When test scores seem too good to believe

Read the original story here.

MILFORD, Ohio — Scott Mueller seemed to have an uncanny sense about what his students should study to prepare for upcoming state skills tests.

By 2010, the teacher had spent his 16-year career entirely at Charles Seipelt Elementary School. Like other Seipelt teachers, Mueller regularly wrote study guides for his classes ahead of state tests.

On test day last April, several fifth-graders immediately recognized some of the questions on their math tests. The questions were the same as those on the study guide Mueller had given out the day before. Some numbers on the actual tests were identical to those in the study guide and the questions were in the same order, the kids told other Seipelt teachers. 

The report of possible cheating quickly reached district officials, who put Mueller on paid leave. He initially denied any wrongdoing. Ultimately, investigators concluded that Mueller had looked at questions for both fifth-grade math and science tests in advance — a violation of testing rules — and then copied them, sometimes word for word, into a school computer to develop his study guides. 

The 50-year-old teacher resigned. He signed a consent agreement with the Ohio State Board of Education admitting that, by looking at the 2010 tests in advance to prepare study guides, he had "engaged in conduct unbecoming a licensed educator." His teaching license was suspended for three months.

At Seipelt, as in other schools nationwide, young students tipped off officials that something was amiss. Yet if anyone had taken a closer look at the past few years' scores, they might have noticed other testing irregularities at Seipelt.  

In several grades, standardized test scores at Seipelt fluctuated year to year, sometimes rising sharply, then falling, according to data USA TODAY obtained from the Ohio Department of Education. 

In 2005, for example, the school's third-graders tested in the 67th percentile statewide in math. As fourth-graders a year later, when Mueller was one of their teachers, their scores jumped to the 97th percentile, among the best in the state. As fifth-graders in 2007, the scores plunged to the 49th percentile. Then, in 2008, when they were in sixth grade, their scores climbed again to the 90th percentile. 

Seipelt's gains and losses are typical of a pattern uncovered by a USA TODAY investigation of the standardized tests of millions of students in six states and the District of Columbia. The newspaper identified 1,610 examples of anomalies in which public school classes — a school's entire fifth grade, for example — boasted what analysts regard as statistically rare, perhaps suspect, gains on state tests. 

Such anomalies surfaced in Washington, D.C., and each of the states — Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Michigan and Ohio — where USA TODAY analyzed test scores. For each state, the newspaper obtained three to seven years' worth of scores. There were another 317 examples of equally large, year-to-year declines in an entire grade's scores. 

USA TODAY used a methodology widely recognized by mathematicians, psychometricians and testing companies. It compared year-to-year changes in test scores and singled out grades within schools for which gains were 3 standard deviations or more from the average statewide gain on that test. In layman's language, that means the students in that grade showed greater improvement than 99.9% of their classmates statewide.

The higher the standard deviation, the rarer that improvement is. In dozens of cases, USA TODAY found 5, 6 and even 7 standard deviations, making those gains even more exceptional.

Large year-to-year jumps in test scores by an entire grade should raise red flags, especially if scores drop in later grades, says Brian Jacob, director of the Center on Local, State and Urban Policy at the University of Michigan. Such fluctuations by themselves do not prove there was cheating, but Jacob says they offer "a reasonable way to identify suspicious things" that should be investigated.

Education reformers say a surge in scores is possible without cheating. Mike Feinberg, the Houston-based founder of the Knowledge Is Power Program (KIPP), a 99-school chain of charter schools widely recognized for raising test scores, says "remarkable growth" is possible with "great teaching and more of it." Where you have "just an amazing teacher who can motivate his kids to really work hard," classes can see gains that might seem "unbelievable" at first glance. 

If big gains were followed by deep losses, Feinberg cautioned, you'd have to ask, "What were the adults doing that might not have been … ethical?" 

"You know something is profoundly different" at schools with spikes in scores, says John Tanner of Test Sense, a San Antonio consulting firm that works with schools nationwide. But, if an investigation shows the school is making "profound changes" commensurate with the gains, "I would give them the benefit of the doubt," he adds.

Others are more skeptical. "An individual student can exceed beyond their wildest dreams in any given year, but when a whole group shifts its position dramatically, you have to worry," says John Fremer, president of Caveon Test Security, a Utah company hired by states and school districts to investigate test irregularities.

Thomas Haladyna, a professor emeritus at Arizona State University, says test gains of 3 standard deviations or more for an entire grade are "so incredible that you have to ask yourself, 'How can this be real?' " 

Haladyna says such a spike in scores would be like finding "a weight-loss clinic where you lose 100 pounds a day."

In the past decade, similar score spikes uncovered by The Dallas Morning News and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, using the same methods as USA TODAY, led state officials in Texas and Georgia to conduct major probes of hundreds of schools. Most recently, Atlanta Public Schools Superintendent Beverly Hall annouced she will step down in June, following inquries by federal and state investigators of alleged cheating at 58 Atlanta schools. 

In Ohio, data show that two of Seipelt Elementary's score fluctuations — the fifth-graders' 48-percentile decline in 2007 and the 41-percentile climb in sixth grade a year later — registered more than 3 standard deviations. School Principal Melissa Borger attributed the fifth-grade decline to inexperienced teachers, the sixth-grade jump to a teacher with 25 years' experience teaching math.

School and district officials here said they saw no reason to suspect that any of their teachers cheated before 2010. Robert Farrell, superintendent of the Milford school district, said in an interview with The Cincinnati Enquirer, a partner of USA TODAY on this project, that he considered Mueller's transgression a one-time event. Mueller did not respond to requests for comment from the Enquirer.

The 66 fifth-graders who used Mueller's study guides had to retake their math and science tests, at a total cost of $3,300. They passed with high marks.

Cause for celebration

Dramatic test improvements are usually causes for celebration.

That's because of the increasingly high stakes attached to the tests required under the federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) law. Although most school districts retain the power to hire and fire teachers, 10 states now require that student scores be the main criterion in teacher evaluations. Some states and districts reward educators for raising scores; a teacher may earn a bonus of as much as $25,000 in Washington, D.C., if his or her students' scores climb. NCLB also puts principals' jobs on the line if students' scores don't improve. Most of the 130 Detroit public schools closed since 2005 were cited for having low test scores. 

The Obama administration has begun doling out extra money to the states that tie teacher evaluations to test scores. At the same time, NCLB's harshest penalties for underachieving schools and teachers are about to kick in: By 2014, the law dictates, 100% of public school students must be "proficient" in math and reading. If not, a school can face replacement of its entire staff. 

Given the mounting pressure on teachers, principals and superintendents to produce high scores, "no one has incentives to vigorously pursue" testing irregularities, says Gregory Cizek, a professor at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill who studies cheating. "In fact, there's a strong disincentive."

Fremer, the Caveon executive, says the idea of investigating high scores seems silly to most educators. 

"Scores are going up? Good. Scores are going down? Bad. And you want me to investigate when scores are going up? What's the matter with you?"

Investigations can be time-consuming and expensive. In Michigan, the average cost for an investigation ranges from "several hundred to a few thousand dollars," says Joseph Martineau, director of the Office of Educational Assessment & Accountability. He told the Detroit Free Press, another USA TODAY partner, that the costs include hiring "independent investigators who are former school administrators and have been trained in police investigation methods."

John Boivin, administrator of California's standardized testing program, says his state once conducted random test audits at 150 to 200 schools a year. California dropped the audits two years ago because of record budget deficits. And the state no longer collects data on which schools show unusually high rates of erasures on answer sheets — sometimes a clue, experts say, that either students or school officials might be cheating. Total savings: $105,000.

