It's called religion or faith, but McCain and Obama illustrated the differences in what people MEAN when they talk about religion or faith in the political arena.

McCain was playing on the field of "religion" as a set of policy stands. It's the faith that made Reagan a good chrisitan who never ever ever ever even pretended to go to church on Sunday. Of course, McCain overplayed his hand: God wants drilling and tax cuts.

Obama was playing on the field of "faith" being about personal values, shared among a community of faith, committment to higher purpose, and a source of strength and inspiration.

VOA reports the pro western, anciently christian land of Georgia is asking China for help:

Georgia has asked China to use its influence to push for a resolution to a territorial flare-up with Russia. Georgian troops have pulled out of the breakaway province of South Ossetia after being overwhelmed by Russian forces. Daniel Schearf reports from Beijing.

Georgia's ambassador to China, Zaza Begashvili, met with China's foreign minister to seek support in the dispute with Russia.

Afterwards, Ambassador Begashvili held a briefing for a small group of foreign and Chinese journalists.  

Begashvili would not say how the Chinese responded to the call for help. But, flanked by several embassy staff and supporters wearing red arm bands that read "Stop Russia!" he said he hoped China, as a great power, would make the right conclusion.

He says he is sure that China recognizes Georgia's borders, that it is as an independent state, and that it is a member of the United Nations. He says he is sure that China, as a member of the U.N. Security Council, will express its opposition to this aggression against an independent state.

I've been receiving more and more spam with titles referring to current events rather than sex, so it made me wonder when I received an email entitled "CNN.com Daily Top Ten" five times this morning.  Outlook express showed that the senders weren't cnn.com.  There's lots of video clips and links to click, too, all of which could lead to malicious programs.

Personally, I decided I didn't need CNN.com and created a rule to block any email with "CNN.com" in the title.

I like James Wolcott: he's not really a political commenter as much as a cultural or arts commenter, like Frank Rich.   When McCain's commercial ventured into the realm of sneering at celebrities, Wolcott has something to say.

Two of the five quick points at his Blog on the Vanity Fair Site, see the link in my Blogroll:

"I believe 9/11 could have been prevented if we'd had a Republican president at the time".  

--Mike Meehan, a Florida businessman who posted billboards in the Orlando area that said "Please don't vote for a Democrat" over the picture of the Twin Towers after the hijacked airliners hit them on Sept. 11, 2001

Chicago Tribune, July 21

Diary on billboard HERE:
http://www.dailykos.com/...

Snarkily the title of McCain's response as reported on Huffpost, over maps of Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq.  The person who chooses the pictures and graphics for HuffPost is a genius.

SEE
Seth Coulter Walls on the back and forth between Obama and McCain camps:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

It's rare that someone hopes their words will recall Nixon's, but I think McCain really hopes some will believe McCain has a "secret plan" for peace.

It looks like HRC was swinging for the fences on Team Obama this weekend, in front of a union crowd in Chicago.  

Reporting from The Swamp, Rick Pearson speaks of Clinton at the American Federation of Teachers Convention.  

http://www.swamppolitics.com/...

"I'm here to say thank you for the privilege of working with you in this presidential campaign. It was a remarkable journey, one that I would not have wanted to make without you, and I feel very privileged that you went with me as we crisscrossed America," the New York senator told more than 3,000 delegates attending the teachers' union convention at Navy Pier.

But more than just offering her appreciation, Clinton received a standing ovation as she played the role of campaign surrogate for the man who defeated her for the presidential nomination, presumptive nominee Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois.

Brooks says: Bush was right on surge and you've GOT to give him credit.

http://www.nytimes.com/...

Life is complicated. The reason we have democracy is that no one side is right all the time. The only people who are dangerous are those who can’t admit, even to themselves, that obvious fact.

Cleary, Brooks is trying to brush back the people who have been right all along on the war.   Those who have been against the war from teh beginning are now confirmed in their certainty, which Brooks would like to turn into a vice: "Hey, you'd better start realizing that nobody's right all the time, or you're dangerous....like Bush himself."  

Of course, nobody IS right all the time.   But Brooks bootstaps it into a specifc....that  Bush was right on the surge.  That's the specific issue that you must give bush credit on. Admit Bush was right about the surge, or you're dangerous.  

I don't get the angst and outrage and white hot purity over Obama's statement.  He says:

Under this compromise legislation, an important tool in the fight against terrorism will continue, but the President's illegal program of warrantless surveillance will be over

On the rec list is a diary implying that somehow, this position isn't constitutional....as if the constitution itself doesn't allow wiretapping.  I don't pretend to be a Larry Tribe but we all SHOULD KNOW that wiretapping is constitutional if there's a warrant.

I'm not talking about any one person, but making a general statement about poll results.

It is true that some polls showed HRC voters would refuse to vote for Obama in disturbingly large numbers.

And it is true that many HRC voters were disturbed by her loss.

But the polls don't reflect that plain fact that one of the ways HRC supporters were encouraged to support HRC, implicitly if not explicitly, was to say Obama couldn't get their vote.

Via Digby, Rick Perlstein, the author of the well received Nixonland writes about the republican ascendancy after the Fair Housing Act passed and republicans turned into the party for those who were fighting the rearguard action against civil rights.

The concentration on Chicago is personally painful, yet apt: the democrat loses to the republican, the working class is coopted by the rich, in what can only be called the Great Distraction.  As he sums up:

Here is the fundamental tragedy of the backlash: Voters like this empowered a party that decided they didn't need .....every decent and wise social provision that made it possible in the first place for mere factory workers to live in glorious Chicago bungalows, or suburban homes, in the first place.

It's not racism that caused the blowout, it's that HRC basically attached herself like a leech to Appalachia in order to win Pennsylvania.

For good reasons, people in the Appalachian areas have suspicions and resentments of outsiders, and HRC remade herself into a rural Appalachian white person fighting for them against 1) San Fransciscans 2) Economists 3) Democratic Activists 4) Those blacks playing the race card.  She appeared on O'Reilly.  She drank.  she pumped gas.  She fumbled with coffee machines at the quick-mart.  She went on about hunting.  

And no mention of gays, or mandates, or abortion, or the supreme court, or a rainbow coalition.  Shhhhhhh. It's not about what you are for.  It's about who you are against.  

She joined the culture war on the red side.

I was tempted to register with MyDD to answer this lovely that's been on the recommended list for three days:

why I resent Obama(Mosley Braun for example)
http://www.mydd.com/...

Some are claiming that HRC's discussion of her white support shows her to be racist or inflaming racism or relying on racism.  It's not that, but something else, something also pretty bad.

It's her premise that voters, even her supporters, are craven, stupid, even evil.

HRC and her fans didn't have much of an agenda besides making her president.  Despite claims to the contrary, it was her that ran the personality driven campaign, her toughness, her intelligence, her experience, her husband.

And one of the destructive aspects about HRC 08 is that is is based so little on issues.  It's about her as president, about being against Obama, and about wedge politics, and about victimization, and about her electability.  

Because HRC 08 defined that way, it's tough to suddenly join the group defined as victimizers and the side across from the wedge.  

Via Deacon's Bench, http://deacbench.blogspot.com/...

Moments ago, Edward Cardinal Egan issued a statement saying he deeply regrets former mayor Rudy Giuliani received communion during Pope Benedict XVI mass at Saint Patrick's.

This came out of the blue today. Yes, there was some controversy when this first happened, but for Cardinal Edward Egan to come out and say he "deeply regrets" it, that's a strong statement.

It all has to do with Giuliani's stance on abortion.

Well, turns out, Giuliani SHOULD have been refused communion, but not out of politics.

That fact from George Will on Sameoldstuffolous's show.  He was illustrating how those people need tax cuts, and his horror that Obama might allow tax cuts to expire. It's not just Charlie Gibson's concern: it's EVERYONE's.  EVERYONE makes a hundred grand a year.  It's just YOU that isn't.

Actually he said, "100k a year is a chicago teacher, is a chicago cop."  So maybe he's got two specific people in mind, who inherited a ton of cash.   But that's not the wage of a Chicago teacher.

Will also stated that capital gains are received by people making under 50,000 a year.  It's true. Retired people living off their investments.  Why should I working for my fifty grand, pay full boat up to 28% on my wages, why someone who doesn't work pays 15% on their income?  What is so BAD about WORKING for a living?  Because Gibson has investments?

And Will lies and says Obama accepted premise that cutting cap gains taxes increases revenue.  If Will wants to pretend his OWN stupidity, fine.  But leave the rest of us out of it.

Theda Skocpol gives her take on the meeting where HRC (allegedly) said "screw them" about working class southern voters, confirming the tone and gist of what Barber recalled of HRC:

Hillary Clinton was among the most cold-blooded analysts in attendance. She spoke of ordinary voters as if they were a species apart, and showed interest only in the political usefulness of their choices -- usefulness to the Clinton administration, that is.

I vividly remember at the time finding it impressive that Bill Clinton (NOT Hillary Clinton) showed real empathy for the ordinary people whose motives and supposedly misguided choices were under analysis. Ironically, just as Barber reported, Bill Clinton was the one who combined analysis and empathy, much as Obama himself did in his full San Francisco remarks.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...