The Watercooler for 09/05/08 5:00 PM

Wolf my Bistered x

CNN is playing Palin's speech in Michigan live

complete with the cheerleaders.  It's like Bush all over!

from Sarah Palin's home town, Wasilla, Alaska.  Here is the URL, though you'll have to paste it into your browser.  It is highly critical of Sarah.  I will post a bit of it.

http://www.andrys.com/palin-kilkenny.html

http://www.talkleft.com/story/2008/9/5/175841/6661

Hillary Rodham Clinton has no intention of becoming a Sarah Palin attack dog — but has no qualms going after John McCain, people close to the former first lady say. “She’s not the answer when it comes to winning conservative women — she never was — and we’re not going to be anybody’s attack dog against Sarah Palin,” said a Clinton insider. “To be fair to Obama’s people, they haven’t asked us to do that.”

Slamming Palin to win back women already hostile to Obama is pointless, the insider said, because Clinton’s most loyal base is working-class voters, not women in particular. “Attacking Palin is checkers, attacking McCain on the economy is chess.” Clinton will continue to yoke McCain and Palin to President Bush on pocketbook issues.

Sorry, but I just don't know how to make the URL active.  You'll have to paste it into your browser.

Excerpt:

"

She has bitten the hand of every person who extended theirs to her in
help. The City Council person who personally escorted her around town
introducing her to voters when she first ran for Wasilla City Council
became one of her first targets when she was later elected Mayor. She
abruptly fired her loyal City Administrator; even people who didn’t
like the guy were stunned by this ruthlessness.

Fear of retribution has kept all of these people from saying anything
publicly about her. "

"

When then-Governor Murkowski was handing out political plums, Sarah got
the best, Chair of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission: one
of the few jobs not in Juneau and one of the best paid. She had no
background in oil & gas issues. Within months of scoring this great
job which paid $122,400/yr, she was complaining in the press about the
high salary. I was told that she hated that job: the commute, the
structured hours, the work. Sarah became aware that a member of this
Commission (who was also the State Chair of the Republican Party)
engaged in unethical behavior on the job. In a gutsy move which some
undoubtedly cautioned her could be political suicide, Sarah solved all
her problems in one fell swoop: got out of the job she hated and
garnered gobs of media attention as the patron saint of ethics and as a
gutsy fighter against the “old boys’ club” when she dramatically quit,
exposing this man’s ethics violations (for which he was fined)."

"

As Governor, she gave the Legislature no direction and budget
guidelines, then made a big grandstand display of line-item vetoing
projects, calling them pork. Public outcry and further legislative
action restored most of these projects--which had been vetoed simply
because she was not aware of their importance--but with the unobservant
she had gained a reputation as “anti-pork”.

She is solidly Republican: no political maverick. The State party
leaders hate her because she has bit them in the back and humiliated
them. Other members of the party object to her self-description as a
fiscal conservative.

"

Around Wasilla there are people who went to high school with Sarah.
They call her “Sarah Barracuda” because of her unbridled ambition and
predatory ruthlessness. Before she became so powerful, very ugly
stories circulated around town about shenanigans she pulled to be made
point guard on the high school basketball team. When Sarah's
mother-in-law, a highly respected member of the community and
experienced manager, ran for Mayor, Sarah refused to endorse her."

http://www.truthout.org/article/palin-wrong-woman-wrong-message

 Sarah Palin shares nothing but a chromosome with Hillary Clinton. She is Phyllis Schlafly, only younger.

This isn't the first time a boss has picked an unqualified woman just because she agrees with him and opposes everything most other women want and need. Feminism has never been about getting a job for one woman. It's about making life more fair for women everywhere. It's not about a piece of the existing pie; there are too many of us for that. It's about baking a new pie. To vote in protest for McCain/Palin would be like saying, "Somebody stole my shoes, so I'll amputate my legs."

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

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

    This could be huge.

