A follow up to reporting on the Santorum Sewickley fundraiser and counter protest

Blue State heard that some of the protesters went with video camera in hand to detail the event, sort of a "red carpet interview", a la the Oscars. There should be some footage, including interviews with both those protesting the Santorum fundraiser, and those attending the Santorum fundraiser. No, nothing so juicy as surveillance footage, unless the FBI has some we're unaware of. Merely, Q&A's with both sides of the fence. Sounds fun, frankly.

One of the interviewers, a skilled writer for such magazines as GQ and National Geographic , Men's Health, and many others, interviewed many people, both those attending the fundraiser and those protesting the event.

He also spoke with, in his words, "a fashionably dressed, attractive young woman in her 20's". He asked if she was able to pay the $1000 to attend the event, and her reply was "It's taken care of." He pursued it, to find out that her way was paid for by her boyfriend’s family. Will video footage of the event and counter-event be available soon?

By the way, we don't generally publish anonymous comments, but one was quite prudent to publish. Upon mentioning the event in the blog 2 items earlier, Blue State received an r-mail from "Anonymous", within hours of our posting.

It read, "Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Quite a show tonight in little Sewickley, PA - anti-Santorum protest set while Bush is visiting to raise money": stating, "i went to the bush fundraiser and your protest sucked".

First, it was not "our protest". We just reported the event. Secondly, we hope that this was actually NOT one of the attendees of the Bush/Santorum event. We hope Bush and Santorum's supporters actually show more intelligence, both gramatically and strategically. As we heard it was a Santorum fundraiser, not a Bush fundraiser/rally, as "Anonymous" states. Additionally, there is a shift key for capital letters. And finally, Blue State wonders what would cause a protest by those from the other side to not "suck" (poor choice of words, Anonymous)? Would not "sucking" mean not being so peaceful? Not having families present? Shouting down the other side more? Bringing in people from outside of the town? Would getting arrested cause it not to suck?

Blue State would like to take a poll to find out when a peaceful protest rally doesn't "suck".

Bush visits Pittsburgh for Santorum - Sparks Protest Vigil

Bush visits Pittsburgh for Santorum fund-raiser
Visit sparks evening protest vigil on downtown Sewickley corner

Saturday, March 25, 2006, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Above, President Bush encourages Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., to wave to the traveling press corps after Air Force One landed yesterday at the 911th Airlift Wing at Pittsburgh International Airport.

Mr. Bush attended a fund-raiser for Mr. Santorum last night in Sewickley Heights. While at the airport, he also presented the President's Volunteer Service Award to Edy Hope, a volunteer with Carebreak at the Watson Institute in Sewickley who helps a family with a 6-year-old autistic girl.

Bush opponents, also above, organized a demonstration in downtown Sewickley last night. Left to right, Clara Murray, 9; Pilar Puyana, 10; Mary Torrance, 10; Claire Torrance, 7; and Allegra Menniti, 10, all from Sewickley, protest President Bush?s visit to Santorum fund-raiser at the candlelight vigil took place at the corner of Broad and Beaver streets.

Quite a show tonight in little Sewickley, PA - anti-Santorum protest set while Bush is visiting to raise money

There should be quite an interesting show in sleepy little Sewickley, PA township tonight. President Bush is coming to town to do a fundraiser for Senator Rick Santorum. Melissa Hart will also be in attendance.

A protest is being staged tonight, including a possible candlelight (peaceful) march past the residence where the fundraiser is being held.

Sleepy little Sewickley is home to many Pittsburgh-based millionaires and conservative base. It is also home to an equal number of liberal base. Pittsburgh is also home to the anti-spying suit being brought by the Thomas Merton Center for Nonviolence at (Catholic, conservative) Duquesne University against the FBI. Also included are other groups like the Raging Grannies and Code Pink Pittsburgh.

The march and protest tonight should be quite interesting. Who will show up? Who will march? Will they be photographed? Look in the newspapers tomorrow for the results.... unless you get some of your own people there soon tonight to see for yourselves.

--Fear, by Harry Truman "When even one American - who has done nothing wrong -- is forced by fear to shut his mind and close his mouth, then all of Americans are in peril." http://greetingsfrompennsylvania.blogspot.com/

Is Texas ready for Governor Kinky?

Note from the editor - C'mon, Texas! Go Kinky! Without Delay!

Is Texas ready for Governor Kinky?
By John Whitesides, Political Correspondent Mon Mar 6, 8:41 AM ET

HOUSTON (Reuters) - The line of well-dressed young executives stretches down a hallway, past a table of Kinky Friedman talking action figures and straight up to the candidate for Texas governor in the black cowboy hat.

