Ultra-Right Wing Is Now The New Taliban.

Oh wow, this is exactly the conversation I had at work last week. I compared our own "ultra right wingers" to Telaban and al Qaeda types. I said they use the same tactics and feel justified in almost any action that begets their ends.

These people have always scared me. I recall the time in my teens when Jehovah's Witnesses came to my door. I was staying alone at my grand parent's house on Long Island. These two young men came to the house. Now, I was from a small town in Vermont - population 710 at the time - so I had never seen this type of thing before. They said their thing, and I think I said, "Are you serious?" I spoke with them for a while trying to convince them of all the other good they could be doing rather than worrying about what religion people followed. Sheeze, what a waste of time.

Flash forward 18 years and I see more and more people who just live hate. Not the Jehovah's witnesses mind you, they may be wasting my time and theirs, but they aren't out to kill to get their way. The point is, both the religious right wingers the old school racists all scare the daylights out of me.

Look, McCain's campaign is getting so full of hate he had to calm the crowd down - lest someone go out and kill Obama.

I've never heard of Rachel Maddow before, but this video editorial really hits the nail on the head.

What am I doing about it? I've supported Obama with cash and time. I've even adorned my MotorCycle with an Obama sticker - that was the toughest thing I did for the guy. Now this week I'm taking it local - on Thursday I'll be manning a phone for Kay Hagan because I don't like Dole's supporters. In other words, I'm not going to attack the crazies directly - instead I'm going to work for candidates that don't support them and are not supported by them.

What do you think? What are you doing this election season?

I'm working for Obama on Wednesday

This week I'm going to the local Obama office at 5pm. They said there will be training and then I'm off to park myself in the front of a "major business" to sign up new voters...

I guess I'm part of the machine now.

I did a few Moveon.org phone calls a while ago. It was really well put tegether. I'm interested not only to do the voter drive, but also to see what a campaign office looks like.

What about you, have you volunteered yet? We're coming up on 40 days left. Get out there!

McCain lies and contradicts himself

I read on Time.com (Time Magazine) that McCain lies and contradicts himself. 

But to really understand it, you really need to see the video tape. Luckily, Cobert has put it all together for us.

Did you watch closely? Did you hear the obscure reference to "taint" near the end? Hmmm, what could that be? Google to the rescure...The answer is it not suitable for work. If it taint suitable for work, it must be pretty funny. Sorry, bad pun.

Back to McCain, every time I see him on TV I can't help but notice how uncomfortable he looks. I wonder if during the debates he'll look like Richard Nixon next to Obama's JFK. 

"In substance, the candidates were much more evenly matched. Indeed, those who heard the first debate on the radio pronounced Nixon the winner. But the 70 million who watched television saw a candidate still sickly and obviously discomforted by Kennedy's smooth delivery and charisma. Those television viewers focused on what they saw, not what they heard. Studies of the audience indicated that, among television viewers, Kennedy was perceived the winner of the first debate by a very large margin."

Since it is so close yet again, I think the debates will decide the election. Since McCain's choice of Palin he seems to have gotten the upper hand as a man of the people (what a joke). Sigh. Time will tell who will win.

Are oil producers manipulating the market to keep Republicans in power

In "Is the “Commodity Super Cycle” Dead or Alive?" Gary Dorsch asserts that the oil producers are manipulating the markets to keep republicans in power.

Under the section "Saudis Topple Oil market, US Election Politics" Gary quotes Venezuelan oil chief Rafael Ramirez: "Obviously, when the price of crude oil oscillates $20 up or down in such a short time, it doesn't have anything to do with production,"

Later Gary states "However, the Saudi kingdom might be looking at the US political calendar, and would feel more comfortable with a John McCain presidency, thus Riyadh might be inclined to leave its oil output unchanged awhile longer."

So, what can we voters make of this?

Looking at the markets I see oil down, the dollar up, and the Fed rescuing weak financial companies. It seems to, to quote my dad, the fix is in. Can the republicans really manipulate the world financial and energy markets just in time for the election? Maybe not. But it seems who ever can is off to a good start.

What's interesting is that it is Britain that seems to have escalated buying of US treasuries the most among top players in this market during the past few months. I find it suspicious that Britain does not have the trade surplus with the United States one would expect for them to acquire such a huge surplus in dollars. So where did this money come from?

With no evidence of my own to support it, I suggest looking at the World's oil producers. Oil producers are receiving billions of dollars every month - we all see that at the pump. It doesn't seem difficult to front a bank in Britain and buy these treasuries. Luckily the Saudis' had foresite to nationalize The British Bank of the Middle East in 1979.

Why would the Saudi's do this? Because they feel the extremely hawkish republicans will keep the Iranians down and stay in Iraq.... Perhaps, but I can't really say...

In any event, isn't this cool? It seems we've come full circle. Back to the events that started at the time of the last major oil crisis.

I've seen enough of Palin

Palin makes me worried. She's bridged a gap McCain had with voters in a way not many could. I'm not sure how the election will turn out, but I have seen enough of Palin to know there is no way I'd vote for her ticket. With Palin on the ticket McCain has gained a large head of steam - what makes me worried is Obama may not be able to overcome it. Some thoughts on Palin:

Religion
I have read all I need to about Palin to know she is a Christian bigot. There should not be any Christian bigots, seems they should be more Christian than that, and accept people as they are.

Good thing we have Bill Burr to explain to us the trouble with overly religious white guys (and girls).

Banning Books
Don't believe it? Indeed Palin asked about banning books from the library. Not the school library where banning some books (like bomb making manuals) seems legit. We're talking the public library. She has said she was asking a rhetorical question. She likely meant hypothetical since rhetorical questions generally have a ready answer and are asked without the expectation of a response. What ever the true reason for her asking - my question is why would this even come up at all? Is it the mayor's job to police what people read? I think not.

Convention Speech Lies
Many news organizations have reported on lies Palin made during here convention speech. I don't have time to Blog about all of them. Take one example, the bridge to nowhere. She claimed to have said no thanks to money from congress for that bridge. But not really. It seems the bridge funding earmark was killed in the normal couse of budget debates in congress. Ironically they still got the funds a different way - but due to cost overruns Palin canceled the project.

What is the definition of executive experience?
Every one "flip flops" it seems, but this video speaks for itself. Truely stunning.

Well any way, I know where my vote is. We donated $$$ to Barack Obama's campaign shortly after Palin was even done speaking.