Mr. Gaffe-o-matic himself, Joe Biden, had some words of wisdom for all of us today:

"Part of what being a leader does is to instill confidence, is to demonstrate what he or she knows what they are talking about and to communicating to people ... this is how we can fix this."

Biden then went on to say the following:

"When the stock market crashed, Franklin D. Roosevelt got on the television and didn't just talk about the, you know, the princes of greed. He said, 'Look, here's what happened"

Oops...

Here's the problem Joe - Roosevelt wasn't President when the stock market crashed in 1929 - Herbert Hoover was. However, he didn't specifically refer to the President in the quote, so that's simply a technicality. Except for a couple things - First, Roosevelt was never on television in 1929. The television wasn't available until the 1930s in the United States.

Joe Biden - instilling confidence and demonstrating he knows what he is talking about since 1942.

With all the talk about candidates' health in this election, why isn't Joe Biden being mentioned at all? John McCain is old, and questions about his health are valid, as long as they are legitimate, and not intended solely to hurt his campaign to advance one's own political purposes. The same questions were asked about Dick Cheney with his myriad of heart problems before the last two elections. Again, all are very fair if asked in the correct manner.

The question regarding McCain are being brought up as a What If? scenario due to the experience of Sarah Palin and her ability to lead the country. The opposition refers to the excellent health of Senator Obama, and the experience of Senator Biden, if something were to happen, due to his numerous experience in Washington over the years.

Here's where the argument falls apart though - Any of us can die at any moment. While the prospect of John McCain's age makes that more probable, there's nothing that says he won't live for many more years, like that of his (still living) ninety-six year old mother. Opponents will point out that McCain's father only lived to the age of seventy. While true, advances in modern technology have vastly increased our lifespans, making eighty seem much more attainable. Furthermore, while Presidents age much quicker than normal, there have been many instances of Presidents living past ninety years old, with Ronald Reagan being the most recent example. He was also older than McCain when elected for his second term, for what it's worth.

In addition, Joe Biden isn't that much younger than John McCain. McCain has previously battled (and overcome) skin cancer. Biden has previously battled (and overcome) a brain aneurysm - on two separate occasions. In fact, Biden's aneurysms were simply caught by chance, due to experienced neck pain.

If John McCain is a risk to be President due to his age, then Joe Biden is a risk to be Vice-President due to his health issues over the years. Voting for another candidate based on health is silly - none of us can predict the future. If the candidate that agrees with you the most has something happen to them, the replacement candidate will most likely parrot their ideology somewhat and will select a replacement Vice President that will do the same. Trying to use age or health as an issue is just another way to supress the vote.

While I typically don't use the Washington Times as a source, the statistics in today's article are just that - statistics.

 

As we draw closer to the election, we are presented with arguments with both campaigns claiming how they will unite the country. The Obama camp has been using the slogans of hope, change and "change we can believe in." The McCain camp, on the other hand, has been running on the change of being Mavericks.

 

This is now a change election, but the type of change America is looking for is important. The arguments against each are that Obama's change would not necessarily be for the better, and that McCain's change isn't really change, but more of the same.

 

While political ads and rhetoric from candidates and surrogates on the campaign trail tend to be...misleading...the votes are not. By comparing apples to apples - McCain's tenure in the Senate during the same period of Obama, we can see the willingness to work with the other side:

Mr. McCain has led as chief sponsor of 82 bills, on which he had 120 Democratic co-sponsors out of 220 total, for an average of 55 percent. He worked with Democrats on 50 of his bills, and of those, 37 times Democrats outnumber Republicans as co-sponsors.

 

Mr. Obama, meanwhile, sponsored 120 bills, of which Republicans co-sponsored just 26, and on only five bills did Republicans outnumber Democrats. Mr. Obama gained 522 total Democratic co-sponsors but only 75 Republicans, for an average of 13 percent of his co-sponsors.

 

Finally, a stark difference between the two candidates is seen not only on who they work with, but how often they go against the party standard:

Over his Senate career, Mr. McCain has voted with the majority of Senate Republicans about 85 percent of the time, while in his three years in the Senate Mr. Obama has voted with his party 97 percent of the time.

While neither candidate is completely independent - we all lean a certain way on issues - Senator McCain has proven to not only work with Democrats more often, but to also go against the party line more frequently as well. Of course, many with a vested interest will find any way to equate John McCain with George Bush no matter what the facts say.

Another Monday, and another round of Electoral predictions...

I've added in a few swing states instead of rolling the dice this week. Last week, I had the states as 274-264 in favor of the GOP. This week, I've made a few changes, specifically with the addition of the aforementioned swing states. The swing states are as follows: Nevada, Colorado, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Virginia. Each of these could go either way, but the current momentum is in John McCain's favor.

So there isn't much change, but the electoral map is a dead heat, even with the swing states, with the GOP holding a 227-226 advantage. This shows that if any state is flipped, it will change the outcome of the election. Of course, should the votes be a tie at 269-269 - which is a distinct possibility, it would be an Obama victory, due to the tie-breaker being controlled by the Democrats in Congress. There could also be another piece of drama, if McCain wins the popular vote, and Obama the Electoral, as has also been predicted. Should this happen, will the same "selected, not elected" crowd be up in arms? Probably not...

As I was driving home from work today, my wife asked me what gas prices were. My response was $3.89 for unleaded, as was the price around the Detroit area where I was driving. She then informed me that gas in Jackson, MI was between $5-6 per gallon, and that friends from the area were recommending we gas up before prices skyrocket. They didn't give a reason why, but one can only assume it was due to Hurricane Ike heading towards Houston, and thirty-percent of America's refineries in the gulf coast region.

This phoenonenon however was localized to Jackson, MI. Why - I've got no idea. Not really the place to be worried about having a hurricane hit. Nonetheless, the Jackson Citizen Patriot released a story this afternoon regarding it.

Here's where it gets interesting however:

Tom DuBois Jr. raced time and dozen of other drivers Friday to fill up for $4 a gallon.

"People are fighting, screaming, cussing, driving between gas pump islands," DuBois observed in his 15 minutes of waiting in line at the Marathon on 4201 S. Jackson St. "I call this Hurricane Bush."

And yes, with all disrespect intended for both the Cit-Pat and Mr. DuBois, George Bush hates stupid people. A useless reason for gas prices to go up on rumors, and an even more useless reason for an anti-Bush quote to appear.

I've always liked Charles Krauthammer. His pieces are some of the most elegantly written articles out there, and always logical and to the point. Tomorrow's opinion piece he wrote for the Washington Post is no different.

The main focus on the article is Charlie Gibson question to Sarah Palin regarding the "Bush Doctrine" and if she agrees with it:

He asked Palin, "Do you agree with the Bush doctrine?"

She responded, quite sensibly to a question that is ambiguous, "In what respect, Charlie?"

Sensing his "gotcha" moment, Gibson refused to tell her. After making her fish for the answer, Gibson grudgingly explained to the moose-hunting rube that the Bush doctrine "is that we have the right of anticipatory self-defense."

Then with a stroke of genius, he made Charlie Gibson his you know what:

Wrong.

I know something about the subject because, as the Wikipedia entry on the Bush doctrine notes, I was the first to use the term. In the cover essay of the June 4, 2001, issue of the Weekly Standard entitled, "The Bush Doctrine: ABM, Kyoto, and the New American Unilateralism," I suggested that the Bush administration policies of unilaterally withdrawing from the ABM treaty and rejecting the Kyoto protocol, together with others, amounted to a radical change in foreign policy that should be called the Bush doctrine.

Nothing like being told you've misinterpreted something from the person responsible for inventing it...

As Americans, today is not a day to be bickering about politics. It was seven years ago when America was attacked by terrorists. All of us know what we were doing that day when it happened. I was a freshman in college, in chemistry class when I found out. Immediately afterwards, with our campus being completely wireless even in 2001, we all jumped online to find out more information. I vividly recall Fox News, CNN and other news sites being so jammed that I was unable to get online. In addition our school was cancelled because, at the time, the area the school is located in was considered a high risk for attack, due to many of the large corporate headquarters nearby, the majority of which, based in Detroit, were automotive.

We are all Americans first, and political ideologues second. Let's reflect on what brought us together as a country and hold back on attacks for at least one day. Anyone, right or left, who participates in any attacks or jabs at the other side will have lost a major deal of respect.

The Democrats are on the run. Seriously. They had attacks lined up for all the supposed VP choices - Romney, Pawlenty, Ridge, etc... but Palin was completely out of left field and they are like chickens with their head cut off. Polls don't mean squat until election day, but they do offer up some insight as to what the public perception is.

Right now, McCain has made an amazing comeback. The majority of this is due to the choice of Sarah Palin, while the remainder is so small it could be classified as "miscellaneous." What has happened is completely amazing - the Democrats had the next JFK, the first serious African-American candidate, a country in economic shambles, an unpopular war, and the majority of problems blamed on Republicans and Bush. It should have been a slam dunk election.

Sadly, for Democrats, this wasn't the case. They had a gruelling primary battle between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, and the far left fringes got the candidate they wanted. By choosing the charismatic candidate with the lesser experience, the Democrats appeared to be in cruise control, ready to pop open the bottle of champagne. But then something amazing happened - the candidate overlooked the person he barely beat in the primary, thus alienating many of her voters, and chose a man with a vast amount of foreign policy experience - something to complement his weaknesses.

On paper, it seemed like a good, safe pick. That is until people realized Joe Biden wasn't at all interesting, had more Washington experience than John McCain and threw out the whole notion of change, until the change Obama was running on was redefined as a different kind of change, which simply meant "Not Republican." This unfortunately, is the same "change" any politician runs on when challenging the incumbent party.

