Great Moment for America

It is far to easy tonight, to claim a victory for democrats, a victory for minorities or a victory against Bush.

Tonight is a night for all Americans and truly, all the world.

We have not elected a Black candidate, liberal candidate or the anti-Bush, we have elected an American candidate to the highest office in the land. We have put our faith in the ideas and policies that have moved us to believe and to think of our future.

We have succeeded and the world awaits for the next American President to truly represent the people of America and lead us into the future.

May God bless America, President-Elect Obama, the leadership of our great nation and all of the people of the world.

Still the same old tricks – GOP dirty strategy returns

As democrats we should be ashamed – once again, the GOP has pulled the curtain and we have allowed it…

It is becoming increasingly clear that if we can show up and bring our friends, than we will win back the White House and make important gains in Congress. I fear, however, that the most recent McCain strategy is a winning one – not for him, but for his crooked republican peers, struggling to hold their seats.

Senator Obama has certainly captured the news cycle of late, with gains in the polls, gains in the electoral math, a phenomenal closing speech, an infomercial to drive the crowds at the polls, and overall, positive news coverage.

But where has John McCain been?

Sure we know about his red-state rally’s, desperately trying to close the gap in the polls. However, less and less, we are hearing about how he thinks trickle-down economics, the War in Iraq, our health care system, tax structure and rate of tuition is perfect for America. Instead, the stories coming out of the McCain campaign have been nothing more than distractions.

Sarah Palin is a diva and a nut-job, we are told by aids (not that we didn’t previously think that). “Joe the Plumber” is a no show . . . but wait, he’ll be there later! McCain is struggling in Arizona, McCain can recapture Pennsylvania, etc.

Instead of defending his poor decisions and support for broken policies, McCain is changing the story to human interest. Worst of all, we’re buying it.

So why do I care? Two words: House and Senate.

Unlike George Bush, I don’t think that John McCain is an idiot. I have no doubt that he has a gracious concession speech and a plan of attack for when he returns to the Senate. I think his strategy now, however, is to decrease damage to Congressional Republicans. While his fate has been all but sealed, there are far too many Senate and House races that are quite close. So rather than talking about his unpopular stances on issues and how his “mainstream” ideas are the same of the radical-right’s Bush policies, he is presenting human interest stories that will distract the public.

Time and time again we have permitted the Republicans to control the story. As Nick pointed out, they have turned “liberal” into a dirty word, they have made the pro-choice movement into the pro-abortion movement, opposition to government murder into soft on crime, anti-war into anti-American and anyone who disagrees with their radical ideology into non-patriotic talk.

It is far past the time to take the conversation back and say once and for all, no. The notion that standing up against a government who has little regard for a large chunk of constituents is un-patriotic proves the gross ignorance of the GOP. Take a look at history. Without debate, disagreement, and the will do stand up for what is right, we would still be colonized.

Just Another GOP Crook!

Sarah Palin claims to be a Washington outsider who will bring change to politics as we know it. She makes outlandish claims that she gains foreign policy experience as Governor of Alaska, economic expertise as a small town mayor, and understands the needs of the people as a hockey mom.

We all knew she was full of crap when she agreed to run as VP (and if elected, most likely President), but for a moment, we could have believed that she was . . . different.

I don’t care if her jacket costs $1 or $100. I don’t care if her daughters, or for that matter, any relative attends events with her. I don’t care if her mullet costs $4 or $400. What I care about is her deceptive manners and cronyism that has represented the GOP politicians since Carter.

I am sick of hearing about Joe the Plumber’s six-pack, caring for the average auto-mechanic Jane and how the failed ‘trickle down’ theory of Regan and Bush will actually work if American’s are dumb enough to give the Republicans another shot.

It is idiotic for someone to argue at 2pm that pork-barrel spending is out of control while spending $75,000 in one shopping spree. What is offensive about it, however, is that her version of pork-barrel spending is taken from the funds of McCain’s failing campaign. With the $150,000 he has spent dressing a lipstick-wearing pig to look like a politician, he could have been writing and producing more made-up Obama policies to run against.

What is wrong, however, is that she is publicly stealing from taxpayers. She claims to reform and cut, but the reality is that she raises taxes, overspends and steals. It is unacceptable for her young children to be traveling at the state’s expese. I have a difficult time believing that a 9 year-old is representing the state to anyone. I’m suprized that she didn’t also charge the state for their clothing and food. Afterall, if they have nothing to wear and eat, how can they represent Alaska to her husband at a snow mobile race?

She has lied, lied and lied. As she is caught, she replaces reality with her own ficition and pretends that it is all okay. She breached ethics rules in her fireings, used private e-mails to get around the inconvinient law, has stolen from the people of Alaska and stolen from the GOP, and robbed her towns piggy bank for self-interested projects.

