Every time the Democrats draw blood , John Mc Cains BBQ Picnic Pals in the Media  try to come to his rescue and start telling Democrats what is fair and not fair. However, when Democrats are attacked by Republicans , Mc Cains BBQ Picnic Pals in the Media always say it's fair game to attack Barack Obama and Democrats. Remember: It was fair to question John Kerry s Military record in 2004 wasn't it ?

The Republicans are throwing a fit and crying "Where's The New Politics ?" because Democrats are rightfully charging (via GENERAL Wes Clark) that Mc Cain does not have the qualifications to be CIC because he led no mission and never sent anyone to battle.It's true. And Mc Cains BBQ Picnic Pals are all fussy and "such as" , because we are ruining their only good story for John Mc Cain. "He deserves to win the White House because he's a War Hero." Well, this ain't a game with prizes!

Here's a good way to start the day, Senator John Kerry (whom I've consulted for), lost his main opponent yesterday, when Ogonowski failed to qualify for GOP ballot. Ogonowski missed the 10K mark by 300 votes, so a little known "security specialist" named Jeff Beatty will be the Republican nominee.

I'm heading out to today, and will be attending a conference for a few days that has representatives from both the West and the Muslim countries (religious, business leaders, and a few bloggers) in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. I just looked at the itinerary and its 22 hours of flight time. I've been there once before, for a couple of days on the way to India. I recall it getting increasingly hot as the day went on, and how orderly everything seemed for an inner city of KL's size.

I blogged this over on Malaysia Matters, about John Kerry yesterday on the Senate floor addressing what's happening in Malaysia right now with the political situation. And also including a editorial by Stuart E. Eizenstat on the titanic conflict within the Muslim world pitting modernity against reactionary radicalism, and the political implications for what happens in Malaysia.  

When I recently went to Israel for a week a couple of months ago, I took a break from blogging about it until I got home (which just led to a lot of huge thoughts that were difficult to make the time to post upon), but I'll try with this trip to make more frequent posts from abroad.

And so it begins.  MSNBC, affiliate of NBC, subsidiary of GE, one of the cornerstones of the military industrial complex, and one of the nation's largest military contractors, convenes its Wednesday morning 8 am political panel, Mika, Joe, Chris and Pat.

Chris Matthews, done with beating up Hillary (for now), starts on Obama:  Obama's "love of country" is "conditional", a "transaction" based upon "what it's done for him".  Obama doesn't "get" the "patriotism of the working class"  Obama's church affiliation and later disaffiliation were purely "cynical" and "political".  Obama appeals to the "upper end" and "the poor" but can't relate to "the middle" "the working class" "the guy who's proud to be an American".  They see "no evidence of his ability to connect with the average man" as opposed to Obama's "exotic life style".

This isn't a confession.  I'm not ashamed of my choice and I'm not going to apologize for it.  But things have changed, and they've changed in ways that I don't know that I can fully articulate, though I think most of us know.  If I'd lived in a swing state, I probably would have voted for Gore, but in Vermont I had the luxury of making a protest vote.   The electoral college map wasn't going to change. Vermont was going to go for Gore no matter what I did.  If I'd lived in Florida, Ohio, New Mexico or New Hampshire, I would have voted for Gore.  I didn't have to make that choice.

After the fold, I'll talk a bit about the decision processes that go into this and why they're relevant to 2008.  For those of you in Vermont, the first few paragraphs will be familiar to you.  For those of you who don't, you'll learn some very strange things about the way we choose a governor.

Today is Memorial Day, obviously, (at least it still is on the West Coast!) and much to my surprise, there were a couple of tributes to John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, when I woke up this morning.

Now, I can more than appreciate Senator McCain's service to our country, but I had to wonder why prominent Democratic servicemen weren't being honored as well. I asked TexasDarlin this on her thread.

Most electable candidate in 2000: Al Gore. Mainstream media destroys him: it starts with attacks on Gore's character and a Bill Bradley love fest, gets worse in the race against Bush, and finishes with a media firestorm demanding Gore concede Florida and the election.

Most electable candidate in 2004: Al Gore. He tests the waters, finds the same crazed Gore-hating media, and decides not to run; doesn't want to deal with that sh*t again.

Most electable candidate in 2008 other than Gore: Clinton. Mainstream media destroys her: the attacks on her character are overwhelming, accompanied by a Barack Obama love fest and absurdly early and overwhelming 'loser' catcalls demanding she concede.

Most electable candidate in 2012 (assuming Obama loses in 2008; it's a strong possibility (see below) though I think he'll win by a nose): Clinton. She decides not to run, doesn't want to deal with that sh*t again.

On Clinton's electability and Obama's relative weakness there, check out electoral-vote.com any time in the past month. Here are the latest numbers:

Reading about the impressive crowd size at the Portland Obama Rally caused me to reminisce about another awesome Presidential rally - John Kerry's Portland water front park rally in 2004.

