Lehman Brothers. Merrill Lynch. AIG.
The Dow dropped over 500 points today — the largest one-day drop since the market reopened after the 9/11 attack seven years ago.
And here’s what John McCain had to say:
The “fundamentals of our economy are strong.”
It brings to mind the words of a US president back on October 29, 1929:
The fundamental business of the country… is on a sound and prosperous basis.
America’s robber barons are once again ruining America’s economy, and John McCain — in his $500 shoes, unmindful of how many homes he owns, after 26 years governing from Congress (if he really had any intention of doing anything to help this economy — or if he “got” the economy — why didn’t he do it in all his years as chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee?!?) — is asking us for four more years. That’s if he’s got four years left in him. (If not, we’ll be ‹‹shudder›› stuck with Sarah Palin.)
I’m thinking our answer should be “no.”
Even Greenspan thinks McCain isn’t up to the job.
Even McCain’s chief economic adviser says McCain will have to raise taxes.
And even turdblossom himself, Karl Rove, thinks that McCain is a liar.
And the McCain campaign apparently still thinks America is a bunch of whiners.
Some interesting (scary?) thoughts in today’s column from Frank Rich:
It’s an urgent matter, because if we’ve learned anything from the G.O.P. convention and its aftermath, it’s that the 2008 edition of John McCain is too weak to serve as America’s chief executive. This unmentionable truth, more than race, is now the real elephant in the room of this election.
While we’re waiting for John McCain to come out from behind Sarah Palin’s skirt, I’d like to raise a couple of issues.
First, Roe v. Wade. I get the impression the most strident Roe opponents — those who shriek loudest about the decision — have no idea what it actually says, so let’s start by taking a peek at what’s there:
The opinion of the Roe Court, written by Justice Harry Blackmun, declined to adopt the district court’s Ninth Amendment rationale, and instead asserted that the “right of privacy, whether it be founded in the Fourteenth Amendment’s concept of personal liberty and restrictions upon state action, as we feel it is, or, as the District Court determined, in the Ninth Amendment’s reservation of rights to the people, is broad enough to encompass a woman’s decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy.”
Note that the decision rests on a foundation of privacy — something that Sarah Palin demands for her own daughter, but would take away from all the other little girls in the country. She’s maybe never actually even read the decision she’s so adamantly determined to overturn. But then again, ignorance never does stop a fanatic, does it?
Yeah, so anyway, Sarah Palin likes her kids ignorant and knocked up, and she wants to repeal Roe.
This means that Sarah, if presented with a woman who just found out that the child she is carrying has Tay-Sachs disease, wouldn’t have her choose between getting an abortion or carrying the child to term, only to watch helplessly as her beautiful baby goes from healthy to mentally disabled, blind, deaf and unable to swallow, then finally becomes paralyzed, before dying by the age of five. Instead, Sarah would make that decision for her, without regard to the woman’s financial situation; or whether she is equipped to deal with the emotional devastation of such an experience; or her ability to cope with the medical needs of a child who has such profound problems. In fact, she would make this decision on her behalf without knowing a single thing about her circumstances. Sarah would opt for the latter situation, and not even offer her the first option (even if the pregnancy resulted from a rape).
To be clear, I am not advocating for a woman to choose either option over the other. What I am doing is arguing that all women should be able to make that choice for themselves — just like Sarah Palin did when she chose to continue her pregnancy after she found out her youngest child had Down Syndrome.
But back to the woman Palin is forcing into gestation… Would Sarah do anything to address her child’s special needs, as she claimed at the convention? Well, the jury’s still very much out on that question, since Sarah has not been a governor long enough to have much of a record when it comes to action on health care. But since she’s signed onto the McCain/Bush/Republican platform, it’s safe to assume she’ll be supporting the status quo when it comes to American health care (at best).
And then there’s this (more here). Sarah Palin belongs to the spiritual warfare movement (go see the movie Jesus Camp if you haven’t already and you’ll get a peak into Palin’s world) — which more and more, is making Christian fanatics look a lot like Islamic fanatics.
The Third Wave may be kind of spooky, but it’s also really dangerous. These people see the world in very black/white, christian/not christian terms, and it’s that kind of simplistic thinking that got us involved in Bush’s stupid war to begin with — a war, btw, that was supported by Palin, who even subscribes to Bush’s theocratic view that the Iraq war is a “task that is from God.”
Now, John McCain may be with Bush 90% of the time, but Sarah Palin appears to be with him 110% of the time (if you saw any of her interview with Charlie Gibson, you may have noticed that she even mimics George’s word-fog style of speaking which features lots of words, but doesn’t necessarily have a clear point).
I really don’t think we want to go there. Eight years of simplistic, slow-witted leadership has been more than enough. I don’t care how much you’d like to hang out with these people, or how thirsty you are for a beer in their company, that doesn’t mean that they have what it takes to lead this country in the right direction. And if you like the fact that they’re just like you, think about whether or not you’re truly qualified to run this country — really, don’t you want to put someone who’s extra smart in charge? Ideally, someone who is smarter than you and me? There’s nothing elitist about not wanting stupid leaders.
If we need change, then we’re going to have to start with a fresh approach. And that is clearly not what these guys would give us.
Seriously, who is really at the top of the Republican ticket? I had the news running in the background for much of the day, so I saw a bit of coverage of the McCain/Palin (Palin/McCain?) campaign stops (sorry, no video, but I’ll put it up if I find some). McCain keeps talking about what a great candidate Palin is, and Palin keeps talking about what she would do in Washington. So, what gives? Has the McCain campaign decided that he’s do distasteful that he’s going to have to try to ride her coattails into the White House?
Now, granted, he is an old man who’s already battled cancer four different times so far, but does he plan to serve if he is elected?
This election is getting kinda spooky.
WOW. Look at what I just found. Spooky isn’t the half of it.
UPDATE: more here.
Eight years ago today, George W. Bush made a promise he has since broken many times over.
So when I put my hand on the Bible, I will swear to not only uphold the laws of our land, I will swear to uphold the honor and dignity of the office to which I have been elected, so help me God.
(a photoshopped image from the back in the day…)
Thursday night, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama andJohn Edwards all appeared on the Colbert Report. It took us back to the heyday of the primary campaign — before things got ugly and boring. To see the clips from the show, go here (edWØRDS was my favorite segment). And if you’ll forgive me a bit of photoshopping, I loved this campaign when it was a three-man race. Now — enh — not so much…
If I had the time, I’d put a the republican leadership in little parachutes and insert them into this photo as well. The news comes from Newsweek (via Tennessee Guerilla Women and Political Wire).
For the first time since 2001, the NEWSWEEK poll shows that more Americans trust the Democrats than the GOP on moral values and the war on terror. Fully 53 percent of Americans want the Democrats to win control of Congress next month, including 10 percent of Republicans, compared to just 35 percent who want the GOP to retain power. If the election were held today, 51 percent of likely voters would vote for the Democrat in their district versus 39 percent who would vote for the Republican. [...] Meanwhile, the president’s approval rating has fallen to a new all-time low for the Newsweek poll: 33 percent, down from an already anemic 36 percent in August. Only 25 percent of Americans are satisfied with the direction of the country, while 67 percent say they are not. [...] [F]or the first time in the NEWSWEEK poll, a majority of Americans now believe the Bush administration knowingly misled the American people in building its case for war against Saddam Hussein: 58 percent vs. 36 percent who believe it didn’t. And pessimism over Iraq is at record highs on every score: nearly two in three Americans, 64 percent, believe the United States is losing ground there; 66 percent say the war has not made America safer from terrorism (just 29 percent believe it has); and 53 percent believe it was a mistake to go to war at all, again the first time the NEWSWEEK poll has registered a majority in that camp.
If you’d like someone to explain these numbers for you, Jon Ponder offers a brief interpretation.
“A stark assessment of terrorism trends by American intelligence agencies has found that the American invasion of Iraq has helped spawn a new generation of Islamic radicalism and that the overall terrorist threat has grown since the Sept. 11 attacks.”
— April 2006 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), a consensus view of the government”s 16 spy agencies
It appears that the Torture Caucus in Congress will win the day and pass a bill that legalizes particular extreme interrogation techniques such as waterboarding, also known as torture. There is no doubt Pres. Bush will sign the torture bill into law.
(from A Cautionary Tale about Torture from America”s Military Past)
More here (link and early version of image via AmericaBlog):
The Geneva Conventions: The bill would repudiate a half-century of international precedent by allowing Mr. Bush to decide on his own what abusive interrogation methods he considered permissible. And his decision could stay secret – there’s no requirement that this list be published.
Bottom Line: we, as a nation, have lost our moral authority, and our troops are at greater risk because of it.
UPDATE: from slate.com:
