McCain/Stifler’s Mom ’08

Suggestion from our friend Adam…

Lindsey Graham Caught Off Guard on Bridge to Nowhere

George Stephanopoulos interviewed Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) this morning.  Graham almost immediately trotted out the Republican claim that Sarah Palin bravely opposed the bridge-to-nowhere. 

What Graham genuinely didn’t seem to realize was that she was first in favor of the project (and campaigned in for it) in 2006.  She changed her position only when a national outrage erupted over the bridge’s proposed cost (and a month after John McCain attacked it). 

Stephanopoulos pointed out that Palin was in favor of the bridge and only abandoned her support when the project became a “national joke.”  Graham’s response was stammering and nonsensical: “Well, the point is that she had the courage to say, ‘we’re not going to do it because its not the right signal we want to send to everybody else from Alaska.'”  Actually, the point is that she didn’t to do what you just tried to give her credit for. 

Seriously, do these people know a single thing about Sarah Palin’s record? Country first!

Here’s the Graham/ Stephanopoulos video:

Oh No She Didn’t

Apparently, the talking points go both ways between Fox News and the Republicans.  Today on This Week with George Stephanopoulos, Cindy McCain took a cue from Fox world affairs genius / weatherman Steve Doocy.  McCain defended Sarah Palin’s readiness to run our foreign and military policy by noting that Alaska is right next to Russia.  (Video here.)

And here’s the original argument, as articulated by Doocy:

Republicans: Alaska’s Land Mass Qualifies Palin for the Presidency

According to Republicans, fitness for office is determined by the size of your jurisdiction. 

Defending Alaska Governor Sarah Palin from charges that she is unprepared to become leader of the free world, Wisconsin Republican Party Chairman Reince Priebus (Prince Incubus? Rinsed Preus? Prepubescent Renis?) cited her experience in “leading the largest state in the union. . .”  That same day, Mike Huckabee, appearing on The Cartoon Network Fox News said that “she’s run the biggest land-mass state in the country.  It’s about 600 times the size of Delaware.” (Video here.)

So the complexity of running a nation of 300 million people with the world’s largest economy and military is comparable to the difficulty of running a state with barely 600,000 because there’s a lot of it.

Hans Enoksen is the Prime Minister of Greenland, a home-ruled territory of Denmark.  Before ascending to power, Enoksen was Minister for Fisheries, Hunting and Settlements. 

Greenland is gigantic, the world’s 13th largest country by land mass.  Despite having all that land, though, only about 56,000 people live there.  Its economy is based mainly on fishing, mineral mining, and handicrafts.  Although handicraft demand is sure to skyrocket at some point, Greenland is today less than an economic juggernaut. 

It also has little military capability to speak of:  “The Royal Danish Navy operates a dog sled patrol called Sirius-patruljen, based in Daneborg. Greenland also has a coastguard that patrols the Greenlandic coast and carries out search and rescue operations.”

The United Kingdom, by contrast, is tiny.  That little island is the world’s 78th largest nation, coming in behind Guinea and right in front of Ghana.  Somehow 60 million people squeeze into the sub-compact country.  Poor Gordon Brown is the Prime Minister.  Before that, he was Chancellor of the Exchequer, which is the office that handles the UK’s economy or whatever.

Despite being sadly diminutive, somehow the UK has managed to develop the world’s fifth largest economy, becoming a world center for banking and finance, and the second largest military in the world.  It’s also got nukes, has at various times conquered large chunks of the world, and contributed incalculably to world culture.  (See, e.g., William Shakespeare, Led Zeppelin, Michael Palin, John Cleese and Eddie Izzard.) 

If Greenland ever becomes part of the UK, Hans Enoksen (the fisheries guy) needs to hire whoever is writing the Republicans’ talking points.  Following the Sarah Palin model, Enoksen is perfectly capable of running the UK.  When you get down to it, what’s the difference between dog sleds and intercontinental ballistic missiles, handicrafts and banking, 56,000 people and 60 million? Greenland is huge.

From Shahar Golan: Nice

“Change we can believe in.” 

http://frgdr.com/blog/2008/02/16/mentch-white-house-2/

Sarah Palin: Failed Governor of a Small State (?)

In 1992, George H.W. Bush and the Republicans referred to Bill Clinton as “the failed governor of a small state”.  Because of that, they argued, he was not fit to be president. 

The words “small state” weren’t used by accident.  The implication was that executive experience in a place with so few people couldn’t translate into fitness for governing a country with 300 million people, nuclear weapons and nuclear-armed enemies.  

With the selection of Sarah Palin, the Republicans have apparently had a change of heart. 

There’s no disputing that she’s the governor of a small state.  Alaska has around 600,000 people.  In 2000, it was ranked 48th in size.  (In 1990 when the last census before the ’92 election was conducted, Arkansas was 33rd largest with 2.3 million people.)

So is Sarah Palin a “failed governor”?  I don’t know.  A survey conducted by CNBC this year says Alaska is 41st in education.  At least it can look down on Mississippi. 

The same study ranks Alaska’s economy 50th.  I don’t think that’s good, but I didn’t go to an Alaska school.  

Alasksa’s quality of life is 35th.  For that 15th from the bottom liveability, you’ll have to fork over more money than you would in 47 other states. 

Overall, CNBC says that out of 50 states, Alaska is somewhere between 49th and 51st.

On the other hand, when he took office, Bill Clinton had no foreign policy experience.  Palin, by contrast, has a lot:

Ads Obama Ought to Run in South Florida Right Now

Florida has been trending red since 2000.  (You may recall that Bush v. Gore was something of a squeaker that year.)  Since then, Republicans have more or less gained the upper hand — but it’s still within reach. 

Cubans and Jews are critical Flordia voting blocs.  As USA Today reported just a month ago

Jewish voters, traditionally Democratic, also favor Obama but not currently by as large a margin as they did John Kerry in 2004. As a result, Jewish voters are “definitely” a target audience for McCain, says Florida GOP chairman Jim Greer. To that end, McCain’s campaign has frequently deployed Sen. Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut, who will campaign in the state next week. “He’s not only a leader, he’s a Jewish leader and they follow what he has to say,” Greer says.

So there is ground to be made up there.  Doing so is far easier today than it was yesterday.

See, Sarah Palin supported Pat Buchanan for president in 1999/2000.  This is from a ’99 AP piece, helpfully discovered by Christopher Hayes:

Pat Buchanan brought his conservative message of a smaller government and an America First foreign policy to Fairbanks and Wasilla on Friday as he continued a campaign swing through Alaska. Buchanan’s strong message championing states rights resonated with the roughly 85 people gathered for an Interior Republican luncheon in Fairbanks. … Among those sporting Buchanan buttons were Wasilla Mayor Sarah Palin and state Sen. Jerry Ward, R-Anchorage.

Buchanan’s bigotry, particularly his anti-Semitism, has been evident for years — many years before he ran for president in 1999/2000. 

While she is still being defined, Obama needs to get an ad on radio and television in south Florida pointing out that in 1999, when Sarah Palin decided to support Pat Buchanan for President of the United States, he was on record saying things like

• After World War II, Jewish influence over foreign policy became almost an obsession with American leaders.

– A Republic, Not an Empire. P. 336.

• I know the power of the Israeli lobby and the other lobbies, but we need a foreign policy that puts our own country first.

– Meet the Press Interview. September 12, 1999.

and

• Capitol Hill is Israeli occupied territory.

– McLaughlin Group, June 15, 1990

As the world knew in 1999, Buchanan has also made a career out of defending accused Nazi war criminals.  In 1987, while working for the Reagan Administration, he provided valuable assistance to wanted Nazis who had escaped Europe and were hiding in our country:

”Buchanan is no help,” said one Federal law-enforcement official . . . ”It appears he’s trying to shut down O.S.I.”

He continued his defense of Nazis in hiding once he left government.  He began referring those those who worked for the OSI — people with names like Rosenbaum and Sher — as “hairy-chested Nazi hunters“. 

