WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN

RECLUSIVE LEFTIST

Yet another insult to women: Obama chooses a sexist pastor for his Inaugural
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Rick Warren is a male supremacist. He’s a man who picks and chooses his Bible verses to buttress his preferred beliefs. Selecting him, of all people, to deliver the Inaugural invocation is yet another insult to the millions of women who voted for Obama, trusting — despite the sexism of the campaign — that Barack Obama would prove to be a champion of equality.

It’s not as if we have a shortage of Christian ministers in this country. Obama could have chosen a progressive, like Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, thus sending a powerful message of religious faith twinned with social justice.

I thought Bishop Jefferts Schori would have been a far better choice, too.

Thanks to Godless Liberal Homo for the link to the Reclusive Leftist post.

THE 'TEAM'

You ain't gonna hear this on the mainstream media outlets, and you sure as hell didn't hear this tonight on the PBS Newshour or Democratic Party pimpin' blogs. Godless Liberal Homo gives a resounding D to the foreign policy 'team' announced by the Dear Leader today

Obama's national security team is rather disturbing, to put it mildly. The two marquee nominations, Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State and Robert Gates as Secretary of Defense are absolutely execrable. Neither has sound judgement on foreign policy in general and especially on matters of war and peace. Both are dishonorable, rightist war mongers who should never hold any office in government. Their support of the Bush agenda of endless war is downright sickening. Read it all...

All I can say is contact your congressperson.

DUTCH ROOTS OF OBAMA?

As reported today in Telegraaf (Dutch)

'Ja wy kinne'
Nederlandse roots van Obama
AMSTERDAM - Zou de aankomend president van Amerika eerst nog Ierse roots hebben, een andere zoektocht naar de stamboom van Barack Obama leidt naar... Nederland

Well, it's already claimed the president-elect has Irish roots. But now are the Netherlands an Obamanation, too? His step-father was from Indonesia (the former Dutch East Indies) and Obbema is a Frisian word, but this has gotta be a hoax. There was a similar (Dutch) report last February in Volkskrant.

LOWER VOTER TURNOUT IN NORTHERN NEW ENGLAND

Brattleboro Reformer Glenn Adams Associated Press 11 November 2008

The nearly 327,000 Vermont voters who cast ballots accounted for 66 percent of the state's eligible voters. Of those, 29 percent -- also a record -- did so via early and absentee ballots, according to Secretary of State Deborah Markowitz. Last Tuesday's turnout percentage of eligible voters falls short of the 1992 figure, she said.

But this year's raw participation figure was higher than in the 2004 presidential election, when 314,220 people cast ballots.

While voter participation by absentee ballots was heavy if not a record in all three northern New England states, it did not translate into record turnouts.

"What was interesting to me was that our (town) clerks were reporting that they thought it was going to be much higher. In part, that was because they had such an overwhelming demand for early ballots. Election Day in Vermont began weeks before Nov. 4. So it wasn't as busy as it could've been," Markowitz said.

Find out how New Hampshire and Maine did here.

AT LEAST IT'S NOT IRRITATING POLYPS

Obama Win Causes Obsessive Supporters To Realize How Empty Their Lives Are

A SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT: 2008 IS JUST THE BEGINNING

DENNIS KUCINICH'S CLEVELAND

Dennis Kucinich gives the Observer's Paul Harris a tour of his Ohio district.

VERMONTERS DIVIDED OVER USE OF VOTING MACHIINES

BURLINGTON FREE PRESS

RUTLAND — Since the 2006 election when human error prompted a recount and reversal of Vermont’s election for auditor, 30 more Vermont communities now have vote-tabulating machines bringing the total to 103.

But some communities still favor tradition over technology and will continue to hand-count the results in Tuesday’s election.

OBAMA'S DUTCH BACKERS GET POLICIES WRONG

THE HEADLINE is from DutchNews.nl

Thursday 30 October 2008

Barack Obama might be most Dutch people’s favourite to be the next American president, but they don’t know much about his policies, according to a poll in Thursday’s De Pers newspaper.

In total, 21,000 people took part in the survey, which was organised by tv show EenVandaag. The poll shows the Dutch think the Democratic candidate is more progressive than he really is, De Pers says.

