Why They Lie

Image credit: Parody by Cujo359 (See NOTE)

At Naked Capitalism, Matt Stoller encapsulated Barack Obama and the reason so many people still believe in him despite his complete betrayal of what we thought of as Democratic Party principles once he took office:

Obama had shown this breathtaking tendency to con people as they knew they were being conned before, the most public time during the campaign being his cynical answer when he was asked about his promise to renegotiate NAFTA. He had said, when fighting for union votes with Clinton, “I will make sure we renegotiate (NAFTA).” Even as he said this, it turns out that campaign advisor Austan Goolsbee had gone to Canada to assure them this was a lie (sure enough, Obama’s trade policies are identical to Bush’s, or worse). And once the election ended, and Obama was asked about his broken promise by a reporter, he gave the following answer.

“This is fun for the press to try to stir up whatever quotes were generated during the course of the campaign,” President Obama said during his Transition in early December, when a reporter asked him about criticisms he and now-Secretary of State Clinton had made about each other’s foreign policy views.

“They’re your quotes, sir,” said the reporter, Peter Baker of the New York Times.

“No, I understand. And you’re having fun,” Obama continued. “And there’s nothing wrong with that. I’m not faulting it.”

This is cynicism as art. It’s literally a Presidential candidate running on hope and change saying that campaign promises are a joke and a ruse.

The Source of Barack Obama’s Power to Trick Us Comes from Our Willingness to Be Tricked

What Obama did there, in the starkest way imaginable, is meet our expectations of what a politician will be. "Hah, hah! 'The politician is lying again.' Can't you guys find some new material?", he seems to be saying there. Far too many of us simply expect to be lied to, as if this were the only way things could possibly be.

If that's our expectation, then politicians will never have to do otherwise. There's a difference between accepting that such a thing is inevitable, and assuming it's going to happen some or much of the time. In the former case, then the politicians we elect will live down to our expectations. In the latter case, they might learn to be better.

This wasn't a case of a politician making a campaign promise he either figured he couldn't live up to, or a campaign promise that he tried to live up to, but couldn't. Here, candidate Obama had absolutely no intention of living up to what he said on the campaign trail. It was nothing but a bald-faced, cynical lie, and plenty of his adoring supporters went along with this because, at least in his case, they don't expect any better.

If you want the world to be better, and your leaders to be better, then start by expecting them to be, and voting them out when they aren't. Until you do, you're not going to get what you want. Unless, of course, you like being lied to.

John Edwards Diagnosed With Serious Heart Ailment

Caption: John Edwards in happier, and healthier days, speaks to reporters in New Orleans after announcing his candidacy for president, December 28, 2006.

Image credit: the Edwards campaign

According to multiple sources, former presidential candidate John Edwards has a heart condition that has delayed his trial on misuse of campaign funds:

A federal judge says she has two letters from a cardiologist saying ex-presidential candidate John Edwards has a life-threatening condition that will require surgery in February.

John Edwards Has Life-Threatening Condition: Doctor

Both CNN and CBS have similar news stories on file.

I see no word yet on what the condition is, but if it requires surgery it's bound to be serious. Edwards is 58 years old, and will go on trial soon. It's not a time for elective heart surgery.

According to CNN, Edwards faces up to thirty years in jail, and $1.5 million fine, if convicted. Those are the sorts of numbers I recall from earlier reports on Edwards' upcoming trial.

Edwards was the candidate I endorsed during the 2008 election.

UPDATE: From the Charlotte News Observer report concerning Edwards' condition:

Judge Catherine Eagles did not disclose the medical condition afflicting Edwards, but said she had received letters from his cardiologist.

In those letters, the judge said the doctors wrote that the condition was treatable and the former U.S. presidential candidate had a good chance of success if the course of treatment were followed.
...
She indicated that his condition has given him problems on three occasions since being diagnosed in December. She said his condition has affected his daily life and makes it difficult for him to drive.

Judge delays Edwards' trial, confirming medical condition

Which is probably as much as anyone can write on the matter without a statement from Edwards' attorneys.

Elizabeth Edwards Dies

Caption: Elizabeth Edwards in Reno, Nevada, during her husband John's 2008 Presidential campaign.

Image credit: John Edwards 2008/Wikimedia

It's hard to call a death due to a well-known case of cancer sudden, but this feels like it. Elizabeth Edwards, wife of one-time Presidential candidate John Edwards, died today of cancer at age 61. Talking Points Memo reports:

Edwards first made public the cancer that would eventually take her life just days after her husband lost the 2004 presidential election at the side of Democratic nominee John Kerry. Following the admission and treatment, Edwards' cancer went into remission before returning -- in metastatic form -- in 2007. That was the year John launched his second campaign for the presidency, which fizzled out before the revelations came to light that he had an affair with and fathered a child by a campaign videographer.

By her own account, neither the cancer diagnosis nor the family collapse was likely the toughest thing Edwards faced, however. In 1996, her 16 year-old son, Wade, was killed in a car wreck coming home from the family's beach house. Edwards left her law practice after the tragedy and dropped her maiden name, Anania, in favor of her son's last name. In the wake of Wade's death, the Edwards family established the Wade Edwards Foundation to help high school students in school. The Edwards family has requested donations be made to the foundation in Elizabeth's name following her death.

