Friday 07NOV08

a "shout out" to "the gang": spike my counter, then I'll believe

[Sorry for the "shop-talk" in the sub-head, I'm just looking for some (not to be soon forthcoming) proof. The ball is in their court: Jason, Kelly, Matt, Carl, Andrew, Emma, Dawn, and the rest of the gang. Spike the counter in triple digits by Monday. I gotta believe that Tommie the Commie is somehow involved. Just a hunch.]

so anyway, sorry for leading off with the shop-talk. Trolls can be such a pain in the ass. Our regular programming resumes.....

As usual, there's much to discuss and once again not much time. So let's get right to it, shall we?

Via Rachel Lucas, it looks like those "working" for President-Elect Obama are still waiting for their payday.

Indianapolis - Lines were long and tempers flared Wednesday not to vote but to get paid for canvassing for Barack Obama. Several hundred people are still waiting to get their pay for last-minute campaigning. Police were called to the Obama campaign office on North Meridian Street downtown to control the crowd.

The line was long and the crowd was angry at times.

“I want my money today! It’s my money. I want it right now!” yelled one former campaign worker.

A former spokesman for the Obama campaign said 375 people were hired as part of the Vote Corps program and said people signed up to work three-hour shifts at a time. Three hours of canvassing got workers a $30 pre-paid Visa card.

The workers showed up to get their cards Wednesday morning at 10:00 am.

“There was a note on the door saying 1:00 pm and then at 1:20 pm everybody was like why is nobody here. They just got here and they’re trying to get it organized,” said Heather Richards, a former campaign worker.

…Eventually people did start getting paid, but some said they were missing hours and told to fill in paperwork making their claim and that eventually they would get a check in the mail.

“Still that’s not right. I’m disappointed. I’m glad for the president, but I’m disappointed in this system,” said Diane Jefferson, temporary campaign worker.

“It should have been $480. It’s $230,” said Imani Sankofa.

“They gave us $10 an hour. So we added it. I added up all the hours so it was supposed to be at least $120. All I get is $90,” said Charles Martin.

“I worked nine hours a day for 4 days and got paid half of what I should have earned,” said Randall Waldon.

Some people weren’t satisfied with filling out a claim form for money they felt was still due to them.

“They say that they gonna call you or they going to mail it to you, but I don’t know. We’ll see what happens,” said Antron Grose.

“Talking about they’ll mail it to us. I ain’t worried about that, man. They’re not going to mail nothin’,” said Martin.

All the cool kids are linking to this one. I gotta laugh, as the presumptive "volunteers" are now figuring out that it's too late to go all "John Galt" on (then) Senator Obama's campaign.

Elsewhere, MichaelW of Q and O fame tips us to Volokh:

There are two versions of American exceptionalism. American-American exceptionalism is "we're richer because we're better." European-American exceptionalism is "you're better because you're richer." Both sides agree on exceptionalism, and just see different causes and implications. The Europeans expect us, on account of our wealth, to live up to (their) ideals, while we think that our wealth ought to prove to them that our ideals are better than theirs. No one of any importance seems to think that the United States is a normal country.

I gots more, but it's gotten late early again.

more soon