Woe is Me

As I have watched the political campaigns unfold since the conventions, I have found myself trying to come to grips with the way the Republicans came out slamming, slandering, and sucker punching. All of this after having chosen a VP candidate that embodies every bit of the "lack of experience" rhetoric with which they had criticized Obama.

Then they turned it all around in favor of Palin. I have laughed heartily at her "Commander-in-Chief "experience" at the head of the Alaska National Guard. She is pictured as being against Federal handouts while she received untold millions. Her international experience is touted as the fact that her state "borders" two foreign countries. The trash talk has gushed forth as she has become the darling of the right wingers.

The sad part here is that so many have embraced this garbage as the issues have been placed in the backseat. As Palin has emerged and her story and its downright lies have been brought out, the McCain campaign has used it to move the front page news away from addressing the issues, because they can't defend McCain's cuddling with Bush. Many of my friends actually believe or have made themselves believe all of the lies and innuendo that McCain and Palin have placed before them to my dismay.

At the moment I am very disappointed with the way the politics have turned. If the polls are, indeed, correct (Frankly, I don't believe them.) all of the lies have been effective in convincing Americans that McCain-Palin is the answer to our woes. We know this isn't so, and I hope that this is simply a short-lived post campaign bump and that the starry eyed right wingers really haven't won already. We simply cannot afford another Republican administration, especially one of this ilk with a VP that would make Dick Cheney look like an innocent pre-schooler.

I am going to take a break from the campaign and clear my head of this frustration. I look forward to a great Petit Lemans coming up at Road Atlanta in a few weeks and our annual SEBA Bluegrass festival a week from now. I also have my basement project to complete. I know there will be some positive posts emerge from all of this.

Is McCain in Control?

As the John McCain political campaign has unfolded, the question has begun to arise in my mind as to whether John McCain can control anything. In the first place his campaign staff structure has undergone several changes as the campaign has repeatedly gotten off track. Each time McCain has had trouble restructuring, because, it is said, he has trouble firing people and talking straight to them. He simply moves them around and puts different people in charge. Then he fails to tell those who have been deposed, so to speak.

We heard him pledge a clean campaign. Now we have the news today of a terrible ad that accuses Obama of supporting sex education for kindergartners. It is a deliberate misrepresentation of the real story. The ad states that Obama supported comprehensive sex education for kindergartners. It goes on to say: "Learning about sex before learning to read? Barack Obama. Wrong on education. Wrong for your family."

The part of the sex education bill that applied to young children allowed teachers to warn them about inappropriate touching and sexual predators. At the time Obama made it very clear that he was not in favor of teaching young children detailed sex education. Yet the McCain campaign has twisted it around in such a way that those who do not think for themselves will be repeating it often in the coming weeks. I expect it to show up in my inbox soon.

Finally, there is McCain's VP choice. Sources on the inside say that McCain was going to choose either Tom Ridge or Joe Liberman, but a back door group of fundamentalist evangelists and others of their ilk, made the choice of Palin for him. It sounds as if he still doesn't control his campaign. He wants the presidency so badly, that he has sold his soul to the party and its extreme base. He says he and Palin are "mavericks," but it doesn't show. Palin is a maverick only in her own mind and McCain has fading memories of bucking his party.

So, who will be in control if McCain wins the presidency? His handlers and that group that chose his VP for him, most likely. These are the same people who have influenced George W. Bush and his regime for the last eight years. A McCain presidency will find us fighting the same social battles the right-wingers have championed, while the country sinks further into despair. We will continue to retreat as they threaten our precious U.S. Constitution and place their backward agenda at the forefront. A McCain presidency will place this country closer to the precipice from which we may not recover.

Hypocrites Karl Rove, Bill O'Reilly, and Dick Morris

This video says it all. The Republicans can't have it both ways. Their Sarah Palin spin is so hypocritical. Somehow, they seem to always get away with it, because they blame the "liberal" press. Exactly how, the "liberal" press slants comments such as those in this video is beyond me.