In an election year, not surprisingly, political labels are being cast around like confetti. Some people take great delight in creating an artificial 'them and us' environment where if one isn't this, then they must be that. Yet labels can be extremely misleading and do not give a real flavour of anyone's true allegiances. Worst of all, they stop real dialogue between people in its tracks. 

In my view a label is terribly inadequate to describe a complex human being who tends to react to contexts than concrete dogma. It is based on a generalised stereotype that bears little resemblance to the multifaceted individuals we are. It restricts the interplay of language and discussion through superficial assumptions and negative expectations. It is misleading, at best, and bigoted, at worst, and a handy shortcut for the self-righteous who prefer to assign labels to mask their ignorance. It focuses on similarities while ignoring differences, and represents one aspect of that person, while being treated as the sum of their whole!

People fall on a continuum of thoughts and ideas. Unless we can be placed firmly at either extreme end of that continuum, and only a very small percentage can, most people are flexible enough in their views, despite their particular choices. Our allegiances are merely leanings to one side or another of the political spectrum, depending on how we feel at a given point in time. They are not fixed points in concrete. We are free to change sides whenever we wish, according to which ideology is serving our interests and aspirations at any moment. Moreover, making a particular choice that suits our expectations does not give us the right to derogate the choice of another, otherwise our choice begins to lose its credibility too.

In short, while labels might give some idea of the ideological or political leanings of a person, they are mere guides to preferences which can be changed at will, not immovable aspects of our personalities we have no control over. In the UK we try to avoid them, as a rule. We are very sensitive to their use and are reluctant to label people to suit our own prejudices and predilections.  Even if one might class one's self as a 'Conservative', or 'Labour', one does not say until one is asked, or there is a definite reason to shout it. It means we avoid judging someone superficially, and on a political level, before we actually get to know them, because labels are both inclusive and exclusive. Fine when they are inclusive, and everyone feels valued, but when they exclude others for the sake of it, or are used to feel smug and superior, that is totally counter-productive. I generally find that once we label a person, we stop listening to them, because we have already made up our minds what they are going to say and often impute things to them which they wouldn't say either!

I cannot understand this obsession with political labels when we are not unchanging robots. It is also difficult to see the other person's point of view when we label them as the enemy, and many Americans appear to be putting unity to one side as they glory in their fragmentation. But we are thinking, feeling people who ALL seek the same thing: a great quality of life in which we can fulfil our potential and feel valued and secure. The only difference between us is the way we each wish to realise that need, and the vehicles we prefer to use to get it.

©Elaine Sihera (Ms CYPRAH) 2012
Emotional Health and People Management Consultant
"Happiness is a state of being. We are the ones who decide whether we wish to be happy or not, by the script we use inside our heads."

For decades, Republicans have railed every four years against the Supreme Court and its perceived liberal activism to spur conservatives to elect presidents who will appoint like-minded justices. Now strategists in both parties are suggesting this could be the Democrats’ year to make the court a foil to mobilize voters.

The prospect arises both because of President Obama’s comments this week implicitly warning the court against striking down his signature domestic achievement, the expanded health insurance law, and because of recent court rulings, chiefly the Citizens United campaign finance decision, and looming cases on immigration and affirmative action that incite passions on the left.

I came across this quote about HOPE from one of the President's earlier speeches, and felt goosepimples as I read it. It is still resonating three years down the line:

"Hope is not blind optimism. Its not ignoring the enormity of the task ahead or the roadblocks that stand in our path. Its not sitting on the sidelines or shirking from a fight. Hope is that thing inside us that insists, despite all the evidence to the contrary, that something better awaits us if we have the courage to reach for it, and to work for it, and to fight for it....Hope is the bedrock of this nation--the belief that our destiny will not be written for us, but by us. By all those men and women who are not content to settle for the world as it is--who have the courage
to remake the world as it should be. Together, ordinary people can do extraordinary things." 

It is so uplifting and motivating, not least for the last sentence, Together, ordinary people can do extraordinary things. Amen to that!

When we are stuck in a rut, in a certain outdated mindset, used to negative actions instead of encouraging ones, it is easy to dismiss the president's comment as mere empty words and political fodder. It is difficult to change from being positive to negative overnight without the necessery 'proof' we require to believe it. Difficult to see another way of achieving things, when everything has been so disappointing. Difficult to see how his words can change into reality when one has seen it all promised before and fallen by the wayside. But the key here is that Barack Obama isn't promising us anything. He is not promising to do anything himself either, which makes those who love to blame and expect actions from others, perhaps feel uncomfortable.

President Obama is, in fact, putting the ball into our court. Showing us that though we are ordinary beings, together we can be almost invincible. In essence, he is emphasising that we can do things we never even dreamt of, if we have the hope, faith and the will to change our world, change our actions and thus change our results. We can, in fact, be quite extraordinary, if we choose, or quite ordinary and powerless if we hang back.

What is giving life to Barack Obama's words just now, making them stand out, are three crucial things: the need for something different, the negativity that surrounds us, especially against women and the more vulnerable, and the timing. That timing is so important. At any other time, his words might have fallen on deaf ears; they would not have made an impact or taken root. But the fact that they are like sparks falling on dry timber says where we all are at this moment and the need to feel empowered to change our situation. Not by one man alone promising what he cannot deliver, but by us all joining him to give life to those words in our way, not in his, and to realise what could be possible!

But he cannot do it alone. Notice how many times he says 'you' in his speeches. He knows that without every single person in America, he can do very little. He needs their trust, faith and help, and that makes him stand out from all the other politicians doing things in the same old controlling way, through those continuing empty promises.

Personally, I don't do ordinary. So it is most wonderful to find someone who can help me to become truly extraordinary.

I personally resent the labelling of people into inflexible political groups like Liberals, Conservatives, Right or Left. There seems to be an obsession with it on the Vine and in the USA. And it isn't attractive at all because it stops genuine dialogue through name-calling. I am not sure if this is because I am a Brit and here things are done in a much more low-key fashion. One never reveals anything unless one feels one has to. 

Even if one might class one's self as a 'Conservative', or 'Labour', one does not say until one is asked, or there is a definite reason to shout it. It means we avoid judging someone superficially, and on a political level, before we actually get to know them, because labels are both inclusive and exclusive. Fine when they are inclusive, and everyone feels valued, but when they exclude others for the sake of it, that is totally counter-productive.

In my view a label is terribly inadequate to describe a complex human being who tends to react to contexts than concrete dogma. It is based on a generalised stereotype that bears little resemblance to the multifaceted individuals we are. It restricts the interplay of language and discussion through superficial assumptions and negative expectations. It is misleading, at best, and bigoted, at worst, and a handy shortcut for the self-righteous who prefer to assign labels to mask their ignorance. It focuses on similarities while ignoring differences, and represents one aspect of that person, while being treated as the sum of their whole!

The Nature of Allegiances

People fall on a continuum of thoughts and ideas. Unless we can be placed firmly at either extreme end of that continuum, and only a small percentage can, most people are flexible enough in their views, despite their particular choices. Our allegiances are merely leanings to one side or another of the political spectrum, depending on how we feel at a given point in time. They are not fixed points in concrete. For example, we might be the staunchest opponent of Medicare, but if our nearest and dearest needed it, we wouldn't hesitate to use it. Our ideology would take a back seat to preserving our loved one. We are free to change sides whenever we wish, according to which ideology is serving our interests and aspirations at any given moment. Moreover, making a particular choice that suits our expectations does not give us the right to derogate the choice of another, otherwise our choice begins to lose its credibility too.

In short, while labels might give some idea of the ideological or political leanings of a person, they are mere guides to preferences which can be changed at will, not immovable aspects of our personalities we have no control over. In the UK we try to avoid labels, as a rule. We are very sensitive to their use and are reluctant to label people to suit our own prejudices and predilections. I generally find that once we label a person, we stop listening to them, because we have already made up our minds what they are going to say and often impute things to them which they wouldn't say either!

I cannot understand this obsession with political labels when we are not unchanging robots. It is also difficult to see the other person's point of view when we label them as the enemy and many Americans appear to be putting unity to one side as they glory in their fragmentation. But we are thinking, feeling people who ALL seek the same thing: a great quality of life in which we can fulfil our potential and feel valued and secure. The only difference between us is the way we each wish to realise those needs, the lengths we would go to realise them, and the vehicles we prefer to use to get them.

©Elaine Sihera (Ms CYPRAH) 2012
Emotional Health and People Management Consultant
"Happiness is a state of being. We are the ones who decide whether we wish to be happy or not, by the script we use inside our heads."

Let's take the day off from picking over the ruins of our own miserable riots and try to cheer ourselves up over Barack Obama's good fortune. What good fortune? I hear you ask. Surely he has just been humiliated over the US budget debacle and the decision of a cowboy credit rating agency to tweak America's triple-A credit status. His standing in the polls is sagging, now below 40%.

Well, yes, that's all true. And he has not been a particularly brave or effective president either. Democrat or Republican, I'd be pretty disappointed, too. But election campaigns are about choice of both candidate and their policies. So Obama's luck lies in the near-unbelievable fact that the Republicans look determined either to pick a loser or refuse to vote for someone who could win.

In her Sunday Times column, Maureen Dowd gave up on her resistance to linking racism and the opposition.

I've been loath to admit that the shrieking lunacy of the summer — the frantic efforts to paint our first black president as the Other, a foreigner, socialist, fascist, Marxist, racist, Commie, Nazi; a cad who would snuff old people; a snake who would indoctrinate kids — had much to do with race.

I tended to agree with some Obama advisers that Democratic presidents typically have provoked a frothing response from paranoids — from Father Coughlin against F.D.R. to Joe McCarthy against Truman to the John Birchers against J.F.K. and the vast right-wing conspiracy against Bill Clinton.

But Wilson's shocking disrespect for the office of the president — no Democrat ever shouted "liar" at W. when he was hawking a fake case for war in Iraq — convinced me: Some people just can't believe a black man is president and will never accept it.

This seeded article is by a liberal pro-gay activist and promoted by PUMA ...

Big Gay Groups To Obama: F--k You

They didn't use those exact words, of course, but in a group statement signed by the Human Rights Campaign, the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, Lambda Legal, the ACLU, and other big national organizations—organizations that are typically cautious and concerned about preserving their access—they come as close to "F--K YOU" as they're ever going to get ...

The Obama infatuation is a great unreported story of our time. Has any recent president basked in so much favorable media coverage? Well, maybe John Kennedy for a moment, but no president since. On the whole, this is not healthy for America.

Our political system works best when a president faces checks on his power. But the main checks on Obama are modest. They come from congressional Democrats, who largely share his goals if not always his means. The leaderless and confused Republicans don't provide effective opposition. And the press—on domestic, if not foreign, policy—has so far largely abdicated its role as skeptical observer.

Obama has inspired a collective fawning. What started in the campaign (the chief victim was Hillary Clinton, not John McCain) has continued, as a study by the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism shows. It concludes: "President Barack Obama has enjoyed substantially more positive media coverage than either Bill Clinton or George W. Bush during their first months in the White House."

Under the bright lights of the Pepsi Center in Denver last August, the young black politician delivered a message of change. Raised by a single mother, trained at Harvard Law School and embraced by white supporters despite his strange name and relative inexperience, he told the cheering crowd, "Our time is now."

That speaker at the Democratic National Convention was Representative Artur Davis of Alabama, but his biography and rhetoric inspired a nickname among listeners: the Obama of Alabama.

On Saturday, Mr. Davis, 41, a four-term congressman from Birmingham, will kick off his campaign for an office that may be even more daunting to a black politician than the presidency: the governorship of Alabama. If elected, he would be the first black governor of a Deep South state since Reconstruction.

President Obama at the Correspondents' Dinner Part 1

President Obama at the Correspondents' Dinner Part 2

Using witty, insightful, self-denigrating and subversive humor, President Obama managed to make the 2009 Correspondents' Dinner the single funniest one that I have seen. Even funnier than Stephen Colbert's. Watch the videos and then vote and comment: did Obama slay the audience or did he fall flat?

RALEIGH, N.C. – His once-prominent political career is buried and the turmoil of his marriage is playing out in public. Now, John Edwards is facing a federal inquiry.
The two-time Democratic presidential candidate acknowledged Sunday that investigators are assessing how he spent his campaign funds — a subject that could carry his extramarital affair from the tabloids to the courtroom. Edwards' political action committee paid more than $100,000 for video production to the firm of the woman with whom Edwards had an affair.
The former North Carolina senator said in a carefully worded statement that he is cooperating.
"I am confident that no funds from my campaign were used improperly," Edwards said in the statement. "However, I know that it is the role of government to ensure that this is true. We have made available to the United States both the people and the information necessary to help them get the issue resolved efficiently and in a timely matter."
While Edwards focused his comment on campaign funds, he also had a range of other fundraising organizations — including two nonprofits and a poverty center at his alma mater — that have come under scrutiny.
Chief among them was the PAC that paid Rielle Hunter's company for several months in 2006 for Web videos that documented Edwards' travels and advocacy in the months leading up to his 2008 presidential campaign. The committee also paid her firm an additional $14,086.50 on April 1, 2007.
Edwards acknowledged the affair with Hunter last year, months after dropping his presidential bid.
At the time of the 2007 payment, the PAC only had $7,932.95 in cash on hand, according to records filed with the Federal Election Commission. That day, according to the records, Edwards' presidential campaign paid the PAC $14,034.61 for what is listed as a "furniture purchase."
Willfully converting money from a political action committee for personal use is a federal crime.

Barack Obama has been President of the United States for 100 days now. Are you still happy with the vote you cast on Election Day 2008? Feel free to discuss after you answer the poll question.

This article is not going to discuss the morality of torture. Why? Because most of the people that support the use of torture in extracting humint (human intelligence) that even suspect someone of opposing torture on moral grounds reacts thusly:

Obviously it's [torture] horrible. But if you would rather see American cities bombed and thousands of Americans killed, then there is something wrong with you[me, the suspected morality geek]. If you care more about the enemy [Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, though I doubt the poster knew his name or identity at the time of posting their comment] than the safety of your own country, then why don't you go move to the Middle East and see what it's like[Salute the flag or beat it, fag]. Those terrorists that you are defending are the same people who would cut your head off without hesitation. [As if I did not know that Islamists treat everyone that writes negatively about them the same, whether it is a lowly blogger like me or Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl]

Bracketed comments added by the author for clarity.

First, let's identify who I am because the hardcore "enhanced interrogation" crowd always makes it to the part where they ask "How do you know anything about national security? Are you in the military?" or the inevitable "Stop blaming America and/or the troops first!" I am Scott Isaacs. My great-grandfather six steps back was Colonel Elijah Isaacs of the southern half of the Continental Army that harassed, slowed and ultimately forced Lord Corwallis' surrender at Yorktown, Virginia. Colonel Isaacs had a widespread reputation for burning Loyalist towns that aided and abetted the British. My great-grandfather five steps back was Samuel Isaacs. Samuel Isaacs, whose rank I have not been able to verify, fought several 3-month hitches in the North and South Carolina militias alike which includes the Battle of Cowpens (in South Carolina) where he fought under Brigadier General Daniel Morgan who won a significant victory against the British. Records indicate further that Samuel Isaacs served as a spy for two years against both the British and the Native Americans for the equivalent at that point of the United States government. From that point to World War I, information on direct relatives is hard to come by because of several court house fires and floods that ruined property, birth and death records. WWI picks back up at the oral record that is still in the living memory of my grandpa. My great-grandfather, Charles Edward "Edd" Isaacs, fought in World War I. My great-uncle, Dorman Isaacs, fought in WWII with George Patton's Third Army. My grandpa, Rev. Bill Isaacs, fought in Korea. My uncle, Jack Isaacs (recently passed away), spent approximately two decades in the Army at different posts but spent significant time training recruits in the mechanics of close-quarters combat. One of his particular specialties was a method of silencing enemy sentries that he learned from the Apache Indians. My dad was too young for Vietnam and had already been hired in at General Electric working in the defense industry for thirteen years by the time that the next large conflict, Operation Desert Storm, got under way. My cousin Butch, however, was a Green Beret during Vietnam. My intention growing up, even though I am the last heir of my line, was always to join the military. At 16, I was experiencing severe pain that was similar to having my right side from the waist up doused in gasoline, set on fire and beaten with a sledgehammer. A neurosurgeon discovered that I had a congenital spinal problem called a Chiari I malformation and decompressed my spinal cord. I still live with chronic pain every day and I can no longer play contact sports (I had loved playing tackle football) and cannot take a job where hard hits are likely and that obviously precludes the military starting at boot camp. I did spend two semesters studying as a civilian with the Marines' ROTC at Miami University which I enjoyed very much. I still feel a kinship with the Marines and a fondness for their intellectual acceptance of me even though I couldn't take the physical rigors. My family has earned the right through its fighting to have a say in how this country runs and I intend to use that right to try to correct what I am convinced was a major setback to our war against the radical Islamists and I refuse to be dismissed as unpatriotic. If there be a flaw to find, find it in my argument because my forefathers took an oath to protect and defend the Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic and I consider that to be a sacred oath that is passed down through my bloodline and not just swearing it out. It is one of the highest honors and traditions of the Isaacs family and it is one that I will continue until the end of my time.

Moving from my qualifications to make this argument to the argument itself, I submit that in far too many cases torture elicits information that is neither genuine nor useful. In some cases in which the interrogator's resources are abundant and the information sought is expected to result in casting a wide net of arrests that leads to more torture and, thus, more arrests, torture can be of use. Consider the Third Reich's use of torture on suspected members of the French underground. The Third Reich almost always collected a majority of prisoners that were not active members, indeed some were not members at all, of the French underground. Instead, if they were lucky, they would obtain perhaps a few and sometimes as little as one captive that was a member of the underground that had useful information to give them. They would torture their entire stable of captives and nearly all would admit to being members of the French underground. Occasionally the Nazis ended up killing some captives through the stress of interrogation and others kept their silence so long that their infuriated captors lost the cat-and-mouse game over information by giving the prisoner what he or she wanted: death. Those still alive that had admitted to being underground members would then start naming names and continue naming as many names as they felt was required by their interrogator to prevent further torture. Sometimes the Nazis obtained an intelligence bonanza, snagging a high leader in the French underground in the act and then, knowing who they had, they would torture mercilessly to wring absolutely every name possible out of the subject before sending him or her to a concentration camp or a summary execution. The cycle would repeat itself. However, much more often, the Nazis would round up another bunch of "spies" that were anything but and spend precious time using torture to extract information out of them that would turn out to be so many dead ends. After a while the Nazis' interrogations had a similar effect on French society that the Salem witch trials had on its own society: French citizens in fear of being named as underground spies would voluntarily go to the Gestapo, confess to being a member of the French underground and then proceed to indict other Frenchmen. Some would go as far to name anyone and everyone they knew, including family, with no regard for the consequences so long as they were not the focus of an interrogation by someone like Klaus Barbie, affectionately known by his alter ego "The Butcher of Lyon." So, while the Gestapo's raison d'etre was to apprehend and execute spies, torturing their prisoners to extract useful intelligence was successful in only the most convoluted manner. By inducing nearly everyone to turn on nearly everyone else they had laid out for themselves a massive suspect pool by which they had to navigate using torture. In reality, it is a near certainty that far more Allied spies and members of the French underground were caught by the Gestapo using different techniques along the lines of investigation rather than torture. The Gestapo operated radio cars that would prowl the area of operations looking for outbound radio signals that indicated an Allied spy or FUM (French underground member) was transmitting his or her intelligence back to London to be sorted out and used by MI-5 and, when it came along later in the war, the Office of Strategic Services. (the OSS, the forerunner of the Central Intelligence Agency that would be created by Harry Truman after the war in 1947) Yet another obstacle that the Gestapo would use to smoke out a non-local (and, hence, a FUM or Allied spy come from another part of France or outside the country altogether) would be to decree that anyone seen riding a bike on Monday, Wednesday and Friday would be picked up for questioning and that beer was not available on Tuesday, Thursday and the weekend. Anyone ordering a beer or riding their bicycle on the respective days would summarily be identified as an outsider, reported to the Gestapo by a French collaborator and that was the end of the spy capers. Even more advanced techniques had the Gestapo identifying an enemy agent, keeping surveillance on him and when he went to meet up with one of the Lysander aircraft that the British sent to drop off and retrieve agents the Gestapo would be able to hook themselves the two agents, the Lysander pilot and any FUM's that had to be on-hand to facilitate the plane's landing in the dark, abandoned pasture.

The same fundamental problem with intel extracted by torture is clearly on display as well in John McCain's time as a POW and victim of torture at the hands of his North Vietnamese captors in the Hanoi Hilton. From a purely objective standpoint, you simply cannot get around the fact that it is the person that you are interrogating that decides whether they will give you useful information or not. An interrogator that uses torture has no option but to treat each confession from the prisoner as a possible truth to be vetted unless the interrogator already knows that what has been said is wrong. Thus, the interrogator's team spends hours (sometimes days or months) running down leads that don't pan out because the torture elicited something different than the truth from the prisoner. It provoked a malicious intent to lie to the interrogator and abuse the only advantage that the detainee has: only he knows what the truth is. Therefore, the prisoner can lie with impunity to his captor and the captor is faced with three choices: 1) end the torture 2) continue spending time torturing the prisoner in the hopes that the torture will wear him down and he will eventually tell you the truth 3) kill the prisoner with torture. McCain began reciting the Green Bay Packers' offensive line as the names of his squadron mates and naming cities that had already been bombed as new targets in upcoming bombing runs. The further into the five and a half years of torture that McCain lived, the more outlandish the stories that he made up to satisfy his captors. As McCain learned his captors' prejudices, he would incorporate them into his increasingly embellished information. At one point he drew a swimming pool on the fantail of an aircraft carrier. On the whole, if the North Vietnamese truly acted on the information they obtained from McCain, they frantically hunted for professional football players among the downed pilots they collected and shifted anti-aircraft defenses to quiet sectors that had already been bombed and were not likely to be hit again for some time.

The Knights Templar are the third example that I will use to illustrate that torture is not conducive to the collection of accurate and desired information. Philip Le Bel (Philip The Fair, in French, ironically enough) targeted the Knights Templar, the monastic organization whose whole reason for being was to conduct war against the Muslims in the Levant who controlled Jerusalem and the surrounding areas. By the time that Philip targeted the Templars, the last outpost of Outremer, Acre, had been lost to the Muslims. The Templars were now left with accumulated property willed to them over more than 200 years to conduct war in the Holy Land that made a tidy annual profit. They were also left as the first international banking cartel, having collected vast sums of money and then acted as the first banker to Europe's kings. King Philip, it turned out, owed them a great deal of money and was currently (and for the foreseeable future) broke to compound his problems. Everyone knew that the Templars had the mother lode, the greatest accumulation of wealth by any non-royal entity in Europe. Thus, Philip decided to seize the wealth for himself and net a double profit: he would wipe out his debt to the Templars by wiping out the Templars as an organization and he would snatch their riches for himself to spend as he liked. Clement V was the Pope at the time and was a childhood friend of Philip's. However, Clement tried to offer opposition to Philip in his plan to eliminate the Templars. He had little leverage to work with, however, after the Papacy was moved to Avignon, France and he was under the thumb of the French king 24/7. Philip used the only card in his deck that was available against the Templars: heresy. Because they were under the Pope's sole dominion the only crime that could force the Pope to discontinue his attempts to protect them from Philip was to convince the public that the Templars were not the upstanding and chivalric Christian knights that they were believed to be but, rather, heretics and enemies of the Church. On Friday, October 13, 1307 (hence the "unlucky" reputation of Friday the 13th to this day) Philip struck, sending his royal forces to every Templar stronghold in France and arresting and charging every Templar they found on their raids. They were hauled off to prisons where they would be consistently tortured, most notably the prison at Chinon. With only the confessions of the Templars under the duress of torture, Philip muddied their public image and then happily obliged when the French public demanded that the Order be punished. Interestingly, 56 Templars (including the Grand Master Jacques de Molay) recanted their confessions and swore on pain of death that the confessions they gave were under torture. They all were executed for maintaining that they did nothing wrong but get tortured by the French king's allies. But what happened to all that money? This is the part where torture failed to produce reliable information for Philip. Though he was absolutely desperate to get his hands on the Templar treasure (especially the treasure from the Paris priory which he had first observed when the Templars had to protect him from a mob of Parisians that wanted to kill him for melting down all the currency, selling that metal and minting practically worthless replacement coinage) torture never managed to reveal to Philip where every Templar possession in France that wasn't nailed down disappeared to. On Thursday, October 12, 1307, the day before the raids, the Templar fleet at La Rochelle, France showed 18 Templar ships in port. The next day, nearly everything of value the Templars owned in France and those 18 ships were gone and no record ever surfaced of where they sailed for nor where they ended up. Philip was left jilted and apparently no matter how much torture he ordered his Templar prisoners to undergo (including thumbscrews and having their feet smeared with fat and roasted over a fire until they literally disintegrated and the bones fell out) he was never able to find the independent information he wanted: the location of Templar monies. All he ever got from them was confirmation (later discredited) of his false accusations against them, which was worthless since all he wanted was their riches in the first place.

In addition to these historical examples of torture not yielding results worthy of practicing it, there are inherent problems in the risk-benefit analysis for a prisoner that is undergoing torture. In our situation, the first problem is that when we tortured members of Al Qaeda our first question would invariably be "Is there another attack coming?" or "When is the next attack coming?". The reality is that even if the true answer is that there is not another attack coming, the prisoner has absolutely no incentive whatsoever to give this answer. First and foremost, if they tell the interrogator there's not an attack coming they are going to get waterboarded (or whatever method is being used) again and that is a standing rule. The interrogator's assumption is that there is another attack and until that is confirmed he will continue to use torture to force his prisoner to confirm that. So, right off the bat, a lie will gain relief from harsh interrogation. The second problem is that a dedicated member of Al Qaeda will want to steer us away from any operations they truly know about. If they are a gifted story teller they will spend their time in their cells spinning a false yarn about an attack nowhere near the true target. They then give over this information during interrogation and what has been accomplished? We are now diverting intelligence resources from intercepting actual intelligence to gathering information and verifying a threat that never existed in the first place. A few "high-value" prisoners lying to us can open the kind of hole in our defenses that allowed the 9/11 attack to proceed to fruition with practically no interference from law enforcement whatsoever. Then, what is the solution to dealing with a detainee that has lied to us? Threatening him with more torture or worse torture if he lies again? At that point he will tell us an even more elaborate lie that may be impossible to actually verify and will leave us chasing our tail. Even if that is proven false, he has no incentive to do anything but tell us lies that will buy him time because the gaps between interrogation sessions are going to be longer if we have to verify information after each one. Furthermore, he has good reason to suspect if he actually tells us everything that he knows and thus renders himself useless as a font of information we will throw him into a dark hole, feed the key into a shredder and he will rot for decades until he dies. There is literally no incentive for them to tell us much, if any, legitimate information.

There are further complications as well. Double agents, which were used extensively during WWII and the Cold War, have a real propensity to refuse your offer to work against their government or group when they are having simulated drowning conducted on them, are left mostly naked in a room to lower their core temperature just above what will kill them from hypothermia or when they're forced to stay in the same stress position for 24 hours. In fact, they tend to turn down offers from people that torture them. Even if they do agree to be a double agent for you after you've interrogated them, you have scrambled their mind to the point that their former comrades are likely to detect something is wrong with them and then they have the choice of using them to feed you bad intel or they just execute them and you lose your source.

The final problem with torture is that it erects the deadly "Chinese wall" between the FBI and CIA that bears so much blame for this nation's inability to detect and foil the original 9/11. FBI agents are not allowed to torture nor are they allowed to witness torture without reporting it to the Justice Department. Therefore, if the CIA is going to torture they have to do their interrogations by excluding FBI agents. Also, there is a push by some to torture every detainee that is a possible significant source of information. At that point, the FBI is being shut off from all humint because torture is de rigeur and they cannot participate in such interrogations. At that point you are facing the benching of FBI agents that have years of experience studying and investigating our enemies (sometimes the prisoners that we have in particular) and when they cannot be present at the interrogation nor watch a tape of it that means something our most experienced intelligence agents might pick up will go by unnoticed to the agents interrogating the prisoner.

