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John Amato: McCain was trying to filibuster Meredith Vieira throughout the segment, but she hung in there pretty good. He tried to say that since he wasn’t in charge of all the Senate Armed Services committee hearings (6) he missed on Afghanistan—it  didn’t count because he knows better and he went there and I’m right and you’re wrong. And of course he knows everything about the economy even though he said to America that the economy is not his bag, man—because he’s John McCain. She brought up Phil Gramm’s “American Whiner,” remark and he said he’s for off shore drilling…

Steve Benen: Given reality, the fact that the Maliki government wants a U.S. withdrawal timetable and has endorsed Barack Obama’s Iraq policy by name would seem to be bad news for John McCain and his presidential campaign. But the presumptive Republican nominee has a trump card to get himself out of inconvenient jams like these: “I’m John McCain.”

  Download | Play  Download | Play (h/t Heather)

Take this morning’s appearance on NBC’s “Today” show, for example.

 Got that? The prime minister of Iraq and the Iraqi people may seem to want U.S. troops out of their country, but John McCain has been to Iraq and he “knows what they want.”

Jason Zengerle noted, “So, basically, the new McCain position on withdrawal seems to be: we shouldn’t listen to what the Iraqi government says it wants, we should listen to what McCain says it wants.”

Keep in mind, of course, McCain was asked this question before — in 2004.

Speaking to the Council on Foreign Relations, McCain was asked what he would do if a “sovereign Iraqi government asks us to leave, even if we are unhappy about the security situation there?” McCain’s response was unambiguous: “Well, if that scenario evolves than I think it’s obvious that we would have to leave because — if it was an elected government of Iraq, and we’ve been asked to leave other places in the world. If it were an extremist government then I think we would have other challenges, but I don’t see how we could stay when our whole emphasis and policy has been based on turning the Iraqi government over to the Iraqi people.”

In the bigger picture, though, the “I’m John McCain” phenomenon is surprisingly common.

In the same interview this morning, Vieira asked McCain about his attacks on Obama’s lack of committee hearings, and noted that McCain didn’t show up for any hearings on U.S. policy towards Afghanistan in the past two years. McCain’s response? “I know the issues extremely well,” McCain said.

In other words, he’s John McCain — and he doesn’t need committee hearings.

For that matter, a few days ago, the NYT had an interesting piece about Barack Obama’s foreign policy apparatus, which consists of a team of 300 or so experts, acting as something like a mini-State Department. The McCain campaign’s response? “John doesn’t need daily talking points” from a team of experts.

And these are just from the past few days. It’s the height of arrogance — McCain doesn’t need the opinions of the Iraqi prime minister, because he’s John McCain. He doesn’t need committee hearings on Afghanistan, because he’s John McCain. He doesn’t need a campaign foreign policy apparatus, because he’s John McCain.

Now, if he could actually demonstrate that he knew what he was talking about, and could talk about his foreign policy vision without sounding like an uninformed child, then maybe the “I’m John McCain” phenomenon would merely be an annoying personality trait.

But therein lies the point. McCain’s trump card — don’t question him, he knows what he’s talking about — is contradicted by the fact that he seems to be utterly and embarrassingly clueless.

I can’t help but wonder what the campaign would be like if the media called him on it.

Barack Obama’s trip overseas is off to a great start — with Prime Minister Maliki endorsing Obama’s withdrawal plan and the White House accidentally informing every news organization about it — and Chuck Todd is hearing that Republicans are starting to worry.

 Download | Play Download | Play

MR. TODD: Republicans are panicked about this trip because they think that this is going to be a home run. And arguably, you’ve got some Obama folks who actually think he ought to come home right now. It’s never going to get as good as it’s gotten in the last 48 hours. You’ve got McCain suddenly in the White House parroting what Obama has been saying in Afghanistan. The McCain folks will say, “Hey, we’re not parroting. We’ve been there before.” But they clearly caught McCain flat-footed there. And then what Maliki did, even in the backtrack statement that the spokes–the government spokesperson over there said, he threw in the word “timetable.”

In order to really appreciate the importance of the Maliki development, consider what would happen if the opposite occured:

To really understand the importance of Maliki’s comments, you need to consider their opposite. Imagine if Maliki had walked in front of the cameras and said, “at this stage, a timetable for withdrawal is unrealistic, and we hope our American friends will not bow to domestic political pressures and be hasty in leaving Iraq just as the country improves.” It would be a transformative moment in this election. John McCain would talk of nothing else. The cable shows would talk of nothing else. Magazines would run thousands of covers about “Obama’s Iraq Problem.” Obama would probably lose the race.

Exactly. And this is what Marc Amibinder has to report:

Via e-mail, a prominent Republican strategist who occasionally provides advice to the McCain campaign said, simply, “We’re fu*ked.”

If McCain loses the foreign policy debate, which is becoming increasingly likely, he’ll have an insurmountable problem on his hands.

Barack Obama sat down with CBS’ Lara Logan Sunday morning for a long interview about his meeting with President Karzai and his vision for American foreign policy. Calling the security situation in Afghanistan “precarious and urgent,” the presumptive Democratic nominee stressed that that country is the real “central front in the war on terror,” and it’s about time we started treating it as such.

 Download | Play   Download | Play 

“The Afghan government needs to do more. But we have to understand that the situation is precarious and urgent here in Afghanistan. And I believe this has to be our central focus, the central front, on our battle against terrorism.”

Full transcript below the fold:

Logan: “Why does it have to be the central focus? What is so critical to U.S. interests here?”

