Barr still working on W.Va.

Though the state is one of the hardest for him to obtain ballot access, Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr's campaign is still collecting signatures for W.Va.

As the H-D reported on the 31:

Party spokesperson Andrew Davis said they are shooting for 22,000 signatures, although just more than 15,000 are needed to pass the initiative.

In ballot access efforts, campaigns generally try to collect a great deal more signatures than the required number, as many are thrown out when officials review them. I worked for a third party in 2000 and our goal was to get 50% more than we needed, so that we had a cushion when they got reviewed.

Off-topic Thursday

Superchunk - "Watery Hands," featuring David Cross and Janeane Garofalo.

"McPathetic" or "A Respectful Run"

Earlier this year, John McCain promised his campaign would be different and would engage the American people on issues.

Well, that promise of "a respectful run" + Karl Rove as an advisor = This:

Ladies and gentlemen, the single stupidest political ad of all time!

AP:

McCain's ad, titled "Celeb" and set to air in 11 battleground states, intercuts
images of Obama on his trip to Europe last week with video of twenty-something
pop stars Spears and Hilton — both better known for their childish off-screen
antics.
"He's the biggest celebrity in the world, but is he ready to lead?"
the voiceover asks, noting the Illinois senator's opposition to offshore oil
drilling and suggesting he would raise taxes if elected.

Basically, the argument is "Britney Spears is popular with the young 'uns. Paris Hilton is popular with the young 'uns. Barack Obama is popular with the young 'uns. Therefore, electing Obama would be like having Britney Spears as president."

Nevermind that Britney and Paris are yesterday's news as far as being taken seriously by the youth and that McCain is once again showing how out-of-touch he is with anyone under 65.

Just stop and ask yourself, "Is this really the way the world's most influential democracy should be picking its leaders?"

----

Gotta love Obama's comeback:

The spot, titled "The Low Road," witnesses the Illinois Democrat playing his
trump card: tying McCain to George W. Bush, both in politics and in
policy.
"He's practicing the politics of the past: John McCain," reads
the ad. "His attacks on Barack Obama: not true, false, baloney, the low road,
baseless. John McCain same old politics same failed policies."
A picture of
the presumptive Republican nominee shaking hands with the soon-to-be-departed
president fills the screen.

Photo: AP

Ted Stevens indicted

or

"These charges are just a series of tubes!"

HuffPo reports on another pillar of GOP ethics:

WASHINGTON — Sen. Ted Stevens, the nation's longest-serving Republican
senator and a major figure in Alaska politics since before statehood, was
indicted Tuesday on seven felony counts of concealing more than a quarter of a
million dollars in house renovations and gifts from a powerful oil contractor
that lobbied him for government aid.

You may remember Stevens as the "Bridge to Nowhere" guy, in which he used his position as chairman of the Senate Appproporiations Comitteee to steer $223 million of taxpayer money to build a bridge to connect a tiny island with a scant population to the mainland. A second Alaskan bridge received about $230 million and was expected to eventually cost up to $1.5 billion.

That's fiscal conservatism for you!

Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma wanted to take Stevens' bridge waste and shift it use for Katrina rebuilding.

Stevens went nuts.

"I don't kid people," Stevens roared. "If the Senate decides to
discriminate
against our state . . . I will resign from this body.

But it's most likely that know Stevens from this performance of legend:



Stevens was already fighting the race of his long political life as this investigation heated up. His Democratic challenger has been running even with him or a point or two ahead, depending on the poll. Obviously, this makes him far more vulnerable. Kos looks at whether the GOP can replace him on the ballot before the election here.

Photo: AP

McNasty claim is false (no surprise)

The nonpartisan Factcheck.org takes a look at McCain's latest commercial, which claims Obama neglected wounded troops while in Germany.

The group finds the spot "falsely insinuates that Obama canceled his visit because "the Pentagon wouldn't allow him to bring cameras."

Recommended Reading: Jeff Cohen

FAIR's founder looks at how the NY Times can't interpret data:

So the Times presents Gallup data showing a clear trend toward the left, and calls it a "Move to the Middle." Is the assumption that we were mostly rightwingers a few years ago? Or is the "move to the middle" line simply more reassuring to an establishment newspaper?

And if you missed it, my old interview with Mr. Cohen is can be found here.

Citizen Kaine

I know, not clever and too lazy of a headline, but I couldn't resist referencing my favorite movie.

Politico reports that Virginia Governor Tim Kaine is "very, very high" on the short list for Obama's V-P.

As Senator Barack Obama turns to the choice of his running mate, Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine has emerged as one of the campaign’s potential finalists, sources familiar with conversations in Richmond and in Chicago said.

Make of that what you will.

One obvious electoral benefit is that he's enormously popular in Virginia, a swing state.

Health care and education are his big issues. He tends to be a bit more culturally conservative than most Dems.

But bear in mind that Obama's campaign said to ignore all speculation and that leaks would not occur. The campaign said no information would be forthcoming until a choice is made.

So who knows?

Democratic Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine talks with reporters during a break at the National Governors' Association centennial meeting, Saturday, July, 12, 2008, in Philadelphia.

One week after...

One week after Bill O'Reilly called Moveon and Netroots Nation the equivalent of hate groups like the Klan and white power movements, we find this out.

---

We all were shocked by the tragic shooting at a church in Tennessee earlier this week.

Information has come out as to the killer's motive:

Knoxville News:

Police found right-wing political books, brass knuckles, empty shotgun shell boxes and a handgun in the Powell home of a man who said he attacked a church in order to kill liberals "who are ruining the country," court records show.
[...]
Adkisson targeted the church, Still wrote in the document obtained by WBIR-TV, Channel 10, "because of its liberal teachings and his belief that all liberals should be killed because they were ruining the country, and that he felt that the Democrats had tied his country's hands in the war on terror and they had ruined every institution in America with the aid of media outlets."
[...]
Inside the house, officers found "Liberalism is a Mental Health Disorder" by radio talk show host Michael Savage, "Let Freedom Ring" by talk show host Sean Hannity, and "The O'Reilly Factor," by television talk show host Bill O'Reilly.

Obviously, he was a disturbed man to begin with. Probably was far gone long ago. So saying rightwing radio caused this would be a real stretch.

Though a steady diet of such angry, divisive rhetoric certainly doesn't help.

But I think Bill can quit pointing fingers as to who's spreading hate now. That line about the war on terror and the media sounds a bit O'Reilly-esque.

Also, O'Reilly and his kind are often the first to blame film and music for violence in society. If they really believe that, will they push just as hard to police their own content?

McNasty

Now we're seeing why he was given that nickname in high school.

This last few week, he's getting increasingly desperate - from thinly-veiled attacks on Obama's patriotism to nonsensical accusations of neglecting the troops (nevermind the fact that McMaverick was the one who opposed the recent GI Bill).

Senator Chuck Hagel, R-Nebraska has had enough.

"John is treading on some very thin ground here when he impugns motives and when we start to get into, 'You're less patriotic than me. I'm more patriotic ... "it's just not responsible to be saying things like that."

Hagel used to be considered one of McCain's strongest allies. He backed McCain in his 2000 run and was, at one point, someone many thought would be on a McCain short list for V-P.

But in the last year, he's spoken out more and more against the war in Iraq and McCain and Bush's positions. Hagel's wife's has donated to Obama and he's even said he'd consider a V-P position on an Obama ticket, if offered. Probably won't happen - but he's made it known to the Obama campaign.

By the way, isn't it a strange coincidence that this sudden, ugly turn in McCain seems to happen around the same time Karl Rove took a more active role in his campaign?

Expect lots more of this kind of MaverickyStraightTalkTM as we enter the final 100 days of the race.

Photo AP

Sunday poll

This one's a rerun (the only time I'll do this) from when the blog wasn't featured on the front page of the site and it didn't get a lot of traffic.

Since I'm on the front through convention time, I thought this would be a good time to reuse it. Here's the original setup:

This week's poll is a look at the people who didn't get to be president. For this list, I've assembled a mix - some I think would have been wonderful, some I believe would have been absolutely horrid and possibly brought about the end of the U.S.A.

I've included as many eras and political stripes as I could, though I admit it's skewed a bit toward modern times.

The only qualification was that the person actually had presidential aspirations - some lost narrowly in the general, others lost in the primary, some never had a prayer in any case and some died before they could be nominated.

Have at it:

Who is the greatest president we never had?
	Alexander Hamilton
	Samuel Adams
	Henry Clay
	Horace Greeley
	Samuel Tilden
	William Jennings Bryan
	Eugene Debs
	Robert La Follette
	Huey P. Long
	Alf Landon
	Tom Dewey
	Henry Wallace
	Strom Thurmond
	Adlai Stevenson
	Barry Goldwater
	Robert F. Kennedy
	Eugene McCarthy
	Hubert Humphrey
	George Wallace
	George McGovern
	Walter Mondale
	Gary Hart
	Michael Dukakis
	H. Ross Perot
	Bob Dole
	Steve Forbes
	Al Gore
	Ralph Nader
	Pat Buchanan
	John Kerry
pollcode.com free polls

Third party watch

Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr was on Ed Schultz's radio program a few days ago. He said he is likely going to appear on the ballot in 49 out of 50 states.

He didn't mention the one he's having trouble with is the Mountain State.

His deputy campaign manager Shane Cory talked to West Virginia Public Radio about their efforts:

He said West Virginia is one of the toughest states for the third party candidate to get on the ballot. To qualify, Barr must get signatures from 2% of voters from the 2004 election. That’s more than 15,000 signatures.

“For us, it was a matter of resources,” he said. “We had not planned to make an effort in West Virginia. It was only in the last two weeks when we said, we can send in the manpower and we can make a valid attempt to get on the ballot in West Virginia.”

Independent candidate Ralph Nader's campaign turned in their signatures this week.

Cynthia McKinney of the Green Party will get the Mountain Party ballot line (as the Mountain Party's Jesse Johnson bombed in his own bid for the Green nomination).

Photo: Bob Barr, Libertarian Party presidential nominee, gestures as he answers a question during a news conference in Oklahoma City, Tuesday, July 15, 2008. AP

Fox follies continue

620, 127 signatures were delivered to the pretend news network, calling it out for it's use of racial stereotypes.

Rolling Stone:

The rapper stood next to 19 neatly stacked cardboard boxes, with the number 620,127 taped to the side of each one — over 600,000 signatures gathered by ColorOfChange demanding that network president Roger Ailes “find a solution to address racial stereotyping and hate-mongering before it hits the airwaves.” Fox rejected the petitions, but Brave New Films says that Comedy Central’s The Colbert Report will accept them instead.

Meanwhile, Bill O'Reilly's constant projection is turning him into a complete cartoon.

He compares Netroots Nation to the Nazi party and David Duke. And he thinks Moveon is the new Klan.

The fact that both groups are openly critical of BillO and have documented numerous inaccuracies by him has nothing to do with this, of course.

This is just the usual thing where BillO accuses everyone else of behavior that he's guilty of.

He's no stranger to hate, having made numerous racist slurs over the years.

Lots of them.

Lots and lots.

And if you really want to see BillO's double standards in action, take a look at the guy who immediately follows him on TV. Mr. No Spin is strangely silent on this one.

Photo by me.

Quickies

- Pollster.com has a good map up on their front page showing how the Obama-McCain polls break down state-by-state and how the electoral vote stands if the election were held today.

- Ralph Nader's supporters have turned in signatures for ballot access in W.Va.

From AP:

The Charleston Gazette reports that petitions containing 7,500 signatures of state voters were submitted to the Secretary of State’s Office on Friday. More than 17,000 signatures were turned in previously and county clerks across the state already have validated more than 12,000.

To get on the November ballot, Nader needs 15,118 valid signatures of registered West Virginia voters.

Recommended Reading: Amy Goodman

America's best journalist asks, "Who's paying for the conventions?"

