In the past week, six lobbyists have resigned from the McCain campaign under questions about their ties to foreign regimes and corporate interests. Doug Goodyear and Doug Davenport - both high level aides - resigned over their ties to the Burmese junta. Eric Burgeson, McCain's energy and environmental advisor, left due to his ties with the White House and the energy industry - particularly the "clean" coal and nuclear industries.

These discolusures have caused the McCain campaign to begin to re-vet everyone on staff, a highly disruptive and embarrasing procedure. Today, that new policy claimed it's first victims - both Susan Nelson, a consultant, and Tom Loeffler, the national finance co-chair, have left the McCain campaign:

One top campaign official affected by the new policy is national finance co-chair Tom Loeffler, a former Texas congressman whose lobbying firm has collected nearly $15 million from Saudi Arabia since 2002 and millions more from other foreign and corporate interests, including a French aerospace firm seeking Pentagon contracts. Loeffler last month told a reporter "at no time have I discussed my clients with John McCain." But lobbying disclosure records reviewed by NEWSWEEK show that on May 17, 2006, Loeffler listed meeting McCain along with the Saudi ambassador to "discuss US-Kingdom of Saudi Arabia relations."

Of course, there are still plenty of lobbyists working for the McCain campaign. Of particular note is Charlie Black, McCain's Senior Political Advisor.

There's a big flap today about President Bush's remarks in the Israeli Knesset to the effect that Obama is an appeaser a la American isolationists pre-World War II.

The controversy hinges on the following quote from Bush:

"Some seem to believe we should negotiate with the terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along. We have heard this foolish delusion before. As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared: 'Lord, if only I could have talked to Hitler, all of this might have been avoided.' We have an obligation to call this what it is — the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history."

Now, which American senator was that, exactly?

Looking for the source of the quote, I stumbled across this 2006 piece by Charles Krauthammer denouncing Ned Lamont and other antiwar Democrats following Lamont's primary victory over Joe Lieberman that year. Krauthammer gives the same quote as Bush, but mentions a name: William Borah. Borah served as Senator from Idaho from 1907 until his death in 1940.

And oh yeah. Borah was a Republican at a time when Republican isolationists like Robert Taft urged against helping the Allies in World War II.

You see, we love to remember how America won World War II. But we tend to forget that it was a Democrat at the helm. We don't remember Alf Landon or Wendell Willkie as the men who helped save the world.

The whole myth of Democrats being soft on defense spits in the face of history. Both parties have shown poor judgment about which wars to fight, especially in the postwar era, but Democrats have shown better judgment. It was Democratic leadership that won World War II, and it will be Democratic leadership that gets us out of the partisan-generated fiasco in Iraq.

And if you think that "you" or "we" won World War II, Doug Stanhope has some words for you.

If you want to understand why Democrats often pursue a timid, fear-based strategy in their attempts to get elected, Glenn Hurowitz' Fear and Courage in the Democratic Party is an excellent starting point. From the formation of the Democratic Leadership Council to the early months of the 2008 Democratic Presidential primary season, Hurowitz gives a detailed look at the shortcomings of the typical Democratic strategy of playing a game stacked against them, the politics of fear.

In the preface, Hurowitz explains the frustrations he encountered while working for various state and national environmental organizations. It soon became clear that the main obstacle preventing Democrats from voting their conscience was fear.

When Democrats voted against us, it was rare to hear them say they disagreed with us on the merits. Instead, they’d tell us they were afraid: afraid that their constituents wouldn’t support a pro-environment position; afraid of defying President Bush and the Republican noise machine; or they’d even admit they were afraid of angering this or that corporate lobby and losing campaign contributions to the Republicans.

Hurowitz goes on to explain nearly all electoral problems faced by Democrats as symptoms of a deeper problem: a severe lack of courage.

Is music undergoing democratization, or anarchization? I've argued before that P2P sites are a populist movement in the music industry, to the dismay of the major music labels. But I was taken to task recently by a friend who compares the use of P2P against recording labels to the use of technological weapons by the Bush administration. I like the analogy of the music industry to a government, but is BitTorrent really comparable to a Smart Bomb? Are P2P sites really akin to the Bush/Cheney White House?

A reader and friend responded to a previous post of mine about the “democratization” of the recording industry. In particular he objected to technology advocates who support P2P sites' attack on music labels. You can read his full comments, and my original article. Here are some excerpts that I find representative:

"Technology provided new consumer outlets, but never provided Label services like some would inappropriately claim. I knew the technology sites would one day have to pay to become "retail stores," just as Napster was advocating at the time. But they were never trying to become "Record Labels." Labels are banks who give artists money to record, tour, buy equipment, advertise, publicize, sell, distribute, hire attorneys, accountants, assistants and more, all of which are still needed, even with Internet "retail stores" like iTunes…"

"The notion of "democratization" as used by technologists toward music seems as absurd as when used by the Bush regime, and I find them similar. We live in a world, for better or worse, driven by "capitalization" which technologists seem hellbent to overthrow when practiced by the music industry. Yet, if the technologists do not 'capitalize" their own companies and VC funding dries up, there is no "democratizing" technologists employed there any longer.

"I personally find P2P users bombing the legal music industry to be no different than Bush bombing with technology in illegal wars and using illegal wiretaps that overthrow even more rights guaranteed by the American Constitution. Those same "democratizing" technologists provide the wiretaps, provide the smart bombs, and agree with right-wing politics most of the time, as suggested in an article about Facebook published by The Guardian in which the author refers to those technologists as "neo-conservative libertarians." Maybe you are one too? The last 8-years of all this bombing by Bush and his technology friends may have done more to overthrow Democratic Rights than to provide the "democratization" of anything."

–David Bean, Digital Music Professional

As anyone who ever befriended a struggling artist, I’m sympathetic to the plight of musicians. I’m sympathetic with those trying to get recording contracts; and I’m sympathetic to those who have recording contracts and find their careers going nowhere.

But I have less sympathy for major record labels. First, I believe generally they are in the business of generating “stars” rather than promoting artists. To this end, they spend a huge amount of capital on “artist development” and then maximize their investments by focusing on highly-profitable performers while allowing the bulk of their portfolio to go unsupported. The result is homogenization and a dead-end career for many very talented artists.

But mostly, I believe major labels have become so entrenched in their money-making system that they are unable to accept and take advantage of the changing technology landscape to benefit their clients. Make no mistake, even if albums disappeared and the price of a song fell to 25¢, there are still profitable business models for artists and labels – but rather than adopt to these models, major labels find it easier to abuse their customers and their clients in order to squeeze out every penny. In this, major labels are serving shareholders rather than artists or consumers.

The Seminal, while primarily an online operation, loves to throw events in the DC area. We've got two going on tomorrow for those who care to join!

First, we are hosting a book salon with Firedoglake and DC Drinking Liberally. Come meet Pulitzer Prize winning author Eric Lichtblau and discuss his new book, Bush's Law: The Remaking of American Justice.

The salon is going down at Timberlakes at 1726 Connecticut Ave NW (Dupont Circle Metro). Happy hour starts at 6:30, with a talk and book signing to follow from 7:30 - 9. More information here.

The second event is being put on by Blue Catapult, author Ian Fried's PAC. Here's the blurb:

Join us and the Woman's National Democratic Club to meet and greet Democratic challenger Frank Kratovil on Tuesday, May 13, at the WNDC HQ (1526 New Hampshire Ave, NW), on the corner of Q and New Hampshire, 2 blocks East of the DuPont North Metro Exit.

Tickets are only $35, food and open bar are included, and all the money raised goes to supporting this great challenger!

The event starts at 6:30. More information here.

All are welcome at either event! Invite your friends!

My suggestion, do both! Hit up the Blue Catapult fundraiser at 6:30, then walk a few short blocks over to the book salon and catch the end of the question and answer period. 

We'll see you tomorrow night.

Isn't the general election fun?

Let's see, so far, we've got the House Republican whip Roy Blunt saying John McCain will be a 3rd Bush term. (Thanks Roy! Couldn't have said it better myself!)

Then we've got Wonkette joking about the McCain campaign dumping lobbyists left and right for their connections with the ruling junta in Burma.

And finally, BarbinMD has a great expose poring over a myriad of suspicious deals McCain has helped set up in return for campaign contributions:

The moral of this story seems to be, if you are interested in real estate, John McCain is the man to know.  Or, for that matter, if you need an advocate for beer distributorships, telephone carriers, railroads or mining companies.  If you are a patron, then you've got a friend in John McCain.  Even as he insists that:

I have carefully avoided situations that might even tangentially be construed as a less than proper use of my office.

Not carefully enough.

Looks like the honorable Senator from Arizona isn't quite as squeaky clean as he might like to say he is.

So, folks, what have you been reading today? Dig up any good McCain dirt?

A friend recently sent me this and it made me laugh. Props to anyone who can figure out what it's about before the end…

I know I'm not the first, and I won't be the last, but I'm declaring the Democratic nomination fight over. Barack Obama won.

We all know the argument:

• Obama leads in pledged delegates (1,593 to 1,425)
• Obama leads in superdelegates for the first time (266 to 264)
• Obama leads the popular vote (15,930,241 to 15,219,684)

There are other, less empirical arguments too. As the Carl Hulse and David Herszenhorn point out in the New York Times, party leadership is starting to treat Obama like the nominee as well:

Behind the scenes, there were new discussions between Mr. Obama and the party leadership. Senior Democratic officials said he met with Speaker Nancy Pelosi when their paths crossed at Democratic Party headquarters. They had spoken by telephone earlier in the week. Ms. Pelosi and Mrs. Clinton have had no known recent talks.

Addressing concern among some Democrats that Mrs. Clinton would fight on to the national convention in late August, Terry McAuliffe, chairman of the Clinton campaign, suggested that the race would end quickly after the final primaries early next month, sparing the party a potentially debilitating summerlong battle.

As far as I'm concerned, this is now over. From here on out, I will treat Obama as the nominee and hold him up as a leader, a unifier, and a patriot over the unstable, untrustworthy, same-as-Bush Republican nominee John McCain.

Trust me, I'm looking forward to it.

(P.S. Don't believe John McCain is the same as Bush? Take this quiz, see how well you do.)

Though the equation above draws scorn from most journalists, and a large segment of the U.S. population sneers at the title of "blogger," the profession (occupation? (hobby?) (pass time?)) occasionally gets some credit. Most often this share of praise falls upon foreign shoulders, where blogging is a much riskier endeavor. Por ejemplo,Yoani Sanchez, a Cuban blogger, was given a prestigious Spanish press award.

Indeed, both the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal have run prominently placed articles on Sanchez, who writes a blog Generacion Y, based in Havana.

As I said, this sort of recognition eludes bloggers in the US, largely because our media here is "free." "What need is there for bloggers when we have a robust media acting as the government and corporate watchdog?" many reason. "They only rant and post stupid pictures of cats."

Well, it's hard to rebut some of that, but given that our mainstream media is so clearly beholden to corporations, and its level of reporting is so often abysmal, the US blogosphere should be getting a lot more credit.

So, for all you Tom Paine's out there, this morning thread is for you.

Really crying on the outside, too.

One line in this AP report caused me to half laugh/half gasp:

A Kuwaiti who had been imprisoned in Guantanamo for more than 3 1/2 years carried out a recent suicide attack in Iraq, the U.S. military said Wednesday.

Abdullah Saleh al-Ajmi took part in one of three suicide bomb attacks last month in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, said U.S. Navy Cmdr. Scott Rye, a military spokesman.

. . . .

Al-Ajmi, 29, was transferred in 2005 to Kuwait, where the government was supposed to ensure he would not pose a threat. In May 2006, a Kuwaiti court acquitted him and four other former Guantanamo prisoners of terrorism charges.

. . . .

"It is unknown what motivated him to leave Kuwait and go to Iraq," Rye said. "His family members reportedly were shocked to hear he had conducted a suicide bombing."

“Unknown what motivated him”—really? What could have possibly happened in the last half-dozen years that would turn a man against US interests in the Middle East? Oh, wait, here’s something:

Military documents previously released to AP show that al-Ajmi was "constantly in trouble" while in Guantanamo and held in disciplinary blocks during his detention. He also allegedly told officials in August 2004 that "he now is a jihadist, an enemy combatant, and that he will kill as many Americans as he possibly can."

Tom Wilner, a lawyer who represented Kuwaiti prisoners at Guantanamo, said al-Ajmi had a broken arm during one of their meetings at the base in Cuba and that he alleged he had been injured by guards who interrupted him while he prayed.

Wilner called the alleged suicide attack a "tragedy" that could have been avoided with court hearings for prisoners held at Guantanamo, where the U.S. now holds about 270 men.

"The lack of a process results in tragic mistakes on both sides," the lawyer said.

I’m not sure how Wilner is defining “sides”. . . or “mistake,” for that matter. This just seems like one big, well-rounded tragedy.