Tuesday, November 25, 2008

NetFlix: Beginnings

This is a list of movies I have watched with my new netflix subscription. Pretty disappointing overall.

City of Men --- Bad, City of God was 10 times better
Charlie Wilsons War --- Not good, I wanted it to be good.
Indiana Jones IV -- Very Bad Movie. Good effects
Smart People --- Boring, trite talkie.
The Assassination of Jesse James ---Way too long, very well shot, not enough substance.
I am Not There --- I thought this was supposed to be good?
Cloverfield --- ehhh Ok. Give me a good disaster film with complete unknowns every once in a while and I will be happy.
Standard Operating Procedure --- very good. Morris is the king, and I love this type of depressing stuff. Fog of War is better though
I like Killing Flies --- I liked it alot. I used to eat here all the time. Could have a better arc. This movie is not for everybody just like kenny

Any recommendations from the peanut gallery?

Sunday, November 09, 2008

Britol, PA

[AD][AD]
By MICHAEL SOKOLOVE
Published: November 8, 2008

Early on Election Day morning in the Philadelphia suburb of Levittown, Pa., Joe Sinitski, 48, stood in a long line inside a school gymnasium, inching his way toward three blue-curtained voting machines. He wore jeans, a sweatshirt and a National Rifle Association baseball cap. He said he would vote for Barack Obama, a choice that some months earlier he could not have imagined.

In the primary, Barack Obama had difficulty connecting with voters. His message seemed too abstract.

“I have to admit, his race made my decision harder,” he said. “I was brought up that way. And I don’t like his name. I’ll admit to that, too.”

Mr. Sinitski, a heating and air-conditioning technician, repeated a joke he had heard back in the spring about the choice in the Democratic primary between a black man and a woman (Hillary Rodham Clinton), and he used a crude term for each. But when I asked him how he might feel to wake up the next morning to the reality of a black president-elect, he said: “I do think it’s an historic election. Part of me feels like it would be really cool.”

Political pollsters track trends and changes within big blocs of voters. What they do less well is catch the complicated, ever-evolving and often conflicted feelings within individual voters.

Levittown had been Hillary country all the way — it gave Mrs. Clinton roughly three out of every four of its votes in the Pennsylvania primary in May. In doing so, it conformed, in some ways, to its history and stereotype. William Levitt built the vast postwar development in the shadow of a giant United States Steel plant, some 17,000 homes sprawling across three Pennsylvania townships and one borough. He would not sell to black families.

According to the latest United States census, just 2 percent of Levittown’s current 54,000 residents are African-American; about an equal percent are Hispanic. The community is overwhelmingly Democratic, but filled with older whites who did not attend college — the so-called Reagan Democrats who in recent presidential elections have been the voters most likely to swing between parties.

I grew up in Levittown, and in the spring had returned there before the Democratic primary to write about how Mr. Obama’s message of hope and change was connecting with its blue-collar population. It wasn’t. My article in The New York Times Magazine reported that his words were coming across as lofty and abstract to people more attuned to concrete concerns like the hourly wage and the monthly car payment. The article was published on the morning before Mr. Obama made his one big gaffe of the campaign, telling attendees at a San Francisco fund-raiser that some blue-collar voters have been so beaten down that “it’s not surprising that they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion... .”

The timing of those remarks and the article were not coincidental. That evening in San Francisco, in the instant before committing what he would later call “my biggest boneheaded move,” Mr. Obama had been ruminating on his struggles to win over white working-class voters, and said, “there were intimations of that in an article in the Sunday New York Times today — kind of implies that it’s sort of a race thing.” What I wrote had seemed to hit at a deep frustration of Mr. Obama’s — his inability to reach a certain segment of voters. Some of the reason for that was his manner of speaking; but in some measure, for sure, his failure to persuade white blue-collar voters was based on his mixed-race heritage.

I traveled again to Levittown on Election Day to see how people would vote and how they would respond to what looked like an imminent Obama victory. The contrast from the spring — and, in fact, this new vision of Levittown compared with what I had known in my childhood — was almost breathtaking.

“Obama,” said the ironworker, when I asked how he’d be voting.

“Obama,” said the plumber.

“Obama,” said the chef.

And on and on. Military moms. Vietnam veterans. Abortion opponents. College students and retirees. Bank tellers, pipe fitters, officer workers, machinists, meat cutters, boilermakers and carpenters.

I spent Election Day at a voting site inside the Magic Cottage preschool in a section of Levittown called Appletree, where Mr. Obama would defeat Mr. McCain, 682-388, a ratio slightly higher than the Democratic registration edge in that precinct. Not a single one of the more than 60 Obama voters I talked to said they had voted for him in the spring. Some said they had come around slowly, and many reported that they had been open to Mr. McCain. These were the voters whom Mr. McCain was targeting when he made a big bet on Pennsylvania, investing money and a substantial amount of his time and the time of his running mate, Gov. Sarah Palin. But Mr. McCain’s message, to the extent it was received at all, irritated them. The Democrats of Levittown did not defect — they stayed in the fold, and then some. Over all, in the four municipalities that Levittown spans, Obama got a slightly higher percentage than John Kerry did in 2004, and because of higher turnout, emerged with a 3,200-vote greater margin of victory. (Levittown is defined by ZIP codes and Levitt-built homes, but is not its own incorporated town. Large parts of it extend into towns with large white working-class populations — Bristol, Middletown and Falls Townships, as well as Tullytown Borough — but it does not make up the entirety of any of those places. In those four jurisdictions, Obama defeated McCain, 41,110 to 25,034 — contributing to his resounding 11-percentage-point victory in Pennsylvania.)

“McCain pointed a lot of fingers instead of giving answers,” Steve O’Connor, a plumber, told me.

Mr. Obama’s message, on the other hand, seemed like it had entered some voters by IV injection. “I don’t want a clone of George Bush,” Mark Maxwell, 47, a corporate chef, said. “With McCain, that’s exactly what we’d get.”

Said Lisa Winslow, a 20-year-old college student: “I’m not rich. I can’t afford to vote for McCain.”

What had changed for Mr. Obama? The financial meltdown obviously made a huge difference. Five more months of exposure to him, and his millions of dollars worth of advertisements, engendered a comfort level. And Iraq, to a much greater extent than the pre-election polls implied, mattered. Nearly every Obama voter I talked to mentioned it, and many linked it to the economy.

“We’re like a trillion dollars in debt and spending what, $10 billion a month on the war?” said Andrew Brehaut, 25, a waiter.

Levittown is filled with a great many veterans of the Vietnam War, not all of whom served happily. “I didn’t want to be there when I was told to go,” said Frank Carr, 62, who recently retired from his shipping job in a corrugated box factory. “I know how the boys feel. I believe Obama is a man of his word.”

When Mr. Obama says he is going to bring home the troops, “I believe him,” Mr. Carr said.

Before Mr. Obama emerged on the national scene and began winning primaries, few people would have predicted Americans were on the verge of elevating a person of African descent to the highest office in the land, or that they would have to confront any reluctance they might have about accepting black leadership. The nation was transformed on Tuesday, but what had to occur first was the transformation of individual voters.

A lot of people in Levittown needed the five months between the primary election and Tuesday to get used to a new idea. After Mrs. Clinton’s defeat, followed by a financial crisis that shook Americans to the core, they came to terms. If Mr. Obama’s race had been a factor, they eventually had to weigh it against other concerns.

“For a long time, I couldn’t ignore the fact that he was black, if you know what I mean,” Mr. Sinitski, the heating and air-conditioning technician, told me. “I’m not proud of that, but I was raised to think that there aren’t good black people out there. I could see that he was highly intelligent, and that matters to me, but my instinct was still to go with the white guy.”

Mr. Sinitski said what pushed him toward Mr. Obama, more than anything, was McCain’s vice-presidential choice of Mrs. Palin. “She might be a great person, but I had never heard of her before and I couldn’t see how such an unknown should be put one heartbeat from the presidency,” he said, “especially with all the problems we’ve got. I didn’t feel it spoke well for McCain. It didn’t demonstrate intelligence on McCain’s part and it just didn’t reflect well in general on him.”

Tina Davis is the council president in Bristol Township, which has the highest concentration of Levittown voters. She said she had endless conversations with constituents who said they would not vote for Obama. “Most of them couldn’t give me a real answer why,” she said. “I had some of them reciting those stupid e-mails saying he was a Muslim. I’m pretty blunt. I would just say to them, ‘You’re against him because he’s black.’ ”

She thinks some of those who argued with her and insisted till the bitter end that they would vote for Mr. McCain just stubbornly did not want to acknowledge they had changed their minds. In the end, she believes they ended up voting out of a different kind of fear — fear for their own economic survival. Self-interest trumped racism. “They had to ask themselves if they wanted a really smart young black guy, or a stodgy old white guy from the same crowd who put us in this hole,” she said.

The people I met in Levittown were not on Mr. Obama’s e-mail list or among his donors, but they may be more likely than his younger supporters and more affluent ones to give him what he most desperately needs: time and patience. Like characters from the songs of one of Mr. Obama’s celebrity endorsers, Bruce Springsteen, many Levittowners have been weathered by life. They haven’t benefited from a lot of quick fixes. Others of his supporters say they’ll be patient, but I sensed these people really mean it. They were harder to sell, but they could end up being pretty loyal.

“How long did it take Bush to get us into this mess?” Mr. Carr, the Vietnam veteran, asked. “It’s a lot easier to screw things up than to make them bette

Wednesday, September 24, 2008

Thursday, September 11, 2008

QOTD

Local Maine Reporter

Well, you say you’re sure that she has the experience, but again, I’m just asking for an example. What experience does she have in the field of national security?

Mccain
Energy. She knows more about energy than probably anybody else in America.

Tuesday, September 02, 2008

How I learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Sarah Palin


I have been spinning my wheels thinking about the this pick since friday. The total absurdity of having someone who 18 months ago was presiding over a town of 6000 from a building that looks like a fish bait shop has left me wondering if it just might work.

John Mccain, recently 72, who spent half a decade getting his health decimated in a POW camp, just picked someone who might have to sit across the table from putin, hu jintao, kim jong il, with the lives of millions of people in their hands. This maverick choice campaign is now being sold to us. The defense of her credentials on the TV is so bizarre its beyond comical.

She has tons of the rightwing credentials of the other loonies in the party, creationism, abstinence only, kill the polar bears...., but below are, I think, those which are beyond expectation for someone running to be the backup to the president. Her husband was part of an organization which main platform was to advocate the indendependence of Alaska. She is someone who until last year recently didnt have a passport, someone who until last year hasnt really focused on the war.

I am sure the religious right will come home to his campaign with this type of zealot on the ticket but what about the rest of us. Her major asset to the rest of us will be her ability, with her former training as sportscaster and pageant contestant, to read a teleprompter and enunciate without looking like frankenstein or making us wonder if she is having a stroke when she speaks. Making someone look young, smart, compassionate and vital on tv in comparison to the rest of the republicans isnt that hard a hard job. Anyone remember Bush circa 2000?

Which reminds me, I cant think of anybody I would have been less comfortable with in that Number 2 spot. Mitt, Rudy, Thompson, Pawlenty, Graham, Lieberman, all of them are flawed and nuts but at least I am familiar with them and their flaws. Who would you have liked less. Jindal?

In one of the candidates most personal decisions, in what has been the most important executive decision to date that the candidates have made with respect to people of this country, Barack Obama picked Joe Biden to replace him in a time of crisis and John Mccain picked Sarah Palin.

This is more about John Mccain's Judgement than about Palins resume.

Country over Politics my Ass.

Thursday, August 21, 2008

How many houses do you Own?

QOTD

Fact Check

I will not stand by and watch the Obama camp try to claim McCain owns seven homes when he owns at least ten. -- Josh Marshall


Tuesday, July 08, 2008

Damn its hot

Wednesday, July 02, 2008

Would Someone Please

tell me why they even tried to make good movies after Fletch? Three words for you -- Joe Don Baker. I dont want to question anyones patriotism a few days before the fourth, especially with a name like rue de la clef, but once you turn your back on Fletch, What is next -- America?


Would Someone Please...
tell me why I'm paying for HBO when one of tonight's movie selections is Fletch??

Friday, June 27, 2008

Will people buy this ?

Actively opposing something and then take credit for it after it is passed over your objection



It is pretty clear what is wrong with this, no?

Last Nights Run

Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Dee Mutha Dee

This is the first thing that came to my mind when I read back to back Ruedelaclef posts about battery acquistition problems post and quotable college-era movies.

Monday, June 23, 2008

Uppity-Watch

Karl Rove's latest to Republicans about how to message on Obama ...

"Even if you never met him, you know this guy. He's the guy at the country club with the beautiful date, holding a martini and a cigarette that stands against the wall and makes snide comments about everyone who passes by."


stolen from tpm

Friday, June 20, 2008

In the midst of all this leftist propaganda

is it time for a breath

If I need ice for my sippy cup understand that in that gi-normous diaper bag I'm straddled with I don't have a sno-cone machine.


and of course water was found on mars today.

Safe for Work..

Thursday, June 05, 2008

How to give a John McCain speech




Speak in front of a bright green backdrop. This is known as a "green screen" and it can be used later to insert special effects behind you, like car chases and lightsaber duels.

Start your speech with: "My friends..." and use this phrase frequently as a crutch to allow your brain to catch up with your mouth.

Tell a lie right out of the gate ("Pundits and party elders have declared that Senator Obama will be my opponent") and then say you'll run an honorable campaign.

Smile awkwardly at inappropriate times, like when you're talking about casualties in Iraq or home foreclosures. Nothing says "I care" like gleaming metal and ivory.

When the crowd applauds, act like you've never heard such a noise before and make facial gestures indicating you’d like it to stop.

Clamp your eyeballs on the teleprompter like a vise. When you switch your gaze to a different prompter, take a moment to focus your eyes. This slight pause in your cadence will sound awkward and stiff, but it will prevent you from saying things like, "We have succseen the success..."

There's nothing better to whip a crowd into a froth with than laundry lists!! You'll want at least five in your speech. Be sure they're lists of things that the Republican party has screwed up over the last eight years. Like this: "Health care, energy, the environment, the tax code, our public schools, our transportation system, disaster relief, government spending and regulation, diplomacy, military and intelligence services."

Here's another: "Job loss, failing schools, prohibitively expensive health care, pensions at risk, 'entitlement programs' approaching bankruptcy, rising gas and food prices, to name a few." The last four words are important to say, because you don't want to give away the entire list of failures so early in the campaign. Pace yourself and keep them guessing.

Blink your eyes like a strobelight. Appearing uncomfortable inspires confidence!

When laying out your generic to-do list for Americans ("We have to rethink, reform, and reinvent the way we educate our children, train our workers, deliver our health care services, support our retirees, fuel our transportation network, stimulate research and development, and harness new technologies."), make it sound like you're assigning ten hours of homework to a classroom of sixth-graders the day before summer vacation starts.

Remind Americans of a natural disaster that took place recently and which your party leaders reacted to with off-the-charts incompetence. But don’t mention the part where you were enjoying birthday cake a couple thousand miles away with the President when it happened. As you talk about the failures of the federal Katrina disaster relief effort, take a moment to flash one of those inappropriate smiles. It's funny!

Rail against special interests, but don’t mention the lobbyists that have swarmed around your campaign like locusts.

Tuesday, June 03, 2008

Obama-Clinton, how about Obama-Wright

Mostly it is about lacking credibility in age where we need honesty. I yearn for plain speaking dems that could go up against the depravity of Mcsame's agenda.
I would be willing to give that up if it would help the dems win.



With videos like this being released by the RNC, i dont see how her presence makes the a better case for an Obama presidency than without her. I would almost wrather have Reverand Wright on the ticket at least he hasnt denigrated obamas capacity as a wartime commander.

If she can figure out a away to walk back from this statement. If, with her political skill, she does this, and accomplishes something unfathomable....

Alright she doesnt have to convince me she just has to convince this lady



I think she lives in riverside park..

Tuesday, May 20, 2008

Captions for Internet Photos?



...earlier today the secret service took a time travel machine back to arrest the boy with the stick..



...thank god its you natalia, i thought it was ted kennedy...




..Hordes rushed into Krusty's head after they heard there were ...

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Hardball College Tour Liveblog.

A couple of predictions of Johnny Walnuts appearance today with Chris Matthews

Tweety fawns all over him.
He becomes confused at a question
He loses his cool at a questioner
He gets booed by a group of yougsters

Please God, let him be as incompetent as he was on MTV

UPDATE

I was wrong. Tweety didnt have the guts to follow up. Not one tough question. Utterly disappointing. I like this exchange though about what the young people watch. He also at some point described life in small town america as being occupied by people who lived through the depression. I guess he has got that demographic all locked up.

Matthews: Why do you think so many young people are attracted to the words of Barack Obama?

McCain: He's eloquent and people want a change. But I can make a change in the future, ability to educate country, motivate the country. But I will contest every vote of every young American, and that's why I did The View and Letterman

Wednesday, April 09, 2008

maybe your body will eat your -ss

Sparky: I want you to think of what you ate today. Got it? Now cut that in half, this is called a diet, people, everyone start one today! Darcy, you should stop eating. You see, when you skip a meal, your body feeds off its fat stores. And if you skip enough, maybe your body will eat your ass!





To curtail Japan's overweight population, the Japanese health ministry recently mandated that all waistlines among its 56 million workers over age 40 be below “regulation size” of 33.5 inches (for men). Any company failing to bring its employees’ weight under control--as well as the weights of their family members--will be fined up to 10% of its earnings by the government.

According to government officials, 27 million Japanese--about half of all adult workers--have health indices (cholesterol, blood pressure, blood sugar and BMI) that don’t meet ideal numbers, and will be targeted for mandatory medical intervention. The director of the Medical Urban Clinic in Osaka, Toshio Mochizuki, says he is concerned about the new movement. “I’m worried that the overweight will start to be shunned at the workplace and these new rules will make no one want to hire them,” he said. Read the full article here.

Tuesday, April 08, 2008

What has Colin has been up to for the past 8 years..

I started laughing hysterically at work listening to the fat trainer at the first one.

This second one is getting some major hits on the youtube.


And of Course rock, paper, scissors. Fred, I think colin stole his lines in this clip from my imitation of that dude who was hitting on Alyssa the night before Patty and Eds wedding. "I could cut you man. I could cut you."

Monday, March 31, 2008

Cotton Wha?

Stolen from TPM

Racial healer Lou Dobbs explains how he's sick of "cotton pickin'" black leaders tell him how he can and can't talk about race (he catches himself at the last minute -- sorta) ...




Tell us what you really think about race LOU.

Monday, March 17, 2008

QOTD

To reiterate, she cannot win without overturning the will of the national Democratic electorate and fomenting civil war, and she doesn’t care.


KOS. 3/17/2006.

Friday, March 14, 2008

client #9

Kristen
'I don't think he's difficult. I mean it's just kind of like . . . whatever. . . I'm here for a purpose. I know what my purpose is. I am not a . . . moron, you know what I mean. So maybe that's why girls maybe think they're difficult . . . . " "Kristen" continued: "That's what it is, because you're here for a [purpose]. Let's not get it twisted - I know what I do, you know."

LEWIS
"You look at it very uniquely, because . . . no one .ever says it that way." LEWIS continued that from what she had been told "he" (believed to be a reference to Client-9) "would ask you to do things that, like, you might not think were safe - you know - I mean that . . . very basic things. . . .

Kristen
"I have a way of dealing with that . . . I'd be like listen dude, you really want the sex? . . . You know what I mean."

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

Final Quote on the Wire from its Creator

I will confess to you now that anything I have ever accomplished as a writer, as somebody doing TV, as anything I have ever done in life down to, like, cleaning up my room, has been accomplished because I was going to show people that they were fucked up and wrong and that I was the fucking center of the universe, and the sooner they got hip to that, the happier they would all be … That’s what’s going on in my head.

David Simon

The bigger the lie, the more they believe

Detective Bunk Westmoreland on the first episode of season 5 of the wire and maybe the theme of the entire last season of the greatest series ever on TV. Strike that, the greatest piece of Art in the history of the world

Bill Bradley on the Clintons
Former senator Bill Bradley, who is a leading supporter of Obama and ran for president in 2000, accused the Clintons of “lying” in pursuit of victory.
“The bigger the lie, the better the chance they think they’ve got. That’s been their whole approach,” he said. “She’s going to lose a whole generation of people who got involved in politics believing it could be something different.”

Bradley has always been able to see things that most people cant. Dude has a 192 degree peripheral vision!

Bush White House Aide on reality circa 2004
"That's not the way the world really works anymore," he continued. "We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality -- judiciously, as you will -- we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do."

This is a great article. Absolutely blew me away when I read it.

Hitler in Mein Kampf on the "Big Lie"
In this they proceeded on the sound principle that the magnitude of a lie always contains a certain factor of credibility, since the great masses of the people in the very bottom of their hearts tend to be corrupted rather than consciously and purposely evil, and that, therefore, in view of the primitive simplicity of their minds they more easily fall a victim to a big lie than to a little one, since they themselves lie in little things, but would be ashamed of lies that were too big. Such a falsehood will never enter their heads and they will not be able to believe in the possibility of such monstrous effrontery and infamous misrepresentation in others; yes, even when enlightened on the subject, they will long doubt and waver, and continue to accept at least one of these causes as true. Therefore, something of even the most insolent lie will always remain and stick-a fact which all the great lie-virtuosi and lying-clubs in this world know only too well and also make the most treacherous use of.

Friday, February 29, 2008

Fearmongering

I guess this is the kitchen sink.


CLINTON: Now, one of Clinton's laws of politics is this. If one candidate is trying to scare you and the other one is try get you to think, if one candidate is appealing to your fears and the other one is appealing to your hopes, you better vote for the person who wants you to think and hope.




What this reminds me of...



Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Overheard

ala motherjones


Man 1: Did you see any of the movies nominated for Best Picture at the Oscars?

Man 2: Nah.

Man 1: Yeah. There wasn't an Obama movie, one that everybody could like.

Monday, February 25, 2008

Coveralls or Overalls

I received this email today out of the blue. I'll fill in the details later in the week.
From: K, Greg Sent: Mon 2/25/2008 7:48 PM
To: V, Adam
Cc: A, Amr; W, Jake
Subject: Need Coveralls

Adam – Good evening.

I wanted to ask you if the company had some coveralls that we could use for the Jones Beach inspections. We will need 2, preferably in a medium size. I don’t know how the sizes run but they are for me and Jake Wolf.

Does we have coveralls? – Greg K


What the week holds...

Sunday, February 17, 2008

Stuff White People Like

#8 - Barack Obama




Because white people are afraid that if they don’t like him that they will be called racist.

Saturday, February 16, 2008

The righteous voter

Another reader writes
I am really trying to stay positive and pledge to support your candidate if you'll support mine, but I feel I have to say something about campaign rhetoric.

Alright go ahead and vote for Mccain. Vote for John and don't support a candidate who has nearly identical positions to your candidate. Don't support Barack because you dislike his lofty rhetoric,. Don't support Hussein because you think other people are voting for him for the wrong reasons. If really it is about results of the elections and the policies a candidate implements, what makes your qualified support a good idea? What is the need for the veiled threat?
However, I would think the average less-informed casual voter thinks, Oh, he's an outsider, he won't play politics as usual.

Barack is the first democrat in a while who could win not only the policy argument but also have the best prose. Gore couldn't turn out the working class swing voters because he was boring. Additionally, he had the legacy of Bill's blow job motivate them to come out in droves against him. People voted against Kerry because of the swift boat ads. In the end all that mattered is they didn't turn out. The democrat candidate didn't get their vote.

If it was possible, I wish Barry could use a vulcan mind meld or the Force to change minds, but the truth is he is not Jesus, Spock, or even Luke Skywalker. He is just a man who has a history of taking good government policies seriously. As long as he gets more votes I don't care If people think he is the second coming.
How, then do you explain things such as the report yesterday in that Times: "Senator John McCain's presidential campaign said Thursday that it stood by a year-old pledge made with Senator Barack Obama that each would accept public financing for the general election if the nominee of the opposing party did the same. But Mr. Obama's campaign refused to reaffirm its earlier commitment." Obama proposed the pledge in the first place; now his campaign is saying they will "address that issue in the general election, when we're the nominee. We're just not entertaining hypotheticals right now." Please note he is raising more than $1 million a day, far more than he would get with public financing.

A couple points.
He does not take money from Political Action Comittees.
The money is from individual contributors and is capped at $2300 per person.
He has almost 500,000 individual donors since december 31st.

