That About Sums it Up

Here is an Op-Ed piece from Donald Sutherland (actor) that was submitted to the Huffington Post.
Quoting:
"It is incomprehensible to me that Mrs. Clinton can seriously be touting the notion, with the support of the punditocracy of CNN and Fox, that she is leading in the popular vote and should therefore be seriously considered as the most electable candidate in the November election. She's including those who voted for her in Florida and Michigan's name recognition ballot saying that to exclude them would be to disenfranchise them. What about the Democrats in Alaska, American Samoa, Colorado, Idaho, Kansas, Minnesota, New Mexico, North Dakota, Nebraska, Washington, Hawaii and Wyoming who did not cast ballots because they were playing by the pledged delegates playbook and voted by caucus. What about them? Certainly if the rules are going to be changed and judgment is based on the 'popular' vote those voters in the eleven caucus states and Samoa will be disenfranchised. What about them?
And what about us? What about the American people? Haven't we had enough of Mrs. Clinton's mad antics in her pursuit of the realization of venal personal ambition; her 'say anything, do anything, no matter what' effort to manipulate our all too willing media to gull this country's populace into believing that her wretched illegitimacy is indeed legitimate. How much mendacity do we have to suffer, how much brazenness do we have to swallow before someone, anyone, has the decency, the common sense, to relieve us of this terrible trifle, this pathetic madness?"
----------------------------------
And, for your viewing pleasure, here is a video of a well-respected GOP Priest doing an invocation at a NY state fundraiser. He makes a complete mockery of a prayer, totally tasteless and incendiary. I'm sure you won't see it on any news shows.

This man's stupidity is endless!

Anybody with half a brain would know that this theory is flawed.  The surest way to piss off bees is to poke around with them while they're minding their own business.  

I guess it proves that he's operating on less than half a brain.

 http://www.236.com/feed/2008/05/19/bush_explains_beehive_theory_d_6620.php 

Hillary Clinton - When All Else Fails, Kill the SOB!

Let me start by saying that we should all have some minimum expectations of our leaders.  How these leaders meet our expectations is the measuring stick by which we can evaluate them.  If our expectations are low – then we don’t expect much (ie – George Bush).  If our expectations are high, especially during a political season such as this, we expect a lot, and justifiably so.  We expect a lot because of the promises they make, the superior judgment they purport, and the emotional investment that we make in the ideal that somehow our hopes will intersect with their vision for our future.

Another expectation I have is simply this:  If you are campaigning to convince people that you are best suited to occupy the highest office of the most powerful nation on the planet, and to be the leader of the free world……then you’ve got to have a tight reign on your lips……and have an intuitive understanding about how things will sound or be interpreted BEFORE YOU SAY THEM.

How does someone who’s been campaigning for President use the example of the un-expected assassination of an opponent as a justification for staying in the race?  How that could ever be political acceptable in a democracy like America?

HRC is no dummy.  She is shrewd, articulate, calculating, aggressive, determined, well-educated, politically savvy, and confident.  I really believe that she exemplifies each of these qualities.  But at the same time, she lacks temperance in some of these same qualities which pull the covers back on probably the most un-harnessed quality of all – ambition.

HRC has lived through the tumultuous run-up and aftermath of Evers, JFK, Malcolm, MLK, and RFK.  She’s touts here political experience, so she knows the gravity of invoking that memory.  In her feeble attempt at an explanation of the statement, she said the “Kennedy’s had been on here mind” due to the recent announcement of Ted Kennedy’s bleak diagnosis.  Damn!  That’s what you think about when you think of Ted Kennedy? Try again, HRC.

Here is something more sobering.  HRC has always talked about her connection to the Black community and how it has been a major pillar of support for her and Bill throughout the last 15+ years.  Since Obama has come on the scene however, obviously that support is not as “guaranteed” as it once seemed.  But, given her affinity to the Black community, wouldn’t she intuitively know how this would be interpreted.  Given the history of our country, wouldn’t she know how this analogy would sound?  This might be one of the most insensitive things ever perpetrated in this campaign.

