Early Callahan Fundraiser Photos

It is 6:45 pm and the Callahan fundrasier still has 1:15 to go.

Olivia and I went early to beat the crowds; Olivia was a trooper about it.

We did leave early as there was a very long line that stretched from outside the door down the steps to the basement.

Here are some photos:

Here you can see the line of people; it stretched up the stairs and out the front door:

This is the setting; contrast that with the 500 dollar a plate event that The Decider gave for Aaron Schock:

There was a song:

And here is our candidate:

There is another one of these in Chillicothe on August 9′th.

I’ll update this photo spread when the “official” photos are posted on the Callahan for Congress site.

My photobucket album is here.

Callahan Fish Fry Today: Dick Durbin, Lisa Madigan to attend

Remember: Kickapoo Sportsman’s Club, 11125 W. Route 150, Brimfield.

Tickets are 15 dollars a person; it should be a fun, family friendly event!

Oh yes, The Decider is coming to Peoria. Yawn. But this quote from our local paper is priceless:

PEORIA —

Why will the president of the United States come to Peoria to raise money for a 26-year-old, first-time congressional candidate?

Some political gurus say he’s looking for positive press to build his legacy. Others say he simply has nothing better to do – with Aaron Schock’s apparent lead in the race, George Bush can’t do much harm to his campaign.

“My speculation is there’s not much else he can do around the country right now in terms of campaigns.

“His poll numbers are very low. Nobody wants to be seen with him,” said Christopher Mooney, professor of political studies at the Institute for Government and Public Affairs at the University of Illinois-Springfield.

“(Schock) has got a comfortable lead, he’s got a lot of money, he’s got the smell of inevitability about him. If it was a close race, I don’t think you’d be seeing George Bush coming out here.”

Bush will appear today at Weaver Angus Farms for a $500-per-plate fundraiser for Schock, who is running for the 18th Congressional District seat against Democrat Colleen Callahan and Green Party candidate Sheldon Schafer.

Last Friday in July 2008 part II

Workout notes 3100 yards of swimming: 500 warm up, 500 drill/swim (zoomers),
1000 in 16:55 (no flip turns: 8:35, 12:47), 600 strokes, 5 x 100 (paddle, free, paddle, free, paddle).

That swim was my best in a long time (May 2007) though my PR is 15:37 (8 years ago). I know; a serious swimmer would die of laughter.

Then 3 mile run on the treadmill (28:50), 1 mile walk. Then leg weights; I am getting stronger.

I still weigh about 195 though; that is why swimming is improving but running/walking is subpar. For some reason, I swim my best at about 195 and run/walk my best at about 185.

It could be that I am physically stronger at 195, or it could be because, well, fat floats.

Some articles: The Republicans are trying to skewer Obama for canceling his military base visit. Here is what is going on:

There was much of noise last night over Der Spiegel’s report that Obama camp cancelled his previously planned trip to the hopsital in Berlin. Rush, Hannity, all had crap to talk about. Some at Faux Noise suggested the trip was cancelled because there was no photo op, developing a new meme against Obama.

It is now confirmed that Pentagon played a crucial role in cancellation:

“Senator Obama had hoped to and had every intention of visiting our troops to express his appreciation and gratitude for their service to our country,” retired Air Force Major General Scott Gration, an Obama adviser, said in a statement.

“We learned from the Pentagon [Wednesday] night that the visit would be viewed instead as a campaign event. Senator Obama did not want to have a trip to see our wounded warriors percieved as a campaign event…and decided instead not to go.”

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/…

Update Politco has more details from Obama’s campaign.

Intially, a couple of weeks ago, Pentagon cleared the visit.

Senior strategist Robert Gibbs said the visit to the military hospital in Germany had been in the works for about three weeks, with Gration serving as the campaign’s contact with the Pentagon.

The Pentagon cleared the Obama plan to land at the base on either July 15 or 16, Gibbs said. The plane needed the clearance because of restrictions on landing nonmilitary aircraft there, he said.

But, only one day before the planned visit, Pentagon overruled itself:

But then on Wednesday, Gration told Obama aides that the Pentagon had informed him that the visit could be viewed as a campaign stop.

