They held a contest, this one won.
–
I voted for a different shirt, too. These people aren’t respecting our opinions or counting our votes! They just forced this “BFD” shirt upon us, and rushed it to print without caring what we think. Action must be taken, and fast!
I’m forming the Tee Party.
-GreenAdder [via fark.com]
Oh, wait, she's in her jammies
Note: title of this post crafted to appeal to Michelle Malkin fans. I know why you read that nut.
How Obama got elected
Three words: Stupid people voted.
Lots and lots of stupid people.
This is nice. Pretty funny actually. Those links go a poll that some nutjub McCain whiner hired “Zogby” to do. As a polling company, this is what they do. It should be noted, however, that the questions here are supplied by the client, it’s the methodology and actual polling done by the contractee.
The guy hired Zogby to do the poll so he wouldn’t be outed as a sneaky editor for making his documentary regarding the stupidity of the majority of American voters. Sadly, looking at the poll results and then the video (which I’ll post at the end) reveals *EXACTLY* how sneaky and underhanded it is.
The poll results are interesting. What is more interesting is how the guy who commissioned the poll is spinning it, while at the same time whining about the election to everyone that will listen.
Read on for that story….
I just found out that Obama has a flickr stream.
This is a pretty amazing set of behind the scenes photos from Tuesday night.
Want to see Obama thinking about leading the free world? Here ya go…this is him watching McCain give his concession speech. My guess would be right around here it was no longer possible for him to deny it.
Obama thinking about being President
There has been a show on television recently that is called “Are you Smarter than a Fifth Grader?”
As someone who feels fairly confident in my own intellectual capacities when compared with a 10-year old, I haven’t felt the need to validate my own intellect by watching. From what I understand, it is a fairly popular program, although has recently fallen in the ratings with the rise of “Oh, My Balls!! : Weekend Edition.”
That being said, I have a new game you can play thanks to the new “Poll” button that WordPress so conveniently added to the interface.
This game, generally, is called “Are You A Better Journalist Than a Fifth Grader?”
Today’s edition, specifically, is called “Is Barbara West A Better Journalist Than Damon Weaver?”
We have decided to take both of their interviews with Joe “the Senator” Biden in as evidence for the contest.
——————–
Here’s Barbara West’s Reel.
Here’s Damon Weaver’s Reel..
——
The McCain / Palin Campaign Debacle continued to roll through like the, pardon my French but there’s no better word…clusterfuck that it is.
This particular post is going to be mostly focused on the interview the McCain / Palin “Team” gave to NBC (GE)’s Brian Williams, and some of the questions is raises about John McCain’s historical responses to crises. There’s also some Palin bits at the end, just for fun.
Also, after much searching a bullshit, I was able to find Joe Biden’s full quote, which I think I’ve only heard once, and then it was lost in a sea of political rhetoric.
—
We’ll start with McCain being “tested” during the Cuban Missile Crisis. From the transcript…
WILLIAMS: You mention Senator Biden’s comment the other day about a new president and a test of the new president’s mettle. One of your very closest friends in the Senate, Joe Lieberman, said on “Face the Nation,” quote, “Our enemies will test the new president early.”
And it has happened throughout modern history.
MCCAIN: Well, look, I’ve been tested. They know me, they know me very well. I’ve been tested. Senator Biden said it. What if Sarah or I had said it? Oh, my God, it would have been terrible, imagine. His own running mate said it’s because he’s young and new and untested. That’s why Senator Biden said, “Mark my words,” “Mark my words,” is what he said, that there’s going to be an international crisis. And then he compared it to the Cuban Missile Crisis.
My friend, I was in the Cuban Missile Crisis. I was on the aircraft carrier “Enterprise” in the air wing. We were close to nuclear war. I wouldn’t predict that for me — I mean, that’s remarkable. When a vice presidential candidate predicts, because a young, untested president is going to face an international crisis like the Cuban Missile Crisis? Unbelievable.
Americans know I’ve been tested.
We’ll get to Senator Biden’s oft-repeated, always-shortened, “gaffe” in a moment, but right now I want to focus on McCain. Note how McCain brings up his experience during the Cuban Missile Crisis [refresher] to say how he, himself, was tested.
McCain is on record, and on YouTube, retellng his experience on the “Enterprise” (and yes, it’s just coincidence that I watched Star Trek II: The Wrath of McKahn this morning) . You should watch that war story retelling now. Watch it all the way to the end, so you get to the part how he wanted to respond to the “test”.
It should be noted that the Cuban Missile Crisis occured in 1962. John S. McCain was born in 1936. He was, therefore, 25 or 26 at the time. This was five years before he would be captured in Vietnam.
In response to the follow-up question, McCain says:
Sure, we were tense, because we listened to what the President had to say, and we had targets in Cuba, and you had your planes loaded with weapons to deliver.
But I also have to tell ya, when you’re that age, there’s a certain spirit of excitement and adventure, and that’s what you’re trying to do. As so, it was also some enthusiasm for carrying out our mission.
So when he was faced with nuclear war, McCain wanted to start bombing. He was kinda excited about it.
This is a quality of John McCain that I mentioned in my general critique on his leadership style and potential.
McCain was not alone in this interview. By his side sat the faithful Palin. Ready to answer the tough questions with gibberish.
Nice. It’s only terrorism when they do it. How about killing a black bear and putting Obama stickers on it?
The carcass of a black bear that had been shot in the head was found wrapped in Sen. Barack Obama campaign signs on a North Carolina campus on Monday, Greenville station WYFF reported.
How about replacing an Obama flag with a Confederate one?
The 4-foot-by-8-foot Barack Obama campaign sign that McLaughlin had posted in the front yard of his Chesterfield County home was gone.
A Confederate flag hung in its place.
Surveying the scene that night, McLaughlin, 78, a Baptist minister and an Army veteran who lived to see the first black person nominated to a major-party ticket, had a message for whoever left the flag, viewed by many as a symbol of racial oppression: “I love you, and God does, too.”
Hmm, I guess that’s actually a pretty good way to respond to this kind of crap.
One other way is to point out the truth of things…which is where I’m going to address the Biden comment. As most the vast majority of political gaffes, this one is all based on the editing.
Now…I’m going to edit in all the parts of the this interview where they make Biden’s comment the new centerpoint of a failing campaign. It’s a decent idea on one side…but the basis of it is a falsehood. I’ve already illustrated how McCain responded to Kennedy’s test.
Before we get to the edits, here is how he responded to George W. Bush’s test, 9/11 (yea, that’s right, it fits, sadly).
On the morning of the 9/11, just moments after the World Trade Center collapsed from the terrorist strikes, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) went on television and immediately began focusing the nation’s attention on Iraq. In an interview with CBS’ Dan Rather on 9/11, McCain said:
To be honest with you, Dan, I never thought that an operation of this sophistication and size would take place. I just never did. But I don’t think there’s any doubt that there are countries — Iraq, Iran, Libya, North Korea and others — who we know engage in proliferation of — of capabilities and, from time to time, involve themselves in state-sponsored terrorism. But never did we imagine on a scale such as this.
The next day, on 9/12, McCain reiterated the point in an interview with Chris Matthews. “It isn’t just Afghanistan,” he said, “we’re talking about Syria, Iraq, Iran, perhaps North Korea, Libya and others.”
So that’s 2 out of 2 for “Let’s Go To War!”
How about the Hostage Crisis?
Looks like he was just kinda mis-remembering that one.
This is getting much longer that I anticipated, I hadn’t realized McCain had done so poorly on these tests.
I was going to make fun of Palin for this…
and
But now it just seems like I’m piling on.
I will say this, however, because of her interview response…
WILLIAMS: Governor Palin, yesterday you tied this notion of an early test to the new president with this notion of preconditions that you both have been hammering the Obama campaign on. What — first of all, what, in your mind, is a precondition?
PALIN: You have to have some diplomatic strategy going into a meeting with someone like Ahmadinejad or Kim Jong Il, one of these dictators that would seek to destroy America or her allies. It is so naive and so dangerous for a presidential candidate to just proclaim that they would be willing to sit down with a leader like Ahmadinejad and just talk about the problems, the issues that are facing them.
