Officials with the McCain campaign and the Republican National convention are considering changing the event’s agenda as Hurricane Gustav bears down on the Gulf Coast…
A senior McCain source said Saturday that officials are considering turning the convention into a service event, a massive telethon to raise money for the Red Cross and other agencies to help with the hurricane.
“He wants to do something service-oriented if and when the storm hits and it’s as bad as its expected to be now,” the McCain source said.
They are also hoping to get McCain himself to a storm-affected area as soon as possible.
And Bush is planning probably to skip the convention in order to look presidential during a crisis – I’m sorry, I meant to type “closely monitor the effectiveness of the emergency response forces.”
It is genuinely revolting to think of a Cat 4 or 5 hurricane as a marketing op, but this is, after all, a country run by a man who let himself be photographed carrying a fake turkey to feed soldiers in Iraq. So I wonder if the Obama team has given any thought to what a spectacular PR coup this will be. And the bar for Republicans to “succeed” is particularly low. All Bush needs to do is to ensure that less than 1836 Americans end up drowning in their own waste, as they did the last time a hurricane struck during a Republican presidency to declare Operation Hype The Hurricane a triumph.
(By the way, the entire CNN article stinks to heaven. It sounds like a trial balloon, to test how the idea of a telethon might play.)
Republicans still run the state, so if there are any “discrepancies” in November, they will have the levers of power. Again:
Florida often is the butt of election jokes, and Indian River County unknowingly played a contributing role Tuesday when the Supervisor of Elections reported 5,189 more votes than were actually cast. It doesn’t exactly instill confidence in the system. Not with the Nov. 4 presidential election looming. Lest we forget Florida’s role in the 2000 race for the White House. We were “The Decider” in the Electoral College — George W. Bush defeated Al Gore by 537 votes. Tell me Tuesday’s Texas-sized blunder isn’t going to put us on the radar of ’08 election watchdogs, be they partisan groups or the national media. As we learned Thursday, votes in 40 of the 54 precincts were counted twice. Fortunately for Kay Clem, who is bidding for a fourth term as supervisor of elections, all of Tuesday’s winners stayed the same. It was pure luck.
Barack Obama made it across the tightrope of the Democratic National Convention, gaining solid endorsements from Bill and Hillary Clinton and giving a rousing speech before some 80,000 supporters at Invesco Field in Denver. But now comes the time when the Republicans win elections. Over the past four decades, Republicans have dominated the outcomes of presidential races by mixing negative campaigning in public with illicit dirty tricks behind the scenes, as I’ve recounted in my last two books, Secrecy & Privilege and Neck Deep.
To those of you who are criticizing me for being “pessimistic” and negative, please keep in mind that I’ve been saying the Democrats will win this election for months and months. I still think so. But I’m not enough of a Pollyanna about it that I don’t think the Democrats should ever take anything for granted.
I have written a short wrap-up of “the progressive moment” at the Denver convention over at The Big Con:
In casual conversation and formal addresses, from health care to foreign policy to media reform and beyond, the progressive agenda dominated the discourse far more than I expected. I knew there would be solidarity in opposition to conservative rule, but it no longer stems from that alone. There is a sense of opportunity and engagement with issues that I haven’t seen in progressive circles for some time.
I was quite surprised at how … well, progressive everyone was. The Democratic party is beginning to unapologetically identify itself as ideological again, tempered with a new pragmatism about Obama and what we can expect him to accomplish on his own. There wasn’t much disagreement at all on issues or the fact that the party establishment is not going to do what needs to be done without strong outside pressure.
The task before us, as a progressive movement, is to figure out how to make them do it. It’s not going to be easy, but there are a lot of ideas out there and we’d be well advised to start thinking about the next steps if we find ourselves in the incredible position of having a government that isn’t run by Karl Rove and Dick Cheney (or their clones.)
It is vitally important that we continue to note the extraordinary speech Obama gave, so here is a transcript and a short quote:
America, we are better than these last eight years. We are a better country than this.
It is also vitally important that we never forget how profoundly significant a date August 28 has become in American history. Most of us who lived through the Sixties could never come close to imagining the opportunity to vote for an African-American as president on a major party platform. History was made this Thursday and nothing in the hullabaloo of the latest news can possibly overshadow that.
I hope sometime next week to look at his speech in detail.
With NORTHCOM taking the lead on briefing the public, it’s clear the Bush Administration wants to send the message that everything is under control. Instead, to those that do this for a living, the message is clear that everything is absolutely and completely broken. Perhaps the state governments need help. Perhaps FEMA is not up to the job. Perhaps the Bush Administration simply wants a uniform on camera, and this way of doing things is preferable to things happening the way that they should (a process, by the way, that WORKED before Bush screwed it up). NORTHCOM taking the lead in public relations is a clear indication that nothing has been fixed in DHS and FEMA since Katrina. As a result, there is no confidence in FEMA’s ability to respond to this hurricane. With NORTHCOM at the helm, the Bush Administration either doesn’t care if, or doesn’t want, the systems to work. This Administration has issued a lot of reports since Katrina (none of which suggest the military should take control, incidentially), but no one has been held accountable and the lessons have not been learned. The priority is still on preventing embarrassment, not keeping people safe.
