McConnell is exaggerating again.... about his role in the cleanup at PGDP this time

If it wasn't bad enough that Mitch McConnell falsely tried to take credit for the sick nuclear workers' compensation program at the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion uranium enrichment plant (PGDP), http://www.ruralthoughts.net/?q=node/92 he's now claiming in a new ad that he "lead the fight" for the cleanup of the PGDP. 

There are a couple problems with that hypothesis. First, as I wrote about in the column at the link above, McConnell was not on the cutting edge of environmental awareness at the plant. Consider that it wasn't even the federal government that first notified the local residents about their wells being contaminated, which was the news that got the entire cleanup process going. (Where were the feds under McConnell's watch?)

"McCracken County officials, in response to complaints by a plant neighbors about their well water, called in Kentucky officials to test local private wells in 1988. The state found the contamination. That is what first alerted the immediate plant neighbors about the environmental problems at the plant," said Ron Lamb, a life long plant neighbor whose family's roots to the area predate the building of the plant. Lamb, who runs a successful auto alignment shop near the plant, has been, from the beginning, a neighborhood leader in learning about the environmental problems at the plant, and in trying to get just compensation for the environmental damage which has occurred on his and other neighbors' private lands. 

"Yeah, we contacted McConnell's office, and Hubbard's, and others when we first learned of the contamination. We never met with McConnell. He just sent a letter back. He and the others just shrugged us off. They told us that the plant had it under control and that it was just a minor amount of contamination," Lamb went on to say. "Besides that, there is no cleanup planned for the contamination on private lands around the plant." 

Vivian Puckett, one of the plant neighbors the state initially found had contamination in their wells, said "The state guy told us not to drink the water. We wrote Sen. McConnell, but everytime you write him, he writes you back like you are stupid. He never did anything. McConnell was in cahoots with all the people that said there wasn't any problems at the plant." Puckett said McConnell isn't being truthful in his ad when he says he lead the fight for the cleanup.

Corinne Whitehead, long time community and environmental activist, and president of the Coalition for Health Concern, the oldest local environmental organization in Western Kentucky, focused for years on the environmental problems at the PGDP, where her late husband worked. Whitehead, over the 20 years of working on issues at the plant, had many instances of approaching Sen. McConnell, pushing for cleanup and exposed worker's compensation. 

"My general impression is that he ignored the problems," said Whitehead. "I felt he had no interest." Whitehead, past president of the Kentucky League of Women Voters and widely recognized for her lifetime of community activism in Kentucky (i.e. see http://www.womeninkentucky.com/site/reform/c_whitehead.html ) said, in response to McConnell's claim that he lead the fight for the cleanup of the PGDP, "It's laughable....It's not laughable...it's tragic. Sen. McConnell has been absent dealing with the agony of workers, workers' families, and plant neighbor's health issues. He's been absent on the cleanup."

In fact, it wasn't until 1992 until the facility was placed on the "Superfund" list, and the much cleanup started at all. Considering that McConnell took office in 1984, by 1988 he should have been up on the problems at the plant. Not only wasn't he up on them then, he downplayed them, and did little but secure the minimal amount of cleanup funding between 1992 and 1998, when the Washington Post expose' about the coverups at the plant went national and McConnell, and the other local and statewide politicians who had downplayed environmental problems at the facility, were caught like deer in the headlights having done little or nothing. 

This is key, also, because it was the Dept. of Energy, along with the politicians, including McConnell, who continued to downplay the problems at the plant even as some workers and plant neighbors were trying to bring attention to the problem. One of the strategies that the politicians, McConnell included, found themselves getting sucked into was, in downplaying the problems at the plant, they created a false reality that if there weren't many problems, it wouldn't take much funding to clean it up. This was fine with the Dept. of Energy. Thus, Paducah received inadequate funding to deal with the serious environmental problems at the site. 

McConnell has to share in the blame for that. After the August 1998 expose in the Washington Post about the environmental problems at the facility, McConnell became more interested in the facility. And, as a result of the bad publicity for Kentucky, he did manage, in conjunction with then Sec. of Energy Bill Richardson, who made three trips to Paducah in the aftermath of the international media barrage the plant came under, to get more money coming into the facility for cleanup. However, that brings us to the second big problem with McConnell's claim. Although there has been $2 billion dollars spent supposedly on "cleanup," there hasn't been a lot of cleanup at the plant. 

A good deal of that money that has been sucked up by such republican-linked international corporations as Bechtel - but the work that has been accomplished for the most part has been superficial, and more just shifting problems around rather than actually eliminating them. Bechtel, for the many years they were the lead cleanup contractor, produced thousands of pages of written reports, engaged in some experiments, most of which did not end up in major cleanup. Their on-the-ground cleanup activities were minor - hauling things to the dump, so to speak, and the like.

The worst problems at the site are such things as old dumps, lagoons, ditches, and spill sites which have no liners or other environmental controls, and into which very toxic and dangerous materials have been dumped. These are leaching into the groundwater and have formed one of the largest, most toxic groundwater contamination plumes on earth. The Ohio River is being contaminated by this plume, and the poor, minority community of Cairo, Illinois, gets its drinking water below the plant site. Not much is being done to address this.

Bechtel failed, although they received hundreds of millions of dollars, to even address the groundwater contamination or the sources. They hauled off a huge pile of crushed uranium barrels, dubbed "Drum Mountain." They brought in cranes and loaded them into train cars and shipped them out to be dumped in the desert in Utah at a place called "Envirocare." Other radioactive scrap metal went to the same place. They have shipped barrels of radioactive, PCB sludges to the DOE incinerator in Oak Ridge, Tennessee., which is poisoning that community. They did a few other things that are good, but very minor. They also had problems - leaky shipments, wastes disposed in improper landfills. But they, like Union Carbide and Martin Marietta, got out while the gettin' was good. Where was the government oversight?

The major cleanup projects - the cleanup of the old landfills, (including the "classified landfill which contains non nuclear (we think) parts to nuclear weapons) the uranium burial grounds, the C-400 spill and leak sites, the oil landfarm, the old coal pile, and then the tearing down and disposal of the 10 or more buildings that are currently considered "radiological sites" (which means they are too radioactive to go into without protection) - haven't even begun for the most part. DOE keeps moving back the "completion date" for the cleanup - it's now 2040 I believe - and the Bush administration has tried its best to reduce funding for the cleanups at nuclear facilities. The cost is going to run into billions more, although over 2 billion taxpayer's dollars have already been used up, with little oversight from McConnell or other leaders, for that matter.