Buchanan’s animosity toward Jews continues to this day. Most recently, Buchanan wrote a book letting Adolf Hitler off the hook for World War II and placing the blame for it on the Western Allies. 

Israel is in greater danger now than it has been in decades.  Iran is led by a religious fanatic who has made clear his desire to see it destroyed and ethnically cleansed of Jews.  Iranian proxy Hezbollah plans to attack Jews worldwide. 

Pat Buchanan has made a career out of antagonizing victims of Nazism and sympathizing with those who want to destroy Israel.  Why is that okay with Sarah Palin?  What is it about Buchanan’s views that led her to believe he ought to be president?  Are these the kinds of questions you want to have to ask about someone who could be a heartbeat away from the presidency in less than five months?

PUMA: Morons, Case Closed

PUMA (Party Unity My Ass) and Just Say No Deal  are groups of alleged Hillary Clinton Supporters who can’t seem to understand that she lost.  These groups’ sole cause appears to be pushing the candidacy of Hillary Clinton, despite the fact that Hillary Clinton is, well, uh, no longer a candidate. 

They’ve pledged that under no circumstances will they support Barack Obama.   Many have endorsed John McCain.  In short, they’re Republicans.

PUMA and Just Say No Deal tried and spectacularly failed to derail the Democratic National Convention.  Why?  Because Bill and Hillary Clinton wholeheartedly endorsed Barack Obama, uniting the Democratic Party.  Also, these people are lunatics:

McCain Would Rather Win an Election…

John McCain, in an attack on Barack Obama’s patriotism, says that Obama would rather lose a war than risk losing an election.  He also frequently says that he’s so patriotic that he doesn’t care about any particular election — he always puts country first.

Nobody who lives permanently on planet Earth believes Sarah Palin is qualified to be president.  She’s the former mayor of a town with fewer than 9,000 inhabitants and has been governor of a state with barely more than half a million residents for less than two years.  She has no known foreign policy views and no national security experience.  Before today, McCain had only met Palin once. 

McCain selected Palin to capture the votes of women — particularly those disaffected by Hillary Clinton’s loss in the Democratic primary.  McCain’s transparent targeting of Clinton voters was evident from the start, with Palin herself praising Hillary for showing such “determination and grace in her presidential campaign.”

Barack Obama picked Joe Biden.  Whatever you think of his politics — and I agree with them of course — you simply cannot argue that he’s not ready to be president.

So who cares more about the country than an election?

An Ad the Obama Campaign Ought to Run

John McCain’s response to everything is to point out that he was a POW.  When defending himself for not being able to remember how many houses he owns, McCain said that there was a time in his life when he didn’t have any homes, didn’t have a table and didn’t have a chair.  http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26399647

That, of course, was nowhere near the point.  The point was that he was either too old to remember how many properties he owns or that he’s too rich and out of touch to understand the lives of ordinary people. 

Engaging in a debate with someone with absolute moral authority is a tough one, but the Democrats have to do it to win.  Here’s the ad they ought to run.

A former POW or soldier wounded in battle should say the following into the camera:

Senator McCain, you served this country honorably and well.

Nobody can ever give you back those five and a half years you spent as a POW.

But you are wrong on the issues. You’ve voted with George Bush 90% of the time. You think Americans are better off than they were eight years ago. You think the economy is going strong, which would be consistent with your admission that you don’t know that much about economics. You want to keep our troops in Iraq for 100 years.

We’re ready for change and that’s just not something you can deliver. For your service and your suffering, our country owes you a debt it can never repay. But it doesn’t owe you the presidency.

Happy Birthday, John!

Cindy McCain recently sent me a very nice note.  It included a request for money.  I considered sending her $3.95, but then realized she was unlikely to send back any beer. 

Cindy also asked me to send her husband a birthday card.  She was thoughtful enough to enclose the card she wanted me to send and asked that I write a personal note on it.  I did and here it is:

Yes, that’s written in English, not Hebrew.  Here’s what it says:

The President exercises control over the nuclear button.  When my grandfather was 72, we didn’t let him use the remote.  Enjoy your retirement. 

