Who said [this]?

I'm fed up with it. Haven't seen anything like it in 25 years of public life. [My Opponent's] negative TV ads, distorting my record, full of lies and he knows it. I'm on the record for [That Thing] his ads say I'm against. I want to build [That Thing]. I'm sure he wants to build [That Thing]. So this isn't about [That Thing] issues. It's about dragging the truth into the gutter. And I'm not going to let them do it. This campaign is too important. The stakes are too high for every American family. The real question is, will we have a president who fights for the privileged few, or will we have a president who fights for you? [My Opponent] wants to give the wealthiest one percent of the people in this country a new tax break worth $30,000 a year. I'm fighting for you and your family, for affordable housing and health care, for better jobs, for the best education and opportunity for our children. It's a tough fight, I know that. Uphill all the way, but I'm going to keep on fighting because what I'm fighting for is our future.

Animal Farm Friday - Old Farts and Pigs

This goes out to the nasty old fart who killed his shot at the presidency by putting that lipstick-wearing pig out in front of his campaign instead of putting his country first. (Yeah, I went there. Palin is a pig, and I've got a massive laundry list of evidence to support that claim.)

Mmmm... Patterns and Peppers

Nate Silver, the once infamous Kossack known as Pablano, is one of the best - if not THE BEST - of the aggregate pollsters. He's called them right more often than the other aggregates by far, so when he tosses love to individual pollsters that stand out above the rest, we should all pay attention.

Anyone who knows me probably knows that I'm far from being a math genius, but I get patterns. A useful metaphor to describe my mathematical perception is that I don't often see the trees, but I do see forests. I may not get the particulars of the equations, but I can see the patterns they form, and understand the concepts fairly well. Of course, the lack of understanding of the trees themselves tends to cast one's perceptions of the forests in doubt; if one knows the trees, one knows the forests even better. So yeah, I'm saying I can see this electoral forest, but I can't say I know it. I think I can say however, that Nate knows the trees damn well, so he also knows the forest damn well.

So, know this: stop believing your favorite polls and keep your attention focused on The Great Pablano!

Letterman Attacks McCain Day 2: "I Feel Like An Ugly Date" (VIDEO)

Judging by the sudden massive uptick in pro-McCain comments here at HuffPo and other Progressive outlets, I can only assume that the McSame campaign has expanded the duty roster of their hired Dutch and Russian writers to lurk and spam the comments the same way they write fake Letters to the Editors of newspapers.

Advice to the "locals" - see this for what it is. When you read a pro-McCain or Obama-hating comment, call it out as a phony "out-sourced" (as in, some foreign national practicing English by getting paid by the word) McCain supporter-for-hire. He's been doing it for a while, and here's proof:

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2008/09/24/mccain_letters/

McCain has already proven to be willing to go so low; don't underestimate just how low he will ultimately go to win.
About David Letterman
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Boxer MAULS McKeating Five

This woman is awesome!!! DiFi and Pelosi could learn a thing or two from her!

Fuck off and die, Bill!

This guy has outlived his usefulness. He really IS a Republican masquerading as a Democrat.

Chris Rock nails it

Sad that the only honest commentary we can get these comes from comedians. But I guess that has always sort of been the case. We need another Lenny Bruce. We need George Carlin back. And Bill Hicks, too.

Stop the Barbarians

Donate what you can.

Say the opposite, say the opposite

As Ze Frank jingled back in 2006, we should know by now that whatever platform a Republiscum harps on about or champions, that they in fact really mean the exact opposite. A few cases in point:

Republicans say they are for small government, but under every single Republican leader since Ike, the government has grown - and it has outgrown Democratic governments.

• In the 2000 elections, George W. Bush ran on a platform of "compassionate Conservatism." Does anyone remembering ever seeing any of that?
• George W. Bush declared "Mission Accomplished" - well, we know how that went.
• George W. Bush said "we do not torture!" But waterboarding is torture. We waterboard. Therefore, we torture.
• John McCain said he was going to run an honorable campaign just about the issues. Yet, we have seen almost nothing from McCain on the issues, but instead have seen only negative and dishonest personal attacks on Obama.
• John McCain is using the campaign slogan "Country First" while every single action he's taken - most importantly with his choosing Sarah Palin as his VP - has shown that he is indeed putting "Campaign First" and no telling where he's putting the country.
• John McCain said he was "suspending his capaign" to fly off to Wershington to save the economy, yet he still has attack ads running in local and national markets. More to the point, his surrogates are still making the rounds with the talking heads, attacking Obama. This morning, Nancy Puffinfucker, or whatever her name is, was on Fox attacking Obama, and then went to a live chat with the Wershington Times.

Just remember, whenever McCain or the Republiscums get all fired up about something and start chanting it from the tops of soap boxes, just try a little mental trick and find the exact opposite meaning of whatever it is they are championing, and run with that, because that is what they really mean.

This list of "say the opposites" with Republicans can go on for a bit. Feel free to add your own in the comments. Meanwhile, check out this blast from the past!

Like watching a train wreck in slow motion

Jeezus - this is more painful than I expected. Palin appears to be one of the most vapid politicians to hit the national stage since Dan Quayle. What's she been doing while she's been hiding away? If this is how a "quick study" performs after having lots of time to practice, America will be so incredibly fucked if she were to somehow find herself as president.

Warning: Watch this at your own risk.

McLiar even lied to Letterman

He lied to him with his own mouth, not through a surrogate or campaign aid. What a fucking coward.

Mitt?

