McCain's Moronic Journey into Madness

In tracking the exotically gruesome vicissitudes of the McCain campaign, we can only conclude we've indeed entered Rod Serling territory. Doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-doo.

They're no longer citizens of the real, political world. They are, instead, otherworldly cryptofreaks methodically stripping off their freakish masks. They're neither Republican nor conservative, neither populist nor passable demagogue.

At their heartland Nürnberg rallies (and I am not prone to such severe metaphors), where they incite chants for the murder of their fellow citizens, they're already unmasked. But even in the quiet of their proposal-plotting strategy room they catch egregious mistakes of accidental thoughtfulness and lunge for their instant reversal. Unmasked, and unhinged.

If this gaggle of lunacy comes in from the Zone on November 4 with any more than token, ultrapartisan support, it'll be a lasting disgrace to, and permanent stain on the name of, whatever's left of American democracy.

Amen, P.M.

First Bailout Results Known

Seeing The Forest

The National REPUBLICAN Congressional Committee has received $8 MILLION from Wachovia Bank.

Credit crunch? Unsecured loans impossible to find?

Chris Bowers at OpenLeft writes that,

in the short term, this is effectively an $8 million donation to the NRCC from Wachovia at a time when Wachovia is supposedly in dire straits, about to be bought out by other banks, and will receive money from the government via the bailout.

The Bush administration is about to start handing out taxpayer cash for bad debts, and suddenly the NRCC gets $8 million from Wachovia. Come on. How blatant can it be?

Repugs and their Masters don't give a shit how blatant it is. They're beyond accountability. IOKIYAR. Grrr...

Update:

LATimes

As ailing Wachovia Corp. waits to see whether it will be acquired by Wells Fargo & Co. or Citigroup Inc. -- possibly with taxpayers paying the tab for hundreds of billions of dollars in bad loans -- some of the company's top brokers are preparing to depart Saturday for an all-expenses-paid cruise of the Greek Isles.

Son. Of. A. Bitch.

Yes, McCain is on drugs

So if you listen to McCain and say to yourself, "He's on drugs!", you're right. And not in the good way. I've posted on this before and I'm doing it again.

Americablog. Links at site.

An Ambien amnesia presidency

Oh swell. "I pushed the Red what?"

So what exactly is going on with John McCain's health? John posted yesterday about McCain's "energy" drink and mentioned that McCain was taking Ambien. McCain's Ambien drug use isn't new, it's been covered by ABC News here, but in the flurry of the Democratic primary, I missed it. Reading it yesterday for the first time, my jaw dropped.

Better late than never, dude.

While Ambien is a heavily advertised drug here in the US - $200 million annually in ad spending - it's extremely potent and has the potential to be addictive. That's why it's a D.E.A. Schedule IV controlled substance.

Fotinakes added that sleeping pills and other sedatives have been proven to be more potent in the elderly. In light of this, he said, "It may not be the best idea for the commander-in-chief to be under the influence when he or she may have to make a snap decision regarding national security in the middle of the night; Hillary's so-called telephone call at 3:00 a.m."

"The key is to use Ambien-like sleeping medications in moderation and don't mix them with other sedative drugs or alcohol," Fotinakes said. "Most importantly, avoid use in the event you have to consider escalation from Defcon 4 to Defcon 3."

Again, this isn't a joke. This is what Ambien does to some people. It makes them do things, while having no idea they're doing them. They tell you not to drive a car after having taken this drug. How is John McCain going to drive a country? To accept the former as fact, yet not worry about the latter, is illogical and dangerous.

And if John McCain won't be answering the phone from dusk until dawn, who will? Cindy (a-la Edith and Woodrow Wilson)? Sarah Palin? Who will really be in charge for the 1/3 of the Presidency McCain would sleep away?

Somebody even less qualified than he is, no doubt. If such is even possible, they'll find a way. Maybe they've found her.

That this hasn't been an enormous issue since the Palin appointment is shocking. It's why Presidential candidates let reporters see their medical records - so the country knows what to expect if the candidate becomes President. If all of this hasn't yet scared you into thinking that McCain's medical records need a REAL exploration, ponder this - do you think that terrorists or other national enemies might want to strike us while the President is incapacitated by his sleeping pills?

