Another National Anthem moment

I'm kind of getting a kick out of these. Who knew so many people had trouble singing the national anthem in public (though I can imagine it). This is another cute one:

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She really has lost her game

Friday was supposed to be Hillary's concession speech. Friday is also the 40th anniversary of Bobby Kennedy's death. Hillary's concession speech is now on Saturday. Read the rest of this post...

Hamas blasts Obama

Another McCain talking point shot to hell:

“Obama’s comments have confirmed that there will be no change in the U.S. administration’s foreign policy on the Arab-Israeli conflict,” Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri told Reuters in Gaza.

“The Democratic and Republican parties support totally the Israeli occupation at the expense of the interests and rights of Arabs and Palestinians,” he said.

“Hamas does not differentiate between the two presidential candidates, Obama and Mccain, because their policies regarding the Arab-Israel conflict are the same and are hostile to us, therefore we do have no preference and are not wishing for either of them to win,” Zuhri said.

Read the rest of this post...

WSJ: Vetting Bill is a "deal-breaker" for Hillary's VP chances

Not that Hillary being V.P. is a good idea, but Bill will be a roadblock:

But close advisers to Sen. Obama signaled an Obama-Clinton ticket was highly unlikely. People in both camps cited what several called "a deal-breaker" -- Bill Clinton may balk at releasing records of his business dealings and big donors to his presidential library.

As predicted. Read the rest of this post...

CA Supreme Court refuses to stay marriages of gay couples

Wow. That means that the vote on the constitutional amendment in November would overturn six months of marriages, possibly (it could also leave pre-existing marriages untouched, which would be odd). But by then, we'll be able to see that the marriages haven't led to any locusts, or to John McCain being forced to leave yet another wife and enter into a third marriage:

The California Supreme Court refused today to put its ruling allowing same-sex marriages on hold until the issue goes before state voters in November, clearing the way for gay and lesbian weddings to begin June 17.

The justices' unanimous vote to deny a stay sought by two conservative organizations will allow thousands of same-sex couples, from California and other states, to marry before the Nov. 4 vote on a state constitutional amendment that would overturn the ruling. If the amendment passes, the court will have to decide whether those marriage are valid.

In a separate vote today, the court denied reconsideration of its 4-3 decision May 15 that struck down the law limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples. That law was passed by the Legislature in 1977 and reaffirmed by the voters in a 2000 ballot measure.

Read the rest of this post...

Clinton attack-dogs Lanny Davis and Bob Johnson are leading the V.P. campaign for Hillary

Well, this says it all.

Last year, anyone paying attention to politics was told that Hillary Clinton had amassed the most talented and competent group of staff and advisers ever assembled.

We've seen where that got her.

But, in yet another sign that the Clinton crew has no political sense, two Hillary supporters, Bob Johnson and Lanny Davis, both of whom launched negative attacks on Obama, have started the campaign to get Hillary on the ticket. That should work, don't you think?

According to the Washington Post, Bob Johnson of BET fame has Clinton's blessing to begin pushing her as the V.P. nominee. Johnson garnered notoriety last December for this episode:

Johnson created an uproar last winter when he made what was interpreted as a thinly veiled reference to Obama's drug use as a youth and later apologized for the remark.

It was very thinly veiled and seemed to be part of a larger strategy.

Then there's Lanny Davis who has probably been the most offensive Clinton cheerleader. He launched a series of negative attacks against Obama in every medium available. He also led the charge to get Joe Lieberman re-elected and we can see how that worked out. This popped up last night from Josh Orton who was liveblogging at Clinton's HQ:

A few minutes before Hillary began her speech, Lanny Davis told reporters in the hallway outside the gym that at midnight he'd be launching a petition drive to support a letter urging Obama to take Clinton as his VP. He said he's doing it on his own with two of Hillary's female supporters.

If Clinton really wanted to be vice president (which is a very bad idea), she picked two of the worst people to start her campaign. And, it shows why she'll lose that campaign, too. Read the rest of this post...

Hmm, so with Caroline Kennedy leading Obama's VP search....

Does callously invoking her uncle's assassination:

a) Help a potential VP candidate; or
b) Hurt a potential VP candidate.

I'm going to hazard a guess that this wasn't lost on the Obama folks when they chose her. They're good. Real good. (Hat tip to reader Tom for mentioning this to me.) Read the rest of this post...

Another way McCain is like Bush: He says things that just aren't true. This time it's on Katrina.

