Because I Said So…

Temperance lecturer, landscape painter, and Minister Gene Amondson wants to add U.S. president to his list of occupations.  He is the Prohibition Party’s presidential candidate. 

This will be Amondson’s second presidential run.  He campaigned under the Prohibition Party with the same one-plank platform–no booze–in 2004.  For some reason, the Prohibition Party thinks alcohol is the biggest issue this country faces.  Health care?  Negligible.  Iraq War?  Who cares?  Alcohol?  Grab your torch and pitchforks!  Yup, they want to bring back the golden age of 1929.  Are they drunk?  No.  And this bad-ass photo from his website makes me think Amondson means business:

Amondson seems like a guy with a sense of humor.  He picketed outside Anheuser-Busch in St. Louis holding a wine bottle and dressed as the Grim Reaper.  Clearly, the Amondson is targeting the youth vote. He reprised this role for the “Daily Show” in 2004 when the program did a segment on the Prohibition Party during the presidential elections.  Check it out here.  The clip is almost as funny as it would be if he actually won.  What a sobering thought…  (Try reading that comment while you’re drunk.  You will find it more amusing.)

It’s been nearly two years since current Green Party presidential candidate Cynthia McKinney punched a cop.  On March 29, 2006, the then Georgia U.S. Representative  punched a Capitol police officer after he mistakenly pursued her for failing to pass through a metal detector.  How much you want to bet she was blasting rap group NWA’s single “F*ck the Police” in her i-pod on the way to work that morning?

To be fair, members of Congress are not required to pass through metal detectors.  So, when the officer called out, “Ma’am, Ma’am,” and grabbed her arm to stop her, she did what any respectable congressman would do: she punched him in the chest.

It turns out McKinney wasn’t wearing the pin that distinguishes the privileged congress members from the nobodies and potential psychos, so security personnel probably weren’t expecting to get chest bumped by an angry Capitol Hill rep.  But, whatever.

Since then McKinney has been ostracized, switched parties and now tries her hand at being Green.  So let’s celebrate how far she’s come since that unsightly incident (caught on tape but, unfortunately for us, unreleased) with a video in which she humiliates herself a couple of weeks after the assault:

McKinney was being interviewed by a reporter who repeatedly questioned her about the scuffle.  Frustrated, McKinney stood up and forgot she was still wearing a microphone. Her off-screen comments calling one of her aids “a fool” were caught on tape.  Enjoy!

Ever wonder why your favorite fringe presidential candidates are being ignored by your nightly news election coverage?  According  to the executive director of the World Humanitarian Peace and Ecology Movement, Joseph Raglione, blame Big Oil corporations.

Raglione said, the only presidential candidates who refused to co-operate with Cap and Trade, are Mike Gravel and Ron Paul. They both believe in taxing the polluters directly.  Mysteriously, both have been cut out of the corporate controlled media spotlight. Dun dun duunnnnnnnnn!

 Senators Mike Gravel and Ron Paul are not listed as having accepted money from the Oil corporations, but if you follow the oil money at the Oil Change International website, you can see a fun little graphic detailing how all the other presidential candidates accepted money.

So that’s why Grandpa Gravel and Popular Paul are being ignored.  The well-paid media is not reporting on these two presidential candidates because they won’t play ball with the oil tycoons.  Ah, well, maybe a sense of decency and an intact moral compass is more valuable than being president of United States.

The Draft Bloomberg committee, started by Unity08 co-founders Doug Bailey and Gerald Rafshoon, posted a new Web video warning Bloomberg that he has 10 days to officially put himself in the presidential race as a third-party candidate.

The video features a digital clock running down–as seen on Fox Network show “24,” the ticking of a time bomb and footage of an explosion, presumably a terrorist attack. It urges people to sign the petition at DraftBloomberg.com.  It was so dramatic I was one terrorist explosion away from adding my electronic signature to the petition in virtual support of the billionaire mayor.

What’s the rush?  “With ballot access laws in several states requiring early action, time is running out,” the committee’s press release stated. “Virtually any effort to qualify for the Texas ballot, for example, must begin the day after the Texas primary on March 4.”

According to Bailey, the decision has to be made in this time frame to get out in front of the Lone Star State primary, which is expected to generate a huge turnout and potentially decide the Democratic contest.

Well no amount of flashy Adobe Premier Elements is going to persuade Bloomberg to make a hasty decision.  The NYC mayor may not decide until May whether to run for president, according to associates.

Check out the video:

Reality has hit Ron Paul hard.  The Texas congressman basically admitted he’d never get the GOP nod.  I mean unless a house fell on John McCain and Mike Huckabee ran away with the Lollipop Gild.  Paul posted a letter on his website at 10:14 p.m. yesterday saying, now that Mitt Romney had dropped from the race he’d be scaling back his campaign. 

Apparently, Paul was banking on a brokered convention to propel him to the White House:

Let me tell you my thoughts. With Romney gone, the chances of a brokered convention are nearly zero. But that does not affect my determination to fight on, in every caucus and primary remaining, and at the convention for our ideas, with just as many delegates as I can get. But with so many primaries and caucuses now over, we do not now need so big a national campaign staff, and so I am making it leaner and tighter. “

  Never fear though, Paul won’t abandon the GOP and try for a third-party bid because he is “committed to fighting for our ideas within the Republican party.”  Perhaps this change of heart has less to do with Paul actually having his hopes for the Republican bid for president dashed and more to do with him realizing he can losing his House seat if he doesn’t start campaigning to his constituency in Texas for the congressional primary:

I have constituents in my home district that I must serve. I cannot and will not let them down. And I have another battle I must face here as well. If I were to lose the primary for my congressional seat, all our opponents would react with glee, and pretend it was a rejection of our ideas. I cannot and will not let that happen.

Looks like Paul’s ruby red slippers are on the fritz so he is retreating to Texas (what is with all the Republican nominee rejects squatting in Texas?) to make sure he has a place on the Hill after all this hoopla.  Give ‘em hell on the inside is what I always say.  And what does Paul say?  “The neocons, the warmongers, the socialists, the advocates of inflation will be hearing much from you and me.”

Oh, Dr. Paul.  You had me at neocons.  Now what to do with all of your supporters?  We’ll just let them keep believing their $30 million didn’t go to waste.

Alan Keyes continues touring Texas before the March 4 primary and guess what?  He thinks he can win!  Ignore John McCain’s huge lead in the Republican race and the fact that Keyes is getting nearly zero media coverage.

When asked by The Beaumont Enterprise if he thinks he can pull off the biggest upset in U.S. government history, Keyes replied “of course”:

I am both the most experienced in every respect, and the best candidate. I proved that back in 2000, when I won every single Republican debate.  I think it is just a matter of getting the word out, from the grassroots to the media, to overcome the effort of the elite to destroy the freedom of choice of the American people.

In that same interview Keyes called McCain “barely halfway” (did he just say McCain is in recovery from drugs?) to the Republican bid since he has betrayed so many grassroots conservatives.  Keyes predicts McCain is bound to lose the general election if he is nominated.  Uh…

Keyes also said “the Republican party is being hijacked” by a bunch of liberals in conservatives clothing.  So what is he going to do to get his party back on track?  Win big in Texas of course.  The former U.S. Assistant Secretary of State believes Texas is the key to Keyes’ campaign.  He told Beaumont he has “no plans beyond winning the Texas primary and moving on to the convention, where I believe that the conservatives will come together in order to nominate the kind of alternative that America needs.”

Looks like Bizzaro World Obama is on a mission to save the Republican Party and it all starts–and ends–with Texas.  Anything I could say about this would sound trite.  So, ellipses.

Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are busy this week jetting across the nation, smiling for cameras while they throttle each other for delegates and momentum on Super Tuesday.  Meanwhile, the third Democrat, former Alaska Senator Mike Gravel is hanging in there and hanging out.

Grumpy Gravel is working the liberal San Francisco and Berkeley areas for the next few days, and while he’s there picking up stray votes he’ll be picking up a few slices.  He and some of his supporters are hanging out at a Berkeley pizza joint to watch the returns Tuesday. 

 Join us as the results from the “Super Tuesday” primaries roll in, don’t sit home yelling at the TV! Come spend a few hours with Mike and the World Can’t Wait–Drive Out the Bush Regime! activists and many other friends. Location: Spud’s Pizza 3290 Adeline, Berkeley, CA (Spud’s is a short walk from Ashby BART / easy street parking / wheelchair accessible)

Gravel has barely registered in any of the early primary states.  Candidates who have already dropped out of the race often get more votes.  But the thinning field may allow him to win some protest votes, maybe even accumulate a few convention delegates. 

Everyone knows the key to winning a presidential primary election is to buy the voters pizza.  At least it worked in high school… 

Spud’s Pizza is the location of Gravel’s Super Tuesday get-together. (photo via spudspizza.com)