The threat of assassination is one of those “un-spoken” but very real understandings shared by African-Americans who know the history of this country, and who know the power of a very, very few but highly corrosive elements in American society. This fear has always been there, just below the surface.  It started when Obama’s campaign reached that critical mass of viability and probability as the party nominee.  Some of us take it so seriously that we feared voting for Obama because we didn’t want to contribute to placing him in a sniper’s crosshairs.  This tragic dread of assassination is seldom spoken about because no one wants to bear having even a whiff of responsibility for planting this idea, much less any part in speaking it into a reality. 

Regardless of HRC’s true intent, this transgression is very hard to get over.  There are some likely reasons this happened.  Maybe:

1 – She wasn’t thinking and it just blurted out.

2 – The long grueling schedule of the campaign has made her fatigued.

3 – It was a Freudian slip revealing her real expectations or desires

4 – She’s desperate to win and will say anything at this point

5 – She’s just stating facts and sometimes facts are harsh

The way I see it, none of these reasons are acceptable because:

1 – A presidential candidate should be able to think on her feet better than that!

2 – If the campaign schedule is hard, just take a look at the before and after photos of presidents from inauguration day to their last day.  This is the easy part!

3 – If that is what she really wants or expects, then she’s not the candidate she claims to be

4 – Desperation will take you to your lowest point almost every time.

5 – Just because it’s a fact doesn’t make it applicable or appropriate.

Clinton should be ashamed of using such a despicable idea as a supporting reason for her to continue her lame campaign.

Here is Keith Olbermann’s Op-Ed piece on the topic.

 

Fox news co-signs the idea - by letting this woman get away with this remark....

Looking toward November, let's get educated on McCain

Here are some YouTube videos that analyze McCain's positions on some very important issues....

We cannot let this candidate win the White House in November! :  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEtZlR3zp4c

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TP1FjUp7bw

On a lighter note, some of Bush's funnier moments:  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKD_BSMXVjg

A Rare But Precious Find

I know you're gonna love this! Tim Wise should serve in Obama's cabinet as Secretary of telling it like it T-I-is!!!

Adjust your speakers to maximum volume, especially if you are in an integrated area.

Peace,

One Man's Opinion

Obama should pick Colin Powell for VP!

Now that the nomination is within close reach (don't want to jinx it and declare it just yet!), Obama must be strongly considering who should be his VP choice.  Several names has been offered up my pundits, analysts, and others.

I think he should look no further than Colin Powell.  Everyone really needs to check out the credentials on Powell.  I don't think you'll find a more qualified candidate and complement to Senator Obama.  

Here is my quick 30-second elevator sales pitch on the idea:

- His military record challenges McCain's record.

- He is very well-respected in Washington - even after the scapegoating that the Bush administration made of his service.  

- He balances out the "foreign policy experience" question raised as a deficiency in Obama's candidacy. 

- He is a very moderate Republican. (Talk about an equalizer!!!)

- Ex-National Security Advisor under Reagan

- Ex-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under Bush 41

- Ex -Secretary of State under Bush 43

- Lauded Military Strategist who executed Dessert Storm 

- Decorated soldier - earning the 3rd highest military award, plus others (Purple Heart, Bronze Star, etc.)

For a more thorough biography of his credentials, click here.

I really cannot think of a better choice for VP for Obama! Spread the word!!!

See this link for a great article in support of the Obama / Powell ticket.

Now, of course - everyone is saying, "Two black guys on the same ticket? Do you really think that is going to fly?" I say probably not, especially based on the results and sentiment throughout Appalachia.  Not if the people who perpetrated these acts have any pull. Click here.

Not if the publisher of this Georgia newspaper can print this stuff with impunity (click).

But if we could leave the harsh realities of American racism and just dream for 60 seconds about how it could be....two intelligent, able, hard-working, accomplished, spiritual men with dignity and values - serving as our leaders and as our image to the rest of the world. Men who did not get to where they are out of privilege, but ascended based on service to others and leadership based on genuine respect. And, oh yeah, they both happen to be "Black".

Just one man's opinion.

