The Joker

John McCain's nom de guerre.



The image was created with Photoshop by graphic designer Marco Acevedo.

Obama's Health Plan Is Better

Your choice is between something that will work and have a great effect on society or something that will ignore the problem, barely have an impact and hurt society. As Dragnet would go, "Just the facts, m'am".

An analysis of the two starkly different approaches to reforming the U.S. health care system offered by John McCain and Barack Obama suggests Obama's plan has the best chance of making health care more affordable, accessible, efficient and higher in quality.

The report, released on Thursday by the Commonwealth Fund, sized up the presidential candidates' plans for dealing with a health care system which has left nearly 46 million people uninsured and many more underinsured.

According to the report, Democrat Obama's plan would cover 34 million of the nation's projected 67 million uninsured people in 10 years, compared with just 2 million covered under Republican John McCain's plan.

Over 10 years, McCain's plan would cost $1.3 trillion and Obama's would cost $1.6 trillion, according to the report.

So Obama's plan would help 34 million people and cost 1.6 billion and McCain's plan would help 2 million and cost 1.3 billion. Does this make the news cycles?

Here's the major difference

Obama's plan seeks to build on the current employer-based insurance system, which now provides coverage to 160 million people, or more than 60 percent of the population under 65.

While over at the Legion of Doom:

McCain's plan seeks to put health insurance into the hands of individuals by removing tax breaks for employer-paid health benefits and offering tax credits of $2,500 for individuals and $5,000 for families instead. About 20 million people would lose their employer-sponsored coverage under McCain's plan, but 21 million would gain coverage on the individual market.

Do you think people who lose their benefits through work will go out and buy it on their own? Part of getting benefits through work is that it's easy to sign up, pick a plan and have it come out of your paycheck. Once you get all these companies not providing health care, I bet you will see a lot more people going without it. Part to save money, part out of laziness.

Do the math: Obama helps 34 million or McCain helps 2 million.

Source: Washington Post

Labor Confronts Racism

It's great seeing a video with such passion like this. This is the change we can believe in. AFL-CIO Secretary Treasurer Richard Trumka blasts racism and it's devisive history. He then underlines how labor has always been on the right side of workers' rights and why his union should vote Obama in 2008. Excerpt of speech is from the Steelworkers convention July 1, 2008. Labor gets amped!



Source: Andrew Sullivan

Katie Couric Interview: Biden Coherent, Palin On The Short Bus

Katie Couric sits down with Joe Biden and Sarah Palin for a few questions of substance: Roe v Wade, States Rights, Rights To Privacy, Supreme Court decisions, et al. The same questions, so there's no "gotcha" moment Grandpa McLame falsely complains about.

Biden is in his element, which of course is the planet Earth, full of sentient beings. His answers reflect his experience and understanding of complex issues. Palin, and I challenge any conservative who disagrees, is a trainwreck personified. Watch the video, the contrast is just painful:




It's like night and day, or maybe it's good and evil. Inherent right to privacy in the Constitution? Palin says yes. That right to privacy is central to Roe v. Wade. It's a federal law, but Palin thinks states should decide. You just cannot say that there is a right to privacy in the US Constitution, but that what to do about that fact should be up to the states. She incorrectly uses the word "federalist". The second answer is just complete gibberish! Childlike. She has no understanding how the government works. She's just note cards and frameless glasses.

This no doubt makes the conservatives happy. They have a clueless, charismatic twit they can mold into what they want. Who cares if she is manifestly not prepared to be President. The Christian Right, who are extremely well-versed in Supreme Court decisions, have found their Trojan Moose.

Source: The Washington Monthly

McCain: Hey Iowa, Grab Your Ankles

With all their attempts to make liberals look angry, or that Michelle Obama sounds angry, take a look in the mirror and see the who the real childlike, angry douche bag is: it's pint-sized John McCain.

Watch how he treats the editorial board of the Des Moines Register with his patented charm. When asked about his government paid health care he's had all his adult life regarding health care reform, he dickishly says:

"So, I have never been an astronaut and I think I know the challenges of space".

WTF does that explain? The kicker, when asked about Palin's perceived lack of experience, even among her base, he kicks up all the dickishness his tiny 5'7" frame could muster with a:

"Reeeally? I haven't detected that, I haven't detected that in the polls."

Check out your polls, Holmes, you're tanking. Out of touch is too simple to describe your dementia. Contemptuous and mean, what a mixture. Check it:



And then he goes on to blame the press for his problems. You're toast flyboy. It's worth noting a man who can not assess his surroundings and can deny reality, all while clouded by his advisors and tied like an anchor to poor decisions, are not good indicators for someone trying to be President.

Source: Andrew Sullivan

Palin: Identity Issues

Palin takes "if you can't beat them, join them" a little too far.

Battle States Choosing Obama

Maybe the Republicans can set lower expectations so they are not surprised on November 5th when they realized they've been stomped on. Some new polling came out today showing Barack Obama leading in some key battle ground states. The Democrat's support jumped to 50 percent or above in Ohio, Florida and Pennsylvania in Quinnipiac University surveys taken during the weekend.

The new surveys show Obama leading McCain in Florida 51 percent to 43 percent, in Ohio 50 percent to 42 percent and in Pennsylvania 54 percent to 39 percent.

Source: Huffington Post

Palin Endorses Obama

More comedy from the Palin/Couric interview. She keeps making the case for the Obama/Biden ticket without a clue that she's even doing it. She does know that "more of the same" is the Obama campaign's slogan for McCain, right? True to form, Palin throws in a lie [not having a coach? Semantics] before sinking her own ship. Follow here:

COURIC: I know you're heading to Sedona to work on your debate. What is your coach advising you?

PALIN: I don't have a debate coach.

COURIC: Well, what are your coaches?

PALIN: I have quite a few people who are giving us information about the record of Obama and Biden, and at the end of the day, though, it is -- it's so clear, again, what those choices are. Either new ideas, new energy and reform of Washington, DC, or "more of the same".

"More of the same" is Obama? Lest we remind you who's balls you and John suck, Sarah.



Via Steve Benen at The Washington Monthly:

"McCain/Palin agrees with Bush/Cheney on foreign policy, national security, economic policy, taxes, healthcare, energy, education, the environment, the federal judiciary, immigration, and the culture-war issues. Indeed, McCain has personally boasted about voting with Bush 90% of the time, and has insisted, "[O]n the transcendent issues, the most important issues of our day, I've been totally in agreement and support of President Bush."

It's bad enough they stole "change" from Obama's campaign, now they use it to describe themselves. Next Palin will be saying she's a black Senator from Chicago.

Source: Steve Benen

Feingold Fights Search And Seizure Of Our Laptops

Sen. Russ Feingold [D-WI] is fighting for you. He has authored S. 3612, the Travelers' Privacy Protection Act of 2008, which would ensure that American citizens and legal residents returning to the U.S. from overseas are not subject to invasive searches of their laptops or other electronic devices without any suspicion of wrongdoing.:

“Most Americans would be shocked to learn that upon their return to the U.S. from traveling abroad, the government could demand the password to their laptop, hold it for as long as it wants, pore over their documents, emails, and photographs, and examine which websites they visited – all without any suggestion of wrong-doing,” Feingold said. "Focusing our limited law enforcement resources on law-abiding Americans who present no basis for suspicion does not make us any safer and is a gross violation of privacy. This bill will bring the government’s practices at the border back in line with the reasonable expectations of law-abiding Americans.”

Bush trashed the Constitution, Democrats are fighting to get it back.

Source: BobGeiger.com

Journalistic Integrity

Why is MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell badmouthing the candidates or even reporting on the bailout? She's married to Alan Greenspan, former Federal Reserve chairman, who oversaw the construction of this massive fiasco. Conflict of interest? She makes no disclosure prior to railing against McCain and Obama.



Is she married to this guy for his looks or his money?



Source: Crooks and Liars

How Can You Tell Palin Is Lying? Her Lips Are Moving

Rimshot! I know she said she had Putin on lockdown in the comedic Katie Couric interview, but she lied. Palin lied? NORAD tells her to STFU.

via NY Daily News:

WASHINGTON - When Russian bombers approach American airspace and U.S. Air Force fighters are scrambled, Sarah Palin's phone doesn't ring. The Alaska governor has no command authority over the guardians of U.S. airspace despite her recent suggestion otherwise. "She doesn't have any role in that process," Air Force Maj. Allen Herritage, spokesman for the Alaska North American Aerospace Defense Command, told the Daily News.

The Lost Tycoons

Superb NYT article, "The Lost Tycoons", on the transformation of Wall St over the past century. Great read and insight into how things have put us where we are now. Scarce capital led 19th and early 20th tycoons to run the show, "J. Pierpont Morgan and other grandees exerted godlike powers over America". Over the years, banks and trading companies changed:

"Where the old Wall Street stuck to the most prestigious clients, the new Wall Street engaged in an unseemly rush to the bottom. Investment houses that once dealt only in grade-A bonds became swept up in junk bond mania in the 1980s. Firms that once snubbed companies beyond the Fortune 500 flocked to Silicon Valley in the 1990s, eager to take fly-by-night companies public. And, in the final reductio ad absurdum, Wall Street during the past decade gorged on mortgage-backed securities, tying its fate to America’s least creditworthy borrowers. Addicted to colossal amounts of leverage, the onetime arbiter of scarce capital had become the most profligate borrower."

"Rush to the bottom" is a good phrase we Americans are in denial about. Ours is a race to the bottom these days. Cheap capital and cheap labor are exploited through corporations and governments who dole out tax breaks and breed anti-populist rhetoric. We're not wealthy because we are smarter, but because we are willing to reward greed and look the other way when the shit hits the fan for the little guy.

Read on

Bill Maher: Religulous

Bill Maher's movie looks good. Check the website for trailers.



Religulous website

Palin: Makes Fun Of Older People, Sees No Value In Experience

At a campaign event in Columbus, Ohio yesterday, Sarah Palin told a crowd she's looking forward to meeting Joe Biden on Thursday.

"I've never met him before," Palin said. "But I've been hearing about his senate speeches since I was in like 2nd grade."

The Republican crowd seemed to think this was hilarious.

Ummm, your grandfather in your running mate.



via Washinton Monthly:

Immediately after the speech, CBS's Katie Couric met up with Palin and asked about her comments. CBS just sent over the transcript of what we'll see this evening:

Couric: You made a funny comment, you've said you have been listening to Joe Biden's speeches since you were in second grade.

Palin: It's been since like '72, yah.

Couric: You have a 72-year-old running mate, is that kind of a risky thing to say, insinuating that Joe Biden's been around awhile?

Palin: Oh no, it's nothing negative at all. He's got a lot of experience and just stating the fact there, that we've been hearing his speeches for all these years. So he's got a tremendous amount of experience and, you know, I'm the new energy, the new face, the new ideas and he's got the experience based on many many years in the Senate and voters are gonna have a choice there of what it is that they want in these next four years.

Is she saying a "new face" with no clue has value just because it is new? What are her new ideas, again? Drill for oil. Creationism. And my choice, according to you, is between those "new ideas" and Joe Biden, a guy with years and years of experience. Experience that even your running mate has made the central theme of his campaign. You are a walking punchline.

David Frum: Palin "Not Up To The Job"

One of their own chimes in. Another conservative who sees Palin on the verge of failure. David Frum, a former speechwriter for President Bush who is now a conservative columnist for The National Review:

“I think she has pretty thoroughly — and probably irretrievably — proven that she is not up to the job of being president of the United States,”

The article goes on:

Mr. Frum noted the difficulty that Dan Quayle, who was elected vice president in 1988, had in recovering from an early set of mistakes that led him to be ridiculed as an intellectual lightweight. “The story of Dan Quayle is he did probably 1,000 smart things as vice president, but his image was locked in and it was very difficult to turn around,” he said. “And Dan Quayle never in his life has performed as badly as Sarah Palin in the last month.”

Read on

Bush Is The "Picture Of A Beaten Dog"

New Gallup poll had Bush approval rating at 27%, a new low for him. 73% think he's doing a horrible job. As if we couldn't see this coming 8 years ago. The current historic financial crisis is the exclamation point his failed administration. New York Magazine’s John Heilemann, on MSNBC, noted Bush after his speech on Monday "was the picture of a beaten dog. That was the picture of presidential impotence right there."

As the Washington Post writes today, yesterday’s failed bailout vote

“marked the biggest legislative defeat of Bush’s tenure and underscored the vanishing influence of a president who could once bend a pliant Congress to his will on wars, taxes, surveillance and a host of other high-profile initiatives.”

Party is over for the Republicans, have fun on Nov 4.



Read on at Gallup

Snarky Palin "Silenced"

All it took was to ask VPIFL Sarah Palin to name another Supreme Court ruling, other than Roe v Wade, and the precocious political neophyte drew a blank. Her vast knowledge of things outside of Alaska, outside of the teleprompter, amounted to jack squat. She had no answer. She was silent, which may be better than her incoherent ramblings.

"There was no verbal fumbling with this particular question as there was with some others, the aide said, but rather silence."

It happened during her interview with Katie Couric the other day and CBS decided not to air it. But news of the gaffe leaked and McPalin are pissed. How dare the news report the news!

Palin makes no attempt to meet with the press and when she does, it's an embarrassment. Sarah Barracuda is a fish story that her base loves to run with. When she swims with the sharks of the lower 48, she sounds like a guppy. An idiot guppy, at that.