tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2008:/theblog/3 2008-09-06T00:04:41Z Movable Type 3.2 tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2008:/theblog//3.124377 2008-09-05T22:50:52Z 2008-09-06T00:04:41Z McCain told the nation that he wants to play nice now, to change the culture of Washington. He might want to run that by his running mate. <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=d0529d22ef98604e29722cce1f854b83" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=d0529d22ef98604e29722cce1f854b83" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> Mona Gable http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mona-gable/ John McCain sure looked tired during his acceptance speech last night. And I don't just mean the bags under his eyes or the lackluster delivery or how he couldn't wait to get off the stage. Cindy was beaming (an aside here: did you see how happy she was the night before holding baby Trig while mom gleefully blasted away at Obama, like he was so many caribou?) but McCain just looked sour. Talk about not enjoying the moment! He'd finally achieved his years-long quest to be the Republican nominee for president, but he was as deflated as a popped balloon. Maybe McCain should start taking cues from Eckhart Tolle instead of Karl Rove? He didn't have anything new to say, either, despite his baffling vow to end the bickering in Washington and work with those do-nothing Democrats to get things done for the American people. Like cut taxes for rich folks, make the middle-class pay for health care they can't afford now, spend billions more on defense, and drill, baby, drill! Now that's a breath of fresh Alaska air, isn't it? Did McCain forget which party's been in charge the last eight years? (News flash: it starts with an R). A time during which the economy has tanked, we got mired in an expensive needless war, oil prices have skyrocketed, unemployment has soared and millions of Americans have lost their homes to shady loans. Not to mention the untold Iraq war vets who've returned home with PTSD or brain injuries or without their legs. Where was the maverick then? Sleeping in Sedona? But that's all water under the Bridge to Nowhere, right? (Sorry, I couldn't resist.) And McCain told the nation that he wants to play nice now, to change the culture of Washington. He might want to run that by his running mate, whose take-no-prisoners approach to governing might not mesh well with that. Palin, who recently bragged to the New Yorker that she hasn't talked with the head of Alaska's Republican Party since she got elected governor, is actually proud of not getting along with other politicians! (I know I'm not supposed to mention the beauty pageant, but how did she ever win "Miss Congeniality?") They don't call her Sarah Barracuda for nothing. (Living in the lower 48 on one of those elitist coasts, I'm wondering if "Sarah The Great White" might be a better fit?) Shortly after she became mayor of Wasilla, she fired most of the department heads, including the police chief who helped get her elected, which led to a brief recall effort. Later Palin tried to fire the town librarian when she wouldn't ban certain books the mayor deemed objectionable. But she backed off when people rallied against her. She didn't even back her own mother-in-law, a Democrat, when she ran for mayor after Palin was termed out. Nice! She also parts with McCain on some pretty fundamental (fundamentalist?) issues. Like teaching creationism in the public schools, exceptions for abortion, global warming, and drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. But perhaps the most striking difference is their approach to earmarks. He hates them, she loves them. In fact, as mayor of tiny Wasilla, Palin hired a private lobbyist and sucked $27 million from taxpayers in the lower 48 for her pet projects. (She also left Wasilla $20 million in debt. But no matter. There's oil under those polar bears. And a $30 billion gas pipeline that God is very into.) Some of those very same projects, strangely, were dinged by McCain. Pretty cool for the hottest governor from the coolest state! As those buttons they were handing out at the convention trilled. Now that's not sexist, is it? I know we're not supposed to mention her qualifications, or lack thereof, to be VP. Because that would be sexist. Speaking of Palin (though I do so at apparent professional risk since she has been declared off-limits to the media, unless it involves fawning over her ability to read a teleprompter and make a Harvard Law graduate, constitutional law scholar, accomplished senator, brilliant campaigner--a politician Carolyn Kennedy has famously likened to her beloved father and who actually writes his own speeches--sound like rotten moose stew), she certainly can smile pretty while lying through her teeth. (That plane she sold on Ebay? She didn't.) Is this a skill she developed hopscotching from one of five or six colleges to the next, eventually earning a degree at the University of Idaho? Or later as governor, when she whipped the good 'ole boys in Alaskan politics? And got oil giant BP to sponsor her inaguration? "I can't wait to show Sarah Palin around Washington!" McCain gushed during one of the few lively moments of his speech. News flash: I don't think Sarah Barracuda needs a tour. But you guys should probably have a talk. <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=d0529d22ef98604e29722cce1f854b83" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=d0529d22ef98604e29722cce1f854b83" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2008:/theblog//3.124370 2008-09-05T22:16:55Z 2008-09-06T00:56:24Z What McCain's speech did not have was the substance to back up the centrist reformism he needs to try to upset Obama. <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=4b31123df182cf56798d0ee1e26766b3" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=4b31123df182cf56798d0ee1e26766b3" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> William Bradley http://www.huffingtonpost.com/william-bradley/ <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/Om2gNE48gDI&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/Om2gNE48gDI&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object> Alaska Governor and former Wasilla Mayor Sarah Palin, on the biggest night of her political career. So, after Wednesday night's spectacle of an intensively-rehearsed Sarah Palin whipping up the Republican convention crowd, what will be for her? Que sera, Sarah. <a href="http://pajamasmedia.com/billbradley/2008/09/05/quick-hits-51/">I think in the end Palin is a sideshow,</a> a base play too problematic and extreme to appeal to independents and moderates, a tyro whose politics actually undercuts the positioning John McCain needs to win the election. McCain's acceptance speech last night, heavy with elegiac tones, had none of the pop of Palin's. What it did have was depth beyond Palin's glib wisecracks, and a more centrist positioning beyond Palin's right-wing base-stoking, and McCain's own Bush-backing record of recent years. What it did not have was the substance to back up the centrist reformism McCain needs to try to upset Obama. I asked McCain's old friend Gary Hart, who was McCain's groomsman at the Vietnam War hero's wedding to Cindy, what he thought. "McCain," Hart said, noting the flat response of the convention crowd even to the watered-down centrism of last night, "is trying to return the neocon party to the traditional conservative party. He won't succeed." In any event, the Vietnam War hero, the "original maverick" as his campaign would again position him after several years of fealty to the very unpopular agenda of President Bush, paled as it were from a performance standpoint next to Palin's kinetic performance. <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/AIn_fFWPaUU&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/AIn_fFWPaUU&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object> John McCain's new ad presents Sarah Palin as "the Alaska Maverick," allegedly a fighter against Big Oil unlike Barack Obama, the candidate of "empty words." Wednesday night was the biggest night of Palin's political career. All ice cream. Palin, whose biggest office until 2007 was the mayoralty of Wasilla, Alaska -- current population 6,715, according to the City of Wasilla -- had been mostly out of sight since her debut last Friday at a Dayton, Ohio rally with John McCain. Palin was getting briefed in on national and international issues, about which she knows little. She's still not ready for interviews, so this will continue at least into next week as she will soon return to Alaska to see her son Track off to Iraq on, naturally, September 11th. This is the first time I can recall that a vice presidential nominee has done no interviews following his or her unveiling. Notice that I said "her." Palin is not the first woman vice presidential nominee. New York Congresswoman Geraldine Ferraro holds that distinction, dating back to 1984. I know this first-hand, as I cast my delegate vote at the Democratic national convention for her that year. It proved to be a mistake. While Ferraro was a credible figure, very well-versed in national and international issues, she was a token. It was stunt casting by a presidential candidate, a decades-long Washington figure, Walter Mondale, hungry to show that he, too, was a change agent. It didn't work. Back to Palin. The hard right base of the Republican Party loves her. Why would they not? She is for creationism, the religious fundamentalist notion that scientific evolution is false. <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/VS2fxwWRTuw&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/VS2fxwWRTuw&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object> A