The Politics Thread - Read the First Post

[emma peel]

www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLIT...index.html

It's a great photo of Kerry in the above link if it works:very presidential and confident, IMO.

Mods, if this screws up again, please delete as I've tried about 4 times on this already. Thanks.

Edited by: emma peel at: 10/26/04 9:40 am

[skittles]

emma, CNN frequently changes pictures that accompany stories...



is the pic you are referring to, the one with the big chin & grin??

skittles

Prepare the child for the path, not the path for the child.

under construction (looking for another quote).

[emma peel]

Yes, skittles, but once (unless I screwed up the link, which is quite possible) a photo of Bush showed up after I posted the link.Blech.

I'd rather a big grin and chin over Bush's "smirk" any day.

Edited to be "nice."

Edited by: emma peel at: 10/26/04 9:52 am

[skittles]

CNN rotates pictures....



so, kittens, look for the big chin & grin from Green Bay (where the pic was taken)...



the problem for me, is that it looks like a caricature pic of Clinton.

skittles

Prepare the child for the path, not the path for the child.

under construction (looking for another quote).

[justin]

Speaking of Clinton he's, unsuprisingly, supporting Kerry. At a conference he said,



"If you have one candidate who's trying to make you afraid, and one candidate who's trying to make you think, you should support the candidate who's trying to make you think."



How very true.

--

"There are some days that you just can't get rid of a bomb" - Batman: The Movie

[sam7777]

As to why folks in other countries are interested in the US election, here's a nice summary:

Vote in U.S. inflames Europeans

Quote:

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One would think it was their leader being elected - and many Europeans believe it is, in a way. In a tremendous show of interest unseen in previous U.S. presidential campaigns, Europeans on both sides of the Channel have been riveted by the coming American vote, obsessing about the future of the United States as if it were their own.

.

"Because of the war against terror and the war in Iraq, people feel it's much more than a U.S. election," said Kay van de Linde, a communications consultant at The Hague. "They feel it's a world election, because the U.S. president decides not only what's good for the U.S., but also what's good, and bad, for Europe."

.

Judging from opinion polls, media reports and conversation on this side of the Atlantic, the overwhelming sentiment on what would be bad for Europe is another four years with President George W. Bush. In Britain, France, Germany, Spain and the Netherlands, Europeans appear to be united by an overwhelming antipathy toward Bush.



"He has the ability to provoke incredible animosity," said Alain Frachon, a senior editor at Le Monde, one of several French newspapers running extensive coverage of the American campaign. "And this gives us even more incentive to be interested in the U.S. election, because Bush is probably the least liked of all U.S. presidents since World War II."

.

Said Martin Fletcher, foreign editor of The Times of London, which also has devoted much coverage to the election: "There's just something about the president that grates on the foreign viewer - it just doesn't play well here. I cannot remember an issue that has ever aroused such intense interest."

.

European media are sending correspondents all over the United States in an effort to delve into the American psyche.

.

"We want to understand why so many people are still on Bush's side; it's a kind of mystery to us," said Peter Frey, Berlin bureau chief for ZDF television in Germany. "We are asking the American people, 'Why are you voting for Bush?' We want to understand why he has this support."

---

Of course, republicans don't give a shit what the rest of the world thinks but they should. The US does not exist in a vacuum despite their best efforts. The US election affects everyone.

Edited by: sam7777  at: 10/26/04 5:54 pm

[darkmagicwillow]

Quote:

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A letter writing campaign where the UK’s Guardian passed out email addresses for Clark County, Ohio voters in attempts to influence our election.

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It's ironic that Americans are fond of calling the POTUS the "Leader of the Free World" but not so fond of the free world expressing their opinions of their so-called leader.

--

"Omnia mutantur, nihil interit." -- "Everything changes, but nothing is truly lost."

[Gatito Grande]

Nor would they like it if "fur'ners" decided that, in order to have a say in choosing the LOTFW, they'll just have to all move to the U.S.



GG Randy Newman meant his 1980s song "Let's Drop the Big One" (as in, America nukes The World) as a parody, but for far too many 'merkins, as long as the fall-out fell elsewhere, they'd be fine w/ it. Out

[Kieli]

"French" becomes a Dirty Word in US Campaign

Quote:

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'French' Becomes a Dirty Word in U.S. Campaign



Tue Oct 26, 1:51 PM ET



By Sandra Maler



WASHINGTON (Reuters) - For centuries the very mention of France has conjured up images of elegance and sophistication but in an increasingly heated U.S. presidential campaign, "French" has become a dirty word.



Capitalizing on anti-French sentiment among some Americans following France's decision not to back the war in Iraq (news - web sites), some Republicans have repeatedly accused Democratic contender Sen. John Kerry (news - web sites) of "looking French."



The conservative press has jumped on the bandwagon, spurred by an anonymous Bush adviser making the comparison to The New York Times. Wall Street Journal commentator James Taranto, for example, has many times referred to Kerry as a "haughty, French-looking Massachusetts Democrat."



President Bush (news - web sites) and his campaign have not characterized Kerry in such a fashion publicly and the Bush campaign declined to comment. "Pas de commentaire," said spokesman Reed Dickens jokingly.



"It should be a compliment but in this context it means that Kerry would defer to France and Germany rather than defend his country," said Kathleen Hall Jamieson, director of the Annenberg Center for Public Policy at the University of Pennsylvania.



Kerry has French relatives and speaks the language fluently. "I thought America was the great melting pot and I don't see why Mr. Bush is picking out a nationality to criticize," said Kerry spokeswoman Stephanie Cutter.



"It's exactly that kind of attitude by Mr. Bush that has led America to be alone in the world."



Ever since French President Jacques Chirac held his ground at the United Nations (news - web sites) early last year and refused to follow America into war with Iraq, there has been a backlash against things French in middle America.



In the wake of the war, U.S. lawmakers ordered French fries renamed "Freedom" fries in the cafeteria of the U.S. House of Representatives.