"I'll sign anything," country singer and mystery novelist Kinky Friedman assures the crowd arriving for a downtown luncheon speech as they snap up Kinky T-shirts, bumper stickers and posters sold to finance his independent -- and decidedly nontraditional -- bid for governor.

With a blizzard of one-liners, a campaign slogan of "Why the Hell Not?" and an eclectic blend of policy ideas from all sides of the ideological divide, the former frontman for the band Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys says he wants to "change the world one governor at a time."

Friedman hopes to tap voter frustration with Republican Gov. Rick Perry, Texas Democrats and politics in general to become the latest celebrity governor, following wrestler Jesse Ventura in Minnesota and actor Arnold Schwarzenegger in California.

"People are drooling for the truth, they are begging for a little honesty from officials and they aren't getting any," the black-clad, cigar-chomping Friedman told Reuters. "This is the moment in history if Texas can grab it."

Friedman's independent crusade kicks off on Wednesday, the day after the Texas primary, when volunteers can begin to gather the signatures needed to get him on the ballot in November.
He has 64 days to get 45,540 signatures of registered voters who did not vote in the primary, a stringent requirement that prompts an urgent plea from Friedman.

'SAVE YOURSELF FOR KINKY'
"Don't vote in the primary. Save yourself for Kinky," he tells his audiences, typically split between supporters and the simply curious.

His candidacy already has enlivened a governor's race involving Perry, who took over when George W. Bush moved to the White House, two Democrats and Republican state Comptroller Carole Strayhorn, who also is running as an independent.

Saying "there's plenty of room in the hot tub," Friedman welcomed Strayhorn, mother of White House press secretary Scott McClellan, into the race. But there has not been an independent on the Texas ballot for governor in modern times, and the last one elected governor was Sam Houston in 1859 -- a fact Friedman calls "shameful."

"Independence is the Texas way. It ain't the easy way, but it's the cowboy way," Friedman said. "The parties are doing a disservice to Texas. They are monopolizing democracy."

Friedman, whose support was at 10 percent in recent polls, hopes to raise $6 million by November, enough to air television ads down the stretch but not enough to make a big splash in Texas, where candidates spent $100 million in the last governor's race.

His prospects are routinely dismissed by pundits and Texas politicians, but "the people are taking me very seriously. They're taking me more seriously than I take myself," Friedman said.

'COMPASSIONATE REDNECK'
"I'm a compassionate redneck, I'm an unabashed dreamer, but I'm not a politician," said the author of more than 20 books, including a string of mystery novels featuring a detective named Kinky Friedman.
He is best known for his days leading the Texas Jewboys, an Austin band known for politically incorrect blasts such as "They Ain't Makin' Jews Like Jesus Anymore" and "Get Your Biscuits in the Oven & Your Buns in the Bed."

"I wrote the songs to express truth as I see it, and that has not changed. From the music to the books, I've been a truth teller," he said. "Being a humorist helps, because you can sail as close to the truth as you can get without sinking the ship."

He announced his campaign last year with a quip -- "I need the closet space" -- and he fires off a steady stream of one-liners and slogans like "How Hard Can it Be?"

"He Ain't Kinky, He's My Governor," reads a Friedman bumper sticker, while his 13-inch-high (33-cm-high) talking action figure, a popular seller at $29.95 each, spouts lines like "I'm gonna de-wussify Texas if I have to do it one wuss at a time."

Kathryn Lott, who bought three bumper stickers, a poster and a button before listening to Friedman in Houston, said she plans to vote for him.

"We need some freethinkers in government. Why not take a chance with someone new?" said Lott, a marketing director for the Houston Grand Opera.

Mary Lane, a Houston realtor, said Friedman has "a definite shot. People are tired of politicians and politics."
He promises to bring musician pals like Willie Nelson into his administration, and says he will rename major highways after Texas musical icons like Nelson, Bob Wills and Buddy Holly.

"Musicians can run this state better than politicians. We won't get a lot done in the mornings, but we'll work late and be honest," he said.

Friedman, whose parents were educators, is serious about the state's education system, promising to turn school choices back to teachers and create a "Texas heroes" program to lure retired experts into schools. He would boost pay for teachers, police and firefighters, he says, and fund it with legalized casino gambling and a 1 percent tax surcharge on Texas oil and gas companies.

He supports gay marriage, saying "they have every right to be as miserable as the rest of us," and prayer in the schools. He is against the death penalty -- a view he likens to "looking into your political grave" in Texas.

"I just want Texas to be number one in something other than executions, toll roads and property taxes," Friedman says. But if he loses he promises to ditch Texas and head to Hawaii.

"If I lose this race I will retire in a petulant snit," he said. "I'm not going to go out gracefully, I promise you."

Who's in Charge?

Keith Olbermann blogs, "Vice President Dick Cheney told Iran on Tuesday that enrichment of nuclear fuel on Iranian territory was unacceptable and warned that Tehran would face "meaningful consequences" if it continued to pursue its nuclear program. " http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11681845/

Pardon me? I don't remember Hubert Humphrey, Spiro Agnew, Dan Quayle, or any other Vice Presidents threatening other countries on our behalf. And this seems to leave open the "possibility" of war. So who is in charge now? Bush or Cheney? Given the recent shooting incident, it would appear that Dick doesn't seem to report to George at all. And are we now electing VP's to speak for us as a country? If we are, and it now seems so, we had better scrutinize all future VP pics carefully. But, given the power Bush has given his VP, perhaps we should do a better job of scrutinizing Presidential choices. I would never in a million years have though after our previous to last election that I was voting (or not) for a VP who could take us to war as a country.

Who Are the Flip Floppers? And How Safe Are Our Lives? .. And our jobs?

In Dan Froomkin's Washington Post Column http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2006/03/02/BL2006030200940_5.html?referrer=email&sub=AR, he noted that Frank James of the Chicago Tribune writes, "Perhaps the only good news for the president is that he is in South Asia while the story is breaking. But the first chance reporters have to ask him about this in India, they will. And the fallout from the troublesome video will certainly compete with the image of an engaged president handling the weighty affairs of foreign policy he had hoped to communicate to the audience back home." This on the heels of the Dubai ports fiasco.

It doesn’t sound like good news, actually, since Bush is over there telling the Indian people that Americans need to be ready to compete for jobs with Indians, and that it will be better for American jobs to be shipped overseas. Bush goes on to say that Americans are now being re-trained. Yes, re-trained from engineers to lower paying medical technicians; from accountants to lower paying nursing positions.

Jim Vandenhei writes in the Washington Post that "In Hyderabad, Bush also talked about the outsourcing of American jobs to India. 'People do lose jobs as a result of globalization,' he said. 'And it's painful for those who lose jobs.' He repeated that the United States should reject protectionism, however, and not view India as a threat." http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/03/AR2006030300183_2.html?nav=hcmodule

Medical is where it’s at says Bush. That’s because professional jobs are going to lower paid Indian workers, which helps Bush's business partners and financial backers. And the American pay scale continues to spiral down, as does the chance for a middle class income. So, as Bush’s comment about it being good for American jobs to go to India, is that really good news for Bush, as the Trib article states? Or will he also have to answer for that on top of the Dubai port deal? And the Katrina "asleep at the wheel" fiasco? And the Iraq "We’ll be welcomed as liberators" misstatement.

I doubt that Americans will be happy to hear that he said it will be good for our jobs to go overseas to India, especially when there were demonstrations by hundreds of thousands of Indians against America. They don't sound like they're thrilled to have us or our jobs there. Perhaps his trip overseas is not the good news the Trib thinks it is. And perhaps it's one more instance of Bush not understanding the American people anymore, if he ever did.

Americans were not happy that he didn’t listen when he was told that New Orleans was in danger and then went off to his ranch and later to California while New Orleans sank. They aren’t happy that Cheney was able to forego an investigation until the next day on a shooting, when any other individual would have had to take a Breathalyzer on the spot before being cleared of wrongdoing.

And finally, what Americans can not correlate is why Iraq, with far less ties to Al Qaeda (no matter what the Bush administration says) gave the administration reason to go to war, while the United Arab Emirates who actually saw financing for 9/11 as well as ties to the Taliban, is not only not seen by the Bush folks as an enemy, and should not only not be considered with some suspicion, but they wonder why they should now be allowed to run our ports. What financial ties does the Bush family have to the families of the United Arab Emirates, and why is that not being traced a bit closer. It's clear that Secretary Snow, who OK'd the deal, has business ties to the UAE.

Incidentally, it is widely known that our port inspections had been only 2 percent of containers since 9/11. The reason? The business people felt it was too expensive to inspect more than 2 percent, and the administration did not want to disappoint the business community. If we can't trust who's sending good into our ports, and we're not sure about who'd running our ports, then why would we think that a 2 percent inspection of containers will give us any security whatsoever.

Harry Truman used to love to say "The buck stops here." Perhaps this administration is fonder of saying "The buck stops with whomever gets caught with it. Meanwhile, the rest of the bucks go in my constituents' pockets." How safe do we feel now? And who, indeed, are the "flip-floppers"?