Dean is first!

"We can find a 100 billion dollars, we can do that..." ---John McCain ABC this week (4/20/2008)

"We can find a million dollars, we can do that..." ---Richard Nixon (the watergate tapes)

Howard Dean and Al Gore are first.

Traitor Lierberman is last.

I remember thinking WTF? when Gore picked him. His most memorable performance was as sock puppet to Cheney, reprised by Edwards in 04.

Chris Dodd would have made a better choice for Gore's VP in 2000.

Blog is screwed up as usual--sorry I knocked you out of first Susan

10:54am

McCain the collaborator--Use this Dems!!

http://www.counterpunch.org/

“…McCain was held for five and half years. The first two weeks’ behavior might have been pragmatism, but McCain soon became North Vietnam’s go-to collaborator…..McCain cooperated with the North Vietnamese for a period of three years. His situation isn’t as innocuous as that of the French barber who cuts the hair of the German occupier. McCain was repaying his captors for their kindness and mercy.

“This is the lesson of McCain’s experience as a POW: a true politician, a hollow man, his only allegiance is to power. The Vietnamese, like McCain’s campaign contributors today, protected and promoted him, and, in return, he danced to their tune. . .”

10:56am

Danny, for heavens sake, spend a few bucks on a knowlegeable geek, and fix this dysfunctional blog.

10:58am

A haunting choice on Gores part in 2000................foolish move...............Edwards was the better choice..................Gore will always carry that moment of poor choice for a  long time...................

At the risk of another potty-mouth attack:

http://www.counterpunch.org/fantina04192008.html

Polls are beginning to show that the upcoming election, in which a Democratic victory should have been assured, is now going to be close; it is possible the Mr. McCain will be elected, thereby advancing the disastrous policies of Mr. Bush for another four years. The wars will continue, with all the carnage and suffering associated with any war and intensified when a world power invades and occupies a third world nation. The U.S. economy will continue to weaken, as more people lose their jobs and their homes.

This, by all accounts, because the U.S. voter is tiring of the endless petty battles between Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton, and is therefore turning to Mr. McCain. One attempts to think the U.S. voter is more intelligent than that implies, but looking at the results of the 2004 election, one is skeptical.

11:04am

In the race for the Democratic Presidential Nomination, Obama leads Clinton nationally 46% to 42% (see recent daily Democratic Nomination results). Today’s results continue to suggest a very stable race with Obama enjoying a consistent, but modest, lead. Obama has been within three percentage points of the 48% level every day for three weeks. Clinton has stayed within three points of the 43% level for well over a month.

While the national numbers are fairly stable, Clinton’s lead in Pennsylvania is down to three percentage points. That same survey found that 57% believe the Superdelegates should honor the primary results and vote for Obama even if something happens to convince them that Clinton would be a stronger general election candidate. Rasmussen Markets data gives Obama an 84.0 % chance of winning the Democratic nomination.

http://rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/election_20082/2008_presidential_election/daily_presidential_tracking_poll

rae hart
Sun, 04/20/08

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Dood meaning in your post..this blog does not allow me ti ID that post ot the time............11.03 right now.............

Yes, maybe if adults listened to their kids more..............but every generation says that.........kids are in betwen a fairytale world of make believe and fantasy......................thats Ok. But I prefer reality because thats what we are in..........................I HOPE for your sake, that Obama wins in November...................I would be pleasantly surprised.

Why Gore picked Lieberman in 2000 is a puzzlement.  When i first heard it, I swore I wouldn't vote.  Now I regret that I did.