For example, 78% think Obama is opposed to the death penalty, 62% think he supports gay marriage and 56% think he supports gun control. In fact, the paper says, Obama supports the death penalty and the right of individuals to own guns, and is against gay marriage [although he opposes an outright ban].

Some 75% of those polled support Obama as president.

Dutch politicians are also surprised where Obama stands on social issues, the paper said, particularly when it comes to gay marriage. ´He is against it?’ said Gerard Schouw, a senator for the gay-friendly party D66. ‘Okay, he is against gay marriage but not against gays,’ Schouw told the paper.

A survey conducted by Radio Netherlands earlier this week showed that 85% of Dutch expatriates and emigrants living in the US want Obama to win the race for the White House.

Three members of the young Socialists, in New York to campaign for Obama, told De Pers they describe themselves as ‘social democrats’. ‘ Socialists are something dirty here,’ said Astrid Benschop (18). ‘Sometimes they even run away, they are so shocked.’

The American stereotype about the Dutch is that they are progressive and tolerant, but that's not true if you follow current affairs in the Netherlands. But what's telling in this news report is how Obamamania has hit NL in much the same way that it has in the USA. Note how some liberals (a D66 senator, for example) in NL don't really know much about Obama's opinons. (The Dutch media are as much to blame as the American.) I daresay a lot of American voters who claim to be "progressive" have joined the Obama cult and don't really know what Barack Obama stands for or don't want to know.

ONLY IN AMERICA

Only in America can someone who's arguably to the right of England's Tories be described as a "socialist."

Many thanks to Green Left Infoasis (always a good read I highly recommend) who got it from the Mahatma X Files.

PRETTY MUCH SUMS IT UP

ON LAST NIGHT'S OBAMA INFOMERCIAL

PROBLEMS WITH SEQUOIA OPTICAL SCANNERS: WHO DO YOU TRUST?

In Palm Beach County, Florida, there are problems in some of the county's high-speed optical-scan tabulation machines, made by Sequoia Voting Systems.

South Florida Sun-Sentinel

With just a few days until the Nov. 4 general election, questions about the ballot counting machines' accuracy leave Palm Beach County vulnerable to legal challenges and could erode voter confidence, voter advocates say. One other Florida county and several others across the nation have reported similar problems — with accuracy, phantom votes and other issues — involving Sequoia Voting Systems machines.

The same machines that failed an Oct. 1 test to see whether they could sort ballots will be used to process absentee ballots and to tally results of a recount if one is needed.

There have also been problems in New York

Sequoia Voting Systems and Election Systems & Software – have been told to correct scores of problems in their devices and related materials. Sequoia, for instance, has 104 discrepancies in its source code and ES&S has 174 discrepancies in its documentation, according to the state board. Previous progress reports indicated that the board wasn't satisfied with SysTec, the firm doing the testing, either.

"The problem the vendors are having is New York state has a higher standard than they're accustomed to," says Bo Lipari, executive director of New Yorkers for Verified Voting, a group that has pressed for rigorous vetting of electronic voting devices. New York is believed to be the only state to require that BMDs and scanners meet guidelines promulgated by the U.S. Election Assistance Commission in 2005. "What we're seeing is the vendors are not prepared to meet that standard." In fact, several vendors have pulled out of the competition in New York since 2006. One company that withdrew in July, Premier Election Solutions of Texas, cited the costs of complying with New York's testing regime as its reason for pulling out.

TACTICAL POLITICS AS PANDERING

Robert Weitzel has a post up in Counterpunch on why he'll vote for Ralph Nader. But I saw this bit --

In 1933, the Glass-Steagall Act was intended to prevent the kind of banking shenanigans that have helped to plunge the world into worst economic disaster since the Great Depression. But legislation written by Republicans Phil Gramm and James Leach and signed into law by Democratic President Bill Clinton repealed the Glass-Steagall Act in 1999.

It's Gramm's bill that has helped get us into the mess we're in. Then I realised that's the same James Leach who very publicly endorsed Obama and spoke on his behalf at the Democratic National Convention. Just this past weekend lying warmonger Colin Powell said he'll vote for Obama. And today's story has neo-con Rumsfeld subordinate Kenneth Adelman's endorsement. So much for being endorsed by the "right people." I think stinks.

