“ Liberty grows from the ground - it cannot be dropped from the air by an unmanned drone.
— David Cameron, Conservative Party leader in Great Britain, September 11, 2006
Yes, the conservatives in Britain are like the liberals here. That is how far to the Right "we" (our government, media) have moved in American. It's time to wake up.
A couple days ago I wrote about McCain's desperation, as evidenced by his increasingly pathetic and baseless attacks against Obama. In particular I covered his most recent smear (at the time) in which he falsely attacked Obama for "snubbing the troops" because he didn't visit them in Germany, because the Pentagon wouldn't let him. McCain's campaign lied, they cut an ad full of lies, they distorted what happened, and they did it all shamlessly, to smear Obama. I made this observation at the time:
The funny thing is, you know damn well that if Obama had made the trip, McCain would have attacked saying it was "inappropriate" for Obama to "use" the wounded troops for his "political campaign".
What the McCain campaign doesn't want people to know, according to one GOP strategist I spoke with over the weekend, is that they had an ad script ready to go if Obama had visited the wounded troops saying that Obama was...wait for it...using wounded troops as campaign props. So, no matter which way Obama turned, McCain had an Obama bashing ad ready to launch. I guess that's political hardball. But another word for it is the one word that most politicians are loathe to use about their opponents--a lie.
Now do I know Republicans or do I know Republicans? Ok, I'm not clairvoyant, and it wasn't any feat of political savvy--to say that scumbags like McCain are predictable would be an extreme understatement. But I do love when Republican whistleblowers come forward and expose these pathetic liars, with their feigned indignation, for what they really are.
And look who it turns out was the one using the troops as political pawns. McCain cares nothing about them, they are propaganda as far as he is concerned.
MoveOn has a new ad out calling McCain on his offshore drilling "gimmick" (personally I'd call it an oil company-sponsored scam to boost corporate profits while lying to the voters about wanting to help them). I think it is an effective spot, since it is the first ad that actually drops some facts about how the scam does nothing, and it actually comes out and calls it a gimmick. Sure, there are a lot harder hitting facts out there, but you can't fit all that into an ad, so, all in all I think it is good:
Perhaps the only thing more outrageous than Exxon Mobil making record profits while Americans are paying record prices at the pump is the fact that Senator McCain has proposed giving them an additional $1.2 billion tax break. While Senator McCain’s plan has succeeded in helping his campaign raise over $1 million from oil and gas company executives and employees just last month, it won’t lower gas prices or end our dangerous dependence on foreign oil. Instead of an energy policy that reads like an oil-company wish list, it’s time to create a new American energy economy by investing in alternative energy, creating millions of new jobs, increasing fuel efficiency standards, and ending the tyranny of oil once and for all.
Obama just released a new ad calling McCain out on his lying attack ads. Sure, it doesn't have all the information, say, this blog post has, but hey, it gets the fundamental point across, which I made a few days ago: John McCain can't win on the issues, so he is desperately attacking (and lying about) Obama. It is a losing strategy for sure:
I hadn't written a blog on the recently uncovered (newest) torture memo, because, well, there are so many torture memos out there, and their justification for torture is so outrageous already, that, really, what can you even say anymore? We know Bush and Cheney authorized torture, which violates American laws and international humanitarian laws, to say nothing of basic concepts of morality. We know the Republicans have stood together to support Bush's "right" to have people tortured. We already know everything we should need to know to have sent his ass to prison a long time ago. So what's another memo? Just more bullshit. Anyway, I think Stephen Colbert did a pretty decent job a covering the issue:
Afghanistan is the real main battleground in the "war on terror". Obama has been saying this for over a year, McCain has been consistently diminishing the importance of Afghanistan, even as Afghanistan has recently become twice as dangerous for US troops than Iraq.
The US needs to increase its military presence to fight the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. McCain has been against this for a long time, although to his credit he has recently been flip-flopping back and forth, so pretty soon he will undoubtedly be following Obama's leadership on the issue.
The US should be willing to strike against terrorist targets across the Pakistan border (Afghanistan-Pakistan, not Iraq-Pakistan) if the Pakistani government is unable or unwilling to combat the terrorists.
Yes, three more blows to McCain's "foreign policy expertise", which virtually no one supports anymore. Even Bush is (slowly) moving away from his hawkish and conservative foreign policy.
It should be made clear however, that even if the NATO troops in Afghanistan need a little temporary military backup, the "war on terror" cannot be won by military means. You can't win a war against a tactic, which is what terrorism is. We have win the war on poverty, on hunger, and we have to change our foreign policy, because those are the factors fueling hate and anti-Americanism around the world. We take on the roots of hate and we undermine the popular support of the terrorists, and terrorism goes away. That is how we win. That is the only way we can win. We stop torturing people. We stop pushing our agenda on the Middle East and the rest of the world. We stop our neoimperialism. We stop screwing over the rest of the world to expand our power or corporate profits. We make those changes, and it goes away, and we will find ourselves as hated as Canada. And when is the last time anyone tried to hurt Canada? You just can't bring yourself to do it.
And that is how we do it. And that, essentially, not in so many words, is what Obama has emphasized as well. There is no military solution to Iraq, and there is no military solution to terrorism. We have to attack the roots of the chaos that breeds terrorism. And we do it in a legal way. That is the exact opposite of McCain's plans, which shows how he has absolutely no understanding of counter-terrorism, international relations, history, or even humanity. Even the conservative RAND Corporation, a policy think tank what advises the Pentagon, just agreed in just-released report:
Current U.S. strategy against the terrorist group al Qaida has not been successful in significantly undermining the group's capabilities, according to a new RAND Corporation study issued today...