OBAMA 08

(Happy Birthday)

Dear RNC,

I’ve been getting junk mail from the Republican National Committee for years.  I’ve asked them to stop, but they never do. 

June 2nd of this year was kind of quiet around my office, so I tried to clarify my interest in being taken off their lists.  It didn’t work, but it felt good.  Here’s the letter:

Good for Fox News

They say it’s a mouthpiece for the RNC, but I have to give Fox News credit.  Immediately following the McCain-Palin event at which she was announced as his running mate, Fox got an extended reaction directly from the campaign of John McCain.

UPDATE…here’s the video:

By the Numbers

Barack Obama is 47.  Joe Biden is 65.   Total: 112.

Sarah Palin is 44.  John McCain is 72.  Total: 116.

The Republicans still have it on the strength of John McCain’s decrepitness.

Me in the Newspaper

Sometimes I write stuff for the paper.  Here’s some of it.

Barack Obama Hates Hayseeds

Fox News wants you to know that Barack Obama (a dazzling urbanite if Fox has ever seen one) doesn’t like small town America.

What it means to be a heartbeat away

John McCain is 72 years old.  Sarah Palin is 44 and has been governor of a state with barely more than half a million people for two years.  She has zero foreign policy experience.

Really?

Me on the TV

Occasionally, I do some legal analysis on TV.  Here‘s a link to video from one such occasion.

Drrr….

In July, Palin told CNBC’s Larry Kudlow that “as for that VP talk all the time, I tell ya, I still can’t answer that question until, until somebody answers for me: ‘What it is exactly that the Vice President does everyday?'”
http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2008/08/a-lighter-shade.html

Me on the Radio

Before law school, I was in the media.  I worked in radio and TV in various markets around the country and also for NBC News. 

As it says right there in the “About” section, these days I do some radio (and TV for that matter).  Among my favorite radio gigs was substitute hosting for my friend, talk show host Michael Berry.  Last year, I sat in for him when he was doing morning drive on 950 KPRC here in Houston.  

Why was it one of my favorite experiences?  Because I was fired after one day for supporting the legalization of gay marriage.  If you’d like to listen, here’s the show: hour one, hour two, hour three.   Janice and I locked the doors when I got home and waited for the front yard to light up from the burning crosses.

More recently, I’ve been sitting in for my friend Leo Gold who hosts the New Capital Show on KPFT, 90.1, also in Houston.   Most recently, I did a show on the Democratic revival in Texas, which you can listen to here.  Before that, at Leo’s request, I did a show on recycling, about which I know virtually nothing.  Here is that catastrophe.

The possibility exists that I’ll get a more regular job hosting.  Of course, I’ll update as that develops.

The Power of Prayer

NOTE: I actually wrote this yesterday well before Obama’s speech, but my wife, who gets on the internet for me, couldn’t post it until today.

Lunatics from Focus on the Family posted this video earlier in the month beeching the lord to douse Barack Obama’s speech at Mile High Stadium with rain. 

Currently in Denver, skies are clear.  It’s 76 degrees with 26% humidity. Winds are from the east northeast at 6 miles per hour. At speech time, it will be clear and 68 degrees. http://www.weather.com/weather/hourbyhour/USCO0105?from=36hr_fcstHourLink_undeclared

Meanwhile, the Lord God almighty has sent a hurricane barreling toward New Orleans as we approach both the third anniversary of Katrina and the beginning of the Republican convention.  Right wing goober Bobby Jindal, governor of Louisiana, and Governor Hair of Texas will both likely skip the convention so they don’t give off the odor of not giving a shit.

Now Fox News is reporting that President Bush may skip the convention too —  you know, to keep an eye on the storm.  The RNC is even considering postponing the convention entirely to avoid a conflict with the hurricane. http://thinkprogress.org/2008/08/28/bush-gustav-rnc/

If it had rained tonight, Focus on the Family probably would have claimed credit.  It would have been evidence, they would no doubt have said, that god listened to their prayers.  Now that the Republican convention is being interrupted by a storm, will they finally admit that god hates them and wants to them to lose and probably suffer from painful urination too?