[Roger Kaputnik]

We had a cat who had kittens by 5 females that we know of. His name? The Rifleman!

[Roger Kaputnik]

• Real Time with Bill Maher

New Rule: If we can’t, after all is said and done, make this election go the right way, at least we can save one man. I’m talking about young Master Levi Johnston. He’s the 18-year-old Alaskan hockey enthusiast who knocked up Sarah Palin’s daughter, and the National Enquirer describes him as “a boozing pot-smoker who doesn’t want to get married” – and John McCain thinks he found his soul mate!





We’ve all recently seen how evil henchman of the Republican party captured this poor innocent out of his natural habitat and forced him into a shotgun wedding, all so that their campaign narrative of fake family values could be upheld. When the 17-year-old daughter of the vice presidential candidate running on the Jesus ticket is “out to here,” it’s just better that Levi was introduced as the “fiancé.” Looks a little less white trashy.





But that doesn’t change the fact that right now Levi is America’s number one political prisoner. But Levi, you don’t have to be – this is the 21st century, at least in the blue states. We don’t have sharia law like in Saudi Arabia, or Alabama, and as much as the Bible thumpers would want it, we still don’t have arranged marriages in America. You don’t have to do this – you have options. You can pull a Juno – fuck, you live in Juneau! Or you could do what most people do with an unwanted child: give it to Angelina Jolie.





And if you’re worried about the baby, don’t – let’s get real dude, the way you are at 18, a baby’s better off not being around you – you’ll wind up losing it, or shooting it, or it’ll be on the bottom of your skate or something – just let the Palin womenfolk look after it for a while, one more infant in that Mormon compound they call a house won’t bother anybody – they’ll barely notice another kid at the table, and soon they won’t even remember whose seed it was that produced young “Trink” or “Truck” or “Puck” or whatever fucked up redneck name they give him.





In any event, we here at Real Time have taken the liberty of purchasing the website FreeLevi.org. And I will be happy to give the site over to you if you want to use it to get folks to contribute to some sort of liberty fund so you can get enough money to get out of that frozen meth lab they call a town. And even if the money doesn’t come in, listen to me, it’s not too late: just grab your skull bong, climb out the window, and get on the highway. I can’t actually come get you, or even let you stay at my place because I’m pretty sure you’d smoke all my weed, but just call me from a pay phone, I know of a safe house you can stay ‘til after the election, it’s like the witness protection program for baby-daddies.





And remember, Levi: California knows how to party. Trust me, the girls out here are going to love a big, high-sticking farm boy like you. If you play your cards right, in a couple weeks you could be screwing the lesbian right out of Lindsay Lohan.


FREE LEVI

[mcstumper]

New Rule: If we can’t, after all is said and done, make this election go the right way, at least we can save one man. I’m talking about young Master Levi Johnston. He’s the 18-year-old Alaskan hockey enthusiast who knocked up Sarah Palin’s daughter.....

What trash. You're stooping, Rog.

[Roger Kaputnik]

I thought it was a humorous idea, and original. Here is something I do really like about Gov. Palin: She is not afraid to be herself; the way the media is kept away from her has more to do with, I suspect, the fear her party handlers have of this. She meets some of the key criteria I identified earlier. And, yes, I do trust intelligence over experience.

[mcstumper]

I thought it was a humorous idea, and original. Here is something I do really like about Gov. Palin: She is not afraid to be herself; the way the media is kept away from her has more to do with, I suspect, the fear her party handlers have of this. She meets some of the key criteria I identified earlier. And, yes, I do trust intelligence over experience.

Fair enough. I heard some clips of her talking about having foreign policy experience due to Alaska's proximity to Russia. That's something I hope I soon forget.

[Roger Kaputnik]

I just hope that we never have to rely on that 'expertise.'

[Roger Kaputnik]

FactChecking Debate No. 2October 8, 2008Nonsense in NashvilleSummaryMcCain and Obama debated for the second time, in Nashville. We noted some misleading statements and mangled facts:

• McCain proposed to write down the amount owed by over-mortgaged homeowners and claimed the idea as his own: “It’s my proposal, it's not Sen. Obama's proposal, it's not President Bush's proposal.” But the idea isn’t new. Obama had endorsed something similar two weeks earlier, and authority for the treasury secretary to grant such relief was included in the recently passed $700 billion financial rescue package.

• Both candidates oversimplified the causes of the financial crisis. McCain blamed it on Democrats who resisted tighter regulation of federal mortgage agencies. Obama blamed it on financial deregulation backed by Republicans. We find both are right, with plenty of blame left over for others, from home buyers to the chairman of the Federal Reserve.

• Obama said his health care plan would lower insurance premiums by up to $2,500 a year. Experts we’ve consulted see little evidence such savings would materialize.

• McCain misstated his own health care plan, saying he’d give a $5,000 tax credit to “every American” His plan actually would provide only $2,500 per individual, or $5,000 for couples and families. He also misstated Obama’s health care plan, claiming it would levy fines on “small businesses” that fail to provide health insurance. Actually, Obama’s plan exempts “small businesses.”

• McCain lamented that the U.S. was forced to “withdraw in humiliation” from Somalia in 1994, but he failed to note that he once proposed to cut off funding for troops to force a faster withdrawal.

• Obama said, “I favor nuclear power.” That’s a stronger statement than we've heard him make before. As recently as last December, he said, “I am not a nuclear energy proponent.”

• McCain claimed “1.3 million people in America make their living off eBay.” Actually, only 724,000 persons in the U.S. have income from eBay, and only some of them rely on it as their primary source.

For full details, and additional quibbles, please read our Analysis section.
AnalysisSens. Barack Obama and John McCain met Oct. 7 for the second of three scheduled presidential debates. It was a town-hall-style debate before an audience of 80 uncommitted voters. Questions were submitted by the audience members, and others who sent them by e-mail, and were screened beforehand by moderator Tom Brokaw of NBC News. The event was held at Belmont University in Nashville, Tenn., and was broadcast nationally. We caught several misleading statements and falsehoods, many of which the candidates have said before.

"My" Mortgage Plan?

McCain made what he claimed was a new proposal to rescue over-mortgaged homeowners:

McCain: As president of the United States. ... I would order the secretary of the treasury to immediately buy up the bad home loan mortgages in America and renegotiate at the new value of those homes – at the diminished value of those homes and let people be able to make those – be able to make those payments and stay in their homes.

McCain added: "It's my proposal, it's not Sen. Obama's proposal, it's not President Bush's proposal. But I know how to get America working again..."

But in fact, the recently passed $700 billion rescue package already grants the treasury secretary authority to undertake just such a program. It requires the secretary to buy up troubled mortgages while taking into consideration “the need to help families keep their homes and to stabilize communities.” It also says “the Secretary shall consent, where appropriate (to) loss mitigation measures, including term extensions, rate reductions (or) principal write downs."

Obama himself had urged this as the package was being considered. He said on Sept. 23 that "we should consider giving the government the authority to purchase mortgages directly instead of simply purchasing mortgage-backed securities."

McCain said "his" proposal would be expensive, and his campaign quickly issued a news release giving numbers:

McCain press release: The direct cost of this plan would be roughly $300 billion because the purchase of mortgages would relieve homeowners of “negative equity” in some homes. ... It may be necessary for Congress to raise the overall borrowing limit.

Minutes later, McCain was attacking Obama for proposing what he said was $860 billion in new spending.

Oversimplifying the Financial Crisis. Again.

The finger-pointing was fast and furious during the discussion of the fiscal crisis. McCain blamed lax regulation of the Federal National Mortgage Association and the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation:

McCain: But you know, one of the real catalysts, really the match that lit this fire was Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. [T]hey're the ones that, with the encouragement of Sen. Obama and his cronies and his friends in Washington, that went out and made all these risky loans, gave them to people that could never afford to pay back.

Obama blamed deregulation of the banking industry:

Obama: Now, I've got to correct a little bit of Sen. McCain's history, not surprisingly. Let's, first of all, understand that the biggest problem in this whole process was the deregulation of the financial system.

We’ve been here before. McCain has in fact been in favor of financial deregulation, but President Bill Clinton signed, and a lot of other Democrats supported, much of that same deregulation. And while Democrats really did fight McCain-cosponsored regulations of the FMs, McCain himself signed on to the bill just two months before the housing bubble popped.

In fact, there’s plenty of blame to go around. Experts have blamed everyone from home buyers to mortgage lenders to Alan Greenspan to both the Bush and Clinton administrations.