AS THE CLOCK TICKS...

Updating from my post yesterday, AMERICAN NEWS PROJECT has this:

Today Jocelyn Voltaire will lose her home . . . unless bloggers and activists can intervene. On Wednesday, ANP reported on the economic plight of people in Hempstead, NY, the location of the third and final presidential debate between Barack Obama and John McCain. Jocelyn's story in particular inspired an outpouring of support on the web. Jocelyn fell victim to a predatory loan that ANP has traced back to Goldman Sachs, the Wall Street firm whose CEO, Lloyd Blankfein, made over $70 million last year. We will continue following this story.

IRAQ VETERANS AGAINST THE WAR ACTIVISM AT THE HOFSTRA DEBATE: STEPPED ON BY A HORSE

WATCH THIS VIDEO AND WEEP

Skepticism is indeed in order, especially about Barack Obama's "tap dancing" around the issues effecting lower income people. Have you noticed his spiel to attract the "middle class" voters in all of the debates? The Democratic Party has time and again betrayed the aspirations of ordinary people (forget Joe the plumber making $250,000) while pursuing an agenda favorable to Wall Street and U.S. imperial ambitions.

Watch this video and weep. (I had to unembed the video because it would start playing everytime you reloaded this page.)

(Thanks to Left I on the News for spotlighting this story.)

VERMONT VOTER SHENANIGANS

Vt. accused of underreporting overseas ballots

The Associated Press [Reported in the Burlington Free Press on 14 October 2008]

MONTPELIER — The state of Vermont is facing a federal lawsuit for allegedly failing to report the amount of absentee ballots sent to Vermonters overseas for the 2006 general election.

The U.S. Department of Justice complaint accuses Vermont Secretary of State Deborah Markowitz, a Democrat, of not reporting ballots sent to Vermonters serving in the military and overseas and alleges that the state will likely fail to comply with the provision for the upcoming election.

The federal government wants the state to implement procedures to record data about the number of ballots requested and cast and report it within 90 days after the general election.

The lawsuit requests that Judge William Sessions III make a decision before the Nov. 4 general election.

NADER ON BECOMING CIVICALLY ACTIVE

OVERCOME YOUR APATHY, APPEASE YOUR GUILT

2008 Presidential Candidate Ralph Nader discusses the steps to becoming civically active. From University of Vermont in Burlington, October 5, 2008.

NADER ON MSM PROGRAM TONIGHT

Ralph will be on CNN's Late Edition with Wolf Blizter at about 5 p.m. EST this afternoon.

And he'll be on Fox's The O'Reilly Factor with Bill O'Reilly [yeah, I know] at about 8:25 p.m. EST tonight.

Hope you get a chance to watch.

'THIS BILL DOES NOTHING FOR THE ADDIE POLKS OF THE WORLD.'

UPI

WASHINGTON, Oct. 3 (UPI) -- The plight of an Ohio woman who shot herself as deputies tried evict her from her foreclosed home was part of congressional debate on the $700 billion bailout.

Addie Polk, 90, was being treated at Akron General Medical Center after shooting herself Wednesday as deputies were at her door with eviction papers, U.S. Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, said Friday during floor debate on the rescue plan for U.S. financial markets. Fannie Mae (NYSE:FNM) foreclosed Polk's home after acquiring the mortgage in 2007.

Kucinich used Polk's circumstances as he spoke against the rescue plan that eventually passed the U.S. House of Representatives 263-171.

"This bill does nothing for the Addie Polks of the world," Kucinich said. "This bill fails to address the fact that millions of homeowners who are facing foreclosure."

The bill, which passed the Senate Wednesday, "will take care of Wall Street," Kucinich said, "but democracy is going down here."

Robert Dillion, a neighbor, climbed a ladder to enter a second-story window in Polk's home after he and the deputies heard the noise from inside, CNN reported.

In 2004, Polk took out a 30-year mortgage for $45,620 with a Countrywide Home Loan office in Ohio, CNN said. Polk had missed payments on her home during the next few years. In 2007 the Federal National Mortgage Association (OTCPK:FDRNP), or Fannie Mae, assumed the mortgage and later filed for foreclosure.

THE GUARDIAN
The bailout is not going to work.