“They cited a regulation,” Gibbs said of their point of contact, described as legislative affairs in the office of the secretary.

The Politico source

I’ll probably get skewered for saying this: I will not be so quick to jump to the conclusion that the military is in the GOP’s pocket on this one, though the diary sites a Morning Joe interview to argue otherwise.

But clearly, the GOP and their apologists are trying to spin this incident for political gain.

Democrats and national security: a nice book review by Samantha Power. Hat tip to 3-quarks daily.

Since Vietnam there has never been a more auspicious time for the Democratic Party to establish close relations with the US military. Building on Obama’s October 2002 speech explaining his opposition to the war in Iraq, Democrats can continue to argue that Obama and his party will never do what the Republicans have done: send US service members to fight unnecessary wars. He will not stretch the US military and military families to their breaking points by extending tours of duty beyond what is tolerable. He will not order young cadets and reservists to carry out cruel and inhuman acts against foreign detainees and then abandon them when it becomes politically inconvenient, allowing them to be court-martialed while those who authorized the practices take up high-paying jobs at corporate law firms or prestigious teaching posts at top-flight law schools.

Democrats should make it clear that they will listen to the military’s pleas to make major improvements in the civilian components of the government that work with the military on policing, governance, and reconstruction. Republicans have had eight years to respond to the appeals of US generals like David Petraeus who have begged for more and better-equipped civilian partners to join US soldiers; yet more US personnel still serve in US military marching bands than in the foreign service.

With their grossly inadequate veterans’ care, moreover, the Bush administration and the Republican-controlled Congress badly failed many of those returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. It is Democrats in Congress such as Jim Webb and Obama who have put forth the health care and college tuition plans that treat American veterans with the respect and dignity they deserve during their difficult transitions to civilian life. The Republicans’ failure to support first-class care for returning service members is not only immoral; it is contributing to the difficulty the armed forces are now having in recruiting and retaining volunteers.

Democrats must also help voters see—and reject once and for all—the false choice that George W. Bush and now McCain offer between militarism and “appeasement.” When John F. Kennedy was ridiculed by the right for his plans to negotiate with Communist countries, he rejected outright the idea that “we have only two choices: appeasement or war, suicide or surrender, humiliation or holocaust, to be either Red or dead.” Obama and the Democrats today can show that while the United States refused to talk to America’s adversaries, Iran and North Korea both advanced much further in their nuclear development.

And finally Democrats must play up the sharp differences that exist between the two parties on national security. Here the voters seem to be accepting in larger numbers the principles of the Democratic foreign policy platform, but Democrats have not yet locked in their advantages. Three framing themes seem particularly worth emphasizing:

• The New versus the Old. Democrats should argue that their foreign policy is particularly well suited to meeting today’s unconventional threats —those that cross borders. Meeting such threats will sometimes entail using military force, but it will almost always require mustering global cooperation. Here the Democrats must point to the security consequences of the loss of respect for the United States around the world: the US requires the assistance of others to aid it in combating terrorism, halting nuclear proliferation, and reversing global warming. In scorning international law and public opinion abroad, Republicans have alienated those the US needs to share the burden of neutralizing threats that Americans deem the most pressing. Democrats for instance, will be more effective in securing the cooperation of intelligence and law enforcement officials in the eighty countries in which al-Qaeda is now active.

• Deeds versus Words. In his National Security Strategy for 2002, Bush used the words “liberty” eleven times, “freedom” forty-six times, and “dignity” nine times; yet people who live under oppression around the world have seen few benefits from President Bush’s freedom doctrine. Richard Armitage, former deputy secretary of state under Bush, put it best when he said, “Since 9/11 our principal export to the world has been our fear.” The gulf between America’s rights rhetoric and the abuses carried out against detainees in American custody has been fatal to American credibility. Obama needs to restore that credibility by ending those excesses, and by following through on his pledge to launch a foreign aid initiative rooted in Franklin Roosevelt’s core democratic value: freedom from fear. The United States should invest in a long-term “rule of law” initiative that takes up the burden of helping other countries and international organizations to build workable legal systems in the developing world.

