Racism, Indianapolis’ 105% voter registration, Press love gets no love but keeps on lovin’, Dems see landslide, NM voter rolls, economic fear and loathing, Derty Pouiiy - donor of a type, The Australian calls candidates & US press on inattention to reality

1) Now, for your morning racism, from the So Predictable it’s a Snore Department,” the NY Observer says black Congressmen find Palin’s talk racist.

As the McCain campaign ratchets up the intensity of its attacks on Barack Obama, some black elected officials are calling the tactics desperate, unseemly and racist.

“They are trying to throw out these codes,” said Representative Gregory Meeks, a Democrat from New York.

“He’s ‘not one of us?’” Mr. Meeks said, referring to a comment Sarah Palin made at a campaign rally on Oct. 6 in Florida. “That’s racial. That’s fear. They know they can’t win on the issues, so the last resort they have is race and fear.”

“Racism is alive and well in this country, and McCain and Palin are trying to appeal to that and it’s unfortunate,” said Representative Ed Towns, also from New York.
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“If McCain’s attacks don’t cross the line, they’re certainly teetering on it,” said Representative Jesse Jackson Jr. of Illinois. “He is certainly appealing to people’s fears and not their hopes.”

Mr. Jackson took issue with the McCain campaign’s attack on Mr. Obama’s connection to Mr. Ayers, who committed acts of domestic terrorism when Mr. Obama was 8 years old, and contrasted that with Mr. McCain’s long relationships with erstwhile supporters of segregation in the Senate like Jesse Helms and Strom Thurmond.

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“Some may say their true colors are showing,” said Representative Yvette Clarke of New York. “Others may say they’re just not being thoughtful. But certainly a lot of the language I’ve heard I consider to be incendiary. I believe it is meant to generate a certain sentiment within their base that engenders fear and certainly appeals to a group of people within our society who would pursue this along racial lines.

“It’s very clear,” she said.

Ms. Clarke also found a racial subtext in Ms. Palin’s repeated appeals to “Joe Six-Pack” and “hockey moms.”

“Who exactly is Joe Six-Pack and who are these hockey moms? That’s what I’d like to know,” she said. “Is that supposed to be terminology that is of common ground to all Americans? I don’t find that. It leaves a lot of people out.”

I guess the term “metaphor” would also be lost on Ms. Clarke. Oh, unless someone uses the word “uppity.” So, now we can add “Joe Six-Pack and hockey moms” to the racist words list?? Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid and. . . oh, stupid. “Urban” and “hip” leave me out. Think Ms. Clarke gives a damn?

New York State Senator Bill Perkins, an early supporter of Mr. Obama, said, “They are obviously playing on people’s fears and prejudices in a desperate way. While not explicitly relating to race, they are clearly creating the opportunity for those inclined to come to those conclusions. I think it is going to become more explicit as we move forward. It’s subtle now, but not so subtle as to be mistaken.”

And Kevin Parker, a New York state senator from Brooklyn, said, “If you have to remind people that Barack Obama is African-American, you have reached the bottom.”

Where to begin? I think it’s BO who constantly reminds people he’s AA, and who cares anyway? Well, how about Palin’s comments that so enraged these fools?

“Our opponent,” Ms. Palin told donors in Englewood, Colo., “is someone who sees America, it seems, as being so imperfect, imperfect enough, that he’s palling around with terrorists who would target their own country.”

She added, “This is not a man who sees America like you and I see America,” she said. “We see America as a force of good in this world. We see an America of exceptionalism.”

During any campaign, candidates try to portray the other as someone “not like” the voters, implying that the candidate “most like” voters should get the nod. That’s standard stuff - happens in EVERY race (oooooohhh, did I just make this racial)? That’s why candidates kiss babies, drink whiskey, eat at diners, etc, etc. trying to show how they are “like” the rest of us. The opponent tries to mute that by showing how But in this case, when Obama’s opponents go for the standard attack, he screams or has his surrogates scream racism. Those fools seem to be quite happy using sexism or ageism though.

Hopey / changey that is not. But one thing could happen. Obama could so ruthlessly play the race card that no politician will ever be able to do that again. That would be the most useful thing he has done in his entire life.

2) Ogdenonpolitics.com has an interesting observation. It looks like Indiana is approaching 105% of its population is registered to vote!

