FYI--Will Your Vote Count??

I haven't vetted this for craziness yet but I want to get it out before I crash ( worked last night ). Let me know what you think.

Published on More Intelligent Life (http://moreintelligentlife.com/)
WILL YOUR VOTE COUNT?
By Rachel Abrams
Created 29/10/2008 - 23:56
film
ISSUES & IDEAS
FINGERS CROSSED October 29th 2008 Did you know that a black American voter's ballot is 900% more likely to get "lost" than a white person's? A week before the election, Rachel Abrams talks to the editor of a comic book that's meant to help you protect your vote ...
Special to MORE INTELLIGENT LIFE
America's winner-takes-all system of counting votes per state [1] makes for some unsettling stories of bungled polls and missing votes in important swing states (yes Florida, we're looking at you.) Manhattanites needn't sweat too much over their own votes in the upcoming presidential elections: Obama fans will simply add their numbers to the blue-state hordes; McCain devotees will nobly spit in the bucket.
Yet uncounted votes make for an insidious problem: according to an exposé in this month's [2]Rolling Stone [3] by Greg Palast [4], an investigative journalist, and Robert Kennedy Jr, a lawyer, over 3m votes cast in the 2004 presidential election were never counted. The culprit, they suggest, was a piece of legislation called the Help America Vote Act, signed into law by George Bush in 2002. They also discovered that a black voter's ballot is 900% more likely to get "lost" than a white person's. But who's counting.
About a week before election day Vote&Live!, political provocateurs in New York's DJ music community, invited their Facebook fan base to a packed Monday-night screening of two alarming films about America's missing votes: "Uncounted: The New Math of American Elections" [5] and "Steal Back Your Vote" [6].
"Uncounted" grimly documents the now-familiar story of misread ballots, dodgy voting machines, long lines at polling stations and missing names of registered voters from the past two presidential elections. "Steal Back Your Vote", made by Palast and Kennedy, is accompanied by a bristling tub-thumping comic book [7], featuring strips by Ted Rall, Lloyd Dangle and Lukas Ketner and edited by Zachary Roberts [8]. Rachel Abrams caught up with Roberts after the Vote&Live! screening.

MIL: This exposé draws on eight years of number-crunching lessons learned from 2000 and 2004. So why a comic strip?
ZR: There's a lot of dry material about the past failures of the voting process out there, so we desperately wanted to do something fun to inform voters this time around. Cartoons were an obvious way to make the information accessible, something that people would remember and share afterwards.

MIL: What can people do between now and Tuesday to protect their votes?
ZR: As the handout explains, if you can vote early, do so. That way, if you find your name's missing from the roll or you run into some other setback at the polling station, you don't just give up; you've got a chance to take your inquiry to the County Clerk's office to see what you can do to get your ballot in.
The County Clerks are really the local heroes of the electoral process. If your name's missing, but you know you registered, it's probably still on the database. If you leave it til Tuesday, you might be leaving it too late to query any setback you encounter at the polling station. Know you're not powerless, know who to call, ask for support from the lawyers in the polling station, call 1-866 OUR VOTE and do what you can to vote unconditionally, not provisionally.

MIL: How is your handout going to make a difference?
ZR: We're distributing it to people while they wait in line to vote, so it had to be non-partisan otherwise the polling stations wouldn't be allowed to carry it. There's deliberately no mention of Obama or McCain, or campaign issues, so the hope is voters will stick it in their back pocket, or download it after November 4th, and share what they learn from it with others.

MIL: Tonight's audience was rightly stunned by what they've learned from these two films. Might they be put off voting all together?
ZR: We absolutely hope not! Whoever's on the ballot next week, the campaign to improve the system, fund it properly, make it more transparent and better organized continues after 4th.

Thanks to MindVirus: "Loans? Did we say we'd do Loans?"

See the NYT article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/29/opinion/29wed1.html?_r=1&hp=&oref=slogin&pagewanted=print

Mindvirus comments:

"Banks to us: Thanks for the cash--now Fuck Off!!"

TANTRUM TIME: This is true although you were led to believe something else

Yahoo asks: Why isn't the Gov't helping out homeowners heading for foreclosure?
Your answer is in this link to an article by US News and World Report.

http://biz.yahoo.com/usnews/081029/29_why_the_feds_rescue_banks_not_homeowners.html?.&.pf=banking-budgeting

It explains why the bailout is only for the banks and not for the private citizens.
...and it's your $700 billion.
Citizens of the USA are going to be taxed to the tune of $700 Billion to bail out the economy of the United States of America...that is, The Big Banks. And you, the citizen are going to lose your home (you really should've realized that if something sounds too good to be true it's because it is. [Remember 3 card Monty?]) And the Banks and the government of the USA are going to tax you, the mere citizen, for the financial collapse and the Iraq War (which we should've been being taxed for all along--money doesn't come out of magic lamps, you know)
We the People of the USA need to stop bitching about being taxed for schools (how about excellent schools?), water, sewer, police, fire, ambulance, roads, bridges (to somewhere, of course), and start thinking about how no one in government has your best interests at heart--only their own.
The US Gov't actually made us believe that greed is good, credit is good and Big Daddy always has a pocket full of money... and if you didn't believe it you were unpatriotic & anti-American. (Big Daddy's pockets are full again---with $700 billion--the old shell game never fails.)
It's payback time, America, and we're going to have to suck it up and pay it back.
But in the future if something sounds like a lie we'd better pull our heads out of our asses and say so.

