Maybe some online organizing before November in addition to that diner canvassing?

Some advice, perhaps, for Obama and McCain as they squabble over the Middle East this week.

There’s lots of chatter that McCain might announce a VP pick this week. Whether or not that’s likely, the vice presidential betting steamed up recently, centering on Mitt Romney or Bobby Jindal. Jindal backers will be sad to know that he just announced he won’t be McCain’s running mate.

Chris Beer certainly won’t be a happy man tonight. He’s 26, and after living all over the world is now in Fairfax City, Virginia. He feels he was “born to be a Republican.” Almost two months ago, he was already fixated on Bobby Jindal — as complement to McCain and adversary to Obama (thanks, Misa Dayson).

Jindal has accomplished more in his 36 years on Earth than nearly every member of the US Senate, and certainly moreso than the do-nothing junior senator from Illinois. While Obama speaks of change in our politics, Jindal has lived it. […]

Jindal compliments McCain in every way, while remaining reformers. Where McCain is old, Jindal is young; where McCain is a maverick, Jindal is a dedicated conservative; where McCain is Protestant, Jindal is Catholic; where McCain is strong on foreign policy, Jindal has mastered domestic policy; and finally where McCain attracts moderates, Jindal will fire up conservatives because they will be making him the next nominee. Most importantly, Jindal is all the best conservative politician in the country. He’s proven, a real conservative, and he fosters an excitement and optimism in Republicans that we really need right now.

Patrick Ruffini, one of the founders of the probutcool group blog The Next Right, is an online political strategist in the DC area who knows politics from the inside and as an observer. He’s puzzled by Romney’s apparent willingness to take the VP slot. Ruffini explains that Romney shouldn’t want it because VPs — especially if they end up on a losing ticket — rarely get elected president. He wonders whether Romney might be faking his enthusiasm:

[I]t can be quite advantageous to be talked about as a potential Vice President without getting the nod. VP buzz is what separates promising future candidates from the pack of senators and governors. […]

VP buzz gets Romney headlines and speaking engagements around the country without being overshadowed and having to share in the downsides of an uphill Presidential campaign. But it’s still unlikely he would get picked because of the questionable personal chemistry between the two men, and Romney has to know this. But as a high level surrogate, Romney gets to travel around the country making the case for McCain better than McCain himself and leaving the base hungry for more.

Best case scenario: After November people say “If only McCain had picked Romney…”

Shay from Chicago, who blogs at Booker Rising (where the platform is “fiscally conservative, socially moderate, and foreign policy moderate”), appears to be an undecided voter. She says the VP candidates will be a “big factor” in her vote:

Picking Mr. Romney would probably excite conservative Republicans, but it wouldn’t excite this moderate-conservative independent. However, Romney is not a hell-no pick for me, like picking Mike Huckabee would be for me. Announcing his VP pick while Sen. Obama is overseas ain’t gonna help Sen. McCain, because the mainstream media overall is so in the tank for Obama. Sen. McCain should wait. My top VP pick for Sen. McCain would be Gen. Colin Powell, but that ain’t gonna happen.

Orange and Blue from a “little corner of heaven” in central Florida goes for the dark horse. He thinks it’ll be Tim Pawlenty, governor of Minnesota. His reasoning? The “conventional wisdom that McCain’s candidacy hinges on his running mate selection.” Orange and Blue singles out three main reasons for this: McCain’s age, his failure to rally the conservative base, and his lack of executive experience.

Picking Pawlenty would answer all these criticisms. He’s young (for a politician of his caliber). He’s a CONSISTENT conservative. And, he’s done a great job picking-up the pieces up in Minnesota since Jesse “The Body” Ventura left the governor’s mansion in St. Paul.

Add to that the fact that the GOP convention is being held up there this go-round, and you’ve got all the key ingredients.

Do you think McCain will be maverick-y on this one?

[catheadsix / Flickr]

What is this saying? That they’re all actors? That they’re all — or aim be — as American as the stars & stripes and Monroe and Campbell’s soup?

