I never repost diaries from other sites in their entirety, and I only cite diaries at Le Grand Orange when they're particularly cogent and insightful, given the amount of chaff that finds its way amidst the wheat over there. But the diarist who wrote this, "Elise", has given blanket permission to disseminate this diary far and wide:

Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt has proposed a new rule that will limit the rights of women to receive medically accurate information and treatment. The alleged goal of the rule is to protect the rights of health care workers, volunteers, and trainees. The result would be limited access to birth control and abortion for women all over the country - regardless of state law.

From CNN:

The rule, which applies to institutions receiving government money, would require as many as 584,000 employers ranging from major hospitals to doctors' offices and nursing homes to certify in writing that they are complying with several federal laws that protect the conscience rights of health care workers. Violations could lead to a loss of government funding and legal action to recoup federal money already paid.

The comment period ends on September 25th. We have 19 days until this rule takes effect.

This rule does not provide a clear definition of birth control or abortion - allowing the health care worker to utilize their own personal definition each time, so if you go to your doctor attempting to get birth control pills, you may find yourself denied that prescription because the doctor defines birth control pills as an abortifacient.

Leavitt says you shouldn't concern yourself too much though:

But Leavitt said the regulation was intended to protect practitioners who have moral objections to abortion and sterilization, and would not interfere with patients' ability to get birth control or any legal medical procedure.

"Nothing in the new regulation in any way changes a patient's right to any legal procedure," he said, noting that a patient could go to another provider.

It's that simple - your doctor, nurse, receptionist, volunteer, pharmacist, pharm tech, etc. won't help you get your birth control? Just go somewhere else!! And I'm SURE you won't have any trouble finding another provider...or maybe you will - based on the rule.

From WaPo (bold is mine):

The regulation drops the most controversial language in a draft version that would have explicitly defined abortion for the first time in a federal law or regulation as anything that interfered with a fertilized egg after conception. But both supporters and critics said the regulation remains broad enough to protect pharmacists, doctors, nurses and others from providing birth control pills, Plan B emergency contraception and other forms of contraception, and explicitly allows workers to withhold information about such services and refuse to refer patients elsewhere.

Just how far does this regulation go? The same WaPo article gives us a clue:

But critics said they remained alarmed at the scope of the regulation, which could apply to a wide range of health-care workers. For example, the regulation would cover "participating in any activity with a reasonable connection to the objectionable procedure, including referrals, training, and other arrangements for offending procedures.

In other words - if your job is to clean the tools used in an operating room after a patient has had a vasectomy or a tubal ligation, you would be protected from any punishment if you flat out refused (on grounds of conscience) to clean those tools because you disagreed with that patient's right to get that procedure.

Here's the language from the actual rule:

Assist in the Performance means to participate in any activity with a reasonable connection to a procedure, health service or health service program, or research activity, so long as the individual involved is a part of the workforce of a Department-funded entity. This includes counseling, referral, training, and other arrangements for the  procedure, health service, or research activity.

Which facilities would be affected by this new rule?

Hospitals, nursing homes, physicians offices, Offices of Other Health Care Practitioners, Outpatient care centers, Medical and Diagnostic Laboratories, Home Health Care Services, Pharmacies, Dental schools, Medical schools, Nursing schools, Occupational Therapy Schools, Optometry Schools, Podiatry Schools, Pharmacy Schools, Public Health Schools, Residency Programs, Health Insurance Carriers and 3rd-Party Administrators, Grant awards, Contractors, and State and Territorial governments.

Daily Kos diarist, Malacandra gave us an idea as to exactly how this kind of law could be interpreted in a widely missed diary last week, Bush Administration to protect Vegetarians of Conscience. Can you imagine going to the butcher to get some sirloin for dinner and being told that you'll have to go elsewhere because the butcher is a vegetarian? And that their job is protected - even though they refuse to perform that job - because of a law that protects their "freedom of conscience"??

How many women will be put at risk due to this new regulation because they will be unable to get access to birth control - which isn't solely used for preventing pregnancy. According to the Center for Young Women's Health, birth control is prescribed for a wide variety of medical problems:

Adolescent girls and young women are frequently prescribed oral contraceptive pills for irregular or absent menstrual periods, menstrual cramps, acne, PMS, endometriosis, and hormone replacement therapy. For example, girls diagnosed with Polycystic Ovary Syndrome (PCOS) (a hormone imbalance which causes irregular menstrual periods, acne, and excess hair growth) are prescribed oral contraceptives to lower their hormone levels back to normal and regulate menstrual periods. Girls with acne that is not responding to simple measures are often prescribed hormone pills. Girls whose ovaries are not producing enough estrogen (because of anorexia nervosa, excessive exercise, or damage to the ovaries from radiation or chemotherapy) often take oral contraceptive pills to replace estrogen. Girls with endometriosis are also often prescribed oral contraceptives, in cycles or continuously, to suppress the condition.

The CDC gives us a sense as to how many people would be affected by this rule:

In 2002, 98% of women who had ever had sexual intercourse had used at least one method of birth control only 7.4 percent of women who were currently at risk of unintended pregnancy were not using a contraceptive method.2 The most popular method of birth control was the oral contraceptive pill, used by 11.6 million women in the United States, followed by female sterilization, condoms, male sterilization, and other methods of birth control.2

98% of women have used a method of birth control - and this regulation could result in refusal of access to health care for every single one of those women depending on how they access that birth control.

• The ACLU has a letter you can send.


• Planned Parenthood has a letter you can send.


• NARAL has a letter you can send.

I urge you to sign and send every one of them - and pass every one of them along to every single family member and friend you know.

We have 19 days. After 19 days this regulation goes into effect and every single health care worker in the United States will be able to refuse any woman health care based on their own personal moral views.

NARAL provides us with a few specific results this regulation could have:

-- This regulation could undermine good state laws that require hospitals to provide emergency contraception to rape survivors and ensure that pharmacies fill women’s prescriptions for birth control.

-- The proposal could allow health-care corporations (hospitals, HMOs, and health plans) to refuse to provide services or make referrals for birth control.

-- The proposed regulation could affect Medicaid and the Title X family-planning program. For instance, staff at clinics or health-care plans that contract for Medicaid services could refuse to provide contraception.

The ACLU provides us with a link to the PDF of the rule here if you'd like to read it yourself.

If this rule takes effect, I wonder what other health care procedures and medications providers could begin to deny patients because of their own personal conscience...the list could extend well beyond birth control or abortion. Just think of all the different religions out there and the wide variety of procedures people object to based on those religious beliefs.

Please take action today and please ask everyone you know to join you. This rule has the potential to eliminate access to healthcare for women all over the country - and will very likely hit women in less populated areas the hardest. Some women simply don't have the option to "find another provider" in their area. Some women don't have the option to "find another pharmacy" in their area. We must do everything in our power to stop this rule before it takes affect.

If you aren't concerned, you damn well should be.

Update: Junkyard Dem has added a link to Digg. Please Digg this story up. The more who learn about this rule and take action, the better.

Labels: abortion, contraception, health care, theocracy, Women's bodies

Remember when John McCain was one of the "Keating Five" -- Senators essentially paid to look the other way while regulators were investigating the failure of Lincoln Savings and Loan?

It seems that John McCain's son Andrew may have learned a few tricks at Charlie Keating's knee in his youth, because now he has a little bank failure of his own:

Nevada regulators closed Silver State and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. was appointed receiver of the bank, based in Henderson, Nevada. It had $2 billion in assets and $1.7 billion in deposits as of June 30.

Andrew K. McCain, a son of Republican presidential nominee John McCain, sat on the boards of Silver State Bank and of its parent, Silver State Bancorp, starting in February but resigned in July citing "personal reasons," corporate filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission show. Andrew McCain also was a member of the bank's audit committee, responsible for oversight of the company's accounting.

The younger McCain, who is the chief financial officer of Hensley & Co., the beer distributorship of which Cindy McCain is chairwoman, is the Arizona senator's adopted son from his first marriage.

Andrew McCain's position on the Silver State board and departure were first reported Friday by The Wall Street Journal online.

