Preemptive action

Does Bush even know what the Kyoto treaty is?

I get reports

Bush knows how hard things are in Iraq because he sees it on TV. Jesus.

Debating

I'm not neutral, god knows, but I think Kerry's kicking ass.

Friday misc.

Somehow I'm not in the mood to talk about the elections today.

Jessamyn West wrote an interesting piece on her experience as a credentialled blogger at the DNC on llrx.com (a website geared towards law librarians - I do occasionally try to keep up with my librarian past).

Update on the map below: the tropical storm missed us, although its remnants may bend back this way and throw some rain at us later. Nothing major.

Yike!

The Raleigh-Durham News-Observer has a piece on the topsy-turvy nature of the presidential race. This is the thing that's been perplexing me most. Apparently I just don't get the way the average voter thinks, because I don't understand why people are buying Bush's line. Can somebody explain it to me?

The debate rules. Rather funny.


A couple of things in the local paper of national interest:

The judge in the Robert Durst case rejected a plea bargain agreement to clear the outstanding charges against him. She won't comment on why.

And three people connected to Ken DeLay's campaign organization were indicted by a grand jury yesterday for illegally raising corporate money for use in Texas elections in 2002, which is not allowed in Texas.

How likely is likely?

Here's another piece on "likely voters" - from the WSJ, but I think that registration is not required for this one.

there is reason to suspect those criteria are outdated, especially in an election where both sides say the intensity level is much higher than four years ago and get-out-the-vote organizations are considerably better than ever -- few people on Nov. 2 will be in the dark on where the voting polls are.

Here a poll, there a poll

Kerry may have a September resurgence, says CNN. That's nice of them to say, since at least some of the polls say it's already happened. And that Gallup poll showing the president with a 13-point lead? The Note (which is ABC News, remember) uses the word "joke" (see the top paragraph). And I'm guessing they don't choose that word lightly. Apparently Gallup has been weighting the voting toward Republicans.


Teresa Neilsen-Hayden on "No-Fly" lists and the proposed new "Trusted Traveler" card. The world gets more Orwellian every day.


And in completely apolitical news, John Scalzi points out that Roger Ebert has revamped his website, which is good news for film geeks. (It looks like you can also just go to plain rogerebert.com as well.)

More catching up

This one's a whole month old, but you know, I have a weakness for people who go off on Bush full-scale:

The Bush administration is quite possibly the most economically destructive, environmentally devastating, ethically corrupt, internationally loathed, deliberately tyrannical, worst-dressed administration in American history.

Actually, to give credit where credit is due, Bush himself is a fairly snappy dresser. Cheney might be another matter.

I hadn't heard of an "ownership society" yet, but it sounds sort of ominous, especially the way the NYT puts it.

When President Bush talks about an "ownership society," hold on to your wallet. The slogan, like "compassionate conservative" before it, is sufficiently vague to mean many things to many people, and the few details that Mr. Bush has provided - encouraging more home ownership and offering new tax-sheltered savings plans - seem innocuous enough. But in tax terms, "ownership society" means only one thing: the further reduction, if not the elimination, of taxes on savings and investments, including taxes on dividends and on capital gains on stocks, bonds and real estate. That, in turn, means, by definition, a shift in the tax burden onto wages and salaries - or, put more simply, a wage tax.

...

The Bush camp has been floating the idea that what the president is getting at is a consumption tax. But the administration is not talking about a true consumption tax, which would apply to spending regardless of where the money comes from - from your paycheck, cashing in your stocks and bonds, selling your house, or borrowing. It is, in effect, talking about a tax on wages.

Catch-up blogging

I've been gone so here's stuff I found while I was trying to catch up.

Hurricane "Forces" GOP to Put Nader on Florida Ballot Despite Court Order (TPM)

I don't know that all this about Bush, Barnes and GTech is really anything new, but I've never heard it all put together quite this way. (Pandagon)

Somebody who was actually in the National Guard in Alabama in 1972 says he is sure Bush wasn't. (NYT) (Bush dated Tricia Nixon? Now admittedly I'm not up on my W trivia, but I never heard that.)

And Available Light has some advice for Senator Kerry.

Bad timing?

Medicare premiums are going up 17% next year.

In years past, the increases in premiums have been announced in October at the same time that cost-of-living increases to Social Security checks are announced. ... McClellan said that politics played no role in the administration's decision to announce the increase late Friday afternoon just as much of official Washington was heading out for a three-day weekend and the Republican convention and a Florida hurricane were dominating the news.

"Politics played no role" - I'm sure.


And the Washington Post looks at the facts behind all those GOP speeches last week.

Mixed messages

I started to say I quote Josh Marshall a lot, but then I looked and I haven't quoted him lately at all. I've linked to him a good many times, though. Anyway, here's his version of the message the Democrats are trying to get across:

President Bush lied the country into war and then screwed up Iraq. He's racked up huge deficit numbers but no good jobs numbers. He's blown a lot of stuff up; but he's made America less safe.

I can't speak for all Democrats, but that kind of sums it up for me.

-----------------------------------------------

Georgia Democrats on Zell Miller. (Apparently they have been running that commercial on A&E.)

Man. Here is a speech from Miller's own website - from miller.senate.gov, y'all - and not from 12 years ago, but from THREE:

My job tonight is an easy one: to present to you one of this nation's authentic heroes, one of this party's best-known and greatest leaders – and a good friend.

He was once a lieutenant governor – but he didn't stay in that office 16 years, like someone else I know. It just took two years before the people of Massachusetts moved him into the United States Senate in 1984.

In his 16 years in the Senate, John Kerry has fought against government waste and worked hard to bring some accountability to Washington.

Weird. What happened to this guy?

"We’re Not in Lake Wobegon Anymore"

Garrison Keillor takes on the Republican party:

Republicans: The No.1 reason the rest of the world thinks we’re deaf, dumb and dangerous.

(Thanks to Corina at TUS for alerting us to the existence of this piece!)