In looking at how other terrorist groups have ended, the RAND study found that most terrorist groups end either because they join the political process, or because local police and intelligence efforts arrest or kill key members. Police and intelligence agencies, rather than the military, should be the tip of the spear against al Qaida in most of the world, and the United States should abandon the use of the phrase "war on terrorism," researchers concluded.
This backs up Obama's position, and further undermines McCain's. The "war on terror" (and I agree with their conclusion that the phrase "war on terror" is idiotic) as it is currently being waged is in an extra-legal manner, a manner that has been consistently opposed by our intelligence agencies. Torture is a key part of this. We can't pursue criminal prosecution of terrorists because we broke fundamental protections by torturing them. Now that evidence can't be held up in court. So through the Bush-McCain strategy, we have hundreds of POWs at Guantanamo Bay that we can't do anything with. We can't build cases against them built on torture, and in many cases we can't return them to their countries of origin because they will likely be tortured or executed there (and it should be remembered that in many, if not most, cases there is no evidence of terrorist activities or wrongdoing -- if they had a case they would have been prosecuted by now). So while the intelligence/law enforcement/legal approach has been very effective in the past, the Republican refusal to obey the rule of law has left us in a very bad position. We can't continue down that path, and liberals have been saying that for a long time. Obama has been saying that for a long time. And now even the conservative RAND Corporation agrees. It is really quite remarkable how inflexible and conservative McCain is, which is quickly making him one of the most right-wing on foreign policy. Amazing.
I think every time someone watches the clip of Lieberman having to explain the basic dynamics of the Middle East and the "war on terror" to McCain (that was just one time out of multiple mind you) an angel gets its wings.
Obama has a new ad out, in response to McCain's ridiculously laughable ad that actually suggests Obama is to blame for high gas prices, because he opposes offshore drilling. If you know even a tiny bit about the issue, you should have no trouble seeing why it is ridiculous.
Let's just put aside the fact that offshore drilling won't solve any of our energy problems, and the that the lack of it certainly isn't the cause for our current high gas prices (the war in Iraq, energy speculation, and oil companies deliberately keeping supply tight to get rich of high prices are the actual main causes). So McCain is blaming Obama for high gas prices, because he opposes offshore drilling, just like McCain himself did up until a few weeks ago when he completely flip-flopped on the issue and sold out to big oil (which paid handsomely). Offshore drilling hasn't even come up for a vote since McCain's flip-flop, so by McCain's own logic, he is just as much to blame as Obama. Furthermore, since McCain has been in Congress longer, he must be MORE to blame than Obama for high gas prices because even if Obama had voted for offshore drilling on his first day in Congress, not a drop of oil would have been pumped from these areas yet, and wouldn't for years to come (or even decades since oil companies are already not even trying to pump on plenty of lands they already have access to). Secondly, there has been an executive ban on offshore drilling this whole time, which Bush just rescinded in the last few weeks, so up until then, Bush was standing in the way of offshore drilling! Yet it is supposedly all Obama's fault. I won't even get into how many times McCain voted against alternative energy and other energy policy that would lower gas prices. I think McCain's blatant lies and rampant hypocrisy in this ad are reason enough to laugh at his ad. Anyway, Obama's ad, which does a good job at hitting back, even if it can't possibly fit everything that is wrong with McCain's ad in 30 seconds:
“ It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.
— Upton Sinclair (1878 - 1968)
There is, of course, a very good explanation for why Republicans can only make our energy crisis and climate change worse, it is because their lobbyist money depends on making it worse, or at least doing absolutely nothing to make it better, which in the end does make it worse.
Campaign contributions from oil industry executives to Sen. John McCain rose dramatically in the last half of June, after the senator from Arizona made a high-profile split with environmentalists and reversed his opposition to the federal ban on offshore drilling.
Oil and gas industry executives and employees donated $1.1 million to McCain last month -- three-quarters of which came after his June 16 speech calling for an end to the ban -- compared with $116,000 in March, $283,000 in April and $208,000 in May.
Here is how that breaks down. In three and a half months McCain got $882,000 from the oil industry, which is a lot of money, but after McCain flip-flopped and started pushing the oil industry's lies about offshore drilling, suddenly the corporate money comes in a wave, and McCain makes $825,000 from them in two weeks. Oh, and you think McCain didn't know he would get paid handsomely for selling out the environment and struggling Americans? Think again:
McCain delivered the speech before heading to Texas for a series of fundraisers with energy industry executives, and the day after the speech he raised $1.3 million at a private luncheon and reception at the San Antonio Country Club, according to local news accounts.
But it doesn't stop with McCain, that is how Republicans are in general. For example, while Republicans have been pushing for false-solutions like offshore drilling, Democrats have actually been trying to solve the problems, for instance by regulating the energy markets (which some of McCain's advisors helped deregulate) that have allowed rampant energy speculation, which most experts believe have been an important factor in driving up oil prices. So we have basically the only short-term solution to energy prices, one of the easiest, most sensible steps to take, and guess what happened:
A US Senate proposal designed to curb speculation and increase transparency in the energy markets was blocked by Republican legislators on Friday.
The move frustrates Democratic efforts to show the party is taking action on record petrol prices. The Stop Excessive Speculation Act, sponsored by Harry Reid, the Senate majority leader, fell 10 votes short of clearing a procedural hurdle.
The vote marks a victory for the futures industry and Wall Street banks, such as Goldman Sachs, which lobbied heavily against Mr. Reid’s proposal, and is a setback for the airline and trucking industries, which strongly supported it.
The legislation would have required regulators to impose limits on speculative oil and natural gas trading. But Republicans countered with proposals for increases in drilling in environmentally protected areas, mining for oil shale in the west and new nuclear power stations.