Even with all of these issues, the race seemed like it would be close, but still a Democratic win. That is until today. Earlier I was speaking with my wife and I said that my gut feeling right now is that McCain is goin to win big. All the momentum is going his way, and Obama's actions lately have showed him appearing to crack under the pressure. What happened today at a rally in New Hampshire took everyone, including myself by surprise when Joe Biden said the following:

"Hillary Clinton is as qualified or more qualified than I am to be vice president of the United States of America. Let’s get that straight. She’s a truly close personal friend, she is qualified to be president of the United States of America, she’s easily qualified to be vice president of the United States of America, and quite frankly, it might have been a better pick than me. But she’s first rate, I mean that sincerely, she’s first rate, so let’s get that straight."

Now, this does a couple things. First, it knocks down any prestige that Biden had, and further elevates the star of Sarah Palin above his. Second, and more importantly, it digs at the heart of Obama's credibility. If Hillary was more qualified and would have been a better pick, then why didn't Obama forsee this? Of course, I believe that Obama knew this all along - the most difficult ticket to defeat from a Republican perspective would be an Obama/Hillary one.

There has been talk of Biden stepping down for various reasons because of the way the election is going. Obama couldn't ask him to do so without destroying his chances, and Biden would need a legitimate health or family reason. On top of that, if this were to open a door for Hillary, I can't imagine her accepting the VP slot. She was originally passed over, and joining now would lower her prestige as well. She also may see the changing political tides and realize she'll have a better chance in 2012 to run if Obama loses, than to hope and run in 2016 with her age.

With everything that has happened in the last few days in the political world, I believe that today will be the day when Americans finally wake up and go to McCain in droves.

The big guns are out — the Democrats have sent Hillary to Florida to try to go after Sarah Palin. That makes two Clintons trying to nail her now. - Jay Leno

And filed under the, funny because it's true category...

There is some good news for John McCain: According to the latest polls, McCain has started to open up a lead over Barack Obama. The USA Today poll has McCain ahead by 10 points; CBS news poll has the two tied; and the MSNBC poll says that Obama won the election last week. - Conan O'Brien

Over the weekend, we all saw the takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac by the government. This is truly scary when looking at the bigger picture. The takeover, at best, is terrible economic policy. At worst, it is reminiscent of socialism. Many of the media outlets are reporting a number of $200 billion to bailout Freddie and Fannie. This is only a half-truth though, as the $200 billion figure is what is being spent today to bail them out. Some economists believe that over time, this figure can jump up to $1.6 trillion, if not more. Suddenly, the aft repeated quote of $10 billion per month in Iraq doesn't sound like much... I've got a question in all of this for those with common sense - Why haven't the CEOs of Fannie and Freddie gone to jail yet? Does anyone recall Enron and Ken Lay? Fannie Mae cooked the books, so it appeared they were making budget. This was however a sham so that the top executives were able to claim a large bonus. After the bonuses were received, they "magically" discovered that the budget needed to be readjusted and it turns out, they didn't make the budget. Fannie Mae was fined $400 billion for cooking the books in 2004. They over estimated their earnings by $6.3 billion. Compare that to the evil Enron, who over estimated their earnings by a paltry $567 million. At the time this occurred, the CEO of Fannie Mae was Franklin Raines. How corrupt was Raines? While being investigated by the SEC for cooking the books, he decided it was time to take an early retirement. However, he wasn't completely off the hook - rather than going to jail for his actions, he bought his freedom for a $24.7 million settlement. However, here's the kicker - Of that $24.7 million, $15.6 million was in stocks, but was from stock at the time when the transgressions occurred. What that means is that he was paying $15.6 million of stock valued at $77 per share, but the stock was now worth $9 per share. So - that money was $15.6 million in 2004 - which was now devalued to only $1.8 million. In addition, Raines paid another $2 million, but surprise surprise, that was covered by the insurance policy to protect against things like that. He also donated an additional $1.8 million in stock, but another shocker - It wasn't even his. He was involved in a lawsuit with Fannie Mae, in which both sides claimed the stock was rightfully theirs. Finally, he agreed to part with $5 million in unspecified benefits...which really shouldn't be unspecified since they are public funds! By the way, Raines still gets a monthly pension of nearly $114,000 per month, for life, and then if necessary, for the life of his wife. So where was the media in all of this? When the Enron Scandal hit, the following nine months saw over 3000 stories in the media about it. In comparison, Fannie Mae has a total of 37 stories in that same time frame. A greater than 80:1 ratio in news coverage, but only about 1/19th the accounting errors. This however, doesn't fit in with the agenda to praise publically run programs and criticize the capitalist system. There was however one exception to this, and that is the Wall Street Journal. Think of how this bodes for society as a whole - if you succeed, the government will classify you as being too successful, and implement a windfall profit tax on you as we've heard will happen to the oil companies. However, if you fail, the government will bail you out, thus giving no incentive to improve. Ironically, this exemplifies one of the major themes of Barack Obama's political message. Obama constantly tells us how hard it is to succeed in this environment. However, if things are so bad, how was he able to succeed? On the contrary, if someone with a background and life story as his, with a father from Kenya and being raised by a single mother can succeed, then this only proves the American dream exists. Barack Obama knows this, but as a very intelligent politician, he also knows that he can't win the election unless he can convince the American people they can't succeed as he did.