Sent: Thursday, September 04, 2008 6:20 PM
To: Staff.FLA
Subject: REPUBLICANS AND INDEPENDENTS FOR OBAMA COME OUT IN FORCE IN THE
VILLAGES

[http://app.icontact.com/icp/loadimage.php/mogile/106775/4f4034b96b6567da30d
5f2b8943d3f13/image/jpeg]

 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

September 4, 2008

Contact: Florida Press Office, 813-857-2563


REPUBLICANS AND INDEPENDENTS FOR OBAMA COME OUT IN FORCE IN THE VILLAGES

Former Republican Senator Lincoln Chafee Met with Crowd of 223 in Support of Barack Obama


ORLANDO - YESTERDAY, Republicans and Independents in The Villages came
together in support of Senator Barack Obama at the Bourbon Street
Restaurant. Former Republican Senator Lincoln Chafee met with more than 200
people Wednesday at one of several stops throughout the state this week to
rally Republican and Independent support for Obama. Chafee was introduced by
small business owner Albert Cheeks, whose restaurant hosted the event and
collected donations for victims of the hurricanes in Florida and the Gulf
region.


Sen. Chafee, the only Republican in the Senate to vote against the war in
Iraq and call for a timetable for the removal of U.S. troops in 2006,
fielded questions from the predominantly Republican audience on topics
ranging from security to economics to experience.


"The McCain camp talks a lot about experience, but George W. Bush has had
eight years of experience as President and leading the Republican Party, and
that has given us monstrous debt, a never-ending war, and no solutions for
change," said former Republican Sen. Lincoln Chafee to a cheering crowd in
The Villages. "It is not experience alone that lends to good leadership.
Barack Obama is a real leader who can restore America's credibility and
solve the complex issues we face such as the economy, the environment and
global stability."


"This is the biggest gathering in support of a Democratic candidate that's
ever happened in The Villages," said Fred McDowell, chairman of the
Democratic Executive Committee in Lake County. The private community
typically frowns on political campaigning, he said.

The Villages management contacted the Bourbon Street Restaurant's owners
twice during Sen. Chafee's speech to stop the event, but owner Albert Cheeks
stood up to the challenges. "As a struggling small business owner, I can't
afford another four years of economic policies that keep me down rather than
help me succeed," he said. "As far as I'm concerned, this is a private
event, and I will do whatever it takes to get Barack Obama elected as our
next President."

my 78 year old mother signed up to work on Barack Obama's campaign today.  This makes me giddy.

Just got back from the hair salon today - all the talk was about the Gov from Alaska - and it wasn't pretty - older women, younger women all disgusted with McCain's pick.  It's backfiring big time.

and after we said to each other, "sah-wah-dee-cup"

he was intent with fear about the current state of  Thai society:

http://www.economist.com/world/asia/displaystory.cfm?story_id=12037612

http://www.economist.com/world/unitedstates/displaystory.cfm?story_id=12066224

It all comes down to judgment and McCain doesn't have it.

http://dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/9/5/2190/77795/394/588459

Barack and Joe release their college and grad school transcripts immediately, in order to pressure McCain and Palin to release theirs.

Thanks to a federal privacy laws, schools are not allowed to release transcripts on their own. But the world is itching to know what Palin was doing at five different colleges/universities over six years to get a BA in Communication, which is one of the easiest degrees going (and I say this from the vantage point of being an English Lit major in the days when mass media/communication was one single course, not an entire major concentration).

I don't care if Barack and Joe had a few bad grades, I think just comparing the content of their respective educations would be beneficial to many.

-- volney

tonight, there was an interview with a woman who is an expert and critic on the media.  I only heard part of the interview, but she pointed out that an Obama ad was using ageism as a negative factor.  She said that the ad began with the statement that McCain couldn't remember how many houses he owned.  Then there was a clip of McCain talking with Bush.  The film speed was slowed down to make McCain appear slow, hesitant, and confused.  He seemed to be in a near drouse.  She pointed out that this was unfair, and I agree.

to be cont.

Then she talked about Soledad OBrian reporting that Sarah Palin had reduced funding for special needs children (exceptional children), but that in fact she hadn't.  Her staff went on FactCheck.com and four hours later they had the information that the budget category had been changed, and Palin had not reduced funding for children.

I also reported that on the blog.  I'm so glad that Bill Moyers is tackling this subject and that we may even be sophisticated enough and ethical enough to deal with it.  So, I stand corrected.  Palin did not reduce funding. 

I also posted the info about special ed funding.  Glad it's been corrected.