Poolside Palin

Photos here.

If you don't think it's her, check out photo No. 5. That's definitely her profile. Also note the Diet Dr. Pepper on the table.

Howard Kurtz doesn't get it

Howard Kurtz plays a game of Trig Palin trutherism semantics and gets burnt.

Kurtz should be writing about the fact that Andrew Sullivan, a blogger for a mainstream media outlet, is so unhinged that he still thinks this is a legitimate story, and still pledges to chase it down. Sullivan is certifiably insane, and yet retains his post at a mainstream outlet.

Cuomo lands Ayers interview

If you were a terrorist tree, what kind of terrorist tree would you be?

First on TVNewser: William Ayers has stayed largely silent during the nearly two years of election coverage, even as his name was mentioned in many forms.

But the Chicago activist who has been tied to President-elect Barack Obama is breaking his silence tomorrow when he appears on ABC's Good Morning America. Chris Cuomo conducts the live interview.

We did not leak to Carl Cameron

Just to be clear, the two hoaxsters who were able to fool MSNBC into believing they were a McCain advisor named "Martin Eisenstadt" and leaked the Palin smears are saying they did not leak to Carl Cameron.

"To be very clear, no, we were not the source for Carl Cameron and never spoke to him," Mirvish tells TVNewser. "We took credit for his anonymous sourcing. If they were going to be cowards, then we figured we may as well step in."

This seems pretty obvious to me, but maybe some people are confused. Cameron travels with the McCain campaign and would not have gone with information from someone calling him up he's never met before. Plus there is enough half-truth in some of the stories that it would be impossible for "Eisenstadt" to know about the slips of the tongue Palin made during debate prep. As irresponsible as Cameron's reporting has been on this issue, I doubt he's that irresponsible.

Harding Institute and Marin Eisenstadt not real

Confirmed.

Trouble is, Martin Eisenstadt doesn’t exist. His blog does, but it’s a put-on. The think tank where he is a senior fellow — the Harding Institute for Freedom and Democracy — is just a Web site. The TV clips of him on YouTube are fakes.

And the claim of credit for the Africa anecdote is just the latest ruse by Eisenstadt, who turns out to be a very elaborate hoax that has been going on for months.

In the comments at Hot Air, Debbie Schlussel claims to know the hoaxer, who has a very political background.

In real life, Eitan Gorlin is a former Orthodox Jew, whom I once knew and who worked for then-Congressman Jack Kemp as an intern. He became a left-winger and made a horridly boring and despicable anti-Israel movie that went up in smoke.

On the hoax, the guy who outed him noted that Eitan took part of my own bio for his “Martin Eisenstadt” character. I kept getting these e-mails from people touting Eisenstadt and the e-mails were always slightly weird and a little off-kilter, so I never fell for the tips, repeated them on my site, or included them on my blogroll, which they kept asking me to do. They told me that Jeffrey Hart was supporting Obama, which was the first hint they were fakes.

I thought the guy looked like and sounded like Eitan when, last night, I saw the videos they made, including one where “Eisenstadt” (Gorlin) claimed he saw Michelle Malkin having an affair with John McCain behind close doors. As if. . . . Puh-leeze. Democratic Underground bought into that, though.

Michelle did cite Eisenstadt’s comments on Paris Hilton, though.

The strangest thing, though, is that we never heard from the McCain campaign throughout the entire year of this non-person creation claiming he is a McCain advisor. Never a mention that, “Hey, we don’t have an advisor by that name.”

UPDATE

"Martin Eisenstadt" also was interviewed by a less-than-convinced host on Breitbart TV.

Couric consulted Obama advisor before Palin interview

Is this a scandal?

HT/Weasel Zippers

UPDATE: Conde Nast has pulled the article down, but I copied the original below.

Katie's Little Helpers: How Couric Prepped for Palin
At Quadrangle's Foursquare conference today, Portfolio's own Matt Cooper interviewed Katie Couric, Brian Williams and George Stephanopoulos about covering the presidential campaign that was. Matt says he's sworn to secrecy, and you know I wasn't invited, but one person who was there says it was a lively discussion, with Williams teasing Couric about all the attention she got for her campaign-narrative-altering interviews of Sarah Palin.

Couric shed some light on her preparation for the interviews: Beforehand, she sought advice from former senator Sam Nunn and Council on Foreign Relations president Richard Haas. They told her to draw Palin out on her geopolitical worldview and urged her to let the governor speak at length without interrupting her. Maybe she should bring them along with her when she takes over at Meet the Press?

Who is Sam Nunn?

He's a Democrat who joined Obama's foreign policy team in April, five months before Couric interviewed Palin.

Sam Nunn lines up behind Barack Obama as best equipped to stop political ‘demonizing, dumbing down’
Friday, April 18, 2008, 12:25 PM

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Former Georgia senator Sam Nunn, who toyed with the concept of a non-partisan run for president last year, has come down on the side of Barack Obama in the Democratic race for president.

The former senator, considered one of the nation’s preeminent experts on U.S. defense, met with Obama’s foreign policy team this morning.

In a just released statement, Nunn said Obama “will have the sound judgment to put together an outstanding governing team, bringing people together across old boundaries.”

“My own role in this campaign will be as an advisor - particularly in the field of national security and foreign policy,” Nunn said.

Though not a superdelegate to the Democratic National

O'Reilly: Most loved and most hated journalist

Half the names appear on both the lists. And most of those polled wouldn't respond.

America's Favorite Campaign Journalists

As the Pew Research Center's Weekly News Interest Index has shown, the public followed news about the 2008 presidential campaign more closely than any presidential election in the past 20 years. Americans relied primarily on television news for information about the campaign, and cable TV was the dominant medium1.


When asked to name their favorite and least favorite campaign journalist or commentator, Bill O'Reilly was named most frequently as the favorite -- and as the least favorite. O'Reilly was named by 5% as their favorite journalist or commentator, while 3% each named Tom Brokaw and Sean Hannity. However, fully half could not name anyone as their favorite.

When asked to name their least favorite journalist or news commentator who covered the campaign this year, 60% offered no response. Among those who did name someone, O'Reilly also topped the list (6%). Katie Couric of CBS News was named by 5% of the public as their least favorite campaign journalist. In addition, 3% named each of the following: the Fox News Channel, Rush Limbaugh, Keith Olbermann, and Sean Hannity

Campaign Carl speaks

He doesn't offer much of an explanation about why he breathlessly reported on some crazy allegations about Sarah Palin's "knowledgability" without double checking. And there's none of this backing away from his story, as Greta Van Sustern says he told her privately.

"The people who put this out, and it's senior McCain staff, are now in the cross hairs themselves for attacking the running mate, which by proxy means attacking the ticket they were trying to elect," Fox News campaign correspondent Carl Cameron, who broke some of these details the day after the election, said by phone.

From Fox News Channel, from Newsweek, from elsewhere, we know more of a strained relationship with campaign staff members who allege she didn't stick to the campaign's game plan, didn't know which countries were in NAFTA, rejected campaign efforts to prep her properly and so on.

Much of this amplifies reporting about Palin during the campaign, though the fact that so much more came out within hours of President-elect Barack Obama's victory leaves open the question of why not tell the electorate before they voted?

Cameron, who noted he dragged off-the-record material into on-the-record usefulness practically daily as needed, said it's because the sniping revealed more about the divisions within the campaign than the candidate herself.

"It grew out of criticism of the campaign from the right that they were putting Sarah Palin on ice, and the staff really resented the assertion," Cameron said. "A lot of this stuff, it's a question of: Does it ever ripen? Does it ever become relevant?"