The simple fact of the matter is that torture is not effective enough to become standard practice (or even anything more than an occasional resort in a tight situation) and it creates problems that are, by nature, almost exclusive to torture and can open the way for another successful attack on this country. I understand that there are a number of people who truly think that torture can make this country safer, but this is one of those situations where the road to Hell is paved with good intentions.

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton arrived in Baghdad on Saturday, a day after suicide bombings killed dozens in the Iraqi capital.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is due to meet the U.S.'s top commander in Iraq during her Baghdad visit.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is due to meet the U.S.'s top commander in Iraq during her Baghdad visit.

The one-day visit to Baghdad was not previously announced because of security concerns.

Clinton, who spoke with reporters after she landed in Kuwait on Friday evening, said she planned to meet with the United State's top commander in Iraq, Gen. Ray Odierno, to get his assessment on the recent bombings in Iraq.

"I want his evaluation of what these kinds of rejectionist efforts mean," Clinton said. "And what can be done to prevent them by both the Iraqi government and the U.S. forces."

Clinton added that she did not see signs of rekindled sectarian violence.

"I think that the suicide bombings, that are lethal and terrible in the loss of life and the injuries they inflict, are in an unfortunately tragic way the signal that the rejectionists fear that Iraq is going in the right direction."

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- How does President Obama compare with his predecessors after nearly 100 days in office?

A new CNN poll of polls shows 64 percent job approval for President Obama.

On his job rating, Obama comes out just a little better. But he really stands out on personal qualities.

CNN's recent poll of polls, taken April 14-21, shows an average of 64 percent job approval for Obama.

According to Gallup polling examining past presidents' job approval, that's similar to where the last six elected presidents stood after 100 days.

Only Ronald Reagan got a slightly higher rating (67 percent). Bill Clinton and the first President Bush were both below 60.

The average for the six recent presidents after 100 days: 61 percent approval. All were in the same general range -- between 55 and 67 percent.

They were all elected after the late 1960s, when the great division in American politics emerged. Conservative versus liberal. Red versus blue. Each has taken office with a hard core of supporters and opponents.

New presidents used to come in with a greater reserve of good will. Ratings for John F. Kennedy and Dwight Eisenhower were markedly higher after 100 days -- Kennedy 83 percent, Eisenhower 72 percent.

Obama really stands out on personal qualities.

(CNN) – One of America's largest labor unions is teaming up with a prominent liberal interest group to target congressional Republicans' economic polices, calling the GOP the "party of no" in a new national ad buy coming only days before President Obama's first 100 days comes to a close.

In the new television commercial called "Timeline," the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) and Americans United portray target Republicans over opposition to Obama's stimulus package, the expansion of the State Children's Health Insurance Program, and legislation seeking to allow women to sue for equal pay for equal work.

"There have always been those who said NO to progress. But in times of crisis, Americans have never taken NO for an answer," an announcer says in the 30 second spot.

The groups say the ad, described as a "mid five-figure buy," will begin airing Friday nationally for five days on MSBC and on all the cable news stations in the Washington, DC area.

The TV spot comes the same day the Democratic National Committee is launching a Web ad that declares, "After 100 days, the Republican approach is 'just say no.'"

This new DNC web video is the latest in a series that portray Republicans in Congress as a party devoid of new ideas.

Republicans disagree, and state that in saying no to President Obama and the Democrats in Congress, they are trying to save American taxpayers money and are attempting to rein in what they consider out of control government spending.

So what do Americans think?

Fifty-eight percent of those questioned in a recent CNN/Opinion Research Coporation national poll said that President Obama had a clear plan for solving the country's economic problems. That was more than double the 24 percent who felt Republicans had a clear prescription for fixing the country's economic mess. Three out of four polled said the GOP didn't have a clear plan.

The same survey also suggests that 62 percent felt President Obama is doing enough to cooperate with the other party, while only 37 percent thought Republicans were doing enough to reach out to the other side.

WASHINGTON — A newly declassified narrative of the Bush administration's advice to the CIA on harsh interrogations shows that the small group of Justice Department lawyers who wrote memos authorizing controversial interrogation techniques were operating not on their own but with direction from top administration officials, including then-Vice President Dick Cheney and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice.

At the same time, the narrative suggests that then-Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and then-Secretary of State Colin Powell were largely left out of the decision-making process.

The narrative, posted Wednesday on the Senate Intelligence Committee's Web site and released by its former chairman, Sen. Jay Rockefeller , D- W.Va. , came as Attorney General Eric Holder told reporters that he'd "follow the evidence wherever it takes us" in deciding whether to prosecute any Bush administration officials who authorized harsh techniques that are widely considered torture.

In a statement accompanying the narrative's release, Rockefeller said the task of declassifying interrogation and detention opinions "is not complete" and urged prompt declassification of other opinions from 2006 and 2007 that he said would show how Bush Justice Department officials interpreted laws governing torture and war crimes.

These developments come days after the Obama administration declassified four Justice Department memos from 2002 and 2005 that revealed in detail authorized interrogation methods, such as waterboarding, which simulates drowning, sleep deprivation and putting detainees in containers with insects.

The drafting of the narrative began last summer, at the prompting of Rockefeller. The Senate Intelligence Committee staff drafted the document, with heavy input from the Bush administration, in a multi-department effort largely coordinated through the Director of National Intelligence's office.

Bush's National Security Council , however, refused to declassify it.

Obama's National Security Adviser, James L. Jones , signed off on its release last week and the Senate panel cleared it Tuesday.

Among other details, the narrative shows that:

— The CIA thought al Qaida operative Abu Zubaydah was withholding information about an imminent threat as of April 2002 , but didn't get authorization to use various interrogation techniques on him until more than three months later.

— Key Senate Intelligence Committee members were briefed on the techniques used on Zubaydah and Khalid Sheik Mohammed in 2002 and 2003.

— The Director of Central Intelligence in the spring of 2003 sought a reaffirmation of the legality of the interrogation methods. Cheney, Rice, then-Attorney General John Ashcroft and White House counsel Alberto Gonzales were among those at a meeting where it was decided that the policies would continue. Rumsfeld and Powell weren't.

— The CIA briefed the Rumsfeld and Powell on interrogation techniques in September 2003 .

— Administration officials had ongoing concerns about the legality of waterboarding as they continued to justify its legitimacy.

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A key Democrat who reportedly was overheard on a National Security Agency wiretap discussing a deal with a suspected Israeli agent has called the wiretap an "abuse of power."

Rep. Jane Harman called on the Obama administration to release transcripts of the alleged conversations.
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Rep. Jane Harman, D-California, called on the Obama administration to release transcripts of the alleged conversations to her, saying she would make them public.

"I never had any idea that my government was wiretapping me at all," Harman said on CNN's "The Situation Room." "Three anonymous sources have told various media that this happened. And they are quoting snippets of allegedly taped conversations. So I don't know what these snippets mean. I don't know whether these intercepts were legal. And that's why I asked [Attorney General] Eric Holder to put it all out there in public."

Harman denied any wrongdoing and said she was outraged by news the National Security Agency had intercepted one of her conversations in 2005 or 2006.

"Many members of Congress talk to advocacy groups," she said. "My phone is ringing off the hook from worried members who think it could have happened to them. I think this is an abuse of power."

Allegations that Harman had made an inappropriate deal with a lobbyist for the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, first surfaced several years ago, but they were given fresh currency Sunday night when the Congressional Quarterly published new details on its Web site.

Sources told CNN this week the National Security Agency intercepted a conversation that Harman was participating in, but said Harman was not the intended target of the wiretap. The wiretap was lawful, the sources said.

It is pretty straightforward... President Bush, Vice President Cheney, former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales were all intimately involved in the decisionmaking process to go ahead with what amounts to torture. Should they be prosecuted for their role in making it happen?

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Obama is launching an effort "to achieve a comprehensive peace in the Middle East," his spokesman said Tuesday.

President Obama speaks to the media during a meeting Tuesday with Jordan's King Abdullah II.

Obama has invited key regional leaders to Washington in the coming weeks for consultations on the peace process, Robert Gibbs said.

Obama wants to meet separately with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, Gibbs told reporters.

Dates for the visits are still being worked out, he said.

Obama met Tuesday with Jordan's King Abdullah II.

"With each of them, the president will discuss ways the United States can strengthen and deepen our partnerships with them, as well as the steps all parties must take to help achieve peace between Israelis and Palestinians and between Israel and the Arab states," Gibbs said.

The leadership of Hamas, considered by the United States and Israel to be a terrorist organization, is not being invited. The group, which also provides social services, won elections in the Palestinian territories in 2006, prompting stringent sanctions from the West.

After the election, skirmishes between Abbas' Fatah and Hamas escalated, ending with Hamas in charge in Gaza and the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority in charge in the West Bank.

A six-month cease-fire between Hamas and Israel ended late last year and was followed by Israel's three-week incursion into Gaza. Israel said that operation was aimed at halting rocket and mortar fire on its southern towns and communities.

Despite a cease-fire called in January at the end of that fight, both Hamas rocket fire and Israeli airstrikes have continued.

Obama appointed a special Middle East envoy on his second full day in office -- former Sen. George Mitchell -- and dispatched him to the region within weeks.

Last week, during his third trip to the region s

President Barack Obama acknowledged in a major economic speech Tuesday that "times are still tough" and warned that a culture of "instant gratification" had produced neglect of major national problems that wound up undermining the economy.
"By no means are we out of the woods just yet," the president said in remarks at Georgetown University. "But from where we stand, for the very first time, we are beginning to see glimmers of hope. And beyond that, way off in the distance, we can see a vision of an America's future that is far different than our troubled economic past.
Obama contended that the nation's "day of reckoning" on the economy was caused partly by "a fundamental weakness in our political system."
"For too long, too many in Washington put off hard decisions for some other time on some other day," he said. "There's been a tendency to score political points instead of rolling up sleeves to solve real problems. There is also an impatience that characterizes this town — an attention span that has only grown shorter with the 24 news cycle and insists on instant gratification in the form of instant results or higher poll numbers. When a crisis hits, there's all too often a lurch from shock to trance, with everyone responding to the tempest of the moment until the furor has died away and the media coverage has moved on, instead of confronting the major challenges that will shape our future in a sustained and focused way."
Obama's speech, titled "A New Foundation," invoked a biblical parable by saying the nation "cannot rebuild this economy on the same pile of sand."
"We must build our house upon a rock," he said. "We must lay a new foundation for growth and prosperity — a foundation that will move us from an era of borrow and spend to one where we save and invest; where we consume less at home and send more exports abroad."
Here are excerpts of the president's prepared remarks released by the White House: 

I want to first start by stating that not all Republicans are doing this. There is a minority that are fair to President Obama, even if they do disagree with him fundamentally. However, there are enough opponents of President Obama's doing this that it would not be inaccurate to say there are "many" taking this approach. Having stated that I am not describing all Republicans, I want to outline their stance towards President Obama and its amazing fluidity. It reminds me of an old trick my cousin used to pull on people that was called "Heads I win, tails you lose!"

My cousin used to use a witty little sleight of hand trick on people to get what he wanted outof them in a disagreement. He would pull out a quarter and then say "Okay, fine, let's flip for it. Heads I win, tails you lose." This worked a lot because usually the person was so distracted that they would agree. Then my cousin would flip the coin and declare himself the winner. When his opponent was dismayed if the coin showed tails up my cousin would remind them that they had agreed to abide by the "Heads I win, tails you lose," rule. By the simple act of flipping the coin after they had agreed to this rule he had won. The same is true of the Republicans that repeat the same tactic against President Obama, just modifying it to fit the situation. Just like my cousin always won under his rules, Obama is always wrong under these Republicans' rules.

A good example occurred yesterday regarding General Motors. GM had spent the money the government had loaned the company to turn its direction around and start remaking the company so that it would be competitive with the Asian car manufacturers like Toyota and Honda. That meant cutting car brands like Hummer that created vehicles that are the antithesis of conserving gasoline since gasoline cost an arm and a leg not too long ago and, although many people seem to have forgotten, it could cost an arm, a leg and a more sensitive body part in the future the next time that conditions conspire to start driving the price up again. GM was having serious problems winnowing down its stable of brands. The next thing that GM needed to do was to design a fleet of fuel efficient vehicles which are pleasant to drive (like the Chevy Malibu which I drove when my Ford Ranger was in the shop and found to be quite a nice little car) that would comprise about 50% of their models to offset the luxury and SUV/pickup & larger truck vehicles that the company is already quite proficient in building seeing as they have built so many that they cannot even get rid of some of them by getting as close to giving them away as financially possible without their dealers going insolvent. That was happening, but not fast enough. President Obama acted decisively yesterday and requested that Rick Wagoner step down and allow a new leader to step up and try to lead GM to greener pastures. Wagoner agreed. Obama also gave Chrysler 30 days to work out a merger with Italian automaker Fiat that would give Fiat a 35% stake in the company without kicking in any capital. Obama's action to safeguard $17.4 billion worth of government aid (in case anyone forgot, those are also the tax dollars you, me and every other American that pays taxes send to Washington) provoked quite a negative response from many Republicans. They said that they mourned for America because the time had arrived when foreign newspapers could print the headline "Obama Fires CEO Of GM" and that signaled the beginning of the end. Obama was Adolf Hitler exerting his power over Alfried Krupp. He was Joseph Stalin taking his baby steps in the collectivization of everything private in the country. He was Mao, making decisions for private firms that would single-handedly destroy America's industry and result in the starving death of millions through pure idiocy. He was Hugo Chavez exerting nationalization over that first oil refinery, salivating for more businesses the government could plunder and run into the ground. He was a fascist for extending public control over private enterprise and a socialist for trying to prevent Fiat from holding back until Chrysler goes bankrupt and then buying what they want at a firesale. Quite a criticism as he seems to be everything to everyone amongst the group that has chosen to deliver a scathing indictment of his behavior as steward of the government's bailout money. Can you imagine how these people would be treating him if taxpayers hadn't bought the government a seat (the seat at the head of the table as the biggest investor, rather) at the table?

So that was the coin falling heads up. Here's the "tails you lose," part. If Obama had not asked Wagoner to resign, had not ordered Chrysler to merge with Fiat and had handed over the billions in further loans that the two companies wanted the very same people would be criticizing him. Except it would be for doing nothing but shoveling money to companies that were lighting cigars with it, flushing it down the toilet and giving $25,000 rebates on $20,000 vehicles. They would be saying that this was proof of what they had saidduring the election season: he had no executive experience and we were going to pay for it and now he had messed up by giving these companies everything that they wanted compliantly. It was clear he had never run a business, they'd say, because he was subsidizng the definition of insanity: repeating the same action again and again while expecting a different result each time.