Pat Buchanan's Answer to Rev. Wright

You'll just have to read it for yourself....  Click here to go straight to the official website where Buchanan posts his views, or read the text below.

 

Let me re-iterate, 3 time Presidential candidate in the general election (not just the primaries), and a regular, respected contributor on MSNBC.  Fair and balanced?

----------------------------------------------------------------------- 

March 21, 2008

PJB: A Brief for Whitey

posted by Linda

By Patrick J. Buchanan

 

How would he pull it off? I wondered.

 How would Barack explain to his press groupies why he sat silent in a pew for 20 years as the Rev. Jeremiah Wright delivered racist rants against white America for our maligning of Fidel and Gadhafi, and inventing AIDS to infect and kill black people?

How would he justify not walking out as Wright spewed his venom about “the U.S. of K.K.K. America,” and howled, “God damn America!”

My hunch was right. Barack would turn the tables.

Yes, Barack agreed, Wright’s statements were “controversial,” and “divisive,” and “racially charged,” reflecting a “distorted view of America.”

But we must understand the man in full and the black experience out of which the Rev. Wright came: 350 years of slavery and segregation.

Barack then listed black grievances and informed us what white America must do to close the racial divide and heal the country.

The “white community,” said Barack, must start “acknowledging that what ails the African-American community does not just exist in the minds of black people; that the legacy of discrimination — and current incidents of discrimination, while less overt than in the past — are real and must be addressed. Not just with words, but with deeds … .”

And what deeds must we perform to heal ourselves and our country?

The “white community” must invest more money in black schools and communities, enforce civil rights laws, ensure fairness in the criminal justice system and provide this generation of blacks with “ladders of opportunity” that were “unavailable” to Barack’s and the Rev. Wright’s generations.

What is wrong with Barack’s prognosis and Barack’s cure?

Only this. It is the same old con, the same old shakedown that black hustlers have been running since the Kerner Commission blamed the riots in Harlem, Watts, Newark, Detroit and a hundred other cities on, as Nixon put it, “everybody but the rioters themselves.”

Was “white racism” really responsible for those black men looting auto dealerships and liquor stories, and burning down their own communities, as Otto Kerner said — that liberal icon until the feds put him away for bribery.

Barack says we need to have a conversation about race in America.

Fair enough. But this time, it has to be a two-way conversation. White America needs to be heard from, not just lectured to.

This time, the Silent Majority needs to have its convictions, grievances and demands heard. And among them are these:

First, America has been the best country on earth for black folks. It was here that 600,000 black people, brought from Africa in slave ships, grew into a community of 40 million, were introduced to Christian salvation, and reached the greatest levels of freedom and prosperity blacks have ever known.

Wright ought to go down on his knees and thank God he is an American.

Second, no people anywhere has done more to lift up blacks than white Americans. Untold trillions have been spent since the ’60s on welfare, food stamps, rent supplements, Section 8 housing, Pell grants, student loans, legal services, Medicaid, Earned Income Tax Credits and poverty programs designed to bring the African-American community into the mainstream.

Governments, businesses and colleges have engaged in discrimination against white folks — with affirmative action, contract set-asides and quotas — to advance black applicants over white applicants.

Churches, foundations, civic groups, schools and individuals all over America have donated time and money to support soup kitchens, adult education, day care, retirement and nursing homes for blacks.

We hear the grievances. Where is the gratitude?

Barack talks about new “ladders of opportunity” for blacks.

Let him go to Altoona and Johnstown, and ask the white kids in Catholic schools how many were visited lately by Ivy League recruiters handing out scholarships for “deserving” white kids.

Is white America really responsible for the fact that the crime and incarceration rates for African-Americans are seven times those of white America? Is it really white America’s fault that illegitimacy in the African-American community has hit 70 percent and the black dropout rate from high schools in some cities has reached 50 percent?

Is that the fault of white America or, first and foremost, a failure of the black community itself?

As for racism, its ugliest manifestation is in interracial crime, and especially interracial crimes of violence. Is Barack Obama aware that while white criminals choose black victims 3 percent of the time, black criminals choose white victims 45 percent of the time?

