Andrew Breibart died today

It is said that when someone dies you should only say good. Right-wing hate monger Andrew Breitbart died today. Good.

In a three-hour period after the death of Ted Kennedy, Breibart tweeted, “Rest in Chappaquiddick", and called him a “villain,” “a big ass motherf@#$er,” a “duplicitous bastard,” a “prick,” and "a special pile of human excrement.” Outside CPAC a few weeks ago he called protesters rapists and murderers.

I would never stoop to that level to call him names, but I will factually call out the disrespect he showed his fellow man. I hope those followers he has left behind come to understand the full weight of the dirty tricks, dishonest discourse, and hatred he heaped upon our society.

And now a Special Comment on MSNBC ending the show "Countdown"

The new, extremely conservative owner of MSNBC, Comcast, has done a great disservice by ending Keith Olbermann's contract - not to Olbermann, but to the ability of the nation to hear another side of the story uniquely presented within the tenets of journalism. Countdown is by its own admission full of commentary and subjectivity to be sure, but it also uses sources, attribution, and the historical record to back up and document its arguments logically, factually, and sincerely.

Countdown was the highest-rated show on MSNBC and wasn't even matched in the ratings by any show at any time on rival CNN, either. Comcast obviously wanted to quiet the most-popular voice that opposed their right-wing political philosophy.

One doesn't have to agree with the progressive side of the story to recognize its place in journalism, which is much in opposition (and NOT a mirror image) to another network that operates outside professional parameters by promoting faux-journalistic fiction, gossip, and abominable inaccuracies in order to persuade the gullible and weak-minded.

MSNBC's level of trustworthiness and respectability has taken a huge hit as will, I'm sure, the ratings and financial rewards of the network. It is their loss, the viewers' loss, and the loss of another piece of honest discourse in our society.

Only One Side Has Been Perpetrating and Promoting Violence

For anyone who's thinking, "Well, I'm sure violence comes from both sides of the political spectrum," here's a brief reminder.

No, it hasn't. It has virtually all been coming from conservatives and to an abominable degree.

From Sarah Palin's gunsights on Representatives including the just-shot Gabby Giffords in Arizona with her calls to "take aim" and "open a salvo", to Sharron Angle's calling for 2nd Amendment remedies to "take out" Harry Reid, to completely taking out of context a quote from Thomas Jefferson as if he were promoting violence (he wasn't) in pursuit of liberty, the radical right as promoted through their media outlets have done everything short of arming their disciples and given them location addresses for their public appearances.

No, strike that. They DID give out the locations for Democrats' public appearances while not revealing Republicans' meetings during the Health Care debate, if you can use that word when the one purpose promoted was to disrupt any discussion or actual debate.

In case you don't remember:

A conservative who followed right-wing media killed a guard at the Holocaust museum.

A conservative who followed right-wing media killed West Memphis cops.

A conservative who followed right-wing media killed Dr. George Tiller while he was in church.

A conservative who followed right-wing media killed two people at a Unitarian church in Tennessee.

Unknown arsonists set fire to a planned Tennessee Mosque and cultural center at the time right-wing media denounced a planned Manhattan mosque and cultural center.

Unknown terrorists targeted Democratic officials and non-conservative media figures with anthrax in the past decade.

Democratic Congressman James Clyburn was spit on while being called racial slurs by conservatives in May 2010.

Numerous Democratic Party headquarters around the country were vandalized with bricks by conservatives who attached pro-conservative rhetoric to the weapons after being directed to do so by their conservative lords.

The headquarters for several Democratic Representatives such as Louise Slaughter and Gabby Giffords were attacked similarly by conservatives.

Nine conservative members of the Hutaree militia planned attacks last year on government officials and those who would attend the subsequent funerals.

A conservative who followed conservative anti-tax rhetoric flew a plane into a Texas IRS building.

A Tennessee conservative was arrested after walking into his local county courthouse to try to effect a citizen's arrest of a grand jury foreman who had refused to investigate President Obama's legitimacy to serve as promoted by right-wing media.

A self-proclaimed Glenn Beck fan was arrested for scouting out and trespassing on Air National Guard Base at Gabreski Airport in New York. She had an XM-15 assault rifle, a shotgun, and 500 rounds of ammunition in her car when police found her.

A conservative supporter knocked down to the ground and then stomped on a liberal protester's head as she lay by the curb outside a Republican campaign stop.

There are so many more I can cite, but the pattern is obvious here. Violent acts are not protected First Amendment speech and cannot be tolerated by a civilized society. The promoters in the conservative media are just as guilty as the perpetrators and should stop promoting violence immediately.

Republicans, The First Week

After just two days, the Republican majority in the House of Representatives has shown themselves to be a hypocritical embarrassment to anyone who voted for them as well as the rest of America.

They promised to employ a stringent interpretation of the Constitution without acknowledging that it is not written in stone to set up permanent rules, but rather to set guidelines that need to be interpreted or even changed with the evolution (oh dear, that word!) of our society. Our forefathers have made plenty of egregious errors along the way. How do the Republicans address that? By changing historical truths to suit their needs. In the reading of the Constitution, they simply ignored such facts as Native Americans weren’t considered people, that Blacks were considered just three-fifths of a person, that escaped slaves were to be returned to their owners no matter where in the country they were found, and that conservatives made alcohol consumption and commerce constitutionally illegal.

Well, isn’t that special!

Two Republican Congressmen – Pete Sessions and Mike Fitzpatrick – didn’t even bother to honor the rules of the Constitution when they didn't show up to be sworn in with the rest of the House. Where were they instead? They were attending a fundraiser that would help line their pockets with all of those really wealthy dollars that helped buy their way into office so they may attend to their further bidding.

