BS: I feel sorry for McCain

Subject: BS: I feel sorry for MacCain
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 10:48 AM

Four years ago Martin Gibson said this place would light up like Times square if Kerry got in. And he was right.

Maccain had this awful job - rather like when Margaret Thatcher was screwing up everything and HAD to be got rid of, and poor old John Major had the job of leading a party that thought maggie was a genius.

And when you think back. I remember talking to Republicans who were embarassed to find themselves required to vote for Reagan: downright pissed off to find themselves voting for the second Bush - wasn't John MacCain ten times a better candidate than either of them?


A pity he got stuffed with Sarah Palin, the moose taker. The republican pundit on tv, was saying how she had energised conservative votes - but in truth he was always always going to get those votes. I think people just looked at her and saw the same sort of cynical rightwing populist claptrap that Bush 2 and Reagan were so good at.

What do you think?

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for MacCain
From: Folk Form # 1
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 10:51 AM

Sarah Palin thought the world was 4000 years old, is therefore stupid, and does not deserve office.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Sawzaw
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 10:51 AM

I think he should have picked Romney.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Little Hawk
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 10:57 AM

(shrug) Well, you know, I don't think she's technically stupid at all. I think she's just a person who has bought into some very mistaken philosophies, and she goes on that basis. Smart people do that too, not just stupid people. Smart people can believe in absolutely anything if they are accustomed to it and they grew up with it, just the same as stupid people can.

Never underestimate your opponent just because your opponent has some different core beliefs from your own.

Why do I say this? Well....Sarah Palin has achieved a good deal more at her age than the average person does. How do you figure she managed that? Sheer blind luck? I don't think so.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Amos
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 11:06 AM

She's not stupid; she is under-educated. Her understanding of the world is cluttered with false data and the dynamics of inaccurate thinking, suitable for a small town mayor or a wildcatter or a moose hunter.

McCain chose her on a gamble. He did not choose her on principle, on a rational assessment of the best for the country, but on a gamble to bring home the bets on the election. But the gamble collapsed and his inside straight was not filled.

He is, at heart, a decent man, IMO, who was swept into difficult corners by elements he did not navigate well.

A

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: goatfell
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 11:16 AM

I feel sorry for Sarah Palin and not that McCain, he's had has his time she hasn't, I'm a Scot and I just wish that Sarah Palin was a democrat and not a republican but then the KKK won't be too happy that a black guy (African American) is now the President and is giving orders to the southern white folk, and some of them won't like that.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Ebbie
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 11:38 AM

If Palin were a Democrat, not a Republican, Goatfell, she would know a little more. *g* Democrats, in my view, are a curious, ever evolving, people. Republicans, by that same view, are not. I remember years back a guy clapping his hands over his ears and expostulating, No! No! I don't want to hear it. That's what I've always believed and I don't want to hear it!

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 11:41 AM

I do not feel sorry for John the candidate.

He did his job of providing a distraction while the entire US Treasury has been sacked, leaving the President elect nothing to work with with for a decade except hard work, hardship and hard times.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 11:41 AM

I feel sorry that McCain wasn't the Republican candidate in 2000. I wouldn't have voted for him, but I know with absolute certainty he would have done a better job than George W. Bush.

I don't feel sorry for the 2008 version of McCain. He allowed himself to be repackaged into something almost as bad as Bush.

The 2000 McCain bucked the standard Republican Party line. The 2008 McCain toed that line while only talking about how he'd bucked it in the past.


(Incidentally, if McCain had won in 2000, it's probable that Jeb Bush, not George W., would have been the next Bush to run for President. While I wouldn't vote for him either, he's ten times the man his weasel of a brother ever thought about being. If there's any Republican for whom I feel a bit sorry, it's Jeb. His brother has pretty much assured that nobody named Bush will ever stand a chance of becoming President again.)

