The Polar Bears Are In Hot Water A Cooking Tip September 8, 2008March 11, 2017 PRAYING FOR A PIPELINE Listen to the Republican Vice Presidential nominee exhorting worshippers to pray for a pipeline. I have little standing in matters of faith, but it strikes me as oddly unChristian to mock community organizing amongst the downtrodden . . . and yet pray for the construction of an oil pipeline. No? Oddly unChristian, yet completely in line with today’s Republican Party. They mock Al Gore, they mock John Kerry (and his Silver Star and three Purple Hearts), and now they mock Barack Obama. Only Sarah Palin – who lobbied for the Bridge to Nowhere, and raised taxes in Wasilla, and left her tiny town, which had been debt-free, $22 million in hock, and says she got a D in macro-economics at the University of Idaho – only she has what it takes to cope with our country’s enormous economic challenges and regain the respect of the world. She and her running mate, the hot-tempered ‘maverick,’ fifth from the bottom of his class of 899, whose campaign is run by lobbyists and who voted 95% of the time with George W. Bush. To augment her prayer and facilitate the pipeline, Governor Palin has sued to strip the polar bear of its Threatened Species status (tell that to your 10-year-old and ask her how she wants you to vote in November), ignoring the scientists (here we go again) – or worse. ‘Essentially, she lied,’ said University of Alaska professor Rick Steiner, according to ABC News. Both she and Senator McCain are fine Americans and remarkable people. But they are running this campaign out of the same mocking, dishonest Republican playbook (Obama is ready to lower almost everyone’s taxes, not raise them), in the urgent Republican hope of getting four more years. SAVE MONEY, TIME, AND THE PLANET The fastest way to grill, roast, bake, boil or broil something, of course, is to microwave it. This makes Charles a little crazy – he even roasts toast, which can’t be an efficient use of energy, though it’s darn good toast – but I am the kind of guy whose artichokes take six minutes instead of 45, and whose baked potatoes, back when I ate baked potatoes – likewise. (The truly fastest way to grill, roast, bake, boil or broil something, is not to cook it in the first place. Those readers trying to lose weight, save money, or accustomed to scraping extra mashed potatoes into the garbage, have doubtless considered this.) But if you are one of those gourmets who insist on boiling things, I have a suggestion. Get one of these, if you don’t already have one – a kettle – and bring your water to a boil fast, without a lot of heat escaping, and with a whistle to alert you to when the water is boiling*, so you don’t keep it boiling longer than you have to, steaming up your kitchen, and, if you’ve lost track and become engrossed in a rerun of Law and Order, boiling all the water away, only to realize it when you begin to smell metallic fumes – which can’t be good for you, and which can set off your smoke detector and scare you half to death, and lead to your falling off whatever you’ve climbed on to try to silence the damn thing – and then, with your pot molten and bone dry, have to start the boiling process all over again. (Not that this has ever happened to me.) Okay? Let me recap. You boil water in a kettle. And now the kettle is whistling. You return to the kitchen, deftly shift the kettle off the hot burner (which you leave burning), switching it for the dry pot of pasta or potatoes or shrimp or whatever you were going to boil . . . even as you pour two or three quarts of boiling water from the kettle into that pot, over the pasta, potatoes, or shrimp. Tada! You’ve saved time, money (by using less energy), and, in a tiny but real way, lived a little lighter on the land. The engineers in the crowd will note that much the same result could have been achieved simply by using a lid. But (leaving aside whatever extra heat escapes from under the lid that a sealed kettle would retain), the problem with this is that, to know when the water has reached its boil – sans a kettle’s whistle – you have to stand there in the kitchen and watch the pot. I will not insult this readership by supplying the next line. *I think the model I linked you to has a whistle, but it doesn’t say. COME MEET SARAH JESSICA PARKER IN CHARLES’ STUDIO TOMORROW If you happen to live in the New York area and want to help Barack Obama, check this out. It could be fun.
