help save the youth of america

What popped into my head while watching the last debate between Obama and McCain.

Americans are hurting and angry and angry and hurting and hurting and angry.

I wonder how Joe the Plumber feels about being in a tug-of-war betwen Obama and McCain?

McCain scares me when he salivates over using a hatchet and a scalpel.

Didn't McCain vote for most of the Bush budgets that were pork and ear-mark laden?

McCain knows how to save all these billions of $$..which is funny given how much money Charles Keating cost the u.s. taxpayers in large measure thanks to McCain.

Again with the overhead projector!

Americans are hurting and angry at being reminded how hurting and agry they are.

Actually, McCain backslid on the torture thing, so stop giving him credit for it.

Schieffer is letting McCain get the last word much too often so far.

Schieffer is challenging them to get into a vebal pissing match on stage?

Does McCain really want us to believe that he wouldn't have gone negative if Obama had done the town halls? Nice that Obama finally (sort of) called him on that b.s.

Enough with the crocodile tears and the calls for repudiation. Get to something meaningful.

Here we go, ACORN. Forget that they are above board. Forget also, McCain, that YOU went to an ACORN meeting. Obama did a good job countering the ACORN issue.

Again, McCain gets the last word!

Nice question about the respective Veep nominees. McCain backed off of the "bridge to nowhere" lie but kept up the gas pipeline lie. And why is he talking about autism when Palin's baby has Downs Synrome? Nice answer by Obama..."she's a capable politician who's excited the base of the Republican party". Says it all in answer to a question about her qualification to be President.

Uh oh, he called the black guy "eloquent".

Nice eye roll by McCain when Obama talked about human rights and labor protections. Says all you need to know about GOP ideology.

And AGAIN McCain gets the last word. Did someone tally this?

And Joe the Plumber gets another shout-out, this time on health care. Again, this needs to be tallied.

McCain still hasn't learned how to smile without looking creepy.

"Senator Government"...funny from a guy who's been in Congress for two+ decades.

How could Obama have voted against Justice Bryer, who was nominated in 1994?

Niiiiice use of the Ledbetter Supreme Court decision and subsequent attempt at legislation.

Why no mention of Joe the Plumber in the Roe v. Wade segment?

"Health of the mother" is just a malleable trope for abortion extremists? Ok.

And AGAIN McCain gets the last word.

Is this the first question about education in any of the three Presidential debates?

Yes! Obama talks about student loan debt.

Sarah Palin's kid is not autisitic? Or at least the baby isn't. Is one of the other kids autistic?

At least Obama got the last word on closing statements.

Nineteen days to go (as of Thursday morning).. The election can't come quick enough.

my mind's gone loose inside the shell

This is the nexus of middle class America, negative political advertising, and an economy that's in the crapper.

The next was a woman, late 50s, Democrat but strongly pro-life. Loved B. and H. Clinton, loved Bush in 2000. "Well, I don't know much about this terrorist group Barack used to be in with that Weather guy but I'm sick of paying for health insurance at work and that's why I'm supporting Barack."

This quote encapsulates how McCain and Palin's associative language trick linking Obama to Ayers has worked in the minds of some voters. It works in much the same way that it worked for Bush in getting people to think that Saddam Hussein was suporting al Queda (link goes to pdf) and might have had something to do with 9/11. All they (McCain/Palin) have been doing is saying that Obama associated with a known terrorist on a non-profit board, and people hear half the words and make the leap to "Obama=terrorist".

And these weren't hard-core conservatives in the focus group. They were "Reagan Dems and Independents. Call them blue-collar plus. Slightly more Target than Walmart."

This is a frighteningly fascinating look into how people process information, and that the skilled rhetoriticians who craft campaign messages know this and (in this case as with Saddam::al Queda) use the power of association to get low-attention voters, outright dimwits or people just looking for a good rationalization to make the link, all while keeping a plausible deniability of being able to say "Hey, we never said Obama is a terrorist". Perhaps the only saving grace is that the economy is bad enough that it even trumps the horribly misguided perception that Obama is some kind of Manchurian Candidate.

It's at once fascinating, disgusting and frightening.

listen, do you want to know a secret, do you promise not to tell?

** update...August 13 -- almost a week later and still no response to an email I sent to Sen. Feinstein's office. Shameful. I did get an unsolicited email fron Sen. Boxer about her sponsoring of legislation to prevent illegal spyware downloads. I'd like to know from Sen. Boxer how she could let her colleague vote for a bill with more pernicious spying capabilities than any software.

I can't begin to describe how disappointed I am in Democrats on Capitol Hill for capitulating to the fear-mongering and pressure from the Bush administration and passing a truly excereble piece of legislation, the update of FISA legislation. Twelve Senate Democrats, including one of my Senators, Dianne Feinstein, voted for it. Shame on you. Forty-one House Democrats voted for it (thankfully NOT my Rep. Nancy Pelosi). Shame on the 41 of you. Glenn Greenwald does his usualy masterful job of explaining why this is bad, so I won't rehash. Suffice to say that the party has control of Congress and thus the upper-hand in crafting legislation that would safeguard civil liberties without weakening security. All they had to do was pass that legislation and either let the GOP filibuster it or let Bush veto it and turn the "weak on national security" argument against them. As is the Dems now get painted as weaklings who bowed to pressure when things got heavy. It's like they forgot that they *won* in the fall precisely because people are fed up with current GOP policy in just about everything.

The legislation sunsets in 6 months. One can only hope that Congressional Democrats will grow a spine between now and then.