According to CFI’s new report, “Analysis of Convention Donors,” since the last presidential election, the corporations funding the conventions have spent more than $1.1 billion lobbying the federal government. Add to it the millions they pour into the conventions. Says Weissman: “In return for this money, the parties, through the host committees, offer access to top politicians, to the president, the future president, vice president, cabinet officials, senators, congressmen. They promise these companies who are giving that they will be able to not only get close to these people by hosting receptions, by access to VIP areas, but they’ll actually have meetings with them.”

Obama addresses 200,000 in Germany

AP:

"People of Berlin, people of the world, this is our moment. This is our time," he declared.

"The walls between old allies on either side of the Atlantic cannot stand," Obama said, speaking not far from where the Berlin Wall once divided the city.

"The walls between the countries with the most and those with the least cannot stand. The walls between races and tribes, natives and immigrants, Christians and Muslims and Jews cannot stand," he said.

---

Laughably, the GOP is trying to tell us that if people in Europe like him, then he must be bad for America (That was Hannity's sad line today).

Yeah, that whole Europe-bashing, Freedom Fries approach to foreign policy worked out so well these last eight years, didn't it?

----

Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., waves as he arrives at the Victory Column in Berlin, Thursday, July 24, 2008. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

Push-polling goes national

Courtesy of the joke that is FOX News.

With pretty much all polls showing Obama leading McCain, Republican State Television is getting desperate and is pulling out all the stops to get a favorable result.

From TPM. FOX's latest series of questions brings us gems like this:

Some people believe Barack Obama, despite his professed Christianity, is secretly a Muslim. Others say that is just a rumor and Obama really is a Christian as he says, and point out he's attended a Christian church for years. What do you believe -- is Obama a Muslim or a Christian

and this one:

John McCain was held captive for five years in a North Vietnamese prisoner of war camp. Do you think that experience would make McCain a better president or a worse president?

Even Colbert couldn't parody stuff like this.

And when you go out of your way to influence the results, you can then send them out to to GOP operatives in talk radio and have them crow "Fox Poll shows McCain-Obama statistical tie!," as Rush Limbaugh did today.

Checking in on Hagee

It's been a while since we heard from nutjob televangelist John Hagee. The controversial pastor was courted by McCain for months. When he finally got his endorsement, McStraighttalk stood by his man for months as controversial statements (praising Hurricane Katrina for wiping out New Orleans, for instance) from the ministry's history became publicized.

Eventually, McMaverick couldn't take the heat and decided to reject him, along with the man he called his "spiritual guide," televangelist and faith healer Rod Parsley.

Hagee has been quiet for a bit, but this week he's kicking off his long-promised gathering of followers at a D.C. conference (McSurrogate Joe Lieberman will be there).

Even though Hagee has hired a p.r. firm to try to put a pretty face on his conference, you don't have to dig too deep to see what kind of fanatical people McCain was seeking to win the approval of.

The American News Project has video and a report on this. Check it out here.

Off topic Thursday

Public Image Ltd. "Don't Ask Me"

CBS covers for McCain's error

Can we bury that tired "lib'rul media bias" myth once and for all?



Politico:

CBS News, which is under fire for its editing of Katie Couric's interview with Senator John McCain last night, defended the editing in a statement to Politico.

In the version of the interview that aired, an apparent McCain error reversing of the surge and the Sunni awakening was edited out, and a different answer was shown in response to the same question, drawing criticism from Huffington Post and from MSNBC's Keith Olbermann, among others.

Quickies

- Public health hazard number one: Bob Novak.

- Bush on the economic crisis:

"There's no question about it. Wall Street got drunk ... it got drunk and now it's got a hangover. The question is how long will it sober up and not try to do all these fancy financial instruments."

Write your own joke here.

- Rasmussen has Obama leading in Florida. 49-47%.

- Lina Newhouser, co-founder of Commondreams.org has died at age 56.

- Rasmussen also has McCain up by 10 in Ohio, which is the opposite of PPP's latest poll, which has Obama up by 8.

Quickies

- Public Policy Polling shows Obama with a 8 point lead over McCain in Ohio (48-40).

- South Carolina State Senator Kevin Bryant does GOP bigots proud.

- Glenn Greenwald explains the real reason for the Democrats' cave on telecom amnesty: The convention is brought to you by AT&T!

- Brownsox at Daily Kos says the race for Ky.'s U.S. Senate seat may be very competitive:

KY-Sen: Speaking of fundraising news, Bruce Lunsford is committed to keeping pace with fundraising juggernaut Mitch McConnell. Largely through personal donations to his own campaign, Lunsford matched McConnell's stunning $3 million take from last quarter.

Barth gaining on Capito?

AP had a story today on the race between incumbent Republican Shelley Moore Capito and Democratic candidate Anne Barth for W.Va.'s 2nd District U.S. House seat.

As the campaign continues, the race is being seen as more and more competitive. The Democrats have listed it as one of their "Red to Blue" targets and national leaders are helping Barth with fund raising.

The Gazette reported last week that Capito is outraising Barth, but as today's AP story shows, political observers like Charles Cook have to keep changing their rankings of the race as Barth closes in.

AP (via the H-D):
Noted national political analyst Charles Cook, for instance, upgraded the race from "Safely Republican" to “Likely Republican” after West Virginia’s May primary and then to “Lean Republican” earlier this month.

Capito has never really faced a serious challenge in her time in office. She won election to the seat vacated by Bob Wise in 2000, largely due to the the fact that Democrats had a lousy and unpopular candidate in James Humphreys.

She beat Humphreys again in 2002 and, in 2004 and 2006, she faced an underfunded candidate and then a challenger with no serious backing from the national party.

Though she won both times, the numbers hardly indicated she was invincible for future races.

Now she's facing Barth, who ran Sen. Robert C. Byrd's office for nearly twenty years and has the national party's backing and support.

And it's a hostile political climate for Congressional Republicans this year.

The way things are going, we may see this win in the "toss-up" category very, very soon.

Al-Maliki says Obama's plan is "more realistic"

Your buried lead this weekend in the mainstream media.

From Spiegel Online:

SPIEGEL: Would you hazard a prediction as to when most of the US troops will finally leave Iraq?

