MidTerm PostMortem

Dems put a “thumpin’” on Reps and Rep Incumbents.  It looked and sounded like a “vote against” rather than a “vote for”, it’ll be interesting to see how all these fresh faces handle the pressure to actually do what they campaigned to do.  But then, we’re talking about politicians, and even the most noble-hearted will find out just how glacier-paced things are inside the Beltway. 

 

Meanwhile, back home, I think it’s time for some recent candidates to step back and think about where they can make a difference in a forum where they might have a legitimate shot at getting elected, specifically Patty Wetterling.  The DFL has to rotate her out of the mix and suggest maybe she consider a mayor’s job in Sartell, a city council position in St.Cloud, or something far more local.  Honestly, anyone who saw 5 minutes of the TV debates should have come away thinking 2 things:

 

1)                   Bachmann was very beatable

2)                   Wetterling might be a sympathetic figure but she’s “deer-in-headlights” CLUELESS.

 

The other ‘dude’, not a factor (IP’s, you also might want to bring more candidates that are unique, not “Democrat-lite”, seriously.

 

Wetterling might be a ‘nice’ person, and it’s easy for any parent to feel for anyone who’s lost a child, especially in the inexplicably horrific way she lost hers, but while a tragedy might spur people to action, they should consider doing it where they could get something done, and a national office is NOT for someone who might be a sweet Midwestern woman who has endured a great deal but is ill-equipped to deal with national (and especially international) policies.  That should have been obvious in the first 3 minutes of her time speaking during the TV debates.

 

Bachmann was very beatable.  A more capable, intelligent, eloquent, and savvy candidate would have been able to fold, spindle, and mutilate another evangelical bobo, especially with the DC page scandal, the Ted Haggard fiasco (way to go, Teddy, way to stand in there, for your candidates, your flock (fleeced as it is), and worst off, your kids, who now have a HYPOCRITE for a dad; jerk-off!), and anything remotely aligning with “W” and the gang.  Bachmann was low-hanging fruit, and a better candidate would have rendered this hopelessly narcissistic shadow immediately to the 35% / useless category of 2^nd place finishers on Tuesday. 

 

Instead, we had to figure out what to do with an IP candidate who blew “Dem-lite”, an IR candidate literally sitting on a tee, waiting to get tee’d up, and clueless housewife with no business being in the race.

 

Can’t the DEMs find anyone to run, they have to try to play the sympathy card?  Lots of smart, eloquent, and common-sense people ran and won seats for Dems, how come they couldn’t here?

 

We have 2 years to figure out how to put Bachmann back in Washington County where she needs to stay, and find somebody who’s going to be a compelling voice for the 6^th district, not a schill for the tiresome evangelicals or a dundering “gee-whiz, I’m in politics” amateur with no skills.

 

OPM

 

First Muslim elected to House - BFD*

*(BFD stands for Big F*king Deal).

 

Honestly, was there fanfare when the first Jew, Catholic, Black, Woman, Physically-Challenged, etc. person was elected?  OK, maybe, but it’s America here, and anyone of any stripe elected to office will undergo the same scrutiny, meaning that, while Mr. Ellison was able to get himself elected, he will be watched, and in this day and age, things can turn faster than you can say “Carolyn Moseley Braun” and turn a “rising star” into a one-term fluke.  (The link is the most recent info on a true political COMET, and one of the first Oprah puppets.  Oprah got smart and started betting on another horse named Barak Obama, but that’s grist for another post). 

 

So Mr. Ellison, who has gone from a non-descript Catholic kid to “fiery follow of Farrakhan” while attending Wayne St. U, has scrubbed himself clean enough to dupe the gullible white-guilt / limousine liberal crowd, will be going to DC.  It’s funny, the transformation from bland, suburban kid to campus firebrand to Congress.  But then, we’re talking about ultra-liberal 5^th district, which is chuck-full of easily duped white-guilt suburban-reared college kids, “artists”, and the mindless disciples of community “leaders”, where they tend to vote a person in 19+ times for near-40-year terms (term limits, PLEASE!!!). 

 

So what about being the first Muslim.  Well, it’s probably nothing.  Why?  He will get as much done as anyone else who starts to project themselves outside the mainstream, and if you don’t have a caucus, you don’t have squat!  He’ll last exactly one-term if we read too much about him.  Therefore, he’s going to blend into the DC woodwork, be a team player, be more Catholic than Muslim, and do the things that help a career-politician get re-elected 18 more times.  In the 5^th district, that’s the blueprint.

 

POM

Minnesota's Own Dan Quayle

Congratulations to DFL Lt.Gov. Candidate Judi (E85) Dutcher for stepping into the political cow pie, a la Dan Quayle, and botching the E85 query by the rural newsnick. E85, must be a quiz bowl question...good one, Jud-i. When the biggest builder of ethanol plants in the upper midwest, the nation, and maybe even the world, is literally 2 hours west of the Twin Cities, and you don't get E85? and you want to "govern" this state?!? You are the Dan Quayle of MN politics, and since the Lt. Gov. position is probably the most toothless political office in the state, you're going to be OK, win or lose.

---

No banners. No pop-ups. No kidding.
Make My Way your home on the Web - http://www.myway.com

funny if it wasn't so scary

Tell me this guy is the funniest dictator on the face of the Earth right now?

 

 

 

Like some Elvis-impersonator in a cheesy Bangkok Revue…Why hasn’t the US already dispatched of this crackpot? 

 

MPO

 

Oil and Politics ALWAYS mix

Oil prices are acting funny.

 

Why?

 

Well, have you noticed the drop in oil prices? They have plunged from $77 per barrel to about $63 in a matter of weeks.

Have Americans suddenly given up their SUVs? Are all the airlines grounded? Is China saying “no thanks” to the modern age?

 

Nope.

 

In reality, only one thing has changed.  The mid-term elections are approaching......and the Republicans don’t want to blow it.

The Republicans? What am I talking about? For sure, George W. Bush is an old-time oil guy, but the Republicans don’t really control the world’s oil supply, do they?

Not exactly, but they do have lots of influential friends.

 

If you think the world’s power elite play fair......then you’ll certainly dismiss what I’m saying.

You believe that everything’s on the up and up. See all the cards on the table. And take everything at its face value.

If — on the other hand — you have a sneaking suspicion that people sometimes play loose with the truth, then I suggest you read on.

 

What you'll learn today can help you in the months ahead.

 

Protecting common interests

I’m sure you’ve heard talk of the “new world order.”  A shadowy cabal of power brokers, who pull all the most-important strings from Washington to Beijing.

Does this secret society really exist? I don’t think so — not quite in the way that novelists and really out-there conspiracy theorists would tell it.

But — and this is critically important — you’d be naïve to think that life’s fair; and that powerful figures and groups never “get together” to protect their common interests.

Of course they do. Manipulation is key to those in power staying in power.

 

One small example: The Federal Reserve usually assumes a more accommodative stance on interest rates around election time. (Like now, as the Fed has “paused” its hikes.)

Simply put, that benefits the party in power. And while the Fed is supposed to be an independent body, when it comes to power helping power, it’s not. That’s how the world works.

And today, power is helping power to keep the Democrats from gaining control of Congress.

 

Watch gasoline prices

They’re down a bunch in recent weeks and headed still lower in the weeks to come.  The average guy on the street knows little about politics, the inner workings of government or the role of the power elite.

Most of them are just pissed off.  About the mess in Iraq, for sure. But Joe Smith from Sunnydale really mutters when he pulls up to the pump, and gas prices are sitting at $3.35 per gallon. And angry voters take it out on the guys in charge.  The entities that want to keep the Republicans in power — or gain some sort of gridlock, at worst — know that.  They also know that none of the big issues, like Iraq, are going away overnight. But it’s funny how fast oil and gas prices can fall when “they” put their minds to it.

 

Friends in the Middle East

Well, not quite friends, but people with common interests.  It’s a story of two Middle Easts, in truth.  One — the world of stone-age tribal mayhem — gets all the press. The other — as personified by capitalistic boom times in Dubai — gets little.  There are many rich power brokers in the Arab world who fear the terrorist scum as much as we do. And they believe the Republicans, led by George Bush, are better terror fighters than the Democrats.  Saudi Arabia, in particular, is nervous about any change.  Oil and gasoline prices are down, because supplies are up. Saudi Arabia is the world’s biggest producer of crude. To me, it looks like powerful people taking care of common interests.

 

What a coincidence

You’ve probably heard about the “enormous” new oil find in the Gulf of Mexico.  Chevron’s deep field — nearly six miles beneath the ocean — may hold up to 15 million barrels of oil.

Interesting timing on this announcement — pre-election. And another reason why oil and gas prices are — temporarily — down.  Of course, that’s just a coincidence, right? After all, the Republican party and Big Oil hold no common interests. No, of course not — and I taught Tiger Woods everything he knows.  (What they’re not telling you — it’d spoil the pre-election buzz: This find is a drop in the bucket — like a few months supply at today’s global consumption rate.)

 

So what does this mean to you?

First off, don’t take anything at face value.  Oil traders are using this pre-election oil dip as a trading opportunity to take some profits off the table. Long-term, most are still energy bulls.

Secondly, this pre-election “rub my back and I’ll rub yours” power trip is creating new risks and new opportunities in today’s stock market.

 

As a very accomplished political hack (and a former governor of Minnesota) once put it, “Follow the Money.”

 

MPO

 

MPLS 5th Ward

What a mess.  What is the identity of Mpls 5^th Ward?  It’s confusing.

 

MPO

the devil made us do it

As the political trail winds along, some of the contestants are too busy putting their feet in their mouths (click or paste

http://articles.news.aol.com/news/_a/voters-hearing-countless-ways-of-saying/20060901115909990001

for an example) 

 

While the media certainly can amplify these mis-statements, the perpetrators themselves don't exactly help their cause.  Such a shoot-from-the-hip approach is exactly what we DON'T need as world events heat up.  We have enough of that already.

 

Will this be the year when political turnover takes place, or will this be just another year of pushing a lever and then wondering what Tom Cruise or Britney Spears are up to?  Maybe we'll start to care.

 

Blogger

---

Check out AOL.com today. Breaking news, video search, pictures, email and IM. All on demand. Always Free.

if it walks and quacks like a duck...

And so, from the "mouths" of the media no less, comes
this appeal to move from using single inflammatory
analogies:
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1515951,00.html?cnn=yes
(paste it in)

For all that mainstream media does to distill the
world's complexities to easy-to-consume, bite-sized
single inflammatory analogies, now they want to "get
sophisticated." having cake and eating, too?

meanwhile, if a despot walks and talks like one, are
we to sit back and wait to see if he is one, or do
something about it before millions more pay?

so short sighted, so inflammatory.

BIC

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
http://mail.yahoo.com

Lieberman tossed under the bus

Amazing how politicians will do and say anything to survive on the Hill. Take this entry from CNN on Sen. Lieberman's approach after getting wacked by DNC Chmn. H. Dean and his fanatical anti-war minions. Say what you will about Dean, the one thing he's done exceptionally well is establish a very wide power base of grassroots democrats who are vehemently opposed to the Iraq war, Bush, Cheney, and everything associated with any of them (Lieberman included). Why are so many republican candidates distancing themselves from Bush? Isn't partisan politics fun? The problem is that Lieberman actually understands the consequences of an immediate and total withdrawal from Iraq. Can you say "Taliban, Part 2?" No sooner would the remaining US / UN forces be gone than chaos of greater-than-Bosnian proportions would take place. Sunnis and Shiites would attempt to annihilate each other, with Syria, Iran, and Saudi Arabia backing their chosen sects. What a mess. Is this what Dean and Co. wants? they're clearly not thinking this through. and when this fiasco goes into full swing, who's going to have to step in? and what will our energy markets look like? again, are Dean and Co. looking at the bigger picture, or is it just fun and fashionable to pull out the protest signs and hit the streets? wake up people, there's more at stake... Texas Toast

---

No banners. No pop-ups. No kidding.
Make My Way your home on the Web - http://www.myway.com

the politics of energy

Here we go again.  Any savvy energy trader will look at today's markets and snap up as many Futures contracts as possible .    Near term prices for natural gas has slipped below $6.00.  buy it now because when that cold snap hits in February, you're going to make a pile of dough.

what does that have to do with the midterm elections?  well, here's a theory... 

Bush want to burnish his legacy.  after all, he has a library to build. 

with so many candidates looking to create space between themselves and Bush, he's working to engage these people to ensure his final two years in office will solidify his place in history by helping push through his policies.  all this is going to cost money.  and it's no secret that Bush's strongest Allies are in the energy business.  they'd done quite well during his administration.  today's dipped in energy prices signals a buying opportunity to raise cash in the coming months as election time rolls near. 

farfetched?  as another old political hack one said,

"follow the money".

The Political Hack

The Political Hack

Our next president? Not if you're from NH anyway. More from the "nanny" party? How the heck are the Democrats EVER going to seat a viable candidate if they keep trying to sell us what THEY think is the right one? And the Dems keep talking about how out of touch the Republicans are.

Funny stuff.

The Political Hack

The Political Hack - where it's at today, August 11, is in the embattled airline industry. From strike-ready attendants ready to spread C.H.A.O.S., to deadly-fanatical terrorists who fuel international chaos, why would anyone want to work at an airline, own airline stock, or in some way count on airlines for their livelihood? What was once a glamourous profession that promised good pay, travel benefits, and endless blue-skies has deteriorated into a low-budget / fresh from Chapter 11 / startup with low-paid support staff from an outsourced firm and confronted by another crazed bomber with a "mission" dispatched from a 3rd world ghetto. Enough already.

What does the US have to do? Working with the rest of the world (besides the UK) and establishing (or re-establishing) intelligence contacts (which whithered during Willie's terms in office), for one. Another is to stuff the ACLU in a box and let law enforcement practice crime prevention instead of crime investigation.

New for '06

Vent, rant, discuss, pontificate, and otherwise state your case. Will it matter when so many hacks do it? That's what democracy is all about. Unless you're a republican...;-)

No cussing, no flaming, no whining and crying.

Politics is a game, and the tote board is now up. Weigh in with your takes on the mid-term derbies of '06, then get really cranked up for "the show" in '08.

Enjoy responsibly...