Palin the wordsmith

This blog post makes a very interesting point about Palin's way with words. I hadn't thought about the exact details of how Palin has been attacking Obama, but this post makes it much more clear how her campaign rallies have generated several stories of racist comments.

Obviously, Palin does not stand for uniting this country and leading it in an honorable way, and I don't think McCain does either.

Volunteer mercenaries?

Does it help McCain's campaign to pay Obama supporters to campaign for him? I think not. This article from The Times in London details the differences between the Obama campaign and McCain campaign.

I know that Obama has less experience on the national and international stage than McCain. But looking at the organization which Obama has built for his campaign gives me great hope that he can run the government in much the same way. That's about 180 degress apart from the cluelessness we have now and that's what we need for the next four years.

Religion gone wrong

This video from YouTube is just plain scary.

I was reading this article from Politico.com and I realized that it's scary how easily money can be turned into political influence. Are Americans that gullible, that we'll just believe the ads we see the most? Apparently, we are.

Putting a finger on what's unsettling about Palin

This article from the Wall Street Journal really puts a finger on what's unsettling about Palin. It also gets to the heart of what's wrong with politics in America today. Thanks to the Bush administration, much of the Republican party wants to look at America as slices, constituencies with common attributes, rather than looking at the whole. Granted, different constituencies will always be used as campaign tactics, but can government afford to work like that? I don't think so.

The system of government in this country is designed to work around consensus and compromise. At the end of the day, all the different slices of America need to work together more than they work to defeat each other. The kind of fractured, partisan politics which have been the hallmark of the Bush administration need to end, one way or another.

Are you anti-American?

Wow, this is political craziness reaching it's extreme, and it's not even in the presidential race! Apparently, Republican Rep. Michele Bachmann of Minnesota wants the media (presumably the liberal elitist media) to do an expose regarding which members of Congress are pro-American and which are anti-American. Really. Read the article here.

Is this what we need in a time of turmoil and crises? Modern-day McCarthyism? I think not.

However, the fact that her opponent in the race for her House seat has received nearly half million dollars in donations from pissed-off Americans (or maybe they're anti-Americans) makes this absolutely hilarious. Bachmann has managed to shoot herself in the foot AFTER inserting it firmly between her tonsils.

Where is this election headed?

The Chicago Tribune endorsed Barack Obama today. The networks are concerned they may have a boring election night. On Twitter, fakejohnmccain and FakeSarahPalin are providing as much campaign hilarity as Tina Fey on SNL. Where is this thing headed?

Is America just tired of pretending that an angry maverick and an uninformed hockey mom actually constitute a viable ticket? Will this election come down to a final week of fading numbers for McCain, requiring he and Palin to run around the country, bravely proclaiming that "you can still make a vote for real change" while knowing that it just ain't gonna happen?

I'd be happy to see the tide finally turn one way or the other. I'd prefer towards Obama, but really, I just don't want to see two weeks of tight polls and ever meaner and shriller campaigning. It's been over a year and a half, people. I'm tired of hearing the talk. Let's just get this over with and move on past the W Era.

Intelligence is elitist, dontcha know?

This article from Salon makes good points. When did being intelligent become "elitist" and something to be made fun of, while general cluelessness and lack of curiosity about the world become "populist"?

I want smart, intelligent people with ideas in charge of this country. I want people with a sense of the world that extends beyond the borders of the USA. I want people with college degrees. I want well-rounded individuals who can think critically about the validity of policy proposals.

McCain has said that he's a better choice for president because he has experience and there's no on-the-job training for the presidency. That's just bull$#!%. No one is totally prepared for the presidency, but a person can be prepared to use their brains.

Geolocation evolution

I think geolocation is going to be the next big evolution on the Internet:
http://labs.mozilla.com/2008/10/introducing-geode/

With iPhones and other new mobile devices building in GPS, and now larger devices like laptops getting easier to geolocate, will sites like MySpace and Facebook start giving users the ability to attach location information to their posts? drop.io already has a drop location feature which allows drops to be assigned a location, so that they are only visible by devices which are close to that location. Features like that seem to tie in nicely with functionality like Geode.

Of course, this opens up a whole bunch of new privacy concerns. But, netizens these days seem comfortable publicly posting just about everything, so adding location into the mix may not really upset many people.

Political satire

Yup, I was right! Political satire does make the campaign season more bearable. Check out this story from NPR.

Economic depression

Time magazine declared that this isn't Depression 2.0. Of course it isn't. It's Depression Vista, Media Center Edition.

SNL ... making the 2008 election more palatable, one skit at a time

I saw Saturday Night Live's opening skit from this weekend. I think we should give Tiny Fey and the SNL writers some kind of award. Without their brilliant parodies, this election would suck a lot more.t

No turning, just more of the same

Last night's debate didn't turn out to be a real turning point. Like the previous presidential debate, I don't think this one swayed an undecided voters. Here's my talking points from last night:

• Palin: she crammed well for the exam, but still isn't really qualified for president, or VP for that matter. She should read the Constitution and figure out what the job of VP actually entails
• Biden: studied hard as well, and didn't come across as a hot-air-spewing politician or an @$$hole
• Palin (and McCain): quit with the "maverick" crap. I'm tired of hearing them refer to themselves and each other as mavericks. That just seems lame and egotistical. It's only cool to call yourself maverick if you're Tom Cruise in Top Gun. Granted, McCain was a pilot and womanizer back in his younger days, but just resist the urge to say it, John and Sarah.
• Biden: good job acknowledging that you started out on blue-collar Main Street, but that you're doing better than most financially now. We all know that none of the candidates really live on Main St. anymore, so thanks for not pretending that you do. On a side note, the only one of the four of them that really hasn't lived where most of us do is McCain. Obama, Biden and Palin have all had experience with living day-to-day as much of America does. Other than his time as a POW, McCain has lived in the Navy or married to money, so I'm fairly certain he has no idea what it's like to try to make ends meet.
  

I realized that I kinda don't like the idea of putting a "Washington outsider" in the presidency or vice-presidency. It sounds good, but really, that just means they're lacking a huge amount of knowledge about how to get things done in Washington. Would the average manager who's trying to fill an open position hire an applicant specifically because they're lacking in expertise which is critical to doing the job?

Yeah, sure, being an outsider means they're not "corrupted" by all the favor-trading and lobbying in DC, but come on! They're all politicians ... it's not like they're saints.

The turning point of the election?

It's less than an hour until the vice presidential debate. I'm fairly certain this will be the most-watched VP debate ever. It certainly will be more interesting and entertaining than Edwards vs. Cheney in 2004. The real question is not whether Palin will completely bomb or not ... the question is how her performance will affect McCain's campaign. If she seems totally clueless, she may get still get a lot of sympathy from the soccer moms of America. If she comes off as knowledgeable, will she look like just another rhetoric-spewing pol and lose some of her Washington-outsider-maverick shine?

Either way, at least she's better to look at than Dick Cheney and his creepy smile/grimace!