Some pics from Saturday's Obama Rally

Thanks to Rep. Huntley for the VIP tickets.

My old HP camera permanently died after just a few pictures. Fortunately I had brought our little Samsung with as well. I think I would have got better pictures with the HP. Oh well.

That Obama guy is sort of a good speaker.

Idiocy on parade

"Huge" turnout

Click on image to see the whole thing.

Obama chips away at yet another idiotic policy

Hopefully this is the beginning of the end of a decades old exercise in stupidity.

Obama to allow travel, money transfers to Cuba

By JENNIFER LOVEN – 4 hours ago

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama directed his administration Monday to allow unlimited travel and money transfers by Cuban Americans to family in Cuba, and to take other steps to ease U.S. restrictions on the island, a senior administration official told The Associated Press.

The formal announcement was being made at the White House Monday afternoon, during presidential spokesman Robert Gibbs' daily briefing with reporters. The official spoke on condition of anonymity so as not to upstage the president's announcement.

With the changes, Obama aims to create new space for the Cuban people in their quest for political freedom and a democratic government, in part by making them less dependent on the Castro regime, the official said.

Bravo

Obama repeals stem cell research ban

One of many needed steps to get science out of the theocratic jail cell imposed by Bush and his religious whackjob masters.

President Barack Obama

Time to get to work. The last guy trashed the place. I hope Bush doesn't get his deposit back.

Bush appointed hack lets assassination threat slide

This what you get when you appoint political hacks to be U.S. attorneys:

Legal experts question US Attorney's decision not to prosecute Obama 'assassination plot'

Interviews with numerous legal experts suggest that Colorado US Attorney Troy Eid misled reporters and diverged from state law when declining to prosecute any of the three men arrested in Denver for threatening to assassinate Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama.

Eid, who was appointed by President George W. Bush in 2006, declined to prosecute the three men on charges of threatening to assassinate Barack Obama during his acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention, saying that the suspects were "just a bunch of meth heads" and their words failed to meet the legal standard for "true threat."
"When you talk about threatening presidential candidates, there's a legal standard you got to meet," Eid told reporters. "It's got to be a credible threat as defined by the law. And that means that someone has a way to carry it out. And at this time we don't have sufficient evidence that there was a true threat."

He added, "They didn't reveal a plan" and characterized the alleged threats and assassination plot as merely "the racist rantings of drug users" and "one meth head talking to another about life."

But multiple legal experts interviewed by RAW STORY -- including criminal and constitutional law scholars, former Assistant US Attorneys and Denver-area defense lawyers also familiar with Colorado state law -- agreed that voluntary intoxication is not exculpatory and that such a claim, especially for a prosecutor, is unorthodox. While it may be presented in an effort to reduce a sentence after a conviction, experts say it is normally the domain of defense counsel.

...Legal experts say that Eid's definition of true threat directly conflicts with the statue covering threats to presidential candidates, 18 U.S.C. 879, which defines the threat as "whoever knowingly and willfully threatens to kill, kidnap, or inflict bodily harm upon a major candidate for the office of President or Vice President, or a member of the immediate family of such candidate."

...In downplaying the threat, the US Attorney's spokesman also characterized the physical evidence recovered from the suspects "including, along with methamphetamine, two high-powered rifles with scopes (one threaded with a silencer), 85 rounds of ammunition, a bulletproof vest, wigs, two walkie-talkies, three fake IDs, tactical pants and camouflage gear" as merely "tools of the drug trade." (FBI special agent and spokeswoman Kathy Wright admitted to RAW STORY that this physical evidence initially "sounded ominous," which is what compelled the FBI to obtain a warrant for search and seizure; yet contrary to reports in alternative media and the blogosphere, the FBI never sought to "charge" any of the suspects for threatening or plotting against Obama.) The implication was that all of these men were, at once, "just a bunch of meth heads" incapable of following through with any plan yet also hardened drug dealers, whose ownership of these items would be commonplace.

But according to narcotics experts, while the amount of methamphetamine recovered from Adolph's Denver hotel room legally constituted enough to charge him with intent to distribute, it does not suggest he or the other suspects are serious drug dealers or even drug dealers. Nor does it explain the kind of weaponry found on them.

One narcotics expert, a former senior DEA special agent who spoke with RAW STORY on the condition of anonymity due to his current consulting work, said that such a relatively small amount seems to point to either "very low level" dealing, the kind in which those involved are selling just to make ends meet, or an amount they simply planned on using themselves.

Michael Levine, one of the most highly decorated former DEA agents in agency history and an expert witness in over 300 federal and state criminal and civil cases, said of the amount of methamphetamine recovered in this case, "It's really not that much at all; that's roughly one ounce of meth. And one ounce of meth is what someone using might buy for himself or to share with friends. It was a small amount, still within the bounds of reasonable intent for use."

Levine also disputed the characterization of the weaponry recovered. "They are not tools of the trade," he said, explaining that while some drug dealers carry weapons, real evidence of drug dealing is the seriousness and amount of trafficking materials, primarily packaging materials, records of buyers' names and contact information, and evidence of witnesses who've said they've purchased from them.

Raw Story

More frightening rhetoric

Another debate

I used to have a certain degree of respect for John McCain. That respect had been diminishing as the Presidential campaign went along. Seeing him cozy up to those that he once vehemently criticized in an undisguised orgy of pandering was actually kind of sad. A man who prided himself on his integrity chucked it out the window to get the right wing christian vote. But with that and other moves that I felt to be sellouts of beliefs he had held in the past, I held on to a small bit of respect for the guy. I found myself thinking (hoping) he was a good guy deep down inside.

No more.

With his childish behavior at last night's debate and rhetoric that is bordering on frightening coming from the McCain camp out on the trail, the final nail has been driven into this coffin. This guy, and the campaign he is running are CONTEMPTIBLE.

People at rallies have been shouting "Kill Him!", "Treason" and "Terrorist" when Obama is mentioned. McCain supporters told a black TV crew member to “Sit down, boy.” after Palin tried to blame her miserable performance in interviews on "mainstream media" instead of her OBVIOUS lack of any substantial knowledge. Nice move from the VP candidate representing the party of "personal responsibility". "My piss poor performance isn't my fault! It was those damn commy journalists doing their JOB!!!"

Palin actually complained that Katy Couric's questions did not allow her to use her prepared talking points to bash Obama. Think about that for a minute. This person actually thinks that the press should be acting like a Letterman or Leno and asking prepared "questions" so she can give the answers she wants. THINK ABOUT THAT! Not only is she completely clueless on political matters, she has no FRIGGIN IDEA what the press does! And even more frightening-She has a B.S. in Communications Journalism. I guess she just paid attention to the "BS" part.

Last night McCain was pathetic. He tanked in the debate format that was supposed to be his strong point. McCain's ads have the gall to call Obama dishonorable yet he gets up there on national TV and LIES about Obama's record and fudges his own. Even worse he uses lies that have already been identified as BS in the national media. The Straight Talk Express has blown all of its tires and rolled over in flames in the ditch.

Grandpa Simpson mentioned a $3 million dollar overhead projector a couple of times as an example of pork that Obama supports. Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo looked into that:

Natural Born Fibber

It turns out that that "overhead projector" John McCain claimed Barack Obama tried to get a $3 million earmark for was actually money to rebuild Chicago's Adler Planetarium, the oldest planetarium in the United States.

McCain's "overhead projector" is the apparatus that runs the planetarium, which is a bit like calling the Palomar Observatory a new set of glasses.


It comes down to this-it is now painfully obvious that the McCain campaign knows that have NO hope of winning on issues. They are on the wrong side of virtually every one. All they have left is to smear, smear, smear, smear. Funny thing is-whenever McCain tried his smears during the debate, the CNN tracking graphs headed down. Fast. It isn't working. Has America finaly had it with Rove style campaigns? I sure as hell hope so.


On another note-I saw "Religulous" this weekend. Bill Maher does a great job of skewering religion-ALL religion. Good stuff. Go see it.

Weekend wrap up

Do I have a bad case of the Mondays? Not any more than usual. We had a weekend filled with fun things like eye surgery, vicoden, dog urine, a Presidential debate, and the Vikes and Twins losing. Yippeee!!

The wife had Lasik surgery a while back. On Friday she had an adjustment to fine tune one of her eyes. I am not sure what is technically involved with this "tweak", but the idea of having one's eyeball sliced open and "adjusted" is enough to send a little chill down my spine. And to think this is the third time she has gone through this-the initial Lasik, then having each eye adjusted. I don't think I could handle that. Especially the aftermath-A few days of stabbing pain in your eye! What a hoot! Fortunately she got a scrip for Vicoden which is extra effective on her. She slept a lot this weekend. If it was me, I would want to sleep the ENTIRE weekend-wake me up when the pain is gone.




Watched the debate on Friday night (surprise). Some thoughts:

Obama held his own on the night's topic (foreign policy) but I don't think he "won". But here is the thing, he didn't need to win this one. He just needed to be standing relatively unscathed at the end of this round, which he did. When the next debates hit on domestic policy Obama will wipe the floor with McCain.

McCain came across as a condescending dick.

I hope this is the last debate that Jim Lehrer moderates. He let McCain interupt Obama more than once and never gave Obama any kind of "make up" time for the interruption.

Where was McCain's flag pin?

Biden and Palin on Thursday. THAT should be entertaining

I went biking at Theodore Wirth for the first time since I crashed about six weeks ago. Took it nice and slow. It is a little disturbing to me how the crash has really robbed me of a lot of confidence on the bike. The second lap was a bit better, but still much slower than my normal lap time. Maybe next time I will push it a little

I found the spot where I crashed and located the branch that reached out and grabbed my handlebar. I think that branch was in "Evil Dead" I swear it moved!

On Sunday I watched the suck ass Vikings game. What a mess!!!! The Vikings did everything in their power to lose that game and the succeeded. One thing, the Titans got a flag for roughing the passer. Gus Frerotte was rolling around on the ground in obvious pain. The replays showed why. I hope I never have to witness another helmet to nuts tackle again. It hurts just thinking about it.

Went for a short ride around the neighborhood after the game. I spent a lot of time going in circles practicing dropping off of a ledge. The people in the park must of thought I was a bit off. During the ride I paused to take a pic of a slightly beat up, but very cool Mustang Mach I.





Well, that about wraps up this post-bored yet?