Small Blawg

It's summer, and there's too much going on to spend much time blogging, though heaven knows I'd love to roll in the sex scandal muck for a while, or chastise Dana Milbank for his silly attack on Obama's willingness to take questions relayed from Iran at a press conference, or give Obama a swift kick in the briefs (legal briefs, that is) for his DOJ's vicious anti-gay support of Dubya's position on gay marriage in the Smelt case, spitefully delivered just a couple of weeks before the 40th anniversary of Stonewall. Nope, no time for any of that today while the sun is shining and the flowers are blooming, bees buzzing, and oh, look out, if I'm seriouslyl hitting the birds and the bees already I'll start babbling about Mark Sanford in no time.

So instead, may I direct your attention to an extensive profile of Sarah "Slippery" Palin, presidential prospect and all-around loon? Nine thousand and eight hundred words, according to one count, by Todd S. Purdom in August's Vanity Fair, already online here:

What does it say about the nature of modern American politics that a public official who often seems proud of what she does not know is not only accepted but applauded? What does her prominence say about the importance of having (or lacking) a record of achievement in public life? Why did so many skilled veterans of the Republican Party—long regarded as the more adroit team in presidential politics—keep loyally working for her election even after they privately realized she was casual about the truth and totally unfit for the vice-presidency? Perhaps most painful, how could John McCain, one of the cagiest survivors in contemporary politics—with a fine appreciation of life’s injustices and absurdities, a love for the sweep of history, and an overdeveloped sense of his own integrity and honor—ever have picked a person whose utter shortage of qualification for her proposed job all but disqualified him for his?

Thanks to Politico for the heads-up.

There will be time to grieve Dr. George Tiller, a good and brave man, later.

Tonight, in haste, here is what is being said about Scott Philip Roeder, the man arrested for his murder — and a concluding note on John McCain's encounter with (and obedience to?) supporters of the previous person who made an attempt on Dr. Tiller's life.

• Kansas State Official Criminal Record regarding his 1996 conviction for having bomb materials. Full name, birthdate, physical description, disciplinary report, release date. No photo. FreeStateDem posted this info on the DailyKos, which is where I got it; thank you, FSD.


• The Anti-Defamation League has a report about Scott Roeder here describing his 1997 parole violation after his 1996 conviction. Thanks to kckc at Democratic Underground for the link.


• CNN began their 10 pm report today saying his name had not been released, but concluded their report by stating "the suspect" had been described by the FBI as a member of the Freemen. The conviction was overturned due to a Fourth Amendment violation in the search of his vehicle. CNN concluded the first part of their 10 pm report by wondering aloud if this would affect the Supreme Court nomination of Sonia Sotomayor. When they began the second part of the report, CNN anchor Don Lemon speculated that Tiller's assassination might create a pro-choice backlash, and quoted Randall Terry's maunderings about how he fears Obama's reaction. Terry said nothing about Roeder's possible connection to the organization Terry started, the so-called "Operation Rescue," nor did Terry condemn the assassination.


• "OR" was always called "Operation Oppress-You" by feminists when we'd have competing picket lines and demonstrations. Terry has asserted that he legally "owns" the name OR. He founded the group in 1986. There have been organizational paroxysms of re-definition and re-naming since he left the group, and his original group has been known since 1999 as "Operation Save America" (and they really hate his guts, apparently; they published Terry's church's letter censuring him for adultery in 2000.) Managed by Flip Benham since 1991, OSA has expanded its anti-choice mission to include activism against Islam, pornography, and homosexuality.


• When mainstream press sources quote "Operation Rescue," they mean a splinter group which was formerly the western division of Terry's original organization, managed from California in the 1990s and from Kansas now. This group, once called "Operation Rescue West," is using the name "Operation Rescue" in Kansas and has feuded with "Operation Save America" over the question of who should be named what, and what their agenda should be. The current OR is run by Troy Newman, who dropped the "West" from the group's name and moved it to Kansas in 2002 specifically to concentrate on Dr. Tiller. Because the site is down, it's hard to say how the website www.operationrescue.org fits into all this. Since Roeder, a Kansas local, was posting on their boards, it is probably the website for the Kansas group rather than for the original OR, now OSA.


WEBSITE ACTIVITY:


• Roeder left at least one message on a board run by operationrescue.org. In his 2007 post, he suggests that Dr. Tiller should be stalked at his church, and that church members and officials should be harassed about him. See it here at Democratic Underground, because the OR site has been down since the murder first hit the news.


• OR has been running a Tiller Watch page for years. It also has been down since the murder was reported.


• Here is Google's cache copy of OR's page outlining their May, 2007 protest harassing Tiller. Thanks to PGHBaldy for their comment at Free Republic providing the cache link.


• Abortion-related terrorism was something the Reagan and Bush 41 administrations pretty much just winked at in the 1980s and early 90s. Feminist organizations begged the DOJ — unsuccessfully — during those years to do serious investigations, instead of making empty gestures of window-dressing. The terrorist support structure was permitted to flourish while Republican administrations wasted time sending Red Squads after environmentalists and peace groups — who haven't ever killed anybody.


• This history of neglect is part of why the Clinton Administration bungled the Richard Jewell scandal, in which law enforcement accused a heroic security guard of bombing the 1996 Olympics because he was chubby, which was proof he must have been maladjusted... finally naming the guilty party as a person of interest in 1998, after Jewell's life had been ruined. Anti-abortion terrorist Eric Rudolph used those two years to bomb a gay bar and two abortion clinics, altogether killing two people and injuring about 150.


• During the 2008 presidential campaign, Obama was being drubbed hourly for being on the same charitable board as a man — a man with no arrests or convictions — who had been a violent activist in the 1960s, when Obama was nine years old. Other than Keith Olbermann, almost no major cable, network, or print reports focused on John McCain's August, 1993 appearance at a meeting of the Oregon Citizens' Alliance, a notorious anti-gay, anti-choice group. (McCain was 57 at the time — not a child.) McCain had been warned in advance about the purpose of the gathering, but chose to attend regardless and sat silently while speaker Marylin Shannon praised long-time clinic vandal Shelley Shannon for her attempt,only eleven days earlier, to murder...Dr. George Tiller. Shelley Shannon tried to kill Tiller and succeeded in shooting him in both arms. She will be in federal prison until 2018. Marylin Shannon, Shelley's groupie but otherwise no relation, was a Bush delegate in 2004... and a McCain delegate in 2008. The year after listening to would-be murderess Shelley Shannon be praised for her attempt on Tiller's life, McCain voted with extreme-right senators against the federal Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, which made a federal crime to bomb or blockade abortion clinics or to attack abortion doctors. Will some mainstream reporter kindly ask John McCain on the record how he feels about this now?

The Republican administrations of the past have shown much more enthusiasm for raging against terrorists from other nations and cultures than they have for tracking down the domestic terrorists who come from their own extremist fringe. Clinton's FBI was hapless in the Jewell matter. Here's hoping Obama can do better.

And here, without haste, is the start of the long slow mourning for Dr. George Tiller, that good and brave and irreplaceable man.

Pay attention! The Ledbetter Act and the Fair Pay Restoration Act have passed the House and are on their way to the Senate, and so it's time to write your Senators and let them know you want to see people who have been discriminated against at work have at least the same small chance of getting justice that they had before Dubya's Supreme Court re-wrote history in 2007.

In other news, Meghan McCain, one of erstwhile candidate John's three daughters, has announced that she's not going to comment on his choice of Sarah Palin for veep. One doubts she was surprised that Daddy went for yet another beauty queen. The fact that the choice has still rendered her speechless shouts louder than words.

And, finally, the infamous and inept Joe the Plumber (Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher) is already making a fool of himself in his new career as a "war correspondent" in Israel. The Huffington Post located these precious quotes on reporters and reportage:

They're supposed to bring the news to you unbiased. They're supposed to actually report it and then let you make your opinion ... What I can provide are actual real questions and get real answers. I'm not talking manufactured answers, I'm not talking soundbites...And uh, not giving it any kind of slants.

* * * *

I don't think journalists should be anywhere allowed war (sic). I mean, you guys report where our troops are at. You report what's happening day to day. You make a big deal out of it. I think it's asinine. You know, I liked back in World War I and World War II when you'd go to the theater and you'd see your troops on, you know, the screen and everyone would be real excited and happy for them. Now everyone's got an opinion and wants to downer-and down soldiers.

Oh gosh, it gets worse. I found the quote continued at The Raw Story:

I think media should be abolished from, uh, you know, reporting. You know, war is hell. And if you're gonna sit there and say, 'Well, look at this atrocity,' well, you don't know the whole story behind it half the time. So I think the media should have no business in it.

Yeah, you tell 'em, Jingo Joe.

By the way, CNN and the Christian Science Monitor note that Wurzelbacher told far-right writer Laura Ingraham back in October that sure, he'd like to run for Democratic Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur's seat in 2010. Joe, not the tightest wrench in the kit, needs to note that Kaptur kept her seat a month later with 74% of the vote in 2008—typical of her performance since taking office in 1982.

The Monitor's commentator suggested Wurzelbacher should consider Ohio Senator George Voinovich's seat as well, a seat which is already Republican. In a country which has elected Sonny Bono, Jessie Ventura, and Arnold Schwarzenegger to major offices, anything at all is possible.

I was going to do a post about a slogan I saw buried in Comment 17 here, following a story about a Republican women's group leader in New Mexico who succumbed to Islamophobia and the temptation to lie like a rug regarding Obama's own religious persuasion in a local letter to the editor. A slogan posted in response?

"Vote for the guy with one wife, one house, one car."
And that's great: succinct, to the point, and a response to the faux pro-family, pro-middle-class tropes the McPalin campaign keeps pushing. But it is nothing to the sheer poetry of this icon by jehannamama of Texas:



Rosa sat, so Martin could walk...
Martin walked, so Obama could run...
Obama is running... so our children can fly.

This post is not complete without this:

Daughter of Slaves, 109, Votes For Obama.

Hillary Clinton did not deserve to have the worst of sexist fears embodied in the metal nutcracker made in her image, nor the prurient coverage of her cleavage, nor... oh, the list goes on. Likewise, Sarah Palin has come in for some sexism she doesn't deserve either.

She doesn't deserve having a porn film made starring a look-alike. It's not flattery, it's degrading, to her and to all women in politics.

She doesn't deserve being the subject of stripper look-alike contests either. Ditto.

She doesn't deserve being called a "diva." If McCain's staff wants to call her an egotist, fine, say egotist. Call her a rogue, that's fine too. Call her a whack job - it's perfectly true. But don't call her a gendered insult such as "diva."

And, although this is not sexist, just vicious, don't hang her in effigy. It encourages sexists, whatever the original intent of the display was. It may be free speech, but it's really trashy, just as trashy as her winking and nodding and waving past the shouts of "Kill him!" at her rallies. It's hateful and it incites violence. Be an American and have the class to take it down. Because of sexism, some loon might take a shot at her, just for being a female candidate for the second-highest office in the country. Certainly plenty of loons felt that way about Hillary Clinton. Don't encourage them.

There. I'm through defending her, I hope. Picking on her $150K worth of clothes is not sexist. It's questioning why what should be a personal expense (like John Edwards' infamous haircuts) is a campaign expense. It's questioning if she's going to scamper off with the goods at the end of the campaign by either paying income tax on the $150K, or having the garments evaluated at Goodwill prices for "used clothes" and reimbursing the campaign for that, instead of the purchase prices. It's about questioning why the campaign is paying her makeup artist about $11,000 each week - more than double the campaign's senior foreign policy analyst. It's about asking whether the McCain's campaign costly focus on her looks is sexist.

Chiding her for continuing to hide from a real press conference is not sexist. It's a recognition that a person who can't handle the press corps is obviously unable to handle Congress, the United Nations, or any head of state — and a veep has to be able to handle all that on a moment's notice. No time to hang out by a creek memorizing speechlets, as she did prior to her "debate" with Biden.

Saying she's a drag on the ticket is not sexist. She is, and it's not because she's a woman, it's because she's the aforesaid whack job and because McCain's campaign put her on pitbull duty, doing the traditional attack-dog routine veep candidates always do. Rabid hatefulness rarely raises anyone's likability, regardless of gender; but the McCain campaign has decided that's her job.

Saying she's disloyal to McCain is not sexist. It's true. She's not the first veep or veep hopeful who has been disloyal to the top of their ticket, though she may be the first to be so blatant about it before the election is held. Saying she's ambitious for 2012 is not sexist. That, also, is true. Whether it's a legit ambition at this time, or ever, doesn't hinge on her gender so feel no compunction: just say it. McCain has been disloyal to women all his life. Perhaps it's karma if this time, this one beat him to it.

Questioning the birth of a full-term child seven months after her rushed, no-family-present wedding and now, her teen daughter's pre-marital pregnancy, is not sexist. It's a legitimate comparison of what she does versus what she says. It is not sexist to expose or discuss the hypocrisy of someone who wants to make every woman's reproductive life subject to government control, and who wants to deny public school teens access to realistic sex ed classes.

Questioning why McCain picked her in the first place and suggesting his notorious fondness for beauty queens is not sexist. That's a slap at McCain, not her, and he richly deserves it. Likewise the recent articles pointing out how the cruising pundits became enamored of her for her looks as well as her charm (nevermind any real qualifications): not sexist. Again, that's a slap at them for being beauty groupies, not at her for being beautiful.

Saying she has a pretty face is not sexist. We talk about how attractive male candidates are, or are not, as well. Saying she's nothing but a pretty face is sexist. She's so much more than that: a self-serving pragmatist who has tossed not one but two mentors over the side, who is married to a secessionist but runs on "Country First!", and who has a record of abusing every office she's held for personal benefit (including using threats of a Secret Service investigation to keep Alaska state investigators away from her re the Troopergate scandal). She's a whack job, all right, who needs to be asked if she considers oral contraceptives abortion, and whether she believes that the government should execute witches. And so on, and so on; so very much more than just a pretty face.

I wrote about Palin's excursion into Marie Antoinette's closet yesterday here.

But other candidates have also gone all-too-elite in some of their fashion choices, per Newsweek:

If Palin's $2,500 Valentino jacket seems expensive, consider that Barack Obama wears Hart Schaffner Marx suits that retail for about $1,500. John McCain consistently wears $520 Salvatore Ferragamo loafers, while Vanity Fair editors estimated that one outfit worn by Cindy McCain cost $313,100, including diamond earrings [$280,000] and pearl necklace.

* * * *

In 2007, Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards sparked derision after his campaign paid for two $400 haircuts. His campaign said they paid the bill by mistake and that Edwards would reimburse the campaign.

As for Obama, his campaign says it has paid for hair and makeup costs associated with interviews or events, but neither the campaign nor the DNC has paid for clothing.

It may have been Chris Matthews, but I think it was Keith Olbermann last night who revisited a photo essay from this spring. Obama's feet are up on a desk. And the soles of both shoes have worn out. That's shared pain we can believe in.

Much is being made of her costly clothes at the expense of the Republican National Committee. Hey, look: she's a beauty queen. And even if she were not, candidates routinely get "makeovers" (which are generally more of a "sharpen up" kind of thing) and so why the fuss? Yes, the cost of each garment is scandalously high and has echoes of Marie Antoinette in these difficult times, but I am more than happy to have the RNC buying mascara and suits for Palin, instead of air time for McCain. Spend! Spend!

The love of my life had heard the bit about "well, when this is over, we'll give the clothes to charity" and was ruminating on the possibilities of a really fierce Jon Stewart piece, following a homeless person wearing a $20K silk suit down the street back to the cardboard box where they are bunking. Spokeswoman Tracey Schmitt: "It was always the intent that the clothing go to a charitable purpose after the campaign." Let's assume it's something like Upscale Resale and not Goodwill.

While we're at it, it's time to mention that the outfit Laura Bush wore to the Republican convention is estimated at $3,425 to $4,325 — and the Los Angeles Times estimated Cindy McCain's outfit (yes, just one outfit!) at between $299,100 and $313,100. Cake! Cake! Let those socialist proles all eat cake! To be fair, $280K of that was her earrings (yes, just her earrings), so knock that number down to $19,100 - $33,100. There were hefty figures for the ceramic watch and four-strand pearl necklace, too.

Most shocking in Politico's report is the news that the RNC spent $295 to dress up Palin's infant and over $4900 in men's accessories, presumably for husband Todd. Hey. Buying the whole family "McCain-Palin" t-shirts would be a legit use of RNC money. Buying baby clothes and cleaning up hubby, not... but again, hey, it's money they piddled away and can't spend on ads, so great!

This "Vote Democrat" fashion faux pas was brought to my attention by belle_marmotte, via zen_kitty, and I thank them both, and Newsweek too, which is where the photo originated.


Don't miss her glorious Betty Boop scarlet open-toed pumps from the tour of Juneau that Palin gave to two cruise ships' worth of Republican pundits back in 2007. No matter how they may have hurt, the investment of those few hours of pain is probably what put Palin on the long list McCain turned to when his desire for Joe Lieberman was nixed by his staff. McCain never met a beauty queen he didn't like; and apparently, some of these Republican eminences grisé had never met a beauty queen at all, much less one who was willing to make nice with them for a whole day.

I know there was a West Wing episode something like that...

Keith Olbermann reminded everyone tonight that the McCain campaign compared Obama to Paris Hilton. It was silly when they did it, and seems exponentially sillier now.

A break from straight politics to indulge in one of my pet avocations!

The Wall Street Journal created a video feature that I can't embed here due to LJ's technological limitations. You may go directly to the video (and sit through a 15-second ad) at the link below.

The Legacy of the McCain Name 10/16/2008

WSJ's Douglas Blackmon speaks with Charles McCain Jr. and his sister Mary McCain Fluker. The two are descendants of slaves held at the Mississippi plantation owned by the family of Sen. John McCain's great-great-grandfather. They discuss the legacy of the McCain name. (Oct. 16)

Apparently McCain himself has attended the biennial reunions for the white and black branches of the family and made a good impression — though the interviewee still plans to vote for Obama. The WSJ does not make clear whether there is a genetic tie, but says the modern black McCains are descended from Levinham (sp?) slaves purchased by the McCain family "150 years ago."

(The Baltimore Sun, based on the work of William Addams Reitwisener, noted in 2007 that Obama has a grandfather five generations back, and a grandmother six generations ago, each of whom owned two slaves. McCain has three known ancestors who owned slaves, one of them having fifty-two.)

And relying again mostly on the research of Reitwiesner, a hobby genealogist with the dream job of working for the Library of Congress, this piece by a genealogist at Suite101.com:

McCain's list of ancestors is a bit ho-hum, with nearly monolithic Scotch Irish dominance and none of the links to famous statesmen Obama counts as kin.

Obama, who opposes McCain in the presidential race, shares pedigrees with eight former U. S. presidents, whereas McCain has none. Obama has similar links to men such as British Prime Ministers Winston Churchill and Harold MacMillan. McCain does not.

McCain is a distant cousin of First Lady Laura Lane (Welch) Bush, their common ancestors being Valentine and Nancy Anne (Arnold) Allen, who were married in Cumberland Co., Virginia in 1853 and moved to Rockingham Co., North Carolina.
* * * *
Genealogist Gary Boyd Roberts, a senior research scholar at the New England Historic Genealogical Society, believes both McCain and Obama can trace their ancestry back to Isabel, illegitimate daughter of William “the Lion”, King of Scots. McCain’s is via his four-times great-grandparents, Hugh and Agnes McCain, who emigrated to Caswell County, North Carolina, in 1778. Obama's is through Edward FitzRandolph, who came to America more than 100 years earlier.

McCain has more Royal ancestors, as does Obama. McCain descends two ways from Edward I, King of England, who died in 1307. These descents are through his ancestors Ann (Coddington) Fenner and Anne Hampden. Both lines are documented in The Royal Descents of 600 Immigrants, by Gary Boyd Roberts (2008: Baltimore), as is Obama’s descent from Edward I.

McCain's own campaign's claim that he descends from Robert the Bruce has been deeply discounted by reports in the Guardian of London. Meanwhile, the Guardian's argument is contradicted by an angry genealogist here (with a nice photo of the grave brass).

Another site has both McCain's family tree chart and his GEDCOM data, though if you aren't a genealogist, the latter link won't be much fun.

What is fun, in a horrid way, is reading about the fury of the real Maverick family for McCain's misappropriation of their family name. The surname became a noun based on a Texas ancestor who engendered generations of progressive Democrats, and they are annoyed. There's a short article and brief CNN clip at the link.

On Sunday, I posted this regarding McPalin's dive for the racial gutter, and McCain's putative regret expressed on Friday:

Obama has shown he can take a crowd and turn them joyous, hopeful cheering section. McCain and Palin have shown they can take a crowd and turn it into a raging, screaming lynch mob. Whom are they trying to attract? The answer is, no one. They knew that wouldn't attract independent voters. So what, exactly, were they trying to accomplish? McCain clearly is willing to wade through mud to get to the White House; is he willing to wade through blood, too? His Friday renunciation suggests that maybe not, maybe there are some things he won't do to win. Let's see how he behaves through the weekend and next week before making that call.

That was written Sunday, October 12.

Monday, October 13, McCain continued to run the vitriolic and volcanic "Obama - terrorists - liar" ad in the swing-state radio market I live in, northern Virginia.

And today, Tuesday, October 14, yet another supporter shouted out "Kill him!" at a Palin rally in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Minute-by-minute report.

So we see just how (in)sincere McCain's putative retreat from racial rage last Friday was. Also, on Monday, McCain turned against Congressman John Lewis, whom he dared to call a mentor earlier in the campaign, calling Lewis "outrageous" for his on-target identification of the race-baiting McPalin tactics with the very same behavior from the infamous George Wallace.

Please, follow that last link to read the language which Wallace used and I cannot. This is exactly what McCain is doing; exactly what he did when he hired the infamous Tucker Eskew, who attacked McCain's own dark-skinned daughter in 2000. Lewis is right, and right to speak up about it. I expect no less from Lewis, and as for McCain's shameful attack on him, well, I expect no better. I'm making the call: nope, there's nothing McCain won't do.

Economic News

Remember how McCain was so enthused about Carly Fiorina, even considering her as a potential running mate? The same Carly Fiorina who had a $42+ million golden parachute when she got booted from Hewlett-Packard after knocking 20,000 employees out of the work force? McCain was okay with that. He didn't become disenchanted until September, when Fiorina told the press that neither Plain nor McCain was competent to run a major corporation.

Here's his latest questionable economic crush on the woman who was eBay's CEO until May:

Meanwhile, on Tuesday Meg Whitman got John McCain's seal of approval as a potential Treasury Secretary, just one day after eBay announced it was slashing 10% of its workforce.

Mr. McCain. We know you like women under all kinds of circumstances (unless they're pregnant and don't want to be, in which case you think they should be imprisoned.) But in these circumstances, what we'd like to see is you choosing competent women. Please, grow up, or wise up, or whatever it takes to get you out of the rut you're apparently wallowing in. Politics ain't beanbag, and it's not a beauty contest, either.

So two days ago, McCain says that Obama is a "decent family man" (much more than he can say for himself, now that I think about it) on the same day that his campaign releases yet another ad trying to link Obama to terrorism.

And yesterday, October 11, the day after McCain supposedly tries to back his followers down from their racial / ethnic / religious animus, an Iowa rally he attended started off like this:

October 11, 2008, 2:41 pm
Pastor Delivers Odd Invocation at McCain Rally
[Wall Street Journal writer] Laura Meckler reports from Davenport, Iowa, on the presidential race:

Sometimes the most interesting stuff happens before John McCain even arrives. At a McCain rally today in Davenport, a pastor delivered an odd invocation.

"There are millions of people around this world praying to their god — whether it’s Hindu, Buddha, Allah — that his [McCain’s] opponent wins, for a variety of reasons," said Arnold Conrad, former pastor of Grave Evangelical Free Church. "And Lord, I pray that you would guard your own reputation because they’re going to think that their god is bigger than you if that happens. So I pray that you will step forward and honor your own name in all that happens between now and Election Day."

That might strike some as provocative given persistent, false rumors that Democrat Barack Obama is a Muslim. Sen. Obama is Christian.

"While we understand the important role that faith plays in informing the votes of Iowans, questions about the religious background of the candidates only serve to distract from the real questions in this race about Barack Obama’s judgment, policies and readiness to lead as commander in chief," said McCain spokeswoman Wendy Riemann.

Yeah right. That's why the campaign chose Conrad to get up and say what he said, on the same stage and from the same microphone McCain would use. McCain's foul tactics this week have Conrad's blessing, and obviously, Conrad's foul petition has McCain's.

My own religious question of the day:

Does Sarah Palin believe in witches, as her guest-blesser Thomas Muthee does?

And does she believe they should be put to death?