Hurricane Gustav Updates

Frank Rich on Why Obama is Winning:

Obama Outwits the Bloviators

Sunday 31 August 2008

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by: Frank Rich, The New York Times

Stop the presses! This election isn't about the Clintons after all. It isn't about the Acropolis columns erected at Invesco Field. It isn't about who is Paris Hilton and who is Hanoi Hilton. (Though it may yet be about who is Sarah Palin.) After a weeklong orgy of inane manufactured melodrama labeled 'convention coverage' on television, Barack Obama descended in classic deus ex machina fashion - yes, that's Greek too - to set the record straight. America is in too much trouble, he said, to indulge in 'a big election about small things.'

As has been universally noted, Obama did what he had to do in his acceptance speech. He scrapped the messianic 'Change We Can Believe In' for the more concrete policy litany of 'The Change We Need.' He bared his glinting Chicago pol's teeth to John McCain. Obama's still a skinny guy, but the gladiatorial arena and his eagerness to stand up to bullies (foreign and Republican) made him a plausible Denver Bronco. All week long a media chorus had fretted whether he could pull off a potentially vainglorious stunt before 80,000 screaming fans. Well, yes he can, and so he did.

But was this a surprise? Hardly. No major Obama speech - each breathlessly hyped in advance as do-or-die and as the 'the most important of his career' - has been a disaster; most have been triples or home runs, if not grand slams. What is most surprising is how astonished the press still is at each Groundhog Day's replay of the identical outcome. Indeed, the disconnect between the reality of this campaign and how it is perceived and presented by the mainstream media is now a major part of the year's story. The press dysfunction is itself a window into the unstable dynamics of Election 2008.

At the Democratic convention, as during primary season, almost every oversold plotline was wrong. Those Hillary dead-enders - played on TV by a fringe posse of women roaming Denver in search of camera time - would re-enact Chicago 1968. With Hillary's tacit approval, the roll call would devolve into a classic Democratic civil war. Sulky Bill would wreak havoc once center stage.

On TV, each of these hot-air balloons was inflated nonstop right up to the moment they were punctured by reality, at which point the assembled bloviators once more expressed shock, shock at the unexpected denouement. They hadn't been so surprised since they discovered that Obama was not too black to get white votes, not too white to win black votes, and not too inexperienced to thwart the inevitable triumph of the incomparably well-organized and well-financed Clinton machine.

Meanwhile, the candidate known as 'No Drama Obama' because of his personal cool was stealthily hatching a drama of his own. As the various commentators pronounced the convention flat last week - too few McCain attacks on opening night, too 'minimalist' a Hillary endorsement on Tuesday, and so forth - Obama held his cards to his chest backstage and built slowly, step by step, to his Thursday night climax. The dramatic arc was as meticulously calibrated as every Obama political strategy.

His campaign, unlike TV's fantasists, knew the simple truth. The New York Times/CBS News poll conducted on the eve of the convention found that the Democrats were no more divided than the G.O.P: In both parties, 79 percent of voters supported their respective nominees. The simultaneous Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll also found that 79 percent of Democrats support Obama - which, as Amy Walter of National Journal alone noticed, is slightly higher than either John Kerry and Al Gore fared on that same question (77 percent) in that same poll just before their conventions.

But empirical evidence can't compete with a favorite golden oldie like the Clinton soap opera. So when Hillary Clinton said a month ago that her delegates needed a 'catharsis,' surely she had to be laying the groundwork for convention mischief. But it was never in either Clinton's interest to sabotage Obama. Hillary Clinton's Tuesday speech, arguably the best of her career, was as much about her own desire to reconcile with the alienated Obama Democrats she might need someday as it was about releasing her supporters to Obama. The Clintons never do stop thinking about tomorrow.

The latest good luck for the Democrats is that the McCain campaign was just as bamboozled as the press by the false Hillary narrative. McCain was obviously itching to choose his pal Joe Lieberman as his running mate. A onetime Democrat who breaks with the G.O.P. by supporting abortion rights might have rebooted his lost maverick cred more forcefully than Palin, who is cracking this particular glass ceiling nearly a quarter-century after the Democrats got there first. Lieberman might have even been of some use in roiling the Obama-Hillary-Bill juggernaut that will now storm through South Florida.

The main reason McCain knuckled under to the religious right by picking Palin is that he actually believes there's a large army of embittered Hillary loyalists who will vote for a hard-line conservative simply because she's a woman. That's what happens when you listen to the TV news echo chamber. Not only is the whole premise ludicrous, but it is every bit as sexist as the crude joke McCain notoriously told about Janet Reno, Hillary and Chelsea Clinton.

Given the press's track record so far, there's no reason to believe that the bogus scenarios will stop now. The question of why this keeps happening is not easily answered. Ideological bias, unshakeable Clinton addiction and lingering McCain affection may not account for all or even most of it. Journalists are still Americans - even if much of our audience doubts that - and in this time of grave uncertainty about our nation's future we may simply be as discombobulated as everyone else.

We, too, are made anxious and fearful by hard economic times and the prospect of wrenching change. YouTube, the medium that has transformed our culture and politics, didn't exist four years ago. Four years from now, it's entirely possible that some, even many, of the newspapers and magazines covering this campaign won't exist in their current form, if they exist at all. The Big Three network evening newscasts, and network news divisions as we now know them, may also be extinct by then.

