(PHILADELPHIA) As the crowd cheered at a Sarah Palin rally this morning in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, a man in the audience grinned as he held up a stuffed monkey doll with a Barack Obama bumper sticker wrapped across its forehead.
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Stuff.co.nz | Saturday, 11 October 2008
Hundreds of voters in New York have been given absentee ballots on which they could vote for “Barack Osama” for the US presidency.
The absentee ballots in the US state spelled rival John McCain’s name correctly, the Associated Press reported.
“Osama” in the US is most often associated with Osama bin Laden, leader of the Al Qaeda terrorist group.
Democratic candidate Barack Obama has faced an uphill battle convincing some people in the heavily Christian US that he is not a Muslim.
The Associated Press, June 5, 2008
WASHINGTON – Hillary Rodham Clinton met late Thursday with Barack Obama, a day after saying she would end her quest for the Democratic nomination and endorse the Illinois senator.
A senior Obama campaign official confirmed that Obama delayed his departure from Washington Thursday night to meet with Clinton at her home here.
Earlier, Clinton had disavowed efforts by some supporters who have urged Obama to choose her as his running mate.
“She is not seeking the vice presidency, and no one speaks for her but her,” communications director Howard Wolfson said. “The choice here is Senator Obama’s and his alone.”
Clinton was planning an event in Washington Saturday to thank supporters and urge them to back Obama’s candidacy. But as she was bowing out of the race, supporters in Congress and elsewhere were ramping up a campaign to pressure him to put her on the ticket in the No. 2 spot.
AFP April 8, 2008
WASHINGTON (AFP) — Days before Pope Benedict XVI was due to begin a historic visit to the United States, a support group for some 9,000 Americans who say they were sexually abused by Catholic clergymen on Tuesday urged the pontiff to act against pedophile priests.
“We are looking for the holy father to hold the enablers and wrongdoers accountable,” Barbara Blaine, head of the Survivors Network for those Abused by Priests (SNAP), told reporters outside the papal nuncio in Washington, where Benedict XVI is due to begin his first visit as pope to the United States next week.
In January, SNAP sent a letter to the pope calling on him to meet with victims of predator priests when he visits Washington and New York, “to assist in the unfinished healing that needs to occur,” Blaine said, reading from the letter.
“We didn’t hear back. We believe the pope will meet with victims, but those victims will have been hand-picked by US bishops,” said the 51-year-old, accusing the bishops of protecting priests who abuse children.
“We are fearful that the pope is only given information that is filtered through the US Catholic bishops, and these are the same bishops who have enabled and promoted and covered up for child abusers,” said Blaine, who was sexually molested by a priest when she was 12.
The Huffington Post, April 13, 2008
CNN reported Saturday that Democratic Presidential Candidate Hillary Clinton touted her experience with guns and hunting to a crowd in Indiana:
Hillary Clinton appealed to Second Amendment supporters on Saturday by hinting that she has some experience of her own pulling triggers.
“I disagree with Sen. Obama’s assertion that people in our country cling to guns and have certain attitudes about trade and immigration simply out of frustration,” she began, referring to the Obama comments on small-town Americans that set off a political tumult on Friday.
She then introduced a fond memory from her youth.
“You know, my dad took me out behind the cottage that my grandfather built on a little lake called Lake Winola outside of Scranton and taught be how to shoot when I was a little girl,” she said.
Michael Cooper, The New York Times, April 9, 2008
WESTPORT, Conn. – When Senator John McCain was asked here this afternoon how he plans to balance the budget, he said that he hoped to do so by stimulating economic growth – and approvingly cited the example of President Ronald Reagan.
There was one thing he did not mention during his response: the deficit nearly tripled during the Reagan presidency, partly due to tax cuts and increases in military spending.
The exchange occurred at a town-hall-style meeting held in a tent outside Bridgewater Associates, an investment firm. A member of the audience stood up and asked Mr. McCain, who has called for balanced budgets, how he plans to do it.
“Basically, which is it?” the man asked Mr. McCain. “Straight talk: Do you want to raise taxes, cut entitlement spending, cut defense spending, or have a deficit?”
Mr. McCain did not explain how he plans to balance the budget, but spoke generally about hoping to stimulate the economy – and cited President Reagan.
Salon, Kartarine Mieszkowski, April 10, 2008
Thursday, the day Rep. Jackie Speier, 57, was sworn into Congress, she wasted no time in pissing off Republicans, by blasting President Bush and Sen. John McCain in a speech about the war in Iraq.
“The process to bring the troops home must begin immediately,” Speier, a Democrat from Hillsbourgh, Calif., told members of Congress, including Speaker Nancy Pelosi. “The president wants to stay the course and a man who wants to replace him suggests we could be in Iraq for 100 years. But Madam Speaker, history will not judge us kindly if we sacrifice four generations of Americans because of the folly of one.”
While Democrats applauded, some Republicans booed, and a few walked out in protest, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. Speier’s 13-year-old daughter, who was watching from the House Gallery, asked, “Why are they booing my mom?”
Reuters, April 10, 2008
TALLAHASSEE, Florida (Reuters) – Most Florida residents would be allowed to take guns to work under a measure passed by Florida lawmakers on Wednesday.
The bill, allowing workers to keep guns in their cars for self-protection, was approved by the Florida Senate by a vote of 26-13. It now goes to Republican Gov. Charlie Crist to sign into law.
Backed by the National Rifle Association and some labor unions, the so-called “take-your-guns-to-work” measure would prohibit business owners from banning guns kept locked in motor vehicles on their private property.
The measure applies to employees, customers and those invited to the business establishment as long as they have a permit to carry the weapon.
Backers say the measure upholds the vision of the authors of the U.S. Constitution, who made the right to bear arms part of the Bill of Rights.
Michelle Roberts,The Associated Press, April 5, 2008
ELDORADO, Texas – Child welfare officials have now removed nearly 200 women and children from a secretive West Texas religious retreat built by polygamist leader Warren Jeffs, authorities said Saturday.
The investigation began after a 16-year-old living there complained of physical abuse. A search warrant authorized state troopers to enter the retreat run by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and look for evidence of a marriage between the girl and a 50-year-old man.
The warrant said the girl had a baby eight months ago, when she was 15.
State Child Protective Services on Friday removed 52 girls from the compound. Marleigh Meisner, a spokeswoman for the agency, said that another 131 residents were removed overnight and that by Saturday afternoon 137 children and 46 women were being housed and interviewed.
Just when you thought reunion tours couldn’t get any worse comes the news that former boy band, The New Kids On The Block, are set to reunite. Sources close to the band say all five original New Kids – Joey McIntyre, Donnie Wahlberg, Danny Wood, and Jordan and Jonathan Knight are participating. Who the hell asked for this reunion? Are the band members so desparate for cash they are willing to make fools of themselves? There are a lot more real bands that I would rather see reunite than these posuers from Boston.
The Boston Globe, March 31, 2008
Senator Joe Lieberman blasted the Democratic Party yesterday as protectionist, isolationist, and hyperpartisan.
Speaking on ABC’s “This Week,” Lieberman, Independent of Connecticut, said it is not the same party that made him its vice presidential candidate in 2000.
“It’s not the Bill Clinton-Al Gore party, which was strong internationalists, strong on defense, pro-trade, pro-reform in our domestic government,” he said. “It’s been effectively taken over by a small group on the left of the party that is protectionist, isolationist, and very, very hyperpartisan. So it pains me.”
Lieberman, who won reelection to the Senate as an independent after losing the 2006 Connecticut Democratic primary, still caucuses with Democrats. But he has endorsed Republican John McCain’s presidential bid, and said yesterday that McCain reflects the legacy of John F. Kennedy.
Erik Eckholm, The New York Times, March 31, 2008
Driven by a painful mix of layoffs and rising food and fuel prices, the number of Americans receiving food stamps is projected to reach 28 million in the coming year, the highest level since the aid program began in the 1960s.
The number of recipients, who must have near-poverty incomes to qualify for benefits averaging $100 a month per family member, has fluctuated over the years along with economic conditions, eligibility rules, enlistment drives and natural disasters like Hurricane Katrina, which led to a spike in the South.
But recent rises in many states appear to be resulting mainly from the economic slowdown, officials and experts say, as well as inflation in prices of basic goods that leave more families feeling pinched. Citing expected growth in unemployment, the Congressional Budget Office this month projected a continued increase in the monthly number of recipients in the next fiscal year, starting Oct. 1 — to 28 million, up from 27.8 million in 2008, and 26.5 million in 2007.
The percentage of Americans receiving food stamps was higher after a recession in the 1990s, but actual numbers are expected to be higher this year.
It just get worse. Since the moment George W. Bush step foot in the White House the United States has gone straight to hell. Everywhere you look pieces of what have made this country the great country it has been since our independence are falling and smashing to pieces. Now another piece, our vaunted financial system is about to shatter.