But, as Ronald Lamb points out, there has been no plan for cleaning up the contamination that has been documented on private lands surrounding the plant. Back several years ago the Dept. of Energy released maps of surface contamination outside the plant boundaries. This includes findings of plutonium, neptunium, and the like found on many private land holdings. http://www.sprol.com/?p=43 There is no plan to clean up this contamination, and people are still living in it!

Through all of this McConnell has played a mostly mechanical role. The Dept. of Energy includes funding for cleanup at Paducah in the president's budget request, and for the most part, it gets funded. McConnell isn't going to go out and ask the president not to bring money into his state. But the fact is that McConnell has not gone out and fought for more funding for the cleanup, and his leadership on the issue is "laughable" and "tragic." 

Through the 8 years that I was on the Dept. of Energy Citizen's Advisory Board for the Paducah site, McConnell never once attended. I don't recall that his Paducah office people ever came. They may have once in a great while, but they weren't regular attendees. We did not have a running dialogue with McConnell over what we were finding through the committee. McConnell was detached and uninterested. Ron Lamb, Vivian Puckett, Corinne Whitehead and I all agree - McConnell's attitude was that the plant had it under control and the problems were minor. This attitude has, in the long run, hurt cleanup efforts at the plant. That is the truth. For McConnell to be trying to say that he "lead the fight" for the cleanup at the PGDP is such a distortion that he shouldn't be allowed to get away with it. People need to know the truth, and the truth isn't in that political ad. But then again, is that such a surprise? 

A good way to close this article would be to quote from the published academic paper, "State-Corporate Crime and the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant," Western Criminology Review 8(2), 29–43 (2007) Alan S. Bruce, Quinnipiac University; Paul J. Becker, University of Dayton http://wcr.sonoma.edu/v08n2/29.bruce/bruce.pdf .

"Given the government’s role in encouraging corporations to participate in a dangerous business, it was government’s responsibility to implement and enforce strict regulations to ensure safety of nuclear plant employees and the public, however, government efforts were entirely inadequate and sanctions were rarely enforced for violations of safety standards. At the organizational level, while safety guidelines were devel-oped, safety programs were inappropriately staffed, and it was generally left to line personnel to make sure that safety measures were being followed. Given the climate created by government and management, and the failure of government to regulate and enforce safety standards PGDP employees were unlikely to fully appreciate the dangers of their work and thus unlikely to take adequate precautions.

"The Louisville Courier-Journal provides a good summary of the harms caused to PGDP workers as well as the community and surrounding area: 'safety practices, concealed health concerns, and decades of ignorance, expediency and poor oversight have left workers, nearby wildlife and the land itself damaged by chemical and radioactive toxins. Workers have inhaled the radioactive dust, chemicals have seeped into the ground water, and debris dumped off the site has created pockets of radiation. And the silent devastation is being seen in creatures ranging from insects to bobcats—an ominous warning to the humans who share the same soil, water, and air. (Carroll and Malone, 2000a)' 

In this case, as acknowledged by the federal government (Carroll, 2000c), a series of decisions from the governmental level to the plant operators ensured PGDP workers, the environment, and public safety were victims of state-corporate crime." 

No doubt these "state-corporate crimes" started before McConnell took office. But he's had 24 years of being a part of that government, and a good deal of this occurred under his watch. To somehow now try to say that he has been on top of the situation is one big fib and he shouldn't be allowed to get away with it.

Sunday News Show

Of course the big news today was Colin Powell's endorsement of Obama on Meet the Press. When Brokaw asked Powell if he was ready to now support a particular candidate, Powell said, yes he was. But instead of just saying who it was, he said he wanted to go into the foundation of his opinion, and he embarked on a rather lengthy, and very articulate explanation of how he liked McCain, but was disappointed about the direction the republican party had gone, about the Palin choice for VP, and the over-the-top negativism, such as trying to connect Obama to Bill Ayers, the robo calls to that effect, and the failure of McCain to speak out forcefully against prejudice as symbolized by the campaign to say that Obama is a muslim. And interestingly enough, Powell, much to his credit, spoke out about how that campaign is prejudiced against good muslims, some of which have been military heros for the U.S. Powell's statement was compelling, for sure. It was more than the average endorsement for those listening.

Chris Matthews had Kathleen Parker and Andrew Sullivan, two traditional conservatives, who both expressed serious concerns about the direction of the republican party. Well, George Will joins them in the more traditional conservatism - that of balanced budgets, smaller governments, and privacy rights. But these folks have been turned off by what Bush is doing. And for McCain to be out there talking about how Obama's plans are socialism while Bush is nationalizing banks and huge financial firms to avoid a financial meltdown even worse than we are having is pure folly, and those intelligent conservatives know it. So the republicans have split their party, and when parties get split bad, it bodes trouble for national elections.

One of the things that came up more than once was skepticism about the ability of the U.S. election infrastructure to handle the election. This worries me more than anything. One pundit said that they have heard from inside the McCain campaign that they are making the ACORN so called voter fraud, which is yet to be proved, as such a big issue because if the republicans lose, they are going to make the legitimacy of the election an issue. Only if the margin of victory is razor thin does that have a chance. That's why Obama is going to campaign hard, and this was noted by more than one pundit today, to run up the score and perhaps get a filibuster proof majority in the senate. More than one pundit today mentioned that this could happen. Wow, that would be amazing.

McCain's best argument is that of the desirability of mixed government - to ride herd over an out of control majority. Yet he isn't using it. He's using all these frivilous arguments, like Bill Ayers, socialism, Joe the plumber, experience, etc. Those are all losing arguments. And it is likely there is nothing McCain can do to stop Obama, but his campaign has only made things worse.

McLaughlin Group tonight

Boy, the McLaughlin Group tonight was a conservative stampede aimed at Obama. McLaughlin had three conservatives against Eleanor Clift. And he, out of the gate, was after Obama as being too liberal, even socialist. 

It was so biased that even one of the conservatives had to say, "hey, we can't really bring this socialism stuff up after a republican president has nationalized banks, insurance companies, and the like, can we?" Duh. I did lose a little respect for McLaughlin tonight, who for the most part I respect. He needs to chill and let the younger generation take over. They can't do much worse than his or our generations have done or are doing. 

McLaughlin cited some polls that I didn't recognize, but he described them as the polls that came the closest to predicting the last election. Oh...is that so? That means they had insides to republican neredowells who aren't above stealing an election. I'm sure McLaughlin won't report that! Even so, they still showed Obama ahead. But hey, we all know that the republicans will try to steal the election - period. The question is whether there will be such a landslide that even those hard core republicans will be worried about trying to block it.