Even when suspicious scores are investigated, it can be hard to identify a culprit unless someone confesses. Ed Roeber, who headed Michigan's testing program for nearly 20 years, says evidence of cheating is almost always circumstantial. "It's very difficult to prove," Roeber says. "Often what you end up with is the feeling that something might have happened, but I don't know for sure and, even if I did, I couldn't prove it in a court of law."

That result frustrated him, Roeber says. "It made me angry because you were cheating kids. You're not finding out if they need help. You're painting this picture that is incorrect."

In states, parties clash over voting laws that call for IDs, limits on where college students can cast ballots

Read original story here.

New Hampshire's new Republican state House speaker is pretty clear about what he thinks of college kids and how they vote. They're "foolish," Speaker William O'Brien said in a recent speech to a tea party group. 

"Voting as a liberal. That's what kids do," he added, his comments taped by a state Democratic Party staffer and posted on YouTube. Students lack "life experience," and "they just vote their feelings." 

New Hampshire House Republicans are pushing for new laws that would prohibit many college students from voting in the state - and effectively keep some from voting at all. 

One bill would permit students to vote in their college towns only if they or their parents had previously established permanent residency there - requiring all others to vote in the states or other New Hampshire towns they come from. Another bill would end Election Day registration, which O'Brien said unleashes swarms of students on polling places, creating opportunities for fraud. 

The measures in New Hampshire are among dozens of voting-related bills being pushed by newly empowered Republican state lawmakers across the country - prompting partisan clashes akin to those already roiling in some states over GOP moves to curb union power. 

Backers of the voting measures say they would bring fairness and restore confidence in a voting system vulnerable to fraud. Many states, for instance, do not require identification to vote. Measures being proposed in 32 states would add an ID requirement or proof of citizenship, according to an analysis by the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University. 

"I want to know when I walk into the poll that they know I am who I say I am and that nobody else has said that they are me," said North Carolina state Rep. Ric Killian (R), who is preparing to introduce legislation that would require voters to show a photo ID at the polls. 

Democrats charge that the real goal, as with anti-union measures in Wisconsin, Ohio and elsewhere, is simply to deflate the power of core Democratic voting blocs - in this case young people and minorities. For all the allegations of voter fraud, Democrats and voting rights groups say, there is scant evidence to show that it is a problem. 

"It's a war on voting," said Thomas Bates, vice president of Rock the Vote, a youth voter- registration group mounting a campaign to fight the array of state measures. "We'd like to be advocating for a 21st-century voting system, but here we are fighting against efforts to turn it back to the 19th century." 

The debate over voter fraud has become a perennial issue since the contested 2000 presidential election. While limited by federal law and court rulings, states have authority over how they run elections. Although elections officials say there are occasional cases of fraud, experts say the battle lines are drawn largely along deeply partisan - and largely theoretical - lines. 

"Election policy debates like photo ID and same-day registration have become so fierce around the country because they are founded more on passionate belief than proven fact," said Doug Chapin, an election-law expert at the Pew Center on the States. "One side is convinced fraud is rampant; the other believes that disenfranchisement is widespread. Neither can point to much in the way of evidence to support their position, so they simply turn up the volume." 

Implications for 2012

The disputes are taking on national implications. Several states where newly empowered Republicans are pushing voter legislation, such as New Hampshire, Wisconsin and North Carolina, are expected to be battlegrounds in the 2012 presidential race. Democrats say the voters most likely to be affected are core pieces of President Obama's base. 

An analysis by the North Carolina State Board of Elections showed that any new law requiring a state-issued ID could be problematic for large numbers of voters, particularly African Americans, whose turnout in 2008 helped Obama win the state. 

Blacks account for about one-fifth of the North Carolina electorate but are a larger share - 27 percent - of the approximately 1 million voters who may lack a state-issued ID or whose names do not exactly match the Division of Motor Vehicles database. The analysis found about 556,000 voters with no record of an ID issued by the DMV. 

Republican lawmakers in North Carolina had pledged to make a photo ID bill a top priority for their new majority, but they have yet to release a plan, with the caucus deliberating over how restrictive it should be. The issue could present a dilemma for Democratic Gov. Bev Perdue, who would have to choose between signing or vetoing a bill that would be popular with swing voters but that could dampen turnout of voters she needs to win reelection next year. 

In Wisconsin, a photo-ID bill backed by the state's new GOP majority would not permit voters to use school-issued student cards. The measure would allow for other IDs, such as passports, but opponents say thousands of students who do not have Wisconsin driver's licenses or passports would face unfair hurdles that would keep many of them from voting.

Republican state Sen. Mary Lazich, who heads the chamber's elections committee, said the legislation is designed to prevent irregularities, such as allegations that votes have been cast by the deceased. She said she hoped to work with university officials to allow student IDs at some point. 

Student groups are rallying opposition, distributing fliers on campuses and creating Facebook pages to pressure lawmakers. 

"It's no coincidence that some of the groups being targeted and that would be most affected by the bill are more Democratic generally," said Sam Polstein, 19, a University of Wisconsin sophomore from New York who is helping to organize the protests. 

Opponents are also using a tea party twist - cost - to try to defeat the bill. 

States that require voter IDs also must be willing to pay for them, the result of a court ruling that declared part of Georgia's ID law unconstitutional because people lacking IDs would have to pay for cards themselves - creating, in effect, a poll tax. A legislative analysis shows the Wisconsin measure would cost the state $2.7 million a year.

The Wisconsin bill is poised for passage in the state Senate but is stalled because of the legislative standoff between Republican Gov. Scott Walker and state Senate Democrats over his plan to roll back public-sector unions' collective-bargaining rights. 

The outcome could be particularly critical in Wisconsin. Though Obama won the state easily in 2008, strategists in both parties expect his reelection contest to be much closer. In 2004, the Democratic nominee, Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.), won there by just 11,000 votes, a margin easily covered just by the 17,000 out-of-state students who attend the University of Wisconsin's campus in Madison. 

New Hampshire bill

In New Hampshire, the measure that covers college students also targets members of the military who are temporarily stationed in the state. But there are no major military installations there, and GOP lawmakers have reserved their criticisms for the voting behavior of students - leading even some college-age Republicans to fight back. 

"There's no doubt that this bill would help Republican causes," said Richard Sunderland III, head of the College Republicans at Dartmouth College. But, he added, "this doesn't help if the Republican Party wants to try to win over people in the 18-to-24 age range." 

After posting O'Brien's comments about college students on the Internet, state Democratic Party officials accused the GOP of pushing the legislation to rig elections. Voting rights advocates have noted that the courts have affirmed the rights of students to vote where they live. 

A spokeswoman for O'Brien said he had not endorsed specific legislation but had spoken out in favor generally of tightening state voting laws. 

Same-day registration "coupled with a lax definition of residency creates an environment in which people may be claiming residency in multiple locations," O'Brien said in a written statement from his office. He added that changing the law "is not an idea targeting any particular political party or ideology." 

Still, the sponsor of the measure, state Rep. Gregory Sorg, addressing a packed public hearing room late last month, focused his ire directly at the college set. 

Average taxpayers in college towns, he said, are having their votes "diluted or entirely canceled by those of a huge, largely monolithic demographic group . . . composed of people with a dearth of experience and a plethora of the easy self-confidence that only ignorance and inexperience can produce." 

Their "youthful idealism," he added, "is focused on remaking the world, with themselves in charge, of course, rather than with the mundane humdrum of local government."

Secret to a happy marriage? Delusion.

Read the original story here.

We’ve all seen those mismatched couples — where the husband is 10 times better looking than the wife. Or where she’s an absolute sweetheart, and he’s a total jerk. What does she see in him?, we think. What does he see in her?

If the couple is happily married, it could be that the better half of the couple has an idealistic vision of the lesser half. New research published in Psychological Science oddly enough finds that people who were, well, a bit delusional about their partners when they got married were more satisfied with their marriage three years later than those see-it-like-it-is realists.

University of Buffalo researchers recruited 222 couples heading in to apply for marriage licenses to fill out surveys on themselves, their partner, and their marriage every six months for three years. They then compared the self-ratings of respondents in terms of intelligence, creativity, athletic skills, etc., with how their spouse rated their attributes.

Those who inflated their partner’s assets also reported being more happily married. “People are very good at changing their definitions to match how they want to see themselves or how they want to see others,’’ lead study author Sandra Murray says in a statement. They can decide their spouse is the perfect match for them, even if they clash pretty badly.

Seeing a partner with rose-colored glasses could help protect against that decline in marital satisfaction that sets in almost as soon as the honeymoon bags are unpacked. “Seeing a less-than-ideal partner as a reflection of one’s ideals predicted a certain level of immunity to the corrosive effects of time,’’ write the researchers in the study.

They say there’s a case to be made for encouraging couples to maintain “positive, even unrealistic, perceptions’’ of each other to stay satisfied over the long haul.

And I have to admit, it does make sense. Thinking your partner isn’t good enough for you may entice you to seek out a better partner. Thinking that person is better than what’s out there might encourage you to stay and be more satisfied.

By the same token, inflating an insecure partner’s sense of self — by expressing your own delusional beliefs — will lessen that person’s fear of abandonment.

I’m just wondering if couples heading for a breakup can really transform that contempt into starry-eyed romance. The researchers say yes. “People have the power to shape their romantic fates through their behavior,’’ they write. “Indeed, the behaviors that sustain relationships (e.g., being supportive) and the behaviors that undermine relationships (e.g., being critical) are controllable ones.’’

NY Time's Paul Krugman has the fix for the Economy

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2011/03/07/krugmans-economic-fix-isnt-education-its-more-unions-and-universal-he


Paul Krugman's Marxist Economic Fix: More Unions and Free Healthcare


New York Times columnist Paul Krugman doesn't believe education is the key to solving America's economic woes.

Quite the contrary, in his recent article "Degrees and Dollars[1]," the Nobel Laureate argued that the path to a more prosperous nation is for unions to have increased bargaining power and for everyone to have "free" healthcare:

It is a truth universally acknowledged that education is the key to economic success. Everyone knows that the jobs of the future will require ever higher levels of skill. That’s why, in an appearance Friday with former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, President Obama declared that “If we want more good news on the jobs front then we’ve got to make more investments in education.”

But what everyone knows is wrong.

Krugman then laid out the major flaw in this premise: technological advancements are diminishing the value of education. With each new piece of software being created, some workers are becoming obsolete:

[A]ny routine task — a category that includes many white-collar, nonmanual jobs — is in the firing line. Conversely, jobs that can’t be carried out by following explicit rules — a category that includes many kinds of manual labor, from truck drivers to janitors — will tend to grow even in the face of technological progress.

And here’s the thing: Most of the manual labor still being done in our economy seems to be of the kind that’s hard to automate. Notably, with production workers in manufacturing down to about 6 percent of U.S. employment, there aren’t many assembly-line jobs left to lose. Meanwhile, quite a lot of white-collar work currently carried out by well-educated, relatively well-paid workers may soon be computerized.

So, technology, in Krugman's view, is destroying the marketplace for well-educated, well-paid, white-collar jobs. The problem is what's left won't be able to make enough money to really prosper.

But Krugman has a solution:

We need to restore the bargaining power that labor has lost over the last 30 years, so that ordinary workers as well as superstars have the power to bargain for good wages. We need to guarantee the essentials, above all health care, to every citizen.

The end of that first sentence deserves repeating: "so that ordinary workers as well as superstars have the power to bargain for good wages."

And therein lies the real truth.

Folks like Krugman aren't interested in prosperity. Frankly, they loathe it.

Instead, they want to make sure that the less-skilled in our society make as much as the "superstars." This is why they advocate unions and shun things such as merit increases and employee evaluations.

People making more money because they work harder offend folks like Krugman as does the idea that "ordinary workers" might be terminated for below average performance.

"From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs."

That's what Karl Marx wrote in his infamous "Critique of the Gotha Program," and Krugman couldn't agree more.

Scarier still is that this is how most of the media think as well as today's Democrat Party and White House resident.

This should tell you why the Left have made Wisconsin a battleground, for the preservation and expansion of unions is the next step in "solving" our economic problems after forcing ObamaCare down the throats of the citizenry.

And they wonder why a movement has formed to take back America.


References

^ Degrees and Dollars (www.nytimes.com)


Read more: http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2011/03/07/krugmans-economic-fix-isnt-education-its-more-unions-and-universal-he#ixzz1FvvYSoBl

The Argument Against Organic Food

H/T to SMS:

The Argument Against Organic Food

http://www.epicurious.com/articlesguides/blogs/editor/2009/02/the-argument-ag.html

by Michael Y. Park
on 02/24/09 at 02:37 PM

Leave it to Cracked.com, of all places, to lay out a cogent and pithy (and, in some places, flawed) argument against organic foods.

You ought to read the story yourself, but the case it makes against organic foods comes down to five basic points. I'll get to them, of course, after the jump.

1. Organic foods won't solve the hunger problem.

This is the one that the pro-organics often seem to gloss over. Chemical-based farming methods vastly increased crop yields and made it possible to feed far more people than ever before. So much so that it could be argued that the recent food crisis isn't so much about our food system failing so much as it is about the slowdown of an unprecedented food boom that came about thanks to the methods the organic movement decries.

A typical pro-organic response seems to be some variation of, "The world lived by organic farming for millennia before chemical farming," or "History shows that nature always finds a balance, if it's allowed to." The obvious counterargument is: "The world's never had to feed this many mouths before." I haven't seen a satisfactory answer for how an entirely organic food system would manage to feed 6.7 billion people even with an efficient distribution system, but I'd like to hear it.

Some other questions that pop up are: Is the organic movement merely a way for the wealthy people of First World nations to assuage their "middle-class guilt" at the expense of the Earth's nearly 1 billion starving, who have far more immediate concerns than their legacies? If the end goal of the organic movement is to convert a majority or all of the world to organic farming methods, how would it do so practically without putting potentially harmful strain on the environment and current food-delivery systems? And if the goal isn't to bring healthier, organic food to everyone in the world, does it mean there's going to be even more of a widening health/food gap between the people who can pay for the luxury and those who are going to subsist on chemically farmed foods?

2. It's questionable whether organic foods are healthier for you.

This is one that's going to debated back and forth for a long, long time. As Cracked.com points out, cancer rates dropped by 15 percent since the advent of chemical farming, and the average life expectancy went up nearly 10 years from 1950 to 2000, according to the CDC.

But the article conveniently neglects to mention that a hell of a lot of other factors other than how your food was farmed go into deciding how long you live. And I'm sure we've all learned that scientists are still kind of foggy on what does and doesn't cause cancer short of playing handball with a nugget of uranium.

Now excuse me while I scarf down a handful of Red No. 5 M&Ms with some saccharine while speaking on my cell phone by a radio tower.

3. It's questionable whether organic foods are safer.

It'll be hard to argue that organics do or don't make you live longer for at least another generation, but you can get a quicker sense of food-safety issues surrounding organics. According to the Center for Global Food Issues (which supplies the the numbers for an article Cracked.com refers to twice), organic foods account for only 1 percent of the U.S.'s food supply, but eight percent of its e. coli cases.

