Category: News

Barack Obama has announced that he has formed a Presidential Exploratory Committee and will make a final decision on whether or not to run on February 10th. The presence of his Google Ads here on the Casey Blog bodes well for him 🙂

UPDATE: I tried embedding Obama’s announcement video using the web code provided from his own site’s video player. But instead of the video, you may see the below statement dissing my site as unqualified to share it. Barack’s first stumble??!!

UPDATE: Phew! They fixed it. Nice recovery Barack.

We get one every day, churn through it, and then add it to the recycling pile. But yesterday, while poking around an antique mall, I found an old copy of the Washington Post that just felt worth buying. On Friday, August 9, 1974, I was just a month past turning nine years old. The Presidential campaign of 1972 is really my earliest political memory, and while I don’t specifically remember the moment, I’d like to think I was aware of the big news of that day. You can read the headline online today, Nixon Resigns.

What else was going on in this 15¢ copy of the Post? Rain was predicted, with a high in the mid-80s. The Senate Banking Committee decided to delay their vote on the nomination of Alan Greenspan to be Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors to give newly sworn-in President Ford the “flexibility” to offer his own nomination. NFL Players were considering a strike. The TV guide took up a quarter of a page and listed seven channels. Three Dog Night was coming to play at The Capital Centre, and The Three Musketeers, Born Losers, Walking Tall and The Sting were playing in local theatres. At the Penn Theatre on Capitol Hill you could catch a double bill of Dairy of a Stewardess and Pigkeeper’s Daughter. An AM/FM stereo with built-in 8-track tape player could be had for $99 at Custom HiFi.

Somewhere in my basement, hidden under a false floor created when the basement was finished, is a copy of the Washington Post from the morning after Election Day, proclaiming Bill Clinton’s presidential victory. It it’s ever discovered, and assuming it’s held up over time, perhaps it will sell for a few bucks at a flea market in 2025. A much happier political memory, it should be worth something.

… of a wonderful Election.

Virginia win gives Democrats the Senate
AP, 11/9/06

The Onion – America’s Finest News Source

WASHINGTON, DC—Republican officials are blaming tonight’s GOP losses on Democrats, who they claim have engaged in a wide variety of “aggressive, premeditated, anti-Republican campaigns” over the past six-to-18 months. “We have evidence of a well-organized, well-funded series of operations designed specifically to undermine our message, depict our past performance in a negative light, and drive Republicans out of office,” said Republican National Committee chairman Ken Mehlman, who accused an organization called the Democratic National Committee of spearheading the nationwide effort. “There are reports of television spots, print ads, even volunteers going door-to-door encouraging citizens to vote against us.” Acknowledging that the “damage has already been done,” Mehlman is seeking a promise from Democrats to never again engage in similar practices.

(Via The Onion.)

At last… at long last…

An Iraq war that has cost us nearly half trillion dollars—and the good will of the world—might not have done it. Runaway federal spending that allowed the national debt to reach $8.5 trillion might not have done it. George Bush’s low approval ratings, the lack of comprehensive immigration reform, the historical pattern of an anti-incumbent “six-year itch” in presidencies, the cascade of stories about administration ineptitude and dissembling and congressional financial and lobbying corruption—none of these issues seemed destined to end the Republicans’ 12-year reign in Congress.

Then came the Foley Scandal. If the Democrats can’t take the Hill now, they deserve to go the way of the Whigs.

Howard Fineman, It Takes a Sex Scandal
Newsweek, 10/3/06

If, after the Foley episode — a maraschino cherry atop the Democrats’ delectable sundae of Republican miseries — the Democrats cannot gain 13 seats, they should go into another line of work.

George Will, What Goeth Before the Fall
The Washington Post, 10/5/06

What line of work did most former Whigs go into? Wikipedia says that most quit politics or switched parties when their own party reached met it’s demise in the 1850s.

I’m not ready to join the Whigs yet, but I’ve been tempered enough by seeing my party snatch defeat (or have victory stolen) in the face of what looked like a sure win. And so I try not to let comments like those above get me too carried away with optimism over the coming elections. And yet, given how badly George Bush is fucking up our country, with the Republican Congress as his willing accomplices, anything less than a major Democratic victory next month will certainly leave me feeling ready to join the Whigs, wherever it is that they went.

(OK, you might point out that many went to the Republican Party. In 1860, I may have as well. But not in 2006 or anytime in this century, that I promise.)

America comes to this realization too late to spare us this second term we’re currently suffering through. But perhaps in time to strike some balance by taking away Bush’s lapdog Republican Congress… we have to remain hopeful. Failing that, all that will remain is the cleanup of his mess, and the bad memory of the Bush era.

Bush Tops List As U.S. Voters Name Worst President

Quinnipiac University, 6/1/06