Al Smith speeches

McCain, and

Obama

h/t one of my Clown Buds

Too good to miss

http://susiemadrak.com/2008/08/03/12/33/john-mccain-and-the-c-word/

Enjoy.

Attaturk on Stalker-in-Chief

http://firedoglake.com/2008/05/20/the-lord-hath-delivered-them-into-our-hands/

Ladies and gentlemen, the Stalker-in-Chief.

And I'm going to bet he'll be out there campaigning whether McCain likes it or not. Sucking whatever hope of close defeat the GOP now has.

We've observed George Bush for seven years, four months now...88 long months. There are many things I have learned to expect from him. All bad, and all about feeding the massive George Bush ego. John McCain will not be allowed to separate himself from Bush, even if the former had the inclination to do so. If McCain runs for President, he'll do it on the Decider's terms.

I predict, the 2008 GOP Convention is going to be George Bush's love note to himself. It's possible we will see John McCain read badly from a teleprompter at some point...and yelling at a cloud.

IIRC, LBJ's refusal to cut loose HHH and let him run his own campaign more or less directly led to Nixon's win.

problems with trolls? LG&M has the solution!

If you can't beat 'em, join 'em!

http://lefarkins.blogspot.com/2008/05/institutionalized-trolling.html

Robert Farley writes:

...incidentally, I think this is one of the best comment threads I've ever seen. My favorites:

    * Jon MkKane is grate. He will mak a grate preznit. He is better from Obamar by a lots. You ar librul coksukers. I am not a trol.

    * John McCain is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being I've ever known in my life.

    * John McCain has a bold vision, a clear sight, and a comprehensive plan for America, and for each and every American. For instance, he wants you, George Robotham of 56 Maple Lane, Waltham MA to start investing in our children's futures, and to stop masturbating in the shower so much. John McCain! He knows what's best. For YOU.

    * McCain hooked me up with some great weed back in the 80s, when things were really dry.

    * For I was hungry and McCain gave me food; I was thirsty and McCain gave me drink; I was a stranger and McCain took me in; I was naked and McCain clothed me; I was sick and McCain visited me; I was in prison and McCain came to me.

    * John McCain once showed me a video of him making love to my wife, and it was the most beautiful thing I ever saw!

I'm not sure the next to last is a troll, based on this:

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/15593.html

Steve Benin writes (and quotes):

direct comparisons between Republican candidates and Jesus are still rather unusual. (via mcjoan)

Georgia Republican Party chairwoman Sue Everhart said Saturday that the party’s presumed presidential nominee has a lot in common with Jesus Christ.

“John McCain is kind of like Jesus Christ on the cross,” Everhart said as she began the second day of the state GOP convention. “He never denounced God, either.”

Everhart was praising McCain for never denouncing the United States while he was being tortured as a prisoner of war in Vietnam.

“I’m not trying to compare John McCain to Jesus Christ, I’m looking at the pain that was there,” she said.

Right, of course. She’s not “trying to compare” McCain to Jesus, she’s just says he’s “kind of like Jesus.” The distinction is obvious. And sacrilegious.

Atrios added, “I’m not Christian so it doesn’t really matter much to me who is casually compared to their Lord And Savior, but still.”

McCain, Obama, & lobbyists

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/05/23/mccains-ethical-dilemma-c_n_103216.html

My ultra-conservative Catholic bud tells me that McCain's about to launch an attack on Obama's lobbyists.

Tom Edsall argues at the link that if McCain cut loose all the lobbyists attached to his campaign, his would be a very lonely campaign.

Wouldn't a Rove-style "attack from weakness" on Obama's lobbyist connections be a major risk for McCain, given Obama's recent record of punching back?

McCain, Obama, and the GI Bill (more)

http://downwithtyranny.blogspot.com/2008/05/mccain-rejected-by-his-senate.html

money quote:

UGLY! I wonder how many Republicans who have to run with him on top of the ticket are starting to feel some buyer's remorse about now. Many senators were embarrassed and one GOP solon said it was the most vicious personal public attack he had every heard in his 18 years in the U.S. Senate. McCain seems to be coming apart-- the campaign hasn't really even begun and he's already unhinged. But everyone knows, especially his wife (who he publicly called "a cunt") that he's on a hair-trigger.

