Palin Refugees?

Will Canada see a wave of American immigrants if the McCain/Palin ticket wins?

Here is a video found at Progressive Alaska, via the Oxdown Gazette that suggests the answer is yes:



Here is a response from the other side of the fence:

Bill sez...

Bill Clinton was down in Florida campaigning for Barak Obama and introduced him with this rousing speech:

Let's get out of the ditch

If you don't have time to watch the speech, Bill's four important points about Barak were these:

1. Barak Obama has the right Philosophy, that America works from the ground up not the top down.
2. Barak Obama has the best policies, and policies matter because they affect peoples' lives.
3. Barak Obama has the ability to make good decisions, as his selection of Joe Biden and calm demeanor during the economic crisis showed.
4. Barak Obama has the ability to execute decisions and make positive changes in people's lives. His job will be Chief Executive and his campaign itself shows organization and execution and bottom-up thinking.

Bill's speech is a reminder of what a competent, articulate, passionate president looks like.

Why I like Biden

In this interview Joe Biden is asked a cascading series of ludicrous questions and he goes for the throat of the arguments and chokes the life out of them.



Questions like this are designed to make the absurd credible, and the best response discredits the question itself. I'd say Joe did a great job doing just that.

Win One For The Gipper

Onion Juice

Jon Stewart is the king of media story-line satire, but the Onion is a brilliant competitor and shines with this clip.


Portrayal Of Obama As Elitist Hailed As Step Forward For African Americans

Sound familiar?

Sound familiar?

Thanks to The Young Turks for calling that one. I like it better without commentary, but here is how they did it:

Sarah shops Saks

Sarah Palin's modus operandi has been to portray herself as a small-town "one-of-us" that wants to represent the "real America" in Washington D.C..

Well, the RNC dealt a discrediting, self-inflicted blow to that myth by tricking hockey ma out with $150,000 dollars worth of New York City fashion.

It seems like only yesterday that a $400 haircut was extravagant to republicans.

In the wake of this, I wonder if anyone has looked to see how much it costs to hunt wolves from helicopters. That might be interesting.

Cuff 'im and stuff 'im

A citizens' arrest is legally binding isn't it?



Nice to see George Mitchell out and about.

Colin's Choice

Colin Powell has decided to endorse Barak Obama and you can watch that endorsement here:



In summary, he thinks Barak Obama would be the type of president we need now, and John McCain would be too polarizing, especially since Sarah Palin represents an even harder track to the right.

Colin feels Barak is steady, made a good V.P. pick, has both style and substance, takes a broader approach that includes small towns and big towns, and shows vigor.

As endorsements go it is reflective and direct, like Powell himself. I don't know how much weight his opinions have with fellow Republicans, but anyone that wants to know his views has them in unambiguous form.

He's got a point...

"Bush is to the left of me now. Comrade Bush announced he will buy shares in private banks."

- Hugo Chavez -

Source: Bush turns left

When Hugo Chavez can fairly mock the president Bush as a socialist, then that ought to be sufficient repudiation of Conservative trickle-down dogma for any man.

Paul's subtle joke?

John McCain appeared on the Letterman show and apologized for snubbing him recently.

John and Dave

I expect that if John McCain had shown America more of this man above, and a lot less Karl Rove, then his campaign would be in far better shape.

I think that John McCain's trouble might be that he is not a convincing liar, but running a fundamentally dishonest campaign (which is about to sink even lower). I can clearly see that John McCain is lying when he tries to spin Sarah Palin's city council work as impressive experience because it shows in his whole body and it shows in his face. Only a man like W. or a woman like Sarah Palin (that is to say ignorant and untroubled by shame) can run a campaign this low without physical regret.

When you have to mention the PTA and snowmobiling in response to a question about your running mate, you should know you chose poorly. And, when Dave asked John if Sarah was his first choice I thought he was going to choke on his beverage.

It was discomforting watching McCain claim Sarah is "an inspiration to us", as if saying it over and over makes it true. She is as divisive as Bush, as dishonest as Bush, and slightly more attractive in lipstick and high heels. She was a poor choice, John knows it, and can't convincingly say otherwise.

Swing low...

It struck me this morning that there must be a roomful of serious-minded people somewhere inside the McCain campaign whose job is to find that game-changing piece of slime, that nasty little cesspool offering, that will make McCain look like an attractive alternative to Barak Obama.

The more Americans reject their methods, the more McCain redoubles their efforts. As their guiding strategy fails them, they seem to repeat their mistakes with increasing vigor.

They said Barak HUSSEIN Obama a million times and got no traction.

They insinuated Barak was a sexual pervert and got no traction.

They called Obama unpatriotic, and more recently a pal of terrorists, and got no traction.

And, make no mistake, they keep at it because McCain keeps them at it.

McCain is a drowning candidate and his advisers keep throwing him anchors.

When does his sense of decency preserve his dignity?

Is this how he wishes to face the curtain?

Cutting to the chase

I had no idea who Rachel Maddow was, had never heard of her, until she became host of a program at MSNBC. People seem to like her and here is perhaps why:



I have noticed that people today say "human trafficking" instead of "slavery". This doesn't mean we live in a world without slavery.

I've had enough of Rovian double-speak, of overly-euphemistic jargon, and of neo-objectiveness in journalism. When a person makes statements that are demonstrably false without retraction upon confrontation, then that person is a liar telling lies.

I like Ms. Maddow for having the resolve to call a lie a lie. Perhaps she is one to watch?

Econological Predictions

Kevin Drum, in this article for the Washington Monthly, takes a look at the likely impacts on the economy if Obama wins and if McCain wins.

It seems to tie in well with yesterday's "Where Rhetoric meets the Road" post analyzing the impact of this election on your taxes.

Your Salary in 2016

Where Rhetoric meets the Road

Do you want to know how the 2008 will affect your taxes?

Follow this link and find out:


Election Taxes

Mine go up under McCain's plan, how about yours?

Can't spin that one

Maybe if you keep turning up the music, nobody will notice the boos?



My favorite was the guy pressing himself against the glass with two thumbs pointing decidedly down.

Just because a crowd assembles does that mean it has to be a breeding ground for campaign stops?

Oh well, at least they held back the octopus'

Words Without Meaning

These stories appeared 10-11-08 on the Google News feed. It is the clearest example I have seen of McCain's complete lack of sincerity.

It is odd that as McCain drops like a stone in the polls he keeps blasting away with the same tired old crap. I'll bet that if McCain ran on his perceived strengths, rather than as a lurching, lying, aged sack of negativity this would be a much closer race.

He seemed perfectly positioned as a straight talking, independent, heroic man of experience. Yet, for whatever reason, he threw that away to run with an idiot in one of the most embarrassing campaigns of my lifetime.

An interesting idea

How should the financial markets be recapitalized?

Here is an idea

Here is what I like about the proposal:

1. Public money is treated with the same terms as private money.

2. The chance of government fraud is reduced greatly, by virtue of the way investment is controlled by the private sector.

3. The chance of corporate fraud is reduced greatly, by virtue of having to attract private money.

4. I think this plan can appeal to conservatives, due to its market-based approach, and to liberals, due to its fiscal responsibility with regard to public money.

Here is what I don't like about the proposal:

Due to a bipartisan aversion to trust-busting, some corporations have been allowed to grow so large that their collapse would inflict a dangerous blow to our financial health. There may be some cases where a business cannot be allowed to fail, and yet is an unattractive investment.

What should be done then?

I say we follow Gordon Brown's lead in those cases and get an equity stake in such companies.

I am not an economist, but there are certain principles I can understand clearly. One is that public money should not be wasted, since it necessitates higher taxes. Another is that corporations are forbidden by law to be anything other than selfish, so let's use their selfishness on our own behalf.

I suppose another idea might be this:

Suppose the US government issued bonds to fund these bailouts, similar to the war bonds which funded WWII? Buying such a bond would be a voluntary act, and Wall Street could have a very small speculator-deterring tax on transactions similar to the UK, to pay for the interest.

Great Music

This great performance serves as a reminder that life holds beautiful moments too:

A Republican Spoiler?

Third-Party Candidate May Steal Support From McCain

Since people are taking Sarah Palin seriously I feel it is my duty to inform you that Mr. Cressbeckler is a fictional candidate.

Philadelphia Boss

I like "America Reclamation Project".

Circling the Drain

When you find yourself shouting murderous threats because Sarah Palin expects a vigorous response to venomous sputtering, you have taken partisanship too far:

Kill him!

To watch John McCain's campaign trolling lynch mobs for votes is to watch political desperation in action.

I think Americans liked McCain when they thought he would practice what he preached, but are rightfully turning away in disgust as they see him campaign.

Deep down

Deep down in the back of my brain, where I keep the old coffee-makers, bean-pots, and instincts that secretly drive my rationalizations, I came across this unexpected election shocker...

Sarah Palin looks exactly like the type of woman that Bill Clinton would hit on.

Tina bo beena, Biden fo fiden

Saturday Night Live has been having fun with politics for a long time. Here they have a little fun with the Biden/Palin debate:

Bertrand Russell's advocacy of a Life of Reason

In his book, "New Hopes For a Changing World", Bertrand Russel wrote about finance:

"One of the most vexing things for the modern he-man is the complexity of our civilization, which makes it impossible to know what will be advantageous unless you are prepared to exert some modicum of intelligence. Intelligence, as every he-man knows, is a contemptible quality. The boys who display much at school are seldom good at games, and can usually be kicked without fear of retaliation, and yet there are many things of obvious importance which only people possessing a certain intelligence can understand. One of these is finance. That is why Anderw Jackson - a typical he-man - could not stand banks. He knew how to kill men in a duel, but he did not know how to get the better of a bank manager. So, in 1920, the he-men took control of American finance, and by 1932 they had brought America and the rest of the world to the brink of ruin. Nevertheless, they continued to resent the policy by which further ruin was averted [The New Deal], because it could only be understood by more intelligence than they could exert. Hatred of intelligence is one of the great dangers of the modern world, because with each new advance in technique intelligence becomes more necessary..."

And he then segued into this political observation:

"...Our great democracies still tend to think that a stupid man is more likely to be honest than a clever man, and our politicians take advantage of this prejudice by pretending to be even more stupid than nature made them."

And offers this advice to correct the problem:

"If teachers and educational authorities had more understanding of the sort of person the modern world needs, they could within a generation produce an outlook that would transform the world. But their ideal of character is an old-fashioned one. They admire most the sort of character which would give a man leadership in a gang of pirates, and if you say that commerce is a different thing from piracy, they think you soft and hope you are mistaken. All this is due to the persistence of old martial ideas that have descended to us from earlier ages. These ideas, I repeat, were appropriate to an age of unavoidable scarcity, but are not applicable to our own times, when whatever scarcity still exists is due to human stupidity and to nothing else. Although this is the case, most of us still prefer passion to intelligence, we like to have our feelings roused, we like to cheer and boo, we like to admire and we like to hate, we like to see things in black and white. Our whole mental apparatus is that which is appropriate to sending us rushing into battle with hoarse war-cries."


From "New Hopes for a Changing World", by Bertrand Russell pp. 158-159, Simon and Schuster 1951.

C'est vrai

If banks are getting so big that their collapse threatens America's financial stability, then maybe it is time to bring back Trust-busting.

As politicians have chipped away at the reforms Teddy Roosevelt introduced, the results have been a resurgence of old problems.

Strong performance

I like this campaign message from Barak Obama:



I thought Obama could have pointed out that a trickle down theory is as elitist in outlook as theories come.

I thought he could have mentioned that trickle-down theories are failing many of the well-to-do too. After all, what good is a capital gains tax-break when there are no capital gains? What good is more money when there are few stable places to make deposits?

Even so, I think he spoke confidently and clearly linked this crisis with strongly-held republican beliefs. Every American voter has seen republicans defending deregulation as if it were a holy duty. Nobody with any sense is going to believe John McCain's deathbed conversion to financial populist. That requires a level of gullibility that is possessed in great but still-insufficient supply.

Sarah tells a joke...

I think Sarah Palin might want to keep her day job rather than trying to moonlight as a comic. In this clip she "tells a joke" about Joe Biden's "experience, not age":



If Mrs. Palin represents "new ideas" and "new energy", then I'd like to see her expend a little of that energy telling us about those new ideas. If it is laughter Sarah wants to generate, then a live press conference ought to provide a hurricane of it.