The Silver Lining: John McCain is a Real Maverick

Following Rep. Joe Wilson's (R-SC) outburst at President Obama's address--the one where he shouted "YOU LIE!" in response to the President's contention that illegal aliens would not be covered under the pending health care bill--John McCain did what we've always been able to count on him to do: be himself. Referring to Wilson's outburst, McCain said it was, "totally disrespectful," and urged the Congressman to apologize. It is worth mentioning that a quick reference into the text of HR 3200 revealed that the liar wasn't Obama:

H.R. 3200: Sec 246 — NO FEDERAL PAYMENT FOR UNDOCUMENTED ALIENS

Nothing in this subtitle shall allow Federal payments for affordability credits on behalf of individuals who are not lawfully present in the United States.

Senator McCain can't help himself: graceful in defeat, honorable in battle, his breeding is a welcome relief in an age when even a Southern man like Wilson has none. How strange to live in a time when a person of honor and decency is a Maverick for (if nothing else) merely having these traits.



(Hint for the GOP: independents are impressed by one of two types, and it's NOT Joe Wilson; manners matter)

Update: I decided that since 'ol "Tell 'em like it ain't" Joe likes calling people liars, even when they're not, he deserves a taste of his own medicine. I tried to write his Dishonor an email, but in true pussy fashion, he ran and hid:



For all his bad-ass bluster, he's not only a liar, but a coward.

The Wasteland

T.S. Eliot, a mild-mannered bank employee and American expatriate in England, wrote some of the 20th century's greatest epic poetry. He was a conservative, a royalist, and had a better public school accent than Winston Churchill. He was also a pessimist. Anyone who's taken an English lit class or two has probably read Eliot's magnum opus, The Wasteland. In navigating the flourishes in German, Latin, French and even Cockney, one quickly gains the sense that Eliot is talking down to us.

That's because he is.

Scholars have argued that the point being made in The Wasteland was that so many people are talking, but no one understands language anymore. Whether this is what Eliot intended or not, the premise is a correct one. Even as English has come to be the dominant language spoken throughout the world, our ability to understand one another has diminished. Educated people once were fluent in multiple languages and almost always were fluent in Greek and Latin. This was because understanding doesn't come from reading a translation. To explain this another way, if you want to understand trigonometry, you'll first have to have a firm grasp of the concepts, methods and mechanisms of algebra. Likewise, if you want to understand class nuances in Lyermontov's Caucasus stories, the English translations will miss the point entirely; you simply can't capture the deference and condescension inherent in the Cossack/Russian dialectic in the same way that ты and вы express so elegantly.

I've thought a lot about The Wasteland of late. It seemed that after the election we were no longer working toward a dialogue. But it's more than that. We no longer understand each other and no longer care to. And it's not just everyone's favorite dichotomy--Democrats and Republicans--the "right" and "left" if you will. The Republican party is besieged from within as the radio entertainers, the religious right, business conservatives and civil libertarians battle among each other and the moderate forces of the party--including those in the press--for the soul of the GOP. The Republican party going the way of the Whigs, perhaps?

Not likely.

Talk on the left is equally tone deaf. Democrats no longer speak to labor or progressives--if they ever did; they certainly don't speak for them. The "liberal" media" (i.e. MSNBC) has a script they're following, not unlike the one followed by the rightist media (i.e. Fox News). Both are looking for knee-jerk reactionists. Both follow the talking points remarkably well.

Will Obama's health care plan make us healthier? Will Republican promises to cut government spending make us more prosperous? In other words, what's the observable difference from up here in the cheap seats?

Abortion? Republican majorities in both houses never tried to pass legislation outlawing it during the 12 years they were in power. Assessment: no one in the GOP cares about abortion. It's simply a wedge issue to help them get elected by people with a genuine ambivalence to the practice. It's worked brilliantly ever since Reagan. Why would they kill their golden goose?

Health care? It's become to liberal rhetoric what 9-11 was for Guiliani's: a verb, a noun and National Health Care. Like most social programs, it has one of two means to be accomplished: levy higher taxes on the middle class or place criminal consequences upon those who can't afford it. Again, it's a Holy Graille; deliberately vague and unachievable, countervailing the Republican promise (with crossed fingers) to outlaw abortion.

The assassination of Dr. Tiller in a Wichita church has been a watershed moment in American politics. Roe v. Wade, though it remains firmly the law of the land, has been virtually nullified through a violent war of attrition that has included the assassination of abortion providers, the bombing of clinics, and any number of other acts that should at once draw howls of laughter at the mere mention of the euphemistically named "pro-life" movement. Those who quickly spoke out to justify his murder as, the victim simply "reap[ing] what he sowed," can no more be labeled as supporting the human right to life than an Antebellum planter could have called himself "anti-slavery."

At the same time, the need for some on the left to have this murder defined as an act of terrorism is disturbing. While it can be argued that demagogues have shown a depraved indifference to human life by lighting the fuses of people that they know to be emotionally unbalanced, this is not the same thing as shouting "fire" in a crowded theater. For my part, O'Reilly's constant repetition of "Tiller the baby killer," in concert with his characterization of him as an unprincipled capitalist (see video below; click the link if you're reading this on facebook) elicited eye rolls the few times I happened to catch it out of the corner of my eye at the gym. There can be no question that O'Reilly and others, who played on the visceral reaction that people naturally have when someone tells them that some maniac is out there slaughtering infants, are responsible for Tiller's murder. Whether or not these reckless demagogues will be held financially responsible is for the civil courts to decide. But as much as I loathe them, I find the idea that they could be legally defined as terrorists horrifying.



At issue isn't what's being said in the media, but why. Why does Bill O'Reilly repeat over and over "Tiller the Baby Killer" like a broken record? Why does Rachel Maddow want the leftist pundits on her show to back up her assertion that the assassination of Dr. Tiller amounts to terrorism (which none of them would)?

Allow me to return to our original discussion about T.S. Eliot's Wasteland. We've lost the ability to communicate. Not just in the languages of the educated; we've lost the ability to accept dissenting opinion from our own. Television and internet has built up an industry that talks at us. And we talk back, even if we know no one is listening. Who reads the comments at the bottom of op-ed pieces on the web, besides the armies of the duopoly, fresh from their latest pep talk by Keith Olbermann or Bill O'Reilly or Rachel Maddow or Glenn Beck or Rush Limbaugh?

I am convinced that the blogosphere is that Wasteland where there are too many voices and no one can understand one another. Don't like the liberal bent someone is taking? Call him a socialist baby killer. Is she criticizing Obama? The racist bitch!

Our fifteen minutes of fame is coming to an end. The current economy doesn't give a rat's ass which side you're on or what you have to say about it. It might care who's listening.

That is, if everyone else weren't so busy trying to get you to listen to them.

The Handshake the Shook Fox News

It was an E.D. Hill moment ("A fist bump? A pound? A terrorist fist jab? The gesture everyone seems to interpret differently. We'll show you some interesting body communication and find out what it really says."): yet another knee-jerk reaction by conservative media.

On the cover of Sunday's Los Angeles Times, President Obama was photographed shaking the hand of (gulp) Hugo CHAVEZ!! While this didn't exactly give me the warm and fuzzies for the embattled Democratic President, I didn't see the harm in it either. Yes, there's been a lot of criticism of the United States from Chavez in recent years, much of which I dismissed, considering the source. Of course, Fox News weighed in, making sure to tell their loyal followers what to think:

When President Obama met Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez in Trinidad on Friday, he shook hands with a man who only four years ago called the United States the most "murderous empire that has existed in the history of the world." . . . "What he's going to say is that what he has been doing in Venezuela now has the seal of approval of the United States," said Otto Reich, who was ambassador to Venezuela under President Reagan. "He sees it as a green light to continue dismantling democracy in Venezuela."

Those few readers following this blog will note that I have written a piece or two myself that weren't exactly singing the praises of Obama. In fact, I believe I have implied that he (like all Democrats and Republicans) was a bought-off-sonofabitch. Not a socialist or a commy, but a pro-business President, willing to socialize the costs of propping up large American corporations (too big to fail) while privatizing the gains. It's just as wrong now that Barack Obama is doing it as it was when Ronald Reagan did it during his first term. No, dittoheads, I didn't stutter: your bloated, drug-addled leader's fantasy lover, whom he verbally felates daily with such abandon, raised ZERO eyebrows throughout the eighties when subsidized multinational corporations, enabling the corporate raids that would dismantle the industries that had been key to decades of American prosperity. The kleptocracy has been continued through Bush, Clinton and Bush, on up to the present day, in which Timmy Geithner continues funneling Goldman Sachs' now much anticipated profit margin through AIG, as well as direct bailout subsidies to Goldman Sachs itself.

In other words, President Obama is no worse--even from a tax and spend perspective--than any other President we've had since 1981. But the conservative media, needing to prove its omnipotence, having failed to turn out the vast numbers of protesters on tax day, seized on the President's handshake with Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez. As hastily planned as the teabagging venture was, I saw it as a brilliant move by Fox News and other conservative media. While I wouldn't have personally had anything to do with it, being as the "astroturf" (fake grass-roots) movement was sponsored and driven by the media, I thought that the mockery from leftists like Paul Krugman and Rachel Maddow failed to recognize the value of such protests, in terms, not only of galvanizing Americans who see themselves as conservatives, but that it might be attractive to independents, like myself, looking for a place to channel their rage over the bailouts.

But Fox News, having seized on a great opportunity to exploit populist rage, once again showed its tone-deafness. This was apparent when Fox & Friends brought Newt Gingrich on for a little of his sophistry:

"Frankly, this does look a lot like Jimmy Carter. Carter tried weakness, and the world got tougher and tougher, because the predators, the aggressors, the anti-Americans, the dictators – when they sense weakness, they all start pushing ahead. . . . I think it sends a terrible signal to all of Latin America, and a terrible signal about how the new administration regards dictators."

Ah, the favorite Republican straw man, Jimmy Carter. I credit the former Speaker of the House with a good deal more intelligence than he exhibits on behalf of the Fox News viewer. To put it another way, Gingrich's analysis is deliberately obtuse and he knows it. Perhaps historians have different standards for showing cause and effect than other social scientists, particularly when your version of history relies so heavily on the stereotype of Democrats being "weak." To claim the Iran hostage crisis was the result of a weak Presidency, fails every litmus test of cause and effect. It ignores the fact, for example, that the Iranian Revolution was the result of many usurpations by the Shaw against his people, on behalf of the United States; the Iranian Revolution can no more be blamed on Carter than the Chinese Revolution can be blamed on Truman, or the Cuban Revolution can be blamed on Eisenhower, or that the Hatian ousting of the Duvalierists was Reagan's fault. Furthermore, while it scores some KISS (keep it simple, stupid) points, it opens the GOP up to the question of why George W. Bush made such a point of going to war to catch Osama bin Laden, who remains at large to this day. And as for our relationship with dictators: does the former Speaker of the House mean military dictators, like Augusto Pinochet and Pervez Musharraf, or just dictators who act in only our interests, while lining their pockets at the same time, like Ferdinand Marcos1, the Shaw of Iran, "Poppa Doc" Duvalier & Son and Fulgencio Batista (don't even get me started on Nicaragua)?

They freaked out over a First Lady with biceps, for crying out loud. The problem with Fox's histrionics is relevance: they're so busy nit-picking about the little things and parroting the echoes of the late Ronald Reagan as per Rush Limbaugh, that they miss the bigger picture. Fox News became relevant by riding a wave of popular dissent, not for dissent's sake, but because the people watching already knew it was necessary. It's hard to imagine how a handshake between Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev could have "legitimized" communism, or shown weakness in a time when many of us went to bed each night wondering if we might awaken to a nuclear winter--or worse, not awaken at all.

I won't bother defending President Obama, as he seems quite capable of doing it for himself:

"It's unlikely that as a consequence of me shaking hands or having a polite conversation with Mr. Chavez that we are endangering the strategic interests of the United States. . . . Even within this imaginative crowd, I think you would be hard-pressed to paint a scenario in which U.S. interests would be damaged as a consequence of us having a more constructive relationship with Venezuela. . . .We had this debate throughout the campaign, and the whole notion was, is that somehow if we showed courtesy or opened up dialogue with governments that had previously been hostile to us, that that somehow would be a sign of weakness – the American People didn't buy it. And there's a good reason the American People didn't buy it — because it doesn't make sense."

So it boils down to this: as long as Barack Obama can so plainly state his point, the conservative media will need a lot more than Newt Gingrich and Jimmy Carter to justify their latest temper tantrum.

1. Having elections only make you a democracy if the ballot boxes aren't stuffed.

Meet the New Boss (Same as the Old Boss): Part II of Ongoing Series

A comic is worth a thousand rants. Suggestion to cartoonist: an ad with Timothy Geithner's picture on the side of the mailbox might have lacked the subtlety that cartoonists aspire to, but it would have also illuminated the continuity inherent in the transition from the corporatist policies from the Bush regime to the same policies, brought to you by the marketing firm of Obama, Goldman and Sachs, makers of Change you Can't Believe in (Since the Democrats are Bought-off Sonsabitches, Just Like Republicans).

We have only four years, independents, to pull someone from our own ranks, promote them and make them competetive against the Two-Parties that have sold us out, time and again.

We've Been Had

When Keith Olbermann breaks ranks with the left to take aim at the same guy Limbaugh, O'Reilly and Beck are taking pot shots at, something has gone terribly wrong. As the Department of Justice moves to quash a suit that would repeal the Bushist policy of unwarranted wiretapping (Jewell v. NSA)the Obama Administration opens itself up to attacks, not only from the right, but from every political axis.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

With the GOP virtually leaderless and clinging to a failed ideology and a Democratic Party promising only more of the same, it is time for Americans to abandon the false dichotomy of the Two-Party System. While the President hasn't failed on all of his promises, he's shown where his allegiances lie, and it's not with the American People. But amid all of the flowery rhetoric, Obama touched on something we have badly needed as Americans: that we are not a Nation where identity politics can trump our national and cultural identity. We are all Americans.

I don't care if you're a card-carrying member of the Sierra Club or a dyed-in-the-wool member of the NRA: when our sharpshooters took out the Somali pirates and rescued our American sea captain of Maersk Alabama, it made you proud of what we are. The olive branch having failed (the ship was carrying aid to Kenya) the arrows were swift and retribution was fierce.

I close with a literary reference. An adolescent boy I know just finished reading Orwell's Animal Farm. He told me he was quite disturbed by the ending (SPOILER ALERT:IF YOU HAVEN'T READ ANIMAL FARM, EITHER READ IT NOW, OR STOP READING THIS POST). As the older animals who remembered the revolution peered through the windows and saw the pigs and the humans quarreling over a card game, they realized they couldn't tell the difference between them. While Orwell was referring to oppression under communism being virtually indistinguishable to what many believed they had suffered under capitalism, I refer to this Orwellian twist for another reason. Having decided the Elephants had violated the Constitution, we placed our faith in the Donkeys. For all of the demagoguery regarding "Socialism," there is no difference between the two: Goldman Sachs has bought and paid for both of them.

How can they look any different in the end?

Meet the New Boss (Same as the Old Boss)

Yes, the title of this thread is aimed at President Obama.

Everyone believed he could do it. Even Pete Townshend, after performing "Won't Get Fooled Again" (Who's Next)said that, given Obama's victory over the conservative political machine, he needed to rethink the meaning of the song. One of the most dynamic and revolutionary songs (literally) in all of rock music, "Won't Get Fooled Again" is the quintessential anthem of the skeptic, pointing out that once the revolution ends and the oppressors are overthrown, the new regime changes little or nothing for the better. I agree with Townshend to some degree: Obama has brought about some much needed changes.

The boos from our troops in Iraq as they were told they will be ceding control of Iraq back to the Iraqis isn't something that would have happened under a McCain Administration (I can understand why they booed him: from a soldier's perspective the place is a mess, and none of the machinery is currently in place to keep Iraq from tearing itself to pieces with civil war; but, I digress). It was a good and necessary step, at least for ability of the United States to move forward. Contrary to what the anti-war "progressives" claim, I agree with the President's decision to stay in Afghanistan--not to take it over or to "stabilize" the region--but to finish what Bush II started in 2001: GET BIN LADEN. Just him, and anyone who protects him. It isn't rocket science: if Bush I can bitch slap Manuel Noriega in his own house and drag him back to the States to try him as a drug runner, I think that these high-tech morons in the CIA ought to be able to sort through the latest stack of Quickbird images from the Af-Pak border and find bin Laden. How will they know it's him? Here's a hint: HE'S THE GUY STANDING OUTSIDE A CAVE TALKING TO A VIDEO CAMERA!

There is, of course that patient side to Obama: the one that doesn't bother swatting at Dick Cheney when he flies by on the news. By all signs, the President wants to move forward. And this is where I have to start calling bullshit. Cheney admitted on television that he knew about and approved the use of torture, defined as a war crime under Geneva. I'm no lawyer, but I'm pretty sure that a spontaneous admission of guilt--one that was in nowise coaxed (say, by waterboarding, for example)--is generally accepted as being admissable in court. And given that President Obama once held the prestigious position of president of the Harvard Law Review, it would seem a no brainer that this is a fact not lost on him.

It's been clear for some time that Washington, while willing to pay lip service to the general outrage with the auld populist sound bite, has had Wall Street's back from the beginning, and has no intention of throwing them under the bus. When the sheriff robs you, it’s bad enough: you have to convince a judge and a prosecutor to get off their lazy asses and do their jobs; then you have to find someone willing to take on a paramilitary force, known as "The Sheriff's Department," to have him arrested. That normally requires a larger paramilitary force, such as the State Police or the FBI. But at least they exist.

So this time, our cattle are being rustled by Wall Street bankers. You know, those "genteel" folk that everyone used to be so deferential to? And now, from all appearances, the gate is being held open by one of the Commander-in-Chief’s top deputies, Tim Geithner. It’s hard to imagine that someone sharp as President Obama is blind to how Geithner appears to be operating as primary gate-holder for that infamous gang of financial rustlers, chasing borrowed revenues through AIG’s hidden range of complicated credit-default swaps, out to the financial pastures where the dandies and the gamblers (still disguised as bankers) cash out the missing pot of a poker game, which from all accounts, they lost.

As much as I want the efforts by the Obama Administration to work, I can’t see how paying an insurance company to pay off the architects of this recession will lead to improving our economy. Perhaps I can’t see the forest for the trees. But perhaps I was right to begin with, when I suggested, some time ago, that right and left, Democrat and Republican, liberal and conservative, were a false dichotomy with a purpose. I know a lot of “blue dog” Democrats; most of the self-proclaimed “leftists” that I know don’t favor any kind of gun control. A surprising number of the women I know that identify themselves as “feminists” are ambivalent toward Roe v. Wade and wouldn’t consider abortion for themselves or for their daughters; on the other side of the abortion issue, there seems no shortage of self-proclaimed conservatives that wish everyone would just shut up about it. These are but a few minor examples pointing to the paradox in American political identity: how we align ourselves politically doesn’t so much reflect beliefs, but how appealing we tend to find someone else’s. Hence, left/right and liberal/conservative, but most importantly, Democrat/Republican, are not so much dichotomies as two sides of the same coin. And they have us well trained: when one side can’t fix the problem, we flip the coin over and hope that the other side can. But no matter how many times we turn over that nickel, it’s still just a nickel. Don’t get me wrong: a nickel still has its uses, but you only get so much mileage out of it—particularly when it’s minted the same on either side.

And so we come to it: the two-party system is out of gas. Both sides have given the bankers a free hand to shape financial and economic policy. I’ve given my support, not only in money but in hope to the idea that this time, it could be different. But it can’t, because this time, like last time and the time before that, the moneyed and the well-connected did what they do best: they used our hopes and desperation to steal what little we had left.I didn’t come to this conclusion via the endless right-wing or left-wing demagoguery that fouls the airwaves. I just looked outside after hearing there was a new sheriff in town, and saw for myself that America was still a kleptocracy. It was founded by rich men who couldn’t stomach the thought of paying taxes to cover the cost of a war that their greed and speculation started, and the same people who have sunk us, time and again, remain firmly entrenched.

So Townshend got it right the first time: revolution, election, regime change. The same banners flew in the last war and the new boss is the same as the old.

I love my country, but our so-called leaders all suck. And until we get another Jefferson in the office, who's willing to stand up for the rights of the common man, we're still flipping that two-headed coin from right-to-left and back again.

The Dog and Pony Show: Washington Goes WWF on AIG Largess

In this corner, weighing in at $170 billion in taxpayer revenue, reporting a 3rd quarter profit of $6 million in 2008 (just before the market meltdown) and $1.6 trillion in losses : the Master of Disaster, the Don of Derivatives, the Jihad on Jobs, the Harbinger of Recession, the Bonus Bitch, and the Credit-default Swap felt 'round the World, American Insurance Group!

AND IN THIS CORNER, weighing in with an annual taxpayer budget of $2.7 billion with pay increases on the way, with wins for multinational corporations, foreign countries, the executive branch and, of course, themselves, having been hoodwinked by Hank Paulson, punked by Karl Rove and made into George Bush's bitch: the Counterfeit Chorus, the Feckless Faction, the Guardian of the Greedy, the Corporate Courtesan, the Strumpet of the Stinking-rich and the Rubberiest of all Rubber Stamps, the United States Congress!

Let the WWF Smackdown begin.

Not. Ed Liddy refused to reveal the names of the employees who took bonuses, due to some threatening mail, including a piece he read aloud, indicating that the writer wanted to garrote bonus recipients with a piano string. I could try to explain to Mr. Liddy and his kind, that the reason horse thieves were hanged, rather than simply receiving long sentences, was because horses in the old West, weren't simply draft/transportation animals, they were livelihood; if your horse was stolen or damaged, you might not be able to provide for your family. That didn't mean selling one of a dozen houses or missing an annual trip to Europe, it meant starvation. He, the members of Congress and the media probably wouldn't know what it means to live paycheck to paycheck (in Liddy's case, another year, another dollar), then to get the news that the cycle you depended on has been broken. Your expenses will continue, but your paychecks will not.

The media has started making fun of the outrage shown by Congress to the insurance giant. Funny that they never mention the reason that it all sounds so disingenuous: Congress will be getting yet another raise this year while the taxpayers that support them continue to lose their jobs and homes.

Bernanke knew about the bonuses, but did nothing to block them. Geithner shrugged his shoulders, accepting the argument that the contracts that agreed to the bonuses--under the auspices that 2007's profits were something other than creative accounting--could in no wise be abrogated.

I'm sure this comes as disappointing news to the UAW.

But the hearing was nothing more than a dog and pony show. As with the situation that led to the financial meltdown, it doesn't take a genius to sniff this one out. Anyone who could look at the price of homes in poor and/or working class neighborhoods could see that we were in for trouble: it simply didn't add up. Here are the facts"

• AIG has funneled tens of billions of taxpayer dollars to Goldman Sachs, Deutche Bank, others
  
• Former Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson and current Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner were both once employed by Goldman Sachs
• Goldman Sachs and AIG were substantial contributors to Barack Obama's presidential campaign.

Before some nut job starts frothing at the mouth about a Jewish banking conspiracy, I should point out that the only implication I'm trying to make is that Goldman Sachs' fingerprints are all over the crime scene. Watching Congress and the Obama Administration bungle through the financial meltdown would be like watching Car 54, where are you? or Keystone Cops, if it weren't so obvious that they're ignoring all of the clues left behind by the criminals.

GEITHNER: "A contract? Gawrsh! Did they pinky swear on it and everything?" (shrugging) "Well, shucks. It looks like there isn't nothin' we can do, then." (turning to AIG) "Would you super-nice fellers who were so greedy a year ago that you didn't give a crap one way or 'nother that you might destroy the world economy, mind giving them there retention bonuses back? No?" (turning to audience) "Gawrsh. Guess there's nothin' we can do, then."

We needed Elliot Ness and we got Frank Nitti. Obama made a mistake by tapping yet another Goldman Sachs alum to run the Treasury. He walked into a wall, dislodged the scaffolding above him and wound up covered in paint with a bucket over his head. Once makes for good theater. But there reaches a point, after a dozen or so prat falls that you shut it off, because it's obvious they're mugging for the cameras.

We need FDR, not Charlie Chaplin, and for Obama to be taken seriously, he's going to have to fire Geithner before another series of prat falls obviates what we already suspect. We need a Congress that walks the walk instead of just talking the talk. And we need a media that follows evidence instead of trying to quell public outrage with eye-rolling and cynicism. But that's not going to happen as long as we wait around for someone else to do our work.

Obama was right about one thing: we are the change we've been waiting for.

The Best and Worst of Election 2008

Best

McCain admonished his party toward their better instincts, saying "We are the party that came to Washington to reform it, but were corrupted by it." I think if anyone could have cleaned up the 'pubs, it was McCain.

McCain's story of how he was broken in Hanoi, ashamed, but not alone, how he found strength through his brothers in arms, and was nursed through this trial by his love for his country.

Obama talking to us about race like we were grown-ups.

Obama's epic of 106 years through the eyes of a black woman and his challenge to us to advance our country as our nation advanced through the lifetime of Ann Nixon Cooper.

Ben Affleck's impression of Olbermann.

Tina Fey's amazing impression of Palin.

Screwing wiith the dudes who follow talking points online. After a while, they won't even talk to you.

Worst
Rachel Maddow suffering from Election post-traumatic stress disorder--she drove me nuts!

Olbermann's nightly comments during the last two weeks leading up to the Election.

The Chaffey Community Republican Women's racist "Obama Bucks" graphic.

The constant allusions to John McCain's age and melanoma.

Sarah Palin--EVERYTHING!

California Prop 8 passing. Do the Mormons know the people they were funding hate them, too?

Mitt Romney prostrating himself before the Evangelicals, who didn't support him anyway.

TALKING POINTS!

What were your best and worst of Election 2008?

The Day Before the Election: Obama Dominates the Polls, But Will it Matter?

There is a guarded optimism among progressives that, provided individuals brave the long lines, combat the electronic voting machines until their vote stops flipping from Obama to McCain (or McKinney) and take video of their voting experience, Obama might actually win. Cue voter suppression efforts: get any emails or phone calls telling you to change polling locations? Changing your voting day from November 4th to November 5th? Seen any fliers warning you that you'll be arrested for unpaid parking tickets, etc, if you turn out to vote?

It's all stock-in-trade for suppressing the vote in minority and poor neighborhoods. The logic goes that poor whites and minorities are likely to vote Democrat, so these dirty tricks advantage the Republicans. But if the long lines for early voting are any kind of barometer, it doesn't appear to be working this time. And Gallup's Tracking Poll indicates Obama widening the gap among registered voters (53-40), expanded likely voters and traditional likely voters (53-42). Curiously, Senator Obama remains vigilant, refusing to let up in his efforts to persuade people to vote; conversely, Senator McCain is not only optimistic, but incredibly, he has enthusiastically assured his supporters that he will come from behind and win the Presidential election. It's not surprising that McCain would say he'll make a comeback, but it's quite another for him to believe it.

Does John McCain know something that we don't?

That depends on who you ask. According to a post in Brad Blog by Stephen Heller, Michael Connell, Republican IT Guru is being deposed today, regarding allegations of electronic election fraud in Ohio in 2004:

Confidential sources indicate that Connell has been blackmailed by Karl Rove to take the fall under threats that Connell's wife, Heather, will be prosecuted for alleged violations of lobby law. If Connell confirms this story, Karl Rove can forget about hiding behind Executive Privelege.

