Texas Progressive Alliance Election Eve Roundup

post from Texas Liberal on 03 November 2008 08:48:56 PM. © Texas Liberal

Here, my fellow Americans, is your Election Eve edition of the Texas Progressive Alliance’s weekly roundup.jobsanger believes an avalanche of new voters could produce some surprises on election day, including the possibility that Georgia will turn blue, and even though an amazing 23% of Texans think Obama is muslim, a huge turnout in the urban areas [...]

Read The Full Article:
http://texasliberal.wordpress.com/2008/11/04/texas-progressive-alliance-election-
eve-roundup/

Add to del.icio.us

Digg this

Post to Furl

Add to reddit

Add to myYahoo!

Governor-Appointed Panel Clears Governor of
Wrong-Doing

post from Firedoglake on 03 November 2008 08:46:52 PM. © Firedoglake

The Personnel investigation into the firing of Walt Monegan--the one conducted by three governor appointees (Sarah didn't hire all of them, but she can fire any of them)--has cleared Sarah Palin of any wrong-doing.[...]

Read The Full Article:
http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2008/11/03/governor-appointed-panel-clears-gove
rnor-of-wrong-doing/

Digg this

Prop 8: The Ad That Upset the Mormon Church

post from Crooks and Liars on 03 November 2008 08:45:18 PM. © Crooks and Liars

(full disclosure: I work for the Courage Campaign)

video details and more

"Home Invasion" was produced by two of our friends in the progressive movement -- netroots activists and brothers Dante Atkins and David Atkins. This 60-second ad satirically skewers the Mormon Church's dictation of public policy to Californians. We will be airing on CNN, MSNBC and Comedy Central in selected markets on Election Day.

Let's just say, the Mormon Church is not pleased and the Salt Lake City media is all over this ad. They are uncomfortable being in the spotlight, which they richly deserve for being the biggest force behind the Yes on 8 campaign. BTW they have been planning a fight like Prop 8 since 1997. Dante Atkins (hekebolos) has an internal document from the Mormon Church up on Daily Kos.

Here is the statement they have released in response to the ad.

?The Church has joined a broad-based coalition in defense of traditional marriage. While we feel this is important to all of society, we have always emphasized that respect be given to those who feel differently on this issue. It is unfortunate that some who oppose this proposition have not given the Church this same courtesy.?

We respect that you feel differently about this issue, but rather than respecting our differing positions, you have attempted to impose your position on all of California. That is what we are responding to and why we are fighting so hard to keep our rights that you are trying to take away.

If you are in CA and can volunteer tomorrow, call your local No on 8 office. If you like our ad, contribute to help get it up on the air.

And here is the big one. Make sure that everyone you know makes it to the polls tomorrow and votes all the way down the ballot. Even if Obama is looking good and numbers are coming in from the East Coast, we need to make sure people go vote. So spread the word! No on Prop 8.

Let's annoy the Mormon Church even more with a victory tomorrow.

Read The Full Article:
http://crooksandliars.com/julia-rosen/prop-8-ad-upset-mormon-church

Digg this

ACORN Smears Setting the Stage for Possible
Post-Election Lawsuits

post from Open Left - Front Page on 03 November 2008 08:30:00 PM. © Open Left - Front Page

With an historic Election Day coming tomorrow, it is increasingly clear that the McCain-Palin[...]

Read The Full Article:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/OpenLeft-FrontPage/~3/441592683/showDiary.do

Digg this

The Daily Fucking Rant

post from My Left Wing - Front Page on 03 November 2008 08:23:42 PM. © My Left Wing - Front Page

(Sure... The one day I needed a rant and there wasn't one. So... I just made my own. You got a problem with that?. I didn't think so.)

Why does stuff suck so much?

I was using the computer yesterday and stepped away for a while. When I came back the monitor was black. The little green light was on so I assumed it was in sleep mode. I jiggled the mouse a bit...nothing. I hit a few keys on the keyboard...nothing. I turned it off and then back on and the screen came up...for two seconds and went black. I tried plugging it into a different computer...same thing. My monitor appears to be fucked, and my computer is only three fucking years old. Since I bought this piece of shit computer the DVD writer has quit working,(to my knowledge, it never worked) the monitor has died and the wireless mouse is broken.(In fairness to Dell, I threw it against a wall, though if it hadn't sucked great big donkey balls, it never would have come to that.)

But it is not just my POS computer. It seems like, anymore, stuff just sucks. In the past year, stuff that I own that is broken or not working:

A dehumidifier that was less than 2 years old.
A cellphone that I bought sometime last year to replace the one that I had bought early the year before.

A ceiling fan I installed late last winter.

A CFL light bulb that burned out after 2 weeks.

A 7 or 8 year old microwave.

At least 3 pair of shoelaces.

The one that really pisses me off (other than the computer) is the ceiling fan. I installed it last winter when I was renovating my bedroom. Now it's crap. All because of some crappy little pull chain switch. I suppose could take it back, but that requires taking it down disassembling it, and that is a major pain in the ass. How hard is it to make a working pull chain switch, anyways? My house is over 80 years old and it has original fixtures with working pull chain switches. It wouldn't be so bad if the switch mechanism could be easily removed and replaced, but this one is integrated into the light and I'll probably end up having to replace the entire light unit, if not the entire fan.

It used to be that stuff worked. My buddy has a 30 year old dehumidifier that he runs in a detached garage 365 days/year. When I was a kid and the television would go out, my dad would just run to the hardware store and get a new tube. Now, everything is cheap crap. When the crap breaks, it is usually cheaper to just buy new crap. You don't mind so much because the crap is so cheap, but it never occurs to you that you'll have to buy new crap in another couple of years.

It wouldn't be so bad if repeatedly buying all this stuff created American jobs, but most of this stuff is made by Bangladeshi children who work for pennies a day. I would just say "Fuck it all." but I am so addicted to crap that I need to buy more crap to replace all of my broken crap. If I had the option, I spend more money to buy stuff that was not crap, but it is pretty much all crap so I'm screwed.

Read The Full Article:
http://www.myleftwing.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=23540

Digg this

Obama salutes his grandmother on the campaign
trail

post from Daily Kos on 03 November 2008 08:20:04 PM. © Daily Kos

In North Carolina, tonight, Election Eve:

video details and more

Obviously, this is a little bit of a bittersweet time for me. We have had a remarkable campaign. And, you know, when we started 21 months ago, I didn't know how it would turn out. And no matter what happens tomorrow, I'm going to feel good about how its turned out because all of you have created this incredible campaign. Some of you have heard that my grandmother who helped raise me passed away early this morning. And look, she has gone home. And she died peacefully in her sleep. With my sister at her side. And so there is great joy as well as tears. I'm not going to talk about it too long because its hard, a little, to talk about.

I want everybody to know, though, a little bit about her. Her name was Madelyn Dunham. She was born in Kansas in a small town in 1922. Which means that she lived through the Great Depression, she lived through two World Wars, she watched her husband go off to war while she looked after a baby and worked on a bomber assembly line. When her husband came back, they benefited from the GI Bill and they moved West and eventually ended up in Hawaii. And she was somebody who was a very humble person and a very plainspoken person.

She was one of those quiet heroes that we have all across America who, they're not famous, their names aren't in the newspapers, but each and every day, they work hard. They look after their families. They sacrifice for their children and their grandchildren. They aren't seeking the limelight. All they try to do is just do the right thing. And in this crowd, there are a lot of quiet heroes like that. Mothers and fathers, grandparents who have worked hard and sacrificed all their lives. And the satisfaction that they get is seeing that their children and maybe their grandchildren, or their great grandchildren, live a better life than they did. That's what America is about. That's what we're fighting for. And North Carolina, in just one more day, we have the opportunity to honor all those quiet heroes all across America, and all across North Carolina. To bring change to America to make sure that their work and their sacrifice is honored. That's what we're fighting for.

Read The Full Article:
http://feeds.dailykos.com/~r/dailykos/index/~3/QJa5HASvXKY/651529

Digg this

Report: Palin Not Responsible For Todd's Acting
Out

post from TPMMuckraker on 03 November 2008 08:19:00 PM. © TPMMuckraker

The key finding of the new Trooper-Gate report is that the earlier report, conducted by the state legislature, erred in finding that Sarah Palin broke state ethics laws by pressuring subordinates to fire Mike Wooten.

The new report finds that:

The Branchflower Report ... states that violation of the scope of code provision may be based on the governor's inaction as opposed to the governor's affirmative acts.
...
But ... the Ethics Act does not require a person subject to its provisions to police the behavior of third parties who are not subject to its provisions. To find that the Governor violated the Ethics Act by failing to control her husband's behavior would require one to add language to the Ethics Act that does not exist.

In other words, Sarah Palin can't be held legally responsible for Todd Palin's actions.

It bears repeating: this was a report that Palin herself initiated, so, despite some other breathless reporting in the press, it's no surprise that it exonerates her. The only independent report into the matter found that she broke state ethics laws.

Read The Full Article:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TPMmuckraker/~3/8Wfn8igrBKY/report_palin_not_respo
nsible_f.php

Digg this

A Strange After-market Life for Iraqi Rations

Some Iraqis explain that the flour provided to Iraqi families as part of the rations that are distributed by the Public Distribution System (PDS) lives a strange after-market life made possible by the system of price supports and subsidies in place that make the PDS function.

Read The Full Article:
http://www.iraqslogger.com/index.php/post/6588

Digg this

Barack the Vote or Else

I think this video, which I am posting for a second time, still beats that new bicycle one.

You may have to wait in line for hours today. Remember this image as you do:

video details and more

Read The Full Article:
http://liberaljournal.blogspot.com/2008/11/barack-vote-or-else.html

Digg this

A Prediction Report: Obama 339 Electoral Votes,
McCain 199

William Arnone, author of previous reports on the key states in the primaries and the electoral vote, has prepared his final assessment of who is likely to carry each state in Tuesday's Presidential election. I am publishing the report with his permission.

His summary:

The final assessment shows that the Democratic ticket of Senator Barack Obama of Illinois and Senator Joe Biden of Delaware will win 27 states (including the District of Columbia) and part of one state (Nebraska) with 339 electoral votes.

The Republican Presidential ticket of Senator John McCain of Arizona and Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska will win 23 states and parts of one state (Nebraska) with 199 electoral votes. The number of electoral votes needed to win is 270.

More...

This final assessment represents a shift of two states (Florida and Ohio) and part of one state (Nebraska) for a total of 48 electoral votes from the Republican ticket to the Democratic ticket since the last October assessment. A detailed analysis of the shifts in these two states and one Congressional District is included.

Since the initial assessment was conducted in August, which showed that Senator McCain would win 30 states with 291 electoral votes to Senator Obama's 21 states (including the District of Columbia) with 247 electoral votes if the election had been held then, there has been a dramatic shift of six states (Colorado, Florida, Michigan, Nevada, Ohio, and Virginia) and one Congressional District (Nebraska's 2nd CD) totaling 92 electoral votes from the Republican to the Democratic Presidential ticket.

With hours to go before Election Day, the likelihood of the results changing depends on the possibility of one or more new intervening variables. Among them are:

A domestic or international incident that disrupts voting or changes the focus of voters from the economy to national security.

A new eleventh-hour revelation about one or more of the Presidential or Vice Presidential candidates.

"keep-down-the-vote" effort in key states, including new-voter registration purges and activities designed to discourage turnout or challenge the voting results. There is already evidence of such destabilizing activity in six states (Colorado, Florida, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Virginia). Should these six states with 107 electoral votes go Republican, then the result would be a 307-231 McCain-Palin triumph.

Do Arnone's predictions match your's?