Black Wednesday

And so, after twenty-one months of smears, bickering, and beamed-in-your-dreams media coverage, it's all over. Comrade Mullah Che Generalissimo Herr OberNAMBLAenfuhrer Barack "Hussein" Obama Bin Laden has been elected as the 44th president-designate of the United Socialist States of America.

Fuckin' A.

(Image found at Moonbattery.com).

Not everyone has been as gracious in defeat as John McCain.

NewsBusters got all grumpy when an African-American reporter on ABC teared up over there being a black President in the White House in his lifetime. How fucking dare he.



Newsbuster commenter attorneygirl just ain't quite feeling the love:

It's about race.

It's always been about race.

Now we'll all be in slavery--to a dictatorship.

I cannot now say God Bless America. Not with a Marxist as President. Not with idiots, morons, and sycophants praying to their savior Obama. He is a racist. He has pitted classes against each other.

I will now raise my rates, stop giving to charity, and will not tip any longer. I will fire employees, stop paying benefits, and stop giving my household help Christmas bonuses.

Let the government do it for me.

Bah Humbug.

I'm pulling in and becoming scrooge because the government will be taking my money. Assholes. Now everyone will see what Obama-economics really is.

And I worked my ass off to start my own business. I ate tuna (still do) and still drive an old car so that I can save money for my old age.

Screw that, right?

I will never, ever support a Democrat, a liberal, or this pseudo-president Marxist Obama.

Never.

We have experienced a coup today. And Communism won.

I will now become more self-centered than ever before.

Good on you, attorneygirl, you are a tribute to everything which lost the election for the Republicans.

I salute you. Enjoy your time at the Socialist Re-education Camp. Palin-Oh-Twelve!

Hot Air Predictions

Travel & dodgy internet connections have kept me from blogging... But they haven't kept me from the election and, unfortunately, from right-wingers furiously spinning an alternate reality where McCain is on course for victory.

Jon Swift tells all with his posts on Why John McCain will win and hidden-Obama-horror-stories.

To add to the madness, I wanted to bring you this poll from Michelle Malin's Hot Air, showing how its readers think the election is going to break:-


79% think McCain will be the next POTUS. We'll find out for sure soon enough - although I'm not sure many will share this level of Hot Air optimism:-

The GOP will gain the lead in house.
I told you so.
I’m betting they will on Intrade.com
I will make money.
Period.
Mcguyver on October 30, 2008 at 2:19 PM

Or this:

The deal is that republicans are voting down the line republican.
We are coming out in large droves to prevent an Obama presidency.
That means republicans can gain in the House, Senate, and win the White House.
jencab on October 30, 2008 at 2:21 PM

And especially this from stonemeister:

McCain may really be up by 20% or more... The “hang-up” percentage, or people who refuse to be polled, is over 85%, which is historically high. This means there is no way to assume the sample is statistically valid. It all depends on the make-up of the 85%. So we have to figure out the motives for the hang-ups. Now we’re not talking probability and statistics, by forensic psychology... Why would anyone not want to participate in a telephone poll?

In case you are wondering, it's because people might feel guilty saying "McCain" for various reasons (*cough* race), or - always my favorite - real working people (Republicans!) are too busy for polls...

That probably accounts for the vast majority of those hang-ups. How do those poll results look to you now? Instead of Obama ahead by 1 to 3%, he might really be behind by 20-30%!

Riiight.

And so to Tuesday. Are the polls accurate? Are there really more Democrats than Republicans? Is America really ready for a black president, or will millions of Americans get into those booths and say "not quite yet"? Who would blame them if they did just that, and voted for McCain instead of Obama? After all, Obama just might be an arab muslim socialist terrorist. We can't be entirely sure he isn't, right?

I mean, at least with McCain/Palin, you know exactly what you're gonna get, right? I mean, we've had people like them in charge for the past eight years. So what could possibly go wrong!?

Cringe with Cindy McCain

The horror... The horror...

Cringe with Cindy as her husband is publicly humiliated by Joe The Plumber, who fails to turn up on cue at a rally:



Palin is busy prepping for 2012. Joe, presumably, was on the phone to his agent about a possible run for congress in 2010. John tries to recover by pretending his date wasn't with Joe, it was with everyone else in the crowd... Who all happen to be called "Joe". Cindy... I feel for poor Cindy...

HT: America Blog.

Prague Spring

Today Glasgow, tomorrow Jilhava.

In celebration, I present a short documentary about the Prague Spring of 1968.



Next, Barack Obama, speaking on the 40th anniversary of this momentous event.



Next, John McCain, twice referring to Czechoslovakia, a country which hasn't existed since 1993.



Finally, Sarah Palin give us her Foreign policy expertise. God help us all.



My next post on Prague will be more autumnal ;>

Godtube For McCain

GodTube viewers overwhelmingly favor John McCain. Film at 11.



Update 23 October

What a difference a day makes...



HT Scuba...

Obama Wins? Israel Bombs Iran

The aptly named Moonbattery.com tells its readers:

Don't eat that bottle of sleeping pills just yet. From November 1, 2004:

Rather than calming its far-right readers, tho, this simple reminder that the election ain't over til it's over brings out some wonderful commentary which surely deserves a wider audience.

First up, a eye-popping prediction. Set your watches for World War III:

"...if Obama wins, Israel will attack Iran before Bush leaves office. That will set up a firestorm response where Iran attack not only Israel in response, but the Saudi oil fields and Iraq in response. While Bush would likely not participate in an Israeli attack against Irans nuclear facilities using US planes they would probably give Israel air and satellite surveilance data to increase the chances of success of the mission - and maybe some bunker buster bombs once they realized they were going ahead any way despite Bush's objections. Last year Israel bombed Syria's unfinished nuclear facility, so I would seem likely that Israel would not count on delaying an attack until after Obama takes office. If McCain pulls out a suprise win, then they could afford to delay any attack for another year or so." - Posted by: Anonymous at October 13, 2008 6:36 AM

Meanwhile, "V the K" calls McCain

"a moderate leftist"

and Spurwing reminds us that polls aren't always to be trusted anyway, 'cause billionaire media owners are all communists (except Rupert)

"Can you realy ever trust any polls taken by CNN/TIME or any of the other liberal news agencies? especialy if its owned by RED TED TURNER and other soclaists scum"

Finally, totally-not-gay "menareawesome" gets over-excited and has to go to bed half an hour earlier than usual:

"Ok all you real men, please do not kill yourself, we will need you in the comming war against communism! Why shoot yourself when you can shoot at the enemy instead?

What is a good way to rehabilitate metrosexual sissies? WAR! No time for hair gel and ipods in the foxhole."

Totally. Not. Gay.

Jihlava IDFF 2008

Random fluctuations in space-time are taking me to the 12th International Documentary Film Festival in Jihlava in Czechoslovakia (© John McCain) next weekend.

I'll try and post something festival-related every day.

First up, the 2008 "Jingle".



Gosh darn it, I do love a bit of European pretentiousness :)

Crazy McCain Lady

SNL's debate special did a fun turn on Crazy McCain Lady, aka 75 year old Gayle Quinell. She says she got her information about Obama being an "arab" (and a "terrorist") from a fellow volunteer at a McCain Campaign office. Nice.

Meanwhile, Sarah Palin is lined up to appear live on SNL this weekend. Given that her handlers won't let her watch TV by herself in case she gets depressed, that seems like a terrible move.

Over at pro-McCain Hot Air, commenters are divided on the idea. Outlander veers off into the eighth dimension of whackory:

"Assuming SNL doesn’t stick the knife in Palin again, this could be a good opportunity for her. Palin’s job now is to rebuild her reputation so she can run against Obama in 2012. Poking fun at Fey’s impersonation is a good way of lightening its negative effect on her reputation. So, if she’s able to do THAT, then it’s worth it. If her appearance will only serve to reinforce the negative stereotype, she should avoid the appearnace.

Along those same lines, when will Palin stop coordinating with McCain and completely run out on her own? Hit Obama with Wright and Ayers and being a crazy socialist… Go on Rush and Fox News and talk radio… Express a vision for the country and a serious political philosophy… This is all about her now."