Romney suspended his campaign. Now that McSame has suspended his, does Romney have a chance to un-thaw from cryogenic freeze his suspended campaign to fill the void? How cool would that be to see Obama debate Mittens? You'd need a drinking game for every time he says the word "liberal". Extra points for when he uses it as a noun or a verb.

McDonalds WTF?!?

Jeezus F-ing Christalmighty. This is just disturbing on a deep level. Pictured below are two McDonalds hamburgers, one bought recently, the other from 12 years ago. 12 years ago. Not preserved in any special way. Seriously. This cannot be considered food.



Read more here.

Getting the pigs to the trough

I've been a little reluctant to say much about the bailout issue, because there's almost no part of it that can be discussed without going into great length or detail, and I haven't had the time.

But I do have time to point out one certainty that should be glaringly obvious to anyone with a shred of common sense, and that is to say to Paulson, and say to the banks, "Here's our offer, on our terms. Take it or leave it."

Paulson claims that we can't "disincentive CEOs" by refusing them massive golden parachutes as part of the bailout. I say, "Fuck you, Paulson." If the CEOs don't want to accept our terms, they don't have to play. They can stay right where they are holding forth with their mountain of trash.

Bush and his cronies are crying wolf about the imminenet collapse of the economy with this deal. The truth is, no deal will stop the inevitable, if we are to assume that the 800 pound gorilla hiding in the bushes is actually a $45 trillion dollar monster, which by many accounts it is. $700 billion won't have much of an effect at reducing the $45 trillion dollar debt load of default credit swaps. That's like trying to empty a swimming pool with one dixie cup.

The bottom line of my position is that we should let some of these financial institutions completely collapse, and focus on saving a few of them, and do it on the terms that benefit the country, and not the banks or their shareholders. I'm talking about equity. Either we get it, or there's no deal. See how long it will take for the fat pigs to belly up to the trough. The fight over scraps would be the stuff of legend.

Read this.

Obama And Democrats Call McCain's Bluff

"

Another, however, lamented the fact that McCain could very well claim the ethical high-ground. "In general," said an aide. "I'd say we should have thought of it, but we did, then McCain [screwed] us."

"



I find it incredibly hilarious that anyone could think McKeating Five could ever claim the ethical high-ground on anything.
About John McCain
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

How come he gets horsies?

KEATING FIVE: McCain was #1

McFraud and Lyin' Palin

I'm not surprised that the reptilian overlords running McCain's campaign would stoop so low as to hiring people to write phony letters supporting their campaign, but it doesn't piss me off any less. Oh, sure, McCain doesn't know anything about it. Yeah, right.

See some of the sample letters here.

Woman on Fire!

Cracked on Brainwashing

Hilarious! Cracked's 6 Brainwashing techniques being used on us right now. But here's the spoiler first.

















#1.

Titties

No, other than that.

I'm talking about...

#1.

"Us vs. Them"

Holy shit. Here we go.

Sure, we know about the obvious examples, they're written across the
history books in blood and bullet holes. Racism, genocide, horrifying
caricatures on propaganda posters.

But They have figured out that the same technique that works so well
for getting people whipped into a murderous apocalyptic frenzy, can be
used sell you cars, or hamburgers, or computers.

Sounds like:

"The heart of America ain't in Hollywood! It's right here in [insert name of small town]!"

"You can listen to what I have to say, or bury you head in the sand with the rest of the sheeple!"

"You have a Nintendo Wii? Are you a toddler or just a retard?"

Why It Works:


Basically, we're hard-wired by evolution to form tribes.
The more stress we feel, the more we feel love and attachment to those
who look and sound the same as us, and the more we feel hatred to those
who don't. It's just an old survival mechanism, since the ancient guys
who didn't show that kind of blind loyalty were killed off by the
fierce tribes formed by the ones who did.

So today we get that petty dehumanization of everybody outside of our
group ("hippies," "rednecks," "fundies", "geeks", "douchebags", "libs",
"cons", "fags", "breeders", "infidels", "towel-heads", "honkies,"
"darkies", "players", "haters").

WEST SIDE SUCKA

They can play on those old, primal urges for even the most retarded
of results, such as fierce brand loyalty (the PS3 vs. 360 vs. Wii flame
wars will make you claw your eyes out).

But to really make this one work, They can't just define your group, but have to define your group as the elite group,
a shining beacon in a world full of weak-minded walking turds. The
items on this list work best in combination, and you'll see in that the
element of mockery and insulation from opposing viewpoints we talked
about earlier (why listen to the viewpoints of those lesser sheeple?).
Often this is combined with siege terminology ("The whole country has
gone to hell, but we've got to stand up for common sense, folks! It's
us against the world!")

Recently Seen:

Watch five seconds of an election stump speech. Every side does it.

In Sarah Palin's convention speech she talked about how people from
small towns are totally the best ("We grow good people in our small
towns, with honesty, sincerity, and dignity"). Earlier in the primaries
the Clinton campaign did the same thing,
talking about small towns as being the backbone of America where real,
honest people are found. Always there is the unspoken reminder that
these honest rural folk are under siege from those scary, phony freaks
in the city.

When speaking to those city folk, on the other hand, Barack Obama made the infamous reference to those same small town types clinging to guns and religion,
talking about them like they were savages to be studied through
binoculars from a tower, with some peasant disease that needs cured by
the enlightened.

Not only is "Us vs Them" the first and most important one on the
list, it's the culmination and end goal of all the others. Drawing you
into the right tribe is what They want most, because they can
accomplish nothing without tribesmen.

If we don't find a way to resist it, this is what could leave the
entire planet a charred radioactive ruin. And you know what else we
lose if that happens?

The titties.

Being President is a Tough Job... When You're Dead

financial 9/11?

