Change.gov

President-elect Barack Obama, has launched a new web site called change.gov. The goal of the web site is to keep people informed as to the decisions Obama is making putting his new administration together. There will be a blog, a suggestion box, job ads, and various other important information that people can read.

Did I mention this guy is amazing?

We are seeing a real change here. Gone are the days of incompetent Bush and his evil Cheney henchman. Secret government and hiring a bunch of inept people like 'hellava job Brownie.'

If I were wearing a hat, I would take it off right now. What an excellent idea this new web site is. I look forward to keeping an eye on it as we wait for Bush to finally get the fuck out of the White House.

GOP Attack Dogs Savage Palin

And so it begins. The Republican aides who worked with Sarah Palin during the 2008 Presidential Election are coming out of the woodwork, eager to stab their former colleague in the back.

Based on initial reports, it seems that her staff hated her with a passion. And according to The Times Newspaper in the UK, aides are claiming that there will be many more damning stories to come out in the weeks to come. I'll keep my eye out.

In the first around of allegations we learned:

• Sarah Palin didn't know that Africa was a continent.
• Did not know which countries were in the North America Free Trade Agreement.
• She spent tens of thousands more on clothes than the $150,000 already alleged.
• Newsweek magazine claims that she was told to buy three suits for the Republican convention, but instead went on a lavish spending spree at Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus.
• Most of the clothes were bought and paid for by a wealthy donor who was 'shocked' when he got the bill.
• One particularly angry aide said it was like, "Wasilla hillbillies looting Neiman Marcus from coast to coast."
• Sarah Palin made low level staffers put clothes in their own credit cards.
• Sarah's Husband allegedly received $40,000 worth of clothing.
• When two GOP aides went to her hotel room to brief her, she showed up to the meeting wearing only a towel, and told them to talk to her husband while she got ready.
  

All the evidence thus far points to the fact that many more revelations about uncontrolled spending by this 'fiscal conservative hockey mom' will be very interesting indeed.

Obama Takes North Carolina

President-elect Barack Obama has won North Carolina according to the Associated Press.

This historic win is the first time a Democrat has taken North Carolina since 1976 when Jimmy Carter won it.

With 15 electoral college votes for the state it takes Obama's impressive total to 364. McCain stands at 173.

You can check the latest electoral map here.

Hot Button Issues

As well as voting for President, Americans were also asked to decide various hot button issues during the election. Here's just some of the issues they decided:

Abortion

No real surprise that this issued popped up again. California voted not curtail abortion rights. South Dakota voted against an abortion ban two years ago. This time around they had a watered down version of the abortion ban to consider. They rejected this proposal too. Maybe it's time to stop putting it on the ballot, and leave the law alone?

Colorado had a religious based law proposed that would define what constitutes human life, and would have later led to abortion being legally considered murder. They rejected the idea.

Assisted Suicide

Washington state joined Oregon as the second state in the union to allow terminally ill people to commit suicide with the help of a physician.

Marijuana

Massachusetts will decriminalize possession of marijuana. If you are caught with less than an ounce you will be fined $100, and have it seized, but that will be the end of the matter.

Michigan changed the law to allow medical use of marijuana. Registered patients can grow their own and smoke it without risk of prosecution.

It's nice to see some sensible moves in this direction. Let's face it, we waste a fortune on the war on drugs. I'd much rather see police busting meth labs, than arresting someone who is smoking a little pot.

Prostitution

San Francisco was going to take the sensible step of decriminalizing prostitution. However, this move was rejected. Opponents to the proposal argued that the move would embolden pimps and make it harder to prevent sex trafficking.

Marriage / Gay Marriage

California, who had gay marriage, voted to take the right away again.

Arizona and Florida voted to define marriage as one man and one woman, joining 27 states that discriminate against gay couples in this manner.

Arkansas decided that unwed couples were not allowed to adopt or become foster parents.

Stem Cell Research

Michigan voted to allow people to donate embryos that were produced during fertility treatment for use in stem cell research.

American Election Prediction

This was a snapshot of Yahoo! Election Map, taken this afternoon. I am generally rather skeptical of polls and pollsters. So I thought I would save a copy of this prediction to see how it measures up to the real thing tomorrow.

Beware of Republicans

I just read an interesting article on Yahoo! News, written by the Associated Press. Hardly a mouthpiece for the left, and it talks about all the voter fraud that is going on right now up and down the country. And the one thing I couldn't help but notice is how many Republican dirty tricks were mentioned in the article.

Having lost the argument in this nation, they moved on to smears against Obama, spreading division, lies and racism.

When even that didn't work, they moved into the final phase. This is when they break the law, spread more lies, and try and intimidate Democrat voters (or poor people and minorities), into not exercising their legal right to vote.

Here are some highlights (lowlights?) of the Republican sleaze campaign for this year:

• Warnings in Philidelphia in predominently black neighborhoods, that if they have unpaid parking tickets or other criminal problems voters will be arrested at the voting station.
• In Virginia fliers with 'official' state seals telling Democrats they needed to vote on the 5th (obviously the day after the election when the polls have closed), while Republicans should vote on the 4th.
• In New Mexico two legal Mexican immigrant women (who are American citizens) were harassed by a Republican hired private investigator, who threatened to get them deported.
• In Pennsylvania, fliers attempted to link Obama to Hitler. Reminding Jewish voters of the holocaust, and implying it would happen again under President Obama.
• At Drexel University fliers were taped to benches on campus warning students that police would be out in force to arrest voters at election stations.
• A Jewish neighborhood had fliers sent out warning voters that Obama favored Palestinians and showed a picture of Obama speaking in Germany as 'proof.'

The article goes on to talk about robo call onslaughts in 2006 where voters were told that their voter registration had expired and if they showed up to vote, they would be subject to arrest.

This year email has been a big tool for Republicans, allowing them to spread hate, racism and lies from one bigot to another, with such emails 'going viral.'

I just have one question. Woudn't it be nice if both sides laid out their policies and let the people decide in a fair election where all the votes were counted?

Palin Whines About First Amendment

Sarah Palin went to six different colleges before finally scraping together enough credits for a degree in political science.

You would have thought that at one of these learning institutions they would have explained the First Amendment to her.

During a radio interview that aired on Friday, Sarah told the interviewer:

"If [the media] convince enough voters that that is negative campaigning, for me to call Barack Obama out on his associations," Palin said, "then I don't know what the future of our country would be in terms of First Amendment rights and our ability to ask questions without fear of attacks by the mainstream media."

Unfortunately, the First Amendment doesn't work that way. It states this:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

To put it another way: the press can't violate Palin's First Amendment rights. If the government were to criminalize her speech, then that would be a violation. But what the press is doing in criticizing Palin is exercising the First Amendment.

Sarah Palin Punked

Sarah Palin found herself on the receiving end of a prank phone call Saturday from a French-Canadian comedian posing as the President of France, Nicolas Sarkozy.

The man working with an accomplice, managed to get past security checks, and ended up speaking to the Governor herself.

The team of pranksters from Quebec known as Les Justiciers Masqués have carried out numerous prank calls to celebrities and politicians in the past.

During the conversation, which they posted on their web site, they managed to get Palin to invite the 'French President' hunting in a helicopter. She also admitted that she would like to be president in 2016, and that she was 'very confident' in her and McCain winning the election.

Despite the exaggerated French accent, outrageous and ridiculous comments (including one about his wife being hot in bed, and being able to see Belgium from his house) Sarah Palin never realized that the conversation was a hoax, until it was explained to her at the end of the call. An official then took the phone off her and terminated the call.

McCain staff later released a statement, "Governor Palin was mildly amused to learn that she had joined the ranks of heads of state, including President Sarkozy, and other celebrities in being targeted by these pranksters. C'est la vie."

The phone call is now on YouTube here.

No Joe No Supporters

Last week we shared the embarrassing moment when John McCain called to his buddy "Joe" The "Plumber" at a rally, only to discover that Joe wasn't there.

But it seems that Joe wasn't the only person with better things to do that day.

It turns out that support for the event was so lackluster the McCain campaign bussed in a bunch of local school children to stand in the crowd and pretend to be supporters, despite the fact most were too young to vote.

6,000 supporters showed up, but of those 4,000 were local school children, who had no choice but to be there. And after John couldn't find Joe, he told them to all stand up because THEY were all Joe the Plumber.

Way to inspire the kids.

With Friends Like These...

Lawrence Eagleburger, who served as Secretary of State under George H.W. Bush and whose endorsement is often trumpeted by McCain, caused a bit of controversy this week on National Public Radio.

In an interview that was intended to be in support of the McCain campaign, he was asked if Sarah Palin was ready to step up as President should the need arise. His response: "Of Course Not."

He then went on to qualify his comments by stating that in his opinion, "I don't think at the moment she is prepared to take over the reins of the presidency. I can name for you any number of other vice presidents who were not particularly up to it either. So the question, I think, is can she learn and would she be tough enough under the circumstances if she were asked to become president, heaven forbid that that ever takes place?"

"Give her some time in the office and I think the answer would be, she will be [pause] adequate. I can't say that she would be a genius in the job. But I think she would be enough to get us through a four year... well I hope not... get us through whatever period of time was necessary. And I devoutly hope that it would never be tested."

Ouch.

And this is from a Republican who allegedly supports McCain.

"Joe" the "Plumber" Goes Rogue

Will the real Joe The Plumber please stand up?

He was supposed to attend a rally with old man McCain yesterday, but apparently McCain's staff were too incompetent to arrange it. And irritated by the lack of professional courtesy, Samuel The Diva decided to stay home, leaving McCain to look embarrassed and then declare that the entire audience was Joe The Plumber.

A more in depth report can be found here.

Ashley Todd Escapes Jail

McCain campaign worker Ashley Todd has struck a deal with prosecutors to avoid jail over her racist anti-Obama lies.

20-year-old Todd claimed that a large black man robbed her at knife point and carved the letter B into her face, because he was angry over her McCain Palin sticker.

After all evidence pointed to the fact she made up the story, she eventually admitted she had indeed made the whole thing up.

She has agreed to undergo mental health treatment, and complete a program for first time offenders. If she stays out of trouble she will eventually have her criminal record expunged.

On a lighter note, GO VOLS!

Revenge of the Killer RoboCall

It seems the McCain RoboCall has gone rogue. Latest reports now show McCain using his team of maverick robots to call his lies into Washington State, a state he is losing by some 17 points.

WTF?

Have the robots gone crazy or has McCain?

A Question For McCain

In the second Presidential Debate, John McCain made this statement:

"I'll get Osama bin Laden, my friends. I'll get him. I know how to get him. I'll get him no matter what and I know how to do it. "

Now apparently this magical solution has evaded President Bush for the past seven years. So the question is, why has McCain not helped his Republican friend out by sharing with him the secret of finding Osama bin Laden?

This question has been asked before, most recently by David Letterman, and I've yet to see a good answer to it.

McCain Running Scared

John McCain has demonstrated just how insecure he is about this election in his latest move of campaigning in his home state of Arizona.

In a state that should be a slam dunk for the Senator, he has decided to invest some of what is left of his campaign fund with more of his sleazy robocalls.

The message of hope he shares with voters is as follows:

I'm calling for John McCain and the RNC because Barack Obama is so dangerously inexperienced, his running mate Joe Biden just said, he invites a major international crisis that he will be unprepared to handle alone.

If Democrats win full control of government, they will want to give civil rights to terrorists and talk unconditionally to dictators and state sponsors of terror. Barack Obama and his Democratic allies lack the experience and judgment to lead America. This call was paid for by the Republican National Committee and authorized by McCain-Palin 2008.

Barack Obama Endorsements

I was thinking of putting a list of Obama endorsements on my blog. But then I discovered the list was far larger than I had expected. Nearly a thousand high profile endorsements as of today.

You can keep a track of the list here.

As an interesting point of comparison John McCain has just over one hundred endorsements.

Sarah The Hypocrite Meets Sam The Con Man

Just when you think the McCain campaign cannot stoup any lower, they have now decided to take "Joe" The "Plumber" out on the road and show him off to the media to prove how non-elitist they are.

Samuel (Joe's real name) on the other hand is trying hang on to his 15 minutes of fame with a death grip (maybe his dream of owning a plumbing company wasn't really his dream). Quick to cash in Samuel has already signed with a Nashville public relations and management firm to organize his public appearances. He is reported to be pursuing a music career. Apparently, as well as plumbing without a license, he enjoys country and western singing although admits (through a spokesperson) that he is not an accomplished musician or song writer.

But although he is not much of a song writer, it turns out the idea of writing a book is already being kicked around.

However, fear not, if the music or book writing falls through, maybe he could get a job as a political pundit. Yesterday after being exploited by Sarah Palin at a rally, they even allowed him to answer some audience questions (which is weird given that they try to avoid letting Palin do that), and he agreed with some audience rant about Palestine, which even made some pundits at Fox News cringe.

I thought that John Kerry ran a crappy political campaign. But John McCain seems to be trying to show us new levels of pathetic.

John McCain: Latest Sleaze Attack

John McCain and Sarah Palin continued this week with their sleazy campaign, this time trying to link Barack Obama with Rashid Khalidi, a person with a foreign sounding name (probably a terrorist then) who they allege was a spokesperson for the Palestine Liberation Organization.

They claimed that Obama palled around with him, and made the usual series of infrences we have come to expect from a campaign desperate to find traction (and racist connotations) any place they can.

Unfortunately this bit of slime didn't stick. In fact like a news boomerang it came right back and hit the McCain campaign squarely in the teeth. Because within a very short time of admonishing the Los Angeles Times for not providing them with a video tape that proved Obama's link to Khalidi, it was discovered that McCain had even closer ties.

See it turns out, embarrassingly enough, 15 years ago Khalidi founded a group called the Center for Palestine Research and Studies, and John McCain chairs a group (International Republican Institute) that has donated over $800,000 to them.

So I guess the question for John McCain is, if Khalidi is such an evil terrorist, why is a group you chair giving his organization all that money?

George Bush To The Rescue

With his job approval rating (22%) as low as pretty much any President in history, George W. Bush took a trip to the GOP Headquarters on Tuesday to give them a helping hand.

He spent 20 minutes explaining to the 200 workers that they faced an uphill battle to win the election for John McCain.

The deputy press secretary Scott Stanzell was asked if Bush had any predictions about the outcome of the election next week. Stanzell told the Associated Press, "He's not a predictor."

Well isn't that the truth?

John McCain Staff Walk Out

McCain campaign workers in Indiana walked off the job this week after refusing to peddle McCain's lies and filth.

The state of Indiana has laws that prevent automated nuisance calls, also called robocalls, where voters are targeted with propaganda from each political party to scare them into voting for them. However, it is legal to hire people to make the calls and read a script live.

But John McCain's message was as negative and dishonest as his campaign. Rather than talking about why people should vote for him, the script launched into a series of lies and smears against Barack Obama. Some of the claims included accusing Obama of being "dangerously weak on crime," "coddling criminals," and for voting against "protecting children from danger."

The staff approached their supervisors saying that they were not comfortable spreading lies for John McCain. But management refused to modify the script approved by the McCain administration.

In the end three dozen or so workers walked out on the job. All I can say is good for them.

Robo calls of all kinds by all parties should be illegal in my opinion. This is no way to solicit votes.