21 Reasons and None Very Good, As It Turns Out

21 Reasons and None Very Good, As It Turns Out

The Foreign Policy magazine website has a colorful diagram showing the many rationales given ( mostly ) by individuals within the Bush administration for going to Iraq.

100 Facts and One Opinion

100 Facts and One Opinion-
The Non-Arguable Case Against the Bush Administration
LINK-The Nation

Bush Is In 'Deep QaQaa' Over Disappearing Explosives

Bush Is In 'Deep QaQaa' Over Disappearing Explosives

Hello?!

Several hundred tons of conventional explosives are missing from a former Iraqi military facility, al Qaqaa, that once played a key role in Saddam Hussein’s efforts to build a nuclear bomb.

This is possibly the worst mistake of all. IAEA inspectors once had a handle on these dangerous explosives. Until Bush lied his way into making a stubborn attack on the country. The Bush administration knew where this stockpile was, but took no action to secure the site. The inspectors had to pull out of Iraq just before the 2003 invasion and have not yet been able to return.

The Bush administration was 'urgently and specifically informed' that terrorists could be helping themselves to the most dangerous explosives bonanza in history, but nothing was done to prevent it from happening.

This should not be reported as a campaign issue. It's an issue that is deadly serious and needs to be thoroughly investigated.

This, dear readers, was a major, major Bush f**k-up. We may suffer for it in the future. Safer, my ass*terisk!. I am very upset to know this has happened while we've gotten nothing but rhetorical lip service from this rotten, destructively partisan, inept, unaccountable administration.

I just saw this headline and wanted to throw up all over it:
Bush: I'm Best Candidate to Protect US
Bull-friggen crap, you are.

On CNN, a senior Bush administration official downplayed the importance of the missing explosives, describing them as dangerous material but "stuff you can buy anywhere." Blogger Josh Marshall said, tongue-in-cheek, "So, given what a powder keg Iraq is, what's another few hundred tons of plastic explosives. It's not even "necessarily" a proliferation risk. I'm feeling better already."

I saw what less than a pound of HMX or RDX could do when Pan Am 103 was blown up over Lockerbie Scotland. It killed 35 students of a university right here in my city ( Syracuse University ). If you haven't seen the heartbreak of hundreds of families caused by less than a pound of that shit, then you'd better get back to your fantasy world and vote for the maniac who failed to secure 380 tons of it.

"This material was monitored and controlled by UN inspectors before the invasion of Iraq. Thanks to the stunning incompetence of the Bush administration, we now have no idea where it is,” Joe Lockhart has said. He demanded the White House explain “why they failed to safeguard these explosives and keep them out of the hands of our enemies.”

Josh Marshall wants to know where the hell Jerry (Paul) Bremer is.

I hope the press doesn't let this slide now that the dreadful information has been unearthed.

Joe Lockhart asks, at official Kerry-Edwards campaign site: "..why was this information unearthed by reporters -- and was it covered up by our national security officials?"

See John Kerry's comments on the situation.

"In the Air" - And a Prayer

"For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air"
-1 Thessalonians 4:16-17

"In The Air"-
and a prayer

"Whether or not we can be ever fully safe is up -- you know, is up- in the air."

-G.W. Bush, Oct 24, 2004

Bush has wasted too much time leaving
our destiny to some idea that will fall
from the sky. Our domestic and foreign
policy belong down to earth.
My prayer is that we will soon
have a leader who
understands that.


Coming from a society that has always prided itself on being based in decency and Christian-based values, I don't think breaking the Golden Rule and making carelessly offensive pre-emptive attacks upon our global neighbors ( largely based upon lies ) is going to cause us to deserve respect; nor will it ever make us safer.

That's what this election is all about.

We need a new direction.

Bush's visions of the Rapture seem too real to him for any of it to be acceptable to me. Each time he reverts to faith when pressed with a difficult question, I lose faith in his ability to lead a real and wanting nation. His latest statement about our safety being up "in the air", combined with his born-again attitude and non-reality-based thinking are disturbing to me. My faithful vision for those who are living on this earth are strikingly different than those of Mr. Bush, and it's one of the main reasons why he will never have my vote.

