My friends, John McCain has suspended his campaign, but he'll still take your $$ for his campaign. 
In a bold attempt to attract a younger, more beautiful and enthusiastic audience, John McCain shocked the world and tapped NBC sitcom star Tina Fey for the VP slot.
i.
Really interesting article from someone who has known McCain for almost 50 years."Most of us who survived that experience are now in our late 60's and 70's. Sadly, we have died and are dying off at a greater rate than our non-POW contemporaries. We experienced injuries and malnutrition that are coming home to roost. So I believe John's age (73) and survival expectation are not good for being elected to serve as our President for 4 or more years.
I can verify that John has an infamous reputation for being a hot head. He has a quick and explosive temper that many have experienced first hand. Folks, quite honestly that is not the finger I want next to that red button."
I've liked Edwards for the most part during his brief political career. A few of of my first blog posts were about Edwards back when he shone like a meteor, taking his Senate seat to the national stage, contending for two presidential nominations. Now he is gone. Toast. Worm meal. Lower than a crawdad's belly in a sink full of soaking hot seaweed.
....on foreign policy, calls him worse than Bush. Yes, worse than George W. Bush."The foreign policy that John McCain now advocates is reckless and promiscuously interventionist. If he were a university student majoring in international relations or security studies, he would deserve a resounding F for his analysis of the crucial issues that the United States has confronted over the past 14 or 15 years. After a promising start, his performance has steadily deteriorated. The last thing that America needs is an even more aggressive and incompetent steward of foreign policy than George W. Bush has been."
Andy has some of the best fake news around, check out his site.Liberal Bloggers Accuse Obama of Trying to Win Election
Nominee Called Traitor to Democrats' Losing Tradition
The liberal blogosphere was aflame today with new accusations that Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill) is trying to win the 2008 presidential election.
Suspicions about Sen. Obama's true motives have been building over the past few weeks, but not until today have the bloggers called him out for betraying the Democratic Party's losing tradition.
"Barack Obama seems to be making a very calculated attempt to win over 270 electoral votes," wrote liberal blogger Carol Foyler at LibDemWatch.com, a blog read by a half-dozen other liberal bloggers. "He must be stopped."
But those comments were not nearly as strident as those of Tracy Klugian, whose blog LoseOn.org has backed unsuccessful Democratic candidates since 2000.
"Increasingly, Barack Obama's message is becoming more accessible, appealing, and yes, potentially successful," he wrote. "Any Democrat who voted for Dukakis, Mondale or Kerry should regard this as a betrayal."
Democratic National Committee chairman Howard Dean said that he was "sympathetic" to the concerns of bloggers who worry that their nominee seems stubbornly bent on winning the election, but he warned them that the DNC's "hands are tied."
"If Sen. Obama is really determined to win, I don't think any of us can talk him out of it," Mr. Dean said.
Liberal bloggers said that they would be watching Sen. Obama's vice-presidential selection process "very closely" for signs that he is plotting to win the election.
"Barack Obama still has a chance to pick someone disastrous as a sign that he wants to lose this thing," Ms. Foyler wrote. "If not, he should brace himself for some really mean blog posts."
Has there ever been a war McCain wanted to end? Seems to me he wants American troops in every country across the globe. Hey, we're most of the way (70%!) there!
"... McCain's entire career has been dedicated to the idea that America must always have the right to solve its problems by force. Throughout his political career, he has argued for increased use of force in virtually every military engagement the U.S. has been involved in since Vietnam. He complained about Bill Clinton's "excessively restricted air campaign" in Kosovo, campaigning strenuously for a ground invasion. During the 1994 flap over Pyongyang's nuclear program, he called for "more forceful, coercive action." Even before the latest Iraq War, McCain argued way back in 1999 that the only way to deal with Saddam Hussein was "to strike disproportionate to the provocation."
The most frightening example of McCain's fondness for force is on display in his own book, Faith of My Fathers, when he complains about the politicians who refused to allow pilots like him to attack, say, Soviet ships unloading arms in Vietnamese port cities. "We thought our civilian commanders were complete idiots," he writes.
Bombing Soviet ships, of course, would probably have started World War III, but McCain's vision, then and now, encompasses war as a way of life. There is significant evidence that McCain believes war is something righteous and necessary, a tonic for the national soul, intrinsically "noble" irrespective of context (he is still one of the only politicians to apply that word to the Iraq conflict). That is why it's no joke when McCain says casually, "There's gonna be other wars," or when he sings, "Bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran." We have to assume that he will jump at the chance to expand this conflict and hit those politically sensitive targets his "complete idiot" civilian commanders once barred him from going after in Vietnam."