Breaking the rules of Constitution on the day Congress is reading parts of the Constitution so you can be paid by really wealthy people is certainly very special!

Republicans pledged to cut 100 Billion dollars in federal spending. Now they say that written pledge was just hypothetical so they’re revised that to 50 Billion and some experts are saying it will be much more like 30 Billion. Meanwhile, they raised the deficit by 133 Billion with bonus tax cuts for wealthy beyond the regular tax cuts they would have gotten as proposed by the Democrats. Republicans say they were already in place, but, in fact, they were put in place at a time of economic surplus without wars and were set by Republicans to expire.

Republicans are trying to explode the deficit by another 230 Billion dollars by repealing health care reform. It’s part of their new “cut-as-you-go” promise – to not just pay for, but cut spending by whatever has to be paid for additionally. What will be cut to pay for this 230 Billion dollar blow up of the deficit? Nothing because they decided arbitrarily they don’t need to follow this promise when they don’t want to! And 230 Billion dollars is the amount computed by the independent Congressional Budget Office – the official accountants working on behalf of the government. The Republican Speaker says that’s just their opinion, which is tantamount to saying he thinks 2+2=7, and those who tell him it’s 4 are simply of the wrong opinion as well.

Well, isn’t that special!

Another broken Republican pledge is their stated commitment to reporting public attendance of Congressional committee meetings, which is where nearly all of their work takes place. But they decided to do away with that provision in a closed-door meeting Tuesday night.

Apparently, their promise of transparency wasn’t that special, either.

Another one of Republicans’ pledges was their promise to allow Democrats to offer amendments to legislation. On their first bill introduced since taking over, Republicans are not going to allow any amendments. Take it or leave it, suckers!

Another often-repeated promise was a “triumphant” return to open rules in the House. But after one day we see reporting that not a single one of the bills that will be brought to the floor this week will be brought under open rules.

Isn’t that triumphantly special!

Finally, in their Pledge to America, Republicans also promised to require each bill moving through Congress to include a clause citing the specific constitutional authority upon which the bill is justified. After all, these Republicans are strict constitutionalists (not counting the parts of the Constitution they don't believe in or want to acknowledge were ever there). However, none of the three bills that Republicans plan to introduce this week have any constitutional citation.

None of this hypocritical, dishonest, or simply bungling behavior is the result of an opposition party trying to destroy any accomplishment of government or childishly just saying “No” to obstruct everything proposed. Republicans have done this totally on their own to themselves and the American people, and they’ve done it in just two days.

The Economy in a Nutshell

You, too, can understand the economy once it's broken down to it's easily component parts. Really!

(Bullet points always help.)

• We wouldn't be upset about AIG execs getting bonuses from taxpayers if there hadn't been a bailout.
• AIG wouldn't have needed bailing out if it hadn't been too big to fail.
• AIG wouldn't have been too big to fail if it hadn't become a giant corporate mixture of insurance, banking, and investment house.
• AIG wouldn't have been able to become a giant corporate mixture of insurance, banking, and investment house if there hadn't been deregulation of Wall Street that allowed firms to get like that.
• There wouldn't have been deregulation of Wall Street that allowed firms to get like that if there hadn't been the Republican political philosophy that preached that regulation was bad and that deregulation was good.
• There wouldn't have been the total deregulation of Wall Street if it weren't for the Graham-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999, introduced by those three Republicans.
• The Graham-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999 tore down the separation of commercial banks from investment banks from insurance companies that had been in place since the Great Depression.
• That's how Citibank gobbled up Travelers Group Insurance to become Citigroup and AIG added the various banking measures to its insurance business by insuring banking and mortgages it knew were bad. BUT WHO WAS GOING TO STOP THEM? Nobody, thanks to the Republicans.
  
• Banking and mortgage companies gave outrageous mortgages to unqualified buyers because they got insurance for them (that was totally worthless). BUT WHO WAS GOING TO STOP THEM? Nobody, thanks to the Republicans.
• Then there came the Commodities Futures Modernization Act of 2000 (with the famed "Enron Loophole") which exempted high-risk actions from any regulation whatsoever. Not only was it legal from the 1999 act, but now it couldn't even be overseen. It was another action by Phil Graham and the Republicans.
  

The Great Depression of the 1930s was repaired by the Democrats with the formation of the FTC (Federal Trade Commission), the SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) to provide oversight and control, and the New Deal (a federal investment in job-creating and economic-stimulating infrastructure) to correct unregulated, Republican failures.

Can we now finally learn from our mistakes?

Economy Solution - The New York Yankee$

I believe the true answer to the financial crisis is to allow the New York Yankee$ to buy the top five banks in America as well as the big three auto makers.

Apparently, there is no economic recession if your last name is Steinbrenner, as in New York Yankee$ owner Hank Steinbrenner.

In the past 12 months or so, the New York Yankee$ have signed five players... FIVE... to contracts totaling more than three-quarters of a BILLION dollars!

They have a brand new stadium, being funded in part by taxpayer bonds.

And what's more scurrilous about this is the way the Yankee$ have most recently gone about it. For recently signed first baseman Mark Texeira they waited until all of the other teams bidding for his services played out, then trounced the top bid by an insurmountable sum at the last second.

Certainly, they will win at least 105 baseball games this year as well as the World Series. If not, they should fire every manager, coach, and executive with the team.

Do all of the citizens of New York really want their tax dollars going to buying every top level baseball player available? If so, I'm sure they'll pay $2500 a seat at the games and $11 a beer in droves, and I'm sure won't mind a few dollars going to bail out the Republican recession as well.

The Yankee$ are truly the evil empire, but they can turn that around by becoming our benevolent benefactors.

I hope the people of New York are happy cheering for their championship team while they're looking for a job, declaring personal bankruptcy, losing their health insurance (such as it is these days), and seeing a radical increase in violent crime. People of New York, you will get what you pay for.

So how about sharing some of your tax dollars with the rest of us? It's only fair if we're going to be the whipping boys for your store-bought All-Star baseball team.

Awful McCain Mistakes on Foreign Policy

In a week in which the Dow lost 1,000 points on Monday and Wednesday, John McCain was insisting the economic fundamentals in America were strong. Wha???????

OK, the economy is, by his own admission, not his strong suit. So does he have a strong suit?

The media has attempted to portray McCain to have knowledge on foreign policy, but his repeated mistakes prove he is not intelligent enough to handle that, either. As a recap, here are some of McCain's recent foreign policy gaffes in which he said that:

1 - Iraq and Pakistan share a border.

2 - Czechoslovakia still exists.

3 - He was confused as to the difference between Sudan and Somalia.

4 - He was confused as to whether it was more U.S troops or more NATO troops he wanted to send to Afghanistan.

5 - He was confused as to what troop levels are in Iraq.

6 - He was confused about Iran's relationship with Al Qaeda.

7 - He was confused about the difference between Sunni and Shiite Muslims.

8 - He referred to Russian President Putin as being the leader of Germany.

9 - He jokingly sang about bombing Iran.

10 - His running mate spoke of bombing Russia.

11 - And now this week, he has referred to our friendly European ally and fellow democracy, Spain, as being our adversary, and...

12 - being located in Central America.

McCain is showing himself to be weak-minded, weak-willed, lacking judgment, lacking intelligence, lacking stamina, and choosing the worst, most unqualified running mate in U.S. history (supplanting even Dan Quayle).

Apparently, he does not have any strong suit at all.

Despite the media's attempts to keep the race close for their own ratings benefit, John McCain is showing such a lack of ability to be president as to even overcome that propaganda to register in the polls whose methodology already favors the republican candidates by skewed selection of those they poll.

Red Sox Add by Addition

Some are arguing the Red Sox accomplished addition by subtraction this week by trading Manny Ramirez and acquiring Jason Bay, meaning they took a step back by making the switch, but accomplished more in the long run by removing a problem player.

They’re wrong. The Red Sox have added a more accomplished player in Bay.

Those who don’t like the deal are only looking at the raw numbers:

Ramirez - .303 BA, 21 HR .936 OPS through 8-3-08.

Bay - .283 BA, 23 HR, .906 OPS.

Those are the UNADJUSTED stats. Adjust for all of the factors and you’ll see Bay is the superior hitter and player.

Factor #1 - Ball Park

Ramirez played home games in Fenway park, a hitter’s park. His stats were inflated because of where he played half of his games.

Bay played his home games in Pittsburgh, a pitcher’s park that made hitting stats worse.

Factor #2 - Pitching staffs

Ramirez didn’t have to face above-average Red Sox pitchers so his numbers were compiled against slightly below league-average pitching. That made his batting statistics better than if they were against average pitching in the league.

Bay didn’t get to face below-average Pirates pitchers so his numbers were compiled against slightly above league-average pitching. That made his batting statistics worse than if he got to face average pitching in the league.

Factor # 3 - Defense

Ramirez was often replaced late in games to allow a better defensive outfielder to play in LF. When David Ortiz was out with an injury, Ramirez moved to DH, a spot he’s more suited for.

Bay is better in the field and can stay in ball games to provide good fielding with his range and his arm.

Factor # 4 - Speed

Ramirez was slow on the base paths, and that’s when he actually tried to run. Ramirez could have gotten extra hits by running harder on misplayed ground balls he assumed would be outs. With him, they were because of his lack of effort.

Bay has always hustled in his career. He plays the game with full effort and won’t accept an out as automatic. This season he is 7 for 7 in stolen base attempts.

Factor # 5 - Age

Ramirez is 36.

Bay is 29.

Factor # 6 - Contract

Ramirez makes $20 million a year and is a free agent after this season.

Bay is signed through 2009 when he will make $7.5 million.

Factor # 7 - In the Clubhouse

No one will ever say that Jason is just being Jason - in a bad way, that is.

An Awful Week in McCain's Political Life, but the Media Covers it up

If John McCain weren’t the darling of the media, he would be in BIG trouble after this past week. I cannot remember a politician having such a disastrous string of mistakes, missteps, and misstatements in so short a time. Yet, it's almost being completely ignored by the media.

First, McCain promised to balance the budget by the end of his first term from all the money he would save by winning the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan even though he has said in the past that there’s no reason to bring troops home if they’re not getting killed anymore. Of course, he has also said that we can’t bring the troops home as long as they’re getting killed. In other words, we stay if we are getting killed and we stay if we’re not getting killed. So where does the money being saved come from?

He then attacked Barack Obama for not voting for something he didn’t vote for, either - the Kyl-Lieberman amendment.

He claimed to have a record with veterans that he really doesn’t have. It was Barack Obama who supported the G.I. Bill and John McCain who refused to vote for it. That just backs up all Veterans’ groups overwhelmingly scoring McCain’s support of soldiers among the worst in the Senate.  

McCain ignored the Iraqi Prime Minister calling for the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq even though McCain had said before that if the Iraqis wanted us to leave, we would leave.

McCain joked about wanting to kill Iranian civilians by giving them lung cancer.

On Monday, McCain described social security as a total disgrace, not saying that it needed to be fixed, but saying, “We are paying present-day retirees with the taxes being paid by young workers in America today.” That just happens to be the entire premise of social security, which he has stated he wants to privatize.

McCain’s top economic advisor, Phil Gramm, who largely caused the mortgage crisis in America by creating the Enron loophole while a Senator, called Americans a bunch of whiners for an economy he said was only in a mental recession. Despite this, he got to keep his campaign co-chairman position.