Vote Early & Often? — 105% of Indianapolis Residents Now Registered to Vote

It’s the elephant in the room that Indiana election officials don’t talk about. Voter registration numbers in the counties have been growing dramatically far above what is possible given the population. In today’s Indianapolis Star, Brendan O’Shaughnessy reports that as of Monday evening 677,401 people in Marion County have registered to vote.
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According to STATSIndiana, In 2007, Indianapolis/Marion County had an estimated population of 876,804. Of that number 232,607 were below 18 years of age, for a total of 644,197 people in Marion County/Indianapolis 18 or over and thus eligible to vote. (Indiana allows felons to vote as long as they are not incarcerated).

So we have 644,197 people eligible to be registered in Marion County/Indianapolis, and 677,401 people registered. Congratulations go to Indianapolis for having 105% of its residents registered!

3) CBSNews has a piece today about how the campaigns treat the press in terms of scheduling, etc. Guess who Dean Reynolds thinks runs the tighter ship and is more accommodating to journalists? Yep. Obama. McCain.

After most of the previous 12 months covering Barack Obama’s campaign for the presidency, it was interesting, instructive and, well, relaxing to follow John McCain for the last few days. The differences between the two are striking.
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The national headquarters in Chicago airily dismisses complaints from journalists wondering why a schedule cannot be printed up or at least e-mailed in time to make coverage plans. Nor is there much sympathy for those of us who report for a newscast that airs in the early evening hours. Our shows place a premium on live reporting from the scene of campaign events. But this campaign can often be found in the air and flying around at the time the “CBS Evening News with Katie Couric” is broadcast. . .

The McCain folks are more helpful and generally friendly. The schedules are printed on actual books you can hold in your hand, read, and then plan accordingly. The press aides are more knowledgeable and useful to us in the news media. The events are designed with a better eye, and for the simple needs of the press corps. When he is available, John McCain is friendly and loquacious. Obama holds news conferences, but seldom banters with the reporters who’ve been following him for thousands of miles around the country. Go figure.

The McCain campaign plane is better than Obama’s, which is cramped, uncomfortable and smells terrible most of the time. Somehow the McCain folks manage to keep their charter clean, even where the press is seated.
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Maybe none of this means much. Maybe a front-running campaign like Obama’s that is focused solely on victory doesn’t have the time to do the mundane things like print up schedules or attend to the needs of reporters.

But in politics, everything that goes around comes around.

Ruh roh. I think this guy has a “racist” taunt coming his way. Can you guess why?

4) Today’s WSJ has a piece about news bias. The author notes that bias in favor of Obama is a trite notion now it is so pervasive.

The single constant in the eternal election remains the media, whose activist role no one will seriously dispute. To point out the prevailing (with honorable exceptions) double standard of reporting so favorable to Mr. Obama by now feels superfluous — much like talking about the weather. The same holds true for all those reports pointing to Mr. Obama’s heroic status outside the United States — not to mention the cascade of press analyses warning that if he fails to win election, the cause will surely be racism.
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Mr. Obama could not have said it better himself. He is the leading exponent of the idea that our lost nation requires rehabilitation in the eyes of the world — and it is the most telling difference between him and Mr. McCain. When asked, in one of the earliest debates of the primary, his first priority should he become president, his answer was clear. He would go abroad immediately to make amends, and assure allies and others in the world America had alienated, that we were prepared to do all necessary to gain back their respect.

There’s more than this. The author makes some thoughtful points. Alas, nothing we haven’t seen or written before.

5) Politico has an article about Democratic strategists thinking they will have a landslide in Nov. Apparently, the recent economic situation has bounced quite a bit in Obama’s favor.

Three weeks of historic economic upheaval has done more than just tilt a handful of once-reliably Republican states in Barack Obama’s direction. Democratic strategists are now optimistic that the ongoing crisis could lead to a landslide Obama victory.

Well, yeah, if Indiana’s voter registration is any indication. This could happen. Of course, you’ll have more voters than actual, live people living there, but who’s going to quibble about that? It’s all about the hope of those nonexistent voters, doncha know.

6) Also in the WSJ is an article about more questionable voter registration - in New Mexico.

One of the biggest instances of suspicious registrations is here in New Mexico, where the Federal Bureau of Investigation has opened a preliminary investigation into 1,400 potentially fraudulent voter registrations in the state’s most populous county.
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The Republican National Committee is trumpeting registration problems on part of its Web site titled, “You can’t make this up.” Among the incidents: In Virginia, a third-party registration group fired three workers who it said falsified nearly 100 applications.