Rachel Maddow dropped the phrase (or maybe she was just repeating it, I'm not sure) that we're experiencing a "financial 9/11". I suppose that depends on your perspective, but one key difference, besides terrorists who knew how to take over airplanes versus terrorists who knew how to take over our financial system, is that more people have foreseen this current cataclysm for years and have been warning against it. Perhaps the dissimilarities stop there, because on paper, both events look similar; there are things that both events have in common. For instance, both events might not have happened were it not for:

• A small group of well-positioned people intent on benefiting from the massive suffering of others
• A small group of well-positioned people with nothing to lose, and everything to gain
• A small group of well-positioned people with the right connections to people in high places that guarantee access
• A complacent media with a singular focus on gossip stories about celebrity infidelity (political and otherwise), and a near perfect absence of true investigative journalism
• An indifferent populace too busy worrying about how much foam they have in their lattes, or how much Made in China junk they could stuff into their Chinese-mortgaged homes

The bottom line here is that these are seriously complex issues that require a sophisticated understanding of either global economics, or at least a modest acceptance of these time proven altruisms:

• Absolute power corrupts absolutely
• Money is the root of all evil
• If it sounds too good to be true, it is
• Treat everyone with respect, and TRUST NO ONE!

But over the past few decades, there has been a strong, systematic effort to dumb down the citizenry, and it has proven to be extremely effective. For the pre-eminent Super Power on the planet, it is striking that we have one of the dumbest and uneducated citizenry of all developed nations, yet we - as Americans - continue to claim superiority. What we really have is a country of scared sheeple begging for leadership, but a people also willing to abdicate individual freedoms at the slightest whiff of scariness, What has America become? When did we become a nation of belligerent cowards, a nation of people eager to throw rocks at other people while taking shelter behind thin paper walls?

Of course, this could only happen by having such a worthless media, a collective body so graciously willing to spread its non-greased ass-cheeks to its corporate masters, emboldened by the help from hyper-greedy, anti-social, war-mongering chickenhawks in government who work tirelessly to pass themselves off as honest representatives of the people - except when those same people aren't looking, which is most of the time. Oh yeah, a compliant media only exists because of the compliant populace willing to keep it afloat. We'l see how long that lasts in the current climate.

One of the biggest takeaways that everyone seems terrified - or cowed by the corporate overlords - to talk about is how precarious our current situation is. It is high time that Obama steps up and offers something that looks like leadership. Get in a good dig or barb on Mac whenever possible, and do it without making him out to be important enough to even run for the office.  So far, Obama has been speaking in sweeping platitudes, and not discussing details, this despite his being surrounded by very smart money-only-men, like Volkerr, et al. McCain is floundering like a fish out of water, but if Obama chooses not to exploit that, his campaign may be doomed.

Can anyone in the Corporate-Run Media call bullshit on McCain once and for all?

Welcome to the United States of France

Yeah, but the French at least have healthcare.

You just know the Frogs have only increased their disdain for us, if
that is indeed possible. And why shouldn't they? The average American is
working two and half jobs, gets two weeks off, and has all the employment
security of a one-armed trapeze artist.

How markets really work

Funny, and true.

YES on Prop 2

For the animals!

Why PETA Matters

Slag on PETA all you want, but don't disregard the good work that they do. If it weren't for PETA, most people would never find out about the horrendous treatment animals get in the massive factory farms.

For more than three months, PETA went undercover at an Iowa pig factory
farm, which supplies piglets who are raised and killed for Hormel
products. PETA found rampant cruelty to animals - committed by workers
and supervisors. The farm changed ownership and management during
PETA's investigation, but that made no difference to the animals who
were born and confined there: Abuse and neglect were widespread during
PETA's entire investigation.

Thankfully, there are alternatives.

Boycott Factory Farm Meat, Buy from Prather Ranch Meat Co.

While there are horrible and cruel barbarians working at factory farms supplying meat to companies like Hormel, as depicted in the video below, there is a fantastic alternative in Prather Ranch Meat Company. Support companies like Prather Ranch who implement sustainable and humane practices, and help put an end to the cruelty like that in the video below. (Full disclosure: I am a co-owner of Prather Ranch Meat Company.)

Sunday Funny - Heart's Cease and Desist order to McCain

Finally, a great anti-McCain ad

(thanks, Kitten!)

Conservatives scare more easily than liberals?

I guess we all kind of already knew that. While red-staters in backwoods Nebraska were cowering behind their statues of butter and giant rubberband balls thousands of miles away from anywhere close to actual ideal terrorist targets, those of us liberals in the urban centers ripe for terrorist targeting have been trying to get the cowards to pull their frightened heads out of their asses.

At least now we have science to back that up.

Economic Meltdown Primer

Many folks are slowly, drearily, waking up to see that John McCain is not an honorable man. I don't believe that he ever was. He was a smartass little brat when he was a kid, and grew into a petulant jerk by the time he went to Annapolis. His first dose of humility came after his fifth plane crash - this one being due to a SAM hitting his plane - which resulted in his being captured by the NVA and spending a few years in the Hanoi Hilton. That was a terrible thing for him, and one would hope that this lesson would have been painful enough to keep him from doing immoral things, like say, cheating on his handicapped wife with a rich heiress, or allowing himself to be corrupted by the likes of Phil Gramm or Charles Keating. Which brings us to the point of our current economic crisis.

Our current situation can be mostly blamed on people like former Senator Phil Gramm, and John McCain himself, who - like with his involvement with Charles Keating and the S&L scandal of the '80s - just doesn't know how to say no to dirty money.

John McCain is an immoral man. He can't help it. It's in his DNA.

For a primer on the current crisis, and how it directly relates to the S&L scandal of the '80s, and John McCain's involvement in both, check out Jim Moore's excellent post at HuffPo.

Propaganda and the American Police State

Mike Wallace gets an Emmy for a propaganda piece created to stir anxiety against Iran? Mike Wallace is scum.

Read more here.

American Police State

How long before we have Death Squads?

Animal Farm Friday - Something Intelligent

Taking a break from the overwhelming idiocy of the McCain campaign, today we feature some creatures with actual intelligence at play. Enjoy!

Palin the Energy Expert

First, this [brilliant] quote from the Hockey Mom:

"Of course, it's a fungible commodity and they don't flag, you know,
the molecules, where it's going and where it's not. But in the sense of
the Congress today, they know that there are very, very hungry domestic
markets that need that oil first. So, I believe that what Congress is
going to do, also, is not to allow the export bans to such a degree
that it's Americans who get stuck holding the bag without the energy
source that is produced here, pumped here. It's got to flow into our
domestic markets first."

And then a not-so-subtle takedown from Hilzoy:

Call me cynical, though: I don't think Sarah Palin had any idea what
she was talking about, any more than I think John McCain had any idea
what he was talking about when he said she "knows more about energy
than probably anyone else in the United States of America". Because if
she does, we're in much deeper trouble than I had imagined.

Seriously, folks. We are one national election away from becoming the Argentina of the late 80s.

Palin the plagiarist?

Sure, you can't trademark a thought, and to be fair, Republiscums are great at stealing ideas and taking credit for them (just a few examples: 1, 2, 3), especially in campaigns, but when you try to do it with an idea that has already been implemented, well... lets just say you have to be pretty fucking stupid. From CNN:

“We’re going to do a few new things also,” [Palin] said at a rally in
Cedar Rapids. “For instance, as Alaska’s governor, I put the
government’s checkbook online so that people can see where their
money’s going. We’ll bring that kind of transparency, that
responsibility, and accountability back. We’re going to bring that back
to D.C.”

There’s just one problem with proposing to put the federal checkbook
online – somebody’s already done it. His name is Barack Obama.

While that might have been bad enough, her campaign spokesperson said something even more stupid.

A campaign spokesperson insisted that Palin
was referring not to that specific proposal, but rather to "that kind
of transparency in general."

So, yeah. Palin is going to bring "back" the kind of accountability that already exists? If so, then I guess that means that she knows herself that she is useless.

Hey, what's the difference between Sarah Palin and pit bull? Don't insult a pit bull with that comparison. Everyone knows pit bulls are smarter.

Republicans vs Democrats on the economy

If you are a firm believer that Republicans are better stewards of the economy than Democrats, or have been at any time in the past, then you're not going to like this.

Lyin' Palin

(thanks Kitten!)

Are you worth $17,000/hour?

Good point!

I’d particularly welcome views of anybody out there who thinks C.E.O.’s
deserve the $10 million they averaged last year, or who argues that
these are real arm’s length negotiations. And anyone else as outraged
as I am that we can’t afford health care for children, or an effective
program to fight malaria, but we can afford $20 billion a year in
subsidies for C.E.O. pay packages?

¿Preparado en el primer día?

That's a rough translation for "Ready on day one?" It would seem that McCain doesn't pass the Commander in Chief threshold after all. Read this greatness from TPM!

So McCain is the candidate with the foreign policy experience ready to lead on day one. But he doesn't know who the leader of Spain is. He gets confused in an interview, apparently thinking Zapatero is someone from Latin America who is an enemy of the United States and manages to create a minor international incident.

No, he wasn't even thinking about the Zapatistas (from Mexico), not like that's even close to being an acceptable explanation. Ya can't blame the poor white dude, he was just lumping all Hispanics together, obviously revealing his true opinions about them, that same opinion he tries to hide when pandering for their support in Arizona. Not like he has a choice there when you consider that white folks are soon to be a minority there. Of course, given that, you'd think McDuh would have boned up a little harder on his required subjects.

Ah, internet porn

Voter registration in 50 states

All you need to know!

Managing Expectations

I'm wondering if the McCain campaign is deliberately keeping Palin away from press conferences because they know it will do these things:

1) Make the press angry and suspicious, which will lead to 2) the press turns that anger into creating stories about how Palin is unprepared, out of her league, and is unable to handle tough questions, which 3) will set the bar really, really low for her so that when she finally does step before someone with tough questions, she will appear smarter than she's been given credit for.

That's pretty much what Bush did, always striving hard to lower the bar as low as it can go. As Bill Moyers said (also the quote in my masthead), "When the bar is low enough, you can never be too wrong."

McCain and the Ol' Boys Network

From TPM:

Speaking in Nevada today, Obama quoted McCain's vow to take on the "old boys' network" in Washington, adding, "The ol' boy network? In the McCain campaign, that's called a staff meeting."

Declining to participate

Like a true Republiscum:

“…Aides to Gov. Sarah Palin won't comply with subpoenas issued by state lawmakers investigating the firing of Alaska's former public safety commissioner, since Palin "has declined to participate" in the probe, her attorney general says.”

That sort of matches perfectly with McCain's voting record in the Senate.

Miss Teen South Carolina and how her brain works

See more of the internets best videos at CollegeHumors Web Celeb Hall of Fame.

Golden Oldie

(hat tip to Rydogg!)

The Deep Religiosity of Capitalism

That's the title of this painting by Nicola Verlato. I'd say that's just about right, and just as perverse.

Get a better job...

...and stop crawling up your boss's ass.

Thoughts on the bailouts

The number one reason behind all of these bailouts is to keep from
happening what led to the Great Depression. As for being immoral, and
wrong on nearly every level, the simple truth is that without these
bailouts, the entire US economy would collapse very quickly. And it
still might. I've been predicting since 2006 - when most people were
still debating whether or not we were in, or heading into recession -
that we would in fact enter a depression before 2010. I'm not an
economist, but I'm also not stupid. If you look past the complex trees
of arguments against a looming depression, it's quite easy to see that
the economic forest itself has been clearcut, slashed, burned, and
completely mismanaged. Taking this metaphor to its logical conclusion,
a wildfire is about to erupt, and it will only get worse. The reason
being is that the Fed keeps adding bad paper to it's portfolio, and
because the Fed is broke, it's borrowing money to cover these debts.
How long can that work? How long before our lenders in China decide the notes they are holding aren't worth the paper they're printed on?

NOW endorses Obama and Biden

Couldnt happen to a nicer guy

GOP delegate's hotel tryst goes bad when he wakes up with $120,000 missing

lipstick, pigs, dog collars

Hilarious send up in the New Yorker! Money quote:

Do you know the difference between me and a Hockey Mom who has forgot her lipstick?

A dog collar.

Do you know the difference between me and a dog collar smeared with lipstick?

Not a damn thing.

McOlytes Abandon Ship

Followed this from TPM (thanks Josh!)


Former McCain fanboy Richard Cohen:

McCain lied about his lying and maybe thinks that if he wins the
election, he can -- as he did in South Carolina -- renounce who he was
and what he did and resume his old persona. It won't work. Karl Marx
got one thing right -- what he said about history repeating itself.
Once is tragedy, a second time is farce. John McCain is both.

Holy shit.

Say the opposite, say the opposite

Up is really down
Left is really right
Night is really day
Dark is really light
Really, nearly right

There is simply no other way to look at Conservative/Republican politics anymore than as exactly "through the looking glass." For a party and group to have as a solid core of their foundation a bias against drugs, I am really wondering what the hell it is that they have either been smoking, snorting, injecting, or swallowing, 'cuz man, that must be some good shit!

We saw this all along with George W. Bush and his administration. The biggest examples are what we saw from Iraq, to Katrina, to the economy.

When King W stood on the deck of that carrier in front of the banner declaring "Mission Accomplished", that must have been the first of the biggest clues that the "mission" (not that he had any real mission in place) was barely even begun. When Li'l Bush said "heckuva job, Brownie!" we should have known (though we did suspect) he meant, "Wow, Brownie. You really fucked this up, but there's no way I'll admit that, since I'm the jackass that gave you this job." When Georgie proclaimed back in his State of the Union that "the fundamentals of our economy are strong," that was the wake-up call to everyone listening that we were indeed in deep shit.

Fast forward a few years, and now we have a presidential candidate formerly known as John "The Maverick" McCain echoing the very same words as Georgie back when, saying "the fundamentals of our economy is strong," which we can only take at face value to mean that we are more fucked now than ever.

But take a couple more steps back for some more "Up is Down" examples. "The Presidential Candidate Formerly Known as John McCain" heretofore referred to as McSame (or McStain, McLiar, McPOW, McFake, McCan't, McMalleable, Mc?), has been promising to bring "Change" to Washington, never mind the fact that he has been in Washington 26 years and the only thing he has changed since then was his once centrist position to that of a full-fledged right-wingnut. He changed wives through an adulterous affair when he started fucking Cindy behind the back of his wheelchair-bound wife, but that was before he became Somebody.

McStain's first notable achievement in office as a Congressman was to sell himself out to some low-rent financialist thugs, embroiling himself into a scandal with this group known as The Keating Five. While he used some of his endless supply of POW clout to keep his ass out of jail - and from getting any sort of real admonition, the bottom line is that the first opportunity McStain had to do something right, he chose to do something wrong. Well, I guess that was the second chance he had to do the right thing. The first being to have not ditched his first handicapped wife for the totally rich prom queen.

During the time between when he sold out to the S&L thugs and the 2000 presidential campaign, Mc? exerted most of his efforts trying to re-brand himself by creating an image of himself as a Maverick willing to challenge his own party. It's the only thing a naturally corrupt politician can do, and that is also what makes him a perfect Republican. By pretending to be a Maverick, always trying to do the right thing, when in fact he is just another power-hungry, amoral, corrupt politician for sale to the highest bidder, he is fitting squarely into the "Up is Down" mold that is the purest definition of the Conservative/Republican idea. He exclaims "I am a Maverick telling you that I am fighting against everything I am actually guilty of doing!"

Up is Down.

Now, here, today, we have as Mc?'s chief economics adviser none other than the very person scum sucking sleazebag most intellectually sound people believing was the one person most responsible for our current economic crises - if there can be only one - because of his spearheading the deregulation of financial markets as head of the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, and the same fucker that made the Enron scam possible. As if that's not enough, another one of Mc?'s top economics advisers is none other that a tool that goes by the name John Thain, the CEO of Merrill Lynch, once a powerhouse in the financial sector but had recently sold itself for chump change to Bank of America. With all that foundation, McFuck-You-America says he's going to bring about change to Wall Street.

Left is Right.

But wait. There's more. One of the latest lines of attack from McWarHero is that he will take on the lobbyists that control Washington. He says this as the very individuals that run his campaign are some of the biggest lobbyists in the business. Charlie Black (lobbied for nearly everything evil), Rick Davis (lobbied for the nation of Georgia), former Senator Phil Gramm (lobbied for UBS), and has other lobbyists working for his campaign that were super cozy with convicted former lobbyist Jack Abramoff. So with that, McLiar says he's "going to take on the Washington lobbyists!" I guess there can be some truth to that if by "taking on" he means "hiring".

