Pangloss

No, it doesn't point to that. It doesn't indicate what they might or might not have told Obama before he submitted his own piece. You're putting too fine a point on it anyway. That's just not the way editorial boards work. They know full well the difference between holding submissions to editorial standards and opening their editorial page to politicians running for office. This was the latter, until they read McCain's piece, then it became the former, and I've presented support for this from objective sources. If you want to speculate about editorial standards, be my guest, but I see no backing for that point of view.

Lol, with my service that would probably improve my reception!

I agree too!!!! (And iNow, you are such a nEwB!)

Plus the string might have been made with hemp. (Or would that be more of a plus?)

BOR = Bill O'Reilly. Bascule: The oil rig speech (and its hurricane cancellation) is being widely reported, but I don't know how accurate the rumor that he got the idea from Rush Limbaugh is. All I know is Rush Limbaugh is reportedly claiming that the idea came from his broadcast a couple of weeks before.

Yeah, I know BOR is mainly TV (he also has a radio show), but I lump him in with the same crowd.

Coincidence?

Well, if it's true it wouldn't surprise me all that much if McCain was picking up talking points (and failing to fact-check them) from the CTR crowd. McCain was supposed to give a speech this week about offshore drilling from an oil rig (the plan was interrupted by Hurricane Dolly). The idea apparently came from a recent Rush Limbaugh suggestion.

Oh I see, yes, I agree with this point completely.

I understand and agree. But I think what he meant was that the surge made the awakenings successful. That would be true, and renders his statement to a minor gaff. On the contrary, it's partisan hyperbole, and beneath us here. You don't like it when people start threads based on rhetoric from Bill O'Reilly or Rush Limbaugh, so it should come as no surprise to you when you're chastised for doing the same. If I let you go on this you'll turn this place into a video hosting service for MoveOn.org, and we all know it. That's not going to happen.

I think Obama would be nodded at and complied with if he'd submitted a piece that mostly derided McCain. He's certainly shown no shortage of willingness to do so, so I don't understand that comment at all. As for Swansont's post above, if they specified those parameters in advance then I could agree with that position, like when a debate is held that focuses on certain issues. If that was the case here then a rejection would be understandable. If it was not the case, then I stand by what I said earlier. It was their right, but it was a huge mistake, and I've got objective backing for that position.

I see your point. I'm still pondering it; I just don't think I know enough to make a final decision on it yet. Probably not -- just yesterday he essentially called Obama a traitor, saying he'd rather lose the war than the election.

I see. Sounds like a pretty minor misstep to me. Shades of Clintonesque "it depends on what your definition of 'it' is". Pretty much anything Keith Olberman says needs to go in one ear and out the other. I think we're better here when we avoid thread-starts based on pure demagoguery. My two bits anyway.

I'm not sure what this is supposed to be showing us. Can someone explain it slowly and with small words? Give me the geriatric version, please. The surge was a pretty straightforward thing. Not a lot there to misunderstand. And he should get credit for supporting the surge. The hindsight thing is just typical campaign exaggeration. So what? He supported the surge. He gets the laurels for that. End of story. It is valid for McCain to ride Obama for opposing the surge.

Absolutely. No question about it. Either they should open their doors to both candidates, or they should not open their doors at all. Mind you, I'm suggesting a law here, I'm just talking about what's fair and what's politically wise. We agree the Times' purpose was not to educate the populace on grammar and punctuation, right? Well, can we not also agree that they're not trying to hold hostage this country's candidates in order to indoctrinate the populace on which political positions are important and which ones are not? Because that's the impression that they've given people by this act. I don't think that's their purpose at all, I think their purpose, what they SHOULD be doing, and what they typically ARE doing in these situations, is simply shining a spotlight on the candidates. Well, letting them repeat utter nonsense and pure drivel, if that's what they want to utter, IS illuminating. So they should leave it alone. And their own ombudsman Clark Hoyt, as well as objective media analyst Howard Kurtz, both agree with me, iNow. Kurtz spoke of how Obama's piece is not a very good leg for them to stand on -- sure, he may not attack McCain as much as McCain attacked him, but he didn't exactly offer anything new, as editor Shipley claimed. Clark Hoyt also spoke of fairness, saying it was a mistake to even give the appearance of holding him to a different standard than McCain, and not because it gives ammunition to the far right, either.

You did indeed call it, kudos.

Sure, but that doesn't mean the Times shouldn't have run it. It's not their place to say anything about the content -- they should either run each candidates' words, as-is, or run neither of them. The situation makes no "editorial" sense at all.

Well, not to drag this out endlessly, but in my opinion it's not plausible because if it were you wouldn't have these particular analysts saying this over and over without a response from the McCain campaign -- they would at least deny it. It's a question of professional courtesy and respectability. But yes, that explanation is possible, given what we've heard so far.

I can hear Hillary smirking all the way from here. (When she's not ducking from the sniper fire.) line[/hr] Update: Looks like it was actually his bill, so he does have a valid reason for using the word "my" and therefore clearly just misspoke -- "my bill" is what he should have said. Obama helped write the Iran Sanctions Enabling Act which was then referred to the Banking committee where it became the bill under discussion today. (Frankly if I had his jetlag I'd probably take credit for birthing my parents. Under sniper fire. In a hurricane.) This update was posted to one of the articles I linked earlier: This URL from 2007 shows Obama as a co-author of the bill: http://www.house.gov/apps/list/press/financialsvcs_dem/press0515072.shtml So once again we find the reality molehill undermining the media mountain (1250+ articles on this on Google News already). I hope you all aren't too angry with me for posting this. Perhaps it is an interesting example for other reasons.

Ah yes, the good old days, when OTHER countries paid the price for our wars. <grump>

General education requirements vary widely by country and even, here in the US, by individual state. What I typically do with this type of question is find a school that has a degree program that I'm interested in, visit their web site, and then drill down through their site until I find their degree requirements, which these days are almost always posted (usually in a "catalog"). Finding a school that has the degree program I'm interested in is actually the most challenging part, but perhaps some folks here can help with that. If you're restricting your focus to a specific geographical area, post the area and maybe we can help you narrow it down.

Obama made this statement in Israel this afternoon: Two sources posted within the last hour: http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/07/23/obama-incorrectly-claims-membership-of-senate-committee/ http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/07/23/1218024.aspx Unfortunately Obama is not on the Banking Committee. This one really irks me because it should have passed his internal "stink test". You simply cannot say something like that without realizing it's false. You can't not know what committees you're on. It's just not reasonable. I may be jumping the gun a bit posting this so quickly. Perhaps there's a reasonable explanation. (I want to check to see if he was even in the country when the committee passed it. I thought he was already on the road at the time. But I've got to get back to work so it'll have to wait.)

Please don't post articles as if they're supporting your position when they do not actually do so. None of those sources state that the New York Times gave the piece to the Drudge Report. Drudge DID scoop it -- I told you that before (YOU said that it was widely reported, NOT scooped). ("I believe I saw it on the websites of all the major news outlets on the day the NYT rejected the Op/Ed. Perhaps the day after.") Anyway, the Times lacks any reason to give McCain's piece to Drudge. They would just run the piece themselves. Why would they WANT to make themselves look bad? And even if they did try some sort of weird underhanded move, Drudge would simply TELL us that the Times did so, because they would love to make the Times look bad. And if McCain didn't leak the story to Drudge he would deny doing so, because everyone is saying that they did so, and they are not ignorant of that fact. Your theory needs a lot of work, not to mention substantiation. Mine, on the other hand, enjoys the support of objective media analysts like Howard Kurtz and (today) Clary Hoyt.

Absence of Malice is still a great movie even 27 years later.

Ack! HDTV isn't a luxury, it's a necessity!! Heathen! Now, if you want to take beer away, that'd be okay. I'm glad you brought up Ramsey. The great irony there is that he's often been seen as a crackpot and a get-rich-quick schemer, but he's only talking about reducing your debt! Regardless of Ramsey's motivations or methods, I think that's an astounding reaction that says a great deal about the relative value we place on having certain items vs saving for the future. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave_ramsey#Criticism