McCain camp on "masculine" and "feminine" convention speeches

That's just weird.

As for the speech itself, Davis said a generic, "masculine" speech was being prepared before the pick was made and, now that Palin is the choice, she is adapting the speech to her own needs and personality.

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Terrorist attacks in Israel are God's punishment to Jews who don't convert to Christ, speaker at Palin's church says in her presence

Holy crap.

...just two weeks ago, when Palin’s church, the Wasilla Bible Church, gave its pulpit over to a figure viewed with deep hostility by many Jewish organizations: David Brickner, the founder of Jews for Jesus.

Palin’s pastor, Larry Kroon, introduced Brickner on Aug. 17, according to a transcript of the sermon on the church’s website.

“He’s a leader of Jews for Jesus, a ministry that is out on the leading edge in a pressing, demanding area of witnessing and evangelism,” Kroon said.

Brickner then explained that Jesus and his disciples were themselves Jewish.

“The Jewish community, in particular, has a difficult time understanding this reality,” he said.
Brickner’s mission has drawn wide criticism from the organized Jewish community, and the Anti-Defamation League accused them in a report of “targeting Jews for conversion with subterfuge and deception.”

Brickner also described terrorist attacks on Israelis as God's "judgment of unbelief" of Jews who haven't embraced Christianity.

"Judgment is very real and we see it played out on the pages of the newspapers and on the television. It's very real. When [Brickner's son] was in Jerusalem he was there to witness some of that judgment, some of that conflict, when a Palestinian from East Jerusalem took a bulldozer and went plowing through a score of cars, killing numbers of people. Judgment — you can't miss it."

Palin was in church that day, Kroon said, though he cautioned against attributing Brickner’s views to her.

Don't forget that McCain was more than happy to join in the fray over Rev. Wright's obnoxious comments. So let's not hear the McCain campaign cry foul over an examination of Sarah Palin's church. Read More......

Obama up three in North Dakota

And now in other news.... Here's something good on the second night of the GOP convention from what has been a reliably red state.

A new poll in North Dakota has Obama up by three: 43 - 40. I'm told by reliable sources that it's a reliable poll conducted by DFM Research (400 respondents with a margin of error of +/-5%).

Here's the key question:

Q5: Turning to the upcoming election. If the election for President was held today, for whom would you vote? Barack Obama the Democrat, John McCain the Republican? (ROTATE NAMES)

Barack Obama …………………..... 43%
John McCain …..…………….......... 40
(VOL) Other candidate ……….…... 5
(VOL) Unsure …………...………… 12

Yes, we're talking North Dakota. According to Pollster.com, two polls from July also show a close race. Read More......

If John McCain really were a maverick...

Obama spokesman Bill Burton on FOX earlier today, talking about Lieberman's speech tonight (no link, sorry :-):

Yes, Joe Lieberman is speaking but the reason he is speaking instead of on the ticket is because there's a choice in this election between Barack Obama who is for a woman's right to choose and John McCain who wants to overturn Roe vs. Wade to the point he kept Joe Lieberman off the ticket.... If John McCain really wanted to show he's the maverick he purports to be, he wouldn't just have had Joe Lieberman giving a speech. He would have put Joe Lieberman on the ticket, but he was forced not to by the right wing of his party.

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Empty seats on the floor of the GOP convention, 45 minutes ago

At the Democratic Convention, the floor was packed at this hour. The floor is where you want to be, it's the hard place to get to. This is bad. Well, for them.

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So much for family privacy

From the LA Times blog:

Levi Johnston, the boyfriend of the pregnant 17-year-old Bristol Palin, plans to join the family at the Republican Party's nomination here of mom and Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin for vice president....

So much for family privacy: Imagine the attention this couple will confront in the media-filled Xcel Energy Center where the hurricane-truncated convention is playing out....

The Palin family already has captured the attention of this hall, after Sarah Palin and husband Todd announced Monday that their daughter planned to have the baby and marry the father. They also asked the media to respect the young couple's privacy.

Good luck with that this week, as the small-town hockey player makes his national TV debut.

The McCain campaign just spent the entire day yelling at everyone to leave these kids alone. Now they're going to put them on stage before millions of Americans. Is John McCain in charge any more? Is anyone? Read More......