Mc? has been borrowing a line from King George, about the fundamentals of the economy being strong. He's used this one a lot, and used it again today, on the same day that Wall Street plummeted harder than it had since 9/11. After being called out on it, Mc? tried to claim that the "fundamentals" he was referring to were actual workers. But probably not the same workers whose salaries he's worked feverishly to keep down, and whose unions he's been complicit with busting, the same workers who he pretends to stand for during election cycles, but votes against at every opportunity placed before him (that is, when he actually does his job and votes).

Night is Day.

Mc? also supported King George in firing up the Iraq War, then pretended he was against the president because he had a different kind of war on, only to later take credit for championing the "Surge" after he had barely supported it out of fear it would fail, and only came out as its champion when it looked like it was sort of working.

Dark is Light.

Seriously, when everything you do is exactly the opposite of what you say you stand for, then all we can do is take you at [the opposite of] your word. So when Conservatives/Republicans rail against drugs, we can only accept as fact that they are actually in-taking the best fucking drugs anyone can imagine.

Right?

Photographer Run Amok Won't Be Paid By The Atlantic

This was a brilliant, if not under-handed move, by this photographer. Not only did she manage to sucker McCain into being photographed in a perfectly - and accurately - representative light, she also suckered those self-congratulatory idiots at The Atlantic. Kudos to her, and screw that dishonest and dishonorable scumbag McCain. Double-screw The Atlantic. It's about time they took one on the chin.
About John McCain
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Not all Alaskan women are crazy

And not all of them like Sarah what's her face.

Wish you were here

RIP Rick Wright.

Ike, in pictures

Impressive!

Street Art

Clever.



More here.

Where are the Clintons?

Just asking.

McLiar is in big trouble!

When this is the best McLiar can do Jacksonville, of all places that should be rock-solid McLiar country - he's in big trouble. Fuck those fictional poll numbers the pollsters pull out of their asses to create the artificial sense that this race is close. Unlike pollsters and McLiar, pictures don't lie!

Tom Toles rocks!

Obama ad. It's about time!

Not necessarily creative, but it is clever in how a solid and strong narrative was put together using direct quotes from major sources. If this ad succeeds, it should force the CRM (Corporate-Run Media) to own up to these quotations of theirs, and will have provide some honest - not "balanced" - coverage for once.

Open Season on journalists in the Corporate-Run Media

It's time to go huntin'!

While not normally an advocate of direct violence, I say now that it should be completely acceptable to punch in the face just about any journalist working for the Corporate-Run Media at every opportunity. The higher up the ladder - those journalists pulling in six figures, and especially the editors - deserve an extras level of punishment for their complicity, and their direct efforts to corrupt the political discourse in this country.

I would argue that the people in this country are just as much to blame, since they are the ones who willingly consume the garbage these hacks force down their throats, but the corporate-un Media created the environment that we live in. They claim they are only giving us what we want, but the truth is, through consolidation - and thanks in very large part to the deregulation that has allowed media markets to to be controlled primarily by just four major corporate entities - choice has become extremely limited. People are only choosing from what is being offered, and that is complete shit.

Josh briefly highlights two recent instances that demonstrate just how fundamentally corrupt the Corporate-Run Media has become, and offers this:

We hear a lot about the steep and perhaps terminal decline of the
business model underlying daily print newspapers. But this corruption
in the basic conception of the craft -- which is actually related to
the economic decline -- gets discussed much less.

This is what gives liars a clear strategic advantage over non-liars.
And it's an open question whether McCain's level of dishonesty turns
out to be so great that it overwhelms reporters' unwillingness to
report accurately on it.

So go after journalists with impunity. Just make sure that as you administer smackies, let them know why. Let them know that you're sick of how they've corrupted our politics, and are hurting this country.

Lets see them denigrate this guy

Go ahead McLiar, attack a fellow POW.

Sunday Funny - Palin and the Bush Doctrine, and like, such as...

If this is what it means to be a Christian...

... then I'm glad I renounced Christianity a long time ago in favor of reason and science.

Southern evangelicals are therefore the mainstay of the torture regime
in this country. The only point at which they even balk at torturing
people who haven't been subject to minimal due process is when they are
reminded that this could come back to hurt Americans. The idea that
torture is immoral in itself seems alien to a majority of the millions
who lined up to see Mel Gibson's The Passion Of The Christ. Since the
South was built on torture-slavery, this is not that historically
surprising. Many ancestors of today's Christianists tortured
African-Americans routinely. But the extent of Southern evangelicals
support for violating one of the core moral absolutes of Christianity
is striking.

If this is what it means to an American...

... then fuck America! All the more reason to vacate if McPalin wins. (No way I could stand to live in a country like that!)

America: The Global Pioneer Of Torture

This is what America now is: a country with the moral values of
countries that routinely torture and abuse prisoners, like Egypt and
Iran. Even the Chinese, living in a neo-fascist market state, oppose
torture in all circumstances by 66 percent, compared to Americans where
only 53 percent do! More horrifying: a higher percentage of Americans -
13 percent - believe that torture should generally be allowed than in any other country save China, Turkey and Nigeria.

MSNBC FAIL

David Gregory is a fucking moronic tool. His analysis of the forum on
service with Obama and McCain was at once vapid and completely off
point. Stating that he saw no discernable difference between the
positions of both candidates on the issue of service, I can only guess
that he must not have watched the same forum I watched.

If he had, Gregory would have observed McCain blathering incoherently,
spewing empty platitudes, and even dropping a few lies.

