"He's a Ni**er!"

How sad. Did you catch that, where Gov. Palin paused for a minute, registering what one of her yahoo supporters just shouted.

This, friends, is the superstar of the Republican party. And this is the caliber of people she attracts.

Give me a break.

by Rope Hoover Palin

What kind of Liberal are you?

I am a:

My Liberal Identity:

You are a New Left Hipster, also known as a MoveOn.org liberal, a Netroots activist, or a Daily Show fanatic. You believe that if we really want to defend American values, conservatives must be exposed, mocked, and assailed for every fanatical, puritanical, warmongering, Constitution-shredding ideal for which they stand.

Take the quiz at www.FightConservatives.com

This is not surprising.

by A. Suffragette

Anchorage Daily News endorses Obama

And for good reasons:

Gov. Palin has shown the country why she has been so successful in her young political career. Passionate, charismatic and indefatigable, she draws huge crowds and sows excitement in her wake. She has made it clear she's a force to be reckoned with, and you can be sure politicians and political professionals across the country have taken note. Her future, in Alaska and on the national stage, seems certain to be played out in the limelight.

Yet despite her formidable gifts, few who have worked closely with the governor would argue she is truly ready to assume command of the most important, powerful nation on earth. To step in and juggle the demands of an economic meltdown, two deadly wars and a deteriorating climate crisis would stretch the governor beyond her range. Like picking Sen. McCain for president, putting her one 72-year-old heartbeat from the leadership of the free world is just too risky at this time.

It seems Gov. Palin is striking out on her own, and we here at Operation: Sarracuda wish her lots of luck. She's going to need it. Many, many newspapers across the country are endorsing Sen. Obama - including ones that have endorsed George Bush in the past.


by Rope Hoover Palin

More for the "what were they thinking?" file.

I didn't want to think that the volunteer had done it to herself. I never want to believe that a woman would lie about something so heinous, putting in jeopardy the integrity of women who are faced with coming forward about assault.

But...she did!

No, seriously. A GOP volunteer laid claim that a black man attacked her, scratched a backwards B on her face, and stole her money because she had a McCain sticker on her car. And then took it back.

GOP Volunteer is a Lying Moron

by A. Suffragette

Bob the Banker

Check out salon.com's "interview" with Bob the Banker, Joe's older brother.

Bob the Banker Speaks Out

Things are tough right now. Average working Americans like me are really struggling. They're angry. And when they see the effects of Obama's spread-the-wealth lunacy on an average angry struggling American like me, they'll be even more angry, average, and struggling.

Let me lay it out for you. Right now, I take home about $19,000 a month after the government skims off its share. And I don't have to tell you that $19,000 a month isn't what it used to be.

Take my Jaguar. Do you have any idea how much it costs just to have that thing tuned up? It's like a BMW repair bill on steroids. We're talking $500 just to open the hood

I love this part:

The numbers don't lie. So here they are.*

So, as I said, I make $280,000 annually after business expenses. I'm married and filing jointly. Under Obama, my itemized deductions would actually increase slightly — I'd get $49,420 in itemized deductions, while under McCain I'd get $48,975. But my personal exemptions would increase slightly under McCain — he'd give me $6,911, whereas I'd only get $6,132 from Obama.
Click Here

That leaves my taxable income at $213, 766 under Obama, $213,433 under McCain. Now we have to factor in the bracket cutoff, which for 2009 is $208,850. Anything below that figure for married couples filing jointly is taxed at the fourth tier, 28 percent. Any income above it, until you get up to near $400,000, is taxed at the fifth tier. And this is where the raving income-redistribution scheme of Barack Robespierre Obama kicks in.

As you can see, my taxable income is about $5,000 higher than the cutoff. McCain is going to tax that $5,000 at the current rate, which is 33 percent. But Obama's crazed plan calls for raising that rate to — get ready for it — 35 percent.

And here's what this means. Under McCain, my total tax bill would be $48,254. Under Obama, it would be $48,511.

That's a difference of $257. I'll say it again: Two hundred and fifty-seven dollars.

FYI: As you see at the bottom of the article, the author of this piece worked with Gerald Prante, an economist with "Tax Foundation." Damn right numbers don't lie.

Sarah Palin spends more money than you do on clothes

I'm sure you've heard by now.

What recession?

The Atlantic did some digging and found out who the co-shopper was:

Does the name Jeff Larson sound familiar? It should. Larson is the Karl Rove protégé...Larson’s firm is the same one that launched the scurrilous robocalls against John McCain in 2000, and that McCain has now hired to make robocalls connecting Barack Obama to Bill Ayers.

Those same people who made those awful robocalls against McCain in 2000? He hired them.

That's leadership.

And I think Palin looks like shit.


by Rope Hoover Palin

Sigh.

At a John McCain rally in North Carolina, Republican Congressman Robin Hayes:

"Folks, there's a real America, and liberals hate real Americans that work, and accomplish, and achieve, and believe in God. That's a great comparison."

In the words of my future second husband Jon Stewart:

Fuck you.

By: A. Suffragette

A visit to Wasilla, the real 'Merica

The parting shot is probably the most profound: that somehow us blue-staters are not as American as those in Appalachia or the deep south. Or, hell, Alaska.

What this says to me is, to Palin, any part of the country that doesn't agree with her worldview isn't the "real" America. When, in fact, the different parts of the country and our different outlook are what make America so grand. Imagine if everyone thought like George W. Bush or Sarah Palin. Scary, right? But that's exactly what they want: an America that nods in agreement, unblinking, when they talk.

My blue-state office job doesn't make me less of an American than the farmer in Iowa, or the fisherman in Alaska, or the soldier serving in Iraq. My blue-state city (conservative though it may be) has some of the same wacky folks that Wasilla does. My blue-state outlook is just as patriotic as those folks at the McCain/Palin rallies who shout "terrorist" at the mention of Obama - even though I don't like the thought.

I'll question your judgement, or your ethics, but I'll never question your patriotism. I'm not that cowardly; I can think of better insults.

We're pretty cool here in the blue states. People I know from red states are amazing people, too. A great man has said that already.

by Rope Hoover Palin

Yep.

I know the video has been posted already, but I want these words actually typed out for copy and pasting ability. Colin Powell:

I’m also troubled by, not what Senator McCain says, but what members of the party say. And it is permitted to be said such things as, “Well, you know that Mr. Obama is a Muslim.”

Well, the correct answer is, he is not a Muslim; he’s a Christian. He’s always been a Christian.

But the really right answer is, what if he is? Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer’s no, that’s not America.

Is there something wrong with some seven-year-old Muslim-American kid believing that he or she could be president?

Yet, I have heard senior members of my own party drop the suggestion, “He’s a Muslim and he might be associated terrorists.” This is not the way we should be doing it in America.

Damn right. Tell your friends.

by: Mrs. A. Suffragette

Colin Powell endorses Barack Obama, partly because of Palin

What do you know? Gov. Palin was one of the many reasons (the others were good, too) that Gen. Powell is endorsing Barack Obama to be president.

The "so what if he's a Muslim" stance is a great one, I think, and sorely needed. I hope Colin Powell made a bunch of Americans feel like shit when he said that. Sadly, he probably didn't.


by Rope Hoover Palin

Dear God.

Palin as president? Lord help us all.

I couldn't have said it better myself.

Many thanks to my friend Suzanne for the pic.

by Rope Hoover Palin

Palin accent, schtick all an act, says Alaskan

From Nick Jans over at Salon.com:

As for that frontierswoman shtick, take another look at that hairpiece-augmented beehive and those stiletto heels. Coming from a college-educated family, living in a half-million-dollar view home, basking in a net worth of $1.25 million, and having owned 40-some registered motorized vehicles in the past two decades (including 17 snowmobiles and a plane) hardly qualifies Palin and her clan as the quintessential Joe Six-Pack family unit -- though the adulation from that quarter shows the Palins must be fulfilling some sort of role-model fantasy...What's with the smug posturing, recently adopted fake Minnesota accent, and that gosh-darn-it hockey mom pitch? Maybe it plays well in Peoria (and presumably Duluth), but it's all an act. "She's definitely put on a new persona since she's been a vice-presidential candidate," says Kertulla, who has worked closely with Palin for the past 18 months. "I don't even recognize her."

by Rope Hoover Palin

Palin's Republican rage is dangerous and out of hand

When people start yelling racial slurs at reporters at Palin/McCain rallies, something has definitely gone wrong. Especially when the candidates do nothing to discourage this type of behavior.

Recent examples of "Republican rage" have cast doubt on whether the right really are good Americans. Sarah Palin has used this Ayers conspiracy theory to cast doubts on Barack Obama's patriotism, character, and even religious views. Never mind the policies - he's a dangerous terrorist.

This, friends, is crap of the highest degree - and it's dangerous. Andrew Sullivan tells us that the fear and loathing Republicans have turned them into nasty reptiles:

McCain and Palin have decided to stoke this rage, to foment it, to encourage paranoid notions that somehow Obama is a "secret" terrorist or Islamist or foreigner. These are base emotions in both sense of the word.

But they are also very very dangerous. This is a moment of maximal physical danger for the young Democratic nominee. And McCain is playing with fire. If he really wants to put country first, he will attack Obama on his policies - not on these inflammatory, personal, creepy grounds.

"Creepy" is right. This is the kind of behavior that led to lynch mobs in the South at the turn of the century, or - in extreme cases - Germans whistling past the concentration camp.

People who shout "kill him" at political rallies are not good Americans. They're foolish, despicable, cowardly blow-hards who deserve neither to be heard nor to be ignored. And all this foolishness may backfire on McCain: the troll-under-the-bridge strategy is the one getting the attention, not Obama serving on a board with some radical hippie. People, smart people, are starting to take notice.

It makes me ashamed, to think that we live in such an ignorant fucking country that can't see the difference between a leader who tries to sell them fear at a discount for one who offers hope and solutions to the problems we face. It's a sign of weakness and desperation when a party has to stoop low enough to use racial, ethnic, and religious slurs to smear an opponent. Is that really what our country is about? Here we had hoped that this election would be different; that this election promised two of the most respectable human beings in politics finally giving us a president we deserved - no matter the result.

No more.

This shit is scary, and the reptiles behind it are even scarier. These attacks have shown the dark side of America, and we can thank Gov. Palin for leading us there.

by Rope Hoover Palin

Evidence of the Reagan Conservative philosophy is very dangerous

The Reagan Administration supports "Islamic Fundamentalism"

Pakistan's ISI was used as a "go-between". CIA covert support to the Mujahideen in Afghanistan operated indirectly through the Pakistani ISI, --i.e. the CIA did not channel its support directly to the Mujahideen. In other words, for these covert operations to be "successful", Washington was careful not to reveal the ultimate objective of the "jihad", which consisted in destroying the Soviet Union.

In December 1984, the Sharia Law (Islamic jurisprudence) was established in Pakistan following a rigged referendum launched by President Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq. Barely a few months later, in March 1985, President Ronald Reagan issued National Security Decision Directive 166 (NSDD 166), which authorized "stepped-up covert military aid to the Mujahideen" as well a support to religious indoctrination.

The imposition of The Sharia in Pakistan and the promotion of "radical Islam" was a deliberate US policy serving American geopolitical interests in South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. Many present-day "Islamic fundamentalist organizations" in the Middle East and Central Asia, were directly or indirectly the product of US covert support and financing, often channeled through foundations from Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States. Missions from the Wahhabi secto of conservative Islam in Saudi Arabia were put in charge of running the CIA sponsored madrassas in Northern Pakistan. .

Under NSDD 166, a series of covert CIA-ISI operations was launched.

