Monday, September 11, 2006

EVEN TEXAS IS FED UP WITH W. AND CO.

Think Texas is mired in red forever? Think again. Stop packing your bags, Dems, to move to friendly blue states or abroad to escape the red nightmare. Our hard work and grassroots efforts are paying off and we've gone it alone with little or no help from our national party and with NO HELP FROM OUR LOCAL AND STATE MEDIA.

The so-called most popular elected official in Texas, Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison's numbers have plummeted to a mere 47%, according to a Zogby poll released today. Barbara Ann Radnofsky is at a cool 39%. This is drop dead stunning news. Ms. Radnofsky's campaign is a completely grass roots effort. She had made 500 trips across the vast state of Texas, in her own vehicle. She campaigns the old fashioned way by making face-to-face contact with Texans. She gives them honest answers. She offers hard and real solutions, not spin or talking point mendacity. Does Barbara Ann stay in swank hotels along the campaign trail? Nope. She stays with friends and volunteers along the campaign trail. Imagine the stuck up former prom queen sleeping on a kid's lower bunk bed.

Our local and state media and newspapers have refused to publish 99% of the letters Radnofsky volunteers have sent to our editors informing them about Ms. Radnofsky. When they do publish a letter or two, the paper will edit out sections about Ms. Radnofsky. It is obvious that Democrats do not have equal access to the media in Texas. The yellow-bellied cowards are all sleeping cozily with the Republicans in power. Fortunately for Texans, the media will soon be toast with the Party of Liars.

The Senator has systematically avoided invitations from sponsors to debate Ms. Radnofsky. She refuses to return Ms. Radnofsky's phone calls or emails. Why? Because Senator Hutchison has been nothing more than a rubber-stamp for the Bush Administration. We know how good this administration, which is based on a foundation of lies and disgraceful low life politics is for our country. Senator Hutchison has endorsed, supported and enabled it all along.

You can run but you cannot hide, Senator. LS


Below is the link to the Zogby poll data:

INSIDE THE BELTWAY BLOG

GREAT COMMENTARY ON 9/11

Notice that I am not viewing ABC's 9/11 crock-a-drama this evening, nor did I view the President's address. It's all attempt, in my book, for the Bush Administration and Republican Party to use the worse and most tragic event in our history for its own contemptuous and despicable political purposes. Speaking of the crock-a-drama, the liberal bloggers and talk show hosts are hunting down the financiers behind it. LS

My friend Ken sent this awesome piece tonight.

"THE SIXTEEN ACRE DITCH"

Excerpts:

If you had told me, five years ago, that on the fifth anniversary of the worst terrorist attack in history Ground Zero would still be nothing but an enormous hole in the ground, I wouldn't have believed you -- just as I wouldn't have believed that a major American city could be thoroughly trashed by a Category 4 hurricane and then left to moulder in the mud for a year while various federal, state and local bureaucrats and hack politicians tried to make up their minds what to do.

What I've learned (from 9/11, the corporate scandals, the fiasco in Iraq, Katrina, the Cheney Administration's insane economic and environmental policies and the relentless dumbing down of the corporate media -- plus the repeated electoral triumphs of the Rovian brand of "reality management") is that the United States is moving down the curve of imperial decay at a amazingly rapid clip. If anything, the speed of our descent appears to be accelerating.

The physical symptoms -- a lost war, a derelict city, a Potemkin memorial hastily erected in an vacant lot -- aren't nearly as alarming as the moral and intellectual paralysis that seems to have taken hold of the system. The old feedback mechanisms are broken or in deep disrepair, leaving America with an opposition party that doesn't know how (or what) to oppose, a military run by uniformed yes men, intelligence czars who couldn't find their way through a garden gate with a GPS locator, TV networks that don't even pretend to cover the news unless there's a missing white woman or a suspected child rapist involved, and talk radio hosts who think nuking Mecca is the solution to all our problems in the Middle East. We've got think tanks that can't think, security agencies that can't secure and accounting firms that can't count (except when their clients ask them to make 2+2=5). Our churches are either annexes to shopping malls, halfway homes for pederasts, or GOP precinct headquarters in disguise. Our economy is based on asset bubbles, defense contracts and an open-ended line of credit from the People's Bank of China, and we still can't push the poverty rate down or the median wage up.

When the public discourse on network news consists of Katie Couric introducting Rush Limbaugh's commentaries, you know the intellectual and ideological rot is well advanced -- maybe not quite as far as the Soviet Union in the '80s, but getting there. One of my favorite books about the Soviet collapse was titled "The Age of Delirium" which I think perfectly captured the progressive insanity of a system that could no longer even understand, much less believe, its own lies. I think of that book practically every time George W. Bush or Dick Cheney or Donald Rumsfeld open their mouths in public.

FROM BILLMON.ORG

KEITH OLBERMANN LETS BUSH HAVE IT AGAIN. THIS TIME IT IS ABOUT 9/11.

A huge thanks to Mr. Olbermann, the only mainstream media anchor so far, who has the courage and integrity to not only tell the truth, but to actually criticize Bush himself. LS

Excerpts:

History teaches us that nearly unanimous support of a government cannot be taken away from that government by its critics. It can only be squandered by those who use it not to heal a nation's wounds, but to take political advantage.

Terrorists did not come and steal our newly-regained sense of being American first, and political, fiftieth. Nor did the Democrats. Nor did the media. Nor did the people.

The President -- and those around him -- did that.

They promised bi-partisanship, and then showed that to them, "bi-partisanship" meant that their party would rule and the rest would have to follow, or be branded, with ever-escalating hysteria, as morally or intellectually confused, as appeasers, as those who, in the Vice President's words yesterday, "validate the strategy of the terrorists."

They promised protection, and then showed that to them "protection" meant going to war against a despot whose hand they had once shaken, a despot who we now learn from our own Senate Intelligence Committee, hated al-Qaida as much as we did.

The polite phrase for how so many of us were duped into supporting a war, on the false premise that it had 'something to do' with 9/11 is "lying by implication."

The impolite phrase is "impeachable offense."

Not once in now five years has this President ever offered to assume responsibility for the failures that led to this empty space, and to this, the current, curdled, version of our beloved country.

OLBERMANN LETS BUSH HAVE IT AGAIN

7 comments:

DMZDave said...

Barbara Ann is at 39 percent? Let's be clear, Texas isn't as red a state as some would have you believe and a yellow dog will get 40 percent of the vote so what can we do about that one percent who would vote for a yellow dog but not for Barbara Ann. I think we should have run a yellow dog. Even "can't dance Gene Kelly got 35 percent. Barbara Ann and her tacky personal comments about Kay Baby have turned serious professional women off. Next time, let's find a yellow dog instead of this dog we got.

Libby's Blog said...

Seems like you are a cheerleader for the former prom queen. Everything Ms. Radnofsky has said about our rubber stamping Senator is 100% accurate. You think it is OK for you to make tacky personal comments about Barbara Ann. Yet somehow it is not OK for Ms. Radnofsky to criticize an elected official who has sold her political soul, as well as that of Texans to corporate interests and big business? You must be a Rove Republican. Libby

DMZDave said...

Chris - That is exactly my point. You think that BAR has wonderful
solutions because she is smart and she certainly is that. You don't get paid a million dollars by by big oil company law firm unless you are pretty smart but smart does not always equal political understanding, and with BAR's repeated tacky name calling and failure to talk about things Texans care about, it is obvious she belongs in a high dollar martini bar exchanging views with the so-called elite and not serving in the United States Senate. You can't rattle off a bunch of high and mighty ideas just because you think you are smarter than everyone else in the room. BAR is failing to connect with Texas voters and she isn't likely to pick up much support any time soon. Texas is diverse, made up of big cities, small towns, ranchers,farmers..etc. River Oaks (I'm just guessing that's where she lives) is not Texas and though she's done some traveling lately it is apparetnly to tell folks all her smart ideas and not listen and learn what Texans care about. And again, that why we might have been better off running a cute, yellow dog. We wouldn't win but we'd sure do better than the 39 percent.

Capitol Annex said...

Libby,

I'm inviting other Texas Democratic bloggers to join the new Party Builder group that's been set up for bloggers in every state by the DNC.

Here's the link to the group, and I hope you'll join us:

http://www.democrats.org/page/group/TexasBloggers

Libby's Blog said...

Thanks for the tip, Vince! I will check out the site. For the record, dmzdave, Ms. Radnofsky does not live in River Oaks, not that it should matter. What should matter is Ms. Radnofsky's integrity, motivation to serve Texas and her refreshing honesty. Her address and former place of employment is irrelevant. Libby

randyjet said...

BAR does not live in River Oaks by the way. She and her husband are better off than most of us, but they got it the old fashioned way, they WORKED for it. I am not a big fan of lawyers, but it says volumes that BAR chose to go into mediation rather than going after the big bucks of litigation. In short, by that choice she has shown that she is more concerned with justice than bucks. THAT is the kind of lawyer I can respect and admire.
As for any comments about KBH, it is a little hard to take such a person seriously who cannot get even a simple thing like the Wright amendment changed to the satisfaction of the parties concerned. It is even worse when as a lawyer, she makes a proposal that is way out of bounds legally. THAT is plain DUMB! As for her immigration proposal, I can only think that she came up with the plan after way too many drinks. It is so bad and unrealistic, it is almost surreal. If that is the best that she can do after all those years in the Senate, then it is obvious that she is WAY out of her league. It is time for a really intelligent and principled person to take her seat in the Senate.

herownself said...

It is far easier to check out a person's true feelings and belief when
one can meet that person face-to-face.
That's how Barbara Ann is taking over the hearts of Texans.

I met Barbara Ann 2 years ago when she was just getting started and have been her friend ever since. This was before I knew her views on so many issues. My respect and admiration have only increased since then.

One of Barbara Ann's talents is the ability to remember names. She has met so many people in so many places, but she can still call people by their names. That's because she is really paying attention to PEOPLE, not just how she looks or what she was told to say.