What If She Said “No”?

Imagine if every American woman woke up one day soon, resolved to make it known to anyone who asked, that unless a comprehensive healthcare reform bill was voted into law that ensured medical coverage to every other American in the country, without restriction, or infringement on any woman’s reproductive rights, any politician, male or female, on either side of the aisle, who did not work toward that goal, who compromised in favor of corporate interests, or, who was percieved to be working against the interests of American women and their families for any reason, would be voted against in their next election.

That’s it.  No organizing, bra burning, torch-carrying, letter-writing; nuttin’.  Just millions of women making up their minds, “no healthcare; no vote.”  In fact, if you cave yield to expediency, sell out your constituents, talk out of both sides of your mouth while stuffing corporate cash in both front pockets, or, worse, actively work against passage of a law guaranteeing access to comprehensive medical care to all Americans, or attempt to block such passage in any way, we’re voting you out.  No matter who you are.  What side you’re on.  Who you’re running against.  In fact, if 2 of you major party sellout scum, male or female, are running against each other, we will vote for whoever the third option is, regardless of political affiliation, corporate backing, policy position, or qualifications.  If no viable third party candidate presents him- or herself, we will actively seek to find one, and ensure that his or her name is placed on the ballot, whether that person has any political experience, or desire to run for office.  If we have to recruit our next door neighbor, our child’s cafeteria lady, a bus driver, garbage collector, Wal-Mart or 7-11 clerk, bag lady, or one of those crazy aunts or uncles who remind us of Joe Biden that live in the basement/attic that every family has and none of us talk about, we will put their names in contention, and vote for them.

Wouldn’t it be lover-ly if, with nothing more than a simple whisper campaign,  where she told 2 people, and she told 2 people, and so on, and so on, and so on…we could make every politician in office at every level aware of our resolve?  And, not only them; all those activist/union/religious leaders who want our dues/tithes so they can suck up to power and sell out our interests, have to be told that the same goes for them, too.  You don’t actively advocate on our behalf, ya gotta go.   Let them know that this is no idle threat, if they fuck us over, they lose their job.   Period.  End of story.

Timid Feminism = Timidism

While there is much in the news to discuss, much of it inter-connected; and I have certainly spent the better part of the week collecting news articles, videos and links in preparation for a post addressing said issues, instead of spending time and energy fanning the “blame Islam flames,” I’m much more strongly compelled to lash out against what I see as the undue timidity of so-called feminist women in the face of coordinated attack, especially when confronted with forces lead by other women.

Lord knows I am not alone in my outrage about the all-too-predictable capitulation to the Right by our Mighty Morphin’ Majority Democrats for no Earthly apparent reason.  Women everywhere are bitchin’ and  moanin’ about the seemingly calculated attempts at the  Stepfordization of American females.  While I see this as the inevitable result of the efforts of that faction of the country’s politics now being fronted by the insidious Bachmann Palin Overdrive, the eager surrender of females on the Left, either because of faith in the illusion of the myth of political expediency, or due to belief in fantasies of sisterhood, unattainable even in legend and fairy tale, as being necessary for success, the end result is the same; when women buy into the “helpless second, weaker, yet, inherently evil sex” patriarchal theory as their self-identity starting position, women lose.

Leaders lead.  They stake a position, articulate it, and invite others to join.  Whether anybody takes them up on their offer or not, they proceed according to their plan.  You cannot lead by consensus, or by whining about who doesn’t see things your way, thereby blaming them for your condition.   Constantly complaining about other women who don’t support your vision, and how much you wish they would for everybody’s sake, is a masochistically masturbatory waste of time.  If only “she” would think like “me,” “we” could do x, y, z, is a crackhead’s pipe dream.  To take it a step further and fantasize that Utopian Nirvana can only be reached by aligning oneself with “her” anyway, regardless of the width of the gulf between your points of view, simply on the strength of shared anatomical features, is a crackhead’s delirium.

Wimpitude In/Suckitude Out

I’ve been saying for months that we are not going to get any substantive health care reform in this country any time soon, no matter what the Pretendident, his cronies in the press, Congress, or anybody else says he’s working really, really, no, really super hard to try to do.  He, and they, are damned liars, as a quick perusal of the headlines will easily show.  “Dems Alone Can’t Deliver Obama Health Care Win” screams the AP’s.  “Why the fuck not?” scream I.  He’s got solid majorities in both Houses, and, the most powerful, effective Speaker of the House in history running point and gleefully playing Wicked Attack Witch From the West for him, according to Politico.  Her ostrich-sized eggs more than make up for Senate Majority Leader Harry (Casper Milquetoast) Reid’s lack of anything comparable to them, so, why can’t the most popular, articulate, persuasive black Pretendident of Any Color schmooze the Sheeple and their representatives into a real Democratic health care plan, instead of bending over and grabbing his ankles to accept whatever the overly influential Republicans want to shove?

There are a couple of glaringly obvious reasons why.  One, he’s lying through his teeth.  Waffles Obama does not want real health care reform.  If he did, he wouldn’t be talking health insurance reform.  You can’t “reform” the problem.  That’s like “reforming” a tumor.  He wants digitized medical records.  Period.  Everything else is smoke.   The reasons for this are myriad, but simple.  Digital medical records by 2014 have been the government’s goal for years, and, those companies and corporations desperate to implement it, paid dearly for him to deliver for them, and others don’t want to be left behind.  I’ve speculated many times about the Republican support Obama has always enjoyed, maybe it’s partially because the use, and misuse of said records represents a veritable gold mine for all interested parties, including multiple government agencies.  And, maybe that’s why he seems so willing to cave.  That’s probably it in a nutshell.

Excuses, Excuses

There seems to be a movement afoot to send women back to the kitchen, happy, barefoot and maybe, unwillingly pregnant.  Now, I could be seeing bogeymen in the bushes, so to speak, but, this “women need permission to make decisions, men don’t”  developing theme bears watching.  Between the Barackulator’s backtracking on selecting a woman to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter, (which really doesn’t count as backtracking since he’s only responded to that trial balloon floated in the Omedia by advocates, like the Wimpy Wishy Washer he is) and “Michelle’s Got The Whole World in Her Bare Arms” articles all over the place, one can be forgiven for seeing a typical Axelrovian AstroTurf campaign in the making.   Add the feminist-endorsed-by-their-silence, “FOCA is not a legislative priority, because women usually do the right thing when they talk to their Daddies” happy crappy recently uttered by the Face of Feminism, and, I think it’s past time to worry.

“Duh”mb And “Duh”mber

Sometimes it’s hard to imagine that so many people entrusted to run our country are as dumb as they are.  Sometimes it’s harder to imagine that the people entrusted to bring us information about the dumb shit the dummies in charge do in our collective name are even dumber than the dummies they’re reporting on.  But, if reading the news reports of the past week can be trusted at all to contain any smidgen of a hint of a scintilla of anything resembling truth, we are being governed by a plethora of Keystone Kop wannabes, and we know that because Spanky and Our Gang, Jr. told us so.

Let’s face it, ya gotta be at least a little stupid to get punked by White House Press Secretary and Tom Arnold/Wally Cox love child look-a-like, Robert Gibbsmeabreak.  But, according to Fox News, that’s exactly what happened to the White House press corps Friday.  Told ya they were all stupid.  The whole lot of ‘em.  In fact, not even I could believe they were that dumb, and kinda figured maybe the humorless drones over a Fox were having their idea of fun and yanking everybody’s chain with a belated April Fool’s Day-type prank, but, no, other sources like the Christian Science Monitor, and the Talking Points Memo press conference transcript, also confirmed that the sorry attempt at humor did indeed happen:

I Just Don’t Care Today

Today’s post is late going up because after following the news religiously for more than two years, and intensely religiously for the last few months, I’ve had it.  I just don’t care today.  Tomorrow is another day, yet, unlike Scarlet, I’m not so sure it holds redemption for our recent past.  And, frankly my dear, I don’t really give a good, hot damn.

