McCain Ministry of Funny Walks

By Keith R. Schmitz

In an example of inadvertent hilarity, the McCain campaign has now opened the Palin Truth Squad.

What next? The Rush Limbaugh Drug Rehab Clinic?

Sarah Palin -- Welfare Mother

By Keith R. Schmitz

Finally some sign that the press might be prying open the lid on the Pandora's Box known as Sarah Palin.

Today Michael Kinsley on the TIME site takes a look at the job Sarah Palin as governor. She may have been runner up as Miss Alaska but she is the Queen of Pork.

Alaska also ranks No. 1, year after year, in money it sucks in from Washington. In 2005 (the most recent figures), according to the Tax Foundation, Alaska ranked 18th in federal taxes paid per resident ($5,434) but first in federal spending received per resident ($13,950). Its ratio of federal spending received to federal taxes paid ranks third among the 50 states, and in the absolute amount it receives from Washington over and above the amount it sends to Washington, Alaska ranks No. 1.

And for those of you who long for a tax cutter and turn red at every move from Jim Doyle, how would you like to have this kind of state government:

Alaska ranks No. 1 in taxes per resident and No. 1 in spending per resident. Its tax burden per resident is 21/2 times the national average; its spending, more than double. The trick is that Alaska's government spends money on its own citizens and taxes the rest of us to pay for it. Although Palin, like McCain, talks about liberating ourselves from dependence on foreign oil, there is no evidence that being dependent on Alaskan oil would be any more pleasant to the pocketbook.

And over the conservative blogs and among the pundits that are against the windfall profits tax:

One thing Barack Obama and McCain disagree on is an oil windfall-profits tax. McCain is against it, on the theory that it is a tax and therefore bad and also on the theory that it would discourage domestic production. Obama is for it, on the theory that if oil companies can make a nice profit when oil sells for $50 per bbl., they can still make a nice profit when it sells at more than $100, even if the government takes a bit and spreads the money around to those who are hurting from higher oil prices.

Although Palin's words side with McCain in this dispute, her actions side with Obama. Her major legislative accomplishment has been to revamp Alaska's windfall-profits tax in order to increase the state's take. Alaska calls it a "clear and equitable share" tax. The state assumes that extracting oil from the tundra costs about $25 per bbl. and takes as much as 75% of the difference between that and the sale price.

So conservatives, maybe you should rethink your choice. Sure politicians lie, but she has become the Babe Ruth of untruthfulness.

You all scream and clap when she blears out her lines about planes and bridges and chefs, but these are all fabrications and Barack Obama sponsoring nothing in the Senate. She would be a heartbeat away from the presidency, and it turns out she is not only lying to us but she's lying to you.

Plane Lying

By Keith R. Schmitz

Mayday, mayday, incoming BS!

Among the not one true thing said by Sarah Palin, is the howler about selling the state of Alaska's "luxury jet."

From the Daily Howler:

The jet was purchased by unpopular Republican governor Frank Murkowski; it had become a major issue in Alaska politics years before Palin’s ran for governor in 2006. (The jet was already an active issue in the 2004 state campaign.) During her gubernatorial campaign, Palin did pledge to sell the plane—but so did the other major candidates, in both major parties. (Murkowski finished a distant third in the 2006 GOP primary, behind Palin and John Binkley. Binkley had also pledged to sell the plane. In the general election, Palin’s Democratic opponent, Tony Knowles, had pledged he would sell the plane too.) Meanwhile, trying to sell the plane on eBay wasn’t a hockey mom’s savvy idea; it was standard practice in Alaska. According to Nexis, the first mention of eBay in this context came after the campaign was over, when Palin formally put the jet up for sale. This was part of Kyle Hopkins’ report in the Anchorage Daily News:

HOPKINS (12/13/06): The state's chief procurement officer, Vern Jones, said it's not unusual for Alaska to sell big-ticket items on eBay because the site is cheap and has a big audience.

It cost the state a few hundred dollars to sell an old state ferry, The Bartlett, for $389,500 in 2003, he said. "They got more for that then they expected."

Tuesday night, the state was auctioning 38 items on the site, including three aircraft—two Super Cubs and a Cessna. Two of the planes have already reached the minimum bids set by the state, meaning Jones expects them to sell for sure.

Selling assets on eBay was standard practice for the state; it wasn’t the hockey mom’s kitchen-table-in-a-small-town idea. And uh-oh! In this case, the eBay gambit turned out to be a bad idea for the state. No suitable bid came in for the jet, and Palin changed course in April 2007, putting the plane up for sale through a conventional airplane broker. The plane was finally unloaded in August 2007—at a substantial loss. (Murkowski had purchased the plane for $2.6 million. McCain’s latest howler to the side, it sold for $2.1 million.)

Meanwhile, the state had continued to pay a $62,500 quarterly note on the plane during the months when Palin’s eBay gambit failed. Using eBay had sometimes worked in the past, but it failed when the hockey mom tried it for this major asset; the “pitbull in lipstick” forgets to say that when she pimps her brilliant maneuver. And McCain misstated the basic facts when he pimped Palin’s brilliance last week. No, she didn’t sell it on eBay. And no, it wasn’t sold at a profit.

And this is where I tell MPS to be wary about taking free money

by folkbum

So mark the day on your calendars, if you will. And I should also qualify my title, in that the money would not actually be headed to MPS:

The Kern Family Foundation will provide $1 million to help bring college graduates involved with Teach for America into Milwaukee Public Schools classrooms by next fall, the foundation announced today. [. . .]

Teach for America leaders have given an initial approval to opening operations in Milwaukee with the goal of putting 30 teachers in MPS classrooms by next fall and 30 more by September 2010. But that is contingent on other pieces of the plan falling into place, including approval by the School Board and raising enough money by early October to pay for the first three years of the program.

Under normal circumstances, I would celebrate anyone willing to invest in MPS and invest in new, quality teachers in MPS. But I think something like The New Teacher Project is a much better way to go than Teach for America. MPS currently partners with several local universities to offer post-grad internships to people whose majors were not education, and to career-switchers who want to fight the good fight--those I also support. But TFA is, in fact, decidedly bad for schools. Anna, a New York City math teacher blogging at Feministe, explains why, in a post unambiguously titled "Why I Hate Teach for America":

At my school, a small public high school in Brooklyn, New York, well over half of the teachers at the school are Teaching Fellows, and, at least in the three years I have been at the school, the longest any of us has stayed (yet) is three years. A few of us are starting our fourth.

And this sucks for our students. I mean, it really, really sucks. It sucks to come back to school and have to have yet another first-year-teacher as a teacher. It sucks to have six different advisory teachers in four years (the case with my old advisory). It sucks to have no continuity from year to year. It sucks for the ninth grade math teacher you really liked to disappear by the time you are in eleventh grade and wanted to ask for some extra help before the PSATs. It sucks to slowly get the impression that teaching anywhere else, or doing anything else for a job is better than staying here and working with you. It sucks to get abandoned year after year after year by young, enthusiastic teachers who saw teaching in the inner city as something great to put on that law school application. [. . .]

Which is why I hate Teach for America. [. . .] TFA members are not required by Teach for America to pursue a masters in education (which, especially if you do not have an undergraduate degree in education is required to become permanently certified in most states), although some of the states where TFA has program sites require teachers to at least begin taking graduate courses as part of their alternative certification requirements. They don’t require teachers to take the steps to become permanently certified because there is no expectation that their teachers will stay in teaching once their two-year resume-building experience is over. How do I know? Because it’s on their website!

I'm eliding some of the best parts, and there is much much more after I left off. But the point is simple: Teach for America parachutes temps into schools instead of finding long-term, committed teachers. TFA is, as she suggests, much more a line on the resume or an entry in the vitae than it is a way to solve the teaching shortage in the country's most needy districts. (I was surprised--astounded, really--to read that MPS is claiming to have only 68 long-term subs in full-time positions this year, out of probably close to 6,000 spots.)

Statistics for urban districts are not much more encouraging for teachers trained the traditional way--something like half of all new teachers bail for the suburbs or different careers in five years. But TFA makes such impermanence explicit.

One of the things that sticks with me from my teacher training came not from the college classroom at all, but from some besuited motivational speaker hired to entertain the troops on the organizational day before school started the year I did an internship at Beloit Memorial High School. I remember nothing of the man's talk except this idea: In my career, I will teach thousands of students. But each one of those students will have only one 9th-grade English teacher (to pick something from my current roster). How do you think the students feel to know that their sole 9th-grade English teacher is doing the 00's equivalent of bumming around Europe, slumming a bit until taking on the MBA?

So my message to the Board, which will have to approve all of this before the TFA temps can parachute in for a year or two of "experience," is this: Be careful. Is an investment in such a transparently temporary band-aid going to do anything to address the educational distress in this city? I suspect not--though the prospect of some more warm bodies will likely be too tempting to pass up.

Audience Participation Time

By Keith R. Schmitz

Yeah, I am an unabashed liberal and Obama supporter who cannot find a single redeeming quality about Sarah Palin.

With that out of the way, as much as I strain and grunt, I cannot find a single morsel of truth in her speech in the Twin Cities and now on the trail.

Help me out. Could any one of you out there give me one single bit of fact beyond the five kids that is emanating from her lipsticked mouth?

Maybe. But my bet is that for any tidbit of veracity there were at least five outright lies.

You might think it's cute. You might think the ticket is getting away with something.

But it is pretty sad when a campaign cannot play straight with the voters and instead has to offer up this distraction. This really indicates a huge lack of respect for the voters.

Mark Your Calendars

by capper

All Politics is reporting the schedule for three upcoming public hearings regarding the county budget:

The budget hearings will be Sept. 10 at Franklin City Hall, 9229 W. Loomis Road; Sept. 16 at Kosciuszko Community Center, 2201 [S.] Seventh St.; and Sept. 18 at the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Community Center, 1531 W. Vliet St. All hearings run from 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.

This is the opportunity for the citizens to make their opinions heard before the County Board. County Executive Scott Walker already held his non-listening sessions and doesn't give a fig about what the people wants. He is only interested in what he thinks would help him as he gears up for another run for governor.

The budget battle will be fought the same way it has for the past six years. At the County Board level. You know the County Board. They're the people that have had to fix all of his previous budget proposals. They're the ones that gave the county a $7 million surplus.

I encourage everyone to attend, and let the board know that Walker's political interests aren't in the best interest of the county, and that they need to preserve the vital services the county provides, like burying the indigent, public transportation, and support for the disabled, the elderly and the poor.

Cross posted at Cognitive Dissidence.

Abstain from This Policy

By Keith R. Schmitz

A chart in yesterday's New York Times proves what a dismal failure the right wing's fairy tale abstinence only policy in particular and opposition to birth control in general has been to our country and to the young girls who have to live with the consequences.

Click here to access the piece by Charles Blow and pull up the chart under multimedia on the left.

With some graphic help the chart show lists countries of the world sorted under columns for teen births per 1,000 for 1970 and 1998, teenage abortions per 1,000 and teen sex by percentages.

The US has a high percentage of teens having sex, but there are some with higher.

It's the other columns that point up to the failure of our approach. In all countries births per thousand have fallen since 1970. In the US they have fallen by about 75%.

But look down the list. In almost all countries the rate of teen pregnancy fell by half or more, except in Catholic countries. Granted the numbers are smaller but in Ireland they actually rose.

These numbers tell us a lot. They tell us that as a country we have to thing more pro-actively about birth control and sex education. I know what's going on in many little heads. "We already shove birth control down kindergarteners' throats." We obviously are doing a bad job of it or no job. In the more open Danish society with kids having more sex than here, the teen birth rate is a minescule 8.1 per 1,000. Heck, many of these kids could be married.

These numbers also tell us about yet another failed conservative policy. In this case we have to do more than just tell kids to keep their knees together.

Yet another failed policy that joins the trash pile of others -- the Iraq invasion, deficit spending, tax cuts for the wealthy, mindless tax cutting. On top of that they want us to go to so-called "consumer-based health care," another faux-populist lame-brained idea that has worked no where on a mass scale and is simply another means to transfer wealth upward.

Yet another failed policy that tells us what this election is all about -- taking away the keys of government from conservatives and letting folks from the reality based side drive.

Trifecta

by folkbum

We all know that the Republican ticket of McCain-Palin lies (the jet lie, the bridge lie, the taxes lie, and on and on). We all know that they they steal, such as using the music of Jackson Browne and Heart against the expressed wishes (and politics!) of the artists. We all know that they question Democrats' patriotism pretty much every time they open their mouths.

But today we got the trifecta--lying, theft, and questioning patriotism all at once:

Days before September 11, on the same morning that John McCain and Barack Obama released a joint statement pledging to avoid politics in light of the anniversary of the terrorist attacks, McCain's campaign accused Democrats of throwing away 12,000 American flags.

"The campaign says the flags were recovered from Invesco Field after the Democrats concluded their convention there," Fox News reported, "and they are going to be used as part of the warm-up ceremonies before McCain takes the stage" for a rally in Colorado Springs, Col.

But according to a senior official involved in organizing the Democratic convention, the McCain camp is simply lying about the flags.

"All of the flags at Invesco were picked up and put in bags and into storage, along with the unused flags and campaign signs. The flags were going to be donated, and the signs were going to be sent out to be used elsewhere," the official said.

Amazing, isn't it? The McCain campaign stole the Obama campaign's flags, lied about where they came from and what Obama's campaign was going to do with them, and by doing so implied that Obama hates the flag and American.

That is shameless. More than shameless, really--base, crass, and criminal. But then again, this is your modern Republican Party. Congrats, my conservative readers--you're about to vote for a ticket with worse ethics than Nixon or your average carjacker.

UPDATED to add that the FOXNews reporter running with this story is Carl Cameron, who famously was reprimanded for just making stuff up about John Kerry in 2004.

A Big Cedarburg Welcome to the National Media

By Keith R. Schmitz

Don't know why this didn't make it into the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, but the national media got a real taste of Ozaukee County hospitality, intelligence and self preservation.

According to the Washington Times (of all people!):

Hundreds of angry people in this small town outside Milwaukee taunted reporters and TV crews traveling with Sen. John McCain on Friday, chanting "Be fair!" and pointing fingers at a pack of journalists as they booed loudly.

On the first leg of the "McCain Street USA" tour -- which will take the Republican presidential nominee and his running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, to small towns across the heartland -- the 30 or so reporters and crew were walking back to their buses to join the McCain motorcade when hundreds of townspeople started yelling.

"Stop lying! You are all liars! Tell the truth!" one woman yelled from the front of the pack.

The crowd was not menacing or threatening, but was clearly angry.

How ironic. After just being treated to about 15 minutes of non-stop lying by Caribou Barbie about how she stopped the bridge to nowhere when she didn't, and how she fought pork but gobbled it down to point of elevated cholesterol, the crowd demanded that the press should stop doing the job that the McCain didn't do in the first place. Don't forget that McCain as well was serving up whoppers (do you want fries with that?) in front of the Chocolate Factory.

News to you folks. As much as you desperately want to love these two the lies won't clean up the economy, make Washington run better or get us an energy policy. Yeah, politicians can stretch things but this duo does hits prevarication homers while others just bunt.

There is this freedom of the press thing in the Constitution. It can be threatened by more than just the government, and that includes a sector of the population that demands their right to not know.

Abortion and Palin: She hath loosed the fateful lightning

by bert
OK, fine, let’s mock the “above my pay grade” statement by Barack Obama and then coo and awe at Sarah Palin’s Down syndrome baby that she chose to raise. But, then, let’s get real.

The Republicans cater to those who are devoted to the cause of making abortions illegal for everyone. That devotion is a force the GOP can harness for their own interests. So, of course, from the St. Paul convention these abortion opponents were fed jokes about the “pay grade” line. That attacks the belief that questions about the nature of life are profound and deserve some awe and humility.

It panders to the type of Christian who embraces the religion because it gives him or her the opposite of awe and humility: it supplies a clippable, refrigerator-door recipe for quick Truth. Nothing is profound, unless you are going to hell. And life begins when sperm hits egg. Next question.

The overweening praise of a party leader who is raising a Down syndrome baby also throws a bone to the anti-abortion movement. Not as nice as merely mocking their sinful enemies with the ‘pay grade’ thing, this praise in effect thumps an accusing index finger in the chest of any other couple who did not do this when they learned their fetus was not healthy. We all know the unspoken accusation: murder.

The reason this anti-abortion movement is exploited is that the movement is impassioned. Those who don’t believe as they do – many would personally not choose or have not chosen an abortion themselves – are not as hot-blooded. The choice people might be unsure about what’s right in all situations, given all the other factors at play. Why don't we give the poor people faced with these awful decisions the freedom to do so privately, they say. I’m like that.

We can all imagine a couple with a pregnancy that learns after those early tests that there is something wrong with the woman’s fetus. Picture them around a kitchen table or talking while lying in their dark bedroom at night. They might even be in the rectory of a liberal church struggling for an answer with a minister. Why God? Is it right to call any human defective? Can I pay for a decent level of care? Can I handle this? Adoption? Is it fair to my other children?

Republicans are telling us our government should use its power to arrest those pregnant people if and when their struggling produces a decision to abort. Get the government in there with its wiretaps and tasers around that kitchen table too. These people are plotting a murder. At the very least, this couple should be arrested and prosecuted like every other murderer if they act on this decision. Once the woman does the perp walk on TV with the orange jail suit, the AM radio shows should also work their listeners into outrage about her. Fire up the base.

If a Republican rolls their eyes at this and says that is not what all these messages mean, they are nevertheless happy that "the base" mistakenly thinks that is what they mean.

Remember the folks who invaded and attacked that poor family of the irreparably vegetative Terry Schiavo? I only now see that throughout this campaign the Republicans have been telling us this is what government itself should do. It is only since Sarah Palin arrived that they started having such a good time in telling us. Her truth is marching on, and all that.

McCain Campaign -- Loaded with Lobbyists Part 3

By Keith R. Schmitz

Last night we heard John McCain explain how the disaster of the past eight years must of been perpetrated by someone else other than the Republicans. Kind of like the plot of Fight Club, where Ed Norton's character finds out he is really beating himself up, it will be Republicans vs themselves saying they promise they won't screw up another four years. The first rule of fight club is not to talk about fight club.

Charlie Black doing business in the back of
the StraightTalk Express

Here is yet another example of how John McCain's promises of last night ring hollow. Meet:

Charlie Black

Charlie Black of BKSH & Associates, a Bush Pioneer in 2004, is perhaps the most experienced and respected Republican lobbyist in Washington, D.C. He is a close friend of former president George H.W. Bush and has served as an adviser to presidents Reagan and George W. Bush, as well as working as official spokesman for the Republican National Committee.

Recent reports about his work for Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) observed that, prior to taking a leave of absence, he did a lot of his lobbying work from the back of McCain's campaign bus. He certainly has had a lot of clients to manage, many of whom have pressing business in Washington.[1] Over the years his client list has included Ahmed Chalabi and the Iraqi National Congress[2], Benazir Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party[3], the China National Off-Shore Oil Corp[4], Zaire dictator Mobutu Sese Seko and Angolan rebel Jonas Savimbi.[5]

Black has also said that he sees great opportunities for lobbyists in Iraq and has considered opening up a branch of his office there. "Is there too much cronyism?" he asked, referring to Iraq. "I just wish I could find the cronies."[6]

For a complete look at Charlie Black's lobbying activities, please visit the non-partisan Center For Responsive Politics' money-in-politics database.

[1] Michael D. Shear and Jeffrey H. Birnbaum, "The Anti-Lobbyist, Advised by Lobbyists," The Washington Post, February 22, 2008.

[2] Kate Zernike, "'Steady Hand' Helps McCain On a New Path," The New York Times, April 13, 2008.

[3] Jim McElhatton and Jerry Seper, "McCain Advisers Tied to Foreign Lobbying," The Washington Times, April 11, 2008.

[4] Tory Newmyer and Kate Ackley, "K Street Files," Roll Call, July 18, 2005.

[5] Wheeler, Tim, "Corporate Lobbyists Drive McCain's Campaign," People's Weekly World, March 1, 2008.

[6] Jane Mayer, "Contract Sport," The New Yorker, February 16, 2004.

From McCain's Lobbyists

Pallin Pick -- Too Clever by Half

By Keith R. Schmitz

One could imagine the gnome from hell Karl Rove rubbing his fat paws over his ingenuity in getting war hero John McCain to pass on buddy Joe Lieberman for the circus clown Sarah Palin. In retrospect one could ponder the missed opportunity however, of if the idea is to pick a woman to sop up Hillary voters while Rove didn't pick Condie. That could have been a two-fer.

But no there is evidence that the election Rove needs to win to avoid prison time may be slipping away and that the Hillary herd is not turning in McCain's direction:

Sandy Goodman was deeply disappointed when Hillary Rodham Clinton didn't get the Democratic nomination, then again when she was bypassed for the VP spot. So Goodman, a longtime Florida Democrat, flirted with thoughts of shunning Barack Obama, and perhaps even voting Republican.

Then John McCain picked Sarah Palin as his running mate, and suddenly things became clear to Goodman: The Republicans had no place for her.

What? The evil genius is loosing his magic?

Evidence so far shows that Palin is not drawing a lot of support from voters outside the Republican base.

An ABC News poll released Friday found the selection of Palin makes people likelier to vote for McCain by just 6 percentage points _ half the 12-point margin by which Sen. Joe Biden makes them more likely to support Obama.

And as for Clinton supporters, eight in 10 said they'd vote for Obama in November, according to a Gallup Poll conducted last weekend after McCain announced his selection of Palin.

Sorry Karl. Women are not dumb. Well, maybe we can think of one.

Something political, but not really.

by folkbum



I believe I have previously mentioned my slight crush on Peter Mulvey. I mean, how could you not?

Loaded with Lobbyists Part 2

By Keith R. Schmitz

Coming up to bat next in the McCain all-star K-Street Team and batting right (they all bat right) is the recently renowned -- thanks to the muck up in the Republic of Georgia -- Randy Scheunemann (nice pose to the right by the way). The problem here is our State Department should be conducting foreign relations, not hired guns like Scheuemann -- as last month's events prove.

From McCain's Lobbyists
A foreign policy advisor to Sen. John McCain’s presidential campaign who heads Scheunemann & Associates, has worked on behalf of numerous high profile clients, including the National Rifle Association, Lockheed Martin and BP. However, it is his work for Texas businessman Stephen Payne that has garnered the most attention.

Two of Payne’s firms, Worldwide Strategic Partners Inc. and the Caspian Alliance, paid Scheunemann to lobby Congress, the State Department and the National Security Council on their behalf in connection to energy issues.[1] According to The Sunday Times of London, Payne offered to give the former president of Kyrgyzstan access to President Bush and Vice President Cheney in exchange for a $250,000 donation to Bush’s presidential library and a $450,000 payment to his lobbying firm.[2]

Payne was recorded as saying that Scheunemann had been on his payroll for five of the past eight years.[3] His work with Baltic countries has also included efforts on behalf of Georgia, which paid another Scheunemann firm, Orion Strategies, to help the former Soviet republic win admission to NATO. The firm met or spoke to McCain and his staff dozens of times between 2001 and 2008, and made regular political contributions to McCain’s campaign and PAC.

The hard work apparently paid off: In 2006, McCain co-sponsored legislation encouraging Georgia’s admission to NATO, and he has been a vocal supporter of the country during his presidential campaign.[4] Scheunemann was also a prominent supporter of invading Iraq, having served as a board member of the Project for a New American Century and a founder of the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq.[5]

For a complete look at Randy Scheunemann’s lobbying activities, please visit the non-partisan Center For Responsive Politics’ money-in-politics database.

[1] Pete Yost, “McCain adviser lobbied for Stephen Payne,” The Associated Press, July 21, 2008.

[2] Daniel Foggo and Steven Swinford, “President Bush Lobbyist Stephen Payne In ‘Bribes’ Row Quits,” The Sunday Times Of London, July 20, 2008.

[3] Ibid.

[4] Mark Benjamin, “McCain: To Russia, Without Love,” Salon.com, June 9, 2008, http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2008/06/09/mccain/print.html.

[5] Peter Slevin, “Randy Scheunemann: McCain Adviser Campaigned for War,” Washingtonpost.com, June 17, 2008, http://blog.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2008/06/17/randy_scheunemann_mccain_advis.html

We Are in a Quandry

By Keith R. Schmitz

Jim Rowen points out that the successful Karl Rove tactic has been to go after a Democratic candidate's strength.

The problem for us is if we wanted to go the route, we have nothing to work with.

We interrupt the Sarah Palin bashing ...

by folkbum

... to remind you what actual sexism looks like. (Yes, it's the same guy.)

McCain Campaign -- Loaded with Lobbyists

By Keith R. Schmitz

While listening to the snarky, classless, braying of Sarah Palin talking about John McCain fighting for you and standing up to the special interests, let's take a look at who in fact is serving on the McCain campaign staff. 

As you read through the bio, connect the dots and color in the hypocrisy of the speech.

h/t -- McCain's Lobbyists
Rick Davis

Partner in the lobbying firm Davis Manafort (and Jeffery Dahmer look-alike), currently serves as Sen. John McCain's (R-AZ) campaign manager. (He managed McCain's 2000 campaign as well.) A former aide in the Reagan administration and the deputy manager of Sen. Bob Dole's (R-KS) 1996 campaign, Davis' dual role as a political operative and as a lobbyist has caused controversy. During the 2000 campaign, critics noted that two of the companies his firm represented, SBC Communications and Comsat, had controversial mergers pending at the Federal Communications Commission. The Senate Commerce Committee, which McCain chaired at the time, oversees the FCC. Davis tenure as head of the McCain-affiliated Reform Institute, where he solicited tens of thousands of dollars in contributions for the Institute from communications companies, has also come under scrutiny. Davis earned $110,000 a year from the Institute while still serving as McCain top political advisor.[1]

Davis has faced other controversies as well. During the current campaign, rivals accused him of self-dealing, noting that the McCain campaign had hired a company he partly owns, 3eDC, to provide Internet services.[2] Davis did not initially disclose his interest to McCain.[3] Davis also came under fire recently when it was revealed that he had arranged a 2006 meeting between McCain and Russian aluminum magnate Oleg Deripaska.[4] Deripaska, critics noted, is not only one of the richest men in Russia and an ally of Vladimir Putin, but has also been linked to organized crime and had his American visa revoked. Nevertheless, Deripaska is not the only shady figure to benefit from close relations with Davis. Davis Manafort has also done political consulting for former Ukrainian Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich, who had close ties to Putin and was defeated in that country's 2004 Orange Revolution. Other recent lobbying clients include Verizon, GTECH, and Airborne Express.[5]

For a complete look at Rick Davis' lobbying activities, please visit the non-partisan Center For Responsive Politics' money-in-politics database.

[1] Lisa Lerer, "Ex-Reformer McCain Depends on Lobbyists," Politico, July 11, 2007.

[2] Michael Cooper, "Savior or Machiavelli, McCain Aide Carries On," The New York Times, October 23, 2007.

[3] Edward T. Pound, "Troublesome Resumes," U.S. News & World Report, May 28, 2007.

[4] Jeffrey H. Birnbaum and John Solomon, "Aide Helped Controversial Russian Meet McCain," January 25, 2008.

[5] U.S. Secretary of the Senate Lobbying Disclosure Database, accessed May 13, 2008.

No Room on McCain Bus for Press

By Keith Schmitz

There is evidence that Navy Captain McCain is turning into Captain Queeg.

For someone who was famously cozy with the press, the GOP presidential nominee is starting to lash out at his friends in the press, largely through surrogate attack hounds. But sometimes when you take up with a woman, you break up with your buddies because they don't approve of your current squeeze. That woman in question is of course Sarah Palin.

And shockingly, per the Joe Klein piece on the Time magazine blog, they are on to her:

(I)t is important for the public to know that Palin raised taxes as governor, supported the Bridge to Nowhere before she opposed it, pursued pork-barrel projects as mayor, tried to ban books at the local library and thinks the war in Iraq is "a task from God.

I'm actually pulling from the end of Klein's post. He starts it off talking about how the McCain campaign staff is getting awfully testy about the press committing (to throw back at Sykes) flagrant acts of journalism.

No wonder McCain's posse is mad. The wonderfully hardwired Republican party as they always do during elections keep repeating the lines about Palin being a tax cutter, a maverick and a pork fighter. They are good at boiling down things to simple and effective talking points.

But it turns out she not only can bring home the bacon, she can fry it up in the pan. She could let her husband let him not forget he's a man, but Palin is having a feud with his mother.

Soon the press will get around to telling us that Palin is nothing but a typical burrow and spend Republican.

The GOP can't have their talking points derailed. More and more we are learning the Staighttalk Express runs on methane. My God, then they'd have to talk about the issues and we can't have that.

They will do all they can to entreat to the American public about how mean the media is, and with any luck the good folks in the press will stand their ground and do their jobs.

UPDATE -- CNN has more on the bullying by the GOP. Also, one of the 20 years olds from the McCain is getting snippy right now with Chris Matthews on Hardball. And Matthews is calling out him and a Utah congressman on the politics of the pick. This is going to get interesting to watch the McCain self-immolation.

Well THAT explains it

by folkbum

Via TPM, McCain campaign chief muckety-muck Rick Davis:

This election is not about issues. This election is about a composite view of what people take away from these candidates.

179 to go

by folkbum

I survived day one. How was everyone else's first day of school? Consider this a directed open thread.