This time Next Week...

We can wake up with a new sense of optimism, renewal and dare I say, hope! We can wake up exhausted from doing all we can do, watching our just rewards come in and partying the night away. Or we can stop pedaling now, raise our arms in victory before the race is done and wake up exhausted from the now too real prospect of Sarah Palin being within a (72 year old) heartbeat of being the President. Please don't let the "great" poll numbers stop you from contributing; time, money and your powers of persuasion over the undecided and/or lazy in your midst over the next six days. And please, please, vote; long lines, cold and wet weather and bullshit voter challenges be damned!

Barack has said the same (much better then I can say it) and will again tonight, on every network except ABC. Watch, work (especially on election day), VOTE, and then we will all get to CELEBRATE!!!

You're Ready to Bring About Change, but Can You Vote??

The McCain campaign is down to a "narrow victory" strategy, focusing on a few key states to eke out victory in, without any real hope of a nationwide popular vote victory.  Part of that strategy appears to be straight out the Rove playbook of voter suppression of constituncies that are likely to support Obama, in order to get those small victories; and ginning up "massive voter registration fraud scandals" to make any losing results for their man become "tainted."  

In the suppression arena, the GOP gets a big assist from provisions in the not quite correctly titled "Help America Vote Act" passed in 2002.  In 2004, the first election after the law passed, over 3 million votes were cast and not counted.  Investigative journalist Greg Palast, the man that first brought us the story of the "felon purge lists" in Florida in 2000, along with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., tells the whole story of the ways that voter suppression is being committed.  They do it in two ways; in an explosive Rolling Stone article and  in comic book form.

Here are the 6 ways that Palast tells us that "they're trying to steal your vote":

1)  "Bust the League"- As in the League of Women Voters.  The League does voter registration drives, and since new voters are usually Democratic voters, Republicans don't like them.  So what do they do?  In Florida the Republican Governor and legislature of Florida, made voter-drive groups subject to a $5000 fine for every voter form they submitted with any errors.  You can imagine how many groups that conduct voter drives can afford fines for 100 (or even 10) mistakes.

2) "The Purge'n General"- One aspect of the Help America Vote Act is the provision that requires states to match the identities of new registrants to government records.  Now that partisan Secretaries of States, instead of bipartisan election boards are in control of their states' registration apparatus, this has allowed from some mighty shady purges.  Then you turn organizations that register voters, like, say ACORN, into the perpetrators of, "one of the greatest frauds in voter historyin this country, maybe destroying the fabric of democracy." When the stakes are that high these mass purges of voters start to seem a little more justified right (maybe that's why John McCain said it in front of his last debate audience)?  One of the most horrendous cases has been in Colorado (a big time swing state) where as many as 20% of voters were taken off of the rolls.  The Colorado Secretary of State's punishment for this? She was appointed as Chairman of the US Elections Assistance Commission; she'll "police the whole nation’s vote in November."  Great!!

3) "Spoiling America"- In 2004, over 1.3 million votes were not counted at all, because they were "spoiled"; "supposedly unreadable, blank, or just somehow lost in the machines."    And spoilage does not occur equally, Black votes are 900%,  and Hispanic ones 500%, more likely to be spoiled then white votes. 

4)"Provisional Democracy"-  3,000,000 provisional ballots were given to "questionable" voters in 2004.  1/3 of those votes were thrown out.  'Nuff said.

5) "Votes Gone Postal"- Idaho will send new voters absentee ballots, then throw them out when they're sent back.  Why? Because new voters in Idaho have to appear with their ID to vote legitimately.  So many states have strange technicalities like this that aren't well known, and they won't let you know if they throw your ballot out.  It leads to 10% of absentee ballots getting tossed.  

6) "Nuns on the Run"- Who doesn't have a state ID in this day and age?  Well, nuns for one, the elderly that aren't driving anymore for two, students that haven't gotten an ID in a state that they go to school in for three and Black people for four, five and six.   In Indiana there are about 400,000 Black voters and 28% of them do not carry the necessary ID to vote in that state.  That's 100,000 Black voters that can't vote in a state that Hillary won in the primaries by 14,000 votes.  

Pretty scary stuff, but you can make sure that your vote counts.  The 7 Steps laid out (in greater detail), by Palast and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in the stealbackyourvote.org  comic are:

1) Don't Don't Don't Mail In Your Ballot

2) Vote Early...Very Early

3) Register and Register and Register

4) Vote Unconditionally, Not Provisionally

5) Occupy Ohio, Invade Nevada (or stay home and phone bank on Election Day)

6) Date a Voter

7) Make the Democracy Demand: No Vote Left Behind

I didn't explain the list because you MUST go read the article and comic yourself, then spread the word!

Enough Palin, Here's a Women that's Trying to be Funny and Offensive

Sarah Silverman lends her objectionable talents to "The Great Schlep" a movement to get young Jews to go down to Florida and convince their grandparents to vote Obama (I'm not kidding). My favorite part is when she compares her Nana to a Black man to show the similarities (starting with a shared love of track suits and going downhill from there).  We all can find our own way to pitch in, here are 5 ways that you can (besides schleping to see Nana...

1) Convince your undecideds- Whether they don't like Black people, are Black people but think Obama isn't "real" enough, are Republicans that are ready to rehab or Dems that still aren't over Hillary (or Kucinich), people that they trust are the ones that they are going to listen to the most.  You're trustworthy right?

2) Phone Bank- You can call voters in the nearest toss-up state and give "straight talk" to your fellow voters.  You can do it from your bedroom or find the nearest phone bank site to you.  

3) Contribute- Money makes the world go round, and it sure makes politics go round.  You can pitch in easily, by going to my donation page.  I'm 1/4 of the way to my $1,000 goal, thanks for getting me closer...

4) Knock on Doors- I did this in '04, for a candidate that was much harder to advocate for, and it was a blast (except for the losing part)!  Nothing is more impactful then person to person contact and you're a person right?

5) Don't Forget to Vote- In the midst all your work don't lose your voice.  Make sure you're registered and that you vote!

Palin Debate Preview: The Hits just keep on coming...

So, THE debate night is here, and I don't know about you but I'm more excited then Raiders fans are about having our 5th coach in 6 years (okay bad example, I actually am excited about the debate, as for the Raiders...).  Since her exuberant introduction a few short weeks ago the Sarah Palin story has been... well, "amazing" just doesn't quite say enough to describe what following along with her story has been.

First we have the scandals:

Troopergate: The governor was accused of using the influence of her office to get the Department of Public Safety Commissioner to fire her State Trooper ex-brother in law.  He refused, so Palin fired the Commissioner.  At first Governor Palin was all for the investigation looking into this, until she started to be on the McCain-Palin ticket that is.  Now she's directing her staff to ignore subpoenas and McCain campaign operatives are trying to shut the investigation down.  Sound like an administration we know?

Bristolgate:

The scandal's not that her teenage daughter is pregnant out of wedlock, I personally don't think that the actions of a candidate's child should really be relevant (although I think that a pregnant teenage Obama daughter might be a topic of conversation in the media); it's that her children are named, Bristol, Track, Willow, Piper and Trig, or am I the  only one that's bothered by this?   

Then we have the interviews:

The Charlie Gibson Interview: Highlights include Ms. Palin, who's running to be the second most powerful person in the free world, clearly having no idea what the "Bush Doctrine" is and saying that she has foreign policy experience because she can see Russia from her State.  This interview was bad, but it was nothing compared to....

The Katie Couric interview:  Katie was being so nice, she kept that, "help me, help you" tone throughout the interview, and used friendly terms like, "Could you explain what you meant..."  That said, Ms. Couric did demand her answers, if she asked for specifics and received vague talking points she'd ask a second, and third time for an actual specific, rarely getting one.  The hit list from this doozy (if you haven't seen these clips, brace yourself:

-Governor Palin not being able to name any specific regulation that John McCain supported as a Senator, besides his call for greater oversight of Fanny Mae and Freddie Mac.  Can't really blame her for this one though, I don't think that there is one.

-Governor Palin explaining how being close to Russia gives her foreign policy experience, again, in a much more frightenening show of ineptitude.  At one point she actually quits in the middle of a sentence because she's not sure what she's trying to say (Katie helps her out though...).

-Governor Palin's "thoughts" on the bailout are about as coherent as Miss South Carolina on foreign affairs (or Sarah Palin on foreign affairs for that matter).  Newsweek columnist Fareed Zakaria told CNN that her answer to Couric's question on this topic made him think that, " It's scary to think that this person could be running the country." (he said much more about her in his Newsweek column, "Palin is ready? Please.") 

-Governor Palin not being able to name one newspaper or magazine that she reads regularly.

...and the Pièce de résistance:

-Governor Palin not being able to name a Supreme Court decision that she disagrees with besides "Roe V. Wade."  She also says that she believes in a right to privacy, the argument upon which Roe V. Wade is built.  Wow...

This stuff would be hilarious if she wasn't so close to being the President!!!

To prove that this would be funny I bring you, The Saturday Night Live Stuff:

-The Palin-Clinton skit, which was really funny, and honestly seems to have given the press the balls to start to question Palin's credibility (which isn't so funny.  A sketch comedy show is where American journalism gets its cues now? Scary...).

-The Couric-Palin skit which is even funnier, until you realize that large portions of Tina Fey's "impression" are near exact quotes of the actual Palin interview (SCARY!).

So now you're ready for what may be the most entertaining, and terrifying, Vice Presidential debate in History.  Enjoy, and think about what John McCain has to think about you and this country in order to choose her to be his running mate...