Year: 2008

Alaska’s Biggest Newspaper Endorses Obama

Jon Ponder

The endorsement from the Anchorage Daily News skewers John McCain, goes easier on Sarah Palin:
“[McCain] declared that ‘the fundamentals of our economy are strong’ at 9 a.m. one day and by 11 a.m. was describing an economy in crisis … His behavior in this crisis — erratic is a kind description — shows him to be ill-equipped to lead the essential effort of reining in a runaway financial system and setting an anxious nation on course to economic recovery.”
– Anchorage Daily News

Gov. Palin’s nomination clearly alters the landscape for Alaskans as we survey this race for the presidency — but it does not overwhelm all other judgment. The election, after all is said and done, is not about Sarah Palin, and our sober view is that her running mate, Sen. John McCain, is the wrong choice for president at this critical time for our nation.

Sen. Barack Obama, the Democratic nominee, brings far more promise to the office. In a time of grave economic crisis, he displays thoughtful analysis, enlists wise counsel and operates with a cool, steady hand. The same cannot be said of Sen. McCain.

Since his early acknowledgement that economic policy is not his strong suit, Sen. McCain has stumbled and fumbled badly in dealing with the accelerating crisis as it emerged. He declared that “the fundamentals of our economy are strong” at 9 a.m. one day and by 11 a.m. was describing an economy in crisis. He is both a longtime advocate of less market regulation and a supporter of the huge taxpayer-funded Wall Street bailout. His behavior in this crisis — erratic is a kind description — shows him to be ill-equipped to lead the essential effort of reining in a runaway financial system and setting an anxious nation on course to economic recovery.

Sen. Obama warned regulators and the nation 19 months ago that the subprime lending crisis was a disaster in the making. Sen. McCain backed tighter rules for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, but didn’t do much to advance that legislation. Of the two candidates, Sen. Obama better understands the mortgage meltdown’s root causes and has the judgment and intelligence to shape a solution, as well as the leadership to rally the country behind it. It is easy to look at Sen. Obama and see a return to the smart, bipartisan economic policies of the last Democratic administration in Washington, which left the country with the momentum of growth and a budget surplus that President George Bush has squandered.

On the most important issue of the day, Sen. Obama is a clear choice.

Is Obama Running Out of Money?

Trish

No one wins an election solely because they had the most money, but there is no doubt that proper funding is a great advantage. The Obama campaign is known as a cash king, but that reputation could be a problem in itself if too many people think Obama doesn’t need the money. Candidates always need the money.

Donate now. In ten days, it will be too late.

Democrat Obama spent more than $105 million during the first two weeks of October, according to new campaign finance reports, and reported raising only $36 million during that period, about half his pace in September when he brought in a record $150 million.

Obama had nearly $66 million in the bank as of Oct. 15, and the Democratic National Committee and a joint Obama-party victory fund had another $31 million combined.

McCain and the Republican National Committee reported having a combined $84 million as of Oct. 15 to spend before Election Day. McCain, who has accepted $84.1 million in public money, had spent all but $25 million as of mid-month…

In seven key swing states – Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Virginia – Obama ran more than double the number of ads between Oct. 6 and Oct. 22 than McCain, 53,049 to 21,106, Nielsen Media Research reported yesterday…

McCain and his running mate, Sarah Palin, meanwhile, tried to douse a furor over how their side spent theirs.

The RNC came under scrutiny after reporting this week that it had spent about $150,000 in September on wardrobe and cosmetics after Palin joined the GOP ticket.

This is crunch time, guys. We’ve come this far, but to go all the way the Obama campaign needs money. Don’t worry, they’ll spend it wisely. Think of it as an investment. We are all investing in the kind of future we want, not the kind McCain/Palin would give us.

It’s the difference between creating clean-energy jobs and shooting wolves from helicopters, the difference between a sane approach to health care and more tax cuts for the rich, the difference between frank truths and whispered lies.

Donate now. In ten days, it will be too late.

Rove: People in Pennsylvania ‘Really Do Cling to Their Guns and Their Faith

Jon Ponder

From Newshounds, where they watch Fox so we don’t have to (thanks!), we are presented with another hot, steaming pile of GOP hypocrisy:

In his “just wondering” voice (which is almost always accompanied by a self-serving agenda), Hannity asked, “I’m trying to understand, if John Murtha’s referring to people in Pennsylvania as racists and as rednecks, and we know what Barack Obama said about bitter Americans clinging to their guns and religion with antipathy towards those that aren’t like him. He was talking about the people in the state of Pennsylvania. I’m trying to understand, why would anybody in Pennsylvania vote for him when he said that in a, you know, in a real moment, that he didn’t think he was being recorded?”

A graphic of the state of Pennsylvania, with the number “21” for the number of electoral votes it has, helpfully appeared on the screen, obviously at the ready beforehand.

