musing minds

Hillary Clinton was set to headline at a rally opposite the UN by several Israeli groups to protest Iran’s President Ahmadinejad’s annual visit to the UN.

When she found out that Sarah Palin was also scheduled to speak, she canceled.

Kate brings us the AP story “Clinton blindsided by scheduled event with Palin”:

“Her attendance was news to us, and this was never billed to us as a partisan political event,” said Clinton spokesman Philippe Reines. “Sen. Clinton will therefore not be attending.”

How on earth can an event that features the top Democrat woman and the top Republican woman be remotely considered partisan?

Looking at the headline of the story and the first graf:

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton has canceled an appearance at a New York rally next week after organizers blindsided her by inviting Republican vice presidential candidate and Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, aides to the senator said Tuesday.

you can see what the real story is…
Hillary Clinton wasn’t consulted about inviting Sarah Palin to speak at the event. She’s miffed at that.

Update: See Fausta’s great little piece on Sarah Palin at LadyBlog.

Back when Fannie and Freddie were being taken over by the government, someone on the local CBS radio affiliate said something like:

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac exist so that investors’ risks are mitigated.

Or

Fannie and Freddie are there as insurance for investors.

or maybe it was a little simpler:

Fannie and Freddie are there so investors won’t lose money if loans are defaulted on.

Investment carries risk. The person on the radio seemed to think that Fannie and Freddie were there to guarantee to investors that there would be no risk. Just reward.

In Chicago, an alderman wanted to outlaw walking and texting because people were walking into buildings or other people or out into the street.

That reminded me of the “Blackberry Helmet” video

A little prescient don’t you think?

We all want to be safe. But do we really need to have the government mandate it?

Does that even work?

Look, you can tell someone that the stove is hot until you’re blue in the face, but they won’t hear you until after they’ve burned their hands.

Yesterday, as in the post below, Shep was talking to Mary Ann Marsh and she said (paraphrased because I hadn’t set the TiVo and I was listening to the show on my phone on my walk to pick up the Little Guy at school)

For 20 of the last 26 years Republicans were in charge of the whole thing.

She said this in relation to John McCain having been in the senate and doing nothing to regulate banks, etc, so as to keep them from going belly up…

I made myself a note to check that claim out.

The last 26 years would seem to be starting with the 98th Congress (1983-1985; 1982 elections)

** In the 107th Congress, the Senate majority passed from party to party so that each party held the majority twice during that Congress.

As you can see from the chart above, Mary Ann Marsh’s statement doesn’t work in any way.

The House was held by the Democrats 14 of the last 26 years.

The Senate was held by the Republicans 14 of the last 26 years.

The White House was held by the Republicans 18 of the last 26 years.

Republicans held both the White House and both houses of Congress for two congresses (and part of one), the Democrats for one congress in the past 26 years. But if you go back a little further, Jimmy Carter’s Administration was completely Democrat. Both houses and the White House were in Democrat hands.

And that’s around the time Joe Biden started out in the Senate…

Barack Obama again today talked about John McCain and old boys’ networks and “he’s been in Washington for 26 years”, yada, yada, yada.

Joe Biden’s been in for 36 years.

Isn’t 36 years 10 years more than 26?

On with Shep Smith this afternoon, Mary Ann Marsh said (paraphrased):

Barack Obama is taking private donations from people. John McCain is using taxpayer dollars.

So…

because Obama’s taking “private donations” some as small as $100 from real people

Obama = Good.

and because McCain is taking the public financing that every presidential candidate in the past except for Obama has taken

McCain = Bad

Obama is the first presidential candidate to decline public financing.

His fundraising isn’t working as well as predicted.

I think he’ll be the last presidential candidate to decline public financing.

International Talk Like a Pirate Day!

And since it’s on a Friday this year, make it a Talk Like A Pirate Weekend!

That’s the number bandied about by the Obama camp and surrogates trying to say that McCain’s been in Washington that long so he doesn’t represent a change.

Joe Biden’s been in the senate for 36 years.

Isn’t 36 longer than 30?

Saturday, in a completely separate storm from Ike, we got a record amount of rain. We didn’t sleep well from rain all night (Friday into Saturday), and then in the morning we realized the sump pump wasn’t going on.

Hubby went down into the dungeon (our 4 foot, concrete floored crawlspace) and found 6 inches of water. He got the sump working (the float was caught on something and didn’t trip the switch to start the pump). We’re going to have to start removing everything that was stored down there. Lots of video tapes, but we don’t even have a tape player anymore… Everything else that was down there was also ruined. No Christmas tree – have to get a new one this year…

The front and back yards also were flooded on Saturday.

Sunday, Ike arrived. More rain. Sump running on and off, on and off, on and off…

Birds are sheltering on the front porch.

One is sheltering inside the house. We found her last Monday just before it started raining. She’s a baby Cockatiel.

Sunshine the baby cockatiel

Althouse hates it and so do a lot of people.

and now they’re rolling back to the previous version.

SiteMeter page 9.14.08

As an alternative, one can

This video was made by the son of one of our local County Republican Committee Chairs, returned from Iraq.

Watch as he walks away.

The Red Cross needs money, volunteers, and blood donations…

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