Whistling Dog Too

Barack's New Ad - Shared Responsibility

2008-09-17T08:56:00.000-07:00

Here's the script:

In the past few weeks, Wall Street's been rocked as banks closed and markets tumbled. But for many of you -- the people I've met in town halls, backyards and diners across America -- our troubled economy isn't news. 600,000 Americans have lost their jobs since January. Paychecks are flat and home values are falling. It's hard to pay for gas and groceries and if you put it on a credit card they've probably raised your rates. You're paying more than ever for health insurance that covers less and less.

This isn't just a string of bad luck. The truth is that while you've been living up to your responsibilities, Washington has not. That's why we need change. Real change. This is no ordinary time and it shouldn't be an ordinary election. But much of this campaign has been consumed by petty attacks and distractions that have nothing to do with you or how we get America back on track.

Here's what I believe we need to do.

Reform our tax system to give a $1,000 tax break to the middle class instead of showering more on oil companies and corporations that outsource our jobs.

End the "anything goes" culture on Wall Street with real regulation that protects your investments and pensions.

Fast track a plan for energy 'made-in-America' that will free us from our dependence on mid-east oil in 10 years and put millions of Americans to work.

Crack down on lobbyists - once and for all -- so their back-room deal-making no longer drowns out the voices of the middle class and undermines our common interests as Americans.

And yes, bring a responsible end to this war in Iraq so we stop spending billions each month rebuilding their country when we should be rebuilding ours.

Doing these things won't be easy. But we're Americans. We've met tough challenges before. And we can again. I'm Barack Obama. I hope you'll read my economic plan.

I approved this message because bitter, partisan fights and outworn ideas of the left and the right won't solve the problems we face today. But a new spirit of unity and shared responsibility will.

Original article and video posted on Huffington Post.

http://www.barackobama.com

Boy George - "Yes We Can!"

2008-09-15T22:53:00.000-07:00

Tina "Palin" and Amy "Clinton"

2008-09-15T13:41:00.000-07:00

Barack on Change in Concord, NH

2008-09-15T05:46:00.001-07:00

Obama's New Ad Challenging McCain's Sleaze

2008-09-15T05:31:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama: Speech in Manchester, NH

2008-09-14T12:36:00.001-07:00

Speaking of Tax Cuts - Compare the Plans

2008-09-11T06:23:00.000-07:00

I've never done this before, but one of the comments below the previous article on Reuters' blogsite was so informative, I thought it should be reprinted.

Here's the entire comment from "DS" about the two economic plans -- Obama's vs. McCain's.

September 10th, 2008
4:46 pm GMT

Today in America the wealthiest 1% owns more than everyone in the bottom 95% combined. Income inequality is at its greatest level since the 1920s - right before the great depression. Though the US has continued to make big gains in productivity over the last decade, nearly all of the benefit of those gains has gone to the wealthy, not the workers. American CEOs earned 411 times as much as average workers in 2005, up from 107 times in 1990. In the economic expansion of 2002-2006, the top 1% captured nearly three quarters of income growth.

http://elsa.berkeley.edu/~saez/saez-USto pincomes-2006prel.pdf

This condition is not an accident, but is instead the deliberate goal of Republican economic policy. The rich write the rules! McCain’s proposals will accelerate this trend further by using a tried and true method - fill the campaign dialogue with talk about social issues, personal stories, vague statements (”tax cuts”), and the trickle-down myth, and hope that middle and lower income voters do not read the details. It worked twice with Bush. While they talk about gay marriage to your face, they are literally picking your pocket from behind - systematically redistributing wealth from poor to rich. And here’s the kicker - they don’t think there is anything wrong with the situation! And if you vote for McCain, you are again telling them that you don’t think there is anything wrong with the situation either! The high unemployment level, housing crisis, credit crunch, lower value of the dollar, high gas prices, and increasing national debt are all related to these failed policies. Standards of living in the US have continued to rise only because in most families both people work, and people work longer hours and more days per year (all for lower benefits). Something has to give…

These are the proposed tax plans for the two candidates. You can see that McCain intends to further reduce the tax burden of the wealthiest Americans at the expense of the middle and lower income families. Obama’s plan increases taxes on the wealthy, especially that top 1%, to the benefit of working americans - a first step in reversing the rich-get-richer trend and toward re-building a real middle class. In fact, Obama has offered to actually raise his own taxes for the benefit of the country as a whole. Where are you in this table?

……………… MCCAIN …………. OBAMA
Income ……. Avg tax bill ……. Avg. tax bill
Over $2.9M …. -$269,364 (-4.4%)… +$701,885 (+11.5%)
$603K and up…. -$45,361 (-3.4%)… +$115,974 (+8.7%)
$227K-$603K…… -$7,871 (-3.1%)…….. +$12 (+0.0%)
$161K-$227K…… -$4,380 (-3.0%)….. -$2,789 (-1.9%)
$112K-$161K…… -$2,614 (-2.5%)….. -$2,204 (-2.1%)
$66K-$112K …… -$1,009 (-1.4%)….. -$1,290 (-1.8%)
$38K-$66K …….. -$319 (-0.7%)….. -$1,042 (-2.4%)
$19K-$38K …….. -$113 (-0.5%)……. -$892 (-3.6%)
Under $19K ……… -$19 (-0.2%)……. -$567 (-5.5%)

http://money.cnn.com/2008/06/11/news/eco nomy/candidates_taxproposals_tpc/?postve rsion=2008061113

- Posted by DS

McCain Slogging Without Palin - Reuters

2008-09-11T06:19:00.000-07:00

Tales from the Trail
Tracking the 2008 U.S. campaign
September 10th, 2008
Posted by: Jason Szep

PHILADELPHIA - Republican presidential candidate John McCain cut short his first public appearance without running-mate Sarah Palin after chanting supporters of Democratic rival Barack Obama interrupted his speech.

After lunching with a roundtable of women at Philadelphia’s Down Home Diner, McCain shook hands with supporters and strode up to a podium to deliver a statement. But as he spoke, chants of “Obama, Obama, Obama” filled the room.

Reporters craned forward trying to hear the Arizona senator. Unfortunately for McCain — and possibly overlooked by aides who planned the event — a section of the diner opened up to a market where a crowd had gathered behind a cordon.

A large contingent of Obama supporters showed up, mixed with some who had bumper stickers reading “Democrats for McCain”.

“It’s time to leave the talk behind and start shaking up Washington and fixing our economy, taking care of the problems facing our families. We’re going to give a tax cut to every family with a child,” he said.

His words were barely audible.

More to the posting here.

New Tough Obama Ad

2008-09-08T15:32:00.000-07:00

This is discussed here on Talking Points Memo today.

I'm glad to see the Obama camp slamming their hands upside McCain's head finally. Ya can't get an advantage if yer always on defense. You have to take the offense to win.

Anchorage Paper Corrects Palin Speech 'Facts'

2008-09-04T15:17:00.000-07:00

The Anchorage Daily News posted an article this morning correcting at least a couple of the fanciful 'facts' and outright lies in Sarah Palin's speech last night at the Repug's National Convention in St. Paul.

'Some of Palin's remarks stretch the truth' was the headline of the story, which calls into question two of the biggest howlers in her address, the first on the proposed gas pipeline in Alaska, which she implied was a done deal. The paper, however, notes that "...no building has begun and actual construction is years away, if it ever happens."

The Anchorage Daily also says Palin continues to lie about being a Federal earmark's opponent. Quoting from the paper, here is the real story:

"THE FACTS: As mayor of Wasilla, Palin hired a lobbyist and traveled to Washington annually to support earmarks for the town totaling $27 million.

In her two years as governor, Alaska has requested nearly $750 million in special federal spending, by far the largest per-capita request in the nation, although she has cut, by more than half, the amount the state sought from Washington this year. While Palin notes she rejected plans to build a $398 million bridge from Ketchikan to Gravina Island, that opposition came only after the plan was ridiculed nationally as a "bridge to nowhere."

Read the full story here.

The Truth Will Out

2008-09-03T20:00:00.000-07:00

Peggy Noonan, a respected Wall Street Journal columnist, and a former speech writer for Ronald Reagan, and MSNBC political commentator and Time Magazine columnist Mike Murphy, who used to advise John McCain, spoke some important words of truth today on MSNBC about McCain and his unfortunate Veep pick, Sarah Palin.

Noonan and Murphy, both of whom I've learned to respect over the years for their candor and relative lack of spin (though they are Republican operatives), were chatting with MSNBC Political Director Chuck Todd during a cutaway today outside the Repug's convention in Minnesota. Huffington Post has a wonderful rehash of their candid and obviously deeply felt disappointment in McCain's choice of Palin.

Says Noonan: "It's over." "Political bullshit."

Says Murphy: "Cynical" and "Gimmicky."

Watch and say thank you, Peggy and Mike.

Original video on HuffPost courtesy of Brightcove.

Barack Obama on Energy in Lansing, Michigan

2008-08-15T20:27:00.001-07:00

If you want to understand what the real issues are in this so-called Energy Debate, please listen to what Barack has to say in this speech. It is carefully constructed to lay all the issues out in an organized and methodical way. Everything you need to fill your quiver with arrows against the Republicans' ranting of drill drill drill is here.

David Plouffe Thanks Donors

2008-08-15T20:17:00.001-07:00

Is the Pickens Plan Not About Green?

2008-08-07T11:29:00.000-07:00

Take a look.

Watch This!

2008-08-06T23:14:00.000-07:00

Watch this video if you want to understand what the issues are in our current our so-called energy debate.

Paris Hilton Makes Her Stand

2008-08-05T18:34:00.000-07:00

Paris Hilton Responds to McCain Adfunny videosFunnyOrDie.com

See more funny videos at Funny or Die

This is Paris Hilton's response to John McCain's ad taking advantage of her celebrity (and Britney's) to take a swipe at how popular Barack Obama is. It's not bad, in fact. Actually, it's pretty clever!

This is my suggestion everyone: Let's all get video cams and put together our own messages on what we'd really like Barack Obama and the Dems to say to McCain et al, but so far they either haven't said it, or feel it's just too unseemly to say outright, and be totally honest.

Cause it's time for a change. We all know it, and we're all just a bit on edge these days. The Republicans want to demoralize everyone. We can't let them.

David Plouffe Thanks 200,000 Donors Last Week

2008-08-05T17:49:00.001-07:00

Al Gore's Challenge to Repower America

2008-07-25T14:03:00.000-07:00

WeCanSolveIt.org

Parsing The Pickens Plan

2008-07-25T13:05:00.000-07:00

photo by vergel tolentino

CNN Money has a good article today that evaluates T. Boone Pickens' plan for moving the country to windpower, solar and natural gas vehicles, and Al Gore's challenge to move to non-carbon fuels over the next 10 years.

Wind power: A Reality Check
Plans are afoot to prod the nation into using much more renewable energy. Can it be done, and what's the cost?

By Steve Hargreaves, CNNMoney.com staff writer
Last Updated: July 24, 2008: 11:04 AM EDT

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- High-profile personalities have been telling the nation to ditch that dirty fossil fuel and turn to renewable energy.

T. Boone Pickens, the billionaire oilman, has been hitting the airwaves, pitching a plan to use wind to replace all the natural gas that's used to produce electricity, then using that saved natural gas to fuel cars.

In addition to weaning the nation from foreign oil, Pickens' plan is not entirely altruistic. He's investing hundreds of millions of dollars on a giant wind farm in the Texas panhandle, and his hedge fund, BP Capital, is said to own stakes in several companies that equip cars to run on natural gas. If his energy efforts pan out, he could get even richer in the process.

Then there's Al Gore. The former U.S. vice president and Nobel Prize winner said last week that electricity generation should be completely fossil-fuel free in 10 years.

The question is, are these plans realistic or just dreams?

Edgar Mitchell, Apollo 14 Astronaut, Says Aliens Are Among Us

2008-07-25T00:00:00.000-07:00

From the Huffington Post and the New York Times today:

Edgar Mitchell, the sixth man to walk on the moon, appeared on a British radio show to say that he was “privileged enough to be in on the fact that we’ve been visited on this planet and the U.F.O. phenomena is real.”

Listen to this YouTube Audio. This is startling.

Obama's Interview with Face the Nation Today

2008-07-20T19:22:00.001-07:00

Huffington Post has the short and long versions of Obama's interview on this morning's Face the Nation on CBS with journalist Lara Logan.

Logan was the first journalist to lkand an interview with Obama while he is on his pre-convention oversaes trip to Afghanistan, Irag, Kuwait, Jordan, Israel, Germany, France and England this week.

