Rafe said this interview with John Kerry has given him a dose of confidence about him as a candidate. Now go and contribute 🙂

Especially when they actually make sense, such as Jon Stewart’s College of William and Mary Commencement Address or Kurt Vonnegut’s latest: “Cold Turkey”.

It seems that any one of these stories would have been enough to haunt any other administration. Is it a sign of the times that they didn?t stay on our national radar screen longer then they did? Or is it something else? In any case? here goes some links to forgotten stories. Here goes some links to make you think:

Do you remember how the world stood behind the United States after 9/11? Or do you think Europe has always hated us? If the later, then your memory has been altered. Don?t you eat those freedom fries!

What happened to the search for the anthrax attacker?

Speaking of biological attacks, do you remember the fear mongering over smallpox?

How about the wave of rashes among school children (14 states!) back during 2001?

What about the State of the Union yellowcake lie?

In retaliation, the person who exposed the lie, the person who was sent to investigate its validity in the first place, his wife was outted as a CIA agent. There is an investigation reaching into the highest levels of the administration. Did you know that?

They recently found one WMD shell. Utilizing ancient technology. Utilizing tech that it seems everyone and their grandmother has. Enough to go to war over? Then we have a lot more countries to attack!

If we went to democratize Iraq, which was not the President?s stated claim originally (ya know – before we actually went to war), then did you know that democracy is spreading across Africa? Subtly and diplomacy. Seems to go a whole lot farther.

What about the GOP sneaking onto Democratic party systems, which were meant to be secure, but were not, and passing out copies of found memos to the media?

What about Afghanistan? How are things going there? You will only find out if you search for it. The news media seems it could care less.

If there is one piece to read on the Iraq prison situation, it is Seymore Hersh in the New Yorker. Wow. Are we becoming what we so long fought against?

“Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And when you look long into an abyss, the abyss also looks into you.” – Nietzsche

Disney Blocks Anti-Bush Movie…Allegedly Because It Fears Retaliation from Bush Family (Discourse.net (the anti-Instawhatever)).

Sinclair censored Koppel and Nightline (WorkingForChange).

CBS delayed report on Iraqi prison abuse after military chief’s plea (Guardian).

The American Civil Liberties Union disclosed that it filed a lawsuit three weeks ago challenging the FBI’s methods of obtaining many business records, but the group was barred from revealing even the existence of the case until now. (Washington Post).

Joseph Wilson, author of “The Politics of Truth,” talks about his prime suspect in the White House smear campaign against him and his wife. (Salon).

If you havn’t read F*cked by the F*CC (The Nation), by Jeff Jarvis, what’s your problem?

Growing intolerance and fear. Censorship by self, by intimidation, and by system. All of this is un-American.

On April 30th John Kerry released his plan for Iraq.

He has now released an ad campaign that emphasizes hope over fear.

Things are bad. We can do better. Here is the way.

I hate to say this, but the main fear I had about Kerry, early during the nomination process, has come back to haunt me.

Kerry is being defined by his opponent.

I got into a political discussion with some friends last night and boy is he in trouble. People view him as “weak” and a “liar”. They have no confidence in him. And these are people hate George Bush. Being the anti-George Bush candidate (Economist) is not enough. That’s why I thought Dean couldn’t win. And although, I was able to defend Kerry easily by contrasting and comparing him against Bush – the marketing campaign of Rove and Company has more exposure then I do!

I was afraid Kerry was going to turn out like Gore, and it’s happening right on schedule. He needs one “I invented the Internet” (something Gore never said damn it!) moment and it’s over. Kerry’s advisors need to do a better job if they truly think folks outside of Washington know what he stands for, or even who he is (NYTimes). They don’t in Philadelphia. I can tell you that much.

Mike Sanders, who was very generous in his compliments to me had this to say: “John Kerry does not seem capable of being the leader we need to unite the country. As Karl points out, one of the major tasks confronting us is reducing the real damage caused by terrorism. This is not an imaginary fear, but a real threat that needs to be addressed. Right now it seems that Bush has the only potentially workable plan on the table and I think that the swing-voting Americans sense this and will give Bush a second term.”

I agree with him. That “Kerry does not seem capable of…”. Keyword is “seem”. The Kerry team has done a terrible job of making clear its vision, while it has spent too much time chasing its tail after Bush henchman attacks. Did you know that 2 days ago Kerry released his plan on Iraq? No? Neither did I. Havn’t heard it in the press. Might have missed it in my e-mail. Too busy sending the spam the campaign is sending me to my junk bin. Thanks to Jeff Jarvis for the link.

It needs to be far more clear in getting its message across. Take Kerry saying this month that the deficit “can become a fiscal cancer that will erode any recovery and threaten the prospect of a lasting prosperity.” (Bloomberg). Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Instead say, “the deficit will destroy the economic future for our children. You are for protecting children aren’t you President Bush? I say the American people can do better. We can defend America now and lay the ground work for future generations.”. Sounds hysterical. It’s not. Bush would use a similar tactic. Actually, he has used far worst! Notice his team now equating dissent over the Iraq war (Talking Points Memo) with racism! No really! It’s true!

The way to win is by engaging the 50% or more of of people out there that don’t vote. The only way to do that is by engaging the center (American Prospect). And running on hope and not fear (Salon).

Read The Political Split Is Pervasive (Washingtong Post). It explains why I’m probably pissing into the wind:

…As it becomes more difficult to reach across the party line, campaigns are devoting more energy to firing up their hard-core supporters. For voters in the middle, this election may aggravate their feeling that politics no longer speaks to them, that it has become a dialogue of the deaf, a rant of uncompromising extremes.

Rifts haven’t always coincided with party divisions. The United States was led for many years by the strange bedfellows of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal coalition. Millions of rural, religious, southern voters joined millions of urban, minority and secular voters in backing the Democrats. After Roosevelt’s death and World War II, the coalition began fragmenting — over civil rights and anti-communism, among other issues — but the breakup took decades.

Experts cite a variety of factors to explain why Red-Blue has risen in its place. For example:

? Reagan happened. Republican presidents Dwight D. Eisenhower, Richard M. Nixon and Gerald R. Ford governed essentially as pragmatic centrists, but Reagan framed his presidency in ideological terms. He coaxed religious conservatives and Cold Warriors away from the Democratic Party while making it uncomfortable for liberals to remain in the GOP. “The signals coming out from Washington helped voters sort themselves out into parties that reflected their world view,” explained Thomas E. Mann of the Brookings Institution.

? Peace happened. From the outbreak of World War II through the end of the Cold War — a span of nearly 50 years — the United States’ foreign policy and military policy, two of the biggest responsibilities of the government, reflected the consensus of both parties. “In the 1950s, the country thought of itself as homogenous,” said White, recalling sociologist Daniel Bell’s influential 1960 book, “The End of Ideology.” “The dominant discussion was about the need for unity in the face of a potent enemy.” The collapse of the Soviet Union stripped much of the purpose out of centrism.

? Clinton happened. Though he campaigned as a moderate Democrat, and delivered on such longtime Republican goals as a balanced budget and welfare reform, Clinton’s administration ultimately proved highly divisive. The first baby boomer presidency opened a new front in the culture wars that erupted in the late 1960s — over sex, responsibility, the role of women, the nature of authority.

? Technology happened. The rise of direct mail, cable television and the Internet has enabled ideological soul mates to find one another efficiently, to organize, to concentrate their resources and to evangelize. Big Media — especially network television and daily newspapers — are rapidly losing their power to shape public consensus and marginalize ideological extremes.

The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press recently found that the number of Americans getting campaign news from network television or daily newspapers has fallen by a quarter since 2000, and by a third for magazines such as Time and Newsweek. Meanwhile, the audience is growing for niche outlets such as talk radio, cable television and Internet sites.

“People naturally reduce cognitive dissonance by seeking out information that reinforces their existing views,” Mann said. “So there’s no single cause” of the Red-Blue divide, “but a number of factors feeding into this.”

There are those that knowingly and unknowingly encourage us to keep apart and divided. They are out here in the weblogging world in force. Give credit to the rare weblogger like Mike Sanders who would use the word “seem”. Because far too many others would just leave that out in their self serving quest for audience. In the media. In politics. In advertising. They want the most direct group to sell their message to.

Update: Removed the last two sentences. They were so loud that they almost drowned out what I’m trying to say.

That’s the title of a daming article at SF-Gate.