An ad hoc coalition – backed by the CME Group, operator of the world’s biggest futures exchange, the InterContinental Exchange (ICE), and Nymex, the New York energy exchange – lobbied hard against the legislation, arguing that limits on trading would make it more difficult for investors to diversify their holdings and that such curbs would drive US markets overseas.
Once again, you see who is actually trying to solve problems, and who is just trying to look out for the interests of big corporate interests. And again, you see them pushing offshore drilling as the solution to everything, even though the oil companies are refusing to drill on open lands they already own the rights to. Yeah, something the Republicans don't like people to know, the oil companies want more land, so they can sit on it while demand goes up so they can make more money when they eventually drill it, but the problem isn't a lack of places to drill, because they already have plenty.
But hey, at least John McCain gets lots of money for selling out.
Update: I'm embarrassed, here I was so focused on the huge wads of cash McCain is getting from the oil industry that I totally failed to mention to lobbyists:
The Jamie Leigh Jones-Halliburton rape case was horrific, but what happened to PFC LaVena Johnson in Iraq in 2005 was many orders of magnitudes worse.
The parents of the young Missouri woman were told that she died of self-inflicted gunshot wounds, and her death was ruled a suicide. But her physician father became suspicious after looking at injuries to the body:
After two years of requesting documents, one set of papers provided by the Army included a xerox copy of a CD. Wondering why the xerox copy was in the documents, Dr. Johnson requested the CD itself. With help from his local Congressional representative, the US Army finally complied. When Dr. Johnson viewed the CD, he was shocked to see photographs taken by Army investigators of his daughter’s body as it lay where her body had been found, as well as other photographs of her disrobed body taken during the investigation.
The photographs revealed that LaVena, a small woman, barely 5 feet tall and weighing less than 100 pounds, had been struck in the face with a blunt instrument, perhaps a weapon stock. Her nose was broken and her teeth knocked backwards. One elbow was distended. The back of her clothes had debris on them indicating she had been dragged from one location to another. The photographs of her disrobed body showed bruises, scratch marks and teeth imprints on the upper part of her body. The right side of her back as well as her right hand had been burned apparently from a flammable liquid poured on her and then lighted. The photographs of her genital area revealed massive bruising and lacerations. A corrosive liquid had been poured into her genital area, probably to destroy DNA evidence of sexual assault.
Despite the bruises, scratches, teeth imprints and burns on her body, LaVena was found completely dressed in the burning tent. There was a blood trail from outside a contractor’s tent to inside the tent. She apparently had been dressed after the attack and her attacker placed her body into the tent and set it on fire.
The Electronic Village has been working hard to draw attention to this tragedy. Color of Change has now joined the battle and is asking people to contact Henry Waxman and ask him to conduct hearings as chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
Amy Goodman had an interview with Lavena's parents you can listen to here. Just heartbreaking.
Yet another example of military rapes and coverups, this time ending in torture, murder and mutilation. These crimes can't be tolerated. Justice must be pursued, relentlessly, for victims like LaVena Johnson, and for future victims, who will undoubtedly turn up if we let these crimes go unpunished. Please sign the Color of Change petition to demand a Congressional investigation, and spread the word.
Yesterday a homicidal maniac busted into a Tennessee church and open fired with a shotgun during a children's play, killing two people and seriously wounding seven others. What would drive a man to do such a monstrous thing? It turns out, right-wing pundits.
The shooter declared he did it because he hates liberals and gays, and since "he could not get to the leaders of the liberal movement that he would then target those that had voted them in to office." And surprise, surprise what the police found in the guy's house:
Inside the house, officers found "Liberalism is a Mental Health Disorder" by radio talk show host Michael Savage, "Let Freedom Ring" by talk show host Sean Hannity, and "The O'Reilly Factor," by television talk show host Bill O'Reilly.
It turns out that filling ignorant people full of hateful, paranoid, delusional rantings can influence them to do very violent things. These people spend all of their time and resources trying to convince people that liberals, minorities and gays are worthless and the cause for all of the ills in the world, and their viewers/listeners/readers suck all of it up, 24/7. Should it be any surprise that there are total nutjobs out there who take it all seriously and react by trying to exterminate them? The likes of Hannity, O'Reilly and Savage are one small step away from the white supremacists out there telling people to prepare for a coming race war. No doubt they share a fair number of followers. This guy was just out there "letting freedom ring" by killing some "liberals".
This is no joke. I'm not saying that people like Hannity, O'Reilly, Savage and Limbaugh are directly responsible, but their hateful lies and ranting no doubt have a profound impact on people, an impact increasing exponentially with how ignorant and crazy people are. Who knows how many other people own their books and watch their shows and listen to their talk radio religiously and are worked up into a frenzy everyday. I bet a majority of these psychos actually think that Obama is a Muslim extremist or terrorist who is going to destroy the country or some other delusional right-wing nonsense. These pundits encourage that paranoia and ignorance, and there are no doubt a bunch of freaks out there who want to "let freedom ring" by doing their "patriotic duty" and trying to assassinate Obama. Crazy is crazy, you can't put anything past them. The people who encourage the ignorance, spread the lies, and work these idiots into a frenzy day after day do bear some responsibility, not legally, but certainly morally.
MCCAIN: I believe that, when he said that we had to leave Iraq, and we had to be out by last March, and we had to have a date certain, that was in contravention to -- and still is -- the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General David Petraeus.
Nice, this coming from Mr. Military, who is constantly saying we have to do exactly what Gen. Petraeus says, and listen to our commanders and all that, and he thinks Petraeus is chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Niiicceee.
For future reference John, the actual chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is Admiral Mike Mullen. You may want to go introduce yourself to him sometime. I hear he just got back from a trip to the Iraq-Pakistan border, with a layover in Czechoslovakia.
