Journal of Post-Ralphaelite Thought

I was in a meeting this afternoon and the chief source of conversation quickly degenerated into a discussion of the vertigo-inducing free fall of the financial markets which was in progress. The DJIA ended the day down 777 points. Our company stock fell 15% today . It's now lost 2/3rds of its value for the year. Lots of nervous jokes and pale faces in the meeting. Candidate McCain quickly blamed Obama for not pulling along enough votes to get the bailout recovery plan to pass. This was after he failed to drag along more than 40% of the Republicans. Bush now expects the Democrats to carry his water? Why in God's name would anyone expect that to happen? Despite the brainwarp this induces, 60% of the Democrats did vote to pass it. The fact that 60% of the GOP legislators decided to give both Bush and McCain the bird on this does not bode well for the Senator from Arizona. It probably doesn't bode well for the GOP up for election this year, either. Meanwhile my 401k looks a...

Of all the third party candidates in recent years, I have decided Bob Barr is my favorite. Third party candidates over the years have fulfilled many roles. Some have served to espouse unpopular ideas, some have provided an outlet for voter irritation or protest, some have provided much needed comic relief. Eugene Debs and Robert La Follette both pushed progressive agendas at the turn of the 19th century. Strom Thurmond ran as a "Dixiecrat" to protest the Civil Rights Act in 1948 and in 1968 former governor George Wallace, feeding off racial strife, polled 13.5% of the popular vote and won 45 electoral votes (primarily southern states). I confess I voted in 2000 for John Anderson, who ran against Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan as an independent. Ross Perot was a screeching wacko who may have cost Bush the elder the 1992 election and Ralph Nader is a cranky egomaniac that may have cost Al Gore the 2000. Bob Barr , in the few times I've caught him on Stephen Colbert ha...

When I went in and checked the value of my 401K today, after the market dropped over 500 points (the biggest one day drop since September 11, 2001). I saw that it is now worth half what it was at the start of the year. Jeebus frogging Cripes! It's not that I'm highly leveraged or optioned, or invested in any number of highly suspect derivative securities. We are now watching what happens to an economy that has had 8 years of Republican deregulation. Hel- lo ? There's a reason stuff is regulated: it's to protect financial markets from greedy fucks like the jokers running Lehman Bros. and Merrill Lynch. Get rid of the regs and sooner or later you get the predicatable result we see today (and a couple of weeks ago with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac): a bunch of hotdogs with MBAs out attempting to game the system. Works great until it stops working. Then...whoops. And of course the real villains will walk away, their purses still bulging and fat, looking for the next opportuni...

Apparently I'm not the only one who's picked up on the fact that John McCain is a lying bastard: even Republicans have noticed. Orrin Hatch has decried as "ridiculous" the McCain claim that Obama was referring to the Right's Favorite Hockey Mom when he used the phrase "lipstick on a pig." Says Don Sipple, a Republican advertising strategist, "I think the predominance of liberty taken with truth and the facts has been more McCain than Obama." Oh my. FactCheck.org has repeatedly called out the McCain campaign for playing fast and loose (or not at all) with the truth, including the bullshit " lipstick on a pig story ," their claim Obama proposed sex education to kindergarteners (the proposal was actually how to protect against predators), and Sarah Palin's run-ins with reality . To quote the New York Times : A McCain spokesman, Brian Rogers, said the campaign had evidence for all its claims. "We stand fully by everything that...

So now John McCain is full of righteous outrage over what he has announced were "offensive and disgraceful" remarks about Sarah "Pitbull" Palin by Barack Obama. The disgraceful quote? Said Obama, on McCain and Bush's policies: "You can put lipstick on a pig. It’s still a pig. You can wrap an old fish in a piece of paper called change. It’s still going to stink after eight years." Oh puh-leeze. The "lipstick on a pig" quip has been used by Republicans, including John McCain, referring to Hillary Clinton's health care proposals (see clip below). I don't seem to recall a great eruption of rage over perceived sexism then. In fact, Hillary was regularly excoriated by the GOP. Calling her a pig would have seemed mild. And so the Republicans and their designated slimemeisters carry on that twin tradition of the Big Lie and the Dirty Trick, The Big Lie: say something so brazenly untrue that people assume no one could make up something that un...

Well, I guess it's official: Sarah "the Barracuda" Palin, having been anointed last night as McCain's vice-presidential running mate, is now Red State America's sweetheart. Five minutes was about all I could take of her last night. The Daily Show had an amazing send up of her huffing and puffing supporters, proving once again they have what is arguably the best research team around anywhere. I can't improve on this -- watch it and ask why CNN and the networks have such piss-poor news teams in comparison.

John McCain is having a rough go of things lately. I mean the guy can't catch a break. I almost feel sorry for him. Almost. First Hurricane Gustav forced a hasty scaling back of the Republican festivities in St. Paul, Minnesota. Then Hurricane Sarah created another storm. Governor Palin probably looked good on paper as the McCain team sketched out strategies in some dark room. But in harsh glare of reality, his decision looks rash and poorly thought out. He can't help but be having buyer's remorse right about now. His choice seems to be a naked attempt to appeal to disaffected Hillary Clinton supporters. Except Sarah Palin is no Hillary. Who thought this fundamentalist right winger would appeal to Clinton's constituency? While she may shore up McCain's soft support amongst the Conservative Christian right, Palin will serve only to alarm moderate voters once they get a closer look. In addition, she brings several liabilities: an abuse of power investigation over all...