What changed, Cameron said, was "the circular firing squad that Republicans and Democrats both go through in the aftermath of a defeat is an interesting story. And it's made more interesting by the obvious political future that Sarah Palin has. … She is not going to go away. There is a clear path for Sarah Palin right now to Iowa and New Hampshire in 2012."

Palin a ratings hit for Greta

Best numbers for On The Record all year.

Cindy McCain cheating?

The photo doesn't show her face and it doesn't look like her.

But here's the story. Plus I'm feeling pissed off at Maverick.

Specter 40 -- Matthews 27

The Huffington Post has details of new poll showing Hardball's Chris Matthews has a chance if he were to run for the Senate in 2010.

A Public Policy Polling survey of Pennsylvania voters conducted shortly before last week's election found that MSNBC host Chris Matthews would have a shot if he ran as a Democrat for the US Senate against long time Republican incumbent Arlen Specter in 2010.

Specter polls at just 40% in a potential match up with Matthews. That's still a 13 point lead over the potential challenger, who gets 27%, but 33% of the electorate is undecided about how they would vote in such a contest, an indication that they're at least open to the thought of supporting Matthews.

Obama to step up Osama hunt

Here's some of the challenges facing the new president in Afghanistan and in his hunt to get Osama bin Laden.

The president is going to inherit the problem the Soviets had roughly 15 years ago during the Soviet jihad. You cannot tame the people in the North-West Frontier Province and on the border in Pakistan and Afghanistan," said Dalton Fury, the commander of special operations at Tora Bora.

"The only army that has been successful has been Genghis Khan and his Mongol horde. They cut off heads and killed everyone in the villages, and since we have self-imposed rules of warfare, we are not going to do what they did."

Cooperation from Pakistan's military has been touchy, and most experts agree finding bin Laden is just not a priority for Pakistan's troops.

Fury says the best route for the president-elect to take would be to change the dialogue about bin Laden. Intelligence officials do not believe he is playing an operational role and so has no reason to move around or communicate.

"I think it's important to understand that bin Laden had his chance at martyrdom. He was in the mountains of Tora Bora, he ran away. In my opinion, I think we ought to promote this," Fury said.

He believes taunting the al Qaeda leader may force him to prove he's relevant and, in the process, lead the United States right to him.

GOP elites: Revenge of the Nerds

The Other McCain again tries to explain the David Brooks, Christopher Buckley, David Frum syndrome.

Read the whole thing. Choice quote:

Having not been isolated within the intellectual class, however, I know that the absolute solid bedrock of the 21st-century GOP coalition are the pro-life activists. Those are the folks who put butts in the voting booth -- they deliver on Election Day. The Republican Party can easily afford to lose 100% of the Harvard vote, but if the GOP loses the pro-lifers, you can kiss it good-bye, people.

Wonkette: Piper just as qualified as Sarah

How can any news serious news organization publish this kind of childish crap?

I think my favorite part of this morning's interview was when Palin justified her desire to "introduce" McCain with her intention to "brag him up" -- a phrase that sounds dirty as well as vaguely violent. But this aside might have done more damage: "it would do what John McCain just can't seem to do for himself -- bless his heart;" if only because it sounds less like he's too humble to boast about his own accomplishments (did you know he was a prisoner of war!?) than he's too feeble.

As for Piper -- she's a pistol, that's for sure. On the Palin plane, she stole the hearts of much of the press corps, who bought her trinkets on Halloween and doted on her like would-be aunts (and some uncles). She also is as qualified as her mother to be president.

The quest for respectable Republicans

The Other McCain nails it and explains why some conservatives so hate the Wasilla Chillbillies.

One of the great woes of the conservative movement in recent years is that it has attracted a set of intellectuals who are culturally and socially disconnected from the people whose votes elect Republican candidates. This is, to an extent, a result of what Herrnstein and Murray called "cognitive partitioning."

Our intellectual class is now dominated by "meritocrats" who come from upper-middle-class backgrounds and who have been grinding it out since middle school trying to get into the elite schools that offer the fast track to success. Conservatism has sought out these brainiac types who bring with them a set of class prejudices that make them incapable of relating to State University business majors and self-sufficient tradesmen, the petit bourgeois backbone of the suburban Sunbelt GOP.

Conservative students on elite campuses seem to develop a siege mentality. On the one hand, they are forced to refine their arguments against liberalism. On the other hand, they tend to internalize the notion that conservatism is somehow less respectable than liberalism, so that there is a flinch reaction to accusations of racism, sexism, homophobia, etc. This creates within the conservative intelligentsia an obsession with respectability.

The quest for respectable Republicanism explains why so many conservative intellectuals kept boosting Rudy Giuliani during the 2006-07 runup to the GOP primaries. Giuliani is a New Yorker, a pro-choice, pro-gay-rights Catholic (oxymoron alert) -- not an evangelical hick governor from Waco or Wasilla. What is odd about conservative intellectuals, especially the younger ones, is that if their class prejudices and standards of "respectability" had dominated the GOP in the 1970s, Ronald Reagan's presidency would never have happened.

Reagan's great feat was to take the fierce anti-communism of Joe McCarthy and Barry Goldwater (which had been disdained as outlandish by the intellectuals of their day) and weave it into a larger, broader critique of liberalism, delivered with a genial smile. Reagan learned from conservative failures of the past the importance of building a coalition through tactical alliances.

Today's conservative intellectuals often praise Reagan and try to claim the mantle of Reaganism for their own pet projects, but they have a very un-Reaganeque tendency: Trying to build a movement via subtraction. David Frum delivered an infamous auto da fe against anti-war conservatives. Chris Caldwell wants to run the pro-lifers and gun owners out of the Big Tent. George Will thinks the GOP's problem is too many hockey moms. And, yes, there are far too many Christian conservatives who use "libertarian" as a pejorative.

I posted a large excerpt because it's that good. McCain is one of the most underrated bloggers on the Conservative side. I discovered him when he linked to my search for the Palin hacker. Put him on your RSS feed.

If you want to see this respectable Republicanism in action all you have to do is read this lengthy Q and A between McCain campaign insider Steve Schmidt and the very liberal Wonkette Ann Marie Cox.

Cox's questions were loaded with terrible assumptions about Sarah Palin, GOP campaign rallies and other things that Schmidt failed to pushback on.

It was an inside glimpse of a Georgetown cocktail party with the supposed conservative — Steve Schmidt — not challenging the assumptions of his liberal friend — Anne Marie Cox.

That’s why so many of these beltway types are programed that way at their elite schools or eventually go native, because if they don’t every conversation turns into a fight.

Palin leaker reveals himself: Update: It's a hoax.

UPDATE: It's a hoax. And a pretty well done one. Read the whole blog if you wish.

Something tells me this unknown blogger and former McCain campaign advisor is about to get a lot of traffic.

So yes, to be clear, last week I was the one who leaked those things to a producer at Fox News who works with Cameron. Carl and his producers are good guys, and I don’t want them to have to worry about protecting their sources (and going through the wringer ala Judith Miller or Matt Cooper) on something like this.

As you know, I was one of the foreign policy advisers on the McCain campaign who worked with Randy Scheunemann to help prep Sarah on her debate with Joe Biden. Did we outright give her a geography quiz when we started the prep? No, of course not. But yes, in the context of the prep, it slowly became apparent that her grasp of basic geo-political knowledge had major gaps. Could she have passed a multiple choice test about South Africa or NAFTA. Probably. But it was clear that she simply didn’t have the ease of knowledge that we come to expect from a major party political candidate. Other slights came up, too: Not knowing the difference between Hezbollah and Hamas. Or the difference between the Shiites and Suni. Or when it came to international terrorist organizations, knowing that the IRA was in Northern Ireland, and ETA in Spain.

