This video from the USA is called The protesters marching at the RNC in St.Paul, 2008.
From Infoshop in the USA:
Contact: Ty Moore @ 612.760.1980
AT THIS MOMENT THOUSANDS OF HIGH SCHOOL AND COLLEGE STUDENTS FROM ACROSS THE TWIN CITIES TO WALKOUT TO PROTEST THE RNC
STUDENTS CONVERGE ON THE STATE CAPITOL TO DEMAND AN END TO THE WAR IN IRAQ ON THE 4th DAY OF THE REPUBLICAN NATIONAL CONVENTION
[TWIN CITIES – Thursday September 4th] Thousands of college and high school students are walking out of class on the final day of the RNC, to demand an end to the occupation in Iraq and money for schools, not war. Students are converging on the steps of the State Capitol for a rally and mock trial. Police have already detained volunteers handing out leaflets for the strike and high school administrators have warned student organizers about organizing a walkout.
Organizers anticipate thousands of students to walkout and convergence to the State Capitol for a rally featuring music and various speakers at 12 PM and will conclude with a peaceful march to Harriet Island to join demonstrators for the Peace Island Picnic and a symbolic mock trial of the war criminals. The trial itself will be audience-interactive and feature testimony from the real-life victims of the government’s actions, including members of Military Families Speak Out. The verdict will be decided at Harriet Island, where all in attendance will be the given the role of the jury to decide the fate of the war criminals, represented by giant puppets of Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Big Oil Bob.
The message of the student strike will be clear: The presence and policies of the RNC officials is unwelcome here. While the cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul roll out the red carpet for the convention, “we say no to business as usual while the people responsible for the killing of hundreds of thousands of ordinary Iraqis, Afghans, and U.S. soldiers come to our city to plot their next steps” said Desarae Walker, a sophomore at the University of Minnesota. “We are tired of paying for a war with no end in sight.”
Youth Against War and Racism, a Twin Cities-based high school anti-war and counter-military recruitment group. This will be the 4th walkout in the last 3 years organized by YAWR. Previous walkouts have drawn up to 2000 youth from the Twin Cities and surrounding suburbs in spirited, enthusiastic displays of civic engagement and opposition to the war in Iraq. Youth Against War and Racism’s most recent victories include winning restrictions on military recruiters in Minneapolis high schools in February 2008.
See also here.
RNC in Twin Cities: Eight protesters charged with terrorism under Patriot Act: here.
Political dissent as terrorism: “Minnesota Patriot Act” charges filed against RNC Eight: here.
About Sarah Palin‘s convention speech: here.
Republican Party Platform Poses Threat to Women’s Rights: here.
Sarah Palin’s Churches and The Third Wave: New Video Documentary: here.
Funniest Sarah Palin Memes: here.
Obama speech in Michigan: here.
Nader in Detroit: here.
An America that disdains Obama for his global support risks turning current anti-Bush feeling into something far worse: here.
Related articles
- Sarah Palin On Gun Control Debate: Politicians Shouldn’t Ask How ‘To Limit The Freedom Of The People’ (huffingtonpost.com)
- Fmr. McCain Strategist Blasts Sarah Palin’s ‘Asininity’ on Obamacare (themilitantnegro.com)
- Palin Hurls Insults Over Government Employee With Side Gig Promoting Race War (huffingtonpost.com)
- Palin Reserves Space in Tampa near RNC Convention Site (sarahpalinblog.typepad.com)
- Sarah Palin still waiting for invite to Tampa convention (tampabay.com)
- Tampa strip clubs getting webcams, ‘Nailin’ Paylin’ Sarah Palin lookalike stripper for RNC (miamiherald.typepad.com)
Dear Kitty. Some blog 
1.
The Real Dr. NO = McCain
Posted by: “bigraccoon” bigraccoon@earthlink.net
Fri Sep 5, 2008 5:37 am (PDT)
The Real Dr. NO = McCain
Senator McCain has voted “NO” to all of these issues when they came up for vote before the senate. Senator Obama voted “YES”. Information is from the US Senate website. http://www.senate.gov/
Most of these are amendments, which means there is no “pork/earmarks” attached.
1. A bill to provide collective bargaining rights for public safety officers employed by States or their political subdivisions.
2. To protect service members and veterans from means testing in bankruptcy, to disallow certain claims by lenders charging usurious interest rates to service members, and to allow service members to exempt property based on the law of the State of their premilitary residence.
3. To provide a homestead floor for the elderly.
4. To require enhanced disclosure to consumers regarding the consequences of making only minimum required payments in the repayment of credit card debt, and for other purposes.
5. To exempt debtors whose financial problems were caused by serious medical problems from means testing.
6. To provide protection for medical debt homeowners.
7. To preserve existing bankruptcy protections for individuals experiencing economic distress as caregivers to ill or disabled family members.
8. To exempt debtors from means testing if their financial problems were caused by identity theft
9. To discourage predatory lending practices.
10. To protect employees and retirees from corporate practices that deprive them of their earnings and retirement savings when a business files for bankruptcy.