It'd be interesting to hear confirmation of this from a second source. The "GOP solon" claim, at least.

Contra Digby, if McCain's GOP Senate colleagues were appalled, I'm not sure that this was a calculated alpha-male ploy. Presumably they would know.

Also the fact that it came at the end of a loss on a major / prestige bill, and worse, one where McCain was deserted by most of his GOP Senate colleagues, doesn't exactly support "calm, cool, calculating". Wrong place, wrong time.

Finally, if this was a calculated act, McCain sure stepped on his own message. The lobbyist / Hagee / Parsley stories took all the air out of the alpha male act (if that's what it was), so at best McCain continues to have a message discipline problem.

GOP strategerists mull significant McCain win in November

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0508/10585.html

(h/t Sully)

(quote)
It sounds crazy at first. Amid dire reports about the toxic political environment for Republican candidates and the challenges facing John McCain, many top GOP strategists believe he can defeat Barack Obama — and by a margin exceeding President Bush’s Electoral College victory in 2004.
____________________________________

Sorry, it sounds crazy at 2nd, 3rd, and 4th, too.

I have zero expertise in this area, but it seems to me that there are three ways to look at this:

1) "a miracle happens";
2) "fundamentals";
3) stuff specific to the candidates.

Taking the possibilities in order:

1). Impossible to rule out. My ultra-conservative Catholic bud back in Feb passed along to me a rumor from "a Clinton operative" about Bad Stuff(tm) in Obama's record that would drive him from the race. "He tells me that the GOP knows it too," my bud said.

Hasn't come out yet.

Still could.

uh, but if it's just hanging out there, what is HRC waiting for? She could have gone to Dean back in February and said, "Look, here's what I have, we have reason to believe the GOP has it too, you have to get Obama to drop out of the race for the good of the party."

Is it credible that she wouldn't have done this if she could have? Is it credible after the infighting in her campaign that she has sufficient control over the grunts in the field that one of them wouldn't have leaked it?

2) 8 years of Dubya. 2/3 of the American electorate hating on the Iraq War. Katrina. Lots of closeted GOP gays and pederasts involuntarily liberated from their closets. Economy turning south. MS-01. Right-wing evangelicals left holdin' nuthin' as the most right-wing religiously-oriented Administration in modern American history winds down. The list goes on and on.

3) Obama: scary black dude, Evul Lib'rul, black pastor hating on whites. (stage directions: "all shudder")

.. versus McCain: "Hail the conq'ring hero come; Sound the trumpets, Beat the drum."

(Trivia contest: without consulting Teh Google, what's the reference?)

Seems like this actually might be significant. McCain is a war hero, not that that did Kerry any good, but no one expects the Dems to Swift Boat McCain. And while questions have been raised about the Forrestal incident, AFAICT they're about as content-free as the Swift Boat accusations against Kerry.

But, wait: there's more. McCain: can't control his temper; wrapped around Dubya like a fur around a grande dame; wrapped around the war like slacks on a hooker; called his wife a 4-letter word that will cause Southren belles to faint (Hi, Mom!); dissed Hagee & Parsley, beloved of a non-trivial fraction of the fundie base; wingnut base (Malkin, Our Lady of Donuts) hyperventilating against him; was for illegal immigration before he was against illegal immigration before he was for illegal immigration again; indies for McCain overlap significantly with anti-war indies.. hard to see how that last survives saturation bombing of the airwaves with "Bomb bomb Iran" and Gabriel Garcia McCain's "100 Years of Iran". No obvious way to unite the base without alienating more indies; no obvious way to corner the market on Indies without alienating the base.

Yet more: Obama grassroots organizing, 3M and counting new Dem voters. Outraising McCain by gazillions.

McCain: getting funds from RNC because he isn't raising funds fast enough to offset Obama's fundraising advantage. Cue Dubya, Most Unpopular President Ever(tm) fundraising for McCain.