Why would they? Republicans believe that the only purpose of government is to take taxpayers money to enrich the already wealthy. All else is superfluous. Naturally, they haven’t fixed anything. They don’t know how to make government perform for the people because they don’t want to. A big disaster is a big opportunity.
Blue America is having one, and you can participate. Here’s Howie:
Today’s the first day of a week-long Blue America contest, I’d like to invite you to participate in. Some of our candidates have been endorsed by the DCCC’s Red to Blue program, which makes it easier for them to access institutional Democratic money– big donors, labor unions, single-issue groups, incumbents, etc. And some haven’t. Blue America wants to spotlight nine of our House endorsees this week who may eventually wind up in the program but who need campaign cash to compete effectively now. These are the nine: Sam Bennett (PA-15)- Lehigh Valley Debbie Cook (CA-46)- Orange County Larry Joe Doherty (TX-10)- northern Austin to Brenham and Katy Alan Grayson (FL-08)- Orlando Jared Polis (CO-02)- Boulder and Westminster out to Eagle County Dennis Shulman (NJ-05)- northern New Jersey from Bergen and Passaic around to Warren County Annette Taddeo (FL-18)- Miami-Dade from Miami Beach and Coral Gables down to Key West Russ Warner (CA-26)- northeast L.A. suburbans from Rancho Cucamonga to Arcadia Barry Welsh- (IN-06) east central Indiana centered on Muncie We’re counting votes at a just launched new ActBlue contest page. Whether you donate a dollar or $20 or $2,000 to the candidate, of your choice, it counts as one vote– although you can certainly vote for as many candidates as you’d like. The candidate who gets the most votes gets a $5,000 Blue America check. The winner will be announced on Saturday, September 6th.
The presidential race is fun and interesting, but this is where the real action is for progressives. We need more of them in congress, no matter who wins the presidency or the Blue Dogs will continue to have veto power. Vote, and vote often!
I’m back now (luggage is lost, naturally) and I’ve had some time to talk to my friends in Alaska and review what’s being said about Sarah Palin. Here’s the most interesting thing: my brother in law and his girlfriend, both teachers, card carrying NPR listening, Riverdance loving, Jim Lehrer watching diehard liberals …. quite like the woman. They don’t like her social conservatism, but it’s so prevalent in Alaska that they hardly notice it. What they like is that she took out Frank Murkowski, cancelled his secret backroom deals, sold the Governor’s private jet and told the oil companies to wait in line. They like that she is giving checks from the surplus to every Alaskan to help pay for the astronomically rising costs of heating oil up there. They see her as a down-to-earth, post-partisan problem solver. Others may as well.
And obviously, she’s a huge hit with the religious right. They know a genuflection when they see one and are very pleased that McCain showed them the proper respect by picking not just a social conservative, but a full blown creationist fundamentalist. They will enthusiastically vote for her and feel good about being “feminists” when they do it. (The media will likely have “learned their lesson” from the trashing they gave Hillary Clinton and will be much more careful this time. Nice how that works for the Republicans.)
So, I wouldn’t be too smug about Palin. She’s got something about her that the people who know her really like. She has an 85% approval rating up there, which includes quite a few liberals. Her western state appeal is an amalgam of right wing populism and libertarianism, something that shouldn’t be discounted among swing voters who might also find her to be an attractive working mom who manages to run the state while taking care of her snowmobile champion husband (Arctic NASCAR) and their five kids. (A politically incorrect friend of mine in Alaska called the ticket “The Maverick and the MILF” and it may work better than we think.)
Palin is so unknown that something even more significant than “troopergate” may yet emerge. Alaskan politicians are all just one degree of separation from each other and the big money oil interests that fuel the state. Who knows what could come out? But I would not assume that her inexperience or her small state background will work against the ticket. It could play well in the western states, a couple of which are necessary for the Democrats to win in the fall.
She’s obviously a disaster from my perspective — her extreme social conservatism is an immediate disqualifier for any office, much less the vice presidency. But I really hope the Obama campaign does not take to heart some of the “advice” it’s getting about going after Palin with snappy slogans over her picture that say “this is what McCain thinks is ready to lead?” After all the talk in this election about feminism, I think the Obama campaign is sensitive enough to know that that reads like a sexist dogwhistle loud enough to shatter the sound barrier. This is not a good approach.
I don’t think that many Hillary followers will vote for an anti-choice zealot, but there is no point in unnecessarily suppressing the female Obama vote by thoughtlessly pushing buttons that don’t need to be pushed. McCain chose Palin partially because they wanted to keep open the wounds of feminist discontent and there’s no reason to help them by picking at the scabs. There are many things on which to attack her — her social conservatism, her anti-environmental extremism, her bad policies, even her potential corruption, but her inexperience has to be handled very deftly. (To me the single best way to discredit Sarah Palin among female voters, is to attack her as a heartless extremist who would let the polar bears drown rather than admit that global warming exists.)