Consider this next time McCain says he wants us to stay in Iraq for an undetermined length of time. If McCain had been in Nixon's shoes, we might still be fighting in Vietnam. And he would think that was a good thing. The choice is clear, folks.
"The most pertinent issue is not what McCain did or didn’t do during the war in Vietnam, but what he learned from that searing, incredibly bloody and wholly unnecessary failure of U.S. policy. Clearly he learned that torture is morally wrong, illegal and counterproductive, and he has spoken with great moral authority on that issue. But listening to him now and over the past decade or so, he also seems not to have learned why that war itself was a tragic mistake — and why we needed to leave Vietnam long before we did.
Indeed, what is most striking about McCain’s attitude toward Vietnam is his insistence that we could have won — that we should have won — with more bombs and more casualties. In 1998, he spoke on the 30th anniversary of the Tet Offensive. “Like a lot of Vietnam veterans, I believed and still believe that the war was winnable,” he said. “I do not believe that it was winnable at an acceptable cost in the short or probably even the long term using the strategy of attrition which we employed there to such tragic results. I do believe that had we taken the war to the North and made full, consistent use of air power in the North, we ultimately would have prevailed.” Five years later, he said much the same thing to the Council on Foreign Relations. “We lost in Vietnam because we lost the will to fight, because we did not understand the nature of the war we were fighting, and because we limited the tools at our disposal.”
We had a chance to reshape the world after the Cold War, after 9/11.... but this isn't what I had in mind at all! What have we become with our insane foreign policies? We need to get back to basics and have our government act within the bounds of the Constitution. That alone would have prevented the Iraq debacle. We need more talk about these big themes, and that's why I liked Ron Paul. Barry would do well to adopt some of these broader ideas and reignite the real patriotism of the Founders, rather than this false patriotism we see today from the likes of Sean Hannity."That guiding idea of nonintervention -- developed by the colonists in rebellion, espoused to great effect by the brilliant pamphleteer Thomas Paine, and crystallized as a national treasure in the final speech to the nation of George Washington -- is as fresh and viable a construct as any of the great ideas that have guided our governance. Washington's Farewell Address, actually a carefully considered letter to the American people crafted in close consultation with Alexander Hamilton and James Madison, is one of our great treasures, but although read each year in the U.S. Senate to mark Washington's legacy, it contains a caution largely ignored by those same senators as they gleefully approve massive spending to enable international meddling of every sort. Their failed responsibility to limit the president's declaration of war has become a farce that as much as anything mocks Congress' obligations as laid out in the Constitution."
"Thanks in part to McCain's vigilance, a defense contracting scandal he exposed resulted in a Pentagon procurement officer and the CFO of Boeing being sentenced to federal prison when it was revealed that the Air Force was leasing unneeded air tankers at an initial cost of $30 billion.
It was not the first time that McCain had risen on the Senate floor to accuse the Pentagon of being in cahoots with defense industry lobbyists, and he does deserve high marks for being one of the few members of Congress willing to hold the military-industrial complex accountable. But we hear little from that McCain these days as he goes on and on praising a pointless war in Iraq that has become the main excuse for wasting trillions in so-called defense dollars.
This last is the deal breaker. It is simply not possible to be a genuine small-government-give-taxpayers-a-break president while planning to pour trillions more down that rathole of failed imperial adventures."
This is my biggest problem with McCain. He knows we're wasting trillions of dollars in Iraq, and how bad that is for our economy, and the future of our country. He's long been critical of wasteful spending, and that's great. But we could stop a thousand "bridges to nowhere" and still be stuck with huge debt from Iraq alone. We're not going to solve our debt crisis unless we leave Iraq, or find a way to take all their oil. What's it gonna be, John?
"McCain may be attempting to hide why the Navy was in fact slow to promote him upwards despite his suffering as a POW and his distinguished naval heritage.
One possible reason: After McCain had returned from Vietnam as a war hero and was physically rehabilitated, he was urged by his medical caretakers and military colleagues never to fly again. But McCain insisted on going up. As Carl Bernstein reported in Vanity Fair, he piloted an ultralight single-propeller plane -- and crashed another time. His fifth loss of a plane has vanished from public records, but should be a subject of discussion in his Navy file. It wouldn't be surprising if his naval superiors worried that McCain was just too defiant, too reckless and too crash prone.
