U.S. Elections 2008: General Elections -- Analysis and Commentary

[Sasaki Kojiro]

Interesting article about McCain's health care plan:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/16/op...erbert.html?em

Talk about a shock to the system. Has anyone bothered to notice the radical changes that John McCain and Sarah Palin are planning for the nation’s health insurance system?

These are changes that will set in motion nothing less than the dismantling of the employer-based coverage that protects most American families.

A study coming out Tuesday from scholars at Columbia, Harvard, Purdue and Michigan projects that 20 million Americans who have employment-based health insurance would lose it under the McCain plan.

There is nothing secret about Senator McCain’s far-reaching proposals, but they haven’t gotten much attention because the chatter in this campaign has mostly been about nonsense — lipstick, celebrities and “Drill, baby, drill!”

For starters, the McCain health plan would treat employer-paid health benefits as income that employees would have to pay taxes on.

“It means your employer is going to have to make an estimate on how much the employer is paying for health insurance on your behalf, and you are going to have to pay taxes on that money,” said Sherry Glied, an economist who chairs the Department of Health Policy and Management at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health.

Ms. Glied is one of the four scholars who have just completed an independent joint study of the plan. Their findings are being published on the Web site of the policy journal, Health Affairs.

According to the study: “The McCain plan will force millions of Americans into the weakest segment of the private insurance system — the nongroup market — where cost-sharing is high, covered services are limited and people will lose access to benefits they have now.”

The net effect of the plan, the study said, “almost certainly will be to increase family costs for medical care.”

Under the McCain plan (now the McCain-Palin plan) employees who continue to receive employer-paid health benefits would look at their pay stubs each week or each month and find that additional money had been withheld to cover the taxes on the value of their benefits.

While there might be less money in the paycheck, that would not be anything to worry about, according to Senator McCain. That’s because the government would be offering all taxpayers a refundable tax credit — $2,500 for a single worker and $5,000 per family — to be used “to help pay for your health care.”

You may think this is a good move or a bad one — but it’s a monumental change in the way health coverage would be provided to scores of millions of Americans. Why not more attention?

The whole idea of the McCain plan is to get families out of employer-paid health coverage and into the health insurance marketplace, where naked competition is supposed to take care of all ills. (We’re seeing in the Bear Stearns, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch fiascos just how well the unfettered marketplace has been working.)

Taxing employer-paid health benefits is the first step in this transition, the equivalent of injecting poison into the system. It’s the beginning of the end.

When younger, healthier workers start seeing additional taxes taken out of their paychecks, some (perhaps many) will opt out of the employer-based plans — either to buy cheaper insurance on their own or to go without coverage.

That will leave employers with a pool of older, less healthy workers to cover. That coverage will necessarily be more expensive, which will encourage more and more employers to give up on the idea of providing coverage at all.

The upshot is that many more Americans — millions more — will find themselves on their own in the bewildering and often treacherous health insurance marketplace. As Senator McCain has said: “I believe the key to real reform is to restore control over our health care system to the patients themselves.”

Yet another radical element of McCain’s plan is his proposal to undermine state health insurance regulations by allowing consumers to buy insurance from sellers anywhere in the country. So a requirement in one state that insurers cover, for example, vaccinations, or annual physicals, or breast examinations, would essentially be meaningless.

In a refrain we’ve heard many times in recent years, Mr. McCain said he is committed to ridding the market of these “needless and costly” insurance regulations.

This entire McCain health insurance transformation is right out of the right-wing Republicans’ ideological playbook: fewer regulations; let the market decide; and send unsophisticated consumers into the crucible alone.

You would think that with some of the most venerable houses on Wall Street crumbling like sand castles right before our eyes, we’d be a little wary about spreading this toxic formula even further into the health care system.

But we’re not even paying much attention.

[ICantSpellDawg]

Obama is bringing his teleprompter with him on the campaign trail.

Woka woka

[Crazed Rabbit]

Returning to the discussion, and taking into account that most of our Republican leaning friends couldn't care less about the opinions of the rest of the world, this piece in Haaretz explains my fears about Governor Palin very well.

