July 18th, 2008
As a tribute to the continued support of our listeners, on this program we like to give a little back to the community every now and then. We are all about providing timely and useful information.
With an election year upon us, it seems appropriate to offer this evening a list of things 15 which John McCain, born in 1936, is older than. Why fifteen? Because I had to stop the list somewhere.
1. The Golden Gate Bridge
2. Jet Engines
3. Ball point pens
4. The discovery of oil in Saudi Arabia
5. Velcro
6. Instant coffee
7. Computers
8. The U.S. Air Force
9. Sunscreen
10. Television
11. The State of Hawaii
12. Bikinis
13. Duct tape
14. Scrabble
and finally,
15. John McCain is older than Mr. Potato Head
We ended with that one because he looks oddly like Mr. Potato Head. Perhaps they’re related somehow?
The link between the candidates and household products may not be all that clear right now, but that’s only because the political advertising has yet to hit California. We’re lucky in that respect. This state has been so thoroughly in the Democratic camp over the past few decades that conservative candidates are usually content to make no more than a token effort to reassure their half-dozen supporters that they really do exist.
The same can’t be said for states like Virginia and Ohio, which are suddenly in play again after securely falling under Republican sway in recent history.
Television viewers in those unlucky states are trying to keep their heads above a tidal wave of advertising one step removed from those late night infomercials for elastic thigh toners.
The campaigns are going to promise tighter budgets, strengthened economic growth, and rock-hard Wars on Terrorism, all for the low, low price of YOUR VOTE.
Do not accept imitations, send in your campaign contributions and BUY NOW in this limited time offer before our opponents corrupt the very fabric of America.
Eeech.
So remember: It could be worse. We could be living in Zimbabwe, or Cleveland, right?
Cleaving to our best information about the truth of things, this is the Timothy Jordan Show News, coming to our dear listeners on the 18th of July, 2008.
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The truth of things can be hard to ferret out in the media cycle these days. A lot of hay was made about Mr. Obama’s decision last month to avoid public financing of his Presidential campaign.
Unfortunately, less attention was paid to the state of Mr. McCain’s finances. At the same time that he was criticizing his Democratic opponent for using private financing, McCain was exploiting loopholes in the campaign finance reform laws that he helped write.
The McCain-Feingold campaign reforms were an effort by Congress to reduce the ability of outside groups to raise money and influence the outcomes of elections.
Particularly targeted were the independent political organizations that operated in a grey area of the tax code, often in collusion with the major political parties. These 527 groups, listeners no doubt remember the Swift Boat Veterans, had in the past been free to accept money from political party organizations. But since they weren’t exactly part of the official party apparatus, they were exempt from the spending limits imposed on the major parties.
The McCain-Feingold law changed that by throwing the same gauntlet of federal spending limits on the 527 groups that existed for the major parties.
Having helped craft the law, McCain’s people knew a little too much about it. See, the law was designed to prevent money flows from the parties to the 527 groups, but not the other way around.
In the recent weeks the McCain campaign has set up no less than six different committees dedicated to raising private money for his campaign. This money is then donated directly into the coffers of Republican Party offices on both State and National levels.
On June 30th just one of the groups alone, McCain Victory 2008, disbursed over $16 million directly to the Republican National Committee.
Does this sound like public financing?
If candidates accept contributions directly into their campaign, they’re bound by McCain-Feingold limits of just $2,300 per individual for both stages of the campaign.
But by putting these 527 groups to work, Mr. McCain is able to circumvent the very legislation he helped create. A quick look through the Federal Elections Commission filings of McCain Victory 2008 reveals individual contributions of up to $28,500. Whoah, $57,000. Wait, no. $67.800. $70,000 from MR. S. GENE CAULEY of Little Rock, Arkansas. Do I hear $70,100? YES! $70,100 from both members of the Chilton household, one of whom lists her profession as homemaker.
And that’s just in the first three pages of the group’s FEC filing. My staff broke into the medicinal absinthe and started drowning their disbelief around page four.
I mean, come on… $140,200 from two people?