The real thing we had to constantly remind her was to never, ever compare herself in any way to Hillary Clinton, as she had at her announcement speech. We had it on good authority that Biden was prepping to unleash the inevitable line, “I know Hillary Clinton. Hillary Clinton is a friend of mine. And Sarah, you’re no Hillary Clinton.” Alas, Biden would have been right.

Video: Frum defends the Cuda ... kinda

Watch CBS Videos Online

Why taking Rev. Wright off the table was dumb

Here's a behind-the-scenes story from the McCain camp that clearly illustrates how McCain's decision not to bring up Rev. Wright handcuffed his campaign and made his surrogates look like idiots sometimes.

In an appearance with Rick Sanchez on CNN in the final days of the campaign, Goldfarb had accused Obama of hanging out with anti-American and anti-Semitic figures and cited PLO sympathizer Rashid Khalidi as an example. Sanchez wanted more.

SANCHEZ: Can you name one other person besides Khalidi who he hangs around who is anti-Semitic?

GOLDFARB: Yes, he pals around with William Ayers who is an unrepentant domestic terrorist.

SANCHEZ: No, no, the question I asked you is can you name one other person who he hangs around with who is anti-Semitic? Because that is what you said.

GOLDFARB: Look, we all know there are people who Barack Obama has been in hot water--

SANCHEZ: Michael, I asked you to name one person. One.

GOLDFARB: Rick, we both--

SANCHEZ: You said he hangs around with people who are anti-Semitic. Okay. We got Khalidi on the table. Give me number two. Who's the other anti-Semitic person that he hangs around with that we quote, "All know about"?

GOLDFARB: Rick, we both know who number two is.

SANCHEZ: Who? Would you tell us?

GOLDFARB: No, Rick, I think we all know who we're talking about here.

SANCHEZ: Somebody who is anti-Semitic that he hangs around with?

GOLDFARB: Absolutely.

SANCHEZ: Well, say it.

GOLDFARB: I think we all know who we are talking about, Rick.

Goldfarb had done the interview from a studio at the campaign headquarters in Crystal City, in suburban Virginia outside Washington, D.C. His exchange rocketed around the Internet and quickly became a favorite of left-wing bloggers--who alternately accused him of playing dirty by making charges he couldn't back up and wimping out by refusing to name a second anti-Semite. Others wondered whom Goldfarb was talking about.

If it wasn't obvious to them, the identity of "number two" was clear to those inside McCain headquarters: Reverend Jeremiah Wright. McCain had pledged last spring that he wouldn't use Wright's hate-filled sermons against Obama, who had listened to them for 20 years in the pews of Wright's church. But virtually no one on McCain's staff agreed with the candidate's restraint. Goldfarb had joked before the appearance that he was going to "go rogue" and bring up Wright's name in the interview. He didn't--barely--thereby preserving his job at the cost of looking a bit ridiculous. But when he walked into the campaign's common area after his exchange with Sanchez, his colleagues gave him a standing ovation.

Michael Malone on his 15 minutes

Read the whole thing

Two weeks ago, in my ABCNews.com column, I took off on a brief tangent from my usual technology and business orientation to instead discuss what I saw as shocking bias by the mainstream media - in particular, television network news, newspapers and newsmagazines - in its coverage of the Presidential campaign.

What happened next is, I think, an interesting glimpse into the dynamics of the traditional and digital media now, nearly a decade into the new century, and a dozen years after the widespread cultural adoption of the Internet.

Peggy Noonan says she voted for McCain but ....

She's absolutely gushing about Obama.

For me, this whole Obama craze is a just a way for 60s boomers to relive their childhood. The 60s didn't die last week because the last Vietnam era presidential candidate lost.

To quote Noonan.

For me, at the end of the evening, looking at live shots of the throngs in Chicago's Grant Park, I flashed back to 1960 and how it felt, as a child, to see that the grown-ups had elected a Catholic president. I can't say we stood taller—we were Irish, we already stood tall—but yes, there was a wave of feeling: "What a country," "What a development!" The other day, when I said that to the writer Henry Louis Gates, head of African American studies at Harvard, he told me he'd grown up in a Catholic neighborhood and had celebrated that night with his neighbors because he thought he was one of them. That struck me as a very American anecdote.

P.J. O'RINO: Pisses Every Republican Off

Peaked in the first Bush administration.

Here's some highlights from his latest confusing rant for The Weekly Standard.

First off, O'Rourke accuses the GOP of being racist.

There was no need to piss off the entire black population of America to get Dixie's electoral votes. And despising cracker trash who have a laundry hamper full of bedsheets with eye-holes cut in them does not make a man a liberal.

On illegal immigration

Our attitude toward immigration has been repulsive. Are we not pro-life? Are not immigrants alive? Unfortunately, no, a lot of them aren't after attempting to cross our borders. Conservative immigration policies are as stupid as conservative attitudes are gross.

On the War on Terror, O'Rourke shows he has no understanding of radical Islam.

Then, half a generation later, when we returned with our armies, we expected to be greeted as liberators. And, damn it, we were. I was in Baghdad in April 2003. People were glad to see us, until they noticed that we'd forgotten to bring along any personnel or provisions to feed or doctor the survivors of shock and awe or to get their electricity and water running again. After that they got huffy and began stuffing dynamite down their pants before consulting with the occupying forces.

Is there a moral dimension to foreign policy in our political philosophy? Or do we just exist to help the world's rich people make and keep their money?

O'Rourke just doesn't get it. For a conservative he sure believes a lot of liberal memes. Nobody becomes a suicide bomber (or, as P.J. puts it, stuff dynamite down their pants) because their electricity grind ain't working.

If so, there would have been no need to rescue people after Hurricane Katrina as they would have blown themselves up before General Honre got to town with his choppers.

O'Rourke should stick to his witty observations about the inefficiencies of the postal system or first-person 5,000-word accounts on privatizing sidewalks mixed in with a liberal amount of references to Clinton being a horn dog and Madonna being a slut.

On Going Rogue

Rich Lowry says "a former McCain aide" has denied a Newsweek story alleging that Sarah Palin went rogue and accused Barack Obama of "palling around" with William Ayers without the approval of the McCain campaign.

According to Newsweek's embedded election story:

There was grumbling that Palin had jumped the gun by bringing up Ayers at her rallies before the campaign could properly do the groundwork with a rollout strategy and ads. (At one rally, she had talked about Obama "palling around with terrorists.") Palin was mad at her handlers. Reportedly, she felt that Wallace and Schmidt had poorly coached and advised her. One adviser later speculated that she impulsively talked about Ayers because she felt thwarted—she had really wanted to bring up the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. (Actually, Palin was feeling hurt and angry over the tabloid treatment of her 17-year-old daughter Bristol, and decided—on her own—that Ayers should be fair game. McCain's advisers were working on a strategy that would launch an Ayers attack the following week, but McCain had not signed off on it, and Salter was resisting.)

However, this story was debunked immediately by Randy Scheunemann, McCain's chief foreign policy adviser, who emailed Marc Ambinder after he first reported the palling-around line had not been vetted by HQ.

The question is, why exactly is someone in McCain's campaign falsely accusing Palin of being the one to bring William Ayers up?

On the surface, bringing up Ayers doesn't really hurt Palin with the base, who had been screaming at McCain to get tougher and raise Obama's associations.

What it does, however, is protect McCain, who had been compared, unfairly, by John Lewis to George Wallace.

