A Civics Test

Another sigh of what is wrong with our country, our leaders are fundelmentally clueless.

US elected officials scored abysmally on a test measuring their civic knowledge, with an average grade of just 44 percent, the group that organized the exam said Thursday.

Ordinary citizens did not fare much better, scoring just 49 percent correct on the 33 exam questions compiled by the Intercollegiate Studies Institute (ISI).

If you are curious, the test is here, and it isn't that hard.

You answered 32 out of 33 correctly — 96.97 %

Average score for this quiz during November: 78.0%
Average score: 78.0%

So you have to wonder how our leaders did so poorly.

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Leadership Sphere: Related Content

Bailing Out CitiBank

Well it seems that we (as a nation) are bailing out another bank, this time to the tune of 325 billion dollars plus (in investment and loan guarantees). One of the justifications made for this huge outlay of taxpayer money is " they are to big to let fail".

It should now be crystal clear to all that mega corporations are a a huge risk to our nation. Once they gain a certain size they can no longer be held accountable to the rules of capitalism and put or economy at risk. We, as a nation should never allow companies to get to big to fail.

But, if this is the case, why did we (as in the US Government) approve the merger of Delta and NorthWest, and why does our government actively support the merger of Wells Fargo and Wachovia? Are we not creating other companies that are going to be to big to fail? And when they hit hard times will they not simply get in line for their taxpayer funded multi-billion dollar payout.


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Some Friday Blog Links

Since I still have not found the time to write much

Band of Butters notes numbers don't lie.


When considering the bail-out of the auto companies, Badtux reminds us to consider the unemployment impact when making decisions.


Crooks and Liars teaches us an important lesson, if you want to get a standing ovation from the US Senate, all you have to do is get convicted of multiple felonies.



an early and incredibly stupid shot in the war on Christmas is dissected at No More Mr. Nice Blog.





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A Center Path

The early appointments in the Obama administration seem to come from the more from the center than the left.

I find this a bit confusing since, according to so many on the right, Obama is a socialist (if not a flat out communist) and is working to create a socialist America, why is he selecting people who are centrist for so many post, does this mean that the center is socialist?

Just a stray thought.


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Obama Administration Sphere: Related Content

Good Friday Morning

Still here, still busy, I hope to have a real post up later today (work willing)

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I Am Alive And Well

(well, at least as well as I ever am)

But overloaded at work, and catching my breath from the last 6-8 weeks. So this is about all I will get done here today.

Everyone have a great Monday.




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Prediction Review

I said

Democrats Gain 8 in the Senate (with no losses)

Right now they are up 6 with three races still being counted or contested. I think I will have been off by 1 or 2 when all is said and done.

Democrats Gain 25 in the House (losing 3 seats)

Well we have gained 23 so far, but lost 4 (1 more than I expected). There are a number of races still in the mix, but I think I will be off by 3 or so when the dust settles.

Obama gets 52% of the popular vote and 364 electoral votes.

Dead on perfect.

Over all not a bad performance overall.


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Election 2008 Sphere: Related Content

More Elections Stats (with Maps)

And these should scare the heck out of Republicans

First the map showing where Republican strength is Growing.


Now, where Democratic Parties strength is moving up.





The Republican party saw growth in the Appalachian Mountains through Tennessee, Arkansas and into Oklahoma. The rest of the US is very blue, including almost the whole of South Carolina.

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Election 2008 Sphere: Related Content

Another Nice Stat About The Vote

America's youth are not real happy with Republicans.

Young voters diverged sharply from the population as a whole, preferring Obama/Biden over McCain/Palin by 66% to 32% in the NEP. This is by far the highest share of the youth vote obtained by any candidate since exit polls began reporting results by age categories in 1976. In past elections from 1976 through 2004, young voters diverged by an average of only 1.8 percentage points from the popular vote as a whole. 2004 had set the previous record for an age gap

A 2 to 1 preference is astounding.



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Election 2008 Sphere: Related Content

A Great Day

A Democrat in the White House, nice gains in the Senate and House and a fresh start for the country.

Obama has been left an absolute mess but this isn't all bad. When you are rebuilding something you also have the opportunity to make needed changes. Since Obama now is faced with rebuilding our economy, our military, our infrastructure our balance sheet and so much more, he will have the opportunity to make the needed changes to grow our country.

Two of the early keys that will indicate if the Obama administration will be a positive one are governance and accountability.

Obama need to run the country with an eye to running the country well. Bush viewed his administrations first job as getting more republicans elected and appointed and hired into government. He did not care if this was good or bad for the nation, only if it benefited his party. Obama can not allow this to happen on his watch. The second issue is, holding those who have misused their authority accountable for their actions. This will be an first step in righting past wrongs and will provide an example to those now holding power and those who will hold power in the future, that violations of the law will not be forgotten or forgiven once the administration changes.

God bless America and God bless Obama, we have a lot of work to do, and we will need all the help we can get.




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Prediction Time

Democrats Gain 8 in the Senate (with no losses)
Democrats Gain 25 in the House (losing 3 seats)
Obama gets 52% of the popular vote and 364 electoral votes.

I hope I am right


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Election 2008 Sphere: Related Content

South Carolina May Not Be A Competive State

But early this morning the turnout at a few of the precincts in my area was astounding. 3 or 4 time the normal amount of voters queued up at just after 7am.

So, join the in crowd and go out and vote today.


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Absolutely Situationaly Unaware

This is a perfect example of one of the many problems with the modern Republican party. To many of their thinkers are as dump as posts. One of the standard questions in polling is the 'is the country moving in the right direction'. In the last month a number of polls have presented us with the response.

Wall St Journal - Wrong Direction 76%
Bloomberg - Wrong Direction 84%
Newsweek - Wrong Direction 86%
Pew - Wrong Direction 86%

AP, CBS, CNN and other have similar numbers. It is clear that the American public, by an overwhelming percentage, are very dissatisfied with the direction our nation is headed.

Now listen to what online editor of the National Review had to say.

We're One Day Away from Changing America

[Kathryn Jean Lopez]

Obama said that a few ago in Florida. Am I the only one who doesn't want to change America in any fundamental way? Does that make me crazy? And alone?

Crazy? well based on much of her work, maybe; Alone, not at all, about 15% of the population are happy with the direction of the country. So she is not alone, but seeing a statement like this from a person who is supposed to be intimately involved in the daily public discourse is astounding.

How stupid and detached from reality do you have to be to say this? Even the Republican candidate try to run on a platform based on change. Yet she apparently is totally unaware of the massive dissatisfaction of the people of Americia with our Republican leadership.

Someone buy this lady a subscription to some media outlet other than Faux News, she needs to be exposed to truth and not dogma based fantasy.



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McCain's Camp, A Stray Thought

Has anyone running for President ever given people fewer reasons to vote for them than John McCain?

He has given us countless number of reasons to vote against Obama (at least a never ending stream of half truths, smears and attacks), but in the last one to two months I do not remember seeing his camp giving a single reason why he should be president.



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GOPs America ?

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Last Minute Moves

It appears that with only 4 days to go until the election that both campaigns are making late media purchases in new areas.

Obama is buying time in Georgia, North Dakota and believe it or not Arizona.

And McCain is adding a state to his media efforts, also Arizona.

You know it isn't going well for McCain when he is having to by add time in his home state with only 4 days to go.

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Election 2008 Sphere: Related Content

GOP Ticket's Appalling Contempt for Knowledge

Christopher Hitchens has a little to say about Sarah.

it didn't seem possible that things could go any lower or get any dumber. But they did last Friday, when, at a speech in Pittsburgh, Gov. Sarah Palin denounced wasteful expenditure on fruit-fly research, adding for good xenophobic and anti-elitist measure that some of this research took place "in Paris, France" and winding up with a folksy "I kid you not."

It was in 1933 that Thomas Hunt Morgan won a Nobel Prize for showing that genes are passed on by way of chromosomes. The experimental creature that he employed in the making of this great discovery was the Drosophila melanogaster, or fruit fly. Scientists of various sorts continue to find it a very useful resource, since it can be easily and plentifully "cultured" in a laboratory, has a very short generation time, and displays a great variety of mutation. This makes it useful in studying disease, and since Gov. Palin was in Pittsburgh to talk about her signature "issue" of disability and special needs, she might even have had some researcher tell her that there is a Drosophila-based center for research into autism at the University of North Carolina. The fruit fly can also be a menace to American agriculture, so any financing of research into its habits and mutations is money well-spent. It's especially ridiculous and unfortunate that the governor chose to make such a fool of herself in Pittsburgh, a great city that remade itself after the decline of coal and steel into a center of high-tech medical research.


