Very Interesting Vote Video

But I have to admit after the saturation coverage of this election, the funny parts are really funny. What's scary is I could place a real name to about half of these characters--watch the video, you'll know what I mean...

Priceless

Now the sad truth is, until about 2 weeks ago, I had no idea what some of these alphabet economic products we keep reading about were. If you had asked me about a CDS or credit default swap, I wouldn't have known. But, seeing the market implode and trying to come to grips with the situation I figured I might as well learn what everyone was getting so excited about.


Here's what I learned: a CDS is basically insurance covering the value of a particular loan--effectively guaranteeing a payoff should the borrower fail to pay off his debt. It's not called 'insurance' but 'swap' to avoid insurance style regulation.

It's an important distinction. Insurance companies are regulated by the government, with reserve requirements, statutory limits, and examiners routinely showing up to check the books to make sure the money is there to cover potential claims. CDS are private bets, and the Federal Reserve from the time of Alan Greenspan has insisted that regulators keep hands off.

According to Global Research

Credit default swaps are the most widely traded form of credit derivative. They are bets between two parties on whether or not a company will default on its bonds. In a typical default swap, the “protection buyer” gets a large payoff if the company defaults within a certain period of time, while the “protection seller” collects periodic payments for assuming the risk of default.

CDS thus resemble insurance policies, but there is no requirement to actually hold any asset or suffer any loss, so CDS are widely used just to speculate on market changes. In one blogger's example, a hedge fund wanting to increase its profits could sit back and collect $320,000 a year in premiums just for selling “protection” on a risky BBB junk bond. The premiums are “free” money - free until the bond actually goes into default, when the hedge fund could be on the hook for $100 million in claims. And there's the catch: what if the hedge fund doesn't have the $100 million? The fund's corporate shell or limited partnership is put into bankruptcy, but that hardly helps the “protection buyers” who thought they were covered.

The current number of CDS agreements are said to be around 45 trillion.

What's interesting in this context--outside of the fact that it's driven our economy into economic meltdown for the forseeable future-- is the failure of Byron York of the National Review to even understand what a CDS is, much less how they might be responsible for the current economic crisis--as most economists understand it. Instead, he's stuck like glue to the conservative talking point that the economic crisis is the result of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac giving out loans to minorities that couldn't afford them. Not only is this economic hogwash--bad loans may have helped but alone they would never have caused this economic tsunami -- it's boilerplate racist garbage. Couple that with the attack against ACORN and you hold the keys to whatever intellectual intergrity modern conservatism can claim. But let's go to tape...

From an online chat between Matt Taibbi of Rolling Stone and Byron York of the National Review...

M.T.: But all of those "headwinds," or almost all of them, are the direct result of McCain having supported policies that are now unpopular. There is absolute justice in his facing a "headwind" from the financial meltdown, from the unpopularity of the Iraq war, and so on. How is that a "headwind"? That's just self-created unpopularity.

I mean, his onetime campaign co-chair and top economic adviser, Phil Gramm, basically created the credit-default-swap market back in 2000. Why shouldn't he get hammered on the financial crisis?

B.Y.: Did I suggest that headwinds are unfair? But on the financial meltdown in particular, if you're suggesting that that is a Republican creation, or even more specifically a McCain creation, I think you're on pretty shaky ground.

M.T.: You don't think the unregulated CDS market was a major factor in the current crisis? Were you watching when AIG almost went under? Were you watching the Lehman collapse?

B.Y.: I think that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were also major factors. And I believe that many of the problems in the mortgage area can be attributed to the confluence of Democratic and Republican priorities: the Democrats' desire to give mortgages to people, particularly minorities, who could not afford them, and the Republicans' desire to achieve an "ownership society," in part by giving mortgages to people who could not afford them. Again, I believe that if you are suggesting that the financial crisis is a Republican creation, or even more specifically a McCain creation, I think you're on pretty shaky ground.

M.T.: Oh, come on. Tell me you're not ashamed to put this gigantic international financial Krakatoa at the feet of a bunch of poor black people who missed their mortgage payments. The CDS market, this market for credit default swaps that was created in 2000 by Phil Gramm's Commodities Future Modernization Act, this is now a $62 trillion market, up from $900 billion in 2000. That's like five times the size of the holdings in the NYSE. And it's all speculation by Wall Street traders. It's a classic bubble/Ponzi scheme. The effort of people like you to pin this whole thing on minorities, when in fact this whole thing has been caused by greedy traders dealing in unregulated markets, is despicable.

B.Y.: I was struck by the recent Senate testimony of James Lockhart, who is head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, about the sheer recklessness of Fannie in recent years. Despite "repeated warnings about credit risk," Lockhart testified, Fannie became more reckless in 2006 and 2007 than they had been in the scandal-ridden tenure of Franklin Raines (who departed in 2004). In 2005, Lockhart said, 14 percent of Fannie's new business was in risky loans. In the first half of 2007, it was 33 percent. So something terribly wrong was going on there, and it became a significant part of the present problem.

M.T.: What a surprise that you mention Franklin Raines. Do you even know how a CDS works? Can you explain your conception of how these derivatives work? Because I get the feeling you don't understand. Or do you actually think that it was a few tiny homeowner defaults that sank gigantic companies like AIG and Lehman and Bear Stearns? Explain to me how these default swaps work, I'm interested to hear.

Because what we're talking about here is the difference between one homeowner defaulting and forty, four hundred, four thousand traders betting back and forth on the viability of his loan. Which do you think has a bigger effect on the economy?

B.Y.: Are you suggesting that critics of Fannie and Freddie are talking about the default of a single homeowner?

M.T.: No. That is what you call a figure of speech. I'm saying that you're talking about individual homeowners defaulting. But these massive companies aren't going under because of individual homeowner defaults. They're going under because of the myriad derivatives trades that go on in connection with each piece of debt, whether it be a homeowner loan or a corporate bond. I'm still waiting to hear what your idea is of how these trades work. I'm guessing you've never even heard of them.

I mean really. You honestly think a company like AIG tanks because a bunch of minorities couldn't pay off their mortgages?

B.Y.: When you refer to "Phil Gramm's Commodities Future Modernization Act," are you referring to S.3283, co-sponsored by Gramm, along with Senators Tom Harkin and Tim Johnson?

M.T.: In point of fact I'm talking about the 262-page amendment Gramm tacked on to that bill that deregulated the trade of credit default swaps.

Tick tick tick. Hilarious sitting here while you frantically search the Internet to learn about the cause of the financial crisis — in the middle of a live chat interview.

B.Y.: Look, you can keep trying to make this a specifically partisan and specifically Gramm-McCain thing, but it simply isn't. We've gone on for fifteen minutes longer than scheduled, and that's enough. Thanks.

M.T.: Thanks. Note, folks, that the esteemed representative of the New Republic has no idea what the hell a credit default swap is. But he sure knows what a minority homeowner looks like.

B.Y.: It's National Review.

On Undecided Voters

From the inimitable David Sedaris in the New Yorker:

To put them in perspective, I think of being on an airplane. The flight attendant comes down the aisle with her food cart and, eventually, parks it beside my seat. “Can I interest you in the chicken?” she asks. “Or would you prefer the platter of shit with bits of broken glass in it?”

To be undecided in this election is to pause for a moment and then ask how the chicken is cooked.

Saving the Paleoliths

McCain campaign spokeperson...

There are people in this campaign who feel a real sense of loyalty to her and are really pleased with her performance and think she did a great job," said the McCain insider. "She has a real future in this party."

Sure, Sarah Palin may have a future in the Republican party, but really, isn't the question more pratically put: "Does a party stupid enough to tout Sarah Palin, actually even have a future?"

1000 words

Anti-Socialism as Racism

Adam Serwer over at The American Prospect breaks down the history of what right wingers mean when they call Obama a 'socialist'...Money graph:

The hysterical accusations of socialism from conservatives echo similar accusations leveled at black leaders in the past, as though the quest for racial parity were simply a left-wing plot. Obama may not actually be a socialist or communist, but his election would strike another powerful blow to the informal racial hierarchy that has existed in America since the 1960s, when it ceased being enforced by law. This hierarchy, which holds that whiteness is synonymous with American-ness, is one conservatives are now instinctively trying to preserve. Like black civil-rights activists of the 1960s, Obama symbolizes the destruction of a social order they see as fundamentally American, which is why terms like "socialism" are used to describe the threat.

This phenomenon extends beyond Obama's candidacy. The conservative explanation for the mortgage crisis falls neatly into this narrative, too; the country is at risk because Democrats allowed minorities to disrupt the natural social order by becoming homeowners. Never mind that this defies all data, logic, and history, the narrative resonates because it allows Obama, a living symbol of black folks rising above "their station," to become a focus for conservative economic anxieties.


Conservatives, now and in the past, have turned to "socialism" and "communism" as shorthand to criticize black activists and political figures since the civil-rights era. In The Autobiography of Malcolm X as written by Alex Haley, Malcolm recalls being confronting by a government agent tailing him in Africa, not long after his pilgrimage to Mecca. The agent was convinced that Malcolm was a communist. Malcolm spent years under surveillance because of such bizarre suspicions. Likewise, J. Edgar Hoover spent years attempting to link Martin Luther King Jr. to the communist cause. King, for his part, welcomed everyone who embraced the cause of black civil rights, regardless of their ideological ties. This included communists and socialists, but the idea that a devout man of God like King saw black rights as a mere step in a worldwide communist revolution was absurd. Malcolm was a conservative. King was a liberal. To their enemies, they were simply communists.

--snip --

McCain, a child of privilege who spent the late 1960s in a Vietnamese prison camp, may simply be unaware of the feelings and historical context he has evoked through his campaign’s rhetoric. When Sarah Palin accuses Obama of "palling around with terrorists" and suggests that Obama hates his own country enough to wish it violence, the McCain campaign fuels age-old paranoia built around the conflation of black rights and the radical left. As for McCain himself, his attempts to tamp down the vitriol of his crowds suggest that he is somewhat confused by their response. He wants voters to dislike Obama, but he seems unaware of just what he has unleashed. However, by implicitly invoking the idea that Obama represents a socialist takeover of the United States, McCain is inviting what can only be a rational response from those who would die for their country: violence. What else is a patriot to do when freedom is threatened? Especially when their fears have been validated by no less authoritative a source than the Republican nominee for president of the United States?

How much of this is broadly true of the attitudes of the rightwing in this country, I couldn't say; but one think that strikes me as deeply insightful are these sentences:

Malcolm was a conservative. King was a liberal. To their enemies, they were simply communists.

How many conservatives can make this obvious distinction? Is it because they don't see or understand it....or is it because they simply don't care?

From Russia, with love

from Politico:
McCain camp hits up Russian envoy

On a day on which McCain campaign manager Rick Davis hinted that Obama was taking foreign money, the Russian Mission to the United Nations has released a standard-issue fundraising letter gone a bit astray: It was addressed to the Russian envoy to the U.N., Vitaly Churkin, at the mission's address, but without his title.

As the Russian newswire RIA-Novosti tells it:

Russia's permanent mission to the UN has received a letter from U.S. Republican presidential candidate John McCain asking for financial support of his election campaign, the mission said in a statement on Monday.

"We have received a letter from Senator John McCain with a request for a financial donation to his presidential election campaign. In this respect we have to reiterate that neither Russia's permanent mission to the UN nor the Russian government or its officials finance political activities in foreign countries," the statement said.

According to Ruslan Bakhtin, press secretary of the Russian mission, the letter dated September 29 and signed by McCain, was addressed to Vitaly Churkin, Russia's envoy to the UN, and arrived on October 16.

The ambassador's title was not included in the letter, and was not clear why the letter had taken over two weeks to arrive.

Enclosed was a request for a donation of up to $5,000 to McCain's election campaign to be returned with a check or permission to withdraw the money from the donor's credit card until October 24.

Bakhtin confirmed the story to Politico, and wouldn't comment on the added oddity of the error coming from the anti-Russian McCain. "We just find it amusing," he said.

Gee, wonder if McCain looks into Putin's soul and still sees K G B.... or ...maybe he's starting to spell it... H E L P

Deepest Republican Fears-- per Joe Scarborough

"...but they start talking about economics, income redistribution, get--you know, taking from the most productive members of society and giving tax breaks to people who don't pay taxes. This is what we're going to see."

Let's take 30 seconds and unpack this, shall we?

Here are the hidden assumptions: if I earn over 250,000 a year I am one of the "most productive members of society". If I earn less than 250,000 a year, I am someone who doesn't pay taxes.

Yeah, I know it's stupid, but let's really break it down. Just to see how Republican talking points really work.

