Midday open thread
by kos
Thu May 22, 2008 at 12:45:00 PM PDT
- The Ted Kennedy stuff has been tough. I vividly remember the day in 1992 that doctors told us, after my 50-year-old father suffered a seizure, that he had a brain tumor. A few days later, after the first biopsy, they confirmed it was a glioblastoma multiforme, with a life expectancy of about a year, tops.
I parked myself in a medical library in Houston for a couple of days and read all the literature. I lost hope almost immediately. Not my father. He ended up lasting four months and fought that tumor every second he had left.
I know exactly what the Kennedy family is going through right now, and it makes me sick to my stomach.
- As I've been saying for years, Bush doesn't speak Spanish. His brother Jeb speaks perfect Spanish. George does not. Yet that myth inexplicably persists.
- Speaking of myths, the Jewish vote remains one of the most loyal Democratic constituencies, and that hasn't changed in previous years, no matter how much Republicans and the media claim otherwise.
- Beware smear emails. It's the Swiftboat of 2008.
- Racist opposition to Obama isn't about racism, it's about:
[...] blood equity, heritage and commitment to hard-won American values. And roots.
Yup. Nothing racist about that.
- Rush Limbaugh explains why Obama won.
LIMBAUGH: You know, the feminazis forgot one thing. Well, one of the objectives of the feminazis over the last 20, 25 years has been to dominate the public education system so as to remove the competitive nature of boys. You know, there's a crisis of young man-boy education in the schools. And they did this on purpose, to eliminate male competition in the work force. This is part of feminazi grand plan.
They forgot affirmative action for black guys. And because of that, every bit of their plan has gone up in smoke now, because they -- if -- they had to come out in favor of affirmative action for black guys, and that's -- see, this is one of the things that really irritates the women. And there are women all over this country fit to be tied -- trust me on this. And it's -- one of the things is affirmative action is exactly -- it's, you know, liberals eventually are going to be devoured by their own policies. And it has happened here. Because Barack Obama is an affirmative action candidate [...]
So, it's just -- they just forgot that one thing: affirmative action for black guys. And if they had remembered to oppose that, then they wouldn't face the situation they face today.
- Gallup:
The only major demographic group still supporting Clinton to the tune of 51% or more is women aged 50 and older.
- Why do George Bush, John McCain, and so many other Republicans oppose Webb's GI Bill that offers full tuition scholarships to vets? Because they need warm bodies.
[A]dministration officials fear that simply making the GI Bill more generous for service members could lead to an exodus of troops leaving the military to attend college [...]
"Now, this is not indentured servitude," [Defense Department spokesman Geoff] Morrell added. "We’re not trying to, you know, keep people here forever. But we are trying to ... create a system in which troops see the benefit of making a career out of the military, out of being the beneficiaries of the training and the experience and the education that we provide them."
And the only way for them to see the benefits of making a career out of the military is to deny them the means to attend college? Wow, that's offensive. And from my own personal experience, most soldiers are either the career types, or the non-career types. Illinois paid my college tuition as a vet, but that's not the reason I got out of the Army. In fact, the educational opportunities were a factor in me enlisting in the Army, since I didn't come from a family that could afford to help me with tuition. So you increase educational opportunities, it should help recruitment, which as we all know, hasn't been all that great in recent years.
- URGENT: If you're a citizen of Michigan, call the office of Democratic Speaker of the House Andy Dillon and tell him NOT to bring to a vote a bill outlawing late term abortions. No, you didn't misread that, it's the Democratic Speaker of the House willing to push forward an anti-choice bill. Call Andy Dillon at 517-373-0857 and tell him not to bring SB 776 for a vote. Learn more about SB 776 at ProgressMichigan. --DHinMI
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