Obama: “This is where they can plan attacks. They have sanctuary here. They are gathering huge amounts of money as a consequence of the drug trade in the region. And so that global network is centered in this area. And I think one of the biggest mistakes we’ve made strategically after 9/11 was to fail to finish the job here, focus our attention here. We got distracted by Iraq.

“And despite what the Bush Administration has argued, I don’t think there’s any doubt that we were distracted from our efforts not only to hunt down al-Qaeda and the Taliban, but also to rebuild this country so that people have confidence that we were to here to stay over the long haul, that we were going to rebuild roads, provide electricity, improve the quality of life for people. And now we have a chance, I think, to correct some of those areas.

“There’s starting to be a broad consensus that it’s time for us to withdraw some of our combat troops out of Iraq, deploy them here in Afghanistan. And I think we have to seize that opportunity. Now’s the time for us to do it.

“I think what’s important for us to do is to begin planning for those brigades now. If we wait until the next administration, it could be a year before we get those additional troops on the ground here in Afghanistan. And I think that would be a mistake. I think the situation is getting urgent enough that we’ve got to start doing something now.

“The United States has to take a regional approach to the problem. Just as we can’t be myopic and focus only on Iraq, we also can’t think that we can solve the security problems here in Afghanistan without engaging the Pakistan government.”

Logan: “And how do you compel Pakistan to act?”

Obama: “Well, you know, I think that the U.S. government provides an awful lot of aid to Pakistan, provides a lot of military support to Pakistan. And to send a clear message to Pakistan that this is important, to them as well as to us, I think that message has not been sent.”

Logan: “Under what circumstances would you authorize unilateral U.S. action against targets inside tribal areas?”

Obama: “What I’ve said is that if we had actionable intelligence against high-value al-Qaeda targets, and the Pakistani government was unwilling to go after those targets, that we should. My hope is that it doesn’t come to that - that in fact, the Pakistan government would recognize that if we had Osama bin Laden in our sights that we should fire or we should capture him.”

Logan: “Isn’t that the case now? I mean, do you really think that if U.S. forces had Osama bin Laden in their sights and the Pakistanis said ‘No,’ that they wouldn’t fire or wouldn’t go after him?”

Obama: “I think actually this is current doctrine. There was some dispute when I said this last August. Both the administration and some of my opponents suggested, ‘Well, you know, you shouldn’t go around saying that.’ But I don’t think there’s any doubt that that should be our policy.”

Logan: “But [not going after him] is the current policy.”

Obama: “I believe it is the current policy.”

Logan: “So there’s no change, then?”

Obama: “I don’t think there’s going to be a change there. I think that in order for us to be successful, it’s not going to be enough just to engage in the occasional shot fired. We’ve got training camps that are growing and multiplying.”

Logan: “Would you take out all those training camps?”

Obama: “Well, I think that what we would like to see the Pakistani government take out those training camps.”

Logan: “And if they won’t?”

Obama: “Well, I think that we’ve got to work with them so they will.”

Logan: “Would you consider unilateral U.S. action?”

Obama: “I will push Pakistan very hard to make sure that we go after those training camps. I think it’s absolutely vital to the security interests for both the United States and Pakistan.” 

Logan: “You do have a situation seven years on into this war where Osama bin Laden and all his lieutenants and all the leaders of the Taliban, they’re still there. They’re inside Pakistan.”

Obama: “It’s a huge problem. First of all, if we hadn’t taken our eye off the ball, we might’ve caught them before they got into Pakistan and were able to reconstitute themselves. So we made a strategic error. And it’s one that we’re going to pay for, and unfortunately the people in Afghanistan have paid for it as well.

“But we now have an opportunity to correct that problem. One of the, if you look at what’s happening right now in Iraq, Prime Minister al-Maliki has indicated he wants a timetable full withdraw. That is the view of the vast majority of Iraqis as well. We’ve seen a quelling of the violence. We haven’t seen as much political progress as needs to be made. But we’re starting to see some efforts on the part of the various factions to deal with some of the issues that are out there.

Logan: “Token efforts at best.”

Obama: “They are token efforts at best. But if we have a timetable and they suddenly see an urgency behind the fact that the American troops are going to be leaving and that they need to get their act together, then this is the perfect moment for us to say, ‘We are going to shift our resources. We’re going to get a couple of more brigades here into Afghanistan. We’re going to be willing to increase our foreign aid to Pakistan.’ In exchange, we’re going to expect that Pakistan takes much more seriously going after al-Qaeda and Taliban base camps on their side of the borders.”

Logan: “What would be a ‘mission accomplished’ for you in Afghanistan?

Obama: “Well, a ‘mission accomplished’ would be that we had stabilized Afghanistan, that the Afghan people are experiencing rising standards of living, that we have made sure that we are disabling al-Qaeda and the Taliban so that they can longer attack Afghanistan, they can no longer engage in attacks against targets of Pakistan, and they can’t target the United States or its allies.”

Logan“Losing is not an option?”

Obama: “Losing is not an option when it comes to al-Qaeda. And it never has been. And that’s why the fact that we engaged in a war of choice when were not yet finished with that task was such a mistake.”

Logan: “Do you believe the war on terror can’t be won if Osama bin Laden is still alive and if he’s still out there?”

Obama: “I think there would be enormous symbolic value in us capturing or killing bin Laden, because I think he’s still a rallying point for Islamic extremists. But I don’t think that by itself is sufficient. I think that we are going to have to be vigilante in dismantling these terrorist networks.”

Logan: “Okay, last question: There is a perception that you lack experience in world affairs.”

Obama: “Right.”

Logan: “Is this trip partly aimed at overcoming that concern, that, you know, there are doubts among some Americans that you could lead the country at war as commander in chief from day one?”