She also made news last month on Comedy Central's Daily Show, on which she told host John Stewart some very juicy behind the scenes stories behind how the US news media has dumbed down war reporting from Afghanistan and Iraq.

FISA Bill Vote May Happen Tomorrow! Call Congress!

2008-06-19T12:49:00.001-07:00

Here's a letter I got from Caroline Fredrickson, Director of the ACLU's Washington, D.C. Legislative Office today. It is urgent. Please read this and call your Congressperson now, then Steny Hoyer's office and Nancy Pelosi's office. 202-224-3121. Please call now!

Dear ACLU Supporter,

Despite the outrage coming from a broad coalition of concerned citizens, by tomorrow night the House of Representatives will vote on whether or not to gut the Constitution and give immunity to phone companies who broke the law and spied on Americans.

We have to act now. Even if you’ve emailed, called or visited your members of Congress about FISA, we need you to contact them again today.

Congress is moving so fast and so secretively that we only got a copy of this bill this morning. I can tell you it’s horrible. It contains vacuum cleaner style surveillance that sweeps up the phone calls and emails of Americans. And it’s blatantly unconstitutional.

The bottom line is that this is legislation that benefits a few of our country’s largest corporations while taking away basic rights from the rest of us. And it is unacceptable.

I’m going to spend the rest of the day on the phone calling Capitol Hill trying to stop this bill. I hope you will spend whatever time you can to make the voice of freedom heard in Congress -- make calls, ask your friends and family to call -- please do whatever you can.

Put Congress on notice that the American people don’t want a "compromise" that sells out our rights. Act now. We’re hearing the vote is tomorrow, so we could have less than 24 hours.

Believe me, no matter what happens, the ACLU will continue fighting this -- if necessary, in the courts.

Thank you for all you have done through this fight. Your dedication has truly inspired me and all of us at the ACLU. Now, let's hit the phones!

Thank you,
Caroline Fredrickson, Director
ACLU Washington Legislative Office

About Those Torture Memos...

2008-06-18T22:12:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I watched a little of the current Senate Armed Services Committee hearing, chaired by Sen. Carl Levin (D) of Michigan, which is exploring how various forms of torture became a "legal" means of extracting information from detainees at Guantanamo Bay. By "legal" I mean it was condoned by Department of Defense officials, from Donald Rumsfeld on down, in contravention of the U.S. Constitution, of the U.S. Military's Code of Conduct, and of the Geneva Accords.

In the docket was the former chief legal counsel for the DoD, one William "Jim" Haynes, who had an unbelievably blank memory for one of the most senior lawyers in the United States government. This man was in charge of 10,000 other lawyers at the DoD. Yes, that is correct, by his own testimony. 10,000. I heard him say it. But it was clear from his own muddled testimony -- and by the printed record of his own memos submitted as evidence -- that Haynes chose to ignore the advice of most of those 10,000 lawyers, and he approved the torturing of prisoners. Then he blamed it on low-level officers at Gitmo. A true gutless wonder of the Universe.

What most amazed me was this: when he was answering questions put to him by Sen. Levin, he just couldn't recall a darn thing about anything. As soon as Sen. Lindsey Graham (R) of South Carolina -- who one might think would be more friendly, but who sounded just as skeptical as Levin did -- started to cajole Haynes' memory banks with a little Southern charm, well, Mr. Haynes chirped up little details that only a moment earlier had eluded him.

This man contradicted himself in testimony numerous times in just the brief 30 minutes I watched this hearing on C-Span. I can't imagine what the rest of the hearing was like.

A few moments after Sen. Graham finished, Sen. Claire McCaskill (D) of Missouri whapped Haynes sideways with several angry verbal two-by-fours , and you could hear all the air escaping the room as if sucked out into the vacuum of space by a hole the size of a pea made by a micrometeorite bulleting through a steel fuselage.

It was fascinating.

If you don't know what this latest Bush Administration scandal is about -- so maddening that retelling it nearly caused Keith Olbermann to blow a blood vessel in his temple tonight, let me make it simple:

It's about Gitmo, Abu Ghraib, Bagram Air Force Base in Afghanistan, extreme rendition, civil liberties, waterboarding, Habeas Corpus, three Supreme Court rulings, the Military Commissions Act, John Ashcroft, Alberto Gonzales and illegal military tribunals.

It's about using torture on completely innocent people around the world who were turned over to the CIA for money by their neighbors who didn't like them, and then these hapless prisoners were kept in isolation, without charges, abused, sometimes raped, sometimes even killed, by our government, all in the name of "protecting Americans," using our taxpayer money, and with our tacit consent, since U.S. citizens had (presumably) elected these same dangerous clowns. An in turn these Bozo's have bloodied our Constitution for political gain in front of God and the whole freakin' planet.

And remember, most of the hundreds of prisoners held at Guantanamo have been released without charge, and without recourse for the abuses inflicted on them and their families. By our government. And to this day, not one person held at Guantanamo Bay has ever been convicted of an act of terrorism.

So, it's also about getting this story out before the election, so the public will have a little more guilt on their conscience, and think twice before electing yet another Bush-ite Republican to the White House -- yet another clown who thinks that perpetual war and terror threats and oil company war profiteers makes for sound foreign policy.

And perhaps of equal importance for some member of Congress, it's about cleaning up our house now, before the Europeans start indicting our past and present elected and appointed officials for War Crimes. Don't think it can't happen. I'm believing more and more that it will. And not just for this mess.

* * *
IT WAS TOP DOWN, STUPID
The Bush Administration's "Bad Apples" Theory Goes Sour
By Phillipe Sands
Posted Wednesday, June 18, 2008, at 1:19 PM ET
Slate.com

When the Abu Ghraib scandal hit in the summer of 2004, two of the administration's most senior lawyers—White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales and the Defense Department's General Counsel Jim Haynes—stood before the world's media and laid out the official explanation for newly aggressive interrogation within the U.S. military: It was the result of a bottom-up request from an aggressive combatant commander at Guantanamo; it was implemented within the law and on the basis of careful legal advice; and it produced useful and important results. These new techniques had been essential in getting vital security information from men they labeled "the worst of the worst."

A memo Gonzales and Haynes made public that day sketched out this move to military cruelty. Written by Haynes and signed by Donald Rumsfeld on Dec. 2, 2002, the document discarded a military prohibition on cruelty promulgated by President Lincoln as long ago as 1863. Haynes' memo recommended 15 new techniques, including nudity and forced grooming, humiliation and deception, dogs, sleep deprivation, and stress positions like standing for up to four hours. Three other techniques—including water-boarding—were not given blanket approval, although their future use in individual cases was not rejected, either. Rumsfeld approved the memo, scribbling next to his signature authorizing these techniques the observation, "However, I stand for 8-10 hours a day. Why is standing limited to 4 hours?"

Four years after that memo became public, Congress has moved to examine the accuracy of the administration's account of the circumstances under which it was prepared. The author of the Rumsfeld memo became the subject of extensive questioning Tuesday before the Senate armed services committee. Many will say it is too little and too late. I disagree. Congress has a vital role to play in establishing accountability for the American torture policy, although yesterday's faltering efforts to jog Jim Haynes' memory hardly inspire confidence that it can do so.

Read the whole story here.

Obama Meets with His New Foreign Policy Team

2008-06-18T18:56:00.000-07:00

Gen. Taguba Says Bush Admin. Officials Committed War Crimes

2008-06-18T18:26:00.000-07:00

By Warren P. Strobel | Posted on Wednesday, June 18, 2008
McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON — The Army general who led the investigation into prisoner abuse at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison accused the Bush administration Wednesday of committing "war crimes" and called for those responsible to be held to account.

The remarks by Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba, who's now retired, came in a new report that found that U.S. personnel tortured and abused detainees in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, using beatings, electrical shocks, sexual humiliation and other cruel practices.

"After years of disclosures by government investigations, media accounts and reports from human rights organizations, there is no longer any doubt as to whether the current administration has committed war crimes," Taguba wrote. "The only question that remains to be answered is whether those who ordered the use of torture will be held to account."

Taguba, whose 2004 investigation documented chilling abuses at Abu Ghraib, is thought to be the most senior official to have accused the administration of war crimes. "The commander in chief and those under him authorized a systematic regime of torture," he wrote.

A White House spokeswoman, Kate Starr, had no comment.

Read the whole story here.

Read the full five-part series that McClatchy Newspapers published Sunday exposing the Bush Administration's reprehensible policies and practices regarding so-called "enemy combatants" and other victims of the mis-named "War on Terror."

My Comment to Jack Cafferty's Question Today

2008-06-18T16:44:00.001-07:00

CNN's Jack Cafferty posed this question to viewers today:

Is drilling for oil in Alaska and off the coast the answer to high gas prices?

Here was my comment (it was still awaiting moderation when Jack read several viewer comments on the air at 4:55 Mountain Time today).

June 18th, 2008 6:24 pm ET

President Bush’s sudden push to open up potential oil fields in US coastal waters might have more credibility — as one of your reports pointed out this morning — if he had the guts to first reverse his own executive order banning that drilling, instead of trying to push it off onto Congress.

Right now, oil produced in Alaska doesn’t reach the US in any case, since Alaska’s heavy crude can only be refined in one US oil refinery in Washington state. Much of Alaskan oil is exported to Japan and other countries. How does that help gas prices in the U.S.?

If the oil companies don’t feel oil produced from US territory should be sent to U.S. consumers now, what assurance does the American public have that new drilling off U.S. coasts would help U.S. gas prices?

If John McCain and George Bush want to help American consumers, instead of lining the pockets of their oil industry buddies — which is what this is really about — why not propose legislation to require that any oil produced from U.S. states and territories be required to be sold to U.S. consumers, and be prohibited from being sold overseas?

Dems in Congress Moving Now to Spy on Americans, Reward Telcoms

2008-06-18T11:41:00.000-07:00

If you are as alarmed and angered by this as I am, call your congressperson, Steny Hoyer's office and Nancy Pelosi' office today and voice your displeasure. Congress' phone number is: 202-224-3121. I recommend everyone keep this number in their cell phones. I call Congress all the time to tell them what I think. I just called Tom Udall's office as well as Steny Hoyer's and Nancy Pelosi's. It is our right and responsibility to do so. THIS is one of those moments. Here's the article:

by ART LEVINE
The Huffington Post
Posted June 18, 2008 | 01:24 AM (EST)

The Democratic-led Congress, with the support of key House leaders, is moving quickly to expand unconstitutional spying authority on Americans and reward telecoms for breaking the law. As the ACLU's chief lobbyist, Caroline Fredrickson, points out in an email alert:

A sham spying "compromise" similar to the one we warned you about last week could be rammed through both the Senate and House this week. It's moving that fast.

Will you write today and let your elected officials know Americans want them to stand up for our privacy?

In a proposal that makes a mockery of the rule of law, telecom companies that broke the law by supplying mountains of personal information to the government without a warrant will be let off the hook.

Here's what Senators Feingold and Dodd had to say about Senator Bond's proposal, which is very similar to what we expect in the coming days:

"Under the Bond proposal, the result of the FISA Court's evaluation would be predetermined... the FISA court would be required to grant immunity."

Tell your members of Congress to reject a sham immunity "compromise."

There's a deeply disturbing premise behind this dangerous FISA legislation: The president simply had to claim his request was legal for immunity to be granted to telecom companies that illegally handed over personal information.

No matter how illegal, offensive or intrusive a company's invasion of your privacy has been, it won't make a difference, because if the president gave the company a note claiming their behavior was legal, they're completely off the hook.

Congress needs to reject this sham for what it is and insist on real accountability for telecommunications companies that broke the law.

Tell your members of Congress you demand accountability, not immunity!

Throughout the extended FISA debate, you and the ACLU have worked tirelessly to protect personal privacy and the rule of law. Together, we've given the Bush administration a run for their money, defeating a number of freedom-stealing proposals. Don't let Congress cave in now.

Thanks for all you do in defense of freedom.

Read the rest of this story in today's The Huffington Post.

Scientists find bugs that eat waste and excrete petrol

2008-06-18T09:03:00.000-07:00

Silicon Valley is experimenting with bacteria that have been genetically altered to provide 'renewable petroleum'

by Chris Ayres
The Times of London Online

“Ten years ago I could never have imagined I’d be doing this,” says Greg Pal, 33, a former software executive, as he squints into the late afternoon Californian sun. “I mean, this is essentially agriculture, right? But the people I talk to – especially the ones coming out of business school – this is the one hot area everyone wants to get into.”

He means bugs. To be more precise: the genetic alteration of bugs – very, very small ones – so that when they feed on agricultural waste such as woodchips or wheat straw, they do something extraordinary. They excrete crude oil.

