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I couldn’t let the first day of gay marriage in the state of Connecticut pass without a bit of reflection.

Having grown up in Connecticut (run-down mill town Connecticut, not Bette Davis movie Connecticut), it’s astonishing to see the progress that’s been made in the decades since I’ve lived there.  The town I grew up in, Winsted, was only about 125 miles from both New York and Boston, but culturally, it was as far away as Wasilla.

My existence there was so sheltered, I grew up literally not knowing that there was such a thing as a gay person. In junior high school, I remember stumbling upon a definition of “homosexual” in a dictionary I had and feeling that shameful sense of self-recognition.  I literally had no information — no Ellen, no Will and Grace, no Advocate.  Where I came from, the “love that dare not speak its name” didn’t even know it had a name.  I didn’t exactly pretend to be straight, but rather I simply didn’t know that there were any other viable options.

In my late teens, I met someone who was openly gay and whose gaydar was well-tuned.  I pretended that my curiosity was purely sociological when he asked me to accompany him to a meeting of the Kalos Society in Hartford, which at the time was equal parts social group, political activism, and group therapy.  Afterwards, my eyes were agog when members of the group went to The Warehouse, a gay club that I remember being snugly and discreetly nestled under an entrance ramp to Interstate 84.  Until that night, not only did I not know that there was such a thing as a gay bar, I also didn’t know that there were enough homosexuals in the world to keep a gay business of any type afloat.

In the wake of Prop 8′s passage in California, it’s easy to think that we haven’t come very far.  But, over the long haul, we’ve made huge progress.  Witness Connecticut.

In the wake of the drubbing they took in the election last week , the Republican Party is now in the process of doing some long overdue self-examination. The media have been trying to determine the whereabouts of the soul of the Republican party. So I thought I’d offer my unsolicited 9-point plan for Republican soul searching:

1. Get one. In order to search one’s soul, one actually has to have a soul.
2. Stop lying. This is the 21st century. We have technology. We will find out that you’re lying. The only ones left to believe your lies will be stupid people. And you don’t want stupid people in your party. (I know this is an unfamiliar concept to Republicans, because you’ve benefited for a couple of decades from the stupid people who you’ve drawn to the party and who have believed the lies that you’ve told them.)
3. Have principles, and follow them. Strategy and tactics are the necessary evil of a political campaign, but they’re not what people vote for. We’re drawn to noble, clear ideas. We’re looking for leaders who inspire us to make our nation and our world a better place.
4. Get smart. That’s not to suggest that you should be more tactical, but rather that you should actually value education more. That also means valuing the educated more. You’ve gotten a lot of mileage out of “no child left behind,” but you continue to run people (like Michelle Bachman) who seem like the children who were left behind. The nation and the world are facing unbelievably difficult issues, and it will take intelligent, educated people to come up with solutions.
5. Ostracize the corrupt. Especially when they’re in your own party. The fact that Tom DeLay is still somehow perceived as someone who can go on national television and represent the positions of the party is laughable. Marginalize persons of his ilk or the nation will marginalize the entire party.
6. Stop elevating and rewarding wackos. Believe it or not, people are looking to you for leadership. When you put subnormal or even just mediocre people on the ballot and expect that the public is going to go along with it just because you have previously enjoyed unquestioning party unity, you do your party and the nation a grave disservice.
7. Separate church from state. You can have still your religion. Knock yourselves out. But why not put your faith into action by doing good works, instead of blurring the boundaries between pulpit and politics in an attempt to force the rest of the world to believe the same dogma that you choose to believe?
8. Distance yourself from the ditto-heads. Admit it. You’ve spent the last 25 or so years building and fostering the multi-billion dollar right-wing media empire — of the Rush Limbaugh/Sean Hannity/Bill O’Reilly variety. But now you may be realizing that you’ve created a monster that is incapable of moderating itself. Cut ‘em off before they eat you alive.
9. Quit blaming the media. How can you be focusing on what you need to be doing when you’re whining about how badly you’re being treated? Besides, you don’t win votes with shame and blame.

One more thing you might want to take into account. I’m sure there are Republican campaign professionals who are right now dissecting examining every aspect of Barack Obama’s campaign, searching for clues as to what was done to win an election and how they might replicate those things. What those strategists seem to be failing to take into account is that, while some of the campaign strategy might be replicatable, the candidate cannot. Obama is a once-in-a-lifetime candidate with transformative ideas and, by all accounts, an uncanny ability to inspire and bring people together.

It’s been remarkable to see the outcry over the last several days about the passage in California of Proposition 8. For gays and lesbians (and those who love them), the elation that we ought to be feeling wholeheartedly along with our fellow Americans is tempered with the knowledge that the same election that ushered in a new era in politics and government also stripped us of rights that other citizens have.

For me, it’s like deja vu all over again.  In 1992, I had just moved to Colorado about a month prior to the November election.  The relief we felt knowing that Bill Clinton would soon be in the White House was overshadowed by the understanding that Amendment 2 had also passed in Colorado.  Amendment 2 was put on the Colorado ballot and funded by the same hyper-religious zealots that got Prop 8 on the ballot in Colorado.  (The California initiative has the dubious distinction of having buckets of money poured into it by the Mormons, who apparently left behind the concept of separation of church and state in Missouri somewhere.  And based on election returns this year, we’d be hard pressed to find the concept alive in Missouri today.)  Amendment 2 stated that non-discrimination laws that included sexual orientation previously passed by several Colorado municipalities would be deemed illegal.

In the wake of Amendment 2’s passage, the GLBT community in Colorado was stung, taken almost completely off guard by the amendment’s passage.  There had previously been a belief, because gays and lesbians were largely able to create pleasant lives for themselves in Colorado, that the work of liberation was complete.  It was a giant wake-up call to know that 54% of one’s fellow citizens thought it was alright to be fired or to lose one’s home simply because one was gay or lesbian.

The community took to the streets, held candlelight vigils, organized weekend workshops, bickered about whether a boycott would be helpful or harmful, and did everything in our power to undo the injustice that was done by the election.

Sound familiar?

The lesson to be learned, I think, is that the legal fight to overthrow Amendment 2 wound its way through various courts up to the United States Supreme Court and was finally overturned.  But that was nearly four years after its original passage.

I completely support the Prop 8 protest marches and I’m grateful that such marches are popping up all over the country, particularly those aimed at the Mormons and the other churches who completely violated the separation of church and state, and who give new meaning to the term “bully pulpit.”  I’m glad people are coming up with creative ways to respond to the inherent injustice of Prop 8.

But I’m also realistic enough to believe that legal remedies are our best option.  And while the pace may seem glacial, especially to the instant gratification set, we have to remind ourselves that the struggle for equality has gone on for decades already.  The struggle will go on while Prop 8 is being fought, and it will go on long after Prop 8 ultimately goes down in flames.

So, what good has come of this?  Well, I can name at least one thing.

In his Special Comment tonight, Keith Olbermann spoke out against the people responsible for the passage in California of Proposition 8.  (The complete text of that comment can be found here.)  The fact that a straight former sportscaster is going to bat in a big way on behalf of gays and lesbians is an indicator of remarkable progress.

I realized I’ve been mostly silent on the issue of Prop 8 here in California. There’s no question that I support the defeat of the proposition.

But I guess I’m old school enough to still be focusing on gay rights more than marriage rights. Back in the dark ages, when the issue of gay marriage started to show up regularly as part of the national discourse, somewhere around 1991, I remember feeling uneasy. I feared that focusing the gay rights struggle on marriage would divert the national attention away from the core issue of equal rights. I also was afraid that gay marriage would be just the kind of flashpoint issue that the so-called religious right would latch onto.

Now, lo these many years later, all of that has come true. And, in spite of all that coming true, we’ve made significant headway on the marriage issue. But this progress has been made if not at the expense of gay rights in general, then at least it has marginalized the struggle.