"Joe the Plumber" one more failed Hail Mary pass by McCain

I guess John McCain was watching every TV clip of Obama out there, because he somehow knew about the "Joe the Plumber" encounter Obama had a few days ago. I myself didn't know what he was talking about when he brought Joe up during the debate. Poor Joe, according to McCain. This ambitious, hard working everyday stiff, with his American dream of owning his own plumbing business, was upset because, if he ever got to buy his plumbing business, might make over $250,000 and have to pay some extra taxes under Obama. McCain sprung Joe's pain on Obama in the last presidential debate, I guess hoping to use Joe to catapult himself in front of Obama as the savior of the American Dream from the Obama pickpocket machine. 

It didn't work. In fact, it backfired - again. It had been widely reported after McCain chose the unknown and untested Sarah Palin as his running mate that McCain was a gambler. I don't mean symbolically - I mean literally. He apparently likes to gamble and bet on longshots. Maybe he trusts his "hunches" or rubs a rabbits foot or has a lucky coin, who knows what he relies on to makes these longshot gambles. But, as we all know, longshots are longshots by definition for a reason - they are highly risky and don't work very often. The 85 yard touchdown pass in the last seconds rarely gets completed. The grand slam homer in the bottom of the ninth rarely gets hit. The wild toss of a basketball at the buzzer from the other side of the half court line rarely goes in. And in this case, McCain's two longshots - picking Palin, and now using Joe the Plumber as his storyline, have met a similar fate - failure.

One has a perfect right to question McCain's judgment. He's in the middle of a presidential campaign and he's taking chances like this? He didn't properly do background checks on Palin, and while for a few days he got a bounce, Palin's inability to answer relevant questions intelligently, the silliness of some of her answers, and now the shield between her and the press have shown that McCain's choice of a person a heartbeat away from the presidency was foolhardy. 

Now, with McCain bringing up Joe the Plumber, the same thing has happened, only on a shorter timeframe. Joe the Plumber, while complaining about this extra tax burden against his American Dream, it turns out, isn't paying his taxes under the current tax regime. He also doesn't have a plumbing license, and compared Obama to Sammy Davis Jr. as a tapdancer. 

It turns out that Joe actually will receive a tax cut under Obama, and even if he made the money that he said he would make if he got to buy his plumbing business, something apparently he isn't even close to, he would have to pay $36 extra dollars. What an example of the "little guy." It's clear now that Joe the Plumber was a republican plant from the beginning, and not a very good one.

But what really is amazing to me is the republican talk - made by McCain, Joe the Plumber, and now Gingrich this morning on Good Morning America - that "sharing the wealth" of the U.S. with the less wealthy is somehow a terrible thing. Isn't it greed that has put our economy in such shaky condition? Isn't it supposed to be a good thing to want to help those who are less fortunate? What kind of world do these republicans want? One in which they and their friends have all the money, have no rules governing how they get it or what they do with it, and with no responsibility to the public in general - that's what. No thanks, I'll pass on that kind of world. That's what we've had for the last 8 years and it's ruining our country. 

Do we want a gambler with his finger on the trigger of the largest nuclear arsenal in the world? Do we want a gambler writing the budgets for our nation? Do we want a person who doesn't believe in sharing the wealth in charge of our national treasury? I don't, that's for sure.

 

The ‘straight talker’ let his mouth overload his ‘you-know-what’

by Berry Craig

MAYFIELD, Ky. – “Never let your mouth overload your ‘you-know-what’” is an old Kentucky expression.

I’m being polite. We don’t use “you-know-what” when we say that.

John McCain said he would whip Barack Obama’s “you-know-what” in the final presidential debate. He ended up with an overloaded you-know-what.

David Gergen, who advised Presidents Nixon, Ford, Reagan and Clinton, called McCain’s performance “an exercise in anger management.” 

Anger mismanagement is more like it. McCain again oozed contempt for Obama, who, to employ another vintage Kentuckism, opened up a can of whup-you-know-what on McCain.

Oh, the “straight talker’s” stock smarminess was a big hunk of red meat for the Red Staters, union-haters, gay-baiters, Confederate flag wavers and the Jesus-loves-me-but-he-can’t stand you crowd. They were true believers anyway.

Post-debate snap polls showed most people thought Obama bested McCain again. Even a quickie survey from Fox News, the Republican Party’s propaganda ministry, had Obama out-debating McCain.

Some of the TV talking heads declared McCain the winner. They gushed over his comeback when Obama compared him to Bush.

“Senator Obama, I am not President Bush,” snapped McCain. “If you wanted to run against President Bush, you should have run four years ago.”

McCain is George Bush, of course.

The “maverick” has voted for the president’s bills almost 90 percent of the time – 95 percent last year. Those numbers are not from the Obama campaign – they come from the non-partisan Congressional Quarterly.

Anyway, I switched off the tube after the debate. I did likewise after the first and second ones, which Obama won big-time, too. I didn’t care to hear how the TV hacks spun what I saw myself. 

The Daily Kos blogsite said most of them cooled it right after round three, worried that the insta-polls would prove them wrong. But CNN’s John King went out on a limb, scoring the debate an 18-15 McCain victory, according to the blogsite.

King ended up with egg all over his face makeup. 

Kos said King ranted “against the snap polls, saying they were bunk because people are answering just after watching the debate [sic], while being too ‘emotional’ … unlike the pundits who are all about reason and logic.”

Nobody bloviates like a pompous TV news “personality.” Kos added, “I love how the American people don’t give a s--t what John King thinks.”

This old daily newspaper reporter turned history teacher loves it, too.

Kentucky Educational Television sells out to Republicans

Yesterday I got an email from Democratic candidate for the 1st Dist. of Kentucky congressional seat, Heather Ryan. What I thought was probably just another campaign email turned out to be news of an incredible injustice that KET perpetrated yesterday on Ms. Ryan.

Apparently when KET first approached the candidates and asked them to appear (they are doing this for a number of KY election races), the incumbent, long time U.S. Rep. Ed Whitfield, said he couldn't make it. He didn't want to give Ryan any credibility of appearing with her. 

Of course, that was an arrogant and sexist attitude, but I guess that he felt that he didn't have to stoop to appearing with her. After all, Ms. Ryan was a political novice who had gotten into some controversy in Paducah when, as Executive Director of the local Film Society, she and her 10 year old daughter confronted U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell in an awkward encounter regarding the war in Iraq. That encounter got her fired and she turned around and ran for Congress. 

Ah, but isn't a week or two forever in politics? Now, after the economic meltdown, and some good campaigning by Ryan, Whitfield must have felt that not appearing might come off as not caring. But, he was between a rock and a hard place. If he appeared in public, then he would give Ryan a chance to gain ground and give her credibility. He also would look like he was worried. But if he didn't show, then he risked not caring.

