Fresh Loaf

In 2007, Georgia Sen. Johnny Isakson co-sponsored the Medicare End-of-Life Care Planning Act, which would expand Medicare’s coverage of voluntary end-of-life counseling. Similar measures had been included in the current health care reform legislation.

“The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama’s “death panel” so his bureaucrats can decide … whether they are worthy of health care.”

—    Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, from an Aug. 7 Facebook entry

“Palin’s website had talked about the House bill having death panels on it where people would be euthanized. How someone could take an end of life directive or a living will as that is nuts.”

—    Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., from an Aug. 10 Washington Post interview

“The irony is that actually one of the chief sponsors of this bill originally was a Republican … Johnny Isakson from Georgia, who very sensibly thought this is something that would expand people’s options.”

—    Pres. Barack Obama, at an Aug. 11 town hall meeting in New Hampshire

(more…)

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Newt Gingrich has an op-ed in the the AJC today extolling the vital importance of truth in the health care debate.

Ha.

And ha.

He is the same man who went on TV Sunday and defended Sarah Palin’s crackpot bullshit about Obama’s health proposals killing old people and babies.

And let’s not forget, Newt’s also a serial adulterer who gives speeches about the importance of traditional marriage.

Newt Gingrich treats his conservative audience like they’re idiots.

(Photo by Joeff Davis)

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On Friday, crybabyquitter ex-Gov. Sarah Palin typed some foam-mouthed gibberish on her Facebook page about Obama creating “death panels” to kill old people and her babies.

Speaking to the Washington Post’s Ezra Klein, Sen. Johnny Isakson said Palin’s comment was “nuts.”

I just had a phone call where someone said Sarah Palin’s web site had talked about the House bill having death panels on it where people would be euthanized. How someone could take an end of life directive or a living will as that is nuts. You’re putting the authority in the individual rather than the government. I don’t know how that got so mixed up.

Hooray for sanity.

It’s a shame Isakson speaking a simple truth is newsworthy, but the fact is there aren’t many Republicans willing to go on the record calling-out Palin for her endless shitstream of vile stupidity.

Two days ago, Newt Gingrich had ample opportunity to disagree with Palin’s blatantly false smear when he appeared on ABC’s This Week With George Stuffing Envelopes, Newt Gingrich chickened out.

(Photo by Joeff Davis)

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Sad news for people who like to publicly insult others.

Conservative political blog Peach Pundit says he’s changing Peach Pundit’s comments infrastructure to reduce the number of personal attacks.

Bossman Erick Erickson:

For the past few months things in our comment threads have really gotten out of hand [. . .] They have descending into ad hominem chaos.

You know its bad when “goat fucking child molester” guy thinks a website is too ad hominemy.

Don’t despair.

If you’re hell-bent on calling your fellow citizens Nazis, Communists, racists, reverse racists, child molesters or you’re simply irate about President Obama’s plan to euthanize the elderly and Sarah Palin’s babies, you’re in luck:

Rep. Hank Johnson is hosting a town hall meeting tonight to discuss federal healthcare policy.

Correction: The first version of this post incorrectly stated the comments were shut down.

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• More violent crimes in metro Atlanta — this time in Roswell — even after Mayor Franklin announced yesterday that crime is down around these parts.
• Unemployment hits 16-year high. More than 11 million Americans are now unemployed.
• Hamas and Israel say no to the U.N. demand for a ceasefire.
• Sarah Palin wants Katie Couric to know that Couric “is not the center of everybody’s universe,” further proving how behind on media information Palin is. Literate people have known that for awhile.
• With no writers’ strike to worry about this year, the Golden Globes award ceremony is back on. Now the stars will have to party hard enough for two year’s worth.
• Obama’s planned stimulus package was met with derision from both parties. Not surprising since Democrats are frequently against tax cuts and Republicans are frequently against financial assistance.
• Russia and Ukraine manage to get along. Maybe they should clue other fighting nations into the finer points of nonviolent negotiation.

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Today’s the last chance for Georgia’s U.S. Senate candidates to campaign, and they’re both playing to the base.

Republican incumbent Saxby Chambliss hosted Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin last night at a private fundraiser at the W Hotel in Midtown; today she’ll stump for the candidate in Augusta, Savannah and Perry before finishing the day at the Gwinnett Arena at 4 p.m.

Democratic candidate Jim Martin is scheduled to receive well wishes from rapper Ludacris and U.S. Congressman John Lewis today at a rally in front of the Capitol at 5:30 p.m.

Martin, whom many political pundits said needed a visit from Pres.-elect Barack Obama to rouse voters back to the polls against Chambliss, is trying to energize turnout among African-American voters. That demographic turned out in record numbers for the Nov. 4 General Election, but statistics for early voting in the runoff election show fewer numbers are returning to the polls. Obama did lend his voice to robocalls and a radio ad for Martin, it looks like he won’t be stopping in the Peach State to rally for the former state lawmaker.

And before I forget. Matt Zencey, the editorial page editor for the Anchorage Daily News, has some kind words for Palin as she makes her way across our gee-golly-this-place-is-neat-ya-know state.

Gov. Palin’s eldest joined the Army and has been deployed to Iraq. As a justifiably proud military mom, she might ask herself why she is using her conservative star power to support such a reprehensible Republican chicken hawk.

OK then! We’ll have info later in the day about voting tomorrow as well as the usual list of who’s partying where. If you attend any of these rallies — I’ll most likely try to get some face time with America’s sweetheart — feel free to send in photos.

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Alaska Governor Sarah Palin will rally for U.S. Sen. Saxby Chambliss on Monday, Dec. 1 at 4 p.m. From the Chambliss campaign:

4:00 PM
METRO ATLANTA
Gwinnett Arena
6400 Sugarloaf Parkway
Duluth, GA 30097

Doors will open one hour before each program begins. The events are FREE for the general public but in order to attend, you must RSVP at www.procatalog.com/saxby or by visiting the ‘Action Center’ at www.saxby.org

For her full Georgia itinerary, click after the jump.

John McCain and Sarah Palin at the 2008 Republican National Convention. (Photo by Joeff Davis)

(more…)

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Online newshound — and self-styled gumshoe — Matt Drudge continues to scare the hell out of office lackeys and far-right keyboard commandos with today’s giant headline reporting a Russian analyst’s comments that the United States is in the throes of collapse and will eventually dissolve into six parts.

[Russian political analyst Igor Panarin] predicted that the U.S. will break up into six parts – the Pacific coast, with its growing Chinese population; the South, with its Hispanics; Texas, where independence movements are on the rise; the Atlantic coast, with its distinct and separate mentality; five of the poorer central states with their large Native American populations; and the northern states, where the influence from Canada is strong.

He even suggested that “we could claim Alaska – it was only granted on lease, after all.”

We’ll see what the governor says about that on Monday, Mr. Panarin.

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Oh, man, this is gonna be rich.

Sarah Palin — governor of Alaska, John McCain’s former running mate, aerial wolf hunter — is coming to Georgia on Monday to stump for U.S. Sen. Saxby Chambliss in his Dec. 2 runoff race against Democratic candidate Jim Martin.

Jim Tharpe with the details:

Palin, who drew large crowds while running for vice president with Republican presidential candidate U.S. Sen. John McCain, will appear at Chambliss rallies in Augusta, Savannah, Perry and Atlanta on Monday, the day before the Dec. 2 senate runoff between Chambliss and Democrat Jim Martin.

Sarah Palin speaking at the 2008 Republican National Convention.

(Photo by Joeff Davis)

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This is hilarious: Marc-Antoine Audette and Sebastien Trudel, two Montreal comedians, tricked Sarah Palin into thinking one of them was French President Nicolas Sarkozy and recorded the six-minute call.

She seems quite smitten by “Sarkozy,” who suggests they “kill animals” together from a helicopter, compliments her on an “edgy” documentary about her life (actually a porn movie), and tells her he’s unclear on whether her husband is Joe the Plumber. They finally tell her it’s a hoax.

The campaign did confirm that it was Palin on the line. No word on whether whether how many campaign aides’ heads rolled afterward.

