Moe found at Drudge that the Obama campaign released their debate talking points a tad early. Here they are, in their full glory:
* This is John McCain’s last chance to turn this race around and somehow convince the American people that his erratic response to this economic crisis doesn’t disqualify him from being President.
* Just this weekend the weekend, John McCain vowed to “whip Obama’s you-know-what” at the debate, and he’s indicated that he’ll be bringing up Bill Ayers to try to distract voters.
* So we know that Senator McCain will come ready to attack Barack Obama and bring his dishonorable campaign tactics to the debate stage.
Obama continues to lead on the economic crisis with a rescue plan for Main Street.
* Over the course of the campaign, Barack Obama has laid out a set of policies that will grow our middle class and strengthen our economy.
* But he knows we face an immediate economic emergency that requires urgent action - on top of the plans he’s already laid out - to help workers and families and communities struggling right now.
* That’s why Barack Obama is introducing a comprehensive four-part Rescue Plan for the Middle Class - to immediately to stabilize our financial system, provide relief to families and communities, and help struggling homeowners.
* This is a plan that can and should be implemented immediately.
* Obama has shown steady leadership during this crisis and offered concrete solutions to move the country forward - and his Rescue Plan for the Middle Class builds on the plans to strengthen the economy and rebuild the middle class that he’s laid out over the course of this campaign.
* Already in this campaign, he’s unveiled plans to give 95 percent of workers and their families a tax cut, eliminate income taxes for seniors making under $50,000, bring down the cost of health care for families and businesses; and create millions of new jobs by investing in the renewable energy sources.
* John McCain has been erratic and unsteady since this crisis began - staggering from position to position and trying to change the subject away from the economy by launching false character attacks.
In short, the O campaign’s talking point is that McCain’s “erratic and usteady”, i.e., nuts.
Any of you doing drinking games during the debate perhaps should consider doing the drinking after the debates as the Dem hacks on CNN, MSNBC et al, parrot the “talking points” over and over. Double shots for every time someone says “erratic“.
You still have a couple of hours to stock up on booze.
In the flurry of speculation and opinion preceeding tonight’s debate, Betsy offers excellent advice for John McCain:
Focus on the economy and how tax increases will affect all of us,
McCain has to be able to explain his proposals for the economy and health care in clear language that also explains how his ideas will affect people. He needs to expose the myths behind Obama’s tax cuts for 95% of people and how it’s really money handouts. Show people that Obama’s math doesn’t add up for all the proposals he has plus his tax cuts. There is no way he’s going to fund that just by taxing the top 5% more.
Especially business taxes, which the US’s are the highest in the world
Point out that taxes on businesses are passed on to customers so we’ll all be paying those higher taxes. And it will affect all of our 401K’s.
And also on how harmful it will be to have all branches of government in the hands of one party,
And McCain should be specific. Talk about Obama’s support for taking the secret ballot away from workers or the money for ACORN that the Democrats wanted to seed into the bailout proposal. Remind people that we’ll never see offshore drilling with Democratic control of the government. Then connect that to people’s gas bills.
This is a particularly important point. You can forget about offshore drilling or for that matter any kind of drilling or exploration of US oil, just as you can forget a strong military under an Obama administration.
Some Republicans may fool themselves into thinking that if Obama comes to power in the middle of a recession and puts through Congress his disastrous policies, the people will then turn to the Republicans in the 2010 Congressional elections as they did during the Clinton years and turn the ship of state around towards conservatism. Allow me to make a prediction:
That’s not going to happen.
The Republicans lose, and they’re going to be out of the game years, possibly decades. One can even wonder, permanently?
For starters, back in the days of Newt Grinwrich’s Contract With America, Newt had been building a large network of support for years, with clear issues. There is a complete lack of leadership among Republicans and they have NOT, I repeat, have NOT come up with anything near a “Contract With America”.
Additionally, the media and academia are busy building a myth of Obama, the likes of which we’re only starting to see. Bush Derangement Syndrome will continue for many many years to come. The Dems will blame every darned thing on Republicans and nobody other than perhaps the bloggers (IF the internet is not censored by then) will have the hardheadedness to contradict the meme. It will not matter that the Democrats created the subprime mortgage disaster; it will be blamed on the Republicans, and if there’s a worldwide depression it will be blamed on the Republicans. Look at how the Dems have completely obliterated the reality of the Civil Rights Movement era: the Republicans are seen as “racist” on every turn.
