Saturday, April 14, 2007

Milwaukee US Attorney On Firings

U.S. Attorney Steven Biskupic, U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Wisconsin and once targeted for firing by the U.S. Justice Department, released a statement this morning in response to a McClatchy New Service story, carried in today's Journal Sentinel, that quoted a source saying Biskupic was once on a Bush administration firing list.

Here is the statement:

  • Until the recent controversy surrounding the firings of eight United State Attorneys around the country, it was never communicated to me that my job could be in jeopardy or that I was considered to be disloyal to President Bush's agenda.
  • It is my understanding that my name appears on a list, which was a ranking of United States Attorneys. My name appeared in a category questioning my performance and loyalty to the President. That same list characterized esteemed Chicago United States Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald as "mediocre." I believe the list has no credibility.
  • The charging decision in the Georgia Thompson case was made in consultation with the then-Democratic State Attorney General, and the Democratic District Attorney for Dane County. The decision to charge Thompson was based solely on the facts, and was not made with consideration of my job status. To my knowledge at the time, my job status was entirely secure.
  • I am a career prosecutor, selected as United States Attorney through a bipartisan commission. My numerous public corruption cases include prosecutions of Democrats and Republicans. Our records show that since 2002 when I became United States Attorney, I have brought at least 12 cases against individuals who donated money to Republican candidates or who were aligned with the Republican Party.

Friday, April 13, 2007

The Big Lie gets sandbagged

from crooks and liars
During his speech to the American Legion on Tuesday, President Bush said this:

  • The bottom line is this: Congress's failure to fund our troops will mean that some of our military families could wait longer for their loved ones to return from the front lines. Others could see their loved ones headed back to war sooner than anticipated.

On Wednesday Secretay Gates announced the Army would be doing this:
  • The Pentagon has announced that all active-duty Army soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan will serve three months longer than expected.
But on March 23 the House passed an Iraq spending bill that includes this:
  • The $124 billion legislation includes more than $100 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, plus billions more than Bush requested for combat equipment and training, for military housing and health care, to address the flaws in mental health care, brain trauma treatment and other issues that surfaced in the Walter Reed Army Medical Center scandal.
  • The bill would establish strict standards for resting, training and equipping combat troops before their deployment and lay down binding benchmarks for the Iraqi government, such as assuming control of security operations, quelling sectarian violence and more equitably distributing oil revenue. If progress is not made toward those benchmarks, some troops would be required to come home as early as July.
Apparently in Bush World passing a spending bill that fully funds the troops, expands funding for veterans care, demands a one year rest period and seeks to extract the troops from a civil war if the Iraqis don't meet certain benchmarks — all in record time — constitutes "failing to fund our troops" and making "military families wait longer for their loved ones to return," despite Bush's escalation strategy that sends more troops to Iraq and Secretary Gates' decision to extend their tours by three months. Paging Mr. Orwell. Mr. Orwell…

UPDATE: Did the administration plan to announce the tour extension after the veto so as to lay blame on the Democrats? Only to have that plan scrapped because of a leak? Duncan notes the strange timing and ThinkProgress highlights Dana Perino's odd quasi-admission that President Bush didn't know about his own policy. This would all seem to suggest that the plan to blame the tour extension on the Democrats was short-circuited by a DoD leak. And who's politicizing the war and the troops?

Wednesday, April 11, 2007

Chomsky - What If Iran Had Invaded Mexico?

Please check out the new link, tomdispatch.com, which has just been added to the growing list. From that site is this recent article from Noam Chomsky. While I don't agree with all the geopolitical and historical comparisons he posits, still, this piece provides a foundation to begin questioning the basis for middle eastern policy wonk-talk pushed through the media.