These litany of lies being anonymously leaked to the media are designed not only to damage Sarah Palin, but to restore McCain's reputation. These smears are not random, but are fully part of the McCain campaign's exit strategy -- blame Palin for the loss and restore Senator Maverick in good favour with the MSM and his Democratic friends, such as Lewis.

Back to that Newsweek story, here's an account of what happened when McCain discovered the Lewis remarks:

McCain was on his bus, about to board a plane in Moline, Ill., when he read the remarks on an aide's BlackBerry. He was so dumbfounded that he held the plane on the tarmac while he considered how to respond. Salter, who had penned the chapter on Lewis, urged McCain to remain more dignified than Lewis had been in his remarks. But Schmidt called in from headquarters brimming with outrage. "Sir," said Schmidt, "he called you a racist. It must be responded to." Nicolle Wallace agreed. Salter was not so sure. He was "very pained" over the incident, Schmidt later recalled about Salter, but his instinct told him not to get his boss into a name-calling fight with a martyr of the civil-rights movement. McCain decided to go with Schmidt and put out a strong statement calling on Obama to "immediately and personally repudiate these outrageous and divisive comments." (Obama left it to a spokesman to blandly state, "Senator Obama does not believe that John McCain or his policy criticism is in any way comparable to George Wallace or his segregationist policies.")

According to several aides, McCain had trouble shaking his sadness over Lewis's statement. To the reporters traveling with McCain, the candidate seemed uncertain, as if he was not quite sure what he had gotten himself into

That was fundamentally McCain's problem and why he was a terrible candidate. Someone unfairly compares him to a racist and McCain and his long-time aide Salter's reaction is to feel sad about it. Normal people would be outraged.

Getting in their faces in action

The latest from the Obama campaign

Protest the McCain/Palin appearance in Media, PA (Organizing)
Anti-McCain Protest: Media, PA Stop The Lies! Hosted by: Greater Media Nether Providence PA Team Where: Delaware County Courthouse When: Monday, Sept 22nd, 3:00 pm

"He goes by the name Rubico"

David Kernell's friends are not doing him any favours.

Devon Holbrook is a UT student from Memphis who grew up with Kernell. He was shocked to hear from mutual friends that David was in some serious trouble.

"I went on Google, and the first thing I saw is David's picture and articles talking about what had happened," Holbrook said. "I immediately started freaking out."

When Holbrook confirmed the news about the FBI frenzy surrounding his longtime friend, he started calling but wasn't able to connect with Kernell.

"I would love to know where he is and know he's alright."

Holbrook says Kernell loves chess, economics, and talking about politics.

"I would definitely say he's more to the left in terms of politics, but he's never really been active as far as political groups or anything like that," Holbrook added.

However under a different name, Kernell's political views are all over several websites.

"He goes by the name Rubico," Holbrook said.

A blogger named Rubico admitted to the web community he broke into Alaska Governor Sarah Palin's e-mail, saying it was easy.

Obama loving Astroturfers issue a statement

In response to The Jawa Report expose.

The idea for the video was mine. No one paid me to produce it. The only out-of-pocket cost will be the fee for the voice-over narrator, which I will pay personally when I receive an invoice. Contrary to the allegation in the Jawa Report, the voice-over artist has never done any work for the Obama campaign. I retained her through a talent agency based solely on the quality of her voice.

Questions:

How does he know the voice-over actress has never worked for the Obama campaign?

Did the Obama campaign tell him that?

And if this has nothing to do with the Obama campaign, why was he talking to them about his voice-over person?

If she's a different person, she sure sounds very similar. Does this woman have a name?

What's the name of the woman who does the Obama ads?

Start digging, folks.

Proxy Webmaster says Palin hacker's IP leads to Kernell's front door

These noose tightens on social engineer and Obamacrat David Kernell.

The man who traced the IP address of the hacker who accessed Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's e-mail account last week confirmed today that it belongs to an Illinois company that provides Internet service to the Knoxville, Tenn., apartment complex where the FBI served a search warrant early Sunday.

Gabriel Ramuglia, the webmaster of Ctunnel, an Athens, Ga.-based proxy service used by the hacker to mask his or her identity, acknowledged that the IP address he found in his server logs belongs to Pavlov Media, an Internet service provider based in Champaign, Ill.

Ramuglia also said he was mistaken when he said earlier he did not think the FBI had the right suspect.

Ramuglia said Sunday that the IP address he found in the proxy service logs didn't "look consistent" with reports identifying Kernell. By today, however, he had changed his mind.

"It became clear that the ISP, in addition to serving Illinois, also serves Tennessee, which means that the IP address could actually be consistent with the news reports," Ramuglia said today.

Weekly Standard confronts a Winner and Associates Astroturfer

If you haven't read The Jawa Report's expose on alleged Astroturfing by Democrats to smear Sarah Palin, then you should read it now.

Those who have read it will get a kick out of this.

John McCormack of The Weekly Standard has contacted one of the alleged Astroturfers with hillarious results.

A YouTube video that appears to have been produced by the PR firm Winner & Associates falsely claims Sarah Palin is a member of the Alaskan Independence Party. Shackleford has evidence that Jared Liu-Klein, an Associate at Winner & Associates, posted this video on website DemocraticUnderground.com more than a week after reports of Sarah Palin's membership in the party had been debunked.

I just spoke with Liu-Klein on the phone and asked him about the matter, but he said that he would have to get back to me later. I gave him my email address and asked if he could give me a simple yes or no answer if he had ever posted a video on the Internet about Sarah Palin and the Alaskan Independence Party. Liu-Klein replied: "I'll have to get back to you as soon as I can." Then he hung up the phone. I'll post Liu-Klein's response if and when I get it.

UPDATE Ace has a LOL observation

I wonder if Liu-Klein realizes that as the lowest man on the totem poll here, he's the obvious fall-guy: "We regret an overly eager employee decided to hijack our YouTube accounts for his own unauthorized political purposes..."

Suspected Palin Hacker hid from the FBI

I know this is totally the behaviour of someone who has done nothing wrong.

According to witnesses, the raid came while several neighbors were partying after the University of Tennessee verse Florida football game

“This black SUV came up, and all these guys got out with equipment and they had a big black bag with high tech stuff in it,” said Jarrett Mooneyham, who was at the apartment. “It was just a big ordeal and everybody was drunk, so it was really chaotic."

Mooneyham said the agents were looking for Kernell, but never found him because he was hiding out on the second floor of the complex with some of his friends.

UPDATE

The Webmaster at C-tunnel doubts whether the FBI have the right guy!!!!!

Where are all these Sarah Palin smears coming from?

Hmmmmm

Just thinking out loud here:

Dozens of unsubstantiated rumors about Sarah Palin and her family have been blasted out onto the Internet over the last 10 days, seemingly starting within hours of her introduction.

These slurs start on left-wing blogs (and left-wing blogs that insist they're right-wing), and soon fill up blog comments everywhere.


The smears are then read by "journalists," who spread them to their audience.


They're almost instantly debunked.


This keeps happening over and over, even though it's not working.


It seems unlikely that so many independent bloggers and blog commenters would suddenly and simultaneously become self-described experts on somebody who most people hadn't heard of two weeks ago.


It's more probable that these lies and half-truths are coming from a single source and are being made to look like the work of a grassroots movement. A netroots movement, if you will.

With all that in mind:

Who would have the means, motive, and opportunity to launch such a wide-ranging smear campaign so quickly?

More importantly: Who would have enough at stake to be so obviously panicky about it?

Yeah .... ever wonder wear all these Palin smears which are later rebuked come from?

The Jawa Report has a very interesting theory.

We believe that the case has been made that the Palin smear video was produced by the Publicis Groupe's Winner & Associates. We believe the evidence to this effect is compelling.

