Roger Stone has been a dirty trickster for the Republican party going back to Nixon. My favorite: fundraising/managing Al Sharpton in the last election in order to try to undermine overall Democratic efforts. Citizens United Not Timid was his personal offering to deep six the Hillary Clinton campaign.
...this coming from the folks taking every opportunity to call Obama a muslim. Basso; The champion of protecting civil liberties.
OK, if that's a compliment, you're welcome. If that's an insult, let me tell you something. You don't know what you are talking about. I don't copy off other posters unless there's a specific fact they are bringing up. I don't need to- I have enough intelligence to post original messages, unlike some people who spend their time trying to drudge up often obscure articles that are obviously a last desperate grasp to prove their candidate is better. All of those "talking points" are ones that I and my wife have come across over the last several weeks- she relayed the interview to me- to this day, I have never seen the full Katie Couric interview. Everything else has been readily available on MSNBC, CNN, Yahoo, Houston Chronicle, and any of a dozen online periodicals one can find through a Google search. I've read the conservative side, and I've read the liberal side. Frankly, I understand much of where the Republicans are coming from, as well as the Democrats. So I don't have anything personal against McCain and Palin- heck, maybe with a different approach, under different circumstances, maybe I'd be voting for them. And their gaffes, including McCain's, is not the primary reason not to vote for them. But, being an English major who had to study persuasive techniques extensively, they've done a rather poor job of communicating a singular, as well as important message to the public. Ayers? Poll after poll indicates that Americans could care less about this- which is why it's conspicuously absent from his recent speeches. "Pals around with terrorists?" It's attacking the person rather than their beliefs or policies. The attacks on his "redistributing the wealth" were actually legitimate- until they tried to compare this to socialism. The experience argument doesn't wash, either. How can they say Obama "doesn't have enough experience" when his choice for VP has an extremely limited amount of experience? And I'll end this by the primary reason Palin was a bad choice, going all the way back to when he first selected her. At the time, McCain's primary message was that Obama doesn't have the experience it takes to be a President and that he (McCain) does. So he goes and selects someone with even less experience. What he did was violate his fundamental message, the one he had initially based his campaign on. When he chose her, I switched my vote from leaning McCain to Obama. I didn't trust him after that- and the number of times he's had to change his messaging in this campaign indicates that he's inconsistent- and I don't want an inconsistent President. Say what you want to criticize Obama, but he has maintained 3 consistent messages since he first started his campaign, and he's still hammering them home. Bottom line: I trust Obama more than I trust McCain. That's why I voted for him this past Wednesday. And I did vote for Bush in 2000.
I gave her a pass on that one only because she could say that, in definition, this is the role of the VP, even though it's not. No problem with the clothes, either- my wife designs high-end clothing and she said this is not unusual, especially for someone who's only the 2nd woman selected as a VP candidate. Plus, whether we believe it or not, they did say they would donate these to charity, so it's hard to say flat-out that she was wrong on that. But she's a lot like Dan Quayle. She's just not informed about a lot of things. Maybe some of them aren't important. But some are. And I just don't think she inspires enough confidence in her abilities to think on both macro and micro levels.
John McCain loves C---- apparently. By his own admission, he married one. Now he hires one as his VP. J-Mac is the King of C----
To be fair, that allegation is anonymously sourced, and he didn't call her that in public, in front of reporters, until a few decades into their marriage. Tyrannical Regulation Of Life-partner Lipstick Obsessively Plastered Your hair is thinning a bit, aussie.
you know, you really are an idiot sam, not sure if it's willful, or genetic, but it's certainly constant. palin was referring to research in france on fruit flies as an agricultural pest, nothing to do with autism. thanks for proving the point of my post.