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Little Hawk
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 11:47 AM

Amos, I think the Republicans must have been gambling on the rather facile notion that they would get the "Hillary vote" if they picked a woman for VP...specially a "working class" woman (hockey mom). If so, they sure miscalculated big time. Someone here last night was saying (while we all celebrated Obama's win) that the Republicans would have been better off to have chosen Condoleeza Rice as their VP candidate. The same person also said that the most stunning single incident in the election to help clinch it was Colin Powell's public endorsement of Obama. I would tend to agree.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: PoppaGator
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 11:48 AM

Don't go feeling too sorry for Sarah; she will be heard from again (and again and again), and is likely to become the best and most effective spokesperson for the fundagelical right, which may or may not be an endangered species. I also believe that she will be able to adapt and change if and when she realizes that her current stance is no longer viable.

I saw an exceprt from her stump speech over this past weekend and was very impressed. Yes, she was "preaching to the choir" of her supporters, and not beoing subjected to tough questions, but she was a very effective and skillful orator, a side of her that I had not really seen before.

She'll continue to use those considerable skills in support of the neoconservtive agenda as long as that works for her, but if and when she realizes that a new approach is necessary, I think we'
ll see that she'll be able to adapt. She's much too singlemindedly ambitious not to.

As far as John McCain is concerned, I don't think he needs us to feel sorry for him. He's undoubtedly better off NOT getting that lousy stressful job, which wold probably have killed him, and he bowed out VERY gracefully. Watching and listening to his concession speech, I felt like I was seeing the old John McCain, someone I had always admired and even liked despite idelogical differences, for the first time in months.

I wouldn't be surprised to see President Obama rely on McCain as a helpful, moderate, "elder-statesman" voice in the Senate, or maybe even to appoint him to some post in an administration that will very probably be historically bipartisan.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Wesley S
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 11:53 AM

"The same person also said that the most stunning single incident in the election to help clinch it was Colin Powell's public endorsement of Obama. I would tend to agree."

I think I'd have to disagree with that. I think the meltdown of the economy had as much to do with it as anything. But if you add those two items along with Bush's record it was three strikes and McCains out.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Bee
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 12:18 PM

I think McCain had the worst campaign advisors ever to sully a candidate's reputation. His concession speech reminded everyone of the man he was at the beginning of the campaign - a man nowhere to be seen during the campaign. So yes, I do feel sorry for him.

Sarah Palin is not stupid, not is she particularly intelligent, IMO. I do think she is very cunning, quick to grasp the main direction of the groups she associates with, and very self-interested. I also think she is very narrow-minded and has very little sympathy for or understanding of people outside of her own cultural subset.

She is certainly undereducated. The record of running from college to college indicates that she was barely able to tolerate academia (although she was able to do the work ably enough when she had to, it seems), and only did so in the end in order to have a degree to hang on her hat. She seems to lack interest in learning; doesn't read, makes mistakes out of not bothering to learn anything she doesn't absolutely have to.

But she blew this enormous opportunity as a result of being out of her depth and being a pawn of McCain's campaign. It happened too fast for her to adjust, I think. I do feel a bit sorry for her, though I don't think I'd ever like her as a person.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: kendall
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 12:24 PM

I could never vote for a maN WHO WOULD CALL HIS WIFE THE MOST DISGUSTING WORD IN THE eNGLISH LANGUAGE. damn capslock

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Big Mick
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 12:27 PM

Great post, Bee. I think you have nailed it.

All the best,

Mick

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: GUEST,Arkie
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 01:11 PM

I cannot say I feel sorry for McCain. Whether it was his choice or whether he was following the instructions of someone else he did what was thought had to be done to win the election. If McCain has the qualities of a person required to lead the country through a terribly troubled era he should have been able lead his own party in an election. He was certainly handicapped by what his party has done to the country and he attempted an unconvincing argument that he represented change. That argument was primarily that he represented change. Nothing in the policies that he did propose resembled even a slight departure from what we have seen over the last eight years.

As for Sarah Palin I have no idea how intelligent she may be. She has a personality that certainly would attract a certain element of the population but but her provincial background, living in a state that is still isolated from much of the country with leadership experience as mayor of a relatively small town and less than two years as governor of a state with a population less than 20 American cities she had no experience to prepare her for a national or international stage. I suspect that the Republican stategists expected Obama to run a campaign similar to their own and that the Democrats would soften their attack on Palin while she could deliver vicious character assassination with provincial charm and a smile. She could certainly gain the experience she now lacks. As far as I know the number of prominent Republicans who endorsed a Democratic candidate is unprecedented in modern politics.

