John McCain: Palinized!

Within minutes of the Palin announcement, my cell phone rang. When the ID came up as Chicago, I knew exactly who was on the line.

“Who the fuck is this broad?!?!”

“Don’t blame me,” I answered. “It’s your party. Obviously, just another far right nut to placate the masses. Your masses.”

“Hell, I’ve never heard of her in my life. And they’re not my masses! Do you know her?”

“I do now. Rumor has it she came out of the womb with an NRA sticker on her forehead.”

“Fuck you! I’m getting to the bottom of this. Don’t think you won’t hear back from me – you WILL! And SOON!”

This kind of reaction was not uncommon in the hours and days after John McCain proudly announced Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate on the 2008 Republican Presidential ticket. Obviously, McCain didn’t get the guy he’d wanted, instead following the party’s dictum on this one. My people tell me that McCain was literally on the phone with Joe Lieberman, about to pop the question to his old buddy, when the Party cut in and told him it was Palin Time. McCain’s caving in hardly spoke to his alleged “maverick” credentials. Worse though, the decision to bring Palin aboard absolutely spoke to the party’s incredibly ancient attitude toward woman. They really think they can attract Hillary’s girls with gender alone. It took me back 20 years to the time when George H. W. Bush fully admitted that he’d brought Dan Qualye aboard because he saw him as a handsome young buck who would attract the female vote. How insulting.

So who is this Sarah Palin? Seemingly smart, strong and fearless, and on the side of extreme issues like guns and abortion that will endear her to the right, though she’s already got problems with the kind of irresponsible spending that McCain likes to rail against. But that said, she’s the “new face of the party.” Ha! Maybe in the sense that Susan Molinari, the goddam dimwit from New York who gave the keynote speech at the 1996 Republican National Convention was going to be the new face of the party. The media even dragged Molinari out after the Palin announcement for some perspective that only she could deliver. What she failed to mention is the grave possibility that the party will drop Palin like a bad habit after a McCain defeat, much as it did to Molinari after Bob Dole’s loss.

But for the time being, Palin has been enlisted to help McCain “change Washington.” The question is, change from what? Republicans are the idiots who have essentially called the shots over the past eight years. Has anyone been paying attention?!?! And now they – the party and even John McCain (clenched teeth and all) – are going to tell us that Sarah Palin is the second most qualified Republican in the land to be the President of the United States; more so than the 49 Republican Senators and 202 Representatives in the House.

I’d like for one Republican – just one! – to look me in the goddam eye and say this is the best they got.

Palin has jumped in with both feet, joining McCain in calling for a fresh start in Washington if, for no other purpose, than to disassociate the Senator from Bush. The reality, however, is that McCain is just like Bush. In fact, it seemed that nobody could be more like Bush than McCain – until Sarah Palin came along. Like Bush, Palin is all for the Alaskan pipeline, is a gun lover and thinks it’s a good idea to continue sending $10B a month to Iran. Like Bush, she believes in denying women the right to choose and opposes stem cell research. Like Bush, she confusing the constitution with the bible. And like Bush, she has a history of denying women equal pay for equal work, while favoring huge tax cuts for the wealthiest 2% of Americans.

Now … for those who discount the role of the Vice President, I can only suggest looking back at the past eight years. In fact, my initial impression of Palin was that she was, indeed, another Cheney – smart and evil. Christ, was I wrong. As it turns out, she’s more like Bush – and after eight years of dumbass, we don’t need any more dumbass in the White House.

With the conclusion of the debates, during which “maverick” John McCain lied repeatedly to his opponent, the moderator and the American people, we find ourselves only two weeks away from the most historic presidential election in almost 60 years, no matter what the outcome. After the past two elections, I hope that this time we get the goddam thing right.

