Tuesday’s political round-up

Regarding whether each party is satisfied with the candidates that are running, it’s interesting to me that the Democrats also have a deeper bench. If there was enough dissatisfaction with the Democratic field, many would be more than happy if Al Gore decided to run (oh please, please!!), but who do the Republicans have waiting in the wings should the current crop falter – Newt Gingrich? Jeb Bush? oh please…

Law and Order should paste the headshots of the various presidential candidates over the heads of regular cast members to meet the equal time law during reruns.

So if a network ran “Bedtime for Bonzo” during the 1980 primaries, they would have had to give equal time to John Anderson, Bob Dole and George Bush?

I believe all of L&O’s pre-Thompson reruns are probably tied up by TNT.

But they could rerun current episodes and just cut his scenes out of them…generally speaking, his character is so tangential that it wouldn’t affect the storyline, PLUS the added bonus of getting his stinkeroo acting off the screen. He really is awful.

…how satisfied Dem voters are with their choices.

I guess I’m in the minority again (and I know it’s all my fault since I voted for Nader), according to the Corporate Military Industrial Media (and in this case, CB as well).

But I couldn’t be more dissatisfied with the Democratic candidates, except Kucinich and Gravel. Dick&Bush and their Satanic, anational, amoral, imperial corporatists have taken a giant collective dump on the Constitution, broken the back of the U.S. Armed Forces and bankrupted our treasury, but you hardly hear so much as a peep about it out of from Clinton, Obama, & Edwards, except to suggest that Kucinich and Gravel should be booted from the debates. Some leadership I say.

It’s time to set aside ideology and political solidarity for a change and focus on the universal commonalities of all Americans, regardless of political persuasion — the interests of our freedoms and rights guaranteed by the Constitution and American National Security (especially, and above all else, the integrity of our Constitutional Republic).

But what the hell do I know — I just love my country and fear for its safety (because of a Private Corporate Cabal unlawfully occupying the Executive Branch, a capitulant, complicit Congress, and an intellectually and morally-unfit Supreme Court).

I kinda agree with JKap. Our frontrunners like to talk bad about Bush but their words don’t ring true somehow. I mean, if Bush has done all the things they say (and he has, and more) then they should be PISSED OFF.

Read Gore’s latest book, it goes over most of the crimes BushCo has committed. He sounds pissed off.

Please god, please… tell Al to RUN!

I don’t get the Fred Thompson problem. Is NBC going to provide comparable FICTION roles to Mitt Romney, Rudolph Giuliani and others. He’s acting as a DA. He is NOT a DA for NYC.

“There was an interesting article in the Columbus Ohio newspaper saying that Governor Stricland(sp?) was going to be the VP because he could carry Ohio.

If the Democrats don’t win Ohio then they either need to win Florida, which is tough, or New Mexico, Nevada, and Missouri which is doable. You could win Iowa and lose Nevada or New Mexico too.

My point is that Richardson would probably bring New Mexico but that isn’t enough if it is a close race. ”

If we build a campaign infrastructure that equals or surpasses that of the Republicans, we almost naturally have to do better. I remember reading an article in USA Today, I believe–I can’t find it, and I’ve searched several times–where Jennifer Palmieri or some other Kerry-Edwards spokeswoman is quoted talking about the campaign’s organization. Several months before the convention, the Republicans had a structure composed at every level that worked to distribute the message and turn out the vote for Bush and Cheney. Only a few months before election day, the Democrats didn’t have that. Separate groups made up some of the difference, but imagine if we had what the Republicans went into election day with, not only in Ohio but in other states.

Perhaps I’m not remembering things correctly, perhaps things were planned a lot better, and perhaps more people simply wanted to vote for Bush. Yet I have this nagging feeling that it isn’t the case. I’d be willing to bet that this sort of thing made up the difference in Bush’s margin of victory over Kerry, even with Kerry’s improved performance compared to Gore in 2000 in urban areas.

Of course, we can’t change the past. But it’s less than a year and a half until election day in 2008, so we have more than enough time, I would imagine, to make up for this. To let something like a poor campaign structure cost us votes once again is simply beyond the pale.

NBC wants to air “Law & Order” repeats over the summer, but is worried about the political consequences — specifically whether the network would need to honor an equal time rule. The WaPo reported, “Hoping to avoid violating a Federal Communications Commission provision that would force the network to provide equal time to other candidates running for president, NBC chief lobbyist Robert Okun has reached out to the GOP presidential campaigns of former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney and former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, among others, to inquire whether they would make a major issue out of Thompson being featured in reruns this summer.”

This past season of “Law and Order” isn’t worth watching anyway. Ditto for “Criminal Intent” and “SVU.” They all cratered with bad casting choices, and somehow the writers who have been there for years managed to turn themselves into semi-literates (giving them all the benefit of the doubt). I was completely shocked on “opening week” last fall to watch all three in a row and they were all duds. I think the only episode of L&O that wasn’t truly dreck was the one where Chevy Chase did his impersonation of Mel Gibson. But the rest have suuuuuuuuuuuucked! So it doesn’t really matter if NBC runs them – they’ve lost half their audience this past season and re-running that crap will lose the other half.