He will try to make a deal with Mccain.
He told reporters in Milwaukee that if he defeats New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton in their close race for the Democratic nomination, "then I will make sure our people talk to John McCain’s people to make sure we abide by the same rules. … My folks will sit down and see whether we can arrive at common-sense ground rules.
If Mccain agrees to "common sense rules" like capping individual contributions at $1500 or $1000 per person, mccain will find himself in the unwanted position of being outraised 5 to 1 instead of 2 to 1. This whole thing is a moot point. There is potentially $200,000,000 pool of money out there in Political Action Committes. Barack is going to have to respond to Madrassa, Islam, and black negative smears. Mccain wont (and cant)keep a leash on these guys. The attempt to make a deal will fall through. There was no "pledge".

Also, an African-American congressman/superdelegate said yesterday on NPR that he is getting calls from other African-American superdelegates saying that if he does not pledge for Obama, they will run someone against him in his next election campaign. Politics as usual, yes. But what about uniting people and transcending race? I have not heard Obama speak out against this.
If you represent a constituency that voted 4-1 for OBAMA and yet your representative does not support Barack do you not see what is wrong with that. I even could see the argument that your representative needs to be primaried for going along with the will of the people. If people started representing the will of the people we would be out of Iraq, have universal healthcare, and have higher paid teachers.
I do not expect my politicians to be more than politicians. I don't expect to get more than politics as usual. But if you promise something more, then how can it not be hypocritical when, if push comes to shove, you are politics as usual as well?
It is not about playing nice. It is about figthing hard and representing the american people not some elite constituency.

Ok, you can yell back now.
I will support the candidate whose political philosophy is closest to mine.

Friday, February 15, 2008

The Subprime Primer

This may be the greatest thing since my last post...


http://docs.google.com/Present?docid=ddp4zq7n_0cdjsr4fn


All Hat, No Cattle

From Andrew Sullivan
A reader writes:
Enough of this rah rah Obama crap. Yes, he's a captivating speaker. He could potentially unite us, lead us, and revive our international reputation. We get it already. But of all the "pro-O" bloggers (and there are many), I was really hoping that you would be the one to really scrutinize his policy positions. What happens when when he turns to Plouffe on election night and says, like Redford in The Candidate, "What do we do now?" When are you going to stop cheerleading and start asking the tough questions? Get to it, man! The idol-worship is wearing thin!

I find this criticism bewildering. Obama has a host of policy positions, on taxes, healthcare, Iraq, Afghanistan, immigration, climate change. There seems to be a meme that because someone is inspiring, there has to be no substance. But they are not mutually exclusive categories. In the Democratic race, the only real substantive difference is healthcare mandates. And compared with McCain, Obama is a wonk.


Here are three links which in go in detail into specific policy decisions
one , two, three

This next one regards specific policy he discussed on tuesday in wisconsin. Now, I know we are all not obsessed like I am with this process but with just a little work typing Obama and Policy in google I get the obama policy book. Each chapter is expanded upon further in his website.

Listen, I understand all your friends are getting on-board the Barack Express and you havent. It is annoying isnt it? All the Hope-Mongering. The mindless obama-bots and obamaniacs infiltrating your inner circles. Me, I am not going to jam him down your throat -- you are not my problem. He has proven that with exposure and time, he can consistently get the well educated, well paid voter, because no matter how annoying the barack-ophiles are or how unbeleivably appealing his speech is
you will eventually get to examine his voting record and history you will find the plaform easily, and consider it on its merits.

My problem is with the poor, uneducated who dont have the time or ability to actually read this stuff. All they know is the clinton brand name as something familiar and safe. These people are also respond most to phrases like "All Hat, No Cattle" and "Empty Suit." These are the voters he needs to reach -and some of them were reached in VA on Wednesday. So, it may be sad to write it, but the best way to combat whisper campaigns are not indepth policy speechs but more positive rhetoric, 30 second tv ads, and a branding of HOPE that include short populist quips.

Thursday, February 14, 2008

St Marks & 3rd



Is the future of the east village the future of architecture?

That intersection is one of the worst -- It wont get better after this.

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Defending Hillary (earlier than I expected)

This is a response post

I have read this post and I am having a hard time responding. A main reason is that deep down I have socialistic tendencies that will not gain me any points. So lets start out with this. I sympathize with your reservations about the Clinton dynasty. I can even understand why for reasons relating to values, authenticity, trust, connection you don’t like her. If someone is considering not voting for her despite their agreement on her positions, I understand that.

My main question is given that the basic democratic platform is formed around the notion of providing social safety nets for the lower quartile of Americans, greater economic opportunity for the middle 50% and paying for it, at least partially, by increasing the burden of the upper 25% (especially the top 10%), how would a democratic candidate running on a democratic platform earn your vote?

No matter how much pork you cut out of the budget or how many loopholes you close, no matter how much growth you create or how big a recession we go in – I can’t see how the democratic platform doesn’t address income/resource inequality.

My other question has to do with your change in perspective. Do you see your position today on these issues as fundamentally different than when you were phone banking for clinton/gore in 1992?

