Odds and Sods - Texas and Ohio primary eve edition

By tomorrow, we should all know if Hillary can pull out a win after losing 11 straight primaries. As of tonight, it's still up in the air, and I have been compulsively flipping channels for all the campaign news. The polls are tight. Hillary claims she's "just getting warmed up"--according to Politico.com:

BEAUMONT, Texas — A pugnacious Hillary Clinton refused to handicap tomorrow’s critical primary elections, unbowed by suggestions that she abandon the presidential race if she doesn’t win in delegate-rich Ohio and Texas.

Asked for her measure of success in Tuesday’s four primaries, Clinton was both blunt and vague.

“Winning. Winning. That’s my measurement of success,” she said during a press conference in Toledo, Ohio, before flying to Texas.

Clinton declined to explain whether that means winning the popular vote in all — or even in just one — of the four states in contention: Texas, Ohio, Rhode Island and Vermont. Nor did she say whether it meant winning enough delegates to justify a continued bid.

Asked specifically what she would do in the event that she won narrowly in Ohio but remained behind in the delegate count, Clinton also wouldn’t say.

“I am not a political pundit. I will leave that to all of you,” she said. “I think I know what’s happening, and I believe we are going to do well tomorrow, and I believe that’s going to be a very significant message to the country. And then we move on to Pennsylvania and the states beyond. So, I’m just getting warmed up.”

Much has been written about how Hillary is pulling out the stops, going for broke, doing whatever it takes. This past weekend, she's hit Saturday Night Live, 60 Minutes, and everything in between. Politico's Roger Simon writes:

The stage has been set for a Hillary Clinton comeback on Tuesday.

Nobody knows if she has the votes to do it, but the opportunity is ripe.

She not only is vigorously attacking Barack Obama but simultaneously portraying herself as a victim.

It is a nifty political two-step.

She is a victim because a male-dominated press corps has counted her out, she says, and has lavished praise on Obama without submitting him to any real scrutiny.

At a Clinton rally in Westerville, Ohio, on Sunday, one woman carried a sign that read: “DON’T LET THE PRESS BOY-CRUSH PICK OUR PRESIDENT.”

Time’s Karen Tumulty noted: “Indeed, at Clinton’s first event of the day, there was almost an anger at the idea that the pundits and the press have anointed a winner before the people have voted.”

And Clinton told the crowd: “We’re coming back. … We need someone in the White House again who is a fighter!”

Stay tuned, fight fans!

~*~

Another plug for the Blogswarm Against the War, which will be March 19th. Hey fellow residents of Blogdonia, don't forget to blog against the war!

~*~

If you need some specifically spiritual reading for Lent, check out the wonderful Emerging Women community. Weekly links round-up with always-thought-provoking discussions of where Church ends and We begin! I just love these ladies!

Ren's got some great commentary and links at her place, for International Sex Workers Rights Day. Educate yourself and learn the issues! I just love this lady, too!

And hey, Texans and Buckeyes--don't forget to vote!

Racist state trooper videos lead to SC law enforcement shake-up

In local news:

Schweitzer, Rourk out after Sanford views trooper video

Saturday, March 1, 2008
By Tim Smith
CAPITAL BUREAU, Greenville News

COLUMBIA - The director of the state Department of Public Safety and the commander of the Highway Patrol resigned Friday after Gov. Mark Sanford watched a 2004 videotape in which a white trooper yells a racial slur and threatens to kill a black man he is chasing.

"You better run, n-----, because I'm fixing to kill you," the trooper says on the tape released this morning by the state Department of Public Safety after a Freedom of Information request by GreenvilleOnline.

The video is of a traffic stop in or near Greenwood County in December 2004. The man chased by the trooper was one of two black male passengers in the car. The man ran after the trooper asked him to put his hands on the car after the trooper conducted a search of the stopped vehicle.

The trooper, off camera but whose voice is recorded, is later heard bringing the man back to his patrol car and he yells at him to get down. There is the sound of a struggle.

"Why are you beating me?" the man repeatedly asks the trooper, who replies that he was "resisting arrest."

That video and another were of incidents cited recently by the Legislative Black Caucus in complaints about racism at the agency, which houses the Highway Patrol. The caucus has asked Senate leaders to delay confirmation of the agency's director, Jim Schweitzer, for a second term until there is some sign of change at the agency or he addresses their concerns. Schweitzer has said the troopers in both cases were punished but members of the caucus say the troopers received 12-hour suspensions which they feel are too lenient.

The agency also released a video of an October 2007 traffic stop in Clarendon County in which a white trooper handcuffed an African-American woman to the bumper of his car. The video shows that he handcuffed her after he stopped her and then handcuffed her to his bumper for several minutes.

The trooper had earlier stopped the car with another, unlicensed driver, for speeding who fled from the scene, according to the video. By the time the trooper chased the driver, the woman, who was unaware the man had been driving her car, found her car and drove off.

The trooper later had her car towed after explaining to the driver that he wanted to compensate the tow driver who had been called earlier to the scene. He gave her the choice of bringing $150 quickly to pay the tow operator or get her car out of storage later, but changed his mind later when he said she cursed at the tow operator.

Video of SC State trooper using racial slur

Video of SC State trooper handcuffing African-American woman to car

Video of Legislative Black caucus response

Is Barack Obama the antichrist?

A couple of weeks ago, one of the local preachers of my acquaintance approached me at work, asking me if I liked Senator Barack Obama. Apparently, I look the type. I answered in the affirmative.

He narrowed his eyes at me: "Isn't it strange how everyone looooooves him?"

I snorted, "Seems to me, everyone is trash-talking him all the time."

He looked disappointed; I obviously wasn't getting it.

"People are treating him like a MESSIAH!" he announced.

Uh-oh. I could see where this was going.

"You aren't implying..." I started.

And yes, he was more than simply implying. He started to tell me all about the Biblical prophecies, and how Barack Hussein Obama fit into those, starting with his birthplace, his father, his middle name, and on and on.

"What happened to George Soros?" I asked.

He ignored me, and continued enumerating the reasons why Barack is the antichrist.

Oh boy.

I've heard this a number of times now, on some tiny-wattage Christian radio stations in the area, as well as on Wonkette.

Who started these rumors, and when? Does anyone know who first propagated the idea?

Very interesting, considering that religious crackpot John Hagee is publicly speaking for the John McCain presidential campaign. Is the GOP tacitly approving the Barack-is-the-antichrist rumors?


Why is Senator Obama expected to "renounce and reject" Louis Farrakhan, while McCain can cozily hobnob with these anti-Catholic and racist Rapture lunatics?

As I told the preacher--I wouldn't worry just yet. It seems to me, Barack is getting it nonstop from the right and the left.

He didn't seem convinced.

They really believe this stuff, you know.

Dead Air Church: Backwater

Left: The Greenville County Recycling Center, Stone Avenue in Greenville, SC.


Here at Dead Air Church, we're in a mostly Buddhist mood this 4th week of Lent. Even though wonderful Belledame has just reached the astounding and enviable goal of 250,000 hits on her blog, I have to say, I had one of my lowest hit-counts this weekend, so I am fairly certain no one is reading. One can choose to abandon the blog at this juncture, or progress into even more obscure cultural corners of the Daisy-psyche.

Thus, Dead Air Church brings you the best in 90s Cowpunk nostalgia today, with the Meat Puppets' wonderful BACKWATER. This song is from Too High to Die (1994).

At this time in your humble narrator's life, I was working two jobs (about 50 hours a week); one at a small, community college, and another at a locally-owned video store that was uncomfortably close to the reality of the film CLERKS. In addition, I was madly scurrying to and fro in manic, 90s-soccer-mom mode, dropping young Delusional Precious off at choir rehearsals, sleepovers and clarinet recitals, trying to recycle and leaflet for candidates like a good doobie, attempting to be a good Catholic and never miss Mass, and wondering why I never had any time to myself. It was around this time that my thyroid simply fizzled out, looking backwards half-unconscious from the pain. I felt as if I was in a never-ending foot-race, always bringing up the rear, with no clean socks in the house for ANYBODY.

During this time, in which my life is a total blur, the song hung over my head; constantly serenading me through this addled, sleep-deprived period:

Hey, I'm blind
Good, fine
Roll the time
On whose dime?

And so, arguing with Delusional Precious in the car (no, you can't wear that to school) and trying to remember to let stubborn stains soak, dealing with the unpleasant fact of a dead pet bird (don't ask), driving, driving, driving, to work, to school, to recycle, home, and .... often forgetting where I was going mid-route... ah, those were the days, weren't they? Where did the time go?

The anal-retentive obsession with Recycling took on spiritual significance; something BETTER will come of my wasted days and wasted nights, I thought to myself. The song became a sort of nihilistic personal hymn to the lost hours, microwaved burritos and lack of sleep.

In short, there was some spiritual-sanity there, that these guys were communicating to me. I welcomed their wisdom, then as now. I didn't have time to stop and smell the proverbial roses, but sitting at traffic lights all over the upstate, I heard their words:

In the backwater swirling
There is something that will never change.

Absolutely true. Enjoy!

~*~

Meat Puppets - Backwater

[via FoxyTunes / Meat Puppets]

Radio Days

Woody Allen's charming and dazzling cinematic childhood remembrance, Radio Days (1987), will be shown tonight on Turner Classic Movies at 10pm, part of their 31 Days of Oscar film series.

I love this movie passionately and beyond words! Don't miss it, if you love nostalgia as much as I do.

And I'll leave you with what is usually called The Communist Scene: