Category: 2008 election

Catherine Crabill (Republican candidate in the 99th): Bush lied, Iraqis died; McCain a “smirking, angry, bully”; Ron Paul “a seriously credentialed constitutional scholar”.

From a letter to the editor that appeared in the Rappahannock Record in their April 3, 2008 edition:

These last five years the American public and the poor Iraqis have anguished over this horrific war made worse by the fact that the decision to engage this battle was based on lies by the Bush administration.

[…]

Then there’s John McCain, the smirking, angry, bully that has ridden his P.O.W. fame all the way to this year’s Republican Party nomination.

[…]

Meanwhile, the likes of Ron Paul, a seriously credentialed constitutional scholar with the track record, intellect, and character to match, is minimized and ignored to the dust bin of history.

H/t: James Cupp in the comments section of a previous post.

Let’s review Rob Wittman’s previous comments and actions regarding earmarks.

On February 7, 2008, Rob Wittman voted for a moratorium on the submission of earmark requests in the House of Representatives; the moratorium, however, failed to pass. The same day, he issued a press release condemning Speaker Nancy Pelosi for opposing the moratorium.

By the end of April 2008, Wittman had submitted $132,500,000 in earmark requests. Included in that amount were three earmark requests totaling $3,125,000 designated to the organization of a major campaign contributor.

By February 2009, several of those earmarks had survived the committee process and had become part of H.R. 1105 (the Omnibus Spending Bill). By the time it came up for an up-or-down vote on H.R. 1105, there were 15 earmarks with Wittman’s name on them totaling $37,661,500, including one for $95,000 for the organization of that campaign contributor. In the end, Wittman voted against the appropriates bill. Here’s a press release that Wittman posted on his website regarding H.R. 1105:

Today, Congressman Rob Wittman voted against H.R. 1105: the Consolidated Appropriations Act of Fiscal Year 2009 or “omnibus” spending bill. To date, only three of the twelve bills funding the government have been approved. Consequently, all domestic functions of the government are being funded through a continuing resolution that expires on March 6, 2009. Wittman has advocated maintaining vital programs included in the bill by freezing current spending rates at Fiscal Year 2008 levels. The spending increases in the bill would grow the budget deficit by $1.4 trillion in Fiscal Year 2009, and the bill is project to result in a deficit of $8.7 trillion in ten years.

“At a time when American families are tightening their belts, the government should be doing the same. We shouldn’t be irresponsibly placing more debt on the backs of our children and grandchildren,” said Wittman.

[…]

“There has been no oversight of the over 8,000 earmarks the bill funds and no opportunity to offer amendments to cut spending. The committee process has been circumvented allowing no review by elected Members of Congress and certainly no transparency for American citizens who want to know where their hard earned dollars are going to,” added Wittman.

[…]

The Consolidated Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 2009 ultimately passed the House by a vote of 245-178.

He even posted a video on his YouTube channel complaining about the earmarks:

And now he’s requested another $94,676,000 in earmarks.

Can someone explain to me if Wittman thinks the system for earmarks is so broken, why is he so willing to submit and have his name on earmarks that will be approved through that process? Is it because his earmarks are so great and everyone else’s are so bad?

Isn’t that the definition of hypocrisy?

Is anyone else sick of this “tea party” junk?

Seriously guys, get a life. You’re not Samuel Adams or the Sons of Liberty.

As Shaun Kenney pointed out, when you have a “tea party” organizer apologizing to the EPA after the EPA told them not to dump tea into a river because it would affect the river water’s color, you’re a joke. If someone had told Samuel Adams that, he — after someone explained to him who and what the EPA is — would have tarred and feathered the EPA bureaucrat.

You people are not living under a constant threat of a dictatorial government’s control. You don’t have soldiers boarded in your house, you don’t have soldiers shooting people in the street for throwing snowballs (the Boston “Massacre”), and you’re not freezing to death at Valley Forge in the winter. And by acting like you do, you’re mocking and trivializing everything that the founding fathers suffered, fought, and died for.

And the same goes to the folks on the other side of aisle with their antiwar protests. You’re not getting shot at and killed by National Guardsmen at a college campus like happened in the ’70s (Kent State shootings), so stop acting like you are. And the same can be said about certain civil rights protests nowadays. This isn’t the ’60s and the country isn’t Selma, Alabama anymore.

And for those attending these “tea party” protests claiming that they’re fighting against government expansion and the national debt…where have you guys been for the past 10 years? Not to bring up Bush, but where the hell were you guys when that first economic stimulus bill in 2008 that cost $158,000,000,000, and was not a tax cut, but government handouts to everyone? And where were you guys when Republicans supported a $290,000,000,000 “farm bill”, which was nothing more than a corporate welfare bill?

And where were you guys last year in recruiting candidates that would oppose increases in government spending and actually try to cut spending? Where were you guys before the November election helping to get someone besides Barack Obama elected? And better yet, where the hell were you guys when John McCain was in process of being nominated as the Republican candidate for President? A bunch of the people going to and promoting these tea parties are the same people that supported John McCain last year. You know, John McCain, that same guy that voted for that first economic stimulus bill and the first bailout bill.

So, maybe instead of you guys sitting in a park for a couple hours on the 15th, you should go find a political candidate that you like somewhere (I suggest Bill Bolling or Ken Cuccinelli), and go door-to-door trying to get people to support the candidate.

Obama Derangement Syndrome (ODS) suffers a setback.

AP (via Drudge):

The Supreme Court has turned down an emergency appeal from a New Jersey man who says President-elect Barack Obama is ineligible to be president because he was a British subject at birth.

The court did not comment on its order Monday rejecting the call by Leo Donofrio of East Brunswick, N.J., to intervene in the presidential election.

[…]

At least one other appeal over Obama’s citizenship remains at the court. Philip J. Berg of Lafayette Hill, Pa., argues that Obama was born in Kenya, not Hawaii as Obama says and the Hawaii secretary of state has confirmed.

Of course, the new icon of the right, Philip J. Berg, is a 9/11 conspiracy theorist that believes the United States government (AND BUSH!!11!) was responsible for the September 11th attacks (from Michelle Malkin):

Here’s an excerpt of Philip Berg’s 9/11 Truther manifesto for all of you who have made him your new hero:

“It is time for the nations of the world to come forth and take the leadership because of the failure of the United States Government and the States where crimes were committed on 09/11/01, where no thorough investigation and indictments occurred, to investigate, arrest and prosecute the people responsible for the murders on 9/11/01, specifically including George W. Bush and Richard Cheney. ”

“Bush and his cronies made 9/11 happen or let it happen. And, if they let it happen, then they made it happen. Either way, they are responsible; and more important, they have completely and unequivocally covered-it-up!”

…That an event such as 9/11 was desired by powerful Administration figures, including Cheney and Jeb Bush, the President’s brother, is a matter of record, as the Project for the New American Century’s [PNAC] blueprint for worldwide U.S. dominance entitled “Rebuilding America’s Defenses,” stated that the program they advocated could win popular support only with the help of a “catastrophic and catalyzing event, like a new Pearl Harbor” which (we are supposed to believe to be coincidence) came to pass just 8 months after many of the co-signers of the PNAC document assumed high positions in the new Bush Administration in January 2001.

As President John F. Kennedy stated, “Things do not just happen; they are made to happen.” There has never been an investigation of 9/11 that had not concluded, before it even began, that the Official Story convicting Osama bin Laden and absolving the Administration and the military of complicity of anything worse than “intelligence failures,” which thereby made the outcome a foregone conclusion.

It is time that the men who had the motive, means and the opportunity to commit the terrible crimes of 9/11, and who have profited by it politically as well as financially, be exposed for their role and held to account.

The world has suffered since the horrific acts of Bush and his cronies on 9/11, that being the events of 9/11 and the aftermath, the illegal act of war against Afghanistan and Iraq that has caused the death and injury of hundreds of thousands, including thousands of U.S. troops; the destruction of property and the enormous costs involved.