So that’s some ill-preparedness right there. But following up with your comment about Biden also, when Biden — what he had done the other night to his Democrat donors, in talking to them in a fund- raiser, warning them saying, “Mark my word, there will be an international crisis if Barack Obama is elected,” he was confirming what he had been saying all along in the primary race.
He had warned voters that Barack was not prepared yet to be president, and that the presidency is not a place for on-the-job training. So there was confirmation that in the comments that he made.
First up, Ahmadinejad isn’t a dictator, and real power in Iran is with the Supreme Commander (or whatever his made-up title is) but pointing that out 100 times won’t work, so I’m going to point out the rest of Joe Biden’s quote, since nobody seems to be able to remember the whole thing.
Mark my words. Within the next, first six months of this administration, if we win, they’re going to — we’re going to face a major international challenge. Because they’re going to want to test him, just like they did young John Kennedy. They’re going to want to test him. And they’re going to find out this guy’s got steel in his spine.
Nice, huh?
Quote the set-up, forget the punchline, and tell the joke over and over. It would work if this was a b.s. election year with a budget surplus and no real problems (i.e. like 2000). Did you hear Al Gore designed, built, and deployed the Internets? Yup, tuned every dump truck himself.
I wonder if they’re doing this to try and keep people from looking into how McCain has done on life’s previous “tests”.
He graduated fifth from the bottom of his class at the academy, and seems to have stayed fairly consistent since.
This is the latest political meme that is sweeping the interwebs. I found it over at Fark.
As the nation as a whole has now had a chance to see each of the four candidates up close and personal in a variety of situations, we can now begin to stereotype each one by building simple cultural metaphors.
This can be done quite easily with Photoshop™ and/or MSPaint (I use Fireworks).
Here’s some of my favorites. I think you will get the idea quickly. Feel free to add your own.
Star Wars
While most people will be watching Thursday’s VP debate to find out whether Sarah Palin will start speaking in tongues, there’s also the little matter of diarrhea-mouth hothead Joe Biden. The Obama camp is worried about the notoriously unpredictable Biden getting too aggressive (read: red-faced bellowing) while addressing Gov. Palin and losing the coveted “we hate people who aren’t nice to the woefully underqualified” vote. To prepare, Joe has been rehearsing with MI Gov. Jennifer Granholm standing in for Sarah Palin. Watch our completely made up recreation of those rehearsals (with exclusive pics!) in the slideshow below:
Debate Training – Biden learns what makes girls cry (WITH HOT PICS!) – 236.com – News.
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Go watch that slide show. It’s the funniest thing I think I’ve seen on the campaign trail yet. Biden makes some amazing faces.
I’m of the general opinion that this is “joke week” for the ’08 Presidential Election. The crumbling of the U.S. economy has pretty much negated any real campaign news and with three senators and a guv’ner involved in the campaign they represent 3% of 50% of the legislative body. Which is to say, they’ve all been made mostly irrelevant except for three (3) votes they might cast.
That being said, they are still out there talking. Everyone is waiting in high anticipation for the Vice Presidential debate tomorrow at Wash U in Saint Louis [previous Wash U mention here, in a curious personal tangent]. Palin’s supporters can’t wait for her to show her real stuff and Obama’s people are waiting for a bloodbath. No one is really pulling for McCain or Biden in this debate, curiously enough. Yes, I know it’s strange, but that’s the kind of week it has been.
So, continuing with the strangeness, here’s the latest gaff-a-palooza (which is a chiche I like better thant -gate).
“So, with due respect, I strongly disagree with your premise that she doesn’t have experience and knowledge and background,” he said. “I fundamentally disagree, and I’m proud of her record.”
Later, after continuing to counter Palin’s critics, he pointed to what he called a divide between the press and the public on their view of the Alaska governor. “…You and I just have a fundamental disagreement and I’m so happy that the American people seem to be siding with me,” said McCain [1].
When editors pointed to similar recent assessments from conservatives, McCain responded “Really? I haven’t detected that,” [2] attributing those sentiments to the “Georgetown cocktail party” circuit.
“Some people allege that others may have spent too much time inside the Beltway, and too much time not out in touch with the American people,” said McCain. “Some people that know that Franklin Delano Roosevelt didn’t address the American people on television.” [3]*
Can someone please forward this website’s URL to Senator McCain? I’m going to try and help him out here. Maybe jar some memories loose.
First. No, the American people haven’t sided with you regarding Governor Palin’s readiness to lead. If you read this site you would know that.
Second. Yes, you are freaking conservatives out. If you read this site you would know that.
Third. Not only did Franklin Delano Roosevelt address the American people on television, he was the first President to do so. If you are reading this site, now you know this.
The Question:
Who was the first president to give a televised speech? My daughter answered FDR but her teacher says Truman. I have found several web sites, including The History of Television, that says FDR. I need a definitive answer. Please help.
The Answer:
We’ll do our best to set the record straight.
According to our sources, Franklin D. Roosevelt was the first president to speak on television. Roosevelt spoke at the opening session of the New York World’s Fair on April 30, 1939.
Perhaps this is the source of your confusion: The first presidential address broadcast from the White House was Harry S. Truman’s speech about food conservation and the world food crisis on Oct. 5, 1947.
We hope this helps.
So not only did FDR address the American people on TV, Senator, and I really want to stress this point, HE DID SO DURING YOUR LIFETIME!!!!11!!!911!!!1!
John Sidney McCain III (born August 29, 1936) is the senior United States Senator from Arizona and presidential nominee of the Republican Party in the 2008 presidential election.
whew. That was tough to get out…wait till you see the video version…
Look, I understand McCain was trying to get in a quick barb at Biden, but the fact that he missed so horribly, and was so historically inaccurate, and that it reveals just how damn old the guy is…this should all mean something…I mean…it’s hilarious. It’s a joke. A really funy one.
Even funnier than this next one, as a matter of fact, which is itself a doozy. This one loses a bit bit of humor, however, because of how frighteningly revealing it is.
Asked later if he had benefited from taxpayer-subsidized health care his entire life, McCain replied that the question had no relation to his ability to understand the concerns of those Americans who had not.
“You know that’s an interesting statement, isn’t it?” he responded. “And I have never been an astronaut, but I think I know the challenges of space. And I have never done a lot of things in my life that I think I am familiar with.”
So here’s a guy who’s family has been in the military as long as the U.S. has existed. He’s a real life Lt. Dan. Everything he every grew up with, or around was paid for by the U.S. This is just how it works. It’s a job. You work and get paid. By taxpayers. For fighting. That’s the deal.
This also apples to military universities. Once you get in and make the commitment, it’s paid for. Including that whole health care thing. Then he goes to war, gets caught, comes back, and goes to Congress. And now, seventy-something years later, he’s never once been off the dole. Ever.
And in order to communicate how this experience has given him the opposite knowledge, that he does, in fact know what it feels like to have absolutely no support from anyone (against the complete support of the most powerful nation on earth) he mentions that he isn’t an astronaut but knows what it feels like to be one.
I’m waiting, on pins and needles, for Palin to defend his astronaut experience by mentioning how much space you can see from Arizona. Because, you know, you can see space from anywhere, but, I’ll tell you what, those Arizonians, they see a lot of space.
Speaking of Jill Six-Pack, here’s her latest nuggest of commonality.
Palin linked herself to the financial situation many Americans now face, telling Hewitt: “I know what Americans are going through. Todd and I, heck, we’re going through that right now even as we speak, which may put me again kind of on the outs of those Washington elite who don’t like the idea of just an everyday, working-class American running for such an office.” The governor of Alaska received a salary of $112,895 in 2007, according to stateline.org. The McCain campaign has not released the Palins’ financial records.
It should be noted that they will most likely not be releasing those records. From the background I’ve read on Todd and his native ties, he is tied by blood into a very wealthy tribe [note: price of oil], and they have plenty of cash on hand. It’s a big part of how she ran for Governor and took on the OBC, so to speak. That didn’t stop her from getting favors to sell her house, but I digress.