With those that do not like Obama, there are no steps backwards where they recognize something he has done well. He is a man for all seasons, offering them something to criticize harshly in each action. They are no different than the people they clinically labeled as having "Bush Derangement Syndrome." If they prove as utterly impotent at changing the President's behavior or halting it altogether as Bush's roughest critics were, it is going to be a long four years or an eternity of 8 years for them.

The Capitalist is tickled pink (or whatever the color of his flannel shirt in the GlamourShots photo that serves as his avatar) that Rush's ratings have went up A WHOPPING 50% since he started to fling dung at the White House. TC thinks this signals a win for Rush. It's not.

Limbaugh can gain listeners from now to Christmas and it doesn't make a difference with regard to whether he "won" against Obama or the Rush strategy "backfired" against the White House. The reality of the matter is that the White House got themselves a distraction when they needed one at Limbaugh's expense. Limbaugh provided this distraction in spades as he spent weeks babbling about the White House on his talk show and further dissecting just exactly how he wanted President Obama to fail. The best part is that the Limbaugh diversion weakened the Republican Party at a time when it was trying to consolidate and challenge President Obama as a single, strong unit. Instead, the Rush controversy showed them to be anything but.

Steele was already coming off the heels of serious criticism for using urban phrases like "off the hook" to describe GOP events, with Republicans questioning whether he should be replaced or not. Then Rush happened and Steele went on the offensive against him, saying that Rush said "ugly" things and was divisive and unhelpful. A few days later on the following Monday, he was back on television begging Rush's forgiveness. Making everyone question who is really running the Republican Party? Check.

Now the Republicans have made another brilliant mess for themselves with regards to President Obama's budget. The $3.6 trillion legislation had been causing disunity in the Democratic ranks that the press had been focusing on as Obama tried to meet behind closed doors with influential members of his party's congressional delegation. Republicans, including Rush, had been hammering away at Obama's budget like John Henry, the steel driving man. Obama challenged the Republicans that if they had something better that they should present it. Over the protests of Rep. Eric Cantor (R - Virginia) and Rep. Paul Ryan (R - Wisconsin), Minority Leader John Boehner (R - Ohio) and Rep. Mike Pence (R - Indiana) demanded that the Republican alternative budget be released yesterday. Boehner and Pence won the battle and lost the war as the House Republicans released their alternative budget and to everyone's surprise (except the House Republicans that put it together, at least) the alternative budget was a 17 page booklet of boilerplate rhetoric that contained absolutely no math or hard numbers whatsoever. It did have a lovely blue cover, however. Can a composition really be considered a budget if it has absolutely no numbers in it whatsoever? House Republicans insist that it will have numbers this coming week but the damage has been done as the public's attention has been turned from potential inter-party controversy about Obama's budget to the GOP attempting to show that they should be the party in power by producing an entire federal fiscal year budget without any numbers but those denoting what page one is reading in the booklet. As most people laugh at the GOP budget, Obama is quickly and quietly working to smooth over problems within his own party about his budget. Just like the Rush Limbaugh dust up, the GOP has gladly stepped into the fray and offered a welcome diversion of the public's attention from him and to GOP incompetence to govern.

Add to the fact that the Republicans provided feuding Democrats cover the fact that, as a result of the House GOP leadership releasing this embarrassing "budget" with no numbers, the GOP Senate leadership is livid at them for bringing the GOP in Congress even more bad press and the rank-and-file GOP Senators are laughing at their counterparts in the House. This budget has turned into a complete fiasco with Obama throwing down the gauntlet and the GOP cockily strutting out to show him up with a budget that is nothing but discussion of budget priorities which, rightly so, has been criticized by the American public as a cheap political stunt to try to act like the Republicans have an alternative that meets America's needs without spending $3.6 trillion but the only reason it doesn't spend that much is because it steadfastly refuses to attach numbers to anything in the budget proper.

Some Republicans, like our dear friend The Capitalist, do not seem to understand (or are not willing to admit) that the Republican Party, far from showing the Democratic Party up, is actually offering the Democrats the opportunity to minimize their rifts with one another in public by turning to the GOP and allowing it to provide an attention-getting screw up every time. Republicans are going to have to stop shooting themselves in the foot if they wish to start making headway anytime soon.

Were you offended by President Obama's comment on The Tonight Show that his difficulties bowling were reminiscent of the Special Olympics? If so, why? Do you know a mentally handicapped person? If not, why not? Do you think there is too much political correctness in the world today?

Former President George W. Bush has regained my respect after quite a few years without it. How, you ask, did he regain my respect? He reasserted himself as the titular leader of a Republican Party in a death spiral and set a tone that is not poisonous or destructive towards the current administration.

In the midst of Dick Cheney making the rounds essentially saying that the Obama administration is opening the country up to catastrophic terrorist attacks, Bush took a different tack. "I'm not going to spend my time criticizing him. There are plenty of critics in the arena," Bush said. "He deserves my silence." For the first time in a while, I agree wholeheartedly with Bush. Instead of acting like a backseat driver as Dick Cheney is doing, Bush is instead focusing on his retirement from political life and declining to cause further rancor by attacking the Obama administration from the sidelines. I actually feel compelled to say that I am proud of the maturity that Bush is showing and that it has redeemed him to a certain degree in my eyes despite the mistakes (and there were many) that I believe he made while he was in office.

Newsvine's parent company, MSNBC, reported the following: "Bush said he wants Obama to succeed and said it's important that he has that support. Talk-show host Rush Limbaugh has said he hoped Obama would fail. "I love my country a lot more than I love politics," Bush said. "I think it is essential that he be helped in office." Bush has stepped into the leadership vacuum that pervades the Republican Party at the top. It remains to be seen whether the party's former official leader can calm the party and stop its destructive self-perpetuating war of words with the current administration or not. It can at least be said that Republicans who want Obama to succeed for the good of America now at least have a banner to rally to when heretofore they were looking at a single stance authored by Rush Limbaugh and reinforced by RNC Chairman Michael Steele and former Vice President Dick Cheney: hope for total failure of Obama for political gain.

I think that Bush has taken a major step to rehabilitating his legacy which has to this point been viewed in extremely stark partisan terms. Offering his hand in peace to Obama casts him as the uniter and not the divider that he campaigned as eight long years ago. The effect that his words have on his party will likely be decisive in how much this gesture alters how the American people view George W. Bush and his legacy. As for me, I feel that he acted as a patriot today by emphasizing country over party and by trying to encourage his supporters to bridge the rifts they have with Obama and not exacerbate them. For that, George W. Bush garners my praise today.

There seem to be two major opinions aside from neutral about the idea that the American media is a liberal enclave that secretly pulls the levers of power from behind the curtain like the Wizard in the Wizard of Oz. One group generally believes that the liberal media is real and it is out and about aggressively persecuting conservatives, Republicans and Christians (all three of those groups individually and individuals that span those three groups as well). The other group generally believes that the idea of an aggressive liberal media that persecutes conservatives, Republicans and Christians is a clever ruse that is utilized by the leaders of the Republican Party along with politically-oriented Christian groups aligned with the Republican Party and conservatives to make their followers feel angry and vindictive between elections which really drives them to do the grassroots work needed to win elections. So let's have a vote: is it a real conspiracy against the right or is it a conspiracy created by the right to benefit the right electorally? Or is it a kernel of truth with lies wrapped around it to the point that the truth is indistinguishable from the lies anymore?

A very telling spat erupted within the Republican Party recently. Meghan McCain, former presidential nominee John McCain's 24 year old daughter, wrote a blog entry for The Daily Beast that questioned the nasty tone and habitual meanness that fellow female conservative commentators Ann Coulter and Laura Ingraham conduct themselves with in their various media outlets.

To Coulter's credit, and God knows I give her very little, she did not respond to McCain's criticism. I would have preferred if she had responded in a respectful way but, given what Ingraham said, Coulter gets points for inaction. Laura Ingraham's response to McCain's criticism was to characterize the young woman as a "Valley Girl gone awry" and "a plus-sized model." Aside from not knowing what in the 9th level of Hell the latter has to do with a political discussion, both disgust me and make me want to call in to Ingraham's show and ask her what point she was trying to make because it clearly got lost in translation.

However, the more I thought about it the more I realized that those particular insults are right in line with spoiling a female conservative commentator because the mostly male talk radio crowd and the ultra-conservative males all have one thing in common: if they're going to listen to a female they want to be able to drool over her. Ingraham's first salvo was an easy cheapshot: portray Meghan McCain as a ditzy dumb blonde from Sodom & Gomorrah (wait, sorry, California to those of you speaking Ingrahamese) and she can be automatically discounted as an ignorant Left Coast Liberal. Body shots to Meghan McCain's intellectual reputation? Check. The second statement, however, is by far the single most pernicious and nauseating thing that I have heard come out of a conservative commentator's mouth since Rush Limbaugh's television "joke" in which he says everyone knows that the Clintons have a White House cat named Socks. He then asks if people knew they had a White House dog. The punchline is that he holds up a picture of a thirteen year old Chelsea Clinton. Ingraham's sorry retort was basically saying "Hey, a fat girl's criticizing me! Who's gonna listen to some chubby chick?"

The whole point of Ingraham's statements were to illustrate that 1) Meghan McCain doesn't have a brain and 2) Even if she has a brain, she's fat so who would want anything to do with her anyway? This cuts to the quick of the problem with the Republican Party collectively. The party objectifies women to an obscene degree. Meghan McCain is, to my mind, pretty and smart. Unfortunately, that doesn't matter in this current showdown. The Republican Party has a clear history of objectifying women in their ranks and one only need to look back at last November to find concrete proof.

Sarah Palin, the rising star of the Republican Party and Vice Presidential nominee in 2008, was lauded as a big deal. Once her name and face got out among the public, what did I hear? What else did I expect to hear... she was a sex object and that overrode any and all questions about her fitness for office. The earliest and most lasting label attached to her was "GILF": Governor I'd Like to F***. Talking to some Republicans that I was working the polls with on Election Day, they regaled me with stories of how when Palin visited West Chester, Ohio that grown men were using a camcorder to ogle her ass and legs and spent the entire political rally talking about the multiple sundry things they would like to do to her. Better yet, some of the young bucks that were doing the physical labor tried (and thankfully failed) to create a hole in the stage so that they could obtain an upskirt shot of Palin: a bit of privacy that no one deserves to have taken away from them. Not only that, but the clamor among men was so loud that a pornography film from Hustler was made entitled "Nailin' Palin." Also, the gun community was all abuzz about how absolutely hot it was that Sarah Palin not only carried firearms but hunted animals with them and, apparently, brought many men close to climax simply by being photographed with her heavy artillery.

So we get to Ingraham trying to discredit Meghan McCain. It would seem that unless you are considered a hot and attractive woman that you cannot hold a position in the Republican Party, much less voice it. Ingraham's response indicates that she knows what her audience likes: articulate women that are bombshells (comparatively at least) that dress like sluts. Meghan McCain does not dress like a slut so, unfortunately, she is going to be tarred and feathered for saying anything besides the party line.

And so we have arrived at Bizaro World: a party that is angry with liberals for destroying family values and not outlawing pornography caters to a base that consumes ever-increasing amounts of pornography and will only listen to a woman and take her seriously if she sates the needs of their sexual fantasy world.

I've been gone from the Republican Party since May, 2006 and all I have to say is this: What the f***?

From the very beginning after the shock of watching 9/11 live on television started to wear off I insisted that the terrorists would win if we significantly changed the American way of life, particularly curbing civil liberties and the erasure of portions (important portions, it turns out) of the Constitution itself predicated on Executive branch power. Not an executive's powers while at war but the power that every executive has at his command as President.

The makeup of these new powers consist largely of being able to nullify large parts of the First and Fourth amendments. The most controversial part of this was the warrantless wiretapping because it violates practically every clause of the Fourth Amendment that establishes a Constitutional search. No warrant is issued. No solemn oath is sworn out to establish probable cause. The scope of the search is not limited in any respect whatsoever: if it's on the lines the government could listen to it even if they have no idea what they are looking for.

When I complained about these broad new powers I was told by supporters of President Bush "If you haven't done anything illegal you shouldn't have a problem with the government listening to your conversations." Never mind the fact that an oppressive government that could arbitrarily and capriciously persecute any citizen it wanted was precisely what the Founding Fathers were fleeing from and what they were trying to avoid when they wrote the Constitution and Bill of Rights. The British government could conduct searches and seizures whenever they wanted and Parliament could pass a bill of attainder that essentially outlawed a specific citizen, both of which the Founding Fathers barred from our government's toolbox.

Something I did find most interesting was that people who agreed with the politics of the President in office were largely willing to accept unchecked power even though there were steps that the government had taken that remained concealed to the public until the next administration would release the documents. I never got a satisfactory answer to this when I asked the people that were in favor of these executive powers if they would support those powers if they were passed on to the next President whom they almost completely disagreed with. They seemed to rather not want to contemplate such a situation. Now that there is a President in the White House that makes some Republicans paranoid that he is building concentration camps for his political enemies, laying the groundwork for a dictatorship, etc. I am prepared to ask the question again. Are you willing to give such broad and sweeping powers to presidents of both parties ad infinitum to use on American citizens as they see fit without having to explain it to a court and offering few avenues of recourse to challenge the government's actions.

Vote in the poll and then discuss as you like.

"You can't just listen to Rush Limbaugh and get things done," he told top GOP leaders, whom he had invited to the White House to discuss his $825 billion stimulus package.

The conservative blowhard opened his show by saying, "I'm the man you should not be listening, according to President Obama."

...

Limbaugh also said Obama is more than happy to "see me fail."

"He's more frightened of me than he is of John Boehner, which doesn't say much for our party," said Limbaugh.

He then said Obama's comments didn't matter, arguing that the president is "sprinting so far to the left" during his first week in office.

"The Republicans haven't been listening to me, anyway," Limbaugh said. "It's a moot point."