[Moltron 3030 / Flickr]

DottComments lives in Louisville, Kentucky, likes the Rolling Stones, and apparently needs nitrous oxide when she gets her teeth cleaned. She says, “I promised I would support and work for Barack Obama so this is what my car bumper looks like today”:

[dotcomments / Flickr]

Work for Obama perhaps, but not without showing that he’s her second choice.

You ready to give up your video-game time?

Political Lizard would like you to know that John McCain’s recent trips abroad didn’t generate anything like the media circus that will soon surround Obama in Europe and the Middle East. Obama will be shadowed by all three nightly news anchors: Katie Couric, Brian Williams, and Charlie Gibson. Political Lizard believes this confirms that mainstream media is “in the tank” for Barack (thanks, Sarolta Cump):

It is guaranteed to be a grotesque display of Obama idolatry masquerading as journalism. Katie, Brian, and Charlie are all tingly in anticipation of the large crowds they are sure will be there to greet the magnificent Obama at every stop. With backdrops in historic locales and adoring audiences, each of the three masters of vapidity are ready to kick their bias into full gear in order to make sure that all Americans know just how much their favorite candidate is loved overseas. […]

What we are seeing here is nothing less than the three anchors becoming active participants in the Obama campaign. They have decided to travel with their candidate in an effort to promote him on a global scale, and in doing so, they use their networks as a vehicle to provide free campaign ads for Obama.

Of course media scrutiny can be a huge liability, too.

This is a sidebar to Ann’s post about evangelical Christians who think religion and politics may be oil and water. RDemocrat blogs at BlueGrassRoots with other Kentucky Democrats. A Christian who believes firmly that religion and politics shouldn’t mix, s/he was upset to see — in Jeremiah Wright and Michael Pfleger — Democrats using the pulpit politically (thanks, Misa Dayson):

Why are Democrats so openly and unapoligetically preaching politics, and slandering other Democrats in a church? Shouldn’t this forum be used to celebrate Christ, his life, and his teachings, and not press a political view?

[…] [W]hether you agree with me or not, at least I am consistent. I thought it was terrible when churches in the last two Presidential elections told their congregations to vote for Bush, and I think it is just as bad when Democrats drag politics into the house of God.

Dennis, a commenter on RDemocrat’s post, agrees that preachers shouldn’t tell you who to vote for but feels that social and political issues come up naturally in church and that the “problem comes when preachers cross the line between issues and candidates.”

[jeremydoty / Flickr]

According to violetjules, Taiwan also “loves and is constantly inspired by Obama.” Some quick googling didn’t turn up much to confirm or deny this (though this piece looked promising, but the download seems to be dysfunctional). In any case, this banner in Taipei says, according to violetjules, “let Obama show you English’s charm.” (Thanks, James Mills.)

[violetjules / Flickr]

Would you bet that the banner has increased or decreased enrollment?

In the United Saints of America, who do you think are the saints?

It is frequently remarked that politics makes strange bedfellows. Well, last week New Yorker editor David Remnick and Ron Paul Twin Rebekah, two media figures who would be hard pressed to have less in common, found themselves in similar positions. Both Remnick and Rebekah were called out to explain their respective satire about the Obama campaign.

Remnick went on record with the Huffington Post to explain that, no, the cartoon on the magazine’s cover (you know the one) was not intended literally. He elaborated: “The fact is, it’s not a satire about Obama - it’s a satire about the distortions and misconceptions and prejudices about Obama.”

A few weeks earlier, Rebekah had uploaded a video in which she took on the persona of a witless Obama supporter. Known to her YouTube followers for her devotion to Ron Paul, she claimed to support Obama after Paul’s withdrawal from the race for a variety of (progressively funnier) reasons:

Rebekah was inundated with emails over her hypocrisy. Baffled at the failure of her humor to carry, she got back in front of the camera to assure her fans that she does not support Obama:

It would seem that Rebekah’s and Remnick’s facetious sensibilities backfired on them in what is, apparently, a rather sensitive political climate. It was a tough week in political satire, but in the end The New Yorker has all due respect for Obama, and Rebekah supports the Constitution Party candidate.

[Ann Raber is a BallotVox co-curator.]

Evangelicals just might be the known-unknowns of this election. How will these traditionally Republican voters cast their ballots in November? It’s always been assumed that their beliefs on hot-button issues like homosexual marriage and abortion dictate their votes. This year things might be different.

We got some insight from two evangelical Christians who are thinking hard about new trends in evangelical politics — and whether laws, legislation, and political influence are the answer to their prayers after all.

Back in June, Greg Alterton of the blog Render Unto God wrote about faith and American conservatism. Citing recent books and articles, Greg says he has “the distinct impression there are seismic shifts going on in the political perspective of evangelicals.” He feels the leaders of the Christian right are concerned that evangelicals will not support John McCain — not only because he doesn’t represent religious causes but because evangelicals are starting to care about new issues:

[A]n increasing number of evangelical Christians have voiced dissatisfaction equating abortion, gays, and guns as the sum total of Christian social concern. Many are expressing the need to address issues of poverty, health care needs, stewardship of the environment, humanitarian efforts in Africa and Asia, opposition to war, to name a few, as consistent with their concern as Christians.

Greg also points out that socially conservative leaders in all branches of government did little to uphold the social values that are important to him and most evangelicals:

As recently as this spring, I was still maintaining that the election of a conservative president was important for no other reason than to continue to shape the philosophy of the federal judiciary. But then came the California Supreme Court’s 4-3 decision to give legal sanction to homosexual marriage. Three of the justices who voted for the decision were appointed by Republican governors, so the idea that Republican-appointed justices can hold back social changes reflective of an ever-increasing post-Christian consensus in society is a vain hope.

Tim Dando blogs on the site LDS & Evangelical Conversations as the evangelical Christian in the conversation. He thinks homosexual marriage will remain a decisive issue in California because of the proposed amendment to the state’s constitution to define marriage as a union between a man and a woman. He’s unconvinced, however, that laws about homosexuality will be the source of social change:

Whether or not any kind of marriage amendment is passed on the state or national level, I’m confident those are short term stop gaps and we’ll eventually be overturned by a younger generation. As we move forward I think what’s important for us is to be vigilant in emphasizing what we are for rather than what we are against (grace and redemption at the top of the list). We should avoid making sex a political issue and making our churches appear to be voting blocks.

Greg agrees with Tim that politics may not be the right place for evangelicals to focus their energy:

[T]he truly revolutionary thing in 2008 isn’t for evangelicals to jump the fence and consider voting for a reasonable liberal, but to look at the futility of politics in general, and to apply the walk of faith to addressing human needs outside the realm of politics. Politics, like the poor and rumors of war, will always be with us, but the growing challenge is to consider that politics is not the end-all/be-all, and wasn’t even within Jesus’ consideration when addressing the needs and pain of a failing world.

[…] Most of the issues we face in our society are spiritual in nature. Conservative Christians have failed over the past generation to reverse the trends in an increasingly secular society precisely because they have tried to respond to these trends through politics. It’s well past time for Bible-believing, Christ-devoted believers to consider what spiritual resources they have in Christ, and begin applying those resources to the challenges in our society.

Amen.

Wobbly. But powerful.

Nationally, immigration takes a backseat to a bunch of other issues in this election, but in border states that may not be the case. Here are two bloggers with Texas roots who feel passionately about it. Their perspectives couldn’t be much farther apart.

Twenty-four-year-old Matthew Webster has been teaching English and ESL in a high school in Brownsville, Texas, where many of the students are undocumented immigrants. He’s about to start law school at the University of Minnesota and hopes to focus on immigration law. Recently, he marvelled at Spain’s welcoming immigration policy (thanks, Ann Raber):

Spain not only attracts immigrants but also provides for them and their family’s assimilation. Immigrants are provided free health insurance, and in the six legalization programs since 1985, all working immigrants were eligible to become legalized citizens. […]

Spain’s reasons for their six legalization programs were, in part, to ensure that lawbreaking employers were not given a competitive edge. However, the major reason espoused by all government officials is social rather than economic. Jesús Caldera, who was labor minister during one of these legalization programs, stated in the New York Times yesterday that, “If you practice exclusion, you risk the future of your country. You risk terrorism, violence.”

