Saunter To The White House 61 ; But There Is A Slightly Ironic Silver Lining For Clinton

Hillary Clinton can dismiss the news about the campaign debt by feeling consoled at the polls which show her ahead in tomorrow's West Virginia primary.

Tell The Truthiness ; It's called the Bradley Effect, which there is debate about, because it may be 'reversing' during this primary season, it's an interesting subject to read about.

Saunter To The White House 60 ; Clinton Has Big Debts

The Hillary Clinton campaign is faced with a debt of $20 million according to reports.

Meanwhile numerous rumours continue that even more money may be lent to the campaign by Senator Clinton.

Tell The Truthiness ; How's this money going to be repaid?

Daily Show Goes After Dick Cheney's Open 'Childcatcher' House

This is great ;



Tell The Truthiness ; We'll never see bathrobes in the same light again, urrgghh.

Saunter To The White House 59 ; Hillary Gets SNL-ed

Here is last night's Saturday Night Live take on the latest doings in the democratic campaign for nominee.



Tell The Truthiness ; Amy Poehler's impression has to keep going for a while, regardless of when she drops out of the race. This impression is just gold!

Saunter To The White House 58 ; Obama Takes More Superdelegates

In another numbers story (well, an election really comes down to just the numbers in the end), Barack Obama has overtaken Hillary Clinton in the number of committed Superdelegates.

The above video gives a good description of the maths, but isn't specifically about the superdelgates, however, it's great seeing simple whiteboards to explain this mammoth contest. Well done Tim Russert!

The Illinois senator now has 267 to the New York senator's 265 after the support of an additional three superdelgates was announced since this weeks primaries.

Tell The Truthiness ; Three for none, it's a good score.

War On Reality Part 90 ; Talk About Delayed Reaction

The US government has finally removed all terrorist and terrorism references to Nelson Mandela and the African National Congress (ANC) party on databases.

Even having been released from prison in 1990 and elected to office in 1994, Nelson Mandela and fellow members of the ANC had to obtain a special waiver to allow access to the US.

Tell The Truthiness ; Well done to Condoleezza Rice for pushing for this to be finally changed, but if this is the way the administration treats democratically elected leaders, it makes you shudder to think how they treat everyone else.

Saunter To The White House 57 ; Daily Show's Take On Primary Night, Don't Miss!

Tell The Truthiness ; Just great!

Saunter To The White House 56 ; How Might The Campaign Be Fought?

Some insight into how McCain may campaign against Obama.



But doesn't this interview show Mrs McCain saying that this will not be a negative campaign?



Tell The Truthiness ; So, what is McCain planning on doing?

Saunter To The White House 55 ; Obama Is The Nominee In All But Name

After the dramatic twists of last night, it really is over for Hillary Clinton.



Obama won North Carolina big and came within a few points of drawing level with Clinton in Indiana.

Tell The Truthiness ; Talk about an historic evening.

Watch Live Coverage Of The Primaries Here On MSNBC

Click on the embedded streaming video below from MSNBC, enjoy!

Saunter To The White House 54 ; Clinton Goes Last Night Too

For the reasons of balance, here is Hillary Clinton presenting the Top Ten on David Letterman's show the other night;

Saunter To The White House 53 ; Olbermann Calls Out Clinton Goalposts

Saunter To The White House 52 ; Obama's Today Show Interview

Saunter To The White House 51 ; Kerry Slaps Down The Media On Wright

Sick, as everyone is of the constant spinning of Reverend Wright, former Presidential nominee John Kerry slapped down MSNBC.



Tell The Truthiness ; Lets talk about the numbers people! That's what matters.

War On Reality Part 89 ; How To Hold A President To Account, Olbermann Style

Saunter To The White House 50 ; Obama Goes Late Night

Tell The Truthiness ; We agree with all ten and really like number four.

Saunter To The White House 49 ; Drip, Drip Of Superdelegates To Obama

The Reverend Wright story seems to lose any sort of effect when, just hours afterwards, more superdelegates move for Obama. This shows just how much, as the primaries rumble on, that the numbers are what it is all coming down to.

Tell The Truthiness ; As the delegate count is tipped in Obama's favour, so the same is happening for the superdelegate count.

War On Reality Part 88 ; Five Years Later From Mission Accomplished

This date marks five years since President Bush stood beneath a huge banner emblazoned with the legend Mission Accomplished. He said that major combat operations had finished in the country and that the US had won.

How wrong he was and how wrong he has been continually ever since. Some people rally against the critics of the current government headed by a guy who would be out of his depth in a puddle, but they forget to see the bigger picture. In decades, in centuries to come, historians and students will analyse this period in our history and say one thing.

"What the hell were the people doing to stop him and hold him to account?"

Tell The Truthiness ; President Bush is still the President and will be until January, as such, our current obsession over the presidential campaigns should not make Mr Bush any less accountable for his actions, whether they are from five days or five years ago.

Saunter To The White House 48 ; Harry Reid Talks Intervention In Dem Primary

It's been said earlier, but it's been made more clear just yesterday by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. It's certain that there will intervention in the Democratic Presidential process if there is no 2,025 delegate winner.

