A great phrase

I needed to showcase it here. Tristero's longer quote is this:

Notice a pattern? The Republicans commit treason but lie that Democrats do. Republicans lied that Gore claimed he invented the Internet - search the Daily Howler to learn Gore never said such a thing - and then turn around and assert, with an absolutely straight face, as dday noted, that McCain helped create the Blackberry.

Up-is-downism is too kind. It doesn't capture the blatantly corrupt mentation that lies at the heart of this kind of deplorable trash.

I want to give credit now because I will probably have occasion to re-use this graphic. Thanks, Tristero!
--Commander Coalfire

La vraie chose

Twenty six years of protecting Wall Street. That's the real McCain.
--Chris in Paris

It wasn't an accident.

DarkSyde says it very well:

The financial crises is in part a result of appointing unqualified political cronies who don't enforce oversight regulations that exist, and allowing industry lobbyists to write new laws overturning procedures specifically enacted to prevent economic catastrophe in the wake of the Great Depression. This crisis was brought to you by conservative ideology. Give 'em another four years and they might just do more damage than the rest of us can repair in a generation.

DarkSyde's post is here.
--the BB

"I don't think John McCain could run a major corporation"

Carly Fiorina on John McCain:



Yes, it's cut off without context. Then again....

h/t to BarbinMD at Daily Kos
--the BB

So, what is "white privilege" anyway?

Jane R points us all to the answer in Tim Wise's article "This is Your Nation on White Privilege ". Go read it. Yes, do it. You will understand the world better for doing so.

Here's a sample paragraph:

White privilege is when you can attend four different colleges in six years like Sarah Palin did (one of which you basically failed out of, then returned to after making up some coursework at a community college), and no one questions your intelligence or commitment to achievement, whereas a person of color who did this would be viewed as unfit for college, and probably someone who only got in in the first place because of affirmative action.

Delicious!
--the BB

Don't expect me to let up before November 7

Petroleum John and his chums:



From the folks at MoveOn.org

--the BB

David Corn notes what McCain ignores

If McCain wants to hold someone accountable for the failure in transparency and accountability that led to the current calamity, he should turn to his good friend and adviser, Phil Gramm.

As Mother Jones reported in June, eight years ago, Gramm, then a Republican senator chairing the Senate banking committee, slipped a 262-page bill into a gargantuan, must-pass spending measure. Gramm's legislation, written with the help of financial industry lobbyists, essentially removed newfangled financial products called swaps from any regulation. Credit default swaps are basically insurance policies that cover the losses on investments, and they have been at the heart of the subprime meltdown because they have enabled large financial institutions to turn risky loans into risky securities that could be packaged and sold to other institutions.

Lehman's collapse threatens the financial markets because of swaps.

h/t to Chris in Paris at Americablog - check Corn's article here.
--the BB

What is this? "All lies all the time"?

Seems that Governor Palin is even lying about the teleprompter when she spoke at the RNC.

Of the claim that the teleprompter failed and she spoke on her own, it seems there is a powerful rebuttal:

This struck many of us -- who, as she spoke, followed along with her prepared remarks, and noted how closely she stuck to the script -- as an unusual claim. (Especially those of my colleagues on the convention floor at the time, reading along on the prompter with her, noticing her excellent and disciplined delivery, how she punched words that were underlined and paused where it said "pause," noting that "nuclear" was spelled out for her phonetically.) [...]

"The teleprompter did not break," wrote Politico's Jonathan Martin. "Sarah Palin delivered a powerful speech last night, but she did not 'wing it'..."

Thanks to Hunter for this update. Palin claimed last night to have been winging it. I guess they can't help themselves.

Who on earth thinks they represent "change" from the Bush-Cheney regime of lying? Or is their a collective wish for "sweet little lies" (and big, nasty sour ones)?


Fleetwood Mac offers commentary for us.

Update: Check out McCain's pointing the finger at Obama when his own position goes further than Obama's and without any nuance or careful evaluation. Plutonium Page lays the hypocrisy bare.
--the BB

Speaking of the economy

... which John McCain would rather not have to do....



h/t to Meteor Blades
--the BB

Flashbacks

A lot of what we saw while driving looked like this. Works for us (we being wide-open-spaces kinds of guys). Note the ubiquitous train tracks. We marveled at the number of freight trains we saw on this trip.

In downtown Fresno this building has Newton's hymn as a giant mural. I spotted it in the rear-view mirror and had to get a photo.

The next section of the Dewey Decimal mural in the Fresno County Free Library main branch depicts the 200s, religion. It was here that I became familiar with the inscription at Delphi, and motto of Socrates, Γνωθι σεαυτον (or "know thyself") and the Decalogue in Hebrew. I commend the Hebrew Decalogue to y'all - so you will know that the first commandment is not even a commandment but a declaration: "I am YHWH your God who brought you up out of Egypt." All the rest follows from this. It is personal, relational, and grounded in salvation history; not abstract.

To the right the mural progresses into society and government.

It is very difficult to take decent photos while in motion (yes, I was driving but put Bill to work on the camera here). We were trying to get a shot for Mimi showing her that western waterways were not all as small as the Rio Grande. Very limited success, alas. And no, Grandmère, I am not contending that any of them matches the Mighty Mississippi. LOL. We were driving through the Delta and I wanted a good shot of the Sacramento River.

That's all for today.
--the BB

Bad day on Wall Street

Now, we are staring at the kind of mess you get when you give two-year-olds a few buckets of paint and tell the baby-sitter to take the day off. Clean-up is going to be a bitch.
--Andrew Leonard at Salon

h/t to Mahablog
--the BB

Senator Sheldon Whitehouse asks an important question

h/t to dday at Digby's Hullabaloo
--the BB

Having trouble keeping track?

Well, now there's an online resource to help you out by counting John McCain's lies:

Count the Lies at McCainpedia

h/t to John Aravosis
--the BB

Senator Biden delivers the speech we've been waiting for

Note: it runs just over 30 minutes. But even a few are great to listen to.



You can read the text as prepared for delivery here.

We've seen this movie before, folks. But as everyone knows, the sequel is always worse than the original.

If we forget this history, we're going to be doomed to repeat it -- with four more just like the last eight, or worse. If you're ready for four more years of George Bush, John McCain is your man.

Just as George Herbert Walker Bush was nicknamed "Bush 41" and his son is known as "Bush 43," John McCain could easily become known as "Bush 44."
....

John McCain is so firmly in their corner he thinks the Exxon-Mobils of the world should get an additional $4 billion dollars a year in tax cuts.

h/t to icebergsim at Daily Kos

Update: You owe it to yourself to listen to this speech. It's energizing.
--the BB

Ever met Sarah Palin on a picket line?

She will do whatever she can to keep you from having an abortion, even if you are raped. [See the article here.]

I do not encourage abortion. I cannot imagine it being a happy choice to make. I consider it a tragic and very personal choice in which I have no right to interfere. And I believe that sometimes it is the right thing to do.

I strongly champion sex education and access to contraceptive methods. Those who would keep people ignorant of their own bodies and deny them the means of contraception while also denouncing abortion are, to my thinking, nothing less than cruel and utterly hypocritical. [Are you listening, Ratso?] Population growth is one of the worst threats to our planet and the future of our descendants. I have no patience with the barefoot, pregnant, and chained to the stove school of piggery.

Getting back on topic, I would suggest that Sarah Palin is not in synch with 2/3 of the American citizenry. It is up to that 2/3 to make certain she and her equally noxious running-mate are NOT elected.

Remember, the Supreme Court of the next couple of decades is at stake.

So, for that matter, is American democracy.
--the BB

McDeception

I am glad to see him being called out on it.

Pork Barrel Palin

Kagro X informs us:

It's been 652 days since Earmark Queen Sarah Palin took office as Governor of Alaska.

In that time, she's hustled for $453,000,000 in federal lipstick pork.

That's $694,785.28 a day. Six hundred ninetey-four thousand, seven hundred and eight five dollars and twenty-eight cents. Every day. Even Sundays!

That's some fiscal responsibility and momentum for change there!

Granted, it's only marginally higher than the pork for Senator Obama's state of Illinois, though one might say that Illinois has a higher population and being one of two senators is not the same as being the only governor. In any case, she can hardly posture righteously in this area - though she is trying her damnedest to do so.

Let's call her on her bullshit, shall we?

And no, the pig portrayed is not an attack on her gender - it's an attack on her politics and, admittedly, her greedy, ambitious person.

The gall of these people!
--the BB

If you think Sarah Palin represents women, think again

h/t to John Aravosis at Americablog
--CC

Commander Coalfire

That's my new name from the Sarah Palin Baby Name Generator. [Well, have you noticed the names of her children?]

I am in awe of my own testosterone now.

h/t to Padre Mickey. This time, Eileen, it's all HIS fault!
--CC

While we've been waiting for Obama's gloves to come off....

From his campaign comes this:

In case anyone was still wondering whether John McCain is running the sleaziest, most dishonest campaign in history, today Karl Rove -- the man who held the previous record -- said McCain's ads have gone too far.

Gotta love it.

Oh, and here's the video of Rove:



Which reminds me - why isn't Karl Rove in prison?

h/t to David Mizner at Daily Kos
--the BB