McCain campaign video entitled "Introducing Sarah Palin." She is a greenhouse effect denier. A convenient stance for someone who pushes for oil drilling everywhere. Incidentally, the Arctic ice cap is melting once again, creating the fabled "Northwest Passage" at the top of the world. Which is why Russia staked a claim to the North Pole last year, as many experts believe that 25% of the world's remaining oil and natural gas reserves are under what was once the intractable ice cap of the North Pole. She's against abortion in all circumstances, including for victims of rape and incest. She is a staunch opponent of sex education. It would be easy to make the point that her underage daughter, now pregnant out of wedlock, the father being some tuff boy teenage hockey player whose now-scrubbed MySpace page said he never wants to have kids and will kick anybody's ass, thereby making him prime dad material, is a victim of this stance. But that whole area should be left to the National Enquirer -- which is delving into the broad sweep of Palin's private life -- and the rest of the lifestyle press and the ADD media. Back to public affairs substance. Palin claims to have opposed the infamous "Bridge To Nowhere." Actually, she campaigned for it, turned against it once it had been discredited publicly, then took the money for it and applied it elsewhere. A fighter against a corrupt Alaska Republican establishment. Actually, she was co-director of U.S. Senator Ted Stevens' political committee. Stevens, a notorious pork barrel pol, is a longtime McCain bete noire, indicted on several charges of political corruption. Palin is also a big-time political consumer of congressional earmarks, long the subject of McCain anti-spending crusades. Palin, who had only met John McCain once before he picked her, seems bright and glib. I was aware that she was on a long list for the vice presidency. I thought about her, and didn't think McCain would pick her. Alaska is a state of well under 700,000 people. That is smaller than not only all 40 state senate districts in California, but all 435 congressional districts in America. Prior to 2007, Palin's claim to fame was that she had been mayor of Wasilla, Alaska. <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/william-bradley/13-reasons-why-its-ah-pal_b_122432.html">Which, as I've noted, Karl Rove erroneously stated on Fox News early last Friday morning was the second largest city in Alaska.</a> Not even close. I reported then that there were 8000 people in Wasilla. Actually, it's 6,715, according to the city itself. When Palin was elected mayor, it was under 5000. I got ahold of Palin's election records. What is interesting to know is that, when Palin was first elected mayor of Wasilla, she received 651 votes. That was a landslide election for her, with over 60% of the city vote. As I look at Palin's record, which prior to 2007 is based on her long tenure as a city council member and mayor of Wasilla, something occurred to me. I held more important local government posts than Palin. When I was in high school. And looking at Palin's record in tiny Wasilla, I accomplished more as a local government official. When I was in high school. Now, frankly, it's definitely not much, though it's had a positive effect on the lives of more people than Palin has had as a local government official. But then, I'm not disappointed by being passed over by John McCain for the vice presidency, though I've spent more time around him than Palin has. Not a high bar to cross, since she'd only met him once before he designated her as his vice president. You know, all this stuff about Palin's private life, which extends out ultimately to the public sphere with her firing of Alaska's public safety commissioner for his refusal to fire Palin's former brother-in-law. I don't care about that. Put it all off limits. McCain's pal David Letterman likens Palin and her family to Jerry Springer guests. Clearly, Letterman is an elitist. McCain, who courted celebrities and now makes fun of them, has been on Letterman more than all but a few movie stars. Since the bulk of Palin's executive experience is non-serious, here is a more serious question. How would Palin do against Vladimir Putin? It's not an idle question, as about 20% of the vice presidents have become president, and John McCain, who had several bouts of cancer, endured terrible tortures at the hands of his Communist captors and as a result is not athletic, would be the oldest person ever elected to the presidency. I haven't met Sarah Palin. I have met Vladimir Putin. A bit more of a priority. I'm not in the least surprised that this elite former KGB officer has outwitted George W. Bush and Dick Cheney. Well, you see where this is going. Speaking of Bush and Cheney, neither was present at his own party's national convention. President Bush, who briefly addressed the convention Tuesday night via satellite, out of prime time, is the first sitting president of the United States not to attend his own party convention in 40 years. Who is the last to hold this distinction? Lyndon Johnson, during the height of the Vietnam War. Vice President Cheney set off on a big foreign tour for the week of the Republican national convention. His job approval rating is unbelievably low, down in the teens. He's off to Georgia, Ukraine, and Poland. To assure them that they have America's full backing against resurgent Russia. Empty words for Georgia, whose misbegotten leader Mikheil Saakashvili so misinterpreted the support of Bush and Cheney and McCain that he launched a disastrously backfiring offensive against South Ossetia. For his troubles, he got a swiftly shattered military and Russian dominance over much of what he thought was his country. As expected, the European Union summit on the Georgian crisis resulted in nothing. A few harshly-worded press releases. Putin, naturally, could care less. He and the rest of the Kremlin crew are certainly losing no sleep about another American politician who talks tough and doesn't know what's going on. As for Sarah Palin, que sera, sera. As Doris Day sang, somewhat incongruously, in the Hitchcock thriller The Man Who Knew Too Much, whatever will be, will be. And what will be is that she is a base play, a tabloid distraction, a bright and glib politician of opportunity whose political posture will prove highly problematic. It should be no surprise that Democratic nominee Joe Biden is seen as far more qualified than Palin. Despite all the hoopla, she looks like a play for the Republican base, as I pointed out immediately after she was selected last week, as well as an attempt to shake things up with stunt casting. The <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/PollingUnit/story?id=5725793&page=1">new ABC News poll </a>shows that Joe Biden is viewed as far more qualified than Palin, and that, while likeable, Palin is not reaching across party lines or motivating independents. Incidentally, to the extent that attention is focused on Palin's private life, that's a good thing for her, because it engenders sympathy. Actually, it's a good thing up to a point. The National Enquirer is now on her case, promising to be as diligent with her as it was with John Edwards, and that's never a good sign. 66% of American voters view Biden as qualified, with only 21% saying he is unqualified. Palin is viewed as qualified by 42%, a few points above the baseline Republican vote in a national election, and unqualified by 50%. Even the effort to spin her small town mayoralty into thematic gold is highly problematic. Tiny Wasilla, nearly an hour out of Anchorage, turns out not to be the idyllic Rockwellesque small town her new conservative fans obviously love to imagine. <a href="http://www.juneauempire.com/stories/030805/sta_20050308002.shtml">Actually, Palin's home town is the methamphetamine capital of Alaska. </a> In the end, this election probably won't be about Sarah Palin at all. (If it is, it's not good news for John McCain.) The election, media hype aside, will quickly settle back into what it's been all along. A change election in a troubled country between a change agent who may be too risky and inexperienced for a plurality of voters and a change agent who may represent more of the unpopular same. And who may have just demonstrated the riskiness of his own judgment. <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=4b31123df182cf56798d0ee1e26766b3" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=4b31123df182cf56798d0ee1e26766b3" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2008:/theblog//3.124368 2008-09-05T22:06:33Z 2008-09-05T22:13:54Z If you are biracial and born in a state not connected to the lower 48, America needs darn near 2 years and 3 major speeches to "get to know you." If you're white and from a state not connected to the lower 48, America needs 36 minutes and 38 seconds worth of an acceptance speech to know you're "one of us." If you spend 18 months building a campaign around the theme of "Change," it's just "empty rhetoric." If one week before your party's national convention you suddenly make your candidacy about "Change," that's "red meat." <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=a489af2e67805647c527f537a65ef86b" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=a489af2e67805647c527f537a65ef86b" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> John Ridley http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-ridley/ This is the Vol. 2 of <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-ridley/your-pocket-guide-to-spea_b_123606.html">The Guide to the Conservative Palinguage</a>. I'm calling this one