Another top economic advisor, the formerly ousted Hewlett Packard CEO, Carly Fiorino, told reporters that McCain was just as upset as she was that insurance companies cover Viagra for men, but not birth control for women leaving McCain befuddled and bewildered on his campaign bus when reporters asked him about it.

Finally, McCain lied about his own life story just to pander to a Pittsburgh TV morning show. When McCain was held in Vietnam by the North Vietnamese, he had always said he gave false information under torture to make the torturers stop. He even stated it in his autobiography and the film that was made about it. Instead of naming his squad mates and squadron commander, he named the offensive line of the Green Bay Packers - the best team in football in the 1960s.

At the time, the Pittsburgh Steelers stunk. They were completely insignificant with no outstanding players although they would later become the best team of the 1970s well after McCain left Vietnam.

In talking to this Pittsburgh TV reporter, McCain changed his life story by saying he named the Pittsburgh Steelers famous defensive line of the time just to show what a great Pittsburgh fan he was. Too bad the famous Steel Curtain defense didn’t exist yet!

Furthermore, he formerly used this Green Bay Packers story to illustrate how ineffective torture is. A victim generally says anything just to end the pain. Of course, McCain completely changed his anti-torture stance under the direction of the Republican dictatorship who used incorrect information gleaned under torture to justify the irresponsible spending of American blood and taxpayers’ dollars in Iraq.

It’s a good thing for McCain that the media is the lapdog of the Republican machine or else he’d never hear the end of this week’s gaffes.

McCain, Republicans - No (truthful) Energy Plan Whatsoever

The latest atrocity being pushed by John McCain and the Republicans is that we need to boost oil production by drilling off the gulf shore shore and in the Alaskan National Wildlife Arctic Refuge (ANWAR).

Virtually every reason they give for this is, at best - completely baseless; and, at worst - a total lie.

The fact is that the Republicans’ stance on energy and oil has been abysmal and that McCain has no plan whatsoever to offer other than to keep doing what Bush is doing - subsidizing oil companies like Exxon-Mobil who made $8 billion per year when Bush took office, but who now make over $40 billion per year giving them the largest yearly corporate profit in the history of planet Earth.

We also have no reason to need it. The oil companies are sitting on 68 million acres of leased drilling land in the United States and purposely NOT drilling on it. They are hoarding at our expense and their republican backed puppets are floating other abominations now.

Misrepresentation #1 - Increasing offshore drilling will help bring down the cost of oil quickly.

Fact - Increasing offshore may produce a little more oil by the year 2025 or so, but the amount will be only a slight fraction of the nation’s total output. Republicans are basing this on the theory that we can drill our way out of the problem.

This is truly the most ludicrous of all their arguments. The United States has two percent of the world’s oil, but use 25 percent. Increasing that to 2.02 percent in 20 years will not make up the difference. If it was a difference maker, why won't they drill on the already secured 68 million acres they're sitting on? Because we're already refining oil at our full capacity. More oil won't get us more gasoline or lower prices.

Misrepresentation #2 - Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005 did no damage to the environment from offshore oil platforms. McCain said, “They’re safe enough.”

Fact - Hurricanes Katrina and Rita forced 700,000 gallons of oil to spill during the hurricanes. The chance of further disasters not related to weather also factor into a possible catastrophic disaster to not only the ecology, but also the gulf states’ industries along the coast, such as the seafood industry and tourism on the beaches.

Misrepresentation #3 (actually a blatant lie) - “China is drilling off the coast of Florida...” (optional aside - “with the help of Cuba.”)

Fact - It’s a LIE. This rumor has been alleged by Vice-President Dick Cheney, Republican Congressmen John Boehner and Roy Blount, and media personalties Michelle Bachman and George Will over the past week. Dick Cheney actually apologized and corrected himself the day after this assertion, but it has a life that lives on thanks to Bachman and friends at the Republican Headquarters known as “Fox News.” It simply happens to be a fabrication.

Misrepresentation #4 (and the most fanciful of all) - ANWAR helps caribou in Alaska because the pipeline is warm. One Republican congresswoman from Minnesota even said the caribou will have coffee klatches with such a warm pipeline! I’m not making that up.

Fact - This is the silliest one yet. Think about it a second - the animals native to Alaska... are freezing??? Wouldn’t they have moved or become extinct long ago if they needed more warmth? And oh, by the way, why would we be HEATING the oil to such a degree that it will make the outside of the pipes warm? Is there some reason we’d need to do that? Would we need portable heaters along the pipeline to keep it warm the entire length? If not, then why has no one ever proposed simply putting in heaters FOR THE CARIBOU?

The simple truth is that the wealthiest corporations in the history of civilization, who are already being subsidized with additional tax dollars paid by hard-working Americans, want more. The Republicans are just the people who will rob the bottom 99 percent to make it happen.

Bobby Jindal - Puppet, Heretic, Exorcist

Bobby Jindal is the Indian-American, 36-year-old governor of Louisiana and the only non-white Republican to hold high political office in the United States.

Some have thrown out his name as a possible vice-presidential running mate for John McCain. It won’t happen because, if for no other reason, the age difference would make John McCain look really old.

Jindal has been appointed to most of his positions by upper-echelon Republicans who taught him to obey, and he has throughout his career in Congress and, now, Governor. He has voted with George W. Bush more than 95 percent of the time and kissed up to every conservative politician who came into the state.

He was a Hindu until converting to Catholicism at 15. But it was revealed this week that he admitted to committing one of the most  egregious sins in the Catholic church when he took the role of a priest in performing an exorcism.

That’s right - he performed an exorcism - on a girlfriend he once knew. He wrote about it in a magazine article.