Maliki: As soon as possible, as far as we're concerned. U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama talks about 16 months. That, we think, would be the right timeframe for a withdrawal, with the possibility of slight changes.

SPIEGEL: Is this an endorsement for the US presidential election in November? Does Obama, who has no military background, ultimately have a better understanding of Iraq than war hero John McCain?

Maliki: Those who operate on the premise of short time periods in Iraq today are being more realistic. Artificially prolonging the tenure of US troops in Iraq would cause problems. Of course, this is by no means an election endorsement. Who they choose as their president is the Americans' business. But it's the business of Iraqis to say what they want. And that's where the people and the government are in general agreement: The tenure of the coalition troops in Iraq should be limited.

In this photo released by the Iraqi Government, the Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki gestures as he speaks at a meeting with several Arab ambassadors to the United Arab Emirates in that country's capital, Abu Dhabi, Monday, July 7, 2008. (AP Photo/Iraqi Government, HO)


----
UPDATE: Al-Maliki appeared to back off this statement a bit yesterday, but today the Iraqi government spokesman issued a statement that looks like it favors the Obama plan.

Gore on coal issues

Former vice-president Al Gore made a surprise appearance at Netroots Nation and took some questions.

wvblueguy of WVaBlue asked him about mountaintop removal and coal-to-liquid technology.

Gore's take on MTR?

"Mountaintop mining is an atrocity. It is an outrage."

[...]

"It's all done in automated way. That's why the coalminers lost all of their jobs. When we make this transition to renewable fuels, we have to keep them in mind. We ought to guarantee a good job in the fresh air and sunshine for every single coal miner who has been affected by the transition over to renewable fuels."

Here's the video:



More on this here in the original WVaBlue post.

Mandela celebrates 90 years

AP:

Sounding and looking vigorous, Mandela told a small group of reporters he was fortunate to have reached 90, crediting his "behavior" for his longevity.

"If you are poor, you are not likely to live long," he said.

His message was simple — the wealthy must do more.

"There are many people in South Africa who are rich and who can share those riches with those not so fortunate, who have not been able to conquer poverty," Mandela said during the 10-minute interview, his first such exchange with journalists in years.

Former South African President Nelson Mandela reacts during an interview with the media at his house in Qunu, rural southeastern South Africa, Friday, July 18, 2008. (AP Photo/Themba Hadebe, Pool)

Netroots Nation

The W.Va. Blue folks are attending Netroots Nation (I envy them), the yearly gathering of progressive bloggers that grew out of of the Yearly Kos conventions.

Read all about their experience here.

Here's Howard Dean, whose 2004 campaign revitalized the Democratic grassroots and energized the netroots, addressing the gathering:

The Real McCain 2

The follow-up video from Robert Greenwald of Brave New Films.

Well, that was quick

McCain has decided to kiss and make up with top advisor and complete jerk Phil Gramm.

Robert Scheer explains how Gramm's lobbyist-driven policies led to Enron and the current banking crisis here.

UPDATE: Looks like Novak's source spoke too soon. Gramm has resigned. To use the most overused GOP cliche, "Look how many people are under the bus in that campaign."

In this Feb. 3, 2008 file photo, former Texas Sen. Phil Gramm looks on at right as Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. addresses a rally at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, Conn. The Associated Press

Icelandic horror!

China's totalitarian rulers have listed Bjork as a national security threat and are banning her from the county.

Yes, Iceland's pop star has the ability to do what centuries of warfare, natural disaster and everything in between couldn't: Bring about the end of the Chinese nation.

Can you blame them? Just look at how chilling she is!

This, of course, is due to the fact that Bjork has been openly critical of China's murderous occupation of Tibet

Earlier this year, Bjork shouted "Tibet! Tibet!" at a Shanghai concert having performed her song "Declare Independence," which she has used in the past to promote independence movements in other places such as Kosovo.

Bjork's position is unlike, say, our last few presidents (and especially the current one) who can't wait to honor such brutality with the reward of trade and U.S. dollars.

Photo AP

Quickies

- Howard Zinn says no one wins in a war.

- Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr attended Gore's speech.

-Clem Guttata at W.VaBlue has a good take on what the Gore plan can mean for W.Va.

- Poor Holy Joe Lieberman has no friends.

Gore hands the Democrats an issue

The Democrats have more or less dropped the ball in making the energy crisis a meaningful issue so far in this race.

McCain and the GOP have put forward their horrid "drill here, drill now, blah blah blah" plan. But, to some voters, at least they're [seen as] talking about a solution. And it's helped McCain some.

I have no doubt that Obama would be a bazillion times better on the issue than McMaverick and his army of career lobbyists, but so far, he hasn't spelled it out as well as he should.

Today former Vice President Al Gore called on the U.S. to set a real alternative energy goal for the nation.

AP:

WASHINGTON (AP) - Just as John F. Kennedy set his sights on the moon, Al Gore is challenging the nation to produce every kilowatt of electricity through wind, sun and other Earth-friendly energy sources within 10 years, an audacious goal he hopes the next president will embrace

[..]

Gore said he fully understands the magnitude of the challenge.

The Alliance for Climate Protection, a bipartisan group that he chairs, estimates the cost of transforming the nation to so-called clean electricity sources at $1.5 trillion to $3 trillion over 30 years in public and private money. But he says it would cost about as much to build ozone-killing coal plants to satisfy current demand.

"This is an investment that will pay itself back many times over," Gore said. "It's an expensive investment but not compared to the rising cost of continuing to invest in fossil fuels."

This is the way Obama should approach this issue. Propose an Apollo Plan for energy. He hinted at it a bit when he criticized McCain's 'magic battery' pitch. Possibly, he'll elaborate as the campaign continues.

He needs to focus on this issue, contrast the differences in his plan and the GOP's and make it his own.

---

And proving that he knows how to get his message out and noticed , Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr was in attendance.

Former Vice President Al Gore speaks about energy and the future, Thursday, July 17, 2008, at Constitution Hall in Washington. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

Go Rachel!

The NYTimes reports that, my hero, Air America's Rachel Maddow is in the running to get her own show on MSNBC.

It's about time.