We also believe that the evidence shows that W&A tried to spread the lies about Palin in such a way as to catch the attention of the left-wing netroot supporters of Barack Obama. We think it is unlikely that one of the largest PR firms in the world would do this for free. That they would pay for video production out of their own pockets, hire a well known voice actress, or that its employees would work together in their free time to help the video go viral.

So, if we're right, who paid them? As of this writing we cannot answer that question. Our initial reaction was that this campaign had all the hallmarks of the Soros funded Moveon.org, but given David Axelrod's known predilection to these type of stealth campaigns it would not surprise us in the least if the Obama campaign itself was orchestrating it.

That this is what Obama meant by "taking the gloves off". Especially given the timing of the video's release -- during the brief period when Obama trailed McCain in the polls, and when most of McCain's sudden surge was attributed to the popularity of Sarah Palin.

Read the whole thing.

Does the FBI have its man in the Palin hacking case?

A major break in the case of who hacked into Republican VP candidate Sarah Palin's private Yahoo! email account earlier this week.

Early this morning, the FBI issued a search warrant at David Kernell's apartment. Witnesses said the feds were there for about 2 hours and took pictures of the entire place.

Wild goose chase?

Not likely.

Consider this:

The hacker, who went by the screen name "rubico" at 4chan.org. wrote a confession in the forum that was later deleted. Here's one of the things he said.

and it finally set in, THIS internet was serious business, yes I was behind a proxy, only one, if this shit ever got to the FBI I was fucked, I panicked, i still wanted the stuff out there but I didn’t know how to rapidshit all that stuff, so I posted the pass on /b/, and then promptly deleted everything, and unplugged my internet and just sat there in a comatose state

Got that?

One proxy.

Unfortunately, "rubico's" screenshots of Palin's emails, which he leaked to the world, showed his entire Web browser, including which proxy service he was using -- CTunnel.com

On Thursday, Gabriel Ramuglia, operator of Ctunnel.com, said in an interview that it would only take him a day to narrow down who did it from his logs.

"Usually, this sort of thing would be hard to track down because it's Yahoo email, and a lot of people use my service for that," he told El Reg in a phone interview. "Since they were dumb enough to post a full screenshot that showed most of the [Ctunnel.com] URL, I should be able to find that in my log."

Ramuglia got into the proxy business a few years ago, after schools began blocking access to an online game site he used to co-own. Pretty soon, people began using the proxy service to access YouTube, Gmail, MySpace, and dozens of other sites that are routinely blocked by IT departments.

To prevent abuse of the service - such as the occasional bomb threat or other illegal act that's been known to happen - Ramuglia logs each user's IP address, along with the time and web destination. That often isn't enough to track down people who access extremely popular websites. But in this case, the perpetrators included a whole string of random-looking characters when posting screenshots of Palin's hacked account. That will probably be enough for him to pinpoint the proverbial needle in the haystack.

So the FBI likely received this information by end of business day on Friday.

Do you think they would raid the son of a state legislator's home on a wild goose chase now?

UPDATE: A commenter at Gateway Pundit who claims to have experience tracking down hackers and Internet stalkers says the following.

They had to get subpoenas to get the anonymizer services, other proxy services and the ISP's to cough up their records and then obtain those records, they probably also got all of his phone records, including text messages. I am sure they have a list of every website he has visited (all of them-including any he visited behind a proxy) and every phone call and text message he has made for the last 5 years. Then they had to get a warrant for his arrest. They are also probably getting warrants for any and all who knowingly hosted the posts he made of the contents of Gov. Palin's email account, too. Those people will be charged as accessories. I hope they all have retained legal help-they will need it.

They also have probably had him, his family, his friends and the people he most likes to chat to via internet or phone under close surveillance 24/7 since this occurred. He really was not a flight risk and if he had tried he would have been stopped. As to the "contents of his computer" there are ways to restore that but he made enough public posts of the contents of her email account and his actions to obtain them to convict him. I hope his daddy doesn't have anything incriminating on his computer because they probably seized all the computers in the house.

UPDATE

Nashville blogger and former NBC News correspondent Sharon Cobb, who is also a personal friend of the Kernell family, says David Kernell has not been arrested.

PS--Let me add that David is in a hotel with his father, Mike, and not in jail.

Let me also reiterate that I stand by Rep. Mike Kernell who never has had anything to do with this, and my heart goes out to him and David's mother who just got back from Iraq.

My heart also goes out to the Palins for having this happen to them. While I disagree with Palin on all political issues, no one should have their private email invaded.

Again, David is free, and I have no idea what will happen next.

FBI serves search warrant against David Kernell

This just in ...

The FBI is stepping up its investigation into the possibility that a University of Tennessee student hacked into the personal e-mail of Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin.

A person who identified himself as a witness tells 10 News that agents with the FBI served a federal search warrant at the Fort Sanders residence of David Kernell early Sunday morning. Kernell lives in the Commons apartment complex at 1115 Highland Ave.


David Kernell is the son of Mike Kernell, a Democratic state representative from Memphis.

A Department of Justice spokesperson confirmed there has been "investigatory activity" in Knoxville regarding the Palin case, but she said there are no publicly available search warrants, and no charges have been filed.

A separate law enforcement source confirmed to 10 News that a search warrant was served on Kernell's apartment.

According to the witness, several agents arrived at The Commons of Knoxville around midnight.

They presented their badges upon entering Kernell's apartment, where several students were having a party, and took down their names.

The witness tells us they asked him and those who did not live in the unit to go outside. He believes the investigators took about 1.5 to 2 hours taking pictures of everything inside the apartment.

He says Kernell's three roommates were also subpoenaed, and must testify this week in Chattanooga.

CIA officials, marines targeted in Islamabad blast

Scary

Islamabad , Sept 20 (ANI): Several senior officers of Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) who are reported to be currently visiting Islamabad were the target of the blast at the Marriott Hotel which took place here tonight.

Well placed sources said that Marriott Hotel is usual hotel choice of the US officials and it seems that militants tipped off that certain high level US intelligence officers were currently staying at the hotel.

While no confirmation was available but Pakistan sources said it was clear that the explosion was aimed at specific targets based on a tip off.

This from another source

ISLAMABAD: US Marines staying at the Marriott Hotel may have been the target of Saturday's suicide attack that killed more than 60 people, security officials said.


They said that about 30 Marines were staying at the hotel and were scheduled to leave for Afghanistan early Sunday morning.

The Islamabad administration said that 40 people were killed and about 100 injured in the blast but eyewitnesses and hospital sources say that more than 60 people were killed.

One official said that the American security personnel were in Pakistan for the just-concluded visit by the Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Michael Mullen.

But another source said that they had come to Islamabad Friday and were scheduled to leave for Afghanistan on Sunday morning.

"We believe that they can have been the target of the suicide attack," a senior security official told IANS. Otherwise, "we don't find any other reason for such an attack", he added.

The sources said that soon after the blast, US embassy officials reached the spot and were seen looking for the Marines who, according to the sources, were staying on the fourth floor of the hotel which was among the worst affected as the entire hotel turned into a blazing inferno with orange flames and thick smoke billowing out of its windows.

We have to talk about Andrew Sullivan

From a bizzaro episode of Real Time

CANADIAN GUY: No, we have we have to talk about Sullivan. I mean, Bill, let me just say, I, I don't even want to go this far in talking about him. He is a farce. This, this, this blog of his. This, blog having any association with The Atlantic. That's, that's unreal. He could be could be editor in January, it is a joke. It is absurd. It is something that should be dismissed out of hand as the most irresponsible act any publisher has ever made. Bill, Bill, let me just tell you one thing...

