– Hollis French promises to get some sort of pre-November resolution of the Troopergate case despite the stonewalling of the Palins and their newfound friends, the lawyers that the McCain campaign has got camped out in Anchorage armtwisting and lobbying the Lege.
– John McCain is trying to explain, in the midst of the stock market meltdown, why taking our Social Security money and giving it to his Wall Street buddies is somehow a good idea. (Paul Krugman and Jesse Jackson Jr. remind us that McCain has, up until about 72 hours ago, been in favor of ripping out all the safeguards put into America’s financial systems by FDR.)
– Charges against Amy Goodman and other journalists arrested while covering the Republican National Convention have been dropped. Very good news!
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John McCain is suffering from senile dementia.
No, I am not being hyperbolic. I am stating the obvious. Did you see that CNN clip the other day about his interview with that Spanish journalist where he kept blathering about Latin America when the woman was clearly and plainly asking him about Spain’s Prime Minister?
The man is out to lunch. This is serious.
Glad to hear Amy Goodman and the other journalists won’t be charged! What the hell. Right wing paranoia has got to stop and it’s why our nation has been on the biggest roller coaster ride in our nation’s history!
Never in the history of politics has a phrase said so much about the meta of a candidate.
Good Morning Phoenix Woman and firedogs -
that Yahoo ‘privatize social security’link pretty much nails him now don’t it and don’t even get me started on the “treat Healthcare like banks” quote Krugman unearthed – that has political epitath writen all over it
bwaaaaahaaaaahaaaaaaa
It is going to be fun watching McShame squirm, wiggle and lie when it comes to his health care program that he wanted to model after our wunerful wunerful banking system.
Explosion in Marriott Hotel in Islamabad kills at least 8. Thanks W for spreading the war.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26803768/
Big surprise that the charges were dropped. They achieved their goal and now they say ‘nevermind’. Those that arrested her need to be not only sued but have charges lodged against them for violating her civil rights. Otherwise, it will continue to happen.
Take a look at this ad. It is the best.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v…..606/604527
Started to leave this downstairs in the Chair but more appropriate to this thread. Heading out on errands so no time to read:
“Racial Views Steer Some Away from Obama”
http://www.politico.com/news/s…..13658.html
Author, you ask? forkin’ fournier
I’m not sure it’s all dementia – McCain seemed to be struggling with content more than finding words to me(and that loss of language and vocabulary is one of the signs of the dementia my mom had early on). He seemed totally and completely clueless about what the hell the reporter was talking about..you could see the wheels going around and around..”who the hell is Zapatera?”
Here’s what McCain has to say about the wonders of market-based health reform
Better Health Care at Lower Cost for Every American [pdf]
Lets see…. I’ve trusted my retirement 401K to the guru’s in the banking/wall street which could guarantee me working until I drop and now he wants me to gamble my healthcare on that same type of casino?
The line that gets me is this products less burdened by the worst excesses of state-based regulation.
Those very state regulations were voted into law by state legislatures because of the BAD acts by the heath insurance companies….. SUCH as NOT covering a new born baby IF they were born sick…… Ya they cover well ones but IF the roulette will spin came out that your baby was born sick….. sorry Charley…. AND the exclusion in the contracts IS called “exclude coverage for Sick Baby of the insured”
Morning PW,
stupid to arrest journos.
Mornin’ all, how’s life in FDL-land today?
This morning I opened the San Jose Mercury News to find yet another example of John McCain, deregulator:
Wow. Hitting hard.
No kidding. He’s confused Army troops with National Guard troops, and as Eli notes, those aren’t the only important things McCain’s confused. Hell, McCain’s confused, period!
and, let’s not forget about ‘competition’ for electricity. That has not worked. At all. No matter who did it(it was a crashing failure in the UK and they did it first), or where they did it. Totally irresponsible to throw competition into the mix for something that basically is a public good…did not save consumers money, took away all incentives for utilities to keep their infrastructure maintained and growing(which is why for all the push for wind power and solar, we are stuck with a hose that is too small already for what we’ve got), and has basically put us at a disadvantage. Public good and competition are three words which should never be equated…
PW, for some reason I thought of you when I saw this *s
Speed Vest
More pictures being released from Galveston. Has anyone heard anything more up to date about recovery. I have not heard anything this am.
I agree…. I am seeing some of that behavior in my 87 yr old mother….
This was a phone interview…..
IF McCain could not understand because of the reporters accent…. he should of said so
IF he could NOT hear well enough to catch what the reporter was asking he should of said so…..
If McCain has congnitive issues, it could be why he cannot switch from one complex subject to another …..I see that also with my mother…..
What gets me….. Once a upon a time I remember seeing pictures of McCain with glasses…. at 72….a former pilot in the days with non-pressurized planes which can cause damage to cornea….(my uncle flew in Vietnam (never crashed a plane either))
beansworth put it this way over on reddit
Is there no way to show that the mass arrests of photographers, journalists, and passerby were not conducted in good faith? Can anything be done about the governments behavior?
I have a question. It’s not snark, I’m serious. Where are they going to get the $700 billion for the bailout?
From that magical forest they have guarded like Fort Knox of Money Trees™
Which is of course located in China & Saudi Arabia….. *g*
pajarito posted this on Peterr’s thread
You got it!
One of the marvels of our banking system is that we no longer need to use
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Printing_press
Now money can be created electronically
Heh!
Bushonomics: from Arbusto to Our-bust-o
Please don’t forget the funny money printing presses that operate 24/7 at the behest of Republican overlords.
Mornin’ readers, if you haven’t read it, please stop by Christy’s Pull Up A Chair.
FDL is all of us, pullin’ up and pitchin’ in….
eggsellent !
Coverage saying they are no longer looking for bodies…not sure what that means. Yesterday I had written that the Austin firemen had come back; they described the scene. I guess they have determined not likely for anyone else to be found. Very odd, I think.
MSNBC has coverage of Islamabad Marriott explosion. Container truck so full of explosives it didn’t need to go thru security checks to get next to hotel. Raging fire, few emergency workers arrived yet (happened about an hour ago), 20 foot deep, 40 foot wide crater.
Looks like the video was compliments of Al Jezeera
I know there’s a lot of suggestions here to see this or that video, but you cannot miss the video oldgold linked to downstairs and above at 8.
Do not miss this ad! I had to play it over and over just to make sure I was hearing McCain say such devastating things about himself, such as “Big donors buy access to my office!”
Jaw dropping stuff! Out of his own mouth!
They should run this ad nationwide, nonstop from now to Nov. 4th.
Missed that. Thanks for pointing it out. Al Jazeera is rapidly becoming the best news source around.
Repeating the McCain ad link for your convenience.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v…..606/604527
Thanks, oldgold!
Borrow it from the Chinese, like we are doing now. But let’s cut taxes so we can defer even more debt to our kids and grandkids.
New debt: 11.3 trillion.
A trillion here and a trillion there, after awhile, you are talking real money.
Can you believe they want us to save their asses and cut their taxes at the same time. Sounds like the Audacity of Greed
OMG the bail out proposal also includes increasing the US Debt ceiling to 11 Trillion… OMG it now will be more than the number of digits on the debt clock…
devastating !
and rightfully so. wonder who made it
McCain never was the sharpest knife in the drawer. His graduation near the bottom of his class at Annapolis should tell you that. So the dimness factor is something he has in common with Bush. But more than that, both are Republicans. They will tell you night is day and, when that no longer works on even low information voters, they will tell you that it has always been their position that it was night and that it is those Democrats who said it was day, and, in fact, it is the Democrats’ fault that it is night and not day. They will say this because 99% of the time they get away with saying this. They know that most of the media are in the bag, most of the others are asleep, and that there are only two or three who have been paying attention. And what are the odds that what they say will have any impact?
As evidence of this last, I give you a snippet that shows up on today’s NYT’s front page online:
And gee why would that be? We have this huge media industry, all of these big media outlets, a 24 hour news cycle, so why wouldn’t people be hearing what Biden has to say? Answer: Because that same media doesn’t cover it. How dishonest is that, that they write a story how because they aren’t doing their job, no one is “noticing” Biden?
Exactly. McCain is all but drooling on himself. The clip that is most telling is the one where he talks about how much fish love off-shore oil-drilling rigs.
FDL’s Dr. Kirk Murphy, who is a psychiatrist, has an excellent recent article where he explains what has likely happened to McCain’s mind.
our Rev Peterr did a post on accounting for the missing yesterday
lots of misery and heartache ahead for our fellow Texans
had dinner with some Beaumont evacuees last night. their house and jobs remain intact but they are here in Austin due to no ice, no food, no gas, no power at home
Of course she wasn’t charged. The point of her arrest (and the arrest of any other journalist covering the protests) was not to determine if an illegal activity had occurred. The point was to tamp down as much coverage of the protests as possible–to silence media coverage. Totalitarian governments the world over use the exact same technique. Arrest journalists, hold them until the “crises” is over and then release them. They do the same with protesters. Sadly, this is the way it is in the U.S. in the past 8 years. They had stopped using the technique after the union movement in the U.S. succeeded, but it has again reared its ugly head. This is not the America we grew up in.
A new item for the foreign affairs debate it looks like the North Korea deal has disintegrated.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…..27920.html
Can you see N. Korea from Alaska
Where is the link?
Looks like I screwed up the McCain ad link.
Trying again.
McCain ad.
So if WE were the ones in on getting things right in the Banking/Wall Street what you want in the legislation?
Mine is this:
Legislation to regulate CEO & Board salary & compensation…. set a Percent of average worker at that company AND make all compensation show on the books and TAXABLE…. clauses to make sure that compensation is linked to how well the company is doing AND if it crashes & burns….. the CEO gets nada….
OT, John Ridley’s got a great piece up at HuffPo about Rush Limbaugh and bigotry.
That prompted me to write a short post at my homeblog…and then Mr. S. started watching Ring of Fire, the Emile Griffith Story this morning.
We’ve seen the Republican bigotry machine in action before. Gay-bashing in 1992, racebating in 2000 and again in 2008. It’s long past time we stood up loud and strong against it.
…or when they come for me–and my fdl family of diversity–there will be no one left to do anything.
The phrase “an excellent recent article” is live, and I just now tested it.
This is great news for John McCain!
-G
That may well be the finest political ad I’ve ever seen. Where are they playing it now?
Also, don’t miss this article by Sen. Bernie Sanders; I think he gets it exactly right concerning the bailout and reforms that will stop us from ending up here again.
I know it’s good they don’t have to defend themselves but I wish the conduct of the rnc and their brownshirts saw the light of day
Buchanan is on MSNBC cheering on the Paksitan bombing. It’s great news for John McCain!
-G
That was the MAIN reason the FDR era financial legislation was put into place…. to prevent this from every happening again….. AND since Reagan….. and always remember Limpball’s statement …… “FDR may be dead but we are trying to kill the New Deal and related legislation”
BTW, yesterday’s proposal by Ian Welsh conforms pretty well to Bernie’s four principles: http://firedoglake.com/2008/09…..ust-banks/
Let us see if he comes across as a hothead again. My feeling is that O&B will be very similarly positioned but once again O will come across non emotional cool and collected while McShame spews
IMHO, FDR and the New Deal is what Grover Norquist wants to drown in the bathtub.
So he really thinks the tarra™ scare them silly is going to work this year?
Sh*t we have the panic on the economy right at home ……. Buchanan is so full of it…
I could not agree more! That’s why I’m emphasizing everyone here see it.
I haven’t see it on air yet; Oldgold posted the link downstairs and again @8 in this post.
I just thought it was so good, I wanted to make sure everyone here saw it!
It’s so good, I’d make sure it was on air coast to coast from now to the election.
And the beauty of it is, McCain himself is saying the most devastating things!
I believe you. In fact, if you check back a few weeks ago, I strongly and repeatedly suggested that very thing. Frightening to me that so few will come forward and admit what is perfectly obvious. That ticket, should it win, will do us in for sure. The country would never recover.
other than that, no worries, eh? *shudder*
Exactly. It’s a true masterpiece.