Is Barack aware that black-on-white rapes are 100 times more common than the reverse, that black-on-white robberies were 139 times as common in the first three years of this decade as the reverse?

We have all heard ad nauseam from the Rev. Al about Tawana Brawley, the Duke rape case and Jena. And all turned out to be hoaxes. But about the epidemic of black assaults on whites that are real, we hear nothing.

Sorry, Barack, some of us have heard it all before, about 40 years and 40 trillion tax dollars ago.

Lynching the (potential) First Lady? Star Jones response

Another AMAZING example of how the conservative media - through selective reporting - will sit on an obvious divisive, exploitive, and insensitive position. Was this a Freudian slip, just a fool with a microphone, or a call to arms like we often suspect is laced in the words in Osama bin Laden's video cameos?

How could something so inflammatory go un-acknowledged since it was first perpetrated on MARCH 19, 2008? Probably because it would have supported the very same racial themes that these same operatives were trying to use to discredit Obama vis-a-vis Jeremiah Wright.

Bill O'Reilly - esteemed journalist, respected reporter, and racial arsonist - talking about how Michelle Obama needs to be handled. 

Check the link.... 

Bill O'Reilly said:
'I don't want to go on a lynching party against Michelle Obama unless there's evidence, hard facts, that say this is how the woman really feels. If that's how she really feels - that is a bad country or a flawed nation, whatever - then that's legit. We'll track it down.'

He retracted this (kinda') 2 days later by saying:

"While talking to a radio caller, I said there should be no lynching in the case, that comment off Clarence Thomas saying he was the victim of a high tech lynching (he said that on 60 Minutes, you may remember). I'm sorry if my statement offended anybody. That, of course, was not the intention. Context is everything...."

Within O'Reilly's feeble apology and pointless justification lies the core issue.  A lack of common human respect for Black people.  Do you think if Harvey Weinstein's or Joe Leiberman's wives had made a similar statement about their pride in America, he would have used a metaphor of "sparing them the gas chamber until fair & balanced vetting was done?"

Star Jones jumped in with a very targeted and appropriate rebuttal.  A very thorough reprimand.  Unfortunately, we didn't hear about this either.  Thanks to the vigilance of people who care about truth, this was brought to my attention, and now I pass it on to you.

Jones said:

I'm sick to death of people like Fox News host, Bill O'Reilly, and his ilk thinking that he can use a racial slur against a black woman who could be the next First Lady of the United States, give a half-assed apology and not be taken to task and called on his crap. What the hell? If it's 'legit,' you're going to 'track it down?' And then what do you plan to do? How dare this white man with a microphone and the trust of the public think that in 2008, he can still put the words 'lynch and party' together in the same sentence with reference to a black woman; in this case, Michelle Obama? I don't care how you 'spin it' in the 'no spin zone,' that statement in and of itself is racist, unacceptable and inappropriate on every level.

O'Reilly claims his comments were taken out of context. Please don't insult my intelligence while you're insulting me. I've read the comments and heard them delivered in O'Reilly's own voice; and there is no right context that exists. So, his insincere apology and 'out-of-context' excuse is not going to cut it with me. And just so we're clear, this has nothing to do with the 2008 presidential election, me being a Democrat, him claiming to be Independent while talking Republican, the liberal media, or a conservative point of view. To the contrary, this is about crossing a line in the sand that needs to be drawn based on history, dignity, taste and truth.

Bill, I'm not sure of where you come from, but let me tell you what the phrase 'lynching party' conjures up to me, a black woman born in North Carolina ... Those words depict the image of a group of white men who are angry with the state of the own lives getting together, drinking more than they need to drink, lamenting how some black person has moved forward (usually ahead of them in stature or dignity), and had the audacity to think that they are equal. These same men for years, instead of looking at what changes, should and could be make in their own lives that might remove that bitterness born of perceived privilege, these white men take all of that resentment and anger and decide to get together and drag the closest black person near them to their death by hanging them from a tree - usually after violent beating, torturing and violating their human dignity. Check your history books, because you don't need a masters or a law degree from Harvard to know that is what constitutes a 'lynching party.'