• Law versus Lawlessness. In arguing for closing down Guantánamo, ending extraordinary rendition, and returning to the Geneva Conventions, Democrats must remind voters of the national security consequences of being perceived as a lawbreaker. More terrorists take up arms against the United States, while fewer countries take up arms along with the United States. In stressing the importance of law, Democrats should also repudiate the extraordinary and illegitimate presidential power seized by Bush (and generally supported by McCain). As a constitutional lawyer, Obama is in a unique position to argue that as commander in chief, he will never hold himself or his advisers above the law.

Last July Friday 2008

Workout notes Nothing yet; a swim, weights, and maybe three miles of running. My outer hip muscles on both sides are sore; I wonder if this is from those leg machines, particularly the hip adductor machine.

Perhaps I need to do those regularly?

Various articles

Yes, this is from the ultra-right wing Fox News, but this article sums up what I am feeling just a bit uneasy about:

Obama Casts Self as World Citizen, But Will It Play in America?
by FOXNews.com

Barack Obama’s speech Thursday in Germany may have grabbed the attention of the crowd of 200,000 with its outline of his world view, but his introduction was enough to catch attention back home.

“I come to Berlin as so many of my countrymen have come before, although tonight, I speak to you not as a candidate for president, but as a citizen — a proud citizen of the United States, and a fellow citizen of the world,” Obama said from his perch next to the Victory Column in Berlin, from which he could see throngs of spectators.

To several observers at home, that opening was the speech’s most noteworthy flourish.

“The opening line where he said he wasn’t speaking as a candidate but as a citizen of the world … it might have seemed appropriate for that audience, but you can’t remove the candidacy factor from it,” said Linda Hobgood, director of the Speech Center in the Department of Rhetoric and Communication Studies at the University of Richmond. “So it might have been more accurate to say, ‘While I am a candidate, I am also a citizen of the world.’”

She added that, as he has done in the past, Obama accentuated his international roots to demonstrate his foreign policy credentials.

“I was curious about what I could hear in terms of the crowd response,” Hobgood said. “There was a huge response in terms of his lineage to Kenya. I am sure again he was trying to emphasize that he was a citizen of the world.”

The question of national or global citizenship is one that Obama’s Republican rival, John McCain, seeks to exploit. In a recent ad on troop funding, the announcer states that the McCain will always put “country first.”

As for Obama’s speech in Berlin, the McCain campaign responded by noting Obama’s “eloquent praise for this country” but said the contrast couldn’t be more evident. [...]

The crowd that greeted Obama in Berlin was larger than the crowds at home on the campaign trail so far, however, Hobgood questioned whether images of a giant turnout of Germans will move American voters to support him.

“To get that crowd size and those backdrops … it does give you pause. Who is he appealing to who is not going to vote for him already? Which voters will come over to him by virtue of this moment, by virtue of this speech situation? To tell you the truth, I can’t come up with too many,” she said.

Arizona Sen. Jon Kyl, a McCain ally who said he has traveled with the candidate to Germany maybe 25 times, suggested that Europeans paying attention to Obama is a double-edged sword.

“Americans haven’t really cared for the attitude of our European friends, who are very seldom with it when it comes to the heavy lifting around the world,” Kyl said.

I am worried that many people will fall for this false dichotomy: “being a part of the community of nations is bad for America”. Frankly, I think it will be good for America.

I think that this article reflects the attitude of the typical Fox News watcher though.

The world is getting smaller though; for example other countries are rapidly catching up in technical areas:

Is the sun beginning to set on America’s scientific dominance? Much like the scientific superpowers of France, Germany and Britain in centuries’ past, the United States has a diminishing lead over other nations in financial investment and scholarly research output in science and engineering, say a group of historians and sociologists led by University of Wisconsin-Madison emeritus history professor J. Rogers Hollingsworth.

Massive investments in recent decades by the European Union, China, Japan, Russia and India have leveled the international playing field in the sciences, according to the essay published in the July 24 issue of the journal Nature. The trend will likely put an end to the age of the “unrivaled scientific behemoth,” a status the U.S. has enjoyed since the end of World War II.

