I really liked this article on conservative viewpoints and the conservative case against G. W. Bush.

I hope everyone is watching the "debate" tonight, even though the use of that word for the display we'll see tonight is a semantic stretch. I've copied a forward I got about the debate that I think everyone should be aware of:

*****Connie Rice: Top 10 Secrets They Don't Want You to Know About the Debates

The Tavis Smiley Show, September 29, 2004 · After weeks of political wrangling, Sen. John Kerry and President Bush will square off for the first of three key presidential debates. Both camps have agreed to an elaborate, 32-page contract that spells out everything from the size of the dressing rooms to permitted camera angles.

But the controversy over the debates threatens to overshadow the events themselves. Some citizen groups complain that the Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD) isn't as non-partisan as it should be, and that Kerry and Bush won't be pressed on urban issues. Commentator Connie Rice says that's just the tip of the iceberg, and she's got another Top 10 list
-- this time:

Top 10 Secrets They Don't Want You to Know About the Debates.

(10.) They aren't debates!

"A debate is a head-to-head, spontaneous, structured argument over the merits of an issue," Rice says. "Under the ridiculous 32-page contract that reads like the rules for the Miss America Pageant, there will be no candidate-to-candidate questions, no rebuttal to your opponent's points, no cross questions or cross answers, no rebuttals, no follow-up questions -- that's not a debate, that's a news conference."

(9.) The debates were hijacked from the truly independent League of Women Voters in 1986.

"The League of Women Voters ran these debates with an iron hand as open,transparent, non-partisan events from 1976 to 1984," Rice says. "The men running the major campaigns ended their control when the League defiantly included John Anderson and Ross Perot, and used tough moderators and formats the parties didn't like. The parties snatched the debates from the League and formed the Commission on Presidential Debates -- the CPD -- in 1986."

(8.) The "independent and non-partisan" Commission on Presidential Debates is neither independent nor non-partisan.

"CPD should stand for 'Cloaking-device for Party Deceptions' -- it is not an independent commission on anything. The CPD is under the total control of the Republican and Democratic parties and by definition bipartisan, not non-partisan. Walter Cronkite called CPD-sponsored debates an "unconscionable fraud.'"

(7.) The secretly negotiated debate contract bars Kerry and Bush from any and all other debates for the entire campaign.

"Under what I call the Debate Suppression and Monopolization Clause of the contract, it is illegal for the candidates to debate each other anywhere else during the campaign," Rice says. "We need a new criminal law for reckless endangerment of democracy."

(6.) The debate contract effectively excludes all other serious presidential candidates from participating in the debates.

"This is what I call the Obstruction of Democratic Debate Rule, which sets an impossibly high threshold for third-party candidates... Where are we, Russia? Isn't Vladimir Putin wiping out democracy in Russia by excluding all opposing candidates from the airwaves during his re-election campaigns? Most new ideas come from third parties -- they should be in the debates."

(5.) All members of the studio audience must be certified as "soft" supporters of Bush and Kerry, under selection procedures they approve.

"It's not enough to rig the debate -- they have to rig the audience, too? The contract reads: 'The debate will take place before a live audience of between 100 and 150 persons who... describe themselves as likely voters who are soft Bush supporters or soft Kerry supporters.' We should crash this charade and jump up in the middle to declare ourselves hard opponents of this Kabuki dance."

(4.) These "soft" audience members must "observe in silence."

"Soft and silent... In what I'm calling the Silence of the Lambs Clause of this absurd contract, the audience may not move, speak, gesture, cough or otherwise show that they are alive and thinking."

(3.) The "extended discussion" portion of the debate cannot exceed 30 seconds.

"Other than the stupidity of the debate contract, what topic do you know that can be extendedly discussed in 30 seconds?"

(2.) Important issues are locked out by the CPD debate rules and party control.

"Really important but sticky or tough issues get axed, because the parties control the questions and topics," Rice says. "For example, in 2000, Gore and Bush mentioned the following issues zero times: Child poverty, the drug war, homelessness, working-class families, NAFTA, prisons, corporate crime and corporate welfare."

(1.) Fortune 100 corporations are the main funders of the CPD-sponsored debates, and the CPD's co-chairs are corporate lobbyists.

The CPD is run by Frank Fahrenkopf, a pharmaceutical industry lobbyist, and Paul Kirk, a top gambling lobbyist," Rice says. "And the biggest muliti-national corporations write the checks that fund the CPD -- Phillip Morris, Anheuser-Busch and dozens more. The audience may have to be silent and motionless, but the corporate sponsors can have banners, beer tents, Budweiser girls handing out pamphlets protesting beer taxes -- a corporate-sponsored circus to go along with the Kabuki Debates. Could we get a more fitting description of our democracy?"*****

Yup, scary. I sat in on the moveon.org teleconference last night. I listened over the internet, and it was amazing to watch little dots come-up on a map of the U.S. as people logged on. A smattering across the country, concentrated on the East coast, of over 3,000 people. Seven of us were tuned in from Tompkins County, New York. At the end they had a call out for volunteers, whether you live in a swing state or not, to help with phone calling for the leave-no-voter-behind initiative to turn out 440,000 voters for Kerry in swing states. The poll of people who volunteered came up on the screen. 3000 volunteers and only 33 had said no, they couldn't volunteer by the time I logged off. I guess I had expected more people, but there was a second confrerence running later in the evening for West coast people. Definately a reason to be hopeful.

Mac is one of the 500 professional organizers they've hired for the task. He's based in Philly, very near where he grew up, and is responsible for 25 precincts and turning out 44 voters in each precinct. A lot of responsibility, that seems to be weighing heavily upon him. I'm driving down this weekend for his birthday to cheer him up. I coudn't be prouder to know that he's a key player in what I see as one of the largest and most important grassroots initiatives of the decade. I find it amusing that his title is "professional organizer" considering the disarray in which he left, and usually leaves, his things at home. But that's just uxorial chiding. I couldn't be prouder of him for taking on this task. I know how hard he's working and the deep obligation he feels to all moveon.org members who are counting on him to make a difference in this election. If YOU are a moveon.org member help him out and volunteer your time, even if you're not in a swing state, by offering to make phone calls to recruit volunteers in swing states. Sign up to volunteer here!