Bush to invoke 9/11 tonight as reason to elect McCain. Is 9/11 a reason to elect President Palin too?

There were a lot of lessons from 9/11, and having Sarah Palin as our commander in chief during a time of war was not one of them. Bush plans to invoke 9/11 tonight - and let's face it, he's doing it to try to get our dander up, so he can divert the media's attention from the Palin fiasco - so let him. John McCain is 72 years old and has had four bouts of cancer. It is entirely possible that Sarah Palin will become our president some time in the next four years, should McCain and Palin win the election. I think Democrats would be more than happy to ask the American people if they'd have been comfortable having President Palin leading the country on September 11. If they'd be comfortable having Sarah Palin leading the country on the next September 11.

Sarah Palin vs. Osama bin Laden. Now there's a discussion we'd all love to have, George Bush. Bring it on. Read More......

Why the pregnancy issue is NOT off limits

While I can appreciate the media wanting to give the Palins privacy, the McCain campaign and her own mother's decision to release the status of her pregnancy - for whatever reason - put this issue front and center. Let's not forget, it was the McCain campaign itself that told us Palin's 17 year old daughter was pregnant. No givesies backsies.

McCain "picked" Sarah Palin to appease the Religious Right. This is in spite of who he really wanted to pick - Lieberman or Ridge. McCain's pandering to the right-wing conservative agenda, by definition, brings up all manner of social issues. So what kinds of issues did McCain dredge up? Part of John McCain and Sarah Palin's agenda according to their own words is to oppose sex education in our schools. From McCain's campaign earlier this year:

Senator McCain strongly opposes efforts by the Democratic-controlled Congress to eliminate abstinence-only sex education classes for school-aged children. Senator McCain believes the correct policy for educating young children on this subject is to promote abstinence as the only safe and responsible alternative. To do otherwise is to send a mixed signal to children that, on the one hand they should not be sexually active, but on the other here is the way to go about it.

And from Palin in 2006:

In an Eagle Forum Alaska questionnaire, Palin gave this response to the following question:

Will you support funding for abstinence-until-marriage education instead of for explicit sex-education programs, school-based clinics, and the distribution of contraceptives in schools?

Palin: Yes, the explicit sex-ed programs will not find my support.

It's an obvious failure of judgment on both McCain and Palin to support abstinence only education - we have study after study that says it doesn't work - girls are more likely to get pregnant or contract an STD. But even in the face of logic and data, if you're going to support abstinence only education, you should at least practice what you preach.

That Palin's own daughter got pregnant should, to any reasonable human being, encourage McCain and Palin to revise their thinking. Do McCain and Palin now support sex education in our schools? That's a fair question the media should be asking both of them. If either of them now support sex education, we haven't heard about it.

If this scale of failure of abstinence only education isn't enough to shake up at least Palin, then these aren't leaders ready for the world stage, they are religious ideologues. This is a question of policy judgment in the face of not only facts but indisputable proof that abstinence only programs don't work. This is a legitimate policy issue to be explored by the press.

Moreover, McCain and Palin have no problem telling gay and lesbian families how to live their family lives. In spite of their "pro-life" commitment, McCain and Palin are opposed to gay marriage. Children of gay parents aren't afforded the same protections Palin's own soon-to-be married daughter is going to have, and therefore running on family values brings up these kinds of issues. From her 2006 campaign site:


If Sarah Palin is going to tell gays and lesbians how to live their lives, it's a fair question to see whether she practices what she preaches. She is the Vice Presidential candidate of a party that has put the private lives of millions of Americans front and center - right in the platform.

As for McCain, his campaign is such a disaster at the moment they are now trying to bat down the very information they released to the media. This is a question of judgment in selecting a running mate. If you're going to run on family values, maybe you should check yourself in the mirror before you walk out the door.

As uncomfortable as some of the questions surrounding Palin are, this woman is a 72 year-old's heartbeat away from the Presidency should McCain win. The public deserves to know who the real Sarah Palin is. And if they don't like what they see, they have a right to judge John McCain's decision-making. Read More......

Palin personally cut funding that gave unwed mothers a place to live

Yes, Palin did it herself. The Washington Post has a photo of the budget with her handwriting on it. She's such a compassionate, right wing theocrat:

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the Republican vice-presidential nominee who revealed Monday that her 17-year-old daughter is pregnant, earlier this year used her line-item veto to slash funding for a state program benefiting teen mothers in need of a place to live.

After the legislature passed a spending bill in April, Palin went through the measure reducing and eliminating funds for programs she opposed. Inking her initials on the legislation -- "SP" -- Palin reduced funding for Covenant House Alaska by more than 20 percent, cutting funds from $5 million to $3.9 million. Covenant House is a mix of programs and shelters for troubled youths, including Passage House, which is a transitional home for teenage mothers.

According to Passage House's web site, its purpose is to provide "young mothers a place to live with their babies for up to eighteen months while they gain the necessary skills and resources to change their lives" and help teen moms "become productive, successful, independent adults who create and provide a stable environment for themselves and their families."

Sarah Palin apparently wants those unwed mothers out on the street. I guess Bristol is lucky that Levi is going to marry her. Alaska's a tough, cold place for young, single moms. Read More......

GOP strategist: Lieberman as VP would have caused "a lot of dissension" at convention

Remember, as Joe Lieberman speaks tonight, that the Republicans dumped him as John McCain's VP choice because Lieberman is pro-choice. (I also wonder how the religious right would have felt about a non-Christian VP - after all, they think Catholics are going to hell.) Today on MSNBC, Andrea Mitchell interviewed GOP strategist Vin Weber, who said that had McCain picked Lieberman as his VP, it would have caused problems at the convention. Joe isn't really loved by either party. Remember that when you watch him pretend that he's a Republican tonight.



Fair-weather Joe Lieberman can't seem to decide which candidate he likes:

"As far as I'm concerned [Barack Obama] is a 'Baruch,' which means a blessing. He is a blessing to the United States Senate, to America, and to our shared hopes for better, safer tomorrows for all our families. The gifts that God has given to Barack Obama are as enormous as his future is unlimited. As his mentor, as his colleague, as his friend, I look forward to helping him reach to the stars and realize not just the dreams he has for himself, but the dreams we all have for him and our blessed country."

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CNN's Cafferty reads "viewer mail" about Sarah Palin

Brutal. And to answer Wolf Blitzer's and Jack Cafferty's question as to whether we're going to see any interviews with Sarah Palin, no we won't. The McCain camp said today that until the media gives her a pass, they won't let anyone interview her. Nice. So we all get to roll the dice and just guess whether she's qualified.

Extorting the media isn't exactly "maverick." It's Bush:

[McCain campaign chair Rick] Davis demurred when asked when Palin will sit for interviews with major news organizations, pointing out that now would not be the right time given the "combative" attitude the media has seemingly adopted toward Palin

Not to mention, wasn't it the McCain campaign recently whining about how many articles there are about Barack Obama, and how the media refuses to cover McCain? Now that the media wants to cover the McCain campaign, McCain and Palin are AWOL. Actually, what's really going on here is that the McCain campaign is afraid to let Palin say anything after all the revelations about her this weekend. Anyway, here's the Cafferty video:

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Now McCain is playing the sexism card to divert attention from Palin's lack of experience

More from Ben Smith at Politico:

During the primary Sarah Palin chided Hillary Clinton for complaining about sexism.

"She does herself a disservice to even mention it, really," Palin said. "When I hear a statement like that coming from a woman candidate with any kind of perceived whine about that excess criticism, or maybe a sharper microscope put on her, I think, 'Man, that doesn't do us any good, women in politics, or women in general, trying to progress this country,'" Palin said. "I don't think it bodes well for her."

She, or at least her advisers in McCain-land, seem to have discarded this principle today, along with years of Republican complaints about identity politics and political correctness.

The campaign just blasted out an op-ed by adviser Nancy Pfotenhauer under the heading "Ignore the Chauvinists. Palin Has Real Experience."

Said McCain adviser Carly Fiorina: “Because of Hillary Clinton’s historic run for the presidency and the treatment she received, American women are more highly tuned than ever to recognize and decry sexism in all its forms. They will not tolerate sexist treatment of Gov. Palin.”

Also, Lindsey Graham:

“Would a man be asked this question? Probably not,” the South Carolina Republican said in an interview with Politico.

“Did anybody ask [Democratic vice presidential nominee] Joe Biden [similar questions] when his tragedy hit him?"

