USA Elections 2008

Barack Your Baby: Obama accepting babies through mail

2008-10-09T23:46:00.001+04:00

Barack Your Baby: Barack Obama travels a lot, but many babies live in places he hasn’t been. That’s why he’s now accepting babies by mail. Send him your baby, and he’ll kiss it and send it back to you.

Most Australians would vote for ObamaFrom

2008-10-09T21:34:00.001+04:00

Obama would win by landslide if world could vote United States only country where McCain won Obama leading in opinion polls since vote

IF Australians could vote for US president, Democrat Barack Obama would win by a landslide, according to a survey that was part of a global poll.

In fact if the whole world could vote, Obama would win by a landslide in all but one of the 17 countries polled by Reader's Digest magazine.

The odd one out was the United States where Republican John McCain was preferred by a narrow margin, the magazine said in an article posted on its website.

However, the surveys - with about 1000 participants in each country - were conducted from June 2 to July 7 and since then Senator Obama has been leading in opinion polls.

In Australia, 76 per cent of respondents said they would vote for Senator Obama, to Senator McCain's 10 per cent.

When asked if they were paying attention to the campaign, 85 per cent of Australians said they were, with 24 per cent of claiming a high level of interest.

But a resounding 71 per cent said they would not want to live in the United States.

Of the global picture, the magazine's polling director John Fredricks said: "It's Obama by a landslide - except in the country in which he's actually running for president".

"What is most striking is the margin of his support."

Senator Obama was preferred by more than 90 per cent in the Netherlands, by 85 per cent in Germany and by similar margins on all six continents, the magazine said.

Polling was conducted in Australia, Brazil, Britain, Canada, Finland, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Mexico, the Netherlands, Poland, Russia, Spain, South Africa, Taiwan, and the United States.

An interactive reader survey by The Economist delivered another resounding victory for Senator Obama.

The Economist has created a "Global Electoral College" in which readers in all of the world's 195 countries can cast votes on its website.

Mirroring the US system, each country is allocated a number of votes in proportion to its population.

In the US electoral college, a candidate needs to win 270 of a total 538 votes to win the White House. US voters cast ballots to decide who wins their state's electoral college votes, rather than voting for president directly.

"With over 6.5 billion people (worldwide) enfranchised, the result is a much larger electoral college of 9,875 votes," the Economist said of its global version.

"But rally your countrymen - a nation must have at least 10 individual votes in order to have its electoral college votes counted," it said.

Voting at www.economist.com/vote2008 will conclude on November 1 at midnight London time.

So far, Senator Obama had tallied 8455 global votes and Senator McCain 16 - from Andorra, Georgia and Macedonia.

From News.com.au

Sarah Palin banned at Madonna shows

2008-10-09T10:57:00.001+04:00

Pop superstar Madonna has banned US Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin from attending any of the dates on her current Sticky and Sweet world tour.

"Sarah Palin can't come to my party. Sarah Palin can't come to my show. It's nothing personal," Madonna announced from the stage during a gig in Meadowlands, New Jersey, last Saturday.

Madonna is believed to be backing Democrat presidential candidate Barack Obama in his campaign for the White House.

From The Star Online

Joe Biden's son leaves for Iraq

2008-10-08T04:20:00.000+04:00

Democratic vice presidential candidate and Delaware senator Joe Biden sent his son off to war Friday.

Joseph Biden III, 39, is a captain in the Delaware Army National Guard's 261st Signal Brigade. He is also the Delaware attorney general.

Biden said goodbye to his son and the rest of the national guard in a ceremony outside the state capitol.

"We take comfort in the knowledge that you are the best-trained, best-prepared group of citizen soldiers that our country to this day has ever sent into harm's way," Biden said.

Biden's unit leaves Sunday for Fort Bliss, Texas. There they will train for six weeks before heading to Iraq.

Love Child of Joe Biden and Sarah Palin

2008-10-08T03:33:00.002+04:00

Avi Muchnick, while commenting on intense sexual chemistry between Joe "Six-Pack" Biden and Sarah "Nukeyoolar" Palin, went ahead and had a closer look at alleged love child of Joe Biden and Sarah Palin.

Have a laugh!

From Aviary

Sarah Palin Winking Her Way to Vice... Presidency

2008-10-06T18:34:00.002+04:00

Sarah Palin, the wink says it all.

Oil Funded research in Sarah Palin's campaign against protection for Polar Bear

2008-10-06T12:21:00.000+04:00

The Republican Sarah Palin and her officials in the Alaskan state government drew on the work of at least six scientists known to be sceptical about the dangers and causes of global warming, to back efforts to stop polar bears being protected as an endangered species, the Guardian can disclose. Some of the scientists were funded by the oil industry.

In official submissions to the US government's consultation on the status of the polar bear, Palin and her team referred to at least six scientists who have questioned either the existence of warming as a largely man-made phenomenon or its severity. One paper was partly funded by the US oil company ExxonMobil.

The status of the polar bear has become a battleground in the debate on global warming. In May the US department of the interior rejected Palin's objections and listed the bear as a threatened species, saying that two-thirds of the world's polar bears were likely to be extinct by 2050 due to the rapid melting of the sea ice. Palin, governor of Alaska and the Republican nominee for US vice-president, responded last month by suing the federal government, to try to overturn the ruling. The case will be heard in January.

Though the state of Alaska has no polar bear specialists on its staff, the governor's stance has pitted it against the combined scientific fire-power of the US Fish and Wildlife Service, the US Geological Survey, and world experts on the mammal.

In its lawsuit, Alaska said it opposed the endangered label partly because the listing would "deter activities such as ... oil and gas exploration and development". Oil companies recently bid $2.7bn (£1.5bn) for rights to explore the Chuckchi sea, an established polar bear habitat.

The threatened species status might also impede the building of an Alaskan natural gas pipeline, which Palin has called the "will of God". In a letter last year to the US interior secretary, Dirk Kempthorne, she said she believed the polar bear population was "abundant, stable and unthreatened by direct human activity". She opposed the call for the listing because it "did not use the best available scientific and commercial information".

Her own Alaskan review of the science drew on a joint paper by seven authors, four of whom were well-known climate- change contrarians. Her paper argued that it was "certainly premature, if not impossible" to link temperature rise in Alaska with human CO2 emissions.

The paper, entitled Polar Bears of Western Hudson Bay and Climate Change, has been criticised for relying on old research and ignoring evidence that Arctic sea-ice is melting at a quickening pace. Walt Meier, a world authority on sea ice, based at the National Snow and Ice Data Centre, said: "The paper doesn't measure up scientifically."

One co-author of the paper, Willie Soon, completed the study with funding from ExxonMobil - which has oil operations in Alaska's North Slope - as well as from the American Petroleum Institute. Soon was a former senior scientist with the George C Marshall Institute, which acts as an incubator for climate-change scepticism. The institute has received $715,000 in funding from ExxonMobil since 1998.

In May, ExxonMobil announced that it was no longer funding Marshall and other groups linked with contrarian views. It said this was to avoid "distraction from the need to provide energy while reducing greenhouse gas emissions" and stressed that the company did not "control the research itself".

Another co-author of the document was Sallie Baliunas. In 2003 she and Soon were criticised when it was revealed that a joint paper had been partially funded by the American Petroleum Institute. Thirteen scientists whom they cited issued a rebuttal and several editors of the journal Climate Research resigned because of the "flawed peer review". A third co-author of the polar bear study, David Legates, a professor at Delaware University, is also associated with the Marshall Institute.

The citation by Palin and her officials prompted complaints from Congress. One member, Brad Miller, dubbed the polar bear study phony science.

Palin told Miller: "Attempts to discredit scientists ... simply because their analyses do not agree with your views, would be a disservice to this country." Miller now says that Palin's use of the paper shows she differs greatly from John McCain, the Republican presidential contender, who has pressed for scientific integrity. "Turning to the cottage industry of scientists who are funded because they spread doubt about global warming is not integrity," Miller said.

Palin's submission consulted J Scott Armstrong, a specialist in forecasting, who regards the global warming issue as "public hysteria".

Two other contrarian scholars were cited. One was Syun-Ichi Akasofu, formerly director of the International Arctic Research Centre, in Alaska, who argues that climate change could be a hangover from the little ice age. He is a founding director of the Heartland Institute, a thinktank that has received $676,500 from ExxonMobil since 1998.

Timothy Ball, a retired professor from Winnipeg, is cited for his climate and polar bear research. He has called human-made global warming "the greatest deception in the history of science". He has worked with both Friends of Science, and the Natural Resources Stewardship Project, which each had funding from energy firms.

Kert Davies, research director at Greenpeace US, said the state of Alaska under Palin's leadership had relied on scholars who argue the opposite view to that of the overwhelming consensus in the scientific community. "It shows that she is completely out of touch with the urgency of the climate crisis."

Last month Palin agreed that the Alaskan climate was changing but added: "I'm not one though who would attribute it to being man-made." She later tried to retract the statement.

Source: Guardian

Sarah Palin thinks Afghanistan and US are neighbours

2008-10-06T11:45:00.000+04:00

Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin called Afghanistan “our neighboring country” on Sunday in a speech that could revive questions over her tendency to stumble into linguistic knots.

Three days after a mostly gaffe-free debate performance, the Alaska governor fumbled during a speech in which she praised U.S. soldiers for “fighting terrorism and protecting us and our democratic values”.

“They are also building schools for the Afghan children so that there is hope and opportunity in our neighboring country of Afghanistan,” she told several hundred supporters at a fundraising event in San Francisco.

The gaffe could add fuel to comedians and late-night talk show hosts who have seized on her linguistic infelicities to portray her as someone not to be taken seriously.

Later in a speech in Omaha, Neb., Palin poked a little fun at herself when talking about one comedian in particular — actress Tina Fey whose dead-on impression of Palin’s looks, voice and body language has been a hit.

Fey, who bears an uncanny resemblance to Palin, has parodied her as a rambling, perky politician unfamiliar with world issues for three straight weeks on the comedy show “Saturday Night Live”.

“I was just trying to give Tina Fey more material — job security for Saturday Night Live,” Palin said.

The skits have become a sensation since an awkward interview with CBS News anchor Katie Couric in which Palin failed to coherently express her views about Russia, the U.S. government’s $700 billion financial bailout package, and the newspapers or magazines she reads.

In recent days, the 44-year-old self-described “hockey mom” has described the Couric interview as “less than successful”, and apologized to crowds of supporters for her shaky performance, saying she was “annoyed” and “impatient” because she wanted to talk about other issues like energy independence.

Palin’s opponent, Democratic vice presidential nominee Joe Biden, has also committed high-profile gaffes, including claiming in a recent interview that President Franklin D. Roosevelt calmed fears in a TV address at the beginning of the Great Depression. There was no TV in 1929 — Roosevelt wasn’t president at the time.

From Reuters Blog

Joe Biden's Fantasy World

2008-10-06T11:04:00.001+04:00

In the popular media wisdom, Sarah Palin is the neophyte who knows nothing about foreign policy while Joe Biden is the savvy diplomatic pro. Then what are we to make of Mr. Biden's fantastic debate voyage last week when he made factual claims that would have got Mrs. Palin mocked from New York to Los Angeles?

APStart with Lebanon, where Mr. Biden asserted that "When we kicked -- along with France, we kicked Hezbollah out of Lebanon, I said and Barack said, 'Move NATO forces in there. Fill the vacuum, because if you don't know -- if you don't, Hezbollah will control it.' Now what's happened? Hezbollah is a legitimate part of the government in the country immediately to the north of Israel."

The U.S. never kicked Hezbollah out of Lebanon, and no one else has either. Perhaps Mr. Biden meant to say Syria, except that the U.S. also didn't do that. The Lebanese ousted Syria's military in 2005. As for NATO, Messrs. Biden and Obama may have proposed sending alliance troops in, but if they did that was also a fantasy. The U.S. has had all it can handle trying to convince NATO countries to deploy to Afghanistan.

Speaking of which, Mr. Biden also averred that "Our commanding general in Afghanistan said the surge principle in Iraq will not work in Afghanistan." In trying to correct him, Mrs. Palin mispronounced the general's name -- saying "General McClellan" instead of General David McKiernan. But Mr. Biden's claim was the bigger error, because General McKiernan said that while "Afghanistan is not Iraq," he also said a "sustained commitment" to counterinsurgency would be required. That is consistent with Mr. McCain's point that the "surge principles" of Iraq could work in Afghanistan.

Then there's the Senator's astonishing claim that Mr. Obama "did not say he'd sit down with Ahmadinejad" without preconditions. Yet Mr. Biden himself criticized Mr. Obama on this point in 2007 at the National Press Club: "Would I make a blanket commitment to meet unconditionally with the leaders of each of those countries within the first year I was elected President? Absolutely, positively no."

Or how about his rewriting of Bosnia history to assert that John McCain didn't support President Clinton in the 1990s. "My recommendations on Bosnia, I admit I was the first one to recommend it. They saved tens of thousands of lives. And initially John McCain opposed it along with a lot of other people. But the end result was it worked." Mr. Biden's immodesty aside, Mr. McCain supported Mr. Clinton on Bosnia, as did Bob Dole even as he was running against him for President in 1996 -- in contrast to the way Mr. Biden and Democratic leaders have tried to undermine President Bush on Iraq.

Closer to home, the Delaware blarney stone also invited Americans to join him at "Katie's restaurant" in Wilmington to witness middle-class struggles. Just one problem: Katie's closed in the 1980s. The mistake is more than a memory lapse because it exposes how phony is Mr. Biden's attempt to pose for this campaign as Lunchbucket Joe.

We think the word "lie" is overused in politics today, having become a favorite of the blogosphere and at the New York Times. So we won't say Mr. Biden was deliberately making events up when he made these and other false statements. Perhaps he merely misspoke. In any case, Mrs. Palin may not know as much about the world as Mr. Biden does, but at least most of what she knows is true.

From Wall Street Journal

Bidens owe SimmonsCooper $1 million in hedge fund deal

2008-10-06T03:50:00.001+04:00

Vice presidential candidate Joe Biden's son Hunter Biden and brother James Biden owe $1 million to SimmonsCooper law firm of East Alton from a hedge fund buyout that fell apart in 2006.

SimmonsCooper attorneys have contributed hundreds of thousands to campaigns of Senator Biden, his other son Beau Biden, and John Markell, current candidate for governor, while turning Delaware into a national magnet for asbestos lawsuits.

In the hedge fund case, Hunter Biden and James Biden seek to shift their debt to former partner Joseph Lotito through counterclaims in a fraud suit he filed against them.

New York State Supreme Court Justice Bernard Fried rejected their bid in May, ruling that they should have checked out the fund more carefully.

"These counterclaims, conditionally pleaded, do not rest on a justiciable controversy, but seek only to foment uncertainty and chaos between the parties in the event that plaintiff is successful in presenting the main claims," Fried wrote.

"Such pleading will not be countenanced," he wrote.

He held that Hunter Biden and James Biden can't allege misrepresentation when they failed to allege their own due diligence.

In June, Hunter Biden and James Biden appealed Fried's decision.

SimmonsCooper committed $2 million but withheld the second million after seeing how Lotito wasted the first million, according to Hunter Biden and James Biden.

SimmonsCooper invested in Hunter Biden and James Biden after teaming with Beau Biden's firm in Wilmington, Del.

In 2005, SimmonsCooper shifted its focus away from Madison County, Illinois, after Chief Judge Edward Ferguson transferred the mammoth asbestos docket from Circuit Judge Nicholas Byron to Circuit Judge Daniel Stack.

The firm targeted Delaware because many businesses incorporate there and the firm's roster of defendants always includes Delaware corporations.

No one at SimmonsCooper held a Delaware law license, so Beau Biden's firm filed the suits and SimmonsCooper identified itself as, "of counsel."

Beau Biden dropped an asbestos defense client to accommodate SimmonsCooper.

At the same time, Joe Biden resisted asbestos litigation reform in the Senate judiciary committee.

On New Year's Eve 2005, SimmonsCooper attorneys, staff and spouses contributed at least $52,250 to Biden's campaign for a seventh Senate term.

In the following five weeks the firm contributed at least $56,100.

Campaign reports don't allow full accounting from any source because contributors ignore employment information requests or many channel cash through others.

While SimmonsCooper backed Joe Biden's reelection, he prepared to run for president.

Hunter Biden meanwhile earned his living as a lobbyist, but not for long.

According to court records filed by Lotito, Joe Biden wanted Hunter Biden to find a different line of work because he couldn't afford to run for president as father of a lobbyist.

Lotito claims he and James Biden discussed Hunter Biden's job prospects.

Lotito met James Biden in 2002 and they invested together in 2005, according to Lotito.

Lotito introduced James Biden and Hunter Biden to lawyer John Fasciano, and the four began planning to buy Paradigm Capital Management.

Majority owner James Parks had started Paradigm in 1991 and successfully promoted it as less volatile than most hedge funds.

Everyone agreed that the Bidens and Lotito would form a corporation to buy 54 percent of Paradigm for $21.3 million in cash.

They would install Hunter Biden as chief executive officer at a salary of $1.2 million.

In April 2006, they formed LBB Limited Liability Corporation.

In May 2006, SimmonsCooper invested $1 million.

In June 2006, according to Lotito, the Bidens told him to stay away.

In August 2006, according to Lotito, the Bidens formed a corporation, executed a promissory note for $8.1 million, and purchased Paradigm's assets.

In September 2006, Lotito signed an agreement relinquishing his third of LBB.

He sued the Bidens in January 2007, alleging fraud and breach of fiduciary duty.

Attorney Brian Wille claimed the Bidens made a secret side deal, terminated Lotito's rights, and fraudulently induced him to sign away his interest in LBB.

Willie wrote that Lotito found investors and the Bidens rejected them.

He wrote that the Bidens intimidated Lotito and accused him of receiving kickbacks from Fasciano.

"Ultimately, the Bidens threatened to use their alleged connections with a former U.S. Senator to retaliate against counsel for insisting that his bill be paid, claiming that the former Senator was prepared to use his influence with a federal judge to disadvantage counsel in a proceeding then pending before that court," Willie wrote.

For the Bidens, Nicholas Gravante answered that Lotito failed to tell them that Fasciano would soon go to federal prison on a fraud conviction.

Gravante alleged that Lotito exaggerated Paradigm's value.

He alleged that Lotito failed to tell the Bidens that Parks had acted for years as absentee owner of Paradigm due to substance abuse.

Gravante filed a counterclaim and brought it to a hearing before Fried in June 2007.

Gravante called Lotito a criminal, and Fried asked where his pleadings called him that.

Gravante stammered and Fried said, "In my courtroom I would like you to restrict yourself to acting civilly."

Fried said, "You have accused him of being a criminal in this courtroom and it's not in these papers."

Gravante said, "He is accused of crimes. I don't call him a criminal, correct."

Fried rejected the counterclaim last September but ruled that the Bidens could amend it.

Gravante amended it to allege that LBB "specifically recruited SimmonsCooper as a result of Lotito's and Fasciano's misstatements and omissions."

SimmonsCooper withdrew, he wrote, and its investment converted to debt.

At a hearing this January, Gravante said the Bidens had "an uncheckered history."

He said, "These are reputable people - discovery will bear that out - who wouldn't have agreed to have that kind of an attorney do this work for them."

In May, for the second time, Fried rejected the counterclaim.

"Certainly defendants do not claim that the law permits sophisticated investors to rely on whatever representations a potential advisor makes without the need for a diligent inquiry by defendants, and that such representations are actionable if they wind up to have been faulty," Fried wrote.

Although the dispute hinges on the SimmonsCooper investment, neither side has alleged that Lotito knew or didn't know that SimmonsCooper would invest.

From Madison County Record

Sarah Palin at Carson

2008-10-06T01:39:00.000+04:00

Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin praised running mate John McCain and criticized Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama today while spelling out goals of a McCain-Palin administration during a speech at The Home Depot Center.

A enthusiastic crowd estimated by Home Depot Center officials to be between 15,000 and 20,000 jammed the Carson facility's tennis stadium -- whose capacity is around 8,000 -- and an overflow area for a rare general election public appearance in Southern California by a major party presidential or vice presidential candidate.

In a 25-minute speech, interrupted about 20 times by applause, Palin demonstrated a folksy and feisty manner that seemingly had disappeared during a much-criticized interview with CBS anchor Katie Couric.

Barack Obama Writes to Indian Prime Minister

2008-10-05T23:00:00.002+04:00

Barack Obama didn't meet Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh during his recent U.S. visit, but has written him a letter reports Rediff.com.

Sen. Obama congratulated Dr. Singh for shepherding the nuclear cooperation agreement through the Indian parliament and deplored the recent string of terrorist attacks. Obama also said he hoped the civil nuclear cooperation would lead to greater cooperation on the non-proliferation issue, and said he would work with the U.S. Senate to secure ratification of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty.

"Imagine our two democracies in action: Indian laboratories and industry collaborating with American laboratories and industry to discover innovative solutions to today's energy problems. That's the kind of new partnership I would like to build with India as president," he wrote.

The Friends of McCain

2008-10-05T22:33:00.001+04:00

Can a presidential candidate justify a long and friendly relationship with someone who, back in the 1970s, extolled violence and committed crimes in the name of a radical ideology -- and who has never shown remorse or admitted error? When the candidate in question is Barack Obama, John McCain says no. But when the candidate in question is John McCain, he's not so sure.

Obama has been justly criticized for his ties to former Weather Underground member Bill Ayers, who in 1995 hosted a campaign event for Obama and in 2001 gave him a $200 contribution. The two have also served together on the board of a foundation. When their connection became known, McCain minced no words: "I think not only a repudiation but an apology for ever having anything to do with an unrepentant terrorist is due the American people."What McCain didn't mention is that he has his own Bill Ayers -- in the form of G. Gordon Liddy. Now a conservative radio talk-show host, Liddy spent more than 4 years in prison for his role in the 1972 Watergate burglary. That was just one element of what Liddy did, and proposed to do, in a secret White House effort to subvert the Constitution. Far from repudiating him, McCain has embraced him.

How close are McCain and Liddy? At least as close as Obama and Ayers appear to be. In 1998, Liddy's home was the site of a McCain fundraiser. Over the years, he has made at least four contributions totaling $5,000 to the senator's campaigns -- including $1,000 this year.

Last November, McCain went on his radio show. Liddy greeted him as "an old friend," and McCain sounded like one. "I'm proud of you, I'm proud of your family," he gushed. "It's always a pleasure for me to come on your program, Gordon, and congratulations on your continued success and adherence to the principles and philosophies that keep our nation great."

Which principles would those be? The ones that told Liddy it was fine to break into the office of the Democratic National Committee to plant bugs and photograph documents? The ones that made him propose to kidnap anti-war activists so they couldn't disrupt the 1972 Republican National Convention? The ones that inspired him to plan the murder (never carried out) of an unfriendly newspaper columnist?

Liddy was in the thick of the biggest political scandal in American history -- and one of the greatest threats to the rule of law. He has said he has no regrets about what he did, insisting that he went to jail as "a prisoner of war."

All this may sound like ancient history. But it's from the same era as the bombings Ayers helped carry out as a member of the Weather Underground. And Liddy's penchant for extreme solutions has not abated.

In 1994, after the disastrous federal raid on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, he gave some advice to his listeners: "Now if the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms comes to disarm you and they are bearing arms, resist them with arms. Go for a head shot; they're going to be wearing bulletproof vests. ... Kill the sons of bitches."

He later backed off, saying he meant merely that people should defend themselves if federal agents came with guns blazing. But his amended guidance was not exactly conciliatory: Liddy also said he should have recommended shots to the groin instead of the head. If that wasn't enough to inflame any nut cases, he mentioned labeling targets "Bill" and "Hillary" when he practiced shooting.

Given Liddy's record, it's hard to see why McCain would touch him with a 10-foot pole. On the contrary, he should be returning his donations and shunning his show. Yet the senator shows no qualms about associating with Liddy -- or celebrating his service to their common cause.

How does McCain explain his howling hypocrisy on the subject? He doesn't. I made repeated inquiries to his campaign aides, which they refused to acknowledge, much less answer. On this topic, the pilot of the Straight Talk Express would rather stay parked in the garage.

That's an odd policy for someone who is so forthright about his rival's responsibility. McCain thinks Obama should apologize for associating with a criminal extremist. To which Obama might reply: After you.

By Steve Chapman

Barack Obama Dress Hits Paris Runway

2008-10-05T00:48:00.003+04:00

Barack Obama also made an appearance at the Jean-Charles de Castelbajac 2009 ready-to-wear show in Paris, in the form of a sparkling canary yellow dress, complete with "Yes" glove. In the spirit of fairness, the model also wore a "No" glove on the other hand.

From Towleroad.com

Ten Lies of John McCain

2008-10-04T00:27:00.001+04:00

John McCain told the Des Moines Register this week that he always tells "100 percent absolute truth," even in campaign ads. There's one big problem with that bold statement: it's just not true.

McCain has made a number of statements — in paid ads and on the campaign trail — that simply cannot be described as 100 percent accurate. Some aren't even close.

Barack Obama is guilty, too. He falsely accused McCain of wanting to slice Social Security benefits in half and grossly exaggerated his role in writing this year's economic stimulus plan. He also promised to accept public financing — and then proceeded to opt out when it was clear he could raise more money on his own.

But only McCain made this dare: Prove it, he told the Register. The paper did not — Politico will.

With the help of the truth-squad crew over at the invaluable Politifact and factcheck.org, as well as other fact-checking websites, here is a list of some of McCain's biggest whoppers:

1. On "The View," McCain claimed Sarah Palin did not take or request earmarks as governor of Alaska. "Not as governor, she didn't," McCain said. But in her first year in office, she requested $256 million in earmarks from the federal government.

2. Shortly after announcing Sarah Palin as his running mate, the McCain campaign ran an ad claiming, "She stopped the bridge to nowhere" — perhaps the most thoroughly debunked claim about the Alaska governor, who supported the bridge project before changing her position late in the game. Asked about the bridge during her 2006 gubernatorial bid, Palin replied: "I'm not going to stand in the way of progress."

3. At the Republican National Convention, McCain claimed Obama's national health insurance plan would "force small businesses to cut jobs, reduce wages and force families into a government-run health care system where a bureaucrat stands between you and your doctor." But according to factcheck.org, Obama's plan does not place burdens on small business, and people would have the option of keeping their existing insurance plans.

4. In a campaign ad, "Dome," McCain claimed Obama's election would result in "painful income taxes, skyrocketing taxes on life savings, electricity and home heating oil," the clear implication being that Obama wants to hike these tax rates. But factcheck.org says Obama hasn't proposed a tax on electricity or home heating oil and wouldn't raise taxes on investments for individuals earning less than $200,000 a year.

It's possible Obama's election would result in these tax rates increasing. But this McCain-Palin claim is a little like the Obama camp's misleading attack on McCain's Social Security plan, tagging his opponent with the most undesirable, unintended and far from certain consequences of his policy proposals.

5. McCain has repeatedly accused Obama of supporting higher taxes on people making as little as $42,000 a year. "Two times, on March 14, 2008 and June 4, 2008, in the Democratic budget resolution, he voted to raise taxes on people making just $42,000 per year," McCain said this week. But this is a misleading claim: Obama's votes were for nonbinding resolutions, which supported allowing certain Bush administration tax cuts to expire but didn't actually have the effect of raising taxes.

6. In a July visit to Colorado, McCain told voters: "I want to look you in the eye: I will not raise your taxes nor support a tax increase. I will not do it." Last Sunday, however, McCain acknowledged to ABC's George Stephanopoulos that his health care plan could lead to some people paying taxes on employer-provided health insurance.

"It depends on what plan they have," McCain said. "But that's usually the wealthiest people."

7. McCain's campaign claimed adviser Rick Davis had taken a leave of absence from his firm, Davis Manafort, and vigorously attacked a New York Times story suggesting that Davis had profited from Davis Manafort's relationship with mortgage lender Freddie Mac. "Mr. Davis has seen no income from Davis Manafort since 2006," wrote McCain spokesman Michael Goldfarb, who called the Times story "demonstrably false."

"Mr. Davis has never — never — been a lobbyist for either Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac."

But Davis Manafort was receiving $15,000 monthly payments from Freddie Mac as recently as August, and while the payments didn't go to Davis personally he still stands to gain from the success of his firm.

8. McCain has boasted of never requesting a single earmark, saying in January: "I have never asked for nor received a single earmark or pork-barrel project for my state." But he has requested federal funding for special projects back home, including $10 million for a center at the University of Arizona, $5 million for a home-state water project and spending authority to purchase land around Arizona's Luke Air Force Base.

Politifact says it's a matter of debate whether these projects constitute pork-barrel spending — but clearly McCain has searched for federal help in his own backyard.

9. In last Friday's debate, McCain accused Obama of "voting to cut off funds for the troops in Iraq and Afghanistan." But Obama has consistently voted in favor of war funding bills, including an earlier version of the bill McCain was discussing. The Illinois senator voted against this particular proposal because it did not push the Bush administration toward a timetable for withdrawal. McCain's comment was technically defensible — but rather too sly to be called "absolute truth."

10. In July, McCain accused Obama of skipping his visit to a military hospital in Germany because he was told he couldn't bring reporters and video cameras. McCain ran an ad saying: "Seems the Pentagon wouldn't allow him to bring cameras." But when pressed to provide evidence that Obama had canceled the visit for this reason, McCain's campaign could not support their claim — and media reports found no evidence that Obama had ever planned to bring media with him.

By Alexander Burns

Bristol Palin, fiance consider summer wedding

2008-10-03T15:23:00.000+04:00

The teenage pregnant daughter of Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin and her boyfriend are considering a summer wedding.

Bristol Palin, 17, and Levi Johnston, 18, haven't set a wedding date yet, his mother, Sherry Johnston, said Thursday.

The two have been considering getting married next summer, "but that could change," she said during a short interview outside her Wasilla home. The baby is due in late December.

The young couple was thrust into the spotlight after Sarah Palin was selected as John McCain's running mate in late August.

That only intensified Sept. 1 when Palin announced her unwed daughter was pregnant, spinning Internet speculation about the father's identity. In a short statement, the campaign never identified Levi, instead saying only: "Bristol and the young man she will marry are going to realize very quickly the difficulties of raising a child, which is why they will have the love and support of our entire family."

Sherry Johnston eventually disclosed that her son, a former high school hockey player, was the father.

Levi Johnston attended the Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minn., the next week as Palin accepted the nomination.

From AP

Joe Biden asked Sister's help to defeat Sarah Palin

2008-10-03T00:43:00.003+04:00

As Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr. puzzles out the perfect tone to take with Gov. Sarah Palin in Thursday night’s debate, he is getting advice from a woman who has been an intimate since he was a grade school student with a stutter and a paper route.

“He’s been my best friend all my life,” said that person, Mr. Biden’s sister, Valerie Biden Owens, in an interview in August. “I opened my eyes and he was there and he said, ‘Let’s go.’ I was his sidekick.”

She has managed every one of his campaigns, from high school class president to his New Castle County Council race to his first Senate bid, a 1972 upset victory, to his minefield of a presidential run in 1988.

The tightly controlled Obama operation has been the first time she has had no official position on her brother’s campaigns. That does not mean, however, that she is sitting this one out.

“She is absolutely his political alter-ego and confidante,” said David Wade, Mr. Biden’s press secretary. “She talks with the campaign every day.”

Their talks include advice on how Mr. Biden should handle himself during Thursday night’s debate, a showdown where many will be watching whether Mr. Biden can temper his oversized personality so he does not appear to be overpowering his female opponent. It was Mrs. Biden Owens who endorsed the plan to have him practice with Gov. Jennifer M. Granholm of Michigan, another dynamic female governor with a quick take.

As Mr. Biden has written in his autobiography, his trust in his sister is complete.

Mrs. Biden Owens, like Bay Buchanan before her, could be part of a small group called Sister Strategists. (Bay is the sister of Patrick J. Buchanan, who ran for president in 1992, 1996 and 2000.)

Mrs. Biden Owens said her family — along with Mr. Biden, there are two other brothers — does not know how to do it any other way. “It’s just how we grew up,” she said.

Having his family closely involved with his life has worked both politically and personally for Mr. Biden.

Claire DeMatteis, who worked as Mr. Biden’s senior counsel for 10 years, said of Mrs. Biden Owens, “I wouldn’t call it weakness, but when people criticize Senator Biden, she takes it understandably very personally.”

When he was hit with charges of plagiarism in his 1988 run, it was “just terrible” for his sister, Mr. Kaufman said. “Senator Biden’s career has been an incredible roller coaster, and that makes it even harder.”

Mrs. Biden Owens was reminded of that flame-out in August, while sitting in a Denver hotel room a few hours before her brother made his acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention.

“You make a mistake and you pay for it,” she said. “He paid for it. When we left the presidential campaign in ’88, he turned and walked down the corridor of the Senate and he sat down and chaired the Bork confirmation.” She paused and looked off, as if she could still see him walking down that long hall.

Shortly after, there was the aneurism that almost killed him. Mrs. Biden Owens noted the positive side: Had he stayed in the race, he very well might be dead.

“Oh, if we had continued,” she said, “and if he had told me three months down the road, right before the Iowa caucuses, that he had a headache and he couldn’t do it that day, I would have said, ‘You don’t know what a headache is.’ ”

After Mr. Biden’s first wife and infant daughter were killed in a car crash in 1972, just after he was first elected to the Senate, his sister quit her teaching job, moved in and cared for his two young sons. “Aunt Val” lived with her brother for four years — through her divorce, remarriage and even the birth of her oldest daughter — before finally moving out.

She is married to Jack Owens, one of Mr. Biden’s closest friends from law school, and they now live only 15 minutes away.

“Valerie Biden was the cornerstone that allowed me to sustain and then rebuild my family,” Mr. Biden wrote in his autobiography, “Promises to Keep: On Life and Politics.”

“It was a gift,” Mrs. Biden Owens said, more lightly, all these years later. “I got to practice on Beau and Hunter before I screwed up my own kids.”

She said that people tried to make what she had done, dropping everything and moving in with her brother, into something heroic, but she insisted it had not been.

Her 91-year-old mother, Jean Finnegan Biden, said it was natural for her daughter. “There’s nothing but family, nothing in the world,” she said. “As they were growing up, they did what she told them to do. She was the only girl.”

When they were children, Mr. Biden was a member of the safety patrol, but he turned in his shiny blue badge rather than report his sister for her bad behavior on the bus one day.

At the University of Delaware, he vetted all of her suitors.

“If there was any guy he knew, I couldn’t go out with him because he knew the son of a gun, and any guy he didn’t know, I couldn’t go out with because he didn’t know the son of the gun,” Mrs. Biden Owens recalled.

After her brother’s 1996 Senate race, Mrs. Biden Owens joined the consulting firm Joe Slade White & Company, marketing candidates in dozens of national races. Her clients include Governor Granholm, as well as Representative Chet Edwards of Texas, who had been discussed as a possible Democratic running mate this year before Mr. Biden was chosen.

These days, she said, her role “is to be the sister of the vice-presidential nominee.”

Thinking ahead to Thursday night, right before her brother takes the stage in St. Louis for the debate, Mrs. Biden Owens said: “I don’t have to tell Joe anything. I’ll just give him a hug and tell him I love him.”

Source: NYTimes

John McCain's mansion on sale for $12 Million

2008-10-01T23:37:00.001+04:00

Got $12 million burning a hole in your pockets? Need a new mansion in Arizona? How about this little place, one of John and Cindy McCain’s unwanted castles?

It’s a 5,000+ square foot estate with nine bedrooms, eight bathrooms, a seven-car garage, an entire extra gourmet chef’s kitchen out by the swimming pools, a 1,750-square-foot guest house, and it’s all on 2.7 gated acres.

Remember, you’re middle-class if you make up to $5 million a year, so following the old rule about buying a house — the purchase price should be no more than three times your gross annual income — you can easily afford $12 million.

But go ahead and offer $7.5 million, because the real-estate market in Phoenix is wrecked.

[Phoenix Real Estate/Phoenix New Times/RealEstate.com]

Sarah Palin Interview Generator

2008-10-01T11:50:00.000+04:00

This site is a parody. The answers are computer generated based on probabilities calculated from Sarah Palin's actual speech.

Source: Interview Sarah Palin

On Facebook, tens of thousands stake claim to Palin's job

2008-10-01T11:15:00.000+04:00

Griffin DuBois of New York is one of thousands of people who think their foreign policy credentials make them more qualified to be vice president of the United States than Alaska Governor Sarah Palin.

"I live above a Greek family and next to an Egyptian family. I'm more qualified than Sarah Palin," DuBois said in a message posted Thursday on the "I have more foreign policy experience than Sarah Palin" group on Facebook, the social networking site.

As of Thursday afternoon -- six days after Republican presidential candidate John McCain unveiled Palin as his choice for the number two spot in Washington -- the Facebook group founded by University of Washington student Timothy Goyder had more than 17,000 members.

And some 100 new adherents from around the world were joining every 10 minutes.

"I studied some French phrases to get ready for a trip to Paris... in doing so, I've leapt miles (or kilometers) ahead of Palin's foreign policy experience," said Matt Eichstedt of Chicago.

Ed Rooney of Vermont claimed to be the man for the job that has gone to a woman for the first time in the history of the Republican Party because: "I recently ate Chinese food which makes me an expert on US-China relations."

"I'm from Taiwan. Can I be VP?" asked David Wang, a high school student.

Others mentioned how often they have eaten at US fast food chain, the International House of Pancakes, italicizing the word "international."

Palin burst from relative obscurity in Alaska, where she has been governor for less than two years, to take center stage in US politics when McCain tapped her to be his running mate last week.

Her credentials for the number two job in Washington immediately came under scrutiny, and critics have homed in on her lack of foreign policy experience.

According to posts on the "I have more foreign policy experience than Sarah Palin", the 44-year-old governor of Alaska only got a passport last year and has visited three foreign countries.

Prominent Republicans have defended her by pointing out that Alaska borders Canada and is separated from Russia by the narrow Bering Straits, which sometimes freeze over to create a walkable bridge to Siberia, although the Republicans did not mention that.

Source: AFP

US College Women not Impressed by Palin

2008-10-01T10:25:00.000+04:00

According to the Anderson Analytics GenX2Z College Poll, 60% of college students (ages 17-34) prefer Senator Obama while only 25% prefer Senator McCain.

Interestingly, the choice of Sarah Palin does not seem to have helped McCain much among female college students. Females were significantly more likely than their male counterparts to prefer Obama (62.9% of females vs. 55.4% of males preferred Obama while only 23% of females vs. 28.4% of males preferred McCain).

The overall 34% youth vote difference between the two candidates is larger than what has been reported in earlier polls among youth. To benefit from the lead, Democrats need to ensure that these students actually visit the polls on Election Day.

Tom H. C. Anderson, managing partner of Anderson Analytics, also noted one other point of interest in the data, "while six in ten students preferred Obama, this preference was even more pronounced among students at Ivy League institutions, where about eight in ten students favored Senator Obama."

Anderson Analytics conducted the online poll during the second to last week of September among 1,000 U.S. College students. Anderson Analytics' GenX2Z panelists are recruited locally at college campuses and on the social networking site Facebook.com. GenX2Z panelists represent over 400 U.S. Colleges and Universities and all students have confirmed .edu email addresses. The poll yields statistics with a confidence interval of +/-3% at the 95% confidence level.

Aussie bets $50,000 on Obama win

2008-10-01T01:30:00.000+04:00

AN Australian punter has bet $50,000 on Barack Obama winning the November US presidential election, Sportingbet Australia said.

Mr Obama's odds have shortened as polls put him further in front and big money continues to come in support of the Democratic candidate, the bookmaker said.

"We have taken a number of big bets for Obama in recent weeks, including a bet of $50,000 at $1.45 this morning,'' Sportingbet Australia chief executive Michael Sullivan said.

Mr Obama's odds have narrowed from $1.50 to $1.40 in the past week.

Republican presidential hopeful John McCain's odds have drifted out from $2.75 to $2.90.

"Until the last week, the money was fairly evenly split between McCain and Obama, but it has been all one-way traffic this week, with punters jumping off the McCain train,'' Mr Sullivan said.

From The Australian

Gwaker on Sarah Palin's Lover

2008-09-30T02:18:00.001+04:00

Further to the exposed story about Brad Hanson, Sarah Palin's Lover,

Gawker adds:

Okay, Brad Hanson. Born in Montana, he grew up in small town Alaska, was a high school jock and is basically the exact same as Todd Palin down to the facial hair but not nearly as totally awesome, which sort of stands to reason why Palin would fall in love with him. A supporter of strip malls and self-professed enemy of "small-town charm" the Palmer football/hockey coach and property developer bonded with Todd over sports and hunting-type activities and ran a snowmobile dealership together until Todd discovered Brad and Sarah had been bonding, according to the Enquirer, over a shared interest in politics.
Here's their evidence:

1. This guy they picture, Jim Burdett. He's the ex-con former brother-in-law of Brad Hanson's wife Carolyn's brother Craig Bratton, and boy is he a piece of work. Served three years in some unspecified clink for some sort of "theft," he filed for bankruptcy in 2001, he supposedly "turned his life around" and now "speaks regularly with family members" — that may change! — and says that everyone always knew Brad had had an affair but that it wasn't until recently that word went down the family pipeline that the affair had been with Sarah Palin, and that if the Enquirer came calling they had better deny that the affair had been with Sarah Palin. Just to make sure, the Enquirer strapped him to a polygraph and he passed with flying colors.

2. When the Enquirer initially called the Hanson household, Carolyn reportedly said: "I would prefer not to talk about it. It's a nonissue." Then she hung up. Then she called back. And then said, "There is absolutely no truth to this story. It is a complete rumor."

3. Than Brad got on the phone and said, hilariously: "Todd and I are still friends. We own a cabin together. I talked to him four times this week. Does that sound like there was a disagreement?" Um, I have had boyfriends I didn't talk to on the phone four times in a week unless something was SERIOUSLY UP so yeah.

Anyway, thoughts:

1. Brad owns a cabin with Todd. Todd also owns a cabin with that other guy with the sealed divorce papers, Scott Richter. The Palins are looking like the Treasury Department with all those ownership stakes in the housing market!

2. Unless it's the same house, in which case, with the affairs and divorces and procreation and prescription pill-popping and Divine Energy Policy Intervention going down, that house is more zeitgeisty than the Real World house circa 1992!

Why Barack Obama will loose

2008-09-30T01:30:00.000+04:00

When Benjamin Franklin was dispatched to France as ambassador of the United States in 1776, he won the hearts of the French through his authenticity. Rather than take on an affected and phony continental style, Franklin eschewed the powdered wig of the European gentleman and donned the fur cap of an American frontiersman. Original genius and polymath, Franklin understood that the French would see through any false pretension but respect an authenticity that sprang from an unpretentious and naive love of country.

What a contrast there is between Franklin and Barack Obama. Obama is a Harvard lawyer who is a mile wide and an inch deep. He is only the latest in a long line of shallow elites that consider it stylish and intellectual to despise their own culture and heritage.

Nothing exemplifies Obama’s antipathy for American culture better than his statement that Americans “cling to” religion and guns out of frustration or bitterness. We only can suppose that Obama regards religion or firearms as aberrations that need to be eradicated.

Of course, both guns and religion are essential aspects of American culture. The United States was founded by people seeking religious freedom. Does the word “Pilgrim” ring a bell with anyone? Our freedom and the right to self-government were won by farmers with guns.

