Today’s WTF moment: Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize?

Okay, first let me say that I generally like Obama, though there are plenty of points where he and I disagree on things. Still, I did vote for the man, and I think he is lightyears better than the asshole who was squatting in the White House until January 20th of this year.

Nevertheless, I had one of those “spray coffee all over the computer monitor” moments a couple minutes ago when I saw the headline that Obama had been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

I seriously had to double check my facebook feed to see if it was a headline from the Onion. Then I had to visit three other news sites, because I was afraid I had gone to sleep in October and woken up on April Fools’ Day.

Okay, I get that the man is popular. And yeah, he’s a damn sight better than the Shrub was.

But seriously, the man has been in office for ten months. Actually, eleven days shy of that. He hasn’t even managed to close Gitmo yet, and they’re awarding him the Peace Prize? Is the Nobel Committee smoking something illegal? And if so, where can I get some, because it must be some seriously good shit to make them completely take leave of their senses like this.

I can come up with only one theory that makes any sense at all, and it is this: the Nobel Committee is not so much rewarding Obama’s efforts as collectively mooning George W. Bush.

And while Bush no doubt deserves a good collective mooning, preferably with him viewing it from a jail cell where he will spend the rest of his life for his crimes against our nation, the Constitution, and humanity, I’m not convinced that it warrants giving what is to my mind the most prestigious award in the world to his successor after a mere ten months in office.

Because seriously, what are they going to do for an encore if and when the man truly accomplishes something deserving of such recognition?

Winning the Nobel Peace Prize deserves recognition, whatever the circumstances, however, and so I will say this:

Congratulations, President Obama. I just hope you eventually accomplish enough to be worthy of it.

-jane doe

Follow up: I wanted to say that I very much liked President Obama’s remarks on the subject of the Nobel Peace Prize earlier today. From the Huffington Post:

Obama told reporters in the White House Rose Garden that he wasn’t sure he had done enough to earn the award, or deserved to be in the company of the “transformative figures” who had won it before him.

But, he said, “I will accept this award as a call to action, a call for all nations to confront the challenges of the 21st century.”

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/10/09/obama-nobel-speech-video_n_315324.html

And:

“I am both surprised and deeply humbled by the decision of the Nobel Committee,” Obama said.

“Let me be clear, I do not view it as a recognition of my own accomplishments, but rather as an affirmation of American leadership on behalf of aspirations held by people in all nations.”

I like his perspective on this. And it’s less cynical than my characterization of the award as a “collective mooning” of the Shrub.

I do think it’s really a “Welcome back, America, we’ve missed you” message from the rest of the world.

But then again, is that such a bad thing?

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/10/09/obama-nobel-speech-video_n_315324.html

The Republican Party disintegration continues…

…with this morning’s jaw-dropping announcement that Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter is leaving the Republican party to join the Democrats.

I say jaw-dropping, but really, it wouldn’t surprise me if we see a few more moderate Republicans follow in his footsteps.

With McCain’s resounding loss in November, the Republican Party has been lacking a clear voice and leader, leaving it increasingly vulnerable to the rantings of the more extreme elements within it.

People like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and Glenn Beck. And let us not forget the extremely scary Newt Gingrich.

And the visibility of those more extreme voices further marginalize the party, causing more and more moderate Republicans to abandon their party for independent or democratic status.

Meanwhile, no matter how much the Faux News people want to holler about socialism, Obama has if anything brought the Democrats closer to the middle than they were before (something that pisses off liberals like yours truly, but whatever).

Given the apparent public distaste for the extreme positions currently adopted by many high-profile Republicans at the moment, one is forced to wonder about the logic of the proponents of such positions.

I have my own theory about this. Regular readers of this blog will not be at all surprised to learn that it relates to terror management theory. But I will save that speculation for a subsequent post … check back in a day or so for that.

Meanwhile, in other news, I think the Department of Justice should open a war crimes investigation into the activities of the Bush administration. Just sayin’…

-jane doe

Obama administration adopting Bush administration positions?

I was going to write a blog post about how the Obama administration appears to be adopting the prior administration’s positions with respect to the illegal warrantless wiretapping conducted by the Bush White House, but Glenn Greenwald at Salon.com beat me to it, and as usual does a better and more thorough job of it than I would.

I suppose I shouldn’t be too shocked. Much to my disappointment, Obama did vote for the FISA “extension” last year that expanded the government’s wiretapping ability and exhonerated the telecommunications companies that violated existing law with respect to wiretapping following 9/11. So why should it surprise me that he wants to hang on to at least some of that power that Bush seized for the executive branch?

But it does upset me. I expect better from Obama than we got from Bush. Perhaps that’s naive. Differences (and there are many) aside, Obama is a politician, just like Bush. Why would he want to give up power?

The Al-Haramain case may well be, as Greenwald says, “the only remaining case against the Government with any real chance of resulting in a judicial ruling on the legality of Bush’s NSA warrantless eavesdropping program.” From the perspective of all who care about constitutional rights, that is reason enough to want it to move forward.

So why is the Obama administration trying to shut it down?

-jane doe

Good news for cancer patients

At least for the next four years, the federal government will be tempering its drug policy in a humane manner.

Yesterday, our new Attorney General, Eric Holder – already several orders of magnitude better in that role than Alberto Gonzales – announced that “the Justice Department will no longer raid medical marijuana clubs that are established legally under state law.”

This is very good news for people suffering from various conditions where administration of marijuana can be beneficial. Marijuana can be particularly beneficial for those undergoing chemotherapy, because it helps counter the nausea-inducing effects of the chemo drugs so the patient can keep food down. If the patient can maintain a healthy diet, his or her chances of surviving the cancer and the chemotherapy are much better.

The previous federal policy of arresting those who are merely trying to help the gravely ill by providing them with a proven treatment for the nausea that accompanies chemotherapy – or arresting the gravely ill themselves for using marijuana – was nonsensical and frankly cruel. It resulted in unnecessary suffering by those who were already fighting for their lives.

It’s nice to see a more enlightened enforcement policy being announced.

-jane doe

State of the Union – Obama style…

Okay, first of all, whose brilliant idea was it to have the State of the Union speech on Fat Tuesday?

I didn’t watch the speech live. Not that I was out Mardi Gras-ing, or anything. I just kind of spaced until after it was over. I’ve gotten so in the habit of watching podcasts for news coverage (Countdown and the Rachel Maddow Show, natch) that I don’t turn the TV on anymore…and most of the time, I don’t miss anything except a few commercials with this approach.

So I kind of blew it last night, and missed Obama’s SOTU.

Fortunately, everything is available on the internets these days, so I can watch the speech and Jindal’s response in the comfort of my favorite coffee shop. Following are my thoughts on his speech, in more or less chronological order, along with a few quotes so that the comments aren’t arriving in a vacuum:

• Okay, did he just say hello to every single person in the chamber before taking his place at the podium? Also, did the Shrub get a standing ovation just for being presented the last couple of SOTUs he gave? I think I would have remembered that…
• Jeez, could Hillary’s suit possibly be a more vivid color?
• Also, somebody needs to explain to Nancy Pelosi that she is also on camera during these speeches and needs to not mess with her hair.
• A surplus became an excuse to transfer wealth to the wealthy instead of an opportunity to invest in our future. Regulations were gutted for the sake of a quick profit at the expense of a healthy market.” Yeah, Dubya, he’s talking to you.
• Let the record show that when President Obama said, “And tonight I am grateful that this Congress delivered and pleased to say that the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act is now law,” the Republican half (oops, sorry, significantly less than half) of the chamber sat on its hands, while the Democratic side gave itself a standing ovation.
• “And that’s why I’ve asked Vice President Biden to lead a tough, unprecedented oversight effort, because nobody messes with Joe.” Okay, that’s a sound bite that’s going to end up in the history books…
• “Already, we’ve done more to advance the cause of health care reform in the last 30 days than we’ve done in the last decade.” Not that that’s difficult to have done, since Dubya and his minions did exactly nothing on the health care reform front, beyond adding a Medicare drug benefit that was written by Big Pharma. Oh, and vetoed SCHIP every chance it got…which is why the Obama administration can claim to have done so much.
• Forty three minutes after his introduction before he actually says the word “Iraq”, and then only to talk about the no-bid contracts there… okay, granted I am radically opposed to those contracts and the Halliburtons and Blackwaters running around that country acting in our name on cost-plus contracts (anyone who’s seen my reviews of the movie War, Inc., and my comments on Naomi Klein’s book The Shock Doctrine knows my position on this). Just seems like he should be talking about Iraq and Afghanistan more than this…
• “We will restore a sense of fairness and balance to our tax code by finally ending the tax breaks for corporations that ship our jobs overseas.” Hallelujah! I had a HUGE argument a few years back with a friend who does business consulting who took a gig on behalf of an Indian company trying to get American jobs. His rationalization was that he was helping American corporations operate more efficiently, and couldn’t see or didn’t care that he was sending American jobs overseas. Or maybe he just wanted to remain in denial… (Are you reading this, my friend? You know who you are…)
• Okay, this is amusing. At the part of his speech where Obama reveals that families making less than a quarter million a year won’t see their taxes go up a dime, all the Democrats in the chamber stood up right away, but initially the people on the Republican side of the chamber remained seated. Then it apparently occurred to some of them that staying seated on this point might not look real good to all the less well-off citizens who vote against their financial interests in supporting the Republican party, and some of them started standing up, too. Out of touch much, Repubs? Remember, if it were just the rich people voting for you, you’d maybe have four or five congressmen and a senator or two…maybe.
• Ooh, another mention of Iraq and Afghanistan, this time in connection with the budget. They’re including the “full cost” of fighting these conflicts in the budget, instead of doing supplemental things that make it harder to track how much the government is spending…very nice. “For seven years, we’ve been a nation at war. No longer will we hide its price.” Yeah, Bush, he’s talking to you…again…
• Ah, 46 minutes into a 58 minute speech, finally we get to actually ending the war in Iraq: “Along with our outstanding national security team, I am now carefully reviewing our policies in both wars, and I will soon announce a way forward in Iraq that leaves Iraq to its people and responsibly ends this war.” Yay!
• “And with our friends and allies, we will forge a new and comprehensive strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan to defeat Al Quaida and combat extremism, because I will not allow terrorists to plot against the American people from safe havens halfway around the world. We will not allow it.” Um, sorry, does this mean we’re going to be fighting Pakistan, too? Aren’t they ostensibly one of our allies? Or is he just talking about launching raids into the remote areas of Pakistan where the government really doesn’t have any power?
• At least he is doing more than just mouthing platitudes about “supporting the troops” and talking about DOING things to help them out: increasing pay, increasing recruiting, and expanding health care benefits for vets. That’s something…
• And 49 minutes in he mentions closing Gitmo, “…because living our values doesn’t make us weaker. It makes us safer, and it makes us stronger. And that is why I can stand here tonight and say without exception or equivocation that the United States of America does not torture. We can make that commitment here tonight.” Yeah, that’s aimed at you again, Duhbya…
• “New era of engagement”…”cannot shun the negotiating table” … “lasting peace between Israel and her neighbors”…Groovy
• And of course, something inspiring to close on: “I know that we haven’t agreed on every issue thus far. There are surely times in the future where we will part ways. But I also know that every American who is sitting here tonight loves this country and wants it to succeed. I know that. That must be the starting point for every debate we have in the coming months and where we return after those debates are done. That is the foundation on which the American people expect us to build common ground. And if we do, if we come together and lift this nation from the depths of this crisis, if we put our people back to work and restart the engine of our prosperity, if we confront without fear the challenges of our time and summon that enduring spirit of an America that does not quit, then some day, years from now, our children can tell their children that this was the time when we performed, in the words that are carved into this very chamber, ‘something worthy to be remembered.’” Very nice.

This wasn’t nearly as much fun as blogging Bush’s SOTUs, which were so damn mockable…still, it’s a nice change having a president who is capable of speaking without completely mangling the English language. Which is actually damning with faint praise – Obama is one hell of a public speaker.

Jindal’s response next…

-jane doe

The long national nightmare is over…

I was going to post one last anti-Bush diatribe, as many other writers and commentators have done. I’ve been working on it off and on for several days. But today I find that I just can’t.

I’m too giddy.

We made history today, folks, in a day many thought would never come.

It’s a great day to be an American.

We have a lot of hard work ahead of us, undoing the damage of the past eight years – the past twenty-eight years, more accurately, perhaps even longer. And tomorrow we’ll roll up our sleeves and get to work.

But for now? I say we party.

-jane doe

Goodbye, 2008

The end of any year is often a time of reflection. Looking back to see what went right, what went wrong. This year, we could perhaps benefit from such retrospection more than other years.

I was going to refer to 2008 as “a kidney stone of a year,” but I was almost certain I had heard that phrase elsewhere, likely in something by Hunter S. Thompson. A quick Google search of the phrase didn’t reveal the original source, but it did show three other people describing 2008 in those words, so at least I’m not alone in thinking of it that way.

On a national level, we saw a further…what’s the word I want? crumbling? eroding? collapsing? disintegrating?…let’s go with… deterioration of: our civil rights, our privacy, our status overseas, the situation in Iraq (notwithstanding all the neocons rushing to claim the surge has been a “success”), the situation in Afghanistan, the economy, the health care system, our schools, our infrastructure (Rachel Maddow’s favorite word), the situation in Israel and the Gaza Strip, the environment, and…well…it’s a really long list, actually.

So maybe we should think of 2008 as the year when the whole house of cards we’ve all been living in fell to the floor.

There was the presidential election, which filled up our ears for way too many months with noise and lies and distortions and endless debates and oh the spinning and spinning and spinning and stop the world, please, I’m getting dizzy.

Before that, though, we had the primaries, and the caucuses, and the conventions, and the polls, and the protests and…well, you were there. You heard it.

There were a lot of lows, but there were a few highs, as well. Particularly toward the end of the year.

For a nice change, we had a presidential candidate that appealed to our hopes, rather than hammering at our fears. We dodged the bullet of a McCain/Palin administration, four more years that would most likely have looked like the last eight, except less organized, and instead managed to elect the smart guy over the guy people would like to have a beer with. Thought I suspect Obama would be way more fun to have a beer with than McCain, anyway.

And there was the nice bit about finally electing someone who isn’t a white male to the highest office in the land. That part was pretty cool.

But the economy is bad, and likely to get worse before it gets better. People are losing their homes, their jobs, and their retirement investments. We’re probably going to see a lot more people moving in with other family members to save money, and we’re already seeing more people living on the street.

It’s a scary situation.

And yet, with the new year comes hope.

In twenty days, we will be rid of alleged president George Walker Bush.

We will have strong Democratic Party majorities in both houses of Congress.

Let’s hope they use their new power for good. Let’s hope they actually use their power, instead of allowing themselves to be conned by Republicans into thinking they don’t dare use the power we gave them to change things.

Let’s hope.

Hope is good.

I have some ideas for a new project for myself in the new year…something that will involve this blog – or perhaps a separate blog created specifically for the project…more on that soon. But I think some more changes are coming in the life of yours truly, that I hope will be interesting for you all, and ultimately, perhaps profitable for me. We shall see…

In the mean time, happy new year, everyone!

And stay safe.

-jane doe

p.s. And lest there be any doubt about it…I still think Bush and Cheney ought to be impeached.

Open letter to Barack Obama re: Rick Warren

So much for change we can believe in.

For those who have been living under a rock for the past day or so, our incoming president – the man who promised change and inclusion – has invited Rick Warren, pastor for Saddleback Church in California and intolerant evangelical sonofabitch, to speak at his inauguration.

For the non-Californians in my readership, Rick Warren has been described (courtesy of my handy copy of The Sinner’s Guide to the Evangelical Right) as “the evangelical Jimmy Buffet” – he’s known for wearing Hawaiian shirts, and he’s the author of The Purpose Driven Life.  Among evangelicals, he is considered “controversial” for saying that Christians should be concerned about things like the environment, global warming, and helping the poor, not just opposing abortion and equal treatment for gays.

Nevertheless, he is opposed to abortion and equal treatment for gays.

Now, many religious leaders are opposed to abortion, and that is absolutely their right. I don’t think anyone likes abortion. It’s just that some people feel that life begins at conception, while others feel that is not the case and that a woman should have the ability to terminate a pregnancy, for a wide variety of reasons. I personally fall into the pro-choice camp, but respect the ethical position of many in the anti-choice camp (though there are also many in the anti-choice camp whom I have no respect for).

If he were merely anti-abortion, his speaking at Obama’s inauguration would be troubling, but not rage-inducing.

It is his position on homosexuality that makes his inclusion in inauguration festivities so offensive to so many people, myself included.

Not content to merely oppose equal rights for members of the GLBT community, he has actually compared their sexuality to incest, pedophilia, and bestiality. He actively campaigned for Proposition 8, which took away the right to marry for same-sex couples in California. Let me emphasize that: it was a ballot measure that took away a civil right that had already been recognized by the courts of that state. And Rick Warren spoke out in favor of taking away that right.

And this is the man whom Obama has chosen to speak at his inauguration.

It is one thing to want to reach out to one’s opponents, to want to engage them in dialogue that may lead to a better understanding among people, and a finding of common ground.

It is quite another thing to provide a pulpit for a bigot at a national event like one’s inauguration. An event intended to be for ALL Americans.

This was, without a doubt, the first major fuck-up of the Obama administration. And he’s not even in the White House yet.

It turns out that the Obama transition team has a website where one can send one’s thoughts, concerns, hopes, et cetera, to members of the new administration.

If you are troubled by the choice of Rick Warren to speak at the inauguration like I am, I urge you, my dear non-existent readers, to go to the site and express your concern. Here’s what I wrote:

To whom it may concern -

I understand and approve generally of the President-elect’s desire to reach out to people with different beliefs, to try to bring them to the table. After so many years of divisive politics, I think the steps the incoming administration has taken to reach across the aisle are generally commendable.

Having said that, I really must protest the decision to invite Rick Warren to speak at the inauguration. There is a difference between reaching out, and providing a platform at such a high-profile event to someone who is on the record expressing such bigoted viewpoints, someone who actively campaigned to take away civil rights from a large portion of the population. A segment of the population that largely supported you in your election efforts, no less.

I am not a member of the GLBT community. But I have many friends who are, and this action seems like a slap in the face to them.

There are better ways to reach out to your opponents – ways that don’t require you to slap your friends in the face. Invite the man to dine with you, engage him in dialogue – these things are of the good. But please don’t provide him with a platform to spew his hatred, his bigotry, at an event that is intended to unite the country.

Best wishes,

-jane doe

What a perfect day after an amazing night!

Needless to say, I am beyond relieved that our country has not opted for four more years that look like the last eight years.

Oh, yeah, and the whole being in Chicago to see history being made part has been pretty cool, too.

One of the local papers estimated the crowd in and around Grant Park to be about 240,000 people. Someone else pointed out (and I have not checked this to confirm it) that that is more people than live in the entire state of Alaska. All on hand to celebrate the Obama/Biden victory.

Or should I say “landslide”?

Whichever you want to call it, it was an amazing night watching the returns come in.

As for today, well, everyone I’ve run into so far seems to be smiling.

Of course, some would say that is as much due to the unseasonably warm weather Chicago is experiencing at the moment – I’ve never lived here, but I would imagine that usually one would want to wear something warmer than a t-shirt by November (I guess that whole global warming thing does have one advantage) – but the people who would say that are probably just a bunch of bitter McCain/Palin voters, so their opinion isn’t about to bring the rest of us down today.

Now if we could just impeach Bush and Cheney, life would be just about perfect on the political front…at least until the next wave of scandals breaks.

-jane doe

I’ve already voted – have you?

Ah, the beauty of being in a state that allows early voting. No waiting in long lines next Tuesday for your humble correspondent. Which is just as well, because barring any unforeseen disasters, I will be driving to Chicago on election day to visit a friend and – assuming the election goes as current polls suggest it will – to be at ground zero for Obama victory celebrations.

No, I haven’t forgiven him yet for his vote on the FISA reauthorization. But I still voted for him, and I still want him to win.

The alternative seems unthinkable to me.

I honestly do not know that our country would survive even four years of a McCain presidency, considering our current sorry circumstances after eight years of alleged president George W. Bush’s mishandling of literally every matter that crossed his desk. To say nothing of the nightmare that might ensue if McCain died or became otherwise incapacitated (I still think he is showing early signs of Alzheimer’s disease) and Scary Palin took over running the show.

In spite of my ongoing fears that there will be some sort of terrorist attack in the coming days by someone seeking to influence the election in favor of John McCain (fears that the recent story about a call for terrorist groups to cause such an attack for just that purpose on a pro-al Quaeda website, did absolutely nothing to ease — honestly, who knew that al Quaeda would have a preference for a McCain/Palin presidency over an Obama presidency?), at this point, I do not believe that such an attack would actually be sufficient to swing the election in McCain’s favor.

Let me say that again, in case any terrorists (foreign or domestic) are actually reading this and got confused by that long sentence and the even longer parenthetical in the middle of it:

At this point, I do not believe that a terrorist attack would be sufficient to swing the election in favor of John McCain.

That window of opportunity has now closed, in my opinion. I don’t know if I could pinpoint the exact moment it slammed shut, but it has definitely done so now.

Back when the race was closer – before the economic meltdown and the McCain campaign meltdown that more or less coincided with it – there was a good chance that a terrorist attack would have swung the election in his favor enough to make a difference. I have explained elsewhere in this blog (over and over again) about why the principles of terror management theory and the research supporting that theory would make such a change in election outcome possible or even likely.

And even now, an attack would likely sway some voters who are still on the fence into McCain’s column. Just as the race-baiting and fear tactics that we have seen so much of from the Republican campaign likely have already swayed some particularly fearful voters.

But I do not think that an attack – even a very large one, even a nuclear attack on a major city – would be enough to persuade voters that McCain was in any way temperamentally suited to handle such a crisis.

Not after the way McCain responded to the economic crisis.

Not after the way the McCain campaign has repeatedly changed tactics and contradicted itself over the past few weeks.

Not after the way that McCain, Palin, and other members of the McCain campaign have repeatedly been revealed to have committed the very same sins they seek to smear Obama with, often to a far greater degree.

Not since the outcome of the Troopergate investigation, which has caused even Republican party loyalists to question McCain’s judgment in his decision to make her his running mate, and has even cause a few of said loyalists to actually endorse – or at least tacitly suggest that they plan to vote for – Barack Obama.

Not since it was revealed that the campaign that has repeatedly tried to paint Barack Obama as an elitist who is out of touch with the American public spent over $150,000 of the Republican campaign budget – money donated by party supporters under the assumption that it would be used to fund advertising – on the Empress’s new clothes.

Not now that McCain campaign insiders have taken to refering to Sarah Palin as “a complete whack job” and “a diva” who has “gone roque” in their comments to the press.

Not since it was revealed that Indiana employees of a robocalling firm walked off the job en masse the other day rather than read the Republican-prepared script smearing Obama over the phone to Indiana voters.

Let there be no doubt about it: not only have the wheels come off the Straight Talk Express, but so have the axles, the transmission, the exhaust system, and various other vital engine parts.

And as much as the pundits and politicians may assume otherwise, the American public does not consist entirely of uneducated morons. And even most of those with less education are smart enough to see that the McCain campaign is a campaign not only without a plan for responding to the various crises that currently face our country, but it is a campaign without even a coherent strategy for winning the election in order to attempt to take on those problems.

Meanwhile, the Obama campaign has continued to take the high road (for the most part, at least) – refusing to be persuaded to openly badmouth either McCain or Palin in the press, speaking instead (again, for the most part) only about differences between the two campaigns plans for the country and their respective abilities to respond to crises. Members of the campaign have not panicked, and are not badmouthing either Obama or Biden (or other members of the campaign team) in the press, and are continuing to work hard to ensure an Obama victory next week.

Obama continues to take his measured approach to responding to questions from the press. He has demonstrated an ability to be thinking about and responding to multiple issues simultaneously. And he has not once, to my knowledge, lost his cool during any of that. Sure, there’ve been a couple of times where he has clearly appeared frustrated by the differences in press treatment of the two campaigns – especially during a couple of the debates. But he has remained cool under pressure, has not made faces when his opponent was speaking, and has stuck to his message – a message that has remained consistent over the course of the entire campaign, not one that changes with the weather.

Of course, none of this is enough to persuade diehard Republican loyalists to vote for Obama. What would be? There are always and have always been members of both parties who would sooner cut off useful parts of their anatomy than consider voting for a candidate from the other party – particularly in presidential races. There likely always will be such voters.

But for most of the voters who describe themselves as independents (with the notable exception of Bill O’Reilly, who, let’s face it, is about as independent as Puerto Rico), the difference between the two major candidates is clear, and those that have taken the time and trouble to listen to what both candidates have to say are showing a lot of concern about what they are hearing coming out of the McCain camp. And with each day that passes, it seems that a larger chunk of those independent voters have made the decision to support Obama.

And I do not believe that a terrorist attack at this point in the race would be sufficient to change that, or to assuage voters’ concerns about the chaos they are seeing in the McCain campaign.

So in spite of being both a Democrat and a Cubs fan, I am actually feeling less and less certain that the Democrats will find a way blow this thing between now and next Tuesday. Though of course, I suppose the election could still be stolen. Sort of like the last two presidential elections…

That’s it for now, my friends. I have to hit the road. I have a long drive ahead of me today.

-jane doe

Worth checking out: Interview with Howard Zinn

The folks over at the Real News Network have posted a series of videos (three so far) of their interview with historian Howard Zinn that I strongly encourage you to check out.

For those not in the know, Howard Zinn is a very well respected historian, political scientist and activist. He’s probably best known for his book, A People’s History of the United States, 1492 to Present, which presents a real eye-opening view of America’s history for those who only got the sanitized, government-approved version of US history in their journey through our wonderful, crumbling, increasingly more and more children left behind public schools. I’m most familiar with his A People’s History, but I would say that anything written by Zinn is worth checking out at your local library or independent bookseller. He’s like a more user-friendly Noam Chomsky.

In the first segment of this interview, Zinn talks about voting for Obama, the need for people to continue to be active after the election if we are going to see any real, substantive change, and particularly the need for civil disobedience in the face of looming problems like foreclosures.

The second segment focuses on the economic bail-out, problems with the free market and the theory of trickle-down economics, and the concept of “big government” and why it’s not necessarily the bad thing that Republicans paint it as – what’s important is what big things government chooses to do (i.e., social security, public works and infrastruscture, education, public health, and rational spending related to national defense vs. feeding the military-industrial complex and facilitating corporate greed and the interests of the wealthiest segment of America at the expense of the public interest).

The third segment deals with taxes and the concept of class warfare that is inherent in our nation’s tax structure.

It’s all very powerful stuff, and something that those of us concerned about how to fix the problems facing this country after eight years of George W. Bush should keep in mind.

-jane doe

Paranoia and politics

The stock market may be tanking, but my paranoia levels are soaring to new record highs with each passing day. If there were a way to make money off paranoia, I would be richer than Warren Buffett right now.

Sadly, this is not the case.

You’d think I’d be feeling relatively good about how the presidential election is going about now, wouldn’t you?

I mean, let’s face it, it’s rare that one gets to see the complete collapse of a national political campaign with just a little over three weeks left to go in the race. And the McCain campaign’s collapse has been nothing short of spectacular. Between McCain’s ongoing weirdness about the economic catastrofuck and his poor performance in the debates, and Palin’s scandals in Alaska and her appalling performance in interviews, not to mention the almost daily changes in major campaign platform components, the smear tactics that seem to be hurting McCain more than Obama, and the increasingly scary crowds at McCain campaign events…well, it’s been like this:

Yet I find myself unable to sleep, worrying about everything that can still go wrong.

Regular readers of this blog know that I’ve been harping on about terror management theory and its implications for our national politics for some time now. My first post on the subject – a rather lengthy primer on terror management theory and how it relates to the political world – was in June of 2007.*

At the time I wrote that post, I ventured into Paranoid Conspiracy Theory Land, where I speculated that persons with a vested interest in seeing that the Republicans retain control of the White House might use the principles of terror management theory to swing a presidential election where the Democratic candidate had a commanding lead in the polls in the weeks leading up to the election to something more to their liking.

The increasingly disturbing rhetoric we are seeing coming out of the McCain campaign, and particularly from Sarah Palin and other McCain surrogates. Attempts to paint Obama as somehow not really American, someone foreign, someone Muslim, someone who associates with terrorists – all of these are tactics one would expect coming from a group of people who are familiar with terror management theory. Ditto all the race-baiting tactics they’ve been using. They want to portray Obama as “other”, because “other” is scary and they want people good and scared.

The increasing ugliness that can be seen at McCain/Palin rallies in recent days – people calling Obama a terrorist or shouting “Kill him!” or “Off with his head!” are evidence that these tactics are succeeding at least with a small portion of their base. This is sad, but not terribly surprising. There has long been that ugly, racist side of America – the side a lot of whites at least like to think we’ve gotten past somehow (though most of my friends who are members of minority groups would tell them otherwise). To see it surfacing in such a blatant manner is very troubling, and points out again how easy it would be for our country to slide into outright fascism of the sort usually associated with Nazi Germany. (Assuming that we haven’t already crossed that line, anyway.)

Still, the poll numbers suggest that most voters are more focused on the economy – an area where McCain’s behavior has been truly erratic and unreassuring to most voters -  and thus have not been swayed by the fear tactics employed by the McCain camp. Likely all that McCain has managed to do is stir up a bit of a hornets’s nest among those who already were likely to vote for McCain anyway, while scaring off independent voters and more moderate Republicans.

This still raises the scary specter of assassination – as Frank Rich pointed out so ably in his column in the New York Times this weekend. (edit: hat-tip to jc on the column, btw) But let’s be frank, that’s been a threat with the Obama campaign from the early days of this campaign, and the Secret Service is all over it. All we can do is hope that they continue to do the excellent job they’ve generally done in protecting presidents and other important officials since the days of the Kennedy assassinations.

It would take something much larger than innuendo and subtle race-baiting to swing the kind of voter shift that McCain needs at this point. This is, in fact, consistent with terror management research. The stronger the “death prime” that induces mortality salience – that is, the awareness of one’s own mortality – the larger the reaction you will get in a population, in terms of number of people who will change their positions or be swayed to take a position they wouldn’t ordinarily.

In other words, as long as the economy is what most voters are most concerned with, all McCain’s fear tactics are unlikely to sway enough voters to tilt the election his way. He either needs to convince the voters that he can handle the economic mess – something that will be difficult for him to do given his behavior over the past few weeks – or he needs a very big BOOM! somewhere in the world, preferably (from his standpoint) somewhere in the U.S.

Don’t get me wrong. I do not believe for one moment that McCain would take any steps to engineer a big BOOM! that would endanger the lives of Americans. Despite all his nasty rhetoric lately, I still believe that McCain is a man who loves this country and sincerely believes that he would be a better leader for it than Barack Obama. I don’t agree with him on the latter point, but I most definitely acknowledge the former.

But that doesn’t mean that there aren’t others out there – people with the money and connections and lack of moral conscience necessary to make these things happen – who wouldn’t do so on his behalf. There are probably a lot of people – people in or associated with the current administration, people in the business world – who have a very strong interest in making sure that Republicans retain control of the executive branch of government. And some of those people I wouldn’t trust further than I could comfortably throw them when it comes to a choice between the lives of innocent Americans and their own pocketbooks.

Which is why I’ve been feeling so paranoid lately.

I think that there is a very high probability of some sort of attack somewhere on American soil in the next two weeks – particularly the next week. And this worries me a great deal.

It could cost the lives of Americans.

It could change the outcome of the election.

It could get us involved in a war.

And it could all be instigated not by foreign terrorists – Bin Laden and his groupies – but by Americans hoping to secure a political and economic future to their liking.

And it could work.

-jane doe

* My other posts on the subject of terror management theory can be found here.

Is it just my imagination…

…or is McCain completely blowing it on the debate?

Just askin’

-jd