There’s no one breaking point, no single straw that can be called last.  The whole mishegas that is our current American political landscape is so pervasively depressing that to say the whole thing sucks is not only an understatement, it is an Herculean exercise in restraint.  Pissy, turd-filled cesspool of bilgewater is more like it.

So, Nasty Pancakes is a bald-faced liar.  What else is new?  Why do her lies make her an undouched twat, while the nation’s Commander-in-Chief ’s lies don’t seem to make him a smegmated dickhole?  They’re both acting like little kids who fervently believe that simply wiping the evidentiary crumbs from their chocolate-smeared mouths will convince Mommy that the whole bag of magically delicious Keebler cookies they swiped were indeed eaten by the tree-dwelling little elves that made them.  At least the kids have the excuse of being children; grown folks calling government agencies liars, as if that doesn’t make them stupid for listening to, and believing anything said liars tell them, or claiming that the impossibility of further inflaming people who would blow themselves up in order to kill somebody who might have once met somebody who’s heard of somebody who knows you, is justification for anything they do, have no excuse for such irrational, illogical behavior at all.  “Don’t let the serial killer see you making finger circles around your ears, or rolling your eyes while you load your gun and set the house alarm, or he might get mad,” only makes sense if your head is so far up your own ass you can kiss your tonsils every time you sneeze.

The Myth Of Affordable Health Care

There are many reasons I didn’t want Barack Obama to win the Democratic nomination for president last year, other than the fact that he’s a lying, cheating, race-baiting, race-traitorous, unqualified, inexperienced, corporate shill, whose only reason for running was to be a front man for the Money Mafia.   However, the main reason is that it was patently clear from the beginning that if he were to be elected, the closest we would get to comprehensive health care reform would be a long-winded, TelePrompTer read, apologetic, “what a good boy am I,”  insurance company-favoring, less-than-nothing, “compromise was the very best we could do” speech about why we won’t get it.  There was only one candidate in the entire field who was likely to fight for true health care for all, and that’s exactly why she’s not president right now.

So, now that the Mystical Magical Lyin’ King has been firmly ensconced in the Oval Office, we’re supposed to sit through this stage-managed, dramatic production of a serio-comic farce that’s currently running in Congress where the insurance industry assumes the role of its own regulators once again, and pretend that we’re fooled into believing that something benefiting us will eventually come out of it.  One doesn’t have to be a rocket scientist, brain surgeon, or second grader to realize that America will get no closer to “affordable” healthcare for all, or, even most, of its citizens, than I will get to Pluto on a bicycle in my lifetime.  What we will get is lip service, bullshit, lies and theater.

An example of all of the above rolled into one juicy hopium doobie is this bit of happy crappy reported by CQ Politics yesterday.   During the way-off Broadway production of Health Care Follies running in Congress starring the Senate Finance Committee and Big Insurance as themselves, Karen Ignagni,  president and CEO of America’s Health Insurance Plans, (AHIP) as the Beaver, put on a big, “We see the light! Let us fix ourselves!” show, designed to fool the gullible into believing that the outcome of this charade is not a foregone conclusion, and a government run option, far from single payer, mind you, is actually on the table.  Don’t believe me?  Read the script:

The 100 Day WORM

This is the  Spokesmodel-in-Chief’s 100 Day Ain’t I Great? speech before his third Fuck It, Why Not? press conference.   His subliminal thoughts are italicized.  The regular type represents his WORM (What Obama Really Meant).

Hey, ‘Bots, how’s it hangin’?  Before I get into what you all came for, talking about me, what I’ve done, and how cool I look doing it, ’cause, let’s face it, if it wasn’t about me…okay, and, to a much lesser extent, you, and how much you love me, none of us would be here, right?  We need each other, you and me.  You need to love me, ’cause I’m black and cute, and this is the only way most of y’all can love a cute black man in public and still have friends, and, to be honest, for once, heh, heh, I need you to love me, no matter how much it costs you.  ‘Cause, it ain’t really about you, it’s all about me.  Always.  See,…Huh?  I’m on?  Well, let’s do the damned thing, then.

Make Nancy Pelosi Cry

Some days there are just so many good stories to pursue in the news that you just don’t know where to start.  Today is not one of those days.  Yes, many stupid things happened yesterday that can be laid at the feet of the Obministration We Love To Hate, but the one that stands out, really stands out.  Seems President Arugula Barry Waffles’ brain, Speaker of the House, Nasty Pancakes, is whining about the overwhelming number of faxes she’s received in support of putting the option of single payer health care on the table.  After 1Payer.net’s email campaign reportedly flooded Nasty P.’s office, her suckophants tried to sound the all-clear.  Don’t let ‘m off the hook.  They’re the ones who issued the Dirty Harry-esque, ” you feelin’ lucky, punk, make my day” challenge, daring the 59% of us in favor of true health care reform to “make them” put the option on the table, so, I say let’s come back at them with our own Die Hard-style, “yippee ki-yay, motherf*ckers,” response.  Fax, email, call, and/or write all of ‘em.  There are three options available on the 1Payer.net site, with links to easy form emails as well as Nasty’s office email address, AmericanVoices@mail.house.gov.   And, pay no attention to her predictable claim that your faxes don’t count if you’re not in her district.  She’s the freaking Speaker of the Freaking House, a pitiful Freddie Prinze,” ees not my yob, mahn,” impression just doesn’t cut it.  Eeet ees your fluckin’ yob, Bighead.

Single Payer This Way

According to Joseph Cannon at Cannonfire via Corrente, who got it from somewhere, but is directing everybody to 1Payer.net, it seems single payer health care is off the table because Nancy Pelosi is convinced that we, the people, don’t want it.  From Corrente:

It appears that Congressional leaders are being deliberately dismissive of single-payer to the point of ludicrous statements. It’s like they have put their fingers in their ears and are yelling “I can’t hear you, I can’t hear you.” Here they are in all their Congressional member glory:

Baucus a few days ago: “Everything BUT single payer is on the table. Single payer is off the table.”

Pelosi: “In our caucus, over and over again, we hear single payer, single payer, single payer. Well, it’s not going to be a single payer.”

Pelosi’s aide: “Where are the phone calls, e-mails and faxes in support of single-payer? Speaker Pelosi has been in favor of single-payer for a long time. Now make us do it.”

If you do want single payer health care, which Physicians for a National Health Program supports, or you just want to make a liar of Nasty P., send faxes til the cows come home.  Then, send another one twenty.  It’s quick, easy, painless, and crucially important.  Don’t let Barry Waffles and Nasty Pancakes screw this up without a fight.   As Cannon points out, if the Obacrats are gonna cram this thing through no matter what the Republicans want, make ‘em go all the freaking way.  This chance might not come again.   Let’s just do this.  Please.

Also, please read this comment that Alessandro Machi of Daily PUMA left on my Dueling AstroTurf II thread about the egregious behavior of the credit card industry and how it impacts all of us.  It’s important, too, in my humble opinion.

The credit card thing. Bravo to those who avoided it in the first place. However, there are legitimate reasons people go into debt. Business investments and medical emergencies are two common reasons, paying for children’s education is another one, so is losing a job and using the cards to get by.

What Dodd Did (And Probably Didn’t Do)

The whole “who put the “out” in the stimulus bill?” kerfluffle has had me flummoxed since it came to light.  Why all the confusion?  Either Christopher Dodd is a one-man crime spree, ( ‘cuz finagling with a bill after it’s been voted on should be a crime, if it isn’t) or he meddled with the wording during some crack in time before it was voted on, (in which case somebody should have noticed) or, he didn’t do nothing.  I vote for the last one.

Chris Dodd was not on the House Senate committee that changed the language of the executive compensation amendment to the stimulus bill.  I’ve posted the relevant portion of the February 8, 2009 version of the Senate bill here, and the final version here.  The segment containing the February 11, 2009 cutoff date affecting AIG’s retention bonuses is not in the Senate version; however, the bill does contain the Wyden-Snowe amendment calling for a 35% tax, and a provision that executives be paid no more than the president of the United States.   As near as I can tell, this is the bill that was voted on, and passed by the Senate, Tuesday, February 10, 2009.  In fact, in Dodd’s mea culpa, he refers to the “Senate approved” language.