It's not the inexperience - I've addressed that before - but the certainty.

The WHOLE article you linked is based on the fact that it was Charlie Gibson, the interviewer, who did not what he was talking about.

Here's an article about how the man who coined the term is saying Charlie Gibson got it wrong.

It Was Gibson’s Gaffe
Which made the smug condescension all the more precious.
There is no single meaning of the Bush doctrine. In fact, there have been four distinct meanings, each one succeeding another over the eight years of this administration — and the one Charlie Gibson cited is not the one in common usage today.

He asked Palin, “Do you agree with the Bush doctrine?”

She responded, quite sensibly to a question that is ambiguous, “In what respect, Charlie?”

Sensing his “gotcha” moment, Gibson refused to tell her. After making her fish for the answer, he grudgingly explained to the moose-hunting rube that the Bush doctrine “is that we have the right of anticipatory self-defense.”

Wrong.

I know something about the subject because, as the Wikipedia entry on the Bush doctrine notes, I was the first to use the term. In the cover essay of the June 4, 2001, issue of The Weekly Standard titled, “The Bush Doctrine: ABM, Kyoto, and the New American Unilateralism,” I suggested that the Bush administration policies of unilaterally withdrawing from the ABM treaty and rejecting the Kyoto protocol, together with others, amounted to a radical change in foreign policy that should be called the Bush doctrine.
...
Until Iraq. A year later, when the Iraq War was looming, Bush offered his major justification by enunciating a doctrine of pre-emptive war. This is the one Charlie Gibson thinks is the Bush doctrine.

It’s not. It’s the third in a series and was superseded by the fourth and current definition of the Bush doctrine, the most sweeping formulation of Bush foreign policy and the one that most distinctively defines it: the idea that the fundamental mission of American foreign policy is to spread democracy throughout the world. It was most dramatically enunciated in Bush’s second inaugural address: “The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other lands. The best hope for peace in our world is the expansion of freedom in all the world.”

As for the rest - is she supposed to say she isn't ready? Good grief.

I am reminded of the interview where Obama is asked if he ever has doubts and he quickly answers "Never." But no media howling about that. And ratings boost or not, the media was offended and has been taking it out on Palin.

Lemur, too, seems to have formed his view based on the lies and distortions the media has been swirling around.

Anyway, remember that McCain Ad about Obama wanting to teach sex-ed to kindergartners?

Turns out McCain is right, and Obama is wrong. The bill is not, as Obama claimed, just about teaching inappropriate touching to kindergartners.

8 (a) No pupil shall be required to take or participate in
9 any class or course in comprehensive sex education if the
10 pupil's parent or guardian submits written objection
11 thereto, and refusal to take or participate in such course or
12 program shall not be reason for suspension or expulsion of
13 such pupil. Each class or course in comprehensive sex
14 education offered in any of grades K through 12 shall
15 include instruction on the prevention of sexually transmitted
16 infections, including the prevention, transmission and spread
17 of HIV. Nothing in this Section prohibits instruction in
18 sanitation, hygiene or traditional courses in biology.

http://www.ilga.gov/legislation/full...cSess=&Session

The bill changed the earliest grade for teaching sex-ed from sixth to kindergarten.

CR

[Tribesman]

The bill changed the earliest grade for teaching sex-ed from sixth to kindergarten.

But left it entirely up to the people that set the curriculum to determine which sort of instuction is suitable and appropriate for each age group from K to 12 .
So that means the McCain ad was wrong as it was misleading , just as your selected quote from the legislation is misleading .
Unless of course you want to try and claim that the education authorities are going to determine that it is suitable and appropriate to teach the kinders the same lesson as the 12s .

[Sasaki Kojiro]

The WHOLE article you linked is based on the fact that it was Charlie Gibson, the interviewer, who did not what he was talking about.

Here's an article about how the man who coined the term is saying Charlie Gibson got it wrong.

