Texas Debate Watch: Another Story In Indignity?

My Third World People Don't Get To Vote In This City
Wrong Circles
The Jewish Identity In New York City
Three Very Different Worlds: Nepal, Obama, Startup
Looking For 10 Ninja Women
Planned Parenthood: First Impressions
Message To Elizabeth Caputo: SOS Call
Planned Parenthood: A Different Kind Of Event
Tonic: What A Party

I am Al Pacino. Elizabeth Caputo is Meryl Streep. She is top political talent. So am I. She could be president, I am going to win the Nobel Peace Prize. I am also going to list my company on Nasdaq.

Granted there is this thing called feeling uncomfortable, but I did not think she was uncomfortable at the last event I saw her which, by the way, was not a DL21C event. Neither of us had to be there. Resolved, the uncomfortable thing is over.

You always have to be careful about Jewish people. You don't want to end up facing the question, so what up, you don't like Jewish people? But no one is going to out Third World me, I don't care if you are Jewish or what.

I still officially don't know if this Berger dude is Jewish, although I have two strong reasons to believe he is. One, there is that er. Two, he grew a beard over the Holidays like my man Friday Adam who is also Jewish. This guy works for a top name in Congress, Charlie Rangel. So he has to be technically competent. He is not exactly Rudy Shenk, who was Obama 08's New York state director. But he belongs in that camp of people who acquire technical knowledge on the details, not my personal specialty. He has his skill set, something I will never acquire.

Jesus was a Jew. Buddha was a Madhesi. We Madhesis have shut down all of Nepal's south for the ninth day in a row now. We are fighting for liberation. Berger and I might have more common ground than he realizes. What's up with these dudes like Jesus and Buddha? They come and go, and their peoples end up bearing the brunt for centuries.

So I have decided to show up for this DL21C event, the Texas debate watch party. The best that could happen is Elizabeth and I could end up having our first ever conversation. The worst that could happen is I could get kicked out third time in a row. At least I might then know never to show up again, since third time is the charm.

I show up early, like perhaps 7:25. If I get kicked out, I take a cab to the Obama debate watch party 30 streets down. I might take a cab. I think I am going to carry a hundred dollar bill if only to fluster the cab driver.

I am not much of a cab guy. I am a train guy. The subway is the most New York City thing about New York City. Trains are better and cheaper. But today I am going to be a cab guy if I have to be.

What the heck.


Thursday, February 21
7:30 pm
DL21C Texas Debate Watch Party! (This is an open event. Anyone can join and invite others to join.)
7:30pm
Connolly's Pub
121 W. 45th Street (between Sixth and Seventh Avenues)
(Ten-gallon hats, cowboy boots and yellow roses optional...)

Name:	Obama NYC and Generation Obama Feb. 21st Debate Watch Party!
Tagline:	Let's make some noise for Barack!

Date:	Thursday, February 21, 2008
Time:	7:30pm - 10:00pm
Location:	Village Pourhouse
Street:	64 3rd Ave
City/Town:	New York, NY

Please join Generation Obama, Young Lawyers for Obama, and ObamaNYC for the Texas CNN and Univision Debate at the Village Poorhouse.
This debate could be huge for Barack and OUR movement, so let's celebrate together!
7:30-10pm
Village Pourhouse
3rd Ave and 12th St.
**Drink Specials all night**

Visits on previous 'day': 1,736.









In The News

Barack Obama keeps winning form BBC News
Obama, Clinton trade punches ahead of debate Houston Chronicle
Hillary's in trouble, Clinton admits Sydney Morning Herald Perhaps Mr Clinton is just enjoying himself too much on the campaign trail. ..... the snipers on the rooftops and the Texas national guardsmen, wearing flak-jackets, helmets and armed with semi-automatic weapons ..... Texas and Ohio have become Senator Clinton's last frontiers. ..... For the first time her usually optimistic husband admitted that if she does not win Texas and Ohio on March 4, she most likely will not win the nomination. .... the final Democratic contest in Puerto Rico on June 7
Obama wins Democrats Abroad global primary, over 60 per cent in Canada The Canadian Press
Clinton begins to cast Obama as hopeless dreamer Canada.com
A Clinton Strategy? New York Times
Clinton camp splits on message Los Angeles Times Bill Clinton, who suggested that his wife could not survive a loss in either of the next two major contests, in Texas and Ohio on March 4. ..... she did not heed calls to limit the overarching power Penn wielded within the brain trust as both its pollster and message- maker.
Bill Clinton says Texas, Ohio could be make-or-break for Hillary Dallas Morning News Obama on Wednesday held a rally for 17,000 supporters at Dallas' Reunion Arena, following a rally the night before at the Toyota Center arena in Houston before more than 16,500 supporters ...... "The biggest personality to come through Victoria in the last 50 years was John Wayne, so this is big," Stephen Jabbour, the county Democratic Party chairman, told the Victoria Advocate about Clinton's visit. ..... Clinton condensed his basic campaign speech Wednesday, which was running an hour or more last week during appearances in the state.

Visits on previous 'day': 1,736.

Talks on to end Nepal blockade AFP

Nepal Extends Terai Curfews; Madhesi Groups to Boycott Election Bloomberg Police fired tear gas to break up protesters in Janakpur yesterday as authorities maintained curfews in Nepalgunj and Biratnagar
Political Memo Clinton Aides Split on How to Take On Obama New York Times what could be her last stands, in Ohio and Texas on March 4. ..... intense frustration among Mrs. Clinton’s advisers ..... Mrs. Clinton woke up Wednesday to the realization that she had lost nearly every advantage she once could claim over Mr. Obama: money, momentum, a lead in national polls and an edge in delegates.
President Clinton: Texas and Ohio Are Must Wins FOXNews Bill Clinton said that March 4th is do or die for his wife making Ohio and Texas “must-wins” for her struggling campaign. ..... over 200,00 Americans gave Hillary 17 million dollars over the Internet in small contributions in the last 17 days
Powerful Teamsters Union Endorses Obama The Associated Press

Obama's Strategy to Avoid a Convention Fight Washington Post the idea is to win so many delegates that the Democratic leadership presses Clinton to concede ...... even after eight consecutive victories, Team Obama's ears were ringing with the warnings bells of New Hampshire. ..... it's like boxing: When you're the challenger, you don't win on points
Hawaiians Flood Polls for Obama U.S. News & World Report
Obama wins Hawaii in a landslide USA Today Obama had 28,347 votes, or 76%, to U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton's 8,835 votes, or 24% .... 20 of the state's 29 delegates .... "I think Hawai'i is going to count this year," she said. "Before, we didn't matter."
Obama campaign insists that Clinton concede Guardian Unlimited The argument from the Obama camp appears designed to paint Clinton as a nuisance candidate -- much like Mike Huckabee ........ Obama and McCain increasingly are taking swipes at one another on the stump ...... "It is time to get real, to get real about how we actually win this election and get real about the challenges facing America," she said in her speech. "I am not running for president to put Band-Aids on our problems. I am running to solve them." ....... Clinton is being deserted by even her most ardent supporters: the working class voters she had been banking on in Ohio and even middle-aged white women. ....... The Clinton campaign also appears to have miscalculated with a last-minute burst of negative advertisements in Wisconsin. ...... Clinton also continues to face a cash crisis. Obama outspent her four to one in Wisconsin ..... Obama took 58% of the vote in Wisconsin against 41% for Clinton. He did even better in Hawaii, the state where he was born, carrying 76% of the vote. ..... Obama 1,336 delegates against 1,251 for Clinton
Obama Camp: Clinton Tactics 'Damaging to the Party' Washington Post the two sides are battling over the ground rules going forward.



Visits on previous 'day': 1,454.

My Third World People Don't Get To Vote In This City

Jewish people get to vote, black people get to vote, women get to vote, but my Third World people don't get to vote in this city.

Many of them don't even get to vote in their own countries because they got dictator creatures lording over them.

The right to vote is fundamental. Every human being deserves that basic outlet. Otherwise people end up with suffocation. That suffocation is painful to those who have to go through it, but it also has implications for the world at large. Swamps are no good. Mosquitoes show up ultimately.

Wealth is literally created out of thin air. Bill Gates did not steal 50 billion from someone. That 50 billion did not exist before he came along. Political space is also created out of thin air. A people who become free do not eat up space of others who were free before them. They expand the overall space through their freedom and so are now in a position to contribute to the larger good. It is a win win situation.

Nelson Mandela talks of "a thousand little indignities" in his autobiography. New York City is not exactly under the cloud of apartheid, but it sure is a city where about 40% of its people go about disenfranchised. And that has concrete implications. You end up with tens of little indignities.

Why do people petition Senators? Why don't they do it on their own? It is because there is a vertical degree of separation between the Senators and the citizens.

America Is A Senator Country

New York City is a Senator city like no other. Every little town on the planet is represented here. Everybody you need to spread democracy into the far corners of the earth lives right here inside the boundaries of this magic city. But so far they have been wasted. Because they have been kept disenfranchised.

New York City does not belong to New York City. New York City does not belong to America. New York City is one city that belongs to the world. This city like no other has the potential to be the progressive dynamo to all humanity. But the city's global political potential goes unharnessed.

If the neocons can be on schedule to spending two and a half trillion dollars just in Afghanistan and Iraq, the progressives must counter by giving the right to vote to every New Yorker in the city elections. It is a political decision, it does not cost money. And that one act can help the cause of democracy in countries across vast swathes of the planet, why only Iraq and Afghanistan?

If you live in the city, you should be able to vote in the city elections, as simple as that. Your landlord gets to certify you live in the said building. The data thus collected gets used only for city election purposes and for violent crime control. The date does not get shared with federal or local immigration officers.

But right now the political establishment in the city is no different from Third World dictators in its thinking. Both deny their people the right to vote.

Bill Perkins: Next Mayor Of New York City

When I think Third World, I don't think perceived slights, or oh you made me feel uncomfortable. The implications are much more concrete. People are dying, to unnecessary violence, to petty, curable diseases. There is the slow death of poverty, ignorance, primitive social ills, super sexism, ethnic divisions.

Thirld World woes get measured in deaths, daily deaths. A big chunk of that is just plain, utterly preventable infant mortality. I am pro-life on that one.

Democracy is where it begins. You introduce democracy into a country with a big bang.

Progressive Political Religion: No Place For Superpowers

In the long run, you want a leveling out. Through democracy, robust economic growths and the internet, you want to end up with a level playing field. People should not have to immigrate for greener pastures.

And New York City is in a unique place to be the dynamo for that positive change. Shanghai also has the skyscrapers, but it does not have NYC's diversity. But NYC has so far acted blind to that wealth.

The Third World people have to demand the right to vote in the city, and the political establishment has to meet it half way, happily so. The people should not have to struggle. If the establishment makes the people struggle, they are not acting progressive.

The current arrangement is racist. Racism is not part of the progressive ideal. This city is lying when it proclaims its progressive credentials. Progressive for whom? Not for the disenfranchised.

The war on terror concludes the day every Arab country is a democracy. That is the only way. This voting rights thing is the progressive way to become strong on defense and eat the neocons' lunch.

And, by the way, you get to say Global South. The term Third World is like the term n____. Only black people get to sometimes use that on each other, although that too has to be discouraged.

