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It's absolutely uncanny. Absolutely every accusation or smear that the McCain campaign hurls at Barack Obama comes back worse for McCain. I'm halfway seriously expecting a registration card for McCain from the '50s to turn up with "Communist" marked as party affiliation.
And after solemnly announcing that we were possibly on the brink of 'destroying the fabric of democracy' due to ACORN and their ties to Obama at the final debate, it turns out that McCain has his own little acorns...or at least, nuts, perpetrating REAL fraud that has stolen votes from REAL Americans, by registering voters as Republicans without their consent or knowledge and tearing up Democratic registrations in several states.
Gus Ayer was the Mayor of Fountain Valley in Orange County when he first became a good friend of Blue America's. Today he's a senior advisor to Debbie Cook's congressional campaign. The other day we were talking about the difficulties a progressive challenger faces in a red district, especially with a DCCC seemingly so dedicated to electing lots and lots and lots of dull, go-along-to-get-along Blue Dogs. Debbie's neither a Blue Dog nor someone who goes along with anything she hasn't gone over thoroughly from every angle. As of September 30th, her opponent, Dana Rohrabacher, had $497,388 left to spend on a blitz of negative media. Debbie, who is getting zero help from the DCCC, is left with $30,284. Several Orange County Democrats pooled their money and came up with a $10,000 package that they are challenging DWT and Crooks & Liars readers to match today. Gus is joining us in the comments section here from 3-4pm PT to discuss the campaign. Here's his take on what's happening right now:
Dana Rohrabacher’s handlers have been keeping him out of the public eye because they know he’s really crazier than Michelle Bachman. He might talk about the Iraq war going badly because Bush picked the really handsome generals instead of the smart ones, rant about the threat from asteroids and the need for a “Death Star” in space, or start shouting about feminists, environmentalists, Mexicans and Chinese ruining America, or terrorists killing your family at Disneyland.
By contrast, Debbie Cook really represents the values of the district, an athlete who married her college sweetheart, and followed a progression of small business owner, PTA President, environmental activist, environmental attorney, then eight years on the City Council and as Mayor of Huntington Beach. She’s smart, driven, decent, and surprisingly modest, and for the last three years, she’s been working to educate local and regional leaders on Peak Oil and renewable energy.
Debbie doesn’t mince words about women’s issues, marriage equality, getting out of Iraq, or the need for single payer health. But her passion is energy and the need to act now to leave fossil fuels before they leave us.
We’re riding a wave of change here in Surf City, and Republicans panicked when they finally did internal polling and showed the race within the margin of error. We’ve gotten great response to our ads on cable, and we can still increase our buy for the last week. We’re on track to knock on almost every door in the district before the election more than once, and we’re getting tremendous support for GOTV from every environmental group, the unions, the nurses, PDA, and DFA.
We have targeted mail ready to go to hit the low-propensity voters and remind younger voters, women, seniors, veterans, Latinos, and Vietnamese that Rohrabacher is a ZERO while Debbie is a HERO. Every dollar you give today goes out the door to communicate to voters.
A series of donors have made a $10,000 matching dollar for dollar pledge.
And donating will allow them to keep this ad up on TV:
I was going to make a video from Hannity and Colmes last night about Biden's remark, but it was so disgusting that I couldn't do it. Hey Sean, how's the white supremacist Hal Turner doing? He's your pal and has his own radio show because of you...Say hi for me will you?
The Nation did a feature on it.
This year a man named Hal Turner sat before his computer at his suburban home in North Bergen, New Jersey, posting bomb-making tips on his website, hailing the firebombing of an apartment containing "Savage Negroes" and calling for the murder of immigrants. "When enough illegal aliens get killed they will stop coming to the country!" Turner wrote.
Turner was once a prominent activist in New Jersey's Republican Party. To area conservatives, he was best known by his moniker for call-ins to the Sean Hannity Show, "Hal from North Bergen." For years, Hannity offered his top-rated radio show as a regular forum for Turner's occasionally racist, always over-the-top rants. Hannity also chatted with him off-air, allegedly offering encouragement to Turner as he struggled to overcome a cocaine habit and homosexual leanings. Turner has boasted that Hannity once invited Turner and his son on to the set of Fox News's Hannity and Colmes. Today, Turner lurks on the fringes of the far right, spouting hate-laced tirades on his webcast radio show. Hannity, meanwhile, remains mum about his former alliance with the neo-Nazi, homing in instead on the supposed racism of black and Latino Democrats...read on
Gov. Sarah Palin charged the state for her children to travel with her, including to events where they were not invited, and later amended expense reports to specify that they were on official business.
