Nobody is saying they are unpatriotic... (updated)
September 06, 2008
Actions do speak louder than words. Democrats tossed 12,000 American flags in the garbage following their convention. More

Powerful video addressed to Obama
September 06, 2008
This is clearly the must-watch video of the day. If you click it, stay the entire two minutes. I promise you the time is well-spent. More

One Unlikely VP Debate Question
September 06, 2008
The Democrats, supported by their allies in the old big media, never tired of highlighting Vice President Dick Cheney's absence of military service. What about Joe Biden? More

The Rangel scandal deepens
September 06, 2008
Charles Rangel writes the tax laws as head of the House Ways and Means Committee. But niceties like actually paying the taxes and reporting significant gifts are apparently for Republicans and the little people. More

Sarah smears continue
September 06, 2008
The left and the media are in a self-destructrive frenzy. More

McCain's sermon
September 06, 2008
McCain's acceptance speech Thursday night was in part a sermon on human redemption. M. Simon makes the cae. More

Reflections on the RNC
September 06, 2008
Eyewitness to history. More

How worried is Obama about Palin?
September 06, 2008
The deployment of female surrogates to counter Palin shows Obama's fear of the Alaskan governor's appeal. More

What has Obama done?
September 06, 2008
What exactly has Barack Obama done for his constituents when it comes to jobs? More

The peasants are revolting (updated)
September 06, 2008
The national press corps is beginning to get a taste of the anger they have created among a large percentage of the American public over their treatment of Sarah Palin. More

Sowell on 'Experience'
September 06, 2008
Thomas Sowell thoughtfully loks at the issue of "experience". More

Chicago Mayor Daley: 'There's no machine'
September 06, 2008
As they say in Chicago "Move along, nothing to see here. Move along!" More

Jeffrey St. Clair
That Dam Senator: A River Ran Through Him

Linn Washington, Jr.
The GOP Excluded Black-Owned Businesses from Contracts at St. Paul Convention

Patrick Cockburn
Did Bush Spies Monitor Iraqi Allies?

Gary Leupp
The September 3 Attack on Pakistan: a Precursor to More War Crimes?

William Blum
Has Obama Already Lost?

Michael Winship
The St. Paul Police vs. the Independent Media

Fred Gardner
Joe Biden, Drug Warrior

Nikolas Kozloff
Sarah Palin and the Wal-Mart Moms: the Cultural Packaging of VP Candidates

Wajahat Ali
The Cryptkeeper and His Pitbull: the Past and Future of the GOP

Wajahat Ali
The Cryptkeeper and His Pitbull: the Past and Future of the GOP

Robert Fantina
Change Agents?

Karyn Strickler
Palin by Comparison: Sarah and the Hillary Voters

David Yearsley
What Their Fanfares Told Us About the Candidates

Richard Rhames
Bad Campaign Moon Rising

James L. Secor
Bandwagon Politics

Missy Beattie
Missy for Vice POTUS

Eric Patton
Baseless in Obamaland

Jeffrey St. Clair
The Real McCain

Paul Craig Roberts
Who is Wrecking America?

Ron Jacobs
The Perishing Republicans, the RNC 9 and the Twin Cities Cops

Website of the Day
Sarah Palin's Air War: On Wolves and Bears

Alan Farago
Nothing Means Anything: The Fantasy of John and Sarah

Dave Lindorff
The Things They Left Behind (Including McCain's First Wife)

Ira Glunts
A Lesson Before Lying: How Republicans Solved Sarah Palin's Jewish Problem

Peter Morici
The Big Slump

Deepak Tripathi
Politics, Morality and the GOP: John McCain as John Major?

Palin's 'Trooper-gate' Cover-up
Sarah Palin is learning from the GOP cover-up playbook as she obstructs a probe into her alleged abuse of power, trying to get her ex-brother-in-law fired from the state troopers, reports Robert Parry. September 6, 2008

Sarah Palin's Media No-Show
Three of the four big party nominees were slated for the Sunday talk shows, but not Sarah Palin, who refuses to submit to serious questioning from the political press corps, notes Mary MacElveen. September 7, 2008

McCain's Neocon Evolution
GOP presidential nominee John McCain has aligned himself with the neocon movement. Watch TheRealNews.com's video. September 6, 2008

McCain Cites His 'Love of Country'
John McCain portrayed himself as a man saved by his "love of country." Watch TheRealNews.com's video. September 6, 2008

Obama Rolls Up His Sleeves, Hits McCain, Palin - Carrie Brown, Politico
The Sixty-Day War - John Heilemann, New York Magazine
Anatomy of a Palin Smear - Dean Barnett, Weekly Standard
Are Evangelicals Really Sold on Palin? - Amy Sullivan, Time
Palin, Evangelicals, and the Secularists - John Podhoretz, Commentary
McCain's Feminist Mistake - Susan Levine, In These Times
Palin Should Strike Fear in Democrats - Jack Kelly, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Don't 'Misunderestimate' Palin's Power - Clarence Page, Chicago Tribune
A Delicate Balance: Freddie and Fannie Bail-Out - Mohamed El-Erian, FT
National Tracking Polls: Gallup: McCain +3 | Rasmussen: Tied
Sunday Talk: Obama on This Week, McCain on FTN, Biden on MTP, FNS

The Culture War's Decisive Battle has Begun
Herbert E. Meyer
Unexpectedly -- perhaps even astonishingly -- this year's presidential campaign is shaping up as the decisive battle in the Culture War that's been tearing apart our country for decades. More

Sarah Palin's Not That Special
Alicia Colon
Sarah Palin is not that special. In Fact, she's typical of the conservative American women who don't whine about how difficult it is to wear so many hats. We just do it. More

Thirty Years after Camp David
Bruce Walker
Thirty years ago Jimmy Carter tried to change the world by getting the leaders of nations to agree. The result, in September 1978, was the Camp David Accords. Did it work? More

The Congressional Democrats and their change
September 08, 2008
If Nancy Pelosi was trying to make a point when she turned off the lights and microphones in The House and all the Democrats left town last month, it looks like the point made was the worst unemployment rate since 2001. More

Obama concedes the case on raising taxes
September 07, 2008
The One concedes that raising taxes while the economy is in a delicate condition could harm growth. But you have to wade through his vague prose to find it. More

Spreading the smear that Obama is a Muslim
September 07, 2008
Look at who is spreading the vicious rumor that Barack Obama is of the Muslim faith. I trust the campaign will condemn this bigot and see to it that he is driven from the public stage. More

The incredible shrinking New York Times shrinks again
September 07, 2008
After shrinking the width of its print edition by 1.5 inches a year ago, the New York Times has announced it will be printing fewer sections More

Democratic 'Wimp Factor' is Back
September 07, 2008
If ever there was evidence that in order for John McCain to win this election he must make it about national security it is this recent survey done by the Democratic pollsters The Third Way: More

Another Sarah Palin smear nailed
September 07, 2008
Michelle Malkin debunks a list of books Sarah Palin supposedly tried to ban in 1996. More

Another Sarah Palin smear nailed
September 07, 2008
Michelle Malkin debunks a list of books Sarah Palin supposedly tried to ban in 1996. More

Your Common Sense Liberal Column for the Day
September 07, 2008
Nick Cohen writing in The Guardian has some words of wisdom for his friends on the left regarding attacks on Sarah Palin: More

It's about the drilling, stupid
September 07, 2008
Kyle-Anne Shiver focuses her magnifying glass on the press and its treatment of Sarah More

Hilarious Fake Palin Bio
September 07, 2008
How did Sarah Palin celebrate her victory in the Alaska governor's race? More

Backlash against media for Palin smears
September 07, 2008
The GOP base, tired of the smears and outright falsehoods against Sarah Palin being advanced by the press, have taken to razzing the media at campaign events: More

Barack Obama wished to join the military but the Vietnam war's end cooled his ardor?
September 07, 2008
Where does one go with such a transparent pander? With such loopy logic? More

Zogby: McCain up 4
September 07, 2008
The devil for Obama in this poll is in the details. More

Weird Theology in Wasilla: A Look Inside Sarah Palin's Pentecostal Church

Bruce Wilson, Talk To Action

Election 2008: Exposing the unusual, highly politicized religious beliefs held at the Wasilla Assembly of God.


Sarah Palin's 9 Most Disturbing Beliefs

AlterNet Staff, AlterNet

It's time to shift the discussion about Palin to what really matters: her far-right views on the issues.

The US Has 761 Military Bases Across the Planet, and We Simply Never Talk About It

Tom Engelhardt, Tomdispatch.com

ForeignPolicy: America garrison the globe in ways that really are unprecedented, and yet, if you live in the United States, you basically wouldn't know it.

Is California on the Brink of Environmental Collapse?

Rachel Olivieri, AlterNet

Water: California has spared no expense to taxpayers or natural ecosystems to become the most hydrologically altered landmass on the planet.

Only in America Could a Two-Faced Creature Like McCain Attain Such Media Status

Rory O'Connor, AlterNet

Media and Technology: Only in America could a man who has called the mainstream media his "base" run against that very same media.


As Vets Take to the Streets to Protest the War, McCain Snubs IVAW at the RNC

Liliana Segura, AlterNet

War on Iraq: "War hero" McCain voted against healthcare funding for veterans in 2003, '04, '05, '06 and '07. Now veterans are confronting him on his record.


McCain's Palin Gambit: Are Americans Weary of the Culture Wars?

Sanho Tree, AlterNet

Election 2008: Sarah Palin's acceptance speech was heavy on rhetoric but light on substance. But ginning up the culture war may not work this time around.


Obama's Biden Pick Signals 'More of the Same' Stupid Drug Policies

Paul Armentano, AlterNet

DrugReporter: Joe Biden authored the laws establishing the White House drug czar and random drug testing of public employees, among others.


Exposing Five Dangerous Lies in McCain's Big Speech

AlterNet

Election 2008: McCain's falsehoods on health care, oil companies, trade, taxes and worker training were egregious and covered up his pro-corporate positions.


Breeding Envy: Do You Need to be a Millionaire to Have Kids?

Vanessa Richmond, The Tyee

Many parents are consumed by an ever-increasing list of things they should be but aren't buying for their kids.


Hospitals' Lessons From Hurricane Gustav

Sheri Fink, ProPublica

Health and Wellness: The pre-storm medical evacuation -- the largest in American history -- revealed some critical flaws in American hospitals.

• Star Parker : The end of race and gender politics
• Paul Greenberg : Sarah's Night
• Burt Prelutsky : Dissecting Liberals
• Mike S. Adams : The Gaystapo
• Carol Platt Liebau : Feminism’s Animal Farm: Where Pro-Choice Liberals Are “More Equal” Than Others
• Harry R. Jackson, Jr. : A Feminist’s Nightmare
• Karin Agness : Sarah Palin: A Liberated Woman
• Debra J. Saunders : Romancing the Vote
• Kevin McCullough : Why only 'modern' feminists hate Sarah Palin
• Doug Giles : If Bill Clinton Could Juggle Five Chicks, Sarah Palin Can Manage Five Kids
• Ken Connor : The Politics of Personal Destruction
• Lee Culpepper : Politics Palin's Polar Pounce: Purely Prodigious
• George Will : Are You Better Off?
• Steve Chapman : When Did Freedom Become an Orphan?
• Jackie Gingrich Cushman : The Middle Distance Begins
• David R. Stokes : It Didn't Start With Palin
• Salena Zito : Sexism in the Twin Cities
• Paul Jacob : What comes first?
• Austin Hill : Can A Guy Hit A Girl? Can Republicans Seize The Moment?
• Megan Basham : Republican Successes are Not Accidents
• Robert D. Novak : My Brain Tumor

U.S. Seizes Mortgage Giants - Hagerty, Simon & Paletta, Wall St. Journal
We're Losing the Broader Economic Struggle - Paul Krugman, NY Times
Economy Faces Perils, Doesn't Die - John Berry, Bloomberg
Democrats Must Learn Some Respect - Clive Crook, Financial Times
Wal-Mart Mom a Heartbeat Away - Bill Kristol, New York Times
GOP Suddenly Finds Its Inner Feminist - Anna Quindlen, Newsweek
A Feminist's Argument for Palin - Tammy Bruce, San Francisco Chronicle
Top 25 House Races - Reid Wilson & Kyle Trygstad, RealClearPolitics
Standing Pat Wrong Move for Obama, McCain - Stu Rothenberg, Roll Call
Why McCain is Running Against the News Media - Peter Brown, WSJ
McCain's Bias Claim: Truth or Tactic? - J. Carney & M. Scherer, Time
McCain's Convenient Untruth on Taxes - Sebastian Mallaby, Wash Post
The Most Important Election Since 1980 - Conrad Black, National Post
Desperate Attacks Very Revealing - Vin Suprynowicz, Las Vegas RJ
Building a Security Framework for a Nuclear Tehran - David Kay, WP
Russia: A Partner and an Adversary - Bernard-Henri Levy, New Republic
Part II: Military Chiefs Became

Weekend at Henry's - Wall Street Journal
Palin's Pipeline - Washington Post
Now the Debate Begins - Baltimore Sun
Candidates Ignore Immigration Reform - Dallas Morning News

<h3 style="margin: 0px; padding: 2px 0px 5px;">HealthCare Index</h3> Getting Real About Health Care
Costs Seen Rising Again Next Year
McCain, Obama Outline Policies

McCain is 'Tied or Behind' in Swing States He Needs - Bloomberg
Obama Stump Speech Plays to Fears, Hopes - Associated Press
Palin Fuses Politics & Motherhood in New Way - New York Times
Once Spruned, McCain Finds Corporate Support - Wall Street Journal

Best of the Blogs
54-44 and Fight! - Ed Morrissey, Hot Air
Sarah Palin's Secret Emails - David Corn, MoJo Blog
Palin in Debate - Byron York, The Corner
Along Comes Sarah - Scott Johnson, Power Line
What to Expect from Palin's Interview - Steve Benen, Political Animal

Why Did Violence Plummet? It Wasn't Just the Surge. - Bob Woodward, Washington Post

Throughout the summer of 2007, as the troop surge in Iraq reached full strength, Gen. David H. Petraeus kept waiting for the tide to turn. By summer's end, the US commander in Iraq got his wish. The high of 1,550 attacks a week fell below 800 -- nearly a 50 percent reduction. It has continued to fall over the past year.

Why did the violence drop so dramatically?

On one level, the surge was beginning to have its intended effect. Doubling the US forces in and around Baghdad from 17,000 to nearly 40,000, coupled with Petraeus's counterinsurgency game plan, had helped quell some of the sectarian and other violence that had defined the previous year and a half. About 30 joint security stations had been established around Baghdad; security along the borders with Iran and Syria had improved; and the Iraqi army was performing better.

In Washington, conventional wisdom translated these events into a simple view: The surge had worked. But the full story was more complicated. At least three other factors were as important as, or even more important than, the surge. These factors either have not been reported publicly or have received less attention than the influx of troops.