If you are a secularist, please pardon my foray into the fields of personal faith for the sake of forwarding political ideals.

I want nothing more than for my nation and its people to follow the rule of law, which, in its most simplistic state, parallels the rule of God. The rule begins from the within and, in the spirit of love, helps us to create a vision of freedom in the light of true respect and fairness.

'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment."
-Matthew 22:37-38

"The second is this: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no commandment greater than these."
-Mark 12:30-31

Bush talks a mean God, and judging from his actions while in office, I can only come to the conclusion that his God is mean.

Maureen Dowd wrote a refreshingly astute column about how Bush planned for national safety predicated upon a miracle with incurious ignorance of fact and willful blindness; to the extent that we (along with our foreign policy) have become a 'casualty of faith'.

When casualties of blind faith become - or cause others to become - casualties of unnecessary war, we can clearly see that the spirit of God's law has been violated.

"A word was secretly brought to me,
my ears caught a whisper of it.
Amid disquieting dreams in the night,
when deep sleep falls on men,
fear and trembling seized me
and made all my bones shake.
A spirit glided past my face,
and the hair on my body stood on end.
It stopped,
but I could not tell what it was.
A form stood before my eyes,
and I heard a hushed voice:
'Can a mortal be more righteous than God?
Can a man be more pure than his Maker?"

-Job, 4:17-21

Bush seems to be trying to act as a Moses when he is merely an elected public servant. I am reminded of the book of Exodus 18:15-24. Bush's job is not to be God's messenger. He has President confused with Prophet.

I am deeply concerned.

"As for the deeds of men-
by the word of your lips
I have kept myself
from the ways of the violent."
-Psalm 17, A prayer of David

We need new direction.

"He has showed you, O man, what is good.
And what does the LORD require of you?
To act justly and to love mercy
and to walk humbly with your God."
-Micah 6:8

We need a humble leader whose faith is incorporated in his soulful deeds, not wading in the shallows of his chirping throat and warbling lips.

What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him?
-James 2:14

This is the closest you'll see me get
to praying that our hope is met-
That John F. Kerry wins next week
to work on the vision that we seek.

Don't be afraid to join me in this prayer.

Desperation from the right

Desperation from the right-
Start learning to say 'President Kerry'


The 'Mowbraying'-
A last-ditch effort to impugn.

There is a new article at the Washington Times by someone I consider to be a total weasel named Joel Mowbray. Mowbray's the rabid critic who disgraced himself by smearing General Anthony Zinni ( former chief of Centcom ) for partisan politics' sake. He's the same Joel Mowbray who inspired the gentle-but-loony Pat Robertson to say, in terrorist fashion, that he wanted to "nuke Foggy Bottom". He's so bad that writer Justin Raimondo created a new term in his sad honor, which is mowbraying, meaning: telling a lie so brazen as to make every decent person within earshot cringe with embarrassment. I apologize if this sounds like an
ad hominem attack, but I think, in this new day of partisan political "bluntness", that we really need to call them as we seem them. The stakes are too high to be polite.

Righties have been allowing themselves to become tittilated about the partisan Washington Times puff piece, posing it as the anticipated 'October surprise'.

The gist of the story? The Washington Times reveals that John Kerry did, indeed, talk for an unspecified period of time to at least a few members of the U.N. Security Council before the Iraq 2002 Resolution was passed - but, in 'mowbrayistic' terms - he really didn't. It's not much of a story. Bottom line, the meetings John Kerry would have had with any of these council members would not have been a public hearing and we cannot expect any security council ambassadors or Kerry to whip out transcripts on what was said in private.

They're only making one last feeble attempt to hurt John Kerry by attacking his honesty. When it comes to the heart of the honesty issue, an examination of the gravity of the Kerry-meetings-situation dissipates like alcohol-on-skin - POOF - when you remember the president's failure to tell the truth to the American people in taking us to an unnecessary war, ruthlessly risking (and taking) untold numbers of lives.

The "big October story" falls flat and predictable and I now realize that John Kerry is, indeed, poised and ready to take his rightful place as President Kerry.