The charges included costs for hotel and commercial flights for three daughters to join Palin to watch their father in a snowmobile race, and a trip to New York, where the governor attended a five-hour conference and stayed with 17-year-old Bristol for five days and four nights in a luxury hotel.
In all, Palin has charged the state $21,012 for her three daughters' 64 one-way and 12 round-trip commercial flights since she took office in December 2006. In some other cases, she has charged the state for hotel rooms for the girls.
Alaska law does not specifically address expenses for a governor's children. The law allows for payment of expenses for anyone conducting official state business.[..]
Back in April, John McCain and his allies taunted Barack Obama as the choice of Hamas in the wake of remarks by a spokesman for that organization. Now with the news that Al Qaeda web sites are seemingly backing McCain for President, the Republican might want to reconsider that line of attack. And to be sure, John McCain should steer clear of touting "Osama the Terrorist" at his rallies.
As the Washington Post detailed Wednesday, Al Qaeda cadres see a McCain as the best bet to perpetuate the policies of President Bush they see bankrupting the United States and the West:
"Al-Qaeda will have to support McCain in the coming election," said a commentary posted Monday on the extremist Web site al-Hesbah, which is closely linked to the terrorist group. It said the Arizona Republican would continue the "failing march of his predecessor," President Bush...
...It further suggested that a terrorist strike might swing the election to McCain and guarantee an expansion of U.S. military commitments in the Islamic world.
"It will push the Americans deliberately to vote for McCain so that he takes revenge for them against al-Qaeda," said the posting, attributed to Muhammad Haafid, a longtime contributor to the password-protected site. "Al-Qaeda then will succeed in exhausting America."
Of course, the claim that John McCain is supported by Al Qaeda is hyperbole that normally would deserve no place in American politics. (That said, the ironies abound for the man who said "I know how" to get Osama Bin Laden and would follow him to "the gates of hell.") But as recent history shows, slanders have become the centerpiece of the McCain campaign.
In April, as you might recall, John McCain showed no compunction in claiming Barack Obama was supported by Hamas.
"There is no question that western Pennsylvania is a racist area."
Looking to take advantage of the gaffe and impute Murtha's comments onto Obama, McCain brought it up during an event in Western Pennsylvania Tuesday. Unfortunately for him, he couldn't have botched it any worse.
"You know, I think you may have noticed that Senator Obama's supporters have been saying some pretty nasty things about Western Pennsylvania lately," McCain told the audience in the town of Moon Township. "And you know, I couldn't agree with them more." I couldn't disagree with you. I couldn't agree with you more than the fact that Western Pennsylvania is the most patriotic, most god-loving, most, most patriotic part of America, and this is a great part of the country."
Oops. The look on the faces of the people behind him is classic.
Now we get to see and hear "Shotgun" Randy Kuhl (R-Hair Club for Men) say on camera that he "firmly believes" that Democrats want the American People to suffer and to hurt." No, really. Here's the exact quote:
I firmly believe the Democratic majority wants the American public to suffer and to hurt so that they can make some political gains at election time, and I think that's wrong.
Excuse me, Randy? Did you really just say that? The tape doesn't lie, I guess.
I have just about enough of this crap from GOP dweebs nationwide, but this addition to their 2008 Hall of Shame is simply beyond the pale.
I understand that Randy is polling well behind progressive Eric Massa and that desperate times call for desperate measures and all, but this is ridiculous.
Another day, another McCarthyite. The hate and vitriol pouring through this election is bone chilling to me. I'm trying to understand how we can ever go back to being an United States of America.
At the annual convention of the Mortgage Bankers' Assn., former White House guru Karl Rove debated the 2008 presidential election -- and the current economic meltdown -- with former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell.
Up on the stage walks a well-dressed woman, name as yet unknown. First she complained that there was no woman on the panel. Then she drew out handcuffs and tried to arrest Rove for treason.