Imagine, Michelle and Barack Obama having the audacity to think that they have the right to the American dream, hopes, and ideals. O'Reilly must think to himself: how dare they have the arrogance to think they can stand in front of this nation, challenge the status quo and express the frustration of millions? When this happens, the first thing that comes to mind for O'Reilly and people like him is: 'it's time for a party.' Not so fast...don't order the rope just yet.

Would O'Reilly ever in a million years use this phrase with reference to Elizabeth Edwards, Cindy McCain or Judi Nathan? I mean, in all of the statements and criticisms that were made about Judi Nathan, the one-time mistress turned missus, of former presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani, I never heard any talk of forming a lynch party because of something she said or did. So why is it that when you're referring to someone who's African-American you must dig to a historical place of pain, agony and death to symbolize your feelings? Lynching is not a joke to off-handedly throw around and it is not a metaphor that has a place in political commentary; provocative or otherwise. I admit that I come from a place of personal outrage here having buried my 90 year-old grandfather last year. This proud, amazing African-American man raised his family and lived through the time when he had to use separate water fountains, ride in the back of a bus, take his wife on a date to the 'colored section' of a movie theater, and avert his eyes when a white woman walked down the street for fear of what a white man and his cronies might do if they felt the urge to 'party'; don't tell me that the phrase you chose, Mr. O'Reilly, was taken out of context.

To add insult to injury, O'Reilly tried to 'clarify' his statements, by using the excuse that his comments were reminiscent of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas' use of the term 'high-tech lynching' during his confirmation hearing. I reject that analogy. You see Justice Thomas did mean to bring up the image of lynching in its racist context. He was saying that politics and the media were using a new technology to do to him what had been done to black men for many years -- hang him.

Regardless of if you agreed with Justice Thomas' premise or not, if in fact -- Bill O'Reilly was referencing it -- the context becomes even clearer. What annoys me more than anything is that I get the feeling that one of the reasons Bill O'Reilly made this statement, thinking he could get away with it in the first place, and then followed it up with a lame apology in a half-hearted attempt to smooth any ruffled feathers, is because he doesn't think that black women will come out and go after him when he goes after us. Well, he's dead wrong. Be clear Bill O'Reilly: there will be no lynch party for that black woman And this black woman assures you that if you come for her, you come for all of us.'

-- Star Jones Reynolds

The Facts They Fail to Mention

Here is some contextual information to help give a more complete view of the recent media barrage of acrimonious commentary against Obama and his so-called associates.....

In 1961, a young African-American man, after hearing President John F. Kennedy's challenge to, 'Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country,' gave up his student deferment, left college in Virginia and voluntarily joined the Marines.

In 1963, this man, having completed his two years of service in the Marines, volunteered again to become a Navy corpsman. (They provide medical assistance to the Marines as well as to Navy personnel.)

The man did so well in corpsman school that he was the valedictorian and became a cardiopulmonary technician. Not surprisingly, he was assigned to the Navy's premier medical facility, Bethesda Naval Hospital, as a member of the commander in chief's medical team, and helped care for President Lyndon B. Johnson after his 1966 surgery. For his service on the team, which he left in 1967, the White House awarded him three letters of commendation.
What is even more remarkable is that this man entered the Marines and Navy not many years after the two branches began to become integrated.

While this young man was serving six years on active duty, Vice President Dick Cheney, who was born the same year as the Marine/ sailor, received five deferments, four for being an undergraduate and graduate student and one for being a prospective father.

Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, both five years younger than the African-American youth, used their student deferments to stay in college until 1968. Both then avoided going on active duty through family connections.

Who is the real patriot? The young man who interrupted his studies to serve his country for six years or our three political leaders who beat the system? Are the patriots the people who actually sacrifice something or those who merely talk about their love of the country?

After leaving the service of his country, the young African-American finished his final year of college, entered the seminary, was ordained as a minister, and eventually became pastor of a large church in one of America's biggest cities.


This man is Rev. Jeremiah Wright, the retiring pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ.

McCain - Senility, or just plain Pandering?

The Huffington Post today has run a very informative OpEd piece on some of McCain's inconsistencies.  Says one thing, denies it later.  It's a great read - full of fact-based events that help frame up McCain in the context of trust-worthiness.

Click this line to go straight to the piece on the Huffington Post.

The text is below.

What John McCain Told Me, And What It Says About How Far He's Fallen

by Arianna Huffington

Update: Through a spokesperson with the colorful name Tucker Bounds, McCain has denied telling me he didn't vote for Bush in 2000. "It's not true," Bounds told the Washington Post, "and I ask you to consider the source."

My sentiments exactly -- because John McCain has a long history of issuing heartfelt denials of things that were actually true.

He denied ever talking with John Kerry about his leaving the GOP to be Kerry's '04 running mate -- then later admitted he had, insisting: "Everybody knows that I had a conversation."

He denied admitting that he didn't know much about economics, even though he'd said exactly thatto the Wall Street Journal. And the Boston Globe. And the Baltimore Sun.

He denied ever having asked for a budget earmark for Arizona, even though he had. On the record.

He denied that he'd ever had a meeting with comely lobbyist Vicki Iseman and her client Lowell Paxon, even though he had. And had admitted it in a legal deposition.

And those are just the outright denials. He's also repeatedly tried to spin away statements he regretted making (see: 100-year war, Iraq was a war for oil, etc.).

So, yes, by all means, "consider the source."

Original Post: At a dinner party in Los Angeles not long after the 2000 election, I was talking to a man and his wife, both prominent Republicans. The conversation soon turned to the new president. "I didn't vote for George Bush" the man confessed. "I didn't either," his wife added. Their names: John and Cindy McCain (Cindy told me she had cast a write-in vote for her husband).

The fact that this man was so angry at what George Bush had done to him, and at what Bush represented for their party, that he did not even vote for him in 2000 shows just how far he has fallen since then in his hunger for the presidency. By abandoning his core principles and embracing Bush -- both literally and metaphorically -- he has morphed into an older and crankier version of the man he couldn't stomach voting for in 2000.

McCain's fall has been Shakespearean -- and really hard to watch for those, like myself, who so admired and even loved him. His nobility and his true reformer years have given way to pandering in the service of ambition.

But a large portion of the electorate hasn't noticed the Shakespearean fall. How else to explain The 28/48 Disconnect -- wherein only a die-hard 28 percent of voters still approve of Bush, but 48 percent say they'd vote for McCain, who is running on the "more of the same" platform?

The thing is, these voters clearly still think of McCain as the maverick of 2000, a straight shooter who would never seek the embrace of a man he couldn't bring himself to vote for, nor accept the regular counsel of Karl Rove, the man behind the vile, race-baiting attacks on him during the 2000 campaign.

And the main reason for The 28/48 Disconnect is the mainstream media's ongoing membership in the John McCain Protection Society. They too continue to party -- and report on McCain -- like it's 1999.

Look at the slack they cut him after his infamous stroll through a Baghdad market was revealed as an utter sham. James Frey was eviscerated for far less. Or the slack they cut him after his repeatedconfusion of Sunni and Shia. Or the slack they cut him when his promise to run a "respectful" campaign ran aground on his sleazy attempt to connect Barack Obama and Hamas.

Every time McCain screws up, the media jump all over themselves to make it better, as if grandpa had said something embarrassing at the dinner table and it needed to be smoothed over as quickly as possible.

The latest example came late last week when the Straight Talk Express hit an oil slick and skidded off the road. Click here for the blow by blow, but, in short, McCain implied that Iraq is essentially a war for oil, then tried to take it back, explaining that he was actually talking about the first Gulf War, then, when pressed, denied that he was actually talking about the first Gulf War.

And, by and large, the media gave him a pass. Chris Matthews called the original war for oil comment "an astounding development," but most everyone else was too busy picking over the bones of the Wright/Obama carcass to give it much play.

Interestingly, McCain's mental meltdown over the reason we invaded Iraq was prompted by a comment from a McCain supporter who said he hoped a group called "Swift Boats for McCain" would be formed to help McCain in the campaign.