McCain did redeem his personal integrity to a large degree with his concession speech and his suppression of the crowds negative reaction to Obama.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: kendall
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 01:53 PM

Spin is a funny thing. You can do wonders with it. For example: McCain spent over 5 years out of the country. He killed countless women and children, and he associated with hard core communists in all that time.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Little Hawk
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 01:57 PM

I agree with you, Wesley. The economy and Bush's past record, combined with Obama's calm and confident personal demeanour and his great oratory were the overwhelming factors. They were not individual "incidents", however, they were overall larger factors that played the largest role in determining the eventual course of the election.

It would have been very hard for any Republican candidate to win this time, after 8 years of George Bush. It would have required an impeccable and brilliant Republican campaign, accompanied by a very poor effort on the part of the Democrats. That didn't happen, needless to say...it was more like the other way around.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Bee
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 01:59 PM

Hey, Guest Arkie, lay off us provincial types. I don't think the not-so-isolated status of Alaska had much, if anything, to do with who Sarah Palin is, and she had lots of experience of other states/cities while running around pretending to get an education. I've lived most of my life in a rural setting in a province with a small population, and I am no Sarah Palin.

I hate lofty dismissals of rural people that paint us as dumb regressive hicks when it is bloody well not true.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: goatfell
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 02:10 PM

Hey McCain you've done it again

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Little Hawk
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 02:11 PM

A la Mr Magoo, you mean?

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Riginslinger
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 02:16 PM

I wonder if all of the Republicans who lost their seats are going to blame McCain?

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Cllr
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 05:14 PM

McCain would have been incredibly more preferable than Bush, as an earlier poster has said. I am hugely relieved as a brit that Obama got it so resoundingly. While I might not use the same rhetoric weelittledrummer is spot on with his anlysis IMHO. The only difference between John Major's position was he didnt have the size of majority to push things through and Obama at least has a majority democrat house with which to work with.

I also believe that McCain got the running mate the republican party wanted him to have -to conteract his percieved leftwingishnes within the republican party. I heard on the grapevine that his preference for running mate was a guy called Joe Leiberman ( i have to confess i didnt recognise the name at the time.)

I find it hard to point to one single factor as the difinitive one other than 8 yrs under Bush.

I tell you one thing though- it really has boosted respect for America in the global popularity stakes.8-)

Cllr

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: GUEST,MarkS (on the road)
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 05:37 PM

Don't feel sorry for McCain - he did his job perfectly.
He took a dive so Republicans could spend the next 4 years
distancing themselves from Bush.
McCain will continue in the senate, and Palin will continue as governor of Alaska. No changes there.
If Obama does well, thats great.
If Obama bombs, then the Republicans can come in as saviors, but without the Bush baggage.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Rasener
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 05:41 PM

Will Obama be alive in 4 years time?

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Barry Finn
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 06:02 PM

It will be an Obama administration for the next 8 yrs. And if he does well maybe the repubulcan party can completely reinvent itself, finding themselves a home some place off shore, near to where they shipped all the jobs we lost during their reign.

I have no pity or sympathy for MaPain & Palin or the rest of the republican party, they earned every bit of the thrashing they recieved. Hopefully, now we can accomplish something meaningfull & worthwhile.

Barry

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: GUEST,MarkS (on the road)
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 06:13 PM

Will Obama be alive in 4 years time?

With the alternative being Joe Biden, let us avidly pray for Mr. Obamas life and continued good health!

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Bobert
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 06:32 PM

McCain is the luckiest man in the world today!!!

Yep, given his temperment and his persoanlity the presidency, during these difficult times, would have killed him in less than 2 years...

So don't weep for Johnny...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Rasener
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 06:41 PM

I am thinking more down the lines of what happened to JFK, which is still burn't in my memory as if it was today.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 06:44 PM

Why feel sorry for the man? Did he deserve any better? Surely far worse.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 08:01 PM

You're not getting what I'm saying Richard. Maybe he wasn't our end of the political spectrum, but he was a damn sight better than candidates his party have fielded, who won.

He was more adroit and capable in debate. More intellectually 'with it' than Bush 2 or Reagan.

He woud have been better for the world than either of those guys. The Republicans need to sort out their selection procedure, if in the past, they have passed a man like him over for those two turkeys.

Political parties get like that. Look at Labour in the 1980's. Nothing you could say would convince Labour supporters that Kinnock was going to fall before the guns in the marginals.

Then the Tories when they went through Haig, IDS and Howard. It seemed like nobody could convince them they needed someone who could master the 'not weird' idiom. Haig still sounds like a mad scoutmaster; IDS was incapable of constructing an unboring sentence, Howard with a glint in his eye like an excited sheep shagger.

When I think of the name Republican - I think Abraham Lincoln. I hope when they start scouting for leaders, thay start looking for humnan beings with an IQ above room temperature - soon!

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: olddude
Date: 05 Nov 08 - 08:09 PM

Don't feel sorry for McCain at all. He knew what he was getting into like everyone running for office.   I am happy with Obama for sure. Now I hope he delivers and I believe he will. John McCain will always hold my respect even though I did not vote for him nor would ever. He has served our country his whole life and for that I admire him. I may not agree with his politics but I do respect and admire him for his dedication to our country over a lifetime of service. Class act speech also at the end. I respect that

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Cllr
Date: 06 Nov 08 - 03:10 AM

I said at the time Haig was not the man for the job but he has come into his own in the last few yrs and is incredibly capable and a brilliant Orator- arguably the best in the conservative party atm, that aside, the point i think you are making and please feel free to correct me, is that you feel sorry for McCain as he should have been the candidate for the republicans years back as a better choice than certain other administrations.

His closing speech was his finest of the campaign recognising implicitly what a massive event Obama's election is.
Cllr

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 06 Nov 08 - 08:37 AM

What remains unbelievably sad about the conservative party is the shadow cast by Thatch.

It stopped men like Hesseltine and Macregor from making their full contribution.

Mind you could say the same about labour and Hattersley.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Rasener
Date: 06 Nov 08 - 08:46 AM

Hattersley was a hit with Spitting Images :-)

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Amos
Date: 06 Nov 08 - 08:50 AM

LEt's see: John McCain has a comely wife, seven houses, millions of dollars, abeer company, and seems to be able to run his job from all over, at 25% of the time. So now he is not campaigning he can take some time off, go sailing or fishing, and find out what Cindy looks like naked.

And for all this you feel sorry for him?

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: artbrooks
Date: 06 Nov 08 - 09:17 AM

I'm afraid that I don't feel at all sorry for him. I have/had a great deal of respect for the "old" John McCain, both for his military service and for the reasoned (if essentially conservative) positions that he took on issues like global warming and immigration reform. However, he changed during the campaign into a vicious attack dog - even when his own comments weren't too far off base, he allowed Palin and the other surrogates to say some really terrible things bout Obama. I am not a conspiracy theorist, and I don't subscribe to the concept that he had handlers/puppet masters from the New World Order, the Main Stream Media or some other shadowy organization. He is personally responsible for everything he did or said or that was done or said in his name or on his behalf.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: SINSULL
Date: 06 Nov 08 - 09:18 AM

Apparently, Sarah showed up on election night prepared to make a pre-concession concession speech - VP losers don't get to do that. She was headed off at the pass and not happy about it. She ain't going away.

John McCain could have run a "kinder" campaign and I bet he wishes he did. The petty nastiness has taken away from his National Hero image and for that I feel sorry for him. Had he chosen a different running mate I might have vorted for him...but it's all water under the bridge.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Barry Finn
Date: 06 Nov 08 - 12:17 PM

I have no pity or sympathy for MaPain & have little respect for him too. I do respect have some respect for his military service but coming from a high ranking miliarty family it was more an expected career choice & move rather than a call to patriotic duty & I refuse to see his political career as "in service of his country". He is a politican & used his 5 MIA years to advance that. His policies & beliefs have caused grief & pain to untold Americans. His in-fighting about health care has helped to drag out the issue & prevent a good national health policty to become a reality, his stand on immigration & the fencing in of our borders is neither helpful nor addressing the real issues, his plea for "Victory at all costs" is no more than an attempt on his part to correct the mistakes of Viet Nam, his moves to turn the nation around will only make his wealth increase along with those that live his life style & hurts the pooer & middle classes & puts them more in debt to the likes of himself. He has backed & pushed bills as a Senator that follows the republican aggenda since the Reagan era, the republican party at all costs, the gathering of the powers that rule, the pushing of the Patriot Act 1 & 2 is exactly the policies that he prays for which is against the Constitution & agaist the freedoms that where a basis & foundation of this country. So, feel sorry for him? Just the opposite, I feel he needs to retire & do this country a favor.