A Biased Proposal

Ordinarily, I wouldn't post something by Keith Olbermann. Which isn't to say that I don't enjoy watching him, but he does have a bit of the buffoon about him and I'd be happier posting something by Bill Moyers instead.

Still, the first part of this video clip is on point with my sister's previous entry about voter fraud, and the rest of the clip is pretty funny too.



So, MY 'Bright' idea is that everyone who is currently not a Republican should go out and register as one. (Naturally, this would have to be for the next election.) And then they can continue to behave exactly like Democratics/Liberals/Independents. (DLIs) They can attend rallies for DLI politicians, donate to DLI campaigns and vote for DLI candidates. That should stir things up a little bit. Can you imagine all the pre-election interviews with Joe the Effete Winetaster or Jane the NAACP Member starting out with, "Well, even though I'm a Republican, I have to say that I'm voting for the other guy/gal this year."

Some people might say that this is subversive. I think it's innovative. But I'm feeling a little subversive today, so I could be biased.

Lois Carneiro

There are a lot of different ways to count votes...

THIS REALLY HAPPENS IN THE USA:

October 29, 2008
Jacksonville Journal
Unease Sits Heavily in a Group of Black Voters
By SUSAN SAULNY
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — For weeks now, James Jones has been extra courteous in traffic and at the gas station because he has an Obama sticker on the back of his truck. “Something like that might make a difference for Barack Obama,” Mr. Jones explained. “I’m not taking a chance.”
Mr. Jones, a black warehouse worker, bought campaign signs for his yard and made sure his family had valid voter registration cards. He and his wife cast their votes 10 days early to avoid last-minute problems at the polls.
So imagine Mr. Jones’s disappointment this week when he got word of a rumor making its way around his humble southeastern part of town — that early voting is nothing more than a new disenfranchisement scam, that early votes are likely to be lost and never counted.
“I went to the library where I voted and I said, ‘Ma’am, I heard rumors that early voting is dangerous, is that true?’ ” Mr. Jones, 47, said he had asked an election worker. “She said: ‘It’s pretty well safe. I wouldn’t worry about it.’ ”
But in conversations with about a dozen Jacksonville residents in cafes, outside churches and at their homes over three days, Mr. Jones and many of his black neighbors worry anyway, unable to put aside the nagging feeling that somehow their votes will not be counted.
Wounds have not healed here in Duval County since the mangled presidential election of 2000, when more than 26,000 ballots were discarded as invalid for being improperly punched. Nearly 40 percent of the votes were thrown out in the predominantly Democratic-leaning African-American communities around Jacksonville, a reality that has caused suspicions of racial bias to linger, even though intentional disenfranchisement was never proved.
Now, in a show of early election enthusiasm, more than 84,200 people have already voted in Duval County, surpassing the number of early votes cast in the last presidential election. Added to 33,800 absentee ballots collected so far, the numbers show that 22 percent of registered voters cast their ballots as of Oct. 27, county election officials said.
But amid excitement over Mr. Obama’s historic candidacy and the chance that the country might choose an African-American president within a matter of days, there is an unmistakable sense of anxiety among blacks here that something will go wrong, that victory will slip away.
“They’re going to throw out votes,” said Larone Wesley, a 53-year-old black Vietnam veteran. “I can’t say exactly how, but they are going to accomplish that quite naturally. I’m so afraid for my friend Obama. I look at this through the eyes of the ’60s, and I feel there ain’t no way they’re going to let him make it.”
Mr. Wesley refuses to vote early. “I don’t believe the machines work properly in general,” he said, “and they really don’t work properly when they think you’re voting for Obama.”
Mr. Wesley’s wife, Paris, disagrees and thinks the best thing she can do is get to her polling place before Nov. 4. “I want to go early so that if I see and hear anything that’s not in keeping with the rules and regulations, I can make a call,” she said. “As far as faith in the system, I don’t have faith in the system. I just pray we have people in the polls who will be honest and watchful.”
Some things have not changed since 2000: Florida is still a battleground. Mr. Obama and Senator John McCain, the Republican nominee, are in hot pursuit of the state’s 27 electoral votes, which could prove crucial for victory.
Other important things have changed. In 2004, there were only minor glitches. Duval County has done away with its old confusing ballot and upgraded its scanning machinery. It also has a new elections supervisor, Jerry Holland, who has reached out to blacks and earned their respect.
The skepticism about early voting is confounding to many officials because it is intended to make voting easier and more accessible, and was recently promoted in Jacksonville by Mr. Obama’s wife, Michelle Obama.
Mr. Holland said that the number of people, including blacks, who had turned out to vote early showed that misgivings were not widespread. Of the 84,273 residents who had voted as of Sunday, more than 30,900 were black.
“Obviously, we’ve come a long way since 2000,” Mr. Holland said. “For some people, it may have taken eight years to rebuild confidence. For others, it might take another election cycle. The goal is to keep building confidence one voter at a time.”
He added: “We will have record numbers. It may be feasible to get 50 percent of our voters before the election.”
Still, suspicions linger that something — faulty machines, misread ballots, mysteriously lost votes — will deny Mr. Obama some of the support that he has.
“I vote in a predominantly minority area,” said Monica Albertie, 27, a health care executive. “I worry about getting there and all of a sudden the electricity doesn’t work. Anything can happen. I know that sounds silly, but these are real concerns. We have a record of getting excited, then being disappointed. You get paranoid. What if the bus system shuts down that day?”
Ms. Albertie said she was “on the fence” about early voting, because “I don’t want my early vote to get lost.”
Her friend Susan Burroughs, who is also a health care executive, said she planned to vote early but felt “queasy.”
“You know, you don’t want to get too excited because it could go in just the opposite direction,” Ms. Burroughs said. “You read the papers here, and you know, there was something wrong with the machine over here, they lost the votes over there, they had to recount votes. That makes a lot of people leery.”
“My queasiness is that we shouldn’t become too comfortable with the polls showing he’s ahead,” she said. “It means nothing until you cast your vote, and the tally is in.”
Mr. Jones also expressed a sense of queasiness.
“I feel good, and I don’t feel good,” he said. “I’m thankful to God that this is happening in my lifetime, that I get to see it. But I’m not ready to celebrate anything. This could be a very tricky time for us. I don’t trust the polls. And the state of Florida in the past has had a lot of crooked things going on.”

