Howard Dean is first.

We're takin' our county back!

-----------

For Immediate Release
April 17, 2008

contact: me

Robert Blazer of Madera Receives Appointment to the Madera Unified School District Personnel Commission

I am very pleased to announce that Robert Blazer, a Madera County Democratic Central Committee member and a CDP/DSCC delegate representing the 25th Assembly District been appointed by our State's Superintendent of Public Instruction, Jack O'Connell to the Madera Unified School District Personnel Commission. Mr. Blazer's Commission term begins immediately and will expire on December 1, 2010.

Congratulations to Robert!

Susan Rowe
Chair, Madera County Democratic Party

http://www.blogforamerica.com/view/24970#comment-1188832

back

Israel Doesn’t Want to Know Carter Any More

by Peter Hirschberg

JERUSALEM - Three decades after he brokered the first-ever peace treaty between Israel and an Arab country, former U.S. president Jimmy Carter has become persona non grata in the Jewish state....

http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=42025

=======================

I read Carter's book, and yes, he was sympathetic towards Palestinians, and told why he was.  But Carter was even-handed and was somewhat apologetic for Israel.  I thought he gave them a lot of passes.

Israel must be more right wing than even I thought it was.

New SUSA national polls:

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/4...

But Congress tries to get things done but most everything of importance has been filibustered by the Republicans in the Senate to the tune of 65 times in this Congress alone.

That's DLC Republicrat Bullshit.

They had, and have the power to shut down Iraq--41 votes, count em.

 They have the power, bjt not the will. As such, they're complicit in Bushco"s crimes

6:35pm

Sorry John, but cutting off funding for troops in harm's way is quite frankly not the way to end a war.

TORTURE? WHAT TORTURE?

http://www.alternet.org/rights/82483/

We now have confirmation that the President of the United States gave the OK to torture. Where is the media? Where are the Democrats?

WHERE INDEED?

6:38PM

Sorry John, but cutting off funding for troops in harm's way is quite frankly not the way to end a war.

More DLC Republicrat Bullshit.

There's more than enough money in the pipeline to bring the troops home.

The "Support the Troops" crapola has been the main copout for Pelosi, Reid, Biden, and all the other Democratic cowards.

Out--Now!

6:43pm

Sorry John, but cutting off funding for troops in harm's way is quite frankly not the way to end a war.

It sure put an end to the Vietnam war!

Theda Socpol on Hillary in 1995.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/theda-skoc...

Philly Face-off
A super-delegate debate.

On the first count, one cannot say whether Obama “won” or “lost” without considering what Hillary needed to accomplish. There are only two ways she can win the nomination now. Either she must overcome Obama’s lead in pledged delegates (a.k.a. those won during the primaries and caucuses), which is nearly impossible mathematically, or she must win the votes of enough superdelegates (a.k.a. Democratic-party bosses) to overturn the verdict of the party rank-and-file. For her to do that, she will have to persuade a majority of the superdelegates (or a majority of them must reach the conclusion on their own) that Obama cannot win in the general election against John McCain.

This is the reality of the race as the Politico’s Jim Vandehei and Mike Allen accurately described it last month, and Clinton wasn’t able to change it last night. For one thing, she demonstrated again that she can’t attack Obama on any front without opening herself up to similar charges. When she tried to exploit Obama’s connection to William Ayers, a former leader in the ‘60s domestic terror group the Weather Underground, Obama shot right back: “President Clinton pardoned or commuted the sentences of two members of the Weather Underground,” he said, “which I think is a slightly more significant act… than me serving on a board with somebody.”

In the spin room after the debate, Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson pointed to Obama’s slippery answers on gun control and argued that his credibility had taken a blow. But if Obama’s credibility has taken a blow, Clinton’s has taken a beat-down: During the debate, Stephanopolous pointed out that six out of ten voters in a recent poll now view her as dishonest. When asked to account for several factually untrue things she said recently about a 1996 trip to Bosnia, Clinton replied, “On a couple of occasions in the last weeks, I just said some things that weren’t in keeping with what I knew to be the case.” That’s as close as you’ll ever get to hearing a politician admit that she lied.

