maybe there's something to racial profiling after all

Bill Maher comments on white people:

And finally, New Rule: A candidate for president should not be judged by the color of his skin. And to - and to anyone who thinks differently, I say, please do not reject John McCain just because he's white. I think the recent news from Wall Street has made us all less tolerant, and only reinforced the stereotype that white people are shiftless, thieving welfare queens.

Now, take a look at these pictures. Here are the CEO's of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, AIG and the Lehman Brothers. I know the first thing that jumps out about these faces is they all happen to be white, and they all happen to be responsible for stealing. But, what you have to understand is that these whites are a product of a society that made them that way.

It was the neighborhoods and the schools they went to: Harvard, Yale, the Wharton School of Business.

They never learned the value of doing real, actual work. And the first step to fixing that is better role models so kids growing up white today don't think the only way out of Westchester is corporate crime.

Or a government handout. Or sailing.

So, I get it. The temptation is to look at McCain and vote against him because you don't see an individual; you just see another typical welfare "whitey."

And it's true. He spent his entire life shuffling from one low-paying government job to another. Well, except those years he spent in prison. Typical. And, between you and me, he's not very articulate.

Oh, he may have some street smarts, but he's not what you'd call an "educated" man. He freely admits he's ignorant about the economy. And apparently the only thing his white running mate knows how to do is crank out one baby after another.

And now, of course, her teenage is pregnant out of wedlock, because she learns it at home!

But, that doesn't mean we should assume all white people are like that just because so many of them are. I believe there is hope. I believe even the stupidest, greediest, laziest whites can break the cycle of dependence, like this November when we finally move George Bush out of public housing.

Political correctness be damned ...!

Capitalism sure is fragile if subprime borrowers can ruin it

The GOP Blames the Victim

Two weeks ago, I wrote that the breakdown of the nation's financial industry was undeniably a self-induced injury; that it would finally force conservatives to own up to the wrongheadedness of their deregulatory project; that they couldn't possibly blame the disaster on any of their traditional bogeymen.

But I had forgotten about conservatives' extraordinary instincts for blame-evasion. This is a movement, after all, that blandly recasts its greatest idols as traitors once their popularity has crashed; that routinely sloughs off responsibility for . . . well . . . anything since, by its logic, conservatism has never really been tried in the first place. Consider in this respect Mitt Romney's remarkable speech to the Republican convention a few weeks ago, in which he rallied his party against Washington -- a place his party has controlled, to one degree or another, for nearly three decades -- by listing the city's various institutions and crying, "It's liberal!"

Or consider the way the House Republicans torpedoed the bailout bill a few days ago. The real reason they did it was almost certainly to evade responsibility for an unpopular measure but the announced reason seemed designed to convince the nation's 7-year-olds -- because Nancy Pelosi said something mean.

On economic questions the standard exculpatory maneuver is even simpler. When some free-market scheme blows up, one needs only find an institution of government in close proximity to the wreckage and commence accusing.

Thus we hear from some on the right that the disaster on Wall Street was the handiwork not of those with unbridled pecuniary motives but of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which were government-sponsored enterprises and therefore partially exempt from market discipline and of theoretical necessity the sole culprits.

THOMAS FRANK of the WSJ points out a few problems with the GOP blame-game over the sub-prime mortgage melt-down.

read the whole thing here

L-O-freaking-L!!!

we just can't resist wallowing in sublime BDS-ecstasy - we just can't!!!

Those who have left us - Paul Newman

Paul Newman dead at age 83

Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it ...

"It's a miracle!"

Evolutionists Flock To Darwin-Shaped Wall Stain


Darwinic pilgrims claim the image fills them with an overwhelming feeling of logic.

DAYTON, TN—A steady stream of devoted evolutionists continued to gather in this small Tennessee town today to witness what many believe is an image of Charles Darwin—author of The Origin Of Species and founder of the modern evolutionary movement—made manifest on a concrete wall in downtown Dayton.

"I brought my baby to touch the wall, so that the power of Darwin can purify her genetic makeup of undesirable inherited traits," said Darlene Freiberg, one among a growing crowd assembled here to see the mysterious stain, which appeared last Monday on one side of the Rhea County Courthouse. The building was also the location of the famed "Scopes Monkey Trial" and is widely considered one of Darwinism's holiest sites. "Forgive me, O Charles, for ever doubting your Divine Evolution. After seeing this miracle of limestone pigmentation with my own eyes, my faith in empirical reasoning will never again be tested."

Added Freiberg, "Behold the power and glory of the scientific method!"

Since witnesses first reported the unexplained marking—which appears to resemble a 19th-century male figure with a high forehead and large beard—this normally quiet town has become a hotbed of biological zealotry. Thousands of pilgrims from as far away as Berkeley's paleoanthropology department have flocked to the site to lay wreaths of flowers, light devotional candles, read aloud from Darwin's works, and otherwise pay homage to the mysterious blue-green stain.

Capitalizing on the influx of empirical believers, street vendors have sprung up across Dayton, selling evolutionary relics and artwork to the thousands of pilgrims waiting to catch a glimpse of the image. Available for sale are everything from small wooden shards alleged to be fragments of the "One True Beagle"—the research vessel on which Darwin made his legendary voyage to the Galapagos Islands—to lecture notes purportedly touched by English evolutionist Alfred Russel Wallace.

"I have never felt closer to Darwin's ideas," said zoologist Fred Granger, who waited in line for 16 hours to view the stain. "May his name be praised and his theories on natural selection echo in all the halls of naturalistic observation forever."

Despite the enthusiasm the so-called "Darwin Smudge" has generated among the evolutionary faithful, disagreement remains as to its origin. Some believe the image is actually closer to the visage of Stephen Jay Gould, longtime columnist for Natural History magazine and originator of the theory of punctuated equilibrium, and is therefore proof of rapid cladogenesis. A smaller minority contend it is the face of Carl Sagan, and should be viewed as a warning to those nonbelievers who have not yet seen his hit PBS series Cosmos: A Personal Voyage.

Still others have attempted to discredit the miracle entirely, claiming that there are several alternate explanations for the appearance of the unexplained discoloration.

"It's a stain on a wall, and nothing more," said the Rev. Clement McCoy, a professor at Oral Roberts University and prominent opponent of evolutionary theory. "Anything else is the delusional fantasy of a fanatical evolutionist mindset that sees only what it wishes to see in the hopes of validating a baseless, illogical belief system. I only hope these heretics see the error of their ways before our Most Powerful God smites them all in His vengeance."

But those who have made the long journey to Dayton remain steadfast in their belief that natural selection—a process by which certain genes are favored over others less conducive to survival—is the one and only creator of life as we know it. This stain, they claim, is the proof they have been waiting for.

"To those who would deny that genetic drift is responsible for a branching evolutionary tree of increasing biodiversity amid changing ecosystems, we say, 'Look upon the face of Darwin!'" said Jeanette Cosgrove, who, along with members of her microbiology class, has maintained a candlelight vigil at the site for the past 72 hours.

"Over millions of successive generations, a specific subvariant of one species of slime mold adapted to this particular concrete wall, in order to one day form this stain, and thus make manifest this vision of Darwin's glorious countenance," Cosgrove said, overcome with emotion.

"It's a miracle," she added.

Quiz from Maggie's Farm (courtesy of Villainous Company)

1. Which of the following countries had the highest economic growth since 2000?

a. France
b. Japan
c. Germany
d. U.S.A.

2. Which of the following countries has the highest GDP per capita?

a. U.K.
b. Germany
c. Japan
d. U.S.A.

3. Which of the following countries had the highest household consumption in 2005?

a. U.K.
b. Canada
c. France
d. U.S.A.

4. Which country spends the most per capita on health services?

a. U.K.
b. Germany
c. Canada
d. U.S.A.

5. What percentage of the U.S.A.’s population is covered by health insurance?

a. 55%
b. 65%
c. 75%
d. 85%

6. In which of the following countries does the richest 20% of households have the highest share of national income?

a. U.S.A.
b. U.K.
c. Israel
d. 65 other countries

7. Which of the following countries had the highest investment per capita in fixed assets in 2005?

a. Germany
b. U.K.
c. China
d. U.S.A.

8. Which period had the lowest unemployment rate?

a. Euro Zone (2000 – 2008)
b. Reagan Presidency
c. Clinton Presidency
d. Bush Presidency

9. Which period had the lowest debt interest payments as percentage of GDP?

a. Euro Zone (2001 – 2008)
b. Reagan Presidency
c. Clinton Presidency
d. Bush Presidency

Here are the answers and sources:

1. d. U.S.A (from the IMF)
2. d. U.S.A. (World Bank)
3. d. U.S.A. (World Bank)
4. d. U.S.A. (WSJ 9-3-08)
5. d. 85% (U.S. Census Bureau)
6. d. 65 other countries (World Bank)
7. d. U.S.A. (World Bank)
8. d. Bush Presidency (Department of Labor)
9. d. Bush Presidency (IMF)

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

And our own addition to the quiz:

10. Which period had the highest per capita debt and interest payments ?

1. Barak Obama presidency (2009 – 2016) - still paying off Bush's war debt for Operation Iraqi Liberation

2. Michelle Obama presidency (2017 – 2021) - still paying off Bush's war debt for Operation Iraqi Liberation

3. Chelsea Clinton Presidency (2022-2030) - still paying off Bush's war debt for Operation Iraqi Liberation

4. Sasha Obama Presidency (2031-2039) - still paying off Bush's war debt for Operation Iraqi Liberation

5. Robert F. Kennedy IV Presidency (2040-2048) - still paying off Bush's war debt for Operation Iraqi Liberation

Bush Administration Lobbyies For Corporate Socialism

Congress Not Swayed By Bush Administration Pleas Of Catastrophe on Big Bailout

Refusing to be pushed, Republicans and Democrats alike rebuffed dire warnings Tuesday from the government's top economic officials of recession, layoffs and foreclosed homes if Congress doesn't quickly approve the administration's emergency $700 billion financial bailout plan.

Congressional leaders still predicted passage — with significant changes — but Wall Street's nerves were hardly soothed. The Dow Jones industrials sank 161 points and now are off more than 500 this week after initially surging on the bailout announcement last week.

Deepening market trouble was just one piece of the economic havoc that Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson told senators would ensue if Congress lags in acting on the administration's proposal to rescue tottering financial institutions.

"I share the outrage that people have," Paulson said. "It's embarrassing to look at this. I think it's embarrassing to the United States of America. There is a lot of blame to go around."

But without the bailout plan, Paulson and Bernanke sketched out a dire scenario for senators at a contentious daylong hearing: Neither businesses nor consumers would be able to borrow money, and the world's largest economy would grind to a virtual halt.

In public and in private meetings, both Democrats and Republicans said big changes are needed, presaging a difficult road ahead for the measure.

The legislation the administration is promoting would allow the government to buy bad mortgages and other rotten assets held by troubled banks and financial institutions. Getting those debts off their books should bolster those companies' balance sheets, making them more inclined to lend and easing one of the biggest choke points in the credit crisis. If the plan works, it should help lift a major weight off the national economy that is already sputtering.

Democrats were determined to wrest concessions from the administration on domestic spending and middle-class economic aid. And they said Republicans had to share in the politically tricky task of pushing through a financial bailout six weeks before the elections at a time when millions of everyday Americans are economically strapped.

"It's their problem. It's their bill. And they're going to have to figure out if they can support it," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said of Republicans.

"Nobody wants to have to do this," agreed Rep. John Boehner of Ohio, the Republican leader. He said he was hopeful of a quick agreement, despite withering criticism from conservative GOP lawmakers who recoiled at the prospect of federal intervention.

Sen. Jim Bunning, R-Ky., said, "This massive bailout is not a solution. It is financial socialism and it's un-American."

Read the rest here.

Your Tax Dollars at Work

Ex-Official: $9 Billion in Iraq Reconstruction Funds Lost to Fraud

A former top Iraqi official told U.S. senators today that roughly $9 billion in American money meant for reconstruction projects was involved in waste, fraud and abuse.

Salom Adhoob, a former chief investigator at Iraq's Commission on Public Integrity -- which is considered the equivalent of the FBI in the United States -- said at a hearing of the Democratic Policy Committee today that he and his agency had done investigations showing the money was misused in fraud and abuse. In one case, he said the Iraqi Ministry of Defense helped create front companies to funnel the money.

So much for Republican fiscal management and responsibility. The $9 billion could be lost to bribes, embezzlement, theft, ... who knows. I doubt that the Bush administration or the Pentagon or any of those responsible for putting the USA into this war will lift a finger to explain this mismanagement.

Read the rest here.

Hypocrisy Alert

Over at "Villainous Company", the self-proclaimed "princess" has her panties in a bunch over Obama, AGAIN, lambasting him for one thing and another, doing her articulate best to portray him as a smearer of ... stuff you smear, a liar, a Führer of digital brownshirts, a ghost-producer and/or financier of YouTube videos.

In typical "princess" fashion, Cass remarks that "This is not to deny that McCain deserves much of the criticism he has received for his distortions about Obama. But not all of it." She is never one to direct her readers' attention to McCain's distortions, or the distortions worked by other Rethugs - Cass's term, mind you, not ours.

She is also not one to acknowledge the on-going Rethug hypocrisy of blasting Obama (and the Dems generally) on their positions on abortion (with which, BTW, HSD is in some disagreement), when it is an acknowledged fact that the Rethugs will NEVER do anything to reduce the availability of abortion in America (besides palaver and cast aspersions) because too many Republican voters think abortion should be a matter of choice between a woman and her doctor. The Rethugs long ago sold their souls to Satan on this issue, however, in exchange for his promise to deliver the Evangelical/Christian/Christianist vote ... . and they hypocritically (quelle surprise!) avoid discussion of practical means of helping women avoid pregnancy.

More on this once we have a chance to go back and rifle through Big Brother's, uh ... VC's ... dusty archives for past pronouncements of princess-ly poppycock.

FLASH: Rethugs Not the Only Prevaricators *

Closing the Whopper Gap

The symmetry of sin is suddenly looking more equal. Last week, I flayed John McCain for dishonesty -- flagrant and repeated dishonesty -- about Barack Obama's proposals. Obama was by no means blameless, I argued, but his lapses were nowhere near as egregious as his opponent's. I stand by everything I wrote.

But a series of new Obama attacks requires a rebalancing of the scales: Obama has descended to similarly scurrilous tactics on the stump and on the air. On immigration, Obama is running a Spanish-language ad that unfairly lumps McCain together with Rush Limbaugh -- and quotes Limbaugh out of context. On health care, Obama misleadingly accuses McCain of wanting to impose a $3.6 trillion tax hike on employer-provided insurance.

Obama has been furthest out of line, however, on Social Security, stooping to the kind of scare tactics he once derided.

Read it and weep, gentle readers ... here.

* Of course, the Rethugs have perfected the art of prevarication, and the Dems are still apprentices.

Bone-Headed American Attitude to Foreign Languages Results In Lack of Military Preparedness

For Military, Slow Progress in Foreign Language Push

WASHINGTON — Three years ago, the Defense Department set out to increase sharply the number of military personnel who speak strategically important languages. Progress has been slow, and the military has not determined how to reach its goal — or what exactly that goal is.

Figures from the department indicate that only 1.2 percent of the military receives a bonus paid to those who can speak languages judged to be of critical importance for the current conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as other areas of strategic concern.

The military has struggled for years to develop a clear objective for language training.

In July, at a hearing of the House subcommittee charged with assessing the military’s progress in language training, the chairman, Representative Vic Snyder, Democrat of Arkansas, said: “I think the Pentagon has a sense that they’re moving in the right direction. I just don’t think they have a sense yet of what that endpoint is.”

John Nagl, a retired lieutenant colonel who is co-author of the Army’s new counterinsurgency field manual, said in an interview that the military had been moving too slowly, and he questioned the military’s assertion that language needs were difficult to assess since they were subject to changing global security conditions.

The military by now should “have a pretty good idea of what countries we’re fighting in,” he said.

Dr. Nagl, a fellow with the Center for a New American Security, said the Army understood the value of having more foreign language speakers in its ranks. But, he said, it had not “done the math on what it means” and had yet to “build the programs and provide the leader development to get there.”

Read the rest of this discouraging story here.

Time Mag says "McCain Plays the Race Card"

You decide.

When politicians interject race into a campaign, they seldom do it directly. Consider McCain's new ad, which the campaign says it will be airing nationally:

When politicians interject race into a campaign, they seldom do it directly. Consider McCain's new ad, which the campaign says it will be airing nationally:



This is hardly subtle: Sinister images of two black men, followed by one of a vulnerable-looking elderly white woman.

Let me stipulate: Obama's Fannie Mae connections are completely fair game. But this ad doesn't even mention a far more significant tie--that of Jim Johnson, the former Fannie Mae chairman who had to resign as head of Obama's vice presidential search team after it was revealed he got a sweetheart deal on a mortgage from Countrywide Financial. Instead, it relies on a fleeting and tenuous reference in a Washington Post Style section story to suggest that Obama's principal economic adviser is former Fannie Mae Chairman Frank Raines. Why? One reason might be that Johnson is white; Raines is black.

And the image of the victim doesn't seem accidental either, given the fact that older white women are a key swing constituency in this election.

After the McCain campaign introduced the ad, the Obama campaign responded with this statement:

Statement from Frank Raines on the ad: "I am not an advisor to Barack Obama, nor have I provided his campaign with advice on housing or economic matters."

"This is another flat-out lie from a dishonorable campaign that is increasingly incapable of telling the truth. Frank Raines has never advised Senator Obama about anything -- ever. And by the way, someone whose campaign manager and top advisor worked and lobbied for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac shouldn't be throwing stones from his seven glass houses," said Obama-Biden campaign spokesman Bill Burton.

At Politico, Ben Smith reports:

McCain spokesman Brian Rogers notes that Obama didn't contradict the claim when it first appeared in the Post.

But that's not really the point of the ad, is it?

UPDATE: The McCain campaign has now put out an ad on Jim Johnson. Please see my post above.

Time's author says she has updated her post, but I couldn't find it. Maybe you can.

So ... what do YOU think?

WSJ Slams McCain for Conduct Unbecoming a President

McCain's Scapegoat

John McCain has made it clear this week he doesn't understand what's happening on Wall Street any better than Barack Obama does. But on Thursday, he took his populist riffing up a notch and found his scapegoat for financial panic -- Christopher Cox, the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission.

To give readers a flavor of Mr. McCain untethered, we'll quote at length:

"Mismanagement and greed became the operating standard while regulators were asleep at the switch. The primary regulator of Wall Street, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) kept in place trading rules that let speculators and hedge funds turn our markets into a casino. They allowed naked short selling -- which simply means that you can sell stock without ever owning it. They eliminated last year the uptick rule that has protected investors for 70 years. Speculators pounded the shares of even good companies into the ground.

"The chairman of the SEC serves at the appointment of the President and has betrayed the public's trust. If I were President today, I would fire him."

Wow. "Betrayed the public's trust." Was Mr. Cox dishonest? No. He merely changed some minor rules, and didn't change others, on short-selling. String him up! Mr. McCain clearly wants to distance himself from the Bush Administration. But this assault on Mr. Cox is both false and deeply unfair. It's also un-Presidential.

Take "naked" shorting, in which an investor sells a stock short -- betting that it will fall in price -- without first borrowing the shares he is selling from an investor who owns them. The SEC has never condoned the practice, and since 2005 it has clamped down on short selling in any stock that shows evidence of naked shorting. The SEC further tightened its rules against naked shorting just hours before Mr. McCain excoriated Mr. Cox for doing nothing.

Read the original here.

NEWS FLASH!! Palin for President; McCain for Vice-President!

Gov. Sarah Palin is now talking about "a Palin and McCain administration."



We knew it would come to this: you just can't keep a food womyn down.

candidates flummoxed by meltdown - news at 11 - not

Financial crisis fails to get its just due with TV talking heads

It's hard to know where to start in dissecting the inane debate on the economic crisis that has dominated the presidential race in recent days.

Commentators, particularly of the cable television variety, have probed Sarah Palin's (suspect) chops for running a Fortune 500 company, recounted John McCain's (nonexistent) role in inventing the BlackBerry and repeated Barack Obama's (nebulous) bleatings about "change."

Armed with these scraps of near-news, horse-race junkies -- like the terminally hopped-up Chris Matthews of MSNBC -- then launched new rounds of soulless palavering.

Can Obama capture economically disadvantaged whites? Is the bloom off the Palin rose? Can Washington veteran McCain sell himself as a populist reformer? Can Jill Biden dance the samba?

OK, no one actually raised that last one. But they might as well have, given the substance-lite quality of the political coverage as the nation faces its most unsettling financial storm in memory.

Click title above to read the whole thing ... or here if it is too much trouble to scroll back up

The Lying Game

Time's Joe Klein says McCain is lying. Miss Dispepsia says he's not, but Obama is. Obama's said says McCain is lying. "Historians" are saying that McCain's campaign is not the sleaziest. Stoneman says McCain is lying. It looks like the National Review is splitting hairs.

Bristol-Levi Watch

A report from the Sarah Palin pep-rally at the Anchorage convention center on Saturday September 13, 2008:

... sitting three-quarters of the way up the bleacher was Bristol Palin and her eighteen-year-old impregnator, Levi Johnston. Once I noticed them, I kept my eye on Bristol and Levi. What I learned provoked an odd empathy for the awful pickle Wasilla High School's hockey stick wielding homeboy now finds himself in.

Bristol and Levi sat shoulder-to-shoulder. But not once did they look at each other, speak to each other, or in any way acknowledge each other's physical presence. Not once. For an entire hour. Instead, Bristol stared straight ahead and Levi had the glazed look of a trapped feral animal.

Then when Sarah wound up her autograph signing and the people sitting in front of him on the bleacher began climbing down, Levi stood up and, without looking at or speaking to his betrothed, turned in the opposite direction and walked away.

What I took away from that is that the People Magazine spin about how excited the happy couple is about their upcoming nuptials and Levi's "Bristol" finger tattoo is the Karl Rovian nonsense that anyone who thinks about it for a scintilla of a second intuitively knows that it is. If McCain-Palin lose, my easy bet is that there will be no nuptials. But if they win, the hand Levi dealt himself by having had the poor luck to knock up the daughter of the Vice President of the United States (at the time who could have known?) will have to be played out.

Pader Johnston has disconnected the Johnston family's land line. So I can't call him to ask what kind of deal he cut. But if Levi was my kid, the deal I would have cut would, at an absolute minimum, have been: $500,000 for from now to the November election. If McCain-Palin win, a $ 1 million signing bonus to take the trip down the aisle. Then, for the duration of the McCain-Palin administration, $100,000 a month for every month Mr. and Mrs. Johnston live under the same roof, and $50,000 a month for every month that they remain married but do not.

That's chump change for the RNC. And if, in the best case for the nation, it turns out to be only a $500,000 payday for sixty days of work, that's a life changing grubstake for an eighteen-year-old kid and more than enough to enable Levi to make his child support payments.

Read the original: From pep rallies to secret emails to Troopergate, a Sarah Palin primer

American legal influence is waning

U.S. Court Is Now Guiding Fewer Nations

WASHINGTON — Judges around the world have long looked to the decisions of the United States Supreme Court for guidance, citing and often following them in hundreds of their own rulings since the Second World War.

But now American legal influence is waning. Even as a debate continues in the court over whether its decisions should ever cite foreign law, a diminishing number of foreign courts seem to pay attention to the writings of American justices.

“One of our great exports used to be constitutional law,” said Anne-Marie Slaughter, the dean of the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton. “We are losing one of the greatest bully pulpits we have ever had.”

Continue reading ...

from one of our correspondents ...

I'm a little confused...

* If you're a minority and you're selected for a job over more qualified candidates you're a "token hire."

** If you're a conservative and you're selected for a job over more qualified candidates you're a "game changer."


* Black teen pregnancies? A "crisis" in black America.

** White teen pregnancies? A "blessed event."


* If you grow up in Hawaii you're "exotic."

** Grow up in Alaska eating mooseburgers, you're the quintessential "American story."


* Similarly, if you name you kid Barack you're "unpatriotic."

** Name your kid Track, you're "colorful."


* If you're a Democrat and you make a VP pick without fully vetting the individual you're "reckless."

** A Republican who doesn't fully vet is a "maverick."


* If you spend 3 years as a community organizer growing your organization from a staff of 1 to 13 and your budget from $70,000 to $400,000, then become the first black President of the Harvard Law Review, create a voter registration drive that registers 150,000 new African American voters, spend 12 years as a Constitutional Law professor, then spend nearly 8 more years as a State Senator representing a district with over 750,000 people, becoming chairman of the state Senate's Health and Human Services committee, then spend nearly 4 years in the United States Senate representing a state of nearly 13 million people, sponsoring 131 bills and serving on the Foreign Affairs, Environment and Public Works and Veteran's Affairs committees, you are woefully inexperienced.

** If you spend 4 years on the city council and 6 years as the mayor of a town with less than 7,000 people, then spend 20 months as the governor of a state with 650,000 people, then you've got the most executive experience of anyone on either ticket, are the Commander in Chief of the Alaska military and are well qualified to lead the nation should you be called upon to do so because your state is the closest state to Russia.


* If you are a Democratic male candidate who is popular with millions of people you are an "arrogant celebrity" or "uppity".

** If you are a popular republican female candidate you are "energizing the base".


* If you are a younger male candidate who thinks for himself and makes his own decisions you are "presumptuous".

** If you are an older male candidate who makes last minute decisions you refuse to explain, you are a "shoot from the hip" maverick.


* If you are a candidate with a Harvard law degree you are "an elitist-out of touch" with the real America.

** If you are a legacy (dad and granddad were admirals) graduate 5th from the bottom ranking from Annapolis, with multiple disciplinary infractions you are a hero.


* If you manage a multi-million dollar nationwide campaign, you are an "empty suit".

** If you are a part time mayor of a town of 7000 people, you are an "experienced executive".


* If you go to a south side Chicago church, your beliefs are "extremist".

** If you believe in creationism and don't believe global warming is man made, you are "strongly principled".


* If you cheated on your first wife with a rich heiress, and left your disfigured wife and married the heiress the next month, you're a Christian.

** If you have been married to the same woman with whom you've been wed to for 19 years and raising 2 beautiful daughters with, you're "risky".


* If you're a black single mother of 4 who waits for 22 hours after her water breaks to seek medical attention, you're an irresponsible parent, endangering the life of your unborn child.

** But if you're a white married mother who waits 22 hours, you're spunky.


* If you're a 13-year-old Chelsea Clinton, the right-wing press calls you "First dog."

** If you're a 17-year old pregnant unwed daughter of a Republican, the right-wing press calls you "beautiful" and "courageous."


* If you kill an endangered species, you're an excellent hunter.

** If you have an abortion you're not a Christian, you're a murderer (forget about it if it is the result of raped or incest.)


* If you teach abstinence only in sex education, you get teen parents.

** If you teach responsible age appropriate sex education, including the proper use of birth control, you are eroding the fiber of society.

a little simplistic, but you get the point!