the Boss endorses Obama; disses Bittergate

Look if Bruce isn't bitter, than neither am I. Click the subject heading for link.

Election Day Today!

I've blogged about several of the candidates, many who are no longer with us. Just follow the "vote" label link at the end of this post. Now it's Obama's turn. By the way, has anyone else heard of a possible Nader-Gravel independent run?

Yet another reason to vote Edwards

I hadn't heard of this until Jeremy (via his Mom in Iowa) reported it on Scatterplot, but apparently it's true:

On the first day of Edwards' administration, he will submit legislation that ends health care coverage for the president, all members of Congress, and all senior political appointees in the legislative and executive branches of government on July 20th, 2009 -- unless Congress has enacted universal health care reform.

If indeed something like this is within Presidential authority (I mean, doesn't Congress have to approve submitted legislation?), I'm impressed. This is the campaign promise of campaign promises. Could we really have universal health care coverage by a year and a half from now?

But that's not the reason I refer to in the subject line. The reason to vote Edwards should be sheerly because of his song choice in this Iowa campaign ad:

Because what we're really looking for in a President is a nice set of heels

So I open up the New York Times this morning to find this article about Bill's participation in Hillary's campaign. But before even getting to the article, I'm sidetracked by the headlining photo, above.

Wow. I can't think too many - well any - times where part of the candidates body is signaled out, and it's not their head. Worse, the photo subject is her husband's head, as the article is really about him anyway.

This is like Killing Us Softly-light: I half expect Jean Kilbourne to appear with this slide behind her, explaining how the face of a man will be responsible for electing a set of heels on a stage. Who cares who she is anyway, right? Just a Woman President, no need to even see which one.

Maybe next she'll be spotted carrying one of these*.

My near not-quite almost siting of Barack Obama

Prologue. Every working morning I transfer on the El from the Red to Green Line at State and Lake. This involves walking up out of the subway* from the Red, crossing the street, walking up to the elevated platform for the Green. I then wait (and wait) through several Brown Line trains when finally a Green arrives, taking me two more stops West of the Loop to my building.

The Siting. Today while waiting (and waiting) for the Green, I noticed a light skinned man standing on the platform. He stuck out, appearing more business-like than even the other business folk who take the train. Don't ask me how, but he drew some sort of attention to himself even though no one was talking to him.

I thought in the back of my head, That guy's kind of hot -- he's like, Barack Obama hot.

From where we were both waiting, we got on the same El car (third from the front) and walked inside. I sat down, he remained standing. As we neared the first of two stops, a lady across from me got up and said, "I've been trying to contact you." "Oh really?" "Yes, my company [something something]" He says, "Leave a message at my office and I'll have someone contact you."

The lady got off the train, and the man walked over to a transit authority employee and asked how he was doing. Soon the CTA guy was dumping about our tragic situation and the man assured the employee that he was working on this issue, doing everything he could.

Finally I thought that this guy *was* Barack Obama, since during two El stops he politicked with two people. Yet, no entourage, no autographs, and seemingly few people recognizing him. He got off at my stop and we both joined the single file line of people down the El stop stairs. I tracked him once we reached the street and he entered the CTA headquarters building, just across the street from my building.

Telling the coworkers. Well of course I told the first three people I saw this morning that I thought that just saw Barack Obama. They wondered if it was him, since no security was tracking him, but I said maybe he was going with a low profile this morning. They wondered why few people seemed to recognize him and I compared it to the Weather Underground, you know where people go unrecognized under your nose simply because you're not looking for them. Then they told me I should gotten an autograph or taken a picture with the guy. I was kicking myself over not even saying one word while walking right next to him.

The Realization. The first words my supervisor says when I told her were, "Are you sure you it wasn't [CTA Pres] Ron Huberman?" To make a long story short** Barack Obama is in New York today. He ate breakfast with Mayor Bloomberg. Then who did I see? Someone was politicking, and admirably so, and I'd like to figure out who it was. So for the sake of argument, let's first inspect the differences between Obama and Huberman. No comparison in my opinion - I don't think I saw either one.