In the Catholic church, only an ordained priest can perform an exorcism, and, even then, it takes quite a high authority to appoint a priest to that function.

Obviously, Jindal thought rather highly of himself to appoint himself to this task.

He said it worked. He claimed the demon was cast out of the girl’s body.

Furthermore, Jindal said he also cured her of cancer!

It’s too bad he can’t use some of those magical powers to keep some his campaign promises about transparency in the Louisiana governor’s office regarding ethics.

Maybe the devil made him do it.

Obama's Record on New Orleans

I wrote yesterday about more misstatements by John McCain about Iraq and New Orleans.

Obama's record in speaking out against Republican lies on Iraq is well-documented, but less well-known are his actions regarding New Orleans. Here's a rundown of what Obama has done for this area. Here's what the blog, "Think On These Things," compiled through February 2008.

 

Sept. 2, 2005: Obama holds press conference urging Illinoisans to contribute to the Hurricane Katrina relief efforts.

Sept. 5, 2005: Obama goes to Houston to visit evacuees with Presidents Clinton and Bush.

Sept. 7, 2005: Obama introduces bill to create a national emergency family locator system

Sept. 8, 2005: Obama introduces bill to create a National Emergency Volunteers Corps.

Sept. 8, 2005: Obama co-sponsors the Katrina Emergency Relief Act of 2005 introduced by Senator Harry Reid

Sept. 8, 2005: Obama co-sponsors the Hurricane Katrina Bankruptcy Relief and Community Protection Act of 2005 introduced by Senator Russ Feingold

Sept. 12, 2005: Obama introduces legislation requiring states to create an emergency evacuation plan for society’s most vulnerable

Sept. 15, 2005: Obama issues public response to President Bush’s speech about Gulf Coast rebuilding.

Sept. 21, 2005: Obama co-sponsors bill to establish a Katrina commission to investigate response to the disaster introduced by Hillary Clinton

Sept. 21, 2005: Obama appears on NPR to discuss the role of poverty in Hurricane Katrina.

Sept. 22, 2005: Obama and Coburn’s Hurricane Katrina financial oversight bill unanimously passes Senate committee.

Sept. 22, 2005: Obama’s amendment requiring evacuation plans unanimously passes Senate committee.

Sept. 28, 2005: Obama and Coburn issue statement about the need for a Chief Financial Officer to oversee the financial mismanagement and suspicious contracts occurring in the reconstruction process

Sept. 29, 2005: Obama and Coburn investigate possible FEMA refusal of free cruise ship offer

Oct. 6, 2005: Obama and Coburn issue statement on FEMA Decision to re-bid Katrina contracts

Oct. 6, 2005: Obama co-sponsors Gulf Coast Infrastructure Redevelopment and Recovery Act of 2005.

Oct. 21, 2005: Obama releases statement decrying the extension of FEMA director, Michael “Brownie” Brown’s contract. Obama calls Brown’s contract extension, “unconscionable.”

Nov. 17, 2005: Obama and Coburn introduce legislation asking FEMA to immediately re-bid all Katrina reconstruction contracts.

Feb. 1, 2006: Obama gives Senate floor speech on his legislation to help children affected by Hurricane Katrina

Feb. 2, 2006: Obama introduces legislation to help low-income children affected by Hurricane Katrina

Feb. 23, 2006: Obama issues statement responding to a White House report on Hurricane Katrina. Obama noted that the top two recommendations that the report had for the federal government were initiatives he had been working on since immediately after the storm hit. Obama called the administration’s response “delinquent.”

May 2, 2006: Obama gives speech about no-bid contracts in Hurricane Katrina reconstruction

May 4, 2006: Obama’s legislation to end no-bid contracts for Hurricane Katrina reconstruction passed the Senate.

June 15, 2006: Obama and Coburn announce legislation to require amendment to create competitive bidding for Hurricane Katrina reconstruction for federal contracts over $500,000. Although it passed previously, the language was stripped in conference.

June 15, 2006: Obama releases podcast about his pending Katrina reconstruction legislation in the Senate.

June 16, 2006: Obama and Coburn get no-bid Hurricane Katrina reconstruction amendment into Department of Defense authorization bill.

July 14, 2006: Obama and Coburn’s legislation to end abuse of no-bid contracts passes senate as amendment to Department of Defense authorization bill.

August 11, 2006: Obama visits Xavier University in New Orleans to give Commencement address

August 14, 2006: Obama and Coburn ask FEMA to address ballooning no-bid contracts for Gulf Coast reconstruction

Sept. 29, 2006: Obama and Coburn legislation to prevent abuse of no-bid contracts in the wake of disaster passes Senate to be sent to President’s desk to become law.

Feb. 2007-Present: As Obama begins his Presidential campaign he references Katrina as a part of his stump speech as he travels around the country in his familiar line, “That we are not a country which preaches compassion and justice to others while we allow bodies to float down the streets of a major American city. That is not who we are.”

June 20, 2007: Obama co-sponsors Gulf Coast Housing Recovery Act of 2007 introduced by Senator Chris Dodd.

July 27, 2007: Obama and colleagues get a measure in the Homeland Security bill that will

investigate FEMA trailers that may contain the toxic chemical, formaldehyde.

Aug. 26, 2007: Obama outlines a detailed Hurricane Katrina recovery plan.

December 18, 2007: Obama calls on President Bush to protect affordable housing in New Orleans.

February 16, 2008: Obama releases statement on toxic Gulf Coast trailers.

And something tells me he's not finished speaking to the problems in the Crescent City.

More McCain Blunders - Iraq (again), Iran (again), and New Orleans

Because I've been away for awhile, I haven't been able to keep up with all of the recent John McCain goofs. Still, the last seven days have shown us that even upon reflection the best McCain can do is compound the errors with more mistakes.