What, You Thought He Was Kidding?

For some reason, a lot of people seem surprised about the scope of change that President Baracus Hubris Maximus (Hail, Ceasar!) has attempted to bring about so early in his administration.  Those budget-mocking magpies, as well as some KoolAid drunk acolytes now screeching, “Whoa, wait a minute!” with stunned disbelief in their eyes in light of some of his more dramatic moves, would be a lot funnier if they weren’t so pathetic.  He told you so.  Over and over again.  Did you think he was kidding?  Or, were you lulled into acquiescence by his transparent sleight of hand, “bipartisan”  appeasements, obviously designed as diversionary tactics for the easily fooled?

If “grassroots” mandatory volunteerism is not for you, sorry, you just weren’t paying attention.  If health care “reform,” not real Universal Health Care, is not okay by your lights, again, you slept through his stump speeches.  If you thought he meant to end all wars, or even end the one in Iraq, you just weren’t listening.  He really means to change the way “Washington does business” according to his own “post partisan” vision of how Washington’s business should be done, not according to any past model with which any particular group or entity not affiliated with him is comfortable or familiar with.  And, he plans to do it by claiming that he has your blessing.

We’re talking Barackism, here, folks.  Part Socialism, part Capitalism, part government backed Corporatism, Barackism is an amalgam of ideologies shaped and molded in his image.  Fascism?  Call it what you like, there’s a  little something for everybody to love or hate.  Of course, to accomplish his ambitious goals of “mixed income housing,” military and charter school supplemented public education, faith-based community service to government, revamped industry, and corporate partnered central banking, among other radical programs that seem to be large parts of Obacracy, you have to throw the baby out with the bathwater and start the world anew.

This will probably piss a lot of people off.  Think he cares?  Not.  Dissent expressed merely represents obstacles to be worked around, not roadblocks likely to derail his plans.  Because in every instance where resentment is met, regardless from which quarter it comes, he can always say, “I told you so.”  He doesn’t think in terms of Republican and Democrat, you do.  Left, right, center, schmenter, he doesn’t care about those labels at all.  Progressive, conservative, these are merely conveniently self-applied designations allowing him to craft appropriate methods of pacification.

That’s why the undercarriage of his bus is so well populated with such diverse occupants.  All are expendable.  You’re either with him, or you’re subject to be run over. No one is guaranteed a seat merely because their self-interests are served by doing his bidding while riding his coattails.  Ask Howard Dean.  And Pepsi. (see below)

That’s why his campaign was so ruthless, he has a single-minded plan he is determined to execute by any means necessary.  Ask Alice Palmer, or Blair Hull.  Or Hillary Clinton.

Whether Obacracy is his idea alone, or more likely, an intricate game plan implemented by an as yet unidentified cabal for which he fronts, or, less likely, even assembled, is open to debate.  However, there is no question, at least in my mind, that the sweeping “change” program beginning to come into focus, is the same one he’s been touting between administering massive hopium doses all along.  Divert attention, hit ‘em where it hurts when they’re not looking, divide and conquer, push the envelope, exploit the system in place until you can change it, tell ‘em what they want to hear while you sugar coat the things they don’t, these are the all too familiar tactics laid out in the opening chapter of the Obacrat playbook. Whether he wrote the book or was hired to sell it, is of absolutely no importance; unless people wake up to what they signed on for when they voted for him, it’s the rule book we’re all going to have to live by for a while.  Might as well listen when he drops hints about what’s in it.

“Change” is not, nor can it ever be considered, a lie if you neglect to insist upon specifics.  Let’s face it, the ability to hide your agenda in plain sight while you play your cards close to the vest in order to trick sheeple into thinking things not in their best interests are the ones they want most in the world, and, their idea to boot, is a pretty frickin’ neat trick.

At Least He’s Still Black

What’s up with the Most Transformational Super Fantastic Bombastic Charismatic Political Figure Who Happened To Be Black And Blessed, that he can’t pick a cabinet for shit?  According to Fox News, Commerce Secretary appointee, Judd Gregg has officially said, “bump this noise, I can’t hang,” only not exactly in those words:

Republican Sen. Judd Gregg of New Hampshire has withdrawn his nomination to become President Obama’s commerce secretary.

In a statement released by his office, the New Hampshire senator cites “irresolvable conflicts” on issues including the economic stimulus package.

Gregg was named the Commerce nominee a week ago after the withdrawal of former New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson.

So while Oboyi’mboss trots around the country today being just black enough, killing two racial birds with one stone by celebrating Lincoln’s birthday, which conveniently falls during Black History Month so he doesn’t actually have to mention it, in the “symbolism over substance” manner of the 16th President, his much touted “superior judgment” is proving to be equally insubstantial.  His scandal plagued Treasury Secretary, Turbo Tax Timmy Geithner, tax cheat,  (TTTG,tc) has shown himself to be not only not the only guy on the planet capable of leading us out of the wilderness of our economic crisis, but excruciatingly boring as well.

Obuyme’s first Secretary of Commerce choice, Bill (Judas) Richardson, is another big ol’ heap o’ trouble waiting to fully develop like a Polaroid picture, according to Politico:

A grand jury in New Mexico is currently investigating whether the financial services company CDR funneled more than $100,000 in campaign contributions to Richardson’s PAC in order to win state bond and construction finance projects. Several other financial firms and banks, including UBS, are also accused of contributing to the PAC in order to gain contracts.

Richardson’s office has been subpoenaed to hand over correspondence with the Democratic Governors’ Association, which received contributions from UBS during Richardson’s time as DGA chairman that alone total more than $400,000.

And the governor’s former chief of staff was recently identified in another alleged pay-to-play scheme; the allegations are that a Chicago investment firm was awarded a contract to handle the state’s pension fund because it contributed $15,000 to Richardson’s PAC. The fund lost $90 million under the company’s watch.

In addition, Richardson has come under criticism for awarding state contracts to political allies. Local news outlets have chronicled how one local firm stacked with Richardson allies has been awarded $7.8 million in state auditing contracts since he became governor. In the five years prior to his 2002 election, the firm received $274,000 in such contracts, according to the New Mexico Independent.

I guess when you can get your party’s high-ranking officials to tout your controversial, not-quite-done, historic victory of a “stimulus bill” as “transformational,” you don’t have to sweat a withdrawal from a guy who seemed like such a good idea when he “campaigned for the job,” only to back out when he realized he doesn’t like you much.  What’s one more setback when you’re the first black President of Hope and Change?

I mean really, could we, as a people, really afford to wait and pray for a good one?

At least one of his appointees seems to be working out.

Whose Art Is This, Anyway?

The Associated Press says that the most annoyingly ubiquitous piece of Obama pseudo-art in the whole, entire freaking universe and beyond, and then ten paces beyond that, Shep Fairey’s “Hope-A-Dope” horror movie-colored Warhol Soup Can ripoff (can you tell I don’t like it?) infringes their copyright.  From an AP article posted on CBS News:

The image, Fairey has acknowledged, is based on an Associated Press photograph, taken in April 2006 by Manny Garcia at the National Press Club in Washington.

The AP says it owns the copyright, and wants credit and compensation. Fairey disagrees.

“The Associated Press has determined that the photograph used in the poster is an AP photo and that its use required permission,” the AP’s director of media relations, Paul Colford, said in a statement.

So, this Fairey guy, who supposedly has a badass maverick rebel’s disregard for “da roolz,” Googles “Obama photo,” finds one, steals it, and uses it without permission to make money?  Open and shut no-brainer, right?  Don’t be dense.  Haven’t you ever heard of “fair use?”

“We believe fair use protects Shepard’s right to do what he did here,” says Fairey’s attorney, Anthony Falzone, executive director of the Fair Use Project at Stanford University and a lecturer at the Stanford Law School. “It wouldn’t be appropriate to comment beyond that at this time because we are in discussions about this with the AP.”

Fair use is a legal concept that allows exceptions to copyright law, based on, among other factors, how much of the original is used, what the new work is used for and how the original is affected by the new work.

