Sarah sez...

And no NOT Palin...SILVERMAN!!!!

Forgive me, my grandparents did NOT live in Florida.

Childhood's Memory...(rough draft)

As a kid I remember my parents taking my brother Cary and me to see "The Sting" at Bay City's downtown theater. We revelled in the cleverness. They were great fans of both Paul Newman and Robert Redford. Having a similar family background to Newman (Catholic mom, Jewish dad), my father had a special kinship, albeit from afar, with the actor. My dad's a man's man...an emotional, physically strong person who worked with his hands and ran a auto-repair business partnered first with his father and then my mother. To a kid he was larger than life and just like those men in the movies--street smart with a survivor's grin.

When I look upon this picture of Newman, vivid memories emerge of my family in the early '70s. We'd pack up on a Friday afternoon and drive three hours "up North" to Atlanta, Michigan, rendezvousing with my mom's family at the public campground by Lake Desheau...her twin, Uncle John, and his family, my grandparents and other cousins, aunts and uncles. The next morning we awoke in our camper, the striped canvass walls dewed in the night, to birdsong and croaking frogs; after squatting behind bushes on a private hillock, I'd eat breakfast of fried bacon, toast, eggs and hot cocoa and go out fishing in the rowboat. Lily pads decorated the surface of the swampy lake replete with tree stumps, turtles and mating dragonflies. If we were lucky we would catch a mess of panfish, blue gills and sunfish, and upon returning to shore, dressed them and mom fried them up for lunch. At night around the campfire stories and jokes entertained this mobile clan. After hotdogs and marshmallows, we'd relax by watching the stars and telling stories.

My family had a kinship to these actors of their time...Paul Newman, Robert Redford, Clint Eastwood, Burt Reynolds. My dad's bushy-bearded effusiveness was moderated by my mom's family's reserve. Dad would tear up with a ferocious passion, grabbing a loved one around the neck, pulling them close for a manly kiss on the cheek; whereas, Uncles John or Leo would quietly observe and cast a quiet grin adding their two cents with a confident deadpan. Mom, grandma and my aunts carried on their own knowing conversations simultaneously.

A kid, as one of the younger cousins, I grew up a tom-boy in the bosom of this Michigan family. Until this age I felt loved and embraced yet connected to the larger world of popular culture. Joanne Woodward looked like my mom and aunties. Why wouldn't we relate to these folks? Time seemed to stand still and this seven-year-old relished in the fact that the future lay ahead and my parents were young, and ready for it.

Often as a kid I'd have those frozen epihanies...realizing that this moment, while hoping it'd last forever, would one day pass. I couldn't imagine being a grownup and wanted the present to be forever.

My brother, cousins and I thrived in running free. We spent mornings following streams into the forest or building shelters with sticks while confident of our parents' nearness and a snack at the ready....

R.I.P., Paul

More than his performances in "Cool Hand Luke," "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" and "The Sting," I'll remember this talented actor for his contributions to society and repairing the world.

The Wrong Direction

According to an article in the New York Times, there is a settler movement in the territories (Judea & Samaria/West Bank) that Israel took over in the 1967 war which is growing more violent.

Instead of reaching out to their neighbors and forging friendships that will help them build a future together, some Israeli settlers are amping up the violence. The Israeli leadership and army should combat this as a matter of preserving democracy inside Israel and establishing future peace with Palestinian neighbors. Allowing vigilantism in territories that it occupies erodes Israel's standing in the community of nations. Gratifyingly, there have been arrests.

There is horrific hatred and violence on both sides of this relationship, but allowing vigilante brutality of other people is not the answer, unless it's mutual assured destruction. It comes down to individual choices and what people want for the future.

This is not an entirely new cycle. I remember reading in 1984 about Rabbi Levinger, an American who had settled near Hebron in the disputed territories; he was always armed and called for violence against Palestinians. It's not surprising that ideolgical descendants have morphed into this current extreme faction.

Meanwhile there are Israelis, that have lost loved ones to the violence, who have reached out to Palestinians who find themselves in a similar circumstance to form coalitions for a peaceful future. While difficult this is a saner choice. And most Israelis and Palestinians want peace.