The gentleman needn't worry. The group already exists. It's called "the media." And they are very well-funded, and highly motivated. The Swift Boat Media for McCain are, for instance, going to make sure that we hear a lot more about the nuances of Obama's decision to not wear a flag pin on his lapel than about McCain's ideas on a little thing like the Iraq war.

Witness the reaction to McCain's repeated declarations that he thinks we should be in Iraq for "100 years." The DNC had the gall to use McCain's own words in an ad, causing McCain to flip out: "My friends, it's a direct falsification," he said, "and I'm sorry that political campaigns have to deteriorate in this fashion."

So, to review: using a candidate's own words against him is off limits, but making disgraceful insinuations about Hamas and Obama isn't.

But instead of nailing McCain on the "deterioration" of his ethics -- to say nothing of his logic and reasoning -- the Swift Boat Media dutifully repeated his talking points, as in this AP lede claiming, without reservation, that the DNC ad "falsely suggests John McCain wants a 100-year war in Iraq."

McCain tries to wriggle away from his "100 year" comment by saying that he wasn't talking about a hundred year war, but a very long term commitment of U.S. troops, like we have in Germany or South Korea. Maybe so, but the last time I looked no one was blowing up American soldiers in Wiesbaden.

The New Yorker's Rick Hertzberg, a writer who hasn't drunk the It's Still 2000 Kool-Aid, sums up McCain's Strangelovian "vision": "McCain wants to stay in Iraq until no more Americans are getting killed, no matter how long it takes and how many Americans get killed achieving that goal -- that is, the goal of not getting any more Americans killed. And once that goal is achieved, we'll stay."

The John McCain the media fell in love with in 2000 isn't on the ballot in 2008. And the proof has all but jumped up and grabbed the media by the throat: the ring-kiss of "agents of intolerance" Falwell and Robertson; the decision to make permanent tax cuts he twice voted against, saying he could not "in good conscience support" them; the campaign finance reformer replaced with a candidate whose campaign is run by lobbyists and fueled by loophole rides on his wife's jet; the hard-line stance against torture replaced by a vote allowing waterboarding; the guarded-by-a-battalion stroll through the "safe" neighborhoods of Baghdad; the use of Karl Rove as an advisor... and the embracing of the disastrous policies of a man he so abhorred he would not vote for him.

What will it take for the Swift Boat Media to realize that John McCain jumped the shark a long, long time ago?

Hillary's 5 Big Mistakes

Great Article published today on web.  The url is:  The 5 Mistakes Clinton Made

Below is the text.

By KAREN TUMULTY

Thu May 8, 11:40 AM ET

For all her talk about "full speed on to the White House," there was an unmistakably elegiac tone to Hillary Clinton's primary-night speech in Indianapolis. And if one needed further confirmation that the undaunted, never-say-die Clintons realize their bid might be at an end, all it took was a look at the wistful faces of the husband and the daughter who stood behind the candidate as she talked of all the people she has met in a journey "that has been a blessing for me."

It was also a journey she had begun with what appeared to be insurmountable advantages, which evaporated one by one as thecampaign dragged on far longer than anyone could have anticipated. She made at least five big mistakes, each of which compounded the others:

1. She misjudged the mood
That was probably her biggest blunder. In a cycle that has been all about change, Clinton chose an incumbent's strategy, running on experience, preparedness, inevitability - and the power of the strongest brand name in Democratic politics. It made sense, given who she is and the additional doubts that some voters might have about making a woman Commander in Chief. But in putting her focus on positioning herself to win the general election in November, Clinton completely misread the mood of Democratic-primary voters, who were desperate to turn the page. "Being the consummate Washington insider is not where you want to be in a year when people want change," says Barack Obama's chief strategist, David Axelrod. Clinton's "initial strategic positioning was wrong and kind of played into our hands." But other miscalculations made it worse:

2. She didn't master the rules
Clinton picked people for her team primarily for their loyalty to her, instead of their mastery of the game. That became abundantly clear in a strategy session last year, according to two people who were there. As aides looked over the campaign calendar, chief strategist Mark Penn confidently predicted that an early win in California would put her over the top because she would pick up all the state's 370 delegates. It sounded smart, but as every high school civics student now knows, Penn was wrong: Democrats, unlike the Republicans, apportion their delegates according to vote totals, rather than allowing any state to award them winner-take-all. Sitting nearby, veteran Democratic insider Harold M. Ickes, who had helped write those rules, was horrified - and let Penn know it. "How can it possibly be," Ickes asked, "that the much vaunted chief strategist doesn't understand proportional allocation?" And yet the strategy remained the same, with the campaign making its bet on big-state victories. Even now, it can seem as if they don't get it. Both Bill and Hillary have noted plaintively that if Democrats had the same winner-take-all rules as Republicans, she'd be the nominee. Meanwhile, the Clinton campaign now acknowledges privately:

3. She underestimated the caucus states
While Clinton based her strategy on the big contests, she seemed to virtually overlook states like Minnesota, Nebraska and Kansas, which choose their delegates through caucuses. She had a reason: the Clintons decided, says an adviser, that "caucus states were not really their thing." Her core supporters - women, the elderly, those with blue-collar jobs - were less likely to be able to commit an evening of the week, as the process requires. But it was a little like unilateral disarmament in states worth 12% of the pledged delegates. Indeed, it was in the caucus states that Obama piled up his lead among pledged delegates. "For all the talent and the money they had over there," says Axelrod, "they - bewilderingly - seemed to have little understanding for the caucuses and how important they would become."

By the time Clinton's lieutenants realized the grave nature of their error, they lacked the resources to do anything about it - in part because:

4. She relied on old money
For a decade or more, the Clintons set the standard for political fund-raising in the Democratic Party, and nearly all Bill's old donors had re-upped for Hillary's bid. Her 2006 Senate campaign had raised an astonishing $51.6 million against token opposition, in what everyone assumed was merely a dry run for a far bigger contest. But something had happened to fund-raising that Team Clinton didn't fully grasp: the Internet. Though Clinton's totals from working the shrimp-cocktail circuit remained impressive by every historic measure, her donors were typically big-check writers. And once they had ponied up the $2,300 allowed by law, they were forbidden to give more. The once bottomless Clinton well was drying up.

Obama relied instead on a different model: the 800,000-plus people who had signed up on his website and could continue sending money his way $5, $10 and $50 at a time. (The campaign has raised more than $100 million online, better than half its total.) Meanwhile, the Clintons were forced to tap the $100 million - plus fortune they had acquired since he left the White House - first for $5 million in January to make it toSuper Tuesday and then $6.4 million to get her through Indiana and North Carolina. And that reflects one final mistake:

5. She never counted on a long haul
Clinton's strategy had been premised on delivering a knockout blow early. If she could win Iowa, she believed, the race would be over. Clinton spent lavishly there yet finished a disappointing third. What surprised the Obama forces was how long it took her campaign to retool. She fought him to a tie in the Feb. 5 Super Tuesday contests but didn't have any troops in place for the states that followed. Obama, on the other hand, was a train running hard on two or three tracks. Whatever the Chicago headquarters was unveiling to win immediate contests, it always had a separate operation setting up organizations in the states that were next. As far back as Feb. 21, Obama campaign manager David Plouffe was spotted in Raleigh, N.C. He told the News & Observer that the state's primary, then more than 10 weeks away, "could end up being very important in the nomination fight." At the time, the idea seemed laughable.

Now, of course, the question seems not whether Clinton will exit the race but when. She continues to load her schedule with campaign stops, even as calls for her to concede grow louder. But the voice she is listening to now is the one inside her head, explains a longtime aide. Clinton's calculation is as much about history as it is about politics. As the first woman to have come this far, Clinton has told those close to her, she wants people who invested their hopes in her to see that she has given it her best. And then? As she said in Indianapolis, "No matter what happens, I will work for the nominee of the Democratic Party because we must win in November." When the task at hand is healing divisions in the Democratic Party, the loser can have as much influence as the winner. View this article on Time.com