McCain Hoisted by His Own Petard

As Serf City columnist and blogger Bob Armstrong has noted, John McCain’s troubles with the FEC and campaign finance regulations are nothing short of delicious. I rarely get any joy from reading political news, but the irony in this story has me positively giddy.

McCain is squirming to get off the hook from the spending limitations imposed on his campaign when he applied for political welfare (i.e., matching funds). When his campaign was on life support last summer, the welfare seemed like a great idea, but now that donations are streaming in, his campaign is noticing the potentially lethal strings that were attached.

Technically, McCain hasn’t taken any of the matching funds yet, but he did use the promise of them as collateral on a $4 million loan. So it’s a bit late, as the FEC chairman noted, to claim he never benetfited from the welfare and now wants to opt out of the spending restrictions.

The public financing system places a spending limit of $54 million on each participating candidate for the duration of the primary season — which for the Republicans doesn’t end until their convention in September. So far the McCain campaign has already spent $49 million, which means they’ll be running on fumes for the next 6 months unless they get a reprieve. Meanwhile, neither Clinton nor Obama has applied for matching funds, so they can spend to their bleeding hearts’ content.

The best part is the FEC can’t even take a vote to let McCain off the hook, because with only 2 out 6 commissioner slots filled, they lack a quorum. Bush’s other FEC nominees are bottled up in Congress.

What makes this all so delicious, of course, is that McCain’s single greatest claim to fame (aside from being held prisoner by the people whose villages he was destroying from 10,000 feet) is championing anti-free-speech “campaign finance reform” laws.

“I would rather have a clean government than one where quote First Amendment rights are being respected that has become corrupt,” McCain infamously told Don Imus in 2006. “If I had my choice, I’d rather have the clean government.”

McCain is getting what he wanted (and deserves), so he should be happy. He gets “clean government” at the expense of the “quote First Amendment,” while Obama spends the next 6 months taking him to the cleaners.

NYC Shoot-Out for Freedom

I just received the following email, regarding a demonstration tomorrow in Union Square against the insane anti-photography legislation working its way through Silly Council:

COME TO AN NYC SHOOT-OUT FOR FREEDOM
AT UNION SQUARE
FORWARD THIS EMAIL

THURS Aug 2nd 1130 AM till 2 PM
 BRING A CAMERA - TAKE PHOTOS -  FORWARD THIS EMAIL
Photographers, filmmakers, local residents, and tourists face
serious restrictions by the NYC Mayor’s Office proposed law.
 The City plans to enact legislation THIS Friday.  The NEW LAW will require
any group of two
or more people who want to use a CAMERA (still or moving) in any public
location
to have a permit and proof of a one million dollar liability insurance
policy.
 FORWARD THIS EMAIL
THE SOUL OF NYC HAS ALWAYS BEEN ILLUMINATED BY STREET PHOTOGRAPHY
DON’T STAND IDLY BY AND WATCH “THE DYING OF THE LIGHT”
SEND A MESSAGE TO THE MAYOR.
Come on. Bring a camera and your lunch to UNION SQUARE Thurs Aug 2nd 1130
till 2 PM
 Robert Frank William Klein  Diane Arbus Garry Winogrand Joel Meyerowitz
Thomas Struth Roy Colmer William Gedney David Beckerman Jeff Spirer Weegee
Andre Kertesz Alfred Stieglitz . . . FORWARD THIS EMAIL COME ON
Organized by :
the Ad Hoc Task Force Against Really Bad Ideas Rules and Regulations
in association with
freedom loving people like you and me
to volunteer or get info 212 367 7701  adhoc@thenowcorporation.com
just show up with a camera and start shooting. thanks.

PLEASE FORWARD THIS EMAIL

I love the “Ad Hoc Task Force Against Really Bad Ideas Rules and Regulations.” Of course, the name is somewhat redundant, as I’ve yet to come across the Really Good Rules and Regulations, at least in the public sector.

For the Fu**ing love of the 1st Amendment *

“If Bush Can Blurt Curse, So Can Network TV.” What a line, from the New York Times today. Countering the wishes of the Bush administration and the FCC, the U.S. Court of Appeals in New York struck down yesterday a government policy that allows the fining of networks and stations for obscene language, whether spontaneous or scripted.

If Bush can utter the “s” word to Blair (whether he realized his mic was on or not), and Cheney the “f” word to Leahy, I suppose us serfs can too.

*I could use the entire “f” word, but it is my choice not to. Thanks, Freedom of Speech!

Keep Ron Paul in the GOP Debates

The truth hurts - and Ron Paul tells the truth.  In the last GOP Presidential debate Ron Paul simply stated what every CIA agent and anyone who has read beyond the tip of their nose already knew - that US interventionist foreign policy - not our wealth and freedom - is a major cause of anti-American sentiment and terrorism.

