Tuesday, May 13, 2008
And Speaking of Rednecks...
A bitter, primitive male of rural extraction emailed me the following question:
What's the difference between a clever pygmy and Sen. Clinton?
What's the difference between a clever pygmy and Sen. Clinton?
Sunday, May 11, 2008
Up Against the Wall Redneck Mothers Day!
Ladies and Gentlemen, Mr. Ray Wylie Hubbard:
He was born in Oklahoma,God bless all our mothers, redneck and otherwise.
His wife's name's Betty Lou Thelma Liz
And he's not responsible for what he's doing
Cause his mother made him what he is.
And it's up against the wall Redneck Mother,
Mother, who has raised her son so well.
He's thirty-four and drinking in a honky tonk.
Just kicking hippies asses and raising hell.
Sure does like his Falstaff beer,
Likes to chase it down with that Wild Turkey liquor;
Drives a fifty-seven GMC pickup truck;
He's got a gun rack; "Goat ropers need love, too" sticker
And it's up against the wall Redneck Mother,
Mother, who has raised her son so well.
He's thirty-four and drinking in a honky tonk.
Just kicking hippies asses and raising hell.
Well,M is for the mudflaps you give me for my pickup truck
O is for the Oil I put on my hair
T is for T-bird
H is for Haggard
E is for eggs, and
R is for REDNECK.
Up against the wall Redneck Mother,
Mother, who has raised her son so well.
He's thirty-four and drinking in a honky tonk.
Kicking hippies asses and raising hell.
Thursday, May 08, 2008
Obliterate = Atomic Death
"I want the Iranians to know that if I'm the president, we will attack Iran [if it attacked Israel]. In the next 10 years, during which they might foolishly consider launching an attack on Israel, we would be able to totally obliterate them." -- Hillary Rodham Clinton, April 22, 2008
A glimpse of actual atomic obliteration of a civilian population.
SETEC ASTRONOMY
Google returns "about 10,400" search results for the phrase "my secret blog".
Wednesday, May 07, 2008
In Politics 45 Years is an Eternity
Evanier:
If all goes as expected, Barack Obama will accept the nomination of the Democratic party at their convention on August 28... 45 years to the day after Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream" speech.It's Proof of the Divine or Apophenia.
Working Class Hero Has Lent Her Campaign Eleven and a Half Million Dollars
Mrs. Clinton better buy the next round of shots. From the Guardian(UK):
Maybe Mrs. Clinton will now try her hand at being a Guitar Hero.Hillary Clinton's struggle to keep her campaign alive is being made tougher by a drying up of donors, forcing her to lend herself $6.4m (£3.2m).
Her poor showing in Tuesday's primaries - losing badly in North Carolina and winning narrowly in Indiana - will make it even harder to attract donors for what many will regard as a doomed campaign.
She has been unable to compete with rival Barack Obama in terms of funding since last year and had to lend her campaign $5m in February. Although her campaign team claimed she raised $10m in 24 hours after winning Pennsylvania last month - sceptics are waiting to see the accounts - her campaign has been running with large debts. ***
Her campaign argues that her success in winning over working class voters in Ohio, Pennsylvania and now Indiana makes her a stronger candidate than Obama against McCain, even though Obama has won the majority of Democratic contests.
In Indiana, the strategy saw Clinton ditching her previous persona of wordly first lady and policy wonk to reinvent herself as a tough, beer-loving heroine of the working classes.
The populist appeal was the most determined effort to date by Clinton to solidify her support among working class white men following her victories in Ohio and Pennsylvania.
Tuesday's Lesson: It's not that Clinton can't ever win... It's that she has ALREADY LOST.
An anonymous senior Clinton official:
Absent some sort of miracle on May 31st, it's going to be tough for us. *** We lost this thing in February. We're doing everything we can now . . . but it's just an uphill battle.NBC's Tim Russert thinks they "lost this thing" last night:
Dems to Clinton: Turn Out the Lights... the Party's Over [You]
From the New York Times:
And if you hurry, you may still have time to recover the credibility and goodwill that you've pawned.
Norman Ornstein, of the American Enterprise Institute:[Sen. Clinton's advisers] said they were likely to face new pleas even from some of their own supporters for her to quit the race. They said they expected fund-raising to become even harder now; one adviser said the campaign was essentially broke, and several others refused to say whether Mrs. Clinton had lent the campaign money from her personal account to keep it afloat.
The advisers said they were dispirited over the loss in North Carolina, after her campaign -- working off a shoestring budget as spending outpaces fund-raising -- decided to allocate millions of dollars, some key operatives and full days of the candidate and her husband there.
I have long viewed this in a simple way: two things matter, delegates and popular votes. If Obama wins both, he cannot be denied the nomination. If these numbers [early returns] hold up, he will erase her gains in Pennsylvania and have a near-insurmountable popular vote lead. That will do it, and I expect a stream of superdelegates to move to him in the coming week-plus.And even her narrow victory in Indiana isn't likely to sway Democratic super-delegates:
Thirty-six percent of primary voters said that Clinton does not share their values. And yet, among that total, one out of every five (20 percent) nevertheless voted for her in the Indiana election. Moreover, of the 10 percent of Hoosiers who said "neither candidate" shared their values, 75 percent cast their ballots for Clinton.It's time to go Mrs. Clinton.