...

This is what the Republican Party has done to us this year: It has placed within reach of the Oval Office a woman who is a religious fanatic and a proud, boastful ignoramus. Those who despise science and learning are not anti-elitist. They are morally and intellectually slothful people who are secretly envious of the educated and the cultured. And those who prate of spiritual warfare and demons are not just "people of faith" but theocratic bullies. On Nov. 4, anyone who cares for the Constitution has a clear duty to repudiate this wickedness and stupidity.

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Palin Knifes McCain

I hope John can get a little help getting that knife out of his back.

I am not real sure, but I don't think that it is proper etiquette to announce your intent to run for an office in the next election cycle while you are still supposed to be helping your candidate get elected to that position this year.

But, that is what McCain's lipsticked pitbull just did.

However, based on her past behavior, this should surprise no one. She did this on every step of her rise to the Governor House.


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An Important Fact, Expressed Well

Could it be that Americans are rejecting the far-right Culture War? Could it be that they see through the tactical misinformation and manipulation of the "Culture of Life" and recognize it instead as a Culture of Lies? Even with a McCain victory the trend lines are obvious, the Culture War issues no longer resonate, especially with younger voters.

Let's be clear. I don't know anyone who would take away the right for a person to believe what they choose, to follow their faith, however they interpret it. The Culture of Lies is not about what the far-right believes or their right to believe it. The lies are about how they distort facts trying to impose what they believe on everyone else, taking away other Americans' rights in the process.

If you want to believe dinosaurs and man walked the Earth together 6,000 years ago, when the Earth allegedly began, go right ahead -- but let's not teach that in public schools. If you hold, as a matter of faith, that pregnancy begins at an unknowable moment of conception, most people I know will fight for your right to believe that, but will oppose any effort to impose that ideology over basic medical facts in public policy. If you believe that teens really will remain abstinent and thus need no knowledge of prevention methods, that may work for you, but to continue wasting $1.5 billion dollars on programs that don't achieve that goal, and actually put teens at risk, seems odd to many taxpayers. You believe that gay people "choose" to live a "lifestyle" that subjects them to discrimination, fine. You believe that women should not be allowed to make their own personal life decisions -- that's your choice -- no one is forcing you to use contraception, plan your family, have an abortion, or work outside the home. And at death, should you suffer from a terminal illness and want every possible technology and treatment to keep you alive, no one -- other than your insurance company -- would deny you your belief that only God can end life, no matter how much science you use to keep yourself alive. The question on the table is whether your personal, individual beliefs should apply to everyone else, regardless of their personal, individual and deeply held beliefs.

For a generation, the far-right has promoted the biggest lie of all -- that they are the ones fighting for individual rights, the ones whose values are threatened.

I am not sure I agree that the culture war is being rejected, but the divers behind the war are getting old and dying and as the writer noted, the youth of America, for the most part, reject this silliness.

Overall this article ask for our society to return to using reason not dogma to craft out national policies.

An argument that is one I eagerly embrace.

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A Republican Does Good

I have to spend a moment praising Florida Governor Charlie Crist for doing the right thing and extending the hours of operation of Florida's early voting. The demand has been so great it has been overwhelming the system, it is good to see him making sure those who want to vote have a reasonable time doing so


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Climate Change and Walden Pond

Henry David Thoreau was many things, including a fantastic naturalist. One of the treasures he has passed down to our generation is a collection of documents about the flora around Walden pond. By looking at his data and comparing it to what we can check with current field studies, it is clear that all is not well in Walden.

Comparing data meticulously gathered by Henry David Thoreau more than a century and a half ago with more recent observations, Harvard biologists report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that more than a quarter of Walden's plant species have already been lost. And an additional 36 percent are in imminent danger, including lilacs, roses and buttercups.