First up, a question: are folks who make more than $250,000 dollars a year actually more productive than those who make less?

Most studies and academically valid evidence suggest this is not just false, but an incredibly stupid assumption.

The median hourly wage for American workers has declined 2 percent since 2003, after factoring in inflation. The drop has been especially notable, economists say, because productivity — the amount that an average worker produces in an hour and the basic wellspring of a nation’s living standards — has risen steadily over the same period.

So what we're seeing--take note Joe--is an INVERSE relation between wages and productivity. There's also empirical evidence that the more you work, physically, the LESS you make.

But what about intellectual work? It's true that advanced degrees correlate with higher salaries up to a point--and that point is right around 100,000 dollars. After that, salaries for advanced degrees especially in academia, flatline. Advanced professional degrees continue to inch upward and a 'productive' lawyer or doctor might make lots more money than a lazy one, true, but this is an utterly one dimensional analysis.

What about doctors who work in poor rural areas? Is there a valid 'productive' correlation between their wealth and the wealth of someone working as a plastic surgeon in Hollywood? Is the plastic surgeon actually more productive or just lucky enough to work for a wealthier community?

Big question, the answer tends to be obvious after a few seconds of thought.

Or let's take a little bit more concrete example. Let's take what you do for a living, Joe.

Try working a UPS shift unloading a truck for say, 10 bucks an hour and compare that labor / value to what you make for spouting ridiculous ideological fantasies for less than an hour every morning.

In that scenario who is actually more 'productive'? The lying fabulist (you) or the UPS trucker unloading his truck for four hours?

I believe a valid argument can be made that Joe Scarborough is actually destroying the intellect of the middle class by lying to individuals who are sadly still watching him, while the guy unloading the UPS truck might not be terribly enlightening, but at least he's moving boxes and not twisting reality into those bizarre rightwing fantasies that have no relation to reality. In short, he's far, far more productive vis a vis the middle class than a Joe Scarborough will ever be.

If you're wealthy, that's no guarantee you have been actually more productive in any meaningful sense for the middle class or the larger community. But it does tell us much about the community you serve, Joe--and it ain't the middle class.

Conversely, what millions and millions of hard working 'Joes' across this country can attest to--if you're truly productive at the nuts and bolts level of society--that bears little or no relation to the amount of real money you might be making when compared across all classes. When compared merely within the limits of the middle class--say those make below 250,000 and above 35,000 dollars you could make an argument that there's a correlation but it's not especially strong, considering the variations across communities in terms of wealth, etc. that I've already mentioned. But this gets particularly bizarre if you compare across classes, because once you move across the million dollar mark, money is generally not even tied to individual 'work day' productivity in any meaningful sense. There are excpetions, of course, but 'earning' wealth at that level is typically tied directly to investment strategies; in Bush's infamous diction, doin 'bidness. That's not productivity, Joe. That's speculative profiteering, gambling, or, depending on the investment strategy, usury.

Next up, is the utterly ludicrous notion that if I make less than $250,000 I'm essentially tax free.

Oh, Joe, Joe, Joe, Joe, Joe.

This should be tatooed on your forehead so you will never earn a cent spouting nonsense on national television again.

All of us...every single one of us poor bastards making less than $250,000 a year, all the millions and millions of us down to those poor suckers barely scraping by on $25,000 a year ... PAY TAXES.

You insufferable idiot.

In one sentence you've managed to insult millions and millions of people in the middle class, about 96% of this country, in fact, which is the number of folks who make less than $250,000 and are tax payers.

So do us all a favor and shut your pie hole, Joe. Your an embarassment to wealthy autocrats everywhere.

Hey, maybe there are some grown ups, afterall...

Obama Canvaser attacked

from WISN

CALEDONIA, Wis. -- Police in Caledonia are investigating the assault of a campaign volunteer as she was canvassing for Senator Barack Obama Saturday afternoon. In an exclusive interview with 12 News, 58 year-old Nancy Takehara of Chicago says she was going door-to-door when she came across a disgruntled homeowner. “The next thing I know he’s telling us we’re not his people, we’re probably with ACORN, and he started screaming and raving,” Takehara said. “He grabbed me by the back of the neck. I thought he was going to rip my hair out of my head. He was pounding on my head and screaming. The man terrified me.” The man eventually stopped and the Caledonia police were called. Takehara was asked if she needed medical assistance, but she was not seriously injured. Instead, she says she was shaken up by the homeowner’s reaction.

--snip--

The reference to ACORN in this account is important. No doubt the irate homeowner came up with that obscure organization's name thanks to far right wing propaganda that has been showered on the American public for the last three or four weeks. The reference to ACORN is no accident, in other words, but part of a sustained Republican voter suppression effort. In fact, scratch the surface a little bit and you begin to realize that the whole Republican gambit against ACORN is tied directly to the US Attorney scandal under Alberto Gonzales. How so? Well recall that in the US attorneys scandal several US attorneys were fired for their unwillingess to pursue politically charged cases, including voter fraud, with sufficient aggression to satisfy the Bush administration.

According to TalkingPointsMemo

House Judiciary chair John Conyers, as well as David Iglesias -- whose firing as US attorney was a direct result of his reluctance to pursue GOP-pushed claims of voter fraud, according to the recent OIG report -- have also connected the FBI's ACORN investigation to the kind of politicization exposed in the firings saga.

The smearing of ACORN is an essential part of McCain voter suppression strategy. By alleging that ACORN voter fraud could threaten the fabric of our democracy, as McCain claimed in the debate Wednesday night, he is trying to create a much greater doubt about the electoral process altogether. Couple that with an imprudent --and possibly illegal FBI investigation this close to a national election --and you create a volatile atmosphere for low information voters who don't realize the demonization of ACORN is all about throwing out as many voter registrations as possible. That's the Republican's end goal, presumably. Perhaps a tangential benefit is calling into question Obama's mandate, should he win. Neither are helpful to the Democratic process or dignified, frankly. And, certainly in this instance, ACORN is very much a victim of a GOP smear campaign.

A word or two about ACORN

ACORN has been around for 38 years. It's an acronym that stands for Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now and it's been active all these years at the community level in fighting for fair wage laws, preventing home owner discrimination and predatory lending and voter registration. What problems there are with voter registration forms are noted AND handed into the precincts. Why? Because in many localities that's the law. It's required they hand in all registrations. Voluntarily, ACORN flags those registrations that appear suspicious, but it's up to local officials to determine the validity of the voter registration--NOT ACORN. As King County Prosecutor Dan Satterberg, a Republican, said last year the ACORN case in Seattle had nothing to do with manipulating outcomes and everything to do with the workers' efforts to keep their $8-an-hour jobs. If anyone was defrauded, it was ACORN... "The defendants ... cheated their employers to get paid for work they did not actually perform," Satterberg said. "The defendants simply realized that making up names was easier than actually canvassing the streets."

Do fake registrations equal fake ballots? No

To give some sense of how infrequently an actual voter registration problem leads to a miscaste ballot, Dr Lori Minnite of Barnard College has reported that from 2002 to 2005 only one person was found guilty of registration fraud. Twenty people were found guilty of voting while ineligible and five people were found guilty of voting more than once. That’s 26 criminal voters -- voters who vote twice, impersonate other people, vote without being a resident -- the voters that Republicans warn about. 26 out of the millions and millions of ballots caste in those three years. Think about those numbers...your odds on the lottery are better than coming across an incidence of true voter fraud. Meanwhile hundreds of thousands of people are getting turned away at the polls.

"Yet", Minnite notes, "we see the repetition of wildly exaggerated allegations about ACORN's "criminality" by people like Michelle Malkin, a right-wing blogger; John Fund, who's been attacking ACORN for years from his vantage as a Wall Street Journal columnist; and Roger Stone, a longtime Republican operative so devoted to Nixonian dirty tricks that he's tattooed an image of Nixon's face on his back. His blog, by the way, is sponsored by the same law firm that launched a phony voter fraud attack on ACORN in Florida during the last presidential election."

"Let’s remember, as the Republicans make a furor over the Indiana registrations, that ACORN itself separated out those registrations -- found the 2,000 faulty ones and flagged them for election officials -- in the first place. "

Let's repeat that: they work with elected officials, not against them.

If you are unfortunate enough to have any, let your Republican friends or family members know that the nonsense the GOP is spewing lately is not merely lies and smears, which, afterall, we have come to expect. But when coupled with the 'terrorist' association nonsense and the nativist racism already prevalent in many American communities, these smears create a toxic environment that is dangerous, incendiary and hate filled. Innocent people will get hurt because of it.

That's not just ACORNs' problem, or Obama's. It's every Republicans' problem who has not spoken out against such ugly tactics used in their name. From history, we know how tragically such cowardly silence can end.

Below is short Hidden History on ACORN.

~DM





P.S. If you are still deeply concerned about election fraud in America, you might try reading this story about a fellow named Mark Jacoby, who was arrested in Ontario and owns a firm hired in California that explicitly violated state registration laws by illegally switching party identification. This is the real deal, afterall. But it will not please the likes of FOX News or The Wall Street Journal: Mark Jacoby was hired by the Californian Republican party. ...

"Jacoby's arrest by state investigators and the Ontario Police Department comes after dozens of voters said they were duped into registering as Republicans by his firm, Young Political Majors, or YPM. The voters said YPM tricked them by saying they were signing a petition to toughen penalties against child molesters. The firm was paid $7 to $12 for every Californian it registered as a member of the GOP."

It's Not Socialism, John. It's a 'correction'

I guess McCain is making for a gentler campaign or just dating himself, pulling out the big bugaboo of his generation 'socialism' and 'welfare' and not using the ole 'terrorist' card that gen-x moron in lipstick Palin likes.

The way McCain phrases Obama's plan makes it sound really sinister and commie.

"In other words, Barack Obama's tax plan would convert the IRS into a giant welfare agency, redistributing massive amounts of wealth at the direction of politicians in Washington," McCain said in the radio address.

The only problem is no 'conversion' of the IRS is necessary and McCain's plan will do the same thing --"redistributing massive amounts of wealth at the direction of politicians in Washington"-- with tax credits.

Besides what's with all the screechy talk about 'socialism', suddenly? Bush has been as prolifigate a spender of federal dollars as you'd ever want to see. He's a bloated embarassment of riches for the fiscally promiscuous. Only, Bush and McCain's policies ensure that the middle class and poor never see a dime of that money. Instead it goes to cronies in various industries and state run boondoogles many of which (FEMA, Homeland Security) rival the old Soviet Union for utter incompetence and corruption. His tax cuts alone were one of the most massive welfare projects in US history; just aimed at a very small and very wealthy demographic and not those treacherous and lazy 'welfare' queens that Ronald Reagan always railed against (poor black women 'in cadillacs' were apparently almost as dangerous as Russian MIGs).

And to be fair, I guess we ought to mention in more detail all those happy RICH recipients of the Bush tax cuts who have been living high and mighty thanks to Bush and McCain's largesse(excuse me, per McCain's new usage, 'welfare') that amounted to a 3.5 trillion dollar giveaway according to the Brookings Institute.

...making the tax cuts permanent would reduce federal revenues by almost $1.8 trillion over 10 years — and that's in addition to the $1.7 trillion of revenue losses already locked into law.

That doesn't even include the latest $770 billion dollar 'bailout bill' for Goldman Sachs ex-CEO Paulson who Bush finagled into the head of the Treasury (henhouse meet rooster, your guard). Or the $85 Billion shelled out to those poverty stricken folks at AIG who had to turn around and blow a few hundred thousand dollars on their retreats and manicures because their poor nerves were so frazzled from not knowing whether Uncle Sam would come to their rescue or not.

Talk about Socialist Welfare Queens.

But enough with this class warfare talk. It's obvious that the middle class, and the poor have been deeply shafted for the last 20 years by the very wealthy in this country. Income distribution graphs
may help to elucidate the matter, but you don't need an L-Curve to let you know which way the wind blows. Obama's plan merely intends to make that L shape a bit less severe. You can call it socialism if you want, John. Or you can call it welfare. Neither are technically even in the ball park. But don't let a silly think like accuracy stop you now. You've already tossed the kitchen sink, what's a few more broken dishes.

But, for the record, I think I'll call it what it actually is: a much needed correction.

Joe 'attacks'

CNN called this Biden's "strongest attack on Sarah Palin to date."

Sarah Palin told donors in North Carolina on Wednesday night that she enjoys visiting "pro-America" parts of the country, as opposed to, well, she didn't specify exactly.

Yesterday afternoon, campaigning in New Mexico, Joe Biden responded to Palin's comments.