Bush’s policies in every single area important to the Federal Government have been absolute shit. Bush has trashed everything from our once untouchable prestige in the world, to the environment, to education, to civil liberties, to a long and bloody illegal war. Unfortunately he apparently wasn’t done fucking up the country. Now our financial system seems to be teetering on the edge of collapse not just a mortgage crisis. Bush’s icing on the cake.
In today’s New York Times, columnist and respected economist Paul Krugman, speculates that this is just the beginning. Krugman seems to believe that the government will have to do a full scale bailout of the financial system much like they did in the savings and loan crisis of the 1980s and the crash of the 1930s. That means billions of our tax dollars to bail out the system. Example. Friday the Federal Reserve bailed out financial biggie Bear Stearns and today allowed JP Morgan and Company to by Bear for $2 a share. Nice. While the fat bastards Bush made rich by taking a blind eye to the financial services industry get away with it and stay rich, the regular people take the beating.
So there you have it. One more colossal fuck up by George W. Bush. I wonder how all those folks out there that voted for Bush because they felt he would be more fun to have a beer with feel about him now. Might be tough to feel good about having a beer with the guy when you living in your fucking car because you lost your job and your house was repossessed.
Bradley Brooks, The Associated Press, March 16, 2008
BAGHDAD — Sen. John McCain, the Republican Party’s presumptive nominee for president who has linked his political future to U.S. success in Iraq, was in Baghdad on Sunday for meetings with Iraqi and U.S. diplomatic and military officials, a U.S. government official said.
Details of McCain’s visit were not being released for security reasons, the U.S. embassy said.
McCain’s visit was not announced and he was believed to have been in the country for several hours before reporters were able to confirm his arrival. It was unclear who he met with and no media opportunities or news conferences were planned.
McCain, a strong supporter of the U.S. military mission in Iraq, is believed to be staying in the country for about 24 hours.
“Senator McCain is in Iraq and will be meeting with Iraqi and U.S. officials,” said Mirembe Nantongo, spokesperson for the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad.
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MSNBC Says It’s Biden
MSNBC reported early Saturday morning that Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has picked Sen. Joseph Biden, 65, to be his vice presidential running mate. There is an Obama rally planned in Springfield, Illinois, this afternoon to officially announce Biden’s addition to the Dem ticket.
Predictably, the half-crazed wingnuts aboard the sinking USS McCain and their allies, the 101st Keyboard Commandos, will be sharpening their pitchforks ready to stick it to the Delaware Senator and erstwhile presidential candidate in any spot that looks tender. Here are the soft places they’ll likely poke with glee:
1. Biden was once called the Senator from DuPont, and for good reason. Joe has been very chummy with the chemical giant, as well as other large corporations from his state, which has no corporate tax. These slings and arrows of outrageous fortune — considering they’re from the wholly-corporatized Republican Party — will be shamelessly slung at Biden for being too close to evil Big Bidness, probably via a strenuous Internet email campaign and multiple postings on some of the more frothing hoof-and-mouth neocon websites like Hind-Acher’s Powerline blog and Freeper Republic.
2. Joe will be endlessly drubbed for appropriating without attribution British Labour Party PM candidate Neil Kinnock’s “born the son of a coal miner, first in the family to attend college” bio that derailed Biden’s presidential run in 1988. That this might have been an innocent mistake won’t cut any mustard with the ravening wolves of the right — “Plagiarist!” “Liar!” will be sprinkled like salt on potato chips all over the right-wing Media Vomitorium, with Michelle Malkin no doubt inferring in a screechy nut-pile smackdown that perhaps Biden really is a liberal Brit, and therefore a foreigner not to be trusted. Next Sean Hannity will demand that Pennsylvania-born Biden produce his birth certificate and, when produced, will ignore it. I can see the Fox News splash now: “Is Joe Biden Really an American Citizen – How Can We Be Sure?”
3. Obama will take a hit for naming Biden since Joe has been in the US Senate for over 30 years, longer than John Sidney McBush III. “Some change you can believe in,” the Tighty-Righties will sneer without embarrassment while in the next paragraph they praise their sealed-in-amber candidate, trying to drag the country back to the Age of the Cold War and a victory in Vietnam – I mean, Iraq.
Also, look for McCainiac ads quoting Biden during the 2008 Dem primary debates wherein he called Obama too inexperienced to be president, and for his ‘yea’ vote on the Iraq invasion. I hope the Obama campaign has some quick short answers ready for these slaps up the side of the head.
Biden’s Good Points:
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