McClone exposed #7: McCain's Green Economy: Drill, Baby, Drill

Almost certainly environmental changes are the greatest threat to the human race. The McClone/Palin twins have only one solution: "Drill, Baby, Drill." Unfortunately most Americans can't see the changes (yet!) so they don't recognize the danger. This is the result of the right-wing deligitimization of science for political purposes over the last almost 30 years.

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McClone exposed #6: McCain's Spiritual Guide

You've heard alot about the Rev. Wright, but very little about Rod Parsley, Pastor of the World Harvest Church. I wonder why? Perhaps the corporate media has been protecting Clone, as they have been every step of the way.

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McCain and Palin lie about Obama and Bill Ayers again

I was struck last night, Wednesday, when John McClone and Gov. Palin in their combined interview with NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams once again focused so much attention on Barak Obama and '60s radical Bill Ayers. Here's what Clone said:

People can make up their minds, as, again, I say about Mr. Ayers ... the full extent of the relationship with Senator Obama is not known,

And Senator Obama has not been forthcoming. He has not told the complete truth to the American people....

What in the world can this nonsense mean. On Oct. 10th the Annenberg Political Fact Check web site stated:

McCain cranks out some false and misleading attacks on Obama's connection to a 1960s radical.

Neither Clone nor Palin seem to be particularly bothered by the truth. But why do they keep harping on this? I can only conclude that they have nothing else to throw at Obama. It's clear that Obama has been completely forthcoming about serving on an education committee with Ayers. But Clone and Palin keep saying - as they did last night - "the full extent of the relationship with Senator Obama is not known." There is no question if Clone and Palin had any information we don't know they'd already have trumpeted it from the highest roof tops. So all they can do is try to cast aspersions that have no basis in fact

The whole Ayers tempest in a tea pot says far more about McCain and Palin then about Obama.

McClone Exposed #4: John McCain vs. John McCain

Here's #4 in the McClone Exposed series. This one is called "John McCain vs. John McCain." It perhaps exposes McClone for who he really is. What I can't figure out is whether he believes what he says when he says it, or just says whatever is necessary to advance his political career. Maybe it was always the "Double Talk Express."

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Al-Queda and McClone's election

There are several questions connected to this election which are getting very little attention from the media. One that has concerned me for some time regards Al-Queda and a John McClone victory. What I'm referring to is how much the Al-Queda leaders want a third Bush administration and what they might do to get McClone elected. Here are some thoughts on this from The washington Post Online:

Al-Qaeda is watching the U.S. stock market's downward slide with something akin to jubilation, with its leaders hailing the financial crisis as a vindication of its strategy of crippling America's economy through endless, costly foreign wars against Islamist insurgents.

And at least some of its supporters think Sen. John McCain is the presidential candidate best suited to continue that trend.

'Al-Qaeda will have to support McCain in the coming election,' said a commentary posted Monday on the extremist Web site al-Hesbah, which is closely linked to the terrorist group. It said the Arizona Republican would continue the 'failing march of his predecessor,' President Bush.

Unfortunately for us, when they support a candidate they tend to do more than wear buttons.

(Also on this question see Robert Parry on Consortiumnews.com)

McClone exposed #3: The Economy

Here's the third episode in the McCain Exposed series: The Economy.



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The new McCarthyism: McClone-Palin

Gov. Sarah Palin and her pals are reincarnating Wisconsin Sen. Joe McCarthy - one of history's most despicable demagogues. Many of us vividly remember the House UnAmerican Affairs Committee (HUAC) and Joe McCarthy's Senate Internal Security sub Committee. Well how much difference is there between "UnAmerican" and the McCain-Palin campaign's "anti-American?" I fully expect Palin to stand at a podium with a piece of paper in her hand and say: "I have here a list of the Communists who Obama will appoint to his administration."

Once you start lying, one lie piles up on top of another. This is at its base a CHARACTER question. Or as someone else said:

Oh what tangled webs we weave
When first we practive to deceive.

Check out their spokesperson Minn. Sen. Michelle Bachman: (If your seeing this on FaceBook, click here for video)

And the idiocies are piling up: North Carolina GOP Rep. Robin Hayes, said at a McCain rally on Saturday:

Liberals hate real Americans that work and achieve and believe in God.

Notice the McCarthyite theme: "Real Americans' vs. "Anti-Americans"

And then, of course, there's the old saw: "socialism." Here's what the Dallas Morning News reports:

With John McCain trailing Barack Obama ... his campaign has promoted the idea that his opponent's tax and health-care policies evoke socialism.

The claim was made after Mr. Obama remarked in Ohio last week that he wanted to 'spread the wealth around.'

But such comparisons to socialism gloss over important facts, analysts say.

Both Mr. McCain and his running mate, Sarah Palin, have criticized Mr. Obama's proposal to raise taxes on high earners and require that businesses provide health insurance. Ms. Palin referred to the plan as 'a little bit like socialism.'

McCain Exposed #2: McCain's YouTube Problem Becomes a Nightmare

Here's McClone exposed #2 - McCain's YouTube problem becomes a nightmare.




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McClone exposed: A series of short films

Here's the first of a series of short films by BraveNew Films exposing John McClone's policies for what they are. This one is called McCain Care Leaves Seniors Behind.



There will be another one tommorow.

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McClone and his temper

Here's an example of how macho McClone makes decisions (according to Katherine Zaleski at The Huffington Post):

In an interview on a St. Louis radio station, McCain said Obama's comments that "I didn't have the guts" to talk about William Ayers in the last presidential debate have "probably ensured" that the former 1960s radical will come up in Wednesday's debate.

Is that really who you want answering the infamous 3AM phone call. One thing I think we can count on is that Clone will follow his worst instincts when under pressure.

Debate results: Barack over McCain

Here's the latest polling data on the Friday evening presidential debate:

PRINCETON, NJ -- Americans who watched the first presidential debate on Sept. 26 gave Barack Obama the edge over John McCain as having done the better job in the debate, by a 46% to 34% margin. These results are based on a special USA Today/Gallup Poll conducted on Saturday, Sept. 27, the first day after the debate.

I realize that this doesn't mean much, it's just a snapshot, but it does contradict most of the wing nut analyses of the debate.

Now McClone wants to postpone the VP debate: Scared?

The phony showboating of John McClone "suspending" his campaign is now being extended to "postponing" the upcoming (a week from Friday, Oct. 3) debate between the vice-presidential candidates. According to Nico Pitney on the Huffington Post:

John McCain's campaign now wants to suspend the VP debate?

CNN's Dana Bash reports that McCain officials are "trying to negotiate with the Obama campaign and the presidential debate commission" to change next Thursday's planned vice presidential debate into a McCain-Obama affair. The VP debate would be postponed to another date.

"That is what they are proposing," Bash reported. "[McCain officials] understand very well that both the Obama campaign and the debate commission have no intention of delaying Friday's debate, but...if there is no bailout deal by Friday, McCain has no plan to go to debate."

McClone tries to steal the spotlight again

Here's the campaign developments as the media are reporting them:

Republican John McCain said Wednesday he is directing his staff to work with Democrat Barack Obama's campaign and the presidential debate commission to delay Friday's debate because of the economic crisis.

In other words, John McCain is taking credit for putting politics aside in order to work with Barack Obama on the Wall Street crisis.

Remember when he and his running mate ran down to New Orleans to be photographed while a hurricane was still expected. If they had waited any longer, the storm would have abated before they got there for their photo op.

Well as usual McCain is grandstanding. Here's what really happened:

The Obama campaign said Obama had called McCain around 8:30 a.m. Wednesday to propose that they issue a joint statement in support of a package to help fix the economy as soon as possible. McCain called back six hours later and agreed to the idea of the statement, the Obama campaign said. McCain's statement was issued to the media a few minutes later.

'We must meet as Americans, not as Democrats or Republicans, and we must meet until this crisis is resolved,' McCain said. 'I am confident that before the markets open on Monday we can achieve consensus on legislation that will stabilize our financial markets, protect taxpayers and homeowners, and earn the confidence of the American people. All we must do to achieve this is temporarily set politics aside, and I am committed to doing so.'

So Obama behaved in a principled and courteous manner. McClone, on the other hand, took the opportunity to upstage his opponent and the press is reporting it the way clone wants it to appear. Nothing unusual here.

Oh, by the way, Clone has not suspended his anti-Obama TV commercials, while he acts in a "bilateral" fashion.

One can ask, what exactly is economically-challenged McClone going to contribute to the discussion. As usual, everything is a political opportunity for Clone.

Obama is going to make a statement very soon. If anything comes of it, I'll be back. Word has it that Obama will say the debate can go on.

McClone and Big Oil: video

Here's a new video about McClone and big oil (you know, the big "Dig here, Dig now!" lie.



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Can Bush save McClone from his foot in mouth disease?

Karen Fox asks on Op-Ed News,

Did George Bush bail out AIG to save AIG or John McCain and the Neocons?

and continues:

John McCain has stated repeatedly and today that "the fundamentals of the economy are sound." Alan Greenspan said yesterday that the economy was in the worst shape in a hundred years. Money manager Michael Lewitt wrote in Tuesday's New York Times, "AIG's collapse would be as close to an extinction-level event as the financial markets have seen since the Great Depression." Imagine if AIG had folded tomorrow and the world stock markets crashed right after Senator McCain stated that the economy was fundamentally sound. It would have been the end of Neocon reign.

It seems to me that the Bush administration (particularly Sec'y of the Treasury Paulson) are as usual flying by the seat-of-their-pants. They are making decisions on a day-to-day (maybe hour-to-hour) basis (much like the "worldwide war on terror" and Katrina). They clearly have no overall plan to undo the economic mess they have made. Although Clinton (the President) contributed to the current crisis, it has been primarily the Republican ideology of de-control, to let the corporations pretty much have their head with no reins in sight, and to undo all the oversight provisions put in place after 1929, that has brought us to this current point.

John McClone, although he denies it now, has been a strong advocate of de-control. According to wire service reports:

[McClone] supported 1999 GOP-sponsored legislation that tore down Depression-era legal walls separating commercial banks, investment banks and insurers from one another. However, President Bill Clinton, a Democrat, signed it into law.

Throughout his congressional career, the Arizona senator has usually backed cutting federal regulation of industries in the name of promoting free markets and ending government interference, which is Republican ideology.

Now, of course, as with everything else he's trying to reinvent himself as an advocate of regulation. The question is: Will voters buy this snake oil? I think people in the U.S. are smart enough to see that the potential emperor has no clothes. But we shall see.

McClone whines about New York Times. So what else is new?

According to AP reporter Devlin Barrett,

McCain campaign spokesman Michael Goldfarb...compared the editors [of the New York Times] to a blogger:

sitting at home in his mother's basement and ranting into the ether between games of Dungeons & Dragons.

When they begin (continue) bitching about the media, they are usually in trouble. Although Barrett also points out that complaining about the New York Times usually gets you brownie points with the right-wing nuts. McClone seems to need that since his credibility outside that sphere seems to be eroding quickly. Oh, by the way, I've never played Dungeons and Dragons and my mother passed away quite some time ago.

McClone not only echoes Bush but also Sen. Clinton

For the last few weeks I have been telling anyone who would listen that for some bizarre reason the McClone campaign was aping Hillary Clinton's hardly winning tactics. Suddenly some corporate-owned media right-wing columnists are noticing this odd phenomenon as well. On Friday in the New York Daily News two columnists linked the McClone and Clinton campaign strategies. In a piece titled "McCain's Mess: Campaign Chaos," Kirsten Powers wrote:

While Obama hobnobbed with world leaders, the McCain campaign settled on a relentless whine about media bias, interspersed with flailing attacks.

She continued:

In many ways, the McCain campaign has turned into a less functional version of Hillary Clinton's: complaining about the press, making crazy accusations about Obama, showing disarray, harping on 'experience," ridiculing "hope" and making dishonest claims about gas prices.