Saddam was tried, found guilty and sentenced to death after being convicted of murder in the killings of 148 Shiite Muslims from an Iraqi town where assassins tried to kill him in 1982. This number of killings that Saddam Hussein was found guilty of is far less than Bush and his cronies caused to die on 9/11.

The 148 Iraqi deaths for which Saddam was tried pales in number to the 750,000 dead at the hands of George W. Bush as a result of this illegal invasion of that country which includes babies, sons, daughters, mothers, fathers, elderly grandmothers and grandfathers, killed without remorse by George W. Bush and his war profiteering supporters.

Bush continues the war in Iraq to keep the world’s attention there and not on the atrocities caused by him on 9/11, including the possibility of Bush sending up to 40,000 more troops to Iraq, even though a majority of the American people are against this increase.

The world must act now because our own government has failed us. We cannot relent until real justice is reached. Only by exposing the truth of 9/11 and revealing how it was used as the “trigger event” to justify the neocon’s imperial policy can we put these events in proper prospective.”

I think some conservatives need to realize that when you lay down with dogs, you’re going to wake up with fleas…

What a miserable failure: Jim Gilmore wants you to pay off a loan from himself!

Seriously [emphasis in original]:

While I wish the election results in Virginia had been better, I am not discouraged and remain resolute to the mission of doing my part to rebuilding our party. The people of Virginia clearly are seeking a new direction, but I believe this election will not deliver to them the change that they are seeking. We must renew our party and use our principles to solve the problems that our state and nation face. We must be the party and the leaders who take the state and the nation into the future.

As I close the campaign, there is an outstanding debt of $50,000 from the final campaign activities. I want to continue to play a role in restoring our party and adding to the public debate of the future. It will be difficult to play this role with this unresolved debt. If you can help me one last time with a contribution of $100, $75, or even $35, I would be most grateful.

The easiest way to do this is click on the box below to make a credit card contribution. If you want to send a check, you may make it payable to: Gilmore for Senate and mail it to 25 East Main Street, Richmond, Virginia 23219.

The $50,000 debt is from a loan from the candidate himself (FEC).

Since the idiot [Gilmore] decided to put his money into his failed campaign, now he wants you folks to pay it off!

Out of curiosity, if we agree to pay this debt off, can we make it conditional? Maybe require that Gilmore never run for another elected position again?

Caroline County gets a mention on The WaPo‘s Virginia Politics blog.

From Tim Craig:

In July, Virginia Notebook published a list of 10 Virginia locations that were likely to be up for grabs in the presidential race between Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) and Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.).

At the time, many pundits thought it would be an uphill climb for Obama to become the first Democratic nominee in 44 years to carry Virginia. For Obama to win, he needed to carry many of the 10 locations that we wrote about in the summer.

Now that the election is over, it’s time to review the results in those counties and cities. Obama carried seven of them, helping him rack up a statewide lead of nearly seven percentage points.

Below are the earlier explanations of the 10 swing locations as well as the results, based on unofficial returns as of Tuesday.

[…]

CAROLINE COUNTY: Caroline, with about 27,000 people, is just south of Fredericksburg. It often sways between the two parties. Former vice president Al Gore (D) carried it by 441 votes during his presidential bid in 2000, but Bush won it by 121 votes in 2004. A year later, Kaine carried it with 54.percent of the vote; in 2006, Webb won it by 191 votes. Turnout among African Americans, who make up 29.percent of the county’s population, is key to Democratic prospects.

Result: Obama won Caroline County by 1,546 votes. Obama received 55.percent vs. McCain’s 43.percent.

Thoughts on the 2008 election: Can we have a do over?

Maybe, this time around we will have a primary instead of a convention to select the Republican Senate candidate, so that idiot Jim Gilmore doesn’t get nominated.

The Republican Party of Virginia (RPV) went out of their way to piss off Tom Davis by doing a convention — which would mean his NOVA Congressional district would have less representation in a convention compared to a primary — and it helped to cost them a Senate seat.

