to our state."

- Sarah Palin to Katie Couric last week

McCain Mutters "Horseshit" During Debate

Sure sounds like "horseshit" to me. And that fits in with all that we know about the real John McCain, the bad temper, the mean streak, the coarse language, the sense of entitlement.

The Nation: YouTubers Ask if McCain Swore at the Big Debate?

RIP Paul Newman

Paul Newman, Eugene McCarthy delegate, at the 1968 Democratic Convention

Paul Newman died on Friday night. He was a great actor and philanthropist who lived a full and rich life. He was a capital L Liberal who put his money where his mouth was, endorsing Democratic candidates (from Eugene McCarthy to Ned Lamont) and raising hundreds of millions for charity with his Newman's Own food brand and Hole in the Wall camps for kids with serious illnesses.

You had to love a guy who said "the highest single honor I ever received" was being #19 on Nixon's Enemies List. You had to love a guy who was #19 on Nixon's Enemies List. Farewell to a great man.


Vanity Fair: The Newman Chronicles

NYTimes: Paul Newman, a Magnetic Titan of Hollywood, Is Dead at 83

Vanity Fair: Hard Act to Follow (photo gallery)

Telegraph (uk): Paul Newman, a life in pictures (photo gallery)

NYTimes: Paul Newman in Pictures

Tina Fey/Sarah Palin Last Night

Old Spice/Bible Spice '08*

John McCain's terrible, horrible, no good, very bad week seems to be continuing this week.

The New York Times reports on McCain's personal gambling jones and his campaign's deep ties to the gambling industry.

Mr. "I'll suspend my campaign" didn't even go to Capitol Hill for the bailout negotiations yesterday; he went to his condo in Arlington (where as one wag put it, he cleaned the fridge and puttered around the house.) Feel the leadership.

On the Jerry Springer front, the Times of London is reporting that the McCain campaign is considering having Sarah Palin's 17-year-old pregnant daughter get married before the election. No joke. Well, it would be a huge joke, but that is being reported.

Fareed Zakaria, Newsweek's conservative columnist, excoriates the Palin pick: Palin is Ready? Please.

The LATimes reports that while Palin was mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, she told a local teacher that dinosaurs and humans coexisted when the earth was created 6000 years ago. Walk the dinosaur!

In the debate Friday night, McCain attacked Obama for saying that if Pakistan wouldn't go after bin Laden, we would. Then Bible Spice was questioned by a citizen while ordering a cheesesteak in Philadelphia on Saturday (finally, she has found a task for which she is qualified -- ordering a cheesesteak) and Palin basically restated and backed Obama's position. McCain was asked about this on ABC this morning and said, in effect, that it's not fair to use a candidate's answers to questions to attack them:



Five days until the VP debate. Can't wait!

*Old Spice/Bible Spice '08 is stolen from a commenter on Balloon Juice from the post-debate thread; I can't find the direct link right now.

McCain Blinks

Excessive blinking is a sign of lying:



hat tip to Dependable Renegade.