John Edwards to Hillary Clinton: We Shouldn't Be Taking Lobbyists' Money

Today JRE was in NH to formally accept his endorsement from the Carpenters' Union. In addition to thanking the Carpenters and his usual spiel of being for the working man and woman, he took the speech a step further in how he intends to be the one to change our government.

The former North Carolina senator accepted a major union endorsement while insisting that no Democratic candidate legitimately can promise to change America without swearing off special interest money from federal lobbyists. New York Sen. Clinton has refused to do so.

"When it comes to the existing lobbyist game, we've got to end it and not defend it," Edwards told more than 700 members of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters union.

Apparently, Senator Clinton felt differently and said this last weekend:

...Clinton stood by her husband and said, "I've learned you bring change by working in the system established by the Constitution. You can't pretend the system doesn't exist."

Edwards fired back with this response:

"Senator Clinton is right. You can't pretend the system doesn't exist. But you can't also pretend that it works."

Read the rest here from WBZ News and watch the video clip of JRE speaking passionately about this and more with the crowd. Apparently, he was given a few standing O's and lots of praise through loud applause.

For other news and live streaming of JRE from a house party tonight, go to JRE's NH place at 6:30 ET tonight.

More buzz l8tr..

Lots to write tomorrow

Otherwise, visit places which gives some good analysis..

Taylor Marsh

Talking Points Memo

International Tribune Herald

I do know that I liked what I saw from an interview with JRE on Talking Points Memo:


Good points by JRE.

Benny's World on McLaughin Group: Update

As I reported earlier this week, the McLaughlin Group had a special show on the rise of political blogs and how they are impacting traditional media. The lead off clip was of Markos at the Yearly Kos. There were several clips of the conference, but footage of one blogger's blog actually was shown twice: Benny's World . The first clip is about 1:38 into the show and the second one is at 2:22.

Here's the link to the video as I was not actually interviewed. However, the point was made that corporate media has competition. Daily Kos, Oliver Willis, and Taylor Marsh's blogs are better examples, but it was gratifying to see a less trafficked blog by a progressive get some air time on a prominent political analysis show.

People-powered democracy for a change. If I can find someone to load it on YT, I'll post that as well.

John Edwards Is Transport Workers' Choice

Transport Workers Union Endorses Edwards; fourth endorsement for JRE.

WASHINGTON (AP) - The New York City-based Transport Workers Union of America endorsed John Edwards on Thursday, saying the former North Carolina senator was the most electable of the Democratic presidential candidates.

Edwards is to be in New York City to accept the endorsement.

In a statement, he said the Transport Workers "keep the city moving and help keep New Yorkers safe."

"As president I'll fight for them every day, so we can honor their hard work and make our infrastructure safe and secure," Edwards said.

Union president James C. Little said they chose Edwards because he has the best chance to beat the Republican candidate in November 2008.

"We think he can win," Little said.

Read the rest here.




Well, alright!

Pavarotti: A Giant Tenor

Pavorotti has gone on to meet his maker this morning. He was 71 and died from Pancreatic Cancer. We will miss his beautiful voice. Figaro...

An New Idea for Republicans

I missed the GOP Debate last night. Well, I did so on purpose because I figure if it were on Fixed Noise, it was not going to be a debate at all. However, David Sirota at Working Assets caught something that was noteworthy. It was a response to the "abortion" issue and it appears that one of the Rethugs actually had a thoughtful answer. It may explain why Iowans and folks like my DH would like the candidate. Like David, I don't agree with the position because the candidate still wants an constitutional amendment against abortion rights, but the answer is more more pro-life than I've seen in other candidates. I wonder it is sincere.

Blue Dog Dem Bashing Season

I have had some mixed feelings about challenging the Bush Dog Dems campaign on Open Left and to a certain extent on other progressive blogs. I couldn't quite put my finger on it until I read this post by Oliver Willis:

That, at the heart, is what I think my reaction to the "Bush Dog" effort comes down to. This is a strategy by folks like Matt Stoller to attack Democrats with more conservative than desired voting records, and I guess challenge them in primaries. Ok, fine I guess. But to someone like myself who figures even a conservative Dem is better than a Republican, it seems kind of futile. A lot of the Democrats listed are the only kind of Democrats likely to be elected in their districts. Nick Lampson represents TX-22, which was Tom DeLay's seat. Does anyone really think such a conservative district is going to be represented by a moderate to progressive Democrat any time soon? Not going to happen.

I certainly think these Dems should be challenged on issues like ending the Iraq war and some of their positions on social issues like abortion (they tend to be economically populist, however) but Democrats like these in those conservative districts are the best we're likely to get.

I agree with him. And many of those same Blue Dogs support John Edwards because of economic fairness. However, I do think they need to push Bush more. The angry mood over the war is getting more ugly, and it's time they started doing what the American people want and not be afraid of the Republicans or wingnut noise machines. As John Edwards said again yesterday, they can start by sending back the bill to Bush on funding the war in Iraq to include a timeline. The timeline doesn't have to be revealed to the journalists, but Bush needs to agree to have one in order to get the funding.

Pics to Make You Smile on Wednesday

Elmo, the Alpha Cat

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<------ Benson, the friendly cat







Nothing special. Plenty going on, but wanted to start out with a positive attitude today!

United Mine Workers Pick John Edwards

I just learned the UMW endorsed John Edwards, in addition to the Steelworkers at a ceremony in Pittsburgh this morning. I haven't seen the total attendance figures, but it was estimated a 1000 were going to be there. Elizabeth Edwards and David Bonior also went with JRE to the event.

Here's an interesting tidbit I didn't know about the USW selection until I read Savage's diary (he's the President of the Local 10-1 in Philadelphia) at the Kos today:

Presidential Survey Results

Thank you to everyone who took the time to respond to the presidential survey. Thousands of you registered your top picks.

The results are as follows (for all candidates, not just Dems):

Top Choice

John Edwards 37.1% Bill Richardson 1.2%

Hillary Clinton 25.3% Ron Paul 1.0%

Barack Obama 12.6% Mike Huckabee 0.5%

Dennis Kucinich 5.8% Chris Dodd 0.3%

Joe Biden 5.3% Mike Gravel 0.2%

Fred Thompson 4.0% Tom Tancredo 0.2%

Rudy Giuliani 2.8% Sam Brownback 0.2%

John McCain 2.2% Duncan Hunter 0.0%

Mitt Romney 1.3%

Seems fitting for Labor Day. Meantime, my thoughts are with the families of the mine workers in Utah. The company gave up the rescue operations yesterday.

Update: check out NCDemAmy's diary at JRE's blog, and there is a video from Good Morning America from earlier today.

Yes, You Did

Today I was out with my spouse riding our tandem bike. It was very warm, but the skies were crystal clear, so we decided to go out on the Lincoln Grass Prairie Trail. Round-trip, it is about 25 miles. It seemed more though because most of it was made of crushed limestone, thus it was arduous at times to get through it.

Before our foray, I had set the DVR to record the McLaughlin Group, as I read that the Yearly Kos was one of the features of their special show on the rise of political reporting via blogging. Six and half hours later, I got an e-mail saying that my blog was on the show. Did you see me? Sure enough, I sat down to review the recording, and OMG, there I was, typing on this blog, about the Yearly Kos. Now unfortunately, I haven't a frickin' clue how to transfer the recording digitally and upload it on Youtube. Yeah, I should have taken a class on this at YK, :-). But I can assure you, it was a snapshot of me of showing the NBC Crew (who took the footage) of this post:

Junkie Political Heaven

Next shot is of the Drudge Report (yuck), but at least there isn't any overlay of writing on the shot of Benny's World, as there was of Drudge's. Of course, he does his for a living; I do not. He will rack up the cash and laugh all of the way to the bank on Tuesday. I get just sheer joy for a few seconds.

I had to go back in and clear away a few more things, so I didn't see the rest of the show for quite awhile. But both DH and I re-ran the recording to see it in its entirety. And within 2-3 minutes this shot was seen:

Quick Post from JRE Booth

Except the content box is empty. I was about to type my post.

I read the video may be up in a few days. If it is, you'll see it first thing here as it's probably not an interesting enough clip to be on other blogs.

Cheers to McLaughlin Group for showing the growing democracy of the blogosphere. I'm proud in both instances a non-A List blogger's blog got shown on McLaughlin's show, and that both it as well as I were promoting my candidate for President, John Edwards or JRE. One can see the display of JRE logos in the background in the first clip.

But as Elizabeth Edwards would say, "Thanks...Now Get Back to Work!" You're right, Mrs. Edwards. Long campaign yet ahead.