faboo mama

WaPo is reporting that the Clinton’s campaign is $20M in debt.

$20M.

And they want back in to the WH?

There’s nothing in the article that says anything beyond Wolfson’s confirmation of the number. We have no idea if that includes the $12M the Clinton’s loaned themselves. Terry McAuliffe was on Meet the Press this morning and said:

A top Clinton adviser this morning said that Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton is open to the possibility of loaning her campaign more money to continue in the race.

Terry McAuliffe, the Clinton campaign chairman, told Tim Russert on “Meet the Press” that he spoke to Clinton about the possibility of contributing more money and “she said that she would be willing to do it.” However, McAuliffe insists, “We haven’t needed it.”

Russert pressed the issue, asking McAuliffe if the Clintons will be able to repay all debts after the campaign is over. “We plan on it,” he replied.

Must be nice to have that kind of change. Let’s put this in perspective: With their first loan, the Clinton’s could have paid off my house, bills and bought me a new car and it would still have been well under 10% of what they loaned themselves.

What a working class family.

I just saw this ad on TV:

My goodness. That last scene…ugh.

Still my curiosity got the best of me because I am loving the new California logo.

There’s also another ad with famous people in it. I love this ad because it’s purely SoCal:

I’m all for people visiting here (and spending money), but they really do have to go home. I mean…really. I don’t care how cold it is where you’re from, do you know what it does to an LA-based mind when everyone is bundled up for hiking the tundra and ya’ll come out in here in t-shirts and shorts because you think 61 degrees is “t-shirt weather”.

This is where Clinton’s dog foghorn to racist whites in Ky and W. Va. is headed. It’s a shame that the Clinton’s campaign is more than willing to revisit their race baiting-tactics of December and January with this. Especially since they are flat out lying about her white support. It’s sad to think that a Democrat feels it’s okay to implement a Southern strategy to win votes in a race she’s already lost.

What makes this all even more laughable are the blogging Clinton supporters who contort their logic to justify anything. Remember that for the past few months, we’ve been told by these people that Obama’s big wins in Idaho, Utah, Mississippi and Kansas don’t mean anything. Despite the hundreds of thousands of people who came out to vote for the Democrats vs. the few thousand that voted for the GOP candidates, we were told that “there was no way those states are voting for a Democrat in November.” Why? Oh, the reasons change and facts are fudged, but they say, “Those states haven’t voted for a Democratic president in ### years.” Needless to say, I was shocked to see that Jerome Armstrong, among other Clinton-supporting bloggers pushing that W. Va is in play because they gave Kennedy the nod in 1960.

THUD.

1960.

You read that right. W. Va. hasn’t voted for a Democratic president in 48 years and that means it’s great for Clinton’s chances in Nov., but the states that Obama has won, but haven’t voted for a Democratic president in 20, 30, or 40 years are not in play.

The stupid is strong in this one.

Or 5 Minutes With a Wacktivist…

Dear Peter of the 9/11 Truthers…remember me? I sat next to you at the panel featuring Amy Goodman, Howard Fineman, Tom Hayden and (shudder) Hugh Hewitt. I’m the one who told you your actions do more harm than good, that you’re useless like Code Pink and World Can’t Wait. See one of the reasons I said that was obvious, but you were too busy being a self-important asshat to notice what was going on around you.

While you were shouting to your friend that 10 people in the audience had signs and that CSPAN may be covering live, you were too dimwitted to notice the producer standing right behind you, too dumb to notice the cameraman standing 6 feet away staring at you and repeating everything you said into the walkie-talkie. It was you and your loud mouth that got the Q&A canceled. It was you and your 10 friends lining up to the mic holding identical pieces of paper, that got that Q&A canceled.

You like to pretend that you’re so high-minded and everyone else “just doesn’t want to know the truth”. It’s not that we’re uninterested in Truth, it’s just that you guys and people like you (your friends on Conspiracy Theory Row for example) ruin it for the rest of us. You’re loud, obnoxious and have very little facts on your side. Any sane argument does not ever include “That’s what they want you to think!”

