Category: Politics

This week the Republican National Convention will take place.  Also this week, Hurricane Gustav will hit the gulf coast.  It’s already a Category 4 storm;  Katrina was Category 5, and New Orleans is still a big mess 3 years later.

The big news for the week was supposed to have been Senator McCain’s Vice Presidential candidate, now known to be Sarah Palin.  More than one person thought of Michael Palin — except for the whole not being American thing. Gov. Palin is an interesting selection, and one that took almost everyone by surprise.  Nobody is sure yet whether this is a big win or a big loss.  Leading theories on the motive for this pick:  she’s a woman and the pseudo-feminists who wouldn’t vote for anybody but Hillary will be impressed;  there was a checklist of positions on various issues and she fit; since she’s relatively unknown, it’s hard to know anything bad about her.

But as MSNBC pointed out last night, there was actually quite an under-the-radar campaign for her.  How else do you explain her spread in December’s Vogue Magazine?  Her appearance on CNBC with Maria Bartiromo?  Her other appearance on CNBC with Larry Kudlow (wherein she wonders what exactly the Vice President does all day!)?

And as many others have pointed out, she has problems.  She has an abuse of power scandal, very little experience, a small baby to take care of on the campaign trail (one commentator wonders if she is breastfeeding), a pro-life stance as courageous as it is out-of-touch for most Americans (at least she walks the walk on this), a host of other positions most Americans don’t share, the town where she was mayor is still trying to recover financially, some experts wonder why she was chosen, others call her a “panic pick“, and to top everything off, her youngest child may very well actually be her grandchild!  Some suspect she may be the grandmother twice!

She is the Governor of Alaska.  Alaska has a population of roughly 670,000 people in 2006. Her entire state has a population roughly equal to the cities of Memphis TN or Austin TX. Not including suburbs. Keep in mind that 27% of the population of Alaska is under 18;  the maximum number of votes she could possibly have received — lifetime, including for Miss Alaska and the PTA and Mayor — was under 500,000.  Roughly 18,000,000 people voted for Hillary Clinton in the primaries.  That’s 36 times the number of votes Gov. Palin could possibly have received for anything, for any purpose, in any poll.

Seriously, what was Senator McCain thinking?

In the end, the nicest thing anybody outside party leadership could find to say was “At least it’s not Romney.”

In closing,  an August retrospective: people still use this as a reference on Wendy Gramm; everybody go serfin’, Serfin’ USA!; duh, drinking lots of high-calorie sugary drinks could make you fat; I wish this were no longer relevant, but a Message for the College Students in your life; here’s Everything You Need to Know about Social Security Reform and Everything You Need to Know about a Federal Sales Tax.

Have a great Labor Day weekend!

It seems just yesterday I called myself a “the-center-is-progressive lady”. Oh wait, that was yesterday! Today the Daily Kos has an item called The “Far Left” is the Mainstream. They give us the figures that show “Most” Americans oppose the Iraq war, support stem cell research, and think we should raise the minimum wage. Most Americans even support abortion rights, at least in part. That is what makes it so puzzling when politicians pander to the rather conservative point on the spectrum that they mistakenly think is the moderate center. Of course, if anyone was paying attention, the late Molly Ivins said the same thing back in 2006.

Welcome to reality, Kos-ites and Kos-acks. Enjoy the view.

Meanwhile, many thanks to Norman Goldman, filling in on the Ed Schultz Show for breaking a story on McCain’s really awful sense of “humor”. Apparently the man, who has been on the record calling his wife a certain impolite sexist term, really did tell this joke:

Did you hear the one about the woman who is attacked on the street by a gorilla, beaten senseless, raped repeatedly and left to die? When she finally regains consciousness and tries to speak, her doctor leans over to hear her sigh contently and to feebly ask, ‘Where is that marvelous ape?’

Yeah, cause being beaten, raped, and left to die is so effing funny.

In closing: more reasons Mandatory Health Insurance won’t work, as “Individual health policies leave many in the lurch” and “Deep flaws found in U.S. Health Care” (yet one more place that politicians are pandering to a far right “center”); and welcoming Michelle Obama to BlogHer.

Ok, I went over to Hillary’s site, and this is what I posted, more or less:

It’s over. Stop thinking about tomorrow; pick up the pieces and go home!

He’s got all the delegates he needs. The longer you go on, the more pathetic you look.

Don’t you have Senate business you should be tending to?

Feel free to add your thoughts, cut and paste, whatever. Hey, giant pill bugs could still attack Senator Obama.

In closing: Zero Punctuation; his shoe didn’t ring, but his cigarette went off; the economics of family leave aren’t what you might have thought; yeah the bus is busier these days; poetic justice; choice quote of wisdom, “If it doesn’t look right, don’t drive into it“; Blackwater‘s got fighter aircraft. Oh yeah, and the Working Women Survey.

This is the first ever guest voice on ShortWoman. It is a letter which will be going out both to the Clinton campaign and to the Democratic Party. I will let the author introduce himself. Please enjoy.

Dear Senator Clinton:

I have been a lifelong Democrat. I spent my first Presidential election as a voter phoning polling turnout reports back to Dukakis campaign headquarters in Fort Worth, TX, so that we could maximize Democratic turnout in key precincts. I have donated and put my time in for all of my adult life. I have always voted a strict party line and, frankly, watching the lemming-like behavior of the Republicans with regard to the impeachment of President Clinton can say with certainty that I will never vote for a Republican for any office.

Those things said, I cannot and will not vote for Hillary Clinton for the Presidency of the United States. As a child I was promised that anyone could grow up to be President. For the last 20 years only 2 families have controlled the White House and your election would extend that to 24 or 28 years. That is the death of the ultimate promise of American opportunity.

I have been disenfranchised by national politics much of my adult life. I have watched as my party has become preoccupied with rancor and political expediency instead of real, meaningful service to the electorate. Your campaign this year has demonstrated that your concern is limited to only those states that serve your political expediency and have little regard for the electorate as whole. This is a failed strategy. And while it served to elect William Jefferson Clinton, it was unable to deliver despite the fitness of Al Gore or John Kerry for service.

I am a physician. I have watched as my own profession has failed to listen to my needs politically or even serve its own end. I have watched as my professional organizations have failed to lobby for meaningful things like Medicare funding caring instead to focus on distractions like tort reform. The answer, and you know this, is not some slipshod universal healthcare plan that involves mandates of private insurance. The answer here is one of real vision, a vision that you have had almost two decades to formulate and have failed to do so.

I have watched you pander to insurance companies, to big oil interests, to the political right, and to religious groups. In short, everyone except actual people who could actually vote for you.

Enough is enough, Senator Clinton. You refuse to endorse a 50 state strategy for your campaign and I refuse to support your campaign under any circumstances. If by some slim chance you become the nominee, I will not vote for you. I will not vote for your opponent either. Whether I withhold my vote or represent some small number of votes for a third party, I cannot say.

Senator, you have failed me as a Democrat and I will not allow you to continue to do so.

Thank you for your time,

Warren Magnus, DO

Our choices for President of the United States are a woman who makes up stories to show how experienced she is, a white guy who is sufficiently out of touch with reality that it doesn’t matter whether he makes up stories, and a black guy who knows somebody who is a racist.

Which one would you rather answered the Red Phone at 3 AM?

In closing: Japanese school uniforms; you have no rights on an airplane, not even human rights; 4 things we should do to improve American disaster management, 2 of which would cost no taxpayer dollars and 2 of which should not cost any more in taxes than we are now paying; you call that a sex scandal?; and the Solar System’s long lost cousin.

Quite enough has been written about the whole “snipers” thing. Including some political cartoons. That’s only one dumb moment, really.

Let’s not forget about Let’s get Alan Greenspan — whom some people blame the housing mess on in the first place — to head a blue ribbon panel to see if it’s a good idea to shore up housing by having government buy up excess supply and maybe we can rent it out or something. Do you think $30 billion ought to do the trick? It was fine for Bear Stearns…. Oh yeah, and while we’re at it, let’s shield mortgage servicers from liability if they decide to arbitrarily make mortgage terms worse without actually negotiating a new contract with the homeowner! Great idea, there, Hillary.