When this election is over and the GOP bans her from the continential US, I think that the Alaskan legislature should bring impeachment charges, the IRS should bring tax charges, and the attorney general should file charges for theft.

I don’t care who you are or where you are from, when you use any position of power to take unauthorized funds to pay for you and your kids’ lifestyle, that is stealing.

Apparently the GOP still hasn’t taught their politicians right from wrong.

Greatness in times of Despiration

About two years ago, disgusted and fed up with the Bush administration, I began to think about what exactly his presidency has lacked. Drive, determination, relevancy, clear headedness, steadiness, reason, ability, competency, care, and the list goes on. More importantly, it got me thinking of what makes Presidents stand out.

Republican politicians, including McCain, love to point out that you need more than words to get things done. He is absolutely right. He is, however, missing the greater point. Words can help and words can heal, often much more than legislation. Diplomacy has ended wars and more importantly avoided them. Embracement has helped the fallen of the most devastating atrocities of time. Messages have driven our economy to new heights and inspired millions.

Lack of words, lack of listening and hateful speech has taken the lives of millions, driven us into war, led us to the threshold of a depression and diminished our legitimacy. Words have killed during the crusades, in Europe during the holocaust, on our shore during the civil war, the Salem Witch trials and hate has driven mass killings in our schools. Words have ignited battles in Sudan, Somalia, Bosnia, Israel, Kuwait, Iraq and most recently Georgia.

It has been the words of many that have led us and helped us along and through and words that continue to.

“…America will once again rise from the ashes of the Bushes.”

“Make no mistake about it. We’ve done it before and we will do it again. America will once again rise from the ashes of the Bushes.”

- Sen. Hillary Clinton
October 12, 2008

Senator Hillary Clinton once again has turned up the heat. In a speech in Scranton, PA, she made this declaration that will certainly be the soundbite of the week.

The truth is in the message – raw, uncensored and clear. We have seen the faults of war, economic strife and increasing domestic problems. The errors of the Bushes plagued us in the early ’90s and plague us again today.

Just as in 1992, it will take the election of a Democrat to clean up this mess and once again exercise the fiscal responsibility, clearheaded decisions and sound judgment to put us on the renewed track of global respect, economic soundness, domestic strength and a belief that freedom and democracy are tools for good, not weapons of evil.

Bush and Nixon Tied!

With the final months of the current administration upon us (finally), Bush’s approval rating continues to fall.

He now is shown to have a whopping approval of 24%! My first question is who thinks he is doing a mediocre job, let along a good one. Standing in a room with 9 others, I doubt I could find anyone, let along 2.4 that would think that he is doing anything other than lousy.

With that said, Bush has now tied his lowest approval rating with that of Richard Nixon, right before he resigned due to pressures stemming from his criminal actions leading o the Watergate scandal.

Absolutely disgusting. I hope to see him charged with the various domestic and international crimes that he has committed. As a morally and legally driven person, I hope that he does get better treatment than what he gave illegal prisoners detained at GITMO and Abu Ghraib.

Republican – It’s a whole new kinda stupid!

The Republican Party is looking even more desperate for votes than ever before.

In a despicable attempt to legalize voter intimidation and censorship, they are hoping to prohibit expression at the polls. That’s right, the Republican’s think that the first amendment should be suspended in the voting booth.

How could anyone be so stupid, you may ask. Because they are desperate to keep this election from a landslide democratic victory.

In the presidential primary, Sue Nace went to cast her primary ballot in Pennsylvania for Obama, sporting her Obama tee. Despite a memo to election officials by the Pennsylvania Department of State, clarifying that only non-passive activism (active activism) was prohibited from election facilities to prevent voter intimidation, the Republicans are supporting two lawsuits contesting the memo.

Right-wing nut jobs are lining up, favoring a dress code at the polls. But why? Ask yourself how many people are walking around supporting a certain 72-year old cancer prone former maverick and a rat with lipstick (or something like that). Ask yourself how many people have covered their Bush-Devil ’04 bumper stickers with John W McCain stickers. Now think about how many Obama-Biden shirts, how many Obama bumper stickers and how many Change lawn signs you have seen.

Is it primarily the young or the old sporting their Obama t-shirts and buttons? Do you see a lot of college students in a sweater vest? That is the reason. It is the same reason that Republicans are auditing $450 Million donated to Obama. They just don’t get where they were left behind.

Perhaps they missed the memo about Al Gore’s internet. Being the kid on the ticket (closer to the great-grand kid on the ticket) Palin can visit the Google and figure out why Joe six pack is gonna go fer the guy with the fancy magazines and Supreme court decisions. She’ll just have to get back to ya!