Be that as it may, at the moment I'm finding it hard to see straight.  The following are military pensioners who deceived the American people.  TWENTY-TWO DIRTY PENSIONERS

Robert S. Bevelacqua
Kenneth Allard
Jeffrey D. McCausland
Thomas G. McInerney
John C. Garrett
Donald W. Shepperd
Montgomery Meigs
William L. Nash
James Marks
Joseph W. Ralston
William Cohen
Barry R. McCaffrey
Wayne A. Downing
Paul E. Vallely
William V. Cowan
Carlton A. Sherwood
Charles T. Nash
Timur J. Eads
Robert L. Maginnis
Robert H. Scales Jr
David L. Grange
James T. Conway***
Rick Francona

ALL THE NEWS THAT FITS

http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_dean_pow_080419_clinton_slams__22activ.htm

Almost 24 hours have passed since the Huffington Post published a damning audio of Clinton disparaging the “activist base of the Democratic Party,” and the New York Times has absolutely ignored it. By this time last week, the Times had written about 258 stories about Obama’s “elitist” views, as revealed in, like, 16 words in San Francisco.

Talk about elitist…When are we who believe the Iraq War is bad for our treasury, bad for our soldiers and their families, bad for the environment, bad for Democracy, bad for our foreign relations, bad for gas prices, and bad for American jobs, green collar or otherwise, going to stop being treated like third-rate citizens? When will our opinions have an audience with a Democrat in Washington, let alone the Republicans? When will the millions of Americans, diverse in race and gender and gender orientation and socioeconomic status, stop being lumped together in the “kook fringe” category and dismissed every time they decide to think differently than well-connected Washington insiders? It’s degrading, and offensive to be reduced to a category box and written off. People of color in America deal with it every day, on a far more emotionally challenging level, and women deal with it, but it is offensive and degrading nonetheless. I’d expect this breathtaking haughtiness from a Republican, but from Hillary Clinton?

11:13AM

WaPo on Hillary. There is no way that Hillary would win in the GE if she is *chosen* as the nominee. Read this article. Her favorability ratings are in the gutter within the Afr. Amer. community. This whole primary is essentially a joke.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/con...

Thanks Michael,  I hope so too.

Why is it that Obama is expected to wear a flag lapel pin, but Hillary isn't and seldom, if every, does even though she usually wears label suits. For that matter has anyone seen Bill Clinton ever wearing one?

Newsweek reporting that Obama is building a war machine to counter any swift-boating.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/132874

Mike, yes....Gore made  a mistake.  He's human.  Gore's strengths and achievements overshadow that particular lapse in judgement by miles.  It is easy, with the benefit of hindsight, to criticize.   Joe Lieberman wasn't always a bad guy....he only recently went over to the dark side.

re. 12-year olds.  It's a sweet, tender age....lots of changes occurring, physiologically, hormonally.  However, with good reason the legal voting age is 18.  We simply aren't ready to elect a president at the age of 12.  An absurd proposition. 

Joan, the "how blue is your collar meme"....

{Chris Matthews} has returned to the alleged symbolic importance of Obama's lack of bowling skills so often, and with such a combination of glee and indignation, that you would have thought that before launching a gutter ball, Obama had donned a powdered wig, sipped from a snifter of brandy, then smacked Rocky Blier across the face with his riding crop. "This gets very ethnic," Matthews said at one point, a preface that no doubt made his producers whisper, "Oh God, please don't." He then went on, "But the fact that he's good at basketball doesn't surprise anybody, but the fact that he's that terrible at bowling does make you wonder." Makes you wonder what, exactly? Whether he would be a better president, were he a better bowler? No, what Matthews wonders is whether Obama can "woo more regular voters -- you know, the ones who actually do know how to bowl."

According to the Times Magazine article, Matthews makes a salary of $5 million a year. When it comes time to relax, he doesn't head to the Jersey shore, where the typical blue-collar Philadelphian might go to get some sea air. Instead, Matthews repairs to his $4.35 million house on Nantucket.

Clinton's *nuclear umbrella*. This is scary stuff, folks.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/4...

The flag lapel pin has gotten totally out of hand IMHO.  So far out of hand that he will be damned for wearing one, and damned if he doesn't.

Pat I love your posts.

Deaniac, I can't relax, I will be a total wreck until Wed.  I am taking Mon, Tues, Wed off work, I'm totally out of control, my husband is hiding from me.

When nervous I tend to blather, I'm blathering as you can tell.

