Jack Cafferty Tells Us How He Really Feels About Sarah Palin

Palin's answer makes no sense.

Gallup Poll Bush Approval Ratings

CNN Documents Sarah Palin's Truthiness Problem

Palin Lies Yet Again!

Add one more lie to the list.

Quotes

I have to steal this line.

"Whatever the source of information you're referring to, you should only find it trustworthy to the degree its claims can be independently confirmed or corroborated."

Obama for President

Check out the rest of this post for some good reasons to vote for Obama.

Obama: Actually, I Think We Can

by hilzoy
I, too, endorse Obama for President, to no one's surprise. Since Katherine has already written a lot of what I would have wanted to say about his rhetoric, and since I've already talked about one of my most important reasons for supporting him, namely the fact that he got Iraq right from the outset, I'll say something about the peculiar idea that Barack Obama is all style and no substance. ...

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Whoopi to McCain: Do I have to worry about slavery again?

I have to say Whoopi is one of my favorite people.

Current Impeach Bush Poll

	Do you believe President Bush's actions justify impeachment? * 716822 responses
	Yes, between the secret spying, the deceptions leading to war and more, there is plenty to justify putting him on trial. 89%
	No, like any president, he has made a few missteps, but nothing approaching "high crimes and misdemeanors." 4.2%
	No, the man has done absolutely nothing wrong. Impeachment would just be a political lynching. 4.6%
	I don't know. 2.1%

Alaska rallies against Sarah Palin

The Alaska Women Reject Palin rally was significantly bigger than Palin’s rally that got all the national media coverage; yet I have found no coverage of this event in the national media.

John McCain's ads are LIES. Here's the video proof.

I wish more time had been spent exploring the context of each lie. Not quite enough evidence is presented within the video itself.

Bush Administration vs Clinton Administration

Clinton:
During the administration of William Jefferson Clinton, the U.S. enjoyed more peace and economic well being than at any time in its history. He was the first Democratic president since Franklin D. Roosevelt to win a second term. He could point to the lowest unemployment rate in modern times, the lowest inflation in 30 years, the highest home ownership in the country's history, dropping crime rates in many places, and reduced welfare rolls. He proposed the first balanced budget in decades and achieved a budget surplus. As part of a plan to celebrate the millennium in 2000, Clinton called for a great national initiative to end racial discrimination. ^[2]

Bush:
* Outed an undercover CIA operative
* Lied to Congress and the American people to get into a war
* Disregarded intelligence estimates, and instead manufactured its own intelligence to support political goals
* Exerted political pressure to hide facts about climate change
* Fired U.S. Attorneys who wouldn't prosecute bogus vote fraud charges against Democrats, or who would prosecute vote fraud charges against Republicans[3]
* Tried to create a fourth branch of government, answerable to no one
* Defied Congressional subpoenas
* Destroyed documents that cannot, by law, be destroyed
* Violated its own rules on document declassification
* Authorized torture--or, as they like to call being bitten by dogs, being nearly drowned, and being sodomized and forced into homosexual acts, "aggressive interrogation"--in violation of both the U.S. Constitution and the Geneva Conventions.

Secret Killings in Iraq - Bob Woodward

This seems incredible.

Republican Small Town Values

P Z Myers' view of what Republicans really mean by "Small Town Values".

The ones the Republicans are worshipping seem to be the narrow insularity verging on xenophobia, the judgmental meddling in other people's affairs, the backward-looking reverence for the good old days (which actually weren't that good), the worship of ignorance, the easy way authority can personally intrude on people's lives without oversight, except by a coterie of good old boys. They seem to overlook the schools in neglect, the churches sprouting everywhere like poisonous mushrooms, the alcoholism, the spousal abuse, the kids who just want to get through high school and flee to a city where something is happening, the elderly piling up and outnumbering the young and being shuffled off to cheap complexes, the despair of people caught in dead-end menial jobs with few prospects for going beyond. That's also small town America, and when I hear a Republican singing the praises of small towns, I have visions of a walmartized wasteland where everyone goes to church. It's not good.

Vitamin Pill Magnate Matthias Rath Loses Case

Rath lost the libel suit he filed against UK newspaper The Guardian and Ben Goldacre.

"It’s just been publicly announced that the vitamin pill magnate Matthias Rath has pulled out of his gruelling legal case against me and the Guardian. He bought full page adverts denouncing Aids drugs while promoting his vitamin pills in South Africa, a country where hundreds of thousands die every year from Aids under an HIV denialist president and the population is ripe for miracle cures. I said his actions were highly worrying, in no uncertain terms. I believe I was right to do so.

This libel case has drawn on for over a year, with the writ hanging both in my toilet, and over my head. Although fighting it has been fascinating, and in many respects a great pleasure, it has also taken a phenomenal amount of my time, entirely unpaid, to deal with it. For the duration of the case I have also been silenced on the serious issues that Rath’s activities raise, the chapter on his work was pulled from my book, and I have been unable to comment on his further movements around the world.