"It's disappointing, and I hope it was just a slip on her part and she doesn't really mean it," Biden told supporters. "But she said, it was reported she said, that she likes to visit "pro-American" parts of the country. Ladies and gentlemen, I, like your senator and governor, have been all over this great land. I've never been to a state, I've never been to a state that hasn't sent its sons and daughters to serve and die for this country.... One of the reasons why Barack and I are running is that we know how damaging the politics of division [is] that continues to be practiced by the McCain campaign, how damaging this policy of division has been for Americans over the last decade. It's time to put this behind us."

"We are one nation, under God, indivisible. We are all patriotic!" he shouted. "We all love our country in every part of this nation! And I'm tired. I am tired, tired, tired, tired of the implications about patriotism."

This is a strong response to a ridiculously immature and demogagogic suggestion by Sarah Palin, but it's not an attack. Sarah Palin suggestion that her tribe of encephalitic jingoists and racists are somehow more 'Pro-American' than supporters of Biden or Obama might be construed as an attack; but pointing out that

a)it's inaccurate and a lie
b)it's consciously being done to polarize our nation even further

isn't an attack, in turn. It's a response.

CNN, as seems required by our idiotic discourse, is playing in false equivalences.

So, look, CNN, if you really want to quote someone attacking Sarah Palin, try this out, courtesy DelicateMonster:

Sarah Palin has a husband who is a traitor to America. She, herself, has sympathetic leanings for secessionist causes in her own state and her husband until recently was a favored member of the Alaskan Independence Party which wants to see Alaska disregard the US Constitution and unilaterally secede from the nation. They fought a major war over that kind of behavior about a 150 years ago. They called the secessionist traitors when they did it the first time. What do you think they ought to call Sarah Palin's husband now?

Sarah Palin has sought to ban books that she deemed were 'immoral' according to her Talibanesque view of morality that suggests gays are simply evil and not worthy of equal rights or protections under our law; views we see represented in such highly evolved clerical states as Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran...oh, and in certain settings in Lynchburg, VA, Colorado Springs, Colorado and Wassila, Alaska.

Sarah Palin has abused the power of her office, threatening and ultimately firing individuals for personal vendettas. She has been found guilty of abuse of office by a highly partisan board consisting of 10 Republicans and 4 Democrats.

Sarah Palin has used her position in the national spotlight to encourage what amount to hate rallies with adoring Right wing fans suggesting that we by turns 'kill Obama'
or 'burn' or 'bomb' Obama...She has done this by the most vile and ridiculous smears, suggesting because Obama had a presence on a Republican and Democratic board with an ex-weathermen member that he is somehow complicit in actions that occurred when Obama was only 8 years old. Robo Calls are now going out from the McCain campaign that make this same smear. The result of such activities can be found in the increased acrimony of the Republican crowds and incidents across the nation of shouting matches, kicking and abusing reporters, and, in one especially interesting case, some whiz in Illinois decided to hang an effigy of Obama in his yard for Halloween, replete with Star of David marked on his skull (someone apparently never sent him the memo about Jewish votes in Florida).

What few interviews she has allowed has shown us a Sarah Palin that is incurious, inarticulate and unknowledgeable at almost every level of importance to national governance.

Sarah's most avid fans appear to hail from the same low end of the gene pool as her. Doltish, ignorant of the simplest realities, and more than willing to lie about what they haven't even begun to understand.

That's an attack, CNN. Please feel free to quote me.

Noonan on Palin

Insightful commentary, for a change, from Peggy Noonan:

But we have seen Mrs. Palin on the national stage for seven weeks now, and there is little sign that she has the tools, the equipment, the knowledge or the philosophical grounding one hopes for, and expects, in a holder of high office. She is a person of great ambition, but the question remains: What is the purpose of the ambition? She wants to rise, but what for?...This is not a leader, this is a follower, and she follows what she imagines is the base, which is in fact a vast and broken-hearted thing whose pain she cannot, actually, imagine. She could reinspire and reinspirit; she chooses merely to excite. She doesn't seem to understand the implications of her own thoughts.

That last sentence captures,unwittingly, I'm sure, a large swath of the right in this country.

Obama addressing the Al Smith Dinner

McCain's New Button

All it's missing is his name.

Al-Jazeera Lets You Know What's Happening in Ohio

Because our own press is apparently incapable:

Friends Don't Let Friends Vote for McCain

Channeling Molly Ivins...

via Granny Doc on dKos:

My favorite tobacco spitter arose from his plastic lawn chair as I pulled in.

"How Ya' doin', today?", he asked politely while eyeing the anti-Mccain sticker on the tail gate.

"Doin' well", I responded in the local venacular. "How are you guys?"

"Heard that Ba'rack guy on the TV just now", he said, getting straight to the point.

"His speech on the economy?", I asked. "What did ya' think?"

"He made some sense", he allowed, "but, what about that Muslim thing?"

"Aw, Ray, you're not still buying that load the Republicans are selling, are you?" I asked.

"Well, I keep hearin' he's a Muslim", he insisted.

There was a general alertness among the Guys at the Dump. They were giving this exchange their undivided attention, and I suspected that Ray had been chosen to make this foray into information gathering. I detected a crack in the facade!

"Ray", I said, "these guys have been lying to you for 30 years! They told you Democrats would take away your guns. It didn't happen. They told you they would outlaw abortion. It didn't happen. They told you we would all get rich if we just let them handle all the money. It didn't happen. They busted the budget, started a war on a lie, and now they have destroyed the jobs and credit of everyone in this country. How long you gonna' keep believin' 'em?"

"Senator Obama is a good, Christian, family man. He was born in the United States, and raised by his grandma' from KANSAS. You gotta stop listening to those guys over at FOX news. You gotta' stop listening to Rush. They are lying, too."

I turned to the crowd that had gathered, all reaching for bits and pieces of trash as an excuse, and said, "If you guys want things to get any better, you better stop worrying about the lie Republicans tell, and the silly issue of what color someone is, and vote for your own interests for a change."

"Well", Ray acknowledged, "he made some sense."

And the others nodded, in unison.

Ayers 'R Us

My buddy Don over at PathKeepers.net has a post up deconstructing the Republicans use of Bill Ayers' Weatherman history as a campaign tactic against Barack Obama. He's generally more right than wrong on this post so go read it.

But one point of contention (and probably semantics) is this jewel. In arguing for defining the Weathermen as terrorists, he writes...