So of course, the welfare-war machine has to try to silence him.  People who should know better, like Saul Anuzis, chairman of the Michigan Republican Party immediately demanded Ron Paul be banned from further debates.  Apparently listening to both sides of the story is too much for poor old Saul to process.  But some of us actually like to hear both sides.

So now we have to make sure Ron Paul is included. 

According to Richard A.Viguerie of ConservativesBetrayed.com  you can sign the petition to Keep Ron In at www.KeepRonIn.com. 

You can also send a message to the debate sponsors:  Wolf Blitzer of CNN, Joe McQuaid, Manchester Union Leader at writeus@unionleader.com and Jeff Bartlett, General Manager of WMUR-TV, Manchester, NH at comments@wmur.com.  

Make sure they all know we want Ron Paul in the debates.

Here is a great video of Ron Paul and Bill Maher.

Banned in China

 

According to the Great Firewall of China, the Serf City blog is among the many websites that are blocked in China. I don’t know what we said that could have possibly offended them. The Manhattan Libertarian Party website is also blocked. They even blocked my publishing company East River Press. You can test any URL at the Great Firewall website to see if you’ve been banned too. (The only URL I tested that wasn’t blocked, oddly enough, was the official New York City website. I guess commie regimes gotta stick together.)

The only trouble with Chinese censorship is that in a half hour I’ll want to be censored again.

Hat tip: Capitol Confidential

Giuliani v Ron Paul: Rudy and the media still clueless on 9/11

On Tuesday night Rudy Giuliani proved he is more willing to pander to fear, ignorance and nationalism than he is to seriously discuss the causes of terror and anti-Americanism.  He played dumb about the voluminous evidence of the direct causes of 9/11 (the reasons given by Osama Bin Laden) and the indirect underlying causes of the terror problem in general.  As a front runner and a moderate, he squandered an opportunity to display real leadership and debate Ron Paul about how to get us out of the crises his party has so badly bungled, much like he squandered opportunities to prepare New York City for foreseeable crises prior to 9/11. 

Instead Giuliani puffed up his chest pretended America can do no wrong and never has.   He had to say it – as if we didn’t know - that he was someone who lived through 9/11. God I hate that.   My office is at 55 Broad Street.  Not everyone who lived through 9/11 has to wear it like a badge. 

It goes without saying that initiation of violence is always wrong whether it’s flying planes into the World Trade Center ,  pre-emptive attacks like Iraq or the overthrow of peaceful Democratic governments such as that of Iran in the early 1950’s .   But it’s a whole lot easier for us to fix our own behavior than it is to forcibly subdue entire civilizations.

It’s hard for anyone to face up to serious mistakes, specially a powerful nation with whole political parties and whole industries whose fate depends on keeping the con running.  The alcoholic may think another drink will relieve the hangover but it won’t help him quit drinking. 

I know it’s tough for politicians to try to deal in fact, but can’t we get even a little real leadership from the leading candidates for the most powerful job in the world.  Only long-shot Ron Paul faces any facts at all.  The Nation’s John Nichols does a great job of framing the issue when he writes “Rudy Giuliani made clear in Tuesday night’s Republican presidential debate that he is not ready to let the facts get in the way of his approach to foreign policy”.

But Rudy is not the only one refusing intelligent debate on a country’s biggest crisis.

Daily News columnist Michael Goodwin reveled in showing his complete lack of seriousness or knowledge of the subject calling  a 10 term Congressman and two time presidential candidate Ron Paul an “old-timey Texas crank “

Michigan GOP leader Saul Anuzis wants Ron Paul banned from future GOP debates.  What’s he so afraid of?  Could it have anything to do with the tremendous positive reaction among conservatives to Paul’s performance in the first debate?  Paul hit the GOP where it hurts, in their conservative base. 

Shawn Hannity makes a complete fool of himself and shows his lack of professionalism (surprise,  surprise)  continually interrupting Ron Paul as Paul intelligently and calmly tries to answer his questions in this amazing video clip  (about 2:45 into the video).   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xEZO7MPxJIs

One thing is certain Ron Paul must have it right or so many people with much to gain from the war wouldn’t be so angry with him.

Revenge of the Diggers

Digg.com has been a boon to the alternative media, including our own Serf City blog, driving traffic to news and opinion items on a meritocracy basis. So it irks me that the suits at Digg are starting to mess around with their successful model by censoring some stories–particularly articles about how to hack high-definition DVDs. Fortunately, Digg users decided to hit back yesterday and resubmitted the censored articles by the thousands, crashing the Digg servers. The virtual bitch slap seems to have gotten the suits’ attention, and they now vow not to allow any censorship going forward.

Hat tip: Rational Review News Digest