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

[ICantSpellDawg]

TuffStuff: You're out of your mind, and your latest argument bears no relationship to what I have been saying. And if you want to keep on this subject, could you please start a thread on it. If you're going to keep hammering on this, you really owe it to the other posters to take it to its own thread.

I see that it is going off topic, but what do you mean I'm out of my mind?

[Koga No Goshi]

Lemur. If Hawaii was invaded, would you approve of sending aid to help them? Why is that, because there is a treaty that links you? How much did you have in common with the people in Hawaii when that treaty was signed? In fact, when Pearl harbor was attacked, they weren't even a State yet - we just had troops hanging out "asking" the Japanese to attack us.

In fact, Tbilisi isn't that much further away than honolulu from where I'm sitting.

The fact that Hawaii was a sovereign monarchy illegally overthrown by American sugar plantation elites kinda debunks your argument Tuff. The idea that we protected Hawaii out of "our legal obligations" is ridiculous, it was at that time just a conquered colony of the U.S., nothing more noble than that. And Hawaii as a strategic point in the Pacific for the U.S. Navy =/= Georgia.

[Banquo's Ghost]

Gentlemen,

Can we step away from the increasingly personal snipes, please?

Thank you kindly.

[CountArach]

CNN Poll on Debate

Regardless of which candidate you happen to support, who do you think did the best job in the debate -- Barack Obama or John McCain?
Obama 51%
McCain 38%

Next, regardless of which presidential candidate you support, please tell me if you think Barack Obama or John McCain would better handle each of the following issues:
• The war in Iraq: Obama 52%, McCain 47%
• Terrorism: McCain 49%, Obama 45%
• The economy: Obama 58%, McCain 37%
• The current financial crisis: Obama 54%, McCain 36%

Thinking about the following characteristics and qualities, please say whether you think each one better described Barack Obama or John McCain during tonight's debate:
• Was more intelligent: Obama 55%, McCain 30%
• Expressed his views more clearly: Obama 53%, McCain 36%
• Spent more time attacking his opponent: McCain 60%, Obama 23%
• Was more sincere and authentic: Obama 46%, McCain 38%
• Seemed to be the stronger leader: Obama 49%, McCain 43%
• Was more likeable: Obama 61%, McCain 26%
• Was more in touch with the needs and problems of people like you: Obama 62%, McCain 32%

CBS News poll of Uncommited Voters

CBS News and Knowledge Networks conducted a nationally representative poll of approximately 500 uncommitted voters reacting to the debate in the minutes after it happened.

Thirty-nine percent of uncommitted voters who watched the debate tonight thought Barack Obama was the winner. Twenty-four percent thought John McCain won. Thirty-seven percent saw it as a draw.

Forty-six percent of uncommitted voters said their opinion of Obama got better tonight. Thirty-two percent said their opinion of McCain got better.

Sixty-six percent of uncommitted voters think Obama would make the right decisions about the economy. Forty-two percent think McCain would.

Forty-eight percent of these voters think Obama would make the right decisions about Iraq. Fifty-six percent think McCain would.

[ICantSpellDawg]

Here is a good David Brooks article about McCain.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Thinking About McCain
By DAVID BROOKS
link