Wisconsin, Hawaii Returns Watch Party

Time:	Tuesday, February 19 at 7:30 PM
Duration:	4 hours
Host:	Faina Ibragimova
Location:	Irish Rogue (New York, NY) 356 W 44th St New York, NY 10036

In The News

Miami Quiet Following Castro Resignation The Associated Press
Voters Go to Polls in Wisconsin Primary Voice of America
Obama opens Texas campaign with housing talk Baltimore Sun
Pakistan Opposition Parties Win Nationwide Elections (Update1) Bloomberg
Call for Musharraf to Go After Election The Associated Press The vote was also a slap to Islamist parties, which lost control of a province where al-Qaida and Taliban fighters have sought refuge. .... the two main opposition parties won a total of 154 of the 268 contested seats ..... plans for a new government and a possible showdown with Musharraf. ..... The Pakistan People's Party of assassinated ex-prime minister Benazir Bhutto was leading with 86 seats ..... The two main opposition parties were unlikely to finish with two-thirds of the seats required to impeach the president.
Fuel, electricity shortage in Nepal continues Xinhua
Obama nudges into first-time lead The Press Association words do matter -- and can influence history.
Clinton wages war over Obama's speeches Newsday
Clinton Waits Out Wisconsin Results in Ohio CBS News
Patrick defends Obama on national TV Boston Globe
Obama leading Clinton as contests get underway MarketWatch Wisconsin is the last primary leading up to the March 4 contests in Ohio, Texas, Rhode Island and Vermont. .... a 90-day moratorium on subprime-mortgage foreclosures, ending tax breaks for companies that ship jobs overseas and providing universal health care
Clinton's Dallas office opens, Dallas Morning News

Obama Camp Raising Specter of 1968 Atlantic Online 2008 will be just like 1968, but worse. ..... given the silence of the superdelegates so far, a scenario whereby Obama's having recieved the majority of both earned delegates and the popular vote results in an annointment of Hillary Clinton is a big stretch.

Clinton 08 Is Getting Desperate

• Michigan and Florida don't count.
  
• Obama has won many more states, more votes, more delegates. He almost took Brooklyn.
  
• It has now become technically, mathematically, impossible for Hillary to win enough delegates to secure the nomination. She can not get a 30% margin in OH, TX, PA, which is what she needs. (OH, TX, PA: Treat Them Well)
  
• Obama has more money, and can raise much more, faster.
  
• March 4 will be tougher on her than it ought to have been. She is hastening her demise through the tactics of desperation. Her supporters have started to desert. The negative tone will make things worse for her. (If Hillary Goes Negative, She Finishes Third In Iowa)
• Worst case scenario: she might not even be running mate if she goes too negative now. (Running Mate) There are women governors in Kansas and Washington waiting in the wings. (Barackface: A Ying Yang Scenario, Barackface: A Woman For Running Mate, Perhaps A Governor)
• I think Barack will take Texas. (Hillary's Rudy Strategy: She Will Lose March) Then it is over. If she delivers a good concession speech, she could be running mate. (A Vote For Barack Is Not A Vote Against Hillary)
• The convention will be no firewall. The superdelegates are not going to disrespect the people.
  

Jupiter And Obama (February 2007)

In The News

Do-or-die Hillary turns bully as Obama Times Online an air of desperation in Hillary Clinton’s camp. ..... Obama, 46, is being tarred as a cultish, messianic figure who talks big but cannot deliver. ..... white women, blue collar workers and Hispanics – her core supporters – have begun to peel away. ...... Privately, her mood has darkened after losing eight primaries and caucuses in a row. The reali-sation that without a series of huge victories in the remaining contests it is impossible for Clinton to win enough “pledged” delegates to clinch the nomination has sent her staff into shock. ...... Tempers have been running high within the Clinton camp. ..... Insiders say the atmosphere is dark, even though the fight is not over yet. ..... there have been too many chiefs and not enough Indians ....... friends of Bill or “white boys”, as Penn and Terry McAu-liffe, the campaign chairman, are known, have long viewed “Hillaryland” – the closed circle of female friends – with suspicion. ....... “There was a feeling that nobody was in charge,” said one observer. “She would try to play honest broker and go to Hillary with, ‘Mark says this, Mandy says that, Howard [Wolfson, her communications chief] says this’ when what they needed was a general.” ....... she did not have the nerve to tell her the campaign was haemorrhaging cash at an alarming rate, a troubling sign of the fear and apprehension that Clinton inspires among staff. ....... staff blew through a mind-boggling $130m and still ended up out-organised by Obama ...... Obama ahead by 47% to 43% ....... Bill Clinton is also campaigning with begging bowl in hand for funds. ...... Daughter Chelsea, 27, has gone from silent campaign accessory to full-throttle surrogate, holding rallies of her own on college campuses. Only now is Clinton’s campaign beginning to invest in states that have yet to vote, after assuming that Obama would at this stage be out of the race. ......... Clinton’s camp has been circulating stories criticising the “cult” of Obama in the hope of portraying “Obamania” as a mass delusion ........ “Media figures call Obama supporters’ behaviour ‘creepy’, compare them to Hare Krishna and Charles Manson followers”. ....... The campaign entered a nasty phase last week with the determination of Clinton’s team to revive delegates from the “ghost” primaries of Michigan and Florida, by legal action if necessary. ..... Even some Clinton supporters are aghast at the prospect that she might try to “steal” the election in this way. ..... her last stand at the Alamo. Her Texas firewall may already be crumbling: one poll on Friday put Obama ahead by 48% to 42% ...... Many Democrats predict a bloody civil war should Obama be defeated by the white men in suits who have run the party for decades. ...... Party leaders are watching her performance with apprehension, wondering if she really is willing to tear the Democrats apart in order to capture every last vote. Nancy Pelosi said: “It would be a problem for the party if the verdict would be something different than the public has decided.” ....... Obama’s ability to outmanoeuvre Clinton is showing in the battle for superdelegates. ...... Obama was already planning for the long game.
Clinton Campaign Gearing Up For Convention Showdown CBS News behind the scenes, the Hillary Clinton campaign is gearing up for what could be a nasty fight over the nomination at the Democratic National Convention in August. ...... "The Clinton campaign should focus on winning pledged delegates as a result of elections, not these say or do anything to win tactics that could undermine Democrats’ ability to win the general election.”
Clinton Aide Wants Mich., Fla. Delegates The Associated Press
Op-Ed Columnist The Grand Old White Party Confronts Obama New York Times Regardless of party, it’s hara-kiri for a politician to step into the shadow of even a mediocre speech by Barack Obama. ...... Letterman memorably pegged its lineup of presidential contenders last spring as “guys waiting to tee off at a restricted country club.” ...... McCain jokingly invoked the Obama slogan “I am fired up and ready to go” ...... the G.O.P. looks more like a nostalgic relic than a national political party in contemporary America. A cultural sea change has passed it by. ...... What was only months ago an exotic political experiment is now almost ho-hum. ...... vestiges of the Southern strategy persist in some Republican quarters. ..... Jerry Falwell, once an ardent segregationist, and Pat Robertson, a longtime defender of South African apartheid ....... nativist overkill on illegal immigration. ...... a 2000 Republican National Convention that had more African-Americans onstage than on the floor ....... the so-called millennial generation (dating from 1982) is the largest in American history, boomers included, and that roughly 40 percent of it is African-American, Latino, Asian or racially mixed ....... In the vast arena of the Internet he has been shrunk to Grumpy Old White Guy, the G.O.P. brand incarnate. ....... if she tosses her party into civil war by grabbing ghost delegates from Michigan and Florida. ..... the Republican Party will face Mr. Obama with a candidate who reeks even more of the past and less of change than Mrs. Clinton does. ...... “I am tired of fighting the Vietnam war. I have drifted toward Obama.” ..... it is Mr. Allen who is the foreigner in 21st century America, Mr. Allen who is in the minority in the real world of Virginia. A national rout in 2008 just may be that Republican Party’s last stand.

Obama's Momentum vs. the Clintons' Moxy Forbes, USA Barack Obama leading Hillary Clinton 49% to 37% among likely Democratic primary voters. ..... on February 14 the United Food and Commercial Workers, one of the largest unions in the country, endorsed Barack Obama. The backing of both unions will strengthen Obama’s support in the Hispanic community.