Silver State Bank ran into difficulty because of a substantial amount of "poor-quality loans primarily related to real estate development" in southern Nevada and other distressed markets, FDIC spokesman David Barr said Friday.

I guess Andrew McCain is one of those people John McCain feels sorry for -- one of those "people who lost their investments in the real estate market" to whom he referred in his convention speech.

Again I ask: What would Republicans say if it were Chelsea Clinton on the board of directors of a failed bank?

Labels: bank failures, corruption, hypocrisy, John McCain

Obama addresses the jaw-dropping cynicism of the Republican Party in Terre Haute, Indiana:


(note: the video starts out very soft, but then it gets louder in the middle.)

Is it just me, or does anyone else hear just a wee bit, a tiny soupçon, of Richard Pryor in his phrasing?

Labels: Barack Obama

Here on the new gold coast of the new south, as we await our tropical storm/hurricane friend, Hannah, we watch sports...lots of it...too much, too many...! The Olympics was big with a certain 98 year old able to recite most of the times and records of the best point milliseconds of the best, and now tennis is huge, as its always been here, with a certain hypnotic back and forth sameness to it all until I'm commenting on the uniforms and love lives of the players. Here's the thing, I don't like popular TV sports, and I'm not even one for much TV these days, besides my MSNBC...the power is off and I'm trapped on the eighth floor, not because I wouldn't run down the stairs and into the street any moment, but so as to be ready to carry a certain person down in case of emergency...When the power comes back there is always more tennis (and save the half naked Nadal on the alternative cover of New York Magazine, I have very little interest at all...)

So, by the time the repug convention rolled around this week, I was finished with not only this scene, but with any organized TV/video event beyond Seder V. Maron! So, a big hat tip to Chubby Bubba over on Sam Seder's blog for posting this, and also many other amusing images today!



I coulda guessed all of this, but its good to know in under 1 minute!

c/p RIPCoco

Labels: Republicans, Sam Seder

Imagine if Hillary Clinton were the running mate of Barack Obama, and there was a similar scandal involving her. Do you think the media wouldn't be clamoring for her to be removed from the ticket?

Brian Ross takes on Sarah Palin's state trooper firing lies:



I wonder if he'll be smacked down by Charlie Gibson?

Labels: corruption, Sarah Palin

With the help of John McCain, Sarah Palin will do for the country what she did for Wasilla, Alaska:

Today, under Sarah Palin's leadership, Wasilla has become the picture of exurban sprawl: an explosion in the housing stock, tons of new highway expansion, tons of new big box stores and fast food franchises, and absolutely 0 sustainability. Combined with a lack of zoning, and a predilection for building open-pit gravel mines all over the place, and Wasilla could be the poster-town for bad municipal leadership.

[snip]

When I graduated from Wasilla High School, Sarah Palin's alma mater, there were 1200 students, some fantastic teachers, and a strong Advanced Placement program. When Sarah Palin graduated, I doubt there were less than half that many students. Unfortunately, the last several years' budget cuts have hit WHS rather hard, and it's been shedding good teachers and AP classes, with no end in sight. Last I heard, the coordinated advanced learning program had been disbanded, for lack of funds. Wasilla High School used to turn out some amazing students, many of whom were friends of mine who went onto MIT, Harvard, Colgate, Tufts, and many other top universities. Now, WHS is a school in decline, even amidst an explosion in the local housing stock, and record state revenues from oil extraction. This decline began under Mayor Palin's watch as mayor, and is coming to its inevitable conclusion under her watch as governor.

And let's not forget her record of "fiscal responsibility":

In fiscal 2003—the last fiscal year Palin approved the budget—the total government expenditures of Wasilla, excluding capital outlays, were $7,046,325. In fiscal 1996—the year before Palin took control of the budget—the expenditures were $4,317,947. The increase was 63 percent. [Wasilla Comprehensive Annual Financial Report 2003, Table 1]

Sarah Palin: Just Another Irresponsible Republican.

Labels: Sarah Palin

Usually when people experience setbacks in their lives, it's a comfort to know that others have been through it too, and ARE going through it too. But there's no comfort in this:

Businesses slashed jobs and the nation's unemployment rate hit a five-year high in August, the government reported yesterday, dashing hopes that the economy might stabilize in the second half of the year and showing that trouble has spread far beyond the housing and financial sectors.

[snip]

The unemployment rate rose to 6.1 percent, from 5.7 percent in July, according to the data released yesterday, making for the most severe four-month rise in joblessness since 1981. More people looked for second jobs to help make ends meet, with little apparent success.

Meanwhile the nation's employers cut 84,000 net jobs, the eighth consecutive month of declines. They have shed a combined 600,000 positions from their payrolls in 2008. Of major categories of employers, only the health-care industry and government added jobs in August.

"These are really ugly numbers," said Scott Anderson, a senior economist at Wells Fargo. "There's been optimism out there that we might be nearing an endpoint, that housing is stabilizing, that the stock market may have turned a corner. But this reinforces the view that things are going to get worse before they get better."

Swell. Just swell. And the cruel irony is that while only the health care industry and government added jobs in August, my job was in mental health research through a quasi-government agency -- and we had five people cut.

So I wonder what the Bush Administration and the McCain campaign, both of which believe that the economy is "fundamentally strong" suggest people looking for work do. Fortunately we are not in a position where we have to sell the house (not for a year or so anyway, depending on how long I'm out of work), but you have to live somewhere and an apartment wouldn't be much cheaper than our house. We don't have car payments, we don't have credit card debt. So I wonder what John McCain has to say to all of us out here who are out of work, while his wife wears $300,000 worth of finery to his party's convention.

I'm serious. I'm all ears.

Labels: unemployment

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss:

The Alaska legislators said Friday that they had no plans to subpoena Palin to force testimony from the governor because she had promised to cooperate. But Democratic state Sen. Hollis French, one of the legislators involved in the inquiry, said seven of Palin's aides had recently declined to be deposed. Palin's lawyer also has pressed to have the matter handled by the Alaska Personnel Board, an agency whose three members are Republican appointees.

Palin's attorney, Thomas V. Van Flein, warned that the Legislature has only "limited investigatory power" -- a caution that some Democratic legislators worry is a prelude to a court battle that would tie the case in knots until after the November election.

"It would be very easy for them to run out the clock," said state Rep. Les Gara, a Democrat pressing for subpoenas. Gara said that if attorneys for Palin and her aides took the case to court, it would wind its way to the Alaska Supreme Court.

Republican lawmakers minimized that threat. "I think a report will be forthcoming in a timely fashion," said state Rep. Jay Ramras, who has been involved with French in a bipartisan effort to look into Monegan's firing.

Both French and Ramras said in a joint statement that they expected a report delivered by Oct. 10 -- well before the election.

Hmmm....abuse of the power of the office, stonewalling an investigation -- yup, the pieces are all there. No wonder the Republicans love Sarah Palin so much. But stonewalling is clearly the theme of the McCain campaign, which in true Cheney fashion, is keeping her hidden in Cheney's underground bunker for two weeks, because only with Palin it's because she's not ready for prime-time and they're afraid she'll say something to get Saint John in trouble:


And the McCain campaign is actively involved in making sure that its #2, in true Republican fashion, never, ever has to account for her actions:

Key Alaska allies of John McCain are trying to derail a politically charged investigation into Gov. Sarah Palin's firing of her public safety commissioner in order to prevent a so-called "October surprise" that would produce embarrassing information about the vice presidential candidate on the eve of the election.

In a move endorsed by the McCain campaign Friday, John Coghill, the GOP chairman of the state House Rules Committee, wrote a letter seeking a meeting of Alaska's bipartisan Legislative Council in order to remove the Democratic state senator in charge of the so-called "troopergate" investigation.

Remember when Republicans used to talk about "law and order", back in the 1970's when they painted Democrats as "soft on crime"? Remember when Republicans used to shout "Rule of law!" at the Clintons? Funny how when Republicans violate the law, it's "Nothing to see here...move along."