11. To amend the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 to provide for an increase in the Federal minimum wage
12. To clarify that the means test does not apply to debtors below median income.
13. To exempt debtors whose financial problems were caused by failure to receive alimony or child support, or both, from means testing.
14. To limit claims in bankruptcy by certain unsecured creditors.
15. To restore funding for education programs that are cut and reduce debt by closing corporate tax loopholes.
16. To ensure that 75-year solvency has been restored to Social Security before Congress considers new deficit-financed legislation that would increase mandatory spending or cut taxes.
17. To express the sense of the Senate that Congress should reject any Social Security plan that requires deep benefit cuts or a massive increase in debt.
18. To protect the American people from terrorist attacks by providing the necessary resources to our firefighters, police, EMS workers and other first-responders by restoring $1,626 billion in cuts to first-responder programs.
19. To increase veterans medical care by $2.8 billion in 2006.
20. To create a reserve fund for the establishment of a Bipartisan Medicaid Commission to consider and recommend appropriate reforms to the Medicaid program, and to strike Medicaid cuts to protect states and vulnerable populations
21. To repeal the tax subsidy for certain domestic companies which move manufacturing operations and American jobs offshore.
22. To protect the American people from terrorist attacks by restoring $565 million in cuts to vital first-responder programs in the Department of Homeland Security, including the State Homeland Security Grant program, by providing $150 million for port security grants and by providing $140 million for 1,000 new border patrol agents
23. To expand access to preventive health care services that reduce unintended pregnancy (including teen pregnancy), reduce the number of abortions, and improve access to women’s health care.
24. To promote innovation and U.S. competitiveness by expressing the sense of the Senate urging the Senate Committee on Appropriations to make efforts to fund the Advanced Technology Program, which supports industry-led research and development of cutting-edge technologies with broad commercial potential and societal benefits.
25. To increase funding for border security
26. To eliminate methyl tertiary butyl ether from the United States fuel supply, to increase production and use of renewable fuel, and to increase the Nation’s energy independence
27. To improve the energy security of the United States and reduce United States dependence on foreign oil imports by 40 percent by 2025.
28. To provide additional funding for medical services provided by the Veterans Health Administration
29. To fund urgent priorities for our Nation’s firefighters, law enforcement personnel, emergency medical personnel, and all Americans by reducing the tax breaks for individuals with annual incomes in excess of $1 million.
30. To provide an additional $500,000,000 for each of fiscal years 2006 through 2010, to be used for readjustment counseling, related mental health services, and treatment and rehabilitative services for veterans with mental illness, post-traumatic stress disorder, or substance use disorder.
31. To improve the Federal Trade Commission’s ability to protect consumers from price-gouging during energy emergencies, and for other purposes.
32. To provide additional funding for the Drug-Free Schools and Communities Act of 1986 and to provide activities for latchkey children.
2.
The Anti-Obama Hate-Fest
Posted by: “Jack” miscStonecutter@earthlink.net bongo_fury2004
Fri Sep 5, 2008 4:05 pm (PDT)
The Anti-Obama Hate-Fest
by Robert Parry
Consortium News
Friday, September 5, 2008
http://www.Consortiumnews.com
The Republican Party, which has defined modern-day negative politics, was back at it again, bashing Barack Obama and the news media in an ugly display that rivaled the old days of Nixon-Agnew – or George W. Bush’s last convention where GOP operatives passed out “Purple Heart Band-Aids” to mock John Kerry’s war wounds.
After a slow start because of Hurricane Gustav, the convention in St. Paul, Minnesota, has turned into an anti-Obama hate-fest with a nearly all-white gathering laughing at and mocking the nation’s first African-American presidential nominee of a major party.
However, beyond the pulsating contempt visible on the faces of the GOP delegates, many of the nasty attacks on Obama – as well as the effusive praise for the Republican ticket – were blatantly false, as if testing the depths of American gullibility and bigotry.
In speech after speech, Republicans didn’t so much as tell the Big Lie as they deployed Wholesale Lies.
The Associated Press, which mostly had been recycling the Republican spin about the supposedly “maverick” ticket of John McCain and Sarah Palin, was so struck by the litany of distortions that the AP produced a special fact-checking article describing how Republicans had “stretched the truth.”
For instance, Palin said about Obama, “it’s easy to forget that this is a man who has authored two memoirs but not a single major law or reform – not even in the state senate.”
However, as the AP noted, Obama “worked with Republicans to pass legislation that expanded efforts to intercept illegal shipments of weapons of mass destruction and to help destroy conventional weapons stockpiles. The legislation became law last year.”
Plus, the AP reported, “In Illinois, he was the leader on two big, contentious measures in Illinois: studying racial profiling by police and requiring recordings of interrogations in potential death penalty cases. He also successfully co-sponsored major ethics reform legislation.”
The AP’s fact-checking article noted, too, that former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee’s slap at Democratic vice presidential nominee Joe Biden – that Palin “got more votes running for mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, than Joe Biden got running for president of the United States” – was a “whopper.”