I’ve been covering John McCain steadily for a decade. A few years ago, I worked on a book, which I foolishly never completed, on the U.S. Senate with McCain as the central character. So when I step back and think of McCain, even in the heat of this campaign, I still think of him first in the real world of governing, not in the show-business world of the election.
I think first of the personal qualities. He was an unfailingly candid man. When other politicians described a meeting, they always ended up the heroes of the story. But McCain would always describe the meeting straight, emphasizing his own failings with more vigor than his accomplishments.
He is, for a politician, a humble man. The most important legacy of his prisoner-of-war days is that he witnessed others behaving more heroically than he did. This experience has given him a basic honesty when appraising himself.
His mood darkened as the Iraq war deteriorated, but his accomplishments mounted. I don’t think any senator had as impressive a few years as McCain did during this span of time.
He lobbied relentlessly for a change of strategy in Iraq, holding off the tide that would have had us accept defeat and leave Iraq to its genocide. He negotiated a complicated immigration bill with Ted Kennedy. He helped organize the Gang of 14 and helped save the Senate from polarized Armageddon over judicial nominations.
He voted against opportunist bills like the pork-laden energy package and the prescription drug plan. He led a crusade against Jack Abramoff and the sleaze-meisters in his own party and exposed corrupt Pentagon contracts.
I could fill this column with his accomplishments during this period, and not even mention the insights. At a defense conference in Munich, I saw him diagnose and confront Russian hegemony. Week after week, I saw him dissent from G.O.P. colleagues as their party lost its way.
Some people who cover the campaign seem to have no knowledge of anything but the campaign, but I can’t get these events — which were real and required the constant application of judgment, honor and courage — out of my head.
Do I wish he was running a different campaign? Yes.
It’s not that he has changed his political personality that bothers me. I’ve come to accept that in this media-circus environment, you simply cannot run for president as a candid, normal person.
Nor is it, primarily, the dishonest ads he is running. My friends in the Obama cheering section get huffy about them, while filtering from their consciousness all the dishonest ads Obama has run — the demagogic DHL ad, the insulting computer ad, the cynical Rush Limbaugh ad, the misleading Social Security ad and so on. If one candidate has sunk lower than the other at this point, I’ve lost track.
No, what disappoints me about the McCain campaign is it has no central argument. I had hoped that he would create a grand narrative explaining how the United States is fundamentally unprepared for the 21st century and how McCain’s worldview is different.
McCain has not made that sort of all-encompassing argument, so his proposals don’t add up to more than the sum of their parts. Without a groundbreaking argument about why he is different, he’s had to rely on tactical gimmicks to stay afloat. He has no frame to organize his response when financial and other crises pop up.
He has no overarching argument in part because of his Senate training and the tendency to take issues on one at a time — in part, because of the foolish decision to run a traditional right-left campaign against Obama and, in part, because McCain has never really resolved the contradiction between the Barry Goldwater and Teddy Roosevelt sides of his worldview. One day he’s a small-government Western conservative; the next he’s a Bull Moose progressive. The two don’t add up — as we’ve seen in his uneven reaction to the financial crisis.
Nonetheless, when people try to tell me that the McCain on the campaign trail is the real McCain and the one who came before was fake, I just say, baloney. I saw him. A half-century of evidence is there.
If McCain is elected, he will retain his instinct for the hard challenge. With that Greatest Generation style of his, he will run the least partisan administration in recent times. He is not a sophisticated conceptual thinker, but he is a good judge of character. He is not an organized administrator, but he has become a practiced legislative craftsman. He is, above all — and this is completely impossible to convey in the midst of a campaign — a serious man prone to serious things.
Amid the stupidity of this season, it seemed worth stepping back to recall the fundamentals — about McCain today and Obama on some other day in the near future.

[Koga No Goshi]

The main problem with McCain isn't, per se, his stance on this or his stance on that. The main problem with McCain is that if we go off what his spoken platform is, then we really have no idea what he will do as President because he has changed direction on everything from deregulation to abortion to making the Bush tax cuts permanent to the importance of Afghanistan, based on whatever was most expedient at the moment in his bid to become President. And if we actually go on his record, ignoring what he says today or tomorrow, then we have to assume 4-8 more years of Bush, guaranteed, since even if he dies, Palin is even more obviously, one-dimensionally a Bush-bot.

[Lemur]

Sounds like a mini-meltdown in the McCain campaign:

Capitol Hill sources are telling me that senior McCain people are more than concerned about Palin.

The campaign has held a mock debate and a mock press conference; both are being described as disastrous." One senior McCain aide was quoted as saying, "What are we going to do?" The McCain people want to move this first debate to some later, undetermined date, possibly never. People on the inside are saying the Alaska Governor is "clueless."

Here's a response to the David Brooks column by a political blogger:

The Blindness Of David Brooks

He's sticking by the McCain he says he knows. He wants to separate the despicable lies and insane ploys that this man has been throwing into the mix in this election season as some kind of aberration. Please. He knows what he is doing: lying and lying and offering the most reckless, cynical gambits I can ever remember in a political campaign. His contempt for his oppponent is as obvious as it is unmerited.

