I Hate What You Just Said

This week’s nominee for the inaugural 2008 Shameful Jackass of the Year Award is Diane Fedele, president of Chaffey Community Republican Women, Federated.  She sent the image below, via newsletter, to the members of her GOP women’s group.

She sent it.  In a newsletter.  That image.  Barack Obama.  On food stamps.  With watermelon, fried chicken, Kool Aid, and ribs. 

No.  Really.

Then she, you know, apoligized “to anyone who was offended:”

The group’s president, Diane Fedele, said she plans to send an apology letter to her members and to apologize at the club’s meeting next week. She said she simply wanted to deride a comment Obama made over the summer about how as an African-American he “doesn’t look like all those other presidents on the dollar bills.”

“It was strictly an attempt to point out the outrageousness of his statement. I really don’t want to go into it any further,” Fedele said in a telephone interview Tuesday. “I absolutely apologize to anyone who was offended. That clearly wasn’t my attempt.”

Fedele said she got the illustration in a number of chain e-mails and decided to reprint it for her members in the Trumpeter newsletter because she was offended that Obama would draw attention to his own race. She declined to say who sent her the e-mails with the illustration [italics added].

The woman who sent out that image finds Barack Obama offensive when it comes to the question of race. 

I just don’t know what to say, except this:  Diane Fedele, you are the first nominee for the SJOYA. 

Good luck!

(p.s. - thank goodness she is apologizing “to her members.”  To her members!)

Here’s a brief video about Oily McWar and his oiliness.  The guy is really oily.

You can find much more about Oily and his energy positions from the Sierra Club here. Their full list of 2008 endorsments is here.

Hey, Oily: Lose, Baby, Lose!

During these difficult economic times, it appears that German readers are turning to Marx for answers.  The Guardian reports the following:

Karl Marx is back. That, at least, is the verdict of publishers and bookshops in Germany who say that his works are flying off the shelves.

The rise in his popularity has of course, been put down to the current economic crisis. “Marx is in fashion again,” said Jörn Schütrumpf, manager of the Berlin publishing house Karl- Dietz which publishes the works of Marx and Engels in German. “We’re seeing a very distinct increase in demand for his books, a demand which we expect to rise even more steeply before the year’s end.”

(I rather like the idea of German bookstore patrons fighting over the last copy of The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte).  And even German politicians are willing to admit that we have something to learn these days from The Capital Crushin’ Prussian:

Increasing numbers of Germans appear ready to out themselves as Marx fans in a time when it is fashionable to repeat the philosopher’s belief that excessive capitalism with all its greed finally ends up destroying itself. When Oskar Lafontaine, the head of Germany’s rising left-wing party Die Linke, said he would include Marxist theory in the party’s manifesto, in the outline of his plans to partially nationalise the nation’s finance and energy sectors, he was labeled as a “mad leftie” who had “lost the plot” by the tabloid Bild. But even Germany’s finance minister, Peer Steinbrück, who must have had some sleepless nights over the past few weeks, has now declared himself something of a fan. “Generally one has to admit that certain parts of Marx’s theory are really not so bad,” he cautiously told Der Spiegel.

I must admit, too, that one of my favorite images from The Communist Manifesto has been occuring to me lately.  In fact, almost every time I watch the news these days, I’m reminded of this passage:

Modern bourgeois society with its relations of production, of exchange, and of property, a society that has conjured up such gigantic means of production and of exchange, is like the sorcerer who is no longer able to control the powers of the nether world whom he has called up by his spells.

And you know, come to think of it, I could have sworn that I saw Henry Paulson the other day, looking confused and wearing one of those pointy sorcerer’s hats.

OK - the ominous music in this video is a bit much. But can you imagine if Barack Obama, or Joe Biden, or John Kerry, or John Edwards, or Hillary Clinton had a more-than-casual relationship with a secessionist party? How long would it take before the word “traitor” was on Sean Hannity’s iguana-like lips, or belching forth from Rush Limbaugh’s yap?

Palin has never had to answer any serious questions about this.

And we’re told that Obama’s character is questionable because he is friends with a former member of the Weather Underground. Well, Sarah Palin is presumably really good friends with Todd Palin - a former member of the Alaskan Independence Party. Oh - and apparently she also attended four of the AIP’s conferences. And spoke at two of them. And she was their choice for governor.

If she ever has a press conference, maybe someone could ask her about this stuff, no?