So, his campaign came up with a third option. Use his political clout to get KET to run a pre recorded video message of his. And that's just what he did. Regardless of how unfair that was, and regardless of the howls of protest coming from our area into KET, they went ahead and let him do it. This is outrageous and KET has lost credibility and now looks as if they are favoring Whitfield in this election. There is no way, no how, no circumstance where this is fair, short of some last minute national emergency that could not be helped, and this was not that situation by any means.

KET should be ashamed. The good ol' boys network of (more than likely) white males (in any case, the KET powerful) went behind closed doors yesterday and caved into the political pressure exerted by a long time sitting congressman. I just can't believe it! It is so wrong. KET, pox on your political house for doing this. And not only that, they let the Whitfield video go after Ms. Ryan.

Let's hope the people of the district see through this blatant, unfair power play. KET is supposed to be fair and even handed, but they proved by this that they are just as politicized as the next institution. This is a black mark on KET, and will long be remembered. While Ms. Ryan is indeed a political longshot, she has a chance, if she will stay in the area and keep working, at giving Whitfield a good run. And with the Republicans falling more and more out of grace, KET had better be careful about who they are unfair with. It could come back to bite them someday.

 

Florida waitress says Bush, McCain and Palin share her values

by Berry Craig

MAYFIELD, Ky. – The economy seems to be in its worst shape since the Great Depression. The war in Iraq is still costing us precious blood and treasure.

Polls say George W. Bush is one of our most unpopular presidents.

John McCain is “John McSame,” as in four more years of Bush-style government of the rich, by the rich and for the rich. His running mate is a rabble-rousing nut job.

Apparently, none of that fazes Elizabeth Dolan, 31, a single mom and waitress in Florida. She’s sold on the McCain-Palin ticket, according to the New York Times.

Dolan came to cheer Palin at a recent rally. She told a Times scribe that Bush is one of America’s great presidents.

“He was really good for my family,” the reporter quoted her. “We’re hurting financially, but he shares our values just like Sarah Palin does.”

“Values voters” like Dolan often vote Republican in my native Kentucky, too. A lot of them work at low-paying, dead-end jobs.

Many, if not most, of them call themselves “born-again Christians.” I’d bet Dolan does. 

"You can't be a Christian and a Democrat,” some “values voters” claim.

I was reared Presbyterian. I don't recall from reading the Bible, going to Sunday school and listening to sermons that God is a Republican or a Democrat. I was taught that we are all God's children and that, like a good parent, God loves us all the same. 

Yet Kentucky – Florida, too – is home to many pastors – perhaps Dolan’s among them -- who pray, preach and pass out leaflets claiming that the only issues that matter on election day are social issues like abortion, same-sex marriage and school prayer.
These preachers tell their flocks to vote for "Christian" candidates who oppose “baby-killers,” bash gays and want to raze the constitutional wall that separates church and state. 

All the while, these same “Christian” candidates favor big tax breaks for millionaires and big corporations and tax crumbs for people like Dolan. 

They oppose unions. They want to get rid of government regulations that guarantee worker safety and health, safeguard the environment against polluters and protect consumers against the greedy and unscrupulous. 

Yet people like Elizabeth Dolan keep voting for these candidates who will keep working stiffs’ slice of the American economic pie as skinny as possible. 

I doubt Dolan is in a union. If she were, she’d know first-hand that unions support candidates like Barack Obama because they will help workers – and not just union members -- get their fair share of the American pie.

The religion or race of the candidate doesn’t matter to unions. How candidates vote – or would vote – on issues of economic justice does.

Besides a Presbyterian, I’m a union member and a Democrat who is voting for Obama. But I wouldn’t for a minute say, “You can’t be a Christian and a Republican.”

As a mortal, I don’t presume to know what God thinks. But my guess is that the Almighty is neutral when it comes to American politics. 

At the same time, I don’t see Christ as an apologist for the rich and powerful or a union-buster. He was working-class. He palled around with the poor and the powerless.

Christ preached love over hate, peace over war, charity over greed and brotherhood and sisterhood over bigotry and exclusion. Jesus admonished us to live by the Golden Rule. 

Christ was big on economic justice. He promised the meek, not the moneyed, would inherit the earth.

He said all of that without any party label.

The Debate, The Markets, and Oil

We watched the debate last night between Sens. Obama and McCain. Nothing new. All in all, I think the demeanor of the two candidates contrasts so significantly that this is what is swaying the voters. Obama and McCain are just so different. Obama is nice, and McCain is mean. That's about as simply as I can put it. We've had 8 years of the mean, scowling, bully president, and look where it's got us. 

Obama is so much more fluent with the language. He speaks in good sentences - in general, not making too many grammatical errors, with a gentle tone for the most part, even when he's attacking. McCain, on the other hand, speaks in choppy phrases which he often doesn't finish before going into another sentence. His tone is harsh and disdainful, even when he's trying to be nice, which isn't often. These contrasts are what is swaying the debates toward Obama in my opinion. 

With all the criticism of Castro, and now Chavez, over the years, for the "nationalizing" of some of their country's major businesses, the western world is now nationalizing businesses faster than at any time in history. Where are all these free market conservatives now? George Will must not be sleeping very well these days. 

And today, just a short while ago, the Federal Reserve, which is throwing money around like it's printed on paper, cut interest rates again, this time in "coordination" with central banks around the world. Isn't that exactly the opposite move of what needs to be done? The problem with the economy is that too easy credit which wasn't backed properly by collateral created a "house of cards" which is now crumbling. So how does making credit easier still going to solve the problem? The problem is not enough collateral, or even close, to back up loans. You gain wealth by making the currencies more valuable and encouraging people to accumulate capital. This expands the collateral base. But you need proper incentives to do that. Making currencies less valuable and greasing the wheels for easier credit is just throwing fuel on the fire, as far as I can tell. We'll see what happens. Lots of desperation by arrogant people that have made a lot of money leading our country and the world to this cliff. Should we trust them? Heck no, they have bad judgment. We need to be prosecuting them!

Oil prices have fallen significantly. I think at their peak, they got up around $150/barrel. Now they are below $90. That's a 40% drop in price. Gasoline, on the other hand, at least around here, got up to, in Kentucky, around $4/gallon. It's now, at least as of yesterday, at about $3.40. That's less than a 20% decrease. Why is that? Whenever oil prices shot up because of a hurricane or some other world event, gasoline prices would go up with it immediately. But when they come down, the prices don't necessarily come down as fast as they went up, that's for sure! Where's our attorney generals when we need them?

What the Heck is Going On?