the People's Edition because you, the people, have obviously been taking AP courses in talking Conservative. I've been slammed with responses. Enough that I can promise you there will be future volumes. Along with some of mine, I've mixed in a few of yours for everybody's linguistic pleasure. Before we start, I'd like to note that I <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-ridley/your-pocket-guide-to-spea_b_123606.html">intimated in Vol. 1</a> that English is a Latin based language. Hondorf was among a few others who pointed out that English is "primarily German based, yes, but it is really a hybrid of Germanic and Romantic languages . . . by the way, I am a redneck." Clearly, none of us should judge a neck by its color. A reminder, we're collecting Palinisms here, and over at <a href="http://www.thatminoritything.com/">That Minority Thing.com</a>. If you've got 'em, send 'em. Ready? Let's begin! If you get 18 million people to vote for you in a national presidential primary, you're a "phoney." Get 100,000+ people to vote you governor of the 47th most populous state in the Union, you're "well loved." SoyAA says: If you are biracial and born in a state not connected to the lower 48, America needs darn near 2 years and 3 major speeches to "get to know you." If you're white and from a state not connected to the lower 48, America needs 36 minutes and 38 seconds worth of an acceptance speech to know you're "one of us." If you give your wife a dap on stage, it's actually a "terrorist fist jab." If your daughter licks her palm so that she can slick down your youngest child's hair on national TV it's an "adorable moment." (Seriously, forget about abstinence only, teach these folks some grooming skills). DTD SAYS: If your pastor rails against inequality in the United States of America, you're an "extremist." If your pastor welcomes a sermon by a member of Jews for Jesus who preaches that the killing of Jews by terrorists is a lesson to Jews that they must convert to Christianity, you're a "fundamentalist." If you're a black man and you use a scholarship to get into college, then work your way up to being the president of the Harvard Law Review, you're "uppity." If you're a conservative and your parents pay your way to Hawaii Pacific University . . . you only have four more schools to attend over the next five years before you somehow manage to graduate (it might be five more schools over the next five years. No one has yet verified whether or not Palin was actually ever registered at the University of Hawaii at Hilo. But, you know how shady people are who ever attended any kind of school in Hawaii). SeanOcali says: If you're 18, white, and get a 16 year old girl pregnant "life happens." If you're 18, black, and impregnate a 16 year old girl, you're a "registered sex offender." If you spend 18 months building a campaign around the theme of "Change," it's just "empty rhetoric." If one week before your party's national convention you SUDDENLY make your candidacy about "Change," that's "red meat." And your last lesson for the day: If you are a Democrat, an Independent, or even a moderate Republican, if you're female, male, white, black, Asian, Hispanic, bi-racial, multi-ethnic, or GLBT, if you're a Jew, Gentile, Muslim, agnostic or atheist -- "Yes, we can!" If you're a pitbull with lipstick from Alaska, "Yup, yup!" <a href="http://www.thatminoritything.com/">ThatMinorityThing.com</a> <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=a489af2e67805647c527f537a65ef86b" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=a489af2e67805647c527f537a65ef86b" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2008:/theblog//3.124349 2008-09-05T21:27:16Z 2008-09-05T21:27:23Z My beautiful and loving wife, despite her passion on women's issues, despite having a son and daughter who may be conscripted, may vote for the party responsible for the entire mess. <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=4e145e9c3035382f5866fced5631dbef" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=4e145e9c3035382f5866fced5631dbef" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> Richard Schiff http://www.huffingtonpost.com/richard-schiff/ I am worried. Just back from the Democratic Convention in Denver, an almost joyous event that was arguably a seminal moment of our time, I have never been this charged up, this excited, this hopeful and this concerned. Charged up that I am a part of genuine movement of people, of citizens, to positively alter the course of history. Excited that I have witnessed a unified front coming from a once fractious Democratic Party. Hopeful that the course of events culminating in the great Obama speech has swayed the fence-sitters to jump off and join in. But concerned that the politics of propaganda and panic will induce the middle of the voting pack to fall back on old rhetoric and Cold War paranoia. I was oh-so anxious to return home and discuss the week's events with my wife. My wife, Sheila of the Hillary camp, of the middle-American, working-class, Catholic, voting block, of a father who landed on Omaha Beach in June of '44 and who wouldn't vote for John Kerry four years ago because the young Kerry had returned from Viet Nam and while still a soldier voiced opposition to the war; Sheila of an extended clan of old coal miners and blue-collar patriots who believe in family values and God and winning with honor. We had fought like pack dogs throughout the primary season; myself for Joe Biden early on and then for the ultimate nominee, Barack Obama, and Sheila for Hillary Clinton, a woman she grew to admire and idolize. And throughout the primary season, she persisted in warning me that she, along with an army of Hillary-ites, infuriated by real and perceived misogyny and mistreatment by the press, will abandon the Democrats and vote for Republican John McCain. Then, as it became clear that the inevitable winner would be Obama, Sheila warned that she would bale again if Hillary wasn't the Vice-Presidential nominee. One day before the convention, Joe Biden, my guy, was chosen. She showed me the emails that spread rumor of dissent, of protest plans and walk-outs. None of it happened. Hillary and Bill were magnanimous and magnificent in their mutual calls for unity and their unqualified support for Obama. And conventioneers rejoiced with a singular voice. I imagined Sheila moved to tears as she watched from home. I thought: done deal! Let's move on and take the whole shebang. I came home exhilarated, kissed my kids, kissed my wife and with eyes wide open asked: "Well?" She was: "impressed but not convinced"; "moved but not moving"; and, unbelievable to my ears, "still considering McCain". I love my wife... but sometimes not so much. Frustration and fights can muck up a good thing. And just when a thing can move past differences and into the realm of peace and prosperity, another thing - an old idea or new interpretation or any spark that relights the paradigms that comfort us - will keep us where we are, where it is safe. Therein lies the challenge: this promise of change is a scary proposition. It seems not to matter that we are at the brink of a war that may spread beyond Afghanistan and Iraq to Iran and Georgia and then where? To Syria? To North Korea? To China? That we in America are in economic doldrums and are seeing small businesses fold and houses reclaimed by banks and a smouldering panic that is palpable everywhere. My beautiful and loving wife, despite seeing her own small business begin to show troubling signs of downturn after years of worry-free success, despite her passion on women's issues, despite having a son and daughter who may be conscripted, may vote for the party responsible for the entire mess. I will sneak out early on election day, vote, get a tub of roses and a vat of champagne and hold my wife hostage in love and seduction until she realizes that the booths have closed and her voting rights expired. Perhaps we can do the same in western Pennsylvania and Ohio and Indiana - we'll have hoedowns and square-dances and prayer meetings and whiskey and make the whole lot of them happily drunk and content enough for inaction. But the bottom line is that this is where we are: a still fractious and divided nation, split right down the middle, as represented by my very own household. I am moved to think that we, along with the Obama/Biden team, will begin to change the very culture of the way we do business with each other and the world at large. That we should use "Example as power rather than power as example"; that "America's promise [is] of a democracy where we can find the strength and grace to bridge divides and unite in common effort." I ask myself why these tenets are so rejected by the opposition, by my wife. Is it racism? Is it the propaganda of family values and God and the manifest destiny of American domination of the world as a righteous cause? Is it that John McCain is still perceived as a maverick and revered for his heroic war service? Is it the singular issue for some women that Hillary Clinton was castigated in certain media and an object of old-school misogyny that is unacceptable and cause enough to abandon the very politics that she supports? I can't answer these questions, as I don't understand the thinking and emotional investment that defends them. My opinion of John McCain is different. Here is a man who had his moment in history already pass him by. After being eviscerated and politically castrated in the 2000 Republican primaries by the Bush PR machine; accused falsely of fathering an illegitimate and racially mixed child, he was given a chance at redemption and a chance to save the world from a man he considered at the time to be dangerous and untrustworthy. He could have run as a third party candidate and taken enough votes away from George W. to seal the election for Al Gore. He passed. Four years later, John Kerry had talks with McCain about running as his Vice-President; a dream ticket that would surely bring down the Bush regime. Again he passed. When I ask Washington insiders why, they can only conclude that the reason was simple, unadulterated ambition to be President. But what a price to pay. This is a man who could have saved the world from the last eight years of disaster and instead is content to inherit the aftermath. But the other half of the divide chooses to imagine the younger McCain, the independent, free thinking, iconoclast he may very well have been once, long ago. And now McCain has picked Sarah Palin of Alaska for the office of Vice-President. I'm sure she is capable of governing the frozen tundra of her state (couldn't help myself) and is surely a force to be reckoned with on some level. But no one can convince me thatMcCain has chosen a running mate who is capable of stepping into the Oval Office in the event of the death of the President. And let's face it, that scenario isn't beyond the realm of possibility. And even with this, I hear in real and electronic voices "we like her," "she's warm and personable," she's a soccer mom who has become accomplished and powerful." What? And so we stay divided: My country, my wife and I. I am stumped. But I am stubborn in my hope that Americans across the great divide, including one who sleeps in my bed, will wake up to more lofty dreams. I imagine an America that can actually change. That we become a nation that prospers again but without pillaging the resources of nations that make their people hate us. That we become a nation that, as the constitution says in its preamble, its very first paragraph, "promotes the general welfare" of its people. When new ideas and belief-altering evidence confronts us, many of us still shout that the world is flat, or global climate change is cyclical, or women belong in the home. I can only remember when great agents of change come to us, it seems as many reject their presence as rejoice in it. Kennedy won office by the slimmest margin in our history to that point. Martin Luther King made as many or more enemies than there were marchers by his side. Many of us Americans are still inert, isolated and content to stay on our couches and watch on television and iPods as the world goes by. This idea of change means, at least, getting up, going out into the real world and opening our eyes. It seems too much of an effort for many of us. Much to my utter shock, after eight years of what most Americans consider a disaster in the Oval Office, we again face an election that may come down to the wire, neck and neck. I can only hope that the roses and champagne do their magic and maybe this change I hope for will win by just that one vote. It may be that close. Originally published in the London <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/">Independent</a> <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=4e145e9c3035382f5866fced5631dbef" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=4e145e9c3035382f5866fced5631dbef" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2008:/theblog//3.124329 2008-09-05T20:37:03Z 2008-09-05T23:52:33Z A couple of very prominent Senators currently running for president might want to consider something when they arrive in Oxford, Mississippi in three weeks for their first debate. <a href="http://www.pheedo.com/click.phdo?s=2280bb72d3cdc32f4249a4e48dc619ff"><img alt="" style="border: 0;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?s=2280bb72d3cdc32f4249a4e48dc619ff"/></a> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=2280bb72d3cdc32f4249a4e48dc619ff" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> Harry Shearer http://www.huffingtonpost.com/harry-shearer/ Gustav, as far as New Orleans was concerned, was not "the mother of all storms," in the latest immortal words of Mayor Ray Nagin, and as my friends and neighbors (the ones who didn't stay) make their way back into town, they're greeted today by another shoe dropping: <a href="http://www.nola.com/printer/printer.ssf?/base/news-2/122059205598330.xml&coll=1">the Times Picayune reports</a> that the American Society of Civil Engineers has finally gotten around to critiquing the Army Corps' massive mea kinda culpa regarding the Katrina flooding. I say "finally" because the Army Corps' report, still incomplete, was first released in June 2006. But, hey, what's the big urgency? Well, according to the ASCE response, plenty. <blockquote>For instance, the civil engineers said the corps did not go far enough in addressing the inadequate design of floodwalls along the 17th Street and London Avenue canals. The corps had blamed the failure of those floodwalls partly on the "complex and challenging" geological conditions in which they were built. "While a massive hurricane does create a 'complex and challenging environment,' engineers routinely are expected to design for such conditions," they said, and such an environment "in no way mitigates the inadequacy of the design." The engineers also criticized the report for soft-pedaling the role of surge overtopping and the use of erosion-prone fill from nearby swamps in the failure of earthen levees. And while the report concludes the levees did not perform as a system, "it does not speak to the fact that it was never designed or managed as a system."</blockquote> But wait, there's more... <blockquote>"Protecting hundreds of thousands of people living in urban areas that are at or below sea level such as New Orleans" should be given more emphasis than protecting smaller towns or open farmland, they wrote. The engineers also were disappointed the report did not mention "the role and importance of external peer review in future projects." The report's risk analysis results "provide a sobering reminder of the potential impacts of an enormous hurricane on the New Orleans area, and of the hazards posed to residents," the engineers said. But the risks outlined for people and property behind levees in New Orleans should be placed in a larger context, such as existing international standards for dams, which are much more stringent.</blockquote> Dams normally protect open land, often sparsely settled. Levees protect major population centers. Who decides that, in this country, the safety factor for the former (following international standards) is "much more stringent" than for the latter? A couple of very prominent Senators currently running for president might want to consider these matters when they arrive in Oxford, Mississippi in three weeks for their first debate.... <a href="http://www.pheedo.com/click.phdo?s=2280bb72d3cdc32f4249a4e48dc619ff"><img alt="" style="border: 0;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?s=2280bb72d3cdc32f4249a4e48dc619ff"/></a> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=2280bb72d3cdc32f4249a4e48dc619ff" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2008:/theblog//3.124315 2008-09-05T19:53:52Z 2008-09-05T20:44:53Z The Right's non-party machinery now suddenly has a laser-like focus on creating a "surge" of voters for McCain-Palin. This machinery is vast, strategically targeted, exceptionally well-financed, and ready to rumble. <a href="http://www.pheedo.com/click.phdo?s=e829f9726ca496201a84ce7764c3645d"><img alt="" style="border: 0;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?s=e829f9726ca496201a84ce7764c3645d"/></a> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=e829f9726ca496201a84ce7764c3645d" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> Rob Stein http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rob-stein/ Warning to Democrats: do not underestimate the political significance of John McCain's choice of Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate. Whatever Governor Palins' strengths and weaknesses as a candidate may prove to be, one set of attributes is undeniable and highly relevant politically - she uniquely and personally embodies every essential component of the Republican electoral calculus. Consider the facts. In 2004, 62 million people voted for President Bush, of whom 54 million (87%) were white men and women. Fewer than 38 million whites voted for John Kerry (64% of his 59 million votes). Thus, sixteen million more whites voted for Bush than for Kerry. Bush voters generally were significantly more married (12 million more); protestant evangelicals (16 million more); people with annual income exceeding $50,000 (9 million more); and living in households owning guns (15 million more) than Kerry voters. (These numbers are derived from exit polls conducted by the broadcast networks and are the only, albeit imperfect, source of information on the demographics of voting) These specific demographic groups - white, married, avid gun owning, devoutly and politically religious, with incomes over $50,000 - were the bedrock of the Republican Presidential electoral majority in 2004. Governor Palin personally fits all of these demographic categories, and therefore, naturally excites and energizes each and every one of them. This has profound political significance. When passionately energized, the Right-wing has formidable human and financial assets to mobilize tens of millions of voters, particularly in what are perceived to be close elections. As recently as several months ago, James Dobson, head of the largest alliance of politicized evangelical churches, Focus on the Family, was negative about supporting John McCain. Then, as if lightening had struck, on August 29th after Governor Palin selection was announced, Dobson issued a press