I'MMA LET YOU FINISH
Is there anybody out there?
pelosi!!!!
Just nod if you can hear me.....
I would just like to point out, if Arnold becomes eligible to run for president, so does Rev. Moon and Rupert Murdoch.
In fact, any old billionare in the world could run for POTUS.
what a great country, where even a bin ladin can grow up to be president.......
I can ease your pain, get you...
On your feet again.
In keeping with the Bush family tradition, I think that Jeb should run for re-election next time based upon the number of hurricanes that hit Florida during his term.
Rev. Moon and Rupert Murdoch?! Oh, dear, I feel faint. Spare me, oh Lord, from the abject stupidity of so many of my countrymen.
Until then, bring it on, Kitty and Sy!
where even a bin ladin can grow up to be president.......
I reach up to my lifelike mask, I start ripping down and away . . .
Fortunately JEB is done in Florida due to term limits. Unfortunately, we'll probably have to deal with him at the national level. I will say this about Jeb... although I would never vote for him, he's a far more intelligent and stable individual than his brother.
...waiting for Frances
In keeping with the Bush family tradition, I think that Jeb should run for re-election next time based upon the number of hurricanes that hit Florida during his term.
Cain't. He's term limited in 2006. He'll probably challenge Bill Nelson for his Senate seat.
I will say this about Jeb... although I would never vote for him, he's a far more intelligent and stable individual than his brother.
Yeah, and NO accent. What's up with that?
Hey, just saw that James Wolcott has blog. Cool. jameswolcott.com
he's a far more intelligent and stable individual than his brother.
That just means he runs a more effective kleptocracy. He's still a punk.
I will say this about Jeb... although I would never vote for him, he's a far more intelligent and stable individual than his brother.
What's your point?
Saddam Hussein was more intelligent and stable than Nero.
That doesn't mean we should accept him in public office.
Nor should we accept any more family members from the tainted gene pool of the Bush crime family.
Arnold will make a great POTUS. Isn't Moon a convicted felon though.. is that part of the amendment, too?
Evan
since we're at the top of a new thread, i'd be interested in hearing some thoughts on georgie's "opportunity zones."
as he described them, they will be areas in which the government will reward job creation by way of tax breaks, etc.
here's how i think it will work:
XYZ manufacturing, located in a rust belt state, has 500 union employees, with decent wages, benefits, etc. the repugnicans encourage them to close up shop in the rust belt and relocate to an "opportunity zone" in east jibip, alabama (or some other so-called "right to work" state).
xyz likes the tax break, but getting out from under the union contracts is the real goody. so they move to east jibip, hire scabs to work for 7 bucks an hour with no pension and no insurance. between the tax break, the savings on benefits, and the 50% reduction in labor payroll, the move makes sense.
(and here's why it's an important issue in this election)
so 500 middle aged blue collar union members are out on their ass without a pot to piss in.
let's review the bidding: screwing the seniors on medicare, screwing union workers on opportunity zones, screwing the middle aged by privatizing social security, screwing the children of the middle aged, who will have to support their parents after social security goes down the toilet.
talk up this "opportunity zone" bullshit among your union member pals. because if their job gets outsourced to india or indiana, it's still gone.
Newsweek poll also puts Criminal Reactionary Shrimp Chub Bushitler ahead by 11 points.
Obviously Rovian storm trooper agents have infiltrated both TIME and Newsweek.
Picked up from a troll in another thread,
http://www.moveonforamerica.org/
Are you fucking kidding me? There is seriously no depth these people won't sink to.
What's your point?
...Hey... I'm governed by two Bush's right now. Give me a break.
I say we make a deal with the repugs: amend the Constitution so the foreign-born can indeed be president, but we also repeal the 23rd Amendment (2 term limit on prez).
Clinton gets better, and this sets up Bill Clinton v. Schwarzennegger.
The Gropenfuhrer will never know what hit him.
So, what country is everyone going to move to after Bush wins? Personally I'm thinking Canada. A lot closer and cheaper than France.
Hey, who said you lazy fuckers could leave my yacht?
According to a new poll conducted by Newsweek, Bush is 53% and Bush 43% among likely voters. Among registered voters, Bush has 54 and Kery 43.
The Time poll also gives Bush a 10%+ boost.
I hope both the polls are outliers, but what are the chances that they are?
There is no pain, you are receding.
A distant ship's smoke on the horizon.
You are only coming through in waves.
Your lips move but I can't hear what you're sayin'.
When I was a child I caught a fleeting glimpse,
Out of the corner of my eye.
I turned to look but it was gone.
I cannot put my finger on it now.
The child is grown, the dream is gone.
I have become comfortably numb
When I heard "opportunity zones" the first thing that sprang to mind was something about lebensraum and finality of solution, kind of like a No Wealthy Child Left Behind program for adults, or the obverse of a gated community.
Now if this was like the American opportunity zones of post occupation Germany, I might be made sympathetic to the cause, but they way it came out of his mouth, made it sound like a new kind of Super Max Prison complex.
What a great idea eh
CPG .. Canada is the most likely. I was hoping for the Netherlands though. That way I could remain in a drug inuced stupor and not have to think about the biggest free nation on earth becoming the biggest fascist nation on eart in just a few short years. But, Canada's laws are more favorable and it's cheaper. And they speak English.
moveonforamerica
This is pretty good, That Amerasian guy. thanks for the heads up
Arnold was elected by the support of a lot of Democrats. I, for one, am watching his involvement with the Bush Campaign. If he goes out with Bush, I will not vote for him again, and I know many who will not either. He is on warning!
The problem with electing Bush to a second term is that his impeachment on the plame affair and related matters would take place in March... Cheney would have to resign in disgrace as well, and we'd end up with Dennis Has-tard as President.
"Is there anybody out there?"
There may be a few Kerryites left, but the polls reflect the fact that the number is much, much lower these days. Best wishes in finding any of his Spitball Brigade!
Toodles.
Is anecdotal evidence as important as empirical evidence: I wonder. Just returned from a family picnic. Last election cycle all three relatives voted for Bush Boy. This time, none of them. (Actually, I think two out of the three simply supported Bush Boy This time they will vote against him)
I think this election depends on voter turnout. If those who oppose the present administration vote: it will not be close. If they decide to take a powder . . . I am a teacher in a very poor school district. I was thinking of renting a limo to bring people to the polls. Might be fun and an idea.
here
this one should work.
Sometimes 'they speak English.' Sometimes, not so much. Depends on whether they're speaking to people from south of the border or not.
I've a little bungalow that'll do me proud, just the other side of Glacier Park. Arthur and I will be be just fine.
disregard the previous two links, I have been haloscanned.
CPG,
I've thought a lot about this. And, I admit, I've been tempted to develop a Plan B that involves a small cabin somewhere outside the US. But if Bush wins, I'm not going anywhere.
I'm going to be right here demonstrating, and writing letters to the editors, and voting, and volunteering, and donating, and doing the best I can to try and turn my country around.
I'm a middle-aged woman who works at a desk every day. I've got a mortgage, and a garden I love, and a cat. The next big things that I'm looking forward to in life are a grandchild and retirement. I'm not exactly young and strong and brave. But I'll be goddamned to hell if I'm going to let these fascists turn the most beautiful, wonderful, experiment to come out of the Enlightenment that is America into some theocratic nightmare. They may do it, but they won't do it without a fight from me.
When it gets really bad, I remember Jimmy Carter's speech at the convention: "I don't despair for America. I never do." If he won't, I won't either. And, don't you despair for America. Good will triumph in the end.
So the Newsweek poll confirms that nasty Time poll.
And the conclusion is obvious: "Negative campaigning" works!
We have Kitty Kelley to look forward to. And Seymour Hersch. And the DVD of "Fahrenheit 911."
But there one simple question that brings everything into play when it comes to George W. Bush's character.
Please ask that question -- or e-mail, say, aaron.brown@turner.com and see why he won't ask it:
"How many times have you been arrested, Mr. President?"
Just Ask!
Jesus, Mary and Joseph. What the fuck is wrong with the idiots in Kaleeefornia? Ahnold does the same fucking thing that Davis was going to do to close the gaping hole in the budget and he still has 60% support? WTF? Are Kaleeefornians stupid or what?
Kerry is giving me agita ... these Time/Newsweek are crap for methodology, but there is no denying the mo is for Bush. Dammit -- Kerry needs to GIVE people a reason to get excited for him ... and it has to be, paradoxically, an emotional reason. I wrote some ideas on my blog
http://www.attacknow.blogspot.com/
that I hope will find their way to somebody important. There are plenty of people who dislike Bush -- even moderates -- his approval ratings still aren't good. But they aren't going to come out to vote unless Kerry makes a good emotional argument and draws some gut-level distinctions. Crap.
According to a new poll conducted by Newsweek, Bush is 53% and Bush 43% among likely voters. Among registered voters, Bush has 54 and Kery 43.
The Time poll also gives Bush a 10%+ boost.
I hope both the polls are outliers, but what are the chances that they are?
red_herring59
Bush should be polling in the single digits and it's not the media's fault. It's the American people's fault who refuse to accept the truth and only want lies how wonderful everything is while our troops get shot in the face and their legs blown off for Cheney's Halliburton billionaires. Fuck them. They deserve what they get. They can all rot in fucking hell. I fought hard for them for years only to find out in the end, they weren't worth a crap.
Hecate - if they let you cross borders, you and the cat come visit!
/s
Arthur
Dances with Donkeys, I am in favor of your idea if you can afford it. I also find the roll results, highly suspect. I don't know personally and have seen no anecdotal evidence of a Gore or Nader voter going with bush. I hear stories like yours all the time.
BIT bush is toast.
Hecate, I admire your spirit. But the fact of the matter is that if Bush wins and you protest AND write a letter to the editor then under the Patriot Act II which will be passed nest spring YOU will be labeled a terrorist and arrested. Canada's better than jail.
Vinnie, Gray Davis was almost as bad and dangerous as Bush. When you have 92 people on the ballot, you have to vote for the one who may get the most votes
So, what country is everyone going to move to after Bush wins? Personally I'm thinking Canada. A lot closer and cheaper than France.
CPG | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 3:59 pm | #
How easy/difficult is it to get Canadian residency?
I have to admit that I spent July in British Columbia and I was astonished by how civilized the elections were. They were actually discussing health care, the deficit, social policy. And the funny is that people thought it was a dirty campaign.
I'm not planning to leave the country any time soon, but I think that all of us should have a backup plan worked out if things really do go over the edge her.
GDWPA,
I'd love that! But Arthur has to promise not to eat Madeline. That is one big dog!
I hope both the polls are outliers, but what are the chances that they are?
The product of the probability that each of the individual polls is an outlier (assuming they are independent of each other).
Oh, sorry, you were probably being rhetorical ;p
Seriously though, don't get your panties in a wad. Bush got a real bump, but probably less that 10%. Who cares. After Monday the fight really starts.
SWR -
It's easy. Check the Canadian Immigration website.
They even allow US citizens in - extremely nice, those Canadians.
I think we have to acknowledge, if we look dimly on the bush dynasty, and the doles, and all the other kin politicos, we have to agree that hillary is right up there with them. I have been reading the Kevin Phillips book, and it does support that clinton's squandering of huge political capital due to his arrogance that he could gamble his hounddog self gave the self-righteous right their opening.
I will vote K-E, but, it's painful to acknowledge that Kerry did the same slick equivocations that hillary did. I was a dean supporter from the start, and looking back, especially, in his rejection of the Iraq war, those ideas would be a better counter than a Kerry nuance.
Funny story. A real estate person writes a column for a Greenwich, CT newspaper. He mentioned that the landscapers in Greenwich speak Spanish. The Greenwich people ripped him a new ###hole - racism, vicious letters to his company, etc. I work with a group in a nearby urban area training African-American kids to be landscapers. He mentioned this in his next column, and asked for donations to my group. Did we get any from those open minded Republicans? Guess.....
SWR -
It's easy. Check the Canadian Immigration website.
They even allow US citizens in - extremely nice, those Canadians.
I have enough savings to live for a few years without getting a job.
But eventually I'd have to. How tough would that be?
France would eat up my money pretty quickly (as much as I like the idea of living in Paris a la Henry Miller) and I don't have an Irish grandparent so I can't take the dual citizenship option.
I've also been thinking of trying to spend a few years in China to learn the language and that's really cheap.
People That time poll was commisioned by CNN and was an outlier. I would not be at all suprised that this Newsweek poll is as well.
The media is still in the republican pockets and are working hard to get us discouraged. There is no fucking way in hell that the crapfest of a convention gave bush that big a boost. Don't the Roves minions or trolls discourage you.
Mr. Happy,
I'll consider it an honor to go to jail if that's what it takes to fight for my country. MLK spent time in jail. The Suffragettes, to whom I owe my ability to vote, spent time in jail. So, I wouldn't look forward to it, and I'm not discounting how truly horrendous jail can be, but if it's Canada or jail, I'll go to jail -- with absolutely no disrespect meant for our Canadian friends, whose country is truly beautiful!
Funny story. A real estate person writes a column for a Greenwich, CT newspaper. He mentioned that the landscapers in Greenwich speak Spanish. The Greenwich people ripped him a new ###hole - racism, vicious letters to his company, etc.
Do you mean those rich people in Greenwich ripped him a new asshole because they were being PC and resented his mentioning of the landscapers speaking Spanish?
Or were they being racists against the Spanish speaking landscapers?
It's not clear from your post.
TWO LOUSY POLLS AND KERRY SUPPORTERS ARE GIVING UP???!! HUH?
What is this gloom and doom $#!%?
Who are the Repubs going to run against Kerry in '08? That's what I want to hear about!!
SWR: .. China? yes it is really cheap. All of S.E. Asia is. but it's also a bit dangerous in many places, and unfortunately I'm convinced I'd starve to death if I moved there. Irish grandparent?? I have Irish Great-granparents is that close enough to go that route?
kent - You rock, my friend.
Atrios - thank you for the new thread. It's snowing here, the wind is blowing a gale down the lake and it is fecking cold. I'm staying right where I am.
Mr Happy : I was hoping for the Netherlands though.
Not so big on the drugs as you might think. However, a huge portion of the country speaks English perfectly fine.
I'm looking to the UK or maybe Germany or Switzerland. Got to finish my PhD so I can post-doc someplace other than the US. After that, if the US stilll sucks, I can go to Korea with my girlfriend who is a citizen. Fortunately, she is from Jeju (the little island off the southern tip), which isn't likely to get completely obliterated when the US provokes a showdown with N Korea.
"Battleground States
Election 2004
Bush-Cheney 48%
Kerry-Edwards 45%
RasmussenReports.com
September 4, 2004--In the sixteen-Battleground States that are likely to determine the winner of Election 2004, President Bush now leads Senator Kerry 48% to 45%."
Dandy Don just broke out into a chorus of "Turn Out The Lights, The (Democrat) Party Is Over"....
Toodles.
I'm going to Ireland for a month and I am going to seriously look into perhaps staying if things continue going south here.
Mr. Happy,
I'll consider it an honor to go to jail if that's what it takes to fight for my country. MLK spent time in jail. The Suffragettes, to whom I owe my ability to vote, spent time in jail.
Go to Indymedia and follow some of the threads about people who spent a few days in pre-emptive detention during the RNC protests.
I barely escaped it a few times myself.
You don't want to go to jail any more than you want to get into the car when a carjacker points his gun at your head and says drive.
Once they have control of you, you're finished.
eond,
Fuck you and lay off Hillary, who is hoping and praying right now that her husband -- who did more good for more people than you or I have ever done -- is going to make it through surgery ok.
Geez, it is still an absolute fucking mortal sin to be a smart agressive woman in this society, isn't it?
brendan - And thanks to you my man. Real Kerry supporters are not giving up. Not even close. The whiners are not Kerry supporters. They are either chronic malcontents or trolls.
It's ironic - Kerry is going to save their sorry asses and the entire country, as well.
kent - You rock, my friend.
Thanks Tena.
anyone who is concered with these poll numbers should go (lets hope I don't cet halloscanned) here
Ruy does a fantastic job of explaining the polls, and the one behind the current frenzy in particular.
SWR: .. China? yes it is really cheap. All of S.E. Asia is. but it's also a bit dangerous in many places, and unfortunately I'm convinced I'd starve to death if I moved there. Irish grandparent?? I have Irish Great-granparents is that close enough to go that route?
I believe that if you have one grandparent who was born in Ireland you can get a green card.
I'm Polish/Swiss and the first country isn't a place I'd relish spending much time and the second is unlikely to be begging for immigrants any time soon.
SWR - They felt he was being racist. The facts are that lots of open trucks filled with Hispanics are seen in Greenwich every day, working with no benefits. However, they are seasonal workers and follow the crops. We are hoping to train local people who live full time in CT (Bridgeport). Doesn't look good, however.
Toodles.
Karen Schell
What's that smell--rotten fish?