On the other hand, longtime-right-wing columnist, National Review editor, Rich Lowry took another tack in trying to right McClone's flailing campaign. He commented:

A McCain comeback has to begin in a deconstruction of Obama as too risky to be president.... The playbook is partly provided by Hillary Clinton, who found her voice in lunch-bucket appeals to working-class white and Hispanic voters.

He notices:

Of course, she didn't defeat Obama -- but McCain ought to be encouraged by how close she came.

Coming close ain't however winning. He didn't, of course, notice the inherent racism of appealing to "white and Hispanic voters." But he wouldn't after all. He went on to write:

For a contemporary Democrat, she ran a center-right campaign; she talked of blowing Iran to smithereens, downed shots of Crown Royal and appealed frankly to blue-collar whites. These gestures conveyed a sense of toughness that endeared Hillary to her working-class voters and highlighted a vulnerability of the polished but aloof Obama.

This is all, remember, coming from right-wing McClone supporters, who are hoping he can turn things around. Some of us have very different ideas. I would, however, make one suggestion to McClone: get Lorne Michaels to schedule a special mid-Summer edition of Saturday Night Live, so that they can all commiserate and moan about how McClone is being mistreated by the mainstream media.

"Mission accomplished" again in Iraq

I knew when the US Abraham Lincoln (see photo) sailed into Iraqi waters that a new "mission accomplished" in Iraq speech was about to rear its foolish head. The only difference from the announcement of May 2, 2003 is this time it was made on dry land by John McClone.

Not being able to say anything just once McClone also told CBS anchor Katie Curic that "We have succeeded in Iraq."

It is truly sad to witness the crumbling of an American hero in his desperate reach for the mantle of Commander in Chief. He consistently demonstrates how little he knows about the Middle East in general and Iraq in particular when his buddy Conn. Sen. Joe Lieberman isn't there to prompt him. The question remains: Why does the media continue to treat him as a serious political person despite his more and more evident limitations.

Why are we so insecure about our country?

On this the birthday of our country I have but one question: Why have we become so insecure? Why are we so afraid of possibly negative truths? Why can't we talk about real issues and not just reject them out of hand? Now I know that the media (in its obsession for political gossip) highlights and treats real questions as sound bites. For example, last week when Gen. Wesley Clark raised a perfectly legitimate question about how McSame's experience in Vietnam (heroic as it might have been) prepares him for the presidency it becomes the meat of political gossip. In any sane world it would have been treated as a legitimate question. The pundits could only focus on how the comment would affect the campaign. Not on whether his Vietnam experience prepares him for the presidency or, in fact, combined with his personality makes him the absolute wrong person for the job.

The same is true of Michelle Obama's saying that her husband's winning the primaries was the first time she was proud of her country. As a Black woman, how much was there for her to be proud of. Why can't we treat it as a legitimate heartfelt comment instead of a negative sound bite? Can we learn anything from the questions raised by the Rev. Jeremiah Wright or must we treat him only as a loudmouthed racist?

I can't explain our insecurity - but somehow we have to face it.

A Native American activist we used to know would say that when we paved over the land we lost touch with what was real. Or maybe independent journalist Greg Palast has part of the answer:

Bush is so far away from his refugee loser roots that he just doesn’t get what it is to be American. So he steals the one thing that every American is handed off the boat: a chance. When they take away your Social Security and overtime and tell you sleeper cells are sleeping under your staircase, you don't take a chance, you lose your chance, and the land of opportunity becomes a landscape of fear and suspicion, an armed madhouse.

Whatever the reason for our insecurity, we have to deal with it. Under the present circumstances our political candidates can't be honest with us. And as I have said before, without truth and honesty on the part of our leaders democracy is impossible.

Obama leads McSame in latest presidential-poll

Getty Images / AP
In a two-person presidential race between only Sens. Obama and McCain, registered voters chose Obama over McCain by 49% to 37% in the most recent Los Angeles Times national poll. When independent candidate Ralph Nader and Libertarian Bob Barr are added to the mix, voters chose Obama over McCain by 48% to 33%. I can only surmise why Green Party candidate Cynthia McKinney was left out. But I can't say I'm surprised.

According to a CNN analysis of five recent national surveys, Obama's lead drops to 8 points over McSame.