Digby's Hullabaloo Posts

The Shrill One!

by digby

If you didn’t see Paul Krugman on Olbermann, tune in to the repeat. He compared Bush to Hoover and took McCain downtown for his idiotic comment that “the fundamentals are good.”

Bravo.

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Trusted Sources

by dday

Shankar Vedantam had a significant article in the Washington Post that essentially explains the campaign that John McCain has been running as an indirect way to fire up their own base:

As the presidential campaign heats up, intense efforts are underway to debunk rumors and misinformation. Nearly all these efforts rest on the assumption that good information is the antidote to misinformation.

But a series of new experiments show that misinformation can exercise a ghostly influence on people’s minds after it has been debunked — even among people who recognize it as misinformation. In some cases, correcting misinformation serves to increase the power of bad information […]

Political scientists Brendan Nyhan and Jason Reifler provided two groups of volunteers with the Bush administration’s prewar claims that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. One group was given a refutation — the comprehensive 2004 Duelfer report that concluded that Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction before the United States invaded in 2003. Thirty-four percent of conservatives told only about the Bush administration’s claims thought Iraq had hidden or destroyed its weapons before the U.S. invasion, but 64 percent of conservatives who heard both claim and refutation thought that Iraq really did have the weapons. The refutation, in other words, made the misinformation worse.

A similar “backfire effect” also influenced conservatives told about Bush administration assertions that tax cuts increase federal revenue. One group was offered a refutation by prominent economists that included current and former Bush administration officials. About 35 percent of conservatives told about the Bush claim believed it; 67 percent of those provided with both assertion and refutation believed that tax cuts increase revenue.

In a paper approaching publication, Nyhan, a PhD student at Duke University, and Reifler, at Georgia State University, suggest that Republicans might be especially prone to the backfire effect because conservatives may have more rigid views than liberals: Upon hearing a refutation, conservatives might “argue back” against the refutation in their minds, thereby strengthening their belief in the misinformation. Nyhan and Reifler did not see the same “backfire effect” when liberals were given misinformation and a refutation about the Bush administration’s stance on stem cell research.

The logic here can be explained by the decades-long project by conservatives to delegitimize collective trusted sources – in particular, the “liberal media” – and cultivate their own. When conservatives hear about the Duelfer report, they can easily access a refutation from across the spectrum of wingnuttia, written by Stephen Hayes or Hugh Hewitt or some other wingnut welfare recipient. When they hear that tax cuts don’t increase revenue, they have dozens of bits and pieces of information they can store in their minds to refute the refutation. When they hear an obvious lie in one of John McCain’s ads called out by a fact-checking organization, they can hear Karl Rove tell them that the fact-checkers are biased.

Collective trusted sources aren’t going to be much of a help here among your hard-core wingnuts (among moderates and independents, the type who say “all politicians are full of it and I think for myself,” it probably won’t either). It is not enough to show a chart with verifiable facts about how earnings for everyone but those with professional degrees are dropping in the Bush economy – wingnut supply-siders argue the economy’s doing great, and that chart was probably from some liberal think tank (it was from the Census bureau). It is not enough for someone like Joe Klein to plainly state the facts of John McCain’s health care policy, which amounts to a huge tax increase on the middle class (not enough has been made of this. McCain wants to tax employer-provided benefits as income, and the goal is to get employers to drop their benefits packages, leaving the individual on their own to manage a largely unregulated individual insurance market armed with a tax credit too meager to pay for decent coverage. McCain’s core philosophy about health care is that Americans have TOO MUCH of it, and if they were forced to buy it themselves, they would buy less.) – he’s part of the liberal media. US News and World Report can can chronicle John McCain’s journey from maverick to liar, and so can the National Journal and just about every major media organization. But they are just more liberal house organs.

In fact, it’s not enough for someone like Alan Greenspan to admit, several years too late, that McCain’s plan to “finance tax cuts with borrowed money” is distasteful, or even for McCain’s own economic adviser to admit that tax increases are inevitable for the next President AND that McCain is lying about this because tax cuts for Republicans are “a brand, and you don’t dilute the brand” – there’s a whole industry of economic denialists who will spin and shape and distort to tell you that federal revenues are bigger under Bush, and tax cuts equal increased revenue, and all the other discredited arguments.