How Much Life Insurance Would the McCains’ 35-Year-Old Son Need (If They HAD a 35-Year-Old Son and If He Had One Infant Child and Had Converted His GLDD Warrants Into Stock)? September 5, 2008January 4, 2017 NEW TOPIC PLEASE Dennis King: ‘I lived through 2000 and 2004, the other highly ‘political’ years for your site. I can remember having the same reaction then as your Friend yesterday who wants a ‘New Topic Please.’ However, in retrospect maybe you did not go far enough. No matter which side of the debate one is on, most would agree that things would be quite a bit different if the elections had gone the other way. The best way to help people make the upcoming decision is to throw a lot at them so that they can be better informed. Of course you walk a fine line. Throw too much and some will duck or walk away to avoid it. Not good. Give us a few other topics as well and many will stick around sometimes even paying attention to a few of the really important ones. This of course will mean a lot more work for you. No problem . . . just double the subscription price.’ Brian A.: ‘As a Republican (supposedly) from Arizona, I really wanted to vote for McCain, but Sarah Palin was such a poor choice that this will now make it three presidential elections in a row that I vote Democrat. I’d like your opinion on how much life insurance I need: I’m 35, my wife stays home with our one-year-old, I make about $100K/year, and we have about $350K in a combination of 401(k)/IRAs/savings. We rent, with no debt. Does $500K level premium term life insurance for 20 years sound about right?‘ ☞ Finally back to insurance. In the first place, it sounds as though you’re doing great. In the second, take a look at intelliquote.com to get an idea of your options. If you’re in good health and have never smoked, the kind of coverage you’re thinking about should cost you around $400 a year. Doubling it to $1 million would cost only about $650. There’s no magic answer, and lots of subsidiary questions: Do you already have some group coverage at work? Have you considered the Social Security survivors’ benefits your heirs would receive? Are there affluent grandparents in the picture? Is your prospective widow someone who could go out and earn a good living if need be? On the off chance you die within 20 years, will you have the good sense to do it in an accident where some deep-pocketed malfeasor can be proven to have been at fault? Any of those factors might lessen your need for coverage. But I plugged your numbers and reasonable assumptions into the ‘insurance needs’ module of my trusty old copy of Managing Your Money (long since orphaned) and it came out with $473,000 – so your $500,000 is a good ballpark. Thorsten Kril: ‘Anne’s story about Sarah Palin was kind of hard to believe but the WSJ has a story which confirms many points. I.e. as mayor she fired most department heads, not because they were corrupt or anything but because they had different opinions than her. Like the police chief who did not want that people can carry around concealed weapons in town. It also confirms that she approached the librarian about censoring what books would be on the shelf. Imagine having somebody like this as vice president or, should the worst happen, as president.’ Jim Reed: ‘I love ‘The Daily Show.’ If you are in the public spotlight and say one thing today and something exactly opposite later, they will show the videos back to back. Last night they featured Karl Rove, Bill O’Reilly, Dick Morris and Nancy Photenhauer. You can watch it here.’ John Baer: ‘Why don’t you list the debunking websites in your column again? That should be enlightening for all.’ ☞ Fightthesmears.com and factcheck.org are good places to start. THE SPEECH Let me spare you thoughts on Cindy and John McCain’s speeches at least until Monday. Suffice it to say, the McCains mean well, and they care, but they are not the change we need; and voting 95% with Bush is not being a maverick; and misleading people into thinking their taxes will go up when they will go down is not straight talk; and if the Clinton/Gore tax rates were such a drag on the economy, how come 22.8 million new jobs were created? and if cutting taxes for the wealthy stimulates the economy and still allows for a balanced budget, how come the economy is in the crapper and 75% of our $10 trillion National Debt (by the time Bush finally leaves) will have been racked up under just three of our 43 Presidents: Reagan, Bush, and Bush? Don’t get me started. THE REAL McCAIN Buy it for everyone you know – lest we make another colossal error and choose the wrong man. GLDD This is the ‘spaculation’ that began a couple of years ago as Aldabra warrants at about 70 cents each (and then more at 35 cents each) – a SPAC that went on to acquire Great Lakes Dredge & Dock, symbol GLDD, that left us with a choice. Either sell our warrants for $4 and change – but pay short-term capital gains tax. Or pony up $5 in cash to convert at least some of the warrants to stock, start the clock ticking again, wait a year, and perhaps then sell – perhaps at an even greater profit – with less of a tax to pay on the gain. (For those who’d bought the warrants inside a tax-deferred retirement account, the choice was simple: just sell and take the profit. Likewise, those who’d bought early enough for the warrants already to have gone long-term.) Now a year has passed, and it turns out that the first choice, despite the higher tax, would have been a lot better: a relatively quick $3.50 profit on each warrant, less ordinary income tax. Choice #2, ponying up $5 in cash to convert each warrant into a GLDD share meant committing a total of $5.70 or $5.35 to each share (depending on what you paid for the warrants) . . . and with the stock around $7.50 today, more like a $1.80 long-term gain. A smaller gain on a not-so-quick profit. I did some of each. I sold all the warrants that had already gone long-term and even some of those that were still short-term; but converted many of the warrants to stock, thinking that one day the stock might be $12 or $14. I still think that; but times are tough, so with GLDD nicely in the black, I lightened up on what was a very heavy holding. Which probably means the stock is headed straight up.
Savings Bond Calculator (Sort of.) September 4, 2008March 11, 2017 NEW TOPIC PLEASE! A friend: ‘Please give us the date of the next column which will not have the words Obama, McCain, Democrat, or Republican, so we can mark it on our calendars. Otherwise, we are going to cut your salary in half.’ ☞ I feel your pain. I am so sick of this. Truly. But do we really want to say, decades from now, that when the world hung in the balance, we spared ourselves thinking about it and wrote about loud sneezes instead? Or about not sneezing with your mouth full? Because the world actually does kind of hang in the balance. It really does matter who’s in charge. The Republicans have done a dreadful job for us, weakening the dollar, weakening the military, diminishing our standing in the world, diminishing the role of science and reason in our governance, exploding our debt, and jeopardizing the future of our children. But they are very, very good at winning elections. Rudy Giuliani did a terrific job last night of mocking and belittling Barack Obama. Sarah Palin, likewise. Norm Coleman zinged Obama with . . . ‘John McCain would rather spend his time creating 200,000 new jobs in America than talking to 200,000 Germans in Berlin.’ Wide grin! Delighted applause! But of course while Obama was talking to 200,000 Germans in Berlin, John McCain wasn’t creating 200,000 new jobs in America – he was having lunch at Schmidt’s ‘Sausage Haus.’ Mitt Romney zinged Michelle Obama with . . . ‘There has never been a day when I was not proud to be an American.’ What does that even mean? My-Lai? Proud! Abu-Ghraib? Proud! Japanese internment? Proud. Napalming Vietnam? Proud! Near the bottom of the industrialized world in math and science education? Proud! Highest prison population? Proud! At the top in violent crime? Proud! Are we really going to chart our course based on who’s more mindlessly proud of everything America has done? Of course we’re all, on balance, deeply proud of America – and with very good reason. But do we really want to entrust our future to the candidate who wears the largest lapel pin? Every Republican Convention speaker talks about how McCain will cut taxes (at no cost! who needs taxes! the military will pay for itself! the interest on our mostly-Republican $10 trillion National Debt will just pay itself! we can just keep borrowing! the chickens will never come home to roost!) . . . whereas Obama – who has made it crystal clear he will lower taxes for 95% of Americans – will, they say, raise them. Raise, lower – what difference does it make as long as you smile, wear an American flag, and make fun of bright, thoughtful people? (A friend marveled to me today how the Europeans pride themselves on choosing leaders who are their best and brightest, where we mock our best and brightest and go for the guy near the bottom of his class. Bill Clinton – the Rhodes Scholar – was an exception, and all we got from that was eight years of peace and prosperity, a strong dollar, and the respect of the world.) John McCain is a maverick, they say (even though he says he’s voted with Bush more than 90% of the time, ‘higher than even a lot of my Republican colleagues’), who sticks to principle above all else, except when he doesn’t . . . calling evangelical leaders ‘agents of intolerance’ in 2000, then embracing them in 2007; criticizing tax breaks for the best off and now embracing them; speaking out against waterboarding, then voting for it; against ethanol and later for it; against overturning Roe v. Wade, now for it; and on and on. Not to say he’s alone in changing positions from time to time . . . but some kind of unique straight talker? Give me a break. Rudolph Giuliani mocked Obama for, among other things, voting ‘present’ 130 times while in the Illinois legislature. He did not mention that this was 130 times out of 4,000, or that there seem to have been good reasons for many of those votes. Or that in 2007 John McCain missed – ‘by a wide margin,’ according to The Real McCain – more Senate votes than any other senator except Tim Johnson (who was in a coma part of the time), including all the others running for President. Where Obama voted ‘present’ about 3% of the time, McCain missed 261 of 468 votes in the first 15 months of the current Congress – about 56% of the votes – including a number of key ones. Like a vote on the Improving America’s Security Act that codified the 9/11 Commission recommendations. Is it possible he didn’t want to go on record with most of his Republican colleagues in opposing this? The Real McCain sites