“At some point, I don’t know when, she should have a show,” said Phil Griffin, hours before he was promoted on Wednesday to president of MSNBC. “She’s on the short list. It’s a very short list. She’s at the top.”

You see, conservatives, this is what actual liberal media would look like.

Contrary to popular misconception, it's not Wolf Blitzer, George Stephanopoulos and the others members of beltway punditocracy you constantly cite.

More on Ms. Maddow, whose radio show airs locally on 1340AM at 6p.m. M-F, can be found here.

Off topic Thursday

Ray Davies of The Kinks performs his classic "Waterloo Sunset" with Damon Albarn from Blur

Recommended reading: Coal to Liquid Plan Means a Kentucky Fried Earth

By Kevin Grandia, managing editor of DeSmogblog.

This one's up on HuffPo:

(excerpt)
An announcement today for plans to construct a $4 billion coal to liquid fuel facility in Kentucky is a sign of the desperate times America is in.

Converting coal to liquid fuel has not been used on a large scale since the 1930’s when Nazi Germany developed the technology because the country had lots of coal but no petroleum of its own.

But the sell-job is well underway right now in Kentucky to re-frame coal to liquid as a miracle answer to America’s energy woes.

Obama making play for the coalfields

TPM reports that Obama is opening 20 new field offices in Virginia - and that five of them are in the western counties of the state where he lost heavily to Hillary Clinton (despite his statewide victory).

The Obama team is setting up shop in Winchester and Bristol, both of which are in areas that voted for Bush in 2004 by at least 25 points. Camp Obama is also adding an office in Harrisonburg, which went for Bush by 13 and is in the reliably-red Shenandoah Valley.

There will also be a new office in Castlewood, which is in the coalfields near West Virginia and Kentucky and went for Bush by eight, and in Martinsville, whose surrounding county went for Bush by 13 points.

Photo AP

Quickies

- McCain is still living like it's 1993.

- Sam Seder's "A Bad Situationist" is released.

-Elizabeth Dole feels the GOP's celebrated bigot isn't celebrated enough.

Republican Senator Dole introduced an amendment to name an HIV/AIDS relief bill after the recently deceased Jesse Helms. Helms, of course, was a strident foe of HIV/AIDS prevention, research and treatment.

- Obama maintains a lead over McCain in the latest polls.

- Mike Meehan is the dumbest man alive.

- Another McFlip-flop from John McCain: This time on gay adoptions. The straight-talker changed his position on this one in just two days.

Blue haze

AP:

CHARLESTON -- The state Department of Environmental Protection will continue to monitor a blue, chemical cloud over western Kanawha County, but isn't putting out any public health notices at this time.

WSAZ:

[DEP spokesperson] Kathy Cosco says the DEP is taking reports of the blue cloud very seriously, and says Friday's sighting is a "cause for concern" since this is not the first time the agency has seen a similar cloud.

Hagel joining Obama in Iraq

The GOP's senator from Nebraska confirms it.

From TPM:

In many ways, Hagel has become the mirror image of Joe Lieberman -- he is a conservative who has infuriated his party through his opposition to the Iraq War. However, Hagel has not crossed party lines to endorse Barack Obama as of yet, opting only to refuse to endorse John McCain.

Some have put Hagel's name out there as a potential Obama V-P. At the least, an endorsement may be a possibility.

By the way, Hagel's wife is an Obama donor.

According to Federal Election Commission records, Mrs. Hagel donated twice to Obama's campaign in February for a total contribution of $500. The contributions were first reported by the Washington Post
The contribution came a month before Sen. Hagel, a sharp GOP critic of the war in Iraq, appeared on ABC's "This Week" and declared that he and McCain have "pretty fundamental disagreements on the future of foreign policy."

Fresh controversy for Monday

The New Yorker's new cover is creating a stir.

I understand that it's satire and it's supposedly poking fun of the paranoid picture the right has painted of Obama.

But, picture a dozen or so of these staring back at you from a magazine rack and I can understand why the campaign is angry. It will just serve to reinforce that stereotype to the casual shopper who sees the cover, but doesn't bother to read the story (which isn't referenced anywhere on the front).

And, sadly, there are people out there who actually believe the image, as absurd as it is, is close to reality.

Dave Evans headed to Iraq

Longtime W.Va. antiwar activist Dave Evans is going to Iraq to help upgrade prosthetic clinics and train to replace limbs for amputees.

Evans, who lost both of his legs in Vietnam, was featured in a good story on the wire this weekend. We ran it in Sunday's paper.

The original appeared in the Gazette last week.

"I don't care what side you are on. I don't care what politics you have," Evans said last week. "I will take care of you if you are an amputee."

The U.S. State Department is financing his work and also will pick up costs to train Iraqis to help the wounded.

Quickies

- Former White House Press Secretary and FOX News host Tony Snow has lost his battle with cancer.

- Arnold Schwarzenegger is quickly becoming my favorite Republican. On the Bush administration:

"This administration did not believe in global warming," Schwarzenegger told ABC News' George Stephanopoulos in an exclusive interview that will air Sunday on ABC's "This Week."

- Scott Saxton reports on his WSAZ blog that ballot access efforts for third party candidate Ralph Nader are underway in W.Va. Bob Barr's supporters are planning to kick off their signature drive Wednesday, Saxton says.

- Pete Seeger is still active at 89.

Seeger will headline a Sept. 13 New England Farm Relief Concert in Brattleboro to raise money for a new micro-loan program being developed by The Carrot Project and the organization that operates the town's annual Strolling of the Heifers.

- The Lie That Won't Die: Pennsylvania Edition!

Photo: White House spokesman Tony Snow conducts his first press briefing in the Brady Press Briefing Room of the White House in Washington Tuesday, May 16, 2006. Snow has died of cancer. He was 53. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert, File)

Also a week of McGaffes

AP recaps McCain's horrible week. They mention the Gramm stuff, but here's a few more I haven't mentioned:

_Monday: At an otherwise well-received town hall event in Denver, McCain described the Social Security system as it currently operates as "an absolute disgrace" and said "it's got to be fixed." Liberal groups seized on the comment. McCain later said the disgrace is that young workers will not benefit from the program if long-term financing problems are not addressed. He vowed to work with Democrats and Republicans to do so.

_Tuesday: After ordering a cheesesteak sandwich at a popular Pittsburgh hangout, McCain invited reporters' questions. Asked about surprisingly large shipments of cigarettes to Iran, where U.S. exports are discouraged, McCain quipped: "Maybe that's a way of killing them." The joke seemed less funny a day later, when he somberly criticized Iran's test-firing of missiles. Bloggers, cable news shows and others replayed the sound bite repeatedly.

_Friday: The calmest day of McCain's week nonetheless included one of those odd moments that cause some supporters to wonder about his political dexterity. A woman at the Hudson forum denounced the Democratic Party and asked McCain if he would "hammer away at their socialist, Marxist philosophy." His "yes" response drew wild applause.

And then there was this bit of odd forgetfulness.

At least they didn't think we were part of Virginia...

Joe Manchin made an appearance on MSNBC to support Obama.

As the excellent blog Lincoln Walks at Midnight reports:

Though Mitchell clearly identified Manchin as the governor of West Virginia, on-screen text described his location as "Charleston, S.C." Thanks, MSNBC.

Quickies

- Net neutrality looks to be on track

- The GOP's Sen. Chuck Hagel is going to Iraq with Obama.

- ACLU is suing over the new FISA law:

President Bush's signature had barely dried on the FISA Amendments Act, which the Senate approved Wednesday, when the American Civil Liberties Union announced that it would mount a constitutional challenge to the new law, claiming that it violates the First and Fourth Amendments.

Week of McDodges

There was the question on Viagra vs. contraceptives while he was in Portsmouth:

When asked Wednesday if he had voted in the Senate against a proposal to require insurance companies to cover contraceptive products, McCain replied, "I don't know enough about it to give you an informed answer because I don't recall the vote... I don't usually duck an issue, but I'll try to get back to you."

Was he feigning forgetfulness? Who knows, but then there the question about his votes on veterans issues:

In a Denver town hall meeting yesterday, a Vietnam veteran challenged Sen. John McCain on his Senate voting record regarding veterans issues, remarking he had voted against increasing vets health funding four years in a row. Ignoring the veteran ’s point, McCain insisted that he had received every award from every major veteran’s organization.

Not only did he dodge the question, but he forgot that he received a "D" from Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, a rating of only 20 percent from Disabled American Veterans and that he opposed Sen. Jim Webb's G.I. Bill, which was backed by The American Legion and Veterans of Foreign Wars - two groups he claims he gets a "perfect" rating from.

Photo: AP

Olympic spirit

The Washington Post reports that China is cracking down on dissent on the eve of the games. George W. Bush is still going to coddle the tyrants by attending the opening ceremonies.

Huang, who had already served a five-year prison term for political material posted on his Web site, had just published an article about China's latest forbidden topic: shoddy construction of school buildings in Sichuan province, where more than 9,000 children were killed when their classrooms collapsed in the May 12 earthquake.

As Huang predicted, when he and two friends walked out of that restaurant in Chengdu on June 10, the police closed in. He is being held in a detention house in the city, the capital of Sichuan province, charged with illegal possession of state secrets, a catchall term often used to stifle dissent.

Recommended reading: Bill Scher

The proprietor of Campaign for America's Future nails it on McCain's economic brain:

Phil Gramm is Conservatism

Phil Gramm thinks that the economy is wonderful and those that feel otherwise are mistaken. This is does not make Gramm uniquely callous. It just makes him a conservative.

For several years, conservatives have been mightily trying to insist the economy tastes great, so shut up and eat it.

AP file photo

---

TPM has some fun with this in their latest video:

Phil Gramm is still a jerk and McCain McFlippity-flops

Remember Phil Gramm, the obnoxious and mean-spirited GOP senator from Texas?

He was best-known for this kind of stuff:

When an elderly widow in Corsicana told him that cutting Medicare would make it
more difficult for her to remain independent, Gramm said, "You haven't thought
about a new husband, have you?"

He was also a world class hypocrite: posing as a faux populist and railing against government waste while sending pork barrel money back to his Texas campaign backers; courting the religious right and blovating about morality while trying to finance a soft-core adult movie (not a joke - See the N.Y.Times).

Gramm also never met an industry he didn't want to deregulate for Corporate America. Among his key works in the Senate was deregulating the banking industry to pave the way for the foreclosure crisis.

Yes Phil Gramm was probably one of the worst politicians of the '90s. He ran for president and failed miserably in 1996. Then he served out his Senate term and retired to work as a lobbyist (for subprime company UBS among others) and spend more time with his wife (who was on the board of directors at Enron.)

Well, he's back!

McMaverick has picked him as an economic advisor.

On Wednesday he said the economic problems are all in your head and that America is merely in a "mental recession." The economy is doing just fine, he says:

"We have sort of become a nation of whiners," he said. "You just hear this
constant whining, complaining about a loss of competitiveness, America in
decline" despite a major export boom that is the primary reason that growth
continues in the economy, he said.

McCain initially stood by Gramm's ugly comments. But now, in the millionth example of McCain trying to say that one of the career lobbyists he constantly surrounds himself is not really representative of his campaign, McStraighttalk says:

"Phil Gramm's comments are not representative of John McCain's views. John
McCain travels the country every day talking to Americans who are hurting,
feeling pain at the pump and worrying about how they'll pay their mortgage.
That's why he has a realistic plan to deliver immediate relief at the gas
pump, grow our economy and put Americans back to work."

McCain, however, is keeping the patron saint of lobbyists on the campaign and Gramm, in his typically insensitve, nasty manner, is standing by his statement.

"I'm not going to retract any of it. Every word I said was true," Gramm
said.

Though he did try to weasel out of it and claim that he wasn't referring to the American people , but leaders in Washington (classic Gramm phony populism), but the idea that the economic problems are imaginary stays.

---

For more info on what a wonderful guy Gramm is, check out Mother Jones' article on his retirement from the senate. That's where you can find stuff on McCain's economic mastermind like this statement:

"Most people don't have the luxury of living to be 80 years old," Gramm
scoffed, "so it's hard for me to feel sorry for them." (responding to
another senator who pointed out that a social security proposal would hurt
retirees)

Photo: Former Texas Sen. Phil Gramm introduces Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., to speak at a town hall meeting, Saturday, Feb. 17, 2007, in Des Moines, Iowa.(AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)

Off topic Thursday

U2 - "Lemon"

4th Amendment dead

Be sure to thank this guy for caving to Bush in his hard work in letting telecommunications companies off the hook.

AP:

WASHINGTON - Bowing to President Bush's demands, the Senate approved and
sent the White House a bill Wednesday to overhaul bitterly disputed rules on
secret government eavesdropping and shield telecommunications companies from
lawsuits complaining they helped the U.S. spy on Americans.

Enjoy the Fourth Amendment for one more night

As Glenn Greenwald and Christi Hardin Smith are telling Mike Malloy Show fill-in host Sam Seder, the Senate is ready to pass Jay Rockefeller's Kill The Fourth Amendment Act tomorrow, in order to help the Democrats achieve a perfect track record in caving to the Bush administration.

So if you have any embarrassing ailments or unpleasant stuff you want to talk about on the phone without someone listening in, tonight's the night to do it.

Doubletalk Express coming to Portsmouth

So McCain is holding a town hall meeting in Portsmouth tomorrow.

Just don't think it's some kind of open event, especially if you're a 61-year-old librarian:

DENVER, Colo.-On orders from Senator John McCain's security detail, Denver police escorted a 61-year-old woman away who was waiting in line to attend a so-called town hall meeting with McCain that was billed as open to the public.

Carol Kreck, who works as a librarian in Denver, held a homemade sign reading "McCain = Bush." On orders from McCain's security detail, police cited her for trespassing and escorted her to the sidewalk. She was told if she returned she would be arrested.

Lipstick is wiped from the face of Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., by his wife Cindy McCain after she kissed him during a town hall-style meeting at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts in Denver, Monday, July 7, 2008. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

The saga of The Lie That Won't Die continues...

The GOP just can't stop repeating this dishonest story.

It's been interesting how each of the perpetrators puts their own spin on the myth. Shelley Moore Capito changed it from 60 miles to 30 miles, for instance.

Now Sen. John Sununu, R-N.H has decided to leave out the Chinese part of the story and just focus on scaring people with the Cubans:

"The Cubans are drilling for oil and gas sixty miles off the coast of Florida, and yet there are people in America that say, 'No, we're not gonna do that, we're not going to explore.'"

Still not true. Even Cheney and Florida's GOP Sen. Mel Martinez have admitted to that. Cheney, of course, did it because he got caught.

Add to the people who admitted they spread a lie GOP Rep. Mark Kirk of Illinois. He told the story back in June.

But he has offered a retraction, as TPM reports:

But the Chicago Tribune asked Kirk's office for clarification, and has now gotten a retraction. "While the Cubans may have issued offshore drilling rights, Congressman Kirk has publicly agreed that the Chinese are not currently drilling for oil near Florida," Kirk's chief of staff told the paper. Score one for reality.

Is it just me...

or is John McCain slowly morphing into annoying 60 Minutes curmudgeon Andy Rooney?

The real cost of war

From Newsday - Joseph Dwyer became a face known around the world.

The March 2003 image became one of the most iconic of the U.S. invasion of Iraq: that of a bespectacled American soldier carrying an Iraqi child to safety.

However, upon returning home, Dwyer was haunted by his experience in Iraq:

His internal terror got so bad that, in 2005, he shot up his El Paso, Texas, apartment and held police at bay for three hours with a 9-mm handgun, believing Iraqis were trying to get in.

Last month, on June 28, police in Pinehurst, N.C., who responded to Dwyer's home, said the 31-year-old collapsed and died after abusing a computer cleaner aerosol. Dwyer had moved to North Carolina after living in Texas.


Dwyer, who joined the Army two days after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and who was assigned to a unit of the 3rd Infantry Division that one officer called "the tip of the tip of the spear" in the first days of the U.S. invasion, had since then battled depression, sleeplessness and other anxieties that military doctors eventually attributed to post-traumatic stress disorder.

The war that made him a hero at 26 haunted him to the last moments of his life.

Dwyer's story is not an isolated case. There are thousands of Iraq vets who, after returning home, have to deal with the psychological and physical cost of our nation's mistake. They need real support from the country that sent them to war. A bunch of magnetic ribbons on SUVs isn't going to make the problem go away.

For more info on a real way to support the troops, check out Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America.

---

Remember how, at the height of Bush war cheerleading, our local rightwing radio outlet, WVHUAM, held two pro-war rallies, attacking antiwar activists in their radio promotions, and claiming that the station's efforts were supporting the troops?

One was hosted by an opportunistic up-and-coming Limbaugh-clone, Glenn Beck. The other was emceed by local wingnut radio host Tom Roten.

WCHS-TV did the same thing in Charleston at a rally of their own.

With veterans being denied the care they need and the Pentagon actively discouraging the diagnosis of PTSD, you'd think these supposed "Support the Troops" folks like Roten and Beck would be booking MU stadium for a follow-up so they could once again express their legendary concern.

PFC Joseph Dwyer, 26, from Mt. Sinai, NY, runs while carrying a young Iraqi boy who was injured during a heavy battle between the U.S. Army's 7th Cavalry Regiment and Iraqi forces near the village of Al Faysaliyah, Iraq. (AP Photo/Warren Zinn/Army Times)

The lie that won't die

The Cuba/China drilling lie/scare continues in the GOP's push to give away the U.S. coastline to Exxon and friends...

It started with a George Will column.

Then Sean Hannity picked it up.

Then Dick Cheney used it.

Then Shelley Moore Capito put it in her column to W.Va. newspapers.

Now failed presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani is in on the act. From Glenn Beck's show:

GIULIANI: And you look at -- you look at Cuba ... Cuba is going to allow China to drill for oil within 80 miles of Florida. And Florida had a 300-mile limit. So in essence, we have China drilling for American oil.