Even the judicial use of logic should make you think about your actions. You said that Amy Goodman was the most powerful and influential voice in the media. You said that you were going to ask her to cover this. We normal and sane people, write letters to the “journalist” and the news agency. We put pressure on them that way. Disrupting a panel on current interests with off-topic subjects does not make anyone want to listen to you. Your tactics also presume that Amy Goodman somehow managed not to notice 9/11 and look into the back story, that she’s never heard of your conspiracy theories. Tell me, when has “the most powerful and influential voice in media” ever shrunk away from reporting a story, especially the uncomfortable ones?

This morning, I woke up still pissed at the farce that happened in Philadelphia last night. As I mentioned in my previous post, there was nothing of substance touched on in the two hour commercial laden gang up on Sen. Obama last night. I see Clinton supporters who whined when Obama and Edwards “ganged” up on Clinton in New Hampshire, actually say that last night’s debates were fair and refreshing. Yeah…for the GOP. The comments on ABCNews website has reached over 14000 and most of them were negative. The blogosphere is abuzz with the Disaster in Philadelphia and even the MSM is collectively shaking its head.

Over at Booman Tribune, StevenD did the hard work I was just starting; going through the transcripts to summarize last night’s quesions:

1. Will you offer loser the VP - Gibson (G)
2. Obama’s “bitter” comment - G
3. Can Obama beat McCain (to Clinton) – Stephanopoulus (S)
4. Can Clinton win (to Obama) – S
5. Wright question (to Obama) – G
6. Wright question (to Clinton) – G
7. Several Wright questions (to Obama) – S
8. Why don’t people trust you/ Tuzla question (to Clinton) – S
9. Has Clinton been truthful (to Obama) – S
10. Flag question/patriotism (to Obama) – G
11. Flag question/patriotism/Ayers (to Obama) – S
12. Questions on Plan to get out of Iraq (to both) – G
13. Iran questions re attack on Israel (to both) – S
14. Economy questions (Will you raise taxes?) (to both) - S
15. Raise Capital Gains Tax questions (to both) – G
16. Soc. Sec. Taxes (to Obama) – G
17. Guns/2nd Amend. Questions (to both) – G
18. Affirmative Action question (to both) –S
19. Gas Prices/Energy policy questions (to both) – G
20. How would you use Dubya as advisor/other role (to both) – G
21. Undecided Superdelegate question (to both) – G

Do you see anything of any importance to the average American there? It wasn’t until about maybe 90 minutes into the 2 hour debate that George Stephanopolous said:

Let me turn to the economy. That is the No. 1 issue on Americans’ minds right now.

Then it was about taxes and we got to learn that Charles Gibson who proved his cluelessness on income levels of professors back in January, told us that people making $200K a year were middle class. We were also subjected to Gibson’s elitism that the average American cares or will be affected by captial gains tax. Gibson acts as if these debates were his personal interview with the candidates and screw the rest of us, he spent an inordinate amount of time debated Obama, while letting Clinton’s answers slide. He failed, once again, as a moderator.
Charles Gibson, also decided that editorializing was fair game. In a question regarding guns directed toward Sen. Clinton he said:

GIBSON: Well, with all due respect, I’m not sure I got an answer from Senator Obama, but do you still favor licensing and registration of handguns?

This was minutes after Obama had, in fact, answered the question and Clinton and Stephanopolous had a back and forth. It could be that Gibson’s inherent and obvious dislike of Obama denied him the ability to hear anything the Senator said. Maybe it’s the simple fact that when you keep interrupting a person when they’re trying to answer you, it proves that you’re not really listening.