Obama: “You know, the interesting thing is that the people who are very experienced in foreign affairs, I don’t think have those thoughts. The troops that I’ve been meeting with over the last several days, they don’t seem to have those doubts. The objective of this trip was to have substantive discussions with people like President Karzai or Prime Minister Maliki or President Sarkozy or others who I expect to be dealing with over the next eight to ten years.

“It’s important for me to have a relationship with them early, that I start listening to them now, getting a sense of what their interests and concerns are, because one of the shifts in foreign policy that I want to execute as president is giving the world a clear message that America intends to continue to show leadership, but our style of leadership is going to be less unilateral, that we’re going to see our role as building partnerships around the world that are of mutual interest to the parties involved. And I think this gives me a head start in that process.”

Logan: “Do you have any doubts?”

Obama: “Never.” 

Last week, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, chief prosecutor for the International Criminal Court (ICC) filed charges for the first time against a sitting head of state, charging President Omar al-Bashir of Sudan with three counts of genocide, five counts of crimes against humanity and two counts of war crimes. Fareed Zakaria had Sudan’s ambassador to the United Nations on his CNN show, GPS, to discuss the charges, which he called “a joke” and cited the U.S.’ 2002 withdrawal from the ICC treaty as an example of why Sudan does not recognize the court’s authority and will not cooperate with it:

 Download | Play Download | Play

ZAKARIA: Will your government mount a defense in the International Criminal Court?

MOHAMAD: We have no relation with the International Criminal Court. We don’t recognize its authority. We are not going to cooperate with it.

ZAKARIA: But of course, you know that other governments that did not recognize the Criminal Court were still forced to extradite their leaders. I’m thinking of Yugoslavia.

MOHAMAD: No. I don’t care about them. As far as we are concerned, we are not members. We have been told these days repeatedly that the ICC is an independent body. And so, OK, if it’s an independent body, I am not a U.N. organ. We have full right to be part of it or not. And we choose not to be part of it, like the United States. …(full transcript)

Complicating the ICC’s ability to pursue war crimes charges, as referenced in the interview by Sudan’s UN ambassador, is President Bush’s “unsigning” of the International Criminal Court treaty in 2002. Though President Bush has publicly denounced the killings in Sudan as genocide, the administration has soft-pedaled sanctions against the Sudanese government to preserve its extensive intelligence collaboration with Sudan, once a safe haven for bin Laden that has become a crossroads for Islamic militants making their way to Iraq and Pakistan.

The most major impediment to ending the genocide in Darfur has been China’s longstanding diplomatic protection and economic support in return for its access to the 500,000 barrels of oil that Sudan produces daily. China, also not a signatory to the ICC treaty, was revealed in a report about a week ago by the BBC to be in violation of the UN arms embargo there through its export of weapons and training of fighter pilots.

Supporters of Barack Obama who would like to see the United States reembrace the International Criminal Court (ICC) treaty, thereby reaffirming its commitment to human rights, have created a group on the candidate’s website, my.barackobama.com.

Image Source: http://fm-i.org/images/img_teamFMi.jpg

Dave Fleet shares some suggestions for online monitoring of your organization's image, or the buzz around it. He says it's important that before you do anything--such as set up a blog, whatever--that you find out how to track what's going on out there. I see his suggestions as part and parcel of establishing your own Global Communications Center for your school or District. Fleet writes:

Before your organization launches a blog, before you start playing with Facebook, before you even think about Twitter, you should be listening to what people are saying about you.

"Google is managing your identity unless you are," as quoted by Dean Shareski in his Going Global, Going Public. "What digital footprints are existing for you right now? It's not an ego search but to find what others are saying about you." This goes for each of us, but also, for organizations like schools. But it's important we go, as Dean and others share, beyond just tracking our digital footprints, but that of others' footprints when they interact with our organizations.

As an edublogger, this is something I learned while setting up my blog and finding ways to connect with others. However, the tools that are available now are much more comprehensive than what were available when I began. A quick look at Dave's suggestions, and I'm astonished that I'm using most of these approaches already. What I doubt is happening, though, is that school districts and schools are doing this...most of our organizations may very well have a less than active interaction with news and other people out there. Simply publishing your own television show isn't enough when most people thrive online, and most content endures online more than in a broadcast.

I love this quote (Christian Grantham as cited in NewAssignment.net) about ending the "passive relationship with local news" in this blog entry. What catches my attention is that the same tribulations and troubles students, teachers and leaders are going through, well, that's what a lot of folks in the news industry are going through. You could tweak this paragraph easily to reflect the angst among educators:

I love working with people who see the importance of the role the net will play in transforming the way the world gets and interacts with information. I also love working with veterans of news, and I will always remember the challenges they face with the changes that are happening. For some, that change is very difficult. But the fact is, we are no more in the television and newspaper business than Wal-Mart is in the trucking business. Our business is no longer the industry that surrounds distribution – the trucks, the printing press, the reams of paper, the broadcast towers, the satellite dishes, the lights, the huge cameras, the buildings, the “live trucks”…

It’s the final product: information. The market in an on-demand world for news and information where people have to wait to receive a highly produced product is steadily shrinking. At the same time, the online audience for news and information is growing significantly. It’s an exciting time to be working in a new medium that is transforming the way we get information.

How has our "business" in education changed? It's no longer about textbooks, that's for sure and canned ideas. It's about creativity, communication, collaboration. Even as the market shrinks in the news world, in the education world, I find this statement to be as true as it's ever been in education (BTW, the link below includes a Clay Shirky moment in video):

If our information was made freely available and became the building blocks through which other work could be done - we would be the foundation upon which the news and information world is built upon.
Source: DigiDave - Journalism is a Process, Not a Product: Changing the Legal Structure for Digital Journalism

That education is still the foundation--albeit being switfly eroding--is because it is firmly entrenched in a "no market" environment.

Dave points to 4 steps and I've included links to some with sample searches for "mguhlin" in each:

1. Define your keywords
2. Create your searches...some of the tools Dave shares include:
   -GoogleNews
   -GoogleBlogSearch
   -Technorati
   -TwitterSearch (Dave mentions Summize, recently acquired by Twitter.com, and TweetScan)
   -Blogpulse.com
3. Plug the results into your RSS reader OR
4. Collapse all the results RSS feeds into a service like AideRSS.com (I've included a list of Tools4RSS here)

One additional type of tool that I'd add to Dave's list includes Social Bookmarking sites. The idea comes to me from a presentation Alan November did in China (Learning2.0 Conference) where an audience member suggested using Del.icio.us as another search tool in lieu or addition to regular search engines. 3 skills November says aren't taught in schools include:

1. Teaching students to deal with massive quantities of information (pattern-making, organizing patterns for information)
2. Global Communication skills/global communication, as well as checking sources with people on the ground
3. Self-directed, lifelong learning

What's neat about becoming your own "global communications center" is that you can teach students these skills as you're setting up your classroom web site. Imagine what would have happened if Bob Sprankle and Darren Kuropatwa had set these tools (if they'd been available) BEFORE they started blogging with their students. Wouldn't it have been awesome to capture the feedback flowing in from all over the world, including traditional and participatory reporting?

WHAT ABOUT SOCIAL BOOKMARKING SITES?
It would definitely be fun to know how many folks are bookmarking what you're doing, and you can also subscribe to the RSS feed of results. To accomplish that, you'll probably need to use Page2Rss.com--a tool someone told me about but a week or two ago (speak up if you're out there!). Neither Diigo or Delicious, as far as I can see, support RSS for search results. So, with that caveat in mind, to the list, I'm adding these two:

• Diigo.com - RSS wasn't available via Page2Rss.com since Diigo timed out.
• Del.icio.us - RSS

OTHER TOOLS
A few other tools worth checking out include these:

• IceRocket.com - RSS
• Teoma.com
• Spy ...lacks an RSS feed but you can get one with Page2RSS (not sure yet how well it works). Lets you know what's going on in Twitter, FriendFeed, Blogs, and Google Reader.

Though I had some of these items setup (Technorati, TwitterSearch) I didn't have all of them setup. As a result, I discovered some new blog entries out there--and new blogs I wasn't reading--writing about what I'd written. Nice to be in touch!

GLOBAL COMMUNICATIONS CENTER
You know, I hadn't ever thought of myself--or the work the Communications Dept in a school district--does as Global Communications. But, that is exactly what we're doing with Read/Write Web tools. And, that is the challenge facing districts as well as journalists. We are caught up in a "citizen" journalism, teacher communicator.

"Should learning professionals be leading the charge around new work literacies such as social media and informal learning?" Good question. My answer: yes. Because everyone should be. Tucker writes, "my responsibility is to work on my own sphere of influence, starting with our online course development team leading by example for our facilitators." Christy Tucker, Experiencing E-Learning
Source: As commented on and cited by Stephen Downes

How are YOU setting up your Global Communications Center? How are YOU leading the charge? The answer to this question is a lot easier than taking this position:

Al Gore said: "We have to abandon the conceit that isolated personal actions are going to solve this crisis. Our policies have to shift." He was talking about global climate change but he might as well have been talking about our attempts to transition schools into the 21st century…
Source: Our Policies have to Shift, Dr. Scott McLeod, Dangerously Irrelevant

Compare that approach--abandoning the conceit that isolated personal actions are going to solve the crisis in education, or journalism--to this one from Pete Reilly (EdTech Journeys) with his tale of Gandhi's decision to not offer advice unless he was living by it himself.

  David Iglesias, one of the eight US Attorneys forced out of their jobs by the Bush administration for failing to pursue bogus politically-motivated prosecutions, appeared on “Morning Joe” Friday to promote his new book, In Justice, and offered his thoughts on why Karl Rove ignored a Congressional subpoena and skipped town in order to avoid testifying.

 Download | Play   Download | Play 

“Which I believe is the reason why he is refusing to testify in front of the Congress. He has information that I believe would show illegal activity, interfering with ongoing federal criminal investigations. So Rove is not testifying I think basically to keep himself from being indicted.”

Remember to watch Robert Greenwald’s latest video and sign the petition demanding Karl Rove be held accountable.

In what's billed as a great year for Democrats, their candidate for president has a big problem. Less than half of Americans think Barack Obama would be a good commander in chief. Almost three-fourths say that about John McCain. Also, Obama in Jordan, and the accused mastermind of genocide in Serbia has been arrested after thirteen years on the run.

All right, everybody. The movie made millions this weekend, I haven’t heard a complaint yet, and iFanboy has given it a glowing review from the (usually harsher on comic adaptions) comic book crowd, so what did you think? I’m sure half of you ran out to see it, and I’m dying to hear more raves to get my pumped for hopefully seeing sometime this week.

If you DID go see The Dark Knight this weekend, be sure to throw your movie reviews in MovieToday group, and enjoy iFanboy’s review:

If you would like to suggest a video to be featured on our blog, feel free to send me a message, use our forums, or just comment on this post.

  Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Admiral Mike Mullen, appeared on FOX today and delivered a message that’s sure to upset Bill Kristol and the rest of the neocon armchair generals.

 Download | Play   Download | Play (h/t Dan)

WALLACE: I want to ask you two questions about Iran. How do you weigh as a military man, as the top military man, the downside risk if either the U.S. or Israel were to militarily strike Iran in terms of blowback from Iran and its allies in the region, increased turmoil in that area, increased turmoil in the oil market?

MULLEN: I think it would be significant. I worry about it a lot. I’ve said when I’ve been asked this before right now I’m fighting two wars, and I don’t need a third one. […]

But I worry about the instability in that part of the world and, in fact, the possible unintended consequences of a strike like that and, in fact, having an impact throughout the region that would be difficult to both predict exactly what it would be and then the actions that we would have to take to contain it.

We saw a great post by John Grohol at PsychCentral called Distracted While Driving. He really caught our attention with one thought. We allow ourselves to be distracted while we drive because we think we’re playing a race against time. In reality, we’re playing against the odds.

A study by Virginia Tech Transportation Institute and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration found that about 80 percent of all crashes and 65 percent of all near-crashes involved someone who was distracted within three seconds of the event. 

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I plead guilty as charged. I have to admit to using my car as a roaming second office. I store up phone messages and return calls while I’m on the road. .

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I’m in the car on a busy, busy day with all these things rolling through my mind. That’s one of the distractions that we often don’t take into account. I zone out … I don’t really pay attention like I should. I’m in my own world. .

.

Psychologists have identified four types of distractions, according to Grohol’s article.

• Visual … checking out an accident or looking at a billboard

• Audible … cell phone calls, the radio, or another person talking

• Physical … eating, flipping the dial, shuffling your iPod, or putting on make-up

• Cognitive … daydreaming, thinking about other things in your life

Of course, a lot of distractions are multi-faceted. For example, talking on your cell phone includes three of these – audible, physical, and cognitive.

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I really do think it saves time. We have a friend who consults with us. He talks to us when he’s on his hour-and-a-half commute home. I can understand why you would use your phone when you have that long drive.

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I won’t dispute that at all, but I now realize more than ever that I have to recognize the odds of something happening and take measures to try to minimize the distractions.

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Changes we plan to make

• Leave earlier. When we have a lengthy trip, we usually don’t give ourselves the time to stop and eat. We gas, grab, and go … eating on the road. Leaving earlier will allow us time to stop and eat. We’ll probably eat healthier, too!

• Ignore the phone. Granted, that’s a hard thing to do. So we’re going to turn our ringers off when we’re only going to be in the car for a short time.

• Change our greetings. If we’re expecting an important call, we’ll change the greeting to let them know when we will be checking our messages.

• Pull over (if we can). For those rare situations where we have to take the call, we’ll stop driving momentarily.

What's your biggest distraction while driving? 

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Ah…Holy Joe Lieberman.  As reliable as the proverbial broken clock, and just as correct.  On FOXNews Sunday, Joe Lieberman played coy on whether he would pull a Zell Miller and appear at the Republican National Convention.  

 Download | Play   Download | Play   (h/t Dan @ PoliticsTV)

WALLACE:  If you’re asked, will you?

LIEBERMAN:  If John asks me, and he thinks I can help him, because I believe this is no ordinary time, no ordinary election, John McCain is no ordinary candidate.  I want to help him.  I’m not going to go to attack Barack Obama.  I’m going to go to explain why I as an Independent Democrat am supporting John McCain, hoping that I can convince other Independents and Democrats to join me in choosing the man who is clearly more ready to be the President America needs today.

Okay, whatever, Joe.  I hear words coming out of your mouth, but what do they mean?  Independent Democrat?  No ordinary election?  More ready to be President?  That America needs today?   Meaningless platitudes, Lie-berman.  But none so meaningless as that statement “I’m not going to attack Barack Obama” because it takes nothing for you to start spouting off those RNC-crafted talking points to attack Obama.

 Download | Play    Download | Play

LIEBERMAN: If Barack Obama’s policy in Iraq had been implemented, he couldn’t be able to be in Iraq today. It’s because he was prepared to accept “retreat and defeat” and that would mean today, al Qaeda would be in charge of parts of Iraq, Iranian-backed extremists would be in charge of other parts of Iraq, there’d be civil war and maybe even genocide. And the fact is, we’re winning in Iraq today. And you know, you can’t choose as Sen. Obama seems to think, to lose in Iraq so you can win in Afghanistan. The reality is if we lost in Iraq-which Obama was prepared to do-we would go to Afghanistan as losers and instead, al Qaeda has its tail tucked between its legs as it’s exiting Iraq to go to try to [crosstalk-unintelligible] into Afghanistan.  

What color is the sky in your world, Joe?  Because I’m pretty sure you’re talking from some parallel reality.  If Barack Obama’s initial policy in Iraq (opposing invasion) would have been implemented, we wouldn’t have gone into Iraq at all.  His current policy of a measured withdrawal is the one favored by the Iraqi government.  So are you saying that listening to the democratic government we propped up helped establish is “retreat and defeat”?  And I don’t know how to break this to you, Joe, but if we hadn’t gone into Iraq, there’d be no opportunity for al Qaeda to establish any foothold in Iraq, much less control a section of it.  And the Iranian-backed sector?  They’re called the Shi’a.  They’re the ones in charge now that we got rid of the more secular Sunni government of Saddam Hussein, you freakin’ idiot.  Not to mention there IS a civil war and with more than a million Iraqis dead and 3 million refugees, I’d say there’s a genocide going on as well.

But this is what Joe Lieberman thinks is “winning” in Iraq and sending al Qaeda running with “its tail between its legs.”  Riiigggghtt.

Don’t miss where Evan Bayh rightfully shoots down these BizarroWorld talking points with a little injection of reality and both Lieberman and Wallace race to interrrupt and shut him down.  Can’t let those Fox viewers be informed.