NOTE FROM JOHN: Yeah, um, last time I checked, our party nominated a woman to be vice president 24 years ago. You just got around to it last week. And we chose a woman who was actually qualified. We then almost chose another woman as our presidential nominee just three months ago. What's the closest a woman ever got to becoming the Republican presidential nominee? Yes, the Republican party, the great defender of women. It's amazing how whiny they get when they screw up.

Jonathan Martin at Politico also notes the apparent hypocrisy of the GOP now playing identity politics:

All that complaining over the years by Republicans about identity politics and political correctness...

Yeah, never mind.

They now have a chance to score some political points, so they're engaging in such posturing full-tilt.

And finally, ABC's Jake Tapper doesn't seem to buy it either. Jake prints the "evidence" the McCain campaign presents to justify the charge of "sexism." Not surprisingly, the McCain campaign has no idea what sexism is. Then again, Republicans never have been very big on civil rights, the rights of women, African-Americans, gays, Latinos, and so many more Americans. I mean, McCain himself voted against the creation of a national holiday for Martin Luther King. So it's no surprise that the issue has them a bit confused. Read More......

Todd Palin was a member of the radical, secessionist Alaska Independence Party

The McCain campaign has been in a frenzy trying to knock back reports that Sarah Palin was a member of the Alaska Independence Party (AIP). As we wrote this morning, Palin has a very close relationship with that radical group, having addressed AIP's conference this year.

It's actually Todd Palin who was a registered member of the secessionist party -- from 1995 through 2002 (absent a few months in 2000 when he was undeclared). Kate Kinnock at TPM Muckraker has the details.

Keep an eye on Todd. I have a feeling we're going to be hearing a lot more about him. Read More......

McCain loses temper, cancels Larry King interview after CNN asks spokesman to explain Palin's national security experience

Woah! Did you hear that? CNN asked a vice presidential nominee, a person who may very likely be asked to fill John McCain's shoes should he die or be incapacitated in office, someone who very may well become our next commander in chief during wartime - CNN asked a McCain spokesman what national security experience Sarah Palin has? How DARE they? Clearly CNN hates America. I mean, what kind of moron cares what kind of national security experience our president has? Well, okay sure, John McCain has made national security experience the center piece of his entire campaign, so yeah, I mean, McCain thinks everything depends on the candidate's national security experience. But still, what kind of sick, depraved reporter would ask about something so personal, something so off-limits, so base as the foreign policy experience, national security experience, of a presidential candidate? Have you no shame, Campbell Brown?

All kidding aside, McCain is entering very dangerous territory here. He's already on the verge of losing his maverick brand - based in large part on his free-wheeling willingness to talk to the media whenever they wanted, and large part on his previous unwillingness to adopt the very Karl Rove-ian negative campaigning he's now adopted. And now McCain is throwing a temper tantrum, when one of McCain's biggest negatives is his over-the-top temper, that even numerous Republican Senators say is a big problem, and not very presidential (or safe).

The McCain camp has benefited from years of media-love. McCain even called the media "his base." It's only the last week, really, that the media, across the board, was willing to ask McCain the kind of hard questions that they never had a problem asking Barack Obama.

The fact remains that McCain screwed up, big time, in selecting Sarah Palin as commander in chief material. The McCain campaign can't admit that on the biggest decision McCain has made as a candidate, he didn't meet the presidential test, so they're attacking the messenger: first the blogs, and now the corporate media.

And as an aside, McCain knows he screwed up. He's now trying to shift the story over to the "big bad media" beating up his wonderful vice presidential pick. It's the only way they know how to save themselves, shift the blame, shift the story. That's what's going on with McCain canceling the interview. They're trying to scapegoat the media, and at the same time force networks like CNN to be nicer to McCain or he won't invite them to any more barbeques.

Watch the CNN interview that so upset the McCain campaign that they're now boycotting CNN. In it, McCain's spokesman makes the preposterous claim that Sarah Palin is ready to lead our armed forces because she's "the commander in chief of the Alaska National Guard." And let's not forget, as Mrs. McCain reminded us, Alaska is close to Russia, so that means, um, it's not clear what it means. Here's the video. See for yourself what a cry-baby John McCain is.

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Sarah Palin's church: Vote for Kerry in 2004 and you might not go to heaven

For 25 years Sarah Palin attended a Pentecostal church. Here are some of the things the church preached:

Pastor Kalnins has also preached that critics of President Bush will be banished to hell; questioned whether people who voted for Sen. John Kerry in 2004 would be accepted to heaven; charged that the 9/11 terrorist attacks and war in Iraq were part of a war "contending for your faith;"

Wonder how they fell about Catholics. Read More......

McCain economic adviser Phil Gramm reiterates "whiners" comment about Americans concerned about the economy

They really are idiots.

Former Texas Senator Phil Gramm, who stepped aside as John McCain's campaign co-chairman in July after an uproar over comments that those worried about the U.S. economy are ``whiners,'' today revisited that sentiment.

``If you're sitting here today, you're not economically illiterate and you're not a whiner, so I'm not worried about who you're going to vote for,'' Gramm told supporters of McCain at a Financial Services Roundtable event in Minneapolis on the sidelines of the Republican National Convention.

Gramm, 66, stepped down as a senior adviser to McCain in July after telling the Washington Times that the U.S. is a ``nation of whiners'' facing a ``mental recession.''

So Americans who aren't at the convention are whiners? Nice. Remember, Phil Gramm is up for a cabinet post in the John McCain/Sarah Palin administration. Read More......

No denial

NYT

The Palins eloped on Aug. 29, 1988, and their first son, Track, was born eight months later, a fact that Maria Comella of the McCain campaign, declined to elaborate on. “They were high school sweethearts who got married and ended up having five beautiful children together,” Ms. Comella said.

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Palin lied about visiting Ireland as part of her foreign policy experience

She didn't visit Ireland, which is what the McCain-Palin campaign claimed to Politico's Ben Smith on Saturday. She had a short refueling stopover, which means at best her extensive Irish diplomacy amounted to buying a sweater and a beer mug in the Shannon airport.

Why does Sarah Palin's duty-free-diplomacy matter? Because John McCain, who is 72 and has had 4 bouts of cancer, just picked Sarah Palin to replace him as commander in chief should he die or be incapacitated in office. Sarah Palin, in an effort to bolster her non-existent national security expertise, claimed she had visited 3 countries: Germany; Kuwait; and Ireland. Now we find out that one of those three, 33% of her experience, was pretty much a lie. Did the McCain campaign know that Palin basically lied to the media and the American people? Or did this Irish blogger do the vetting that the McCain campaign couldn't be bothered to do?

Oh, the McCain-Palin campaign now alleges that Palin visited Canada too. Sure, if you count buying a Celine Dion CD. Read More......

This is what vetting looks like

The new GOP talking point, dutifully repeated in the last 24 hours by McCain's spokesman, by Bill Bennett, by Gary Bauer, by Bill O'Reilly, and pretty much by every Republican surrogate on TV (they're very good at handing out talking points) is that the blogs are mean. That's John McCain's only response to the revelation that he didn't vet his choice for vice president of the United States? That bloggers are mean? Wow. If John McCain can't handle words from DailyKos, how is he going to handle bombs from Al Qaeda? But putting that aside, what really irks the Republicans is that the blogs, and the corporate media, did the vetting of Sarah Palin that McCain failed, and refused, to do. The next time a McCain supporter throws a temper tantrum over how mean everyone is to Sarah Palin, ask them why John McCain didn't even bother vetting our potentially future commander in chief. Had Sarah Palin been fully vetted, we'd never be discussing any of this.

Today, John McCain told reporters that Palin was thoroughly vetted:

"The vetting process was completely thorough and I'm grateful for the results," McCain told reporters as he toured a Philadelphia fire house.

Seriously? John McCain is practically the only person in America who thinks that.

For those of you who asked, here's a listing of our Palin posts to date. There's been a lot, so it might help to have an index to reference.