On his least knowledgeable topic, the Middle East, his seemingly unending streak of misstatements, foul-ups, and lies continued last week with his assertion that troop levels in Iraq were below what they were before the Republican escalation of the war in January 2007. WRONG!

In fact, troop levels are higher now. So he tried to “correct” that the next day by saying he meant they would be below pre-surge levels by July.

Again, that simply wasn’t true. The ending of already Republican-extended troop deployments will force levels to reduce somewhat this summer, but they will still be a full 10,000 troops above what they were before the January 2007 troop escalation.

The week began on Monday with McCain speaking to the conservative Jewish group, AIPAC, and bashed Barack Obama for proposing to speak with other countries before beginning to bomb them. McCain made his point by speaking about the divestment campaign against South Africa and how that lead to the end of apartheid. If only he were president, he would begin a divestment campaign against Iran as well.

That was all good, except for three BIG problems.

First, the Senate already proposed an Iran divestment bill last year. It was written by Barack Obama. Oops. In case you think it was a democrat version, it wasn't. In fact, the bill was co-sponsored by conservative republican Sam Brownback.

Second, John McCain voted AGAINST the bill he's now proposing. Double oops.

Third, he had also voted years ago against the divestment bill against South Africa, the very example he held up as a basis for pursuing one against Iran!!! WHAT A MORON!!!

McCain continued his sightseeing tour of forgotten truths this week when he was asked why he twice voted against independent investigations into governmental failings before and after Hurricane Katrina. McCain said, I’ve supported every investigation and ways of finding out what caused the tragedy." WRONG!

In 2005 and in 2006, Democrats proposed an independent commission to look into the problems regarding the handling of the worst natural disaster in American history. It would have been comprised of non-federal-government analysts appointed by both Democrats and Republicans.

McCain and his fellow Republicans killed both proposals.

Again, McCain tried to later “correct” his misstatement by saying he voted against the bills because they were filled with pork barrel projects that had “billions for projects and programs that had nothing to do with the recovery of the city of New Orleans.”

Once again, McCain’s attempt to explain away his earlier incorrect recollection was completely wrong. The bills would have provided $3 million for the projects, but had no allocations for anything else.

McCain’s Magical Misery Tour continues.

The Conventional Wisdom is Wrong

Conventional Wisdom #1 - Hillary's done with the campaign.

She can't win, mind you, but she's not done yet. She loaned herself another $6.4 million before Indiana and North Carolina. She'll likely be loaning herself more money this month before Kentucky, West Virginia, and Oregon. By staying in she can pay back the Indiana/North Carolina loans, and after the other three on May 20th she'll have won two more of them. This will allow herself to raise enough so that she can be paid back for this month's loans to herself.

It's all about her financially breaking even now.  It's not about the presidential election anymore because she can't realistically do that. Even if she were to subvert the process or overtly take advantage of what would have to be an egregious error by Obama, it would so fracture the Democratic Party as to make her unelectable.

Obama's in. He just has to be patient for a few more weeks.

Conventional Wisdom #2 - Obama and McCain differ on Hamas.

While Cindy McCain was saying Thursday morning that John McCain would not run an attacking campaign, John McCain was running an attacking campaign against Barack Obama by linking Obama to the Palestinian terrorist group.

McCain hypocrisy aside,  the fact is that Obama and McCain have exactly the same stance on the now duly elected entity of the Palestinan government. Obama has stated he will not speak to them unless they:

1 - denounce violence,

2 - recognize Israel's right to exist, and

3 - live up to their previously agreed to accords.

The candidates have no differences when it comes to Israel.

Conventional Wisdom #3 - Obama gets the most-favored press.

At a recent Associated Press gathering, reporters on the McCain beat proclaimed themselves to be traveling on McCain's "Straight -Talk Express" while presenting him with his favorite chocolate sprinkle covered doughnuts. At the same gathering, Barack Obama was addressed as Barack Osama.

I think Obama will still be waiting in November to be presented with his favorite doughnuts by the press.

McCain STILL Making Same Iraq Blunder!!!!!

You'd think by now John McCain would be humiliated into knowing the truth.

If the media wasn't his lapdog, the embarrassment would likely have caused him to admit to senior moments if not absolute stupidity.

Because no one is calling him on it, he continues to show his complete ignorance of reality in Iraq.

He actually doesn't have a clue who's fighting in Iraq. He doesn't know who's killing Americans - you know, his fellow citizens.

To recap, AlQaeda are Sunnis and Iran is Shiia. They aren't the same. They're as different as Red Sox and Yankees. Even more accurately, they're as different as Boston Red Sox and New York Giants - they're both sports teams , so in McCain's world they must be the same thing. After all, they both use a ball in their games.

AlQaeda and Iran - hey, they're both Arabic, right? and they both call God (the same one that Jews and Christians pray to, by the way), "Allah", right? They are all the same in McCain's world.

"So let's kill 'em all," McCain is basically saying, even if they fight along side us as Iran did in Basra last week against the Mahdi Army. And that is despite the fact that AlQaeda in Iraq wasn't there until we invaded, that they have no connection to the international terrorist group because they're just a tiny splinter organization, that they're just as happy killing Shiite Muslims as they are American occupiers because we're all infidels to them, and that they number about 1,000 out of some 8.8 million.

No, John McCain will never let facts get in the way of a good, but wholly incorrect propaganda story the media is only too happy to help him perpetrate on the American people.

So McCain continues to conflate AlQaeda and Iran. Even after being publicly corrected by a former Democrat.

Let's recap the repeated misstatements.

First came the speech in Houston in February when he said Shiia Iran was helping Sunni AlQaeda.

Then he said the same thing on Hugh Hewitt's right-wing radio show in March.

