First Looks category archive

Natch, they probably voted for McMaverick.

Gun stores and trade groups have reported a spike in firearms sales in the run-up to the November 4 election victory of Democrat Obama and Vice President-elect Joe Biden, who many perceive as strongly pro-gun control.

The National Shooting Sports Foundation, a trade association for the shooting, hunting and firearms industry, reported a 10 percent jump in gun sales this year based on its analysis of an excise tax placed on firearms and ammunition, and a spokesman said the increase had grown dramatically ahead of the election.

“Gun owners are afraid of what Obama is going to do as far as guns,” said spokesman Tony Aeschliman. “He has a clear record of being against us.”

Obama stated his support for the right to bear arms during campaigning, although both he and Biden back a permanent ban on assault weapons — military style semi-automatic rifles — and “common sense measures” to keep guns away from children and criminals, positions which spurred concern among some gun enthusiasts.

Then, again, maybe they are children and criminals.

By their behavior shall ye know them.

Learn how here.

Or download the PDF.

Bonddad on the National Debt (follow the link to see the full analysis):

I’ve been complaining about the deficit for the last 4 years. And I will continue to complain about the deficit for one primary reason: as a country we have to make choices. Some things are more important than others. Those things we find important we should spend more money on.

Over the last 8 years we have not made any choices. Instead we have funded, well, everything that has come down the pike. In addition, we cut taxes, further exacerbating the problem of deficit financing. As a result, we have issued mammoth amounts of public and intra-government debt. Here’s a reading of the last 8 years from the Bureau of Public Debt:

09/30/2008 $10,024,724,896,912.49
09/30/2007 $9,007,653,372,262.48
09/30/2006 $8,506,973,899,215.23
09/30/2005 $7,932,709,661,723.50
09/30/2004 $7,379,052,696,330.32
09/30/2003 $6,783,231,062,743.62
09/30/2002 $6,228,235,965,597.16
09/30/2001 $5,807,463,412,200.06
09/30/2000 $5,674,178,209,886.86

The current total is $10,566,146,196,490.58.

My words, not Bonddad’s: Republican Economic Theory is beggaring the nation.

And anyone who understands arithmetic saw it coming.

Now that baseball is over, the Sports Section has lost its allure.

From John Cole.

Cumberland Country, North Carolina:

Obama: 73,926

McCain: 51,596

Cumberland County is the home of Fort Bragg.

It doesn’t take an IT certification to know that nothing that passes through the internet is private.

Exhibit one:

See, here was Buck’s (Buck Burnette–U. of Texas footballer–ed.) Facebook status following Barack Obama’s win the presidential election:

“all the hunters gather up, we have a #$%&er in the whitehouse”

Geez, Buck. Even if you actually feel that way — which is sad — why not just keep it to yourself? You know, instead of telling five million people. But he didn’t, and naturally, he is now paying the price; he’s been kicked off the UT football team.

Exhibit two (from across the Big Pond–later in the article, the author explores whether such a firing would be legal in the US):

Virgin Atlantic airline fired 13 employees for what they said on Facebook. The charge: The employees “brought the company into disrepute.” The evidence: a discussion that said its airplanes (their workplace) harbored cockroaches and that its customers were “chavs,” the British slang equivalent of “white trash.”

From Brendan.

Over the past couple of days, before the McCain campaign has even had a chance to cool, McCain operatives are trashing their vice-presidential nominee. Frankly, my opinion of her got lower and lower as the campaign progressed, and I posted about the things she did and said that caused me the greatest discomporfort, most notably here.

But this orgy of internecine back-stabbing is quite remarkable.

See, for example, here and here.

Whatever one’s opinion of Palin, she did not nominate herself as vice president. Her party’s candidate called her, and she responded.

If she were the wrong choice, that was not her doing. And I predict she’s going to pay a high political price for answering that phone call.

Why are the GOP long-knives out to get her?

Graachus over at the Great Orange Satan has a theory. The language is more harshly stated than I would normally use, but I think the theory is still worth considering. I’ve edited the portion that I quoted below, both to make it more concise and to remove some of the more just flat-out insulting adjectives. If you want to read the original, just follow the link.

(Aside: Even though Sarah Palin may not have the philosophy, background, temperament, nor seasoning to serve as vice president, much less as president, frankly, some of the adjectives in the source were wholly uncalled for; what is important is not what the post suggests about her; it what is suggests about her party. And there I think it is spot on.)

The problem is that the rich folks who run the party – and run Fox News – aren’t really sincere about the party’s social agenda. It’s just red meat for the rightwing workies. The rich – really, the country’s owners – want the party to look after their class interests, which are all economic. They don’t trust the petit bourgeois footsoldiers any more than you or I do.

The problem is that the crazies are getting restless, and want to run the party themselves, not just provide the voting muscle. This makes the richies nervous . . . .

(snip)

Palin also scares them, as she’s drawn from the same group (as Huckabee–ed.) . . . And the people who run the party aren’t fools, just dedicated to their own interests: they realize that she’s incredibly ignorant, and probably dangerous beyond a point they’re willing to tolerate.

In short, says the GOP to the Christian right, “Vote for us, but don’t expect us to take you seriously. And if you start to get a power-base in the larger party, we’ll take you down.”