There is no mention here of voting places which are posted with rather too many police officers and/or with officers from the Immigration Service--so, if a citizen feels that a loved one's Green card may be in jeopardy that citizen may just turn around and go home.

Another one of many ploys to keep citizens from going to the polls.

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MCCain-Palin Butt of Too Many Jokes

http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20081028/pl_politico/14982

The news today states that the media's poking fun at the candidates has been unbalanced by about 4-1. McCain/Palin are a laugh a minute while Obama/Biden get chuckled at from time to time.

Unfortunately McCain and Palin go way past funny to ridiculous--and then on to scary: Old Geezer with Melanoma (needing anger management class) and Moose Disemboweler--(with aspirations to World Domination).

Neither melanoma nor the disemboweling of animals not entirely necessary for our survival would be a problem if either one of them could perform the task of world leader alone--especially if they had a crack team of advisors hired on. Neither McCain (old&sick) or Palin(egocentric&stupid) can carry it off alone, and if the past 8 years are any indication, Republican-picked advisors are to be avoided.

So, what's a country to do?

We can laugh until it's time to pick up our rakes and torches and march to the Capitol.

Stolen Words; Simple, True and Damned Embarrassing

It's the old 'Be Here Now'; the amazing truth of attempting to participate decently in a glorious and schizophrenic world. I've taken a quote and leave it here for ya'll to enjoy. It's from Manohla Dargis' NYT review of 'Synecdoche, New York':

"...it comes down hard for living in the world with real, breathing, embracing bodies pressed against other bodies. To be here now, alive in the world as it is rather then as we imagine it to be, seems a terribly simple idea, yet it's also the only idea worth the fuss, the anxiety of influence and all the messy rest, a hard lesson won for Caden. Life is a dream, but only for sleepers"

Really...how could I have forgotten that simple truth? Probably because it's hidden in plain sight.

Crimes Against Humanity;Brought to you by the USA

Man's inhumanity to man is nothing new--we are born to it. I can't laugh today. My good friend is moving out of our cheap little apartment complex because she can't afford the rent. She'll be paying $375.00 per month for a place that's so small that when the oven door is open it touches the bathroom door and has the added advantage of being on the busline. This is an intelligent woman who's worked hard all her life. Raised 4 kids to adulthood and buried one of them. I hear no complaints from her--she counts her blessings: that she's still able to work, that her pension isn't completely gone yet, that she has children who love her. Her greatest fear is being a burden to them.
I must admit that these are very great gifts when compared to troubles that exist on the rest of the globe. We Americans are strong and most of us just keep on stepping without remark or expression of grief or pain.
I think its long past time for us to gather together and confront the meanness and smallness of character that pervades the government of the United States of America. We have been manipulated for years to believe that owning a home for our families and saving money for our old age is the American Way. Well, our homes have been manipulated right out of our hands and our saving is following quickly. I hear from politicians that taxing the public is unpatriotic but who will it be that pays for the crimes of the Wall Street financiers? John McCain? George Bush? Fannie or Freddie Mae? No, it will be us, the taxpayers who after 40 years of work have to sell our homes, move to an apartment and then move to a smaller one. And compared to other countries--Darfur, The Congo, Ruwanda, Sudan--we are still sitting on top of the world.
Where are the Americans to want to see justice for all? Where are the Americans who pitch in and put their shoulders to the wheel for the USA?
Where and WHO are the Christians who believe that God made people in his image and to be their brother's and sister's keeper? I don't think there any boundries or conditions specified about that in the bible. Although, I am not a believer in any god--I want to believe that people will do good and comfort each other without boundries or commandments or gods. I have deceived myself.
I don't want to give up without a fight, though.
I'm planning a fight--a peaceful fight--but LOUD.
Maybe I'll laugh again tomorrow.

UPDATE and Breaking NEWS. Possible 'Rogue Palin' sighted off Malibu!

(Read the REAL article 'Rising Tension' from which I have shamelessly stolen quotes.

"Four Republicans close to Palin said she has decided increasingly to disregard the advice of the former Bush aides tasked to handle her, creating occasionally tense situations as she travels the country with them."

In the preceding pictures, we can see the Great White Palin, turning on her handlers with no warning, eating a cameraman and severely damaging the equipment they would have been using to film Palin's upcoming public appearance. Finally, she broke completely free of her handlers and they have been unable to bring her under control. According to a senior Republican, Palin had begun to "go rogue" in some of her public pronouncements and decisions.

"I think she'd like to go more rogue," he said."

Palin partisans say she chafed at the handling. "Her strategy was to be trustworthy and a team player during the convention and thereafter, but she felt completely mismanaged and mishandled and ill advised," the person said. "Recently, she's gone from relying on McCain advisers who were assigned to her to relying on her own instincts."

Instinctive behavior, especially in such a ruthless and impulsive creature, makes the Great White Palin exceedingly dangerous to approach.

Reliable sources report that the Rogue Palin has been seen cruising off L.A.'s Santa Monica Blvd, hoping to make it to Rodeo Drive before the 'Christmas Crush'. All residents are warned to remain clear of the area around Santa Monica Blvd up to North Rodeo Drive until this situation has been resolved by proper authorities.

Update: Two Malibu fishermen have reported a close encounter with the Great White Rogue Palin. They were not able to bring her on board after she took the bait ( a beige Ferragammo pump secured with piano wire) because she attacked the aft portion of the 40 foot boat and then broke free. The fishermen were able to recover "a tooth the size of a shot glass" from where it was embedded in the transom. DNA testing will be performed to determine if this is the real rogue Palin, or just look-alike, Tina Fey.

The fishermen, visibly shaken by the attack, stated that they would not make the attempt again. They advised that anyone foolhardy enough to do so will "need a bigger boat".

- Maggie Carneiro

Tina Fey is GOOD!

- Maggie

Geez, I'm Going to Have to Stop Making Fun of Evangelicals...

.....'cause this babe makes sense!



I have been guilty of lumping all evangelicals into the same group; knuckleheads! Clearly, I have been wrong to do so. And I apologize.

- Lois Carneiro

I'm Back!

It was a very successful trip. Little Bobby is married to his best girlie. The Hatchling is in fine fettle. Maggie and I

had a wonderful time in Montauk.

I got home to discover that Sarah Palin might be a liability to the GOP's chances.

Alan Greenspan thinks that maybe people who handle money DO need some regulation.

Colin Powell is disappointed with the Republican ticket.

Obama is gaining in the polls and some wagering outfit in the UK has already paid off on him.

They've obviously forgotten that voting in the USA is unreliable at best. The people may go to the polls but do they actually get to vote? And if they do vote are their votes counted?

The Government of the USA has been playing fast and loose for too long. Our collective brains need a quarter-turn so we can focus on who we really are and on what's really happening now.

For some real intelligence read this:

THE END OF THE FIRST INDUSTRIAL AGE

http://scorpionbowl.blogspot.com/

This is Your Brain on Morality

The link below leads to a twenty minute talk by Sam Harris on moral relativism. You'll have to exercise your brain to take it all in, and you should probably watch it at least twice.

http://thesciencenetwork.org/programs/beyond-belief-candles-in-the-dark/sam-harris-1

What he's saying is revolutionary, possibly dangerous, and it has the ring of truth to it. (You'll start to understand what he's talking about when he compares morality to food.) He speaks of morality as a pathway for society, and suggests that, in some aspects, morality can be universally and scientifically quantified as either good for humanity or bad for humanity.

It is my long-held opinion that we need no Gods to identify right from wrong. And I think that's what he's saying as well. But is human-kind mature enough to let go of the geezers in the sky and take the responsibility for civilized and altruistic behavior upon themselves?

- Lois Carneiro

An Unexamined life is Generally Lived by Republicans

I'm going to add this trenchant cartoon http://scorpionbowl.blogspot.com/
supplied to me by Rich Simon, (click pic above for clearer image) to an old, but pertinent essay that's been floating around the internet since McCain was a boy.

A Day in the Life of Joe Republican

Joe gets up at 6 a.m. and fills his coffeepot with water to prepare his morning coffee. The water is clean and good because some tree-hugging liberal fought for minimum water-quality standards. With his first swallow of water, he takes his daily medication. His medications are safe to take because some stupid commie liberal fought to ensure their safety and that they work as advertised.

All but $10 of his medications are paid for by his employer's medical plan because some liberal union workers fought their employers for paid medical insurance - now Joe gets it too.

He prepares his morning breakfast, bacon and eggs. Joe's bacon is safe to eat because some girly-man liberal fought for laws to regulate the meat packing industry.

In the morning shower, Joe reaches for his shampoo. His bottle is properly labeled with each ingredient and its amount in the total contents because some crybaby liberal fought for his right to know what he was putting on his body and how much it contained.

Joe dresses, walks outside and takes a deep breath. The air he breathes is clean because some environmentalist wacko liberal fought for the laws to stop industries from polluting our air.

He walks on the government-provided sidewalk to subway station for his government-subsidized ride to work. It saves him considerable money in parking and transportation fees because some fancy-pants liberal fought for affordable public transportation, which gives everyone the opportunity to be a contributor.

Joe begins his work day. He has a good job with excellent pay, medical benefits, retirement, paid holidays and vacation because some lazy liberal union members fought and died for these working standards. Joe's employer pays these standards because Joe's employer doesn't want his employees to call the union.

If Joe is hurt on the job or becomes unemployed, he'll get a worker compensation or unemployment check because some stupid liberal didn't think he should lose his home because of his temporary misfortune.

It is noontime and Joe needs to make a bank deposit so he can pay some bills. Joe's deposit is federally insured by the FSLIC because some godless liberal wanted to protect Joe's money from unscrupulous bankers who ruined the banking system before the Great Depression.

Joe has to pay his Fannie Mae-underwritten mortgage and his below-market federal student loan because some elitist liberal decided that Joe and the government would be better off if he was educated and earned more money over his lifetime. Joe also forgets that his in addition to his federally subsidized student loans, he attended a state funded university.

Joe is home from work. He plans to visit his father this evening at his farm home in the country. He gets in his car for the drive. His car is among the safest in the world because some America-hating liberal fought for car safety standards to go along with the tax-payer funded roads.

He arrives at his boyhood home. His was the third generation to live in the house financed by Farmers' Home Administration because bankers didn't want to make rural loans.

The house didn't have electricity until some big-government liberal stuck his nose where it didn't belong and demanded rural electrification.

He is happy to see his father, who is now retired. His father lives on Social Security and a union pension because some wine-drinking, cheese-eating liberal made sure he could take care of himself so Joe wouldn't have to.

Joe gets back in his car for the ride home, and turns on a radio talk show. The radio host keeps saying that liberals are bad and conservatives are good. He doesn't mention that the beloved Republicans have fought against every protection and benefit Joe enjoys throughout his day. Joe agrees: "We don't need those big-government liberals ruining our lives! After all, I'm a self-made man who believes everyone should take care of themselves, just like I have." - Anonymous

- Lois Carneiro

This is SO mean! It's SUCH a cheap shot......

and it's perfectly hilarious!


John McCain Accidentally Left On Campaign Bus Overnight

Charity Begins at Neiman Marcus

Has anyone heard about this clothing thing yet? http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1008/14805.html
It's just too perfect. I especially like this part: "With all of the important issues facing the country right now, it’s remarkable that we’re spending time talking about pantsuits and blouses," said spokeswoman Tracey Schmitt. "It was always the intent that the clothing go to a charitable purpose after the campaign."
Donating her clothes after the campaign? Why won't she need fancy clothes then? Because she's going straight back to Alaska.

Moved By a Crescent

Maureen Dowd has written an unusually thoughtful and serious column today concerning Colin Powell's endorsement of Barack Obama. It's well worth reading.

She quotes Mr. Powell as saying "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 something wrong with some 7-year-old Muslim-American kid believing that he or she could be president?” - Colin Powell

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/22/opinion/22dowd.html?hp



- Lois Carneiro

'Muslims For McCain' Defend Their Religion and Their Choice

And good for them! I also applaud the Christians for McCain who stood with the Muslims against the ignorant hate-mongers!



Hey, this video clip is too wide for my blog! I wonder if I could make my blog wider.

(Editor - The blog is now wider.)

- Lois Carneiro

This is Sounding Awfully Relevant. Again.

To Paraphrase Bart Simpson....

....."C'mon, people! This music isn't going to appreciate itself!

Snuggs needs love

Good thing Chris is there to give it to him. Doesn't this cat look miserable and starved for love? Doesn't your heart just break for him? I am sneezing too hard to type anymore.

This One's an Oldie.....

.....but oh, so relevant!

Serious Loss of Cool

It was not my best day ever at work. I lost all my good humor and became very irritated. It all worked out in the end, but for a few moments I was actually seeing things in red. I am home now and the boys ordered pizza. It is always nice to come home to food.

Jake is mad about the election. I hear him muttering away in the other room. Chris is handling it all in his own calm way. He is asleep.

The new rumor is that Colin Powell will endorse Obama on the next Meet the Press. I may have some facts wrong there, but that's what a rumor is. Deal with it.

I think an endorsement from Powell is the final nail in McCain's coffin. I absolutely could dance and sing about how neutralized Palin has been. Everyone knows she is laughable and now you never hear about her. She deserves to be hidden, along with her backwards ideas and well-developed calves.