The American Revolution started when the British marched to Concord with the intention of confiscating colonial arms. Both the right to “keep and bear arms,” and the right to “free exercise” of religion are enshrined in the Bill of Rights. We have come a long way when the presidential nominee of a major political party regards the exercise of fundamental rights as a mental aberration.

When Obama refers to “my Muslim faith,” the verbal gaffe resonates as a Freudian slip because of Obama’s thinly veiled hatred for this country’s unique culture and institutions. Obama sat for 20 years in a church where the Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr preached “goddamn America.” He only resigned from the congregation when it became politically expedient to do so. When earlier this year, Michelle Obama said “for the first time in my adult life, I am proud of my country,” can we conclude that her husband disagrees? Is it not remarkable that Michelle Obama can be so small-minded as to find nothing in the history of the United States that merits her admiration but the personal success of her husband?

What is Barack Obama for? His campaign motto is “change.” But even a 6-year-old child understands that “change” can be either good or bad. Lacking specifics, the invocation of “change” as policy is completely empty. As we witness Obama’s minions mindlessly endorse the meaningless maxim of “change,” it only can call to mind the barnyard animals in George Orwell’s “Animal Farm” chanting “four legs good, two legs bad!”

The choice of Sarah Palin as John McCain’s running mate has been devastating for the Obama campaign precisely because she is everything Obama is not. Palin is not ashamed of her culture or country. She is not embarrassed by being an American, but naively embraces her birthright. Unassisted by affirmative action, Palin has risen to national prominence on the basis of her character, intelligence and natural gifts. In a word, she has guts. This is a woman who is proud of her country, not because it has granted her personal success, but because she respects what America stands for: freedom, opportunity, and individualism.

Obama is a vapid demagogue, a hollow man that despises American culture. He is ill-suited to be president of the United States. As the weeks pass, more Americans will come to this realization and elect McCain/Palin in a landslide.

DAVID DEMING is an associate professor of Arts and Sciences at the University of Oklahoma, but his opinions do not necessarily represent those of the university.

Published in The Edmond Sun

John McCain: The Gambler - Part 3

2008-09-30T00:55:00.001+04:00

From Part 2

Change in Tone

After the Abramoff scandal, Mr. McCain stopped taking campaign donations from tribes. Some American Indians were offended, especially since Mr. McCain continued to accept money from the tribes’ lobbyists.

Resentment in Indian Country mounted as Mr. McCain, who was preparing for another White House run, singled out the growth in tribal gambling as one of three national issues that were “out of control.” (The others were federal spending and illegal immigration.)

Franklin Ducheneaux, an aide to Morris Udall who helped draft the 1988 Indian gambling law, said that position ran contrary to Mr. McCain’s record. “What did he think? That Congress intended for the tribes to be only somewhat successful?” Mr. Ducheneaux said.

Mr. McCain began taking a broad look at whether the laws were sufficient to oversee the growing industry. His campaign said that the growth had put “considerable stress” on regulators and Mr. McCain held hearings on whether the federal government needed more oversight power.

An opportunity to restrain the industry came in the spring of 2005, when a small tribe in Connecticut set off a political battle. The group, the Schaghticoke Tribal Nation, had won federal recognition in 2004 after producing voluminous documentation tracing its roots.

The tribe wanted to build Connecticut’s third casino, which would compete with Foxwoods and another, the Mohegan Sun. Facing public opposition on the proposed casino, members of the Connecticut political establishment — many of whom had received large Pequot and Mohegan campaign donations — swung into action.

Connecticut officials claimed that a genealogical review by the Bureau of Indian Affairs was flawed, and that the Schaghticoke was not a tribe.

The tribe’s opponents, led by the Washington lobbying firm Barbour Griffith & Rogers, turned to Mr. McCain’s committee. It was a full-circle moment for the senator, who had helped the Pequots gain tribal recognition in the 1980s despite concerns about their legitimacy.

Now, Mr. McCain was doing a favor for allies in the Connecticut delegation, including Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, a close friend, according to two former Congressional aides. “It was one of those collegial deals,” said one of the aides, who worked for Mr. McCain.

Barbour Griffith & Rogers wanted Mr. McCain to hold a hearing that would show that the Bureau of Indian Affairs was “broken,” said Bradley A. Blakeman, who was a lobbyist for the firm at the time.

“It was our hope that the hearing would shed light on the fact that the bureau had not followed their rules and had improperly granted recognition to the Schaghticoke,” Mr. Blakeman said. “And that the bureau would revisit the issue and follow their rules.”

Mr. McCain’s staff helped that effort by offering strategic advice.

His staff told a lobbyist for the firm that the Indian Affairs Committee “would love to receive a letter” from the Connecticut governor requesting a hearing, according to an e-mail exchange, and offered “guidance on what the most effective tone and approach” would be in the letter.

On May 11, 2005, Mr. McCain held a hearing billed as a general “oversight hearing on federal recognition of Indian tribes.” But nearly all the witnesses were Schaghticoke opponents who portrayed the tribe as imposters.

Mr. McCain set the tone: “The role that gaming and its nontribal backers have played in the recognition process has increased perceptions that it is unfair, if not corrupt.”

Chief Richard F. Velky of the Schaghticokes found himself facing off against the governor and most of the state’s congressional delegation. “The deck was stacked against us,” Mr. Velky said. “They were given lots of time. I was given five minutes.”

He had always believed Mr. McCain “to be an honest and fair man,” Mr. Velky said, “but this didn’t make me feel that good.”

Mr. Velky said he felt worse when the e-mail messages between the tribe’s opponents and Mr. McCain’s staff surfaced in a federal lawsuit. “Is there a letter telling me how to address the senator to give me the best shot?” Mr. Velky asked. “No, there is not.”

After the hearing, Pablo E. Carrillo, who was Mr. McCain’s chief Abramoff investigator at the time, wrote to a Barbour Griffith & Rogers lobbyist, Brant Imperatore. “Your client’s side definitely got a good hearing record,” Mr. Carillo wrote, adding “you probably have a good sense” on where Mr. McCain “is headed on this.”

“Well done!” he added.

Cynthia Shaw, a Republican counsel to the committee from 2005 to 2007, said Mr. McCain made decisions based on merit, not special interests. “Everybody got a meeting who asked for one,” Ms. Shaw said, “whether you were represented by counsel or by a lobbyist — or regardless of which lobbyist.”

Mr. McCain’s campaign defended the senator’s handling of the Schaghticoke case, saying no staff member acted improperly. The campaign said the session was part of normal committee business and the notion that Mr. McCain was intending to help Congressional colleagues defeat the tribe was “absolutely false.”

It added that the senator’s commitment to Indian sovereignty “remains as strong as ever.”

Within months of the May 2005 hearing, the Bureau of Indian Affairs took the rare step of rescinding the Schaghticokes’ recognition. A federal court recently rejected the tribe’s claim that the reversal was politically motivated.

Making an Exception

That spring of 2005, as the Schaghticokes went down to defeat in the East, another tribe in the West squared off against Mr. McCain with its bid to construct a gambling emporium in California. The stakes were similar, but the outcome would be far different.

The tribe’s plan to build a casino on a former Navy base just outside San Francisco represented a trend rippling across the country: American Indians seeking to build casinos near population centers, far from their reservations.

The practice, known as “off-reservation shopping,” stemmed from the 1988 Indian gambling law, which included exceptions allowing some casinos to be built outside tribal lands. When Mr. McCain began his second stint as chairman of the Indian Affairs Committee three years ago, Las Vegas pressed him to revisit the exceptions he had helped create, according to Sig Rogich, the Republican fund-raiser from Nevada.

“We told him this off-reservation shopping had to stop,” Mr. Rogich said. “It was no secret that the gaming industry, as well as many potentially affected communities in other states, voiced opposition to the practice.”

In the spring of 2005, Mr. McCain announced he was planning a sweeping overhaul of Indian gambling laws, including limiting off-reservation casinos. His campaign said Las Vegas had nothing to do with it. In a 2005 interview with The Oregonian, Mr. McCain said that if Congress did not act, “soon every Indian tribe is going to have a casino in downtown, metropolitan areas.”

Prospects for the proposed California project did not look promising. Then the tribe, the Guidiville Band of Pomo Indians, hired a lobbyist based in Phoenix named Wes Gullett.

Mr. Gullett, who had never represented tribes before Congress, had known Mr. McCain since the early 1980s. Mr. Gullett met his wife while they were working in Mr. McCain’s Washington office. He subsequently managed Mr. McCain’s 1992 Senate campaign and served as a top aide to his 2000 presidential campaign. Their friendship went beyond politics. When Mr. McCain’s wife, Cindy, brought two infants in need of medical treatment back to Arizona from Bangladesh, the Gulletts adopted one baby and the McCains the other. The two men also liked to take weekend trips to Las Vegas.

Another of Mr. McCain’s close friends, former Defense Secretary William S. Cohen, was a major investor in the Guidivilles’ proposed casino. Mr. Cohen, who did not return calls, was best man at Mr. McCain’s 1980 wedding.

Scott Crowell, lawyer for the Guidivilles, said Mr. Gullett was hired to ensure that Mr. McCain’s overhaul of the Indian gambling laws did not harm the tribe.

Mr. Gullett said he never talked to Mr. McCain about the legislation. “If you are hired directly to lobby John McCain, you are not going to be effective,” he said. Mr. Gullett said he only helped prepare the testimony of the tribe’s administrator, Walter Gray, who was invited to plead his case before Mr. McCain’s committee in July 2005. Mr. Gullett said he advised Mr. Gray in a series of conference calls.

On disclosure forms filed with the Senate, however, Mr. Gullett stated that he was not hired until November, long after Mr. Gray’s testimony. Mr. Gullett said the late filing might have been “a mistake, but it was inadvertent.” Steve Hart, a former lawyer for the Guidivilles, backed up Mr. Gullett’s contention that he had guided Mr. Gray on his July testimony.

When asked whether Mr. Gullett had helped him, Mr. Gray responded, “I’ve never met the man and couldn’t tell you anything about him.”

On Nov. 18, 2005, when Mr. McCain introduced his promised legislation overhauling the Indian gambling law, he left largely intact a provision that the Guidivilles needed for their casino. Mr. McCain’s campaign declined to answer whether the senator spoke with Mr. Gullett or Mr. Cohen about the project. In the end, Mr. McCain’s bill died, largely because Indian gambling interests fought back. But the Department of Interior picked up where Mr. McCain left off, effectively doing through regulations what he had hoped to accomplish legislatively. Carl Artman, who served as the Interior Department’s assistant secretary of Indian Affairs until May, said Mr. McCain pushed him to rewrite the off-reservation rules. “It became one of my top priorities because Senator McCain made it clear it was one of his top priorities,” he said.

The new guidelines were issued on Jan. 4. As a result, the casino applications of 11 tribes were rejected. The Guidivilles were not among them.

Kitty Bennett and Griff Palmer contributed to reporting. From New York Times

John McCain: The Gambler - Part 2

2008-09-30T00:52:00.001+04:00

From Part 1

Behind an Inquiry

At a September 2004 hearing of the Indian Affairs Committee, Mr. McCain described Jack Abramoff as one of the most brazen in a long line of crooks to cheat American Indians. “It began with the sale of Manhattan, and has continued ever since,” he said. “What sets this tale apart, what makes it truly extraordinary, is the extent and degree of the apparent exploitation and deceit.”

Over the next two years, Mr. McCain helped uncover a breathtaking lobbying scandal — Mr. Abramoff and a partner bilked six tribes of $66 million — that showcased the senator’s willingness to risk the wrath of his own party to expose wrongdoing. But interviews and documents show that Mr. McCain and a circle of allies — lobbyists, lawyers and senior strategists — also seized on the case for its opportunities.

For McCain-connected lobbyists who were rivals of Mr. Abramoff, the scandal presented a chance to crush a competitor. For senior McCain advisers, the inquiry allowed them to collect fees from the very Indians that Mr. Abramoff had ripped off. And the investigation enabled Mr. McCain to confront political enemies who helped defeat him in his 2000 presidential run while polishing his maverick image.

The Abramoff saga started in early 2003 when members of two tribes began questioning Mr. Abramoff’s astronomical fees. Over the next year, they leaked information to local newspapers, but it took the hiring of lobbyists who were competitors of Mr. Abramoff to get the attention of Mr. McCain’s committee.

Bernie Sprague, who led the effort by one of the tribes, the Saginaw Chippewas in Michigan, hired a Democratic lobbyist who recommended that the tribe retain Scott Reed, the Republican lobbyist, to push for an investigation.

Mr. Reed had boasted to other lobbyists of his access to Mr. McCain, three close associates said. Mr. Reed “pretty much had open access to John from 2000 to at least the end of 2006,” one aide said.

Lobbyist disclosure forms show that Mr. Reed went to work for the Saginaw Chippewa on Feb. 15, 2004, charging the tribe $56,000 over a year. Mr. Abramoff had tried to steal the Pequots and another tribal client from Mr. Reed, and taking down Mr. Abramoff would eliminate a competitor.

Mr. Reed became the chief conduit to Mr. McCain’s committee for billing documents and other information Mr. Sprague was digging up on Mr. Abramoff, Mr. Sprague said, who said Mr. Reed “did a great to service to me.”

“He had contacts I did not,” Mr. Sprague said. “Initially, I think that the senator’s office was doing Reed a favor by listening to me.”

A few weeks after hiring Mr. Reed, Mr. Sprague received a letter from the senator. “We have met with Scott Reed, who was very helpful on the issue,” Mr. McCain wrote.

Information about Mr. Abramoff was also flowing to Mr. McCain’s committee from another tribe, the Coushatta of Louisiana. The source was a consultant named Roy Fletcher, who had been Mr. McCain’s deputy campaign manager in 2000, running his war room in South Carolina.

It was in that primary race that two of Mr. Abramoff’s closest associates, Grover Norquist, who runs the nonprofit Americans for Tax Reform, and Ralph Reed, the former director of the Christian Coalition, ran a blistering campaign questioning Mr. McCain’s conservative credentials. The senator and his advisers blamed that attack for Mr. McCain’s loss to Mr. Bush in South Carolina, creating tensions that would resurface in the Abramoff matter.

“I was interested in busting” Mr. Abramoff, said Mr. Fletcher, who was eventually hired to represent the tribe. “That was my job. But I was also filled with righteous indignation, I got to tell you.”

Mr. Fletcher said he began passing information to John Weaver, Mr. McCain’s chief political strategist, and other staff members in late 2003 or January 2004. Mr. Weaver confirmed the timing.

Mr. McCain announced his investigation on Feb. 26, 2004, citing an article on Mr. Abramoff in The Washington Post. He did not mention the action by lobbyists and tribes in the preceding weeks. His campaign said no one in his “innermost circle” brought information to Mr. McCain that prompted the investigation.

The senator declared he would not investigate members of Congress, whom Mr. Abramoff had lavished with tribal donations and golf outings to Scotland. But in the course of the investigation, the committee exposed Mr. Abramoff’s dealings with the two men who had helped defeat Mr. McCain in the 2000 primary.

The investigation showed that Mr. Norquist’s foundation was used by Mr. Abramoff to launder lobbying fees from tribes. Ralph Reed was found to have accepted $4 million to run bogus antigambling campaigns. And the investigation also highlighted Mr. Abramoff’s efforts to curry favor with the House majority leader at the time, Tom DeLay, Republican of Texas, a longtime political foe who had opposed many of Mr. McCain’s legislative priorities.

Mr. McCain’s campaign said the senator did not “single out” Ralph Reed or Mr. Norquist, neither of whom were ever charged, and that both men fell within the “scope of the investigation.” The inquiry, which led to guilty pleas by over a dozen individuals, was motivated by a desire to help aggrieved tribes, the campaign said.

Inside the investigation, the sense of schadenfreude was palpable, according to several people close to the senator. “It was like hitting pay dirt,” said one associate of Mr. McCain’s who had consulted with the senator’s office on the investigation. “And face it — McCain and Weaver were maniacal about Ralph Reed and Norquist. They were sticking little pins in dolls because those guys had cost him South Carolina.”

Down on the Coushattas reservation, bills related to the investigation kept coming. After firing Mr. Abramoff, the tribe hired Kent Hance, a lawyer and former Texas congressman who said he had been friends with Mr. McCain since the 1980s.

David Sickey, the tribe’s vice chairman, said he was “dumbfounded” over the bills submitted by Mr. Hance’s firm, Hance Scarborough, which had been hired by Mr. Sickey’s predecessors.

“The very thing we were fighting seemed to be happening all over again — these absurd amounts of money being paid,” Mr. Sickey said.

Mr. Hance’s firm billed the tribe nearly $1.3 million over 11 months in legal and political consulting fees, records show. But Mr. Sickey said that the billing statements offered only vague explanations for services and that he could not point to any tangible results. Two consultants, for instance, were paid to fight the expansion of gambling in Texas — even though it was unlikely given that the governor there opposed any such prospect, Mr. Sickey said.

Mr. Hance and Jay B. Stewart, the firm’s managing partner, defended their team’s work, saying they successfully steered the tribe through a difficult period. “We did an outstanding job for them,” Mr. Hance said. “When we told them our bill was going to be $100,000 a month, they thought we were cheap. Mr. Abramoff had charged them $1 million a month.”

The firm’s fees covered the services of Mr. Fletcher, who served as the tribe’s spokesman. Records also show that Mr. Hance had Mr. Weaver — who was serving as Mr. McCain’s chief strategist — put on the tribe’s payroll from February to May 2005.

It is not precisely clear what role Mr. Weaver played for his $100,000 fee.

Mr. Stewart said Mr. Weaver was hired because “he had a lot of experience with the Senate, especially the new chairman, John McCain.” The Hance firm told the tribe in a letter that Mr. Weaver was hired to provide “representation for the tribe before the U.S. Senate.”

But Mr. Weaver never registered to lobby on the issue, and he has another explanation for his work.

“The Hance law firm retained me to assist them and their client in developing an aggressive crisis management and communications strategy,” Mr. Weaver said. “At no point was I asked by Kent Hance or anyone associated with him to set up meetings with anyone in or outside of government to discuss this, and if asked I would have summarily declined to do so.”

In June 2005, the tribe informed Mr. Hance that his services were no longer needed.

Continued in Part 3

John McCain: The Gambler - Part 1

2008-09-29T23:59:00.005+04:00

Senator John McCain was on a roll. In a room reserved for high-stakes gamblers at the Foxwoods Resort Casino in Connecticut, he tossed $100 chips around a hot craps table. When the marathon session ended around 2:30 a.m., the Arizona senator and his entourage emerged with thousands of dollars in winnings.

A lifelong gambler, Mr. McCain takes risks, both on and off the craps table. He was throwing dice that night not long after his failed 2000 presidential bid, in which he was skewered by the Republican Party’s evangelical base, opponents of gambling. Mr. McCain was betting at a casino he oversaw as a member of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, and he was doing so with the lobbyist who represents that casino, according to three associates of Mr. McCain.

The visit had been arranged by the lobbyist, Scott Reed, who works for the Mashantucket Pequot, a tribe that has contributed heavily to Mr. McCain’s campaigns and built Foxwoods into the world’s second-largest casino. Joining them was Rick Davis, Mr. McCain’s current campaign manager. Their night of good fortune epitomized not just Mr. McCain’s affection for gambling, but also the close relationship he has built with the gambling industry and its lobbyists during his 25-year career in Congress.

As a two-time chairman of the Indian Affairs Committee, Mr. McCain has done more than any other member of Congress to shape the laws governing America’s casinos, helping to transform the once-sleepy Indian gambling business into a $26-billion-a-year behemoth with 423 casinos across the country. He has won praise as a champion of economic development and self-governance on reservations.

“One of the founding fathers of Indian gaming” is what Steven Light, a University of North Dakota professor and a leading Indian gambling expert, called Mr. McCain.

As factions of the ferociously competitive gambling industry have vied for an edge, they have found it advantageous to cultivate a relationship with Mr. McCain or hire someone who has one, according to an examination based on more than 70 interviews and thousands of pages of documents.

Mr. McCain portrays himself as a Washington maverick unswayed by special interests, referring recently to lobbyists as “birds of prey.” Yet in his current campaign, more than 40 fund-raisers and top advisers have lobbied or worked for an array of gambling interests — including tribal and Las Vegas casinos, lottery companies and online poker purveyors.

When rules being considered by Congress threatened a California tribe’s planned casino in 2005, Mr. McCain helped spare the tribe. Its lobbyist, who had no prior experience in the gambling industry, had a nearly 20-year friendship with Mr. McCain.

In Connecticut that year, when a tribe was looking to open the state’s third casino, staff members on the Indian Affairs Committee provided guidance to lobbyists representing those fighting the casino, e-mail messages and interviews show. The proposed casino, which would have cut into the Pequots’ market share, was opposed by Mr. McCain’s colleagues in Connecticut.

Mr. McCain declined to be interviewed. In written answers to questions, his campaign staff said he was “justifiably proud” of his record on regulating Indian gambling. “Senator McCain has taken positions on policy issues because he believed they are in the public interest,” the campaign said.

Mr. McCain’s spokesman, Tucker Bounds, would not discuss the senator’s night of gambling at Foxwoods, saying: “Your paper has repeatedly attempted to insinuate impropriety on the part of Senator McCain where none exists — and it reveals that your publication is desperately willing to gamble away what little credibility it still has.”

Over his career, Mr. McCain has taken on special interests, like big tobacco, and angered the capital’s powerbrokers by promoting campaign finance reform and pushing to limit gifts that lobbyists can shower on lawmakers. On occasion, he has crossed the gambling industry on issues like regulating slot machines.