here's the text of her remarks: [rquoter]Thank you all very much. I appreciate the hospitality of the people of Pittsburgh, and I'm grateful to all the groups who have joined us here today. The Woodlands Foundation, the Down Syndrome Center at the Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh, Autism-link, the Children's Institute of Pittsburgh: Thank you for coming today. And, above all, thank you for the great work you do for the light and love you bring into so many lives. John McCain and I have talked about the missions he'd like me to focus on should I become vice president, and our nation's energy independence and government reform are among them. But there is another mission that's especially close to my heart, and that is to help families of children with special needs. And today, we'll talk about three policy proposals that are going to help us fulfill our country's commitment to these children: more choices for parents, fully funding IDEA, and efforts to reform and refocus. Too often, even in our own day, children with special needs have been set apart and excluded. Too often, state and federal laws add to their challenges, instead of removing barriers and opening new paths of opportunity. Too often, they are made to feel that there is no place for them in the life of our country, that they don't count or have nothing to contribute. This attitude is a grave disservice to these beautiful children, to their families, and to our country -- and I will work to change it. One of the most wonderful experiences in this campaign has been to see all the families of children with special needs who come out to rallies and events just like this. We have a bond there. We know that children with special needs inspire a special love. You bring your sons and daughters with you, because you are proud of them, as I am of my son. My little fella sleeps during most of these rallies, even when they get pretty rowdy. He would be amazed to know how many folks come out to see him instead of me. When I learned that Trig would have special needs, honestly, I had to prepare my heart. At first I was scared, and Todd and I had to ask for strength and understanding. I did a lot of praying for that understanding, and strength, and to see purpose. And what's been confirmed in me is every child has something to contribute to the world, if we give them that chance. You know that there are the world's standards of perfection, and then there are God's, and these are the final measure. Every child is beautiful before God, and dear to Him for their own sake. And the truest measure of any society is how it treats those who are most vulnerable. As for our baby boy, Trig, for Todd and me he is only more precious because he is vulnerable. In some ways, I think we stand to learn more from him than he does from us. When we hold Trig and care for him, we don't feel scared anymore. We feel blessed. Of course, many other families are much further along a similar path -- including my best friend who happens to be my sister, Heather, and her 13-year old son Karcher, who has autism. Heather and I have worked on this for over a decade. Heather is an advocate for children with autism in Alaska. And as governor, I've succeeded in securing additional funding and assistance for students with special needs. By 2011, I will have tripled the funding available to these students. Heather and I have been blessed with a large, strong family network. Our family helps make sure that Trig and Karcher have what they need. But not everyone is lucky enough to have that strong network of support. And the experiences of those millions of Americans point the way to better policy in the care of children with special needs. One of the most common experiences is the struggle of parents to find the best and earliest care for their children. The law requires our public schools to serve children with special needs, but often the results fall far short of the service they need. Even worse, parents are left with no other options, except for the few families that can afford private instruction or therapy. Many of you parents here have been through the drill: You sit down with teachers and counselors to work out the IEP -- an individual education plan for your child. The school may be trying its best, but they're overstretched. They may keep telling you that your child is "progressing well," and no extra services are required. They keep telling you that -- but you know better. You know that your children are not getting all of the help they need, at a time when they need it most. The parents of children with special needs ask themselves every day if they are doing enough, if they are doing right by their sons and daughters. And when our public school system fails to render help and equal opportunity -- and even prevents parents from seeking it elsewhere that is unacceptable. In a McCain-Palin administration, we will put the educational choices for special needs children in the right hands their parents'. Under reforms that I will lead as vice president, the parents and caretakers of children with physical or mental disabilities will be able to send that boy or girl to the school of their choice -- public or private. Under our reforms, federal funding for every special needs child will follow that child. Some states have begun to apply this principle already, as in Florida's McKay Scholarship program. That program allows for choices and a quality of education that should be available to parents in every state, for every child with special needs. This process should be uncomplicated, quick, and effective -- because early education can make all the difference. No barriers of bureaucracy should stand in the way of serving children with special needs. That's why John and I will direct the Department of Education to clarify the statute administratively. We'll make explicit that when state funds are portable, federal funds are fully portable. We're going to make sure parents have choices and children receive the education they deserve. Even the best public school teacher or administrator cannot rightfully take the place of a parent in making these choices. The schools feel responsible for the education of many children, but a parent alone is responsible for the life of each child. And in the case of parents of children with disabilities, there are enough challenges as it is, and our children will face more than enough closed doors along the way. When our sons and daughters need better education, more specialized training, and more individual attention, the doors of opportunity should be open. Like John McCain, I am a believer in providing more school choice for families. The responsibility for the welfare of children rests ultimately with mothers and fathers, and the power to choose should be theirs as well. But this larger debate of public policy should not be permitted to hinder the progress of special-needs students. Where their lives, futures, and happiness are at stake, we should have no agenda except to ease the path they are on. And the best way to do that is to give their parents options. In a McCain-Palin administration, we will also fully fund the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. To his great credit, it was President Gerald Ford who signed the legislation that became the IDEA -- establishing new standards of respect and inclusion for young Americans with disabilities. From that day to this, however, the federal government's obligations under the IDEA have not been adequately met. And portions of IDEA funding have actually decreased since 2005. This is a matter of how we prioritize the money that we spend. We've got a three trillion dollar budget, and Congress spends some 18 billion dollars a year on earmarks for political pet projects. That's more than the shortfall to fully fund the IDEA. And where does a lot of that earmark money end up? It goes to projects having little or nothing to do with the public good -- things like fruit fly research in Paris, France, or a public policy center named for the guy who got the earmark. In our administration, we're going to reform and refocus. We're going to get our federal priorities straight, and fulfill our country's commitment to give every child opportunity and hope in life. For many parents of children with disabilities, the most valuable thing of all is information. Early identification of a cognitive or other disorder, especially autism, can make a life-changing difference. That's why we're going to strengthen NIH. We're going to work on long-term cures, and in the short-term, we're going to work on giving these families better information. Once a condition is known, parents need the best and latest information on what to expect and how to respond. This service is also provided for under the IDEA. And we will make sure that every family has a place to go for support and medical guidance. The existing programs and community centers focus on school-age children -- overlooking the need for assistance before school-age. But it would make a lot more sense for these centers to focus as well on infants and toddlers. This is not only a critical stage for diagnosis; it can also be a crucial time to prepare the family for all that may lie ahead. Families need to know what treatments are most effective, and where they are available, what costs they will face, and where aid can be found, and where they can turn for the advice and support of others in their situation. As Todd and I and Heather know, there's no substitute for the friendship of those who have been where we are now. The IDEA is also intended to serve teens and young adults with special needs. And here, too, there is an opportunity to reform and extend the reach of federal support under the IDEA. By modernizing a current law, the Vocational Rehabilitation Act, we can better serve students with disabilities in our high schools and community colleges. This will require reform by the states as well. Just as the federal government expects proven results in the progress of other students, we must require results as well in the achievements of students with disabilities. And the result we will expect is simple: that every special-needs student be given a chance to learn the skills to work, and enjoy the freedom to live independently if that is their choice. As families across America know, the care of special-needs children requires long-term planning, and especially financial planning. A common practice among these families is to establish financial trusts. These are known as special needs trusts, covering years of medical and other costs, and for parents they bring invaluable comfort. Understandably, then, many families with special-needs children or dependent adults are concerned that our opponent in this election plans to raise taxes on precisely those kinds of financial arrangements. They fear that Senator Obama's tax increase will have serious and harmful consequences -- and they are right. The burden that his plan would impose upon these families is just one more example of how many plans can be disrupted, how many futures can be placed at risk, and how many people can suffer when the power to tax is misused. Our opponent has an ideological commitment to higher taxes. And though he makes adjustments on his tax plan pronouncements seemingly by the day, his commitment to increase taxes remains the same. John McCain and I have just the opposite commitment. We intend to lower taxes, promote growth, and protect the earnings and savings of American families. Not long ago, I spent some time at a place in Cleveland called the Michael T. George Center, a beautiful home for adults with Down Syndrome and other disabilities. I met Michael George, too, a boy of five with Down Syndrome. Michael is a healthy, sweet, joy-filled little man -- and I saw in him all the things I wish for Trig in just a few years. Michael's parents, Tony and Kris George, are advocates for children with special needs in their community. They are thinking far ahead, in their own boy's life and in the lives of others. They named the center after their son. It's a public-private partnership. This welcoming place -- and so many others like it -- shows the good heart of America. They are places of hope. They are the works of people who believe that every life matters, everyone has something to contribute, and every child should have things to look forward to, and achievements to point to with pride and joy. As many of you know better than I, it can be a hard path, and yet all the more joyful and productive when the barriers are overcome. John McCain and I have a vision in which every child is loved and cherished, and that is the spirit I want to bring to Washington. To the families and caregivers of special-needs children all across this country, I do have a message: For years, you sought to make America a more welcoming place for your sons and daughters. And I pledge to you that if we are elected, you will have a friend and advocate in the White House. Thank you all, and God bless you. [/rquoter] http://www.johnmccain.com/Informing...spx?guid=3d5fc0cf-8229-490f-879b-91f6f4bb9eb2
For what it's worth (very little), that may be the speech as prepared, or some draft version of it, but that's not an actual trasncript of what she said in that speech, as, for one, this omits her bridge (to nowhere) line evident in the previous sentence on the tape. She seemed to freelance a bit from the prepared remarks, to her speechwriter's detriment. To the larger point, I don't understand how scientific study of fruit flies is, to Palin's mind, qualitatively worse than scientific study of, say, the sex drives of crabs: To the original columnist's contention, that the manner in which Palin has been treated, I submit that the columnist either wasn't paying attention during the Clinton primary or was looking from afar, with dontchaknow-colored glasses. H. Clinton was a formidable campaigner and candidate, and could never be charged with being caught in the headlights in media interviews or anytime she was away from a teleprompter; that did not stop a vocal minority of her opponent party coming out against her, as evidenced by the linked 527 group, with no more than misogynistic name-calling. Palin isn't ready for prime time. Neither was Quayle. Their genders have nothing to do with that.
I assume this is the relevant section from the linked report: I don't see the difference in your distinction. You don't want government research to prevent ecological and financial ruin stateside? Stitch in time? I suspect the only reason this particular fruit fly study, if it is indeed the project she referenced, was included was because the speechwriter knew that saying "Paris, France," would be a guaranteed "boo" line. What other discernible reason is there to call out this project, and not her own approved seal DNA study?
she was talking about priorities, and suggesting that special needs funding was more important that the fruit fly research, and i suspect, the sex life of crabs as well.
odd that you didn't have a similar reaction to the Biden choice, one that contradicts everything Obama has talked about for the past 20 months. Not "change," he is "more of the same." double standard?
She was suggesting this because she is too stupid to know what most high school students know.. as are you too. Look it's obvious that she (and her speechwriter) picked out something that they thought was a cheap applause line. Of course they were obviously ignorant of basic facts - fruit fly research has been a cornerstone of modern genetics for about a century. It just shows the underlying ignorance of Palin about grown-up issues - and your own. Where does it come from? Why are you the enemy of sounding knowledgeable about something? Is it because you are so used to being stupid that you think it's acceptable to sound uneducated and dumb about things?
There is no doubt that there was a lot of unfair treatment of Sarah Palin, much more at the beginning than in the end. I don't think it can even be disputed. However, the unfair treatment wasn't hurting the McCain campaign at all. In fact, it helped them in the polls. While she was being targeted in sexist ways, her own personal popularity was still high nation wide. America liked her. Her lack of popularity now, and the criticism she receives now, is a direct result of her own failings, not sexism in any way.
basso, your boy Christopher Hitchens called, he deposited a flaming sack of ownage in front of your door. http://www.slate.com/id/2203120/ Sarah Palin's War on Science The GOP ticket's appalling contempt for knowledge and learning. By Christopher Hitchens Posted Monday, Oct. 27, 2008, at 11:43 AM ET In an election that has been fought on an astoundingly low cultural and intellectual level, with both candidates pretending that tax cuts can go like peaches and cream with the staggering new levels of federal deficit, and paltry charges being traded in petty ways, and with Joe the Plumber becoming the emblematic stupidity of the campaign, it didn't seem possible that things could go any lower or get any dumber. But they did last Friday, when, at a speech in Pittsburgh, Gov. Sarah Palin denounced wasteful expenditure on fruit-fly research, adding for good xenophobic and anti-elitist measure that some of this research took place "in Paris, France" and winding up with a folksy "I kid you not." It was in 1933 that Thomas Hunt Morgan won a Nobel Prize for showing that genes are passed on by way of chromosomes. The experimental creature that he employed in the making of this great discovery was the Drosophila melanogaster, or fruit fly. Scientists of various sorts continue to find it a very useful resource, since it can be easily and plentifully "cultured" in a laboratory, has a very short generation time, and displays a great variety of mutation. This makes it useful in studying disease, and since Gov. Palin was in Pittsburgh to talk about her signature "issue" of disability and special needs, she might even have had some researcher tell her that there is a Drosophila-based center for research into autism at the University of North Carolina. The fruit fly can also be a menace to American agriculture, so any financing of research into its habits and mutations is money well-spent. It's especially ridiculous and unfortunate that the governor chose to make such a fool of herself in Pittsburgh, a great city that remade itself after the decline of coal and steel into a center of high-tech medical research. In this case, it could be argued, Palin was not just being a fool in her own right but was following a demagogic lead set by the man who appointed her as his running mate. Sen. John McCain has made repeated use of an anti-waste and anti-pork ad (several times repeated and elaborated in his increasingly witless speeches) in which the expenditure of $3 million to study the DNA of grizzly bears in Montana was derided as "unbelievable." As an excellent article in the Feb. 8, 2008, Scientific American pointed out, there is no way to enforce the Endangered Species Act without getting some sort of estimate of numbers, and the best way of tracking and tracing the elusive grizzly is by setting up barbed-wire hair-snagging stations that painlessly take samples from the bears as they lumber by and then running the DNA samples through a laboratory. The cost is almost trivial compared with the importance of understanding this species, and I dare say the project will yield