The members of Bush's base are deathly afraid of American voters

Right-blogs such as Powerline are afraid that every voter who desires to vote for John Kerry will actually be able to do so. The Powerline blogger says that Democrats are "gaming the system" simply because they've registered people to vote. The same blogger has taken pleasure in seeing the reverse decision on the Ohio provisonal ballots, which I believed was a decision running in bad faith toward the people's rights and interests. The election-related "fraud" those on the right seem to be anticipating surrounds the dreaded possibility that everyone who intends to vote will be enabled to do so. If every vote counts, why is counting every vote such a fear? I think it may be because they know Bush's ability to win has diminished. They see that decent Republicans have been jumping ship.


False Reliance upon Unreliable Polls vs. The Electoral Process

I notice that righties in the blogosphere are also taking poll statistics to heart, forwarding the notion that, if the vote is a landslide for Kerry, there will have to have been corruption involved because it wouldn't have "jibed" with poll numbers. We seem to be easily confusing polls with the real and meaningful participatory action of voting. Example at Powerline:

"The bottom line is that if this election is close enough, it will be stolen. If it is too close to steal but still close, the result will be months or years of litigation, designed either to give John Kerry the Presidency, or to deny President Bush legitimacy in his second term. Under current law, there is no solution to the problem of voter fraud other than a one-sided election. And this year, that doesn't look likely."

A one-sided election doesn't "look" likely because unreliable polls have systematically conditioned the righties to believe they've got an edge. What if the election were to be close and John Kerry won, prompting an action by the people to contest the election? Would John Kerry's "legitimacy" not also be affected?

*see Scrutiny Hooligans for more proof of poll voodoo


The People - Our rights and privileges are paramount

I saw a right blogger complaining today. He said:"

This has been the mantra of the Democrats since September; if we can't beat you, we'll make your election illegitimate in the eyes of the world."

I made sure to remind him that his statement was pure self-contradiction in light of our free democratic society, which our Founding Fathers helped to form. In a race that is allegedly this close, it is a natural "given" that Bush (or Kerry) can (and one will) be beaten. Any legal election-related challenges raised by either side may effect someone's perception of a winner's "legitimacy", but what's truly important is the American PEOPLE getting a fair treatment in the electoral process. I can't imagine why we would worry more about the perception of Executive power and less about the PEOPLE. We're the ones who are supposed to hold true power in this nation. Regardless of who holds the presidency, it's paramount that we, the people, keep our freedoms and privileges intact.


One thing we DO know about Bin Laden...

In other news from the right, the Washington Times has a column by Jack Kelly playing with the possibility that Osama Bin Laden might be dead, for all we know. One thing we do know is that we let him slip away at Tora Bora and lost him in the haze of lies told to us about Iraq.

New Kerry Endorsements-including Wa Po

New Kerry Endorsements

62 So Far Today....

Washington Post endorses John Kerry
Chicago Sun-Times endorses John Kerry
Hampton Roads Daily Press (VA) endorses Kerry
LA Daily News (surprise) endorses John Kerry
The Olympian (WA) endorses John Kerry
Sarasota Herald Tribune endorses John Kerry
The Decatur Daily endorses John Kerry
Lufkin Daily News (TX) endorses John Kerry
Ventura County Star (CA) endorses John Kerry
The Coloradoan (Fort Collins, CO) endorses John Kerry
Kennebec Journal (ME) endorses John Kerry
Allentown Morning Call (PA) endorses John Kerry
The Quad City Times (Davenport, IA) endorses John Kerry
The Iowa City Press Citizen endorses John Kerry
The Raleigh News & Observer endorses John Kerry





