BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign

Subject: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Amos
Date: 08 Sep 08 - 11:41 AM

Now that the conventions are over, but the campaign is not, I though it would be good to make a thread for the whole show.

For starters, here is a graphic of the comparative tax-reform plans promoted by the two sides. On the average the McCain plan reduces income tax by 4% for those making a million plus per year, and by less than 1% for those making less than 50K/yr.

The Obama plan provides cuts to 95% of taxpayers --those making less than 226K/year-- with decreases from 2.4 to 5.5% for those making less than 66K. The largest reductions would benefit thos emaking less than 20K.

Obama's plan means less taxes for about 80% of taxpayers, compared to McCain's plan. McCain's plan provides the greatets percentage reductions (2.5 to 4.4) for thos emaking between $111K and >2.87M/year.

A

Moved to BS section....clonedude

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Amos
Date: 08 Sep 08 - 12:00 PM

Danke, clonedude.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 08 Sep 08 - 12:40 PM

The link is to party propaganda.
The new Congress will make or break any proposed legislation.

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Riginslinger
Date: 08 Sep 08 - 12:58 PM

Besides, Obama has already changed his proposed tax plan!

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Amos
Date: 08 Sep 08 - 01:02 PM

The link is to a chart of numbers. If they are falsified, please point out how. I hate to disseminate false or misleading information, and I also dislike having good data smeared with idle comments.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 08 Sep 08 - 01:33 PM

Political website data is never more than campaign slogans.

If comparisons are to be made, use reliable sources, such as Wall Street Journal, New York Times, etc.
Even CNN- see Obama Tax plan on CNN.com/politics.

I would also ignore material on a Republican website. Both sources are 'dream' stuff.

Obama is an expert waffler; see Associated Press report, "Obama: Recession could delay rescinding tax cuts," Sept. 7. "....Obama says he would delay rescinding President Bush's tax cuts on wealthy Americans if he becomes the next president and the economy is in a recession, ...."
but also-
Obama ".....wants to push for his promised tax cuts for the middle class, he said in a broadcast interview aired Sunday."

A much better comparison was printed by CNN, "What they'll do to your tax bill," CNNMoney.com, June 11, 2008, Jeanne Sahadi.

Of course claims by both parties are so much dust in the wind; Congress will write the final version.

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Sep 08 - 01:43 PM

Yeah, not only that,---insert generic complaint here---

It does matter what they say now if only to hold them accountable for lieing later.

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: pdq
Date: 08 Sep 08 - 01:52 PM

"...rescinding President Bush's tax cuts on wealthy Americans..." ~ Obama

What mealy-mouthed rubbish. The tax cuts enacted in 2002 were voted on and passed by a majority in both the House and Senate. They were signed and became law.

If the Democrats want to raise taxes again, they should should have the guts to say "we will raise your taxes". The American people do not trust Democrats because they never say what they really mean. Bill Clinton's word-twisting was the last straw for many of us (I was a Democrat for 32 years).

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Sep 08 - 01:58 PM

"they should should have the guts to say "we will raise your taxes"

No politician in North America has the guts to say "We will raise your taxes."

Nevertheless, the cost of living keeps going up year by year, and the dollar keeps dropping in value, and things get more expensive.

Hmmm.

Sounds to me like they have ALL been lying to us, pdq.

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: katlaughing
Date: 08 Sep 08 - 02:10 PM

LATs

Only I can bring change to Washington, McCain and Obama each claim
The rivals, appearing in different states, also talk up their economic plans in the wake of the worst jobless report in five years and the announcement of a planned Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac bailout.

By Noam N. Levey and Maeve Reston, Los Angeles Times Staff Writers
September 7, 2008

TERRE HAUTE, IND. -- Barack Obama on Saturday ridiculed John McCain's renewed emphasis on his reputation as a government reformer, mocking the Republican presidential nominee in unusually sharp language while campaigning in this traditional GOP stronghold.

"This is coming from the party that's been in charge for eight years. They've been running the show," Obama told some 800 supporters here at the Wabash Valley fairgrounds.

"I guess maybe what they're saying is, 'Watch out, George Bush. Except for economic policies, and tax policies, and energy policies, and healthcare policies, and education policies, and Karl Rove-style politics, except for all that, we're really going to bring change to Washington. We're going to shake things up.' "

Ever since McCain selected her as his running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has cited their reputations for political independence to argue that they would be more effective in changing Washington than Obama and his vice presidential nominee, Sen. Joe Biden of Delaware.

"Sen. McCain has called the two of us a team of mavericks, and he knows that we've done some shaking up there in Alaska," she said at the Albuquerque convention center before a crowd of about 6,000.

Saturday, both campaigns also talked up their economic plans in the wake of the worst jobless report in five years and news that the Bush administration was laboring to devise a rescue plan for the nation's mortgage giants, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

But it was the dispute over who could bring change that created the most friction.

On the second day of their post-convention tour, McCain and Palin sought to woo voters with their message of change in Albuquerque and, earlier in the day, in conservative Colorado Springs at a rally in a breezy airplane hangar. But it was Palin, much more than McCain, who pressed the argument.

As she had in her speeches Friday, Palin lavished praise on McCain and ridiculed Obama, the senator from Illinois, for his judgment on Iraq and his "high-flown speechmaking."

"There is only one man in this election who has ever really fought for you, and that man is John McCain," she said.

Palin repeatedly questioned Obama's ability to reform Washington, but she also took aim at Biden, who has served in Congress a decade longer than McCain.

"Sen. Biden can claim many chairmanships across many, many years in Washington and certainly many friends in the Washington establishment," she said, "but even those admirers could not be able to call him an agent of change."

Obama, speaking in a pole barn where youngsters usually show off their livestock, offered a sharp critique of McCain's widely viewed convention speech, acidly noting that some of the Arizona senator's top advisors were lobbyists until they went to work for his presidential campaign.