Palin goes on to tell this “non-mainstream news source” [more on that in second] how she’s just a regular gal running for VP.
Palin was asked in the interview about her reaction to “extreme hostility” from the media. “I think they’re just not used to someone coming in from the outside saying you know what — it’s time that normal Joe Six Pack American is finally represented in the position of vice presidency,” she said. “And I think that that’s kind of taken some people off guard, and they’re out of sorts, and they’re ticked off about it, but it’s motivation for John McCain and I to work that much harder to make sure that our ticket is victorious.”
Umm, I dunno about that. After all, we just had a Joe Six Pack (literally) coming from outside to take over the Presidency in 2000. My guess would be that some of the suspicion is coming from that direction and recent barrage of wisdom regarding selecing leaders. BTW, “extreme hostility” is in quotes because it was a bullshit question asked by the notoriously biased Hugh Whoit?
Whoit? represents a “non-mainstream news [MSM]” source that is third in line behind Charlie Gibson and Katie Couric for the best media get of the month. Hannity doesn’t count because he, like all right wing commentators that rail on the liberal media, are not part of the media themselves. Once anyone with right wing tendencies is excluded from the concept of “the media” is easy to see how liberal “the media” really is.
And so it goes, for one more day.
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This is re: Stewart’s funny regarding Biden’s latest gaffe. I just saw this joke on the Sunday Funnies and thought its inaccuracy kinda hurt the humor.
Here is part 1 (and 1.1) and 2 of last weeks roundup. Below you will find the links for each story mentioned.
Part 1.1
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Part 1.2
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Part 2
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Read more for story links and details…
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Part 1:
Executive Experience in Alaska
Info-Graphic Convention Coverage
Military Industrial Complex Shuts Down Olbermann and Matthews on MSNBC (owned by GE)
Another Upside of Global Warming
Part 1.1:
Water Bears May Be Fruit of All Life
Has the Large Hadron Collider destroyed the world yet?
Part 2:
A Southpark Metaphor For McCain’s Speech
Palin to Right of Republicans on Climate Change
Sarah Palin is to Harriet Miers…
A Second Theory as to Why John McCain Tapped Sarah Palin
Oh Yeah, and Obama Gave Some Speech
The John McCain “I’m a Victim” Express
A Simple Guide to Biased Reporting (re: Lipstick bullshit and Bonney Kapp)
Anderson Cooper : 360 Degrees Of Suck
McCain Makes New Pledge to American People
Wall Street Journal Joins News Censorship Game
What Talking About Issue Looks Like (Joe Biden)
“You can actually see Russia from Alaska” – Sarah Palin on her “international experience”
NOTES: A couple quick notes…I have another 20 minute or so of suff. Because of the time limits on YouTube (and Google doesn’t seem to be liking me) I think I’m going to shoot for a 20 minute limit next week. This was more of a proof-of-concept. Let me know what you think. If you absolutely have to see the rest, let me know and I’ll throw it up. I should also have a much quicker turnaround next week, as my editing skillz just about doubled this last week.
The blogosphere is reporting that when she was mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, in the late 1990s, Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin’s municipal police department charged rape victims for the “rape kit” used to collect the forensic evidence necessary to convict their attackers. According to reports, this changed in 2000 when then Alaska Gov. Tony Knowles signed a bill protecting rape victims from being charged. As I wrote recently, however, the situation described in Wasilla is not unique. In all too many instances, women are still being stuck with the bill for rape kits. This despite the fact that in order to qualify for federal grants under the Violence Against Women Act, states are supposed to pick up the entire tab.
Sarah Palin and the Rape Kit Question – On Health and Money (usnews.com).
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Knowles was the man Palin defeated BTW.
The irony here is that the “Violence Against Women Act” was, and has been, Biden’s baby.
The Violence Against Women Act of 1994 (VAWA) is a United States federal law. It was passed as Title IV, sec. 40001-40703 of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 HR 3355 and signed as Public Law 103-322 by President Bill Clinton on September 13, 1994. It provided $1.6 billion to enhance investigation and prosecution of the violent crime perpetrated against women, increased pre-trial detention of the accused, provided for automatic and mandatory restitution of those convicted, and allowed civil redress in cases prosecutors chose to leave unprosecuted.