the example of a vote on $1.2 billion for local law enforcement enhancement that was sandwiched between 15 other votes that day, all the others of which McCain did cast. Is ducking a vote better than voting ‘present’ to register an objection to it? The point is, the Republicans are great at mocking and belittling and Swift-Boating. But the result has been eight years of tremendous harm to our country, with the very real possibility of four more. There’s no denying that Sarah Palin is spunky and appealing – but that doesn’t make the teaching of creationism in high school science classes a good idea, or the teaching of ‘abstinence only’ an effective way to protect our teenagers against disastrous mistakes. And is she really ready to be a world leader like Barack Obama or Joe Biden or Al Gore or Hillary Clinton? Or, for that matter, General Eisenhower or Richard Nixon or George Bush Sr.? I just don’t see Sarah Palin in that league. If it hasn’t already hit your inbox, this strikes me as an informed, balanced biographical recap by one of her neighbors in Wasilla: ABOUT SARAH PALIN by Anne Kilkenny 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 she’s 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 Palin’s 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 weren’t 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. She’s 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 boy’s 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 State’s top cop (see below). As Mayor, Sarah fired Wasilla’s 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 man’s 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 State’s lawsuit against the Dept. of the Interior’s 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, there’s 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 unconsitutional). •pro-creationism: mixed. Supports it, BUT did nothing as Governor to promote it. •“Pro-life”: mixed. Knowingly gave birth to a Down’s 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 Wasilla’s 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 Palin’s 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-90’s. Anne Kilkenny annekilkenny@hotmail.com August 31, 2008 SAVINGS BOND CALCULATOR Same friend: “When you do start reporting about money again, you might want to give out the following address – www.savingsbonds.com. Put in your bond’s security number and purchase date, it gives you today’s value. Works even for series I bonds.”
National Security September 3, 2008March 11, 2017 McCAIN’S FELLOW POW Voting for Obama. Watch him here. And from his essay circling the Internet: . . . John was offered, and refused, “early release.” Many of us were given this offer. It meant speaking out against your country and lying about your treatment to the press. You had to “admit” that the U.S. was criminal and that our treatment was “lenient and humane.” So I, like numerous others, refused the offer. This was obviously something none of us could accept. Besides, we were bound by our service regulations, Geneva Conventions and loyalties to refuse early release until all the POW’s were released, with the sick and wounded going first. . . . . . . [H]aving been a POW is no special qualification for being President of the United States. The two jobs are not the same, and POW experience is not, in my opinion, something I would look for in a presidential candidate. . . . He has a quick and explosive temper that many have experienced first hand. Folks, quite honestly that is not the finger I want next to that red button. . . . GENERAL WESLEY CLARK Voting for Obama. Watch him here. TODAY’S MILITARY Giving to Obama. Read it here: AP – Military donations favor Obama WASHINGTON (AP) – U.S. soldiers have donated more presidential campaign money to Democrat Barack Obama than to Republican John McCain, a reversal of previous campaigns in which military donations tended to favor GOP White House hopefuls, a nonpartisan group reported Thursday. . . . NATIONAL SECURITY The world yearns for an America, and an American President, it can root for and be inspired by again. And HAVING most of the world on our side again would be good for our national security. Who would be more effective? A tough-talking, impulsive President seen as an extension of the Bush regime, who has trouble remembering whether Iran is Shiia or Sunni and thinks Afghanistan borders Iraq? Or one who has the nations of the world waving American flags again. THE REAL McCAIN Buy it for everyone you know – lest we make another colossal error and choose the wrong man.