From here in rural Minnesota, there is little I can do to actively oppose the border wall in la frontera, a border wall initially proposed to stop illegal immigration. But I can work to change public opinion, the prevailing nativist rhetoric, and ultimately the antiquated and criminalizing laws which produce illegal immigrants rather than facilitate legal migration. We all can.

TexasFred doesn’t buy one bit of the social or economic argument for immigration. He believes “the strain imposed on our infrastructure by the ILLEGALS is bleeding the taxpayers to death” and that “we have a right to protect our sovereignty, we have a duty to protect it.” He advocates militarizing the borders (thanks, Sue Salinger):

Use the [National] Guard, repel the invasion, by ANY mean necessary, I do NOT advocate rounding up and killing the ILLEGALS that are already here, but I DO advocate deporting them, ONCE and only ONCE, and if that means we have to have a ‘no mans land’ at the border, one that is mined and guarded by fully armed troops to stop them from coming back again,, then so be it, if you think it’s too harsh, then let’s hear what your solution to the continuing and repeated violations of our borders would be, and I can tell you right now, asking them nicely to leave and not come back isn’t going to work. […]

The sovereignty of this nation is at stake, the very survival of this nation, and it’s LEGAL citizens hang in the balance, this is NOT a time for political correctness or the lamentations of the feint of heart, America 1st, our survival 1st, and if you don’t fully believe that, in MY opinion you need to rethink your priorities as an American and look at just where your loyalties lie.

It’s hard to imagine Matthew and Fred in any conversation about this.

So what do you think? Is cakesecret voting for McCain or Obama?

Flickrite Mary Hodder went ahead and carried out Kevin Drum’s suggestion about how to improve the cartoon. The idea here is that the satire becomes clearer this way — and less “gutless”:

[mary hodder / Flickr]

Jon Swift describes himself as a “reasonable conservative.” He says that “since the media is biased,” he gets his news from “Fox News, Rush Limbaugh and Jay Leno monologues.” Quite possibly a satirist himself, Jon takes up this same question of satirical clarity:

Wouldn’t it have been simpler and clearer to run the illustration with a big X over it so that we knew what they were trying to say? We are not mind readers. It doesn’t make much sense to say the opposite of what you mean and then attack people for being unsophisticated because they thought you were sincere. […]

If the New Yorker wanted to run a humorous cover that showed Obama is not a Muslim, they could have accomplished that goal by depicting him slipping on a banana peel on the way to church. That would have made the same point and it would also have had the virtue of being funny.

Gary Hall from Evanston, Illinois, is the Dean and President of the Episcopal Seabury-Western Theological Seminary. He loved the cover and thinks democracy needs humor:

Blitt’s cover was aimed, of course, at those in the population who have not yet suffered terminal irony failure. By surrounding the Obamas with all the icons of fear in which the Limbaughs persist in clothing them, Blitt’s wonderful drawing suddenly make the whole Obama smear campaign seem what it is: a joke. […]

The piety which surrounds Barack Obama would be charming were it not so potentially dangerous. […] I worry that my liberal friends can be worse than Stalinists when it comes to making fun of their own. Remember that Franklin Roosevelt loved Will Rogers, and that Will Rogers made merciless fun of him. That’s the kind of Presidents and satirists we need. I hope that Barack Obama’s first White House guests will be David Remnick and Barry Blitt.

Warren Longwell, a writer in Golden, Colorado, recently visited the Abraham Lincoln museum in Springfield, Illinois. It taught him a lesson about keeping this New Yorker cover in perspective (thanks, Misa Dayson):

One entire gallery of the spectacular museum is devoted to the political cartoons of the day that were published to attack Lincoln during his presidency, and they are unparalleled for their tastelessness, viciousness, and outright absurdity. The only lasting effect of these cartoons, lampoons, and caricatures was to make their creators and publishers look like idiots in the light of history.

Probably not music to Barry Blitt’s and David Remnick’s ears, but it might cool blog passions.

The US currently exports over ten times more to Iran than at the start of the Bush administration. At the top of the pile: cigarettes. Somewhat suprising, no? John McCain seemed to think so last week when he responded by saying, “Maybe that’s a way of killin’ ‘em.” Meaning: maybe the cigarettes will kill off Iranians. A worthy sequel to his “Bomb Bomb Iran” quip. The blogosphere attacks and defends.

Tara van Brederode is a lawyer in Ames, Iowa, who was inspired by Paul Wellstone to take up Democratic activism. In a nice twist, she’s married to a Christian conservative. Tara was appalled by McCain’s comment (thanks, Ann Raber):

He’s not talking about the troops of a nation with which we are at war, he’s talking about killing the men, women, and children of an entire nation, on purpose. […]

Sometimes people say insensitive things. Sometimes people laugh at them. That’s okay with me; I know I have made crude or obnoxious jokes, some of which should never appear in print. Probably all of us have.

But these are more than that. These are inappropriate comments you might let slide if your angry uncle made them while he was downing his 4th beer and grousing about welfare recipients. They are not comments or “jokes” that the potential President of the United States should make.

Jay Henderson, former urbanite now living in rural, mountainous Virginia, thinks Iran’s wounded reaction was way overblown. Judging by his blog title (A McCain Democrat’s Journal), Jay is a Democrat who plans to vote for McCain.

John McCain made a little joke about Iranian cigarette imports and now officials in Iran are fuming . . . oops . . . fired up . . . oh, darn . . . really smoked . . . uh, cheesed off about it. […]

No sense of humor in Tehran, apparently, and Iranian government spokesmen are now bristling and carping that McCain is a “warmonger,” according to a report by Reuters. […]

So, let’s compare. When the President of Iran vows to destroy the nation of Israel, that is okay, just fine, no problem. No warmongering there. When Iran trains insurgents and supplies them with arms and explosives to kill American soldiers and Marines and civilians and whoever in Iraq . . . hey, just good business, right? But a wisecrack about Iranian cigarette imports . . . whoa! International incident! Call in the Interpol PC Police!

Jay, a little fired up himself, ends by heading out for a cigarette break.

Mmby2k is a 27-year-old single mom in Alabama who thinks Jackson is a hater — possibly because of his two unsuccessful bids for the presidency. She also feels he should have known that Fox was just waiting for another black man to criticize Obama (thanks, Sarolta Cump):

William, a lawyer and “life strategist” in Cleveland, acknowledges that many people say unkind things in private. But he thinks public figures should be savvy enough to watch their mouths at all times. He also believes Jackson is just wrong about Obama. (Hat tip again to Sarolta Cump.)

Very smiley at the end — maybe that’s part of his life strategy?

Ask? is a graffiti and stencil artist in Israel. He’s also a pacifist. In this photo you can see one of a series of posters he made from newspaper articles about war or peace overlayed with a Gandhi stencil (hat tip to Sarolta Cump):

[Ask? / Flickr]

Ask? thinks about peace in this way:

Peace is not just a word. It is not just a diplomatic maneuver, not just a treaty to be signed. Not just a greeting to greet your bro’ with.

Peace is a way of life. It is a goal to be acieved not just in the middle east but also in one’s home.

Peace is something to be hunted, to be chased, to be asked.

In fact I believe that everything is to be asked. Everything is to be put under a question mark. Only some-things can be answered. The way of the question is a difficult way. It is hard for us to question our believes when we think they are true. But I believe that truth is elastic. And I try to question that belief too. Or do I?

A1one is a fellow street artist in Tehran. He says he is “not about politics” but that he’s “interested on social Subjects.” He seems to indicate that in this picture the pink sign says “peace.” (Thanks again, Sarolta Cump.)

[A1one / Flickr]

Ask? and A1one must be wondering how the US election will affect them. But as Ask? says, “the way of the question is a difficult way.”