More: McCain, blowing off vets, siding with Dubya on the GI Bill. Recent polls have shown opinion within the military trending left after decades of trending right. I have read that in 2006, of the vets running for office in the primaries (probably the general as well, but I don't remember), many more were running as Dems than were running as GOPers.

McCain: "older than penicillin" (h/t Sully)

More: McCain seems to be an awful campaigner. I saw mention somewhere (i.e., no link, might not be true) that in states where he actively campaigned, McCain's final vote totals in the primary were uniformly lower than his polls going in. (I think this was before he locked up the nomination, no reason to believe it was true afterwards.) Did I mention "old"? Worse, looks old. Obama articulate, young, blah blah blah.

More generally, the 50%+1 strategery: energize the base blah blah blah. Kerry lost by about 2.5% overall. McCain has pissed off the evangelicals and the nativists. Even some of the Big Bidness types call McCain a liberal. (Yeah, yeah, I know, it beats the hell outa me, too.. but personal experience. I don't seem to have much luck convincing conservative buds and friends-of-buds that voting with Dubya 95% of the time in '07 counts for squat. Or the mid-80 ACU ratings, or the mid-teens ADA ratings. Meta-reference to rivers in Egypt.)

Lately elections have been won on the margins. In this climate, and with these personal attributes, McCain wins by a substantial margin?!?

I'd like to get some of the stuff these GOP strategerists are smoking.. if they're for real, and not just trying to spin away the freight train that's the light at the end of the tunnel, I sure don't see the arguments.

It's widely assumed from the experience of past elections that despite the increasing intra-party hostility between HRC and Obama supporters, the two factions will sing Kumbayah once the nomination is settled and mostly march to the general election unified.

If that assumption is wrong, then all bets are off.

I've seen posts suggesting that HRC might mount an independent campaign if she doesn't get the Dem nod, which seems all but certain now (the nomination, I mean). I just can't see that happening. It's too much risk toher credibility and power base within the party. (Of course the fact that my calculus says "no way" doesn't mean that her calculus will say "no way", but still..)

There's the "working class whites" problem Obama has. Several people have made compelling cases that this is an Appalachia problem, not a general problem, as witness Obama's success in appealing to the demographic in Oregon. An Appalachia problem is still real, but:

1) it's a problem mostly in states that the Dems won't win anyway, which states are not crucial to a Dem victory in the general;

2) the racists are mostly concentrated in the South and Deep South where again, it's unlikely that a Dem will win, nor does a Dem victory depend on winning (all) the Southren states;

3) a Veep like James Webb could bring significant credibility to an Obama ticket in states where the margin is close. Personally, I'd be happier to see Webb stay in the Senate where he is both a leader and a building block towards 60 votes.

So I just don't see where GOP optimism would be coming from...

____________________________________________________

About the Forrestal incident: viral attack e-mails circulated a few months ago - after McCain had won the nomination, IIRC - accusing McCain of causing the incident, and the Navy of covering it up. I did a little armchair research (cue teh Google), and concluded that there was nothing there. Wikipedia has an article about it. But I was curious as to who was circulating the rumors, and why?

I didn't get very far, but as best I can tell, the rumors and blog posts come from the far right. Someone or some group on the Bircher right was trying to gin up a Swift Boat attack against McCain.

Why?

And why did they go quiet?

Might this have been a Rove-style attempt to inoculate McCain against Forrestal charges a la Rather/TANG?

Were the charges just too silly? But then so were the charges against Kerry.

McCain, Obama, and the GI Bill

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2008/05/are-we-clear-by-digby-if-john-mccain.html

Digby argues that McCain's temper tantrum might well be a carefully crafted political expression aimed at asserting his alpha male cred and tagging Obama as effeminate..

.. but sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.

Sully on the GI Bill

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/05/webbs-bill.html

Sully's last comment is exactly my reaction.

I asked my ultra-conservative Catholic bud what the strategeric thinking here is. He responded:

"The military will vote for McCain."

Finding this, uh, less than edicational, I responded more acerbically than I probably should have.

But is there any credible & substantive strategeric thinking behind the GOP/Admin/McCain position here?

As best I can see, the McCain campaign is beginning to look like a bunch of amatyoors.. one might even say a (ahem) clown show.