Let’s not forget that she’s a member of a secretive, ultra-fundamentalist group of Christian nationalists called The Fellowship who want to bring their specific blend of Christianity into mainstream government in violation of the First Amendment. Before you start getting all defensive, do you think your Christianity is good enough for them? If they are really fighting for what is “right”, why do they have to be secretive? The Jesus whose words I’ve read said that you shall know the truth, and it shall set you free.

Fewer people view her positively now. At all. And as for those SuperDelegates we’ve been told are the key to her winning? The ones that she thinks knows better than us (and so uh, that’s why we’re supposed to shut up and voter for her in November)? She’s “turning them off“. Heck, didn’t she see Bill Richardson’s endorsement of Obama as a sign? Maybe they just don’t like being threatened. Way to win friends and influence people, there.

And yet she thinks she has a chance. A fat one maybe. Perhaps the Japanese have the right idea about elections.

In closing: don’t forget Real ID; an interesting way of looking at health insurance; underground candy smugglers; New Scotty played true to Old Scotty; Citizen Carrie on the H-1B mess, which she probably understands better than any layperson; and now I remember why I haven’t deleted BoingBoing from my list of feeds, Now our skies are safe from the scourge of nipple rings. Now really, once you’ve seen her boobs, can’t you just apply your brain and figure out they aren’t gonna blow up? They’re boobs! Much like the screener who noticed them! How would somebody take over an aircraft with a nipple ring? Take me to Cuba or I’ll pierce you! And was it really necessary to remove the things, in the concourse, with the male screeners laughing? And furthermore, if the nipple rings are dangerous, why not the navel ring? Why were hers dangerous, but Nicole Richie’s were ok for flight? What’s going to happen when they encounter some of the more unusual piercings? Pardon me, do you have Prince Albert in a can?? Seriously! America’s Zero Thinking Policies must change or we are doomed.

Take it easy. It’s crazy out there.

Campaign season is too darn long.

It’s too long for a number of reasons, including this modest list:

• “Voter Fatigue” — Joe and Jane Average get so tired of hearing about politics that they lose interest in voting altogether. Particularly since it looks like candidates will be finalized something like 9 months before the elections. That’s an entire human gestation period.
• Circular Firing Squad — Candidates have such a grand time ripping on one another during primary season that they hand the opposing party ammunition for the general election.
• Too expensive — The long campaign season means it costs a lot more money to mount a credible campaign. It’s not possible to really run without being on the hook to special interest groups. That is to say nothing of the insanity of spending millions of dollars to try and get a job that earns $400,000 that you only get to keep 4 years. Sure, there are perks like free housing, security, and riding a private 747 around the world, but you see the point.
• Day jobs — The people trying to become President are almost all current elected officials. They should be doing the job their constituents elected them to do instead of going off on a year long job interview. Seriously, there have been some important votes in the Senate lately.

This year, the Democratic Convention is in late August; the Republican Convention is in early September. That’s fine! It allows a good solid 2 months of plain old campaign afterwards. What really needs to be shortened is primary season. The various states have tried to get their primaries and caucuses earlier and earlier so that they are still relevant. Various states use the process to flex political muscle in a race that would otherwise bypass them. It has gotten to the point that the Democratic Party has told Michigan and Florida that their primary is too darn early and doesn’t count! By the time Super Tuesday has come and gone, the fat lady is singing.

So yes, the Presidential campaign season isn’t just too long, it’s way too long. It was probably too long back before candidates could travel by airplane and have their comments on the TV within minutes, and it’s even worse in the “internet age”. I have an idea to fix that. It will never happen, because the Powers That Be seem to like things the way they are.

So here’s my idea.

Let’s keep the conventions and the general election cycle exactly where it is, but reduce primary season to 12 weeks. This is a full month longer than the period of time between the conventions and Election Day. Furthermore, let’s break this down into six sections, each 2 weeks long.

Let Iowa and New Hampshire continue the traditional kickoff to the season in weeks one and two.

By my count, there are 8 states (including the District of Columbia) that each have 3 electoral votes. They can all do their primaries in week 3. By now, one out of 5 states have done their thing, and several weaker candidates should be seriously considering dropping out of the race.

Another 9 states (excluding New Hampshire) have 4 or 5 electoral votes each. They all go in week 5.

An additional 10 states (excluding Iowa) have between 6 and 9 electoral votes (inclusive) each. They get week 7. In an ideal world, we are down to a half dozen candidates on each side.

The 13 states with 10-15 electoral votes all have their primaries in week 9.

So by week 10, 41 states and the District of Columbia have had primaries, caucuses, straw polls, or whatever else they do. In weeks 10 and 11 the remaining nine states — our nine most populous states — finish out the roster. Ideally, we have three or maybe even 4 candidates for each party still in play, even if some are regarded as longshots. Since at the moment these nine states control 226 electoral votes, they are still very much relevant to the outcome. They can still make or break a candidate’s chances.

Needless to say, after the 2010 Census, the Electoral Votes will be shuffled, and this order will have to be slightly adapted. I consider this a minor tweak. Even we we take a few weeks off before the conventions, we can still start the process in May!

Can anyone tell me why this would be bad for the voting public? Anyone?

Please, do not mistake any of what I am about to say for any sort of endorsement of Hillary Clinton whatsoever. This is not about Hillary. The question of whether Hillary Clinton or Elizabeth Dole or Nancy Pelosi is prepared to be our “Iron Lady of Politics” is another issue altogether.

You’ll hear it at parties, you’ll see it alluded to in blog posts and political cartoons. Everybody suspects it is something the political strategists ask themselves behind closed doors. It’s only happened on television. The question is “Is America Ready for a Woman President?”

I don’t like that question. I don’t like it any more than I like the assumption that a woman candidate would automatically get some substantial percentage of women’s votes. It’s shallow, sexist, and insulting.

If America is not ready for a woman to be our head of state, that means we are less modern than Great Britain.

If America is not ready for a woman to be our head of state, we are less progressive than Israel.

If America is not ready for a woman to be our head of state, that means we are more sexist than India, an ancient culture where it is still perfectly acceptable to light your wife or daughter on fire.

If America is not ready for a woman to be our head of state, that puts us behind Pakistan and Sri Lanka and Argentina, Bolivia, Germany, Yugoslavia, Haiti, Ireland, Bangladesh, France, Poland, Canada, Bulgaria, Liberia, Ecuador, New Zealand, Norway, Latvia, Panama, Finland, San Marino, the Philippines, Indonesia, South Korea, Serbia, Peru, Austria, the Ukraine, and Mongolia. Among others.

For that matter, if America is not ready for a woman to be our head of state, we are behind ancient Egypt.

Is that the nation I live in? I sure as hell hope not.

Cross-posted at Central Sanity.

Toast! It’s even buttered!

What exactly were you expecting?

Seriously, I wish everyone happy celebrations this evening, and send my thoughts of peace, wellness, and happiness to all my readers and all living things. May 2008 be a year where good things come into your life!

Ok, now then, about John Edwards. I support Mr. Edwards. Well, alright, in a world where Mr. Kucinich is considered “unelectable” I support Mr. Edwards. I think he is the best of the top-line candidates. But nevertheless, I do not agree with every one of his positions — I’m one of those darned “free thinkers” — and that brings me to his commentary the other day entitled “Rallying the middle class“. This piece is timely, since according to polls, Americans consider the economy and health care to be top issues. His first four paragraphs are pretty much right on, revisionist history about the golden age where working hard would magically put your family ahead aside. I especially like when he says “How long will we let big corporations and special interests dictate the direction of our country, while middle-class Americans suffer?” Then we get into the four legs of the table he wants to rebuild the middle class upon. I’ll take them one at a time if you don’t mind.

The first thing we need to do is create more jobs and make sure those jobs pay enough for people to get ahead. As president, I will end the failed NAFTA trade model and pursue a trade policy that ends tax loopholes for companies that send American jobs overseas. I will also invest in renewable sources of energy to create new industries and good-paying jobs. I will make sure work pays by raising the minimum wage to $9.50 an hour, and I will build career ladders to help low-wage workers move into better jobs. I will put the government back on the side of working people by strengthening organized labor. And finally, I will reform our tax code to make sure that the people who need tax breaks – our middle-class families – are the ones getting them.

Ok, I can’t argue with creating more good-paying jobs. Investing in renewable energy is a win-win cause: it reduces our dependency on fossil fuels while creating high-tech development jobs and good wage manufacturing jobs too. Someone’s got to build the solar panels and windmills! Now, although I am an advocate of a higher minimum wage, I am a little nervous about taking it all the way to $9.50. That’s higher than any state’s minimum wage. I hope there is a plan to do it in stages. That would bring the annual pay of a full-time minimum wager to about $19,000. As for tax breaks, I still believe in radical tax simplification that includes making the poverty line the standard deduction and caps itemized non-charitable deductions at three or four times that level.

The second thing we need to do is give families the tools to build a secure financial future. In today’s economy, people cannot rely on their employers for their long-term retirement security, so as president I will create Universal Retirement Accounts that can be taken from job to job. To respond to the mortgage crisis, I will pass a tough new national law to prevent predatory lending abuses, and I will rein in credit card and other abusive lending practices by creating a new consumer watchdog agency.

Again with the “we can fix that with a special account!” business. Is there some reason we can’t simplify the law to get what he wants with the IRA accounts that many people already have? Can’t we make a way for employers to contribute directly to our IRAs instead of a separate 401k program (which is incidentally controlled by that employer)? This would get more retirement funds in place, give Joe and Jane Average fewer accounts to keep up with, which would in turn make them less subject to fees on those accounts, and would even curb the retirement account issues that plagued employees of Enron and WorldCom. Oh, and speaking of reinventing the wheel, I bet there already is a consumer watchdog agency that should have reined in abusive lending and credit practices. And I bet they have been underfunded for the last 7-20 years.

The third thing we need to do is remove the burdens that weigh families down. We need to help people balance their work and home lives by making sure that workplace policies keep up with changes in the economy. As president, I will expand early-education programs, provide paid leave and sick leave to all workers, and expand job protection under the Family and Medical Leave Act. I will also expand opportunities to attend college through my “College for Everyone” program.

Well, workplace policies that are at least not family-hostile seem like a good thing. Got a plan to make large corporations think twice about transferring people across country — making them abandon ties to their communities, straining relationships with extended family, forcing spouses away from jobs, leading to fractured educations in their children, and contributing to the housing bubble? Work on that. As for “College for Everyone”, I think that devalues a High School education. Not everyone needs college! I support a “money should not be a barrier to college” program instead.

The fourth thing we need to do is create universal healthcare in America. Not only are healthcare costs putting a huge strain on American families and our competitiveness in the global economy, but our broken healthcare system that leaves 47 million Americans without healthcare is also a moral disgrace. I have proposed a healthcare plan that calls for shared responsibility among people, businesses, and the government, and will ensure that every man, woman, and child in America has access to affordable, quality coverage.

Alas, when he says “universal healthcare,” he does not mean “Medicare for All”; he means “mandatory health insurance.”

In closing: information overload; more write-downs on the way?; a maternal health issue you need to know about; faith is great, but it takes money to pay the bills; the AeroCivic; and finally Jim Cramer, English Teacher? Happy New Years.

By way of background, the latest version of the FISA overhaul bill — yes the same one Nancy and Harry swore they would fix in September after getting back from being gone all August and caving in to Administration demands before leaving town at the end of July, yes it is now December — includes retroactive immunity for telecom companies who allowed the government to spy on citizens without warrants in violation of not only the law but the Bill of Rights.

Senator Dodd — a member of the majority party, and a current presidential candidate — doesn’t think that’s right.  Do you?   He and a mere handful of allies in the Senate are planning a filibuster.  Give a call.  Tell them to do the right thing.  Then call your own Senators and tell them you expect them to do the right thing.  And then call Harry Reid and ask him why the hell a member of the majority party has to filibuster anything, ever!

The Senate needs to be reminded who sent them to office.

In closing: if JurassicPork is right, we are worse off than we think;  fiscal sanity; one thing free trade zones are really good for is drug smuggling;  another way of looking at the DMV;  so much for manufacturing jobs; oh, and so much for the stable part of Iraq; an increase in inequality; and finally, Cynthia at Shorty Stories alerts us not-so-tall people to a new website for petites.