The Proletariat site contends "It seems to me Roe v. Wade will be a lot safer in a McCain than an Obama presidency," promoting Ralph Nader's appearance in Madison tonight.

Is this guy kidding?

From John McCain's site on women's choice:

Human Dignity and the Sanctity of Life Overturning Roe v. Wade John McCain believes Roe v. Wade is a flawed decision that must be overturned, and as president he will nominate judges who understand that courts should not be in the business of legislating from the bench. Constitutional balance would be restored by the reversal of Roe v. Wade, returning the abortion question to the individual states.However, the reversal of Roe v. Wade represents only one step in the long path toward ending abortion.

I have voted for Nader for president before, but I swear some of these pro-Nader people are as deluded and oblivious to facts as the religious right.

From Pollster.com. One must believe that the Republicans are so scared that they would virtually ban Bush and Cheney from the convention, and nominate "Caribou Barbie" (that's what Stephanie Miller calls her) for vice-president and hype her national security credentials with mostly straight faces.

Fun times.

Update: Most observers mention Palin’s less-than-two-year administration of Alaska's National Guard as a sardonic reference to her stunning lack of credentials to become commander-in-chief, but not Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Janesville); Ryan hypes it.
 
Said Ryan in a statement: "As the head of Alaska's National Guard and mother of a soldier she understands the importance of supporting our brave men and women in uniform. …  I look forward to giving everything I've got to help the McCain-Palin team win in Wisconsin, so they can bring the right kind of change to Washington." (MJS, Aug. 29, 2008) The GOP looks like some desperate dudes. Can you imagine any Democratic nominee for president or vice-president touting his/her credentials by pointing to heading the Alaska National Guard for less than two years?

Like a modern-day Santiago, the politically ailing John McCain battles the titanic forces of Barack Obama and spears his GOP the largest catch of his political life: The great marlin in the form of Governor Sarah Palin.

Chuck Todd, top media politico, just said on MSNBC's Hardball that Wisconsin was the turning point in the 2008 Democratic primary.

Todd said that after Obama clobbered Hillary in Wisconsin on February 19, Hillary had only a 10 percent chance of getting the nomination, and not the 50 percent chance that Hillary's people and the media proclaimed.

Obama's Wisconsin victory, gained on the heels of his sweep in Virginia, Maryland and D.C. the week before, left many objective observers looking to Ohio and Pennsylvania (where Hillary won solid victories) as merely prolonging the inevitable Obama nomination.

Salon had a piece by Mike Madden in early May explaining the importance of Wisconsin's primary and probing why this perfectly composed demographic state for Hillary handed her a 17-point thrashing.

See also Wisconsin More Important than Pennsylvania Machine-State.

by globalgirl and mal contends

Madison, WI - We have heard numerous comments in conversation from friends and family fearful that there are just too many bigoted idiots in America to let Barack Obama live to be president.

 
Our common response is that: Though I do not know it for a fact, the United States Secret Service, created after the assassination of President William McKinley in 1901, is surely a dynamic, continuously improving organization. A would-be assassin's shot like that taken at Ronald Reagan in 1981 is undoubtedly nearly impossible today. It would take a military assault to get to Obama, I bet, I hope.

Dane County 911 Center

Update: Obama Ground Report: Canvassing in Waukesha, Wisconsin and Record-low seventeen percent of Wisconsin voters think the country is going in the right direction

The political wisdom of some (the Washington Post's Dan Balz, for example) is the next 10 days in August will see the presidential race in a holding pattern.

Nothing could be further from the truth of course, and this applies emphatically in Wisconsin.

Two dynamics continue here:

- Barack Obama's on-the-ground field operation (that rivals his Internet operation's superiority to the McCain camp's) is hitting the ground running

- Barack Obama will pull away in fundraising, no matter the sleazy finance machinations of John McCain and the rightwing independent slime merchants

Milwaukee - Spent this weekend listening to numerous people in Milwaukee in one of Wisconsin's most diverse and densely-populated areas.

Asking residents (living in expensive homes, modest homes, and rentals) their concerns in open-ended questions, I expected answers on Iraq, the national debt, the price of a college education, downsizing and outsourcing to be the most frequent complaints.

And downsizing and outsourcing were mentioned, but by far the biggest complaint was the lack of respect for a person's home, a quality-of-life issue for which residents seek redress from all levels of government.

Complaints ranged from jerks littering on front yards, vandalism, loud music, trespassing, with burglaries rounding out the list.

The consistency is striking, residents in a $500,000 home two blocks down from a $100,000 home share the same anger at toward trespassers, vandals, and people screaming in front of their homes like they're at a Brewer game.

In so many words, people just do not like anyone messing with their homes in which they have carved out their familiar, calming refuge in an increasingly isolated, inequitable society.

via mal contends - Robert Novak opines that "Republican losses in Congress will range from bad to catastrophic ... ," and yet Novak still contends that McCain has an even 50 shot at winning the election because of the static some-five-point-lead Obama has enjoyed at the polls for weeks.

"The complete lack of movement in the national polls is good news for Sen. John McCain and bad news for Sen. Barack Obama, even as the Democrat continues to hold a modest lead," writes Novak, whom we hope stays with us for decades to come.

But since when does a newcomer, non-incumbent presidential nominee blow away his challenger in the polls before the conventions and Labor Day—the first Monday in September. Can anyone name one example?

As Alan Abramowitz, Thomas E. Mann, and Larry J. Sabato write:

Update: Prominent evangelical leaders to McCain: Don't pick Mitt. We don't trust him.

Matt Taibbi in Rolling Stone discusses the failure of John McCain to consolidate his position as GOP nominee with the religious right, asking: Is this the end of the GOP's unholy alliance?

As written here before, though I happen to disagree with their descriptive facts of the world, those of the religious right whom I have met personally (here in Wisconsin) are earnest and well-intentioned, disdainful of cynicism and involved in the concept of community. And they do not respect liars.

And that's why McCain is not playing well.

(H)is basic stump speech doesn't contain a single line about God or religion. McCain is probably the first Republican in modern history to talk more about 'green technology' than about his personal relationship with Jesus Christ. ...

Update: Affirmative distraction

via mal contends - Jesse Helms and the Southern Strategy live.

John McCain just cannot resist that old-time religion used by the GOP in fighting general election presidential campaigns: Race as a wedge issue.

Obama says McCain flip-flops by opposing affirmative action reads a McClatchy headline on a piece by William Douglas, though a more instructive headline is that: McCain did flip-flop on affirmative action.

That flip-flop is a fact, and should be reported as such.

Writes Douglas: