Last Night You Heard the Lies, Now its time to Check for Facts

Once again I yield to the people at FactCheck.org to analyze the facts and deliver us from the fiction in last night’s debate

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.

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.

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.

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:

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.

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.

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.

more can be found at:
http://www.factcheck.org/elections-2008/factchecking_debate_no_3.html

Congrats Bob Schieffer, you have just won my vote or my Critique of the Fourth and Final Debate

What was that? You mean he’s not running on a ticket with Gwen Ifill? Too bad, he could have swept to power because lets be real here for a minute he was better than both Obama and McCain, but because this post is about McCain v. Obama I will, for the final time this election cycle (a brand spanking new one begins on November 5, 2008) I will evaluate the debate on the four old categories of substance, style, delivery, and likability

Substance: Once again we saw a near draw, but Obama came out just ahead as he stayed on message and McCain pulled a Sarah Palin in that he answered the questions he thought he heard and not necessarily the ones that were asked. Obama hammered home the point and looked comfortable on education, the economy, and taxation. McCain looked lost out there. He recycled his disproven lies. He tried to attack Obama, but he looked more like a bitter old man and not one who should be president. Even on the abortion issue, which he should have taken to the bank, he came out second. McCain sounded like he was deferring the issue to the states and Obama calmly said I only support abortion if the woman is going to die. McCain had a shot with Ayers, but Obama just simply brushed it off and succeeded in explaining Ayers and Acorn away.

Style: Obama won because he kept his cool and looked intelligent. In a word he looked presidential. McCain looked like a grumpy old man. He appeared to be at the edge of flying off the handle and much like debate one it looked very much like he was go postal. McCain looked like a deer in the headlights and like he was dazed and confused

Delivery: Obama was calm, collected, and scholarly. McCain looked like a bitter old man

Likeability: McCain looked like he was going to decapitate Obama. Obama looked personable

The bottom line is that while Obama won this debate, Bob Schieffer and Gwen Ifill are clearly the front runners in this election.

Video Wednesday

Today’s Topic is when You know Your Campaign Has no Chance

The First sign is when you go to a sporting event and get booed

The second sign is when you get booed at your own rally

The third sign that your campaign might be finished is when your campaign commercials attack your opponent for doing exactly what the people on your ticket did.

Quite simply Palin was married to a member of a domestic terrorist organization; McCain supported high risk housing loans; Phil Gramm, his chief financial adviser, led the senate committee that drafted the deregulation bills; and McCain has been lying all through the summer

Another sign that your campaign is in trouble is when your idea of an attack ad is black high school kids -keep in mind that only about sixty percent of high school students complete their coursework- saying that because of the example of Barrack Obama they will not end up as vegabonds, dropouts, and failures at life.

Things That Make You Go Hmmm

Lately all you GOPer types have been up in arms about Obama using ACORN, but don’t feel left out, John McCain supports ACORN Too:

http://74.125.95.104/search?sourceid=navclient-ff&ie=UTF-8&q=cache%3Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.mdc.edu%2FHome%2FPress%2Frally.htm

The Idea that McCain is bringing change we can believe in is just plain Nutty.

The Man Behind the Myths, or Admit it You’ve been Had

Hello out there, the disinterested cynic here, today we will discuss the origins of the Obama is a Muslim, Obama is a terrorist, Obama is plotting the overthrow of the republic stuff. As it turns out, and this is no real surprise, these allegations are the fabrications of one Andrew Martin. Now just who is Andrew Martin?

According to the New York Times, he is known to be:

62, to be a man with a history of scintillating if not always factual claims. He has left a trail of animosity — some of it provoked by anti-Jewish comments — among political leaders, lawyers and judges in three states over more than 30 years.

He is a law school graduate, but his admission to the Illinois bar was blocked in the 1970s after a psychiatric finding of “moderately severe character defect manifested by well-documented ideation with a paranoid flavor and a grandiose character.”

Though he is not a lawyer, Mr. Martin went on to become a prodigious filer of lawsuits, and he made unsuccessful attempts to win public office for both parties in three states, as well as for president at least twice, in 1988 and 2000. Based in Chicago, he now identifies himself as a writer who focuses on his anti-Obama Web site and press releases.

. . . .

As for his background, he said: “I’m a colorful person. There’s always somebody who has a legitimate cause in their mind to be angry with me.”

When questions were raised last week about Mr. Martin’s appearance and claims on “Hannity’s America” on Fox News, the program’s producer said Mr. Martin was clearly expressing his opinion and not necessarily fact.

It was not Mr. Martin’s first turn on national television. The CBS News program “48 Hours” in 1993 devoted an hourlong program, “See You in Court; Civil War, Anthony Martin Clogs Legal System with Frivolous Lawsuits,” to what it called his prolific filings. (Mr. Martin has also be known as Anthony Martin-Trigona.) He has filed so many lawsuits that a judge barred him from doing so in any federal court without preliminary approval.

He prepared to run as a Democrat for Congress in Connecticut, where paperwork for one of his campaign committees listed as one purpose “to exterminate Jew power.” He ran as a Republican for the Florida State Senate and the United States Senate in Illinois. When running for president in 1999, he aired a television advertisement in New Hampshire that accused George W. Bush of using cocaine.

In the 1990s, Mr. Martin was jailed in a case in Florida involving a physical altercation.

His newfound prominence, and the persistence of his line of political attack — updated regularly on his Web site and through press releases — amazes those from his past.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/13/us/politics/13martin.html?em

From the same article it would appear that Martin is the man behind the nefarious and widespread lie that Obama is a Muslim who has concealed his religion. Martin, just a couple weeks ago falsely accused Obama of training to overthrow the United States government.

Bottom line is that if you bought the Obama is a Muslim statement then you have been had.

Matt Blunt, Stop Using My Tax Money to Support the GOP

This is an open letter from the desk of Inoculation Against Idiocy to the Governor of Missouri. Mr. Blunt I have lived in this state all my life, I love this state, and I am immensely proud of it. However, I am not happy with your recent behavior of using my tax money to publish press releases which are partisan in nature. For you GOPers out here that accuse me of being a partisan I would be equally irate if Jay Nixon -assuming he wins in November- used my tax dollars for partisan purposes. Mr. Blunt, you do not have the right to use my tax money to advance your political ambitions in the manner that you did on your official website http://governor.mo.gov/cgi-bin/coranto/viewnews.cgi?id=EkkFVZyyuZcJTdDqqD&style=Default+News+Style&tmpl=newsitem and http://governor.mo.gov/cgi-bin/coranto/viewnews.cgi?id=EkkkVFulkpOzXqGMaj&style=Default+News+Style&tmpl=newsitem

Mr. Blunt in your first letter you attack and rail against ACORN, which is responsible for ensuring that the poor and minorities -I know I know you are a Republican and I am aware that the GOP laments brown people and poor people having suffrage- are registered to vote. Sir, your political partisanship is disgusting and the desire to deny people the right to vote is unconstitutional and unconscionable. In addition you criticized Obama for his desire to use the state legal system to prosecute those who made libelous statements against him but you failed to mention that McCain has sought the same protection. Furthermore, while you talk about Obama’s “truth squads”, you fail to mention that:

The “truth squads” are not tax payer supported, and that while there will be law enforcement agents on the “truth squads” they will be in a completely off duty and very voluntary manner with no prosecuting authority.

You also neglected to mention that:
Frank Donatelli, deputy chairman of the Republican National Committee, held a conference call with reporters Saturday morning while touring the state’s offices for GOP presidential candidate John McCain.

In a telephone interview with the News-Leader, Donatelli admitted the Democratic prosecutors “haven’t specifically said” they would use their prosecutorial powers on Obama’s behalf. . . . and . . . .that “a review of McCain’s own truth squads shows he has a district attorney from New Mexico and the South Carolina attorney general ready to respond to misleading ads from Obama and Democrats in their respective states.”

http://www.news-leader.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080927/BLOGS09/80927018

Mr. Blunt, you do have the right to support the candidate(s) of your choice in the same manner that all Missourians do. However, you do not have the right to spend my money to advance your political agenda and/or candidates. Please cease and desist from this outrageous behavior.

Sincerely,
An Extremely Concerned Missourian

Friday Funnies

As you know we, here at Inoculation Against Idiocy, care about your health and happiness so every Friday we will bring you five to ten videos which will bring a smile to face and a laugh to your belly.

As you know today, everyone seems to have a cellphone and they can get kinda annoying so it got me to thinking what would happen if some of the protagonists in our movies had cellphones, more specifically how would these films be different because of it?

The next clip will explore the dangers of relying too heavily on Wikipedia

The next clip asks the question of what life would be like if it were a board game

The following clip is About Wal-Mart and its hilarious because its oh so true

In Sports Frank Caliendo brilliantly takes on the cast of Fox NFL Sunday (well at least when James Brown was there)

Next we look at George W Bush, can you tell which one is the real deal and which one is the imposter?

Finally Chris Rock tells it like it is when it comes to Iraq (caution, strong language)

Sarah Palin: Revolutionizing the Judicial System and Remixing Children’s Songs

I gotta say Sarah Palin is now someone I really admire -no, she should not be VP or anywhere else near the White House- because her latest bout of monkey business may very well revolutionize the legal system. I refer of course to her recent attempt to exculpate herself from blame and preempt a report by the State of Alaska that would have found her quite guilty of abusing her power. You can read more about this in the following piece of excellent journalism by MSNBC:

ANCHORAGE, Alaska – Trying to head off a potentially embarrassing state ethics report on GOP vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, campaign officials released their own report Thursday that clears her of any wrongdoing.

Sen. John McCain’s running mate is the subject of a legislative investigation into whether she abused her power as governor by firing her public safety commissioner. The commissioner, Walter Monegan, says he was dismissed in July for resisting pressure from Palin’s husband, Todd Palin, and numerous top aides to fire state trooper Mike Wooten, Palin’s former brother-in-law.

The move came hours after the state Supreme Court refused to halt the ethics investigation.

Lawmakers were expected to release their own findings Friday. Campaign officials have yet to see that report — the result of an investigation that began before she was tapped as McCain’s running mate — but said the investigation has falsely portrayed a legitimate policy dispute between a governor and her commissioner as something inappropriate.

“The following document will prove Walt Monegan’s dismissal was a result of his insubordination and budgetary clashes with Governor Palin and her administration,” campaign officials wrote. “Trooper Wooten is a separate issue.”

Monegan said Thursday that he doesn’t know what to expect from the legislative panel’s own report.

“I just hope that the truth is figured out,” Monegan told The Associated Press on Thursday. “That the governor did want me to fire him, and I chose to not. You just can’t walk up to someone and say, ‘I fire you.’ He didn’t do anything under my watch to result in termination.”

Palin’s critics say that shows she used her office to settle family affairs.

“When you’re the governor, you leave your household hat at home and you become governor,” said state Senate President Lyda Green, a Republican who has frequently clashed with Palin.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27105917/

I gotta say that first off I am extremely impressed by this mockery of justice and the monumental scale of abuse of power that it represents. Secondly, this thing could revolutionize the justice system. OJ Simpson has to be beside himself right now and he has to be thinking “dang it, if only I had written my own report and found myself not guilty of my recent burglary in Las Vegas I could be out on the links today and not behind bars. The biggest disappointment I have in all this is that I did not think of this first. I mean I did some stupid things in High School, of course name one teenager that hasn’t done something stupid, and I really wish I had thought of this. I mean my mom would have said son why did you do this? I would have responded, “not so fast, I have written this statement which proves that this recent allegation is nothing but a politically motivated slander on me.”

Oddly enough I would have been punished anyway because my mom would not have countenanced something like that, neither should the state of Alaska, and neither should the American people. Mrs. Palin, sorry honey but you abused your power in getting this man fired and your ever growing abuse of power is reminiscent of the children’s song of the little old lady who swallowed a fly. For those of you who have forgotten that song -quite frankly I don’t blame you- she then swallows a spider to get the fly, then she swallows a bird to get the spider to get the fly, etc . . . . Anyway, the moral of the story is a small action such as an abuse of power can get bigger and bigger and bigger as you attempt to cover it up and deny it.

The fly in this case is Palin firing Alaskan Safety Commissioner Walter Monegan because he would not fire a deputy who Palin had a vendetta against as the deputy in question had divorced Palin’s sister. If nothing else this action reeks of nepotism and power abuse. The spider is Palin’s husband’s refusal to respond to a subpoena. http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5jOTk11gvqDAgD0cY3i4WjI_2YOxwD939G6UG0

I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t accept Palin’s refusal to respond to a subpoena and neither did the Alaskan Supreme Court and Palin’s husband was required to respond to the state’s inquiries: http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2008/10/07/Todd_Palin_to_answer_written_questions/UPI-55871223420541/
The state, not tolerating Palin’s abuse of power, stood up to Palin and said that it would issue its finding in the investigation. This forced Palin to swallow a bird (her preemptive statement that not too surprisingly averred her innocence) to swallow the spider sent in to swallow the fly. I just have to ask will she reach for a cat if the state finds that she abused power and will McCain ask why oh why did she swallow that fly?

Is McCain Capable of Making the Sound Judgements Required to be President?

Its time to talk about America’s favorite self described maverick John McCain. Today I seek to answer the question of whether or not McCain is capable of proper judgment -something that would be required of a president- in making personnel and policy decisions. I mean I realize he is a self described maverick and I realize that he talks a good game about how he provides leadership and experience, and I am familiar with his rants that he is the right man for the job, but is he?

First, lets discuss his abilities to judge character and make personnel decisions and discuss why this is important. McCain, as president, would be required to appoint a cabinet to run everything from national parks to the military and state department. As our geriatric supreme court justices are not getting any younger he will eventually have to appoint new justices because Ginsberg and Stevens are showing the tell tale signs of age and fatigue. Sadly, McCain’s track record in character judgment and personnel issues is decidedly dubious. The short course of McCain’s inability to display good judgement includes Charles Keating, Phil Gramm, Mikheil Saakashvili, and Sarah Palin.

In the Keating affair, McCain was the only Republican senator in a group of five who sold out the American people by turning the watchful eyes of government regulatory agencies away from Keating’s company. McCain was paid more than 100 thousand dollars from Keating and McCain and Keating were in fact very good friends.

Speaking of deregulation, lets talk about Phil Gramm, who -as chair of the Senate Banking Committee in the late 1990s- deregulated the banking industry at the behest of his buddies on Wall Street. Mr. Gramm’s deregulation policies are the causation of the current economic turmoil affecting millions of working class Americans and wreaking havoc on our economy. So did McCain practice wise judgement regarding Gramm? No, McCain was a maverick who brought him on board as his chief campaign adviser. After Gramm stated that Americans were in a mental recession, McCain simply kicked him off the team, and by kicking him off the team I mean Gramm became his chief financial adviser.

Moving on from Wall Street to Foreign stock in McCain’s campaign lets talk about Mikheil Saakashvili and the one million dollars that bought McCain’s support for Georgian genocidal actions in South Ossetia. Now, to his credit Saakashvili showed buyers’ remorse after McCain said Russia is bad but did not come to his aid militarily. The main problem I have with McCain’s support for the Georgian government is that it was purchased. This means that McCain could sell out America’s interests in exchange for financial gain. This could mean more wars that we should not fight, trade deals which would further cripple our economy, and poverty and despair for us all.

Now lets talk about his running mate, Mrs. Sarah Palin. Now McCain will say Obama likes domestic terrorists, even though no court has ever found Ayers guilty, but Palin was married to a domestic terrorist and as governor endorsed her husband’s terrorist group which voids her candidacy because of the second paragraph of the fourteenth amendment. So a quick run down of McCain’s record in previous decision making shows that he makes poor choices, allies himself with greedy and corrupt individuals, and can be purchased -for the right price- by foreign states

If his personnel decisions aren’t alarming enough lets examine his foreign policy record. He supported NAFTA, GAT, CAFTA, and a variety of free trade pacts which shipped American jobs overseas and gutted our manufacturing center. He supported the war in Iraq from the very beginning and he supports bombing Iran and North Korea. In recent days he has said over and over that he would not seek to place pressure on Pakistan to hand over Osama Bin Laden -in case you forget thats the bastard who attacked us on 9/11- and lets not forget that he has repeatedly stated that he has supported Bush more than ninety percent of the time. Speaking of defense, he has repeatedly slashed the budget for programs and benefits for veterans.

McCain has also endorsed the banking industry bailout (heck, he cancelled his campaign for a couple of hours) to ram that piece of legislation through congress). Oddly enough he voted down bankruptcy protection for the poor and he has publicly stated that he is against reforming the credit card industry.

So does McCain have the capability of making wise decisions? His track record says no.

Video Wednesday

Today’s Theme is the History of Republican Foreign Policy During the Twenty First Century.

In our First clip we go back to the days when Bush made sense and he was firmly against Preemptive Wars:

Our Next Clip was made during the Time that Bush embraced bullying and Intimidation as part of twenty first century warfare:

Our Third clip Bush makes it perfectly clear that Preemptive War is only just when we conduct it, but that other nations are barred from bullying and intimidation:

We’ll be back to Video Wednesday after a short message from our sponsors:

This post is brought to you by GOP Records and the Music Talents of John McCain, check out the chart topping single

As you know John McCain has strongly Railed Against Russia for its intervention to halt genocide in Georgia.

This Clip explains why

What Does the GOP ultimately Seek to Achieve?

John McCain and the GOP, Too Risky for America.