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"We live in the midst of alarms; anxiety beclouds the future; we expect some new disaster with each newspaper we read."

--Abraham Lincoln

My God, is it really October? It's been a whole month since I started this Rant (can you believe it's only been one month? It's like dog-years) and this is the 21st Edition! I just want to take a moment to thank all of you for keeping me well-nourished with juicy tidbits and also for forwarding it on to your friends!

So with the House of Representative in disarray, the Senate has decided to give things a go today. Obama, McCain and Biden will be headed back to DC to vote on their version of the bill I so carefully outlined yesterday. "I'll see your $700 thousand million and raise you an FDIC limit of $250,000."

Media funnies

A few of my favorite items for today-- always knowing there will be more tomorrow!

Jon Stewart on The Daily Show grabs the conch and goes OFF about Congress' inability to get this bill done and that they're out for the Jewish holiday: "Listen up, Congress! Get the F**K back to work! For the 'Jewish holiday' for God's sake? How many Jews are even in Congress? Wall Street is open-- I'll guarantee you they got more Jews on Wall Street than in Congress. I'm here, The Daily Show is on, and I guarantee we have more Jews at The Daily Show than Congress. So, get back to saving the economy and if you have to do it without Feingold and Lieberman so be it. How about this? The Congressional delegations from Florida and New York can sleep in. How about that? I mean seriously--Utah? You're not coming in for Rosh Hashanah? Wyoming? My rabbi doesn't even have the balls to take two days for Rosh Hashanah."

If you're looking for a little "laughing while I'm crying moment, here is McCain, versus McCain. (Thanks for sending that, Randi, now my eyeliner is all smudged...)

And for flat out sputtering outrage, watch Cenk Uygar go off on Palin's answer to Katie Couric regarding Hamas. Cenk--who's admittedly on the biased side, like me--is convinced Palin has NO IDEA who the Hamas is, and dontcha know, I'm inclined to agree. He also suggests that if you put a map in front of her, she couldn't tell you where the Gaza Strip is. Entirely possible. Cenk wishes selecting a VP candidate were more like gymnastics where you get a big ZERO score if you flub your vault. Don't we wish.

Here's a YouTube nugget I missed earlier this year, a consumer calls up customer service to ask about the Iraq War Charge on her bill.

And this morning Paula Poundtone put a homespun touch on the financial crisis: "Gee, this stuff is hard to follow. I don't think I even know how many zeros are in a trillion. But after listening to the candidates, I realized I can't count on the powers that be to explain the nature of the financial crisis, and it will be up to me to inform myself. So I turned to It's A Wonderful Life for background on liquidity and solvency, which would have filled me with hope if I didn't have a bad feeling that we've already spent George and Mary Bailey's honeymoon funds."

Okay, this one's not really funny, per se, but it is very very interesting. Five economists discuss the crisis at Princeton. (Hyun Shin, Markus Brunnermeier, Harrison Hong, Paul Krugman, Alan Blinder) It's an hour long, so don't click on this if you're in a hurry. But it's extremely enlightening and well worth the time...

Hoisted with Her Own Petard

Eric wants to rescue the post turtle. No, no, no, not Sarah Palin, he mean the poor little turtle in the picture. I love the joke. ('You know she didn't get up there by herself, she doesn't belong up there, she doesn't know what to do while she is up there, and you just wonder what kind of dumb ass put her up there to begin with.') But even so, it's becoming clearer and clearer that the problem with comparing the turtle with Palin is that the turtle didn't put herself up there... Sarah Palin did. Free the Real Post Turtle.

A little advance taste of the Thursday's event: a photo of Palin in Sedona, prepping for the debate with a practice run with Randy Scheuneman. In my fertile imagination, I picture this photo being snapped in the long silence after a Palin answer, and then Randy saying, "What the hell was that? Okay, okay [shakes head] ya gotta focus, Sarah, ya gotta frackin' FOCUS IN."

So the real question, though, is how will Palin "play" in her debate with Biden tomorrow? So far, consensus is that her performance in interviews has been someplace between abysmal and disastrous. BUT The New York Times has an interesting look at her previous debates. (They also examine Biden's style, noting he'll have to guard againt being "overbearing or condescending." Sorry, Joe, I know that's nigh-on impossible given Palin's utter lack of any brains, but please try.) While they see echoes of the peripatetic blather we've seen before ("I can't tell you how much that will reduce monetarily our health care costs, but competition makes everyone better, it makes us work harder, it does allow reduction in costs, so addressing that is going to be a priority."), there also hints of an "average person who understood the average person's needs and would not be expected to have detailed policy prescriptions." Lord help us. Why would we WANT an "average person"? Should we want an ABOVE average person? Or is that too intimidating?

Still, Andrew Halcro, who debated Palin in the governorship race in Alaska, warns ,"she's a master, not of facts, figures, or insightful policy recommendations, but at the fine art of the nonanswer, the glittering generality."

As part of their "media blitz" this week, Palin went on the radio telling America about how she's just average working class..."Todd and I, heck, we're going through that right now even as we speak, which may put me again kind of on the outs of those Washington elite who don't like the idea of just an everyday working class American running for such an office.

Up is down. Black is white. Thursday is Tuesday. As HuffPo notes, it was the bastion of conservativism, The Washington Times, that pointed out that Palin is hardly working class: "A check of financial records, though, shows the Palins live anything but a common life when compared with their fellow residents of their hometown of Wasilla. Their combined income of nearly a quarter-million dollars last year was five times the median household income for Wasilla's 7,000 residents. They own a single-engine plane, two boats, two personal watercraft and a half-million-dollar, custom-built home on a lake that is worth three times the average of other homes in town. For the future, they also have a 401(k) retirement account compliments of Todd Palin's years as an engineer with oil giant BP." Hmmm, that wasn't what I meant by "above average."

Former Dem strategist Paul Begala offers his ten rules about debates on CNN (Thanks, Jackie for sending that along!) It's a sobering reminder that actually knowing something isn't necessarily a prerequisite oto good debating in this case. He observes: "Politicians are a lot like Little Leaguers (although I don't think I'd trust them with aluminum bats). They crave confidence. And the more confident they are, the better they're likely to do." To me, the question is not if Palin has confidence--she has loads...to start with. But in just about every interview she's done thus far, we see the same thing. At the outset, she's just dumb enough to think she's smart, but then as you watch her keep on talking, you can also see that she's just smart enough to gradually realize that she's dumb.

ANYway. Yes, it's true, just by reading my daily rant, YOU can become More Qualified to Be Vice President than Sarah Palin. From HuffPo: "Asked what newspapers and magazines she reads, Palin - a journalism major in college - could not name one publication. "I've read most of them, again with a great appreciation for the press, for the media," she said at first. Couric responded, "What, specifically?" "Um, all of them, any of them that have been in front of me all these years." "Can you name a few?" "I have a vast variety of source where we get our news," Palin said. "Alaska isn't a foreign country, where it's kind of suggested, 'wow, how could you keep in touch with what the rest of Washington, D.C., may be thinking when you live up there in Alaska?' Believe me, Alaska is like a microcosm of America."

As I mentioned to Betty, with all this trash-talking about elitist media, Palin had a little problem embedded in that question (besides the obvious problem of being completely incurious about anything):

• She can't say she reads NY Times after Steve Schmidt blasted it as having no "journalistic integrity."
• She can't say she read the Washington Post, because Howard Kurtz has been dogging her for weeks.
• The LA Times reports how even Alaskans are angry that the McCain campaign was shielding Palin.
• Time? Nope, home of the conservative libertarian Mark Halperin who called for them to "Stop the Madness!" and said on CNN, "if a core part of their message is something that every journalist -- journalism organization in the country has looked at and says it's demonstrably false, again, we're not doing our jobs if we just treat this as one of many things that's happening."
• Newsweek has the Jonathan Alterman problem.
  
• Forget the Atlantic, home of Andrew Sullivan, who once supported McCain but now enumerates the Twelve Lies of Sarah Palin.
  
• And even the National Freaking Review's Kathleen Parker says, "If BS were currency, Palin could bail out Wall Street herself."
  

See, the problem with being your kind of maverick is that you don't have any friends now--no lifelines, no one to help you, no one whose name you'd be allowed to mention. Hoisted with your own petard.

(By the way, about "seeing" Russia from Alaska. That's true, but there's only one place in Alaska that you can do that from: Little Diomede island in the Bering Strait. Gary Tuchman on Anderson Cooper 360 visited it --which Palin has never done. "No American mayor resides in a city closer to Russia than Andrew Milligrock, and he says being two miles from Russia doesn't give him any foreign policy expertise."

And is the McCain Campaign going "Jeff Gillooly" on this debate? "PBS' Gwen Ifill has broken her ankle after tripping and falling down stairs at her home last night, a NewsHour insider tells TVNewser. We're told Ifill had been walking up a staircase, carrying research related to her moderating duties at Thursday's Vice Presidential debate in St. Louis, when she took a wrong step.We are also told the show will go on: Ifill is planning to travel to Missouri for the big event." Stay tuned-- if someone takes a whack at Gwen's knees, you know what happened.

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So Thurday's topics may wander all over the place, but I'm betting you'll hear more than a little about Sarah Palin's values. So today's topic is candidate positions on social values issues. (I know, I know, stop rolling your eyes. We gotta cover it. It's in the curriculum.) I focus on the lead candidate positions knowing that a) the policy positions of the person at the top of the ticket is what most people consider more important and b) I'm interested to see if there is any divergence of opinion between the presidential and vice-presidential candidates. A lot of info here from the NY Times' resource on candidate positions, and also the Associated Press' summary-- liberal-biased media elites that they are.

On proposed constitutional amendment that defines marriage as between a man and a woman:

Obama: Opposes constitutional amendment to ban it.

McCain: Opposes constitutional amendment to ban it.

On civil unions between same sex partners:

Obama: Supports civil unions, says states should decide about marriage. Switched positions in 2004 and now supports repeal of Defense of Marriage Act, which denies federal recognition of same-sex marriages and gives states the right to refuse to recognize such marriages.

McCain: Says same-sex couples should be allowed to enter into legal agreements for insurance and similar benefits.

On Roe v. Wade decision

Obama: I have been a consistent champion of reproductive choice and will make preserving women's rights under Roe v. Wade a priority as president. I oppose any constitutional amendment to overturn the Supreme Court's decision in that case.

McCain: I do not support Roe versus Wade. It should be overturned. Has voted for abortion restrictions permissible under Roe v. Wade, and now says he would seek to overturn that guarantee of abortion rights. Would not seek constitutional amendment to ban abortion.

On continuing the current ban on funding for embryonic stem cell research in place

Obama: No. Each year, 100,000 Americans will develop Alzheimer's disease, with impaired memory, ability to understand, and judgment. Over 1 million adults will be diagnosed with diabetes this year, and risk complications that include blindness, damaged nerves and loss of kidney function. We all know or have met individuals with spinal cord injuries, including national celebrities, local war heroes and loved ones from our own families and circles of friends, who are struggling to maintain mobility and independence. For most of our history, medicine has offered little hope of recovery to the 100 million individuals affected by these and other devastating illnesses and injuries. Until now. Recent developments in stem cell research may hold the key to improved treatments, if not cures, for those affected by Alzheimer's disease, diabetes, spinal cord injury and countless other conditions. For this reason, I am a proud supporter of the Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act. The president was wrong to veto it, and I will make sure that it is finally signed into law when I'm president.