VAWA was drafted by Senator Joseph Biden‘s office with support from a number of advocacy organizations including Legal Momentum and The National Organization for Women, which heralded the bill as “the greatest breakthrough in civil rights for women in nearly two decades.”
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The act was opposed by Sen. John McCain.
Just to be clear, and to on one’s surprise, Obama is for it and Palin hasn’t been told what to say yet (hey, she’s not on the record and doesn’t answer questions…how we are to know…other than by looking at her record).
BTW, they might have to buy in bulk because the per capita incidents of sexual assualt in Alaska (like drug abuse and dranking) are off the charts.
The study, conducted by the University of Alaska Anchorage’s Justice Center, looked at 989 sexual assault cases reported to state troopers in 2003 and 2004. Researchers did not look at cases reported in the same period to municipal police departments, including those in Anchorage or other urban centers that account for 80% of Alaska’s 670,000 residents.
Overall, 46% of the cases were referred for prosecution. Of those 452 cases, about half resulted in convictions.
The study is believed to represent only a fraction of abuse actually committed in trooper jurisdiction. Still, Alaska has had the nation’s highest per capita occurrence since 1995. According to statewide figures for 2003 and 2004 alone, there were 89 rapes per 100,000 people, almost three times the national average of 32 per 100,000, said Andre Rosay, the Justice Center’s interim director.
“There are a lot of excellent programs here, so it could be reporting rates are higher here. We don’t know, though,” he said. “But even if there are higher reporting rates, our rates far surpass those in the lower 48.
If Palin ever allows those blood-sucking vultures in the press to ask her questions, can someone put this one on the list?
I know a lot of you don’t know what it looks like, as it happens quite rarely during “silly season” (at least on major cable channels), but this is how it looks when you go out and talk to people about actual things that matter.
This is what real politicians do. Go out and explain the reasons why our healthcare system needs to be fixed (international competition) and a bit about a governing philosophy (we can’t fix all your problems, but we should at least be aware of them). Explain how you balanced a budget, and what happened when an “experienced” executive took over. Explain what needs changing and how it could be better. Pretty basic stuff.
“Image-based” politicians try to limit their exposure to the public. For a great example of this, see: Bush, George W.
For a current example…watch the news…
Campaigning keeps Palin from media
Palin will spend much of the next few weeks campaigning with Sen. John McCain, a move that not only capitalizes on the Republican enthusiasm for the vice presidential nominee but also limits her exposure to the news media.She left Washington for Alaska on Wednesday, her first trip back home since being named to the ticket.
McCain and Palin traveling together limits her exposure to reporters and gives McCain’s top aides more control of her.
Palin has not done interviews after one she gave to People magazine on the day she was introduced as McCain’s vice presidential choice.
[full article…which includes this bit]
Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the Republican vice presidential nominee, has sought to burnish her executive credentials by telling how she had engineered the deal that jump-started a long-delayed gas pipeline project.
Stretching more than 1,700 miles, it would deliver natural gas from the North Slope of Alaska to the lower 48 states and be the largest private-sector infrastructure project on the continent.
Palin has asserted the pipeline will help lead America toward energy independence.
An examination of the project has found that she has overstated both the progress that has been made and the certainty of success.
The pipeline exists only on paper. The first section has yet to be laid, federal approvals are years away, and the pipeline will not be completed for at least a decade.
In fact, the pipeline might never be built.
Biden’s money quote from his speech: “Name me one single thing that John McCain and Sarah Palin are talking about, on the major issues, the issues that affect our lives and our security. Name me one, one, where they disagree with George W. Bush.”
Now this is kinda the point of the media here. This is a pretty basic question that should be addressed. It should be fairly easy to address. Where are you different from Bush? We keep hearing about “executive experience” and “mavrickness” but where is the meal? The appetizer was fascinating, but is there a meal coming?
Or are we going to be told to go straight to dessert, and go eat some cake?
Robot Pirate Ninja 