I want this election over with so badly. We are in this terribly stagnant state right now and it will be healthy for everyone if we can move on. We are all lame ducks, waiting for the next government. I hate this feeling and I want the nineteen days or so to hurry up. I also know the entire world is watching us, and it is such an important election. But at the same time, I'm ready to vote for Daffy Duck because our financial situation is so bad that no one is going to have the money they want to make any new policy. If either one of the candidates had looked into the camera at the debate and said "Cut the shit, America. You lived outside your means. I'm raising taxes. I'm not cutting anything, I'm not starting a health care program and I'm not sending Joe the Plumber out on any septic jobs. We are broke. The next four years will be full of recession and pain," I would have immediately voted for that man.

Ah, well. In celebration of this fine moment in our nation's history, I upped my principal mortgage payment by sixty dollars.

PUMA - Doin' the 'Palin' Wink

A friend of mine wrote to me and asked me what I though about PUMA's - (site link below ) I read their 'credo', perused a few of their blog entries and marveled as I read the comments, looking for one that criticized their confusing political stance and their rambling and unfocused commentary. I found nary a one!

Last night, being the Grinch that I am, I added one. The subject of my comment was simply that I could find no negative comments and, as impressive as that might be, it also seemed quite improbable. To my surprise, they posted it. But when I checked again this morning, they had pulled it. Mystery solved!


Dear Rich,

I agree with them on one point only: Blindly voting along party lines without examining the candidates, or the issues they support and/or oppose is the sheerest of stupidity, Beyond that,...........I think they're nuts!

(Linda, this is the website to which Richard is referring:)

http://riverdaughter.wordpress.com/

What is their basic agenda, do you think? Are they pushing for Hillary in 2012 or do they hope to override the results of the National Convention and get Hillary on the Democratic ticket for the 2008 election? (Three weeks from now.) Or maybe they're trying to organize a massive write-in campaign for Hillary for the 2008 election. Or maybe they're Republicans dressed in sheeps clothing. (I must be getting a migraine, because I keep smelling Karl Rove.)

I quote a blog entry concerning Barack Obama by 'riverdaughter' posted Oct 16th, entitled "Amok Time" (Clearly a 'Star Trek' fan-fiction writer.).

"He has ruined Hillary Clinton’s political career. It is time we faced up to this fact. She could run again but doing it a second time will be very difficult. A lot of people supported her and donated money to her only to see her undermined by her own party. It was just too close, too heartbreaking to want to experience that again. We don’t really understand the dynamics about why the party turned on her in the first place, at least not completely. Obama decided to run and he wasn’t too concerned whether he was ready or whether Hillary was the better candidate. He exercised his male prerogative to go for it (Editorial Comment by Maggie: What sort of horseshit statement is that?) and the rest of the party fell in line. The rest of the country may be ready for a female president but it is becoming more and more obvious that the (Democratic) party is not."

http://riverdaughter.wordpress.com/2008/10/16/thursday-amok-time/

WTF???? He ruined Hillary's career because he won the party's nomination? And why on Earth would Obama consider Clinton to be the better candidate after she supported the Bush Administration's illegal and immoral war time after time after time?

I could spend all evening criticizing this site, line by line. And I would too, except I want to send you this picture.

I would have taken a picture of the actual tennis courts, but they've been swallowed up by a giant sinkhole! Apparently, some youngster who worked on them back in the '90's ('Rickie' or 'Richie Simmons', or something like that) spent so much time smoking doobies and chasing surfer girls, that he got the clay mixture all wrong, and the tennis court surface just liquified when the LIRR train vibrated past it once too often on it's way out to the terminus at Montauk. Ah well....

We had a lovely time in Montauk by the way. Under the influence of way too much wine and cheese, Linda and I have decided to start a new project; one that focuses on taking our flag back from the Republicans and giving CPR to the Constitution. We've even thought of a name for ourselves, though we would never stoop to calling ourselves PUMAs. (I think that whole 'Puma' and 'Cougar' thing has gotten a little stale, don't you?) When we've created our manifesto, we plan to run it by you so you can pick out the stupid parts. I'll bet you can't wait!

- Maggie

Goodness Gracious! Two Chris Hitchens articles in a row.....

.....and neither of them have set my teeth on edge. That's a 50% improvement!

No but I joke about ole' Chris. I can actually read and appreciate about 80% of his stuff, even if I don't entirely agree with it. And the other 20% of the time, he's just looking for a fight, so that doesn't count.

Here's the second article:

http://www.slate.com/id/2202163/

And here's the first:

http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/

- Lois Carneiro

Christopher Hitchens - A Man Who Pisses Everyone Off...

.....including me, on occasion. So, I guess he must be doing something right. Please read his article in 'Vanity Fair' about the 'kleptocracy' of the New Banana Republic.

http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/

- Lois (Maggie) Carneiro

Thanks to Redditor, Trifecta!

Dear 'Trifecta',

I'm putting this up on my blog. That cowardly old bigot deserves as much air time as we can give him.

Lois Carneiro

A man brought a stuffed monkey doll wearing an Obama sticker to a Palin campaign event in Johnstown, Ohio. Realizing he was caught on camera, he passed it off to a child he didn't know. (cbsnews.com)

- Lois (Maggie) Carneiro

Maddow: Venomous Hate at McCain-Palin Rallies is Frightening

Here is a very comprehensive report from Rachel Maddow. There were a couple of times when I almost felt sorry for John McCain, when he was trying to calm down the mob. Please watch it all the way through.