Here are some of the awesome pictures:

The crowd size was estimated at 50,000.  Link

Some 50,000 people came out to hear John Kerry and special guests speak in Portland on a sweltering hot summer day. Your phototographer arrived before 10AM, and Kerry finished speaking a tad after 2PM. (I'm wearing a towel over my head - find the shot of me in here).

Along with Kerry, the rally included quick speeches by Oregon's Democratic representatives and leaders: Governor Ted Kulongoski, Senator Ron Wyden, and Representatives Darlene Hooley, David Wu, and Earl Blumenauer. Celebrity guests included actor Leonardo DiCaprio, and rock musicians Jon Bon Jovi and Richie Sambora (who played two accoustic songs).

Finally, the Kerry busses arrived, and Kerry's step-son Chris Heinz spoke briefly first. Then Tereasa Heinz Kerry spoke for quite a few minutes. Jim Rassmann (whose live Kerry saved in Vietnam) also spoke briefly. Retired General Tony McPeak - a Republican critic of Bush's policies - was on stage but did not speak.

Kerry spoke last. He got a lively reception from a large crowd that had been waiting several hours in the heat.

Watching that rally, I was very confident that John Kerry would become our next President.  He and John Edwards were getting amazingly huge and enthusiastic crowds all over blue America.

I cried the day I watched John Kerry concede in Boston on TV.  It was incomprehensible to me why he would lose  --  he was getting huge and fantastic crowds all over the place compared to GWB.

I'm less naïve now.  Like Kristen Breitweiser, I have learned to understand that it is all about swing state electoral votes.  Big crowds in Oregon and Pennsylvania are fantastic but they won't guarantee us victory in November.  Both Obama and Clinton would beat McCain in Oregon according to the most recent head-to-head Oregon poll (Link),  but that would not guarantee us victory in the 15 critical swing states that include Ohio, Florida, Michigan, West Virginia.

Kristen's article Reality Bites: Swing-State Math is very helpful to me in understanding why John Kerry didn't win.  It's a must read.  

Excerpt:

In '04, I traveled as a surrogate for the John Kerry campaign. I was sent to places like Iowa, Ohio, Nevada, Colorado, Wisconsin, New Hampshire, and Florida. Quite the roadtrip.

In the beginning, I wondered why I kept getting sent to these random "swing states." Iowa (a state in 2004 with, yes folks, only one Starbucks!!) Why did Iowa matter? I was a political novice. So dumb. So naïve.

To me, it seemed so terribly undemocratic that a handful of states could determine who became our president. Likewise, It never truly clicked in my head when my New Yorker friends would wryly state that their vote didn't count. Of course their vote counted. Every vote counts. This is America, right?

And then on Election Day '04, I learned the hard way why those swing states mattered so much. John Kerry lost Ohio and Florida and therefore lost the election to George Bush. Four more grueling years of Republican rule. My impression on that sad day? 1460 days to go.

Now with roughly 240 days until Election Day '08, one thing remains the same: THE ONLY VOTES THAT WILL MAKE THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN ELECTING JOHN MCCAIN AND A DEMOCRAT TO THE WHITE HOUSE ARE THE SWING STATES.

So with all this talk of delegates and superdelegates counting and not counting, why has nobody (at least to my knowledge) looked at how either Clinton or Obama performs against McCain in the crucial 15 swing states? Frankly speaking, isn't that really all that matters?

Like Kristen, I want a nominee that can win the GE -- the one that has a better odds at winning the swing states.  In my opinion, that candidate is Hillary Clinton.

Obama has outspent her 4-1 in this primary, and has produced ads on stations where no one else ever did. And he is said to be the strong front runner, the candidate who supposedly has galvanized the nation in a new politics. Now here we are in late April when every front runner in recent memory and any other time in memory, at this point, has blown away the opposition: Kerry, Bill Clinton, Dukakis, Mondale, Carter, McGovern and, likewise, every nominee on the other side as well, but still Barack Obama, and his supporters have the nerve to tell us that a win by Hillary Clinton of less then 10 points would constitute a victory for him. Do he and his followers really think this is a nation of fools? Don't they realize that a winning candidate doesn't lose primaries in late April? Don't they realize that real winning candidates are able to blow away the competition at this point by 20 points and more?

The fact that he is not able to consolidate his lead, and seal the deal has to be an ominous sign for him. The plain fact really is that even a small win by Obama in Pennsylvania would not be impressive at this point. However a loss is devastating, and a big loss should be crushing.

As things stand now it looks like Hillary Clinton is on the verge of pulling off Comeback Gal III, and Tuesday night is shaping up to be one that will rock the foundations of this race.