The Blagojevich saga drags on, embarrassing the Democrats just when they should be celebrating

THE 111th Congress is sworn in on Tuesday January 6th. The 435 representatives will take their places with a minimum of fuss, but the more august chamber, the Senate, is bogged down in the sort of machinations that a writer of political fiction would scarcely dare to dream up.

Barack Obama speaks to the people of Israel and lays out his opinion on the conflict there

Video of Barack Obama visiting the people under siege at Sderot, Israel.

With great power comes great re sponsibility.

The Democratic Party certainly attained the former on Tuesday: Barack Obama's decisive presidential victory, coupled with gains in Congress, puts the party in control of an undivided government for the first time since 1994.

As to the latter . . . let's just say there's going to be a steep learning curve.

One of the great tragedies of the past eight years has been the way the left's visceral hatred for President Bush leeched proportionality and responsibility from its opposition to administration policies.

BY midnight Tuesday, millions of conservatives probably will believe that the nation, foundering on the reefs of sin, is ruined. And millions of "progressives," emboldened to embrace truth in labeling by again calling themselves liberals, probably will have decided that Heaven is at hand.

...

Tuesday night might be chaotic: Elections are government undertakings, so they aren't expected to be well run, and judging by the multiplying warnings that voting arrangements might buckle under the weight of predictably large turnouts, Election Day seems to have taken many state and local governments by surprise, yet again. Such dreary developments, anticipated with certainty, must be borne philosophically.

Careful what you wish you may regret it,
Careful what you wish you just might get it!

- Metallica, King Nothing

This is, for all practical purposes, my lone article for the general election (post-Convention, of course). The main reason for that is because writing articles in the final weeks of a presidential contest is like whispering into a vacuum cleaner - it just adds to the noise.

But it's important to bundle some of the election together into one neat ball of understanding: the two most damaging words in American history will be "President Obama" (seemingly conventional wisdom indicates that Wall Street is going to take a belly flop at the news). And why is that?

It mostly stems from the fact that Obama is a polished, nice looking used car salesman. Buy this car and I'll throw in free rust protection and a free car washes for a year. But what's under the hood? Oh, good stuff, my man! If you buy a car from that other guy it won't be as good - he's not offering the same give-aways. Buy my car and I promise that someone will chauffer you around in it. But, um...what's under the hood? What about it's previous owners? I heard that Bill Ayers used to own this car. I'm not too keen on that. You weren't even born yet when Ayers got his groove on. Who wouldn't want to be affiliated with someone so respected in academia? Go ahead - look at the tire. Just don't kick it (like that Joe guy did). And so on...and so forth...

Yes, Obama is a master salesperson. He is a professional campaigner and has boldly embraced every left-wing initiative to grow the federal government. He wants to buy this election.

How does he do that?

Remember that so-called "amnesty bill" that President Bush and Senator McCain and dozens of other conservative Republicans supported? The one that was brought down by the hard-right hot air machine? The same one where I said that if we don't do this now, we may very well have a President Hillary or Obama do it for us, with eager support from the Pelosi-Reid union in Congress. And when this happens we will never again be allowed to abuse the term "amnesty" because real amnesty will be a reality in the next year or two (after we see government entitlements extended to illegals). This all-or-nothing mentality on this issue has gotten us just that - nothing. Not only nothing, but a long-term change to the how we handle the gates at the nations edge. Change We Can Believe In!

And here's the sale: kaching!! Obama and the Democrats have just rewarded millions of new voters with the gift of being beholden to their new welcomers and their new president, both in votes and contributions. This kind of sale will also be applied to felons serving time and millions of young people lining up to be indoctrinated by the Obama theme.

Obama and the Democrats stand to buy themselves electoral security for years to come. Change We Can Believe In!

Obama and the Democrats will weaken our support for our democratic allies like Georgia and Israel. Change We Can Believe In!

Obama and the Democrats will deal with our friends and enemies in the ways that have led to Cold War global expansion of Soviet Communism, the Killing Fields and the Peoples Republic of Vietnam, the Iranian Revolution, the Second Intifada, a nuclear-armed North Korea and ultimately, a nuclear-armed Iran (Obama can finish the job started some thirty years earlier by Jimmy Carter). Change We Can Believe In!

Conservatives who have behaved in ways that suggested they had no where to go will suddenly find themselves with no where to go. We can brace for it but the reality is that the Obama/Pelosi/Reid trifecta will push through the biggest expansion of government spending, power and leftist politics this nation has ever seen. And Obama will use this opportunity to secure his own ideological philosophy through the appointment of two to four SCOTUS justices (the court of which will soon be named, The Dancing Ginsburgs). Change We Can Believe In!

As we've been told how both General Petraeus and Osama bin Laden considered Iraq to be the ultimate battlefield in the war on terror, tomorrow's election will be the ultimate battleground in the US war of politics and culture. Abortion will find a permanent home in America - Change We Can Believe In!; marriage will become obsolete - Change We Can Believe In!; national interests will take second place to international concerns - Change We Can Believe In!; our enemies will most certainly (per Joe Biden) test a President Obama - in ways they would never test a President McCain - Change We Can Believe In!; Big Government will find itself a permanent and lasting mandate to help fund every conceivable challenge and setback in life through spending and programs that once initiated, will never go away - in other words, your tax dollars are going to go to pre-school for three year olds, college for spoiled brats, health care for people regardless of economic circumstances or citizenship, doubling funding for the UN, increased foreign aid, an "army" of teachers, expansion of the Peace Corp, mandatory government service to achieve a high school diploma, higher salaries for teachers with no merit-based mechanism in place, federally funded abortions, unions doing away with secret ballots, energy programs that punish people, a welfare check for every working American who doesn't pay federal income taxes - Change We Can Pay For!

And conservatives who like their Limbaugh or Savage or Hannity or Beck...rest assure there will be drastic restrictions if not outright destruction of your favorite conservative talkers. The resurfacing 'Fairness Doctrine' may well be the first step toward silencing the opposition. - Change We Can Fall In Line With!

In my prophetic way, I pleaded with conservatives months ago to understand that they share a symbiotic relationship with the GOP - the crippling of the Republican Party will render conservatism impotent. Conservatives and Republicans will have to embrace each other again in order to at least hope for a midterm shift, in the face of all of the odds stacked against them, courtesy of the Democratic Party and the politics or purchasing elections and silencing conservative voices.

There is no Ronald Reagan waiting in the wings to fix everything. There is no fix. Even if circumstances lead conservatives back to a position of influence or power, instead of fighting for the America we have today, we will instead be fighting for the America the New Left Democrats will hand back to us. The status quo will be sharply different.

These are the thoughts I have late at night. Every generation is, in the face of aggressive progressivism, concerned about transformations that move us farther from the ideals of strength, sacrifice, family, faith, hard work and individualism. For the first time in my adult life, I am concerned. I sadly envision my children raising their kids in an America that is unrecognizable to us, one that shifts us farther away from lessons of the founding fathers, one that doesn't celebrate the family as we see it today. Today's America is an answer to the leftist shifts of much of the rest of western civilization; tomorrow's America may very well be leading the charge.

So to those honestly purport to be conservatives or Republicans, yet still think the answer is in a third party, or in staying home on election day or in making absurd comments questioning who the real conservative in the race is or prematurely writing off this election as in the bag for Obama (it is not) - it's time to put up or shut up. You can make your meaningless statement with your vote and throw the country under the bus or you can take the sure course in keeping conservatism alive and relevant and vote for John McCain.

There is no 'redo' or 'cleanup' function in tomorrows election. Come January, America will either continue to be the great country it has always been or it will "change" as promised...and those changes will be long lasting and damaging.

Believe It.

OK this is how this works.

This is where you can refute whatever claims have been made against your candidate of choice.

You list something negative that your candidate has been accused of, smeared with or generally associated with then in the SAME POST you refute it with evidence to to the contrary or a point countering the claim with the same or similar accusation that has been made. Here I will start.

OK one by one......

Obama/Biden > ACORN no formal charges in fact they report what they believe to be fraudulent registrations while turning in all registrations as required by federal law

McCain/Palin > The head of a voter registration group hired by the California Republican Party was arrested over the weekend for allegedly lying about his address in the state in order to vote illegally, the office of California's secretary of state announced Sunday.

Mark Anthony Jacoby, the owner of a signature-gathering firm called Young Political Majors, was taken into custody by Ontario police just after midnight Saturday and booked with a felony punishable by up to three years in prison.

NEXT!!........

Obama/Biden > Ayers

McCain/Palin > G Gordon Liddy Source Oregon's Citizens Alliance Source

Does John McCain "pal around with terrorists?"

Certainly McCain's continuing "association" and relationship with the convicted Watergate burglar and domestic terrorist G. Gordon Liddy might suggest that is the case, if we are to apply the standards drawn by the McCain campaign.

In 1998, Liddy gave a fundraiser in his Scottsdale, Arizona home for McCain's senatorial re-election campaign -- the two posed for photographs together; and as recently as May, 2007, as a presidential candidate, McCain was a guest on Liddy's syndicated radio show. Inexplicably, McCain heaped praise on his host's values. During the segment, McCain said he was "proud" of Liddy, and praised Liddy's "adherence to the principles and philosophies that keep our nation great."

Which of Liddy's "principles and philosophies" was McCain referring to? Liddy's advocacy of break-ins? Firebombings? Assassinations? Kidnappings? Taking target practice with figures nicknamed Bill and Hillary?

And

It seems that in 1993, John McCain was the keynote speaker at a fundraising banquet for the Oregon Citizens Alliance, the notorious anti-gay organization that was causing all sorts of trouble in Oregon in the 1990s.

McCain quickly got a first-hand flavor for the OCA. Marylin Shannon, the vice chairwoman of the Oregon GOP, had a spot on the program to give an opening prayer. In short order, she praised the Grants Pass woman accused of shooting an abortion doctor in Wichita and thanked the Lord "for Lon Mabon and the vision you put in his heart."

Let's check that again. Marilyn Shannon praises a terrorist who shot a doctor while introducing John McCain, and not only does he stay, he stands up and gives a fundraising address for these terrorist-lovers?

Outrageous. Will John McCain do what he should have done 15 years ago - and denounce the domestic terrorists who shoot doctors who provide legal medical services?

America is waiting.

NEXT............

Obama/Biden > Rev Wright "god damn America"

McCain/Palin > Ed Kalnins "if you disagree with Bush you are going to hell"..source

A review of recorded sermons Ed Kalnins, the senior pastor of Wasilla Assembly of God since 1999, also offers an "eyebrow-raising sketch of Palin's longtime spiritual home,'' the Post reports.

Kalnins has preached that critics of Bush will be banished to Hell, questioned if people who voted for Sen. John Kerry in 2004 would be accepted to Heaven, charged that the 9/11 terrorist attacks and Iraq were part of a war "contending for your faith;" and that Jesus "operated from that position of war mode."

During the 2004 election, Kalnins praised Bush's performance in debate with Sen. John Kerry, then offered a not-so-subtle message about his own preference: "I'm not going tell you who to vote for, but if you vote for this particular person, I question your salvation. I'm sorry." Kalnins said. "If every Christian will vote righteously, it would be a landslide every time."

Kalnins later bristled at the criticism Bush was facing for the government's handling of Hurricane Katrina: "I hate criticisms towards the president, because it's like criticisms towards the pastor -- it's almost like, it's not going to get you anywhere, you know, except for hell. That's what it'll get you."

NEXT...........

Obama/Biden > Tony Rezko

McCain/Palin > Council for World Freedom. Source

GOP presidential nominee John McCain has past connections to a private group that supplied aid to guerrillas seeking to overthrow the leftist government of Nicaragua in the Iran-Contra affair.

The U.S. Council for World Freedom was part of an international organization linked to former Nazi collaborators and ultra-right-wing death squads in Central America. The group was dedicated to stamping out communism around the globe.

The council's founder, retired Army Maj. Gen. John Singlaub, said McCain became associated with the organization in the early 1980s as McCain was launching his political career in Arizona. Singlaub said McCain was a supporter but not an active member in the group.

Oh, my. Playing the Guilt by Association Game doesn't seem to be a good idea for McCain with friends like those.

Not following the format of point/counterpoint will result in your post being deleted. ( I will not delete simple I agree or I don't agree statements to show support, but if you make a point about a candidate it must be point/counterpoint.

Please post your point/counter points one post at a time, not like above all strung together.

See how this works? No baseless claims without citing a source.

This could be interesting.....

Your move......

In the past week, TV anchors have taken to claiming that Obama "refuted" John McCain's statement that Obama launched his political career at the home of former Weather Underground leader Ayers.

No, Obama "denied" it; he didn't "refute" it. If "denying" something is the same as "refuting" it, then maybe the establishment media can quit harping on Palin's qualifications to be president, since she too "refuted" that by denying it.

Back before the media realized it needed to lie about Obama launching his political career at Ayers' house, the Los Angeles Times provided an eyewitness account from a liberal who attended the event.

Approximately 60 million people watched the third and final debate between John McCain and Barack Obama on Wednesday night, marking what is likely the last time this election season that an audience of such proportions will be assembled to observe either of the candidates. Obama may draw comparable numbers with his October 29 nationwide half-hour commercial, but McCain will encounter serious difficulties in trying to amass such an audience again before Election Day. That being said, this is what that audience saw..

Among the things that struck me the most from the debate, this hit me like a ton of bricks: as Obama recounts that Colombian labor leaders had been assassinated John McCain rolled his eyes as if he couldn't be bothered to listen any longer. This simply capped off a problem that plagued McCain throughout all three debates and that was acting even more ill-mannered than Al Gore did during presidential debates. McCain would write while his opponent was talking, talk while he was talking, etc. which was simple disrespectful debate behavior. McCain took it to another level, however, when during the second debate he rose and wandered the stage actively while it was Obama's turn to answer. He then took it to the ultimate level when, during the third debate, as Obama referenced the murders of activists in Colombia McCain rolled his eyes. Whoever was tasked to brief McCain on polite behavior during debates should be fired.

McCain also thinks that he was tarring Obama with the "spread the wealth" line. McCain should remember that Huey Long was a serious contender with FDR for the presidential nomination until he was assassinated. Acting like Obama wants to "share the wealth" is probably going to make him look more palatable to undecided voters and not do so much to paint Obama as a socialist.