release praising her as an "outstanding choice" that "should be extremely reassuring to the conservative (Republican) base..." The Right's non-party machinery now suddenly has a laser-like focus on creating a "surge" of voters for McCain-Palin. This machinery is vast, strategically targeted, exceptionally well-financed, and ready to rumble. For example, in 2004, the National Rifle Association and its thousands of affiliated gun clubs throughout the country, helped to mobilize over 30 million votes for President Bush from people who own guns. John Kerry received the vote of roughly 17 million gun owners. The core audience for several hundred hours per week of right-wing talk radio is heavily white male. These programs' bombastic hosts (e.g., Limbaugh, Hannity, Praeger, Malkin, etc.) blanket the radio airwaves daily with diatribes against anything center-left and bestow effusive praise for everything conservative-right. This politically relevant drumbeat helped to produce 27 million white male voters for Bush, compared to just 16 million for Kerry. The religious-right has built a potent complex of activist non-profit organizations and media outlets that maintain a political conversation with their constituencies on a daily basis. This includes Focus on the Family (Dobson's network of tens of thousands local churches), Christian Broadcast Network (the media empire built by Pat Robertson), Salem Communications (the largest for-profit conglomerate of politically active Christian radio stations, publications and internet sites) and many others. This politically oriented religious machinery helped to produce 22 million protestant evangelical votes for President Bush in 2004, compared to about 6 million for Senator Kerry. These, and others groups - such as the National Federation of Independent Business Owners (targeting voters who operate their own businesses, many of whom have incomes in excess of $50,000 annually), and veteran's organizations (predominantly older white men) - will mobilize voters this fall through an army of impassioned volunteers in thousands of communities in every "solid" and "likely" Republican state and in every "swing" state. Collectively, these right-wing, movement groups will provide hundreds of millions of dollars worth of canvassing, registering, phoning, and leafleting to get tens of millions of voters to the polls for Republicans in dozens of states in November. None of this guarantees a McCain victory. Indeed, given Obama's competitive advantages, McCain's weaknesses, and the grave damage that the Bush Administration has caused the country, Obama-Biden should hold virtually all of Kerry's 59 million votes, skim some votes that Bush received in 2004, receive millions more votes from first time voters, and therefore, emerge victorious in November with 63-65 million votes, or more. Nevertheless, the addition of Governor Palin to the Republican ticket does more to excite each of the right's demographically targeted machines than anything that has happened in this election cycle thus far. That is a sobering threat that the Obama campaign, and all Democrats, would ignore at their peril. <a href="http://www.pheedo.com/click.phdo?s=e829f9726ca496201a84ce7764c3645d"><img alt="" style="border: 0;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?s=e829f9726ca496201a84ce7764c3645d"/></a> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=e829f9726ca496201a84ce7764c3645d" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2008:/theblog//3.124294 2008-09-05T19:05:11Z 2008-09-05T19:38:11Z How can any candidate or party that hopes to lead America take such joy in putting down American institutions -- like grassroots democracy and its hard-working stewards? <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=5fa2ca5eb5ecc54accdf255e05782280" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=5fa2ca5eb5ecc54accdf255e05782280" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> Van Jones http://www.huffingtonpost.com/van-jones/ Sarah Palin and the GOP had great fun this week belittling Barack Obama's background as a community organizer. But in doing so, they were not just putting down one person. They were attacking the (small "d") democratic traditions of the United States, itself. Let us not forget: the first of America's freedoms is the freedom to speak out for change. That is the rock upon which all of our other freedoms are built. And across the country, in roles paid and unpaid, America's community organizers are the people who help us exercise that freedom every day. They are the invisible champions of America's grassroots democracy. For little or no pay, they work with neighbors -- or with people in need -- to address tough problems. They are often people who could make a great deal of money in other professions. But many have chosen to dedicate themselves to causes greater than themselves -- and to communities poorer than their own. Their work epitomizes what it means to put community -- and, yes, country -- first. Their dedication and sacrifice is nothing new; the idea of bottom-up, democratic action is as old as the republic itself. In fact, constant engagement and debate at the neighborhood, community and grassroots level is what keeps the nation's democracy vital and alive. My question is this: how can any candidate or party that hopes to lead America take such joy in putting down American institutions -- like grassroots democracy and its hard-working stewards? Rosa Parks was a community organizer. The PTA moms (with whom Sarah Palin loves to associate herself) are community organizers. Today, organizers are powering our democracy -- registering millions of young people, disadvantaged people and senior citizens to vote for the first time. They do the invaluable and thankless labor of making democracy work. When factories are shut down and families find they have nowhere else to turn, community organizers step in and step up. They help frightened and frustrated people find shared solutions to wrenching problems. They help our national leaders correct major policy mistakes. Not only were community organizers the first people in this country to stand up against the war in Iraq. They were also the first to talk about how U.S. soldiers in harm's way were not given enough protective gear. They come from red states and blue states. Community organizers, including groups led by evangelical Rick Warren, helped to lead the rebuilding of New Orleans following Katrina. Many of those religiously motivated organizers have stayed there after the media, the government big shots and practically everyone else has left. But apparently, it is not enough that they work under incredibly difficult circumstances for little pay and no recognition. Now they have to listen to broadcast put-down's from the party of Bush, McCain and Palin. That's a shame -- and a disgrace. Those who make democracy work every day should be respected, along with America's other homeland heroes. Anyone who aspires to lead this country should be saluting them -- not sneering at them. <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=5fa2ca5eb5ecc54accdf255e05782280" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=5fa2ca5eb5ecc54accdf255e05782280" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2008:/theblog//3.124272 2008-09-05T18:17:11Z 2008-09-05T18:18:15Z How dare the Republicans look down their noses at Obama and thousands of other organizers who put community, and yes, country first by trying to make life a little bit better for other people. <a href="http://www.pheedo.com/click.phdo?s=ab2b29266bd60ae975bf53c26ff4e29a"><img alt="" style="border: 0;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?s=ab2b29266bd60ae975bf53c26ff4e29a"/></a> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=ab2b29266bd60ae975bf53c26ff4e29a" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> Rob McKay http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rob-mckay/ While there was much to react to last night in Minnesota, I have to comment on a particular line of attack employed by Rudy Giuliani and Sarah Palin. The utter contempt and disdain they showed for Senator Obama's history as a community organizer is something that we all must stand up against. I'm particularly angered by the lies and distortions because my foundation has proudly financed millions of dollars of incredible work by community organizers over the past fifteen years. I was also reminded that the ghosts of Willie Horton and Jesse Helms were on display in the Twin Cities. Make no mistake: inside that convention hall "community organizer" was shorthand for radical, black activist. It's certainly not all community organizers they trivialize and dismiss. What else is the pro-life, creationist, anti-tax, pro-gun movements but the work of Right-wing community organizers? Clearly, Palin is specifically condemning those organizers who work to improve the lives of poor and marginalized Americans. In belittling community organizing work, the Republicans made the case for what they really stand for. Just to review the record, community organizers work in houses of worship, neighborhood centers, union halls and schools. They have taken the lead in fighting for living wage laws in cities across this country, defended tenants against illegal evictions and foreclosures, led the rebuilding of Los Angeles in the aftermath of the Rodney King verdict and the rebuilding of New Orleans following Katrina. They have registered millions of young people, African Americans, Latinos and senior citizens to vote for the first time. It is they, not people like Rudy and Sarah, who respond when factories are shutdown and families find they have nowhere else to turn. Community organizers