In today’s Boston Globe, foreign affairs columnist H.D.S. Greenway provides a brief retrospective on the calamitous reign of Bush the Younger.  Greenway mentions a number of Bush’s greatest hits, including “mission accomplished,” the botched job in Afghanistan, torture, and the current financial crisis.  But the money shot is Greenway’s comparison between the shame of Bill Clinton and the shame of W:

IT IS HARD to believe how far this republic has fallen since President George W. Bush took office. Eight years ago, the United States had a budget surplus, peace and prosperity reigned, and America was universally respected. True, Bill Clinton had besmirched the office of the presidency by his self-indulgence. In his memoir, he would put down his dalliance with a White House intern to the worst of all possible motives. He did it because he could. But that pales in comparison to what Bush has done to the country.

…

When all the various reasons for a preemptive war against Iraq are examined - the nonexistent weapons of mass destruction, spreading democracy, helping Israel, etc., etc. - it all boiled down to the worst of all possible reasons: Bush invaded Iraq because he could  [Italics added].

I’ll say it again: draft George W. Bush.

In the wake of last night’s V.P. debate , a distressing number pundits and columnists are all-too eager to declare Sarah Palin’s performance a success.  At the Boston Globe, for example,  J.J., is postiviely gushing.  After saying that Joe Biden was ”in fine form,” he adds:

But Sarah Palin was incredible! She turned in a performance that would have done any vice presidential nominee proud - and she did it after less than six weeks in national life, and having never before debated in front of a national audience. She was strong, well-spoken, intelligent, an obvious quick study, and not in the least intimidated by her opponent’s decades of experience.

Well-spoken.

Seriously.

And for her own part, Palin declared that she was happy to have the chance finally to talk to the American people, without the filter of the mainstream media.  Palin - the candidate who has been largely hiding from view (and earshot!), the candidate who shows no inclination even to hold a press conference - says she is happy that the American people finally heard her in her own words.

Her own words are worth examining.  From the transcript of the debate, here are Palin’s comments on three rather important issues: education policy, climage change, and the Middle East.

 On education policy:

Say it ain’t so, Joe, there you go again pointing backwards again. You preferenced your whole comment with the Bush administration. Now doggone it, let’s look ahead and tell Americans what we have to plan to do for them in the future. You mentioned education and I’m glad you did. I know education you are passionate about with your wife being a teacher for 30 years, and god bless her. Her reward is in heaven, right? I say, too, with education, America needs to be putting a lot more focus on that and our schools have got to be really ramped up in terms of the funding that they are deserving. Teachers needed to be paid more. I come from a house full of school teachers. My grandma was, my dad who is in the audience today, he’s a schoolteacher, had been for many years. My brother, who I think is the best schoolteacher in the year, and here’s a shout-out to all those third graders at Gladys Wood Elementary School, you get extra credit for watching the debate. Education credit in American has been in some sense in some of our states just accepted to be a little bit lax and we have got to increase the standards. No Child Left Behind was implemented. It’s not doing the job though. We need flexibility in No Child Left Behind. We need to put more of an emphasis on the profession of teaching. We need to make sure that education in either one of our agendas, I think, absolute top of the line. My kids as public school participants right now, it’s near and dear to my heart. I’m very, very concerned about where we’re going with education and we have got to ramp it up and put more attention in that arena.

On climate change:

Yes. Well, as the nation’s only Arctic state and being the governor of that state, Alaska feels and sees impacts of climate change more so than any other state. And we know that it’s real. I’m not one to attribute every man — activity of man to the changes in the climate. There is something to be said also for man’s activities, but also for the cyclical temperature changes on our planet. But there are real changes going on in our climate. And I don’t want to argue about the causes. What I want to argue about is, how are we going to get there to positively affect the impacts? We have got to clean up this planet. We have got to encourage other nations also to come along with us with the impacts of climate change, what we can do about that. As governor, I was the first governor to form a climate change sub-cabinet to start dealing with the impacts. We’ve got to reduce emissions. John McCain is right there with an “all of the above” approach to deal with climate change impacts.We’ve got to become energy independent for that reason. Also as we rely more and more on other countries that don’t care as much about the climate as we do, we’re allowing them to produce and to emit and even pollute more than America would ever stand for. So even in dealing with climate change, it’s all the more reason that we have an “all of the above” approach, tapping into alternative sources of energy and conserving fuel, conserving our petroleum products and our hydrocarbons so that we can clean up this planet and deal with climate change.

Responding to this question from Ifill: “Has this administration’s [Middle East] policy been an abject failure, as the senator says, Governor?”

