Month: April 2008

Panda sez: “Campaign too long. Kill me now.”

I wrote last week about Safe Schools: National Day of Silence April 25th  I would like to share a little more about the day and the rally I attended at the Texas State Capital to break the silence.

Young people across America went to school and did not speak on National Day of Silence to bring attention to the silence that is heard from teachers, parents, school administrations, elected officials, and students about the ongoing problem of bullying in our schools.

Crossposted @Cross posted @ Daily Kos, Texas Kaos, Doing My Part For The Left

The National Day of Silence brings attention to anti-LGBT name-calling, bullying and harassment in schools. This year’s event will be held in memory of Lawrence King, a California 8th-grader who was shot and killed Feb. 12 by a classmate because of his sexual orientation and gender expression. Hundreds of thousands of students will come together on April 25 to encourage schools and classmates to address the problem of anti-LGBT behavior.

At 4:30 pm students from several Austin high schools, their friends and allies started arriving at the south steps of the capital to break the Silence.  The featured speakers from such groups as TACT(Transgender Advocates of Central Texas), PFLAG(Parents, Families & Friends of Lesbians & Gays), Equality Texas, and many other groups were there to show their support for the brave teenagers.

The most heart moving moment was when a young transgender woman spoke about how we all say “Not  In My Town” when we hear of violence and evil.

She was on her way to work on the morning of February 12th when she heard a news story of a 8th grader being killed in California.  As time went by the story was elaborated on and it turned out Lawrence King had been shot and killed by a fellow classmate in class for being gay.   The most shocking part for this young lady was that the killing happened in her hometown.  She had always been able to say ” Not in my town” but now it had happened in her town.  The time for silence was over and she would never be able to say “Not In My Town” until we could say “Not In Any Town”.  

Many of the students also told of their day in school and what type of reception they received from their classmates and teachers.  There were stories of taunts and jeers as well as support and cheers.  The most impressive thing was that each of the students, no matter their experience, said they would continue to observe the National Day of Silence as well as speak out loudly for change the other 364 days of the year.  

For an older gay male standing listening to these brave young people, it was one of the most heart warming experiences I have ever had.  Here are young people doing what could never have been done back when I was 15. Many of the students could not speak or be on camera as they are not out to parents but it was not only GLBT students but also their straight allies who were there supporting them.  

After talking several of the teenagers into talking at the open mike, I also shared some of my thoughts with the audience.  

I stand here today in awe of the young people for their bravery in speaking out against bullying and harassment.  I, also, appreciate all the allies I see supporting change and trying to make this a better world for all Americans.  

I have been involved in Civil Rights since I was 8 years old and will be 50 in November.  I cam out at the age of 15 in a small town in North Carolina and was beaten and nearly killed 3 times and could not go to the police as they probably would have finished the job.  This was before there was any such thing as a hate crime.  

I remember when I first started working for Equal Rights for the Community.  It was Gay Rights then Gay & Lesbian Rights then Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual Rights then Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Rights then Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer Rights and now Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, and Androgynous Rights.  Before long we will add so many letter we will have the whole alphabet and maybe then we will stop discrimination.

I remember Martin Luther King’s speech “I Have a Dream”  

He said “I have a dream… little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.”

I have a dream also.  I dream that one day young men and women will be able to hold hands and look into the eyes of the person they love and no once care who that person is.  We have come a long way but we have a long way to go but we will get there.

The way we make the biggest difference is speaking out and also changing the leadership in this building behind me.  We have to elect leaders who understand and care about all of their constituents and not just the status quo.  We have many great allies in the Texas Legislature but while there is a Republican majority we will always be treated as an outcast minority.  If you are not registered to vote, talk with me.   afterwards

Sometimes these days, we in the netroots/liberal blogosphere get so deep into the swamp of the Obama/Clinton campaign that we lose sight of what is most important in this year’s election. The issues. The policy differences between any Democratic nominee and John McCain. Indeed, what are the differences between the two parties and what political agenda would a President McCain offer to America vs. that which a President Clinton or Obama would pursue? So, in the interest of getting our dialog off Jeremiah Wright and the the Great Super-delegate Easter Egg Hunt, I’d like to take a stab at delineating what a McCain victory would mean for all of us in terms of substantive policies as opposed to cheap rhetoric.