"Suddenly he's the change agent," Obama said. "He says, 'I'm going to tell those lobbyists that their days of running Washington are over.' Who's he going to tell? Is he going to tell his campaign chairman, who's one of the biggest corporate lobbyists in Washington? Is he going to tell his campaign manager, who was one of the biggest corporate lobbyists in Washington? Is he going to tell all the folks who are running his campaign, who are the biggest corporate lobbyists in Washington? Who? Who is it that he's going to tell that change is coming? I mean come on. They must think you're stupid."

Obama also criticized Palin, who has touted her opposition to federal earmarks even though she lobbied for millions of dollars of earmarks when she was mayor of a small town and, as governor, she requested $197.8 million in earmarks this year.

"When you've been taking all these earmarks when it's convenient, and then suddenly, you're the champion anti-earmark person, that's not change," Obama said.

Later in the day, Palin said she was "surprised that he raised the subject" and noted that Obama has sought almost $1 billion in earmarks in the last three years.

"Just wait until President McCain puts a stop to that," she said.

Taxpayers for Common Sense estimates that, excluding earmark requests for national programs, such as breast cancer research, Obama has asked for $853.3 million in earmarks for Illinois since he took office.

Also on Saturday, both campaigns addressed the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac bailout.

In Colorado Springs, McCain made only passing reference to the crisis, but later in Albuquerque he talked about a possible federal bailout in the context of the everyday struggles of voters who are were trying to deal with the economic downturn.

"You're worried about keeping your job or finding a new one. You're struggling to put food on the table and stay in your home," he said. "The jobs number yesterday was another reminder of that. Today we're looking at possible failure of our home loan agencies we need to keep people in their homes, but we can't allow this to turn into a bailout of Wall Street speculators and irresponsible executives. We can't let it do that."

Obama, responding to a question after his rally in Indiana, said he believed the Bush administration would have to intervene, at the cost of billions in taxpayer dollars, to ensure that Fannie and Freddie would not collapse and further damage the housing market.

But Obama said that any federal bailout should be constructed in a way that does not reward the executives and shareholders of the two troubled mortgage companies.

"The one thing I want to make sure of is that whatever steps we take that we don't let them make profits and keep those private, but then when they have losses simply those are all public," he said. "You notice a lot of these folks don't like government when they're making money but the minute they start losing money, they think government's just swell."

Amid the day of partisan rancor, the candidates also found time for a bipartisan gesture: a joint statement announcing that they would appear together at ground zero in Manhattan to mark the seventh anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.

"We will put aside politics and come together to renew that unity, to honor the memory of each and every American who died, and to grieve with the families and friends who lost loved ones," the statement said.

[e-mail]

[e-mail]

Levey reported from Indiana, Reston from Colorado and New Mexico. Times staff writer Tom Hamburger contributed to this report.

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: pdq
Date: 08 Sep 08 - 02:17 PM

Yep, more copy'n'paste sliming, professionally written by the sliming experts at the LA Times (aka the LA Slimes). Yawn.

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Amos
Date: 08 Sep 08 - 02:50 PM

Seems you're doing your own share of sliming from time to time, there PDQ.

Obama's tax plan will not "raise your taxes" unless you are already making huge amounts of money -- >~ $1M/yr.

I take it this is not your tax bracket.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 08 Sep 08 - 03:46 PM

I thought that little about US politics could surprise me although much of it can horrify me.

Hello? Can anybody hear me?

You have a recession.

What cures a recession?


Tax and spend. That's what.

All you need to check it out is a time machine or a history book.

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 08 Sep 08 - 06:09 PM

MR. Bridge--there are only two alternatives to Tax and Spend. Either don't spend (which neither party appears willing to do) or don't tax (which means selling your country to lenders while you pile up monstrous debts.)

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Riginslinger
Date: 09 Sep 08 - 04:16 PM

"Times staff writer Tom Hamburger contributed to this report."


                   And did they hold the onions?

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: GUEST,beardedbruce
Date: 09 Sep 08 - 05:33 PM

"It's true that McCain's voting support for Bush policies has averaged slightly above 89 percent since Bush took office, according to Congressional Quarterly's vote studies. But it has ebbed and flowed. It reached a low of 77 percent in 2005. Last year it was 95 percent. By comparison, Obama's own record of supporting Bush policies has averaged slightly under 41 percent since the senator took office. However, Obama's voting record is no less partisan than McCain's. He has voted in line with his party an average of nearly 97 percent of the time. The truth is that neither candidate can claim a strong record of "breaking with his party" if Senate votes are the measure."

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: irishenglish
Date: 09 Sep 08 - 06:18 PM

The sad thing about the mudslinging is that after such a prolonged election, people are starting to get desensitized to it. It's not holding much for either candidate. Obama's got some work to do, for sure, but my feeling is-he's gonna get it back in the public's eye real quickly. McCain may have gotten the best reaction to a mediocre speech I have ever seen, but the days ahead are going to be real tough. Biden hasn't yet begun the fight....to paraphrase. I think he's going to show some definite positive results to his selection very shortly. And Palin? Honestly (and I say this with no attack upon her as a person) is going to have a bit of a struggle when she has to explain her views in person, on the cuff, and away from McCain. They won't be continuing the joint appearances too much longer I would think. All of that is honest opinion, nothing more than my own. But my other opinion is that despite what the numbers may say, there are far more dissatisfied people in the country based on a number of issues who are going to vote for Obama than for McCain. Again I say, not based on any hard facts, just my gut reaction, despite of the media, the radio shows, the blogosphere, all of it.


One last thing-pdq-you never acknowledged in the Palin VP thread, despite attempting to call me out, that you were, in fact, wrong about the number of people who have gone from the Senate to President. Just for fun of course.