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=NGNlMzhlYWJjYTc3ZWU0MTg1MWI1YTBhNDAxOTJkNjY=

s/b Skocpol.

Yet Carter will be encouraged by the fact that not all Israelis oppose contact with Hamas.

 In fact, a poll published in the daily Haaretz newspaper in February found that 64 percent of Israelis supported direct talks with Hamas over a ceasefire and over the release of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, who has been held captive in the strip by the Islamic movement since June 2006. Only 28 percent said they opposed such talks.

Former Israeli foreign minister Shlomo Ben-Ami has said that Israel needs to engage Hamas in dialogue. So has Ephraim Halevy, a former head of Israel’s Mossad spy agency.

During his visit, Carter met with Shalit’s father, Noam, and told him that the matter of his son’s release — now being negotiated by Israel and Hamas, with Egypt acting as a go-between — would be at the top of his agenda when he met Meshal.

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/04/17/8357/

http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=42025#share

Bury my post at wounded Knee!

6:53pm

Obama: Let's campaign, not have more debates

Sen. Barack Obama on Thursday suggested he doesn't see any point in having another debate with Democratic rival Sen. Hillary Clinton.

Wednesday's debate on ABC may be the final face-off between Sens. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. 1 of 2 Clinton has agreed to a debate next week, but Obama has not yet accepted the invitation.

At an appearance in Raleigh, North Carolina, Obama said he has a lot of campaigning to do in a limited amount of time. Obama said he had agreed to an earlier debate, but Clinton declined that one.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/04/17/campaign.wrap/?iref=mpstoryview

Right! On with the campaigning and attacking McCain  

http://www.gallup.com/poll/106579/Democrats-Leading-McCain-Purple-States.aspx

sorry here is the link

Dean to super d's - Decide Now!

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/4...

PRINCETON, NJ -- As Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton prepare for Wednesday night's debate in Philadelphia, Gallup's daily tracking indicates that Obama's support has yet to suffer following his widely reported remarks about small-town voters being "bitter." The remarks were first reported on April 11.

Obama said in essence that small-town voters are bitter because the government has not been able to help their economic plight. As a result, they "cling" to religion and drift toward narrow issues such as gun rights, and anti-trade or anti-immigration policies, instead of their larger economic interests.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/106561/Obama-Support-Among-Bitter-Voters-Unchanged.aspx

Obama leads in elected  super delegates -  those who hold elected offices.

It would be advantageous of the rest of the elected super delegates to consider weighing in their support of Obama ASAP.

The sooner they support Obama and convince others like them that Obama is unbeatable, the more money there might be available for other elections, possibly including their own.

I don't know why Howard hasn't pointed this out to them.

I don't watch  MSM, but it was posted on Obama blog that Katie Couric reported "screw em" story.  Hope the story gets legs.

Huron is spot on.   41 votes.  Most of our dems are complicit.

Israel must be more right wing than even I thought it was.

Fred, I believe many of the citizens want peace, like many of us do.

But it's the leaders, putzco and Olmert and his henchmen who want this to continue forever - expanding forever...and ever.  Both countries are mavericks..war mongering and expanding.

I met a Jewish man a few days ago who is very troubled by the plights of the Palestinians.

Maybe the new Jewish lobby will be able to help both countries. 

A Diamond in the Debate Rough/

http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/tal...

From an active duty military fellow. This is incredible and should be a talking point.

Sen. Barack Obama on Thursday suggested he doesn't see any point in having another debate with Democratic rival Sen. Hillary Clinton.

On the contrary, let's have more and bring in the League of Women voters or Moyers or Stewart or Colbert to moderate.

BO does not debate well.  HC does.  Maybe good questions would change that.

I am thoroughly disgusted by Stephie bringing up "The Weather Underground" and even more disgusted at Hillary trying to jab Obama with it.  BOTH Dems should have called out Steph on the inanity of the remark....'NEITHER' Barack nor Hillary are/were radicals, lol....he was, what about 9 yrs. old and lving in southeast asia during that period, fer gawd's sakes.

They should have called Steph on it and demanded that they discuss substantive issues. 

I wonder if the numbers would be different if they had equal amounts of money to spend.  I suspect so.

Broken country, totally. 

John wrote "It sure put an end to the Vietnam war!"

Do you mean the Vietnam war during which the Selective Service conducted draft lotteries?  Your cause and effect analysis is suspect.

No more debates. I'll get high blood pressure.

cC, You are the one making ignorant assumptions without proof - I don't know if Hillary is or is not using union products and/or products Made in USA, but if she is, she would be a better Democrat (like Obama) to advertise the fact - telling millions of people we strongly favor domestic production, especially made by Union people.<<<<<<<<<

Most Democrats know that 99.999% of Dem campaign lit. is  union made.  If you are particularly curious about Hillary's materials then go find out.....rather than make stupid accusations/assumptions, fred.  Gee, find the evidence AND THEN make your argument...there's an idea, fred. 

seashell wrote "I wonder if the numbers would be different if they had equal amounts of money to spend.  I suspect so."

This is a feasible theory since Clinton led Obama for months last year when she was the fundraising champ.  I guess Dean is the outlier of the group.

 Ummm....that tiny blue wedge would be Israel.  Expanding on Arab turf, yeah.

Facts, people, facts. 

Most Democrats know that 99.999% of Dem campaign lit. is  union made....

==============

Where's your link - asshole "statistic" with no proof - pulled it out of your ass.

THE ASSUMPTION OF cCHALFONTE

Please....seek help.  Turret's can be medically managed.

Speaking of idgits:

At some point amid the hailstorm of criticism that greeted ABC's handling of yesterday's Dem debate, moderator George Stephanopoulos received an email -- one of the many, many missives about the debate he's received -- from an Obama adviser.

"Feel like a candidate today?" the adviser asked.

In an interview with me moments ago, Stephanopoulos strongly defended his handling of the debate. He dismissed criticism that it had focused too heavily on "gotcha" questions, arguing that they had gone to the heart of the "electability" that, he said, is forefront in the minds of voters evaluating the two Dems.

"Overall, the questions were tough, fair, relevant, and appropriate," Stephanopoulos argued. And he rejected the claim by many Obama supporters that the debate had been stacked against him, saying Hillary had faced sharp questioning, too.

Today on the campaign trail Obama criticized ABC's handling of the debate, characterizing it as "the roll out of the Republican campaign against me in November."

Asked to respond, Stephanopoulos said that getting criticized "comes with the territory."

"Our job is to ask the questions," he said. "His job is to go out and win votes."

Asked to defend the fact that policy didn't come up for the first 40 or so minutes of the debate, Stephanopoulos said:

"We decided to focus at the top on the issues that had been at the center of the debate since the last debate. Everything we brought up in that front section had not come up since the last debate. And they all focused on the same theme -- which candidate would be a stronger Democratic candidate in Novembber."

I am thoroughly disgusted by Stephie bringing up "The Weather Underground" and even more disgusted at Hillary trying to jab Obama with it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Clinton could have scored a big victory had she attacked the questioning as unfair, defended Obama, and demanded the questioning be about what to do about the mess Bush has gotten us into.

 Ummm....that tiny blue wedge would be Israel.  Expanding on Arab turf, yeah

=======================

Notice it is mostly wasteland desert.

I guess it would be OK if the poor battered Jewish  nation decided to kick all the Christians out of little New Jersey or Rhode Island and take over?  Since Christians and non-Jews have so much of the land of the world already.

The only difference is that Arabs were poor undeveloped herders with no power, easy to bully around. - and OH, YES, their claim is based on ancient mythology and Cecile B. DeMilles movies.

mary vb,

Please ask your daughter if she wouldn't rather attend a local state university instead.

IMHO, the art student needs therapy and should visit the local planned parenthood clinic to get a real education and some much needed attention. What a gross abuse of power and selfishness she has exhibited. It shows a total lack of self-love and self-respect. It's so sad.

----

From the previous thread.

65.

Susan Rowe
Thu, 04/17/08

I agree. That is just disgusting. It's a typical Yalie's elitist attitude and behavior. Every time I a read report about a study that has come out of Yale, I cringe. The one they did about health care was written for the insurance and pharmaceutical industries' stock market projections as far as I am concerned. After I read it, I wondered who funded their grant.


53.

mary vb
Thu, 04/17/08


Art Student at Yale enduces multiple abortions for *art*.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/4...

I'm pro-choice but this is just sickening. And to think that my daughter was wait-listed at Yale and Dartmouth and this nut got in...

Those poor Arab nations....nothing but the worl's oil supply to sustain them....gosh.

The Pope called what Obama described as bitter, "alienation and polarization" in his homily at the stadium.

had Obama used the exact words as the Pope he would have been called out in the same manner as he was for the words he used

life is hard for a truth teller

Today on the campaign trail Obama criticized ABC's handling of the debate, characterizing it as "the roll out of the Republican campaign against me in November."<<<<<

He's right about that. 

Those poor Arab nations....nothing but the worl's oil supply to sustain them....gosh.

======================

Yea I see how wealthy they all are -

 the Arabs..... I mean, ......not the Jews, heaven forbid, they all just scraping by.

frank Rosenhoover  ~ Blair County (PA) Democratic Chairman

Who is on CSPAN1 now (7:40 EST) for about 20minutes

asks

*why are our young men  being bribed to serve*

He repeated his point many, many times. 

C'mon Fred.

You understand that all postings and communications you make through the Service are your sole responsibility. This means that you, and not DFA, are entirely responsible for all content you post. You agree to not use the Service to:

1. upload, post, email, transmit or otherwise make available any Content that is unlawful, harmful, threatening, abusive, harassing, tortuous, defamatory, vulgar, obscene, libelous, invasive of another's privacy, hateful, or racially, ethnically or otherwise objectionable;

I agree no more debates.

Gives Clinton free airtime.

sea IMHO I think Barack is the much better debater, when he is given a question to answer, is not being hacked, and interrupted.

Susan Rowe - She got into some great schools - she also received several academic scholarships. She's got into UC Berkeley and USC - but they're too big for her liking. She's leaning to a couple of the liberal arts schools on her list. Doesn't have to decide till 1 May.

C'mon Fred.

========

What?  Is nothing sacred?

Oh dear - too many grammatical boo boos and typos in my last post.

Tom wrote:

Do you mean the Vietnam war during which the Selective Service conducted draft lotteries?  Your cause and effect analysis is suspect.

It took a cutoff of funds by a Democratically controlled Congress with more courage than the 110th to end the Vietnam war.

Cause: funding cutoff

Effect: War ends

It will take the same action to get us out of Iraq, no matter who is Prez!

Alas

7:52pm

Oh, yea, maybe using vulgar language is the way to go.

as long as the dems are re-visiting the weather underground, why not re-visit the keating 5? 

*********

hollywood used to be the clintons' domain, but barack is running neck to neck in fundraising--$300 ahead, actually.  lol.  the clintonistas are pissed that their atm was highjacked.

I'm not saying much about the debate except this.

BO better get used to being hammered w/o looking so put out, even angry.  He's simply not experienced in this area and the repugs have to win this election.  

He does much better when standing above and before a crowd, not when doing a face to face and having to answer questions he doesn't agree with or like.  It doesn't matter that the questions were awful - they will be worse if he's the nominee.  Just my take. 

We need both on the ticket to beat Rovian attacks.  IMO

Unless it's BO and he chooses a sharp  woman like Boxer.

Welcome my son

Antonio Carlos Jobim - Lamento

mary vb

I have thought about when my son started in big school ... a different cultural context  ...a thousand miles from home, whether he could find an anchor to establish his moorings, and in hindsight the challenge of Katrina and his throwing himself into something bigger than himself got him through. he found himself among other caring people, which is how he was brought up, went to live in the church student center  his sophmore year, and navigated his way to finish his third year now without losing sight of why he is getting an education. that association with others doing things to make a positive contribution

it can be done in a big school or a small school

your daughter has the start of helping give the country a new President along with a whole lot of people buying into HOPE and she can help wherever she is this fall in some small way that will leave associations with others so motivated as well

good luck with her decision, May is just around the corner

want to lose me seashell

give me the ticket of Obama Clinton

nightmare not dream

I don't see how the debate helped Clinton but it was a free infomercial for McCain.

nothing to be gained by another debate

Ally update at baby ~~

 http://eatapyzch.blogspot.com/

nothing to be gained by another debate  

==============================

Not a debate with McCain on ABC (for the GE) anyway.

grunt work time. organize precinct by precinct in Kentucky whether the race gets there or not, and West Virginia, times a wasting, 20 million people left to go

http://gobnf.org/i/c/dfa.gif

VERY UGLY LOGO.  WHAT A TOTAL WASTE OF MONEY AND TIME.

Phil, are you saying that both on the ticket would lose to McC?

I don't understand why you say that.

I'm focusing on who/what can beat the repugs. 

I've never called it a dream ticket.

Gore/Dean is my dream tickie.  :-) 

www.CondiMustGo.com

puddle, thanks for the update.

Perhaps they could at least look into the Rife cure.  Just a suggestion.   Perhaps both at the same time.

No one should ever have to have cancer, no matter what age.  Big pharma (not all are guilty) might be better served trying to find cures for cancer rather than producing pills for impotency.

Personally, I liked that BO got PO'ed. He did it in a measured and presidential way. No red-faced angry ranting like Bill Clinton was famous for, just a subtle impatience with fools.

I would like him a lot less if he'd slapped on a foolish grin and played the good "boy".

BTW, I also think he demonstrated a powerful lesson in the Golden Rule last night. Part one, pointing out the "cookie flap" and saying at the time he didn't appreciate the MSM making Hillary out something she was not. Part two, refraining from mentioning that Hillary also doesn't wear a flag pin.

I imagine all during that question she was worrying that he would point out she's no different, and I'll bet she was bewildered when he didn't.

When struck, turn the other cheek; when compelled to walk a mile out of your way, make it two miles.

-- volney

Keith and Rachel covered the outrageous HC statement last night in which she took on the whole ME.

Truly frightening.  Is she  now running to the right of McC and Bush as Keith suggested? What does this statement do to help her? This should be headlines all over the country.

What should Obama do? 

Path of Karma Yoga

volney, good points.  He did say not long ago that he never gets angry, so we know from last night that that's not a true statement.  I can't imagine why he said that...it was absurd.

I'd like to see a little more anger...holding it in is not good and there are people who hold it in for years and then it comes out against the wrong thing or person.  I suspect McC has that problem.

I felt his anger last night was justified.  

Another thing, trying to shock us with the fact Obama knows a former Weather Underground member is just silly, since the majority of voters well remember the Vietnam era, and even if not as radical as the Weathermen, probably protested with vehemence, and were proud of it.

Fact check wise, Ayers did not say "on 9/11" that he wished he'd "done more", as Hillary misrepresented things. He was interviewed before 9/11 and the interview was coincidentally in that day's paper but was not in response to the events of that day.

-- volney

Phil, are you saying that both on the ticket would lose to McC?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hillary would not be a positive addition to the ticket  because her polarity and high negatives would still be there, and she has a hard time ever breaking 50%.

Obama will cream McCain.

Thanks, Phil. Blair's a wonderful and compassionate young woman. Both our children help in our community - in fact in every community we have lived in. It's their duty and privilege to help others.

Phil, she may have high negatives but she also has a whopping number of women who would vote for her as VP.

I was thinking BO/HC 

9:16 PM EDT

fyi - new Front thread

I can picture a guy from the weather underground I met once in my minds eye but for the life of me can't remember his name, so go ahead and tag me with that association. they had some window breaking gig in downtown Chicago they called the Days of Rage and I couldn't figure out how protesting destruction by causing destruction ever made sense, but he was dedicated to ending the war by whatever means, they were pretty radical

rr
Sseashell....

Thank you for posting about the fantastic conversation between Rachel and Keith about Hillary's escallation of her position about ME.

Keith said it was the most important statement of the campaign. It's been mostly ignored by the media and even here.

I almost fell off my chair last night. I was so glad Keith brought it out.

http://www.blogforamerica.com/view/24973#comment-1188920

Rachel Maddow was great on Keith. I also watched a video of Rachel schooling Joe Scarborough. What has happened to Joe Scarborough lately? I remember him going on Bill Maher's show very recently and praising Obama and saying some of his Republican friends were supporting Barack. He's changed his tune. He and Pat Buchanan don't let up.