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Blackwater is aggressively attacking Marshall Adame, Democratic challenger to “Mr. Freedom Fries,” seven-term Republican incumbent Walter B. Jones. Blackwater Worldwide’s 7,000-acre corporate headquarters and training facility sits in North Carolina’s 3rd District, which Adame is trying to win.

Adame, a former State Department official in Iraq, was protected by Blackwater thugs. He has publicly stated his experience with many unprovoked attacked by the steroid boys, which has drawn attention and attacks from Blackwater. Blackwater has zero interest in having an out spoken democrat with first hand experience of their death squad win a seat in Congress.

As a State Department official in Iraq, he was protected by Blackwater, which, he says, used excessive force on at least two occasions while he was in their care. “I saw them shoot people,” he says. “I saw them crash into cars while I was their passenger…. There was absolutely no reason, no provocation whatsoever.” Once, while en route to the Iraqi Ministry of Interior, Adame says he heard gunfire coming from the turret gunner in his own vehicle. He looked out the window of the humvee and “saw people ducking and falling…. The vehicle in front of us rammed into a car that was trying to get out of the way, and they just spun that guy around. He was out cold in that car, maybe even dead. I don’t know, but we just kept on going.”

His criticism of Blackwater in Iraq has put him in the cross hairs of Blackwater’s aggressive attacks. Adame’s has been receiving hate mail from Blackwater employees headed by executive vice president Bill Mathews.

In an internal corporate email, Mathews encouraged his colleagues to barrage Adame with mail (”he was too cowardly to put a phone number on the web,” Mathews noted in the message). “[H]e wants this company and all of us to cease to exist,” Mathews wrote in the email, which was obtained by the Raleigh News & Observer and posted to the newspaper’s web site. “Do you like your jobs? Are you sick and tired of the slanderous bullshit going on in DC? If so, would you all mind joining me in reminding Mr. Adame that he is running for office in our backyard…. Let’s run this goof out of Dodge…!”

Since then, Adame has been on the receiving end of “some pretty rough stuff,” he says. “I received all kinds of hate mail from Blackwater people. They use a lot of vulgarity. They tell me how Blackwater is defending America’s rights, and that we’re free because Blackwater is fighting for us. Give me a break! That is so erroneous and misleading. It’s just totally dishonest, but those people really believe it. Blackwater is a large organization, and they have a great way of propagandizing their product.”

Adame, who plans to hold a campaign event near Blackwater’s Moyock headquarters next month, is quick to point out that he has received no threats of physical harm from Blackwater, and despite some obscene emails, has engaged in constructive conversations with some of its employees. “These people don’t want to lose their jobs, and I understand that,” he says.

I feel very strongly about how extensively organized Blackwater has become,” he explains. “And I will do everything I can as a congressman to look into that, to find out whether or not the things they’re doing are even legal.”

Adame’s ActBlue page needs a serious injection for him to successfully beat Republican incumbent Walter B. Jones and Blackwater. We need to help Marshall Adame win North Carolina’s 3rd District and rid the U.S. of Blackwater.

Digby writes one of her brilliant posts, pointing to the latest Attorney General waffle on the subject of torture. Personally, I feel if anyone can qualify torture for any reason, then they, themselves, should be tortured. My ethical reasons are as sound as Mukasey’s: if civilized nations don’t torture, the world grows more civilized. And you can’t use logic with people convinced that their bad ethical judgment is actually good, so maybe experiencing torture will make them understand and less people will be tortured.

Which also means, since I qualified torture, I should be tortured, too.

I should. But it’s a small price to pay if civilization advances. Just make sure Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Gonzalez, Mukasey, Addington, Yoo, and all the other torture defenders get their fingernails ripped out when I do.

He’s a dangerous, hateful guy who can’t stand white people, he can’t write worth squat and rumor has it he’s mean to his kids.

All of which you’d know if you read David Neiwert’s blog regularly. He’s just an awful dude.

So go give him money and maybe he’ll leave us all alone.

(and for those who don’t get snarkasm, give him twice as much money. He actually has to hang out with some awful people to record what creepy shit they’re doing, so he’s actually rather courageous, plus amiable, kind and articulate. He deserves as much support as folks can give.)

Paul Wiseman at USA Today describes the resurgence of the Taliban in Afghanistan. But he didn’t fully cover all the reasons why the situation’s so grim.