Addendum:

Atrios has more on the scapegoating of Sarah Palin.

Good night. Sleep tight.

I know I shall.

I just put out my flag.

And a special “thank you” to Colorado.

When Senator Dodd dropped out of the campaign, I trotted over to Barack Obama dot com, made my first contribution, and ordered an Obama yard sign.

Until last week, it was the only yard sign on my little street. Then a McCain sign appeared across the street and a few houses down.

It’s gone this morning.

I think I shall leave my Obama yard sign up for a day or two.

And my Obama tee shirt hanging in the upstairs window for a day or two.

And my picture of Obama and Biden sitting in the bay window to greet persons who approach my front door for a day or two.

Man, I wouldn’t want his new job on a bet. The odds are so against him. But he is a good and decent man who will put country above party.

It will be a refeshing change.

Trudy Rubin in today’s local rag:

It’s easy to get dubious about democracy in rich countries, where corruption in politics and on Wall Street seems out of control. Americans might have been tempted to turn their backs on politicians as they watched the greedy get bailed out in the global economic crisis. Voters could have chosen to stay home, especially those with bitter memories of the disputed 2000 election.

And yet the opposite happened. Although opinion surveys show voters are pessimistic about whether a new president can turn things around, they flooded the polls. This surge reflects a desire to repudiate the incumbent. (President Bush’s 25 percent approval rating is the lowest of any modern president before an election.) Yet it also shows that many Americans still hope a vote can bring change.

“I will always be honest with you.”

That will be a nice change.

God be with President Obama.

With Virginia, Florida, and possibly North Carolina, going for Senator Obama, the Solid South is broken and the odious “Southern Strategy” is dead.

I grew up when and where public facilities had four bathrooms: “White Men,” “White Women,” “Colored Men,” “Colored Women.”

The four bathrooms are gone, but the mentality behind them still lives. I see it every day.

But it is now clearly the losing side.

And the United States of America is finally ready to have government of all the people, by all the people, for all the people.

I love this country. My family was here for its founding and its story is my story.

It is the only country in history that is based, not on the accident of geography or ethnicity, but on an idea–the idea of freedom.

It screws things up an awful lot, but, through the years, it somehow manages, ultimately, in its own bumbling way, to straighten things out and figure out the right thing to do.

It sometimes takes a long time, but it ultimately figures out the right thing to do.

I think I’m going to cry. Okay, I cried. Okay, I’m still crying.

Give us a couple of more centuries, and maybe we’ll actually get it right.

God be with President Obama.

He has inherited a mess and will need all the help he can get.

__________________

I compliment Senator McCain for his gracious concession. He was the Senator McCain of the past, not the Senator McCain of this recent campaign.

Markell wins the governorship.

But I just saw Judge Lee’s concession speech on the telly vision.

He conceded with class and good humor. Since this is Delawhere, I don’t expect to ever see it on YouTube.

He also left me about 12 robocalls, but, after tonight, I will forgive him that.

From Andrew Sullivan’s live blog of the returns (emphasis added):

9.38 pm. In Ohio, Catholics split down the middle – 51 to 47 for McCain. In Pennsylvania, Obama won Catholics 51 – 49. The Vatican failed to corral voters into the Republican column. I’m watching Fox News now. They insist that America remains a center-right country. I think they’re right. But the GOP is no longer a center-right party. It’s a fringe religious, Dixie-based, big government machine, that relies on fear of others to win elections. And so it lost in a center-right country. And a center-left candidate beat them.

Me, I’m not predicting anything. I’m too worked up about this election, and too burned from the theft of the 2000 election and the disappointment of the 2004 election, the first election in which I ever manned a phone bank, to rejoice until everything is signed and sealed.

But I, as this post I made last week implies, I think his analysis is spot on.

The Republican Party, the party that freed the slaves, has become the party the frayed the sleeves.

And, with luck, the American people have finally figured out that it is an empty shell, a banging cymbal, a sound signifying nothing, that hath not love, nor hope, nor charity.

Off to drink liberally. Leaving a little early; it’s in part of town I haven’t driven in at night for several years, so I want to allow plenty of time to find parking.

Addendum:

Plenty of parking places on Chestnut between 2nd and Front. Mildly shocked. Good thing I brought lots of quarters.

Good bar, good food, nice people.

When I can, I like to go in mid-morning and avoid the rush of persons trying to go before or after work or school.

A rather officious, scruffy-looking young man was blocking my way as I went in, stepping from side to side in front of me as I tried to manuever aournd him. Turns out he was inspecting my button. I pointed out to him that it does not refer to a candidate and he let me pass.

His life would be easier if he told people what he was doing.

Three people were ahead of me in line and three voting machines were set up. All three machines were in constant use.

I was there a total of ten minutes and spent five of those minutes jawboning with one of the poll judges, a neighbor I haven’t seen in a couple of years.

He told me that, when they opened the doors at seven, the line went from the door of the polling room almost out the door of the school (approximately 200 feet) and that traffic had been steady all day.

Now for the long wait until the evening.

End the madness.

Oink, oink.

As I said, deeply corrupt.

And, as I didn’t say, inhuman, unfeeling, and willing to sell their souls.

If they had any.

H/T Karen for the link.