Furthermore, McCain misspoke when he said Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac "made all these risky loans, gave them to people that could never afford to pay back." Actually those organizations did not make "home loans directly with consumers." Rather, they "work[ed] with mortgage bankers, brokers, and other primary mortgage market partners" and supplied them with the funds to lend to home buyers at affordable rates, as described on their Web sites.

Dubious Health Care Savings

Obama said that his health care plan would cut premium costs substantially:

Obama: We're going to work with your employer to lower the cost of your premiums by up to $2,500 a year.

We contacted health experts about this claim before – when Obama was saying the $2,500 would be the savings per family "on average." Some were quite skeptical. M.I.T.’s Jonathan Gruber told us, “I know zero credible evidence to support that conclusion.” Obama has also said on the campaign trail that more than half of the savings would come from the use of electronic health records, a major part of his plan to cut health costs. When we looked into that claim, experts told us it was wishful thinking.

Adoption of electronic medical records has been slow among doctors and hospitals. Obama could do much to speed it up, but it's not clear that he could bring about widespread adoption or reap such large savings from it. One of his advisers previously told us that the $2,500 figure included savings that would go to government and employers and that could, theoretically, result in lower taxes or higher wages for Americans. It remains to be seen whether savings could trickle down like that, even if Obama could gain the optimistic overall health care savings he touts.

More Health Care Misleads

McCain misstated his own health care plan and Obama’s in one sentence:

McCain: I am in favor of . . . giving every American a $5,000 refundable tax credit and go out and get the health insurance you want rather than mandates and fines for small businesses, as Sen. Obama's plan calls for.

McCain's plan does not call for giving a $5,000 tax credit for "every American." It calls for a tax credit of $2,500. The $5,000 figure would apply to couples or families. And Obama’s plan requires large businesses to provide coverage for their employees or pay into a national plan, not "small businesses," as McCain said. Obama's health care proposal, posted on his Web site, says: “Small businesses will be exempt from this requirement.” McCain previously used this charge in his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention, and he repeated the claim in the debate, saying, "If you're a small business person and you don't insure your employees, Sen. Obama will fine you. Will fine you." As we said, that's false. Obama countered that he had proposed a refundable tax credit for small businesses of up to 50 percent of the cost of premiums, which is indeed part of his plan. We've noted before that neither man defines what he means by "small business."

Black Hawk Down

McCain lamented having to “withdraw in humiliation” from Somalia in 1993, but failed to mention his own role:

McCain: We went in to Somalia as a peacemaking organization, we ended up trying to be – excuse me, as a peacekeeping organization, we ended up trying to be peacemakers and we ended up having to withdraw in humiliation.

What McCain isn’t saying is that he led an attempt to force the Clinton administration to withdraw more quickly. After the First Battle of Mogadishu (immortalized in the book and film “Black Hawk Down”), Clinton proposed a six-month plan for withdrawing combat troops. Then-Sen. Phil Gramm complained that the plan was an attempt to “save face,” and McCain introduced an amendment to cut off funding for combat in Somalia and force an immediate withdrawal. The amendment was tabled and the Senate backed Clinton’s plan. In his 2002 memoir, “Worth the Fighting For,” McCain called his amendment “hasty” and wrote that he “regretted” what he came to see as “a retreat in the face of aggression from an inferior foe.”

Nuclear Warming

Obama flatly said he favored nuclear energy – embracing it more warmly than in the past:

Obama: Contrary to what Sen. McCain keeps on saying, I favor nuclear power as one component of our overall energy mix.

Previously Obama has been more hesitant. He said at a town hall meeting in Newton, Iowa, on Dec. 30, 2007, when asked if he was "truly comfortable" with the safety of nuclear power:

Obama (Dec. 30, 2007 I start off with the premise that nuclear energy is not optimal. ... I am not a nuclear energy proponent.

He then went on to say later in the same response that he has "not ruled out nuclear ... but only so far as it is clean and safe." The energy plan Obama released in October 2007 only grudgingly conceded that more nuclear power is probably needed to reduce carbon emissions: "It is unlikely that we can meet our aggressive climate goals if we eliminate nuclear power from the table."

eBay Error

McCain said that "1.3 million people in America make their living off eBay." He's way off. That's the number of people worldwide who have eBay earnings as their primary or secondary income. The online auction site says that of these, 724,000 people are in the U.S. – but it still doesn't say how many of the 724,000 use eBay as their primary source of income.

McCain was touting the founder of the popular Internet auction site, Meg Whitman, as a possible secretary of the treasury in a McCain administration.

Counting Errors

McCain exaggerated Obama's votes to increase taxes.

McCain: Sen. Obama has voted 94 times to either increase your taxes or against tax cuts. That's his record.

He’s getting warmer — the first time we dinged him for this one, he said Obama voted 94 times to increase taxes, which is way off. He's now saying it's 94 votes either for increased taxes or against tax cuts. But that's still misleading. Seven of the votes were for lowering taxes for most people while increasing them on a few, and 11 votes were for increasing taxes only on those making more than $1 million a year (not "your taxes" except for a very few.)

Obama had his own misleading claim about vote counts:

Obama: And during that time, he voted 23 times against alternative fuels, 23 times.

We found that only 11 of those votes would have reduced or eliminated subsidies or tax incentives for alternative energy. The rest were votes McCain cast against the mandatory use of alternative energy, or votes in favor of allowing exemptions from such mandates.

More on that $860 Billion

McCain said that Obama has proposed more than $800 billion in new spending.

McCain: Do you know that Sen. Obama has voted for – is proposing $860
billion of new spending now? New spending.

That’s based on a McCain campaign estimate of how much Obama’s new proposals will cost, without figuring in any savings or reductions in spending. Any increase in funding and any created program counts as "new spending" in this estimate, whether or not it is offset by decreases in spending elsewhere.

The nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget has found that both Obama and McCain are proposing combinations of tax and spending policies that would increase the federal deficit. It found that in 2013, Obama’s proposals would produce a net deficit increase of $286 billion, while McCain's major policies would produce a net deficit increase of between $167 billion and $259 billion. In talking to CNN, CRFB President Maya MacGuineas estimated that McCain's deficit increase would fall midway between the extremes of that range, at $211 billion.

Iraqi Surplus

Obama repeated a stale talking point when he said, "We're spending $10 billion a month in Iraq at a time when the Iraqis have a $79 billion surplus, $79 billion."

As we’ve pointed out when Obama said it on the campaign trail, when he repeated it at the last debate, and even when Biden mentioned the figure in the vice presidential debate, that number is wrong. The Iraqis actually “have” $29.4 billion in the bank. The Government Accountability Office projected in August that Iraq’s 2008 budget surplus could range anywhere from $38.2 billion to $50.3 billion, depending on oil revenue, price and volume. Then, in early August, the Iraqi legislature passed a $21 billion supplemental spending bill. The supplemental will be completely funded by this year’s surplus, and that means that the Iraqi’s will not have $79 billion in the bank. They could have about $59 billion.

$6.8 Million Boast

McCain repeated a questionable boast when he said, “I've taken on some of the defense contractors. I saved the taxpayers $6.8 billion in a deal for an Air Force tanker that was done in a corrupt fashion."

As we mentioned in our analysis of the first debate, there is more to the story. McCain certainly did lead a fight to kill the contract, and the effort ended in prison sentences for defense contractors. The contract is still up in the air, however, and questions have been raised about the role McCain played in helping a Boeing rival secure the new contract.

After the original Boeing contract to supply refueling airliners was nixed in 2003, the bidding process was reopened. And in early 2007, Boeing rival EADS/Airbus won the bid the second time around. But Boeing filed a protest about the way the bids were processed, and the Government Accountability Office released a report that found “significant errors” with the bid process.

Further, the New York Times reported that “McCain’s top advisers, including a cochairman of his presidential campaign, were lobbyists for EADS. And Mr. McCain had written to the Defense Department, urging it to ignore a trade dispute between the United States and Europe over whether Airbus received improper subsidies.”

68 Million Acres

Obama was off the mark when he said that oil companies “currently have 68 million acres that they're not using.”

As we’ve pointed out previously, those 68 million leased acres are not producing oil, but they are not necessarily untouched. In fact, in 2006, the last year for which figures are available, there were a total of more than 15,000 holes that were being proposed, started or finished, according to the Bureau of Land Management. These acres of land that these holes sit on are not counted as being “producing,” but they are certainly far from untouched.

The Return of the Oil Slick

McCain recycled a misleading claim from Sen. Hillary Clinton’s primary campaign,
charging Obama with voting to give “billions” to oil companies:

McCain: By the way, my friends, I know you grow a little weary with this back-and-forth. It was an energy bill on the floor of the Senate loaded down with goodies, billions for the oil companies, and it was sponsored by Bush and Cheney. You know who voted for it? You might never know. That one. You know who voted against it? Me.

McCain is referring to the Energy Policy Act of 2005, which Obama did in fact vote for. Clinton raised this same charge against Obama during the Democratic primaries. It was misleading then and it’s equally misleading now.

In fact, according to a Congressional Research Service report, more tax breaks were taken away from oil companies than were given. Overall, the act resulted in a small net tax increase on the oil industry:

Congressional Research Service: The Energy Policy Act of 2005 (EPACT05, P.L. 109-58) included several oil and gas tax incentives, providing about $2.6 billion of tax cuts for the oil and gas industry. In addition, EPACT05 provided for $2.9 billion of tax increases on the oil and gas industry, for a net tax increase on the industry of nearly $300 million over 11 years.

As we said last year, the bill did contain $14.3 billion in tax breaks, but most of those went to electric utilities, and nuclear, and also to alternative fuels research
and subsidies for energy-efficient cars, homes and buildings – not to the oil industry.

Computer Error

Obama moved the invention of the computer up by more than a century:

Obama: The same way the computer was originally invented by a bunch of government scientists who were trying to figure out, for defense purposes, how to communicate, we've got to understand that this is a national security issue, as well.

It’s true that the first electronic computer, ENIAC, or the Electronic Numerical Integrator And Computer, was developed at the University of Pennsylvania with funding from the War Department.

But ENIAC was not actually the first computer. That distinction belongs to the difference engine, a mechanical computer invented in 1822 by the British mathematician Charles Babbage. And even Babbage was drawing on earlier work, such as the calculating machine built in 1671 by the German philosopher Gottfried Liebniz.

Other quibbles

• Obama said: "When George Bush came into office, our debt – national debt
  was around $5 trillion. It's now over $10 trillion." Actually, it was closer to $6 trillion when Bush took office. On Jan. 22, 2001 (two days after Bush was sworn in) the debt stood at $5.728 trillion. On Sept. 30, 2008, it was $10.025 trillion.
  
  
• McCain said it again: "We've got to stop sending $700 billion a year to countries that don't want us very – like us very much" (He actually used the figure three times in the debate.) He's talking about what we spend importing oil, and he's said the same thing at the last debate and numerous other times. At current oil prices, the correct figure is about $493 billion. About a third of that goes to Canada, Mexico and the United Kingdom, which were still on the friendly side of the ledger last time we looked.
  
  
• Obama was right about the amount of earmarks, when he said they "account for about $18 billion of our budget." According to the budget watchdog group, Taxpayers for Common Sense, earmarks totaled just $18.3 billion in 2008. Citizens Against Government Waste came in with a slightly smaller number of $17.2 billion, and the Office of Management and Budget smaller still at $16.9 billion.
  
  
• McCain repeated an error he made in the last debate when he said, "In Lebanon, I stood up to President Reagan, my hero, and said, if we send Marines in there, how can we possibly beneficially affect this situation? And said we shouldn't. Unfortunately, almost 300 brave young Marines were killed." In fact, as we noted previously, McCain wasn't elected until three months after the Marines had been deployed. He did vote against the post-hoc War Powers Act authorization of the deployment; Reagan signed it into law in October 1983, 11 days before a suicide bomber set off a blast that killed 241 servicemembers in their barracks.
  
  –by Brooks Jackson, Viveca Novak, Lori Robertson, Joe Miller, Jessica Henig and Justin Bank
  
  
  

Sources Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. "Promises, Promises: A Fiscal Voter Guide to the 2008 Election." U.S. Budget Watch. 15 Sep. 2008.

CNN Political Ticker. "Fact Check: Is Obama proposing $860 billion+ in new spending?" 29 Sep. 2008.

JohnMcCain.com. "Straight Talk on Health System Reform." accessed 8 Oct. 2008.

Transcript, “Barack Obama Sept. 23 press conference,” Lynn Sweet's blog, Chicago Sun Times 24 Sept 2008.

Obama, Barack. "Plan for a Healthy America." BarackObama.com, accessed 8 Oct. 2008.

"U.S. Imports by Country of Origin." U.S. Energy Information Administration, accessed 8 Oct. 2008.

"Spot Prices, Crude Oil in Dollars per Barrel." U.S. Energy Information Administration, accessed 8 Oct. 2008.

"Statement Regarding the Bid Protest Decision Resolving the Aerial Refueling Tanker Protest by The Boeing Company" Government Accountability Office. 18 June 2008.

Isikoff, Michael, "McCain’s Boeing Battle Boomerangs," Newsweek. 30 June 2008.

Laurent, Lionel, "Boeing Boomerangs on McCain," Forbers Magazine. 4 March 2008.

Wayne, Leslie, "Audit Says Tanker Deal Is Flawed," New York Times. 19 June 2008.

Majority Staff, "The Truth About America’s Energy:Big Oil Stockpiles Supplies and Pockets Profits," House Committe on Natural Resources. June 2008.

"Total Producing and Non-Producing Leases: Fiscal Year 2007," Mineral Management Service. Accessed 2 July 2008.

Van Wagener, Dana, "Impacts of Increased Access to Oil and Natural Gas Resources in the Lower 48 Federal Outer Continental Shelf," Energy Information Administration. Accessed 2 July 2008.

"Inventory of Onshore Federal Oil and Natural Gas Resources and Restrictions to Their Development," U.S. Departments of the Interior, Agriculture, and Energy. 2008.

Krauss, Clifford. "[url="http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F0CEEDC123CF936A25753C1A965958260"]Backing Clinton, Senate Rejects Bid to Speed Somalia
Pullout[/url]," New York Times, 15 October 1993.

Winegrad, Dilys and Atsushi Akera. "A Short History of the Second American Revolution," University of Pennsylvania Almanac, 30 January 1996.


Related ArticlesSadly, Mostly TrueMcCain and Obama accuse each other of falsehoods, and both have good reason.FactChecking Biden-Palin DebateThe candidates were not 100 percent accurate. To say the least.Who Caused the Economic Crisis?MoveOn.org blames McCain advisers. He blames Obama and Democrats in Congress. Both are wrong.FactChecking Debate No. 1Facts muddled in Mississippi McCain-Obama meeting.

Copyright © 20

[Southsider2k12]

Read between the lines here. Under Barack Obama's tax plans 56% of the country will be fully supporting 44% of the country. Stop and think about that. That means almost half of the country, including many who are close to median income in this country will be paying ZERO taxes. A large chunk of that 44% will actually PROFIT from the tax code. That and the old welfare style disincentive to work are by far the two biggest problems I have had with his fiscal policies from day one. I'll be damned if I should support middle class families simply because I am a little more middle class than they are.

The end of the article is 100% right when it wonders why this hasn't been hammered by the McCain campaign, instead of all of the stupid stuff like flag pins and Pastors. This is what I care about, not the rest of the fluff.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122385651698727257.html

One of Barack Obama's most potent campaign claims is that he'll cut taxes for no less than 95% of "working families." He's even promising to cut taxes enough that the government's tax share of GDP will be no more than 18.2% -- which is lower than it is today.
[Review & Outlook] AP

It's a clever pitch, because it lets him pose as a middle-class tax cutter while disguising that he's also proposing one of the largest tax increases ever on the other 5%. But how does he conjure this miracle, especially since more than a third of all Americans already pay no income taxes at all? There are several sleights of hand, but the most creative is to redefine the meaning of "tax cut."

For the Obama Democrats, a tax cut is no longer letting you keep more of what you earn. In their lexicon, a tax cut includes tens of billions of dollars in government handouts that are disguised by the phrase "tax credit." Mr. Obama is proposing to create or expand no fewer than seven such credits for individuals:
[Review & Outlook]

- A $500 tax credit ($1,000 a couple) to "make work pay" that phases out at income of $75,000 for individuals and $150,000 per couple.

- A $4,000 tax credit for college tuition.

- A 10% mortgage interest tax credit (on top of the existing mortgage interest deduction and other housing subsidies).

- A "savings" tax credit of 50% up to $1,000.

- An expansion of the earned-income tax credit that would allow single workers to receive as much as $555 a year, up from $175 now, and give these workers up to $1,110 if they are paying child support.

- A child care credit of 50% up to $6,000 of expenses a year.

- A "clean car" tax credit of up to $7,000 on the purchase of certain vehicles.

Here's the political catch. All but the clean car credit would be "refundable," which is Washington-speak for the fact that you can receive these checks even if you have no income-tax liability. In other words, they are an income transfer -- a federal check -- from taxpayers to nontaxpayers. Once upon a time we called this "welfare," or in George McGovern's 1972 campaign a "Demogrant." Mr. Obama's genius is to call it a tax cut.

The Tax Foundation estimates that under the Obama plan 63 million Americans, or 44% of all tax filers, would have no income tax liability and most of those would get a check from the IRS each year. The Heritage Foundation's Center for Data Analysis estimates that by 2011, under the Obama plan, an additional 10 million filers would pay zero taxes while cashing checks from the IRS.

The total annual expenditures on refundable "tax credits" would rise over the next 10 years by $647 billion to $1.054 trillion, according to the Tax Policy Center. This means that the tax-credit welfare state would soon cost four times actual cash welfare. By redefining such income payments as "tax credits," the Obama campaign also redefines them away as a tax share of GDP. Presto, the federal tax burden looks much smaller than it really is.

The political left defends "refundability" on grounds that these payments help to offset the payroll tax. And that was at least plausible when the only major refundable credit was the earned-income tax credit. Taken together, however, these tax credit payments would exceed payroll levies for most low-income workers.

It is also true that John McCain proposes a refundable tax credit -- his $5,000 to help individuals buy health insurance. We've written before that we prefer a tax deduction for individual health care, rather than a credit. But the big difference with Mr. Obama is that Mr. McCain's proposal replaces the tax subsidy for employer-sponsored health insurance that individuals don't now receive if they buy on their own. It merely changes the nature of the tax subsidy; it doesn't create a new one.

There's another catch: Because Mr. Obama's tax credits are phased out as incomes rise, they impose a huge "marginal" tax rate increase on low-income workers. The marginal tax rate refers to the rate on the next dollar of income earned. As the nearby chart illustrates, the marginal rate for millions of low- and middle-income workers would spike as they earn more income.

Some families with an income of $40,000 could lose up to 40 cents in vanishing credits for every additional dollar earned from working overtime or taking a new job. As public policy, this is contradictory. The tax credits are sold in the name of "making work pay," but in practice they can be a disincentive to working harder, especially if you're a lower-income couple getting raises of $1,000 or $2,000 a year. One mystery -- among many -- of the McCain campaign is why it has allowed Mr. Obama's 95% illusion to go unanswered.

Please add your comments to the Opinion Journal forum.

[Roger Kaputnik]

Is the Tax Foundation nonpartisan? The WSJ isn't.


This is exactly what I am talking about in another thread. The issues are real, and the media coverage is insulting. One problem with all the tax policy enacted and proposed is that there are so very many permutations on the effects that one is inundated to the point of numbness, if not numbed-skull-ness, and discussion rapidly becomes meaningless.

What I advocate is a flat tax, a true flat tax--no exceptions, no deductions. Let's say it is determined that income (we can leave that definition to later) tax should be 18%, then the new 1040 post card return would have these instructions:

Line 1 Enter total income
Line 2 Multiply by .18 and enter
Send the Line 2 amount to the US Treasury.

[Roger Kaputnik]

http://www.factcheck.org/elections-2008/fa...ebate_no_3.html


FactChecking Debate No. 3

October 16, 2008Sorting out fact and fiction in the presidential candidates' final debate.SummarySpin and hype were apparent, once again, at the third and final debate between McCain and Obama:

• McCain claimed the liberal group ACORN “is now on the verge of maybe perpetrating one of the greatest frauds in voter history ... maybe destroying the fabric of democracy.” In fact, a Republican prosecutor said of the first and biggest ACORN fraud case: “[T]his scheme was not intended to permit illegal voting.” He said $8-an-hour workers turned in made-up voter registration forms rather than doing what ACORN paid them to do.

• McCain said “Joe the plumber” faced “much higher taxes” under Obama’s tax plan and would pay a fine under Obama’s health care plan if he failed to provide coverage for his workers. But Ohio plumber Joe Wurzelbacher would pay higher taxes only if the business he says he wants to buy puts his income over $200,000 a year, and his small business would be exempt from Obama’s requirement to provide coverage for workers.

• Obama repeated a dubious claim that his health care plan will cut the average family’s premiums by $2,500 a year. Experts have found that figure to be overly optimistic.

• McCain claimed that Obama’s real “object” is a government-run, single-payer health insurance system like those in Canada or England. The McCain campaign points to a quote from five years ago, when Obama told a labor gathering that he was “a proponent of a single-payer health care program.” But Obama has since qualified his enthusiasm for Canadian-style health care, and his current proposal is nothing like that.

• Obama incorrectly claimed all of McCain’s ads had been “negative.” That was true for one recent week, but not over the entire campaign. And at times Obama has run a higher percentage of attack ads than McCain.
  
  
• McCain described Colombia as the "largest agricultural importer of our products." Actually, Canada imports the most U.S. farm products, and Colombia is far down the list.
  

• Obama strained to portray himself as willing to break ranks with fellow Democrats. His prime example was his vote for a bill that was supported by 18 Democrats and opposed by 26. Congressional Quarterly rates him as voting with his party 97 percent of the time since becoming a U.S. senator.

For details on these and other misleading claims, please read on to the Analysis section.
AnalysisSens. John McCain and Barack Obama met for their final debate Oct. 15. The face-to-face was held at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y., and was moderated by CBS News' Bob Schieffer.

ACORN and Vote Fraud

McCain made some dire claims about a liberal group he said was out to steal the election:

McCain: We need to know the full extent of Sen. Obama's relationship with ACORN, who is now on the verge of maybe perpetrating one of the greatest frauds in voter history in this country, maybe destroying the fabric of democracy.

It's true that the voter registration wing of the Association of Community Organizers for Reform Now has run into trouble in several states. ACORN employees have been investigated and in some cases indicted for voter registration fraud. Most recently, more than 2,000 registrations in Lake County, Ind., have turned out to be falsified.

But does this constitute "destroying the fabric of democracy"? More like destroying the fabric of work ethic. There's been no evidence that the ACORN employees who submitted fraudulent forms have been paving the way for illegal voting. Rather, they're trying to get paid for doing no work.

Dan Satterberg, the Republican prosecuting attorney in King County, Wash., where the first ACORN case was prosecuted, said:

Satterberg: [A] joint federal and state investigation has determined that this
scheme was not intended to permit illegal voting.

Instead, the defendants cheated their employer. ... It was hardly a sophisticated plan: The defendants simply realized that making up names was easier than actually canvassing the streets looking for unregistered voters. ...

[It] appears that the employees of ACORN were not performing the work that they were being paid for, and to some extent, ACORN is a victim of employee theft.

The $8-an-hour employees were charged with providing false information on a voter registration, and in one case with making a false statement to a public official. ACORN was fined for showing insufficient oversight, but it was not charged with masterminding any kind of fraud.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the table, Obama wasn't entirely forthcoming about his relationship with ACORN:

Obama: The only involvement I've had with ACORN is, I represented them alongside the U.S. Justice Department in making Illinois implement a motor voter law that helped people get registered at DMVs.

He did, but that wasn't his only involvement. He also worked closely with ACORN's Chicago office when he ran a Project Vote registration drive after law school, and Obama did some leadership training for Chicago ACORN. The Woods Fund, where Obama served as a board member, gave grants to ACORN's Chicago branch; both organizations are concerned with disadvantaged populations in that city. And during the primaries of this election, Obama's campaign paid upwards of $800,000 to the ACORN-affiliated Campaign Services Inc. for get-out-the-vote efforts (not voter registration). Those services were initially misrepresented on the campaign's Federal Election Commission reports, an error that some find suspicious and others say is par for the course. ACORN's Chicago office and CSI have not been under investigation.

For more on investigations of ACORN and registration fraud, and Obama's involvement with the group, keep an eye on our home page. A longer article on ACORN is in the works.

Joe the Plumber

Ohio plumber Joe Wurzelbacher got a lot of airtime.

McCain first mentioned Joe by saying:

McCain: Joe wants to buy the business that he has been in for all of these years, worked 10, 12 hours a day. And he wanted to buy the business but he looked at your tax plan and he saw that he was going to pay much higher taxes.

Joe’s newfound fame stems from an impromptu encounter Oct. 12, during which Wurzelbacher questioned Obama’s tax plans. Joe has since become a conservative folk hero after telling both Fox News and the conservative Web site Family Security Matters that he thought Obama’s plans sounded “socialist.”

At their encounter, Wurzelbacher told Obama that “I’m getting ready to buy a company that makes 250 to 280 thousand dollars a year,” before asking whether or not Obama would raise his taxes.