Fortunately and not, individuals have a real impact in the world. We must decide what we want our individual and collective legacy to be. Personally, I am for democracy. I am for respecting others and myself. Despite our differences we are all related. Yes, we must protect our loved ones from the violent actions of others, but we must acknowledge the enemy resides within ourselves when we succumb to blind rage and lash out at innocents around us. I'm sure that psychologists have a better angle on this, and I remain hopeful.

Know Your Enemy

Attached is a link to Ahmadinejad's address to the United Nations and the response from Ha'aretz.

Superiority is Delusional

Some folks hold America apart as superior based on the Manifest Destiny myth which drove "white" settlers and missionaries west to conquer the land and its people. But this is a myth. Some folks' viewpoints narrowed in whom they thought should have rights. Others' losses were their gains; Native Americans were denied U.S. citizenship until the 1920s.

Still other people acknowledged the common threads that bind all American people together despite our specific heritages. That is the beauty of this land.

America is a blend of nations. Westward settlers of yore mixed and married with Native Americans, and it's important to acknowledge the positive cultural contributions of those that were here before us. We should be proud of those roots; we don't need to perpetuate the delusion of "white" superiority or an evangelical focus on Armageddon. Freethinking people of other or no faiths have an equal place in America.

Most recently big differences in the America's self-portraits were displayed at the two political conventions. One showed an amalgam of all America; the other resembled a frat party for the old "Westward, ho!" tale.

To move toward a more perfect union, our nation should embrace the common sense values of Native American teachings. These include balance; hunting is for sustenance, not to decimate an entire species. We might be stewards, but we are also students of many teachers in this world if only we open our eyes. In the end if there is a Creator, s/he is the Creator of all of us on the planet and beyond. Let's treat one another with respect and stop the missionary-as-superior act. Enough! We're all family.

Let Her Talk

Why does John McCain and his campaign sequester Sarah Palin from the press? How are we to know how she thinks on her feet and what her views are without the media being allowed access? How ironic that she herself is a former member of the media--now trying to pass as a potential head of state. Well then, let her talk. It's sexist. It's dictatorial. It's embarrassing. What are they afraid of? Maybe she's not ready to be a breath away from the presidency. Maybe she'll quote her favorite writer, Westbrook Pegler, again. Maybe she's not qualified for the job. Neither is McCain. In times like these one wonders what Wanda thinks.

Misogyny Revealed

Margaret Cho summed up Sarah Palin quite succinctly by saying,

"I am certainly not defending Palin – because make no mistake – she is the ultimate misogynist. She is a woman hater in the extreme. To force women to have children against their will, to deny abortion rights EVEN in cases of incest and rape is abominable. She is an insult to feminism, a sickening example what a woman will do to other women in order to please men and further her own career. Women do shit like that to other women to keep them down – to make their achievement seem more extraordinary – to keep women out of their way, so they can enjoy all the power and the men themselves, and that stuff makes them worse than sexist men. It is worse to be a traitor than a perpetrator. That she made rape victims pay for their own forensic exams shows that she believes that women somehow deserved to be raped – that it is our fault, just like unplanned pregnancy, just like being victimized by men – or women like her. She acts like all women are wearing a miniskirt and are asking for it. So fuck her."

Maybe Princess Sarah will change and become more tolerant of people's differences. There's always hope. Until there isn't.

With Friends Like These...

What's up with former President Bill Clinton singing Governor Sarah Palin's praises at his Global Initiative meeting?

"Why don't we like them and celebrate them and be happy for her elevation to the ticket? And just say that she was a good choice for him and we disagree with them?"

Is there any way either Clinton would have said that about the Obamas? It's as if he's proving Maureen Dowd correct on the whole Hillary-wants-Obama-to-lose-so-she-can-run-in-2012 strategy. He may be maneuvering to score points when he "receives" Palin on Thursday. I know, maybe he's super smart and wants to keep the enemy close. Or maybe he's embraced Barack Obama's positive message. Heck, Bill can't even bring himself to say Barack's name. Or he's drunk Poppy Bush's kool-aid-for-abandoned-boys-from-Hot-Springs-who-go-to-Yale-but-aren't-tapped-for-Skull-&-Bones. Or are they? Mwah hah hah hah (except that it's no joke).