And why would anyone on this site pay any attention to the polling of the SCLM? Was the Repig convention's stupidity contagious? Time, Newsweek, NYT, WaPo, all in the Bush pocket, for the time being. Couldn't tell the truth if their survival depended on it. this is just more of the modern method of fascist takeover, not guns and jackboots, but lies, propoganda and fear-mongering. All of the neocons plans added to the Repigs' domestic agenda point to world domination but not by force and violence exclusively; that won't work any more. This is a subtle, well-planned conspiracy among the rich country-clubbers, and will need to be fought against for at least the next decade, so get ready!
The problem with electing Bush to a second term is that his impeachment on the plame affair and related matters would take place in March...
I'll believe that when someone locks up Kenny Lay.
Cheney too. The only reason he's stayed in Washington is that otherwise he'd be in Federal court in Houston right about now.
Geez, it is still an absolute fucking mortal sin to be a smart agressive woman in this society, isn't it?
Hecate
Not in my neck of the woods.
arent emasculated bigots cute?
No one is giving up. The Times and the Newsweek Polls were either purposely biased or just errors. There were a number of other polls released yesterday, and Kerry lead in a couple, and Bush in some others. They were all 2 - 4 point ranges.
Zogby Sept 2 B - 45 K - 44
Rasmussen Sept. 3 B - 49 K - 45
Amer. Resear. Grp. Sept 2 B = 46
K 48
Pollbooth.org Sept 3
B 247 EV K 254 EV
Race 2004.net Sept 2
B - 157 EV K 216 EV
Elect. vote Pred. Sept 4
K 252 EV B 270 EV
Next week this should all play out!
It's ironic - Kerry is going to save their sorry asses and the entire country, as well.
Tena | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 4:21 pm | #
Yes. I hope your right. But I don't think that hashing out just how the election is going and how scary the Republican convention was makes you a troll.
I'd like to see Kerry move to the left and hit Bush on the war and on the economy. I'd also like to see him speak up against the 1700 or so pre-emptive detentions in Manhattan last week.
Maybe that will help him win. Maybe it won't. I simply don't know.
SWR,
I heard reports from the folks in detention. Some of them sneaked in cell phones and called NPR. Cramped, cold, in a toxic environment, no medical care, little food. I'm not downplaying how truly awful jail can be. But, war's truly awful and we ask 18-year-olds to go get their arms and legs blown off to protect our country. If they can do that for our country, this middle-aged broad can go to jail if that's what it comes to. As I said, I'd hope that it wouldn't come to that. But I'm not just going to leave this country to the theocrats.
I was so inspired by the man who infiltrated MSG and held up a sign that said his son died for Bush's lies. When the police got him out, he said to them, "I paid with my son's life for my freedom of speech, but, it's OK, you can arrest me now." They were too ashamed to arrest him, but he was willing to go in order to protect our country from Bush.
"RasmussenReports.com
9/4/04 Scott Rasmussen
For the third straight day, the Rasmussen Reports Presidential Tracking Poll shows President George W. Bush with 49% of the vote and Senator John Kerry with 45%."
Munchins lead the Oz and American citizens in "Ding, Dong" singalong.
Toodles.
SWR - heard an NPR story that retirees are having a grand old time in Nicaragua - housekeepers and gardeners are $3.00 a day, and a huge house can be had for $100,000. The only drawback is that the help has to swim over the river in the rainy season, and they might not show (being washed downstream and all). Nobody they know personally has been kidnapped.
Vinnie - God I could so move to Ireland but for one thing - it is expensive. And when I was there last the exchange rate was better than it is now.
Must read article in the WaPo. The Israeli spy probe has been going on for over two years and goes much further than Franklin. Perle and Chalabi are involved. Surprise, surprise.
SWR - They felt he was being racist. The facts are that lots of open trucks filled with Hispanics are seen in Greenwich every day, working with no benefits. However, they are seasonal workers and follow the crops. We are hoping to train local people who live full time in CT (Bridgeport). Doesn't look good, however.
Sue | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 4:22 pm | #
I've been to Greenwich. I've seen the groups of nannies waiting for the train. Pretty funny. They're the only black people I saw in the whole town and I felt that I wasn't white enough to be there.
But I'm still a bit unclear about the situation you're describing. Are you saying that the people in Greenwich are using accusations of racism to keep anybody from even talking about the migrants who work there?
p.s. I also see busloads of Spanish speaking immigrants building houses in New Jersey.
I know people who are going to vote this year who have never bothered to in the past. Yep, Bush is, indeed, a uniter.
I read on another site that a gallop poll out tomorrow or monday will have Bush up by 14 pts. has anyone else heard this?
I read on another site that a gallop poll out tomorrow or monday will have Bush up by 14 pts. has anyone else heard this?
Does anyone know anything about this Pentagon 911 missile coverup?
(I hope I haven't broken Haloscan with this)
http://pages.infinit.net/noc/pen...oc/
pentagon.swf
IMO, Kerry can beat the unholy crap out of Bush if he just tries.
Attack Bush's supposed strength, national security. Relentlessly point out his massive failures (or "catastrophic success") and say, "I would have done this better". Attack his lies and say "I believe the American people deserve the truth".
Similarly, when playing defense (ie, setting the record straight), always turn it around and point to Bush's failures and incompetence.
Bush has no real "strength"...
Tena, Yeah, that is the only drawback to Ireland. It is a budget buster.
Has anyone heard the rumors about the Kerry campaign finding the two guys who sold coke to young George W.? Nuclear.
SWR,
I heard reports from the folks in detention. Some of them sneaked in cell phones and called NPR. Cramped, cold, in a toxic environment, no medical care, little food. I'm not downplaying how truly awful jail can be. But, war's truly awful and we ask 18-year-olds to go get their arms and legs blown off to protect our country. If they can do that for our country, this middle-aged broad can go to jail if that's what it comes to. As I said, I'd hope that it wouldn't come to that. But I'm not just going to leave this country to the theocrats.
You sort of had to see the cops arresting hundreds of people pre-emptively to get how strange it was.
They would "allow" 200 people to have a peace vigil, as long as they marched only 2 abreast on the sidewalk. Then some provocateur or undercover cop or just some bystander would make a third person abreast on the sidewalk and they'd come in with orange nets and arrest everybody.
When I was in college, I did Civil Disobedience in DC. I spent a grand total of 2 hours in detention for sitting down in front of the President's motorcase on Penn Avenue.
In NYC, you had middle aged women netted and put in jail for 50 hours for standing on the sidewalk.
And remember, half the media in the world was standing around watching everything.
I think the most depressing moment I had all week was when I was standing in Union Square and heard nice, upper middle-class Manhattan liberals gushing over how great the cops were.
So much for the blue state vs. red state meme.
Another reason the polls are wrong- they don't begin to reflect first time voters and young people.
I can't tell you the number of people I talk to who say that they haven't voted before but they're going to this time, even if only to make a point.
I think the bushies are going to be shocked on election day. The more they primp and unlease their fear mongering, the more civilized, normal people say, WTF? we've GOT to get rid of chimpy.
So, poodles! to all you republican fucks. Go back to the shadows.
I think you got that backwards, wasn't Bush the dealer?
SWR - there are extremely few black nannies in Greenwich (like none, and the blacks are the cleaning help, duh!). The existing nannies are imported from Sweden or are college students who want to go to Nantucket and live with the families. I think you may be a troll. Let me throw myself under the bus by stating more and naming names.
I think you got that backwards, wasn't Bush the dealer?
Jeebus. Is that what you heard?
SWR - Maybe those things don't make one a troll, but this week has been wall to wall moaning and groaning about Kerry. Can you understand that that gets old? I'm quite snappish at this point - there has been a nonstop Kerry whinefest until I'm ready to punch someone.
I forget where I read that, but that was the word. he dealt blow in college.
About outliers....
The entire point of statistics is to quantify how much you don't know. There is a real chance that any poll is an outlier, but you just don't know. That is the point. To say that we are certain the Time and/or Newsweek polls aren't reflective of reality is to assume you know more than you do. It is stupid in other words.
Just chill...
As for what you can do:
1) Talk to you neighbors. If they are planning to vote for Bush, convince them they are wrong (by using reason).
2) Donate
Now, this is only an AOL users straw poll, but better keep it out of John Fibber Kerry's sight anyway. And don't forget to hide the "sharps" if JFibberK does view it. Think "intervention" in his case.
AOL Straw Poll
SWR,
I heard reports from the folks in detention. Some of them sneaked in cell phones and called NPR. Cramped, cold, in a toxic environment, no medical care, little food. I'm not downplaying how truly awful jail can be. But, war's truly awful and we ask 18-year-olds to go get their arms and legs blown off to protect our country. If they can do that for our country, this middle-aged broad can go to jail if that's what it comes to. As I said, I'd hope that it wouldn't come to that. But I'm not just going to leave this country to the theocrats.
Eh. Well, I saw a lot of white people and a few groups of black women who were obviously not locals. I assumed they were nannies. Sorry my bad.
Anyway, Greenwich is a creepy place. That's the only thing I was trying to express.
I read on another site that a gallop poll out tomorrow or monday will have Bush up by 14 pts. has anyone else heard this?
brandon
Oh that's just fucking great. That's it. It's over, folks. Might as well just fucking hang it up.
And, by the way, the 'Move On For America' is someone's dumbass website.
If it is indeed a '527' they haven't registered with the FEC yet.
SWR - Maybe those things don't make one a troll, but this week has been wall to wall moaning and groaning about Kerry. Can you understand that that gets old? I'm quite snappish at this point - there has been a nonstop Kerry whinefest until I'm ready to punch someone.
I agree that it's part of the strategy to depress people and lower turnout.
The media is still in the republican pockets and are working hard to get us discouraged.
The Corporate-Run American Press (CRAP) strikes again.
fourlegsgood - you and me both. I have talked to all kinds of people who say that they've skipped voting in the past, but not this year. Bush has scared the daylights out of any number of different people with different reasons for being scared.
Oh that's just fucking great. That's it. It's over, folks. Might as well just fucking hang it up.
Get a grip, get off your ass, register some voters in Louisiana or wherever you're from and stop griping.
Tena, I am sick of Kerry playing rope a dope. To slam Bush's vaunted character in the war on terra, all he's got to do is mention the Aug 6 PDB and ask why he went on vaction for a fucking month after that warning. Damnit!
AOL, Schmaoell. Everyone knows AOL is a rightwinger hellhole. Only mouthbreathers would be stupid enough to pay so much for such shitty service.
Last night I had the craziest experience of my life. I went out to the bar for a couple of beers. I saw two soldiers at the end of the bar and one grabbed a martini glass from the ceiling and told the other to hold it under the bar. We began talking and I was interested in their service. I asked them where they had toured. The younger told me how he had served one tour in Iraq and was headed for his second. The other was headed for his first. I asked the younger guy about Iraq and he began. The other jumped in and started to tell me how the military works here. I said, I know that I was wondering what it was like in Iraq. He told me of how it was hard to see someone you know holding their guts and crying for their mother. He stressed that three times. The other began to interrupt again. Somehow, I let it slip that I didn't think that they should be over there. The younger looked as though I had said something wrong. I told them, "no, I support what they are doing, and wish them the best over there." The older, out of shape one came over and proceeded to call me democrat and told me how Clinton had gutted the military. That the Republican party was the party who traditionally gave raises, how the democrats would cut and run and they would be out of jobs, and how they had signed their life away to the President no matter who was in power. The older one told the younger one to bum a 2 cigarettes from the table of girls next to us. With a stern look on his face, he sent the obviously ordered soldier to get him a smoke. This story is pretty good and it amounts to how the oder soldier was there to watch the younger to make sure that he didn't tell how things really are in iraq. If you want to hear the rest, email me or put a post. I got to go now and I don't want to type it all out if no one is interested.
Talked to a UAW member at the farmer's market this morning. You should have heard her discuss Bush. She said she's shocked that some repubs haven't realized that this is not the same republican party it once was. This new breed of people who refuse to play by the rules and love to sling mud are trying to turn this country into a one-party state. I asked her if other UAW members felt the same way, and she said absolutely.
We have two months to keep spreading the word about this corrupt administration and make sure that the thugs get slapped down hard. Afterwards, let's make sure they get what's coming to them for all their indiscretions.
The Corporate-Run American Press (CRAP) strikes again.
queen crab
now that is a thing of beauty.
*
Dear poll watchers:
YHBT. YHL. HAND.
love, Karl (&whores)
Incognito - I couldn't agree more. Please hang it up right now.
Tena, I am sick of Kerry playing rope a dope. To slam Bush's vaunted character in the war on terra, all he's got to do is mention the Aug 6 PDB and ask why he went on vaction for a fucking month after that warning. Damnit!
Vinnie | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 4:39 pm | #
I was talking with some anti-Bush protesters this week and a lot of them suggested that Kerry say the following thing:
"If you question the legitimacy of my medals, aren't you questioning the legitmacy of all of them."
When I pointed out that's precisely how he did respond, none of them had even heard it. That's how relentless the media's been hyping the Swift Boat group.
But it's not really enough to complain about media bias. You just have to assume it and move on.
I'd love to see Kerry have a mass rally in Manhattan to get a bit of momentum off of the space the protesters cleared for him. True, it's not a swing state but it would give him a lot of free media.
SWR "But eventually I'd have to. How tough would that be?"
It's not particularly tough to find decent work in Canada. For example, I've been on unemployment here in Phoenix for the last year and a half - and every single week, I see jobs that are pretty much tailored to my precise (and lunatic) KSAs available roundabout exactly where I target relocating. If you've an education, if you can work, then you can work in Canada. In order -to- be employed legally, you do have to go thru the landed immigrant process or alternatively, actively go for Canadian citizenship. They're still a bit testy about the number of US folks who went up in the 60s and 70s and took Canadian jobs. Not nice.
None of this of course has much to do with abandoning ship in the event of a second term Shrubbery. It has a whole lot to do with what a colleague of mine analogised with the description of folks who left Germany in 1932, versus folks who left in 1939. For me, as a dual citizen, it's actually a twistingly difficult thing to even contemplate, especially because 15 years ago I very deliberately made the decision that the US was going to be my own, my native land - and I very deliberately left Canada determined not to be divided in loyalty. However, autres temps, autres moeurs and like that.
And we already had the discussion about howcome kitties and doggies look so much bigger when they lie down - meatloafing I believe is the term. Arthur isn't all that big - and if Madeleine is very nice, and whips out those claws at the right moment, I guarantee you Hecate that Arthur will not eat her. Nibble maybe. Just a little bit.
Hey Jenny:
I have nothing specific to add -- just saying hello.b
One other thing to note about the Time/Newsweek polls -- if they include Friday they are catching people right after Bush's speech, which was very effective. Some of that will wear off. It's not good news for Kerry, but much of the post-convention bounce will fade. Kerry has to start running a more effective campaign though. Hopefully the Swifties have worn the public's attention span out, 'cept of course for the freepers and such. But they were solidly in Bush's pocket anyway.
I think I should clarify that I plan on leaving the US for a few years (for post-doc work) even if Kerry gets elected. In fact, that yet another reason it is so damn important he gets elected.
Rigth now most of the world thinks Bush is a tragedy, but they don't blame the American people (since we didn't elect him after all). If he gets re-elected, then we are giving him a stamp-of-approval, and his atrocities become ours.
Obviously, hello is not supposed to have a .b after it.
Tena,
I'm with you. (Getting snappish, that is) We need to work on tipping the scales in Pennsylvania, Iowa, and Missouri. Then Ohio and Arizona. Keeping Wisconsin and Minnesota.
Fuck the polls. What do you expect when Kerry's at 25% in fucking Utah and Idaho. I'm glad Kerry's not popular in fucking Utah. I'd wonder what was wrong with him.
"But I'm still a bit unclear about the situation you're describing. Are you saying that the people in Greenwich are using accusations of racism to keep anybody from even talking about the migrants who work there?"
(God, somebody tell me how to italize this!)
No, I'm saying that the people of Greenwich are more than willing to point out racism in their town, but unwilling to fund an opportunity for the same job 30 miles away, and keep the urban folks where they are. If you have a problem with where the Greenwich money goes, check out Harpers. Hey, I just saw Thomas Foley (multimillionaire and the former head of private sector development of Iraq and now co-chair of the Bush re-election committee in CT)on t.v.! He gets that newspaper for free! It goes to all Greenwich residents.
If I have to choose between taking a terrorist warning seriously or going on vacation, I'll go on vacation every time. W.
Canadian immigration runs on a point system based on education, job experience, possibly age. I don't know that immigrating there is as easy as you might think it is. All other suggestions are welcome, though.
Last sunday I worked a voter registration table in Santa Monica (CA). Granted, it's a 99.9% dem area but I was astounded by the passion and enthusiasm of the passers-by, especially by the variety of well-wishers.