MAHER: But let me interrupt your shit fit with a little...

CANADIAN GUY: No, it's not a shit fit, this is an outrage...

MAHER: I agree with you. I understand...

CANADIAN GUY: ...and after two years, no comments on his blog?

MAHER: But here's the, here's the deal...

CANADIAN GUY: What is this, Putin's Russia?

MAHER: I know, we're all, we're all, we're all upset about it.

CANADIAN GUY: We need to be more upset. We, we, we need to be much more upset.

(Canadian Guy then thows himself on the floor like Howard Beale)

If you didn't laugh, read this.

McCain campaign accuses time reporter of "hysterical liberal bias"

A day after a senior McCain campaign official calls the media "pro-Obama," we get this attack on Time's Karen Tumulty.

Time magazine’s Karen Tumulty accuses this campaign of racism for launching this ad targeting Senator Obama’s ties to Fannie Mae Chairman Franklin Raines. Why? Tumulty writes:

Obama's Fannie Mae connections are completely fair game. But this ad doesn't even mention a far more significant tie--that of Jim Johnson, the former Fannie Mae chairman who had to resign as head of Obama's vice presidential search team after it was revealed he got a sweetheart deal on a mortgage from Countrywide Financial. Instead, it relies on a fleeting and tenuous reference in a Washington Post Style section story to suggest that Obama's principal economic adviser is former Fannie Mae Chairman Frank Raines. Why? One reason might be that Johnson is white; Raines is black.

The only problem with Ms. Tumulty’s story is that we also released an today targeting Senator Obama’s extensive ties to Jim Johnson. The ad is called…Jim Johnson. And Ms. Tumulty might have been aware of its existence if she’d bothered to call this campaign to find out the facts (reporting) before indicting us for racism in a half-baked, late night rant. Tumulty also takes Obama’s response, signed by Mr. Raines, at face value. The Obama campaign says Raines didn’t advise the campaign, and Tumulty apparently wasn’t interested in getting to the bottom of that either. So we contacted Ms. Tumulty and told her of the multiple sources that tie Raines to Obama, including three separate instances in the Washington Post, none of which was ever challenged by Raines or the Obama campaign until yesterday.

Tumulty did not correct her post, she simply responded “I grew up in Texas. I know what this stuff looks like.” Well, now we all know what hysterical liberal bias looks like as well.

UPDATE

Send the same memo to Rachel Maddow

Andrew Sullivan: We need to be more upset about Palin UPDATE: now with video

NewsBusters calls Friday's Real Time with Bill Maher "potentially the finest example of Palin Derangement Syndrome seen on television."

Here's a transcript ... which shows Sullivan could hardly contain himself and can hardly get out his sentences.

ANDREW SULLIVAN, THE ATLANTIC: No, we have we have to talk about Palin. I mean, Bill, let me just say, I, I don't even want to go this far in talking about her. She is a farce. This, this, this nomination. This, the nomination of this person to be potentially President of the United States next January. That's, that's the possibility. She could be president next January, is a joke. It is absurd. It is something that should be dismissed out of hand as the most irresponsible act any candidate has ever made. Bill, Bill, let me just tell you one thing...

MAHER: But let me interrupt your shit fit with a little...

SULLIVAN: No, it's not a shit fit, this is an outrage...

MAHER: I agree with you. I understand...

SULLIVAN: ...and after three weeks, no press conference?

MAHER: But here's the, here's the deal...

SULLIVAN: What is this, (unintelligible), Russia?

MAHER: I know, we're all, we're all, we're all upset about it.

SULLIVAN: We need to be more upset. We, we, we need to be much more upset.

Then they came for O'Reilly

So this is what politics in the U.S. has become

Just days after publishing U.S. vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin's personal email messages, the Wikileaks Web site has published data about members who signed up for a section of Fox Television host Bill O'Reilly's Web site.

Hackers were able to obtain a list of Billoreilly.com premium members, including email addresses, site passwords and the city and state where they live. Some of the information was published Friday on Wikileaks.com, which has been under fire from conservative commentators, including O'Reilly, for publishing Palin's messages.

"Wikileaks has been informed the hack was a response to the pundit's recent scurrilous attacks over the Sarah Palin's email story -- including on Wikileaks and other members of the press," Wikileaks said on its site. "Hacktivists, thumbing their noses at the pundit, took control of O'Reilly's main site, Billoreilly.com."

Premium members pay US$49.95 per year to access special content on the Web site, including discussion boards. Operators of Billoreilly.com could not be reached for comment Friday afternoon, and IDG News Service could not immediately confirm whether the list was legitimate.

Wired has more, including a lot of background on comments O'Reilly has made this week that may have angered the Wikileaks community.

Does NewsBusters know Rubico10's IP?

A pretty good case is being made by The College Politico.

After all of this I really think there are several things we can learn about these screenshots. They are, in fact, from Rubico. They show he is on a NewsBusters post while hacking into Palin’s email. They show that he is NOT using a proxy to view the NewsBuster post. They give us a specific time frame that he was on the NewsBusters post. Those things are important because they mean that NewsBusters, most likely, can figure out if David Kernell (or rather someone from the University of Tennessee, who I would assume is David Kernell) was on that specific post durring that specific time frame. Is it evidence that you could use in court? Certainly not, but is it enough to get one step closer to convincing me and put a clearer focus on Kernell? Absolutely.

Rumoured Palin hacker lawyers up

As he should ....

The latest from the Nashville blogger who says she's friends' with David Kernell's father, Rep. Mike Kernell.

UPDATE; Sept 19, 5:01 PM. Just got off the phone with Mike Kernell, who is in Knoxville with his son, David, and they were headed out for dinner with David's lawyer. Law enforcement still has not contacted father or son. Beyond that, I'm done with updates, as I've been called names on other blogs for being one of the few people accurately reporting this story, and for that, I've been called a whore, an attention whore, a bitch, a liar, and other words I won't use.
I gave you the truth, and you had to be evil and cruel, like so many bloggers and especially anonymous bloggers are, and that's not okay. So wait and you'll eventually find out what really happened, but not from me.

But I want to be clear Mike Kernell is an honorable man who does not and will not lie, and whatever his son did or didn't do has nothing to do with Mike, and I stand behind Rep. Mike Kernell 100 percent. He is my friend, and his integrity is beyond reproach and I'm not taking anymore crap over reporting the truth and being accused of doing nothing more than spinning for a friend by people who don't know the first thing about reporting.

My friend, Mike, and his son, are two different issues. I will defend Mike to the death. I have no idea what his son did or didn't do, and neither do you.

This contradicts the wild rumour in Protein Wisdom's pub that Kernell had already been taken into custody.

PDS: TV anchor who resembles Palin gets angry voice messages

National Review now pumping out liberal memes about Palin

This could have been written by a Kos kid, but it's in National Review

Confession: I love Barack Obama and I love Sarah Palin — both for different reasons. They both also scare me to death.

I love Obama for his style, grace, intellect, and his way with words. I want the healing power that an Obama presidency could deliver to this country.

. . .

I worry that Sarah Palin won’t set foot in that maze.

I worry that she won’t intellectualize enough. I worry about her certitude and her slight offness. Whatever her charms, anyone in public office who thinks out loud about banning books might be missing some aces in her deck.

I worry about a worldview that might have been shaped in part by a minister who believes that Alaska someday will be home to Christian renegades arriving for the Rapture.

