Payback really is a bitch!

Ha! More unintended consequences!

After the desperate decision by the idea-free McCain campaign to dive into the cesspool of racial politics and happily cavort in the filth, donations began pouring in...to Obama. Over 100,000 people donated in a single day, and over one third of them were first time donors. "I think John McCain has harmed himself in the last week, really eroding any capital he had built up in terms of what kind of politician he is," said David Plouffe, Obama's campaign manager. "But he's really helped our campaign, because so many of you have contributed in the last week. Our field offices had people pouring into them yesterday."

Maybe someone should clue the old fart in to how those of us under 60 think. See, to most of us, race doesn't matter. At all. We all went to integrated schools and most of us have friends of diverse ethnicity. A whole bunch of us have dated outside our race, and our kids certainly did. The only time we even think about race is when some stupid fucking dinosaur tries to play that shit, and then we leap to the defense of our friends. Like so many did yesterday.

And that is just my generation - our kids are really offended by crap like McCain is trying. It might play well on the dead pecker bench in Mayberry, but it doesn't get any traction with us, and like it or not, we have the numbers because they bred like bunnies for a couple of decades.

And on the upside, it is poisoning the republican well for a whole bunch of young people who are just now figuring out where they fit in on the political spectrum. So thanks for that assist, republicans. We couldn't have done it without you.

~BG

So who is giving money to McCain?

He isn't getting any love from the members of his own party. He isn't getting any donations from the PACs of fellow republicans in the congress. So who is underwriting the campaign until the public financing kicks in after the convention (that a whole passel of republicans are scared to attend)?

Well! The Washington Post has the answer to that question!



Contributions to McCain from executives and employees in the oil industry rose dramatically in the last half of June, after the senator from Arizona flip-flopped and reversed his opposition to the federal ban on offshore drilling. It was a veritable money-gusher, bringing in $1.1 million to McCain last month, and 3/4 of it was made after his June 16 speech calling for an end to the ban compare that to the $116,000 that same group donated in March, the $283,000 they donated in April and the $208,000 donated in May.

McCain said the reversal came as a response to citizen anger over skyrocketing energy prices, but most Americans are smart enough to realize that any relief would be years away and not likely worth the associated costs, when the stuff is finite and alternatives will have to be developed sooner or later anyway. (We should have listened to Carter in 1977. I did. But I was 13 and politically powerless, and pissed off at the so-called grown-ups around me who put their fingers in their ears, sang "lalalalala I can't heeeaaarrr yooouuuuu!" and elected the idiot Reagan four years later. But I digress...)

The Washington Post gets perilously close to practicing journalism when the reporter points out the timing of the sudden change in McCain's course:

McCain delivered the speech before heading to Texas for a series of fundraisers with energy industry executives, and the day after the speech he raised $1.3 million at a private luncheon and reception at the San Antonio Country Club, according to local news accounts.

"The timing was significant," said David Donnelly, the national campaigns director of the Public Campaign Action Fund, a nonpartisan campaign finance reform group that conducted the analysis of McCain's oil industry contributions. "This is a case study of how a candidate can change a policy position in the interest of raising money."

Of course the campaign denies any connection between the timing of the flip-flop and the fact that he was going to Texas to fundraise. But not being utter morons, we don't believe them.

Here is a portent for the fall

Donations to presidential campaigns by members and employees of the armed services have gone overwhelmingly to anti-war candidates.

From January 2007 through March of this year, service members or civilian employees of the military donated at least $766,000 to presidential candidates, according to data made available April 20 and provided by the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonprofit research group in Washington.

The analysis included donations of at least $200 made by individuals who listed their employer as one of the four branches of the military — Army, Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps — or the Coast Guard, National Guard, Army Air Force Exchange Service, armed forces or military.

These donors gave the largest amounts to Rep. Ron Paul, the long-shot Republican candidate from Texas who has acknowledged defeat in the nomination process but continues to campaign, and Sen. Barack Obama, the Democrat from Illinois.

During the reporting period, Paul — a former Air Force surgeon who broke with his party to vote against the Iraq war — received the most military contributions, with $201,271.

That’s significantly more than the presumptive Republican nominee, Sen. John McCain from Arizona, who received $132,133 from military donors, according to CRP.

“I think that our fighting men and women want to protect America, defend our Constitution and defend our borders,” said Jesse Benton, a spokesman for Rep. Paul’s campaign. “I think they’re sick and tired of being sent overseas on these police actions and getting caught in the middle of these civil wars, and want someone like Ron Paul speaking sense.

“They signed up to defend our country, not police the world,” Benton said, “and I think they’re hungry for leaders who do that.”

I am not Ron Paul supporter - but that sentiment is right fucking on. Just because military members agree to fight wars by definition when they join up doesn't mean they lust after just any war. Quite the opposite, in fact.

Remember, it was easier to convince every last citizen of Athens that war was necessary than it was to convince a single Spartan. That is because a professional warrior class understands the seriousness of the undertaking in ways that simply aren't conveyed in repeated viewings of Band of Brothers and Saving Private Ryan.