JustTruth101 disagrees:

"Live on the air the SNL crew... will do the skit from the version that the real Sarah never saw... and it will skewer her. There might even be a joke about the difference between her brain and her womb, but the setup in the REAL Sarah’s skit will be nothing even remotely like that, but her answer will be something that makes all special needs children look bad, or will make her look crass and uncaring... This is a TERRIBLE idea... I can’t believe she’s going to do this. If they could get away with it, they would shower her with pig blood like Carrie."

Pigs blood!? Quick - does anyone have NBC's phone number!?

Being stuck in Britland, I've never watched a full episode of SNL. I didn't even think I wanted to, 'til I read this from SaintOlaf in the same thread:

"SNL is definitely the most bigoted, Christian persecuting, television show on the air today... Pure liberal atheist garbage."

I'd buy that for a dollar...

Obama: 2nd String Negra

Wow... The Dems must've had their work cut out for them planting actors to make these McCain/Palin supporters look like racist redneck hick morons. Go Sarah and your Holy Spirit!



Then there's Diane Fedele. Her newsletter with this image upset some sensitive souls. It's OK though - she says it wasn't meant to link Obama to food stamps or be racist. So that's all right then.



I love a good joke me, so I was tickled by this hilarious pic from the Sacramento County Republican Party. Look! "The only difference between Obama and Osama is BS... Waterboard Barack Obama." It's OK, see, 'cause they're Christians who love America. Unlike some presidential candidates I could mention, right!?



John McCain must be so proud it'd make your heart burst.

McCain Licks Obama

An unlikely headline, I know...

McCain Hate - Video Roundup

It's the Youtube election. There's so much video flying around it's impossible to keep up... But here's a mini-best-of-new-clips for your enjoyment and elucidation.

Rachel Maddow on venomous hate at McCain/Palin rallies:



Tell McCain to end the politics of hate:



McCain Declines To Condemn Obama-Osama Comparison



Rachel Maddows interviews David Frum on GOP panic...



20 days to go.

Campaign Humour

Here's a McCain supporter who hilariously doesn't want Obama supporters to park in his lot...



"For political reasons, he's just throwing a little humour into the presidential race":

"I don't expect to go after anyone with a baseball bat. I would grin at them and laugh and ask if they could read English".

Given the US's rich tradition of racial segregation, that seems a little strange to me. But hey, I guess it's just comedy.

Then there's these:


See, here's what I don't get. You can say these images are a joke - that they are not meant to be taken seriously. But if they are a joke, the joke is "Obama looks like an arab terrorist". Am I meant to laugh at that?

Now, take as an alternative some "progressive liberal" humour. Is the message here that Sarah Palin will give you VD? Or that she'll fire ping-pong balls from her vagina to get votes? Or is it more subtle?

________

For me, comedy works when it's not laughing at someone... It's laughing at attitudes, expectations, mores, ourselves... It's not about inciting hatred and mistrust and fear and ignorance. But them I'm a godless liberal, so what would I know?

McCain: Obama not an Arab

These videos are all over, but they need to be seen.

First up, McCain tells his supporters that Obama is not an arab, nor a terrorist, and that he is a "decent" man (and gets booed for doing so).



Next up, an attack ad approved by McCain, implying that Obama is a terrorist.



Now some more McCain/Palin supporters attacking the character of Obama. Do you know he's a terrorist? I wonder where they got that idea...



Finally, Obama from earlier this year, predicting just how and when the attacks would come.



Meanwhile, the conspiracy theorists are running wild on the right. The global economic crisis was engineered to help the democrats (and will resolve itself quickly after the election)... McCain was nice about Obama because he feared for his safety if he loses the election... McCain was just a fatted calf served up by the GOP to help them prepare for a proper fight for the Whitehouse in 2012... All this and more coming up soon on PTET. Go on and subscribe :)

The Despicable Race Card

If you want surreal, check out the reaction of many McCain/Palin supporters to even the slightest hint that racism might be a factor in the US election campaign.

The American Sentinel thunders:

"Liberals love to lump people into groups and sub-groups based on how they vote: we can call this potential segment the “white guilt vote”: white people who didn’t want to vote for Barack Obama, but did so rather than be forced to wear the MSM’s “Scarlet R” for racism...

...don’t allow either racism, or reverse racism, to sway your vote for that candidate."

OK, we get it. Not all black people support Obama, and not all McCain supporters are racist. But is it it really too much to even acknowledge the Bradley Effect? Or to take extra care when campaigning not to play into the hands of bigoted assholes?

Apparently so.

Check out this comment at Bride of Rove:

"few things offend me more than to hear “the race card” being used. It’s old, it’s an excuse and I just lose respect for the original argument..."

Or this eye-popping prose quoted at Liberal Rapture:

"Shut TF up about race. Now. We are sick of it... You keep saying crap like "they" will try to scare you because you don't look like past Presidents or you have a weird last name or whatever. Bullshit. BULL SHIT. This is nonsense. You got millions of votes (less than Hillary but still millions) in the primaries. None of those voters gave a shit you look like the result of Dr. Moreau sending Alfred E Newman, Bob Saget, Dumbo, and Urkle through a wood chipper and fusing their DNA in a wheat grass juicer."

Let's say it again for the hard of thinking. Not all black people support Obama, and not all McCain supporters are racist.

But sheesh, if these videos don't have you cringing with embarrassment for the state of America, then I suggest you check your pulse...

First up, "He's got the bloodlines":



Next, drunken rednecks:



Forget the redneck idiots. Stick with the normal Americans. Joe Six-Packs and Hockey Moms. Next time some Palin supporter tells you they know Sarah better than Barack... Just ask, when did you hear of them both. When did they first hear about Acorn or Rezko or Troopergate or Keating.

And again. Not supporting Obama does not make you racist. It's being racist which makes you racist.

Obama v. McCain/Palin

How did I miss this one? I can't find the original source. If anyone has the proper credit, please let me know...


I'm a little confused. Let me see if I have this straight.....

* If you grow up in Hawaii, raised by your grandparents, you're
"exotic, different."

* Grow up in Alaska eating mooseburgers, a quintessential American
story.

* If your name is Barack you're a radical, unpatriotic Muslim.

* Name your kids Willow, Trig and Track, you're a maverick.

* Graduate from Harvard law School and you are unstable.

* Attend 5 different small colleges before graduating, you're well
grounded.

* If you spend 3 years as a brilliant community organizer, become
the first black President of the Harvard Law Review, create a
voter registration drive that registers 150,000 new voters, spend
12 years as a Constitutional Law professor, spend 8 years as a
State Senator representing a district with over 750,000 people,
become chairman of the state Senate's Health and Human
Services committee, spend 4 years in the United States Senate
representing a state of 13 million people while sponsoring 131
bills and serving on the Foreign Affairs, Environment and Public
Works and Veteran's Affairs committees, you don't have any real
leadership experience.

* If your total resume is: local weather girl, 4 years on the city
council and 6 years as the mayor of a town with less than 7,000
people, 20 months as the governor of a state with only 650,000
people, then you're qualified to become the country's second
highest ranking executive.

* If you have been married to the same woman for 19 years while
raising 2 beautiful daughters, all within Protestant churches,
you're not a real Christian.

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

* If, while governor, you staunchly advocate abstinence only, with
no other option in sex education in your state's school system
while your unwed teen daughter ends up pregnant, you're very
responsible.

* If your wife is a Harvard graduate lawyer who gave up a position
in a prestigious law firm to work for the betterment of her inner
city community, then gave that up to raise a family, your family's
values don't represent America's.

* If your husband is nicknamed "First Dude," with at least one DWI
conviction and no college education, who didn't register to vote
until age 25 and once was a member of a group that advocated the
secession of Alaska from the USA, your family is extremely
admirable.

OK, much clearer now.

John McCain - "That One" "Kill Him"

Here we see John McCain's utter disdain for Barack Obama, and what this has led to amongst his supporters.



Edit: Oops. Just realized that in this case the McCain supported shouted "terrorist" and not "kill him". My bad. Heard it wrong. The "kill him" line was from a Palin rally. Sorry for the confusion.

McCain is playing to a dangerous audience with an obviously racist sentiment. Amusingly, tho, even those votes aren't in the bag for him. Ben Smith has this:

"An Obama supporter, who canvassed for the candidate in the working-class, white Philadelphia neighborhood of Fishtown recently, sends over an account that, in various forms, I've heard a lot in recent weeks.

"What's crazy is this," he writes. "I was blown away by the outright racism, but these folks are f***ing undecided. They would call him a n----r and mention how they don't know what to do because of the economy."

On that note, in case you missed it, here's a incredibly perceptive letter to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram from back in September:

"What if John McCain were a former president of the Harvard Law Review? What if Barack Obama finished fifth from the bottom of his graduating class? What if McCain were still married to the first woman he said "I do" to? What if Obama were the candidate who left his first wife after she no longer measured up to his standards?

What if Michelle Obama were a wife who not only became addicted to pain killers, but acquired them illegally through her charitable organization? What if Cindy McCain graduated from Harvard? What if Obama were a member of the "Keating 5"? What if McCain was a charismatic, eloquent speaker?

If these questions reflected reality, do you really believe the election numbers would be as close as they are?

This is what racism does. It covers up, rationalizes and minimizes positive qualities in one candidate and emphasizes negative qualities in another when there is a color difference.

— Kelvin LaFond, Fort Worth"

One ironic thing is that I thought, during the nomination process, that Hillary would have had a hard time being elected president. Now it's clear she would have won hands down. The only thing standing in the way of an Obama victory is mud flung from an increasingly erratic and obnoxious McCain camp. It will probably get uglier. Here's hoping it doesn't.

Sarah Palin: Barefaced Liar

Watch as Sarah Palin tells a bare-faced lie:



She only raised Ayres because the New York Times did. Right.

If Sarah Palin truly believes in the God of the Bible, then why does she tell lie after lie after lie?

Here's a nice little comment from Cheryl at the Secrets of Sarah Palin:

"...What I don’t get is how a supposedly “Born-Again” Christian can be saying all these horrible things about Barack Obama… talking about people she knows nothing about or has never met. How can she be lying and spreading rumors and untruths and not feel guilty? Where is the love that Christians supposedly have for each other?"

The next bit is genuinely scary:

"Some people in my state even think she is a prophetess for this day. Why can’t Christians wake up and ask some questions, like “Where’s the love, Sarah?” “Where’s the desire to obey the law, Sarah?” “Where’s the putting your family first, even before your own career?”"

Meanwhile over at Pro-McCain blogs such as Bride of Rove, perfectly normal, civilized, intelligent people are laughing about "getting rid" of Barack Obama, and cheer-leading as McCain turns this into the most hateful election campaign in US history.

McCain can't win on the issues. His own campaign team says so. So he's going to lie and smear.

Luckily for him, the Stupid Vote is still up for grabs...



Could things get even uglier? Watch this space.

McCain Presidency: Day 1

From HeadzUp, HT: BobGeiger.com.

Scratch: Henry The Fish

Check out Scratch, a simple animation programming language from the wonderfully named Lifelong Kindergarten group at the MIT Media Lab.

I'll bet even Sarah PalinJohn McCain could work out this game...

Sarah Palin Speaks In Tongues

Wow. Apparently Pentecostals are "offended" by this cartoon, and want it removed from Washingtonpost.com. In their defense, they are right that the Washington Post refused to run the Danish "Mohammad Cartoons". After all, they ran in an Egyptian newspaper (as shown) and nobody rioted there.

I often wonder in these sorts of discussions whether Christians are complaining that they wouldn't riot; or whether they are threatening that they might?

Here's what I think. We should be proud in the West that we don't riot when someone makes a joke involving something about our religious beliefs (or lack thereof).

Am I wrong?

Edited to add: It's worth mentioning the original cartoon ran on 9 September - before Palin started speaking in tongues during CBS News Interviews...