(cont.)
Iraq

This one’s pretty easy to define. McCain wants to keep US troops in Iraq for as long as humanly possible. He literally foresees an occupation by our forces with permanent military bases much like the ones we maintain in South Korea, Germany and Japan. I imagine he also supports a continued propping up of the current Iraqi government, and continued wasteful spending on private contractors to supply services to our forces and to the reconstruction efforts (such as they are) in Iraq. In short, he’s Bush’s third term. Whatever the cost (and it will be steeper as the years go along in human lives and dollars spent) he wants to pay that price.

Iran and Israel

McCain is the Beach Boys President, i.e., he’d have no qualms about bombing Iran if Bush and Cheney don’t beat him to the punch. And he would likely order such an attack on his own, without Congressional approval. Despite her recent bellicose statements about Iran, I don’t believe Clinton would order an attack without Congressional authorization. Obama has already stated his willingness to negotiate with Iran.

McCain also would be the President most likely to support the right wing agenda of the Olmert government which is currently starving and killing Palestinians in Gaza as part of their blockade effort, building more and more settlements in the Occupied Territories, and generally punting the Israeli/Palestinian problem down the road, hoping, I suppose, that eventually there will not be enough Palestinians for Israel to worry about. I don’t see McCain changing that dynamic. Clinton or Obama would at the least push for more negotiations.

The War on Terror and National Security

I’d like to believe that McCain would put a stop to our use of torture and our illegal and warrantless wiretapping of Americans. I’d like to believe that, but I see no evidence that he is so inclined, despite “maverick” statements he made, and positions he took, earlier in the Bush era.

And since he is the “Iraq or Bust!” candidate, I don’t foresee any reallocation of resources to pursue Al Qaeda in Pakistan and the Taliban in Afghanistan by a McCain administration. Nor do I see him getting tough with the Saudis over that country’s under the radar support for Islamic extremism. McCain talks about shoring up our alliances, but I’ll have to see it to believe it. Once in office I anticipate he’ll be as enamored with unilateralism as Bush was.

As for Homeland Security Measures that the Democrats have proposed, such as increased security at our ports and at our nuclear and chemical plants, as well as increased spending for first providers, I simply don’t know. If a Democratic Congress passed such bills he might favor them, but he might not. Particularly if they are paid for with increased taxes.

What you can expect is lots and lots of spending on whatever the Department of Defense and the Pentagon want, and even on many things they don’t want. McCain has never met a defense appropriations bill he didn’t love.

Taxes.

He’s now a Bush man all the way. On the stump he’s been speaking loudly about making the Bush tax cuts permanent. However, since the tax cuts are set to end automatically in 2010, as long as no bill is passed by Congress to extending them or making them permanent (and I don’t see that happening) he probably can do very little to accomplish that goal. He can’t that is, unless all the Blue Dog Democrats form a coalition with Republicans to get such a measure passed.

On the other hand, I suspect any “Middle Class” tax cuts, such as those Obama has proposed, would be vetoed by a President McCain. He’d also likely veto any increase in the Capital Gains tax, increases in tax rates on wealthy Americans, and the closing of the current tax code loopholes which allow many corporations to avoid paying taxes.

Health Care

McCain has recently proposed a “new” market based heath care plan. For all intents and purposes its the same plan that Bush has proposed last year. With a Democratic Congress one would think his plan would be dead in the water, but you never know. It’s a band aid when we need major surgery. I don’t much like the Obama or Clinton approaches to solving our health care crisis, but they are vastly superior to anything McCain is likely to support, and with the veto power he holds I don’t see him compromising much on health care issues with the Dems.

The Economy

The man has already said he doesn’t no much about economics. What he’d do is anyone’s guess, but you can be assured it would be based on “free market” principles rather than any massive intervention by the Federal government. Frankly, I think he’d extend himself on economic issues only if forced to do so. In this respect, he could very well be the reincarnation of the presidency of Herbert Hoover should the economy’s walls all come crashing down next year.

Federal Reserve Chairman Bernanke has been giving us his best three card monte game to forestall any collapse until after this year’s election and he may well achieve that limited success. However, that only means a deep recession/major depression is all the more likely to occur over the next 4 years. No President is well prepared for such an eventuality, but McCain, with his well known aversion to dealing with domestic concerns, is certainly the least qualified person to guide our country in a time of an economic crisis.

Environment/Global Warming

The good news is that McCain does believe global warming is real. The bad news? He doesn’t want to do much about it. His proposal: a cap and trade because for him it is “far more capitalistic and free-enterprise oriented” then setting emission reduction goals or imposing a carbon tax. He’s also a big advocate of nuclear power, which, while good at reducing carbon emissions carries its own set of problems, including the thorny issue of what to do with all that radioactive waste.

Still, at least he’s not a complete nutjob when it comes to the environment. Indeed, his ideas are not that much different than those of Clinton or Obama, though they appear place a greater emphasis on developing alternative, clean sources of energy than McCain. His main problem is that his moderate position are deeply at odds with those of his own party, and with many of the GOP’s largest contributors from Big Oil, the automotive industry and the energy utilities. In my view a McCain White House would be under a lot of pressure from industry lobbyists to water down any legislative proposal regarding environmental and global warming standards that might come out of Congress.

As for his record on environmental protection, it isn’t a particularly good one. For the most part he has voted the GOP party line with respect to weakening federal air and water pollution standards, weakening the power and regulatory ability of the EPA, etc. So, that doesn’t give me a lot of confidence that he would back his green friendly rhetoric with a lot of substantive legislative proposals. What we are likely to see from him is, again, “market based” solutions to protecting the environment rather than government regulation. Still, I expect the national media to tout him as an environmentalist whatever he does.

Social Issues

McCain is basically spouting the party line regarding gays, guns and abortion. However, since his party never really does anything about these issues anyway, except to use them to inspire conservative Christians to vote, I don’t believe they merit much discussion. The only significant issue would be his likely appointments to the Supreme Court, and I expect him to follow the lead of Republicans in Congress as to that issue. Thus if elected you can expect to see more pro-business, pro-life, anti-civil liberties conservatives, such as Justices Roberts, Scalia and Alito, appointed to the court. It goes without saying that anyone nominated by President Clinton or Obama would be less radical, if not necessarily liberal/ progressive in orientation.

Summary

McCain may be touted as a moderate and a maverick, but the reality is that he is deeply conservative, and as business friendly as any other Republican out there. This is the man who was a close personal friend of Charles Keating and one of the infamous Keating Five, who did whatever was asked of him to assist the corrupt and criminal enterprise of his good buddy. The goal of the Democratic party and its nominee should be to emphasize the fundamental radical nature of his philosophy and his proposals regarding national security, foreign policy and domestic issues, as well as his close ties to business lobbyists. And I’d make his position on Iraq the centerpiece of a major national ad buy. America can’t afford another 4 years of fighting Bush’s war, much less expanding that war to Iran, nor do most Americans want to do so.

McCain as President would be a disaster for this country after 8 years of the corrupt and lawless reign of Bush the Second. Let’s try to keep ourselves focused on that as much as possible despite the ongoing debacle of the Democrats’ scorched earth nomination battle.

Oh God, please let this be true:

The latest Evans-Novak Political Report says that “a rumor running through the political community” now puts former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney (R) in the lead to be Sen. John McCain’s vice presidential candidate. “But Romney has many critics in the McCain inner circle, and we don’t think the decision has been made.”

There is also speculation McCain could name his veep early “to step up fund-raising before the national convention.”

It can’t be true. Can it?

Huffpost has the scoop of Hillary on O’Reilly-Fox News.

She just could pass this up. And it’s a two-part interview to air Wednesday and Thursday in prime time EDT.  

Shit stirer-in-chief.

Hillary Clinton On O’Reilly Factor: Wright’s Statement Are Offensive and Outrageous (Video at Huffpost link)

Fox News is releasing highlights from Hillary Clinton’s first interview on “The O’Reilly Factor.” ABC got its hands on a partial transcript (transcript also pasted below). Hillary says she believes Reverend Wright’s comments are “offensive and outrageous.”