results in the measurement of other animal populations as well, but all McCain could do was be flippant and say that he wondered whether it was a "paternity" or "criminal" issue that the Fish and Wildlife Service was investigating. (Perhaps those really are the only things that he associates in his mind with DNA.) With Palin, however, the contempt for science may be something a little more sinister than the bluff, empty-headed plain-man's philistinism of McCain. We never get a chance to ask her in detail about these things, but she is known to favor the teaching of creationism in schools (smuggling this crazy idea through customs in the innocent disguise of "teaching the argument," as if there was an argument), and so it is at least probable that she believes all creatures from humans to fruit flies were created just as they are now. This would make DNA or any other kind of research pointless, whether conducted in Paris or not. Projects such as sequencing the DNA of the flu virus, the better to inoculate against it, would not need to be funded. We could all expire happily in the name of God. Gov. Palin also says that she doesn't think humans are responsible for global warming; again, one would like to ask her whether, like some of her co-religionists, she is a "premillenial dispensationalist"—in other words, someone who believes that there is no point in protecting and preserving the natural world, since the end of days will soon be upon us. Videos taken in the Assembly of God church in Wasilla, Alaska, which she used to attend, show her nodding as a preacher says that Alaska will be "one of the refuge states in the Last Days." For the uninitiated, this is a reference to a crackpot belief, widely held among those who brood on the "End Times," that some parts of the world will end at different times from others, and Alaska will be a big draw as the heavens darken on account of its wide open spaces. An article by Laurie Goodstein in the New York Times gives further gruesome details of the extreme Pentecostalism with which Palin has been associated in the past (perhaps moderating herself, at least in public, as a political career became more attractive). High points, also available on YouTube, show her being "anointed" by an African bishop who claims to cast out witches. The term used in the trade for this hysterical superstitious nonsense is "spiritual warfare," in which true Christian soldiers are trained to fight demons. Palin has spoken at "spiritual warfare" events as recently as June. And only last week the chiller from Wasilla spoke of "prayer warriors" in a radio interview with James Dobson of Focus on the Family, who said that he and his lovely wife, Shirley, had convened a prayer meeting to beseech that "God's perfect will be done on Nov. 4." This is what the Republican Party has done to us this year: It has placed within reach of the Oval Office a woman who is a religious fanatic and a proud, boastful ignoramus. Those who despise science and learning are not anti-elitist. They are morally and intellectually slothful people who are secretly envious of the educated and the cultured. And those who prate of spiritual warfare and demons are not just "people of faith" but theocratic bullies. On Nov. 4, anyone who cares for the Constitution has a clear duty to repudiate this wickedness and stupidity.
Very good point. During the initial bout of scrutiny, just before and just after the RNC, she was riding high. To my mind, the initial speculation about the provenance of Trig Palin is the main source of umbrage, the source of the, "But they went after my family!" line of sexism/bad manners. However, there were: A) reports that Sarah Palin wasn't showing in her seventh month of pregnancy (true) B) reports Palin flew back from Texas to Alaska after her water broke to deliver in a small Alaskan hospital (true) C) recent family photos of Bristol Palin showing / obviously pregnant (true) D) reports of Bristol Palin being pulled out of public school with an extended five months-long bout of mononucleosis (I've never seen a respected source either verifying or refuting this claim). Given A, B, C, D, conspiracists assumed that the mother was covering for her pregnant daughter, and that Trig Palin was actually Bristol Palin's. To my mind, this would suit Occam's blade. However, it was more complicated; Sarah Palin was covering for her daughter's pregnancy, but there were two pregnancies. So, there was a cover-up; people just guessed the wrong cover-up. All things considered, I can see how a reasonable person might leap to the first conclusion. The rest of the sexism claims appear to be red herrings designed to distract from Troopergate / poor interview / debate performances, or, most recently, to distract from the 150 Gs spent on her wardrobe or the 20+ Gs spent on her makeup artist.
sometimes you still manage to amaze me- are you, and hitchens, really trying to suggest she was proposing cutting funding for science research in a speech about fully funding the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act? she was talking about eliminating earmarks, which could provide the funds to pay for IDEA.