Terrorist or Not?

It’s pretty clear to me that the Weather Underground was a terrorist group. The loss of their comrades (from their own incompetence) in Greenwich Village caused the Weathermen to shift tactics. From that point on, they always announced their targets and warned people to stay away before they set off their bombs. In fact, Bill Ayers used this to deny that the Weathermen were terrorists:

We were very careful from the moment of the townhouse on to be sure we weren't going to hurt anybody, and we never did hurt anybody. Whenever we put a bomb in a public space, we had figured out all kinds of ways to put checks and balances on the thing and also to get people away from it, and we were remarkably successful.

But, they still bombed. That’s the mark of terrorists, isn’t it? They set bombs against specific targets, but so do Al Qai’da. So did the Provisional Irish Republican Army and their Protestant counterparts.

This strikes me as a surprisingly simplistic definition. Yes, bombing might be one feature of terrorism, but hell, the U.S. military bombs lots of folks--and yes, they do it to 'affect behavior' and to 'terrorize' (remember shock and awe? Folks on the ground were screaming in terror at our wonderful 'shock and awe'--and we managed to kill quite a few more civilians than the Weathermen ever did) so pray tell, what exactly separates these two entities? Is it because one entity is 'state run' and the other is 'ad hoc' or because one is fighting a unilaterally 'declared' war and the other...oh, that's right, fighting a 'unilaterally declared' war? In short, the only thing separating terrorists who bomb military targets from a military that bombs military targets is the power and the authority of the state. But if the state acts without international authority--as is the case with the preemptive war in Iraq--it's a distinction without a difference. Throw in the fact that the US routinely kills more innocent civilians in their bombing runs in either Iraq OR Afghanistan than the Weathermen have in their entire history and the argument approaches the ludicrous. Unless, of course, your moral principles devolve to 'might makes right'. At bottom that's hardly an ethical principle to balance such a damning certainty on.

The problem isn't with defining terrorism, per se, the problem as Noam Chomsky put it, "lies in the unwillingness to recognise that your own terrorism is terrorism."

Unless Don's open to a discussion on what constitutes 'terrorism' generally, I suggest taking Ayers at his word is as valid, or more valid, than taking the Pentagon and Pentagon apologists at their word. Certainly whether 'bombs' are used or not can be a determining factor in that definition, but if that's the case let's use the definition in all instances. In other words, according to Don's definition, the U.S. military is a terrorist organization.


Don't agree? Fine. Come up with a better definition for terrorism. For the record, I'd be open to calling Ayers activity 'terrorism' if we could have a bit more honesty in what the hell our various covert and overt military operations amount to. Maybe we could begin with our support of terrorism (the Contras) in our attempt to illegally overthrow the Sandisnista government in Nicaragua during the Reagan administration?

Included in the indictment by the World Court of the United States behavior was some detailed information on our own explicitly terroristic behavior:

As a part of its training program for the contras, the CIA prepared and distributed a manual entitled Psychological Operations in Guerrilla Warfare. This manual included instructions in the "use of implicit and explicit terror", and in the "selective use of violence for propaganda effects". Commander Carrion explained that the manual was given to the Contras, "All of these terrorist instructions have the main purpose of alienating the population from the Government through creating a climate of terror and fear, so that nobody would dare support the Government". The manual calls for the "neutralization" (i.e. assassination) of Sandinista local government officials, judges, etc. for purposes of intimidation. It was openly admitted by the President Reagan in a press conference that the manual had been prepared by a CIA contract employee.

In testimony before the court, Professor Glennon of the International Human Rights Law Group, and the Washington Office on Latin America summarized his fact finding mission as follows:

"We found that there is substantial credible evidence that the contras were engaged with some frequency in acts of terroristic violence directed at Nicaraguan civilians. These are individuals who have no connection with the war effort-persons with no economic, political or military significance. These are Individuals who are not caught in the cross-fire between Government and contra forces, but rather individuals who are deliberately targeted by the contras for acts of terror.

That last sentence strikes me as a pretty good definition for what terrorism really is: Innocent non-combatants who are deliberately targeted by the either side to influence a community's behavior through fear.

Sticking to this definition, you could argue that Ayers intentions, at least initially, were generally terroristic AND you'd also be forced to admit that an awful lot of activity by our own military and our spook operatives is terroristic--in the extreme. But that bit of honesty is no reason not to adopt it.

Learning economics from the press?

Yes, that's a question --and the broad answer is, don't try to do it. These guys are getting it wrong. Not just on the big picture, that could more effectively be called betting on a run on a ponzi scam than a 'liquidity crisis', but they even fudged (apparently earnestly) small details that even I--almost utter economic neophyte--understand are wrong. Here's Brad Delong (a real life authentic economist) to take them to task:

You remember Paul Krugman's joke--that if Bush said the world was flat, reporters would write "opinions on shape of earth differ"?

Now we have Mike Allen and Jonathan Martin of the Politico encountering McCain saying "the earth is flat." And what do they do? They agree:

Exclusive: McCain to unveil more economic policies - Mike Allen and Jonathan Martin: As part of a plan to reinvigorate his flagging campaign, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) is considering additional economic measures aimed directly at the middle class that are likely to be rolled out this week, campaign officials said. Among the measures being considered are tax cuts – perhaps temporary – for capital gains and dividends, the officials said...

Capital gains and dividend tax cuts are simply not "economic measures aimed directly at the middle class": the middle class doesn't collect capital gains, or dividends, in any material amount. Indeed, that's what makes you middle class--that even though you have a fair or a good income you work for it.

This might somehow fall in line with McCain's delusion that being 'rich' only begins when you have 5 million socked away, and thus with only 4.25 million in capital, you might well enjoy a Captial Gains tax cut, but the vast majority of us 'working' Middle Class could give a rip.

Now I'm not paid to know this stuff. I take a vague interest in it because right around the time Reagan was elected I began to understand that most pundits (like George Will, for example, or Charles Krauthammer) were distorting what little reality I could glean from the press. But if straight up reporters seem unable to get simple definitional statements right, what's a guy to do?

So, gents, how about doing your jobs? This is what you get paid for, not repeating some insipid Republican talking point that bears no resemblance to reality at all.

Back to Delong ...

... there is not even a token "some Democrats say that dividend and capital gains tax cuts have no direct effect on the middle class" in ths story. McCain says the earth is flat--and the reporters swallow it whole.