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October 2, 2008, 9:35 p.m. at 502 Amsterdam Ave. N.E.

This weeks Time and Place photograph was taken off the television screen at the Amsterdam Café. When I go out on an assignment I try to previsualize an image before I arrive at the shoot and for this one I was thinking of somebody drinking in front of the television screen with the Vice Presidents debate going on behind them but when I got there that image felt a little too contrived so I started taking photos of just the television screen with a long lens and came up with this Palin shot.

(Photo by Joeff Davis)

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Oh, please let this be true: according to the Chicago Sun-Times columnist Bill Zwecker, vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin is interested in appearing on “Saturday Night Live” in order to parody Tina Fey, whose Palin impersonations have been the must-see-TV of the presidential campaign. Zwecker says “I’m hearing some sort of Palin tweak of Fey’s American Express commercials is in the works,” which sounds potentially hilarious. (Those American Express ads with the likes of Fey, Jerry Seinfeld or Ellen Degeneres tend to be pretty funny, but they’re also overdue for parody.)

Zwecker alludes to an unnamed “top honcho with the McCain campaign,” which makes the whole thing sound more like wishful thinking than a done deal. “Saturday Night Live” is in reruns this week and returns Oct. 18, but will be producing at least two prime-time “Saturday Night Live Weekend Update Thursday” specials on Oct. 9 and 16, so it might could happen. At any rate, the Sarah Palin/Tina Fey impressions have been a bonanza for “SNL,” giving the show its best ratings in years. If you haven’t seen them, Hulu has her season-opening sketch with Amy Poehler’s Hillary Clinton (NBC.com’s most-watched viral clip ever), the Fey/Poehler parody of the Palin/Couric interview and Saturday’s vice-presidential debate.

(more…)

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Andisheh just pointed out to me that Sarah Palin told Katie Couric the other day that she reads Creative Loafing. I’m excited that a potential vice president “established her worldview” by reading our paper, as well as by reading dailies like the New York Times and Pravda.

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Tonight at 9 p.m., the two vice presidential nominees from both major parties — where’s the Libertarian? — will face off in what’s sure to be a battle of the wits.

In one corner, we have Sen. Joe Biden, a veteran lawmaker with a history of gaffes but who has more or less held it together — even while riding the Amtrak from D.C. to Delaware every single day of his life. In the other, there’s Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, who has proven to be the most astute interview subject since Crispin Glover.

To help you enjoy the debate, the fine folks at GEDBlog have put together a Sarah Palin BINGO card. The targeted moose is a free space. Each time Palin mentions “lipstick,” “glass ceiling,” “Tony Rezko,” or the healthy polar bear population, cover a space. First person to mail in their winning BINGO card receives a free pair of 3-D glasses that have been sitting on my desk for a couple of months.

We may or may not be liveblogging this spectacle. I’m in talks with a special guest to join me, a person who has changed the very fabric of modern politics with her wit, wisdom and style. I’m speaking with her agents, who as luck would have it, are demanding I provide her with tomatoes. Even if we don’t, at least you have this fancy game to play.

To print out a BINGO card, click here to access the PDF version.

(Hat tip to various folks on Tumblr, GEDBlog)

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OMG y’all! Sarah Palin’s cybersecurity was like, totally breached, and all her e-mails and photos of aerial wolf hunting were stolen. And just like everything bizarre in this world, it turns out there’s a Georgia connection. It’s in Athens, the land of drunks, an Arch, and a bunch of bulldogs on street corners!

The Associated Press reports that the Internet anonymity service used by the person who hacked Palin’s Yahoo account is based in the college town I know, love and that I miss dearly.

From the AP:

Investigators were waiting to speak with Gabriel Ramuglia of Athens, Ga., who operates an Internet anonymity service used by the hacker. Ramuglia told the AP on Thursday he was reviewing his own logs and promised to turn over any helpful information to authorities because the hacker violated rules against using the anonymity service for illegal activities.

“If you’re doing something illegal and causing me issues by doing this, I’m willing to cooperate,” Ramuglia said. “Obviously this is the most high profile situation I’ve dealt with.”