McCain campaign manager slams "pro-Obama media"

This was taken from a press gaggle on the campaign trail

Steve Schmidt (McCain campaign): I think what Brian, what Brian’s intent, I know what Brian’s intent to say was this: Is we won’t be intimidated by the Obama campaign or by a lot of the pro Obama media that disregards fact because they’re political inconvenient for Obama. Every ad that we put out, and I’m happy to set up a reading room and a table on any of these ads to go through his record. It’s factually accurate. For example, Barack Obama voted in the Senate for a tax increase budget resolution for people making 42,000 a year. That happened. In the space-time continuum that we all understand, all right, he made that vote. It happened. It’s real. On issue after issue we have represented his record in an accurate and a fair and in a fair way. Certainly, there is no symmetry between what the obama campaign is saying about john mccain particularly with this immigration ad, and you know many others with what we have said. We are talking about Senator Obama’s record. The ads are factual. And we will continue to talk about his record. And the fact that there is a lot of people in the media who when we criticize Obama rush forward with no hesitation at all to defend and protect him says something about the state of journalism in America, much more than it does about our campaign.

Memphis TV Station confirms FBI Palin hacking probe focusing on Memphis

Tennessee Rep. Mike Kernell has denied reports his son is being investigated in the federal probe into who hacked Sarah Palin's Yahoo account, but now a Memphis TV station has confirmed the investigationn is focusing on Memphis.

But Democratic State Representative Mike Kernell tells News Channel 3 his 20-year-old son has not been questioned by the FBI. He says he's absolutely amazed at how quickly this story has spread on the internet.

Right now there's a lot of speculation out there.

But News Channel 3 has confirmed the Anchorage division of the FBI has contacted the Memphis division and an investigation is underway.

UPDATE: Memphis FBI spokesperson confirms local force investigating Palin case.

BREAKING: OBAMA'S GMAIL ACCOUNT HACKED!!!!!!!

More here

Wired now reporting on rumoured Dem connection to hacker: UPDATED father denies being contacted by investigators

More on the Palin hacker from Wired:

The story was briefly posted Wednesday to the 4chan forum where the hack first surfaced. Bloggers have connected the handle of the poster, "Rubico," to an e-mail address, and tentatively identified the owner as a college student in Tennessee.

Threat Level was unable to reach the student by phone because his number is unlisted. A person who identified himself as the student's father, when reached at home, said he could not talk about the matter and would have no comment. The father is a Democratic state representative in Tennessee. Threat Level is not identifying them by name because authorities have not identified any suspects in the case, and the link to the student so far is tenuous.

Don't want to read too much into that comment, but why would he say he couldn't talk about the matter -- if those were his exact words or just poor paraphrasing by Wired?

Wired is correct in not naming names here because the link is tenuous and it's likely the rubico10 email is fake. But there are other coincidences between the student in Tennessee and this controvesy, including how his last name fits nicely with the new password the hacker selected for Palin's account.

If this student is the hacker, conservatives would be wise not to quickly blame the father for the son's behaviour, just as it should have been in the Bristol Palin controversy -- although hacking is a crime and pregnancy isn't.

At the Weekly Standard, Mary Katharine Hamm predicts the media will be easy on the father if this is true.

I'm sure if it does end up being a Democrat's son who's the culprit, the media will regain its respect for the privacy of politicians' children but quick. Perhaps should Bristol Palin should engage in something more illegal and high profile next time to stave off the press.

UPDATE: Tennessean: State rep’s son contacted in Palin e-mail probe

NASHVILLE – The son of state Rep. Mike Kernell has been contacted by authorities in connection with a probe into the hacking of personal e-mail of vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, Kernell told The Tennessean.

Kernell, a Memphis Democrat, said his 20-year-old son David had been contacted by authorities investigating the hacking of Palin’s personal e-mail account, the newspaper reported on its Web site this afternoon.

Again .... Kernell has only been contacted by authorities and is not a suspect.

UPDATE: The Tennessee paper rejigged it's story and only say that Kernell said he is aware his son is the subject of Internet rumours.

UPDATE: A blogger claiming to have a relationship with Rep. Kernell says they spoke with him tonight and that neither he nor his son have been contacted by the FBI.

I just got off the phone with Mike Kernell at 6:21 pm CST, and as of that time, neither he nor his son has been contacted by the FBI, Secret Service or any other branch of law enforcement or the government.

So far, everything going on about David Kernell hacking Palin's computer is RUMOR. Again, NO ONE HAS INVESTIGATED HIM.

If that changes, I will let you know, but as of this moment, there has been no investigation into David Kernell hacking Palin's computer.

On a personal note, I need to say something about Mike Kernell. Rep. Kernell has more integrity than almost anyone I know. He doesn't lie, cheat or steal, and helps people whenever he can.

When I was sick, he'd leave soup by my door after a long day of work. When I needed a friend, Mike was there for me as he is not only for his friends, but for strangers.

If David does turn out to be involved in hacking, Mike Kernell had nothing to do with it. Anyone who knows Kernell, knows he doesn't even email because he hates computers and is computer illiterate. That's the irony. Everyone who knows Mike is chuckling because he hates computers.

There are very few people I would vouch for, but Mike Kernell is one of them, and if it turns out his son did something wrong, Mike had nothing to do with it.

And I reiterate, as of this moment, NO ONE has contacted Mike or his son from law enforcement and as of now it is an Internet rumor.

Explosive CEO calling Obama, Dems "Family" of Fannie Mae

Who is Rubico10?

Michelle Malkin received an email from someone following the Palin email hacking based on comments in a hacker forum.

This afternoon, in a thread that was later deleted, an individual claiming to be the original poster gave his account of what happened. I’ve attached screencaps. Here’s the text. The original poster used the name “rubico.” The linked email address for the poster was rubico10@yahoo.com.

A Google search of "rubico10" comes up with this rubico10 -- who is from Memphis, Tennessee?


Just a theory? But how many people use the name rubico10?

UPDATE: I had more info but deleted it after reading this comment at Volokh Conspiracy.

>Finding the guy is a piece of cake

Methinks that's not his real email address. Only noobs give their real email address on 4chan. Doing is an invitation to get spammed with furry porn.

Associated Press won't cooperate with Secret Service investigation of Palin emails

Found this tidbit in the AP's story on the Palin emails

The Secret Service contacted The Associated Press on Wednesday and asked for copies of the leaked e-mails, which circulated widely on the Internet. The AP did not comply.

And whose side is the AP on in this case of illegal invasion of privacy?

The disclosure Wednesday raises new questions about the propriety of the Palin administration's use of nongovernment e-mail accounts to conduct state business. The practice was revealed months ago — prior to Palin's selection as a vice presidential candidate — after political critics obtained internal e-mails documenting the practice by some aides.

Translation: SHE HAD IT COMING!!!

UPDATE: Malkin has the inside story about the hacker(s).

Palin's email hacked?

From Wired

UPDATE: The American Thinker has more on what this means.

And people wonder why we don’t see high-quality, or even “normal” people, run for public office. First you have to submit financial information beyond even what the IRS wants. Then the real fun starts. The opposition sends in an army of lawyers looking into everything you’ve ever said or written. They’ll talk to your enemies, ex-spouses if you have any, former business partners, their ex-spouses and disgruntled former subordinates. Journalists will make stuff up. Hollywood and TV entertainers will imitate you unflatteringly, mock you and call you everything evil. They’ll dig into your children’s lives and post their pictures everywhere. Strangers will forward invented emails and internet hoaxes. Your photos will be photo-shopped and posted on the internet. Hope to goodness that you have no real photos or cell-phone captures that might be embarrassing.


And now they hack into your private emails and post them online.


This is the most despicable and truly anti-democratic move I’ve seen in my lifetime in America.

"Carly will now disappear,"

It's about time

Hockey Moms For Truth

Running Against Sarah

Excellent piece on those who have faced down Sarah Baracuda.