Elizabeth Edwards Dead At 61

Elizabeth Edwards was a classy lady. In an article back in 2008, I referred to Elizabeth Edwards' discussion of how things were on the campaign trail:

[T]his is a terrific essay by someone who, as she put it, had a front-row seat in this Presidential campaign[.]

Elizabeth Edwards On The State Of Journalism

She had more than her share of heartbreaks in that campaign, and some were at the hands of a press that favors the superficial and establishment-leaning stories over anything of real substance or importance. As she often did in her life, Elizabeth chose to make lemonade out of those lemons, too.

She was a classy lady, and both she and her candor will be sorely missed.

Afterword: For those interested, the TPM article has all the usual details about survivors, etc.

Quote Of The Day

Ian Welsh, reacting to this quote from the Financial Times:

The venue was the Oval Office. A group of British dignitaries, including Gordon Brown, were paying a visit. It was at the height of the 2008 presidential election campaign, not long after Bush publicly endorsed John McCain as his successor… Trying to be even-handed and polite, the Brits said something diplomatic about McCain’s campaign, expecting Bush to express some warm words of support for the Republican candidate… ‘I probably won’t even vote for the guy,’ Bush told the group, according to two people present. ‘I had to endorse him. But I’d have endorsed Obama if they’d asked me.’

[Sorry, don't have a link. FT is a pay site.]

Ian's reaction:

And why not, it’s not hyperbole at all to say that Obama is Bush’s third term. He has embraced Bush’s wars, Bush’s approach to executive power, Bush’s civil liberties doctrines and Bush’s economic doctrines. The differences exist, but they are not significant. In almost every way that matters, Obama took Bush’s constitutional order and institutionalized it, giving it a bipartisan imprimatur.

Bush would have endorsed Obama if asked

Yep, that's it in a nutshell. McCain was just a crazy guy who wanted to be President. Anyone looked good next to him, except maybe his running mate.

It's both sad and hilarious that, at this point, there are still so many people who don't see this.

It's Done

Al Franken being sworn in as a Senator by President of the Senate Joe Biden this morning. He is accompanied by Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and former Senator (and Vice President) Walter Mondale. Image credit: Screenshot of TPM video by Cujo359



It's finally happened. After months of useless delays, Al Franken has been seated as the junior Senator from Minnesota.

Congratulations to Senator Franken and the people of Minnesota.

It's Over

Image credit: Screenshot of Minneapolis Star Tribune website by Cujo359

What a long, strange trip it's been:

Sen.-elect Al Franken and his wife, Franni, greeted their supporters and the press in front of his Elliot Park condo; coffee, cookies and brownies were in the offing at the end of this epic campaign trail. As cars honked at the sidewalk gaggle, Franken said he was "thrilled" and agreed that the phone call between him and former Republican U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman was very gracious; both men talked about the how tough the experience had been for their families, and they agreed that it was time to bring the state together again. It was a "nice way to end this" between "two people that really fought hard," he said.

239 days, 312 votes and one new senator: Franken 'thrilled' and ready to go

Norm Coleman finally gave up after the Minnesota Supreme Court decided against him yesterday. In a comment on my previous article on this topic this morning, Dana Hunter summed things up:

I'm shocked ol' Norm gave up before he took his whine all the way up to the Supremes. I guess he just didn't feel like getting spanked by the highest court in the land, even though his Con[servative] friends were handing him a paddle and begging him to go for it.

I can hardly wait to see the wailing, moaning and gnashing of teeth from the rabid right.

Comment on: At Long Last, An End Is Near

They have nothing to complain about. For the most part, the last six months have been a waste of time. Nate Silver had this called last November. The Republicans must have known this would be a waste of time, since they have enough money to hire good lawyers and statisticians, too. The only explanation that makes sense to me is that they deliberately delayed Franken's entry into the Senate as long as they could.

Not that this will stop the whining. One thing conservatives will never run out of is their sense of entitlement.

At Long Last, An End Is Near

Yesterday, Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty said there could be an end to the madness:

Governor Tim Pawlenty (R-Minn.) said Sunday he has no plans for further delay in certifying the results of the state's disputed U.S. Senate election so that Republican Norm Coleman can pursue a federal court challenge.

Pawlenty told CNN that he would abide by whatever ruling the Minnesota Supreme Court makes in the contest, where Democrat Al Franken appears to have an upper hand.

Pawlenty Won't Delay If Court Rules For Franken

There seems little doubt that the Supreme Court will rule in favor of Franken. Every other court has ruled in his favor, and the facts seem to be on his side. Nate Silver (of Five Thirty-Eight) predicted in November that Franken would win the recount, and last month he noted that Pawlenty was losing popularity at least in part thanks to the battle over the Senate race. Little wonder then, that he wants to see the back of this controversy. Whatever the reason, Pawlenty's numbers are falling, and the ridiculous lengths the Republicans seem to want to go to prevent Franken from being seated aren't helping his image.