If the company is actually that profitable, and depending on how the business is organized legally, Obama’s plan would indeed raise his federal income taxes, and Obama conceded as much during the exchange. As we’ve written before, small businesses commonly are organized in such a way that their owners file business taxes as individuals. So if Joe’s plumbing business earns more than $200,000 per year (or $250,000 if Joe is married and files tax returns jointly) then his taxes would indeed be higher under Obama's plan than under McCain's.

It’s worth noting that while Wurzelbacher told Fox News’ Neil Cavuto that he lives “in a simple, middle class home” and portrayed himself as an ordinary working guy, Wurzelbacher’s $250,000 to $280,000 is a bit higher than "ordinary." In 2007, the last year for which the Census Bureau has figures, the median income for a family in Toledo, Ohio, was $43,553.

But Joe the Plumber wasn’t through yet. He made an encore appearance when McCain recycled a bogus claim that Obama would "fine" small business owners who fail to provide health care coverage for their workers:

McCain: Now, my old buddy, Joe, Joe the plumber, is out there. Now, Joe, Sen. Obama's plan, if you're a small business and . . . you've got employees, and you've got kids, if you don't get – adopt the health care plan that Sen. Obama mandates, he's going to fine you . . . I don't think that Joe right now wants to pay a fine when he is seeing such difficult times in America's economy.

McCain raised a similar charge at the last debate. It's still false. Obama’s plan, which is posted on his Web site, specifically says, “Small businesses will be exempt from this requirement.”

Obama hasn't defined exactly what he means by "small" but he seems to think Joe would qualify; he repeatedly referred to Joe’s “small business” during their exchange.

Obama's health plan does mandate that children have health coverage. If Joe doesn't provide insurance for his kids, he would face some unspecified penalty.

Health Care Hype

Obama and McCain traded boasts and accusations on each other’s health care plan. They ran afoul of the facts a few times.

Obama: And we estimate we can cut the average family's premium by about $2,500 per year.

The Obama camp does estimate that. But experts we talked to found that optimistic figure hard to believe.

Then, McCain said:

McCain: Sen. Obama wants to set up health care bureaucracies, take over the health care of America through — as he said, his object is a single payer system. If you like that, you'll love Canada and England.

Obama’s plan is not a single-payer system, which would be one in which everyone has health care provided and paid for by the government. Under Obama’s health care plan, Americans can keep the insurance they have, choose from federally-approved private plans or buy into a new public plan similar to the health care federal employees and members of Congress have.

McCain was referring to comments Obama made at a town hall meeting in Albuquerque in August. But Obama did not say that "his object is a single payer system." He said it would "probably" be his first choice "if" he were starting with a clean slate, which he isn't. He said his object is to "build up the system we got." According to the Wall Street Journal, Obama said:

Obama (as quoted by the Wall Street Journal, Aug. 19): If I were designing a system from scratch, I would probably go ahead with a single-payer system. ... [M]y attitude is let’s build up the system we got, let’s make it more efficient, we may be over time — as we make the system more efficient and everybody’s covered — decide that there are other ways for us to provide care more effectively.

Back in 2003, Obama was much more explicit. At an AFL-CIO forum, he said he was “a proponent of a single-payer health care program,” adding, “that’s what I’d like to see. And as all of you know, we may not get there immediately.”

That was five years ago, however, and recently, Obama has said he’d favor single-payer only if “starting from scratch.” He told The New Yorker in May 2007: “If you're starting from scratch, then a single-payer system ... would probably make sense. But we've got all these legacy systems in place, and managing the transition ... would be difficult to pull off. So we may need a system that's not so disruptive.”

Obama exaggerated a weakness in McCain's health care plan:

Obama: Now, under Sen. McCain's plan there is a strong risk that people would lose their employer-based health care.

Experts see a risk that some would lose their employer-based care, but Obama’s reference to "people" makes it sound as though nearly everyone would. Two independent studies both found that McCain’s plan would lead to a net decline in the number of people with health care through their jobs. (They said Obama’s would result in a net increase.) Both reports show, however, that there’s not a “strong risk” for all, or even a majority, of workers to lose their health care.

Currently, 159 million Americans have health care through their jobs, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. A study by the Lewin Group shows a net decline in the number with job-provided benefits of 9.4 million people in 2010 for McCain's plan. The Tax Policy Center projected that the net decrease would be 7.7 million in 2010 and 20.3 million people by 2018.

McCain and Obama both said much more that may have confused viewers. For a spin-free look at both of the candidates’ health care plans, see our recent article on this issue.

100% Negative?

Obama falsely claimed all of McCain's ads had been "negative."

Obama: And 100 percent, John, of your ads – 100 percent of them have been negative.

McCain: It's not true.

Obama: It absolutely is true.

It was almost true, for one recent week. Obama was referring to a report by the Wisconsin Advertising Project at the University of Wisconsin that concluded that “nearly 100 percent of the McCain campaign’s advertisements were negative” during the week of Sept. 28 through Oct. 4. During the same week, 34 percent of the Obama campaign’s ads were negative. The Obama campaign was found to have outspent the McCain campaign in nearly all of the competitive states, in some cases by a margin of more than 3-to-1.

McCain’s ads, however, have not been deemed 100 percent negative in other weeks. In fact, in the week after the Republican National Convention, 77 percent of Obama’s ads were negative, according to the advertising project, while 56 percent of McCain’s were negative.

Wrong on Exports to Colombia

McCain was way off when he said that Colombia is "our largest agricultural importer of our products." To be sure, Colombia is an important trade partner. According to statistics from the Department of Agriculture, Colombia imported slightly more than $1.4 million worth of U.S. agricultural products in 2007. But that's not even close to the nearly $1.9 billion worth of agricultural products exported to Canada. And there are dozens of other countries that import more U.S. farm products than Colombia does.

Obama No Maverick

Obama exaggerated his willingness to defy his own party. When McCain asked for an example, Obama offered this:

Obama: First of all, in terms of standing up to the leaders of my party, the first major bill that I voted on in the Senate was in support of tort reform, which wasn't very popular with trial lawyers, a major constituency in the Democratic Party.

That 2005 bill was S.5, which dealt with class-action lawsuits. Obama was one of 18 Democrats voting for it, while 26 opposed. It's a stretch for Obama to claim that he bolted his party when nearly 41 percent of Democrats voted in favor of the bill.

And as we pointed out before, Obama has a pretty consistent record of voting in stride with his party. According to Congressional Quarterly, in Obama's three years in the Senate, he has voted with his party almost 97 percent of the time.

Budget Ballyhoo

Both candidates got ahead of themselves when it came to balancing the budget and eliminating the deficit. Obama said every one of his spending increases was paid for.

Obama: Now, what I've done throughout this campaign is to propose a net spending cut. ... Every dollar that I've proposed, I've proposed an additional cut so that it matches.

McCain said he could balance the budget within one term.

Schieffer: Do either of you think you can balance the budget in four years? You have said previously you thought you could, Sen. McCain.
McCain: Sure I do. And let me tell you...
Schieffer: You can still do that?
McCain: Yes.

These are pie-in-the-sky predictions. We've looked at McCain's balanced-budget promise before – it's out of reach unless he cuts spending to an unrealistic degree. The Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center estimates that by 2013, at the end of his first term, McCain's tax plan would have him facing a $662 billion deficit. That could come to more than half of that year's discretionary spending, which the Office of Management and Budget projects to be $1.1 trillion. And we've previously disputed Obama's claim that "every dime" of his proposed spending is covered. The Tax Policy Center estimated that Obama’s plan – and McCain's, too – "would substantially increase the national debt over the next ten years" unless the candidates come up with "substantial cuts in government spending" that they haven't yet specified. More recently, the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget also estimated that in 2013, Obama’s major budget proposals – including spending cuts – would increase the deficit for that year by $281 billion.

The $42,000, Again.

McCain was on the wrong side of this exchange:

McCain: Sen. Obama talks about voting for budgets. He voted twice for a budget resolution that increases the taxes on individuals making $42,000 a year. . . .

Obama: [T]he notion that I voted for a tax increase for people making $42,000 a year has been disputed by everybody who has looked at this claim.

McCain was wrong to say Obama's March 2008 vote for a budget resolution "increases" anything. Budget resolutions set targets for taxes and spending; actually raising or lowering them requires separate legislation.

The $42,000 figure also would only apply to single taxpayers, not to couples or families. As we’ve reported, a single taxpayer making more than $41,500 would have seen a tax increase, but a couple filing jointly would have seen no increase unless they made at least $83,000, and for a couple with two children the cut-off would have been $90,000. Regardless, the increase that Obama once supported as part of a Democratic budget bill is not part of his own current tax plan. And Obama was right when he said "even FOX News disputes" McCain's $42,000 claim. Chris Wallace of Fox News agreed that it was misleading.

Wrong Justice

McCain said that Obama voted against the confirmations of Supreme Court Justices Stephen Breyer and John Roberts:

McCain: Senator Obama voted against Justice Breyer and Justice Roberts on the grounds that they didn't meet his ideological standards.

McCain probably meant to say that Obama voted against the confirmations of Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito, the most recent additions to the court. Obama did vote against the confirmation of Roberts, but he wasn’t in the Senate when Breyer was nominated to join the Court. Breyer was nominated to the Supreme Court by former President Bill Clinton and confirmed by the Senate in 1994. Obama didn’t become a senator until January 2005.

Charter School Slip-Up

Obama overstated his work on charter schools in Illinois:

Obama: Charter schools, I doubled the number of charter schools in Illinois despite some reservations from teachers unions.

Actually, the bill Obama cosponsored doubled the number of charter schools in Chicago, not in the entire state of Illinois. (And an extra slap on the wrist to Obama for using the personal pronoun in saying that "I doubled the number of charter schools" – as we've pointed out before, it takes a lot more than one politician to get a bill passed.)

Tried But Untrue

And we noted that both candidates continued to recycle bunk that we've heard before:

• McCain said once again, "We have to stop sending $700 billion a year to countries that don't like us very much." As we've noted several times in the past, $700 billion would have been the cost of all annual U.S. oil imports when the price was $140 per barrel. But it's down to about half that now.

• Obama said oil companies have "68 million acres that they currently have leased that they're not drilling." We've previously criticized him for similar statements, and it's still not true. As we've pointed out, there is exploratory drilling being done on much of these lands, which are not yet producing oil. In 2007 there were more than 15,000 holes that were being proposed, started or finished that do not count as "productive" holes.
  
  
• Listing some of his running mate's achievements, McCain credited Gov. Sarah Palin with “a $40 billion pipeline of natural gas that's going to relieve the energy needs" of the lower 48 states. We'll just note, again, that the pipeline is still in pre-development and is actually projected to cost $26.5 billion.
  

Sea Story

Finally, the ears of nautical buffs may have perked up when McCain said, “we've sailed Navy ships around the world for 60 years with nuclear power plants on them.” His naval history is off by a few years. The first nuclear-powered vessel, the submarine USS Nautilus, was actually launched Jan. 21, 1954.

–by Jessica Henig, Joe Miller, Lori Robertson, Justin Bank, D'Angelo Gore, Emi Kolawole and Brooks Jackson
SourcesCongressional Research Service. Oil and Gas Tax Subsidies: Current Status and Analysis. Washington: GPO, 2007.

Burman, Leonard E., et.al. "An Updated Analysis of the 2008 Presidential Candidates’ Tax Plans: Updated September 12, 2008." Tax Policy Center, 12 Sept. 2008.

Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. "Promises, Promises: A Fiscal Voter Guide to the 2008 Election." U.S. Budget Watch. 15 Sep. 2008.

Satterberg, Dan. "Statement of Interim King County Prosecuting Attorney Dan Satterberg." 26 Jul. 2007.

U.S. Census Bureau. "Toledo City, Ohio Factsheet." U.S. Census Bureau. American Community Survey, 2006, accessed 16 Oct. 2008.

ACORN Responds to Senator McCain’s Desperate Attack. 15 Oct. 2008

Griffin, Drew and Kathleen Johnston . “Thousands of voter registration forms faked, officials say.” 10 Oct. 2008

Robinson, Mike. Obama got start in civil rights practice. Associated Press, 20 Feb. 2007

Tapper, Jake. Spread the Wealth. ABC New Political Punch Blog. 14 Oct. 2008

Brown, David M. “Obama to amend report on $800,000 in spending.” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, 22 Aug. 2008

CQ member Profiles: Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill). Congressional Quarterly, 12 June 2008.

Rabinowitz, Steve. “[url="http://wiscadproject.wisc.edu/wiscads_release_100808.pdf"]Pres. TV advertising spending continues to grow;
Over $28 million spent from September 28-October 4.[/url]” Wisconsin Ad Project. 8 Oct. 2008

Kurtz, Howard. “Recent Obama Ads More Negative Than Rival's, Study Says: Democrat Said to Be Facing Pressure to 'Show Some Spine.'” Washington Post, 18 Sept. 2008

OECD Tax Database. Centre for Tax Policy and Administration.

Hodge, Scott. The difference between genius and stupidity is that there are limits to genius. Albert Einstein

[JHeath]

Obama incorrectly claimed all of McCain’s ads had been “negative.” That was true for one recent week, but not over the entire campaign. And at times Obama has run a higher percentage of attack ads than McCain.

I believe the overall statistic (for negative campaign ads) was McCain 73%, Obama 63%. This is from the time of the nominations until now.

[Roger Kaputnik]

I would trust FactCheck.org, not anyone else.

[Roger Kaputnik]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/us_ele...008/7679987.stm


Here is the printable version:


A six-pack of Joes

The next president of the United States will not be called Joe, but Joes of various kinds have been all over the news from the campaign trail. Democratic vice-presidential candidate Joe Biden has been joined by Joe the plumber, Joe Six-Pack and others.

So here is a guide to six Joes in the news:










JOE THE PLUMBER

Joe the plumber confronted Barack Obama on a walkabout in Toledo, Ohio, asking awkward questions about his plan to increase income tax on high earners. "I'm getting ready to buy a company that makes $250,000 to $280,000 a year," he said. "Your new tax plan is going to tax me more, isn't it?" John McCain seized on this - and on Mr Obama's reply, that "when you spread the wealth around, it's good for everybody". He mentioned Joe Wurzelbacher the plumber more than 20 times in the final presidential debate.



It later turned out that Joe's real name was Samuel, he was not a licensed plumber, he was unlikely to be buying a company any time soon, and would probably benefit from Mr Obama's tax plans. He also refused to confirm that he would be voting for Mr McCain. The original Joe, or Samuel, has spawned a number of others. Mr Obama's running mate, Joe Biden, said on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno on Thursday that in his neighbourhood they didn't know many plumbers making $250,000 a year, and that people were "kind of worried about Joe the fireman, Joe the policeman, Joe the real plumber with a licence".

This weekend the Democratic Party went a step further, running a pro-Obama telephone ("robocall") advertisement recorded by "Joe Martinez... a plumber from Denver, Colorado, calling for Barack Obama's campaign for change".

JOE SIX-PACK

Joe Six-Pack is a close relative of Regular Joe, Average Joe, Ordinary Joe, Joe Schmo, Joe Blow and others. The name "Six-Pack" refers to his favourite drink rather than a well-sculpted washboard stomach.



Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin sees something of Joe Six-Pack in herself. As she told one interviewer: "It's time that normal Joe Six-Pack American is finally represented in the position of vice-presidency… it's motivation for John McCain and I to work that much harder to make sure that our ticket is victorious, and we put government back on the side of the people, of Joe Six-Pack like me." So Joe Six-Pack is definitely not a Washington insider. Nor is he responsible for the problems on Wall Street. He is a male version of the hockey mom. This is how Mrs Palin put it in the vice-presidential debate on 2 October, answering a question about the financial crisis: "One thing that Americans do at this time, also, though, is let's commit ourselves, just everyday American people, Joe Six-Pack, hockey moms across the nation, I think we need to band together and say, 'Never again, never will we be exploited and taken advantage of again by those who are managing our money and loaning us these dollars.'"

The Palins may be a bit wealthier than some Joe Six-Packs and hockey moms.

The Anchorage Daily News writes: "Add up the couple's 2007 income and the estimated value of their property and investments and they appear to be worth at least $1.2 million."

JOE "LUNCH-PAIL" BIDEN

Joe Biden, Barack Obama's vice-presidential candidate, is the most prominent Joe on the Democratic side of the race. John McCain, a four-term senator, has referred to him as "Joe the six-term senator", but conservative columnists and bloggers prefer the derisive "Lunch-pail Joe Biden" - a reference to his habit of talking up his working class roots in the coal-mining town of Scranton, Pennsylvania (where most working men would have taken their lunch to work in a lunch box, or lunch pail).



One of the main reasons Barack Obama chose Joe Biden as his running mate - apart from his experience in foreign policy - was his potential appeal to working class white male voters. "The pick works if it is positioned as Obama picking a lunch-pail Dunkin' Donuts Democrat to complement his Starbucks Democrat brand," Democratic strategist Chris Lehane told the New York Times. But Mr Biden's grandfather was a mining engineer rather than a miner, and Joe left Scranton at the age of 10, when his father got a job at a car-dealership in Delaware. It was this lunch-pail tendency that led him during his bid for the 1988 Democratic nomination to recycle parts of a speech by British Labour Party leader Neil Kinnock, asking why it was that he was the first Biden (Kinnock) in a thousand generations to go to college.



One of the least wealthy members of the Senate, Joe Biden nonetheless lives in a colonial-style lake-front house worth in the region of $3m.

JOE LIEBERMAN Joe Lieberman, an Independent (formerly Democratic) senator from Connecticut, has been tipped as a possible Secretary of Defense or Secretary of State if John McCain wins the White House. Both are foreign policy hawks. Mr Lieberman endorsed Mr McCain in a speech at the Republican convention, and has appeared at countless McCain rallies around the US - he knows the routine, having been Al Gore's running mate on the Democratic presidential ticket in 2000.



On the stump last week in Florida, he could not help joining in the fun surrounding another Joe: "Which of the two candidates is the fighter we need for Joe the Plumber?" he said. "I think you know what I'm saying, John McCain will fight for Jose el Plomero!" If Mr McCain does not win the White House, Mr Lieberman's role in the Senate could be an interesting one. Since the 2006 mid-term elections, he has continued to caucus with the Democrats in the Senate, giving them a majority of one.

After the election, if the Democrats end up with 59 Senate seats, it will be in his power to grant them a filibuster-proof "super-majority" of 60.

SHOELESS JOE JACKSON

Shoeless Joe has only played a bit-part in this election - alluded to by Sarah Palin, knowingly or not, in the vice-presidential debate with Joe Biden.

This is how it happened. Joe Biden launched into lunch-pail mode for one of his attempts to draw parallels between the McCain/Palin ticket and George Bush: "Look, all you have to do is go down Union Street with me in Wilmington or go to Katie's Restaurant or walk into Home Depot with me where I spend a lot of time and you ask anybody in there whether or not the economic and foreign policy of this administration has made them better off in the last eight years."



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Sarah Palin turns on folksy charm

Sarah Palin replied: "I'll say it ain't so, Joe, there you go again, pointing backwards again. You prefaced your whole comment with 'the Bush administration'. Now doggone it, let's look ahead and tell Americans what we have to plan to do for them in the future."

The words "Say it ain't so, Joe" date back to 1920. They were allegedly spoken to Chicago White Sox baseball star Shoeless Joe Jackson by a broken-hearted young supporter, as Joe was leaving a grand jury hearing where he had admitted taking part in a match-fixing scandal.

(Chat show host David Letterman has suggested Mrs Palin set-up her use of the "Say it ain't so" quotation by asking Mr Biden before the debate if she could call him Joe.

Mr Biden's critics, meanwhile, have cast doubt on the suggestion that he spends a lot of time in Home Depot - and point out that Katie's Restaurant closed down a decade ago or more.)

GI JOE



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Some of the Sarah Palin dolls - and reaction to them

You can buy GI Joe-style action figures of Barack Obama, John McCain and Sarah Palin. But the real GI Joes are the sons of the candidates who are, or have been, serving in Iraq.

Captain Beau Biden (real name Joseph Robinette Biden III, in other words, a genuine GI Joe) introduced his father at the Democratic Convention in Denver, with an oblique reference to his forthcoming deployment: "But because of other duties, it won't be possible for me to be here this fall to stand by him the way he stood by me. So I have something to ask of you. Be there for my dad like he was for me." His father responded: "Beau, I love you. I am so proud of you." Two days later, Mr McCain picked Mrs Palin as his running mate. She gave the Republican Convention the news that her son, Private First Class Track Palin, would, on 11 September, "deploy to Iraq with the Army Infantry in the service of his country".

Both VP candidates made speeches at their sons' deployment ceremonies. John McCain, by contrast, has maintained an almost total silence about his own son Jimmy's role in Iraq - a marine who returned from a tour of duty in February. Another of Mr McCain's sons, Jack, aged 21, is to graduate from the Naval Academy in 2009. This gives rise to the possibility of Mr McCain becoming the first occupant of the White House since Eisenhower to have a son at war.



Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/amer...008/7679987.stm

Published: 2008/10/21 08:24:56 GMT

© BBC MMVIII

[Roger Kaputnik]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/us_ele...008/7683677.stm




Printable version:

Warning over US election problems Researchers are warning of potential problems during the US election with record numbers set to vote and many states using new voting machines.

Long queues are likely at polling stations on 4 November, Pew researchers say, and both parties are hiring lawyers in anticipation of challenges.

Voters have already had long waits in some states where early voting is under way, like North Carolina and Florida.

It comes despite efforts to improve the system after problems in 2000 and 2004.

The 2008 election "has the potential to combine a record turnout with an insufficient number of poll workers and a voting system still in flux," the report by the non-partisan Pew group says.

The biggest hurdle facing election workers may be the new voters registering in record numbers in almost every state, the report says.



For example, officials in Virginia recently ordered 200,000 extra voter registration forms.

And although many states are encouraging people to cast their ballot early or send it in by post, there is still a danger of big queues on election day and insufficient numbers of poll workers to handle the influx, the report warns.

Election officials in Virginia have said they will step up polling station security amid concerns that arguments over long queues, voter registration and identity issues could become heated.

Analysts suggest that early voting in a number of key states is favouring Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama.

In North Carolina, some 214,000 people cast their ballot on the first two days of early voting, with registered Democrats making up 62% of the number compared with 22% registered Republicans.

Meanwhile, a new opinion poll by the Pew Research Center suggests Mr Obama has increased his national lead over rival John McCain in the past month to 14 points, with 52% to his 38%.

The latest NBC/Wall Street Journal poll gives Mr Obama the same lead over Mr McCain, up from a six-point margin in the same poll two weeks ago.

Testing times

Mr Obama and his running mate, Senator Joe Biden, are to meet his campaign's national security advisers in Virginia on Wednesday.

After the discussion, Mr Obama is expected to give a public briefing on how his foreign policy plans compare to those of his rival.




McCain continues to talk about Obama 'spreading the wealth', which I understand as a political tactic might be effective

It comes a day after Mr McCain questioned his rival's readiness for the White House, as he campaigned in Pennsylvania.

"We don't want a president who invites testing from the world at a time when our economy is in crisis and Americans are already fighting in two wars," Mr McCain said.

Mr McCain was expected to return on Wednesday to New Hampshire, a state he won in the Republican primaries but which opinion polls suggest is leaning towards his rival.

Mr Obama will also hold rallies in Richmond and Leesburg, Virginia, on Wednesday in which he will focus on the economy.

He will campaign in Indiana - another traditionally Republican-leaning state where he is doing well in the polls - on Thursday, before taking a two-day break to visit his sick grandmother in Hawaii.

Clashes on tax

On Tuesday, the second day of a swing through Florida, Mr Obama accused Mr McCain of making "stuff" up in the last weeks of the campaign.



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Barack Obama blames "irresponsibility in Washington" for financial turmoil in the US

Earlier, Mr Obama met the governors of Ohio, Michigan, New Mexico and Colorado in Lake Worth, Florida, to discuss jobs and the economy with business leaders and financial experts.

On the campaign trail in Pennsylvania, where Mr Obama has the lead in opinion polls, Mr McCain said his rival's economic plan would result in raised taxes.

Meanwhile, his running mate Sarah Palin apologised for any misunderstanding over comments last week on the patriotic values of "the real America" and "pro-America areas of this great nation".

Mrs Palin denied that was her intention to imply that some parts of the country were more patriotic than others.

"I don't want that misunderstood. If that's the way it came across, I apologise," she told CNN.



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Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/amer...008/7683677.stm

Published: 2008/10/22 12:26:25 GMT

© BBC MMVIII

[Roger Kaputnik]

http://electoral-vote.com/


Obama projected 375 electoral votes, McCain 157.

[Roger Kaputnik]

http://electoral-vote.com/


Obama 364 McCain 157


Go to the site and scroll down past the map to some pretty interesting discussion.

[Johnny Rush]

Obama's on his way to spend Halloween in NW Indiana...

Senator Obama to Visit Lake County Friday

Indianapolis, IN – The Obama-Biden Campaign announced today that Senator Barack Obama will return to Indiana the evening of Oct. 31 for an event in Lake County. He will make his closing argument to Hoosiers and ask them to choose hope over fear, unity over division and the promise of change over the power of the status quo.

Further details will be announced as they become available.

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE





Also, this is just something that I find interesting (even though it has very very little to do with the actual election), here is a list of surrogates that the campaigns are pushing to do radio and television interviews. Contact information has been deleted...

Seems like McCain is going to spend the final week hitting up his military prowess, while Obama is still attempting to make America comfortable with him?

Barrack Obama:

**KENNETH “BABYFACE” EDMONDS, NATIVE HOOSIER PRODUCER/SONGWRITER**

Producer and songwriter Kenneth “Babyface” Edmonds (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babyface) is available to you for radio booking during the day Thursday.

**NEW MEXICO GOVERNOR BILL RICHARDSON**

New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Richardson) is available to you for radio booking during the day Thursday.


**MARK RUFFALO, ACTOR FROM COLLATERAL**

Actor Mark Ruffalo (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Ruffalo) from Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Collateral is available to you for radio booking during the day Thursday.


**EDIE FALCO, ACTRESS FROM THE SOPRANOS**

Sopranos star Edie Falco (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edie_Falco) is available to you for radio booking during the day Thursday.


**BRIAN McKNIGHT, GRAMMY-NOMINATED SINGER**

Grammy-nominated artist Brian McKnight (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_McKnight), singer of the hit “Back at One,” is available to you for radio booking during the day Thursday.


**FRANCES McDORMAND, OSCAR WINNING STAR OF FARGO**

Academy Award-winning star of Fargo Frances McDormand (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frances_mcdormand) is available to you for radio booking during the day Thursday.


**CAMILLE WINBUSH, ACTRESS FROM 7th HEAVEN AND NYPD BLUE**

Image Award-winning actress Camille Winbush (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camille_Winbush) from 7th Heaven and NYPD Blue is available to you for radio booking during the day Thursday.


**MARIA ECHAVESTE, FMR CLINTON WHITE HOUSE DEP CHIEF OF STAFF**

Maria Echaveste (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria_Echaveste), former Clinton White House Deputy Chief of Staff and highest ranking Latina in the Clinton administration, is available to you for radio booking during the day Thursday.


**MARIO VAN PEEBLES, ACTOR FROM ALL MY CHILDREN**

Veteran actor and director Mario Van Peebles (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mario_Van_Peebles), most recently seen on All My Children as Samuel Woods, is available to you for radio booking during the day Thursday.


**JASMINE GUY, ACTRESS FROM A DIFFERENT WORLD**

Jasmine Guy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jasmine_Guy), actress from the TV show A Different World, is available to you for radio booking during the day Thursday.


**JOHN CHO, HAROLD FROM HAROLD AND KUMAR**

John Cho (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Cho), Harold of Harold and Kumar fame, is available to you for radio booking during the day Thursday.


**KAL PENN, KUMAR FROM HAROLD AND KUMAR**

Kal Penn (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kal_Penn), Kumar of Harold and Kumar fame, is available to you for radio booking during the day Thursday.


**BRANFORD MARSALIS, FAMOUS SAXOPHONIST**

Branford Marsalis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Branford_Marsalis) , famous saxophonist and leader of the Branford Marsalis Quartet, is available to you for radio booking during the day Thursday.


**HEATHER TOM, ACTRESS FROM THE YOUNG AND THE RESTLESS**

Two-time Emmy Award-winning actress Heather Tom (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heather_Tom), a star of the CBS’ daytime drama The Young and the Restless, is available to you for radio booking during the day Thursday.


**ERIC HOLDER, FMR DEPUTY ATTORNEY GENERAL OF THE US**

Eric Holder (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Holder), first African American Deputy Attorney General of the United States under the Clinton Administration, is available to you for radio booking during the day Thursday.


**JEAN SMART, EMMY AWARD WINNING ACTRESS**

Multiple Emmy Award-winning Actress Jean Smart (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Smart) is available to you for radio booking during the day Thursday.


**NATE PARKER, ACTOR FROM THE SECRET LIFE OF BEES**

Actor Nate Parker (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1676649/) is available to you for radio booking during the day Thursday.






For John McCain:

The Hon. Robert 'Bud' McFarlane-
Robert C. "Bud" McFarlane is a retired Marine Colonel and Vietnam combat veteran who served as National Security Advisor to President Ronald Reagan. He is a graduate of the United States Naval Academy.

The Hon. John F. Lehman-
John F. Lehman, Jr. Served as Secretary of the Navy in the Reagan administration and since 2003 has been a member of the 9/11 Commission.

The Hon. James Woolsey-
Former CIA Director and Under Secretary of the Navy. He is currently a member of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy Board of Advisors, and an advisor of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security.

General Paul X. Kelly-
Former Commandant of the US Marine Corps, Four Star General, Green Beret. He is the Vice Chairman Emeritus Cassidy and Associates, a Public Policy firm and is on the board of directors for a number of corporations, including Allied Signal, Inc GenCorp,Inc and Saul Centers Inc.

Col. Bud Day-
The most decorated Veteran in the US, POW over 5 years, first cellmate of Sen. McCain. Medal of Honor recipient. One of Sen. McCain’s closest friends.

The Hon. Orson Swindle-
POW. Cellmate with Sen. McCain in Hanoi. POW over 6 years, USMC Lt Colonel (ret), Former Federal Trade Commissioner (1997-2005) and Asst Secretary of Commerce under Reagan. One of Sen. McCain’s closest friends.

Garry Berntsen-
A 23-year CIA officer, Berntsen led CIA response into Afghanistan after 9/11 and is the best-selling author of “Jawbreaker” The attack on bin Laden and al-Qaeda: a personal account by the CIA's key field commander. Has just released a new book 'The Walk-in’.

Mike Durant-
The American pilot who was shot down and held prisoner after a raid in Mogadishu, Somalia. His awards include the Distinguished Service Medal, Distinguished Flying Cross with Oak Leaf Cluster, Bronze Star with Valor Device, and The Purple Heart. Durant’s harrowing story was the inspiration for the movie “Black Hawk Down”.

Captain Scott O'Grady -
His F-16 was shot down in Bosnia, and O’Grady survived in hostile territory for six days before being rescued by the U.S. Marines. He wrote a book called 'Return With Honor' that was on the New York Times bestseller list. His story has also been documented on the Discovery Channel presentation, “Behind Enemy Lines”.

[Ang]

Thanks for the info Johnny!

[Roger Kaputnik]

Why do you call them "The Hon.?" They do not hold those offices any longer, and since this is non-royalist America, they do not keep those titles or honorifics after they are not in those offices. Same goes for former judges, senators, governors, presidents, ambassadors, etc.

[Johnny Rush]

Believe me, there was no editorializing on my end...just a copy and paste job with the honorable's.

Trick or treating with my 4 and 2 year old or seeing the next President of the United States, trick or treating or moment in history, my children's memories or story to tell the others in the old folks home...grrrrr...tough call.





UPDATED: Senator Obama to Hold Early Vote for Change Rally at Wicker Memorial Park in Highland


Indianapolis, IN – Friday, Oct. 31, Barack Obama will return to Indiana for an Early Vote for Change Rally at Wicker Memorial Park in Highland. At the rally, Obama will make his closing argument to Hoosiers and ask them to choose hope over fear, unity over division and the promise of change over the power of the status quo.



Early Vote for Change Rally with Barack Obama

Wicker Memorial Park

8554 Indianapolis Blvd.

Highland, IN 46322



Public Entrance at Ridge Rd. and Prairie St



Media Pre-Set: 2:00 to 2:30 p.m. CDT (Equipment must be dropped by 2:30 p.m.; media will not have access to the site from 2:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m.)

Media Access: 5:30 p.m. CDT

Gates Open: 6:00 p.m. CDT

Program Begins: 7:30 p.m. CDT



Throw: 60 ft.

Cable Run: 500 ft.

Live Truck Parking: Use West Entrance to Wicker Park

Press workspace is limited.

Wireless internet is not available.



Media Coverage: The event is open to the press. For credentials, please visit www.barackobama.com/mediarsvp



The event is free and open to the public. Tickets are NOT required. Members of the public are encouraged to RSVP at www.in.barackobama.com. Space is available on a first come, first serve basis. Please do not wear costumes.



Parking is available on the Wicker Memorial Park Driving Range. Pedestrian and vehicular entrance at the intersection of Ridge Rd. and Prairie St.



Contact for press logistical and planning purposes only: Brandon Lepow- 312-343-8810 or BLepow@barackobama.com



***For security reasons do not bring bags or umbrellas. Please limit personal items. No signs or banners allowed.***







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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE