Changing the game

If the Presidential race does come down to Obama versus McCain and Obama doesn’t do something really, unpardonably stupid, he will whip Saint John like a red-haired stepchild. If this trend holds, it ain’t even gonna be close.

As many as a tenth of the Texans voting in the Democratic contests could be Republicans, and overwhelmingly they favor Obama, a first-term senator from Illinois, the polls show.

“I ran for Republican precinct chair. I went to the Republican state convention,” said one of them, Donald Rau of Austin, who has already voted in early balloting. “In this election, I voted for Barack Obama.”

[Snip]

A poll released this week by SurveyUSA of Verona, N.J., indicated that registered Republicans would make up 9 percent of Democratic primary voters next week. Michael Baselice, head of Baselice and Associates, a Texas polling firm, said that was in line with what his company was finding.

[Snip]

For whatever reason, Baselice said, the movement toward Obama should be a warning to Republicans.

“Look, if Texas is a problem for Republicans, then it’s a disaster for the rest of the country,” he said. [emphasis mine and Oh. Hell. Yeah.]

If Obama can build a base of support within the Republican Party similar to what Reagan did with Democrats, the prevailing political dynamic of the past twenty five odd years will be completely altered. That would be a very good thing.

Service

Say what you will about the British royal family, they are willing to serve their nation in ways that most American elites, at least of recent vintage, would never even consider. Seriously, do you think any of the Bush (or Clinton, Hilton, etc. for that matter) progeny would volunteer to go on desert patrols? Yeah, I didn’t think so either.

Now compare that to the House of Windsor, where military service is something of the family business. With the notable exceptions of the Bill Gates, Al Gore, and Warren Buffett, who seem intent on saving the world, America’s wealthiest and most powerful families seem most interested in acquiring more wealth and power. It was not always thus. The Carnegys, Rockafellers, Vanderbilts and Dukes of a generation or two ago tried to do some good with their money. They built universities and hospitals, gave artistic and research grants, and the like. To be sure, a lot, maybe even most, of this noblesse oblige was as ego-driven as any rapper’s desire for the biggest Hummer limo in L.A or Ralph Nader’s presidential aspirations. But so what; you gotta name the school something, it was their money besides, and their efforts often yielded some tangible benefit to the commonweal. They decided to do something other than consume lavishly. I have no empirical data to support any of this speculation but anecdotally, it seems that, among our elites, the impulse to “do good” is not nearly as prevalent as it once was.

Cheeseburger in a can!?!?!?!?!

Those four words make my gustatory apparatus recoil in horror and revulsion. Sweet merciful crap, what an abomination. Leave it to the Germans to create something so awful.

Sign of the times

The Virginia Marine Resources Commission is close to approving a pile of tough but ultimately essential restrictions and regulations on this season’s crab harvest. The sad fact is these new rules will likely put a good many waterman out of business. Sadder still is that the poor water quality in the Chesapeake Bay necessitates such action.

“Believe me, the commission gets no pleasure out of passing regulations that make things more difficult for watermen,” said Steve Bowman, who heads the marine commission. “But the numbers don’t lie. Things are bad. They’re really bad.”

For example, the average annual harvest in Virginia and Maryland from 1945 to 2006 was 72 million pounds. The harvest in 2007 was expected to be about 40 million pounds, the lowest on record.

Researchers at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science have also documented a 70 percent decline in the abundance of adult crabs since 1991 – a time when the state enacted 22 regulations designed to enhance stocks.

Jack Travelstead, state director of fisheries, said Tuesday that the years of regulation may not have turned the population around, but they probably helped avoid a complete collapse of the species.

Watermen, though, said the experience proved what they have argued for years – that the biggest problem facing crabs is not overfishing, which the commission has tried to regulate. Instead, they argued, crabs are suffering from a combination of environmental degradation – pollution, lost habitat, little oxygen to breathe – along with increasing numbers of natural predators such as striped bass, croakers and blue catfish.

“Water quality is the key,” Kelly Price, an Eastern Shore crabber, told the commission. “Without that, you lose habitat. And without habitat, you’re done.”

Exactly right. Nitrogen, mostly from farm runoff, is the real reason the Bay is suffering. It helps created vast oxygen-depleted dead zones, which in turn, destroys habitat. For that, the watermen are hardly responsible.

You see, Big Poultry is killing the Bay, drowning her in millions of gallons of nitrogen-rich untreated chicken shit from the poorly regulated factory farms on the Eastern Shore. Those farms and their runoff are to blame for the declining health of the Bay and her fisheries. Politicians in Virginia and Maryland long ago sold out the waterman, as well as the oysters and crabs they depend on, to Perdue and Tyson. The poultry companies, having bought themselves protection from regulation, gladly pushed the consequences of their actions onto the folks that lack lobbyists and big campaign dollars. It is unfortunate that the state agencies are forced into screwing the little guys for events beyond their control but they must in order to prevent a total collapse of the fisheries. Until the farms on the Shore are cleaned up, water quality will continue to decline. Simply regulating the harvest will do little to restore the Bay; it is, as the old waterman’s expression goes, “just pissing into the wind”.

Ralph Nader’s ego is running for President

God do I loathe this man. A vote for Nader is tantamount to a vote for McCain; that Ralph’s brain cannot or will not get around on that fact simply underscores just how vainglorious this pursuit is.

So painfully obvious

In a rare and fleeting moment of honesty, Senator and Iraq cheerleader Tom Coburn (R-OK) admitted that “it was probably a mistake going to Iraq”.

Jesus, Tom, you think? Welcome to the party…

But John McCain is a straight talker!!!!

For reasons known only to the Chris Matthewses of the world, the mainstream media has propagated the perception of John McCain as something of a cross between Elliot Ness and Sergeant York, the incorruptible, ever-candid war hero and every reporter’s favorite Senator. No matter that much of the façade is complete garbage; Tim Russert loves him!

Well, it seems the media has taken a brief respite from its constant and lovingly administered fluffing of McCain to actually investigate a potential conflict of interest and/or extramarital affair. In his blanket denial that anything untoward had occurred, it appears Mr. Straight Talk may not be as forthright as his reputation would indicate. Indeed, he appears to be full of shit. Take it away, Mr. Isikoff:

Just hours after the Times' story was posted, the McCain campaign issued a point-by-point response that depicted the letters as routine correspondence handled by his staff--and insisted that McCain had never even spoken with anybody from Paxson or Alcalde & Fay about the matter. "No representative of Paxson or Alcalde & Fay personally asked Senator McCain to send a letter to the FCC," the campaign said in a statement emailed to reporters.

But that flat claim seems to be contradicted by an impeccable source: McCain himself. "I was contacted by Mr. Paxson on this issue," McCain said in the September 25, 2002 deposition obtained by Newsweek. "He wanted their approval very bad for purposes of his business. I believe that Mr. Paxson had a legitimate complaint."

While McCain said "I don't recall" if he ever directly spoke to the firm's lobbyist about the issue-an apparent reference to Iseman, though she is not named--"I'm sure I spoke to [Paxson]." McCain agreed that his letters on behalf of Paxson, a campaign contributor, could "possibly be an appearance of corruption"-even though McCain denied doing anything improper.

McCain's subsequent letters to the FCC--coming around the same time that Paxson's firm was flying the senator to campaign events aboard its corporate jet and contributing $20,000 to his campaign--first surfaced as an issue during his unsuccessful 2000 presidential bid. William Kennard, the FCC chair at the time, described the sharply worded letters from McCain, then chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, as "highly unusual."

The issue erupted again this week when The New York Times reported that his top campaign strategist at the time, John Weaver, was so concerned about what Iseman (who was representing Paxson) was saying about her access to McCain that he personally confronted her at a Washington restaurant and told her to stay away from the senator.

So not only does it appear that McCain is lying, if Isikoff’s portrayal is accurate, dude is on the take. I will be shocked if the focus remains on the potential bribery (the real issue here), what with a possible sex scandal brewing, but at least for now, maybe people will see that John McCain is just as bought as any other corporate whore on the Hill. It is about damn time.

These people are assholes

From the Huffpo:

"During what was supposed to be a somber memorial service in Statuary Hall for Rep. Tom Lantos, who died Monday, the House chamber became mired in chaos over procedural votes," the Politico reports.

House Republicans are upset that Democrats are voting today on contempt citations for White House aides Harriet Miers and Josh Bolten, and vowed to hold 'protest votes' to suck up time and delay the contempt proceedings.

But Democratic aides were shocked when, during the middle of a memorial for Holocaust survivor and Congressman Tom Lantos, GOP Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart demanded a procedural vote on the floor, forcing members to leave the service early, even "while dignitaries were still giving tributes to Lantos."

That is beyond disrespectful – what a dick.

Castro resigns

Love him or hate, the guy is a motherfucking survivor, the undisputed champion of marathon dictatorships. Seriously, we first tried to kill him back in the Kennedy administration, which incidentally, was about the same time we developed our stupid Cuba policy. And much like that nation's leadership, our policy has remained unaltered. I cannot for the life of me understand why we don’t invade with Coca-Cola and the Gap rather than maintain this failed yet never-ending trade embargo. A few months exposure to true blue American consumerism and Cuba will be bursting at its newly carbonated but fashionable seams for more than just a taste of economic freedom. Sadly, with brother Raul succeeding Fidel and little stomach in the US for a sweeping reform of our Cuba policy, I doubt things will change much in the near term.

Viva la non-revolucion!

Africa has enough problems

Do we really need to be sending it ours?

Again

This is just terrible. My heart goes out to everyone in the NIU community.

Stunning

Obama crushed Clinton yesterday, no two ways about it. This was nothing short of a shellacking. In Virginia, he carried every major demographic including whites (barely but still), the over 60 crowd(!), women (59% to 41% - !!!!!) and first-time voters. That means he is cutting into Hillary natural constituency as well as pulling new voters into the fold. Furthermore, he garnered more votes than the entire Republican field and he did it, lest we forget, in a state that has not voted for a Democratic Presidential candidate since Johnson in 19-freaking-64. This is starting to look less and less like a simple campaign and more like a movement.

Next up is Wisconsin and Hawaii and both should be friendly territory for the Illinois Senator. Beyond that, the next big contests are going to be in Ohio and Texas, where the Clinton campaign must make a stand to have any chance of pulling this thing out. And while the race is far from over, Barack Obama must be considered the odds on favorite to win the Democratic nomination. Ladies and gentlemen, that is indeed stunning.

The Potomac Primary

For the first time I can remember, voters in the Commonwealth will actually have a meaningful say in the Primary contests. In recent memory at least, the candidates have long been decided by the time Virginia holds its contest. Tomorrow is the exception. In that light, y’all need to get out and vote (preferably for Obama).

The aftermath

Well, it looks like McCain has finally completed a political resurrection that would do Lazarus proud. With Romney out and Huckabee only viable in the Bible Belt, McCain appears to have salted away the nomination almost by default. Out of a sea of less than stellar candidates, it seems most Republicans found him the least objectionable of the lot. Bummer for the GOP and bully for us.

On the Democratic side, Super Tuesday hardly brought forth the closure that many people believed it would and on which the Clinton campaign was banking. Hillary bet on the knockout blow and failed to deliver. Now she and Obama are neck and neck, readying for a long run. This unexpected state of affairs has Team Clinton positively freaking out. I actually heard Mark Penn, her campaign manager (and not a very good one at that), refer to Obama as the “establishment” candidate this morning on NPR. Really, I am not kidding. Somehow, this idiot thinks he can reposition Hillary, the former First Lady for goodness sake and pre-Primary front-runner, as the insurgent contender. When political operatives attempt this level of bullshit jujitsu, they are hitting the panic button, hard. Think Richard Nixon and “I am not a crook”, or if you prefer, Bill Clinton dithering over the definition of “is”. Add to that Clinton’s insistence on more debates and you can almost smell the fear and desperation.

Most ironic, the fear is not of Obama or his message, it is his money. You see, Hillary’s trump card was always her ability to raise cash. She was tapped into the main line of Democratic donors. Based upon that and her name recognition, she should have crushed all comers. Thanks to a terrific campaign by Obama and a wicked burn rate in her own, those advantages are now gone. Her donor base is narrow compared to Obama’s, with many in her corner maxed out to the legal limit. Obama’s, on the other hand, is largely built upon a huge number of low dollar contributors that can be solicited again and again. This shortage of cash is particularly important when her campaign relies on a media strategy that has concentrated on larger, more urban states with big, expensive markets. Hillary can’t afford that tactic any further, hence the clamor for more debates, read free media.

Long story short, he has the money to compete and, right now, she does not.

The town Pat Robertson built

Virginia Beach police have arrested an Abercrombie and Fitch store manager because the store’s racy advertisements were deemed obscene.

Oy. Sometimes, the Seven Cities seem a hotbed of stupid. This is one of those times.

Sarah Silverman is a riot

and she's fucking Matt Damon. Extra points to Damon for the white boy dance moves - too funny.