Then he said it twice to reporters on his trip to the Middle East before Joe Lieberman corrected him.

Then there was three days ago at the General Petraeus hearing when he said, "Al Qaeda isn't just an obscure sect of the Shiites... (pause) ... or Sunnis or anybody else." Well they're definitely not Shiites, and not likely anybody else unless they've been recently adopted by the Baptists, or the Mormons, or the fundamentalist born again whatevers, or, as he said, "anybody else."

Finally, Fox Noise yesterday gave him the opportunity to clear up any confusion people may perceive that he has about the situation by hand-feeding him what to say:

Fox Noise: "Do you understand the difference between Sunni and Shiia, and how would you like to respond those who claim you don't?"

McCain: "I've been to Iraq eight times. I know the leaders. I know the situation on the ground. I know that Sunni and AlQaeda are closely tied."

CLOSELY TIED?????

Like buses and subways are closely tied to mass transit?

Like the shape of wheels is closely tied to a circle?

Like football, baseball, and basketball are closely tied to America's three most popular team sports?

I don't know whether to laugh or cry. HE STILL CAN'T GET IT RIGHT!

What a blithering idiot.

For the last time (I hope), allow me to explain.

AlQaeda is Sunni.

Saudi Arabia is Sunni.

15 of the 19 AlQaeda 9/11 terrorists were from Saudi Arabia under the leadership of AlQaeda in Afghanistan.

0 were from Iraq.

That's because Iraq had 0 AlQaeda until the US invasion.

Iran is Shiia.

AlQaeda's sworn enemy is anyone not Sunni, and Iran is not Sunni.

Got it, McCain? Got it, media?

We're not as stupid as you want us to be.

McCain's "plan" for Iraq - HA!!!!!!!!

John McCain said on April 7, 2008 - in between his humorously sad, consistent conflation of AlQaeda (Sunni) with Shiite Extremists in Iraq even after being corrected on camera by former Democrat Joe Lieberman - that we don't have to be in Iraq for 100 years or longer provided certain conditions are met.

Iraq merely has to secure U.S. interests by being a country that is:

1 - Stable;

2 - Prosperous;

3 - Democratic;

4 - Not a threat to its neighbors (exception - see number 8 below);

5 - A terrorism fighter;

6 - Happily entertaining international entities (i.e. allows foreign oil companies to remove Iraq's oil for no money whatsoever);

7 - Accepting of all religions; and

8 - Starts treating Iran like an enemy.

Gee, wouldn't it be nice if the United States could meet some of those criteria, too?

I'd especially like the USA to fulfill numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 7 because we're sorely lacking in each of those under our current Republican dictatorship.

100 years, McCain? Under those conditions we're going to be there closer to 1,000 years.

And there's certainly no better strategy for accomplishing those goals than by having your country controlled and occupied by a foreign military.

Think for a minute - do you suppose the USA would be more stable, prosperous, democratic, neighborly, terrorist-fighting, and increasingly tolerant of religions if, say, we were occupied by the armies from Japan (enemy in WWII) or China (enemy in Korea), countries who now hold most of our ever-increasing national debt?

Naaaaaaah, i didn't think so either. Otherwise, we probably wouldn't have spent so many lives fighting them before.

Of course, those were Democratic presidents who fought those wars so maybe our Republican emperor and his puppet yes-men have a different idea of what democracy and America stand for.

Radio Show Host Randi Rhodes Ridiculously Suspended

Air America Chief Charlie Kireker suspended Radio Show Host Randi Rhodes because she performed a stand-up routine at a public appearance off the air in which she called Geraldine Ferraro a whore for racist comments made against Barack Obama. Mind you, she was not using the term in the "prostitute" connotation, but rather in the "selling out your principles" definition. She then called Hillary Clinton one as well for not calling out Ferraro on her bigoted remarks.

Two weeks later, Kireker took action.

First, video shows the audience understood the context and laughed. Second, Rhodes was warmly received after the event. Finally, Rhodes has been on the air for two weeks with no public reaction.

So here are my Top Ten reasons Why Air America Overreacted:

10. Kireker got upset because he didn't understand another word used by erudite radio show host Lionel today and Randi is tired of having to be the one to explain it to him - several times.

9. Kireker heard right-wing wacko Neal Boortz might be looking for a new gig.

8. Randi's last name isn't Rhodes, but Kireker doesn't understand the whole "Show Biz name" thing. Watch out, Lionel.

7. Cruise Ship envy - Randi -2, AA - 1.

6. Kireker wants to be memorialized in name for the NEXT San Francisco Sewerage Plant.

5. Total misunderstanding - When Randi told a Clinton supporter she was "right", she actually meant "correct" - not "anti-left".

4. Isn't this Air "America"? Oh yeah, I suppose South American dictatorships can technically be called "America".

3. Kireker figured that his network had too much "Talk, talk, talk" and not enough action. He's hoping Hulk Hogan returns his calls soon.

2. She can't come back until she agrees to wear a Tucker Carlson bow tie.

1. Three words - Fox America Radio!!!

Bush, McCain = Baghdad Bob

Do you remember the Iraqi Information Minister under Saddam Hussein, Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf aka "Baghdad Bob"? This was the guy who would tell the English-speaking press corp that the Americans were nowhere near Baghdad while American tanks were passing by in the street behind him.

This week, President Bush and John McCain both reached that level of unreality in speaking on the same subject - life in Iraq at present.

Friday saw a fifth straight day of rocket fire and mortar fire into Green Zone of Baghdad. Several Americans and Iraqis were killed in these attacks on this American-fortified "safe" zone.

Basra, the second largest city in Iraq, has been under siege for more than a week. Markets are closed. People can't go to work, can't get food, have no electricity, have no access to medicine, and can't even get fuel for generators.