Don't forget to breathe, Jill.

Oh--and here's Sarah Palin being prayed over by the witch hunter....

John Bircher for Veep?

Tell me it ain't so, Sarah. Evidently, there's a photo of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin and her desk on which sits a copy of the John Birch newsletter/magazine.

This campaign is getting more...whatever.

It's absurd and scary at the same time.

Iran's Idiot

“We are opposed to the idea that the people who live there [Israel] should be thrown into the sea or be burnt,” he said.

Well, isn't that big of him.

"Mr. Ahmadinejad made clear his opposition to Israel, saying that while “some say the idea of Greater Israel has expired, I say the idea of lesser Israel has expired too.” He also called the Holocaust a “fake” and accused Israel of perpetrating a holocaust on Palestinians."

So...it's not the Jews he has a problem with, just the Israeli government. He can't stand the idea of a Jewish nation and only wants Jews as a minority within a larger country. He denies the Jewish people's history and their treatment by other nations and expects the Israelis and others to just say "mmmmkay"?

This type of thinking doesn't help the peace process. If Ahmadinijad can't even stand the idea of an Israeli state side by side with a Palestinian one, then it's moot.

I'd like to hear McCain and Obama's take on this.

This is Not Hunting--It's Slaughter

Science and the Future

It's gratifying to hear SOMEONE, in this case Barack Obama, articulating the need for all Americans to have broadband access. That McCain doesn't see that as a definite need for our ability to go forward as a nation of educated citizens is mystifying. Then again, his whole campaign has been mystifying...and not in a positive way.

Alaska Women Reject Palin Rally

The counter-demonstration to the welcome home rally that Sarah Palin got in Anchorage last week was larger than the official one.

Over 1,500 protesters with homemade signs showed their support for Barack Obama according to this blogger.

My Name ... If Sarah & Todd Were My Parents

Bowl Antler Palin!

"Who knows, Bowl Antler Palin you just might be president one day!" Woo-hoo, I just knew it.

You, too, can have your very own Palin name. Click here.

Humorless Pope. Dangerous Man

So, now the Vatican is trying to get an Italian woman thrown in jail for five years--with a Fascist era law--because she dared to make a crude joke involving the current pope. Just who runs Italy? Who is holier than whom? Does the Pope think he's actually G-d? Where's his Christian forgiveness?

Monster?

So, the story is that this is something from a TV show.

Or something else.

Montauk...isn't there an old cold-war era lab out there?

Reminds me of a story about a woman who says she was kidnapped on the beach in Montauk in the 70s and taken to a lab where there was this monster-like alien thing. Maybe that was a TV show, too.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,398322,00.html This photo is an entirely different thing...looks photoshopped.

The truth is out there somewhere. And maybe some raccoon knows a thing or two.

In Memoriam

I think that Roger Cohen said it best in his column today.

John's McCAIN's New Low

I've come to believe that John McCain doesn't care at all about anyone but himself. He certainly doesn't care about children. The man has no honor. If I were Barack Obama I'd punch him in the face. Oh, and he's also sexist--what about the topless contest, Cindy?

Extremists Among Us

Sarah Palin's church is bent on bringing about the "end days." Whatever that is. It doesn't sound good to me.

Go Get 'Em, Barry!

Gloria!

Opinion
Palin: wrong woman, wrong message
Sarah Palin shares nothing but a chromosome with Hillary Clinton. She is Phyllis Schlafly, only younger.
By Gloria Steinem
September 4, 2008

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

This could be huge.

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

Neocons for the End of Days

Why are William Kristol, Joseph Lieberman and David Brooks pushing the McCain-Palin ticket? Evidently, they think they've got friends in extremist religious communities. What they don't know may hurt us all. Do they think that McCain and the Wasilla wanna-be will take on Iran and the whole bloody mess in the Middle East will disappear? How so? I don't think they represent the majority of Americans on this idea. As an American Jew I am miffed.

And by the way AIPAC isn't the only group representing American Jews with regards to Israel. They're just a behemoth that gets most of the attention. What about J Street?, Brit Tzedek v'Shalom and other Jewish American voices for peace? These groups want dialogue NOW and are for negotiating peace that ensures Israel's safety. Unfortunately, their work tends to get silenced or ignored by the media who go to the old familiar, AIPAC. Moderates and liberals should be upset that the process has been hijacked by the far right. To what end?

This is when I fondly recall my agnostic grandfather's annoyance regarding organized religion. Man's inhumanity toward his fellow man is often made in the name of religion. It's time for freethinking people everywhere to make their opinions known.

Extremists can appear in all religions. I don't want our kids led to war by some End Days evangelicals fulfilling a dark dream. Because in the end the extremist Christians' plan for America and the Jews is no better than Ahmadinejad's. Am I wrong?

Skeet Shooters for Obama

Here's the deal, Sarah Palin. Since Hillary is busy...doing who knows what, I volunteer to step up and do the right thing.

On behalf of the Independents and Democratic women everywhere, I challenge Sarah Palin to a skeet shoot. A what? our urban friends may ask. I'll take her on with my shotgun, and we'll keep score as to how many clay pigeons each of us blasts into smithereens.

Start quaking in your mukluks, Palin. When I was a twelve-year-old, I joined my dad and uncles in my grandparents' backyard in rural Michigan to blast away at the flying targets. I won the high praise of my country kin and that was with a hefty 12-gauge. Imagine what I'd do with a 20 gauge equipped with a poly choke like some folks. My point being, you're not the only 40-something able to get the job done.

And if that's not fun enough for you, I'll fly up to your neck of the woods and have a go at bagging a moose--it's gotta have antlers, though. I'm all for culling a herd if needed but not a mama moose. And to go one-step further, I'll bet my Bowie knife against yours that I can gut it faster. And if you don't want to take me on, I'm sure my cousin Debbie, who knows her way around high-powered rifles and elk, would oblige.

Or, if you prefer, let's have a fishing contest. I once skinned and gutted a mess of bluegill sunfish with my jackknife. And that was before I knew you should pierce the fish's brain so he doesn't have to live through the ordeal. We could get our rods, reels and worms and see who can get the biggest thing with fins.

So how about it? If you don't mind messing up your manicure, just have your people get back to my people so that we can start cutting your myth down to size.

You're not the only shooting mama, and this one's for OBAMA!

Where's Hillary?

Oh...c'mon, Hillary, it's time already. Are you really going to let Sarah Palin take over the momentum of this campaign? Believe me, if McCain's elected and you don't go all out for Obama, I'll remember.

Now, we're hearing from other Alaskans about their governor. Turns out Palin has the habit of firing anyone who gets in her way. John McCain better watch his back.

Speaking of McCain do we know how healthy he is? Yikes. Visions of a Taliban-like future right here at home. Take your vitamins, Johnny!

The RaNCid Show

Is it just me or are there like barely any people of color at the Republican Convention? Or maybe that phrase to them means brunette. Seriously, Carly Fiorina had to darken down to back up Meg Whitman or it would have been non-stop blondes.

Anyway, not that there's anything wrong with being rich. I just can't stand them whining the 'trickle down' mantra...that hasn't ever worked. Hey, they got to their positions somehow, so can you. But the government shouldn't help you. Nope.

And they're pretty upfront about if the rich folk's taxes go up, they'll just pass that burden along to everyone else...isn't that what they've done during the Bush and Reagan years anyway?

Hypocrisy. The GOP ruins the economy and the surplus and then gripes about paying their fair share. It's okay for Bush to leave this country in tatters but don't expect anyone to pick up the pieces. You're on your own, as Barack and others have said.

Well, as an American, I find that self-righteous attitude pretty lame. They back up their personal luck stories with tales of the valiant folk who've fought and died for our country. As if only Republicans have served their country.

My ancestors were here before the Revolutionary War and many served along the way. Being a tortured war hero doesn't mean you're automatically qualified to serve as president.

Between Mitt Romney, Huck Finn Huckabee and blood-blathering Rudi Giuliani, it's getting pretty moist in the xCel center. Now, he's denigrating Obama for having worked as a community organizer. There's the one black man clapping for Giuliani. Whatever.