For those who actually follow events closely, there can be no doubt that the media is biased in its "reporting". I've been saying it for a long time. The media goes out of their way to eat up McCain's talking points, and grill Obama on them, ad nauseam (take "the Surge is awesome, why can't you just admit what we are assuming is correct just because McCain told us so??" for an easy example), while at the same time they actually edit out McCain's gaffes/lies for him, and when they don't, they do their damnedest not to call him out on his lies, or report on his constant gaffes and flip-flops. It has gotten to the point where it borders of self-parody, it is ridiculous, beyond ridiculous.
So yes, it has been pissing me off for quite some time, it has been pissing off a lot of people, it certainly must annoy Obama, although you'd never know it because he isn't one to complain, unlike McCain. I don't hold my breath waiting for it, but it is nice when the mainstream catches up and acknowledges the obvious as well. Take, for instance, the conservative-leaning Center for Media and Public Affairs at George Mason University, which just released a comprehensive study of the media coverage so far in the general election, and they have found, unsurprisingly, that the networks were biased against Obama:
During the evening news, the majority of statements from reporters and anchors on all three networks are neutral, the center found. And when network news people ventured opinions in recent weeks, 28% of the statements were positive for Obama and 72% negative.
Compare that with the 43% positive for McCain, and the 57% negative.
But that doesn't even begin to get at the whole picture. That assumes that perfect objectivity would be equal numbers for both candidates. That assumes that both candidates are equal in the reporting they deserve. Say, for instance, you have a candidate who constantly makes factual errors, about basic things, on subjects they are supposed to be experts on. Say for instance the same candidate lies frequently. Say for instance the same candidate changes his positions more than a stock changes its price. Would it be "fair" or "balanced" for that candidate to get the same positive/negative coverage as another candidate who doesn't make constant mistakes, doesn't lie, doesn't flip-flop, and is constantly proven to have the superior judgment? Let's take a more extreme example, is it "objective" to have similar coverage of a serial killer and a Nobel Peace Prize recipient? Hell no, the answer for both is of course not. The FACTS are never equal, so reporting them as equal is not balanced. That is the point people don't seem to understand. This means that even if the media was reporting about McCain and Obama equally (in terms of positive vs negative), they would be very much biased in McCain's favor, because they are covering for all of McCain's negatives, while co-opting McCain's talking points to use against Obama (for instance the recent Meet the Press interview Obama did, where Tom Brokaw spent an hour confronting Obama with the most negative polls, columns and critiques in the media, no matter how ridiculous or unfounded they are). But it isn't just that they aren't reporting equally, they are going far in the other direction, somehow reporting more negatively about Obama, and more positively about McCain. It takes stunning degree of shoddy, shallow, biased, pseudo-journalism to turn what has been going on in the last six weeks into a net plus for McCain, and a net negative for Obama. Unbelievable.
But it is happening. New York Times columnist Bob Herbert wrote two days ago about the pro-McCain media bias. He goes after the "conventional wisdom" in the media that Obama is the unknown, and people know all about McCain. This conventional wisdom ignores how little voters really know about McCain, and how much McCain benefits from keeping the light off his huge negatives. Herbert describes how the media has scrubbed McCain's image squeaky clean:
Senator McCain crossed a line that he shouldn’t have this week when he said that Mr. Obama “would rather lose a war in order to win a political campaign.” It was a lousy comment, tantamount to calling Mr. Obama a traitor, and Senator McCain should apologize for it.
But what we’ve learned over the years is that Mr. McCain is one of those guys who never has to pay much of a price for his missteps and foul-ups and bad behavior. Can you imagine the firestorm of outrage and criticism that would have descended on Senator Obama if he had made the kind of factual mistakes that John McCain has repeatedly made in this campaign?
(Or if Senator Obama had had the temerity to even remotely suggest that John McCain would consider being disloyal to his country for political reasons?)
We have a monumental double standard here. Mr. McCain has had trouble in his public comments distinguishing Sunnis from Shiites and had to be corrected in one stunningly embarrassing moment by his good friend Joe Lieberman. He has referred to a Iraq-Pakistan border when the two countries do not share a border.
He declared on CBS that Iraq was the first major conflict after 9/11, apparently forgetting — at least for the moment — about the war in Afghanistan. In that same interview, he credited the so-called surge of U.S. forces in Iraq with bringing about the Anbar Awakening, a movement in which thousands of Sunnis turned on insurgents. He was wrong. The awakening preceded the surge.
More important than these endless gaffes are matters that give us glimpses of the fundamental makeup of the man. A celebrated warrior as a young man, he has always believed that the war in Iraq can (and must) be won. As the author Elizabeth Drew has written: “He didn’t seem to seriously consider the huge costs of the war: financial, personal, diplomatic and to the reputation of the United States around the world.”
Herbert also points out it isn't just McCain's mistakes, lies and nasty comments that the media has whitewashed, it is his character as well, which most Americans know nothing about:
Part of the makeup of the man — apparently a significant part, according to many close observers — is his outsized temper. Mr. McCain’s temperament has long been a subject of fascination in Washington, and for some a matter of concern. He can be a nasty piece of work. (Truly nasty. He once told an extremely cruel joke about Chelsea Clinton — too cruel to repeat here.)
If the McCain gaffes seem endless, so do the tales about his angry, profanity-laced eruptions. Senator Thad Cochran, a Mississippi Republican, said of Mr. McCain: “The thought of his being president sends a cold chill down my spine.”
Senator Pete Domenici, a New Mexico Republican, told Newsweek in 2000: “I decided I didn’t want this guy anywhere near a trigger.”
Both senators have since endorsed Senator McCain’s presidential bid, but their initial complaints were part of a much larger constellation of concerns about the way Mr. McCain tends to treat people with whom he disagrees, and his frequently belligerent my-way-or-the-highway attitude.
Senator McCain has acknowledged on various occasions that he has a short fuse and has at times made jokes about it. He told Larry King in 2006: “My anger did not help my campaign ... People don’t like angry candidates very much.”
My guess is that most voters don’t see John McCain as an angry candidate, despite several very public lapses. The mythical John McCain is an affable, straight-talking, moderately conservative war hero who is an expert on foreign policy.
The real question is how long can the media hide reality from the voters? How long can they carry McCain's water for him, how long they can cover up his gaffes, how long will they ignore his flip-flops and his lies, how long will they push his talking points, how long will they hide his real character from American voters? How long can they? My guess is that they will do it for as long as they can, which means until McCain screws up so bad, on video, that they can no longer ignore it anymore, and then the fragile illusion of McCain the "affable, straight-talking, moderately conservative war hero who is an expert on foreign policy" will be forever shattered, and then maybe, just maybe, we can get some honest, unbiased journalism from the mainstream media.
If there was any doubt that McCain was shameless, especially after his attempt to politicize the Holocaust to attack Obama, his most recent ad, and the Republicans' new line of attack against Obama, erase any doubt. Let's have some background first though.
Essentially the issue is this: McCain can't win on the issues, period. Even on foreign policy, which is "supposed to be" his strong suit, he can't win, Obama has been kicking his ass on foreign policy, which we can see in the last few weeks with the Iraqi government supporting his timeline for withdrawal, with Bush talking about "time horizons" for withdrawal, with Bush now more open to diplomacy with Iran and North Korea, with Bush following Obama's ideas on hunting down terrorists on the Pakistan border, on issue after issue, Obama has been right, he has been leading, and Bush has started to follow him, and now even the New York Times has pointed out that McCain is now MORE CONSERVATIVE THAN BUSH on foreign policy (this should raise huge red warning flags for the around 80% of Americans who think we are already heading in the wrong direction, do you really want us digging our hole any faster?). Despite all of the facts running in Obama's favor, McCain is still stubbornly opposed to even things Bush recognizes are smart. These are the kinds of things McCain has been saying about leaving Iraq in less than 5 years:
MCCAIN: For him [Obama] to talk about dates for withdrawal, which basically is surrender in Iraq after we're succeeding so well is, I think, really inexcusable.
Oh, but of course he did just say this a few days ago about the Maliki/Obama 16 month timetable:
BLITZER: Why do you think [Maliki] said that 16 months is basically a pretty good timetable?
MCCAIN: He said it's a pretty good timetable based on conditions on the ground. I think it's a pretty good timetable, as we should -- or horizons for withdrawal.
Flip-flop, flip-flop. So it is hard to tell what exactly McCain thinks, because he attacks Obama and saying he wants to "surrender", and then he turns around and agrees with Obama's timeline. Basically his campaign is scrambling, it is in chaos, they put all of their hopes into Iraq, and now that it has been shown that Obama has been right on everything, and even Bush is moving in that direction, McCain is left with nothing but his extreme hawkishness. So McCain has started questioning Obama's judgment based on his opposition to the Surge, which McCain insists has worked (it hasn't). The media has been hounding Obama on this all week, as they dutifully push McCain's talking points, and refuse to actually look at the details of decline in violence in Iraq, or question judgment in a meaningful way, like comparing their judgment on invading Iraq in the first place, which was the biggest foreign policy mistake in DECADES. Why doesn't the media ask McCain why he would do it all again even given the huge mess it has made for the US and the world, and given that NOTHING good has come from it? Why doesn't the media ask that question? Because McCain doesn't want those questions asked, so the media won't ask them. Notice a pattern?
Alright, so the point is, McCain and the Republicans are desperate, they are running scared, and they know the only thing keeping the roof from coming off their entire campaign is that the media, so far, is giving them a free pass, and running their talking points while ignoring, as much as they can, the facts. But McCain doesn't know how long the media can ignore reality, and how long the media can carry his water for him. So he keeps attacking Obama, with shockingly outrageous attacks, like the Holocaust attack, in order to keep the focus off of the issues, and on things like Obama's patriotism, or any number of other ridiculous things, so the voters don't learn about the issues.
So during Obama's trip, the Bush administration, on behalf of McCain's campaign, has been doing everything they can to mess it up. First, the night before Obama left, Condoleezza Rice announced that American embassies abroad can't give any assistance to political candidate's. This hadn't been the case when McCain had traveled abroad before as a presidential candidate, but suddenly the night before Obama goes on a big trip there are new restrictions. Then, when Obama was preparing to give his big speech in Berlin, which drew nearly a quarter million Europeans, the State Department again intervened and announced that foreign service workers can't go to his speech, which hadn't been a restriction for McCain, and it pissed off a lot of Americans working abroad, and drew the consternation of the American Foreign Service Association. So again we see the Bush administration stepping in to put restrictions on Obama's visit, while McCain had no such restrictions.
And then after his Berlin speech, Obama originally intended to visit wounded veterans in military hospitals in Germany, leaving the cameras and the press behind to visit them personally, and the trip was approved by the Pentagon weeks earlier. However then the Pentagon stepped in, the day before the event (last minute again), and reversed course saying that the rules stated that he could "only go as part of a previously-arranged congressional delegation." So Obama had to cancel his visit, however he still spoke to the wounded troops via phone later on. Again, the Bush administration stepped in, and at the last minute imposed restrictions on Obama's trip that hadn't applied to McCain. Andrea Mitchell, who was in Germany, even suggested that perhaps McCain's ties to the Republican foreign policy establishment were a factor in the reversal.