were the first people in this country to stand up against the war in Iraq. Their organizations are also the first to provide basic services such as health care and education in the wake of a generation of mean-spirited and hateful conservative policies. Community organizations, and their talented organizers, arethe social safety net for many in this country. If America had any doubt that the McCain/Palin/Rove playbook is down to one option -- divide this country by class and race -- all that is put to rest now. How dare they look down their noses at Senator Obama and thousands of other great Americans who put community, and yes, country first by trying to make life a little bit better for other people. The community organizers that I know could have made their way in the fields of finance, medicine or, yes, politics. All of these choices would have been more lucrative and easier for many of them. Apparently, it's not enough that they work under incredibly difficult circumstances for little pay and no recognition. Now the party of Bush and Cheney wants to belittle their contributions to American families. We cannot, and will not, let this attack go unchallenged. <a href="http://www.pheedo.com/click.phdo?s=ab2b29266bd60ae975bf53c26ff4e29a"><img alt="" style="border: 0;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?s=ab2b29266bd60ae975bf53c26ff4e29a"/></a> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=ab2b29266bd60ae975bf53c26ff4e29a" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2008:/theblog//3.124259 2008-09-05T17:43:59Z 2008-09-05T17:41:11Z The Republicans have gone beyond lying. Bush and Cheney have been great liars, really, the best. Rove has made a career, and even a philosophy of lying about everything. But there is a special cold villainy to the way they have taken it to the next level now. <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=4f8b2e9cd2a3b4048c16c6d9a6d0ab63" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=4f8b2e9cd2a3b4048c16c6d9a6d0ab63" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> Jane Smiley http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jane-smiley/ Remember the old Charles Boyer-Ingrid Bergman movie Gaslight? In it, a famous opera singer is murdered. Her niece is then seduced by the murderer, who constantly tricks her and lies to her in order to prove to her that she is crazy, so that he can institutionalize her and get the jewels he missed the first time. Gosh, what does this remind me of -- oh, yeah! John McCain, Bill O'Reilly, and the Republicans! Same motive--grand theft, same strategy--asserting with a straight face that what we all know to be true is complete wrong -- we must be crazy to think that! When O'Reilly was challenged on calling the Spears parents "pinheads", but not the Palin parents, those gaslights kept flickering, but he denied saying it, even though it's on tape! Then there's McCain. Don't we know he's been in Washington for a generation? Don't we know he's voted with Bush 90 percent of the time? It's all on tape! Its fully attested and in the public record. But don't look at the flickering gaslights, dear. And that brooch in your purse? Don't you realize you put it there? Darling, you must be crazy! So, the Republicans have gone beyond lying. Bush and Cheney have been great liars, really, the best. Rove has made a career, and even a philosophy of lying about everything. But there is a special cold villainy to the way they have taken it to the next level now. "Neither repented they of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts." Rather than repent, they plan ever more of the same. Knowing that we know what they know, they now tell us we're crazy, that black is white and cats are dogs and John McCain is a maverick and Sarah Palin is a tax cutter (hear the one about Sarah P. leaving the town of Wasilla with 19 million dollars in long term debt? You did? No, you didn't, darling. You must be imagining things) Well, we are crazy if we let them get away with it. The whole world thinks so. <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=4f8b2e9cd2a3b4048c16c6d9a6d0ab63" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=4f8b2e9cd2a3b4048c16c6d9a6d0ab63" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2008:/theblog//3.124249 2008-09-05T17:11:10Z 2008-09-05T17:12:25Z If you give the attractive young news anchor on your hometown station a world-class speechwriter and a team of handlers, my bet is that she could have pulled off Sarah Palin's speech too. <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=605ab8c0c5cd0a47edc03d4f7d292cf6" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=605ab8c0c5cd0a47edc03d4f7d292cf6" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> Peggy Drexler http://www.huffingtonpost.com/peggy-drexler/ As they sweep up the confetti and stack the chairs in St. Paul, all the Republican players can depart having done did their jobs; professionally, if not memorably. Except for Gov. Sarah Palin, who rocked their house and won their hearts. Like the third cup of coffee after a hangover, however, things are beginning to come into focus. The best I can tell: a man named Matthew Scully wrote an excellent speech. And an attractive woman we (and Scully) barely knew did a very good job of reading it. As a side note, unless the Obamas have the most loyal and self-effacing speechwriters in the history of the craft, their words were their own. Palin did what the McCain camp hired her to do. Nobody can fault that. But if you give the attractive young news anchor on your hometown station a world-class speechwriter and a team of handlers, my bet is that she could have pulled it off, too. Also: the Republicans rope-a-doped the Democrats into driving down expectations so far that an adequate performance would look strong -- and a strong performance would shake the balloons loose from the rafters. Now comes the hard part. Critical questions about this unknown quantity are being beaten back for now with counter charges of sexism, ruralism, familyism and anything else the McCain camp can throw into the blame-the-media strategy. But that act is already wearing thin. Unlike, the Clintons' remonstrations of sexism, the media is skipping the obligatory self-examination. The attitude this time: if you can skin a caribou, you can deal with us. As she strides on to the national stage as the Republicans' first female vice presidential nominee, there is some toilet paper on her pumps. Her positions will hardly rally the hordes of Hillary-istas who put those 18 million cracks in the glass ceiling: pro gun; anti abortion (even in incest and rape), pro teaching of intelligent design -- creationism we used to call it -- in schools; pro ban on gay marriage; pro death penalty. These aren't Hillary's people; they're Pat Robertson's people. She also brings with her a documented history of firing people she doesn't like. And coming off its told-you-so moment with John Edwards, the National Enquirer has a team (pit bull: meet the dobermans) scouring the North County for dirt. Now comes the sharp elbows of the actual campaign, including debating geopolitical strategy with bad Joe Biden, a man who does foreign policy for a living. She should be justly pleased with her opening night reviews. She earned them. But now we find out if this show has legs. <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=605ab8c0c5cd0a47edc03d4f7d292cf6" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=605ab8c0c5cd0a47edc03d4f7d292cf6" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2008:/theblog//3.124236 2008-09-05T16:39:27Z 2008-09-05T17:21:56Z <a href="http://www.pheedo.com/click.phdo?s=e6271fe796bbf7e86466f1c4d5ffd2b7"><img alt="" style="border: 0;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?s=e6271fe796bbf7e86466f1c4d5ffd2b7"/></a> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=e6271fe796bbf7e86466f1c4d5ffd2b7" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> Huff TV http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-tv/ Part 1: <HH--VIDEO--AD:0--1773632699--HH> Part 2: <HH--VIDEO--AD:0--1772783526--HH> <a href="http://www.pheedo.com/click.phdo?s=e6271fe796bbf7e86466f1c4d5ffd2b7"><img alt="" style="border: 0;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?s=e6271fe796bbf7e86466f1c4d5ffd2b7"/></a> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=e6271fe796bbf7e86466f1c4d5ffd2b7" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2008:/theblog//3.124220 2008-09-05T15:57:20Z 2008-09-05T20:15:38Z John McCain was John McCain last night -- a pedestrian speaker with a twitchy and often weird smile who delivered his bromides as if he were one of the nation's great orators. <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=2fd9ef98eb99d4c95718393c8df3641c" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=2fd9ef98eb99d4c95718393c8df3641c" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> Stephen Schlesinger http://www.huffingtonpost.com/stephen-schlesinger/ John McCain was John McCain last night -- which is to say that he is, as always, a pedestrian speaker with a twitchy and often weird smile who delivered his bromides as if he were one of the nation's great orators. What was most peculiar was his shtick of criticizing Washington as if the Democrats had controlled it for the last eight years. But his impersonal, accountant-like tone was especially strange -- given that this was presumably the most important speech of his campaign. Maybe he just wanted to get through with the thing at age 72 without showing geriatric exhaustion. He lamely latched onto the "change is coming" mantra while tossing a few weak bleats at Obama. He never proferred a vision or a domestic agenda. He gave no sense of what his leadership was about except to suggest the 9/11 theme. At the very end, he went on a strange rant, almost shouting to the audience,something akin, in his mind, to General Patton rousing the troops. If this can be the best he can muster, he risks a downhill slide for the next 90 or so days. <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=2fd9ef98eb99d4c95718393c8df3641c" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=2fd9ef98eb99d4c95718393c8df3641c" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2008:/theblog//3.124198 2008-09-05T15:01:14Z 2008-09-05T15:21:29Z When you put the accomplishments of politicians alongside those of community organizers for poor families it isn't even close. <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=8bccc0988a319673f8838025a8a82591" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=8bccc0988a319673f8838025a8a82591" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> Jim Wallis http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jim-wallis/ Wednesday morning, I got an e-mail from a former member of our Sojourners Community. His name is Perry Perkins and he is now a community organizer in Louisiana with affiliates of the Industrial Areas Foundation (IAF). “Perk,” as we used to call him, reported on the enormous consequences of 2 million people being evacuated because of Hurricane Gustav, much of the state now being without power, how hard cities like Baton Rouge were hit, the tens of thousands of people in shelters and churches, and the continuing problems caused by heavy rains and flooding. Then he talked about how their community organizers were responding to it all of this; responding to hundreds of service calls, assisting local officials in evacuation plans, aiding evacuees without transportation, coordinating shelters and opening new ones, providing food, essential services, and financial aid to those in most need. Since Katrina, Perry’s Louisiana Interfaith organizations have played a lead role in securing millions of dollars to help thousands of families return to New Orleans and rebuild their homes and their lives. Then Wednesday night, I heard <a href="http://blog.beliefnet.com/godspolitics/2008/09/beyond-palins-personality-by-j.html">Republican Vice-Presidential nominee, Sarah Palin</a>, say that her experience as “a small town mayor is sort of like a community organizer, except that you have actual responsibilities.” The convention crowd in St. Paul thought that was very funny. But it wasn’t. It was actually quite insulting to the army of community organizers who work in the most challenging places across the country and have such a tremendous impact on the every day lives of millions of people. I guess Sarah Palin and her fellow Republican delegates don’t know much about that. The “actual responsibilities” of community organizers literally provide the practical support, collective strength, and hope for a better future that low-income families need to survive, Community organizers are now most focused in the faith community, working with tens of thousands of pastors and laypeople in thousands of congregations around the country. Faith-based organizing is the critical factor in many low-income communities in the country’s poorest urban and rural areas, and church leaders are often the biggest supporters of community organizers. And many of them felt deeply offended by Sarah Palin. <a href="http://blog.faithinpubliclife.org/2008/09/post_38.html">Here are a few of their responses:</a> <blockquote dir="ltr" style="margin-right: 0px"> “As a life-long Republican, the comments I heard last night about community organizing crossed the line.  It is one thing to question someone’s experience, another to demean the work of millions of hard working Americans who take time to get involved in their communities.  When people come together in my church hall to improve our community, they’re building the Kingdom of God in San Diego.   We see the fruits of community organizing in safer streets, new parks, and new affordable housing.  It’s the spirit of democracy for people to have a say and we need more of it,” said Bishop Roy Dixon, prelate of the Southern California 4th ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the Church of God in Christ, member of the San Diego Organizing Project and former board chair of PICO National Network.   </blockquote> They have also pointed out how the most important victories for social justice have come more from community organizers than elected officials. <blockquote dir="ltr" style="margin-right: 0px"> "We can thank community organizing for the weekend, the 8 hour day, integrated swimming pools, public transportation, health care for children and safe neighborhoods.  Community organizing is behind most of the family-oriented initiatives we benefit from every day.  I am proud to work for change in my country, my state, and my city as a community organizer, following the great traditions of Dr. Martin Luther King," said Laura Barrett, National Policy Director of Gamaliel/Transportation Equity Network (TEN). </blockquote> And when you put the accomplishments of politicians alongside those of community organizers for poor families it isn’t even close. And without the pressure from community organizers and the movements they lead, there would often be nobody to hold politicians accountable. <blockquote dir="ltr" style="margin-right: 0px">  “Politicians should thank community organizers, not insult them. As a longtime organizer, I’ve seen time and time again that we are the ones who make government work for the poor, the powerless and the marginalized.  Politicians’ policies and promises would amount to nothing without grassroots activists to hold them accountable. We are leaders of faith and stewards of democracy. In a time when the face of faith in politics is often ugly, community organizing is a valuable example faith’s positive role in public life,” said Pastor Mark Diemer, senior pastor of Grace of God Lutheran Church in Columbus, Ohio and a DART community organizer. </blockquote> Palin’s effort to attack the experience of Barack Obama, a former community organizer in Chicago, turned into a bad joke and an insult. Sarah Palin owes a lot of good people an apology. Jim Wallis is the author of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/redirect.html?ie=UTF8&location=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.amazon.com%2FGreat-Awakening-Reviving-Politics-Post-Religious%2Fdp%2F0060558296%3Fie%3DUTF8%26s%3Dbooks%26qid%3D1201532439%26sr%3D8-1&tag=sojo%5Ftga%5Fhuffpo-20&linkCode=ur2&camp=1789&creative=9325">The Great Awakening</a><img src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=sojo_tga_huffpo-20&l=ur2&o=1" width="1" height="1" border="0" alt="" style="border:none !important; margin:0px !important;" />, Editor-in-Chief of <a href="http://www.sojo.net">Sojourners</a> and blogs at <a href="http://www.godspolitics.com">www.godspolitics.com</a>. <a href="http://www.sojo.net/index.cfm?action=sojomail.subscribe&source=web_huffpo_blog">Click here to get e-mail updates from Jim Wallis</a> <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=8bccc0988a319673f8838025a8a82591" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=8bccc0988a319673f8838025a8a82591" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2008:/theblog//3.124182 2008-09-05T14:39:43Z 2008-09-05T15:45:26Z No doubt, showing a 9/11 video at a political convention was emotional exploitation. But it was also something much worse: it was blatant historical revisionism. <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=816e4fd1171a50ff3c989aa0cb946c7e" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=816e4fd1171a50ff3c989aa0cb946c7e" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> Jeffrey Feldman http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeffrey-feldman/ <div style="border: 1px solid gray; margin: 5px; padding: 5px; float: right;"><img width="250" src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3247/2829789437_a482944024.jpg?v=0" alt="tribute" title="McCain's 9/11 tribute claims link between Al Qaeda and Iran" /></div> Last night, while Americans sat quietly expecting to watch a video 'tribute' to victims of the terrorist attacks  on September 11, 2001--John McCain took advantage of America's good will to showed a video falsely linking Iran to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. At 9:11pm (CST), the MSNBC coverage cut to a video being projected onto the main screen at the RNC.   At that point, Tom Brokaw introduced the video as follows:<blockquote>Tom Brokaw: OK, let's go now, Keith, if we can, down to the floor.  We want to share with our viewers the 'Tribute To The Victims of 9/11.'</blockquote>So, that was the introduction the networks gave to the video--no doubt lifted from a press release given to them by the RNC.  Normal practice, I suppose.  But here is the astoundingly immoral thing that happened next, rather than show a video 'tribute' to the victims of 9/11, the McCain team showed a video 'history' of 9/11 that began like this: <blockquote> (Fade to black as ominous slow piano music plays) (Fade in:  iconic image of Iranian revolutionaries from the late 1970s holding American hostages) Narrator:  The first attack occured in Iran.  (MSNBC feed now shows picture of Iranian hostage crisis with title '9/11 Video  Tribute') Narrator: 444 days--America held hostage. (Cut to: image of 1998 Al Qaeda bombings of Kenya and Somalia) Narrator: Then again. (Cut to: second image of 1998 Al Qaeda bombing of  Kenya and  Somalia) Narrator: And again. (Cut to: image of 2000 Al Qaeda bombing of USS Cole) Narrator:  At our embassies. (Cut to: close up image of 2000 Al Qaeda bombing of USS Cole) Narrator: Our navy. (Cut to: image of generic crowd of Middle Eastern men waving machine guns) Narrator: They grew ever more bold.  