I mentioned in my previous post that this debate was such a joke that it had me agreeing with Jonah Goldberg. No one makes me agree with Goldberg without reprecussions. Last night, Tom Shales posted on Washington Post an article titled: In Pa. Debate, The Clear Loser Is ABC. I recommend you read the entire article, but let me share you some snippets:

For the first 52 minutes of the two-hour, commercial-crammed show, Gibson and Stephanopoulos dwelled entirely on specious and gossipy trivia that already has been hashed and rehashed, in the hope of getting the candidates to claw at one another over disputes that are no longer news. Some were barely news to begin with.

snip

Obama was right on the money when he complained about the campaign being bogged down in media-driven inanities and obsessiveness over any misstatement a candidate might make along the way, whether in a speech or while being eavesdropped upon by the opposition. The tactic has been to “take one statement and beat it to death,” he said.

No sooner was that said than Gibson brought up, yet again, the controversial ravings of the pastor at a church attended by Obama. “Charlie, I’ve discussed this,” he said, and indeed he has, ad infinitum. If he tried to avoid repeating himself when clarifying his position, the networks would accuse him of changing his story, or changing his tune, or some other baloney.

snip

To this observer, ABC’s coverage seemed slanted against Obama. The director cut several times to reaction shots of such Clinton supporters as her daughter, Chelsea, who sat in the audience at the Kimmel Theater in Philly’s National Constitution Center. Obama supporters did not get equal screen time, giving the impression that there weren’t any in the hall. The director also clumsily chose to pan the audience at the very start of the debate, when the candidates made their opening statements, so Obama and Clinton were barely seen before the first commercial break.

Newsday writes:

The morning after the latest Democratic debate, the talk doesn’t seem to be about which candidate — New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton or Illinois Sen. Barack Obama — would make a more-formidable foe to run against Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain.

The talk seems to be about which of the two ABC News moderators — Charles Gibson or George Stephanopoulos — did the worst job, which one was sillier in Philadelphia.

Will Bunch wrote an open letter to the two hosts of last night’s debacle:

With your performance tonight — your focus on issues that were at best trivial wastes of valuable airtime and at worst restatements of right-wing falsehoods, punctuated by inane “issue” questions that in no way resembled the real world concerns of American voters — you disgraced my profession of journalism, and, by association, me and a lot of hard-working colleagues who do still try to ferret out the truth, rather than worry about who can give us the best deal on our capital gains taxes. But it’s even worse than that. By so badly botching arguably the most critical debate of such an important election, in a time of both war and economic misery, you disgraced the American voters, and in fact even disgraced democracy itself. Indeed, if I were a citizen of one of those nations where America is seeking to “export democracy,” and I had watched the debate, I probably would have said, “no thank you.” Because that was no way to promote democracy.

And that’s just a small sampling. You know it’s bad when USAToday, the tabloid that seems to focus of the news of 8 months ago, has a current roundup of criticisms on their pages.

You’ll note the recurrent themes. The candidates themselves were mere props on the stage. To ask who won or lost last night’s “debates” is to ask the wrong question. Neither candidate shined, though the focus group said that Clinton one. Odd one that, since the only time they responded really postively toward her was when she told a joke that didn’t sound scripted. Naturally, the Clinton’s are using that clip as a promo piece. Otherwise, a simple scanning of the transcripts show that Obama’s answers to the most inane questions were intelligent and clear. The focus group responded overwhelming positive to his answers, so it was curious that only 5 of the 22 people thought he won the debate.

It has been estimated that over 10M watched last night’s debates, making it the most watched debate this season. 10 million Americans who care what the next President of the United States has to say and as StevenD mentioned, they didn’t touch on any of the important questions:

Global Warming, New Orleans Reconstruction, Health Care, Veterans Benefits (New GI Bill or Health Benefits), Defense Spending, National Debt, Trade Issues, Environmental issues (not about global warming), Regulatory Agency scandals and problems, Financial markets, Worldwide Food Crisis, Darfur, Pakistan, Somalia, North Korea, NATO, Russia, China, Nigeria, Venezuela, Drugs, Unemployment, Mortgage crisis, Bush administration Crimes and Scandals, Torture, Guantanamo Bay and other detention facilities, Loss of Civil Rights (Electronic surveillance, FISA, Habeas Corpus), Infrastructure issues, Gay Rights, Race (except as it came up re: Reverend Wright), Immigration

Last night’s debate forces us the understand how vested the powers that be are in keeping us uninformed. They say that Americans are turned off of politics, it was the disgusting behaviors of the two “moderators” that turn us off, not necessarily the candidates themselves. ABC, once again, put on a show for the corporate masters and the rest of us could only watch from the cheap seats.

