Today's Stories

November 5, 2008

Cockburn / St. Clair
Why McCain Lost

Ishmael Reed
Morning in Obamerica

November 4, 2008

Kathleen Christison
McCain, Obama and Khalidi

James Ridgeway
A New World?

Winslow T. Wheeler
Cleaning Out the Pentagon Pig Sty

Mike Whitney
Obama's Little Red Book

Conn Hallinan
A New Foreign Policy

Holly M. Barker
The Inequities of Climate Change and the Small Island Experience

Ashley Smith
Where is the Occupation of Iraq Heading?

Andy Worthington
Guilty Verdict Fails to Justify Gitmo Trials

Martha Rosenberg
AIG: Too Big to Play Fair

Stephen Martin
Breakdown of the Globalisation Agenda

Doug Lummis
Full Moon Over Okinawa

Carlos Fierro
An Anarchist View of Elections

Website of the Day
La Pequeña as Sarah Palin

November 3, 2008

Patrick Cockburn
Friends Like These

John Kennedy O'Hara
Voter Lockdown: Prosecuting Voters

Peter Montague
Is Nuclear Power Green?

Steve Conn
Nader and the Youth Vote

Andrew Gebhardt
How Much Do the Differences Between Obama, McCain and Bush Really Matter?

Ron Jacobs
Bombing Syria: Borders are for Sissies

Ralph Nader
Between Hope and Reality: an Open Letter to Senator Obama

Niranjan Ramakrishnan
Cleaning Up After Bush

Uri Avnery
Obama and the Order of the Optimists

Dave Lindorff
Studs and Me

Fred Gardner
Adieu, Rimonabant

DC Larson
You Are How You Vote

David Michael Green
McCain Finally Gets Tough

Val Strange
Hopeless Hoi Polloi or Step in the Right Direction?

Tuli Kupferberg /
Jeffrey Lewis
Wailing Wall Street:
Bring Spare Money!

Website of the Day
Pranking Palin (the Uncut Version)

October 31 , 2008

Alexander Cockburn
Change You Can See

Jeffrey St. Clair
Killing Leroy Jackson: the Indian Wars Have Never Ended

Douglas Valentine
Giving Aid and Comfort to the Enemy: McCain's 14th Amendment Problem

Ismael Hossein-Zadeh
The Great Bailout Fraud: Misrepresenting the Financial Crisis

Dr. Ignacy Nowopolski
Is the Global Economy a Mistake? an Interview with Paul Craig Roberts

Alan Maass
What's So Funny About Peace, Love and Spreading the Wealth?

William P. O’Connor
Reflections of an Average Joe

Patrick Irelan
Johnny's Tantrums: McCain the "Gook Hater"

Brian Cloughley
Out of Control: Memo From Islamabad

Mats Svensson
The Last Dance in Ramallah

Binoy Kampmark
Into Syria We Went

Steve Conn
The Future of Ted and Sarah

Alan Farago
The Division of Florida: the Politics of Growth

Morton Skorodin
The Bush-Obama-McCain Administration

Robert Bryce
Not McCain

Wajahat Ali
Dear John McCain, Please Stop...

David Yearsley
Palin's Flute, Obama's Voice

Dennis Loo
What to Do with Bush and Cheney?

Pam Martens
Why 2008 Feels Like 1932

Stephen Martin
Defense Strategies in Economic Warfare

Richard Rhames
Nothing for Something: the Doomed Rustic's Lament

Ramzy Baroud
A Third Palestinian Intifada

Missy Beattie
I'm Sick of Their Voices

Howard Lisnoff
Burning Reason: More From the Religious Right

Richard Neville
Pickled Heads: First the Revelation, Then the Revolution

Saul Landau /
Farrah Hassan
Bush Ultra Lite: Oliver Stone's Oedipal Problem

Kim Nicolini
Max Payne: Vigilante Violence as Sex Story

Lorenzo Wolff
Dance to the Music--or Else!

Poets' Basement
Four Poems from the Japanese Trans. by Rexroth

Website of the Weekend
Art Against Empire

October 30, 2008

Cockburn / St. Clair
McCain's Women Problems

Vijay Prashad
Smearing Rashid Khalidi

Paul Craig Roberts
World Tires of Rule by Dollar

Glen Ford
Turning the Tide of Ethnic Cleansing in America's Cities

Stanley Heller
Wall Street Bonus Madness

William Loren Katz
"Kill Him!:" a Political Chronicle

Joshua Frank
Memo to Progressives for Obama: What Happens After the Election?

James McEnteer
The Year of Unreliable Witnesses

Felice Pace
The Big Change: Can "Civic Unreasonableness" Save the Earth?

Jonathan Cook
The Executions at Kafr Qassem

Reza Fiyouzat
Boycott the Elections!

Website of the Day
An Open Letter to Whole Foods

October 29, 2008

Arno J. Mayer
The US Empire will Survive Bush

Eric Toussaint
How the Food and Financial Crises are Interconnected

Matt Gonzalez
What Do They Have to Do to Lose Your Vote?

Steven Conn
Obama and the Camp Followers

Jonathan Cook
Israel Bars Visit to a Father's Grave

Patrick Bond
Strauss-Kahn Strikes Again!

Ramzi Kysia
A Freedom Rider in Gaza City

Douglas Valentine
A Glimpse Inside the Head of Joe the Plumber

Stephen Martin
What America is Owed

Margaret Dooley-Sammuli
Alternatives to Incarceration

Amee Chew
Support Obama, Vote McKinney?

Website of the Day
N-Word Chant Doesn't Phase Palin

October 28, 2008

James G. Abourezk
How to Bail Out the Taxpayers

Andy Worthington
The Empty Chair at Guantánamo

Gary Leupp
The Specter of the Sixties: Palin v. Ayers

Paul Craig Roberts
The End of the American Road

Mike Whitney
Meet the World's New Currency

Gregory V. Button
What the Next President Must Do to Save FEMA

Ralph Nader
Share the Sacrifices, Share the Benefits

P. Sainath
Haunted by Socialism

Martha Rosenberg
Melting Pot in Hell

Charles R. Larson
Palin/Wurzelbacher 2012!

Website of the Day
Why You Can't See Across the Grand Canyon

October 27, 2008

Michael Hudson
Scenes From the Global Class War

Barbara Rose Johnston
The Clean, Green Nuclear Machine?

John Dinges
Palling Around with Dictators: McCain and Pinochet

Mike Whitney
Chickenhawks and the Horrors of War

Mary Lynn Cramer Greenspan's Higher Power

Alan Farago
Origins of the Fall

David Michael Green
Remind Me Again: Who Won the Cold War?

Andy Worthington
The Collapse of Omar Khadr's Guantánamo Trial

George Wuerthner
Is Ranching Sustainable? The Story of Bob the Rancher

Niranjan Ramakrishnan
The Obamanations of Barack

Website of the Day
Heartland of Darkness

October 24 / 26, 2008

Alexander Cockburn
Waiting for the Curtain to Rise

Ishmael Reed
Boogiemen: How Lee Atwater Perfected the G.O.P.'s Appeal to Racism

Mike Whitney
Down for the Count

Don Santina
How Maria Fell: Death in the Central Valley

Scott Boehm
Manufacturing Sympathy: Palin, Special Needs and Identity Politics

Saul Landau
Faith-Based Surge: Whining About Winning in Iraq

Ron Jacobs
Iraq and the Arrogance of Washington

Binoy Kampmark
Afghanistan the Un-Winnable

Linn Washington Jr.
The Great Vote Fraud Hoax

Nicole Colson
Mocking Our Rights: McCain's Disdain for Women's Health

Bernard Chazelle
The Humorology of Power

Brian Jones
Campaign by Codeword

Christopher Brauchli
Down the Drain with McCain's Vetters

Benjamin Dangl
Bolivia Rejects Neoliberalism

Val Strange
The Fraternity of John McCain: Scenes from North Carolina

Joe Mowrey
Name That Candidate: He Supports Petraeus, the Death Penalty, the Bailout, Nuclear Power, the Occupation...