“What we are seeing is a diffusion of good science centers all over the world, a trend which ultimately may be good for science,” says Hollingsworth. “But it also means that the U.S. relative to the rest of the world no longer dominates.”

The authors cite China as the most pronounced example. In 1995, China ranked 15th among nations in the production of science and engineering papers, according to the research analysis firm Thomson Reuters ISI. By 2007, the country ranked second, an increase driven in large part by the country’s economic growth.

China also made dramatic gains in scientific talent. From 1985 to 2005, the number of natural sciences and engineering doctorates in China increased seven-fold and elevated the country to third in the world.

Similar major strides in the number of doctorates and the volume of scientific publishing have taken place in India, Japan, Russia and Europe. Hollingsworth argues that this shift closely parallels the emergence of a global economy and the newfound ability of many nations to compete.

“The decline of the U.S. economy relative to the rest of the world is facilitating the strengthening of science elsewhere,” the authors argue.

Hollingsworth and his co-authors – UW-Madison senior scientist Ellen Jane Hollingsworth and Karl H. Muller, director of the Vienna Institute for Social Science Documentation and Methodology – assert that U.S. science is still strong and performs at a high level. For example, U.S. researchers still account for more than half of the top 1 percent of most-cited papers in the world.

But the global proliferation of science will present new challenges to the United States. Hollingsworth says that the biggest threat to U.S. science competitiveness may be the massive size of major research universities, which produce a high volume of published work but not a corresponding increase in “major breakthroughs.” For example, Hollingsworth says that almost 50 percent of papers published by U.S. scientists are not cited by other scientists, which raises the question of whether the high volume of publishing “is really enhancing our stock of knowledge.”

(yes, some of my papers have been cited by others, but not enough recent ones. I had better get to work!)

Speaking of science:

Matter vs. anti-matter. This remains a puzzle for cosmologists to solve. Why is our universe asymmetric with respect to baryons? Baryons are particles like protons and neutrons; e. g. why are there lots of protons but almost no anti-protons (same mass, but with negative charge)?

Informed speculation: what would the universe have been like had some of the cosmological constants been a tad different? Or equivalently, what would our parallel universes look like if the multiverse model is true?

Somewhat snarky comment: an outspoken atheist speaks out:

I wasn’t searching for anything. I wasn’t dabbling or questioning. I wasn’t having any kind of spiritual breakdown. I just opened my eyes one day, looked around and realised that I had once been standing in a house and one by one the walls had collapsed and there was no longer a house there. I was standing out in the open. It was very liberating.

Funny though. For a while I would go to pray and then remind myself that I didn’t believe. These days I send out wishes. I know, just as crazy.

I question some of my progressive, believing mates about if they believe in Noah’s ark, the Immaculate Conception, Adam and Eve, the Resurrection, even heaven, and they squirm a little and try to change the subject. They get vague, defensive and then start muttering something about faith and mystery and a power of love that unites us all.

Sure, it would be easy to torture them, but they’re adults and it’s their life. I just can’t see why it’s so difficult to have a rigorous discussion about it. I feel no need to convert them. I just want them to know that if you are brave enough to place your hand through the invisible electric fence there’s a bigger world beyond.

It’s been a revelation to me a year since my “epiphany”. I feel as if I’m walking through life with the blinkers off. Suddenly all the religious mumbo-jumbo jumps out as so bonkers. Wearing certain things, eating certain things, mumbling certain things at certain times so some imaginary friend will let you into a club in the sky when you die. I want to do my living now, thanks. I’m not afraid of dying. I’m afraid of never having lived.

There is a school of thought that suggests atheists should not call themselves atheists but just say we apply rational thought to everything and religion is no exception.

As Sam Harris, author of The End Of Faith, puts it, “I think that ‘atheist’ is a term that we do not need, in the same way that we don’t need a word for someone who rejects astrology.

“We simply do not call people ‘non-astrologers’. All we need are words like ‘reason’ and ‘evidence’ and ‘common sense’ and ‘bullshit’ to put astrologers in their place, and so it could be with religion.”

I don’t care what people believe in, but I do care that religion impacts on political discourse, public policy and that it stunts the ability of people to think for themselves and question. And that it kills people and causes suffering. But most of all I care that the invisible electric fences that are wired in the minds of children brainwashed by religion are difficult to remove. And impossible if you don’t even know they’re there.