Which is why Meghan Kelly’s demolition of Tucker Bounds today on Fox News is arguably more important than the independent analyses or comprehensive takes from sources that ought to be trusted more.

You see that Bounds falls back on “you can’t trust what Obama will say because he voted to raise taxes 94 times,” etc. He’s trying to delegitimize anything that comes out of Obama’s mouth. And for some wingers, that will be enough. But seeing this argument play out on conservative media is far more likely to be impactful to those who have seen traditional sources trashed and conservative sources elevated and made trusted over the years. “Why is John McCain saying Obama will raise taxes on the middle class when he’s not?” is a pretty compelling argument coming from an embedded conservative trusted source, I would imagine. And Bounds had no answer for it.

We all have the power to be trusted sources in our spheres of influence. Instead of passing around links to the New York Times saying something or Time saying another, the only way to persuade in an environment of diminishing trusted sources is to create your own arguments. Cracks in the facade like Meghan Kelly showed today are not going to be plentiful, important as they may be.

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Failed Philosophy

by digby

Barack issued a statement on the meltdown today that I think is quite good. He does, unfortunately, say that he doesn’t blame McCain personally for the meltdown on Wall Street, which I think was an unnecessary disclaimer. (Why do they keep doing that?)

But he goes on to say that the meltdown is a consequence of:

… the economic philosophy he subscribes to. It’s a philosophy we’ve had for the last eight years – one that says we should give more and more to those with the most and hope that prosperity trickles down to everyone else. It’s a philosophy that says even common-sense regulations are unnecessary and unwise, and one that says we should just stick our heads in the sand and ignore economic problems until they spiral into crises.Well now, instead of prosperity trickling down, the pain has trickled up – from the struggles of hardworking Americans on Main Street to the largest firms of Wall Street.This country can’t afford another four years of this failed philosophy. For years, I have consistently called for modernizing the rules of the road to suit a 21st century market – rules that would protect American investors and consumers. And I’ve called for policies that grow our economy and our middle-class together. That is the change I am calling for in this campaign, and that is the change I will bring as President.

As anyone who regularly reads this blog knows, I think one of the tasks of liberal politicians is to expose the bankruptcy of the modern conservative philosophy. If you don’t run against that, you end up running against some guy who, even though he’s been an elected member of that party for nearly thirty years, can claim that he’s a change agent. You have to indict the philophy and the party that adheres to it. (Think about what they did to liberalism…)

These financial failures are a recurring consequence of Republican governance. Their faux laissez faire economic policies (in which the rich get richer from unregulated feeding frenzies until taxpayers are forced to bail out the institutions or risk economic catastrophe) inevitably lead to these crises. It is the single most enduring feature of their philosophy. If John McCain doesn’t believe in that then he wouldn’t be running as a Republican. It’s fundamental.

As McCain often says himself he’s just a foot soldier in the revolution. But he’s fought for thirty years on their side, pretending to be a maverick, when all he’s ever really been is an intemperate jackass. At the end of the day, it’s his tribe and he’s as responsible as any one of them for the mess they’ve created.

As scary as this whole thing is, it’s the first news I’ve heard in a long time that makes me feel confident again hat the Democrats will win this election. No member of the Republican party should be put in charge at a time like this — it would letting the lunatics run the asylum. I don’t think that’s hard for people to figure out (even in the midst of our new number one reality TV hit: Culture War XXI: The Alaska Chronicles.)

BTW: I don’t suppose anyone noticed that gas prices jumped to five bucks a gallon in some places over the week-end.

Update: I wonder if Phil Gramm’s whiney at all today. His employer’s looking a little bit shaky. (h/t to bb)

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Word On The Street

by digby

Kevin Hayden has a neat idea that some of you might want to be involved with. Check it out:

Why do you blog? Or read political blogs? How’s the economy impacted you and your family in the last eight years? What do you think about the presidential tickets? Are there other races you’re concerned about? Know any troops who’ve been to Iraq? What issues really matter a lot? Do you have a message for your elected officials?

Then, if you’re along (or near) my coast-to-coast route, why not let me interview and video you?

Here’s how to make the Word On The Street project happen. Time’s short before the launch, so act today.

We’ve heard the candidates pitch their issues, heard the pundits and the partisans. Isn’t it time that they took time to hear what Americans like you want?