Seattle Times endorses John Kerry
Centre Daily Times (PA) endorses John Kerry
Las Vegas Sun endorses John Kerry
Bismarck Tribune endorses John Kerry
Des Moines Register endorses John Kerry
The Journal Times in Racine, Wisconsin endorses John Kerry
The Journal Gazette in Fort Wayne, Indiana endorses John Kerry
Bangor Daily News endorses John Kerry
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette endorses John Kerry
Allentown (PA) Morning Call endorses John Kerry
Newark (NJ) Star Ledger endorses John Kerry
Memphis Commercial-Appeal endorses John Kerry
Bergen County (NJ) Record endorses John Kerry
Newsday endorses John Kerry
The Republican (MA) endorses John Kerry
Macon Telegraph endorses John Kerry
The Journal News (White Plains, NY) endorses John Kerry
Northwest Indiana Times endorses John Kerry
The Courier Journal (KY) endorses John Kerry
Glens Falls Post Star (Upstate NY) endorses John Kerry
Orlando Sentinel endorses John Kerry
Gloucester County Times (NJ) endorses John Kerry
Asheville Citizen Times endorses John Kerry (10/22)
The Buffalo News endorses John Kerry
The Nashua Telegraph endorses John Kerry
The Portsmouth Herald endorses John Kerry
Nashville Tennessean endorses John Kerry
Santa Fe New Mexican endorses John Kerry
The Toledo Blade endorses John Kerry
The Memphis Commercial Appeal endorses John Kerry
The Santa Cruz Sentinel endorses John Kerry
The Port Huron Times Herald (MI) endorses John Kerry
The Lansing State Journal (MI) endorses John Kerry.
The Hutchinson News (KS) endorses John Kerry
The Idaho Statesman endorses John Kerry
Stamford Advocate endorses John Kerry
Rockford (IL) Register-Star endorses John Kerry.
Contra Costa Times (CA) endorses John Kerry.
Worcester Telegram & Gazette (MA) endorses John Kerry.
Wausau Daily Herald (WI) endorses John Kerry.
Billings Gazette (MT) endorses John Kerry.
Walla Walla Union-Bulletin (WA) endorses John Kerry.
Rochester Democrat and Chronicle (NY) endorses John Kerry.
Reno Gazette-Journal (NV) endorses John Kerry.
Daily Southtown (IL) endorses John Kerry.
Durango Herald (CO) endorses John Kerry.
Waco Tribune-Herald (TX) endorses John Kerry.
The Flint Journal (MI) endorses John Kerry
Traverse City Record-Eagle (MI) endorses John Kerry



I have an important "non-endorsement" to announce. The Detroit News is conservative, and they had endorsed Bush in 2000. Bush no longer meets their endorsement test.



See list of all endorsements to date HERE

Do not miss the most Bush-damning endorsement of all--from the AMERICAN CONSERVATIVE- Kerry's The One

Jon Stewart Watch

Jon Stewart Watch

Jon Stewart will be on 60 Minutes Tonight. ( We know you specialize in the 'Fake News', Jon, but we suggest you don't bring any fake documents with you to this particular interview. *wink* )

Daily Kos diary- Jon Stewart 's CSPAN interview

Mercury News- The unlikely influence of Jon Stewart, The Comedian as pundit; it's funny, but it's true.

NYT- JON STEWART GETS SERIOUS: If You Interview Kissinger, Are You Still a Comedian?

Ft Wayne Journal Gazette- Take it easy. He’s joking; Stewart insists show about comedy, not news by Howard Kurtz

Wal Mart Sez No Nudies! No Jon Stewart books in store.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Want to see Lawrence O'Donnell rip John O'Neil a new one? ( * inspired by Jon Stewart, I think * ).

Watch This Video

Watch this video

Please watch this powerful Truth and Hope ad today. (Quicktime)

Why the Neo-Cons Can't Win the War on Bin Ladenism

Why the Neo-Cons Can't Win the War on Bin Ladenism
by Paul Adler
October 20, 2004

"I do not doubt that people like Paul Wolfowitz or Dick Cheney are sincere in a desire to see democracy expand to the Arab world. However, not only do I doubt their ability to carry through on such rhetoric, but I have serious issues with their conceptions of democracy.."

Paul Adler talks about how he thinks the Bush Administration is both too cynically political and too rigidly ideological to conduct this war properly; how Afghanistan (the primary front in the war on al Qaeda) remains a very dangerous and unstable place, and how, in the Bush Administration, we find a hyper version of the neo-liberal economics that has hampered development efforts around the world. In Adler's words, "Reconstruction and development efforts need to be based more on the ethos of the New Deal, not the era of robber barons." A must-read.