"When you have Americans dumping fine French wine down their sink in protest at Iraq, you see the depth of the sense of betrayal," said Francoise Meltzer, a humanities professor at the University of Chicago.



'PUNCHING BAG'



The attacks against France during the campaign prompted the French ambassador to Washington, Jean-David Levitte, to protest to U.S. authorities this month.



"... We've been a bit too much as France the punching bag of the electoral debate," Levitte said recently during a speech at Johns Hopkins University.



Hall said this anti-French sentiment was relatively new.



"The level of international awareness in the United States is so low, I don't think the American public in general had a clear impression of France," she said. "If anything, prior to this concept, most Americans would assume 'looking French' would have been a compliment. People would take it as a synonym for being attractive, worldly and cultured."



Meltzer, a dual French-American national, says the anti-French sentiment is mostly a phenomenon among middle Americans -- middle in terms of geography and class -- a main group of voters, along with Christian fundamentalists, targeted by the Republican Party.



"There is a kind of rage among middle Americans that the French are ungrateful because 'we saved you in 1944 and now that we need you, you're not there.' The French didn't come through after Americans came through for them," Meltzer said.



"It's true that America helped the French during World War II but after all, without the French, it would not have won the American Revolution, and none of this has anything to do with whether the French should be in Iraq," she added.



While Bush and Kerry share the same background -- upper class from New England -- Bush has cultivated his Texan roots and affects a slangy speech, with broken sentences and uneven pronunciations like "nucular" instead of "nuclear."



Kerry, on the other hand, is perceived as a multilingual intellectual who speaks with an expansive vocabulary, proper grammar and syntax.



"Not only does Kerry speak French. He speaks English well," Meltzer said. "In addition his wife is foreign -- she speaks with an accent and she speaks her mind... That further contaminates Kerry. He's part Jewish, he grew up Catholic, he studied in Switzerland and he speaks French -- this all combines to make him 'French', not really American.



"French really means un-American," she added.



Although Bush has a French tailor, Georges de Paris, and until recently enjoyed the culinary delights of White House French pastry chef Roland Mesnier, he has publicly shunned things foreign.



While on trip to France in May 2002, he chided an American reporter for asking Chirac a question in French during a joint news conference in Paris. "He memorizes four words and plays like he's all intercontinental," Bush sneered.



Kerry, on the other hand, has even on occasion spoken French on the campaign trail. Opinion polls show Europeans overwhelmingly want him to win.



"Anybody who has been at the Statue of Liberty (a present from France) knows that America's greatest strength is its mix of nationalities and I think it's time for Mr. Bush to take one more trip to the Statue of Liberty to find out what America is all about," Cutter said.

---

Bush Campaign Site Blocking Foreign Visitors

Quote:

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Bush's Campaign Site Reported Blocking



1 hour, 59 minutes ago





LONDON - U.S. President George W. Bush (news - web sites)'s official campaign Web site has blocked access to foreign Web surfers since Monday, an Internet monitoring company said Wednesday.



Netcraft, based in Bath in western England, said the site, http://www.georgewbush.com, "appears to be rejecting visitors from most points outside the United States, while allowing access from U.S. locations."



Netcraft did not report any reason for the blockage. "We can't say precisely, except that it seems to be a decision by the maintainers of the Web site," Rich Miller, an analyst at Netcraft, said in a telephone interview.



Miller said the company had detected a six-hour outage last week which affected by the Bush Web site and http://www.rnc.org, the site of the Republican National Committee (news - web sites). The latter site was accessible from Britain Wednesday.



"Last week's simultaneous outages for GeorgeWBush.com and RNC.org prompted speculation that an electronic attack may have occurred, as the two sites are hosted on separate web servers," Miller said in a statement posted on Netcraft's Web site. "The Bush campaign told media the outage was "no big deal" and offered no specific explanation for the outage."



Netcraft said it monitors Web site response times from four locations within the United States and three in other countries.



"Since Monday morning, requests to GeorgeWBush.com from stations in London, Amsterdam and Sydney, Australia have failed, while the four U.S. monitoring stations show no performance problems. Web users in Canada report they are able to visit the site," Netcraft said.

---

Time flies by when the Devil drives.
It's not the pace of life that concerns me, it's the sudden stop at the end.

Edited by: Kieli at: 10/27/04 1:34 pm

[sam7777]

Well that's a sad comment on the Bush campaign. The best argument for John Kerry is that we need someone who does not polarize and divide the nation as Bush does. Kerry will reach out to people beyond his base, Bush has proved in this campaign that he will not.



Parties divided on Bush, Iraq

Quote:

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The president prompts emotional, almost visceral reactions from members of both parties. The man who pledged to be a uniter more than four years ago inspires little bipartisan agreement today.

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America deserves better. The current election shows the worthlessness of the Electoral College:

Electoral College polarizes nation

Quote:

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Today, we have political maps depicting two Americas. There are the blue states, so-called liberal bastions, and the red conservative bastion states. This is the stuff civil wars are made of, and this is not a trite comment. This is a growing danger to our republic.



Democrats and Republicans alike simply write off huge segments of American voters as lost causes. Is that healthy? No, it is wrong having "two Americas," one treated with disdain and the other coddled by each party respectively. "Red" voters in blue states, and "blue" voters in red states are ignored and have little incentive to vote for a presidential candidate other than for statistical purposes. Accordingly, a lot of people fail to even vote because of the apathy of knowing their ballots actually do not count, thanks to the Electoral College.



If presidential elections were decided by a popular vote, all parties would have to be more aware and considerate of the voters ---- you and I, the people who are supposed to count, not the red or blue turf. The presently sharply contrasting colors would blend and fade, leaving the extremists of both parties with dwindling influence as candidates' new strategies draw them to consider the needs of all voters, not as factions, blocs, or others.