- Lois (Maggie) Carneiro

Soon It Will Be Halloween. Here's Something Scary!

I present this without comment, except to my good friends who belong to the NRA.

When the Constitution gets suspended, they WILL be taking away your perfectly legal right to own firearms. They won't listen to ME, but they may listen to you! Don't let this happen.



Sincerely Yours,
- Lois (Maggie) Carneiro

Now is the Winter of our Discontent....

.....made glorious summer by....this post from our good friend, Rich Simon at: http://scorpionbowl.blogspot.com/

The times, they are a-changing and it don't take a weatherman to tell which way the wind blows so we all must suffer a sea change, into something rich and strange, in order to survive, perhaps to prosper, perhaps to become something better than what we are now.

Read his post with an open mind and a courageous heart. He's telling us about the start of a great adventure.

- Lois (Maggie) Carneiro

Is There No Balm in Montauk?

The Owl and the Pussy-cat went to the sea
In a blue jay-poop covered car,
They took some honey, and not much money,
Wrapped up with a Hershey Bar.

To The Royal Atlantic they were bound,
To a room on the second floor.
With two queen beds,
Pillows for heads.
And a deck with a sliding door.

(Take the 'Virtual Tour' of the 'Ocean Front-Extra Large)

They dined on mince, and slices of quince,
Which they ate with a runcible spoon;
And neck-in-neck, out on the deck,
They drank by the light of the moon,
The moon,
They drank by the light of the moon. (Apologies to Edward Lear.)

- Lois (Maggie) Carneiro

Be Careful What You Wish For

I've said it before and now I'm saying it again. As much as I would like to, I simply cannot vote for the McCain/Palin ticket in November, because it would be a stupid, selfish and destructive thing to do.

But the folks on the video below want John McCain and Sarah Palin to win. And, more importantly, these folks deserve to have John McCain and Sarah Palin win. They deserve to live with the consequences of their love of violence, their intolerance, their bigotry and their misogyny. It's only natural that they identify with hatefulness born of ignorance and mental instability, as those qualities seem to be their own defining characteristics.

So, even though the rest of us would have to take our lumps along with them, I'm perversely hoping that they get exactly what they're asking for. And then we can see who they blame for what happens during the next four years.

Dennis Kucinich in 2012. You heard it here first.

- Lois (Maggie) Carneiro

Wait a Minute!!

"McCain still struggling in states won by Bush"--This from Yahoo News.

Well, of course!

McCain and Palin are caricatures. One based in the past and one based in the Archie comics.

People might want a war horse and a pitbull but these are strange days and reason must take precedence.

Americans are resistant to Reason. These are hard times indeed if we're finally opting for Brains.

OK, now I'm leaving for NY...

I'm Bound Away

I'm leaving tomorrow morning for Rochester, NY. I've already outlined what I'll be doing while I'm there but here's a refresher:

Rochester, NY 2 days with the Hatchling and pick Cath up at the airport Friday evening.



Saturday early morning: Cath and I drive to Lake Placid, NY for a family wedding. It's going to be a good time but what I'm especially looking forward to is the political thinking of the other guests--I need other opinions and perspectives than my own and I'm pretty sure I'll find them there. Saturday and Sunday in Placid and then we leave for

Somers, NY where we will visit with the Olde Original Matriarch, Louise Blum--92 years old and hating it--but the very salt of the Earth.

We will pick Hermana up in Somers and toot around the old sod for a few hours before driving to

JFK so Cath can pick up a ride back to Tacoma. Hermana and I will continue to

Montauk, LI to commune with the past, present and future--all encapsulated in the Autumnal Atlantic--also in the autumnal Atlantic are lobsters--I'm going to do some serious communing with a lobster.

Then back to Rochester where I'll keep house for the Hatchling for a few days before returning to Tacoma.


In each place I'm going to try and get some photos and write some impressions of what the hell I'm feeling and thinking at that place and time. Probably be as boring as can be but there you are.
I'm going to have a lot of fun--I'll be back here 10/22.

Let's Take Five!

Just five short minutes for a little music appreciation. Sit back and enjoy the musical stylings of The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain!
- Lois (Maggie) Carneiro

Intelligent Decisions

Has the USA always been like this?
We are in debt. The fellows who got us there are still running the show. We the people are now responsible for paying that debt back to the tune of 700 billion dollars. Is that a tax hike I hear?? I thought Republicans weren't going to raise taxes. Yes, its on the backs of Joe Six-Pack and his neighbors now---the Main Streeters, the Hockey Moms and their children for years to come. George W sure is happy. Bailed us out, he did.

Dennis Kucinich on the Bail-out

Congressman Kucinich says,

.....“Some people will ask of this Congress, what were we thinking? Why did we give $700 billion bailout to Wall Street without fixing what caused the problem in the first place? Why did we rig the free markets for security fraudsters? Why didn’t we explore alternatives to let Wall Street solve its own problems? Why didn’t we have money save millions of homeowners, create millions of jobs, and a green economy? Why didn’t we stop the speculators? Why wasn’t there accountability? Why didn’t we take time to make an intelligent decision?