Where is Sitka?  I miss him.

But while he's there (Matthews), perhaps he throws back a couple of Yuenglings with his fellow working man, Tim Russert. Russert never hesitates to remind us that he's just "a blue-collar guy from Buffalo," Joe Sixpack's tribune in Washington, grabbing the powerful by the collar and snarling, "Look here, fancy boy, are you going to tell me the truth, or do I have to beat it out of you?"

Russert and Matthews have more than their blue-collar affectation in common -- Russert too has a house on Nantucket, where it's safe to say any regular folks he encounters are either busing his table or mowing his lawn. As Howard Kurtz of CNN and The Washington Post lovingly described him in 2004, "Tim Russert is the anchor as everyman, the big talker with the street smarts, the man who hobnobs with presidents but aims his delivery at the working stiffs." Or so he wants us to believe.

Russert and Matthews may be at the top of their profession's hierarchy, but their proletarian pose has become the standard affectation of the media elite.

This Blue Collar Chic unites the allegedly neutral journalists and the conservative commentators, whether it's Peggy Noonan dismissing the "intellectuals, academics, local clever people who talk loudly in restaurants, and leftist mandarins," so distant from "a bigger America and a realer one --

a healthy and vibrant place full of religious feeling and cultural energy and Bible study and garage bands and sports-love and mom-love and sophistication and normality," or Michael Barone harrumphing about "soft America," where those pathetic liberals sip merlot and listen to NPR, in contrast to "hard America," where the real folks do the real work.

Joan, the Hillarites and Bushites are very desperate now.

Hope, being in the same category as peace, love and faith, scares the cr@p out of the fascists... it's what won WWII.

Hope not fear!

Strength thru peace!

And when it comes to Blue Collar Chic, nobody can touch Bill O'Reilly, who has raised it to the level of performance art, infusing his every utterance with the pose of the average Joe, all toward convincing you that you're under attack from a bunch of college professors and ACLU lawyers. Pick up any of his books and you'll find that his ghostwriter (I'm presuming) has captured the voice perfectly; not too many authors punctuate their arguments with interjections like "I mean, come on" and "So there." A few years back, Michael Kinsley offered an absolutely perfect takedown of O'Reilly's "fantasy that he is a stiff among the swells," one that could apply to many others as well:

Why fake a humble background? Partly for business reasons: Joe Sixpack versus the elitists is a good posture for any talk show host, especially one on Fox.

Partly out of vanity: It makes the climb to your current perch more impressive. Partly for political reasons: Under our system, even conservatives need some plausible theory to qualify for victim status, from which all blessings flow. But mainly out of sheer snobbery. And it's the only kind of snobbery with any real power in America today: reverse snobbery. Bill O'Reilly pretends (or maybe sincerely imagines) that he feels the sting of status from above. But he unintentionally reveals that he actually fears it more from below. Like most of us.

================================================================ 

Myself, I'm with Bill Maher:  "I'm bitter because a bunch of shit-kickers voted Bush for President twice and I have to live with the consequences." 

(hat tip:  Denise) 

I can't relax, I will be a total wreck until Wed.

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May I respectfully suggets rae you remove yourself from the elction for awile......it aint worth your personal health.....................try a nice rum n coke, dutch masters honey flavoured cigar...sit on your front porch.......................foreget about this crap for awhile..................

It's unfortunate that this trial date will be set three days after the PA primary and also that the media has not covered the story at all.

While Senator Clinton is on the campaign trail telling reporters that the use of her opponents' 'bitter' remarks could damage Senator Obama's chances to win the general election if he should win the nomination, a California superior judge will soon be setting a trial date for the historic civil landmark case in Paul vs. Clinton.

[. . . ]

For some reason, the media doesn't think that a historic trial to haul a former President and a Presidential candidate to court for fraud is newsworthy.

[. . .]