Unbelievably, this is not science fiction. Mr Pal holds up a small beaker of bug excretion that could, theoretically, be poured into the tank of the giant Lexus SUV next to us. Not that Mr Pal is willing to risk it just yet. He gives it a month before the first vehicle is filled up on what he calls “renewable petroleum”. After that, he grins, “it’s a brave new world”.

Read the full story here.

Change that Works for You: Flint, MI

2008-06-18T01:50:00.001-07:00

Anytime somebody says Barack Obama gives nice speeches that are short on details, just show them this latest speech...

Al Gore Endorses Barack Obama in Detroit, MI

2008-06-18T01:46:00.001-07:00

This was stirring....

Barack Obama on Jimmy Kimmel Live

2008-06-18T01:42:00.001-07:00

Sweeet....

Oil Demand in the US is Falling Significantly; Bush Panders

2008-06-17T20:58:00.000-07:00

In light of the hoo-ey today by McCain and Bush about opening up offshore oil reserve areas along U.S. coastlines (an obvious pander to gasoline-price-stressed consumers more egregious by logarithmic factors than McCain's old gas tax holiday canard), I thought two articles that appeared tonight might provide some perspective.

Sorry I've been away. Busy, you know.

* * *

Oil Falls a Fourth Day on Signs of U.S. Gasoline Demand Drop
By Christian Schmollinger
Bloomberg News

June 18 (Bloomberg) -- Crude oil fell for a fourth day in New York in the longest losing streak this year on signs that gasoline demand in the U.S., the world's largest consumer, is declining as record prices curb usage.

Consumers purchased an average 9.305 million barrels a day of motor fuels, 3.2 percent less than a year earlier, MasterCard Inc. said in its weekly SpendingPulse report. It was the eighth week of decline. Gasoline demand was down 1.7 percent from last year, the U.S. Department of Energy reported June 11.

Read the rest of the story here.

* * *

Bush To Echo McCain's Plan To Drill In Oceans
H. JOSEF HEBERT | June 17, 2008 09:16 PM EST |
Associated Press | Huffington Post

WASHINGTON — President Bush plans to make a renewed push Wednesday to get Congress to end a long-standing ban on offshore oil and gas drilling, echoing a call by GOP presidential candidate John McCain.

Congressional Democrats have opposed lifting the prohibitions on energy development on nearly all federal Outer Continental Shelf waters for more than a quarter-century, including waters along both the East and West coasts.

With oil prices soaring and motorists paying $4 a gallon for gasoline, political pressures have been growing for more domestic oil and gas production.

"He will explicitly call on Congress to ... pass legislation lifting the congressional ban on safe, environmentally friendly offshore oil drilling," Perino said. "He wants to work with states to determine where offshore drilling should occur."

Bush also will reiterate his call for development of oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska, Perino said. McCain has opposed drilling in the refuge, maintaining that the pristine areas in northeastern Alaska should be protected from energy development.

On Monday, McCain made lifting the federal ban on offshore oil and gas development a key part of his energy plan. The Arizona senator said states should be allowed to pursue energy exploration in waters near their coasts and receive some of the royalty revenue.

Bush has made clear in recent weeks that the drilling moratorium in coastal waters should end to allow for more domestic oil production and help "take the pressure off the price of gasoline."

Democrats, as well as some Republican senators from coastal states, have opposed lifting the drilling prohibitions, fearful that energy development could harm tourism and raise the risk of oil spills on beaches.

Sen. Barack Obama, the Democratic candidate for president, opposes lifting the ban on offshore drilling and says that allowing exploration now wouldn't affect gasoline prices for at least five years.

Read the rest of the story here.

Laying a Foundation For Voting

2008-04-12T14:23:00.000-07:00

Washington Post
By Marvin Krislov, President, Oberlin College
Saturday, April 12, 2008; Page A15

A little-noticed effort to help enfranchise college students for the Ohio primary elections may have a significant effect in that battleground state and nationwide when Americans go to the polls in November.

At the urging of students from Oberlin College and other Ohio schools, Jennifer Brunner, Ohio's secretary of state, ruled in late February that colleges and universities can issue utility bills to their students, enabling them to fulfill the state's voter residency requirements. The bills, which require no action, reflect payment for services such as telephone, Internet access and electricity, already covered by the students' tuition and fees.

Some critics have assailed that decision, claiming it allows transient "outsiders" who did not grow up in a given community, do not pay local taxes and may leave upon graduation to affect the outcome of elections. Those views contradict our Constitution and the facts.

Voting in America is not restricted to taxpayers or property owners. Federal law guarantees college students the right to vote where they go to school. Many students have jobs and pay state and local taxes on their earnings. All students pay the taxes applied to goods and services, such as sales taxes. And in our highly mobile society, millions of voters do not live where they grew up. Denying such people the right to vote, which even the homeless are guaranteed, would be unthinkable.

Providing students with utility bills to prove residency does not circumvent the law. They still must comply with state residency requirements or vote absentee. But the utility bills make it easier for students to exercise their right to vote, and that's an encouraging sign not just for Ohio but for American democracy.

The health of a democracy depends on active, informed voters. Numerous studies have shown that young people who vote are likely to become lifelong voters. So a young person's first experience of voting should be welcoming, not frustrating.

Ohio colleges that have not already done so should consider providing the appropriate documentation so their students can vote. Other states with strict proof-of-residency requirements should emulate Ohio's willingness to help young voters participate.

That would be a welcome change from past practices that discouraged the youth vote. College students often have difficulty proving residency because they move during their time on campus, many every year, often from one dormitory to another. Many students also receive postal service via a campus mailroom, so they have no street address. Because some states require an exact match between the student's residence and the form of voter identification, a student might need to obtain an amended driver's license in the short period between the start of school and the deadline for voter registration. Finding the time and transportation to do that can be a problem.

These requirements, including Ohio's, have the effect of inhibiting student voting. In the 2004 elections, that chilling effect was egregious in some Ohio college towns. Students in Oberlin and in Gambier, where Kenyon College is located, stood in line for up to 14 hours at the polls because of a dearth of voting machines. Some grew frustrated and went home without voting. Many of those who eventually reached the polling booths had to cast provisional ballots because of residency issues.

Such issues still exist in Ohio and elsewhere. In Ohio's primary election on March 4, for example, some students in Oberlin waited in line for hours because the supply of ballots ran out. Given the heavy youth turnout so far in the 2008 primaries across the country, election officials should make sure that such shortages do not recur in November.

See the original article here.

Obama Responds to McCain and Clinton attacks in Terre Haute

2008-04-12T01:09:00.001-07:00

The Clintonistas and Repugs are going to try to stop Barack Obama anyway they can with his own words because he's got all of his fingertips on the pulses of America, and Hillary Clinton and John McCain are the ones who are wearing fake political masks. Obama's observations ring a bell of truth, in my opinion, even when he's inartful.

I love Hillary's brain and her grasp of policy details, and I sense she would really know how to fix things. But she tries too hard to convince us that she's sincere, instead of just being sincere. By contrast, few people doubt Obama is sincere.

My partner said tonight that this latest dust-up -- over Obama's comments that people are bitter -- is going to thwack Hillary in the face. Obama, he said, has a way of turning these apparent mis-speaks into opportunities with his "Tai Chi" approach to criticism.

Remember Hillary's slack-jawed head shaking during the last couple of debates -- when Obama would take her fake outrage over (fill in the blank here) and turn her points to his advantage with a quick verbal pirouette?

Well, check out this response to an angry Obama, who makes an Indiana crowd stand up and cheer for him, by calling Hillary and McCain on their hypocrisies.

I've been wanting to see him get righteously angry. Well, he's getting there.

We're all "mad as hell, and we're not going to take this anymore."

Barack Obama in Fort Wayne, IN

2008-04-07T02:23:00.001-07:00

At six minutes into this speech, Obama explains that he gave his speech remembering the 40th anniversary of Martin Luther King's death in Indiana, because 40 years ago, Bobby Kennedy was campaigning in Indianapolis, and it was he who broke the news to that city that Dr. King had been killed, and he helped keep that city peaceful that night, while the rest of the country went mad with grief.

We have spent 40 years in the wilderness like the Israelites. I find it fascinating that this year of all years, a man who reminds so many people of Martin Luther King himself is now running for president and seeking to help fulfill Dr. King's legacy. We would all be greatly blessed, if he is able to be sworn in as president in January 2009, so we can begin the healing work together we need to do now so urgently.

Barack Obama in Grand Forks, ND

2008-04-07T02:01:00.001-07:00

This is a solid speech that lays out the themes Obama will use in the fall campaign. Meat and potatoes and well-delivered.

Missoula, MT: Mayor Endorses Obama

2008-04-07T01:41:00.001-07:00

The Red States are Going to Obama. This is a fun endorsement. It's short and well-stated.

Bill Richardson Defends His Endorsement of Obama

2008-04-02T18:09:00.000-07:00

Washington Post

Loyalty to My Country

By Bill Richardson
Tuesday, April 1, 2008; 10:29 AM

My recent endorsement of Barack Obama for president has been the subject of much discussion and consternation -- particularly among supporters of Hillary Clinton.

Led by political commentator James Carville, who makes a living by being confrontational and provocative, Clinton supporters have speculated about events surrounding this endorsement and engaged in personal attacks and insults.

While I certainly will not stoop to the low level of Mr. Carville, I feel compelled to defend myself against character assassination and baseless allegations.

Carville has made it very clear that this is a personal attack -- driven by his own sense of what constitutes loyalty. It is this kind of political venom that I anticipated from certain Clinton supporters and I campaigned against in my own run for president.

I repeatedly urged Democrats to stop attacking each other personally and even offered a DNC resolution calling for a positive campaign based on the issues. I was evenhanded in my efforts. In fact, my intervention in a debate during a particularly heated exchange was seen by numerous commentators as an attempt to defend Sen. Clinton against the barbs of Sens. Obama and John Edwards.

As I have pointed out many times, and most pointedly when I endorsed Sen. Obama, the campaign has been too negative, and we Democrats need to calm the rhetoric and personal attacks so we can come together as a party to defeat the Republicans.

More than anything, to repair the damage done at home and abroad, we must unite as a country. I endorsed Sen. Obama because I believe he has the judgment, temperament and background to bridge our divisions as a nation and make America strong at home and respected in the world again.

This was a difficult, even painful, decision. My affection and respect for the Clintons run deep. I do indeed owe President Clinton for the extraordinary opportunities he gave me to serve him and this country. And nobody worked harder for him or served him more loyally, during some very difficult times, than I did.

Carville and others say that I owe President Clinton's wife my endorsement because he gave me two jobs. Would someone who worked for Carville then owe his wife, Mary Matalin, similar loyalty in her professional pursuits? Do the people now attacking me recall that I ran for president, albeit unsuccessfully, against Sen. Clinton? Was that also an act of disloyalty?

And while I was truly torn for weeks about this decision, and seriously contemplated endorsing Sen. Clinton, I never told anyone, including President Clinton, that I would do so. Those who say I did are misinformed or worse.

As for Mr. Carville's assertions that I did not return President Clinton's calls: I was on vacation in Antigua with my wife for a week and did not receive notice of any calls from the president. I, of course, called Sen. Clinton prior to my endorsement of Sen. Obama. It was a difficult and heated discussion, the details of which I will not share here.

I do not believe that the truth will keep Carville and others from attacking me. I can only say that we need to move on from the politics of personal insult and attacks. That era, personified by Carville and his ilk, has passed and I believe we must end the rancor and partisanship that has mired Washington in gridlock. In my view, Sen. Obama represents our best hope of replacing division with unity. That is why, out of loyalty to my country, I endorse him for president.

The writer is governor of New Mexico and a former Democratic candidate for president.

Here's the original article.

Bill Clinton's SF tirade stunned some superdelegates

2008-04-02T16:53:00.000-07:00

San Francisco Chronicle
by Phillip Matier,Andrew Ross
Wednesday, April 2, 2008

The Bill Clinton who met privately with California's superdelegates at last weekend's state convention was a far cry from the congenial former president who afterward publicly urged fellow Democrats to "chill out" over the race between his wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton, and Barack Obama.

In fact, before his speech Clinton had one of his famous meltdowns Sunday, blasting away at former presidential contender Bill Richardson for having endorsed Obama, the media and the entire nomination process.

"It was one of the worst political meetings I have ever attended," one superdelegate said.

According to those at the meeting, Clinton - who flew in from Chicago with bags under his eyes - was classic old Bill at first, charming and making small talk with the 15 or so delegates who gathered in a room behind the convention stage.

But as the group moved together for the perfunctory photo, Rachel Binah, a former Richardson delegate who now supports Hillary Clinton, told Bill how "sorry" she was to have heard former Clinton campaign manager James Carville call Richardson a "Judas" for backing Obama.

It was as if someone pulled the pin from a grenade.

"Five times to my face (Richardson) said that he would never do that," a red-faced, finger-pointing Clinton erupted.

The former president then went on a tirade that ran from the media's unfair treatment of Hillary to questions about the fairness of the votes in state caucuses that voted for Obama. It ended with him asking delegates to imagine what the reaction would be if Obama was trailing by just 1 percent and people were telling him to drop out.

"It was very, very intense," said one attendee. "Not at all like the Bill of earlier campaigns."

When he finally wound down, Bill was asked what message he wanted the delegates to take away from the meeting.

At that point, a much calmer Clinton outlined his message of party unity.

"It was kind of strange later when he took the stage and told everyone to 'chill out,' " one delegate told us.

"We couldn't help but think he was also talking to himself."

When delegate Binah - still stunned from her encounter with Clinton - got home to Little River (Mendocino County) later in the day - there was a phone message waiting for her from State Party Chairman Art Torres, telling her the former president wanted him to apologize to her on his behalf for what happened.

Still, word of Clinton's blast shot all the way back to the New Mexico state Capitol, where Richardson spokesman Pahl Shipley reiterated Tuesday that his boss had never "promised or guaranteed" Bill and Hillary his endorsement.

NM Gov. Bill Richardson endorsing Obama

2008-03-21T01:45:00.001-07:00

By BARRY MASSEY, Associated Press Writer

SANTA FE, N.M. - March 21, 2008 - New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, the nation's only Hispanic governor, is endorsing Sen. Barack Obama for president, calling him a "once-in-a- lifetime leader" who can unite the nation and restore America's international leadership.

Richardson, who dropped out of the Democratic race in January, is to appear with Obama on Friday at a campaign event in Portland, Ore., The Associated Press has learned.

The governor's endorsement comes as Obama leads among delegates selected at primaries and caucuses but with national public opinion polling showing Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton pulling ahead of him amid controversy over statements by his former pastor.

Richardson has been relentlessly wooed by Obama and Clinton for his endorsement. As a Democratic superdelegate, the governor plays a part in the tight race for nominating votes and could bring other superdelegates to Obama's side. He also has been mentioned as a potential running mate for either candidate.

No primaries are scheduled until Pennsylvania's on April 22, a gap in time Obama hopes to use for such announcements to assert that he is the front-runner for the nomination.

"I believe he is the kind of once-in-a-lifetime leader that can bring our nation together and restore America's moral leadership in the world," Richardson said in a statement obtained by the AP. "As a presidential candidate, I know full well Sen. Obama's unique moral ability to inspire the American people to confront our urgent challenges at home and abroad in a spirit of bipartisanship and reconciliation."

Richardson's endorsement also could help Obama pick up support among Hispanics, who are the nation's largest and fastest-growing minority.

Read the full story here.

Obama Cuts Into Clinton's Delegate Lead Among Elected Officials

2008-03-14T10:15:00.000-07:00

Note: Normally I would cut this article at the first subhead and link it to Bloomberg's posting. But I had trouble loading the link the first time and had to do a search for the story. So I am posting the article in its entirety here. --Wes

Barack Obama, U.S. senator from Illinois and 2008 Democratic presidential candidate, speaks at a campaign rally in Columbus, March 10, 2008. Photographer: Suzi Altman/Bloomberg News

Bloomberg News

By Julianna Goldman and Catherine Dodge

March 14 (Bloomberg) -- Barack Obama has pulled almost even with Hillary Clinton in endorsements from top elected officials and has cut into her lead among the other superdelegates she's relying on to win the Democratic presidential nomination.

Among the 313 of 796 superdelegates who are members of Congress or governors, Clinton has commitments from 103 and Obama is backed by 96, according to lists supplied by the campaigns. Fifty-three of Obama's endorsements have come since he won the Jan. 3 Iowa caucuses, compared with 12 who have aligned with Clinton since then.

``That's not glacial, that is a remarkable momentum,'' Senator Claire McCaskill of Missouri, a superdelegate and Obama supporter, said in an interview. ``I don't think there is anything that will slow that down.''

Democratic elected officials have the most at stake in the nomination because the candidate at the top of the ticket in November will have an impact on state and local races.

In the overall race for superdelegates -- elected and party officials who automatically receive votes at the Democratic National Convention that will choose the nominee -- Clinton leads Obama in commitments by 249 to 212, according to an Associated Press tally.

The trend, though, is running against the New York senator. Since March 5, the day after she won primaries in Texas, Ohio, Rhode Island and Obama took Vermont, the Illinois senator has won backing from nine superdelegates and Clinton one, according to the campaigns and interviews.

Obama's Lead

Both sides agree her chance to win the nomination rests on winning a significant majority of superdelegates because Obama is likely to maintain a lead of at least 150 pledged delegates - - those won in primaries and caucuses -- after the last contest is finished. If he does, Clinton, 60, would have to snag more than 70 percent of the remaining 334 or so superdelegates.

Clinton also has suffered defections, notably Georgia Representative John Lewis, a prominent civil-rights leader and early backer of the New York senator, who switched to Obama.

Underlying the movement to Obama, 46, is some politicians' calculation that he'll be the strongest candidate to face Republican Senator John McCain in November.

``All along he has been the one person McCain does not want to run against and that is still true,'' said Senator Jay Rockefeller, a West Virginia Democrat who endorsed Obama last month.

A Chance in Nebraska

Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska said Obama, unlike Clinton, stands a chance of winning at least part of his state, which has voted Republican in every presidential election since 1964 and is one of two states that award some presidential electoral votes by congressional district rather than winner-take-all.

``Obama has coattails in Nebraska,'' said Nelson, who endorsed his Senate colleague two months ago. ``Our internal polls show he can win one, possibly two, congressional districts.''

Clinton's advisers contend that most of the uncommitted superdelegates will hold off taking sides until the last 10 primaries and caucuses are held.

``We think the momentum has been stopped, not cold, but very much stopped,'' Clinton adviser Harold Ickes said.

Clinton's aides argue that because she has won big states such as New York, New Jersey, California, Texas and Ohio, she would be the better general-election candidate.

Polls so far show little difference in head-to-head match- ups between McCain, 71, and either Clinton or Obama. Clinton and McCain are tied with 46 percent each, according to an average of national surveys compiled by Pollster.com. Obama would have a 2 percentage-point edge over McCain, a result within the margin of error.

Hillary Clinton, U.S. senator from New York and 2008 Democratic presidential candidate, speaks at a campaign rally in Harrisburg, March 11, 2008. Photographer: Mike Mergen/Bloomberg News

Swing States

The same holds true in Ohio, which Clinton won, and Pennsylvania, where voter surveys say she is leading in the April 22 primary. Polls show Obama does as well or better than Clinton against McCain in those crucial swing states.

In Iowa, a February Des Moines Register poll showed Obama beating McCain 53 percent to 36 percent, while McCain beat Clinton 49 percent to 40 percent.

That is one of the reasons he's won support from governors in Republican-leaning states, including Kathleen Sebelius of Kansas, Janet Napolitano of Arizona and Iowa's Chet Culver.

``It comes down to electability in red states like Iowa,'' Culver said this week.

Among pledged delegates, Obama has 1,390 to Clinton's 1,248, AP's unofficial estimate shows. A total of 2,025 delegates is needed for the nomination.

Even if Clinton scores a net gain of 10 delegates in Pennsylvania, Obama can make that up with wins in smaller states such as North Carolina and South Dakota, which vote later.

Feeling Pressure

Meanwhile, superdelegates are being pressured by both sides. Joyce Beatty, the minority leader of the Ohio state legislature, has heard from Clinton; her husband, former President Bill Clinton; their daughter Chelsea; Obama; and his wife, Michelle.

Beatty, the first black female minority leader in Ohio's history, is torn by competing allegiances. While her district in Columbus voted for Obama, Clinton won overwhelmingly statewide.

The toughest pressure she's feeling isn't coming from the campaigns. With a mother who supports Obama and a father who supports Clinton, she will eventually have to choose between her parents.

``I think my mother puts a lot more pressure on me than anyone,'' she said. ``I have to look at her every day.''

To contact the reporters on this story: Julianna Goldman in Washington at jgoldman6@bloomberg.net; Catherine Dodge in Washington, at Cdodge1@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: March 14, 2008 00:01 EDT

See the original story at Bloomberg News

Keith Olbermann's Special Comment on the Ferraro Fiasco

2008-03-13T10:49:00.000-07:00

Here's the story on HuffPost.

Here's the video:

Here's the transcript.

California Primary Recount Adds Delegates to Obama Column

2008-03-12T13:17:00.000-07:00

Confirmed: Obama Did Gain Delegates From California Vote Count
TPM Election Central
By Eric Kleefeld - March 11, 2008, 12:23PM

We've just confirmed with the California Democratic Party that reports in the blogosphere, which said that Barack Obama picked up additional delegates from the vote count in California, are correct.

Election Central spoke to Bob Mulholland, campaign adviser to the California Dems, and he confirmed that the delegate estimates for the California primary have been revised from the initial media estimates.

To put this in perspective, over one-million votes were yet to be counted when the media estimates were first made. Those estimates had Hillary at 207 delegates to Obama's 163. The new projection: A small alteration to Hillary 203, Obama 167, which Mulholland said is not expected to change when the election is officially certified this Saturday.

Barack: I Am Running for President, Not VP

2008-03-11T01:27:00.000-07:00

Excuse me, Billary, you wouldn't be trying to pull the old okeydoke on us now, would you? Naw.....

Child in Hillary's 3 a.m. Ad Supports Obama

2008-03-10T14:21:00.000-07:00

Imagine that....

The Monster Mash! by Bobby 'Boris' Pickett

2008-03-08T02:24:00.000-08:00

Monster Mash!

2008-03-08T01:34:00.000-08:00

Just for the fun of it, I think we should make the word "MONSTER!" the new shibboleth of our political present and future.

Poor Samantha Power. She channeled all of our rage and had to resign, but in the end she made it okay for all of us to scream at once what we've been feeling inside: "Monster! Hillary Clinton is a MONSTER!"

Hillary and her once-beloved Husband (I won't speak his name aloud any longer), for many years have comprised the vision of the "anti-Bush" that so many Americans (and not just Democrats) looked back to like a shimmering blue and green oasis in the barren, dessicated desert that had spread out all around us like a granulating cancer under a glowering sky.

All at once, in the space of two nightmarish months, our golden pair of heroes morphed into hissing, sharp-fanged political MONSTERS in the face of competition from a quiet, beautifully spoken man of true integrity and elegant bearing, a man no one had expected, especially the Clintons.

Hideous green vapors of jealousy waft from Hillary's skin every time she looks at Obama when they are together for their so-called "debates." Flustered and tongue-tied, she can't seem to believe that people heckle her stubborn, tone-deaf and petulant complaints about Obama. She only looks more pathetic every time I see her. I want to vomit, honestly.

Well, that's it. Now I've relieved myself. Move along, please. Nothing to see here. Except perhaps how much I'm really beginning to hate Hillary.

Hiss!

Here's a summary on Huffington Post of La Samantha Power "Monster!" Affair.

Behind the NY Times Story on McCain Last Night

2008-02-21T13:25:00.000-08:00

According to one of the talking heads last night (and I honestly cannot recall who said this), the New York Times decided to break its controversial story about John McCain's alleged affair with lobbyist Vicki Iseman -- which they allege also may have compromised McCain's ethics in a conflict of interest with Iseman's clients -- because they learned the New Republic was planning to publish a story about the Times' problems getting this story out.

Here's the New Republic story, right on time, as it were.

Now This Guy Gets It

2008-02-21T00:37:00.000-08:00

To Vilify Obama for his Ability to Inspire is to Ignore the Principal Lesson of the Last Three Decades of American Politics

Huffington Post
Posted by ROBERT CREAMER
February 19, 2008 | 11:30 AM (EST)

It's one thing for supporters of Hillary Clinton to make the case that her experience in Washington politics would make her a better president than Barack Obama. But it's quite another to actually vilify Obama's ability to inspire as a "cult of the personality" or "nothing but words."

It is particularly disturbing when serious progressive writers who should know better repeat this attack on Obama's inspirational abilities. It demonstrates a failure to grasp the principal lesson of the last thirty years of American politics.

In fact, it is precisely the absence of inspiration in progressive politics that has kept Progressives on the political defensive for decades.

That's because to inspire people, Progressives have to appeal to something much more important than endless lists of policies and programs. To inspire people, Progressives have to appeal to our values and to our vision for the future.

Read the rest of this insightful Huffington Post editorialist's essay here.

