Drawing Even

Wilmington News Journal (exerpt)
Saturday, September 06, 2008
Delaware Newspaper Calls Out JOE BIDEN for Drunk Driving LIE

TVs Inside Edition ran a story last week replaying Sen. Joe Bidens claim that Curtis Dunn, the truck driver who struck the car driven by his first wife in 1972 and which killed her and his daughter, was drunk at the time of the accident, bringing tears to the surviving daughter of the innocent truck driver. The Wilmington News Journal writes about JOE BIDENS FALSE CLAIM that a drunk driver killed his wife and daughter

Full article: http://advanceindiana.blogspot.com/2008/09/delaware-newspaper-calls-out-biden-from.html

BIDEN. . . . THE GAFFE MACHINE:


* BIDEN TELLS SEN. CHUCK GRAHM (IN WHEELCHAIR) TO STAND UP: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SRV5Y1JCGRI
Cartoon about the above: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHs_OZw-ONw&feature=related


* RACIST SLIP: Why in his very home state, you can't even go to a 7-11 or Dunkin Donuts without having a slight Indian accent. www.youtube.com/watch?v=sM19YOqs7hU
(Biden added the next day on MSNBC: It was meant as a compliment!)


* NEXT PRESIDENT OF THE U.S. WILL BE: BarackAmerica:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKTjlAd-GXM


* BIDEN BRAGS . . . MY STATE IS A SLAVE STATE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFduMuP7v-k


* Joe Biden was criticized for describing Obama to the New York Observer as the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy. Biden stated, It was meant as a compliment!


* Joe Biden drunk on campaign trail: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4TBNeNHHXEY&feature=related

BIPARTISANSHIP: The facts speak for themselves. McCain, not Obama, has the Bipartisan legislature record by far. Below is an excert from an article detailing a comparison of Obamas and McCains record. - sharenews

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
The Washington Times
Records Show McCain More Bipartisan
By Stephen Dinan
Monday, September 15, 2008

ANALYSIS:

Sen. John McCains RECORD of working with Democrats EASILY OUTSTRIPS Sen. Barack Obamas efforts with Republicans, according to an analysis by The Washington Times of their LEGISLATIVE RECORDS.

Whether looking at bills they have led on or bills they have signed onto, Mr. MCCAIN has REACHED ACROSS THE AISLE FAR MORE FREQUENTLY and with more members than Mr. Obama since the latter came to the Senate in 2005.

In fact, by several measures, Mr. MCCAIN HAS BEEN MORE LIKELY to team up with Democrats than with members of his own party. Democrats made up 55 PERCENT of his political partners over the last two Congresses, including on the TOUGH ISSUES of campaign finance and global warming. For Mr. OBAMA, Republicans were only 13 PERCENT OF HIS CO-SPONSORS during his time in the Senate, and he had his biggest bipartisan successes on NON-CONTROVERSIAL MEASURES, such as issuing a postage stamp in honor of civil rights icon Rosa Parks.

With calls for CHANGE IN WASHINGTON dominating the campaign, both Mr. Obama, the Democrats presidential nominee, and Mr. McCain, his Republican opponent, have claimed the mantle of BIPARTISANSHIP.

But since 2005, Mr. MCCAIN HAS LED AS CHIEF SPONSOR OF 82 bills, on which he had 120 Democratic co-sponsors out of 220 total, for an AVERAGE of 55 PERCENT. He worked with Democrats on 50 of his bills, and of those, 37 times Democrats outnumber Republicans as co-sponsors.

Mr. Obama, meanwhile, sponsored 120 bills, of which REPUBLICANS CO-SPONSORED JUST 26, and on ONLY FIVE BILLS did Republicans outnumber Democrats. Mr. Obama gained 522 total Democratic co-sponsors BUT ONLY 75 REPUBLICANS, for an average of 13 percent of his co-sponsors.

More . . .

Continued in the full article: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2008/sep/15/records-show-mccain-more-bipartisan/?page=2

Great video, must see: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJiBDu5gWtc


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A "fundamentally sound" economy, huh?

Herbert Hoover said the same thing at the doorstep to the Great Depression.

McCain sure knows how to pick his quotations.

Does it really matter who becomes the next US president?

The important thing is he should not underwrite China???s future, nor for that matter, the future of any independent nation in the world. Uninvited presence in any foreign soil would even be more inexcusable, let alone intolerable.

He must realize that democracy needs not be the best form of government for everyone on earth, especially when its concept and meaning have been so often twisted by different leaders to serve their self interests. How often have atrocities been widely and openly committed in the name of democracy?

The new president needs to refrain from imposing the supposedly superior Western values on others. There are many countries which have been thriving for centuries under their own cultural and political system. It helps to avoid playing the role of international police at will -- for the sake of a better tomorrow for all.

Sen. Joe Lieberman, the former Democrat (now Independent) who supports McCain, accused Obama of not reaching out to the other side:

Lieberman: In the Senate, during the three-and-a-half years that Senator Obama has been a member, he has not reached across party lines to get accomplish anything significant. ...

We don't know what Lieberman considers "significant." But Obama has co-sponsored bills with members of the other party, some of which have been noteworthy. Obama and Republican Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana, for instance, teamed up on an initiative to lock down and secure both nuclear and conventional weapons worldwide, such as the shoulder-fired, anti-aircraft missiles that have been proliferating in recent years. According to a report on the bill by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the legislation "enhances: (1) U.S. cooperation with foreign governments to destroy conventional weapons stockpiles around the world; and (2) the United States' ability to provide assistance to foreign governments aimed at helping them detect and interdict weapons and materials of mass destruction." Lugar hasn't objected to Obama's characterization of their partnership or the bill, which became law in 2007, in his ads.

Another example: Obama worked with Sen. Tom Coburn, an Oklahoma Republican, to write the Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006, which created a searchable database the public can use to look up details on federal grants and contracts. (McCain was also among the original co-sponsors of that bill, so Lieberman may have been tarring his own candidate when he disparaged Obama's legislative accomplishments). Obama and Coburn also got together on a bill to prohibit the Department of Homeland Security from issuing open-ended, no-bid contracts for emergency response activities after abuses were found in post-Katrina contracting.

Tax Policy Center: The Obama plan would reduce taxes for low- and moderate-income families, but raise them significantly for high-bracket taxpayers. ... By 2012, middle-income taxpayers would see their after-tax income rise by about 5 percent, or nearly $2,200 annually. Those in the top 1 percent would face a $19,000 average tax increase ??? a 1.5 percent reduction in after-tax income.

It???s true that Obama???s tax proposals overall would raise federal revenues by $627 billion over 10 years. Is that ???one of the largest tax increases in American history??? as Thompson claimed? And would it be a drag on the economy as he says?

When it comes to assessing the effect that a tax change will have on the economy, the single most relevant figure is the size of the increase or cut in relation to the size of the overall economy. And by that yardstick, Obama???s increase is hardly a history-maker. The largest was the 1942 increase enacted as the U.S. plunged into World War II, and it amounted to 5.2 percent of the entire economy in its first year.

President Bill Clinton's 1993 tax increase, which Republicans regularly and misleadingly call the largest in history, was actually about one-tenth as large, amounting to 0.5 percent of the economy over its first two years. The TPC calculates that Obama???s overall tax increase, as described by his aides and on his Web site, would be roughly 0.1 percent in its first year, and 0.3 percent on average over 10 years, compared with what people are paying now.

And how would that affect the economy? Not much. The TPC says, ???Neither candidate???s plan would significantly increase economic growth unless offset by spending cuts or tax increases that the campaigns have not specified.??? The tax plans of both Obama and McCain would leave the federal government wallowing in huge deficits for years to come, and compared with the economic drag created by deficit spending, the effects of either man???s tax plan is negligible.


Troop Funding Foul Play

President Bill Clinton's 1993 tax increase, which Republicans regularly and misleadingly call the largest in history, was actually about one-tenth as large, amounting to 0.5 percent of the economy over its first two years. The TPC calculates that Obama???s overall tax increase, as described by his aides and on his Web site, would be roughly 0.1 percent in its first year, and 0.3 percent on average over 10 years, compared with what people are paying now.

And how would that affect the economy? Not much. The TPC says, ???Neither candidate???s plan would significantly increase economic growth unless offset by spending cuts or tax increases that the campaigns have not specified.??? The tax plans of both Obama and McCain would leave the federal government wallowing in huge deficits for years to come, and compared with the economic drag created by deficit spending, the effects of either man???s tax plan is negligible.


Troop Funding Foul Play


Lieberman also said that "colleagues like Barack Obama were voting to cut off funding for our American troops on the battlefield." That's a highly misleading claim that McCain also touted in an ad this summer. Obama has voted in favor of war-funding bills at least 10 times since becoming a senator. The McCain camp and Republicans cite one vote Obama cast against a funding bill as justification for their claim ??? but that vote came after President Bush had vetoed a version of the bill that included a date for withdrawal from Iraq.

In fact, most Republicans voted against that 2007 war-funding bill Obama and the Democrats supported. McCain was absent for the vote, but he urged the president to veto the bill. As we said about this subject previously, "Based on those facts, it would be literally true to say that ???McCain urged a veto of funding for our troops.??? But that would be oversimplified to the point of being seriously misleading." And the same goes for Lieberman???s claim at the convention.

http://www.factcheck.org/elections-2008/gop_convention_spin.html


Lieberman and Thompson make misleading claims about Obama on Day Two of the party in St. Paul.

Summary

Joe Lieberman and his former Senate colleague Fred Thompson both made misleading claims about Obama in their prime time GOP convention speeches on Tuesday. We've heard two of them before ??? many times.

Lieberman said Obama hadn't "reached across party lines" to accomplish "anything significant," though Obama has teamed with GOP Sens. Tom Coburn and Richard Lugar to pass laws enhancing government transparency and curtailing the proliferation of nuclear and conventional weapons.


Thompson repeated misleading claims about Obama's tax program, saying it would bring "one of the largest tax increases in American history." But as increases go, Obama's package is hardly a history-maker. It would raise taxes for families with incomes above $250,000. Most people would see a cut.


Lieberman also accused Obama of "voting to cut off funding for our American troops on the battlefield." But Obama's only vote against a war-funding bill came after Bush vetoed a version of the bill Obama had supported ??? and McCain urged the veto.

Analysis

We found a few factual issues in Tuesday night's big-name speeches at the convention in Minnesota's Twin Cities.


Obama on Your Side


Sen. Joe Lieberman, the former Democrat (now Independent) who supports McCain, accused Obama of not reaching out to the other side:

Lieberman: In the Senate, during the three-and-a-half years that Senator Obama has been a member, he has not reached across party lines to get accomplish anything significant. ...

We don't know what Lieberman considers "significant." But Obama has co-sponsored bills with members of the other party, some of which have been noteworthy. Obama and Republican Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana, for instance, teamed up on an initiative to lock down and secure both nuclear and conventional weapons worldwide, such as the shoulder-fired, anti-aircraft missiles that have been proliferating in recent years. According to a report on the bill by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the legislation "enhances: (1) U.S. cooperation with foreign governments to destroy conventional weapons stockpiles around the world; and (2) the United States' ability to provide assistance to foreign governments aimed at helping them detect and interdict weapons and materials of mass destruction." Lugar hasn't objected to Obama's characterization of their partnership or the bill, which became law in 2007, in his ads.

Praise in Context
------------------
The ad uses a partial quote ??? she "has a record of bi-partisan reform" ??? from an Aug. 29 Associated Press report. Those words do appear in the article, but so do several others that aren't as flattering.

In fact, the AP report raises some questions about Palin's credentials, saying: "She is younger and less experienced than the first-term Illinois senator, and brings an ethical shadow to the ticket." It also says, "Palin's lack of experience undercuts GOP charges that Obama is not ready to be commander in chief."

The ad also quotes the Wall Street Journal as saying, "Governor Palin's credentials as an agent of reform exceed Barack Obama's." But those words didn't come from the newspaper's reporters, they came from the WSJ's editorial board, which is notably conservative and generally friendly to Republicans and hostile to Democrats.


Liberal Leanings


The ad also says Obama is "the Senate's 'most liberal,' " a claim that rests on flimsy evidence to say the least. It's based on one analysis of votes cast in 2007. Obama was ranked as the ???most liberal senator??? by a National Journal evaluation of voting records in 2007 ??? but that wasn???t the case during his first two years in the Senate, when he ranked 16th and 10th on the most-liberal scorecard. Obama also missed one-third of the 99 votes on which National Journal based its rankings last year, due to his campaign schedule.

We have no argument with the fact that Obama is liberal ??? he is a Democrat, after all ??? but we note the ad's claim rests on one evaluation of last year's votes. According to another analysis, this one of bill sponsorship by the independent site GovTrack.us, Obama is a "rank-and-file Democrat." That's a step below the ranking of "far-left."

Sen. John McCain's campaign says the ad, titled "Alaska Maverick," will run in "key states," though it will likely get plenty of media coverage as well. It's misleading on a few fronts.


Don't Forget About the Tax Hikes


The most misleading claim in the ad is that Obama "gave big oil billions in subsidies and giveaways," a reference to the 2005 energy bill that we've debunked again and again. Actually, the bill, which President Bush signed into law, slightly raised taxes on the oil industry. Obama voted for the bill; McCain voted against it. The nonpartisan Congressional Research Service said that the energy act "included several oil and gas tax incentives, providing about $2.6 billion of tax cuts for the oil and gas industry. In addition, [the act] 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."

In total, the vast majority of the billions in tax breaks and subsidies included in the bill went to electric utilities and nuclear power, as well as alternative fuels research and energy-efficient cars and buildings.

McCain's ad attempts to contrast Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's record on "big oil" with Obama's. It says she "took on the oil producers." Maybe so. The ad's quote comes from an Anchorage Daily News article that said Palin had pushed through a bill to have an independent company build a gas line that oil companies hadn't moved on quickly enough, according to Palin, and she also backed increased oil taxes. But Obama is making attacks on oil companies a centerpiece of his campaign, while Palin favors drilling in places that even McCain wants to keep off limits, most notably the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

McCaskill: ???Sarah Palin Has Been An Earmark Queen In Alaska.

That???s The Facts.???

This week on ???The View,??? Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) claimed that Sarah Palin had never requested earmarks as governor. Today on ABC???s ???This Week,??? campaign spokeswoman Carly Fiorina repeated the lie, claiming Palin did not request earmarks for Alaska:

FIORINA: Sarah Palin as governor stood up and said, I know earmarks are corrupting. We must ask for less of them???

STEPHANOPOLOUS: But she still requested them.

FIORINA: As governor she did not. [???]

MCCASKILL: Sarah Palin has been an earmark queen in Alaska. That???s the facts.

Stephanopolous corrected Fiorina when she falsely claimed that Palin had ???rejected the money for the Bridge to Nowhere.??? Watch it:




As ThinkProgress has documented, Palin has aggressively pursued earmark funding for her state as governor, requesting nearly $750 million in federal funds, ???by far the largest per-capita request in the nation.??? Just last March, Palin wrote an op-ed in the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, explaining that her ???role at the federal level is simply to submit the most well-conceived earmark requests we can.???

Fiorina???s assertion that it is a ???fact??? that Palin ???rejected the money for the Bridge to Nowhere??? is wrong. Once Congress removed the designation for the bridge from the earmark, Palin took the money and redirected it to other projects.

As Keith Ashdown, chief investigator for the watchdog group Taxpayers for Common Sense, pointed out, Palin???s constant claim to have said ???thanks but no thanks??? to the bridge earmark is simply a lie: ???To say ???thanks but no thanks??? would imply that they didn???t take the money. And they got every dime of it.???

McCain???s Record On Economic Reform: [0] In [12 Years]

A new ad released this morning by the McCain campaign states, ???Our economy in crisis. Only proven reformers John McCain and Sarah Palin can fix it.??? In a statement today, McCain said he will ???replace the outdated and ineffective patchwork quilt of regulatory oversight in Washington??? and bring ???accountability to Wall Street.??? That promise rings hollow considering he has the former lobbyists of AIG, Merrill Lynch, Lehman Brothers, and Bank of America on his campaign staff.

On Bloomberg Television this weekend, House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank noted that, as a leader in the Senate Republican caucus, McCain did nothing for years to deliver reform in the face an impending credit crisis:

So here???s the record ??? 12 years of Republicans, including John McCain being a committee chairman for much of that period. Zero ??? zero enactment of any reform. Democrats take power, and in a year and a half, we have passed a bill that did everything the administration asked for, in terms of enhancing the regulatory structure.

Watch it:




Years of right-wing economic policies have created this moment of financial crisis. The mortgage bubble resulted when Fed chief Alan Greenspan kept interest rates at historic lows, and the government failed to regulate questionable practices in the financial sector.

This fact was underscored recently by Republican Mike Oxley, the former chairman of the House Financial Services Committee. Oxley noted that the House passed a bill in 2005 that could well have prevented the current crisis by issuing stronger regulations of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac:

???All the handwringing and bedwetting is going on without remembering how the House stepped up on this,??? he says. ???What did we get from the White House? We got a one-finger salute.??? [???]

???We missed a golden opportunity that would have avoided a lot of the problems we???re facing now, if we hadn???t had such a firm ideological position at the White House and the Treasury and the Fed,??? Mr Oxley says.

Oxley recalls that the bipartisan legislation ???faced hostility from the Bush administration,??? but also ???lacked a champion in the Senate.???

ANCHORAGE, Alaska ??? Gov. Sarah Palin is unlikely to speak with an independent counsel hired by Alaska lawmakers to review the firing of her public safety commissioner, a spokesman for Republican presidential candidate John McCain said Monday.

Spokesman Ed O'Callaghan initially said Palin, the Republican nominee for vice president, would not testify as part of the probe "as long as it remains tainted." He later clarified his statement to say Palin is "unlikely to cooperate" with the inquiry.

O'Callaghan also said he did not know whether Palin's husband, Todd, would challenge a subpoena issued last Friday to compel his cooperation. Thomas Van Flein, the Palins' lawyer, who has accepted service of the subpoena, did not return messages seeking comment. The governor herself has not been subpoenaed, but the Legislature's investigator, Steve Branchflower, has said he hopes to speak with her.

McCain's campaign insists the investigation into the firing of Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan has been hijacked by Democrats. The campaign says it can prove Monegan was fired in July because of insubordination on budget issues, and not because he refused to fire a state trooper who went through a nasty divorce from Palin's sister.

To that end, the campaign released a series of e-mails detailing the frustration several Palin administration officials experienced in dealing with Monegan. The "last straw," the campaign said, was a trip Monegan planned to Washington in July to seek federal money for investigating and prosecuting sexual assault cases.

In a July 7 e-mail, John Katz, the governor's special counsel, noted two problems with the trip: the governor hadn't agreed the money should be sought, and the request "is out of sequence with our other appropriations requests and could put a strain on the evolving relationship between the Governor and Sen. Stevens."

Monegan was fired four days later.

In the weeks since, it has emerged that the Palins and her staff repeatedly had contacted Monegan expressing their dismay at the continued employment of Trooper Mike Wooten, who divorced Palin's sister in 2005. The following year, Wooten was suspended for five days based on complaints filed by the Palins, including that he drank in his patrol car, used a Taser on his 10-year-old stepson and illegally shot a moose.

The Legislature voted to authorize an investigation into the circumstances of Monegan's firing.

Palin initially said she welcomed the inquiry. But after she became McCain's running mate on Aug. 29 her lawyer sought to have the three-member state Personnel Board take over the investigation, alleging that public statements by the chair of the Senate Judiciary committee indicated the probe was politically motivated.

In the two weeks since Sarah Palin was announced as Senator McCain's pick for VP, her handlers have allowed her to speak to the press 1 time and after serious coaching sessions. In that same time frame Senator Biden spoke with reporters 54 times. Thankfully the Palin bubble is finally bursting as the public get to see who this person for who she really is despite the McCain camp's best efforts to stifle the truth. Buyer's remorse is setting in. John McCain's judgement is in question as he blew the single most important decision he had to make as a candidate.