Operation: Sarracuda

Like a Lemming.

2008-11-20T15:05:00.003-05:00

Since all the cool blogs are doing it.

I typelyzed our blog here at Sarracuda to see what type we are.

Results:

The independent and problem-solving type. They are especially attuned to the demands of the moment are masters of responding to challenges that arise spontaneously. They generelly prefer to think things out for themselves and often avoid inter-personal conflicts.

The Mechanics enjoy working together with other independent and highly skilled people and often like seek fun and action both in their work and personal life. They enjoy adventure and risk such as in driving race cars or working as policemen and firefighters.

Hm. And it took about .08 seconds to analyze us.

By A. Suffragette

Just Read

2008-11-09T13:39:00.003-05:00

If this doesn't leave you in tears, nothing will. I'm not religious, but God bless Eugene and Helene. If there isn't a heaven, this story only proves that there should be.

-Max Power

Now the truth comes out.

2008-11-06T07:14:00.000-05:00

Huh. Africa is a country.

Nice knowing you, Gov. Palin!

by Rope Hoover Palin

And what the HELL is wrong with Ralph Nader?

2008-11-05T13:43:00.003-05:00

Nader says:

To put it very simply, he is our first African American president; or he will be. And we wish him well. But his choice, basically, is whether he’s going to be Uncle Sam for the people of this country, or Uncle Tom for the giant corporations.

Props to Daily Dish.

by A. Suffragette

We aren't the underdogs anymore.

2008-11-05T10:19:00.001-05:00

Is that right? No more bleeding heart liberal who just can't cut a break; who practically has to beg for votes? No more angry left? You mean we won? Well what are we supposed to complain about now? What’s a democratic gal like myself to do?

We keep going. Nothing stops here. There are plenty of Fox News supporting republi-bots out there who are just waiting for us to scamper back to our lattes and abortion clinics [or worse, our low-income housing] while the guy we just elected throws American flags and bibles down the toilet, along with what’s left of our economy. But what I’m wondering is…are these crazies still our major adversaries? Or will we see the face of the Republican party change?

Wonkette gave a succinct summary of how they see things going down:

…And it really could happen, and probably will happen. Probably a new Tory-Elitist-Educated party, based in the Northeast and led by … Bloomberg? He has plans. And probably a Western branch led by Arnold. But the dumb-redneck era of politics is over, forever, we hope

.

On the other hand, we have Sarah Palin and Tall thinking about her run for presidency, with the “base” in her pocket. But how big is that base nowadays, really? Should it even be called that? The only age group that McCain did better with were the geriatrics. The base? The base is dying.

I believe in a government of give and take, of differences in opinion, and of multiple parties. I don’t want to see the Republican party crash and burn. Maybe this walk into the woods will be good for them. Change your tactics, Republicans, and maybe I’ll respect ya the morning after.

by A. Suffragette

No She Can't.

2008-11-05T07:14:00.004-05:00

The boos last night during John McCain's concession speech were from Sarah Palin's caliber of people.

And hopefully, they were aimed at her, because she deserved them.

We saw last night the defeat of hate, fear, and bigotry - ideals that Sarah Palin lives up to, along with cowardice, ignorance, and insincerity. Palin became a drag on the McCain campaign, on the Republicans, and on the very people she represented, and the voters rejected her worldview in overwhelming numbers.

We here at Operation: Sarracuda saw through her disguise and labeled her a fraud from the get-go. Now people are talking about her running for president in 2012. I saw, bring it on. We will be ready for her. And so will America; the country will reject her and her terrible worldview for a second time.

President-elect Barack Obama deserves this election. He was a better person, a better politician, and had better ideals for our country. Unlike the McCain-Palin ticket, you didn't hear of infighting or Biden "going rogue" or - anticipating a loss - talk of someone else running in 2012. Discipline will take you places, and Gov. Palin has none of that discipline - or grace or class.

Congratulations Obama.

by Rope Hoover Palin

40 minutes.

2008-11-04T08:54:00.002-05:00

That's about how long my journey to the polls ran. The weather was calm, the coffee was tasty, and my fellow line standers were quiet and polite. My neighborhood is fairly diverse here in Harrisburg, PA, so it's tough for me to gauge if there were more African Americans or more young people, or simply more people in general. But, if I had been expecting a riot I didn't get it. There was a brief moment of panic when I didn't see my name in the book right away, but there I was, on the bottom.

Some local news pundits are predicting up to an 80% turnout in the Commonwealth. We shall see.

by A. Suffragette

It's the final countdown.

2008-11-03T11:39:00.003-05:00

So. Here we are. Election Eve. What do we do after this? We need to start thinking constructively, whether it's a specific cause we start tearing into, or simply beginning Rope Hoover Palin's run for political office.

Until then, I give you something that everyone needs once in awhile: adorable puppies.

by A. Suffragette

"He's a Ni**er!"

2008-10-29T16:39:00.001-04:00

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?

2008-10-28T09:57:00.001-04:00

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

2008-10-26T17:39:00.004-04:00

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.

2008-10-24T16:02:00.008-04:00

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

2008-10-23T11:28:00.003-04:00

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

2008-10-23T07:24:00.003-04:00

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.

2008-10-22T16:25:00.003-04:00

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

2008-10-21T18:34:00.003-04:00

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.

2008-10-21T16:12:00.003-04:00

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

2008-10-19T15:31:00.001-04:00

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.

2008-10-16T11:28:00.000-04:00

Palin as president? Lord help us all.

I couldn't have said it better myself.

2008-10-16T07:18:00.004-04:00

Many thanks to my friend Suzanne for the pic.

by Rope Hoover Palin

Palin accent, schtick all an act, says Alaskan

2008-10-13T07:52:00.002-04:00

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

2008-10-10T17:37:00.005-04:00

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

2008-10-10T03:07:00.001-04:00

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...

2008-10-09T11:14:00.002-04:00

...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

2008-10-09T11:09:00.002-04:00

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?

2008-10-09T08:52:00.004-04:00

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

2008-10-06T18:25:00.001-04:00

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.

