Obama Horse Whipping McCain in Electoral Votes

Over at Real Clear Politics they have a state by state tabulation of polls on how each state is going to vote and Obama is beating the crap out of McCain. Granted there are still some states that are in the toss up category but as time passes folks and polls will change. As of today, RCP has 153 solid Electoral College votes for Obama and 99 solid votes for McCain. Eleven states are in a toss up category with 137 votes in play. What is surprising is the number of states that President Bush won that are now going for Obama or leaning just a tad for McCain.

I honestly believe that one of the things that is swinging what was once a die hard red state to a thinking about going blue state is the simple fact that Barack Obama is selling hope and not fear. Who in their right winged mind would have voted for Ronald Reagan if he ran his Presidential campaign on fear? He ran his campaign on pride and a simple belief that America is the greatest land on Earth! Ronald Reagan was the great communicator and in the same breath and thought, so is Barack Obama. America is in a time of turmoil, we just have not hit rock bottom yet. Our banking institutions are in crisis, our housing market is busted, and our military is based on calling our sons and daughters up for their third and fourth and even fifth or sixth tour of duty in Iraq. Our nation is in trouble and in times of trouble, we need real leaders that can bring us all together under one flag, not divide us as the last eight years has proven. America needs a new Sherriff in the White House and just as well in the Congress. When you stand back and look at what America can be, and the future that each political candidate on both sides of the aisle is painting then the choice for your vote should be as plain as can be. One is looking at a one hundred year war and the other is looking at diplomacy and working together to solve so many problems our world faces.

All across the world people fight for freedom but don’t understand what it really means. When you think of freedom you have to think of something as delicate as a flower. It is the ultimate form of beauty to the person looking at it as it should be on the plant it came from. When you pick that flower the beauty is short lived as the pedals slowly die without the nutrients it needed from its roots to propagate the species. Freedom is something you have to appreciate and cultivate to make sure it survives the winter. In the end, no matter how much the bull dozers of progress trample the seeds of freedom they grow and flower once more.

Right now in our lifetime we as a people have an opportunity to see flowers and freedom as we have never seen them before. An opportunity to view freedom in its greatest bloom and that only happens when we choose a leader that is looking at all of our people and not just one side of the flower bed. Ronald Reagan gave birth to pride in America in his Presidency because he believed in the American people. He nurtured the pride and stood guard over it like a dotting parent and the result was a newborn belief in America that still stands today. Only Barack Obama can rebuild the pride in our nation from the damage done by the Bush prodigal son. Obama is not selling fear or hate in his message to America, he is telling all of us that we can be one people once more with a common goal. Freedom. Something our founding fathers granted us all as a people in the Constitution. Not some of us, not half of us, but all of us as a people.

Freedom, that is as American as Apple Pie!

Papamoka

So, The General Election Is Going To Be About The "War On Terror?"

BY MICHAEL LINN JONES

Mitt Romney is out. John McCain is now the presumptive candidate for the presidency representing the Republican Party. And, as is natural, everyone will be playing kissy-kissy in the name of party unity. One thing that will help bring that about is to define what the general election is all about.

Governor Romney almost bowed out gracefully. By tossing in the notion that his continued candidacy might impair the "war on terror" he put forth a warning that Sen. Clinton or Sen. Obama would "surrender" to the terrorists. Sen. McCain followed suit with similar observations.

The gist of this new drumbeat is that we cannot afford to "lose" Iraq. Like we "lost" China in 1949. If only we had.....what? It might be fair to say that there are those circumstances where the United States doesn't own anything to "lose" in the first place. Call me crazy, but it is arguable that the Chinese themselves had a lot to do with what happened in China.

The "war on terror" is similar to the "war on drugs" in several ways. It has no clear goal in sight, meaning an endless supply of unquestioning loyalty to the goal, which is redefined to match current political situations. And, the first casualty in such a "war" are the very freedoms and liberties that are only revoked from the very people who pose no threat in the first place.

It makes a great cudgel, though. That is, if you have no interest in (or interest in addressing) boring things like economics, disenfranchisement of citizens, healthcare, bloated government, and so on. President Bush used the GWOT very well in 2004.

But this is 2008. Some people might question how any national struggle can be maintained when the country is going broke. Lecturing those in Michigan that their jobs aren't coming back sounds like tough love. Maybe. It also sounds like someone who really doesn't have a grasp of economics. I'll offer this one for free: if a $20-an-hour job is exported, the governments' (fed, state, & local) tax base shrinks. The individual who then lands one of those valued "associate" nametags at Walmart will do the best they can. But the taxes they pay will be much less. Also, try not to lecture such people on pulling themselves back up by their bootstraps while pulling a Congressional salary. You may as well give swimming lessons in New Orleans.

"Compassionate Conservatism" has been revealed for what is is: cynical conservatism. And that applies to the GWOT as much as to anything else. For all the hope that our venture in Afghanistan would bear permanent fruit, the debacle in Iraq has to be transformed from one of those stupid moves into part of a justified expenditure of life and treasure. It is always easy to sound tough while sending someone else's son or daughter into the fire. It's also easy to turn your back on them when they return because "we have to show fiscal discipline."

For a man who dismissed critics of his ill-fated immigration "reform" bill last year, Sen. McCain is displaying a very selective view of national security. Americans are dying every day at the hands of criminals here illegally. Enforcement of existing law would put a stop to most of it. Sen. McCain might come to an understanding that American citizens and legal residents are not xenophobes just because they want the law enforced.

However, campaigns are like a house of mirrors at a carnival. Talking points and campaign themes can be made up out of whole cloth. The key is to keep banging that drum; truth has nothing to do with elections. Not when it comes to instilling fear.

For all the talk about Mitt Romney's Mormonism; for all the talk about Mike Huckabee's Christian zeal....no one mentions the fact that the Global War on Terror has become a faith also.

What Senator McCain and Gov. Romney may discover this year is that at this stage there are not as many believers as before. Pat Buchanan believes that a President McCain will start more wars; that his administration will be an expansion of the Bush II initiatives.

We're all mortal. I know I'm going to die someday; that's a simple fact. It's much harder to accept the notion that my country may perish through neglect. To borrow from T.S. Eliot, I'd rather go out from a terrorist bang than die an economic whimper.
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Cross-posted at Michaellinnjones.com

NO More Red State or Blue State

Following the election after Iowa is enlightening and educational to this Biden junkie. As much as I loved Joe Biden for President I am finding the Obama camp more to my liking without Joe in the race for President. Obama’s approach to the election is not about a divided America but a United America with a common purpose. Serving all Americans and what they need first.

There is no red state or blue state or division in his speeches and he reaches out in unity for all. That principal is something that people from all walks of life can vote for and believe in that Barack Obama and his message of change is what we need as a nation. From over at Liberal Values, Ron Chusid has this great video and read on Barack Obama’s victory in Iowa…



With about 98% of the vote in from the Iowa caucus, I project Barack Obama will be elected the next President of the United States.

Sure, a lot can still happen between now and November, but baring a major change it is difficult to see any other result. Edwards’ populism won’t sell in many states outside of Iowa, and having lost her aura of inevitability, support for Clinton is likely to hemorrhage. Dodd and Biden both withdrew, and Richardson performed too poorly to be a serious candidate. As for the general election, the record turnout of 227,000 in a state that went for George Bush is just one sign of the advantage the Democrats have. Some questioned the model used by The Des Moines Register that estimated 200,000 attendees but this number was greatly surpassed. By comparison, the turnout in 2004 was 125,000.

Not only did Obama win the caucus, he “won” in the post-caucus speeches. Clinton’s speech sounded like a speech of the Democratic Party past. John Edwards’ speech was the Dean scream put to words, showing yet again Edwards would never be elected president. Barack Obama gave the speech which would be expected not only by the leader of the Democratic Party, but by the president of all the people of the United States. The Republicans might be able to beat Hillary Clinton. I believe they would have beaten John Edwards. They will have a hard time beating Barack Obama. - Liberal Values

In America we need to stand up for ourselves and vote for change simply because the Congress will not act if we do not send our elected candidates to speak for us. This is a time for great change in our nation and the only way it will happen is by voting for change.

President Bush and his crew of political thugs have convinced the American people that there are two sides to every issue and if you are on the opposing opinion then you are anti-American. With us or against us mentality works in the school yard but not in the world we adults have to leave as a legacy to our children or grand children. Living under the cloak of perpetual Republican fear because the toughest kid on the block should never talk to the political leaders of other nations because they do not agree with us is isolationist and the fast track for our nations failure.

When the folks on the right side of the aisle talk about making your life just a little bit better they are talking about the top three to five percent of income earners. When Barack Obama talks about making your lives a little better he is talking to you and I that are struggling just to pay the mortgage or the rent and fill the gas tank of the family car. He is talking about the future and ending the tyranny of oil, the energy crisis that is crippling Americans at the pump or the oil heating tank in not just your home but your business. He is talking about change and change only comes from listening to inventors and people with innovative ideas that will cripple the domination and strangle hold that the oil industry and markets hold over Americans every single day. From that perspective, his love for our country and all of our people is genuine and unquestionable.

As for those that would question his patriotism or desire to end the war in Iraq he has a time line. Iraq is free, Iraq will have sixteen months to get its own house in order and our troops will be out. Much like Ronald Reagan let the Iranians know that he would not tolerate hostage takers as President, the result was freed hostages during his inauguration.

One thing is sure as we all live here in America and go about our lives is that the state of our nation is in trouble. The perception of America is no longer the defender of freedom. We are supposedly the police of the world and we can not be that for all nations. We as a nation need to put the Teddy Roosevelt big stick down and listen to the people of the world that used to be our friends. Selling fear is easy, selling the answers to overcome that fear is someone you need to listen to. We are not the ugly Americans but that is the perception around the world of our nation and of you. Can we change that? I don’t think we have a choice.

America is not just about Americans. We are the beacon of light to the world and many times we might get it wrong on world politics but we have the innate ability to prove that change is possible. When our nation is right, then we can all do amazing things for the world. When we are wrong and our President has a twenty eight percent popularity rating then we can and will initiate change by voting accordingly. We are not red states or blue states, we are Americans. If we want our government back then we need to stand up for change. It is that easy and that simple and Barack Obama is right!

Papamoka

Cross posted at Bring IT ON!

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All We Have to Fear Are Candidates Selling Fear

BY MICHAEL LINN JONES

If one is fortunate they never experience the trauma of long-term and chronic fear. I agree wholeheartedly with the "fight or flight" syndrome; that is, when confronted with a threat we either avoid it or fight back if cornered.

But fear can also be used, manipulated. Very few Americans have ever heard of Bobby Sands. He was incarcerated at Long Kesh Prison for possession of firearms. Sands was a volunteer with the Irish Republican Army. Claiming that he and other IRA members were political, rather than criminal prisoners, he took part in a hunger strike. In May, 1981, Bobby Sands died.

Following his death there were numerous mock funerals for Mr. Sands. I was in the city of Limerick when one occurred there. It was the first time in my life that I saw fear on peoples' faces. Or trepidation. There was also anger, as the "funeral" was surrounded by an air of intimidation. If any business was open during the march down O'Connell Street, there were implied repercussions. What was eye-opening was the display of how civil authority could be so openly challenged.

That memory was the first thing to come to my mind when I read Bill Clinton Warns of "Unexpected", a Washington Post article by Alec MacGillis.

Addressing more than 100 supporters gathered at a VFW hall here, Clinton said that there were four reasons to vote for his wife: her vision, her plans, her experience -- the three reasons he has been giving in his stump speech until now -- plus, he said, a fourth, the threat of the unknown.

"Here's the other thing you need to know, the most important thing of all. You have to have a leader who is strong and commanding and convincing enough...to deal with the unexpected," he said. "There is a better than a 50 percent chance that sometime in the first year or 18 months of the next presidency something will happen that is not being discussed in this campaign. President Bush never talked about Osama Bin Laden and didn't foresee Hurricane Katrina. And if you're not ready for that then everything else you do can be undermined. You need a president that you trust to deal with something that we will not discuss in this campaign....And I think on this score she's the best of all."

I know that there are a number of endorsements for different candidates being offered. The best I can do is put forth a few "un-endorsements," specifically for two candidates. They are Rudy Giuliani and Hillary Clinton. Guiliani has been a fear-monger from the get-go, and now we have the one man in America we can all trust telling us that his wife is our only salvation. From "it," whatever "it" is or will be.

Before contemplating who would be the best person to sit in the Oval Office on January 20th, 2009, it behooves us to look at 16 years of the Bush/Clinton/Bush/Clinton(?) dynasty. Bill Clinton and George W. Bush both scrambled for their "legacies" in the waning months of their presidencies. It can best be summed up thusly: 8 years of a very cynical con artist followed by 8 years of a very cynical bully.