She was quickly ushered off the stage.
The exchange between George Mitchell and Karl Rove on negative campaigning may very well be the best part of the clip. Be sure to watch til the end.
Just another example of how indispensable Jon Stewart and the Daily Show are, catching things the media don't. McCain and Palin (indeed, the entire GOP establishment) have been bashing Obama as a "socialist" the past few days for having the audacity to propose raising the top tax rate from 36% to 39% while giving working folks (95% of the rest of us) some relief. The only problem: Stewart dug up footage of McCain making the exact same argument a scant eight years ago.
Stewart: "Now you can argue that this country has dabbled in socialism ever since the income tax was introduced, and that calling Obama's plan 'socialist' is a cynical ploy that even McCain realizes is a bankrupt tactic. Or, should I say, realized."
Audience member: "Why is it that someone like my father who goes to school for 13 years gets penalized in a huge tax bracket because he's a doctor."
McCain: "I think it's to some degree because we feel obviously that wealthy people can afford more."
Audience member: "Are we getting closer and closer to, like, socialism?"
McCain: "Here's what I really believe: That when you reach a certain level of comfort, there's nothing wrong with paying somewhat more."
Stewart: "That, of course, is the late socialist leader John Mccain. I believe he passed away during the Republican primaries. He will be missed."
Devastating. I smell a viral YouTube video brewing. Or an awesome Obama ad.
Southern Poverty Law Center: The smears, lies, and eliminationist rhetoric emanating from the right in this election cycle aren't surprising to many observers. Membership in various hate groups has been rising steadily since 2000. These people aren't just preparing themselves to go into opposition, they're preparing themselves to dispute the legitimacy of an Obama presidency -- in ways that could, if taken to extreme, lead to another Oklahoma City, or worse.
Intimidation is a big part of Republican strategy to keep turn out low. Latinos should band together and show up to vote in groups of at least four so that they won't be intimidated when someone tries to deny them the right to legally vote. Republicans are deathly afraid of the Latino influence in elections ever since Sennsenbrenner tried to call them all felons and the radical right shot down any attempt to get an immigration deal. Why do you think Rove and Bush tried to pass that legislation?
Greg and Robert Kennedy, Jr. have a new article out in Rolling Stone called: Block The Vote:
This November, what happened to Maez will happen to hundreds of thousands of voters across the country. In state after state, Republican operatives — the party's elite commandos of bare-knuckle politics — are wielding new federal legislation to systematically disenfranchise Democrats. If this year's race is as close as the past two elections, the GOP's nationwide campaign could be large enough to determine the presidency in November. "I don't think the Democrats get it," says John Boyd, a voting-rights attorney in Albuquerque who has taken on the Republican Party for impeding access to the ballot. "All these new rules and games are turning voting into an obstacle course that could flip the vote to the GOP in half a dozen states."
According to financial disclosure records, the accessorizing began in early September and included bills from Saks Fifth Avenue in St. Louis and New York for a combined $49,425.74.
The records also document a couple of big-time shopping trips to Neiman Marcus in Minneapolis, including one $75,062.63 spree in early September.
The RNC also spent $4,716.49 on hair and makeup through September after reporting no such costs in August.
And the McCain camp response?
“The campaign does not comment on strategic decisions regarding how financial resources available to the campaign are spent."
Our good friend John Aravosis over at AmericaBlog did some research and found that the RNC spent more on clothes in two months for Palin than the average American household spends in 80 years. Out of touch much?
UPDATE: (Nicole) Marc Ambinder reports that Republicans and RNC donors have been emailing him with their disgust of this use of funds. Surely there's a tight down-ticket race or two that could have used that money to buy more ads, something those Republican candidates won't forget if they lose. And will this expenditure be considered taxable income for Palin?
Gus Ayer was the Mayor of Fountain Valley in Orange County when he first became a good friend of Blue America's. Today he's a senior advisor to Debbie Cook's congressional campaign. The other day we were talking about the difficulties a progressive challenger faces in a red district, especially with a DCCC seemingly so dedicated to electing lots and lots and lots of dull, go-along-to-get-along Blue Dogs. Debbie's neither a Blue Dog nor someone who goes along with anything she hasn't gone over thoroughly from every angle. As of September 30th, her opponent, 