It's unclear when the court will rule on the election. Rumors had the date as being last week, and the week before. Clearly, any speculation at this point would be as pointless as picking a date at random. Nevertheless, it seems reasonable that it should occur within the next month or two.

Once that's done, Minnesota's long nightmare may finally be over.

UPDATE: Corrected the first sentence of the second paragraph. Originally, it said "There seems little doubt that the Supreme Court will rule against Franken". As commenter Eric noted, it was clear that this wasn't what I meant, but somehow I missed this. Thanks for pointing out the error, Eric.

I'd Call It A Fortuitous Omission

Over at Talking Points Memo, Eric Kleefeld writes:

At a pre-trial hearing in the Minnesota election lawsuit just now, Franken attorney Kevin Hamilton made a striking accusation: That the Coleman campaign has been doctoring evidence.

As an example, Hamilton showed two photocopies of a rejected absentee ballot envelope, one of which he said was the unaltered original, and the other taken from Coleman's legal filings in his attempts to get more of the rejected ballots opened. The Coleman copy was missing the section in which a local election official explained why it was rejected.

Franken Legal Team: Coleman Is Doctoring Evidence

Like most people, I've been wondering why Coleman's supporters, who are clearly paying a lot of money to have these ballots challenged in court, have been thinking they could win. Maybe they don't.

Down To The Wire

The race for U.S. Senator in Minnesota is coming down to the wire, it would appear. Incumbent Senator Norm Coleman has been losing ground steadily, and now appears to be behind challenger Al Franken, Nate Silver of Five Thirty-Eight explains:

Minnesota's Canvassing Board this afternoon completed the bulk of its review of challenged ballots. The Canvassing Board ruled upon 1,325 challenges, according to numbers prepared by the Star Tribune, including 852 challenges brought by the Coleman campaign and 472 brought by the Franken campaign. Among these 1,325 ballots, 758 were allocated to Franken, 319 to Coleman, and 248 ballots were assigned to third-party candidates or deemed to be illegal. This resulted in a net gain of 439 votes for Franken, giving him a nominal lead of 251 ballots.

Franken's lead is almost certain to diminish once the Canvassing Board reviews more than 5,000 withdrawn challenges, and defaults them to the rulings originally made at the county level.

Franken is Winning, and Coleman Knows It

There's still a lot of vote counting and arguing to go, however. At this point, it looks like Minnesota will have a Senator Al Franken soon.

One difference you'll notice between this process and the one that went on in Florida in 2000 following a close race for President is that it's being taken seriously by the state government. They're counting the votes, including a few that I'd have trouble deciding, and they're finding the ones they missed the first time around. Part of the reason for that is that the Democratic Party has learned to take the state offices that control elections seriously, as this e-mail from ActBlue explains:

As you read this, canvass boards in Minnesota are scrutinizing hundreds of ballots to make sure that every vote is counted. Why? Because Secretary of State Project candidate Mark Ritchie is making sure that the election for Minnesota's Senate seat is handled with the transparency and fairness Americans expect.

Despite a razor-thin margin of victory and hundreds of ballots missing or uncounted, Republican Norm Coleman declared victory in November and tried to rush back to Washington. Secretary Ritchie did the right thing for the people of Minnesota and pushed ahead with a recount. Ritchie has protected election officials from Republican harassment and ordered the examination of absentee ballots, searching for those that were wrongfully excluded from the count. So far, the process has turned up approximately 1600 ballots, many of which are expected to favor Democrat Al Franken.

In many states, including Washington, the Secretary of State is in charge of election management, in cooperation with the county boards of elections. Florida's SoS was political hack Katharine Harris. In Washington, we had a very close election for governor in 2004, which was initially won by the Republican candidate, Dino Rossi. After two recounts, it was determined that Christine Gregoire had won by less than 200 votes. Our state was lucky enough to have an honest Republican, Sam Reed, in charge of this process.

In at least three statewide elections in the last three years, the difference has turned out to be less than three hundred votes out of millions cast. I draw two conclusions from this. First, your vote really does count. It won't always matter, but sometimes it does. In each of these three elections, if five hundred of the loser's supporters had shown up that day instead of blowing the election off, the outcome would have been different. Second, all votes should be counted fairly, and the Democrats have been right to emphasize this. Let's hope that emphasis continues, and is embraced by more Republican Party politicians as well.

The 2008 Presidential Campaign In One Picture

Watertiger has captured the essence of the 2008 election in one picture caption.

Now Comes The Hard Part

Once again, I bring you news about an online petition.

I was able to watch Barack Obama's acceptance speech on television the other night. To call it inspiring is probably a master stroke of understatement. Now comes the tough part, though, which is living up to those words. This online petition by AVAAZ is asking him to do just that. AVAAZ describes itself this way:

Avaaz.org is a new global web movement with a simple democratic mission: to close the gap between the world we have, and the world most people everywhere want.

Across the world, most people want stronger protections for the environment, greater respect for human rights, and concerted efforts to end poverty, corruption and war. Yet globalization faces a huge democratic deficit as international decisions are shaped by political elites and unaccountable corporations -- not the views and values of the world’s people.

