Here’s the second part of the Alfred E. Smith Dinner on October 16th at the Waldorf-Astoria.

Here’s Obama:

In case you missed it McCain and Obama roasted each other at the Alfred E. Smith Dinner on October 16 at the The Waldorf-Astoria in NYC. The Candidates were surprisingly funny and human.

Here’s McCain’s performance as broadcast on the Rachel Maddow Show:

In the clip I posted the other day of John and Yoko, John Lennon made a passing reference to a Chinese book Yoko turned him onto about war. In it he paraphrased that “if your castle is being attacked, lock all your doors but one, that way you know where your enemies will enter”. I thought this was a fantastic piece wisdom especially in how Lennon was using it as the reason for wearing his hair long.

I have turned this sage advice over and over in my head for the past few days and, in light of this, I’ve come upon at least one application of our present circumstances that I can’t help feel a bit uneasy about.

If you venture with me in so far as to make the fairly extensible stretch that our government has successfully been taken over by a well articulated conspiracy of the few where the goal is to bankrupt the people for the ends of a greater mechanism of control and deeper reservoir of invasive protocol through the implementation of a well considered single party system existing under the auspice of a two party struggle, than wouldn’t Sarah Palin be the finest door to leave open in this our present battles?

I mean if we’re being honest we can see that the McCain agenda varies only slightly from the Obama concerns. Neither is calling for peace in our modern world (and frankly, as an aside, I’m very comfortable with that… but let’s continue with our War Games here), both were strongly in favor of the greatest socialist effort in human history with the government bail outs, both are outspoken about their interests in nuclear energy and coastal drilling, both are in support and have been in support of continued invasion of U.S. citizen’s privacy. And both, unflinchingly, are working to trump up Russia’s roll in it’s ongoing - and many would argue, justified - struggle with Georgia.

So many Obama supporters - of which, outside of this scenario, I now firmly and enthusiastically count myself among - are projecting so much of their liberal idealism on the guy that they can’t seem to notice that, ultimately, an Obama presidency will change very little about how our government conducts itself financially and militarily, at home and abroad.

If I was running a theoretical oligarchical conspiracy I could see a candidate like Obama being just the note I needed to play at this time. As national support for my military campaigns continue to decelerate into one of the most unpopular presidencies in history a candidate so completely anti-thetical to everything the current rogue administration has put forward - so seemingly young, new, intelligent and compassionate, so able to galvanize the American people into a fury of elated support on the “Anything But” ticket - is just what the doctor ordered. For an inky underworld shadow-government of a proud, rich few, Barack Obama could be the ideal candidate.

And, as anyone who has read any good super hero tomes or religious screeds will know; a great hero needs an even greater enemy. And, let there be no words minced about this cunt Sarah Palin is the greatest enemy our country’s presidential races has ever grown. She is the Moriarity to Obama’s Holmes, the Joker to Obama’s Batman (eww, sorry Joker), the Satan to Obama’s Christ, the mean spirited Lucy to Obama’s very earnest Charlie Brown.

So as we see the nationalization of our banks and the federal government taking control over our economic system and as we continue to extend ourselves militarily to a point of both depleting our national resource of military and foreign relations, as we see state’s unemployment rates sky-rocketing and running out of money of employment programs, as we see a country and a world spiraling farther and farther out of control leaving the theatrics of the solution to the dim scripting of simply softening the fall for only the wealthiest involved, perhaps it is time we begin looking at this entire scenario as a war against humanity by a conspiracy of the few. And perhaps we should start looking at what is happening under the terms of war strategies and how those strategies are being used against us to further a rather telegraphed agenda. And perhaps, as we look at our national and planetary narrative unfold in an increasingly predictable, frustrating, and destructive fashion, we should keep our eyes a little more keenly pried for where the open door may be. And practice caution before haste as we trip over our future to run right through it.

If you watched the Presidential Debate last night you might have noticed John McCain’s mention of a $3 million earmark, supported by Barack Obama, for an Overhead Projector.

“He [Obama] voted for nearly a billion dollars in pork barrel earmark projects, including, by the way, $3 million for an overhead projector at a planetarium in Chicago, Illinois. My friends, do we need to spend that kind of money?”

Now, I know the projector he’s talking about. The old one, in need of replacing, is pictured above. In fact, I’ve seen many a sky show at the Adler Planetarium as a youth and it helped ignite my excitement for the larger world around us. The galactic vistas and interstellar reaches projected on that dome were more inspiring than you’d think possible with a collection of Zeiss steel and glass. Unfortunately, this projector is over 40 years old - its nebulae have grown dim. It’s time for a replacement. What price would you put on reaching untold millions of children over another 40 years? I think $3 million out of the Federal Budget is a bargain. Click here to read the Huffington Post’s take on the AP debunking of McCain’s “Overhead Projector” as well as a statement from the Adler Planetarium itself.

Funny reminder warning of the possible dangers of vote tampering from the good people at the Simpsons.

The Great Schlep from The Great Schlep on Vimeo.

I’m sure most of you have seen it. But if you haven’t… enjoy

The Vikings made an agreement a few months ago to try and keep politics out of the blog. That agreement has already failed and, frankly, I now think this election is too fucking important to try and pretend it’s not relevant to write about given the opportunity.

It’s my very strong feeling that, for Obama to lose this election, would truly spell the end of my engagement in the process of this country and my hope that it can ever be restored to any kind of functional civility. A loss by the Obama camp, in my mind, would be evidence beyond refute that the American people are vile, bottom-feeding, morons who would deserve the president and vice president they get.

But as of today, September 17th, 2008, I don’t believe that. I still have hope for America. I still think it’s populous is smart enough to smell a rat (I’ll be it slow to admitting it) and passionate enough to demand change when it desperately needs it. I still think the average American has it within them to make a healthy and informed decision about their country’s politics and I believe it’s the responsibility of every above-average American (that’s you fuckers!) to inform them.

This is no small election. This is not something to plead apathy towards. The fight is not finished and I know we can win. Let’s skewer these neo-con cocksuckers who distort, destroy, and invert every good instinct of humanity - from love of fellow human, to love of country, to intelligence, compassion, spirit, and true grit - and let’s hang their snide, cynical, hate-filled and dickless hides from every flag pole, just below them old stars n’ bars (hurumph).

I want to be proud to be an American again as there is so much to be proud of. I am tired of these puny little cunts taking so much of what is great to feed their agenda of so much that is foul, deceitful, fearful and ignorant. Make no bones about it, there are plenty of dumb, hateful, inbred, dipshit Americans out there, but I do not believe they are the majority and I do not believe their broken souls that materialize in mushroom clouds of marmot-hustling blood-orgies and mongoloid turd-kings deserve the opportunity to steer this country or this world any longer. Fuck those people. Fuck them for good.

Wow and to think this post was actually supposed to point to a couple good articles comparing the two candidates health care initiative. Yowser.

It seems Biden’s senatorial history flies in stark contrast to Obama’s lip service about copyright issues and a more progressive Washington.

In addition to the singly damning fact that Biden wrote the fucking RAVE Act, it seems he’s been a toady for the RIAA and a thorn in the side of privacy activists going so far as being the inspiration for Phil Zimmerman to create PGP encryption. Biden flunked CNETs Tech rating scoring less than a 4 on a 10 point system.

Here’s the new boss, same as the old boss…