---

The Bush's campaign stategy to appeal only to his base is bad for America and Democracy. Bush is dividing this country at a time when we need to work together to defeat threats such as terrorism and economic woes. I am not the only one who sees a bush disaster:

Gay Bishop: Bush A Disaster

Quote:

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Calling it "the most important election of our lifetimes" the Episcopal Bishop of New Hampshire Tuesday announced his support for John Kerry.



Bishop V. Gene Robinson, the first openly gay bishop in worldwide Anglican Church, and the center of a controversy over the role of gays in the Church, said that President George W. Bush has had a polarizing effect on the country.



He told students at Franklin Pierce College that he was voting for Kerry because he is afraid of what four more years of President George Bush would do to the country and the world.

---

The election on Nov 2 will not solve the problems of division in this country but I belive that electing Kerry who will listen is better than four more years of Bush obstinacy and incompetence.



Election Results Could Cause Depression, Anger and Despair Says Psychologist

Quote:

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Mental-health experts around the country should be on the lookout for signs of depression, anger and despair next week when the Presidential election results are tallied and the losing candidate's supporters face the grim reality that their man lost, according to psychologist Robert R. Butterworth, Ph.D.



With the election less than a week away and polls showing a race practically tied, supporters of both parties will be going into the election Tuesday ill prepared psychologically, without any inkling of how it may feel emotionally when their candidate loses.



"Many people have poured their heart, soul and money into this election. In addition, with the psychological tone of this campaign being extremely polarizing, it becomes difficult for the losing parties to join with the winners in an emotional and political reconciliation which could lead to closure and moving on with one's life," said Butterworth.



"This emotional state results in not only feelings of disappointment and dread in those voters backing the loser but has the potential to turn into psychological symptoms -- both because their candidate lost and because their entire political belief system and philosophical roots have been defeated!"



According to Butterworth, there are several patterns that may emerge in those individuals whose hopes and dreams have been dashed as a result of the election:



-- Sad and depressed: Not only has their candidate lost but their hopes and dreams concerning the future have crashed and burned. Feelings of despondency, hopelessness and even dread could occur.



-- Angry and resentful: Refusing to believe the legitimacy of the results, they become angry not only toward the winning candidate but the entire governmental process. This could result in alienation, cynicism and even anti-social activities.



-- Cynicism: When their candidate loses so does their belief in the democratic process. These individuals are the most likely to quit voting and alienate themselves from the entire political process. They could also have thoughts of moving out of the U.S.



Butterworth's advice to those individuals who feel depressed and despondent: "Help people to look at the long-term political view by not just only focusing on a this Presidential campaign but the issues that they care about both within a national and local perspective."

---

Whoever wins the presidency will inherit the Bush legacy: a divided and bitter country.

_____________________

I still see dead lesbian cliches

Edited by: sam7777  at: 10/27/04 2:54 pm

[Gatito Grande]

Quote:

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They could also have thoughts of moving out of the U.S.

---

C'mon, this is only true of losing Kerry supporters.



GG If Bush loses, his more "distressed" supporters move to bunkers in Idaho, or remote hollers in the South . . . w/ their guns. Lots of guns. Out

[sam7777]

In the way obvious category, most gay people are supporting Kerry:

Profile of Gay Voters Shows Overwhelming Support for Kerry

Quote:

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The annual Gay/Lesbian Consumer Online Census, fielded this past July and August by GLCensus Partners (a Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, OpusComm Group partnership), found that of registered voters 55 years and older, nearly 84 percent of females and 75 percent of males identified themselves as Democrats. (Among 18- to 24-year-olds, 68.8 percent of males and 67.4 percent of females identified themselves as Democrats.)



When asked to registered voters: “Who would you vote for if the presidential election were held today?” 90.4 percent of female respondents and 88.6 percent of male respondents said they would vote for Kerry. President Bush was the pick of 4.4 percent male and 1.5 percent female registered voters.

---

Gosh you could never tell that by reading this thread



Averaged together that gives Bush about 3% of the gay vote a bit down from the 25% that the Log Cabin Republicans say he got last time. It's odd how being anti-gay turns off most gay voters (at least those that can see past their republican blinkers).



And in the "oh is he still running" category. Alan Keyes spews more homphobia during a Debate with Barack Obama:

Quote:

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Obama criticized Keyes' argument that the children of gay couples, if born from artificial means and kept in the dark about their biological parents, could later end up unknowingly having sex with a relative. Calling it "a vicious attack," he claimed the argument was a subtle attempt to link homosexuality with incest.

---

Gosh republicans must be so proud to count the likes of Keyes as one of them. The only question that remains in this race is by how much Obama will kick Keye's ass.

_____________________

I still see dead lesbian cliches

Edited by: sam7777  at: 10/27/04 6:04 pm

[Kieli]

The Nausea.com (DISCLAIMER: This site shows scenes of graphic violence to civilians and children done by armies on behalf of their governments, etc. It is NOT for anyone with a weak stomach nor should children or teens view it without parental permission. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!)



This may get deleted but...felt some might want to see it for themselves.

Time flies by when the Devil drives.
It's not the pace of life that concerns me, it's the sudden stop at the end.

[Warduke]

I saw this at IMDb and just had to post it

Quote:

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Bush Voted Year's Top Film Villain



American President George W. Bush has topped an unlikely poll in Britain - as this year's top screen villain. Bush won the dubious accolade for his unauthorized appearance in Michael Moore's anti-Bush documentary Fahrenheit 9/11. The politician beat out the likes of Doc Ock, played by Alfred Molina, in Spider-Man 2; The Texas Chainsaw Massacre's Leatherface; Andy Serkis' Gollum from Lord Of The Rings trilogy; and Elle Driver, the assassin played by Daryl Hannah in Kill Bill. Almost 10,000 people voted in the poll, conducted by Total Film Magazine.

---

---

Firefox: One Browser To Rule Them All.

[Gatito Grande]

Guess he musta beat Satan in The Passion of the Christ, too.