Steve Early
SEIU Learns the Meaning of "No"

David Macaray
Patriotism and the Labor Movement

Allison Kilkenny
You Have the Right to Airport Harassment

Richard Rhames
Open Season

Jim Bell
Nuclear Power's Big Con

Kris De Welde
Domestic Violence and Financial Stress

Barry Clemson
John Wayne Syndrome

Adam Engel
Last Exit to Disneyland

Mark Scaramella
The World's Weirdest Pipe Organ?

Tuli Kupferberg
Nobody for President: the Original Version (Annotated)

Lorenzo Wolff
A Frustrated, Broken-Hearted Joy from Kidnapkin

Poets' Basement
Gibbons, Swartzfager and Payne

Website of the Weekend
Patrick Cockburn Dismantles the Surge

October 23, 2008

Allan J. Lichtman
What Voter Fraud?

Todd Chretien
Why I'm Not Voting for Obama

John Ross
No Child Left Behind, Mexican-Style

Peter Morici
Strategies to End the Crisis

Mats Svensson
Short Film Clips at a Checkpoint

Marlene Martin
Don't Let Them Execute an Innocent Man

Robert Jensen /
Pat Youngblood
Looking Beyond the Election and Beyond Elections

Margaret Kimberley
Rightwing Obama Love

Deepak Tripathi
Post-Bush Scenarios

David Morris
Why Joe the Plumber is a Socialist (And You Are, Too)

Website of the Day
Voting While Black in North Carolina

October 22, 2008

Brian Cloughley
Kid Killers are Barbarians

Heather Gray
Raising Hell in the South: the Legacy of J. L. Chestnut, Jr.

Jeff Birkenstein
McCain's Disdain for Spain

Ralph Nader
The Song Remains the Same: Convergence and Avoidance in the Presidential Election

DC Larson
The Growing of a Heartland Nader Raider

David Swanson
Colin Powell, Not Qualified for Government Service

Keeanga-Yamatta Taylor Race and the Election: When the "Real" America Enters the Voting Booth

Larry Everest
9/11 and the Imperial Adventure in Afghanistan

Robert Fantina
Anything to Win

Martha Rosenberg
The Financier's Playbook

Stephen Martin
Giving It Up to the Combine

Website of the Day
Brokers with Hands on Their Faces

October 21, 2008

Vijay Prashad
Wealth's Apostles

Paul Craig Roberts
How Inflation Works: Why I Can't Buy an Old Ferrari

Corey D. B. Walker
Empire and White Supremacy

Steve Breyman
How to "Win" in Afghanistan

Eric Toussaint
The Economic Crisis and Latin America: Time to Delink

Wajahat Ali
Boo Radley Comes Out to Play: the Emerging Muslim-American Electorate

Robert Weitzel
Wasting a Vote for Lincoln's Radical Ideal (Or Why I'm Voting for Nader)

Brendan Cooney
Palinoscopy: an Exploration of Why Liberals are So Obsessed with Sarah Palin

Dave Lindorff
Cuba's Oil Reserves: a Game-Changer?

Marqueece Harris-Dawson / Bob Wing
When You're a Black Candidate There's No Such Thing as a Safe Lead

Patrick B. Barr
Socialist, Socialist, SOCIALIST!

Omar Barghouti
The Boycott and Palestinian Groups: Countering the Critics

Website of the Day
How to Dismantle a US War Plane (and Get Away With It)

October 20, 2008

Michael Hudson
The ABCs of Paulson's Bailout

Anthony DiMaggio
The Scandal That Never Was: ACORN, Rightwing Media and Election "Fraud"

Tariq Ali
Zardari Bans My Books

Uri Avnery
Is Akko Burning?

Bill Quigley
Hammered by the Swedes

Ben Rosenfeld
The Politics of St. Joe, Martyr to a Lie

David Michael Green
Payback's a Bitch: McCain on the Ash Heap

William S. Lind
The Afghanistan Advantage

Chris Genovali
Drill, Baby, Drill (Wink, Wink)

Stephen Martin
The Last Man in America

Howard Lisnoff
Bad News for War Resisters

David Yearsley
Organ Meat

Website of the Day
Our Brother is Sick: the Steve Ferguson Cancer Fund

October 17 / 19, 2008

Alexander Cockburn
Blow Ups and Bombers

Jeffrey St. Clair
Inside Hanford: a Trip to America's Most Toxic Place

Pam Martens
How the Banksters are Making a Killing Off the Bailout

Paul Craig Roberts
Government of Thieves

Mike Whtney
No More Investment Banks

Michael D. Yates
Bowling Alley Blues: Racism Dies Hard in Johnstown, PA

Suzanne Smith
The Energy-War Connection: McCain Said It, Why Don't We?

Carl Boggs
Prosecuting Bush

Ralph Nader
Closing the Courthouse Doors

Fidel Castro
The Global Crash

Dave Marsh
The Great Levi Stubbs

Saul Landau
Denial, the Election Musical Comedy

Jo Guldi
The Floods of Heaven

Kevin Zeese
Now the Cost of War Really Matters

Larry Everest
Afghanistan, Not a Good War Gone Bad

Steve Early
Stop, in the Name of Joe!

David Macaray
Hey, Joe

Ben Terrall
When Ike Hit Haiti

Missy Beattie
Palin and God's Children

Don Monkerud
American Exceptionalism

Helen Redmond
Health Care Now's Big Con

Dan Bacher
Schwarzenegger's Delta Vision: Canals and Dams to Bail Out Big Ag

Wajahat Ali
Bush Gets Stoned

Farzana Versey
The White Tiger's Stripes and Gripes

Vladimir Frolov
Medvedev to Obama: We Come Not to Bury America, But to Buy It

Kim Nicolini
Frozen River: At Last, a Great Movie That's Neither Hip Nor Cool

Poets Basement
Gibbons, Corsale, Davis and Fleming

Website of the Day
The Real Sarah Palin?

November 5, 2008

"Time Loves a Hero, But Only Time Will Tell

The Rebooting of America, 2008

By MICHAEL DONNELLY

“That’s all I can stands. I can’t stands no more.”
- Popeye the Sailor

Rudy Giuliani has the lead, but Hillary’s not conceding.

A year ago, halfway through this interminable election, all the pundits had it Hillary Clinton vs. Giuliani. New York Neo-Lib vs. Neo-Con. A few months later, the pundits woke up and found out that there is, indeed, a country west of the Hudson.

Today, the mean-spirited Christian Taliban who hijacked the Republican Party woke up and found out that their nightmare came true and That One – the secret Arab, Muslim, Terrorist Redistributionist – was elected by folks who just couldn’t stands it no more. They also found out that their belief that “pro-American parts of the country” would be the key to advancing their theocratic notions was, to quote Bill Clinton, “a fairy tale” – a vicious, racist, soundly rejected one at that.

Which brings me to what pissed me off the most this election: no, not the nasty attacks I received from Ralph Nader supporters for writing that it was time to turn it all over to the Dems, as they are complicit, after all. No, it was the GOP strategy of seeking to win by dividing people based on the basest of “identity” politics.

Real America

Even Mike Huckabee, he of the floating cross ad, wasn’t nasty enough - anti-Christ-like enough - for these rabid folks. He, after all, had some weird Christian populist notions like caring for others. The “real” Americans wouldn’t have Mitt Romney, either. Though his conservative Mormonism and “blessed by God” wealthy elitism was right up their nave, they are after all, equal opportunity bigots. And, for them, Mormonism hasn’t been around long enough to shed its “cult” status.

So, they finally settled on the unprincipled, unhinged faux War Hero. Said war hero was more than willing to discard any convenient-at-the-time, past beliefs and adopt whatever furthered his one consistent belief – John McCain First!

But, first he had to prove his conversion was real. So, McCain searched long and hard (one fifteen-minute meeting) and picked Alaska Governor Sarah Palin to carry the cross. The right-wing theocrats drooled all over themselves at the choice and gleefully signed on for the us saved -versus-the-infidels trip; no matter the, as yet, unchecked baggage. Wink. Wink.

Can you just imagine the “Christian” response if one of Obama’s daughters was an unwed, pregnant 17-year-old with an alcohol problem – if the drop-out stud “baby daddy” proudly claimed to be a “gangsta” on Facebook? Or, if Hillary had used her clout to try and get a government employee fired? – oh, yeah, I forget. Can you imagine if folks were distributing images of Michelle Obama with an AK-47? Oh, yeah, again.

Palin jumped into her role with gusto. No matter that she was incoherent on real policy issues. She could “connect” with the racist underbelly of “real America.” And, she had the looks – a Rush-approved “babe” - in American Idol Nation. I found it astonishing that NBC ended its Election Eve national newscast with a piece on how Saturday Night Live influenced the perception of Palin and thus, the election! Mind you, NOT the Couric interviews. Accurate, of course, but surprising in its honesty - and not just network loyalty.

And, just in case Palin wasn’t fully up to it (she convincingly was on the “real America” part), then there was the fall-back fraud of Sam the Sham Plumber. Good Gaia! The media fell for that? Do they vet anyone on the Right? Can you imagine if say, MSNBC, ambushed McCain with a twice-divorced, tax-dodging, wife-beating, unlicensed, unemployed plumber - complete with ludicrous lie about being, or fantasizing being, an overtaxed $250,000+ per year profit small business owner? Wurzelbacher once lived in Wasilla, Alaska. He once lived in an Arizona condo on Keating Way, built by none other than McCain’s felonious former benefactor Charles Keating, Jr. “Joe” could very well be related to Keating. That’s just too many coincidences. What is it with the media and failing to investigate virtually any GOP claims? WMDs anyone? What is it with the GOP and “plumbers?”

My parents grew up in Palin/Wurzelbacher’s “real America” in the conservative heartland where Michigan, Indiana and Ohio come together. Numerous relatives still live there. The Ku Klux Klan burned a cross outside my great-grandparent’s farmhouse as they didn’t want any “non-American” Irish homesteading there. It didn’t matter that the Irish wing of my family came to America in 1746, ancestors fought in the Revolutionary War or that Gen. Abner Doubleday was my great-grandfather’s uncle. All that mattered were that they were “other.”

That experience later led my parents to stay in inner city Flint as white flight saw our neighborhood change from ethnic white working class to African-American working class in less than five years. It wasn’t an easy place to be a white teenage boy, but the experience taught me that all this stuff about who are the “real Americans” is a deadly cancer that must be excised from the body politic; banned from use as a wedge by ambitious, conscienceless elitists of any political or religious persuasion or ethnic background.

So, yeah, that part of it and the prospect of more to come – four years of such attacks on Obama (making their endless attacks on Bill Clinton seem like childplay) was and will be insufferable. But, unlike the liberal Dems as a whole, Obama has proven he can stand up to bullies; i.e. Bill Clinton. It’s one of his best traits. And, I’m more than ready for the end of 216 years of white, male presidents.

There will be plenty of legitimate reasons to oppose Obamian policies without suffering through any more malignant, Rovian crap. And oppose Obama we will; on justifiable grounds; whenever necessary. He is, after all, an Imperial President-elect now.

The Quality of the Campaigns

“Well they say time loves a hero
but only time will tell
If he's real, he's a legend from heaven
If he ain't he was sent here from hell”
-- Little Feat

Obama is refreshingly intelligent and talks to people like they’re adults in a time when people have more than had it with the twisted anti-intellectualism of the GOP. Obama ran a next to perfect campaign. He had to. There was the “bitter” gaffe, the smug “you’re likeable enough” riposte to Clinton and his lame attempt to co-opt the Joe the Plumber nonsense at Debate Three. But, not much else. He kept a far tighter rein on Biden than McCain did on Caribou Barbie – something that actually influenced the outcome.

Forget the hostility and negativity that defined the McCain campaign. Speaking just to the quality of campaigning, can you just imagine “my fellow prisoners,” if Obama had botched things like this one where McCain took a swipe at Jack Murtha and Obama?

"You know, I think you may have noticed that Senator Obama's supporters have been saying some pretty nasty things about Western Pennsylvania lately. And you know, I couldn't agree with them more. I couldn't disagree with you... I couldn't agree with you more than the fact that Western Pennsylvania is the most patriotic, most god-loving, most, most patriotic part of America, and this is a great part of the country."

Or if Obama had said something this inane, which McCain did in response to Chris Wallace on Fox Noise?

"So is one of the tenets of socialism redistribution of the wealth? Not just socialism — a lot of other liberal and left wing philosophies — redistribution of the wealth? I don't believe in it. I believe in wealth creation by Joe the Plumber."

And what about Joe? This one was surreal, though surreal seems to be the default mode for McCain:

"Joe’s with us today. Joe, where are you? Where is Joe? Is Joe here with us today? Joe, I thought you were here today…. You’re all Joe the Plumber. So stand up and say that ‘I thank you.’"

Huh?

The myth that the corporate media were in the tank for Obama from the beginning is ludicrous. If Obama had made just one of these gaffes (and these are but a fraction of McCain’s total) the right-wing media would have never let up – witness the Ayers buffoonery. As opposed to what they did to John Kerry, the media did everything they could to avoid close inspection of McCain’s actual military record – if this “hero” was real. They failed to demand his (and Palin’s) medical records after they went ballistic about Bubba’s or McCain’s full military records like they did with Kerry. The “just what is he (she) hiding?” bogus outrage doesn’t apply to the GOP, it appears.

Holding Obama Accountable from “Day One”

We’ll know soon enough how hard we’ll have to fight bad Obama policy. Even before Inauguration Day, we’ll know. Who Obama picks for his “team” will be all-telling. At first, I was offended at Obama’s calling out the Baby Boomers as a whole, not just the sorry lot of politicians my generation has produced. If President Obama fails to break completely with the narcissistic Baby Boomer politicians; we’ll know. If he keeps Gates at Defense or appoints Powell in his place; we’ll know. If he recycles Gore’s ghost writer and greenwasher-in-chief Katy McGinty at Interior; we’ll know. If he anoints Gore, himself, as some sort of Climate Change Czar; we’ll know. If he puts Zbiggy or Kerry at State; we’ll know. (Though, I would certainly enjoy the howls from the Right should he appoint Hillary or Bill Richardson as Attorney General.)

We’ll know soon enough if he intends to take on the prison-industrial complex; end the War on Drugs and stand down the private, mercenary armies like Blackwater.

How Obama will deal with the contraction of the Empire will also be quickly known. As Bill Bennett, of all folks has written, the Empire is an “extravagance” that we must stand down. If a plan to retreat from our 700 – 1000 overseas military installations isn’t developed soon, the country will be rapidly bankrupt and Obama will be a one-termer, for certain. The economic havoc wrought by not abolishing the empire will destroy any chance of gaining Universal Health Care like the civilized Democracies. Gone also will be any chance of a public works program to rebuild infrastructure.

Very few people mourn the demise of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Spanish Empire, the Japanese Empire or even the British Empire these days. The world and we ourselves will be far better off once the “American Century” is over with. It’d be far cheaper (in money and lives) to just buy the remaining oil. (One thing I do give McCain unintended credit for is that he made it quite clear during his despicable campaign that the wars and occupations are all about oil.)

Alexander Cockburn dropped the definitive marker as to what Obama has seriously wrong about him and just what progressives will have to do to hold his feet to the fire.

(Somehow though noting its mirror image, he missed the abuse directed at Obama voters by Nader deadenders. I can provide him with e-mail copies. Of course, only Nader is right on the issues! But, what’s the point anymore? There is not an iota of evidence that Nader’s many runs, like those of Gus Hall before him, have moved the Democrats one inch our way; nor, much evidence that the public supports him given Peak Nader has clearly come and gone. Actual election? Impossible. Just as for the Boomer Democrats, it’s time for Nader to step aside and allow space for new leadership.)

Popeye the Sailor trumps Joe the Plumber

Ultimately, this election was about a citizenry that “couldn’t stands no more.” The old GOP black magic of “Fear, Hate, Tax Cuts for the Rich and PermaWar” just didn’t work this time. Neither the recent pseudo-recovery on Wall Street aided by Bush’s Plunge Protection Team – the same inept folks who oversaw the crash – nor the recent drop at the gas pump worked. Neither did the usual dirty tricks, like calling voters in several states with text messages or sending e-mails urging Obama supporters to put off voting until Wednesday because of the long voting lines – said long lines themselves being a clever kind of new poll tax. In Canada, they use paper ballots and have the election tabulated within a couple hours. Here in Oregon, we use mail-in paper ballots that are scanned and some are doubly hand-counted for control – the system has worked flawlessly for over a decade with a far higher average participation rate than most states. So, just who benefits from the unaccountable machines and the long lines necessary to use them? Democracy? Hardly.

Americans were treated to a raw display of looting by the wealthy classes during Bushtime – both Bushtimes. It’s no mere coincidence that the trillion dollar Savings & Loan heist (see Charles Keating, Jr.) took place on Reagan and Bush the Elder’s watch and that the Enron and Lehman Bros. crimes and this Fall’s trillion dollar looting took place under Bush the Lesser. Neil Bush’s Silverado Savings and Loan collapsed in 1988, costing taxpayers $1.3 billion. “Redistribution” anyone? Americans have finally awakened to the 20-year-long crime spree of these repeat offenders.

Somehow McCain’s “brain trust” never figured out that the “real America of Joe the Plumber” is a distinct demographic minority. Less than 50 million Americans live in the - let’s brutally decode it - ill-informed, white, rural areas of the “real Joe” meme. It didn’t work for a desperate HRC and it didn’t work for McCain. Yet, the GOP’s already off and running with it again. It’s an integral part of their post-mortem denials.

After eight years of a smug, me-first, fake down-home scion of privilege (“Bush the Cowboy?”) with daddy issues driving the country off a cliff, REAL Americans just couldn’t see yet another, more unhinged version in the White House – “McCain the War Hero” who can only top his admiral daddy and granddaddy by becoming commander-in chief.

It was nice to see the old Goldwater conservative and the Rockefeller social liberal wings of the GOP split off this time – downright heartening to see the logical consistency of Christopher Buckley and other conservatives.

Bible Spice 2012

Somewhat unfortunately though, the voter disgust with the neo-Cons has led to the rout of “moderate” Republicans. Though the Gordon Smiths of the GOP fully deserved their fate after fanning fears, abridging Constitutional Rights, conducting a one-sided Class War, and enabling Bush all these years; it does mean that the Christian Taliban elements are all that’s left standing and are who the party will regroup around – leading to more “real America” cancer and the Bible Spice 2012 campaign which began a few weeks ago on Saturday Night Live.

MICHAEL DONNELLY has no illusions about Obama and no illusions that the complicit Democrats will ever hold the thieving traitors accountable. He can be reached at pahtoo@aol.com

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Greenspan’s Confession

For his 20-year stretch as Fed chairman, they all fawned on him – presidents, Congress, the press. Only a handful of left economists said he was pushing the economy over the cliff. Now Greenspan admits it in a humiliating confession. As the world’s financial structure tumbles in ruins, guess what? “I found a flaw in the model… To the extent that I figure out where it happened and why, I will change my views.”  Read Frederick Claremont’s savage assessment of the fool who has plunged millions into misery. Also in our new issue: Bill Hatch on the story of one foreclosure; and Kristian Williams on police torture in Chicago.

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