LO reader and blogpublisher Darrelplant had an interesting tech/politics piece crossposted to Daily Kos today. One of the many ways in which the Obama campaign innovated not only beyond John McCain's capacity to match him, but beyond what any other major presidential campaign had even tried, much less succeeded with, was the IPhone applet that provided a virtual Obama desktop literally at your fingertip. Not only is it functional, it looks dynamite on screen. And as darrel points out, it's largely a product of Portland's creative class.
That's Darrel's larger point, that Obama's advantage is much more about creative spirit and understanding of the medium's limitless capacity, than it is about money or products that will allow the Republicans to "catch up" to the left when it comes to online politics. "The right has radio; the left has the internet" is becoming a truism because it's...true. And while the GOP is doing its darndest to try to replicate even the Howard Dean beta version of the magic, they're still just making excuses about what's gone wrong until now:
First, let me just say that you would have to ask whether there would have been enough McCain/Palin-oriented iPhone users to make it worthwhile for the campaign. Personally, I think there would have been (for reasons you will hear in a minute). The main thrust of the Politico story, however, was that the McCain team was whining about how so much of the high-tech community supported Obama that they just couldn't get their ideas out of the gate.
To which I say: codswallop.
"Memo to self: next time get the co-founder of Facebook on your team," said McCain-Palin veteran Becki Donatelli. "The CEO of Google was in the Obama commercial. I mean, you don't get more out front than that."
Speaking on a panel about the role of technology in the 2008 campaign, Donatelli said the McCain team had plans for using the Internet to reach voters, but ultimately lacked the resources and the personnel to put them into action.
Oooh, Obama had Facebook and Google on his side! Well, last I heard, McCain's national campaign co-chair was former eBay CEO Meg Whitman, someone he floated as a potential Treasury Secretary when asked about that position in the second presidential debate. Surely in her decade at eBay she made a few technically-inclined contacts? And last I looked, there were plenty of programmers around the world eager for work if they couldn't find someone in the US who wanted to work for McCain.
In other words, for the "we didn't have the resources" complaint to be valid means that McCain's people couldn't manage to find some way to outperform a team of unpaid Obamaphiles that could be counted on two hands. How pathetic would that be, if it's true? Ot is it just as likely that they were so incompetent that they didn't think of doing it and now they're lying about it? Considering how Republicans tend to run things, it could be either one of those or a combination of both.
It's an amazing time. Both Democrats and Republicans are doing a lot of mouthing of the right words, but really who can tell if their intent will be borne out, or one or both sides will simply revert to status quo ante? That's why we watch, I suppose. Anyway, the online organizing program is just one tiny section of the campaign they'll be writing about for a hundred years. And thanks to some clever Portlanders, the iPhone app will be emblematic of where the gap continued to remain between Democrats and Republicans when it came to technolitics.
OK, I've given Team Merkley plenty of (IMO deserved) shit this campaign, but they are rightly ALL OVER this developing story involving not only Gordon Smith but John McCain. From Huffington Post a while ago:
Oregon's Gordon Smith has become the fourth Republican Senator to disavow John McCain's robocalls linking Barack Obama to Bill Ayers.
In a statement to the Huffington Post, Smith for Senate press secretary Lindsay Gilbride said: "They [the Ayers calls] are not taking place in Oregon and Senator Smith does not condone these sort of calls. Negative robocalls are not appropriate and have no place in campaigns."
OK, fair enough. It's a pretty far walk from being McCain's Oregon Chair (a job since shunted off to former Goob Vic Atiyeh) to repudiating McCain for his nasty tactics, but in the end Gordo is doing the right thing. However, Merkley isn't about to let him get away with it, in an update to the HP story:
Jeff Merkley's campaign responds to Sen. Smith's new position, describing it as hypocritical in a statement:
"Gordon Smith is a complete hypocrite. Just like John McCain, Gordon Smith and Karl Rove are using robocalls to attack Jeff Merkley. On top of that, Smith and the Oregon Republican Party are paying this company (FLS) thousands of dollars for undisclosed services. Smith should immediately fire this group of Bush-Rove hacks and demand that Freedom's Watch get out of Oregon."