Liberal campaign grounded ... literally

Ha ha!

MONTREAL — The Liberal party’s campaign convoy was grounded Tuesday night when its aging plane was forced to land in Montreal.

Liberal Leader Stephane Dion’s 29-year-old Boeing 737 leased from Air Inuit was en route from Sherbrooke, Que., to London, Ont., when it made an unexpected stop shortly after 8 p.m. at Pierre Elliott Trudeau Airport.

The pilot told passengers over the loudspeaker that something was wrong with the plane and he needed to land for repairs.

Liberal campaign spokesman Mark Dunn says one of the aircraft’s two generators was losing power, so the pilot decided to land as a precaution.

Dunn says passengers, including Dion, Bob Rae, Liberal staffers and journalists, will likely stay in Montreal overnight.

Janeane Garofalo: Great to Jail All Republicans

From Newsbusters

GAROFALO: First of all there is no evidence to support that the current incarnation of the Republican party, hyphen conservative movement, has any tethering to decency, kindness, tolerance, open-mindedness. What do they stand for? Torture as a policy. They stand for homophobia. They stand for no reproductive justice. They stand for denying global warming.

FUND: So what should we do? Jail them?

GAROFALO: That would be great!

"She performed very well under her interrogation"

The key quote is at the end.

Sarah Palin Baby Name Generator

Good for a laugh.

This is dumb

This guy is supposed to be helping John McCain

Pressed to provide an example of what McCain had accomplished on that committee, Holtz-Eakin said the senator did not have jurisdiction over financial markets, then he held up his Blackberry, telling reporters: "He did this."

"Telecommunications of the United States, the premiere innovation in the past 15 years, comes right through the Commerce Committee. So you're looking at the miracle that John McCain helped create," Holtz-Eakin said. "And that's what he did. He both regulated and deregulated the industry."

Cindy McCain says ‘View’ hosts ‘picked our bones clean’

From MSNBC

And the lashings from the McCain camp didn’t just stop with Tina Fey — Cindy McCain also called out the ladies of “The View” after their appearance on the daytime talk show last week.

“In spite of what you see in the newspapers, and on shows like ‘The View’ — I don’t know if any of you saw ‘The View’ yesterday, they picked our bones clean — in spite of what you see, that’s not what the American people are saying and what they are believing,” Cindy McCain said at the 119th annual Oakland County Republican Party’s Lincoln Day Dinner, Saturday night in Michigan, according to ABC News’ Arnab Datta.

Barack Obama Embellishes His Resume

No biggie, but still pretty funny. Be sure to read the comments

About that crazy anti-McCain photog The Atlantic hired

Michelle Malkin has more ... way more .... talk about not being vetted.

"The press and the Democratic ticket are paying the price for decades of biased mainstream press coverage"

Michael Barone on how Palin has messed up Obama and the media real good.

Tom Brokaw Hits Rock Bottom

Promotes the "Jesus was a community organizer" meme.

"Every so often, journalists become deranged at the sight of certain candidates"

A writer at The Atlantic reacts to the freelance photographer who doctored a photo of John McCain and bragged about it

"He would have had better go of it had he picked Hillary for his running mate"

Every time Obama trots out Hillary, it just reminds her supporters what could have been. And she's not taking off the gloves to go after Palin.

Elyria, OHIO--Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY), swept into friendly territory today to ampaign for her former rival, generating large, passionate crowds--but barely mentioning the woman whose popularly has many here fretting.

Since the Republican convention, Clinton has pointedly avoided directly criticizing vice-presidential nominee Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) as she campaigns for Barack Obama, a strategy her staff says is endorsed by Obama's campaign.

Stones: Gimme Shelter: Live 1989

The Fair Game Doctorine

From the New York Times Ombudsman

And, yes, it was inevitable, and right to a more limited degree, that her family would come under the spotlight, too. As Bill Keller, The Times’s executive editor, said, “Senator McCain presented Mrs. Palin’s experience as a mother as one of her qualifications for the job.”

So you think Palin's got them pumped?

From today's rally.

Vanity Fair still peddling Palin pregnancy conspiracies

They call them "wingnut," but Vanity Fair is still peddling the conspiracy theories that Bristol Palin is the real mother of Sarah Palin's son, Trig.

But it turns out they are just catering to their readers, as their poll shows 68 per cent believe Bristol is Trig's mother.

This of course comes the same day David Frum argues Democrats are smarter than Republicans.

No, she’s not from another planet.

The Palin smears debunked.

Here's some of the better ones.

yes, she kills animals and eats them, and wears their skins
yes, she was a beauty contest contestant
yes, she was once a sportscaster
yes, she has a college degree in Journalism, but I won’t hold that against her, as she seems to have found honest work as well

The Power of Palin in swing states

From Rasmussen Reports

Ohio—with 20 Electoral College votes--moved from Toss-up to Leans Republican following the second straight Rasmussen Reports telephone survey that showed McCain with a modest lead over Obama.

North Carolina—with 15 Electoral College votes—moved from Leans Republican to Likely Republican. This change was based on the latest Rasmussen Reports polling and changes in the RasmussenMarkets.com data.

Wisconsin—with 10 Electoral College votes—moved from Likely Democratic to Leans Democratic. That move was prompted by the latest Rasmussen Reports polling which shows McCain closing to within four percentage points of Obama.

Colorado—with 9 Electoral College votes--moved from Leans Democratic to Toss-Up, based primarily upon the latest Rasmussen Reports poll in which McCain holds a statistically insignificant two-point lead over Obama.

Oregon—with 7 Electoral College votes—moved from Likely Democratic to Leans Democratic. While the latest Rasmussen Reports polling shows Obama with a 10-point lead, the average of other polls and a national trends adjustment places the state in the leaner category.

South Dakota—with 3 Electoral College votes--shifted from Leans Republican to Likely Republican based upon Rasmussen Markets data and a national trends adjustment.

Ohio is the big news because it's a bellwether state that has picked the winning party in every U.S. presidential election since 1960, four years before Sarah Palin was born.

More on that Fox special on Palin

Here's the back story on tonight's Fox News documenetary on Palin. It was shot as part of an Israeli documentary on extraordinary women around the world.

"I would get up in the morning, drive to her office and just follow her around all day. The amazing thing was that she never asked me to stop filming. I was there for everything – the phone calls and the meetings – and she would answer any question I had, she was very cooperative."

Frank also recorded Palin at home. "I have her with her family, making sandwiches for her daughter after school, watching television. I spoke to her husband and asked him about how it feels to be married to such a dominant woman. I have the two of them talking about private matters. I was able to catch very intimate moments on film. She even played the flute for me."

Like Harper, Chris Matthews has a list for questions

Hot Air has found this interesting tidbit from an RNC convention volunteer.

According to Doug, MS-NBC apparently took no chances on questions from the crowd. Rather than get caught with a question that might make Republicans look good, their producer pre-screened questioners, and Chris Matthews pretended it was random.

New NDP ad

Here's the NDP's first attack ad of the election.

Oh, about that Tory majority

On the eve of Canada's federal election, blogger Canadian Blue Lemons tells it like it is:

I can show the math: that the CPC has to win 155 of 200 seats (assuming - correctly I think - that the party will not win a seat in Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver nor the safe non-big-city Liberal, NDP & PQ seats). Earlier in a post I said 155 of 168, but I'm being generous this rainy morning. Such a sweep - a campaign without seats in the big 3 cities - has never come close to being done.

I myself have looked at all the ridings before the 2006 election. The last time a Canadian conservative party won a majority government was in 1988 and that was with seats in downtown Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver. The Tories have slim hopes of winning seats in these big cities.