This will now change, and I hope that other newspapers will have the sense to step outside of commercial allegiances and write about his activities, despite this single incident being one newspaper’s tussle. I genuinely believe that the madness of the South African government’s approach to Aids is one of the most important stories of our time."

Republicans and military men on John McCain

Well it seems they did lie.

New Ecuador constitution recognizes evolution

On September 28, the people of Ecuador will vote on a new constitution and that constitution is expected to gain easy approval. The new constitution includes a five article section granting rights to nature as a whole. The section refers to nature as Pachamama, a local pagan goddess, the equivalent to Mother Earth or Mother Nature in Anglo-American idiom. Nature has the right to "integral restoration" and people of any nationality can petition the courts in the name of nature. The government Ecuador is obligated to protect nature and prevent extinction or harmful alteration of ecosystems and natural cycles.

According to Reuters, 56 percent of Ecuadorans approve of the proposed document.

Chapter: Rights for Nature

Art. 1. Nature or Pachamama, where life is reproduced and exists, has the right to exist, persist, maintain and regenerate its vital cycles, structure, functions and its processes in evolution. Every person, people, community or nationality, will be able to demand the recognitions of rights for nature before the public organisms. The application and interpretation of these rights will follow the related principles established in the Constitution.

Art. 2. Nature has the right to an integral restoration. This integral restoration is independent of the obligation on natural and juridical persons or the State to indemnify the people and the collectives that depend on the natural systems.

In the cases of severe or permanent environmental impact, including the ones caused by the exploitation on non renewable natural resources, the State will establish the most efficient mechanisms for the restoration, and will adopt the adequate measures to eliminate or mitigate the harmful environmental consequences.

Art. 3. The State will motivate natural and juridical persons as well as collectives to protect nature; it will promote respect towards all the elements that form an ecosystem.

Art. 4. The State will apply precaution and restriction measures in all the activities that can lead to the extinction of species, the destruction of the ecosystems or the permanent alteration of the natural cycles.

The introduction of organisms and organic and inorganic material that can alter in a definitive way the national genetic patrimony is prohibited.

Art. 5. The persons, people, communities and nationalities will have the right to benefit from the environment and form natural wealth that will allow wellbeing.

The environmental services are cannot be appropriated; its production, provision, use and exploitation, will be regulated by the State.

McCain Former Rebel

Seems McCain is willing to do anything to be President.

Jon Stewart on Sarah Palin

Jon makes an excellent analysis of republican hypocrisy.

Rove said Wasilla was the second largest city in Alaska, which is a lie.

1 Anchorage 278,700
2 Fairbanks 31,142
3 Juneau 30,737
4 Wasilla 9,236

Questionable Content

"Fiery, electromagnetic destroyosaurs"

You know how sometimes you can't get a song out of your mind? Well it can happen with phrases too, fortunately it just doesn't last as long.

The Sarah Palin Church Video Part One

Looks like lying is not Sarah Palins main problem, insanity is.

Sarah Palin misled Republican supporters

The Governor of Alaska gave a misleading version of events over a controversial bridge project in her home state when she made her maiden speech as the presumptive nominee.

Mrs Palin told a cheering audience in Ohio that she had turned down an offer from the US Congress to build the so-called "Bridge to Nowhere", which would have connected Gravina Island with Ketchikan International, an airport in Alaska's southeast serving just 200,000 passengers a year. Mr McCain routinely cites the £100 million project as a symbol of wasteful central government spending.

As she introduced herself to Republicans and the American public on Friday, the virtually unknown Mrs Palin said: "I championed reform to end the abuses of earmark spending by Congress. In fact, I told Congress ... 'thanks, but no thanks' on that bridge to nowhere. If our state wanted a bridge, I said we'd build it ourselves."

However it emerged that in a 2006 interview with the Anchorage Daily News during her gubernatorial campaign, Mrs Palin had a different view of the bridge.

Asked "would you continue state funding for the proposed Knik Arm and Gravina Island bridges?" she replied: "Yes. I 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."

When Congressional funding was withdrawn because of an uproar in Washington about the expense of the project, she cancelled it, but in a regretful tone.

"Despite the work of our congressional delegation, we are about $329 million short of full funding for the bridge project, and it's clear that Congress has little interest in spending any more money on a bridge between Ketchikan and Gravina Island.

Palin lied about visiting Ireland as part of her foreign policy experience

She didn't visit Ireland, which is what the McCain-Palin campaign claimed to Politico's Ben Smith on Saturday. She had a short refueling stopover, which means at best her extensive Irish diplomacy amounted to buying a sweater and a beer mug in the Shannon airport.

Why does Sarah Palin's duty-free-diplomacy matter? Because John McCain, who is 72 and has had 4 bouts of cancer, just picked Sarah Palin to replace him as commander in chief should he die or be incapacitated in office.
Sarah Palin, in an effort to bolster her non-existent national security expertise, claimed she had visited 3 countries: Germany; Kuwait; and Ireland. Now we find out that one of those three, 33% of her experience, was pretty much a lie. Did the McCain campaign know that Palin basically lied to the media and the American people? Or did this Irish blogger do the vetting that the McCain campaign couldn't be bothered to do?

McCain’s Navy Air Mishaps

...The second occurred two years later. McCain had completed flight training and was deployed to the Mediterranean. “He was flying low one day when he decided to have some fun,” Leahy wrote. He dropped so low that he knocked down power lines over southern Spain, cutting off electricity in the area. McCain later referred to his own behavior as “daredevil clowning” and said he had created “a small international incident.”

The third came in 1965. McCain, stationed at Norfolk, flew solo in a Navy trainer plane to the Army-Navy football game in Philadelphia. On the way back his engine quit. McCain ejected, landed safely and the plane crashed into a wooded area.

Leahy wrote that McCain had a “desultory performance” in the air. On the face of it, the incident in Spain stands out as an example of rash, poor judgment. The other two also raise questions. How much was a problem with the equipment, how much was pilot error? What about McCain’s responses: What do they tell us about his temperament?

Sara Palin Lies in Her First Speech as McCain's Running Mate

Sarah Palin that in her first big appearance before a national audience - her introduction as McCain’s running mate - she decided to flat out lie about her accomplishments?






Republicans have been heavily touting Sarah Palin's reformist credentials, with her supposed opposition to Alaska's "Bridge to Nowhere" as Exhibit A. But how hard did she really fight the project? Not very, it seems. Here's what she told the Anchorage Daily News on October 22, 2006, during the race for the governor's seat (via Nexis):

5. Would you continue state funding for the proposed Knik Arm and Gravina Island bridges?

Yes. I 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.

So she was very much for the bridge and insisted that Alaska had to act quickly...

P.S. Here's a piece that Palin's special counsel, John Katz, wrote in March of this year for the Juneau Empire, assuring the Alaskan public that Palin was still very much in favor of earmarks, but sadly needed to scale back her requests somewhat (to "only" 31 earmarks this year—down from 54 last year) in response to "unwanted attention" from Congress and the press. 

--Bradford Plumer

On ABC’s This Week, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) similarly argued that Palin is a reformer because she supposedly said, “I’m not going to build a Bridge to Nowhere.” This Week host George Stephanopoulos pointed out that Graham’s claim is false:

GRAHAM: To go in her state and say ‘I’m not going to build a bridge to nowhere’ — a $400 - $400 million appropriation that was passed by brute force in the Congress by two senior members of the congressional delegation, very powerful figures in Washington. And for her to say, ‘We’re not going to do this because its not necessary and its wasteful,’ to take on your own Republican party –

STEPHANOPOULOS: But Senator, she turned against that, only she campaigned for it in her 2006 race, and turned against it in 2007 only after it became a national joke.

The Bells of St. Mary: No 'under God' in Pledge of Allegiance

It appears that Gov. Palin does not know her history.

Headache

I have had a headache since I woke up this morning.

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Japanese Maple

Research Japanese Maples.

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Amish Autism Rate

The autism rate for U.S. children is 1 in 166, according to the federal
government. The autism rate for the Amish around Middlefield, Ohio, is 1 in 15,000, according to Dr. Heng Wang.

He means that literally: Of 15,000 Amish who live near Middlefield, Wang is aware of
just one who has autism. If that figure is anywhere near correct, the autism rate in that community is astonishingly low.

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Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed

Is a book by Jared M. Diamond, and just got on my must read list.

From Wikipedia.

"This book employs the comparative method to understand societal collapses to which environmental problems contribute"

Diamond lists eight factors which have historically contributed to the collapse of past societies:

1. Deforestation and habitat destruction
2. Soil problems (erosion, salinization, and soil fertility losses)
3. Water management problems
4. Overhunting
5. Overfishing
6. Effects of introduced species on native species
7. Population growth
8. Increased per-capita impact of people

Further, he says four new factors may contribute to the weakening and collapse of present and future societies:

1. Human-caused climate change
2. Buildup of toxins in the environment
3. Energy shortages
4. Full human utilization of the Earth’s photosynthetic capacity

The root problem in all but one of Diamond's factors leading to collapse is overpopulation relative to the practicable (as opposed to the ideal theoretical) carrying capacity of the environment.

Circular Halbach using 12 rare earth magnets - from gyroscope.com

Interesting Halbach array, I did not think about such a small circular array.

Large Brass Lecture Gyroscope - gyroscope.com

Wish I could afford this, nice toy.