By contrast, Obama clearly enunciated actual policy plans and
discussed how these plans would be funded. Instead of espousing
bullshit like "I am confident Americans will come together to get
things done," Obama articulated how he would bring people together to
get specific things done.

No discernable difference? David Gregory is an idiot.

Stupid Distractions

Thank you, Tom Tomorrow - and Salon!

Animal Farm Friday - Wolves Rule

I'm way past being sick of Sarah Palin being in the news, and even writing about her makes me gnash my teeth, but this is important. I've been an advocate quietly - sometimes not so quietly - fighting for the wolves, in the lower 48, and especially arctic wolves up near the Huntress's current stomping grounds. With regards to her stance on wolves - and animals in general - she is my nemesis like no other. Where George W. Bush was indifferent, this savage beast of a woman is proactively evil. As the type of Christianist that she is, she embodies the belief that humans have dominion over animals, a belief that I strongly oppose from the depths of my being. Say what you want about her carrying her afflicted child to term, she has little to no regard for non-human life, and that is why she is evil incarnate.

I am even more sickened at how the McPalin campaign, and the gleefully compliant Corporate-Run Media, is playing off weaker people's archetypal - and unwarranted - fear of wolves, much the same way that W/Dick did with those disgusting ads back in 2004 (I won't link to it here. If you want to subject yourself to that kind of shit, do it by your own choice, and Google it). That was pure Rove, and here he is following up with Sarah the Wolf Slayer campaign.

I say with aplomb that if given the opportunity, Sarah Pain should be considered fair game, and so too, Karl "Dog Food" Rove. At this point, I'm not sure which animal would benefit the most in that pursuit; the American people, polar bears, or wolves. But I dedicated last Friday to polar bears, so this one goes out to the wolves. (People can fend for themselves.)

I chose this particular video because it shows the animals in a respectable light which they so deserve. Watch it in deference.

Unusually stupid, even for McCain

It looks like some in the Corporate-Run Media are waking up:

I'm afraid this is just embarrassingly incoherent. First, the notion that Palin's proximity to Russia counts as national security experience continues to be unusually stupid, even for McCain.

We need a tax on Stupid

If you are an American who supports McCain, you should have to pay a Stupid Tax of 75% of your income, which would go directly into a public education fund. Then we should pass a law making it legal to slap McCain supporters for being so stupid.

Some truth from the right

An op-ed in the WSJ particularly kind to big business. Equally surprising that it's coming from Thomas Frank.

He opens with this nugget:

It tells us something about Sarah Palin's homage to small-town America, delivered to an enthusiastic GOP convention last week, that she chose to fire it up with an unsourced quotation from the all-time champion of fake populism, the belligerent right-wing columnist Westbrook Pegler.

"We grow good people in our small towns, with honesty and sincerity and dignity,"

He continues:

Leave the fantasy land of convention rhetoric, and you will find that small-town America, this legendary place of honesty and sincerity and dignity, is not doing very well. If you drive west from Kansas City, Mo., you will find towns where Main Street is largely boarded up. You will see closed schools and hospitals. You will hear about depleted groundwater and massive depopulation.

And eventually you will ask yourself, how did this happen? Did Hollywood do this? Was it those "reporters and commentators" with their fancy college degrees who wrecked Main Street, U.S.A.?

No. For decades now we have been electing people like Sarah Palin who claimed to love and respect the folksy conservatism of small towns, and yet who have unfailingly enacted laws to aid the small town's mortal enemies.

Read the whole thing when you get a chance.

What we give up for Security

Cocky Pathological Liar and Neophyte

Honest, non-sexist words to describe Sarah Palin.

If Democrats were Republicans

Mitch and the Heckler

My favorite comedian in great form!

"We can't kill our way to victory..."

In what has to be one of the greatest quotes ever, and one which is an incredible smackdown to war mongers like George W. Bush and his evil twin John McCain, JCOS Chairman Mike Mullen had this to say about Afghanistan:

"We can't kill our way to victory, and no armed force anywhere -- no
matter how good -- can deliver these keys alone. It requires teamwork
and cooperation." Mullen said.

That's a line Obama should adopt immediately, and drive it down McPalin's throat.

get yours

courtesy TPM.

Phil Donahue PWNS! Bill O'Reilly

"Lipstick" was deliberate and successful?

Nate Silver makes the case.

There is NO horse race

Check this blog and you will see this is something I've been saying all along - that there is NO horse race between Obama and McCain. Now this post at Daily Kos based on a ground-breaking article by Seth Colter Walls at HuffPo lends credence to my claim.

These fudged poll numbers are still no reason for Obama not gut-punching McCain for his disgusting and perverted ads. It's time someone teaches that old man a valuable lesson.

A bad Disney movie

indeed.

!!!ENOUGH!!!

Has the LHC destroyed the Earth?

Just asking...

So much for all that

I gleefully retract my earlier remarks about Andrew Sullivan and his "thing" for McCain. I'm glad to see Andrew come to his senses. Too bad it took so much to make it happen.

Whore!

This probably would have worked better if some of the sockets were actually being "used"...

Sarah Palin IS a pig with lipstick

There, I've said it. I'm proud of it too. I'll even go so far as to say that John McCain is a pig in makeup also (what's he using to hide his cancer sores?). But the only story here is how shamelessly complicit the Corporate-Run Media is in all this. Do you think this video footage will make it on CNN, ABC, NBC, or Fox? No way.

I.O.U.S.A. redux

A 75 trillion dollar fright fest.