The cult of personality is such that Howard Stern, of all people, illustrated the blind support for Obama in this exchange (h/t GoV):
School books are already out with pages of praise for Obama. Do you think that will stop once he’s president?
The President of the United States not only nominates judges to the Supreme Court, he appoints the Federal judges. Think about it: a liberal majority in Congress, in the Senate, in the federal courts, and in the Supreme Court, too.
You’re looking at all branches of government, the media and academia tightly controlled by one party. A party which is the master of propaganda.
Now, consider the existing voter fraud carried out by ACORN (and ACORN received $800,000 from the Obama campaign): With paperless voting machines, who’s going to investigate when the results favor the stranglehold on power?
And another issue: Who will stop any censorship on the internet, on talk radio, on any dissenting organ? Let’s imagine one scenario like we’re seeing now: The president of the world, as Obama sees himself, wants to be seen as a friend of the world, and a socialist country doesn’t want a website owned by one of their nationals to be hosted by a server in the US? What do you think Obama’s position will be? What do you think McCain’s position would be?
Listen to Betsy, John. The game’s a lot bigger than just tonight’s play.
I’ve been making the case the last couple of weeks that we can’t just focus on winning in November, but that we have an imperative to take advantage of a historic opportunity to break the conservative movement’s backs and crush their spirits. In the White House, that means getting Obama a broad popular and geographic mandate for change. In the House, that means annihilating the Republican caucus and working toward a 100-seat Democratic majority. In the Senate it means getting to a 60-seat filibuster proof majority.
Milonga pa’ recordarte,
milonga sentimental.
Otros se quejan llorando,
yo canto por no llorar.
Tu amor se secó de golpe,
nunca dijiste por qué.
Yo me consuelo pensando
que fue traición de mujer.
Varón, pa’ quererte mucho,
varón, pa’ desearte el bien,
varón, pa’ olvidar agravios
porque ya te perdoné.
Tal vez no lo sepas nunca,
tal vez no lo puedas creer,
¡tal vez te provoque risa
verme tirao a tus pies!
Es fácil pegar un tajo
pa’ cobrar una traición,
o jugar en una daga
la suerte de una pasión.
Pero no es fácil cortarse
los tientos de un metejón,
cuando están bien amarrados
al palo del corazón.
Milonga que hizo tu ausencia.
Milonga de evocación.
Milonga para que nunca
la canten en tu balcón.
Pa’ que vuelvas con la noche
y te vayas con el sol.
Pa’ decirte que sí a veces
o pa’ gritarte que no.
UPDATE
Here’s another one with El Indio Benevente,
Crude oil futures dropped Tuesday as the market anticipated months of weak demand even if the U.S. government succeeds in preventing the economic downturn from deepening.
The Mideast worries and talks about reducing output, but the one with the most reason to worry is Hugo Chavez. No one, and I mean not one single petty tyrant in all the oil-financed tyrannies in the world, is as dependent on oil revenues to maintain himself in power. Venezuela relies on oil income for more than 40 percent of its budget and Chavez squanders every day millions of dollars of oil revenues while oil production has fallen by a quarter since he won power.
The official rate of inflation is 22.5 - the highest in Latin America. However, inflation in some sectors, such as food, is 50%. The Venezuelan economy is in tatters now and will get a lot worse.
In the meantime, “Baby needs a new pair of shoes.”
Chavez sent $300 million to the FARC earlier this year. “Baby needs a new pair of shoes.”
Chavez is buying Russian jets, and the Russians don’t take Mastercard. “Baby needs a new pair of shoes.”
Chavez has all sorts of new business deals with Iran, and the mullahs don’t take Mastercard, either. “Baby needs a new pair of shoes.”
Chavez also sends financial support Argentina, Bolivia, Ecuador and Nicaragua. “Baby needs a new pair of shoes.”
Lord knows what kind of deals Chavez has with China. “Baby needs a new pair of shoes.”
Lots of babies, lots of shoes, all coming from oil proceeds. And now oil’s down.
Going broke: Noticias24 (in Spanish) and El Universal ( in English) both publish a report by PFC Consulting Limited, a Washington-based wholly owned subsidiary of Power Finance Corporation Limited, and German bank Deutsche Bank, which states that Venezuela is the most vulnerable country to the financial crisis:
PFC considers that Venezuela needs that the price of oil averages USD 97 to balance its accounts while in 2000, the South American country required that the price of the barrel of petroleum was USD 34.