Actions Speak Louder than Words

This week we have once again seen what happens when there is all talk and no action from our leadership. Eight years of Bush’s ‘free-market responsibility’ has led to a de-regulated lending and banking industry that is costing the same as nearly eight months of Bush’s un-winnable war.

Once again, the Republican party is exposed and once again they fail the American people.

Sarah Palin’s background has once more been exposed. Upon a deeper look at her policies, she appears even further out of the mainstream than originally though. Under her leadership, for the first time, women were charged for a ‘rape kit’ – a decision outlawed later by the Alaska legislature and a horrible decision that discouraged rape victims from coming forward. On the environment, she is absolutely disgraceful. She led the charge to sue the federal government for listing the polar bear as an endangered species as their positioning on the list prevented some off-shore oil drilling (in that narrow maritime border between Alaska and Russia). She fought against wildlife protections that would regulate the fishing industry. She supports drilling in ANWAR – a concept so vile, even her lying, cheating, corrupt running mate opposes.

During her infamous interview with Katie Couric, not only did she prove her inexperience, lack of qualification and simple inability to responsibly assume the office of the President if needed, she made a crack at the length of time that Senator Joe Biden has served in the senate, claiming that she remembers hearing about his speech style since she was in the second grade.

Isn’t it ironic that she is calling him old when her running mate is 72. Perhaps someone should remind her that when she was a grade school child (and had about the same qualifications for the office of the vice-president that she does today), Joe Biden was among those leading the fight to undue many of the wrongs of our nation. Since she was a teenager he has been a champion of women’s rights, minority rights and the good name (or former good name) of the United States around the world.

It is insulting to America for the Republican party to once again try to sell a bucket of crap as the golden ticket. This time, as polls continue to indicate, the American people will stand up and shout, from sea to shining sea, from the mountain tops, and yes, from front porches where they can see Alaska, an overwhelming chorus of ‘No.’

I am looking very forward to November 5, 2008 when I will wake up and know that the future for us is a bright one, led not by incompetence and denial, but of hope and vision.

A New Republic(an)

It has become clear during this campaign season that John McCain and the Republican party is so far from mainstream America, that they have been rendered themselves irrelevant. The McCain campaign will certainly have very little impact on this presidential election.

Polling shows that his numbers are falling, and will balance out in the low number that his campaign has earned and deserves. He will get the die-hard Republicans and few others.

I do believe, however, that he is actually the second step in a major shift in the Republican party as we know it.

The first step was George W. Bush and the corrupt Bush Republicans, leading to the exposure of radical Republican ideology, polarization the majority of Americans. John McCain, in attempt to pick up the pieces, has formed the second step, deciding to go to the right, instead of center, resulting in a good man’s name being smeared and exposed for the broken policies he has embraced. In attempt to gain the trust of the people, he had a choice: pick a moderate, well trusted politician with a track record that the radical right would hate, or to choose a candidate with less qualifications and track record than Harriet Meirs.

As we have learned, when you have a broken economy, mass job loss, massive bank failure, a war we cannot win, a broken education system, an energy crisis and grave uncertainty about our future, we require more than ignorance – we require vision and detailed change.

I think McCain’s many missteps will officially destroy the right wing nut-job base of the Republican party immediately following the election. What will result will be an appropriate response and valuable change in the next decade.

The Republican party will need to follow the steps of some of their greatest leadership. Politicians such as Senator Lieberman, Mayor Blumberg and Governor Schwarzenegger, in my opinion, will be the moderate, and even reasonable, new Republican party.

The McCain Energy Plan? Chicken Poop (well, no – that’s the problem!)

The Netherlands have announced that they will be building a new factory that will use the feces of chickens to power 90,000 homes.

My gut reaction was thinking that instead of follow the McCain energy plan of “drill, baby, drill,” we could just take the heaps of crap that McCain, Palin and the Republican party have been spewing and use that to make something useful (it might be the greatest contribution the Republican party has made since Lincoln).

It does legitimately bring to the table, however, why we have not take a serious look and converting animal waste into useful energy. One of the great hurdles to energy security has been the concentration of resources – that some states have great ability to produce wind power or solar power, but areas, such as the south east, would require massive transmission lines, requiring great resources and research into potential health benefits and safety factors. The southeast does, however, have farms and livestock. If it is possible to produce energy from animal waste in a clean manner, it could help to reduce our dependence on dirty sources such as oil and coal.

My guess is that our scientists have not had adequate ability to explore the possibility. It will take a commitment and resources from a pro-science white house and the levelheadedness to realize that more drilling may make a dent (at most), but will no be a viable, long term solution.