Elections'08 Thread

[jensaltmann]

I found this online.

[jbhelfrich]

So it looks like Palin might have shoved her knee down her throat after all: feeds.feedburner.com/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/410530895/american-fascist-wes.html

“Republican vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin quoted an unidentified “writer” who extolled the virtues of small-town America: “We grow good people in our small towns, with honesty and sincerity and dignity.” (9/3/08) The unidentified writer was Westbrook Pegler (1894-1969), the ultraconservative newspaper columnist whose widely syndicated columns (at its peak, 200 newspapers and 12 million readers) targeted the New Deal establishment, labor leaders, intellectuals, homosexuals, Jews, and poets.”

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westbrook_Pegler

[Anders]

Is that really going to be a problem for her?

[jbhelfrich]

Tarring by association is unfortunately effective in the US political arena.

From the Wikipedia article:

"In the 1950s and 1960s, as his conservative views became more extreme and his writing increasingly shrill, he earned the tag of "the stuck whistle of journalism." He denounced the civil rights movement, embraced anti-Semitism, and in the early 1960s wrote for the John Birch Society —until he was invited to leave for his extreme views.

His assertion in November 1963 (at the height of the civil rights movement) that it is "clearly the bounden duty of all intelligent Americans to proclaim and practice bigotry"; his embrace of the label racist, "a common but false synonym for Nazi, used by the bigots of New York"; or his habit of calling Jews "geese," because, "they hiss when they talk, gulp down everything before them, and foul everything in their wake," characterized his beliefs in the latter portion of his life."

Emphasis added.

I mean really, what the fuck do you have to do to get the JBS to kick you out?

[paulpogue]

Oct 3, 2008 14:34:21 GMT -8 jbhelfrich said:

Tarring by association is unfortunately effective in the US political arena.

Yeah, but unfortunately it only works on Democrats. Obama once sat in a boardroom with William Ayers? TERRORIST!

But with McCain, the media are falling all over themselves not to say the name "Keating." There are probably no two pre-2001 families in the world that were more buddy/buddy than the Bushes and the Bin Ladens. Palin SPOKE AT THE ALASKA INDEPENDENCE CONVENTION and the mainstream media still acts like anyone who talks about her AIP ties are tinfoil hat wearers.

Hell, forget quoting Begler; Palin's OFFICIAL PHOTO from her time as a city council member shows her READING THE JOHN BIRCH SOCIETY NEWSLETTER and nobody seem to care.

[K-Box]

Oct 3, 2008 7:03:30 GMT -8 jensaltmann said:

I found this online.

Fixed.

And good one, Jens.

[Anders]

I was thinking more along the lines of nobody knowing who the guy wa. It would have been one thing if she quoted Mein Kampf, Das Kapital or the Koran, but some obscure never-made-into-a-TV-show guy? Joe Sixpack won't care.

[K-Box]

And now, the final word on how well Sarah Palin did in the vice presidential debate:



... Yeah, she's done.

Sarah Palin and Tina Fey have now officially entered into the realm of George H.W. Bush and Dana Carvey - more Americans think of these two politicians in terms of the Saturday Night Live cast members who have played them than they do in terms of the actual real-life people themselves.

In short, Tina Fey AS Sarah Palin is now MORE REAL to most people than Sarah Palin HERSELF.

Ask Bush Sr. how well that worked out for him in an election year.

[K-Box]

So, let's say you are the McCain campaign.

You've been relentlessly hammering home the attack ads against Obama for what amounts to 40 years in presidential election campaign news cycles, and your candidate devoted the majority of his first debate performance to saying his opponent "doesn't understand" anything from the economy and foreign policy to the birds and the bees, all while glowering menacingly and refusing to meet his gaze, much like Lex Luthor when faced by Superman (and, for added lulz, it was you, the campaign, who told your candidate not to make eye contact with his opponent, because you've openly admitted to the press that you're afraid that your own candidate might not be able to control his temper otherwise).

And guess what?

Poll after poll has shown that independent and moderate voters are being driven away in droves by the overwhelming, unceasing negativity of both your candidate and his campaign.

So, if you were the McCain campaign, what would you choose to do?

If you said, "Go even MORE negative against Obama, and devote literally 100 percent of our advertising budget to attacking him" ... well, you'd be completely fucktarded, and yet, at the same time, you might very well be psychically connected to the actual McCain campaign, since that's exactly what they've chosen to do.

Forget the question of whether such a move is ethical or not; is there anyone with so much as half a brain who can possibly think that this even qualifies as a practically sound decision?

In fact, we should totally come up with our own anticipatory attack ads, to poison the well even further against McCain's attack ads beforehand, by making voters even more disgusted with McCain's attack ads than they would be otherwise, while at the same time, making our own attack ads so absurdly overblown that McCain's actual attack ads will seem sedate and trifling by comparison.

Some examples, just off the top of my head:

OBAMA: HE RAPES HOUSECATS

OBAMA: HE'S FUCKING YOUR WHITE WIFE, RIGHT NOW

OBAMA: HE DID 9/11

OBAMA: YOU KNOW ALL THOSE SLASHFICS ON THE INTERNET WHERE HE AND BIDEN GET IT ON? TOTALLY TRUE

OBAMA: HE'S KEYSER SOZE

OBAMA: HE CREATED AIDS

OBAMA: HE'S THE REASON ANNE RICE AND LAURELL K. HAMILTON LOST THEIR FUCKING MINDS ON AMAZON.COM

OBAMA: HE CANCELLED YOUR FAVORITE TV SHOW - YOU KNOW, THE ONE THAT WAS REALLY GOOD, AND IT WOULD HAVE CAUGHT ON, IF ONLY IT HAD STAYED ON THE AIR JUST A LITTLE LONGER? YEAH? WELL, IT DIDN'T, AND IT'S ALL HIS FAULT

OBAMA: HE'S THE ONE WHO MAKES POP-UP ADS APPEAR ON YOUR BROWSER

OBAMA: FUCK BEING A SECRET MUSLIM TERRORIST; HE'S SECRETLY WORKING FOR COBRA COMMANDER AND DESTRO. TOP THAT, BITCHES

... Anyone else got any suggestions?

[K-Box]

Obama to preempt McCain assault

Branding his opponent as “erratic in a crisis,” Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) is preempting plans by Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) to portray him as having sinister connections to controversial Chicagoans.

Obama officials call it political jujitsu – turning the attacks back on the attacker.

McCain officials had said early in the weekend that they plan to begin advertising after Tuesday’s debate that will tie Obama to convicted money launderer Tony Rezko and former Weathermen radical William Ayers.

But Obama isn’t waiting to respond. His campaign is going up Monday on national cable stations with a scathing ad saying: “Three quarters of a million jobs lost this year. Our financial system in turmoil. And John McCain? Erratic in a crisis. Out of touch on the economy. No wonder his campaign wants to change the subject.

“Turn the page on the financial crisis by launching dishonorable, dishonest ‘assaults’ against Barack Obama. Struggling families can't turn the page on this economy, and we can't afford another president who is this out of touch.”

Then Obama says: “I'm Barack Obama and I approved this message.”

McCain officials told Politico that the new offensive is likely to focus on Rezko and Ayers. The officials said the campaign will not bring up the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Obama’s former pastor, because McCain has forbade them from using that as a weapon. Without being specific, the officials said outside groups may focus on Wright.

When word of the planned attacks leaked Saturday, Obama officials said within hours that it was an attempt by McCain to distract voters from the economy.

“We think the McCain campaign made a huge error by telling the press that their strategy was to distract from the most important issue facing voters,” a senior Obama official said. “Every attack going forward will be easy to characterize for what it is – an attempt to distract from the Bush-McCain economic record."

McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds hinted at the tough new line Saturday on “Fox & Friends.”

“There are associations that are important to who Barack Obama is as a candidate, who he’d be as president,” Bounds said.

Obama-Biden communications director Dan Pfeiffer said about the new ads: “If John McCain thinks he can ‘turn the page’ on the economic crisis facing American families, he is even more out of touch than we imagined. Now there may be no good answers for John McCain due to his erratic response to the financial crisis, but his desire to avoid discussing the economy is something we will remind voters of everyday for the next month.”

---

Wow. So, it looks like the Obama campaign and I were of like minds when it came to preemptive attack ads, then.

At least one quote from this story bears repeating:

“[...] the McCain campaign made a huge error by telling the press that their strategy was to distract from the most important issue facing voters [...]”

John McCain? Your own thoughts?

“You don’t tell them your plans [...] you don’t say things like that out loud [...]”*

What excellent advice! A pity that your own campaign doesn’t have enough sense to follow it.

*(Okay, yes, so he was talking about Pakistan, but still ...)

[K-Box]

The New York Times - Who You Callin’ a Maverick?