And the price of oil can plummet even lower,
Goldman expects crude to average USD 75 in the fourth quarter and USD 70 at the end of the year, but added: “Should the financial and economic crisis cut deeper into demand, the market could fall as low as USD 50 a barrel.”
Oil drops, Hugo sweats.
What, then: Daniel’s been looking at outcomes and odds for the short term (less than a year). All the options hinge on Chavez, and his future is directly linked to the price of oil.
I will speculate further and say that if oil stays below $80 for an extended period of time, Chavez will be looking at real estate in a retirement community near Cannes.
While you read the article, please do keep in mind that Community Reinvestment Act,
a law that allows groups like ACORN to force banks into making high-risk loans to low-credit customers
is still active. None of the legislation has repealed the CRA to date:
The CRA’s ostensible purpose is to prevent banks from discriminating against minorities. But Rep. Marge Roukema (R-NJ), who chaired the subcommittee, was worried that charges of discrimination had become an excuse for lowering credit standards. She warned that new, Democrat-proposed CRA regulations could amount to an illegal quota system.
FOR years, ACORN had combined manipulation of the CRA with intimidation-protest tactics to force banks to lower credit standards. Its crusade, with help from Democrats in Congress, to push these high-risk “subprime” loans on banks is at the root of today’s economic meltdown.
When the role of ACORN and congressional Democrats in the mortgage crisis is pointed out, Democrats reply that banks subject to the CRA represent only about a quarter of the loans that led to our current troubles. In fact, the problem goes way beyond the CRA.
As ACORN ran its campaigns against local banks, it quickly hit a roadblock. Banks would tell ACORN they could afford to reduce their credit standards by only a little - since Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the federal mortgage giants, refused to buy up those risky loans for sale on the “secondary market.”
That is, the CRA wasn’t enough. Unless Fannie and Freddie were willing to relax their credit standards as well, local banks would never make home loans to customers with bad credit histories or with too little money for a downpayment.
So ACORN’s Democratic friends in Congress moved to force Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to dispense with normal credit standards. Throughout the early ’90s, they imposed ever-increasing subprime-lending quotas on Fannie and Freddie.
But then the Republicans won control of Congress - and Rep. Roukema scheduled her hearing. ACORN went into action to protect its golden goose.
IT struck as Roukema aired her concerns at that hearing. Pro testers, led by ACORN President Maud Hurd, stood up and began chanting, “CRA has got to stay!” and “Banks for greed, not for need!” The protesters then demanded the microphone.
With the hearing interrupted and the demonstrators refusing to leave, Roukema called the Capital Police, who arrested Hurd and four others for “disorderly conduct in a Capital building” - a charge carrying a penalty of a $500 fine, six months in prison or both. As the police arrived, two of the protesters menacingly approached Roukema’s desk, still demanding the hearing microphone.
Requests to the Capital Police to release the activists from Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.) and Rep. Joe Kennedy (D-Mass,) failed. Then Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) showed up at the jail and refused to leave until the protesters were released; the Capital Police relented.
Meanwhile, instead of repudiating ACORN’s intimidation tactics, Rep. Kennedy berated Roukema for arresting one of his constituents and accused the Republicans of preparing for “an all-out attack on CRA.” He also promised to introduce legislation to expand the CRA’s coverage to mortgage bankers and large credit unions.
THIS little slice of political life from 1995 had a variety of ripple effects. Above all, ACORN’s intimidation tactics, and its alliance with Democrats in Congress, triumphed. Despite their 1994 takeover of Congress, Republicans’ attempts to pare back the CRA were stymied.
Instead, Democrats like Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) and Reps. Kennedy and Waters allied with the Clinton administration to broaden the acceptability of risky subprime loans throughout the financial system, thus precipitating our current crisis.
ACORN had come to Congress not only to protect the CRA from GOP reforms but also to expand the reach of quota-based lending to Fannie, Freddie and beyond. By steamrolling the GOP that March, it had crushed the last potential barrier to “change.”
Three months later, the Clinton administration announced a comprehensive strategy to push homeownership in America to new heights - regardless of the compromise in credit standards that the task would require. Fannie and Freddie were assigned massive subprime lending quotas, which would rise to about half of their total business by the end of the decade.
And where is Obama in all this?