This is your chance. Our chance. There’s no time to hesitate: click on the link above, offer to help, and let’s stop complaining that we never get heard. This year, let’s change that dynamic once and for all.

I have a feeling some of you might have something to say …

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Von Spakovsky 2.0

by digby

Biden mentioned the latest caging gambit in his speech this morning and progressives in Michigan are gearing up for it:

Stop McCain’s Plan to Deny Votes of People Who Have Lost Their Homes

Sign below and tell John McCain and the Republican Party to stop their outrageous plans to prevent Michigan residents who have lost their homes to foreclosures from voting this November!

Republican Party officials have admitted they plan to suppress the vote in November of families that have lost their homes. Plans include party officials who will monitor polls on election day and use foreclosure lists in an attempt to stop voters who have lost their homes from casting their ballots (MI Messenger 9/10/08).

Families who have lost their homes to foreclosure should not be kicked when they are down. Their homes have already been taken away from them because of the disastrous economic policies of the last eight years and the unfair, policies of the Bush administration.

Do not take away their right to vote this November. Having lost their homes, losing their right to vote would be a slap in the face of all Americans.

Here’s the story:

Republican leaders have since disavowed plans to use foreclosure lists as part of their plan to challenge the eligibility of some voters, but an attorney for the party, Eric Doster, did confirm that the party would use returned mail to challenge voters based on residency. As veteran Republican activist Allen Raymond told Michigan Messenger in a recent interview, holding down Democratic turnout is a key part of Republican strategy for victory in November.

Raymond knows about Republican campaign tactics. For almost a decade he managed campaigns for Republicans running for state and national office. In the 2002 New Hampshire elections, he ran a phone-jamming operation aimed at blocking elderly people from arranging rides to the polls, an illegal action that he says was approved by the highest levels of the party. He spent three months in federal prison. Earlier this year Raymond published a book about his life and work as a Republican operative, titled “Confessions of a Republican Operative: How to Rig an Election.”

As for our report that the Michigan GOP planned to use foreclosure lists to block likely Democratic voters, Raymond said: “It’s a very good tactic. It works.”

“It is actually a very smart thing to do,” he went on, “particularly in this climate with so many foreclosures.”

For Republicans, he said, targeting the foreclosures would be a cost-effective and “probably” legal method of reducing Democratic votes.

If he were still in the election business, he said, “I’d be doing that all day long.”

Raymond explained how he would use foreclosure lists.

“You would go into certain geo-political areas and make a selection based on voter history and performance, and then what you would do is look for foreclosures within those geopolitical areas, and you would mail letters, and then those letters would come back and say that that person’s not there any more because their house has been foreclosed on, and they get challenged,” he said.

He explained why it makes sense for Republicans to seek to disqualify people who have lost their homes.

“If you look at who is being foreclosed upon, it is going to be sub-prime [borrowers]. Sub-prime [borrowers] are generally going to be low-income people, and low-income people are generally going to be Democratic voters.”

“You got to remember this is a cost-per-contact business,” he explained. By targeting households in foreclosure, for the price of a letter and first-class postage, Republicans get a high rate of return, because people in foreclosure are very likely to move and to have their mail returned.

Raymond estimated that people might have moved out of as many as a third of homes listed as foreclosed. “That is a huge number,” he said, noting that people enduring the stress of foreclosure are not likely to think to change the address of their voter registration.

Raymond said that, barring some legislative action, Republicans will be free to challenge people who’ve lost their homes at the polls.

“They will get challenged and they will get denied,” he said

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John Fund, who’s recently written a book on “voter fraud” said on Bill Maher that the Republicans would be challenging every provisional ballot, which means if the race is close it could get thrown into the conservative courts. It’s unlikely that would happen, just as it’s unlikely they could cull enough voters from foreclosure lists to swing an election. But a lot of this is just designed to create havoc at the polls on election day and make the process so arduous that busy people with jobs and kids and lives just don’t have the time to wait.

The last presidential election I had to vote by provisional ballot. Even though I’d been on the same voter roll for 15 years, for some reason my name didn’t show up. It happens even by acident. But it took me nearly an hour to vote. After standing in line for 30 minutes, I had to go through many hoops before I could get my ballot. People were very nice, but it was a frustrating experience. I can only imagine what happens in someplace with a high population density and fewer machines — and you’re already late for work.

