On Friday, July 11, The Office of Thrift Supervision (OTS) closed the $32 billion IndyMac Bank, headquartered in Pasadena, California, and transferred operations to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC).

My Mom, who is 88 years old, has a CD at Indymac Bank.  She lives off the interest. Thanks to the Democratic Party and Franklin Delano Roosevelt, my Mom didn't lose her money when the feds seized the  bank in the second largest federal takeover in US history.  I haven't told my Mom about the takeover. She has Alzheimer's. If you can't figure out how to find the bologna in the refrigerator I figure you can go without knowing you almost got wiped out financially.

I, on the otherhand, am a wreck. I got her into Indymac! For years they paid the highest CD rate around--if you opened it online. Whoohoo. I've even  got a little money stashed  there.

The woman I talked to at Indymac today--who works for the FDIC--said people have been weeping on the phone. They had more deposited there than the FDIC will insure. If you are above $100,000 that money is out the door.

I was speechless on Friday. When I could put two words back to back they were x-rated:

 Holy fu*king shit! What a fu*king disaster. Jesus H. Chist, Dad, you were right. I mean you were RIGHT!!!.

And then --even though he has been gone for 10 years-- I whispered:

Thanks.

It was my Dad when  I was 18 who drummed the FDIC into my head with tales of the Great Depression and how people were wiped out and jumped from skyscrapers. And then he would explain how FDR and the Democrats fixed it so if the banks failed again, no one would be wiped out.

But c'mon, banks fail?? I didn't think it could happen again. And I certainly flirted over the years with money ventures and institutions that were not FDIC insured. But my Dad really pounded something into my thick head. Why flirt with disaster when the Democratic Party has provided a safety net? Over and over, in countless different ways he brought the point home.

Why? For a little extra money--you could lose it all. Stick with the FDIC. You'll be fine. Don't color outside the lines, Ok?

I'd nod my head, bored and despairing of his interminable lectures. Now, I find out that  these lectures from my depression era papa shaped my behavior with Indymac.And so my Mom and I are among those who are lucky this Monday.

Many others are not.

I supported Hillary Clinton for the nomination for the Democratic Party, and a cast of sore losers--unlike the woman they profess to support who has been gracious in defeat-- cannot understand why I now support the Dem nominee, Barack Obama. It is so fuc*king simple. It ain't the head of the party that matters above all else. It is the Party!!!

And I am living proof right now today that the Party matters.  Ok. Sure. The dem leadership hasn't been exactly angelic in the primary struggle. But I will take this party and these "fu*k-ups" over the Republicans any day.

Remember, it was Herbert Hoover who fired on the vets when the marched on the White House demanding their pay. And this is the same party that has backed our Coward in Chief from showing the coffins of our soldiers as they come home in body bags from Iraq.

Hillary knows what is at stake in this election. In Chicago Saturday for the American Federation of Teachers conference, she said:

The Republicans should hold a press conference and apologize to the country and say they're just not going to run anyone for president.

I am newly grateful to the Democratic Party today. And I urge you to think of this Party and it's long and grand tradition of standing up for the rights and welfare of working people. The Republicans for the last eight years have done nothing but gut every protection they could get their hands on.

Isn't it time to put the Party back in power that brought us the FDIC.  

The Dodd-Feingold amendment to remove telecom immunity from the bill just failed in the Senate by a vote of 32-66.

Barack Obama and  Hillary Clinton voted in favor of the amendment to remove telecom immunity from the bill.

These are the Democrats who have voted in favor of removing immunity from the bill: Akaka - Baucus - Biden - Bingaman - Boxer - Brown - Byrd - Cantwell - Cardin - Casey - Clinton - Dorgan - Durbin - Feingold - Harkin - Inyoue - Kerry - Klobuchar - Lautenberg - Leahy - Levin - Mendenez - Murray - Obama - Reed - Reid - Sanders (I) - Schuemer - Stabenow - Tester - Whitehouse -Wyden.

Every Republican voted against removing immunity (including Arlen Specter, who spent all day arguing against immunity). Democrats voting against removing immunity: Bayh - Carper - Conrad - Feinstein - Johnson - Kohl - Landrieu - Lincoln - McCaskill - Mikulski - Nelson (FL) - Nelson (Neb.) - Pryor - Rockefeller - Salazar - Webb.

Specter's amendment would ban immunity if the spying was unconstitutiona has failed 37-61. Obama voted in favor of the amendment, and Specter was the only Republican to do so.

All Republicans voted against, and these were the Democrats voting against: Bayh - Carper - Johnson - Landrieu - Lincoln - Mikulski - Nelson (FL) - Nelson (Neb.) - Pryor - Rockefeller - Salazar. [NOTE: I'm recording these roll calls from watching the proceedings, and so it's unlikely there are some errors and omissions. I will correct them as they are brought to my attention and will link to the official roll call vote once it is available. The Bingaman amendment is next.

--

The Bingaman amendment -- merely to require that the Senate waits until the IG audit of the NSA program is complete before immunizing the telecoms oversight just failed by a vote of 42-56 (60 votes were required for passage, courtesy of an agreement not to force the GOP to do a mount filibuster). Obama and Clinton voted in favor of the Bingaman amendment. McCain wasn't present to vote on any of this (though almost certainly would have voted with the GOP on all amendments). Specter was the only Republican to vote in favor of the Bingaman amendment. The Democrats voting against: Bayh - Landrieu - Nelson (Neb.) - Pryor - Rockefeller. The Senate is now in recess until the afternoon, after which they will vote to pass the underlying bill.

Barack Obama announced today that in honor of the July 4 celebration of America's revolt "against taxation without respresentation" he will join the Pray at the Pump Movement.

The PAPM, founded by Rocky Twyman, a member of the Seventh Day Adventists, has been holding prayer vigils at Exxon and Shell stations across the country. Smiling and obviously excited Obama told the impromptu presser:

I was a community organizer and I know what this involves. This is one man making a difference. It is faith based and it is spiritual. It is a man of God doing God's work. Who can be against God?

Obama refused to disclose which gas station he will turn up at in the next few days. His press corps immediately launched into a flurry of speculation. So far Pray at  the Pumpers have hit Exxon and Shell stations. But Wednesday they turned their prayers on the Embassy  of Saudi Arabia in Washington D.C.

Obama announced in response to a question about the Embassy pray-in.

"No. No. No.  I don't think praying at the Saudi Embassy, is a good idea The Saudis understand our concerns well enough. We don't need to seem to attack them directly. Besides they are Muslims. They could care less about a bunch of Jesus freaks.

He then told one of the women in the press throng:

I don't understand your question, sweetie, No one said Jesus freaks. You misheard me. Easy to do out here in the wind.   I am a devout man of faith. I take my religion and my preacher seriously. That would be contrary to everything I believe.

On the issue of his beliefs, another reporter questioned the presumed Democratic nominee about his stand on Iraq. Obama has been reported as saying recently that based on his upcoming visit there, his view of when the troops might come home, could be adjusted.  He explained:

One simply cannot  know in advance what sort of expedient position the President will be required to take. But I am sure all of my supporters and the American people can rest easy in the knowledge that I have no qualms changing my position to suit whatever situation arises.

Obama then blew the woman reporter a kiss and turned away from the impromptu presser. As he stepped into the waiting limousine and the reporters melted away, one bystander was seen picking a paper off the ground. It was headed:

Senator Obama's Impromptus Remarks on Pray at the Pumpers. Staff note: Remember, this should appear to be spontaneous.

Twyman, who prompted the first national campaign aimed at getting African Americans to become bone marrow donors, who still did not know of Obama's support, was reported later as saying:

I think we have just entered a new phase. We were in the prayerful phase, but now we're going into a more activist phase, because we feel that whole faith without works is dead.

John Neurohr from the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank, has a different approach to managing the high gas prices.

There is little, if anything, the average person can do to reduce gas prices generally. What they can do is reduce their personal dependence on gasoline by carpooling and utilizing public transportation.

Obama rejected the riding the bus idea. Not prayerful and faith-based enough. He wants to win evangelicals to his side, and praying at the pump is by far the best publicity op.

http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewNation.asp?Pa ge=/Nation/archive/200807/NAT20080703a.h tml

***Disclaimer. Senator Obama has held no such press conference and his views on Pray at the Pump are unknown at this time. However, while I support him because he is the Democratic Party nominee, I can readily imagine this happening.

cross posted at clintonistasforobama and at TaylorMarsh

Hillary supports Barack because she wants women's rights. And so does he.

Both Islamic Fundamentalists and Christian Fundamentalists may go to war over whose God is supreme, but there is one subject on which they both agree: state control of a woman's body. From Osama bin Laden to George W. Bush, throw in the warlords of Afghanistan, Pope John Paul II and the mullahs of Iran--if you are a woman, they all want control--of your body. And now there is another man clamoring to join the club. All together now: it is John McCain.

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Because McCain will continue Bush policies with regard to women's rights, lets take a quick refresher. In 2003 George W. Bush cut off funding for a highly praised AIDS program for refugees from Africa and Asia because one member of the non-profit consortium running the project was also working with a UN program that was accused, falsely, of colluding with China's policy of forced abortions. Who suffered? The poor in Angola, Congo, Rwanda, Somalia, Eritrea, and other poverty-stricken areas around the globe.

I used to walk on the beach every Sunday, early, with my dog Blue. She and I would watch the sun come up, our paws and feet in the water, she tearing around, sniffing the wind, dancing in the surf.

Today was my first trip back to the beach since she died last November.

My dog Blue was one of those great furred personalities almost everyone loves. And she was totally  indiscriminate in her affections. Obama or Hillary would be just fine. I cannot remember a human being she avoided. Well, ok, if they had a stick to ward off the pesky creatures--and these often proved to be Republicans--  she would give them a wide go  around. But otherwise she adored humans and they adored her. In Manahttan where we lived for  several years  I can still hear the piping voice of the boy who lived on our block calling out to his Mom as we passed,

Look,  it's the singing wolf!

To his young mind the whoooowhoo whooo-oohthat all huskies do  sounded like singing, although the same happy sounds often sent older Manhattanites scooting to the edges of the sidewalk sometimes wide-eyed in terror as they asked,

Is that a wolf?

Blue never suspected the terror she aroused. She thought it was a game.  And for Blue life was a game. She especially loved:

I have it, now you try and get it back.

But if you did succeed in gaining the upper hand she just laughed and whoooowhoo whooo-ooed at you.    In Manhattan Sunday mornings were a special treat for both of us as we'd get up early and walk from the East river across 79th  Street  to Central Park where we would tramp  for more than an hour through the Ramble.  I always wondered if it reminded her  of being back in the woods in Montana.

In the beginning I had tried a polite turn around the great circle where all the fancy Manhattan dogs pranced and gamboled loose until 9 a.m., but Blue deemed most of these pampered pooches a little short on the rambunctious side of life. No, the Ramble was more her speed, and mine too with its trails cut through a profusion of trees and streams full of mossy boulders. The Ramble  even has a lake although a mean swan often partolled the shore and Blue instinctively knew to give that honker a wide go around. [ok. ok. Yes. It was a Republican swan.]

Thinking back on that time I still have no words to describe how fondly my heart would swell at the way she  would bound off into the brush only to  turn up somewhere down the trail, looking back, waiting patiently for me to catch up.

Blue loved everything to play at in life except swimming. I don't know why, now,  I thought she should swim? But when she was 2 years old I threw her of the dock in Montana's Whitefish Lake. Blue was born not far from Glacier Park, and that is where we first hooked up. But she hated water over her head, and she  never, ever forgot getting tossed in. She also never forgave me, so that whenever she and I were in close proximity to a large body of water  she'd lower her head, roll her  big blue eyes at me and then dash well out of reach.

But Blue loved the great southern California  beaches. Some mornings she would dash into the surf up to her chest and then raise her head and sniff the wind. Dolphins often come in close to shore and maybe she smelled them or maybe something else. I will always wonder because it is one of the secrets she took to her grave.

Beside curiosity about  her secrets Blue left behind a brown teddy bear with a red bowtie that  she adopted the second I walked in the door with it from a trip to Japan. It is sitting in a corner of the house alongside   a  grey and white rubber monster with spiky hair that squeaks  and a small, furry  Siberian husky with blue eyes mailed to us from some animal rights group in return for a contribution.

But to Blue, all stuffed animals were attractive, ownership being a slippery  issue because at street fairs she would lift them off counters and sometime even swipe one from an unwary child's hand. She also loved in no particular order trucks, cars, walks, rabbits, chickens  and my mother's wheaten terrier, Duffy. Unfortunately. Duffy went off Blue forevah after he tried to swipe a tidbit from the Big Girl's bowl. Blue was an alpha female and well, you do not mess with the food of the  Goddess. Although I was delighted when she stopped standing over the water spout in dog parks issuing commands   about  exactly  when her minions could have a swig--or not.

I never wrote about Blue's death. What do you say when your best friend dies after losing use of her back legs from liver cancer. After 13 yeears she lived inside my very cells. And I was not ready to say goodbye. I knew she died, of course But that question of saying goodbye in your heart is a whole other matter. I cried for a week and then sporadically after. I am crying now. Because I am saying goodbye. She is dead, and I am still here and wanting a pal to ramble with.

I read somewhere recently that if you have a good relationship, when it ends you are more likely to want another. Whereas if you had a bad experience, you will be less likely to want another. So I am seeing my desire for a new four-legged friend in this light. It is a tribute to Blue and all she gave  me of her great hearted self. Of course, she was my first  dog love. And you never get over the first one. I don't care how many come after.

[UPDATE--I have now been thrown off Hillarysvoice, a site owned by Alegre. Dissent, it seems, is only a quaint idea to someone who has made so much about her abuse for dissenting with others!]

Does anyone care about Hillary anymore?

A website whose reputation and business quadrupled when it backed Hillary Clinton's candidacy is in the-- Resurrect Hillary business now.

No that's wrong. It is in the Screw Obama Anyway You Can business now.

A well-known blogger has created her own website to promote Hillary's candidacy--well, until the end of  August anyway. But by then the website will be up and running. Front page positions are available Yoohooo.

But while these voices are clamoring, Hillary is facing a silence as bleak as any she has ever known. So before we move along, this is for Hill:

Now, about mydd, the website  that provided a home to the famous blogger mentioned above after she famously marched out of dkos--well, gosh, it has been a big Hasta la Vista, Baby! I used to wonder why this blogger didn't care if she had 3 diaries on the rec list, all put there by her private army of backers on call to rec as requested? I guess because her commitment to mydd was temporary, a  soapbox that's all. Who cares if they were nice to you, and took you in when you marched away from the other guy?

Hell, for all I know mydd has said, `Hey, terrific. Go for it. More the merrier.' I guess that would be taking the high road.

And I do know by now that I should definitely throttle this tendency to think of  this place as a community. Don't lecture, me, ok?  I know it is silly. People come and people go. On any given day only a handful of people who have posted before will do so again. And I know that people who get banned come back under new names and then do the same creepy stuff all over again.

When I first came on this site, Seymour Glass was here and YellowDem. My next love was Undiesided.[These are just names that came off the top. My favorites might not be yours, so chill, ok?] I remember liking them--through their diaries-- a lot. And then I got to know so many other contributors, all Clinton supporters; they are mostly all gone now. And so many of them seem to hang out now at these these old pro-Clinton, now hate-Obama sites.

The truth is everywhere I look I see these people creating websites to tear down Barack Obama and promote Hillary Clinton's candidacy--still. They are also endorsing John McCain.  It actually looks like a huge cottage industry. And they promote each other. A happy family.

And then there are those of us who are doing as Hillary asked. We are supporting the Democratic nominee. There is no reputation to be made, no crusade and no drama. Just people playing by the rules, doing as Hillary requested and loving all she stands for-- still.

I read yesterday that Hillary is taking an extended vacation. She will return if necessary for crucial votes in the Senate, and party leaders are backing her on this. I also read somewhere that to be defeated in a close run for the nomination, or for the Presidency itself, creates a depression like no other.

Who doesn't remember when Al Gore grew a beard and wandered the world? Other  candidates like Gary Hart, who battered her endlessly during the primary campaign, have offered advice in Huffpo, no less. I'm sure she felt cared about by that one. But as was intended, I read it. And between Gore and Hart and McGovern, Ferraro, Mondale and Dole-- who have all written about it, there is no question that Losing the Big One is devastating. They all say that "It" is the Hardest Loss.

Of course Hillary didn't lose the Presidency. But you see, she did. The Democratic nominee will win the White House this year. You can take that to the bank. And she was campaigning for the nomination  for 18 months. It had to take an enormous toll. Acceptable if you win--a terrible burden when you do not. And then there is the pressure of such a campaign. As Ed Pilkington who traveled around the US interviewing failed Presidential candidates writes in the Guardian:

As I meet more members of this exclusive club I realise quite what an ordeal presidential candidates go through - they are subjected to afflictions that can reasonably be compared to torture: sensory overload; ritual humiliation; strangers invading your body space at all hours of day and night; disorientation; sleep deprivation.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/ mar/29/uselections2008.usa

I know people say she has faced up to hardship, disappointment and loss before. And so she has. But I cannot help but wonder how it feels to Hillary to see all these people who say they support her, ignoring her last request. Making a business out of defying her--all in her name.