The exact numbers aren’t in front of me, but my last check on the Obama campaign showed an average contribution of under $70.
McCain got 2002 times that from two donors to ONE of his contributing committees, ironic because 2002 was the year that he and Senator Russ Feingold proposed their campaign finance legislation.
It’s good to be Mr. Potato Head.
• McCain Victory 2008 FEC filings
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Less is more, right?
That’s the theory behind the Missile Defense Agency’s acquisition process, according to the Government Accountability Office.
Unsatisfied with the traditional Pentagon process for buying weapons, former Sec. Defense Rumsfeld switched to a “spiral” acquisition for missile defense. In spiral acquisition there aren’t set goals for a weapons system. Instead goals are revised as parts of the system are purchased.
It let the Bush Pentagon buy a missile defense system and declare it operational long before it actually proved itself to be effective. It’s like buying a truck one wheel at a time, and then trying to drive it off the lot before the engine’s installed.
Also imagine that you’ve been financing the truck as you buy it… interest only… on credit cards. Imagine how much it would cost.
The result is a program that’s over budget and behind schedule.
But goals are being met, because the goals keep being shifted lower and lower as the program fails to meet expectations.
I’d like to remind our listeners that this is a multi-billion dollar program that has yet to show success outside of carefully scripted scenarios. The missile silos in Alaska have flooded due to rising ground water, and sometimes the missiles don’t even launch when they’re being tested.
Some individual parts of the missile defense program are doing well, but the Pentagon doesn’t want to break the system down into separate elements because it would interfere with their management of the program as a whole.
To sum up the GAO’s review, some progress is being made, but it’s less than expected, and costs a hell of a lot more than planned.
• GAO: Missile Defense Acquisition Strategy Generates Results but Delivers Less at a Higher Cost
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And in news of more than expected and less than planned, we got former Attorney General John Ashcroft’s testimony before Congress earlier this week.
Ashcroft was expected to talk about his role in approving the interrogation of detainees early on in the War on Terror. Unfortunately for the House Judiciary Committee, the former Attorney General couldn’t really remember the difference between what he did, and what other people have said about what he did.
Seriously.
What he did reveal, unexpectedly, was the interrogation of al Qaeda suspect Abu Zubaydah early in 2002, using methods now widely identified as torture, without the legal protection of John Yoo’s “Torture Memo”.
So apparently the gloves, and the rule of law, came off right out the gates. The very first high-ranking al Qaeda member to fall into the Bush Administration’s hands was subjected to waterboarding or worse without even the most cursory legal review.
• via Talking Points Memo, Ashcroft Testimony Brings CIA Interrogation Timeline Into Question
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In a follow-up to a story from a few months ago, we’d like to announce that the proud residents of San Francisco will have the opportunity to to rename the Oceanside Water Pollution Control Plant. A proposal has qualified for the ballot to rename the plant in honor of our Nation’s leader. If the proposal passes it would be known as the George W. Bush Sewage Plant.
Damn, that’s excellent.
• via CBS, Proposed Bush Sewage Plant Will Appear SF Ballot
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In fact that was a winner of our weekly award a few months back, but you can’t win twice. Our winner this week comes from the Big Apple. It’s…
Remember how much fun those bendy straws were as a little kid? Are you currently a little kid? Ever have to ask specifically for a bendy straw because you got a boring old non-flexy straw?
Well ask no more, because those boring old non-bendy straws can be made into something excellent.
Available at the Museum of Modern Art website are John McCoy’s constructible drinking straw kits. They’re a set of rubber angles, Ts, and connectors that’ll let you link any number of straws together. Want to drink out of your neighbor’s glass? Want to drink out of both of your neighbors’ glasses at the same time? Want to make your beer spiral around your glass and across the table as it flows like sweet cold hoppy nectar into your lips?
It’s like an erector set for straws, an excellent erector set.
And it wins John McCoy this week’s Timothy Jordan Show Award of Excellence.
• Constructible Drinking Straw
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That’d be the News for July 18th, Ought-Eight.