More at The Washington Post.

US 'Microgrants' Win Hearts, Minds One Business at a Time - Richard Tomkins, Washington Times

From a small compound in northeast Baghdad, US troops are taking tiny steps to rebuild an economy shattered by war.

Their target is al-Beidha'a, a community of cinderblock homes, apartment buildings and potholed streets close to Sadr City, where U.S. and Iraqi forces in April and May fought pitched battles against gunmen of anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and Iranian-influenced "special groups" militias.

The US is offering "microgrants" to strengthen and expand small businesses, help create jobs and invigorate the community. The effort also allows troops to expand personal interaction with Iraqis as they conduct meetings and surveys to find appropriate recipients.

"It isn't a free-money program," said Capt. Clint Rusch, who oversees the microgrant project of Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, 68th Armored Regiment, which is attached to the 1st Battalion of the 6th Infantry Regiment. "We're not giving away money. We're here helping people to get the technology and equipment they need to do better business.

More at The Washington Times.

US Begins Hunting Iraq's Bombmakers, Not Just Bombs - Tom A. Peter, Christian Science Monitor

When members of the Air Force's 447th Explosive Ordnance Disposal unit first arrived here in May, they were dealing with three to four roadside bombs a week. During prior tours, the group's veterans say at least one a day was normal.

But last month, they went their first week without encountering a single roadside bomb.

For US soldiers in Iraq, this decline is perhaps the loudest herald of a quieter Iraq. It's also representative of the US military's greater strategic shift, focusing less on individual threats like improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and broadening their scope to the larger counterinsurgency mission.

"We've made a mistake focusing on IEDs as a technological threat," says Frederick Kagan, a military expert at the American Enterprise Institute. To defeat roadside bombs in Iraq, the military had to broaden their focus beyond the devices and look at them as a piece of the entire conflict. "As we've been winning the counterinsurgency, the effectiveness of IEDs has been wearing off," he says.

IEDs, the military's name for roadside bombs, have posed the biggest threat for most of the war, accounting for the death of more than half of all US servicemen killed in combat. But since the troop surge began earlier this year, which is also when the military began to place a greater emphasis on counterinsurgency tactics, US military officials say IED attacks have dropped by 70 percent.

More at The Christian Science Monitor.

The War Within
In his "fourth insider account from the Bush White House," The War Within: A Secret White House History, 2006-2008, veteran journalist Bob Woodward "tracks the growing alarm in the White House in 2006, as U.S. casualties mounted during Iraq's plunge toward civil war." Based on "more than 150 interviews," including conversations with the President and classified documents, Woodward's book "reveals that the administration's efforts to develop a new Iraq strategy were crippled by dissension among the president's advisers, delayed by political calculations and undermined by a widening and sometimes bitter rift in civilian-military relations." Woodward portrays Bush as an out-of-touch commander in chief who was slow to recognize the threat posed by the growing Iraqi insurgency during the summer of 2006. Woodward reveals that, despite the Bush's public assertions that "he relies on his generals to tell him what to do," the surge strategy "came from the White House" and was strongly opposed by the Joint Chiefs of Staff and General George W. Casey, the Commanding General in Iraq from 2004 to 2007. The surge itself, Woodward notes, was not solely responsible for the lessening of violence in Iraq. "At least three other factors were as important as, or even more important than, the surge," Woodward writes.

DETACHED PRESIDENT: As violence escalated in Iraq throughout 2006, Bush seemed detached from the reality on the ground. In a recent interview with CBS's 60 Minutes, Woodward reported that Bush could not understand why the Iraqis were seemingly unappreciative of "what we've done to them." "His beacon is liberation. He thinks we've done this magnificent thing for them. I think he still holds to that position," Woodward said. In 2006, Casey "concluded that one big problem with the war was the president himself" who viewed the war in conventional terms, repeatedly asking how many of the various enemies had been captured or killed." Casey "confided to a colleague that he had the impression that Bush reflected the 'radical wing of the Republican Party that kept saying, 'Kill the Bastards! Kill the bastards! And you'll succeeded.'" Similarly, deputy national security adviser Megan O'Sullivan and National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley tried "in the summer of 2006 to get an Iraq strategy review underway" but "they encountered resistance," and "it was almost a month before the president would be fully engaged" in the process. With the 2006 midterm elections looming, the administration, Woodward writes, did not want to acknowledge that "Iraq had gotten so bad that they were considering a new approach. That would play into the hands of critics and antiwar Democrats." Finally, "in mid-October, after months of inaction, Hadley told the president, 'I want to start an informal internal review'...'Do it,' Bush said."

MILITARY OPPOSED THE SURGE: "While the violence in Iraq skyrocketed to unnerving levels, a second front in the war raged at home, fought at the highest levels of the White House, the Pentagon, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the State Department," Woodward writes. Indeed, "the idea of five brigades came from the White House, not from anybody except the White House." The Joint Chiefs of Staff "all but dismissed the surge option, worried that the armed forces were already stretched to the breaking point." Like Casey, the JCS "favored a renewal effort to train and build up the Iraqi security forces so that U.S. troops could begin to leave." By November 2006, the chiefs' frustrations burst into the open" after "news coverage that retired Gen. Jack Keane, the former Army vice chief of staff had briefed the president...about a new strategy being proposed by the American Enterprise Institute." "When does the AEI start trumping the Joint Chiefs of Staff on this stuff," Gen. Peter J. Schoomaker, the Army chief, asked during one meeting. Adm. Michael Mullen, chief of naval operations, warned that "the all-volunteer force might break under the strain of extended and repeated deployments" and "several of the chiefs noted that the five brigades were effectively the strategic reserve of the U.S. military, the forces on hand in case of flare-ups elsewhere in the world." But Bush decided that the surge would "keep a lid on" violence and "also help here at home, since for many the measure of success is reduction in violence." For all his certainty, however, the president "did not know what his principal military adviser, Gen. Pace had recommended." During an interview with Woodward, Bush said, "Okay, I don't know this. I'm not in these meetings, you'll be happy to hear, because I got other things to do."

SURGE NOT FULLY RESPONSIBLE FOR DECREASE IN VIOLENCE: Despite conventional wisdom that "the surge had worked...the full story was more complicated." According to Woodward, the U.S. military's reliance on "a series of top-secret operations...had a far-reaching effect on the violence and were very possibly the biggest factor in reducing it." These covert activities enabled the military "to locate, target and kill key individuals in groups such as al-Qaeda in Iraq, the Sunni insurgency and renegade Shia militias, or the so-called special groups." Defense officials say that the military relied on "fusion cells" or "small, hybrid teams of special forces and intelligence officers" to capture "hundreds of suspected terrorists and their supporters in recent months" The book also reveals that U.S. intelligence closely tracked Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki. "There is significant surveillance of Maliki. And as one source told me, 'We know everything he says.' And others I've talked to about that say, 'You can't literally know everything.' But we know a great deal," Woodward said in the 60 Minutes interview. Woodward also confirms that "the so-called Anbar Awakenings, in which tens of thousands of Sunnis turned against al-Qaeda in Iraq and signed up with U.S. forces," and Moqtada al-Sadr's decision "to suspend operations" of his powerful Mahdi Army also contributed to the lessening of violence.

ETHICS -- HISTORIANS CALL ON CONGRESS TO STOP BUSH/CHENEY FROM DESTROYING DOCUMENTS: The Center for American Progress Action Fund (CAPAF) has partnered with the three leading associations of U.S. historians -- the American Historical Association, the Organization of American Historians, and the National Coalition for History -- to send letters urging Congress to strengthen the Presidential Records Act of 1978 (PRA), which requires the preservation of all presidential records. Mark Agrast, a Senior Fellow at CAPAF who led the effort, told The Progress Report, "After learning of the loss or destruction of millions of White House e-mails, we asked 30 of America's most eminent historians to join us in urging Congress to put real teeth behind the PRA." Agrast explained the need for action saying, "The PRA cannot do its job if presidents are free to ignore it, and the preservation of the historical record is too important to be left to the sole discretion of this or any future White House." Separately, the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington is "asking a federal judge to declare that Vice President Cheney's records are covered by the Presidential Records Act of 1978 and cannot be destroyed, taken or withheld without proper review," the Washington Post reports. Their goal is to preserve records that "could be hidden from the public if Cheney adheres to his view that he is not part of the executive branch." View CAPAF's letters to House and Senate leaders here and 7&elq=657372467D7140ECB30013ABC12CB188".

RELIGION -- RIGHT-WING ALLIANCE DEFENSE FUND SEEKS TO PUT OVERT POLITICS IN CHURCHES: The conservative group Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) is recruiting several dozen pastors to publicly endorse political candidates from their pulpits on Sept. 28, "in defiance of Internal Revenue Service rules," the Washington Post reports. The effort is "designed to trigger an IRS investigation that ADF layers would then challenge in federal court," with the aim of persuading the Supreme Court "to throw out a 54-year-old ban on political endorsements by tax-exempt houses of worship." Three dozen church leaders have already agreed to participate, promising to "make a specific recommendation from the pulpit about how the congregation would vote," according to an ADF attorney. In 2004, Americans United for the Separation of Church and State asked the IRS to investigate statements by Bishop Michael Sheridan, who sent a letter to church members "insisting that they not vote for candidates who support legal abortion, stem-cell research or euthanasia." Another group of bishops that year, "alarmed at the prospect of a President Kerry," blanketed churches "with guides identifying abortion, gay marriage, and the stem cell debate as among a handful of 'non-negotiable issues.'" Archbishop Charles Chaput declared voting for Kerry would have been tantamount to "cooperating in evil."