There’s no recap. It sucked balls.

ABCNews needs to know how much they fucked up on this one. You can call (212) 456-7777 or email them.

It was, hands down, probably the worst excuse of a debate in all of debating history. It was through no fault of the candidates. It was purely Assclown Hijinks with Chuck Gibson and Georgie-boy. Absolutely NOTHING of substance was asked of the candidates. I came in late and was still subjected to 45 minutes of non-issue questions on Rev. Wright, bitterness and flag pins. Can you guess the bias? There was one guess on Clinton’s lying habits. She actually said something like, “People are just going to have get over my habitual lying.” Oh…that part may be an tiny exaggeration.

Okay…wanna know how bad it is? Jonah “Iraq is Going Great!” Goldberg thought it was bad. When you have me agreeing with something Goldberg writes you know it’s bad. (h/t to idredit)

I’m no leftwing blogger, but I can only imagine how furious they must be with the debate so far. Nothing on any issues. Just a lot of box-checking on how the candidates will respond to various Republican talking points come the fall. Now I think a lot of those Republican talking points are valid and legitimate. But if I were a “fighting Dem” who thinks all of these topics are despicable distractions from the “real issues,” I would find this debate to be nothing but Republican water-carrying.

The responses from viewers on ABCNews gives you a better idea of how bad it was:

Jesus Christ - are you kidding! This is the worst sham for an unbiased debate I have ever seen - FIRE STEPHANOPOLOUS and GIBSON… and by-the-way, NO multi-miliion dollar severance package - make them pay a fine for torturing americans with their insane questions

Posted by:
j50george 9:42 PM

Pathetic job, ABC. Very sad. You had a chance to cut through the crap, but you chose to wallow in it. Lapel pins? Wright? Bosnia? All that crap’s been hashed and rehashed. And millionaire Gibson whining about capital gains taxes. What a travesty.

Posted by:
Yucca333 10:15 PM

Whatever they paid them to gang up on obama i’ll double it.they should leave the debates to the REAL news networks!!!!!

Posted by:
walchrs 9:43 PM

What a terrible debate by ABC’s moderators. I guess this is why I never watch ABC News. About 30 minutes was spent on Rev. Wright, the bitter comment, and Hillary mis-speak(which was only about 5 of those 30 mins). We then had to sit through 30 minutes of commercials in a two hour program. That was pathetic ABC. PATHETIC.

Posted by:
mr_sj 10:12 PM

And apparently, that’s a-okay for a lot of people. I mean, clearly it’s a non-issue what with (yet another) religious sect in Texas and Clinton’s campaign drama taking up the news. It seems very few almost no news outlets are interested in getting into the hard work of investigating war crimes by the executive branch.

In dozens of top-secret talks and meetings in the White House, the most senior Bush administration officials discussed and approved specific details of how high-value al Qaeda suspects would be interrogated by the Central Intelligence Agency, sources tell ABC News.

The so-called Principals who participated in the meetings also approved the use of “combined” interrogation techniques — using different techniques during interrogations, instead of using one method at a time — on terrorist suspects who proved difficult to break, sources said.

Highly placed sources said a handful of top advisers signed off on how the CIA would interrogate top al Qaeda suspects — whether they would be slapped, pushed, deprived of sleep or subjected to simulated drowning, called waterboarding. (ABCNews)

This is after the protestations of these same US officials that “the United States does not torture”. Granted those of us with brains and not living like ostriches were well aware that these people were lying and committing crimes and for our troubles we were called unpatriotic or treasonous by the flat-earth types who refused to allow logic to dwell in their heads.

Dan Froomkin at the Washington Post seems to be another reporter who is paying attention:

If you consider what the government did to be torture, which is a crime according to U.S. and international law, Bush’s statement shifts his role from being an accessory after the fact to being part of a conspiracy to commit.