The Merkley campaign cites FEC reports showing that FLS-Connect, the company in charge of McCain's robocalls, has been paid nearly $100,000 by Smith's campaign in the last year.
Duhhh....Gordo should have kept his mouth shut. But in his zeal to distance himself from every single living Republican on the planet as a way to rescue his slipping chances at re-election, he left his flank wide open--and Merkley shanked him but good. Well done.
The PUMAs are on life support, but the McCain campaign has managed to expeller-press a couple of "feminist" women from out of the woodwork to endorse COB (Cranky Ol' Bastard). Who says so? Mayor Sam says so! Well, it's not THAT Mayor Sam--more like Da Mayor--but I couldn't resist citing him anyway:
Prameela Bartholomeusz - a small business owner and a member of the Democratic National Platform Committee, Linda Klinge - Past Oregon president and now Vice-President of theNational Organization of Women, Shelly Mandell - President of the Los Angeles chapter of the National Organization of Women, Lynn Rothschild - member of the Democratic Platform Committee, Elaine Lafferty - a former editor in chief of Ms. Magazine.
I hardly think this is the sentinel event to indicate a mass surge of women voters for McCain, especially on the basis that he represents the tenets of feminism in his campaign. And clearly citizens of this country have every right to back whomever they like in whatever race they wish.
But you really have to have a bit of a screw loose to be fighting for the expanded rights of women in this country, and choose John McCain and Sarah Palin as your standard bearers. Here's just one set of examples to suggest how counterintuitive it is, but really...do you need to have it discretely explained? The choice of Palin itself--which amounted almost entirely to "Hey, we need us some ovaries on this bus!"--is about the most unfeminist thing I can think of on McCain's record. Did he pick her because she was knowledgeable, prepared and experienced? Uh, no. If that's what he wanted, there are several Republican women out there who fit the bill in the high-profile way required. Palin, not so much.
I've been unable to discover any remarks by Ms. Klinge on her support for McCain; I'd love to hear her defense of his policies on women's issues. Really, I would.
Updating--here's a handy column just published at Huffington Post, by Eleanor Smeal, President of the Feminist Majority. Excerpts below the fold...
It's not limb-clinging to assert there is almost zero chance Barack Obama will lose Oregon on November 4th--and based on the final debate last night and the early polling/focus reactions to it, as goes Oregon so too will go the nation, strongly and I believe in some cases quite surprisingly.
But John McCain is supposedly running a major national campaign for President, and even if he doesn't spend any money or staff to speak of in Oregon, as the standard bearer for the entire Republican Party he owes it to at least appear ready to fight on behalf of its downticket candidates and state party. Maybe I hold too a parochial view; GOP state parties are in disarray all over the country, but I have a hard time picturing many that are more dysfunctional and headed further downward than Oregon's of late.
So it has to be rather deflating to Oregon conservatives (like myself, according to the Wrinkly/Winky email database) to receive an email on how to go about registering and voting for McPalin and the rest of the GOP slate in Oregon, that makes clear they are just faking the funk here, and truly do not even have their most basic shit together.
[Loaded Orygun is happy to (with permission) reprint the diaries coming from Les and Sue AuCoin, who are headed to Ohio to campaign/canvass for Democratic candidates. You can read them yourself at Ohio Political Journal, or catch the reprints here...]
In Round 2, McCain needed a game-changer, and did not get it. Obama wanted to close the sale and did not do it. But Obama moved closer to his goal than McCain did his, with 29 days left, by sweeping the board on polls judging the debate.
On the other hand, a recent AP-Yahoo! News poll found that 18 percent of likely voters are up for grabs — undecided or willing to change their minds — little more than five weeks before Americans choose between Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain.
A large chunk of these voters say they are hurting on a personal level from the country’s economic woes, and, like everyone else, they say the economy is the top issue. Most are looking for a better life and a leader to help make it happen — and most haven’t found what they seek in Obama or McCain.
Apropos of this, over at Five Thirty Eight blog, there’s a discussion of race and what Obama’s ceiling may be, and some concern that he may be near it, which would mean, if true, that McCain has an advantage with those undecideds.
It’s the most nerve-wracking election I’ve ever been through.
[Loaded Orygun is happy to (with permission) reprint the diaries coming from Les and Sue AuCoin, who are headed to Ohio to campaign/canvass for Democratic candidates. You can read them yourself at Ohio Political Journal, or catch the reprints here...]
Waterloo, Iowa
I’ll just say this: if on this trip we’re going to meet our Waterloo, let it be in Iowa, not Ohio.
This, though not representative of Ohio undecideds, is one of the targets of our mission. Leave a comment with the message you think will reach him. (Don't be too serious.)
Eleven and a half hours on the road today, across South Dakota (a helluva lot wider than tall, dammit!), and into Iowa.
If any of you have ever driven from Madras to Culver–central Oregon flatland farming country–then you have as good as driven through Iowa. Except that those few Oregon miles are on a spool here and someone keeps rolling them out ahead of you, ahead of you, ahead …
I’ve been thinking about the Biden-Palin debate all day, and it came to me who Palin reminds me of: Trudy, the Bag Lady, in our friend, Lily Tomlin’s one-woman play, Searching For Signs Of Intelligent Life In The Universe. Trudy, see, was a conduit for messages from deep space.
How else does one explain the collision of thought shards or Ifill questions and Palin answers passing each other like ships in a fog?
I’m proud of Joe Biden. If Failin’ beat expectations, I say, well, if you start at zero …
(My best friend in Ashland wrote to tell me that she was winking at him.)
[Loaded Orygun is happy to (with permission) reprint the diaries coming from Les and Sue AuCoin, who are headed to Ohio to campaign/canvass for Democratic candidates. You can read them yourself at Ohio Political Journal, or catch the reprints here...]
On Wednesday, my wife and I will drop everything we’re doing and drive to Ohio to campaign for Barack Obama and Joe Biden for the last month of the campaign.
We hope we can provide a modicum of help in a battleground state for a ticket we hope and believe will lead the country into a new era of progressive governance and away from the law-of-the-jungle, soak-the-middle class, robber baron era of most of the last thirty years.
But the most important thing we will influence will no doubt be our own psyches. If we sit by as observers much longer, we’re both going to blow a gasket. Rather than hoping neoconservatives won’t steal this country, we want to help Obama and Biden stop them from it, and roll back the trickle-down fleecing, the environmental pillaging and the preemptive war-making that has already occurred.
We hope this journal will give you an up-close and personal look at the campaign from the trenches of a hotly contested state that may decide the election. In 104 years–with only three exceptions–no one has won the White House without winning Ohio’s electoral votes.
So, we’ll now throw everything we have into Ohio to try to restore the best instincts of the country we grew up in. If, god forbid, Obama should lose, at least we’ll have a good answer when our granddaughters ask us, “Pop-Pops and Nana, what did you do in the table stakes election of 2008?”
Declaring that it was time to "set wins and losses aside," Phil Jackson said Wednesday that he would temporarily suspend the Lakers' 2008-2009 season and seek to delay the Lakers' season opener against the Portland Trail Blazers, so that he could return to New York to help to forge an overhaul of the NBA Referees Association, which has been mired in scandal since allegations of bribery against former official Tim Donaghy came to light last season.
Kevin Pritchard rejected the call by Mr. Jackson, the Los Angeles Lakers' head coach, to delay the game, and Blazers officials noted that Mr. Jackson only made the offer after the Blazers reached out to their opponent asking them to issue a joint statement calling for increased transparency of the Referees Association's internal processes during the coming season.
The maneuvering came as the referee scandal continued to dominate headlines in the wake of Mr. Donaghy's reporting to a Federal holding cell in Florida on Wednesday. Wednesday evening both Mr. Jackson and Mr. Pritchard, the Blazers General Manager, accepted Commissioner David Stern's invitation to meet with him on Thursday to address the issue.
Phil Jackson's a real, honest to Magic hero! Way to put league first, Phil...
(Worth noting, given Bounds' status as a native Oregonian and former stooge for Walden and Smith...Jeff Mapes bios Bounds, and his boss Jill Hazelbaker, like Bounds a UofO alum. I note with interest that these young ultra-crackers admit they probably wouldn't be in the positions they hold, had everyone more qualified than they not left McCain last summer when he was tanking. If Oregon Republicans consider them their best and brightest for the state, we have a long period of Democratic control ahead of us. - promoted by torridjoe)
I'd just like to call your attention to Gawker.com's compilation of clips wherein Oregon's own (embarrassing) Tucker Bounds gets hit upside his head for telling lies and then defending them.