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Amos
Date: 09 Sep 08 - 10:45 PM

BARACK Obama has dismissed the US presidential campaign of rivals John McCain and Sarah Palin as putting "lipstick on a pig" in his most direct attack on the Republican odd couple aiming to keep him out of the White House.

However the line could be interpreted as a personal sledge against Mrs Palin, Senator McCain's surprise running mate who described herself as a "pit bull with lipstick" when she accepted the Republican vice-presidential nomination at the party's national convention last week.

"We've been talking about change when we were up in the polls and when we were down in the polls," Senator Obama told a rally in Virginia as surveys suggested Senator McCain and Mrs Palin have overhauled his lead for the election to be held on November 5 (Australian time).

"The other side, suddenly, they're saying 'we're for change too'. Now think about it, these are the same folks that have been in charge for the last eight years.

"You can put lipstick on a pig. It's still a pig. You can wrap up an old fish in a piece of paper and call it change. It's still going to stink after eight years. We've had enough," he said to instant applause.

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 10 Sep 08 - 11:35 AM

But in a longer term and global analysis, what about the baldness gap??

~ Becky in Tucson

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Bobert
Date: 10 Sep 08 - 12:01 PM

There are two different forces at work on Obama's tax proposals...

The first is Obama saying that he would not extend the 2002 Bush tax cuts... The second is Obama's position on giving tax releif to 95% of Americans and increaing the burden on the remaining 5%...

John McCain has been running ads that do not recognize the 2nd half of Obama's tax proposal but only the first half... In other words, they are playing some real games with the truth... Yeah, okay, they are lieing but...

...who really cares???

They don't and they have made that perfectly clear in letting Sarah Palin misrepresent her stand on the "Bridge to Nowhere"...

The challenge for Obama is to point out that MCCain is lieing without saying "He's lieing" because the McCain camp is poised to jump on Obama as running a persoanl negative attack on McCain which, of course, plays into their strategy of having the electorate think:

1. Both campaigns are negative (false), and...

2. Both cmapaigns have avoided talking issues (again false) but...

...these misconsptions have set into alot of voters minds and it's going to be tough to root them out...

But with that said, Obama is still on the high road and if he stays there and jusr runs on the economy and leaves the resy alone, he should be fine by election day...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 10 Sep 08 - 12:05 PM

BB-
Youve proved my point. If you want to continue what the Republican administration has been doing, vote for McCain/Palin. If you don't, vote for Obama/Biden.

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Bobert
Date: 10 Sep 08 - 12:25 PM

The problem, Dick, is that is exactly wnat bb wants... He has never criticised a single Bush decision or policy as far as I can recall...

BTW, without going into all the details because I can't the themes in my last post were in a Letter to the Editor of the Wsahington Post and I was contacted yesterday by them asking permission to use the letter... If it gets published then I'll get Amos to do a clicky but right now I am sworn to not go into too much detail... The Post is kinda funny about this stuff...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: beardedbruce
Date: 10 Sep 08 - 02:04 PM

"He has never criticised a single Bush decision or policy as far as I can recall."

Then you have not read my posts.

I commented on the poor tactical approach to Iraq, complained that the administration waited too long ( ie, after the WMD materials had been removed) to invade Iraq, gave in to Turkey (risking Kurdistan) and did not plan for the occupation.

Now, waiting to hear when *you* have praised Bush for acting as you wanted in Darfur, etc...

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Amos
Date: 10 Sep 08 - 02:14 PM

Here are the real things this presidential campaign should turn on:

1. How do we resolve the education gap nationally to create comeptitive science, engineering and business people tor evitalize the economy long term, to create a new generation of important artists to restore the nation's soul, and a new generation of leaders to create vital new visions and direction?

2. How do we turn our lame and limping oil-driven economy, battered by a flattening international market, into an innovative, energy-independent, self-reliant, fiscally sound economy?

3. How do we ensure the fundamental safety of the nation to ensure these things can happen?

4. How do we regenerate an infrastructure to accomodate the new order of magnitude of population of the country, including water, road, waste, and environmental services?

5. How do we manage our relations with neighbors, allies, and other nations do allow thiese thigns to happen with minimum disruption and maximum international benefit?

Note that these are the issues Obama talks about over and over, and the issues that ther media repeatedly avoids, and that the Republicans mock. Note that none of them involves sex, abortion, or a fixation on body parts, and none of them are predicated on hatred, revenge, or unkind attitudes toward others; they arepredicated instead on what is effective across the spectrum of national concerns.

A


A

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 10 Sep 08 - 02:21 PM

The fundamental problem with much education and not only in the USA is that other students admire jocks, and classify the academically able as "geeks".

This follows into politics where those who do actually have and display a detailed understanding are dismissed as "policy wonks".

If a Frenchman in France says he is an intellectual others nod approvingly.

In the UK (and, I suspect, much of the USA) if a man says he is an intellectual, the reply is moronic violence.

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Amos
Date: 10 Sep 08 - 02:27 PM

A critical part of the problem, I agree. While I think athletic excellence is wonderful, the notion of raising it to the summum bonum of learning at the cost of a wonderful rich array of much deeper and meaningful subjects is barbaric, IMHO.

When the barbarians arrive at our gates this time, they will be riding giant, lipstick-smeared boarhogs.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: irishenglish
Date: 10 Sep 08 - 03:08 PM

You know, I only said this yesterday, but again today I saw another joint appearance by McCain/Palin. When are they going to go in seperate directions on the trail? Also, Biden has been REAL quiet overall. Do we think he's working on a calculated response to Palin?

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Bobert
Date: 10 Sep 08 - 03:09 PM

Actually, bb, Bush has handled the crisis in Georgia half right and a lot better than McCain...

Yeah, the sabre rattlin' is way down for this White House... Of course, if John McCain were the C-in-C he would have US embroiled in a nasty proxy war in Georgia with his cowboy mentality of the world but...

...me thinks that Bush has had his fill of war... It took long enough but I think is finally getting it...

That5 is waht worries me about McCain, however... I firmly believe that with his hot temper and his ractionary personality that he'd have US in another war within his 1st year...

As a citizen, he scares the living heck outta me...

But Bush??? I'd give him a B- on Georgia...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Amos
Date: 10 Sep 08 - 03:11 PM

Gov. Edward G. Rendell of Pennsylvania just accused the campaign of Senator John McCain and Gov. Sarah Palin of flat-out "lying" about Senator Barack Obama's plan on taxes.

Mr. Obama would cut taxes for the majority of Americans, according to theTax Policy Center that has examined his proposals, and yet the McCain campaign continues to say that Mr. Obama would raise them.

"I call on Senator McCain to stop misleading, stop lying, about Senator Obama's tax plan," Mr. Rendell said in a conference call with reporters.

Politicians rarely accuse each other of lying, preferring euphemisms instead. Mr. Rendell's unusually blunt language is a sign of the anger that Democrats are feeling as they watch the McCain camp distort Mr. Obama's proposals (Factcheck.org says the McCain campaign is engaging in "a pattern of deceit") and their frustration at being unable to stop it. Governor Rendell was highlighting the issue in advance of a visit Tuesday to Pennsylvania by Mr. McCain and Ms. Palin.

Mr. Rendell repeated his accusation several times. He said that most speakers at the Republican convention in St. Paul last week had "lied" about Mr. Obama's tax plans and that Mr. McCain's television ads "have continued to lie." He said Mr. McCain was using "the big lie strategy," which is to repeat something often enough in hopes that it will stick. And, he lamented, "to some extent it has stuck."

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Amos
Date: 10 Sep 08 - 06:43 PM

"From the way the day started, no one could have predicted the festival of fatuousness that would eventually unfold. Around 9 a.m., Obama unveiled a new education plan during a speech at Stebbins High School in Riverside, Ohio. Breaking with Democratic orthodoxy (and the powerful teachers' unions) to embrace reform concepts normally associated with the GOP, Obama promised to double funding for charter schools and to launch a merit-pay program that would hold public-school instructors to higher standards of accountability. It was a serious package of policy proposals meant to address one of America's most pressing problems. At the same time, Obama unleashed a new ad (titled "What Kind?") meant to amplify the day's education message by drawing contrasts with McCain's record. "John McCain voted to cut education funding," it said. "He even proposed abolishing the Department of Education." Not exactly pattycake--but it was all policy, nothing personal, and pretty much par for the course.

The McCain campaign quickly saw and seized its opening. Instead of engaging Obama in a debate about the future of public education--McCain supports school vouchers, for example; Obama doesn't--Crystal City passed Go, waved off the $200 and skipped straight to the senseless mudslinging. In a hastily assembled response ad called "Education," McCain claimed that "Obama's one accomplishment" in the area of education was "legislation to teach 'comprehensive sex education' to kindergartners." "Learning about sex before learning to read?" intoned the announcer. "Wrong on education. Wrong for your family." Thus our bright, shining new era of inanity began in earnest. The point of the bill in question--which as an Illinois state senator Obama voted for but did not sponsor, and which never passed--was not to give kindergartners explicit sex-ed lessons. It was to give local school boards the ability to warn young children about inappropriate touching and sexual predators. Offended parents even could opt out of the program.

Maybe McCain thinks cautioning kids about creeps is a bad thing, but I doubt it. I even doubt that McCain buys what his own ad is slimily implying--that Obama is some sort of perverted sexual deviant who wants to parade pornographic images in front of the nation's prepubescent children. But the problem is, McCain is treating the American people as if they're stupid enough to believe just that. Obama spokesman Bill Burton called the effort "shameful and downright perverse." I think "cynical" is more accurate.

Incredibly, the day only got more asinine from there. After Burton pissily, counterproductively questioned McCain's "honor"--a move that prompted teeth-gnashing and garment-rending among the Arizona's senators martial minions--Obama went on stage in Lebanon, Va., and said of McCain's newfound "change" message that "you can put lipstick on a pig, but it's still a pig." Again, Crystal City was ready to pounce. Reminding voters that Palin had used the word "lipstick" in her convention speech while joking about the "difference between a pit bull and a hockey mom," former Massachusetts governor and current McCain surrogate Jane Swift quickly declared, in full faux-outrage mode, that Obama had "uttered what I can only deem to be disgraceful comments comparing our vice presidential nominee, Governor Palin, to a pig" and demanded an apology. Soon, other Republican flacks--all of them women, incidentally--were weighing in, as well. Meanwhile, Team McCain slapped together another ad, "Lipstick," told reporters that it would "air" on the "Web" and watched with delight as Chris Matthews and Co. broadcast it for free (predictably enough) on their evening gabfests.

The point, of course, was get everyone speculating about whether or not Obama had committed a heinous act of "sexism" and change the day's debate from education to gender insensitivity. Never mind that "you can put lipstick on a pig" is an old idiomatic expression. Never mind that Obama was talking about McCain--not Palin--when he used it. Never mind that Obama also said that "you can wrap an old fish in a piece of paper called 'change,' [but] it's still gonna stink after eight years." Never mind that McCain's former press secretary, Torie Clarke, wrote a book called "Lipstick on a Pig: Winning in the No-Spin Era." Never mind that Elizabeth Edwards once compared McCain's health-care plan to "painting lipstick on a pig." Never mind that Obama has used the phrase before, claiming last September that Gen. David Petraeus "has done his best to try to figure out how to put lipstick on a pig" in Iraq. And never mind that McCain said the same thing of Hillary Clinton's health-care plan the following month, characterizing it as "eerily" similar to her failed 1993 proposal. "I think they put some lipstick on a pig," McCain said, "but it's still a pig.""