Barry

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Rasener
Date: 06 Nov 08 - 01:14 PM

Since I last posted on this thread, I see in my newspaper (big splurge on 3 pages), that Obama has top level security including bullet proof glass around him when he is at events. There seems to be a great fear that he may never be inaugurated.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Nov 08 - 01:48 PM

McCain and Palin part ways according to the ABC News folks.

Strains Between McCain and Palin Aides Go Public
Report: Palin's Wardrobe Is to Be Audited by GOP


Now that the defeated team of Sen. John McCain and Gov. Sarah Palin have gone their separate ways, the knives are out and Palin is the one who is getting filleted.

Revelations from anonymous critics from within the McCain-Palin campaign suggest a number of complaints about the Alaskan governor:

-Fox News reports that Palin didn't know Africa was a continent and did not know the member nations of the North American Free Trade Agreement -- the United States, Mexico and Canada -- when she was picked for vice president.

-The New York Times reports that McCain aides were outraged when Palin staffers scheduled her to speak with French President Nicholas Sarkozy, a conversation that turned out to be a radio station prank.

-Newsweek reports that Palin spent far more than the previously reported $150,000 on clothes for herself and her family.

-Several publications say she irked the McCain campaign by asking to make her own concession speech on election night.

The tension is likely to continue or get worse. Lawyers for the Republican National Committee are heading to Alaska to try to account for all the money that was spent on clothing, jewelry and luggage, according to The New York Times.

Perhaps the most dangerous allegation for Palin are reports in The New York Times and Newsweek that when she was urged by McCain adviser Nicole Wallace to buy three suits for the Republican convention and three suits for the campaign trail, she went on the now-infamous shopping spree at swank stores like Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus.

A Republican donor who agreed to foot a majority of the expenses was stunned when he received the bill, Newsweek reported. Both the Times and Newsweek report that the budget for the clothing was expected to be between $20,000 and $25,000. Instead, the amount reported by the Republican National Committee was $150,000.

That wasn't the whole tab, however, according to Newsweek. The magazine claims that Palin leaned on some low-level staffers to put thousands of dollars of additional purchases on their credit cards. The national committee and McCain became aware of the extra expenditures, including clothes for husband Todd Palin, when the staffers sought reimbursement, Newsweek reported.

---

This is just the first page of three that go on with a litany of complaints and problems behind the scenes for the campaign.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: GUEST,Arkie
Date: 06 Nov 08 - 04:53 PM

Bee, the remark about Sarah Palin was not intended as an insult to folk in small towns or Alaska. I grew up in the country 10 miles from the nearest town and have now lived in a town of less than 3000 people for over 30 years. I also live in Arkansas. Many have served overseas in the armed forces. We have had a paved road into this area for almost 60 years. We have had television reception for just over 30 years and now have relatively fast internet connections. I am here because I choose to live in a small town. We have had some mayors who have done very well and others who did some things well and were sometimes downright embarrassing. Our present mayor made the statewide news when he complained about hearing a foreign language in Wal-Mart. I was close friends of one of men who served as mayor. I would not consider sending any of them to Washington. I know a provincial attitude. I would guess that close to 60% of the people in this area have a provincial view on state-wide and world-wide affairs.

My reference was to Palin not every citizen of Alaska and was focused on her attitude and image. She may have been an excellent mayor and may even be a good governor. She may be a generous, caring person, but the image she presented was of someone who knew nothing about a world outside of your state or about urban culture.