I wish I hadn’t read that.  Every time I hear the word “fair” associated with an Obamazoid, I’m reminded of Harold Ickes pleading with the Rules and Bylaws Committee of my old party, the Democrats, to apply the party’s own standards of “fair reflection” in determining the outcome of Florida and Michigan’s delegate appropriation in light of their “rule breaker” status, only to be told by Carl Levin that “fair reflection” couldn’t be applied to a flawed process.  Bastard.

I’m sorry, but I remember every minute of that fiasco of a debacle of a circus of a joke, and I’m still so fucking pissed off about it, I get happy every time another creep assed fuck seems to realize just how screwed we all are because they encouraged and enabled the KoolAid pushing “boneheaded screw-up” they were sucking off to cheat and exploit the system all the way to the White House.  Now, they all want to know why he seems to be so tentative, wishy-washy, unsure.  Because that’s what he always was, you dipshits! That’s who he is! When you (s)elect an inexperienced, incompetent, TelePrompTer reader as Commander in Chief, that’s what you get.  And when you cheat to do it, that’s just so much worse.

Obama’s fighting Pelosi and sucking up to Republicans.  No shit?  We told you he was going to do that.  We yelled our heads off and blogged our fingers raw, and you followed your leader’s email instructions and sabotaged us at every turn.   And cheated.

I’ve written blog posts about it, as have many others, including Alegre, who says we must never forget.  I agree.  We must never allow the Pretender President and all his paid-off enablers to forget that we remember, and let them get away with re-writing their clear-cut history of cheating.

In Michigan, nobody was supposed to campaign or fund raise, but there was no imperative to remove one’s name from the ballot.  The state was having a primary, anyway, so what noble stance would one be taking by removing one’s name from a “beauty contest” that “wasn’t going to count for anything?”  The obvious answer is kiss my ass, none.  Just like there was no reason to campaign for votes under the guise of encouraging Democrats, Republicans, and Independents to vote “uncommitted” in a “beauty contest that wasn’t going to count.  Like Barack Obama did.

This blogger at Our Michigan laid it all out.  However, Obama’s intentions were never secret; the Washington Post, CNN, Politico, Huffington Post, Newsweek, and others documented the ploy, all giving complimentary details of the John and Monica Conyers/Carl Levin-led campaign to get people to vote “uncommitted” for Barack Obama.  They needn’t have bothered; it was on my.barackobama.com, now Organizing for America:

A group of several hundred Michigan voters plan to knock on doors, make calls and hold rallies for a rather unconventional candidate in next Tuesday’s primary — “Uncommitted.”

The only way that backers of Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards or New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, who withdrew their names from Michigan’s Democratic primary ballot, can show their support is to vote “uncommitted.”

Detroiters for Uncommitted Voters, most of whom say they are supporting Obama, want to make sure that people don’t avoid the polls Tuesday because their favorite candidate isn’t on the ballot.

“We really want to educate people on what they should do,” former Wayne County Commissioner Edna Bell said. “If Michigan voters want change, the uncommitted vote is their way to make their voices heard.”

He cheated.  So, it’s no surprise that one of his followers is doing the same thing.  The only surprise is that so many people seem so surprised how things are turning out.

Must Be Something In The Water

Oh, those wacky, horny politicians.  Just when you thought it was safe to go back to Florida, another scandal breaks.  This one, though familiar, is rich in irony, too, too rich, in fact.  See, the cleanup guy got caught wick dipping, too.  Let me explain.

ABC News (and every other news service in the country) is reporting on it’s investigation page, that Nancy Pelosi is calling for an investigation into allegations that Rep.Tim Mahoney, who was elected to replace page palling Mark Foley, paid off his mistress after firing her, to avoid a lawsuit.

Whew!

“I just learned today about the serious allegations concerning Congressman Tim Mahoney,” Pelosi said in a statement. “These charges must be immediately and thoroughly investigated by the House Ethics Committee.”

Right, Nan, sure, whatever.  The Republicans, naturally, are eating this up, so to speak.  From what I could gather reading my favorite scandal rag, Politico, Mahoney is a quite piece of work.  Seems the Congressman is a hypocrite, too.

The scandal could have repercussions far beyond the Sunshine State, where Mahoney ran under the slogan “Restoring America’s values begins at home.”

House Democrats flayed the GOP leadership for covering up Foley’s inappropriate behavior with pages two years ago — and Republicans are eager to return the favor.

Yeah, Timmy, but it’s what begins at the office that got you in trouble.  But wait, there’s more!  Referencing ABC, the article explains the $121,000 payoff to the woman, Patricia Allen, who broke off the affair after learning she wasn’t the only “other woman” in homeboy’s life, and the 2 year job he got her at his communication firm, which immediately kicked him straight to the curb:

“FRCR Inc. has resigned from Tim Mahoney’s campaign and permanently ended our relationship with him,” Fletcher wrote in an e-mail. “According to ABC News, Tim Mahoney apparently included our company in a secret legal settlement without the knowledge of our firm. Our firm did not agree to any legal settlement. If these allegations are true, Tim Mahoney’s actions are unacceptable and not in line with FRCR’s business ethics.”

Play audio of firing here.

All the articles have good juicy details and are worth a read, but I want to move on to the “doin’ a little sumpin’-sumpin’” rumors surrounding the Democratic nominee for president.  I’ve mostly left those accounts alone, not neccessarily because I don’t believe them, I just prefer not to think about it, but the last few days have been interesting, and since we’re dishing…

I’ve never known quite what to make of Larry Sinclair, the man who claims to have done drugs in addition to that thing-thing in the back of a limo with Barack Obama.  Anybody can say anything, of course, but Sinclair has been saying the same thing for a long time.  He even got arrested by Joe Biden’s son for trying to get the media to listen, and I just learned from my friends over at HillBuzz, he’s at it again.  What’s up with that?  Normally, I’d just file the info and be done with it, but…

In the last couple days I’ve read stories on HillBuzz, No Quarter and other sites about some chick Barack Obama was supposed to be banging until Michelle found out and exiled her to a distant island.  It seems Vera Baker was Obama’s campaign finance director until, one day, she wasn’t anymore, and then, she was in Martinique.  Now, like I said, thinking about the Big O playing “hide-the-salami” with anybody is a lunch losing proposition for me.  But with the election looming, The Lifestyles of the Corrupt and Greedy soap opera is getting verrrrry in-ter-rest-ink.

And a little stupid.

SNL Unbanned And Edited

This is the edited version of the controversial Saturday Night Live bailout sketch.  It seems, believe it or not, that the reason the sketch was originally pulled is because neither Lorne Michaels, the show’s creator and producer, nor the NBC legal team, knew that the Sandlers, a couple depicted in the sketch, were real people.  According to the L.A. Times:

“I, in a state of complete ignorance, thought they were characters in the piece,” he said. “I did not know they were real, up until somebody called me about it on Monday. And I went, what? Now, that’s entirely my fault. Entirely.

“When I spoke to them, I can assure you this: They are very, very real. I think they were angry, I think distraught, I think they were not expecting to turn on the television and see that. First of all, I pleaded incompetence, which is not a thing I do often, and the fact that I did not know they were real is 100% my responsibility.”

The unflatteringly depicted couple, accused in the skit of exploiting the subprime mortgage crisis, did not complain; the decision to remove the bit was simply the show’s attempt to excercise an abundance of caution.  You buying any of this?  Another L.A. Times story says this:

A “Saturday Night Live” skit that skewered President Bush, Democrats, homebuyers and subprime lenders for their roles in the mortgage meltdown was removed from the program’s website because it “didn’t meet out standards,” a spokesman for the show said Tuesday. An edited version of the skit will be re-posted online soon, the spokesman said.

A third L.A. Times story, shares this:

In an interview with Gold, the show’s executive producer, Lorne Michaels, said the Sandlers were distraught but had not demanded the changes. He noted the “People who should be shot” line was deleted as was a reference to their “corrupt activities.”

But a comparison of the two versions shows that actually a little more than that was cut. What also was excised was any mention of the involvement of Massachusetts’ Rep. Frank in the Sandler subprime mess.