- Palin's fringe party colleague: "We don't say we're Americans. We say we're Alaskans."
- Palin aggressively sought federal earmarks for Wasilla
- Blockbuster NY Times piece on the Sarah Palin vetting disaster
- Will Sarah Palin cooperate with the investigation into the troopergate scandal?
- Call her General Palin
- Members of "Fringe" Alaskan Independence Party Say Palin Was a Member in 90s
- Special needs mom weighs in on Sarah Palin
- McCain's lawyers are reportedly vetting Palin now, 4 days after he picked her
- Palin, the next JFK?
- It's about McCain. Period.
- How John McCain forced me to write about the weird story of Sarah Palin's daughter's pregnancy
- Palin gave her daughter a choice to have an abortion?
- Palin's spokesman didn't know about pregnancy two days ago
- Jerry Springer: Call the Palins ASAP.
- McCain campaign: Palin's unwed daughter is pregnant
- Reckless
- David Broder's contortions: Yes, McCain gambled with the country's future, but it's okay
- Josh Marshall on McCain's "dangerous trait"
- Mystery over Palin's Wikipedia entry updates
- Sarah Palin wasn't vetted
- What earrings would you choose for visiting a national disaster?
- Our future Commander in Chief
- MoDo on Palin (I laughed out loud reading this)
- Former Palin staffer: "She's not qualified, she doesn't have the judgment, to be next in line to the president of the United States"
- Palin lied about opposition to "Bridge to Nowhere"
- Does Sarah Palin count duty-free shopping as foreign policy experience?
- Sarah Palin is my mom, without the foreign policy experience
- The Theocrats are in a frenzy over Palin
- When John Met Sarah
- Palin's buddy Pat Buchanan on women
- So is this what McCain means by putting country first?
- First poll, Palin a bust
- Sarah Palin and children conceived out of wedlock - an uncomfortable question needs to be posed
- We know McCain, Palin and the GOP will reverse Roe v. Wade. They also want Griswold gone. That means birth control.
- McCain impressed by Palin's courageous work at the PTA
- Alaska's GOP State Senate President on Palin: "She's not prepared to be governor. How can she be prepared to be vice president or president?"
- Sarah Palin doesn't know much about the Iraq war.
- Palin supported anti-Semitic Pat Buchanan for president
- Top McCain aide says McCain won't die during his first term in office, and admits Palin isn't ready to be commander in chief
- Wash. Post interviews Public Safety chief fired by Sarah Palin -- and it seems Todd Palin was very involved in this process
- John McCain's gimmick: He doesn't even know Sarah Palin. They've only met once, maybe twice.
- Sarah Palin wants to let the polar bears die, too. On global warming, she's aligned with" most discredited, fringe, extreme viewpoints"
- Sarah Palin not sure what the vice president does. (Here's one hint, Sarah: You might become President)
- UNDER INVESTIGATION: Palin Read More......

Remember, the only reason we know about Bristol Palin's pregnancy is because John McCain leaked it to Reuters

I'm watching McCain surrogate Gary Bauer, a religious leader who had a fall from grace a few years ago, lecture MSNBC about how dare they cover the Bristol Palin unwed pregnancy story. McCain supporter Bill Bennett tried this tactic on CNN's Wolf Blitzer yesterday too. Someone needs to remind the McCain campaign, when they whine to journalists about how terrible it is that the media is reporting on the pregnancy, that none of us knew about Bristol Palin's unwed pregnancy until yesterday morning when John McCain's campaign leaked the story to Reuters. Read More......

Palin's fringe party colleague: "We don't say we're Americans. We say we're Alaskans."

John McCain has a problem with patriotism -- he keeps talking about putting America first, but his running mate, Sarah Palin, was member of the Alaska Independence Party, a political party would put Alaska first by seceding from the U.S. She addressed that group -- this year. This is a very serious issue. Jed has the details and the video:



Okay, imagine, just imagine, a Democratic candidate being a member of a party where people say they're not Americans. It would be over. Over.

This also means another warped GOP attack off the table, too. While McCain should have been vetting his running mate, he was instead attacking Obama's patriotism. That's over. McCain can never again even raise that issue when his running mate wanted her state to be its own country.

John McCain did not vet Sarah Palin. His running mate belonged to a party that wanted to secede from the U.S. When was the last time anyone on a ticket wanted that? 1856? 1860? Read More......

How Joe Lieberman got kicked out of the Republican party too

You may have heard that Joe Lieberman may be speaking at the Republican convention tonight. Lieberman is the former Democratic Senator who lost his primary race two years ago, threw a hissy fit, then ran as an independent in the general election and won. Since that time, Lieberman has been trying to find ways to seek revenge on his Democratic colleagues (even though it was Connecticut voters who threw Lieberman out), including his latest stint as John McCain's cheerleader.

Now, the Republicans love to pretend that they love Joe Lieberman, but they really don't. They can't stand Joe Lieberman. I've heard Bush administration officials bemoaning McCain's relationship with Lieberman. And we finally had definitive proof of Lieberman's GOP problem when just last week he got passed up for the vice presidency under John McCain because Lieberman is pro-choice (or that's the reason they publicly used, but Lieberman is also anti-gun, pro- gay civil unions, and pro- stem cell research - he's also not a Christian, a fact that doesn't bother Democrats, we put him on our ticket in 2000, but it does matter greatly to the religious right, which controls John McCain and the Republican party). You see, no one who is pro-choice is permitted a serious position of power in the Republican party leadership. So all of Lieberman's backstabbing over the past two years, all of his work to get a conservative Republican elected president, was for naught. Joe Lieberman was kicked out of the Democratic party for being too Republican, and now he's been kicked out of the Republican party for being too pro-choice.

So if and when you hear Joe Lieberman speaking at the Republican convention, and you hear him, or other Republicans, or media pundits talking about how poor Joe was just too "moderate" for the Democratic party, don't forget that he was too moderate for the Republican party - he was too moderate for John McCain - too. Read More......

Karl Rove said Gov. Kaine was unqualified too

I've been hearing mutterings that the Republicans are trying to carefully play the sexism card with respect to criticism of Sarah Palin. Their argument goes that Sarah Palin has just as much experience as Virginia Governor Tim Kaine, the Republicans never said Kaine was unqualified to be VP, but the Democrats are now saying that Palin is unqualified, so it must be because she's a woman. Yeah, good try - except that Karl Rove, an unofficial adviser to John McCain, attacked Governor Kaine as - you guessed it - unqualified to be vice president just three weeks ago. Next! (PS Kaine has been a governor 50% longer than Palin, and he was Lt. Gov. for four years before that. Palin, on the other hand, was the mayor of a town of 7,000 people, a PTA mom, and a sportscaster.) Read More......

No escape: Bush will speak to GOP delegates tonight after all

Via the Detroit Free Press comes word that George Bush will indeed speak to the GOP convention tonight. McCain just can't shake the guy -- and McCain shouldn't be able to shake the guy. They are one and the same:

Tonight, it looks like the convention will return to a full slate of events, with former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson -- who ran in the primary against McCain - speaking, as well as Joe Lieberman, a Connecticut senator and former Democratic vice presidential nominee.

There could also be a 9:30 p.m. address by President Bush - via satellite from the White House.

McCain is hoping this is the last time Americans see Bush's face on t.v. until November 5th. But, McCain and his fellow Republicans worked very hard to put George Bush in office. John McCain has George Bush on his shoulders every day.
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McCain wimped out when challenged by the special interests in the GOP

Last night, we posted an excerpt from a blockbuster NY Times article about John McCain and his v.p. selection process. There is a critical development in that article that warrants further examination.

We're always told how tough McCain is. We're always told how much of a maverick John McCain is. Yet, the tough maverick didn't have the courage to take on the special interests in his own party. McCain couldn't pick the person he wanted as v.p. because GOP activists wouldn't let him. How can McCain take on special interests in Washington when he totally caved to the special interests in St. Paul?:

Up until midweek last week, some 48 to 72 hours before Mr. McCain introduced Ms. Palin at a Friday rally in Dayton, Ohio, Mr. McCain was still holding out the hope that he could name as his running mate a good friend, Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, independent of Connecticut, a Republican close to the campaign said. Mr. McCain had also been interested in another favorite, former Gov. Tom Ridge of Pennsylvania.

But both men favor abortion rights, anathema to the Christian conservatives who make up a crucial base of the Republican Party. As word leaked out that Mr. McCain was seriously considering the men, the campaign was bombarded by outrage from influential conservatives who predicted an explosive floor fight at the convention and vowed rejection of Mr. Ridge or Mr. Lieberman by the delegates.

If John McCain was truly the leader he claimed to be, Sarah Palin wouldn't be the v.p., Ridge or Lieberman would be. This was the most important decision McCain had to make in his campaign -- and he had six full months to think about it. But, McCain just could not stand up to the right wing special interests in his party. Not such bold leadership after all.