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Ebbie
Date: 10 Sep 08 - 11:55 PM

Tonight on NBC the commentator told Williams that the Republican candidate and his minions are doing this on purpose. He said they are consciously latching onto anything they can that will derail any talk about the economy, for instance, with the hope and belief that it buys them time. The current economy, he said, is not a strong point for the Republicans and so they don't want to discuss it.

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: beardedbruce
Date: 11 Sep 08 - 06:39 AM

http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1840327,00.html?cnn=yes


"Key to McCain's lead in Virginia and Missouri is his appeal to Independent voters. While Obama holds an edge over McCain with self-identified moderate voters in all four states, he's losing among Independent voters in Virginia by 9 percentage points and in Missouri by 18 percentage points. The surveys ask participants to identify themselves by both party — Republican, Democrat and Independent — and ideology (conservative, moderate and liberal). On the income front, Obama is winning by double digits among those making less than $50,000 a year in all four states."

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Amos
Date: 11 Sep 08 - 01:09 PM

But the vice president isn't supposed to get any attention, and all people can talk about is Palin, Palin, Palin!

True. I think that's because she's from Alaska. It's got that frontier aura that we've missed since all the cowboy television series were canceled a generation ago. Plus, it gives us the opportunity to talk a lot about moose, which are a funny animal no matter how you slice it. If Palin had been a deer-hunting mom from New Jersey, John McCain would have gotten no post-convention bump whatsoever.

McCain, by the way, is the Republican nominee for president. You may remember him from the Sarah Palin convention in Minneapolis, where he gave a speech and was congratulated by Sarah Palin.

Have you seen that Republican lipstick video? They're trying to say Obama called her a pig!

Obama simply brought up the old saw about how "you can put lipstick on a pig; it's still a pig." The Republicans seem to be assuming that since Palin has a joke about how hockey moms are pit bulls with lipstick, all references to mammals wearing lip rouge are about her.

If you really want to see a strange line of attack, take a look at the wolf ad. It cuts from Palin's face to Obama's to packs of wolves prowling through the forest, presumably in search of vice-presidential prey. Then comes the text claiming that as Barack drops in the polls, "he'll try to destroy her." Given Palin's affection for shooting wolves from airplanes with high-powered rifles, it'd be more appropriate to have them cowering in their dens while she aims her machine gun from a diving Cessna.

You don't seem to appreciate how critical this election is.

Well, I definitely appreciate how long this election is. Time only seems short because these people have already been running for a year. Calm down. Remember, that 17-mile-long Swiss particle collider that people were afraid would create a black hole that swallows the Earth? It started operation this week. And so far, no planet-eating black holes. So you see, things could be worse.

(NYT)

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Amos
Date: 12 Sep 08 - 01:53 AM

Blizzard of Lies


By PAUL KRUGMAN (NYT)
Published: September 11, 2008

Did you hear about how Barack Obama wants to have sex education in kindergarten, and called Sarah Palin a pig? Did you hear about how Ms. Palin told Congress, "Thanks, but no thanks" when it wanted to buy Alaska a Bridge to Nowhere?


These stories have two things in common: they're all claims recently made by the McCain campaign — and they're all out-and-out lies.

Dishonesty is nothing new in politics. I spent much of 2000 — my first year at The Times — trying to alert readers to the blatant dishonesty of the Bush campaign's claims about taxes, spending and Social Security.

But I can't think of any precedent, at least in America, for the blizzard of lies since the Republican convention. The Bush campaign's lies in 2000 were artful — you needed some grasp of arithmetic to realize that you were being conned. This year, however, the McCain campaign keeps making assertions that anyone with an Internet connection can disprove in a minute, and repeating these assertions over and over again.

Take the case of the Bridge to Nowhere, which supposedly gives Ms. Palin credentials as a reformer. Well, when campaigning for governor, Ms. Palin didn't say "no thanks" — she was all for the bridge, even though it had already become a national scandal, insisting that she would "not allow the spinmeisters to turn this project or any other into something that's so negative."

Oh, and when she finally did decide to cancel the project, she didn't righteously reject a handout from Washington: she accepted the handout, but spent it on something else. You see, long before she decided to cancel the bridge, Congress had told Alaska that it could keep the federal money originally earmarked for that project and use it elsewhere.

So the whole story of Ms. Palin's alleged heroic stand against wasteful spending is fiction.

Or take the story of Mr. Obama's alleged advocacy of kindergarten sex-ed. In reality, he supported legislation calling for "age and developmentally appropriate education"; in the case of young children, that would have meant guidance to help them avoid sexual predators.

And then there's the claim that Mr. Obama's use of the ordinary metaphor "putting lipstick on a pig" was a sexist smear, and on and on.

Why do the McCain people think they can get away with this stuff? Well, they're probably counting on the common practice in the news media of being "balanced" at all costs. You know how it goes: If a politician says that black is white, the news report doesn't say that he's wrong, it reports that "some Democrats say" that he's wrong. Or a grotesque lie from one side is paired with a trivial misstatement from the other, conveying the impression that both sides are equally dirty.

They're probably also counting on the prevalence of horse-race reporting, so that instead of the story being "McCain campaign lies," it becomes "Obama on defensive in face of attacks."

Still, how upset should we be about the McCain campaign's lies? I mean, politics ain't beanbag, and all that.

One answer is that the muck being hurled by the McCain campaign is preventing a debate on real issues — on whether the country really wants, for example, to continue the economic policies of the last eight years.

But there's another answer, which may be even more important: how a politician campaigns tells you a lot about how he or she would govern.

I'm not talking about the theory, often advanced as a defense of horse-race political reporting, that the skills needed to run a winning campaign are the same as those needed to run the country. The contrast between the Bush political team's ruthless effectiveness and the heckuva job done by the Bush administration is living, breathing, bumbling, and, in the case of the emerging Interior Department scandal, coke-snorting and bed-hopping proof to the contrary.