The original sketch below.

SNL Unbanned

Found it!

more about “SNL Unbanned“, posted with vodpod

h/t Pat Dollard

Voters Confused? You Bet Your Ass!

Slate Magazine, which I grew to hate during the primaries for it’s incessant Obama cheerleading, has an article by Walter Shapiro claiming voters are angry, but too stupid to know why.

A Pew Research Center poll released Wednesday found that 43 percent of all voters admitted that they feel “confused” by the proposed plan to stabilize the financial markets. At the same time, voters grasp that something important is happening — 54 percent say, in response to another question, that they are paying “a lot” of attention to the bailout debate in Washington. Pollster Andy Kohut, the director of the Pew Research Center, said that it was virtually “unparalleled” to have this simultaneous level of interest and confusion in a policy debate. “It’s a tough one to get into the nitty-gritty of,” said Kohut. “It is not like gay marriage that is easy to grasp no matter what your point of view is.”

Hey, Walter, wanna buy a clue?  Maybe what voters are “confused” about is the reason people who get paid to figure stuff out spend so much time looking up their own asses for answers to obvious questions.  We’re “confused” by the fact that the media is so obviously trying to elect a raving lunatic, which Barack Obama is, that they applaud him for doing absolutely nothing to deal with the current economic mess but repeat, over, and over again, that he’s not the guy he’s running against, whose biggest sin, according to Obama, is that he knows the guy who’s been engineering the money train for the last eight years.  The candidate who said, “call me, I got my cell,” the guy who has collected more money from the companies profiting from the restructuring of our financial market than any other, who has also taken more money in his brief tenure from those identified as the major culprits involved in this mess than just about anybody, is for some reason, the media’s fair-haired boy.  Oops, I said, “boy.”  I must be a latent racist, since that’s the only reason I could possibly have to use that particular phrase in that particular instance, or to criticize the Golden Child at all, at least, according to the media.  Never mind that if I am a racist, I must hate myself, ’cause I’ve been black a long time, too.

We’re confused alright, Walter.  It’s hard to figure out how the Democratic party could produce a bill in the House to address the crisis of the imminent collapse of our free market system, or however they framed their “fire-in-a-crowded-theater” clarion call, and then not only not push it through, deliberately sabotage it.  We don’t get that, Walter.  Silly us.

Then there’s David Gergen, who I find considerably more annoying than I would imagine a nest of vipers hatching in my underwear, or a swarm of bees building a hive in my ear to be, who, in a blog post for Anderson Cooper 360 on CNN, bemoans America’s lack of trust in it’s leaders, not just in government, but pretty much, across the board:

Four of the five lowest rated groups in the index were business, Congress, the executive branch, and the press. No wonder the “leaders” of these institutions had so much trouble persuading the general public about the seriousness of our financial mess.

David cites research from The Harvard Center for Public Leadership, which he claims to direct, done in partnership with U.S. News and World Report, and Yankelovich, which states this erosion of trust has been going on for a while:

In the fall of 2005, some 65% said we have a leadership crisis in the country. By 2006, the number had risen to 69%. And last fall, no less than 77% declared there was a crisis of leadership. Moreover, 79% said the United States would decline unless we get better leaders.

Gergen goes on to bitch and moan about the challenges facing Barack Obama and John McCain, as well as all the other pseudo-leaders in other fields, in the face of this growing crisis of confidence, blah, blah, blah. Maybe we’d have more confidence in “leaders” if they didn’t have to commission a stupid study to see what’s right in front of their faces.  The government does a lousy job; that’s why their approval ratings suck.  Both parties are full of corrupt liars.  They always promise “change” in exchange for votes; they get the votes, nothing changes.  “Business” wants 700 billion dollars of taxpayer money to prop up the house of cards they’ve been ripping off those same taxpayers from, and the media is a joke.  Those are pretty good reasons for people to stop trusting them.  And, as far as that “better leaders” thing is concerned, we had one running on the Democratic side that I would have trusted in this crisis with my future, but you guys, Walter and David, were among the worst character assassins out there helping to torpedo her chances to be an effective leader.  That’s why we hate you and your kind.

No, we’re not “confused” about the inefficiency of government, or the complicity of the press, or the greed of the financiers.  We’re “confused” that you seem so surprised that we don’t trust them, or you, as far as we could spit at you from.

And, that pisses us off.

‘Cuz, you’re supposed to be the smart guys.

PUMA

Just Say No Deal

The Speech That Killed The Bill

According to House Republicans, this is the reason many of them voted “no” on the bailout bill.  Sounds like a giant middle finger salute to me.  Way to go Nancy!  Way to go, guys!  Who pisses next?

PUMA

Just Say No Deal

Bailout Bill Fails

Looks like the House of Representatives has rejected the bailout bill, according to MarketWatch:

The U.S. dollar pared its gains Monday after reports that the U.S. House of Representatives surprisingly voted against a proposal to prop up financial institutions being dragged down by losses on non-performing debt.

CNN Money reports:

What was supposed to be a 15-minute vote stretched past the half-hour mark as leadership scrambled for support. Investors who had been counting on the rescue plan sent the Dow Jones industrial average down as much as 700 points while watching the measure come up short of the necessary support, before rebounding slightly. The key stock reading was down more than 500 points.

The measure needs 218 votes for passage. Democrats voted 141 to 94 in favor of the plan, while Republicans voted 65 to 133 against. That left the measure with 206 votes for and 227 against.

AP-Yahoo News says Republicans are placing the blame on Nancy Pelosi:

Several Republican aides said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., had torpedoed any spirit of bipartisanship that surrounded the bill with her scathing speech near the close of the debate that blamed Bush’s policies for the economic turmoil.

Without mentioning her by name, Rep. Adam Putnam, R-Fla., No. 3 Republican, said: “The partisan tone at the end of the debate today I think did impact the votes on our side.”

snip

“We could have gotten there today had it not been for the partisan speech that the speaker gave on the floor of the House,” House Minority Leader John Boehner said. Pelosi’s words, the Ohio Republican said, “poisoned our conference, caused a number of members that we thought we could get, to go south.”

Rep. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., the whip, estimated that Pelosi’s speech changed the minds of a dozen Republicans who might otherwise have supported the plan.

Barney Frank, however, disagrees:

“Well if that stopped people from voting, then shame on them,” he said. “If people’s feelings were hurt because of a speech and that led them to vote differently than what they thought the national interest (requires), then they really don’t belong here. They’re not tough enough.”

But hey, ol’ Barn’s got his own credibility issues:

Here, Henry Paulson, on 60 Minutes, seems to prove my point that they should have seen this coming.

PUMA

Just Say No Deal

Hillary Makes Barack Look Bad

Every time Hillary Clinton makes an appearance on behalf of Barack Obama, she makes him look bad.  She doesn’t do it on purpose.  It’s not even her fault; she says and does all the right things, with much more sincerity evident in her demeanor than one might imagine possible.  The problem for Barack is, she just looks so damned impressively presidential doing it.

Every time she offers a suggestion about how a Democratic presidential candidate should handle an issue, it highlights another Obama deficiency.  Those rabidly suffering wretches infected with virulent cases of Clinton Derangement Syndrome will, of course, suggest that she’s doing it on purpose, just to make Obama look bad.  Once again, the Obama Delusionally Faithful give their Messiah way too much credit.

Hillary Clinton is the superior candidate.  To Barack Obama.  To John McCain.  To Bill Clinton.  That’s what her supporters saw, and what made us vote for her.  That’s what made the sexism and downright mysogyny directed at her so infuriating.  That’s what made the bogus racial exploitation by her opponent, with the blessings of the greedy, misguided Democratic leadership, so egregious.

While Obama flounders in the waters of his own political undoing, further fouling his prospects for rescue by pissing in the pool, he might want to consider that deploying Hillary Clinton to do his dirty work is like asking someone to throw you a cement lifeline.  Even a sincere desire to fulfill your request puts you down.