Perhaps no episode burnished Mr. McCain’s image as a reformer more than his stewardship three years ago of the Congressional investigation into Jack Abramoff, the disgraced Republican Indian gambling lobbyist who became a national symbol of the pay-to-play culture in Washington. The senator’s leadership during the scandal set the stage for the most sweeping overhaul of lobbying laws since Watergate.

“I’ve fought lobbyists who stole from Indian tribes,” the senator said in his speech accepting the Republican presidential nomination this month.

But interviews and records show that lobbyists and political operatives in Mr. McCain’s inner circle played a behind-the-scenes role in bringing Mr. Abramoff’s misdeeds to Mr. McCain’s attention — and then cashed in on the resulting investigation. The senator’s longtime chief political strategist, for example, was paid $100,000 over four months as a consultant to one tribe caught up in the inquiry, records show.

Mr. McCain’s campaign said the senator acted solely to protect American Indians, even though the inquiry posed “grave risk to his political interests.”

As public opposition to tribal casinos has grown in recent years, Mr. McCain has distanced himself from Indian gambling, Congressional and American Indian officials said.

But he has rarely wavered in his loyalty to Las Vegas, where he counts casino executives among his close friends and most prolific fund-raisers. “Beyond just his support for gaming, Nevada supports John McCain because he’s one of us, a Westerner at heart,” said Sig Rogich, a Nevada Republican kingmaker who raised nearly $2 million for Mr. McCain at an event at his home in June.

Only six members of Congress have received more money from the gambling industry than Mr. McCain, and five hail from the casino hubs of Nevada and New Jersey, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics dating back to 1989. In the presidential race, Senator Barack Obama has also received money from the industry; Mr. McCain has raised almost twice as much.

In May 2007, as Mr. McCain’s presidential bid was floundering, he spent a weekend at the MGM Grand on the Las Vegas strip. A fund-raiser hosted by J. Terrence Lanni, the casino’s top executive and a longtime friend of the senator, raised $400,000 for his campaign. Afterward, Mr. McCain attended a boxing match and hit the craps tables.

For much of his adult life, Mr. McCain has gambled as often as once a month, friends and associates said, traveling to Las Vegas for weekend betting marathons. Former senior campaign officials said they worried about Mr. McCain’s patronage of casinos, given the power he wields over the industry. The officials, like others interviewed for this article, spoke on condition of anonymity.

“We were always concerned about appearances,” one former official said. “If you go around saying that appearances matter, then they matter.”

The former official said he would tell Mr. McCain: “Do we really have to go to a casino? I don’t think it’s a good idea. The base doesn’t like it. It doesn’t look good. And good things don’t happen in casinos at midnight.”

“You worry too much,” Mr. McCain would respond, the official said.

A Record of Support

In one of their last conversations, Representative Morris K. Udall, Arizona’s powerful Democrat, whose devotion to American Indian causes was legendary, implored his friend Mr. McCain to carry on his legacy.

“Don’t forget the Indians,” Mr. Udall, who died in 1998, told Mr. McCain in a directive that the senator has recounted to others.

More than a decade earlier, Mr. Udall had persuaded Mr. McCain to join the Senate Indian Affairs Committee. Mr. McCain, whose home state has the third-highest Indian population, eloquently decried the “grinding poverty” that gripped many reservations.

The two men helped write the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act of 1988 after the Supreme Court found that states had virtually no right to control wagering on reservations. The legislation provided a framework for the oversight and growth of Indian casinos: In 1988, Indian gambling represented less than 1 percent of the nation’s gambling revenues; today it captures more than one third.

On the Senate floor after the bill’s passage, Mr. McCain said he personally opposed Indian gambling, but when impoverished communities “are faced with only one option for economic development, and that is to set up gambling on their reservations, then I cannot disapprove.”

In 1994, Mr. McCain pushed an amendment that enabled dozens of additional tribes to win federal recognition and open casinos. And in 1998, Mr. McCain fought a Senate effort to rein in the boom.

He also voted twice in the last decade to give casinos tax breaks estimated to cost the government more than $326 million over a dozen years.

The first tax break benefited the industry in Las Vegas, one of a number of ways Mr. McCain has helped nontribal casinos. Mr. Lanni, the MGM Mirage chief executive, said that an unsuccessful bid by the senator to ban wagering on college sports in Nevada was the only time he could recall Mr. McCain opposing Las Vegas. “I can’t think of any other issue,” Mr. Lanni said.

The second tax break helped tribal casinos like Foxwoods and was pushed by Scott Reed, the Pequots’ lobbyist.

Mr. McCain had gotten to know Mr. Reed during Senator Bob Dole’s 1996 presidential campaign, which Mr. Reed managed. Four years later, when Mr. McCain ran for president, Mr. Reed recommended he hire his close friend and protégé, Rick Davis, to manage that campaign.

During his 2000 primary race against George W. Bush, Mr. McCain promoted his record of helping Indian Country, telling reporters on a campaign swing that he had provided critical support to “the Pequot, now the proud owners of the largest casino in the world.”

But Mr. McCain’s record on Indian gambling was fast becoming a difficult issue for him in the primary. Bush supporters like Gov. John Engler of Michigan lambasted Mr. McCain for his “close ties to Indian gambling.”

A decade after Mr. McCain co-authored the Indian gambling act, the political tides had turned. Tribal casinos, which were growing at a blazing pace, had become increasingly unpopular around the country for reasons as varied as morality and traffic.

Then came the biggest lobbying scandal to shake Washington.

Continued in Part 2

Joe Biden endorses John McCain for President

2008-09-29T23:54:00.001+04:00

Not much is said about Joe Biden these day. We know his first wife and an infant daughter died in a horrible automobile accident in 1972. He married his present wife in 1977. He has been in the Senate since he was twenty-nine years old. So he is a stick-to-it kind of guy. But…does that make him a good choice for being Vice President?

Well, apparently the American people in Iowa didn’t think so. In fact, he received less than 1% of the vote in the Iowa primaries along with Chris Dodd. Both candidates dropped out of the run for President of the United States after that first primary vote. Now that sort of dings him when it comes to his stick-to-itiveness. But at least he keeps his wives…unlike other politicians. I think the Republican Vice-Presidential candidate, Sarah Palin, had more people vote for her for governor of Alaska than Joe Biden supporters in Iowa.

He has said, “you cannot go to a 7-Eleven or a Dunkin’ Donuts unless you have a slight Indian accent.”

He has said, “My wife Jill, who you’ll meet soon, is drop dead gorgeous,” Biden said and then joked, “My wife Jill, who you’ll meet soon, she also has her doctorate degree, which is a problem.”

He has said that he and Obama, if elected in November, “”will not be stopped from pursuing any criminal offence that’s occurred,” in reference to the President Bush and his administration.

And, he has in the past few weeks eluded to the fact that maybe he wasn’t even the right choice for Obama to pick for Vice President; that Hillary Clinton was the better man for the job. However, let’s not forget that as Barack Obama’s Vice-Presidential running mate, he said to a large crowd “I am running for the President of the United States.” Opps. I think he meant Vice-President.

Source

Signature of John McCain on Faith of My Fathers found to be fake

2008-09-29T00:54:00.001+04:00

The stories in the book may be real, but John McCain's signature on some copies of "Faith of My Fathers" are not the real deal, according to a publisher of autographed and collectible books.

Tim Miller, founder of FlatSigned Press, a Nashville-based publishing company specializing in rare and collectible books, says he purchased books that claimed to have an authentic McCain signature and sent them to a New York City auction house to be resold. But instead, an expert there determined the signatures were likely done by a secretary and not the presidential candidate.

Miller says it surprised him because signed books up until recently were being sold on Sen. McCain's campaign Web site at a premium price.

"This one auction house and others just discovered yesterday that they have unwittingly been selling secretarial-signed John McCain books for months and now they must do the very embarrassing and financially hurtful steps of letting their customers know that they had been wrong when they had previously sold ‘signed' John McCain books as being hand-signed by the presidential candidate," says Miller.

Miller says it's not unheard of for secretaries or other subordinates to sign books instead of the famous politician author. But he says it is unusual for someone to sell "signed" books at a premium when they are not authentic which it appears is what the McCain campaign was doing.

The campaign has since removed the ‘autographed' book from its Web site.

Miller says fake autographs undermine and even threaten what is now a $1-billion industry.

"In this economy you don't want to harm any sector of the economy," says Miller. "We in the industry feel the pain when fakes are presented as authentic."

Source Web Site: http://www.flatsigned.com/

President of Paraguay Turns Down Meeting with Sarah Palin

2008-09-28T17:15:00.000+04:00

Paraguay President Fernando Lugo, while attending both the United Nations General Assembly meetings and the Clinton Global Initiative, shared with friends over dinner some of the other meetings he had been having in New York.

He met this head of state. . .and that head of state. . .and so on. . .

. . .but then the room went silent and then broke into subdued laughter when he confided that he was approached about meeting with GOP Vice Presidential candidate and Alaska Governor Sarah Palin.

President Lugo turned the meeting down.

With all due respect to Paraguay and its great citizens, something is really wrong when the Paraguayan President won't even hang with Palin.

But note to world leaders, PLEASE start meeting with her.

Otherwise, she'll never get any credible international experience.

-- Steve Clemons

Sarah Palin has no Gay Friends

2008-09-28T16:58:00.000+04:00

When John McCain announced Alaska governor Sarah Palin as his vice-presidential running mate in late August, the response was near-universal astonishment. With no foreign policy credentials, next to no national profile, and having served in the statehouse for less than two years, Palin has such a thin record -- both legislatively and in terms of public statements -- that it’s difficult to predict just what sort of vice president (or, given McCain’s advanced age, president) she might soon become. As for issues affecting gay Americans, there’s only a handful of legal decisions -- made early in her tenure as governor -- that can help us divine where she stands.

A self-described “hockey mom,” hunting enthusiast, and evangelical Christian, Palin has been reared in the political culture of Alaska. It’s a state whose politics is defined at times by a libertarian, live-and-let-live approach that fits naturally with frontier existence and at times by a more intrusive, religiously grounded conservatism brought by the Southerners and Westerners who swarmed the state in the 1970s and ’80s for jobs in the booming oil industry. In 1996 the Alaska state legislature passed a law stipulating that marriage can exist only between people of opposite genders. A gay couple sued the state on the basis that the measure was discriminatory. Two years later, 68% of voters approved a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, making Alaska the first state to amend its constitution this way.

Palin, then mayor of Wasilla -- a city about 40 miles north of Anchorage with a population of less than 10,000 -- supported the marriage amendment, as did most of the state’s politicians. And she continued to solidify her reputation as a traditional, “family values” conservative as her political career took off. Running for governor in 2006, she announced her opposition to a 2005 Alaska supreme court ruling that ordered the state government to offer health and retirement benefits to the domestic partners of its employees; her Democratic opponent, former governor Tony Knowles, supported the ruling. In a questionnaire provided by the Alaska chapter of the Eagle Forum, the socially conservative lobbying organization founded by Phyllis Schlafly, Palin listed “preserving the definition of ‘marriage’ as defined in our constitution” as one of her highest priorities.

Palin won the gubernatorial election comfortably -- and one of her first acts in office was to veto a bill that would have blocked those court-ordered benefits for same-sex couples. The move is now cited as an example of her “inclusiveness,” but she made it only under the advisement of the attorney general, who said the bill violated the state constitution’s equal protection clause. In a statement released in conjunction with the veto, Palin made clear her continued opposition to domestic-partner benefits: “Signing this bill would be in direct violation of my oath of office,” she said, emphasizing that her rejection of the bill was purely legalistic and ought not to be taken as a sign of any newfound support for gay rights.

Sarah Palin: Alaska's Dead Wolf Pups Demand Justice!

2008-09-28T06:34:00.000+04:00

Target: Alaska Governor Sarah Palin
Sponsored by: Care2.com

This summer, Alaska wildlife agency personnel reportedly staked out a known wolf denning site – a practice that is illegal under Alaska law – and, using helicopters, gunned down 14 adult wolves from the air.

When they landed, they found 14 helpless pups in the nearby dens – infant wolves just weeks old – and methodically shot each one in the head. 28 wolves gunned down in all.

Due to a loophole in federal law, Alaska is the only state in the U.S. where a few hunters still use aircraft to shoot wolves or chase them to exhaustion before landing and shooting them point blank. But the practice of "denning" – the killing of wolf young in the den – is prohibited even under Alaska law. This killing of 14 wolf pups disturbs even longtime hunters in Alaska.

During her two years as governor, Sarah Palin proposed a $150 bounty for the severed foreleg of each killed wolf and introduced legislation to make it even easier to use aircraft to hunt wolves and bears. But it's time that Governor Palin call for a thorough investigation into the killing of these 14 wolf pups, and bring any Alaska employees who acted illegally to justice.

Governor Palin presents herself as a pro-ethics reform politician.

On Pigs and Lip Stick

2008-09-27T05:20:00.001+04:00

Can we stop talking about the melting ice caps and hurricane highways, the conspicuously absent Kim Jong-il or the new permafrost between Russia and the West?

Can we please ignore the two strategic Russian bombers which landed in Venezuela today, evoking unpleasant memories of the Cold War in America's backyard?

Can we just stop fretting about the record number of foreclosures and the meltdown on Wall Street?

Please - let us have a real eyeball-to-eyeball, toe-to-toe debate about lipstick and pigs.

Pit-bull

Who has Barack Obama's comment "that you can put lipstick on a pig but it's still a pig" really offended?

Who has it not offended?

The famously thin-skinned porcine population of the US is up in trotters about the imputation of cross-dressing.

The lipstick industry is getting ready to file a lawsuit under the Serious Misuse of Cosmetic Products Act (which actually does not exist yet but is already being "war-gamed" on K Street, the hub of Washington's lobby industry).

Oh yes and then we have Sarah Palin, the governor of Alaska who first introduced lipstick into the summer campaign by wearing it and by making the ribald observation that the difference between a hockey mom and a pit-bull is, yes, lipstick.

The governor of Alaska has become a kind of campaign superhero who can morph like liquid mercury

Oddly enough she was not offended by Barack Obama's remarks.

In fact it is the kind of thing this pistol-packing moose-slayer might have said herself.

But her campaign advisers and those blushing violets around the uber-sensitive John McCain are more offended than nuns in a nudist romp.

The Republican Party that used to pride itself on red meat and red necks is behaving like a bunch of fruitarians in a sausage factory.

The proud founding member of the "bad boys club" at the US Naval Academy, John "Wayne" McCain himself is hanging the noose of sexism around the feline Barack Obama, who is more in touch with his inner woman than any candidate since Hillary Clinton.

And the Republicans are getting away with it.

This is electioneering genius; it makes Karl Rove look like Bob the Builder.

John McCain has found Barack Obama's Achilles heel and he is busy firing one small-but-vicious arrow after another into it.

He can do this, thanks to a combination of chutzpah and Sarah Palin.

The governor of Alaska has become a kind of campaign superhero who can morph like liquid mercury.

One minute she is Joan of Arc.

A McCain supporter holding a banner that reads "American Lipstick Club"
The Republicans have successfully put Mr Obama on the defensive

You blink and she has become Germaine Greer, the champion of feminism.

The former Miss Congeniality - are we even allowed to say that anymore? - has turned out to be an electoral force field around the ageing John McCain.

She repels critics and attracts followers, an odd kind of magnet.

Maybe she is actually an early product of the Cern atom smasher creating new matter somewhere near Geneva.

Joe Biden, Mr Obama's running mate, has clearly been swallowed up by the witness protection programme.

Sarah Palin never leaves her nominee's side.

She is a crowd-puller, a poll-booster, a star-turn.

My eyes gravitate automatically towards her and yesterday I caught myself thinking, albeit briefly: "Who is that grinning old man shadowing her on stage the whole time? Her father? Her uncle? Her lawyer? Oops. Sorry, John."

But we should not blame pigs or lipstick or Republicans.

If this is a crisis it is largely of Barack Obama's own making.

The brazen agent of change, the audacious interpreter of American dreams, the rousing rhetorician is sounding like an electoral actuary.

The Democratic nominee has been boxed into a corner, endlessly reacting to the outrageous slurs and arrows, unable to steer the conversation towards the issues and the future.

Ever since Sarah Palin has erupted onto the scene, Barack Obama has been caught like a moose in headlights.

He needs to rediscover his mojo, appeal to the voter's gut and not just their frontal lobe or he too will become Alaskan road-kill.

Matt Frei is the presenter of BBC World News Americawhich.

Palin Accepted $25,000 in Gifts

2008-09-27T02:25:00.001+04:00

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, who has made a crackdown on gift-giving to state officials a centerpiece of her ethics reform agenda, has accepted gifts valued at $25,367 from industry executives, municipalities and a cultural center whose board includes officials from some of the largest mining interests in the state, a review of state records shows.

The 41 gifts Palin accepted during her 20 months as governor include honorific tributes, expensive artwork and free travel for a family member. They also include more than $2,500 in personal items from Calista, a large Alaska native corporation with a variety of pending state regulatory and budgetary issues, and a gold-nugget pin valued at $1,200 from the city of Nome, which lobbies on municipal, local and capital budget matters, documents show.

About a quarter of the entities bestowing gifts on the governor are represented by one of Alaska's most influential mining lobbyists, who said in an interview that she was not involved in the tributes. The lobbyist, Wendy Chamberlain, has a relationship with the governor's family through the friendship of their teenage daughters.

On forms disclosing the gifts, Palin, who is the Republican vice presidential nominee, routinely checked "no" when asked whether she was in a position to "take official action that may affect the person who gave me the gift," and a spokeswoman for Sen. John McCain's presidential campaign said the gifts had no undue influence on her.

In response to e-mailed questions, Meghan Stapleton, who is based in Alaska for the McCain-Palin campaign, wrote: "Throughout her career Governor Palin has stood for the highest standards of ethics. She spearheaded new ethics reforms in Alaska and took on her own party and entrenched interests to return Alaska's government to its people."

Records show that 23 of the gifts were offered during Palin's early months in office, when she was pushing the legislature to address a state corruption scandal by passing a package of ethics reforms. She accepted 18 gifts after the law passed in July 2007. Among other provisions, the law forbade executive branch officials from taking gifts from lobbyists or from interests with pending state business.

Gift rules for elected officials vary among states, with some such as Wisconsin banning all gifts and others with no applicable rules other than anti-bribery statutes. When former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee (R) ran for president this year, he faced questions about his acceptance of more than $150,000 in gifts during a decade in office.

The Alaska attorney general's office contends that gifts to a governor must be evaluated on "a case-by-case basis," Assistant Attorney General Judy Bockman said. Some are offered as "a courtesy," she said, to newly elected officials and are not considered an ethical issue.

Palin has noted that passage of the tough ethics law was a proud accomplishment. She took office amid a widespread federal investigation of influence-peddling by Veco, a now-defunct oil pipeline services and construction company, that had led to indictments of prominent state legislators and eventually to charges against Ted Stevens, the state's senior Republican senator, who is now on trial in Washington.

Palin forwarded her ethics proposals to the legislature in January 2007, her first month in office. That month, she accepted three gifts from Calista's chief executive, Matthew Nicolai: a $2,200 ivory puffin mask, a woven grass fan worth $300 and a $150 ivory necklace. Nicolai, who did not return phone calls, runs the large corporation, which profits from a multibillion-dollar gold-mining operation on its land.

Palin, who holds significant sway over budgetary issues affecting cities, also accepted for "personal use" the gold-nugget pin from Nome. Mayor Denise Michels said the memento was meant to remind the governor that "Nome is a historic mining community." Palin approved about $6 million in funding this year for a public safety building in the city. "Anything our state can do to help us in capital projects, we're very grateful," Michels said.

Palin has also reported as gifts two fact-finding trips that mining companies sponsored for her husband, Todd. The trips were among several sponsored by mining companies for state officials.

Todd Palin accepted an $805 charter flight from Barrick Gold and a $200 flight from Red Dog Mines. Both companies are clients of Chamberlain, a top lobbyist with Legislative Consultants, which led the state in lobbying income last year.

Red Dog is the sole taxpayer to the Northwest Arctic Borough, an Alaskan jurisdiction represented by Chamberlain that received $10.9 million from the zinc mine in 2007. The borough gave Palin a whale baleen basket valued at $300.

Chamberlain, the ex-wife of an influential former state lawmaker, said in an interview that she was unaware of her clients giving gifts to the Palins.

Under the new ethics laws, Palin may not accept lobbyist gifts unless the lobbyist is a family member. The governor explains in detail in her disclosure how she reimbursed Chamberlain for a summer trip made by Palin's 14-year-old daughter, Willow. Willow is friends with Chamberlain's teenage daughter, Mackenzie. Chamberlain said Willow accompanied her and her daughter in the summer of 2007 to a basketball camp and then to Mexico.

"This is not a gift," reads a handwritten note on Palin's disclosure form. "It is merely interaction with a parent who is registered as a lobbyist with the state of Alaska."

Chamberlain said she kept trip receipts to ensure that the Palins could reimburse her. The lobbyist said she has been careful around Palin in government settings.

"Because our kids are together quite a bit, people made the assumption we are good buddies, but we aren't," she said. "I was a bit nervous of her, and I guess she was a bit nervous of me."

It was an unspoken rule that lobbyists should not directly approach Palin, Chamberlain said. The lobbyist said she had access to the governor's key staff members and she set up meetings for her clients. "I didn't have business conversations with her, because she didn't see lobbyists," Chamberlain said. "She preferred to see clients without lobbyists present."

Chamberlain also represents the Pebble Partnership, which has proposed a massive gold mine on Bristol Bay that has encountered opposition from conservationists. Palin has come under fire for speaking out against a statewide initiative, Proposition 4, that would have imposed costly environmental regulations on mining operations, particularly the Pebble Mine. A hearing by a state ethics watchdog agency has been scheduled for mid-November to see whether statutes prohibiting partisan activity apply to the governor's statements on the initiative.