"It had been thought that climate change would result in uniform shifts across plant species, but our work shows that plant species do not respond to climate change uniformly or randomly," said co-author Charles Davis, a biologist at Harvard, in a release.

The Walden study shows that even small changes in temperature can have outsized impacts on plants that are evolutionarily adapted to fulfill ecological niches. Together with changes seen in other locations, like the unprecedented pine beetle damage in the West, the new work suggests that finely tuned biological systems are having a difficult time keeping up with the rapid pace of human-induced climate change.

Yet, Sarah Palin claims that this is either not happening or not very important. What an ignorant person she is.


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Another Day Of Economic Instability

Globally the markets are still sliding and the futures in the US look very negative. There is talk of another emergency rate cut in an effort to slow the crash. With any luck we will get a respectable bounce for a little while to at least soften the blows.

In any event, it looks like we will get another week of enjoying the wonders of deregulation.




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"Reality has a Well-Known Liberal Bias."

This little quip or the Mythbuster, Adam Savage's, "I reject your reality and substitute my own" seem to sum up both McCain's run for president, and the right wing mentality that had gripped out nation for the last 8 years.

When confronted with data, if it didn't fit their world view, they rejected it. This was true from war planning, scientific funding, climate issues, tax policy, and about anything else.

Today on Meet the Press we see two very fine examples of this denial in action. First we hear McCain denounce Bush and his policies, again declaring that "I (McCain) am not Bush". This bold statement leaves one to ask; If he is not Bush, and if Bush's policies are so bad, why did he support them over 90% of the time. Why did the self declared 'Maverick' not fight against them, push back and work to block or change them? And more importantly, now that the election is upon us, if Bush's policies are so bad, why does McCain embrace and want to extend so many of them?

The Bush economy is a disaster, this is not questioned by anyone. The cornerstone of Buhs's economic policy are most clearly expressed by 2 key initiatives, tax cuts for the richest Americans funded by increasing our debt, and removal of corporate regulation.

These are also key points in McCain's plan. McCain wants to continue the Bush tax cuts for the hyper rich, and in the last 48 hours has called for a reduction in government regulation of industry (This worked so well on Wall Street, I can see what he liked the idea). My question to McCain is, if you are different from Bush, why are your policies so alike.

The second moment of McCain denying reality was when he was asked about the polling covering both the election overall and the various issues people are interested in. In every area Obama was favored, often by massive margins. When confronted by the facts of what the polls were saying, McCain did not try to modify his message, did not try to argue that despite these results, his ideas were unpopular but right, he tried to deny the validity of the polls, except for the single national election poll showing him just a few points down.

To fix any problem the first thing that you have to do is be able to understand it. If you refuse to accept reality and insist on trying to substitute your own, the problem will not get solved and very likely will simply get worse.

This has been the operational pattern we have seen the last 8 years, can we afford 4-8 more years of willful ignorance.


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Fraud, Voter, Voter Registration and Acorn

Of course while this is a regular lie told by the right and it is getting a lot of attention this cycle, even getting repeated by Palin and McCain, it is just one of the many lies and smears getting a lot of play.


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The Gullibility of Blogs

There have been a couple of news stories in the last week or so that show just how gullible and how willing to believe any smear that some blogers are. This happens on both the right and left but it appears to me that the majority of the tin-foil hat conspiracy brigade are from the right. These recent event provide more evidence to this view.

Both of these stories originated in right wing press outlets (NY Post and Drunge), and quickly hit talk radio (Rush and others) and moved to the blog pages. This is the echo chamber that right is famous for.

The first story was a supposed receipt for a lavish dinner in NY that Mrs. Obama was said to have ordered. The meal included expensive caviar and other pricey items. Copies of this charge for were splashed across blogs, including at least one here in S.C. It fits into the naritive or elitism, so it must be true.

Unfortunatly for these folks, they were so eager for a story that they never bothered to check it there was any chance that Mrs. Obama was even in New York, she wasn't. The story was exposed for the lie it was.

