Great

.
Those of us born and reared in North Dakota don't need Newsweek to tell us this is a great place. Again. Always.

But just in case you didn't know.

Great thanks are due to the tireless work of a North Dakota legendary Senator: Byron Dorgan.
.
And hopefully Newsweek will find a buyer soon so they can hire themselves a fact-checker. They can start looking at the local campus of the renowned NDSU Bison in Fargo. Because we all know it's Karen, not Carole. And we coulda told you so...if you'd asked.
.
crossposted at firedoglake's The Seminal

Prairie Recommends: The Cause of My Life

.
From Newsweek, Ted Kennedy on "The Cause of My Life."

Me, too, Senator. Me, too.

The time is now.
.

Prairie's Reading: This Is Important

.
This is not the first piece I've seen or heard of late about how important this election is, how focused and thought-full we must be in the face of red herrings and gossip and trivia. But Anna Quindlen in Newsweek says it in a way that cuts through the spin and talking points and buffoonery we see and hear too much of on cable teevee and talk radio

I don't need the president to be my friend. I have friends. What I need is someone to clean up the mess George W. Bush has made of the country I love.

* * *

Here is the only thing about anyone's kids that matters now: every time you vote you make your kids a promise. It's a promise that you will look past cheap slogans and lazy alliances to try to find a way to make America worthy of a new generation. And if we keep that promise in November, we not only keep faith with our children, we keep faith with the country.

Wisdom from Quindlen...will it be drowned out by the ranters and screamers and shills?

That's pretty much up to who we choose to listen to...and that's the most important choice of all.
.

Prairie's Readin': Alter on the "smear gap"

.
The case that McCain lied about his intentions to run a civil campaign, seems to me, is readily apparent by his strategy hires and the cronies he's brought into his campaign...the same lowlifes responsible for labelling his adopted Bangladeshi daughter the family bastard in 2000.

Jonathan Alter minces no words in discussing the "smear gap" of the McCain campaign and lays blame on two fronts...McCain himself—and the media who enable him.

But the fault, notes Alter, lies in candidate McCain, who has compromised all the principles he's professed to uphold in order to win the White House. Like me, Alter wants to see the much-vaunted McCain honor instead of the sleaze.

If not, win or lose, we'll know who the bastard is.
.

UPDATE: Josh over at TPM adds this thought about the company McCain keeps.
.