“Why? Why? Why?”

Please read the whole article posted at AfterDowningStreet.org

- Lois (Maggie) Carneiro

UPDATE: The House of Representatives has just passed the 'lick and and a promise' bail-out bill. Dennis Kucinich stood his ground and voted 'No'.

- Maggie (At about 4:00pm.)

Do I Watch 'The Simpsons"??!!??

"The Simpsons" is one of the things this country can be proud of! They've been speaking truth to power long before that phrase became a cliche. I bought the first three seasons on DVD. I watch them on 'Surf The Channel'. (No TV)

"The Simpsons", telling it like it is.

Don't Vote!

Debt does it all

I totally agree that Americans are shackled by their debt. Too busy making ends meet to look up at the world around them.
I do remember that Tupperware floating away. I am already regretting not staying longer but by the time I get off the plane I will be glad to have come home. I will get back to work then and start saving up some money for the holidays.
I am working tonight but plan to keep up with the debate action via the Internet. I hope she gets absolutely crushed. This is wicked of me, but I cannot stand her incompetence. She must be punished for it.
Does anyone on this blog watch the Simpson's? Is it just me or is Joe Biden the school superintendent? HA!
Another sad thing about going to work tonight will be missing game 2 of the AL and NL division series. I watched both games last night and enjoyed them immensely.
I just got over a three day migraine. It really sucked this time. I was even sick to my stomach. You don't need to call me, Mom. I'm fine now. Mom tends to panic about health related items and me. I once made the mistake of emailing her that I cut the inside of my mouth and my phone rang within a minute of hitting the send button. Mothers!

Avarice, Indeed.

Hermana hits it on the head again.

There's a reason GWB, the House and the Senate are going to pass this bill swiftly and that's so the people don't have too much time to think about it. ("What do you mean too fast? We rejected it once for you!")

Government will always bail out big business--they are arm-in-arm.

Government set this up back in Reagan's administration. I don't know how the pauperization of the people profits the present administration--well, wait a minute--yes, I do!

Keep the people in a stranglehold of debt and they don't have the luxury of time to think about how their representatives are screwing them over.

Terrify them about being on the threshold of the next Great Depression and they'll go along with anything.

Keep them poor and frightened and they'll work for us forever--cabanaboys to the military-industrial complex.

The Great Indebtedness of 2008 was orchestrated by the greed and baser instincts of the financial institutions and by the Government of the USA working on the greed and baser instincts of the people of the USA. Buy it! Get it! Have it! Spend it!

We took the bait. But they only have us by the balls if we cower in fear of losing what we have. Face it, people.

Grow up and let's take one in the teeth for ourselves. Let it fail. And then let's screw the banks and---

Let's Terrify the Government.

Linda

Reply to Congressman John Hall

Today I received an email from John Hall's office, explaining why he voted to pass the revised bail-out plan. (Which was roundly defeated in the House of Representatives.) Mr. Hall did make some good points, but I can't endorse any plan which was given 15 minutes of consideration and doesn't include criminal charges against those who LIED to the people, to the press, to their employees and their investors.

I wrote this to Mr. Hall on his own website email page, which isn't working! Apparently, it's bailed out! So, now this is an 'open letter' which I intend to send far and wide.

Issue: Armageddon. "Pass this bill! Pass it now! We need action. Immediate action. Don't look both ways before crossing the street, just RUN, dammit! Our futures hang in the balance. We have no time to take stock of the situation; it's got to be done now, now NOW! Oh sure, Congress gets to take time off to observe a religious holiday, but we have NO time to convene an advisory board of independent economists or even to determine if Congress is half-way cognizant of the situation and the consequences of lightning-fast, knee-jerk reactions that, coincidentally, keep things pretty sweet for some CEOs who SHOULD be going to jail, instead of receiving only half of their 'Golden Parachutes. So don't think about it, JUST DO IT!"

Frankly, Mr. Hall, I don't give a tinker's damn about the way you voted. This is a world-wide economic problem and it deserves a little bit more time and consideration than you seem willing to allow. Let's get the crackpots who ran up a humongous war debt (whilst privatizing and deregulating major economic markets) OUT OF OFFICE before we try to start digging ourselves out of this hole. Until the Bush Administration is neutralized it's always going to be the taxpayers who take it up the rear.

(Point of information not included in my original reply: The IRS processes about two million tax returns every year. (This includes large corporations.) If we took the trillion dollars that are 'needed' for this bail-out and divided it amongst all those who filed, we'd be getting back $5,000.00 per tax return. (These are my calculations and probably wrong.) $5,000.00 would look pretty good to me right now. Let Big Business bail itself out. Their officers and board members have enough in their off-shore bank accounts to do it.)

You wrote: "Tomorrow I am returning to Washington for votes on a revised rescue package. I'm not giving up and I'll continue working until we come to a bipartisan agreement to stabilize the markets." Dandy. Make it a good agreement. You also wrote about taking "swift, responsible, and effective steps...". Let's go a little light on the 'swift', please, and try to nail something together that isn't the result of uniformed panic and unbridled avarice.

Lois Carneiro