08 Nov 08 The Real McCain
Did you wonder what he was thinking during that concession speech? Wonder no more!
03 Nov 08 The Dance-Off
Tomorrow night the Obama - McCain dance-off becomes old news, it’ll be wrapped up and thrown out like an old fish. Let’s enjoy it one last time!
03 Nov 08 The Election Line
With one day left in the campaign, the national Pollster numbers show Barack Obama leading John McCain 51.5% to 44.3%, with 4.2% of the votes going to other candidates or still undecided. Their electoral college prediction is 311 votes for Obama, 142 votes for McCain, and 85 votes too close to call. These are the best predictions available in the US, but many people wonder how accurate they really are. For example, what if the people polled weren’t telling the truth?
There is a better way to predict elections than polling the voting population: ask the gamblers. Rather than dealing in hypothetical what-if’s, the gambling world deals in dollars and cents. Every potential fraud or screwup has to be taken into account when your livelihood depends on correctly predicting the outcome. A pollster can say “Ooops!” and move on, but a bookie who sets the wrong odds literally loses his shirt. Gambling on election outcomes is illegal in America, but perfectly acceptable in many parts of the world. Two sites, Intrade and Betfair, won’t let Americans place bets, but do publish their election odds lines. With only one day left to go, their numbers are likely to be very accurate. If not, they face going out of business the day after tomorrow.
This morning Betfair has Barack Obama at approximately 91% to win and John McCain at 8%, with the odds of Obama receiving more than 350 electoral votes at 59%. Those are overwhelming odds this late in the game. Their prediction model has Obama winning the following battleground states: Colorado, Florida, North Carolina, Ohio and Virginia. Over at the Intrade site they put the electoral college numbers front and center: 353 for Obama, 185 for McCain. Their model has Obama picking up the same swing states, plus Nevada. Here’s the bottom line: tomorrow night the newsboy bobbleheads are going to be talking about an Obama presidency, you can bet on it.
02 Nov 08 John McCain on SNL
John McCain, Tina Fey, and Cindy McCain opened the show last night on SNL. McCain has a better sense of humor about running a distant second in the race than you might expect. This is very likely to be Tina’s last appearance ever as Sarah Palin, fingers crossed lol.
01 Nov 08 With Friends Like These
With friends like these, who needs enemies? Take a musical trip through John McCain’s world.
30 Oct 08 Helen Takes No Prisoners
Helen is an 82 year-old woman who lives near Austin, Texas. Her kids gave her a blog and she doesn’t pull many punches. She has a lot to say, and if you visit there, keep reading back for the good stuff. Here’s a sample from something she wrote today to an undecided acquaintance.
Now let’s talk about taxes. John McCain is working overtime to scare the hell out of all the Joe the Fill-in-the-Blank’s out there. He’s trying to fool them into thinking that they actually make enough money to be worried. That is the biggest joke the Republican party has managed to play on the good people of America. Most of us don’t even make enough money in a life-time to afford the membership into that club. The idea of a progressive tax where the wealthy pay more in taxes than the poor is nothing new. Not even close. In fact 81% of economist agree with the concept… and here is a real eye opener - until he crapped his pants about losing this election John McCain supported the concept as well. Trust me, that dog don’t hunt, he will say anything to win at this point. De-regulation of banks? He was for it, but now is against it. He was for privatization of social security and now he is against it. He was for the estate tax and now he is against it. He used to have a spine and now he doesn’t. You know, at his age, he should know there’s medication for such personality swings.
If I hear that McCain is a Maverick one more time I just might throw myself to the floor and break a hip. A maverick is an independent individual who doesn’t go along with a group or party. If John McCain’s a maverick I am one of those cheerleaders on the sidelines of Harold’s beloved Dallas Cowboys. Nobody seems to dispute that the Republican party led by George W. Bush got us into this mess but what everybody seems to forget is that Sarah Palin and John McCain are Republicans. Look, when the Religious Right came knocking at the door of the RNC Membership Round-Up, someone should have turned out the porch lights and told everyone inside to be quiet until they went away… the same thing I do when those nice looking boys on bicycles with bibles come to my door. But the Republicans opened that door, invited them in and now they have to live with that decision.
Cecilia, when was the last time a politician brought a tear to your eye… moved you deep in your soul? Honestly when was the last time you really felt that Americans could do anything if we put our hearts and minds to it? I am an old lady. Most of my life politicians have moved me. Most of my life I have felt that Americans can do anything if we put our hearts and minds to it. It’s been 8 long years. I had almost forgotten what that felt like. Thank you Barack Obama. Thank you.
30 Oct 08 FUX Business News Slams McCain
In an amazing turnabout for a FUX newsperson, Neil Cavuto takes John McCain to the woodshed. He describes McCain’s economic policies as inconsistent and confusing. To wrap things up, Cavuto says there’s no straight talk on economics from the straight talk express.