I'm talking, instead, about the relationship between the character of a campaign and that of the administration that follows. Thus, the deceptive and dishonest 2000 Bush-Cheney campaign provided an all-too-revealing preview of things to come. In fact, my early suspicion that we were being misled about the threat from Iraq came from the way the political tactics being used to sell the war resembled the tactics that had earlier been used to sell the Bush tax cuts.

And now the team that hopes to form the next administration is running a campaign that makes Bush-Cheney 2000 look like something out of a civics class. What does that say about how that team would run the country?

What it says, I'd argue, is that the Obama campaign is wrong to suggest that a McCain-Palin administration would just be a continuation of Bush-Cheney. If the way John McCain and Sarah Palin are campaigning is any indication, it would be much, much worse.

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Amos
Date: 12 Sep 08 - 02:10 AM

This surprised the hell out of me. From the LA Times:

"Sarah Palin's secessionist sympathies sparked minor hysteria last week. Her crime was hailing with round praise the work of the cranky Alaskan Independence Party, which advocates a statewide plebiscite on the secession of Alaska from the Union. "The fires of hell are frozen glaciers compared to my hatred for the American government," the party's late founder, gold miner Joe Vogler, once said. "And I won't be buried under their damn flag."

Palin's husband was a member of the AIP for seven years, and Palin herself has courted the AIP for more than a decade. In an address to the party convention this spring, wearing a ski parka and looking like she was about to decamp into the back country, Palin told the secessionists, "Keep up the good work." Dexter Clark, the white-bearded vice chairman of the AIP, recently explained the motivation behind the "good work": "Through oppression, greed, corruption, incompetence and folly, the [U.S. government] is forfeiting its moral authority."

The thing is, it's not just residents of the Last Frontier who favor breaking away from the Union. According to a Zogby poll conducted in July, more than 20% of U.S. adults -- one in five, about the same number of American Colonists who supported revolt against England in 1775 -- agreed that "any state or region has the right to peaceably secede from the United States and become an independent republic." Some 18% "would support a secessionist effort in my state."

The motivation of these quiet revolutionaries? As many as 44% of those polled agreed that "the United States' system is broken and cannot be fixed by traditional two-party politics and elections."

Put this in stark terms: In a scientific, random sample poll of all Americans, almost half considered the current political system to be in terminal disorder. One-fifth would countenance a dissolution of the bond. This is not a hiccup of opinion. In an October 2006 poll conducted by the Opinion Research Corp. and broadcast on CNN, 71% of Americans agreed that "our system of government is broken and cannot be fixed."..."

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: akenaton
Date: 12 Sep 08 - 02:49 AM

Hoorah!!......somebody "GETS IT" at last.
I just knew it would be American people who saved us all.

That naivety that all the intellectuals condemn, really means that there is still hope in their hearts...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: akenaton
Date: 12 Sep 08 - 02:58 AM

Hi Amos...lets be friends! When Scotland gets Independence we can visit one another. You can come to Scotland....I'll visit the Californian Free State......Ake

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 12 Sep 08 - 05:44 AM

Can I remind people who the principal promoter of political reform was, while that person was running for candidature?

Kucinich.

You're right, the system is broken.

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Amos
Date: 12 Sep 08 - 09:31 AM

"/...It would be silly to count out the Obama strategists; they have defied every prediction and surpassed every expectation thus far. But watching the Obama response to the Sarah Palin frenzy, conjures up sad images of John Kerry, Al Gore, or, dare we say it, Michael Dukakis.

"Once again, we have Democratic dignity on display. They are taking the high road, constantly acknowledging John McCain's honorable service to the nation and saying that Sarah Palin is a tough and talented politician.

"Meanwhile, on the low road and on their high horse, Republicans are making minced moose meat out of Obama. In 30 brutal minutes during the Republican Convention last week, Rudy Giuliani and Sarah Palin took Obama's anti-elitist, street cred and turned it against him."

Samuel then makes this remarkable statement: "Maybe it would have been better for Obama to have called Sarah Palin a pig, rather than to have spent a day explaining why he didn't. Voters actually respond to that kind of jibe, if they think you're fighting the good fight against people who don't have their interests at heart."

..." WaPo

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Riginslinger
Date: 12 Sep 08 - 10:17 AM

"...It would be silly to count out the Obama strategists;"


             Not really. They only deal with elites!

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Amos
Date: 12 Sep 08 - 10:44 AM

Gee, Rig, that's so succinct, and inaccurate, as to be close to mad drivel.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Amos
Date: 12 Sep 08 - 11:21 AM

"Palin: wrong woman, wrong message
Sarah Palin shares nothing but a chromosome with Hillary Clinton. She is Phyllis Schlafly, only younger.
By Gloria Steinem
September 4, 2008

Here's the good news: Women have become so politically powerful that even the anti-feminist right wing -- the folks with a headlock on the Republican Party -- are trying to appease the gender gap with a first-ever female vice president. We owe this to women -- and to many men too -- who have picketed, gone on hunger strikes or confronted violence at the polls so women can vote. We owe it to Shirley Chisholm, who first took the "white-male-only" sign off the White House, and to Hillary Rodham Clinton, who hung in there through ridicule and misogyny to win 18 million votes.

But here is even better news: It won't work. This isn't the first time a boss has picked an unqualified woman just because she agrees with him and opposes everything most other women want and need. Feminism has never been about getting a job for one woman. It's about making life more fair for women everywhere. It's not about a piece of the existing pie; there are too many of us for that. It's about baking a new pie.

Selecting Sarah Palin, who was touted all summer by Rush Limbaugh, is no way to attract most women, including die-hard Clinton supporters. Palin shares nothing but a chromosome with Clinton. Her down-home, divisive and deceptive speech did nothing to cosmeticize a Republican convention that has more than twice as many male delegates as female, a presidential candidate who is owned and operated by the right wing and a platform that opposes pretty much everything Clinton's candidacy stood for -- and that Barack Obama's still does. To vote in protest for McCain/Palin would be like saying, "Somebody stole my shoes, so I'll amputate my legs."

This is not to beat up on Palin. I defend her right to be wrong, even on issues that matter most to me. I regret that people say she can't do the job because she has children in need of care, especially if they wouldn't say the same about a father. I get no pleasure from imagining her in the spotlight on national and foreign policy issues about which she has zero background, with one month to learn to compete with Sen. Joe Biden's 37 years' experience.

Palin has been honest about what she doesn't know. When asked last month about the vice presidency, she said, "I still can't answer that question until someone answers for me: What is it exactly that the VP does every day?" When asked about Iraq, she said, "I haven't really focused much on the war in Iraq."


She was elected governor largely because the incumbent was unpopular, and she's won over Alaskans mostly by using unprecedented oil wealth to give a $1,200 rebate to every resident. Now she is being praised by McCain's campaign as a tax cutter, despite the fact that Alaska has no state income or sales tax. Perhaps McCain has opposed affirmative action for so long that he doesn't know it's about inviting more people to meet standards, not lowering them. Or perhaps McCain is following the Bush administration habit, as in the Justice Department, of putting a job candidate's views on "God, guns and gays" ahead of competence. The difference is that McCain is filling a job one 72-year-old heartbeat away from the presidency.

So let's be clear: The culprit is John McCain. He may have chosen Palin out of change-envy, or a belief that women can't tell the difference between form and content, but the main motive was to please right-wing ideologues; the same ones who nixed anyone who is now or ever has been a supporter of reproductive freedom. If that were not the case, McCain could have chosen a woman who knows what a vice president does and who has thought about Iraq; someone like Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison or Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine. McCain could have taken a baby step away from right-wing patriarchs who determine his actions, right down to opposing the Violence Against Women Act. ..." LA Times

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Amos
Date: 12 Sep 08 - 02:30 PM

This moment eerily resembles the situation in 1988 when George H.W. Bush used his convention to define the campaign and never again ceded the agenda to Democrat Michael Dukakis.

Here's the problem: Few voters know that Obama would cut the taxes of the vast majority of Americans by far more than McCain would. Few know Obama would guarantee everyone access to health care or that McCain's health plan might endanger coverage many already have. Few know that Obama has a coherent program to create new jobs through public investment in roads, bridges, transit, and green technologies.

In short, few Americans know what (or whom) Obama is fighting for, because he isn't really telling them. And few know that McCain's economic plan is worse than President Bush's. As Jonathan Cohn points out in The New Republic, McCain would add $8.5 trillion in new debt over the next ten years. It's McCain who should be on the defensive.

It should not be hard for Obama to use crisp, punchy language to force the media and the voters to pay attention to the basic issue in this election: whether the country will slowly continue down a road to decline, or whether, to invoke a slogan from long ago, we can get the country moving again.

One test in the coming weeks will be whether Obama continues to contest North Carolina.

In truth, he has paid too much attention to broadening the political map and not enough to nailing down the states he must win. But North Carolina is a state on the edge. Despite one outlying poll showing McCain with a big lead, most give him an advantage of only four to six points. If Obama does his job in framing a national message, this state should at least be competitive enough to force McCain to expend resources here.

But Democratic politicians say that won't happen unless Obama grabs the campaign back. "One of the criticisms is that he hasn't cut through all the Republican rhetoric to reveal in a clear and simple way what his plan is, which I believe would resonate with the electorate," says Jerry Meek, the Democratic state chairman. Voters, Meek says, "like a fighting spirit."

Rep. David Price, a Democrat who represents the Chapel Hill area, argues that Obama has "offered economic proposals with a lot of promise ... but there has not been the direct personal connection that there needs to be." Obama "needs people to feel angry, he needs to get people to feel something is at stake."

McCain has shown he wants the presidency so badly that he's willing to say anything, true or false, to win power. Obama can win by fighting for what he believes. What he can't do is wait for the media to call McCain out -- although they should -- or expect voters to know he'll fight for them when they are not yet sure that he's willing to stand up for himself.

(RCP site--"Tiptoeing Through the Mud"_

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Sep 08 - 04:36 PM

It looks like big oil is dropping their prices for the end of the peresidential campaign.

You have to admit its wierd when the Gulf gets hit by hurricaines the price drops further.

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Amos
Date: 12 Sep 08 - 05:59 PM

"With the Obama-McCain race so close less than two months until the election, several factors could prove pivotal in coming weeks, including how the two campaigns do in winning the support of the roughly 15 percent of voters who could go either way, and how well Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin does in assuring skeptics that she's up to the job.

The poll finds that registered voters continue to wonder whether Palin, a first-term Alaska governor, is as qualified to step up to the job of president as her Democratic counterpart, Joseph Biden, who's been in the Senate for more than three decades.

A majority of voters, 60 percent, think that Biden is qualified to be president, while 31 percent think he is not.

By comparison, 48 percent of voters think Palin is qualified, while 44 percent think she is not.

"While Palin has electrified the base, her overall appeal is less than Biden's," Young said.

On issues, McCain leads on foreign policy and national security. Obama leads on jobs and the economy, health care and representing change.

Voters split almost evenly on which is a better leader. "Neither has been able to dominate on that," Young said.

At stake for all the candidates are the roughly one in six voters still up for grabs, a total that includes those still undecided and those who still could change their minds about Obama or McCain.

Among McCain supporters who are registered voters, 77 percent said they'd definitely vote for him; 13 percent said they'd probably vote for him; and 10 percent said they still could change their minds.

Among Obama supporters, 80 percent said they'd "definitely" vote for him; 12 percent said they'd "probably" vote for him; and 8 percent said they could still change their mind.

McCain leads 57 percent to 34 percent among non-Hispanic whites, and by 53 percent to 38 percent among voters age 55 and older.