AVAAZ: About Us

They chose the name "AVAAZ", they say, because "'Avaaz' means 'Voice' in many Asian, Middle Eastern and Eastern European languages."

They're trying to gather a million signatures in the next 48 hours. I think it would be just splendid if the majority of those signatures were Americans, don't you? Especially if those Americans all wrote something like:

"We realize that many people in Washington, DC will tell you that the change you speak of, the change we want, is impossible. We sent you there because we think otherwise"

Like most politicians, Obama will only live by his words if we tell him, and the rest, that we want them to. Over the next few years, that will be one of our tasks.

(h/t Dana at ETEV)

SnS Blue: The Outcome So Far

Image credit: PuppyDogWeb.com

As of this evening, this is where the remaining Slobber And Spittle Blue candidates are doing:

• Eric Massa, the former Navy Commander from the NY-29 Congressional district, has apparently won his race against incumbent Randy Kuhl. Eric won't claim victory, he wrote in an e-mail to supporters, until the last vote is counted, since the margin is pretty thin:
  

  
  While many prominent news organizations such as the Associated Press, CNN, MSNBC, and Politico have already called this race in our favor, my respect for our democratic system prevents me from making such a declaration until every vote is counted. To do any less would be a disservice to our democracy and our men and women serving overseas whose votes are yet to be counted.
  

  
  I can't blame him. We've been burned by such predictions before, haven't we?
  



• Sam Bennett has lost her race against incumbent Bush enabler Charles Dent. Just to give you an idea of why, here are a couple of quotes from the Morning Call, the principal newspaper in her district:
  

  
  Bennett came out on the attack from the start, seeking to portray Dent as a George Bush Republican who had walked lockstep with the unpopular president. Bennett lobbed several accusations at the incumbent in hopes to sway thousands of undecided voters to support her.
  
  Dent countered with jabs at the nonprofit Bennett runs, Properties of Merit, focusing on her salary, which until last summer accounted for nearly one third of the charity's total budget.
  
  Dent Retains Seat In 15th
  

  
  In other words, Bennett criticized Dent's voting record, and Dent retorted with personal sliming, and this is equivalence in the eyes of the Morning Call. Here's the other quote:
  

  
  Dent, 48, is a moderate who has sought to distance himself from Bush throughout the campaign.
  
  Dent Retains Seat In 15th
  

  
  Why even make such an observation, which is certainly going to evoke the obvious question: Does a moderate vote with the most out-of-control President of all time more than 85 percent of the time, including all the most important issues like FISA, the PATRIOT Act, and the Iraq War? The only things he didn't support Bush on were the things he knew he'd pay for in his home district, near as I can see.



• As expected, Andrew Rice lost his race for Oklahoma's U.S. Senate seat. The most dismaying thing about this loss was the margin: 57 - 39. Unfortunately, Oklahoma is one of the least Democrat-friendly states in the country, as the AP notes:
  

  
  Oklahoma voters gave Republican John McCain his biggest percentage victory of any state despite the Democratic tide that swept Democrat Barack Obama into the presidency.
  
  Oklahoma loses federal stroke in election
  

  
  I have no idea what a "federal stroke" is, but if it's anything to do with knowing who is screwing them, Oklahomans lost it a long time ago.



• Darcy Burner is in yet another tight race for the WA-08 Congressional district with incumbent phony Dave Reichert. Darcy was slimed recently by Reichert, with the willing help of one of our local papers. This egregious piece of shilling may end up being the difference in this race, although at the moment it's hard to tell who is going to win. Burner is trailing by about 500 votes, with almost half the votes in King County, the main part of her district, still to be counted. She just sent an e-mail to her supporters indicating she will wait for more votes to be tallied before either conceding or claiming victory.
  
  There may be a recount in this one.


• Finally, Donna Edwards has won a lopsided victory in her MD-04 Congressional district. This is a heavily Democratic district, and the only real contest was the one she faced against reprobate Democrat Al Wynn in the primary.

Congratulations to the winners, and thanks to the other fine candidates for your efforts.

We Did It

Image credit: Obama campaign.

We did it. Less than fifty years after the last Jim Crow law was rescinded, enough Americans ignored old prejudices to elect an African-American as our President.

Maybe it was time. Maybe it was just the right man at the right time. Or maybe it was just that enough people realized, after the trauma of the last eight years, that there are worse things that can happen to this country than having it run by a member of an ethnic minority. Whatever the reason, America is in some ways a better place.

One thing no one can say now is that America isn't ready to elect a black man President.

The Muslim "slur" of Obama, and the "consorts with atheists" charges by Elizabeth Dole against her challenger (and apparent successor) Kay Hagan in the North Carolina U.S. Senate race, show that we still have quite a way to go before we're truly a society that tolerates its differences. In neither case was Colin Powell's question the most asked one - "Why is being a [Muslim|atheist] a slur?"

Ugly as this campaign was at times, though, it probably would have been far uglier even twenty years ago. I'm sure there are young people reading this article wondering "What's so special about all this?" Maybe that's the most startling indication of how far we've come.