Labels: corruption, IOKIYAR, Sarah Palin

THIS is why I was glad Joe Biden got the VP nod from Barack Obama:


Fightin' Joe. Yes, he is, as Karl Rove said, a big blowhard doofus. But he's OUR big blowhard doofus, and he knows how to tell it like it is. And after he and Obama are elected, we'll make him atone for the bankruptcy bill.`12

Labels: Democrats with balls, Joe Biden

Well, do YOU feel like writing after the Four Days o'Hate in St. Paul? As for me, it's more about this (apologies to Rachel Maddow, who's been using this sound clip for over a year):




...and this:

Labels: inertia

That is, if by "working" you mean this:

Small scale bombings and shootings persist in the capital — each a reminder that the war is not over and that Baghdad remains a place where no trip is routine and residents are still guided by precautions.

Most won't drive at night. Many try to avoid heavily clogged streets, remembering that suicide bombers and other attackers intent on killing large numbers of civilians favor traffic jams or congested areas.

Baghdad is the key to stability in Iraq as the center of government and as a potential symbol of reconciliation among rival groups. This flagship role, however, also makes it coveted ground for militias and insurgents fighting efforts to fully restore order.

or this:

Dawood was two miles from his office in central Baghdad's Khilani Square where he worked as a civil engineer when the bomb exploded. It was stashed near a police post, although it was unclear whether that was the target.

The blast killed him and Hameed Miziel, a 37-year-old laborer, according to officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not allowed to talk to the media.

Moments before the blast, mechanic Qassim Mohammed jumped out of a minibus, deciding to walk the rest of the way to his shop despite the punishing Baghdad sun. None of those who stayed in the bus was hurt.

"I saw the fire of the explosion and two women fell on the street. Then, I found myself at the hospital with wounds to my right shoulder and leg and shrapnel wounds on my face," he said later at a nearby hospital.

The mother, who gave her name only as "Umm Mohammed" or "mother of Mohammed," said she chose to beg in that area — a busy intersection lined with car and generator repair shops — because she thought it was safe.

"I used to beg in different areas, but recently I came to this intersection because I thought it was safe there. Thank God, my injury and my sons' were not serious," the 36-year-old widow said from the hospital where she was treated for a leg wound.

In Baghdad, however, safe is a relative term.

U.S. and Iraqi officials do not routinely release figures on the number of bombs that explode each month in Baghdad, citing security.

According to Iraqi police, however, at least five small bombs explode on average each month in the area where the bombing occurred Tuesday: near the intersection on the eastern side of the Tigris River. Less than two weeks ago, a pair of bombs exploded almost simultaneously near the intersection, killing three civilians.

Because nothing says "stability" like small-scale bombings, suicide bombers, and other attackers that are still present to such a degree that the U.S. military won't even release the numbers that they claim are a sign of the "surge"'s success.

Labels: Iraq, now with slightly less FUBAR

Thanks to Barry, our resident wingnut troll, for decoding it for us. From the comments:

I got out my super-secret Karl Rove decoder ring (which all wingnuts are issued) and learned that "community organizer" means "n**ger." I'm not sure if Jesus was a "community organizer" or not.

Labels: racism, Republicans

(If Fran I Am didn't exist, we would have to invent her. Can we please make her the Head Christian of America and turn her loose to smite all those Philistines who only CALL themselves Christians?)

Labels: activism, bloggers, Christianity

Today's honoree: Keith Olbermann, for his expression of disgust and dismay at the Republicans shamelessly exploiting 9/11 yet again as a vehicle with which to score cheap political points:



I swear, sometimes I think Republicans masturbate to images of the 9/11 attacks.

(h/t: Hoffmania. And yeah....what he said too.)

Labels: 9/11, cheap symbolism, chutzpah, Republic Party, shamelessness

First class, apparently.

The Republicans have put up a woman who used to be a broadcaster as their Vice Presidential nominee, and now they want to pass her off on us not by doing interviews, but by as a scripted mannequin, delivering speeches, presumably written for her just the way her speech last night was written for her:

According to Nicole Wallace of the McCain campaign, the American people don't care whether Sarah Palin can answer specific questions about foreign and domestic policy. According to Wallace -- in an appearance I did with her this morning on Joe Scarborough's show -- the American people will learn all they need to know (and all they deserve to know) from Palin's scripted speeches and choreographed appearances on the campaign trail and in campaign ads.

It seems to me that this insults Palin as much as it insults the voting public. Not only does it say that we have no right to know what the #2 to a 72-year-old man who has had multiple bouts of melanoma knows about major issues, but the McCain campaign is also implying that Palin shouldn't worry her pretty little head about such big topics, that she should just leave it to the menfolk and just get up there and look pretty.

Haven't we had enough of an unaccountable Executive branch for one lifetime?

(h/t)

Labels: John McCain, sexism, Wake Me Up When It's Over

WHEN ARE YOU IDIOTS GOING TO VOTE US OUT OF OFFICE???



(Fast forward about 2 minutes in)

Jon Stewart: Still the One.

Labels: comedy, Jon Stewart, sheer awesomeness

You can't deny that John McCain picked a broad that doesn't have a brass set. Let's take a look at Sarah Palin's latest swipe at Barack Obama.

Palin's puling, pissing and moaning about "the Obama/Biden Democrats" spreading lies about her and her family. She's taking Obama to task for voting "present" way back when he was an Illinois state senator, a voting and attendance record that somehow doesn't seem nearly as relevant as John McCain's own voting record of late that shows he hasn't cast a vote since last April.

This is coming, of course, from a typical Republican who's even now crawling away from the putrifying political corpses of Ted Stevens and Don Young now that they're circling the shitter. Palin is touting her opposition to Don Young's two bridges to nowhere but in reality she was for it back in in 2006. In fact, Ms. "Thanks But No Thanks" wrote in a questionnaire, "Yes. I would like to see Alaska's infrastructure projects built sooner rather than later. The window is now -- while our congressional delegation is in a strong position to assist."

And while we're on the subject of earmarks, Palin once said, "Earmarks are not bad in themselves. In fact, they represent a legitimate exercise of Congress’ constitutional power to amend the budget proposed by the president."

Indeed. When one hears such flipflopping from Palin, one can at last understand what John McCain meant when he called her his "soulmate."

The Republican convention is a mutual handjob on a Biblical scale, liars getting raucous applause and Hosannas by other liars who are willing to change out their core principles as quickly as crab-infested underwear. Palin's speech last night proved what a lying douchebag she truly is, an "outsider" as she's being touted who nonetheless is quickly learning the ropes regarding Beltway Republican punches under the belt.

It's no coincidence that Palin's speech was wetting the delegates' seats with her pious stance against lobbyists, the same delegates who defended to the death convicted scumbags like Jack Abramoff, who grew sleek and bloated due to the largess of fellow scumbags who enabled them these past eight years.

The only glimmer of honesty that we got from Palin last night was when she took a swipe at Barack Obama for daring to be a community organizer back when, once again, he was an Illinois state senator. Apparently, you're not supposed to be instrumental in keeping heat in the homes of the poor, keeping the poor in their homes, keeping food in their stomachs or otherwise helping them when they're fatally failed by the very same principles that sociopaths like George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, John McCain and other Republicans champion. Whatever issues I have with Obama's continued moral cowardice and his own flip-flopping of late, back in the day when he was a community organizer, Obama represented the very best that America had to offer: Compassionate liberalism.

But in Crazy Base World that's bleeding heart liberalism. Which is, I guess, supposed to pass for a populist message among the psychological sideshow of the Republican delegation. However, I can think of ten million reasons why Palin should keep talking.

If you thought the 1992 Republican convention was mean-spirited, just wait until McCain accepts the nomination in his "town hall" setting (It's just a coincidence that this particular town is 100% Republican). The white streaks you'll see darting across your TV screen will be Republican ejaculate squirted by those who will do their damnedest to perpetuate the last eight years that they simultaneously think they're repudiating.

Barack Obama in York, PA today:


I sure hope he's right, that we can't keep playing the same political games we always play. Because so far, those games have worked for the Republicans every damn time.

Labels: Barack Obama

Come on now, it's not fair for Tina Fey to get to have all the fun:

Labels: Sarah Palin

Going unnoticed in all the hoopla over Sarah Palin this week was the news that Alberto Gonzales took classified documents about the government's wiretap program home and neglected to keep them locked up "because he couldn't remember the combination" to his safe -- and that the Justice Department is not going to prosecute. If you needed any further proof that Michael Mukasey's Department of Justice is about protecting his bosses and predecessor and not about upholding the law, there it is. So let us have no more talk about Sandy Berger, shall we?

But playing fast and loose with national security isn't the exclusive province of those currently in power. The woman who is running for the office of Waiting For McCain to Sneeze, in an effort to score cheap political points off of her son's service, has violated Operational Security.

Here is Sarah Palin, telling the world the date her son is to be deployed to Iraq:


Jon Soltz of VoteVets explains how this may very well be a violation:

Calling around to a couple of Public Affairs Officers (PAO) who would be handling the flow of information about Track and his unit, VoteVets.org found out that, first, Track is not deploying on September 11. He may be part of a deployment ceremony that day, before going to Kuwait, though one Public Affairs Officer said that any details of the upcoming ceremony hadn't been made public yet by the military.

Governor Palin may have spilled the beans on that one, while showing she doesn't know the difference between a soldier deploying to Iraq vs. one preparing to deploy to Iraq. And while not illegal, if she really did believe that's when he's deploying to Iraq, then she didn't know enough to keep quiet about that to keep from violating OPSEC - something a potential Commander in Chief should know.

But, more disturbing, and definitely in violation of security, are an explosion of stories that say specifically where in Iraq Track is deploying to, which have been dutifully eaten up by right wing websites, and reprinted. I will not reprint it here, because I would only be compounding the issue. But, unfortunately, it is very easy to find on the web at this point.

It is simply impossible that any reporter could figure this out on their own. Just by knowing Track's name and the date he is heading to Kuwait, one could not figure out specifically where Track and his company would be going in Iraq. There's a reason it's impossible to figure that out - because the military doesn't want that information out there. It only serves to aid the enemy to know where are troops are moving.

Did the Pentagon release that information to the press?

No, according to another PAO that VoteVets.org talked with. In fact, this PAO said, the military was actively trying to quash this story, and keep reporters from repeating all these details, because it was a clear OPSEC violation. The PAO was adamant that the military has no idea how these details got out there and doesn't want them out there.

So where is this information coming from, if not the military? Certainly not the Obama campaign, which would not gain anything by promoting Track's service. The only people who I can think of would be those in the McCain-Palin campaign.

If the McCain-Palin campaign has disclosed details about Track's company's movements to gain stories in the press about it, they will have put many American lives in danger - not the least of which would be Track's.

Heckuva job, Sarah.

Labels: dumbassery, hypocrisy, John McCain, Sarah Palin

Is there a revolt among the stringers against Washington Bureau Chief Ron Fournier's fawning parroting of John McCain's talking points? Because now there's yet another article that dares to point out the utter horsepuckey that is whatever comes out of the mouth of Sarah Palin.

Here's just one; if I quote more I'll get nasty e-mail from the AP. So you'll have to click over and read the rest yourself:

PALIN: "I have protected the taxpayers by vetoing wasteful spending ... and championed reform to end the abuses of earmark spending by Congress. I told the Congress 'thanks but no thanks' for that Bridge to Nowhere."

THE FACTS: As mayor of Wasilla, Palin hired a lobbyist and traveled to Washington annually to support earmarks for the town totaling $27 million. In her two years as governor, Alaska has requested nearly $750 million in special federal spending, by far the largest per-capita request in the nation. While Palin notes she rejected plans to build a $398 million bridge from Ketchikan to an island with 50 residents and an airport, that opposition came only after the plan was ridiculed nationally as a "bridge to nowhere."

Wow. Another Republican hypocrite. Who'd a thunk it possible?

The cynicism of these Republicans is breathtaking, but not surprising. Not when we have former New Jersey Governor Christine Todd Whitman, whose tax cuts help cripple the state's budget lo unto this very day and who has been jumping through hoops to justify her party for the last decade, explaining in all seriousness her support for a woman who believes pregnant women lose all of their right to self-determination:

“It’s an important issue. I believe in it. … But on the other hand, we face an economy that is in very bad shape, we have wars in several places, an international situation that is very unstable. We have a host of environmental issues that have got to be addressed – energy being top most amongst those.”

And she thinks Sarah Palin is the right #2 to help address this -- how?

The willingness to sacrifice women's sovereignty over their own bodies on the altar of party unity is appalling enough by itself, but when coupled with the notion that we have to elect a president who has supported the very policies that got us into the mess she herself describes is just insane. But Republicans have become experts of calling blue green and getting away with it. That's how we were attacked by Saudis trained in Afghanistan and retaliated by attacking Iraq. That's how we get working class people supporting policies that shovel cash into the pockets of wealthy CEOs who close the factories and offices in which they work and outsource their jobs to other countries. That's how we have a party that has vociferously decried unmarried sex for a generation, and ends up applauding teen pregnancy at its own convention. That's how one guy who enlisted to fight in Vietnam can be painted as a coward while a guy who didn't even bother to show up for his cushy Texas Air National Guard duty can put on a flightsuit and paint himself as a military stud, and how that same rich kid from Connecticut and Kennebunkport can buy himself a prop house in Texas and paint himself as a regular guy rancher. That's how a man who was one of 600 guys taken captive by the Viet Cong can claim that the same experience he shared with all these other men entitles only him to the presidency.

So I don't know why this continues to surprise me. Perhaps it's the unmitigated chutzpah, the sheer volume of horse manure being spewed this week by these people. As Gail Collins notes today:

The difficulty for the Republican ticket in talking about change and reform and acting like insurgents is that they have been running Washington — the White House and Congress — for most of the last eight years.

Sarah Palin, the vice presidential nominee, was a combative and witty relief at a torpid convention. But it was bizarre hearing the running mate of a 26-year veteran of Congress, a woman who was picked to placate the right-wing elite, mocking “the permanent political establishment in Washington.”

And we couldn’t imagine what Mitt Romney was thinking when he denounced “liberal Washington” and then, at the convention of the party that brought you unimpeded presidential spying, declared: “It’s time for the party of big ideas, not the party of Big Brother!”

You wonder how they say this stuff with a straight face. Unless they really ARE this delusional.

Labels: Republicans

Are you kidding? It isn't bad enough I'm unemployed, you expect me to sit through the Republican National Convention? The heck with that. You want reporting, go check out Hoffmania, who's got all kinds 'o golden nuggets from lunacy (don't miss the hilarious open-mic moment in which Peggy Noonan for once in her life tells it like it is).

Labels: bloggers

It isn't that I have any great fondness for jocks who knock up their girlfriends, and refer to themselves as "f'in rednecks". All too often it's the girls who are left to face the consequences of what to do with a pregnancy that results out of ignorance or a sense of invincibility. And I can't imagine what it must be like to be the latest incarnation of World's Most Famous Underage Pregnant High School Girl when a few weeks ago you were just a high school girl from Alaska. But there's something grotesque about a political party that not so long ago was excoriating an adult fictional character for having a baby out of wedlock, and is today lauding the virtues of a shotgun marriage between two teenagers.




I've been feeling badly for Bristol Palin for a few days now, ever since her mother decided to squelch rumors stemming from her bizarre behavior as she went into labor last April by announcing Bristol's pregnancy to the world. I wonder just how long ago this marriage had been planned. I suspect it was over the weekend. And here are these two kids, who were probably told as part of their abstinence-only sex education that condoms don't work, being not only forced to marry before they're out of high school, but also forced to be props for Bristol's mother's political aspirations. Poor Bristol has no choice since she was born into this family, but I'm wondering if young Levi is asking himself now why on earth he didn't just go into the bathroom with a stack of Penthouse magazines and a bottle of baby oil.

Watching the spectacle of the family values party that's been pontificating about chastity for over two decades now lauding the virtues of teen pregnancy, combined with the train wreck that John McCain and Sarah Palin are making of these kids' lives, I have to wonder if perhaps it's all deliberate. After all, is there a better argument for chastity than to keep oneself from ending up being a poster child for a bunch of religious lunatics?

Labels: Sarah Palin

Fewer N.J. women receiving prenatal care

The number of women receiving early prenatal care in New Jersey has declined slightly during the last decade, largely because many do not have regular access to doctors or cannot afford to pay medical bills, according to a report released today.