RADICAL RIGHT -- REP. SMITH: 'OUR STUDENTS MUST FIND THE GOD OF THE BIBLE AND BIBLICAL VALUES IN THE CLASSROOM': At a reception in St. Paul, MN on Wednesday for Catholic Republicans, Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ) -- a fierce opponent of abortion -- said that he is "very concerned that many of our schools and universities have lost their way." They have become "bastions of moral relativism and moral compromise with the culture of death." As a solution, Smith suggested that "students must find the God of the Bible and Biblical values in the classroom." "Our schools need to become oases of goodness," said Smith. Smith's call for "Biblical values in the classroom" could easily be interpreted as a call for the promotion of Christianity in American schools. But, as the First Amendment Center has pointed out, "the courts have been clear that public school teachers cannot teach religion to their students or read the Bible to the class as a way of promoting their faith." Smith's comments appear to be even more radical than Rep. Steve King's (R-IA) claim last year that "every child" in American schools needs to learn "the tenets of the Christian faith." While King conceded that if "the tenets of Christianity" are to be taught in school, "other faiths" should be taught as well, Smith said no such thing.

SALLY KOHN
Defending Community Organizing ourfuture.org — If the candidates are going to start attacking each other personally, why can't they leave hard working community organizers out of it? It's ironic that as both parties are focused on change, community organizers — the ones who actually patch the holes and our democracy and help Americans demand change — are now a political football. PAUL KRUGMAN

The Resentment Strategy nytimes.com — The Republican Party, now more than ever, is firmly in the hands of the angry right, which has always been much bigger, much more influential and much angrier than its counterpart on the other side. What's the source of all that anger?

JARED BERNSTEIN
Disdain Versus Change huffingtonpost.com — They're not talking about the part of your life wherein good government can actually make a difference. That's because they've failed to govern competently and they're bereft of ideas about what to do next.

CLIVE CROOK
Nationalization in All But Name ft.com — The "conservatorship" that Hank Paulson, Treasury secretary, has announced for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac is nationalization by another name. Give the man some credit for this. It is not an easy thing for a Republican administration to take two such colossal undertakings on to the public sector's balance sheet two months after promising not to.

RUSSELL MORSE
The New Right news.newamericamedia.org — A week in the Twin Cities revealed the manifestation of events like Columbine, the Seattle WTO protests, and the Oklahoma City bombing in the faces of the young white men of two movements well outside the walls of the convention; groups of men without a political home.

DEAN BAKER
The Need for Community Organizers tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com — In the world where people can't remember how many homes they own, no one can imagine needing a community organizer to help them press their case with city hall. These people already own city hall.

SUSAN CHANDLER
The Cost of Privatization chicagotribune.com — The privatization of public assets has sparked a debate among academics and urban officials across the country about whether the leasing infrastructure is a smart way to manage public resources. Less has been said about what happens to consumers when they go from being taxpayers using public facilities to customers of a for-profit business. It turns out they pay a lot more

DANA GOLDSTEIN
The Conservative Case for Urbanism prospect.org — Republicans may have an uneasy relationship to global warming, but some are finding reasons to embrace government projects close to environmentalists' hearts — like public transit.

McPalin Rattles Team Obama - Jonah Goldberg, Los Angeles Times
Obama is Still in the Driver's Seat - Douglas Schoen, New York Daily News
A Pathetic Response to GOP Attacks - Richard Cohen, Washington Post
The Palin Firestorm - Pat Buchanan, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
Voters Want Solutions on the Economy - Mark Penn, Financial Times
Protecting Taxpayers From More Bailouts - Sen. McCain & Gov. Palin, WSJ
On Nov. 4, Remember 9/11 - Jeffrey Goldberg, New York Times
Palin Signals Fewer Choices for Women - Dahlia Lithwick, Newsweek
Is Trig at the Heart of Media's Reaction to Palin? - Mona Charen, NRO
Palin, Muslim Fundamentalists Are One and the Same - Juan Cole, Salon
Obama Pays Price for Bungled Attacks on Palin - Kirsten Powers, NY Post
It's Not Going to Be About the Issues - Tom Bevan, RealClearPolitics
'You're Not Accountable, Jack' - Bob Woodward, Washington Post
Woodward on the Surge - Peter Wehner, Commentary
Liberals Should Celebrate Their Successes - Bob Herbert, New York Times
The Vision of the Left - Thomas Sowell, RealClearPolitics
Running Against Resentment - Marie Cocco, Indianapolis Star
RCP Blog: Clinton's 2nd Tour of Duty | Palin Attacks No Joke | AM Rpt
Politics Nation: Strat Memo | Top 25 House Races

Editorials
The Bailout's Big Lessons - New York Times
Did Obama Shift on Taxes? - Wall Street Journal
The Truth About Drilling - USA Today
Venezuela Plays The Russia Card - Investor's Business Daily

Transcripts & Speeches


Guest: John McCain (PDF) - Face the Nation
Guest: Joe Biden - Meet the Press
Guests: David Axelrod & Rick Davis - Fox News Sunday
Guests: Sen. Kyl & Gov. Kaine - Late Edition
Bob Woodward on "60 Minutes" - 60 Minutes

Best of the Blogs
Sarah Palin's 1,100+ Secret Emails - Justin Gardner, Cross Tabs
We Could Actually Win This Thing - Patrick Ruffini, Next Right
Palin 's Per Diem Issue - Jeralyn, TalkLeft
Wilma Jennings Bryan - Jim Manzi, The Corner
Where Have All the Republicans Gone? - Ryan Avent, The Bellows

The Sarah Palin Farce
Now is not the time for right-wing screwball.
by Leon Wieseltier

• Scheiber: The Polls Aren't THAT Bad
• Palin's Scary-Sharp Debating Skills
• Cottle: Big Families Are All-American!
• Plumer: Will Hurricanes Kill Our Dreams Of Energy Independence?
• Peretz: Chavez Is The New Castro

CNN Actually Does Have The Best Political Team On Television. God Help Us.
by Greg Veis

Why Is Sarah Palin Hiding From The Media? Because The McCain Campaign Knows She's Unprepared To Face Them.
by E.J. Dionne, Jr.

http://www.tnr.com/politics/story.html?id=...88-7bd1a99935e7


Sarah Palin Scares Me--And Here's Why
by Noam Scheiber

A Bad Year For Feminism: Can Someone Please Tell Me What Happened?
by Michelle Cottle
The Making Of A Conservative Folk Hero: Why Rush And The GOP Establishment Were In Love With Sarah Palin Even Before She Was Picked
by Dave Jamieson
If Russia Is Both Partner And Adversary, How Should The West Respond?
by Bernard-Henri Levy
Cutting Through The Propaganda About The History Of Muslim Anti-Semitism
by Benny Morris
THE 60 DAY SPRINT: Should Democrats Start Worrying Already?
by Nate Silver

• September 9, 2008
• More »

Medicare: A Bush Disaster That My Life Depends on

James Ridgeway, Mother Jones

Health and Wellness: Remember Bush's signature health care initiative? I need it to survive -- and that's not very reassuring.


Nationalize Fannie Mae? It Worked Until It Was Privatized

Robert Kuttner, Huffington Post

Amid all the hubbub, it's important to remember Fannie Mae's pedigree.


Palin, Huckabee and the GOP's 'Hick Factor'

Sarah Posner, AlterNet

Election 2008: Why did the GOP choose a political neophyte to appeal to the religious right over a seasoned politico? Fried squirrels and economic populism.

Why Obama's Message Resonates with Millions

By Matt Taibbi, RollingStone.com

Election 2008: Obama delivers the same message Democrats always rely on. So why does it sound like a clarion call this time around?

Medicare: A Bush Disaster That My Life Depends on

James Ridgeway, Mother Jones

Health and Wellness: Remember Bush's signature health care initiative? I need it to survive -- and that's not very reassuring.


Nationalize Fannie Mae? It Worked Until It Was Privatized

Robert Kuttner, Huffington Post

Amid all the hubbub, it's important to remember Fannie Mae's pedigree.


Palin, Huckabee and the GOP's 'Hick Factor'

Sarah Posner, AlterNet

Election 2008: Why did the GOP choose a political neophyte to appeal to the religious right over a seasoned politico? Fried squirrels and economic populism.

Five Things You Need to Know about Hurricanes

Carl Pope, Huffington Post

Water: Three years after Katrina and a week since Gustav, we are in need of a sobering reminder of some basic truths.


Wall Street's Next Target: Roads and Bridges

David Bollier, OnTheCommons.org

The New York Times has jumped aboard the corporate cheering squad for the privatization of America’s bridges and roads.


VA Now Allows Voter Registration Drives, But Will Its New Policy Help Vets in 2008?

Steven Rosenfeld, AlterNet

Democracy and Elections: With Senate pressure looming, Veterans Affairs issues a new policy after barring voter drives for most of the 2008 voter registration season.

Jon Stewart Presents 'McCain: Reformed Maverick'
Video: The Daily Show's John McCain bio film shows him through the wild years, up to abandoning everything he's always stood for. More »

The Real Reason Bush Spied on Maliki

Patrick Cockburn, Independent UK

War on Iraq: Although Bob Woodward doesn't mention it in his book, the true aim of the U.S. has been to figure out Baghdad's real relationship with Iran.

How the West Will Be Won
Eli Sanders
September 8, 2008
As Democrats make their play for the Mountain West, candidates like cousins Mark and Tom Udall are altering the Democratic message to appeal to the region's independent-minded voters. In the process, they're changing the whole notion of what it means to be a Democrat.

Mark Udall, D-Colo., and Tom Udall, D-N.M., sharing a laugh in Washington, Tuesday, May 10, 2005. (AP Photo/Tami A. Heilemann, Interior Department)

The group blog of The American Prospect
Lies that keep on giving.[/color]
Posted at 2:05 p.m.



A respectable liberal blog
Palin's first flub.
Posted at 3:08 p.m.


Dean Baker's economic commentary
[color="#800000"]Yes, the Fannie/Freddie bailout was predictable.

