Hillary’s gas tax plan

The folks over at TalkingPointsMemo.com have compiled the weekend’s chatter about Sen. Clinton’s (and Sen. McCain’s) so-called gas tax holiday. Check it out, it’s a good summery of the issue:

Where is Senator Obama?

Josh Marshall, over at TalkingPointsMemo.com, asks about something I’ve observed and wondered about, too. That is, even though Sen. Obama leads in the Democratic primary, he has clearly lost the initiative when it comes to setting the national agenda; thus making it harder for his surrogates to go on the offensive on his behalf.

Here’s how Josh Marshall frames it:

His voice seems silent and has for a few weeks. Of course, he’s out in the field campaigning, not focusing on national media and catering to political junkies around the country. But what I really think this is that he’s not controlling the agenda. Hillary’s controlling the agenda, defining the race at the moment. And that’s made him recede into the background, even as he’s a constant topic of conversation.

Clearly it’s easier said than done, however, Sen. Obama needs to flood the national airwaves with a nuts & bolts summery of his agenda, and get away from another mere bio-intro (as candidates often do at this point in the campaign).

Fox News: Propaganda Arm of the Bush White House

Just more evidence that Rupert Murdoch’s Faux News is the propaganda arm of the republican party and of Bush’s White House, via TalkingPointsMemo.com:

It’s 9:13 PM (September 10, 2007). If you have a chance, flip on Fox News at least for a moment. It’s Gen. Petraeus’s (and Crocker’s) one hour “exclusive” with Brit Hume on Fox. The chyron actually reads “A Briefing for America.” And that’s really pretty much what it is. It’s another briefing. It’s not an interview. It’s a continuation of today’s bamboozlement but in prime time on Fox with the expected soft-ball questions and credulous analysis.

Late Update: The “exclusive” is also helpfully interspersed with commercials from the White House-organized pro-Iraq War astroturf group Freedom’s Watch.

Later Update: As around 9:45, Hume is walking Petraeus toward explaining how the Iraq War is really a “war against al Qaeda.” Petraeus is playing along.

UPDATE: TPM.com has a video clip up.

60 Hours, 29 minutes and Counting of Continuos Filibustering

As I’m sure you’ve heard, Republicans have threaten to change long established Senate rules on debate, a move that Republicans initially called their “Nuclear Option.” If Republican’s implement the nuclear option it would end the Democrats’ ability to defend the independence of the courts, since Republicans would be able to put in the bench any ideologically driven judges for lifetime appointments. Senator Bill Frist is spearheading the Republican’s efforts to ram through their nuclear option. In response, an idealistic band of students at Senator Frist’s alma matter, Princeton, have mounted a continuous filibuster in front of a building that the Senator’s family donated to the university.

You can see the student’s ongoing filibuster here:
http://www.princeton.edu/~petehill/filibuster.html

The students, and guests, including a couple of physics professors, have been at it for 60 hours, 29 minutes and going… they deserve a big applause.

I found out about the students thanks to Talking Points Memo.

“Separation of Church and State is Absolute”

I came across this on Talking Points Memo, via Andrew Sullivan :

I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute — where no Catholic prelate would tell the President (should he be Catholic) how to act, and no Protestant minister would tell his parishoners for whom to vote — where no church or church school is granted any public funds or political preference — and where no man is denied public office merely because his religion differs from the President who might appoint him or the people who might elect him.

I believe in an America that is officially neither Catholic, Protestant nor Jewish — where no public official either requests or accepts instructions on public policy from the Pope, the National Council of Churches or any other ecclesiastical source — where no religious body seeks to impose its will directly or indirectly upon the general populace or the public acts of its officials — and where religious liberty is so indivisible that an act against one church is treated as an act against all. — John F. Kennedy

President Kennedy was right then, and he remains correct now — and always.