These are not small numbers. By comparison, of the 33 percent of voters who said Sen. Barack Obama does not share their values, only seven percent cast their ballots in his favor. Basically, more people who don't relate to Clinton are, for one reason or another, still voting for her. These are not likely to be loyal supporters.
On a broader level, among the 17 percent of primary goers who said they would choose Sen. John McCain over Hillary Clinton in a hypothetical general election match-up, 41 percent of that group came from Clinton's own camp. In essence, roughly seven percent of Clinton support in Indiana (40 percent of 17 percent) said they would defect to the Republican should she end up the nominee.
And if you hurry, you may still have time to recover the credibility and goodwill that you've pawned.
Tuesday, May 06, 2008
Sisters Vote for Nun of the Above
Your Chicago Tribune reports that a dozen Indiana nuns were turned from their polling place because they didn't have state or federal photo IDs.
Indiana's photo ID law is the strictest in the country. The Republican-led effort was designed to combat ballot fraud, said supporters, who also have acknowledged that no case involving someone impersonating a voter at the polls has ever been prosecuted in Indiana. *** On April 28, the Supreme Court ruled 6 to 3 that the law did not violate the Constitution.Congratulations to the Republican party for successfully disenfranchising nonogenarian nuns in their battle against a crime without actual criminals.
Saturday, May 03, 2008
Kentucky Derby as Democratic Primary Metaphor
From Lynn Sweet of your Chicago Sun-Times:
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) wanted Eight Belles to win the Kentucky Derby. The filly came in second, had leg fractures, was euthanized.Clinton's supporters contend that the first-place horse can't win in November and that the number-two nag must be declared the winner.
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Cause Caller: Phone Banking Made Easy?
From Boing-Boing:
I've just completed building the 2.0 version of for my master's thesis. It's called Cause Caller and it is a virtual phone bank web app powered by a Semantic Media Wiki.It looks like a good tool for good works.I came up with the idea of automating call queues for phone banks while trying to organize one for myself, it was a total hassle to find everyone’s phone number on a particular committee, so I built CommitteeCaller last semester. Over the last couple of months I’ve worked with several local causes to develop the idea into a generalized activist tool that is my thesis — Cause Caller. The result is a fully extendable, platform that drives a “live” VoIP application that hopefully takes a lot of the hassle out of phone banking.
Right now Cause Caller is a bit of a blank slate — while I have almost all of America’s federal politicians (Congressional representatives, Senators, etc.) in the database, I am really interested in building state level politicians into it. Causes also need to be added as right now there are only two: the demo cause and SolarOne’s I Heart PV Cause. This is where you can help — if you are or you know any activists looking to organize phone banks, please forward this to them! I’m going to be presenting this project for my thesis at ITP on Friday, May 9th at 12:20pm, so I’ll be incorporating feedback I receive over the next week into the “results” section of my presentation.
Have fun getting in touch with democracy!
Sun Times Q&A on Sen Obama and Rev. Wright
Carol Marin asks, "What took Barack Obama so long?"
Neil Steinberg answers:
Neil Steinberg answers:
Obama courageously stood by his pastor, at first, and when the issue was sound bites of Wright's past rhetorical excesses, he was correct to do so.Marin asked the right question and Steinberg hit the nail on the head.
Now that Wright has changed the equation, restated his views in present tense and performed his giddy self-immolation, Obama is doing his best to spit his poison out.
BioFuel Breakthrough: Clinton and McCain Agree on Horseshit-Based Gas Policy
The Atlantic's James Fallows on Clinton-McCain economics:
Just you wait and see.
HuffPo: Expert Support For Gas Tax Holiday Appears Nonexistent
The pandering and ignorance-across-party-lines represented by the John McCain-Hillary Clinton united front for a temporary reduction in the gasoline tax should make Americans hold their heads in their hands and moan.But rest assured Americans -- once McCain or Clinton gets in the White House, then he or she will start proposing and implementing sound and responsible policies.
No one who has thought about this issue thinks that it will actually reduce prices or -- more important -- help the the people disproportionately hurt by $100+/barrel oil and $4 gasoline. And to the extent it has any effect on America's long-term approach to energy policy, transportation, oil dependence, and climate change, the effect will be perverse.
I can imagine that John McCain, who boasts about his sketchy command of economics, might consider this a good idea. But the master of policy, Hillary Clinton??
Please. This is embarrassing. It makes me long for the good old days of debating about flag pins on the lapel.
Just you wait and see.
HuffPo: Expert Support For Gas Tax Holiday Appears Nonexistent
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
How Low Can You GOP?
