This guy has an idea involving nine keyrings

Add comment August 21st, 2008

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/ydusFDKdE4o" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

Here’s McCain’s response ad on house flap

8 comments August 21st, 2008

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/vjC2AlWy6CI" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

Another pathetic expression of celebrity envy

Add comment August 21st, 2008

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/PetxaA42OuE" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

Voices

Add comment August 21st, 2008

This is pretty cool.

By the way, the voices include Michelle Obama and Cindy McCain.

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/_CvW42MC-14" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

How many houses does McCain own?

21 comments August 21st, 2008

Gee, I thought it was 10 or 11, but it’s only seven. Poor guy!

But he’s probably not too downhearted about it, because he doesn’t know for sure how many homes he owns.  He’s got people who keep track of that stuff for him. Don’t you?

(Oh, Jeeves! Click on that arrow so we can watch the video, would you? I hope it’s not another commercial for that insufferable elitist Barack Obama.)

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/vpmFd25tRqo" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

McCain abandons effort to change GOP platform plank on abortion

2 comments August 21st, 2008

It says HERE that John McCain has bowed to the Religious Right and given up on his effort to change the Republican platform with respect to its call for a ban on all abortions.

McCain previously had wanted to allow for exceptions in cases of rape or incest.

In light of this development, I’m repeating here a commentary I posted about three and a half months ago:

John McCain is one of the millions of Americans who are generally opposed to abortion but want its legality maintained in cases of rape or incest.

Accordingly, McCain has advocated on several occasions that the Republican Party platform be changed from its current opposition to all abortions to a position allowing for certain exceptions.

But now that he’s the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, Mr. Straight Talk is under BIG PRESSURE from the party’s hard-core anti-abortion wing to drop his plan to change the platform.

The squeeze in which McCain finds himself involves a few angles that might not occur to the casual observer.  As I’ve said before in this forum and others, the stricter position against abortion is more logically consistent than the one that allows for exceptions. (My own pro-choice view involves numerous other factors and is not at issue here.)

The only good reason for a person to oppose abortion in general requires one to believe that it’s the taking of an innocent life. If it’s not the taking of an innocent life, it’s no different in an ethical sense than having your appendix removed.

(Granted, the decision on whether to bring a fetus to full term can involve complex emotions and considerations, but absent the homicide question, the ethics are not very problematical, and the government has no legitimate interest in the matter.)

So, the basic premise advanced by the so-called pro-life movement is that abortion is wrong because it’s tantamount to murder. If you don’t buy that argument, you have no valid reason to want abortion outlawed.

That makes it hypocritical to say you’re against abortion except in cases of rape or incest or the life of the mother.

How can a fetus in a case of rape or incest be less innocent than one produced in more acceptable circumstances? How can John McCain and those who agree with him deny that they’re logically and morally inconsistent on this score?

Indeed, one has to wonder if McCain has actually thought this matter through, or whether his opposition to abortion is an insincere political convenience for purposes of advancement in the Republican Party.

But their are lots of other hypocrites on this issue. Most pro-lifers shudder at the thought of a woman having to bring a fetus to full term in a case of rape or incest. And most politicians are loathe to buck majority sentiment in that regard. So much for the sincerity of their pro-life positions.

There’s another political question that arises here:  If a fetus is a person, and abortion is the unwarranted killing of that innocent person, why don’t any of the pro-life politicians favor a law under which the woman who gets an abortion would be charged with murder?

The answer, of course, is that taking such a position likely would be political suicide. Most Americans don’t want women who get abortions to be prosecuted as murderers.

Nor is there any consistency of logic in making an exception for an abortion to save the life of the mother. In his book “Papal Sin,” author Garry Wills argues: “If the fetus and the mother have equal status as persons, the natural and not the inflicted death should be preferred,” if you’re going to be morally and logically consistent about it.

Then, too, politicians should be required to square their anti-abortion positions with the belief among some folks — orthodox Catholics, for example — that the morning-after pill is an abortifacient. Are any of these pols willing to call for a ban on morning-after pills? Are they willing to call for murder charges against women who take such pills? If not, why not?

The politicians should be required to explain in detail their opinions on just when life starts and when, if ever, it’s permissible to end such life and what penalties should be imposed for violations of any limits that are enacted into law.

Questions like that would prompt the Republican pols, I’m sure, to squirm and dance and tie themselves into ideological knots.

Last-minute guess: Obama will pick Hillary

6 comments August 21st, 2008

After long periods of serious concentration over the past few days, I’ve come to the conclusion that Barack Obama will choose Hillary Clinton as his running mate.

The announcement might come as soon as today.

Yeah, I know this flies in the face of my frequent condemnations of Clinton over the past six months, and I recognize that Obama and Hillary aren’t exactly the best of chums. But in the final analysis, the pairing of the two on the Democratic ticket would make eminent political sense.

The principal rationale is that the choice of Clinton as a running mate would unite and energize the party as no other choice could.

Besides, there’s plenty of precedent for this sort of thing in both parties.

 John Kennedy went with Lyndon Johnson, though the two had contentiously vied for the nomination — and despite the fact that the Kennedy family didn’t much like LBJ. (Bobby hated him, and vice versa.)

Ronald Reagan chose George H.W. Bush, no matter the negative stuff Pappy said about Ronnie when they competed for the GOP nomination. (Remember when Bush scoffed at Reagan’s “voodoo economics”?)

Another reason why I think Obama will go with Clinton is that he has to do something bold after this long and dramatic lead-up to the announcement. Any other choice would seem dull.

So, that’s my guess. I might well be wrong, but it wouldn’t be the first time.  Hey, I initially thought Obama had no chance to win the Democratic nomination for a U.S. Senate seat from Illinois in 2004. An unknown black guy from Chicago with a name like that? Not gonna happen, I said.

UPDATE: Obama said something this afternoon that makes even more inclined to suspect that Hillary will get the nod.

USA Today reports:

“In an interview in Chester, Va., the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee said he’s made up his mind, but he would not say whether he’s informed that person yet. ‘I won’t comment on anything else until I introduce our running mate to the world,’ he said. ‘That’s all you’re going to get out of me.’

“Obama said it was a difficult decision. ‘We had some great choices.’

“Obama said he wanted somebody who is ‘prepared to be president’ and who will be ‘a partner with me in strengthening this economy for the middle class and working families.’

“He said he was looking for not just a partner but a sparring partner. ‘I want somebody who’s independent, somebody who can push against my preconceived notions and challenge me so we have got a robust debate in the White House.’”

Hmmm. Robust debate in the White House? Economy for the middle class and working families? Sparring partner?

Sounds like Hillary.