The AP wrote that “Palin got 616 votes in the 1996 mayor’s election, and got 909 in her 1999 re-election race, for a total of 1,525. Biden dropped out of the race after the Iowa caucuses, but he still got 76,165 votes in 23 states and the District of Columbia where he was on the ballot during the 2008 presidential primaries.”
Parallel Reality
The Republican National Convention also acted as if the Republicans had not controlled the White House for the past eight years and the Congress for most of that time.
“We need change, all right,” declared former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, “change from a liberal Washington to a conservative Washington! We have a prescription for every American who wants change in Washington – throw out the big-government liberals, and elect John McCain and Sarah Palin.”
Beyond this parallel universe of who runs Washington, there was fanciful puffery about the GOP “reformer” ticket – dubbed “maverick squared” – that doesn’t square with reality at all.
For instance, the AP cited Palin’s claim that “I have protected the taxpayers by vetoing wasteful spending … and championed reform to end the abuses of earmark spending by Congress. I told the Congress ‘thanks but no thanks’ for that Bridge to Nowhere.”
The reality, of course, was much different.
As the AP noted. Palin, as mayor of the tiny town of Wasilla, hired a lobbyist and made annual treks to Washington seeking earmarked spending that totaled $27 million, and then as Alaska’s governor for less than two years, she sought nearly $750 million in special federal spending, “by far the largest per-capita request in the nation.”
And as for that $398 million bridge from Ketchikan to an island with 50 residents, the truth is that Palin enthusiastically supported the project before she reluctantly opposed it, rejecting the “Bridge to Nowhere” only after it had become politically indefensible.
The Los Angeles Times discovered that Sen. McCain had specifically cited several of Palin’s earmarks on his annual list of wasteful pork-barrel spending.
In 2001, for instance, McCain’s list included a $500,000 earmark for a public transportation project in Wasilla, and in 2002, he criticized $1 million targeted for an emergency communications center that Palin sought but local law enforcement said was redundant and a source of confusion.
Remaking Palin
Now, however, Palin has been transformed into a maverick reformer. McCain’s campaign even cites her experience as an abuser of the earmark process as part of the reason she supposedly understands why it must be scrapped.
McCain spokesman Taylor Griffin said Palin’s successes in getting earmarked funds “was one of the formative experiences that led her toward the reform-oriented stance that she has taken as her career has progressed.”
Nevertheless, Palin wrote in a newspaper column just this year that “the federal budget, in its various manifestations, is incredibly important to us, and congressional earmarks are one aspect of this relationship.” [For more details, see Los Angeles Times, Sept. 3, 2008 http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-earmarks3-2008sep03,0,2482434.story ]
Beyond the GOP’s reality-challenged speeches, there was the startling image of a nearly all-white convention – where only 36 of the 2,380 delegates were black, the smallest number in at least 40 years – rollicking in ridicule and bristling with animosity toward Obama, an African-American.
With their loud chants of “drill, baby, drill” regarding energy policy and boisterous shouts of “USA, USA” about “victory” in Iraq, there was a sense that St. Paul was hosting a convention of American Falangists, rather than that of a modern national party.
The whiff of authoritarianism extended to outside where demonstrators and journalists were swept off the streets in indiscriminate arrests.
What’s less clear about the GOP convention is whether the Republicans are on to something, that perhaps the United States has crossed over into a post-rational society that cares little about facts and reality or serious policy ideas and respectful debate, but rather is a nation moved by anger and ridicule, fear and nationalism.
Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories in the 1980s for the Associated Press and Newsweek. His latest book, Neck Deep: The Disastrous Presidency of George W. Bush, was written with two of his sons, Sam and Nat, and can be ordered at http://www.neckdeepbook.com. His two previous books, Secrecy & Privilege: The Rise of the Bush Dynasty from Watergate to Iraq and Lost History: Contras, Cocaine, the Press & ‘Project Truth’ are also available there.
3.
Palin Pick Is GOP Hypocrisy at its Best
Posted by: “lilgeorgiehas2go” lilgeorgiehas2go@yahoo.com lilgeorgiehas2go
Fri Sep 5, 2008 7:21 pm (PDT)
Palin Pick Is GOP Hypocrisy at its Best
By Laura Flanders, AlterNet.
Posted September 5, 2008.
Will the media test her on substance or let her play “Ms. Congeniality?” It is up to the public to see through the fact-free diet we’re being fed.
In selecting Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate, John McCain is dusting off an old GOP tool: the estrogen guard. Slap a friendly, female face on a hard core-conservative political platform, and pray that the pundits will only take pot-shots and talk about gender. It worked for George W. Bush and it just may work for Palin.
