Tag: elections

politics

Wanna Talk About It?

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Did you watch the debate tonight? I did. I watched it on CNN’s HD channel and got to see six analyst scorecards on the side of my screen scoring the “fight.” Five out of six thought Biden had more positive points than Palin. I was also emailing back and forth with my buddy who is involved with the Obama campaign throughout and followed the live blogging on both the NYT site and Andrew Sullivan’s site. Surround sound!
Overall, I agree with everyone’s (i.e. NYT, MSNBC, Andrew Sullivan, NYT and CNN) reaction. Palin did a decent job. Biden did a better one.
There were no game changers tonight. Overall, Biden did not make any gaffes and had the emotional moment of the evening when he choked up about being a single parent. Palin helped herself more than John McCain. While no Republican now wants to kick her off the ticket, she definitely did not convince America that McCain is the better choice than Obama. In fact, everyone will be talking about the bailout tomorrow and not even this debate. Not good for McCain’s chances.
Election Day is now almost one month away and one cool election related web site is FiveThirtyEight which is run by Nate Silver, a super stats guru. 538 equals the number of electoral votes that are up for grabs and right now Nate is calling it 331 – 206 for Obama.
I think the best moment of the night was when Biden schooled Palin on the Constitution. He gave her the “Article One Smackdown” and invoked the dreaded word “Cheney” when the Veep question came up which really will resonate with a lot of people. Her response was wishy washy. Biden’s was fast and firm.

politics

O'Reilly interviews Obama

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Bill O’Reilly, everyone’s favorite person to either love or hate, recently interviewed Barack Obama and the interview is posted in four parts on the Fox News site.
I’ve been debating my brother-in-law for the past two weeks on the merits of Obama’s platform versus McCain’s platform and it was interesting to watch this exchange because Bill was asking many of the same questions that my BIL did. I find the way that Barack answered O’Reilly enlightening.
Part 1 is about security and the wars we are fighting. Part 2 is about the economy. Part 3 is about his dubious connections to people like Reverend Wright. Part 4 is about drilling.
Overall, I think Barack did a fine job answering Blowhard O’Reilly. Check it out yourself.

politics

Michael Palin Would Have Been a Much Better Choice

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When John McCain picked Sarah Palin as his VP choice, it sent everyone, me included, into a tizzy.
On the issues, she is against abortion, does not believe in the whole “global warming” thing, is a member of the NRA, believes that marriage should only be between a man and a woman and even sued the US government for putting the Polar Bear on the endangered species list because it prevented her from drilling for oil wherever she wanted. She is an arch Conservative, not just a Republican, pure and simple.
One of my favorite Republican talking points is that since Russia is next to Alaska, Palin is the most qualified to be Commander in Chief because she runs the Alaskan National Guard and as we’ve seen in Georgia, Russia is ornery these days and heck, they might just try to take Seward’s Folly back. Love it! Fear mongering at its finest.
While Palin’s personal story is being bandied about quite a lot, something that has not gained that much traction as of yet is the possibility that she’s a big fat liar.
First, while Palin is being pegged a maverick because she passed all of these ethics reform laws and canceled Ted Steven’s Bridge to Nowhere, she is being investigated by her state legislature for lying about how she pressured a lot of people to fire her ex-Brother-in-law from his state job. A Troopergate scandal didn’t play well in NY and it isn’t playing well in Alaska either. Plus, a person who is vindicative towards someone who wronged his or her family is the wrong person to be President. Just look at what W did to Saddam because Saddam threatened his daddy. ‘Nuff said.
Second, (though first in how weird and damaging it would be to the campaign), is that maybe Sarah Palin is not the mother of the 4 month old she claims is her son and that she is actually the grandmother. If that is the case, then Palin decided to lie to the world to hide the “shame” of her oldest daughter’s unwed pregnancy.
To stoke these flames, it seems that Palin never told anyone she was pregnant until she was 7 months along, that she was never showing beforehand and didn’t really show at the end either, and then did something absurd when she went into labor, especially absurd considering she knew the child to be developmentally disabled. This burgeoning scandal is being dubbed Waterbreak (love it!) because, as a forum poster put it, “on a list of things I would be doing if my waters had broken, staying to give a conference speech and then flying 3000 miles probably wouldn’t be that high. Seems strange.” As a new father who was very close to his wife during her pregnancy, I 150% agree that the pictures of Palin at public appearances over the course of her “pregnancy” are crazy.
If either of the above is true, then Sarah Palin is a big, fat liar and the last person we need to be one heartbeat away from the Presidency.

politics

Oh, Man!

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What a week it’s been if you care about American politics. The Democrats ran a mile wide love fest in the Mile High City which had me tuning in to CNN for four nights in a row. Each speech was a little better than the last and then when all the newspaper’s had Obama’s historic moment on Friday’s front page, those cheeky strategic Republican bastards knocked it right into the back pages by announcing Sarah Palin (who?) as the VP choice. Whoa! Oh baby, what a week…
On Thursday night, in front of 80k plus who turned out on a better summer night, the words, “America we are better than these last eights years. We are a better country than this. Tonight I say to the people of America, to the Democrats and Republicans and Independents across this land ENOUGH. This moment, this moment, this election, is our chance to keep in the 21st century the American promise alive,” rang out in the Rockies. It was powerful, it was necessary and it was motivating.
Two co-workers watched a stream of Barack’s speech yesterda, one at work and one after, and both basically said to me “Fuck that was a good speech.” I am now re-listening to Barack’s 42 min totally kick ass speech and cannot wait until September 26th when he debates John McCain for the first time. I think he’ll clean McCain’s clock and when you see the two of them side by side, oh baby, what a difference. It’ll be Kennedy versus Nixon all over again.
In the speech, Obama impressively rebutted point by point all of the arguments that have been lobbed against his candidacy. He was specific about his domestic programs and how he would fund what he wants to do. He was specific about the current state of foreign affairs and clearly laid out the case for he can be a great Commander in Chief and why he should be President. He laid out a ten year challenge a la Kennedy for energy independence. He mentioned nuclear power, which many dismiss as a horror but in actuality is one of the best green options on the table. He was precise, like a surgeon, with his concerns about McCain and soaring with his rhetoric about what this country can be. Once again, I’m inspired and if you didn’t listen to the speech, find the time and do so.
In the end, this election is simply a battle between the present and the future. Barack, despite his VP Biden being a 35 veteran in the Senate, is the future. The Grateful Dead’s “The Wheel” is one of favorite songs right now and its lyrics are apt for the situation we are in:

The wheel is turning and you can’t slow down
You can’t let go and you can’t hold on
You can’t go back and you can’t stand still
If the thunder don’t get you then the lightning will

I feel as if the Republicans are either ignoring or trying to stop that the great big wheel from turning but our nation’s debt keeps rising, the Earth’s sea levels are rising, the troubles in Afghanistan keep rising, the East’s power again is rising and we can’t go back, we can’t stand still: we are in the 21st Century and we need to keep moving forward. I think that Barack can lead the way.

politics

From the "You've Got To Be Kidding Me" Department

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One thing that really bothered me about Hilary’s campaign was how time and time again it did not pay for the goods and services it used from very same people it supposedly was “fighting for” – small business owners. Here is just one example:

Dakota Pizza, a restaurant owned by Stephen Bledsoe in Wynnewood, PA, fed Clinton, her campaign and the press corps that traveled with her more than $11,000 worth of grilled shrimp, sandwiches, “hand-crafted” pizza and salads leading up to the April 22 primary. He received a partial payment, but is still owned $5,933. “I can’t believe that someone of her stature will not have the ability to repay what they owe,” he said.

I have been following this trail of unpaid bills all over the country and always figured that Bill would just have to give a weeks worth of speeches once she dropped out to handle the damage. Therefore, I almost spit up the coffee I was drinking when I read an email from the Clinton campaign which featured the subject line, “Keeping my promise.” In this missive, Hilary had, to borrow one of Obama’s words, the audacity to ask and expect her supporters to help her resolve her campaign debts. I mean, for fuck’s sake she raised $237 million (!) yet still had more than $22.5 million in debts as of the end of May. That includes $12 million that the New York senator loaned her campaign.
Is this the person we want trying to balance the budget?! If anyone has a debt after raising almost $240 million, it because of one simple reason: grossly negligent financial management. I for one never reward anyone for that type of behavior, least of all a former first lady and current U.S. Senator.
If you you think I’m kidding unfortunately I am not – please see the image below that I grabbed from the email:

box_hrc.jpg

After getting sufficiently angry, I have started to think differently about this situation and have sort of come full circle because Hilary has truly inspired me in my approach towards my household finances. I think I’m going to send an email to all my friends and family asking them to help me “retire my debt” (aka pay off my mortgage) so that “we can keep fighting together” (whatever the hell that means – it sure does sound good though). In fact, I might actually carry a balance forward on my credit cards starting now. Who cares that I’ll get hit with 22% a month in finance charges: I can just get my “supporters” to retire my debt for me! Thanks for the swell idea HRC!

politics

Baracky

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My friend, who has been working on Obama’s campaign for the last almost two years now, sent me the video below which, while being Pro-O, is definitely entertaining.

Via YLFO

meeting ramblings

Super "Two for Tuesday" in NY

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I love New York, especially when especially big things happen and today it’s “Two for Tuesday!” here in the Big Apple:
1. The NY Football Giants celebrated the aftermath of the catch (aka an improbable super bowl victory) with a ticker tape parade through the Canyon of Heroes. The last time a parade was held there was pre-9-11 when the Yanks won the World Series. I was there, just like I was in ’99. Everyone loves a parade, especially if Boston is miserable as a result.
2. The Democratic Primary in New York was held today – I voted before 8:00 am and the woman who handled my registration remarked, “I remember you – you vote in every election.” It’s true, I do. I firmly believe that if you do not vote, you are not truly a citizen and therefore you do not have the right to complain about whatever you find lacking in your society (and you know how much I love to complain). While I didn’t create the world I live in, I can help to alter it as much as possible. Voting is one concrete way you can help affect change. Each vote matters, whether you think it does or not.
Let’s save for another post the ludicrous fact that before I even had a chance to vote, my democratic choices were winnowed down to two ( I would liked to have voted for Joe Biden). The great fact of the day is that I had the singular pleasure of actually voting for a great friend of mine – he was on the ballot in my district as a delegate for Barack Obama. While I have friends and family who are elected officials, I never got to pull a lever for them. The only downside was that I couldn’t bring Bingham in with me – they were cracking down this year.
As an aside, did you know the Dead got back together to rock out for Obama? I think that is pretty cool.

politics

Hillary's Song

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Like many people who vote Democrat and who are paying careful attention to the 2008 Presidential race, I am currently torn between Barak Obama and Hillary Clinton. I used to also throw John Edwards in the mix but now its just down to Hil and the Big O.
To help me make up my mind, I am going to hear Obama speak on Friday night and depending on how eloquent he is, I may be won over to his side. Then again, Hillary might have already pushed me there today by naming Celine Dion’s “You and I” as her campaign song! I mean, as the Junior Senator from New York, doesn’t Hillary watch enough NY1 to know that this is the same song that is used in the “Go to Canada” tourism commercials?!?
Okay, to be fair, she didn’t choose it: her supporters chose it for her as she had a contest where she listed about 8 songs and said “vote for my campaign song.” I forget who I voted for but it was definitely not that crazy Cannuck and if her supporters love Celine Dion, maybe I’m rooting for the wrong team…
That being said, Hillary did do something incredibly cute and clever for a politician in announcing it: she and Bill spoofed the Sopranos ending! To be punny, I found it hilarious. Ba dum dum. Make sure your speakers are on and check it out below:

In this day and age, isn’t it great that we are focusing on campaign songs too and not just the issues? To be honest, I’m not even sure if I mean that sarcastically or not. I mean, things are so fucked up in the world, you need to laugh once in a while and just saying “Iraq, Terrorism, Taxes, etc” gets boring after a while and you tune out. So, if having a campaign song contest is a way to get you involved again, who is to say that its so bad?