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— Travis may be in Arizona shouting “Go Dawgs!” until his voice is gone, but that isn’t stopping him from exercising his fingers on Lucid Idiocy. Today he wonders if John McCain is elected president, which McCain will we get? The maverick of the past or the bullshit artist of the present?

— Whichever, and whomever, it is, the next president will have to deal with an economy that may be at its worst since the Great Depression. And with all that’s going on with our economy, Reporter Cub is feeling a wee bit unsettled. He also wonders what we all wonder: Why is gas still over $4 a gallon in Atlanta?

— But Jason Pye is even more unsettled. First, he notes that McCain has flip-flopped on the federal bail-out of AIG. And then he takes us into “deep breath” territory: the feds have spent over $800 billion in bail-outs so far. And that’s on top of a $400 billion federal deficit. Isn’t anyone keeping an eye on the house up there?

— The candidates are finally starting to get it that people are freaked out about the economy. And now that the dust has settled, more and more folks are looking at Sarah Palin and going WTF? She could be a heartbeat away from being our president? Well, not everyone, as Drift Grift notes in an especially sour edition of his “Morning Wooten.”

— Speaking of the paper that used to cover Dixie like the dew, the fine ladies at Pecanne Log poke a little fun at Atlanta at the expense of the AJC and how the paper of record always seems to want to put a happy face on things.

— And finally, Live Apartment Fire has the real skinny on the state of modern print journalism, courtesy of Doonesbury. Again, it’s all about the economy.

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Calling all bespectacled, no-nonsense women who steal the spotlight from their potential bosses when they’re not killing moose! Your services are requested for an “adult-themed video production” here in Atlanta.

The wonderful ladies at Pecanne Log unearthed this gem:

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 — The presidential election approaches. With Georgia now officially off the table for Obama, JMac at Safe As Houses takes a look at the states still up for grabs.

— Is Sarah Palin a bad parent because her 17-year-old daughter is preggers? Dcup at Politits isn’t ready to go there.  But Palin’s family situation has caused her to look back at her own adventures in raising teenagers.

— At Blue Heart of Dixie, Jason takes offense at the AJC’s Jim Wooten declaring that Palin is “one of us.” Not so fast, he writes.  Exactly who is “us?” And why do people who challenge the status quo get labeled as traitors who don’t love their country?

—Over at Chicken Fat, Edwin waxes poetic about his family doctor growing up. Ah, the good ol’ days:  If your were sick, you didn’t make an appointment; you just showed up to be treated.

— Modernism is also stuck in the craw of Max Earnest, a local artist who has created the blog Central Branch Library to raise the question of  why Fulton County would want to demolish a perfectly fine central library in downtown to build another one. In his mind, it’s pimping the public to the tune of $275 million.

— And, finally, WXIA-TV’s Jerry Carnes, a long-time news reporter, has prostrate cancer and is devoting a blog to detailing his fight to beat it.

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— The Republican party is over, the elephants have left Minneapolis and Sarah Palin is the modern day Joan of Arc. What’s left? The same old same old, says Amy Morton at Georgia Women Vote. She also slips in the line of the day, discussing Gov. Perdue’s interest in having the power to take over a school system.

— The graphic of the day comes from Travis at Lucid Idiocy, who has posted a wordle that compares the acceptance speeches of Obama and McCain. What’s a wordle? It shows which words they used the most, and the result is fascinating and in stark contrast.

— And the uppity idiot of the day award, of course, goes to Georgia Congressman Lynn Westmoreland, who is obviously still trying to learn every one of those 10 Commandments. Mel at Blog For Democracy goes off on Westmoreland for perpetuating all sorts of stereotypes.

— DriftGrift’s reaction is sadness because he thinks McCain is a good man, and that his acceptance speech will be his last hoorah.

— There’s more to life than politics. And A.man.I at My Urban Report has posted a video report on his road trip to Myrtle Beach to chase Hurricane Hannah, and how his wife is none too happy with the idea.

— And finally, leave it to the fine ladies at Pecanne Log to keep it real. Take a ride with them on the Bulldog Bounce. Go Dawgs!