He did cover the corruption of the Kabul elitists - a trait that is common everywhere Bush has gone. Faux democracy that enriches a few privileged folk while the major population suffers.

It’s also a result of heavyhanded military strikes. The body counts of dead insurgents sound suspiciously like those of William Westmoreland in Vietnam, but they cover up the fact that too many civilian casualties have been caused along the way by US weaponry.

In short, they’re losing the hearts and minds of too much of the populace, something that’s hard to regain even if our military efforts improve. If things continue true to form, I expect our military generals will be ‘burning down the village to save the village’ meaning massive deaths and an effort to force the populace into submission. Which will fail.

Bush is losing two wars simultaneously. His plan is to keep both going till a Democrat takes the White House, then blame them for all the failures that ruined the chances for positive outcomes.

Negotiations and cooperation with all of Afghanistan’s neighbors remains the only path to success, but Bush would rather play politics with millions of lives instead of seeking the best interests of that country and ours.

And where are our Democratic leaders on any of this? They’re too worried about saving Wall Street and other domestic concerns.

And eventually there’ll be hell to pay by us and them. But don’t worry, the elitists in Afghanistan, Iraq and the USA will remain reasonably safe, fat and happy. Everyone else will suffer because we’re expendable.

The lack of conscience would be called sociopathic in ordinary people but in elitist circles, it’s called leadership if they can save their own asses while building their personal fortunes while getting the little people to take all the pain.

You don’t believe me? Then how come no one’s fighting for Cyd Mizell?

The media asserts that this will now be an historic race, as the Democratic nominee will be a woman or a black man. It would have been historic had Edwards prevailed though, as no one has ever achieved the Oval Office after serving as a civil suit lawyer nor while their spouse was battling terminal cancer.

The major strike against him, it seems, is he happened to be a white male pushing the most progressive agenda since Jesse Jackson and George McGovern made their runs. The corporate media was not about to grant any room to a guy insisting on reducing the power of corporations over our government. And demographic groups who have yet to break the glass ceiling of the top spot in the nation were simply not going to yield in their quest.

That’s fine and good, as far as I’m concerned, because the sooner each ceiling breaks, the sooner the country can start to address the institutional reforms needed to make our government more representative again. Campaign finance reform, stricter lobbying laws, elected officials held accountable for their crimes, a more sensible primary system, verifiable vote counts and severe penalties for disenfranchising qualified voters remain the greatest hurdles we face as a nation if we will ever again wrest control of our government from the military-industrial-corporate complex that grips it and the deadly plunder it constantly requires.

I’m in favor of any man or woman of any type, color, sexual identity or belief system that makes progress on any of those fronts because I see a world growing warmer and dirtier, governments growing darker and individual freedoms shrinking with the promotion of de-mock-racies by the extremist controllers of capital. I’ve seen these destructive processes at work for the past 40 years and remain convinced we are all headed towards greater tyranny and fascism.

Perhaps it’s necessary to repeat the deadliest mistakes of human existence before we can re-emerge towards brighter days. Perhaps a massive die-off of the human race isa necessary part of the natural order of the global ecosystem. I welcome any person with any capacity - in or out of government - who can lead us towards a more civil world without such catastrophic events. But I remain a cynic so long as greed and fear can be so easily manipulated by the wealthy, the powerful and the superstition evangelicals.

I think Mr. Edwards represented a brighter path forward, offering some resistance to the manifest destiny of authoritarians and the devastating consequences they will bring. It took me several years to become convinced Mr. Edwards offered us a real alternative and I hope we’ll get another chance for a similarly progressive leader sometime in the remaining decades of my life.

I wish the Edwards family happiness, health and peace.

Update: Christy Hardin Smith provides an especially great farewell.

Edwards is out.

Why hast thou foresaken me, John?

Giuliani is out.

Thank you, Rudy. Thank you voters of Florida. You got it right. Well, considering.

Last night, my blogpal Cunning Runt said in comments somewhere, ‘John Edwards has been out there speaking truth to Power, and Power in the form of the corporate media, isn’t going to cover that……’

Exactly.

The Rightwing dismisses Edwards as a rich man with a big house and expensive haircuts who pretends to care about the poor and working classes. They hate him because he was a trial lawyer. Rightwingers say “trial lawyer” like liberals say “Hitler.” Not to drag his horrid ass into this or anything. But you get my point.