Watching Palin address the RNC from here in St. Paul, Wednesday, I could have sworn I heard Katherine Harris cheer. Remember Harris, Florida’s Secretary of State in 2001, and co-chair of her state’s Bush/Cheney Committee? No one did more to snag the White House for her man — and no one was laughed and scoffed at more heartily by the media. While the press poo-poo’ed her make-up (“she seems to have applied her makeup with a trowel” wrote the Washington Post) and introduced her to the public as caricature (“Cruella de Ville”), as Florida’s top election-cop, Harris purged enough voter rolls, understaffed enough voting places and ill-equipped the voting system sufficiently to guarantee election day chaos. Parodied in the press, she rose to stardom in the GOP. Come Inauguration Day 2001, Florida Republicans threw an enormous bash for the woman they dubbed “our Joan of Arc.” Soon after she was elected to Congress.
So it is with Palin. While her record stinks, so does the media coverage. In place of serious discussion of her policies on the environment, on human rights, on taxes, free speech and governance, we’ve had five days of “Veep Pregnant Teen Shock” and there’s more than enough misogyny in the mix to give the McCain camp a stick to beat any truly investigative members of press-corps with.
Desperate for female votes (a group the Democrats have taken for granted for years,) John McCain clearly hopes his Palin pick will burnish his appeal among middle-of-the-road women. It’s a long-shot. Palin believes abortion is a crime even in the case of rape and incest (that was even too draconian for the voters of South Dakota). She supports teaching creationism in schools as strongly as, as Governor, she opposed environmental protections for the Holy planet.
The hypocrisy is rank. Bristol, Palin’s daughter “made the decision on her own to keep the baby,” McCain’s aides told the press. That’s not a choice pregnant teens would have under the proposed administration of her mother and McCain. As for her claims to oppose corruption and pork – according to the Alaska press, she supported that costly bridge to “nowhere” for years, before finally canceling it as Governor. And experience? Again, according to Alaskan papers, during Palin’s tenure as Mayor, most of the actual work of running small Wasilla was turned over to an administrator after Palin’s precipitous firings gave rise to a recall campaign. Mayor Palin even tried to fire City
Librarian after she demurred at a proposal to censor the library’s collection.
Will the media see the substance or only the “Ms. Congeniality.” We’ll find out soon enough. But it’s likely she’ll get plenty of jabs in before then if her first performance on the national stage is anything to go by. Palin can dig at Obama more effectively than her running mate. (Does anyone not hear the racism in her allusion to John McCain’s as the “sort of name you find on small town war memorials.”) And if you’re counting on her getting a grilling on the campaign trail, don’t hold your breath. Reading from the Karen Hughes/Karl Rove campaign playbook, they McCain team will keep Palin from answering questions (as they did a young Texas Governor called Bush.)
They’re already de-legitimating the questioners, and there will simply be no access for anyone but “Fox News” pals and those who act like them.
So will the public that’s been fed a fact-free diet of John McCain the “maverick,” see through Palin, the fresh-faced feminist? Don’t bet on it.
http://www.alternet.org/election08/97644/palin_pick_is_gop_hypocrisy_at_its_best/
4.
Tool of a Tyrant: Bush Can Now Put & Keep Citizens in Jail Without T
Posted by: “frankofbos” FrankOfBos@yahoo.com frankofbos
Sat Sep 6, 2008 1:01 am (PDT)
Tool of a Tyrant: Bush Can Now Put & Keep Citizens in Jail Without Trial
(Bush History, 9/6)
Bush gets the GOP Congress to give him a tool any tyrant would love;
the power to throw US citizens in jail & keep them there, without trial
or a hearing. Also, selling the public war like McDonald’s sells
hamburgers, & we’re told of a “mountain of evidence” for Saddam’s WMDs!
Also, the infamous uncomfortably weird OB/GYN Bushism
http://poorgeorgesalmanac.com/?p=391
Today’s categories: Bushisms, Constitutional Abuse, Iraq, Proven Wrong
LikeLike
RNC
NATIONAL GUARD DEPLOYED AGAINST PROTERERS
As the protests grew, scores of National Guard troops in riot gear and gas masks fanned out around the Xcel Energy Center, where the convention is being held, and set up a blockade about three blocks away. Police helicopters buzzed over St. Paul throughout the day. Humvees painted in fatigue green ferried water to police officers working in the 88-degree heat, and city dump trucks were used to block traffic on some streets.
IVAW, FATHER OF FALLEN MARINE LEAD PROTEST
Leading the throng of up to 10,000 marchers was Carlos Arredondo of Boston. He pushed a flag-draped coffin bearing the uniform, dog tags, and Purple Heart of his 20-year-old son Alexander, a Marine lance corporal who was killed in Iraq in 2004. . . . Along with the Arredondos, dozens of Iraq veterans marched at the front of the crowd.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2008/09/02/boston_father_of_fallen_marine_leads_protest/
UP TO 50K MARCHERS DEFY INTIMIDATION
The crowd of at least 20,000 — march organizers estimated the crowd at as many as 50,000 — was made up of antiwar activists, veterans and military families, students, immigrant rights supporters, unionists, welfare rights activists and many more. . . . The turnout was in defiance of heavy-handed repression and intimidation by police, who carried out eight or more preemptive raids and roughly 100 arrests after filling the media in the days leading up to the protest with warnings about “violence and chaos” that “anarchist” protesters planned to unleash.
http://socialistworker.org/2008/09/02/marching-on-the-rnc
PROTESTERS PERSEVERE
Dozens were pepper-sprayed and tear-gassed. . . . “Nobody was trying to cause destruction or violence. . . . . The idea was to just block the streets. We were just trying to disrupt the delegation, and I think we succeeded.”
http://www.startribune.com/politics/27736044.html?elr=KArksi8cyaiUeyD8_o8cyaiUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUU
PROTESTERS CHARGED WITH “TERRORISM”
If convicted, the suspects could each face up to five years in jail, a $10,000 fine, or both.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-terror4-2008sep04,0,7911659.story
POLICE REPRESS CONVENTION PROTESTS
[A]t a press conference the following day, march coordinator Jess Sundin was quick to point out that any rage displayed by activists in the streets is completely justified and pales in comparison to the state violence committed on a daily basis by U.S. forces at home and abroad.
http://www.workers.org/2008/us/rnc_0911/
ARRESTS MARK LAST ANTI-WAR MARCH OF CONVENTION
Percussion grenades, tear gas and nearly 400 arrests marked the final anti-war march during the Republican National Convention.
http://wcco.com/local/protests.arrests.rnc.2.810694.html
MOB ATTACKS PROTESTERS DURING MCCAIN SPEECH
One of the livelier moments of the evening came when Mr. McCain was interrupted by several antiwar protestors who had infiltrated the hall. Their signs were quickly ripped from their hands, and they were carried out of the arena as the crowd shouted, “U.S.A.! U.S.A.!”
LOCKDOWN IN ST. PAUL
The real conspiracy was a plot by 30 federal, state and local law enforcement agencies to repress dissent and protests under the rubric of “national security” and the “war on terror”. . . . A member of Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) who witnessed some of the violent police attacks told reporters that police were “treating [U.S.] civilians like you would Iraqis.”
http://socialistworker.org/2008/09/05/lockdown-in-st-paul
MILITARY RESISTANCE AT THE RNC
“It’s amazing to me,” he observed, “how little soldiers know about their government and politics in their own country, not to mention the people they’re going to blow up.”
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200809u/veterans-against-war
WHY WE WERE FALSELY ARRESTED
Here on the streets of St. Paul, the press is free to report on the official proceedings of the RNC, but not to report on the police violence and mass arrests directed at those who have come to petition their government, to protest.
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20080903_why_we_were_falsely_arrested/
RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE DEFIES BOTH PARTIES
Many contemporary musical acts have lined up behind the Democratic candidate for president, Senator Barack Obama, while the McCain campaign has put some country music firepower behind it, but Rage Against the Machine and its legions regard donkeys and elephants as the same species. . . . “[Police at the RN] blocked us from even approaching the stage, saying they’d arrest us if we played. So we went into the middle of the crowd and began to improvise.”
WIDESPREAD REPRESSION ECHOES RNC 04
[M]ore than 800 people were arrested in St. Paul and Minneapolis over the last week, and dozens of others were detained, handcuffed, photographed and searched without arrest. . . . [M]any people have said they were stopped on flimsy pretexts, or in some cases arrested on peaceful marches that were blocked by heavily armored police officers who used pepper spray and flash bangs.
LikeLike
Urgent!
Demand the phony charges against the RNC protesters be dropped immediately!
Fire Assistant Police Chief Matt Bostrom and Ramsey County Sherriff Bob Fletcher!
We need a people’s investigation of RNC-St. Paul Police criminal activity during the RNC!
Sign the online petition to send a message to the Minneapolis-St. Paul Police, Bush, Cheney, McCain, RNC, the Minneapolis and St. Paul City Councils, the Minnesota Gov., Congressional Leaders and the media to drop the phony charges against RNC protesters IMMEDIATELY! Demand a Peoples’ Investigation into RNC-police criminal activity during the RNC!! http://www.troopsoutnow.org/rnc08protestrights.shtml
For updates from the streets of Minneapolis-St. Paul, see http://dncrnc.wordpress.com.
LikeLike
Posted by: “Compañero” companyero@bellsouth.net chocoano05
Sat Sep 6, 2008 3:14 pm (PDT)
Scholars question Palin credentials
David Mark, Fred Barbash
Sat Aug 30, 12:24 PM ET
John McCain was aiming to make history with his pick of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, and historians say he succeeded.
Presidential scholars say she appears to be the least experienced, least credentialed person to join a major-party ticket in the modern era.
So unconventional was McCain’s choice that it left students of the presidency literally “stunned,” in the words of Joel Goldstein, a St. Louis University law professor and scholar of the vice presidency. “Being governor of a small state for less than two years is not consistent with the normal criteria for determining who’s of presidential caliber,” said Goldstein.
“I think she is the most inexperienced person on a major-party ticket in modern history,” said presidential historian Matthew Dallek.
That includes Spiro T. Agnew, Richard Nixon’s first vice president, who was governor of a medium-sized state, Maryland, for two years, and before that, executive of suburban Baltimore County, the expansive jurisdiction that borders and exceeds in population the city of Baltimore.