So-called journalists

I have to weigh in on Glenn Greenwald's post today in reaction to the latest drivel to spewed forth from the bloviators at The Atlantic. Despite my reference to a recent post by Marc Ambinder (the only one that I have ever made), I canceled my subscription to that publication over a year ago because of their self-gratifying, borderline-Republican propaganda editorials, all so cleverly masked by peculiarly long-winded, drawn out articles that - as suggested by the title of their flagship publication, The Atlantic Monthly - has taken them a month to write, but actually come off as little more than late night blog posts. There may have been a time when The Atlantic was worth reading, but that time has long passed.

Per my perception of Glenn's post, Ambinder, and cohort Yglesias, split hairs over whether or not they should take their jobs seriously, or if they should enjoy all the benefits and rewards of tabloid journalists, which is to sit around glad-handing each other and congratulating themselves for being so much more pious and clever than everyone else, while convincing themselves that they are not in fact swimming in the same feces-filled puddles as the rest of the so-called journalists working for the Corporate-Run Media.

Them boys at The Atlantic pretend to give a shit about the American polity while espousing how great and noble their profession is and, at the same time, harbor the notion that they are in their profession purely out of self-interest.

Just like tabloid journalists.

See? The truth is out there, hitting you in the face every fucking day, waiting to be acknowledged.

Glenn's observation is far more astute than mine could be, and that is why he is a journalist, and I am just an angry American who is sick of assholes who pretend to be journalists, like those shitheads at The Atlantic. I'll give a slight pass to Andrew Sullivan, whose views I don't entirely share, but he at least has a modicum of self-respect and dignity, and a willingness to expose the truth, at least when those truths aren't clouded by strongly hidden desires (I have a non-professional observation about Sullivan and his "Daddy figure" obsession with McCain, but that is for another time).

As Glenn points out:

...journalists have the duty and obligation to serve the public interest, not merely their self-interest. If self-interest is their only concern, then what possible rationale exists for granting them any of those privileges [legal protection]? If they have no duties and obligations other than to themselves, then they should be questioned, subpoenaed, arrested, and forced to wait in line in exactly the same way everyone else is.

This perspective is more sound, and is a more reasonable argument than what I would have proffered. The point I want to make from the perspective of a ranting blogger is that for journalists who do not think they have a duty and obligation to serve the public, those journalists deserve no respect beyond that which bloggers get. In fact, they probably deserve less respect, since they are getting paid to say things that could be considered the same level of trash as this:

Marc Ambinder is a fat, corpulent, pus-filled gas-bag separated physically and genetically from Mark Penn by nothing more than a goatee, with the exception that he has less to say that is worth listening to.

I'm not a journalist, so I can say that about someone else who doesn't deserve to call himself a journalist.

I'll close by throwing out mad props to a real journalist, Glenn Greenwald, someone who actually has unimpeachable character and dignity, and is worth a million Ambinders/Sullivans/Fallows/Reihans/and insert-paid-so-called-journalist-name-here.

One last thought, this to the editor-in-chief at The Atlantic. How much more irrelevant and partisan can you get before the distinction between your publication and The National Review or The Washington Times or The New York Post becomes indistinguishable? Do you have plans to hire Bill Kristol any time soon?

Poll Madness: McCain Takes Lead Even As Democrats Out-Register Republicans?

I've been saying all along that the only reason this looks like a close race in the polls is because the polls need to make it look close, otherwise who cares about Gallup, or Zogby, or what have you? As for polls like RCP or Nate Silver (who actually does a better job than most), they are just aggregating poll data and averaging them. WSJ and other media channels have their own agendas.
About Barack Obama
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Economics are different in Alaska, apparently.

Finally, a Corporate-Run Media story actually not afraid to use the word "LIE" when speaking about the crap that passes through Palin's lips.

Good stuff in there about how drilling in Alaska won't help any American who doesn't live in Alaska.

"These people."

That's more like it!

I.O.U.S.A.

I've been writing about this for years now. It is hard to believe - and quite sickening - that it has taken so long for this issue to come to the forefront. But that is not nearly as sickening as the continued belief in the myth that Republicans are fiscally conservative. They are the ones who got us into this mess in the 80s with Reagan and Bush, and now even more so with that sorry excuse for a human being, George W. Bush.

Hey, remember way back when people joked about W's horrible business instincts, like how he wrecked his oil company, and made the dumbass decision to trade Sosa when he owned The Rangers? Remember how everyone thought that joke was funny, but didn't have anything to do with the presidency? Yeah, not so funny now is it?

Stealing America: Vote by Vote

It's going to happen again, unless we do something about it.

Actually, there's nothing logical about religion

I want to see more of this!

When Obama gave his acceptance speech, he was being the man he needs to be for the rest of this campaign. Joe is being that man here.

We need more of this!!! (From Fallows)

More defense from Obama. Where's the offense?

Obama's new ad "No Mavericks" is pretty good, but it's a shame that it's launched from a defensive crouch. I would much rather have seen this come out before the McCain ad, and they definitely need to come out with ads that put McCain on the side of having to put out his defensive ads. McCain is still controlling the narrative of this campaign. Before anyone gets excited and wants to say that Obama is the one being cool-headed and level, and has control of the campaign narrative - that being "change" - just stop and think for a moment. It may seem like McCain abandoned his experience message in favor of the change message, but that's not the narrative. The narrative is that Obama is weak. It's that simple. McCain is showing everyone just how weak Obama is by punching him over and over, keeping him in the corner, or always on his back foot. He's doing it and Sarah Palin is doing it too. The McCain campaign is showing the country that Obama is getting beat up by an old man and a girl. If you don't think that's the message that is starting to sink into the minds of voters in the heartland, think again.