Of course, maybe she doesn't see it at all. Who knows for sure?

What I do know is that Hillary is more than a candidate, more than an icon, and more than a political platform. She is also more than the candidate to back if you didn't and still don't  like Obama. Hillary is a person. When Emily Malcolm, founder of Emily's List, said recently  at a panel on sexism in the media that Hillary told her breathlessly in New Hampshire

Emily, I am the first woman to win a Presidential primary.

My heart ached like someone had slugged it--hard.  Because it was true, and no matter how many more primaries she went on to win, the media never, ever talked about it.

I know it  is hard to be a standard bearer for a cause, and icons can be lonely. She certainly became my hero.  I have never been so proud of being a woman as I was when watched Hillary Clinton in those 22 debates. Would I have liked more of that--you betcha. Would I have loved to see a woman put her female's hand on the  Bible and swear to defend the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic--God yes. I think I would have liked this as much as many African Americans will like it when Barack Obama puts his hand on the bible on  January 20,  because he will. I do not think he can lose. [I am not saying, by the way, that I won't like it when that happens. What I am saying is for many African Americans it will be exceedingly, and then exceedinly again, Special.]

I also wish with all my heart now that Hillary would be his Vice President. I expect that is not to be either. Either way  I am doing my best to support the nominee. And in the meantime I think about Hill. I look at all the people who I used to think of as my friends who are bashing Barack and promoting her still. And when I read about her extended vacation, I think, `they are not helping her.' They don't really care about her. She isn't a person to them. She is a business, a cause, a means to drive traffic to a  website. She is a claim to fame.

But Hillary is bigger than they are, and she cares about the well being of this country as much as anyone I have ever seen on the public stage. Hillary inspires me now, no less than she did throughout the entie campaign, because  unlike so many of her so-called supporters, she will do the right thing. And then she will go private, as she already has done, away from the clamor and cameras, to a lonely beach somewhere or maybe into the privacy of her own home. Alone--or not. But certainly with God. And with her beating heart safely tucked away, out of reach from all those who would sell it for their own advancement.

cross-posted at coyotedbytes

The untimely death of Tim Russert, an event hailed far and wide as a tragedy not just for him but for NBC, for his family and for the nation, aroused in me an opposite reaction.

The outpouring of praise and adulation for the host of Sunday morning's Meet the Press, dumbfounded me.  If others were shocked by his death, I was equally shocked by the around the clock panegyric to his father, his son and his Catholicism-- his adulation of the Pope, his patriotism and his good guy persona.

The fact is Tim Russert, longtime head of NBC's Washington Bureau, was the quintessential non-reporter. And there was no journalist more implicated in disseminating the Bush administration's propaganda about Iraq.

More like a Brave New World version of a journalist, than the real deal, Russert was America's leading  exponent of entertainment  vs information. His  famous `gotcha' style--wherein each Sunday his  viewers waited for his punch, jab and  pounce on  that show's guest--came to homes every Sunday for more than a decade, but no one mentioned on the occasion of his death that show's journalistic contributions to  the public good. That he was good, no one doubted. But his work was not evaluated.

I suppose that is because after 4,000 deaths, and a totally discredited intervention that the American people have resoundingly rejected, no one wants to remember how he promoted the Iraq war. And no one wants to admit how his much vaunted journalistic integrity  went sailing out the window after he revealed without a quiver of distress at the Scooter Libby trial  he had cooperated with the FBI in revealing his source. Finally, there was no media personality on the public stage who was  closer  or more fawning  towards the Bush-Cheney White House than Tim Russert.  

President Bush's swift outpouring of sympathy at Russert' untimely death, if contrasted with his Katrina comments, were a marvel of timely consideration.

John McCain today hosted a nationwide telephone forum in tandem with Carly Fiorinia, his ambassador to women. This forum is the latest effort by  his campaign in their full court press to lure former supporters of Hillary Clinton.

According to today's Boston Globe:

John McCain is aggressively targeting former supporters of Hillary Clinton, hoping to capitalize on their dissatisfaction with presumptive Democratic nominee Barack Obama and anger over how Clinton was treated during the Democratic primaries.

More from the Globe:

On Thursday night, Fiorina spoke to dozens of disgruntled Clinton supporters in Columbus, Ohio, and   next week she plans to visit a number of battleground states to speak to women voters.

The campaign is betting that even women who favor abortion rights may be willing to accept a difference of opinion on that issue if they like what they hear McCain saying on broader issues such as national security, the economy, and healthcare.

Barack Obama is also planning to court those same voters.  NARAL Pro-Choice America and Planned Parenthood Action Fund will soon be raising awareness among women voters about McCain's long record of opposing abortion rights.

According to the Globe report:

Planned Parenthood Action Fund, which is running a $10 million grass-roots campaign to recruit 1 million voters for Obama in battleground states, today will kick off a weeklong series of more than 400 house parties across the country. Yesterday the group unveiled an Internet ad highlighting McCain's record on abortion rights and other health issues that it plans to send to 3.5 million of its supporters and the antiwar group MoveOn.org., urging each recipient to forward the ad to five people.

Cecile Richards, president of Planned Parenthood, said yesterday that even the most disaffected Clinton supporters are unlikely to defect to McCain, whose views on abortion and other reproductive health issues are diametrically opposed to Clinton's and Obama's. McCain favors overturning Roe v. Wade, the US Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion nationwide, then working to reduce the number of abortions and eventually end them.

But the McCain campaign thinks otherwise.

Women are not single-issue voters," said Crystal Benton, a campaign spokeswoman. "The issues we're hearing from them that matter most are economic prosperity, national security, and choice and portability in healthcare, which puts Senator John McCain in position to fight for each one of their votes."

After a town hall meeting in New Jersey yesterday, McCain repeated his effusive praise for Clinton and acknowledged he had "a lot of work to do " to reach female voters.

"I believe that women all over America need to be assured that I will do everything in my power to continue the progress that has been made in equal opportunity in America, and that means an emphasis on education, that means service to country, and it means providing the same job security that all Americans deserve," he told reporters.

Polls released this week showed the candidates with mixed results among women. In a Gallup tracking poll conducted June 5-9, Obama increased his lead over McCain among women from 5 percentage points to 13 percentage points since Clinton conceded a week ago. But an NBC News/Wall Street Journal survey showed that while Clinton led McCain by 14 percentage points among suburban women, Obama trailed by 6 percentage points.

Democratic strategist Mary Anne Marsh of the Dewey Square Group in Boston said the Obama camp should be concerned about the state of the women's vote after a primary that dismayed many Clinton supporters. McCain does not need a majority of women to win the election, she noted, he just has to chip away at Obama's share of the women's vote. Women typically make up a majority of voters in presidential elections.

"I think in this case, there are several threats - Hillary Clinton supporters who may go to support John McCain; Hillary Clinton supporters who may not vote at all, and Hillary Clinton supporters who do nothing between now and November except cast a vote," she said. "Any combination of these things is something to worry about if you are Barack Obama."

This week, several prominent female Clinton supporters issued clarion calls for unity. Ellen Malcolm, president of EMILY's List, which funds female candidates who support abortion rights, presided over a conference call in which she called McCain "out of touch" with women's lives.

At the group's annual luncheon both she and former secretary of state Madeleine Albright urged women to get behind Obama.

And many Clinton supporters, angry and defiant, are not being swayed.

Women for Fair Politics, a group of Clinton supporters in Ohio angry about what they saw as pervasive sexism in the primary campaign and determined to "never let it happen again," hosted Fiorina Thursday night. Two of the group's cofounders, businesswoman Cynthia Ruccia and real estate agent Marilu Sochor, said yesterday that they planned to vote for McCain this fall, even though they were both longtime Democratic activists and strongly in favor of abortion rights.

"It doesn't matter to me if we have all the great things the Democrats can offer if it's OK to go ahead and denigrate 51 percent of the country," Ruccia said in a telephone interview. "Sexism is neither Democratic nor Republican, and it needs to stop."

Sochor said she was also outraged at how Obama had, in her view, alienated key components of the Democratic base during the primary season by not campaigning much in Appalachian states such as West Virginia and Kentucky and by characterizing small-town Pennsylvanian voters as apt to "cling to guns or religion" because they were "bitter" about their circumstances.

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2008/06/14/mccain_courting_clinton_loyalists/