John McCain: The Beginning of the End

In 2004, war heroes as we know them were persona-non-grata, as far as presidential candidates go. John Kerry was shunned like a member of the Viet Cong he so valiantly battled and George W. Bush, an alcoholic coke freak gone AWOL, was re-elected. But this year - 2008 - war heroes are once again in vogue, as John McCain steams ahead toward the Republican nomination. And now that we officially have a presidential race, it's time we set a couple of things straight. First of all, John McCain may be a “war hero,” insomuch as he suited up; that act alone would make every American who has EVER worn a uniform a war hero. Which is fine, but I wouldn’t quite deem just any veteran, past or present, as qualified for leading the country. And John McCain is “just any veteran” and nothing more. His examples of leadership both in the field of battle and in Washington are negligible. And as for being a thought-leading “maverick” … that’s a joke.

It’s no secret that in the past eight years he has gone with the Bush crowd 95% of the time. And before that, he prided himself on bi-partisanship – which is basically how Congress was run before the age of Reagan, when McCain came on board.

But more than anything else, John McCain is a phony. That smirk of his – always delivered immediately after a grim-faced McCain has delivered more bad news about the country or an opponent – is starting to piss me off after all these years. We’ve all seen it: At the conclusion of a statement, he’ll freeze, look around quickly for the camera with the red light on, and flash that pained, fake smile. However, I don’t think he’s going to being smiling too much in the coming months of Campaign 2008 – now he has Barack Obama to contend with and things are about to get a lot more serious.

McCain has criticized Obama as the nominee of “pundits and party elders,” ignoring the uprising the guy has generated, not to mention the rightly won delegates. He has claimed to be better qualified to lead a nation at war due to Obama lack of military service, which is a joke, considering McCain’s allegiance to Bush. Recently, McCain has asked how Obama could possibly know what is going on in Iraq since he hasn’t been there lately. Well, hell, I haven’t been to Iraq at all, but I sure as fuck don’t think I need to visit the damn place to understand how bitched up things are thanks to George W. Bush and the support of John McCain.

A few months ago, McCain claimed that this war could go on for another 100 years. Realizing the stupidity of that statement, just a few weeks ago he said he’d be able to end the war in four years time; over his first term.

My question is, if you know what it takes to bring these kids home, why not do it NOW? What are you waiting for? What have you BEEN waiting for?

It’s as if McCain is in a vacuum – vowing to continuing Bush policies in Iraq and at home, essentially giving us that third Bush term we’ve all been dreading, ignoring what American voters screamed in 2006: GET US OUT OF IRAQ!

Iraq. Jesus. A place we should have NEVER descended upon, and wouldn’t have if Dick Cheney hadn’t felt the need to pad his already plentiful bank account. Liberate the Iraqi people? I don’t give one good goddam fuck about the Iraqi people … do you? That rationale is about as insane as the argument used by Bush the First in 1991 – a war to “liberate the people of Kuwait?” Anyone who doesn’t know now – and didn’t know then – that the Persian Gulf War was about oil and money is a moron. And lest anyone think I’ve some sort of peacenik, my post-9/11 plan would have taken care of a couple of problems: On September 12, 2001, the carpet bombing would have commenced – Iraq, Iran, Libya, Afghanistan, Syria and Sudan … wiped off the goddam map. The U.S. military moves in to surround Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, combining them to create the 51st state and WE own the world’s oil.

And we’d be paying about 25¢ a gallon for gas.

But things didn’t work out that way. And now this “war” goes on and on, though there have been signs of McCain backtracking on his heretofore support of Bush.

On the night of Obama’s clinching primary victories, McCain disavowed Bush in a mean and nasty way, while gushing over Hillary in a pathetic roundabout plea to her supporters; the same Hillary he’s spent years trashing.

Once a phony, always a phony.

The American "System" is Just Fine

It seems that anytime an election fails to deliver the desired result, the losing candidate and/or those running in his or her circle, place the blame on our “system.” I was reminded of this in Sunday’s St. Louis Post-Dispatch, in which Post reporter Calvin Wilson interviews filmmaker Frank Popper, director of “Can Mr. Smith Get to Washington Anymore?” – the story of first-time politician Jeff Smith’s pursuit of the U.S. Congressional seat left empty by retiring long-time Missouri congressman, Dick Gephardt. Popper claims that “…the core issue of the film…is…the system for electing people to public office is broken.”