The problem is, it's still not true. Even if 5 people say it, it's still a lie.

At least Cheney's office eventually admitted it was untrue.

Cheney's office said in a statement to The Associated Press that the vice president had erred.

But that didn't stop Hannity and Capito.

And now Glenn Beck is giving Rudy a forum to continue spreading this particular bit of misinformation.

Photo AP

The GOP's true face

Matthew Yglesias points out what the reaction to Helms' death tells us about the Republican Party of 2008:

One might expect that Helms' death would prompt from conservatives the sorts of things that I might say if, say, Al Sharpton died -- that he and I had some overlapping beliefs and I don't regard him as the world-historical villain that the right does, but that he's a problematic guy and I regard him and his methods as pretty marginal to American liberalism. But instead conservatives are taking a line that I might have regarded as an unfair smear just a week ago, and saying that Helms is a brilliant exemplar of the American conservative movement.

And before our conservative friends come up with the knee-jerk "But what about Robert Byrd and the Klan?" line, bear in mind that Byrd's membership in that group was over 50 years ago. Byrd has repeatedly apologized, calls it the biggest mistake of life and you'll find no shortage of figures on the Left who find the fact troublesome.

Helms, on the other hand, continued with his racist ways until his retirement in 2003, remained unapologetic and proud of these views and was never called on any of them by the rightwing.

And when Byrd passes, the KKK will be discussed by Democrats when evaluating Byrd's life. Helms is simply being hailed as a hero and patriot by the Republicans with no questions asked.

---

Helms may be gone, but those craving his disgusting (lack of) values need look no further than John McCain's circle of friends:

Republican strategist Charlie Black, perhaps the most prominent member of McCain’s political inner circle (especially since he suggested that a terrorist attack on the U.S. would benefit the Republican’s prospects this fall), advised Helms throughout much of the senator’s career and played a particularly central role in the 1990 campaign, according to contemporary media accounts.

When the “White Hands” ad stirred a national controversy, Black appeared on the PBS’s Newshour to defend it. Democratic National Committee chairman Ron Brown, who was also on the show, said to Black: “You are a principal adviser of Jesse Helms. Would you advise him to run that kind of ad, Charlie? Do you approve of that ad, Charlie?”

Black replied, “I advised Jesse Helms to do what he’s always done.”

Mountain Keepers Festival is this weekend

From a press release:

July 5 & 6: Mountain Keepers Music Festival

About an hour south of Charleston, W.Va., Kayford Mountain is an island of green West Virginia in midst of a Mars-scape of massacred mountains. People from across the United States and beyond travel to Kayford Mountain to get a shocking first-hand look at mountaintop removal operations. Every year, folks also converge on Kayford Mountain for events that celebrate everyone's work for environmental justice. Join the celebration on Saturday, July 5th and Sunday, July 6th--come to the annual Mountain Keepers Music Festival, held at the Stanley Heirs Park on the mountain.

The free two-day event features local and regional musicians playing a variety of bluegrass, gospel, country and old-time music, as well as children's games, a pot-luck meal, free camping and a silent auction. Attendees are encouraged to bring a covered dish for a potluck

Photo: Larry Gibson steps over a crack in the ground he says was caused by blasting at nearby Princess Beverly mountaintop mine. Gibson is fighting to save the land his family has owned on Kayford Mountain for more than 100 years. The family land is surrounded by the coal mines. Herald-Dispatch file.

Happy Fourth of July weekend

“When we celebrate Fourth of July, we’re not celebrating the documents. We’re celebrating the intervening 229 years, and those good folks who sacrificed, bled and died to democratize those documents. I’m talking about pamphleteers, the Sons of Liberty, Sojurner Truth, Frederick Douglass. I’m talking about the populists, the labor leaders, the Civil Rights movement, the environmentalists.”
-- Jim Hightower

-- and Happy Birthday to Ron Kovic!

Racist icon Jesse Helms has died

Just because the man is gone doesn't change the fact that he was one of the most vile, hate-filled bigots ever to hold power in D.C.

The media will, no doubt, downplay his career-long racist streak (which the Republican Party happily embraced), just as they did when he retired. Instead, we'll get the 'conservative icon' treatment of the man who made race-baiting an art.

Here are some examples from FAIR's report from back then:

As an aide to the 1950 Senate campaign of North Carolina Republican candidate Willis Smith, Helms reportedly helped create attack ads against Smith's opponent, including one which read: "White people, wake up before it is too late. Do you want Negroes working beside you, your wife and your daughters, in your mills and factories? Frank Graham favors mingling of the races."

[...]

Ancient history? No. Helms remains unapologetic to this day. Forty years after the Smith campaign, Helms would win election against black opponent Harvey Gantt with another ad playing to racist white fear-- the so-called "white hands" ad, in which a white man's hands crumple a rejected job application while a voiceover intones, "You needed that job…but they had to give it to a minority."

[...]

In columns, commentaries and pronouncements from the Senate floor, Helms sowed hatred and called names: The University of North Carolina was "the University of Negroes and Communists." (Capital Times, 11/22/94) Black civil rights activists were "Communists and sex perverts." (Copley News Service, 8/23/01)

[...]

Over the years Helms has declared homosexuality "degenerate," and homosexuals "weak, morally sick wretches." (Newsweek, 12/5/94) In a tirade highlighting his routine opposition to AIDS research funding, Helms lashed out at the Kennedy-Hatch AIDS bill in 1988: "There is not one single case of AIDS in this country that cannot be traced in origin to sodomy." (States News Service, 5/17/88)

Yep...this is the proud segregationist the GOP put in charge of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and who groups like the Heritage Foundation and other rightwing thinktanks are making out to be a patriot today.

In this June 17, 1999 photo, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Sen. Jesse Helms, R-N.C., makes his opening statement at Richard Holbrooke's confirmation hearing. Helms has died at age 86, the Jesse Helms research center says. (AP Photo/Joe Marquette, file)

Off Topic Thursday

Back at it again tomorrow.



I've been on vacation and avoiding the news for five days.