Why oh why can't we have a better press corps?

Ah, yup,yup,yup

don't let that faux hick accent fool ya, there.

Abuse of governmental authority is a nice way of saying she's another Dick Cheney. Or, if one wants to get ultra technical, she has 'totalitarian tendencies'. For the Poli sci geeks out there, yup, yup, she's one more friggin' wannabe Leninist.

By the way that "politically motivated" investigation included 10 Republicans and 4 Democrats.

The report has been released (by unanimous vote of the Council). Here's the nugget:

For the reasons explained in Section IV of this report, I find that Governor Sarah Palin abused her power by violating Alaska Statute 39.52.110(a) of the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics Act. Alaska Statute 39.52.110(a) provides

"The legislature reaffirms that each public officer holds office as a public trust, and any effort to benefit a personal or financial interest through official action is a violation of that trust."

Or as Newsweek put it:

Sarah Palin unlawfully abused her power as governor by trying to have her former brother-in-law fired as a state trooper, the chief investigator of an Alaska legislative [and majority Republican] panel concluded Friday. The politically charged inquiry imperiled her reputation as a reformer on John McCain's Republican ticket.....

I like that 'imperiled her reputation'

...ya think?

Your New Conservative Movement: Gloves come off, so do the Hoods

From Dana Milbank in the Washington Post:

Worse, Palin's routine attacks on the media have begun to spill into ugliness. In Clearwater, arriving reporters were greeted with shouts and taunts by the crowd of about 3,000. Palin then went on to blame Katie Couric's questions for her "less-than-successful interview with kinda mainstream media." At that, Palin supporters turned on reporters in the press area, waving thunder sticks and shouting abuse. Others hurled obscenities at a camera crew. One Palin supporter shouted a racial epithet at an African American sound man for a network and told him, "Sit down, boy."

That’s right, it’s the fault of uppity blacks that Palin can’t give a coherent answer about her lack of foreign policy experience, can’t give a coherent answer to a question about which newspapers she reads, can’t name a single Supreme Court decision, etc. Uppity black sound engineers.

Far be it from me to suggest if you vote GOP you are throwing your lot in with a pack of morally retarded racists and hooligans who have had pretty much entrenched power for eight years, managing to destroy the economy, and our foreign policy in the process. No, I understand there are 'grownups' somewhere in the GOP party, folks like...ex-Senator Phil Gramm who made sure that institutions of higher finance were sufficiently deregulated to lead to the inexorable implosion of our market system. Or, say, folks like Donald Rumsfeld who boldly lied for the good of the country and said he knew exactly where those weapons of mass destruction were in Iraq. Indeed, even moderates like Colin Powell helped out with those fibs.

So no. The GOP isn't all just mindless racism and seething morons riled up by an even dimmer bulb who likes to think of herself as a pitbull with lipstick. It also consists of honorable men like John McCain who promised not to run such a campaign until he started flaying in the polls and coming off like the cranky old fart he is. And, of course, clever and suspense filled math wizards like Karl Rove who ingeniously promised to turn McCain's campaign around by picking the single stupidest hockey mom on earth to energize it.

Yes, that is your modern conservative movement, as diverse a group of ideological simpletons and liars as you would ever want to put in charge of your country. The spittle flecked crowd roused to their feet, crying as one did, vis a vis Obama, "kill him"? ... oh, that's just added value.

You want a scandal? I'll give you a scandal: Keating 5 redux

http://www.keatingeconomics.com/

Here's a nice little ad to go with it...

Will Obama weather the storm?

Given Palin's rehash of an exhausted Ayers association charge, the 'weather' title and pic seems somehow approbo.

As to the question, my guess is he will. And Palin and the paleolithic conservatives she represents can head back to their caves to re-fashion their exhausted and impotent ideology or await their delusional raptures, whichever they think might come first.

Ditto

From Eschaton:

Life Among The Econ


My experience with economists (as a group) is that they tend to be Democrats who sympathize with Republican rhetoric on economic issues but know that they're full of shit about everything.

Palin as Post Turtle

Humor via TalkingPoints memo:

While sewing a cut on the hand of a 75-year old Texas rancher, whose hand was caught in a gate while working cattle, the doctor struck up a conversation with the old man. Eventually the topic got around to Sarah Palin and her bid to be a heartbeat away from being President .

The old rancher said, "Well, ya know, Palin is a post turtle."

Not being familiar with the term, the doctor asked him what a post turtle was.

The old rancher said, "When you're driving down a country road and you come across a fence post with a turtle balanced on top, that's a post turtle."

The old rancher saw a puzzled look on the doctor's face, so he continued to explain. "You know she didn't get up there by herself; she doesn't belong up there; she doesn't know what to do while she is up there; and you just wonder what kind of dumb ass put her up there to begin with."

For those yearning for more info

Regarding my opinion that Sarah Palin is not qualified to be Vice President or President....here ya go, courtesy of Joe 'sixpack' Mclu over at dkos:

1. Palin is against abortion in cases of incestuous rape.

http://www.youtube.com/...

http://www.youtube.com/...

2. Palin believes that the war in Iraq is a Holy War

http://www.youtube.com/...

3. Palin said that "dinosaurs and humans walked the Earth at the same time"

http://www.latimes.com/...

4. Palin wants to have evolution taught in schools

http://www.youtube.com/... (start at 2:11)

5. Palin view's on global warming

http://www.youtube.com/...

6. Palin's favorite newspapers and magazines

http://www.youtube.com/...

7. Palin's understanding of the Vice Presidency

http://www.youtube.com/...

8. Palin's views on the Financial Crisis

http://www.youtube.com/...

9. Palin's foreign and domestic policy experience.

http://www.youtube.com/...

http://www.youtube.com/...

http://www.youtube.com/...

http://www.youtube.com/...

On Suffering Fools

What do the various WMD arguments for invading Iraq and the Sarah Palin pick for the Vice Presidency have in common?

They both lean on obfuscations to sell short term solutions that lead to long term disasters.

Now I don't think that people who buy into these obfuscations are necessarily stupid, or even uninformed. I think they need to believe that the politicians who they support are not nefarious morons or simple moral retards. This is understandable. They want to believe that the people they have voted for --or are inclined to vote for--are honestly wrestling with the questions of the day and are really trying to get it right.