Having seen the film and having now read the interview with Popper, I will say that his film is well-done and that Popper is certainly a bright enough guy. But I’ve got to admit I’m struggling with the notion that the process by which we govern our country is broken.

What exactly IS the “system?”

In a nutshell, it’s a representative democracy in which, in essence, the people govern themselves. Novel enough.

That government is divided into a sort of three-legged beast that ideally works to keep itself in check….most brilliant.

It’s only when the system is abused – by money or power or distorted facts – that trouble begins. When this happens, either apathy or fear, or both take over. And at this point, the legislative branch ceases to be … well … not so representative.

In Frank Popper’s film, there are two key scenes: First, the scene in which candidate Smith receives the news that he will NOT receive the endorsement of the St. Louis American (the city’s African-American newspaper), despite years of personal commitment by Smith to the city’s African-American community. Second, the scene in which a woman claims that she’d like to vote for Jeff Smith but didn’t think he could win.

And therein lays the primary culprit – Fear.

Fear on the part of voters to risk being associated with a perceived “loser.”

Fear on the part of the media to stick its neck out now and then, instead of always foregoing the risky choice when it comes to endorsements.

Money is the monster that doesn’t necessarily always have to triumph. In the case of Jeff Smith, it’s safe to say that the lost St. Louis American endorsement probably cost him the election against Russ Carnahan. But it sure as hell wasn’t a “broken system.” (In fact, it WAS the system that allowed a rookie like Jeff Smith to have a shot in the first place.)

No – the system is fine. The problem lies in the execution. This can be corrected by eliminating all political advertising, direct mail, etc. – taking money out of the equation.

This leaves only news coverage and all-out hustle by the candidates to get their message across to voters.

Why not? The worst thing that could happen is you become unhappy with the candidate that won and you vote him or her out in two years. Yes, the VOTE is a powerful thing. And the answer to those who stupidly cry for term limits. But that’s another topic for another time.

Justice Rehnquist Checks Out

The paper this past Sunday was dated September 4, 2005 – my 44th birthday.

The headline stated “Chief Justice Rehnquist Dies.”

I couldn’t have asked for a better gift.

Not that things are going to improve much as George W. Bush will surely do everything in his power to load the court even further to the right. But that’s another worry for another day. For the time being, I say good riddance to William Rehnquist, the guy who presided over and championed an impeachment trial that wasted a ton of time and money, not to mention was conducted against the wishes of a considerable majority of Americans.

Good riddance, indeed, to the guy who essentially gave us President George W. Bush when he led the way in stopping the Florida vote count.

Good riddance to the guy who proclaimed states rights over federal power, but only when the cause fit his own ultra-right ideology. In 2003, Rehnquist was dismayed when the majority both preserved affirmative action in college admissions and killed laws criminalizing gay sex. However, in 2004, he had no objections to the federal government detaining terrorism suspects indefinitely while denying them access to courts. Then he turned around and voted against laws created to protect female victims of violent crime and to keep guns out of schools. The guy just couldn’t make up his mind.

On the subject of religion, despite the separation of church and state as decreed by the U.S. Constitution, Rehnquist frequently found a place for God in government, as in 2002 when he wrote the 5-4 decision which permitted parents to use public tax money to send their children to religious schools.

But it was on the topic of race when his concept of white supremacy was truly exemplified. In 1952, Rehnquist composed legal documents that seemed to reflect his resistance to Broad v. Board of Education. And lest one think that the good justice became enlightened along the way, as recent as 1999, Rehnquist directed a gaggle of lawyers and judges in the singing of “Dixie” at a public setting.

Until his death, Rehnquist never did get around to disavowing these despicable acts of racism. And for that alone, we’re better off having him off the Supreme Court – by whatever means necessary.