Sonoma County Democracy for America - Progressive values in action for Sonoma County

OR-05: It's called "baking soda"

Syndicated — Fri, 16 May 2008 20:30:01 -0700

by brownsox [courtesy of Daily Kos]

Republican Mike Erickson, candidate for the nomination in Oregon's 5th District, has come under heavy fire lately from primary opponent Kevin Mannix, with rumors afloat that Erickson used to hold wild cocaine parties on his boat.

Well, Erickson flatly denies these scurrilous allegations; he's not only never used cocaine, but

"I've never used cocaine. I wouldn't know what it looks like," Erickson said, adding that he has never used illegal drugs or tobacco.

He doesn't know what cocaine looks like? He's never seen Beverly Hills Cop? He's never cooked with baking soda?

I had to snort at that one.

Call me a skeptic, but Erickson's denial just doesn't pass the smell test.

It would have been a bit more plausible if he just denied knowledge of the coke parties. Something like "If there's been cocaine use here, well, it's been happening right under my own nose."

Anybody else got a clever pun? A not-so-clever one?

In all seriousness, this is one of the most ridiculous statements we've seen yet this cycle. Either Erickson is a bald-faced liar, or a first-class moran. It's his choice as to which he'd rather be.

And please submit all coke-related Erickson jokes below!

Late Night FDL: Not too poor to paint or too proud to whitewash

Syndicated — Fri, 16 May 2008 20:00:01 -0700

by Julia [courtesy of Firedoglake]

Bill Donohue, whose religious indignation as the head of the Catholic League might seem to the cynical to be more informed by his loyalty to the benificence of The Heritage Foundation than by his loyalty to his catholicism, has unilaterally forgiven Senator McCain's great and good friend Rev. Hagee on behalf of the Roman Catholic church (or, as Rev. Hagee refers to it, the Great Whore)

In an attempt to solidify his backing among evangelicals, McCain actively sought the support of Pastor John Hagee, who heads the Cornerstone Church in San Antonio, when he launched his presidential bid last year. McCain's campaign was caught off guard by the uproar over Hagee's comments after the pastor's February endorsement.
…
In his letter to the Catholic League today, Hagee said he now understands that other terms he used to describe the church - "the great whore" and the "apostate church" - are "rhetorical devices long employed in anti-Catholic literature." He said he had gained a better understanding in recent weeks of the Catholic Church's relationship to the Jewish faith. Hagee wrote of his "profound respect for the Catholic people" in the letter and said he hoped to advance "greater unity among Catholics and Evangelicals."

So what's our old buddy Bill forgiving Hagee for?

Evangelical leader John Hagee, one of John McCain’s highest-profile supporters from the religious right, has apologized for comments he made that were offensive to Catholics.
In a letter Monday to Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League for Civil and Religious Rights, Hagee wrote, “I want to express my deep regret for any comments that Catholics have found hurtful.”
Pastor Hagee, leader of San Antonio’s Cornerstone Church, has often made references to “the apostate church” and the “great whore,” terms that Catholics say are slurs aimed at the Roman Catholic Church.
In his letter, Hagee said he now better understands that the Book of Revelation’s reference to the Catholic Church by those two terms are “a rhetorical device long employed in anti-Catholic literature and commentary.”
“Neither of these phrases can be synonymous with the Catholic Church,” he wrote.
Donohue, accepting the apology, said on FOX News Radio: “I’m absolutely delighted … I haven’t seen such a quick turnaround in the 15 years that I have been president of the Catholic League.” He said he plans to meet with Hagee on Thursday.
Likening Hagee to two New York shock jocks who encouraged a pair of listeners to attempt to have sex in St. Patrick’s Cathedral in 2002, Donohue added that he is receptive to honest apologies.
“We’re not in the business of rejecting apologies whether it’s from Opie and Anthony or Pastor Hagee so now when we meet we can understand that this issue is moot and behind us and I think it’s a great moment that we can have some degree of reconciliation.”

Honest apologies (and quick turnaround)

Donohue had been noodging Hagee to apologize for more than a decade. He finally succeeded, largely because Hagee was becoming an embarrassment to his political favorite son, Senator John McCain. “I got pretty much what I wanted,” Donohue told me, “but only because this was a presidential year.”

None of that messy moral relativity there.

So who set up this meeting of the moral giants?

Key to the effort was Deal Hudson, a former Southern Baptist turned Catholic from Fort Worth who in 2000 was tapped by political guru Karl Rove to help win Catholics for George W. Bush. This year, Mr. Hudson is on Mr. McCain's Catholic outreach team.

Deal Hudson, one-time point man for Catholic outreach for Our Fearless Leader.

Until

An 18-year-old Fordham freshman in 1994, Poppas had been in-and-out of foster homes from the age of seven. The fourth of nine children, her mother an alcoholic and her father a troubled and disabled Vietnam veteran, Poppas had survived poverty and traumas.
In early February 1994, she approached Hudson with a question. He suggested, she said, that they go to his office and discuss it. "I told him everything about me," Poppas recalled in a four-page document she provided to Fordham administrators in May 1994. "He knew I was … without parents, severely depressed, and even suicidal. I discussed with him why I had lost my faith in God, in humanity, and in myself. He was extremely attentive and genuinely concerned."
On Feb. 15, "Fat Tuesday," Poppas again visited Hudson at his office. Hudson invited her, she said, to join him and a group of NYU students at a bar in the West Village. Later that night, Hudson and Poppas engaged in a sexual encounter that is recounted graphically in a four-page description she provided Fordham University. Her memo is reported on in detail in the story elsewhere on this Web site.
...
"Sexual harassment is not tolerated at Fordham University," the school's assistant vice president for public affairs, Elizabeth Schmalz, said in a July 2004 statement provided to NCR. "It subverts the mission of the University and threatens the well-being, educational experiences and careers of students, faculty and staff. It is especially disturbing in the context of a teacher-student relationship."
Continued Schmalz: "Fordham followed its policy rigorously in this case and initiated an investigation into the matter upon receipt of the student's complaint. The professor later surrendered his tenure at Fordham."

Fordham is, so you know, a Jesuit institution.

Hudson is now on John McCain's Catholic steering committee, and so, apparently, is Bill Donohue.

From Hudson's account of the meeting he brokered between Donohue and Hagee

We went into Donohue's office for our chat, but first he showed the Hagees the window through which he saw the World Trade Center Towers fall to the ground in 9/11. He told the story of taking his staff to a local pizza restaurant where they prayed together, with the result that some Jews seated nearby asked if they could join in.
The conversation lasted about 45 minutes -- Hagee had to get back to the UN for his evening speech. During that time Hagee and Donohue affirmed their not only the reconciliation but also their future partnership on matters of importance to both them: life, marriage, family, and support for Israel.
Donohue said, "Pastor, you are my friend from this point forward and nothing's going to change that. We have our theological differences but we Catholics and Evangelicals need to work together -- that is the liberals [sic] worse nightmare."

Yeah. Because we're all conflicted about opposing this sort of thing

On the September 18, 2006, edition of National Public Radio's Fresh Air Hagee asserted of Hurricane Katrina: "I believe that New Orleans had a level of sin that was offensive to God, and they are -- were recipients of the judgment of God for that. The newspaper carried the story in our local area that was not carried nationally that there was to be a homosexual parade there on the Monday that the Katrina came. And the promise of that parade was that it was going to reach a level of sexuality never demonstrated before in any of the other Gay Pride parades." He later added: "Hurricane Katrina was, in fact, the judgment of God against the city of New Orleans."
As the blog Think Progress noted, Hagee made similar comments on the April 22 edition of Dennis Prager's syndicated radio talk show. On April 25, Hagee released a statement asserting that "ultimately neither I nor any other person can know the mind of God concerning Hurricane Katrina. I should not have suggested otherwise." But in a May 7 post to the Dallas Morning News blog Trail Blazers, senior political writer Wayne Slater reported that during "a conference call with religious supporters" that day, "[w]hen a woman on the call asked why he seemed to have backed away from his Katrina comments in face of criticism, Hagee said he hadn't. As for the Katrina, he said, God controls hurricanes and 'God always punishes unconfessed sin.'** You do the math."

Go ahead. Do the math.

*Donohue has been remarkably silent on the subject of Mr. Giuliani's little lapse of taste during the Pope's visit. He's got a fair amount of experience in that area.

**Hagee also has some fascinating theories about jews and the holocaust

Obama Delegate Round-Up

Syndicated — Fri, 16 May 2008 19:57:01 -0700

by Scout Finch [courtesy of Daily Kos]

Today's edition was a bit lighter than the recent run on delegates, with Californian Congressman Pete Stark being the only delegate endorsement of the day. Apparently nobody wants to be relegated to the Friday afternoon news dump. Nonetheless, advantage Obama as he continues to pull away from Clinton.

Congressman Stark said, "Senator Barack Obama has captured the imagination of Americans in a way we’ve not seen for decades. He’s inspired millions of young people to register to vote and join the ranks of our Democratic Party, he’s consistently opposed the war, he advocates universal health care, and he delivers a message that transcends party politics at the same time.

"I have the greatest respect for Senator Clinton and for her many years of service, but I believe the time has come to unify our party. The outcome we need in November is a Democratic President. To achieve that, we must turn our focus squarely on Senator McCain and his quest to continue another four years of the failed Bush agenda.

"Barack Obama is the person we need as the next President of the United States of America. I’m excited to help him achieve that goal."

WA-Gov: Grudge Match

Syndicated — Fri, 16 May 2008 18:55:04 -0700

by mcjoan [courtesy of Daily Kos]

If there's any governor's mansion in the country the Republicans want to gain in November, it's Washington's. This year's race is a rematch of 2004, with poor loser Dino Rossi trying to capitalize on the sour grapes the state and national Republicans still feel over their 133 vote loss that came after three vote tallies and a failed Republican court challenge. That election was also probably the reason for the firing of USA John McKay, who refused to open a federal criminal investigation into voter fraud allegations.

So there's a lot at stake for Republicans in this. And it's not looking too good for Rossi at the moment. On the heels of reports that she doubled Rossi's fundraising in April, raising well over a million dollars (1.3m) to his $641K, comes some very encouraging polling from Rasmussen.

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of Washington voters shows Gregoire leading her Republican challenger, Dino Rossi, by eleven percentage points. It’s Gregoire 52% Rossi 41%.

In late March, Gregoire was up by just a statistically insignificant single percentage point. In February, Rossi had a one point advantage. Four years ago, the 2004 election between the same two candidates was one of the closest elections in the state’s history.

Gregoire is supported by 86% of Democrats and has a has a nine-point lead among unaffiliated voters. Both those figures reflect significant improvement for Gregoire since March. Rossi earns the vote from 88% of Republicans, up slightly from 85% in the previous poll. The incumbent Democrat now leads among both men and women.

One of the factors behind Gregoire's surge is that she's finally able to campaign and fundraise after the "session freeze" which prevents Washington lawmakers from fundraising during the legilslative session. The freeze allowed Rossi to amass $2.7 whlie she was stymied, but given her totals for April, and her polling, she should have no problems on the money front. Another factor to consider is Obama's eleven point lead in the state over McCain.

The Republicans are going to be hell-bent in getting revenge on Gregoire this year, and shouldn't be taken lightly. But it's definitely going to be an uphill battle for them.

McCain Lies Away The Iran-Contra Scandal

Syndicated — Fri, 16 May 2008 18:26:01 -0700

by Phoenix Woman [courtesy of Firedoglake]

Lawrence Walsh\'s book Firewall

You'll have to excuse the mess, folks. My head just exploded.

Why? Seems that John Sidney McCain III just lied away the existence of the Iran-Contra scandal:

"Yes, there have been appeasers in the past, and the president is exactly right, and one of them is Neville Chamberlain,'’ Mr. McCain told reporters on his campaign bus after a speech in Columbus, Ohio. “I believe that it’s not an accident that our hostages came home from Iran when President Reagan was president of the United States. He didn’t sit down in a negotiation with the religious extremists in Iran, he made it very clear that those hostages were coming home.'’

For those who weren't around during the period from 1980 to 1988, the Iran-Contra scandal occurred because from the beginning, Ronald Reagan and his people did quite a bit more than "appease" and negotiate with Iran. It's the main reason that Reagan's end-of-office approval ratings were lower than Bill Clinton's among the general public, despite the media's fluffing of Reagan and stuffing of Clinton.

Here's a brief synopsis courtesy of Robert Parry:

The Iran-Contra scandal came out of a couple of different initiatives that the Reagan administration was following. One was the war in Nicaragua, which had to be done with a great deal of deception surrounding it because Congress had opposed much of that effort. The international community had opposed much of that effort, so the Reagan administration essentially took it underground with the work of people like Elliot Abrams and Oliver North and John Poindexter.
On one side there was an effort to maintain support for the contras, who were engaged in fighting the Sandinistas in Nicaragua. On the other side there was a long-running policy, which we have traced back now to 1981, of secretly helping the Iranian government arm itself. The U.S. policy secretly supported both sides -- both the Iranian fundamentalist government of Khomeini, and the more secular government of Saddam Hussein in Iraq. Those two policies were running in parallel.
When the financing for the contras became more and more problematic, the Reagan administration decided to use some of the profits from selling arms to the Iranians to help support the contras. So, that became known as the Iran-Contra scandal when it finally broke.

When it broke, it nearly took down Reagan's government. Not only had Reagan and his people been negotiating with and appeasing the Iranians for years, but the aid given to the Contras had been illegal up until fairly recently, as the three Boland Amendments forbidding such aid had been in force from 1982 to 1984. It took some superhuman efforts to firewall Reagan from being removed from office over this -- efforts that Iran-Contra prosecutor Lawrence Walsh described in his book Firewall.

In a way, I guess it's weirdly fitting. The media swallowed it without comment when George W. Bush, the grandson of Nazi-appeasing Prescott Bush, sternly came out against appeasing Nazis. Why shouldn't they blow it off when their other hero, John Sidney McCain III, lies about Ronald Reagan's role in Iran-Contra? They've got more important things to do, such as manufacturing hissy kabuki against Democratic presidential candidates. (Funny: It's OK for Bush to call Candy Crowley "Dulce" on purpose, but when Obama does it by accident it's much worse than either committing Iran-Contra or trying to lie it out of existence. Oh, well.) I'm just being silly -- just because I can remember a time, pre-Rupert-Murdoch and pre-Sun-Myung-Moon, when Republican presidential candidates who said stupid-ass things (such as when Gerald R. Ford "freed" Eastern Europe) would get reamed out by the press for them. Give it up, Phoenix; it's Chinatown.

Happy Friday Night News Dump

Syndicated — Fri, 16 May 2008 17:32:02 -0700

by emptywheel [courtesy of Firedoglake]

Dear George Bush:
Thank you for giving this son of immigrants the opportunity to deprive brown people of their right to vote. I'm just sorry I won't have the opportunity to do so during the 2008 election.
Love,
Hans

I'm sorry. That's not exactly what Han von Spakovsky said in his resignation letter. He did mention being the son of immigrants:

The day that I was sworn in as a Commissioner in January of 2006 was almost exactly 55 years to the day from the date that my parents arrived in the United States as penniless war refugees. It says a great deal about what a wonderful country we live in that a first-generation son of immigrants could be appointed by the President to such a post of public service.

And he did boast about his service in the Civil Rights Division of DOJ.

I am very proud of the work that I did as a career lawyer at the Department of Justice, which has been validated by numerous federal courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court.

Spakovsky must have forgotten the "sometimes" in that last sentence, as he was also reversed by those same courts.

Mostly, though, this letter is all about victimization--his victimization, not those whose votes or civil rights he ignored. He explains as his reason for withdrawing that his family does "not have the financial resources to continue to wait until this matter is resolved" (which I'm frankly fairly sympathetic to). No mention of Mitch McConnell's refusal to let Spakovsky get an upperdown vote of his very own, without yoking him to other, more palatable nominees. To hear Spakovsky tell it, he was due this nomination, and unfair mean opposition ruined it for him.

That's a stance that Harry Reid does not agree with, to say the least.

I welcome the President's decision to withdraw the controversial nomination of Mr. von Spakovsky. It is an action I have repeatedly urged the President to take for more than six months. Democrats stood united in their opposition to von Spakovsky because of his long and well-documented history of working to suppress the rights of minorities and the elderly to vote. He was not qualified to hold any position of trust in our government.

As I understand it, the Senate has a Rules Committee hearing scheduled for Wednesday, at which they will be prepared to discuss the three other nominees. I'm trying to clarify whether that means Commissioner Mason--the guy who said McCain was breaking his own damn campaign finance law--will be ousted, but it seems to be. (In fact, I think one of the people they've nominated is Donald McGahn, a former DeLay lawyer also involved on the edges of the NRCC scandal--so we may be trading racially biased policies for outright corruption.) I will update you when I figure out more.

Hey, Didja Hear The One About The Uppity Black Man?

Syndicated — Fri, 16 May 2008 16:28:02 -0700

by David Neiwert [courtesy of Firedoglake]

The NRA Convention is always good for a few ripe samples of eliminationist right-wing "humor," but today, Mike Huckabee reached new depths:

During a speech before the National Rifle Association convention Friday afternoon in Louisville, Kentucky, former Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee — who has endorsed presumptive GOP nominee John McCain — joked that an unexpected offstage noise was Democrat Barack Obama looking to avoid a gunman.
“That was Barack Obama, he just tripped off a chair, he's getting ready to speak,” said the former Arkansas governor, to audience laughter. “Somebody aimed a gun at him and he dove for the floor.”

If that was another Obama dog whistle we just heard, then we should contemplate what it was whistling. It's not as though we don't know who the target audience might be.

In the meantime, I do hope Huckabee doesn't try the "they took it out of context" defense. The video above includes the larger context of Huckabee's remarks, which were all about how those libruls are a bunch of worthless elitists who hate Real Americans.

Edwards For AG, Not VP

Syndicated — Fri, 16 May 2008 11:30:07 -0700

by Chris Bowers [courtesy of Open Left - Front Page]

I think Paul Rosenberg is one of the best writers around, and I respect his views tremendously. However, I never really agreed with his premise that Edwards should be VP, and now it looks like Edwards does not agree, either:

"No," Edwards said in no uncertain terms on NBC's the Today show when asked about the possibility. "Won't happen....It's just not something I am interested in."

As for another position in an Obama administration, specifically Attorney General, Edwards was decidedly more coy.

"I don't really want to get involved in that speculation," he said. "Right now we have to focus on getting Barack Obama elected to President of the United States, then we'll worry about those things."

Edwards seems like a great pick for VP. While there were some who thought he was overly messianic in his anti-corporate campaign rhetoric (people like positive messages), that strikes me as exactly the attitude we need from an Attorney General.

Also, shouldn't the Attorney General be an elected position? It strikes me that we should have independent law enforcement, not a toady of the executive. Given the problems with FISA and the US Attorney scandals over the past two years, really this should be a no-brainer. Perhaps we should also have an elected position at the Department of the Treasury, or the GAO, since we should have independent oversight of the books, too.

These Are Our Friends

Syndicated — Fri, 16 May 2008 10:45:01 -0700

by Natasha Chart [courtesy of Open Left - Front Page]

We have a long way to go in the policy debate on global warming. This is from a press release by Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA), Chair of the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming:

... Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.) sent a letter to the president yesterday asking him to live up to his campaign promise from 2000 to "jawbone OPEC" into producing more oil on his Saudi Arabia visit. Since President Bush took office, OPEC's production has stayed relatively flat, even as global demand has skyrocketed.
... "It appears that when it comes to getting the Saudi's to turn on the spigot and produce more oil, the president's political 'jawbone' is broken.
"While Americans are getting pummeled at the pump, the president apparently is unable to even squeeze another drop of oil from the Saudi sheiks.
... "The president has delayed taking action on gas prices for too long, perhaps hoping his Saudi friends would bail him out. That course of inaction has now failed, and now the President must wield the power he had all along to aggressively use our nation's oil reserves to help Americans at the pump."

Why the certainty that the Saudis even have more to pump?

Also, we don't actually own Saudi Arabia and I don't see the benefit of talking as if we had ought to; that sort of mindset is exactly what's gotten us into this ridiculous, tragic mess in Iraq. This isn't our world to do with always and everywhere just as we please, making all others bow before us.

Shouldn't the Chair of the Select Committee be using the advent of the current, glaring price signal to push for sustainable alternatives and better research and development budgets? Why isn't he complaining about the shortsightedness of previous energy policies, the ones that left us unprepared to deal with market shocks through the availability of alternative choices?

It disappoints me that we're getting this sort of badly framed grandstanding from the committee that represents the very best of our congressional wisdom on climate change. We can't keep doing what we've always done, and we definitely shouldn't be looking to make it cheaper.

If we want real help for consumers trying to get from point A to point B, bring on the public transportation funding.