McCain: Supports relaxing federal restrictions on financing of embryonic stemcell research.

On the Supreme Court decision upholding a ban on partial birth abortion

Obama: "I strongly disagree with [the] Supreme Court ruling, which dramatically departs from previous precedents safeguarding the health of pregnant women. As Justice Ginsburg emphasized in her dissenting opinion, this ruling signals an alarming willingness on the part of the conservative majority to disregard its prior rulings respecting a woman's medical concerns and the very personal decisions between a doctor and patient."

McCain: "[The] Supreme Court ruling is a victory for those who cherish the sanctity of life and integrity of the judiciary. The ruling ensures that an unacceptable and unjustifiable practice will not be carried out on our innocent children...as we move forward, it is critically important that our party continues to stand on the side of life."

On Gun Control

Obama: Voted to leave gun-makers and dealers open to suit. Also, as Illinois state lawmaker, supported ban on all forms of semiautomatic weapons and tighter state restrictions generally on firearms.

McCain: Voted against ban on assault-type weapons but in favor of requiring background checks at gun shows. Voted to shield gun-makers and dealers from civil suits. "I believe the Second Amendment ought to be preserved — which means no gun control."

On Judicial Nominations as President

Obama has signaled he would nominate judges with expansive, progressive view of the Constitution. "Justice Roberts [John G. Roberts Jr.] said he saw himself just as an umpire. But the issues that come before the Court are not sport; they're life and death. And we need somebody who's got the heart … the empathy to recognize what it's like to be a young teenage mom, the empathy to understand what it's like to be poor or African-American or gay or disabled or old. And that's the criteria by which I'm going to be selecting my judges."

McCain has signaled a dedication to nominating reliable conservatives, but is against naming "Activist judges." "I will look for accomplished men and women with a proven record of excellence in the law, and a proven commitment to judicial restraint. I will look for people in the cast of John Roberts, Samuel Alito, and my friend the late William Rehnquist — jurists of the highest caliber who know their own minds, and know the law, and know the difference. My nominees will understand that there are clear limits to the scope of judicial power, and clear limits to the scope of federal power."

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Meanwhile, in the "Keep Your Eye on the Ball" Dept.:

Voter Fraud-- it's not just a slogan."You know it's going to be a heated election when a state attorney general sues his own state agency for not cracking down on voter fraud. But that's just what's happened in Wisconsin. It's indicative of the kinds of legal challenges now being brought in hotly contested states around the country. The outcomes of those challenges will decide whose votes get counted and whose don't — and in a race as close as this one, that could make all the difference."

Folks, I'm happy to see more and more projections turning North Carolina in Obama's favor. The vaguely right-leaning RealClearPolitics has quietly flipped it over to Obama with a 0.3 point lead, but I think given Wachovia's fire sale to Citigroup last week, he may take a more sizable lead in coming weeks. Wachovia's headquarters were in Charlotte, and with 20,000 employees, they were the second largest employer in the region.

And the Quinnipiac poll numbers are up in the most delightful way in three big swing states: Ohio (50-42 Obama), Pennsylvania (54-39 Obama) and Florida (Sit down for this, 51-43 Obama). But all this only says to me that desperate parties will be working on desperate measures. It's time for vigilance.

I leave things with this head-shaking moment from PunditKitchen:

34 days to the election! Reminder again that time is running out--for many states, you must register to vote well in advance of the elections. RockTheVote's list of voter registration deadlines. Here are some upcoming dates--forward this on to your friends in the appropriate states (swing states in bold):

• THIS Saturday Oct 4: Alaska, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Washington
• NEXT Monday, Oct 6: Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, DC, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia.
• NEXT Tuesday, Oct 7: Illinois, New Mexico
• NEXT Wednesday, Oct 8: Missouri
  

If you're voting absentee, you may have to get your ballot in weeks before the Nov 4th Election date. Declare Yourself has links to each state's voter information page where you can find out how to get your absentee ballot.