Palin Alaska Rallies: Two Very Different Perspectives

by: mooncat

Sun Sep 14, 2008 at 15:43:00 PM CDT

Sarah Palin had a rally in Anchorage, Alaska yesterday.  Alaska blog Mudflats covered it.  So did Brett Blackledge, former Birmingham News star reporter and digger of dirt on Don Siegelman, now with the AP.

This is from Blackledge's report:

Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, who came to the friendly turf of her home state for her first campaign venture without John McCain, told supporters at a farewell rally Saturday that she'd return at the end of the campaign.

"We've got a little travel coming the next 52 days," Palin, Alaska's governor, told a cheering crowd of more than 2,000 gathered at the city convention center.

Alaska blog Mudflats also filed a report from Palin's Sept. 13 rally, with photos.  The capacity of this room is 5000 -- does that look like 2000 to you?

I walked in to the large “Eklutna Room” where the rally was to be held. More TV cameras than I have ever seen in my life were set up on risers all around the room. The room itself, when filled to capacity, holds 5000 people. I tried to eyeball it, and I’d guess there were 1000 or so there. Everyone was pushed into the center of the room where the podium was set up.

Next, Blackledge and Mudflats describe the Alaska Women Reject Palin Rally, also yesterday in Anchorage.

Madison County Democratic HQ Grand Opening

by: mooncat

Sat Sep 13, 2008 at 18:57:11 PM CDT

Y'all may have noticed my light posting this week.  It isn't that I've given up blogging, just that my county party has been getting ready for the Grand Opening (even though we've been "open" for about a month) of our 2008 Democratic Headquarters .  Today was the big day and it was a huge success. 

I won't even hazard a guess at how many people showed up for the official ceremony this morning but it was an impressive turnout.  Close to 100 people filled out volunteer forms, just today, and the crowd didn't leave right after the shindig either.  The office was full all day and we practically had to shove people out the door at closing time so the volunteers who had been there since 9 am could finally go home and put our feet up.  Or whatever.  I'm doing whatever.

Statewide and Madison County Democratic candidates attended, including: 

• Deborah Bell Paseur, Supreme Court, Place 1
  
• Clyde Jones, Court of Criminal Appeals, Place 1
  
• Reta McKannan, Madison County District Judge, Place 2
  
• Cynthia Rena Webb, Madison County District Judge, Place 1
  
• Lynda Hall, Tax Collector
• Fran Hamilton, Tax Assessor
• Mark Craig, License Director
• Jerry Craig, County Commisioner
• Richard Showers, City Council
• Bob Harrison, County Commissioner who spoke on behalf of Sen. Vivian Figures (U.S. Senate)
• Justin Saia, who spoke on behalf of Parker Griffith (U.S. Congress)
  
• Richard Smith, Chairman of Alabama Veterans for Obama
  

The enthusiasm level is extremely high -- really heartwarming.  If y'all aren't already helping out in your county, you're missing a bet.  Look them up in the phone book or on the internet if you don't know where they are.  Lots of pictures below the fold. 

"No Change" inTroy King's Status with McCain Campaign

by: mooncat

Mon Jul 14, 2008 at 17:25:00 PM CDT

I confess to being very skeptical of the "computer glitch" explanation for the disappearance of the John McCain press release naming Troy King as the campaign's chairman for Alabama.  I mean, how gullible do they think we are?  Juicy rumors start circulating online about King (the same ones that have been circulating offline for weeks) and suddenly this page disappears from McCain's website and we're told it's a coincidence?  An accident of programming?  Kind of like WHNT's blackout of the Don Siegelman story on 60 minutes.  Apparently it really was accidental, but the timing was awfully suspicious.

Inquire as to state contact information for Alabama at johnmccain.com and you are directed to this page.  Not Alabama, but the Southeastern region, apparently run out of Florida.  Our researcher checked with them today.  When asked if Troy King was still the McCain Chairman for Alabama, as had been announced in the Jan. 29, 2008 release, the McCain staffer made inquiries, then said there had been "no change."  So, McCain is standing by Troy King in his time of trouble.  Presumably Troy will be heading to the Republican Convention in Minneapolis in his role as McCain delegate and Alabama McCain Chairman, too.

As to the computer glitch story, it's hard to believe, but given the level of computer genius in the McCain outfit, it could probably happen.  They've had website issues before, see here, here, here, here, and here.  From the New York Times:

[McCain] said, ruefully, that he had not mastered how to use the Internet and relied on his wife and aides like Mark Salter, a senior adviser, and Brooke Buchanan, his press secretary, to get him online to read newspapers (though he prefers reading those the old-fashioned way) and political Web sites and blogs.

“They go on for me,” he said. “I am learning to get online myself, and I will have that down fairly soon, getting on myself. I don’t expect to be a great communicator, I don’t expect to set up my own blog, but I am becoming computer literate to the point where I can get the information that I need.”

Asked which blogs he read, he said: “Brooke and Mark show me Drudge, obviously. Everybody watches, for better or for worse, Drudge. Sometimes I look at Politico. Sometimes RealPolitics.”

... Mr. McCain said he did not use a BlackBerry, though he regularly reads messages on those of his aides. “I don’t e-mail, I’ve never felt the particular need to e-mail,” Mr. McCain said.

Advice to Vivian Figures' Campaign

by: mooncat

Tue Jun 17, 2008 at 13:18:18 PM CDT

From a blogger ...

(This advice is from Ben Goshi, currently at the mercy of a computer that won't let him log in to Left in Alabama, received via email) 

Were I Figures' manager I'd make this about two things:
 
  1.  Sessions will do ANYTHING to suck up to the oil companies that are gouging Alabamians, Vivian figures will (A) not suck-up to them and (B) introduce and/or support legislation to make an "Apollo-type" project of alternative fuels and energy in order to break the Mid-East & Exxon Stranglehold on the US consumer and national security.  This can, and with the right advocate in the Senate (which Sessions would never be), will also bring thousands of jobs to Alabama (green tech, "green collar" jobs, R&D, wind turbine plants, bio-fuels plants...).  Sessions' answer:  turn the Gulf of Mexico, right off Alabama's coast, into Baku (find a really horrid photo of "Oil Rocks", post it and say:  Sessions' dream for Alabama's coast).  Which vision of Alabama's, and America's, future do you embrace?  Depending on that, vote accordingly.

[BenGoshi says the picture of Baku below is one of the pretty ones.  Ick! -- Mooncat]

  2.  Jeff Sessions is, indeed, a fighter:  AGAINST health and education benefits for our Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen (and women) and Marines.  He has fought, tooth and nail, to derail Former Reagan Navy Secretary, Sen. Jim Webb's, New GI Bill.  This round, Sessions and his Anti-Vet friends in the Senate won.  Next time, with Senators who *really* support our troops in a greater majority, WE, and our troops will win.  Vivian Figures will be on the side of our troops when we say, "Good RIDdence!" to Jeff Sessions.
 
That'd be pretty much it.  I'd put Sessions on the defensive ALL of the time and never, ever, ever, concede ANY point.  And when Sessions all "gets the vapors" at such "outlandish" accusations, Figures and her campaign people should say, "Sorry, Jeff, it's YOU who chose to stand up for Exxon and Saudi power and AGAINST Alabamians.  It's YOU who chose to stand against our vets, who've given so much, often including their lives.  So don't go all gettin' the vapors on me, Jeff!"

Don't forget to vote for Vivian Figures TODAY in the Pick  a Progressive Patriot contest!!

A meditation on a missed opportunity, or, Republican Wind

by: herding old cats

Tue May 13, 2008 at 22:53:40 PM CDT

John McCain made a speech yesterday in Portland, Oregon, on the subject of climate change (energy policy will be a different speech) and how to deal with it.

Now,  in all fairness, John McCain is actually admitting that global warming is happening, and that we will all need to adapt.  That is a big step from Cheney's "The American way of life is non-negotiable" in that it recognizes that the Laws of Thermodynamics,  Ohm's Law, and Newton's Laws of Motion trump the unitary executive every time.

But, I digress.  The subject is to be missed opportunity.

The venue for McCain's speech was the Vestas wind turbine plant in Portland.  Vestas is a Danish company that has been producing wind turbines for electrical power since the late 1970s.

Now, in the 1970s, American companies were getting serious about wind power and its potential as a growth market.   But fast forward 30 years...

Disinformation and Dirty Tricks

by: herding old cats

Thu Jan 10, 2008 at 23:14:34 PM CST

The Internet is a wonderful tool to connect activists working together for a noble cause.  It is also a terrifically effective crap distribution system, rivalling the best sewage systems in the world.

Snopes is an excellent resource for fact-checking.  The denizens of the spittle-flecked outer moon of Planet Wingnut have learned about this and are adopting it as thier own.  Apparently all you need to do to establish rock solid credibility is reference www.snopes.com in your slanderous e-mail.  Then, you're home free, you and all your invisible secret friends from the 23.7th  dimension

Dollars per Vote, Dollars per Delegate, New Hampshire Edition

by: herding old cats

Tue Jan 08, 2008 at 23:33:56 PM CST

 Now the New Hampshire primary has come and gone.

The vote totals, from CNN were:

93,617 for Obama

100,541 for Clinton

43,432 for Edwards

11,735 for Richardson

67,749 for Romney

79,350 for McCain

18,413 for Giuliani

16,361 for Paul

23,811 for Huckabee

These are totals with 89% of precincts reporting for both sides - I gotta get up in the morning.  I'll leave the effect of the last 11% to all you political hoot owls. The delegate count used in the calculations below matches CNN's figures.

On the Democratic side, delegates are awarded proportionally with a minimum requirement of 15% to get delegates.  On the Republican side, the delegates are awarded proportionally with a minimum requirement of 10%. New Hampshire has 22 pledged Democratic delegates and 12 pledged Republican delegates.

From Graniteprof, here is what the candidates have spent on TV ads:

Obama: $2.1 million

Hillary Clinton: $1.65 million

John Edwards: $1.2 million

Bill Richardson: $700,000

Mitt Romney: $3.9 million 

 John McCain: $1.1 million

Rudy Giuliani: Just under $1 million

Ron Paul: $270,000

Mike Huckabee: $160,000

Caveat: These are TV ads on WMUR, the only commercial station in New Hampshire with statewide reach.  Part of New Hampshire is in the Boston media market, but I could not find expenditures by the campaigns on Boston stations. These amounts represent only the supposedly less expensive all-New-Hampshire market.  That should make them all apples to apples comparisons, anyway.

 So, we crunch the numbers and we get:

Obama spent $22.43 per vote, Clinton spent $16.41 per vote, Edwards spent $27.63 per vote, and Richardson spent $59.65 per vote. For each delegate, Obama spent $233K, Clinton spent $183K, and Edwards spent $300K.  It looks like Richardson did not get any delegates.

Romney spent $57.75 per vote, McCain spent $13.86 per vote, Giuliani spent $54.31 per vote, Paul spent $16.50 per vote, and Huckabee spent $6.72 per vote.  For each delegate, Romney spent $975K, McCain spent $157K and Huckabee spent $160K.  Giuliani and Paul did not get any delegates.

Of the candidates who did manage to get delegates, Romney is clearly getting the least bang for his megabucks, by quite a margin.  He might as well stand in the median of I-89 burning $50 bills.