He even points out the media’s lack of interest in this “old news”:

The mainstream media by and large seem to agree with Bush that the ABC News Report wasn’t so startling, and they have given Bush’s remarks almost no coverage. There was no mention of Bush’s admission in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal or the Los Angeles Times. There was nothing on the major wire services. And nothing on CNN, CBS or NBC.

What kind of world do we live in when the President can get on TV, admit to high crimes and no one in the media bats an eye and Americans, by and large, are more consumed over their reality shows and campaign silliness? Still don’t care? Let’s look at it another way: I have two children who have never lived in a United States where torture was not allowed.

Sucks, don’t it?

The ACLU has called on Congress to investigate, though I’m still unclear as to why Congress feels they can’t. I understand that Nancy Pelosi must have made some strange backroom deal with Bush to remove impeachment “off the table“, but surely there are other Congressmen and women who have backbones, who believe in the ideals and moral authority of America to move this forward.

“Long after the Bush administration is history, our nation will continue to be tarnished by its record of disregard for the rule of law and human rights.

“If there is a redeeming factor, it is the exposure of these illegalities and the determined effort to prevent a recurrence.

“To that end, the American Civil Liberties Union has called on Congress to investigate.

“Given the record of the Bush administration, including the political manipulation of the Justice Department under disgraced Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, the request is entirely reasonable. We urge our elected officials to embrace it - and to restore our country’s dedication to moral leadership.” (Tuscaloosa News)

I heartily agree and urge you to write your Representative and ask them to push for investigation into these heinous crimes. Do it so that I can tell me kids that the US doesn’t condone torture.  For reals.

From NBC’s Kelly O’Donnell
Campaigning in Connecticut today, McCain pledged to have a news conference once every two weeks if elected president.

“You’ve gotta have a conversation with the American people,” he said.

Oh my goodness.  The suicide rate in this country would skyrocket if McCain forced himself on the American people every two weeks.  People don’t even want to listen to him now.  My YouTube videos would get more coverage than McCain [s]newsers.  He’s not even half as interesting as Abe Simpson either, so it would be more painful than anything.

I won’t even touch the dunderheadedness of “you’ve gotta have”.  Ugh.

Why? Oh, only because on his show yesterday he actually asked Sen. Claire McCaskill:

OK. Let me ask you about how he — how’s he connect with regular people? Does he? Or does he only appeal to people who come from the African-American community and from the people who have college or advanced degrees?

You got that?

Black people are not “regular” according to Chris Matthews.

College-educated people are not “regular” according to Chris Matthews.

Chris Matthews just said that I am not a regular person.

I don’t get why MSNBC has racists on their shows. Does is make them money? If this ass was on any other channel, he’d make Olbermann’s Worst Person in the World list. Something tells me that Chris Matthews insulting a good chunk of the electorate isn’t going to get him suspended like David Shuster.

The next time some Clinton supporter whines that the media is mean to Clinton just say ‘Tuzla’. See, I’m not getting it…Obama’s Reverend says stuff that unhinges a nation. To make it worse, the words were taken out of context and when you read the entire sermon, make a lot of sense. Sigh. But stupid people are stupid people and they’re actually getting upset and demanding that Obama leave his church. Let me repeat that. These people think Obama should leave his church based on 40 seconds of words snipped from a 30 year career. To make it worse, some of them even say that means that he shouldn’t be president…because of some one else’s words.

Huh?

So, it’s been proven–again–that Sen. Clinton is a bald-faced liar. Now, remember that she’s been on about her trip to Bosnia and all the sniper fire. You’ll remember that back on March 11, before all this Rev. Wright stupidity, The Sleuth ran a story with Sinbad who was also on that trip.

“I never felt that I was in a dangerous position. I never felt being in a sense of peril, or ‘Oh, God, I hope I’m going to be OK when I get out of this helicopter or when I get out of his tank.’”

In her Iowa stump speech, Clinton also said, “We used to say in the White House that if a place is too dangerous, too small or too poor, send the First Lady.”

Say what? As Sinbad put it: “What kind of president would say, ‘Hey, man, I can’t go ’cause I might get shot so I’m going to send my wife…oh, and take a guitar player and a comedian with you.’”

You’d think that the media would have picked up on this, but they didn’t it. Apparently to be mean to Clinton. So, then video showed up late last week, definitely making Clinton’s words lies. You’d think that on the Sunday talkshows, it would The Story, you know, since a presidential candidate was caught in a lie. But on Meet The Press, Tim “Obama is BLACK–like Farrakhan!!!” Russert merely glossed over it:

MR. RUSSERT: Chuck Todd, Hillary Clinton released–had some documents released about her experience as first lady, which brought up again her foreign policy experience as she has articulated it. Here she was last Monday, talking about a trip she made to Bosnia in 1996, suggesting they sent her rather than her husband because of the danger involved. And here she is.

(Videotape)

SEN. HILLARY CLINTON (D-NY): I remember landing under sniper fire. There was supposed to be some kind of a greeting ceremony at the airport, but instead, we just ran with our heads down to get into the vehicles to get to our base.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT: Yesterday in a column called “Factchecker” by Michael Dobbs in The Washington Post, Dobbs wrote this: “Clinton’s tale of landing at the Tuzla airport `under sniper fire’ and then running for cover is simply not credible. Photographs and video of the arrival ceremony, combined with contemporaneous news reports, tell a very different story. Four Pinocchios.” Which is the highest you can get, which means a whopper in terms of exaggeration. Now, the Clinton campaign has responded by having a speechwriter who was with Hillary Clinton saying, in fact, it was a dangerous situation. And General Nash, who had told Michael Dobbs there was no sniper fire, said that he was aware of some security concerns, but The Post stands by the four Pinocchios. The credibility issue, truth telling, is this a problem for Senator Clinton?

MR. TODD: Well, it’s been–the thing, the nagging thing throughout this whole campaign. When you ask that question of honest and trustworthy, she has always consistently scored lower than Obama, though I am curious what things are going to look like next week, because now, as John Meacham put it, Obama’s mortal, and now he is going to be viewed as just another politician. And so how much does he take a hit, for instance, on that one question. But I, for the life of me, haven’t understood why they have pushed this story. They knew that, well, somebody went after and reinterviewed Sinbad, who was on that trip, the former comedian, and I put “comedian” in quotes, that he was on that trip and doesn’t remember it being that harried or anything like that, and yet she went out and, and retold the story. They have an, an amazing sometimes, with the, the Clinton campaign, where they continue to push something like the, the Ireland thing, which was, her role in the Irish peace process, there appears to be that she certainly played some role or she was involved with it, but what was it? And they, they seem to, to push it. They didn’t need to retell this story because, if they had not, then they wouldn’t have gotten this four Pinocchio thing under The Washington Post and given the Obama’s campaign something to, to hit them with.

That was it. Remember Russert needling Sen. Obama about Farrakhan? Didn’t it look lame that Russert was pushing on Obama to distance himself from something Farrakhan said almost 18 years ago? Then on Monday, this went viral:

That was handmade for the media, but nothing. After getting very strong headlines supergluing Obama to his pastor’s 40 seconds words out of a 30 year carreer, we see “Clinton says she misspoke” or “Clinton backpedals on Bosnia“…all because the media is out to get Clinton.

The media is so evil to Clinton that they just reported the spin lies from their campaign spokesperson. Here we have a candidate who flat out lied. She lied. She’s a liar. I haven’t seen any pundits going, “Well, what does this mean for Hillary?” Meanwhile, Obama gets calls to end his campaign because of 40 seconds of snippets out of a 30 year career that were spoken by someone else?

If anyone ever complains about Clinton’s media portrayal just mention ‘Tuzla’ because trust, if Obama had made a statement like that with video that clearly proved he was lying, the Clinton campaign would be all over this like stank on shit and the media would do their best to drum Obama out of the race.