Barack Obama is wrong. It is never 'inappropriate' to visit our men and women in the military.
So McCain believes that the Pentagon is wrong too, apparently, since it was their choice, not Obama's. The funny thing is, you know damn well that if Obama had made the trip, McCain would have attacked saying it was "inappropriate" for Obama to "use" the wounded troops for his "political campaign". So whatever, Obama wanted to visit the troops just by himself to give them his support and tell them how proud he is of their service to the country, but the Pentagon, undoubtedly under the direction of Bush, told him he couldn't, and McCain nevertheless attacked him for it. End of story, right? Oh no, you underestimate how childish, vindictive and desperate McCain is:
First sentence, first distortion. Obama attended one hearing on Afghanistan, McCain, in the last two years, despite having a LOT more free time than Obama (since Obama has been in a nonstop campaign for a year and a half, while McCain has had months of nothing to do), hasn't attended a SINGLE HEARING on Afghanistan. Furthermore, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Joe Biden has taken care of holding hearings on Afghanistan, as is often the case when important issues are discussed in the whole committee, instead of left to a subcommittee.
Second sentence, why does this matter? As I've said before, the number of photo-ops you take in a geographic location means absolutely nothing about how much you know about that location. Just a few weeks before McCain started making these ridiculous attacks Obama has held a hearing with Gen. Petraeus, IN THE UNITED STATES (yes, it turns out the generals can travel too). It is funny, that McCain thinks he is an expert just because he has traveled to Iraq a few more times, yet he still can't get even the most basic facts about Iraq, the issues there, or even the geography of the area correct! Obama, on the other hand, has been proven right again and again, and he didn't have to go to Iraq to prove it. By McCain's own criteria, McCain would have no real knowledge of any issues concerning Iran (since he hasn't been there), Cuba (since he hasn't been there) or most other countries (because he hasn't been there either). Yet McCain seems to think he is an expert on Iran and Cuba and other countries, despite him never visiting, isn't that weird? Oh, and by McCain's own criteria, Obama is now more of an expert on Iraq, since he has traveled there, and to Afghanistan, more recently than McCain.
Third sentence, complete distortion. Obama voted against giving Bush a blank check to continue the war forever without any timetables for withdrawal, and the same bills happened to contain supplemental war funding. Here McCain is, as usual, a complete hypocrite, because McCain supported Bush's veto of all of the TROOP FUNDING BILLS that passed his desk that contained timelines for withdrawal, so by McCain's own criteria, McCain and Bush both vote against funding the troops. Oh, and do you really want to talk about funding the troops McCain? Because last time I checked, when the Democrats created a new GI Bill to give the troops greater educational benefits, MCCAIN OPPOSED IT, essentially saying that if we gave the troops too many benefits, they wouldn't feel trapped in the military anymore! Yeah, talk about supporting the troops.
Forth sentence, utterly shameless. Yes, Obama met with troops in a gym, and if you watch the actual clip from that appearance, you would see that the troops LOVE HIM. But what is really nasty is that McCain flat out lied here. Obama never intended to bring cameras or the press on his trip to the hospital, it was just going to be him and the troops, just like when he visited the troops in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Walter Reed. And the Pentagon didn't say he couldn't come because of cameras, it said he couldn't come because he wasn't part of a Congressional delegation. McCain is completely lying about what Obama wanted to do, and the Pentagon's role in restricting his trip. McCain is a liar. McCain, the scumbag he is, is actually trying to say Obama doesn't care about the troops, based on absolutely nothing but lies, and he knows it. So much for straight talk. It turns out that when McCain's back is against the wall and he doesn't want to admit Obama is right, or talk about the issues, he goes for disingenuous personal attacks, just like Bush and Rove did against Kerry. Only Bush and Rove had the good sense to use "independent" swiftboating groups to lie and attack the patriotism of Kerry, apparently McCain is going to throw out that slander himself.
And of course the Republicans and McCain's surrogates are making the rounds to all of the networks spreading lies about what actually happened, attacking Obama's patriotism and support of the troops, even though every poll I've seen has consistently shown that the troops support Obama over McCain. Hmmm...I wonder why...
And on On Face the Nation this morning, Senator Reed defended Senator Obama's not going to the military hospital in Germany, as did REPUBLICAN Senator Chuck Hagel, who accompanied Obama on the Middle East portion of his trip. Hagel responded to McCain's ad saying:
John is treading on some very thin ground here when he impugns motives and when we start to get into, 'You're less patriotic than me. I'm more patriotic ...' it's just not responsible to be saying things like that.
Damn right.
Needless to say, I expect some backlash against the McCain campaign for this, because it is so blatantly false, and so over the top dirty and shameless, there simply has to be a response. Right? Although nothing else the McCain campaign does, no matter how blatantly false or outrageous, it seems like McCain gets away with everything. So, in conclusion, I'm just going to end with this, what Cindy McCain vowed a few months ago on the Today Show:
Cindy McCain: There are clear differences in this race between whatever candidates wind up against each other. That's the beauty of this race. What you're going to see is a great debate. Which is what the American public deserves. None of this negative stuff, though. You won't see it come out of our side at all.
Curry: None of the negative stuff will come out of your side?
Cindy McCain: My husband is absolutely opposed to any negative campaigning at all.
They're doing it because the candidate, and the campaign, is not happy with where they are and they're lashing out.
