McCain’s campaign was floundering when they picked an unknown Alaska governor as his running mate. She said all the right things at the RNC. She was smirky, smarmy and disrespectful and of course, lied her ASS off. She was an instant hit with the neo-con base. She is pretty and has a cute (for a while) accent, giving her that perky, feisty attitude. Her in-your-face speech gave the dull and lifeless McCain a real boost, both with money AND excitement among  the far right wing of her party. She was an instant rock star, drawing thousands where before a few hundred was thought to be a big crowd. But then things changed.

Sarah Palin did a couple interviews with news “anchors”. Despite being asked simple, softball questions, she showed herself to be little more than a light-weight beauty queen without a grasp on basic current events or any qualifications to hold ANY elected office. Then the economy tanked. Nobody connected to their campaign could form a cogent sentence about what to do to fix it. The surrogates kept sticking their feet in their mouths, and were forced out. Their poll numbers began slowly sinking. So what to do? McCain hired the whole rove crew, the same bunch who used scorched-earth tactics against him, his wife and even his adopted daughter in 2000. Of course, they suggested using a smear and fear based series of speeches to instill doubt and discourage independent voters about Barack Obama. Palin started blathering about Obama’s “associations” with unrepentant domestic terrorists over and over. Mccain made comments  accusing Obama of lying about these”associations” and whipping the crowds into frothing at the mouth hate mongers. Fox news “commentators” and right-wing radio entertainers screamed about Obama the terrorist traitor insinuating that he is a Muslim and an Arab terrorist hell bent on the destruction of our country.HERE’S an example of what unfettered control of talk radio, a lazy (and corrupt) media and egging on the vilest reptilian nature of people who are prone to hate those with whom they disagree. My better nature and my experience tells me that the crowd you see spitting out mouthfuls of bile are otherwise decent honest people who are caught up (and pissed off) in a losing campaign and a changing political landscape.

At BEST the McCain/Palin campaign has been erratic and incoherent. There are no cogent policy platforms. Sarah Palin as a VP choice looked good……at first, but personally, she has more issues than National Geographic, she has been cited for abuse of power in Alaska, and she has made an ass of herself every time she’s off-script. McCain is presenting himself as an angry,erratic, bitter old man who won’t look at his opponent in the debates. It has reached a point where McCain has to try to cool the rhetoric at his own rallys. HERE’S a countdown report on a recent rally in Minnesota  where things got out of control and the crowd turned on their own candidate.

There is an increasing concern within the structure of the GOP about the erratic nature of the McCain/Palin campaign. HERE’s one article, and HERE’s another (with some overlap) stating concern for the GOP campaigns. At THIS point, there must be fear that the incoherent nature of the top of the ticket could drag the the down ticket (house/senate and state and local races) into the morass with them. With 250,000 homes families having their homes forclosed on per MONTH, millions of jobs lost every year, major American corporations failing everyday, they want to talk about abortion. They want to shift the message to “associations”. *sigh*

I am going to step out on a limb here. I am predicting a massive landslide Obama victory. I believe that despite a massive election fraud in the form of voter caging and “purging” of Democratic voters in districts in key states, the numbers will be overwelming. There are stories of administration plans for civil unrest and placement of Army units and possible martial law. Scary stuff. IF they try to “pull” something there WILL be civil unrest,a magnitude of which nobody could anticipate, not bush not anyone. Depending on how they handle the massive political defeat, this COULD put republicans out of power for generations. Even that possibility saddens me. A respectful opposition is good for our country. It’s just that there is SO little respect within the GOP,for both our country and it’s citizens.

• Audrey got sent home sick,feel better Audrey
• Slicky-boy Dino Rossi, just what DOES he do for a living?
• Dirty Dino tries to avoid testifying about slimy money
• We talk to state legislator Tami Green about lying Dino ads about state budget deficits and also health care issues
• The effect of the global economic depression on state revenue
• We talk health insurance
• The bush depression
• McCain and the Keating five
• NSA spying for fun and laughs
• The debates,stumbling, bumbling mean McCranky

McCain professes to be a maverick. Politicians will say what they think people want to hear to get elected, such is the nature of the business. BUT McCCain complaining about greed and lack of oversight in today’s depression is like saying “Who crapped my pants!!”. McCain has a LONNNG history as a neo-conman. There is a video that every American should watch in order to get the FACTS about his judgement. It’s about thirteen minutes long and worth every second of your time. Check it out HERE.

• “Perky” Palin debate debut. She’s great at “skirting” around the truth and dancing around the issues,winking and of course…….lying
• The bailout snow job
• Palin supports genocide in Darfur
• Palin the product

• The bail out/neo-fascism
• Democrats in peril
• Reganomics has come home to roost and McCain supports it
• Flip-floppin’ john
• Palin/McCain campaign circus
• Perky Katie and moose mom
• Hey John ,don’t lie to and piss of Letterman
• Monkey wrench McCain “saves”the day
• The blush is off the Palin rose
• Sarah the witch hunter…oo ee oo ah ah ting tang walla walla bing bang
• Rick Davis: whiner, liar, lobbyist

Sec. 8. Review.

Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.

Spooky,huh? No agency OR court,even the supreme court can look at what he does. Remember that the Sec Treas serves at the pleasure of the President and Vice President. THEY can tell him what to do and he does it. So, they say pass it and trust me. Their track record of that kind of thing, claiming an emergency and ramming through massive power-grabs ( I think that’s just what this is) is abysmal.

I can’t believe that congress is going to pass this thing as-is. They might pass SOMETHING, but there is little stomach to hand the bush/cheney administration yet ANOTHER club to beat us poor schmucks over the head with. This is an election year. I will work against ANYone in congress who supports this abomonation against the American people……ANYONE!!

• A NEW energy bill passes in the house,Congressman Jay Inslee (D-WA) joins us to talk about the finer points,now it’s on to the Senate
• Drill THAT GOP
• The neo-con results are in…the complete destruction of our economy
• Impalin’ the Palins
• McCain, the de-regulatin’ deregulator…..?

OK, here goes. Where does John McCain stand on the economy? There is an article HERE that could shed some light. His chief economic adviser has been (and probably still IS) ex-Texas senator Phil Gramm. Because of HIS legislation de-regulating energy and banking concerns, our economy is at the brink of total meltdown. John McCain claims to be against regulation and has offered more tax cuts and to set up a “commission” to find out what happened……..OK. A “commission” is politi-speech for “I’m going to get a group of the people who caused this problem together and claim they are studying the problem, get the problem out of the news cycle, and continue doing what they claim to be studying, and look like a reformer without actually changing anything”. Whew!

John the reformer? He claims to be an agent of change and a reforming maverick. Take a look at who is running and advising his campaign. Here’s a good graphic depicting who surrounds him. He claims to be on a crusade to clear out the K street crew. He already did. They are running his campaign. Are they supporting him to put themselves out of business?

Where does the war-hero stand on veterans issues? THIS is the short answer. John McCain gets about 68 thousand a year for his service AND free medical care. I have NO problem with that. BUT he continues to use other vets as a backdrop and votes against THEM getting the well-deserved benefits HE enjoys.

THEN there’s the……truthiness issue. He just can’t seem to stop lying. HERE’s the latest count. HERE’S Senator McCain telling a WHOLE bunch of really big whoppers to a guy in Maine. Here’s yet ANOTHER piece written about the issue of McCain’s lies.He is even starting to lie about the number of people attending his rallies, check it out HERE. As a matter of FACT, poor old John can’t draw FLIES without his running mate.

So there you have it, I’ve done my best to not be TOO hyperbolic.But that’s where he stands…..for now. But as we’ve found, that could change.OFTEN.

UPDATE!!!!!

*sigh* There’s more….A day after yet ANOTHER TWO huge brokerage and insurance corporations fail, two days after a hundred fifty year old bank that survived the civil war, at least two depressions, the first AND second world wars went bankrupt, thirty five thousand stock brokers and banking executives are thrown out onto Wall street, McCain declares that our “economic fundamentals are sound”. THEN he literally expresses TWO different positions on the same issue  within an hour. See it HERE. McCain has stated hundreds of times for DECADES that he is a “de-regulator” but NOW…..read about his latest flip-flop HERE. McCain’s campaign is becoming …..well HERE’S a typical day. I’m not smart enough to tell anyone who to support in ANY election. IF you are a McCain supporter, just please do so with your eyes (and mind) open.

Up until about two weeks ago, Alaska was that place somewhere around the North Pole that you sometimes heard about but never really considered.  The last of the great outdoors, pristine wilderness, a place where Republicans want to drill for o’l.

Then John McCain pulls a boner and picks obscure as the state is large, one Sarah (who?) Palin — Alaska’s governor with roughly 540 days of experience.  (puts it in perspective, doesn’t it?)

So everyone here in the lower 48 can only speculate about this woman.  Outside of a couple of Air America talk shows, most people haven’t bothered to ASK the people of Alaska what they think of this woman.

Well, there is a great source you can check out.  It is a blog out of Anchorage called Mudflats. It is run by a blogger that goes by the handle of AKMudracker, and he has been in Anchorage for a long time and knows where all the bodies are buried.

Of course, I could always call my friend Marty (whom some of you might remember as being a participant here up to a couple of years ago) because he and his wife are from Alaska and still have friends and family there.  (I have gotten a LOT of dirt from him already)

I encourage you to check out Mudracker, and especially check out his ‘Alaska Women Reject Palin’ Rally is HUGE! post.  He has pictures and a video which pretty much tell the story of what Alaskans think of Sarah Palin.