It also includes George H.W. Bush’s vice president, Indiana Sen. Dan Quayle, who had served in the House and Senate for 12 years before taking office. And it also includes New York Rep. Geraldine Ferraro, who served three terms in the House before Walter Mondale chose her in 1984 as the first female candidate on a major-party ticket.
“It would be one thing if she had only been governor for a year and a half, but prior to that she had not had major experience in public life,” Dallek said of Palin. “The fact that he would have to go to somebody who is clearly unqualified to be president makes Obama look like an elder statesman.”
And Alaska is a much smaller state than Illinois, the political base of Barack Obama, whom Republicans have repeatedly criticized for being inexperienced, having served nearly four years in the U.S. Senate after eight in the Illinois state Senate.
“Not to belittle Alaska, but it’s different than the basket of issues you deal with in big, dynamic states,” Dallek said.
Palin has no experience in national office. Before becoming governor in December 2006, she served as a council member and mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, which had a population of slightly more than 5,000 during her time in office.
Brad Blakeman, who ran the 1988 Republican convention for GOP nominee George H.W. Bush, turned the experience question on its head, suggesting that accomplishments in office mean more than time accrued.
“Here’s a governor who may have served two years, but her accomplishments are worth eight,” said Blakeman, citing Palin’s work as governor on ethics reform and an Alaska oil pipeline. “She’s got as much experience for being vice president as Barack does to be president.”
But other students of presidential history said that in choosing Palin as his running mate, McCain has reached back to a time when few actually seriously contended that the vice president should be demonstrably prepared to assume the presidency from Day One.
If elected vice president, Palin would appear to have the least amount of experience in federal office or as a governor since John W. Kern, Democrat William Jennings Bryan’s 1908 running mate, who had served for four years in the Indiana state Senate and then four more as city solicitor of Indianapolis. The Democratic ticket lost to Republican standard-bearer William Howard Taft and running mate James S. Sherman by an Electoral College spread of 321-162.
More conventionally in modern times, running mates could boast decades of experience in Washington, from ballot box winners like Dick Cheney, Al Gore, the elder Bush and Mondale to also-rans such as Jack Kemp, Lloyd Bentsen and Joseph I. Lieberman.
These super-credentialed candidates were sometimes chosen, like Joe Biden, to shore up the r€ ¦ésum€ ¦és of candidates with little or no time in Washington, such as Jimmy Carter (Mondale), Bill Clinton (Gore) and Michael Dukakis (Bentsen).
Palin, on the other hand, is a total “wild card,” said Stanford historian David Kennedy.
“If she had been around for two terms as governor – or been a senator – it would have been an incredible choice,” said historian Doris Kearns Goodwin. “Who else could he have found who appealed to the conservative base … and as someone who was a reformer?”
That’s not to say Palin will be a dud on the campaign trail.
But out-of-the-box picks in recent years have not usually worked out too well for the top of the ticket. Consider independent candidate Ross Perot’s 1992 running mate, former Navy Adm. James Stockdale, who famously asked at the vice presidential debate with Gore and Quayle, “Who am I? Why am I here?”
“He took the wind out of Perot’s sails, and Perot could have done even better” than the 19 percent he garnered, Dallek said.
A bad running mate pick can even put a successful presidential ticket in question. The 1988 Bush-Quayle victory over Dukakis and Bentsen came in spite of Quayle’s frequent campaign trail gaffes and questions about his military service in the Vietnam era and other controversies. Bush handlers largely relegated Quayle to small-town audiences that would attract little media attention.
“Quayle – it threw off the momentum for some weeks,” said Goodwin. “One has to hope for McCain’s sake that [Palin] has been fully vetted.”
“The first thing that hits me,” said Stephen Hess of the Brookings Institution, “is that it suggests that John McCain is a gambler. This is a high-roller decision.”
“The next thing you have to ask yourself: Is it worrisome to have a gambler in the Oval Office? That’s an important question,” he said, “perhaps more important than anything else today.”
UPDATE: After reading this article, the McCain campaign issued the following statement: “The authors quote four scholars attacking Gov. Palin’s fitness for the office of vice president. Among them, David Kennedy is a maxed-out Obama donor, Joel Goldstein is also an Obama donor, and Doris Kearns Goodwin has donated exclusively to Democrats this cycle. Finally, Matthew Dallek is a former speech writer for Dick Gephardt. This is not a story about scholars questioning Gov. Palin’s credentials so much as partisan Democrats who would find a reason to disqualify or discount any nominee put forward by Sen. McCain.”
~ Don’t believe anything until it has been officially denied by the White House ~
LikeLike
Posted by: “K.C. Pep” caseypep@yahoo.com caseypep
Sun Sep 7, 2008 4:16 am (PDT)
Books Mayor Sarah Palin tried to remove from Wasilla library
This information is taken from the official minutes of the Wasilla Library Board.
When the librarian refused to ban the books, Palin tried to get her fired.