Meanwhile, TPM notes that the media is reporting on McCain's shameless ad, but they aren't calling it false, surprise surprise. They'll just report what McCain said, report that Obama responded, and leave it at that, without ever telling the readers/viewers that McCain's claims are absolutely false, and Obama is right. That's just one way the media distorts reality, when McCain lies, they don't call him on those lies, they just spread them around, without a drop of critique, and say "oh, we were just reporting". Meanwhile readers/viewers who don't know the background of the issue, are once again left not knowing who is right, McCain or Obama, which certainly helps the candidate who spends 90% of his time on the campaign trail lying and flip-flopping (McCain).
Update (7/28): If I've had issues with Andrea Mitchell in the past, and I have, I might forgive her now, because she nailed the McCain camp on these lies, which she does a pretty good job debunking, like ALL journalists should be doing on every issue, they should be telling the full picture, in its full context, every time:
Notice the GOP hack can't even explain away McCain's bullshit, he just has to try to weasel around it by saying that Obama could have somehow ignored the Pentagon's rules and made the trip anyway, if he *really* cared about the troops. No you idiot, they are the Department of Defense's rules, you don't break those, that is idiotic, especially given the fact that McCain and the Republicans would have undoubtedly responded by attacking Obama for ignoring the Pentagon. And if the idiot can't figure out that he hasn't been banned from going on these trips because he hasn't been a presidential candidate (and doesn't have the Bush White House working against him), there is really no hope for the guy. He is a complete moron, through and through. Anyway, kudos to Andrea Mitchell for doing your job, since barely anyone else will. Keep it up!!!!!
Former Chief of Medical Operations for HQ USAFE at Ramstein Air Force Base Responds to Latest McCain Ad
WASHINGTON - The former Chief of Medical Operations for United States Air Force in Europe (USAFE) Headquarters at Ramstein Air Force Base in Germany today ripped into Senator John McCain's latest ad, which attacks Senator Barack Obama for not making a campaign event of a visit to wounded troops.
Dr. Katherine Scheirman, who was Chief of Medical Operations during Operation Iraqi Freedom, said in a statement:
"John McCain's new ad is dishonest and shameful, and I say that as the former Chief of Medical Operations. Senators Hagel and Reed confirmed to Bob Schieffer yesterday that Senator Obama visited the Combat Support Hospital in Baghdad as a part of their CODEL, with no media present.
"In Germany, Senator Obama made the right decision to respect wounded troops, and the doctors and nurses doing crucial and time-sensitive work, by not making a visit that was characterized as a campaign event by the Pentagon. Senator Obama should be thanked for putting our military above politics. And, I would hope that John McCain would think in those same terms, the next time he is put in a similar situation.
"Senator Obama has voted for the troops when John McCain has not, most recently on the new GI Bill. I am happy that Senator Obama puts the welfare of our troops above politics."
Dr. Katherine Scheirman, MD, MHA, CPE, FACPE, is a Senior Advisor to VoteVets.org, and has twenty years experience in the Department of Defense medical system. She retired from the Air Force in 2006 with the rank of Colonel. During her time in the military, she was assigned to a number of duties where she saw 'first hand' the shortcomings of the DOD medical system and its effect on troops. Most recently, she was at Ramstein Air Force Base in Germany, which saw the majority of those injured during the war in Iraq.
During that assignment as Chief of Medical Operations, she directed four branches responsible for medical operational and legal policy guidance for 10 USAFE medical facilities and an Air Force squadron at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center and provided oversight and mentoring for 11 Chiefs of Medical Staff and over 700 medical personnel throughout Europe. She was responsible for all quality of care, patient safety, behavioral health, JCAHO compliance, community health programs and business plan execution there, among her decades of other assignments at home and abroad.
So it turns out that Fox "News", like CBS, is taking their campaign to help McCain to the edit room. While CBS prefers to cut out foreign policy gaffes (lies) from McCain's interviews, and replace wrong answers to questions with answers that had nothing to do with the questions but are nonetheless loaded with McCain's anti-Obama talking points, it turns out that Fox has noticed those polls that show Americans uneasy with McCain's advanced age, and so they have broken out on a quest for the fountain of youth. Well, they didn't find it, so they had to fake it, which is why Fox is now using 8-year-old footage of McCain, from back when he was a spry 64, and are trying to pass it off as footage of his current campaign. Check it out:
So you learn a lot in that video, three major things actually:
Fox News, unsurprisingly, goes out of its way to deceive its viewers with a pro-McCain bias. I can't really say I'd put this past ABC, or CBS, because it is certainly less nefarious than editing out his lies for him, but I think it is certainly an amateur mistake they would probably know to avoid. Maybe if they could get their hands on a good video editor they could cut a few years off in the edit room, while still using current footage.
Ben Stein is a giant conservative douchebag. Seriously? 75,000 people wanting to experience a historic moment with the best candidate we've seen in decades = Hitler. Really? Is that all you got? You are facing a huge enthusiasm gap between your soggy old candidate and Barack Obama, so the best you can do is try to suggest that Obama is Hitler? Hey Ben, do you know who else is just like Hitler by your own criteria? John F. Kennedy, who was the last candidate to make such a speech in an arena. Of course a psycho like Ben Stein would no doubt love to compare JFK to Hitler as well, because, well, he is an lunatic, and worse, he is conservative.
And lastly we hear that John McCain canceled a trip to an oil rig to push offshore drilling because of Hurricane Dolly. Interesting spin Fox, because in reality he canceled his trip not because of the Hurricane, which was no threat, but because there was a big oil spill nearby. But of course Fox wouldn't say that, because it kind of hurts McCain's "offshore drilling is completely safe and the answer to all of our problems" spin, and probably cost their rich oil baron financiers a bunch of cash.
And this is why you can't get any real information from the media. For those concerned with fact, here is the real reason why McCain's offshore drilling photo-op was ruined:
The U.S. Coast Guard has closed 29 miles of the Mississippi River from New Orleans southward after a tanker and a barge collided, spilling more than 400,000 gallons of fuel oil into the river.