By framing the issue as being about marriage, we’ve managed to tap into the law of unintended consequences and skirted the core issue of rights. So I’m posting a list of Federal rights, as enumerated by the Government Accounting Office (GAO), that are compromised or made unavailable to GLBT people as a result of the failure of the Federal Government to provide a way for us to marry: GAO Marriage Rights

Until the right to marry is provided at the Federal level to all Americans, we’re not going to have true equality. And, until then, we’ll have to revel in the victories on a state-by-state basis.

The election is getting down to the wire, and the 24-hour news channels, the blogs, the newspapers all seem to have fallen into the same pattern.  Almost as soon as the polls started to reveal a commanding lead for Obama, the media all seem to be providing strategic advice to the fumbling McCain campaign.  We keep seeing headlines and hearing teases along the lines of “How McCain Could Turn the Tables.”

It’s clear that the news media have a distinct interest in keeping their viewers and readers engaged by making the race seem much closer than it actually is.  A race in which a horse wins by a nose is much more exciting.  So the media keeping harping on the idea that the 9 or 10 or 14 point lead that Obama has in the popular vote, along with the 100+ lead in electoral votes, can be closed up if only McCain can magically come up with the right formula.  Never mind that nothing even close to a formula of any kind has emerged thus far from the McCain campaign.

Perhaps as close as we come to a formula is an extension of the vile tactics used in 2000 and 2004 to suppress the (Democratic) vote, as described last night on Rachel Maddow’s show by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.:

Considering the gravity of the issues that Kennedy raises, it’s somewhat shocking that the media (with Rachel Maddow and Rolling Stone being two notable exceptions) have given virtually no play to this story.

I want to believe that the effect of this most recent round of media apathy will be offset by the foolishness of dim bulbs like Michelle Bachman, whose neo-McCarthy-esque proclamations about a litmus test in Congress to determine whether our elected officials are pro-America or anti-America have had the unintended consequence of filling the campaign coffers of her Democratic opponent. The almost universal rejection of her statements and of other similarly extremist positions seems to indicate that America just isn’t willing to buy this load of crap any more.

2 cups leafy green verbs
1 cup adjectives, chopped
1/2 cup pronouns
6 dangling participles
2 cups ripe nouns, minced
12 prepositions, peeled and diced
1 cup ripe conjunctions
6 articles, slightly blanched
1/2 tsp. intelligence
1 qt. hubris
Non-sequiturs

Season a large saute pan with participles. Gradually add nouns, prepositions, and conjunctions. Stir until lumps are gone. Add intelligence, one drop at a time, and continue to stir until intelligence disappears.

Drizzle saute mixture over verbs and adjectives. Serve on red, white and blue plates with a generous dollop of hubris. Season to taste with non-sequiturs.

Perfect for those parties of … ya know … reporters. Your guests will be saying “Thanks, but no thanks!”

Serves 6.

It’s been widely reported that John McCain has exhibited no interest in technology. The Republicans have attempted to characterize him as a lovable latter-day Luddite whose failure even to embrace e-mail is somehow a component of his cute and curmudgeonly personality.

If McCain were a plumbing and heating contractor or even a senior partner in a small-town law firm, this characterization might sit just fine. It might even be charming.

But John McCain is running for President of the United States. His lack of knowledge of and interest in technology is not cute. It’s dangerous.

Let’s face facts. The likelihood that another set of terrorists will fly planes into buildings has been limited by international efforts in the past seven years to tighten security. It’s not impossible, but it’s considerably less likely.

So what else remains vulnerable? Our ports? Our infrastructure? Yes, of course. But what would give terrorists the most bang for the buck? Our technology.

It’s hard to imagine the kind of impact that bringing down the internet or our other telecommunications assets would have. Our businesses all rely on it, our communications depend on it, and it’s one of the primary ways people get their information.

So do we really want to put the oversight of anti-terrorism efforts in the hands of someone who doesn’t know an IP address from a Zip code? Sorry. That’s not cute or quaint. It’s a huge security risk.

And, while we’re on the subject, what about our economy? Our banking industry wouldn’t exist without technology. The case can easily be made that many of our current problems have been exacerbated by the speed at which transactions can be made and the complexity that can be managed by computers. Again, how can we put a technophobe in a position of oversight of something as critical as our economy? And, again, a faltering economy leaves us in a much more vulnerable security position in the world.

What it boils down to is this: To have a clear understanding of how the world works, you kind of have to have at least some understanding of how technology works.

These are not issues that can be overlooked, as McCain seems to want us to overlook them, because he’s hailed as a war hero. You can’t play that card in this game, John.

It was fairly stunning, during last night’s Christian dog-and-pony show at the Saddleback Church, to see the contrast between Obama’s responses to the questions that were asked of him and McCain’s responses.  But if you’ve been following the campaign at all, it wasn’t all that surprising.

Barack gave thoughtful answers to the questions as they were posed.  McCain, on the other hand, gave calculated answers formulated with two parts campaign rhetoric and one part jingoism, and squeezed them in to make them fit (even though they often weren’t really even answers to the questions that were posed).  Obama spoke from the heart; McCain spoke from talking points.

It was also pretty revealing to see how McCain used so many of his answers to interject military options at every juncture.  In fact, his entire perspective is a military one.

The other thing that was so surprising was that the (right-wing) pundits immediately said what a great job McCain did, using the number of times he got applause to support their claims.  Well, hello!  He’s a Republican speaking in front of a church audience in Orange County, the right-most place on the left coast.  Big deal.  Anyone can get applause in front of an audience that already agrees with his positions.  What was more telling was that Obama got such a significant positive response from this crowd. Kudos to Barack for going into the lion’s den.  (C’mon.  I couldn’t get through a post like this without at least one Biblical reference.)

… to the pundits. Do not listen to Joe Scarborough, or Wolf Blitzer, or Larry Elder, or Rush Limbaugh, or Rachel Maddow, or David Gregory, or Gene Robinson, or Sean Hannity, or any of other those losers on Fox News, or any of the other talking heads.

Just listen to the speech:

The television coverage of Barack Obama’s speech today has consisted of hour upon hour of pundit blather, peppered with a few selected soundbites from the speech itself. But, aside from the initial live airing, they haven’t seen fit to air the whole speech. The underlying message is twofold: First, their viewers aren’t smart enough or interested enough to make assessments of news events for themselves. Second, they don’t care that their viewers abandon them for YouTube in order to get the real story.

If there were ever any doubts that George W. Bush treated his presidency as just another misadventure in a life filled with misadventures, this video — captured surreptitiously at the annual Gridiron Dinner — should quell those doubts:

I cannot express the level of disgust and rage I feel when I listen to this. It is completely surreal that this fool is capable of being so cavalier about things that would embarrass the most hardened sociopath. The fact that he can joke, under any circumstances, about Scooter Libby, Harriet Myers, and his good friend Brownie and what they did to this nation is unconscionable.

If Bush were merely idle and his presidency were merely useless, that would be several rungs up the ladder from where we stand. His presidency has been actively destructive — of human lives, of our economy, of our standing in the world. I do not envy his successor who will face the task of cleaning up the biggest shit pile an American president has ever left behind.

(By the way, George, did you even know that this song is about a man facing execution? If you make it through to next week, you may want to make a better song choice.)

On the evening of the Texas and Ohio primaries, I got on my soapbox (oh, alright, I got on the phone) with my friends and stated that Hillary Clinton would now face a choice that will inevitably reveal her true colors. A number of analysts have concluded that it’s mathematically impossible for Mrs. Clinton to achieve enough delegates to win the nomination, even if she wins all the remaining states by a 55% to 45% margin and if the DNC decides to give her the delegates from Michigan and Florida. Obama would still be ahead.

Many are saying that, given this arithmetic, it’s appropriate for Mrs. Clinton to be conciliatory, at the very least, towards Mr. Obama and perhaps even to concede the nomination. Nobody believes that a protracted battle between the two candidates will be good for the Democratic party. Such a fight may even jeopardize the nominee’s chances against McCain and will certainly provide fuel for the right-wing misinformation machine.

But then there’s the issue of Mrs. Clinton’s ambition and ego. Her reputation is that both are enormous.

So here’s the choice that we spoke about: Will Hillary serve her party and her nation first, or will she serve her ego and ambition first?

I thought it would take at least a few weeks for the answer to that question to be revealed. But the events of the last few days have indicated that Hillary’s choice is most assuredly the latter.

Hillary came out of the Texas and Ohio primaries slugging. She and her campaign have compared Obama to Kenneth Starr. They have fanned the flames of ignorance and fear by providing a photo of Obama dressed in Sikh garb. And, perhaps most odious of all, she has denigrated his experience by saying that she and John McCain had sufficient foreign policy experience but Obama didn’t. (There are those who interpret that statement as, “If I don’t win the nomination, please vote for John McCain.”)

Pretty monstrous behavior.

So, with all that invective being thrown about by Clinton and her campaigners, there’s something gravely disingenuous in Mrs. Clinton’s supposed outrage at being referred to as a “monster” by Obama campaign aide Samantha Power.

Power also stated that Clinton “is stooping to anything” in her attempt to grab the nomination. Power’s statements are harsh, perhaps, but true.

On the one hand, Clinton criticizes Obama as not having the stones to deal with the down-and-dirty tactics of the Republicans, citing his largely positive campaign to date as evidence. But when he or his campaign make any kind of statements that venture into that territory, she feigns outrage and hurt, all the while stoking the negative engines of her own campaign.

What I find most troubling in all of this is that there are so many Democrats, myself among them, who previously were big fans of the Clintons. It’s pretty sad that, from the start of the campaign until now, our opinions of the Clintons have deteriorated. The collective bad taste left in Democrats’ mouths can only translate into fewer Democrats showing up at the polls, should Clinton win the nomination.

I hope both campaigns don’t lose sight of the fact that the Republicans, George W. Bush, John McCain, and the status quo are what we are running against — not each other.

Gloria Steinem made quite a stir over the weekend by pointing out a couple of same things I posted here previously.

I’m not saying that Gloria gives a shit about my sorry little blog, but rather that there’s a case that needs to be made questioning John McCain’s wartime captivity as a qualification for the highest office in the land. In Steinem’s words:

“This is supposed to be a qualification to be President? I don’t think so.”

At least someone on the national scene is willing to take it on the chin by attempting to get people to look at this issue.

The favorite son of my hometown (Winsted, CT), announced his candidacy for the Presidency yesterday on Meet the Press. Ralph Nader has generally been embraced by his mostly liberal blue-collar hometown. Even those who disagree with his politics and tactics tend to acknowledge his impact on the consumer protection laws and the environment.

But Nader’s Sunday morning chat show appearance was kind of sad.

I’m not going to criticize him about being a potential spoiler in this campaign (although I do believe that to be true in the 2004 Presidential campaign and, given the current climate, may be true again). But what the Meet the Press interview revealed about him was that, although his ideas may be progressive, his single-mindedness and dogged determination may be his own undoing.

The interview reveals a man who is frustrated — even bitter — at his own inability to see his ideas gain wider acceptance. There seems to be a complete lack of pragmatism about his approach. It’s as though he’s never learned how to move from the theoretical to the practical.

Barack Obama lately has been accused, both by his fellow Democratic candidates and by his Republican opponents, of being long on rhetoric and short on policy. (He used to be criticized for being too wonky, so go figure.) His campaign speeches have done what those of no candidate in my lifetime have ever done. Namely, they’ve inspired voters and instilled a sense of hope and optimism in these most negative of times. Because these more recent speeches are meant to inspire rather than simply rattle off a litany of policy statements, he’s been perceived as not having fleshed-out positions on matters of importance.

The most recent criticism came last night from Republican frontrunner John McCain’s “victory” speech in Wisconsin:

“I will fight every moment of every day in this campaign to make sure Americans are not deceived by an eloquent but empty call for change.”

I refer Senator McCain to a 64-page document, entitled “The Blueprint for Change: Barack Obama’s Plan for America,” which describes in detail Barack Obama’s positions and plans for his Presidency. If anyone (including the Clinton campaign and the mainstream media) would care to look at that document (along with the Issues section of Obama’s website), they might be surprised at how empty it isn’t.

I find it particularly ironic that McCain is attacking Obama for his oratory. Is it because that’s one of his own many weaknesses? The grammar cop in me likes to point out how often McCain fails even to match subject and verb, so how can he be expected to energize the electorate? McCain may have silver hair but he sure doesn’t have a silver tongue. Frankly, I find it unlikely that he could inspire a good bowel movement in his demographically challenged base.

Here’s the extent to which McCain inspires. The total of all Republican primary voters in Wisconsin is less than the total cast for either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama on the Democratic side. This is in a state that is usually pretty evenly split between Republicans and Democrats. (The numbers, according to the Associated Press, are adjacent.)

This kind of criticism of a candidate may be new to Democratic rivals, but the Republicans are quite familiar with such tactics. It was the same kind of approach the Bush campaign used against John Kerry in almost identical circumstances. Kerry’s positions also were very clearly defined and posted on his website. That document was available for anyone who cared to view it, but few cared to, including the press.

The next step in the Republican’s attack on John Kerry was the now-legendary swiftboat ads. If the right-wing attack machine is on schedule — and we have no reason to believe it isn’t — there’s some severe nastiness in store.

Watch your back, Barack.

If there were any lingering doubts about how disconnected Romney-the-person is from Romney-the-candidate/campaigner, today’s endorsement of John McCain should shatter those doubts.

It was only a couple of weeks ago that the Republicans were all jockeying for the bottom-of-the-barrel position as “most conservative.” (I guess that’s kind of like the right-wing version of Miss Congeniality.) Romney was boasting that his platform, positions, experience, and credentials are the most conservative of any of the candidates. He repeatedly stuck out his anchorman chin and criticized John McCain for not being conservative enough and scolded voters for even considering voting for him.

But, in this race for the bottom, it was pretty generally agreed by all the pundits that Mike Huckabee was by far the most conservative, hovering somewhat to the right of James Dobson and Jerry Falwell on social issues. He and Romney have both been attempting to resurrect the wedge issue of the anti-gay “Defense of Marriage Amendment,” or whatever the fuck they’re calling it these days, which would for the first time enshrine in the U.S. Constitution discrimination against a single class of citizens.

So how is it that Romney now has done a 180-degree turn and, instead of endorsing the more conservative Huck-ster, is now singing the praises of McCain? This is just one more item in Romney’s record that proves that he’s far more interested in political expediency than principles. And, if you sniff around the edges of this turn of events, it’s starting to smell a little like desperation on the part of the G.O.P.

Presumed Republican presidential nominee John McCain and his supporters love to boast about McCain’s military service. “He’s a war hero. He was held captive and tortured for 5+ years in Viet Nam.” Quotes similar to this are used as the primary evidence of his ability to lead the nation, or at least a nation at war.

I am not so brazen as to discount either his service or his stamina. But it’s pretty easy to discount this attempted linkage between his military service and his readiness to lead the nation. Sadly, but not surprisingly, the mainstream media have not dared to question this linkage because they risk being misinterpreted as questioning his patriotism.

Military service in and of itself (and, in particular, being held captive) does not qualify one to be President or, by extension, Commander in Chief. The ability to strategize effectively to bring about peace while minimizing the loss of human life is a primary qualification. This qualification is not miraculously bestowed upon all those held in captivity. If that were the case, we could argue that Gitmo is creating the world leaders of tomorrow.

There are those who posit — and I tend to agree — that being held in captivity is instead a disqualifier for the nation’s highest position. It’s virtually impossible to escape lasting psychological damage from the type of captivity and torture that McCain endured. (There’s a special irony in the fact that our 43rd President’s policies have made it highly unlikely that the thousands of returning Iraq War veterans with PTSD and other emotional and mental problems will ever have sufficient mental health services provided for them. Do you suppose they take some comfort in the fact that a Presidential candidate shares something in common with them?)

McCain’s hotheadedness is longstanding, legendary, and well documented:

• How Tough Is John McCain? Salon, May 14, 1999
• McCain’s Temper May Become an Issue Washington Post, Oct. 31, 1999
• Famed McCain temper is tamed Boston Globe, Jan. 27, 2008

It’s not a very long dotted line that connects his captivity to his outbursts of rage. With the kinds of pressures a President faces on a daily basis, do we dare risk electing a President who may make decisions out of anger instead of rational thinking?

The dotted line is perhaps not so direct or obvious between McCain’s Viet Nam experiences and his myopic approach to his campaign. Whatever the source of his campaign strategy, McCain is largely a single-issue candidate. He himself has chosen to make the Iraq war the centerpiece of his campaign. While he may dabble in discussions of other matters, he always comes back the favorite song in his songbook: war.

Moveover, McCain seems to be among the millions of Americans who don’t make a distinction between American history and military history. Indeed, the two are sometimes difficult to separate because generation upon generation of American men (and now women) have gone off to one war or other. War is a giant part of the American identity. The prevailing mindset is that we must somehow prove our individual and collective worth by being engaged in and winning wars. Consquently, we find ourselves cast in the role of the world’s policemen. In that role, we’re damned if we intervene and we’re damned if we don’t.

Our next president will be faced with the challenge of changing not only the world’s perception but the reality of the U.S.-military-as-global-police-force. How on earth will McCain’s perspective meet that challenge? McCain’s own war experience was in the nation’s previously most misguided war, and yet he, like so many other Republicans, have yet even to admit that Viet Nam was almost as much of a mistake as the current Iraq fiasco. To expect McCain to meet or even address this objective is like shopping for groceries at a lumberyard.

Let’s face some facts. The vast majority of the nation is opposed to the war. People are tired of having our young men and women sent off to this ill-conceived and poorly-executed venture in Iraq. People are tired of seeing our national debt escalate and our spending power dwindle. People are really tired of all other aspects of our government being hobbled because of inordinate defense spending. John McCain is simply not capable of addressing the needs, desires, and — dare I say — hopes of America.

This is too funny for words. Just watch:

From the Colbert Report.

I spotted this creative use of stick-on letters today:

The video of the incident in which a student was tasered while speaking out at a University of Florida campus forum for John Kerry has been plastered all over the news channels today (as well as YouTube):

The incident and the video that captures it are disturbing on so many levels.

First and foremost on the disturbing list is the fact that this student, Andrew Meyers, is so clearly detained, tasered and arrested merely for exercising his First Amendment rights. Is there a reason why a microphone was placed in the audience other than to capture questions and opinions from participants?

It’s also equally disturbing that John Kerry is heard on the video continuing to address the rest of the audience, while the police are dragging this student out. How quickly would the police have ceased their tactics had Kerry addressed them directly from the podium and asked them to leave Meyers alone? It was completely within Kerry’s power (if not his ability) to defuse the situation and he didn’t. Perhaps what we got from Kerry in this incident is what we should expect from candidate Kerry, who failed or refused to address the tough issues during his Presidential bid?

The fact that the police were so willing and ready to pounce is also pretty suspicious. In the video, it looks like there are at least seven cops surrounding Meyers. It’s absurd to think that seven cops can’t subdue someone who is merely yelling. He’s not fighting them, he’s not flailing, and he’s not resisting arrest. He’s merely begging them for a reason why he’s not being allowed to speak and, then, begging them not to taser him.

Add to this increasingly disturbing list the fact that several of Meyers’ fellow students — their brains apparently turned to Alpo from overdoses of “Jackass” and “Girls Gone Wild” — can be seen laughing as the cops are zapping Meyers. These dimwits apparently didn’t get to the part in their American History books about Kent State. (Am I crazy to have higher expectations of higher education?)

Here’s the kicker. The media, who have the most to lose in this deterioration of the First Amendment, seem to be perfectly content to camp out outside O.J.’s jail cell (both physically and metaphorically), apparently reminiscing about the good old days of Camp O.J., and determined to provide wall-to-wall coverage of this non-essential story.

One final (and admittedly more trivial) level of “disturbing” is that, when the University’s President J. Bernard Machen spoke out today, is that he referred to the incident as “regretful.” Clearly, he was never an English major. It’s regrettable that a university president doesn’t know the difference between “regretful” and “regrettable.”