He outlined that a series of letters would be sent to superdelegates to urge them to make their endorsements public. Howard Dean has made comments also, but Nancy Pelosi has remained quiet on the subject. But she has commented that the will of the delegates shouldn't be overturned by the superdelegates.

Tell The Truthiness ; As Mr Reid said, this might not be needed, if Obama gets the delegates, which looks more than likely.

Saunter To The White House 47 ; Clinton's Reality Bites

Hillary Clinton's win in Pennsylvania could still have been a loss and it's not hard to imagine that her latest comments wouldn't have been any different.

The Clinton campaign have sent out an email entitled 'More People Have Voted For Hillary Than Any Other Candidate'. But, the votes that push her into the lead, in her numbers game, are from those states, Michigan and Florida, where the votes weren't counted in the national count towards the nomination. That was something she signed and agreed to as punishment for those states that moved their primaries forward!

Tell The Truthiness ; As seen in the video above, it's Spinnsylvania.

Saunter To The White House 46 ; Is This Hillary's Last Chance, Again?

Today looks set to be a rather exciting day in the democratic race for the presidential nominee. But it still doesn't seal the deal for either candidate.

Tell The Truthiness ; We'll see if that's the case later on...

Saunter To The White House 45 ; ABC's Debate Gets Picked Apart

The hash made by the ABC News team of the latest democratic debate gets the appropriate treatment...







Tell The Truthiness ; Poor job Charlie and George. Makes you wonder what Peter Jennings would be asking the candidates.

Saunter To The White House 44 ; ... Then Obama Uses It, Puts Tech Probs On Notice

Tell The Truthiness ; Good thing Hillary fixed that screen.

Saunter To The White House 43 ; First Hillary Fixes The Screen...

Tell The Truthiness ; Lets call her at 2am, just to catch her off balance!

Saunter To The White House 42 ; Colbert Woos Michelle Obama

Stephen Colbert has had quite a busy time lately.



Tell The Truthiness ; Stephen should get on America's Got Talent.

Saunter To The White House 41 ; The Clinton Thing That Wouldn't Die

Tim Russert rounds up what happened with Hillary Clinton and the snipers



Tell The Truthiness ; Is he getting his editors from The Daily Show?

SNL Gets On Petraeus & Everyone Else

Saturday Night Live continues to keep a ht lead on the activities of the presidential candidates. This is from last week's show:



Tell The Truthiness ; Keep it coming!

War On Reality Part 87 ; Bush Inner Circle Approved Torture

The Associated Press is reporting that an inner circle of US government officials, led from Dick Cheney pushed for torture to be used and asked the Justice Department to approve it.

What is very revealing is that efforts were made to keep all this and even discussion of the subject away from President Bush, allowing him to deny any torture was taking place.

Tell The Truthiness ; We are now in a dangerous era, when a government is more dangerous to it's people than the enemy it claims to protect us from.

Saunter To The White House 40 ; McCain Stumbles, Again & Again

Pennsylvania gets closer, though it seems to be taking forever to get to May. Meanwhile, April fools reign supreme with John McCain getting things wrong, again.

This time he wasn't at a campaign rally, or making a speech to reporters, he was on Capitol Hill, talking about the Iraq invasion and occupation with important other people and he made that Sunni mistake, again.

Then John McCain became Johm McCain in a campaign advert, take a look :



The third times the charm, he has refused to rule out a pre-emptive war, though he admits it's unlikely. We all know how the last one of those went.

Meanwhile Obama has upset a gay newspaper. Seems pretty small-fry when compared to McCain's doings, doesn't it?

Tell The Truthiness ; There's more stuff rolling out, stay tuned.

War On Reality Part 86 ; See No Evil - Abortion Vanishes, According To US Government

A US government backed medical information website blocks the use of the word 'abortion' in it's search function. Why not give it a go?

This seems rather like the blocks the Chinese government makes on Google when anyone domestically searches for Tibet independence.

Tell The Truthiness ; Perhaps if they remove the word Iraq invasion from search engines the US government can make us thing it never happened? Not flipping likely.

Saunter To The White House 39 ; Bill Rails On Superdelegates At Private Meeting

We've all seen Bill Clinton getting rather forceful on the campaign trail. At the start of the year, when things weren't going Hillary Clinton's way, much blame was placed at the door of whoever thought it would be a winner to keep wheeling Bill out. That wasn't the media saying that, that was Hillary's own campaign. Hence for a few days afterwards the two-term President was no-where to be seen.

But now, the wrath of Bill has been spent on a meeting of superdelegates in California. Behind closed doors, he ripped into the press, the delegates and was incensed at Bill Richardson's endorsement of Barack Obama.

Tell The Truthiness ; Who is running for President, Bill or Hillary?

Saunter To The White House 38 ; Reuters Says It's Over For Hillary Clinton

Reuters has become the latest media outlet to report or editorialise that Hillary Clinton is fighting a battle she has little chance of winning. The Politico was the first of any significance to call time on Clinton's campaign bid.

Tell The Truthiness ; Is it just media positioning, or will this judgement become the majority view in the coming weeks?

War On Reality Part 85 ; PM Gives Basra Fighters Deadline

Nouri al-Maliki has given gunmen in Basra a 72 hour period to give up their weapons and surrender. Meanwhile, the British forces that retreated to the airport in December remain there and are not helping the Iraqi army deal with the increase in violence.

Tell The Truthiness ; Is this as bad as it gets, or is Basra slipping back into it's previous lawless state?

War On Reality Part 84 ; An Artistic Response To Bush & McCain

This picture was published in response to the death toll mark being reached the other day.

War On Reality Part 83 ; A Disconnected President

What was President Bush doing on the day that the death toll of US personnel reached 4000?

Hugging an Easter bunny.

Tell The Truthiness ; Then again, has he ever shown any true understanding, no matter what the casualty figure was?

Bill Richardson Separated At Birth From...

... yes, that's right, actor John Rhys-Davies.

Tell The Truthiness ; So, not only does Obama have Bill Richardson's backing, but also the guy from The Lord Of The Rings and Sallah from Indiana Jones. Is there anyone else left to say "yes we can" ?

Saunter To The White House 37 ; Bill Richardson Endorses Barack Obama

Tell The Truthiness ; Is it just us, or did they both look like a possible ticket stood together today?

Saunter To The White House 36 ; Passports Breach For Obama, Clinton & McCain

After last night's news that Barack Obama's passport details had been breached by contractors within the State Department, the story continues.

This lunchtime, as if this story couldn't get any worse, details emerged that Hillary Clinton's and John McCain's records had also been breached at separate times to Senator Obama's. Barack Obama's record was breached on three individual occasions since the beginning of the year.

Tell The Truthiness ; It'll be interesting to find out what the motivation of those who breached these confidential details was. Was it sheer curiosity, or is there a hidden motive to all this?

Holding Them To Account 11 ; Fox News Feuds On Friday

The editorial policy at Fox News boiled over for all to see for what it is today. Anchor Brian Kilmeade walked off the set and later Chris Wallace slated his own network for "Obama bashing". All this follows the misrepresenting of comments by Senator Obama about his grandmother.





Tell The Truthiness ; Fox News, Fairly Unbalanced On Their Unbalancing

War On Reality Part 82 ; 5 Years Of This & How Things Can Be Different

The fifth anniversary of the US led invasion and occupation of Iraq has thrown up a lot of numbers. The deaths, military and civilian, money wasted, attacks, the list is pretty endless. But there is one thing, above everything that we have learned and it's illustrated on the cover of today's Independent, shown above.

The one lesson we never learn is that of history. Human's have very short memories. From the constant meddling by other people and other countries in the Middle East since the dawn of time to the ignorance of federal officials of the mathematical vulnerability of a below sea-level city to the affects of a hurricane's winds and flood waters.

But instead we bury our heads in the sand and claim ignorance, when the lessons of history surround us, like the elephant in the room. This happened the last five years and still we are there, fighting for what exactly?

According to today's news from London, it's against a shadowy collection of loosely affiliated groups that are all around us and all out to get us.

But, look deeper, with more attention to detail and you'll find that things are not like that, the threat has been exaggerated. Using that report as an example, the UK of the 1970s was a far more dangerous place to exist than today's version. In 1972, 470 people were killed by terrorists (the legacy, mostly of the IRA) and in 2007, that number was three (the last fragments of violence in Northern Ireland).

The politics of fear has been almost fine-tuned these past seven years. We've seen the fake terror threats. We've seen the linking of any criminal activity to al-Qaeda. Yes, that includes those people at work who offer you pirate copies of DVDs, they're on a hotline to Osama Bin Laden and are planning the next big attack. We've seen the hyping of non-existent or paper thin intelligence on the next country to attack.



Then to top all that, President Bush, today, on this most sobering of dates, claims victory in Iraq. His Vice President goes one better and responds to a question about two thirds of the US public being against the war, Cheney responded with "so?".

But, things don't have to be like this and recent movements since the start of the year indicate they won't be soon. The interest by Americans and others around the World in the nominees for President has never been seen before in recent times. Every speech, every primary, every stand on an issue is devoured and analysed by media, but equally by the public.

To take things back from the brink of another seven years of what we've just been through, get involved, become an active citizen, get informed and keep informed on what elected officials are doing, even if it's only locally in your town or city. Become a member of a party, attend rallies, investigate those you are considering voting for.

Tell The Truthiness ; We have lived as if in a trance, we have lived as people in fear. That nightmare, that has become daily life for too many of us, is coming to an end. We are waking up from it and it's up to us, not only to move onto a new era of citizen, grassroots led governance, but to promise we shall not let future generations repeat our mistakes.

Special Comment On Clinton Campaign From Keith Olbermann

Keith Olbermann Special Comment Tonight On Clinton Campaign

Tonight's must-see is on MSNBC tonight at 8ET, with a Special Comment on Keith Olbermann's Countdown about the Clinton campaign.

Saunter To The White House 35 ; Accusations, Resignations & Another Win

It's becoming difficult to keep up with the twists in the Clinton and Obama campaigns.

After the primary wins for Hillary in Texas, Ohio and Rhode Island, Barack evened things up by taking the Texas Caucus (at 41% of votes counted) and Vermont. Then there was the resignation for the Hillary 'monster' comment, then there was today's resignation after the accusation of Barack only getting to this point due to being black.

Plus Obama won Mississippi.

Tell The Truthiness ; So it rolls on.

Saunter To The White House 34 ; And... We Still Don't Know

After Super Tuesday Part 2 : Another Cliffhanger, there still is no clear Democratic frontrunner.

Up until Tuesday, press coverage leaned on the side of Obama, with cycle after cycle calling it the final hours for Clinton. Then she won three of the four contests. Now all the same people are talking about her comeback. Then there's discussion about Michigan and Florida having primary real-runs (they wouldn't really be reruns, since they didn't properly take place, with only Clinton being on the ballot in Michigan, in the first place.), after the penalties placed on them due to their early scheduling of voting. Plus there's discussion of a Clinton/Obama ticket (not sure about the order).

Tell The Truthiness ; At least we know that John McCain is the Republican nominee. Plus he can take plenty of naps in the afternoon between now and November, so he's all rested for the main event.

Saunter To The White House 33 ; Obama Gets Own Show!

Tell The Truthiness ; Tune in next week for the next exciting episode!

Saunter To The White House 32 ; Saturday Night Clinton (& Giuliani)

MSNBC spoof debate :



Hillary's Response & Introduction :



The this man pops up, remember him?



Tell The Truthiness ; Thank goodness the writer's strike is over.

Saunter To The White House 31 ; Daily Show Confronts Bias Claims

Tell The Truthiness ; The truth and nothing else. Sort of.

Debates Done & Dusted ; Last Round Starts

No-one, again, seemed to emerge blinking into the warm glow of 'winning' after last night's debate between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.

They discussed their healthcare plans at rather dull length for sixteen minutes. They both said how much they respect the other, before making it clear they thought themselves were the best for the job. Plus, the difficult-for-Clinton issue of NAFTA came up. Meanwhile Obama went on about his ability to bring people together.

Tell The Truthiness ; As nice and needed as debates are, enough about them and come on Ohio and Texas!

Saturday Night Live Gets On Obama & Clinton's Cases (& Mike Huckabee Gets On His Own)

Olbermann's Bush Era Timeline 2002-2008

Here is an excellent piece from Countdown of the 'terror' warnings of the last five years and their uncanny closeness to sensitive political incidents for the Bush administration.



Tell The Truthiness ; Worryingly, what could be added to this during the next 331 days before he leaves?

Saunter To The White House 30 ; Lobbyists, Denials & Debate Moments

This weekend the campaigns, for all contenders, have had very different stories to deal with.

John McCain, 'Mr Straight Talk' , has had to explain accusations about a lobbyist who looks uncannily like his wife.

Barack Obama has been telling those alleging he's stolen lines from someone's speeches, that the same man is on his team for the campaign.

And everyone else has been reading into some comments made at the Democratic CNN Debate that Hillary Clinton is readying herself and the country that she may not be the candidate.

Tell The Truthiness ; Get plenty of bed rest, we need to be fresh and alert for Texas and Ohio on the fourth!

Saunter To The White House 29 ; Ten Out Of Ten For Obama, Clinton Ohio/Texas Last Stand

John McCain would do well to take the next month off, since he is, in all but name, the Republican candidate. Not just for the sake of working for something he already has, but to know, in four weeks time who he will be fighting against.

Obama extended his lead, taking Hawaii and Wisconsin yesterday. The Clinton campaign immediately moved on, pinning hopes, again, like happened before, on the next set of states. This time, those hopes are placed in Ohio and Texas. And once again, the next voting date is seen as decisive.

Tell The Truthiness ; This time though, Texas and Ohio will be Hillary Clinton's last stand. Lets hope, for her sake, she has something to pull out of a ten-gallon hat. If she's not wearing one, then Bill probably will.

Bush , FISA, Warmongering & A Special Comment

Here is last night's Special Comment by Keith Olbermann from Countdown on MSNBC.

Saunter To The White House 28 ; Momentum - The Current Winner

Post Super Tuesday and pre everything else, some frustrations appear to be boiling over.

John McCain's attitude to Mike Huckabee seems to be similar to trying to shake something nasty off his shoe. No matter how hard he tries, it still stays there. As done the distinct odour of true republicanism. While Hillary Clinton is trying to play things as cool as possible, resembling a duck who is paddling furiously under the waterline, in an effort just to remain afloat. Don't mention the change in management of her campaign, the delegate numbers showing Obama the leader, her last win being Arizona or anything else.

Tell The Truthiness ; Everything rests with Texas, Clinton's doing a Giuliani. And we all know how that turned out. Gulp.

Saunter To Super Tuesday ; A Racing Certainty & A 50/50

John McCain is leading the Republican field for tomorrow's primaries and caucuses. For the democrats it's once again as unpredictable as a Lost plot line or story arc.

Hillary Clinton, who had a slight comfortable lead nationally, has been caught on a level by an Obama surge in the last few days. Mr Obama gained the endorsement of Maria Shriver, the wife of California governor Schwarzenegger (who endorsed John McCain). Meanwhile Mrs Clinton has remained on a steady footing, not being knocked off by the shivering chance of having Ann Coulter campaign for her, or any blustering from her husband.

John McCain meanwhile has raised the heckles of some GOP senators who fear that people who have had run-ins with him in the past will have to swallow hard and smile when he gets the nomination. Hardly grounds for a united party come election time.

Tell The Truthiness ; Super Tuesday is shaping up to be a real cracker. We live in interesting times.

Saunter To The White House 27 ; 48 Hours Treading Water

With Super Tuesday on, well, Tuesday, all the candidates are banking on repeating their selling points over and over again. The worse thing that can happen now is something unexpected.

Meanwhile, some of the campaigns seem to be more media savvy than others, Barack Obama's music video is the most obvious one after all the internet 'money bombing' and grass roots efforts for libertarian Ron Paul.



Tell The Truthiness ; Can anyone see John McCain supporters doing anything like this?

Saunter To The White House 26 ; Can We Say Killer Ticket?

Obama/Clinton or Clinton/Obama?

Either way, it's the only certain, bullet-proof way of preventing a Republican White House for the third term in a row. The tit for tat sniping that's been taking place since the beginning of the year, suddenly stopped on debate night.

Have the two camps realised that only one of them will win on Super Tuesday and that a united front has greater odds of winning than a splitting down party lines.

Tell The Truthiness ; There's no chance of that happening with McCain and Romney.

FISA & Wiretapping Special Comment From Keith Olbermann

If you've got shares in any US telecoms giants, then perhaps you should watch this.



Tell The Truthiness ; George Bush and his team needs to be held to account.

Saunter To The White House 25 ; The February Four

It quickly went from "we don't really know", to "we know who it won't be".

Obama, Clinton, Romney, McCain.

While Democrat leaning voters tie themselves in knots, deciding between a black man and a white woman (we're still hoping Michelle Obama will throw her hat into the ring and solve that dilemma), the GOP leaners have to pick either a used-car salesman, or Cold-War-Era-McCain.

In five days the results will be in and, hopefully, unless everything hangs on margins, we'll have a candidate for each party and democracy can be defrosted again. It was last seen being blast frozen by Dick Cheney late in 2001 and hung in a meat locker.

Tell The Truthiness ; Of course, the whole thing could be turned on it's head and on Tuesday everyone might vote for Ron Paul, wouldn't that be something.

355 Days Left ; No-One Expects Anything Anymore

The State Of The Union speech was given by the President this week and, he didn't even try to redeem himself.

Mr Bush is relying heavily on history being his judge. So in thirty or forty years, at least they'll be able to put a name-to-the-face responsible for the state of international relations and delays in environmental protection.

Tell The Truthiness ; No-one is going to mind if Mr Bush just sits quietly in his office and reads some of those books he missed out on. Really, go ahead, put your feet up, you've done enough, you really have.

Look Out, The Latest War Franchise Is Launched

Tell The Truthiness ; Look out Finland, he's after you before January next year!

Saunter To The White House 24 ; Bill Versus Michelle, For The Bored

With all news outlets saying 'the gloves have come off' about Obama and Hillary, since last year, a new match has been scheduled.

For those bored of the Obama/Clinton battle, or truce, whatever it currently is, Bill Clinton and Michelle Obama are starting off a parallel battle. Indeed, since most people have noted the difficult choice between the first female president and the first black president, why not have both? Michelle Obama is black and female, there's your 'out of the blue candidate'.

Tell The Truthiness ; It'll be a battle between Michelle and Rudy Giuliani in November! You heard it here first!

PS Whoever gave Giuliani the idea that putting all your eggs in the Florida basket was a good idea? Well, we will see how that went before too long.

Road To Tehran 9 ; Bush Says 'No No No' I'm Right

President Bush has bragged (apparently to reassure) the Israeli Prime Minister that he doesn't actually take any notice of the intelligence community's evidence that Iran has no current nuclear weapons programme.

Indeed, we'll repeat it again, the last time they had a programme was back in 2003, nearly five years ago. The National Intelligence Estimate however has been brushed off in public and totally dismissed as fiction in private by Mr Bush.

Is this an attempt to ratchet up the 'big bad wolf' image of Iran that Bush is desperate to maintain. Or, are these comments the final steps toward a full out invasion before the President's term expires?

Tell The Truthiness ; Someone please stop him. Anyone.

Road To Tehran 8 ; Hormuz Boat Incident A Fake

The Pentagon has backtracked on the exact details of Sunday morning's boat incident between the US and Iran.

Iran was the first to produce evidence that discounts the US claims. Authorities showed footage they said didn't show any of their boats approaching US vessels. Then, the US Navy admitted the voice on the US released tape may not have been Iranian in origin.

Plus, Pentagon officials are also saying the threatening voice on the videotape was recorded separately and added to the tape later.

Tell The Truthiness ; A poorly executed 'false-flag' operation, carried out by an inept government. Expect the actual plan for this to be published tomorrow, written badly on the back of a cheap bar napkin. Just three-hundred and seventy-five days of this administration to go.

Saunter To The White House 23 ; Clintons Go Budgeting

With speculation over what tonight's results will show, another set of numbers are worrying the Clinton campaign. It's being reported that Hillary Clinton's campaign has $15 million to $20 million left out of an initial budget of $100. Campaigners are now weighing up the pros and cons of skipping the Nevada caucus and the South Carolina primary.

The loss cutting, if it was followed through, would allow the Clinton campaign to plough everything into the Super Tuesday push on the 5th February.

Tell The Truthiness ; No doubt the numbers from tonight's result will be just as big an influence on the Clinton campaign as the financial numbers in making a decision.

Road To Tehran 7 ; Meanwhile, A Well-Timed Confrontation For The Bush Administration

On the eve of President Bush's (do you remember him?) visit to the Middle East, a convenient 'confrontation' that seems eerily familiar to the UK sailor hostage situation is being reported.

Looking for anything that could be used as pretext for a strike on Iran, the story of a confrontation between boats US Navy and Iranian Revolutionary Guard boats, is just what the administration has needed. The suggestions that the administration is not beyond a 'Gulf Of Tonkin' style incident is grounded in truth, with the January 2003 story about shooting down a drone aircraft over Iraq, painted in UN colours, as grounds for invading Iraq, discussed between President Bush and Prime Minister Blair.

Tell The Truthiness ; Remember, Iran does NOT have an active nuclear weapons programme. They shut it down in 2003. So no matter how much they might scratch the varnish on the US Navy's rowing boats, it's not a reason at all for Iraq : 2 - The Bad Sequel. Are you listening George?

Saunter To The White House 22 ; Media Goes Into Hyper-Drive Over NH

With about twenty-four hours to go before the New Hampshire Primary it seems the media, not including Chris Matthews, (who's always this wired) is in danger of spinning itself out of control.

New polls seem to be out every half an hour showing that Barack Obama's at 67% and Hillary Clinton's at 5% (those are the latest thirty minute figures). Combine that with the rumour-mill now grinding away, given a push by the Drudge Report, that Hillary Clinton may quit the race tomorrow if she doesn't win in New Hampshire, you'd be forgiven for thinking the election was the 5th of February.

On the Republican side, the great-white-hope pundits and GOP spinners have thrown themselves behind is the great-white John McCain. In addition, the man who overtook Rudy Giuliani in Iowa, Ron Paul, may have more of an impact in New Hampshire, with some speculating that the Fox snub of Ron Paul may garner a public pro-Ron Paul backlash tomorrow.

Tell The Truthiness ; Wait until the results and anything real to happen, instead of this incessant 24/7 spin, from all sides.

Saunter To The White House 21 ; A New Start Starts In Iowa Surge

Surge seems to get a bad reputation these days, after it was hijacked by the Bush administration for Iraq. Happily, into 2008, it can be used anew for a very positive reason. But there has been a huge surge of Iowans lining up to access caucuses across the state.

And the result was?

Mike Huckabee for the GOP and Barack Obama for the Democrats.

But the headline grabbers were not just the two winners, a close look at the numbers shows astonishing results across the board.

Obama didn't just win it by a nose, his number was 37.6% of the vote, with Edwards and Clinton fighting for runner-up at 29.7% and 29.5% respectively.

On the Republicans, Huckabee was 34.3%, with the next nearest being 25.3% for Romney. The loudest candidate, Giuliani (the one we love because we don't know what he'll do next candidate) needn't have bothered with 3.5%. But Ron Paul, the man who's been banned from televised debates and cast-aside by jokes from anchors and reporters stormed to a 10% of the vote.

Tell The Truthiness ; New Hampshire - You're next!

War On Reality Part 81 ; FBI Takes Out Some Really Smelly Trash Too

Former FBI Director, J Edgar Hoover had a plan in the nineteen-fifties to arrest twelve thousand people in the US who were considered a threat to national security.

The papers, classified until, now also detail how Hoover pushed for the suspension of habeas corpus.

Tell The Truthiness ; We of course know that President Bush has taken on, pretty much all of Hoover's mantle, with warrant-less wiretapping, the optional Geneva Convention and the suspension of habeas corpus. Hoover would feel like what he was planning was unambitious compared to the current president.

Keith Olbermann's video reminds us of the extraordinary unconstitutional actions of this presidency.

War On Reality Part 80 ; CIA Takes Out A Trash Bombshell

A snugly dropped bombshell into the public domain on this weekend, just before Christmas, the CIA has taken out the trash.

Back when the 9/11 commission were requesting information to compile their very watery report in 2003, repeated requests were made to the CIA on interrogation of al-Qaeda suspects.

This footage is the same footage that was later revealed to exist, but was then reported to have been erased. So for about the eight-hundredth time in the last four years, public confidence in the CIA is shattered and the flawed commission report has another swiss cheese-like hole shot through it's authority which is big enough to fly a plane through.

Tell The Truthiness ; Once again, the real news is 'dumped' at a time of year when it will get the least coverage and analysis by the papers and networks. Take out the trash, sounds like something out of The West Wing, oh, it is, click here.

Saunter To The White House 20 ; Players Keep Talking Up To Christmas Deadline

For Mitt Romney, the Concord Monitor has staked it's claim against the GOP hopeful, Christmas could come as a welcome relief. They made it pretty clear, "Romney should not be the next President."

For Rudy 'we love him because we don't know what he will do next' Giuliani reality struck, not once, but twice. Firstly, his campaign plane had to return to the airport when he complained of severe headaches. Secondly, having been released from hospital, he's now be struck a second blow. A review of the records concerning his expenses has partially exonerated the former mayor, but not many media outlets have been as loud about this as about condoning him.

Mike 'the family favourite fire and brimstone' Huckabee is trying to subliminally become more religious through his famed campaign video with the white cross shelving behind him by Southern Baptists and Ikea.



The same people who analyze terrorist video tapes are trying to discover if there's a one second frame of Huckabee dressed like Roddy McDowell in Fright Night sprinkling holy water over Hillary Clinton in it...



Plus Barack Obama will be pleased this Christmas with a new poll that puts him two percent over Hillary Clinton's twenty-eight percent in New Hampshire.

Hillary Clinton's fortunes are mixed with the Des Moines Register endorsing her (plus John McCain) because of her "readiness", but some in her camp are worried it's only a matter of time before the Republicans make use of Mr and Mrs Clinton's Secret Service records. As part of the service detail, records are kept of where they go and who they meet with. Though these are secret, the Clintons have received tip-offs that those details are regularly given to senior Republicans.

Tell The Truthiness : And the one wish all the candidates have for Christmas? That's easy, they all wish they had Ron Paul's money and his military 'money bombs' as his supporters call them.



PS If only Bush had dropped money bombs in Iraq in 2003, how different the World could be.

Truthiness Teller Colbert AP's Celebrity Of The Year

He may have suffered a faltering attempt to stand for President and be off air while the writer's strike drags on, but the father of twenty-first century news comment has been acclaimed.

Stephen Colbert has been named by the Associated Press as their Celebrity of the Year.

The man who speaks not his mind, but his gut on all things news, has done it again.

Tell The Truthiness ; A merry American Christmas to our celebrity of the year, Stephen Colbert.

Nation, you know you should be bowing in honour.

Saunter To The White House 19 ; Huckabee Wishes For A Norris Christmas

There doesn't seem to be a single person who believes there was any sense accompanying the decision to have Chuck Norris feature in campaign videos for Mike Huckabee.

You can't really blame Mike Huckabee, as he's doing as much as possible to keep people from writing about him being the biggest card-carrying Christian in the campaign. To any waivering voters in Iowa who believe he is reasonable, please pay close attention if you're listening to him. You might suddenly be distracted, look back and hear him saying the planet is only six thousand years old (as shown by the video below) and that he called abortion a "holocaust."



Don't look into his eyes!

Tell The Truthiness ; Get ready for the negative ads post-Christmas, of Mike Huckabee threatening you to vote Republican and go to heaven, or vote Democrat and die. Hey, other GOPers did it at the midterms.

Saunter To The White House 18 ; Ohio's Voting Machines 'Flawed'

A report into the voting machines due to be used in Ohio for the general election in November has found them open to tampering. A federally funded study found investigators could remove memory cards and put extra votes into the machine count.

Interestingly, Secretary Of State Jennifer Brunner called for replacement machines to be optical scan machines, which involve manually filled out paper ballots.

Tell The Truthiness ; Florida is also scrapping touch-screen machines. Maybe November's election may have an accurate result, unlike the previous two.

President Threatens To Veto House Ban On Waterboarding

As pro-waterboarders try to justify the torture method from the apparent thirty-five seconds it took before the confession of an alleged al-Qaeda member, the President has once again had to search for his veto stamp.

The 222-199 vote in the House, sends the bill to the Senate for consideration to ban waterboarding. Despite the Democrats and some Republicans involved, if the President is going to veto anyway, shouldn't there be another way of overruling Mr Bush?

Tell The Truthiness ; This has happened with the war funding bill and now with this. There's only so many times you can keep slamming your head against a wall before it cracks open all together. Come on Pelosi, you must have some other ideas?

The View's Sherri Shepherd Does It Again

Sherri Shepherd is quickly becoming the daytime version of Rudy Giuliani with her priceless comments.

After blasting us with the news that the Earth is flat and that she didn't think anything happened before the Christians arrived, she's gone one better.

Whoopi Goldberg tried her best to save Sherri and the discussion on sexual stereotypes and transgender children. However Sherri said she would stop her son from playing dress-up at school if he was allowed to put on a dress.

Tell The Truthiness ; Why did they hire Sherri Shepherd of all people?

Bush On Iran No Nukes ; How Long Might He Have Been Lying For?

We know a bit more know on the process of the release of info on the 'Iran stopped it's nuclear programme'. George Bush was told there was new information on Iran's nuclear programme several months ago.

However, it's then said that he didn't know what the information was. Plus it's not been confirmed whether the Director Of National Intelligence, Mike McConnell told the President that all previous intelligence could be considered invalid.

Tell The Truthiness ; So, did the President know? If he did, how long ago did he know? If the intelligence was faulty, was Mr Bush told this, or did he choose to continue ratcheting up the non-story on Iran in absence of any valid information? Mr Bush, you couldn't stop talking on Monday, want to talk out the answers to these questions? We're ready to listen.

Has Morgan Spurlock Found Bin Laden?