Now that is a circus. Drunk caucasians are turning beet red under their straw hats guffawing for the nice mayor who has tried to milk 9/11 for all its worth. Do some people forget that the people who died in the towers were from many different nationalities. They were not all Republican sympathizers either.

"Change is not a destination, just like hope is not a strategy," he says. What do the Bushies know about improving the economy? They're just about pillaging.

Oh...and now he's complaining about the Dems not talking about Islamic terrorism. He's pushing his constituency for a Holy War. Idiocy. Now he's saying Democrats have given up on Iraq and, therefore, have given up on America. Can you believe it? It's all lies, of course, to keep those that don't think for themselves a reason to pick the GOP once again.

The Bushies went into the wrong country. It wasn't Iraq that attacked us...the dumbass...it was Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. Al Qaeda wasn't even in Iraq. Now they are. You bet.

Now...he's fanning the flames of the MidEast about an undivided Jerusalem. Great...Holy War. Hey, they've got to give the working people some alternatives to revolution; send them to die overseas and if they make it back and succeed some of them might become Republicans and exploit the next generation.

"In choosing Palin as his running mate, John McCain has chosen for the future," says Giuliani. A very scary future I'm sure. He touts her as having more executive experience than the entire Democratic ticket combined. As if...being a small town/state dictator is gonna fly in DC. Ooohh he zinged him. "Maybe they cling to religion there." followed by boos. Oh yeah, she clings. She had the temerity to tell the out-going mayor of Wasilla that now they'd "have a Christian mayor." How Christian of her....

Giuliani is good at propaganda. You have to give him that.

Oh, and now she's on the stage. Governor Palin is looking so...Republican right now. And the cutaway shot to the boy who's just made eye-contact with his future mother-in-law is priceless--looks like he's about to cry. Talk about being able to deliver. I hope her daughter actually likes him.

I wonder what Hillary Clinton is doing right now.

This Palin woman is slick. She's a true believer. She's a big threat and the Dems are going to need to make their case. Oh my...the audience is eating her up. There she goes telling the world her son's exact deployment date...why is that necessary to her? Oh...because it's 9/11. Duh.

Now she's addressing special needs families. "You will have a friend, an advocate in the White House." Great, but what specifically are she and McCain going to do to get insurance companies to pay for treatments, etc? (On their website 90 percent of the two paragraphs babble on about preventing autism. On the Obama site there are pages devoted to treating people and families affected by autism in a respectful manner...with real proposals for program support.)

She's definitely a politician. And just happens to mention hubby's 1/144th Yu'pik Inuit ancestry, but she says "eskimo" like most uneducated white folk. Oh, the grannies are eye-balling him. "He drives snowmobiles!" Oh look, her parents are adorable. We're screwed. Not. yet.

Oh my...she grew up with the people who "are always proud of America." I wonder why, then, her husband was/is a member of the secessionist movement in Alaska? Oh, and now the baby is on the littlest daughter's lap. Is she going to drop him while daddy's taking his bow?

"Being a small town mayor is like a community organizer except that you have actual responsibilities." A real zinger, Sarah. May I call you Sarah? Oh and a bunch of muscle men in suits are dragging a woman up the stairs...did she not clap enough for Princess Sarah? Oh my, she's gonna be a tough one to beat. Oh...and she's going to have a "servant's heart and carry (her)self in that spirit as vice president." Mmmmmmkay. Why the dis on community organizing though? Snarky.

She's slick...kinda like Willy. I like that she sold Alaska's former governor's corporate jet on eBay. (Actually, it didn't sell there but no matter.) She's lying about not wanting the bridge to nowhere. First she did want it and when the Feds cut off funding, that's when she said, "thanks but no thanks." Like there was a choice. Obfuscation.

Now she's talking about ravaging the North Slope of Alaska. And she's picking up the alternative fuels football. And she's really dissing Obama. Nasty. Nasty Republican wench.

Look at all the rich people "boo-ing" Obama for Palin. She's going after the swing states. Now she's saying, there are those who "use change to promote their careers, and then there are those...who use their careers to promote change."