A quote attributed to Stephen F. Robert sums it up for me: “We are both atheists, I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours.”

Peace be with you.

This kind of sums up how I feel.

If you wonder why this is such a big topic with me, I’ll offer up a few reasons

1. At work, I have lots of atheist friends. But many of these types have never been interested in religion. I continue to be; I have for all of my life. I just find it interesting: how it spread, how beliefs evolved, how the various holy books were written, why this writing was included and why this other one was not, etc. Frankly, studying this from an atheistic point of view makes it even more interesting because answers like “book X was included but book Y wasn’t because our deity told the church fathers to do it this way” become glaring cop-outs.

2. I do come into contact with communities which have lots of “believers” (think: AA. No, I am not an AA member but that isn’t too far off of the mark…) I admit that there are times when I think that their way of seeing the world is just plain nuts.

3. Political season: all politicians pander to so-called people of faith.

4. I am interested in science education. Enough said.

5. I’d like to let the other atheists/agnostics out there know that they aren’t alone. Of course I am probably one of the few atheist/agnostic types who enjoys reading books called Introduction to the Bible (Rogerson), Biblical Literacy (Telushkin), The Complete Gospels, (Jesus Seminar), Gospel Fictions (Helms) and The Bible as it Was (Kugel).

John McCain is embarrassing himself

What has John McCain done today or yesterday?

1. He forgot about Afghanistan. He called the Iraq war the first major conflict since 9-11.

2. McCain whined about Obama speaking in Berlin. However, he seemed to forget that he has spoken in foreign countries too

In an interview with NBC’s Kelly O’Donnell airing tonight, John McCain questioned Barack Obama’s decision to give a speech in Berlin while he’s still a candidate. But MSNBC points out that he’s forgetting a recent speech of his own:

“I would rather speak at a rally or a political gathering any place outside of the country after I am president of the United States,” McCain told O’Donnell. “But that’s a judgment that Sen. Obama and the American people will make.”

However, on June 20, McCain himself gave a speech in Canada — to the Economic Club of Canada — in which he applauded NAFTA’s successes. An implicit message behind that speech was that Obama had been critical of the trade accord. Also, McCain’s trip to Canada was paid for by the campaign.

The Jed Report has a nice list of other foreign places where McCain has spoken as well as times where McCain made foreign references to Obama:

This, of course, is the same John McCain who held a political event in Ottawa at the Economic Club of Canada just one month ago.

This is the same John McCain who held a campaign fundraiser in London in March.

3. So Obama canceled a visit to a military base as it might be too much like a campaign stop. Well, McCain’s campaign criticized him for that too.

For the second part of his trip, the senator wanted to visit the men and women at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center to express his gratitude for their service and sacrifice. The senator decided out of respect for these servicemen and women that it would be inappropriate to make a stop to visit troops at a U.S. military facility as part of a trip funded by the campaign.”

John McCain’s campaign has been quick to call most of Obama’s activity abroad inappropriate. Now that Obama has chosen not to do something, you might think they would be pleased. But you would be mistaken:

“Barack Obama is wrong. It is never ‘inappropriate’ to visit our men and women in the military,” McCain spokesman Brian Rogers said in response to the news.

Well, I don’t know if I can blame McCain; he even isn’t getting backing from other Republicans.

Consider what Chuck Hagel had to say:

Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel, fresh from an Iraq trip with Democrat Barack Obama, said the presidential candidates should focus on the war’s future and stop arguing over the success of last year’s troop surge.

Hagel mentioned both candidates, but his comments seemed directed at Republican John McCain. McCain, while Obama traveled the Middle East, attacked Obama for opposing the military escalation last year that increased security in Iraq.

“Quit talking about, ‘Did the surge work or not work,’ or, ‘Did you vote for this or support this,’” Hagel said Thursday on a conference call with reporters.

“Get out of that. We’re done with that. How are we going to project forward?” the Nebraska senator said. “What are we going to do for the next four years to protect the interest of America and our allies and restructure a new order in the world. … That’s what America needs to hear from these two candidates. And that’s where I am.”