McCain made another mistake during the debate which was to say his campaign is all about fixing the economic mess. With his campaign eyeballs deep in portraying Obama as a potential terrorist sympathizer, this makes McCain look dishonest because what he's saying and what his campaign are doing are not matching up.

The real problem that has run throughout McCain and Obama's interactions is that Obama is deferential to McCain and McCain is not so to Obama. Obama has a Zen-like quality to him that David Brooks has written about that FDR and Reagan had too: they are unflappable. No matter what you say to them, they decline the bait and thus drive their opponent crazy. The third debate was just a continuation of the same problems inherent on this campaign for John McCain.

NEWBERG, Ore. -- A Christian university in Oregon said Tuesday it has punished four students who confessed to hanging a likeness of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama from a tree on campus.

National Polls | Compare Candidates | Alerts

George Fox University broke the news to students and staff Tuesday afternoon at an all-campus meeting. About 1,000 people attended, said Rob Felton, a university spokesman.

A statement from the school said the penalties against the four students were "immediate long-term suspension and public service." The school cited federal privacy rules in not disclosing more about the students or their punishment.

The FBI is investigating whether any civil rights were violated.

"A criminal investigation is much more rigorous than an academic one, obviously," said Beth Anne Steele, an FBI spokeswoman. She couldn't say when the investigation would be complete.

Felton said the university's own investigation led to the four students. "To the best of our knowledge these are the only people involved," he said. "We're not pursuing it any further."

The commercially produced cardboard cutout of Obama was hung from a tree last week with fishing line around the neck.

A message taped to the cutout read, "Act Six reject." That refers to a scholarship and leadership program for minority and low-income student leaders at Christian colleges primarily located in the Northwest.

Felton wouldn't comment on the students' motive. Instead he cited a statement from Brad Lau, the university's vice president of student life.

"Regardless of the students' intent, the image of a black man hung from a tree is one of the most hurtful symbols of racism in American history," Lau said in the statement. "Displays such as this have no place on a campus that is dedicated to living out the teachings of Jesus."

Steve Schmidt, Karl Rove's protege and an expert at the negative campaign and dominating the news cycle as well as the man telling campaign manager Rick Davis what to do, has moved the McCain campaign into its next phase. His strategy is to ignore the economy and roll the dice by shifting to a vicious attack on Obama's character. Not only is he shifting to a vicious character attack, but he is having Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin deliver it. I think both are mistakes that are likely to cost the campaign the election.

First, let us tackle the smaller issue which is who the campaign is attacking with. Palin's success at drawing support stems not only from her bona fides as a longtime conservative but, on a deeper and subconscious level, as someone likable on a personal level. In a discussion, the woman I was speaking with put it to me thusly: "She's a family person, a mom, someone that could be your neighbor and someone that you would trust to babysit your kids." Therefore, if Palin's likability is indeed because of personal reasons in moderate voters' minds, sending her out to deliver a line like "Obama is palling around with terrorists" is not going to maintain the image that has been cultivated and brought support from the mainstream voters to McCain's campaign. If they continue to have Palin act as McCain's chief surrogate and axewoman they may erode all the positive things that naming her VP has done for their campaign. Just as the Bible says a man cannot serve two masters, a politician cannot serve two images. I do not think that Palin getting down into the gutter and getting all that dirt all over her is going to be a net positive for the campaign because any benefit she derives from attacking Obama will be eliminated by the damage she does to her own image. If you doubt that damage to her image will hurt McCain's campaign, you are wrong. This is one of the few presidential elections in which the Vice Presidential nominee draws voters outside their home state. In McCain's case, Palin's popularity helps him a great deal as was illustrated by the campaign's difficulties before bringing her on board. So, not only is this embarkation upon a mission to assassinate Obama's character a mistake, it is a mistake being compounded by using your most effective principle to deliver it.

Second, and more importantly, for McCain to attempt to turn the page on the economy while the public is still concerned about it is a mistake of epic proportions. Apparently Steve Schmidt did not observe or read about the 1992 election, but George. H. W. Bush lost that election (when he was expected to win) because he decided to talk about foreign policy while the public was seriously concerned about the economy. It was Bill Clinton, the hillbilly governor (I'm allowed to say that because I'm a hillbilly) from Arkansas, that realized the public was susceptible to a candidate that was talking about their economic concerns so while Bush was lauding victory in the Gulf War Bill Clinton, in stark comparison, was having a summit about the American economy. The economy is THE issue that lost the election for the current president's father because people concerned about the economy either voted for Perot because of his anti-NAFTA rhetoric (remember the "giant sucking sound" comment from Perot in the second debate?) like my dad did or they voted for Bill Clinton because his campaign shifted its emphasis towards economic concerns. George H. W. Bush would almost certainly have been elected if he had not ignored the economy in his re-election campaign.

It is instructive to compare the two situations as well. Bush 41's electorate was looking at a minor recession as compared to what is going on with our economy right now and they still elected Bill Clinton over George H. W. Bush. Today we are looking at an economic crisis in which we just had to infuse $700 billion in capital into the economy from government coffers to stabilize the economy and there is talk amongst financial experts (which, make no mistake, is filtering down to the average person and that includes everyone that will be voting in this election) that this "bailout" was the beginning and we could be looking at the government kicking in up to $2 trillion more before all is said and done. If the 1992 electorate was viewing a minor recession and voted in the candidate talking about the economy, what will today's electorate whose economy is staring into the abyss do?

Campaigns are all about the issues that are being discussed by the candidates and who is dictating the subject. The campaigns decide what they will talk about and which issues they will focus on. However, it is important that the decisionmakers in a campaign be plugged into reality because the events of the day guide what the most effective issues to discuss are and, in a wider sense, they constrain what you can discuss by making some issues highly relevant and other issues absolutely irrelevant. The economy right now is highly relevant. Also, McCain's campaign is really playing with fire because it already took a major hit from its candidate saying the fundamentals of the economy were strong as the economic meltdown started. While Obama's campaign made only one commercial using the video of the comment, the comment itself initiated the slide in which McCain leading or being tied with Obama in nearly all battleground states turned into Obama having the lead or being tied with McCain in those same states just three weeks later. Also, McCain should not become disenchanted with the entire issue of the economy simply because he made an impetuous decision that backfired. That decision, if you were wondering, was McCain's decision to suspend his campaign and take public ownership of the economic bailout bill. That, in itself, was a terribly risky decision that I would have advised against because the potential downside was astronomical. The worst ended up happening for McCain, which is that he told the public he was putting the bailout bill on his shoulders to carry it to success and his own party torpedoed it in the House of Representatives. Therefore, he did more than the Obama campaign could ever do to damage his standing with the public vis-a-vis his stewardship of the economy. The bailout bill is touted as critical to the economy continuing to provide for the American people and he cannot even control the members of his own party in the House of Representatives to get it to pass. The Republicans and John Boehner, by the way, were the ones that failed to do their part in the House and their part was to come up with 80 yea votes for the bill.

Third, and most importantly, Schmidt and McCain's chief advisers need to understand something and understand it yesterday if they have any hope of helping McCain-Palin win this election and that is the American people's priorities. The average American is scared of one thing more than they or their friends and family being killed by a terrorist and that one thing is being broke. I have said many times that not only did I think that the 2008 election resembled the "crossroads" election that 1932 was, but based on his strategy during the campaign I believe that Barack Obama and his advisers closely studied FDR and his campaign and have tried to emulate it because they believe that the 2008 election is like the 1932 election. The economic crisis that started on September 15 and extends to this day have simply made this election not just similar to 1932, but a carbon copy by introducing the fear among the public that the economy could be unsound.

These three points together indicate why it is not in the McCain campaign's best interest to "turn the page" on the economy. I use quotes because Greg Strimple, one of McCain's senior advisers, said "We are looking forward to turning a page on this financial crisis and getting back to discussing Mr. Obama's aggressively liberal record and how he will be too risky for Americans." Source McCain, after already being made to look as though he is incapable of handling the economy if elected by the Obama campaign (with no small amount of help from McCain himself), should be doing his best to assure the American people that he is ready to help everyone in economic distress and capable of doing so. Changing the subject to character will simply allow the Obama camp to stay on the economy (they have not stopped talking about it for the last three weeks) while responding strongly to McCain attacks and then McCain will be faced with the choice of surely losing the election or switching back to talking about the economy with Obama having a significant head start on that as well as looking as though he is leading McCain's campaign around by the family jewels. Neither are pleasant options.

The true 'pro-life' candidate is the one who is supporting social policies proven to reduce abortions, policies that would extend substantial financial and health-care assistance to poor families facing unplanned pregnancies.

The true pro-life candidate is the one who has also emphasized pregnancy prevention and the need for fathers to take greater responsibility for unplanned pregnancies.

There is a pro-life candidate out there — and it turns out he's a Democrat!

As I write this, there are 44 days, 1 hour and 34 minutes until the polls close on the East Coast on Election Day and that includes, most crucially, the polls in Ohio. I know this because I have a countdown clock in the center of the top of my screen on my work laptop. It is essential that all Democrats read what I am about to write and take it to heart, but if Barack Obama is to end the Republican rollback of American government and industry to pre-FDR days Ohioans must read and heed this message.

This is a transitional election. John McCain is not a bad man, far from it. But the fact is that he brings with him the same cadre of Republican allies and Republican advisers that have viewed the economic consequences of the War on Terror, the prescription drug benefit and now the financial industry bailout that is going to cost more than 10% of America's annual GDP. It is this braintrust of the Republican Party that started with Reagan and has since co-opted Republican presidents, whether they agreed with them or not, to amass more and more debt. Their fondest wish is to bankrupt the United States government while enriching their allies so that they can rebuild on a pre-1932 foundation as if Franklin Roosevelt never existed. They have gotten more and more effective at this to the point that George W. Bush's administration has been the most profligate debt spending entity in the entirety of American governance. Now these people are aggressively backing John McCain and working hard to get him into the White House. Given their record of methodically destroying the government's credit rating and trying to spend until it becomes practically impossible for the government to uphold its obligations per the New Deal and their phenomenal success using the Republican Party and Republican presidents to further their cause, a vote for John McCain is a vote to veto every act of progressive American governance in the modern era.

The Republicans have done an excellent job this time, a job so good that their strategy even snuck up on me. They always win the vote of white men and they have engineered a coup with Sarah Palin to make a competitive grab at the vote of white women. Senior citizens are skewing to John McCain because he is one and because Barack Obama represents a change that many of them are not comfortable with. Given the basis of the voters that are left, that means that Barack Obama's strongest supporters are going to have to roll the rock up the hill and do the grunt work of mathematically overpowering the groups that McCain has won already. Obama's strongest supporters are voters under 40 years of age and African-American voters. We will have to pray that the Hispanic and Latino votes break our way despite an underlying enmity between these voters and African-Americans, perhaps making Hispanics and Latinos balk at voting for a candidate that IS an African-American despite the writing on the wall that if the Republican Party is allowed to continue having power it will use that power to systematically destroy everything that FDR disciples value about our country.

After the financial news this week, I am even willing to say that this choice of presidents is more crucial than the choice in 1932. The economy has been bailed out, for now, but lax monitoring of the financial sector after the New Deal regulations preventing commercial and investment banking to be housed under the same roof were overturned has caused rot and bad business practices to spread like a virulent disease that our country has not been immunized against. There will be more trouble and this $1 trillion buyout is not the end of America's economic woes. To elect the candidate of a party whose mantra is deregulation to the White House after this is to invite total disaster since it was the government providing practically no regulation that allowed it to fester and grow.

Therefore, I say to my fellow Democrats: THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT ELECTION OF YOUR LIFE AND LOSING IS NOT AN OPTION. Every Democrat that cares about his or her country must do the following things ranked by importance not just because they are a Democrat but because they are a patriot and no change of party in the White House will lead to the destruction of America as we know it:
1) Vote for Barack Obama on November 4
2) Find your friends and relatives that support Obama and make sure that they get to the polls to vote for Barack Obama on November 4
3) Help to register new voters while there is still time. The deadlines are coming up and October 6 is the deadline for new voters to register in Ohio.
4) Give your discretionary income to the Obama campaign for the next 44 days to make sure Obama's message is heard loud and clear and that Obama can accurately represent what another Republican president will bring to American governance.
5) Coordinate with your local Obama campaign representative or county Democratic party to volunteer in a massive Get Out The Vote campaign.

Just as America's fate was lain on the shoulders of the Greatest Generation during WWII and they were asked to save the country from Hitler and Hirohito, America's fate is now being lain on our shoulders and we are being asked to help save America from itself. It is a calling that we cannot defer and we cannot fail at.

I speak to my Ohio Democratic brethren now, but this goes for the rest as well. The best chance to beat the Republicans coincides, unfortunately, with a time where their policies have culminated and put the country at risk of a total meltdown. However, the meltdown is on their terms and those that did not design or are not assisting in that meltdown will be the ones that pay the biggest price. A Republican has never won the White House without winning Ohio so the most crucial fight has been put into our hands: eliminating Ohio from the Republican column is historically the equivalent of eliminating the chances of the Republican presidential candidate winning the race. A blue Ohio is the stake that must be driven through the McCain/Palin campaign's heart to make sure that this aberrant, destructive form of the Republican Party will rise no more to threaten our country. We are on the front lines and failure is not an option. Every Democrat that reads this should forward it to every Democrat they know, but it is crucial that every Democrat in Ohio read this while there is still time for them to act, redouble their efforts and prevent an extension of the most incompetent governance of America by a party in its history. Use the Send a Link feature on Facebook, link to this on Digg and Reddit, use all the social networking tools at your fingertips to help this piece make the rounds because Democrats must know that the stakes are the highest they have ever been. Also, to my Democratic brothers and sisters in states that are crucial and close like Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Florida I give you the same advice... forward this link on and emphasize the importance that your state go into Obama's column. There is no such thing as winning by too much but we can lose by a single vote; we must run like we are a hundred votes behind until the polls close. On that note, it's time to win an election and save our country. I will leave you with a quote:

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has. - Margaret Mead

As, presumably, was the less-widely reported remark he made immediately afterward: "You can wrap an old fish in a piece of paper called 'change' [and] it's still gonna stink."

That the Democrats have pointedly noted that Sen. John McCain is 72 years old is an eerie coincidence, right?

All of which makes Obama's feigned outrage over the controversy - portraying himself as the victim of a "Swift Boat" attack - a tad hypocritical.