The field of potential Presidential candidates became larger this year. It now includes both women and black people. While there are certainly those who would try to make hay out of such minority status, and those who wouldn't vote for either, having a larger talent pool for one of the toughest political jobs on the planet is a good thing. That alone makes this a good day, even for those of us who are white American men.

Congratulations to Barack Obama, Joe Biden, their campaign and supporters, and the rest of us. We did it. All of us.

UPDATE (Nov. 5): As Lotus notes, Tom Toles caught the meaning of this election in his cartoon today.

The World Is Watching

Over at the Northwest Progressive Institute Advocate, Andrew writes:

This is Election Day. This is the moment we have been working towards.

As I write this, the Pacific Northwest is still a few hours away from midnight on Tuesday, November 4th, 2008. But the hour has already struck on the East Coast, and the first poll votes of Election Day 2008 are being cast in New Hampshire in a town-meeting style setting.

Around the world, humankind is watching as the final votes are cast. Today is the day that America decides who will lead our nation for the next four years.

World watching United States elections, cheering for Barack Obama

He then shows several screen shots of different front pages for various online newspapers from around the world. I'll just borrow one to give you an idea:



Go on over to that article and see the others, if you haven't already. It's a reminder that what we do affects the rest of the world, as surely as what they do affects us.

This is an election that is important both for our own futures and for the rest of humanity's. How many good people we can elect to the government will probably determine whether we can extricate ourselves from Iraq and repair our own country. How few religious fanatics and fear mongers are left in the government will determine whether we choose reason and compassion, or violence and hatred when dealing with each other and the rest of the world. Yes, I've said it before, but it bears repeating - they run this country for us, but they'll only do what we tell them if we choose them wisely and they know we're watching.

Let them know that loud and clear today.

Dear Senator Biden

As Glenn Greenwald relates, you made a speech in Kettering, Ohio, in which you said this:

"Ladies and gentlemen, we need to move past the politics of division and attack," the Democratic vice-presidential nominee told a crowd of 2000 in Kettering. "Over the past week, Republicans have gone way over the top in my view, calling Barack Obama every name in the book, and it probably will get worse in the next three and a half to four days."

"Well look, if you look at who he is, what he's done, and what he plans to do for this country, if you work for us in the closing days and choose hope over fear," Biden urged supporters, "after next Tuesday, the very critics he has now and the rest of America will be calling him something else - they will be calling him the 44th president of the United States of America, our commander in chief Barack Obama!"

Biden: Come Tuesday, Obama's Critics Will Be Calling Him Commander-In-Chief

[emphasis added]

I've been a critic of Obama's at times. I've also found reason to praise him on occasion. I'll vote for him tomorrow. So, I suppose I could also be considered a supporter. Either way, I'm not going to be referring to him as "our commander in chief".

You see, he's not going to be our commander in chief. As Greenwald puts it:

"[C]ommander in chief" is a military term, which reflects the core military dynamic: superiors issue orders which subordinates obey. That isn't supposed to be the relationship between the U.S. President and civilian American citizens, but because the mindless phrase "our commander in chief" has become interchangeable with "the President," that is exactly the attribute -- supreme, unquestionable authority in all arenas -- which has increasingly come to define the power of the President. Recall the explanation by GOP Sen. Kit Bond in June when explaining why telecoms should be immunized for lawbreaking after being "directed" by George Bush to allow illegal government spying on their customers:

I'm not here to say that the government is always right, but when the government tells you to do something, I'm sure you would all agree that I think you all recognize that is something you need to do.

The Single Worst Expression In American Politics

As usual, he's right about this. Obama won't be our commander, any more than President Bush is our commander. It says so right here in the Constitution:

The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States; he may require the Opinion, in writing, of the principal Officer in each of the executive Departments, upon any Subject relating to the Duties of their respective Offices, and he shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.

Constitution of the United States (Article II, Section 2)

See? Only the military has to call him "Commander In Chief". The rest of us call him something else: our employee.

After thirty years in the Senate, I'd think you'd have caught on to that by now.

So please, follow Glenn's advice and stop using this ridiculous terminology. It's not correct, and it certainly doesn't strike me as democratic.

Be One Of Those Who Show Up

"We hold these truths to be self-evident," they said, "that all men are created equal." Strange as it may seem, that was the first time in history that anyone had ever bothered to write that down. Decisions are made by those who show up.

-- President Josiah Bartlet, The West Wing

Yes, I love that quote. It was delivered by Bartlett during a talk at a local university. He was trying to encourage students to participate more fully in their society, particularly by voting. It seems an especially apt quote here.

I've read a few articles in the last few days on various blogs discussing how the race between John McCain and Barack Obama is now widening, and that Obama has taken a commanding lead. I don't see that. What I see is this, courtesy of Pollster:

Pollster tries to "average out" the many polls that are taken to come to a more accurate understanding of what the voting public thinks at the moment. The reason I put "average out" in quotes is because it's actually a weighted curve-fit process, some of which is probably only understood by the people doing it. For my part, it seems more accurate than most individual polls. At least, taken together, all the polls cover more segments of the population than any one. I'll take this as the closest thing to the truth until I know better.