It is a telling sign that CBS News didn't invest in the usual sky box for its anchor, Katie Couric, in Denver. It is equally telling that CNN consistently beat ABC and CBS in last week's Nielsen ratings, and NBC as well by week's end. But now that media are being transformed at a speed comparable to the ever-doubling power of microchips, cable's ascendancy could also be as short-lived as, say, the reign of AOL. Andrew Rasiej, the founder of Personal Democracy Forum, which monitors the intersection of politics and technology, points out that when networks judge their success by who got the biggest share of the television audience, 'they are still counting horses while the world has moved on to counting locomotives.' The Web, in its infinite iterations, is eroding all 20th-century media.

The Obama campaign has long been on board those digital locomotives. Its ability to tell its story under the radar of the mainstream press in part accounts for why the Obama surge has been so often underestimated. Even now we're uncertain of its size. The extraordinary TV viewership for Obama on Thursday night, larger than the Olympics opening ceremony, this year's Oscars or any 'American Idol' finale, may only be a count of the horses. The Obama campaign's full reach online - for viewers as well as fund-raising and organizational networking - remains unknown.

None of this, any more than the success of Obama's acceptance speech, guarantees a Democratic victory. But what it does ensure is that all bets are off when it comes to predicting this race's outcome. Despite our repeated attempts to see this election through the prism of those of recent and not-so-recent memory, it keeps defying the templates. Last week's convention couldn't be turned into a replay of the 1960s no matter how hard the press tried to sell the die-hard Hillary supporters as reincarnations of past rebel factions, from the Dixiecrats to the antiwar left. Far from being a descendant of 1968, the 2008 Democratic gathering was the first in memory that actually kept promptly to its schedule and avoided ludicrous P.C. pandering to every constituency.

Nor were we back at Aug. 28, 1963. As a 14-year-old in Washington, I was there on the Mall, taken by my mother, a tireless teacher, with the hope that I might learn something. At a time when the nation's capital, with its large black population, was still a year away from casting its first votes for president, who would have imagined that a black man might someday have a serious chance of being elected president? Not me.

But even as we stop, take a deep breath and savor this remarkable moment in our history, we cannot linger. This is quite another time. After the catastrophic Bush presidency, the troubles that afflict us on nearly every front almost make you nostalgic for the day when America's gravest problems could still be seen in blacks and whites.

As Obama said, this is a big election. We will only begin to confront the magnitude of our choice when and if we stop being distracted by small, let alone utterly fictitious, things.

And this made me cry:

So Many Miles From Selma
By Eugene Robinson
Friday, August 29, 2008; Page A15

DENVER -- "I cried on Monday when Michelle spoke," Rep. John Lewis told me Wednesday at the Pepsi Center, "and I know that on Thursday night at the stadium I'll cry again."

Lewis, as every schoolchild should know, is one of the few lions of the civil rights movement still with us. As a Freedom Rider, he was pummeled by white Alabama mobs in 1961. As chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, he spoke alongside Martin Luther King Jr. at the March on Washington in 1963. His pate is scarred from a brutal beating administered by Alabama state troopers at the Edmund Pettus Bridge during the first Selma-to-Montgomery march in 1965. Lewis has earned the right to shed tears of amazement and joy.

A Democrat who represents Atlanta, Lewis fretted for months over whom to endorse in the primaries. Last October, he joined much of the black political establishment in backing Hillary Clinton -- out of a sense of loyalty and realpolitik. But as it became clear that Barack Obama might actually win the nomination, Lewis seemed increasingly agonized over the choice he had made. It wasn't just that he was catching hell from his African American constituents; nothing in John Lewis's biography suggests he even knows how to back down. Rather, he began to feel that he was on the wrong side of history.

"Something is happening in America, and people are prepared and ready to make that great leap," he said in mid-February. Two weeks later, he switched his endorsement to Obama.

We haven't heard much about race during the Democratic convention. That's clearly by design, and in terms of Obama's prospects it's probably a good thing. A recent New York Times-CBS News poll found that 16 percent of white voters feared an Obama administration would "favor blacks over whites." Obama has taken great pains to reassure voters that as president he would act without racial animus or resentment -- that he bears no grudges and intends to settle no scores. His success to date has depended largely on his ability to be seen as a candidate who happens to be black rather than as "a black candidate."
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Still, this is an amazing, unbelievable moment.

Wandering around the convention hall, I kept running into people with a kind of "pinch me, I'm dreaming" look in their eyes. I saw Spike Lee, who seems to be everywhere; in a television interview earlier in the week, he grandiloquently divided American history into two epochs, "B.B." and "A.B." -- Before Barack and After Barack. I saw New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, who was hoping he'd have the chance to witness Obama's acceptance speech before rushing home to prepare for the likely landfall of the evil-looking storm named Gustav. I met black delegates from Florida, California and various points in between, and they all said basically the same thing: Do you believe this is happening?

When Clinton came to the convention floor during Wednesday's roll call and asked that Obama be nominated "by acclamation," I got a lump in my throat. I knew that it wouldn't be official until Obama had given his acceptance speech, according to party rules, but there was something about the word "acclamation" that hit me. It implied an acceptance of leadership, a recognition of merit. African Americans have been an integral part of this nation since its birth and certainly don't need anyone's validation. Still, it feels as if this obvious historical fact has finally been acknowledged in a way that many of us felt we'd never witness in our lifetimes.

A black man is running as the Democratic nominee for president of the United States. Can you believe that?

Whether Obama wins or loses in November is important, to say the least; this feels like one of those potential turning-point moments for our nation, full of both peril and possibility. The campaign won't really even begin in earnest until next week, after the Republicans have held their convention. The debates are still to come; events surely will intrude; the polls will start to mean something; and what looks now like a squeaker of an election could turn into a landslide either way.

But let's not let this moment pass without fully appreciating what we've just seen. All Americans, regardless of race or party, should think of John Lewis bleeding on that Alabama bridge -- and then think of him at Invesco Field, watching a black man accept his party's nomination.

Tears are entirely appropriate.

eugenerobinson@washpost.com

And lest we overlook the contrast between the two unfolding campaigns, here is a joke John McCain told back in 1998, resurrected now that he is parading himself as a feminist:

http://www.salon.com/news/1998/06/25newsb.html

Though no tape of McCain's quip has yet emerged, this is what he reportedly said:

"Why is Chelsea Clinton so ugly?
Because her father is Janet Reno."

Can you say "track record"?

Our resources are stretched.

If this administration and it's Homeland Security and FEMA don't pull the rabbit out of the hat, it will be a September surprise for the GOP.

I'm pretty much gone for the rest of the day, joining with Obama for Change for America team and canvassing.

Please keep us updated. Thanks.

(Slugbug and sparrow),

Appreciate everything you do to keep this site up and running and informative. Yes, I know, there are bigger, more "IN" places to be on the blogosphere these days. But alot of us who still check in here are the same people who have been conversing since mid '04.

It's so wonderful and nice to have a place to have a "reunion"! A place to share our thoughts with people we have lived the past four hairy years with (in heart)and with who we have communicated our hopes and fears.

TSP...good luck canvassing. And yes, you're right. DCP is home for many of us.

On a different topic...Polly Sigh is checking out the RNC today. We (she) will provide updates as she can.

And last but not least, I've had text messages from people asking, "WTF?! Does McCain want to lose?"

I think I agree with Christy...he picked her so that he'd have a scapegoat.

Christy,

Email to you....

Sparrow - FPS is Secret Service-style protection for folks of Cabinet level and below who aren't high enough on the totem pole to get the Secret Service. So it probably means Paulison or Chertoff was coming through.

I am just glad the state & local governments have their acts together. Evacuating people in advance, doing away with the horrendous shelter-of-last-resort-Superdome, and having viable post-storm plans in place means that there won't be as much scrambling during & after. It's what the state & local gov'ts are supposed to do. It also means FEMA can do what it's supposed to (assist with recovery operations) instead of being expected to deliver supplies to / rescue people who never evacuated in the first place. And as cruel as it sounds, the city population is much smaller now - meaning fewer to evacuate - and some of the poorest and worst off never returned after Katrina.

Also - just to be nitpicky - Katrina didn't pass over NOLA either. Nor was NOLA in the NE quadrant (the worst part) of the storm's path, as predicted so far for this one. In fact, the storm passed over without catastrophic damage and everyone heaved a sigh of relief...oops...and then the levees burst. If this storm stalls out over the LA/TX border then there will be some serious flooding threats there as well.

And IMO it's a good thing they decided (against a hell of a lot of PC pressure) not to rebuild in some of the really low-lying areas of the city.

V--

I don't mind the pickyness. I prefer to be corrected if I'm wrong.

And regarding your information about the FPS, I checked out their website and they were very vague, but your description definitely fits what my brother witnessed.

I'll have to call him and let him know. Also, in Katrina, my brother was one of the truckers bringing in the bottled water; however, he refused to do anything with the dead bodies. As an independent truck owner, he couldn't risk contamination in his trailer. And he couldn't risk losing that trailer for weeks on end until they returned it.

Those were two of the many crazy things on our plate...all of a sudden, the order came down that we had to shove bottled water into every available nook and cranny on our helos, so they could airlift them in (trucks being stopped by clogged traffic, washed-out roads, and lack of fuel). Why we were suddenly responsible for getting bottled water to storm survivors was beyond me.

But it got better - next thing I knew, we were trying to source body bags from DOD...hundreds of them...so our helo & boat crews could pack up the victims I guess. They hadn't gotten as far as thinking about what we'd actually *do* with all these dead bodies.

It was really hard to get body bags though; even my amazing civilian with DOD experience & connections had problems. Why? There was a nationwide shortage of body bags due to OIF/OEF (wars in Iraq & Afghanistan).

V--

What a nightmare for everyone involved!

And thanks for not minding the talk of db's. I was a little worried if it would be taken the wrong way.

I think it's incredible to have a shortage of bb's, and that makes me wonder even more if our stats on the victims in Iraq & Afghanistan are worse than even I imagined.

That's really incredible work you coasties did for Katrina. And I'm thinking that you guys should have been there instead of Brownie and his direct underlings.

Hypocrites should not pray too hard because they just may get what they wish for, but when they play God, things may misfire.

YOU CAN NOT PETITION THE LORD WITH PRAYER!
(from a Jim Morrison song)

I am not a disbeliever in God but believe as my mother started to a couple of years ago when she turned away from organized religion - I am a disbeliever in the concept that God is so small that any politician or political party could "channel" through God or have "God" be on their side in battles which kill people. This is particularly true of "Christians" who believe the world is only 5000 years old, in the face of fossil and geological evidence or that men should control women's bodies or that white people should control minorities.

I had quit discussing religion on this blog but I have actually visited Focus on the Family last week AND the convention and they sinned when they prayed for rain even in jest. It makes me more not less religious but I want to stand in honor of something much bigger than the "Gods" of man and that includes every "organized" religion that gives too much power of interpretation to Imans, Priests, Ministers, Monks etc.

Amen.

If you don't doubt you live in a country with some racist yahoos whose ignorance passeth understanding, check this out. (video we did not post the code for, just the link - it is too vile) - posted by Nyc who went through 9/11 himself so has seen a tragedy firsthand.
http://silencedmajority.blogs.com/silenced_majority_portal/2008/08/wingnut-on-katr.html

I was wondering about this.

Democrats turned their attention to the storm as well. Presidential nominee Barack Obama offered to tap his sprawling network of donors and volunteers to help any victims of Gustav.

"I think we can get tons of volunteers to travel down there if it becomes necessary," Obama told reporters after attending St. Luke's Lutheran Church in Lima, Ohio. "I think we can activate an e-mail list of a couple of million people who want to give back," he said.

He said donations could include cash, goods and individual labor.

Obama said he might visit storm-damaged areas once "things have settled down."

more

I updated the front page with a comment - Starhawk's bus has been seized and it promotes sustainable gardening - the information came from an organic gardening blog.

How ironic. Only in America.

Slugbug...I always thought we passed up a missed opportunity in 2005 when the administration didn't facilitate people across the country opening up their homes to evacuees.

A ton of people did - even paying folks' plane tickets to get to their far-flung locales - but still, it could have used some presidential leadership.

I think this is one place where Obama's network would work really well even pre-landfall...and the supporters have already proved very willing to house other volunteers. Hmmm maybe I'll email their HQ.

Good idea slugbug and v.

I agree with both of you about the leadership that could have been more compassionate to the victims of the hurricane. But then again...we understand this leader and his administration, so we know compassionate conservative really just meant, "good b.s.'er"

~~

slugbug,

I agree with you. They sinned.

slugbug,

Thanks for keeping us posted on the arrests on the Home Page.

So much going on today, I guess we will be flipping back to those updates, Gustav updates, and soon...I think we'll have an update on the RNC and MN protests. (We'll see.)

Slugbug, it distressed me that Obama ended his speech the other night with the tired, "God bless America." What would be wrong with a candidate instead saying:

"God bless America, and her allies, and even those good people who happen to live in nations today which we consider our enemies."

Saying just "God bless America" is tantamount to saying "God bless me, and to hell with everyone else". If God exists, does anyone imagine that He, She, or It would respond to such a myopic, narcissistic plea?

Matthew
I was there and all I heard him say was "thank you" - I wondered why he didn't say "God Bless America" and maybe if he did it was drowned out (for me) by applause. There was also a Benediction after so I thought maybe that was it - and the prayer lambasted those who promote fear and so on - and it made a call to affirm in any manner people wanted. That's what I heard.

I do not like to hear people say God Bless America because I do put my world citizenship above nationalism/patriotism and have gotten jumped on for it alot but I've felt that way since childhood. I agree about the myopia and narcissism of making the specific plea.

That's how I interpreted the Doors song when I was 15 (Jim was just singing about a character who questioned authority in seminary school) - it made me think hard about that.

I just went around the block to my local store.

It looks like an exodus. So many people with everything worth carrying trying to buy maps to go further north.

There must have been 30 cars there, all in a caravan.

I think I will go cry now.

Dear Focus on the Family Reporter Stuart Shepard,

I'm writing this to inform you that I received your prayer, and that - after minimal consideration - your request for inclement weather to take place at the time and location of Barack Obama's speech at the Democratic National Convention has been denied on account of being so ludicrous and idiotic. In all My Infinite Wisdom, I see no reason for changing My current weather plans on account of your personal political leanings (Also, while we're at it, instead of praying for rain to keep Obama from speaking, why not just ask that I not allow him to become president? Seems more to the point, and I'm All-Powerful, remember? I mean, come on, duh!)

While you were probably too busy bombing abortion clinics and hating gay people to notice, I'm currently a little too busy with more pressing God-duties - like trying to keep you people from killing the Earth and each other - to just drop everything I'm doing and whip up a torrential downpour every time some Fox News-following redneck in a fly-over state gets themselves all worked up about the increasing reality of a black guy becoming president.

I appreciate the prayers and all, but really, they're so boring and predictable. "Wipe out the gays with a plague" this and "let George W. Bush be the new Jesus" that. Can't you people at least mix it up a little, throw in a "feed and clothe the poor" or a "let there be world peace just for a day" here and there? Always with the Angry God stuff! Contrary to what you might think, I'm not some giant dick in the sky just looking for someone to smite with a giant lightning bolt. 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina didn't happen because I hate your sins, they happened because religious nuts are violently crazy and all your pollution is seriously screwing up My weather systems, respectively.

Anyway, Obama's gonna speak at the convention, and coming from someone who knows a thing or two about the future, let's just say he'd be my horse in the election race come November. And guess what? When he's elected, gay people are gonna get married, abortion is going to be permanently legalized and the nation's capital is moving to San Francisco. Okay, okay, I'm kidding about San Francisco. But seriously, you guys might want to relax with the ignorance and bigotry a little, because if you don't, it's gonna be a long eight years.

So thanks again for the prayer, and sorry I couldn't help out with that. Though if I may express my humble opinion as the lord and creator of all things, maybe you should focus less on the family and more on not being a total moron.

Omnipotently,

God

Sent from my iPhone

GOP Cancels Convention Opening Night

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/08/31/gop-cancels-convention-op_n_122808.html

This came from North Carolina for Obama -

My fellow Obama/ Biden Supporters,

I purposefully chose an incendiary subject line in order to garner your attention. I do have a lot to say, so stick with me, but it is a matter of utmost importance.

Over the last 72 hours i have spent more than my fair share of time reading blogs and emails and watching the talking the heads and pundits analyze the choice of Sarah Palin as John McCain's running mate. At first it seemed as if McCain had made a serious blunder and displayed a gross ineptitude for making a sound decision. However, after the dust has settled the real motives behind his choice have come to light. He, just like Bush-Cheney-Rove are making this election about God, guns and fetuses.

The article "Palin electrifies conservative base" by politico.com's Jonathan Martin lays out in no uncertain terms why Palin is now McCain's running mate. We all know that she is pro-drilling, pro-life, pro-creationism and pro-gun. The stance she takes on these issues upsets us a great deal, and we can see how damaging they will be to our country if John McCain is elected President. In spite of that, ladies and gentlemen John McCain will be the next President of the United States and Sarah Palin will be the next Vice-President.

article: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0808/13016.html

Let me explain. Bush, a complete and utter moron, was elected PUSA, not once, but twice based off of these same tactics. He is a charismatic campaigner, who takes simple easy to understand stances on moral issues. There is no finely nuanced thought process that goes into his decision making process. To him, these moral issues are black and white, right or wrong, us or them.

The vast amount of American voters identified with him, easily understood his position on these issues, were energized and assumed a competitive attitude over whether he should be PUSA (hence, the "us or them"). That is why he has been the PUSA for the last eight years.

Fellow O/B supporters, when we look at Sarah Palin we see an inexperienced politician who has no business being in this national race. We see someone who will be easily manipulated by the neo-cons to further their "war on terror" and funnel billions more tax dollars into the pockets of the military industrial complex and big oil companies.

When right-wing, conservative Evangelicals look at Ms. Palin, they see a gift from God.

Yes, we see through the cheap, transparent, manipulative Rove-esque tactics, and post our rants online as blogs and nytimes.com comments. But this running mate was not chosen for us. It was chosen to solidify the conservative base, who is not reading blogs and sending emails. They are sitting in church and chatting with their fellow church-goer about how McCain has made such a wonderful choice in picking his veep. Not only does she talk the talk about being pro-life, she walks the walk by giving birth to a baby with Down Syndrome. Not only is she a charmer and a looker, but if we vote for her she will be the first woman Vice-President. We can be apart of history.

Therefore, do not read the blogs and internet postings and think it is a good gauge of the national consciousness on this choice. The people whom this was aimed at and are rejoicing over this pick are NOT online blogging and emailing.

So, in the end it comes down to what do we as Obama/ Biden supporters do to take this country in a new and better direction.

Well, we can sit and bang out email after email about how Palin wants to shoot wolves from helicopters. We can blog about how she is in favor of teaching the creation story along side the theory of evolution in our public schools. We can even try to start rumors about how her four month old baby might not even be hers, but is actually her seventeen year old daughter's.

Obama/ Biden supporters you are wasting your time! Not only are you "preaching to the choir" (sorry, i could not think of another metaphor), but your message is not being read by the other side. Besides even if they did read it, they would look you in the face and say, "Well, God put us in charge of the animals, and their numbers need to be thinned out for the new oil pipeline going through Alaska. And why not teach creationism in schools, both sides need to be represented. And abortion is murder."

Therefore, we need to mobilize and TAKE ACTION like never before. Here is a list of things we can do in order to help elect Barack Obama.

1. Donate money. Remember, Obama is not taking public financing so we are responsible for fueling his campaign with the resources he needs to take our message into those battleground states.

2. Phonebanking. During the primaries i did some phonebanking and i cannot express to you how rewarding of an experience this is. At first it seems daunting, but in the end chatting with potential voters about our message of hope, peace and change is very gratifying.

3. Canvassing. Going door to door to chat with potential voters and show your enthusiasm for the Obama/ Biden ticket is satisfying, and also demonstrates that this is a national movement, not empty rhetoric.

4. Write letters to local newspapers. Not the .com newspaper, but the ones that used to be (maybe still do) sitting at your front door in the morning. This is the medium through which social conservatives receive their news and information. Do NOT express outrage, but our message of hope, peace and change.

5. Stay away from moral issues. When discussing Obama/ Biden, stay away from these moral issues and focus on how McCain does not get it. That he is out of touch. That he has been wrong time and time again. That Obama/ Biden get it. Have excellent judgement and intellect and can lead this country in a new and better direction.

6. Ignore Palin. The best thing we can do is to ignore her. The only reason she was brought on to the ticket was to energize the conservative base. Those individuals vote with their gut, (with emotion) over moral issues. There is no amount of convincing we can do in order to change their minds on these issues. If we are lucky, the harsh continuous light of the national media on Ms. Palin will cause a gaffe or misstep on her part.

My Fellow Obama/ Biden supporters i implore you, do not underestimate these social conservatives. Rove has said before, that he wanted to (and has for the last eight years) establish a permanent Republican majority. This is how he has done it. Ladies and gentlemen, they will succeed again. If you do not believe me, go back and analyze the results of the last two general elections. More women than men vote.

That is unless, we get out from in front of our laptops (only after donating $5 to the campaign) and get our message of hope, peace and change out to the American people.

I encourage replies (and forwarding of this email), to my comments above, but also include action items, and ideas on what we can DO to elect Barack Obama as President and Joe Biden as Vice-President of the United States of America.

kC

I don't have any objection to his "God Bless America," because clearly his actions speak of diplomacy and creating global peace and harmony.

Yes, it's patriotic. Yes, it's patriotism; however, since he and Kerry spent two nights trying to take back our flag, our right to dissent, and the word "Patriotism", I really see absolutely nothing wrong in him living up to the standards of being patriotic.

Sparrow
I think that's a good way to look at it.
My husband and I were just talking about what fundamentally decent men they are.

Ummm, picking palin because she chose not to abort a Downs baby is problematic and the evagicals have another thing coming.

First off, the majority, the solid majority of this country supports abortion rights. He may have picked up the evangicals but he is flying in the face of the other 77% of Us.

Not only that, but I say to hell with ANY WOMAN who believes her own life is the only exception to abortion.

What kind of mother would only use her own life as an excuse to abort...? You won't abort a seriously damaged child but you would abort a perfectly healthy child to save your own life?

That really is quite pathetic. As long as she can save her own skin that is all that matters.

Most people do not abort Downs babies, but somehow she will be held up as the only one who ever refused because she believes in something. I had a child born with a cleft, but somehow she is the special one because SHE did not abort? I don't think so lady!

The only thing worse than a man trying to tell women what to do with their own wombs is another woman who does. She does not even think rape or incest is a reasonable exception.

What kind of woman would sit on her high horse and demand another woman carry the child of her rapist for her own ideology?

They thought they needed a woman on the ticket, only problem is they picked the wrong woman.

But that has always been the problem with the GOP, they believe all women are as dim as their own.

BTW, what else does she have, besides the fact she did not abort her own child?

NOTHING.

So what she did not abort her baby. That is hardly a qualification to be a heartbeat away from POTUS.

Two diaries at kos about Palin's corruptions--already. (I refuse to call this the gift that keeps on giving, but... I will say that I hope it makes more people get off their butts and vote for Obama!)

Troopergate

Palin almost recalled 3x as Mayor

Checking in and reporting!

If I may be a little bit self depracating, other than losing my balance on someone's top step, and almost losing my car from leaving it in neutral at the top of a hill (Alabama guy said "There goes your car".) I had to run to catch it and jump in and put on the brakes.

I loved it!!! Here's the scoop so far. It's going to be close here in this Red town in this Red state (that may be leaning pink).

I expected everyone to say "I'm voting for McCain period." They did not. One guy said "My wife and I think eight years is enough"., another lady said "No doubt about it, my husband and I are voting for Obama". MOST
ARE UNDECIDED YET (OR SAYING THEY ARE UNDECIDED since I have an Obama button on.)

They are THRILLED the campaign cares enough to send people out here to rural America.

I am a charasmatic campaigner and canvasser too, when I'm not chasing my car down a hill or teetering on somebodys top step.

I am also humble. (hee hee)

Becky gave me the street my aunt and uncle pastor people live on, and I gave that street back to her.

I ran in to one guy that I just KNEW I had met before. He said "McCain. We don't care for that other fellow." I thought, good grief, I have seen this man before SOMEWHERE...then I realized I had been to many "social events" with relatives of his and his wife, and that they used to attend my aunt and uncle's church until they switched four years ago. His wife is A BIG CULPRIT AS FAR AS sending, sending, sending, sending, and sending those smear mails about Obama. She hasn't received my latest email yet. :-D) She is also best friends with my aunt.

It was 95 out there and muggy and the air is dense. I just came home long enough to grab some more cold water and stand in front of the air conditioner for a few minutes.

I'm encouraged after today. Don't want to raise too many hopes, but the atmosphere, at least for me today, is different out there than I thought it would be.

I am heading out again, and Becky is in a nearby town, and we will get together here later this evening.

It's fun! (I have a new found respect for all the hard work you all have done.)

Yes, McCain is cementing his evangelical base and soccer mom's and horny men that like to shoot guns by picking Palin and trying to get the vote of every woman who has ever carried, given birth to, and/or loved a child.

Let's just call her "The Madonna".

Don't get all freaked out about it. What else would you expect?

Funny thing is, one of my friends said she was scared to vote for McCain because he is so old, and she is logical enough to think that it was a dumb idea to pick an inexperienced woman. Course Buddy and Bubba out there don't know any better. Attention!!!

Hey TSP,

I had a really positive response in general with all the canvassing I did (Alabama, Oregon, California) so far. The worst I got was phonebanking to Indiana - one guy got started on this racist rant.

Definitely the horny (old) men vote is locked up now. I'm just not sure that women will vote for her - certainly not non-fundie women...and the fundie women have got to be unsure about putting a woman in a position of leadership over men...right??

As far as Obama saying "God Bless America" I don't think it is myopic, nor do I think it is narcissistic. The guy is running for President, for heaven's sakes. People are running around saying he's a Muslim and unpatriotic, etc.

He's not being phoney, it is his belief. He was also being WISE. The polls say the majority of us out here do believe in God. It is reassuring to the majority to hear him say that. I know without absolutely any doubt that he did not mean any thing by it as far as mixing church and state, or implying that everyone should believe in God. He is campaigning for heaven's sakes. But, please, let's NOT GO THERE!

If y'all want to not be forced to recognize what you consider to be somebody else's perceived God, I would say sluff it off, and cut them some slack. We need to win this thing.

It's not going to matter one whit that he said God Bless America if he's sincere and it draws votes. Politicians have been doing it since...well, FOREVER.

If someone wants to believe in a frog or worship the sun they will still be able to after Obama is President.

If Obama doesn't get to be President, I don't think any of us will have to worry much about anything because we'll be too busy dying.

I say we chill.

V,

RIGHT!!! That's what they get for playing to their fears. How many people are going to want an inexperienced babe running their country as scared as they have made them? (Except the horny old guys and Evangelicals who have never studied politics.) Unless, UNLESS, a Madonna will trump a sincere guy (Obama) and a distinguished senior senator VP.

I'm really glad to know your experience has been as good as mine was today.

Well, I'm off again.

TSP...I think the comment wasn't so much about God as it was about not blessing the whole world at the same time as just America. (Unless I'm myopic about what Matthew's original statement was.)

Maybe Matthew needs to clarify his statement.

V,

Thanks for all your hard work. I'm hitting the road running from now until November.

Glad to hear the canvassing is going well for you, tsp. Ok..so the car thing is tooo funny!!!

Sparrow, beloved peace keeper.

I say everyone has the RIGHT to believe what they want. I think it reassured many people considering what the smearmails have been saying about him being a Muslim and not loving America etc. etc.

I'm sure he wants God to bless the whole world.
And he's not campaigning for Pope, or The Messiah.

O.K.? We will all get along now because it's not worth fighting over.

Don't ever play chicken with God. It is just not a good idea.

Do you know what I just realized? McPOWS most loyal base were those running around saying : 'I would never vote for a ni**er or a WOMAN!'.

And he wants to put her a heartbeat away, forcing his most loyal base to vote FOR A WOMAN! HAHAHA!

That is freaking hillarious. Karma is a mofo. Fo sho!

McCain and Republicans hope to use Gustav as redemption and also to help McCain separate himself from Bush. They hope to prove their competence as well.

ap link

Hey Christy,

Stay safe and dry in the coming days. I hope Gustav weakens and turns away before he gets to Shreveport.

Thinking of you.

Sparrow,

Yeah, it was a moment. I'm standing in this guy's yard because he is outside getting ready to get on a ladder to fix something on the outside of his house, because he and his wife JUST MOVED HERE FROM ALABAMA. (Wait till winter sets in.....:-D) And he's sayin' "I ain't voting for that guy until I see his birth certificate, we've got too many aliens in this country as it is." Then he goes...."There goes your car" and the sucker was picking up speed as it went backwards downhill. I ran and jumped in (just like Evil Knievel) and was able
to jump in there and stop it before it really gathered more speed. I was freaked.

I gave the guy a brochure and wrote the web site
to www.fightthesmears.com and told him that I thought the birth certificate was on there.

The funniest thing was the people who told me, "I have a pretty good handle on it, we follow everything really closely" (on Faux?)
One guy said "Yeah, I know alot about the issues because I watch CNN."

Christy,

Yeah, Karma. Them people just a prayin' for the country don't get the Democratic convention rained out, they get another reminder of the massive failure in 2005.

Fo Sho.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/8/29/163234/559/495/579213

I didnt have time to research this, but wanted to post ASAP. i do know the small groups that fundamentalists and evangelicals are involved in, these are militant religious groups and believe they are ordained by god. Anyone that does not believe they are the vessel of the One God are damned. These are the people that want to see WW3 come about.

If VP candidate Palin is associated with this group, its very troubling.

Matt,

I'm sorry I got a little testy about the God thing ('specially the part about a frog and the sun), and you know I really don't mean to be reactive to that. You are entitled to your opinion without me even needing to answer, however I did think I was lending a different angle to the prism when I said that I thought it would comfort alot of people who are saying they are "scared" of him.

I think I told you my girlfriend and I took a test two weeks ago to see if we were right brained or left brained. I was right in the middle, she was more to the left than I. Guess what it did? (It took us over three hours to take the test and grade it.) It proved your point that EVERYONE sees things out of their own window.

I respect your window and your right to voice it. I'm sorry I reacted.

Actually that test taught us each so much, to ease up on others, and even to not question the differences between the two of us, because we are each different, with different hemispheres working, different temperments, and different past life and family experiences. I think it was a lesson on tolerance and understand for each of us. What I think of Matt regarding this is how you told us three years ago during your excellent series on the DCP blog that things are NOT BLACK AND WHITE. I think most people think they are, and they always want everyone else to see things out of their window, or else they feel insecure and weird, or think everyone else is weird, to justify the difference.

The key is understanding and respect.....

OK Becky is going to use computer to send her stats in now.

My thoughts are with the millions of people driving bumper to bumper in the dark tonight evacuating.

P.S. Sparrow......Bush can never be redeemed for his failure in '05. It happened, and this hopefully will serve as a reminder of what happened in '05.

I am wondering if the levees breach again (my dad just called and said the news is reporting they WILL breach again)if they will have enough help and support to actually take care of the people affected. We shall see.

Oh, ANOTHER personal firing, AND her mchubby is all up in the middle of her office. AND he is now back on the payroll of BP. Ain't that sweet?

Todd Palin, Shadow Governor of Alaska (Updated)

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/8/29/155145/681/530/579154

The Palin Family's Potential Big Oil Conflict of Interest

http://www.mydd.com/story/2008/8/31/2277/17391

I swear, she is the gift that keeps on giving. She is their perfect scapegoat and I do believe she is too dim witted to realize it.

They are setting her up so bad to take the blame for McPOWs historic loss of GOP power.

Just as long as we don't blame ANYBODY ELSE they will feed her to us like chum.

Please read and research the Dominionist groups that she may belong too. These groups believe the King James old testament should be the basis for the US Supreme Court and US culture.
This is very dangerous, incorporating extreme right wing religious beliefs into the fabric of the Judicial Branch, and Foreign Policy decisions.

If Gov Palin does belong to these groups, it places an individual with extremist right wing beliefs into the highest levels of our Government.

TSP, you rock. I put in a ton of time for the campaign earlier in the year but now between medical stuff & family & work I don't know that I'll be able to help out all that much. I'm still hoping to kick in a weekend in NV (that's where they're sending all us uber-liberal SF'ers).

I'm glad you caught your car & that you're safe! That happened to me in a sloped parking lot once...luckily nothing near as dramatic as your story.

There are three new stories at http://www.silencedmajority.blogs.com that Kayakbiker posted (I am still reading) - they have to do with Code Pink and other protests that happened in the Twin Cities today and also music of Pete Seeger's grandson.

I was at Bumbershoot registering voters.

Home now - reading the firestorm of crazy stuff on the internets about that little ole Sarah Palin. It is absolutely bizarre as is the whole scenario of the Republican Convention and the freaky weather we get nowdays.

None of this could have been predicted by anyone, nor can the outcome. Looking forward to reading all your posts here, probably bottom to top.

John Kerry said on one of the Sunday chat shows that McCain is a PRISONER of the right. He knew like we all do that McCain would rather have chosen Lieberman or Romney or anyone else but had to cater to what Kerry called the "Flat Earth" people. I agree that McCain has become a mere puppet rather than blindly lusting for power. Like the pathetic Bush Jr., he will go wherever he is led and say what he is told to say. I saw an exhibit of photographs tonight and one was of a woman who was wounded in Iraq. "I'm not a hero," she said, "I'm a survivor." It's the same with John McCain. He was used before and he's being used again, but he's too blind to see it. Slugbug

PrisonerOfW

Wouldn't you love to be a RNC delegate and get such cool schwag?!

Ninety percent of the Democratic delegates said the nation was in a recession, while 72 percent of the Republican delegates say it is not.

“If we were in a recession, people would not be eating out — they would be in the grocery store and cooking at home,” said Phyllis Gorman, 59, a business owner and delegate from Oklahoma, in an interview after the delegate poll was taken. “When I drive by McDonald’s, there are so many people in line there. There are still a lot of cars on the road. If we were still in a recession like we were in the ’70s, people wouldn’t be doing anything.”

more at NY Times link about these delusional delegates

Bush quietly seeks to increase his powers to make war permanent
http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Bush_seeks_to_institutionalize_war_powers_0830.html

"Naturally the common people don't want war: Neither in Russia, nor in England, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, IT IS THE LEADERS of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship.
Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is TELL THEM THEY ARE BEING ATTACKED, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. IT WORKS THE SAME IN ANY COUNTRY"

Herman Goering, interviewed during his trial at Nueremberg for war crimes, and crimes against humanity.

Sherry, for the record, I was responding to what I perceived as a nationalistic claim for God in contrast to a more universal acknowledgment. I don't believe that Obama buys into this particular form of American Exceptionalism, but I was disappointed that he didn't use his speech to help dispel it.

As I phrase it, if God exists, then God must be everyone's God. If God created the world before he created America - assuming you think that God had a hand in creating America, which is a controversial subject in itself - then God must also love everyone else.

From my point of view, it's important that Americans not assume that its leaders actions automatically reflect God's will, in order to guarantee than said actions are critically appraised by whichever spiritual yardstick one chooses.

By the way, does everyone realize the phrase "God damm America" did not begin with Reverend Wright, but actually the psychologist / philosopher William James - in the aftermath of revelations of American torture and human rights abuses in the Philippines?

Matt,

I understand your point. His using that phrase might lend some to fear that there is a danger of him feathering the line between church and state.

I'm going to try to focus on the good that remark "God Bless America" may do.

I am learning that try as we might, we will never make others (or even be able to wish hard enough) to control others in to believing what we individually believe. As much as some would wish or try to make another like himself, I believe they are really cheating themselves. That's what liberty and freedom are all about. Diversity is not to be feared, but to be understood and appreciated. The next step is everyone working around common goals.