The Political Whore

Check out the following clip of McCain speaking about the recently passed G.I. Bill:

Now realize McCain was against this bill, and even proposed an alternate version that did not contain the provisions he’s bragging on in this video.

• Seymore Hersh’s latest New Yorker piece, on Bush’s increased covert action against Iran, is a doozy.
• Obama takes aim at southern voters.
• Tampa looks at minimum zoning requirements.
• Wall Street feasts on finger nails before the open.
• Some cry over Wal-Mart’s spilled milk.
• Will they or won’t they? Hollywood actors prepare to strike.
• Checking in on Oliver Stone’s W.
• The Bucs re-sign Earnest Graham.

I will be out of the office on special assignment next week, so my blogging will be light. Hang in there. Joe B will continue to file the Short List every day, and I will pop in as often as I can from my remote locations to add my 2 cents.

Tampa Tribune Editor Janet Coats will meet with her restless troops next week to discuss what they have all been awaiting/dreading: the future of the newsroom. She sent this e-mail to her staff today:

From: Coats, Janet E.
Sent: Friday, June 27, 2008
Subject: Newsroom staff meetings

We’ll have staff meetings on Tuesday to talk about plans for the second half of the year. We’ll talk about the subject that is foremost in your minds – job reductions. But we’ll also talk about the new structure for the newsroom and the ways we see the newspaper and TBO.com changing in the coming months.

We’ll also try to draw a road map for the next few months. We live in uncertain times, and there’s not much I can do to change that. But I will try to give you a little better sense of the decisions we face in the next few months, and how we’re going to work through them to create the best opportunities to do good journalism.

Bonus cuts: 54 take buyout at Media General Fla operations; Closing the South Tampa office

The McCain camp actually pulls off a decent viral video! I wouldn’t take a word of this at face value, but you have to admit the video is well done. If McCain knew what a computer was we might actually have a race here …

• Obama gives Clinton $2,300. (Side note: The Times should be shot for using that picture.)
• Novak says Colin Powell will endorse Obama at some point, but not because he’s a fan of Barack. No, he’ll do it to spite W.
• Speaking of traitors to their party: Time has a story on Joe Lieberman that made me puke in my mouth a little.
• Don’t blow your top trying to figure out the energy crisis, there’s a mountain of a solution out there.
• North Korea dynamites the cooling tower at the Yongbyon nuclear power plant.
• One barrel of oil = 28 Subway footlongs.
• This weekend’s viewing: WALL-E is a “Pixar masterpiece.”
• “Six Crazy Hollywood Stories You Probably Haven’t Heard.”

Our CL issue on newsstands as of yesterday is the (Openly) Gay Issue, and I wrote about the two groups that were formed to fight against a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriages. Why are there two?

 Blame the dueling PACs on partisan politics, ideology and — to a lesser degree — personalities. One PAC is pointedly bipartisan, while the other doesn’t identify with a party but is extremely pro-Democrat and progressive. It’s not that they aren’t both working against the amendment; they just can’t seem to do it under one roof.

“Personally, I am of the opinion that it is unfortunate that they went two separate ways,” said Jim Pease, the president of the Tampa Bay Log Cabin Republicans who is aligned with one of the competing yet cooperating groups, Florida Red and Blue. “Together as one unified front, as one single message, it would be better.”

The two groups, Florida Red and Blue and Fairness for All Families, are coordinating their message and sharing intel but have resisted efforts to merge into one political organization.

The rest of the story is online here.

The Washington Post is reporting that the Supreme Court voted 5-4 along ideological lines to strike down Washington D.C.’s 1976 ban on handgun ownership. This marks the first time since 1791 that the Supreme Court has ruled on the second amendment or tried to sort out if gun ownership was tied to being in a “well regulated militia.”

Though some are sure to fears chaos in the streets, it is important to remember this simple fact: Though you have been unable to own a handgun in D.C. for the last 32 years, shotguns and rifles were still allowed. You read that correctly. Handguns, No way! Shotguns and rifles? A-OK. I take that to mean this decision will not result in immediate mass killings on the National Mall.

Best quote from the WaPo story:

The issue caused a split within the Bush administration. Vice President Dick Cheney supported the appeals court ruling, but others in the administration feared it could lead to the undoing of other gun regulations, including a federal law restricting sales of machine guns. Other laws keep felons from buying guns and provide for an instant background check.