In an intriguing and bizzare story, Osama Bin Laden may have been found.

Found by a documentary film maker, the man behind 'Super Size Me', Morgan Spurlock. His new film, 'Where In The World Is Osama Bin Laden?' , Spurlock went to try and seek the big man and it's rumoured, he's found him.

The film is to be shown at the Sundance Festival in January, we'll find out then.

Tell The Truthiness ; You just never know, could he really?

Keith Olbermann Counts Down Lou Dobbs Continual Immigration Coverage

Tell The Truthiness ; Immigration is an important issue, but it's not the only one.

War On Reality Part 79 ; Bush Tries For 'Iraq 2' With Iran

President Bush went on TV this morning and decided to say that nothing has changed and that instead Iran is still a threat.

Despite the National Intelligence Estimate, parts of which were made public yesterday indicates that Iran shut down, of it's own accord, it's nuclear weapons programme.

So spin has taken over and the President has done his own revisionism of current events and has ignored yesterday's report.

Tell The Truthiness ; Have they been telling us the truth, or has the President and administration been determined to go into Iran as long as they've had the same wish about Iraq? So is the President lying, again?

Pakistan's Middle Class Protesters Show A Dangerous Fracture In US Ally

One thing seems to have been missed in all the protests and riots in Pakistan recently. Yes, the application of power by President Musharraf has been questioned. The real motives about the return of Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif have been talked about.

But on one, visually stunning aspect of this uprising, never seems to get a mention.

The people who have been protesting have been wearing suits.

Yes, like those hippies and young people against the Vietnam war, or the masked protesters during the 'Battle For Seattle' in 1999, these people have their own 'First.'

Television and print media has shown people in suits and business attire protesting and rioting. Lawyers.

Tell The Truthiness ; When middle class, mild mannered, well tailored lawyers take to the streets, you know there is something very wrong with your country.

ABC Pulls GMA Footage Of Pakistanis Denying Bin Laden Is Real

In an effort to give the US a view of what the young people of Pakistan think about current affairs, Good Morning America conducted an interview with four such people.

Well done GMA and ABC?

Not really.

When the folks interviewed said that the majority of Pakistanis do not believe that Osama Bin Laden is real, simply being a character conveniently created for the United States own ends, ABC didn't want people finding out.

So the video was pulled from ABC's website.

Just like the Fox News thing the other day, we're proud to show a viewpoint. So here it is.

Tell The Truthiness ; Not everyone has the same opinion, ABC and the rest of the mainstream media needs to show that. Even if some might not like that view or find it comfortable.

War On Reality Part 79 ; Fox Denies Anti-Bush Advert Airtime

A pro-constitution advert has been denied airtime by Fox News. The advert is critical of George Bush's interpretation of the law post-9/11, especially regarding torture and rendition.

Tell The Truthiness ; Since we are not Fox News and we believe in freedom of speech, we here, post that advert.

War On Reality Part 78 ; Rove Blames Congress For Iraq Rush

You can't make a statement like Karl Rove's from last week and expect people to agree with you. Especially when it's personally thought to be a joke by some and known widely to be a lie by everyone else.

Taking a leaf out of Mr Bush's book and trying a bit of revisionist history by laying the push for the Iraq invasion at the door of the Congress and not the administration was greeted as a joke by Tom Daschle. But it's also members of Bush's inner circle that have backed away from Rove's comments. Andy Card and Ari Fleischer both were critical of what he said.

Tell The Truthiness ; We know that when something like this comes from George Bush, it's not surprising since he isn't recognised for being smart generally. But when it comes from someone who's nickname includes the word 'brain', it does seem like Karl Rove doesn't know what he's talking about.

Road To Tehran 6 ; No Nukes, But 'Still Dangerous'? Are You Sure?

A US intelligence report has today poured cold water on the chance that Iran has, is about to, or has stashed somewhere, nuclear weapons.

The National Intelligence Estimate says that Tehran stopped it's nuclear weapons program in 2003. Furthermore, if they did decide to restart work today, it would be 2009 before they gained anything worth lobbing to pierce anyone's armour.

Of course, the Bush administration had very little choice but to say the NIE was "positive", but they also stated how dangerous it would be if Iran got hold of a nuclear weapon. You know, in the same way you'd think about a five year old getting their fingers stuck in a wall socket.

Tell The Truthiness ; In both cases, the chance is there, but it's very small. So stop trying to stick the nation's fingers in the nearest socket Mr Bush.

War On Reality Part 77 ; British & Don't Like Bush? Lock Your Doors Now

If the lax attitude to the advantages of democracy you thought had been reached by the US government, think again.

At the Court Of Appeal in London, a lawyer for the US government said that kidnapping of UK citizens is legal.

That's right. You may be the United States greatest ally. You may have stood by our shoulder on 9/11. You may have gone into Afghanistan and illegally into Iraq at our behest.

But we will kidnap your own citizens on your soil, if we like.

Because it's now law. Indeed, it's been law since the 1860s.

You would expect the US government then to calm fears by issuing a statement saying it needs amending and in the meantime it is doubtful it would be used?

Tell The Truthiness : However, the US Department Of Justice declined to comment. Typical.