By David Swanson

Next weekend in Andover, Mass., a group of attorneys, academics, and activists will gather to plan the prosecution of Dick Cheney, George Bush, and the lawyers and advisors who, together with them, are responsible for war crimes. The conference is open to the public and expected to be well attended: http://war-crimes.info

Remember how rightwingers and their media whores spent days snickering about the "elitist" Greek columns at Mile High Stadium for Obama's big speech? (Those columns were even featured as laugh lines in GOP hate speeches.) 

So McCain's speechwriters chose a different backdrop for his big speech: Walter Reed.

Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington DC, you say?  Nope. Walter Reed Middle School in North Hollywood, California. WTF???

John McCain's entire campaign is based on his biography as a POW who survived torture, returned home, and overcame his injuries. That's been the mission of Walter Reed Army Medical Center since May 1, 1909. A photo is below. What does it tell you when John McCain's campaign doesn't know the difference?

1. They hate our injured soldiers who are recovering at WRAMC.
2. They are too stupid to run America because they don't even know how to Google.

Of course it's possible they did know the difference, but deliberately decided against using WRAMC when they discovered it had ... Greek columns!!

Vanity Fair (h/t Nicole Belle):

Cindy McCain(’s first night of Republican National Convention outfit)

Oscar de la Renta dress: $3,000
Chanel J12 White Ceramic Watch: $4,500
Three-carat diamond earrings: $280,000
Four-strand pearl necklace: $11,000-$25,000
Shoes, designer unknown: $600
Total: Between $299,100 and $313,100

By Dave Lindorff

The introduction to John McCain at the Republican National
Convention last night was all about family values. There was the paean
to his mother and father, the touching story of his and Cindy’s
adoption of a baby girl from India, and then there was Cindy herself,
who was the focus of much of a gauzy introductory film on McCain, and
who also did the introductory speech, and who brought all the kids up
on stage with her at the end.

By Dave Lindorff

Now that we’ve had a chance to see Sarah Palin and to hear her speak—or at least read the big rolling white block letters on the teleprompter in front of her—we can see that she’s prone to telling whoppers.

Now we know politicians as a group have a propensity to embellish the truth—particularly when describing their opponents or themselves—and even to lie outright, but Palin does it so well, she’s like a George Bush with reading and pronunciation skills.

In her acceptance speech last night, Palin told a whole string of lies. My favorite was talking about little Trig, her latest offspring, who was born with Down syndrome. Looking right out into the camera, she told the parents of America with special needs children that if she and John McCain win in November, “You’ll have an advocate in Washington.”

Why is Sarah Palin popular in Alaska? Easy: as Governor, she gets to play Santa Claus with Alaska's gushing oil revenues.

Over the opposition of oil companies, Republican Gov. Sarah Palin and Alaska's Legislature last year approved a major increase in taxes on the oil industry — a step that has generated stunning new wealth for the state as oil prices soared...

Alaska collected an estimated $6 billion from the new tax during the fiscal year that ended June 30, according to the Alaska Oil and Gas Association. That helped push the state's total oil revenue — from new and existing taxes, as well as royalties — to more than $10 billion, double the amount received last year...

Sarah Palin introduced herself to America and the world last night with the nastiest primetime convention speech since Zell Miller.

"They say the difference between a hockey mom and a pit bull: lipstick."

If Sarah Palin wants to call herself a pitbull with lipstick, so be it. 

John McCain's campaign manager Rick Davis declared "This election is not about issues." Nope - for McCain-Palin and their Republican Party, it's exclusively about arrogant, sneering, vicious contempt.

Why? Because after 8 years of destroying America and the planet, contempt is all they've got. the last thing they want to talk about is issues, as Glenzilla explains:

The Republicans are well aware that they can't possibly win the election if it is even partially decided based on issues. They need and intend to win despite the fact that Americans hate their positions on the issues, and to do that, they want to ensure that a majority of Americans love and respect the strong, honorable, principled, culturally familiar all-American mavericks John McCain and Sarah Palin (even if they don't agree with them on everything) while strongly disliking that wishy-washy, snooty, foreign, exotic, self-absorbed Eastern elitist Barack Obama (even if he says the right things on issues).

Obviously the Republican campaign is not about reaching swing voters in the middle, which is where elections are won. Instead they're offering voters the simplest possible choice: you're either with them or you're against them. Too bad the overwhelming majority of Americans are against them.

Since that's the Republican campaign plan, all I can say is three words: Bring. It. On.

Team McCain utterly failed to "vet" Sarah Palin, so the blogosphere did the job instead. And we obviously drew blood because Team McCain cannot rebut any of the facts, so they are crying "sexism" instead. 

Give me a break.

It was John McCain - not progressive bloggers - who laughed and said "that's an excellent question" when asked "how do we beat the bitch," referring to Hillary Clinton. It was John McCain - not progressive bloggers - who called Cindy McCain a c**t. It was John McCain - not progressive bloggers - who famously joked "Why is Chelsea Clinton so ugly? Because her father is Janet Reno."

Before John McCain or anyone around him accuses anyone else of sexism, McCain needs to apologize publicly and sincerely to Hillary Clinton, Cindy McCain, Chelsea Clinton, and Janet Reno.

No one in the Corporate Media knows Sarah Palin, so their "vetting" has been limited to a handful of issues like her introductory lie about opposing the "bridge to nowhere." Here is a thorough report from a Wasilla neighbor who has watched Palin's rise to power. I bolded information that was new to me.

ABOUT SARAH PALIN 
by Anne Kilkenny
August 31, 2008

I am a resident of Wasilla, Alaska. I have known Sarah since 1992. Everyone here knows Sarah, so it is nothing special to say we are on a first-name basis. Our children have attended the same schools. Her father was my child's favorite substitute teacher. I also am on a first name basis with her parents and mother-in-law. I attended more City Council meetings during her administration than about 99% of the residents of the city.

At a town-hall meeting in West Palm Beach, Florida, Joe Biden promised investigations - and possible prosecutions - of Bush's crimes.

Looking to the future but with one eye on the past, Biden also promised that an Obama-Biden government would go through Bush administration data with "a fine-toothed comb" and pursue criminal charges if necessary. 

"If there has been a basis upon which you can pursue someone for a criminal violation," he said, "they will be pursued, not out of vengeance, not out of retribution - out of the need to preserve the notion that no one, no one, no attorney general, no president, no one is above the law."

How long will it take for the Republican Party and the Corporate Media to unleash a vicious counterattack on Biden and Obama?

After all the Republican attacks on Michelle Obama for not loving America enough, this is beyond rich:

Todd Palin, currently registered as "undeclared," was indeed an official member of the Alaskan Independence Party from October 1995 through July 2002 (except for a few months in 2000).

The Alaskan Independence Party hates America so much it wants Alaska to secede.

And if you think Rev. Jeremiah Wright was angry at America, how's this?

Joe Lieberman only mentioned Barack Obama twice in his speech to the Republican convention and the world, and the second time he flat-out lied:

when Barack Obama was voting to cut off funding for our troops on the ground

The Senate never held a vote to abandon our troops in Iraq without funds, because that would get them killed. Instead Russ Feingold and Harry Reid proposed carefully-written amendments to set deadlines for Bush to remove troops safely, with a funding cutoff for combat troops only after those troops were removed to enforced the deadlines that George Bush (and John McCain) adamantly opposed.

Ben Smith reports,

An illustration of that gap came just two weeks ago, when Palin's church, the Wasilla Bible Church, gave its pulpit over to a figure viewed with deep hostility by many Jewish organizations: David Brickner, the founder of Jews for Jesus.

Palin's pastor, Larry Kroon, introduced Brickner on Aug. 17, according to a transcript of the sermon on the church's website.

"He's a leader of Jews for Jesus, a ministry that is out on the leading edge in a pressing, demanding area of witnessing and evangelism," Kroon said...

Brickner’s mission has drawn wide criticism from the organized Jewish community, and the Anti-Defamation League accused them in a report of “targeting Jews for conversion with subterfuge and deception.”