Kerry: the conservative choice/Bush: A radical candidate

Kerry: The conservative choice
Bush: A radical candidate
By Daniel Sneider, foreign-affairs columnist for the San Jose Mercury News

"We are witnessing the cost of Bush's radicalism in Iraq. And there is reason to believe it will not be the last we will see of this doctrine in action if he wins a second term.." LINK

Ohio Provisional Ballot Ruling Reversed

Ohio Provisional Ballot Ruling Reversed

"The ruling by the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals supports an order issued by Ohio Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell. Democrats contend the Republican official's rules are too restrictive and allege they are intended to suppress the vote. Ohio Democrats were discussing in a conference call Saturday night whether to file an appeal in the case, one of the first major tests of how such ballots will be handled in a close election......Blackwell has said allowing voters to cast a ballot wherever they show up, even if they're not registered to vote there, is a recipe for Election Day chaos.The Ohio Democratic Party and a coalition of labor and voter rights groups argue that Blackwell's order discriminated against the poor and minorities, who tend to move more frequently."

Newsweek- OHIO: The Next Florida by Howard Fineman
Fineman is forwarding the notion that Ohio may be so close that it will be a fight to the finish. He plays directly into the poll trap, placing poll results on par with the result of true and real democracy, which can only be represented by those who actually come out to vote on Election Day. But who is representing the voters? In Ohio, Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell is fighting against those people who wish to participate in the process while polls spread the myth of the popularity of Dubya Bush. I don't see Fineman as being helpful here. The people need the journalists' support instead of their lust for controversy and poll-speak. The people need the truth.

Plain Dealer Fiasco/Headlines

by Jack Ohman, OregonLive.com

Headlines

**Cleveland Plain Dealer to Endorse Bush Even Though Majority of Editorial Board Voted For Kerry (5-2)**
The Cleveland Plain Dealer's publisher is overriding the editorial board. Lorain Journal editors were told that either they endorse George Bush or they endorse no one. So, they are endorsing no one.

NOTE: It is critical for us to start a MAJOR letter writing campaign to the Plain Dealer and to spread the word about the publisher overruling the editorial board's vote. If this is going on here, you can imagine it's being duplicated all over the country.

Letters can be mailed to the Editor, The Plain Dealer, 1801 Superior Ave, Cleveland 44114. Email can be sent to letters@plaind.com. Faxes can be sent to 216-999-6209.

SEE UPDATE ON MAIN PAGE/DAILY KOS.
Apparently, this has something to do with a conflict between Richard Holbrooke and the publisher of the Plain Dealer, Alex Machaskee. To me, a publisher going over the heads of the editorial board for revenge seems to be a non-democratic and unAmerican way to conduct the business of editorializing in an American newspaper. The Plain Dealer's journalistic integrity will be lost on many because of this.

From Editor and Publisher:

"E&P has learned from several sources at the Cleveland Plain Dealer that the paper's nine-person editorial board decided earlier this week that it wanted to endorse Kerry but Publisher Alex Machaskee, who has final say, has decided on Bush. The paper backed Bush in 2000. This has caused consternation in some quarters at the Plain Dealer, with sources telling E&P that the endorsement editorial, which was expected to run Sunday, was put off."

Jesse "The Body" Ventura Slams Bush
Ventura breaks his own rule against endorsing major-party candidates because he is so unhappy with President Bush's leadership on the war in Iraq, the deployment of National Guard and reservists overseas and the treatment of veterans. Jesse endorses John Kerry.

Stocks sent sliding on rash of bad news

A repeat of the 2000 recount would almost certainly send stocks tumbling

Crude Oil Tops $55 per Barrel

"It hurts to see my wife cry"- Margaret Hassan's husband appeals for her release

Further abuse at Abu Ghraib detailed

Army captain sues government, saying Iraq assignment came after he had retired

Vote for a man, not a puppet by Charlie Reese

"This election really is important, not only for domestic reasons, but because Bush's foreign policy has been a dangerous disaster..I will swallow a lot of petty policy differences with Kerry to get a man in the White House with brains enough not to blow up the world and us with it."

UPDATE: What's Happening in Lucas County?

"It’s an area of opportunity. It’s that little extra percentage we’re trying to make up in Lucas County that could pull Ohio through for the president in a close race."

--Bernadette Noe, chairwoman of the Lucas County Republican Party

UPDATE: What's Happening in Lucas County?
PART ONE HERE

The Columbus Dispatch has an interesting article about Dick Cheney's appearance in Sylvania, Ohio on Thursday.