There’s that word again: maverick. In Thursday’s vice-presidential debate, Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska, the Republican candidate, used it to describe herself and her running mate, Senator John McCain, no fewer than six times, at one point calling him “the consummate maverick.”

But to those who know the history of the word, applying it to Mr. McCain is a bit of a stretch — and to one Texas family in particular it is even a bit offensive.

“I’m just enraged that McCain calls himself a maverick,” said Terrellita Maverick, 82, a San Antonio native who proudly carries the name of a family that has been known for its progressive politics since the 1600s, when an early ancestor in Boston got into trouble with the law over his agitation for the rights of indentured servants.

In the 1800s, Samuel Augustus Maverick went to Texas and became known for not branding his cattle. He was more interested in keeping track of the land he owned than the livestock on it, Ms. Maverick said; unbranded cattle, then, were called “Maverick’s.” The name came to mean anyone who didn’t bear another’s brand.

Sam Maverick’s grandson, Fontaine Maury Maverick, was a two-term congressman and a mayor of San Antonio who lost his mayoral re-election bid when conservatives labeled him a Communist. He served in the Roosevelt administration on the Smaller War Plants Corporation and is best known for another coinage. He came up with the term “gobbledygook” in frustration at the convoluted language of bureaucrats.

This Maverick’s son, Maury Jr., was a firebrand civil libertarian and lawyer who defended draft resisters, atheists and others scorned by society. He served in the Texas Legislature during the McCarthy era and wrote fiery columns for The San Antonio Express-News. His final column, published on Feb. 2, 2003, just after he died at 82, was an attack on the coming war in Iraq.

Terrellita Maverick, sister of Maury Jr., is a member emeritus of the board of the San Antonio chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas.

Considering the family’s long history of association with liberalism and progressive ideals, it should come as no surprise that Ms. Maverick insists that John McCain, who has voted so often with his party, “is in no way a maverick, in uppercase or lowercase.”

“It’s just incredible — the nerve! — to suggest that he’s not part of that Republican herd. Every time we hear it, all my children and I and all my family shrink a little and say, ‘Oh, my God, he said it again.’”

“He’s a Republican,” she said. “He’s branded.”

---

Don't feel bad, John. Even if you're not a "Maverick," you'll always be ...



AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! IT NEVER STOPS BEING FUNNY!!!

[jessebaker]

Oct 4, 2008 22:15:50 GMT -8 K-Box said:

... Anyone else got any suggestions?

Obama framed Leslie Bacon! Obama called the heroin hot line on Abbie Hoffman! Obama bought the gun that Bremer used to shoot Wallace! Obama had an affair with Juan Corona! Obama blew Richard Speck!

[paulpogue]

OBAMA: ONE MORE DAY WAS ALL HIS IDEA

[jarddavis]

Jard's Belated Palin Debate Evaluation:

If I was the guy running the GOP, I'd be saying one thing right now. Forget 2008, we'e already lost. Get Palin ready for 2012.

Forget the SNL skits, folks.

This woman's Dangerous.

Not only did it not help that for the first 45 minutes, Joe Biden and his Eyebrows from Hell made him look like Simon Bar Sinister, but Sarah Palin spent the first 45 minutes of the debate being a.) likeable, b.) charismatic and c.) not negative. I.E. she debated, and didn't go for, you know, attacks, except for when she, did, and you know, she's smiling, so obviusly it must be kind of a joke or something.

She was polite. So was Joe, but she came off as more expressive and warmer.

It didn't matter that she had no clue what she was talking about.

People responded. At least for the first 45 minutes, until the subject turned to the war. At which point, the audience deferred to the more experienced, and note carefully here, male, opponant.

If you watched CNN's coverage, they had a group of independants, Republicans and Dems rating everything the two candidates said.

The first 45 minutes, she spoke, and it didn't matter what she said, she regularly scored higher numbers than Biden... most notably of course, with Men.

SNL can make all the fun of her it wants right now. It'll dry up eventually, and assuming she's re-elected as Alaskan Governor, she's in a prime position to reap all the rewqards of a GOP education.

[K-Box]

The past week in politics, summed up in Internet memes:

Palin's appeal to conservative commentators in the VP debate:



McCain and Palin's difference of opinion on campaign tactics ... or is that strategy?



And the meme that will define McCain's second debate performance:



For those who don't get that last one, let's just go to the video and HOLY SHIT DUDE:


... Because apparently, "BOY" is still not considered socially acceptable enough.