Well today it happened again. Fox news pimped a story hard, and the Columbia Conservative and many other blogs latched onto the story of a poor little white girl who claimed she was mugged by a big scary black man, then assaulted for having a McCain bumper sticker on her car. Those who ran with this story said it confirmed their belief that Obama's followers where just waiting for the opportunity to attack. It is race baiting of the highest order, something the McCain camp has been doingfor weeks, but this time it was done so poorly that it has exposed something very ugly in the way so many of them think.

Such foolishness is disturbing to watch and I must admit that a number of right wing blogers refused to get sucked into this lie. Those were the wise ones. Mnay others embraced this story, including the McCain camp, with both candidates apparently calling the girl to commensurate with her.

But, the plain truth is she lied, and has been caught.

I wonder if the blogs who ran with this have the courage to publish corrections, rather than delete the post.




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Your Friday Reading Selections

BadTux quickly debunks the right wing myth that the economic collapse is the fault of the poor.


Vote fraud and Acorn are looked at at Dispatches from the Culture Wars.


From Informed Comment, a look at McCain Feingold and how Sarah Palin's $150,000 shopping spree broke that law.


And a look at the current economic situation and it's effect on education can be found in Millard Filmore's Bathtub.

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The Ax Will Soon Fall, Layoff Talk

There was a old joke about how to break bad news gently, and how badly this one person fails at doing it.

A fellow is going away for a vacation for a couple of weeks and he has his best friend look after his house. you know, water the plants feed the pets and all the rest of it. He’s gone for a couple of days and he gets a phone call from the fellow tending to the house.

He says, “I gotta tell you, I’ve got bad news – your cat’s dead.” The guy was traumatized.

So the next year when he was getting ready to go on vacation he says, “I’m going to be going again. I want you to watch the house, look after things. But if anything bad happens, you’ve go to give it to me in small bits, just a little at a time. Like with the cat – you call me up and you say, “Your cat’s dead!” Instead, say “Your cat went up on the roof.” Then, call me back later and said, “ the fire department came to rescue your cat.” a little later call back and “the cat fell off the roof.” the after telling me we are headed to the vets you can say “Your cat’s dead”. That way I could have prepared myself rather than being so shocked. The guy said, “Okay. I’ll do that I understand.”

So he goes on vacation for a couple of weeks but has only been away for a couple of days and he picks up the phone and it’s his friend who’s looking after the house, and the fella says,


“I’ve got news for you. Your mother’s on the roof.”

We had a department meeting this morning that was very much like that; Our people are our most valuable resource, you are all vital to our operations, but

We may have to consider 'Reduction in force', furloughs, early retirement and other measures.

I think I am on the roof.

PS, I did hear that Wall St. Executives will only get about 70,000,000,000.00 in bonus pay this year. I wonder if I they may be hiring.

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Employment Sphere: Related Content

More on Voter Fraud

Keith Olbermann looks at the issue, and reminds us that when it come to voter fraud, the Republicans are experts.

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Putting Personal Gain First

Wow, if Mark Sanford had tried to pull the stunts that Sarah Palin has tried as the Governor of Alaska, he would have been drawn and quartered.

Gov. Sarah Palin charged the state for her children to travel with her, including to events where they were not invited, and later amended expense reports to specify that they were on official business.

Lets see, she charged the state for family travel, and then after the fact 'corrected' the paper work to cover her rear end. And, by the way, what kind of official state business can a 2nd grader do?

The charges included costs for hotel and commercial flights for three daughters to join Palin to watch their father in a snowmobile race, and a trip to New York, where the governor attended a five-hour conference and stayed with 17-year-old Bristol for five days and four nights in a luxury hotel.

In all, Palin has charged the state $21,012 for her three daughters' 64 one-way and 12 round-trip commercial flights since she took office in December 2006. She also has charged the state for hotel rooms for the girls.

While it appears that see may not have broken a single state law, it does bring me to question both her judgement and ethics. Why should the people of Alaska pay to have her kids go see her father race, or visit New York. There is nothing wrong with having her kids travel with her, but she, not the tax-payers would foot the bill.

Just another reason why the selection of Palin is damning to McCain's claim that she was a well thought out and completely reasonable selection as a running mate. For as bad as Palin's judgment appears to be, McCain's appears even worse.





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Election 2008, McCain, Palin Sphere: Related Content

Calling Them Out For Their Hate

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