Magnet: $10.00; Yard sign: $20.00; Hug: Priceless

HT: DailyKos

Best First Wedding Dance Ever

This is too good to miss and I figure with all the bad economic news out there, we could all use a mental health break.

glumbert - Best wedding first dance ever

A true conservative comes out for Obama

I apologize for not writing my own thoughts on all this. They are coming. I'm too busy leading the phone bank effort here in West Chester and trying to recover from the power outage to give much more time to my blog. On the other hand, I do peruse the daily offerings of political speak that the Internet serves up to me and this one caught my attention. I wish I were as eloquent. As a lifelong conservative, THIS piece finally addresses my core anxieties about what has happened to the Republicans. It worries me deeply that some of my best friends who I consider good thinkers continue to buy the Republican line that they represent conservatism!

The second part of this article that especially connected with me is the writer's clarity about the kind of man that Obama is: prudent, wise, has read the Federalist Papers (has taught them!). It is in Obama's books (which he authors) that he gives the most comprehensive vision of how his viewpoint would address the core issues of our nation at this point in time. Obama may not resonate with all of the Republican ideological platform items, but he is not a reckless, "without blinking" politician who would rather rattle our sabers against perceived evil than thoughtfully deliberate how to best protect both our interests and our reputation.

A Conservative for Obama

THE MORE I LISTEN TO AND READ ABOUT “the most liberal member of the U.S. Senate,” the more I like him. Barack Obama strikes a chord with me like no political figure since Ronald Reagan. To explain why, I need to explain why I am a conservative and what it means to me...

(snip)

But today it is so-called conservatives who are cemented to political programs when they clearly don’t work. The Bush tax cuts—a solution for which there was no real problem and which he refused to end even when the nation went to war—led to huge deficit spending and a $3 trillion growth in the federal debt. Facing this, John McCain pumps his “conservative” credentials by proposing even bigger tax cuts. Meanwhile, a movement that once fought for limited government has presided over the greatest growth of government in our history. That is not conservatism; it is profligacy using conservatism as a mask.

Today it is conservatives, not liberals, who talk with alarming bellicosity about making the world “safe for democracy.” It is John McCain who says America’s job is to “defeat evil,” a theological expansion of the nation’s mission that would make George Washington cough out his wooden teeth.

This kind of conservatism, which is not conservative at all, has produced financial mismanagement, the waste of human lives, the loss of moral authority, and the wreckage of our economy that McCain now threatens to make worse....

(snip)

Barack Obama is not my ideal candidate for president. (In fact, I made the maximum donation to John McCain during the primaries, when there was still hope he might come to his senses.) But I now see that Obama is almost the ideal candidate for this moment in American history. I disagree with him on many issues. But those don’t matter as much as what Obama offers, which is a deeply conservative view of the world. Nobody can read Obama’s books (which, it is worth noting, he wrote himself) or listen to him speak without realizing that this is a thoughtful, pragmatic, and prudent man. It gives me comfort just to think that after eight years of George W. Bush we will have a president who has actually read the Federalist Papers.

Most important, Obama will be a realist. I doubt he will taunt Russia, as McCain has, at the very moment when our national interest requires it as an ally.

Harry Truman

"The underlying differences between the Republican and Democratic Parties boils down to a very simple thing. The Republicans believe that the power of the Government should be used, first of all, to help the rich and privileged people of this country. With them property comes first. The Democrats believe that the powers of the Government should be used to give the common man some protection, and a chance to make a decent living. With the Democrats the people come first.

"The Democratic Party is a political organization that has a heart--it cares about the people--it cares about all the people, rich and poor alike. The Republican Party is ruled by a little group of men who have calculating machines where their hearts ought to be.

"Sometimes the Republicans aid their clientele by special favors--like the rich man's tax cut bill which was passed by the 80th Congress over my veto--or like their attempts to give away the Nation's oil resources to all the big oil interests.

"Sometimes the Republicans aid their special friends by doing nothing--by a philosophy of each man for himself and the devil take the hindmost. That's why they've fought such measures as minimum wage laws, social security, and the protection of the right of labor unions to organize. All these things and others like them have been opposed by the Republicans."

Harry S Truman
October 6, 1952

I don't know if this is a true quote for Truman. I've tried to find it on the Internet for confirmation but to no avail. I read it in the comments section of an article in the San Francisco Chronicle. Regardless, I thought it worth discussing. I agree with the overarching theme - that the Republicans seem to believe that providing for and protecting the interests of those with property (and wealth) is better for the rest of us than looking out for the common person in the middle and lower classes. The rhetoric goes that when you give monetary breaks to those who create jobs, they will pass along the wealth to the consumers and to their employees which will in turn foster healthy economic growth.

That's not what happens, as we can see by the ever expanding gap between what CEOs of corporations earn versus the wage earners they pay at the low end. I found this information from 2005:

• CEO compensation is out of orbit: At the 350 largest public companies, the average CEO compensation is $9.2 million. Compensation for oil and gas execs increased by 109 percent between 2003 and 2004.
• In 2004, the average CEO received 240 times more than the compensation earned by the average worker. In 2002, the ratio was 145 to 1.
• These levels of CEO compensation are not the norm for the industrialized world. Typically, CEO pay in other industrialized countries is only about onethird of what American CEOs make.
• Highly-compensated CEOs are not being rewarded for performance with the interests of shareholders in mind, the “textbook” explanation of CEO compensation, according to an extensive body of research and reporting.
• After-tax profits are booming and corporate America can easily afford to offer fair wages and benefits to rank and file employees. Unfortunately, while CEOs have enriched themselves, middle-class families have taken hard hits to their paychecks, their health coverage, and their pension plans.

Something's not right. And I don't know why we think that the Republicans will be motivated to fix it.

Also, don't you find it scary to think that we've been urged to tie our retirement earnings to the stock market rather than retaining our social security?

Politico's Elizabeth Drew

writes a piece (after having authored the book Citizen McCain... and is clearly a fangirl) that shows her disappointment in her candidate.

How John McCain Lost Me

While McCain’s movement to the center was widely popular (if not on the right) – and he even flirted with becoming a Democrat – there’s now strong reason to question whether it was anything but a temporary, expedient tactic. (In his 2002 memoir, “Worth the Fighting For,” he wrote, revealingly, “I didn’t decide to run for president to start a national crusade for the political reforms I believed in or to run a campaign as if it were some grand act of patriotism. In truth, I wanted to be president because it had become my ambition to be president. . . . In truth, I’d had the ambition for a long time.”)

When he decided to run for president in 2008, he felt he couldn’t win without the support of the right, so he adapted.

In retrospect, other once-hailed McCain efforts – his cultivation of the press (“my base”) and even his fight for campaign finance reform (launched in the wake of his embarrassment over the Keating Five scandal) now seem to have been simply maneuvers. The “Straight Talk Express” – a brilliant p.r. stroke in 2000 – has now been shut down.

Ah the joys of the lightbulb

In honor of Thomas Edison, after our power returned, I cuddled the lowly light bulb and turned it on. What a difference!

Today I face a mountain of email after being away all yesterday assembling IKEA furniture in Johannah's college apt. She has three feisty roommates (as all girl roommates-in-college-apts. ought to be if at all possible). We purchased a futon and screwed the frame together with a power drill... my first solo drill-age outing. Drill, baby, drill!

The sun is out, the air is cool, I ate the newly discovered oatmeal in an adorable cup at Starbucks (yes, I'm a sucker for good packaging as all southern Californians worth their sea salt are) with my tall one pump decaf vanilla latte. I allowed the sun to bathe my back. Ahhhhhh. There are so few days left like this. I've got my solar panels hooked to my spine to soak up the last rays in time for the per youzh dark winter days rapidly advancing.

More Obama soon, I promise. Coming up: Why Obama is qualified to be president, even if you doubt his experience.

Power out in Cincinnati

Over one million without power now in Cinci, due to the ravages of Ike. Findlay Market (right across the street from my church downtown!) caught fire and several of the buildings adjacent as well. Hope my church is okay. :(

We are all congregating at Panera in the great Y2K diaspora, 8 years late. Wi-fi and hot coffee have drawn every small business owner and "out of school" teen to the electricity-providing bagel place.

We may be without electricity for a week. It's all McCain's fault, by the way. And Bush's. You know if Palin is such an energy expert, where is she? Hmm? Just sayin'.

Anyway, one more reason to vote Obama, obviously.

See you soon, I hope!

Facts about their tax plans

One of the chief reasons my Republican family is voting McCain is that they think Obama will raise their taxes. And, perhaps he will, since some members of my family make a whole lot of money (a lot more than the typical middle class family who earns less than $250,000 per year). If, however, you fall into that vast group of families who earn under the quarter million a year mark, there is good news for you. Obama will help you more.

McCain's new ad says that Obama plans to impose "painful tax increases on working American families" and past ads have said Obama wanted to raise taxes on "families" making just $42,000 a year.

Here's the truth: Obama's plan would substantially cut taxes to all but the wealthiest families — far more than McCain's tax plan would. But if you're yearning for some more hefty tax cuts for the nation's rich, then McCain's your man.

The nonpartisan Tax Policy Center has analyzed both campaigns' tax plans and found that Obama's would cut taxes for 81.3 percent of all households and for 95.5 percent of households with children.

Going with Obama's plan, according to the center, would reward middle-income taxpayers to the tune of $2,200 in tax cuts annually by 2012. While taxpayers in the top 1 percent of income would face an average tax increase of $19,000.

Under McCain's tax plan, middle-income taxpayers would see a rise of $1,400 in after-tax income by 2012. But for those in the top 1 percent, McCain would cut their taxes by more than $125,000 annually.

McCain's plan would increase the national debt by $5-trillion by 2018, while Obama's plan would increase it by $3.5-trillion, according to the center. Yet McCain's ads warn that Obama's plan would bring about "years of deficits."

Check out the whole article.

Obama's foreign policy judgment

In light of Sarah Palin's interview with Gibson last night and this a.m., everyone is talking foreign policy. One pressing question may be: How can Obama address our international concerns when Illinois can't see a single foreign country from any of its borders?

Andrew Sullivan today offers a run-down on the foreign policy judgments Obama has offered over the last year. Each one had been "smacked down" as being misguided... until Bush decided to adopt them himself.

The Bush administration - when guided by the saner forces within it such as Gates and Rice - eventually follows Obama's advice. In that sense, Obama has been president for quite a while already. And proving he could be a shrewd, pragmatic and prescient one.

Read it all. Discussing foreign policy is not a quiz to see if you know the right policy answers based on your party's established viewpoint. It's a question of keen interest, thoughtful reflection, investigation into the dynamics of each region and how they impact each other and our national security, filtered through superior and sober judgment. One reason I'm an Obama fan.

Jon Stewart on how Bush and McCain campaign