Cracked.com doesn't note, however, that the CGFI is part of the Hudson Institute, a conservative think tank with a definite agenda when it comes to agriculture, and has come under criticism from various scientists' groups.

4. Organic farming may not help the environment.

There's something to be said about this. If you're buying produce from an organic farm in, say, St. Louis, you're really not doing much to reduce your carbon footprint by paying to have it shipped to you in, say, Miami Beach, Fla. And, since organic farming is less efficient than what's now considered conventional farming, it requires more land, spelling disaster for certain dwindling ecosystems.

That said, the article doesn't delve into the fact that a growing number of people in the U.S. have the option of buying from local farms that use organic methods. But the whole eat locavore vs. organic thing is a whole 'nother issue.

5. You're not sticking it to the man by buying organic.

Here's something most of us can agree on. Corporations are nothing if not good at sniffing out new ways to make money, and the fact that organic food grew into a $40 billion worldwide industry by 2006 wasn't because mom-and-pop organic farms everywhere started suddenly thriving.

Using old-fashioned-sounding brand names, their powerful established distribution networks and billions of dollars of corporate muscle, Big Ag has taken over the organics section of your supermarket, invaded your pantry, and even had a hand in helping the government define what "organic" means.

If you think you're living off the grid by buying Muir Glen, Naked Juice or Boca, think again. (General Mills, PepsiCo, Kraft Foods.)

6. Organic food doesn't necessarily taste better.

This wasn't one of the article's arguments, but it's one worth mentioning. In the new, revised edition of Mark Bittman's all-important book "How to Cook Everything," he adds a section that sums up the philosophy he and many other at-home chefs take toward the organics issue: "This is a political question, not a cooking question."

When it comes to preparing food for yourself and your family, let taste be your guide: "Buy local when you can. Buy the best food you can when you can't find local."

Before I get lambasted as either a corporate stooge or a hacky-sack-playing hippie, let me note that I, like a lot of people, haven't decided either way about organic foods yet, though I am fairly disturbed by the straight-out propaganda coming from both sides. But I am willing to hear the arguments from both sides, and do so with an open, if naturally skeptical, mind. More so if they don't involve the words "Nazi" or "sheep," and don't devolve into shrill demonizing.

Now convince me.

Tagged with: Eat Local, Farming, Food Safety, Green, Healthy, History, Hunger, Michael Y. Park, News & Gossip, Organic, Shopping, Websites

Read More http://www.epicurious.com/articlesguides/blogs/editor/2009/02/the-argument-ag.html#ixzz1FvcPqEVn

Overheard locker tot outrage

The Herald Sun Reports:

Virgin Blue has sacked a male flight attendant and offered an angry mother free flights after her toddler was put in an overhead locker.

Natalie Williamson claims she, her 17-month-old son, Riley, and her now estranged husband were on a Virgin flight from Fiji to Sydney, when the flight attendant picked up Riley, placed him in the locker and closed the latch.

Virgin has admitted an incident did take place, but claims Ms Williamson's husband was playing a peek-a-boo game with Riley involving the overhead compartment when the flight attendant joined in.

"We conducted a thorough investigation of the incident and the staff member involved was subsequently terminated," a Virgin spokeswoman said.

The airline offered Ms Williamson three free flights, but the mother has said she is too shaken by the mid-air experience to redeem them.

"My husband, Shayne, was standing one metre behind my son, Riley, when the air steward picked him up and placed him in the overhead compartment," she said.

"I stood up and there were people laughing and then I said 'Get my son out of there now'," she told the Sunday Herald Sun.

"I was devastated. I was absolutely devastated.

"I was crying. My husband was in shock. For days on end I was crying."

Ms Williamson said Riley was locked in the compartment for up to 10 seconds in complete darkness.

"The manager on board came up to me later and said: 'I need you to complain, I need you to do something. Write or ring. Do whatever you can'," she said.

Ms Williamson said Riley, now 20 months, had seen various specialists since the incident after suffering from anxiety and withdrawal.

"He won't leave my sight now. He sleeps with me. If I'm not in the same room as him, he will scream and yell 'Mum, mum, mum'," she said.

Virgin said they took the incident seriously and had dismissed the flight attendant.

"The safety of our guests is our top priority and we do not tolerate any breaches of this," a spokeswoman said.

"We have expressed our sincere apologies to the guest and have provided them with a credit for the full amount of the two return flights."

America's secret plan to arm Libya's rebels

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/americas-secret-plan-to-arm-libyas-rebels-2234227.html

Desperate to avoid US military involvement in Libya in the event of a prolonged struggle between the Gaddafi regime and its opponents, the Americans have asked Saudi Arabia if it can supply weapons to the rebels in Benghazi. The Saudi Kingdom, already facing a "day of rage" from its 10 per cent Shia Muslim community on Friday, with a ban on all demonstrations, has so far failed to respond to Washington's highly classified request, although King Abdullah personally loathes the Libyan leader, who tried to assassinate him just over a year ago.

Washington's request is in line with other US military co-operation with the Saudis. The royal family in Jeddah, which was deeply involved in the Contra scandal during the Reagan administration, gave immediate support to American efforts to arm guerrillas fighting the Soviet army in Afghanistan in 1980 and later – to America's chagrin – also funded and armed the Taliban.

But the Saudis remain the only US Arab ally strategically placed and capable of furnishing weapons to the guerrillas of Libya. Their assistance would allow Washington to disclaim any military involvement in the supply chain – even though the arms would be American and paid for by the Saudis.

The Saudis have been told that opponents of Gaddafi need anti-tank rockets and mortars as a first priority to hold off attacks by Gaddafi's armour, and ground-to-air missiles to shoot down his fighter-bombers.

Supplies could reach Benghazi within 48 hours but they would need to be delivered to air bases in Libya or to Benghazi airport. If the guerrillas can then go on to the offensive and assault Gaddafi's strongholds in western Libya, the political pressure on America and Nato – not least from Republican members of Congress – to establish a no-fly zone would be reduced.

US military planners have already made it clear that a zone of this kind would necessitate US air attacks on Libya's functioning, if seriously depleted, anti-aircraft missile bases, thus bringing Washington directly into the war on the side of Gaddafi's opponents.

For several days now, US Awacs surveillance aircraft have been flying around Libya, making constant contact with Malta air traffic control and requesting details of Libyan flight patterns, including journeys made in the past 48 hours by Gaddafi's private jet which flew to Jordan and back to Libya just before the weekend.

Officially, Nato will only describe the presence of American Awacs planes as part of its post-9/11 Operation Active Endeavour, which has broad reach to undertake aerial counter-terrorism measures in the Middle East region.

The data from the Awacs is streamed to all Nato countries under the mission's existing mandate. Now that Gaddafi has been reinstated as a super-terrorist in the West's lexicon, however, the Nato mission can easily be used to search for targets of opportunity in Libya if active military operations are undertaken.

Al Jazeera English television channel last night broadcast recordings made by American aircraft to Maltese air traffic control, requesting information about Libyan flights, especially that of Gaddafi's jet.

An American Awacs aircraft, tail number LX-N90442 could be heard contacting the Malta control tower on Saturday for information about a Libyan Dassault-Falcon 900 jet 5A-DCN on its way from Amman to Mitiga, Gaddafi's own VIP airport.

Nato Awacs 07 is heard to say: "Do you have information on an aircraft with the Squawk 2017 position about 85 miles east of our [sic]?"

Malta air traffic control replies: "Seven, that sounds to be Falcon 900- at flight level 340, with a destination Mitiga, according to flight plan."

But Saudi Arabia is already facing dangers from a co-ordinated day of protest by its own Shia Muslim citizens who, emboldened by the Shia uprising in the neighbouring island of Bahrain, have called for street protests against the ruling family of al-Saud on Friday.

After pouring troops and security police into the province of Qatif last week, the Saudis announced a nationwide ban on all public demonstrations.

Shia organisers claim that up to 20,000 protesters plan to demonstrate with women in the front rows to prevent the Saudi army from opening fire.

If the Saudi government accedes to America's request to send guns and missiles to Libyan rebels, however, it would be almost impossible for President Barack Obama to condemn the kingdom for any violence against the Shias of the north-east provinces.

Thus has the Arab awakening, the demand for democracy in North Africa, the Shia revolt and the rising against Gaddafi become entangled in the space of just a few hours with US military priorities in the region.

Like Robert Fisk on The Independent on Facebook for updates

What's your priority?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080611/ap_on_el_pr/mccain_iraq;_ylt=Atnmhg9ECt5u1Etu6f1zOfWs0NUE

In the attached news article, McCain points out the truism that removing troops from Iraq is less important than reducing casualties. Who would disagree that our primary goal in terms of troop levels should be minimization of casualties? He goes on to point out that withdrawing them is his goal but he doesn’t want to do it in a way that puts more of them at risk.

Two prominent Democrats disagree with this assertion: Joe Biden and Harry Reid. This is a time when having a VP nominee to go out and slam them would be great. This is the perfect time where someone should go out and say:

“Joe Biden and Harry Reid are simply echoing the irresponsible line from Barack Obama: that retreat from Iraq is more important than keeping American troops and Iraqi civilians safe. Apparently, having their Presidential nominee state that genocide is an acceptable tradeoff to get American troops home is not good enough for the Democrats. They now need other Democratic leaders to say that not only is genocide acceptable but sharp increases in American casualties is acceptable as long as we remove troops. This is unacceptable and naïve.

“The Democrats have been complaining for some time that people question their patriotism. When they come out and say such despicable garbage, when they say flat out that exiting Iraq is more important than keeping our troops safe, how can they not expect people to question their patriotism? Maybe they think that abandoning an ally begging for assistance to be patriotic. Maybe they think that putting civilians in the way of genocide is patriotic. Maybe they think that cutting off funding for troops in the field to make a political point is patriotic. Maybe they think that putting soldiers at needless risk for political gain is patriotic. Maybe they think that increasing American casualties is patriotic. I believe that most Americans would disagree.

“Let me be very, very clear on the topic. Joe Biden and Harry Reid should be deeply ashamed of themselves for their statements today indicating that safeguarding our troops should not be our top priority. The troops in the field of battle deserve better than to have their civilian leaders come out in public and say that their safety is not of tantamount priority.”

Notable Quotable

To summarize, Mrs. Clinton maximizes her chances of becoming president if she (1) does enough damage to Obama to snatch the nomination away from him, (2) failing that, does enough damage to him to bring about his defeat in November, and (3) gets herself on the ticket, whether he wins in November or not.

Some will say Mrs. Clinton is being disloyal to her party if she undermines Obama's chances of winning in November. But maybe she just practices a different kind of party loyalty. After all, if you can be a patriot while hoping your country loses a war, why can't you be a loyal Democrat while hoping your party loses an election?

-James Taranto, Wall Street Journal: Opinion Journal

Sen. Barack Obama says he clinched the nomination

BARACK OBAMA: Sixteen months have passed since we first stood together on the steps of the Old State Capitol in Springfield, Illinois. Thousands of miles have been traveled; millions of voices have been heard.

And how many were not heard ?

And because of what you said, because you decided that change must come to Washington, because you believed that this year must be different than all the rest, because you chose to listen not to your doubts or your fears, but to your greatest hopes and highest aspirations, tonight we mark the end of one historic journey with the beginning of another, a journey…

Anyone else having a Qui-Gon Jinn vs. Yoda moment? "We must bring balance to the force..." "But the good guys are overwhelmingly winning....wait....."

(APPLAUSE)

… a journey that will bring a new and better day to America.

Because of you, tonight I can stand here and say that I will be the Democratic nominee for the president of the United States of America.

(APPLAUSE)

But I want to thank — I want to thank all those in Montana and South Dakota who stood up for change today. I want to thank every American who stood with us over the course of this campaign, through the good days and the bad, from the snows of Cedar Rapids to the sunshine of Sioux Falls.

Didn't Obama lose S. Dakota? Is he thanking the minority or is he thanking the majority who voted for Hillary? Or is he thanking them because in his mind he won it all?

And, tonight, I also want to thank the men and woman who took this journey with me as fellow candidates for president.

At this defining moment, at this defining moment for our nation, we should be proud that our party put forth one of the most talented, qualified field of individuals ever to run for office.

I have not just competed with them as rivals. I've learned from them as friends, as public servants, and as patriots who love America and are willing to work tirelessly to make this country better. They are leaders of this party and leaders that America will turn to for years to come.

Oh crap....these are the leaders?

And that is particularly true for the candidate who has traveled further on this journey than anyone else. Senator Hillary Clinton has made history in this campaign.

(APPLAUSE)

She has made history not just because she's a woman who has done what no woman has done before, but because she is a leader who inspires millions of Americans with her strength, her courage, and her commitment to the causes that brought us here tonight.

Vince Foster has no comment...

I congratulate her on her victory in South Dakota, and I congratulate her on the race that she has run throughout this contest.

(APPLAUSE)

We've certainly had our differences over the last 16 months. But as someone who's shared a stage with her many times, I can tell you that what gets Hillary Clinton up in the morning — even in the face of tough odds — is exactly what sent her and Bill Clinton to sign up for their first campaign in Texas all those years ago, what sent her to work at the Children's Defense Fund and made her fight for health care as first lady, what led her to the United States Senate and fueled her barrier-breaking campaign for the presidency: an unyielding desire to improve the lives of ordinary Americans, no matter how difficult the fight may be.

That wasn't my impression of why Hillary gets up in the morning.

And you can rest assured that when we finally win the battle for universal health care in this country — and we will win that fight — she will be central to that victory.

Thank you...so is he pre-blaming it on her when that plan crumbles or when the plan succeeds and health care crumbles? Why is everyone so blindly lunging towards universal health care when there are so many examples how it DOESN'T work?

(APPLAUSE)

When we transform our energy policy and lift our children out of poverty, it will be because she worked to help make it happen.

Our party and our country are better off because of her, and I am a better candidate for having had the honor to compete with Hillary Rodham Clinton.

I'll say one thing, the Republicans are better off from Obama vs. Clinton :)

(APPLAUSE)

There are those who say that this primary has somehow left us weaker and more divided. Well, I say that, because of this primary, there are millions of Americans who have cast their ballot for the very first time.

1. I can feel the unity among the Democrats
2. Aren't there Americans who cast their first ballot in every election? It happens when people turn 18....Obama-mania not withstanding...

(APPLAUSE)

There are independents and Republicans who understand this election isn't just about a change of party in Washington, but also about the need to change Washington.

There are young people, and African-Americans, and Hispanic- Americans, and women of all ages who have voted in numbers that have broken records and inspired a nation.

Umm...nothing about Asians?

(APPLAUSE)

All of you chose to support a candidate you believe in deeply. But at the end of the day, we aren't the reason you came out and waited in lines that stretched block after block to make your voice heard. You didn't do that…

(APPLAUSE)

You didn't do that because of me or Senator Clinton or anyone else. You did it because you know in your hearts that at this moment, a moment that will define a generation, we cannot afford to keep doing what we've been doing.

We owe our children a better future. We owe our country a better future. And for all those who dream of that future tonight, I say: Let us begin the work together. Let us unite in common effort to chart a new course for America.

A future of running, hiding, surrendering, and sucking more than post-bastille France? Oh, don't forget pandering to dictators. No offense France.

In just a few short months, the Republican Party will arrive in St. Paul with a very different agenda. They will come here to nominate John McCain, a man who has served this country heroically.

(APPLAUSE)

I honor, we honor the service of John McCain, and I respect his many accomplishments, even if he chooses to deny mine.

1. Passive aggressive much?
2. What accomplishments? He still hasn't named any?

(APPLAUSE)

My differences with him — my differences with him are not personal. They are with the policies he has proposed in this campaign, because while John McCain can legitimately tout moments of independence from his party in the past, such independence has not been the hallmark of his presidential campaign.

It's not change when John McCain decided to stand with George Bush 95 percent of the time, as he did in the Senate last year.

I voted for George Bush twice. I'm sold. Thanks Barack, I'm set for McCain :)

It's not change when he offers four more years of Bush economic policies that have failed to create well-paying jobs, or insure our workers, or help Americans afford the skyrocketing cost of college, policies that have lowered the real incomes of the average American family, widened the gap between Wall Street and Main Street, and left our children with a mountain of debt.

How much of that mountain of debt is a lack of personal fiscal responsibility??

It's not change when he promises to continue a policy in Iraq that asks everything of our brave men and women in uniform and nothing of Iraqi politicians, a policy where all we look for are reasons to stay in Iraq, while we spend billions of dollars a month on a war that isn't making the American people any safer.

Safer than a policy of genocide and turning the United States into a giant vi-jay-jay

So I'll say this: There are many words to describe John McCain's attempt to pass off his embrace of George Bush's policies as bipartisan and new, but "change" is not one of them.

(APPLAUSE)

"Change" is not one of them, because change is a foreign policy that doesn't begin and end with a war that should've never been authorized and never been waged.

I'm not even going to bother with that

(APPLAUSE)

I won't stand here and pretend that there are many good options left in Iraq, but what's not an option is leaving our troops in that country for the next hundred years, especially at a time when our military is overstretched, our nation is isolated, and nearly every other threat to America is being ignored.

Or he is ignoring General Petraeus...?

(APPLAUSE)

We must be as careful getting out of Iraq as we were careless getting in, but we — but start leaving we must.

Careful genocide....as opposed to careless genocide? I suppose if you are going to let an entire people get wiped out you don't want to leave any stragglers...

It's time for Iraqis to take responsibility for their future. It's time to rebuild our military and give our veterans the care and the benefits they deserve when they come home.

I will second strengthening the military and better benefits for the VA. Since the government did such a crappy job, how about privatizing it?

(APPLAUSE)

It's time to refocus our efforts on Al Qaida's leadership and Afghanistan, and rally the world against the common threats of the 21st century: terrorism and nuclear weapons; climate change and poverty; genocide and disease. That's what change is.

1. A group that has no allegiance to a land is not restrained in said land...Just because the NY Times won't call it AQI, even when AQI says we're AQI, doesn't make it not AQI...
2. How are you going to fight terrorists if you won't fight terrorists? I'm going to start calling him Obama the Ostrich.
3. I vomited in my mouth a little.
4. I thought he was ok with genocide? Or is only genocide by disease he will fight. I suppose you can't negotiate without preconditions with a virus or a bacterium.
5. What is change? The threats are change? Rallying is change? Is it just that he is changing his mind on what he said before?

Change, Minnesota, is realizing that meeting today's threats requires not just our firepower, but the power of our diplomacy: tough, direct diplomacy, where the president of the United States isn't afraid to let any petty dictator know where America stands and what we stand for.

Tough, direct, diplomacy where the United States isn't afraid to let any petty dictator know that they can have what ever they want without preconditions with a legitimized discussion with the president. Hell, maybe I should become a dictator...I don't even need to be "Terrible" or "Magnificent" or even "Corrupt"...all I need to hit is petty, and I can have an audience with the US. Hmm...I'll need to do something to get above "Apathetic", and I'll need to work on my oppression skills. And my nunchuk skills...

(APPLAUSE)

We must once again have the courage and the conviction to lead the free world. That is the legacy of Roosevelt and Truman and Kennedy. That's what the American people demand. That's what change is.

Umm...let's see....Invaded Europe, Nuked Japan, Invaded Cuba....All Obama is willing to invade is my bank account... If that's what the demand is, can someone check on how many US Soldiers were killed in combat actions directed by each of those Presidents?

(APPLAUSE)

Change is building an economy that rewards not just wealth, but the work and the workers who created it. It's understanding that the struggles facing working families can't be solved by spending billions of dollars on more tax breaks for big corporations and wealthy CEOs, but by giving a middle-class tax break to those who need it, and investing in our crumbling infrastructure, and transforming how we use energy, and improving our schools, and renewing our commitment to science and innovation.

So why is he taking away my George Bush given tax break?? I am middle-class! I'm not one of the uber-wealthy like Sean & Tanya with their mansions (oh wait...), their fleet of expensive cars (oh wait...), their entourage of servants, all minorities of course (oh wait...), their champagne dreams and caviar wishes (well...they might have those) ;)

(APPLAUSE)

It's understanding that fiscal responsibility and shared prosperity can go hand-in-hand, as they did when Bill Clinton was president.

Umm...riding a boom that was already in motion? Why didn't I think of that....Obama you are s-a-m-r-t-er than me...

(APPLAUSE)

John McCain has spent a lot of time talking about trips to Iraq in the last few weeks, but maybe if he spent some time taking trips to the cities and towns that have been hardest hit by this economy — cities in Michigan, and Ohio, and right here in Minnesota — he'd understand the kind of change that people are looking for.

Kind of like when Obama came to Detroit (oh wait...) a suburb is close enough, right? It was close enough for Michael Moore since he grew up in Flint....right?

(APPLAUSE)

Maybe if he went to Iowa and met the student who works the night shift after a full day of class and still can't pay the medical bills for a sister who's ill, he'd understand she can't afford four more years of a health care plan that only takes care of the healthy and the wealthy.

Am I healthy and wealthy? I need that on a T-Shirt!

She needs us to pass health care right now, a plan that guarantees insurance to every American who wants it and brings down premiums for every family who needs it. That's the change we need, Minnesota.

Isn't his plan post-procedure insurance? How will that bring down premiums? How will it be cheaper if he bankrupts the insurance companies?

(APPLAUSE)

Maybe if John McCain went to Pennsylvania and he met the man who lost his job, but can't even afford the gas to drive around and look for a new one, he'd understand we can't afford four more years of our addiction to oil from dictators.

Then LET US DRILL HERE! What was Obama's vote for ANWR?????

That man needs us to pass an energy policy that works with automakers to raise fuel standards, and makes corporations pay for their pollution, and oil companies invest their record profits in a clean energy future, an energy policy that will create millions of new jobs that pay well and can't be outsourced. That's the change we need, Minnesota.

Hmm...so let's see, all auto workers lose their jobs, corporation workers lose their jobs, oil company workers lose their jobs. I guess it won't matter since there will be no cars made for the no oil people can't afford. What's the millions of new jobs...unemployment line place holder?

(APPLAUSE)

And maybe if John McCain spent some time in the schools of South Carolina or St. Paul, Minnesota, or where he spoke tonight in New Orleans, Louisiana, he'd understand that we can't afford to leave the money behind for No Child Left Behind; that we owe it to our children to invest in early-childhood education; and recruit an army of new teachers and give them better pay and more support; and finally decide that, in this global economy, the chance to get a college education should not be a privilege for the few, but a birthright of every American.

