hogwash

Sarah Palin may have covered the spread last night, but it was only because the odds makers were not sure exactly how low to set the bar. For a comparison, imagine the coverage today if Al Gore, in 2000, would have acted like Sarah Palin did on Oct. 2nd, winking at America, spouting ill-timed slams on Biden like “say it ain’t so Joe,” and worst of all, essentially admitting that she was not going to answer the moderator’s questions.

Sarah Palin was typical last night, the real “Average Joe” of the evening, if you will. I understand that some people like that. I understand how some people think that having a typical, plain Palin in the White House is totally rad, dude. I understand how some people think that a lack of intellectual curiosity in the White House is a good thing. But dagnabbit people, this is America, and America is the most powerful nation in the world.

Being the most powerful human being in the free world is an incredible responsibility, and requires the attention of an incredibly qualified person. Running this amazing country is only simple in the acknowledgment of its complication; and gosh darnit, if I had my druthers, Americans would realize that.

Excuse me for a moment while I look “backwards” and ask my fellow Wasillian Main-Streeters what they think of typical leaders. What do you think was typical and “just like me” about George Washington? What do you think was typical and “just like me” about Ben Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, or James Madison? (Yes, I know Franklin was not a president, but America as we know it would not exist without him nonetheless.) What do you think was typical and “just like me” about John Adams? What do you think was typical and “just like me” about Abraham Lincoln, or Teddy Roosevelt, or FDR, or John F. Kennedy? (While being the son of a poor frontiersman, Lincoln was well-read, philosophical and was a successful attorney.)

Now, for comparison, *wink* what do you think is typical and “just like me” about George W. Bush? Remember? People were passionate about W because they could sit down and drink a beer with him. He was just like them. He understood them. He could not field dress a moose, God bless his soul, but darnnit, he could choke on a pretzel with the best of them. I mean, because he is just like, “us” he led this country into arguably the worse eight years of this country’s previously great existence. What is more “backwards” and regressive than that?

To all that voted for Bush, not once, but twice, for Christ’s sake, are you not embarrassed about that people? Are you not willing to at least take some of the responsibility for the current situation we find ourselves in as a country? Yes, there has been a failure in leadership, but that is only because there has been a major washout in followership. Democracies and republics fail for one overriding reason.  It is the failure of society to pay attention; to educate themselves on the complexities of the governance; their utter refusal to look in the mirror and take some responsibility for the failures of those whom they pick to lead.

Now, here we sit, on three hundred million straw pedestals, ready to pick the next great (or not so great) leader of the free world, and you are telling me that the major criteria of which almost half of this country is using to pick their next President is, “Well, she understands me, she gets me, she shares in my problems. She doesn’t know her ‘you know what’ from a hole in the wall, but she can recite prepared euphemisms and doublespeak with the best of them.” Are we really going to use the same criteria to pick the next president that we used to pick the last one? Are we really a country of gluttonous fools who want to continue relishing in the repercussions of the incredible weakness of our collective decisions?

I feel compelled to remind everyone that this is what we have psychiatrists and best friends for, not presidents and vice-presidents.

Am I aggravated? Yur darn toot’n I am aggravated. I don’t think this country can handle another four years of ignorant leadership. Even if you tattoo it with lipstick and call it change, it’s still W and Dick.

This is a fantastic article.  If you never read another Hogwash post, read this one…

A Conservative for Obama | D Magazine - Dallas Fort Worth’s Resource for City Guides, Daily Blogs, D Bests, and Restaurants
Barack Obama is not my ideal candidate for president. (In fact, I made the maximum donation to John McCain during the primaries, when there was still hope he might come to his senses.) But I now see that Obama is almost the ideal candidate for this moment in American history. I disagree with him on many issues. But those don’t matter as much as what Obama offers, which is a deeply conservative view of the world. Nobody can read Obama’s books (which, it is worth noting, he wrote himself) or listen to him speak without realizing that this is a thoughtful, pragmatic, and prudent man. It gives me comfort just to think that after eight years of George W. Bush we will have a president who has actually read the Federalist Papers.

Sarah Palin has been thoroughly exposed for the gimmick and fraud (in relation to the persona presented by the McCain campaign) that she is.  Whether 54 days is enough time for the average American voter to pick up on it is another story.  If the percentage of people who still believe that Iraq had a hand in 9/11 is any indication, the truth about Sarah Palin may never take hold.

So here is the deal, there probably is not much more that I can contribute to the Sarah Palin conversation that is not being exposed somewhere else.  Unless she makes some newsworthy blunder, or does something else to contradict or embarrass John McCain and his obviously poor judgment and critical thinking skills, I am not going to go out of my way to post it here.

What I am interested in right now is how the Bush administration has slowly begun to follow the Barack Obama foreign policy doctrine (maybe that is why Sarah Palin was confused – damn, what was that…like 15 seconds without mentioning Palin?)

All of the  things that John McCain and the Republican party used to call Obama naïve for, like an Iraq withdrawal time table…check.  Talks with Iran…check.  Ground forces in Pakistan without Pakistani permission…check.

This is like something out of the twilight zone.  If Barack Obama is so ignorant, naïve, and liberal, why have the Regressives adopted his foreign policy?

(Picture the penguin and the audio fade, “Do, be, do, be, dooooooooooo.”)

Update:  Apparently, Andrew Sullivan from the Atlantic concurs:
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/09/a-first.html

“The Bush administration - when guided by the saner forces within it such as Gates and Rice - eventually follows Obama’s advice. In that sense, Obama has been president for quite a while already. And proving he could be a shrewd, pragmatic and prescient one.”

The Sarah Palin Trojan Horse – with lipstick

The Trojan Horse metaaphor may have a new name after the 2008 election season, as the McCain campaign has set Sarah Palin outside of the American peoples’ doorsteps.  The Sarah Palin Trojan Horse is a perfect example of regressive deception politics, where a political machine will construct an imaginary “perfect” being for a given election and then set out to try and find the right person to fill that role.

The McCain campaign did not find Sarah Palin first and then bring her in to the campaign, they first devised their imaginary creature and then found Sarah Palin.  What is becoming apparent to me is that for several reasons, it did not matter to them that she was not thoroughly vetted.

First, there is only two months to the election.  Even though the religious idea of Sarah Palin being a real creature in the minds of regressive Republicans is only a shell for the contents of the real Sarah Palin biography, the McCain campaign is betting on the idea that it will take longer than two months for most American’s to ascertain the truth.  (Think Al-Qaeda/Iraq connection and Obama/Muslim falsehoods)  As a matter of fact, large percentages of Americans still believe those falsehoods to be true and this election will be over before the insides of the Palin Horse are discovered, or so the McCain campaign is hoping.

Basically, in politics, it doesn’t matter if it is true, all that matters is what Americans believe to be true.

Second, as the specs were developing for the Sarah Palin Trojan Horse, the McCain campaign most likely took his historically favorable relationship with the press, as well as their reaction to Hillary’s playing of the gender card in to consideration.  As soon as McCain unveiled his strategically placed Palin Horse to the American people, the press entered a state of confusion.  They did not really appear to know what to do.

Comments ranged from, “What a strategically brilliant move,” (William Kristol – Fox News) to Juan Williams, also of Fox News saying, “From this point on, I don’t ever want to hear conservatives complain about affirmative action.”  But for a couple of days, the press really dug in to do their jobs.  They began to investigate Sarah Palin’s biography, to find out what makes her tick and what her policy history is.

At the outset, the goal of the McCain campaign was to define Sarah Palin before anyone else could, and in doing so, Palin was presented to the American people, and the press, as your everyday Hockey mom, government reformer, who had rejected the bridge to nowhere, sold the governor’s private jet on eBay, and wants to open Alaska for drilling.  But, when the press began to dig, they started to find numerous inconsistencies in the McCain presentation of their Palin Horse.

Palin did not reject the “Bridge to nowhere” until it garnered national attention, and even campaigned for it as part of her platform to be elected governor, yet still kept the $200+ million.  Sarah Palin did not sell Alaska’s private jet on eBay, she tried, but after months and months on the site, she turned it over to a private aviation company to sell it.  Palin did not refuse federal earmarks as an elected official in Alaska, as a matter of fact, she hired a law firm to help her lobby the federal government for even more pork barrel monies, ending up on John McCain’s own “pork” list, and eventually leaving her town of less than 9,000 people more than $20,000,000 in debt.

And here is the kicker, at this moment, the McCain campaign is presenting the Palin Horse as real change, but at the same time, at this very moment, the Troopergate investigation is taking place in Alaska.  It is an investigation in to whether or not Sarah Palin abused her power in trying to get her ex-brother-in-law fired.  And now, the police union has filed a complaint that Palin and/or her aids may have illegally accessed his employment files.  That charge is not a slap your wrist kind of charge.  If true, it has the consequence of being an actual criminal act.  The investigator expects to be done by the end of October, but the McCain campaign is doing all it can to delay the results.  That is not reform and change, it is the epitome of everything that has been wrong about the last eight years in Washington.  It is straight out of the book of the Bush Administration.  Abuse of power.  How is that change?

But what has the press done with this readily available information?  Nothing, and the reason why is because the McCain campaign has played the same gender card that worked so effectively towards the end of Hillary Clinton’s run at the Democratic nomination.  The reason why it worked, and this is mostly a topic for another time, is because the press is full of personalities instead of hard-hitting reporters.  They are totally ratings and advertising driven, and quite frankly, when you insult them, they don’t have thick enough skin to deal with it, no matter how right they might be.  CNN’s Anderson Cooper appeared to be on the verge of tears during the analysis of the John McCain speech.  His self-consciousness manifested itself over and over with his self-effacing, sarcastic jokes about how he and Wolf Blitzer are apparently part of the “elite” media.

McCain gambled on his relationship with the press, as well as their thin skin, to see if he could insert his Palin Horse right in to the middle of this presidential race, and as of right now, he is winning.  There is little to no coverage from the mainstream media right now on Sarah Palin’s biography, nor the McCain campaign’s unwillingness to allow Palin to “Face the Nation” or “Meet the Press.”  It is exactly the same kind of press-release, mouthpiece, hands off coverage of American government that allowed the Iraq War wool to be pulled over the unsuspecting and politically naive eyes of the everyday American, the lie that made the so-called “surge” necessary in the first place.

It is one thing to win an election based on merit and policy; it is another thing completely to win an election based on a regressive deception.  The press, as the only institution specifically mentioned in the Constitution, has a duty to get to the bottom of the story and present the truth to the American people.  The success and long-term health of the great American Democracy depends on it, and the American people need to know what kinds of possible dangers are lurking inside of McCain’s Sarah Palin Trojan Horse.

“TOM RIDGE: Because John Bush - because John McCain is very much his own man…”

Wow.  What a difference 24 hours makes.  From Sarah Palin’s bullying pontification that got the regressives all excited, to the yawn of a reminder that the person they have to vote for as President is John McCain.  The last couple of days have allowed the regressive Republican party to have their moment in the sun, their last hurrah, if you will, but it will do no more than temporarily pull them even with the Barack Obama campaign.

While the excitement for Sarah Palin was genuine last night, the hooping and hollaring that took place tonight looked like it really took a lot of effort, almost like the state party heads reminded their delegations to try and keep a party-like atmosphere.  It felt manufactured.  Like one Fox commentator just said, “The crowd was really trying hard tonight to like John McCain.”  I think that statement needs to be picked apart because that is exactly what it felt like, like manufactured effort.

I am a political junkie, and I watch everything, even Fox News.  I actually changed channels during McCain’s speech.  I never do that.  I always watch what the regressives have to say.  But tonight, I just couldn’t.  Not out of anger or irritation, but out of complete boredom.

Granted, it is not a good idea to pick a President based on whether or not they bore you, but inspiration and change is what the 2008 election is about.

Several reasons why Barack Obama has this election in the bag are the things readers of Hogwash already know.  He inspires the average every day American that both as an individual, as well as collectively as a country, we can do better than what we are doing now, much better.  Anybody can say those things, but Barack Obama has proven time and time again over his life and his career that he has made people’s lives better.

His intellectual curiousity is unmatched in this campaign; his critical thinking skills are unmatched in this campaign; his judgement is unmatched in this campaign; and he is the epitome of Presidential temperament.

Barack Obama reminds me of FDR and his election on November 4th will bring the kind of pride back to this country that has not been experienced in my lifetime and probably not since FDR released his four essential freedoms of everyone in the world:

1. Freedom of speech and expression
2. Freedom of religion
3. Freedom from want
4. Freedom from fear

Regressives, welcome back to the Earth.  I guess that it is good for Sarah Palin that this is her party now, unfortunately for regressives (and fortunately for America) John McCain is the name at the top of the ballot.

Sarah Palin — Words versus Actions

It was Rethuglican theater at its finest. Fangs bared, red-meat flying, the crowds delirious with joy, the culture warriors in full battle mode. Of course, the media loved it. 

“And children with special needs inspire a special love.

“To the families of special-needs children all across this country, I have a message: For years, you sought to make America a more welcoming place for your sons and daughters.

I pledge to you that if we are elected, you will have a friend and advocate in the White House.”

Except, as governor, Sarah Palin slashed state funding for special education by 62%.

“I came to office promising major ethics reform, to end the culture of self-dealing. And today, that ethics reform is the law.”

Too bad, the law Governor Palin signed has been criticized for being weak and ineffective.

“I told the Congress “thanks, but no thanks,” for that Bridge to Nowhere. If our state wanted a bridge, we’d build it ourselves.”

Another piece of fiction. She supported the quarter billion dollar plus pork project and only said “no thanks” when the feds said she could keep the money for other projects. As governor, Palin asked for $750 billion in earmarks last year.

“I fought to bring about the largest private-sector infrastructure project in North American history. And when that deal was struck, we began a nearly forty billion dollar natural gas pipeline to help lead America to energy independence.”

But former Alaskan governors and business leaders are incensed because the pipeline ships that natural gas and most of the jobs to Canada.

“To confront the threat that Iran might seek to cut off nearly a fifth of world energy supplies … or that terrorists might strike again at the Abqaiq facility in Saudi Arabia … or that Venezuela might shut off its oil deliveries … we Americans need to produce more of our own oil and gas. 

“And take it from a gal who knows the North Slope of Alaska: we’ve got lots of both.”

The U.S. imports 65% of the oil it uses. By Department of Energy estimates, the North Slope can only provide about 1% of the oil we use — in 10 to 20 years. She may know the North Slope, but she obviously has a problem with math.

“Starting in January, in a McCain-Palin administration, we’re going to lay more pipelines … build more nuclear plants … create jobs with clean coal … and move forward on solar, wind, geothermal, and other alternative sources.”

But wait a minute, John McCain has never voted in favor of alternative energy — only more tax breaks for oil companies.

“The Democratic nominee for president supports plans to raise income taxes … raise payroll taxes … raise investment income taxes … raise the death tax … raise business taxes … and increase the tax burden on the American people by hundreds of billions of dollars. My sister Heather and her husband have just built a service station that’s now opened for business - like millions of others who run small businesses. 

“How are they going to be any better off if taxes go up?”

This oft-repeated whopper is typical Republican propaganda that has been disproved multiple times by independent analysis, yet the desperate spin-masters of God’s Only Party continue to repeat it any time they spy a microphone and camera. And it completely side-stepped the fact, that as mayor and governor, Sarah Palin has raised taxes.

“Senator McCain’s record of actual achievement and reform helps explain why so many special interests, lobbyists, and comfortable committee chairmen in Congress have fought the prospect of a McCain presidency - from the primary election of 2000 to this very day.”

Oh, please. John McCain has more than 160 Washington corporate lobbyists working on his campaign. He has reversed positions and back-tracked on more issues to secure this nomination than any candidate in modern times.

Leadership requires much more than sarcasm and mockery. It requires an understanding of the problems that face this country and a plan to move us forward. Sarah Palin has shown she is no more than an opportunistic, right-wing ideologue.

I thought about going through Sarah Palin’s 40 minute pontification and picking it apart point by point, but then I found the following link who had already done a fabulous job of it.

Instead of reinventing the wheel, I posted it here for the readers of Hogwash.

The Reality-Based Community: Palin v. Reality

Well, it has taken the British to report it, but here it is…

Joe Biden says Barack Obama might pursue criminal charges against Bush administration if elected | World news | guardian.co.uk
Obama might pursue criminal charges against Bush
· Biden says criminal violations will be pursued
· Democrats have issued subpoenas to Bush aides
· 3 staffers have been held in contempt of Congress

* Elana Schor in Washington
* guardian.co.uk,
* Wednesday September 03 2008 19:32 BST
* Article history

Democratic vice-presidential nominee Joe Biden said yesterday that he and running mate Barack Obama could pursue criminal charges against the Bush administration if they are elected in November.

Biden’s comments, first reported by ABC news, attracted little notice on a day dominated by the drama surrounding his Republican counterpart, Alaska governor Sarah Palin.

But his statements represent the Democrats’ strongest vow so far this year to investigate alleged misdeeds committed during the Bush years.

“If there has been a basis upon which you can pursue someone for a criminal violation, they will be pursued,” Biden said during a campaign event in Deerfield Beach, Florida, according to ABC.

Are you really a conservative?  Not likely.  A regressive…well, here is how to tell:

Regressive:

1. Tending to return or revert.
2. Characterized by regression or a tendency to regress.

Or in other words, moving this country, and humanity, backwards instead of forward - and wanting to take the rest of us down with them!

So, how do you tell if you are a Regressive?  Here are 22 good ways:
1.  If it is 2008, and you are still proud to call yourself a conservative, you are a Regressive.

2.  If you think Ann Coulter is hot, you are a Regressive.

3.  If you pee your pants, or if your face turns red every time you hear someone whisper, “Muhammad” you are a Regressive.

4.  If you would gladly turn over your freedoms guaranteed by our constitution for a little “safety,” not only would you be a coward, you would be a Regressive.

5.  If you think it is manly to keep a gun on your hip like you’re Wyatt Earp or something, you would be a Regressive.

6.  If you think Jesus Christ would agree with your hatred of black people and gays, you would be a Regressive.

7.  If capital gains tax cuts are more important to you than education, health care, justice, falsifying CIA intelligence on White House letterhead about uranium in Niger, you are a Regressive.

8.  If you mispronounce the name of the country Niger, you are a Regressive.

9.  If you still believe that Barack Obama is a Muslim, not only would you be in fairyland, you would be a Regressive.

10.  If you believe that Jesus Christ gives a crap about whether or not December 21st through January 3rd is called Christmas Break or Winter Break, you would be a Regressive.

11.  If you believe that the government should be able to tell people who they can or can not love, you would be a Regressive.

12.  If you believe that the government should regulate whether or not a woman has to give birth when a sperm cell penetrates a vaginal egg, you would be a Regressive.

13.  If you believe that God has broken heaven in to different levels, one for Mexicans, one for Blacks, One for Chinese people, a really high level where you and 15 billion other white Americans who have lived from Adam and Eve until judgment day (2012) will be sitting at the right hand of the Lord himself, you would be a Regressive.

14.  If you still think Rush Limbaugh has any credibility left, you would be a Regressive.

15.  If you still believe that Fox News is fair and balanced, you would be a Regressive.

16.  If you believe that there are people out there actually breaking the law so that they can vacation at some imaginary Cook County Jail in Illinois, you would be a Regressive.

17.  If you still think that Extremist Wahhabi Muslim Osama Bin Laden was partnering with Sunni Iraqi Saddam Hussein, you would be a clueless dunce…and a Regressive.

18.  If you think building a fence to keep Mexicans from taking our “jobs” makes us any different that than third century B.C. Chinese people, you would be a Regressive.

19.  If you think that the Earth is only six thousand years old and that Jesus rode bareback on Tyrannosaurus Rex, you would be a Regressive.

20.  If you believe that progressive liberals somehow have no respect for tradition, you would be a Regressive.

21.  If you believe that fire is just a fad, you are a Regressive.

22.  If you have read this list and still plan to vote for John McCain in November, you would be a Regressive.

Stay tuned for more ways to tell if you are a Regressive.

 All of the empty rhetoric from the Bush Administration and the McCain camp’s manufactured consent operations has many people believing that things are going well in Iraq and that the surge is working.  Well, that is a bunch of hogwash, and by saying that, I am not making light of the situation.  It is the vilest of hogwash, a disgusting manipulation of an American population that is just trying to make ends meet.  The problem for people who know the truth, and want to communicate the truth, is that the situation is complicated and requires a very large attention span to understand.

That is exactly how the Republican Party operates.  They oversimplify very complicated topics, appealing to the worse of human nature, in order to get everyone to fall in line behind their ignorance.

The real truth about the current situation in Iraq is that it is the world’s largest segregated prison, with an entire generation of children, full of bottled up rage and anger over everything and anything American.

When I saw this video, it made me sad for our country’s future, and for the future of my four children.  At first, I was almost in tears for the boy, and then when I heard him say what he said, I wanted to wring his neck; and then the reporter said what he said, “It doesn’t matter if it is true what they believe or not.”  And he was right on the money.  It doesn’t matter why an entire generation of Iraqi’s hate us.  The fact of the matter is that they do, and it certainly will not be hard to convince them at some point to mobilize against us.

This war isn’t even close to being over.  Whether the next President pulls our troops out in 16 months or not, Bush has put us in an untenable situation of epic proportions, and that is the truth of the matter.