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Republicans for Kerry 
(more) republicans for kerry, wisconsin edition
Gary Comer, founder of the Land's End clothing company, took out a full-page ad in the Wisconsin State Journal today, addressed to "Undecided Voters of Wisconsin." Land's End is a beloved business in Wisconsin, a reliable employer of thousands in the politically conservative southwestern portion of the state. In the ad, he doesn't come out and say "vote for Kerry," but the message is clear:
I have been a Republican and voted Republican most of my life. But in my opinion, this administration has high-jacked the Republican Party I knew and is taking Wisconsin and the United States in dangerous directions. If Bush is re-elected, you and your children and grandchildren and mine will pay dearly in their freedoms and opportunities long after his term of office expires. I believe that four more years of President Bush and the people who surround him is not in our Nation's best interest.
You could very well be the deciding factor in the electoral outcome of this election. Think carefully, vote your heart and head. I think of the debt that we will leave ourselves and everyone who follows, and I question the judgment that caused the deaths of 1100 U.S. friends and neighbors in a war that we didn't need to start.
Emphasis his.
UPDATE: Apparently, Rudy Guilani had recently come to the Dodgeville, WI headquarters of Land's End to campaign for Bush, so I would imagine Comer's ad is in response to that action.
Bush October suprise, in November?
Iraq's Allawi Says 'Patience Thin' on Falluja by Alistair Lyon
Iraq's interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi said on Sunday a showdown was imminent in the western city of Falluja, where U.S. marines are poised for an onslaught on insurgents and Islamist militants.
He said the government was still offering an olive branch, but told a news conference: "Our patience is running thin."
The government says Saddam Hussein loyalists and militants loyal to al Qaeda ally Abu Musab al-Zarqawi are operating from Falluja and Ramadi, another rebel city west of Baghdad.
Seven people, including women and children, were killed and 11 wounded in clashes between U.S. forces and insurgents in Ramadi, according to hospital director Abdul-Muneim Othman.
Residents said U.S. artillery had shelled eastern districts and said there had been air strikes on Saturday and Sunday.
The military could not immediately be reached for comment.
The commander of a marine battalion near Falluja told reporters earlier his men were awaiting orders to attack.
"We will continue to probe the enemy's defense until such time as we decide to enter and clear the city," Lieutenant Colonel Willy Buhl said. "And we'll do that when Prime Minister Allawi and President (George W.) Bush tell us it's time to go."
The aim is to crush Iraqi guerrillas and foreign militants in Falluja and elsewhere before national elections in January.
It is not clear whether U.S. and Iraqi forces will launch the offensive before Tuesday's American presidential poll. [more]
It wasn't just Al Qaqaa
2 More Iraq Arms Stashes In Focus CBS News
Looters unleashed last year by the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq overran a sprawling desert complex where a bunker sealed by U.N. monitors held old chemical weapons, American arms inspectors report.
Charles Duelfer's arms teams say all U.N.-sealed structures at the Muthanna site were broken into. If the so-called Bunker 2 was breached and looted, it would be a new case of restricted weapons being at risk of having fallen into militants' hands.
Separately, Human Rights Watch said Saturday it alerted the U.S. military to a cache of hundreds of warheads containing high explosives in Iraq in May 2003, but that officials seemed disinterested and still hadn't secured the site 10 days later, even though it was being looted every day by armed men.
The disclosure, made by a senior leader of the New York-based group, raised new questions about the willingness or ability of U.S.-led forces to secure known stashes of dangerous weapons in Iraq.
Peter Bouckaert, who heads Human Rights Watch's international emergency team, told The Associated Press he was shown two rooms "stacked to the roof" with surface-to-surface warheads on May 9, 2003, in a warehouse on the grounds of the 2nd Military College in Baqouba, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad.
Bouckaert said he gave U.S. officials the exact location of the warheads, but that by the time he left the area on May 19, 2003, he had seen no U.S. forces at the site, which he said was being looted daily by armed men. [more]
Republicans and democracy-- like oil and water
GOP demands IDs of 37,000 in city: City attorney calls new list of bad addresses 'purely political' by Greg J. Borowski
Citing a new list of more than 37,000 questionable addresses, the state Republican Party demanded Saturday that Milwaukee city officials require identification from all of those voters Tuesday.
If the city doesn't, the party says it is prepared to have volunteers challenge each individual - including thousands who might be missing an apartment number on their registration - at the polls.
The move, which dramatically escalates the party's claims of bad addresses and potential fraud, was condemned by Democrats as a last-minute effort to suppress turnout in the city by creating long delays at the polls.
City officials, who already were trying to establish safeguards in response to the party's claim of 5,619 bad addresses, were surprised by the 37,180 number, nearly seven times larger.
"It's not a leap at all to say the potential for voter fraud is high in the city, and the integrity of the entire election, frankly, is at stake," said Rick Graber, state GOP chairman. "The city's records are in horrible shape."
Any inaccurate address, he said, is an opening for someone to cast a fraudulent vote. However, many of the new addresses now cited might be eligible voters who have voted for years without problems.
City Attorney Grant Langley labeled the GOP request "outrageous."
"We have already uncovered hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of addresses on their (original list) that do exist," said Langley, who holds a non-partisan office. "Why should I take their word for the fact this new list is good? I'm out of the politics on this, but this is purely political." [more]
Support the troops
Never Forget: Internet Vets for Truth
How very American
Resident says confusion cost her tickets to Republican rally by Matt Coughlin
A Lower Makefield woman said she received a rude awakening Wednesday when she tried to get tickets to see President Bush today in Lower Makefield.
Simi Nischal got a ride with a co-worker to pick up tickets for herself, her husband, Narinder, and their two children. But just as the tickets were about to be placed in her hands, she was escorted from the Yardley gristmill and told to leave, she said.
" 'I deny you the right to attend this rally,' " Nischal said a Bush-Cheney campaign worker told her.
Apparently, Nischal's ride was a Kerry-Edwards supporter. Her car sported a bumper sticker for the Democratic candidates.
Nischal, a computer programmer who is originally from India, said her children wanted to see the president. The family had talked over dinner Tuesday night about attending today's campaign rally at the Broadmeadows Farm in Lower Makefield.
About lunchtime Wednesday, Nischal's co-worker dropped her off at the gristmill to pick up free tickets. When the co-worker returned, rally organizers for Bush and Vice President Cheney apparently noticed the Kerry-Edwards sticker stuck on the car, Nischal said. The organizers asked the co-worker why she was there and she responded, "to pick up Simi." While this was going on, Nischal was in the ticket office finishing paperwork and showing her identification for her tickets.
"The lady came in and said, 'Who's Simi?' " Nischal tearfully recalled Wednesday night, adding that she identified herself and was then refused tickets to the rally and escorted from the building.
Shortly after that, a man wearing a Bush-Cheney T-shirt confronted Nischal in the parking lot and told her to leave.
"He was so rude, he made me feel like a criminal," Nischal said. "I said, 'That's not fair, you are losing a supporter.' [And he said], 'We don't care about your support.' "
Nischal said onlookers cheered and laughed at her as she left the property.
But that wasn't the end of the insult, she said.
She said another co-worker took her back to the gristmill to try to clear up the confusion, but she was again refused tickets.
Multiple calls to Bucks County Republican Party headquarters, several party members and the Broadmeadows Farm were not answered. However, rally organizer Hank Miller said he could not comment on the incident because he was not there and had not heard of it.
Nischal said her daughter has been learning about the political process at school and has been a Bush supporter. She even picked up papers for her daughter to volunteer for the Bush campaign right before she was kicked out of the gristmill, she said.
Nischal said she and her husband had not voted in previous elections, but the couple wanted to set a good example for their daughter by voting this year.
"I was undecided, but we have changed our opinion," Nischal said. "You don't treat people that way."
The first thing her son asked when he got home from school Wednesday afternoon was if they would get to see the president. Nischal said her son did not understand what happened. But she said her daughter said she wasn't going to support Bush anymore.
Bastards.
The bar is open
Whiskey Bar: Free Thinking in a Dirty Glass
17 Articles of Faith
17 Things you have to believe to vote Republican
- Saddam was a good guy when Reagan armed him, a bad guy when Bush's daddy made war on him, a good guy when Cheney did business with him and a bad guy when Bush needed a 'we can't find Bin Laden' diversion.
- Trade with Cuba is wrong because the country is communist, but trade with China and Vietnam is vital to a spirit of international harmony.
- The United States should get out of the United Nations, and our highest national priority is enforcing U.N. resolutions against Iraq.
- A woman can't be trusted with decisions about her own body, but multi-national corporations can make decisions affecting all mankind without regulation, especially so if they are paying women less than men.
- Jesus loves you, and shares your hatred of homosexuals and Hillary Clinton.
- The best way to improve military morale is to praise the troops in speeches while slashing veterans' benefits and combat pay.
- If condoms are kept out of schools, adolescents won't have sex.
- A good way to fight terrorism is to belittle our long-time allies, then demand their cooperation and money.
- Providing health care to all Iraqis is sound policy. Providing health care to all Americans is socialism.
- HMOs and insurance companies have the best interests of the public at heart.
- Global warming and tobacco's link to cancer are junk science, but creationism should be taught in schools.
- A president lying about an extramarital affair is a impeachable offense. A president lying to enlist support for a war in which thousands die is solid defense policy.
- Government should limit itself to the powers named in the Constitution, which include banning gay marriages and censoring the Internet.
- The public has a right to know about Hillary's cattle trades, but George Bush's driving record is none of our business.
- Being a drug addict is a moral failing and a crime, unless you're a conservative radio host. Then it's an illness, and you need our prayers for your recovery.
- You support states' rights, which means Attorney General John Ashcroft can tell states what local voter initiatives they have the right to adopt.
- What Bill Clinton did in the 1960s is of vital national interest, but what Bush did in the '80s is irrelevant.
November 2nd is coming up quick.Remember to Vote!
(list via a fellow Central Texan -- ill-sorted ephemera)
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