In this photo provided by NBC, showing former President Jimmy Carter, left talking with Jay Leno during the taping of 'The Tonight Show with Jay Leno' in Burbank, Calif., Wednesday, May 7, 2008. (AP Photo/NBC, Paul Drinkwater)
On Wednesday, former President Jimmy Carter was a guest on the Tonight Show.
Jay Leno gave Jimmy Carter one of the most glowing introductions I've ever heard him give a guest. Leno gushed about how thrilling it is to interview former President Carter. What a great man! So many accomplishments!
In Leno's introduction, he noted that Carter is an "undeclared super delegate."
That, of course, is somewhat of a crock. Carter keeps insisting that he's undeclared but then he adds that everyone in his family supports Barack Obama, his way of hinting that he does, too.
Carter said he would not be declaring until after the primary season concludes in June.
Leno asked Carter what he thought about Tuesday's primaries in Indiana and North Carolina.
Carter responded, "Well, I thought that Obama won one and Hillary won one."
He said it takes a super delegate to analyze that. Right.
Something that had to tick Hillary off was Carter's comments about the delegates from Michigan and Florida.
Carter did a dramatic lead up, asserting that they "ought to be seated for sure... in 2012."
Leno agreed with Carter when he said it would be wrong to seat them in 2008 because "they disqualified themselves."
Leno ended the topic by saying, "That argument is pretty much over."
On what planet? I wouldn't say that the issue of Florida and Michigan is settled, not by a long shot.
Talking about the Democrats' primary methods, Carter said the Dem party went with the super delegate system because at the 1980 Dem convention, Carter's opponent Ted Kennedy refused to shake his hand.
If you say so, Jimmy.
Leno asked Carter if he thought McCain was too old to be running for president. Carter said that McCain is 12 years younger than he is. It sounded as if Carter would say that McCain wasn't too old.
Wrong.
Carter flipped and said, "I think we need a younger person to be president."
Way to diss older Americans!
Naturally, Leno brought up Carter's recent talks with Hamas.
Leno asked, "Why do it? It seems like...boy, it gets people riled up. I mean..."
Carter led off with, "Well, for 32 years, I've been trying to bring peace to Israel, and was successful in getting a peace treaty between Israel and Egypt."
Gee, when was the last time you heard Carter mention the Camp David Accords?
It had to be the last time you heard Carter speak because he manages to work that into every statement he makes.
Then, Carter blathered on about meeting with Hamas, and the need for dialogue, and blah, blah, blah.
Carter said that the State Department didn't ask him not to go on the trip and meet with Hamas. He claimed no one even insinuated that he shouldn't go.
If you say so, Jimmy.
The real purpose for Carter's guest appearance was to hawk his new book about his mom, supposedly a great Mother's Day gift. He mentioned how she loved to be the center of attention. Carter added that he's "really not that way."
HUH? Carter wasn't joking. He claimed that he doesn't like to be the center of attention.
Pointers for Life is a right-to-life group at UW-Stevens Point whose leader is funded by Wisconsin Right to Life.
The group staged a "Cemetery of Innocents" display on the campus, consisting of 4,000 white crosses and pro-life signs.
Student Senator Roderick King didn't like it. He and other students pulled out the crosses in protest even though Pointers for Life had obtained approval for the display.
Barbara Lyons, Executive Director of Wisconsin Right to Life, comments:
"We wonder what caused such intolerance and disrespect. It is hard to understand why a group of white crosses would trigger such an extreme response from King."
What would trigger King's response?
I think King can't handle the truth. Sometimes, the truth hurts.
Individuals with conservative ideologies are happier than liberal-leaners, and new research pinpoints the reason: Conservatives rationalize social and economic inequalities.
Regardless of marital status, income or church attendance, right-wing individuals reported greater life satisfaction and well-being than left-wingers, the new study found. Conservatives also scored highest on measures of rationalization, which gauge a person's tendency to justify, or explain away, inequalities.
The rationalization measure included statements such as: "It is not really that big a problem if some people have more of a chance in life than others," and "This country would be better off if we worried less about how equal people are."
To justify economic inequalities, a person could support the idea of meritocracy, in which people supposedly move up their economic status in society based on hard work and good performance. In that way, one's social class attainment, whether upper, middle or lower, would be perceived as totally fair and justified.
If your beliefs don't justify gaps in status, you could be left frustrated and disheartened, according to the researchers, Jaime Napier and John Jost of New York University. They conducted a U.S.-centric survey and a more internationally focused one to arrive at the findings.
"Our research suggests that inequality takes a greater psychological toll on liberals than on conservatives," the researchers write in the June issue of the journal Psychological Science, "apparently because liberals lack ideological rationalizations that would help them frame inequality in a positive (or at least neutral) light."
The results support and further explain a Pew Research Center survey from 2006, in which 47 percent of conservative Republicans in the U.S. described themselves as "very happy," while only 28 percent of liberal Democrats indicated such cheer.
Translation: Conservatives are compassionless, selfish brutes wearing psychological blinders.
What a load!
The researchers don't distinguish between inequality and injustice. The distinction between the two is an important one. Inequalities aren't necessarily indicators of social injustice. That's not a rationalization. That's a fact.
I certainly don't frame injustice in a positive light. I don't rationalize it.
I don't ignore others' suffering. I don't rationalize it away to make me happy.
Did the researchers make a discovery?
No. Their work isn't science. It's propaganda.
Rather than saying conservatives rationalize inequality, the researchers could say that liberals are irrational and lack nuance.
A 911 call from a murdered college student's cell phone featured sounds that should have been significant to a 911 operator, but they were not heard by the dispatcher during the call, Dane County's top official said Tuesday.
County Executive Kathleen Falk apologized for errors in how the call was managed, but said even if it had been handled correctly, it probably would not have saved Brittany Sue Zimmermann's life on April 2.
"From what I know, I do not believe that had the errors not occurred in the 911 center, that her murder could have been prevented," she said.
Global positioning satellite information would have dispatched police to a 24-unit building next to Zimmermann's apartment in downtown Madison, and a more extensive search of cell phone subscriber records would have taken as long as 30 minutes, county officials said.
Authorities have refused to release the call, describe its content or say when it was made or how long it lasted, saying that could compromise the murder investigation.
On Tuesday, Falk ordered a review of training and personnel qualifications at the county's 911 center and said a national association should also review the matters. She also said she has sent apology letters to Zimmermann's family and fiancé.
County officials and investigators trying to solve the murder of Zimmermann, 21, a University of Wisconsin-Madison student from Marshfield, acknowledged last week that the 911 center had received a call from her cell phone the day of the murder.
Madison police said evidence in the call should have triggered the dispatch of an officer, but that they weren't notified. The head of the county's 911 center said it doesn't have the ability to accurately track emergency calls made from cell phones.
...Falk said residents should have confidence in the system, but acknowledged a series of problems with how the 911 operator responded to the call. She said the 911 dispatcher's failure to hear critical sounds was just one of the errors:
• A new chronology provided by Falk indicates the dispatcher asked three questions during the call from Zimmermann's phone before it ended, but did not make a follow-up call as required by 911 rules.
• After the call from Zimmermann's phone, the dispatcher fielded a hang-up call from a land line. Although she did call that number back, she didn't alert law enforcement - another breach of protocol. Police were first told the call back was to Zimmermann's phone and wasted time focusing on the two men who made the second call, thinking they had used Zimmermann's phone. Falk said records reviewed later showed no connection between the calls.
• Police investigating the murder were falsely told the 911 dispatcher did make a follow-up call to Zimmerman's cell phone. That call did not happen.
Falk said the 911 center was fully staffed at the time of the call and that there were no distractions that would have prevented the operator from hearing the sounds on the call.
"Critical sounds"?
How awful!
Falk is not addressing this matter properly.
Sending apology letters to Zimmermann's family and fiancé is appropriate but that fails to adequately address the multiple errors by the 911 dispatcher.
Falk's call to review training and personnel qualifications at Dane County's 911 center is the right thing to do, but again, not enough.
The dispatcher should at least be reprimanded for failing to follow policy. I think she should be fired.
The community can't have confidence in the 911 system knowing that such an incompetent woman was on the job. Clearly, there are serious problems in terms of the hiring and training of dispatchers.
Worst of all, it's wrong for Falk to declare that Zimmermann would have been murdered even if the 911 call hadn't been so horribly botched.
She can't be certain of that, unless the "critical sounds" are of the actual murder.
But even in that case, quick action may have led to the arrest of the murder suspect. So under any circumstances, the errors have had serious consequences. Zimmermann is dead and no one is in custody for her murder.
...Falk said she continues to have confidence in Joe Norwick, director of the Dane County Public Safety Communications Center, but she and other county officials are still reviewing whether the operator should be disciplined.
The dispatcher asked to be transferred to a different department in county government; it was granted.
Granted?
It should have been demanded.
Falk doesn't seem to get that this a very big deal.
This has to be torture for Zimmermann's loved ones. They have to cope with their loss as well as comes to terms with the fact that when their beloved Brittany called for help, her call was ignored.
Barack Obama’s campaign issued an e-mail on Tuesday night that appeared to relegate Hillary Clinton’s lead in Indiana to efforts by Rush Limbaugh to wreak havoc in the Democratic presidential primary contest.
In an e-mail entitled “The Limbaugh Effect in Indiana = 7 percent,” Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton wrote: “According to the latest exit polling data, 17 percent of voters in the Indiana primary today said they would vote for John McCain in a Clinton/McCain match-up. Forty-one percent of that number is constituted by people who voted Clinton in the primary but also indicated they will vote for McCain in the general election. That comes out to just under 7 percent of the primary electorate the number that may be attributed to a Limbaugh Effect.”
What a lame e-mail!
Burton is saying that Obama really won Indiana.
That's not how it works. Obama lost because Hillary got more votes.
Did Limbaugh's Operation Chaos play a role in giving Hillary that slim victory in Indiana?
Maybe.
It doesn't matter.
What matters is the Dems are divided. This has been a grueling bloody primary. It's May and Obama has shown that he hasn't been able to knock out Hillary.
There's definitely chaos, but Limbaugh can't take credit for all of it.
Sen. Barack Obama won a convincing victory over Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton Tuesday in North Carolina and nearly toppled her in Indiana, twin results that could ramp up pressure on the New York senator to reconsider her candidacy for the Democratic nomination.
Clinton claimed a 51 percent to 49 percent victory in Indiana, a margin of just 22,000 votes statewide out of 1.2 million votes cast. The result was badly delayed due to extremely slow counting of votes in Lake County, a northwestern area seen as strong Obama country.
...The North Carolina electorate divided sharply along racial lines. As has been the case in nearly every state to vote so far in the nomination fight, African American voters went overwhelmingly for Obama -- 91 percent for the Illinois senator to just six percent for Clinton, according to exit polling. Clinton carried white voters in the Tarheel State convincingly, taking 60 percent to Obama's 38 percent.
Whites are significantly more likely to vote for Obama than blacks are likely to vote for Hillary.
Regarding the black vote, this Dem primary is playing out like a general election, with Obama being the Dem and Hillary being the Republican.
Blacks are completely abandoning Hillary.
Over 90 percent of blacks vote for Obama even though Hillary and Obama aren't essentially different in terms of the issues.
The difference is skin. It's race.
Although Hillary carries white voters, the margins are nowhere near the overwhelming number of black voters that Obama carries.
It's about race. When given a choice between a comparable white Dem and a black Dem, blacks go with the black candidate.
That's racist.
It's the elephant in the room.
Blacks used to support Hillary. Then Obama came along.
In North Carolina, Mr. Obama’s performance was bolstered by a strong black vote. He captured more than 90 percent of those voters in that state, where blacks accounted for one in three voters.
Exit polls in North Carolina and Indiana show that race is key.
Race again played a pivotal role in Tuesday's Democratic presidential clashes, as whites in Indiana and North Carolina leaned solidly toward Hillary Rodham Clinton and blacks voted overwhelmingly for Barack Obama, exit polls showed. Almost half said they were influenced by the focus on Obama's former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright.
Obama, the Illinois senator battling to become the first black president, again failed to gain ground with a crucial voting bloc that has consistently eluded him — working-class whites. But he pieced together coalitions that besides blacks included the young, first-time primary voters, the very liberal and college graduates, plus sizable minorities of whites.
According to exit polls of voters, about two-thirds of whites in both states who have not completed college were supporting Clinton. The New York senator could use that to fortify her argument that she would be the stronger Democratic candidate in the November general election. Of 28 states that held primaries in which she and Obama competed before Tuesday, Clinton had prevailed with working-class white voters in 25.
...The six in 10 whites in both states supporting Clinton were similar to her margin over Obama among whites nationally so far, showing he continues to have trouble cutting into her support from those voters. Even so, his lopsided backing from blacks meant he didn't need white majorities Tuesday to be competitive.
...Nine in 10 blacks in both states were backing Obama — an even stronger margin than usual for a group he has dominated. That proved decisive in North Carolina, where they comprised about a third of voters — nearly double their proportion in Indiana.
All the talking heads keep stressing that Obama hasn't managed to win the Archie Bunker vote. Those blue-collar, uneducated bigots won't vote for the "exotic" Obama.
Jeremiah Wright had an impact on the way these bigots voted.
Actually, the pundits and columnists sound like bigots to me.
They completely ignore why blacks aren't voting for the white candidate.
Alex Schumer, left, and Kami Koeshall, students with the Pointers for Life group on the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point campus, replace crosses Thursday after they were pulled up by protesters. (Doug Wojcik/For the Stevens Point Journal)
Students at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point butted heads Thursday after an anti-abortion organization planted 4,000 white crosses on campus to symbolize aborted fetuses and a student responded by pulling hundreds of them out of the ground.
The display, sponsored by Pointers for Life and planted on Isadore Street outside the Health Enhancement Center, is called "Cemetery of the Innocents" and features crosses and anti-abortion and religious signs, one of which reads "Seek Jesus."
The group has come to expect minor vandalism each time it displays the exhibit, but students were shocked when Roderick King pulled up many of the crosses in protest.
"It's just so disrespectful, and it's disappointing that this comes from UWSP students. I've always thought of this campus as a tolerant place. ... Someone made these (crosses) with their own hands," said Pointers for Life member Tracey Oudenhoven.
King eventually left the site of the display after speaking with Protective Services officials, but he later returned to protest. King said his anger was not just politically charged, but also related to the anonymity of the exhibit.
"If you're not ashamed of this, then you should claim it and sign it," King said. "My student dollars are going to support this, this travesty."
Pointers for Life reserved the space but didn't indicate its sponsorship of the exhibit. At King's request, students eventually posted a sign reading, "Sponsored by Pointers for Life."
Students put up the exhibit early Wednesday. By Thursday morning, some signs had been slashed and a few crosses had been broken. King said he didn't participate in those acts.
According to a release from Students for Life of America, King did take part in the vandalism.
After having their display vandalized on the night of April 30th, several members from the UWSP pro-life group, Pointers for Life, were repairing the display around 11am on the morning of May 1st when a group of angry students, lead by UWSP Student Senator Roderick King, began to walk though the rows, taking crosses from the ground and throwing them.
King began to voice his complaints and said that Pointers for Life had "no right" to display the crosses, and that it was "his duty as a paying student" to take it down.
When the campus Protective Services officer arrived, most of the students stopped vandalizing the display, however, Senator King did not stop. He claimed, "The freedom of speech does not cover these signs and symbols!" Only after the Protective Services officer threatened to make him pay for damages, Senator King finally stopped.
Bob Tomlinson, Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs, apologized to Pointers for Life for the disrespect and vandalism by the students. And Student Senators Katie Kloth and Erica Wardle came to the display and clearly defined the policies, asserting that Pointers for Life had correctly reserved the space and were allowed to host the display.
That night, Pointers for Life submitted a complaint to the Student Government Association (SGA) and asked for Senator King to resign or be disciplined appropriately under the student government Constitution. However, the student government has yet to force Senator King to resign.
Jackie Kryzkowski, the Pointers for Life President, said, "Student Senators should be helping to defend our freedom of speech, not trying to take it away because of personal beliefs. If students had a problem with the display, they could exercise their freedom of speech maturely by protesting it peacefully, not by defacing our display."
There is no question that King vandalized the display on the morning of May 1. Watch Sen. King rip down the crosses.