With the death of Benizar Bhutto, the emphasis of the campaign is veering towards the appeal of fear. Fear is a very emotional and irrational reaction to a threat. Constant fear, promoted for political gain, is nothing more than subjecting an entire society to massive Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. It's quite an effective technique in shredding the Constitution along with an extremely dangerous expansion of executive power.

But....but....there's a war on, ya know? Of course there is; there always will be. Orwell's 1984 describes the ever-changing alliances in the world, with allies and enemies constantly changing. And, with history itself re-written every few years to accommodate the agenda of "Big Brother." A common theme in Orwell's book is "Big Brother loves you."

Well, to hell with Big Brother. I don't want any government "loving" me to death because that's exactly what happens. Instilling fear into the populace is the key to the door of oppression.

Hatred is fear's roommate. Watch closely; see beyond the rhetoric and in most cases you'll see fear transformed into hatred.

In the meantime, the earth may be melting, Martians may conquer us, Islamic hordes may sweep across the world, and God forbid I might actually be mortal and die someday, despite the nanny state assuring me that this will not come to pass if I just fear everything.

How about a little encouragment? You know, the kind that tells us that we can make things happen; that tells us to believe in ourelves and our republic DESPITE the oafs who "serve" in the government.

But perhaps hope is too much to hope for.

************************ This post kindly featured at MemeOrandum

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Cross-posted at Michaellinnjones.com

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Smoke and Mirrors to a bad Comb Over?

Picture courtesy of DebbieSchlussel.com

I’m not by any means a great fan of Rudy Giuliani (Me too Republican But…) in the upcoming elections and he continuously reaffirms my sentiment and personal dislike of him. While he is trying his best to scoop up the Republican base, or for that matter what Bush has left of it, he fails to come off even remotely sincere. Rather than offering guidance and hope to the American people he is offering four more years of George W. Bush. More shiny objects over here while he will continue the Bush policy of hiding what he too as President will be doing somewhere else.

In the former Mayor of the Big Apples case it will be a diversion in hair care and the comb over might be straight back, to the right, or to the left. It will not matter what kind of hair cut you want from the Mayor because he is going to do things…”My way”.

Over at the Washington Post they have a great piece on the Mayors comments recently about Democrats being losers for offering something, anything in regards to the Iraq, Afghanistan wars. The reply from Senator Joe Biden was to the point and right for the jugular of Giuliani’s remarks.

On Thursday, during a stop in Houston, Giuliani called Democrats "the party of losers" for demanding a scheduled pullout of U.S. troops from Iraq.

"Democrats have already declared we've lost," the former New York mayor said. "It's really strange. The Democrats want to give our enemies a timetable."

That drew a quick retort from Democratic candidate Sen. Joe Biden.

"It is absurd for Rudy Giuliani to call Democrats 'losers' after five years of failed Republican policies in Iraq," the Delaware senator said in a statement issued Friday.

Biden said cheap shots wouldn't make the United States or its troops any safer.

"Giuliani and the rest of the Republican candidates continue to cling to this administration's failed policy that a strong central government can be propped up in Iraq," Biden said. "If these are the positions he wants to defend, I invite him to debate me on these important topics."

Giuliani sidestepped a question on whether embattled Attorney General Alberto Gonzales should resign, saying the case has been distorted by partisanship in Washington.

"I think in the last six months it is quite possible the Democrats in Congress have set a record for subpoenas," he said. - Washington Post

Just a general correction for the former Mayor to think about, subpoenas are issued only when there is enough evidence to suggest that the law has been broken. Who were the ones that allegedly broken the laws of our land? Why did they allegedly break the law? I’m pretty sure that you just can’t make stuff up and issue subpoenas like lottery tickets.

What Giuliani is selling the moderates will not or should not buy. He is selling the horror of 9/11 and what it did to the people of his city on that tragic day. Personally, I think he should be ashamed for selling himself off as America’s strongest Mayor in a time of crisis like we all as Americans had on that day. He was not the one to bring America together, President Bush gets some credit for that but the people of America deserve the credit for more so. Together as a nation we all felt the need for revenge at one level or another. That is something none of us can deny. Our nation was aggressively attacked on that day and if you honestly think about it, revenge was in your mind. Eye for an eye was there in the back of your mind eating away at you. Action and reaction to the attack was called for and delivered by somewhat devious ways.

There have been some major mistakes by OUR government in the lead up to this multi front war and the perpetuation of mistakes to cover it up have only divided our great nation further. We need leaders that will speak from the heart and not from any political party play book sent down from the RNC or the DNC. America needs a new leader with fresh ideas and a very much different perspective from our current President. This coming election for our nations President should not be about George W. Bush. It should be about where we as Americans want to go from the point in time when he leaves office.

We can all bitch and moan over what one political candidate says against the other over the past mistakes on both political sides of the isle till the cows come home, or we can look to the future nation we want to pass down to our children. What we need to focus on is our nations future. We can continue down the road of this President or we can choose a path that is better and wiser.

Diplomacy from America is not dead, it has just been put on the back burner for a couple of administrations. We can either send out ten thousand diplomats to talk to nations around the world or propagate the Bush Doctrine of sending more troops to die for a cause that will never end.

Pick one? Peace amongst men by talking or foreign nations living in fear of America? That is the guts of this upcoming Presidential election and “We the People” have the power to make that choice.

Papamoka

Media Hype or Bush being Chicken Little?

I’m not sure if I should wear my bullet proof vest to work tomorrow or just wear a polo shirt? I tend to watch the news and actually READ many different points of view from many different avenues of news information. Which makes me wonder now why I do not trust any information from the main stream media?

If I take them literally I’m going to die tomorrow in a hail of bullets from someone from Iraq or Iran or someone from Al-Kill-You-All. I’m thinking about looking at what Al-Jazeer has to say more than what NBC, CBS, ABC or CNN has to say anymore.

With all the latest hype over attack on our nation any moment I tend to be worried and scared for my five daughters but then again we could all be hit by a meteor that will obliterate our entire species world wide according to some folks in NASA as well. Death, destruction, and absolute fear seems to be what the RNC is selling. Anyone want to buy that and if you do, if you have a coupon will they honor it?

CNN is pushing the Republican message of being very afraid…

By Ed Henry
CNN White House Correspondent

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- So let's cut to the chase on the new National Intelligence Estimate: Does it show America is safer today than it was on September 10, 2001 -- or not?

President Bush's top aide on terrorism, Fran Townsend, briefed the press on the NIE Tuesday.

Getting a straight answer is not easy, especially with so many acronyms flying around -- this is an NIE from the DNI (director of national intelligence) that took into account intelligence analysis from the CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) and the DIA (Defense Intelligence Agency) and ... well, you get the idea.

Then there's the reaction from the White House, which is downright confusing. On the one hand, the White House does not dispute the findings of the report, which declares: "The United States currently is in a heightened threat environment," especially from al Qaeda.

But on the other hand, White House Homeland Security Adviser Fran Townsend asserts President Bush's claim that al Qaeda "is on the run" is still applicable.

On one hand, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff says just days before this report he has a "gut feeling" there could be a summer terrorist attack in America. But on the other hand, Townsend reiterates Chertoff's claim that there's "no specific, credible threat" against the United States right now.

Adding further confusion, this report re-ignites the ferocious debate over whether the war in Iraq took the president's eye off the broader war on terror, a point I pressed hard today in an on-camera White House briefing with Townsend.

(She and I have previously joked good-naturally off-camera about another back-and-forth we had in December 2006, when I asked her to admit that not catching Osama bin Laden is a major failure and she countered that capturing him is merely a "success that hasn't happened yet." Jon Stewart on "Comedy Central" had a field day with that exchange that even White House officials found amusing). - CNN

I’m grabbing the kids and heading to the bunkers. Just like the Vice President we have them all over Worcester. The government built them just after 9/11 to protect all of our citizens in America. I’m sure that you must have them in your town as well or you must not have voted Republican in the last election. Al Qaeda, Ali Baba, and his brother Al Pay ya Back are going to kill us all. President Bush says so and that is good enough for me.

Bullshit!

Even the Iraqi President, Premier, head honcho does not want America in his country anymore. Get our troops home and let the Iraqi people deal with their own family dysfunctions. Let us take our God home and let them define their own religious belief amongst themselves. How they do it should not be up to any American President or political party. It is their damned country and I do mean damned.

Papamoka

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