GG Really wanna bitch-slap (nonviolently, of course) any LGBT who would vote for Dubya* Out



* Though that bitch-slap would be sorta welcome, I'd guess: after all, if a queer vote for Dubya, they might as well be wearing a "Kick me!" sign . . .

[Jimmi Magnus]

The Florida circus is back in action.



On your marks, get set, rant.

Du skal ha lussinger i takt til musikken

[maudmac]

Heh, my real rant is mostly unpostable. It's just flaming rage.



I hate like hell that I'm not the least bit surprised these things are going on.



Seems to me there's one really good way to make sure things like this don't happen in future presidential elections - get rid of the Electoral College. Then the voters of Broward Country won't be disproportionately important to the outcome of the election and will, hopefully, be left alone. And my vote, as a blue voter in a red state, will actually count. The last poll for my state shows Kerry favored by over 40%. A peek at the Electoral Vote Predictor shows that that's the case for most Southern red states. Slightly less for the Plains and Western red states, but even there, still a good third of those polled favor Kerry. And, of course, Bush is polling around 40% in most of the blue states. All those red voters' votes are going down the toilet, too.



I've read a few arguments in favor of keeping the Electoral College that I thought had some validity, but on the whole, I think it's an institution that's doing far more harm than good.



It's just not right to have a nationwide election go to the candidate the majority of voters say they don't want! But, either way, no matter who wins from which party, you still have a situation where a very significant percentage of the population has chosen another candidate.



I really wish we had more than two (viable) choices. And I wish we had Instant Run-Off voting. That would open the door to greater representation from "third parties" without having to deal with any of those candidates being a "spoiler."



All in all, the way things are done now in the United States, it makes it very easy for one or both of the major parties to foment a culture war, to turn this country into, essentially, two nations at each other's throats. And that is just sooooo 1860s.



The reality of what things are like in the US isn't so black and white...or red and blue. We aren't just Democrats and Republicans or liberals and conservatives. I'd say that probably most of us don't fit neatly into either ideology box. Plenty of us fit into both, depending on the issue. And plenty of us are further left or further right than both boxes allow for. It's only this two-party system that keeps us from seeing that, if we must be so divided (and I think we always will be), we are actually five or ten or twenty nations, not just two.



Power to the people!

---

rain ain't gonna hurt me

[sam7777]

Quote:

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All in all, the way things are done now in the United States, it makes it very easy for one or both of the major parties to foment a culture war, to turn this country into, essentially, two nations at each other's throats.

---

Maudmac: Too true. We only get two viewpoints form the parties that in no way represent the diversity of the country's citizens.



The past election and this one show that the Electoral college as currently implemented simply does not work to provide representation for all Americans not make every vote count. I'm in a blue state so my vote for Kerry will count but not that any Bush supporters. I hate that the focus on this election is on about 10-12 of the 50 states with the rest of us ignored. There are alternatives:



What are some of the alternative reform ideas?

Quote:

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Direct Election (with and without Instant Runoff Voting) Congressional District Allocation Proportional Allocation (with or without a percentage limit, say 5%, to be considered) National Bonus Plan (gives 102 extra electoral votes to the national popular vote winner)

---

I like the proportional system. I would get rid of the actual electors and have elector points instead split up by proportionally. This would solve the problem of how to allocate electors proportionally. If Nader gets 1.35% of the vote then he gets 1.35% of the eclector points. Without human electors the electors can be split up in frational amounts.



For example, according to the Electoral Vote Predictor today, the state of Oregon with 7 electoral votes is split:

49% Kerry

43% Bush

3% Nader



I would give out the electoral votes as follows:

3.43 Kerry

3.01 Bush

0.21 Nader

etc for the rest of them



The points would then be added up with the one getting 270 being elected. The advantages I see are that candidates would be forced to compaign everywhere and not just in "swing" states. All votes would be counted but proportionally in accordance with the current electoral college. This would give less populous states the same advantage that they get now with the electoral college. Third parties would have a better chance to make an impact in electoral votes. Right now there is simply now way to break the 2 party gridlock. The current Electoral College rewards niche campaigning and special interests. The presidents of the US should be forced to represent the whole country rather than just their base.

_____________________

I still see dead lesbian cliches

Edited by: sam7777  at: 10/28/04 3:24 pm

[Gatito Grande]

* More than 100 people in a Georgia precinct were summoned to a hearing to "prove" that they were legal voters. The grounds for the challenge? No reason given (not required, in order to make the challenge), but they all "just happened to have" Spanish surnames (you'll be shocked to hear it was a GOP official making the challenges)



* The latest Dubya TV spot, w/ a doctored photo in it (3 soldiers at one of his rah-rah rallies, were digitally turned into dozens, if not hundreds of soldiers!)



* GOP intimidation squads planned on being dispatched to polls throughout the black areas of Cleveland (illegally demanding proof of legal voter status)



GG As I type, I'm hearing on NPR's "Market Place" that boycotts of American goods are spreading around the globe: like our economy wasn't bad enough already? Re-electing Bush will be economic, social justice and civil rights suicide!!! Out

[Blue Pariah]

but since these are the people running America, I think it fits better here:



www.grist.org/news/maindish/2004/10/27/scherer-christian/



Forget about "suiciders" in Iraq, these people want to take the whole PLANET with them.

I take to shade and I play in the shadows
I watch my back and I play it cool
"Blue Pariah" by BRJ

[Gatito Grande]

Love it, love it, LOVE IT!!!



[Mods, 'scuse the double post: I'm just too giddy ]



Right when Dubya and Rummy had thought maybe they were gonna get away from the unguarded explosives gone missin' story [Note: GG sez it would have been relevant even if the explosives had been moved befor the war], comes footage showing that the explosives WERE still there, when the US Army got there!!! (The Army cut the "UN seal," and went wandering around inside!")

Quote:

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The seal's critical," Albright said. "The fact that there's a photo of what looks like an IAEA seal means that what's behind those doors is HMX. They only sealed bunkers that had HMX in them."



After the bunkers were opened, the 101st was not ordered to secure the facility.

---

Ladies and gentlekittens: I present to you, what may well be the coffin nail in this putrid adminstration.



GG Read it, and weep . . . tears of joy! Out

[sam7777]

GG: Here's hoping this scandal is the one that finally sinks Dubya.



Washington Blade has it's endorsement out:

Not Bush for president

Quote:

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One million gays voted for Bush four years ago, and if his support for a marriage amendment hasn’t cost him that support, then his cynical politics should.

...

John Kerry’s gay supporters point to a long record of supporting gay civil rights over two decades in the U.S. Senate. He has for the most part been on the right side on every issue where George Bush stands on the wrong side: workplace protection, hate crimes, repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” responsible HIV prevention.

....

A vote for John Kerry is a vote for progress, however incremental, and a vote against the hateful, cynical politics of division.

---

It's nicely summarizes the bad of Bush without sparing Kerry on his gay marriage stand.

_____________________

I still see dead lesbian cliches

Edited by: sam7777  at: 10/29/04 10:55 am

[Still Waters Run Deep]

I know I'm preaching to the converted, but if any of you kittens out there are'nt sure about whether to vote or not, please re-consider.



vote Bush, and you make the world an even harder place to live if you're marginalised for whatever reason



vote Kerry and you will make the world a slightly better place to live in



No I'm not American, I'm Welsh and a citizen of this world.



You may think that I should'nt be making this plea, as it's your election. but when the most powerful nation on this small earth is run by an administration who have scant regard for the rights of the individual, minority groups, constitutional law, environment, partner states and anybody who displeases them, then the rest of the world has a right to be worried.



Because you know, once Iraq and the middle east is sent back to the stone age, who will be next... ?

-----------------------------------

love and kisses

Still Waters



"just an old, saggy cloth cat. Baggy, and a bit loose at the seams, but Emily loved him"

Edited by: Still Waters Run Deep at: 10/29/04 12:09 pm

[maudmac]

I don't have a problem with you making that plea at all. Because the outcome of this election will doubtlessly affect a great many nations besides the US. I don't want to live in the country Bush is running any more than I want you to live in a world he's going to stomp all over. No one should have Bush inflicted upon them. Those tens of thousands of dead Iraqi women and children would probably agree.

---

rain ain't gonna hurt me

[sam7777]

The war has left over 100,000 Iraqis dead:

Household Survey Sees 100,000 Iraqi Deaths

Quote:

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Researchers have estimated that as many as 100,000 more Iraqis - many of them women and children - died since the start of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq than would have been expected otherwise, based on the death rate before the war.

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You don't have to be a liberal to endorse. Kerry has the endorsement of the American Conservative.

Quote:

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Kerry’s the One



There is little in John Kerry’s persona or platform that appeals to conservatives. The flip-flopper charge—the centerpiece of the Republican campaign against Kerry—seems overdone, as Kerry’s contrasting votes are the sort of baggage any senator of long service is likely to pick up. (Bob Dole could tell you all about it.) But Kerry is plainly a conventional liberal and no candidate for a future edition of Profiles in Courage. In my view, he will always deserve censure for his vote in favor of the Iraq War in 2002.



But this election is not about John Kerry. If he were to win, his dearth of charisma would likely ensure him a single term. He would face challenges from within his own party and a thwarting of his most expensive initiatives by a Republican Congress. Much of his presidency would be absorbed by trying to clean up the mess left to him in Iraq. He would be constrained by the swollen deficits and a ripe target for the next Republican nominee.



It is, instead, an election about the presidency of George W. Bush. To the surprise of virtually everyone, Bush has turned into an important president, and in many ways the most radical America has had since the 19th century. Because he is the leader of America’s conservative party, he has become the Left’s perfect foil—its dream candidate. The libertarian writer Lew Rockwell has mischievously noted parallels between Bush and Russia’s last tsar, Nicholas II: both gained office as a result of family connections, both initiated an unnecessary war that shattered their countries’ budgets. Lenin needed the calamitous reign of Nicholas II to create an opening for the Bolsheviks.



Bush has behaved like a caricature of what a right-wing president is supposed to be, and his continuation in office will discredit any sort of conservatism for generations. The launching of an invasion against a country that posed no threat to the U.S., the doling out of war profits and concessions to politically favored corporations, the financing of the war by ballooning the deficit to be passed on to the nation’s children, the ceaseless drive to cut taxes for those outside the middle class and working poor: it is as if Bush sought to resurrect every false 1960s-era left-wing cliché about predatory imperialism and turn it into administration policy. Add to this his nation-breaking immigration proposal—Bush has laid out a mad scheme to import immigrants to fill any job where the wage is so low that an American can’t be found to do it—and you have a presidency that combines imperialist Right and open-borders Left in a uniquely noxious cocktail.



During the campaign, few have paid attention to how much the Bush presidency has degraded the image of the United States in the world.

...

George W. Bush has come to embody a politics that is antithetical to almost any kind of thoughtful conservatism. His international policies have been based on the hopelessly naïve belief that foreign peoples are eager to be liberated by American armies—a notion more grounded in Leon Trotsky’s concept of global revolution than any sort of conservative statecraft.

....

This election is all about George W. Bush, and those issues are enough to render him unworthy of any conservative support.

---

I agree with none of their politics but even they can see what a disaster Bush has been.

_____________________

I still see dead lesbian cliches

Edited by: sam7777  at: 10/29/04 7:04 pm

[Gatito Grande]

"Our" as in "George W. Bush's Best Friend."



I'm just sick about this: the mo'fo' new Osama Bin Laden tape. If I were any more cynical and paranoid, I would suspect that OBL (looking "tan, rested and ready" as one CNN wag put it) has been put forth (from wherever we've been keeping him) for just such an occasion (the idea that suddenly "finding and killing him" might be a little too obvious an October Surprise).



