Bush: Obama win ‘a triumph of the American story’

The Hill - Leading the News

President Bush on Saturday used his first post-election radio address to praise Democratic President-elect Barack Obama, saying that he “represents a triumph of the American story.”

Bush added that the Illinois senator’s victory is a “testament to hard work, optimism, and faith in the enduring promise of our nation.”

The president noted that the wartime transition of power will be the first in four decades and pledged that making it as seamless is possible would be a “priority for the rest of my time in office.”
Bush also pointed to other challenges facing Obama.

“Our country faces economic challenges that will not pause to let a new president settle in,” he stated, adding, “We’re in a struggle against violent extremists determined to attack us -- and they would like nothing more than to exploit this period of change to harm the American people.”

The president detailed steps he had taken to make sure that the transition is successful, such as “fully informing” Obama of any important decision he makes.

“Taken together, these measures represent an unprecedented effort to ensure continuity throughout the executive branch,” he stated.

Obama, in his first address as president-elect, also had kind words for Bush, saying that the current president “graciously offered his full support and assistance in this period of transition.

“Michelle and I look forward to meeting with him and the First Lady on Monday to begin that process,” Obama stated. “This speaks to a fundamental recognition that here in America we can compete vigorously in elections and challenge each other’s ideas, yet come together in service of a common purpose once the voting is done.”

The Barracuda Bites Back

I don't know how anyone else feels about this, but i just can't get enough Sarah Palin and those wacky Wassilla Hillbillies.
Palin just seems to be getting more and more desperate and defensive about her run for vice-president as seen in this segment of Countdown with Keith Olbermann. In this impromptu press conference upon her return to Alaska yesterday, Palin sounds frazzled and ready to cry. Keith has Margaret Carlson comment on the Palin press conference.

Throwing Palin Under the Bus

The Night Old Dixie Died and a New Generation Was Born

The Hill's Pundits Blog - Brent Budowsky

It was a moment for the ages and the night Old Dixie died, when the trumpet sounded and a president like Caroline Kennedy's father came. In terms of race relations and America being a community of diverse people from countless backgrounds working together for the common good, it was the most important night since the Emancipation Proclamation.

It was the night Old Dixie died, when those who were whipped and beaten can have a president of their own, and we will have a president of our own. It was a night for the realignment of generations, as people age 18 to 30 have a president of their own, and just as profoundly, kids too young to vote in 2008 will have a president of their own. As they get older, they will change the demographics of our democracy for a generation, to the advantage of Democrats.

It was a night when the last became first and the first became last, when the small donors and hard workers and grassroots who were so alienated and maligned found a president of their own and made it happen. It was a night when the old and tired and corrupt told us that the Bradley effect would prevail and the American people left them behind, once and for all, now and forever.

It was a night for the ages, a night for the generations, a night for the historians. A night for the people and a night to begin the future.

It was the night Old Dixie died and the night a new generation was born, and from this night forward, every mom and every dad can tell every little boy and every little girl that anywhere in America anything can happen and anyone can rise as far as their talent and hard work will take them.

What a great country!

Palin: I'm Sorry if I Cost McCain a Single Vote

Sarah Palin this morning apologized for any votes she might have cost John McCain in his bid for the presidency, while downplaying aspirations to challenge Barack Obama in four years during an interview with MSNBC.

“If I cost John McCain even one vote, then I am sorry about that,” she said.

Palin said she could not even imagine running for national office in 2012, saying “2012 sounds so far off.”

The governor cited the economic crisis as the key factor for their loss, saying her selection as McCain’s running mate could in no way trump the country’s serious financial woes.

Palin said she will return to Alaska tonight and cannot wait to get back to working full time as Alaska’s governor.

President-Elect Barack Obama

What To Watch For Tonight

Political Wire -

7 p.m. -- Polls close in Georgia, Indiana, South Carolina, Virginia and Kentucky.

If Virginia is called quickly for Obama, it means he likely wins the presidential race and Democrats across the country will have a huge night. If it's not called early, it's could be an indication that white undecided voters are breaking to McCain. Prepare for an hour long discussion of the "Bradley effect." If Georgia or Indiana are called early for Obama, it's a leading indicator for a landslide.

7:30 p.m. -- Polls close in North Carolina, Ohio and West Virginia.

Obama victories in North Carolina or Ohio likely seal the deal for him. An Obama win in West Virginia means start looking for Obama coattails in close House and Senate races.

8:00 p.m. -- Polls close in Florida, Missouri, New Hampshire and Pennsylvania.

If Pennsylvania is called early for Obama, McCain cannot win. His only real path to the presidency at this point requires he win the Keystone State. An Obama win in Missouri once again means a likely landslide in the electoral college.

9:00 p.m. -- Polls close in Colorado and New Mexico.

Polls indicate both of these swing states should go to Obama. Early calls in each state will have Obama racking up electoral votes quickly.

10:00 p.m. -- Polls close in Iowa, Montana, and Nevada.

If Obama wins in Montana and Nevada, we're looking at a possible political realignment of the Mountain West of the United States.

11:00 p.m. -- Polls close in California and North Dakota.

California is the biggest state of them all with 55 electoral votes and may put Obama over the top. If the election hasn't been decided by now, it's probably become an interesting night for the McCain campaign and Republicans. However, an Obama win in North Dakota means we're witnessing a landslide.

Nowhere man: a farewell to Dubya, all-time loser in presidential history

by Simon Schama - the Guardian

"Forgotten but not gone" was the way in which the supremo of Boston politics, Billy Bulger, liked to dismiss the human irritants he had crushed beneath his trim boot. The same could now be said for the hapless 43rd President of the United States as the daylight draws mercifully in on his reign of misfortune and calamity. How is he bearing up, one wonders, as the candidate from his own party treats him as the carrier of some sort of infectious political disease? How telling was it that the most impassioned moment in John McCain's performance in the final debate was when he declared: "I am not George Bush."

Where, O where are you, Dubya, as the action passes you by like a jet skirting dirty weather? Are you roaming the lonely corridors of the White House in search of a friendly shoulder around which to clap your affable arm? Are you sweating it out on the treadmill, hurt and confused as to why the man everyone wanted to have a beer (or Coke) with, who swept to re-election four years ago, has been downgraded to all-time loser in presidential history, stuck there in the bush leagues along with the likes of James Buchanan and Warren Harding? Or are you whacking brush in Crawford, where the locals now make a point of telling visitors that George W never really was from hereabouts anyroad.

Whatever else his legacy, the man who called himself "the decider" has left some gripping history. The last eight years have been so rich in epic imperial hubris that it would take a reborn Gibbon to do justice to the fall. It should be said right away that amid the landscape of smoking craters there are one or two sprigs of decency that have been planted: record amounts of financial help given to Aids-blighted countries of Africa; immigration reform that would have offered an amnesty to illegals and given them a secure path to citizenship, had not those efforts hit the reef of intransigence in Bush's own party. And no one can argue with the fact that since 9/11 the United States has not been attacked on its home territory by jihadi terrorists; though whether or not that security is more illusory than real is, to put it mildly, open to debate.

Bet against that there is the matter of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilian casualties, more than 4,000 American troops dead, many times that gravely injured, not to mention the puncture wounds and mutilations inflicted on internationally agreed standards of humane conduct for prisoners - and on the protection of domestic liberties enshrined in the American constitution. If the Statue of Liberty were alive, she would be weeping tears of blood.

If Bush himself has been largely kept out of sight, his baleful legacy has been visible in the McCain campaign. McCain has made much of his credentials for independence of mind, a claim which once was credible given his support for immigration reform and opposition to Bush's tax cuts. But somewhere along the road to the Republican nomination, all of this became less important than the lessons of the Reagan-Bush-Rove political playbook which, with the exception of the Clinton election of 1992, seemed to have a track record of unbroken success.

McCain knew this from bitter personal experience, having been on the receiving end of Bush lowball politics in the South Carolina primary in 2000. Coming out of a convincing win against George Bush in New Hampshire he was stopped in his tracks by a smear campaign conducted through push-poll phone calls in which people were asked whether they knew that the daughter McCain had adopted from Sri Lanka was in fact the illegitimate child of an affair with a woman of colour. Now you would think McCain could never reconcile himself to a politician capable of those kinds of tactics. But there he was in the campaign of 2004, stumping the country for the incumbent, ingratiating himself with the conservative base he knew he would need, even as his old Vietnam buddy, John Kerry, was being coated in slime by the Swift Boaters.

Whatever misgivings McCain might have had about adopting the hardball tactics of his 2000 adversary have long since disappeared before the blandishments of classic Bush-style operatives like Rick Davis and Stephen Schmidt. "Do you want to be pure, or do you want to win"? they must have asked right after the nomination. Ditching Joe Lieberman as a running mate and unleashing pitbull Palin was his answer.

So even while George Bush is kept at arm's length from the campaign, his campaign style lives on as Obama is stigmatised as a terrorist-friendly stealth-socialist, too deeply unAmerican to be let anywhere near the Oval Office. "He just doesn't see America as we do" says Sarah Palin trying to wink her way into Dick Cheney's seat. McCain is betting the house that this way of doing politics has at least one more hurrah left in it, and we will find out on in the early hours of Wednesday morning whether he is right.

The Bush presidency is the spectre haunting the feast in more than tactics. Although every conservative administration since Ronald Reagan has promised to deliver, through supply-side stimulation, economic growth without bloated deficits, they have never been vindicated in their blind faith in what Bush senior once rashly called "voodoo economics". Consistently, they have brought the US Wall Street crashes and recessions along with massive deficits; and yet somehow, the stake that history attempts to drive through the heart of their economic theology never puts the ghoul away.

No weight of evidence to the contrary has ever shaken the totemic belief that tax cuts can grow the economy robustly enough to compensate for drastic shortfalls in revenue. George W Bush clung to this belief even as the Clinton budget surplus was converted into a mountainous deficit, and John McCain continues to parrot the same belief with the shining face of a true believer.

Not even Gibbon could supply a story as fatefully bizarre as the ultimate consummation of Reagan-Bush conservatism, its last act: the most massive shift of financial power from the private to the public sector since the New Deal. Rather like the Pope deciding that all along he really wanted a barmitzvah.

If you look at this saga as the history of a dynasty; it's come full circle. For, believe it or not, there once was a time when Bush politics was about centrist moderation. Dubya's revered granddad, Prescott Sheldon Bush, son of an Ohio railroad executive and senator for Connecticut from 1952 to 1963, was punished in the Catholic towns of industrial Connecticut for his connection with Planned Parenthood. Not only that, but he was a trustee of the United Negro College Fund, the kind of institution that made the eventual career of Barack Obama conceivable.

But the Bushes have always been selective about idealism. And even at the height of the Kennedy-Johnson apogee, Prescott and George Herbert Walker Bush were turning the pages of Barry Goldwater's Conscience of a Conservative. They could smell the wind direction changing. The future of Republican money and Republican power lay elsewhere; with Texas oil. Hence the migration to Midland Texas of George Herbert Walker Bush and his makeover into a Texan who knew the ways of the corporate world; and how to bring about the Great Cosiness between government and business that seemed like the perfect feedback loop: money to power, power to money; tax breaks for the corporations; donations to those who might command the heights.

This is the politics George W Bush inherited, and he has been its faithful disciple; to the point of purging it of any remaining traces of pragmatism. It is astounding to hear rightwing talkshow bloviators rant about the predicament of the Bush administration being caused by its failure to carry out the true conservative agenda. For there never has been and never will be a more doctrinally faithful instrument of the creed. Never mind the hanging chads of 2000, the Cheney-Bush administration seized the moment to bring on the Goldwater-Reagan Rapture in which government was once and for all got out of the way of business.

So it hasn't really been all George Bush's fault, the stupendous American fiasco. He came to power armed with an ideology that was about to crash and burn; that was, years before the present tumult, already fatally disconnected from historical reality. It was on his watch that American government needed reinventing. It was responsible government that was needed in Iraq and Afghanistan; government that was desperately needed in New Orleans after Katrina, while all George Bush could manage was a fly-by. It is government that this most anti-governmental of all American administrations is learning that is needed now to save the United States from a second Depression.

In his heart of hearts I actually think the shell-shocked Dubya, somewhere in the bowels of his presidency knows this. But he is nowhere to be found, and so on goes the mad rant that health care reform and progressive taxes are the Trojan horse for socialist revolution. To which those who have another view altogether might want to say, fear not, for yours, as a Republican president once said, is a government of the people, by the people. And really it will not perish from the earth.

Les Misbarack And A Thank You To The Campaign

We wanted to thank all the people who volunteer day in and day out for the Obama campaign. Your work is making a difference. Thank you everyone for your wonderful emails about "Les Misbarack." We hope you enjoy this video.

-NatHeadquartersObama-

Obama’s Grandmother Dies

New York Times-

Senator Barack Obama’s grandmother, a central figure in his life who helped raise him during his teen-age years, died in Hawaii on Monday morning.

Mr. Obama, who left the presidential campaign trail late last month to travel to Honolulu to bid her farewell, announced the death in a statement released by his spokesman upon landing here this afternoon. Her death comes one day shy of Election Day.

“It is with great sadness that we announce that our grandmother, Madelyn Dunham, has died peacefully after a battle with cancer,” Mr. Obama said in a statement. “She was the cornerstone of our family, and a woman of extraordinary accomplishment, strength, and humility. She was the person who encouraged and allowed us to take chances.”

Madelyn Dunham, who turned 86 on Oct. 26, was unable to travel to see her grandson on the campaign trail. But from her apartment in Honolulu, she religiously followed his bid for the presidency, tracking his movements and his progression through cable television.

Mr. Obama learned of his grandmother’s death a little after 8 a.m. in Jacksonville, Fla., where he had spent the evening, said Robert Gibbs, a senior adviser. Mr. Gibbs said that Mrs. Dunham died late Sunday evening on Hawaii Standard Time, which was between 4 and 5 a.m. on the East Coast.

“She was proud of her grandchildren and great-grandchildren and left this world with the knowledge that her impact on all of us was meaningful and enduring,” Mr. Obama said in the statement. “Our debt to her is beyond measure.”

Mr. Obama released the statement with his sister, Maya Soetoro-Ng, who has been at Mrs. Dunham’s side while Mr. Obama has been campaigning for president.

“Our family wants to thank all of those who sent flowers, cards, well-wishes, and prayers during this difficult time. It brought our grandmother and us great comfort,” Mr. Obama said in the statement. “Our grandmother was a private woman, and we will respect her wish for a small private ceremony to be held at a later date.”

Gallup: Obama has highest favorability rating of any presidential candidate in 16 years

If the final USA Today/Gallup poll is any indication, Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) has achieved his widest lead in the presidential race to date.

In addition, Obama's favorable rating is 62 percent -- the highest of any presidential candidate tracked in Gallup's final pre-election polls dating back to 1992.


Obama holds an 11 point lead in the final poll of likely voters taken by the polling organization, up one point from the previous day.

Just a day before the polls open, Obama leads Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), 53 to 42 percent in the Gallup poll. The numbers are based on interviews conducted by phone on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. The group surveyed is based on Gallup's model of those most likely to show up at the polls.

No candidate behind in the Gallup poll at the end of October has ever won the presidency.

Obama is also ahead in the Washington Post ABC poll (11 points), the CBS/NY Times poll (13 points), and the CNN poll (7 points).

Obama leads in six states that went for Bush in 2004: Real Clear Politics' average shows Obama ahead in Colorado (5.5 percentage points), New Mexico (7.3), Nevada (5.8), Virginia (3.8), Pennsylvania (7), Florida (4.2), Ohio (4.2) and North Carolina (0.3). McCain leads in the swing states of Arizona (3.5 points), Georgia (3), Montana (3.8), Missouri (0.7) and Indiana (0.5).

Also, "Gallup says that when it allocates the 4% of likely voters who either had no opinion or would not choose between Obama and McCain, it estimates the candidates' current support levels would most likely be 55% for Obama, 44% for McCain."

Sarah Palin's popularity is hemorrhaging, the poll says -- 45 percent now rate McCain's choice as poor, a worse-than-total reversal from a poll directly following the Republican National Convention when 60 percent deemed her selection "excellent" or "good."

Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE), meanwhile, retains similar numbers to the period following his selection; 60 percent say his choice was excellent or pretty good, whereas the same figure was 63 percent in early September.

John Byrne
The Raw Story

Reuters/Zogby: Obama Leads in Most Battleground States

The final Reuters/Zogby surveys in eight battleground states show Sen. Barack Obama in a very strong position to be elected President on Tuesday.