The Prenatal Care Task Force report, released by State Health Commissioner Heather Howard, found teens, minorities and unmarried mothers are at higher risk of poor birth outcomes, including low birth-weight babies. Yet they remain less likely to receive early prenatal care, according to the report.

Uninsured mothers in New Jersey had the lowest rate of trimester prenatal care - 73 percent - while women with private insurance had the highest rate - 96 percent - across all racial and ethnic groups.

The overall average for prenatal care in New Jersey was 89 percent, according to the report, based on birth and infant death certificate data from 1990 to 2004.

These are troubling statistics. Successful early prenatal care programs would show a continuous steady rise. We can guess at a few of the causes. One would be that poor women & teenagers wait longer before confirming a pregnancy, from denial or any number of reasons. Another would be the fear many undocumented women have of entering the public health care system & calling attention to themselves. Prenatal deportation? Sounds cruel, but it's happened. It could be up there on the right wing agenda along with overturning Roe v. Wade & ordering teenagers to stop having sex or else suffer the consequences. Let's call it the Sarah Palin Agenda until we hear otherwise.

These numbers are discouraging, but they they don't have to stay that way. The expansion of SCHIP to all uninsured children & a greater attention to child health in schools will bring many more families into contact with regular health care, & those families will become accustomed to using the resources & more likely to urge others to do the same. For those families, we need more family care clinics conveniently located in the neighborhoods where they are needed, not two bus rides away on the other side of the city, phasing out hospital emergency rooms as primary care providers.

Labels: family values, health care, immigration, Sarah Palin, SCHIP

(h/t: Sam)

Labels: Barack Obama

Slate.com's William Saletan, who through the blatant misuse of statistics, implies that some of the daughters of former presidents, vice presidents, and party nominees for said offices, had abortions and that's why you didn't hear about their pregnancies. That they were educated about contraception has never occurred to Mr. Saletan, so needy is he to normalize the Palin family.

Labels: hack journalism, idiocy

Howie Klein has a far stronger stomach than I do. Not only did he actually sit through the Lieberman Litany o'Lies last night, but painstakingly debunks the speech, point by point. Go reward his intrepid soul by giving DWT some hits.

Labels: Joe Lieberman

After Wesley Clark was soundly excoriated by all near and far for "impugning the heroism of John McCain" by questioning how being shot down was a qualification for the presidency, it's been mandatory to laud McCain's service to his country if you want to then question his political record or his policies. And even that hasn't been enough, as Camp Grandpa Simpson has played the POW card every time their guy has been criticized for any reason whatsoever. I'm not sure that even the video I posted yesterday in which Dr. Philip Butler, a veteran who was also a POW right alongside John McCain, is going to make a difference. He'll no doubt be portrayed by the right as a traitor, a Viet Cong dupe, a man driven mad by his captivity, while Shining Hero John McCain emerged from his captivity stronger than ever, wearing a Superman costume. After all, as we saw in 2004, military service only counts if you're a Republican. And then a cushy gig in the stateside Air National Guard where you don't even have to show up makes you more of a war hero -- if you're a Republican -- than a Democrat who saw combat.

But you don't have to question McCain's war record to question his judgment. McCain's mantra about Barack Obama's record on Iraq is to disclaim "I don't question his patriotism, I question his judgment." Today the New York Times turns it back on McCain:

If John McCain wants voters to conclude, as he argues, that he has more independence and experience and better judgment than Barack Obama, he made a bad start by choosing Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska.

Mr. McCain’s supporters are valiantly trying to argue that the selection was a bold stroke that shows their candidate is a risk-taking maverick who — we can believe — will change Washington. (Mr. Obama’s call for change — now “the change we need” — has become all the rage in St. Paul.)

To us, it says the opposite. Mr. McCain’s snap choice of Ms. Palin reflects his impulsive streak: a wild play that he made after conservative activists warned him that he would face an all-out revolt in the party if he chose who he really wanted — Senator Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut.

Why Mr. McCain would want to pander to right-wing activists — who helped George W. Bush kill off his candidacy in the 2000 primaries in a particularly ugly way — is baffling. Frankly, they have no place to go. Mr. McCain would have a lot more success demonstrating his independence, and his courage, if he stood up to them the way he did in 2000.

[snip]

For Mr. McCain to go on claiming that Mr. Obama has too little experience to be president after almost three years in the United States Senate is laughable now that he has announced that someone with no national or foreign policy experience is qualified to replace him, if necessary.

Senator Lindsey Graham, the South Carolina Republican who has been one of Mr. McCain’s most loyal friends, said Tuesday that he was certain that Ms. Palin would take the right positions on issues like Iraq, Russia’s invasion of Georgia and Iran’s nuclear weapons ambitions. That seemed based largely on his repeated assertion that Ms. Palin would be tended by Mr. McCain’s foreign policy advisers. That was not much of an endorsement.

Some of the things Ms. Palin has had to say in the recent past about foreign policy are especially worrisome. In a speech last June to her former church in Wasilla, Ms. Palin said the war in Iraq was “a task that is from God.” Mr. Bush made similar claims as he rejected all sound mortal advice on how to conduct the war.

[snip]

Mr. McCain’s hurdles are substantial. To start, he has to overcome Mr. Bush’s record of failures. (The president addressed the convention Tuesday night and now, McCain strategists fervently hope, will retire quietly to the Rose Garden.) That record includes the disastrous war in Iraq, a ballooning deficit, the mortgage crisis — and the list goes on.

To address those many problems, this country needs a leader with sound judgment and strong leadership skills. Choosing Ms. Palin raises serious questions about Mr. McCain’s qualifications.

Labels: John McCain

Tonight Sarah Palin will accept her party's nomination for the presidency of the United States. She's flying in her prospective son-in-law for the occasion. No word on whether Todd Palin will be standing behind Levi Johnston with a shotgun. She will use her daughter and a high school boy as poster children for the so-called "pro-life movement". It remains to be seen whether these two unfortunate kids will be able to muster the necessary smiles.

For all that Cindy McCain has decided that living in proximity to Russia means that you have foreign policy expertise, the Palin selection is about one thing and one thing only: abortion. Because regulating sex between unmarried people, deciding who is allowed to marry, doing everything possible to ensure that sex results in chidlren, and punishing the transgressions of those who do not abstain, is the four-legged stool of the Christian right. So two kids who are decidedly not ready for marriage are going to be served up to the Republican delegates to further Sarah Palin's career.

You'd think that Palin's pro-life stance would include a record of providing care for teen mothers, wouldn't you? Well, you'd be wrong. Because as governor of Alaska, she slashed funding for a program that provided a place to live for teen moms who had nowhere to go:

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the Republican vice-presidential nominee who revealed Monday that her 17-year-old daughter is pregnant, earlier this year used her line-item veto to slash funding for a state program benefiting teen mothers in need of a place to live.

After the legislature passed a spending bill in April, Palin went through the measure reducing and eliminating funds for programs she opposed. Inking her initials on the legislation -- "SP" -- Palin reduced funding for Covenant House Alaska by more than 20 percent, cutting funds from $5 million to $3.9 million. Covenant House is a mix of programs and shelters for troubled youths, including Passage House, which is a transitional home for teenage mothers.

According to Passage House's web site, its purpose is to provide "young mothers a place to live with their babies for up to eighteen months while they gain the necessary skills and resources to change their lives" and help teen moms "become productive, successful, independent adults who create and provide a stable environment for themselves and their families."

I guess she figured that teen moms who are thrown out of the house by their parents deserve their punishment for their sins. Scratch the surface of the most ardent fetophiles, and you'll find punishment for young women as a motivation every single time.

Labels: Sarah Palin

Why is a shotgun marriage of a pregnant 17-year-old and a high school boy who describes himself as a "f---in' redneck" and claims to not want kids "sacred" in the eyes of Sarah Palin and her ilk, but a marriage representing a commitment between two gay men (or women) who love each other and want to commit to each other and raise children together is somehow an abomination? Can someone please explain to me how this makes any sense whatsoever?

Labels: Burning Questions For Our Time

How bad a decision do you have to make that not even a population that conflated Osama Bin Laden with Saddam Hussein, who fears that Barack Obama is a secret Muslim, and is more likely to vote on American Idol than in a presidential election, is fooled?

Jack Cafferty reads some e-mail, and that dog ain't huntin':


If McCain weren't so downright terrifying a prospect as President (and make no mistake -- any lead less than 10 points is close enough for Republicans to steal through disenfranchisement and "flawed" (read: rigged) voting machines) you could almost think he's a Shakespearean figure, done in by hubris and lust for power. He wants the presidency so badly, and he'd do anything to get it. So last week the maverick, the straight talker, the one who doesn't insult your intelligence, blew the reputation he's worked a lifetime to have, so that a bunch of people who think dinosaurs were on Noah's Ark will vote for him. It's almost sad.

Almost.

Labels: dumbassery, John McCain, Sarah Palin

As opposed to the World of Delusion in which John McCain resides:

Labels: John McCain

Praise the Lord and pass the popcorn. You thought Jeremiah Wright was going to be a problem for Barack Obama this fall? Let them just try. Then we will take on the Wasilla, Alaksa Assembly of God:

Speaking before the Pentecostal church, Palin painted the current war in Iraq as a messianic affair in which the United States could act out the will of the Lord.

"Pray for our military men and women who are striving to do what is right. Also, for this country, that our leaders, our national leaders, are sending [U.S. soldiers] out on a task that is from God," she exhorted the congregants. "That's what we have to make sure that we're praying for, that there is a plan and that that plan is God's plan."

Religion, however, was not strictly a thread in Palin's foreign policy. It was part of her energy proposals as well. Just prior to discussing Iraq, Alaska's governor asked the audience to pray for another matter -- a $30 billion national gas pipeline project that she wanted built in the state. "I think God's will has to be done in unifying people and companies to get that gas line built, so pray for that," she said.

[snip]

A review of recorded sermons by Ed Kalnins, the senior pastor of Wasilla Assembly of God since 1999, offers a provocative and, for some, eyebrow-raising sketch of Palin's longtime spiritual home.

[snip]

Pastor Kalnins has also preached that critics of President Bush will be banished to hell; questioned whether people who voted for Sen. John Kerry in 2004 would be accepted to heaven; charged that the 9/11 terrorist attacks and war in Iraq were part of a war "contending for your faith;" and said that Jesus "operated from that position of war mode."

It is impossible to determine how much Wasilla Assembly of God has shaped Palin's thinking. She was baptized there at the age of 12 and attended the church for most of her adult life. When Palin was inaugurated as governor, the founding pastor of the church delivered the invocation. In 2002, Palin moved her family to a nondenominational church, but she continues to worship at a related Assembly of God church in Juneau.

Moreover, she "has maintained a friendship with Wasilla Assembly of God and has attended various conferences and special meetings here," Kalnins' office said in a statement. "As for her personal beliefs," the statement added, "Governor Palin is well able to speak for herself on those issues."

Clearly, however, Palin views the church as the source of an important, if sometimes politically explosive, message. "Having grown up here, and having little kids grow up here also, this is such a special, special place," she told the congregation in June. "What comes from this church I think has great destiny."

More about the lunatic Pastor Kalnins here.

I'm almost starting to think we want this nutball on the ticket after all. She's neutralizing everything that Camp Curmudgeon had hoped to throw at Barack Obama.

UPDATE: It just keeps getting better:

An illustration of that gap came just two weeks ago, when Palin’s church, the Wasilla Bible Church, gave its pulpit over to a figure viewed with deep hostility by many Jewish organizations: David Brickner, the founder of Jews for Jesus.

Palin’s pastor, Larry Kroon, introduced Brickner on Aug. 17, according to a transcript of the sermon on the church’s website.

“He’s a leader of Jews for Jesus, a ministry that is out on the leading edge in a pressing, demanding area of witnessing and evangelism,” Kroon said.

Brickner then explained that Jesus and his disciples were themselves Jewish.

“The Jewish community, in particular, has a difficult time understanding this reality,” he said.
Brickner’s mission has drawn wide criticism from the organized Jewish community, and the Anti-Defamation League accused them in a report of “targeting Jews for conversion with subterfuge and deception.”

Brickner also described terrorist attacks on Israelis as God's "judgment of unbelief" of Jews who haven't embraced Christianity.

"Judgment is very real and we see it played out on the pages of the newspapers and on the television. It's very real. When [Brickner's son] was in Jerusalem he was there to witness some of that judgment, some of that conflict, when a Palestinian from East Jerusalem took a bulldozer and went plowing through a score of cars, killing numbers of people. Judgment — you can't miss it."

Palin was in church that day, Kroon said, though he cautioned against attributing Brickner’s views to her.

Sorry, guys. If you're going to hold Barack Obama responsible for the lunatic ravings of Jeremiah Wright even when he wasn't there, then YOU guys laid the groundwork for us to question Palin's views about Jews who are actual Jews, not trying to finesse it and have it both ways, when she was right there in the pews when the bile was spewed. Payback's a bitch, bitchez.

Labels: Christofascist Zombie Brigade, Sarah Palin

Amy Goodman is a journalist who was covering protests at the Republican National Convention. But you are not permitted to be a left-of-center journalist at the Republican National Convention, and you certainly are not permitted to try to protect your producers, who are being arrested for the crime of showing something the RNC doesn't want yo to see. If you do, then in Republican America, you are subject to arrest for thoughtcrime:



They call it "conspiracy to riot", but I don't see any riot going on here. This comes on the heels of the pre-convention raids designed to "prevent" disruptive protests at the Republican National Convention. Once again, this is reminiscent of the old Franken/Davis "Pete Tagliani" sketch, in which one candidate shows how tough he is on crime by saying he'll execute criminals before they can commit a crime. Of course he never says how he'll know they're criminals. Now we know -- anyone who disagrees with Republican policies and wants to exercise his or her first amendment rights to petition the government for redress of grievances, is a criminal. This shouldn't be surprising, given that this Administration has pissed all over the Constitution for nearly eight years.

Goodman talked about the arrest later:



Glenn Greenwald reports on what St. Paul looks like this week. It almost seems like a dry run of the police state to come in every city and town in the country under continued Republican governance:

Beginning last night, St. Paul was the most militarized I have ever seen an American city be, even more so than Manhattan in the week of 9/11 -- with troops of federal, state and local law enforcement agents marching around with riot gear, machine guns, and tear gas cannisters, shouting military chants and marching in military formations. Humvees and law enforcement officers with rifles were posted on various buildings and balconies. Numerous protesters and observers were tear gassed and injured. I'll have video of the day's events posted shortly.

In an update, Greenwald notes that an AP photographer was also arrested yesterday, which takes away any excuse about Goodman being "a leftist." The AP has been sycophantically dutiful in carrying the Republicans' water, and even their photographer is not permitted to show protests.

It certainly seems that it's the police who are fostering riots this week, not the protesters.

Welcome to Republican America, folks. Mission accomplished.

Labels: police state, Republicans

I'd like to know how being entertained by a band called "Hookers and Blow" is consistent with conservative Christian family values:



And what is it with Republicans and pink feather boas anyway?

By the way, Bob Marley is turning in his grave at the notion of one of his songs being played at a big party for Republicans given by the oil industry.

(h/t)

Labels: lobbyists, Republic Party

I'm beginning to think so. I don't know if the delegates who hew to the religious right were planning any shenanigans at the Republican National Convention. But with the strong evidence that Palin is only being vetted by Camp Grandpa Simpson NOW, it seems to me that it's either the Palin nod was about McCain escaping his handlers and making a characteristic gamble that he cynically believed would rope in the Hillarions (and draw attention away from Barack Obama's Thursday night speech), or else she's designed to get him through the convention and seal the nomination before he can dump her (read: "She will resign 'for family reasons') and run with his TRUE soulmate, Joe Lieberman.

The only other explanation would be mind-boggling stupidity on the part of the Republicans, and let's face it: they just aren't that dumb.

Barack Obama is right that family should be off-limits. But so much of Sarah Palin's mythos is about her perfect family that's a shining beacon of conservative family values that it's she who has put its members out for public consumption. John Edwards was fair game because he presented himself as a devoted, loyal, and faithful husband, loving and respectful towards a wife who is older than he and doesn't look anywhere near as youthful. And he turned out to be something entirely different. Sarah Palin is about abstinence über alles, and instead she's the living embodiment of how abstinence education doesn't work.

I don't want to see Bristol Palin dragged through the mud. She didn't ask for this, and frankly, she has enough problems, what with being the child of a sanctimonious hypocrite and with a baby on the way and an upcoming marriage before she's even had a chance to be young. But she is now "a story", and once the convention is over, she provides the perfect cover for Palin to decide to bow out to protect her daughter from the blue meanies in the media. Then enter Joe Lieberman after it's too late for the Republicans to do anything about it. They'll laud Palin's family values, and she'll go home to Alaska to wait for the public's short memory to expire, when she can resurface again -- perhaps running for the #1 spot.

At that point Lieberman will be such a relief that no one will utter a peep. And then McCain can claim "the first bipartisan ticket." The upside to this for Democrats is that perhaps Harry Reid will finally wake up.

Labels: Joe Lieberman, John McCain, Sarah Palin

Sarah Palin's 17 y/o daughter Bristol is pregnant. Pass it on.

There is no truth to the rumor, however, that Palin's four month-old child with Down Syndrome is Bristol's daughter.

The McCain campaign is saying that McCain already knew about the blessed event before he made his running mate choice eight days ago. If that's true, then it seems to suggest that McCain really is as ethically blind as he proved during the Keating 5 scandal.

CNN reports that Palin's child with child will keep the baby and marry the father, as if making such a decision while still in high school bespeaks Christian family values. Naturally, the Palins are insisting on everybody respecting their privacy (Read: Don't write or speak about it).

You know, like the GOP would've respected Chelsea Clinton's privacy if she'd gotten knocked up in her junior year of high school.

Nice of the McCain campaign to vet his running mate now -- AFTER selecting her and while no one is paying attention.

At least Todd Palin actually WAS young when he was "young and irresponsible":

Sources close to Sarah Palin tell The Brody File that the husband of the GOP Vice-presidential choice, Todd Palin, was arrested and charged with Driving under the Influence of alcohol back in 1986. He was 22 years old at the time. He was driving in a truck with some friends in the small southwestern Alaska town of Dillingham when he was pulled over for the DUI. As is customary, he was taken to jail briefly. Sarah and Todd Palin were high school sweethearts so they were dating at the time. The Brody File can also report that there was no accident or injuries.

Sources close to Sarah Palin also tell The Brody File that Todd Palin has been “forthcoming about the situation and has indicated that it was a lesson learned from when he was younger.”

Meanwhile, the fertility habits of the Palin family become "curouser and curiouser", and are being addressed by the Palin family thusly:

Reuters: "The 17-year-old daughter of Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin is pregnant, Palin said Monday in an announcement intended to knock down rumors by liberal bloggers that Palin faked her own pregnancy to cover up for her child.

Bristol Palin, one of Alaska Gov. Palin's five children with her husband, Todd, is about five months pregnant and is going to keep the child and marry the father, the Palins said in a statement released by the campaign of Republican presidential candidate John McCain.

Bristol Palin made the decision on her own to keep the baby, McCain aides said. 'We have been blessed with five wonderful children who we love with all our heart and mean everything to us,' the Palins' statement said. 'Our beautiful daughter Bristol came to us with news that as parents we knew would make her grow up faster than we had ever planned. As Bristol faces the responsibilities of adulthood, she knows she has our unconditional love and support,' the Palins said."

*** UPDATE *** Here's a statement the McCain camp released from Todd and Sarah Palin, which is identical to the quote in the Reuters story: "We have been blessed with five wonderful children who we love with all our heart and mean everything to us. Our beautiful daughter Bristol came to us with news that as parents we knew would make her grow up faster than we had ever planned. We're proud of Bristol's decision to have her baby and even prouder to become grandparents. As Bristol faces the responsibilities of adulthood, she knows she has our unconditional love and support."

"Bristol and the young man she will marry are going to realize very quickly the difficulties of raising a child, which is why they will have the love and support of our entire family. We ask the media to respect our daughter and Levi's privacy as has always been the tradition of children of candidates."

Nothing like using a troubled sixteen-year-old as a cudgel with which to beat other women for their decisions, eh? The difference, Governor, between us and you is that we want your daughter to have had options and we respect whatever option she chose. YOU think YOU know what's right for ALL women through the narrow view of your own experience.

And what ABOUT that much-touted abstinence education, anyway?

Labels: Sarah Palin

Breaking News: Sarah Palin just confirmed that her 17 year old daughter, Brillo, is 5 months pregnant and is gonna marry the father, Levi, and keep the baby. Supposedly McCain knew about this pregnancy before choosing Palin as his running mate.
These people are so full o' lies that its mind boggling in its enormity. Read on for more on ungodly partnership of the dysfunctional Alaskan with the PTSD Gambler.
(h/t to my Mom and her diligent monitoring of the Bill O'Reillys of the world...know thy enemy!)

I'm looking at MSNBC's coverage of Gustav barrelling ashore in Louisiana and throwing Michelle Kosinski off camera, intercut with pictures of ....er...walls, which are the levees not quite up to snuff, we're told, because the project is supposed to take until 2012. At this moment the wind driven water is reportedly pouring over the tops of west side industrial canal walls of New Orleans like a waterfall...they might actually be breached by the force or punctured by loose ships floating around (and how did that happen with so much advanced warning?) In the 9th ward the walls are holding so far because the wind is not blowing directly there yet. It all depends on the speed and direction of how this thing turns around. Tornados have already been reported here and there but they don't seem to be touching down.

Bad and evil girl that I am, (and feeling like most people in the path of the storm are out or trying to be secure...they at least have the information...I have been wandering the city streets with a smile, thinking that never could payback be so targeted as to force the republican party to conduct business in the shadow of this. They are unable to postpone the business of the convention by law, so as the "stars" of the party fall away leaving the silly democrat troll Joementum Lieberman, mother Palin, and McInsane hisself trying to figure out how to not appear in split screen against the embarrassment reminder of what his party finds important. If we had to have big storms...and we do, with the environment as it is, and as part of the normal course of things...the timing of this thing is perfect!

On to the unbelievable joke that is Sarah Palin....and wasn't that her riding the air on her bike in the storm surge? (I've got to work on learning to photoshop!!)
John Cole nails this situation at Balloon Juice with the unbelievable news that McCain's people are finally now heading up to Wasilla to look into Palin...now....Here is what hes got:
According to the Washington Monthly, democrats doing opposition research found out that no one had checked the archives of the local papers up there (they are not online in full and archives have to be searched in person if one wants to do a complete search.) The former Republican House Speaker for Alaska expressed surprise that Palin was chosen because no one had come to Alaska to do any research on her. Only just now have the McCain people reserved rooms in the local hotel...just now?.....
Is this part of McCain's tendency to gamble (one man's maverick is another man's idiot when it involves expensive fighter planes or, heaven forbid, national security,) or part of a bigger plan (more on that to come?) More to come on the high stakes gambling addiciton of McCain....but keep it in mind if youknow anything about PTSD, addiction, and the 12 steps...we are dealing with a pretty old guy who has been through major trauma in his life and remains in denial about much of it. At some point soon we have to look at this seriously and not through the lens of David Gregory's failed climb to the top of broadcasting.

I could have guessed that Palin has flip flopped on the bridge to nowhere, that she is not real sharp on historical facts about America, was likely a member of the Alaska secessionist movement before jumping into mainstream politics, and is unclear about what the VP job entails. She only just got her passport in the past year, so those...ahem, Faux News...who feel like she has international experience because she lives close to Russia...well....

The issues about her kids and the maternity/paternity of little Trix or Snap, Crackle, Pop, is less important than the lies involved in how the issue was/is being handled. The holier-than-thou conservative right can come up with some of the best lies when its their foot in the bathroom stall of the solicitous cop next to them, or their kid having the baby out of wedlock.

Regardless of who actually gave birth to Twig, I say from personal experience and all the medical advice I've ever gotten, not to mention airline safety rules, that one does not get on a plane when one's water has broken and one is in labor. After the first child, the labor process tends to vary in that it can be very, very fast or can be troublesome...and from what Ive heard and experienced in my lifetime of being a mom and from other mothers, subsequent babies are usually born quicker than initial ones; sometimes surprisingly quicker. So, why would anyone in their right mind (especially one who purports to care for the health of the unborn,) get on a plane in that condition? This wasn't a short flight either; we're talking Texas to Seattle to Alaska to a small town hospital. She went specifically to a small town hospital knowing that the kid was going to have Downs Syndrome and probably would have special needs.

This was a very high risk pregnancy and actually, regardless of how she got back to the small hospital, she shouldn't have even gone anywhere at that risk level.No one in their right mind, and who has access to the best health care in the country, would do that! Setting aside gossip on the intertubes, I've got to say that I question the woman's judgment in all matters if she took such a chance with not only her own health but with the health of the baby and with a number of planeloads of people. Is it right to take a chance of making a plane, or connecting flight, make an emergency landing? Is it right to expose her unborn special needs kid to the bacteria involved in all of that travel? Finally, is it ,medically possible to break your water and yet show no signs of pregnancy or labor over the hours spent travelling? Possibly....but unlikely. The whole explanation shows poor judgement in the best case scenario and a real tendency to lie (with the possibility of insurance fraud and endangering airline safety) in the worst.

Then there is Troopergate...but I'm in a hurry this morning. 87% of Alaskans believe she lied about it and I agree. Here is what Josh Marshall has on it. Its minor in the scheme of things, but these things add up, and what really is troubling is the McCain campaign's lack of due diligence.
Maybe he is a gambler...er...maverick...but, who is handling him? If there is institutionalized denial apparent before we've even gotten to the issues at hand then what can we expect when the next disaster arrives? More of the same, as they say.

A rumor is being floated around that if Palin were to have to step down then the obvious choice would have to be Lieberman. Check Christy Hardin-Smith at FDL's exasperation and questioning about all of the same stuff here, and then peruse the comments there or at Kos or anywhere else, (soon to be on the M$M...not!...until, that is, it happens in their faces or Rachel Maddow forces it out,) that the real plan is to have Palin step aside and put Joementum in the slot when its too late to do much about it.

Its the Big Brother Backdoor Strategy that those of us who try to relax and forget with reality shows know all too well. See, the head-of-household (or nominee in this case) nominates 2 houseguests for eviction. One is often a pawn, because when the veto is played that nominee can be removed from contention for eviction and the real target can be slotted in with no chance of being saved by the veto. If this is a backdoor admission of Lieberman onto the ticket, then I'm impressed...though its been sorta clumsy by Big Brother standards. But hell, it indicates that someone, anyone, in the McCain camp turns on the TV at all; forget news or the internets...just plain old pop culture TV will do at this point.

I don't see how this whole thing isn't a joke...but....I couldn't believe most of what Bush was doing while he was doing it either. Depending on the American people to actually think about this and weigh possible outcomes of their voting actions is a non-starter. There must be some way to produce this into a reality show that will grip the masses in prime time and spell it out s-l-o-w-l-y and carefully. The security of the nation may depend on it.

Labels: Joe Lieberman, lies, Sarah Palin

Taking a trip through Blogtopia (™Skippy) to see what other people are saying about the St. Paul Clown Car this week, and the occupants therein:

DCap on how with Cindy McCain around, who needs comedy writers?

Driftglass examines the Palin selection process.

Earth-Bound Misfit puts it all in context.

Warren Street on how someone who wasn't even vetted at all got to be the Republican Vice-Presidential candidate. McCain's Viagra must have been kicking in, big-time. Are we allowed to ask questions about McCain's judgment yet?

Mick Arran on the Bush Administration deciding that Congress needs to re-affirm his war powers -- and why Congressional Democrats need to for once in their lives stand up to him.

Digby has poll numbers, thus proving that perhaps this country will get the leadership it deserves in President Palin. I just wish they wouldn't drag the rest of us down with them.

Glenn Greenwald on the Gestapo-like tactics being used against protesters in St. Paul.

And now that I'm thoroughly depressed, I'm going to cheer myself up by doing housework. Yes, that's what it's come to.

Labels: 2008 election, bloggers, Wake Me Up When It's Over

See for yourself.

(h/t)

Labels: 2008 election, Barack Obama, taxes

"Republicans think government is the problem because they're so incompetent at doing it effectively."

Krugman today (also revealing that the hurricane preparation and response isn't even being done by FEMA, because that agency is rotten to the core with theocrats and hacks:

On Sunday morning the White House Web site featured photos of the president talking to Gulf state governors about Hurricane Gustav while ostentatiously clutching a red folder labeled “Classified.” On Monday, instead of speaking at the convention, reports suggest that Mr. Bush will address the nation about the storm.

And a report on Politico.com suggested that John McCain might give a speech “from the devastation zone if the storm hits the U.S. coast with the ferocity feared by forecasters.”

What’s wrong with this picture?

Let’s start with that red folder. Assuming that the folder contained something other than scrap paper, is the planned response to a hurricane a state secret? Are we worried that tropical storm systems will discover our weak points? Are we fighting a Global War on Weather?

Actually, that’s not quite as funny as it sounds. Some observers have pointed out that daily briefings on preparations for Gustav, which should be coming from the Federal Emergency Management Agency — which is, you know, supposed to manage emergencies — have been coming, instead, from the U.S. military’s Northern Command.

It’s not hard to see why. Top positions at FEMA are no longer held by obviously unqualified political hacks and cronies. But a recent report by the inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security said that the agency has made only “limited progress” in the area of “mission assignments” — that is, in its ability to coordinate the response to a crisis. So FEMA still isn’t up to carrying out its principal task.

That’s no accident. FEMA’s degradation, from one of the government’s most admired agencies to a laughingstock, wasn’t an isolated event; it was the result of the G.O.P.’s underlying philosophy. Simply put, when the government is run by a political party committed to the belief that government is always the problem, never the solution, that belief tends to become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Key priorities are neglected; key functions are privatized; and key people, the competent public servants who make government work, either leave or are driven out.

The political cost of Katrina shocked the Bush administration into trying to undo some of the damage at FEMA, and it’s a good bet that the initial response to Gustav will be better (it could hardly be worse). But because the political philosophy responsible for FEMA’s decline hasn’t changed, the administration hasn’t been able to reverse the agency’s learned incompetence. Three years after Katrina, and a year past a Congressional deadline, FEMA still doesn’t have a strategy for housing disaster victims.

Hopefully people will remember that when John McCain is in an apron, dishing out red beans and rice to the now-homeless, to demonstrate "Message: I care."

Labels: Hurricane Gustav, John McCain, Paul Krugman

For all the lip service that John McCain is giving to "putting aside politics" this week out of "respect" for the people who are possibly going to lose their homes in Louisiana today, the Republicans are eager to spin a natural disaster as a boon for their own retention of power:

“You don’t wish for it, but it shows McCain dealing with a surprise — a big event that has consequences on people,” a convention planner said. “It’s redemption for the Republican Party on the competence issue. The convention ends up being about John McCain showing the best way to serve a cause greater than yourself.”

What this means is if the response is even one iota better than the response to Katrina (which it should be, given that Katrina was recently enough to still be a relatively fresh memory), the Republicans will want a freakin' medal for competence:

McCain and his new running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, flew to Mississippi on Sunday to show they are on top of things. Back here, there is talk of convention-goers raising money for victims or putting together care packages for victims — a genuinely good gesture if they do it and probably good politics, too.

“This is McCain doing the right thing, showing leadership and taking command,” the convention planner said. “He’s deciding how to handle this, and Bush is irrelevant.”

Translation: Don't look at this photo anymore:



Well, too bad. Any idiot, especially a highly political animal like McCain, can learn from a blunder last time. But I wonder where this sense of service was three years ago.

Yup. A photo-op of making care packages shows how presidential he is. Talk about setting the bar low...

At Netroots Nation this year, conventioneers -- those very bloggers that the McCain campaign (and most of the media) disdains, took it upon themselves to make care packages for troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. And they did it without TV cameras around.

Labels: Hurricane Gustav, icepick meet forehead, John McCain