Video thanks to Crooks & Liars
30 Oct 08 The Temperament of a Rabid Badger
On his way to endorsing Obama last night, Steven Colbert had a few words to say about John McCain’s temperament (see above). He also described the Republican party as “A staggering mass of flaming agony” lol.
30 Oct 08 You Can Vote
You can vote however you like! 
28 Oct 08 Socialists Endorse John McCain
Barbara Ehrenreich, author of Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America
Surely you have heard by now of the imminent socialist takeover of America, and if you find the prospect unlikely, ask yourself: How many socialists do you know who lost millions in the recent stock market crashes? Just as I thought—none—and that’s not only because you don’t know any socialists. The truth is that we, the Socialist International Conspiracy, not only saw this coming, we are the ones who made it happen.
The plan took shape during a particularly intense criticism/self-criticism session at our 2000 annual convention in a booth at an Akron IHOP. We realized that we’d been recruiting no more new members per year than the Green Bay Packers and that, despite all our efforts, more Americans have been taken aboard UFO’s than have embraced the historic promise of socialism. So we decided to suspend our usual work of standing on street corners and hissing, “Hey, how’d you like to live in a workers’ paradise?” Instead of building socialism, one worker at a time, we would focus on destroying capitalism, hedge fund by hedge fund.
After months of studying the candidates’ economic plans, we have determined that one of them, and only one, can be relied on to complete the destruction of capitalism. With high hopes and great confidence, the Socialist International Conspiracy endorses John McCain!
Barbara Ehrenreich’s Report from the Socialist International Conspiracy
27 Oct 08 Litany of Lies - Meet The Press Edition
John McCain just can’t stop telling lies, no matter how hard he tries. He lies about Bush and he lies about Iraq. Here’s the simple truth, in living color.
Video thanks to Daily Kos
26 Oct 08 Big Losers Always Make Excuses (BLAME)
McCain and Palin are on their way to being big losers and the knives are coming out. James Carville and Paul Begala threw a few on the table today to get the party started.
The smartest people in the conservative movement are already pointing like a bird dog on a South Georgia quail hunt. David Brooks and Bill Kristol are leading the way. Mr. Brooks, representing the intellectual wing of the conservative movement, called Ms. Palin, “a fatal cancer to the Republican Party.” Attaboy, Brooksie. Score one for the brainiacs.
Mr. Kristol, on the other hand, blames neither Ms. Palin nor Sen. John McCain, but rather McCain’s campaign advisers, writing of the campaign: “Its combination of strategic incoherence and operational incompetence has become toxic.” See? That’s how you do it. Kristol can’t say McCain’s problem is that he supported the Iraq war, (which Kristol advocated) or that he chose Sarah Palin (whom Kristol praised). So rather than play defense, Bill went on offense, blaming McCain’s Steve Schmidt-led campaign. But we have a feeling this fight will only begin when the Schmidt hits the fan.
But where are the other voices? We need to hear, for example, from Karl Rove. Whom will he blame? We stipulate that Karl is a genius — albeit a genius whose advice took Pres. Bush from a 91 percent approval rating down to 26. With the House of Bush ablaze, Karl is going to have to do some quick finger-pointing before they change his nickname from The Architect to The Arsonist.
How about Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and other radio personalities? They never liked McCain much — but his campaign cratered only when he embraced their wild attacks on Sen. Obama. It was only after Mr. McCain borrowed the Limbaugh-Hannity line on Bill Ayers, only after Gov. Palin accused Mr. Obama of “pallin’ around with terrorists,” that the bottom fell out for Mr. McCain and Ms. Palin. We’re betting the hot air boys will blame the intellectuals. After all, if you want to make an omelet, you’ve got to break a few eggheads.
Huffington Post link:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/james-carville-and-paul-begala/let-the-blame-game-begin_b_136223.html
26 Oct 08 McCain Still Loves Palin
You ask why? Simple:
Her husband is a, uh, works the third shift on oil facilities on the North Slope.
26 Oct 08 Cracks In The Republican Facade
There’s little doubt that the McCain campaign is a sinking ship at this point. Obama is expanding his lead in the key electoral state battles day by day. Key Republicans are already beginning to play the blame game, and rumors coming from behind the scenes say that Sarah Palin is a very unhappy camper. The question on many observers’ minds is whether McCain will do anything to help the Republican candidates for Senate who are on the bubble. If he doesn’t, the differences between the moralists and the fiscal conservatives in the Republican party may erupt into full-scale civil war after the election.
Image thanks to Gary Varvel
25 Oct 08 McCain Lacks Volunteers
Despite denials from the McCain campaign staff, they’ve had to hire temporary workers in Florida to do the precinct work usually done by volunteers. And they really don’t want anyone to know that they’re doing it, see for yourself lol.