I guess Rightwingers don’t mind that they expose their true selfish selves when they take Edwards to task for “caring about the poor.” That’s right. He’s a rich guy, why in the hell should he care about poor people unless, of course, it’s caring that enriches him at the expense of those poor people or the government. Perhaps Edwards should set up a faith-based program that treats shopaholics and former country club members who are no longer able to pay their dues and suffer from Snob Hill Rejection Syndrome. Through his program, he could get federal tax dollars to buy donut holes and Kleenex, a few folding chairs to put in some church basement and spend the rest on what else? You guessed it. $400 haircuts.

That’s the kind of caring about the “poor” the Right can get behind. As long as he promises not to sue anybody ever again. For anything.

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As a good Democrat, I am always concerned about the environment and unemployment. Therefore, I decided to recycle some old advertising icons in order to find some jobs for the Republicans who will have nothing to do once the election is held in November. To make sure that they are happy in their new gigs, I am giving each of the guys a choice of 2 jobs.

Let’s start with Rudy since he will probably be the next to be looking for something to do. Here’s the first choice:

Original Maidenform ad.
The second job for Rudy almost stumped me. I thought of Mr. Clean since there is a resemblance, but it seems to me that Rudy doesn’t like to be alone. Therefore, I thought of a job he could do along with his old buddy, Bernie Kerik.

He gets to wear a cute little green frock and hang out with Bernie! Could he be any happier?
Read the rest of this entry »

He’s headed to New Orleans for a major address about poverty.

Will the corporate media give it real coverage or will they dismiss it as they’ve dismissed him most of the last year? Either way, I suspect he’s going to get the campaign leaders back to serious issues for a badly needed change.

The GOP candidates need 1,191 delegates to win the nomination. After Florida, McCain leads Romney 83-59. And pundits abound who say it’s all over after 5 states have voted.

Typical GOP thinking. Disenfranchise the voters in 45 states, DC and American territories.

They call it democracy.

And why McCain? Consider, out of 43 presidents, how many took office who were older than the American early retirement age of 62. Just six.

Dwight D. Eisenhower: 62 yrs, 3 mos, 6 days
Zachary Taylor: 64 yrs, 3 mos, 8 days
George H.W. Bush: 64 yrs, 7 mos, 8 days
James Buchanan: 65 yrs, 10 mos, 9 days
William Henry Harrison: 68 yrs, 23 days
Ronald Reagan: 69 yrs, 11 mos, 14 days

In fact, the GOP seems to like them old. Before our current President, only Nixon was a Republican younger than 60 at his inauguration, since way back to Herbert Hoover. And by the next inauguration day, you’d have to go back 79 years to Calvin Coolidge to find one younger than Dubya was.

The Democrats, on the other hand, can go back to Andrew Johnson in 1865 to find three older than 56 even. Only Woodrow Wilson and Harry Truman have been 56 or older in the 143 years since.

Mitt Romney would be two months shy of 62 at his inaugural, which would make him the eighth oldest President ever. And McCain? He’d be 72 yrs, 4 mos and 22 days, making him the oldest president ever by almost 2-1/2 years over Reagan. And every President BESIDES Reagan LEFT office at a younger age than McCain would be ENTERING it.

So this is the guy the GOP pundits are putting all their chips on. The guy they gave up on until Huckabee’s win in Iowa made them run scared from their Religious Right base. And his only similarity to Reagan is his advanced geezerhood.

Hillary Clinton is 11 years younger than McCain. Yet only James Buchanan in 1857 and and Andrew Jackson in 1829 were older Democrats at their inauguration than Hillary would be. She’d be the ninth oldest President ever to be inaugurated at nearly 3 months over 61.

Obama? At 47 years, 5 mos and 16 days, he’d be the fifth youngest, behind Teddy Roosevelt (the youngest, at 42 yrs, 10 mos, 18 days), JFK, Bill Clinton and Ulysses Grant. Barack would be a year and 15 days older than Bill Clinton was.

(Huckabee -53+ - would be the youngest Republican since Calvin Coolidge. Edwards - 55+ - would be the oldest Democrat since Harry Truman, but six years younger than Hillary and 17 years younger than McCain).

And the GOP pundits have already written off Romney, who’s just 24 delegates behind Rip Van Winkle McCain. If that doesn’t sound like desperation, consider that only an atheist or homosexual would be less popular than a 72 year old per a Gallup poll taken 11 months ago.

I guess they know he’s got a winning platform.

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Because of all the early mail voting, I predict McCain will beat Romney by 7 points. The late endorsement of McCain by Crist would, if it had come earlier, widened that gap even more.

Despite the retired New Yorkers there, I predict Huckabee will beat out Rudy for third, but neither will look very good. I just don’t believe Rudy will stick around through Super Tuesday and his departure will ultimately boost Romney a couple of points everywhere afterward.

On the Democratic side, Hillary will play up the results, pissing off everyone except her Florida supporters. I won’t even project any numbers because I expect the Florida and Michigan delegates to be left out if they go to a divided convention. The party will only let them in if one candidate emerges as a clear favorite by March 15th which looks increasingly unlikely.

The party would risk suicide if it chose any other course. And Hillary risks further rebuke if she pushes a Florida victory too far. Florida retains a taint of the stolen election already and there are plenty of Dems in other states who won’t respond favorably if she claims any Florida delegates in her count, even though it’s likely to be her largest margin of victory anywhere except New York.

Anyone else with predictions?

11 pm Update: I said McCain by 7 pts. He won by exactly 5. I said Huckabee would beat Rudy. He fell 1.1 point short of a tie, but they were both well behind the top two.

And I said Hillary by at least 15 pts. She won by 16.7. So from 1.1% to 2% margin of error isn’t so bad. Bring on Super Tuesday.

The Orlando Sentinel’s hearing lots of complaints about voters not being able to vote.

The South Florida Sun-Sentinel is reporting problems, too, but as most seem related to slowdowns, they don’t seem as serious.

As a former precinct worker in central Florida, I suspect some of the problem is simply that some precinct workers are confused. (Dedicated as they are, there’s a preponderance of older folks working the polls and some older folks just don’t adapt to changes as quickly. Yeah, call me a bigot, but that’s my honest perspective after being in the thick of it).

However, some of the problems, esp near Orlando, continue to look suspicious 7 years after such problems were first noted. There’s no excuse for that. County elections officials need to be held more accountable. Period.

Avedon Carol provides a very insightful reflection on what’s occurred and how it affects voters. I feel similar letdowns, too.

She also referred readers to Miriam’s blog with pics about the current status of New Orleans. That remains the biggest mistake that will live as the Bush family legacy. His Daddy was indifferent to the homeless. Bush has been indifferent to black Americans and the poor. There is no Democrat running whose mistakes come close to the hateful bigotry of that. Not to mention the cronyism sucking at the public treasury.

The Great Grey Warmongeress writes of the New York state employee selling stolen documents on ebay:

Mr. Lorello noted in his confession that most of what he stole was not particularly valuable (some of his items sold for as little as $10). Most of the artifacts were known among dealers as trash, he wrote, although he used a trashier word than trash.

From James Glanz at the NY Times:

Rebuilding failures by one of the most heavily criticized companies working in Iraq, the American construction giant Parsons, were much more widespread than previously disclosed and touched on nearly every aspect of the company’s operation in the country, according to a report released Monday by a federal oversight agency.

Previous reports by federal inspectors and by news organizations identified numerous examples of construction failures in Parsons Corporation projects in Iraq, including dozens of uncompleted or shoddily built health care clinics and border forts, as well as disastrous sewage and plumbing problems at the Baghdad police academy that left parts of it unusable.

But the new report, by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, an independent federal agency, examined nearly 200 Parsons construction projects contained in 11 major “job orders” paid for in a huge rebuilding contract. There were also three other nonconstruction orders. The total cost of the work to the United States was $365 million.

The new report finds that 8 of the 11 rebuilding orders were terminated by the United States before they were completed, for reasons including weak contract oversight, unrealistic schedules, a failure to report problems in a timely fashion and poor supervision by the United States Army Corps of Engineers, which managed the contracts.

“There was a confluence of shortfalls here,” said Stuart W. Bowen Jr., who leads the inspector general’s office. “It was obviously an unworkable plan.”

In response to the report, a spokeswoman for the company, Amber Thompson, released a statement saying, in part, that “Parsons put forth its best efforts to simultaneously build or refurbish hundreds of facilities across Iraq.”

“We did so under an extremely hazardous security environment while simultaneously contending with constantly changing demands by government officials regarding what they wanted, where and for how much,” Ms. Thompson said.

The work, Ms. Thompson said, was carried out with other challenges, such as a United States requirement to work with Iraqi contractors whose capabilities often fell short. “Despite the challenges we faced, Parsons completed many of the required facilities” and completed most of the work on many others, Ms. Thompson said.

But William L. Nash, a retired Army major general who is a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, said the report filled out a tapestry of failure illustrating that American military and civilian officials in Iraq failed to absorb lessons learned in the 1990s about how to carry out rebuilding in conflict zones.

“To me,” Mr. Nash said, “it further illustrates the disconnect between the military and the C.P.A.,” or the Coalition Provisional Authority, the American administrative authority after the 2003 invasion.

From 1990 through 2002, Parsons was the 10th biggest political contributor among postwar corporate contractors.

And coincidentally, the CEO of Parsons, James F. McNulty, stepped down 4 days before this report was released, though he continues as board chair. Also, beyond the usual revolving door between his 24 years in the Army and the military industrial corporate world McNulty stepped into for fun, profit, and deficient performance at taxpayer’s expense, there’s another group of cronies McNulty belongs to.

Take a look at this list.

That would be the group of neocons, corporate moguls and celebrities united to support John McCain’s coronation as the next Republican crony to ascend to the throne of military-industrial primacy: the US Presidency.

That would be the same McCain promising us more wars, which would also mean more rebuilding contracts offered to deficient contractors on the public dole.

“Shoot first, overspend later” sounds like a more apropos campaign slogan for Mr. Straight Talk. Elect him if you want more of the same.

An American aid worker helping Afghani women get their embroidery marketed has been kidnapped in Afghanistan, provoking a rare protest by hundreds of Afghani women.

The kidnapping of a pair of Israeli soldiers provoked a massive Israeli attack less than two years ago. Publicity and public outrage follow other such captures, if US troops or contractors are taken. But an American woman?

This is not just a test for our government, and the Afghan government, but for our society. Does the life and safety of Cyd Mizell matter? Damn straight it does.

It’s understood that the government won’t negotiate for her release, but it should be advocating for it. An outcry that transcends US politics in behalf of a woman aiding women in one of the world’s most impoverished lands will be necessary.

Her kidnapping is an outrage. Her kidnappers must hear that every civilized nation rejects this form of violence, the abduction of an unarmed non-combatant performing non-political good works. The abductors can find no defense for their action in any sacred scripture. They must understand that her release is necessary and if they fail that, it will be their lives in constant jeopardy.

The Afghan women have taken an unprecedented step forward in her defense. It is up to the rest of us to raise the outcry to an unprecedented level, as well.

The Florida primary is tomorrow and everyone needs to go to the polls and vote, even if the Democratic National Committee doesn’t recognize the votes. because the Republicans have a nasty tax cut on the ballot that needs to be defeated. The only people who will be helped by Amendment 1 are the same old group that has been helped by several earlier measures. New homeowners get nothing from it, and the state legislature is setting up the school districts for another funding cut, forcing the districts to either reduce services in our already marginal system, or raise school property taxes. It’s the Reagan tax fake - the guys at the top cut taxes forcing the guys below them to raise taxes to make up the lost revenue.

The Florida tax code needs to be rewritten, not patched, but the legislature doesn’t want to do the work.

A number of people have been lumping Florida and Michigan together because both states moved their primaries and the Democratic National Committee took away all of the delegates from both states. The situations are not the same.

Michigan has a Democratic governor and Democrats control the lower house of the legislature, with the Republicans controlling the upper house. Either party could have stopped the change from taking place, but they both agreed to it.

In Florida the Republicans control everything, and the Republicans changed the date. There was nothing the Democratic Party of Florida could do about it. It would be an understatement to say a lot of Florida Democrats are not happy about being punished for a Republican action and the national party is not exactly popular. I hope the national committees are able to make up the money they won’t get from Florida with contributions from in Iowa and New Hampshire.

On a happier note, Senator Bill Nelson of Florida who claims to be a Democrat was absent today and unable to vote with the Republicans on the “get out of jail free” card for the telecommunications companies and Bush administration. Chris Dodd proves he is a leader by standing up for the Fourth Amendment, and Senators Obama and Clinton managed to find the Senate and vote with the Democratic Party.

It’s been a really frustrating time, these last few months. But today I found a Craigslist ad seeking p/t humor writers for a mobile media network. They asked applicants to create three faux headlines. And articles of 50 words or less to go with them.

So I tried these.