John Nichols of The Nation:
h/t HW
The Constitution Party -- which supports the repeal of the Sixteenth Amendment (the one that allows Congress to tax income) and the Seventeenth Amendment (the one that requires the direct election of U.S. Senators) and believes that states should be allowed to secede at will -- took a look at Alan Keyes and found him wanting as a candidate.And the same clueless, Grand Old Party bosses want their proven political wisdom to override the will of Illinois primary voters.
But the Republican Party was willing placed Keyes' name on the ballot in its race to retain a Senate seat from Illinois.
And which party are we supposed to take seriously?
h/t HW
Monday, April 28, 2008
Öber Alles
Cap. Fax, aka Rich Miller, has posted some more calls for Jim Oberweis to bow-out of the race for Bill Foster's seat in the 14th and (Aurora's finest Republican) OneMan has given his two cents, so I figured I'd offer my deep thoughts on the prospect of making the Republican nominee walk the plank for the party:
First, it is my understanding that there was some form of election to determine who would represent the GOP against the Democratic candidate for the 14th. Therefore, I believe, the people's candidates should stand for election. Although there is a claim to be made that the Milk Dud was finally able to buy a Republican nomination, it's not as if the Öbermensch was an unknown quantity -- he may have bought the nomination, but GOP voters in the 14th knew exactly who they sold it to.
Maybe I'm naively populist, but when the voters have spoken, I think it is corrupting for party "leadership" to undermine the will of the people as expressed at the ballot box. Forcing the Ice Cream Headache out would be too much like the Clinton endgame, i.e. forget the voters, we know who should represent our party.
That kind of anti-(small 'd')emocratic, back-room nonsense is wrong for the Democrats in their presidential primary and would be wrong for the GOP in the 14th. I'm anti-party boss, regardless of the party.
Second, it is too late to start a campaign for a new GOP candidate from scratch.
The first problem is the calendar, i.e. there just aren't enough days before November to heal the intra-party wounds that would be inflicted by forcing JimOb out. If he was unable to continue, the various factions of the GOP might rally around the new candidate for stepping into the breach. As it stands, a new candidate would have to conduct three hyper-intense campaigns simultaneously:
And a late reboot would have the GOP milling its seed corn. Any candidate who is meritorious enough to be even remotely viable in this race with so much going against him is simply too good to be thrown away by tossing him into the race with so much going against him. Losing in November with Jim Oberweis is certainly a better option for the Republicans than losing in November with a candidate who could someday amount to something.
In addition: 1) The term is only two years, the GOP's next shot at Foster is right around the corner, and 2) the 2010 off-year election is likely to take place with a Democrat in the White House, increasing the vulnerability of Cong. Foster, see e.g. 1994 Congressional Election.
So as a progressive Democrat, my advice to the Republicans is as follows:
First, it is my understanding that there was some form of election to determine who would represent the GOP against the Democratic candidate for the 14th. Therefore, I believe, the people's candidates should stand for election. Although there is a claim to be made that the Milk Dud was finally able to buy a Republican nomination, it's not as if the Öbermensch was an unknown quantity -- he may have bought the nomination, but GOP voters in the 14th knew exactly who they sold it to.Maybe I'm naively populist, but when the voters have spoken, I think it is corrupting for party "leadership" to undermine the will of the people as expressed at the ballot box. Forcing the Ice Cream Headache out would be too much like the Clinton endgame, i.e. forget the voters, we know who should represent our party.
That kind of anti-(small 'd')emocratic, back-room nonsense is wrong for the Democrats in their presidential primary and would be wrong for the GOP in the 14th. I'm anti-party boss, regardless of the party.
Second, it is too late to start a campaign for a new GOP candidate from scratch.
The first problem is the calendar, i.e. there just aren't enough days before November to heal the intra-party wounds that would be inflicted by forcing JimOb out. If he was unable to continue, the various factions of the GOP might rally around the new candidate for stepping into the breach. As it stands, a new candidate would have to conduct three hyper-intense campaigns simultaneously:
- A campaign for backing from Oberweis voters and supporters, and
- A campaign for funding from the cash-strapped Republican national party, and
- A campaign for district swing votes in November.
And a late reboot would have the GOP milling its seed corn. Any candidate who is meritorious enough to be even remotely viable in this race with so much going against him is simply too good to be thrown away by tossing him into the race with so much going against him. Losing in November with Jim Oberweis is certainly a better option for the Republicans than losing in November with a candidate who could someday amount to something.
In addition: 1) The term is only two years, the GOP's next shot at Foster is right around the corner, and 2) the 2010 off-year election is likely to take place with a Democrat in the White House, increasing the vulnerability of Cong. Foster, see e.g. 1994 Congressional Election.
So as a progressive Democrat, my advice to the Republicans is as follows:
- Expend what ever time, political capital and good will it takes to force Jim Oberweis out of the race,
- Identify a "future star" to slate as the candidate (one who doesn't live in the district would be ideal),
- Put all of your eggs in the 14th District basket by identifying it the most important contest in November and by pouring cash and resources into the race, and
- Rent a big ball room for the victory celebration.
Saturday, April 26, 2008
The Primary is Getting Really Ugly
A candidate this homely would not have made it out of Iowa:
Yeesh.
Yeesh.