For a long time, I granted conservatives this basic premise. In part, it was a way of humanizing our debates and arguments and so was important to having a civil discourse. Of late, a series of incidents have made me reconsider how long we are made to suffer such foolishness.

Case in point: Sarah Palin has made it abundantly clear that she is not qualified for the post of Vice President and certainly not qualified for President. This is not to say that she didn't 'act' sufficiently coherent to make it through a debate that didn't allow follow up questions. She did, without a single 'train wreck' moment, but it's fairly obvious to any sentient being that Sarah Palin would be a disaster anywhere close to the oval office. She has a difficult time forming coherent sentences, when she decides to answer in complete sentences at all.

One can understand McCain's desire to choose a running mate that could 'shake up' the race, poach some of the disillusioned Hillary supporters and drag along the far right wing of his party as well. But there were other--smarter and more considered-- choices than Sarah Palin: Libby Dole and Olympia Snowe come immediately to mind. Why didn't McCain choose them? Choosing Sarah Palin may have offered a short term solution to limit the potency of Obama's convention speech, but it was a disaster for the long term health of the campaign--but more importantly--would be an even greater disaster if John McCain were to actually win with Sarah Palin on the ticket.

In many ways John McCain's impulsive and short term decision shows in a nutshell the entire problem with conservative thinking over the last eight years. It really accomplishes nothing more than winning the political moment. Certainly, it doesn't take into account the long term health of the country. Would a nation by better served under a Sarah Palin Presidency or an Olympia Snowe Presidency? That should have been a question that was asked by conservatives and the McCain campaign as part of the vetting process, not an after thought that probably hasn't even occurred to them yet. But if all you are looking toward is the short term political benefit than Sarah Palin must seem like an appealing pick.

Fortunately, I think Americans are starting to sober up after 8 years of 'short term' Republican rule. They are beginning to recognize that almost any 'justification' can be modified to suit the political winds of the day. Under Republican rule, the Iraqi war was fought ostensibly to prevent the use of WMD ( which we supplied to Saddam Hussein originally ), and then to 'liberate' the Iraqis, and finally to 'draw out and fight the terrorists'. All of these justifications are patently ridiculous and completely dependent on the moment in time that they were initially used to have any traction at all. They were all 'short term' political justifications that changed as Republican political fortunes changed with the war. The underlying reasons for the war are apparent to anyone with a 8th grade knowledge of geography: strategic positioning to protect 'our' oil supply.

Why couldn't Republicans say that? Because preemptively invading a country and murdering their leaders, and destroying their infrastructure and consigning a million of its citizens to death or displacement is not something we like to think about doing merely for our convenience. But that's the truth of the Iraqi war. An honest assessment would perhaps have made us more inclined to investing those billions of dollars wasted on a foreign policy debacle into an alternative energy infrastructure. But we were never given the choice.

When individuals defend such 'short term' political decision making processes-- they are defending a process that is specifically designed to limit our choices. And the results, after 8 years of this nonsense are more than obvious. 'Short term' thinking led us to one of the most incompetent Vice Presidential candidates in U.S. history, and one of our worst foreign policy debacles ever.

Isn't it time we started taking a look at the long term health of our nation over and above what the short term political gain might be?

For the record

Just in case years from now, historians look back and wonder what kind of feckless morons we were to even think about running candidates as inarticulate and inept as Sarah Palin, let me say, unequivocally, her debate performance reeked of evasion, lying, distortion and incoherence.

My disagreements with her on matters of policy are minor by comparison with my revulsion at her utter incompetence. The fact that she is being applauded by our erstwhile punditry merely because she didn't stare like Bambi into the headlights of a Couric softball question, doesn't mean she is not still the least qualified person to ever run for the Vice Presidency in the history of this country. Beating even such luminaries as Danny-boy Quayle.

That McCain picked this idiot says as much about his cynical posturing as it does about our ever gullible population and our deeply frivolous press. Pace the inimitable Charles Pierce:

And yet, through the entire run-up to the debate, it was argued by serious people who analyze serious politics and make a serious living doing it that Sarah Palin could reveal herself to be non-dim by putting on the correct puppet show for the media in her debate against Joe Biden. Make no mistake. That's what the punditocracy was arguing. Give us a reason, please, not to have to write what we all know to be true, what has been self-evidently true to the entire country since you walked off the podium in St. Paul. No rational person can possibly believe that she got smarter, or better informed, or more curious in the time that elapsed between when she talked with Ms. Couric and last night's debate. What we were being asked to judge was purely how well she had refined her performance skills in the interim. None of what the Walking Dead on the cable shows were looking to see has the slightest thing to do with her fitness for the office she seeks, let alone the office that might descend upon her.

Sarah Palin's Debate Flowchart

From addenak over at dkos:

I know some folks out there might have had trouble following the Vice Presidential debate. Particularly, trying to parse meaning from the things that Sarah Palin said. With that in mind, I have compiled a handy resource for your perusal. I hope to update this chart, both graphically and grammatically, when it is no longer ten to five in the morning. For for the mean time. . . enjoy! Click on the image for a full size view.

The Angry Age

From Robert Reich

...whatever it's called and however it's financed, it's [the bailout bill] still an outrage.
America's foreign policy is made no more flexible by going into deeper hock to the Chinese and the Middle East. And the deal still subjects American taxpayers to some risk, especially if the housing market doesn't bounce back for many years. Worse, the bill can't help but prop up the earnings many Wall Street executives whose malfeasance, greed, and stupidity got us into this mess in the first place. And it does nothing for average Americans except avoid economic calamity. (The provision ostensibly helping distressed homeowners is to be used at the discretion of the Treasury Department, so it's mostly a sham.)
The larger economic outlook is not encouraging. All signs point to the economy worsening, bailout or no bailout. Unemployment will continue to rise. Median earnings will continue to drop, adjusted for inflation. More Americans will lose their health insurance.

The Era of Angry Populism has only just begun. Let's hope Obama wins, and is able to mobilize the anger into fierce pressure on Congress to get his agenda enacted, as well as reform Wall Street and Washington.

Outrage

My buddy Don White, who I might describe as a rabid independent on his good days, takes the Republican House members to task for their ideological intransigence over at PathKeeper.net. It's a great read. Especially delectable is his deconstruction of Congress critter Eric Cantor who, from all appearances, is the equivalent of some lately exhumed ideological zombie from the Gingrich years--without even Newt's brains. Ouch. Give 'em hell, Don.