In an earlier post I pointed out that when Outta (Bounds) is not playing Lee Atwater for Grampa Mac, he does the same kinda job for the insurance industry's lobbying group.
My favorite clip is the one from the Fox News - that's right the FOX NEWS - newsreader who whacks him soundly and refuses to let him wiggle out of it. How can you tell when Tucker Bounds is lying? His eyes are open... or closed.
One of the side benefits of having the Obama campaign essentially merge with the DNC is that there seems to be stronger message unity--or rather, that outlets down the line underneath the national HQ are helping move the message in their states. Such is the case in Oregon, where the Democratic Party of Oregon is working in tandem with the Obama camp to help educate Oregonians about McSame's lies and Obama's solutions. Today state Chair Meredith Wood-Smith was all over McCain's ludicrous repetition--on a Black Monday like we had yesterday, no less!--that the economy remains "fundamentally sound:"
The fundamentals of John McCain's economy might be strong, but here in Oregon our families are spending more on everything from gas to groceries while their wages have stagnated. I’ve just returned from organizing Democrats in Klamath, Lake and Harney counties. They are living this downturn, and they are worried,” DPO Chair Meredith Wood Smith said. “Although Oregonians are being crushed under the weight of Bush-McCain economic policies, John McCain has the nerve to tell them what they are seeing in their own lives isn't true. Of course, coming from a man who doesn't even know how many homes he owns, no one should be surprised that he thinks the fundamentals of the economy are strong.
This is actually the second day in a row Wood has hammered McCain for his absurdism; here's what she had to say yesterday:
John McCain doesn't understand Americans' economic struggles. In fact, he doesn't even acknowledge them," DPO Chair Meredith Wood Smith said. "Perhaps it should surprise no one that a person who doesn't know how many homes he owns could wake up to headlines of a near financial collapse in this country and still claim that the fundamentals of the economy are strong. John McCain wants to continue the same failed Bush economic policies that got us into this recession in the first place. Oregonian can't afford four more years of Bush-McCain economic policies.
Rah rah ree, kick em in the knee! Rah rah rass, kick em in the...other knee!
In airing this ad, McCain has done something I never thought I would see: He has sponsored a new television commercial that effectively declares his support for child molestor rights.
I'm dead serious here: The ad explicitly criticizes Obama for supporting state legislation that the Kansas City Star notes was designed to give "schools the ability to warn young children about inappropriate touching and sexual predators."
So by basic logical deduction, then, McCain's ad attacking Obama for supporting that bill means McCain would have opposed it - meaning he would have taken the side of the Pedophilia Lobby that wants young children to not understand when they are being molested. I'm wondering - is there a NAMBLA endorsement in the works for McCain? The Arizona senator sure seems to be courting that interest group with this latest declaration.
Indeed. And as part of a larger effort this week by the Obama Oregon team to flood the zone (finally) with responses and countercharges to the McCain/Palin Festival of Crusty Lies, the campaign points out that age-appropriate sex ed is part of Oregon's curriculum (along with that of a number of other states), and that McCain's sad attack is actually a retread of one tried by Obama's 2004 Senate opponent, Alan Keyes:
In 2004, Allan Keyes accused Obama of supporting sex education for kindergartners. Obama said in response, “Actually, that wasn't what I had in mind. We have a existing law that mandates sex education in the schools. We want to make sure that it's medically accurate and age-appropriate. Now, I'll give you an example, because I have a six-year-old daughter and a three-year-old daughter, and one of the things my wife and I talked to our daughter about is the possibility of somebody touching them inappropriately, and what that might mean. And that was included specifically in the law, so that kindergarteners are able to exercise some possible protection against abuse, because I have family members as well as friends who suffered abuse at that age. So, that's the kind of stuff that I was talking about in that piece of legislation.” [IL Senate Debate, 10/21/04]
{more on Oregon's laws and the broad support for similar statutes, below}
(Always a pleasure to publicize's skywaker9's analyses... - promoted by torridjoe)
The following is a review of Oregon's primary and a preview of Oregon's fall elections now that the primary results (with the exception of Ballot Measure 53) are certified. Crossposted from Daily Kos (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/6/16/121742/983/269/536725).
For those of you who are not already aware, the blogosphere is engaged in a massive crowdsourced search engine optimization project called Searching for John McCain spearheaded, by Chris Bowers over at Open Left. TJ wrote about it here last week, but the basic gist is that:
1. Nine articles were researched and selected for being reputable source, having McCain's name in the title, and the title and article containing honest reporting about the highly conservative nature of McCain's ideology.
2. Active participants are changing their signatures and linking to these articles in blog posts and comments wherever and whenever applicable.
Since Soapblox disallows any scripting elements in blog posts, I've created a custom page to share several tools and widgets we've created to assist in the search engine optimization of McCain, and increasing the awareness of the project to get more participants. Additional instructions are detailed over there.
The linking part is where we come in--creating links manually is time consuming and can require some technical skill. So we've created a bookmarklet button that you can add to your Bookmarks Bar and click on to convert all references to John McCain and McCain into links to these articles no matter what page you are on.
Whether you're writing your own blog post, or a comment at some other site (Blue Oregon, Kos, OpenLeft--doesn't matter!), once you've got the button in your toolbar, all you do is click it after you've written something in a text box with the name McCain as one or more of the words. (Note: The button below is for display only; the one you can drag to your toolbar is at the custom page.)
The bookmarklet is the 'killer app' that will allow us to virally spread these links (so go install it right now), but there is also:
1. an html widget to create an ad banner that can be customize link to any of the nine articles.
3. a javascript widget that shows a randomly selected link within the banner each time the page is refreshed.
So please visit the widget page and share these tools with all your friends! While these tools were created for Searching for John McCain , if it works out well, they can easily be converted to do the same thing for, say... Gordon Smith?
Hey, you may notice in the side bar I've added some distinctly non-Oregon content. I try to stay fast to that rule, but there are rare exceptions and this is a good one. Chris Bowers of OpenLeft has unveiled what amounts to Googlebombs 2.0, his scheme for organized manipulation of search engines to pick up the most salient negative stories about the target--in this instance John McCain.
It's especially important to tag McCain early, for the same reason it is to do so for Gordon Smith--people think they're independent and/or moderate Republicans. Fooey.
Here are nine stories on McCain that tell the real story. Post them in your sig when you comment at Kos or MyDD or OpenLeft or SwingState Project or any community forum. Pick one or all nine, and put them in your sidebar like I have. First, the list version:
You can just do a "view source" to get the code for that. Even putting it in one blog post like this services the cause; the search engines will pick it up.
Here's a great little widget that grew out of the movement. Bookmark this page and when you want to make a comment about McCain, use the GoogleBomb McCain page to hotlink the 9 stories, however many times you've used the name McCain. If you have more than nine McCains, it repeats through the list. As you can see, I did it for this paragraph. Try it on your next comment! Or just do it randomly for fun! It all helps!
OK, that first picture is not mine, but I understand now what dazzled people about Camelot--and cripes, JFK was cheating on his wife! I keep staring at them thinking, that's what the world will see of the next American First Family. It gives me a happy shudder to see such a thing.
With the exception of I think two others (one of which is clearly a getty photo), the rest are all from my iPhone and either cropped up or cleaned up a little. They're not high quality, but a couple decent shots.
{more below the jump, just to save some front page data load...}
Acting Chief Alan Oja said police questioned Thornton Massie Tice, 63, of McCain Road in Astoria, after he attempted to get one of his business cards to former President Bill Clinton, who was giving a speech urging voters to support his wife's bid for the Democratic presidential nomination.
At that point, Oja said Tice began "talking weird." Police ran Tice's name through the law enforcement computer system and discovered he was wanted on a warrant out of Linn County for a probation violation for custodial interference. After he was taken to Clatsop County Jail, Tice began loudly criticizing the federal government and threatening lawsuits, Oja said.
Tice told The Daily Astorian this morning that he is an independent candidate running for the presidency of the United States. He said he wanted to give the business card to Clinton because he wants the Clintons to serve on his Cabinet if he is elected. His Web site can be found at www.sonofjefferson.com
Come on, the guy's an independent candidate living on McCain Road, stalking Hillary and Bill Clinton? And it's taking place in Astoria?? That's pretty good--but it's worth a look to check out his campaign website. I'd say "talking weird" about covers it...and that's actually the saner version, without the HUGE picture of Monticello that used to dominate the top of the page. It still does very modestly remained titled "Son of Jefferson," however. And hey, he's MORE than willing to have her on in his adminstration, which seems like a better deal than she might get elsewhere...
Does that qualify as a Presidential debate held in Oregon if he managed to shout something at Hillary? She can't say we didn't try.
Over at PolitickerOr.com they describe him as A Surprise Visitor at McCain's Event. A guest who, according to the story, was described by Senator McCain as "a great governor of his state" which would, of course, be Oregon.
The apparent Republican nominee reportedly added "I appreciate his leadership, I appreciate his dedication, no matter what his party identification is to the betterment of the state of Oregon and America..."
Not made clear to the attendees or the press was that the major cause for surprise was that the originally scheduled guest was NY Senator Hillary Clinton who was unable to appear due to an unexpected scheduling conflict. In Senator Clinton's absence, the McCain/Smith campaigns opted for Governor Ted - a devoted Clinton endorser who is, like his first choice candidate, profoundly admiring of Senator McCain's qualifications for the presidency.
Oregon House Speaker Jeff Merkley, whose candidacy for the Democratic nomination for Gordon Smith's job has also been endorsed by Governor Ted, declined comment but a staff person, on guarantee of anonymity, said "We'd have been there with Ted except that McCain's people just had to go and invite that mean old Gordon Smith!"
OK. So I made up every thing in italics. My tongue would be firmly in my cheek if my gag reflex weren't working overtime. What the hell was Kulongski thinking????
Who says the journalistic mojo is gone out of Loaded Orygun??
Look what we found! The missing McCain Voter's Statement!
John McCain
Republican
Occupation: U.S. Senator
Occupational Background: Naval Aviator and U.S. House Representative
Educational Background: United States Naval Academy
Prior Governmental Experience: I’ve been in Washington, D.C. for decades. You may remember me from the Keating Scandal and the George Bush hug.
My Friends, I’m running for president of the United States because I believe in the status quo. I want to continue the regress we’ve made over the last eight years.
As president, here is my pledge to you.
I won’t worry about the economy if you won’t.
We will stay in Iraq for 100 years.
If the first 100 years in Iraq don’t work out, we can sign up for 100 more.
I know change can be unsettling. Don’t worry, with my presidency there won’t be any. All I offer is a third Bush term.
I want experts in my cabinet. We need people with years of insider experience dealing with Congress and writing legislation. So, we’ll have an all lobbyist cabinet. I won’t have to look hard for applicants. All the major lobbyists already work for my campaign.
My friends, I’m John McCain, aka McBush, and I ask for your support.
Find out more about me at http://www.oregondemocrats.org/mccain
Endorsements: President George Bush, whose presidency deserves the third term I will provide, Vice President Dick Cheney and Oregon’s Republican U.S. Senator Gordon Smith. Yep, Gordon Smith claims to oppose the war, but he vigorously endorses my candidacy and has continued voting to keep troops in Iraq. He’s not quite a straight talker if you ask me.
(This is not John McCain’s actual Oregon Voters’ Pamphlet statement. He did not provide one, so this information was furnished by Democratic Party of Oregon.)
Portland pollster Mike Riley delivers the third poll in the last couple of weeks that tests falls presidential matchups in Oregon. Like the other polls, he shows Democrat Barack Obama running better against Republican John McCain than does Democrat Hillary Clinton. But, unlike Survey USA, Riley's poll tends to agree with Rasmussen Reports that McCain would have a tough time against Obama in the fall in Oregon.
"I would have liked to see that prize go to the Buddhist monks who are suffering and dying in Burma," McCain is quoted as saying.
While most of the world is deeply troubled and opposes the military junta's crack-down on the Burmese monks in their struggle for human rights and democratic reforms, it flies in the face of several facts.
LO reader and 
John McCain
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