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A Republican war hero picks an inexperienced right-winger as his running mate.

Questions quickly arise about the upstart VP candidate’s qualifications, and a scandal gets national media attention. But the running mate wows the party’s conservative base with a scrappy televised speech, turning the table with attacks on Democrats and the media.

Sound familiar? Yeah, I’m talking about Richard Nixon.

There are remarkable parallels between Nixon’s famous “Checkers speech,” which saved his spot alongside Ike in 1952, and Sarah Palin’s speech at the Republican convention, which … well, which may have done the same thing for her.Here’s one of the speeches:

I know that this is not the last of the smears. In spite of my explanation tonight, other smears will be made. Others have been made in the past. And the purpose of the smears, I know, is this, to silence me, to make me let up. Well, they just don’t know who they are dealing with. (more…)

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— It was Sarah Palin’s big night and the blogosphere is alive with reaction. First off, Travis at the aptly-named Lucid Idiocy checks in with his “jerk” reaction.

— But ATLmalcontent  says liberals should at least acknowledge that Palin put on a good performance for the faithful.

– Decatur Guy doesn’t agree. He writes at Atlanta Public Affairs that he thought Palin — along with other speakers last night — came across as bitter, angry and condescending about Obama’s candidacy.

— Of course, Hurricane Gustav almost stole the spotlight from the Republicans and at Live Apartment Fire, there’s a nifty critique on how the local TV stations covered the weather event.

— While the Democrats and Republicans bicker, Atlanta’s still stuck in a massive traffic jam. B at Terminal Station takes a look at the state’s commuter rail plan and notes that riding a train will take longer to reach Atlanta than driving. Which leads him to ask: If we’re gonna spend all that money on rail, why in the world aren’t we doing high-speed rail?

– And, finally, the Daley Briefing puts it all into a deeper perspective with a letter from Iraq written to Audrey Marie, his newly-born niece.

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Your daily dose of wacky Sarah Palin art, courtesy of The Searcher on Flickr. (Click the link for an excellent pseudo-interview, as well.)

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That John McCain. He’s a decider. He knew about that whole Troopergate thing before choosing Sarah Palin for his VP candidate. At least, he says he did.

And he knew about Palin’s daughter Bristol being pregnant.

He knew Palin considers the Iraq war “a task that is from God.” He also knew that Alaska’s two leading newspapers, Republican state Senate leader, Republican House leader and mother in-law would guffaw unkindly about Palin as a vice presidential candidate. And, of course, he knew that her first foray into public life was as a beauty contestant. (more…)

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— Is questioning McCain’s choice of Sarah Palin demeaning to women, as conservatives would like you to believe? Of course not, writes Amy Morton at Georgia Women Vote.  The fact that McCain didn’t fully vet Palin before selecting her is what’s really demeaning.

— Palin is also on the mind of Dcup at Politits. She writes that she wants to take the high road on all the Internet conjecture about Palin’s teenage daughter and her pregnancy(s). But for Dcup, it’s personal because it’s about respecting choice and about Bible-thumping hypocrites.

— But leave it to DriftGrift to put Palin’s “issues” in perspective with his “Morning Wooten.”

— Over in Iraq, the Daly Briefing reminds me of what Mark Twain said about Americans: Everyone complains about the weather, but nobody ever does anything about it. Our correspondent in the war zone says Iraqi leaders complain about problem after problem, but never offer any solutions.

— At Lucid Idiocy, Travis takes aim at a state government that shows its appreciation to veterans by closing an assisted living center for vets because of the budget shortfall.

— And, finally, Sara at Going Through The Motions picked the wrong weekend to travel to Biloxi for a poker tournament. She left the Gulf Coast Sunday morning and writes of being swept up in evacuees in the search for food and gasoline while driving 20 mph on the interstate. Gustav missed New Orleans and for that, we can be thankful.

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We here at Creative Loafing Enterprises Inc. Ltd. like to stay above the dirt and the muck, opting instead to pursue truth with our swords of reason, research and…uhm…resolve? With that being said, I present thee:

(Photo Illustration courtesy of ICanHasWar.com)

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