Transcripts below the fold:

Clip 1:

WALLACE: Real quickly, are you going to speak at the Republican Convention?

LIEBERMAN: Uh, I don’t know yet.

WALLACE: If you’re asked, will you?

LIEBERMAN: If John asks me, and he thinks I can help him, because I believe this is no ordinary time, no ordinary election, John McCain is no ordinary candidate. I want to help him. I’m not going to go to attack Barack Obama. I’m going to go to explain why I as an Independent Democrat am supporting John McCain, hoping that I can convince other Independents and Democrats to join me in choosing the man who is clearly more ready to be the President America needs today.

WALLACE: Even if that means the Senate Democrats would kick you out of their caucus?

LIEBERMAN: Well, I’m following the model of John McCain. I’m going to do what I think is right for the country and not worry about the politics and John McCain is definitely right for the country as our next President.

Clip 2:

LIEBERMAN: If Barack Obama’s policy in Iraq had been implemented, he couldn’t be able to be in Iraq today. It’s because he was prepared to accept “retreat and defeat” and that would mean today, al Qaeda would be in charge of parts of Iraq, Iranian-backed extremists would be in charge of other parts of Iraq, there’d be civil war and maybe even genocide. And the fact is, we’re winning in Iraq today. And you know, you can’t choose as Sen. Obama seems to think, to lose in Iraq so you can win in Afghanistan. The reality is if we lost in Iraq-which Obama was prepared to do-we would go to Afghanistan as losers and instead, al Qaeda has its tail tucked between its legs as it’s exiting Iraq to go to try to [crosstalk-unintelligible] into Afghanistan.

BAYH: I have to respond to that. Barack Obama was not for “losing” in Iraq. Barack didn’t want the war to begin with. John McCain opposed surging troops in Afghanistan till last week. [Lieberman interrupts] Joe, excuse me. Was John for losing in Afghanistan? I don’t think so. And now you have Maliki, even President Bush, are moving towards Barack Obama’s position. His judgment [crosstalk] was right…

WALLACE: Gentleman, I want to…we could continue this…

LIEBERMAN: Bottom line, no question Barack Obama was prepared to lose in Iraq. [crosstalk]

BAYH: That’s not true…

LIEBERMAN: Whether it was right or wrong…

WALLACE: Gentleman, you’re going to have to agree to disagree. I want to move on to the whole issue of his trip this week…

  Download | Play  Download | Play  (h/t Heather)

Somewhere in the darkest recesses of the RNC (or from Norquist’s or Rove’s office, your pick) the fax machine was working over time making sure that Tom Brokaw had the latest GOP talking points to discredit Al Gore for his appearance on Meet the Press.  You know Al, that over-achiever that managed to win an Oscar, an Emmy, a Nobel Peace Prize and legitimately the office of the Presidency before the Supreme Court overreached and gave it to George W. Bush, the lifetime underachiever.  That kind of superiority niggles at a party that believes that government can’t do anything well, so they’ll find anything–and I do mean anything–to detract from Al Gore’s message.

This one is especially laughable though, and truly beneath Brokaw in its clear partisan bent.  When the “Draft Al Gore” movement was in full gear, Gore demurred from running again, saying that he wasn’t interested in the political gamesmanship necessary to mount a campaign.  Tom Brokaw confronts Gore, worried that he’s sending the wrong message to the children: 

BROKAW: Let me ask you about your attitude towards politics these days. I was a little surprised. You’re a man who was in politics at the highest level in this country: in the House of Representatives; in the Senate; Vice President for eight years and yet you said recently, “What politics has become requires a level of tolerance for triviality and artifice and nonsense that I have found in short supply.” Is that the right kind of signal to send to the young people of this country who more than any time in recent memory are deeply involved in the political decisions that we’re making this year? And young people who want to get into the political arena look to Al Gore and he said ‘it’s all about trivia and nonsense.’ 

Oh good lord.  That’s so head-poundingly stupid that I’m surprised that Al Gore took the time to respectfully respond.  My first inclination would have been to laugh in Brokaw’s face and point out that those kinds of questions are exactly the kind of triviality and nonsense I have little tolerance for.  But it gets worse.  Gore’s response merits the concern troll follow up of “but I can hear Rush Limbaugh saying this about you…”

 

BROKAW: With all due respect, Mr. Vice President, I can already hear your critics and I don’t do Rush Limbaugh, so I will not attempt to. But I can hear him saying on radio, “Well there’s Prince Albert. There he was, 25 years hanging out with lobbyists, raising big money, then he lost and now he’s above the process, calling it trivial and nonsense.”

Tom Brokaw = Concern Troll.  Gore goes on to encourage Americans to be on the forefront of alternative energy development and to raise awareness of the ramifications to our environment if we don’t and Tom Brokaw–elder statesman of NBC News–wants him to be worried about Rush Limbaugh poking fun at him.

Transcripts below the fold

BROKAW: Let me ask you about your attitude towards politics these days. I was a little surprised. You’re a man who was in politics at the highest level in this country: in the House of Representatives; in the Senate; Vice President for eight years and yet you said recently, “What politics has become requires a level of tolerance for triviality and artifice and nonsense that I have found in short supply.” Is that the right kind of signal to send to the young people of this country who more than any time in recent memory are deeply involved in the political decisions that we’re making this year. And young people who want to get into the political arena look to Al Gore and he said ‘it’s all about trivia and nonsense.’

GORE: Well, no….I…that quote you used was about my own personal tolerance for…bear in mind, I was in the political process for almost 30 years. And I…no, I encourage people to get involved in politics. Public service is an honorable calling and I’m very excited by the way, about the fact that millions of young people that haven’t been involved in the past are now getting involved, many of them for Senator Obama, of course. And I think that’s exciting. I do think, Tom, that we have a very serious set of problems affecting our democracy. The role of big money, the role of lobbyists, the role of special interests, it’s a very serious problem for our democracy. I think the new internet-based forms of organizing and mobilizing people and that’s what has gotten a lot of these young people involved offer a real ray of hope. I’m optimistic, but I think my best role is to try to help that…bring…come to pass and to focus on enlarging the political space so that we can start focusing on real solutions and not these gimmicks.

BROKAW: With all due respect, Mr. Vice President, I can already hear your critics and I don’t do Rush Limbaugh, so I will not attempt to. But I can hear him saying on radio, “Well there’s Prince Albert. There he was, 25 years hanging out with lobbyists, raising big money, then he lost and now he’s above the process, calling it trivial and nonsense.”

GORE: I’m not saying that I’m above the process. I was in it for a long time. When I first was elected 32 years ago, I called for full public financing of every federal election. I introduced legislation and proposed that every year…

BROKAW: And your guy Obama has turned it down…He said he was for public financing and now he’s decided to stay in the private sector.

GORE: There’s a new reality now with the internet-based small donor playing the dominant role. And I think that’s another example of how the internet has helped to bring about some positive changes that can give us a way to break the back of the special interests dominance that we have in government today.

Ever since Dean Shareski showed me his Sony GC1 Net-Sharing Cam (along with some other, similarly priced cameras) at NECC 2008 several weeks ago I’ve aspired to add a camera like this to my digital backpack. Yesterday at our local Ultimate Electronics store in Oklahoma City, I found a Sony GC1 display model for sale without a box, manual, cables or charger, for just $50. This was too good of a bargain to pass up.

Much to my delight, I’ve found the GC1 to be a joy to use today, and am only disappointed that this model has been discontinued by Sony and is no longer available for purchase. (Unless you buy one used or happen upon a remaining demo model, as I did yesterday.) I thought I would have to buy an AC charger from Sony or Radio Shack, but it turns out the same standard USB cable which is used to transfer photos and video from the camera can also be used to charge it. Sweet! Since I had a USB cable already, along with a 4 GB Sony memory card I picked up on sale in March at a ridiculously low price, I really don’t need anything else to fully utilize and enjoy the GC1.

Dean wrote the the post “Sony Net-Sharing Camcorder Review” back in January, and more recently (in June right before NECC) the post “Comparing little video cameras.” Generally cameras in this category cost $150 to $200, so picking one up for $50 really was a great deal. In his most recent post, Dean observed “The Sony definitely does not play nice with the Mac,” but this was not my impression. I wasn’t able to use the GC1 as a webcam with QuickTime Pro or Ustream, but it did mount fine on my Macbook’s desktop and allowed me to drag both 5 megapixel images as well as 320×240 MP4 videos right onto my hard drive where I uploaded them readily. This is the first “little video camera” I’ve ever used like this before, however, so my frame of comparison reference is admittedly more limited than Dean’s. If what I’ve experienced today is limited functionality, however, I can’t wait to see what a more fully featured camera will offer!

We recorded some short videos in the “Tinkering Garage” at the Oklahoma City Science museum today. I posted several to Flickr, since videos less than 90 seconds can be posted and shared there, and was very pleased with how fast and relatively painless this process was.

I also attempted to email a video up to a .Mac gallery I setup previously with iPhoto, but apparently that video is still being processed as it hasn’t shown up for me yet in the gallery.

Some of the initial reviews of the Sony GC1 were less than enthusiastic last fall when this pocket camcorder first came out, and perhaps that is the reason Sony has discontinued it. I think the functionality and ease-of-use of this type of digital camera and camcorder is amazing, however, and I look forward to both using it more in the future as well as learning about other camera / pocket camcorder options like this which we may be able to start utilizing as standard equipment in the digital backpacks provided to participants in our Celebrate Oklahoma Voices oral history / digital storytelling project.

Of course, many cell phones now offer photo and video recording functionality which can rival pocket camcorders like the GC1. I do like the fact that the native recording format is MP4, and that I can record in 640×480 video resolution at 30 fps if desired. (The default setting is 320×240 at 30 fps.) Pocket camcorders like these are sure to provide continuing challenges for the ethical and responsible uses of digital technologies in our schools and communities. We need to be talking about digital citizenship much more than we currently are in many schools and classrooms.

Have you had positive or negative experiences with pocket camcorders? Do you have a model you recommend?

Technorati Tags:
video, camcorder, record, pocket, sony, gc1, school, citizenship

On Hardball today, Matthews talked about Obama’s excellent interaction with the military in Afghanistan and Iraq. The Politico’s Roger Simon, a Villager extraordinaire said that the middle east trip is going swimmingly so far. Andrea Mitchell did confirm that Maliki indeed backed Obama on his Iraq plans because he brought up Obama’s name by himself in his interview over the weekend earlier in the interview, but then she said a very odd thing about his “message management” as some footage of Obama played in the background on MSNBC.

  Download | Play  Download | Play (h/t Heather)

Andrea: Let me say something about his message management. He didn’t have reporters with him. He didn’t have a press pool. He didn’t do a press conference while he  was on the ground either on Afghanistan or Iraq. What you’re seeing is not reporters brought in, you’re seeing selected pictures taken by the military, questioned by the military and what some would call fake interviews because they’re not interviews with a journalist so there’s a real press issue here. Politically it’s smart as can be, but we’ve not seen a Presidential candidate do this in my recollection ever before.