They’ve built this vote suppression machine since the 1980s. There is absolutely no reason to believe they will not use it — particularly in an election that’s going to be won or lost on turn out among first time voters.

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Sheldon Whitehouse Gets “Senator For Life”

by dday

While John McCain and the Republicans are steadfastly trying to eliminate issues and facts from the election altogether, there is one exception to that rule – offshore drilling. There’s a large enough group of lawmakers working on this that something is likely to come out of Congress in the waning days of the session, and most likely it won’t be that great. From a practical standpoint, Republicans can simply wait out the Congressional moratorium which has to be renewed every year and let it elapse, meaning that they would then be able to deliver leases to oil and gas companies allowing for exploration as close as 3 miles from the shoreline. Democrats are trying to gain a political advantage by showing how bankrupt the “all of the above” energy plan Republicans appear to endorse truly is, by forcing a series of votes where the GOP will cling to its Big Oil buddies, and vote down removing their tax breaks, incentives for solar and wind, etc. And there is some movement by more threatened Republicans to embrace a more comprehensive bill which would incentivize renewables and cut Big Oil subsidies in addition to limited allowances on drilling.

However, I think that this argument made by Rhode Island Senator Sheldon Whitehouse is the one worth repeating a thousand times between now and November.

WHITEHOUSE: Gentlemen, we’re in the middle of a near total mortgage system meltdown in this country. We have a health care system that burns 16 percent of our GDP, in which the Medicare liability alone has been estimated at $34 trillion. We’re burning $10 billion a month in Iraq.

This administration has run up $7.7 trillion in national debt, by our calculation. And there is worsening evidence every day of global warming, with worsening environmental and national security and economic ramifications. In light of those conditions, do any of you seriously contend that drilling for more oil is the number one issue facing the American people today?

(Long silent pause during which nobody answers.)

WHITEHOUSE: No, it doesn’t seem so.

And relatedly, the Republicans who brought you all of these policy failures, in the economy, health care, Iraq, housing, and the environment, are telling you that the answer completely lies in drilling.

Trust them?

The words “snake,” “oil” and “salesmen” come to mind.

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Memories Of Keating

by digby

As we watch yet another Republican financial crisis unfold before our very eyes, everybody needs to employ Mr Google to read up a little bit on the Keating Five scandal. McCain was big, big pals with Charles Keating. He spoke up for Keating with the regulators, buying him more space to defraud his investors — and the taxpayers — even more than he already had. He has not changed his philosophy since then. In fact, his closest economic advisor, Phil Gram, apparently believes that these firms should be completely unregulated and then bailed out by the taxpayers on a regular basis.

John McCain has a long history with bank failures and financial scandals. He created his whole reform persona around the idea that he’d come too close to the flame and gotten burned. But he hasn’t changed his philosophy or his policies one bit. He believes in the same scam his close advisor Phil “you’re all a bunch of whiners” Gramm believes. He pretended for years that the problem was solely in the campaign finance system, burnishing his image with signature legislation that has proven to be completely useless. Meanwhile, he backs deregulation like it comes down from Mt Sinai.

There’s more in this post I wrote a month or so ago. And if you didn’t view it before, you might want to take a look at McCain’s press conference and committee testimony from that period. It’s pretty lethal.

Every two term Republican in the last 80 years who isn’t Ike had some kind of a severe meltdown in the financial system. Coincidence?

Update: Here’s a great article on Keating and McCain from the Boston Globe:

Black … maintains that the Keating case was a textbook example of politicians, McCain among them, serving a major donor. And Dennis DeConcini, a former Democratic senator from Arizona and another of the Keating Five who hosted the key meeting in his office, said in an interview that McCain has gotten a relatively “free ride” even though DeConcini insists that McCain was the “most culpable” of the senators because he had the closest relationship with Keating.

McCain met Keating in 1982, during McCain’s successful run for Congress, and soon began accepting offers from Keating to fly McCain’s family on a corporate plane to Keating’s house in the Bahamas. McCain did not pay for most of the trips until years later, when the matter became public.

Keating, meanwhile, complained regularly to McCain that a proposed regulation would hurt his business. Known as the “direct investment” rule, it limited the amount that savings-and-loan institutions could invest from their assets. In 1985, after having “heard frequently from Charlie on the matter,” McCain decided that Keating’s complaints “were sound enough to warrant our assistance.” He cosponsored a resolution sought by Keating, but it failed to postpone the regulation, McCain wrote in his autobiography.

By then, Keating was one of McCain’s most important benefactors; McCain received $112,000 in campaign donations from Keating and his Lincoln associates, mostly between 1982 and 1986.

In the summer of 1986, while McCain was running for the Senate, the banking executive wrote him letters castigating the regulators. “The [bank board] is a mad dog turned loose in a police state,” Keating wrote in one of them. Weeks later, McCain accepted another trip aboard Keating’s jet to the Bahamas.

“I genuinely liked him and enjoyed being around him, especially on those occasions when Cindy and I and our oldest child, Meghan, were invited to his family’s vacation home in the Bahamas,” McCain wrote in his book. “I was never concerned that the time I spent enjoying Charlie’s company would raise public doubts about my judgment.”

With McCain having failed to postpone the regulation limiting investments by a savings and loan, Keating wanted him and other senators to get the Federal Home Loan Bank Board to grant Lincoln an exemption from the rule. McCain subsequently attended two meetings with regulators.

McCain said he felt he had a responsibility to a constituent whose company had 2,000 employees. Yet McCain had reason to be wary. His closeness to Keating had been an issue in his 1986 campaign, and aides urged him not to go to the meetings.

Four senators, including McCain, met with Edwin Gray, the chairman of the Federal Home Loan Bank Board in Washington that April in 1987. When Gray returned from the meeting, he told Black he was “very upset” that the senators were trying to pressure him, according to Black’s Senate testimony. Gray told Black to attend a follow-up meeting and take notes. Gray could not be reached for comment.

A week later, five senators, including McCain, met with Black and three other regulators at DeConcini’s office.

“I don’t want any part of our conversation to be improper,” McCain said, according to Black’s notes. Then he launched into a complaint about how regulators were conducting an examination of Lincoln’s finances. “It seems to me, from talking to many folks in Arizona, that there’s a problem,” McCain said, according to Black’s notes.

Black later told the Senate Ethics Committee that the actions of the five senators were clearly “improper.”

“This was an institution that is probably the worst institution in America,” Black said, referring to Lincoln. Instead of trying to help “bring it under control, five US Senators were pushing us in the opposite direction.”

Does anyone truly believe, after the ring kissing and genuflecting McCain has had to do to get back in the good graces of the GOP establishment, that he would be a “maverick” on this issue in 2009? If you do, I have some Lehman stock I’d like to sell you.

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Not Enough

by tristero

This is fine, as far as it goes.

But it’s not enough. After all, Dukakis released a similar ad, and we all know it did him a world of good.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. The Dems missed their opportunity to attack McCain in an effective manner when they failed to have anything ready for Palin’s announcement, other than congratulations, and when they failed to seize back the news cycles the day after the St. Paul hatefest. Now, with decent attack ads, they can only stave off further inroads. Today, the Obama campaign will not be able to turn this election around by merely fighting back, although of course they have to do that. Obama must make news. What kind of news? That is the job of the Obama campaign leadership.

Note to all those who think I”m hitting the Dems too hard: save your breath until the polls dramatically show support for Obama. Then, feel free to tell me you told me so, and I will gladly, and with great relief, agree.

Another note: I am not, in any way, criticizing Obama. Personally, he has run a superlative campaign. I think he is one of the greatest candidates for president ever and has the potential to be a great president. However, the support he has received from leading Democrats has been shamefully tepid and the marketing of the campaign in the election cycle has been atrocious. I understand that right now, Biden is just getting around to hitting McCain hard. Good for him. But where was he the day of the Palin announcement when it would have done some good? He was full of good vibes, defending “my friend” John. Again, spare us any defense until the poll numbers turn around. What Biden is doing now is the least he can do, and he’s easily 10 days late in doing it.

McCain/Bush/Palin: Completely Unqualified

by tristero

Here are three truly imminent crises this country is facing. John McCain, like George Bush before him, is completely unqualified to grapple with them. In fact, like George Bush before him, John McCain’s ignorance, his sheer inability to grasp simple facts, and his propensity to gamble on gut instincts all but guarantees he will make things worse.

We’re on the verge of an economic meltdown. Yet, John McCain fully admits he is not qualified to deal with it:

At a recent meeting with the Wall Street Journal editorial board, Republican presidential candidate John McCain admitted he “doesn’t really understand economics” and then pointed to his adviser and former Senate colleague, Phil Gramm – whom he had brought with him to the meeting – as the expert he turns to on the subject, The Huffington Post has learned.

And yes, Phil “Nation of Whiners” Gramm is someone McCain still relies on for economic advice.

Then, there’s the catastrophe of Afghanistan:

One of the most experienced Western envoys in Afghanistan said Sunday that conditions there had become the worst since 2001.

Let’s not forget that John McCain was one of the first to make the mistake to shift focus from Afghanistan to an invasion of Iraq:

Within a month [of 9/11] he made clear his priority. “Very obviously Iraq is the first country,” he declared on CNN. By Jan. 2, Mr. McCain was on the aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt in the Arabian Sea, yelling to a crowd of sailors and airmen: “Next up, Baghdad!””

As if the Afghan mission was accomplished.

As for the Bush/McCain invasion and perpetual occupation of Iraq, only a fool such as McCain would point to a situation as dangerously complex as the current mess in Iraq as a success:

A Sunni Arab leader of a citizen patrol group in Baghdad who had been a proponent of reconciliation in his neighborhood was assassinated over the weekend.

The killing of the leader, Fouad Ali Hussein al-Douri, a Sunni mosque imam who directed a group of about 65 guards in the Jihad neighborhood in western Baghdad, is the latest in a string of attacks on members of the so-called Awakening Councils. Relations between the Awakening Councils and the Shiite-led government have become increasingly strained.

Administration of the Awakening program, which is made up of almost 100,000 mostly Sunni men countrywide on the American military payroll, is expected to be handed over to the government starting Oct. 1.

About 54,000 Awakening patrol members in Baghdad will start reporting to the government that day. There are serious concerns that many might be arrested for previous links to the insurgency or denied long-promised jobs in the army and the police.

The Awakening members, whose ranks include many former Sunni insurgents, backed by the Americans to fight militants, are often cited as a crucial factor in the improvement of security in Iraq. But they have long been viewed with deep suspicion by many Shiites in the government.

Mr. Douri’s death is a double blow, given his efforts to promote Sunni-Shiite coexistence in a section of Baghdad especially riven by sectarian killing and displacement. Ryan C. Crocker, the American ambassador, specifically mentioned Jihad in October as a place that was “critical” for preserving security gains in Baghdad.

It was unclear who was responsible for Mr. Douri’s death. Relatives and friends blamed the government. “The Awakenings are being targeted by the government, Iran and Al Qaeda elements linked to Iran and other neighboring countries,” said Nusayef Jassim Muhammad, Mr. Douri’s cousin and neighbor.

Mr. Douri was killed when a bomb concealed in shrubs was detonated as he drove his car into his driveway on Saturday night.

Needless to say, you don’t get to the bottom of a situation like this if you’re too dumb and/or too disengaged to understand the basics of what is going on. McCain doesn’t grasp the first thing about the situation in Iraq:

He said several times that Iran, a predominately Shiite country, was supplying the mostly Sunni militant group, al-Qaeda. In fact, officials have said they believe Iran is helping Shiite extremists in Iraq.

Speaking to reporters in Amman, the Jordanian capital, McCain said he and two Senate colleagues traveling with him continue to be concerned about Iranian operatives ‘taking al-Qaeda into Iran, training them and sending them back.’

Pressed to elaborate, McCain said it was ‘common knowledge and has been reported in the media that al-Qaeda is going back into Iran and receiving training and are coming back into Iraq from Iran, that’s well known. And it’s unfortunate.’ A few moments later, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, standing just behind McCain, stepped forward and whispered in the presidential candidate’s ear. McCain then said: ‘I’m sorry, the Iranians are training extremists, not al-Qaeda.’

By contrast, I noticed something interesting in this article from Army Times. Now, Josh linked to it because it documents one more egregious McCain lie. But the article also has this to report:

“McCain’s interpretation of Obama’s position is typical of the way in which the Republicans have twisted Democratic views in order to undercut their opponents and at the same time obscure the past positions of the Republicans,” Thompson said. “Future Combat Systems is the centerpiece of Army modernization. However, McCain has been more critical of it than anyone else in the chamber. Obama has been much more detailed and thoughtful in his comments about future military investment than McCain’s very superficial statements.”

And that is part of a pattern. Where McCain blabbers and sneers incoherently, posing – when he’s not sequestered in one of his too-numerous-to-recall palaces residences – as a straight-talking man of the people, Obama is “detailed and thoughtful.” Not just about Future Combat Systems, but on every single serious issue that faces this country.

If experience – as it should – includes taking the time to study carefully the challenges this country faces as it tries to reverse the catastrophe of Bush’s eight-year reign of error, if experience – as it should – includes crafting detailed, practical proposals based upon that analysis, then there simply is no comparison: Obama is the only serious presidential candidate with the experience and seriousness of purpose to lead this country.

Period.

Not A Dime’s Worth Of Difference

by digby

The Republicans have suddenly become concern trolls about “negative advertising” — just as Obama’s harder hitting ads are getting traction. I’d expect to see the GOP work the refs hard over the next week saying that “the campaign” had become dishonest and negative — as if it’s the result of some outside force over which poor Maverick has no control. The media is already robotically presenting the two campaigns’ ads as equivalent.

It’s clever:

Leading Republicans on Sunday faulted both presidential campaigns for the increasingly negative tone of their advertising, suggesting the bitter attacks undermine John McCain and Barack Obama’s credibility with voters and could backfire.

“Both campaigns are making a mistake, and that is they are taking whatever their attacks are and going one step too far,” said former White House political adviser Karl Rove. “They don’t need to attack each other in this way.”

“There ought to be an adult who says, ‘Do we really need to go that far in this ad? Don’t we make our point and won’t we get broader acceptance and deny the opposition an opportunity to attack us if we don’t include that one little last tweak in the ad?'”

In the last week, the McCain campaign has put out an Internet ad accusing Obama of calling Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin a pig when he used the phrase putting “lipstick on a pig” to criticize the GOP ticket as trying to make a bad situation look better. McCain supporters said Obama was slyly alluding to Palin’s description of herself as a pit bull in lipstick, but there was nothing in his remarks to support the claim.

The McCain campaign also produced an ad saying Obama favored “comprehensive sex education” for kindergartners; as an Illinois state senator, Obama voted for legislation that would teach age-appropriate sex education to kindergartners, including information on rejecting advances by sexual predators.

In turn, a recent Obama TV ad makes a none-too-subtle dig at McCain’s age in saying McCain hasn’t changed in the last 26 years. It shows McCain at a hearing in the early 1980s, wearing giant glasses and an out-of-style suit. “He admits he still doesn’t know how to use a computer, can’t send an e-mail, still doesn’t understand the economy, and favors $200 billion in new tax cuts for corporations, but almost nothing for the middle class,” the commercial says.

Former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, who unsuccessfully sought the GOP presidential nomination, said McCain and Obama need to engage more openly in town hall meetings rather than back-and-forth negative advertising.

“I agree that the campaign has gotten too negative on both sides,” Giuliani said. “If the two of them are out there answering questions, a lot of these ads are going to get done that way, they’re going to be able to confront each other with these things. Senator Obama can explain his views on sex education and just what he was doing with that. Senator McCain can either back off it or agree with it.”

Rove said he believed that Obama’s “lipstick on a pig” comment was a “deliberate slap at Governor Palin,” saying it came too soon after the Alaska governor’s pitbull comment not to be. Rove also said while it might be fair to criticize McCain for being a longtime Washington insider, faulting McCain for not using a computer when he can’t type due to war injuries is not.

“McCain has gone in some of his ads — similarly gone one step too far, and sort of attributing to Obama things that are, you know, beyond the 100-percent-truth test,” Rove said, without elaborating.

Golly, no wonder people are so turned off to politics, eh? Thank goodness we have decent, God fearing, non-partisan elders like Rove and Giuliani to step in and guide them back to the the issues people really care about before things get out of hand. John McCain is such an honorable man that even the hate-filled Democrats are forced to repeatedly admit it. He’ll be the first to say that this has gone too far, I’m sure. But there’s no guarantee that vicious liberal attack dogs will pull themselves back from the brink.

And then McCain will, understandably, have to defend himself.

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