2008-10-01T20:17:00.003-04:00

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

All the Bailout questions you've had but were afraid to ask...

2008-09-30T12:57:00.003-04:00

Anyone interested in reading useful Q and A regarding the Bailout Plan, how it works, and how we got here with not too much opinion worked throughout, check out this site:

Some Really Good Questions

Just a taste:

Where will the $700+ billion go? What exactly will it buy and from whom?

That's the, uh, $700 billion question. Mortgage-backed securities were to be the main target, and banks the main sellers. But Hank Paulson and Ben Bernanke wanted a fund that could buy pretty much anything from anyone.

How, exactly, is this bailout supposed to 'save' credit markets?

Not entirely clear. Paulson and Bernanke described it as a way to jumpstart trading in mortgage securities for which there's no market at the moment, thus allowing banks to clean up their balance sheets and get back to lending. But a lot of economists outside government believe that the real problem is that lots and lots of financial institutions are insolvent--their losses, if they actually recognized them, are enough to wipe out their capital reserves. If that's true it would make more sense for taxpayers to give them cash outright, and take a big ownership stake in return (with the idea of selling it off a few years down the road). The Swedish solution, they call it (and longtime readers of this blog know it was being discussed here long before anybody else in the U.S. was talking about it). The version of the bailout plan voted down in the House Monday seemingly would have allowed Treasury to take such action. But it also would have allowed Treasury not to take such action.

Read more here.

By A. Suffragette

2008-09-30T09:41:00.001-04:00

Top 10 Reasons Sarah Palin Cancels the Debate

by: David Weinberger

10. Suspicious Russian tourists spotted across the Bering strait in Dezhnevo

9. Wrasslin' a bear

8. Learns Tina Fey will be watching

7. When taken on tour of White House by McCain handlers, is "inadvertently" locked in Cheney's man-sized safe

6. Schedule for memorizing state capitals thrown off by need for new schedule to memorize states

5. Speechless after finally looking up what "MILF" stands for

4. On deadline to finish her book, Namin' Your Baby the Alaskan Way

3. Needs more time to really nail those hilarious hair-plug zingers

2. No matter how hard she scrubs, she can't get Kissinger's moral stank off of her

1. Stuck in traffic on the Bridge to Nowhere

by A. Suffragette

The Economist: Palin 'out of her depth'

2008-09-26T19:19:00.000-04:00

Lord knows we've posted enough videos of Sarah Palin looking like a dipshit lately, but even The Economist - not what you'd call a liberal publication - calls a spade a spade:

I think what we're seeing is someone who thought she knew everything discover how little she actually knows, and it terrifies her...With Ms Couric, conversely, she rambled, she edited her own sentences recursively, she looked away from time to time, and her answers did not make sense—and I don't mean political sense; I mean they made no grammatical or logical sense.

There are some parts of America where vague answers to pointed questions will result in screams of "liberal media!" But can anyone argue that Palin gave no intelligent answers during the Couric interview? Being on the PTA does not qualify you to take on Russia, nor does being the governor of Alaska. And the economy? Not even McCain has his ducks in a row on that one. Friends, we're watching a flaming plane fall out of the sky right before our eyes. Only 40 more days...

by Rope Hoover Palin

Hockey Moms against Sarah Palin

2008-09-26T16:04:00.001-04:00

See more funny videos and funny pictures at CollegeHumor.

The Couric Interview

2008-09-25T19:54:00.002-04:00

If you haven't seen it yet, here is a visual representation of how it went for Palin:

A special thanks to Couric for having the bravery to actually ask a follow-up question.

By Max Power

A McSame Side Note:

2008-09-25T17:08:00.002-04:00

I just saw this on Andrew Sullivan's Daily Dish, original from Jessica Hagy.

By Max Power

Free Sarah Palin.

2008-09-25T11:30:00.001-04:00

Read the full transcript here.

by Rope Hoover Palin

You know...

2008-09-25T09:21:00.001-04:00

I can't help but think what a beautiful thing it would have been to see a Palin/Clinton VP debate. I agree with the choice of Biden, and was hesitant to see Clinton in that slot, but man oh man...she would've eaten her for breakfast.

And to hell with sexism.

by A. Suffragette

"I'll try to find ya some..."

2008-09-25T07:18:00.002-04:00

Dipshit.

We'll help you out, Sarah. How about John McCain's position on torture (before he changed his mind), or his immigration bill (that he now doesn't support). Those are two recent examples off the top of my head. What do you know about your own running mate?

Platitudes don't qualify you to be the vice president.

by Rope Hoover Palin

Bless you, Marcy Kaptur.

2008-09-24T21:25:00.001-04:00

I voted for her.

By: A. Suffragette

McCain keeping Palin boxed up.

2008-09-24T11:50:00.000-04:00

From the Washington Post:

Where Dick Cheney made the rounds of five news shows the weekend after he was tapped by George W. Bush, Ms. Palin has not turned up on a single Sunday program.

I'm sure McCain is making the argument that any exposure to the "liberal media" would expose Palin to "sexist" questions (like, "What would YOU do in this economic bailout situation?"), it reeks of inexperience and fear.

The president and vice president have to deal with the press. They have to. It's part of the American political system. And now people are seeing through McCain's cowardly attempts to hide his VP nominee.

by Rope Hoover Palin

Highlights for Palin.

2008-09-24T07:18:00.003-04:00

Obama definitely has the creative vote, because the stuff that graphic designers and t-shirt designers are coming up with is fantastic.

But this "Highlights for Palin" may be the most ambitious - a kindergarten-age magazine devoted to the Veep nominee and her conservative outlook. It's friggin' hilarious.

Thanks to John Gruber for the link.

by Rope Hoover Palin

Least Qualified EEEVVVEEERRRRRRR!!!!!

2008-09-23T22:02:00.004-04:00

Here's a pretty devastating look into Palin's claim that she has equitable experience to previous vice presidents. (Thanks to Lawrence Lessig!)

Chester A. Arthur is rolling over in his grave.

By Max Power

G-L-O-R.I.A.