No, I do not believe that it has been. But I’m so encouraged to know that we both love Israel, and I think that is a good thing to get to agree on, Sen. Biden. I respect your position on that. No, in fact, when we talk about the Bush administration, there’s a time, too, when Americans are going to say, “Enough is enough with your ticket,” on constantly looking backwards, and pointing fingers, and doing the blame game. There have been huge blunders in the war. There have been huge blunders throughout this administration, as there are with every administration. But for a ticket that wants to talk about change and looking into the future, there’s just too much finger-pointing backwards to ever make us believe that that’s where you’re going. Positive change is coming, though. Reform of government is coming. We’ll learn from the past mistakes in this administration and other administrations. And we’re going to forge ahead with putting government back on the side of the people and making sure that our country comes first, putting obsessive partisanship aside. That’s what John McCain has been known for in all these years. He has been the maverick. He has ruffled feathers. But I know, Sen. Biden, you have respected for them that, and I respect you for acknowledging that. But change is coming.

Eight hundred and nine words.  And she hasn’t said a thing.

Here’s a little warm-up for tonight’s debate.  It speaks for itself.

Start popping the popcorn, because  this promises to be a hell of an evening.

It goes without saying that presidential elections are serious business. It is our duty as citizens to engage in productive debate and discussion of the issues. We should all endeavor to keep our political discourse at a high level, and we should refrain from childish name-calling.

However, it is now reasonably clear that Sarah Palin is the dumbest dumb dumbass in the history of dumb.

Viewer discretion is advised.

The abusurdity of Sarah Palin’s presence on a national ticket is becoming so obvious that it no longer appears to be a partisan question.  Andrew Sullivan has been beside himself ever since McCain made his choice.  But various other conservatives are beginning to sound alarms, raise questions, or even call for her to leave the ticket.

Yep - conservatives, like most other other bipedal mammals, are none too impressed with the former mayor of Wasilla.

To wit:

Kathleen Parker thinks Palin should decide, euphemistically speaking, to “spend more time with her newborn”:

As we’ve seen and heard more from John McCain’s running mate, it is increasingly clear that Palin is a problem. Quick study or not, she doesn’t know enough about economics and foreign policy to make Americans comfortable with a President Palin should conditions warrant her promotion…

When Couric pointed to polls showing that the financial crisis had boosted Obama’s numbers, Palin blustered wordily: “I’m not looking at poll numbers. What I think Americans at the end of the day are going to be able to go back and look at track records and see who’s more apt to be talking about solutions and wishing for and hoping for solutions for some opportunity to change, and who’s actually done it?”

If BS were currency, Palin could bail out Wall Street herself.

David Frum seems kind of scared:

If anything were to happen to a President McCain, the destiny of the free world would be placed in the hands of a woman who until the day before Friday was a small-town mayor.

Mr. McCain’s supporters argue that he is more serious about national security than Barack Obama. But the selection of Sarah Palin invites the question: How serious can he be if he would place such a neophyte second in line to the presidency?

Early Palin-backer Ross Douthat shows some good humor in admitting his misjudgement:

And now, an excerpt from my inner monologue, as transcribed while watching various clips from Sarah Palin’s interview with Katie Couric (I can’t link to them; they’re too painful):

And that, Douthat, is why nobody’s ever going to hire you to help pick their running mate.

Jeffrey Goldberg is worried, too:

 I want to wait and see Palin on Thursday night in her debate with Joe Biden; perhaps her performance in the Couric interview was abnormally bad. But I have a terrible feeling that John McCain has placed this country - and, of lesser importance, his campaign - in an untenable position.

Chillingly, David Brooks compares Palin to the Dummkopf-in-Chief:

Sarah Palin has many virtues. If you wanted someone to destroy a corrupt establishment, she’d be your woman. But the constructive act of governance is another matter. She has not been engaged in national issues, does not have a repertoire of historic patterns and, like President Bush, she seems to compensate for her lack of experience with brashness and excessive decisiveness.

Maybe we should have been listening to Alaskans all along.  Republican state senator Lyda Green, for example, isn’t shy about expressing her opinion of Palin: 

“She’s not prepared to be governor. How can she be prepared to be vice president or president?” said Green, a Republican from Palin’s hometown of Wasilla. “Look at what she’s done to this state. What would she do to the nation?”

Thanks, but no thanks, Palin!

Somewhere, Thomas Eagleton is smiling.

Andrew Sullivan is on a roll - a serious anti-Palin roll. In “The Twelve Lies of Sarah Palin,” my favorite Obamacon succinctly makes the case that Palin’s pants are now a four-alarm fire:

So for the record, let it be known that the candidate for vice-president for the GOP is a compulsive, repetitive, demonstrable liar. If you follow the links, here is the proof. I repeat: proof:

- She has lied about the Bridge To Nowhere. She ran for office favoring it, wore a sweatshirt defending it, and only gave it up when the federal congress, Senator McCain in particular, went ballistic. She kept the money anyway and favors funding Don Young’s Way, at twice the cost of the original bridge.