Several very young (but voting age) "dudes" on skateboards, carrying their surfboards, asked what they could do. Bought Kerry bumper stickers and buttons. Said they were already registered but wanted to do more.
Now, in Southern CA this is a brand new group of energized voters. Believe me they have not been polled. But they are out there in massive numbers. It gave me great joy and hope to meet them!
*
The Time poll is crap - instead of random sampling, they consciously asked for the youngest adult male in each household. In other words, they aimed for the subpopulation where Bush is strongest.
I've yet to track down the details of the Newsweek poll. But let's keep in mind that it was on MSNBC. The major networks are all in the bag for Bush.
What these polls show is a continuing story line being pursued. It is necessary for polls to show Bush ahead if the GOP is going to pursue the kind of shenanigans we saw in 2002 in GA. If we can have no confidence in our elections and no confidence in our polls, I have to wonder just what kind of democracy we have.
If I have to choose between taking a terrorist warning seriously or going on vacation, I'll go on vacation every time. W.
Vinnie | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 4:46 pm | #
I have nothing but complete fucking contempt for the blase Manhattan liberals during the RNC who left town because they were afraid of terrorists and anarchists.
And I have nothing but respect for the out of town protesters who didn't buy it and flooded into the city last week.
Munchins lead the Oz and American citizens in "Ding, Dong" singalong.
Toodles.
"I will wait for your shoes..."
Shaun - interesting. Randi Rhodes had a call-in guest the other day - a soldier in Iraq. According to him, he and most of the rest of the military there know they were lied to and are pissed. They are also aware that the administration fucked them by failing to plan for this insurgency.
The guy was furious with the Bush administration, but even handedly - he had some complaints about the Democrats. In general, however, he made it clear that Bush cannot count on a huge majority of military to vote for him.
if you amend constitution for foriegners- then what- box turtles?
For the third straight day, the Rasmussen Reports Presidential Tracking Poll shows President George W. Bush with 49% of the vote and Senator John Kerry with 45%."
So what's your point? Anything under 50% is fucking pathetic for an incumbent. Is this your first election? What are you like 18? Drunk and stupid is no way to go through life, girl.
Sk8 the vote!
-
Dear poll watchers:
YHBT. YHL. HAND.
love, Karl (&whores)
A movie that should be made..
*****The Jerusalem Candidate*******
Starring George W Bush. Brainwashed Christian fundamentalist becomes president of the United States and does the bidding of a foreign country including invading a sovereign nation that was no threat to the USA.
Incognito, get a grip on yourself man. Get out there and register some voters. If we turn out our side there's no telling what could happen.
As for the rest of you- here's some ammo for when you need to argue with your winger acquaintences.
By the Numbers- Bush
I found the link of Kos.
Sheesh, don't sit home and whine- get the fuck out there and do something.
I haven't seen any Kerry/Edwards bumper-stickers only Bush/Cheney ones on cars and, no kidding, this old guy driving past me in traffic with one was picking his nose.
Pike county in southern Ohio is strong Republican country, and politically active to boot. They've had their yard signs up for local races a good month already. I drove down Rt. 23 on Tuesday and I saw no Bush signs. There were four Kerry signs, two each in Waverly and Piketon. The signs for local races were everywhere, but the lack of Bush signs was stark. If Bush can't get folks to put up signs for him there, he's finished.
Vacation every time. Vacation every time. Vacation every time. Terror or vacation? Vacation every time.
Also interesting to note - members of the military in Iraq and Afghanistan got the screenshot of the Purple Heart bandaids at the RNC hatefest the other morning from a few Vets.
They were not impressed to say the least.
Well hello.b, Steve (hee) -
*
Bigfoot stomped boo story:
FROM TPM
Karen gets results!
A little more on the boo-a-rama, from a reporter on the scene ...
Karen Hughes went totally apesh-t at the AP when that dispatch hit the wire.
She stormed up the bleachers and starting screaming at the AP writer (who took it in stride). "They didn't boo! Were you and I in the same rally! What is this crap?" or something along those lines (it was loud in there). The AP writer then canvassed his colleagues, who all said they hadn't heard any boos.
Say what you want about McClellan ("dreadful briefer," "talking points only"), I don't think he's ever screamed at a reporter.
The innards of a campaign ...
There's no need to get upset over the recent poll results. Carter was ahead by quite a margin in 1980 after the Democratic convention. Bush is in Carter's position, despite all the dirty work his people have done.
Note also that these polls are done right at the eave of Labor Day weekend. How many Democrats would sit waiting for a phone call during the RNC? I suspect that the sample oversampled Republican regulars.
It's very early days yet, and today's polls don't mean anything.
...that Bush cannot count on a huge majority of military to vote for him
it will be interesting to see if realizinng a loss in early military count- bush fights as hard for the illegally counted late-postmarked votes like in 2000?
Actually, SWR, you are one of a few who create dialogue, in a positive way. That's why i'm suspicious. It rarely happens (like never).
Look, everybody, it's going to be a long 58 days. There are going to be all kinds of polls and they'll thaw bin Laden out and trot him in front of the cameras, and they'll dump more money that god has on Florida, and they'll make up more lies about Kerry, and they'll slime the Edwards' dead son, and they'll generally act like the assholes in power that they are.
And we can notlet them get to us and scare us and make us dispirited. This is war and it's not for the faint of heart. But we can win this election. We won the last one and many people were far more complacent back then. I know I didn't understand how bad Bush would really be, and I had watched his father before him. So lots of folks who didn't get involved and didn't even bother to vote last time are in this game now.
Kerry came out swinging at the midnight smackdown and he's already got them on the defensive. Suddenly, yesterday, Cheney didn't have anything else to say about "unfit to command". Bush is scared to have 3 debates. Barnes, and Kelly, and Hersh are coming out with books. The DVD of F/911 is coming out soon and I'm buying lots of copies to just basically give to people who won't go see it at a theatre. We've got Jon Stewart on our side and hitting hard at the SCLM.
Don't give up. Work harder. Remember the song from the convention: No defeat, baby, no surrender.
Say what you want about McClellan ("dreadful briefer," "talking points only"), I don't think he's ever screamed at a reporter.
Reporters are like dogs or battered women.
They respect hostility.
Why doesn't Kerry hire Karen Hughes?
(puts on flame retardent suit)
I'm with you guys who think the big polls don't mean diddley. It's the individual polls in swing states that matter.
I know plenty of people in Florida who voted for Bush last time and have made their minds up to vote for Kerry.
There's two months to go. If Bush is ahead in a month, then I'll worry.
Jenny from the Blog - See, this is what I keep seeing and hearing, too. Really. The chick who cuts my hair in Dallas is really great - she cuts a lot of the Indy musicians' hair, and she's so good she has more clients than she can handle now. She told me last May before I left town that if someone comes in now and tells her they don't ever vote and don't intend to this time, she orders them out of her chair and fires them as clients. I believe it - she's like that.
Anyway, according to her, and I know this is anecdotal, there are large numbers of young people in Dallas who are going to vote for the first time ever this year. They ain't voting for Bush.
(God, somebody tell me how to italize this!)
Sue Do it just like this, except make your I's capitals.
Bush is ahead...way ahead. The election is over. No need for the trolls, turnout volunteers or battle state ad buys. It's a lock. The corporate-controlled media brings this one home.
You can relax now GOPers. America wants four more years of fear and greeed. In fact, I hear that the first act of the second term will be to borrow from another great leader - Mussolini - and formalize our nascent culture of corporativism.
Bold leadership.
Actually, SWR, you are one of a few who create dialogue, in a positive way. That's why i'm suspicious. It rarely happens (like never).
Sue | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 4:55 pm | #
If you think I'm a troll why not give some $$$ to the DNC?
I was watching C-Span last night with fat pig James Taranto and some Mercury News reporter who were discussing "trolling" (believe it or not) and they both agreed that the strategy of giving money to Dean every time his blog got trolled worked. It discouraged the trolls.
And Taranto should know since most of the trolls were his readers.
no whiners, i love hurricanes, first Charley, now Frances. i say Bring it On!!!
look it ain't over till it's over, a lot like this hurricane. could get slammed, might skirt by on the edge.
and what if this happens Cofer Black?
of course i don't know how reliable this source is.
''Everything is in place and a little bit is needed to localise these people and catch them,'' the US State Department's coordinator on counter-terrorism J Cofer Black said during a briefing for selected senior journalists at the American Information Centre.
It'd be nice to think that the disaster in Russia would help people understand that "Tough Guy Theatre" has its limits. If Dubya wins, in four years we'll still be hearing ever-more-threadbare speeches about "staying the course" as the body count keeps piling up.
I see in a Daily Kos diary that William Pfaff has a good column in the International Herald-Tribune on the same thing.
All those who are giving up, go and study some history of polling. What the polls are right now is meaningless. UNLESS it makes you give up. Then it worked.
Montreal is a lovely city! A bit of Europe in North America, i could sponsor one or two of you political exiles if need be!
The Bush gov. is making very strong pressure on the canadian gov about that fucking anti-missile sheild. Nobody here wants it nor pay for it. NOBODY except The Liberal minority gov we have since june who feels the pressure to make Bush happy... but it would fail to get a majority vote in the Parlement so it could bring down the Liberal gov!
So the Liberals are waiting for the election to say yes or no...fuck Bush! Terrorists use space missiles a lot, have you noticed?
It's important to protect the continent!!!
we need a Prine "Your Flag Decal Won't Get You To Heaven Anymore" sing out.
moi-frequently censored here
Sorry Sue, let's try this try this:
Before the word (or words) you want to italicize put a left angle bracket (shift-comma), the letter i,right angle bracket. After the word (or words) left angle bracket, slash, the letter i, right angle bracket. No spaces.
we need a Prine "Your Flag Decal Won't Get You To Heaven Anymore" sing out.
moi-frequently censored here
we need a Prine "Your Flag Decal Won't Get You To Heaven Anymore" sing out.
moi-frequently censored here
October is coming early this year - they say that they're getting close to nabbing Osama.
I thought he was dead years ago. Maybe they're starting to thaw out his body.
Now, in Southern CA this is a brand new group of energized voters. Believe me they have not been polled. But they are out there in massive numbers. It gave me great joy and hope to meet them!
You go girl. I got deputized thursday to register to vote in my county. The meeting I went to was filled with students (all dems) who were motivated and pissed off.
It gives me hope for the future- we may be seeing the birth of the next big counterculture movement.
As for that link to the Guardian I posted earlier- just scroll down and read all the environmental atrocities this admin has perpetrated. It makes me want to scream- and I want to hear the Kerry campaign talking about it.
The Jerusalem Candidate
...Ain't that the truth. One of the worst parts of our political discourse in this country is that any criticism of Sharon's thug policies is met with cries of anti-semitism. Nobody throws out the race card even half so fast. I've even seen Jewish commentators called anti-semitic for criticizing Sharon. It's maddening.
Any Vancouver singles interested in a pair of sham marriages to help my gf and I immigrate? 
(Yes, I'm joking. I think)
Tena -
Heh, thinking of your hairdresser tossing clients from her chair - I had a kind of blind date (just an afternoon coffee thing with a guy) recently. We met in front of the place and started to talk. I had just come from the registration table and was all jazzed about the experience and started to tell him about it. He then tells me he's "canadian" and doesn't have an opinion.
I just stared at him and felt a rage building and he morphed from a cute guy to an ugly piece of shit right before my eyes. I told him I couldn't possibly have even a five minute coffee with someone who was filled with such apathy and had no opinion about the state of the world, which is my passion.
I turned on my heels and walked away.
When I got home there was a nasty email from him telling me I was psycho. Hee. I had a good laugh.
*
In the past week I have talked to five people about this election -- people whom I know don't share my own political views. I know that four of them voted for Bush last time, and one didn't vote.
EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM is making it a point to vote for Kerry this time. Their reasons run from being disgusted with the deficit to being disgusted with the relisious right's takeover of the party.
Get out there and work, folks. If I can do it here in North Carolina, you can do it wherever you are.
It's still a long way till November.
"so what country is everyone moving to if bush wins"
i'm starting to think about moving to afghanistan with a bag of antique camera stuff. it's not like i'm going to live forever anyway.
Isn't Anne Coulter from Greenwich?
your right tena, i've never voted been through nixon (ok i wasn't legal then) reagan, bush, clinton, didn't like them, didn't vote.
i love kerry, i might have voted for him no matter. but this year i decided to vote even before the primaries began.
i think a lot will just depend how the campaign shapes up, and world events, beyond the control of anyone.
and of course we could hope for one of these spy cases to break open, but i'm not holding my breath.
tangerine, email me.
I haven't seen any Kerry/Edwards bumper-stickers only Bush/Cheney ones on cars and, no kidding, this old guy driving past me in traffic with one was picking his nose.
Incognito--where do you live incog?
Anyway, according to her, and I know this is anecdotal, there are large numbers of young people in Dallas who are going to vote for the first time ever this year. They ain't voting for Bush.
Tena----Fantastic news.
I run across these anecdotes all the time and for months have been wondering from what lists they use for calling people.
Some have suggested that they use voter reg lists for likely voters, and there would have to be a lag time. I personally refuse to take calls from pollsters, and wonder if there are others that feel the same.
But lately I have seen and soothed a number of distraut dems. Way too early to get discouraged, and believe me I understand the outrage fatigue. the only reason bush is not in jail
is because the media has propped his
sorry ass up from the beginning. Don't by what they are selling. Change the channel, talk to friends and neighbors
take a walk and enjoy the weekend.
"Suddenly, yesterday, Cheney didn't have anything else to say about "unfit to command" Hecate-
Kerry is not Gore and Edwards is not going to curl up in cheneys lap. Bush is GOING TO LOOSE.
Heads up-Krugman, Joe Wilson, Unger, Blumenthal, Mark Green now on CSPAN2
battered women. They respect hostility.
I've been a battered woman and I did not then, nor do I now, respect hostility.
Just sayin'
When I got home there was a nasty email from him telling me I was psycho. Hee. I had a good laugh
Good on you, girl!
Isn't Anne Coulter from Greenwich?
queen crab | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 5:05 pm | #
New Canaan. Same thing.
Falstaff - I agree and it's crazy. I know Repugs in Dallas who have been dedicated anti-Semites for years and all of a sudden they are all kissy-face with Sharon and the Likud. It's just too bizarre.
battered women. They respect hostility.
I've been a battered woman and I did not then, nor do I now, respect hostility.
Just sayin'
Hecate | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 5:08 pm | #
I'm aware of that. I was trying to get flamed.
I wanted to draw attention to the fact that what Hughes did is precisely what the Kerry people should be doing.
Tena, tell your hairdresser she should get deputized to register voters. It's easy and fast and she can do it in her shop.
Give them a choice- register or get the fuck out.
Email me and I'll give you the details (if you don't already know). I'll be happy to find out where she needs to go in her county.
Wouldn't it be funny if Texas turned out to be unexpectedly close?
oh, i know. a better person might have talked calmly and tried laying out some facts. but i just didn't feel like having a coffee with someone i had to educate.
*
Falstaff - I agree and it's crazy. I know Repugs in Dallas who have been dedicated anti-Semites for years and all of a sudden they are all kissy-face with Sharon and the Likud. It's just too bizarre.
Tena | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 5:09 pm | #
Not too bizarre. They just hate Muslims even more than they hate Jews.
The Chechnya massacre is going to be a wakeup call but in the wrong way.
Russia's been treating Chechnya for almost a decade exactly the way any Freeper would want us to treat Iraq.
All it's done has been to create the perfect Al Qaeda training ground.
I can't believe this air of defeatism I'm smelling here. Come on! This is stupid and playing directly into Bush's hairy hands. Or are these defeatist trolls sent in to spread doom and gloom?
As I said in an earlier post, there is always a post-convention bounce. What do you expect when the media advertizes one party all the time? Second, this is the labor day weekend, and Democrats will be undersampled in the polls. Third, the young-male-correction, while not uncommon in polls, might oversample Bush voters. Fourth, most people who are asked will probably say which ever name they have heard most often in the television (which is the same as my first point, but worth repeating). Fifth, only certain states count, not the whole country.
And so on. This is NOT the time to give up and play dead, for goddess' sake! When I used to box I was often losing and then came back and won. If I had gone home earlier, I would have nothing but losses. Jees.
As for Kerry hiring Hughes (egad, what a horrific thought!), well, he's done the next best thing.
He's hired Joe Lockhart. Lockhart's about to go midieval on their asses. He knows how to play the broadcast media game.
Go watch C-span: Krugman, Blumenthal, Joe Wilson. 5pm.
As for Kerry hiring Hughes (egad, what a horrific thought!), well, he's done the next best thing.
He's hired Joe Lockhart. Lockhart's about to go midieval on their asses. He knows how to play the broadcast media game.
fourlegsgood | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 5:13 pm | #
Why doesn't he hire Carville?
kent - "Bush is going to lose."
or to put it another way: Kerry is going to win.