BTW: jacks loved the necklace

Monday, February 04, 2008

Friday, February 01, 2008

thats old news

Twenty one democratic Senators and one hundred and twenty six democratic Congressmen voted against the 2002 Iraq AUMF. Why should I choose you for president after making most important foriegn policy blunder in my lifetime?





Remarks of Illinois State Sen. Barack Obama Against Going to War with Iraq
| October 02, 2002
October 2, 2002



Good afternoon. Let me begin by saying that although this has been billed as an anti-war rally, I stand before you as someone who is not opposed to war in all circumstances. The Civil War was one of the bloodiest in history, and yet it was only through the crucible of the sword, the sacrifice of multitudes, that we could begin to perfect this union, and drive the scourge of slavery from our soil. I don't oppose all wars.

My grandfather signed up for a war the day after Pearl Harbor was bombed, fought in Patton's army. He saw the dead and dying across the fields of Europe; he heard the stories of fellow troops who first entered Auschwitz and Treblinka. He fought in the name of a larger freedom, part of that arsenal of democracy that triumphed over evil, and he did not fight in vain. I don't oppose all wars.

After September 11th, after witnessing the carnage and destruction, the dust and the tears, I supported this administration's pledge to hunt down and root out those who would slaughter innocents in the name of intolerance, and I would willingly take up arms myself to prevent such tragedy from happening again. I don't oppose all wars. And I know that in this crowd today, there is no shortage of patriots, or of patriotism.

What I am opposed to is a dumb war. What I am opposed to is a rash war. What I am opposed to is the cynical attempt by Richard Perle and Paul Wolfowitz and other armchair, weekend warriors in this administration to shove their own ideological agendas down our throats, irrespective of the costs in lives lost and in hardships borne.

What I am opposed to is the attempt by political hacks like Karl Rove to distract us from a rise in the uninsured, a rise in the poverty rate, a drop in the median income - to distract us from corporate scandals and a stock market that has just gone through the worst month since the Great Depression. That's what I'm opposed to. A dumb war. A rash war. A war based not on reason but on passion, not on principle but on politics. Now let me be clear - I suffer no illusions about Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal man. A ruthless man. A man who butchers his own people to secure his own power. He has repeatedly defied UN resolutions, thwarted UN inspection teams, developed chemical and biological weapons, and coveted nuclear capacity. He's a bad guy. The world, and the Iraqi people, would be better off without him.

But I also know that Saddam poses no imminent and direct threat to the United States, or to his neighbors, that the Iraqi economy is in shambles, that the Iraqi military a fraction of its former strength, and that in concert with the international community he can be contained until, in the way of all petty dictators, he falls away into the dustbin of history. I know that even a successful war against Iraq will require a US occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences. I know that an invasion of Iraq without a clear rationale and without strong international support will only fan the flames of the Middle East, and encourage the worst, rather than best, impulses of the Arab world, and strengthen the recruitment arm of Al Qaeda. I am not opposed to all wars. I'm opposed to dumb wars.

So for those of us who seek a more just and secure world for our children, let us send a clear message to the President today. You want a fight, President Bush? Let's finish the fight with Bin Laden and Al Qaeda, through effective, coordinated intelligence, and a shutting down of the financial networks that support terrorism, and a homeland security program that involves more than color-coded warnings. You want a fight, President Bush?

Let's fight to make sure that the UN inspectors can do their work, and that we vigorously enforce a non-proliferation treaty, and that former enemies and current allies like Russia safeguard and ultimately eliminate their stores of nuclear material, and that nations like Pakistan and India never use the terrible weapons already in their possession, and that the arms merchants in our own country stop feeding the countless wars that rage across the globe. You want a fight, President Bush?

Let's fight to make sure our so-called allies in the Middle East, the Saudis and the Egyptians, stop oppressing their own people, and suppressing dissent, and tolerating corruption and inequality, and mismanaging their economies so that their youth grow up without education, without prospects, without hope, the ready recruits of terrorist cells. You want a fight, President Bush? Let's fight to wean ourselves off Middle East oil, through an energy policy that doesn't simply serve the interests of Exxon and Mobil. Those are the battles that we need to fight. Those are the battles that we willingly join. The battles against ignorance and intolerance. Corruption and greed. Poverty and despair.

The consequences of war are dire, the sacrifices immeasurable. We may have occasion in our lifetime to once again rise up in defense of our freedom, and pay the wages of war. But we ought not -- we will not -- travel down that hellish path blindly. Nor should we allow those who would march off and pay the ultimate sacrifice, who would prove the full measure of devotion with their blood, to make such an awful sacrifice in vain.

Wednesday, January 30, 2008

Why do people vote

Apparently it is not tv shows, books or celebrity endorsements

Poverty, healthcare, jobs, wages, education; these are the issues the public agrees overwhelmingly with democratic platform position. Reasons why we always whine we should be elected.

In the real world people vote for candidates based on values, connection, authenticity, trust. All these etherial qualities are the reasons we fail to get elected.