So, in the end of it all I guess I just saw some random hot guy on the train and decided to blog about it. I still think he looked very much like Barack and very little like Huberman. What are the odds a politician has a public breakfast in New York and then sneaks over to Chicago and uses the train?

Incidentally, if Obama really did solve our CTA crisis, I'd totally change my vote in the primaries.

*Ever notice that New York's transit system is called the subway even above ground while Chicago's is called the Elevated even below it? And that's your fun fact of the day.
**Too late!

I guess I'll be voting for a white man in the primaries

Meghan found this Presidential Matchup at the ABC website, matching your answers to political issue questions with the candidates running in the primaries. Looks like Kucinich is my man, who I voted for in 04 over the Deaniac buzz. But the other two are the ones that get me. I've heard little about Mike Gavel from Alaska - so little that I somehow thought he was on the Republican ticket. And Joe Biden?! Is he running? I'd choose Dukakis over him any day.

If I were to vote my conscious and not for who I think will win (don't we all do that?), then I'd go for Kucinich first, and probably Edwards second. Barack just isn't convincing me, and Hillary - well (my sentiments exactly). But Gavel I might have to check out. When I do, I'll check out Bill Richardson a bit too.

Do you hear the enthusiasm? Let's just say I'll be happy to get rid of Bush, but I'm not so sure if it'll be much of a regime change.

a very special day

Happy Birthday to Dennis Kucinich!

(what, you thought i was going to say something else?)

Aldermanic Runoff Vote in April!

(click image for larger version)

Awesome News. Both the 49th (that's mine) and the 50th wards have incumbents that received under 50% of the vote. Congrats to the spirited campaigns of the other candidates, especially to Ginderske and Gordon. If I understand correctly, Gordon and Moore will now contend for the vote in April. This is one case where "Anyone but Moore" might actually work.

Click on the labels for more:

Barack Obama has 35,774 friends on MySpace

In my last post I insinuated that John Edwards was ahead of the online campaign curve because of his thriving Flickr account. Perhaps I spoke too soon. Barack Obama does not maintain his own MySpace account, but the person who does maintain it does a thorough job - and now has over 35,000 friends. So, now for a little MySpace and the Presidential candidates, by the numbers.

Barack Obama (unoffical): 35,774 friends
Hillary Clinton (unofficial): 21,539 friends
John Edwards (official): 10,777 friends
Elizabeth Edwards (official): 1638, though not running
Dennis Kucinich (official): 849 friends
Joe Biden (unofficial): 385 friends

Since I found no Republican candidate MySpace pages, we can at least say that the Democrats are more popular online. I would go through now and compare everyone's favorite TV shows or something, but that is a bit of content analysis that I probably won't do. One of these really likes Oprah, though.

How many Edwards' does it take to change a light bulb?

Apparantly it takes the whole family, the next door neighbors, and then someone to post the whole thing on Flickr.

I was planning on posting today about the newly released Edwards plan for universal health coverage (note: link to PDF). Or I thought about including his recent statement about retaining a deficit in the national budget, if the only thing congress is willing to cut are programs for the poor (they are: click here then here).

Then in clicking around I discovered something way more entertaining: The John Edwards for President photostream in Flickr! He has an entire set dedicated to National Energy Day, and includes pictures of he and his family calling their representatives on the phone, insulating pipes in their basement, and - yes - changing their lightbulbs to energy saver bulbs. Here it is: all documented on Flickr.

I suppose this is the next step, after Howard Dean started with the Campaign by Blogger in 04. Especially with the saturation and normalizing of blogs today (I mean, even I have a blog), Campaign by Flickr is really a great idea. Of course these are still politically motovated photo shoots, but instead of now run-of-the-mill public appearances with lots of journalists and news crews, we get to see just plain old "What John Edwards Does at Home," thanks to online photo pools.

Flickr makes changing a light bulb way more exciting than this recent public stunt in Illinois by the President, who "discusses the economy" by sitting in a tractor. At least when John Edwards changes a light bulb, it's because a light bulb needs to be changed.

This was my first finding of Flickr as campaign tool, and I figured that perhaps the other candidates thought of it too. No luck: Hillary Clinton has 7 photos and 0 contacts, Dennis Kucinich keeps 5 photos and 0 contacts. Obviously Edwards, with 201 photos, 302 contacts, and a URL address heading "forallofus" is taking full advantage of an online presence.

Picture of the Week: Anyone but Moore

(ad-busters lite: reminders of Moore and Foie Gras)

I don't usually cover local issues on this blog. There are other blogs for that purpose. But when looking over my choices for picture of the week, and being obligated to choose one, I can't resist the temptation.

For those who don't live in Chicago, you might have heard about our Alderman's ban on Foie Gras. Not that this isn't a bad issue (footnote: see here), but many residents of the 49th ward think that a couple of other issues are much more pressing for the money spent.

For those who do live in Chicago, and even better the 49th ward, here are two more reasons not to vote for Moore:

(1) Good on some issues (footnote: living wage ordinance, though later vetoed), but not on ones relevant to the 49th ward (footnote: no big box stores here).

(2) 16 years in office is too long. We need term limits.

Lucky for the Chicago Aldermanic election, we have Instant Runoff Voting! This means that we can rank our choices, disagree on which other candidates to choose, and still not elect Moore. This will work so long as a majority of people don't vote for him, no matter who else they decide on.

That said, my suggestion is to check out these two campaigns of better white men than Moore: Gordon and Ginderske.

Picture(s) of the Week(s): Sarah's Red Crocs, Viking Monkey, Torts Clock, Sexist Komen
Project 365: Flickr page, What is this?

Kucinich!

Dennis Kucinich is running for President! Now here's a man who is never a part of the hype (ex. Dean in 04, Obama now) and remains solid on the issues. Check out his campaign today, and expect much more to come.

Other campaign news:
Speaking of hype, Barack Obama has an announcement of his own. Also of interest, check out the candidacy of Christopher Walken, then head over to the fan sites of Hillary Clinton and Condoleezza Rice, everybody's favorite imaginary contest.

VOTE!

Things to Do: Register to Vote

I just registered to vote in Illinois today. I have been procrastinating on this issue for a long time, and refuse to miss November mid-term elections in our state. Many people wait for a Presidential election year to vote, but really it's local elections that matter the most. So don't say "I'll do it later" and then suddenly get trapped in the dreaded 28 day period before the election. Do it now, and reduce your hassles today!

The best part about registering is that you get to choose how you do it. For example, you can Rock the Vote, Declare Yourself, or just Register and get it over with. For navigation ease, visit Congress.org, complete with interactive map.

A note on Citizenship. You do have to be a U.S. citizen, and you must be over 18 years of age on or before election day. The age thing might be ok, but I sort of think that non-citizen residents should be allowed to vote. Sociologist T.H. Marshall talked about social citizenship, where citizens are not fully so until they are awarded basic civil, political and social rights (including social protections against poverty, and for education and housing). This argument is easily extended to suggest that in much of the Western world, the have-nots are not fairly treated as citizens. That is, "legal" citizen does not a citizen make. If we are indeed citizens, then we should be guaranteed life sustaining rights.

This can turned around somewhat. If legality is only one of many factors that determine citizenship, then perhaps someone who qualifies socially as a citizen should be able to vote. That is, if you perhaps pay taxes, or otherwise take advantage of public resources (like the school system, or emergency room treatment), then you should get a chance to vote on improving our public services. Imagine, if this were allowed, the attention that politicians would finally have to pay to undocumented workers!

On residence. Ok, so you are a citizen, but without a residence. My favorite part of the one-page voter registration application allows for you to draw a picture of where you live.

It reminds me of Mitchell Duneier's Sidewalk. Some of the New York sidewalk vendors in his study of Sixth Avenue rented apartments, but others stayed in places like the subway system, at strategic spots that provided shelter but did not bother anyone. Legal citizenship at least can lead to being able to vote on matters that lead to social citizenship. This part of the form eliminates the address barrier to voter registration. Of course, it doesn't assist with other problems, like access to the internet or a printer to obtain this form in the first place. And it's possible that a voter registration drive might ignore the socially invisible homeless population.

For many of us, though, the only barrier is our own procrastination. So the thing to do this month? Maybe I should practice subliminal web tricks.