In Nevada on Tuesday, state election officials raided the offices of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, known as Acorn, after receiving information about falsified registration cards. “We have complaints every election that fraudulent registration forms are being turned in, and no one does anything about it. People have lost faith in the electoral process,” said Democrat Ross Miller, Nevada’s secretary of state.
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Maggie Toulouse Oliver, the clerk of Bernalillo County, which includes Albuquerque, has turned over to law enforcement the 1,400 voter-registration cards that raised suspicions of fraud. Ms. Toulouse Oliver, a Democrat overseeing her first presidential vote, says her office’s review of cards works. “That’s 1,400 cards here sitting in a file; they’re not entered into the system,” she said.

A mile from Ms. Oliver’s office, Acorn operates a major New Mexico registration effort. Young workers there worked late one night this week preparing to submit registration forms. Acorn and other groups have registered nearly 80,000 new voters in a drive focused on the state’s Democratic-leaning urban areas.
Indiana, New Mexico, Nevada, Virginia. All are having significant voter fraud problems.

1,400 strikes me as a large number. Although defenders say it’s not enough to sway an election, that’s a lot of false paper, filed knowingly by someone. Given that, I’d want to take a good look at the entire 80,000. But that’s probably racist.

7) Believe it or not, the NYT has a piece today that is NOT all gooey over the O. Talking about how Obama is using economic fear in his speeches, the author talks about how Obama still doesn’t offer specifics about how to make things better even after doing his best to scare the financial bejezus out of people. (Uh, hope RRRA doesn’t make it this far down. … )

Mr. Obama, the Democratic presidential nominee, told thousands of people at a rally here that America was “at a moment of great uncertainty.” He used the words “significant drop,” “anxiety,” “crisis” and “worse” all in his second sentence. He explained why the credit markets were frozen, and in plainspoken language described how automobile plants were closing because people could not get car loans, how savings for college and retirement were “disappearing.”
“Back in 1980, Ronald Reagan asked the electorate if you were better off than you were four years ago,” Mr. Obama told a grandstand full of voters in the swing state of Indiana. “At the pace things are going, you’re going to have to ask if you were better off than you were four weeks ago.”
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n short, Mr. Obama continues to promise that everything will get better once he is president, but does not explain how his programs and governing philosophy will adjust to new economic realities. He said Wednesday that Americans needed to unite to avoid “a dark and painful recession,” even though many economists say that a recession has already begun, and that pain may be inevitable.
Mr. Obama also turned to placing blame for the economy on President Bush and charging that all Mr. McCain offers are personal attacks and “more of the same Bush economics that led us into this mess the first place.”

I thought fear mongering is a “big bad” in politics? Oh, only if you call it racial. If you fear monger about something as insignificant as people’s livelihoods, it doesn’t count.

8 ) The LATimes has a piece about questionable Obama donors.

The Democratic candidate’s donors also include “Derty Poiiuy,” an individual with a scatological sense of humor who has given $950. “Mong Kong” has contributed $1,065 and lists an address in a nonexistent city. “Fornari USA” gave $800 and listed the address of an apparel store of that name near San Francisco.

Obama’s contributions have also exposed a loophole in the law, which does not require disclosure of the identities of donors who give $200 or less, making it impossible to determine whether they are legitimate without a federal audit.

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Exactly why a donor would use a name like Derty Poiiuy is not clear. “It’s part of phenomenon that we’ve never seen before,” FEC spokesman Bob Biersack said. People who make up names when donating to federal candidates violate laws against making false statements, but Biersack could not recall anyone being prosecuted for such a crime.
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Obama has returned money to Poiiuy, Fornari and many others. It will return Kong’s donation after The Times brought the name to the campaign’s attention.

Derty Poiiuy - isn’t he a porn star? Who knew Obama had the porn demographic locked up? An aside: How do you return real campaign funds to a person who may or may not exist?

Donna Skinner of Upper Marlboro, Md., communicates over Obama’s website via “O-mail.” “We have what we call money bombs. We make donations to each other’s fundraisers,”

“O-mail?” Is this a campaign or an amway convention?

9) The WaPo has another scary economic story. Holiday season approaches and retailers are scared.

“I don’t think anyone predicted a crisis of this magnitude that couldn’t be fixed quickly,” said Bob Carbonell, chief credit officer for Bernard Sands, a retail rating and credit services agency. “If the American housewife puts the money under the mattress, we’re in deep trouble.”

It’s an interesting early look at retailers’ concerns about the holiday season, which accounts for about 20% of sales. Why do I include it here? Because, if Obama is elected, look for him to switch gears from economic fear mongering and suggest Americans go shopping. Retailers need not worry, since Obama will begin to heal the economy, so buy that plasma tv, y’all or that latest Derty Pouiiy DVD.

10) The Australian has some comments about campaign rhetoric. Aside from saying American elections are less useful in terms of policy than Australian ones (an interesting point, that), the author talks about what the candidates actually said (something the American press doesn’t bother to do, sadly).

Obama is, formally at least, now terrifically hawkish on the use of force. Iran must not be allowed to get a nuclear weapon. No military option will be taken off the table. The UN cannot have veto power over US action. He will support Israel, one of America’s closest allies in the world. He will attack in Pakistan if there is solid evidence of the presence of an important terrorist. Hunting down and destroying al-Qa’ida must be America’s No.1 national security priority. Every time genocide or ethnic cleansing occurs and the US doesn’t intervene militarily, it is diminished.

Good grief. If George W. Bush were still saying things like that there would be a warrant issued for his arrest at The Hague.

In response to Obama’s alpha-dog swagger on national security, McCain read him a little lecture on the limits of US power and the need to intervene only when it can clearly do some good. Presumably Obama wanted to look tougher and McCain less threatening.

The author also talks about the Biden / Palin debate.

The content of US debates is much less important than their style. The bias of the liberal press made it go crazy over the inevitable couple of factual mistakes in the things Sarah Palin said in the much more engrossing vice-presidential debate. But her opponent, Joe Biden, declared that the US had got Hezbollah out of Lebanon, which would be news to the Lebanese.

He also said NATO troops should have been sent to Lebanon, which means US troops, which would certainly be a revolutionary development. And he said three weeks of US expenditure in Iraq equalled seven years of US expenditure in Afghanistan, which turns out to be completely wrong. He implied McCain opposed US intervention in the Balkans, which McCain in fact supported.

But the media has decided Biden is a genius and Palin a dunce, so no significant attention, beyond The Wall Street Journal, was paid to Biden’s weird utterances.

11) The NYPost has a good piece about Ayers’ educational views. Since Obama worked with him on a program to affect education in Chicago, one might think it would be interesting to know what Ayers pushed there and Obama funded.

Yeah, right. Looking into whether a multimillion dollar grant actually did anything to help those children is NOT considered salient information. Neither is whether that “education” helped those kids get jobs. But I’m quibbling.

But, as Stanley Kurtz and Sol Stern have pointed out, Obama helped deliver thousands of dollars to fund Ayers’ education projects in the Chicago Annenberg Challenge - whose purpose, says Kurtz, is to infuse students “with a radical political commitment.”

Ayers makes this very clear in all his writings. K-12 teachers, he has written, must teach “for social justice and liberation” - making classrooms into centers for creating revolutionary change.

Time has only hardened Ayers’ views. Consider an interview he gave two years ago to “Revolution,” a magazine published by The Revolutionary Communist Party, USA, a self-described “Marxist, Leninist, Maoist” group.

There, Ayers argues that education can’t be separated from “the concept of politics and political change.” Urban schools are now merely preparing students “for prison, for unemployment and for war.”

So, to create a genuine “progressive” education for our children, teachers must work to overturn the repressive, racist and imperialist system that governs the United States; it is imperative to fight “the most reactionary cabal of ideologues” that control the federal government and the media.
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Consider also Ayers’ 1997 book on juvenile justice, which Obama praised in a review as a “searing and timely account” of the issue. Yet, Ayers argued against the very existence of prisons in the United States, compared our country and its incarceration system to apartheid in South Africa and called for drastically softer sentences for juveline murderers. In a panel on the book Obama later even agreed with Ayers that the system is an “industrial-prison complex.”

I DON’T want Ayers’ idea of quality educational content in my children’s schools. If he or Obama was a real educational reformer or even cared about the children, they would offer strong academic programs and materials to kids or at least address the property tax funding formula for schools. Rethinking how schools are funded would go much farther than any “radical political commitment” to helping all students. But that’s not really their point, is it??

BONUS:

AmericanThinker seems to think Ayers might have ghosted Obama’s book. . . .

I bought Bill Ayers’ 2001 memoir, Fugitive Days, for reasons unrelated to this project. As I discovered, he writes surprisingly well and very much like “Obama.” In fact, my first thought was that the two may have shared the same ghostwriter. Unlike Dreams, however, where the high style is intermittent, Fugitive Days is infused with the authorial voice in every sentence. What is more, when Ayers speaks, even off the cuff, he uses a cadence and vocabulary consistent with his memoir. One does not hear any of Dreams in Obama’s casual speech.