Is it just me, or am I confused? I thought Congress fixed the mess. I mean, this excruciating vote to bail out these scandalous corrupt executives (but of course, NOT to give them golden parachutes) for the good of all of us on "main street" finally passed, after Congress so wisely added all these wonderful parts of the bill that are going to help us, actually passed both houses and was signed by the president a couple days ago. So why did the stock market tank around the world? Could it be that we have a credibility problem? 

Last night on 60 Minutes, the public learned what "credit swaps" were. And, oh, if you forgot to watch, no one knows for sure how many of these credit swaps are out there. I have no idea. But apparently, it's like a highly contagious disease - it spreads quickly. After all of this, Congress with the "bailout" and 60 Minutes with "credit swaps" by the unknown number and score, 60 Minutes wins. At least if you listen to the stock market today, it does.

But it will probably go up by 400 points tomorrow, and then down by 800 a couple days later. Some of the experts say we have further down to go, and I think that is right. Desperation takes on many cloaks. Of course, all the pundits say that our deposits are safe, as long as they are within FDIC limits. That's way cool. But what if everyone asks for their money at the same time? No one ever thought about that, did they? Get those printing presses humming! 

Let's hope cooler heads prevail.

Palin sounded like the cop from Fargo, but not as bright

by Berry Craig

MAYFIELD, Ky. -- “Did you ever notice how some politicians cuss when they get around us?” asked Larry Sanderson, a veteran Kentucky labor leader. “You know, they want us to think they’re one of us.”

Gov. Sarah Palin, the Republican vice presidential hopeful, didn’t curse during her debate with Sen. Joe Biden, her Democratic rival. Golly gee, no.

But perky Palin played the just-plain-folks card. “Hey, can I call ya Joe?” she greeted Biden. 

Palin was down-home Wasilla, Alaska. She grinned like a possum, as we say in Kentucky. She was short on “straight talk” but long on clichés and homespun hokum. I heard an “I’ll betcha,” a “bless their hearts” and at least a pair of “darn rights.” She tossed in a “Joe Six Pack” and a “doggone it,” too.

Palin sounded like Police Chief Marge Gunderson in the movie Fargo, but without the smarts. I almost expected to hear a “Darn tootin!’” from the moose burger-munching “hockey mom.” 

Anyway, Palin’s schtick was supposed to make working class voters think she’s one of us. Darn right, she was a union member, union-buster John McCain said when he named her his running mate. 

That was more double-talk from senator “straight talk,” according to the Union Gal Internet blogsite. “Governor Palin received an ‘honorary’ membership in the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers,” Union Gal posted. “Not because she’s paid dues or been represented by the union, but because she pushed for a pipeline that had benefited the union’s membership.”

Like the Steelworkers, the IBEW has endorsed the Barack Obama-Joe Biden ticket.

Union Gal is not in the McCain-Palin corner. She said the idea of Palin being in a union “makes my skin crawl.”

Mine, too, but it also riles me when I hear Palin’s husband called, “First Dude,” like he’s a regular guy. Todd Palin’s politics are as nutty as hers. Before he registered Republican, he belonged to the Alaska Independence Party, a far right-wing, anti-government fringe group that wants Alaskans to be able to vote on secession from the United States.

Anyway, his union card “doesn’t include an automatic auxiliary membership for her,” said Steelworkers International President Leo W. Gerard on the union’s Internet website. That goes for McCain, too, he added. “…McCain[‘s]…record on labor issues would require some serious penance before he could ever earn a union card.”

Gerard pointed out that McCain opposes the Employee Free Choice Act. He also supported a national right-to-work law. McCain votes the labor 

position on legislation just 16 percent of the time – zero percent in 2007 -- according to the AFL-CIO’s Committee on Political Education. 

Biden and Obama are for the Employee Free Choice Act, and they oppose right-to-work. Obama’s COPE score is 98 percent overall and 100 percent in 2007. Biden’s is 85 percent lifetime and 100 percent in 2007.

“McCain has jeopardized retirement by championing Bush’s privatization scheme for social security,” Gerard also said. “McCain has voted for every American-job-killing free trade deal, without regard to human rights or environmental standards. And he has proposed, instead of providing health insurance for all Americans, a plan to tax the insurance of those lucky enough to still have employer-provided coverage.”

Mum is still the word from Palin about the Employee Free Choice Act, right-to-work, NAFTA and CAFTA. “Ms. Palin needs to stop trotting out her husband as an exhibit until she explains her positions on workers’ issues,” Gerard challenged. 

He said the Palins have benefited from Todd Palin’s union membership. “Workers in labor organizations earn higher wages and are more likely to have pensions and health insurance….Todd Palin earns a good wage and has good health insurance. The Employee Free Choice Act would make it easier for other Americans to join unions and earn better money and obtain health insurance.”

Gerard added, “Inquiring minds want to know, Ms. Palin. Where do you stand on Employee Free Choice? Where do you stand on privatization of social security? Where do you stand on job-killing free trade?” I’d like to know where both Palins stand on union issues.

Gerard continued, “Are you with McCain – and against workers – on these issues? If so, you need to stop using your husband’s membership in the USW as a prop, because then his union card cannot possibly cover up your or John McCain’s worker-savaging positions.”

When McCain picked Palin, Gerard called the choice “another example of his poor judgment and his desire to play politics as usual. McCain-Palin is not a team that works for working families. The first-term governor’s record is thin and divisive. And John McCain has a life-long record of being for the rich and powerful. No union card can hide that any more than Ronald Reagan's union card did."

Reagan was the most anti-union president since Herbert Hoover. Palin praised Reagan in her debate with Biden.

I’ll betcha Palin’s union views are the same as Reagan’s and McCain’s. But, doggone it, she wore an American flag lapel pin in the debate. Darn right she did!

Sunday News Shows

I watched Wall Street Journal Review, Chris Matthews, ABC Sunday Morning, part of Meet the Press, and Face the Nation. None of the shows really stood out. Of course, the VP debate was the main topic, along with the presidential campaign. 

The catch phrase of the day regarding the debate and Palin was that she "stopped the bleeding." That was heard repeatedly. Everyone thought Biden had delivered a strong performance also, and like all the pundits the night and morning after the debate, no one believed that this was going to swing the election.

There was also general agreement that Obama had a more than narrow lead in the polls, and had cracked the 50% mark in most polls. Also, Obama was close or ahead in polls in a number of states which Bush carried. McCain wasn't challenging seriously in any state that Kerry carried.

Joe Scarborough, on Chris Matthews, had the quote of the day. He said, at one point, that the McCain campaign didn't care about principles or issues (I'll get the exact quote when Matthews posts the transcript), they only cared about winning. Doesn't that just about define the republican's "values?"