Mining interests did not play a major fundraising role in Palin's gubernatorial campaign, but post-election donations to her inaugural committee came from four mining companies, including Northern Dynasty, the Pebble Mine co-developer. The money was spent on inaugural balls and on travel by the governor and her family for events. The amounts were not disclosed.

Palin also reported receiving $1,000 in gifts -- an Aleut woven basket, a sea otter headband, a Tlingit rattle and an Athabascan chief necklace -- at an inaugural reception thrown by the Alaska Native Heritage Center. Executives of several of Chamberlain's clients serve on the center's board and many were in attendance when the gifts were presented to the governor.

Research editor Alice Crites contributed to this report.

Sarah Palin carved into cornfield

2008-09-27T02:02:00.002+04:00

Sarah Palin gets Corny!

An Ohio farmer would like to invite you to get lost inside the head of Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin.

A 16-acre corn maze near the town of Whitehouse has been carved in Palin's likeness, complete with her familiar updo hairstyle and eyeglasses.

Farmer Duke Wheeler says that Palin created a lot of excitement in the campaign and that he was hoping to generate some for this year's maze.

Wheeler says it took an artist from Idaho at least eight hours to mow down stalks for the maze.

Source: AP

Incredible McCain Girl

2008-09-25T19:10:00.001+04:00

Sarah Palin's Alleged Lover Exposed

2008-09-25T18:57:00.001+04:00

Threatening legal action will not be enough to stop a national gossip magazine from featuring its exclusive on Sarah Palin’s alleged extramarital affair.

According to The NATIONAL ENQUIRER, three members of the man’s family, including one by sworn affidavit, have claimed that Palin engaged in an affair with husband Todd’s former business partner, Brad Hanson.

Hanson owned a snowmobile dealership with Palin’s husband Todd, who terminated the partnership after he heard stories about the alleged romp in 1996. This was around the time that Palin was mayor of Wasilla.

“Sarah was elected mayor of Wasilla, Brad became a city council member in the nearby town of Palmer, and they started an affair,” says Jim Burdett, who was described by the Enquirer as a “Hanson family insider.”

“Todd found out about the affair and was so mad he broke up their partnership at the snowmobile dealership.”

The NATIONAL ENQUIRER says that Burdett has gone on the record with the details of the affair and even passed a “rigorous” polygraph test. Another source, who The NATIONAL ENQUIRER did not identify, provided the magazine with a sworn affidavit attesting to the Palin-Hanson report.

“I’ve known about Brad having had an affair for a long time, but it wasn’t until just recently that I learned his affair was with Sarah Palin,” Burdett tells The NATIONAL ENQUIRER.

Rumors of Palin’s alleged secret booty call have been circulating the ‘net. Coincidentally, Hanson has reportedly filed a motion to have his divorce records sealed in Alaska.

In attempt to stop the reports, John McCain’s people threatened legal action against The NATIONAL ENQUIRER.

A+E Interactive

Joe Biden stepping down as Barack Obama's VP?

2008-09-25T02:09:00.000+04:00

There is no doubt that the Democrats who voted for Hillary Clinton in the primariers are still fuming mad that she didn’t win the nomination…but they were angered even further when Barack Obama didn’t have the guts or fortitude to choose Clinton as his running mate for this year’s election.

So when Sarah Palin was selected by the Republican Party…it seemed as though a lot of women fled to McCain because they liked him better than Barack Obama and they admired The Maverick for choosing a female running mate…no matter how idiotic the decision actually appears to be.

So what better way for the Democrats to regain their plummeting momentum than to get back a lot of the pro-abortion women’s vote and some of that white, working middle class vote throughout the United States than to place Hillary Rodham Clinton back on the ticket?

I really cannot see this scenario taking place…with Biden stepping down…unless there really is something very wrong with Joe Biden’s health.

But wouldn’t this have been examined long before he was chosen by Barack Obama to be his running mate? I mean in the vetting process?

Joe Biden is saying a lot of things that are just plain stupid and kind of annoying to those to whom he is directing his comments…but this is normal, typical Joe Biden! So I say that these rumors of Hillary Clinton coming in to replace him as VP are just ridiculous rumors and that Barack Obama will probably be muzzling Joe Biden until the October 2, 2008 Veep debate with Sarah Palin.

At any rate, I am not very sure that even Hillary Clinton could stop the spiraling poll numbers for the Democrats at this point in the game.

The Democrats may just have to admit that they lost the election to someone who played their image and pandering game better than they did…John McCain, when he chose Sarah Palin as his running mate (please don’t say he picked her because she, too, is a Maverick)…utter nonsense.

Twelve Lies of Sarah Palin

2008-09-24T14:50:00.000+04:00

- She has lied about the Bridge To Nowhere. She ran for office favoring it, wore a sweatshirt defending it, and only gave it up when the federal congress, Senator McCain in particular, went ballistic. She kept the money anyway and favors funding Don Young's Way, at twice the cost of the original bridge.
- She has lied about her firing of the town librarian and police chief of Wasilla, Alaska.
- She has lied about pressure on Alaska's public safety commissioner to fire her ex-brother-in-law.
- She has lied about her previous statements on climate change.
- She has lied about Alaska's contribution to America's oil and gas production.
- She has lied about when she asked her daughters for their permission for her to run for vice-president.
- She has lied about the actual progress in constructing a natural gas pipeline from Alaska.
- She has lied about Obama's position on habeas corpus.
- She has lied about her alleged tolerance of homosexuality.
- She has lied about the use or non-use of a TelePrompter at the St Paul convention.
- She has lied about her alleged pay-cut as mayor of Wasilla.
- She has lied about what Alaska's state scientists concluded about the health of the polar bear population in Alaska.

From Andrew Sullivan

John McCain's Brazilian Lover Found

2008-09-24T13:49:00.003+04:00

A former model and ballerina is making headlines across Brazil after being identified as John McCain`s lover 51 years ago. Maria Gracinda Teixeira, 77, says she is the woman the Republican presidential candidate fondly described — though never named — in his 1999 book `Faith of My Fathers.`

The former "dancer" was tracked down by Brazil's O Globo newspaper . Maria Gracinda Teixeira says, "He was a lovely person and loved to go out with me. I called him 'John' but he was my dear and my coconut dessert."He was such a good kisser that I had to purchase a book which taught me how to kiss to keep up with him."

Asked about John in bed, Gracinda says, "Of course we had sex...he was not only good at kissing but good at everything."

In an interview with the newspaper Extra, Garcinda described the young McCain as "cuddly, affectionate and romantic" and noted he called her "my coco bonbon".

Garcinda, known by her working name Cherie, describes herself not only as a former model, “but also a dancer, miss and lover of very important men”.

Sarah Palin and Hamid Karzai discuss Babies

2008-09-24T13:11:00.003+04:00

Gov. Sarah Palin met with Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Tuesday in New York.

"Palin and Karzai Bond Over Children 1 p.m. When Gov. Sarah Palin sat down with President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan on Tuesday afternoon, the polite preliminaries to their conversation centered around children, as Mr. Karzai spoke of the birth of his first child last year."

Ohno; not a sixth Palin baby in the works?

John McCain Is Against Birth Control

2008-09-24T06:00:00.000+04:00

On historic Griswold v. Connecticut anniversary, NARAL Pro-Choice America says McCain's anti-choice record includes opposition to birth control

Washington, DC – On June 7, anti-choice activists around the country will protest the historic Supreme Court ruling that held that the right to privacy includes the right to birth control – showing just how far out of the mainstream their agenda really is. While the majority of Americans support the use of birth control to prevent unintended pregnancy, John McCain has actually voted to block women's access to birth control. Nancy Keenan, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, said that voters should question the myth of the moderate maverick that the McCain campaign is selling.

"Forty-two years ago, the United State Supreme Court ruled in Griswold v. Connecticut that the right to privacy includes the right to birth control, yet American women are still facing attacks on their freedom and privacy from every level, including the White House," Keenan said. "Many Americans may be unaware that it's not just a fringe group of activists who oppose birth control. Seemingly ‘mainstream' anti-choice politicians like John McCain are consistently bowing to the pressure of their far-right base and moving an agenda that is out-of-touch with the American public."

John McCain has, in fact, voted at least 22 times against women's access to family-planning services, including birth control.

"During his twenty-five years in office, Sen. McCain has consistently voted to block low-income women's access to birth control, to deny our teens accurate information about birth control and condoms, to stop measures that would require insurance companies to cover birth control, and to prevent funds to an organization that provides family-planning services – not abortion – for the world's poorest women. Voters need to know that John McCain is not only against abortion, he is against birth control."

On June 7, 1965, by a vote of 7-2, in Griswold v. Connecticut, the Supreme Court struck down a Connecticut law that prohibited the use of contraceptives, holding the statute violated the constitutional right to marital privacy. This decision is cited as fundamental to privacy rights, but today, the right to use birth control is under increasing attack from extreme anti-choice activists and pressure groups. This weekend, the American Life League, an anti-choice, anti-birth control group, is launching "Protest the Pill Day '08: The Pill Kills Babies."

To learn more about John McCain's full anti-choice record, including a section on his votes against access to family-planning services, please visit: http://www.prochoiceamerica.org/assets/files/mccain_fact_sheet.pdf.

Pro-Abortion Groups Renew $30 Million Campaign Against McCain, Sarah Palin

2008-09-24T05:20:00.001+04:00

Three pro-abortion groups are renewing their pledge to spend $30 million collectively bashing John McCain. The organizations upped their commitment to the attack ads and get-out-the-vote efforts with the addition of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin to McCain's ticket.

NARAL, Planned Parenthood and Emily's List are the long-time heavy hitters of the pro-abortion movement and they each previously announced multi-million dollar campaigns targeting the presidential election.

They told The Hill newspaper on Friday that voters can expect to see the effort roll out over the last 60 days of the election season.

"This is the most anti-choice ticket in history of the Republican Party," NARAL Political Director Beth Shipp told the paper. "McCain put someone as outside the mainstream as you can on his ticket, which is Sarah Palin."

Shipp is concerned that Palin will draw the kind of voters -- independents, pro-abortion Republicans and women -- that they are working to persuade to vote for pro-abortion candidate Barack Obama.

NARAL's $10 million will reportedly target about three dozen Congressional districts where the organization thinks it can swing enough votes to Obama to make the difference in the election.

Planned Parenthood also told The Hill that Palin makes the differences between the tickets clear with respect to abortion.

"This selection may satisfy the right wing of the Republican Party, but it will further alienate mainstream women voters," it said.

Emily's List president Ellen Malcolm, a prominent Hillary Clinton supporter during the Democratic primary, says Palin will be unable to win over disaffected Clinton backers who, she says, are gravitating towards Obama.

"With the most important decision of his candidacy, Senator McCain managed to appear politically expedient, reverse his advantage on experience, damage his potential for growth among independents and undecided voters, and turn off the women who supported Senator Hillary Clinton," she told The Hill.

Ellen's comments make it clear that pro-abortion women's groups like Emily's List are more concerned with abortion than with helping and promoting women.

"If Senator McCain thought that putting Governor Palin on the ticket would be a game changer, he may have been right, but not in the way he intended. Senator McCain has seriously misjudged women voters if he thinks he can win them over simply by putting a woman on the ticket," she said.

However, polls show that about 20 percent of Clinton backers will support McCain in the November election.

Freddie Mac paid McCain's manager $15,000 monthly until August

2008-09-24T04:56:00.000+04:00

Freddie Mac paid $15,000 a month to a firm owned by Sen. John McCain’s campaign manager from the end of 2005 through last month. The disclosure contradicts a statement Sunday night by Mr. McCain that the campaign manager, Rick Davis, had no involvement with the company for the last several years.

The Times, bases its report on "two people with direct knowledge of the arrangement."

They said they did not recall Mr. Davis doing much substantive work for the company in return for the money, other than speak to a political action committee composed of high-ranking employees in October 2006 on the coming midterm congressional elections. They said Mr. Davis’s his firm, Davis & Manafort, was kept on the payroll because of Mr. Davis’s close ties to Mr. McCain, the Republican presidential nominee, who was widely expected by 2006 to run again for the White House.

Mr. Davis took a leave from Davis & Manafort for the duration of the campaign, but as a partner and equity-holder continues to share in its profits.

A Freddie Mac spokeswoman said the company would not comment. The McCain campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

McCain has been attacking Sen. Barack Obama for his ties to former officials of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. Both mortgage lenders, which have been taken over by the federal government, have cultivated congressional allies for years to ward off efforts to restrict their business.

Sarah Palin: wrong woman, wrong message

2008-09-24T02:00:00.001+04:00

Here's the good news: Women have become so politically powerful that even the anti-feminist right wing -- the folks with a headlock on the Republican Party -- are trying to appease the gender gap with a first-ever female vice president. We owe this to women -- and to many men too -- who have picketed, gone on hunger strikes or confronted violence at the polls so women can vote. We owe it to Shirley Chisholm, who first took the "white-male-only" sign off the White House, and to Hillary Rodham Clinton, who hung in there through ridicule and misogyny to win 18 million votes.

But here is even better news: It won't work. This isn't the first time a boss has picked an unqualified woman just because she agrees with him and opposes everything most other women want and need. Feminism has never been about getting a job for one woman. It's about making life more fair for women everywhere. It's not about a piece of the existing pie; there are too many of us for that. It's about baking a new pie.

Selecting Sarah Palin, who was touted all summer by Rush Limbaugh, is no way to attract most women, including die-hard Clinton supporters. Palin shares nothing but a chromosome with Clinton. Her down-home, divisive and deceptive speech did nothing to cosmeticize a Republican convention that has more than twice as many male delegates as female, a presidential candidate who is owned and operated by the right wing and a platform that opposes pretty much everything Clinton's candidacy stood for -- and that Barack Obama's still does. To vote in protest for McCain/Palin would be like saying, "Somebody stole my shoes, so I'll amputate my legs."

This is not to beat up on Palin. I defend her right to be wrong, even on issues that matter most to me. I regret that people say she can't do the job because she has children in need of care, especially if they wouldn't say the same about a father. I get no pleasure from imagining her in the spotlight on national and foreign policy issues about which she has zero background, with one month to learn to compete with Sen. Joe Biden's 37 years' experience.

Palin has been honest about what she doesn't know. When asked last month about the vice presidency, she said, "I still can't answer that question until someone answers for me: What is it exactly that the VP does every day?" When asked about Iraq, she said, "I haven't really focused much on the war in Iraq."

She was elected governor largely because the incumbent was unpopular, and she's won over Alaskans mostly by using unprecedented oil wealth to give a $1,200 rebate to every resident. Now she is being praised by McCain's campaign as a tax cutter, despite the fact that Alaska has no state income or sales tax. Perhaps McCain has opposed affirmative action for so long that he doesn't know it's about inviting more people to meet standards, not lowering them. Or perhaps McCain is following the Bush administration habit, as in the Justice Department, of putting a job candidate's views on "God, guns and gays" ahead of competence. The difference is that McCain is filling a job one 72-year-old heartbeat away from the presidency.

So let's be clear: The culprit is John McCain. He may have chosen Palin out of change-envy, or a belief that women can't tell the difference between form and content, but the main motive was to please right-wing ideologues; the same ones who nixed anyone who is now or ever has been a supporter of reproductive freedom. If that were not the case, McCain could have chosen a woman who knows what a vice president does and who has thought about Iraq; someone like Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison or Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine. McCain could have taken a baby step away from right-wing patriarchs who determine his actions, right down to opposing the Violence Against Women Act.

Palin's value to those patriarchs is clear: She opposes just about every issue that women support by a majority or plurality. She believes that creationism should be taught in public schools but disbelieves global warming; she opposes gun control but supports government control of women's wombs; she opposes stem cell research but approves "abstinence-only" programs, which increase unwanted births, sexually transmitted diseases and abortions; she tried to use taxpayers' millions for a state program to shoot wolves from the air but didn't spend enough money to fix a state school system with the lowest high-school graduation rate in the nation; she runs with a candidate who opposes the Fair Pay Act but supports $500 million in subsidies for a natural gas pipeline across Alaska; she supports drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve, though even McCain has opted for the lesser evil of offshore drilling. She is Phyllis Schlafly, only younger.

I don't doubt her sincerity. As a lifetime member of the National Rifle Assn., she doesn't just support killing animals from helicopters, she does it herself. She doesn't just talk about increasing the use of fossil fuels but puts a coal-burning power plant in her own small town. She doesn't just echo McCain's pledge to criminalize abortion by overturning Roe vs. Wade, she says that if one of her daughters were impregnated by rape or incest, she should bear the child. She not only opposes reproductive freedom as a human right but implies that it dictates abortion, without saying that it also protects the right to have a child.

So far, the major new McCain supporter that Palin has attracted is James Dobson of Focus on the Family. Of course, for Dobson, "women are merely waiting for their husbands to assume leadership," so he may be voting for Palin's husband.

Being a hope-a-holic, however, I can see two long-term bipartisan gains from this contest.

Republicans may learn they can't appeal to right-wing patriarchs and most women at the same time. A loss in November could cause the centrist majority of Republicans to take back their party, which was the first to support the Equal Rights Amendment and should be the last to want to invite government into the wombs of women.

And American women, who suffer more because of having two full-time jobs than from any other single injustice, finally have support on a national stage from male leaders who know that women can't be equal outside the home until men are equal in it. Barack Obama and Joe Biden are campaigning on their belief that men should be, can be and want to be at home for their children.

This could be huge.

Gloria Steinem is an author, feminist organizer and co-founder of the Women's Media Center. She supported Hillary Clinton and is now supporting Barack Obama.

Pit Bulls against Palin

2008-09-24T01:35:00.000+04:00

It takes 13 cars to be John McCain

2008-09-24T01:03:00.000+04:00

When you have seven homes, that’s a lot of garages to fill. After the fuss over the number of residences owned by the two presidential nominees, NEWSWEEK looked into the candidates’ cars. And based on public vehicle-registration records, here’s the score. John and Cindy McCain: 13. Barack and Michelle Obama: one.

One vehicle in the McCain fleet has caused a small flap. United Auto Workers president Ron Gettelfinger, an Obama backer, accused McCain this month of “flip-flopping” on who bought daughter Meghan’s foreign-made Toyota Prius. McCain said last year that he bought it, but then told a Detroit TV station on Sept. 7 that Meghan “bought it, I believe, herself.” (The McCain campaign did not respond to multiple requests for comment.)

Obama’s lone vehicle also is a green machine, a 2008 Ford Escape hybrid. He bought it last year to replace the family’s Chrysler 300C, a Hemi-powered sedan. Obama ditched the 300C, once 50 Cent’s preferred ride, after taking heat for driving a guzzler while haranguing Detroit about building more fuel-efficient cars.

If John McCain owns seven houses, well that’s a lot of garage space for cars to take so we all could relate, right? After all, he can’t just leave the garages empty. HuffPo has a slideshow of McCain’s rides

John McCain, the elitist that you can’t believe in…

How to be Sarah Palin

2008-09-22T11:11:00.003+04:00

1. Who is this woman?She is a former beauty queen. She came in second in the Miss Alaska contest and in fact won the Miss Congeniality title. But most of us only got to know about her because Senator McCain thinks she is all that. I mean, why else would he choose her to become the potential vice president?

It could be her looks, or it could be what we are about to learn about this wonder woman. She is the Governor of Alaska and as a child, she would sometimes go hunting with her father before school, a thing that she enjoyed so much that would later shape her adult life. She has a strong conviction for doing what is right. Here, be the judge of this; when her stepmother-in-law decided to run for mayor, Sarah Palin instead supported her opponent. Of course it was not because mothers-in-law and daughters-in-law do not generally get along, but probably because she thought the other person was better suited to run the office. So to be Sarah Palin, you have to be Miss Mary two-goody shoes, you have to dislike your stepmother-in-law, be a politician, and above all, be in the good books of John McCain.

2. May God’s will prevailSarah describes herself as a Bible-believing Christian. And when you hear how many times she alludes to the Bible, you will be convinced that this is true. As a young girl, she headed Christian athletes’ fellowship in school, and every time before a basketball match, she led the team prayer. An outstanding candidate for the Kingdom of God you may say. In fact, she believes that God is responsible for everything. On the topic of Iraq, she asked that people pray for the soldiers and that “there is a plan and that that plan is God’s plan.” Yes. God has tendencies of sitting in the oval office and deciding to invade countries. In regards to a proposed natural-gas pipeline she said, “I think God’s will has to be done in unifying people and companies to get that gas line built. In keeping with the tradition of the Bible therefore, she is very much against homosexuality, and believes it should be discriminated against.

3. Tree hugger?Not. To be Sarah Palin, you have to have no love for the environment. Scratch that. You have to absolutely ignore the environment all together. Feel free not to take any time off your busy political schedule to learn anything about the environment. And such attitude will get you thinking like this; that global warming is not caused by human beings. Aliens perhaps? Not that it is surprising, considering she has been chairman of an oil drilling company and her husband works for BP, an oil drilling company. What is that old saying - you can’t bite the hand that feeds you? Right, so to be Ms Palin, you should be clear about which side of your toast is buttered. Sarah Palin also hates the natural environment. She is a life long NRA (National Rifle Association of America) member, kills animals at every chance, and has sued the federal government for putting polar bears on the endangered species list.

4. Family values She preaches about the sanctity of marriage, the importance of family, and other conservative evangelical Christian philosophies. She stands strong defining marriage as the sole right of a man and woman. Not man and man. Or woman and woman. In 2006, she okayed denying benefits to homosexual couples. In 2008, she vetoed a bill stating that denying rights to gays and lesbians is unconstitutional. Her own underage high school student daughter is pregnant. Out of wedlock. Of course she comes off as a woman of great character for letting her daughter keep the baby. She is after all publicly against abortion. To be Sarah Palin, you have to believe that family values have nothing to do with teenage pregnancy. You should preach family values everywhere except in your own home. Another saying comes to mind. Charity begins at home Sarah. To be a perfect Sarah Palin, you have to have one description of family; Mother, Father, and heterosexual children.

5. The gun followed the crossWe have seen above that Ms Sarah is a good Christian. Kind of reminds us of another set of Christians. Remember them? The missionaries? Remember how they introduced God only a few days before introducing us to the machine gun? Well, Sarah takes the teachings of the missionaries ever so seriously. As a result, she is a firm believer in the goodness of the gun. She supports the constitutional right to bear firearms. I bet that gun must have come in handy when she had to hold a gun to her daughter’s boyfriend to marry her after making her pregnant. Okay, so I am lying, she did not literally hold a gun to the boy’s head, but surely a high school student can’t have been too eager to walk down the isle yet? Anyway, to be Sarah Palin, you have to be a lover of guns. You have to ignore that those things have been known to kill. And there you have it - how to be Sarah Palin 101.

Dorene Namanya

A Personal View on Sarah Palin

2008-09-20T17:30:00.000+04:00

I am a resident of Wasilla, Alaska. I have known Sarah since 1992. Everyone here knows Sarah, so it is nothing special to say we are on a first-name basis. Our children have attended the same schools. Her father was my child's favorite substitute teacher. I also am on a
first name basis with her parents and mother-in-law. I attended more City Council meetings during her administration than about 99% of the residents of the city.

She is enormously popular; in every way shes like the most popular girl in middle school. Even men who think she is a poor choice and
won't vote for her can't quit smiling when talking about her because she is a "babe".

It is astonishing and almost scary how well she can keep a secret. She kept her most recent pregnancy a secret from her children and parents for seven months.

She is "pro-life". She recently gave birth to a Down's syndrome baby. There is no cover-up involved, here; Trig is her baby.

She is energetic and hardworking. She regularly worked out at the gym.

She is savvy. She doesn't take positions; she just "puts things out there" and if they prove to be popular, then she takes credit.

Her husband works a union job on the North Slope for BP and is a champion snowmobile racer. Todd Palins kind of job is highly sought-after because of the schedule and high pay. He arranges his work schedule so he can fish for salmon in Bristol Bay for a month or so in summer, but by no stretch of the imagination is fishing their major source of income. Nor has her life-style ever been anything like that of native Alaskans.

Sarah and her whole family are avid hunters.

She's smart.

Her experience is as mayor of a city with a population of about 5,000 (at the time), and less than 2 years as governor of a state with about 670,000 residents.

During her mayoral administration most of the actual work of running this small city was turned over to an administrator. She had been pushed to hire this administrator by party power-brokers after she had gotten herself into some trouble over precipitous firings which had given rise to a recall campaign.

Sarah campaigned in Wasilla as a fiscal conservative. During her 6 years as Mayor, she increased general government expenditures by over 33%. During those same 6 years the amount of taxes collected by the City increased by 38%. This was during a period of low inflation (1996-2002). She reduced progressive property taxes and increased a regressive sales tax which taxed even food. The tax cuts that she promoted benefited large corporate property owners way more than they benefited residents.

The huge increases in tax revenues during her mayoral administration werent enough to fund everything on her wish list though, borrowed money was needed, too. She inherited a city with zero debt, but left it with indebtedness of over $22 million. What did Mayor Palin encourage the voters to borrow money for? Was it the infrastructure that she said she supported? The sewage treatment plant that the city lacked? or a new library? No. $1m for a park. $15m-plus for construction of a multi-use sports complex which she rushed through to build on a piece of property that the City didn't even have clear title to, that was still in litigation 7 yrs later--to the delight of the lawyers involved! The sports complex itself is a nice addition to the community but a huge money pit, not the profit-generator she claimed it would be. She also supported bonds for $5.5m for road projects that could have been done in 5-7 yrs without any borrowing.

While Mayor, City Hall was extensively remodeled and her office redecorated more than once.

These are small numbers, but Wasilla is a very small city.

As an oil producer, the high price of oil has created a budget surplus in Alaska. Rather than invest this surplus in technology that will make us energy independent and increase efficiency, as Governor she proposed distribution of this surplus to every individual in the state.

In this time of record state revenues and budget surpluses, she recommended that the state borrow/bond for road projects, even while she proposed distribution of surplus state revenues: spend today's surplus, borrow for needs.

Shes not very tolerant of divergent opinions or open to outside ideas or compromise. As Mayor, she fought ideas that weren't generated by her or her staff. Ideas weren't evaluated on their merits, but on the basis of who proposed them.

While Sarah was Mayor of Wasilla she tried to fire our highly respected City Librarian because the Librarian refused to consider removing from the library some books that Sarah wanted removed. City residents rallied to the defense of the City Librarian and against Palin's attempt at out-and-out censorship, so Palin backed down and withdrew her termination letter. People who fought her attempt to oust the Librarian are on her enemies list to this day.

Sarah complained about the old boys club when she first ran for Mayor, so what did she bring Wasilla? A new set of "old boys". Palin fired most of the experienced staff she inherited. At the City and as Governor she hired or elevated new, inexperienced, obscure people, creating a staff totally dependent on her for their jobs and eternally grateful and fiercely loyal--loyal to the point of abusing their power to further her personal agenda, as she has acknowledged happened in the case of pressuring the States top cop (see below).

As Mayor, Sarah fired Wasillas Police Chief because he intimidated her, she told the press. As Governor, her recent firing of Alaska's top cop has the ring of familiarity about it. He served at her pleasure and she had every legal right to fire him, but it's pretty clear that an important factor in her decision to fire him was because he wouldn't fire her sister's ex-husband, a State Trooper. Under investigation for abuse of power, she has had to admit that more than 2 dozen contacts were made between her staff and family to the person that she later fired, pressuring him to fire her ex-brother-in-law. She tried to replace the man she fired with a man who she knew had been reprimanded for sexual harassment; when this caused a public furor, she withdrew her support.

She has bitten the hand of every person who extended theirs to her in help. The City Council person who personally escorted her around town introducing her to voters when she first ran for Wasilla City Council became one of her first targets when she was later elected Mayor. She abruptly fired her loyal City Administrator; even people who didn't like the guy were stunned by this ruthlessness.

Fear of retribution has kept all of these people from saying anything publicly about her.

When then-Governor Murkowski was handing out political plums, Sarah got the best, Chair of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission: one of the few jobs not in Juneau and one of the best paid. She had no background in oil & gas issues. Within months of scoring this great job which paid $122,400/yr, she was complaining in the press about the high salary. I was told that she hated that job: the commute, the structured hours, the work. Sarah became aware that a member of this Commission (who was also the State Chair of the Republican Party) engaged in unethical behavior on the job. In a gutsy move which some undoubtedly cautioned her could be political suicide, Sarah solved all her problems in one fell swoop: got out of the job she hated and garnered gobs of media attention as the patron saint of ethics and as a gutsy fighter against the old boys club when she dramatically quit, exposing this mans ethics violations (for which he was fined).

As Mayor, she had her hand stuck out as far as anyone for pork from Senator Ted Stevens. Lately, she has castigated his pork-barrel politics and publicly humiliated him. She only opposed the bridge to nowhere after it became clear that it would be unwise not to.

As Governor, she gave the Legislature no direction and budget guidelines, then made a big grandstand display of line-item vetoing projects, calling them pork. Public outcry and further legislative action restored most of these projects--which had been vetoed simply because she was not aware of their importance--but with the unobservant she had gained a reputation as anti-pork.

She is solidly Republican: no political maverick. The State party leaders hate her because she has bit them in the back and humiliated them. Other members of the party object to her self-description as a fiscal conservative.

Around Wasilla there are people who went to high school with Sarah. They call her Sarah Barracuda because of her unbridled ambition and predatory ruthlessness. Before she became so powerful, very ugly stories circulated around town about shenanigans she pulled to be made point guard on the high school basketball team. When Sarah's mother-in-law, a highly respected member of the community and experienced manager, ran for Mayor, Sarah refused to endorse her.

As Governor, she stepped outside of the box and put together of package of legislation known as AGIA that forced the oil companies to march to the beat of her drum.

Like most Alaskans, she favors drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. She has questioned if the loss of sea ice is linked to global warming. She campaigned as a private citizen against a state initiative that would have either a) protected salmon streams from pollution from mines, or b) tied up in the courts all mining in the state (depending on who you listen to). She has pushed the States lawsuit against the Dept. of the Interiors decision to list polar bears as threatened species.

McCain is the oldest person to ever run for President; Sarah will be a heartbeat away from being President. There has to be literally millions of Americans who are more knowledgeable and experienced than she. However, theres a lot of people who have underestimated her and are regretting it.

CLAIM VS FACT

Hockey mom: true for a few years
PTA mom: true years ago when her first-born was in elementary school, not since
NRA supporter: absolutely true
social conservative: mixed. Opposes gay marriage, BUT vetoed a bill that would have denied benefits to employees in same-sex relationships (said she did this because it was unconstitutional).
pro-creationism: mixed. Supports it, BUT did nothing as Governor to promote it.
Pro-life: mixed. Knowingly gave birth to a Downs syndrome baby BUT declined to call a special legislative session on some pro-life legislation

Experienced: Some high schools have more students than Wasilla has residents. Many cities have more residents than the state of Alaska. No legislative experience other than City Council. Little hands-on supervisory or managerial experience; needed help of a city administrator to run town of about 5,000.

political maverick: not at all
gutsy: absolutely!
open & transparent: ??? Good at keeping secrets. Not good at explaining actions. has a developed philosophy of public policy: no

A Greenie: no. Turned Wasilla into a wasteland of big box stores and disconnected parking lots. Is pro-drilling off-shore and in ANWR.
fiscal conservative: not by my definition!
pro-infrastructure: No. Promoted a sports complex and park in a city without a sewage treatment plant or storm drainage system. Built streets to early 20th century standards.

pro-tax relief: Lowered taxes for businesses, increased tax burden on residents
pro-small government: No. Oversaw greatest expansion of city government in Wasillas history.
pro-labor/pro-union. No. Just because her husband works union doesn't make her pro-labor. I have seen nothing to support any claim that she is pro-labor/pro-union.

WHY AM I WRITING THIS?

First, I have long believed in the importance of being an informed voter. I am a voter registrar. For 10 years I put on student voting programs in the schools. If you google my name (Anne Kilkenny + Alaska), you will find references to my participation in local government, education, and PTA/parent organizations.

Secondly, I've always operated in the belief that "Bad things happen when good people stay silent". Few people know as much as I do because few have gone to as many City Council meetings.

Third, I am just a housewife. I don't have a job she can bump me out of. I don't belong to any organization that she can hurt. But, I am no fool; she is immensely popular here, and it is likely that this will cost me somehow in the future: that's life.

Fourth, she has hated me since back in 1996, when I was one of the 100 or so people who rallied to support the City Librarian against Sarah's attempt at censorship.

Fifth, I looked around and realized that everybody else was afraid to say anything because they were somehow vulnerable.

CAVEATS

I am not a statistician. I developed the numbers for the increase in spending & taxation 2 years ago (when Palin was running for Governor) from information supplied to me by the Finance Director of the City of Wasilla, and I can't recall exactly what I adjusted for: did I adjust for inflation? for population increases? Right now, it is impossible for a private person to get any info out of City Hall--they are swamped. So I can't verify my numbers.

You may have noticed that there are various numbers circulating for the population of Wasilla, ranging from my "about 5,000", up to 9,000. The day Palins selection was announced a city official told me that the current population is about 7,000. The official 2000 census count was 5,460. I have used about 5,000 because Palin was Mayor from 1996 to 2002, and the city was growing rapidly in the mid-90s.

Anne Kilkenny

What's common between Barack Obama and Abraham Lincoln

2008-09-20T17:15:00.001+04:00

* Both came from obscurity and very humble socio-economic backgrounds.
* Both physically thin and very tall.
* Both met and married their respective Illinoian wives, in Illinois.
* Both vocally opposed existing Wars and alleged deliberate deception by the Presidents who started them. Lincoln, the Mexican War. Obama, the Iraq War. And both did so at a time when public sentiments were strongly in favor of the respective Wars.
* Both advocated paradigm shifts in race relations.
* Both practiced law in Illinois.
* Both demonstrated knowledge of and competence in Constitutional law. Lincoln by being admitted to practice law before the U.S. Supreme Court. Obama by teaching Contitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School for 12 years.
* Both served multiple terms in the Illinois state legislature.
* Both served a single term in the U.S. Congress before running for President. Lincoln in the House and Obama in the Senate.
* Both nominated to run for U.S. President with nearly identical elective resumes consisting of multiple terms in the Illinois state lege and a single term in Congress.
* Both younger than the average age of the elected first-term Presidents who preceeded them. Lincoln by 5 years, Obama by 8 years. Although both were preceeded by several Presidents who had been even younger when inaugurated.
* Both faced significantly older General Election opponents. McCain is at 72 years old the oldest non-incumbent Presidential candidate in our nation’s history. Well, unless you want to include perennial spoiler wannabe Ralph Nader who is 74.
* Both significantly younger at nomination than the sitting President. Lincoln by 18 years, Obama by 14 years.

Joe Biden refusing to pay $150,000 campaign debt

2008-09-20T16:55:00.000+04:00

Family, I feel an obligation to honesty and truth to share with you some facts. My Father and Mother instilled in me the values and morals of treating people fairly and always being honest. If you purchase something, you pay for it. If you borrow something, you give it back.

I have been "stiffed" three times in my 30 year professional career by someone who I rendered services to, gave a finished product to, but who refused to pay for those services even though they acknowledged the services and products were correct, were what they asked for, and were never challenged for not being correct. I am lucky in having only three, but those three hurt badly.

Joe Biden was one of those people. I worked on his 1988 Presidential campaign financial disclosure engagement. I busted it for him and got everything right. He stiffed me for over $15,000 worth of work. He refused to pay once he dropped out of th e race. I did similar Capitol Hill campaign financial disclosure work for Bob Dole, Pat Buchanan, and a Democratic candidate for Ambassador to New Zealand. All of those folks paid even though they lost the election or did not get the appointment. That type of work is very demanding and very tedious because your efforts are scrutinized by Congress. Biden did not care.

I am on the Board of Directors of a company that owns a majority position in a private jet management company in Northern Virginia. They manage jets for businesses and rich folks. They also charter planes to the public. This past winter John Thompson chartered over $250,000 worth of air time. He paid every penny.

Joe Biden, in his latest unsuccessful run for President, chartered over $150,000 worth of air time. He PAID ZERO.

He continues to refuse to pay stating his race is over and he is out of money. He never once complained about his flights. Joe Biden is a rich man. He could pay.

Joe Biden is a liar and a cheat. I know it first hand.

Character is what life is all about. Joe Biden is a man of bad character and sets a bad example for America.

I feel compelled to share this dark side of a man who asks for your vote and trust.

Best Regards, B ruce D. Riddle, CPA, CFP

(Received in Email)

New Twists and Turns on Sarah Palin Yahoo Email Hack

2008-09-20T16:38:00.003+04:00

The Investigation:

The FBI and Secret Service are teaming up to try to track down the hacker behind the breach. The Secret Service attempted to get copies of the stolen messages from the Associated Press, according to Fox News, but the AP refused to hand over what it had.

The McCain-Palin campaign is working with authorities to help further the probe. "This is a shocking invasion of the governor's privacy and a violation of law. The matter has been turned over to the appropriate authorities," Campaign Manager Rick Davis stated.

The webmaster of a proxy service believed to have been used by the hacker is cooperating with the FBI to help pinpoint the suspect's location. Gabriel Ramuglia says he believes the hacker used his Ctunnel service to disguise his identity. Ramuglia is now sending more than 80GB worth of server logs to investigators, who hope to find the hacker's IP address inside.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation is raising questions over whether the hacker could be legally protected, even if he is caught. The EFF says the Department of Justice believes opened and read e-mails should be viewed differently than unopened messages -- and that accessing someone's read e-mails without their authorization should not necessarily be subject to prosecution. It all comes down to a matter of definitions, but in this case, those seemingly simple meanings could end up making all the difference.

The Players:

A Tennessee state representative is now confirming early rumors that his son is, in fact, the person linked to the postings that claim credit for the hack. State Rep. Mike Kernell told the Tennessean his 20-year-old son, David, is the subject of all the chatter surrounding the case. He declined to elaborate; however, several connections have surfaced between the young man and the forum poster, including a past blog of Kernell's in which he used the handle "rubicox", a strikingly similar name to the forum poster's alias of "rubico10." The posting itself is also believed to have been done under an e-mail account linked to Kernell with that same alias. (Coincidentally enough, the account was hosted with Yahoo Mail.)

Neither Palin nor McCain have publicly addressed the issue thus far, outside of their campaign manager's comments.

Amy B. McCorkell, a member of one of Palin's governor advisory boards who appears to have written one of the hacked e-mails, initially refused to discuss the subject with media members. She later confirmed to Wired that she had, in fact, sent the e-mail -- and had also since been in touch with the FBI.

Alaska Lieutenant Governor Sean Parnell, who also appears to have sent one of the hacked messages, is staying mum on the matter.

The Alaska governor's office is generally referring questions to the McCain-Palin campaign, telling Fox News: "People wouldn't be asking these questions if she wasn't a candidate."
Yahoo has stated it "can't get into specific details of any of our users' accounts." The company did, however, post a blog Thursday night urging all its webmail users to increase the strength of their Yahoo Mail passwords.

The Bigger Questions

The revelation that Sarah Palin maintained two separate Yahoo Mail accounts -- both of which have now been deleted -- is raising new questions over how much official government business she was conducting with non-logged, private mail services. Palin has come under fire for withholding more than a thousand e-mails from recent public records requests. The New York Times reports that Palin's staff had actually looked into whether using the Yahoo Mail accounts "could allow them to circumvent subpoenas seeking public records." Palin's spokespeople have stood behind the private e-mail use, saying they "don't hear any public clamor for access to internal communications of the governor's office."

Whether the hack itself was meant as a political statement or a simple prank, it has fueled a controversy now stretching far past the borders of the 49th state. While the ultimate implications have yet to be seen, you can be sure this mid-week move and the fallout that's followed won't soon be forgotten.

Honey, Have You Seen My Lipstick?

2008-09-19T23:30:00.000+04:00

McCain to new lows

2008-09-19T23:13:00.000+04:00

Yesterday, Republican John McCain held up the dog tags of a soldier killed in Afghanistan, saying they had been given to him by a female supporter.

According to the Associated Press, The Arizona senator lamented how negative the presidential contest had become and then told the audience that a woman named Cheryl Lee Patrick had reminded him why politics matter.

“When Sarah and I landed in the airport here there was a woman there to greet us, and she handed me an envelope,” Mr. McCain said.

“Please remember and support our troops in Afghanistan. God bless you,” McCain read from the envelope. He opened it and pulled out Lybert's dog tags, as members of the audience gasped.

“I will do everything I can and know to make sure his sacrifice was not in vain,” McCain told the audience to loud cheers.

In 2000, a similar incident occurred on the McCain campaign trail. Having fought back against push-polls suggesting he fathered an illegitimate black child, McCain was facing accusations of having gone negative. At a town hall event, he was confronted by a woman who told him that her son had believed in him, and was now disillusioned with politics. McCain swore on the spot to return honour to politics and promised to call the kid immediately. It was a huge moment, and allowed McCain to close the books on his own questionable behaviour.

Not to suggest that his campaign would deliberately create a story line during a week when they have been repeatedly accused of lying about Barack Obama's record. But it must be a relief for the guy to be talking about war again.

How I hacked Sarah Palin's email account

2008-09-19T17:12:00.002+04:00

The son of a US state politician has reportedly been revealed as the hacker who broke into Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin's email account.

Democratic state representative Mike Kernell, from Tennessee, admitted that his 20-year-old son, David Kernell, was suspected of hacking the Yahoo mail account and sharing its contents with the world, the Tennessean reported.

Kernell is a student at the University of Tennesse-Knoville. His father, Mike, refused to comment further.

Asked by the Knoxville News Sentinel whether his son had been contacted by investigators, Kernell said: "I can't say. That doesn't mean he has or hasn't.''

The FBI and Secret Service started a formal investigation into the hacking on Wednesday. They have yet to name Kernell as a suspect.

But several political bloggers and news organisations have named Kernell as the hacker after a massive online manhunt.

Michelle Malkin adds the first person account:

Hello, /b/ as many of you might already know, last night sarah palin’s yahoo was “hacked” and caps were posted on /b/, i am the lurker who did it, and i would like to tell the story.

In the past couple days news had come to light about palin using a yahoo mail account, it was in news stories and such, a thread was started full of newfags trying to do something that would not get this off the ground, for the next 2 hours the acct was locked from password recovery presumably from all this bullshit spamming.

after the password recovery was reenabled, it took seriously 45 mins on wikipedia and google to find the info, Birthday? 15 seconds on wikipedia, zip code? well she had always been from wasilla, and it only has 2 zip codes (thanks online postal service!)

the second was somewhat harder, the question was “where did you meet your spouse?” did some research, and apparently she had eloped with mister palin after college, if youll look on some of the screenshits that I took and other fellow anon have so graciously put on photobucket you will see the google search for “palin eloped” or some such in one of the tabs.

I found out later though more research that they met at high school, so I did variations of that, high, high school, eventually hit on “Wasilla high” I promptly changed the password to popcorn and took a cold shower…

>> rubico 09/17/08(Wed)12:58:04 No.85782727

this is all verifiable if some anal /b/tard wants to think Im a troll, and there isn’t any hard proof to the contrary, but anyone who had followed the thread from the beginning to the 404 will know I probably am not, the picture I posted this topic with is the same one as the original thread.

I read though the emails… ALL OF THEM… before I posted, and what I concluded was anticlimactic, there was nothing there, nothing incriminating, nothing that would derail her campaign as I had hoped, all I saw was personal stuff, some clerical stuff from when she was governor…. And pictures of her family

I then started a topic on /b/, peeps asked for pics or gtfo and I obliged, then it started to get big

Earlier it was just some prank to me, I really wanted to get something incriminating which I was sure there would be, just like all of you anon out there that you think there was some missed opportunity of glory, well there WAS NOTHING, I read everything, every little blackberry confirmation… all the pictures, and there was nothing, and it finally set in, THIS internet was serious business, yes I was behind a proxy, only one, if this shit ever got to the FBI I was fucked, I panicked, i still wanted the stuff out there but I didn’t know how to rapidshit all that stuff, so I posted the pass on /b/, and then promptly deleted everything, and unplugged my internet and just sat there in a comatose state

Then the white knight fucker came along, and did it in for everyone, I trusted /b/ with that email password, I had gotten done what I could do well, then passed the torch , all to be let down by the douchebaggery, good job /b/, this is why we cant have nice things

The “white knight fucker” was the /b/tard who thought that going through Sarah Palin’s email wasn’t cool. He logged in, changed the password, and sent an email to a friend of Palin’s warning her and letting her know the new password. Unfortunately, he then posted a screenshot of this email to let the other /b/tards know their fun was over. He failed to blank the password, and they all tried to log in and change the password — which tripped the automated Yahoo! freeze. Since then, the account has been deleted. “Rapidshit” refers to rapidshare.com — i.e., rubico wanted to download the emails, put them into one file, and put that file up on rapidshare for /b/tards and the world at large to download. But he panicked, or didn’t know how to download the emails, and so pawned that task off on Anonymous, which he didn’t realize wasn’t monolithic and in his favor.

As Paul Harvey would say, “And now you know…. the rest of the story.”

I May Be Broke, But I'm Not Flat Busted

2008-09-19T03:33:00.000+04:00

A photo of Sarah Palin during her college days in the '80s, wearing a t-shirt that reads: "I May Be Broke, But I'm Not Flat Busted."

David Letterman on Sarah Palin

2008-09-19T03:00:00.000+04:00

McCain may look like a guy who just backed over his mailbox or the guy at the movies whose wife has to repeat everything, but how about that Sarah Palin? Here's what Letterman has been saying:

"I like that Sarah Palin. She looks like the weekend anchor on Channel 9. She looks like the hygienist who makes you feel guilty about not flossing. She looks like the relieved mom in a Tide commercial." --David Letterman

"I kind of like that Sarah Palin. You know, she reminds me, she looks like the flight attendant who won't give you a second can of Pepsi. No, you've had enough. We're landing. Looks like the waitress at the coffee shop who draws a little smiley face on your check. Have a nice day." --David Letterman

"I like that Sarah Palin. She looks like the lady in the dental office who gives you the keys to the rest room. 'There you are. Just bring them right back.' She looks like my selection of the week on E-Harmony.com. Sarah Palin is a good-looking woman. She looks like the woman in the department store who tries to spray you with perfume. 'Just a little.'" --David Letterman

"I like Sarah Palin. She looks like the dip sample lady at Safeway. She looks like the nurse who weighs you and then makes you sit alone in your underwear for 20 minutes. She looks like the Olive Garden hostess who says, 'I'm sorry, your table isn't ready yet." She looks like infomercial lady who says she made $64,000 a month flipping condos." --David Letterman

"Do you like Sarah Palin? Do you kind of like her? Yeah. I like her because she looks like the lady at the bakery who yells out '44! 45!' She looks like a real estate agent whose picture you see on the bus stop bench. That's who she looks like. She looks like the lady who has a chain of cupcake stores. She looks like the mayor of a small town that's banned dancing." --David Letterman

The Paline Doctrine

2008-09-19T02:26:00.000+04:00

Sarah Palin's Juneau

2008-09-19T01:25:00.000+04:00

John McCain's economic advisor Carly Fiorina benched after gaffe

2008-09-19T01:10:00.001+04:00

She was named the world's most powerful businesswoman for seven years in a row. She ran an empire as the chief executive officer of IT major Hewlett Packard before being sacked in 2005.

And now Carly Fiorina, who is US Republican Presidential candidate John McCain's chief economic advisor, has again been benched. This time she was benched for her remarks on McCain himself and his running mate Sarah Palin.

In an interview to a news channel, she said that neither McCain nor Palin was capable of running a large corporation. She went on to say that even McCain's Democratic rival Barack Obama and his running mate Joe Biden could not run a major business.

"A major corporation is not the same as being president or vice president of the United States. To run a business you have to have a lifetime of experience in business. Neither Sarah Palin, John McCain, Joe Biden nor Barack Obama has this experience. But that's not what are doing," Fiorina said.

The McCain staff admitted that the Republican candidate was very angry over the statement made by Fiorina and this led to her being taken off all public appearances.

John McCain: Another Day, Another Lie

2008-09-19T00:45:00.000+04:00

Honestly, it's getting harder and harder to keep up with all of the lies that come out of John McCain's mouth. His latest (as I type this anyway)?

Two years ago, I warned that the oversight of Fannie and Freddie was terrible, that we were facing a crisis because of it, or certainly serious problems," Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., told CBS this morning. "The influence that Fannie and Freddie had in the inside the Beltway, old boy network, which led to this kind of corruption is unacceptable and I warned about it a couple of years ago.

And here is John McCain 10 months ago when asked about the subprime mortgage crisis:
But so, in this whole new derivative stuff, and SIBs and all of this kind of new ways of packaging mortgages together and all that is something that frankly I don’t know a lot about. [...]

But I don’t know of hardly anybody, with the exception of a handful, that said ‘wait a minute, this thing is getting completely out of hand and is overheating.'
So, I’d like to tell you that I did anticipate it, but I have to give you straight talk, I did not.

by BarbinMD

60 facts about Sarah Palin

2008-09-19T00:38:00.000+04:00

Sarah Palin once beat a moose to death with its own beating heart.
Sarah Palin doesn’t know what the Bush Doctrine is because Sarah Palin is the Bush Doctrine.
It is well known that Sarah Palin’s longest political experience is as mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, which had 6,300 residents at the time - but what’s less well known is that each resident is made of the souls of a thousand Alaskans, who each devoured ten more. This fact was omitted as it didn’t play well to the hockey mom demographic.
Sarah Palin has, in fact, applied lipstick to a pit bull.
Alaska is supplied with fossil fuels through Sarah Palin’s relationship with Santa.
Sarah Palin was exposed to gamma radiation, and you wouldn’t like her when she’s angry.
Sarah Palin taught John McCain to moonwalk.
Sarah Palin’s pets are made of guns.
Sarah Palin’s heart is made of ice and must be kept refridgerated.
Sarah Palin believes in dinosaurs; it was she who made them extinct.
Sarah Palin can see Russia from the window of the ten thousand foot revolving nuclear bombard tower she makes her home.
Sarah Palin intends to drill for oil on the moon.
Although Sarah Palin has only left North America once physically, she has travelled the world via mind-link.
Sarah Palin maintains a bipartisan relationship with all the animals. This involves guns.
Sarah Palin can align her molecules to become any material she chooses.
Sarah Palin can see through time.
Sarah Palin has the most incredible collection of hand-painted sandles.
Sarah Palin is an elaborate joke.
Sarah Palin has to be careful not to touch water or she’ll turn into a mermaid, which is impractical in most of Alaska.
Sarah Palin is a dab hand with a scythe.
Sarah Palin taught John McCain to set the table properly.
Sarah Palin has a huge moustache, but chooses to grow it at the back of her head.
Sarah Palin’s bottom makes small trumpeting noises as she sleeps.
Sarah Palin prefers spoon-playing to violins.
Sarah Palin is preparing to lay her magnum opus.
Sarah Palin features as an easter egg on the Criterion Collection DVD of Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters.
Sarah Palin once held an opponent’s wife’s hand in a jar of acid … at a party.
Sarah Palin is an expert throat singer, but stopped performing because her music kept being interpreted as policy.
Sarah Palin is your father.
Sarah Palin was designed in a clean room by Jonathan Ive, and makes a satisfying noise when rebooted.
Sarah Palin lives her life through a combination of the principles outlined in Sun Tzu’s The Art of War and Luke Rhinehart’s The Dice Man.
Sarah Palin cheats at Tetris.
Sarah Palin would like you to smoke her a kipper; she’ll be back for breakfast.
Sarah Palin has been made aware of the final resting place of the Holy Grail, and plans on heading to the Louvre to claim it for America.
Sarah Palin knows High School Musical off by heart, but chooses to exclude the sequels from canon.
Sarah Palin was created in the forties using a super serum, and was later recovered from suspended animation by a ragtag group of superheroes.
Sarah Palin does not believe in rock and roll.
Sarah Palin’s chest hair cures cancer.
In the right light, Sarah Palin resembles Senor Peeg.
Sarah Palin is a devout believer in Yogic principles.
Sarah Palin taught John McCain to speak Inuit.
Sarah Palin is friends with a hilarious set of anthropomorphised inanimate objects who help her out with common tasks around her home.
Sarah Palin rebelled. She evolved. She looks and feels human. She is programmed to think she is human. She has many copies. And she has a plan.
Sarah Palin has a trademark dance.
Sarah Palin invented Jupiter. As in, the god.
Sarah Palin can contort herself into the shape of an American eagle.
Sarah Palin has a double jointed left elbow, which she uses to steal food from unwitting guests at parties.
Sarah Palin taught John McCain to produce energy through cold fusion.
Sarah Palin’s foreign policy chops were cut watching episodes of Alias, and intends to make Marshall Flinkman part of any administration.
Sarah Palin predicted the collapse of the subprime mortgage market mere hours after it had actually happened.
Sarah Palin looks tired because she hasn’t slept since 1732.
Sarah Palin enjoys whipping moose.
Sarah Palin’s webbed feet allow her to maneuvre easily underwater.
Sarah Palin has the moral strength of a hundred Ronald Reagans, or ten thousand George W Bushes.
Sarah Palin delights in chasing bees.
Sarah Palin is Mandarin for “life”.
Sarah Palin taught John McCain to love.
Sarah Palin can connect to the hearts and minds of voters via Bluetooth.
Sarah Palin survives on microbes carried by the air.
Sarah Palin is a credible Vice President.

From Rum and Monkey

Michelle Obama among 10 best dressed women

2008-09-18T01:00:00.001+04:00

Michelle Obama, wife of Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama, has made People magazine's list of the year's top ten best dressed women.

"Politics may be tougher than ever, but Obama has wowed along the campaign trail with confidence, in polished looks that bring to mind a famous former first lady," wrote People in an apparent reference to Jacqueline Kennedy.

At 44, the tall, athletic former lawyer was the most senior woman on the magazine's annual list.

"Sticking mainly to favorite hometown designers like Maria Pinto, who crafted her sleek purple sheath, Obama has also tried new looks by Isabel Toledo and jeweler Tom Binns for campaign fund-raisers," the magazine wrote.

The list also includes Barbados-born singer Rihanna, pop star Fergie from the "Black Eyed Peas" and Oscar winners Gwyneth Paltrow and Charlize Theron, as well as the star of "Sex and the City," Sarah Jessica Parker.

AFP

John McCain invented the Blackberry

2008-09-17T23:55:00.000+04:00

Senator John McCain's PR came up with something that rest of the world was unaware of. It seems that McCain is not as dumb as he seems on-screen. According to his PR, he has invented the Blackberry :)

Asked by campaign trail reporters what McCain's experience as chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee does to help him to understand the economy and lead the country through its current turmoil, Douglas Holtz-Eakin waved his BlackBerry in the air, according to The Politico.

"Telecommunications of the United States is a premier innovation in the past 15 years, comes right through the Commerce committe," Holtz-Eakin said. "So you're looking at the miracle John McCain helped create and that's what he did."

The comment met with immediate derision across the internet.

"McCain economic adviser claims McCain invented the Blackberry. I'd vote for him if it was the iPhone," joked "mnoreen," on Twitter.

And someone else has started a running joke with the word "#invent" on the micro-blogging service. Hundreds of sarcastic comments are pouring through the service.

U.S. Jews outraged over phone campaign alleging 'Obama gave money to PLO'

2008-09-17T23:30:00.000+04:00

Jewish voters have been receiving telephone calls from figures claiming to be pollsters yet trying to dissuade them from supporting Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama in the upcoming election.

The callers introduce themselves as poll-takers who are gathering data for a public opinion survey and subsequently ask their interlocutors loaded questions whose tone infers that Obama holds anti-Israel views and is thus unworthy of Jewish votes.

The calls, which have been reported of late in Florida and Pennsylvania, were brought to public attention by the Jewish Council for Education, a pro-Obama organization that has worked to drum up support for the Illinois senator among prospective Jewish voters.
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Callers posed questions asking if voters would reconsider their preferred candidate had they learned that "Obama had given money to the Palestine Liberation Organization", or that "the leader of Hamas, Ahmed Yousef, expressed support for Obama and hoped for Obama's victory," or that Obama's political advisors are "pro-Palestinian," or that Obama once said "the Palestinians have suffered the most."

The "pollsters" also asked what would-be Jewish voters thought if they were told that the president of Iran also "endorsed Obama," or if they learned that Obama "supported a united Jerusalem and then switched his opinion and believed in a divided Jerusalem," or Jimmy Carter's "anti-Israel national security advisor is one of Barack Obama's foreign policy advisors."

Officials from the Jewish Council for Education are scheduled to convene a news conference in New York on Tuesday during which they are expected to reveal new information that sheds light on the mysterious campaign intended to smear Obama under the guise of a public survey.

One of those expected to address the media in New York on Tuesday is Joelina Marcus, a retired professor currently residing in Miami Beach.

Marcus says she received a phone call from a man who claimed to be a pollster. She was asked if she was Jewish, and if so, to what stream of Judaism does she belong, and whether she attended synagogue.

She was then asked if her vote would be influenced by the fact that Obama once contributed money to the PLO or that one of Obama's closest aides maintained close contacts with Palestinians, she recounted.

From Haaretz.com

Obama does Hollywood

2008-09-17T23:20:00.008+04:00

Hollywood A-listers paid big bucks to see Sen. Barack Obama at a Beverly Hills dinner on Tuesday night, where Obama focused his remarks on easing Democrats’ jitters about the close race ahead. Obama spoke for around 15 minutes in an outdoor courtyard at the Greystone Estate, a Tudor-style mansion on 16 acres overlooking Los Angeles. Attendees at the $28,500-per person dinner included Will Ferrell, Chris Rock, Tobey McGuire, Leonardo diCaprio and Jodi Foster.

“A lot of you, just in conversations while we were in the photo lines, had all sorts of suggestions,” Obama said. “…And a lot of people have gotten nervous and concerned. Why is this as close as it is? And what’s going on?” The Illinois senator said that the race was always going to be a hard-fought contest because he represented a “leap” for voters, especially when running against John McCain, a “genuine hero” with a “compelling biography.” Obama said that there was “enormous resistance … because people have been fed cynicism for a long time” but he said that he remained “confident about winning because I’ve looked at John McCain, I’ve looked at Sarah Palin, I’ve looked at their agenda, and they don’t have one.”

Despite the lavish setting, the gourmet meal (filet of beef and asparagus), and the exclusive crowd, Obama said his campaign was being fought for people who would “never see the inside of a building like this and don’t resent the success that’s represented in this room, but just want the simple chance to be able to find a job that pays a living wage.”

Sen. McCain took his own shot at Obama on Tuesday, as the presidential hopefuls jockeyed over who would best lead during a financial crisis like the one that had seized Wall Street last weekend. “He talks about siding with the people just before he flew off for a fund-raiser in Hollywood with Barbara Streisand and his celebrity friends,” McCain said during an Ohio rally. “Let me tell you, my friends, there’s no place I’d rather be than right here with the working men and women of Ohio.”

For his part, Obama told the audience Tuesday night that the recent Wall Street turmoil would help clarify the choices facing voters. “It’s reminded people that this is not a game. This is not a reality show, no offense to any of you,” Obama said to laughter. “This is not a sitcom.” Between 250 and 300 attended the fund-raiser, according to the campaign, and was set to attend a second event featuring a performance by Streisand later Tuesday night.

Obama’s decision to forego public financing means that he’s still able to solicit private donations for his campaign; McCain has accepted public financing and can no longer solicit campaign contributions. Both candidates can also continue to raise money for their respective political parties, though there are greater restrictions on how that money can be used.

Obama raised $66 million in August, a new campaign record, but McCain set his own record by drawing a $47 million haul. Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, top strategist David Axelrod played down the idea that the Obama campaign believed that its “very large and dynamic fund-raising base at the grassroots” would ever translate to “some huge fund-raising advantage.” “We knew we were going to be up against the Republican fund-raising machine,” Axelrod told reporters. “Our ability to draw on the grassroots has been helpful so I don’t think we’d be in a better position” if the campaign had accepted public funding.

Sarah Palin's Yahoo Account Hacked

2008-09-17T23:20:00.004+04:00

Vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin's private Yahoo e-mail account was hacked, and some of its contents posted on the internet Wednesday.

The internet griefers known as Anonymous took credit for the intrusion, and screenshots of e-mail messages and photos belonging to the Alaska governor have been published by WikiLeaks. Threat Level has confirmed the authenticity of at least one of the e-mails.

The cache of stolen data contains five screenshots from Palin's account, including the text of an e-mail exchange with Alaska Lt. Gov. Sean Parnell about his campaign for Congress.

Another screenshot shows Palin's inbox and a third shows the text of an e-mail from Amy McCorkell, whom Palin appointed to the Governor's Advisory Board on Alcoholism and Drug Abuse in 2007.

The e-mail, a message of support to Palin, tells her not to let negative press get to her and asks Palin to pray for McCorkell, who writes that "I need strength to 1. keep employment, 2. not have to choose."

The Republican Party hasn't responded to a call for comment, but McCorkell, reached at her office, confirmed that she did send the e-mail to Palin.

A fourth screenshot shows an e-mail sent to Ivy Frye, a Palin aide, from someone claiming to belong to the group Anonymous advising that the person has changed the password to Palin's Yahoo account to prevent other members of Anonymous from accessing it again. The e-mail includes the new password.

The data posted by WikiLeaks also includes a list of Palin's e-mail contacts and two photos of her children.

Palin has come under fire for using private e-mail accounts to conduct state business. Critics allege that she uses the account to get around public records laws, as the Bush administration has also been charged with doing.

WikiLeaks said in a press release sent to reporters that Anonymous gained access to Palin's e-mail account around midnight Tuesday.

Sarah Palin: The New Face of Religious Right

2008-09-17T17:14:00.000+04:00

Sarah Palin, a working mother-of-five whose down-to-earth appeal has electrified the Republican Party's bid to retain the U.S. presidency, reflects a new attitude toward women in America's religious right.

Analysts say Palin, the nominee for vice president who has galvanized the party's conservative Christian base, highlights how the movement has evolved from its staunchly anti-feminist roots in the 1970s as it tries to broaden its appeal.

The movement, which has no formal structure but includes a number of prominent Christian groups, has a big influence on Republican politics. It has become younger, more female and less white-dominated and extended beyond its Southern roots.

Polls suggest Alaska Governor Palin's starring role as Sen. John McCain's running mate for the November 4 election against Democrats Barack Obama and Joe Biden has helped the Republican ticket make inroads with female voters.

Some women have been put off by her strong opposition to abortion, to gay rights and her lack of experience and expertise in national or international affairs.

But she has generated a new enthusiasm among the conservative evangelicals who comprise the Republican Party's most important constituency. McCain, who was lagging Obama in national polls before selecting Palin, is now running even or slightly ahead in opinion polls.

About one in four U.S. adults are evangelical and while the religious right hardly speaks for all of them it does represent the views of many.

Palin represents one way it has redefined itself in the 21st century while sticking to its guns on its red meat issues like opposing abortion rights and gay marriage.

The movement also has reached out to non-whites, seeing ground to be gained among socially conservative blacks and Hispanics, though gains for the Republican Party especially among African Americans have been limited.

Some analysts said Palin was not such a mold-breaker.

"She does not in any way challenge the traditional conceptions of men and women that are present among conservative evangelicals. She is a mother of five, she talks about God as having a plan for people's lives," said David Domke, a professor of communication at the University of Washington in Seattle.

"Her role on the ticket is to support the presidential candidate and this fits very much what would be the expectations for the woman," Domke said.

Critics of the anti-feminist plank of the religious right's platform remains entrenched in its unyielding opposition to abortion rights -- a position that polls consistently show a majority of American women oppose.

(By David Storey)

Key States in US Presidential Race

2008-09-17T16:43:00.003+04:00

The U.S. presidential race between Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama ultimately will be decided in about 10 states where their battle remains close.

Each candidate is battling for the 270 electoral votes needed to win the White House. The president is determined not by who gets the most votes nationally but by the Electoral College, which has 538 members allotted to all 50 states and the District of Columbia in proportion to their representation in Congress.

All of the states except Maine and Nebraska award their votes to the popular vote winner in the state. Maine and Nebraska split them by congressional district.

Here are some of the key battleground states in the November 4 election, with their electoral vote totals, 2004 results and some recent details about the contests in each state.

* Colorado -- 9 electoral votes. President George W. Bush beat Democrat John Kerry 52 percent to 47 percent here in 2004, but since then Democrats have captured the state legislature and governor's office, putting it near the top of Obama's target list. Polls continue to give Obama a slight lead, even after McCain's post-convention boost in momentum.

* Florida -- 27 electoral votes. Bush beat Kerry 52 percent to 47 percent in a state infamous for the disputed result that decided the 2000 race. Florida's diverse population makes it a classic swing state, with a heavy concentration of older voters who could favor McCain and of Jewish voters who are normally Democratic but have been wary of Obama. Polls give McCain a solid lead at this stage.

* Michigan -- 17 electoral votes. Kerry won by 3 percentage points in 2004, and the state's depressed economy and ailing manufacturing base make it a prime target for competing arguments by the candidates on the economy. Obama has narrowly led most recent polls, although one poll after the Republican convention showed the race dead even.

* New Hampshire -- 4 electoral votes. Kerry narrowly beat Bush here by one percentage point in 2004, and McCain's history of big primary wins in the state in 2000 and this year gives him hope he can push it into his column in November. Democrats captured both seats in Congress and gained control of the state legislature in 2006 in an anti-Republican wave Obama hopes to capitalize on. Most polls show Obama with a slight lead.

* New Mexico -- 5 electoral votes. Bush narrowly beat Kerry by fewer than 6,000 votes in 2004. As the senator from neighboring Arizona, McCain is familiar to many voters here but will have to battle Obama for the state's growing bloc of Hispanics, who make up more than 40 percent of the state's population.

* Nevada -- 5 electoral votes. Bush beat Kerry by 20,000 votes in 2004 in a state won by Republicans in 8 of the last 10 presidential elections. Like New Mexico, the burgeoning Hispanic population will be crucial -- they now make up nearly a quarter of the state's residents.

* Ohio -- 20 electoral votes. Bush beat Kerry by about 120,000 votes in the state that ultimately decided the 2004 race. No Republican has won the White House without Ohio, and McCain will have a hard time piecing together a win without the state. Polls show a tight race.

* Pennsylvania -- 21 electoral votes. Kerry beat Bush 51 percent to 48 percent in 2004, but Pennsylvania is one of a handful of states won by Kerry where McCain's camp sees a chance to reverse the result. Polls have given Obama a steady 4 to 7 point lead for months, but that narrowed after McCain's post-convention surge.

* Virginia -- 13 electoral votes. Bush won fairly easily by 9 percentage points in 2004 in a state that hasn't gone Democratic in a presidential election since 1964, but Virginia has trended toward Democrats in recent state elections amid dramatic growth in the Democratic-leaning northern suburbs of Washington D.C. McCain has a narrow lead in most recent polls.

* Wisconsin -- 10 electoral votes. Kerry won by 11,000 votes out of more than 3 million in 2004, but Obama has held a lead for months in a state where he crushed Hillary Clinton in a February Democratic primary showdown.

(Writing by John Whitesides; Editing by Patricia Wilson and David Wiessler @ Retuers)

Cindy McCain's Half Sister Swept Under The Carpet

2008-09-17T00:35:00.005+04:00

Kathleen Hensley Portalski, is half sister of Cindy McCain, wife of President hopeful Senator John McCain. In a recent interview NPR described McCain as the only child of Jim Hensley, a wealthy Arizona businessman. The next morning, NPR received an e-mail from Nicholas Portalski of Phoenix, who heard the story with his mother.

"We were listening to the piece about Cindy McCain on NPR, All Things Considered, and it just struck us very hard," Portalski said.

His mother, Kathleen Hensley Portalski, is also Hensley's daughter.

Kathleen Hensley Portalski displays newspaper clippings of her father in World War II, as well as snapshots of herself as a child with her father. (Image Source: Ted Robbins/NPR)

The Portalski family is accustomed to hearing Cindy McCain described as Hensley's only child. She's been described that way by news organizations from The New Yorker and The New York Times to Newsweek and ABC.

McCain herself routinely uses the phrase "only child," as she did on CNN last month. "I grew up with my dad," she said then. "I'm an only child. My father was a cowboy, and he really loved me very much, but I think he wanted a son occasionally."

McCain's father was also a businessman — and twice a father.

"I'm upset," Kathleen Portalski says. "I'm angry. It makes me feel like a nonperson, kind of."

Documents show Kathleen Anne Hensley was born to Jim and Mary Jeanne Hensley on Feb. 23, 1943. They had been married for six years when Kathleen was born.

Jim Hensley was a bombardier on a B-17, flying over Europe during World War II. He was injured and sent to a facility in West Virginia to recuperate. During that time, while still married to Mary Jeanne, Hensley met another woman — Marguerite Smith. Jim divorced Mary Jeanne and married Marguerite in 1945.

Cindy Lou Hensley was born nine years later, in 1954.

She may have grown up as an only child, but so did her half sister, Kathleen, who was raised by a single parent.

Portalski says she did see her father and her half sister from time to time.

Portalski is shown with her late father, Jim Hensley, who also was Cindy McCain's father. (Image Source: Nicholas Portalski)

"I saw him a few times a year," she says. "I saw him at Christmas and birthdays, and he provided money for school clothes, and he called occasionally."

Jim Hensley also provided credit cards and college tuition for his grandchildren, as well as $10,000 gifts to Kathleen and her husband, Stanley Portalski. That lasted a decade, they say. By then, Jim Hensley had built Hensley and Co. into one of the largest beer distributorships in the country. He was worth tens, if not hundreds, of millions of dollars.

When Hensley died in 2000, his will named not only Portalski but also a daughter of his wife Marguerite from her earlier marriage. So, Cindy McCain may be the only product of Jim and Marguerite's marriage, but she is not the only child of either.

She was, however, the sole inheritor of his considerable estate.

Kathleen Portalski was left $10,000, and her children were left nothing. It's a fact Nicholas Portalski says his sister discovered the hard way.

"What she found in town — on the day of or the day before or the day after his funeral — was that the credit card didn't work anymore," Nick says.

The Portalskis live in a modest home in central Phoenix. Kathleen is retired, as is her husband. Nicholas Portalski is a firefighter and emergency medical technician looking for work. They say it would have been nice if they were left some of the Hensley fortune. They also say they are Democrats, but Nicholas Portalski says he had another reason for coming forward.

"The fact that we don't exist," he says. "The fact that we've never been recognized, and then Cindy has to put such a fine point on it by saying something that's not true. Recently, again and again. It's just very, very hurtful."

Kathleen Portalski says she'd like an acknowledgment and an apology.

From NPR

The McCain-Follieri Love Boat

2008-09-16T23:03:00.003+04:00

Mark Ames and Ari Bermen recently exposed another dark side of John McCain. They revealed just how star-struck a straight-talking maverick can become when offered the chance to celebrate his birthday aboard a yacht filled with celebrities--even if one of those celebrity types turns out to be an A-list con man.

The photograph substantiates reports that in late August, 2006, McCain celebrated his 70th birthday aboard a yacht, the Celine Ashley, rented by A-list con man Raffaello Follieri and his then-movie star girlfriend Anne Hathaway. In the current edition of Vanity Fair, Michael Schnayerson reported that Follieri rented the Celine Ashley for the month of August 2006. Montenegro's leading dailynewspaper, Vijesti, earlier reported that during McCain's visit in 2006 he celebrated with birthday cocktails and sweets aboard the Celine Ashley yacht. In the photograph, taken in Montenegro at the end of August, McCain is shown boarding the yacht ramp towards the smiling Follieri and Hathaway. Just ahead of McCain and shaking hands with Follieri appears to be Rick Davis--McCain's top aide and now co-manager of his campaign, who accompanied him on the trip and advised the government of Montenegro. A few months after McCain's yacht party, Follieri strengthened his ties to McCain's orbit by retaining Rick Davis's well-connected Washington lobbying firm, Davis Manafort, and offering Davis both an investment deal and help in securing the Catholic vote for McCain's presidential bid.

Follieri, who posed as Vatican chief financial officer in order to win friends and investments, pleaded guilty Wednesday in a Manhattan district court to conspiracy to commit wire fraud, eight counts of wire fraud and five counts of money laundering. As part of the plea, Follieri admitted to misappropriating at least $2.4 million of investor money and redirecting it to foreign personal bank accounts that were disguised as business accounts.

At the time he met McCain, Follieri was adept at collecting friends in powerful places and using those connections to attract investments in projects which later turned out to be bogus. His ties to Bill Clinton and his entourage have been well-documented; the charismatic Follieri, whom Vanity Fair has likened to an ambitious nineteenth-century protagonist from a Balzac novel, ingratiated himself to President Clinton and aides by posing as a mega-donor to the Clinton Global Initiative. He also formed an investment partnership with California business mogul and Clinton donor Ron Burkle to develop surplus real estate properties owned by the Catholic Church, which Follieri claimed to represent. Burkle later sued Follieri for $1.3 million in misappropriated funds.

Yet Follieri's ties to McCain's orbit have been largely overlooked by the media. Follieri first met McCain when the Arizona Senator visited Montenegro from August 29-31 as part of a Congressional delegation that included Republican senators Lindsay Graham, Richard Burr, Saxby Chambliss, Mel Martinez and John Sununu. [We'll have more on what else McCain was doing in Montenegro in a forthcoming article in the print edition of The Nation.]
What, exactly, was McCain doing aboard Follieri's yacht? Or put another way, was this McCain's 70th birthday wish--to spend an evening floating on the Adriatic with one of Hollywood's top actresses and her smooth-talking Italian beau?

An even bigger mystery is how Follieri's boat came to be docked in Montenegro on McCain's birthday. According to a journalist in Montenegro, the yacht had been anchored there for several days before McCain's arrival, and only sailed away after McCain boarded. According to Vijesti, locals were told that McCain was meeting "friends from Florida" on the yacht.
McCain aides later confirmed the encounter with Follieri, but said it was "entirely social and nothing came of it." Follieri, they told the New York Daily News, was just a "passing acquaintance." (Though the McCain campaign promise to comment on the encounter, it did not respond to The Nation's request by the time this article was published.)

It must not have seemed that way to Follieri. According to the Italian newspaper Il Sole 24 Ore, in January 2007 Follieri sent Rick Davis a packet of information on his companies Follieri Capital and Follieri Media, apparently hoping to get financing from Pegasus Capital Advisors, a hedge fund in Connecticut that Davis represented. "Follieri's proposal to Davis had two dimensions to it--first, as an investment opportunity for Davis's fund; but secondly, there was the political dimension, in which Follieri offered to help deliver Catholic votes to McCain," said Claudio Gatti, a reporter for Il Sole 24 Ore, who investigated Follieri for eighteen months.

In February 2007, according to a recent article in the New York Daily News, Follieri retained Davis's lobbying firm, Davis Manafort. According to the paper, "on Feb. 27, 2007, Davis Manafort partner Rick Gates signed a confidentiality agreement drafted by the Follieri Group. In the contract...Gates agreed not to disclose any information about Follieri's deal to get Clinton pal Ron Burkle to buy Catholic Church properties." (Gates did not respond to repeated requests for comment.)

Two months later, Burkle sued Follieri, who later repaid the $1.3 million owed to Burkle's Yucaipa Funds. That fall, the Wall Street Journal exposed Follieri's life as a high-society con man. In June of this year, Follieri was finally arrested and charged. Following his guilty plea this week, Follieri now faces up to five years and three months in jail.

Source: The Nation

John McCain denounced by Family

2008-09-16T21:10:00.004+04:00

Adam Vaulx Boles, maternal cousin of Senator John McCain, shared his memories about President-hopeful and commented on his recent campaign. He goes;

John and I are related through our grandmothers. Katherine Vaulx McCain and Huetta Vaulx Boles, both of Fayetteville, Ark., were sisters. My side of the Vaulx family represents a long line of Democrats, but it is with no small amount of pride that we've followed the life and career of now-Sen. John McCain.

My dad knew John when he was a child, and maintained a close relationship with his father, Adm. Jack McCain. When my dad was a teenager, the McCains visited his family in Arkansas around the time my great-uncle, John's grandfather, was commanding an aircraft carrier group in the Pacific during World War II.

He and Jack remained close over the years, exchanging many letters while my dad was in Lake City and Jack was commanding the fleet in the Pacific during Vietnam. When John was taken prisoner, the letters my dad sent took on a tone of deep concern and sympathy.

My father is, above anything else, dedicated to his family. Although he had never met John's then-wife, Carol, he knew that she lived an hour away, just outside of Jacksonville. He did everything he could to make sure she was taken care of during that time.

Criticizing the policies and campaign of Senator McCain,

So, where is the straight-talking, commonsense John McCain of 2000? I'm afraid he is long gone, replaced by a desperate version of himself who seems to contradict nearly everything he once stood for.

What becomes apparent in his ideological about-face is just how out of touch McCain really is with America's working families.

In a time when the country is facing the worst housing crisis in the memory of most Americans, McCain couldn't even recall how many homes he owns. When asked how many homes my side of the family owns, I can answer you pretty quickly. Zero.

Just like so many working families in this country, we were nearly ruined by the ongoing mortgage and foreclosure crisis. Our family home of three generations was sold at auction last year. The story is a familiar one: We were suckered into a refinance deal during the real estate boom, and when times got tough, the near criminally deregulated mortgage companies changed the rules on us.

What was John McCain's response to this? He lumped together all the families who fell victim to the smarmy sales pitches from subprime lenders, calling us "irresponsible," a move the New York Times described as "mean-spirited and economically naive."

What contortions has this new John McCain twisted himself into in order to win this election? When asked last year about his stance on abortion, he told a group of supporters, "I do not support Roe vs. Wade. It should be overturned." This statement not only sharply contrasts with what he said back in the 2000 election cycle, but is also at odds with a majority of American public opinion, according to the most recent Harris poll on the subject.

Further, McCain's decision to put the antichoice, creationist Sarah Palin on his ticket appears to be motivated completely by a political desire to shore up the radical right evangelical base with whom he's been at odds for so long. This is the same woman who claimed in June "that our national leaders are sending (our soldiers) out on a task that is from God."

he went as far as denouncing McCain:

A part of me is made very sad to write this article. As I've said, my family has followed John's life and career with no absence of pride. If there ever were a Republican we might consider voting for, it would have been my cousin John.

But, as he continually demonstrates in this campaign, my cousin John is long gone. "Straight talk" has been replaced with "flip-flop." Saddest all, this is the same man who, when campaigning in 2000, told a crowd of supporters, "I don't think Bill Gates needs a tax cut. I think your parents do."

My parents, John, need some help after the economic destruction Bush has wrought in the last eight years, but it's clear you're not the one who'll give it to us. America's working families no longer recognize you, nor does your own.

Published in TampaBaby.com

Barack Obama's anti-abortion campaign hits him on the face

2008-09-16T18:59:00.003+04:00

“If Barack Obama had his way I would not be here.”

Can you imagine not giving babies their basic human rights, no matter how they entered our world? My name is Gianna Jessen, born 31 years ago after a failed abortion. I’m a survivor, as are many others…but if Barack Obama had his way, I wouldn’t be here.

Unfortunately, Barack Obama voted four times against affording these babies their most basic human right. I have serious concerns about Senator Obama’s record and views on this issue, given he voted against these protections four times as a state Senator. Just as abuse victims share their stories to educate the public, fight for the common good and hope that as a result politicians do what’s right, I felt it was important to come forward and give these new born babies a voice.

I am living proof these babies have a right to live, and I invite you to learn more about Senator Obama’s record on this important issue.

-Abortion Survivor Gianna Jessen
(Born Alive Truth)

Phoenix-based comic book store to sell McCain, Obama comic books

2008-09-16T18:38:00.002+04:00

It's official. Everybody's trying to capitalize on the presidential election.

Phoenix-based Atomic Comics will start selling biographical John McCain and Barack Obama-themed comics on Oct. 8.

Idea & Design Works, a San Diego company, publishes the 32-page, full-color books priced at $3.99 each.

Presidential Material: Barack Obama chronicles "the rise of the Democratic candidate from his humble beginnings to his spot on the November ballot," according to a store promo.

Presidential Material: John McCain "follows an American hero from the dregs of Vietnam to the halls of Washington, D.C."

Bill Mitchell, president of purchasing for Atomic Comics, said neither candidate is portrayed in tights. Neither has super-human power.

"This is a great to get people involved in registering to vote," he said. "Most of the people that work here are political, so we know how politics affects our lives. We wanted to make sure other people got involved as well."

He added there are spirited employee debates at Atomic Comics, which has not endorsed either candidate.

The store offered customers the chance to preorder the comics, which begs the question: Which candidate is ahead in orders? It's close. Last week, McCain had 51 preorders and Obama had 50.
Mitchell didn't think Atomic Comics would be carrying Sarah Palin and Joe Biden-themed comic books. It's an interesting thought, though.

More information: www.atomic comics.com/election.html.

Source: The Arizona Republic

Sarah Palin Wigs

2008-09-16T17:01:00.006+04:00

To cash on surging popularity of Sarah Palin,WigSalon came up with a Palin-wig, inspired from none other than hearththrob Raquel Welch.

When a client asked WigSalon to make her a wig that looked like Sarah Palin's hair style and color, she expected to wait weeks for it. She was really surprised when she got a call the next day from the owner saying that we already had the wig style and the right color for her. All she needed was "a few bobby pins and maybe some eye-glasses" to complete her look. Sarah Palin's color is a dark brown with strawberry blond highlights that show especially up front.

Raquel Welch already made that color: 8/29 GLAZED HAZELNUT, and her new VALENTINE wig is a very close approximation of the Palin hair style.

Simply bobby pin back the upper layers of the Raquel Welch's new Valentine wig style, which is truly beautiful in it's own right, and let the longer layers fall freely.

These are the colors you should consider if you want a true Sarah Palin look. The Hazelnut shades have the strawberry blond hightlights, and the Chocolate Copper has an auburn highlight on a deep brown base, which Sarah also shows in some seasons.

Barack Obama the $66 Million Man

2008-09-16T16:45:00.000+04:00

Desperate to change the election narrative, the Democrats released a breathtaking number yesterday: $66-million(U.S.).

That's how much Barack Obama's supporters donated in August. No politician, not even Mr. Obama himself, has ever come close to raising that kind of money in one month. In August, 500,000 new donors joined the two million who already have contributed to the presidential nominee's campaign.

Republican nominee John McCain raised $47-million (U.S.) during the same period - by far his most successful effort. But because he has accepted public financing for his campaign, Mr. McCain is prohibited from spending more than $84-million (U.S.) during this fall election season.
Why does this matter? For two reasons: First, it suggests that Mr. Obama will be able to outspend Mr. McCain by something approaching two to one over the coming weeks.
Second, it reminds us that the fundamentals in this election continue to favour the Democrats, despite the euphoric frenzy among social conservatives over Republican vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin.

These are the top-10 industries from which the U.S. presidential candidates receive personal
donations.

Barack Obama:

1. Lawyers/law firms $24,060,136
2. Retired $23,180,767
3. Education $10,375,038
4. Securities & investment $9,873,356
5. Business services $6,746,937
6. Real estate $6,421,385
7. Health professionals $5,852,212
8. Misc. business $5,411,083
9. TV/movies/music $5,161,298
10. Computers/Internet $4,258,226

John McCain:

1. Retired $23,536,345
2. Lawyers/law firms $7,959,446
3. Securities & investment $6,893,293
4. Real estate $6,796,844
5. Misc. finance $3,907,413
6. Health professionals $3,563,798
7. Misc. business $3,122,709
8. Business services $2,550,153
9. Commercial banks $1,868,224
10. Insurance $1,655,352

Source: OpenSecrets.org

Raleigh the most political U.S. city

2008-09-16T16:01:00.003+04:00

Raleigh in North Carolina has been voted the most political city in the United States -- ahead of Washington D.C. and New York City, according to a new ranking.

Montgomery, Alabama, came in at No. 2 in the 100 most political cities, followed by Little Rock, Cleveland and Kansas City.

Greensboro in North Carolina, Des Moines, Milwaukee, Portland and Pittsburgh, rounded the top 10 in the ranking by Men's Health magazine.

"Our hope is that by releasing these rankings now weeks before election day, the residents there will see this as a challenge and step up at the polls like never before," said Men's Health editor in chief David Zinczenko.

Washington D.C. took the 16th spot while New York placed 89th on the list.

Americans will head to the polls on November 4 to vote for Republican candidate John McCain or Democratic candidate Barack Obama for president.

Men's Health magazine used information for its ranking on the percentage of citizens registered to vote, percentage who participated, campaign spending in each city since 2006 and contributions by residents to the 2008 U.S. presidential race.

The bottom five cities included Yonkers in New York, Norfolk, Virginia, Modesto, California and
three Texas cities -- Arlington, El Paso and Lubbock.

Source: Reuters

Sarah Palin: On The Issues

2008-09-16T01:51:00.003+04:00

I am pro-life and I believe that marriage should only be between a man and a woman. I am opposed to any expansion of gambling in Alaska.

Meg Ryan and Jada Pinkett Smith denounced Sarah Palin

2008-09-16T01:23:00.007+04:00

Hollywood celebrities are continuously coming out with their political preferences. In a recent observation Meg Ryan and her The Women co-star Jada Pinkett Smith denounced Sarah Palin as US Vice President nominee.

Meg Ryan insists that Palin she should be respected for her current family situation - but she won't be getting the actress' vote.

She tells the New York Daily News, "I guess we have to root for her in that her son just went off to Iraq, that's gotta be really, really tough. (But) she doesn't represent my politics at all."

Jada Pinkett Smith has also denounced Palin, saying: "It's nice to see women in America are being extremely vocal about politics this year. But her being a woman hasn't made me sway to that side. Not one bit."

Obama and McCain on Wall Street Overhaul

2008-09-16T00:30:00.007+04:00

As Wall Street is trembling on bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers (largest Chapter 11 filing in the history of America) and news of Merrill Lynch's acquisition by Bank of America, President hopefuls John McCain and Barack Obama are trying to outdo each other in presenting solutions for Wall Street Overhaul.

It was unclear which candidate voters might be more likely to turn to in an ongoing climate of economic turmoil. Polls generally show voters believe Mr. Obama would do a better job than Mr. McCain in handling the economy, but his lead on economic issues has been shrinking.

Image Source: National Post