What that picture is telling us is that there is a fairly large lead for Obama - around six points. That's a strong lead, but not a commanding one. The race isn't widening, either. If anything, it looks to be contracting. How that will really play out in the last few days, no one can be sure. It's not the trend we'd like to see, though. What's more important, however, is how unimportant that chart really is.

The polls that make up that chart are national polls, which measure something that doesn't count. What actually counts is in this graph, which is also from Pollster:

That's a graph of the electoral college situation as of Oct. 31, 2008. It shows how the states would vote, according to Pollster's numbers, if they elections were held today. As you can see, the states that would likely vote for Obama would probably add up to more than the required number (270) to elect him President. That's good news if you're an Obama supporter.

As you may recall, Al Gore won the popular vote in the 2000 election by around half a percent. That's a fairly wide margin, yet he lost the electoral college vote. It's not the first time that's happened, either. He lost the election 271 - 265. If he had won Florida, which he officially lost by around 2,000 votes, Gore would have been our President for at least the next four years.

The electoral college means that your vote can count a lot more, or a lot less, than other votes. Why not assume it will mean a lot more?

I still haven't mentioned the most important reason to get out and vote, though. The most important reason is that much of what our government does has nothing to do with the President. There are members of Congress to elect, including the Slobber And Spittle Blue candidates. These people will write the laws and budgets that the President follows and expends. They, too, have a big effect on your life. In some cases, Darcy Burner's in particular, they'll need every vote.

What's more, in many areas, your local and state government will be even more important. When it comes to enforcing the law, protecting you from fire and other disasters, building roads, and educating people, the states and municipalities have at least as much to do as the Federal government with how those processes go.

So, my advice to you is, be one of the ones who show up. Assuming that Obama will win, and that this victory will make government better by itself counts as two very bad assumptions. If you can, vote early. If you can't, vote Nov. 4. If you don't, you won't find me very sympathetic when you bitch about the results.

UPDATE (Nov. 3): Here's an example of what I was referring to when I mentioned that state governments can have as much effect on some aspects of life as the federal government does:

As a healthcare provider and owner of a small business in this state for the last 17 years, I recently took notice of some changes. There are certain methods of problem solving, picking up the telephone and calling a state agency, that I long completely given up on. Some new employees who didn’t know not the bother doing that, reported having solved several problems recently by doing just that. They called a state agency, were able to talk with a human being and got the answers that they needed. There certainly is a lot of work to be done yet but my personal experience as well as the PEW report shows that Governor Gregoire has made progress working towards that smarter government.

Vote for Chris on Tuesday

This blogger is a lot more supportive of Washington Governor Gregoire than I am. I'll be voting for her primarily because her opponent is an obvious con artist who is quite clearly in the camp of the people who have made my part of Washington difficult to traverse and much harder to look at than it used to be. Nevertheless, the point should be clear - if you want your business to be less complicated by bad regulations or ineffective bureaucracy, then your state government is at least as important as the federal government. As the paragraph relates, we've had a dreadful environment for small business here for a long time, and if Chris Gregoire has helped change that, it sounds like a good reason to consider supporting her.

(h/t to Lynn Allen at Evergreen Politics.)

That Didn't Take Long

The results of two new polls have been released for the Minnesota Sixth Congressional district. That race, between Michelle Bachmann and Elwyn Tinklenberg, was turned around dramatically by Bachmann's call for a new witch hunt for un-American views among her fellow congressmen. As I indicated at the time, there were some signs that Bachmann was in serious electoral trouble, and these latest polls have driven the point home.

Here is the latest trend chart by Pollster:

Compare this to the previous chart from ten days ago, and you'll see that the upward trend in Tinklenberg's numbers has become more pronounced. Pollster has the race as 43.6 - 42.5 in favor of Bachmann, but the last two polls both show the race a dead heat, with Tinklenberg leading by less than the margin of error.

These two polls are the first independent polls conducted in the district.

That's a substantial jump, but it's still possible that the race will swing more firmly the Democrat's way in the closing days. There are still 5 to 8 percent undecided in the race. Bachmann's a known quantity, so it seems more likely that Tinklenberg will appeal to late deciders. That's particularly true in light of Bachmann's recent performances.

UPDATE: Lotus spotted this bit from the article on the second independent poll:

[Director of the Humphrey Institute's Center for the Study of Politics and Governance Larry] Jacobs says the poll results show Bachmann is losing support even among Republicans.

"Among supporters of Norm Coleman and John McCain, there's a about one-fifth of them saying that they're not supporting Michele Bachmann. And indeed among Republicans, Michele Bachmann is losing about one-fifth of them. So her base is cleary shaken up about what's happened," said Jacobs.

The survey found two-thirds of 6th District voters disagree with Bachmann's comments.

Reed Christianson of Woodbury says he was shocked by what he heard from his congresswoman. Christianson says he had planned to vote for Bachmann, but not anymore.

"Since this has come out I've learned a lot more about who she's running against. And with the comments she made, it made me determine that I'm not going to vote for her," said Christianson. "And I'd vote for anybody, no matter who was running against her, based on her comments."

Poll: Dead Heat In The 6th District Race

Combine Bachmann's worrisome rhetoric with Tinklenberg's positive campaign, and you have a reason for many of Bachmann's more rational supporters to change their minds.

Political "Attack" A Fake

Via Open Left, what has to be one of the most bizarre stories of this election:

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) ― Police say a campaign volunteer confessed to making up a story that a mugger attacked her and cut the letter B in her face after seeing her McCain bumper sticker.

At a news conference this afternoon, offiicals said they believe that Ashley Todd's injuries were self-inflicted.

Todd, 20, of Texas, is now facing charges for filing a false report to police.

Police: Campaign Volunteer Lied, Injured Self

The story about her being mugged by an Obama supporter has apparently been getting wide coverage. Let's see if the truth of this matter gets the same play that the original story did. Considering what's happened in the local coverage of the WA 08 race (scroll down to the second update), I'm not holding my breath.

I hope the police decide not to file charges. Someone who deliberately disfigures herself needs counseling, not jail.

More Good News For Darcy Burner

image credit: www.darcyburner.com

A new poll on the WA-08 Congressional district was published yesterday. It showed SnS Blue candidate Darcy Burner leading her opponent, incumbent Dave Reichert, by four percentage points. I suspect some news agencies and Reichert's campaign will spin this as a drop in Darcy's numbers, but that's simply not the case.

This actually is quite an improvement. Pollster lists four polls done by the same polling organization in the Eighth District. They are done roughly every six weeks. All the previous polls showed Reichert up by at least six points. Survey USA explains:

Nominally, it's Burner 50%, Reichert 46% today. Compared to a SurveyUSA poll 6 weeks ago, Reichert is down 8 points, Burner is up 6. The September poll was taken at a time when the national Republican party had just finished a successful convention, and the nomination of Sarah Palin as John McCain's running mate was new and novel. At that time, in Washington state, SurveyUSA showed McCain within 4 points of Barack Obama, statewide, and showed Reichert 10 atop Burner. Today, SurveyUSA shows Obama 16 points atop McCain, a swing of 12 to the Democrats. And, SurveyUSA shows Burner 4 atop Reichert, a swing of 14 to the Democrats.

Results of SurveyUSA Election Poll #14647

This means that the same poll, using the same methods to determine what it takes to be a representative sample of the district, thinks that Burner is now ahead. Those last two sentences also indicate that this change is congruent with other political shifts in the area, which is further indication of the validity of the results.

In my last article on this subject, one thing I neglected to mention was that one of the recent polls showing Darcy ahead was one that had been done for the first time by that polling organization, BPN. There was no way to judge how the sample related to earlier samples, so it was a bit less reliable as an indication of a trend. The other poll, the one by Lake Research, did show a change, but it was one poll done by a partisan poll firm. Another poll, by KosCom, that appeared at about the same time as the BPN poll, showed Reichert up by eight points. I suspected that one was a bad one due to the large number of undecided voters it showed. This is the second time these two candidates have run against each other. The voters are familiar with the candidates already, so there aren't likely to be many undecideds there.

This is very good news. While it's by no means a sure thing, I now believe that Darcy will win this election, assuming nothing changes the political landscape in the next couple of weeks.

UPDATE: It looks like Dave Reichert's been very, very bad:

Bellevue (October 22) – The campaign of 8th District Democratic congressional candidate Darcy Burner today filed a complaint with the Federal Elections Commission over a six-figure illegal loan provided to the campaign of Republican incumbent Dave Reichert by his media buying firm.

The complaint comes in response to the Burner campaign’s discovery last Friday that Reichert had secured more than $1 million in television advertising time for the closing two weeks of the campaign despite being short of cash.

Burner Campaign Files FEC Complaint over Reichert Loan

My guess is that nothing will be done about this before election time, unless the voters do it. The FEC seems to be powerless to do anything about these complaints. Folks like Reichert's media firm and the Chamber of Commerce, who have been running ads criticizing Burner for the last few weeks, like it that way.

There are times I think it's a wonder that she's even in this race.

UPDATE 2: The day ends, at least for me, with some bad news. Apparently, the Seattle Times have taken it upon themselves to do a hatchet job on Darcy:

Bellevue (October 22) – With a new King 5 poll released this evening showing Democrat Darcy Burner leading incumbent Republican Dave Reichert 50 percent to 46 percent – the third consecutive poll to show her leading – a desperate Reichert campaign has begun to fling false accusations in a desperate attempt to stop Burner’s growing momentum. Unfortunately, this afternoon the Seattle Times, in a poorly contextualized story, bought their latest spin.

Burner Campaign Statement on Seattle Times Story

The Seattle Times ran a story saying that Darcy had "exaggerated" her degree in a debate two weeks earlier. This was, as the "reporter" admitted in a paragraph buried deep in the story, based on a release from the National Republican Campaign Committee, with little real fact checking. The Harvard professor who was the Dean of Harvard College at the time Darcy graduated (1996) confirmed that she wasn't misstating her qualifications. Here's the man's biography, by the way. At this time (late on Oct. 23), they still haven't corrected or retracted the story. In fact, they followed up with a story that restates those false claims, and at the same time makes light of the mistaken claim on Dave Reichert's Congressional biography page that said he had a bachelor's degree, when in fact it was only an associate's. Reichert's office has since corrected the site, but only after the Burner campaign noted the error.

I don't suppose this slant could have anything to do with the Times having endorsed Reichert in an editorial that matches the worst of the Wall Street Journal's exercises in unreality word for word.

The Real America

[New York City and Wasilla, Alaska. Both are part of the real America, despite what some bigots would have you believe.]


Image credit: composite of photos by Trip Advisor and CityData by Cujo359

Recently, Rep. Michele Bachmann, Gov. Sarah Palin, and other Republicans have been talking about how there's a "real" America out there living in small towns that aren't anti-American.

Well, on the subject of who is and is not the real America, Jon Stewart speaks for me:

We're all a little chafed here about this whole 'some parts of the country are real and American' and other parts are not. This weekend I was performing at Northeastern and I just read the statement that Sarah Palin had made about the 'pro-American' parts of the country and I...in response to that, I think I might have said, you know, 'Fuck you!' That's just my way of saying that I think that's a profanity to say, and I was answering with a profanity. But it's not really fair, and it makes it seem like I'm just addressing Governor Palin about this, and I'm not, it's just this whole entire theme that there's more American areas, or some people love the country, some people don't. So what I meant to say is, 'Fuck all y'all.'


Jon Stewart Clarifies Palin Remarks, Expands To 'F%ck All Y'All'

Now, I normally prefer more subtle forms of humor, like this wonderful bit of satire from Marc Ambinder:

For decades, theoretical physicists have sought to unify the theory of gravity with standard particle model of physics. So far, no dice. The dominant but by no means proven theory is popularly referred to as Superstring theory, or M theory, or some variant. No need to go into the details here. Crucially, though, some of the leading variants of string theory presuppose a universe of ten spacial dimensions plus time.

We cannot rule out the possibility that Palin, Bachmann and Pftoenhauer -- let's call them PBP for short -- are somehow about to perceive these extra dimensions, and that there is something fundamental about their physical constitutions that makes such perceptions unavailable to most everyone else.

McCain's Cosmological Breakthrough: Unreality Is Expanding

Unfortunately, subtlety is lost on some people. It's lost particularly, it would appear, on Republican rhetoricians and their target audience. So a big upraised middle finger would seem to be the rhetorical weapon of choice.

Why are we seeing this call for witch hunts now? It's pretty clear that it's not just John McCain's campaign that's doing this. Bachmann isn't part of that campaign. This is part of a broader GOP campaign. And when you think about what's happened lately, it's pretty clear what the reason is. Their poll numbers are dropping like lead balloons. They need someone to blame for their own screwups.

We've had Republican rule for the last eight years. Yes, the Democrats were allegedly in charge of Congress for the last two, but for all the harm they did, and as faithfully as they gave President Bush everything he wanted, we'd have been no worse off with Republicans. What have we to show for those last eight years?

Two lost wars and a trashed economy.

Let me just emphasize that point a little more:

Two lost wars and a trashed economy.

That's what they're trying to make us forget - they fucked this country up worse than our most dangerous enemies have ever managed. What previous Administration has managed to lose two major wars? Not a one. The only previous Administration in anyone's memory that's caused the sort of economic meltdown we're seeing now only lasted one term.

So they blame Muslims for our problems. They blame Demcrats for the results of their economic policies. And they blame the rest of us for not making their ridiculous plans work. The only thing they've ever been good at is blaming other people for their failures. They're at it again.

To misquote John Mellencamp, I grew up in small towns. I've also lived in the metropolitan area of a big city. I can tell you that there is no shortage of people who care about their country in either kind of place. Anyone who imagines that big cities are full of fake people and vast pockets of anti-Americanism needs to get to know one. Anyone who thinks that the rural parts of this country are filled with rubes and morons needs to get out there more. Don't mistake what we say when we make fun of each others' idiosyncrasies for reality. The fact is that reality has always been more complicated, and interesting, than empty-headed Republican spokesmodels want us to believe.

So the next time you hear someone talk about where the real America is, tell them that real Americans have 401k's and mutual funds, and that real Americans have bank accounts, and real Americans want to have good jobs. Real Americans have sons and daughters, fathers and mothers, or friends and lovers they don't want to have killed in useless, lost wars. Then tell them you don't give a fuck if some of them happen to live in New York City. Or in Wasilla.

UPDATE: North Carolina Rep. Robin Hayes NC-08 has joined the hit parade:

Warming up a crowd in North Carolina on Saturday, Republican Rep. Robin Hayes offered the diagnosis that “liberals hate real Americans that work and achieve and believe in God.”

His remarks came shortly after he had said he would “make sure we don’t say something stupid, make sure we don’t say something we don’t mean.”

GOP Rep.: ‘Liberals hate real Americans that work and accomplish and achieve and believe in God’ [updated with audio]

Hayes' opponent in his race, which he appears to be losing, is Blue America candidate Larry Kissell. Clicking on this link would be a good way to express your displeasure with Hayes' comments.

(h/t Lotus)

UPDATE 2: Via Pharyngula, Keith Olbermann provides a coda to this sad week of bigotry and stupidity.