In truth, she doesn’t really have enough experience, but a lot of the criticism I’m seeing could easily be read as both sexist and elitist. Barack doesn’t have a ton of experience either, but his qualifications are made manifest by his ivy league education, cosmopolitan background, urban connections and endorsements from other powerful people. I can easily see certain rural, working class voters not being impressed with big city Dems’ disdain for her “big state with no people” and her “beauty queen” background. This is the kind of thing that makes the elitist tag stick.
Luckily, I think McCain’s miscalculation may have been in not recognizing that the Obama campaign just won a primary where a lot of these issues were raised and they have very recent experience dealing with it. His brain trust will know better than to fall for the easy trap. The rest of us should too.
There’s quite a lot to say about Sarah Palin. There’s actually quite more to say about Barack Obama’s magnificent speech, but John McCain kicked the soccer ball and the media herd is chasing it. So we’ll go with Palin for now and come back to Obama’s speech on the weekend.
What’s striking to me is what has happened in Alaska since Palin was swept into office as a reformer. In 2006, sitting governor Frank Murkowski finished third out of four in the primary due to corruption scandals. A good chunk of the Republicans in the state legislature are either under indictment or under suspicion. Ted Stevens will go to court in September. Palin offered a new direction from that culture of corruption.
And then she came into office and did the same thing as every other Republican in Alaska. The most prominent scandal, for which she is currently under an ethics review, concerns her trying to get her sister’s ex-husband fired as a state trooper.
Gov. Sarah Palin, a rising young GOP star mentioned as a possible running mate for John McCain, could see her clean-hands reputation damaged by a growing furor over whether she tried to get her former brother-in-law fired as a state trooper.
A legislative panel has launched a $100,000 investigation to determine if Palin dismissed Alaska’s public safety commissioner because he would not fire the trooper, Mike Wooten. Wooten went through a messy divorce from Palin’s sister.
Palin has denied the commissioner’s dismissal had anything to do with her former brother-in-law. And she denied orchestrating the dozens of telephone calls made by her husband and members of her administration to Wooten’s bosses.
There’s actually tape of a Palin aide pressuring the Public Safety Department to fire Wooten. And when the Public Safety Commissioner wouldn’t, she fired him and replaced him with someone who would. Someone who had a history of sexual harrassment and is now the PUBLIC SAFETY commissioner.
That’s shades of Archibald Cox and Elliot Richardson and William Ruckleshaus. I understand that the state trooper and her sister had a messy divorce, and he’s been alleged to have done all sorts of terrible things to the sister and the kids, but firing people who refuse to carry out your wishes – well, that’s good for Woodward and Bernstein’s career, but not for the country.
And there’s more.
Siun reports that Palin broke the law to ensure that Alaskan water would stay dirty:
It is against the law for the governor to officially advocate for or against a ballot measure; however, Palin took what she calls “personal privilege” to discuss one of this year’s most contentious initiatives, which voters will decide Tuesday.
Along with taking a position on the big mine’s side, Palin’s administration apparently used state Department of Natural Resources resources to lobby for defeat of the Clean Water Initiative under the pretense of creating a state run website to “educate” citizens. The citizen group Alaskans for Clean Water responded by filing “a complaint against DNR for a recently-launched state website meant to clarify the issue for voters. “
The complaint alleges that the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) improperly attempted to influence the outcome of an election by publishing information against the initiative on its website. It also alleges that DNR failed to report to APOC the expenditures, including employee time, related to creation of the information.
“It has become clear to us that the Department of Natural Resources is working hand-in-hand with the industry, and that the state is inappropriately making efforts to influence voters on this ballot initiative,” said Art Hackney, a co-sponsor of Ballot Measure #4.
Now, this reflects Nixon as much as it reflects our current White House resident. When the laws constrain you, use a “personal privilege” or make a signing statement. The point of similarity is contempt for the rule of law and a belief in the expansion of executive power.
Not to mention that she is completely in line with Fourthbranch Cheney and Spiro Agnew and the rest of the Corruptocrats on the issue of abuse of power. The Anchorage Daily News put it best:
She can look you in eye and tell you black is white.
The Poorman points out the obvious: Alaska seems very foreign.In fact, it is — and I know this because I graduated from high school in Fairbanks and lived there for years. It is actually, in many ways, like a foreign planet. A very cold and icy foreign planet. Don’t tell Cokie.
There is much to be said about Sarah Palin, but I think the thing I like the most about this choice is the fact that McCain chose someone from the state which is simultaneously the most oil drenched and the one that is suffering the most dramatically from global warming. Not that the governor cares. She’s far more concerned about saving blastocysts in petrie dishes than saving drowning polar bears.