I don’t think journalism is the prime thing that we recruit them and pay them for.

She was upset because she wasn’t “present” during these interviews. You mean you weren’t able to get a gotcha moment? When she says “what some would call” I guess she means herself. Will Andrea go on a limb and say every interview on FOX News is not legitimate when Cheney, Bush or McCain appear? How about when she joins O’Reilly? Or when someone is interviewed on a blog? The Daily Show has some very interesting interviews, does that not count? Is the military not capable of performing interviews? Where does she draw the line? Saying they are “fake interviews” really goes too far. I’ve emailed Obama’s campaign for a response.

  Download | Play  Download | Play  (h/t Heather)

We’ve long since documented the desperate lengths that John McCain is willing to go to win the office of the Presidency, even to the point of hiring the same people responsible for those whisper campaigns in 2000 that he might be a little off his rocker from his years as a POW and that he fathered an illegitimate black baby.  Chris Matthews seems a little surprised that John McCain is actually seeking to win the election.  Not sure what Chris thinks McCain’s been doing for the last 18 months, but it’s Howard Fineman who gives the real answer to the $64,000 question.  The White House wants McCain to win because they know there would be no accountability for all their criminal acts with another Republican in office.

FINEMAN: If you’re in this White House, you want another Republican administration to follow. You don’t want a Democratic administration coming in there while the evidence is still fresh, so to speak. To look at it the way…

MATTHEWS: With the subpoena power…

FINEMAN: With the subpoena power and looking through all the records and looking at all the decisions that were made. You want to cover over your two terms with a third term the way Ronald Reagan did with George HW Bush.

All of which is undoubtedly true, and one can only hope that there might be a depressingly rare accountability moment coming from a Democratic White House (although nothing about the current Democratic majority would lead us to believe they have the fortitude to pursue it).  But the thing that chaps my hide is the tacit admission by Fineman that the Bush administration would have stuff to hide.  Not that they don’t…we’ve been saying so since the beginning of C&L, but that after years and years of having Fineman and Co. make excuses for the Bush administration and be content to regurgitate their talking points (just as Kelly O’Donnell unapologetically does in this clip), NOW Fineman admits it as if it’s been common knowledge all along. 

Transcripts below the fold

MATTHEWS: As we’ve said, President Bush and John McCain have had a chilly relationship at best. Things turned arctic after that brutal primary fight back in 2000 and while they warmed up a bit in recent years, few people believe Bush and McCain are close friends. But the president and some of his former staffers are working hard to get their former rival elected. No surprise there. Getting another Republican in there would be Bush’s best hope to carry on, even bulk up his legacy. Here’s Bush back in March when he made it plain that he wants McCain there to continue his foreign policy.
[video]

BUSH: John McCain will find out when he takes the oath of office his most important responsibility is to protect the American people from harm. And there’s still an enemy that lurks. An enemy that wants to strike us. And this country better have somebody in that Oval Office who understands the stakes. And John McCain understands those stakes.

[end video]
MATTHEWS: So Kelly, they’re not ready to turn the ball over to the other side, see how well they can play it, huh?

O’DONNELL: Well the President would certainly like to continue that idea of offense as a part of foreign diplomacy, which is something that John McCain talks about a lot. Where McCain does differ is he is more open to some of the diplomatic negotiations that you hear so much from Barack Obama. Different than Obama, but I think McCain does have a slightly different view on foreign policy than the President.

MATTHEWS: Again, Karl Rove is hovering over this campaign. Steve Schmidt, one of his former people… associates is in there running the campaign now. Now it looks to me like they want to win.

RATHER: They want to win and John McCain wants to win. Because he has bought in to the Rovian strategy for this next election and why wouldn’t he? Karl Rove ran two brilliant campaigns for president. However, that could cost him on the other side, because on the one hand he’s trying to say, ‘you know, what…I’m not Bush III’ on the other hand, he’s having Bush’s operatives run the campaign for him.

O’DONNELL: Obviously top Republican operatives have worked for the Bush/Cheney era. But Schmidt would be the first to tell you he’s an Arnold Schwarzenegger man. He ran his re-election campaign, helped him to win coming back from a big deficit. So even this new guy whose sort of running this organization is not as tied to President Bush and Vice President Cheney as you might think.

MATTHEWS: I’m looking at Rove here, over this whole campaign, not just Schmidt, but Rove. I wonder if the polarizing, partisan way that the Bush campaign put his whole operation together the last two terms isn’t going to invade and perhaps hurt the McCain effort. ‘

TUCKER: Well, remember Rove worries about his legacy too. Just a little while ago, he was thought of one of the most brilliant political strategists of a generation. But more recently he’s been looking like the guy who has diminished the Republican brand.

MATTHEWS: Yeah.

TUCKER: So he wants McCain to win not just for Bush’s sake, but for Rove’s sake as well.

MATTHEWS: Yeah, he’s was five feet ahead of the Special Prosecuter, let’s not forget that, in the leak case.

FINEMAN: Yeah. That’s part of it too. First of all, belief matters here. Bush and McCain agree on Iraq…

MATTHEWS: Right.

FINEMAN: …Which is a big deal. One of the biggest, most consequential decisions any president ever made. So there’s belief. There’s also fear. If you’re in this White House, you want another Republican administration to follow. You don’t want a Democratic administration coming in there while the evidence is still fresh, so to speak. To look at it the way…

MATTHEWS: With the subpoena power…

FINEMAN: With the subpoena power and looking through all the records and looking at all the decisions that were made. You want to cover over your two terms with a third term the way Ronald Reagan did with George HW Bush.

MATTHEWS: Yeah…