Regardless of who goes to jail, this is the biggest political scandal since Watergate. Will the mainstream media pick it up? Something tells me this is highly unlikely, even if Senator McCain makes an inexplicable, eleventh-hour comeback. That's why we're going to need to get off our asses and do something about it.

NOW.

I've said it before: in hard times, the patriots aren't ones with their hands out, but with their fists up. No one is going to give you your vote back, you're going to have to take it. Click the link, pledge your support and take a stand for democracy.

When an Election Jumps the Shark into the Politics of Hate: An Open Letter to the Chaffey Community Republican Women, Federated

If I started off a joke about someone eating ribs, fried chicken and watermelon, who was on food stamps, you would know that I was about to tell an inappropriate ethnic joke about an African American. If you were a decent person, you might tell me to watch my mouth before I said anything. If you were morally upright and I told the joke anyway, you might knock me on my ass. And if I had a conscience, instead of calling the cops, I'd do what was decent and feel ashamed. While I wouldn't want to admit to full-on bigotry, I would feel compelled to say I was sorry--again, if I had a conscience.

On the other hand if I were a jerk who wanted to insult your intelligence, I would try to tell you that I didn't know that eating fried chicken, watermelon and barbecued ribs were a stereotype for black people, or that being on welfare was an unfair and negative sterotype of black people.

Diane Fedele, president of the Chaffey Community Republican Women, Federated of Upland, California, is the lowest form of life that has ever existed in our great country: Diane Fedele is a bigot. That's not playing the race card, that is a statement Diane Fedele invited when she composed such an image. This was not "poor judgement," it wasn't innocent, and her garbage apology "to anyone who was offended" is not accepted, because it isn't sincere. She has allowed her enthusiasm in this historic presidential campaign to sour into something so ugly that we have to go back nearly four decades for a reference on such an overt and mainstream display of hate. In an election plagued by members of people yelling "Kill him," in reference to Senator Obama, after being whipped into a violent frenzy by the Republican candidate's running mate, not to mention the Sacramento County Republican's call to "waterboard Obama," there been a clear lack of leadership within the your party, but that does not excuse Diane Fedele's actions. Her portrayal of Barack Obama's face on a food stamp, complete with watermelon, barbecued ribs and KFC fried chicken was a clear and deliberate usage of negative, racist stereotypes directed at African American people. Were there any question that this was anything but a deliberate and vulgar display of ethnic stereotyping, Diane Fedele tipped her hand at symbolism with the Kool-Aid character; your bloggers have stuck to their talking points a little too well.

Drinking the Kool-Aid.

It is a reference to people who followed a white cult leader, Jim Jones, ingesting poisoned punch in Guyana, committing mass suicide. This has been a talking point that Republicans have stuck to religiously, referring to Obama supporters as "drinking the Kool-Aid." Diane Fedele, President of the Chaffey Community Republican Women tipped her hand at symbolism. This was no innocent error. She knowingly and with malice of forethought, in a County that is home over 187,000 African Americans, created such a divisive and hateful image, and in targeting a political campaign, unleashed an unexcuseable attack on, not on 187,000 people, but an entire nation of them.

An entire nation of us--black, brown, red, yellow and white.

Is this who you want leading you, Chaffey Community Republican Women, Federated? Are you honestly okay with this? Because it's not Diane Fedele's name on it, it's your name. Do you hate your African American neighbors, as she clearly does? Or your Hispanic neighbors? Or your Asian neighbors? Or your Native American Neighbors? Or your poor, white neighbors? Because this kind of hate rarely stops at one group of people--at least it never has before; not with the Nazis or the Ku Klux Klan or the Neo-Nazis or the Aryan Nations. Those groups never stopped at just one group of people, either. And you can say that you're not racists, but you clearly appear willing to tolerate racism when it suits you. Diane Fedele, as your club president, speaks for you, unless you dencounce this disgusting and racist image--unless you denounce her.

Does Diane Fedele speak for you, Chaffey Community Republican Women, Federated?

Are you "drinking the Kool-Aid" of hate for her?