Shiite extremists - misnamed as al-Qaeda three times last week by John McCain just before letting the world know that Purim is the Jewish Halloween - are led in Basra by the largest of these groups - the Mahdi Army led by Muqtada al-Sadr who control government, traffic, and killing.

On Tuesday, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Malicki launched an assault on Basra, which led to more killing and a further spread of widespread violence in Shiite-held districts in Baghdad and other places in Iraq where Shiite militiamen hold sway over local and Federal governments.

President Bush said this week:

"The surge is doing what it was designed to do. It's helping Iraqis reclaim security and restart political and economic life." He said, "Normalcy is returning back to Iraq."

HUH????

John McCain, who is looking to continue each and every George W. Bush policy down to the letter, commented this week:

 "Dramatic reduction in violence has opened the way for a return to something approaching normal political and economic life for the average Iraqi. People are going back to work. Markets are open."

ARE THESE PEOPLE INSANE?

WHAT FICTION ARE THEY READING??

ARE THEY CAPABLE OF SEEING REALITY???

DO THEY THINK WE ARE SO STUPID AS TO BELIEVE THIS GIBBERISH????

Fellow Americans, I give you Baghdad Bobs - George W. Bush and John McCain.

Media Missteps of the Week

John McCain and John Hagee - John McCain appeared in person this week to embrace and accept the endorsement of a hate-filled, anti-Catholic, anti-Semitic bigot whose faith tells him the greatest contribution he can make in life is to take the money of his followers to enrich himself on the way to bringing about Armageddon via a cataclysmic World War III event.  How do you suppose the media reacted to this?

Yawns were in evidence.

How do you suppose they would have reacted if an alleged religious leader who called the Catholic church a "whore religion" and said God destroyed New Orleans because of its sinners endorsed Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton?

Even more telling would be how Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton would have reacted. I dare say neither would have bothered to appear onstage with this human reptile much less embrace his radical followers' beliefs into their points of view.

The media darling in the presidential race has been declared. Hint: he's the old, white man who has pledged to bring us four more years of following the Bush regime to the letter.

Barack Obama wins Texas - I know this may come as a bit of a surprise. After all, didn't Hillary Clinton win Texas, Rhode Island and Ohio to Obama's Vermont on Tuesday?

No, the media was incorrect and are not in any hurry to correct the information.

Barack Obama won a projected 98 Texas delegates to Hillary Clinton's 95. His Texas caucus victory was much greater than Hillary's primary victory. The momentum didn't shift very much at all. She gained fewer than 10 delegates Tuesday night while trailing Obama by 152. She's still so far behind that she doesn't have a realistic mathematical chance of winning the pledged delegate count.

Hillary Clinton does not have more legislative experience than Barack Obama -The media has continually harped on Hillary Clinton's "3 a.m. phone call" ad THAT ONLY RAN IN TEXAS (a state she lost) to repeatedly play nationally on her behalf to give her free publicity on the issue of experience in government. Although Clinton has two more years as a U.S. Senator than Barack Obama, he actually has more legislative experience. Regarding security clearance as First Lady, Hillary Clinton had none. If you count her time as First Lady in government, than perhaps Barbara Bush or Laura Bush should be considered for John McCain's running mate.

Of course, McCain has more legislative experience than either Democrat, but then again, it's not like longtime Senators offer any special advantage to becoming great presidents, do they, President Dole or President Kerry?

The Democratic Party, for whichever candidate it nominates, is losing ground every day that Hillary Clinton is telling America that she and McCain have the most experience. On the other hand, maybe she's looking to be McCain's running mate. She'd certainly have a much greater chance of taking over the presidency during his administration than if she ran with Obama.

Nothing Unusual

There is nothing unusual about George W. Bush overriding the U.S. Constitution to increase power and control over money and life itself.

There is nothing unusual about George W. Bush protecting corporations over people.

There is nothing unusual about George W. Bush showing contempt and disrespect for the bottom 99 percent of the U.S. population.

There is nothing unusual about George W. Bush ignoring the rule of law.

There is nothing unusual about George W. Bush not caring about freedom and liberty.

There is nothing unusual about George W. Bush terrorizing his own country by promoting weakness, hatred, and fear of outside terrorism to accomplish the above. 

What is unusual is when all of the above statements come together in one act. It became clear this week when George W. Bush actually stated his intention to veto FISA, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act designed to actually protect Americans against acts of terrorism, if Congress didn't also grant immunity for past criminal acts carried out by phone companies at the request of Bush.

Mind you, the FISA bill doesn't expire until August. So why is he throwing a tantrum about it now? Because the immunity for criminal behavior expired yesterday.

He's actually willing to create a greater threat of terrorism against the United States because he's not getting immunity for his business criminal buddies having broken the law at his command. He's doing it by telling (i.e. lying to) the American people by saying holding up immunity of these past criminal activities helps terrorists win, and. by golly, he'll actually help terrorists win just to prove it.

The Republican Congress made a big show of storming out of Congress (after the media had assembled their cameras, naturally) so they wouldn't have to do their job of checks and balances against their savior, George W. Bush. It also helped that they were scheduled to vote on contempt charges against John Bolton and Harriet Miers for ignoring Congress' orders to testify before them. Imagine - two reasons for Republicans in Congress to show their cowardice at one time.

And what was the law the corporate criminals broke the Republicans favor? They spied on American citizens, collected email, telephone, text messages, web activity, and every other bit of information they could find by peering into the private thoughts of Americans, recorded it, and refuse to destroy it or turn over this illegally-obtained information to anyone.

They stole our privacy and they don't want to give it back. But most of all, they don't want to be held responsible for their criminal activities - even it if kills us.

I can't believe this is what Americans wanted to vote for in 2000 and 2004.