Media's Treatment of Palin and Obama
James Edmund Pennington
If Barack Obama's past had been subjected to one tenth the media scrutiny during the full year of his candidacy, to which Sarah Palin has been subjected during the last two weeks, Hillary Clinton would be the Democratic nominee. More

The Mom and the One
Christopher Chantrill
We know now that the Palin phenomenon is for real. We can tell because our lefty friends have come up with a new pejorative: "Caribou Barbie." More

The Party of Genuine Tolerance and Inclusion: Republican
Humberto Fontova
Our next vice President eats mooseburgers from moose she has killed, yet her speechwriter is an animal rights activist. Now that's a big tent. More

Unions try playing the race card
September 09, 2008
Don't you love it when leftist unions accuse their own membership of being racists? More

Who supported that Bridge to Nowhere?
September 09, 2008
Talk is cheap. Look at the vote in Congress when there was an opportunity to send the pork funding to help Katrina victims instead. More

An Obama-Annenberg irony
September 09, 2008
The Annenberg Foundation's FactCheck.org group has been shooting down rumors about Palin spread by Obama supporters. More

Obama tipped off about search of Annenberg Records
September 08, 2008
No big surprise. More

Fannie and Freddie: GOP Cleaning up Democrat Messes
September 08, 2008
Grown ups are always having to step in and clean up the messes left by the children. Such is the case all too often in our government. More

Obama Dials Up His Trash Talk
September 08, 2008
It's time to go on Obama Trash Talk Watch. He's demonstrated a proclivity toward using such language when under stress. More

The 'Obama is a Muslim' smear continues
September 08, 2008
Yet another prominent political figure joined the" Barack Obama is a Muslim" vicious smear campaign. More

GOP gets huge lift from convention
September 08, 2008
Obama must be talking to himself about now... More

Matthews, Olbermann ousted from anchor duties
September 08, 2008
Could we be seeing the beginning of a trend? More

New York Post Endorses McCain for President
September 08, 2008
A good start to the week for McCain. More

How to tell Obama's in trouble
September 08, 2008
Sunday Biden says life begins at conception. Over the weekend Obama said he'll not rescind the Bush tax cuts if the economy remained in trouble. Earlier on O'Reilly he said the surge did work. More

United Nations Rooting for Obama
September 08, 2008
Obama and the United Nations: Kindred Spirits More

• The Culture War's Decisive Battle has Begun - Herbert E. Meyer

• Sarah Palin's Not That Special - Alicia Colon

• Thirty Years after Camp David - Bruce Walker

ETHICS
Lies To Nowhere
On August 29, when Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) introduced Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin ® as his running mate, he touted her as "someone who's stopped government from wasting taxpayers' money." Following McCain on the stage, Palin claimed that she "told Congress, 'Thanks, but no thanks,' on that Bridge to Nowhere." "If our state wanted a bridge, I said we'd build it ourselves," said Palin. Since her debut on the national stage, the McCain campaign and its surrogates have reiterated this claim at least 19 times, even featuring it in a new TV ad. But the problem is that Palin's claim to be the the great bridge killer doesn't stand up to scrutiny. As The New Republic's Brad Plumer first noted, Palin "was fine with the bridge in principle, never had a problem with the earmarks, bristled at all the mockery, and only gave up on the project when it was clear that federal support wasn't forthcoming." "We need to come to the defense of Southeast Alaska when proposals are on the table like the bridge," Palin said in August 2006, "and not allow the spinmeisters to turn this project or any other into something that's so negative." In fact, not only did Palin support the project while running for governor in 2006, but when she finally redirected funds away from the bridge, she lamented the fact that Congress had "little interest in spending any more money on a bridge between Ketchikan and Gravina Island." Afterwards, Palin "did not return the federal money. She just allocated it elsewhere."

RUNNING FOR THE BRIDGE: As the Associated Press wrote recently, "Palin was for the infamous bridge to nowhere before she was against it." In September 2006, while campaigning in the city that would benefit from the bridge, Palin spoke in favor of the bridge. "The money that's been appropriated for the project, it should remain available for a link," said Palin, according to the Ketchikan Daily News. "I think we're going to make a good team as we progress that bridge project." She also told the residents that "she felt their pain when politicians called them 'nowhere.'" In fact, Palin was so supportive, that she was even photographed displaying a pro-bridge t-shirt that proclaimed, "Nowhere, Alaska 99901." Asked by the Anchorage Daily News in Oct. 2006 if she would "continue state funding for the proposed Knik Arm and Gravina Island bridges," Palin replied, "Yes," adding that she "would like to see Alaska's infrastructure projects built sooner rather than later. The window is now -- while our congressional delegation is in a strong position to assist."

'A NATIONAL EMBARRASSMENT': Funds for the project, which would build "a bridge nearly as long as the Golden Gate Bridge" to connect an island populated by 50 people to the mainland, were appropriated by Alaska's congressional delegation in a 2006 transportation bill. Soon after it gained infamy as the epitome of excessive pork-barrel spending. In October 2005, Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) tried to "redirect the money" to a bridge damaged by Hurricane Katrina, but following Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) threat to resign, the Senate kept the project with an 82 to 15 vote. Coburn's failed effort "became a cause celebre on the left and the right." The conservative Heritage Foundation released a paper calling the bridge earmark "a national embarrassment." T