McCain made a rash, reckless, impulsive decision. That's bad enough. But, the back story shows he just capitulated when challenged by the GOP theocrats. Read More......

Tuesday Morning Open Thread

Good morning.

Wow. My head is spinning.

There are 9 weeks -- 63 days -- until November 4th, Election Day. We're in for a wild, wild ride. Where to begin? The GOP convention is going to be all about bashing Obama and Biden. They've lost one day already. Given the debacle that their ticket has become, expect the Republicans to be in total ugly, negative mode from here on out. They've got nothing else. And, they'll go places no civilized people would expect. All of us should be prepared for the worst -- the very worst.

On the weather front, Gustav is winding down, but Hanna's on the way. And, Ike is forming, too.

Let's get it started. Expect another wild day.... Read More......

Palin aggressively sought federal earmarks for Wasilla

Is Sarah Palin really the wasteful spending fighter that the GOP would have us believe? How much federal money does a small town really need? This hardly sounds like a person who fights special interests and waste. If anything, she was part of the problem that McCain claims he wants to fight. If John McCain really vetted Palin, he would have know about her history. How many more bad decisions will McCain be allowed to make before being called out?

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin employed a lobbying firm to secure almost $27 million in federal earmarks for a town of 6,700 residents while she was its mayor, according to an analysis by an independent government watchdog group.

There was $500,000 for a youth shelter, $1.9 million for a transportation hub, $900,000 for sewer repairs, and $15 million for a rail project -- all intended to benefit Palin's town, Wasilla, located about 45 miles north of Anchorage.

In introducing Palin as his running mate on Friday, Sen. John McCain cast her as a compatriot in his battle against wasteful federal spending. McCain, the Republican presidential candidate, hailed Palin as a politician "with an outstanding reputation for standing up to special interests and entrenched bureaucracies -- someone who has fought against corruption and the failed policies of the past, someone who's stopped government from wasting taxpayers' money."

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Abu Dhabi group buys British soccer club

I may not care about British football, but wow, what a coup. In the last few years the West has thrown bundles of cash to the Middle East and Russia as the price of gas has increased and now the oil-rich regions will be looking to diversify their money in various world markets.

In August I passed through Monaco briefly (which I dislike) and could not believe how present the Russians were this year. Even on my last visit, the town was still a Ferrari kind of town but now it's all Rolls Royce and Bentleys with Russian plates, courtesy of petro-dollars. One Russian billionaire just purchased the most expensive house ever next to Monaco. Different times we're living in right now and let's just say the Americans aren't at the top of the bling bling list any more.

The tiny Gulf state of Abu Dhabi launched an audacious raid on one of Britain's top football clubs yesterday in a move that will transform the shape of global football.

The £210m takeover of Manchester City threatens to dethrone their closest rivals Manchester United and establish City as the biggest team in the world. The club announced that it had signed a memo of understanding with the Abu Dhabi United Group (ADUG), a holding company set up by Middle East investors, backed by the country's royal family. The new regime's first move was an attempt to gazump United's £30m signing of Tottenham Hotspur's star striker Dimitar Berbatov with an offer of £34m. And they quickly followed that by lodging bids for Spain's highly rated forward David Villa and Stuttgart's Mario Gomez.

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Murder of five women defended by Pakistan lawmaker

And to think Pakistan is supposed to be an ally. There's nothing honorable about murder and the violation of basic human rights.

A Pakistani lawmaker defended a decision by southwestern tribesmen to bury five women alive because they wanted to choose their own husbands, telling stunned members of Parliament this week to spare him their outrage.

"These are centuries-old traditions and I will continue to defend them," Israr Ullah Zehri, who represents Baluchistan province, said Saturday. "Only those who indulge in immoral acts should be afraid."

The women, three of whom were teenagers, were first shot and then thrown into a ditch.

They were still breathing as their bodies were covered with rocks and mud, according media reports and human rights activists, who said their only "crime" was that they wished to marry men of their own choosing.

Zehri told a packed and flabbergasted Parliament on Friday that Baluch tribal traditions helped stop obscenity and then asked fellow lawmakers not to make a big fuss about it.

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Amy Goodman of DemocracyNow! arrested at GOP convention

This is going to be tick a lot of people off.

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