South Carolina Democratic chairwoman Carol Fowler sharply attacked Sarah Palin today, saying John McCain had chosen a running mate "whose primary qualification seems to be that she hasn't had an abortion."

Palin is an opponent of abortion rights and gave birth to her fifth child, Trig, earlier this year after finding out during her pregnancy that the baby had Down syndrome.

Russell Brand, the British comedian, hosted the MTV Video Music Awards, making a series of political, sexual and off-colour remarks throughout the night....Brand appeared to annoy some of the celebrities in attendance with his blunt remarks, although he did receive cheers for backing US Presidential candidate Barack Obama.

He said: "As a representative of the global community, a visitor from abroad, I don't want to come across a little bit biased, but could I please ask of you, people of America, please elect Barack Obama, please, on behalf of the world.

"Some people, I think they're called racists, say America is not ready for a black president.

"But I know America to be a forward thinking country because otherwise why would you have let that retard and cowboy fella be president for eight years.

"We were very impressed. We thought it was nice of you to let him have a go, because, in England, he wouldn't be trusted with a pair of scissors."

Brand also took a shot at Republican Vice-Presidential nominee Sarah Palin.

Speaking of Palin's daughter's boyfriend, Levi Johnston, Brand said: "That is the safe sex message of all time. Use a condom or become a Republican!"

Former Democratic National Committee Chairman Don Fowler apologized Sunday for recently joking Hurricane Gustav's expected landfall on the same day as the opening of the Republican National Convention suggested God was on the Democrats' side.

A YouTube video of the comments posted by the conservative blog RedState.org and showed Fowler joking with South Carolina Rep. John Spratt about the timing of the hurricane while on a flight from the Democratic National Convention back to South Carolina. The person who filmed the conversation is not identified.

"The hurricane is going to hit New Orleans about the time they start. The timing is, at least it appears now, it will be there Monday. That just demonstrates God is on our side," Fowler said, while laughing. Fowler also told Spratt that "everything's cool."

And I looked and behold a Palin horse: and his name that sat on her was Death. and Hell followed with him.

This VP pick is problematic on so many levels I do not even know where to begin so, with the assistance of rolling a single dice, I found an arbitrary place to start: women voting for women. There is a serious problem in theorizing that because many women voted for Hillary Clinton because she was a woman that they will now vote for John McCain because Sarah Palin is a woman. Let's start with the simplest one: Hillary was running for President and Palin is not. True, McCain could yield the office to Palin because of his advanced age at some point but that is not a likely enough event to motivate the women who wanted to see the first female president to go out and vote McCain in significant numbers. Also, there is the problem of the abortion issue. A woman plays with women voters when those voters agree with the woman's stance on abortion, generally. The women that voted for Hillary included a substantial portion that were pro-choice. Palin is not only second on the ticket, but she's pro-life. Sure Palin will play with angry Clinton voters that refuse to vote for Obama because of a perceived sleight against their candidate and she will most certainly play with pro-life women voters, but wasn't John McCain likely to win those votes without her? Just being a woman is not going to get it, especially from the second spot on the ticket: Geraldine Ferraro proved that in 1984 when Reagan ran up one of the most lopsided presidential victories in history.

Secondly, Palin is from a small state (Alaska) and was born and has roots in another (Idaho) that both reliably vote Republican in election after election. Alaska wields three electoral votes and Idaho holds four for a grand total of seven electoral votes that McCain would have likely collected anyway. While Obama was likely to collect Delaware's three votes and Pennsylvania's twenty one votes, at least Biden's background is pitching in twenty four electoral voter as opposed to seven. Palin doesn't really play from a "Favorite Son" perspective either.

Thirdly, there will be no more bringing up Barack Obama's associations with Tony Rezko or his crooked Chicago politics. Palin fired several people for political reasons (which Alaska authorities decided was not discrimination and she had the prerogative to do) as well as ordering one of her subordinates to fire her former brother-in-law (who was involved in a contentious dust-up with Palin's sister) from the Alaska State Troopers and, when he balked, she replaced him with someone that left after a few weeks. Not only that, there are incriminating taped conversations mentioning Palin and her husband by name. Before you declare that these issues from Palin's past don't matter you should consider that in a little more than a year and a half as Alaska's governor she started with a 90% approval rating and by the time she abandoned ship it had dropped 25% to 65%. Her stock was dropping as McCain chose her and the reality is that they may have been the answer to the other's problem: Palin needed out of Alaska before scandals ate her up and McCain needed a token women to try to poach angry Hillary voters from Obama's camp. A match made in Heaven if there ever were one.

Fourth, another attack we will not see forthcoming from the McCain camp (unless they expect the counterpunch to knock out several teeth and are fine with that) is the inexperience argument against Barack Obama. True, Obama was a community organizer, a constitutional law professor and a U.S. Senator from Illinois since his swearing in in 2005 and McCain was able to argue, by comparison, that Obama was inadequate when compared to himself to run this country, particularly in a time of war. Now that he has added Palin to his ticket, if McCain launches the inexperience argument again during this campaign the response is going to come out something like this: "A 72-year old candidate for president with a history of serious health problems that would be the oldest president ever elected wants to entrust the Oval Office in his stead to a woman that was a sports reporter, the mayor of a small Alaskan town, an appointed official and a governor of a sparsely populated state for half as long as Barack Obama has been a senator and he's arguing that it would be dangerous to vote for someone as inexperienced as Barack Obama?" If McCain's advisers have anything left upstairs, don't expect them to open the door to that retort.

Fifth, McCain may not know it but he is taking a serious electoral risk putting Palin as close to the Big Chair as he is. The Republican Party is the resident home of the alpha male and, most particularly, the alpha male from the rural states down South and out West that the Republican Party tends to dominate. Is one to expect these same men, who believe that the Bible says a woman is subservient to her husband and that they ought not be in positions of leadership, to cast a vote for a 72- year old man who would be giving up the office to the first female president if he is incapacitated which, with each passing day, is becoming a more realistic possibility as McCain struggles to keep up the campaign pace of a man that is nearly three decades his junior? Bob Barr is running in this election and men that want to register a protest vote against the Republican Party (for, say, nominating a woman as VP perhaps?) have their own Ralph Nader to pull the lever for this year.

Finally, the structure of the Republican ticket is backwards. The Democratic ticket is set so that Joe Biden can give advice and be an involved Vice President and if, God forbid, something should happen to Barack Obama he can step in with all his experience and be a steady hand to guide the rudder. The Republican ticket is set up such that McCain will be relying on his own experience and if, God forbid, something happens to McCain a woman that has spent roughly a year and a half in an executive position is going to take control of the country with no one there to guide her, the fellow on the ticket with all the experience being gone. Do you want to take your chances with such an order of succession?

Edited for breaking news: This is why you NEVER pick a presidential or vice presidential candidate with teenage children: they're always in a bad mood, forever making bad decisions and likely to ruin your political career right in front of you. Rudy Giuliani's son aired some serious dirty laundry about him during his presidential run, Al Gore's son got picked up for a DUI and now Sarah Palin, the new face of evangelical Christian morals, has a pregnant 17-year old daughter. This is likely the most damning reason why she was a bad pick because it eliminates a fair amount of positives with the base and leaves McCain carrying the negatives.

All joking aside, this unmarried pregnancy of Palin's daughter creates a serious quandary for the GOP ticket. Palin was widely hailed in conservative circles to be McCain's vital link to energizing the evangelical base and the rising star in the Republican Party that could get McCain into the White House and then keep the Republicans there by running for re-election. One has to think that values voters are going to be at least a little let down and miffed by Palin valiantly supporting things like abstinence only education and no pre-marital sex and then having her hand forced to admit that her daughter IS one of those young unwed mothers that evangelicals believe have loose morals and are a drag on society by taking welfare money by the handful and then badly raising their children so that they end up, as the Republicans put it, "mugging you twice, once when welfare had to support their mother and again when they grow up and take your wallet at knifepoint." This is, quite simply, one of the most unlucky things politically that could have happened to McCain's team and it also reflects badly on their judgment. Either they didn't know and were irresponsible in vetting her or they did know and chose her anyway knowing that such a scandal would clash with everything they purport to believe in.

Depending on how the campaign progresses, Hell may actually follow Palin's nomination for the Republican Party.

Loose Lips Sink Ships

Over the course of his presidential bid, Biden cemented his reputation as -- how to put this nicely? -- less than disciplined on the campaign trail.

In the summer of 2006, as he was publicly mulling the race, Biden set off a controversy over comments he made about Indian Americans.

"I've had a great relationship [with Indian Americans]," Biden said. "In Delaware, the largest growth in population is Indian-Americans moving from India. You cannot go to a 7-Eleven or a Dunkin' Donuts unless you have a slight Indian accent. I'm not joking."

On the day he formally announced his candidacy, a New York Observer story that quoted Biden as calling Obama "articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy" came out, and the resultant uproar effectively undercut any momentum Biden was hoping to build.

Now that the not-so-secret courtship of Joe Biden has culminated in a most public union with Senator Barack Obama, many Conservatives are breathing a sigh of relief. For those who have worried lo these many months about a last second surprise "Dream Ticket" with Hillary Clinton or some combination featuring Evan Bayh, Jim Webb, Chuck Hagel, or others who might offer centrist appeal, we instead got a gift from the Obama Campaign.

It would be wrong or foolish to underestimate Joe Biden; he is very smart, caustically funny, a cunning and skilled political operative of the first degree, and a fierce and unrelenting partisan. He brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to an Obama campaign that was sorely lacking in certain key areas.

However, Joe Biden is ideologically not a balance to the ticket; he is only marginally less Left than Obama on many significant issues, and has a reputation for fiesty stubborness that does not bode well for much bi-partisan cooperation. Tales of his temper flashes rival those of John McCain. And, he is a known one-man gaffe machine who can sometimes be a loose cannon.

He is, in the gracious and understated words of the Los Angeles Times, "famously verbose," who struggles to articulate issues in a succinct manner; unless, of course, he is cutting someone down, in which case he can be razor sharp.

One of my favorite Biden moments, as recounted by the above-mentioned LA Times was when he was still running for President:

Biden's arming cluelessness was on display in a recent ABC news interview. The famously verbose senator was asked to state in 25 words or less why Democrats should nominate him. His response was 45 words. I suppose that, by Biden's standards, coming in at just under twice his allotted length counts as a victory of sorts. Biden then explained why he could win:

If people learn my story, learn my record, I think I can compete. The question is, can I raise the money. This is sort of like me saying that I think I can compete for a starting NFL quarterback job, but the question is, can I avoid injuries. It's a question, but it's certainly not the question.

If Biden can use a sports metaphor, then so can I. My terrible golf skills are redeemed in this one regard: even though I can't hit the ball straight, I can't hit it very far. Biden not only has a propensity to toss out the gaffes, but given his verbosity, when he goes off course, it can be a whopper.

Who can forget Biden's earlier Presidential run (OK, poor choice of words) back in 1988, when he had to drop out due to the discovery of him plagerizing a speech from a UK politician? As the LA Times and others have noted, Biden more recently raised eyebrows with his awkwardly-worded praise of Obama as being the first mainstream Presidential candidate who was black, "clean," and "articulate."

Reverends Jackson and Sharpton were not amused.

In Biden's defense, neither Sharpton nor Jackson were exactly "mainstream" or had a chance to actually win the elections, and when Biden used the unfortunate phrase "clean," he was picking up on an old 1950s complimentary word meaning "really sharp and together." Sharpton, who is not always sharp or together, immediately spun Biden's comment to mean that black politicians had heretofore practiced poor hygiene, and much hysteria ensued. And, Biden didn't help his image as being racially insensitive when he said, "you cannot go to a 7-Eleven or a Dunkin' Donuts unless you have a slight Indian accent."

Few of Biden's statements may come back to haunt him more than this one, as reported today in the Daily Mail UK:

However, Mr Biden, 65, is known for being talkative and is prone to making statements which get him into trouble.

"Biden has denounced Barack Obama's poor foreign policy judgment and has strongly argued in his own words what Americans are quickly realising - that Barack Obama is not ready to be president"'

On the other hand, Biden has made many warm comments about John McCain, and even suggested that he would consider being McCain's running mate:

I would be honored to run with or against John McCain because I think the country would be better off.

One thing is certain: we will be hearing a lot more about these quotes and gaffes in days ahead. Another thing is certain: we have not heard the last words from Joe Biden about these issues. Not by a long shot.

This "O'Biden" ticket (I want to trademark that) is a bit of an odd couple, and it's pretty obvious which one is Oscar and which one is Felix. Will the cautious and lawyerly Obama be undone by the caustic and careless Biden? Time will tell.

Barack Obama showed his naivety as a politician today when, after weighing all the choices, he selected Joseph Biden, Senator from Delaware as his running mate for the 2008 election campaign.

Let's start with the positives about Biden for the Obama campaign. There are two:
1) Biden fills a glaring hole in Obama's resume when it comes to foreign policy experience. He is the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and has served more than thirty years on the committee in some capacity. He has also spent extensive time abroad, the most recent trip coming approximately a week ago to Tbilisi, Georgia at the behest of that country's president Mikhail Saakashvili. Within just the last few years he has traveled to Afghanistan and Pakistan twice and to Iraq an impressive eight times. Under Biden's foreign policy experience, he provides a bridge between centrist Democrats and Obama, whose campaign was buoyed strongly by the anti-Iraq war bloc in the primary. Biden, who voted for the war, later qualified that vote by saying that the president had not been straight with the Congress and made his hay criticizing how the war was being mismanaged as well as taking issue with the delay in getting armored Humvees into Iraq which, contrary to the Pentagon's expectations, turned into a 360 degree war with no front line for the thin-skinned regular Humvees to operate behind.
2) Joe Biden's experience is the other tangible asset that he offers Barack Obama as a partner on the presidential ticket. Biden was elected to the Senate from Delaware in 1972 and, with thirty six years and counting in the United States Senate, has spent more than half his life in Congress.