I can't believe there are people who continue to insist that Kerry doesn't have what it takes. LOL! Right. That attitude sure doesn't speak well for Dean, who got trounced by Kerry in the primaries. And don't hand me that "it was the media's fault," because Dean's Scream occurred after he started losing to Kerry.
Give 'em hell, Jenny!
Wouldn't it be funny if Texas turned out to be unexpectedly close?
fourlegsgood
That would be hilarious, but I wouldn't be suprised. If Kerry is at 40% in Indiana, Bush is in big trouble. Our State voted for Johnson in '64 Roosevelt in '32, and '36. before that 1912. Its sad to live in such a red state, but a dem close to or above 40% can't make rove happy.
Wow, the MoveOn copycats are really easy to debunk. Took me about 5 minutes.
FindLaw
Commonwealth of Massachusetts v. Reissfelder
(Suffolk Co. Superior Ct., MA, 1982)
Kerry, assisting his partner Roanne Sragow, won a motion for new trial for George Reissfelder based on his wrongful conviction as an accomplice to murder. The district attorney decided not to bring new charges in the case, and Reissfelder was released.
Reissfelder is listed as "Inactive" with the Florida DOC, and a release date of Aug. 1982. I'm not sure if that means his prison sentence had been transferred to FL from MA, or what. I don't have access to search every state's database (I'm not a lawyer), but nothing else came up under a criminal search. Don't know what else they're referring to, but we'll hear the lies soon enough, huh?
BTW, let's forget that Gore was down 20 points after his convention, and he still won.
Hey, after November 2, can we all shout "Toodles" to Karen Schell?
Why doesn't he hire Carville?
Carville's not for hire. He's already sharing his thoughts w/ the Kerry folks and he's been fairly effective as a talking head. So no need to hire him. Lockhart knows a thing or two about handling someone who's under fire.
Come on, folks, did you watch Kerry's speech the other night? It was great! It was hard-hitting. He took it to Bush on every single important issue. I especially loved his criticism of how Bush is allowing the Saudis' to control our energy policy (which we all know, in turn, controls our foreign policy). Kerry's obviously not afraid to ruffle some feathers. Now that he can spend money like Bush, he's really come out swinging. If we get dispirited, the trolls, Bush, the terrorists win.
We can win the White House and the Senate.
Hey!! Floridians the wind is picking up. God may be speaking to you,hear?
Look, one of the reasons I'm so optimistic is because I married into a family of dedicated conservatives, Mr. Tena being one. I fell in love with him regardless because he is an exceptional human being. He hates George Bush's guts now. He's said he'd vote for Lyndon Larouche before he voted for Bush again (and yes, he fucked up and voted for him last time - believe me, he regrets it bitterly.) I have talked to so many people who think they are Repugs who are stunned by Bush's lies, inept handling of every aspect of governing the country, and generally just don't like him worth a good goddamn. And I live in Dallas, Texas, for christ's sake, at least the majority of the time.
At the very least, can we quit worrying about the polls until after Ben Barnes spills the beans on 60 Minutes, or 60 Minutes II, or whenever it is going to be?
"He then tells me he's "canadian" and doesn't have an opinion."
Um, Jenny? In his own, 'I'm Canadian and am forbidden to move my lips while I speak" way, he was trying to be civil.... Granted the follow-up was poor, but then, he really did think you were um, extremely, um, 'American'. As a Canadian, he actually didn't have an opinion that he could share with you, since to do so would have violated all his early training in not telling the people from the south just now nutty they are....
Just saying. Different country, you see.
'But let's keep in mind that it was on MSNBC. The major networks are all in the bag for Bush.'
I'm still not convinced that these polls are a good predictor of public sentiment. These guys also had Dean pegged for the Dem nomination in the primaries. I feel that they're making the same mistakes with Bush/Kerry as they did with Dean/Kerry. I would like to know how the polls inside the Kerry campaign look, because if I remember correctly his internal polls had him leading Dean while everyone else had Dean ahead.
Why doesn't he hire Carville?
Carville is a strategist. It's a different skill to actually work effectively with the media (I know, it's part of what I do). Lockhart knows these people and knows how to get it done.
Plus he's mean as a snake (in a good way). Anyhow, I'm certain Carville is giving advice behind the scenes.
BTW, let's forget that Gore was down 20 points after his convention, and he still won.
steve simels
Bless you, Steve.
Hey, after November 2, can we all shout "Toodles" to Karen Schell?
That's funny. We should all open our windows and yell "Toodles" to the whole lot of them!
*
Tena,
you are right I like your way better. Steve Gilliard has a good post convention analysis going on and one of the things he suggested was to try to create the sense of inevitability of Bush's defeat. Kind of motivated my take. But I will change that to Kerry will win.
Why doesn't he hire Carville?
Carville is a strategist. It's a different skill to actually work effectively with the media (I know, it's part of what I do). Lockhart knows these people and knows how to get it done.
Why doesn't he hire Tony Soprano?
I'm honestly sick of these media people. Hughes is Satan but Satan is exactly the man I'd like to see in charge of most of the media for most of eternity.
Can you imagine what HL Mencken would have done to Schwarzenegger?
We can win the White House and the Senate.
Hecate
And the House, those coattails are gonna be huge. FLG and Tena are personally gonna guarrantee the downfall of delay
And this is what I think, too: We fight until the elections and we win it. If we don't win it, we fight some more for the next one. And so on. There is no alternative, unless you think that a potentially fascist, potentially handmaid's-tale world is an acceptable alternative. It is not for me, so that's all there is to it.
And I am actually a moderate.
GWPDA -
There are a lot of Canadians on this board and elsewhere who feel they have a stake in this election and who care about the survival of the planet. (I didn't yell or get upset, even though I was burning up inside -- I just calmly told him I didn't have the time to get to know him better.)
I'm not saying I handled it in the most mature way. But it felt good just the same.
*
And besides... "blaming Canada" is so five years ago...
*
Tena, bingo. Bush has infuriated and frightened a number of republicans who thought, "well, bushie jr. ain't the sharpest tack in the box, but he'll have good people around him."
Bush has brutally disabused them of THAT notion. He's surrounded himself with other fanatics and crooks.
Listen folks, they're trying to make you lose hope. They want you to be discouraged and go home. They don't want you out there registering voters and getting out the vote. They don't want you out there telling the truth.
Don't let them get away with it.
hecate, if you are serious about spending time in jail you should think about getting some training first. jonah house in baltimore could give you some tips. i'm sure there are organizations inm dc too but i don't know any names. any group that regularly engages in civil disobedience could help.
what's up with that picture on the left labeled "who will you vote for?"
Bush looks like a McCain/Dukakis lovechild, and Kerry looks a lot like Bush, all the while retaining that whole "tree fro mthe wizard of oz" vibe.
Oops, hit OK too soon.
Reissfelder was wrongfully convicted, and was released. As in, his conviction was overturned. It seems the Rethugian's are trying to claim that since he was released for a crime he DID NOT commit, that it's Kerry's fault if he did commit other crimes later. Yeah, that makes sense... if you're a MORON!
Node of Evil and Steve Simel - I second that "bless you."
kent, from your mouth to god's ears. Delay is someone that I actually hate more than Bush.
As for toodles- I suggest that we all get bumperstickers that say:
Toodles! Bush. You're done.
And let's all get signs made for election night that say TOODLES! just so all the wingers get nice and mad.
fourlegsgood is right... half the negative comments here come from trolls. They are trying to plant the seeds of doubt. Don't get sucked into it, and ignore the day to day nationwide polls 58 days before the election. Elections are won on November 2, not September 4.
Ok folks. I've been reading everyone's posts (especially Tena's) and now you guys have pulled me out of my funk. I went and donated $50 to the DNC and am going to local Demo offices Monday to volunteer. Don't know what I can do here in North Arkasnas. Pretty much uncontested state. All Cong. will win Linconln will win senate seat and state may or may not be in play for Kerry. But, we can't give up!!!
kent,
I'd love to win the House, as well, but with the Texas re-districting, I'm not as sanguine about that. It's impacted my donations strategy significantly. Normally, I'd send a lot of money to women running for Congress, but this year the Senate is more important.
If we can win the WH and the Senate, Kerry can get some legislation through and, most importantly, in my mind, he can appoint one or more decent Supreme Court justices. They'll hopefully be around longer than Kerry's 8 years. Also if we can win the WH and the Senate, it will help keep a lid on what I expect to be a tremendous effort to slime Kerry a la Bill Clinton.
But I agree with you that long Kerry coattails could make Congress much closer, or even ours. That would be a thing of beauty. 
Mr. Happy -
You've made me happy!
*
Tena, glad to hear Mr. Tena has turned away from the dark side.
I hope he's trying to turn his colleagues away too.
Ok folks. I've been reading everyone's posts (especially Tena's) and now you guys have pulled me out of my funk. I went and donated $50 to the DNC and am going to local Demo offices Monday to volunteer.
OK. Maybe I'll volunteer to canvass for Kerry in a swing state. Pennsylvania's the closest one.
I'll keep Sieg Heil Zell in the back of my mind every time I get lazy.
Try Tuesday Mr Happy.
Monday is a Federal Holiday.
Mr. Happy- you've made me happy too.
Go get deputized to register voters. I don't think Arkansas is a lost cause.
Some of the polling organizations do not include cel phone numbers in their phone data base. This can exclude many voters who have given up on standard land lines.
The current polls are small samples. The larger and more accurate Rasumssen poll showed Kerry ahead by 4% with almost no undecided voters.
By far, the more important issue is to compare contributions to Mr. Kerry and the assorted Democratic funds to the contributions to Mr. Bush and the assorted Republican funds.
The numbers do not favor Mr. Bush and the Republicans.
Falling contributions from their core constituency may explain the recent attempts of Mr. Bush and the Republicans to reinvigorate their income stream by appealing to the worst instincts of their constituency.
Interestingly, Mr Bush and the Republican's attempts to do so have widened the contribution gap in favor of Mr Kerry and the Democrats.
If you will excuse me, I need to go meet Republicans and other potential swing voters to gently complain about Mr. Bush to them and suggest alternatives. By my count, I've only converted 43 this week. I'm 7 short of my weekly quota.
Olaf glad and big,
Thank you! I sincerly hope it doesn't come to that. As I've said, I think we can take our country back from these people and I think we'll make a very good start on November 2nd.
"Toodles Uncle Jackass" is the one I want. It will suck people in for discussion.
Good to here it Mr Happy, enjoy the weekend.
Tena, FLG, SWR, JFTB. take care, got some shit to take care of see yall on another thread.
I mean same channel another "bat" thread.
Toodles.
Just saw this on FoxNews.com from the AP: "U.S. Said to Be Closer to Bin Laden Capture"
http://www.foxnews.com/story/
0,2...,131477,00.html
Ace in the hole? Any bets on the day he is finally captured? How about October 11th?
And hey, to all you lurkers, you get out there and register voters too. If every reader on Eschaton registered 10 new voters- shit, think what an impact that could have.
It could turn a lot of close states into not so much.
It would be a beautiful thing.
To win against Rove, you need to act like Rove...
There is good evidence that George Bush distributed racially charged campaign materials accusing his Blount's opponant of being for desegragation when he worked on the Blount campaign in 72. Don't be afraid of going negative... run it.
The polls in Spain were wrong
The polls in Venezuela were wrong
The polls are bullshit, but they demoralize people. They've already got my husband thinking Kerry will lose and maybe it's time for Plan B. We just made a $1000 bet, I'm saying Kerry will win and I fully expect to collect my money.
As long as others are sharing their empirical experience, here's mine:
I know many Republicans here in the South Jersey/Phila. area, both conservative and moderate, who voted for dubya in 2000 and have no intentions of voting for him again. The moderates dislike him because he's too right wing, and the conservatives hate him for spending like a drunken sailor and running up the deficit. Sure, a couple of them are still drinking the Koolaid, but it's almost as though they've been marginalized and don't even want to talk about the election.
It's important to share this anecdotal evidence, however unscientific. As someone upthread mentioned, the reason the Corporate-Run American Press (CRAP) is using such bizarre polling methods may be to skew the results in shrubya's favor, so if there's any election day hanky panky it won't look suspicious if he "wins" after trailing by double digits in the polls. I know that sounds a bit tin-foil-hattish, but let's face it, Bu$hCo has already done much worse.
But I agree with you that long Kerry coattails could make Congress much closer, or even ours. That would be a thing of beauty.
Hecate
I know its gonna be a tough one but I can dream. In fact I choose to dream.
Lets just act as if there is no way in hell that we are gonna lose.
That should discourage the rovelettes.
every time Rove cries, baby jesus smiles.
Toodles, Hecate, et al
fourlegsgood-
I hope there are community groups who are planning to offer rides to polling places on election day. That is important and completes the effort. Probably more people than we care to think about get lazy on election day.
*
Not to change the subject or anything, but Jaun Cole has some interesting information about the AIPAC/Franklin spy case.
" The Washington Post reported that the leak of intelligence information to Ahmad Chalabi is part of the investigation. Chalabi somehow found out that the US had cracked Iranian communications codes, and passed the information on to Iran, profoundly damaging the ability of the US to monitor Iran's (largely peaced) nuclear program. The Washington Post also reveals that the investigation extends to David Wurmser, who wants to overthrow the governments of Syria and Iran, and now works for Dick "Kindly Grandpa" Cheney. The Post also reveals that Michigan Congressman John Conyers is very concerned that the investigation has been taken over by a Republican political appointee and may get buried as a result.
It turns out that Condi Rice and Stephen Hadley were informed of the investigation already in 2001, which raises real questions about what action AIPAC officials took to spark it in the first place (most of the details so far leaked concern issues that arose in 2002 and 2003). Stephen Hadley is very tight with the Neocons, and if he knew about the investigation, you wonder whether he could have kept it to himself. On the other hand, maybe the FBI deliberately told some people, to see if they then showed up in the electronic surveillance."
.
Toodles, Kent.
*
I must say that Node of Evil is my favorite new nom de blogg.
To win against Rove, you need to act like Rove...
There is good evidence that George Bush distributed racially charged campaign materials accusing his Blount's opponant of being for desegragation when he worked on the Blount campaign in 72. Don't be afraid of going negative... run it.
You can get the actual citation of what happened -in Salon
what Bush learned in that campaign because Blount got caught --was don't do the lying yourself and that is what he has done ever since -got someone else to do the dirty work.
Don't know if anyone's posted it yet, but if anyone wants to send flowers to Clinton, here's the website for Organic Bouquet, the company that was so nice to Lila Lipscomb...
Hey everyone! If anyone wants to come to Canada, even just for a visit, please do! Just watch out for low vacancy rates and high housing costs, particularly in the major urban areas. Our elections are civilized for the most part, although we've had some unusual mud-slinging in the past (just google "McGuinty kitten-eater" for a goofy 2003 press release from the Ontario Conservative party's camp against the Liberal leader - now Ontario's current Premier - Dalton McGuinty) and some that was more serious and tasteless (such as a press release by federal Conservatives suggesting Liberal leader - now Prime Minister - Paul Martin supported child pornography... the Conservatives were justafiably pilloried by the press!).
"u.s. said to be closer to bin ladin capture"
closer than what? it's not like they could be farther from it. forgive me if i seem skeptical.
mj_juran, you beat me to it with the bin Laden story. i predicted this scenario two years ago. people said i was nuts. they'll get him just in time and the sheeple will eat it up. i hate this shit.
Our elections are civilized for the most part
I was honestly amazed at how high the level of discussion was last June compared to the US.
And people were complaining that it was dirty. That shocked me. Canadians don't know what dirty is.
Now why is the level of discours in Canada so much higher than it is in the US.
Canada really doesn't have that great of a press or media. It's pretty much the same thing we've got here.
meathead, why on earth do you believe that they are close to catching bin ladin? because it said so on tv?
I think the reason you are seeing the 'US closer to bin Laden' thing is that Rove is trying to keep the Kerry campaign from bringing up the subject.
Logically it doesn't make much sense... 'Closer to bin Laden'? How the hell would they know one way or another. You either capture him or you don't.
SWR, I've been posting this link for Election Protectio n,they're an organization you can volunteer with to canvass and pollwatch.
There is good evidence that George Bush distributed racially charged campaign materials accusing his Blount's opponant of being for desegragation when he worked on the Blount campaign in 72.
Hmmm. Muy interesante. Any chance any of these materials are still around somewhere?
It's important to share this anecdotal evidence, however unscientific. As someone upthread mentioned, the reason the Corporate-Run American Press (CRAP) is using such bizarre polling methods may be to skew the results in shrubya's favor, so if there's any election day hanky panky it won't look suspicious if he "wins" after trailing by double digits in the polls. I know that sounds a bit tin-foil-hattish, but let's face it, Bu$hCo has already done much worse.
queen crab
Bingo! They're getting the public prepared for Diebold. There's no fucking way Bush could be up 10 points after that convention.
