HorsesAss.Org

I just got back from a long weekend in Chicago, and I’ve apparently missed out on a few local medical marijuana cases. Here’s a quick roundup:

– A medical marijuana patient named Alex Morris, who is suffering from Crohn’s disease, is serving a 30-day jail sentence and is unable to use the medicine a doctor has authorized him to use. He’s lost 10 pounds in 8 days. Even under the Washington State law approved by the voters, his medicine is not legally available to him while in prison.

I’m not able to find out if Morris was sent to jail for marijuana-related charges or something else, but the effects that his lack of medicine is having on him should make us question having a person in his condition serving a 30-day jail sentence in a state where the prisons are already overcrowded.

– Another Crohn’s patient named Steve Senn was sentenced to one year in jail today, although he will be out on bail awaiting appeal. A Snohomish County judge has ordered Senn not to use his medicine while under Department of Corrections supervision. Even though Senn had already served his deferred prosecution for a refusal to submit to a breathalyzer test, the judge cited failed drug tests due to his legal medical marijuana use as the reason to invalidate the deferred prosecution.

– Bruce Olson, the husband of Pam Olson, had a pre-trial hearing today in Kitsap County. The case may be postponed until after July 1, when the state Department of Health is expected to announce the quantity guidelines for medical marijuana patients. As with all cases, showing up at the courthouse to show your support for the patients is always appreciated.

Speaking of political campaigns making effective use of the Internet, the WA State Dems have put up a new web site of their own, The Real Rossi. I especially like this audio clip of Rossi, which I think pretty much sums up his entire campaign:

[audio:https://horsesass.org/wp-content/uploads/rossismile.mp3]

One of the fascinating things about this election cycle is the way the Internet is breaking the stranglehold of traditional political and media institutions. For example, we all knew that Hillary Clinton was a lock for the Democratic nomination because nobody could compete with her massive money machine… that is until Barack Obama used the Internet to go straight to the people, and set new fundraising records in the process.

The same is beginning to happen in terms of media coverage, with some wags referring to 2008 as the first “YouTube election.” The video above is a great example, generating nearly 400,000 views in its first 24-hours online; not quite the audience of a network news program, but damn impressive nonetheless. It begs the question how much longer the national media can stick to the “Straight Talk Express” narrative without damaging (further) their credibility?

Meanwhile the DNC is doing its part to help both voters and reporters discern truth from fiction with today’s launch of McCainPedia:

McCainpedia.org is a wiki run by the DNC’s Research, Communications, and Internet teams. The goal is to centralize research material, allowing the general public to use it as they see fit.

Opposition research is nothing new, but its product is traditionally aimed at journalists and opinion makers, who then regurgitate the tidbits they find most compelling, and in the context of their choosing. Campaign seasons are typically filled with swarms of press releases pushing one factoid or another, most of which never make it into the mainstream media narrative.

With McCainPedia, the DNC is both seeking to cut out the gatekeepers, while simultaneously giving them a tool to do their job better. Sure, this is a partisan site created by a partisan organization, but facts are facts, and each citation is thoroughly documented.

The legacy media may want to ignore these new developments, but they do so at their own peril.

State Democratic Party Chair Dwight Pelz, a superdelegate to the national convention, has officially declared his support for Sen. Barack Obama. Following a theme we’ve seen throughout Obama’s recent flood of endorsements, Pelz writes:

Throughout this campaign, I have gained an enormous respect for Hillary Clinton. This country and this party are unquestionably far stronger for the contributions she’s made throughout this campaign and throughout her long career in public service. I will be eternally grateful for Sen. Clinton’s appearance at our awards dinner last year, as she was warmly welcomed by Washington State Democrats, and for the time she has spent campaigning in Washington state. I have no doubt that Sen. Clinton would be a tough, thoughtful, intelligent, compassionate, and supremely-prepared President of the United States.

At this point in time, however, I feel the voters have spoken, that Sen. Obama will be our nominee, and that it is time for us as Democrats to begin the final stretch of this historic 2008 campaign to take back America. It is time to unify our party around one candidate.

There was a point early on when Clinton led Obama five to one in WA superdelegates. Obama now leads seven to five, with five remaining. (Actually, it’s seven to four with five remaining, as Ron Sims isn’t technically part of WA’s superdelegate slate, earning his slot as president of the National Democratic County Officials. But why get technical?)

An estimated 75,000 rallied to hear Barack Obama speak in Portland today, just days before the Oregon primary.  Blue Oregon has video of the massive rally that gives a good feel for the size of the crowd.

Imagine John McCain drawing a crowd of this size.  Betcha can’t.

The official NRCC Blog doesn’t typically generate much of a conversation—a few comments here and there, maybe a dozen or so in a really active thread.  So perhaps NRCC chair Tom Cole might want to pay attention to the 1255 comments on his most recent post, “Republican Solutions and a Positive Agenda.“

And all of them negative. Really.  I’ve been browsing the thread for an hour and haven’t found a single supportive comment.

You want to watch the Republican meltdown in action, go read this thread.

George Bush is not, apparently, willing to attend soldier’s funerals. But, perhaps, we shouldn’t be quick to judge him as a selfish prick. He has given up a lot for this war (besides his approval ratings).

Here is a medley of commentary on Bush’s recent Farewell to Clubs:

(These and some 60 other media clips from the past week in politics are posted at Hominid Views.)