Scary. Please read the rest.

McCain Attended Fundraiser for Domestic Terrorist

BuzzFlash, links to Pensito Review

McCain attended a fundraiser sponsored by a hate group in 1993 in support of a woman who had shot a former Navy surgeon because he had performed legal abortions. At the fundraiser, McCain did not object when Marilyn Shannon, a leader of the hate group, praised the shooter as a "fine lady." The woman's sentencing judge called her a "terrorist." This year, Shannon was a McCain delegate at the GOP convention.

A comment:

It is lovely to see the crazies that endorse the Archie Bunker ticket.

These people would denounce Archie as a flaming Librul.

*Flew into Miami Beach, BOAC ...

Unlike the Chimp & Paulson, et al, the Brits have a pretty decent plan for shoring up the markets. Krugman wonders if the rest will get it:

...

Why do we need international cooperation? Because we have a globalized financial system in which a crisis that began with a bubble in Florida condos and California McMansions has caused monetary catastrophe in Iceland. We’re all in this together, and need a shared solution.

...

What should be done? The United States and Europe should just say "Yes, prime minister." The British plan isn’t perfect, but there’s widespread agreement among economists that it offers by far the best available template for a broader rescue effort.

...

While I'm no economist, nor anything resembling a money guy, I do have a little common sense. I'm also old enough to remember the crash of '87 and the dotcom bubble and the resulting failures. it seems to me, watching the market for the better part of 30 years, that markets don't like artificially inflated values on anything and try to correct themselves. Unfortunately, a lot of debt had been leveraged on loans for real estate that was/is woefully overvalued.

Sorry, but much as I love my home, much as I work to make it nicer and more comfortable for us, I know damn well it ain't worth a half-million. That's what it was 'worth' 2 years ago and my bank would gladly have given me a mortgage for that amount. The amount of people who are 'underwater' (their houses are now worth less than their mortgages) today is unbelievable, thanks to this wave of over-valuation. It's just like the Dotcom Days when everybody with a web page attracted capital like flies to one of Shayna's deposits in the back yard on a hot summer day. There was a correction then too and the herd was culled; only those with a reasonable, workable, business plan survived. Shit, Amazon just started showing a profit a couple years ago. The only internet business to show a profit from the get-go was the porn industry.

As I said a couple weeks ago:

...

Coming out of a bubble of over-inflated home prices (artificial) and inflated stock prices, I get the feeling that if nothing is done the market will stabilize in the 7000 - 9000 range, probably where it should be. The only reason action is so "imperative" is to relieve the fat cats of their losses without pain to them. It does nothing for us.

...

And I still stand by that. I don't think anything done so far (and at the rate the markets are approaching terminal velocity Earthward, it would bear that out) will make much of a difference until the markets are comfortable with home values first; thus establishing a value for all the pieces of Shitpile all these banks and mortgage brokers own. Until we know what exactly all of Shitpile is worth, we won't know how to go about paying for it.

Throwing money at the greedy idiots who perpetuated this mess, who propped up this artificial 'bubble' (because they had to prop it up or risk the bottom falling out) using dubious investment instruments and practices, will only prolong it.

If we're going to spend taxpayer money to soften the blow, the taxpayers have to have a stake in the outcome. If we're going to bail out a bank or an investment house, the taxpayer, in the persona of the U.S government, must have a controlling interest in said institution. There is no confidence in the bunch of infidels (and imbeciles) who have been running the show and that confidence won't return until investors know all are playing with the same rulebook, a rulebook (yet to be written) that doesn't allow for shady deals using questionable instruments, leveraged 100:1.

Until the 'Wild West' atmosphere on Wall St. is put to bed, none will have the confidence to hand their money over to this current generation of Gordon Gekkos and keeping them solvent with taxpayer funds (without strict management oversight) will only prolong the agony. Without real change and reform, no amount of cash will help.

And an addendum before I go to work: This is what the 'Bush Economy' will be known for. When the nation went to war, the people were told to shop, to live large on the (over-inflated) value of their homes. It will be known as a time of nearly free, unlimited credit for anyone who had their hand out. As the government has been run (record deficits, a war that's not even on the books), the American people have also been encouraged to engage in 'deficit spending'. I've said it many times; if I ran my personal finances the way the government did theirs, I'd be living out a refrigerator box under a bridge somewhere. It seems many of my fellow Americans did.

*Apologies to the Beatles.

Little dicks ...

The Rethugs haz them:

...

It's possible that Republican men, sexual inadequates that they are, really believe that women will vote for a woman just because she's a woman. They're unfamiliar with our true natures. Do they think vaginas call out to each other in the jungle night? I mean, I know men have their secret meetings at which they pledge to do manly things, like being irresponsible with their semen and postponing household repairs with glue and used matches. Guys will be guys, obviously.

...

Above link via the General:

...

It simply isn't true. We're just more efficient. We can't waste time on things like foreplay; we have important things to do like watching NASCAR and spying on our neighbors. So we get undressed, visualize a naked woman, a rifle,a goat, or something, and go to town for about 10 to 15 seconds. Then, we're done. Those of us who are multi-taskers might also spy on our neighbors and watch NASCAR while we're doing it, thus increasing our efficiency even more.

Of course, some of my fellow conservatives are not so sexually proficient. But it's still wrong to say they are inadequate. They're just ignorant. No one has ever sat them down to have "the air pressure talk." It's a difficult concept to master, air pressure. Anything under 10 psi causes your partner to become gelatin-like making it easy to fall off, mid-stroke. That distracts you from thinking about rifles.

...

Heh ... Okay, so maybe satire ain't dead.

Joe!

Say it to his face, bitch:

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"All of the things they said about Barack Obama in the TV, on the TV, at their rallies, and now on YouTube … John McCain could not bring himself to look Barack Obama in the eye and say the same things to him," Biden said this morning. "In my neighborhood, when you’ve got something to say to a guy, you look him in the eye and you say it to him."

...

Link thanks to UL.

Life On Mars

Tonight's the night! Go see some previews of this new show debuting tonight.

I want it to be a big hit so our pal deuddersun (Click it!) can keep working and I can keep getting my Social Security...

“The last week has severely damaged Republican candidates”

Noo Yalk Times

The economic upheaval is threatening to topple Republican Congressional candidates, putting more Senate and House seats within Democratic reach less than a month before the elections, lawmakers and campaign strategists say.

Top campaign officials for both parties, pollsters and independent experts say the intense focus on the economic turmoil and last week’s bailout vote have combined to rapidly expand a Democratic advantage in Congressional contests. Analysts now predict a Democratic surge on a scale that seemed unlikely just weeks ago, with even some Republicans in traditional strongholds fighting for their political careers, and Democratic leaders dreaming of ironclad majorities.

Democrats say they feel confidently ahead in five Senate races where they hope to pick up Republican seats, and they believe their candidates are running competitively in seven more.

In the House, Democrats say they could capture a dozen of the 26 Republican seats left open by retirements, and challengers are closing in on Republican incumbents in Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Michigan, Nevada, New York and elsewhere.

It hurts me to say this, and you may fire at me at will for it, but THANK GOD FOR THE DEPRESSION if it gets the Repugs thrown out in significant numbers.

I think we stand a pretty good chance of getting through a depression before we get out from under the damage done in the last eight years. Even with a Democratic majority.

Heels

The Last Chance Democracy Cafe

Is it just me, or is there something a little weird, creepy even, about the McCain campaign’s obsession with Sarah Palin’s high heels?

”The heels are on, the gloves are off.”

Think about this for a moment: here we have a female candidate for vice president referring to wearing her heels — her high heels — as a way of expressing her intention, as a woman, of getting tough with a man. Does that strike anyone else as just a wee bit familiar? Putting you in mind, perhaps, of a certain outside the mainstream form of sexuality involving the use of whips, ropes and, yes, heels in the infliction of pain?

Is it possible that in this historic year of political firsts, we are now seeing yet another one — the first explicit use of S&M imagery by a major party candidate for national office?

Certainly, at a minimum, the reaction of many of Palin’s male right wing fans — hooting and hollering in ecstasy over the viciousness of her attacks — makes one wonder, whatever Palin’s intent, whether this isn’t how a good many of these dudes see her. I mean, let’s face it: there’s always been something more than a little odd about the extreme passion these same bozos feel towards vicious female “pundits” like Ann Coulter. (You can almost hear them panting: “She may not be that pretty, but, man, she makes it hurt so good!”)

I don’t know, but the whole thing is starting to feel more than a little creepy to me.

A little too creepy on many levels.

Here's an old one:

Masochist: "Ooh! Beat me! Beat me!"

Sadist: "You'd like that, wouldn't you?"

The Repug base loves pain. They must. They keep voting for ying-yangs who are experts at inflicting it on them.

Of course then they blame it on Libruls.

McCain's Wife Says Obama Has Waged "The Dirtiest Campaign In U.S. History"

Tony Peyser

Cindy, Cindy, Cindy, Cindy
Poor dear ... you're hanging by threads:
You're not supposed to talk
To the press when you're off your meds.

Sometimes ...

You just gotta throw somebody a beatin'.

Responsibility ...

Pic stolen from our pal UL. Click pic to incrase the bailout.

Off to Napoli work ...

Yes, please ...

Roger Ailes the Good:

Could everyone please stop saying game changer?

That phrase is working my last nerve like people who use the phrase working my last nerve.

Thank you for your consideration.

Been there ...

Dude, politics aside, as a fellow GI who's dealt with PTSD, you gotta get some help. Steve Benen:

...

John McCain today referred to Americans as "my fellow prisoners." How odd.

...

Seriously.

Palin’s Kind of Patriotism

Tom Friedman, who sometimes Sees the Light:

Criticizing Sarah Palin is truly shooting fish in a barrel. But given the huge attention she is getting, you can’t just ignore what she has to say. And there was one thing she said in the debate with Joe Biden that really sticks in my craw. It was when she turned to Biden and declared: “You said recently that higher taxes or asking for higher taxes or paying higher taxes is patriotic. In the middle class of America, which is where Todd and I have been all of our lives, that’s not patriotic.”

"We all have to ... pay our fair share, but we must insist that our government be wise and honest in spending our money."

What an awful statement. Palin defended the government’s $700 billion rescue plan. She defended the surge in Iraq, where her own son is now serving. She defended sending more troops to Afghanistan. And yet, at the same time, she declared that Americans who pay their fair share of taxes to support all those government-led endeavors should not be considered patriotic.

I only wish she had been asked: “Governor Palin, if paying taxes is not considered patriotic in your neighborhood, who is going to pay for the body armor that will protect your son in Iraq? Who is going to pay for the bailout you endorsed? If it isn’t from tax revenues, there are only two ways to pay for those big projects — printing more money or borrowing more money. Do you think borrowing money from China is more patriotic than raising it in taxes from Americans?” That is not putting America first. That is selling America first.

As long as the rich get richer, I think she's fine with it.

I've been paying taxes since before McBimbo was born. I don't particularly like it, but it's the Federal equivalent of buying a lunch room pass from bullies - pay up or get beat up - to wit, cough it up or lose everything you've got and go to jail.

So how d'ya think all them back taxes you owe is gonna work out for ya, Moosebreath?

My taxes seldom go for very much that I would like them to but that's the way it is and I have no say in it. All I hope in return for myself is that the fire department will show up if I need them.

America's Cocktail Waitress

With apologies to all you gals out there serving drinks, stereotypes are almost always wrong, but occasionally useful. So, what's the difference between a cocktail waitress and a '55 Chevy? Not everyone's had a '55 Chevy.

Raw Story

However, CNN may now have found the ultimate Palin comparison -- a 1932 cartoon titled "Betty Boop for President," in which Betty winks broadly while singing, "Some of you have money, while some are poor, you know. If you send me to Washington, I'll just divide the dough, oh!"

No doubt Palin, who insisted at the debate that paying taxes is "not patriotic," would consider Boop's plans for income redistribution -- along with her promises that "we will get things for nothing, movies, cabarets and jazz!" -- to mark her as a wild-eyed radical and probable associate of the Weather Underground.

Go see the CNN video. The post led me to the one below as well as the title of this post. From Heptune:

Betty Boop's 36th cartoon is rich with political references. Leslie Cabarga gives the copyright date as November 4, 1932. We don't know how closely that date corresponds with the release date, when people would have actually seen it in the movie theater, but in November 1932 was the presidential election in which Franklin Roosevelt defeated the incumbent Herbert Hoover. Prohibition, which began in 1919, was still in place but was soon to end. The Depression was well underway following the stock market crash in 1929.

During the credits, we hear an instrumental version of the Civil War song, "The Battle Cry of Freedom." Then we join Betty Boop at a political rally, where she is addressing an enthusiastic crowd:

Bush, Press, Lies, Truth, Beat McCain Twice

MoDo's snark is coming in handy these days:

Some of John McCain’s friends, from the good old days when he talked straight, feared that his Greek tragedy would be that he would be defeated by George Bush twice: once in 2000, because of W.’s no-conscience campaigning, and again in 2008, because of W.’s no-brains governing.

Excellent! McLame's no-brains campaigning is helping as well.

John McCain has long been torn between wanting to succeed and serving a higher cause. Right now, the drive to succeed is trumping any loftier aspirations. He cynically picked a running mate with less care than theater directors give to picking a leading actor’s understudy. [...]

She left out 'in a high school play', but I forgive her.

Certainly, at some level, John McCain must be disgusted with himself for using the tactics perfected by the same crowd that used these tactics to derail him in 2000. He’s now curmudgeonly, even hostile, toward the press — the group he used to spend hours with every day and jokingly describe as his base.

They were fine until they belatedly started telling the truth about him. To the press's credit (everlasting shame to us), they held out as long as they could before it became so obvious what an asshole he is that even they couldn't ignore it any longer.

Palin Appeals to Mob Instincts During Her Rallies

Trish at Pensito Review, obviously a regular reader of the Brain, picked up on my Klan reference yesterday with a lovely photo in a post that closed with this:

What next? Dousing a big cross on the stage with gasoline, tossing on a match, and claiming Obama raped her?

The way you tell the average IQ of a mob is by dividing its actual average IQ by the number of people in it. McCain/Palin is working it like a rented mule.

KKK, Nazis, McCain/Palin. Everything this country is against. Or should be. Or was.

Update:

Also at Pensito:

Rolling Stone reporter Matt Taibbi’s depiction of Sarah Palin at the GOP Convention as “Gidget addressing the Reichstag” is becoming more apt by the minute. Earlier, Trish wrote about Palin’s incitement of verbal violence at a rally in Clearwater, Fla., when a Republican voter in the crowd shouted, “Kill him,” apparently in reference to Barack Obama.

Now the Washington Post’s Dana Milbank says the anger among the GOP rank and file in Clearwater was also directed toward reporters covering the event generally, and an African American sound man in particular:

Palin’s routine attacks on the media have begun to spill into ugliness. In Clearwater, arriving reporters were greeted with shouts and taunts by the crowd of about 3,000. Palin then went on to blame Katie Couric’s questions for her “less-than-successful interview with kinda mainstream media.” At that, Palin supporters turned on reporters in the press area, waving thunder sticks and shouting abuse. Others hurled obscenities at a camera crew. One Palin supporter shouted a racial epithet at an African American sound man for a network and told him, “Sit down, boy.”

Given the racist bent of their base, and leaving aside their constant lying about Barack Obama, his associations and his record, John McCain and Sarah Palin are playing with rhetorical fire.

As in "going down in flames"? Crash and burn? Well OK then!

Desperate and despicable. Ugly.

Heh ...

Mary:

Tonight's joke: What's the difference between a Lehman Brothers investment banker and a pigeon? A pigeon still can make a deposit on a Ferrari.

...

All the money guys I know are shitting their pants. One in particular, a freind of Mrs. F's from college, is in the middle of a huge remodel of his house (on the scale we're doing). Unfortunately, he has to pay for labor and he doesn't know if he'll have a job from week to week.

Off to the Sons of Italy work ...