'Closer to bin Laden'? How the hell would they know one way or another. You either capture him or you don't.
LOL. Exactly! bunch o' liars.
*
This is a year I wished I still lived in Utah, where someone with some fight and a feel for the local landscape could change minds. I live in California, which is good and bad -- good because it's an all-around great place to live, bad because I already know Cali will go for Kerry by a decent margin and I would like to cast my vote someplace where Kerry voters are scarce. I just started a new job and so I don't have vacation time saved up to go contribute in a swing state. So, I write. I plan on doing some more active oppo research, especially to counter the takeover of this "spreading Democracy" meme by the Republican party which has done no such thing. I saw that Tbogg picked up on the hypocrisy of Arnold invoking Nelson Mandela when, at the time, a majority of his party believed Mandela was a terrorist. There's lots more where that came from, so I'm off to scrounge through my papers and books and find some gems from the last 30 years of America's imperial adventures.
"close to catching bin ladin" is just something that they throw out there every now and then. bin ladin has been dead for years. you can't get regular dialysis treatments in waziristan even if you stay in one place.
Okay, I now want there to be an election night event: Eat Noodles, Say 'TOODLES!'
This is voter suppression, people. Pure and simple.
Reclaim 'Toodles'! Say it with a smile! Because the U-Hauls are coming to DC on January 20th.
Toodles!
The best thing about the polls showing the big bounce is that Sean Hannity and others like him have been gloating about the "huge bounce." It's going to be really funny in a week or two when they have to explain where that bounce went (after more realistic polls come out.)
Bin Laden Capture? - Beleive it when it happens. This story in some form or another happens every four weeks or so.
My sister lives in Dayton OH. Maybe I should go up there and she and I could volunteer in that very important area some. Even if it's only for a couple of weeks. We'd have to be quiet though. Her husband's a raving right wing lunatic. Of course I could also make some across the border incursions into Southern Missouri and see if I can work against Roy "for rent" Blunt.
Jenny - I've told this story before, but it's been awhile. It fit with your story, I think. My hairdresser friend, Ryan, also told me that she had been invited to go to a party with a woman she didn't know well, to the home of some people she didn't know at all. When she got there, she went into the kitchen and these people had a signed photo of George and Laura on their frig. Ryan said went and found the woman she had come there with and told her that she couldn't stay in that house - she had to leave right that minute. I got a real laugh out of that. Ryan is hilarious. It was all very like the Larry David episode where he was finally going to get his anniversary gift from his wife - having sex with another woman - he's on the couch with the other woman, looks up and sees a signed photo of George Bush and asks her about it. She says she is never without it.That's it. Larry loses his ability to perform. I fell on the floor laughing at that one.
seriously, bin ladin is either in saudi arabia or dead. he's not in afghanistan.
SWR - "Canada really doesn't have that great of a press or media. It's pretty much the same thing we've got here."
No. It isn't. Never has been. It's different. It isn't part of the United States. The media isn't the same.
When I was little and still living in Canada (hear me, Jenny?), one of the most interesting things was the Canadian press commenting, investigating and examining the oddities of US political life. It went on constantly, and was mostly couched in terms of concern and some little fear. The Canadian press has little connexion to that of the US, and with the exception of the leakage from the US media electronically, it has little in common with it.
It's probably time for you to go take a good read in the Globe and Mail. Or the Toronto Star. Or even, heavens, the Calgary Herald.
'I must say that Node of Evil is my favorite new nom de blogg.'
Thanks! Hopefully I can scare up some interesting stuff for you to read. I'll put up tidbits from time to time as I'm working.
-Andrew-
The best thing about the polls showing the big bounce is that Sean Hannity and others like him have been gloating about the "huge bounce." It's going to be really funny in a week or two when they have to explain where that bounce went (after more realistic polls come out.)
availablelight
They'll just blow it off like they never said any such thing. Repukes are masters at ignorning unfavorable news like it doesn't exist and howling when things go their way.
I like the reclaim "toodles" idea. That idiot Karen Schell needs to have it shoved down her throat. A whole lot.
It's probably time for you to go take a good read in the Globe and Mail. Or the Toronto Star. Or even, heavens, the Calgary Herald.
I read these papers every once in awhile but I don't think the difference is enough to account for the tremendous difference in the discourse around the elections.
And Canada has its own tabloid media. So does the UK.
I thought Bin Laden escaped Pakistan to Africa a couple of years back. I always felt he went to Mali (so similar to Afghanistan in demographics it isn't funny), but after the Taliban-like crap popped up in Sudan, that seemed more plausible to me. Besides, didn't Bin Laden used to live in Sudan?
if they know where bin ladin is, shouldn't they have him already?
and if they don't know where he is, what makes them think they're close to catching him?
if you read the story closely, i think the guy is saying they have a plan in place so that they can catch him if they can find him.
i guess they've handed out handcuffs, or sumthin'
The curious thing about those polls to me is that just a few days ago they were telling us that only 3 or 4 percent of the voters where undecided. In addition, the ratings on the convention were not that great. They really don't make any sense.
Ha ha, it's funny watching everyone here squirm as Kerry collapses.
So now the polls are bogus because they show Kerry smacked down?
Newsweek, baby. Out this afternoon:
Bush/Cheney receive 13-point margin bounce from convention.
Bush/Cheney lead Kerry/Edwards 54 to 43 percent.
Bush approval rating rises to 52 percent -- first time above 50 since January.
A majority (53%) wants to See Him re-elected, the highest since May 2003.
Like Duncan, you guys should just take the rest of the weekend off.
Maybe do a little windsurfing off Nantucket — that all-American recreational activity (like NASCAR — and "who among us doesn't like NASCAR?" in the immortal words of JFK) . . . .
.
All of you that are wringing your hands worrying about the poll numbers, CALM DOWN!
Think back to January when many MANY of us thought that Howard Dean had this in the bag. How shocked we were when Kerry won the Iowa primary. I know I was absolutely flabbergasted. It took me days to get over this disappointment. If not weeks.
I do believe we are going to see the same thing come this November. Kerry will not only win this election, it won't even be close.
Now you can all think that I live with rose colored glasses, perhaps I do. But, I sure as hell would rather wear my rose colored glasses than live with doom and gloom.
As an aside, I realize I live in a pretty democrat area of Minnesota and I work with a majority of liberal people, still, I have not come across one single person that voted for Gore last time that is voting for Bush. I can name at least 20 people that voted for Bush that are voting for Kerry.
And because I screen all my phone calls, as do the majority of my friends, none of us have ever been polled. I think it is getting more and more difficult to get a good cross section of the public to do any sort of accurate polls.
Tena - good one. you know, in times past i might have swayed on the side of tolerance but these days, i cannot muster any good will toward the other side.
okay. i'm off to have a nice left-wing psycho holiday weekend.
toodles all!
*
Let's say they're close to getting bin Laden. I don't believe this myself -- remember the earlier "we're closing the net" business and the "HVT" for the Democratic Convention? -- but let's prepare ourselves for all possiblities.
They bring him in public right before the election. We say, "Great -- glad you finally got him. Of course, it took three years and in the meantime he's been continuing to work against our interests. And of course he's had three years to prepare for this and to train his successors, so getting him now isn't as effective as it would have been three years ago. But good show! You've finally got him!" We need to point out that Al Qaeda is not just bin Laden; it was never just bin Laden, and now, three years after 9/11, you can bet your life that there are hundreds, even thousands, of cells all over the world to carry on his work.
I personally think it's unlikely that they're going to get him at all, let alone in time for the election. I just finished reading Imperial Hubris, and, while there are some serious problems and contradictions in his conclusions, he makes a clear point that bin Laden is a hero to Muslims throughout the world. He is not seen by most Muslims as a terrorist but as the next Saladin. We think, as Westerners, that everyone has his price, but we may not be thinking like Middle Eastern Muslims. I think it would be much less likely that Pakistan, or any country composed mostly of Muslims, would be able to find people who were willing to turn bin Laden in for a reward, no matter what the reward was. He's being protected, and has been for the last three years. He will continue to be protected, and as long as we're thinking in terms of bin Laden as someone like Saddam Hussein, we are never going to defeat al Qaeda.
David Patterson | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 6:00 pm | #
closer to catching Bin Laden-LOL. If they do catch him by November it'll be purely accidental. This is like saying we've killed or captured X percentage of Al Qaeda leadership. A totally imaginary statistic.
David Patterson | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 6:00 pm | #
I'm going to have to donate some $$$ now.
The Toronto Star's Linda McQuaig is often worth reading.
I remember when she appeared on that CBC comedy show about the teevee news room. What was that called? A friend of mine has every episode on videocassette and he lent it to me once. I ROTFL. Truly some funny stuff.
Whoops!
Two Anti-Kerry Vets Serve on VA Panel
WASHINGTON - Two former Vietnam prisoners of war who appear in ads attacking Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry were appointed by the Bush administration to a panel advising the Department of Veterans Affairs.
Swift Boat Liars shown to be connected to the administration. Again.
They're still a bit testy about the number of US folks who went up in the 60s and 70s and took Canadian jobs. Not nice.
They've more than caught up since, I believe. I'm pretty sure I know more Canadians working in the US than vice-versa, and I have friends on both sides of the border.
One of them just moved to Kitchener/Waterloo last year, right after his divorce. If his case is any indication, the landed immigration process is fairly simple if you marry a Canadian.
bin Laden will not let himself be taken alive. Count on it. He would so kill himself if he thought they were even close.
I've been thinking - the neck and neck race that the polls have reflected until this anomalous Bush bounce crap is a good thing. It keeps us Democrats hungry and mad. As long as we don't let them get to us, we have got the edge in a big way. It assures high Democratic voter turnout, something we didn't have when Gore was running. High voter turnout=Democrats win. Remember that, my lovelies - there are more Democrats in this country than Repugs.
bin Laden will not let himself be taken alive. Count on it. He would so kill himself if he thought they were even close.
Remember those multi-million dollar rewards they had for his capture?
With bin Laden, I really believe that it's not about money. Who would be an apostate to turn in a Muslim hero for mere money? The kind of dishonor you're talking about would destroy you. You would be a pariah. It wouldn't be worth it.
"who among us doesn't like nascar?"
i'm not into racing much at all, but my father loves formula1, indy car racing. he calls nascar "antique car racing" because of the requirement that the cars driven by engines with carbureters and pushrods. plus they go pretty slow for "race cars".
With bin Laden, I really believe that it's not about money. Who would be an apostate to turn in a Muslim hero for mere money? The kind of dishonor you're talking about would destroy you. You would be a pariah. It wouldn't be worth it.
Nora | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 6:07 pm | #
My point exactly. Bush wasn't "sensitive" enough to Muslim culture.
Instead of talking about how Bin Laden discraced Islam or playing up the number of Muslims he's killed, Bush offered a $$$ reward.
Had he been able to see things from their point of view, somebody might have risked his/her life to turn him in.
Incog
Why does everyone ignore theDiebold central tabulator scheme? This thing was designed to be rigged. Backdoor entry, two sets of books and all changes can be completely erased? Worries the hell out of me that the media won't comment and state govts. don't want to hear about it. I hate to say it, but I'm with you.
Re: Joe Lockhart
Go, Joe, Go! Let the Joementum begin:
Democrats said the president's plans for a second term were just rehash of four-year old promises. "It's almost like the president, with his boyish charms, is asking for a do-over," Kerry spokesman Joe Lockhart said.
link
Isn't it just nauseating how the repukes only show up to gloat? When Kerry was up, I never visited wing nut blogs to gloat. Another example of the caliber of creeps they are and how small their nooders are.
Ace in the hole? Any bets on the day he is finally captured? How about October 11th?
Any bets on which hotel in Bahrain or Abu Dhabi they've got him in?
Nora, I think you're making a mistake assuming the Bin Laden is a hero to most Muslims. Anon's analysis of our foreign policy problems is good, but he doesn't really have a handle on the Muslim world. It's not his area of expertise. Check this review in the Guardian.
When did NASCAR become a rethuglican thing? I seem to remember when I was growing up in the grimy coal region of NE PA, auto racing was pretty popular. And it's always been heavily Democratic up there.
Bush is an ignoramus. I'm not saying he's stupid; I'm saying he doesn't give a shit. He knows there's lots of stuff out there that he has no clue about and he has no desire to get a clue.
His response to bin Laden was just another example of that. It played well to the American public, the Wild West thing, "Wanted - Dead or Alive" with reward money. But it had little or no chance of getting desirable results from the people who might have been able to catch bin Laden.
And then he was so lazy that he didn't even bother to commit our troops to capture bin Laden at Tora Bora. No, let the Afghans do it; do it on the cheap (in terms of American lives and money), without considering whether Afghan tribesmen would really go into the caves and capture or kill a man who they believed was a hero. Result: three years later, we're still hearing breathless reports about how they're getting close to catching bin Laden.
Why doesn't he hire Carville?
Probably the same reason why Chimpy hasn't hired Matalin.
as far as canadian media goes, my local npr station carries "as it happens" it's very good. i listen to it pretty often, mostly because i'm in love with barbara budd's voice though.
"who among us doesn't like nascar?"
Well, I like races where you have to turn in more than one direction
'I'm going to have to donate some $$$ now.'
Don't forget to donate double, because that's a two-fer trolling. The real David Patterson always used his real email address; behind that Patterson-facade is just our usual psychopathic trolling chum though. But give in honor of both of them all the same!
Hoary cripple re Diebold: Worries the hell out of me that the media won't comment.
Corporate-Run American Press = CRAP
CSPAN2 is great right now. Krugman, Unger, Blumenthal, and Joe Wilson's on right now.
There is good evidence that George Bush distributed racially charged campaign materials accusing his Blount's opponant of being for desegragation when he worked on the Blount campaign in 72. Don't be afraid of going negative... run it.
There's good evidence that George Bush didn't distribute jack shit when he was "working" on the Blount campaign, which is why they had to get Red Blount's nephew to do it.
Or do I have the story wrong?
Incog
Why does everyone ignore theDiebold central tabulator scheme? This thing was designed to be rigged. Backdoor entry, two sets of books and all changes can be completely erased? Worries the hell out of me that the media won't comment and state govts. don't want to hear about it. I hate to say it, but I'm with you.
hoary cripple
I don't understand it either since all this time it's been known. I'm glad we have mechanical machines here which have always worked fine but they're replacing them with Diebold.
"It's almost like the president, with his boyish charms, is asking for a do-over,"
Excellent. More like this, please.
karin, thanks for the review. As I said, I just finished reading the book and had some serious mental reservations about a lot of the things anonymous said, though I hadn't picked up on the one the Guardian reviewer pointed out.
Still, I think that we have been underestimating bin Laden by talking about him as a crazy extremist, a "terrorist" and not a leader of people. And I think that anonymous is right that there have been people in Afghanistan guarding him and keeping an eye on him for years, and that those people are devoted to him and will not turn him in for any monetary consideration.
"CSPAN2 is great right now. Krugman, Unger, Blumenthal, and Joe Wilson's on right now."
Yeah, I loved hearing Krugman say again "If the Bush administration said the earth was flat, the headlines in the media the next day would say 'Shape of Earth in Dispute'".
>"It's almost like the president, with his boyish charms, is asking for a do-over,"
I really think Kerry will be stressing the "broken promises" theme -- he hit it pretty good Thursday night in Ohio.
anonymous in nc - please let me know what Krugman, et al, are saying. No TV.
When Kerry was up, I never visited wing nut blogs to gloat.
I don't go anywhere near them myself. I haven't had my shots.
His response to bin Laden was just another example of that. It played well to the American public, the Wild West thing, "Wanted - Dead or Alive" with reward money. But it had little or no chance of getting desirable results from the people who might have been able to catch bin Laden.
Don't people get it? Don't people see what happens when you have a kleptoctracy in charge of the country and you respond to everything with "bomb them back to the stone age?"
Two years ago, terrorists literally took over a theater in the middle of Moscow?
Weaken the American economy enough, take enough stupid casualties in enough stupid wars, and you'll turn the USA into Putin's Russia.
These people are playing with everybody's safety.
I thought he was hiring Begala????
Fun and games in Maryland - The new Florida?
Md. Election Official Placed on Leave
Judge Is Asked to Block Firing; Board Appoints Acting Chief
By John Wagner and Brigid Schulte
Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, September 4, 2004; Page B01
Maryland Elections Administrator Linda H. Lamone asked a judge yesterday to block the Board of Elections' attempt to oust her, as two leading Democrats accused the Republican-dominated board of blatantly abusing its political power.
In a move that triggered a full afternoon of legal and political jockeying, election board Chairman Gilles W. Burger (R) announced that Lamone had been placed on paid leave for unspecified complaints that rose to the level of "incompetence, misconduct or other good cause." Linda Lamone will get the chance to defend herself at hearings in October.
The board then immediately named Robin Downs Colbert, Prince George's County elections administrator, as acting chief of the state agency.
Democrats said the personnel action, decided at a seven-hour session Thursday, was little more than a partisan bid to take control of the state's election machinery before two key contests -- the presidential race in November and the governor's race in 2006. Burger stressed that Colbert, a Democrat, has 25 years of experience as an election official
As a Canadian, he actually didn't have an opinion that he could share with you, since to do so would have violated all his early training in not telling the people from the south just now nutty they are....
I resent that. I'm Canadian and I have no problem telling the cousins from the south just how completely nuts you guys are from time to time.
Nora - I wish I could get ahold of the article I read well over a year ago about bin Laden. Al Qaeda has in fact engendered good will in less cosmopolitan areas of the middle east and south asia by feeding people, getting care for the sick, etc. I know that since he is a Wahabist, the Shiites, for example, don't like him. And I know that there must be legions of Muslims who are Sunni who don't like him, either. But I do think that it is naive to believe that it would be that easy to turn him in and collect that reward. He has lots of friends and no matter what the rest of the bin Ladens claim, he has lots of family on his side, too.
Weaken the American economy enough, take enough stupid casualties in enough stupid wars, and you'll turn the USA into Putin's Russia.
These people are playing with everybody's safety.
SWR
The future belongs to a Pax-China after the Pax Americana and Pax Islam exhaust themselves thanks to these idiots. We're probably already in a Clash of Civilizations. So China is just sitting back enjoying all this. Empires have always wax and waned this way with another replacing it.
I recommend CBC Radio to everyone. The programs are consistently interesting and high-quality. It's one of my favorite bits of Canadian media.
Olaf - Hee! Glad I'm not the only one who gets shivers when Barbara Budd comes on. And I'm a married woman!
Wilson is on fire. He mentions that the publication of his 1999 trip to Niger dealing with nonproliferation burned a number of his business contacts in Africa.
The neoconservatives 'are a parasite loyal only unto themselves who found the Republican party a willing host.'
A source from the WSJ: 'The real reason they went after you so hard was because you've been so effective.'
Yes, there are a lot of tribal areas in Afghanistan & Pakistan right now, where Bin Laden will be protected and supported(assuming he's there). Part of it is the code of hospitality, once someone has been granted sanctuary you can't just give them up. Honor is at stake. Also, even if they're not crazy about OBL, if forced to choose between him and the U.S., they'll take him.
The pro-wrestling approach to motivating American voters
Tag-team match for first couple of America!
Big John & Ms. T vs Georgie Cheerleader & The Lizard Queen
Olaf-
I gave up watching tv news long ago. I guess I just wouldn't put it past these mf'ers to produce dialysis man just in time.
Thank you hoary cripple. I'll have my 21 year old tell me how to translate that. And to why, SWR, I haven't given money, how would you know? Actually, I've done that, and been on my hands and knees building butterfly gardens in the urban schools. Next Friday we will have a 9/11 celebration with the garden, which has been named after a victim of 9/11's 3 year old son, with police horses, veterans, poetry and selling buttons to send money to soldiers to buy phone cards. It's called "being where the rubber meets the road."
Wilson suggests that his smearing was a dress rehearsal for the Swift Boat smear: allowed them to test out tactics and fine-tune them.
The future belongs to a Pax-China after the Pax Americana and Pax Islam exhaust themselves thanks to these idiots. We're probably already in a Clash of Civilizations. So China is just sitting back enjoying all this. Empires have always wax and waned this way with another replacing it.
Incognito | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 6:27 pm | #
Some of it's actually making the mainstream media, like the coming clash between the USA and China over oil.
China's industrializing at an unreal pace. They're importing several times the amount of oil they did only a decade ago.
Like comics?
Here's a newly published 200 page comics anthology of stories about the history of the Bush Family & its known associates. A group of internationally reknowned cartoonists including Ralph Steadman (Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas), Steve Brodner (The Nation), and Spain Rodriguez (Zap Comics, Salon) has been gathered by Fantagraphics Books to relate this: The Bush Junta, a Field Guide to Corruption in Government.
More info and samples here:
http://www.mackwhite.com/BushJunta.html
Amazon link with ordering info here:
http://tinyurl.com/5lrpm
I promise not to plug this again for another week.
--Duke
'The whiff of fascism': 'beware, you will not know until it is too late.'
And to why, SWR, I haven't given money, how would you know?
I never said you didn't. I said "why not" give money "if you think I'm a troll." In other words, why not give *more* to counteract my trolling.
The only right wing blog I ever visit at all is The World Magazine Blog. I go over there once in a blue moon and drop a small turd of doubt into the comments. I have a thing about the religious right.
I'm never abusive, I just will point out where something that has been posted is completely false and then I usually ask them if they really think their Savior is pleased about their spreading lies. I also tend to point out all the ways that George Bush is not a good christian, and ask them if they are so sure after all that he isn't really on satan's side. It's pointless, but it warms my heart a bit.
The panel's repeated on CSPAN2:
Sunday, Sept. 5 at 2 AM
Monday, Sept. 6 at 6 AM
I can TiVo it and create a BitTorrent if you like...
It's called "going to a place that is different/strange/dangereous/ and being accepted and making a diffence."
Who would be an apostate to turn in a Muslim hero for mere money?
I'm sure Islam has its share of Ralph Reeds. Chalabi would do it in a second if he only knew where the man was.
anonymous in nc... Wislon is a much better speaker than Sidney, but I liked Sidney's content more. (Glad someone other than me is watching CSPAN on a Sat afternoon...)
Anyway, did anyone else see Alterman on Booknotes or Washington Journal or whatever it was? Damn, he is almost as much of a snotty bastard as I am... show me the evidence, bitch!
Screw the niceties. We are fucking demonstrably correct. They are fucking proven liers. This isn't relativity land... there is an objective reality, and it is on our side.
High voter turnout=Democrats win. Remember that, my lovelies - there are more Democrats in this country than Repugs.
No doubt. Everytime I here some right-wing blowhard make some noise about how the country is "trending conservative," I think to myself,"Then why has the Democratic candidate won the popular vote in the last three presidential elections?"
And it's about to be four.
I'm sure Islam has its share of Ralph Reeds. Chalabi would do it in a second if he only knew where the man was.
Jack Daniel | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 6:35 pm | #
There aren't many Chalabi's in the tribal areas of Pakistan.
The equivalent would be Paris Hilton working on the pipeline in northern Alaska.
Actually, Tena, sometimes the only time I feel I've made a difference is here on the web, even though I've lived the inner city thing. But we are just fooling ourselves here.
Yeah, I loved hearing Krugman say again "If the Bush administration said the earth was flat, the headlines in the media the next day would say 'Shape of Earth in Dispute'".
Puts me in mind of Ted Koppel's interview with Jon Stewart, when Koppel said the press could only report "facts," and truth had to catch up later.
Koppel actually said that if Bush called Koppel a drug dealer in a speech, journalists would be obligated to report the "fact" of the statement, even if it is a lie.
Krugman, in other words, was exactly right. And Stewart couldn't get Koppel out of his ivory journalism tower long enough to understand why such obtuseness frustrates the audience for news.
Incog and queen crab
On this subject I've been called a pessimist and a tinfoil hatter on the same post. First, I believe Kerry can win the electoral vote assuming he plays the game correctly and gets face time. Second, I do enjoy a good conspiracy theory by the way, but why has everyone seemingly forgotten that Bushco stole the election in '04?
I applaude people's efforts to register new voters and talk undecideds into voting Kerry. But, if this problem isn't addressed, we're screwed.
any suggestions?
China's industrializing at an unreal pace. They're importing several times the amount of oil they did only a decade ago.
SWR
And building 24 nuclear power plants and they've damned the Yangtze. They're kicking butt.
hecate-so hillary is off-limits? do I detect partyline?
what if the dems had stood up and questioned bush?
St Paul E Wog @ 4:29 pm: I hadn't seen that particular clip but I've read other sites about the evidence. Makes you wonder, doesn't it? If I'm not mistaken, they didn't find wreckage at the WTC either, did they?
And building 24 nuclear power plants and they've damned the Yangtze. They're kicking butt.
Incognito | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 6:41 pm | #
On the bottom of the IBM Thinkpad I'm typing on now it says "made in China."
I don't know if China is going to become a world dominating power like the USA, the British or the USSR, but fuck with their oil supply and you *won't* be going up against the Iraqis.
We're eventually going to have to either fight them or join them.
Sid Bleumthal (sp) on the media issue:
'the on the "one hand" - on the "other hand" problem'.
Siwft Boat Vets - prime example. The Vets present the 'lie'- and it's all Kerry's fault. The media 'promotes the 'lie' as fact. Then the media at the same time presents the other side - the 'truth' - as the 'on the other hand' part of the the story.
This thereby adbicates responsibility to report the truth.
As Joe Wilson said - the media takes what is used in 'talking points' as the whole fact, without bothering to read the rest of the story. Which confirms what most of us know - they are stenographers at best.
That whiff of fascism you smell.... watch the fuck out. You have been warned.
Strongly suggest watching this on CSpan this weekend. You will be enlightened.
And building 24 nuclear power plants and they've damned the Yangtze. They're kicking butt.
why are the chinese kicking our ass right now -- they understand that a stable financial sector to support expansionism and infrastructure are the two most important components of economic strength; we are sitting on our ass building a military
i think it was andy grove of intel who once reconciled that the dot com bust wasn't totally the sum of bad business plans; he argued then as now that we had a killer product with the internet and 50 year old crumbling and conjested freeways that could not support the dot com craze
the chinese "get it" better than we do now; and now they are financing our debt
if we do not repair our trade deficit and come to grips with a better energy policy, we are in trouble within five years
We're eventually going to have to either fight them or join them.
Incognito | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 6:44 pm | #
That's a false choice. We co-existed with the USSR. We can co-exist with the Chinese.
We just have to get these loons out of power.
China's a big market. Plenty of people willing to buy from the US when they get enough $$$.
"And building 24 nuclear power plants and they've damned the Yangtze. They're kicking butt."
Also, the nuke plants are pebble-bed reactors that are meltdown-proof, and almost hands-free/idiotproof.
Which means safe.
any suggestions?
hoary cripple
Cross our fingers is all we can do now. But we've been saying this for over two years but things just sort of fooled around and never got done--probably on purpose.
When did NASCAR become a rethuglican thing? I seem to remember when I was growing up in the grimy coal region of NE PA, auto racing was pretty popular. And it's always been heavily Democratic up there.
The Andrettis are/were Indy car drivers. NASCAR is really a Southern thing, not a Republican thing; it's just that most of the South votes Republican now.
NASCAR's geographical appeal has widened as well; they've added Indianapolis to the NASCAR circuit, and I recently saw a minivan with Dale Earnhardt paraphernalia parked in front of a Tim Horton's in Huntsville, Ontario.
(my dad up in northern Indiana likes to describe NASCAR as "twenty rednecks chasing a Hoosier".)
Think back to January when many MANY of us thought that Howard Dean had this in the bag. How shocked we were when Kerry won the Iowa primary. I know I was absolutely flabbergasted. It took me days to get over this disappointment. If not weeks.
i had the same experience, except i was elated.
John Kerry Kicks Ass!!!
bush sux ass.
Anyway, did anyone else see Alterman on Booknotes or Washington Journal or whatever it was? Damn, he is almost as much of a snotty bastard as I am... show me the evidence, bitch!
It was great. The fact-deprived GOP callers normally get a free ride, and Alterman delivered a hearty fuck-you. Not necessarily catching flies with honey, but certainly would remind people how GOPism is not that far from believing in the divinity of the Jeebus.
Robert Jeffers: Blumenthal talked about this. He called it 'false objectivity', in which the press has derogated its duty to be an arbiter of fact. I think there's a more exact term to describe this process whereby the existential basis of a statement is more important than its epistemological basis. Put simply, the media regards the telling of a lie as news, rather than whether it's true.
It's manifest in so many ways: in the Faux News 'some people say', for instance. Perhaps it comes down to the culture of Biblical literalism: when people really, truly believe that the world was created in seven days because it's written down in one book, then there's obviously a market for a media that treats other mythical texts with similar, if temporary, reverence.
China's a big market. Plenty of people willing to buy from the US when they get enough $$$.
Except right now they're selling everything to us.
Heard a report recently about the labor shortage in China (yes, labor shortage. The factory owner they focussed on has one factory that makes 40% of the bicycle helmets in the world.
Quite a lot, even if it is only bicycle helmets. The region of China his factory is in is called "the factory of the world." It is not an exaggeration.
We saw ourselves that way after WWII, with industrial Europe bombed into the Stone Age. It's time to see China as the U.S. after WWII.
But don't tell the GOP. They'd just foam at the mouth again.....
China's a big market. Plenty of people willing to buy from the US when they get enough $$$.
SWR
The environment can't handle the damage we're doing now. A billion 300 million people wanting cars and refrigerators--and India, too? Forget it. You think Global Warming is bad now, we'll probably have a run away green-house effect like on Venus and fry ourselves. That's the trends but anyway you look at it whether short-term or long-term, it's over.
Heard a report recently about the labor shortage in China (yes, labor shortage. The factory owner they focussed on has one factory that makes 40% of the bicycle helmets in the world.
The problem is the world is entirely too small for these retards the USA has in power now.
China is kicking ass building industry but they have *serious* environmental problems. Parts of Western China are becoming desert, for example.
Right now we just can't afford the USA to turn into a fascist madhouse with half the population thumping bibles and foaming at the mouth to kill Muslims. We can't turn into Putin's Russia, an ineffectual kleptocracy getting its ass kicked by a few terrorists.
We're just too important to be idiots. I wish people would get this.
HC, a paper receipt (like the one you get when you use an ATM) would go a long way to prevent abuse. Congressman Rush Holt of NY was sponsoring legislation a while back to provide for this "paper trail" for balloting. I wrote to all my reps asking them to support Holt's bill and pleaded on all the blogs for others to do the same. As far as I know, the bill is still stalled somewhere. And with only two months to go, there's probably not enough time to get this done. One other possibility, though, might be to do a mail-in vote. And if you live in a swing state, especially one where there's a large minority and/or elderly population, you can make sure those people get to the polls and are allowed to vote. A lot of the problems in 2000 came about because a lot of people, for a variety of reasons, were unable to cast their votes.
all of the china apologists in the room, please understand that china does present a more significant threat to us than advertised; it shows that a totalitarian power can adopt free-market principles and use it's economy as an economic extension of its military
and you want to know why North Korea is just sitting there? it's because of its might as an economic power and how the chinese are financing western debtor nations like us
they can walk the walk and talk the talk and it's a bigger danger than terrorism I assure you
take a glance at buchanan's new book about how the right is selling us all out on china policy - revealing point
oh and, hectater.....entertain that I've been a smart agressive woman who spent over 20 years in the medical sphere.
all I wanted to point out is that the sainted dems (hill & kerry) didn't stand up to the transparently slanted rationale for war on iraq.
entertain what it might be like if the dems had a candidate who could point to their consistent opposition to the iraq war.
Duke- I appreciate the plug. And did you know Art Spiegelman has a new book?
When did NASCAR become a rethuglican thing? I seem to remember when I was growing up in the grimy coal region of NE PA, auto racing was pretty popular. And it's always been heavily Democratic up there.
I recall hearing that Dale Earhardt Jr. took his entire team to Fahrenheit 9/11. Republican or not, at least some of them are open-minded.
Put simply, the media regards the telling of a lie as news, rather than whether it's true.
When we dethrone the chimperor, we need to work on this problem next. This state of affairs cannot be allowed to continue if we want to have a healthy democracy.
Corporate-Run Media = CRAP
Bush's acceptence speech in < ahref="http://www.dorkinglabs.com/fim_popup.php?id=87">summary
Er, I mean:
Corporate-Run American Press = CRAP
Put simply, the media regards the telling of a lie as news, rather than whether it's true.
When we dethrone the chimperor, we need to work on this problem next. This state of affairs cannot be allowed to continue if we want to have a healthy democracy.
Corporate-Run Media = CRAP
queen crab | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 7:01 pm | #
Anybody who was in NYC last week could have gone to a rather inspiring rally in midtown.
5000 people were in the streets rallying against Fox news and CNN. Jello Biafra and Jeff Cohen were there.
It didn't get much coverage but it was great. Even the cops were bending over to listen to the speakers and nodding their heads in agreement.
Whoops, this link should work
summary
The juicer and hotter environment with two hurricanes in less than a couple of weeks hitting Florida is an example of Global Warming. Insurance companies, which do long-term analysis of this so would have really good data, are increasingly unlikely to insure Floridians against hurricane damage. Florida will probably we erased off the map in the future when the Hurricane Super Storm hits.
Congressman Rush Holt of New Jersey. He was my Congressman(I'm now in another district). I was thrilled when he won in an extremely close election, the difference between him and his opponent was in the low 100's.
Bush's acceptence speech in summary
On the subject of fact-checking, Jon Stewart had Chris Mathews on last night. Jon said, referencing Chris and Zell, that it's come down to this:
Politicians saying to journalists if you question my statments, I will kill you!
Bush's acceptence speech in summary
With NASCAR, you have to remember that there's also a strong anti-authoritarian element there, especially among people who look back to the early days of stock car racing in the days of bootlegging runs.
That's the tradition that Dale Jr. (and his father) belong to -- an irreverent tradition -- and I don't think that tradition wants to be hitched to the back of the GOP wagon.
"The simple truth is John Kerry was in Vietnam and George Bush (news - web sites) wasn't," Plusquellic told the crowd in Ohio, a critical battleground state. "It's as simple as that. George Bush was hiding in the woods in Alabama when John Kerry was defending our country."
The mayor of Akron today. We need more of this - it is brief and to the point. It defines the issue, rather than taking the bait of the GOP definition of the issue (who cares exactly if/when Kerry was in Cambodia?)
queen crab
Yes, I wrote my reps. and sens. and signed an online petition as well. About a month ago on CSPAN I saw congress debating it. they has a panel of experts who seemed evenly split as to whether a paper reciept would work. Inrerestingly enough, those against spoke like politicians, while those in favor sounded like techies. Anyway, I didn't get the feeling anything was going to get done.
My idea was to have to reciepts; one you drop in a voting box and the other you keep for yourself.
The problem with mail-in votes and absentees is they're all entered into the central tabulator, which is then compromised.
any suggestions?
hoary cripple
contact your local and state election authorities and demand that they require election machine vendors to allow their software to be publicly audited.
as it stands right now, the people who test voting machines do not talk about the testing at all; the only indications the press has been able to get from them are that the process includes silly things like shock and vibration testing, which can only make sense for voting machines if you're going to have an election on Mars.
Anyone who's serious about developing software for a living realizes that s/he has to make his/her code available for peer review before it is released. The secrecy under which electronic voting machines are currently being built would not be tolerated in any serious commercial environment. There is no reasonable incentive to conceal software of an embedded device like a voting machine; the only thing this kind of secrecy can lead to is buggy software.
The only way that the public can be confident in the integrity of its election processes is for those processes to be conducted in public, with all the technical details of voting technology made open to public scrutiny. Anything less should be considered susceptible to fraud; the burden of proof of the honesty and integrity of voting technology must rest with the manufacturer.
When I was little and still living in Canada (hear me, Jenny?)
GWPDA - huh?
Just wanted to pop back in to say the following: Well, first of all, do you think I have a problem with someone from another country? I'm not exactly sure why you continue to point out that you are originally from Canada. So what?
I am not bashing Canadians! I'm laughing at myself as much as anyone else. I know that many different societies have unique ways of expression and am not a "nutty American". I'm not a jingoistic or nationalistic soul.
I was just giving an anecdote to my fellow commenters about my level of intensity these days, probably in response to another's story in the same vein.
Today, apathy is hard to take. This fellow I was talking about has lived in this country a long time. He was not here on holiday.
Anyway, we've always had a nice cyber relationship and I do adore your dog too (forgot his name at the moment). Please don't paint me as some type of cultural know-nothing or bigot. That's not me.
I was just having a funny kind of a day and that's the way I expressed myself. I dare to venture that if my "date" had been from Zimbabwe, living in this country for any length of time, and did not have an opinion I would have felt and responded the same way.
I spent a summer month a few years ago in Vancouver and had one of the nicest times of my life. Loved the place, loved the people and always will have wonderful memories.
Peace!
*
With NASCAR, you have to remember that there's also a strong anti-authoritarian element there, especially among people who look back to the early days of stock car racing in the days of bootlegging runs.
Smokey and the Bandit was on TV last week. Ha. Ha. Ha. What a great movie.
It really summed up the redneck anti-authoritarian quality you're describing.
If the fucking body armor was so important, why did the cowBOY send them to war without it? Can you imagine the casualties if he had ANY of the WMD they said he did?
hecate-so hillary is off-limits? do I detect partyline?
No, you detect some people who object to your being an asshat.
Surely you can't be surprised at that, when you come in here equating the clintons and kerry with the bushes and bob dole without any supporting arguments.
Now, if all you can do is whine about being "censored", please go away.
I finally found this article about the hunt for Osama, which the earlier conversation brought to mind. It's from The New Yorker and a year old, but still worthwhile.
Excerpts:Ijaz said he’d been told that bin Laden was surrounded by concentric circles of security: an outer ring of loyal villagers, a second ring of tribal leaders, and an inner ring of personal aides and bodyguards. “Since he’s surrounded by devout followers, there’s virtually no chance of the U.S. being able to pinpoint him,” he said.
....
Asad Hayauddin confirmed that a United States military presence in the tribal areas “would be very unwelcome. There is great resistance to the idea of foreign occupation of any sort.” He added, “You have to deal with this area politically, not militarily. That’s why the U.S. is having such problems. They don’t have an anthropological approach to world problems. If you take an armored personnel carrier, or a helicopter gunship, you kill innocent people. Then you’ve lost that village for a hundred years. These places run on revenge.”
......
Cannistraro, the former C.I.A. official, said that the effort to find bin Laden had “lost at least half of its original strength.” He added, “Arabic speakers are in short supply. You still have some intelligence-collection assets in Afghanistan, but mostly it’s just small teams looking for signals. That’s because of Iraq.”
Rand Beers, who until March handled terrorism issues for the National Security Council, told me he had become so concerned about the impact that the war in Iraq was having on the war on terrorism that he quit his job—at the height of the American invasion. Beers, who served on the N.S.C. under Ronald Reagan and both Presidents Bush, is now an adviser for the Presidential campaign of the Democratic Senator John Kerry. He told me, “I have worried for some time that it became politically inconvenient” for the Bush Administration to “complete operations sufficiently in Afghanistan.”
I forget where I read that, but that was the word. he dealt blow in college.
Vinnie
don't forget those fANG "training runs" to pick up "tropical plants" in Central America
The Time poll is crap - instead of random sampling, they consciously asked for the youngest adult male in each household. In other words, they aimed for the subpopulation where Bush is strongest....
Rick
you mean the draft-age ones? now that's fucking scary, but we have 2 months to turn that around
I wonder if Rush has his hillbilly heroin in a water proof container?
anyone have thoughts on the future that are not tied to current candidates?
My sister and niece came to visit me here in the U.S. last November. The first thing they said after clearing the airport was that they were so reminded of the old Soviet Union with all the safety stuff and waiting in long lines. There are other similarities. For example, the Soviet union put up one candidate for elections, the U.S. puts up two. Most countries put up a lot more than that. Then there are the high crime rates of the U.S. and Russia which are similar, likewise the odd adoration of dictatorial governing styles.
But I do love the common Americans I have met here.
The Andrettis are/were Indy car drivers.
Mario was a RACER. Won in every type of car. Sprint cars,Indy cars, F-1 WORLD CHAMP, and won the Daytona 500 (nascar). In practice at the US Motorcycle GP at Laguna Seca a few years ago, he set a time on a borrowed bike that was good enough for 4th on the grid!
On the political front, the only chance Shekelgruber has of avoiding the worst landslide in US history is Diebold. Polls, like all statistics, can be made to say whatever they want them to say. Twist this here, that there, and voila!
RE: finding a new country to move to, where on earth do ya plan to run to that isn't subject to the American Hegemony of the New Reich?
hmm. without supporting evidence, Jack Daniel?
ok. the bushes may be east coast native, but they "win" on being tied to southern states.
doles made a big deal of being from "heartland" kansas. both of them have lived in washington for years. but now, Liddy is the Senator from North Carolina?
and the couple that came from " a place called hope, AK"-produces an illinois native as a senator from ny?
I may not disagree with Hillary's positions, but I have to be honest enough with myself to recognize ambition when I see it. Ultimately, it's a matter of liberals not being afraid to be just that. We cripple ourselves when we censor ourselves along party lines. Bill Bradley was far superior to Gore, but dems were not "allowed" to stray too far from clinton.
Smokey and the Bandit was on TV last week. Ha. Ha. Ha. What a great movie.
It really summed up the redneck anti-authoritarian quality you're describing.
SWR | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 7:09 pm | #
Yep. Why are you here?What is your purpose?
'We're probably already in a Clash of Civilizations'
Ah, Samuel P. Huntington, a man whose intellectual capers are right up there with the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. Here's a bit about him, found in Joseph Lelyveld's book "Move Your Shadow", a book he wrote about South Africa (starting at the bottom of pg. 67):
'The serviceability of the jargon generated by American political scientists for this kind of approach to the renovation of apartheid was always marvelous to behold. Just as fast-food chicken has now been domesticated as vingerlek lekker, the ruling National party can hold a mirror to iteslf and discover that it has the potential to become, in the words of Professor Robert Rotberg of MIT, "a model modernizing oligarchy."... The first major document on the new approach to constitutional change, a report by a committee of a multiracial advisory body called the President's Council, was written by an in-house academic with a Cornell Ph.D. who managed to append a bibliography with citations to about thirty American political scientists: all to dress up an argument that brazenly hinged on the honest declaration of a corrupt calculation, that blacks could not be included in "a successful democracy in current and forseeable circumstances" because of "their cultural differences, relative numbers, conflicting interests and divergent political objectives."...[with "all deliberate speed", indeed -- this was written around 1985]'
'Professor Samuel Huntington of Harvard, who had the dubious honor of being cited more frequently than any other American in this document[emphasis mine], had flown to South Africa to deliver a paper in which he considered the abstract proposition that increased authoritarianism might actually be necessary for reform. "It is not inconceivable," he declared loftily, "that narrowing the scope of political participation may be indispensable to eventually broadening that participation." Professor Huntington left himself an out with words like "not inconceivable" and "eventually." ... He went on to offer a possible rationalization for police state methods: "The centralizaton of power may also be necessary for the government to maintain the control over violence that is essential to carry through major reforms." To advance such a thesis in Johannesburg without considering the actual methods by which "control over violence" is maintained in South Africa -- indefinite detention without trial, solitary confinement, humiliating interrogation sessions often including torture -- was to offer a form of unction, to say, man to man, that we all know how difficult reform can be.* Finally the visitor from Harvard observed that the "reform process" requires "substantial elements of duplicity, deceit, faulty assumptions and purposeful blindness."'
The footnote referenced by the "*" says:
'Writing a year later in a magazine called Servamus that is published for t
Sorry. I'm not buying it. What is the word I'm looking for..no, I won't say groveling..but SWR, you are too nice. And I like Atrios, but we all just post opinions, which don't dialogue, and don't go anywhere, and there is no connection, because there is such a big audience, and we want to have our day in the sun. But very few take the moment to acknowledge and verify what the other is saying, to build upon the argument. So that is why you are suspect.
Echidne - I've tried to make this point before, and I'm not always successful in putting it well. But basically, I see virtually no difference between either extreme position - whether capitalism to the nth degree, or Stalinism to the nth degree. To me they are not polar opposites, but rather nearly the same thing - an extreme. Either corporate masters or politburo masters - ultimately it doesn't matter. What matters is that they are both extremely hierarchical and we are not high up in the chain of being.
Ooops, hit the limit (sorry for the long post, but this is priceless)
The footnote referenced by the "*" says:
'Writing a year later in a magazine called Servamus that is published for the South African police, their commander, General Johan Coetzee, gratefully cited the "Huntingdon [sic][sic original] thesis" as if it were on its way to being recognized as a law of nature.'
Newsweek poll is improperly weighted. Check out Chris Bowers on MyDD:
http://www.mydd.com/
it's a strange experience, reading this blog for years then getting villified for any post.
I applaude people's efforts to register new voters and talk undecideds into voting Kerry. But, if this problem isn't addressed, we're screwed.
any suggestions?
hoary cripple
1)swing by an Army/Marine recruiting office and pick up a stack of enlistment forms
2)swing by your voter registrar and pick up a stack of voter registration forms
3)hand one of each to everyone you know/meet under 30 and tell them it's their call
"The scare at the international terminal came when batteries in a plastic flashlight inside checked luggage exploded as the bag was being hand-searched by a TSA worker, TSA spokeswoman Amy Von Walter said. She said the small but loud blast appeared to have been caused by old batteries.
That is what it says on the AP site re the doin's at LAX.
OK, i have been using batteries for a loooong time, new and old, and NEVER has an old battery exploded on me. They leak. They ruin the vibr flashlight, but they don't explode....
Tena, you're right. They are very similar at the extremes, and that's why so many people who were once in one extreme so easily move to the other extreme. I've known some ex-fundies who are now left of everybody, but what's constant is the search for one correct answer and the fanaticism that goes with it.
preznit giv me turkee:
Beautiful!! As easy as 1-2-3:
1)swing by an Army/Marine recruiting office and pick up a stack of enlistment forms
2)swing by your voter registrar and pick up a stack of voter registration forms
3)hand one of each to everyone you know/meet under 30 and tell them it's their call
No rest!!
Was anyone on this thread at the rally in Akron today? There were thousands of people packed into Firestone Stadium, and we were all feeling the crush. But it was such an exciting day.
I got to snap some pics of our favorite Senator...
http://www.sonafide.com/kerry.html
http://
www.washingtonmonthly.com...409.sirota.html
How Kerry broke the code to terrorist funding .. in 1988!!! before it was kosher and even ticked off some Demis. We need a proescutor like this in office to uncover all the Bushies leftovers.. including JFK.
coming in late, and only briefly, my goal here is to furnish you with stuff that you may not know. stuff that i think you need to know to go out and fight the good fight. i am a latter day member of the white rose society.
very odd polls have been released by time and newspeak. both of them i think to be agitprop items, intended to cow the electorate to accept the inevitable: bush has won.
now, as i said this morning, time should never be believed. it is a boner book. i subscribe. and i do so so as to get the establishment party line.
i subscribe to newspeak as well. for the same reason. i study the press.
but newspeak is no more different from time than garbage differs from refuse.
both of these entities are agencies of the state. and they must be considered this way, always.
musing on this, i have been compelled to recall donnie graham's senior dinner at the crime. his mom and ben bradlee were the guests of honor. ben delivered the after-dinner talk. it was his reminiscence of how jfk and lbj put his pecker in their pockets. how those presidential regimes forced the press to report the way the regime wanted them to report.
ben told us the nuts and bolts of being a media castrati in the winter of 1966.
some things have changed since then. for the worse. after the pentagon papers, the intell services inserted more of their personnel onto the payrolls of the media. and, the anti-trust division of the justice[now, there is an oxymoron] dept relaxed all the anti-trust laws so that the media could become consolidated - as it goes without saying, it is easier to muscle a few than to muscle many.
and this did not occur inadvertantly. the fascists, the totalitarians, have always had a coherent vision of their destination and how they were going to get there.
lamentably, the anti-fascists have never even recognized that they are in such a war.
perhaps that is too strong. it is entirely possible that large numbers of the citizenry recognize the existence of this conflict...but recognize that the democrat party[its boner candidate] is not a force for anti-fascism.
they see that the contest is dnc fascism versus rnc fascism. and that no matter what fraudulent result prevails, the victor will still be a fascist.
that is the dilemma for kerry/edwards. i think that unless they kick out the jams, as long as they are perceived to be just another pair of gangsters, the devil that is known will be preferred to the devil[s] that is unknown.
and knowing what i know about boners, it is unimaginable that kerry will assault his birthright.
it is another theatrical contest. sad to say.
wwf learned from our electoral politics. never forget it.
i know, way too negative, you think. can't be negative enough these days, is my view.
sic semper tyrannis,
eond said "anyone have thoughts on the future that are not tied to current candidates?"
yeah i do, and i'm not gonna bash you. in fact, i'll get bashed before i'm done.
thought number 1: i heard on the radio the other day that thre are as many hispanic children under 10 yoa in america as there are anglo children under 10 yoa. the democratic party must continue to be the party of choice for latinos, just as it has been for african americans, working americans, etc. i'm sure there is a latino barack obama out there who is not on my radar yet. she's got to develop a condi rice kind of resume, and be brought into the loop from an early stage of her career. it's going to be very important if not in 2012, certainly in 2016.
thought number 2: if kerry doesn't win this election, i fear for the future of the party. and my fear revolves around hilary clinton. i don't dislike her, i think her positions are largely in accord with my own. but i don't know if the power axis of the party is aware of the deep, unthinking blood hatred that the mere mention of her name evokes. if she plans on making a run in 2012, she needs to get out from under the demon horns the thugs have saddled her with. [and take some public speaking lessons, hil. you're never too good to get better, and when you increase the volume of your speech, it goes up about an octave and sounds incredibly (dare i say it?) shrill. see, e.g., her introduction of bill at this year's dem con.]
so there's a couple of thoughts about the future, and i'm even going to draw some fire away from you.
Believe in your fireman and you will be saved.
Hillary Clinton.
There, I've said it, and I'm a blond haired blue-eyed white heterosexual middle aged American male, and my blood doesn't boil.
If Bu$hCo steals this one, and she'll raise her voice against it, and she tries stop it, she has my vote.
There. Now I've drawn every troll on the boards to this thread.
What?
RE: finding a new country to move to, where on earth do ya plan to run to that isn't subject to the American Hegemony of the New Reich?
Serf in USA | Email | Homepage | 09.04.04 - 8:02 pm | #
Bush-Cheney and the gang may be looking for a new country to run to.
Paraguay was pretty open after WW11.
SOLDIERS IN A BAR- SUPPRESSION IN THE RANKS
This is the full account of the soldiers in the bar from last night. If you respond, please email me so I can be sure to read it. This thread moves pretty fast.
Last night I had the craziest experience of my life. I went out to the bar for a couple of beers. I saw two soldiers at the end of the bar and one grabbed a martini glass from the ceiling and told the other to hold it under the bar. We began talking and I was interested in their service. I asked them where they had toured. The younger told me how he had served one tour in Iraq and was headed for his second. The other was headed for his first. I asked the younger guy about Iraq and he began. The other jumped in and started to tell me how the military works here. I said, I know that, I was wondering what it was like in Iraq. The younger told me of how it was hard to see someone you know holding their guts and crying for their mother. He stressed that three times. He told me how it was told that If your friend is shot in the neck to put their finger in the wound. He told me how they had to go back for a guaranteed year. A full year in a war, and that was the minimum. He told me how they had initally signed up for 30,000 dollars for school expecting a weekend a month and two weeks a year. The other began to interrupt again. Somehow, I let it slip that I didn't think that they should be over there. The younger looked as though I had said something wrong. I told them, "no, I support what you are doing, and wish you the best over there." The older, out of shape one came over and proceeded to call me democrat and told me how Clinton had gutted the military. That the Republican party was the party who traditionally gave raises, how the democrats would cut and run and they would be out of jobs, and how they had signed their life away to the President no matter who was in power. I continued my questioning, desiring to know everything that I could from the streets of Iraq. The first told me how as they arrived in Iraq they were assigened to an Iraqi that they would serve with. The second told me how the Iraqi Govt forces would be killed at a much higher rate than Americans. While I assured him that I knew the statistics of the soldiers v the iraqis being killed, he continued to dominate the conversation. He told me how they would be their for months on end, and would be lucky to be home by December of next year. I assured him that I was well aware of the situation in which they had been placed. He continued how President Bush was a man that was supporting the growth of the military. The older one told the younger one to bum a 2 cigarettes from the table of girls next to us. With a stern look on his face, he sent the obviously ordered soldier to get him a smoke. When he returned the older, drunk superior wandered off. The younger began to tell me that he had been in Falluja and that I probably didn't know what it was
SOLDIERS IN A BAR PART II
The younger began to tell me that he had been in Falluja and that I probably didn't know what it was like there. I told him that I know that it is a hotbed which we have pretty much conceded, but I couldn't imagine how it truely was. He said that I was pretty much right. He told me that as you enter the city there are orange cones marking the spots where troops would come under fire. He said that a man would stand to the back with a stopwatch to time how often the shots would come. He was in Recon, and showed me his "Recon" tattoo on his chest. The other had returned and interrupted to tell me how they would potentially be in Iraq through next December. He pressed on me to think of them there, while I was here in a bar drinking. I told him that I thought of them every night, and was most thankful for all that they did, no matter how bad a situation it was. In recon, their job is to go ahead of the convoys, sometimes sending in troop positions, but primarilly looking for IEDs. The younger told me how he was responsible for removing the rocks covering these devices. He said that sometimes the enemy would be by for an ambush and then detinate the mine wiping out the first two vehicles. He was again cut off by the elder to tell me how the Republicans were the ones that traditionally gave them raises. He pressed how they would be out of work if Kerry is elected. The first offered to buy me a drink. I told him no and that I wanted to buy them a drink because I was enjoying their stories and I had a few questions for them. They sat. The first grabbed a pen and began to write. I thought that he was paying his tab. The drunk soldier came over and began talking to me. Pushing his positions. I asked how the people in the military were planning on voting. The younger told me how it was a weird situation, he began. The older cut him off saying, "90% Republican." I said, "really." The other interjected, "You can't be in the military and not be Republican," while showing true angst in his face. He continued to write. The other pressed the raise issue again, and how the Dems want to cut pay. I told him how I would support any help for the troops that they need. The younger looked at me and under his breath he said, "I know." The other walked off again and the other told me,"Do not believe anything that he said, He is wasted." The other returned and asked me to join them at Applebee's for another round. The other hidden behind him gave me an unmistakable signal to say no. He cut his hand under his throat and silently said, "You don't want to go." The other walked off after I declined, and the first again tried to buy me a drink. The other returned, and the younger handed me the card on which he had been writing. It was written sloppily, I think maybe in hopes that the other would be unable to read it. From what I can decipher he wrote, "thank you for the care and interest for me
SOLDIERS IN A BAR PART III
It was written sloppily, I think maybe in hopes that the other would be unable to read it. From what I can decipher he wrote, "thank you for the care and interest for me and my men, Lt. Marquess. S IC Edwards (Pretty sure it says SIC, but I am not positive, the elder did a number on the ranks). We got your drinks all night." Now i read it and was not sure what it said at first. I am an attorney and felt that I could not accept his buying my drinks when he is risking his life for money for college. I told him that was unnecessary. The other grabbed the note and attempted to read it. He said, "this guy lied about our rank. We are equals." He proceeded to change the rank on the card to Sgt Marquess, and Sgt Edwards. He then told me that he would rewrite the note so I could read it. His reads, "To Shaun, Thanks for the stiff drinks, don't forget us, Sgt. Marquess, Sgt. Edwards, RECON!!!" I began to see a weird body language from the younger. He again said under his breath to not listen to ANYTHING that the other guy said because he was wasted. He tried to sneak 5 bucks around the bar to me for my drinks. I refused. I continued to ask about Iraq, and asked if he had been in the Kurdish North. He said that he had, but the other cut him off and he began spouting his message. He told me to keep that card and to think of how he and his men would be in Iraq soon. He again made the younger to bum cigarettes from the ladies at the next table. He returned and the other left and he told me how he wanted to buy my drinks. I told him that I was going to buy theirs. He said that he was so happy with my interest in what they were doing. I said, "I bet you guys get drinks bought for you every night." "We are lucky to have one bought each night," he replied (shocking coming from Republican Mississippi). I told him that I hoped that he knew that every Democrat was thankful for what he was doing. That we wanted to give them everything that they needed. That his job was safe since we are obviously with insufficient troops at this time in the world. He told me that he knew. He again told me not to listen to anything that the other said. The other returned and ask, "What did he say to you." I told him how he told me that Republicans were the ones who would give the military raises. It had become apparent that he was there to monitor what he was saying. The body language of the younger guy made it clear that they were not particularly on the same page. Several times he would cut his hand under his chin. Or give me strange eyes. The other left again, and I said to him, "Is this what I think it is?" He didn't ask me what I was talking about, he didn't ask me what I thought that it was. He made a face and said that I should not believe ANYTHING the other guy said because he was wasted. I said, Is this what I think it is. I said, wink at me if this is what I think it is. He never denied my s
SOLDIERS IN A BAR PART IV
Or give me strange eyes. The other left again, and I said to him, "Is this what I think it is?" He didn't ask me what I was talking about, he didn't ask me what I thought that it was. He made a face and said that I should not believe ANYTHING the other guy said because he was wasted. I said, Is this what I think it is. I said, wink at me if this is what I think it is. He never denied my suspisions.He simply said with a blank face, "It's not what you think it is." I laughed, figuring it out more and said, "wink at me if this is what I think it is." Again, he never acted surprised by my comment which I thought would make a stranger question what the hell I was talking about. He again said, "It's not what you think it is." Again he told me to disregard everything that the other said. As they winded up their final drinks, I told the bartender to put their drinks on my tab. The younger walked off. When he returned they were about ready to go. He thanked me agian for my interest. The older out of shape soldier hugged me in a freaky kind of way and kissed my neck. I made a face at the younger and he responded with his own. The younger of the two shook my hand about 5 times. The first continued to press on me not to pay attention to the other guy, while telling me that hopefully I would see him at the bar at a later date. Thanking me. I thanked them both and told them that I wished them a safe tour and a quick return. As they began to leave, a lady in the bar began calling them out for the martini glass. The older gave the younger a stern look, and he looked to the ground as he smuggled the glass out at the behest of his superior. It was so sad. I hope that the soldiers are not afraid to vote Dem on their ballots. Threats of Falluja could possibly sway my vote. If that is the case, what a freedom they are fighting for. THe older had told me how he worked at the Sheriff's Dept in TN with the younger guys mother. Immediately I had thought that this was possibly another way to control him. I am not the type to freak out about somehting like this, but I trembled after the encounter. I came immediately home and began to write notes about my experience. One that I know that I will never forget, but I didn't want to lose any of it. I don't know what was being surpressed. I assume it is the general conditions over there. Maybe he had a reputation of telling things. Maybe he saw things that are not wanted to be known in the public. Regardless, It was obvious that the other guy was there monitoring him. I got the younger guy's email. I hope to receive a response from him, but don't know if that is monitored as well. At the end of the night, my drinks were paid for. Obviously not somthing that I would expect from someone if they didn't appreciate my opinions. If I learn more, I will share. Now, Does anyone know if this is commonplace? Am I crazy? Please email me if you have infor
SOLDIERS IN A BAR- Conclusion
Please email me if you have information or questions or similar stories. This is the most horrible realization that I ever had. The extent the government will go to suppress the truth. I just need some help with figuring this out. I also have no medium to get this word out if it is not already well known. Please let people know what is going on. Thanks for your time!!!!!
Sincerely
Shaun Cade
Echidne - I like your analysis - that search for the absolute. I was having a conversation here the other night about the difference between faith and proof and I ended up saying that some people - perhaps many people - are incapable of living in doubt and mystery so they construct a fantasy answer. Some answers are philosophical, some are political, some are religious.
The Massachussettes State Police Union is backing Bush inspite of State Democrats threats of "retaliation".
Zell Miller's comment about not politicizing national security matters must have went over Bay State Democrats heads.
"OK, i have been using batteries for a loooong time, new and old, and NEVER has an old battery exploded on me. They leak. They ruin the vibr flashlight, but they don't explode....
cory"
Cory, that was my first thought too, and several thoughts since then. This reeks. Sheer coincidence that it's a holiday weekend, and oh! Look, over there! A hurricane!
Be interesting to see if LATimes or anybody follows up on this.
for all the babies who are ready to throw in the towel.. what makes you think Canadians even want your lazy ass in their country? And I'm sure the hard working people in the Netherlands are thrilled at the prospect of some wussy Americans whose ambition upon arriving is to get baked off their ass and trying to qualify for Dutch government assistance checks. Pathetic.
Get motivated, register some voters, do _something_! It's not like this little Bush surge was unexpected, so fuckin deal with it and help the team as many of us are already doing. Fight back and stop being pussies. Go JK and have some faith!
don't ask. don't tell.
Excuse me, but are all you folks who (like me) bemoan the excessive influence of religion in American politics seriously considering IRELAND as an alternative?
I mean, my roots are there and all, but come on...
The Massachussettes State Police Union is backing Bush inspite of State Democrats threats of "retaliation".
Zell Miller's comment about not politicizing national security matters must have went over Bay State Democrats heads.
Papertiger
The police unions in Mass. are notoriously Republican. This is especially true of the Boston Patrolmen. The MA. State Troopers in Mass are still whining about their cushy, overly compensated, flagman details being taken away from them. But just watch, if they can't get a good contract out of Mitt Romney or another Republican they'll suddenly turn into Mother Jones.
I've got no trouble with Democrats in the state house making a point with them. If they don't like it they can try and get a job with the State Police in New Hampshire (who seem to be less inclined to be SOBs, at least) but they shouldn't try Maine, they don't pay nearly as well as in Mass.
Get rid of those stupid uniforms, they attract a really bad, unprofessional, authoritarian type to the job.
ALERT!
Be on the lookout for the latest disguise of the criminally unpatriotic troll, lurking through these threads. The new disguise of this low form of life is called the "oh woe is me - what's wrong with the Kerry campaign, o my god, we're gonna lose" style.
Appearance of troll: above all, concerned! Furrowed brow, much handwringing, panicked breathlessness.
Typical behavior: Pushes meme of Democratic "helplessness." Promotes sense of "hopelessness." Tends to disappear when repeated posts remind everyone how John Kerry has many, many thousands of people thronging to his open, exciting campaign events. Flees when instructed to read blog at johnkerry.com, where powerful pictures abound showing evidence of a great patriotic movement building all around the country.
Security against this dangerous, disguised troll: Awareness of this scurrilous tactic. Frequent visits to http://blog.johnkerry.com. There you can see for yourself (pictures and text) the evidence the mainstream media doesn't want you to see.
There you can also sign up, so you can take part in the blog to join the campaign as it happens, offer your suggestions to the campaign, hear the suggestions of others. There and on other parts of the www.johnkerry.com website, you can connect with other supporters in your own neighborhood, and discuss what you can do to right now, every day to ensure a Kerry Landslide.
WE ARE THE CAMPAIGN.
Defeat Bush. Defeat the trolls. Defeat Tokyo Rose.
I was so mad I posted this in the wrong damn thread a few minutes ago. Again:
Totally off-topic, but this just made me so mad I can't think straight. I can't believe I'm sitting here on a Sunday morning, with a hurricane creeping toward me, in a rage over politics. At any rate, from The Telegraph:
"In a fresh blow to John Kerry's flagging presidential campaign, the Pentagon has ordered an official investigation into the awards of the Democratic senator's five Vietnam War decorations."
And, here's the really delicious part:
"A navy spokesman confirmed on Friday that the inspector-general's office at the Pentagon had authorised the inquiry. "It is the responsibility of all personnel to correct errors in official records," said the spokesman. Another official said privately: "There's a feeling that it's time to deal with this thoroughly, once and for all.""
When are they going to do an investigation on Bush's record? A THOROUGH investigation of his "service" to clear everything up "once and for all"? People have been asking for that very thing for YEARS.
This turns my stomach. I don't have the words ... at least, not the kind I'd use in public.
Disgusting.
It just occurred to me that it's even worse than I thought. The "investigation" will lend official Navy credence to the Swift Boat liars, and even assuming they find everything in order (which would be announced AFTER the election, of course) just the fact that the Navy felt the need to check at all sends the message that there is REAL question about his awards.
Sorry, I'm ranting. I can't believe how mad that made me, is all.
Saw Jim Carville and that nasty SHREW he's married to, Mary Matalin, on TV this morning.
Not only is that bitch unattractive but she's rude. Her own husband is sitting there talking, and she sits there with that pickle-puss look on her face (like she sucks lemons for breakfast) and shakes her head derisively (I swear I could hear rattling noises).
And that voice - she talks through clenched teeth - mouthing the same Bushist propaganda. I turned it off. I can't believe she's as dense as she puts on.
As recently as 4 months ago, the air-headed, dismal, dithering political hack who is New Mexico's Secretary of State did NOT know the difference between open source and proprietary election-machine software. Her name is Rebecca Vigil-Jiron, and she's dumber than shit.
About the Newsweek, et. al. polls:
I'm new here, but since I do research professionally as a big part of my career, I thought I might say a thing or two to put your minds at rest.
Thing #1: You can expect Bush to get a little momentum after the convention, but soon he'll screw up again.
Thing #2: The polls run by the magazines are seriously flawed. They interviewed "people likely to vote" but not registered voters. They had few controls on their study, too small a sample, and well, I could go on and on about the lax methodology. The bottom line is, a researcher can design a study to produce any result desired. OR, he/she can juggle the data to reflect a result desired. OR, one can report the data incorrectly to achieve the result desired. There are a lot of ways to influence the results.
One poll you can generally trust is Zogby. They have trustworthy data, and report it fairly. If you really want to know how Kerry and Bush are doing, check there. http://www.zogby.com/
(Sorry, I'm new to halo scan and am not sure how it will accept my attempts to embed an url using the standard markup language.)
I just checked Zogby's poll of undecided voters in which Bush was ahead of Kerry by 25 points. However, (and this is what lots of readers tend to overlook)there was a 54 percent margin of the remaining voters that disapproved of Bush.
You cannot trust statistics that come from news magazines. The way I see it, Kerry has an excellent chance of gaining some momentum and converting the majority of the undecided voters.
It's hard to ignore the right-wing press and the sly twisting they do of facts and figures. That's why Zogby, Harris, and other trustworthy polls are around. And No, I don't work for Zogby.
Here's to thinking positive.
RAZZ
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