Wow, she's quite the cheerleader. I wonder how she debates. She's got those glib lies on her sleeve. Boy, if I could speak that quickly, I'd want to speak truth to power, not obfuscate. She's got a smarmy tone to her voice. Now she's rah-rah-ing the fact that John McCain is the only one to have served in the armed forces. See...guns matter.

Man, that's a good--if annoying--speech. She's got a good, folksy delivery--kinda like Reagan but more likeable. Hey, we're not beaten yet.

McCain is smart in a wacky, sell-your-soul way. He picked a daughter-like shadow. She painted a real picture with her delivery. From now on it will be everyone's vaginas on their own! no recourse from someone putting in something that we don't want in there. "Oh...you got raped and the doctor says you shouldn't have any babies? well, too bad. You're f*$%d and dead." Yikes.

Oh, and smart move on her part taking the baby in her arms after her family joins her onstage. And now there's John McCain...he's seems pleasantly surprised and it's nice to see him getting the accolades after hearing his story...yet again.

Okay, so who's going to give him his Ritalin in the White House? Who will be his handler, someone from the Dobson camp?

Well...where does she/they get their money from? Lots of questions....

It's Not About Sexism...

Now that John McCain has jumped the shark by flying in a teenager from Alaska for a good ol' shot-gun wedding, I can't help but laugh at the RNC/GOPs calls of sexism in those asking legitimate questions of his running-mate, Governor Sarah Palin.

Palin is a real danger and I'm not joking. Well, maybe I can afford a smile at this point since they haven't been elected...yet.

I'm not gloating on a sure-thing at this point because I've been there before. I was surprised to learn that I was the only one in my third-grade-class to have voted for George McGovern in '72. And then Richard Nixon's resignation totally ruined my sleepover with my bestfriend when we couldn't find anything else to watch on TV that August night. I was amazed in '80 when the palsified Ronald Reagan seemed to take over the minds of many of my peers. Could they really believe in that phoniness?

With the Camp David accords of the Carter years and the improved economy during the Clinton administration, I was confident that Al Gore would and did win the election. When we Americans couldn't seem to redefeat George Bush and John Kerry was swift-boated out of the water, I was angry and more determined than ever.

(Someone/we should really look into election-rigging in this country.)

When Hillary Clinton announced her campaign, I was elated. Finally, the smarter half of the Clinton team would run. When Barack Obama and John Edwards entered the race, I was thrilled at the depth of the field. When Senator Clinton started going negative on Senator Obama, I started paying more attention. And I realized in my gut that she was not up to the task.

I'm pleased with the way the Democratic convention turned out. Hillary was strong in her speech, and especially in moving to suspend the roll call in nominating Obama. Michelle Obama was passionately real; Bill succinctly got to the point, Joe Biden sparkled and Barack Obama strongly made his case. In the spirit of unity the Democrats came together.

Now compare that with McCain/Palin. McCain's no spring chicken and--like his predecessor--has attentional issues. Compounding the issue is yet another Republican who can't pronounce "nuclear" and Palin is only beginning to glow with a zealot's potential.

In Alaska she tried banning books as mayor of Wasilla. As governor she tried having her sister's ex-husband fired from his job. She's against protecting polar bears and for aerial shooting of wolves. She's spoken in her church how the war in Iraq is God's will. She's against science and for teaching creationism in public schools.

And Miss Holier-than-Thou said this of the incumbent mayor when ousting him:

"Sarah comes in with all this ideological stuff, and I was like, ‘Whoa,’ ” said Mr. Stein, who lost the election. “But that got her elected: abortion, gun rights, term limits and the religious born-again thing. I’m not a churchgoing guy, and that was another issue: ‘We will have our first Christian mayor.’ ”

“I thought: ‘Holy cow, what’s happening here? Does that mean she thinks I’m Jewish or Islamic?’ ” recalled Mr. Stein, who was raised Lutheran, and later went to work as the administrator for the city of Sitka in southeast Alaska. “The point was that she was a born-again Christian.”

So...Miss Sarah wants to be the Church Lady of all of us? I think not. And by the way I think Senator Clinton has been too low key about Governor Palin. What's up? Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.