Putting the Iran Crisis in Context

By Noam Chomsky

--- Unsurprisingly, George W. Bush's announcement of a "surge" in Iraq came despite the firm opposition to any such move of Americans and the even stronger opposition of the (thoroughly irrelevant) Iraqis. It was accompanied by ominous official leaks and statements -- from Washington and Baghdad -- about how Iranian intervention in Iraq was aimed at disrupting our mission to gain victory, an aim which is (by definition) noble. What then followed was a solemn debate about whether serial numbers on advanced roadside bombs (IEDs) were really traceable to Iran; and, if so, to that country's Revolutionary Guards or to some even higher authority.

This "debate" is a typical illustration of a primary principle of sophisticated propaganda. In crude and brutal societies, the Party Line is publicly proclaimed and must be obeyed -- or else. What you actually believe is your own business and of far less concern. In societies where the state has lost the capacity to control by force, the Party Line is simply presupposed; then, vigorous debate is encouraged within the limits imposed by unstated doctrinal orthodoxy. The cruder of the two systems leads, naturally enough, to disbelief; the sophisticated variant gives an impression of openness and freedom, and so far more effectively serves to instill the Party Line. It becomes beyond question, beyond thought itself, like the air we breathe.

The debate over Iranian interference in Iraq proceeds without ridicule on the assumption that the United States owns the world. We did not, for example, engage in a similar debate in the 1980s about whether the U.S. was interfering in Soviet-occupied Afghanistan, and I doubt that Pravda, probably recognizing the absurdity of the situation, sank to outrage about that fact (which American officials and our media, in any case, made no effort to conceal). Perhaps the official Nazi press also featured solemn debates about whether the Allies were interfering in sovereign Vichy France, though if so, sane people would then have collapsed in ridicule.

In this case, however, even ridicule -- notably absent -- would not suffice, because the charges against Iran are part of a drumbeat of pronouncements meant to mobilize support for escalation in Iraq and for an attack on Iran, the "source of the problem." The world is aghast at the possibility. Even in neighboring Sunni states, no friends of Iran, majorities, when asked, favor a nuclear-armed Iran over any military action against that country. From what limited information we have, it appears that significant parts of the U.S. military and intelligence communities are opposed to such an attack, along with almost the entire world, even more so than when the Bush administration and Tony Blair's Britain invaded Iraq, defying enormous popular opposition worldwide.

"The Iran Effect"

The results of an attack on Iran could be horrendous. After all, according to a recent study of "the Iraq effect" by terrorism specialists Peter Bergen and Paul Cruickshank, usinggovernment and Rand Corporation data, the Iraq invasion has already led to a seven-fold increase in terror. The "Iran effect" would probably be far more severe and long-lasting. British military historian Corelli Barnett speaks for many when he warns that "an attack on Iran would effectively launch World War III."

What are the plans of the increasingly desperate clique that narrowly holds political power in the U.S.? We cannot know. Such state planning is, of course, kept secret in the interests of "security." Review of the declassified record reveals that there is considerable merit in that claim -- though only if we understand "security" to mean the security of the Bush administration against their domestic enemy, the population in whose name they act.

Even if the White House clique is not planning war, naval deployments, support for secessionist movements and acts of terror within Iran, and other provocations could easily lead to an accidental war. Congressional resolutions would not provide much of a barrier. They invariably permit "national security" exemptions, opening holes wide enough for the several aircraft-carrier battle groups soon to be in the Persian Gulf to pass through -- as long as an unscrupulous leadership issues proclamations of doom (as Condoleezza Rice did with those "mushroom clouds" over American cities back in 2002). And the concocting of the sorts of incidents that "justify" such attacks is a familiar practice. Even the worst monsters feel the need for such justification and adopt the device: Hitler's defense of innocent Germany from the "wild terror" of the Poles in 1939, after they had rejected his wise and generous proposals for peace, is but one example.

The most effective barrier to a White House decision to launch a war is the kind of organized popular opposition that frightened the political-military leadership enough in 1968 that they were reluctant to send more troops to Vietnam -- fearing, we learned from the Pentagon Papers, that they might need them for civil-disorder control.