Obama leads among voters age 18 to 34 by a margin of 55 percent to 34 percent, among non-Hispanic blacks by 90 percent to 3 percent, and among Hispanics by 58 percent to 34 percent.

They're in a dead heat among voters age 35 to 54.

METHODOLOGY:

The Ipsos\McClatchy poll was conducted Sept. 5-9, 2008.

For the survey, a nationally representative, randomly selected sample of 1,018 adults across the U.S. was interviewed by Ipsos. With a sample of this size, the results are considered accurate within ±3.1 percentage points, 19 times out of 20, of what they would have been had the entire U.S. adult population been polled. The margin of error will be larger within regions and for other sub-groupings of the survey population." (KansasCity.com>

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: katlaughing
Date: 12 Sep 08 - 11:37 PM

Thanks for the Steinem piece, Amos!

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: katlaughing
Date: 13 Sep 08 - 12:21 PM

I am amazed. In browsing the statewide newspaper in WY, I have read several letter to the editor in which folks praise Obama and weigh in on Palin. I am really pleased with the support I am seeing for Obama. There are a few samples on This Page.

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Stringsinger
Date: 13 Sep 08 - 12:27 PM

Anyone who really trusts polls believes in Media Propaganda.

McCain has now become McNasty. His 527's are odious and he approves these
messages. (Even when they are outright lies).

This is one of the dirtiest campaigns ever and believe me, Karl Rove knows how to do them.

100 years in Iraq is too long.

Victory with an Occupation?   I don't think so.

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: Amos
Date: 13 Sep 08 - 12:43 PM

As we watched Sarah Palin on TV the last couple of days, we kept wondering what on earth John McCain was thinking.

The Board Blog
Additional commentary, background information and other items by Times editorial writers.
Go to The Board »
If he seriously thought this first-term governor — with less than two years in office — was qualified to be president, if necessary, at such a dangerous time, it raises profound questions about his judgment. If the choice was, as we suspect, a tactical move, then it was shockingly irresponsible.

It was bad enough that Ms. Palin's performance in the first televised interviews she has done since she joined the Republican ticket was so visibly scripted and lacking in awareness.

What made it so much worse is the strategy for which the Republicans have made Ms. Palin the frontwoman: win the White House not on ideas, but by denigrating experience, judgment and qualifications.

The idea that Americans want leaders who have none of those things — who are so blindly certain of what Ms. Palin calls "the mission" that they won't even pause for reflection — shows a contempt for voters and raises frightening questions about how Mr. McCain and Ms. Palin plan to run this country.

One of the many bizarre moments in the questioning by ABC News's Charles Gibson was when Ms. Palin, the governor of Alaska, excused her lack of international experience by sneering that Americans don't want "somebody's big fat résumé maybe that shows decades and decades in that Washington establishment where, yes, they've had opportunities to meet heads of state."

We know we were all supposed to think of Joe Biden. But it sure sounded like a good description of Mr. McCain. Those decades of experience earned the Arizona senator the admiration of people in both parties. They are why he was our preferred candidate in the Republican primaries.

The interviews made clear why Americans should worry about Ms. Palin's thin résumé and lack of experience. Consider her befuddlement when Mr. Gibson referred to President Bush's "doctrine" and her remark about having insight into Russia because she can see it from her state.

But that is not what troubled us most about her remarks — and, remember, if they were scripted, that just means that they reflect Mr. McCain's views all the more closely. Rather, it was the sense that thoughtfulness, knowledge and experience are handicaps for a president in a world populated by Al Qaeda terrorists, a rising China, epidemics of AIDS, poverty and fratricidal war in the developing world and deep economic distress at home.

Ms. Palin talked repeatedly about never blinking. When Mr. McCain asked her to run for vice president? "You have to be wired in a way of being so committed to the mission," she said, that "you can't blink."

Fighting terrorism? "We must do whatever it takes, and we must not blink, Charlie, in making those tough decisions of where we go and even who we target."

Her answers about why she had told her church that President Bush's failed policy in Iraq was "God's plan" did nothing to dispel our concerns about her confusion between faith and policy. Her claim that she was quoting a completely unrelated comment by Lincoln was absurd.

This nation has suffered through eight years of an ill-prepared and unblinkingly obstinate president. One who didn't pause to think before he started a disastrous war of choice in Iraq. One who blithely looked the other way as the Taliban and Al Qaeda regrouped in Afghanistan. One who obstinately cut taxes and undercut all efforts at regulation, unleashing today's profound economic crisis.

In a dangerous world, Americans need a president who knows that real strength requires serious thought and preparation.(NYT)

Subject: RE: BS: Notes on the Presidential Campaign
From: katlaughing
Date: 13 Sep 08 - 12:50 PM

I esp. like this bit form Dino Wenino's letter in Casper WY:

After graduating from Columbia University and before going to Harvard Law School, Barack Obama went to Chicago to work as a community organizer to help those less fortunate than himself. Isn't helping the less fortunate considered a high Christian ideal?

Sarah Palin mocked Barack Obama's community service. Is mocking the helping of the less fortunate considered appropriate Christian behavior? Personally, I found her mocking behavior disgusting and I think that it was disgusting that people listening to this mocking cheered her on.

Some of Sarah Palin's criticism of Barack Obama was dishonest. Isn't honesty supposed to be a highly valued Christian virtue?

So, Sarah Palin calls herself a Christian while mocking Barack Obama's helping of the less fortunate and while being dishonest and Republicans cheer. Wow! Is this the Republican Party's idea of family and Christian values?

I guess this just goes to show that calling oneself a Christian has very little meaning these days and that partisan politics holds much greater value than Christian virtue -- at least for self-righteous people like Sarah Palin and her supporters and admirers.

Actually, I would suggest that the religious right has done an excellent job of reducing Christianity to little more than partisan politics. Is it really any wonder that some people have such contempt for Christianity and for politics?