Zandar's Thought Of the Day

Obama's going to need that $150 million plus whatever he gets down the stretch here. Every penny of it. Despite all the ads and the spending and the debate wins and the economy and the weaknesses of McSame/Palin/Preznitman/Nameless One...he still has to get 270 electoral votes, the GOP is pulling out all the sleaziest, most horrific garbage imaginable, and they have lost control over their Hatenstein's monster.

Everything I have seen so far has indicated to me that this may be the most turbulent two weeks America has seen in generations, and I have my doubts that this election will be over by November 4. Once again I believe this will go to the courts, I just don't know which state will be the margin, perhaps NC or Missouri or Ohio or Florida or even Colorado.

I just don't believe in the Obama getting 350-400 EV theory. It's going to be one state deciding this election again.

But which one?

Why Is It So Hard For The Democrats To Stop Cowering?

Digby once again brings us yet another example of Democrats pissing themselves with abject fear rather than realizing the American people are about to give them a complete mandate for real change.

On Stephanopoulos this morning:

Newt Gingrich: If Obama won and had a moderate House and a moderate Senate, he would probably be a moderate president. His temperament would lead him to be much more like Richard Daley than like Eeverend Wright. He's not gonna have that. he';s gonna have card check to take away your right to a secret ballot. He's going to have an effort to eliminate freedom of speech for Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity. He's going to have a congress that wants to raise taxes, that wants to increase government --- is he really going to veto and fight with Pelosi and Reid? ... As the Wall Street Journal said on Friday, here is what their promising their allies they're going to do.

Donna Brazile: Yeah, but they're not in office Mr. Speaker. Senator Obama wil inherit a 10 trillion dollar deficit and he's going to have to put things on the table that perhaps many of us would not like to see a Democratic president put on the table in terms of cutting back on spending, freezing hiring and making some real tough decisions. So, I think he will be constrained by the deficit and also by the fact that we're still in two major wars.

That's a relief. No need for anyone to worry that Obama isn't going to govern like a Republican. Except, you know, Republicans are really unpopular.

Gingrich is playing for 2010, here, preparing his troops to run against the already unpopular congress. He's calling Obama a wimp for being unable to stand up to his crazed, radical base. It's a natural move for the Republicans.

But there is no excuse for Brazile to fall into the rhetorical fetal position and help him. My God, we are in the final two weeks of a presidential campaign which is taking place in the middle of an economic crisis and is this the best she can do? He gave her the perfect opening in the world --- "the Republicans are more worried about a non-existent free speech threat to multi-millionaires like Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity than they are about the real threat to average Americans financial security. Obama is going to be dealing with real problems of average people and will do what it takes to get this country back on the right track after the Republicans drove it off the rails over the last eight years."

After a generation of Democrats cringing from the mere sight of the whip hand, they have a chance to take this country in a brand new direction...but they are still so afraid of the Right Wing Noise machine that they're still afraid to even try to resist.

Not all of them are. Obama's core team stands as testament to the power of belief. But the rest of the Washington Democratic apparatus is terrified that Contract With America II is going to come for them and put another 12-year lock on the House door. It hasn't occured to them that rolling over like dogs was what cost them in 1994, 1996, 1998 and 2000. Capitulation got us Bush in the White House for 8 years after that, a good 14 years of conservative bullshit that culminated in catastrophe after catastrophe, and yet like Stockholm Syndrome the Village Dems are petrified that they will offend their righg-wing overlords.

It's time to decide who we keep and who we toss overboard in November, folks. Village idiots? They get jettisoned first. Digby's brilliant summation:

No wonder Gingrich looked like a very fat cat with a mouthful of yellow feathers when she said that. He's winning even as he's losing.

Stop fearing them. Start fighting them. Look at what Obama is doing. Let him DO it. Help him DO it.

Not Even He Deserves This

Now, I have my problems with Colin Powell, but not even Colin Powell deserves to be called a racist by El Rushbo of all people.

Rush Limbaugh said Colin Powell's decision to get behind Barack Obama appeared to be very much tied to Obama's status as the first African-American with a chance to become president.

"Secretary Powell says his endorsement is not about race," Limbaugh wrote in an e-mail. "OK, fine. I am now researching his past endorsements to see if I can find all the inexperienced, very liberal, white candidates he has endorsed. I'll let you know what I come up with."

As for Powell's statement of concern this morning about the sort of Supreme Court justices a President McCain might appoint, Limbaugh wrote: "I was also unaware of his dislike for John Roberts, Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Anthony Kennedy and Antonin Scalia. I guess he also regrets Reagan and Bush making him a four-star [general] and secretary of state and appointing his son to head the FCC. Yes, let's hear it for transformational figures."

You'd better believe race is now front and center in this campaign for the GOP. They aren't even hiding it any more. Colin Powell is now Just Another Uppity Negro to them, and in a heartbeat he has gone from the poster boy for Big Tent Republicanism to a racist shill for Obama.

Not that Colin Powell doesn't deserve some time alone in the wildnerness with his sins when he DIDN'T stand up and do the right thing in 2002. Believe me, endorsing Obama doesn't begin to make up for his crimes.

But he's being burned at the stake for the wrong thing. Irony, Schadenfreude, call it what you will. I call it two wrongs don't make a right. Because I'm human, I do feel a bit sorry for the man.

Then I remember the fact he helped lie us into a war where we killed hundreds of thousands, and that was THIS war...not Vietnam. He still has to answer to the Gods Above And Below for My Lai, for example.

He's got nobody now. He has plenty of time for reflection, I'd imagine.

Perhaps Obama should offer him a position as Outreach Advisor To Black People Crazy Enough To Vote Republican. I know a few. If the GOP is willing to have El Rushbo crucify the man, no black person in the GOP is safe, or even above suspicion at this point.

But there you have it. We're now into full blown public racism territory here with 16 days to go.

[UPDATE] George Will equates Colin Powell to Al Sharpton, and basically accuses America of reverse racism.



Colin Powell is now as black as coal to the GOP. Absolution by public flogging by the right won't save him in my eyes, but again, that doesn't change the fact the GOP is now run and represented by racist, bigoted assholes.

In this case I think this is his way of receiving penance, scourging himself by way of public flogging by the right. Maybe he's trying to break with the administration and the GOP for good and this was the last straw.

But if that's the case, he's doing this for the benefit of Colin Powell, not Barack Obama. Which means he deserves no absolution.

You have to actually be sorry to be forgiven. He had years to make this break.

Too little. Far too late.

Another Link From Zandardad

Pop's a good man, sending me links to articles when he has time. Today's offering is a heads up on Andrew Sullivan's piece this morning on Sarah Palin, serial liar.

This is indeed odd. Here is Palin answering Hannity's question about her decision to accept the vice-presidency:

"It was a time of asking the girls to vote on it, anyway. And they voted unanimously, yes. Didn't bother asking my son because, you know, he's going to be off doing his thing anyway, so he wouldn't be so impacted by, at least, the campaign period here. So ask the girls what they thought and they're like, absolutely. Let's do this, mom."

But here's the official tick-tock of the announcement from McCain communications director Jill Hazelbaker on August 29:

"Later that morning, John McCain departed for Phoenix and Governor Palin departed with staff to Flagstaff, Arizona. Governor Palin, Kris Perry, Steve Schmidt and Mark Salter proceeded to the Manchester Inn and Conference Center in Middleton, Ohio. They were checked into the hotel as the Upton Family. While there, Governor Palin’s children, who had been told they were going to Ohio to celebrate their parents’ wedding anniversary, were told for the first time that their mother would be a nominee for Vice President of the United States of America."

In other words, Sarah Palin isn't telling the truth in a campaign where she's publicly calling Barack Obama a lying, terrorist pallin', un-American socialist.

And people wonder why McSame/Palin is losing this election.

Colin Powell Endorses Obama

Which is big news or something.

Former Secretary of State Colin Powell announced Sunday that he will be voting for Sen. Barack Obama, citing the Democrat's "ability to inspire" and the "inclusive nature of his campaign."

"He has both style and substance. I think he is a transformational figure," Powell said on NBC's "Meet the Press."

"Obama displayed a steadiness. Showed intellectual vigor. He has a definitive way of doing business that will do us well," Powell said.

Powell, a retired U.S. general and a Republican, was once seen as a possible presidential candidate himself.

Powell said he questioned Sen. John McCain's judgment in picking Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate because he doesn't think she is ready to be president.

He also said he was disappointed with some of McCain's campaign tactics, such as bringing up Obama's ties to former 1960s radical Bill Ayers.

Powell served as secretary of state under President Bush from 2001 to 2005.

The notion of a Powell endorsement has been rumored for several months.

As a response, I'll post my comment from the Frog Pond last night on the rumor that Powell was indeed going to endorse Obama today:

It's not too late for Powell to join the human race.

Oh wait...after his "Saddam's mobile WMD labs" bullshit helped Dubya kill hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and THAT didn't disturb him enough to speak the truth, I don't give a damn about what he has to say unless it starts with "I believe my actions constituted being an accessory to one of the greatest war crimes in world history" and that is just a starting place.

He must then go from there. Then we can talk about what he has to say about the GOP as America's mainstream hate crime party.

Otherwise, fuck Colin Powell.

End.

Virginia, West Virginia, And Real Virginia

McSame spokesperson Nancy Pfotenhauer isn't even trying to hide the "Dems are anti-American" slant anymore, directly calling the red parts of southern Virginia the "Real Virginia" on MSNBC. The Democrats that moved in from DC, you know -- hippies and colored people --they're polluting the Commonwealth or something. Nancy then got busy rattling off other "real" states like Minnesota's iron range, rural Pennsylvania and Indiana. Rest of the country is full of traitors, apparently.



The MSNBC host gives her an out on the "Real Virginia" crack. She then steps in it even further by saying it's the "part of the state that's more Southern in nature". Northern Virginia is apparently just "Metro DC". Hell, DC doesn't even have a Senator. It's not a real state, they aren't real people, and they're going to put "That One" in office. You don't have to be a genius to hear the "real Virginia is more Southernin nature" dog whistle when a black man is running.

They're not even trying to use the outs and free passes the media is giving them anymore. That's how much they hate America for turning on the GOP...Democratic areas of the country and the people who live there just don't count as Real America anymore.

Hell, just install McSame as President and take the right to vote away from registered Democrats. They're not real Americans.

The $150 Million Man

Obama campaign manager David Plouffe announced this morning that with more than 600,000 new donors, the Obama team raised a staggering $150 million in September alone.

In a video to supporters, Obama campaign manager David Plouffe said a record 632,000 new donors gave to the campaign, with the average contribution under $100. More than 3 million donors have given so far.

The Obama campaign raised $65 million in August.

Regardless of the stunning haul, Plouffe told supporters the campaign still needed more money because "of the slime that we're getting from the McCain campaign." Plouffe cited recent attack ads and robo calls in battleground states and said the campaign needed to have every resource to "fight back."

"Their campaign is going to descend even more into the gutter," he said.

Plouffe also said the campaign was expanding its reach to compete "aggressively" in West Virginia.

Tightening polls in Georgia and North Dakota meant more money and resources could be sent to those two states in the remaining days, he said.

"We can't afford to make any cuts. We have to execute everything we think is required to win," Plouffe said of their battleground strategy. "None of us can look back on the night of November 4 or the morning of November 5 and wished we had done something extra."

The video is here.

This is nothing short of mind-blowing. Donors gave nearly twice as much money in one month as McSame's entire campaign war chest. No wonder he's losing. The people are putting their cash where their hearts are, and their hearts are with Obama.

Zandar's Thought Of the Day

When GOP party officials, sitting GOP members of Congress, and campaign officials up to and including the douchebag running for President say ACORN ACORN DEMOCRAT VOTER FRAUD REZKO BLOOGITY BLAH BLAH OSAMA BIN BIDEN ACORN MUSLIM PLANT SOCIALIST TERRORIST AYERS ACORN SCARY BLACK MAN IN THE FOYER I SAY OLD CHAP I MUST ABSCOND TO THE BILLIARDS ROOM AND RETRIEVE MY BLUNDERBUSS WHAT WHAT REZKO ACORN TRAITOR! *deep breath* what they really mean is:

1. Do not pay any attention to arguably the worst-kept secret in America that is our continuing effort to steal this election (which we admit isn't going so well right now.)
   
2. In case #1 is unsuccessful, our official excuse as to why our brilliant plan to steal the election didn't work is that Obama must have stolen the election. Get him.

So yeah, I wouldn't put it past these assholes to call for impeachment investigations into Obama's "unprecedented voter fraud" before he even takes office.

You thought they hated Bill Clinton? You have no clue what hate is.

And when the investigation and impeachment calls are laughed off the national stage, the only question is how long will it take before somebody decides to "martyr themselves to save America from Obama" after the hate merchants say "Who will rid me of this troublesome Negro?"

Watch the reaction to that when it inevitably happens. I'm calling now that the wingnuts say:

Despite the tragic actions of this individual, such unfair blanket condemnations of our efforts to have Obama explain the unanswered questions surrounding his so-called "victory" is an affront to free speech. Instead, Mr. Obama owes the people of America a detailed explanation in order to bring closure to the wounded nation to calm the fury against him.

You guys think I'm joking, or engaging in hyperbole that the wingnuts in this country will blame Obama for somebody trying to kill Obama.

I'm not. It's only a question of how long it will take.

Helpful Bush Is Helpful

With the world financial crisis looming large over everyone, Preznitman decides to be Presidential again and will hold a world financial summit to solve the problem...and if that doesn't help, he'll hold...MORE MEETINGS!

President Bush announced Saturday that he will host the first of what could be several summits of world leaders to discuss the global response to the financial crisis.

"It is essential that we work together because we're in this crisis together," Bush said at Camp David, Maryland, with French President Nicolas Sarkozy and European Union President Jose Manuel Barroso.

"Together we will work to modernize our financial systems," Bush said. "We must resist the temptation of financial isolationism."

Bush said the summit would include developed and developing nations from around the world.

No date was set, though a White House statement said the gathering would be held in the United States "soon after" the November 4 general election.

Translation: "This problem is potentially catastrophic, but not catastrophic enough for me to do anything about it for at least three weeks, because every time I'm in the news, John McSame loses 2 points in the polls."

Do you think if Obama wins, Bush will invite Obama or any of his economic team to these summits?

I wouldn't hold your breath on that.

StupidiNews, Weekend Edition

• Dallas's school district made an accounting mistake...costing them $84 million and hundreds of teachers.
• Billy Joel and Bruce Springsteen rocked out for Obama.
• A physicist has had 53 years to work on all the time in the world.
• Hundreds of protesters descend on Wall Street to boo the UberBailout.
• 30 million computer users have fallen for fake virus fixing adware.

Michele Bachmann And The New McCarthyism

Folks, bookmark this post. Minnesota Republican Michele Bachmann goes off the charts here on the wingnut Obama-hating insanity.



"What I would say is that the news media should do a penetrating expose and take a look. I wish they would. I wish the American media would take a great look at the views of the people in Congress and find out if they are pro-America or anti-America."

Folks, this is a sitting member of Congress asking for investigations of Barack Obama and other sitting Democratic members of Congress and the media for what amounts to suspicion of treason. You do not get any more wingnut batshit crazy then this. Do you think she will "reach across the aisle" to embrace a President Obama?

Afterwards, The Nation's Katrina Vanden Heuvel takes Michele McCarthy out back to the woodshed, and not even Pat Buchanan will defend her.



At least there are some folks willing to stand up to incendiary nutjobs like Bachmann (and Sarah Palin for that matter) but there is a violently angry wing of the GOP that will never, under any circumstances, accept a Democrat in office. To them, a Democrat elected over a Republican is against the natural order of things...and one as President is tantamount to the most foul blasphemy. Throw in the fact this Democratic President is an African-American, and you get Michele Bachmann's tirade tonight on Hardball.

To her, Barack Obama literally represents the End Of Days. There are millions more folks like Michelle Bachmann out there, ranging from ignorant to hateful to downright violent. The GOP will let Bachmann and others like her spout their tirade, with the whole point of the exercise to dehumanize Barack Obama to the point of illegitimacy.

They honestly can't believe he will President. But he is not their President if elected, oh no. They will not recognize him as such if he wins. He will never be legitimate to Michelle Bachmann and her hate squad. They will attack him in a fashion that makes the GOP crusade to impeach Clinton look like a "minor playground misunderstanding."

This is the new McCarthyism, folks. Democrats are the Enemy. They must be destroyed by any means necessary. Should Obama become our next President as he most likely will be, they won't rest until Obama is gone. And you can take "gone" in any number of unpleasant ways, including the most dire.

We have a Secret Service protecting the man for a reason. And tirades like Michele Bachmann's exquisite little mountain of bile there serve only to fuel the need for more Secret Service protection for the President. My greatest fear is that somebody from this vile, hate-filled little place will say "Hell yeah, he's a damn traitor!" and take it upon themselves to rescue the country by doing something horrendous. We have quite a long history of good Presidents having their terms cut short.

I cannot help but pray that when that security detail is tested...when, not if...that our country can survive. I say "when" because various attempts have been made on every President's life since Kennedy's assassination. Of 43 Presidents, four have been assassinated. Two more were rumored to have been assassinated, and again, various attempts have been made.

It's not really a question of "if", really. It's how many...how many will be fueled by this sort of "free speech"?

Supremes Come Through

With a unanimous 9-0 decision, the Supreme Court told the Ohio GOP to go intercourse itself...for now.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled today in favor of Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner, overturning a lower-court order that she provide to county elections boards by today details of discrepancies discovered with new voter registrations.

The court ruled 9-0 that the Ohio Republican Party, which sued Brunner for the information, was unlikely to succeed in its arguments that Brunner legally could be sued on this issue and that the courts had the authority to issue the order.

But the court expressed no opinion about whether federal law was being followed properly.

At issue is what should be done when personal information from newly registered voters doesn't match state motor vehicle and federal Social Security records after an automatic computer check is done.

The ruling settles for now a dispute that had worked its way through the lower federal courts in recent days, with district and appellate judges taking different sides on the issue.

The problem is that the issue of the dispute itself hasn't been addressed, only that the court wasn't the right avenue for it.

This may be over for now, but not for good.

Pointing Out McSame's Race-Baiting Proves Obama's A Racist

According to Chuck Krauthammer anyway. He's pissed at his own employer the NY Times calling McSame out on this, and insists that the only racism in this campaign is the stuff Obama's making up...

Let me get this straight. A couple of agitated yahoos in a rally of thousands yell something offensive and incendiary, and John McCain and Sarah Palin are not just guilty by association -- with total strangers, mind you -- but worse: guilty according to The New York Times of "race-baiting and xenophobia."

But should you bring up Barack Obama's real associations -- 20 years with Jeremiah Wright, working on two foundations and distributing money with William Ayers, citing the raving Michael Pfleger as one who helps him keep his moral compass (Chicago Sun-Times, April 2004) and the long-standing relationship with the left-wing vote-fraud specialist ACORN -- you have crossed the line into illegitimate guilt by association. Moreover, it is tinged with racism.

The fact that, when John McCain actually heard one of those nasty things said about Obama, he incurred the boos of his own crowd by insisting that Obama is "a decent person that you do not have to be scared (of) as president" makes no difference. It surely did not stop John Lewis from comparing McCain to George Wallace.

The search for McCain's racial offenses is untiring and often unhinged. Remember McCain's Berlin/celebrity ad that showed a shot of Paris Hilton? An appalling attempt to exploit white hostility at the idea of black men "becoming sexually involved with white women," fulminated New York Times columnist Bob Herbert. He took to TV to denounce McCain's exhumation of that most vile prejudice, pointing out McCain's gratuitous insertion in the ad of "two phallic symbols," the Washington Monument and the Leaning Tower of Pisa.

Hey Chuckles, keep telling yourself there's no racism in this campaign by Republicans that McSame isn't repudiating, especially when his entire campaign is based around plausible deniability of racist smears against Obama.

He then gets the assist from assholes like Chuckles here who clutch their pearls and want to know how dare Democrats (and Republicans and human beings in fact) get upset at this kind of thing, because pointing out these actions means Obama is "playing the cynical race card". The correct answer Chuckles is that when Republicans do this, they get called out on it, which probably explains why your boy Sidney there is losing by double digits.

The GOP Tries To Steal Ohio And More Part 2

Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner's counterstroke against the Ohio GOP's legal victory forcing her to come up with a plan to verify all of Ohio's new voters? Appealing to the Supreme Court on the grounds that forcing the new voters to cast provisional ballots will disenfranchise hundreds of thousands.

Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to decide how 200,000 Ohioans will be voting in the presidential election.

Brunner wants those newly registered voters to use regular ballots. The Ohio Republican Party would prefer that they fill out provisional ballots to give boards of elections time to determine whether they are eligible to vote or not.

Late Wednesday, Brunner appealed a ruling from the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that would force her to cross-check the names of people who have registered to vote or updated registrations since Jan. 1 against a state driver's license database. She would then have to tell Ohio's 88 boards of elections how to deal with people who don't match up.

Brunner fears voter suppression if the appeals court decision stands, since many provisional ballots are not counted for a variety of technicalities.

The GOP says a reversal of the appeals ruling would increase chances of voter fraud.

The court could decide to take up the case today.

At stake here is just how tough voter verification laws need to be surrounding the Help America Vote Act, or HAVA, passed after Florida in 2000.

The Republicans argue that ideally anything less than 100% certainty and Federal uniformity in state voter eligibility laws will result in voter registration fraud and vote fraud, and that the right to vote is the most cherished right in America and therefore should be the most protected, and that if Americans seriously want to exercise that right, they must be willing to endure close scrutiny on behalf of the country. There is plenty of evidence that rigged elections throughout the world are a problem.

Democrats argue that there's no evidence of the kind of voter fraud the Republicans are complaining about, and that they are in fact trying to surpress millions of minority and poor voters -- traditionally Democratic voters -- in order to assure Republicans win elections. There's plenty of evidence to support laws designed to reduce turnout of these groups in our own history, laws struck down as unconstitutional burdens upon these voters.

The Supreme Court, if they take up the decision, could be deciding the future of voting in this country. It's very possible that the Supreme Court ruling will be used as a precedent across the country for minimum standards in voter eligibility checks. If they rule in favor of the Ohio GOP and do define strict guildelines for voter eligibility in the Buckeye State, there will be precedent to possibly rework voter eligibility laws across the country, and the challenges the GOP can make to new voters across the country, perhaps even in this election.

How much chaos would it cause if dozens of states that didn't already meet the strict guidelines the Supreme Court could hand down to Ohio had to then force all their new voters into provisional ballots? Millions of votes could get rejected across the country for not meeting the criteria, and that could turn an Obama landslide into a McSame victory.

If they side with Secretary Brunner, it may be a pyrrhic victory as well. Certainly the right wing Wurlitzer will sound off that more than ever McSame must win the election in order to replace the Supreme Court's "judicial activists" with "patriotic Americans" and will motivate even more hatred and bile against Obama than before. He will be seen as illegitimate by possibly millions of Americans, and it would only take one to possibly bring him harm, most likely spouting that famous Jeffersonian quote about the Tree of Liberty needing to be refreshed by the blood of patriots and tyrants.

Whether or not you agree that the GOP is trying to steal THIS election (I believe they are, they always play to win) they will try to set the stage for as much dehumanizing hatred as possible against Barack Obama. There will be violence eventually. It's just a matter of how deadly and widespread it will be. In these dire economic times, economic times that will get far, far worse before they get better, we will see good people do bad things in the name of what they believe to be justice.

This Supreme Court decision could become the GOP's final revenge against us all.

StupidiNews!

• Sarah Palin will in fact appear on SNL this weekend.
• Joe The Plumber? No plumber's license in Ohio.
• Washington Mutual's collapse has left a big hole in the Seattle charity scene.
• Brother, can you spare a job in Dayton?
• The Red Sox score a dramatic 8-7 comeback to stay alive against the Rays.