- She has lied about her firing of the town librarian and police chief of Wasilla, Alaska.

- She has lied about pressure on Alaska’s public safety commissioner to fire her ex-brother-in-law.

- She has lied about her previous statements on climate change.

- She has lied about Alaska’s contribution to America’s oil and gas production.

- She has lied about when she asked her daughters for their permission for her to run for vice-president.

- She has lied about the actual progress in constructing a natural gas pipeline from Alaska.

- She has lied about Obama’s position on habeas corpus.

- She has lied about her alleged tolerance of homosexuality.

- She has lied about the use or non-use of a TelePrompter at the St Paul convention.

- She has lied about her alleged pay-cut as mayor of Wasilla.

- She has lied about what Alaska’s state scientists concluded about the health of the polar bear population in Alaska.

You cannot trust a word she says. On anything.

Nope. It appears that you cannot.

It is intensely irritating when Republicans - like McCain and Palin, for instance - pretend to be the champions of working-class interests.  And when they do, the inevitable result is this sort of totally unsurprising hypocrisy:

In a speech on the economy today in Scranton, PA, John McCain spat populist fire as he railed at the high executive compensation and golden parachutes enjoyed by top Wall Street executives. From the prepared remarks:

“The firms we help need accountability too. We cannot have taxpayers footing the bill forbloated golden parachutes like we see in the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy, where the top executives are asking for $2.5 billion in bonuses after they ran the company into the ground. The senior executives of any firm that is bailed out by treasury should not be making more than the highest paid government official.”

Only hours earlier, however, McCain was on MSNBC, where he displayed a notable lack of concern — and a lack of awareness of the details — about the golden parachute enjoyed by former Hewlett Packard CEO Carly Fiorina, one of his own leading economic advisers.

Asked if he viewed Fiorina and her $45 million golden parachute as an example of the sort of person that’s the problem on Wall Street, McCain said: “I don’t think so.”

Asked to square her golden parachute with his pledge to crack down on such compensation, McCain responded: “I think she did a good job as CEO in many respects. I don’t know the details of her compensation package but she’s one of many advisers that I have.”

Pressed further, McCain claimed: “I do not know the details of what happened.”

He does not know the details of what happened.  He also appears not to know who the Prime Minister of Spain is, or that Iraq doesn’t border Pakistan…

As a handy supplement to the Zapatero fiasco, we have a harrowing summary of Oily McWar’s persistent confusion from Steve Benen:

Let’s also not lose sight of the broader pattern. McCain thinks the recent conflict between Russia and Georgia was “the first probably serious crisis internationally since the end of the Cold War.” He thinks Iraq and Pakistan share a border. He believes Czechoslovakia is still a country. He’s been confused about the difference between Sudan and Somalia. He’s been confused about whether he wants more U.S. troops in Afghanistan, more NATO troops in Afghanistan, or both. He’s been confused about how many U.S. troops are in Iraq. He’s been confused about whether the U.S. can maintain a long-term presence in Iraq. He’s been confused about Iran’s relationship with al Qaeda. He’s been confused about the difference between Sunni and Shi’ia. McCain, following a recent trip to Germany, even referred to “President Putin of Germany.” All of this incoherence on his signature issue.

I’m curious. What do you suppose the reaction would be from the political establishment if Barack Obama had made these mistakes over the course of the campaign? What would reporters, pundits, and Republicans have to say about Obama’s ability to lead a complex world in a time of war and uncertainty?

Wow.

It’s a good thing that his running mate - Sarah “What the F*ck is the ‘Bush Doctrine’?” Palin - will be able to help him sort out all these complicated foreign policy thingies.

Somehow McWar continues to campaign as a foreign policy expert, and people seem to buy it.  Matthew Yglesias summarizes the ridiculous situation well:

The problem is in the underlying assumption that McCain has some deep underlying national security expertise. In conventional Washington terms, expertise and credibility on security issues basically just requires you to (a) enjoy talking about security issues and (b) support starting wars. Support for launching a war that turns out well is the best thing to do (+5 cred points), but support for launching a war that doesn’t get launched is pretty good (+3 cred points), and even support for launching a war that turns out poorly is okay (+1 cred points) — the important thing is to support launching wars.

He likes wars.  He likes oil drillin’.  That’s why I call him Oily McWar.