Cheney needs to reconsider. If the people can get their hands on machine guns, ol’ Dick’s ass might be in some trouble.

(Photo Credit: Dubswede)

Breaking news: John McCain is “aware” of both the Internet and computers. He doesn’t use them, silly. He just knows they exist — and that should be good enough for you.

• In other McCain news: Someone really loves their weekends.
• “Reporter M.E. Sprengelmeyer writes that Nader accused Barack Obama of ‘downplaying poverty issues, trying to ‘talk white’ and appealing to ‘white guilt’ during his run for the White House.’”
• The Supreme Court cuts the damages Exxon has to pay for the Valdez disaster to 1/5th 1/10th their original value. The best part: Alito had to recuse himself, as he owns Exxon stock and stands to gain from this decision.
• The Axis of Evil loses another member as North Korea is removed from the list. That just leaves Iran, right?
• Old school: Tuppeware parties. New school: Taser party.
• Coming soon: The Playstation phone.
• The Rays shelve the waterfront stadium plan … for now. (Does this mean they’ll stop winning?)
• Vinny to stick with the Lightning for life.

I’m proud and happy to be the featured speaker at the Suncoast Tiger Bay Club meeting Thursday night on the USF-St. Petersburg campus.

USF St. Petersburg
140 7th Avenue S., St. Petersburg
Click here for campus map
5:00 – 6:00 p.m. – Hors D’oeuvres Reception*
*$20 for STBC members, students, faculty & staff / $25 for all others
6:15 – 7:15 p.m. – Program (open to all at no cost)

Details here. (I know the RSVP deadline has passed but contact Tiger Bay Club anyway; I’m sure they can make an accommodation.)

I will be talking about the impact of the youth vote in 2008, and I hope there are plenty of people there ready to take me on on the subject.

It is nice to see today’s kids are taking advantage of our right to protest.

Two girls in Salt Lake City are protesting rising gas prices after their mom was forced to cut cable TV from the family’s budget because they could no longer afford it. The girls are upset because they can’t watch their favorite cartoons.

This is the way things work in America these days. Despite the world seemingly beginning to fall apart at the seams, there is little real uproar here in the US.

It’s because we’re all at home watching TV. Sometimes it takes something like cartoon deprivation to get us to take a stand.

Once we have to forego more of our guilty pleasures and distractions, we will all be on the streets protesting, despite the fact that it likely won’t force the price of gas any lower. Never mind the real issues; just don’t take away our Comedy Central.

I can see the signs that would be carried by the picketers:

“Beer should be an everyday thing, but gas prices have eaten away at my beer money! Stop the madness!”

“My Explorer runs on oil but my big-screen HD TV doesn’t! I can’t afford either!”

“My children deserve a future filled with electronic gadgets and video games! How can we leave them that legacy?”

We have become disconnected because we are so contentedly preoccupied. We find it easy to ignore what’s going on as long as we have something to distract ourselves with. It will be interesting to see the reaction once gas prices double again and we are forced to choose between paying for what we need and what we just really want.

I wrote two weeks back about the power lunch spot in Tampa, Valencia Gardens, and true to form, as I was at lunch their today (with Hillsborough GOP political director Greg Truax), I spotted the following politicos:

• Former Congressman Sam Gibbons with a group of his old buddies. Gibbons made the PoHo blog earlier this month when he crossed party lines to endorse Republican Gus Bilirakis.
• Former Tampa Mayor Dick Greco, who was meeting with McCain and GOP staffers. Greco, a DINO, made the blog recently when he crossed party lines to endorse John McCain.
• Al Fox, a former Democratic candidate for Congress, who crossed some Cuban-American leaders by taking VIPs from the USA to Cuba (including, on one occasion, Greco).
• Former CL arts critic and current Tampa City Councilwoman Mary Mulhern with Democratic House candidate E.J. Ford.
• Former House candidate from St. Petersburg Liz McCallum, who now works more in the film biz than in politics.

How stupid are we as a nation? CNN interviews author Rick Shenkman, in this clip posted to YouTube on June 15.

• Nick of time: Congress acts to remedy the mortgage crisis.
• Alan Greenspan: “We are on the brink.”
• A new documentary on Lee Atwater has conservatives crying foul.
• The IRS opens an investigation of local firebrand Bill Keller. The preacherman cries “Romney!”
• Oh good, Imus is shooting his mouth off again. I had gone months without hearing moronic, racist drivel.
• Bet you don’t know how much oil there is in the world. Turns out, no one does.
• George Carlin’s final interview, a wide-ranging, bittersweet affair, pops up on the Psychology Today’s website. Plus: HBO plans a Carlin marathon and WBAI looks back at history.
• The Mullet drops his cushy ESPN job to become coach the Lightning.

This vlog from our favorite differently sympathetic, erotic-photographing Tampa cab driver:

Gov. Charlie Crist tried to rebound from his horrible flip-flop on offshore drilling with a stunning, “Yellowstone”-sized deal to put a big chunk of Big Sugar out of business and save the Everglades.

From the NYT account:

In a deal that environmental groups said would be the largest ecological restoration in the country’s history, a plan for the state to buy the nation’s largest producer of cane sugar was announced Tuesday by the governor and officials of U.S. Sugar Corporation.

Governor Charlie Crist of Florida, with Robert H Buker Jr., the chief of U.S. Sugar, held up an agreement struck between the state and the sugar producer.

The intention is to restore the Everglades by restoring the water flow from Lake Okeechobee, in the heart of the state, south to Florida Bay. That flow had been interrupted by commercial farming and the Everglades have suffered as a result.

U.S. Sugar is one of two large sugar growers and processors in South Florida, but very politically connected (the Fanjuls and their Flo-Sun being the other), and in full disclosure, I have to say that I was a consultant to U.S. Sugar in the 1990s for one year. In all of this, though, I have yet to read where FLA is going to come up with $1.75 billion. From the Palm Beach Post:

The details of how the state will pay for the land are still unclear, as is the question of how exactly the state would use such a vast expanse of parcels scattered through Palm Beach, Hendry and Glades counties. The deal also includes some property U.S. Sugar owns in Gilchrist County.

The huge acquisition will require the state to refashion its $10.9 billion Everglades restoration plan, said Michael Sole, secretary of the state Department of Environmental Protection. The current plan relies on a complex network of pricey engineering projects, such as more than 300 deep storage wells, which critics have assailed as impractical and perhaps ecologically dangerous.

So maybe by not having to do the expensive engineering projects we can afford to buy out U.S. Sugar? Let’s hope so, because otherwise, last time I checked our state didn’t have a spare $1.75 billion. Didn’t we just slash the shit out of the state budget? Murderize funding for our higher education system? Gut our criminal justice system?

Crist’s oil drilling stance, widely viewed as a political ploy to assist John McCain’s presidency, was starting to hurt the Gov, as the Florida Democratic Party was more than happy to point out again today in an e-mail:

Crist has reason to worry about his support among the people of Florida. A Miami Herald report today cites a new Zogby International poll that shows the once-popular Governor’s approval rating dropping precipitously as he spends more time gallivanting around the country and less time attending to the state’s economic challenges.

A majority of South Floridians acknowledge that Charlie Crist is doing a fair to poor job, “the first time in Crist’s 18 months in office that more people give the Republican a negative rating than a positive one.” [Miami Herald, 6/23/08]

Previously, Zogby polls showed Crist’s rating at 54-36 percent in September and 54-40 percent in December in South Florida. The latest poll shows the tide has turned on Crist, 43-52 percent.

I’m not sure the Everglades pact will be enough to turn that around, especially once we see the financial details.

(photo by Craig O’Neal)

Lately I am vexed by the use of openly gay as an adjective needed to describe any gay person running for public office who is willing to discuss their sexual orientation. Like this Herald account, about a Fort Lauderdale city council member running for the mayor’s office being vacated by the openly intolerant Jim Naugle:

Dean Trantalis officially filed Monday to run for mayor in Fort Lauderdale in 2009.

He formally kicked off his campaign at ArtServe Monday evening. Trantalis, the city’s first openly gay city commissioner, served one term between 2003 and 2006. He decided not to run for a second term.

In a speech Monday, Trantalis talked about his desire to lower property taxes, fight crime and overdevelopment while embracing the city’s diversity. He offered no specifics regarding how he will lower taxes other than forming a task force to attract new industries.

I was made very aware of the phrase a few weeks back when a campaign manager for a local candidate called me to complain that every time his candidate was introduced in a news story, the words “openly gay” preceded the candidate’s name. Did I plan on referring to the candidate’s opponent as the “openly obnoxious” incumbent?

Then there is this exchange from CL’s upcoming Q&A interview with “openly gay” county commission candidates Darden Rice and Kevin Beckner, to be published Wednesday in print and online:

Read the rest of this entry »

Greatest toy ever: The Dude (Unemployed) 8-Inch Action Figure.

• McCain adviser Charlie Black sees more dead Americans as a quality election strategy.
• Outrageous quote of the week: “I think [Obama]’s deliberately distorting the traditional understanding of the bible to fit his own worldview, his own confused theology.” —James Dobson, gay-hating [i.e., probably gay] Christian wackjob and founder of Focus on the Family.
• Really? Really? We’re going to talk about how Obama is on the wrong side of the “emotional” Elian Gonzalez issue? Really?
• If the Florida state budget is in such dire straights, how can we possibly afford what Time Magazine calls “the $1.75 billion deal to essentially purchase U.S. Sugar”?
• Eulogizing George Carlin.
• “Kobe, tell me how my ass tastes.”
• First it was those spoiled writers. Now, the Screen Actors Guild prepares to go on strike.
• R.I.P. Wilbur Hardee.

(I had meant to post this last week as the Russert frenzy was in full bloom but had trouble with the embedding code; with that fixed, and with The Today Show this morning yet again finding a reason to mention Russert’s passing, I figured, what the hell …)

Here’s Fox News waxing godly about how a rainbow suddenly appeared after Tim Russert’s funeral. Don’t these anchors know that Rupert will fire them for saying nice stuff about liberal journalists?

The U.S. Conference of Mayors has recognized Tampa’s urban livability as follows, from the city’s news release this A.M.:

Tampa, Fla. (June 23, 2008) – The City of Tampa was the only Florida city presented with a 2008 Outstanding Achievement City Livability Award by the United States Conference of Mayors (USCM) on Saturday morning, June 21, during the organization’s 76th Annual Meeting in Miami.

City Livability Awards, a program of the USCM and sponsored by Waste Management Inc., recognize cities and mayors that have initiated programs that improve the quality of life in their communities.  Tampa was recognized by an independent panel of judges in the large cities category along with Chicago, Honolulu, and Seattle. Louisville took home the first place award and four other cities including Orlando received honorable mention citations. Ten smaller U.S. cities were also recognized for their efforts.

Tampa’s nomination focused on its youth programs including the Mayor’s Youth Corps, Mayor’s Mentoring Program, and the city’s newest youth based initiative, the “Mayor’s Book Talk” program on City of Tampa Television, CTTV.

Now, I don’t mean to piss all over the aforementioned programs; they are good efforts and, coincidentally, all carry the word “Mayor” in their titles. But I have to question any award that also gives Orlando an urban livability honorable mention, as that sprawling mess has got to be one of the least urbanized and livable cities in the country. Traffic. Tourists up the wazoo. A lack of any culture or history. One crappy major league sports team. Not to mention it is too far from the beach.

“And words, you know the seven don’t you? Shit, Piss, Fuck, Cunt, Cocksucker, Motherfucker, and Tits, huh? Those are the heavy seven. Those are the ones that will infect your soul, curve your spine and keep the country from winning the war. Shit, Piss, Fuck, Cunt, Cocksucker, Motherfucker, and Tits, wow.”

R.I.P. George Carlin. The brilliant, subversive, hilarious, precedent-setting comedian was 71. In his honor, here is one of Carlin’s all-time classics: Baseball & Football.

• Obama in bed with Big Ethanol?
• Newsweek has it 51%-36% Obama over McCain.
• Tom Brokaw to host Meet The Press through the election.
• The Mississippi River appears to be cresting.
• Is Bob Barr Nader 2.0?
• So far, Amendment 1 has failed to live up to Crist’s hype.
• 49% think government should regulate in the Internet like TV or radio. In other news, 49% of the population just pooped and need the government to help them wipe.
• The Love Guru tanks. You’re welcome.

Station Director Vicki Santa has abruptly stepped down from her position of eight years at the community radio station, which revealed the news on its website on Friday:

Vicki Santa regretfully announced her resignation as Station Manager at the WMNF Community Radio Board of Directors meeting on June 16th, 2008.

Vicki has been our Station Manager for 8 years and was instrumental in realizing many of our goals, including construction of our beautiful new facility on Martin Luther King Blvd. and shepherding our move into it.

Vicki will be transitioning to a new role at WMNF where she can continue to share her vast experience and love for community radio with us and we are grateful that Vicki will still be a valued and contributing member of our family.

Mercedes Skelton has been appointed Acting Station Manager effective immediately.

Ed Ruark President, Nathan B. Stubblefield Foundation

Santa had weathered a downturn in fundraising in 2007 and a controversy over the cancellation of activist Connie Burton’s show in 2005. Any MNF’ers out there know what’s going on with this move?

Wait a second, didn’t Sam Zell say that the news-ad mix was going to have to change to about 50-50?!? So how in the world is the new O-Sentinel going to achieve that AND keep its standalone business and feature sections? Not to mention sports, which rarely has any ads to speak of?

Here’s a multimedia explanation by the Orlando editors about the new design that launches Monday.

I have to say, for all the talk about change and inventing a new newspaper, the Orlando redesign is very old school. Same sections, A-section, Metro, Biz, Sports, Features. When is somebody going to try something truly different, really revolutionary?

(h/t to Journerdism)

In the interest of equal-time bashing here at Pohoworld, this morning’s op-ed piece by the New York Times‘ David Brooks is a hardcore (and deserved) stripping away of Barack Obama’s sainthood. Here’s an excerpt:

Dr. Barack could have changed the way presidential campaigning works. John McCain offered to have a series of extended town-hall meetings around the country. But favored candidates don’t go in for unscripted free-range conversations. Fast Eddie Obama threw the new-politics mantra under the truck.

And then on Thursday, Fast Eddie Obama had his finest hour. Barack Obama has worked on political reform more than any other issue. He aspires to be to political reform what Bono is to fighting disease in Africa. He’s spent much of his career talking about how much he believes in public financing. In January 2007, he told Larry King that the public-financing system works. In February 2007, he challenged Republicans to limit their spending and vowed to do so along with them if he were the nominee. In February 2008, he said he would aggressively pursue spending limits. He answered a Midwest Democracy Network questionnaire by reminding everyone that he has been a longtime advocate of the public-financing system.

But Thursday, at the first breath of political inconvenience, Fast Eddie Obama threw public financing under the truck. In so doing, he probably dealt a death-blow to the cause of campaign-finance reform. And the only thing that changed between Thursday and when he lauded the system is that Obama’s got more money now.

One-time CL staff member and current freelance contributor Dawn Morgan is sharing her journalistic talents with other news organizations around town. Just today, Dawn interviewed journalist/political organizer David Sirota about his new book The Uprising, a chronicle of the “burgeoning backlash against the Establishment, government, and media’s unrealistic representation of the people.” The interview is set to run on tonight’s WMNF evening news, but you can get a sneak peak here. Or, tune in to WMNF tonight between 6-7 p.m. on your final hellish commute of the week.

If that doesn’t work for you, hit up the WMNF website in a few days for an archived clip.

The theme of the presidential election this week is becoming less one of change or no change and is becoming the week of the flip-flop.

Barack Obama announced he will not use public financing of the presidential campaign in this year’s general election. In a questionnaire last year, Obama said he would pursue public financing for the general election, which would cap spending for both candidates at $85 million.

From the New York Times in Feb. 2008:

WASHINGTON, Feb. 22 — The staff of the Federal Election Commission has drafted an opinion that would allow the two major parties’ presidential nominees to adopt what amounts to a fund-raising truce.

The draft opinion would allow the nominees, if both agreed, to return contributions they had solicited for the general election campaign and limit themselves to public financing for it instead.

The opinion is a response to an inquiry by Senator Barack Obama of Illinois, a leading candidate for the Democratic nomination. It is an indication of how the commission, which released the document Thursday, is likely to rule on the idea. The commissioners are expected to issue their decision after a meeting next Thursday.

Read the rest of this entry »

I searched YouTube for an hour last night looking for something — anything! — worth sharing with the Short List faithful. I finally did a search for “first day of summer” (which is tomorrow, by the way) and found this:

• Israel’s been practicing bombing Iran’s nuclear facilities. How long until practice makes perfect?
• Obama skips public funding, the first major candidate to do so since the system began in 1976.
• Signs point to Florida in the search for the smoking gun in the tainted tomato investigation.
• After really thinking about it, that stuff that looks like ice in the new photos of Mars tuns out to be … ice.
• 3 years old: Over/under on age of Jamie Lynn Spears’ new baby girl when she’s taken into custody by the state.
• I call no way: A Croatian woman who died in 1966 while sitting in a chair watching TV was just found undisturbed after 42 years.
• Screw HD. 3D TV debuts in Japan.
• The Rays sweep the Cubs.

I was struck by something in the coverage today about Tampa Bay’s 10 morning anchor Mario Diaz going to be a flack for the McCain for President campaign in the Southeast. From the Trib’s Walt Belcher:

Diaz says the offer from the McCain camp came after he attended a Republican Hispanic political conference in Orlando in May.

Diaz was one of several journalists who participated in a panel discussion on issues that concern Florida’s Latino community.

“I had the blessing of Channel 10 to attend the conference,” he points out. “After the session, people were coming up to me asking if I had ever considered going into politics.”

So, how far along were Mario’s talks with the McCain campaign when he conducted 10’s interview with Barack Obama last month? The Republican Hispanic Conference he references was held on May 10. Obama spoke in Tampa — and was interviewed by Diaz — on May 21.

I asked Tampa Bay’s 10 spokesman Pete Nikiel if the issue came up with Diaz when he let the station know he was leaving. Nikiel said it did not but was fairly certain that Diaz was not in talks with McCain when he did the Obama interview. “I don’t believe he was,” Nikiel told PoHo. “This all came up very quickly. We were all set to sign a contract with him.”

Nikiel said he did not have a way to contact Diaz, whose last day at the station was yesterday. I’m trying to track him down for comment and will update if I can.

UPDATE: I haven’t spoken with Diaz yet, but he did tell Eric Deggans at The Feed that he was offered the McCain gig on June 11, after he conducted the Obama interview:

Diaz said he talked to McCain’s regional campaign manager after interviewing the candidate at his June 5 fundraiser at the Vinoy in St. Petersburg.

“I knew they had needs in the state of Florida, so why not take that opportunity?” he said. “When Barack Obama came to town (in May) I fought hard for those stories…(And) I asked the same questions an anybody else.”

The job offer came less than a week later, on June 11, he said. Diaz’s last day at WTSP was Tuesday, and the former reporter said he filed no more political stories after informing the station’s general manager on June 11 that he was taking the McCain job.

Seriously, though, the Barack Obama campaign today released its first general election ad, a piece titled “Country I Love.” (Wasn’t that a Neil Young song?)

Here it is:

From the campaign’s news release:

The Obama campaign today announced the release of its first television advertisement for the general election.  The sixty second ad, entitled “Country I Love,” will begin airing in eighteen states across the country tomorrow to highlight how our shared values have shaped Senator Obama’s life.

In the spot, Senator Obama speaks to voters about the core values this nation was founded on and how they have guided him to work hard for his education, to bypass jobs on Wall Street to work as a community organizer, and to lead the fight for America’s families and veterans as an Illinois and United States Senator.

The ad presents Senator Obama’s record of passing laws to reform welfare, to cut taxes for working families, and to ensure America’s veterans have the health care they deserve.

The ad will air in Alaska, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Indiana, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Virginia.

I have some face time with Tampa Mayor Pam Iorio later this morning for an in-depth interview, so what do you want me to ask her? I will put your query to her if it is relevant and interesting.

Seriously, it is Day 7 of the carpet-bombing coverage of the tragedy that was the death of NBC’s Washington bureau chief, and I had enough on Day 2. The news reports about Russert’s untimely passing illustrate just how far the mainstream media has moved away from true journalism and into the realm of infotainment. Russert’s death has a classic story arc with great characters: working-class kid, loves his dad and dotes on his son, writes a popular book, hosts a national show, is a good, old-fashioned journalist and not just a pretty TV face; his son is articulate, his friends in the biz are legion; a nation in mourning.

Let’s hope today’s coverage of yesterday’s memorial service end this madness.

Bonus cuts: DailyKos removed anti-Russert posts; in death, Russert dragged into oil debate; Deggans: Of course Russert coverage was over the top; “What has possessed NBC News to televise a never-ending video wake?”

Michelle Obama charms the ladies of The View. Warning: This video is pretty long. If you hate The View, don’t bother.

• Big Oil carves up Iraq.
• The Royal Bank of Scotland yells fire in a crowded global marketplace.
• In retrospect, Tiger Woods winning the U.S. Open was even more spectacular than anyone realized.
• The Washington Post loves the new Firefox browser. I can’t get it to open without it crashing immediately.
• Progress in the war on cancer comes one obscure, cutting-edge technique at a time.
• I’m sure that burger’s tasty, but $200 tasty?
• Your tax dollars at work: The shape-shifting robot.
• Rays beat the Cubs … again.

This story made the rounds on the blogosphere a while back, but here’s an insightful video about how the media has handled the fact that John McCain once called his wife “a cunt:”

Congresswoman Kathy Castor, who has helped lead the fight in Congress against oil drilling off Florida’s Gulf coast, released this statement today, which I present in full:

“The Bush/McCain proposal to severely expand drilling for oil in the coastal waters of the State of Florida is a political gimmick that will not lower gas prices for consumers but will have real and tragic consequences for Florida’s economy and natural environment.”

First, let us examine the fallacy of the argument that this policy would lower gas prices.  Currently, 68 million acres of leased federal lands and waters are currently open to drilling but are not being tapped. Most offshore oil and gas reserves are already available. Since President Bush took office in 2000, the number of wells in federally-leased areas has increased exponentially, but gas prices have risen just the same. In fact, gas prices have more than doubled since President Bush took office in 2000.
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John McCain claims ending a 26-year ban on oil drilling in some areas of the Gulf of Mexico would help Americans by lowering gas prices and moving the U.S. away from dependence foreign oil.

But would it? Will this strategy really work to end the $4 a gallon (and rising) prices? The evidence is overwhelmingly against it.

There are an estimated 15 billions barrels of oil in the Gulf of Mexico. According to the Energy Information Agency, in 2007 Americans consumed 20.7 million barrels of oil per day (this number includes all oil-based products, including production of plastics and the like). To give you an idea of how long the Gulf reserves would last, at that rate of consumption, if we sucked out all the estimated 15 billion barrels of oil from the Gulf and eschewed all foreign oil, we could be completely energy independent for around 724 days. Less than two years.

Now, the Gulf reserves are not the only ones McCain is talking about opening up, so it is possible we could be energy-independent for more than two years. But still, can we make huge advances in alternative energy sources and implement them in anything under five years, or even 10 years? Unlikely. And since billions of dollars would need to be invested in order to get to all the oil in the Gulf, a process that could take a decade, lower gas prices in the near future as a result of the McCain plan are just as unlikely.

And that left McCain’s plan open to partisan attack today.

Read the rest of this entry »

Horse race journalism warning: the latest polling shows Obama ahead of McCain in three key states, including Florida.

WMNF Evening News anchor Mitch Perry grabbed me on the way out of the Iorio newser this morning to announce her new city attorney and asked, “What do you think of the new Quinnipiac poll that shows Obama ahead in Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania?” In my rush out the door to city hall, I hadn’t seen the change.

Clearly, if the polling is accurate, and that’s always a caveat even though in this case the Q polls have been pretty well done, Obama is getting a good bounce from having HRC out of the race, and many HRC supporters must have gotten over their loss pretty quickly. McCain had been ahead in Florida by as much as 10 points recently, so Obama moving ahead is quite a swing.

A copy of the poll here.

Republican contender John McCain’s flip-flop on the environment and drilling off the Gulf Coast of Florida for oil has inspired a similar flip-flop by a legion of the state’s ever-independent-thinking GOP officials.

At the top of that list is Charlie Crist — whose hunger to move into Number One Observatory Circle is apparently so strong that he is willing to throw over the beaches of Florida, something that even his predecessor wouldn’t do. As the Florida Democratic Party pointed out late yesterday in an e-mail to media and supporters, Crist told Buzz blog last week that he didn’t like the idea of drilling off Florida’s coast:

At the media availability before Cabinet last week, Gov. Charlie Crist was holding strong against drilling in the gulf. Gov. are you dropping your opposition to drilling for oil off of Florida’s coast?

“I am not,” he replied.

See below for more about Crist’s thoughts on energy and drilling from last Tuesday.

Question: There’s also talk of drilling off Florida’s coast.

Crist: Who’s talking about that?
Question: What do you think about it?

Crist: “No. 1, I don’t like it.

The Dems, however, selectively edited out part of Crist’s answer after that in which the Gov left the door open for drilling:

But nor do I like the price of gas. I don’t think the people of Florida are enjoying it, I know they don’t.

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