While in Sylvania speaking to a crowd of 500 supporters, Cheney said:

"What Senator Kerry is trying hardest of all to hide is his record on national security."

Very interesting, considering that the Bush administration lied (boldfaced) to us consistently, handing us almost thirty different rationales for attacking Iraq while they kept their real intentions in tight secrecy and, to this day, waver, swerve, and dodge the obvious realities of failure on the ground in Iraq.

Frankly, all I've seen John Kerry doing is pointing out those realities.

Who's trying to bury their national security record and lies to America in a near-fantasy world of wild optimism, fables of grand coalitions, and (knowing Iraq will be a hardline fundamentalist democracy at best), a child's tale of freedom and liberty to rival "My Pet Goat"?

You know who: Dick and George.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

There are disturbing things happening in Lucas County That Are Happening Across America

At the Sylvania rally, a Bush/Cheney supporter named Rita Fournier cited the Iraq war in Iraq as the top issue for this election, saying:

"We were right to go there because we needed to do something to protect our country. John Kerry is two-faced about the war; he says what people want to hear."

If anyone watched the three presidential debates, they should clearly understand that John Kerry has, indeed, been consistent with his plan for national security. All they needed to do was to listen with a discerning and open, independent mind.

Rita is just one out of many Bush/Cheney supporters who have been systematically trained to misunderstand the reality which has unfolded before them in Iraq. A recent study shows similar cognitive dissonance with many Bush/Cheney supporters.

There have been studies tracking the public's misperceptions of major news events and polling people to find out just where they go to get things flat out wrong. It is interesting, but not surprising, to find that, statistically, those who consistently get the actual facts wrong about what our country has done and is doing - and about much of what is happening in the world - use Fox News as their usual source of information.

PIPA- The Program on International Policy Attitudes - has released a recent study titled Public Perceptions of the Foreign Policy Positions of the Presidential Candidates- Bush Supporters Misread Many of His Foreign Policy Positions- pdf file. There are two subheadings which speak volumes. "Kerry Supporters Largely Accurate" and "Swing Voters Also Misread Bush, But Not Kerry."

Related article at 'Just Above Sunset'

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DAILY KOS: The GOP is hiring recruits and paying them $100 on election day to "challenge" the validity of voters' registrations!


Toledo Blade- Ohio GOP to deploy 3,600 for challenges
Republican Party officials in Ohio took formal steps yesterday to place thousands of recruits inside polling places Nov. 2 to challenge the qualifications of voters who they suspect may not be eligible to cast ballots. In Lucas County (and other Ohio counties), Republicans are trying to blame Democrat '527' fund groups for "undermining the Ohio election". David Sullivan, voter protection coordinator for the Ohio Democratic Party, called the latest challenges an "unprecedented effort to throw tens of thousands of voters off of Ohio's voting rolls." (Question: If the 527 ads sparked voter interest and participation, how is the election process undermined? Sour grapes, GOP!


Bad News for all would-be voters: Judge Carr issued a decision favorable to Mr. Blackwell when he ruled late Thursday against the Lucas County and Ohio Democratic Parties.
As I described to you on Thursday, the case involved a space, Box 10, on Ohio Voter registration forms asking applicants to provide their driver's license number or the last four digits of their Social Security number. Blackwell's office told county boards of elections that the registration applications couldn't be accepted if Box 10 wasn't filled and the form was submitted in person at a county elections board, a public library, or vehicle department. Democracy loses this one.

Let's Work Together to Elect Kerry/Edwards

Let's Work Together to Elect Kerry/Edwards
They're Going to Win - Believe It!

There are less than two weeks left before the presidential election. I'm optimistic that John Kerry will be elected by a clear and undeniable margin on November 2nd, no matter how the mainstream media beats the "close race" drum.

America knows too much of the truth to allow Bush to take our country further down the drain for another four years.

Democracy and strength at home, and respect in the world for America must be restored.

Let's work hard these next 10 days to make it happen.



credit- AP photo, Oct 22 in Reno, Nevada


Never lose hope. The Johns have got it goin' on!

KERRY-EDWARDS ONLINE FORUM
ACTION PLAN: POST ON BLOGS, FORUMS AND MESSAGE BOARDS
Pro-Kerry Blogs, Forums and Message Boards are listed here.
Visit as many as you can. Please participate. Volunteer.
Do all you can.



credit: Reuters photo, John Kerry and Dana Reeve, Oct 21st
Christopher Reeve spent his final evening cheering on presidential hopeful John Kerry.

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From Political Strategy:
"Top 35 Trends that say Kerry will Take the White House in November

"Recently, a couple nationwide polls have shown Bush with a substantial lead, including some nonsensical outlier from Fox News and an equally unrealistic poll from Gallup which showed likely voters favoring Bush by 8 points. What's going on?

Fear not. It is all a grand load of garbage!

See the transcript of John Kerry's powerful speech in Iowa:
A Fresh Start: Succeeding In Iraq And Winning Against Terrorism

POLLGATE: Pollsters Are Stealing Democracy

POLLGATE: Pollsters Are Stealing Democracy

Not one cell phone has been called during the presidential campaign. This is because there is no method for polling cell phones. Yet, there are 170,475,160 cell phones in America.

While polls may sound convincing, the foundation for their statistical predictions is shaky, at best. This is no longer a nation of landlines, and this is becoming a real credibility problem for pollsters. Polls are rapidly becoming an antiquated predicting tool.

If the election were to be stolen on November 2, the nation would be more apt to swallow it due to their heads being stuffed, 24/7, with inaccurate statistical poll data in the weeks leading up to the election.

On the positive side of possible poll inaccuracy, if Jimmy Breslin's right about this poll fiasco and Kerry wins by a landslide on election night, soon we could well be singing 'Buh-Bye, Dubya'!

Excerpt from Jimmy Breslin's latest column:

"Yesterday, the polls showed a Bush surge. It never happened because they were basing it on thin air. There also were figures showing Kerry winning states like Ohio in the Midwest. They came up with the percentages without calling one cell phone of the millions and millions of them in the area. I believe nothing.

Everybody maintains that the two candidates are in a statistical dead heat. Nobody knows that. With a huge number of new registered voters, overwhelmingly of color, and young, and with 40 million using cell phones, the only thing going on in this election is how many times George Bush goes under before he drowns on Election Day. As he should. He is the worst president we have had, maybe ever...

..They [the polls] are lies by numbers. The reporters basing their coverage on these polls are lazy, unimaginative and irresponsible. That everything is based on an untruth could be the reason for the dreadful election coverage. What they write or say so often has nothing to do with the times in which they are supposed to live and report."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Paul Krugman writes in today's NYT:

"A lot can change in 11 days, and Mr. Bush may yet win convincingly. But we must not repeat the mistake of 2000 by refusing to acknowledge the possibility that a narrow Bush win, especially if it depends on Florida, rests on the systematic disenfranchisement of minority voters. And the media must not treat such a suspect win as a validation of skewed reporting that has consistently overstated Mr. Bush's popular support."

Doing 'Whatever It Takes' To Cling To Power by Sen. Patrick Leahy

Doing 'Whatever It Takes' To Cling To Power by Sen. Patrick Leahy

This week, U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) offered a guest column to Howard Dean's 'Democracy for America' readers.

Excerpt:

"To hold on to power, to preserve their own political self interest, President Bush and his political allies have tried to smother debate about his policies on terrorism and on Iraq. They have implied that a coronation instead of a real election would be the patriotic thing to do....This is not politics as usual. This is something new and ugly and dangerous...they routinely use fear of terrorism to divide the American people to preserve their political self interest...this Administration has squandered the unity of the American people and our international allies....What they are saying is that the half of all Americans who disagree with this President's policies are less patriotic or are somehow not as American as they are. Have they no self respect? No sense of decency?....This is the American people's election, not al Qaeda's. And it's not Karl Rove's, Dick Cheney's or George Bush's either. As Election Day nears, they can't be allowed to undermine the right that the American people have to an open and informed debate about some of the most important issues of our lifetimes.."

Bravo, Senator Leahy!

Salam Pax in the U.S.A.

Salam Pax in the U.S.A

"There is no way the Bush administration can get away with the mess it created in Iraq by saying it did not know and could not predict this, because for two hours I sat with a man who was so knowledgeable on things I thought no one in the west knew or cared about."

-Salam Pax/The Baghdad Blogger

I hope you've been reading Salam Pax this week at the Guardian. His diary is filled with unique bits of observational wisdom. These paragraphs caught my eye in today's installment:

"The state department had, through its Future of Iraq project, detailed plans on how to proceed. There were plans for all the ministries. Months were spent preparing reports that once they reached the Pentagon ended up in the waste basket. Chalabi was in; everybody else was out. It really is strange how often his name comes up when people start talking about Why Things Went Wrong."

"..When we talk about possible Iraqi elections in January, he doesn't sound very optimistic. He doesn't see it happening because, to start with, there are no internal parties; only the exiles are ready. Actually, the religious parties are ready as well, and this is something not many people have considered. What would the US government do if we had elections and we in Iraq choose someone like Sadr - or even Ayatollah Sistani?"

Virginian-Pilot Endorses Kerry

Virginian-Pilot Endorses Kerry

"Resolve is no substitute for results."

A course change: The Virginian-Pilot endorses John Kerry

Terrorists for Bush, no matter what GOP tries to feed us

Terrorists for Bush, no matter what GOP tries to feed us

A new Bush ad is hinting that terrorists want Kerry to win this election. I found that to be preposterously hilarious, knowing that Iran (one member of Bush's "axis of evil") strongly endorsed him this week. (Democrats press human rights issues, you see).

The Abu Ghraib torture probably won Tehran over for Bush.

An endorsement from the government Bush considers to be 'evil' should give us all a startling pause. Breathtaking pause.


Why Iran Wants Four More Years by David Jagernauth

Massing Taking on the Press; Bradlee Calls Bush "a liar"

Michael Massing: Taking the press to task for buying into the war

The Seattle Times discusses a compendium of pieces written for The New York Review of Books by Michael Massing, a contributing editor of Columbia Journalism Review titled "Now They Tell Us: The American Press and Iraq".

Excerpt:

"So here's the Washington, D.C., bureau of the Knight Ridder newspaper chain working the bowels of the bureaucracy — low-level intelligence, defense and diplomatic analysts — and publishing on Oct. 8, 2002, a forceful story reporting the doubts analysts had about the Iraqi threat, and more significantly, making a case that the civilian leadership was deliberately exaggerating the threat.. but because Knight Ridder has no newspapers in New York or Washington, it was all to no effect..

Is American-style journalism — weighted with the misnomers "objective" and "impartial" — so reliant on government sources, and blind sources in particular, that it is prone to being duped by those willing to deceive to advance their agenda?"

Pierre Salinger and days of solid investigative reporting memorialized

Which leads me to a quote from the NY Times article about yesterday's funeral of former White House press secretary and bon vivant Pierre Salinger:

"....when the mourners prayed for "those who serve in government or the press," they prayed for themselves, marking the passing not only of Mr. Salinger but also of an era when journalists considered themselves reporters and thought of "media" as a Greek sorceress, "usually played by Dame Judith Anderson," as the veteran NBC and ABC correspondent Sander Vanocur recalled in a written remembrance read aloud..."

Ben Bradlee says, flat out, that Bush is a liar.

I read an alleged 'exclusive' piece on the internet about Ben Bradlee calling Bush a liar.

From Spiegel Online:

"He [Bradlee] says US President George W. Bush is a liar. Journalists should stop dancing around the issue and name Bush for what he is, the ever surly Bradlee says in a SPIEGEL ONLINE interview. Bradlee also bemoans a worsening Washington climate in which politicians regularly hide behind lies - his favorite being that they can't discuss an issue "on the grounds of national security." Nixon used that line, too, Brandlee says. Bradlee admonishes reporters at both the Washington Post and the New York Times to get a backbone and to do more homework. Journalists today should not only question what politicians say but also their motivation, he says. He faults both news biggies for not asking enough questions before the Iraq war broke out and for not investing enough time or money into researching tough-to-get stories. Calling Clinton a liar was easy, Bradlee says. With Bush, the trail is less transparent."