Have you heard the latest crazy idea from John McCain ?  He wants to open up the coastal waters of the United States of America to unrestricted oil drilling, even though big oil corporations already have some access to offshore drilling, and have failed to use almost 80 percent of their leases of public land for drilling so far. The truth is that there is an ecological crisis in the earth's oceans, including America's coastal waters. Fish populations are crashing to unseen low levels... Read Full Story

Republican insiders and anti-Obama power brokers like Thomas Buffenbarger have spent the last few months trying to make elitist the official word of the 2008 election. What makes someone an elitist, in their opinion? Drinking coffee with milk (a latte), some say. Driving a hybrid car to save money on regular unleaded gasoline that will soon be five dollars per gallon, others say. That doesn’t make sense to me. You want to see what real elitists look like? Consider the people who bought... Read Full Story

Roman Catholic Archbishop Joseph F. Naumann has begun a religiously-based coup d’etat in Kansas. He has issued an ultimatum to Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius, telling her that she must impose the Catholic Church’s religious beliefs on all citizens or Kansas, or suffer “additional pastoral actions” - excommunication from the Catholic Church. Naumann spoke to Sebelius, telling her to submit to his authority, and then threw down the gauntlet in his religious publication, accusing Sebelius... Read Full Story

Kansas can already be proud to have its native son, Barack Obama, running for President. What if another great Kansas Democrat were running on the Democratic presidential ticket as well? It’s time to consider Kathleen Sebelius for Vice President. Sebelius has a strong record of standing against right wing zealots in Kansas. Four years ago, people were asking What’s the matter with Kansas? Now, Kathleen Sebelius is showing people what’s right with Kansas. An Obama-Sebelius political team... Read Full Story

Last week, after John Edwards brought announced his unexpected endorsement of Barack Obama for President, the Obama-Edwards presidential ticket was the hot new idea in the 2008 campaign. Everybody was talking about what a great Vice Presidential candidate John Edwards would make. But, at the end of the week, John Edwards made another announcement: He does not want to be Barack Obama’s Vice President (although he didn’t rule out being Attorney General). Now, another Vice Presidential... Read Full Story

96.6% of all the Election 2008 bumper stickers, lawn signs, magnets, buttons, t-shirts etc. that we sold last week (May 11-17, 2008) were items declaring support for the presidential candidacy of Barack Obama. 2.8% of the items we sold last week declared support for Hillary Clinton. Share This Read Full Story

On the terms of some children, If The Dinosaurs Came Back, by Bernard Most, is a fine book with some interesting visualizations imagining what would happen if the Earth of tens of millions of years ago was combined with the Earth today. For my son, however, the book doesn’t quite ring true. Bernard Most seems to imagine dinosaurs mostly as really big tools just waiting for people to come along and use them. Most visualizes dinosaurs serving as bridges for people to drive over, ladders for... Read Full Story

Just for kicks, let’s set aside our reason for a moment and grant the Republicans their fashion talking point: that the central determinant of one’s patriotism is the jewelry one wears. Here’s a photo of Barack Obama making public remarks today: Is Barack Obama wearing an American flag lapel pin? Yes! Barack Obama is a patriot. Here’s a photo of John McCain making public remarks today: Is John McCain wearing an American flag lapel pin? NO! McCain is missing the jewelry needed to be a... Read Full Story

Butter-sauteed onions, provolone cheese, mozzarella cheese, bacon, and blue cheese. If you want to pretend it’s healthy for you, put it on whole wheat bread. Share This Read Full Story

I looked at a certain section of my library this afternoon and was struck by a difference between two sorts of progressive political books I saw on the shelf. Some had been very timely when they were published, but were not at all enduring in value, whereas others had not achieved much initial acclaim, but have been valuable to me for quite a long time. Al Franken’s book, Lying Liars and the Lies they Tell, is amongst the first group. It had a great public relations event to start it out... Read Full Story