Watch the video and read more from ABC below :
Hillary Clinton, in her first appearance on “The O’Reilly Factor,” matched Barack Obama’s declared outrage over Rev. Jeremiah Wright, saying she was offended by the pastor’s statements about America.

In a two-part interview to air Wednesday and Thursday night at 8 p.m. ET, Clinton said it’s up to voters to decide whether the mounting controversy over Obama’s retired pastor should impact the race.

O’Reilly: “Some people say it’s not a big difference between you and Barack Obama, overall philosophy, overall outlook. It’s a democratic liberal line, he’s more liberal than you, but it’s the same thing. It’s a personality run, which is why before Rev. Wright derailed him, Barack Obama had some momentum because you are a more polarizing personality than he is. Do you agree with that?”

Read the transcript – courtesy of ABC.

ABC News’ Eloise Harper Reports: In an “O’Reilly Factor” exclusive, Hillary Clinton rebuked Rev. Jeremiah Wright in her strongest language to-date.

Sen. Clinton, D-N.Y., speaking exclusively to FOX News, called Wright’s comments “offensive and outrageous,” telling conservative talk show host Bill O’Reilly that she going to leave the controversy “up to voters to decide.”

Here’s the full exchange between O’Reilly and Clinton, as released by FOX News:

O’Reilly: “Can you believe this Rev. Wright guy? Can you believe this guy?”

Clinton: “Well, I’m going to leave it up to voters to decide.”

O’Reilly: “Well, what do you think as an American?”

Clinton: “Well, what I said when I was asked directly is that I would not have stayed in the church.

O’Reilly: “You’re an American citizen, I’m an American citizen, He’s an American citizen, Rev. Wright. What do you think when you hear a fellow American citizen say that kind of stuff about America.”

Clinton: “Well, I take offense. I think it’s offensive and outrageous. I’m going to express my opinion, others can express theirs. It is part of just, you know, an atmosphere we’re in today.”

In an ABC News debate earlier this month, Clinton repeated the assertion she had made on the campaign trail that, if in Obama’s position, Rev. Wright would not have been her choice in pastor.
::

go read the rest. Watch the video at the Huffpost link

My comment: make it end. put me out of my misery.

Update [2008-5-1 15:44:12 by idredit]:

This new video has a disconnect with Hillary and working class people.

Hillary: “Rich People, God Bless us, we deserve all the opportunities….”

Watch It:

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Below the fold … US Gov’t Report: Losing the WOT

"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."

Somehow, the full on attack of Barack Obama doesn’t seem to be doing what it was supposed to do.

TRENTON, N.J. – Support among New Jersey Democrats in the presidential race appears to be shifting to Barack Obama.

A Monmouth University/Gannett New Jersey poll finds 45 percent of the Democrats and Democrat-leaning independents surveyed would like to see Obama get the party’s nomination compared to 38 percent for Hillary Clinton.

Clinton beat Obama in the state’s Democratic primary in February by a 10-point margin.

Nearly 40 percent of the Democrats polled say the continuing battle between the presidential candidates will damage the party’s chances in November.

Shouldn’t the opposite be happening?

Read this before it gets erased. Does anyone have an explanation for why Hillary Blogs are deleting diaries, erasing comments, and suspending the accounts of people left and right? Are any neutral or Obama-leaning bloggers doing this? I know that most Clinton supporters voluntarily stopped posting here when I came out for Obama, but the few that remain aren’t censored or troll-rated, and as long as they make good faith arguments they get good faith responses.

It just seems to me that this censorship at Hillary Blogs is a metaphor for something much greater. It’s almost as if they can’t sustain an open debate without being driven from the field on their own turf.

I know MyDD and Daily Kos have long had their taboo topics, which has always been somewhat problematic. But this is the first time I’ve seen people get banned for talking about a candidate.

It’s creepy.

Update [2008-4-30 15:14:16 by BooMan]: Bob Johnson’s diary wasn’t deleted, it was artificially taken off the recommended list. How do I know? Booman Tribune and MyDD are both driven off of SCOOP. While I had the recommended diary feature written separately from MyDD, they both work off a formula. It works like this. Each recommendation is weighted evenly. But a recommendation’s power wanes over time. You can tinker with the formula to speed up or slow down the rate at which a recommendation degrades, but they all degrade at the same rate. I have no power to alter the rankings. Whatever the community decides should be on the recommended list is what is on the recommended list. To take something off the recommended list I either have to delete it, put it in a ‘never display’ mode, or promote it to the front-page. But Jerome has obviously built in a feature whereby he can mess with his community’s rankings. Bob Johnson posted his diary at 12:39 and it has 42 recommendations. The top ranked diary at MyDD right now was posted at 11:07 and has 31 recommendations.

Depending on the setting for speed of recommendation degradation, recommendations on these diaries may have already lost some of their power, but the older diary would suffer more degradation than the newer. Therefore, even though it is possible for a diary to be ranked higher on the MyDD recommended list while having less recommendations, it is not possible that Bob Johnson’s diary is ranked lower than the highest ranking diary currently displayed at MyDD. That is because Bob’s diary is both newer and has more recommendations.

In other words, Jerome has set up a totally corrupt system for his recommended diaries. As a SCOOP man, I find this disgracefully unethical.

This will be a short but important post. Some of you may know the excellent work that Cliff Schecter has done around the blogosphere, both at The Agonist, at Huffington Post, and other places. Some of you may have seen him take down and destroy right wing talking heads over the past few years on cable “news” channels.

And some of you know the fantastic work he has done researching and bringing to light the Real McCain.

So, for those who didn’t already know that Cliff’s book The Real McCain, Why Conservatives Don’t Trust Him–and Why Independents Shouldn’t (buy it by clicking this link) is chock full of everything that everyone should know about John W. McSame, you can hear Cliff talk to me and thereisnospoon today at 4PM Eastern on our BlogTalkRadio show.

The link to the show itself is here, and we will be taking calls as well later in the show. The call in number is 718-508-9410, and we will try to keep the chat room open as well.

This is a great opportunity to hear Cliff talk about the things that everyone should know about John McCain – his voting record, his associates, his temper, his actions throughout the years and who he “really is” – as opposed to the carefully crafted persona that the corporate media keeps trying to ram down this country’s throat.

The book is a must read as well – I plowed through it and highly recommend it to anyone that knows someone that is even remotely considering voting for John McCain – and despite what we all wish, there is probably someone that each of us knows who is planning on possibly voting for this odious and phony candidate.

If you can’t make the live show, it will be available at Heading Left as well as our BlogTalkRadio page, in addition to the new 24/7 BlogTalkRadio “Heading Left” radio channel.

Hope you can make it!! I assure you that Cliff will not disappoint (can’t vouch for me though….)

The Atlantic hires warmonger Jeffrey Goldberg to be one of their bloggers and Atrios says:

It appears the Atlantic has hired a pretentious commentless blogging git whose gullible advocacy led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people. How he manages to live with himself is a mystery, and why The Atlantic thinks we should live with him is a deeper one.

To which Armando replies:

Surprisingly, Atrios is not discussing Andrew Sullivan. With Obama love, all is forgiven.

Coupla points:

1. Atrios probably is secretly, quietly, an Obama supporter, but he hasn’t endorsed anyone and has no animus for Clinton or her supporters. At most, he has been mildly critical of some Clinton campaign rhetoric…like calling whole states irrelevant.
2. Atrios is responding to the hiring of a new blogger, so it stands to reason that Andrew Sullivan’s employment at The Atlantic didn’t come up.
3. If Andrew Sullivan has gained a measure of redemption, it is more for recanting his prior support for the Bush administration and for becoming an articulate and impassioned opponent of torture. His endorsement of Obama is a minor consideration in comparison.
4. Not to pin this on Armando, but it’s more than a little unseemly to see how often Clinton supporting commenters refer to Sullivan as ‘Bare-Back’.
5. When you stoop to slamming Atrios, your well has truly run dry.

Update [2008-4-30 12:48:39 by BooMan]: Apparently, Atrios did disclose that he voted for Obama in the Pennsylvania primary. Nevertheless, he keeps his front-page impartial.