Tugboats hold up pieces of a barge after it collided with a tanker Wednesday in the Mississippi River in New Orleans.
The river, a major shipping route between the Midwest and Gulf of Mexico, could be closed for days during the cleanup, the Coast Guard said Wednesday.
More than 30 ships already are queued up along the river, waiting to pass through the closed zone, Coast Guard Petty Officer Jaclyn Young said.
The Coast Guard has deployed 45,000 feet of inflatable booms to contain the spill and is lining up another 29,000 feet, but it could be days before the river is reopened, she said.
The accident left a sheen over 90 percent of the area, she said.
And this one will be an exceptionally hard spill to clean up, because the oil is of a heavy, unrefined variety that can sink to the bottom, instead of staying on the surface. Some specifics from blogger "ukit":
State Department of Environmental Quality officials warned the unrefined, tar-like # 6 fuel oil is so thick that it could sink, complicating the cleanup efforts. Therefore, the fuel oil won't simply evaporate off the surface, which means workers will try to remove it before it starts to sink.
Additionally, the spill has already disrupted the local drinking supply:
Residents in Algiers, Gretna, St. Bernard Parish and Plaquemines Parish are also being asked to conserve water, as water intakes for those communities are closed to prevent contamination of the drinking water supply. Water flowing through the tap is from reserve supplies, which could run out in many areas by afternoon or early evening, officials said.
Finally, the report offers a sobering description of the disaster area:
Oil from the spill is visible along the New Orleans riverfront, with a thick coat of black muck washing up along the rocks near the Moonwalk. Farther away from the bank, the muck broke off into small islands.
A thick blanket of oil stuck to the hull of a Coast Guard cutter patrolling the area between the wrecked barge and the riverfront near the Aquarium of the Americas. The surrounding air there smells like it would near a gas station or in a traffic jam, only stronger.
Mmmm, smells like oil company profit! Gotta love that offshore drilling! It would be quite comical, for the reality of offshore oil drilling to mess up McCain's photo-op, if it weren't for the very real environmental damage that the spill caused. At the very least though, it is ironic. For more on McCain's (and Bush's) oil lies, see my past blog on offshore drilling.
Oh yes, one last thing on Fox "News" because I wrap this up. Last night Keith Olbermann did a nice piece exposing how according former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan, the White House sends their talking points directly to the decision makers over at Fox so they can know what to report. Yes, that's right, in addition to being a bunch of lying right-wing hacks, Fox is essentially a propaganda outlet for the Bush administration! As if we needed any more proof that Fox is not a real news network. Here's the video of the story:
Watch the Judiciary Committee (non-impeachment hearing) hearing on impeaching Bush on C-SPAN, because you aren't going to see a mention of this in the news. Go here to watch it online, it is good stuff.
Update (12:40 PM ET): Right now there is a crazy law professor named Jeremy Rabkin ranting about how Bush's impeachable offensives shouldn't lead to impeachment, not because they weren't illegal or didn't break the Constitution, but because other presidents have broken the law in the past during war time. Yes, because we locked up Japanese Americans during WWII, which is now nearly unanimously seen as extremely anti-democratic, and unconstitutional, Bush and any other president can do whatever they want as long as they do it during "wartime" (like the never-ending, never-defined, omnipresent "war on terror"). The guy is a complete nut, and you could tell he was a nut, because he reacted to the sane witnesses as if they were crazy. It was something to behold.
Update #2: It is over now. It is easy to sum up. The Democrats and most of the witnesses pointed out obvious facts about how Bush has broken the law and committed innumerable impeachable offenses. They spoke of the Constitutions and the consequences of failing to hold the Executive (Bush or any other president who acts with impunity) accountable. The Republicans, the same people who went on a witch hunt against Bill Clinton, wrung their hands and spun around and around trying to excuse Bush's lawbreaking. Oh, and usual with the Republicans in Congress, they acted like children, especially Rep. Steve King of Iowa, who always acts like a goddamn juvenile delinquent. They put on a pathetic spectacle.
And do you think the media will say a word about the six-or-so-hour hearing on impeachment? Hell no. Do you think they'll have an honest discussion, or any discussion, of impeachment, about the pros, the cons, the issues, the implications of inaction? Hell no. That's our media for you--shallow, pathetic, dumbed down, useless. Thanks.
Republican Senator Norm Coleman is facing a tough reelection battle this year from former comedian Al Franken. Now Minnesota is a progressive state, very blue, and Al Franken is a perfect fit. The only reason Coleman was elected is because the Democratic incumbent, Senator Paul Wellstone, a great Senator, tragically died in a plane crash just days before the election. Now it is our chance to take Paul's seat back, and Al Franken is just the person to do it. However Norm Coleman, like all Republicans, is unable to have a debate on the issues, because he supports bad policies, he is on the wrong side of the issues, especially in a state like Minnesota. So Coleman has been digging through every joke Al Franken ever told, and is trying to smear Franken by bringing up jokes from years ago that were just that, JOKES. It is a transparent attempt to keep the attention off his record. Here is Al Franken's response, which I think is right on the money:
He needs to keep this up. Every time Coleman comes out with a ridiculous attack on Franken's past career, Franken should come back with something like this:
I believe Minnesotans know the difference between comedy and politics, and they can see through the same old tired 'gotcha' politics that seeks to distract them from the real issues that affect them every day. Norm Coleman supports the same policies that have been hurting America for the last 8 years, and now he doesn't want the voters to focus on what is best for America, and Minnesota.
Go to Al Franken's website to help his campaign (and donate if you can), because this race is closer than it should be, and we need to fight for this seat.
