Country star Darryl Worley brings his unique brand of fun and friendly music to the Volusia County Fair in Florida on November 7, 2008. Here he performs his hit “A Good Day to Run”.

I’m writing an article for a website and I have some questions for flute performers or those who enjoy flute performances.

1. How do you feel about the flute?
2. What kind of emotions or feelings do you experience when you hear a great flute performance?
3. Is there anything you’d like to add or want people to know about the flute and flute performers?

Thanks very much for any contribution you can make. You can leave your comments to this post or reply back to me at chrishowell.is@gmail.com

Be aware that I may be using your responses in my article.

There are the great unwashed masses out here in America that hope to heavens that our government can get something done soon about the abject mess the country is in. Politics is out. Working together to help America and Americans become strong again is the most patriotic thing the new Administration and Congress can do. This snippet from Marc Ambinder, if true, is good news.

Behind the scenes, Obama himself and many key aides have been making overtures to conservative Democrats.  These Democrats want budget off-sets included with every expensive piece of legislation that Obama sends to the Hill; at the very least, they want the White House to incorporate centrists in decision-making. 

[...]

Importantly, Barack Obama doesn’t seem to be too interested in everyone else’s opinion of how he’s supposed to run his White House. This can only be a good thing (unless you’re a Republican praying for Obama to make a fool of himself). It seems that, much like with the campaign, he has some long term goals and isn’t worried about engaging in small fights over things like his West Wing staffing choices.

Can it be true? Is politics as usual over? Are we returning to that post-911 feeling that brought the country together? We can only hope.

Well, I’ve done it. I voted for Barack Obama this morning and it felt like the right thing to do.  Unfortunately, I don’t think this is going to be a good day for John McCain. I’ve heard pundits say he was on the wrong side of history. That only partially explains McCain’s defeat. He was caught up in a perfect storm of bad luck, bad strategy, and bad behavior that doomed his candidacy. 

First, today’s John McCain looks and acts a lot different than the 2000 version. I think he sold his soul and his values in so many ways to gain the nomination. In for a penny, in for a pound. After the nomination, McCain had to “go for broke” and do all the things he probably wouldn’t have normally done like going negative. That only hurt him. But by now it’s too late. He looks like another dirty politician.

The Bush presidency, Sarah Palin, suspending his campaign, the financial crisis. All bad for him. Here’s a little quote from Politico.com’s Roger Simon: (more…)

I’ve written before about the gross hypocrisy in portraying Sarah Palin as anything close to an average American. The money she and her husband makes and her job simply remove her from consideration. How can you consider the governor of a state the same as an ordinary working class citizen. By definition, as a governor you are part of the ruling class. And now surprise! Palin has spent more than what I make in FIVE YEARS on clothes.

Yet Republicans expressed consternation publicly and privately that
the shopping sprees on her behalf, which were first reported by
Politico, would compromise Ms. Palin’s standing as Senator McCain’s
chief emissary to working-class voters whose salvos at the so-called
cultural elite often delight audiences at Republican rallies.

That possibility was brought to life, for instance, on “The View” on ABC, as Joy Behar, a co-host, noted the McCain campaign’s outreach to blue-collar workers — like an Ohio plumber who recently chided Senator Barack Obama over taxes — after another co-host, Elisabeth Hasselbeck, defended the expenditures.

“I don’t think Joe the Plumber wears Manolo Blahniks,” Ms. Behar said.

The argument from Republicans is that Palin needs to look good and if she didn’t, the press would criticize her for it. They could have turned this to her advantage if they had purchased clothes at Wal-Mart or Sears. The Republicans, who were a formidable political force just a few year’s ago, are now so out of touch with real Americans that it’s no surprise that Democrats will be sweeping them out of the White House, the Congress and the Senate in just 12 days.

Tonight is the final debate of the 2008 race for the White House. It’s 18 days before the election and a good time to start analyzing where McCain went wrong. Take it away Maureen Dowd!

On Tuesday, Matthew Dowd, the former Bush strategist who offered a famous apologia for helping get W. re-elected, offered a scorching assessment of Palin’s not being ready, saying that McCain “knows that in his gut. And when this race is over, that is something he will have to live with. … He put somebody unqualified on that ballot, and he put the country at risk.”

Christopher Hitchens endorsed Barack Obama on Slate on Monday, calling Palin’s conduct “a national disgrace” and writing: “Given the nasty and lowly task of stirring up the whack-job fringe of the party’s right wing and of recycling patent falsehoods about Obama’s position on Afghanistan, she has drawn upon the only talent that she apparently possesses.”

Christopher Buckley endorsed Obama on The Daily Beast, writing of McCain’s embrace of Palin: “What on earth can he have been thinking?” (The endorsement led to Buckley’s resigning from The National Review, founded by his father.)

On “The Colbert Report” on Monday, the conservative columnist Kathleen Parker stuck by her assertion, which she said caused the base to treat her like a traitor, that Palin should have bowed out. She said she’d gotten some secret e-mails from Republicans in the White House agreeing with her.

Unless there’s another catastrophic event before the election, it looks like McCain’s campaign has imploded, falling in upon itself like a deflated cake.  There’s always Palin in  2012!