2008-09-23T21:26:00.004-04:00

So, with all the polar-bear-hating, helicopter-wolf-shooting, teeth-licking, bikini-super-imposing pieces that we post here, this is what I believe:

Palin: Wrong Woman, Wrong Message

By Gloria Steinem

Here's the good news: Women have become so politically powerful that even the anti-feminist right wing -- the folks with a headlock on the Republican Party -- are trying to appease the gender gap with a first-ever female vice president. We owe this to women -- and to many men too -- who have picketed, gone on hunger strikes or confronted violence at the polls so women can vote. We owe it to Shirley Chisholm, who first took the "white-male-only" sign off the White House, and to Hillary Rodham Clinton, who hung in there through ridicule and misogyny to win 18 million votes.

But here is even better news: It won't work. This isn't the first time a boss has picked an unqualified woman just because she agrees with him and opposes everything most other women want and need. Feminism has never been about getting a job for one woman. It's about making life more fair for women everywhere. It's not about a piece of the existing pie; there are too many of us for that. It's about baking a new pie.

We're here to tell the truth. Yes. But once the truth is told and the facts are laid out, it's time to form an educated opinion. Here's mine: Sarah sucks. Yes. But what I wonder is, who is the real problem here? Do we fault Palin for being blindly ambitious? Or is it time to stop staring at those 350 dollar glasses and start taking a look at the guy that asked her to be 2nd in command in the first place? Where'd the man behind the curtain go?

To quote my beloved Steinem:

So let's be clear: The culprit is John McCain. He may have chosen Palin out of change-envy, or a belief that women can't tell the difference between form and content, but the main motive was to please right-wing ideologues; the same ones who nixed anyone who is now or ever has been a supporter of reproductive freedom. If that were not the case, McCain could have chosen a woman who knows what a vice president does and who has thought about Iraq; someone like Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison or Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine. McCain could have taken a baby step away from right-wing patriarchs who determine his actions, right down to opposing the Violence Against Women Act.

McCain scolds Obama for being the smartest kid in the class (because, for some unknown reason, Americans don't trust smart people in leadership roles) while at the same time has the audacity to assume that men and women (but mostly women, let's be honest) are stupid enough not to see past Palin the Prop. (And I hope, I HOPE, that most women remember that on the issues, Palin doesn't line up with the vast majority of us.) And at the same time, McCain continues to cater to the same right-wing fools that can't stop thinking about Prius-Driving-Contraceptive-Wearing-Queer-Baby-Killers long enough to notice that it's not the liberals that caused the economic landslide (although the jury is still out as to whether or not we caused terrorism. Depends on who you ask.)

In short - Sarah Sucks. And I assume that for many men it's a lot more fun to stick her head on a nekkid lady's body than McCain's. But let's not forget the real problem.

By A. Suffragette

Still The Man, After All These Years

2008-09-22T21:16:00.003-04:00

"If it were left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter."

-Thomas Jefferson

25 days without a press conference - your move S.Palin.

Tommy-J, you're still the man!

By Max Power

Is this the best they can come up with?

2008-09-22T18:57:00.002-04:00

Seriously, this looks like it was done on Microsoft Word '97 during a one-hour community college graphic design class.

See the original here. If this is what we have to fear from the Palintards, then maybe we don't have much to fear at all.

by Rope Hoover Palin

Bartlet For President

2008-09-22T16:23:00.003-04:00

Even a fictional President would be better. Here's President Bartlet's advice to Obama:

BARTLET: GET ANGRIER! Call them liars, because that’s what they are. Sarah Palin didn’t say “thanks but no thanks” to the Bridge to Nowhere. She just said “Thanks.” You were raised by a single mother on food stamps — where does a guy with eight houses who was legacied into Annapolis get off calling you an elitist? And by the way, if you do nothing else, take that word back. Elite is a good word, it means well above average. I’d ask them what their problem is with excellence. While you’re at it, I want the word “patriot” back. McCain can say that the transcendent issue of our time is the spread of Islamic fanaticism or he can choose a running mate who doesn’t know the Bush doctrine from the Monroe Doctrine, but he can’t do both at the same time and call it patriotic. They have to lie — the truth isn’t their friend right now. Get angry. Mock them mercilessly; they’ve earned it. McCain decried agents of intolerance, then chose a running mate who had to ask if she was allowed to ban books from a public library. It’s not bad enough she thinks the planet Earth was created in six days 6,000 years ago complete with a man, a woman and a talking snake, she wants schools to teach the rest of our kids to deny geology, anthropology, archaeology and common sense too? It’s not bad enough she’s forcing her own daughter into a loveless marriage to a teenage hood, she wants the rest of us to guide our daughters in that direction too? It’s not enough that a woman shouldn’t have the right to choose, it should be the law of the land that she has to carry and deliver her rapist’s baby too? I don’t know whether or not Governor Palin has the tenacity of a pit bull, but I know for sure she’s got the qualifications of one. And you’re worried about seeming angry? You could eat their lunch, make them cry and tell their mamas about it and God himself would call it restrained. There are times when you are simply required to be impolite. There are times when condescension is called for!

The whole thing is here. It's funny cuz' its true.

By Max Power

Sarah Palin, in one word.

2008-09-22T12:01:00.000-04:00

Veiled Transparency

2008-09-22T10:08:00.003-04:00

In another brilliant thunderbolt of hypocrisy, the Sarah Palin email scandal has again distorted the real point - she purposely used a private email to try to circumvent the possibility of revealing the real dealings of her government.

This is fact. Not twisted spin, not an interpretation, but FACT.The Atlantic's Connor Clark makes this vivid point:

The hacking incident should not draw attention away from the following: Sarah Palin has used her private email account to conduct state business, and she was doing so to circumvent the state's public records law and avoid public scrutiny.

This is a statement of fact, and it has been reported as fact casually and frequently in numerous places well before Palin's account was broken into.

This is from Gawker:

The thing is, though, Palin's staff haven't even bothered to deny there's been some official business flowing through Yahoo Mail. Though Palin recently pledged to govern with "a servant's heart," her press secretary this week said, when asked about the private accounts, that Alaskans don't need a transparent government because "the final decisions will be public."...
In other words, the executive branch has the right to deliberate and keep a wide array of secrets, regardless of some ill-considered public access rules. That assertion is basically what Dick Cheney has been saying for the past eight years to justify the Bush Administration's culture of secrecy.

(The original here.)

I don't think we need to worry so much about McCain being another 4 years of Bush as we need to worry about Palin being 4 more years of Cheney.

I'm not sure I need to state the obvious again but...

Same campaign ideology - Same disastrous results.

By Max Power

Palin running scared from debates.

2008-09-22T07:56:00.004-04:00

See here at the New York Times.

McCain advisers said they had been concerned that a loose format could leave Ms. Palin, a relatively inexperienced debater, at a disadvantage and largely on the defensive...McCain advisers said they were only somewhat concerned about Ms. Palin’s debating skills compared with those of Mr. Biden, who has served six terms in the Senate, or about his chances of tripping her up. Instead, they say, they wanted Ms. Palin to have opportunities to present Mr. McCain’s positions, rather than spending time talking about her experience or playing defense.

"Inexperienced debater?" Are they serious? Couldn't it be she's just plain ol' inexperienced? Or doesn't know what the hell she's talking about?

And being a mouthpiece for the campaign is fine, but limiting your duties to just spouting the party line during a debate seems weak and cowardly. Can you imagine Hillary Clinton serving as simply a mouthpiece to the Obama campaign had she been picked for VP?

Something stinks to high heaven. Come out and fight, Palin, or go home.

by Rope Hoover Palin

Alaskan Independence Party - Todd Palin's kind of group

2008-09-21T18:45:00.003-04:00

Is it true that Todd Palin, Sarah Palin's husband, was once a member of the Alaskan Independence Party?

Yes. Yes, he was.

Their site even admited such, but only concedes that Todd "never participated in any party activities aside from attending a convention in Wasilla at one time."

Sounds like a group trying to cover its tracks to me. The group's philosophy?

The Alaskan Independence Party can be summed up in just two words:

ALASKA FIRST!

Until we as Alaskans receive our Ultimate Goal, the AIP will continue to strive to make Alaska a better place to live with less government interference in our everyday lives.

We all want less government interference (like on the right to choose, for instance), but we don't want Alaska to secede from the Union like some wintry Mason-Dixon state.

If Todd Palin doesn't want Alaska to be a part of the United States, why does he want his wife to be vice president of those same States? Is there a hidden agenda?

by Rope Hoover Palin

Wasilla needs water, not Wal-Mart.

2008-09-20T18:15:00.003-04:00

First the polar bears and now the little fishies.

Thanks to salon.com for the information.

Sarah Palin's dead lake
By promoting runaway development in her hometown, say locals, Palin has "fouled her own nest" -- and that goes for the lake where she lives.

By David Talbot

Sep. 19, 2008 | Every morning she's at home here, Sarah Palin wakes up to a postcard view from her lakeside home. Out the windows of her two-story wood-framed house stretch the serene, birch-lined waters of Lake Lucille. Ducks go gliding by the red-and-white Piper Cub floatplane docked outside. With the snow-frosted Chugach and Talkeetna mountains looming in the distance, the scene seems to define the Alaska that Palin celebrates: rugged, majestic, unspoiled.

And, yet, the lake Sarah Palin lives on is dead.

"Lake Lucille is basically a dead lake -- it can't support a fish population," said Michelle Church, a Mat-Su Valley borough assembly member and environmentalist. "It's a runway for floatplanes."

Palin recently told the New Yorker magazine that Alaskans "have such a love, a respect for our environment, for our lands, for our wildlife, for our clean water and our clean air. We know what we've got up here and we want to protect that, so we're gonna make sure that our developments up here do not adversely affect that environment at all. I don't want development if there's going to be that threat to harming our environment."

But as mayor of her hometown, say many local critics, Palin showed no such stewardship.

"Sarah's legacy as mayor was big-box stores and runaway growth," said Patty Stoll, a retired Wasilla schoolteacher who once worked in the same school with Palin's parents, Chuck and Sally Heath. "The truth is, Wasilla is just plain ugly, it's not a pleasant place to live. It's not thought out. And that's a shame.

"Sarah fouled her own nest, and I can't understand why. I hate to think it was simply greed or ambition."

Among the environmental casualties of Wasilla's frenzied development was Palin's own front yard, Lake Lucille. The lake was listed as "impaired" in 1994 by the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation, and it still carries that grim label. State environmental officials say that leaching sewer lines and fertilizer runoff caused an explosion of plant growth in the lake, which sucked the oxygen out of the water and led to periodic fish kills.

"Sarah," a recent biography of Palin by Kaylene Johnson, features a photo of a beaming Palin, sitting in a rowboat on Lake Lucille clutching a fishing rod. But, according to local fishermen, the Republican vice-presidential candidate would have to be very lucky to reel in something edible.

The Alaska Fish and Game Department dutifully stocks the lake with coho salmon and rainbow trout each year -- but the fish don't last long.

Fishing on the lake "was tough," reported Alaska fishing guide Carlyle Telford on his Web site when he tried his luck on Lake Lucille last year, "because the vegetation is decaying and floating. When you retrieve every cast, the fly comes back with crud on it."

In a recent phone conversation, Telford said he hasn't returned to Lake Lucille since then. "I think the lake's pretty dead," he said. "That's why I haven't been back."

Wasilla, where Palin grew up and still resides, sprawls between two lakes -- Lucille and Wasilla Lake. Cottonwood Creek, which flows in and out of Wasilla Lake, has also been labeled "impaired" by state environmental officials, after foam was detected on the water surface and subsequent testing found excessive concentrations of fecal coliform bacteria.

The two lakes are the town jewels, the only eye relief along a harrowing corridor of strip malls, big-box stores and fast-food drive-throughs that is Wasilla. "Lord, help me get through Wasilla," reads one Alaska bumper sticker.

The population in Mat-Su Valley began booming in the 1970s with the Alaska oil pipeline and the influx of oil workers from Texas and Oklahoma. But while some valley towns tried to control growth -- like nearby Palmer, which was originally settled by Midwest farmers as part of a Roosevelt social experiment in the 1930s -- Wasilla took a frontier, boom-town approach. Soon the Parks Highway, which cuts straight through Wasilla, and its arteries were lined with a chaotic bazaar of quickie espresso shacks, moose-stuffing taxidermists, Bible churches, gun stores, tattoo and piercing parlors, mattress barns and the inevitable box stores with their football-field parking lots.

John Stein, Palin's predecessor as Wasilla mayor, tried gamely to get a handle on the commercial free-for-all. He made an effort to restore the health of Lake Lucille, which, he said, "was turning into a bog."

"We brought up a scientist to study both lakes," Stein recalled. "We also worked with the state to filter storm drainage from the highway."

Controlling runoff from the six-lane highway is a key to saving the lakes in Wasilla. Other cities have their industrial pollution problems; Wasilla has highway pollution. "Anything that comes off an automobile -- oil, antifreeze, de-icing agents, heavy metals -- all of that can run off into the lakes when it rains," observed Archie Giddings, Wasilla's public works director.

But while Mayor Stein tried to impose some reason on Wasilla's helter-skelter development, and its growing pressures on Mat-Su Valley's environmental treasures, when Sarah Palin took his place, she quickly announced, "Wasilla is open for business."

"That's for sure," Church said. "Sarah was so eager for big-box stores to move in that she allowed Fred Meyer to build right on Wasilla Lake, and her handpicked successor, Dianne Keller, has done the same with Target."

Under Mayor Palin's reign, Fred Meyer, an emporium that sells everything from groceries to gold watches to gardening tools, lost no time in leveling a stand of trees overlooking the lake for its big-box store. When Fred Meyer applied for permission to pump the storm drainage from its parking lot -- with all the usual automobile sludge -- into the lake, outraged citizens finally cried enough.

"We mobilized public opposition," said Church, who led the Friends of Mat-Su, a pro-planning group, at the time. "We forced them to put in ditches and grassy swales to catch the runoff.

"Sarah was such a great cheerleader for Wasilla, but she did nothing to protect its beauty. She'd go to these Chamber of Commerce meetings and say, 'Wasilla is the most beautiful place in the world!' And we'd just sit there gagging."

A city official in nearby Palmer, who has lived in the Mat-Su Valley his whole life, sadly admitted: "Sarah sent the growth into overdrive. And now they're choking on traffic and sprawl, all built on their ignorance and greed.

"I try to avoid driving to Wasilla so I won't get depressed," added the official, who asked for his name to be withheld, to avoid Palin's "wrath."

"You get visually mugged when you drive through there. I take the long way, through the back roads, just to avoid it."

Wasilla City Council member Dianne Woodruff hears the same lament about her town all the time. "Everywhere in Alaska, you hear people say, 'We don't want to be another Wasilla.' We're not just the state's meth capital, we're the ugly box-store capital. Was Sarah a good steward of this beautiful valley? No. I think it comes from her lack of experience and awareness of other places, how other cities try to preserve what makes them attractive and livable.

"The frontier mentality has prevailed for so long in Mat-Su Valley -- the feeling that 'you're not going to tell me what to do with my land,'" added Woodruff. "That's fine as long as you have endless open space. But when you start to fill in as a city, you can end up with a sprawling mess. With million-dollar homes next to gravel pits -- and dead lakes."

In recent years, after Palin's departure from City Hall, Wasilla has been "changing and learning," according to Woodruff. The city has taken steps to control toxic runoff into its two lakes.

But Wasilla still doesn't test the lakes' water quality -- that's left up to volunteer groups, which periodically take samples from the lakes, according to city officials.

Why is there no official effort to test the local waters?

"That's a good question," said Wasilla public works chief Giddings, after a long, thoughtful pause. "I guess we're still ahead of the curve. We haven't seen huge concerns about the lakes yet."

Giddings acknowledged that there has been some public concern about swimming in the lakes, but not enough to prompt the city to monitor the water quality. If the public did start complaining about skin rashes, diarrhea and other health problems, "the state would probably step in," he added.

Would Giddings let his own children swim in Wasilla's lakes? "Yes," he said.

But Laura Eldred, an environmental program specialist with the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation, offered a more qualified response. She would swim in the local lakes, but would "take the usual hygiene precautions," without specifying what those measures were.

"Sarah did nothing to protect our lakes; in fact, she obstructed efforts to improve our water quality," said city watchdog Anne Kilkenny. The property surrounding Wasilla's two lakes is privately owned, complicating the city's efforts to protect these natural treasures. While her predecessor, Mayor Stein, moved to incorporate the homes surrounding the two lakes -- like the Palin family residence -- so the city could control runoff from the dwellings, Palin campaigned for "no more annexation."

"Sarah hasn't traveled outside of Alaska much," said Kilkenny. "She hasn't seen dead lakes and rivers."

Now Palin can see one right out her window.

By: A. Suffragette

Women and polar bears vote 'NO' on Palin

2008-09-20T10:28:00.003-04:00

Turns out that polar bears AND Alaskan women want nothing to do with Sarah Palin.

USA Today reports that a crowd of "hundreds" (which is a lot for Alaska) came out to protest Sarah Palin's welcome home party in Anchorage. From the report:

One person strolled through the crowd in a polar bear suit. The bear was holding a sign that said, "Polar bear moms say No to Palin," a reference to Palin's opposition to placing the polar bear on the threatened species list because that could interfere with drilling for oil off Alaska's coast.

So not only do women reject Palin's VP nod, but polar bears - feeling threatened by a gun-totting "hockey mom" - turned out to protest, too.

The Mudflast blog has pictures from the event, which we here at Operation: Sarracuda are grateful for.

by Rope Hoover Palin

The Deception Grows Deeper

2008-09-19T22:44:00.003-04:00

ABC news has uncovered "New Doubts" (read: New Truths) about Sarah Palin's claims on Troopergate.

We can again see the political ideology that seems to continuously spew forth from the McCain Slime Machine. What truly makes it frightening is the parallel's to the W* campaigns of yesteryear.

It is not only the style that is appalling, it is also the substance. I enjoy waking everyday and finding that Palin keeps using the unequivocal 'thanks, but no thanks' line. (Thanks TTT) When directly asked about it by Hannity,(the closest thing Hannity actual got to asking her a real question), she began the long, slow slink away from the lie that is so painfully obvious now.

HANNITY: Did you rigidly support it and did you change your view on it? Because the Democrats are saying, no, no, no, she originally supported it and she said she said she opposed it.

PALIN: Well, I killed the Bridge to Nowhere. And you know, I think I ruffled some feathers there, also, with our congressman who had been requesting that bridge for so many years.

What we needed to do up there in Alaska, was find some good transportation between the two land bodies there. And we did. We found that with an improved ferry system between Ketchikan and its airport. But, the Bridge to Nowhere is, as I've been saying in my speeches, if it's something that Alaskans really want and support, which at this time, they're not willing to support to such an extent that we'll pay for it ourselves, we better kill the bridge because we know the rest of the nation's not going to pay for it.

Sadly (or predictably), Hannity failed to ask the follow-up question that Palin's answer begs - "Can you kill a bridge that is already dead?"

This is typical Bush/Rove politics. How can anyone conclude that the result of this campaign is going to be any different than the administration of the past 8 years?

"Just keep lying - it makes it seem like the truth" - ancient GOP proverb.

Same campaign ideology - Same disastrous results.

White Privilege Revisited

2008-09-19T18:19:00.002-04:00

Palin hubby flip-flops on testimony

2008-09-19T16:45:00.001-04:00

She was willing to cooperate before she was against it.

But now the the full weight of the "Troopergate" scandal is landing on Palin's hockey hubby, Todd. Says NPR:

The investigation began in July by a mostly-Republican Legislative Council. At the time, Gov. Palin agreed to cooperate. But the McCain campaign said that is no longer possible, because Palin's elevation to vice-presidential candidate has biased the council against her.

How about that? Get nominated for VP and you see enemies all around you. Is this how Nixon felt in his last days?

Over at the excellent Mudflats blog, the penelties could come to pass after the election:

Todd, along with other witnesses, can stall without penalty for months, pushing this investigation well past election day. To bring contempt charges, which are punishable by a fine up to $500, or up to six months in jail, the full Legislature must be in session. That happens after Christmas.

So no jail time for Todd until after his wife could be sitting pretty (figuratively) in the White House. If the Palins have done nothing wrong, why don't they testify and put this mess behind them?

by Rope Hoover Palin

Fact-checking the McCain campaign.

2008-09-19T13:29:00.002-04:00

Check out McCainPedia - a Wikipedia-style wiki that fact-checks the lies of the McCain campaign.

Here's a famous one:

Palin was originally for the Alaskan "Bridge to Nowhere" while running for governor -- before she was against spending federal money to build it. She opposed the bridge only after it had become an embarrassment to the state and after $233 million in federal money earmarked for the bridge was diverted to other transportation projects in Alaska. In six of his 25 years in Congress, McCain voted for spending bills that included 12,763 pork-barrel earmarks worth more than $144.4 billion, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service. Campaign finance reports also show Palin received significant support from oil industry executives, lobbyists or their wives during her 2006 election as governor and 2002 race for lieutenant governor. Her husband, Todd, is an oil fields production operator.

[thanks to The Tricky Trail Times]

by Rope Hoover Palin

Even the pit bulls are fighting back.

2008-09-19T10:00:00.000-04:00

Sarah Palin knows as much about pit bulls as she does about foreign policy.

That's the idea behind PitBullsAgainstSarahPalin.com. That "What's the difference between a hockey mom and a pit bull" joke that everyone fell over? Well the pit bulls didn't take too kindly to it.

It's pretty much a site to sell a t-shirt, but still - even dogs can only take so much.

why?

2008-09-19T07:49:00.002-04:00

In 2000 the fate of the world rested on her shoulders

In 2008 why let it rest on hers?

How to participate in 'Operation: Sarracuda'

2008-09-19T06:30:00.001-04:00

We provide the ammunition, you pull the trigger - it's just that simple.

'Operation: Sarracuda' is an attempt to fight e-mail lies and libel with e-mails full of truth and full disclosure. Those friends and family members who e-mail you lies about Obama? We'll hit them back with the truth about Sarah Palin.

Here's what to do with the information you find here:

Click on the title of a blog post you like
Copy the address bar link and paste it into an e-mail
Send the e-mail to everyone you know, with a personalized message (something like "Can you believe what Palin's up to now?")
OR you can head directly to the source, copy and paste the useful stuff into an e-mail, and send that
Do it once or twice a week, and tell whoever you e-mail to do the same
Keep spreading the virus until November

Have a news post or some info you'd like to share? E-mail us at operation.sarracuda [at] gmail [dot] com. And while you're at it, use Obama's face at right to support his campaign. We need all the help we can get.

by Rope Hoover Palin

Who is Sarah Palin?

2008-09-19T02:53:00.004-04:00

Palin’s Start in Alaska: Not Politics as Usual SEPTEMBER 3 NEW YORK tIMES

Jim Wilson/The New York Times

Jenny Bryant bought McCain/Palin stickers from the Republican booth at the Alaska State Fair in Palmer, a few miles from Wasilla. More Photos .

By WILLIAM YARDLEY

Published: September 2, 2008

Correction Appended

WASILLA, Alaska — The world arrived here more than a century ago with the gold rush and later the railroad. Yet one aspect of American life did not come to town until 1996, the year Sarah Palin ran for mayor and Wasilla got its first local lesson in wedge politics.

Skip to next paragraph

Multimedia

Slide Show

Sarah Palin’s Hometown

Interactive Feature

Milestones: Sarah Palin

Times Topics: Sarah Palin

The Caucus

The latest news from the convention in St. Paul and around the nation. Join the discussion.