How about instead of an army of new teachers, we give America a division of qualified teachers? How about that? And no offense, but I get annoyed when people start talking about privilege vs. rights. I have the right to free speech and bear arms and due process. I don't have the right to go to college. I'm sorry, in a perfect world everyone would get to go to college. But in reality, 1. college is not for everyone. 2. It's not a right, billions of people in the world do not get to go to college. By calling it a right, you set up the expectation that the metaphorical I gets to go to college for free without working for it. College is 1. a privilege you have to earn, and 2. you get more out of it if you have to earn it, in my opinion. It's like the right to vote...it is not a right, it is the privilege of a good law-abiding citizen.

That's the change we need in America. That's why I'm running for president of the United States.

Insert pithy comment. I hope he gets Mondale-d

(APPLAUSE)

Now, the other side will come here in September and offer a very different set of policies and positions, and that is a good thing. That is a debate I look forward to.

Can we quote him on that? I do look forward to that debate...

(APPLAUSE)

It is a debate that the American people deserve on the issues that will help determine the future of this country and the future for our children.

But what you don't deserve is another election that's governed by fear, and innuendo, and division. What you won't hear from this campaign or this party is the kind of politics that uses religion as a wedge and patriotism as a bludgeon…

I don't know...it seems to me that the primaries of the Democrats were pretty much governed by fear, innuendo, and division. Or was he saying that he got it all out of his system at this point.

(APPLAUSE)

What you won't see from this campaign or this party is a politics that sees our opponents not as competitors to challenge, but enemies to polarize, because we may call ourselves Democrats and Republicans, but we are Americans first. We are always Americans first.

Then why does he want America to lose? If he wants America to lose, and he is an American first, then by logic he wants to lose and we should all vote for McCain to give him what he wants!

(APPLAUSE)

Despite what the good senator from Arizona may have said tonight, I've seen people of differing views and opinions find common cause many times during my two decades in public life, and I've brought many together myself.

I've walked arm-in-arm with community leaders on the south side of Chicago and watched tensions fade as black, white, and Latino fought together for good jobs and good schools.

Like Rev. Wright and that Ayer guy? Hmm....there was a reason everyone told me to stay away from the South Side of Chicago.

I've sat across the table from law enforcement officials and civil rights advocates to reform a criminal justice system that sent 13 innocent people to death row.

And how many guilty people were set free from prison? How many monsters physically can't do anything anymore because they're dead. I'm not trying to excuse mistaken executions, and I understand the principle of innocent until proven guilty (or you can convince a jury that the crime you wrote on your company check is not a crime), but in no other country do death row inmates get appeals (Sean, check me on that). So while it is an imperfect system, people are an imperfect species, how do you attain perfection from imperfect minds?

I've worked with friends in the other party to provide more children with health insurance and more working families with a tax break, to curb the spread of nuclear weapons and ensure that the American people know where their tax dollars are being spent, and reduce the influence of lobbyists who have all too often set the agenda in Washington.

cite your source Obama.

(APPLAUSE)

In our country, I have found that this cooperation happens not because we agree on everything, but because, behind all the false labels and false divisions and categories that define us, beyond all the petty bickering and point-scoring in Washington, Americans are a decent, generous, compassionate people, united by common challenges and common hopes.

Unless you're a church-goer, a gun-owner, or a blue collar worker

And every so often, there are moments which call on that fundamental goodness to make this country great again.

So it was for that band of patriots who declared in a Philadelphia hall the formation of a more perfect union, and for all those who gave on the fields of Gettysburg and Antietam their last full measure of devotion to save that same union.

So it was for the greatest generation that conquered fear itself, and liberated a continent from tyranny, and made this country home to untold opportunity and prosperity.

So it was for the workers who stood out on the picket lines, the women who shattered glass ceilings, the children who braved a Selma bridge for freedom's cause.

So it has been for every generation that faced down the greatest challenges and the most improbable odds to leave their children a world that's better and kinder and more just.

And so it must be for us.

Did he just compare himself to Revolutionary War vets, Civil War vets, WW2 vets, and Civil Rights activists?

(APPLAUSE)

America, this is our moment. This is our time, our time to turn the page on the policies of the past…

(APPLAUSE)

… our time to bring new energy and new ideas to the challenges we face, our time to offer a new direction for this country that we love.

The journey will be difficult. The road will be long. I face this challenge — I face this challenge with profound humility and knowledge of my own limitations, but I also face it with limitless faith in the capacity of the American people.

What are they? What do you feel are your limitations, Senator?

Because if we are willing to work for it, and fight for it, and believe in it, then I am absolutely certain that, generations from now, we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless…

(APPLAUSE)

… this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal…

umm..Jesus? I'm sorry...Moses?

(APPLAUSE)

… this was the moment when we ended a war, and secured our nation, and restored our image as the last, best hope on Earth.

I suppose it is easy to end a war, when you give up...he wants the US to give the military equivalent of a soccer own-goal.
Last, best hope on Earth? Wasn't that the tag line for a super-hero?

(APPLAUSE)

This was the moment, this was the time when we came together to remake this great nation so that it may always reflect our very best selves and our highest ideals.

Thank you, Minnesota. God bless you, and may God bless the United States of America.

Unless you're his spiritual minister for the last 20 years....I guess we should be glad someone apparently slept through church for 20 years....

The London Times comments on the election...so I comment on the London Times

Yes it's politically incorrect but race matters
The Democrats must admit it: Obama would lose to McCain
Anatole Kaletsky
The London Times
April 24, 2008

American Presidential elections have been compared with reality TV series or game shows, in which a gaggle of jumped-up nonentities aspiring to be celebrities are ritually humiliated in public and offered entertaining opportunities to self-destruct, until only one survivor remains. But this time round, a much more elevated analogy is sadly apposite.

Whose fault is that? How do you as a party lose the 2004 election? Talk about a handicapped gimme....It's like playing golf against Tiger Woods except before the game your friends have slipped him a roofie, broke both of his hands and replaced his clubs with a limp ramen noodle. I think the 2004 victory by Pres. Bush is less a commentary on the American people and more on the utter unqualifications of the Democratic candidates.

The 2008 US election has all the makings of a Greek tragedy, in which noble heroes and heroines are forced to follow a course to catastrophe, divinely preordained as punishment for sins and blunders committed by their forefathers in the dim and distant past. In acting out their ineluctable doom, the eloquent protagonists do not just destroy themselves but also their cities, their nations and even their entire civilisations.

Oh boy....someone loved the lit classes in college... I think there were more adjectives in this sentence then anything else.

If this description sounds too grandiose, consider yesterday's results from the Pennsylvania primary. The outcome seemed to be precisely calibrated by the gods to maximise the agony of the Democrats. It gave Hillary Clinton just the support she needed to stay firmly in contention, but not quite enough to turn the tide in her favour.

By grandiose, do you mean uppity? And please... is the outcome a Greek tragedy or just the result of having 2 equally ambitious and minimally if at all qualified candidates (for their own reasons) squaring off for their own success? If they truly believed that a Dem should run the country for the sake of the country and/or the party, why did someone not just drop out and ask for VP? this democratic primary season is an early Christmas present for the GOP, and I very purposefully say Christmas present and not "holiday present".

Worse still, this result underlined the fear that senior Democrats have long been aware of, but have never dared to express in public: America may not yet be ready to elect a black President. Worst of all, it has created conditions for the possible election victory of a militarily belligerent and economically unqualified Republican candidate who supports many of President Bush's worst policies. Given the Bush Administration's domestic and foreign failures, the disasters in Iraq and Afghanistan and, most recently, the slump in the economy, the possibility of a Republican victory in November would seem to overturn every principle of proper democracy - and also the hope of America and its system of government being rehabilitated in the eyes of the world after the Bush years. The fact that Mr Obama and Mrs Clinton are both such impressive candidates, intelligent, sincere, articulate and in command of the issues, while John McCain does not qualify on any of these criteria only makes matters worse.

1. Could it be not that America is not ready, and more that a 1st term Senator with the same foreign policy experience as my 12 year old cousin, the attitude toward genocide of Pol Pot, and the health care plan of Elmo from Sesame Street is not a qualified candidate? 2. By militarily belligerent does he mean not a giant vi-jay-jay (not sure if Websense will have issue with the actual word) ? I can think of nobody better than McCain that is running with a true sense of the cost of war... 3. Why is it that Dems always seem to have the attitude that the president rules like a king, with no advisors, counsel, and completely and solely based on themselves? I mean not everyone can invent the internet and save the planet with the ingenious plan of starving third world countries with rising food prices so they can't cause pollution for the rest of us? Still, I wonder...HOW DO YOU WIN AN ACADEMY AWARD AND THE NOBEL PEACE PRIZE WITH THE SAME 2 HOURS OF WORK??? Wouldn't the "achievement in film" and "peace prize" inherently describe 2 probably very different areas of accomplishment?? 4. Disasters and failures? Don't even need to go there, somebody just smack him and take away his sippy cup. He needs to go home and learn to walk and talk at the same time without sounding like a preschooler. 5. I can find no possible explanation how either Obama or Clinton are sincere or in command of the issues. I tap out, if this is the way the country truly believes, I wonder if Thomson has any offices in Australia...

That Mrs Clinton will now carry on with her campaign is not just probable but essential. For the voting in Pennsylvania confirms that she has a much better chance than Mr Obama of winning the White House for the Democrats. According to the Associated Press exit polls published yesterday, 16 per cent of white Democratic voters considered race an important factor in the Presidential election and 43 per cent of these said they would either vote Republican or not vote at all, if Mr Obama were the Democratic nominee.

To me race is a non-issue as is gender. I don't know any other Republicans to whom race is a issue more than qualifications, experience, and future strategies. It seems to me, that it's always the ones who whine about race and equality (mind you, not legitimately complain, but whine) are the ones for whom it is a an electability issue which can change their vote.

Given that Mrs Clinton's clear victory over Mr Obama in Pennsylvania followed similar results in other "must-win" states with large working-class constituencies, such as Ohio, Florida, New Jersey, Michigan and even New York and California, the conclusion would be fairly obvious, were it not for the political correctness that makes it almost impossible for American politicians or commentators to express such a view: Mr Obama may by unable to carry large industrial states with socially conservative white working-class populations simply because of his race. This is especially true now that the televised rantings of Rev Jeremiah Wright and Mr Obama's own gaffe about the "bitter" white working-class culture of "guns and God", have reminded Americans that race is not just a matter of skin colour. Rev Wright embarrassingly revealed in his "God damn America" and "Chickens come home to roost" sermons that his African-American vision of America is be profoundly at odds with the white majority view.

Does Michigan and Florida really count as clear victories for Clinton? I mean beating nothing is a win....I suppose. I do note that Rev Wright is brought up as a sign a political mis-speak, not as a potential issue when looking at a presidential candidates advisers and personal counsel.

The latest polls in the two most important swing states show Mr McCain easily beating Mr Obama in both Florida and Ohio, while Mrs Clinton comfortably beats the Republican in Ohio and is neck and neck in Florida.

Mr Obama has, of course, apologised for his condescension towards working-class church-goers and hunters - probably the most important group of floating voters in the electorally critical mid-Western states. He has tried even harder to dissociate himself from Rev Wright's anti-American tirades, which really have to be seen (on YouTube) to be believed. And Mr Obama's supporters have chastised Mrs Clinton for turning to "negative campaigning" and "scorched-earth" strategies in her desperation to stay in contention.

Note: Dear Hillary. Please continue the scorched earth strategies. It is delicious, it's like gold when it touches your lips. Thank you, Eric.

The trouble is that Mr Obama's efforts to suppress the race issue are doomed to failure. For the influence of Rev Wright on him is a matter of public record. Indeed, the phrase "Audacity of Hope", which is the title of Mr Obama's political autobiography as well as his presidential leitmotif, is attributed in that book to a sermon by "my pastor, Rev Jeremiah Wright". The Republican political machine, which demonstrated its mastery of the arts of character assassination in the two Bush presidential contests, will have no compunction in exploiting the Wright relationship and portraying Mr Obama as an anti-American in the general election, even if the Clinton campaign and the media observe a self-denying ordinance on the race and patriotism issues, as they broadly have so far.

Demonstrated art of character assassination? Then what the Dems do, character apocalypse? I have seen no one more completely and totally attack the personal character of people than Democrats. Is it character assassination to bring attention toward Wright for everything he has said? Or is it a legitimate look at a candidates personal friend and spiritual adviser?

The certainty of a no-holds-barred attacks by the Republicans brings us to the potentially most tragic aspect of this election. If ever there was an election the Democrats ought to win this is the one. Yet on the basis of the primary results so far, they are all too likely to lose it. Mr Obama may be marginally ahead of Mrs Clinton in the popular vote but the Democrats seem to have forgotten that all the votes cast so far have been by their own supporters. In the general election their candidate will have to win over Republicans and right-leaning floating voters. Most of the evidence so far suggests that the Repulicans will find it much easier to frighten voters about the prospect of a President Obama than a President Clinton.

If there was ever an election that the Democrats should win it was 2004. But let's not dwell on the utter and complete failure of the DNC, which should be expected considering their core is MoveOn, Code Pink, and all of the leftover eco-nazi, communist, hippies who had nothing to do when all of their ideologies failed on their respective merits or lack thereof.

Professional Democratic politicians now have the casting vote in their party's nomination and could yet force the two candidates into a "dream ticket" led by Mrs Clinton with Mr Obama as Vice President which would sweep all before it and would probably make Mr Obama unbeatable as a presidential candidate in 2012 or 2016. Yet the Democratic superdelegates who could now secure years of hegemony for their party seem to consider it "unfair" to use their professional judgment to overturn the "democratic" verdict of primary voters.

By professional democratic politicians do they mean "Oh crap the voters have too much power so let's change the rules so the candidates can buy our nominations"? Is the article really advocating the buying of votes of to secure "hegemony"? The one fair thing the superdelegates could do is vote the way of the party....isn't that what primaries are for? And if you had a dream ticket, so to speak, is anyone else picturing a west side story style showdown between Obama and Clinton in the oval office?

The Republicans will have no such compunctions about the fairness of launching personal attacks against a potentially vulnerable Democratic candidate. In this respect this Presidential contest may again manifest the tragedy of left-wing politics through the ages. Parties which care more about fairness than about power, end up achieving neither.

Are they vulnerable candidates or are they candidates which have a lot of quality weaknesses? Is it a personal attack to complain that McCain is too old? Because I've already seen that. Is it a personal attack to say he is unqualified because he isn't an economist? If that's the case, then Hillary and Barack have absolutely no business being president because of their foreign policy which consists of making up stories worthy of an episode of 24 dodging snipers in a helicopter and playing tag with a bunch of yellow children in grade school. The tragedy of left-wing politics is that they are the only ones that don't see the weaknesses transparent in their party, and then they wonder what went wrong. Tanya, what was that definition of insanity again? And since when have the Dems ever cared more about fairness than about power? The Clintons....really?

END RANT....McCain 2008, Rice 2012, Petreaus 2016