******
A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
Annie on My Mind by Nancy Garden
As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
Blubber by Judy Blume
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson
Canterbury Tales by Chaucer
Carrie by Stephen King
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
Christine by Stephen King
Confessions by Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Cujo by Stephen King
Curses, Hexes, and Spells by Daniel Cohen
Daddy’s Roommate by Michael Willhoite
Day No Pigs Would Die by Robert Peck
Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller
Decameron by Boccaccio
East of Eden by John Steinbeck
Fallen Angels by Walter Myers
Fanny Hill (Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure) by John Cleland
Flowers For Algernon by Daniel Keyes
Forever by Judy Blume
Grendel by John Champlin Gardner
Halloween ABC by Eve Merriam
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Prizoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J.K. Rowling
Have to Go by Robert Munsch
Heather Has Two Mommies by Leslea Newman
How to Eat Fried Worms by Thomas Rockwell
Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
Impressions edited by Jack Booth
In the Night Kitchen by Maurice Sendak
It’s Okay if You Don’t Love Me by Norma Klein
James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl
Lady Chatterley’s Lover by D.H. Lawrence
Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman
Little Red Riding Hood by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
Love is One of the Choices by Norma Klein
Lysistrata by Aristophanes
More Scary Stories in the Dark by Alvin Schwartz
My Brother Sam Is Dead by James Lincoln Collier and Christopher Collier
My House by Nikki Giovanni
My Friend Flicka by Mary O’Hara
Night Chills by Dean Koontz
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
On My Honor by Marion Dane Bauer
One Day in The Life of Ivan Denisovich by Alexander Solzhenitsyn
One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Ordinary People by Judith Guest
Our Bodies, Ourselves by Boston Women’s Health Collective
Prince of Tides by Pat Conroy
Revolting Rhymes by Roald Dahl
Scary Stories 3: More Tales to Chill Your Bones by Alvin Schwartz
Scary Stories in the Dark by Alvin Schwartz
Separate Peace by John Knowles
Silas Marner by George Eliot
Slaughterhouse- Five by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
The Bastard by John Jakes
The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier
The Color Purple by Alice Walker
The Devil’s Alternative by Frederick Forsyth
The Figure in the Shadows by John Bellairs
The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
The Great Gilly Hopkins by Katherine Paterson
The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
The Headless Cupid by Zilpha Snyder
The Learning Tree by Gordon Parks
The Living Bible by William C. Bower
The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare
The New Teenage Body Book by Kathy McCoy and Charles Wibbelsman
The Pigman by Paul Zindel
The Seduction of Peter S. by Lawrence Sanders
The Shining by Stephen King
The Witches by Roald Dahl
The Witches of Worm by Zilpha Snyder
Then Again, Maybe I Won’t by Judy Blume
To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee
Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare
Webster’s Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary by the Merriam-Webster
Editorial Staff
Witches, Pumpkins, and Grinning Ghosts: The Story of the Halloween
Symbols by Edna Barth
LikeLike
Palin church promotes converting gays
By RACHEL D’ORO, Associated Press Writer
Saturday, September 6, 2008
(09-06) 14:18 PDT Anchorage, Alaska (AP) —
Gov. Sarah Palin’s church is promoting a conference that promises to convert gays into heterosexuals through the power of prayer.
“You’ll be encouraged by the power of God’s love and His desire to transform the lives of those impacted by homosexuality,” according to the insert in the bulletin of the Wasilla Bible Church, where Palin has prayed for about six years.
Palin’s conservative Christian views have energized that part of the GOP electorate, which was lukewarm to John McCain’s candidacy before he named her as his vice presidential choice. She is staunchly anti-abortion, opposing exceptions for rape and incest, and opposes gay marriage and spousal rights for gay couples.
Focus on the Family, a national Christian fundamentalist organization, is conducting the “Love Won Out” Conference in Anchorage, about 30 miles from Wasilla.
Palin, campaigning with McCain in the Midwest on Friday, has not publicly expressed a view on the so-called “pray away the gay” movement. Larry Kroon, senior pastor at Palin’s church, was not available to discuss the matter Friday, said a church worker who declined to give her name.
Gay activists in Alaska said Palin has not worked actively against their interests, but early in her administration she supported a bill to overrule a court decision to block state benefits for gay partners of public employees. At the time, less than one-half of 1 percent of state employees had applied for the benefits, which were ordered by a 2005 ruling by the Alaska Supreme Court.
Palin reversed her position and vetoed the bill after the state attorney general said it was unconstitutional. But her reluctant support didn’t win fans among Alaska’s gay population, said Scott Turner, a gay activist in Anchorage.
“Less than 1 percent of state employees would even apply for benefits, so why make a big deal out of such a small number?” he said.
“I think gay Republicans are going to run away” if Palin supports efforts like the prayers to convert gays, said Wayne Besen, founder of the New York-based Truth Wins Out, a gay rights advocacy group. Besen called on Palin to publicly express her views now that she’s a vice presidential nominee.
“People are looking at Sarah Palin as someone who might feasibly be in the White House,” he said.
LikeLike
Tell The Media to Call Sarah Palin a Serial Liar
It is now thoroughly documented that Sarah Palin supported the $398 million “Bridge to Nowhere” when she ran for Governor in 2006, even though Congress cancelled the earmark in 2005.
She only opposed it in September 2007 after her final efforts to get $329 million more from Congress failed. Yet she kept the partial funding from Congress!
So when Palin repeatedly says “I told Congress, ‘Thanks, but no thanks’ on that bridge to nowhere,” she is repeatedly lying.
It is long past time for reporters to call Sarah Palin exactly what she is – a serial liar.
Sign our petition to the Media:
http://www.democrats.com/call-sarah-palin-a-serial-liar
LikeLike
Posted by: “Zoltan Abraham” zsazle@yahoo.com zsazle
Wed Sep 10, 2008 3:58 am (PDT)
Sarah Palin likes to style herself as a hockey mom of five. But the truth about her family values is chilling.
In her role as Governor of Alaska, Palin used her line item veto power to slash funding for troubled teens, including Passage House, a shelter for teenage moms, where the young mothers can learn skills to become productive members of society. (The Washington Post, September 2, 2008.)
As Mayor of Wasilla, Palin required rape victims to pay for their own forensic investigations, which could cost between $300 and $1,200. (The Frontiersman, May 23, 2000.)
The marriage of Palin’s sister, now known as Molly Hackett and Mike Wooten ended in a bitter divorce. During the ensuing custody battle, Palin and her sister were chastised by the judge for the ongoing disparagement of the father. The judge went so far as to say that Palin and her sister were engaging in emotional child abuse against the children, which would have to stop immediately, or the court would transfer custody of the children to the father, and order the children to be moved away from the area in which Palin and her family live. (Newsweek, Sept 9, 2008.)
Sarah Palin’s family values in a nutshell:
* Slashed funds for teenage mothers.
* Required rape victims to pay for their own forensic tests.
* Chastised by judge for emotional child abuse.
Sarah Palin � unfit to lead!
Please circulate this email far and wide to get the truth out about Sarah Palin.
LikeLike
Dropped Against DN! Journalists – Investigation Needed
Thank You For Your Support!
The St. Paul City Attorney’s office announced Friday it will not prosecute Democracy Now! journalists Amy Goodman, Sharif Abdel Kouddous and Nicole Salazar. St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman also issued a statement Friday that “the city will decline to prosecute misdemeanor charges for presence at an unlawful assembly for journalists arrested during the Republican National Convention.”
Both announcements come two weeks after the conclusion of the Republican National Convention where over 40 journalists were arrested while reporting on protests taking place outside the convention center.
Upon learning of the news, Democracy Now! Host Amy Goodman said, “It’s good that these false charges have finally been dropped, but we never should have been arrested to begin with. These violent and unlawful arrests disrupted our work and had a chilling effect on the reporting of dissent. Freedom of the press is also about the public’s right to know what is happening on their streets. There needs to be a full investigation of law enforcement activities during the convention.”
Goodman was arrested while asking police to release Kouddous and Salazar who had been violently arrested while reporting on street demonstrations. After being handcuffed and pushed to the ground, Goodman reiterated that she was was a credentialed reporter. Secret Service then ripped the credential from around her neck.
During demonstrations on the first day of the convention, police used pepper spray, rubber bullets, concussion grenades and force against protesters and journalists. Several dozen demonstrators were arrested, as was a photographer for the Associated Press.
John Lundquist, attorney for the Democracy Now! journalists, said, “The most notable lapse by law enforcement during the RNC was the record-breaking number of journalists indiscriminately arrested and detained for doing nothing more than performing in the best tradition of reporters who gather the news.”
In the weeks after the journalist arrests, tens of thousands of members of the public contacted St. Paul officials to protest the unlawful arrests of working journalists. Goodman said, “We were deeply moved by the outpouring of support. We thank everyone who called and wrote first to have us freed and then to have the charges dropped. We thank everyone who stood up for press freedom and the First Amendment.”
The YouTube video of Goodman’s arrest was the most watched YouTube video during the convention week. It has now been viewed over 830,000 times. Salazar’s video of her own violent arrest is also available on YouTube.
LikeLike
The crackdown on protests at McCain and Palin campaign stops is ridiculous. Sarah Palin came to our school (Elon University) and i was able to capture some footage of a protester being harassed, He was later arrested for “disturbing the peace”. Here are the videos…
LikeLike
Hi Dan, thank you for your comment and your links.
LikeLike
Pingback: Palin even more pro war with Russia than Bush | Dear Kitty. Some blog
Pingback: Gordon Brown and Sarah Palin | Dear Kitty. Some blog
Pingback: Creationist Sarah Palin and dinosaurs | Dear Kitty. Some blog
Pingback: FBI persecutes peace activists as ‘terrorists’ | Dear Kitty. Some blog
Pingback: Sarah Palin’s expensive clothes | Dear Kitty. Some blog
Pingback: Palin found guilty in Troopergate scandal | Dear Kitty. Some blog
Pingback: United States Senator McCain, sycophantic eulogies and truth | Dear Kitty. Some blog