Times Topics: Republican Convention

Election Guide More Politics News

Photograph via Associated Press

Sarah Palin taking office in Wasilla, Alaska, in 1996. More Photos »

The traditional turning points that had decided municipal elections in this town of less than 7,000 people — Should we pave the dirt roads? Put in sewers? Which candidate is your hunting buddy? — seemed all but obsolete the year Ms. Palin, then 32, challenged the three-term incumbent, John C. Stein.

Anti-abortion fliers circulated. Ms. Palin played up her church work and her membership in the National Rifle Association. The state Republican Party, never involved before because city elections are nonpartisan, ran advertisements on Ms. Palin’s behalf.

Two years after Representative Newt Gingrich helped draft the Contract With America to advance Republican positions, Ms. Palin and her passion for Republican ideology and religious faith overtook a town known for a wide libertarian streak and for helping start the Iditarod sled dog race.

“Sarah comes in with all this ideological stuff, and I was like, ‘Whoa,’ ” said Mr. Stein, who lost the election. “But that got her elected: abortion, gun rights, term limits and the religious born-again thing. I’m not a churchgoing guy, and that was another issue: ‘We will have our first Christian mayor.’ ”

“I thought: ‘Holy cow, what’s happening here? Does that mean she thinks I’m Jewish or Islamic?’ ” recalled Mr. Stein, who was raised Lutheran, and later went to work as the administrator for the city of Sitka in southeast Alaska. “The point was that she was a born-again Christian.”

For all the admiration in Alaska for Ms. Palin, her rapid ascent from an activist in the P.T.A. to the running mate of Senator John McCain did not come without battle wounds. Her years in Wasilla, her first executive experience, reveal a mix of successes and stumbles, with Ms. Palin gaining support from a majority of residents for her drive, her faith and her accessibility but alienating others with what they said could be a polarizing single-mindedness.

“She is an aggressive reformer who isn’t afraid to break glass, to bring change to Wasilla and later to the state of Alaska,” said Taylor Griffin, a spokesman for the McCain campaign, who declined to address specific aspects of Ms. Palin’s tenure as mayor. “Washington needs some of that.”

In Wasilla, Ms. Palin is widely praised for following through on campaign promises by cutting property taxes while improving roads and sewers and strengthening the Police Department.

Her supporters say she helped Wasilla evolve from a ridiculed backwater to fast-growing suburb. The population of about 5,000 during her tenure as mayor has grown to nearly 10,000 now, and the city is filling with big box stores, including a Target that is scheduled to open on Oct. 12, one of three opening statewide that day in the chain’s Alaska debut.

But her critics say too much growth too quickly has made a mess of what not long ago was homesteaded farmland.

And for some, Ms. Palin’s first months in office here were so jarring — and so alienating — that an effort was made to force a recall. About 100 people attended a meeting to discuss the effort, which was covered in the local press, but the idea was dropped.

Shortly after becoming mayor, former city officials and Wasilla residents said, Ms. Palin approached the town librarian about the possibility of banning some books, though she never followed through and it was unclear which books or passages were in question.

Anne Kilkenny, a Democrat who said she attended every City Council meeting in Ms. Palin’s first year in office, said Ms. Palin brought up the idea of banning some books at one meeting. “They were somehow morally or socially objectionable to her,” Ms. Kilkenny said.

The librarian, Mary Ellen Emmons, pledged to “resist all efforts at censorship,” Ms. Kilkenny recalled. Ms. Palin fired Ms. Emmons shortly after taking office but changed course after residents made a strong show of support. Ms. Emmons, who left her job and Wasilla a couple of years later, declined to comment for this article.

In 1996, Ms. Palin suggested to the local paper, The Frontiersman, that the conversations about banning books were “rhetorical.”

Ms. Emmons was not the only employee to leave. During her campaign, Ms. Palin appealed to voters who felt that city employees under Mr. Stein, who was not from Wasilla and had earned a degree in public administration at the University of Oregon, had been unresponsive and rigid regarding a new comprehensive development plan. In turn, some city employees expressed support for Mr. Stein in a campaign advertisement.

Once in office, Ms. Palin asked many of Mr. Stein’s backers to resign — something virtually unheard of in Wasilla in past elections. The public works director, city planner, museum director and others were forced out. The police chief, Irl Stambaugh, was later fired outright.

.
Mr. Stambaugh lost a wrongful termination lawsuit against Ms. Palin. He did not respond to a request for an interview.
Ms. Palin also upended the town’s traditional ways with a surprise edict: No employee was to talk to the news media without her permission.
“It was just things you don’t ever associate with a small town,” Victoria Naegele, then the managing editor of The Frontiersman, recalled of Ms. Palin’s first year in office. “It was like we were warped into real politics instead of just ‘Do you like Joe or Mary for the job?’ It was a strange time.”
Ms. Palin, her critics note, was not always the fiscal watchdog she has since boasted of being. In her second term as mayor, she pushed for a half-cent raise in the local sales tax to pay for a $15 million sports complex. The complex is popular and a junior league hockey team plays there now, but the city recently had to pay more than $1.3 million to settle an ownership dispute over the site.
Ms. Palin also began annual trips to Washington to lobby for federal money for specific initiatives, including rail projects and a mental health center. Her running mate, Mr. McCain, has been an outspoken critic of these so-called earmarks and as governor Ms. Palin has sounded more like him, vetoing tens of millions of dollars of local projects sought by state lawmakers.
She is largely viewed as having had her hometown’s best interests at heart when she pursued big projects or an overhaul of city taxes. By the time she ran for re-election in 1999 — again facing Mr. Stein — things had smoothed out. She was returned to office by a large margin, 826 votes to 255.
Ms. Palin, who had campaigned promising to cut her own full-time salary, reduced it from about $68,000 to about $64,000, but she also hired a city administrator, John Cramer, adding a salary to the payroll.
Critics said Republican leaders installed Mr. Cramer, who was closely tied to a powerful local state lawmaker, Lyda Green. Ms. Green, who is retiring this year as Senate president, endorsed Ms. Palin in her campaign for mayor but became one of her biggest critics when Ms. Palin was governor.
Tensions did ease eventually in Wasilla, and Mr. Cramer is given some of the credit, supporters and opponents of Ms. Palin said.
“When I first met Sarah, I would say Sarah was a Republican, with the big R, and that’s it,” said Dave Chappel, Ms. Palin’s deputy mayor for more than two years. “As she developed politically, she began to see beyond the R and look at the whole picture. She matured.”
Just as Ms. Palin terminated employees on her way into office, she also let some go on the way out, including Mr. Cramer. When Ms. Palin completed her second and final term, in 2002, her stepmother-in-law, Faye Palin, was running to succeed her. It seemed like a good idea, except that Faye Palin supported abortion rights and was registered as unaffiliated, not Republican, people who remember the race said. Sarah Palin sided instead with Dianne M. Keller, a religious conservative and an ally on the City Council. Ms. Keller won.
“That was interesting,” Mr. Chappel said. “Faye lives up the street from me. I can’t really say much about that.”

Operation: Sarracuda

2008-09-18T19:29:00.001-04:00

Maybe this is a news flash, but Barack Obama is a Muslim. He also hates America, isn't a patriot, and wants to kill us all in our sleep.

If you didn't know all this, it's okay. Just open up your e-mail inbox and it's all right there.

I say that in jest, of course, but the fact remains: the right-wing uses e-mail like a pro. They've used it against the Clintons and against John Kerry, and now it's being used against Obama. Probably because it only involves hitting the "Forward" button, and it doesn't involve much creativity. Why pay for ads when you can just type up some bullshit and hit "send" to your family members?

The left-wing has its own form of propaganda, but it involves a little more work. Liberals get off their asses and does some on-the-street reporting, in blogs and in commenting forums and in Twitter feeds, like journalists used to do (and should be doing today).

The Twitter feeds I read are alive with protests and linking. John Gruber, who authors my favorite blog Daring Fireball, has made it his goal to uncover everything evil about Sarah Palin. And Andrew Sullivan, over at The Atlantic, has hit the governor everyday. But who actually reads this stuff? Do average Americans really jump on The Atlantic's site for their political news? How much influence do they have?

There's a great new blog that has surfaced since the Palin VP announcement, called Mudflats, and its written by a guy up in Alaska that reports as an Alaskan on the whole ordeal. It's great stuff, like when he attends an anti-Palin rally that's actually larger than her "welcome home" rally.

But then I watch the Sunday morning political shows, like "This Week," and all of them were gushing over Sarah Palin and her "dramatic invigoration" of the Republican base. No truth-telling, no in-depth questioning - just idol worship. How can blogs compete with ABC? My good friend Andrea has had some great posts about the awfulness of the Governor, but even her and me combined don't get the audience that major media outlets do. Not even close.

So we need an e-mail campaign of our own.

We need to take what these go-getters, these guardians of the public interest (most of which are underpaid or not paid at all - just passionate investigators of the truth) are finding and spread them like a virus. We can finally test whether the truth will set America free, and whether lies fall under the weight of their own hypocrisy (though are are some exceptions).

Take what you find, copy the link or the text, and send them to your relatives. You know the ones: the same aunts and uncles who send you those "send this or die in five days" kinds of e-mails. Send them all the shit that's been dug up about Palin. If that's the only way we can reach people about this lady, then so be it. Because I'll tell you, McCain's cronies are working hard to assault Obama through e-mail (by calling him a Muslim, anti-American, a socialist, and so on). We can fight back.

The key will be not to send them to people who think the same way you do. That's preaching to the choir. Instead, send it to people who you know are either undecided or are so pro-Palin they're going to get their Sarah beehave hairdo. Set your sights on folks who don't pay attention, in any sort of detail, to news from the political front. The fact is, these folks aren't going to find out the truth unless it's shoved in front of their face. So let's do the shoving.

To get things started, however, spread the good word amongst your friends. They can then take what we've found and spread it to their non-believers. It has to start somewhere.

Is this back-handed? Is it the cheap way of doing things? Is it even right? Yes, maybe, and probably not - but listen, we're on the losing side of a fight that's been raging for years. We can hope that people will suddenly care about what goes on in the world, and we can hope that people will read blogs and watch the news and do some research. But hope only goes so far, and eventually we need to do the work ourselves. Part of it is the good people who are researching the candidates and putting the information out there. But that's only half the battle. The other half is making sure people see the stuff. And friends, that's where you and I come in.

You know what the great part is? Most of the stuff being spread about Barack Obama are lies. Shit-storm, muddy, dirty lies. But the information about Sarah Palin? That's all true. The difficult part is already done, because we don't have to make anything up. Her husband really did want Alaska to secede from the Union. She really did say the Iraq war was "God's will." She look into banning books at her town's library. All this makes the entire job easier.

This begins "Operation: Oooh, Sarracuda." But what should our hub be? Should we have a blog? A website? Some kind of resource people can go and find all the ammunition they need? Let me know, and we can build a hot-and-heavy coalition of people who really care about who is going to govern their country. Nothing is out of bounds, but there is one limitation: we're only going to spread stuff that's true. No lies. Nothing that might be true. Just truth, fair and square.

The moral high ground is a good place to start, and as the Jedi say - the truth hurts. Let's make it hurt really bad. While we may feel a bit dirty and slimy at the end - anything that deals with spreading e-mail propaganda is always a bit messy - our hard work will be worth it. A side benefit? Maybe your neighbor, the one who sends you all those lottery offers and racist jokes, will leave you the hell alone.

The war will not be televised. It will be forwarded and spread and will catch fire in the inboxes of the unbelievers. We have nothing to lose but our dignity - we have a country to gain.

by Rope Hoover Palin

Alaskans don't believe Palin on 'Troopergate'

2008-09-18T16:29:00.003-04:00

Read here. Turns out 85% of her own state's citizens believe she lied about the "Troopergate" scandal.

That approval rating the Right is bragging about? Does that include approval for stone-cold lies?