Brooks: "He was an unfailingly candid man." So why the stream of bald-faced lies now? To give one simple example, he said on live television that Sarah Palin never received federal handouts for Alaska as governor. He lied. He has not apologized or retracted that lie.

Brooks: McCain is "a humble man". Is Brooks really saying that a humble man would come back from Vietnam and among his first actions write a massive piece about his heroism in US News and then "write" five memoirs detailing his own heroism? Does a humble man bring up the Hanoi Hilton even when discussing his own many houses today? Real heroes never talk about their war records. McCain has milked and milked and milked his shamelessly for political advantage from the minute he got home. Men of the Greatest Generation wouldn't dream of this disgusting exploitation.

Brooks cites his legislative achevements but omits the fact that this torture victim was critical in putting into American law the first legalization of torture of prisoners by the American government in 2006, a betrayal of ancient principles so deep only a man without any integrity at all could have agreed to it. Someone somewhere is being tortured right now because John McCain made it happen. Standing over the shoulder of the torturer is the presence of McCain, as the pain and terror of the torture victim is milked for false confessions, then used for political purposes. That is integrity?

And Brooks, of course, omits Palin: the worst act of political judgment in my lifetime. She is indefensible. By any standards and by any reasonable person. No candidate with an ounce of concern for his own country would have selected her with such insouciance, cynicism and incompetence.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

Sounds like a mini-meltdown in the McCain campaign:

Capitol Hill sources are telling me that senior McCain people are more than concerned about Palin.

The campaign has held a mock debate and a mock press conference; both are being described as disastrous." One senior McCain aide was quoted as saying, "What are we going to do?" The McCain people want to move this first debate to some later, undetermined date, possibly never. People on the inside are saying the Alaska Governor is "clueless."

I wonder what the obama campaign has to say:

“We’ve looked at tapes of Gov. Palin’s debates, and she’s a terrific debater,” Plouffe told reporters on a conference call. “She has performed very, very well. She’s obviously a skilled speaker. We expect she’ll give a great performance next Thursday. “

...

“She’s obviously prepping this weekend in Pennsylvania,” Plouffe continued. “Anyone who watches any of her previous debates would be impressed by her debating skills.”

[ICantSpellDawg]

The Blindness Of David Brooks

He's sticking by the McCain he says he knows. He wants to separate the despicable lies and insane ploys that this man has been throwing into the mix in this election season as some kind of aberration. Please. He knows what he is doing: lying and lying and offering the most reckless, cynical gambits I can ever remember in a political campaign. His contempt for his oppponent is as obvious as it is unmerited.

Brooks: "He was an unfailingly candid man." So why the stream of bald-faced lies now? To give one simple example, he said on live television that Sarah Palin never received federal handouts for Alaska as governor. He lied. He has not apologized or retracted that lie.

Brooks: McCain is "a humble man". Is Brooks really saying that a humble man would come back from Vietnam and among his first actions write a massive piece about his heroism in US News and then "write" five memoirs detailing his own heroism? Does a humble man bring up the Hanoi Hilton even when discussing his own many houses today? Real heroes never talk about their war records. McCain has milked and milked and milked his shamelessly for political advantage from the minute he got home. Men of the Greatest Generation wouldn't dream of this disgusting exploitation.

Brooks cites his legislative achevements but omits the fact that this torture victim was critical in putting into American law the first legalization of torture of prisoners by the American government in 2006, a betrayal of ancient principles so deep only a man without any integrity at all could have agreed to it. Someone somewhere is being tortured right now because John McCain made it happen. Standing over the shoulder of the torturer is the presence of McCain, as the pain and terror of the torture victim is milked for false confessions, then used for political purposes. That is integrity?

And Brooks, of course, omits Palin: the worst act of political judgment in my lifetime. She is indefensible. By any standards and by any reasonable person. No candidate with an ounce of concern for his own country would have selected her with such insouciance, cynicism and incompetence.

I'm all for retorts but "some blogger"? You must know Andrew Sullivan. I've read a piece or two that was well thought out, but the majority of things that I read from him are from the mind of a psychotically partisan (not political party partisan, the other kind), emotional, homosexual, weirdo.

He is nuts and very well known.

As far as Palin goes I am worried. I am suprised that her replies sound so robotic, nervous and canned. She must know Alaska 100% but blur on National and International issues. I'm afraid that she might be too regional to be the VP. On the one hand I like her very much, on the other I'm afraid to have her as the VP. She sounds like such an amazing pro when talking about Alaska, I figured that she'd sound convincing on the national stage. I've sold electronics, clothing, watches, vitamins, sweetener, books, cd's, computers, movies for separate companies and considered myself an expert in all after a very short period of time; hell, I can build computers, fix mechanical timepieces, deliver presentations at neutraceutical conventions, play in a band, put on a fashion show and get straight A's in college and I'm 25. It shouldn't take too long to become proficient enough to answer the turd questions that these hack anchors lob at you. We will see as of the first debate what to think. If I were the campaign I would put off debates indefinitely, but I don't think that would be right to do to the American people. I'm hoping for anything short of a nervous breakdown for Palin in debate with Biden would be miraculous.

[seireikhaan]

Exactly Tuff.

Just because a person adheres to philosophy which one might consider to be ideal or superior, it doesn't mean that they are someone who can handle something like being VP. There's lots of 'conservatives' out there; heck, I know many personally. This doesn't mean they are political equals, or remotely qualified to aid in running the white house.

[KarlXII]

http://news.aol.com/elections/articl...521x1200577618

Pretty interesting.

[Koga No Goshi]

Exactly Tuff.

Just because a person adheres to philosophy which one might consider to be ideal or superior, it doesn't mean that they are someone who can handle something like being VP. There's lots of 'conservatives' out there; heck, I know many personally. This doesn't mean they are political equals, or remotely qualified to aid in running the white house.

This is another instance where the practice of keeping tight rank in the GOP has backfired. In this case we see, yet again (and this should not be an eye-opener to anyone who wasn't unconscious throughout 8 years of Bush) loyalty to lockstep and ideology being elevated over qualification, intelligence or ability. She was helped into her governorship and then picked for this VP slot because she had the "right" views on all the "right" issues for the GOP and its voting base. (Those issues primarily being pro-oil/corporation, deregulation and hardcore anti-choice.) Not because she was the smartest, best qualified or most knowledgeable potential pick.

I feel bad for the Republicans at this point, but I also think that winding up with "this being the best they can run" is also in strong part a bed they themselves have made. And I also think (and I've been saying this in not so many words for awhile now) that Republican voters need to do soul searching in terms of the sort of "litmus" they have in their heads of what a GOP candidate must meet, and making everything else expendable so long as that litmus is met. In this case I'm talking specifically about the hardliner Bible thumper social agendas and pro-rich on taxes/regulations issues. You wind up with a lot of well connected, talking points-following corporate Stepford Wives leading your party to appeal to the religious right and the "base" (rich) with a lot of normal middle class Joes in the middle vehemently defending voting for this strange alliance for reasons which, mostly, have no direct benefit on them whatsoever. (Middle/working class people voting for tax cuts for the rich, which they then use to outsource your job... or believing somehow that if women have abortions, or gay people get married, that is going to directly hurt you in your life more than losing your job, or losing your retirement, or going bankrupt fighting with an insurance company over your medical bills.) And even when it comes to people who actually have some semblance of an intellectual defense for Republican tax platforms it's often again ideology trumping pragmatism in terms of arguing for things like the free market or trickle down, neither of which have proved to be the utopian state they have been touted. I think a lot of it also (and this is pure conjecture) is that a lot of Republican voters have delusions they will be rich themselves one day, or that hard work is directly correlated with income and thus taxing the rich is counterproductive. Which all I can say to that is that I think it suggests an extremely naive worldview, given that you are very hard put to find a Republican Senator or Presidential candidate in our lifetimes who hasn't been rich by virtue of birth and family lineage or big corporate connections for generations.

I kind of meandered off there into my own thoughts. What were we talking about? Yes, Palin. She's totally unqualified but she is ADORED by the religious right because, as I said, she has the "right" views which override all other rational considerations. And it's fairly obvious she was politically picked for exactly that reason, for that bump we saw after the Republican convention. Apparently though McCain (and I've heard multiple, and conflicting stories on how Palin was selected, ranging from McCain did it on impulse, to McCain was against it and wanted someone else) ultimately has to be held responsible as a decisionmaker in this instance. Either he very shortsightedly made a pure political pick to energize the base thinking they could put off or deal with her shortcomings later, or he did pick her on an impulse not knowing how much baggage and how ill-equipped she was. Frankly, neither scenario bodes well for McCain with the most important decision he's made as a potential next President. And both situations go against the "maverick" characterization many benevolently bestow upon McCain, saying that he's the type to just do what he thinks is right in a situation, regardless of whether that means going against his own party or advice or what have you. If he just thought Palin was the right pick and ignored advice he was a fool, and if he didn't think she was the best pick but thought she was the best choice to politically energize the base, then he's not much of a maverick.

I have to say though, again, that I do not think this should be a nervous shock to anyone who has been paying attention. Even how Palin and her husband have snubbed the subpoena in Alaska, issued from a PRIMARILY REPUBLICAN legislature, under the guise that it's "Democratic partisan sabotage." This has been the status quo of the GOP prioritizing loyalty and talking point litmus over intelligence, law, qualification or effectiveness. If Palin is a wake-up call to any of you about that, it's not an issue of "how could they do this?" as much as "how could we have gone along with this for so long?"

[KukriKhan]

So, just guessing here, a Christmas card from McCain-Palin to you, would be wasted postage?

[Koga No Goshi]

So, just guessing here, a Christmas card from McCain-Palin to you, would be wasted postage?

I'd have to have a holy man come out and bless my mailbox.

[Lemur]

A more in-depth examination of the strategy v. tactics thing that I noted in the Debate thread.

The least self-aware moment for John McCain in last night's debate came at the half-way point, when he said, "I'm afraid Senator Obama doesn't understand the difference between a tactic and a strategy." [...]

There has been no greater contrast between the Obama and McCain campaigns than the tactical-vs-strategic difference, with McCain demonstrating the primacy of short-term tactics and Obama sticking to a more coherent long-term strategy. And McCain's dismissive comment suggests that he still does not realize this.

I seem to remember Hillary Clinton copping much the same attitude, right up to the end. And a bit past the end as well.

[Koga No Goshi]

A more in-depth examination of the strategy v. tactics thing that I noted in the Debate thread.

The least self-aware moment for John McCain in last night's debate came at the half-way point, when he said, "I'm afraid Senator Obama doesn't understand the difference between a tactic and a strategy." [...]

There has been no greater contrast between the Obama and McCain campaigns than the tactical-vs-strategic difference, with McCain demonstrating the primacy of short-term tactics and Obama sticking to a more coherent long-term strategy. And McCain's dismissive comment suggests that he still does not realize this.

I seem to remember Hillary Clinton copping much the same attitude, right up to the end. And a bit past the end as well.

You are quite correct, Lemur, and touting The Surge (tm) as the "plan to win in Iraq" shouldn't pass a 3rd grader's smell test. But I also find it interesting how most discussions of how "wildly successful" the surge has been tends to quietly ignore the fact that it wasn't working at all until we started bribing Sunni militias. The moment we stop.......

[GeneralHankerchief]

So, what did everybody think of the Saturday Night Live debate last night? As someone who has a long history with this particular skit (Bush/Gore I was the first SNL skit I'd ever seen and what I credit for getting me interested in politics), I was a bit disappointed. Obama, aside from one series of comments that escapes me (tax cuts for Chicago buddies and another funny bit later on) seemed to play straight man/Alex Trebek to Darrell Hammond's John McCain/Sean Connery.

All in all, pretty funny, but not as memorable as "Lock box" or "It's hard work" (Bush/Gore I and Bush/Kerry I, respectively).

I was glad to see Chris Parnell return as Jim Lehrer though.

[Koga No Goshi]

I spit my drink out, seriously.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fb-i...eature=related

[KukriKhan]

It was easier to watch than the actual event. I particularly liked the proposal "Drop us both into Waziristan, and the first one to find bin Laden wins."

[OverKnight]

There was less to mock in the debate this time; no loud sighs or garbled words. Also Hammond's Gore and Will Farrel's Bush (Strategery!) were much better parodies than Hammond's McCain or Armisen's Obama.

Still Hammond does a good job as usual, he reprised Clinton as well, though his Ah-nuld isn't great.

Somehow I feel that the VP debate will provide more fertile ground for satire.

A sad commentary on SNL's current state is that the three best performers were the host, Farris, and Parnell and Fey, alums whose imitations were spot on.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

"I propose that we suspend our campaigns and have a pie eating contest..."

I laughed at that

[KukriKhan]

So, the next big event is Thursday's VP sweepstakes debate in St. Louis.

Q: In your opinion, has her opposition so derided, mocked, and disparaged Gov. Palin, and therefore lowered expectations of her performance, that all she has to do is suit up, show up, and not drool, to "win" with undecided voters?

-edit-
L.A.Times thinks maybe so.

[Lemur]

Hard to say. When do low expectations cross the line into a fully formed vision of idiocy? And what does it mean when your supporters start quoting Stalin approvingly?

All Governor Palin should insist on, after the desperate editing of her words by Gibson, is that every interview be live. And, if they're all disasters, they'll wind up like Biden's gaffes or Clinton's adulteries. As Stalin remarked in another context, one is a tragedy, a million is a statistic.

[CountArach]

I'm reminded of The West Wing when they are lowering expectations about Leo's debating skills.

Biden will wipe the floor with her - I'm just worried he will look mean for doing it.

[KukriKhan]

I guess that's what I'm getting at: a "win" for Sen Biden could backfire into a net electoral loss.

OTOH, probably not a big enough loss to affect the state-by-state electoral college vote.

[ICantSpellDawg]

http://www.kmov.com/localnews/storie...69e89.html?npc

Truth Squads? Why would he need State prosecutors to do this job? It does reek of intimidation.

Truth squads are fine, but when you have Sheriffs, county prosecutors and others in positions of authority threatening prosecution for "any comments that may be in breach of State ethics laws". That's all well and good, but c'mon - can anyone defend this? What is "misleading"? Obama himself is misleading when he says he is against Gay marriage, but he wants a repeal of the defense of marriage act that would make any marriages performed in any state able to be carried to other states.

Libel and Slander laws are important, but there has to be egregious breaches to qualify. You can't just have people in political power running around prosecuting anyone who they think is misleading others in their political opinions.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

I'm reminded of The West Wing when they are lowering expectations about Leo's debating skills.

Biden will wipe the floor with her - I'm just worried he will look mean for doing it.

I don't think he'll attack her harshly--all he has to do sound intelligent and the contrast will win the debate.

I don't think the expectations game is all that relevant.

[Koga No Goshi]

Let's not forget Biden himself has a tendency to run off and say things that can be badly misinterpreted. Anyone remember his comment about how Obama was "articulate and CLEAN"? I would not put it past him to gaffe, but I think regardless of the performance, the right will have no real problems spinning something to try to damage control the numbers. If he performs perfectly and mops the floor with Palin, it'll be that he's so mean and sexist.

[Strike For The South]

Biden is really the only one I like in this whole cluster. He puts his foot in his mouth, he knows he puts his foot in his mouth, You know he has people telling him to stop putting his foot in his mouth and yet he still does it.....A Texan can admire that kind of stubbornness.

[drone]

In a surprise twist, Palin will come out and completely destroy Biden. Wit, humor, and leet speaking skills, all in one package will leave Biden stuttering and cursing in a career threatening meltdown.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Michael Palin, that is, he would absolutely pwn Biden. I don't think I will be very impressed with Sarah. It may be too late to dump her, the time for setting the names on the ballot may be past.