There was also a quote from a (Bill?) Gross, on the Wall Street Week in Review, in which he said that he expected the unemployment rate to rise to 7% in the next 6 months to year. That's pretty sobering, to say the least. Everyone agreed that these negative economic reports favored Obama. 

Of course, everyone agreed that McCain and the republicans are going to go super negative in the next month. Palin started yesterday, saying that Obama hung out with terrorists, referring to Bill Ayers. We'll see the Rev. Wright "goddamn America" quote soon on republican ads. We'll probably see worse as the republicans get desperate. George Will, on ABC Sunday morning, had the best advice for the Republicans - campaign on the need for "divided government" in order to keep the Dems in check. I think that is McCain's best argument, but he's wasting his efforts on all this other stuff, and probably the "split government" argument isn't enough to win this year on its own, because people are so desperate for some action to make things better, and split government always means less action and not more, at least most of the time. We'll see what happens, but get your slime meter ready!

VP Debate and Presidential Politics

No doubt Palin "exceeded expectations" in the debate last night, but her expectations were that she could walk out and stand at the podium. Beyond that, there wasn't much for Palin in the way of expectations. And, of all nights to exceed expectations, she did it on a night when the good Joe Biden showed up and not the bad one. They were like the flippers on a pin ball machine and if the steel pinball is the campaign, they both worked to flip it back up to their superiors, Obama and McCain. 

The one thing I didn't care for about Palin's presentation was her winks. She winked at least 3 times when she was saying something kinda cutesy. In a situation like that a wink means one of two things - either that you are kidding or you are flirting or enticing. I think her use of the wink was the latter and not the former. And, considering that it appears that McCain picked her as a long shot to appeal to Sen. Clinton's supporters strictly because she is female, is it a proper use of sex for Palin to be flirting with the public to get their attention? Is this what Clinton's campaign symbolized? Absolutely not.

All the presidential polls, including the Republican ones, like Rasmussen, show Obama ahead at this point. That means we're going to be seeing a lot of Rev. Wright in these weeks to come. I'm sure that will bring on the ads showing McCain kissing Bush, or whatever he is doing to him. Agreeing with him, that's for sure, at least for the most part. 

Yes, it is going to be nasty. And who knows what we will see. Let's hope it isn't too bad. But better prepare for the worst. I mean, if you could have believed that the least popular administration in the history of country could have blackmailed a Democratic congress into voting into this big wall street bailout a few weeks before the election then one might have been tempted to offer you a sale on the Brooklyn bridge. But here we are, signed, sealed and delivered. So for those that think there is a huge difference between the major parties, forget that. But, there is a difference.

Let's hear the voice of the alternative party candidates. We have some experienced and really credible candidates from the alternative parties, and why in the hell can't the system sponsor one nationally televised debate featuring all of them? Are we a true democracy or just a sham democracy? I mean, come on, the ideas we are getting from the "major" parties are pretty lame. And look where they have gotten us. So why not open up the discussion. Wouldn't that be in the national interest?

McCain seems to be Likeability Challenged

by Berry Craig

MAYFIELD, Ky. -- “What’s the secret to success in politics?” I once asked the late Paul Simon, the bespectacled, bow-tie senator.

“If people like you, they’ll vote for you,” the Illinois Democrat replied with a grin.

Sen. John McCain of Arizona, this year’s Republican presidential hopeful, didn’t look very likeable in his first debate with Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, the Democratic candidate.

McCain scowled a lot. He reminded me of dour Dole in 1996.

Now, I’m an old newspaper reporter who believes in full disclosure. So here goes: I’m voting for Obama.

There, I’ve come clean. But I’m not the only one who thinks Obama won the debate. The polls say most Americans agree with me.

McCain oozed condescension. He hardly even looked at Obama.

Several times, McCain scolded Obama as if he were an upstart, not a senate colleague. 

On the other hand, Obama kept cool. He disagreed with McCain without being disagreeable.

Most people -- except the most rabid partisans -- appreciate candidates who are courteous to their opponents. It makes candidates seem, well, likeable.

Likeability served Sen. Simon well. The senator whom Obama called a “dear friend” won election to congress five times before he took on three-term incumbent Sen. Charles Percy in 1984 and beat him.

Simon died in 2003 at age 75. He lived in Makanda, Ill., not far from Paducah, where I teach.

Simon spoke at our community college in 1997. Before the talk, my wife, Melinda, and I took the senator and his spouse, Jeanne, to dinner.

Simon reminisced about the ’84 campaign, recalling a man he said he met on a sidewalk in a ritzy Republican suburb of Chicago. “He said, ‘Sen. Simon, I don’t like your politics,’” Simon explained. “But he also said, ‘I’m going to vote for you because I like you.’”

I doubt McCain has enjoyed many such experiences on the campaign trail.

During the debate, McCain confessed he’s not the senate’s “Miss Congeniality.” If he meant it as a joke, it fell flat.

If he meant it doesn’t matter if a presidential candidate is likeable, he’s wrong. Presidential voters often equate likeability with trust. Seldom do Americans vote for, or trust, sour pusses.

Ask Sen. Bob Dole, the Kansan. Like McCain, he’s from a Red State where a lot of voters are ultra-conservative Republicans. McCain’s haughtiness might play in Phoenix, and Dole’s arrogance might work in Wichita. But Bill Clinton beat Dole, and McCain’s behind in the polls.

Now we’re in what could be our worst economic jam since the Great Depression, which has been caused by the same greed-is-good economic policies that George W. Bush has been giving us for going on eight years. 

McCain helped Bush sell the same old Hoover-era snake oil to the American people.

New York Times columnist Bob Herbert doesn’t pull punches about Bush and McCain. He says they are among the GOP’s “madmen of the right.” 

Herbert calls them “reckless clowns who led us into the foolish multitrillion-dollar debacle in Iraq and who crafted tax policies that enormously benefited millionaires and billionaires while at the same time ran up staggering amounts of government debt. This is the crowd that contributed mightily to the greatest disparities in wealth in the U.S. since the gilded age.”

Herbert adds, “John McCain and his economic main man, Phil (‘this is a mental recession’) Gramm, were right there running with them….Toadying to the rich while sabotaging the interest of working people was always Mr. Gramm’s specialty. He was considered a likely choice to be treasury secretary in a McCain administration until he made his impolitic ‘mental recession’ remark. He also said the U.S. was a ‘nation of whiners.’”

Herbert claims Gramm’s “tone deaf remarks in the midst of severe economic hard times undermined Senator McCain’s convoluted efforts to reinvent himself as some kind of a populist. But they were wholly in keeping with the economic worldviews of conservative Republicans.” 