Senator Clinton was dismissed from the case as a defendant, but Munoz already has made it clear he won't accept any attempts to block Senator Clinton from serving as a material witness.  The judge told Clinton's lawyer David Kendall: "Well, any opposition is probably going to be dead on arrival, if that will – if you understand what I'm saying, Mr. Kendall."

[. . .]

Perhaps voters should be 'bitter' that this story is not being reported by the mainstream media. 

http://www.hillaryproject.com/index.php?/en/story-details/what_hillary_clinton_and_the_media_are_hiding_from_the_voters/

rae

Not to worry!

 Obama has already won this primary, he knows it, the media know it, and the Clintons know it.

The only question remaining is when will Hillary save face by quitting this foolishness as well as save the party a lot of money and embarrassment in Denver. The majority of supers will not go against the will of the voters for fear of destroying the party and perhaps their own careers.

Obama will survive well on top the heap. He is well ahead in NC, ahead in Indiana, Oregon, South Dakota, and Puerto Rico and Montana may be tossups. Clinton could reasonably win in WV and KY but there are previous few delegates there for her to win and they also would undoubtedly be split with Obama.

Sleep tight!

 Obama has already won this primary, he knows it, the media know it, and the Clintons know it.

The only question remaining is when will Hillary save face by quitting this foolishness as well as save the party a lot of money and embarrassment in Denver. The majority of supers will not go against the will of the voters for fear of destroying the party and perhaps their own careers."<<<

Exactly. 

In an early sample of the sort of rhetoric we might expect in the general election campaign, John McCain's campaign has sent out a fundraising e-mail warning recipients that Hamas is rooting for Barack Obama.

"Barack Obama's foreign policy plans have even won him praise from Hamas leaders," the e-mail says. "Ahmed Yousef, chief political adviser to the Hamas Prime Minister said, 'We like Mr. Obama and we hope he will win the election. He has a vision to change America.'"

 Thanks Joan and rae, I'm going to trust  your trust in Obama's winning this primary.   If we ever needed leadership, it's now.  I think it is a great as in WWII.

I heard that the American troops in the green zone were surrounded by the Mahdi (spell?) army and the Shiites militias.  Condi's there on a desperate, secret mission.  It sounds as if it's all coming undone.

What does it take to bring down a civilization?  A distracted, over busy, ignorant, fearful, materialistic, disconnected people; a small group of ruthless, greedy, powerful people who are infected with hubris, have little real world experience except in small power groups, have no ethics other than power seeking; destruction of resources, devaluing of human beings, a saturation of the ethos with want want want, get, get, get, me, me, me, get for free, no boundaries, no responsibilities, and no community other than commerce.  I think it's a sure recipe for destruction.

Can we change this?   

SANTORUM'S MEDIA MAN CREATES "BITTER" ATTACK AD.

At Marc Ambinder, check out the first GOP anti-Obama mailing to seize upon the "bitter" comments. It's a flyer from Matt Shaner, who is running in a Congressional primary to represent Pennsylvania's 5th district. The text:

He called us a "bitter" people.
He criticized us for "clinging" to religion.
He criticized us for "clinging" to guns.

Now it's time to send a message to Barack Obama.

"I'm a God-fearing, chuch-going, NRA member. And I'm proud of it." - Matt Shaner, Republican for Congress

The strategist behind the ad is John Brabender, whose firm also managed media for Rick Santorum, Rudy Giuliani, and even GOP turncoat Lincoln Chafee. Brabender is godfather to one of Santorum's children. His practice is proof that "moderate" Republicans are in thrall to the same socially conservative establishment figures as their religious right brethren. Now we're seeing how that establishment plans to go after the leading Democrat.

Joan, watch your sources?   From the same HILLARY PROJECT source from which you quote....an article entitled, "Goodbye Hillary, Goodbye Barack":

..."We turn now to Barack Obama, who asks us to believe his excellent education let him down when he tried to explain the sources of the discontent felt by citizens of small town America but succeeded only in describing them as an angry, bitter, prejudiced bunch of Bible thumping gun brandishing fools.

Actually, however, the opposite is true. After all, the education Barack received at Harvard and from Radic-Lib friends has excellently prepared him to say what he said. And he said it well.

Maybe not as well as Marx, who scorned the Middle Class for having the audacity to believe in the right to life, liberty, and a pursuit of happiness that includes freedom of worship and freedom to keep and bear arms.

Maybe not as well as the speaker of Langston Hughes’ “Goodbye Christ,” who had the audacity to dismiss religion, extol communism, and issue the following injunction to Christ:

“Beat it on away from here now

Make way for a new guy with no religion at all—
A real guy named

Marx Communist Lenin Peasant Stalin Worker ME”

But well enough.

To his credit, however, and despite his perpetually plugged in Foggy Hope Machine, Barack has been pretty much up front about his thoroughly Liberal vision for America, explaining why

Democrats give him a smack down 23 point “honesty” lead over his truly angry, bitter rival.

In the most important poll of all, however, it’s looking as though the public has increasingly had it with the real gal named Hillary Liberal Liar Shameless Phony and the real guy named Barack Liberal Elitist and therefore will wave a resolute and emphatic goodbye to whichever one makes it to November."

Bottom line:  The Hillary Project hates Hillary more than they hate Barack....but clearly they hate Barack as well.

Obama door-to-door in N. Philly. According to Lars it may have something to do with internal polling.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/4...

sorry I've been such a doubter folks - PA just seems so much like OH. If Barack can keep it under 10 points - I think that's a small victory.

more good news from Philly.

http://www.philly.com/philly/opinion/200...

After this past horrendous week I have to say this. I don't use this work lightly but here goes.

THE MEDIA IS A BUNCH OF LIARS. THIS MORNING A REHASH OF THE SAME CRAP. OBAMA, PINS, HILLARY, WRIGHT.

STOP IT ALREADY!!!

And now we have an article in the New York Times about all these crappy generals lying for the Pentagon.

All I can say to save grace is to watch "John Adams". It starts at 1pm with all the previous installments and tonite at 9pm is the final one.

Watch it, It teaches to today. It will make you  sit up and take notice.

Peace.

LIARS.

John Adams....haven't missed an episode, linda b.  You're right...riveting.

Slate has a video on their site.  Watch Hillary attack Bruce.  It is such B.S.

http://www.slate.com/

Going to work.  bbl

Would love to see John Adams.  Wish I had HBO.

Now I'm really going.

John McCain cupped a fist and began pumping it, up and down, along the side of his body. It was a gesture familiar to a participant in the closed-door meeting of the Senate committee who hoped that it merely signaled, as it sometimes had in the past, McCain's mounting frustration with one of his colleagues.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/19/AR2008041902224.html?hpid=topnews

That Slate thing is a joke? right??

I am going to see Bruce April 30. Can't wait.

rae thanks for the video attacking Bruce.  They take a video of him about 25 years old, singing about the truths that were going on then (and are again), and then continue the ridiculousness throughout the ad.  Wow did they waste money on this one.  

 I've often wondered if Bruce ever ran for president how far he'd get.  A true fan knows the meanings AND TRUTH to his songs.  

Quick hello and then off.  Good to hear your thoughts, rae, and cChalfonte.

Just read an interesting article in this week's New Yorker, The Travel Issue.  An anthrolopogist in Papua, New Guinea talks about the necessity of revenge in the human psyche.  His colleague is also a tribal member and the colleague relates the 20 year revenge cycle and how important that was to his own sense of honor, his status, his kinship and membership in his tribe. The cost was about 20 lives and 300 pigs.  When he sees the man who killed his uncle crippled for life, it makes him happy. To make a long article short, the colleague recognizes the greater justice and safety a state judicial system provides but it doesn't solve the need for revenge.

In hoping  (there's that foggy word again), to understand the animal that we are, it explains somehow the glee humans show at the defeat and humiliation of an enemy, the demonizing of the enemy, and the necessity some feel to see the execution of someone who perpetrated a crime against them.  So, how to deal with that?

Christ said, turn the other cheek.  Buddha offered compassion, the vow to do no harm, etc.  Seems to me we're still working with the animal that we are.  Maybe if we weren't so brilliantly cunning as tool makers, weapons makers, and as vicious predators, we would have done less harm.  How do we school the human pysche towards happiness and well being?  Guess I'm on my questioning soapbox this morning, but that 2000 mile cross country interstate trip was disturbing to say the least. 

linda b you are going to have a great time!!  Is this your first time?

I haven't missed a show of his since 1978, and many times saw the same tour more than once, in different places.  Same for U2, only that was 1982.

Let us know how he was - he screams more now than I care for but his passion just can't help itself! 

Hi Pat, bye Pat :)

Off for coffee and then across the bay.  Enjoy the lovely day!

Denise, we saw Bruce last fall in DC but were in the nosebleed section at the Veirzon Theatre.

I mean right at the top!!

This venue is much smaller so I have been listening to all his old songs to sing along.

Well, it's ambitious as hell, I'll give them that... You might've heard of this already, but D-Day, H-Hour, M-Minute is tomorrow.

The good folks over at An Obama Minute have been running an effort to get Obama supporters to donate $1 million in one minute.  Monday, April 21st, at 1pm Eastern, that is.  

Can they do it?  Hell, I don't even know if the servers would hold up.  But am I going to join in to try to make it happen?  Hell yes.   I love this stuff.  Grassrootsy, hella ambitious, and hella creative all in one package.

They've been getting some great buzz, including a sweet hit in the NY Times..  

I'm in.   Who's with me?

[UPDATE:  Wow, rec list already?  Thanks folks, that's great, and a great sign for this effort]

[UPDATE # 2:  Can't make it at 1pm? Go here to donate now, & have it credited to this effort.]

[UPDATE # 3: Got a blog? Blog the HELL out of this, and get the word out]

Lieberman, ... as a 'mentor' ?

Joan, watch your sources?   From the same HILLARY PROJECT source from which you quote

cC

I didn't pick the website, it was the only one covering the lawsuit that Google picked up. The MSM certainly isn't going to.

We need this diary to be recommended.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/4/20/1195/71768/932/499434 

This is simply outrageous...

Video Link Here

McCain hit Obama for an association, this coming after the McCain Campaign has in the past stated it would not attack Obama over whose endorses him and associated with him.  SImply incredible Hipocracy.

The Obama Response

“Unable to sell his out-of-touch ideas on the economy and Iraq, John McCain has stooped to the same smear politics and low road that he denounced in 2000. The American people can’t afford a third term of President Bush’s failed policies and divisive tactics,” said Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton.

Meanwhile whoring with his wife recovering from and auto accident. nice guy.

Clinton's *nuclear umbrella*. This is scary stuff, folks.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/4...

mary

What's scarier even more if the fact that the sorry MSM except for Olbermann have not picked up on this Clinton bomb that happened four days ago. So much for "Breaking News."

Probably few viewers picked up on what she actually said, though we did here. I think she was trying to look macho and by doing so talked herself right into a gaffe that has yet to be explored.

Imagine if Obama had said something like that . . .

Mccain gets kinda testy with George S. earlier when George askd him why couldnt every American have the same health care as he has had while in the miltary and congress..............Mccain says that was a cheap shot..............also this perpetual reference to POW in Vietnam(no health care then)................brother, i have a relative that was in a Nazi concentration camp for 4 years and you never heard  a complaint outta the guy.................

And this war hero status...............oh for the 60s to come back, when at least many in that generation had the guts to ask a mccain how many sorties did he fly over villages with women and children in them he probably napalmed to incineration...................my how far we have declined..........

Joan In Florida
Sun, 04/20/08

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if you watched CSPAN today a profesor for UMD ME studies mentined that he has conducted polls amongst ME countries and they all fear the US and israel ore than Iran, etc..............so much for spreading democracy thru the ME......................i said in 1976 stay out of that region if we know whats good for us..............................oh well...........................