“Well, he’s got a problem,” Rove replied. “James Carville once famously referred to Pennsylvania as Pittsburgh on the west, Philadelphia on the east and Alabama in between. I think that was his way of sort of mimicking what John Murtha said. But it’s a conservative part of the state. And then if you take the far southwestern corner, over there near Pittsburgh and the suburbs, that’s coal country and that’s the kind of people who really do cling to their guns and their faith.”

And of course, just to tie it up with a nice bow, don’t expect the liberal media — or the Democrats — to hammer Rove the way the rightwingers (and the Clinton campaign) hammered Obama.

Mormons Have Donated 40% of Funds for Anti-Gay Marriage Prop 8 in California

Jon Ponder

It’s passing strange that the Mormons, of all people, are so bothered by the idea of same-sex marriage that they have donated 40 percent of the funding — almost $11 million — to promote Proposition 8, the ballot initiative that would amend the California Constitution to make it illegal for gays to marry.
If you don’t like to be reminded that your grandparents were polygamists, why entangle yourself in another group’s struggle for marriage rights?
You might think that Mormons would be more tolerant than others toward nontraditional marriage practices, since their antecedents practiced polygamy for more than a century after the church was founded in the 1830s. The Church of Latter Day Saints (LDS) stopped sanctioning plural marriages after 1904, but existing polygamous arrangements were allowed to continue, and many of these lasted until the 1950s. Polygamy is still practiced among Mormon splinter groups like the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, or FLDS.

The fact that many mainstream Mormons are embarrassed by their polygamous heritage makes their activism in California appear not only intolerant and mean, but also clueless. Entangling themselves in another group’s struggle for the right to marry is bound to bring comparisons with their own.

Even so, the good guys are winning the money race, but just barely. With just 10 days to go before the vote, the no-on-8, pro-gay marriage side has raised $31.2 million. But anti-gay forces are nearly even, with $27.5 million.

Fittingly, one of the largest donations to the pro-marriage cause came from WordPerfect founder Bruce Bastion, a gay ex-Mormon who gave $1 million, in part to counter the efforts of his former co-religionists.

On the other hand, this leader of a wealthy and powerful homophobe organization apparently didn’t get the memo that the majority donors to the cause were members of a former polygamist sect:

From his base in Tupelo, Miss., Tim Wildmon, president of the American Family Assn., said his group gave $500,000 to the Yes-on-8 campaign for moral reasons.

“We believe in the Bible, and the Bible teaches that marriage is between one man and one woman,” he said. “That is how the human race continues.”

Wildmon said he fears that if the initiative doesn’t pass, children will be taught about same-sex marriage in schools. And he worries that other things might follow.

“If you change the definition and have no moral standard, then honestly what is wrong with polygamy?” Wildmon asked. “On what basis do you deny three men getting married, or a man with five wives?”

Wildmon is lying, of course. The Bible does not teach that “marriage is between one man and one woman.” Quite the opposite. Polygamy was practiced by Abraham, the father of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, and by both King David and King Solomon, among others.

And as Wildmon surely knows, current laws against polygamy will not be affected by Prop 8, one way or another.

Update 11/10/08: The final tally shows that as much as 70 percent of Prop 8 funding from individuals came from Mormons.

Yes, We Carve

Trish



Check out YesWeCarve.com before you slice into your Halloween pumpkin for ideas and templates to create your own Barack-o-Lantern. You can even have a BYOP (Bring Your Own Pumpkin) party and compete for an orange iPod. Download a stencil, submit a pun-kin (The Squashacity of Hope and Joe Pumpkin Pie-den are taken), upload photos of your own Jack O-Bama, and see tons of photos of pumpkins. Unfortunately many of them look like I carved them, but they still make great yard signs.

An Accessory Possibly Worth $150,000

Trish

Obama/Biden Florida Field Organizer Jaylen McGrew

I just came from seeing Jill Biden speak, after introductions by Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), and his wife, Grace. Dr. Biden, a community college professor, was as great in person as she seemed from the convention cameras, and like the rest of the Obama campaign, urged Florida Democrats to vote early.

I was so taken with Jaylen’s hat that I was a bad reporter and failed to ask how he spells his name. If I find out later I have it wrong, I will update. Thanks for being a great sport, Jaylen, and for all the work you and the other volunteers are doing!

Update: I had it wrong. Now it’s right!

More Than 10 Percent of Those Registered Have Already Voted in Some Parts of Florida

Trish

Early voting continues at a brisk pace in Florida, and in my own county, the supervisor of elections reports that on Day Five, more than 10 percent of those registered have already cast their ballots. At this rate, there will be no one left to vote on Election Day.

That scenario would only bode well for Obama, since it’s his campaign that is pushing early voting, and Democrats who are most suspicious of having their votes stolen. We have been making canvassing calls at my local Obama headquarters, which have two purposes: ask people for a commitment to vote for Obama, and then urge them to vote early. The response is mostly favorable on both counts.

In Florida, early voting sites are open on Saturdays as well as Monday through Friday. If you’re a Floridian and don’t know where to go to vote, the Division of Elections has posted a PDF of all the early voting sites in the state.