At any rate, everyone and their mother is saying that this will help Dubya (his approval rating goes up whenever the words "terror" dominate the headlines). Yeah, I can hope that Kerry will say "Look how healthy and confident he looks! Does this look like a man we've 'got on the run,' as the President keeps boasting? Or is this just another twisting of the truth?"



OBL does condemn both Bush and Kerry (part of how we know it's such a recent tape). However, my paranoid, pessimistic, and realistic self knows that too many undecided/weak Kerry voters are going to go to the polls either fearing, or determined to "stick it to," Bin Laden, and will therefore (against all common sense) pull the Dubya handle.



GG I assume most of y'all aren't religious, but we may need a miracle to get past this, and put Kerry over the (Electoral College) top. Work for victory, but consider praying for it, too! Out



ETA: the following was written earlier today, before the Bin Laden tape story broke (it was written regarding the extremely fake-looking "Azzam the American" tape . . . which you'll probably never hear about again).



I report, you decide: scarily-accurate prediction, based upon easily-guessed consequences?

Quote:

---

At the very least, it ought to lay to rest who al-Qaida is pulling for on Tuesday, assuming the tape is real. This is one terror group that would obviously appreciate four more years of the same.



Boosting recruitment with the occupation of Iraq. Letting Osama bin Laden run free. Alienating America's allies.



Actually, given the political bank-shot potential here, it's a wonder bin Laden hasn't put out a press release: "Kerry is my man." That could lift Bush well beyond the margin of error and ensure one diabetic terrorist never gets caught.

---

Ellis Henican, originally in published in Newsday

Edited by: Gatito Grande at: 10/29/04 10:03 pm

[emma peel]

GG, I understand what you're saying about the OBL tape, but I do hope you're wrong about it helping Bushie boy. I mean, if the translation is correct, OBL mentions that Bush was reading My Pet Goat at the school on 9/11. Pretty unpresidential, if you ask me.

But then again, I was able to vote yesterday (Kerry), so it's a done deal on my part.

[sheila wt]

Quote:

---

Be the Wind: On the Upcoming Elections

by Starhawk



As you read this, a mother in Iraq is newly wailing over the body of a dead child. A nineteen year old kid who used to be the star of his basketball team is being sent home without legs. A father in Guantanamo hasn't seen his kids, or sunlight, for three years. Another chunk breaks off the polar ice caps and the heat trapped by greenhouse gases churns the atmosphere into new swirls of turbulence like those that unleashed four hurricanes in one season in the Caribbean. As I type this sentence, another worker loses her union job, another child is shot in Palestine, another farmer somewhere drinks pesticides in despair. The stakes are really high right now. And the future is very unclear. It

seems likely the outcome of the elections will be a cliff hanger until the very end. Bush could win. Kerry could win. Bush could try to manipulate, steal, or subvert the outcome. His forces could manufacture a last-minute

surprise, unearth Bin Laden, say, or stage a terrorist attack. They could even try to postpone or cancel elections altogether. After all, this particular gang of thugs has for decades plotted, planned, schemed, manipulated and murdered to consolidate their power, why should they let it

go for anything as simple as a fair election? I don't know when I've seen so many people so deeply afraid, staring into the future like a rabbit caught in the headlights of an oncoming truck. Will it run us down? Do we try to deflect its path, or run away?



I'm hearing two schools of thought among progressives. Some are heading to swing states to help get out the vote. Others are saying, 'Why vote?' when both candidates are taking such similar positions on the war, and serve the

same corporate interests. I'm a direct action kind of gal, and I don't generally put a lot of energy into electoral politics. But I believe that we need to vote. We need to do all we can to keep the neocons behind Bush from further consolidating their power. Voting is not the most empowering of political acts -- but it's the one that most people across the political spectrum take part in. When I stand in line to vote in my neighborhood, I stand in a crowd that is more diverse than almost any other political activity I take part in. Working class, middle class, old, young, Euro/African/Asian/Latino Americans‹everyone is there. I don't see how we can claim to speak to the communities who are most impacted by the neocons policies, most disenfranchised, most utterly screwed, if we disdain this simplest, most basic of political acts. How do we speak to the parents of kids whose schools are lacking books and desks and supplies if we can't get out to vote for school bonds? In California, we have a chance to vote for Proposition 66, which would end the worst abuses of our vicious three-strike law that now condemns mostly black and brown offenders to life sentences for stealing a few bucks worth of groceries. If you can't be bothered to vote for that, don't claim to be an ally of communities of color. In every area, there are crucial issues on the ballot that go far beyond just the choice of presidential candidate -- whether they are initiatives to ban the growing of GMO crops that we need to pass, or initiatives to ban gay marriage that we need to defeat.



What about voting for Nader, or the Green Party? I've voted for Nader many times. I'm registered Green Party. I strongly support Green Party candidates in local and regional elections. I've seen what a Green Mayor and City Council can do in Sebastopol, where they have banned the use of pesticides on city property, planted a permaculture garden outside the Police Station, are working on a community garden and skateboard park. I think that's one way we can build a Green Party or other third party as a

counterforce that might pull our national dialogue to the left, from the bottom up, in places where we can win and build alternatives as examples of what is possible. I thought Nader was right to run last time, to attempt to

give voice to issues that other candidates weren't talking about, to start to build a new base. But this time, I see his decisions as undermining that base. If by some miracle a candidate with his policies got elected, she'd need to be a great coalition builder, with a brilliant sense of how to win

over, influence, charm, and yes, and occasionally arm-twist both allies and enemies -- and I don't see that in Nader or the Greens nationally at this time.



I've heard it said that "the lesser of two evils is still an evil." Kerry does not perfectly represent my vision for the world, or the policies I would like to see implemented. I don't expect that any candidate for President will, under the current system which is so driven by money and corporate influence. But Kerry does represent change, a refusal to give the current evil a mandate. And here let me quote my brother, Mark Simos, who wrote to me saying:



"I'm choosing to focus on these messages: that voting for change right now will send the most powerful possible message to the world, that Americans still have a conscience; that we are not completely controlled by our media spinmeisters; that the mechanisms of democracy are, somehow, still intact if compromised on all sides; that we hold our leaders accountable for the consequences of their policies, even if they themselves refuse to do so; that we are capable of getting out of denial about realities on the ground, instead of "changing the facts to suit our position"; and that we are fundamentally committed to finding more just ways of exercising leadership in the post 9/11 world. In other words, the act of change itself will open doors to new alternatives hard to envision right now." But won't things get so bad if Bush gets in again that people will finally

wake up and make the revolution? Oh, if you believe that you weren't around or have forgotten the same arguments in '68 and '72 and '80 and '84 and on and on. What actually happens when the right wing triumphs is that progressives become demoralized, the economic elite gains and keeps more power, the national dialogue shifts further away from progressive goals, and things get worse. Maybe it's hard to imagine that things can get worse than they are, but I've been to Palestine and I'm telling you, they can get a whole lot worse. And I believe that in many important ways Kerry will be significantly better than Bush. On issues of women's rights and on the environment, there's a world of difference between them. Kerry has fought to prevent Bush from rolling back clean air and water standards. He

supports a shift to renewable energy sources, and is aware of the global warming crisis. He's a strong supporter of women's right to choose, and is pledged to nominate judges to the Federal bench who will support our liberties.



At minimum, he seems to inhabit roughly the same reality I do, in which Iraq is a mess, the economy is a disaster, and people all over the world are suffering. Listening to Bush in the debates, I began to wonder if he is actually the president of some other country, where foreign wars are going well, the economy is booming, African American children are dutifully doing their homework in the homes their parents own and getting the test scores they need to go on to college, and the environment is something invented by liberals to hamper business. That would explain a lot, since I know he wasn't actually elected president of this one. For the American people to ratify the Bush policies of greed, lies, empire and war, or to let them continue out of apathy or misguided principle, would be to contribute to crimes against humanity. I have no illusions that Kerry will be a beacon of pacifism and revolution, but at least he knows that Iraq is a disaster, that nuclear proliferation is a danger, that jobs are evaporating, and that the environment actually exists and has some bearing on our quality of life. And Kerry windsurfs. That's a quality I want in a president, because we need to be the wind.



We need to be the force that politicians have to respond to. It's useless complaining about Kerry's positions or about how frustrating it is to not have a viable candidate that can really raise the issues of the war and globalization. We need to raise those issues, as we have been, and continue

to raise them so strongly and loudly that they cannot be ignored. Regardless of who is elected, we need to build the base and the movement that can shift the political currents away from the right-wing shoals of empire back to the harbor of real democracy.



If Bush wins the election or steals it, if there is fraud or attempts to disrupt the process, we can't sit back this time with that paralyzed-rabbit-stare. We need to be organized and prepared to hit the streets and raise such a ruckus that the fraud cannot be ratified. We can complain all we want about Gore and the Democrats rolling over and playing dead last time, but how many of us were in the streets urging them on to fight? This time, we need to be ready. So at the bottom of this email you'll find a call from the NO STOLEN ELECTIONS campaign, and a pledge you can sign to participate in protests including nonviolent civil disobedience if fraud occurs. I've signed it: I hope you will too. If Kerry wins, we also need to be prepared to hit the streets, to celebrate but also to agitate, to let him know that we actually do want health care and good schools, taxes on the rich and the corporations, and end to the

murderous mess in Iraq and our civil liberties back. Oh yes, and that small problem of the basic life support systems of the planet heading toward collapse, could we begin to address that? In San Francisco, we have demonstrations planned for November 3, regardless of who wins, calling for

Healthcare, not Warfare‹beginning with a 9 AM rally at Justin Herman Plaza, a march through the Tenderloin district and a convergence at noon at the Federal Building. It's part of an overall national campaign, Beyond Voting,

http://www.beyondvoting.org . You can check the website to find out what's planned in your area, or plan an action of your own.



And whoever wins, we need to actually build the world we want to live in, street by street, neighborhood by neighborhood. That's a longterm project, and I won't outline the full program here. But here's what I intend to do

on November 2: My house is across the street from our neighborhood polling place. We're going to set up a free café in our garage, and invite the neighbors to stop by, before or after voting. For some free coffee, and some homegrown apple pie, and some conversation about what our neighborhood wants and needs. Maybe we'll set up a mini Really Free Market, and give stuff away. Give out sidewalk chalk to the kids and let them draw their visions on the street. It's a small action, but any time we start to reach out across the barriers that keep us isolated and build community, we undermine the empire. A year ago, my friends and I were blockading and dancing outside the walls

of the World Trade Organization's collapsing Ministerial, chanting in Spanish, "We are the wind that blows the Empire down."



We need to be that wind.



------------------------------------------------------------------------

Copyright (c) 2004 by Starhawk. All rights reserved. This copyright protects Starhawk's right to future publication of her work. Nonprofit, activist, and educational groups may circulate this essay (forward it, reprint it, translate it, post it, or reproduce it) for nonprofit uses. Please do not change any part of it without permission.



Starhawk is an activist, organizer, and author of Webs of Power: Notes from the Global Uprising and nine other books on feminism, politics and earth-based spirituality. Her latest book, The Earth Path, has just been published by HarperSanFrancisco. For details of her upcoming events, see her schedule page.

---

------------------------------

Sheila

[mscheckmate]

Sigh. This is just sad. The Bush administration is trying to limit the legal rights of American citizens to file suit under the Help America Vote Act, in essence taking away the rights of individual Americans to sue to make sure that federal election laws are enforced. And this is in addition to documented efforts on the part of Republican Party operatives to suppress votes in traditionally democratic-leaning minority communities in Florida, Ohio, and Wisconsin.



From the LA Times:





Published on Friday, October 29, 2004 by the Los Angeles Times

Quote:

---

Bush Seeks Limit to Suits Over Voting Rights

Administration lawyers argue that only the Justice Department, not the voters, may sue to enforce provisions in the Help America Vote Act.



by David G. Savage and Richard B. Schmitt,



WASHINGTON — Bush administration lawyers argued in three closely contested states last week that only the Justice Department, and not voters themselves, may sue to enforce the voting rights set out in the Help America Vote Act, which was passed in the aftermath of the disputed 2000 election.



Veteran voting-rights lawyers expressed surprise at the government's action, saying that closing the courthouse door to aspiring voters would reverse decades of precedent.



Since the civil rights era of the 1960s, individuals have gone to federal court to enforce their right to vote, often with the support of groups such as the NAACP, the AFL-CIO, the League of Women Voters or the state parties. And until now, the Justice Department and the Supreme Court had taken the view that individual voters could sue to enforce federal election law.



But in legal briefs filed in connection with cases in Ohio, Michigan and Florida, the administration's lawyers argue that the new law gives Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft the exclusive power to bring lawsuits to enforce its provisions. These include a requirement that states provide "uniform and nondiscriminatory" voting systems, and give provisional ballots to those who say they have registered but whose names do not appear on the rolls.



"Congress clearly did not intend to create a right enforceable" in court by individual voters, the Justice Department briefs said.



In one case the Sandusky County Democratic Party sued Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell, arguing that the county's voters should be permitted to file provisional ballots even if they go to the wrong polling place on election day.



The Justice Department intervened as a friend of the court on Blackwell's side.



Saturday's decision in that case, and in other recent cases from Michigan and Florida, gave the department a partial victory. On the one hand, the courts agreed with state officials who said voters may not obtain a provisional ballot if they go to the wrong polling place.



However, all three courts that ruled on the matter rejected the administration's broader view that voters may not sue state election officials in federal court.



Still, the issue may resurface and prove significant next week if disputes arise over voter qualifications. Some election-law experts believe the administration has set the stage for arguing that the federal courts may not second-guess decisions of state election officials in Ohio, Florida or elsewhere.



J. Gerald Hebert, a former chief of the department's voting-rights section, said he was dismayed that the government was seeking to weaken a measure designed to protect voters.



"This is the first time in history the Justice Department has gone to court to side against voters who are trying to enforce their right to vote. I think this law will mean very little if the rights of American voters have to depend on this Justice Department," said Hebert, who worked in the voting-rights section from 1973 to 1994.



In a statement, the Justice Department said it was simply trying to implement what it considered to be the clear intent of Congress. Other voting-rights laws, including the National Voter Registration Act of 1993, which required states to allow citizens a chance to register to vote while applying for or renewing driver's licenses, have been more explicit in allowing for private enforcement, it noted.



In contrast, the Help America Vote Act says in its enforcement section that "the attorney general may bring a civil action" in federal court to challenge the actions of states that fail to follow the law.



"Where Congress expressly decided to trust judicial enforcement of a statute to the Department of Justice, as it did in HAVA, the Department has a practice of defending its jurisdiction in court," the department's statement said. The department said that, on occasion, it had opposed private enforcement in other voting-rights cases.



But some former Justice voting-rights officials and some election law and civil rights experts said the department's latest position represented a marked philosophical shift. Historically, they said, the department had been aggressive in supporting the idea of private suits as an important tool in fighting discrimination and other ills, even where such rights were not clearly spelled out by legislation.



"Before this administration, I would say that almost uniformly, the Department of Justice would argue in favor of private rights of action … to enforce statutes that regulate state and local government," said Pamela Karlan, a professor at Stanford University's Law School.



She said the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965 did not originally include a private right to sue state officials who discriminated against aspiring black voters. The Justice Department backed the idea of private suits, nonetheless, in a test case that ultimately reached the U.S. Supreme Court in 1969.



In their ruling, the justices said "the achievement of the act's laudable goal would be severely hampered … if each citizen were required to depend solely on litigation instituted at the discretion of the attorney general."



More recently, the Justice Department also sided with private plaintiffs in a 1996 case challenging a registration fee that had been instituted by the Virginia Republican Party as a racially motivated poll tax under Section 10 of the Voting Rights Act.



The section did not expressly mention private actions but the Supreme Court, at the urging of the Justice Department, found an "implied" right to sue, said Steven J. Mulroy, an assistant professor at the University of Memphis Law School and a former lawyer in the department's voting-rights section.



"It is pretty rare for the Department of Justice to take a position that there is no private right of action to enforce a federal statute guaranteeing voting rights," he added.



In a related development, the Justice Department announced Thursday that it was sending nearly 1,100 federal workers — more than twice the number four years ago — to monitor and observe the election in 25 states for possible violations of the federal voting-rights laws.



About 840 federal observers will be stationed at polling places in 27 areas covered by federal court orders, including parts of Mississippi, Texas, Arizona and New Mexico, the department said in a news release.



In addition, the department said it was deploying scores of attorneys and staff from its civil rights division to monitor voting in 58 jurisdictions in other parts of the country. Officials did not explain how they chose those locations, although many are in such battleground states as Michigan, Ohio and Florida.



Civil rights groups have been concerned that the spectacle of a growing number of federal workers stationed at polling places could have a chilling effect on potential voters.



The department said that most of the workers would be from the federal Office of Personnel Management and that none of the monitors at polling locations were criminal prosecutors.

---

In the evenings I shall read to you while you work your cross-stitch in the firelight. And then we shall go to bed, our bed, my dearest girl...from "Sisters," by Lynne Cheney

Edited by: mscheckmate at: 10/30/04 9:11 pm

[Gatito Grande]

My favorite radio program is This American Life.



Listen to to this week's show---streamed here in Real Audio---on swing voters (mainly a buncho idiots . . . but w/ some hope in the end), but mainly for the compilation of GOP-sponsored Vote Suppression: catagorily different (i.e. worse!) than anything the Democrats have (by even GOP characterizations), or haven't done.



GG Prepare to be outraged . . . AND prepare to FIGHT BACK! Out