The Real McCain September 2, 2008March 11, 2017 YOUR MONEY Princeton Economics professor and former Fed Vice Chair Alan Blinder concludes his Sunday op-ed this way: . . . if history is a guide, an Obama victory in November would lead to faster economic growth with less inequality, while a McCain victory would lead to slower economic growth with more inequality. Which part of the Obama menu don’t you like? ☞ So if prosperity is your issue, you can skip all the rest. Vote Obama. THE REAL McCAIN Buy it for everyone you know – lest we make another colossal error and choose the wrong man. AS FOR THE VP . . . Warren Kaplan: ‘I think we must conclude that one or the other of the following two alternatives is true: Either (1) McCain truly believes that Palin is the person best qualified to succeed him as president and commander in chief in the War on Terror if he becomes disabled or dies while in office, or (2) the choice of Palin was a transparent play for the disgruntled Hillary supporters, and a shameless appeal to the far right Republican fundamentalist base, made in reckless disregard for the welfare of the country. Take your pick. Either way, McCain has irrevocably disqualifed himself from serious consideration for the presidency by any rational standard.‘ ☞ If presidents were elected ‘by any rational standard,’ Gore would be stepping down after eight years; Bin Laden would be dead; there’d have been no trillion-dollar war in Iraq; and we would lead the world in stem cell research. Michael Kinsley in the Washington Post: Experience? Never Mind By Michael Kinsley Monday, September 1, 2008; . . . It seems like only yesterday that the Republican Party was complaining about Barack Obama’s lack of foreign policy “experience.” (As a matter of fact, when I started writing this, it actually was yesterday.) . . . The contrast in experience, especially foreign policy experience, between John McCain and Obama was supposed to be the central focus of McCain’s campaign. But that’s so five minutes ago, before Sarah Palin. Already, conservative pundits have come up with creative explanations for McCain’s choice of a vice presidential running mate with essentially no foreign policy experience. First prize (so far) goes to Michael Barone, who notes that “Alaska is the only state with a border with Russia. And it is the only state with territory, in the Aleutian Islands, occupied by the enemy in World War II.” . . . . . . the important point about Palin’s lack of experience isn’t about Palin. It’s about McCain. And the question is not how his choice of Palin might complicate his ability to use the “experience” issue or whether he will have to drop experience as an issue. It’s not about the proper role of experience as an issue. It’s not about experience at all. It’s about honesty. The question should be whether McCain — and all the other Republicans who have been going on for months about Obama’s dangerous lack of foreign policy experience — ever meant a word of it. And the answer is apparently not. Many conservative pundits woke up this morning fully prepared to harp on Obama’s alleged lack of experience for months more. Now they face the choice of either executing a Communist-style U-turn (“Experience? Feh! Who needs it?”) or trying to keep a straight face while touting the importance of having been mayor of a town of 9,000 if you later find yourself president of a nation of 300 million. . . . How could anyone truly believe that Barack Obama’s background and job history are inadequate experience for a president and simultaneously believe that Sarah Palin’s background and job history are adequate? It’s possible to believe one or the other. But both? Simply not possible. John McCain has been — what’s the word? — lying. And so have all the pundits who rushed to defend McCain’s choice. This is especially damning to McCain because his case for himself (besides not being Obama, a standard under which many of us might qualify) has rested on his honor and integrity. The North Vietnamese couldn’t break him, and neither could the Brahmins of his own party in the Senate. He was a maverick who always told it straight. So much for that. ☞ If Daily Kos readers have it right, she may not even be the V.P. nominee after all, so we can save a lot of ink.
How Did Warren Buffett Get So Rich? August 29, 2008March 11, 2017 HOW DID WARREN BUFFETT GET SO RICH? He started with nothing, inherited nothing, made it all by his wits. How? By being uncommonly smart but also by being wise, which is different, and uncommonly thoughtful; uncommonly decent, which has attracted decency in return; by taking the long view and sorting out what’s important; and – crucially – by being a good judge of talent. Knowing which chief executives to bet on. What does it say about Senator Obama that for the first time ever Warren Buffett has taken an active role in a modern Presidential election, hosting and headlining fundraisers to make Barack Obama our next chief executive? What does it say about Senator McCain? YOUR WEEKEND To try to see in him what Warren Buffett and lifelong Republicans Susan Eisenhower see in him, please consider spending part of your weekend listening to him.