There are, however, a myriad of contradictions between Obama and Biden as well as legitimate negatives about a Biden as the vice presidential candidate.
- For starters, the two men represent two totally different views of Washington to the voters. Barack Obama had cultivated a slick, refined "outsider" image that has propelled candidacies like Ronald Reagan's to victory. Joe Biden's image strikes directly at that image by being everything that Obama appears to be the opposite of: a Washington insider doing a hard forty (forty years with no parole) in Congress. It was difficult but in Biden, the Obama campaign managed to choose a vice presidential candidate that was even more Washington establishment vanilla than Hillary Clinton. For many people the appeal of Barack Obama was that he was not a creature of the beltway, he was a newly-arrived outsider in Washington that was a free thinker who would change the way that things were done. In fact, he beat Hillary Clinton on that platform. How does he successfully turn around and disown that image by teaming up with Biden and still remain a winner at the ballot box?
- Obama is faced with an opponent in John McCain who is of advanced age and has a nasty habit of saying things that come back to haunt him. What is the best way to counter this? Choose for a running mate a man of advanced age that has a nasty habit of saying things that come back to haunt him. Some of Biden's gems have included saying that one has to have a slight Indian accent to enter a 7-Eleven or Dunkin Donuts (misguided attempt at xenophobic humor), saying that his own running mate is the "first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy," (all great reasons to run on the same ticket as him assuming that blacks don't vote against him because he chose a white guy that insulted every other black politician from the B.O. period [Before Obama]) and, my personal favorite, verbal plagiarism of British politician Neil Kinnock on a level so obvious that Biden was forced to drop out of the 1988 Democratic presidential primaries (that will make Obama's oratory all the more amazing since Obama isn't copying another politician).
- Barack Obama, being raised by his grandparents and single mother, has cultivated the image of a president that would be the champion of the lower classes and protect them from unfair treatment by those with economic power over them. Biden's nomination as Vice President renders this image a total joke considering his strong support of the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2005 which was passed by Congress and signed into law by President Bush with the vote of Joe Biden. You can click over to see the full extent of the bill but the highlights are that credit card companies (like Delaware-based MBNA, one of Biden's most fervent financial supporters) can practice predatory lending (i.e. high credit limits with interest rates at 30% or greater), credit card companies can seize their money in the first wave of liquidation in bankruptcy and those whose debts were run up by identity theft or medical bills have no legal refuge in bankruptcy. Better yet, two other changes took place. One is that all filings of bankruptcy were made more difficult with debts being far harder to seek protection from except Chapter 11: the bankruptcy filing for a corporation. The second is that "protected trusts" in states like Utah were left legal so that those who have enough money to organize one can file bankruptcy and keep whatever they want safe in the trust, giving up the rest for their debts. These changes in bankruptcy law were brought to you by Barack Obama's new partner in his potential executive office: Joe Biden.
- Obama, already on shaky ground with regards to his stance on the surge in Iraq which, whether it is responsible or not, has coincided with drastically reduced violence on the ground in Iraq has taken on a running mate who 100% unequivocally said that the surge would not work and things were just going to get worse. The Republicans now have the opportunity to throw the surge back into the entire Democratic ticket's face and not just occasionally at the top of the ticket.
- This choice also made no sense whatsoever from an electoral standpoint. Biden has connections to Pennsylvania (his biography says he is from Scranton, Pennsylvania) and his home state since at least the age of 29 is Delaware. Firstly, Biden has questionable pull in Pennsylvania that carries 21 electoral votes and the state he does have pull in, Delaware, carries a whopping 3 electoral votes. Secondly, Obama has a lead in both states and since a Democrat has won both states in the last four presidential elections that means Biden has absolutely no effect whatsoever on the bottom line that puts Obama into the White House: electoral votes.

It would appear that Barack Obama was so concerned that his national security credentials would be questioned it led him to choose a running mate that is wholly unsuited to his campaign strategy and is going to act as a drag on his ability to win the presidential election. The lesson may come at the cost of losing a national election but Barack Obama is about to learn that solidifying one aspect of your strategy at the cost of negating multiple other aspects (including those that have been most effective thus far) is not worth the trade no matter what facet of your strategy you are shoring up.

Here is one of the more disturbing reports from the Presidential campaign trail:

A day after Barack Obama and John McCain exchanged an embrace during a faith forum at a California megachurch, Obama called the U.S. economy a disaster thanks to "John McCain's president, George W. Bush." - Senator Barack Obama (Associated Press)

United States citizen and Senator Barack Obama refers to United States President George W. Bush as "McCain's President" with the clear and insidious implication that George W. Bush is not Barack Obama's President, or that somehow Bush is not the President of every American citizen. While some may believe this is a minor issue, or some may agree with Obama's sentiment, I would contend that this is a symptom of something very, very wrong and dangerous in our current bitter partisan culture.

Love him or hate him, George W. Bush is the President of the United States, and will be until January 2009. To assert otherwise is wrong-headed, divisive, and damaging to our national unity. For a man who purports to be a "healer," such comments are far beneath Obama's dignity or indeed, his stated mission. And, for a man who has battled perceptions that he has associated himself with unpatriotic radicals such as William Ayers, Father Michael Pfleger, and Rev. Jeremiah Wright, such comments only serve to highlight these negative perceptions.

Should Barack Obama be so blessed and honored as to be elected as the next President of the United States, then he will be the President of all US citizens, Democrat and Republican alike. Should he be elected, he will be my President, and while I may disagree profoundly and strongly with some of his policies, I will freely acknowledge and honor him as our leader. I will pray for him daily, as my faith instructs me to do, as our leader. In fact, even though he is not my Senator at this time, I am already praying God's blessings for him and his family, even as I do for Senator McCain and his family...and President Bush and his family.

I did not vote for Bill Clinton, and disagreed often with him, but he was my President. He wasn't just "Hillary's President" or "Al Gore's President" or "Joe Biden's President." He held the highest elected office in our land, and for the sake of that office - and for our national unity - I honored that.

We should call on Senator Obama to cease this divisive talk, especially during this time of war, terror, and danger. We are the United States of America, and George W. Bush is our President.

It's about time somebody said it ...before NBC continues any further to do to McCain what they did to Hillary Clinton!

McCain's campaign manager Rick Davis asked Sunday for a meeting with Steve Capus, the president of NBC News, to protest what the campaign called signs that the network is "abandoning non-partisan coverage of the Presidential race."

Davis made the request Sunday in a letter that is part of an aggressive effort by Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) to counter news coverage he considers critical.

Politico has asked NBC for a response and will post that here when it arrives.

In this case, the campaign is objecting to a statement by NBC's Andrea Mitchell on "Meet the Press" questioning whether McCain might have gotten a heads-up on some of the questions that were asked of Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), who was the first candidate to be interviewed Saturday night by Pastor Rick Warren at a presidential forum on faith.

After tonight's wonderful and insightful Presidential Candidate Forum with Pastor Rick Warren at Saddleback Community Church in Lake Forest, California, both Barack Obama and John McCain have many reasons to be pleased with their performances. The format of the forum was brilliant and fair focusing on Leadership, Values, Faith, and the Role of America in the World.

Pastor Warren (author of the mega-selling book, The Purpose Driven Life) offered brief, succinct, and relevant introductory remarks, noting that he believes in the separation of church and state, but not the separation between faith and politics, because faith has such a significant impact on a person's worldview.

Then, Pastor Warren presented Senator Barack Obama, and sat with him at a comfortable desk in front of a large audience. He asked tough, but fair questions, and was often avuncular and relaxed with Obama. As they were talking, Senator John McCain was held in a "green room" offstage, under what Warren jokingly called "the cone of silence," unable to hear any of the questions or answers.

After one hour, he concluded the dialogue, presented Obama to the audience once more, and they stood together at the edge of the platform. Pastor Warren then presented John McCain, who entered and exchanged warm handshakes and hugs with both Pastor Warren and Senator Obama. It was a riveting moment.

Senator Obama then departed the stage and Pastor Warren then conducted the exact same format with Senator McCain for one hour, and then the evening was concluded. By all accounts, the forum was a great success, and provided an intriguing model for future possibilities for getting to know these candidates better.

Many other seeds and authors will break down the specifics of the forum; this article is simply intended to be a quick, broad brush stroke impression.

Obama was very smooth and cool, as expected. He had a sense of ease, humor, and comfort in the church surroundings. He and Warren had great rapport, two buddies chatting amiably about the issues of the day. Some of his answers, especially on abortion and embryonic stem cell research, will not sit well with Evangelical Christians; he attempted to keep things fuzzy and general, and may have mis-stated a key fact about the number of abortions in recent years.

One of his answers - that marriage should be defined as the union of one man and one woman - will not sit well with his liberal political base. Likewise, some may be uncomfortable with Obama's firm declaration of his strong personal faith in Jesus Christ.

He said he would not have nominated Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court, citing a lack of experience and "not being a strong enough legal thinker." He also said his own ideological differences with Justice Scalia would prevent him from nominating a man like Scalia to the Court. And, he said that John Roberts had not protected against the encroachment of the Executive Branch on the other branches. His answers with regard to faith-based organizations made it clear that he would place new restrictions and intepretations on the activities and hiring practices of these organizations, although he claims to be strongly in favor of these organizations.

With regard to the people he admires or would turn to for advice, he mentioned his wife, Michelle, and his grandmother, and then Senator Sam Nunn, Senator Richard Lugar, Senator Ted Kennedy, and Representative Tom Coburn.

Obama discussed what he described as the very difficult decision to oppose the war in Iraq, as well as his "greatest moral failures" relating to his teenage usage of drugs. He said America's greatest moral failure was in not taking better care of "the least of these" among us (quoting from Matthew 25). He addressed these issues thoughtfully and sincerely. At times throughout his segment, Obama seemed to be taking a very scholarly, lawyerly, and measured approach; the post-modern notion of viewing every situation from every possible angle. Sometimes, this came across as a bit vague or unfocused, or even attempting to please and placate all constituencies. Still, he should be happy overall with how he conducted himself.

Senator McCain was somewhat surprising in the way he immediately came out of the box crackling with energy. His answers were very succinct and focused. One commentator noted that Obama sounded like a lawyer and McCain sounded like a fighter pilot.

McCain also engaged in a lot of spontaneous humor and banter with Pastor Warren, although his experience and command of specific proposals and circumstances gave the conversation more of a weighty or significant tone; less a chat between buddies, and more of a respectful interview with a statesman. McCain's answers were unequivocally and unapologetically conservative and clear, and he gave many persona illustrations to explain his thinking, as well as detailed global examples. He mentioned one specific issue where he had changed his mind, because facts and issues had become more clear to him: the need to drill now in America for more oil, and to explore every single option for eliminating our dependance on foreign oil - and the need for new alternatives to oil, including renewable energy and nuclear energy.

As Senator Obama had been asked about moral failure, so was McCain also asked. He stated immediately and simply that his own greatest moral failure was in his failure in his marriage to his first wife.

He praised General David Petraeus, and cited him as the kind of person he would turn to for advice in his own administration, along with Civil Rights icon John Lewis and entrepreneur and E-Bay CEO Meg Whitman. He praised faith-based organizations and called on government to avoid restricting these organizations in their ability to function successfully in problem-solving.

McCain's answers are sure to energize and excite the Conservative base of the Republican party in ways that he has heretofore been unable to accomplish. His energy level and sharp wit belied the accusations that he is an old, tired crank. His reflections on his service in Vietnam, particularly his decision to not accept early release as a P.O.W., and also a brief Christmas moment of worship together with one of his Vietnamese captors, who was also a Christian, were deeply moving and compelling.

My immediate response to the forum was that if baseball were employed as a metaphor, it could be said that Obama doubled, McCain homered, and Warren smacked a grand slam. The impressions of my fellow Newsviners would be greatly appreciated.

IN 2007 James Dobson, who heads Focus on the Family, a powerful Christian group, said that he "would not vote for John McCain under any circumstances." Mr Dobson said he was worried that the Republican was "not in favour of traditional marriage, and I pray that we won't get stuck with him." But now Mr Dobson is reconsidering. It is a strange year for religious voters trying to decide between candidates who, on Saturday August 16th, will air their views on matters spiritual and earthly by talking in turn to Rick Warren, a megachurch pastor in California.

....

Mr Obama has a different set of problems. He has been a Christian since early adulthood. He talks in detail about his faith, and in speeches can cite the books of Micah and Isaiah, or how Leviticus and Deuteronomy cannot be applied letter-for-letter to the modern world. His youthful community-organising fits well with his notion of the "social gospel". Whatever the numbers of ill-informed (about 10% think he is a Muslim), Mr Obama's faith is genuine.

But his inflammatory former preacher, who made paranoid and angry anti-American statements from his pulpit, almost derailed Mr Obama's quest for the Democratic nomination. Mr Obama may want to use his time with Mr Warren to explain to white, middle-American Christians what he saw in the feisty black church he has left. Mr Obama's church might not be such a big issue if his politics were different.

In swing-state Colorado, the Republican Secretary of State conducted the biggest purge of voters in history, dumping a fifth of all registrations. Guess their color. In swing-state Florida, the state is refusing to accept about 85,000 new registrations from voter drives - overwhelming Black voters.

Mr. Farber's vast contact list could prove crucial in raising the millions of dollars needed by the Denver host committee to showcase Senator Barack Obama and the Democratic Party in August in Denver. But Mr. Farber's activities are a public display of how corporate connections fuel politics — exactly the type of special influence that Mr. Obama had pledged to expunge from politics when he said he would not accept donations from lobbyists.

For two years now, Mr. Farber has parlayed his love for Denver and his ability to call on a network of lobbying clients to help him with the daunting task of raising the $40 million, or more, that Democrats need to run their convention. As the host committee's chief fund-raiser, he is on the phone 10, 20 times a day, twisting arms and cajoling potential donors — a task made more difficult by the fact that Denver has few hometown companies with enough resources to help foot the bills.

In a sign that Democrat Barack Obama will be competitive in the nation's largest swing state, he is beating Republican John McCain comfortably in South Florida and has a slight edge among Hispanics, according to a new Miami Herald poll.

Obama is ahead 46-30 percent over McCain in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties in the survey of 807 people conducted by Zogby International. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.5 percentage point

With strong support from women, blacks and younger voters, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, the apparent Democratic presidential contender, leads Arizona Sen. John McCain, expected to be the Republican candidate, among likely voters in Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania, according to simultaneous Quinnipiac University Swing State polls released today.

This is the first time Sen. Obama has led in all three states. No one has been elected President since 1960 without taking two of these three largest swing states in the Electoral College. Results from the independent Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pe-ack) University polls show: