Religious freedom not part of Sen. Dole's beliefs

Sen. Elizabeth Dole, Republican from North Carolina, has put out the most disgusting ad of this entire election season, and that's saying something considering what has come out of the McCain campaign. She accused her Democratic rival, Kay Hagan, of being "godless" and taking "godless money" because she attended a fundraiser that was sponsored, in part, by someone associated with the Godless Americans PAC, an atheist group who works toward separation of church and state (because we sure don't have it now, even though we should). The insinuation, of course, is that someone who is an atheist is someone she would never associate herself with. Godless, therefore, is to Sen. Dole disqualifying.

For her part, Dole is getting desperate to hang onto a seat she has no business occupying. She has done virtually nothing for North Carolina, is ranked as one of the most ineffective Senators in Congress, and has spent virtually no time in the state. Her ads have almost universally been negative and misleading. Now she apparently has decided that the Constitution has no place in her political world. Like many evangelicals, she wants to try to subvert the Constitution and turn this country into a "Christian nation."

Let's review what the Constitution says about religion, shall we?

Article XI says in part: "The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States."

Just in case you didn't understand that, Senator Dole, the First Amendment should make it pretty clear: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

There is no mention of God, Christianity or Jesus in the Constitution. To the contrary, the framers of this document make it clear that this nation is founded on religious freedom.

Senator Dole -- you are supposed to represent all your constituents, whether Christian, Jew, Muslim, Hindu or non-believer. This is NOT a "Christian nation." If you don't like that, you are free to leave.

But I'm not letting Kay Hagan entirely off the hook, either. In response to Sen. Dole's ad, Ms. Hagan found it necessary to stress her religious beliefs and assert that she was not, in fact, godless. The correct response should have been that she herself was a Christian, but that the United States of America is a democracy founded on religious freedom, that this is guaranteed by the Constitution, and that she intends to be a senator for ALL North Carolinians, regardless of their beliefs.

I for one hope that someday our politicians actually read the Constitution before running for office.

Republican Party to fracture?

The chattering class has been chattering about the possibility of the Republican Party being fractured into tiny pieces after this election. The apparent victory of Barack Obama over long-time Republican President wannabe John McCain has caused division and back-biting in the GOP. Going down for a large loss of seats in the both the House and Senate as well as the probable loss of the White House, the finger-pointing has been ramping up before the election is even over.

It appears that some people in the Party think Palin will be a shoo-in for the nomination in 2012. Others are in the "if only we had nominated Romney instead" camp. I think it will break down this way -- Palin will grab the far right evangelical Christians and the white people who would never have voted for a black person anyway. The fiscal conservatives and middle-of-the-roaders may gravitate back to Romney. And the conservative Democrats and Independents who are looking for a Republican to vote for (if they decide they don't like Obama by 2012) will be looking for... anybody else.

We'll see how things shake out. But right now it's looking like the Democrats are sitting pretty. Now let's just not screw it up!

Remember to GO OUT AND VOTE!!

Here's an article from the HuffPo re the GOP disarray:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/27/gop-draws-internal-battle_n_138303.html

A little advice for John McCain

You might think it's a little odd, my giving advice to John McCain. But if he's going to get trounced like I think he will be on Nov. 4th, then I can't resist at least trying to help him out so he can come out of this thing with a little bit of dignity intact. After his nasty, dishonest, snarky campaign he will likely end his political career with one of the largest losses in modern presidential campaign history. So forgive me for feeling a little magnanimous for a minute.

What he should do is this -- first and foremost, he should fire all those Karl Rove-ian operatives, the guys who created the dishonest robocalls (the very same guys who perpetrated those horrible robocalls against himself in 2000), and save his campaign a little bit of money. Then he should pull every negative ad he has, which is most of them, and replace it with one ad and one ad only -- a pull-out-the-stops patriotic, Vietnam War hero, tug at the heartstrings ad. Throw in some comments about his family, and show a picture of all of them (don't leave out the adopted black daughter, now!), and do not mention one word about Sarah Palin. Not a picture, not a "McCain/Palin" sign, nada. Just johnmccain.com.

Would it win him the election? Probably not. But at least he could end this thing with some small bit of dignity intact. Because the bulk of his campaign, particularly since he picked Palin as his VP, has been a disgrace.

Barack Obama has almost stubbornly refused to get into personal attacks, letting slide a lot of nefarious contacts John McCain has had (with the exception of a short mention of Charles Keating, which the MSM did virtually nothing with and considering what's happening with the economy, was a perfectly legitimate thing to look into). There's been nothing about McCain's ties to G. Gordon Liddy (among others), despite their focus on Obama's tenuous ties to Bill Ayers; nothing about Cindy McCain's past drug issues despite the fact that some of McCain's advisors have wanted to get into Obama's admitted past cocaine use; nothing about McCain virtually hiding his adopted black daughter, something Obama could have made hay with; nothing about the oddball pastors Palin has associated herself with despite their past focus on Jeremiah Wright; and nothing about Sarah and Todd Palin's associations with a party that wants Alaska to secede from the United States, despite her repeated charges that Obama is anti-American! There's been nothing about a lot of things. It's too bad that John McCain didn't recognize that Obama was pulling his punches and pull some himself. Don't get me wrong, if John McCain won this election I would give up that the voters in this country have a clue... but it's sad to think that a Vietnam war hero has sunk to these levels and will end his political career with a campaign such as this. It would have been a refreshing change if this contest had been a fair and honorable one on both sides.

Palin's RNC clothing allowance: $150,000!!

Holy cow! The Republican National Committee spent $150k on outfits at places like Saks and Neiman Marcus for Sarah Palin and her family to wear during the campaign. (Barbie clothes have certainly gone up!) They say they will donate them to charity when the campaign is over. Mmmm hmmm... I bet that's news to Sarah! YIKES!!

If somebody gave me $150,000 I'd come home with clothes, a car and a house.

Let's break it down:

Sarah -- Saks Fifth Avenue - $50,000
Neiman Marcus - $75,000
clothes for baby Trig and husband Todd
Me -- $25 blouse from Kohl's

Sarah -- over $4,700 (to date) on hair and makeup
Me - $12 twice a year at Great Clips (less if I have a coupon) and makeup from Target

Sarah -- designer shoes
Me -- does Rack Room have a 50% off sale going on??

Is there something wrong with a nice suit from Dillard's or Talbot's, for crying out loud?

I guess when John McCain wears $570 Italian loafers he doesn't blink at this stuff, but jeez...

So let's see... McCain announced she was his VP pick on August 29th. The election is November 4th. That's 9 1/2 weeks. So if you take $150,000... divide by 9 1/2... that's $15,789 a week, or $2,255 a day. Whew!!!!

I wonder if the RNC would have bothered to spend $150,000 on wardrobe and makeup if McCain had chosen Tim Pawlenty or even Olympia Snowe as vice president. I know the guys in my office love Palin, and it's not because they think she's an economic or foreign policy genius. Are all those Manolo Blahnik heels and the red leather jacket for them, I wonder? Hmmm.... maybe they're targeting the testosterone vote!

To John McCain: THIS is class warfare

John McCain accused Barack Obama of class warfare in wanting to roll back the tax cuts George Bush gave disproportionately to the wealthy. Obama is proposing rolling back the tax rates to where they were under the Clinton adminstration for someone who makes over $250,000.

Maybe $250,000 isn't much to John McCain -- after all, his wife made over $4 million last year. But to those of us in the real world, $250,000 is a lot of money. But let's review, shall we, the Republican version of class warfare:

It's no secret that the unspoken platform of the Republican party has been to give more to the already wealthy and large corporations and if some of it "trickles down" to the little guy, well, that's OK. Keep in mind that most corporations pay NO income tax at all. The wealthy generally pay less, percentage-wise, than do their nannies and administrative assistants (even Warren Buffett finds it ridiculous that his admin pays a greater percentage than he does). So it begs the question -- why would George Bush put in tax cuts that went so disproportionately to the wealthy if this is not, in fact, class warfare? Did you even feel a blip in your paycheck when Bush's cuts went in? I didn't.

Now comes John McCain, he of the wife worth $100 million and so many homes he can't remember them all. He charges Barack Obama with class warfare because Obama wants to roll those tax cuts back for people making over $250,000. He calls it a tax increase -- but it's really only undoing some of the unfairness created by Bush's tax code in the first place.

John McCain should go back and review what happened with the savings and loan scandal (i.e., his connection with Charles Keating) and remind himself what happens when the wealthy steal from those less fortunate.

Class warfare is former Republican Speaker of the House Tom Delay jury-rigging Texas Congressional districts to separate out the wealthier areas in one of his many attempts to create a permanent Republican majority in Congress so they can write legislation favoring -- guess who -- the wealthy who voted them in.

Class warfare is John McCain's idea of taxing, for the first time in history, the health care benefits of people who get a paycheck. Sure, he wants to turn around and give you a tax credit to help you pay for a health care plan (which, if you are older and/or have health care issues will probably not cover the cost)... but does he think all this added complexity doesn't come with a price? How many companies will dump their health care plans entirely rather than deal with all the extra costs involved in collecting those taxes?

Class warfare is George Bush asking the middle class to shoulder the burden for a national debt that is out of control because the Republican Congress that has been in power over the budget for most of his presidency has spent money like a drunken sailor on short leave.

The Republicans have made an icon of Ronald Reagan. But Reagan, a staunch proponent of the trickle down economic theory, tripled the national debt during his term. And when his original tax cut (again, disproportionately to the wealthy) created such economic havoc, he put in a huge tax increase, and shifted more of the tax burden to people who have a paycheck (the middle class) and took it away from people who get their income from securities (i.e., the wealthy). Sounds like class warfare to me.

Class warfare, John McCain, is not proposing that the wealthy in this country give their generous "gimme" from Bush up. Class warfare would be not doing so.

The Republicans want to label fairness as socialism. But if the middle class is struggling, and losing jobs, then we stop spending. If nobody's buying anything, then stores close, plants shut down, company stocks lose money, 401(k)s shrink, and everyone is hurt. The middle class is the economic engine of this country, not the wealthy. This is a lesson the Republicans have never learned.

McCain's temperment disqualifying

Re the third presidential debate, I have to tell you I fell asleep before it started, which tells you how interested I was! But having woken up around 1:30 a.m. I turned on CNN and MSNBC, watched a little bit of the debate and the analyst chatter, and perused parts of the transcript. So I will limit my comments to McCain's temperment, which is scary, and I believe totally disqualifies him to be President.

Although he finally actually looked at his opponent this time, mostly because it was unavoidable due to the configuration of the table, it was obvious that his disdain for Obama continues. He tried several attacks, from Bill Ayers to "pro-abortion" that Obama dispatched pretty well. But what became obvious to me was that McCain is a man who carries a grudge unlike anybody I've ever seen.

He has had an obsession with having ten town hall meetings, and was so pissed that Obama would not agree to them (why would he when town hall meetings is not Obama's best format?) that he now brings it up constantly. It's raining today! That would never have happened if Obama had agreed to these town hall meetings! The stock market is crashing! That would never have happened if Obama had agreed to these town hall meetings! I've had to get really ugly in this campaign, and that would never have happened if Obama had agreed to these town hall meetings! (He actually did say the last one in the debate.) Holy cow.

It reminds me of his pique at the President of Spain. Spain!! Our NATO ally in Europe, that Spain! The country of the flamenco and hot guys (but I digress...) He has said he might not meet with the Spanish president -- why? Because Spain pulled their troops out of Iraq four years ago. McCain is still pissed. How dare a sovereign nation do something he doesn't want them to do! Hence if he becomes President the grievance will continue. Frightening.

If you carry grudges like this, where would our foreign policy be if angerball McCain is President?

By the way, his running mate, Politician Barbie, has been out on the campaign trail accusing Obama of some pretty awful things regarding abortion rights. Apparently Barbie has gotten ahold of one of those internet e-mails written by a wacko named Jill Stanek. I've gone off on this woman in a previous post. Just suffice it to say that it appears that Barbie didn't vet this woman like McCain didn't vet her. If she would have bothered to look her up, she would have found out what a nutcase she is (for instance, claiming the Chinese eat aborted babies as delicacies -- all righty then!) In the face of almost certain defeat, McCain and Barbie are presenting internet e-mails as fact?? I agree with Tina Fey -- if these two win the White House, I'm leaving the planet.

Weathermen prosecutor outraged at Obama link

In a letter printed in the New York Times William Ibershof, lead federal prosecutor of the Weathermen, the anti-Vietnam war group that included Bill Ayers, the "domestic terrorist" that McCain and Palin are trying to make into a character assassination of Barack Obama, says he is "amazed and outraged" at the attacks against Obama.

Yesterday McCain finally began to try to tamp down the racist rhetoric at one of his rallies. He did this only after he saw his poll numbers drop further, and had taken a lot of heat from former supporters, some right-wing columnists and the mainstream media. I wish I could say that McCain was doing this out of a desire to be fair, but I think he is not only realizing that it's hurting his chances on November 4, but that it's hurting his own legacy, and that's what's driving this new attempt to tone down the increasingly violent outbursts.

At a time when the country is facing the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, we don't need a presidential candidate who is focused on trying to portray his opponent as being un-patriotic and un-American. We need a presidential candidate who is going to lead us out of the mess the Bush administration has put us in. And that candidate is certainly not John McCain.

You can read Mr. Ibershof's letter here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/10/opinion/l10ayers.html?

McCain Palin's dangerous tactic: race baiting

There's a stark contrast between what you see in these debates and what you're seeing at a McCain or Palin campaign event. In a debate you won't hear John McCain refer to Barack Hussein Obama. In a debate you won't hear people in the crowd yelling "kill him" or "terrorist." But this is what you're hearing at McCain/Palin campaign events. More than once recently someone who was introducing one of the Republican nominees has revved up the red meat-eating crowd by referring to Barack Obama's middle name in an attempt to stoke this ridiculous idea that Obama is secretly a Muslim. People in these crowds are starting to yell racial epithets and threats (being investigated, as I understand it, by the Secret Service). And what does McCain or Palin do about it when this happens? Do they tell the crowd in no uncertain terms that that kind of behavior will not be tolerated? No. Because God forbid they lose the racist vote.

What must people in other countries watching this be thinking of us? Isn't America supposed to be the country of opportunity and equality for everyone, regardless of race or ethnicity? And what does it tell people in the Muslim world about how people at a campaign event for the nominees of a major party, a current Senator and a current Governor, view them? Is that helpful to our diplomatic efforts to get Middle Eastern countries to trust us?

McCain can't even hide his disgust of Obama in a debate or treat him as though he belongs on the same stage with him. Yet Obama went through 20-some debates and more than 50 primary contests to get where he is. He fought Hillary Clinton, no lightweight there, tooth and nail to get the nomination. And he won it fair and square, despite the obvious obstacles he had to overcome in the eyes of some voters and the view that Clinton was a shoo-in. Obama knows his stuff and deserves to be treated with respect, and yet McCain can't even look the guy in the eye.

The polls show that there are about 30% of white voters who say they can't vote for Obama either because he's (half) black or because they think he's secretly a Muslim. These are the folks whose racial intolerance McCain and Palin are stoking in their ads and at their campaign events. I'm not sure why McCain thinks this is a winning strategy, it's not like these people were going to vote for Obama! Fortunately, I think what it is doing instead is turning off the other 70%, as Obama continues to put distance between himself and McCain in the polls.

Obama should win this contest by a larger margin than he will, due to that 30%. But I think there's little doubt now that he will win, and that will be a victory for this country, for tolerance, and for common sense.

Shame on John McCain and Sarah Palin

John McCain is getting desperate. His last attempt at trying to become President, for which he has been willing to sell his soul, is looking irretrievably lost. He has become erratic (witness the "suspending" of his campaign to go to Washington to "help" with the rescue bill), snarky and disrepectful (his debate performance), and now, willing to outright lie. What little respect I had for him and his Barbie running mate is now completely gone.

Seeing the polls, and the election, slip away from him, McCain has decided to unleash Swiftboat-style attacks for the last 30 days of the campaign in a desperate gamble to get enough people to believe made-up crap to get him to the White House. So, the Karl Rove lie-making machine is now putting out ads, and Sarah Palin is now saying on the campaign trail, that the New York Times asserts that Obama has close ties to a terrorist. This is just beyond ridiculous.

Let's review -- Bill Ayers was a member of the Weather Underground, a '60s radical group that did set off bombs in order to make a point about bombing in Vietnam. I'm not going to even begin to try to defend that, and neither does Obama. He has rightly condemned it. He was also 8 when it happened, a fact that the McCain campaign tends to forget. Ayers was never convicted of anything, and he went on to become involved in Chicago politics and education-related charity work (where he met Obama), and is now a professor at the University of Illinois. They are not pals, as Palin says, but simply were on the same board that distributes educational grants.

Here is the original New York Times article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/04/us/politics/04ayers.html?pagewanted=2&sq=barack%20obama%20ayers&st=cse&scp=3

And here is a followup they did today after Palin's remarks on the campaign trail:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/05/us/politics/05palin.html

Obama has so far played the gentleman and refuses to get into attack politics. I would not suggest that the Obama campaign indulge in this kind of thing -- but I am a little confused as to why they have not brought up the Keating Five scandal which nearly cost John McCain his Senate seat. That is a legitimate thing to bring up, particularly considering the savings & loan scandal has direct correlation to the current subprime mortgage mess. Not to mention, it's true, unlike McCain and Palin's attacks on Obama regarding his association with Ayers.

Maybe the 527's should put out the ad for him... but at least independent bloggers like myself can point these things out. It's up to the voters to Google it and find out exactly what faux "maverick" McCain really is all about.

Biden v. Palin = no contest

I'm not going to belabor what everyone has probably already read about -- and who was telling the truth about this thing or that thing... but I do have to climb up on the soapbox for a little bit.

Biden knows his stuff and it showed. Palin crammed and that showed. There were no moose in the headlights moments, and she managed to put coherent sentences together (at least we didn't hear "I'll know when Putin rears his head because I can see Russia from Alaska!"), but unfortunately quite often she didn't bother answering the question but went off on another tangent. But what the heck was all the winking about and the folksy Joe Six-Pack talk? Was that particularly presidential? And why, oh why, do some Republicans have such trouble pronouncing "nuclear"??

At least she looked Biden in the eye, something McCain could not do with Obama.

Congratulations to Joe Biden, who I thought had a great command of the facts and managed to treat Palin like a worthy adversary even though he could have debated her with half his brain tied behind his back. He will be a great Vice President.

Palin not the female candidate women wanted

Tomorrow night will be the one and only vice presidential debate. Sarah Palin vs. Joe Biden is such a lop-sided matchup it's like sending the New York Yankees to play a Little League team. And that's too bad, because Palin is the first woman on a major party ticket since Geraldine Ferraro in 1984, 24 years ago. After this, what do you think the chances are that another woman will be on the presidential ticket again?

I've seen the polls that say women are turning against her. There has always been a big gap in how many men like her (obviously not because they think she's a foreign policy genius) vs. women. But now it appears that women are waking up and realizing that, while it would be nice for a major party to have a woman on a presidential ticket, this is not the woman they would have liked to have had. Will her obvious lack of qualifications and mind-numbing gaffes make it harder for another woman to be chosen again? In other words, isn't she setting women back instead of helping us break the ultimate glass ceiling?

Personal opinion, the fact that this woman is not someone who can really be taken seriously in national politics is a real detriment to women as a whole. Her inability to even give coherent answers, in some cases, to questions that she should have been prepared for just solidifies in men's minds that women aren't smart enough for this job. So thanks, Sarah Palin, but I for one really wish you would have stayed home.