Krauthammer

Doesn't matter who wrote it though. Banquo's article was based on the fact that palin didn't know what the bush doctrine was, and IN THE ARTICLE YOU JUST POSTED it says:

Yes, Palin didn’t know what it is. But neither does Gibson. And at least she didn’t pretend to know — while he looked down his nose and over his glasses with weary disdain, “sounding like an impatient teacher,” as the Times noted. In doing so, he captured perfectly the establishment snobbery and intellectual condescension that has characterized the chattering classes’ reaction to the phenom who presumes to play on their stage.

Now, the bush doctrine does have a standard definition (and it's not "spreading freedom and democracy throughout the world" regardless of what krauthammer says ). Palin should have known that. If you still aren't convinced he's a hack look at the next sentence: "at least she didn't pretend to know". She did pretend to know. Anyone who watched the interview could see that.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

John McCain claims he invented the blackberry!

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/the...lackberry.html

[Crazed Rabbit]

Um, a silly staffer made the remarks and was promptly thrown under the bus.

CR

[Lemur]

Lemur, too, seems to have formed his view based on the lies and distortions the media has been swirling around.

Hey, I'm not the one out on the trail forcing her to create disprovable, unnecessary lies. That's entirely her problem.

At a fundraiser in Canton, Ohio, this evening, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin had an interesting description of her speech to the Republican convention.

“There Ohio was right out in front, right in front of me," Palin said. "The teleprompter got messed up, I couldn’t follow it, and I just decided I’d just talk to the people in front of me. It was Ohio.” [...]

"The teleprompter did not break," wrote Politico's Jonathan Martin. "Sarah Palin delivered a powerful speech last night, but she did not 'wing it'..."

Says Martin, "Perhaps there were moments where it scrolled slightly past her exact point in the speech. But I was sitting in the press section next to the stage, within easy eyeshot of the teleprompter. I frequently looked up at the machine, and there was no serious malfunction. A top convention planner confirms this morning that there were no major problems."

Why lie about such a stupid thing, so easily checked and so easily revealed? Who knows?

-edit-

More independent reports of push-polls. Sounds rather like Tucker Eskew's handiwork, no?

But soon enough I understood why they were asking about Carter. After going over some more issues and confirming the fact that I was likely to vote for Obama, the caller made a series of rather pointed inquiries. Would it affect my vote, he said, if I knew that

• Obama has had a decade long relationship with pro-Palestinian leaders in Chicago
• the leader of Hamas, Ahmed Yousef, expressed support for Obama and his hope for Obama's victory
• the church Barack Obama has attended is known for its anti-Israel and anti-American remarks
• Jimmy Carter's anti-Israel national security advisor is one of Barack Obama's foreign policy advisors
• Barack Obama was the member of a board (sic) that funded a pro-Palestinian chartiable organization
• Barack Obama called for holding a summit of Muslim nations exlcuding Israel if elected president

My notes are pretty close to verbatim. (I started typing as soon as I realized I was getting polled.) When the caller was finished, I got a supervisor on the phone and asked if he would tell me who was sponsoring the survey. He said he couldn't reveal that information.

Also being reported by Politico. What was it you were saying about how I got hysterical over one little blog post? Seems to be getting corroborated all over the place, doesn't it? Maybe because it's actually happening?

So far we have reports of this push-poll in Florida, Michigan, New Jersey and Philly.

Oh, and now's the part where you stop insisting it didn't happen and start declaring how it doesn't matter and all's fair, etc., or better yet defending the push-poll as legitimate.

[Xiahou]

Hey, I'm not the one out on the trail forcing her to create disprovable, unnecessary lies. That's entirely her problem.

At a fundraiser in Canton, Ohio, this evening, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin had an interesting description of her speech to the Republican convention.

“There Ohio was right out in front, right in front of me," Palin said. "The teleprompter got messed up, I couldn’t follow it, and I just decided I’d just talk to the people in front of me. It was Ohio.” [...]

"The teleprompter did not break," wrote Politico's Jonathan Martin. "Sarah Palin delivered a powerful speech last night, but she did not 'wing it'..."

Says Martin, "Perhaps there were moments where it scrolled slightly past her exact point in the speech. But I was sitting in the press section next to the stage, within easy eyeshot of the teleprompter. I frequently looked up at the machine, and there was no serious malfunction. A top convention planner confirms this morning that there were no major problems."

Why lie about such a stupid thing, so easily checked and so easily revealed? Who knows?

The two statements aren't necessarily in conflict. The teleprompter could be messed up but not broken. Palin's now famous lipstick line was said to have been thrown in by her, essentially to stall for time during the teleprompter problems. I've also heard stories about how, before the speech, campaign staffers were scrambling for a paper copy of the speech for Palin because they were aware of teleprompter issues. If it was ahead of, or behind her speech on several occasions, it could well be true that she "couldn't follow it".

Why is that a lie?

[Lemur]

Why is that a lie?

I can always count on you to speak power to truth.

Journos in the convention noted (with great favor) how closely she stuck to the script. How well she delivered it. Her statement at the fundraiser is: "The teleprompter got messed up, I couldn’t follow it, and I just decided I’d just talk to the people in front of me." She claims to be winging it, when in fact she stuck incredibly closely to the prepared script. According to the evil librul media:

Especially those of my colleagues on the convention floor at the time, reading along on the prompter with her, noticing her excellent and disciplined delivery, how she punched words that were underlined and paused where it said "pause," noting that "nuclear" was spelled out for her phonetically.

Do you understand? The journos were reading the speech along with her off her own teleprompter. But who are you going to believe, your lying eyes or the Governor?

Here's another big fat fib. She claimed during the Charlie Gibson interview:

Let me speak specifically about a credential that I do bring to this table, Charlie, and that's with the energy independence that I've been working on for these years as the governor of this state that produces nearly 20 percent of the U.S. domestic supply of energy, that I worked on as chairman of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, overseeing the oil and gas development in our state to produce more for the United States.

Fail.

It's simply untrue that Alaska produces anything close to 20 percent of the U.S. "energy supply," a term that is generally defined as energy consumed. That category includes power produced in the U.S. by nuclear, coal, hydroelectric dams and other means – as well as all the oil imported into the country.

Palin would have been correct to say that Alaska produces just over 14 percent of all the oil produced in the U.S., leaving out imports and leaving out other forms of power. According to the federal government's Energy Information Administration, Alaskan wells produced 263.6 million barrels of oil in 2007, or 14.3 percent of the total U.S. production of 1.8 billion barrels.

But Alaskan production accounts for only 4.8 percent of all the crude oil and petroleum products supplied to the U.S. in 2007, counting both domestic production and imports from other nations. According to EIA, the total supply was just over 5.5 billion barrels in 2007.

Furthermore, Palin said "energy," not "oil," so she was actually much further off the mark. According to EIA, Alaska actually produced 2,417.1 trillion BTUs [British Thermal Units] of energy in 2005, the last year for which full state numbers are available. That's equal to just 3.5 percent of the country's domestic energy production.

And according to EIA analyst Paul Hess, that would calculate to only "2.4 percent of the 100,368.6 trillion BTUs the U.S. consumes."

Palin didn't make clear whether she was talking about Alaska's share of all the energy produced in the U.S. or all the energy consumed here. Either way, she was wrong.

Wrong, easily checked and easily disproved. Sensing a pattern?

Another big fat whopper:

When Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska took center stage at the Republican convention last week, she sought to burnish her executive credentials by telling how she had engineered the deal that jump-started a long-delayed gas pipeline project. [...]

“And when that deal was struck, we began a nearly $40 billion natural gas pipeline to help lead America to energy independence,” said Ms. Palin, the Republican vice-presidential nominee. [...]

The pipeline exists only on paper. The first section has yet to be laid, federal approvals are years away and the pipeline will not be completed for at least a decade. In fact, although it is the centerpiece of Ms. Palin’s relatively brief record as governor, the pipeline might never be built, and under a worst-case scenario, the state could lose up to $500 million it committed to defray regulatory and other costs.

Contributing to the project’s uncertainty is Ms. Palin’s antagonistic relationship with the major oil companies that control Alaska’s untapped gas reserves.

[Crazed Rabbit]

The pipeline exists only on paper. The first section has yet to be laid, federal approvals are years away and the pipeline will not be completed for at least a decade.

Engineering projects don't start when the first equipment is installed, but long before that. That's not a lie; it could be said in a sense that the pipeline did start then, when the deal was made.

The partisanship of the NYT is evident when they bash her for not working closely enough with Big Oil.

Looks to me like another gray area. The Alaska energy 'fib' seems to have the most substance.

CR

[ICantSpellDawg]

CNN's Crowley: Obama team wanted "Horrific" economic headlines

Democrats, CEO failures and gas station gougers should start a crisis profiteering club. They could call it "Scumbags Anonymous"

[Seamus Fermanagh]

So now we "know" that:

Palin spins her presentation of some subjects to make herself look good and tries to come off as being "spontaneous" when she's no more spontaneous than most. She seems confident even when some have their doubts about her readiness, which must mean she's prone to snap judgements and therefore not ready.

Biden has a long record in the Senate, a solidly democrat voting record without being slavishly party line on all things. He's been a key player on all of the big FoPo and Intelligence committees, so he must be ready for foreign affairs. He's also totally devoid of verbal truth and has -- since his failure to quote properly foible of many years past -- developed much skill in the area of saying nothing absolute while sounding as though he's saying what his audience wants to hear. So we should dismiss him as an "empty suit" better suited to running Foggy Bottom than to making the call himself.

McCain is too old for the modern world. Yes, he's got experience and his suffering/stance/senate work all suggest he'll be able to handle the FoPo responsibilities of the presidency pretty quickly. But, he's got a temper and hasn't come to the correct answer that diplomacy and not military power is where its at. He's also too old. Self-admittedly under-prepared on economics, he's not ready to lead a nation that feels very uncertain about the economic future. Nice SecDef, but only if he can have time for naps.

Obama, of course, isn't old. He's been actively preparing to run for President since his mid-20s and is easily the most glib. Much or his charm and part of his problem is the lack of substance. When he's platitudinalizing, he's easily the greatest of them all. When he talks specifics about what he'll do in office, he sounds like a generic democrat push-poll. Too much smoke and mirrors with this fellow.


Doesn't sound like a good description of "your" candidate? It shouldn't. This is how they'll look to most "uncommitted" (read: I ignore all such things until about Oct 15) folks around late October. The politically aware and interest will vote as they've decided to vote already (many such decisions made LONG ago). The other 40% of the country will hate all the choices but a majority will pull the lever for Obama because at least he's different and then no one can hint that they're being racist.

Now, which ignorant voters in which state will decide this for true.

[Tribesman]

Engineering projects don't start when the first equipment is installed, but long before that.

Correct , it is normal for projects to usually have years of proper planning and assesment before they actually start , it is considered neccesary especially on something involving a potential hazchem risk like oil and gas .
Perhaps Rabbit you had better tell Rabbit about that as I don't think he understands it at all .

John McCain claims he invented the blackberry!

No he didn't he claimed he helped invent Wi-Fi .... and got a nice big cheque for it just before the company went belly up .

[CountArach]

Now the question is this:

Does McCain inventing the Blackberry trump Gore's inventing the Internet?

[drone]

Now the question is this:

Does McCain inventing the Blackberry trump Gore's inventing the Internet?

Can you get pr0n on a Blackberry?

[KarlXII]

Can you get pr0n on a Blackberry?

McCain '08: Pr0n for the Blackberry!

[CrossLOPER]

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

I just think its funny

I posted that, then took it down. Oh well.

[Xiahou]

I can always count on you to speak power to truth.

And I can always count on you to respond to arguments with personal attacks.

I too was sitting in the press section, (behind Palin and off to her right side). I had a clear view of the TelePrompTer, and read along with her.

At one point I noticed, and remarked to a colleague, that it would jog a line or two ahead of where she had paused. I noticed that she seemed to use the pause afforded by applause to glance down at the papers in front of her. Having found the missing line or two (it was not more than that), she would resume.

Certainly she managed the hiccups smoothly, but this is not an example of winging it in the same vein as a Truman, Kennedy, Nixon, or Clinton might have.

link
You claim she is blatantly lying about the teleprompter. I have seen no statements of hers that show such. According to the above source, there were some problems with the teleprompter and she did have to refer to a paper copy- like I said. But go on calling me dishonest if it makes u happy.

Engineering projects don't start when the first equipment is installed, but long before that. That's not a lie; it could be said in a sense that the pipeline did start then, when the deal was made.

The partisanship of the NYT is evident when they bash her for not working closely enough with Big Oil.

I thought that part was pretty funny- the NYT suggesting a politician should acquiesce to the oil companies.

Really, I think there's little support for calling the pipeline claim a lie. Of course, there's still work to be done on it- but work on the pipeline has certainly begun. Saying otherwise would be like claiming that Intel doesn't actually start working on a new chip until they're actually producing the silicon wafers.

Looks to me like another gray area. The Alaska energy 'fib' seems to have the most substance.

Unlike FactCheck, I think it's obvious that she was talking about "domestic" energy- she said as much in the quote. However, they go on to point out that, "domestic" aside, her statement was still factually wrong. Had she been talking specifically about domestic oil production, she would've still been exaggerating, but at least she would've been in the ball park. Did she misspeak? Did she not know the facts? Or was she shamelessly lying as Lemur believes? We don't know- but I think she should be further pressed on the issue.

[Strike For The South]

Accusation:Obama may have attempted to stall current troop withdrawals until after the elections were over.

Retort:
Campaign strongly contests

Sounds like an archetypal political move to me. What a jerk.

And Palin charges for rape kits

[ICantSpellDawg]

You are obsessed with Sarah Palin. We can keep coming up with things about the presidential candidate that you support while you counter with things about someone other than our presidential candidate. It is a joke - figure out who you are up against, not who you should be up against. Obama belongs in the VP contest and you know it, then maybe your line of attack would be reasonable.

[Strike For The South]

You are obsessed with Sarah Palin. We can keep coming up with things about the presidential candidate that you support while you counter with things about someone other than our presidential candidate. It is a joke - figure out who you are up against, not who you should be up against. Obama belongs in the VP contest and you know it, then maybe your line of attack would be reasonable.

I've been obsessed with everyone at some-point.

[ICantSpellDawg]

I've been obsessed with everyone at some-point.

I'm sorry - I thought CountArch posted that. What the?

[Sasaki Kojiro]

You are obsessed with Sarah Palin. We can keep coming up with things about the presidential candidate that you support while you counter with things about someone other than our presidential candidate. It is a joke - figure out who you are up against, not who you should be up against. Obama belongs in the VP contest and you know it, then maybe your line of attack would be reasonable.

Be real TuffStuff, I posted an article on McCain's health care plan and it was ignored.

[ICantSpellDawg]

Be real TuffStuff, I posted an article on McCain's health care plan and it was ignored.

Good Sasaki. Keep it up.

[Crazed Rabbit]

For anyone wondering:
Palin hasn't pushed Creationism:
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5g...zwOqAD92V3VQG0

Palin said during her 2006 gubernatorial campaign that if she were elected, she would not push the state Board of Education to add creation-based alternatives to the state's required curriculum, or look for creationism advocates when she appointed board members.

...

Palin's children attend public schools and Palin has made no push to have creationism taught in them.

Neither have Palin's socially conservative personal views on issues like abortion and gay marriage been translated into policies during her 20 months as Alaska's chief executive. It reflects a hands-off attitude toward mixing government and religion by most Alaskans.

"She has basically ignored social issues, period," said Gregg Erickson, an economist and columnist for the Alaska Budget Report.

CR

[KukriKhan]

So now we "know" that:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Palin spins her presentation of some subjects to make herself look good and tries to come off as being "spontaneous" when she's no more spontaneous than most. She seems confident even when some have their doubts about her readiness, which must mean she's prone to snap judgements and therefore not ready.

Biden has a long record in the Senate, a solidly democrat voting record without being slavishly party line on all things. He's been a key player on all of the big FoPo and Intelligence committees, so he must be ready for foreign affairs. He's also totally devoid of verbal truth and has -- since his failure to quote properly foible of many years past -- developed much skill in the area of saying nothing absolute while sounding as though he's saying what his audience wants to hear. So we should dismiss him as an "empty suit" better suited to running Foggy Bottom than to making the call himself.

McCain is too old for the modern world. Yes, he's got experience and his suffering/stance/senate work all suggest he'll be able to handle the FoPo responsibilities of the presidency pretty quickly. But, he's got a temper and hasn't come to the correct answer that diplomacy and not military power is where its at. He's also too old. Self-admittedly under-prepared on economics, he's not ready to lead a nation that feels very uncertain about the economic future. Nice SecDef, but only if he can have time for naps.

Obama, of course, isn't old. He's been actively preparing to run for President since his mid-20s and is easily the most glib. Much or his charm and part of his problem is the lack of substance. When he's platitudinalizing, he's easily the greatest of them all. When he talks specifics about what he'll do in office, he sounds like a generic democrat push-poll. Too much smoke and mirrors with this fellow.


Doesn't sound like a good description of "your" candidate? It shouldn't. This is how they'll look to most "uncommitted" (read: I ignore all such things until about Oct 15) folks around late October. The politically aware and interest will vote as they've decided to vote already (many such decisions made LONG ago). The other 40% of the country will hate all the choices but a majority will pull the lever for Obama because at least he's different and then no one can hint that they're being racist.

Now, which ignorant voters in which state will decide this for true.

Excellent analysis.

The problem with Palin is that she's ignorant and has a low regard for ethics.

The problem with american politics is that the people have been bludgeoned by incessant attack ads into an apathetic "politicians are all crooks" stance where they either don't vote or vote off some arbitrary issue or personality trait. The psychological investment required to pay close attention to politics is too high.

My friend, I wasn't arguing with either you or Banquo's Ghost about Palin. I have no opinion on her as a CinC/POTUS - yet. Media and opposing campaign investigations will turn up whatever dirt there might be, and the debates will probably solidify my opinion (how does she handle bullying? what does she do with a 'curve ball'? Cry? Curl her lips and get down and dirty? Or think a moment, then paint the big picture, and show how america fits into it?).

I was arguing that Bradley Bursten's Ha'aretz op-ed misrepresents Gov Palin's intentions and motivations (he knows even less about her than I do, which isn't much), and also fundamentally misunderstands america's approach to leadership picking. And that that misrepresentation and misunderstanding is fed by, originates from, and is encouraged by radio, television and print media. And that that fundamental misunderstanding of america's group-think tendancies are, in fact, not a weakness, but a strength - a strength that has allowed the freedom of the press and speech that he enjoys in his beleagured country today.

I expected more from the free press of our 51st state.

If, god forbid, POTUS Mac has a heart attack January 27th, or POTUS Obama gets shot by a Klansman on the 28th, what Joe or Sara will do when Putin invades Ukraine on the 29th matters. I want insight into that. I don't give a flying fig what barnyard animal is graced with lipstick, or who's pastor convorted (thanks, DDave) with which radical 70's bomber, who's married to which corporate mogul, who's sister is a lesbian welfare queen crack-ho.

I want predictions of what the world is gonna look like March 1st, 2009, through November 2012, and what the aspiring leaders are gonna do. Why is that too much to ask? The sports/entertainment lean of the media not only makes us look bad in the eyes of the rest of the world, it dis-serves us, we the electorate.

[CountArach]

You are obsessed with Sarah Palin. We can keep coming up with things about the presidential candidate that you support while you counter with things about someone other than our presidential candidate. It is a joke - figure out who you are up against, not who you should be up against.

What do you want a response to? Show me something substantial and I'll give you a substantial response. What you have to understand is this - I think Palin is ing insane - and I find it hilarious that such an insane woman could possibly come this far in politics. I don't expect people to respond to stuff I post, I'm just getting the truth out about this woman.

Also I am not 100% behind Obama - he is way too conservative for me and as such I am not going to defend everything he does or says.

Obama belongs in the VP contest and you know it, then maybe your line of attack would be reasonable.

...wah?

I'm sorry - I thought CountArch posted that. What the?

Lolz...

[JR-]

a partisan article about british attitudes to the US election:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/m.../17/do1705.xml

[CountArach]

Obama's new 2 minute ad on the economy