President Bush asserts the State of the Union remains ‘Undissolved’

Pointing to South Carolina’s refusal to secede from the United States and an economy still growing on the strength of slave labor, George Bush declared his presidency an ‘unqualified success’ while admitting some disappointment that majority control of Parliament had fallen to the hands of the Abolitionists and Suffragettes.

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Author Toni Morrison endorses the candidacy of that guy with the funny name

Best-selling author Toni Morrison, who previously dubbed Bill Clinton the ‘blackest president since Johnny Winter’ endorsed Barack Obama for the 2008 presidential race today, proclaiming him as the ‘finest honky she’s ever seen’ even though he ‘needs more practice playing the bagpipes.’

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Tom Brady’s Ankle Injury Won’t Impede Performance

After a week of media speculation about his ankle injury, Patriots QB Tom Brady passed his physical with the NY Giants yesterday. Giants’ coach Tom Coughlin expressed confidence that Brady would be ‘ready to assume the place-kicking duties for the team after today’s planned execution of Lawrence Tynes.’

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Groan if you must.

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I should think most Southerners would read this and figure out Huck’s playing them as suckas. He must really think they’re dumb as a fence post to consider this worthy of any mention at all. Especially since he doesn’t even eat fried chicken.

Yesterday, I thought Huck would win all those states, but after his Kentucky fried comments, I hope Southerners will give hima wake-up call that fried chicken preferences are not what’s got them worried.

Chickenshit politicians they fret about. And guys like Huck should be skinned for treating Southerners as yokels.

Krugman revisits the past and predicts a repeat for AnyDem who gets to the White House. It’s his way of reminding Obama supporters not to delude themselves.

At the same time, he mentions a Clinton mistake or two, while praising John Edwards.

Stormy at Angry Bear gets his point and adds to it. Archcrone gets it, too, as does Ron Beasley.

Others seem to think he’s stumping for Clinton or that Clinton earned $50 million worth of investigations and nastiness. It’s too bad they can’t read. Or remain incapable of their kneejerk defense of rightist lunacy. The latter, of course, believe winning is everything, no matter how much damage gets done to the country. Hatred as a virtue: it’s the only GOP family value when the dust clears.

It won’t be progressives, nor the working class, nor the middle class below median income, nor anyone with less than a bachelor’s degree, nor Latinos, Blacks or women, nor white males making less than $50K/yr. And it sure won’t be members of the military sent to carry out the policies of the wealthy and powerful by killing and being killed or wounded. Nor will it be the majority of the Iraqi people, who do happen to be living, breathing human beings according to any God you might worship.

No, it’ll be a few politicians, most of whom have a lot of ambition and really don’t give a shit about you or me unless you happen to be wealthy and/or influential.

Will the endorsement of Obama by Teddy Kennedy or Caroline Kennedy matter? Sure. People 55 and older still look fondly upon the Kennedys because of JFK and RFK, so a few will be influenced. But just as most Iranians have no memory of the Shah, less than a third of America really recall the dead Kennedys and a third of them - being Republican - won’t be influenced still.

But primary season can be a game of inches so it could make a difference in three or four states. Which really matters little since delegates aren’t awarded like electoral votes.

It has become wearisome reading political blogs lately. I can predict what almost all will say because they just find fresh ways to reiterate who they support and too many commenters believe that rudeness and flame wars are as good as logic in changing minds. In short, there’s many flavors of assholes but the smell remains a constant.

Some bloggers, however, remain fun to read because they take care with their presentation. I’ll provide a long excerpt but you should read this in its totality.

Melina at Brilliant At Breakfast:

The difference between me and Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg is one of having faith in human nature and hope that the American system and/or the American people are strong enough, at this point in history, to fall behind an idealistic young candidate and go through with what will be necessary to turn this ship around before it hits ground. I keep imagining the moment that, in the midst of a terra alert, we put McCain or Romney into office just to be “safe.” Hey, Its happened before! Don’t rule it out!

I don’t know what rosy colored glasses the Kennedy’s look through to maintain their hope in the face of tragedy, and as political insiders who have seen their share of the gruesome details, but its sort of heartening and lovely in a way…and a little unreal. I also think that it has something to do with being raised in an extended family of public servants who are steeped in being able to promote change. They are told this from the moment they hit the ground running, and they have the support, even in trauma and dysfunction, of their extended family and religion to keep going. They also are from money; not that they all have riches beyond compare, because there are so many of them, but operating from a platform of upper classiness, they are educated and prepped for a life of great privilege, and a life of service to balance it. Religion has something to do with it too. They are Catholics, and it seems that having a higher reason behind what the aim is, helps with all those questions of why.

A coy Obama as much as admitted that Teddy Kennedy is on board as well. Breaking News: Tomorrow comes the endorsement. Do they know the real thing when they see it just because they are Kennedys? Because everything about Obama seems to rely more on the feeling that he gives people than actual substance. I’d like to see more substance and less positioning.

Granted, I would be the virtual Woody Allen neurotic New Yorker to any Kennedy hope filled spiel about this young candidate being of the flesh and the body of the father. It must be nice to feel like you’ve found the reincarnation of hope, but I’m not quite there yet, to be honest, I’m doubtful about the whole thing. America does not have a very good track record at successfully letting hopeful leaders make their way into office. Surely, if Barak Obama is going to be brave enough to throw himself out there, I’m willing to listen, but it took me four years and an in person meeting to make me start to think that John Edwards really means what he says, and I have some very concrete reasons why I like him.

Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg’s reasoning about Obama had less to do with the specifics of what Obama might do, than with things that people have told her about how he reminds them of her father. See, she doesn’t really remember her father, but I’m sure that she knows everything he ever did, and the concrete reasoning behind it all, so why this wishy-washy endorsement? It sounds to me like ” He moves the American people and makes them feel good..” and people say that he reminds them of my father, so lets trust him to try to dig us out of the worst hole we’ve been in, maybe ever?

Whoever gets the job is bound to look bad pretty quickly if not right away. There is just too much to clean up, and even the most experienced politician is gonna have to get their hands really dirty, offending alot of people along the way, meanwhile trying to fix the diplomatic mess that they are going to be left with. I think that whoever is the winner of this contest is going to end up with the short end of the stick, and the war is going to be his/her’s, thanks to the democratic majority’s inability to get itself to act, even in the interest of getting some information on the record to protect the next president.

I’ve been a little shocked at the reaction of a few people in the blogosphere to Edwards not dropping out of the race when he didn’t win South Carolina.
I see no reason for him to drop out, and in fact, I urge him to stay in…I sent him money, and will send more after the 1st of the month. I guess that the best thing about this race has been the discourse. Some of it has been insane and some of it has been upsetting, but mostly, it’s been good to see everyone allowed to talk out loud about whats been going on for these years in what seemed like a virtual gulag, as the terra alerts went from yellow to red, and we were told the best way to duct tape ourselves into a room in case of attack. Remember all that? Some woman around here actually killed herself and her kid because she sealed them into a room too tightly at a time when they had to use a generator or heater or something.

Remember not being able to buy duct tape because that asshole director of homeland security, Tom Ridge, said that all Americans should have these things…and survival food…doesn’t it seem like a fucking dream? How did they successfully carry out all of the lies? How is it that they wont have to pay somehow? And isn’t it crazy that any of these fools wants the job at all?

Yeah, you have to be pretty sure of yourself to think that you might be able to fix this mess up…even with a full staff of advisers, I cant imagine that anyone wouldn’t have some trepidation. And I guess that I don’t feel like Obama has the experience to run the entire country …but I’d prefer to take a chance with him than to go with what I know will be business as usual with Billary. One way or another, we’re bound to take a bit of a dip before we start to rebound. The dip might last what seems like a long time in our short sightedness, but historically it will be a blip. It’s what we deserve for getting too lazy to pay attention and vote, and the turnout speaks loudly to the fact that its going to be a long time before people become that complacent again.

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If you haven’t already contacted your Senators on the revisions to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance act that the Bush administration is pushing for in the Senate today, please do it. Be polite, but let your Senators know that you don’t want to reward criminal behavior by giving the telecommunication companies immunity for their actions.

Understand that if they have been acting legally, the companies are already protected by existing law. This blanket immunity would protect not only the companies, but administration officials who may have violated the rights of Americans. The program is classified and we really don’t know what they were doing, but we have learned that they started the program in early 2001, before the attack on the World Trade Center.

Senator Christopher Dodd is leading the opposition, but he could certainly use the assistance of other Senators, especially those who are running for President. If Senators Clinton and Obama want to lead the nation, this is a good place to show us all that they intend to honor the restrictions placed on Presidents by the Constitution.