The US supplied weapons to the Islamic brigades through the ISI. CIA and ISI officials would meet at ISI headquarters in Rawalpindi to coordinate US support to the Mujahideen. Under NSDD 166, the procurement of US weapons to the Islamic insurgents increased from 10,000 tons of arms and ammunition in 1983 to 65,000 tons annually by 1987. "In addition to arms, training, extensive military equipment including military satellite maps and state-of-the-art communications equipment" (University Wire, 7 May 2002).


With William Casey as director of the CIA, NSDD 166 was described as the largest covert operation in US history:

The U.S. supplied support package had three essential components-organization and logistics, military technology, and ideological support for sustaining and encouraging the Afghan resistance....

U.S. counterinsurgency experts worked closely with the Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) in organizing Mujahideen groups and in planning operations inside Afghanistan.

... But the most important contribution of the U.S. was to ... bring in men and material from around the Arab world and beyond. The most hardened and ideologically dedicated men were sought on the logic that they would be the best fighters. Advertisements, paid for from CIA funds, were placed in newspapers and newsletters around the world offering inducements and motivations to join the Jihad. (Pervez Hoodbhoy, Afghanistan and the Genesis of the Global Jihad, Peace Research, 1 May 2005)

And it's not just the fringe, either...

...just look at a little article written by Bobby May, McCain campaign chair in Buchanan County, Virginia, as well as treasurer and former correspondence secretary of the Buchanan County Republican Party. These aren't just rednecks on the back of 4 wheelers, folks.

"The White House: Hire rapper Ludacris to "Paint it "black"...

McCain wants to discuss a neighbor of Obama's, and these are the people openly running his campaign?

by A. Suffragette

The Obama Counter atack

Governor Palin, everyone's favorite stereotypical Northerner, is at it again. Attempting to link Obama with the Weather Underground.

Now the fools that once "accused" Obama of being a Muslim, are now accusing him of being a terrorist. Of course 2 years ago the popular saying was "all terrorist are muslim". Then how does Sarah eplain her inuendo. Notice she refers to Aeirs as a "domestic terorist". The Patriot act doesn't have a clear definition of what that means. I think the real question that should be brought up to Governot Palin is this

"How do you critisize Barrack Obama for past associations, knowing that your philosophy funded the ideology"

Not one of us?

It saddens me as I realize that I personally went from disagreeing-with-yet-still-respecting the John McCain camp to complete disgust with the tactics they've come up with. And they are packaging it all in a sensible skirt and naughty librarian heels. A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down, I suppose.

Palin's speeches have become so incendiary and even racially tinged that it would be laughable if it weren't so incredibly unfunny. "He's not one of us..."? Really? [psst...Joe Six Pack, Obama's BLACK! Didja notice? He's BLACK!]

They keep trying to pin Obama as a radical, so far to the left it's hard to reach across the aisle, yadda yadda, while at the same time not chastising the right's frightening fringe for calling a state senator (or any human being, for that matter) the N-word.

How did McCain get to this point? What happened, 'Friend?' I've read so many conservative blogs that point out the flaws in Obama's plans, his health care shortcomings, and none of them need to bring up the idea that Obama's a terrorist, or cut quotes short to change their meaning, or the fact that he's black.

by: A. Suffragette

Sarah Palin - scared of the press for good reason

One of the first things an authoritarian government does after taking power is impose its will on the press, either through direct state control (most often) or through influentially-place appointments.

So pardon me for being nervous at Gov. Sarah Palin's recent remarks, during the vice presidential candidate debate with Sen. Joe Biden, that she was happier to speak to the American people "without the filter" of the modern American press. She also remarked that she may not answer the questions like the moderator or the audience wished, but - you betcha - she was going to speak her own mind from time to time.

We've seen this movie before. Presidents and their running mates have had some legendary run-ins with the media. Think about Whig newspapers going after Thomas Jefferson for his affair with a slave, or Nixon's battle with the California media during his failed governor's race, or the current Bush's avoidance of the press corp. Even Bill Clinton had secrecy issues with the media - the same "liberal" media that hung him out to dry during the Monica Lewinsky scandal.