Hillary’s GMA interview this morning was bittersweet.  She looked relaxed and comfortable, sounded poised and composed, and, as always, had a firm grasp of the issues.  She handled the questions easily, even the attempted “gotcha” ones about Sarah Palin and Joe Biden.  She expressed her disappointment with the outcome of the primaries while imploring her supporters to vote Democratic.  She said she was excited to work for an Obama/Biden ticket, and in the process of doing her very best to make them both look good, made them both look pitiful.

The DeaNC, Obama, Biden, Pelosi, et al, should have remembered something I’m sure Donna Brazile’s mama taught her:

Be careful what you ask for, you just might get stuck with it.

PUMA

Just Say No Deal

“Ho’s” Trump “Bro’s” Every Time

Face it, Barack, you’re toast.  Running as a gimmick in Howard Dean’s revenge scheme might have seemed like a good idea in the beginning, but it was always doomed to fail.  Sure, it got you through the early primaries and caucuses, but it faded pretty quickly, and by the convention, you were really dragging ass.  If it wasn’t for Dean’s maniacally desperate need to prove himself worthy (a nearly impossible task,) along with Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi’s desire to prove themselves relevant (equally undoable) and Donna Brazile’s bet with her BFF, Karl Rove, you never would have even been invited to Denver.  To be fair, the self-interests of John Kerry, Ted Kennedy and James Clyburn played a role too, but it wasn’t as significant as even they would like to believe.

All the polls show you spiraling downward and the word on the street is that your fundraising is lagging.  Whether the abandonment by the early Republican mischief makers you and Dean so obviously exploited is now playing enough of a major role in your imminent demise to be definitive, and/or other equally devastating miscalculations by you and your crew are to blame, the bottom line is, you’re screwed.

Being black when convenient works to an extent, but it’s not sufficient to win the big game.  The truth is, there are people who will vote for you because you’re black and probably an equal number who won’t for the same reason.  However, that’s never been the sole reason you can’t win, and the new developments in the contest have nullified any imagined advantage you might have had in that regard.

You’ve been played.  See, the “bro’s before ‘ho’s” mentality is wrong on so many levels that if even one of those levels comes into play, you lose.  Too bad that now they all are.  Hillary beat you, Barack.  You, I and everyone else who’s been paying attention knows that.  For one thing, there are just more “‘ho’s” than “bro’s.”  And to make bad matters worse, at least some of the “‘ho’s” come from the “bro” side.  That’s one problem.  Another is, McCain, that savvy old pro, along with his team, knows the game, too, and by picking Sarah Palin, he steals some of your “‘ho’s” and gives some of your racist foes a convenient place to park their racism.  See, they don’t have to wear the big “R” on their cowboy hats to vote against you.  They can plaster the big “F U” of  feminist understanding proudly across their chests.

So, yeah, Palin’s a gimmick, too.  But unlike you, where a lot of people in your party really, really don’t like you, primarily for the way you’ve played the game, her side sees her as the ace in the hole that trumps you.  They love that.  And as for those “bro’s” you thought you could count on, some of them are not going to be there for you, either.  See, you’re not really there for them and they know that.  You put them down, call them “Pookie;” lazy boys who can’t be depended upon to man up to their responsibilities, and believe it or not, a lot of them plain don’t like that.  Go figure.  Just the fact that you would exploit the “bro” thing subliminally rankles, too, Barack.  Black men usually don’t even refer to each other that way.  I’ve never heard it, and I’ve been black longer than you.  The word is “bruh.”  The fact that you and your t-shirt making cronies don’t know that, may seem like a small thing, but it speaks volumes about on whose behalf you put black people down.

Oh, yeah, bruh, you’re gonna lose.  And racism nor sexism will be the cause.  Those two gimmicks cancel each other out in the long run.  The reason you don’t have a prayer is because you and your “sell-out-the-base-for-a-pipe-dream” crew just aren’t as good at the game as the other guys.  Clinton offered you the best deal going early on; her running mate.   Sure-fire win.  No gimmick from the other side plays against that dynamic ticket.  But you and your boyz got greedy enough to convince yourselves you were not only better than the other teams you would face, but that you were better than you actually are.  That’s clearly delusional thinking on the part of people who can’t even do basic math.  “Bro’s” vs. “ho’s?”  “Ho’s” win, hands down.

Every freaking time.

PUMA

Just Say No Deal

Poor Hillary, Ain’t She A Woman?

I saw a clip of Sarah Palin on Hillary Clinton’s “perceived whine” over on No Quarter, and I thought, gee, with friends like these…

Sojourner Truth:

That man over there says that women need to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches, and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody ever helps me into carriages, or over mud-puddles, or gives me any best place! And ain’t I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm! I have ploughed and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain’t I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man – when I could get it – and bear the lash as well! And ain’t I a woman? I have borne thirteen children, and seen most all sold off to slavery, and when I cried out with my mother’s grief, none but Jesus heard me! And ain’t I a woman?

Hillary Clinton on Sarah Palin:

“We should all be proud of Governor Sarah Palin’s historic nomination, and I congratulate her and Senator McCain,” Clinton, the first woman to win a presidential primary, said in the statement. “While their policies would take America in the wrong direction, Governor Palin will add an important new voice to the debate.”

PUMA

Just Say No Deal

Sarah: Twisting Democrats’ Knickers

When you twist your own knickers in a bunch, nobody wants to hear you complain about having a wedgie.  That’s the position the Democrats are in now.  “Waaahhhh, We were the ones with the vapid rock star first!  They copied!” Ha, ha, ha.

Shoulda thought about that a long time ago, Dr. Deanenstein and Frau Nancy Blucher.  You’re the ones who gave the rabid Clinton Derangement Syndrome suffering “Anybody But Hillary” lunatic fringe free reign while you allowed your creation to traipse around the country like a real boy playing dress-up in the Emperor’s see-through suit.  Now you want to complain because the McCain camp has given your monster a Lilith-like bride. Ha, ha, again.

Sarah Palin ripped big chunks from Barack Obama’s political flesh, chewed them up, and spit them out, all the while gracefully doing the Dance With Who Brung Ya backwards and in high heels.

Your pathetic little formula was so obvious and easy to copy.  It only worked a little bit in the primaries, but you’re too power-lust crazed to realize that once Hillary and Co. realized what you were up to, she cleaned your clock nine ways to Sunday, even with both hands tied behind her back.  By you.  And your Republican mole, Donna Brazile, who along with her crew, kept the Rove playbook working overtime.  You scrambled, thugged and mugged your way across the finish line, barely ahead, dragging your wounded, limping creation behind you and thought you had gotten away clean.  What a schmoo.

Oh, yeah, Dr. Deanestein, your little theory worked. Even better than you hoped.  That was your undoing.  Drunk with the success of the midterm elections in ‘06, you thought you and your guy were ready for the big, “Puttin’ on the Ritz” tour, so you ramped up your plans and rushed off half-cocked, just like you did in your own presidential run.  Good plan, lousy execution, Deanenstein trademark.

Your scheme is so transparent, so easy to copy, are you really surprised that an old warhorse like McCain borrowed the formula, Deanenstein?  His feminized, Stepford-influenced clone is going to reduce your Emperor Pinocchio to a puddle and walk all over him without even taking off her glasses.

And there’s nothing you can do about it.

Bwahahaaaa, my ass.

PUMA

Just Say No Deal

Next Up, Nancy P.

This is the third in a series of “give-em-rope-and-let-em-hang” posts about the people who drove me from the Democratic party.  Today, we visit the comments of Nancy Pelosi during the primaries.  As Speaker of the House she wields tremendous influence and used it more liberally than one might think prudent.

In an article found on the FlaDems website re: seating the delegates from Florida and Michigan, dated Oct. 9, 2007:

“The Democratic National Committee is the ruling authority now .. but the tradition is that the presidential candidate will decide,” Pelosi said.

She noted that she had the job in 1984 of reviewing whether states had complied with rules governing the party’s presidential primaries and caucuses.

She recalled that when she threatened the states with not seating their delegates if they broke the rules, “they said ha, ha, ha, because no presidential candidate is going to say we’re not seating New Hampshire and we’re not seating Iowa.”

ABC News, Nov. 5, 2007, saying Clinton was not receiving sexist treatment:

“[Sen. Clinton] said it best: They’re ‘piling on’ — or whatever the words were — ‘because I’m the front-runner.’ That’s why they’re piling on,” said Pelosi. “If she was in third place, they wouldn’t say, ‘Let’s go attack a woman.’”

SFGate, Jan 29, 2008 commenting on Ted Kennedy’s endorsement of Barack Obama:

“Did you ever see anything like that?” asked Pelosi. “Transferring the mantle from John F. Kennedy to Barack Obama. It was the most stunning thing. I mean, I couldn’t take my eyes off it. And I didn’t have any time to sit there and watch TV, you know – we had a whole schedule. I just was mesmerized by it.”

Feb. 16, 2008, with Obama leading in delegates, Clinton in superdelegates:

“I think there is a concern when the public speaks and there is a counter-decision made to that,” she said, adding quickly, “I don’t think that will happen.”

edit

“I do think that they have a respect — it’s not just following the returns, it’s also having a respect for what has been said by the people,” Pelosi said. “It would be a problem for the party if the verdict would be something different than the public has decided.”

edit

“Well, I don’t think that any states that operated outside the rules of the party can be dispositive of who the nominee is. That is to say they can’t make the difference because then we would have no rules,” she said.

Politico, Feb. 19, 2008:

“I think there is a concern when the public speaks and there is a counter-decision made to that,” she said. “It would be a problem for the party if the verdict would be something different than the public has decided.”

March 5, 2008, Washington Post:

“I don’t think it was ever intended that superdelegates would overturn the verdict, the decision of the American people,” Pelosi said. “What they are there to do is to be in place should there be a need for some change … but not to change what happened in the election.”

March 8, 2008 re: Florida and Michigan:

“As chair of the convention, I want to make sure I can moderate the matter in a fair way,” she said. “But I mean, let’s face it: Barack Obama wasn’t even on the ballot in Michigan, so how can you say that that was an election? I think Florida has a bigger case. But in each of the cases, they are outside the rules and an accommodation is going to have to be made.”

ABC, March 14, 2008:

“If the votes of the superdelegates overturn what’s happened in the elections,” said Pelosi, “it would be harmful to the Democratic Party.”

When asked by George Stephanopoulos what if one candidate lead in popular vote and one in delegates:

“But it’s a delegate race,” Pelosi replied. “The way the system works is that the delegates choose the nominee.”

On April 1, The New York Daily News quoted from a Good Morning America interview:

“These superdelegates have the right to vote their conscience and who they think would be the better president, or who can win, but they also then should get involved in the campaigns and make their power known there,”

In the same interview, asked about a letter she received from Clinton backers concerned that she was taking Obama’s position re: delegates:

“It wasn’t important to me.”

Asked about a Clinton/Obama joint ticket, the Chicago Tribune quotes the Larry King Show, April 24, 2008:

“I don’t think it’s a good idea,” Pelosi says, according to a partial transcript. “I think that first of all that the candidates, whoever he or she may be, should choose his or her own vice presidential candidate.”

There’s plenty of talent to go around to build a “good, strong ticket,” says Pelosi. “I’m not one of those who thinks that that’s a good ticket.”

In a joint statement with Howard Dean and Harry Reid, reported in the LA Times, Jun 4, 2008:

“We have come to the end of an exciting primary and caucus process — the voters have spoken.  As the Democratic leaders of the Senate, House of Representatives, the Governors and the Democratic National Committee we commend all of the participants of the 2008 primary process, especially Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, for making this such a transformational election.

edit

“Democrats must now turn our full attention to the general election.  To that end, we are urging all remaining uncommitted superdelegates to make their decisions known by Friday of this week so that our party can stand united and begin our march toward reversing the eight years of failed Bush/McCain policies that have weakened our country.

CNN, June 4, 2008 before Hillary Clinton conceded:

“Running for President is not for the faint of heart. This is very difficult, and people have to unwind from it in their own time, but I think the message was clear last night. The people have spoken, the elections are over for the nomination. Barack Obama is the nominee of the Democratic party,” Pelosi said.

June 24, the Chicago Tribune, asked was there sexism against Clinton:

“Is there sexism? Probably so. Is it responsible for the defeat? I really wouldn’t have the scientific knowledge, all of the information, to know that. But I do think that being a woman has a positive upside in the campaign, probably offset by more sexism, I don’t know.

Chastising Joe Lieberman, Aug. 13, 2008:

“You are right. Joe Lieberman has said things that are totally irresponsible when it comes to Barack Obama,” Pelosi said. “Here we have a leader for the future, really a great leader for the future and one that comes along only every now and then, and they know it so they have to undermine him. And one of their best weapons, of course, is someone who is considered by some to be a Democrat.”

According to Politico, at a fundraiser in San Francisco, August 18, 2008, she referred to Barack Obama as…

“…a leader that God has blessed us with at this time.”

PUMA

Just Say No Deal

We TOLD Howard Dean First!

Greta Van Susteren has a question up on her blog, GretaWire, asking if PUMAs are real.  Boy, is she getting an ear/eyeful!  She also has an accompanying video up of Sarah Palin’s speech with John McCain, but nobody’s paying attention to that.  PUMA after PUMA is expressing all the outrage we’ve felt over the way the Democrats have treated us this year.  What’s interesting is that while Hillary Clinton’s name comes up, since she bore the brunt of the abuse, it probably is mentioned no more than the names of Howard Dean, Nancy Pelosi and Donna Brazile.  All the pent-up anger and frustration we, and people like us who didn’t even know they were PUMAs, have been feeling, is pouring out from keyboard after keyboard in an unrelenting deluge.

There is this notion being put forth by some in the media, pushed by the DeaNC and the Obamacrats, no doubt, that the PUMA movement is a myth.  Somebody wants people to believe that a few Republicans have been making mischief by infiltrating the Democratic party and agitating the base.  Whoever is trying to peddle this poop knows better.

The way the primaries unfolded didn’t sit right with us voters not jumping on the O train, but we gave the Dems the benefit of the doubt.  Maybe there was something to this guy we weren’t seeing.  But week after week, more and more stink kept rising.  The Rules and Bylaws committee was the last straw.  See, unlike the Obots, we’re not kids.  We see, and we know what we’re looking at.  “Rules are rules,”  “we all agreed” and all that other parental sounding happy crappy is fine and dandy if you don’t know that “the rules” are always fluid and “we all agreed” not to mention that “we all know” there are “rules around the rules.”  We also know fair is fair, and “rules or no rules,” the nomination process between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama was not fair.  Two hour private “lunches” at a public meeting on the same day the preferred candidate “sees the light” and dumps his contentious church, for which he is rewarded with delegates he couldn’t possibly have  earned, not being on the ballot, don’t exactly inspire confidence.  But that’s not the point.  We can re-litigate the primaries later, I’m happy to do it.  But right now what I want to address is the notion that the DeaNC and the media are surprised that we exist.

We told Howard Dean! He’s the one who sat up in the RBC meeting and called for “party unity” signaling from the jump that we were going to get screwed.  We knew that going in, but the blatant, dare I say it, “audacity” of these petty criminals trying to “hoodwink” and “bamboozle” people who wrote the game, in broad daylight, no less, was unbelievably appalling.  That was  the moment PUMA was born.  Party Unity My Ass!

On the Confluence, a website founded by Riverdaughter, angry HRC supporters gathered to vent. One of them SM77, christened the movement.  From the Confluence about page:

SM77: Our spicy Latina in Florida gave PUMA a name when she said after the RBC hearing in May: Party Unity My Ass!

The sentiment was already there, however.  All the PUMA movement needed at that point was a name.  And that name went viral.  More than one group co-opted it and adapted it to their vision, and while different groups took different approaches, throughout this loose-knit coalition, the underlying mission was the same: screw you back, DNC!

One of the PUMA groups, PUMA Pac, changed the acronym to mean People United Means Action and, in short order, became a registered pac.  But they didn’t start that way.  The frustrated visitors to their new website wanted to do something so they soon started organizing various missions called “action alerts”  One of the first was an e-mail campaign to Howard Dean. On Jun 5, 2008, this call to action was printed:

All Pumas, please send an email to Howard Dean, chair of the Democratic National Committee right now @ howarddean@dnc.org

Tell him that we are Democrats who will not vote for Barack Obama for president. We will not support a “Unity Ticket” with Hillary Clinton as the vice-president. We will not donate one thin dime to the DNC or any of its affiliate organizations until they wake up, listen to the voices of the voters in ALL 50 states, and start distancing themselves from this disastrous nominee.

Subsequent “action alerts” from PUMA Pac and many of the other groups, organizations and websites in, and out, of the Just Say No Deal coalition alerted the heck out of Brazile and Pelosi, too.  And if you check with them, they have their own stories of how they came to be and what they’ve done about their anger.  So, as you can see, the DeaNC knew about PUMA almost as soon as we did.  As well they should.  They started it.  They started us.

And the rest will be history.

PUMA

Just Say No Deal

A Sham, A Hostage, and a Schmoo

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Just Say No Deal

It’s Official: Democrats Are Schmoos

Every minute that goes by provides more evidence that, yes, the Democrats are  jerks Schmoos, with a capital “J.”  They keep shooting themselves in the foot stuck in their mouths, not an easy thing to do, to be sure.   AP News is reporting:

In an emotional meeting leading up to the Democratic roll call of the states, Hillary Rodham Clinton released her convention delegates Wednesday to vote for certain presidential nominee Barack Obama.

Many in the crowded ballroom yelled back, “No!”

“I am not telling you what to do,” Clinton responded. “You’ve come here from so many different places having made this journey and feeling in your heart what is right for you to do.”

This was expected, and so far, it doesn’t seem so bad, right?  Well, except for that whole “nominate Obama” thing, but enough said about that.  While some delegates were said to be “visibly upset” by the plan to engage in a symbolic roll call-in-name-only, some were more upset than others:

Massachusetts delegate Nancy Saboori was visibly upset at the end of Clinton’s speech.

“She doesn’t have the right to release us,” Saboori argued. “We’re not little kids to be told what to do in a half-hour.”

The story continues:

Not all Clinton supporters were on board. Sonja Jaquez Lewis, a Clinton delegate from Colorado, said she and others may walk out if Clinton is denied a roll call.

“If we don’t have an official roll call vote, state-by-state, it is going to reopen a wound,” Lewis said.

Ya think?  Unsurprisingly, Claire McCaskill is vying for the title of Chief Among Schmoos:

Missouri Sen. Claire McCaskill, an Obama supporter, said Clinton’s challenge in getting her delegates to come on board with Obama “may be the biggest test of her leadership.”

“If she’s not a strong enough leader to get her followers to do what’s right for America, then that would surprise me,” McCaskill told the AP. “I think they are going to follow her lead, and her lead was very crystal clear last night.”

Wyoming Senator Mike Massie tells of the shenanigans going on:

Wyoming state Sen. Mike Massie, D-Laramie, said his delegation gave 12 votes to Obama and six to Clinton after state party officials rejected a request from Clinton delegates to delay the vote until after a meeting later in the day with Clinton. Massie said the delegation is still puzzled by orders to vote before Clinton could meet with her delegates and release them.

“That question is on the minds of a lot of people,” Massie said.

They rushed the vote?  Say it ain’t so!  In other news showing the delusion of the clueless, from another AP article:

Bill Clinton will say in a roughly eight-minute speech that only a Democrat in the White House can “restore America’s standing to what it was eight years ago,” said the aide, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to pre-empt the former president’s speech.

And this:

In a sign of unity, Obama adviser Berman and Clinton adviser Smith told delegates on Wednesday that they had been working out of the same office all week to ensure a smooth convention.

“The story is that we are working as a team,” Berman said.

Some story.  “Clinton adviser Smith.”  We know whose side he’s really on.  Bill Clinton gets an eight minute speech, Hillary Clinton’s delegates are forced to vote before talking to her, and Claire McCaskill thinks this is all about Hillary.  It is, but not the way Claire thinks, if she is indeed capable of such activity.  And while Claire might be Chief Schmoo, she can’t hold a candle to Nancy P.:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, presiding officer of the Democratic National Convention, predicted the roll-call voting after the names of both Obama and Clinton were put in nomination would go “very smoothly.”

Anything like Congress, Nan?  Schmoos, the whole lot of ‘em.

Pelosi – PUMA Meat

Nancy Pelosi was let out alone again, despite the sincere wishes and best efforts of a large portion of her American constituents.  Once again, Nancy Schmancy Pancy found a way to piss people off while talking smack with a foot stuck in her mouth.  It wasn’t mine, but, hey, a girl can dream, can’t she?

I wish I could say that it was the gratuitous, thinly veiled PUMA diss that set me off, but that comes pretty late in the Politco article I was reading.  No, it was the cluelessness associated with her interpretation of the current poll data:

The speaker said Obama and the other Democratic presidential candidates “have attracted millions of more voters — first-voters voters and many more voters who haven’t voted in a long time.

“Many of them are not even reachable by these pollsters,” Pelosi said. “These are polls of likely voters. Likely voters are people who have voted in the last two elections, and they are likely to vote again. They are not the universe of people who will vote on Nov. 4.”

Why depend on reliable people to vote, huh, when you’ve got limitless numbers of “shadow” people at your disposal?  Pollsters can’t find these people, but Pelosi and the Boyz can get their hands on them and, what, make them go vote?

Yup.

“We will own the ground Election Day,” she said.

Tell me, anybody, why are we not supposed to be frightened by this?  Or this?

Pelosi said she sees McCain’s initial inability to name the number of houses he owns as “emblematic of the differences between Democrats and Republicans.”

“Democrats have wealth, too — we salute wealth,” she said. “But let me tell you this: This election is about the economy. It always is, and it’s a question of who has the leverage. And for eight years, the wealthiest 1 percent has had the leverage.”

What the flour does that even mean?  Who has leverage?  Who has wealth?  The guy with the most houses?  Pat, I’d like to buy a vowel, because there’s obviously a few letters missing.  Vanna start touching.  Gratuitous PUMA reference next:

The speaker said Democrats are tough on national security but were rightly skeptical of the real threat from Iraq.

“Think of me as a lioness — you threaten my cubs, you have a problem,” she said.

WTF is she talking about?  More, in her own words:

She said that with — “God willing” — a President Obama, the country also would speed the withdrawal from Iraq.

Pelosi said: “That’s not a full 100-days agenda. It’s more like 100 hours.”

On the Democrats’ domestic agenda, she said she wants listeners to think of four words: “Science, science, science and science.”

“I think that could take up the 100 days,” she said.

We’ll be out of Iraq in 100 hours but we’ll be spending the first hundred days doing what, baking soda explosions with Bill Nye?  There’s a few other lines in this story but, you read it.  I have to…decontaminate my computer screen.

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Just Say No Deal

Democrats Running The Convention? Clueless

How can people entrusted with so much responsibility be so clueless?  For anybody to think that you can make a sham nomination of a fraudulent candidate legitimate by forcing people to pretend they’re cool with it, is so amazingly stupid that it’s hard to believe that anyone with mental ability beyond what it takes to scrabble on walls with a crayon could think of it, let alone try to pull it off.  But hey, that’s Nancy Pelosi, for you.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who is chairwoman of the convention, acknowledged Monday that Democrats are not yet united following the bitter primary fight, especially among women. She said a “gender gap” in Obama’s favor had emerged “even before the convention, and even before the complete reconciliation that we need,” she said.

“But to stay wallowing in all of this is not productive,” she said. “So we can talk about this forever, or we can talk about how we’re going to take our message to the American people, to women all across America, to see the distinctions” between Obama and Republican candidate John McCain.

The biggest difference, Madame Speaker, (it’s a shame when using someone’s title qualifies as a dig, considering Congress’ approval ratings ) is that John McCain won his nomination fairly.  Don’t you get it, honey?  For a lot of us, that’s huge.

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Just Say No Deal