The IRack

post from My Left Wing - Front Page on 15 March 2008 11:42:22 PM. © My Left Wing - Front Page

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Every time I catch this sketch in a MadTV rerun, I mean to locate a YouTube and post it. This time I actually did something about it. Hilarious.

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Obama Pitches Independents and Repubs to Register
as Dems in PA

post from TalkLeft on 15 March 2008 11:12:00 PM. © TalkLeft

Remember Dems for a Day? Here's the new ad that went up on Barack Obama's website yesterday, telling voters if they are Indpendents or Republicans they must register as Dems by March 24.

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Salon has more on the Obama's very orchestrated and intentional campaign to have Republicans and Indpendents register as Dems so he can be our party's nominee. [More...]

According to the L.A. Times, the Obama campaign is seeking to register an additional 100,000 voters as Democrats in the next two weeks. Currently, there are 3.89 million registered Democratic voters in the state.

....But both the Politico and the Los Angeles Times have published stories recently about the Obama campaign's efforts to register thousands of independent and Republican voters as Democrats before the March 24 voter registration deadline. The vote itself will be held on April 22; as it's what's called a "closed" primary, only registered Democrats will be allowed to participate in the Democratic half of the primary.

If the Obama campaign is to pull off an upset, the new registrants will be vitally important. As the Politico's Carrie Budoff Brown observes, "The final tabulations [of the voter rolls] from the Department of State could offer the first tangible indications of whether Obama can catch Clinton in a state where she holds the advantage."

More at Politico, the Philadelphia Enquirer and the LA Times.

Independents and Republicans can easily switch back for November. At least if real Dems, not Dems for a Day, were picking the nominee, we'd know we'd have their vote for the general election. And real dems prefer Hillary. She's got more of their votes than Obama, I posted the numbers in this post a few days ago, as calculated by a TalkLeft reader. No one disputed them.

When you re-tally the votes of only self identified Dems (from CNN exit polling), and using Rear Clear Politic’s reported votes by state, the following is the breakdown of votes by Democrats for Obama and Hillary.
Popular Vote Total:
* Total Dems 19,067,662
* Clinton Dems 9,508,926
* Obama Dems 9,027,622
* Hillary Over Obama 481,307
Popular Vote Total (w/FL)
* Total Dems 20,210,950
* Clinton Dems 10,103,436
* Obama Dems 9,427,773
* Hillary Over Obama 713,010
Total Popular Vote (w/FL & MI)
* Total Dems 20,680,081
* Clinton Dems 10,384,915
* Obama Dems 9,596,660
* Hillary Over Obama 825,601

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Eco-Diary Rescue 3.15

post from Daily Kos on 15 March 2008 11:10:13 PM. © Daily Kos

Beginning next week, Eco-Diary Rescue will always include an action item, something you can do to make the world greener.

Intrepid (and apparently tireless) A Siegel had praise for a Netroots success story last week in Energy Smart from Illinois? Foster in Congress ..., a new Representative who happens to be of a green hue: "In Illinois 14, as all are aware, held a special election to fill the seat of the Dennis Hastert. Rather than a seemingly corrupt, extreme right-winger who (at times) makes other Republicans seem almost in the reality-based community, Illinois-14 will be sending someone of substance to the Congress, a man with serious scientific credentials and successful business experience. Bill Foster is now Congressman Bill Foster. In short: YEAH!"

The DailyKos Environmentalists can be found here.

POLLUTION & REGULATION

Drugs in the water supply caught the attention of several Diarists, including, a gnostic, who wrote Water supplies contaminated with pharmaceutical drugs,: "If you don't drink water treated by reverse osmosis, you are drinking anti-psychotics, antibiotics (!), tranquilizers and anti-epileptic drugs in your tap water, amongst many many other drugs. Granted it is trace amounts but nevertheless there are serious health concerns about the nation's water supplies being contaminated by Big Pharma's wares ....and nobody is doing a damn thing about it.

JDWolverton reported, however, that Pharma Water Supply Contamination - Old News: "Traces of pharmaceuticals in our tap water is old news. German scientists and other European chemists noticed it in the early 1990's. The problem was discussed and dismissed by the EPA in 2005. Despite the New York Times running the AP article, the problem isn't that the traces are there so much as there is no safety standard and too little is known about the effects trace amounts of drugs have on our health. The Water Research Center (University of Arizona) has studied the subject and have found the problem to be widespread. So what's BushCo doing about it?

And Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse saw the matter in a different light in the Diary Environmental Justice & Human Rights: Doped-Up Drinking Water Supplies: "An AP investigation found that our nation's drinking water supplies for at least 41 million Americans are contaminated with pharmaceuticals that had been initially provided to people, pets and cows. Some of the drugs are absorbed by the body while the remainder ends up in wastewater. The contamination extends to drinking water supplies, watersheds and groundwater basins. Some of the drugs will not even be removed by modern drinking water and wastewater treatment processes and no sewage treatment systems are specifically engineered to remove pharmaceuticals. There really are no cost effective alternative options because private drinking water wells are affected, water bottlers often use tap water and home filtration system makers do not usually treat the water or test for drugs. Only the reverse osmosis technology removes virtually all pharmaceutical contaminants but is very expensive for large-scale use. While it is shocking to find out that we may be involuntarily ingesting unknown quantities of a variety of drugs, this really is business as usual."

Like many other people, history geek was unhappy because the EPA Sets unacceptable Standards--WaPo article: "The Environmental Protection Agency has decided to lower the allowable amount of smog-forming ozone in the air to 75 parts per billion, a level significantly higher than what the agency's scientific advisers urged for this key component of unhealthy air pollution, according to documents obtained by The Washington Post. This is evidence, once again, that the Bush White House is unconcerned with both science and health."

The Light Brown Apple Moth, Aerial Spraying, and You was aigeanta’s explanation of a longstanding practice: "Many are also questioning the motivation behind the massive aerial spraying of urban areas, as opposed to the pheromone twist tie technique or more localized agricultural spraying. For example, to date there has been no extensive crop damage from the moth, which, considering its range, must have existed in the state for many years. The ‘emergency’ seems to have been prompted by a USDA quarantine on exports from affected counties, and its declaration resulted in $75 million in funds made available from the federal agency to eradicate the moth, a goal that is probably unattainable according to experts, but $500,000 is being spent on PR to convince us otherwise. In addition, it has recently come to light that ‘the company that makes one of the pesticides state officials are considering spraying over the Bay Area to fight the light brown apple moth is owned by a wealthy California agribusinessman who has been a generous contributor to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and other state officials.’"

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Late Nite: Wingnut Crap of the Week

post from Firedoglake on 15 March 2008 11:05:46 PM. © Firedoglake

We're coming up on the anniversary of the Bushite invasion of Iraq, a disaster which clearly ranks among the worst foreign policy blunders in American history. Of course, there are those who disagree. These people are, in a word, lunatics.[...]

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C&Ls Late Nite Music Club with The Cure

post from Crooks and Liars on 15 March 2008 11:01:18 PM. © Crooks and Liars

“Purple Haze” is probably one of Jimi Hendrix’s most famous and best loved songs. It first appeared on his debut album and it’s been covered by lots of people, including Ozzie Osborne and, more interestingly, Kronos Quartet. My favorite cover version is a relatively rare promo-single from The Cure (1994), who, much earlier, had done [...]

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http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/03/15/cls-late-nite-music-club-with-the-cure/

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The Will Of The Voters

post from TalkLeft on 15 March 2008 10:49:00 PM. © TalkLeft

By Big Tent Democrat

Adam Nagourney writes:

While many superdelegates said they intended to keep their options open as the race continued to play out over the next three months, the interviews suggested that the playing field was tilting slightly toward Mr. Obama in one potentially vital respect. Many of them said that in deciding whom to support, they would adopt what Mr. Obama’s campaign has advocated as the essential principle: reflecting the will of the voters.

(Emphasis supplied.) Ah, the question is begged - what do we mean by the "will of the voters?" Obama means the selected delegate count. Most normal people say the popular vote.

More . . .

I like Sherrod Brown's criteria for deciding who to cast his delegate vote for:

“It’s the overall popular vote, it’s the overall delegates, it’s who is bringing energy to the campaign, it’s who has momentum,” Mr. Brown said.

I think that is actually what the Super Delegates will look at. I am comfortable with that myself.

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Catching On

post from Talking Points Memo on 15 March 2008 10:49:00 PM. © Talking Points Memo

A while back we noted that top Clinton advisor Harold Ickes had admonished the press not to use the phrase "super delegates" but instead to employ what he claims is the more accurate "automatic delegates." The Clinton campaign has pushed for this change[...]

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My State's a 4-Letter Word

Pretty good day for Obama in Iowa.

A pretty stunning gain out of Iowa for Obama, where an Iowa Democratic official confirmed to me just now that the county convention results will translate into a 25-14-6 edge for Obama over Clinton and Edwards.

That's a gain of nine for the Illinois Senator over the results reported in January, while Clinton lost one delegate. (Edwards lost eight).

Obama gains a net of 10 delegates in Iowa, while a net of 9 delegates is what Clinton obtained over Obama with a substantial win in Ohio eleven days ago.

I don't know what that means...

Must be good news for Giuliani.

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Looks great for McCain in March

On the heels of a Rasmussen poll showing McCain leading Obama or Clinton by a 46-40 margin in Iowa, Zogby includes Nader in a national poll. Now, Zogby loves to make news, so I wouldn't put it past him to have polled for a sample showing Nader doing[...]

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http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/mydd/~3/252217322/376

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Coolest Family-Related News Ever

Photo by mjlaflaca under a Creative Commons license.It's nonpolitical, but this is ridiculously[...]

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