Their call was, 'On those who believe in God, and hopes for reward--' (Cut to: image of Osama Bin Laden firing automatic rifle) Narrator: 'To obey God's command to kill Americans.' (Fade to black) (Fade in:slow motion video of smoke rising from top of WTC.) Narrator: And kill us they did.  This time on American soil. The date was September 11th--9/11. (Violent burst of flames slashes through Tower 2--the second plane. Crash is punctuated by high-pitched flourish of music followed by slow rising fireball) (Cut to: video images of towers burning) Narrator:  This enemy sword to our destruction has been at war with us for decades. This we now know. (Cut to: video of Tower 1 collapsing)</blockquote>The 'tribute' continued for several more minutes, showing video of firefighters and rescue workers, other scenes of destruction. Everyone in the United States has inevitably seen dozens of actual tribute videos to those who lost their lives on September 11, 2001.  In most cases, these videos overlay photographs of those individuals who died with the video of the burning towers.  There is, one could argue, a familiar vocabulary for tributes to the victims of 9/11. Rather than follow that standard and recognizable tribute format, however, McCain's video presented a political argument about Iran's links to 9/11.  Never before had a major broadcast video so blatantly attempted to connect the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_hostage_crisis">Iranian hostage crisis</a> of 1979 to the Al Qaeda terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Never before John McCain's night at the Republican National Convention. Interestingly, Keith Olbermann responded to the imagery in the McCain video immediately after it was shown by apologizing to MSNBC viewers for imagery that could be construed as a political exploitation of the emotions of 9/11. No doubt, showing a 9/11 video at a political convention was emotional exploitation.  But it was also something much worse:  it was blatant historical revisionism.  It was a cynical attempt to claim attacks on Americans--1979 and 2001--were carried out by the same 'enemy.'  What Olbermann should have apologized for was MSNBC accidental transformation of their network into a mechanism of the most cynical kind of Orwellian propaganda. John McCain did not make the link between 9/11 and Iran in his RNC speech, but we can be certain that the video 'tribute' is a sign of what is to come on the campaign trail between now and November. The media's responsibility from this point forward is clear:  either they can sit back and let McCain's historical revisionism stand or they can move quickly to debunk it. Either way, it seems apparent that major broadcast outlets need to take a more proactive role in pre-screening for blatant historical inaccuracies any video a political party plans to show during a national broadcast--or at least preparing to immediately debunk politically motivated inaccuracies. John McCain will no doubt continue to exploit the pain of 9/11 in some vain hope of political gain, and will continue to push historical revisionism about the links between Iran and 9/11.  The media,  if it does its job, can be a crucial counterweight that prevents false and militaristic propaganda from flowing freely on our public airwaves.   <div style="border: 1px solid gray;">The full video: <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/uz59R-FmQpQ&hl=en&fs=1" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="425" height="344" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/uz59R-FmQpQ&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div> <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=816e4fd1171a50ff3c989aa0cb946c7e" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=816e4fd1171a50ff3c989aa0cb946c7e" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2008:/theblog//3.124065 2008-09-05T13:48:54Z 2008-09-05T19:40:54Z Your identity can liquify with a catwalk; "I want that skirt" becomes "I want that attitude" becomes "I want that change in myself." You can't deny that's powerful. <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=b5f5cc65f2024dc990ae77b4e8ccdf00" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=b5f5cc65f2024dc990ae77b4e8ccdf00" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/> Faran Krentcil http://www.huffingtonpost.com/faran-krentcil/ This is the first thing that comes to mind when I'm asked what New York's Fashion Week, which begins today, is like: There's a hole in the world like a great black pit And the vermin of the world inhabit it And its morals aren't worth what a pig could spit... At the top of the hole sit the privileged few Making mock of the vermin in the lonely zoo Turning beauty to filth and greed... I too have sailed the world and seen its wonders. --Benjamin Barker, Sweeney Todd And the second thing: "The Quidditch World Cup is Aces, Harry! All the teams from all over the world get together and there's this massive show and witches and wizards from all over the world come together!" --Ronald Weasley, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. To those typing WTF in the comments below: hang on. There's no denying Bryant Park and its surrounding style orbits have a lot of beauty, a lot of glamour, and a lot of fun humming through them this week. But anyone who's ever watched a grown woman lie and claw her way through a publicist just to crash a fashion show, anyone who's ever fallen knees-first on Soho cobblestones because their overpriced heels couldn't hold their ambitions, and anyone who's felt - despite fighting it - like she wasn't good enough, blonde enough, or thin enough to stand beside her peers at an open champagne bar, knows that those experiences are as intrinsic to this week as Betsey Johnson's annual cartwheel down the runway. Which, by the way, is pretty awesome. And Fashion Week might shatter more than one imagines, especially now, when the industry is at a crossroads. It's a place where wealth, class, and fear crash into each other with alarming speed and harrowing subtlety. It's also a place where hundreds of versions of vision seep together in search of something deeper - a visual expression of who we, as Americans, want to be. There's some fear in that, too, but really, it's thrilling. At its core, Fashion Week is much like the opening ceremonies of the Olympics, or for the more fanciful/more juvenile/more me, the opening exhibit at the Quidditch World Cup. It's where everyone in the fashion world convenes, shares collections, opinions, and a sense that perhaps the world can shift through seams alone. Your identity can liquify with a catwalk; "I want that skirt" becomes "I want that attitude" becomes "I want that change in myself." You can't deny that's powerful. Is it also superficial? Perhaps, but then, isn't architecture? Also powerful: the underside of this garment gathering in Bryant Park, which boils down to one sour, dour truth: creative people cling to ego. Your show venue holds 500 seats, and only 75 of them are in front. Whoever muttered "power struggle" is correct. It's true people further back (disclaimer: usually me) check the front with interest, but the reverse is just as true, and a lot of the scoping and the head-checking comes from section A-1, where more powerful editors, celebrities, "celebrities," and buyers crave seeing who they've beat. Progressive types believe that the industry should ditch fashion shows altogether and broadcast their presentations live online, so everyone gets the same perfect view (and the fashion houses save the million dollar budget from a show). That's pragmatic and democratic, and it'll happen after Sarah Palin's daughter gets an abortion. In fact, fashion shows are premised on exclusion. If the brand is hard for all but a privileged few to snatch immediately, then people want it even more. If people want it even more, they try harder to get it -- by mentioning it more in their magazines, by name-dropping it more on TV, by - gasp - buying it at retail. Does fashion need to be exclusive in order to be powerful? Is aspiration just the flip side of jealousy? And wait, remind me, why does Fergie exist? These are just a few of the questions we should be asking during Fashion Week. Meanwhile, I'll leave it here: Just as Dolce can't be without Gabbana, just as Carrie Bradshaw can't exist without Pat Field, these two sides of fashion- the desperate wanting and the feeling that if your eyes are open you can own the whole world with a higher heel and a freer spirit - can't really be torn apart. But I'd argue that ambivalence - the loving it so much you worry what it does to you; the hating it so much you sign up for extra yogurt - it's worth it if you really think the industry can make a positive change on society through aesthetics. On a more personal (and, okay, less pretentious) note, it's even more worth it if a dress can shift the way you see yourself -as long as you agree it's not the only way to make that change. So I guess we've all got to choose our preferred attitude before gleefully entering the tents this week - are you a good witch, or a bad witch? Or does it depend on your daily choice of heels - like it does for me? <img alt="" style="border: 0; height:1px; width:1px;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?i=b5f5cc65f2024dc990ae77b4e8ccdf00" height="1" width="1"/> <img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=b5f5cc65f2024dc990ae77b4e8ccdf00" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/>

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