Regardless, McCain owes it to the country to release his complete naval records so that American voters can see his documented history and make an informed decision."
Wow, five planes! What a hero... or what a crappy pilot? Hard to say. And it was his plane that started the Forrestal tragedy. Surely these weren't all his fault, but hey, that's some bad luck.
"The Edge seemed more interested in talking about the U.S. presidential race. Wondering whether "Americans really are ready for a black president," The Edge said he hoped so, but predicted "it's going to be very, very close ... perhaps as close as the one in 2000." Whatever the outcome, The Edge, like virtually every European I met the past two weeks, is convinced either Barack Obama or John McCain will greatly improve America's standing on the world stage."
4. Hit McCain's policy reversals. This week, McCain didn't show up to vote for a climate change bill that he helped shape, and which he holds up as one of the great points of contrast with the Bush administration. (He said he probably wouldn't have voted for it even if he had shown up.) McCain has also refused to endorse his own immigration bill. He has also changed his mind on the Bush tax-cuts, torture and the Geneva conventions, and the rape-and-incest exception to the GOP's abortion amendment. These are matters of high principle, and not nearly enough attention has been paid to the lengths McCain went to in order to make himself acceptable to the GOP right. Obama frequently hits McCain on his support for tax cuts he once called unconscionable, and that's great, but he needs to expand the list. Moderates should realize that the McCain they once admired--I was one of them--is not the same man.Perhaps the best advice was from commenter 'Dan':
I would like to see Obama announce one cabinet appointment every week or two in the weeks or month preceding the convention. This would accomplish several things. First, it would give us a chance to see what his administration would look like. Second, it would reassure those who don't know Obama or have concerns about him what kind of people are advising him and which direction his administration will likely move. Third, announcing a high level appointment each week would create a drumbeat of news at a time in which there isn't much and would get Obama some positive attention in the press. Fourth, it would provide Obama with several heavyweight surrogates who can help defend him against unfair attacks during the general election. Imagine Obama selecting John Edwards as Attorney General, Bob Graham to head Homeland Security, Richard Gephardt as Secretary of Labor, Sam Nunn as Secretary of Defense, Joe Biden or Bill Richardson as Secretary of State. Most have already been vetted in national campaigns. Most are southerners and would appeal to whites who may have concerns about voting for a black president. This would also reduce the importance of the vice presidential pick. Instead of counting on one announcement to act as a magic bullet to appeal to all groups Obama needs to court, he can select a few people who can help him in different ways -- Biden on foreign policy, Richardson with Hispanics, Graham with Florida and so forth. Just a thought.Nice plan Dan, I like that thinking!
Fellow North Carolinians, the time has come to place your vote, and I'm expecting better results from us than those smarty-pants folks in CA, NY, PA, OH, etc.
Yesterday after church, an older man came up to me and said he had seen me on Monday. At first, I thought he must have seen me driving around town or something.
But this gentleman had seen me at the Obama rally. He had waited in those long lines because he thinks Obama is the best chance we've ever had to make a difference. He thinks Obama is the one person who can best deal with the folks in the Middle East. He thinks Obama can make America great again. And I couldn't agree with him more.
I gave him some 3D glasses and some pictures from the rally, and implored him to go vote on Tuesday. His response: "I already have".
So fellow North Carolinians, I implore you, go vote tomorrow, and vote for a real change.
"Tragedy struck the first filly in the Kentucky Derby since 1999, as Eight Belles went down on the track after her second-place finish today, broke two ankles, and was euthanized.
Showing a sisterhood with the female horse, Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., during a trip to Louisville this week had said she was going to bet on Eight Belles to win, place, and show....
... Eight Belles' trainer, Larry Jones, returned the love. "It looks like it could be the year for the girls," he said. "Eight Belles I’m sure would want to endorse.""
He looks scared to me. "Have you noticed the pattern?" Clinton wrote in an e-mail to supporters. "Every time our campaign demonstrates its strength and resilience, people start to suggest we should end our pursuit of the Democratic nomination. Those anxious to force us to the sidelines aren't doing it because they think we're going to lose the upcoming primaries. The fact is, they're reading the same polls we are, and they know we are in a position to win."
This is simply not true. Obama is up 60/40 in the polls here in North Carolina. Even if she did win 'em all....it's too late. Too late for a graceful exit, and too late to get the VP nod, unless McCain picks you.