ABC News: Bill Clinton Tells Texans It Could Be Over

2008-02-21T00:23:00.000-08:00

Texas Could Be Hillary's Last Stand
Former President Tells Lone Star Crowd Wife Needs Wins in Texas and Ohio

By RICK KLEIN and SARAH AMOS
Feb. 20, 2008

There's a Texas-sized stumbling block on Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's comeback trail.

Even Clinton's most devoted surrogate -- her husband, Bill Clinton -- acknowledged the do-or-die stakes on Wednesday in Beaumont, Texas, conceding that a loss in Texas or Ohio would likely doom her candidacy.

"If she wins Texas and Ohio I think she will be the nominee. If you don't deliver for her, I don't think she can be. It's all on you," the former president told the audience at the beginning of his speech.

Read the whole article here. Huffington Post has the AP version of a similar story here.

An Overseas Perspective on the Dem Primaries

2008-02-20T00:35:00.001-08:00

If you listen to the regular gaggle of talking blatherheads on CNN and MSNBC -- many of whom I like most of the time -- you might think that the campaign for the Democratic nomination is now all about the latest picayune verbal misstep, and all Hillary has to do is catch Barack in some epistomological hiccup (or his wonderful intelligent wife Michelle, who has five times the speaking skills that Hillary has; if you doubt my estimation, just go review her amazing speech at UCLA on Feb. 4 on YouTube).

Well, time to turn off the local so-called analysts. Only Howard Fineman and Bill Schneider have the good sense to see this race with an even temper. The more Hillary goes negative, the more it boomerangs on her. The Clintons are daily spoiling their 90s legacy with too-clever-by-half snide comments and knowing looks. She should have kept crying. It worked better.

Here's a well-considered editorial from Britain's Guardian this morning. Mull this over a cup of coffee, and then tell me that Barack Obama doesn't have the experience or the acumen to handle the presidency. He's beat the pants off of Billary on every level of the three-dimensional chess game they thought they were playing in this campaign. And I think the American people simply grok all of it very clearly.

I will leave you with this thought: none other than Pat Buchanan pointedly noted last night on MSNBC that Obama had accrued more votes by himself than the entire Republican field together in Wisconsin Tuesday. In fact, by midnight, the Dems had together received more than 1 million votes. The Republicans earned half that all told. The same was true in Virginia last week. In Virginia. Shall I say that again?

-------------------------

Lost in Wisconsin
US elections 2008:
Hillary Clinton's campaign has made a series of strategic and tactical blunders that will ultimately cost her the presidential nomination

by Richard Adams
February 20, 2008 4:00 AM

If Hillary Clinton loses the Democratic presidential nomination - and after another hammering at the hands of Barack Obama in Wisconsin, it's increasingly looking as if she will - then it didn't just happen overnight.

Nor did she lose it last week, when she was devastated in the "Potomac primary" of three big losses in one day. Nor was it the series of defeats she suffered in states such as Washington, Louisiana and Nebraska. No, the day when the first nails went into the Clinton campaign's coffin was exactly two weeks ago - on February 6.

Read the rest of the article http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/richard_adams/2008/02/lost_in_wisconsin.html">here.

Barack Obama: We Need You, Texas.

2008-02-19T20:59:00.001-08:00

Obama's Victory speech after winning the Wisconsin primary tonight.

I second Michelle Obama's comments yesterday: I am very proud of America, for the first time in a long time. We are rediscovering ourselves and the best values we represent -- those that make us dream about making the world a better place once again.

BREAKING NEWS: Fidel Castro Resigns

2008-02-19T01:54:00.001-08:00

HAVANA, Cuba (CNN) -- Fidel Castro announced his resignation as president of Cuba and commander-in-chief of Cuba's military on Tuesday, according to a letter published in the state-run newspaper, Granma.

The resignation ends nearly a half-century of iron-fisted rule that inspired revolutionaries but frustrated 10 U.S. presidents.

Castro revealed his plans without advance notice by publishing a letter in the middle of the night in state-run newspaper Granma.

"I will not aspire to, nor will I accept the position of president of the council of state and commander-in-chief," Castro wrote. "I wish only to fight as a soldier of ideas. ... Perhaps my voice will be heard."

The news is likely to send shock waves across the island and among the tens of thousands of Cubans who have sought refugee in the United States and other countries.

Castro, 81, captured the world's attention at the age of 32, when the bearded revolutionary led a band of guerillas that overthrew a corrupt dictatorship in 1959. He went on to become a thorn in Washington's paw by embracing communism and cozying up to the Soviet Union.

Read the entire CNN story here.

Sheryl Crow - God Bless This Mess

2008-02-19T01:29:00.001-08:00

Just got the new Sheryl Crow album 'Detours." It's as good a record as she's ever made, with strong songs and thought provoking lyrics. And more than any other album she's made, this one is very political. Fittingly, she starts the album with this song, a kind of tribute to Bob Dylan's early songs, complete with crappy microphone hiss and vinyl record clicks & pops.

Sheryl Crow - Lullaby for Wyatt

2008-02-19T00:48:00.001-08:00

Sheryl Crow - Shine Over Babylon

2008-02-19T00:41:00.001-08:00

Sheryl Crow - Love is free

2008-02-19T00:38:00.001-08:00

Not posting much, cause....

2008-02-11T00:22:00.000-08:00

I've not been feeling well this weekend, and even before that, plus this was an odd week for both my partner and myself. Hopefully, I will get back to posting more in the next week.

Democratic Sandoval County Straw Poll

2008-02-06T18:26:00.001-08:00

Only attended for a little while, but it was an interesting event, and i met a couple of the candidates for Congress for my district.

When You Go Vote Today, Prepare for a Crowd

2008-02-05T15:27:00.000-08:00

Voted around 1 pm today, after standing out in the cold (28 degrees) for an hour with a fellow Corralen(e)a -- we held Obama signs together, and nearly everyone that passed us in their cars gave thumbs up, waved, hollared support out their windows, or honked and banged on their steering wheels. What fun!

Sadly it was just too cold to stand outside, so we went inside to vote.

My only suggestion is, don't wait until 6:45 tonight to go vote. The parking lot at the Corrales Rec Center was jammed with cars at noon. There were dozens of patient voters lined up in Disneyland-style twisty lines inside the gymnasium. People were serious about their voting today, and they are coming out in droves. Expect to wait, but you will have fun. Everyone seemed to be in a bouyant mood.

And guess what? Simple paper ballots and black ink pens. You fill in the block next to the name of the candidate of your choice, fold up your ballot and drop it through the ballot box slot. After all the (well-deserved) fuss about electronic voting machines, vote tampering, stolen elections and equipment breakdowns, it was a joy to vote the old-fashioned way.

Welcome to Whistling Dog Too

2008-02-05T00:52:00.000-08:00

The layout on my previous blog, Whistling Dog, just went wobbly the other night. I can't fix it, and the last person I found on Blogger Help who had this same issue posted last April (2007). And no one had yet helped him. Does anyone have any idea how to reach Blogger Help Desk directly by email? All I have are no-reply addresses for them.

I've finished rebuilding the entire Whistling Dog blog over again, all 52 entries, as of this morning, Feb. 5, 2008. The only thing I could not save were the comments.

Welcome to Whistling Dog Too. (smiles)

Barack Obama Rallies in New Mexico Friday, Feb. 1

2008-02-05T00:46:00.000-08:00

I dropped by the Sandoval County Democratic Club's Presidential Straw Poll event in Rio Rancho last night (which Obama won, by the way).

I learned at the Obama table that Barack Obama would be making at least a couple of appearances at rallies here in New Mexico this Friday, Feb. 1. The Obama campaign called me today and confirmed it.

This evening I checked the Obama website (http://newmexico.barackobama.com), and the info was all posted around 7 p.m.

There is info about the Friday Albuquerque rally on the New Mexico Community Blog:

http://my.barackobama.com/page/community/post/zachedwards/CGBqq

And through a link on that page to:

http://my.barackobama.com/page/s/albuquerque

This Friday, February 1st, Barack Obama will be in Albuquerque, NM for a special event at the Albuquerque Convention Center.

Here are the details:

Economic Summit with Barack Obama
Kiva Auditorium
Albuquerque Convention Center
401 2nd Street NW
Albuquerque, NM 87102
Friday, February 1, 2008
Doors Open: 11:30 a.m.
For security reasons, do not brings bags. No signs or banners permitted. The event is free and open to the public; however tickets are required. Tickets are complimentary and are not for sale or re-sale. Due to space constraints, admission is on a first come, first serve basis.

You can also pick up tickets are at the Albuquerque Obama office beginning at 5 p.m. Wednesday:
Albuquerque Obama Headquarters
1014 Lomas Blvd NW
Albuquerque, NM
Thursday: 9 a.m. - 9 p.m.

Here’s the info on the Santa Fe rally:

http://my.barackobama.com/page/event/detail/communityservice/4rkfk
When: Feb. 1, 2008
Where: Santa Fe Community College Witter Fitness Center, 6401 Richards Avenue, Santa Fe
Details about Albuquerque still pending.
Time: Doors open at 5 p.m., event starts at 6:30 p.m.
Free tickets available on-line on Thursday evening. Check BarackObama.com, click on STATES, click on New Mexico for information.

Here’s the Santa Fe rally ticket link:

http://my.barackobama.com/page/event/detail/communityservice/4vt8f
Free tickets for the Obama event in Santa Fe, Feb. 1, 6:30 p.m. will be available on Thursday, January 31, 5 - 7 p.m. at parking lot across the street from the post office on Central Avenue. (doesn’t say which post office though).

The Albuquerque Obama information number I have is: 505-228-0496

First drafted for posting on 1-31-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius Endorses Obama

2008-02-05T00:43:00.000-08:00

Last night in El Dorado, Kansas, Gov. Kathleen Sebelius (D) endorsed Barack Obama for president with a very competent and impressive speech, and I couldn't help but think that she might make a wonderful vice presidential running mate for Obama, if he is nominated.

See what you think. (My guess is probably for Bill Richardson as a VP for either Obama or Hillary.)

So, I checked Wikipedia to see what it says about her. Lo, and behold! Read the rest of the Wiki entry about her here.

During the 2004 election Sebelius was named as a potential running mate for John Kerry.[14] In the aftermath of Kerry's defeat in the 2004 presidential election, some pundits named Sebelius as a potential candidate for the Democratic nomination for President in 2008. Some of Sebelius's political leanings, including support for abortion rights and opposition to capital punishment, are unusual for a governor of Kansas; yet many contend that her appeal would be broad among her fellow Midwesterners.[citation needed] As of 2008, speculation remains that she would be a contender for the vice-presidential slot on a ticket headed by either Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton.[15]Speculation that the Vice Presidential nomination lies in her future was heightened by the fact that she was chosen by the Democratic Party's congressional leaders to give their party's official response to Republican President George W. Bush's State of the Union Address.[16] The next day, she endorsed Obama's campaign, one week before the Kansas caucus on Super Tuesday [17].

Sebelius is now chair of the Democratic Governors Association, a popular launchpad for those with national political ambitions.[18] In 2007, she traveled to Istanbul to attend the annual Bilderberg Group meeting.[19]

First posted 1-30-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Kennedy Endorsements of Barack Obama

2008-02-05T00:40:00.001-08:00

This is history in the making. The Kennedys have withheld their endorsements from candidates for 40 years. They have now done it as a family. Today, Barack Obama wears the mantle of the Kennedy family -- and he can call upon the heritage of Jack and Bobby Kennedy with the family's blessing.

Something new is happening.

First posted 1-29-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Charlie Gibson interviews Ted and Caroline Kennedy

2008-02-05T00:38:00.001-08:00

First posted 1-29-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Barack Obama's response to Bush's final State of the Union

2008-02-05T00:32:00.000-08:00

First posted 1-29-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

CNN: Barack forming a huge coalition

2008-02-05T00:29:00.000-08:00

First posted 1-29-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Sandoval County Dems to Straw Poll in Rio Rancho Jan. 29, 6:30 pm

2008-02-05T00:26:00.000-08:00

I received a call from the New Mexico Obama campaign last night, and they told me there will be a straw poll event at the Rio Rancho Inn, 1465 Rio Rancho Dr. SE, just north of Sara Road, at 6:30 pm tonight, Tuesday Jan. 29, 2008, for New Mexico Democrats, to test the temperature of the local electorate in advance of the Feb. 5 caucuses.

If you are a registered Democrat living in Sandoval County, please consider attending this event tonight, whichever candidate you support. I will be standing for Obama myself, as I have already declared.

http://newmexico.barackobama.com/page/content/NMResources/?source=NMhome

First posted 1-29-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

I Will Support Barack Obama on Feb. 5

2008-02-05T00:23:00.000-08:00

If -- from my recent Whistling Dog posts -- you might be wondering if I'm favoring Barack Obama in the upcoming New Mexico Democratic caucuses, you would be correct in your assumption.

I think the Clintons (both Bill and Hillary) have behaved immaturely (my mother's word, actually) in recent weeks -- in a shockingly clumsy way, as a matter of fact -- especially for a couple with a reputation for competence and intelligence.

That Bill & Hill could not understand that the election is not about them, but about us -- as a people, a community, a culture, a country and an idea -- is disturbing, to say the least, and perhaps grounds for getting them both off the national stage ASAP with a very large and deliberate Vaudevillian hook.

Furthermore, I think Barack Obama has matured and held his ground not only as a candidate, but as a human being. In the words of my very Republican-loyalist 86-year-old mother, a President Barack Obama "could be very healing for the country." If my Republican mom wants to vote for Obama, I say we have a winning candidate.

On Charlie Rose tonight (Monday, Jan. 28), ABC News' Martha Raddatz said that the majority of service people in Iraq and Afghanistan she spoke with on a recent trip supported Barack Obama. Then presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin added that her son, who earned a Bronze Star during two tours of duty as a platoon leader in Baghdad, had told her the same thing. When the military supports a Democrat, especially whne a decorated and celebrated war hero like John McCain may well be the Republican nominee for president, it is time to sit up and take notice.

Re: the NM Dem caucuses on Feb. 5

I've felt we have heard too little about the Feb. 5 caucuses. It turns out that because the NM Dem State Central Committee and Governor Richardson wanted to move the Dem presidential primaries up to Feb. 5, the event had to be held separately from the state's regular primary, which meant it could not be called a primary, and it had to be promoted with publicity only (not advertising) by the NM Democratic Party. So, I thought I would do my little bit here to help get out the word.

The upcoming Dem "caucuses" -- which will be run by the NM Democratic Party, not by the NM Secretary of State's office -- will, by the way, not be an Iowa-style caucus. It will be a paper ballot election, with 184 polling places located around the state, each open 12 noon to 7 pm on Tuesday, Feb. 5. I was sorry to hear that when I called the NM Dem Party office the other day to get info about the election. I'd been looking forward to participating in a live-person caucus as they do in Iowa and Nevada. Ah, well.

Here's the link to the Feb. 5 caucus FAQ's pdf.

I'll be posting more about this soon. Please, Vote!

http://newmexico.barackobama.com/page/content/NMResources/?source=NMhome

First posted 1-29-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Barack Obama - Victory Speech in South Carolina

2008-02-05T00:20:00.000-08:00

First posted 1-27-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Now Ted Kennedy Will Endorse and Campaign For Barack Obama

2008-02-05T00:18:00.000-08:00

Photo credit: Stephen Jaffe/Agence France-Presse

When Bill Clinton was president, he and his wife sailed with the Kennedys off Cape Cod. In this 1997 outing, the former president is at the helm, Hillary Rodham Clinton is second from left and Senator Edward M. Kennedy is to her right.

January 28, 2008
Kennedy Chooses Obama, Spurning Bill Clinton Plea
By Jeff Zeleny and Carl Hulse

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Senator Edward M. Kennedy, rejecting entreaties from the Clintons and their supporters, is set to endorse Senator Barack Obama’s presidential bid on Monday as part of an effort to lend Kennedy charisma and connections before the 22-state Feb. 5 showdown for the Democratic nomination.

Both the Clintons and their allies had pressed Mr. Kennedy for weeks to remain neutral in the Democratic race, but Mr. Kennedy had become increasingly disenchanted with the tone of the Clinton campaign, aides said. He and former President Bill Clinton had a heated telephone exchange earlier this month over what Mr. Kennedy considered misleading statements by Mr. Clinton about Mr. Obama, as well as his injection of race into the campaign.

Mr. Kennedy called Mr. Clinton Sunday to tell him of his decision.

The endorsement, which followed a public appeal on Mr. Obama’s behalf by Caroline Kennedy, the daughter of President John F. Kennedy, was a blow to the Clinton campaign and pits leading members of the nation’s most prominent Democratic families against one another.

Mr. Kennedy, a major figure in party politics for more than 40 years, intends to campaign aggressively for Mr. Obama, beginning with an appearance and rally with him in Washington on Monday. He will be introduced by Ms. Kennedy.

Mr. Kennedy then heads west with Mr. Obama, followed by appearances in the Northeast. Strategists see him bolstering Mr. Obama’s credibility and helping him firm up support from unions and Hispanics, as well as the party base.

The endorsement appears to support assertions that Mr. Clinton’s campaigning on behalf of his wife in South Carolina has in some ways hurt her candidacy.

Read the entire article here.

First posted 1-27-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Caroline Kennedy Endorses Barack Obama

2008-02-05T00:16:00.000-08:00

January 27, 2008
OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR
A President Like My Father
By Caroline Kennedy

OVER the years, I’ve been deeply moved by the people who’ve told me they wished they could feel inspired and hopeful about America the way people did when my father was president. This sense is even more profound today. That is why I am supporting a presidential candidate in the Democratic primaries, Barack Obama.

My reasons are patriotic, political and personal, and the three are intertwined. All my life, people have told me that my father changed their lives, that they got involved in public service or politics because he asked them to. And the generation he inspired has passed that spirit on to its children. I meet young people who were born long after John F. Kennedy was president, yet who ask me how to live out his ideals.

Sometimes it takes a while to recognize that someone has a special ability to get us to believe in ourselves, to tie that belief to our highest ideals and imagine that together we can do great things. In those rare moments, when such a person comes along, we need to put aside our plans and reach for what we know is possible.

We have that kind of opportunity with Senator Obama. It isn’t that the other candidates are not experienced or knowledgeable. But this year, that may not be enough. We need a change in the leadership of this country — just as we did in 1960.

Read the entire editorial here.

First posted 1-27-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

NY Times Praises Obama, but Endorses Hillary

2008-02-05T00:14:00.000-08:00

The New York Times Editorial Board , as was earlier rumored, has endorsed Hillary Clinton to be the Democratic nominee for president. This endorsement comes with a few caveats, however. Here are a few select paragraphs from today's editorial in the Times' Opinion section.

The potential upside of a great Obama presidency is enticing, but this country faces huge problems, and will no doubt be facing more that we can’t foresee. The next president needs to start immediately on challenges that will require concrete solutions, resolve, and the ability to make government work. Mrs. Clinton is more qualified, right now, to be president.

We opposed President Bush’s decision to invade Iraq and we disagree with Mrs. Clinton’s vote for the resolution on the use of force. That’s not the issue now; it is how the war will be ended. Mrs. Clinton seems not only more aware than Mr. Obama of the consequences of withdrawal, but is already thinking through the diplomatic and military steps that will be required to contain Iraq’s chaos after American troops leave.

On domestic policy, both candidates would turn the government onto roughly the same course — shifting resources to help low-income and middle-class Americans, and broadening health coverage dramatically. Mrs. Clinton also has good ideas about fixing the dysfunction in Mr. Bush’s No Child Left Behind education program.

Mr. Obama talks more about the damage Mr. Bush has done to civil liberties, the rule of law and the balance of powers. Mrs. Clinton is equally dedicated to those issues, and more prepared for the Herculean task of figuring out exactly where, how and how often the government’s powers have been misused — and what must now be done to set things right.

As strongly as we back her candidacy, we urge Mrs. Clinton to take the lead in changing the tone of the campaign. It is not good for the country, the Democratic Party or for Mrs. Clinton, who is often tagged as divisive, in part because of bitter feeling about her husband’s administration and the so-called permanent campaign. (Indeed, Bill Clinton’s overheated comments are feeding those resentments, and could do long-term damage to her candidacy if he continues this way.)

We know that she is capable of both uniting and leading. We saw her going town by town through New York in 2000, including places where Clinton-bashing was a popular sport. She won over skeptical voters and then delivered on her promises and handily won re-election in 2006.

Her ideas, her comeback in New Hampshire and strong showing in Nevada, her new openness to explaining herself and not just her programs, and her abiding, powerful intellect show she is fully capable of doing just that. She is the best choice for the Democratic Party as it tries to regain the White House.

Read the full editorial here.

First posted 1-25-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

I Just Called Hillary Clinton's Office

2008-02-05T00:12:00.000-08:00

Watch the above Chris Matthews interview with Ed Schultz and Mark Green of Air America Radio, and see what you think to the question: Is Bill Clinton helping or hurting Hillary and the Democrats. Ed Schultz says categorically Bill Clinton is hurting. I agree with him.

I called the press office for Hillary Clinton's campaign this morning. I wanted them to hear what I feel, and I know a lot of us have felt similar emotions this past month:

The attacks by Hillary and Bill on Barack Obama are not helping her campaign and are dividing the party, and this friction could conceivably hand the next election to the Republicans, however unthinkable that might have seemed even a couple of weeks ago.

I told them to stop, in no uncertain terms. I said their strategy would make it impossible for a Clinton/Obama ticket to be realized if they kept this up, that when Hillary announced with Obama and John Edwards in Las Vegas that they were all calling a truce, that everyone expected her to follow through on that. I said that because she and Bill did not quit their disingenuous sniping at Obama, she and Bill were losing credibility.

And I told them that everyone expects the Clintons to be the heroes right now, to be above the fray, to ride to the rescue of the country, and that is what the country wants, not this divisive bickering that they've started.

As my partner said this morning: every time Hillary shakes her head and purses her lips when Barack Obama says something during a debate, she only makes herself look like the pinched school marm we always thought she was. And none of us want to elect a school marm for president. We've already had seven years with a school bully in the White House.

If you want the Clintons to start embodying once again the best of what they can be and who they are, call the Hillary Clinton campaign in Washington now. Here is their contact info:

Hillary Clinton for President
4420 North Fairfax Drive
Arlington, VA 22203
703-469-2008
Fax: 703-962-8600
email: go to this URL and send a message of hope:
http://www.hillaryclinton.com/help/contact/

First posted 1-24-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Al Gore Posts a Video Supporting Gay Marriage

2008-02-05T00:10:00.000-08:00

In a story logged today on Politico.com and then covered on Huffington Post, Poltico.com columnist Ben Smith writes:

Not sure what prompted this, but Al Gore has quietly released a video with a forceful endorsement of equal marriage rights for gays and lesbians. It pushes the Democratic establishment that much closer to a position he now shares with Eliot Spitzer and some other leading Dems, and is prompting a bit of grumbling in gay political circles that this batch of candidates aren't quite there.

"Gay men and women ought to have the same rights as heterosexual men and women -- to make contracts, to have hospital visiting rights, to join together in marriage, and I don't understand why it is considered by some people to be a threat to heterosexual marriage," he says on the video, which appears on his Current TV network. "Shouldn't we be promoting the kind of faithfulness and loyalty to ones partner regardless of sexual orientation?"

Read the whole story here.

Towleroad.com has also covered this.

Here's Gore's original video link on Current.tv.

First posted 1-23-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Barack Obama On Email Rumors About His Faith

2008-02-05T00:08:00.000-08:00

See an extended version from the CBN's Brody file, replayed by Wolf Blitzer at CNN. The YouTube version here.

First posted 1-23-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Sen. Obama on the Today Show

2008-02-05T00:06:00.000-08:00

From this morning's Today show on NBC. I am so disappointed in the snarky and disingenuous tone both Bill and Hillary Clinton have taken since New Hampshire to try to cut Barack Obama down. If they are trying to test his mettle to make him a better candidate, I believe they are going to succeed.

First posted 1-23-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Red, White and Blue Tag Sale

2008-02-05T00:04:00.000-08:00

If you want to know what's really going to drive the coming elections, there is no better sage than the sarcastic queen herself, Maureen Dowd, to lay it all out in easy to understand "See Dick Run" sophistication.

I recommend you read her column today (New York Times registration required). It is the perfect companion to the news article I just posted earlier today. And, I must ad, her column gave me a few bits of inspiration for the essay I posted directly before this.

Here are three apropos paragraphs from her column, entitled Red, White and Blue Tag Sale:

Two decades ago, we fretted that Japan was taking over America when Sony bought Columbia Pictures and Mitsubishi bought a chunk of Rockefeller Center. But they overpaid for everything.

Now, because of Wall Street’s overreaching, our economy depends on foreign oil and foreign loans to stay afloat.

China and Arab countries have a staggering amount of treasury securities. And the oil-rich countries are sitting on so many petrodollars that they are looking beyond prestige hotels and fashion labels and taking advantage of the fire sale to buy eye-popping stakes in our major financial institutions.

And then there's this humdinger Maureen quotes from Warren the Buffett:

As Warren Buffett has said, we are giving ourselves a party to feed our appetite for oil and imported goods and paying for it by selling off the furniture, our most precious assets.

Oh, by the way, if I am not mistaken, kiddies, it may have been Mr. Buffett, who helped get us into this mess 20-plus years ago by pushing the notion to corporate CEOs that the only obligation of public businesses was to please their shareholders -- not their employees, not their customers, nor their communities, nor even their country. He made a lot of money for himself and several thousand of his devotees before he told his children they weren't getting any of it -- oh, by the way -- more recently. A fine howdy-do that must have been.

At least Mr. Buffett is using his latter years to try to lead the rest of us out of this wasteland of milk and honey he first led us into. Sometimes I think I'd rather have a golden calf, personally. I guess his kids will have to find their way out on their own.

First posted 1-20-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

The Yard Sale - Homily for Sunny Winter Sunday

2008-02-05T00:02:00.000-08:00

The previous post was the news side of today's sermon.

Here's where I think we are as a country in my own words.

Our economy is about to go through a ringer that was predictable from the beginning of the Bush Administration fiasco. Let's put this in personal, local terms:

Let's say you are the head of the spoiled brat ne'er-do-well family of the neighborhood.

You've always been uppity with your neighbors, and certainly you seemed to have more money than they did, but at least they all thought you meant well -- despite your occasional drunken binges, your wild parties (where everyone had fun anyway), in spite of that odd car you wrecked into a lamppost once when you were over in Little Vietnam down in Orange County (well, that was a long time ago), and in spite of a certain amount of bullying you can be prone to -- because you have always come to everyone else's defense when other people get into trouble.

Then let's say your oldest son comes home from college. He didn't graduate with honors, and he nearly got thrown out, but you don't tell anyone about that.

Everyone likes him at first. However, he's a smart-aleck frat kid, and his sense of humor tends to put others at a disadvantage. Every now and then he humiliates someone else with an off-hand joke, and you get the feeling from him that if you don't laugh, there will be consequences. Very awkward. People stop coming around, and your parties aren't fun any more.

What's worse for you is that your son can't keep a job. He goes through the allowance you give him on the first day you give it to him, every week.

You're starting to get worried, to say the least.

One day, someone who doesn't like your frat kid son, breaks into your garage and burns it down. He had an old race car in there he was fixing up. Maybe someone thought your son cared about it, but he'd had it up on jacks since he was in high school.

A couple of days go by, and still no one knows who did it. You want to get the police involved, but your son bullies you about it until you let the whole thing go.

Now you really begin to suspect that something is terribly wrong, but you say nothing for the sake of maintaining some peace at the dinner table. Your son has a rotten temper, and you don't want to provoke him.

No one outside your family knows anything about this, of course. All of your neighbors finally feel sorry for you. They come around bringing pies and cakes and lasagna to say how much they care. But instead of saying thank you, your frat kid son points his finger at one neighbor who comes to the door and he threatens to burn down your neighbor's garage if he so much as looks cross-eyed at your son again.

Word gets around quickly. Everyone in the neighborhood is frightened to talk with you now. They avoid you at the market, at church, at the hardware store. Even the barber won't talk to you when you get a haircut.

Still, you hold up your head and try to maintain your dignity. After all, you've been an important person in your town, in spite of your weaknesses.

The next blow falls when you start getting dunning notices from the credit card companies, and you discover to your horror that your son has been running up debt like a drunk (well, he is a drunk; you just didn't want to admit it. After all, you're not so sober yourself, and your spouse is on anti-depressants).

To get the banks off your back, you do something desperate: at a poker party at a neighbor's house one night you ask your closest friends to lend you money. You discover they still love you and your family, in spite of everything that's happened, and they feel very sorry for you now. They don't blame you for your troubles. They blame your son. So they say yes. "Anything you want," they promise, and you accept the moon.

But there is an unspoken agreement between you and your neighbors as a price for their generosity, and that is this: they tell you you have to keep your son under control. "He's a menace to the serenity of the neighborhood," they tell you. You say yes, okay, you will.

But you don't, and things get immeasurably worse.

One rainy night, under the cover of a thunder storm, your son gets caught breaking and entering an old lady's house. She gets driven off in an ambulance, a brace around her neck. You are left with untold thousands in legal bills, medical bills and lawsuits.

You wish your son had run from the law. It would have been easier to face everyone else. But he doesn't. Instead, he swears he was just getting his revenge for the garage incident. He insists the old lady's nephew was the one who did it, and he can prove it. He claims he was looking for evidence. He even tells this tall tale to the police. Your lawyer sends your son to a psychiatrist. He wants to use an insanity defense, but you won't hear of it. "Not my son!" you shout.

Your son bravely locks himself in his room and sulks. You can't talk to him. He won't come to the door. Things get black.

And the bills pile up, and up.

What can you possibly do? You're stuck. You can't move, you can't sell, because no one will buy your house for what you paid for it. The yard has gone to seed. The garage is still a charred scar beside your once beautiful home. The paint is peeling, and you have no money to fix it up again.

One morning you announce to your wife over the last two glasses worth of orange juice in the fridge that you've decided you have no choice. You have no credit. You plan sell everything you have to pay at least a few of your bills. All of your income and hers goes to the lawyers now. And you at least have to eat.

"You may just have to eat, but I have a life, and everything is in your name," she says. Your wife packs her bags and leaves you without another word. You know, because she's told you over and over for weeks, that it was either her or your son. And you hadn't been willing to make a choice. So she makes it for you.

You get really good and drunk that day, a Saturday. The next morning, on a Sunday, hung over and unshaven, you put everything out in your driveway, and you start a vigil with all of your belongings, until everything you own is gone. Your neighbors dub it "the longest yard sale in the history of your town."

Half of your belongings they simply cart away. You don't dare charge them a nickel, because you owe them more money than you want to tally.

Everyday you think, as you sink more and more into a depression, that maybe if your son has no bed to sleep on, he'll leave. You hope and pray he'll leave. But no. Never. He hunkers in the corner of his empty closet, rocking back and forth, madly muttering incoherently. His room begins to smell so bad you won't go down to that end of the hall anymore.

Now you can barely afford to buy peanut butter and milk. Your wife has left you. You sleep on one broken down couch facing an old black and white television you can't bring yourself to shut off at night. Your house is empty. You will never have any money to pay back your friends, the banks, the lawyers, the doctors, the IRS or the courts. You are alone, and friendless, and about to be homeless.

But at least, you have your son.

And that, my friends, is about where we are.

Not exactly David Niven's sermon at the end of The Bishop's Wife, now was it? I wonder what Cary Grant would say, were he alive today. I know if I were he, I would be living in France.

Here endeth the lesson for today.

Wait a second! Wait a second! I just watched Lewis Black's new HBO special on Comedy Central, and I just have one thing to say about the ridiculously pessimistic essay above. I mean, have you ever heard such sophomoric drivvle in your life? ...Wait...

What? Someone's at the door? The Intervention TV show crew?...What? And this stupid slob's parents? What? And his GRANDMOTHER? You have GOT to be kidding me. . ..

What? Bill Clinton's here, too? What the hell is this, a campaign stop, fer godssakes? What the hell is Bill Clinton going to do here, feel this guys's pain? What? No, I don't know whether he's going to vote in the primary next month! He doesn't even have a car! Jesus H. Chri...

Hey, ask Bill Clinton if he'll pay for this guy's heating bill! He will if this guy will volunteer for Hillary, huh? Okay, lemme ask him... Nah, don't bother. He says he's voting for Obama... Hold on! What did you say? You were a f***king Republican? That the f***ck is the MATTER with you people!??

Oh, fer Chrissakes, nevermind... Of all the stupid idiots in the world... And you couldn't see this coming, huh....?

First posted 1-20-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Overseas Investors Buy U.S. Holdings at a Record Pace

2008-02-05T00:00:00.000-08:00

By PETER S. GOODMAN and LOUISE STORY
Published: January 20, 2008

Last May, a Saudi Arabian conglomerate bought a Massachusetts plastics maker. In November, a French company established a new factory in Adrian, Mich., adding 189 automotive jobs to an area accustomed to layoffs. In December, a British company bought a New Jersey maker of cough syrup.

For much of the world, the United States is now on sale at discount prices. With credit tight, unemployment growing and worries mounting about a potential recession, American business and government leaders are courting foreign money to keep the economy growing. Foreign investors are buying aggressively, taking advantage of American duress and a weak dollar to snap up what many see as bargains, while making inroads to the world’s largest market.

Last year, foreign investors poured a record $414 billion into securing stakes in American companies, factories and other properties through private deals and purchases of publicly traded stock, according to Thomson Financial, a research firm. That was up 90 percent from the previous year and more than double the average for the last decade. It amounted to more than one-fourth of all announced deals for the year, Thomson said.

Read the whole article here.

First posted 1-20-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Hilarious Colbert Report Interview with Lou Dobbs

2008-02-04T23:59:00.001-08:00

See the original vid on Comedy Central here.

The Huffington Post published this piece about last night's Colbert Report spoof interview (above) with Lou Dobbs by Colbert's Spanish-language counterpart, Esteban Colberto. The interview, according to HuffPost Media & Special Projects Editor Rachel Sklar, was actually a clever re-edited version of Colbert's interview with Dobbs from a year ago.

Read Sklar's article at HuffPost here.

First posted 1-18-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

NH CONTEST: Diebold Miscounts Reported in First Day of Election Hand Recount

2008-02-04T23:57:00.000-08:00

Blogged by Brad Friedman from on the road...

LATEST OUT OF NH: Disparities being found during hand-counts of ballots, in many wards, many candidates. Diebold op-scan memory cards unaccounted for at the moment, Secretary of State (SoS) doesn't track them after elections, doesn't track error reports during elections. LHS Associates (see below) handles all of it instead, according to reports on the ground. Public records request reveals hundreds of ballots in one area scanned as blank due to incorrect ink used on ballots, and other problems on LHS problem report forms.

Read the whole report here.

I will continue to post Brad's reports here on Whistling Dog.

First posted 1-17-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Survey Says? Bloomberg Couldn't Win

2008-02-04T23:55:00.000-08:00

[New York] Mayor [Michael] Bloomberg would lose the presidential vote in key states and even in New York City were he to run, according to a SurveyUSA poll commissioned by WABC. Despite his strong approval ratings in the city — currently 73% according to Quinnipiac University — Mr. Bloomberg would be able to claim, in his best scenario, 28% of the vote in a three-way race between Senator Obama and Michael Huckabee, losing easily to Mr. Obama. He fares even worse in other hypothetical match-ups, securing only 18% of the vote against fellow New Yorkers, Senator Clinton and Mayor Giuliani, and 21% against Ms. Clinton and Senator McCain.

Read the whole article here.

First posted 1-17-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

GOP funk slows turnout, money

2008-02-04T23:53:00.000-08:00

By: Jim VandeHei and John F. Harris
Jan 16, 2008 07:14 PM EST

Ten months before Election Day, Republicans are facing a threat that spells serious trouble for GOP candidates from the top of the ticket down to the most obscure races. The problem is the funk of the foot soldiers.

So far, the story of the 2008 campaign on the Republican side is what’s not happening.

Ambitious Republican politicians at the state and local levels are not deciding that this is the year to make a bid for higher office.

Republican contributors are not opening their wallets and writing campaign checks.

Most striking of all, Republican voters are not heading to the polls to vote in the GOP primaries in anything like participation rates of early years.

Read the whole article here.

First posted 1-16-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

New Hampshire Recount Granted

2008-02-04T23:52:00.001-08:00

This story, by Kristen Anderson at the Huffington Post, is a pretty good summary of my thinking about why we need a recount for the New Hampshire primary. We've heard all kinds of explanations for why the vote came out the way it did last week, and they all have their merits, but as we are just beginning the primary process, it behooves everyone to make sure we feel comfortable with the integrity of our election system.

When even the New York Times chimes in with an article entitled: "Can You Count on Voting Machines?" the Sunday before the New Hampshire primary, well...let's just say it will pay to make absolutely certain the results were accurate. At least New Hampshire uses all paper ballots, so there are physical marks for the recount counters to count.

Hats off to Dennis Kucinich and Republican candidate Albert Howard. I'm with Frank, who commented about my earlier posting on Kucinich's call for a recount, I hope Dennis stays in the race to the convention just so we will have a candidate who can and will request a recount everytime if necessary, if nothing else but for the sake of principle. -- wes grey wolf

By Wednesday morning, stories were flying all around the Internet--have you looked closely at the results of the primary? There was something strange about the votes, they said, about the difference between municipalities that hand-counted votes and those that used optical scanners. The chatter increased, and by Friday, the New Hampshire Department of State issued a press release announcing that two candidates, Democrat Dennis Kucinich and Republican Albert Howard had requested and been granted a recount, having met the following requirement:

"New Hampshire law, RSA 660:7, provides that "any person for whom a vote was cast for any nomination of any party at a state or presidential primary may apply for a recount." RSA 660:2, IV provides that if the difference between the vote cast for the applying candidate and a candidate declared elected shall be greater than 3 percent of the total votes cast in the towns which comprise the office to be recounted, the candidate shall pay the fees provided in RSA 660:2, III and shall agree in writing with the secretary of state to pay any additional costs of the recount." RSA 660:6 provides that if the person requesting the recount is declared the winner after the recount or loses by a margin of less than one percent of the total votes cast, the fees for the recount will be refunded by the State."

The recounts will begin on January 16, at a time and location to be announced after the state has completed an estimate of the cost and received payment based on that estimate.

Read the whole article here.

First posted 1-14-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

John Kerry Endorses Barack Obama in 2008

2008-02-04T23:49:00.000-08:00

This is a fine speech. I think strategically this is also an amazing move by the Obama campaign: on the heels of Hillary's turnabout in New Hampshire this week, the last Democratic candidate for President passes the torch instead to Barack Obama. Now this is an endorsement. I can't find the rest of this speech, but the Obama campaign has posted a shorter version of Kerry's speech and his introduction of Obama here.

YouTube video here.

First posted 1-11-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Barack Obama: Yes We Can

2008-02-04T23:45:00.000-08:00

Obama's speech after the New Hampshire primary. It's not just that this man speaks in beautiful cadences reminiscent of Martin Luther King, I think I find him so inspiring because he holds himself at all times with such dignity and a sense of perfect, effortless balance.

Every other politician has to work at looking comfortable in his own skin, but Barack Obama gives confidence to everyone else around him, he has it in so much abundance. Even my mother, a lifelong Republican, wants to vote for him. That's the whole story in a nutshell.

YouTube video here.

First posted 1-11-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Anne Rice Pitches for Hillary and Barack as the Democratic Party Ticket

2008-02-04T23:43:00.000-08:00

David Kuo, of all people, just posted this Anne Rice YouTube video in support of a Hillary Clinton candidacy -- with Barack Obama as Hillary's vice presidential candidate -- on the Huffington Post. If you don't remember David Kuo, he was once deputy director of the Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives for the Bush White House, until he walked and took his evangelical friends and credentials with him, then wrote and promoted the book Tempting Faith -- before the 2006 election.

VERY interesting...

First posted 1-10-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Kucinich Calls for New Hampshire Recount

2008-02-04T23:41:00.000-08:00

From a press release issued by the Dennis Kucinich campaign today, Thursday, January 10, 2008:

DETROIT, MI – Democratic Presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich, the most outspoken advocate in the Presidential field and in Congress for election integrity, paper-ballot elections, and campaign finance reform, has sent a letter to the New Hampshire Secretary of State asking for a recount of Tuesday’s election because of “unexplained disparities between hand-counted ballots and machine-counted ballots.”

“I am not making this request in the expectation that a recount will significantly affect the number of votes that were cast on my behalf,” Kucinich stressed in a letter to Secretary of State William M. Gardner. But, “Serious and credible reports, allegations, and rumors have surfaced in the past few days…It is imperative that these questions be addressed in the interest of public confidence in the integrity of the election process and the election machinery – not just in New Hampshire, but in every other state that conducts a primary election.”

Read the full press release here.

First posted 1-10-08 on the original Whistling Dog.

Sure, There Are Some Echoes, but '08 Won't Be '68

2008-02-04T23:39:00.000-08:00

Joel Achenbach published this thoughtful editorial in the Washington Post yesterday. It reflects my own thinking on the parallels between our time and forty years ago (I can scarcely comprehend that much time has passed, but so be it).

By Joel Achenbach , Sunday, December 30, 2007; B01

History repeating itself: It's a tidy premise. In fact, it's irresistible -- and wrong, but wrong in interesting ways that shed light on both years. Sure, elements of '68 persist in the world and in America today (because folly is durable), but the difference between 2008 and 1968 is the difference between needing psychotherapy and requiring a brain transplant.

Read the full editorial here.

First posted 12-31-07 on the original Whistling Dog.

Looking at America

2008-02-04T23:37:00.000-08:00

December 31, 2007
EDITORIAL

There are too many moments these days when we cannot recognize our country. Sunday was one of them, as we read the account in The Times of how men in some of the most trusted posts in the nation plotted to cover up the torture of prisoners by Central Intelligence Agency interrogators by destroying videotapes of their sickening behavior. It was impossible to see the founding principles of the greatest democracy in the contempt these men and their bosses showed for the Constitution, the rule of law and human decency.

Read the full editorial here. Note: You must have a subscription to read this editorial.

First posted 12-31-07 on the original Whistling Dog.

Fixin' To Die Rag - Country Joe & the Fish

2008-02-04T23:36:00.001-08:00

Okay, so this is an oldie, but so little has changed in this country over the last 40 years, and so much truly has changed, that it's worth looking back. The Iowa Caucuses are just a few days away, and it truly does feel a little like that time once more. The Circle Game, perhaps, as Joni Mitchell once sang.

First posted 12-30-07 on the original Whistling Dog.

Things Have Changed - Bob Dylan

2008-02-04T23:33:00.000-08:00

Lately I've been vacillating between the sentiments expressed in this wonderful Bob Dylan song from "The Wonder Boys" and something like The Jefferson Ariplane's old song "Volunteers." Let's just hope 2008 is less like 1968 and more like 1967.

First posted 12-30-07 on the original Whistling Dog.

Key Setbacks Dim Luster of Democrats' Year

2008-02-04T23:20:00.000-08:00

By Jonathan Weisman and Paul Kane
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, December 20, 2007; A01

The first Democratic-led Congress in a dozen years limped out of Washington last night with a lengthy list of accomplishments, from the first increase in fuel-efficiency standards in a generation to the first minimum-wage hike in a decade.

But Democrats' failure to address the central issues that swept them to power left even the most partisan of them dissatisfied and Congress mired at a historic low in public esteem.

Handed control of Congress last year after making promises to end the war in Iraq, restore fiscal discipline in Washington and check President Bush's powers, Democrats instead closed the first session of the 110th Congress yesterday with House votes that sent Bush $70 billion in war funding, with no strings attached, and a $50 billion alternative-minimum-tax measure that shattered their pledge not to add to the federal budget deficit.

"I'm not going to let a lot of hard work go unnoticed, but I'm not going to hand out party hats, either," said House Democratic Caucus Chairman Rahm Emanuel (Ill.).

On Iraq, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said yesterday: "Nobody is more disappointed with the fact that we couldn't change that than I am." But Pelosi was not about to accept Republican assertions that her first year as speaker has been unsuccessful, saying: "Almost everything we've done has been historic."

Read the full story here.

First posted 12-19-07 on the original Whistling Dog.

Dodd's Filibuster Threat Stalls Wiretap Bill

2008-02-04T23:18:00.000-08:00

From Sam Stein at the Huffington Post:

Senator Chris Dodd won a temporary victory today after his threats of a filibuster forced Democratic leadership to push back consideration of a measure that would grant immunity to telecom companies that were complicit in warrantless surveillance.

The measure was part of a greater bill to reorganize the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Earlier on Monday, the Senate, agreed to address a bill that would have overhauled FISA, authorized the monitoring of people outside the United States, given secret courts the power to approve aspects of surveillance, and granted telecom companies retroactive immunity for past cooperation.

But the threat of Dodd's filibuster, aimed primarily at the latter measure, persuaded Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-NV, to table the act until January. A compromise on the immunity will ostensibly be worked out in the interim period.

Read the whole article here.

First posted 12-18-07 on the original Whistling Dog.

William S. Burroughs' Thanksgiving Card to America

2008-02-04T23:14:00.000-08:00

This is a brilliant little polemic. It makes you cringe, and to wish what Burroughs says isn't true. But it all is. This is who we are as Americans, and who we have been, and not who we wish to be.

According to the YouTube summary, "...This is a short film by Gus Van Sant of Mr. Burroughs reading his poem called Thanksgiving Day Nov. 28, 1986." Here's the original video on YouTube.

There is also another more positive and hopeful side to America, of course. But I believe we cannot be who we want to be unless we accept the worst truths about ourselves. Burroughs lays it out, warts and worse, here.

We have certainly come face to face over the past few years with those parts of ourselves and of our society and our culture that we have preferred to lock away in secret cupboards. No doubt about that. All the crows are hanging about now and squawking, right in the open, from Bill O'Reilly to Mitch McConnell and Ann Coulter and the so-called Rev. James Dobson.

Pretend I'm Howard Beale for just one moment. I want you to get mad as hell. I want you to go to the window and open it and yell at all of those crows just like Terry Jones in Life of Brian. Repeat after me at the top of your voice (make sure you sound like an old British washerwoman now): "Go away!!"

Then take two Tylenol, but don't call me in the morning, please. Call your Senators and your Congressional Representative. Tell them what is on your mind. Be courteous. Their staff members are getting an earful right now on every subject. Please add yours to the mix.

Call the local Democratic candidate who is running in your district or state at whatever level and volunteer to work for them. Call your County Clerk's office and volunteer to work as a voting clerk or judge in the primaries next spring. Write a letter to the editor of your local paper and tell them what you see that bothers you and how you want to see us fix it as a community. And most of all, contribute, contribute, contribute as best you can with the means you have.

Whatever you do, don't just sit there. I'm serious.

First posted 12-18-07 on the original Whistling Dog.

An Early Movie with Two Men Dancing

2008-02-04T23:12:00.000-08:00

Found this not directly on YourTube but at the top of a DList profile of a wise-beyond-his-years young man.

First posted 12-18-7 on the original Whistling Dog.

Sen. Chris Dodd Plans a Filibuster over FISA

2008-02-04T23:09:00.000-08:00

Finally Something to Filibuster About

This CBS story was the headline link on Huff Post Sunday night.

I spoke with Sen. Chris Dodd's office several weeks ago after I heard him say on Air America that he planned to filibuster if the FISA "fix-it" bill came to the Senate floor with immunity for the telecom companies. Dodd's staff confirmed then that he planned to filibuster.

It appears he has stuck with his pledge. He should be supported and applauded.

Sen. Dodd (D-CT) has been an important articulator during this past year on the subject of Constitutional rights. His determined campaign to bring subjects like this to the front of the Democratic nomination process is one key reason all of the candidates made such a point of saying last week in Iowa that they would heal the Constitutional wounds that Bush has inflicted on this country.

The House has already passed a FISA bill that does not include telecom immunity, and in my opinion they should not get immunity. If they do, the courts -- which are dealing with numerous lawsuits on this subject right now -- and the Congress -- which has been investigating but not getting very far -- will never be able to uncover the un-Constitutional invasions of privacy shenanigans the telecoms have committed in collusion with the Bush Administration in the name fighting "terrorism."

Aside: Can one really declare a "war on terror?" Isn't that like declaring war on all the sand on all the beaches in the world? Answer: Yes. This is a completely futile and symbolic act, the only purpose of which is to keep the population stirred up and fearful, so one can do things like....infringe on people's civil liberties with relative impunity.

Anyway, please support Dodd's efforts to stop the Senate Intelligence Committee's FISA bill that coddles the telecom companies.

Please call your Senators now. Urge them to support the Judiciary Committee's FISA bill instead. This bill excludes immunity for the telecoms.

Both bills may come to the Senate floor as early as today, Monday, December 17.

The switchboard number for the US Congress (House and Senate) is: 212-224-3121.

First posted 12-17-07 on the original Whistling Dog.

Bill Clinton on Charlie Rose

2008-02-04T23:06:00.000-08:00

Charlie Rose has been a blogger on the Huffington Post since August 15. I'm sorry I had not noticed this, because I believe he does the most important interviews on TV. I've been watching him routinely for 20 years at least.

Here is part of his interview with Bill Clinton from yesterday, Friday, December 14.

You can see the rest of the interview on Charlie's program website at http://www.charlierose.com/guests/bill-clinton.

Please note that the URL link to Charlie's site on the Huffington Post is incorrect.

First posted 12-15-7 on the original Whistling Dog.

2008-02-04T23:05:00.001-08:00

May the Mind and Spirit in Each of Us
Recognize, Greet and Honor
the Divinity in Each of Us
this Holiday Season.

Season's Greetings to All

~Wes Grey Wolf

First posted 12-15-07 on the original Whistling Dog.