Though conservative “trickle down” economics has failed the country again, McCain rails against liberals. He called Obama one in the debate.

Obama smiled and replied, “John mentioned me being wildly liberal – mostly that’s just me opposing George Bush’s wrong-headed policies.” 

When McCain for the umpteenth time styled himself a “maverick,” Obama coolly pointed out that McCain is one of Bush’s biggest boosters. McCain has voted for Bush’s bills nearly 90 percent of the time, according to the non-partisan Congressional Quarterly.

Still, I wish Obama had given us a history lesson. (Okay, I teach history.)

A lot of working class Americans – including many who pack union cards – need to be reminded of what liberal politicians have done for them and what conservative politicians have done to them. 

President Franklin D. Roosevelt and liberal New Deal Democrats disagreed with the conservative Republican idea of government of the rich, by the rich and for the rich. FDR believed government had a duty to help people who need help. So does Obama.

Conservative Republicans fought – and still fight – unions tooth and nail.

McCain votes the union position on bills just 16 percent of the time, according to the AFL-CIO’s Committee on Political Education. Obama’s COPE score is 98 percent. 

“When you go back and look at history, history will tell you the Democrats ramrodded every meaningful piece of legislation for the benefit of working people,” said Kentucky Labor Secretary J.R. Gray, a former Machinists union official.

They were liberals, too.

Cache River Hearing 2

I attended the continued court hearing today on whether or the Illinois Dept. of Natural Resources can stop the Big Creek Drainage District from removing the "Diehl Dam" from the Cache River. Although I tipped off the regional media, the only response I got was from WKMS FM, the NPR station from Murray State, who seems kind of interested in the story. But as far as I can tell, no other media attended the hearing today.

The IDNR completed their case for the injunction. Testimony today included the Director of the Illinois Natural History Survey, Dr. Brian Anderson, and a couple of IDNR bureacrats. All in all, I thought the IDNR's performance was less than stellar. I wondered why Max Hutchinson, Henry Barkhausen, Dave Maginel, and many of the other "stars" of the day who ended up splitting with the elder, but local Cache guru, A.E. Corzine, who once was their darling, didn't show up to testify?

No decision was rendered today, and the defense (the Drainage District) presents their case on the afternoon of Oct. 27 and all day the 28th. I still believe that the Drainage District stands to gain in their authority. Their attorney, Ron Osmon, of Marion, Illinois, has out-lawyered the IDNR's attorney in my opinion. Now he gets to present his case, and he has several weeks to prepare it after hearing the IDNR's case. WOW! This is one historic proceeding. I wouldn't miss it for the world!

Cache River court hearing begins

Yesterday a court hearing was held in Mound City, Illinois, at the Pulaski County courthouse regarding the "Diehl Dam" on the "Lower Cache River." The Illinois Dept. of Natural is seeking an injuction keeping the Big Creek Drainage District from removing the "Diehl Dam." 

In actuality, after the expiration of a lengthy court agreement several months ago, the drainage district did remove the dam after receiving complaints from a local landowner that owns land on the banks of the swamp that the sustained, unfluctuating water levels were killing hardwood trees on his property. The IDNR, according to statements in court, entered private property at night, without a permit that underwent public scrutiny, and replaced the dam. The drainage district said that they were going to remove it, and the IDNR is seeking an injunction to stop the drainage district from removing it.

The hearing really just had gotten going when it was adjourned. It is to take up in the morning. I intend to be there. I will let you know what happens. I've written about the cache river before, in a story published on counterpunch.com. http://www.counterpunch.org/donham04272005.html

This is a complicated issue of mixed environmental effects combined with local vs. centralized control of public resources that affect private lands. I believe this will end up in the Illinois supreme court, but just for the heck of it, I'm going to go out on a limb and predict, based on the couple hours I listened to yesterday, that the drainage district will win in the lower court. How it ends up eventually I have no idea. But it is an interesting case that deserves attention from everyone who is interested in public land. The cache river wetlands have been featured in National Geographic as being internationally significant. I'll let you know what happens.

McCain blames Obama and the Dems?

McCain, already desperate and looking for anything he can say, whether it is true or not, to get a political edge, which he isn't getting, said today after the republicans failed to produce a majority to push thru the "bail out" bill and it failed, that it was Obama's fault because he and the Dems were too partisan.

But that logic is flawed. The Dems have a fool proof majority in the House. They c ould pass their own bill without even involving the republicans if they wanted. Yeah, the fact that the Dems were at least as much interested in political cover in doing the "right thing," shows that there is blame to go around. But the fact is that the Dems could have, and probably will now, pass their own bill with a strict Democratic majority. That passage is probably going to cause the stock market to go up. Then, the Senate republicans will have to decide whether or not they want to be seen filibustering a bill that, upon announcement of their filibuster, will cause the stock market to go down even more. I'm glad I'm not a republican in congress. 

Obama, in the meanwhile, called for "calm." Yeah right. But his call for calm was reassuring compared to McCain continued overly harsh rhetoric. But my question to McCain is, why, when the Dems could have passed a bill without the republicans, can he call them overly partisan when they do everything they can to involve the republicans, but the rank and file republicans won't listen to their own leadership? It's just one more example of how McCain is saying anything to get elected. But I don't think people will buy it.

If I was the Democrats, I would, today, while Congress is off, be working out an alternative proposal that will pass the house by getting at least 12 of Dems that voted against it by strengthening assistance for working and middle class folks. I would then have Obama roll it out. It would at least give the appearance that there is some leadership somewhere - something really lacking right now.

Sunday News Shows

I missed the first half of Chris Matthews. Immediately before his show is Wall Street Week in Review, with Maria Bartaromo. I had gotten up and was watching her interview Bill Clinton and it put me back to sleep, and when I woke up again, Matthews was half over. 

The one thing in his show that caught my ear was during the "tell me something I don't know" segment. Katty Kay said that after the debate she talked to some friends in Iraq who said that people there weren't really happy with the way that McCain is saying that things are so good there now and the "surge" is working so greatly - that things were still really uncertain. All you have to do is read the news to gather that. But it's all McCain has - "the surge has worked." And of course, Obama doesn't really need to take the discussion to the question of whether McCain's statement that the "surge" is working and that we are winning in Iraq is true or not , because events will do that. There is do doubt, according to several articles that I have read in USA Today, New York Times, and other outlets, that there is rising tensions between Sunni and Shiites. In fact, NPR recently reported that U.S. solidiers were bodyguarding Sunni Awakening leaders from being arrested by the Shiite government. I don't know the details there, but this is McCain's definition of "working?" 

I tried to watch a few minutes of the "debate" between Udall and Shaffer for the U.S. Senate seat in Colorado. They appeared together on Meet the Press. But Shaffer was so obnoxious, just trying to hog the time, and Brokaw did little to stop him, I thought it was disgusting and I turned it off. Stephanopolous interviewed McCain, and we watched some of that. Nothing new. 

But Stephanopolous' roundtable was really interesting, and I would give it the trophy for the day. It was, of course, regular George Will, who is a man in an alien land these days with all this big government stuff floating around, especially proposed by republicans. But also were Robert Reich, Newt Gingrich, and a Greenburg dude from the Washington Post. 

I didn't take notes, but the conversation was facinating. I hope a transcript is published soon. Basically no one really liked the "bailout" for a number of reasons. But basically they all said it had to be done. Well, after that, I guess all such differences of opinion might be characterized as a distinction without a difference. But, what was interesting to me was how they all didn't really like the bailout, but they all had different reasons for being suspicious, and how they all had different remedies. 

At one point, Robert Reich said to Gingrich, that he was (and he was) sounding a lot like a Democrat. (he was talking about the importance of education.) Gingrich didn't even try to deny it very much. But the conversation was very much an indication of how traditional party allegiances are shifting. 

Face the Nation had an interview with Obama. Nothing new from him. No mistakes, and he was on message that voting for McCain and Palin was continuing the Bush policies. That's a safe tactic for Obama, especially when the stakes are high and he is tired. 

I didn't hear whether or not the Matthews meter gave the week to Obama or McCain, but how could they not give it to Obama? It may have been the decisive week of the entire campaign.

to be continued....

What World does David Broder Live In?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09/27/AR200809...

David Broder has this column in today's Washington Post where he says that McCain "won" the debate "on points" and that McCain established himself as the "alpha male" between he and Obama. His reasoning for this is based on the fact that Obama actually said that he agreed with McCain when he did and McCain never said once that he agreed with Obama. What world is Broder living in?

Broder is one of these washed up long time insiders that has taken our country down the road of ruin. His word should be rejected as part of the problem. He's sticking up for his generation of older white males that have ruled the U.S. since it's beginning, and he, like McCain, can't stomach the truth that our country is changing and there's nothing they can do about it.

While I don't agree with everything that Obama is saying, especially when it comes to war-mongering and pushing nuclear, coal, and biofuels, clearly Obama established himself, even on the topic of foreign affairs, which is supposed to be McCain's strong suit, as being the one that is controlled and able to handle the pressure. McCain came off as angry, hateful, and partisan. Even Chuck Todd, NBC political director, (hardly a flaming liberal) characterized McCain as "disdainful" of Obama, and it was probably worse than that. He wouldn't look at Obama, he used hateful tones and expressions, and he didn't once say that Obama had anything good to offer. Is this what Broder is saying is a "winner" in our country? I don't think so.

While Broder did mention the fact that McCain actually proposed a "freeze" on federal spending "except for defense" spending, which I give him credit for, because it was one of the major disclosures of the debate I thought, (and the network morning news shows for the most part also brushed over it) Broder shortchanged Obama's very skilled answer, and perhaps the soundbite of the debate in my opinion, when Obama retorted strongly that this was "using a hatchet when a scalpel was required." This response showed that Obama was going to try and rein in spending but not with a dogmatic precondition. And Obama provided a specific example of a category of spending that should be increased, preschool education, to show what he meant. But Broder failed to mention this - a huge omission, and to me a sign that he just doesn't get it. 

But even more is the real implications of a "freeze." A freeze isn't a freeze at all. It's a cut, because of inflation. So, does that mean McCain is advocating for no COLAs for social security or medicare and medicaid? What about veterans benefits? Yet, where is Broder and news media on this? What would a true "freeze" on all federal spending other than "defense" really mean? What about our roads and bridges? What about our attempts to retool our energy and transportation sectors to combat record CO2 increases in the atmosphere and the growing impacts of global warming? What about the drag on the system from ill people that don't have insurance or enough insurance but don't have enough money to pay for needed treatment? What about making college more affordable for the poorer people in society? How is that going to be accomplished with a spending freeze? Broder brushes all of these aside and by his column, leaves himself open to all kinds of accusations, which I will think silently to myself but won't write over and above what I have written. 

David Broder, if you, and McCain, can't do better than that, it is time for you to get out of the way and let the younger people lead. It's your type - with money and influence for decades - that have screwed things up. You aren't as smart or powerful as you think! And while the country may have a credit problem, your type has a credability problem. 

As being a white person with roots from E. St. Louis, Illinois, and living most of my life well within a small circle around where I was raised, I just wonder how much of Broder and McCain's disdain isn't due to a deep seeded belief that in their older age, with all their experience, their acclaim and honors they have accrued over the years, their upbringing, and the like, shouldn't have to answer to the younger generations - especially from a "upstart" politician who thinks he's smarter and has more power than he should. I really get that feeling - and I've been around those kind of "alpha' males all my life. Broder, like McCain is out of touch.

McCain Gone off the Deep End

Can anyone survive the tongue lashing given to John McCain by David Letterman last night? OMG!!! But McCain deserved it. I mean, the guy has absolutely no credibility left with anyone. He is proving himself to be a shameless liar. I mean, he cancelled his long scheduled appearance on Letterman saying that he had to rush off to Washington to save the economy. He forgot to tell Letterman that he was stopping off at Katie Couric's studio for a quick interview on the CBS evening news. Hah! He should have known it was the same network. I mean, McCain couldn't have looked like more of an idiot.

But, McCain is not going to be able to easily shake his statement that the economy is still fundamentally strong, which he made just about a week ago after the Lehman Bros. bank failed. His actions today only made things worse. If he skips the debate, he might as well concede the election. It really does bring his judgment into question. And now, the latest news is that he peeled off a number of conservative House Republicans to oppose a "bailout" package that had been negotiated all day. I can't imagine the news shows in the morning are going to give McCain much good. That's because he's hiding Palin and the press is getting tired of it.

So, McCain lets Couric interview Palin. It was pretty embarassing, really. Palin is..uh..not knowledgable or articulate. And Couric wasn't even that tough! Geez, if she can't get by that pretty soft interview, what is she going to do on a heard interview? And then Bob Schieffer, CBS News long timer and host of Face the Nation, reported that the scuttlebutt was that McCain really wanted to get the vice presidential debates stopped, because he is terrified about what is going to happen. After listening to both of Palin's interviews, I think his terror is justified. 

Obama has got to step up. And he can't make change if he thinks he's going to be everything to everyone. He's got to stake out his position and go for it. Hopefully he can. If he can't, then our country is in pretty bad shape.