Imagine if we had both.

Monday, January 28, 2008

Becoming Religious about Barack -- or more aptly titled

Why I might not talk to you if you vote for anybody but Barack in the Democratic Primary.

Barack Obama on his favorite TV show
Sen. Barack Obama has previously said that HBO’s "The Wire" is his favorite show. But now Obama's revealed another tidbit. In a story from Monday's Las Vegas Sun, the presidential candidate said that Omar is his favorite character on "The Wire."

“That’s not an endorsement. He’s not my favorite person, but he’s a fascinating character,” Obama said, who noted in an audio clip on the site that Omar, who is gay, is also “the toughest, baddest guy on the show.” My Tribune colleague Jeremy Manier, who sent me the link from the Las Vegas Sun, also noted that Sen. Hillary Clinton’s favorite show, according to this Essence magazine piece, is “Grey’s Anatomy.” So where does Clinton come down on the whole George and Izzie relationship? No word on that yet.



I really apprecriate your friendship, or whatever reason i had for talking with you previously.... it has just become apparent to me that if you are a registered democrat and you do not vote for him in the primary we have nothing in common.



On the Mend..

After some complications during surgery, and an extended recovery, I am finally on the mend. I will get more into that later...

Sunday, January 06, 2008

Not Returning From Costa Rica

I had to cancel my trip to costa rica at the last minute. I was feeling horrible, with sinus pain, a cough, and a fever. I probably would have sucked it up, put on a ski mask and got on the plane. But the trip was way too active. Hiking, Biking, Trekking, Surfing, I dont know how i would have recovered. The main good reason not to go was that I wanted to be healthy enough to have my planned surgery for my deviated septum and clogged sinuses. It looks like its on for this wednesday.

Canceling was a huge disappointment. It was going to be the first trip for me and msmcdizzell. We had been planning this trip for months and it seems like everytime i saw her on the computer she was looking at another kooky rustic lodge in puerto Viejo. She has informed me that she is disappointed that i wont be able to see what a wonderful enjoyable travel partner she is -- so its doubly good i didnt go i because my attitude would have probably made me the worst travel partner ever.

As far as what type of other surgeries I am having they include Septoplasy, Frontal Sinusotomy, Ethmoidectomy, Maxillary Antrostomy.
Here are a couple quotes about the different surgeries from Sinus Relief Now by Jordan S Josephson.

Ethmoidectomy
The ethmoid sinuses are shaped like a beehive and composed of up to 22 smaller cavities or cells. When the anterior sinuses are obstructed the frontal and maxillary sinuses will not drain properly because these two sinuses drain into the anterior ethmoid. This area is known as the ostiomeatal complex.
Frontal Sinusotomy: This surgery opens up the frontal sinus in your forehead. This procedure is done through the nose in most instances. The passageway is difficult and technically challenging to open for most surgeons...
Maxillary Middle Meatal Anstronomy
... the natural ostim of the maxillary sinus is opened

I have learned about my possible problems Here is a little video from a doctor in singapore.I hope my doctor has better training than just watching these classical music themed videos.



Here is a nice full length video of Functional Endoscopic Sinus Surgery



Friday, January 04, 2008

Two Jokes about Ambition

Original Press Release from Clinton Campaign

Sen. Obama Rewrites History, Claims He Hasn’t Been Planning White House Run

12/3/2007 4:40:37 PM

“Senator Obama’s comment today is fundamentally at odds with what his teachers, family, classmates and staff have said about his plans to run for president. Senator Obama’s campaign rhetoric is getting in the way of his reality.” —Clinton campaign spokesman Phil Singer

Today in Iowa, Senator Barack Obama said: "I have not been planning to run for president for however number of years some of the other candidates have been planning for.”

However, the facts don't back up Sen. Obama’s claim......

In third grade, Sen. Obama wrote an essay titled 'I Want To Be a President':

Sen. Obama’s third grade teacher, Fermina Katarina Sinaga, "asked her class to write an essay titled 'My dream: What I want to be in the future.' Obama wrote 'I want to be a president,' she said." [The Los Angeles Times, 3/15/07]


In kindergarten, Sen. Obama wrote an essay titled 'I Want to Become President':

"Iis Darmawan, 63, Obama's kindergarten teacher, remembers him as an exceptionally tall and curly haired child who quickly picked up the local language and had sharp math skills. He wrote an essay titled, 'I Want To Become President,' the teacher said." [AP, 1/25/07]


Now Clinton has gotten a ribbing for that press release, and deservedly so, but I am most with the pushback.... So, I ask, which is funnier?

a)


b) Obama Makes a Clinton-Campaign Joke


Inside an old airplane hangar at what used to be Pease Airforce Base in Portsmouth, Barack Obama made his first New Hampshire appearance since his Iowa victory.

He recited his standard stump speech, but there was a confident, almost giddy, spirit in his voice and among the crowd of a few hundred supporters.

Obama did work a new joke into his speech. Referring to his new status as the Democratic front-runner, he said: "This feels good. It's just like I imagined it when I was talking to my Kindergarten teacher."