I’d be willing to shove the lad into Lake Erie. It’s handy, and it’s often been referred to as a bathtub by scientists explaining its weird, dangerous waves during storms.
It has been the Repug & Neocon MO….. since Reagan… working night and day to undo anything related to the FDR safeguards and New Deal…..
Those of us who have lived out west most of their lives see examples of that time….. the WPA projects, Hoover Dam…. National Park lodges ….. rock walls along many of the highways…… Crown Point in Oregon….. There are a thousand different WPA projects that put Americans to work ……
Haven’t seen you around for some time or did I just miss you?
Glad to see you anyway.
Naomi Klein was on Bill Maher’s program last night and made exactly that point. Worldwide, the conservatives have used financial shocks to roll back all social safeguards for the poor and the middle class and to turn countries (back) into the political equivalent of banana republics. If McCain gets elected, we can expect Social Security to be privatized (and subsequently raided) and the rest of the social safetynet dismantled.
The concept of evil, brown, non-Christians gets Pat Buchanan riled up and scared.
-G
Right. Reagan called dismantling the New Deal and busting the unions, “unleashing the miracle of free enterprise.”
I enjoy watching Rachel smack him around. And, he seems to love it.
Getting ready for another weekend of meeting Outside journalists, here, investigating Sarah Palin’s past and the Wasilla religious culture that pawned her. Attendance is up at fundamentalist churches in the Mat-Su Valley, as reporters from around the planet assemble at the Wasilla Assembly of God and other such places.
I hear that Maureen Dowd deigned to soil her dainty Manolos by stepping in Alaskan dirt for a week.
Do the visiting global visiting reporters refrain from giggling during the services? Any tomato throwing?
Bush has already done that. THis trillion dollar bullshit to save rich fucks pretty much does away with anything either candidate could have done to help anyone. They’re borrowing A TRILLION DOLLARS to save the bankers.
Forget the New Deal, or any of that. Bush’s legacy is secure, he turned the US into Brasil ‘85.
Nice going Clusterfuck.
I missed MoDo. That’s OK. I hope to meet with Max Blumenthal today. I’m replying to an e-mail from him right now. Ms ET will be walking through a wierdly shaped Aaska House District today with Nancy Lethcoe, who is running against the creepy John Harris, the legislator from Valdez, who is in the pocket of big oil.
Do Amy et al. get to bring criminal or civil charges of their own for false arrest, by any chance? I’d donate to that effort!
What’s the latest on the McCain lawyers aiding and abetting the Palin Stonewall?
Question:
Anyone know how this crisis is going to “trickle” down to our states?
AZ has a big budget deficit this year of course due to the myopic Repug legislators who kept cutting taxes & returning money to the taxpayers because they had a surplus a couple of years ago…..
I see less revenue from state income tax due to increasing unemployment…… foreclosure and non-payment of property taxes….. less driving so less gas taxes collected…… less buying reduces revenue from sales taxes to the state, county and cities….. to then it trickles down even further….. which means I could get less police/fire and city services
Here’s what I don’t get. Well, this is the latest thing I don’t get. The other day, McCain said we need a 9/11 commission-type commission to get to the bottom of this. Yesterday he was telling us why it all happened. Barack Obama did it. How did he figure that out when we need a commission to figure it out? Maybe he appointed his own commission and the worked real fast?
Hope Obama and Biden hit on this some more. “Appoint a commission” = total abdication of leadership. Barack Obama. Ready to Lead.
Here’s the link to al Jazeera’s English TV. They’re the one with good coverage of the Islamabad Marriott bombing.
http://english.aljazeera.net/watch_now/
General question. If Congress is supposed to be in charge of the purse strings of the nation, how does the executive branch get to take on an additional trillion dollars of debt without debate and voting in Congress. Just askin’.
The plan is to use the downswing to smash the state employee unions. G. Will had an article about how unions were bleeding states to death.
Arnholed S. is doing the same in Kalifawnia.
Grover Norquist lives on.
-G
Simply put, Gramm, Mcain, Kudlow & and the rest of their ‘free market’ & deregulation buddies have own the shitstorm they have created.
The repeal of Glass – Steagall let to all of these “too big to fail” institutions.
Sen. Bernie Sanders gets it exactly right when he says “too big to fail is too big to exist”.
I remember when it happened. A lot of malarky was sold about how Glass -Steagall had to be repealed so we could compete in the ‘global marketplace’
Hogwash. To paraphrase a lot of our mothers “If the ‘global marketplace’ wants to jump off a bridge, are you gonna do it, too?”
In closing, when is the discussion gonna get around to the thieves that sat in the Risk Management and Board of Directors of these corporations?
Particularly the risk management folks. How will they, with a straight face, say it was ok to sign off on the 27 to 1 leverage the average investment bank carried on its books in 2007.
I heard last evening (dont remember where) that this whole package has to go to Congress but the issue is putting together a bunch of crap or smart legislation… are they putting together something that just keeps the fingers on the leaks in the Dam OR are they really trying to FIX things?
The people of the Lord are under attack by the modern day Romans. That must be the way they see it.
-G
Don’t think they really know how to fix anything but since we the people now virtually own Wall Street I want some sayso in what these buzzards get paid and what they do.
It is a weekend, so nothing will happen again until Monday. Ted goes on trial next week. Hopefully, we can find ways to deluge the national blogosphere with pictures of Ted and Sarah together, during their June-July lovefest, that was warming rapidly – until the indictment came down.
See my comment @52 as a start…
Thanks, eCAHN.
Meanwhile, in Nigeria, the oiligarchs are under attack:
“Oil exploration has brought only pain to them by way of environmental damage, harassment from the military and rape of under-aged girls by soldiers, extra-judicial killings of young men and development and wealth to other parts of the country at their detriment,” he said
Link to Al J**eera
-G
That’s a great start. They need to clean their house and start over – with OUR approval.
The best part of this whole things is that the mess with Palin has “opened the eyes” of the MSM to the Real McCain….. they are finally looking beyond the fund BBQ guy…. and it is about time…..
The more that is dug up in Alaska…. the more it hits Arizona…. as finally the local reporters are feeling brave enough to expose the BullSh*t Express….
New post – Teddy
Hi. Just been lurking as much as possible, but not per usual. Busy downsizing here after 35 yrs in same place – oogh! Sick of all the trips to recycling center, but glad to do it, e.v.e.n.t.u.a.l.l.y.
I miss u guys!
This is just another example of the cost of racism to all of us.
You could not have a clearer contrast of who is better equipped to run this country, but because of racism a confused, doddering bus driver for lobbyists has a chance to win an otherwise unwinnable election.
Then, billions of our dollars will get handed out to the very people that created this mess, while screwing up the economy even more, if that’s even possible.
All because of dimwits that base incredibly important decisions on the basis of the color of someone’s skin.
There has been a lot of malfeasance and even crime in those boardrooms. Here is an interesting Columbia Journalism Review article that talks about that stuff that Christy linked to yesterday: http://www.cjr.org/essay/boiler_room.php?page=all It’s a great read.
The middle class has been wiped out in the last 8 years of Republican rule. Make no mistake, this economic Armegeddon is the death nell of the middle class. Your great great grandchildren will be saddle with the debt brought on by Republican economic theory and policies aided and abetted by Democrats. It’s time to take class warfare to a whole new level. Should Obama be elected his first act should be to raise the tax rate on the rich to 75-90%. Let these thieves help pay for the debt they have created.
Thanks. I’m certainly gonna read all of it when I get home.
thanks for the gentle reminder … i’m all anted up.
~itunkala
They could get the money from the Pentagon. They were stealing before 911..can you imagine how much has ‘disappeared’ since 911? A walk down memory lane…
On Sept. 10, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld declared war. Not on foreign terrorists, “the adversary’s closer to home. It’s the Pentagon bureaucracy,” he said. He said money wasted by the military poses a serious threat.
“In fact, it could be said it’s a matter of life and death,” he said.
“According to some estimates we cannot track $2.3 trillion in transactions,” Rumsfeld admitted.
http://benfrank.net/patriots/n….._trillions
I should have added that the video is from Sept. 10th of 2001.