Life and my job have consumed most of my time lately. I kept wanting to write something about the Edwards’ announcement, but couldn’t find the time to put anything together. I watched their 60 Minutes interview with Katie Couric. That left me more convinced that this guy should be our next president. I honestly can’t recall being as excited about the candidacy of anyone at any point in my life. After the interview, I signed up to give an automatic monthly donation to the campaign for the duration.

I’m still finding time to read the occasional article here and there, but I’m not finding much time to comment on them. This article on the GOP field almost entirely misses the point until the final paragraph where John Zogby is quoted. Forget national polls. Giuliani needs something other than memories of 9/11 to carry him to the nomination. His social issues positions aren’t going to serve him well in the southern states. McCain will have to run a truly incompetent campaign not to get the nomination.

Here’s an interesting piece on the latest attempt to create a power sharing government in Northern Ireland.

Congressman Holds No God-Belief

Rep. Pete Stark (D-Calif.) is first Congress member in history to acknowledge his nontheism

For Immediate Release
Contact: Lori Lipman Brown, (202) 299-1091
March 12, 2007

There is only one member of Congress who is on record as not holding a god-belief.

Rep. Pete Stark (D-Calif.), a member of Congress since 1973, acknowledged his nontheism in response to an inquiry by the Secular Coalition for America (www.secular.org ). Rep. Stark is a senior member of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee and is Chair of the Health Subcommittee.

Although the Constitution prohibits religious tests for public office, the Coalition’s research reveals that Rep. Stark is the first open nontheist in the history of the Congress. Recent polls show that Americans without a god-belief are, as a group, more distrusted than any other minority in America. Surveys show that the majority of Americans would not vote for an atheist for president even if he or she were the most qualified for the office. Read the rest of this entry »

The Christian Science Monitor has a good article on the California housing market. It could be another year before the market bottoms out here, but any drop in home values here isn’t going to make housing affordable for the average Californian. In some parts of the state that made suburbia famous, the days of single family housing construction are over.

At the American Conservative Union’s political action conference this week, Ann Coulter called John Edwards a faggot.

The conservatives have nothing substantive to say about Edwards. They know that even though his message is a left-populist one it will appeal to many moderate and even some socially conservative voters.

I’m tired of the right wing fuckers using hatred for gays as a way to rile up their own base. The Edwards campaign is trying raise $100,000 in “Coulter Cash” this week to show that this kind of strategy will backfire, that everytime they do shit like this, it’ll rile us up and backfire on them.

You can see the video here. That same page also has a form where you can donate money. I just gave $50 and I really hope that some of you will give something, too. As long as we’re stuck in this paradigm where “money is speech” and often the speech that matters most in politics, then donating to counter this kind of crap is our most effective way to speak out against it.

I supported Ned Lamont’s bid to unseat Joe Lieberman. I think I might even have sent him $50 or $100. I was sorry to see Lieberman use a loophole in Connecticut’s electoral law to get on the ballot as an independent after losing the primary. He couldn’t have done that the last time he ran and he won’t be able to do it next time. If the Bushies weren’t so much worse than a typical (or at least previous) Republican administration, I would be fine with Lieberman being booted from the Democratic Caucus and giving control of the Senate to the GOP. Really. This is a man who has shown nothing but contempt for the Democratic voters in Connecticut. Democrats voted against Lieberman in the primary and they voted against him in the general. He’s in the senate right now because the Republicans put all of the muscle and votes behind him.
I am pleased to see that Ned Lamont isn’t going away. He continues to be a voice on the national stage and, in particular, a voice that’s trying to hold Lieberman accountable for his words and his votes. His latest contribution in that arena is an open letter to Lieberman regarding Lieberman’s recent Wall Street Journal editorial.

Here’s a light article on Wisconsin senate president Fred Risser. Risser has been in the Wisconsin legislature since 1957. Yes, that’s 50 years. I really think it’s a shame that so many states have adopted term limits. Guys with the kind of institutional memory and parliamentary savvy that Risser has just don’t exist in those states. Term limits haven’t met any of their original goals about changing the embedded powers, making seats competitive, etc. In many states, as soon as one term-limited Democrat or Republican leaves, they’re replaced by another one who often ran uncontested. In my mind, in some of those states some very real power has devolved into the hands of unelected staff members who may serve the same district through several different same party legislators.