In interviews that I watched, her ineptitude in talking about national and global issues was laughable. She ridiculed serious work that was done by Obama indicating she either knew nothing of inner city culture or if she did, it was something she held in contempt. She may be more than what she has appeared to be, and I certainly hope so, but she did nothing to give anyone a favorable impression of the people who either live small towns or in Alaska. If campaign managers created the image that she presented they made a serious mistake. From observations and conversations, I gather that people thought Sarah Palin was refreshing and found her charming in provincial sort of way, but they would not send her to Washington.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 06 Nov 08 - 05:08 PM

Al, when I think "Republican" I think NRA wacko or well greased Gordon Gecko. But apart from all that, McWar did not need to be what he called his wife.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: PoppaGator
Date: 06 Nov 08 - 05:20 PM

"I heard on the grapevine that his preference for running mate was a guy called Joe Leiberman ( i have to confess i didnt recognise the name at the time.)"

FYI, Joe Liebermann is a Senator from the state of Connecticut who had always been a Democrat, until, when up for re-election, he lost the Democratic primary election in his state to a younger anti-war candidate.

Joe, as a "moderate/centrist": Democrat (i.e., not particularly "progressive" or "leftist"), was one of the very few Democrats to continue to support Bush's war in Iraq after the first year or so. Also, he's Jewish, and his support for and attachment to Israel probably accounts for his enthusiasm for Bush's military policy in the Middle East.

At any rate, after losing the Dem primary, Joe did not bow out of the race in favor of the younger and leftier candidiate who had defeated him in the party primary, but ran in the general election as an Independent, against the Republican and Democratic candidates, and won. So he is now a US Senator unaffiliated with either of the two major parties.

Liebermann and McCain are apparently good friends of long standing, and Joe would have been an appropriate-enough running mate for Republican McCain after having left the Democratic party. However, he is not now and has never been a true right-winger guaranteed to appeal to the Republican "base," (he's pro-choice, for one thing), so the GOP bosses would not allow McCain to select him.

Of course, the very qualities that made Liebermann unaccepetable to the extreme fundigelical right are the very qualities that would have made him a better running-mate for McCain, had he been allowed to run a campaign aimed at the typical moderate/centrist American voter.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Maryrrf
Date: 06 Nov 08 - 05:23 PM

Well he did give a gracious concession speech but I can't feel sorry for him. If he'd won the election he would have smugly continued with the same policies we have suffered under for eight years. There'd have been not a glimmer of hope for doing anything that would help people as far as our health care situation is concerned (having raised a child with an expensive chronic illness, that's alway been an extremely important issue for me and my family), the rich would have continued to gorge themselves on the wealth of this country and protect their own interests at the expense of the middle and working class, and we'd still be trying to bully the rest of the world with our foreign policy. He had the arrogance (or stupidity, I haven't figured out which - maybe both) to choose Sarah Palin as a running mate which I feel was an insult to women and to the American people. I don't think he deserves any sympathy. I'm glad he lost!

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 06 Nov 08 - 05:44 PM

I've got a feeling that it won't be long and he'll be feeling relieved at the outcome. Wouldn't you?

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Charley Noble
Date: 06 Nov 08 - 08:48 PM

I'm not at all sorry for McCain. I'm just disappointed that he didn't run a better campaign, one which did not indulge in character assassination and guilt by association. He deserved to lose, and I'm proud that the majority of voters saw through those attacks and voted for the better man.

However, McCain did deliver a fine concession speech and will have ample opportunity to take a leadership role in passing much needed bipartisan legislation initiated by the Obama Administration.

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 06 Nov 08 - 09:10 PM

I can quite imagine in four years you could have McCain endorsing Obama for a second term. Especially if he's running against Sarah Palin...

I don't think McCain and Sarah Palin are going to be exactly bosom buddies after the last few weeks.   As I have said on another thread, I think we owe a tremendous debt to Sarah Palin for helping Obama win.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: Ron Davies
Date: 06 Nov 08 - 10:00 PM

Amen, Kevin. Sarah: God's gift both to comediennes worldwide, and to Obama.

Subject: RE: BS: I feel sorry for McCain
From: GUEST,Arkie
Date: 06 Nov 08 - 10:43 PM

There was something in the news about Ms Sarah and the campaign managers having words. Yet to be verified.