McCain is picking up Bush's trick of saying things that just aren't true. Last week, it was Iraq. This week it's Katrina. So, here's a little hint for the media: As with Bush, just because McCain says something, doesn't mean it's true.

From the DNC:

During his media availability in Baton Rouge today, John McCain told reporters that he "supported every investigation" into what went wrong during Hurricane Katrina. Unfortunately for the people of Louisiana, that is just not true. John McCain voted TWICE to oppose a Congressional commission to examine the federal, state, and local response to the disaster: once in September 2005 and again in February 2006.

McCain's outright deception today is the latest in a string of misstatements and distortions on key issues that call into question his willingness to mislead the American people, telling them what he thinks they want to hear instead of the truth. Just last week, John McCain falsely claimed that our forces in Iraq had drawn down to pre-surge levels, then used a defense that was so misleading, one fact checker called it "an insult to our intelligence." He falsely claimed Iran was training al-Qaida in Iraq, claimed he could walk peacefully through a Baghdad market despite requiring a massive security escort, and denied he had ever said he didn't understand the economy--all of which have proven inaccurate.

Read the rest of this post...

ABC: HIllary will "drop out" on Friday

Not sure if this means "concede." But whatever. Read the rest of this post...

Sam Nunn wants to revisit the gay ban... just in time to be VP

"We hate her," says the poster that's been on my bathroom wall for the past 14 years. It was made by the Campaign for Military Service back in 1993, to commemorate how gay and lesbian Americans, and President Bill Clinton, were royally screwed by then- Georgia Democratic Senator Sam Nunn (the "her" reference is to something in gay culture that some of you adamantly claim doesn't exist - well here it is not existing again from a completely different historical source).

Sam Nunn is the primary reason we have the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy banning gays from serving in the US military. Nunn took it upon himself in the first weeks of the Clinton administration to publicly challenge our new president and make a laughing stock out of him. Rather than let Republicans do the anti-gay dirty work of derailing Bill Clinton's effort to lift the ban, Nunn decided to take the lead himself. He ran the entire thing. It was horrible. I worked on the effort to lift the ban. I saw what Sam Nunn did from the inside. And he was gratuitously homophobic. Showers. He talked about showers. And what gays might do to straight soldiers in them. He took the media on a tour of a submarine to show how close the beds were to each other - because, again, you know those gays, just can't control themselves. It was simply horrible.

So, it's nice that Nunn is now saying "gosh, maybe we should revisit the policy" just in time to become Obama's possible VP (there's been talk of Nunn for the job). But give me a break. Did Nunn reverse himself on the policy? Is he now in favor of gay servicemembers serving openly in the US armed forces? Did he write an op ed for the New York Times proclaiming his mistake? No. Nunn's big "epiphany" is to suggest that the Pentagon do another study of the policy. Yeah, good idea. Wonder how that'll turn out. Read the rest of this post...

US carriers are doubling and tripling many of the cheapest non-stop fares in US

Any economists want to weigh in on whey we shouldn't just let some of them go bankrupt? Doubling and tripling fares? And American, which I usually fly, charging $15 for the first bag (and more I believe for the second)? Thanks, since business travelers don't need to check bags but the rest of us do. What's next, charging for the life vest? This is why I don't fly US carriers to go abroad, ever, and haven't for years. They got too cheap a long time ago, and their attitude only worsened as the cheapness increased. I just don't need to pay $1000 to have someone treat me like they're doing me a favor. Read the rest of this post...

Now Rangel is publicly criticizing Hillary

This isn't good for Hillary. In fact, it's kind of a disaster. Her biggest supporters are publicly rebuking her. This morning it was Ed Rendell and Hilary Rosen, and now Rangel. She's put her supporters in an impossible position, and they're not happy about it:

ABC News' Kate Snow Reports: One of Hillary Clinton’s most loyal backers on Capitol Hill is voicing frustration about the position she has put her supporters in.

In an interview with ABC News, Rep. Charles Rangel said he thinks it is time for Clinton to publicly clarify what she is doing and allow her supporters to switch their allegiance to Barack Obama.

“Unless she has some good reasons-- which I can’t think of-- I really think we ought to get on with endorsements (of Obama) and dealing with what we have to deal with… so we can move forward,” Rangel said....

Asked why the Senator told supporters Tuesday night that she needed more time to consider her future, Rangel said: “I have no clue.”
...

“The NY congressional delegation encouraged her to run for President. So we feel some obligation to stay with her as long as we can” to give Clinton some time and space he said.

“We just have to have a better answer as to why it helps her to victory… as to why we’re not endorsing Obama when the only person left to endorse is Obama.”

“It’s awkward for us for us who are known to be her strongest supporters in the NY delegation not to be able to answer the question of how long is it going to take before you can endorse?” he added later.

Rangel also told ABC News that he does not think the path to the vice presidency should involve a negotiation between Clinton supporters and the Obama campaign.

“Common sense would dictate if you want to get on the ticket you don't do it by leaning heavily on the person who makes the decision. So I don't think pressure is something that should be used,” he said.

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Hillary's congressional backers aren't as shy as Obama's

Note how Hillary's congressional backers aren't nearly as shy as Obama's. Obama's backers have sat back and given Hillary months to pull out of the race, and they're still not demanding that she concede, or even suspend her race, or even acknowledge that Obama won last night. Hillary's backers, on the other hand, led by Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL), are considering getting together to pressure Obama to pick Hillary as VP. The Democrats simply refuse to take Hillary at her word. She's not going away. And she won't, unless and until you call the cops, have them drag her kicking and screaming out the door, pull down the curtains, change the locks, change your phone number, and move. Holy water and a string of garlic are optional. Read the rest of this post...

Wall Street now cutting loans to certain schools

Is anyone going to grab these banks by the scruff of their necks and tell them to quit screwing up our country? We do not need more social stratification in the US. We do not need to push people further behind. We do not need to discourage Americans from seeking higher education so they can flip burgers. The banks, run by the supposed best and brightest who did have the benefit of enjoying the best education money could buy, have dragged the country and Europe down. I still see no reason why Congress is not dictating terms and conditions with Wall Street banks. Reminder note to Wall Street: we saved your ass from financial ruin so shut up and quit making our problems worse.

Some less-selective four-year colleges, like Eastern Oregon University and William Jessup University in Rocklin, Calif., say they have been summarily dropped by some lenders.

The practice suggests that if the credit crisis and the ensuing turmoil in the student loan business persist, some of the nation’s neediest students will be hurt the most.

The difficulty borrowing may deter them from attending school or prompt them to take a semester off.

When they get student loans, they will wind up with less attractive terms and may run a greater risk of default if they have to switch lenders in the middle of their college years.

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McCain "welcomes" anti-gay ballot initiative to revoke marriage in CA

"I welcome the news that the people of California will have the opportunity to decide on the question of the definition of marriage, rather than having that decision made by judicial fiat as the California Supreme Court asserted in their recent ruling." -- John McCain

Seeing as McCain is on his second marriage, after having dumped his first permanently disabled wife for a rich trophy bride 17 years his junior, he knows a thing or two about marriage. Read the rest of this post...

Top Hillary surrogate on her speech last night: "She left her supporters empty"

Hilary Rosen is a big deal in town. Some would call her a big scary deal. Hilary has a reputation for being, well, a barracuda. And I say that with a healthy dose of envy. She used to run the Recording Industry Association of America, and is smart as hell.

I first met her back in 1992/93. I was still working for the Republicans, had just come out, and was attending secret gay-agenda meetings at the Human Rights Campaign (Hilary used to chair their board). Hilary has always been good to me - including welcoming me to their meetings in spite of my then-Republican employment. That decision on her part led to my getting involved with the Campaign for Military Service, the effort to lift the military's gay ban, which then led me to get to know, and work for, Ted Kennedy's staff on a variety of gay rights issues. Kennedy then helped get me a job at the Children's Defense Fund, where I learned online advocacy, which is obviously a lot of what I do today. In a very real way, Hilary's decision to let me attend those meetings in the early 90s played a huge role in making me the effective online advocate I hope I am today.

Anyway, my point in saying this is to give you a sense of why what she wrote today on the Huff Post matters. Hilary was a top Clinton surrogate during the campaign. Today she penned a piece endorsing and embracing Barack Obama, but also noting that the other Hillary should have done the same last night. Here's a quick excerpt. What's also interesting about her piece is the fact that top Hillary surrogates are now publicly saying "it's over." Unfortunately, it's the public pressure Hillary will need to put this thing to rest. But it's interesting that it's actually happening. Here is Hilary (one L Hilary):

Senator Clinton's speech last night was a justifiably proud recitation of her accomplishments over the course of this campaign, but it did not end right. But she didn't do what she should have done. As hard and as painful as it might have been, she should have conceded, congratulated, endorsed and committed to Barack Obama. Therefore the next 48 hours are now as important to the future reputation of Hillary Clinton as the last year and a half have been....

I am also so very disappointed at how she has handled this last week. I know she is exhausted and she had pledged to finish the primaries and let every state vote before any final action. But by the time she got on that podium last night, she knew it was over and that she had lost. I am sure I was not alone in privately urging the campaign over the last two weeks to use the moment to take her due, pass the torch and cement her grace. She had an opportunity to soar and unite. She had a chance to surprise her party and the nation after the day-long denials about expecting any concession and send Obama off on the campaign trail of the general election with the best possible platform. I wrote before how she had a chance for her "Al Gore moment"
And if she had done so, the whole country ALL would be talking today about how great she is and give her her due.

Instead "she left her supporters empty", Obama's angry and party leaders trashing her. She said she was stepping back to think about her options. She is waiting to figure out how she would "use" her 18 million voters.

But not my vote. I will enthusiastically support Barack Obama's campaign. Because I am not a bargaining chip. I am a Democrat.

Read the rest of this post...

Watch Obama's SEIU speech, live at 10:50AM Eastern, or so (he's late)

This is interesting. Using Ustream, the technology Joe, Jacki and I were asking you guys about last week, SEIU is streaming Obama's speech this morning live and you can watch it here. Cool.

Sorry, all over. Read the rest of this post...

How the Obama team did it

Today's Washington Post takes a look at how the Obama team defeated the vaunted Clinton machine. It's fascinating. Obama's operatives played a different game than the usual path taken by presidential candidates -- and it worked. Worth a read for all the political junkies:

The insurgent strategy they devised instead was to virtually cede the most important battlegrounds of the Democratic nomination fight to Clinton, using precision targeting to minimize her delegate hauls, while going all out to crush her in states where Democratic candidates rarely ventured and causes that were often ignored.

The result may have lacked the glamour of a sweep, but tonight, with the delegates he picked up in Montana and South Dakota and a flood of superdelegate endorsements, Obama sealed one of the biggest upsets in U.S. political history and became the first Democrat since Jimmy Carter to wrest his party's nomination from the candidate of the party establishment. The surprise was how well his strategy held up -- and how little resistance it met.
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"We kept waiting for the Clinton people to send people into the caucus states," marveled Jon Carson, one of Obama's top ground-game strategists.

"It's the big mystery of the campaign," said campaign manager David Plouffe, "because every delegate counts."

And, the Obama campaign worked towards amassing delegates -- wherever those delegates could be found. It sounds so simple, but the brain trust at Clinton HQ overlooked it. Read the rest of this post...

McCain's "Stop calling me Bush, you bastards" speech last night was an unmitigated disaster

Last night, John McCain gave what I called his "Stop Calling me Bush, you bastards" speech. It was a disaster -- and not just because McCain can't be separated from Bush. Too late for that. But, it's good to know that line of attack gets under McCain's skin.

Read compilations of the very bad reviews at DailyKos and Huffington Post Also, Jed did a mashup of the "Worst. Speech. Ever.":
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"A milestone in U.S. history"

Understated, from Reuters :

The win by Obama, son of a black Kenyan father and white mother from Kansas, marked a milestone in U.S. history. It came 45 years after the height of the civil rights movement.

Obama will give his acceptance speech on August 28, 2008 -- 45 years to the day after the March on Washington and Martin Luther King's "I have a Dream" speech. Read the rest of this post...

May job cuts up 46% from 2007

Even just looking at the April to May period, the US cuts are up 15%. We know what a McCain presidency would look like since we've lived it since Bush arrived. When you marry into deep pockets as McCain did, none of this registers. For the rest of us, we can't afford a third Bush term.

Meanwhile, ADP reports 40,000 new jobs added last month and Wall Street is ready to celebrate. Yes, they are going to celebrate despite seeing only about 25% of the new jobs that we need to see to break even. This gives us a good idea of how bad the situation is that they think this is good news. Read the rest of this post...

Wednesday Morning Open Thread

Good morning.

And, it really is a good morning. Yesterday was very fun. We have a nominee and we're going to make history. Wow. I'm pretty pumped.

I really don't want to write about Hillary Clinton's campaign anymore. But, like most people, I'm also still a little befuddled by that speech Hillary gave. I wonder if someone took her speech from West Virginia or Kentucky and stuck it in the teleprompter. Because, she made a fool of herself last night. The thing is, she lost. It's over. If we're going to win in November, there certainly needs to be an intervention -- soon. And, since the Democratic leaders all thought it wise to wait, let them intervene. She's their problem, not Obama's. (And, between that bizarro performance last night and Bill's hysterical "scumbag" meltdown and attack on Obama from Monday, I'd say V.P. is out of the question --more on that later.)

Okay, back to the positive stuff. We're in the campaign against McCain now. And, the choice is clear: Another term for Bush or a new direction. And, it's good to know that comparing McCain to Bush makes McCain very angry.

So, let's get it started. Read the rest of this post...

Democrats to abandon benefits for jobless extension

This is so pathetic. They go along with bailing out Wall Street without a peep yet now they are going to throw the jobless under the bus. Regular Americans who are losing their jobs in part because of Wall Street and their failures are getting the shaft again. Where are the "Blue Dog Democrats" and their "conservative" principles when we shovel out billions to maintain luxurious lifestyles on Wall Street? Answers? Anyone? It's incredible to think that as a nation we can't afford to extend jobless benefits for 13 weeks yet we can afford to ignore the gambling problems of Wall Street. How on earth do Democrats ever get the reputation for being spineless and wobbly? Gosh, I can't imagine. Read the rest of this post...

US loses WTO ruling on cotton subsidies

So-called free trade strikes again. It's "free" as in "free handouts" to US cotton farmers but to the rest of the world, it is destructive and destroying their business. This is exactly what countries are talking about when they ask for an even playing field instead of handouts. Americans and Europeans will easily complain about giving money to countries in need but too often fail to look at the full picture. Government handouts appease corporate farmers but this also means destroying any hope of building or sustaining business opportunities such as agri-business around the world. In this specific case, the issue is over $3 billion in subsidies to US cotton farmers. That is an amazing number when everyone else is being asked to tighten their belts.

Besides the business and personal impact such policies also feed into the sentiment that Americans and Europeans are hypocrites in terms of free trade. It's always "free trade" when it favors the rich countries but a long, costly battle at the WTO when the rich countries are called out on dumping. Read the rest of this post...

The credit card time bomb

A few weeks ago I listened to some industry analyst (from JPMorgan Chase, I believe) talk about the "real problem" in the market. No, not oil. Food prices? Nope. Runaway CEO salaries? Kidding, right? Subprime collapse or related banking problems? No way. The "real problem" in the market today is that salaries might go up and cut into corporate profits. So the fact that income continues to struggle keeping up with inflation, that's what we all need to worry about. I'd like to see how long that guy would have kept a cushy salary if taxpayers didn't bail his sorry ass industry out. I've lost all patience with those clowns.

Back in the real world, it's a different story. Credit card debt is spiraling out of control.

Meanwhile, the banks that underwrite the credit card debt stand to lose as the delinquencies continue to rise. Standard & Poor's on Monday issued a dour forecast for banks in 2008, in part because of their exposure to bad debt.

Ianieri ranks his "starting five" in terms of exposure to risky debt: Lehman Brothers
Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc, Citigroup Inc, Bank of America Corp, UBS AG [McCain co-chair Phil Gramm's client], Merrill Lynch & Co Inc.

"It's a disaster, it's a time bomb," Ianieri says. "The credit crisis is a lot more severe than it's being made out to be. I think the government is doing everything it can to keep the severity of this situation under wraps from the general population. I think they're just trying to bide time for these banks."

Read the rest of this post...

Dean, Pelosi and Reid to issue a public statement tomorrow, or something

It's all a bit vague. And has the feeling of being a wee bit too little and a lot bit too late. But Huff Post reports that Dean, Pelosi and Reid are going to be issuing a joint statement tomorrow calling on uncommitted superdelegates to endorse someone. I don't quite get it, since at this point Obama has the nomination. We kind of needed this two months ago. The problem now isn't the uncommitted delegates, but rather, the crazy Senator in the attic who thinks she won the nomination last night, and who our leadership has been enabling for months. Hillary thinks tonight was about her (the phrase "deranged narcissism" comes to mind). And she also thinks that now she somehow has Obama hostage unless she gets to be his VP, or he gets to be her VP, or something. It's all very odd, especially since Obama no longer needs Hillary's delegates, he has his own now thank you very much. Dean, Pelosi and Reid need to shut down the monster they helped to create. They coddled her like she was some poor, frail, emotionally unstable flower. Yeah, not so much. Now she's just nuts. Read the rest of this post...