More Amazing Speeches August 28, 2008March 11, 2017 On the one hand, you can argue this is a really lame excuse for a ‘column’ – just linking you to some speeches. On the other hand, they are historic speeches. I particularly commend you to watch President Clinton and Joe Biden’s speeches from last night . . . and if you have time, Tammy Duckworth’s, too. Craig Wiener: ‘The Microsoft Silverlight technology the DNCC uses for its videos is incompatible with older Macs with PowerPC processors that I (and millions of others) use everyday. I understand that Linux users are similarly affected. If the Democrats want their message to reach the widest audience possible wouldn’t it make sense to use that technology which is more inclusive than one which shuts out a substantial minority of U.S. computer users?’ ☞ Yes! Jack Rivers: ‘I was most amazed by [Republican Iowa Congressman] Jim Leach’s speech. OK, he isn’t an exciting speaker at all, but it was like a trial lawyer building his case. A great lecture to our nation’s Republicans and Independents on why they should vote for Obama. And good news, a long time friend – an Arizonan who has always voted Republican and never once voted for a Democrat for ANYTHING – let me know yesterday he will vote Obama.’ ☞ Yes!
Amazing Speeches August 27, 2008March 11, 2017 Zac: ‘In your speech to the Convention Monday, you forgot to mention that Phil Gramm’s wife was on the board of directors at Enron when it collapsed.’ ☞ That and so much more. But it was a privilege to be given even 400 words to drive home a few main thoughts . . . and obviously, the Convention is not about speeches like mine, but speeches like Michelle Obama’s Monday night and Hillary’s last night. Amazing speeches. As our future hangs on the outcome of the election, I urge you to watch them – and more – on the Convention website.
Sorry: Down Is NOT Up August 26, 2008March 11, 2017 McCAIN DELIBERATELY MISLEADS JS Hereford: ‘You write, ‘The McCain ad I saw here in Denver yesterday said . . . ‘Obama: Ready to raise your taxes, but is he ready to lead? I’m John McCain and I approved this message.’ How far John McCain has fallen. This ad is grossly deceptive, at best. Obama stands ready to LOWER most people’s taxes, not raise them. (See the difference?)’ I notice you didn’t address the issue of, ‘is he ready to lead.’ Is it because Biden and the Clintons have asked the same question?’ ☞ I stuck with the part that was objectively wrong and dishonest. With regard to the second part, McCain is welcome to ask the question he asks. That’s fair. (And the answer in my view is ‘yes,’ insofar as anyone is ready for this job – particularly as compared with McCain.) Marc Goldberger: ‘You have got to be kidding me…..don’t both sides do this in every election from dog catcher to president? In this case…I find it funny because it’s NOT misleading…In general Obama will try to raise taxes more than McCain would. But the real issue is not who will raise taxes or for whom but rather should we now be raising taxes AND why…..that’s the real issue…Sad to see you becoming more and more political as Nov nears..It’s a real turn off and I might have to pass on your thoughts until after the elections.’ ☞ If the Straight Talk Grocery Store charged more than its competition for everything except lobster and filet mignon – but advertised that it was the lower priced store, would you really consider that straight talk? And an ad like that exempt from criticism? I guess we just disagree on this one. But please don’t suspend your subscription. As to whether we should be raising taxes now, maybe not (although please be clear that we are poised to add three-quarters of a trillion dollars to our national debt in just the coming 12 months alone – it may not be a good idea, or moral, to keep borrowing from our children’s future). Bit leaving that aside, Obama plans to REDUCE taxes on most folks. So the net result would not be an economy killer. He is a very smart guy, advised by other very smart guys. Like Buffett, Volcker, Rubin and Summers. I feel a lot more comfortable with that than with Phil Gramm’s being the architect of McCain’s plan. (You know Gramm – the one who says the so-called economic ‘hard times’ are just in our heads – that we’re a nation of whiners. In some ways, I suppose quite a few of us are whiners. But the hard times are real -and headed for realer. So while we’re at it . . . McCAINPEDIA A valuable reference. Click here.