While Tom Davis might not have won, it wouldn’t have been a crushing 30% defeat. It would also have helped whoever the Republican Presidential candidate would have been (more on that later). The Republicans would have probably have held on to the 11th Congressional District too. Instead, now, we have that complete idiot Gerry Connolly (D) in Congress now. Bravo.

Now, that the certified loser Jim Gilmore has lost yet again, does that mean he will finally retire from politics? Or will he do the Alan Keyes thing and pop up anytime he has a chance to screw something up?

As for the Presidential nominee: Of all the bloody people that could have been picked during the early primaries, conventions, and caucuses; those people chose John Freakin’ McCain.

The guy is hated by many so conservatives and the party identification of the exit polls showed that. The only reasons that some conservatives showed up at all was due to Sarah Palin. But like most Vice Presidential nominees, it usually isn’t enough for them to accomplish whatever his/her reason for being picked was (making the base happy, trying to pick-up his/her home state, etc.)

Those early conventioneers and primary voters could have chosen Fred Thompson, Mitt Romney, or Rudy Giuliani. Sure, those candidates had their weakness — Thompson’s age, Romney’s Mormonism, or Giuliani’s less than stellar reputation with the social cons — but they would have done a hell of a lot better than McCain.

Those early voters chose McCain because he was “the most electable candidate”.

Good to see that worked out well.

And Ace of Spades HQ has a great post about McCain’s problems:

There is no “McCainism” as there was a “Bushism” or “Reaganism.” Those men offered fairly clear visions (well, Reagan particularly so). Not McCain. Everything with him is just his personal gut, principle-free, just an instinct, an impulse, which often takes him in wildly contradictory places (but he’s always haughty about the moral superiority of his decisions).

For example, he’s pro-drilling… but not in ANWR. Um, why? He’s forever undercutting himself with unexplained hedges and caveats.

He’s pro-business… Kinda. Except when he’s making his distaste for anyone working in the private sector “for profit not patriotism” so glaringly evident.

He wants to lower taxes. Sorta. Sometimes. Maybe. In election years.

We must regard Obama as suspect because of his association with the terrorist Bill Ayers… but it’s racist to mention his membership in Jeremiah Wright’s Church of Hate.

This leads to a paralysis among his campaign staff. Everyone knew, pretty much, the Idea of Reagan. They could act independently with confidence that they were advancing Reagan’s goals.

No one could do that with McCain.

Read the whole thing, as they say.

Well Mr. Clinton, you obviously didn’t learn enough in that first year.

Former President Bill Clinton won’t go on the record saying Barack Obama is ready to be President, as Ace of Spades points out. But here’s an even more important thing (quote from the Daily News [New York]):

“I certainly learned a lot about the job in the first year,” Clinton said from Rwanda. “You can argue that even if you’ve been vice president for eight years, that no one can be fully ready for the pressures of the office.”

Bill Clinton was inaugurated on January 20, 1993 after winning the 1992 election.

On April 6th, 1994, the president of Rwanda, Juvénal Habyarimana, was assassinated, sparking the Rwandan genocide. Bill Clinton had been President for over a year (441 days) by that point.

While Bill Clinton sat on his ass for a hundred days, between 500,000 and 1,000,000 Tutsis were killed by the Hutu militia.

It was only after the genocide ended that Bill Clinton bothered to lift a finger. And all he did then was have humanitarian supplies flown in.

If that’s the caliber of work we can expect from Barack Obama after some on-the-job training, we’re really screwed.

What a bunch of classy people: Liberal Virginia bloggers attempt a denial of service (DOS) attack against a [supposed] McCain push polling phone number.

Raising Kaine has officially jumped the shark.

I wonder what their response would be if I launched a DOS on their web server.

Will the other libs/progressives repudiate this illegal act by the supposed champions of freedom of speech?

One or two might (say someone like Vivian Paige). But the majority will ignore them, defend them, or will join in and help their fellow fascists liberals.

See, this is what happens when the pro-choice, freedom loving liberals encounter someone they disagree with. They do whatever they can to shut the person up.