Pennsylvania: Obama 54%, McCain 40%

Ohio: Obama 50%, McCain 44%

Virginia: Obama 51%, McCain 45%

Nevada: Obama 51%, McCain 43%

Florida: Obama 48%, McCain 46%

Missouri: Obama 47%, McCain 46%

North Carolina: McCain 49%, Obama 48%

Indiana: McCain 49%, Obama 44%

Palin’s Advice to Tina Fey

Watch your back, Tina Fey.

Gov. Sarah Palin kicked off a rally in Ohio this afternoon with a feisty shot at Ms. Fey, who has played Ms. Palin with dead-on accuracy on “Saturday Night Live” for the last two months.

Ms. Palin had just taken the stage after Gretchen Wilson, the country singer, who sang “Redneck Woman” to warm up the crowd.

“Speaking of great performances, did anyone catch John McCain on ‘SNL’ last night?” Ms. Palin said, drawing cheers.

“A little advice to Tina Fey,” Ms. Palin said. “I want to make sure she’s holding on to that Sarah outfit. Because she’s gonna need it in the next four years.”

It turns out Ms. Palin missed the full experience of watching Mr. McCain on “Saturday Night Live.” She boarded her charter plane at 11:30 p.m. on Saturday, just on time to watch the show, an aide said, but the audio on her television wasn’t working.

-JULIE BOSMAN, NY Times

Quote of the Day

"I cannot foresee a scenario that John McCain is elected president of the United States."

-- Republican strategist Frank Luntz, interviewed on the BBC.

Dueling Tracking Polls Now Agree

The two Gallup tracking poll likely voter models -- with one that has consistently shown a close race and the other showing a likely Democratic blowout -- have converged, with both models now showing Sen. Barack Obama way ahead of Sen. John McCain, 52% to 43%, and 52% to 41%, respectively.

- Political Wire

House GOP leader uses expletive to describe Obama

From Yahoo News -

House Republican leader John Boehner has used a vulgar expression to refer to Democrat Barack Obama and his voting record in the Illinois legislature.

While campaigning for Republican presidential candidate John McCain on Wednesday, Boehner told a small crowd at a bar in the college town of Oxford that failing to vote "yes" or "no" on an issue meant a lawmaker was a "chickenshit."

The Ohio congressman said the last thing the country needs is to have a "chicken" in the White House.

McCain Gave "Radical" Professor Rashid Kahlidi $448,873 In Grants

John McCain and his surrogates have attempted to paint Sen. Barack Obama as holding anti-Israel views because of his relationship with Palestinian-American Professor Rashid Kahlidi. They claim that Kahlidi holds a “very hostile view of Israel” and has “a connection to the PLO.”

The “public record” shows that Khalidi is a well-respected, mainstream scholar of Middle Eastern studies.

The inaccuracy of the McCain camps characterization of Khalidi as being "hostle to Israel" and a supporter of the PLO, is the fact that while McCain served as chairman of the board for the International Republican Institute he distributed several grants to the Palestinian research center co-founded by Khalidi, the Center for Palestine Research and Studies, totaling $448,873.

"This, of course, just goes to show how absurd it is to suggest that Khalidi is some sort of radical polemicist. The guy is such a credentialed and respected scholar that even right-leaning organizations have funded his work, simply because it's good work. They may not agree with his personal conclusions, but Khalidi's scholarship gets taken seriously." Noted Ezra Klein of the American Prospect

The Obama Infomercial: American Stories, American Solutions

If you missed the Obama infomercial last night, you missed something extraordinary. It was a strong, caring, thoughtful and positive message that was very persuasive. If you missed it, take a look at it here.

Obama Confesses to Socialist Leanings: "I Shared My Peanut Butter And Jelly Sandwich"

Barack Obama went beyond the prepared remarks in pushing back on McCain's "socialist" attacks, ad-libbing about the shadowy Marxist and redistributionist leanings he's secretly harbored since kindergarten:

"By the end of the week, he'll be accusing me of being a secret communist because I shared my toys in kindergarten," Obama said, as per the prepared remarks. Then he added: "I shared my -- I shared my peanut butter and jelly sandwich."
- TalkingPointsMemo

"His Choice"