As Kurtz states in his article, Obama
Was an ally of ACORN during his community organizing days
As a young lawyer, he offered leadership training to the activists who were forcing Chicago banks into high-risk subprime loans
Channelled money from the Woods Fund (over $200,000) and the Chicago Annenberg Challenge
Additionally, the Obama campaign has paid $832,000 to an Acorn affiliate, while
Obama was perfectly aware of ACORN’s intimidation tactics - indeed, he oversaw a Woods Fund report that boasted of managing to fund the radical group despite its shocking behavior.
And as a lawmaker, in Illinois and in Washington, he has continued to back ACORN’s leglislative agenda.
As readers of this blog are well aware, ACORN is deeply involved in voter registration fraud. Just yesterday Rick Moran noted yet one more instance of ACORN’s criminality: Shelby Holliday, doing the investigative work that the lamestream media has forsaken, shows ACORN vans driving newly-registered people to polls in Ohio where they aren’t required to show ID or proof of residency in order to cast their ballot, in the absence of Republican election observers who were not allowed to be there. One Christopher Barkley of Cleveland estimates that he registered to vote “10 to 15″ times after ACORN relentlessly pursued him; another man, Freddie Johnson, filled out voter registration cards a total of 72 times over the course of 18 months.
This is what Obama stands for. This is who Obama allies himself with. This is why Obama is not suited for any position of leadership, least of which the Presidency.
Regarding those denials from the Obama campaign, read this: Obamacorn
Obama’s Web site proclaims, “Barack was never an ACORN trainer and never worked for ACORN in any other capacity.” Then how is it that Chicago ACORN leader Toni Foulkes sang Obama’s praises for his work for ACORN in his article, “Case Study: Chicago — The Barack Obama Campaign,” which appeared in Social Policy magazine in 2004?
Foulkes said ACORN first recognized Obama’s talents as a community organizer when he was organizing on Chicago’s far south side with the Developing Communities Project.
Foulkes wrote: “When he returned from law school, we asked him to help us with a lawsuit to challenge the state of Illinois’ refusal to abide by the National Voting Rights Act . . . . Obama took the case, known as ACORN vs. Edgar . . . and we won.”
Then Illinois Gov. Jim Edgar balked at implementing the new federal “Motor Voter” law out of concern that allowing people to register via postcard and blocking the state from pruning voter rolls might invite vote fraud. We wonder where he got that idea.
Foulkes says that “Obama then went on to run a voter registration project with Project VOTE in 1992 that made it possible for Carol Mosely Braun to win the Senate that year. Project Vote delivered 50,000 newly registered voters in that campaign (ACORN delivered about 5,000 of them).”
Because Mr. Obama’s tax credits are phased out as incomes rise, they impose a huge “marginal” tax rate increase on low-income workers. The marginal tax rate refers to the rate on the next dollar of income earned. As the nearby chart illustrates, the marginal rate for millions of low- and middle-income workers would spike as they earn more income.
Some families with an income of $40,000 could lose up to 40 cents in vanishing credits for every additional dollar earned from working overtime or taking a new job. As public policy, this is contradictory. The tax credits are sold in the name of “making work pay,” but in practice they can be a disincentive to working harder, especially if you’re a lower-income couple getting raises of $1,000 or $2,000 a year. One mystery — among many — of the McCain campaign is why it has allowed Mr. Obama’s 95% illusion to go unanswered.
On that last point, because of the McCain campaign’s incompetence.
A few minutes later,
I found the right picture for this post,
Princeton economist and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman won the Nobel economics prize on Monday for his analysis of how economies of scale can affect trade patterns and the location of economic activity.
The Nobel Prize is never posthumous — it is only awarded to living persons. So some great minds such as John Maynard Keynes and Fischer Black never received the prize in Economics. All that has changed. With today’s award to Paul Krugman, the Nobel as gone to an economist who died a decade ago. The person alive to receive the award is merely a public intellectual, a person operating in the same domain as Oprah Winfrey. And even as a public intellectual, the prize is inappropriate, because never before has a scientist operating in the capacity of a public intellectual so abused and debased the science he purports to represent. Krugman’s New York Times column drawing on economics is the equivalent of 2006’s Nobelists in Physics, astromers Mather and Smoot, doing a column on astrology — and then, in that column, telling lies about astronomy.
But what’s done is done. The only question now is whether Krugman will pay taxes on the prize at the low rates enabled by the Bush tax cuts he has done so much to discredit, or if he will volunteer to pay taxes at higher rates he considers more fair.
The Mideast 