The "filter" of the media is there on purpose. It takes the usual bullshit politicians puke out, research the facts, and present their findings as news stories and editorials. Watchdogs, the fourth branch of government - call the media what you will, they do their job decently well more often than not. After all, if it weren't for some dig-down-deep New York Times reporting, we found out the Bush administration spies on the American people without warrants. That's illegal. And the press let us know about it.

Politicians are famous for never answering the question they're asked during interviews and press conferences. They'll ask something, and the politician will give some meandering answer, and it's the reporter's job to say, "You didn't answer the question, so let's try that again." That may seem like badgering to some people, but the reporter is doing what they're paid to do: get the facts, find out what the politician really means, and offer up their findings.

This is a serious responsibility. Acting as a "filter" carries some heavy ethical questions, because journalists are writing history as it's being made. Any slip-ups, and the whole thing is fucked up.

It's no wonder, then, that politicians like speaking "directly" to the American people: the filter is gone. The bullshit detector is switched off. They can say anything they want and not have to answer, at least directly, to anyone. Isn't that nice?

Katie Couric asking, simply, what newspapers a politician reads seems like an easy way for a politician to explain a bit more about themselves. Instead, to the big babies on the right, it played like an attack. This hyper-sensativity to softball questions must come from some inner lack of self-confidence, some inferiority complex that says, "My candidate is a dumb shit, and you can't ask that." Think about Bush. Every time the man opens his mouth, he displays a catastrophic lack of intelligence, curiosity, or deep thinking. And to the person to responds positively to that, Palin is the perfect candidate. She's "real." She's "simple." You'd like to go hunting with her. You don't like the media beating up on her.

And yet, if she were to visit the British Isles for a weekend, the BBC would whip her into jelly. Now that's a press corp doing their job.

The "deference" the media, or Americans in general, is supposed to show candidates is downright un-American. Here, we demand the truth from our candidates, and we expect them to give it to us straight. We left that aloof, secretive crap back in the UK when we set sail for the Promised Land. And we like our candidates to be tough and not cower at a simple question like, "When did your running mate stand up to both parties?" or "What Supreme Court decision to you identify with?" If you don't know either of those on the spot, it's because (a) you haven't really ever thought about them or cared, or (b) you're dumb.

You see, Americans can't sit in front of a presidential candidate and grill them in their own personal interview. It's simple logistics: there are too many of us. So the press takes it upon themselves to find out for us. Most of them get paid very little to do so, suffer through a thankless job, and have a heavy rate of alcoholism and suicide to shoulder.

Jefferson said he's rather read a newspaper than be chained to a government of any kind. First, it's a lot more fun to read. Second, there are more pictures. Third, it's virtually bullshit-free. Head to the opinion page if you want an opinion or some analysis or an argument. But the news section gives it to us straight, filter fully engaged, and attempts to keep politicians honest.

If you can't stand up to the press, then step down and go home. Or don't open your fat, lying mouth. But don't blame them for your troubles: blame your own know-nothing outlook on life. The press didn't make you stupid - you have only yourself to blame for that.

by Rope Hoover Palin

Helping Palin prepare for the debate...with a quote generator.

In all seriousness, we here at Operation: Sarracuda hopes that the Alaska governor does well tomorrow night in her debate against Sen. Joe Biden. Watching some of those interviews lately ("What's the newspaper you read?" seems like an easy enough question to me) has been painful and wince-inducing, and we sure don't need another know-nothing Bush clone in the White House.

But let's be realistic. This lady is in way over her head.

So, to help the governor prepare, we stumbled on the Sarah Palin Quote Generator. There, the governor can find knock-out talking points to pin Sen. Biden against the wall. Like the one above.

Because when someone asks you "What media do you get your news from," and you answer, "All of 'em," you need all the help you can get.

by Rope Hoover Palin