Can anyone explain McCain's support of W?

McCain called on the Kerry campaign to cease and desist using the ad that has McCain himself telling Bush (during the 2000 Republican primary) that he should be ashamed for his methods of using Vietnam vets to sully the record of himself and other candidates who served - and you can feel how cornered in his own bullshit Bush suddenly feels. And you can tell at that moment that this is not political BS - McCain is feeling it, and Bush is feeling it. This absolutely justified contempt is a very real thing. Which brings me back to the same old question: why does McCain support Bush? The way he supports the Clown-in-Chief escapes me, as much as it escapes everyone who knows the history between the two men, when he's so clearly been screwed over by Bush & Co in numerous ways. "If I were a conspiracy theorist", I'd suggest that they brought him into a little room at some point and "explained the situation", that if he messes around with the big boys, it's not just him, it's his family too. It was McCain himself who, a few months ago in response to a reporter question about how the Republicans could get his support on a budget he refused to approve, said, "I could suddenly die in a horrible car accident". My brother, more sensible, says it's just that McCain hasn't ruled out running for the Presidency again in 2008 and needs to show his creds as a party player. But it's still disheartening and sad - unless of course you're a Republican ready and willing to suck down the sewage of the current smear campaign.

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

I can't say enough good things about this selection in Salon from the new book from Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Eloquent, balanced, lucidly expressed and argued, and blissfully free of partisan cant. He's even good friends with Roger Ailes, commander uber alles at Fox News, the most infamous example of the corporate dumbing of reporting that Kennedy elucidates so well in this selection. Don't miss it. Don't miss a chance to pass it on to all of your conservative friends and relatives. (And if you have to do the Salon day pass to read it, well, then, do the Salon day pass already, it's worth it....)

Clerical error?

Thanks, Adriana, for this. Almost eerie how one of the most vocal opponents of the Bush Administration in the Senate (after Robert Byrd) - and a longtime favorite target for the right wing - Ted Kennedy, mysteriously shows up on the no-fly list put out by Homeland Security. Not like I'm a conspiracy theorist or anything... rrrm....

Will the protests backfire?

I can't say I'm not worried about this happening next week. Don't know what to say about it really, since if I was in New York still, there's no way I'd hold back from participating. Will the protests backfire and scare the fretful inhabitants of that mythic land of Family Values, Middle America, into tipping the scales in favor of George W. Bush? I guess we'll find out soon.

Wish I would have more time to blog right now - esp. with all of this Swift Boat Vets for "Truth" crap happening right now. Nothing was more satisfying than when on e of Bush's top campaign lawyers, Ben Ginsberg, had to quit after it was revealed that he had been advising the SBVT's, esp. when he argued his case by saying 'it was entirely legal', as if legality were the point and not the fact that the Bush Campaign had been insisting that they had nothing to do, no absolutely no affiliation with the SBVT's... Oh my no .

Well, possibly more satisfying is the brilliant piece of footage from the 2000 Republican primaries that the Kerry campaign found for their Old Tricks ad (click on the video, and it brings up the library), of John McCain excoriating Bush for funding the slurs by fellow Vietnam vets on his (McCain's) service at the time, and telling Bush that he should be ashamed, really ashamed. The pained look on Bush's no-longer What Me Worry face is as priceless as it is painful. How any sane person could look at that man ever, but especially in this footage, and let him run a company, much less the entire country...