Hagel, too, opposed the troop increase strategy, though he acknowledged Thursday it brought about positive changes. “When you flood the zone with superior American military firepower, and you put 30,000 of the world’s best troops in a country, there’s going to be a result there,” Hagel said.

Whether the surge worked, though, can’t be measured, Hagel said, arguing the small gains came at a high price. He said President Bush’s decision last year to dispatch an additional 30,000 troops to Iraq has cost more than 1,000 American lives and billions of dollars.

Brent Scowcroft is remaining neutral toward the candidates.

Former Lt. Gen. Brent Scowcroft, the former Bush 41 adviser, considers himself officially “neutral” in the presidential contest between Barack Obama and John McCain, and is willing to offer advice to either candidate, according to two independent sources familiar with Scowcroft’s thinking.

That description of the former national security adviser’s political loyalty conflicts with a Washington Post survey of campaign surrogates, which listed Scowcroft as part of McCain’s retinue as recently as late 2007.

Colin Powell is having to do some soul searching.

Last week, Mr Powell revealed that he has been advising the senator from Illinois on foreign policy – provoking a flurry of speculation about the plans and ambitions of both men.

Mr Powell, 70, who left office in January 2005 under a cloud left by the war in Iraq, has served three Republican presidents, but made clear that he is considering backing a Democrat to succeed his former boss, George W Bush.

He disclosed that he has twice met Sen Obama, at the request of the White House hopeful. “I make myself available to talk about foreign policy matters and military matters with whoever wishes to chat with me,” Mr Powell said. “I’m going to support the best person that I can find who will lead this country.”

He ruled out any speculation that he may seek the vice-presidency. But asked if he would accept another senior post, he said: “I would not rule it out. I am not at all interested in political life if you mean elected political life. But I always keep my eyes open and my ears open to requests for service.”

There are other Obama leaning Republicans.

The main issue as I see it: I’ve read about this in liberal leaning publications such as the New Republic and the Huffington Post, and I’ve read about this in conservative publications such as Townhall and The American Conservative.

Yes, Obama is the Democrat and more liberal and more intellectual than McCain. McCain is the Republican and more conservative and has met a sterner test of character than Obama has.

But it really boils down to this, I think: will the swing voters be ready to move the United States of America to being part of the world community at large, or do we want to stay in some ultra-nationalist “exceptional” mode?

How will Obama being cheered overseas play with the independent voters? Do they prefer our being disliked as it proves some sort of “to hell with the rest of them” individualist attitude?

Frankly, I don’t know. I have my fears, and my hopes. My fears is that most Americans will want to remain “apart from” and my hopes is that we will want to become “more international”.

That is why I think that there is some sort of a generational gap, and a gap between white and non-white America (among the older voters).

This election might not break along purely conservative/liberal lines; I think there will be a rural-culturally isolated vs. worldly-cosmopolitan line as well.

A couple of prejudices of mine

I don’t like:

1. Neighbors with neat lawns. Why does that bother me? It bothers me because they are out there constantly working in them with their power mowers, blowers, etc. The buzzing is constant. I’d much rather have slackers with sloppy yards!

2. The so called “good people”. To me, your “good, God-fearing red-blooded patriotic American” is something like the woman described in this blog post:

I am so mad right now I don’t know what to do. For those unfamiliar with me, I live in a small, conservative, republican town in Georgia. I just had a HUGE argument with my next door neighbor. After seeing my new shiny Obama sticker on my van, she launched into an attack on me that was unprovoked and very unsettling. She asked me why he couldn’t say the pledge of allegiance to which I replied, that is not true. I then explained the details of various lies and smears. She continued to bring up every smear out there from the pledge to the swearing in on the Koran. I told her she needed to check her facts as these had all been disproved. She then asked, “So if he is a Muslim, and did swear on a Koran, then would you still support him?” I explained that I would support him because a person’s religion is not an important factor to me. Which is when she said, “I hope if he gets elected, that he is shot and killed within 24 hours!”

This woman fits my “conservative American” caricature. But it could be that I grew up around such people (not my family though my family had its own prejudices ).