Get Out of Jail Free August 25, 2008March 11, 2017 McCAIN DELIBERATELY MISLEADS The McCain ad I saw here in Denver yesterday said . . . ‘Obama: Ready to raise your taxes, but is he ready to lead? I’m John McCain and I approved this message.’ How far John McCain has fallen. This ad is grossly deceptive, at best. Obama stands ready to LOWER most people’s taxes, not raise them. (See the difference?) BUT SO FAR, HE HAS A GET-OUT-OF-JAIL-FREE CARD Maureen Dowd in yesterday’s New York Times: Too Much of a Bad Thing By MAUREEN DOWD Published: August 24, 2008 WASHINGTON My mom did not approve of men who cheated on their wives. She called them ‘long-tailed rats.’ During the 2000 race, she listened to news reports about John McCain confessing to dalliances that caused his first marriage to fall apart after he came back from his stint as a P.O.W. in Vietnam. I figured, given her stringent moral standards, that her great affection for McCain would be dimmed. ‘So,’ I asked her, ‘what do you think of that?’ ‘A man who lives in a box for five years can do whatever he wants,’ she replied matter-of-factly. I was startled, but it brought home to me what a powerful get-out-of-jail-free card McCain had earned by not getting out of jail free. His brutal hiatus in the Hanoi Hilton is one of the most stirring narratives ever told on the presidential trail – a trail full of heroic war stories. It created an enormous credit line of good will with the American people. It also allowed McCain, the errant son of the admiral who was the commander of U.S. forces in the Pacific during Vietnam – his jailers dubbed McCain the ‘Crown Prince’ – to give himself some credit. ‘He has been preoccupied with escaping the shadow of his father and establishing his own image and identity in the eyes of others,’ read a psychiatric evaluation in his medical files. ‘He feels his experiences and performance as a P.O.W. have finally permitted this to happen.’ The ordeal also gave a more sympathetic cast to his carousing. As Robert Timberg wrote in ‘John McCain: An American Odyssey,’ ‘What is true is that a number of P.O.W.’s, in those first few years after their release, often acted erratically, their lives pockmarked by drastic mood swings and uncharacteristic behavior before achieving a more mellow equilibrium.’ Timberg said Hemingway’s line that people were stronger in the broken places was not always right. So it’s hard to believe that John McCain is now in danger of exceeding his credit limit on the equivalent of an American Express black card. His campaign is cheapening his greatest strength – and making a mockery of his already dubious claim that he’s reticent to talk about his P.O.W. experience – by flashing the P.O.W. card to rebut any criticism, no matter how unrelated. The captivity is already amply displayed in posters and TV advertisements. The Rev. Kirbyjon Caldwell, the pastor who married Jenna Bush and who is part of a new Christian-based political action committee supporting Obama, recently criticized the joke McCain made at the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally encouraging Cindy to enter the topless Miss Buffalo Chip contest. The McCain spokesman Brian Rogers brought out the bottomless excuse, responding with asperity that McCain’s character had been ‘tested and forged in ways few can fathom.’ When the Obama crowd was miffed to learn that McCain was in a motorcade rather than in a ‘cone of silence’ while Obama was being questioned by Rick Warren, Nicolle Wallace of the McCain camp retorted, ‘The insinuation from the Obama campaign that John McCain, a former prisoner of war, cheated is outrageous.’ When Obama chaffed McCain for forgetting how many houses he owns, Rogers huffed, ‘This is a guy who lived in one house for five and a half years – in prison.’ As Sam Stein notes in The Huffington Post: ‘The senator has even brought his military record into discussion of his music tastes. Explaining that his favorite song was ‘Dancing Queen’ by Abba, he offered that his knowledge of music ‘stopped evolving when his plane intercepted a surface-to-air missile.’ ‘Dancing Queen,’ however, was produced in 1975, eight years after McCain’s plane was shot down.’ The Kerry Swift-boat attacks in 2004 struck down the off-limits signs that were traditionally on a candidate’s military service. Many Democrats are willing to repay the favor, and Republicans clearly no longer see war medals as sacrosanct. In a radio interview last week, Representative Terry Everett, an Alabama Republican, let loose with a barrage at the Democrat John Murtha, a decorated Vietnam War veteran who is the head of the House defense appropriations subcommittee, calling him ‘cut-and-run John Murtha’ and an ‘idiot.’ ‘And don’t talk to me about him being an ex-marine,’ Everett said. ‘Lord, that was 40 years ago. A lot of stuff can happen in 40 years.’ The real danger to the McCain crew in overusing the P.O.W. line so much that it’s a punch line is that it will give Obama an opening for critical questions: While McCain’s experience was heroic, did it create a worldview incapable of anticipating the limits to U.S. military power in Iraq? Did he fail to absorb the lessons of Vietnam, so that he is doomed to always want to refight it? Did his captivity inform a search-and-destroy, shoot-first-ask-questions-later, ‘We are all Georgians,’ mentality?