Doubtless Iran's government merits harsh condemnation, including for its recent actions that have inflamed the crisis. It is, however, useful to ask how we would act if Iran had invaded and occupied Canada and Mexico and was arresting U.S. government representatives there on the grounds that they were resisting the Iranian occupation (called "liberation," of course). Imagine as well that Iran was deploying massive naval forces in the Caribbean and issuing credible threats to launch a wave of attacks against a vast range of sites -- nuclear and otherwise -- in the United States, if the U.S. government did not immediately terminate all its nuclear energy programs (and, naturally, dismantle all its nuclear weapons). Suppose that all of this happened after Iran had overthrown the government of the U.S. and installed a vicious tyrant (as the US did to Iran in 1953), then later supported a Russian invasion of the U.S. that killed millions of people (just as the U.S. supported Saddam Hussein's invasion of Iran in 1980, killing hundreds of thousands of Iranians, a figure comparable to millions of Americans). Would we watch quietly?

It is easy to understand an observation by one of Israel's leading military historians, Martin van Creveld. After the U.S. invaded Iraq, knowing it to be defenseless, he noted, "Had the Iranians not tried to build nuclear weapons, they would be crazy."

Surely no sane person wants Iran (or any nation) to develop nuclear weapons. A reasonable resolution of the present crisis would permit Iran to develop nuclear energy, in accord with its rights under the Non-Proliferation Treaty, but not nuclear weapons. Is that outcome feasible? It would be, given one condition: that the U.S. and Iran were functioning democratic societies in which public opinion had a significant impact on public policy.

As it happens, this solution has overwhelming support among Iranians and Americans, who generally are in agreement on nuclear issues. The Iranian-American consensus includes the complete elimination of nuclear weapons everywhere (82% of Americans); if that cannot yet be achieved because of elite opposition, then at least a "nuclear-weapons-free zone in the Middle East that would include both Islamic countries and Israel" (71% of Americans). Seventy-five percent of Americans prefer building better relations with Iran to threats of force. In brief, if public opinion were to have a significant influence on state policy in the U.S. and Iran, resolution of the crisis might be at hand, along with much more far-reaching solutions to the global nuclear conundrum.

Promoting Democracy -- at Home

These facts suggest a possible way to prevent the current crisis from exploding, perhaps even into some version of World War III. That awesome threat might be averted by pursuing a familiar proposal: democracy promotion -- this time at home, where it is badly needed. Democracy promotion at home is certainly feasible and, although we cannot carry out such a project directly in Iran, we could act to improve the prospects of the courageous reformers and oppositionists who are seeking to achieve just that. Among such figures who are, or should be, well-known, would be Saeed Hajjarian, Nobel laureate Shirin Ebadi, and Akbar Ganji, as well as those who, as usual, remain nameless, among them labor activists about whom we hear very little; those who publish the Iranian Workers Bulletin may be a case in point.

We can best improve the prospects for democracy promotion in Iran by sharply reversing state policy here so that it reflects popular opinion. That would entail ceasing to make the regular threats that are a gift to Iranian hardliners. These are bitterly condemned by Iranians truly concerned with democracy promotion (unlike those "supporters" who flaunt democracy slogans in the West and are lauded as grand "idealists" despite their clear record of visceral hatred for democracy).

Democracy promotion in the United States could have far broader consequences. In Iraq, for instance, a firm timetable for withdrawal would be initiated at once, or very soon, in accord with the will of the overwhelming majority of Iraqis and a significant majority of Americans. Federal budget priorities would be virtually reversed. Where spending is rising, as in military supplemental bills to conduct the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, it would sharply decline. Where spending is steady or declining (health, education, job training, the promotion of energy conservation and renewable energy sources, veterans benefits, funding for the UN and UN peacekeeping operations, and so on), it would sharply increase. Bush's tax cuts for people with incomes over $200,000 a year would be immediately rescinded.

The U.S. would have adopted a national health-care system long ago, rejecting the privatized system that sports twice the per-capita costs found in similar societies and some of the worst outcomes in the industrial world. It would have rejected what is widely regarded by those who pay attention as a "fiscal train wreck" in-the-making. The U.S. would have ratified the Kyoto Protocol to reduce carbon-dioxide emissions and undertaken still stronger measures to protect the environment. It would allow the UN to take the lead in international crises, including in Iraq. After all, according to opinion polls, since shortly after the 2003 invasion, a large majority of Americans have wanted the UN to take charge of political transformation, economic reconstruction, and civil order in that land.

If public opinion mattered, the U.S. would accept UN Charter restrictions on the use of force, contrary to a bipartisan consensus that this country, alone, has the right to resort to violence in response to potential threats, real or imagined, including threats to our access to markets and resources. The U.S. (along with others) would abandon the Security Council veto and accept majority opinion even when in opposition to it. The UN would be allowed to regulate arms sales; while the U.S. would cut back on such sales and urge other countries to do so, which would be a major contribution to reducing large-scale violence in the world. Terror would be dealt with through diplomatic and economic measures, not force, in accord with the judgment of most specialists on the topic but again in diametric opposition to present-day policy.

Furthermore, if public opinion influenced policy, the U.S. would have diplomatic relations with Cuba, benefiting the people of both countries (and, incidentally, U.S. agribusiness, energy corporations, and others), instead of standing virtually alone in the world in imposing an embargo (joined only by Israel, the Republic of Palau, and the Marshall Islands). Washington would join the broad international consensus on a two-state settlement of the Israel-Palestine conflict, which (with Israel) it has blocked for 30 years -- with scattered and temporary exceptions -- and which it still blocks in word, and more importantly in deed, despite fraudulent claims of its commitment to diplomacy. The U.S. would also equalize aid to Israel and Palestine, cutting off aid to either party that rejected the international consensus.

Evidence on these matters is reviewed in my book Failed States as well as in The Foreign Policy Disconnect by Benjamin Page (with Marshall Bouton), which also provides extensive evidence that public opinion on foreign (and probably domestic) policy issues tends to be coherent and consistent over long periods. Studies of public opinion have to be regarded with caution, but they are certainly highly suggestive.

Democracy promotion at home, while no panacea, would be a useful step towards helping our own country become a "responsible stakeholder" in the international order (to adopt the term used for adversaries), instead of being an object of fear and dislike throughout much of the world. Apart from being a value in itself, functioning democracy at home holds real promise for dealing constructively with many current problems, international and domestic, including those that literally threaten the survival of our species.


Noam Chomsky is the author of Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy (Metropolitan Books), just published in paperback, among many other works.

Copyright 2007 Noam Chomsky

This article was first published at www.tomdispatch.com

Friday, April 06, 2007

iPod Saves

Just featured as a top person of the day; the story of the US Army Sergent and the iPod that stopped a bullet.

Here is the original flicker pic set and the caption:
Photos sent to me by my friend Danny with this caption:

My wife’s uncle works in a military hospital and told me about this. Its pretty amazing. Kevin Garrad (3rd Infantry Division) was on a street patrol in Iraq (Tikrit I believe) and as he rounded the corner of a building an armed (AK-47) insurgent came from the other side.

The two of them were within just a few feet of each other when they opened fire. The insurgent was killed and Kevin was hit in the left chest where his IPod was in his jacket pocket. It slowed the bullet down enough that it did not completely penetrate his body armor. Fortunately, Kevin suffered no wound.

I thought it was a great story so I posted them here.
Possibly more interesting is the original poster's documentation of the blooming of the Internet growth of the picture and the related story on the blog HavanaLion under the post "The Digg Effect".

That post even warranted an update:

I decided to move the updating on the Soldier and Ipod photos to my blog. It’s just easier to do it here.

First I want to thank everyone who has volunteered to replace the iPod. This includes people from Apple, Circuit City and Wal-Mart. There also numerous individuals who have volunteered to do it themselves or take up a collection. All of this support is real cool.

To make something very clear, DO NOT send me anything. I’m not trying to profit in any way from this story and I don’t want there to be any misunderstandings.

Danny and I are working hard to try and reach Kevin. When we do, we promise to pass the information along (if he wants us to) to those that are interested.

Thanks again everyone.

Thursday, April 05, 2007

Wilde can't raise funds

From the Star Tribune

... Wendy (Wilde) Pareene and other supporters said in a news release Wednesday that a lack of funds forced the center's closure ...
Imagine that, but then looking at the 2006 fundraising numbers and should come as no surprise. Now we don't advocate surrendering in any district, but when the opposition in question (Ramstad) is more "moderate" than some individuals in the DFL, maybe contributions are better suited going toward real candidates in the 1st and 6th district against shaking and truly wingnut neoconservatives (assuming such a person runs against Walz).

Should retirement rumors for Rep. Ramstad prove to be true, members of the 3rd CD DFL should abandon Wilde for the pitch perfect Ford Bell. Wilde tried unsuccessfully to incorporate at least 2 members of Bell's Senate campaign staff, but Wilde was and may never be a candidate rather than a micromanager.

On the flip side, Bell proved he could fundraise, even under the most trying of underdog campaigns. While Wilde only had two personal friends contribute the maximum federal amount for the general campaign, Bell had many donors who double maxed (primary and general) in his contested run against party favorite and current Sen. Amy Klobuchar.

While Bell is more progressive than Ramstad, the two apparently know each well enough not to run in elections against each other. This why Bell won't run mano-e-mano against Ramstad. However, a Ramstad to Bell transfer of power will continue to be a pitch perfect representation of the district. And to put to rest any lingering thoughts, Bell raised money, only contributing $10,050 to his Senate ambitions.

At 1/6 of Wilde total 2006 congressional budget, that probably could have even kept the youth center open.

Wednesday, April 04, 2007

Obama raises $25 million from 100,000 donors

From Associated Press

DAVENPORT, Iowa - Democrat Barack Obama raked in $25 million for his presidential bid in the first three months of 2007, placing him on a par with front-runner Hillary Rodham Clinton and dashing her image as the party’s inevitable nominee.

The donations came from an eye-popping 100,000 donors, the campaign said in a statement.

The figure was the latest evidence that Obama, a political newcomer who has served just two years in the Senate, has emerged as the most powerful new force in presidential politics this year. It also reinforced his status as a significant threat to Clinton, who’d hoped her own $26 million first quarter fundraising total would begin to squeeze her rivals out of contention.

The campaign reported that the figure included at least $23.5 million that he can spend on the highly competitive primary race. The Clinton campaign has yet to disclose how much they can use for the primary verses money that is designated for the general election.

While Clinton has honed a vast national fundraising network through two Senate campaigns and her husband’s eight years as president, Obama launched his bid for the White House with a relatively small donor base concentrated largely in Illinois, his home state.

But his early opposition to the Iraq war and voter excitement over his quest to be the first black president quickly fueled a powerful fundraising machine.

More than half the donors contributed a total of $6.9 million through the Internet, the campaign said.

“This overwhelming response, in only a few short weeks, shows the hunger for a different kind of politics in this country and a belief at the grassroots level that Barack Obama can bring out the best in America to solve our problems,” said Obama finance chairwoman Penny Pritzker.

Iran to release British sailors

From the Guardian Unlimited

Fifteen British marines and sailors held captive in Iran for almost a fortnight are expected to fly home tomorrow morning after the country's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, announced their release as a "gift" to the UK.

In a surprise announcement during a news conference at the presidential palace in Tehran, Mr Ahmadinejad said the 14 men and one woman would be "going back home" in a move marking the birthday of the prophet Muhammad last Saturday and acknowledging Easter.

Iran's IRNA state news agency said later they would leave Tehran tomorrow at 8am (5.30am UK time) on a flight to London.

After the conference finished, Iranian television broadcast footage of the British naval crew, who were detained on March 23, meeting Mr Ahmadinejad on the steps of the palace.

Dressed in grey suits, apart from the sole female captive, Leading Seaman Faye Turney, who was wearing a striped top and a headscarf, they appeared delighted.

"We are very grateful for your forgiveness," said one of the male captives, Lieutenant Felix Carman. "You are welcome," Mr Ahmadinejad responded in Farsi.

"You came here on a compulsory trip," the Iranian leader told another, getting the answer: "I don't know if I'd put it like that but you could call it that."

Downing Street welcomed the news but struck a note of caution, saying it was still establishing what the announcement "means in terms of the method and timing of their release".

However, the news prompted uncontained delight among relatives. Sandra Sperry, the mother of Royal Marine Adam Sperry, told Sky News: "I'm absolutely ecstatic ... I heard in Asda ... I think everyone thought I had gone mad ... we thought it would drag into next week."

Speaking in London, an Iranian diplomat said the next step would be for the detainees to be taken to the British embassy in Tehran before boarding a flight home.

It had been feared that Mr Ahmadinejad - renowned for being a hardliner and a critic of the west - would use his news conference to make more demands relating to the captives.

The initial signs were not positive - the president began with a long complaint about the invasion of Iraq, also criticising Britain for taking the case of the captives to the UN security council.

He also presented medals to three members of the Revolutionary Guard naval patrol that seized the Britons as they searched an Indian-registered merchant ship just outside the mouth of the Shatt al-Arab waterway, which divides Iran and Iraq.

But in a dramatic flourish about an hour into the address, the president suddenly announced: "While insisting on our rights, these 15 sailors have been pardoned and we offer their freedom to the British people."

Iran repeatedly said the patrol had been in Iranian waters, but Britain presented GPS evidence last week that it said proved the UK personnel had been well inside the Iraqi zone.

Later on during his two hour-plus press conference, Mr Ahmadinejad said the British government had sent a letter to Iran's foreign ministry pledging that incursions "will not happen again".

A foreign office spokesman refused to comment on the specifics of any communication with Tehran, but said it had "made our position clear" about where Britain believed the UK crew was when they were captured.

There has also been speculation that the release was prompted in part by an agreement to let an Iranian representative meet five Iranians detained by US forces in Irbil, northern Iraq, in January.

Tehran says the men are diplomats; the US says they are Revolutionary Guards linked to insurgents in Iraq. There have been claims that Tehran orchestrated the seizure of the British crew with a view to an exchange.

The US insisted today that there was no connection between the cases. "Not that I am aware of," said a State Department spokesman, Tom Casey, when asked if there was a link.

Feingold Ready to Up Ante

Mr. President, if you really want Congress to come back and give you a different bill to sign ... let's just say you're not going to be happy. Preach on brother Feingold!

Monday, April 02, 2007

Wisconsin Governor Tommy Tompson Is In

Democratic Fundraising Numbers Roll In

He thought about it in 2000, and it leaked out last week, but the main stream media found and reported it; the "boy from Elroy", former Wisconsin Governor Tommy Thompson, is in the hunt for the Republican Presidential nomination.

His announcement came with what might be one of the best Iraq solutions offered from the 2008 Presidential field.

Thompson will be holding events this Wednesday, April 4 in Wisconsin and Iowa:


Milwaukee Event
Time: 9 a.m. CDT
Location: Messmer High School - Tommy G. Thompson Athletic Center
742 W. Capitol Drive, Milwaukee, WI


Iowa Event
Time: 12 p.m. CDT
Location: 7 Flags Event Center
2100 NW 100th Street, Clive, Iowa

Could he pull it off? Consider these points:
  • His announcement on yesterday's "This Week" on ABC trumped any story regarding fund-raising totals by other Republican nominees.
  • Thompson is incredibly strong at retail politics and Wisconsin borders Iowa (Thompson grew up less than 100 miles away) which will provide an influx of volunteers and play to mid-west allegiances - two huge advantages in the first caucus of the 2008 election.
  • The endless accounts of how dissatisfied conservatives are with their field of Republican candidates. Playing to this is Thompson's talking point that he is "the only reliable conservative." The Des Moines Register quoted it back here and two weeks later here.
  • As a White House cabinet member from 2001-2005, he was secretary of Health and Human Services back when Bush was still popular enough to barely get reelected.
  • Before joining the Bush administration, he was the nation's longest-serving governor and will hand the perennial battle-ground state of Wisconsin's electoral votes to the Republican for the first time since Reagan
  • He has a proven track record of new ideas and change including the overhaul of Wisconsin's welfare system, some of which filtered up into the Clinton welfare redo (both with their detractors). Its what David Broder called Thompson's need to "fight the status quo" at the end of Broder's column regarding Thompson's departure from HHS.
  • He heads a health-care think tank, a major issue that the Democrats own on the national stage.
With the best idea about Iraq to date, Thompson said he would demand that the Iraqi government vote as to whether it wanted the U.S. to remain in the country. If the answer were yes, "it immediately gives a degree of legitimacy." If the answer were no, "we would get out, absolutely. It's a duly elected government." Quells the idea of cutting and running when the "sovereign" nation asks you to leave. This would also endure the Iraqi government to its people, being able to do something, especially as insurgents seem to make things worse. The blog Average Joe has more quotes from Thompson.

Democrats should unilaterally take up this stratagem. It'll kill Thompson's primary dreams, but as a way to honorably (not cut-and-run) get the troops out of Iraq and end the occupation, it's an idea that is win-win.

Thompson's biggest drawbacks are the limited pool of financial and political power from his home state of Wisconsin, and at HHS the flu vaccine shortage in the fall of 2004 and the anthrax scare which has yet to be solved.

Today of course the Democratic numbers trumped all things political with Barack Obama continuing to shine. USA Today placed Hilary Clinton's faux $36 million raised in its front page side bar (above the fold). The real number was $25 million from 50,000 contributors. Obama '08 pulled in $22 million from over 83,000 people.

That is impressive for two intertwining reasons. First is the weight of Rodham Clinton's insider contacts. Former DNC Chair and major fundraiser Terry McCauligh is her campaign chair, President Bill Clinton is an obvious asset and her cash crazy US Senate races have all combined to produce what should be the most productive fundraising call list ever. Ever.

Add to that the idea that Rodham Clinton has been running for years, and odds are that she had numerous verbal commitments that only required to be contacted. A cornucopia of low hanging fruit, in fundraising vernacular, who were willing to give $2300 for both the primary and general elections. This is the case, considering the estimated $500 per contributor for Clinton versus an estimated $265 per contributor for Obama.

As the less experienced candidate, especially against the insider heavy Clinton campaign, Obama's numbers are simply astounding. A clear advantage in donors puts Obama in drivers seat when you consider that the low-dollar donors will also be volunteers. As for the experience question, see the t-shirt graphic to the right and remember that Pedro won.

In the end, however, both dollars and volunteers have been poorly used (we're looking at you Joe Trippi and Howard Dean). Before now, the highest off-year, first-quarter total was $13.5 million reported in 1995 by Republican Texas Sen. Phil Gramm. That didn't help him secure the Republican nomination which was won by Viagra spokesman Sen. Bob Dole.

Rounding out the Democratic contenders are John Edwards, who raised more than $14 million — twice his first-quarter total in 2003 and also beating Gramm's old record — from more than 37,000 donors. New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson raised more than $6 million.

All first-quarter reports are due April 15 at the Federal Election Commission.

Sunday, April 01, 2007

Snoop says " f— Bill O'Reilly"

From TBOHipHop.net -- "Snoop was on a Dutch talk show ... called "Jensen!" [on March 29]. He couldn’t get into the UK so he decided to stay in Holland for a couple of days. The talk show host talked about how Snoop still isn’t seen as a good American citizen, while he has done a lot of good things for society. That was the moment they began to talk about Bill O’Reilly". [explicit]

Here is the original interview with Snoop's defence attorney [video]