35 years ago, in the early days of the Pinochet regime in Chile, folk singer Victor Jara was murdered. Yesterday, one of the people involved, colonel, Mario Manriquez Bravo was found guilty. It’s really an amazing story, and I recommend that you read the whole thing here.

The dictatorship ultimately banned Jara’s music. They even banned some of the folk instruments often used to play it.

That day is over.

The boxing arena where he was murdered is now called Victor Jara Stadium.

Almost thirty-five years later, and nearly two decades after the end of the dictatorship, a Chilean court has found a retired colonel, Mario Manriquez Bravo, guilty in the murder of Victor Jara.

Unfortunately, they also closed the case, despite the clear involvement of numerous others. The Jara family’s attorneys believe that the court is still protecting the rest for political reasons. Now come appeals.

… are you doing inside reading a blog on a beautiful day like today?  Go outside and get some exercise.

Now scram!

The Democrats aren’t the ones falling apart, the Republicans are. The Democrats can see daylight ahead. For all their fractious fighting, they’re finally resolving their central drama. Hillary Clinton will leave, and Barack Obama will deliver a stirring acceptance speech. Then hand-to-hand in the general, where they see their guy triumphing. You see it when you talk to them: They’re busy being born.

The Republicans? Busy dying. The brightest of them see no immediate light. They’re frozen, not like a deer in the headlights but a deer in the darkness, his ears stiff at the sound. Crunch. Twig. Hunting party.

That’s Peggy Noonan.  In the Wall Street Journal, for chissakes.  Mourning the death of her party.

At least one Republican isn’t in denial.

Mr. Bush has squandered the hard-built paternity of 40 years. But so has the party, and so have its leaders. If they had pushed away for serious reasons, they could have separated the party’s fortunes from the president’s. This would have left a painfully broken party, but they wouldn’t be left with a ruined “brand,” as they all say, speaking the language of marketing. And they speak that language because they are marketers, not thinkers. Not serious about policy. Not serious about ideas. And not serious about leadership, only followership.

This is and will be the great challenge for John McCain: The Democratic argument, now being market tested by Obama Inc., that a McCain victory will yield nothing more or less than George Bush’s third term.

That is going to be powerful, and it is going to get out the vote. And not for Republicans.

Ouch.

As Goldy pointed out, there was a new poll for the Washington gubernatorial race released today by Rasmussen Reports. The poll was taken on May 12 on a sample of 500 likely voters, giving it a margin of error of about 4%.

The poll shows Governor Christine Gregoire is leading Dino Rossi 52% to 41%. This double-digit (+11%) lead is substantially better that her +5% lead in a late-April Elway poll poll and her +4% lead mid-April SurveyUSA poll. Finally, the previous Rassmussen poll, taken in late March gave Gregoire a slim +1% lead.

My Monte Carlo analysis of the Elway poll indicated that Gregoire had an 89.9% chance of beating Rossi (but only if the election were held when the poll was taken). It is precisely because that probability is less than 95% (a rather arbitrary number offered as a reasonable cut-off “significance level” by the great statistician Sir. R.A. Fisher early in the last century), that the results are considered a “statistical tie” or “within the margin of sampling error.” But having a nearly 90% probability of winning is not the same as having a 50% probability of winning—something that is implied by the phrase “statistical tie.”

So lets repeat the Monte Carlo exercise to estimate Rossi’s or Gregorie’s probability of winning a hypothetical election held right now. I simulated a million gubernatorial elections of 500 voters each election. Each person had a 52% chance of voting for Gregoire, a 41% chance of voting for Rossi, and a 7% chance of voting for neither.

The result? Gregoire won every single one of the one million elections. In other words, the poll results indicate that, in an election held right now, Gregoire would win with certainty. There are some assumptions involved: the Rasmussen poll is unbiased and the sample was truly selected at random. So violations of those assumptions may offer Rossi slight chances. Furthermore, there is no question that things can and will change before November. But right now the best evidence available suggests that Gregoire wins.

There was another interesting finding in the poll. When the likely voters were asked their views on each candidate, 49% viewed Rossi favorably; 55% viewed Gregoire favorably; 45% viewed Rossi unfavorably; and 41% viewed Gregoire unfavorably. That gives Rossi a +4% spread between favorable and unfavorable, and Gregoire a +14% spread.

I’m thinkin’ the “We Wuz Robbed” meme isn’t really working out for Rossi….

(Cross-posted at Hominid Views)

I guess this is what passes for humor amongst the Guns & God wing of the Republican Party:

Ever wonder why there are so few Republican comedians? It’s because this is what passes for humor During a speech before the National Rifle Association convention Friday afternoon in Louisville, Kentucky, former Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee — who has endorsed presumptive GOP nominee John McCain — joked that an unexpected offstage noise was Democrat Barack Obama looking to avoid a gunman.

“That was Barack Obama, he just tripped off a chair, he’s getting ready to speak,” said the former Arkansas governor, to audience laughter. “Somebody aimed a gun at him and he dove for the floor.”

One thing you can say about Huckabee, he sure knows how to play to an audience.

UPDATE:
Here’s the video:

Listen to the audience laugh.  Somebody aimed a gun at our first African American presidential nominee… oh man that’s funny, isn’t it?