“John McCain is my friend,” said the loquacious Blue Hen. “I admire John McCain. I know of no man or woman I have ever met that has more personal courage than John McCain. We have been friends for over 33 years. We have traveled together. When John was Navy liaison he staffed me for three or four years everywhere I traveled in the world.
“Jill and John are good friends,” Biden said, referring to his wife Dr. Jill Biden, who had just introduced him. “Matter of fact there’s a best-selling book written about us called The Nightingale’s Song about John and some of his graduating class from Annapolis that references Jill and John in the book as good buddies.
“She doesn’t like the reference,'” Biden added, “but John, John’s a great guy. John was staffing me in Greece. I was meeting with the Prime Minister Papandreou and we were supposed to go to this fancy dinner and Jill said ‘Do we have to go to this dinner?’ And John said, ‘No, no, no I know this great place for dinner.’
“And there was a place literally down on the docks, where Zorba lived I think, and so I had to go to the fancy thing and I come back down and I find it, and we’re wandering through these alleys on the dock — you’re gonna get very angry at this Jill — but I walk around the corner and there’s these cement tables like down at the shore you know, the cement base ,the cement table, and I walk in and Jill and John are standing up on the table drinking ouzo dancing with one another, and I’m thinking, ‘I’ve never trusted John since then, Jillie.’
“But he’s a great guy,” Biden said, “and if John called me today and said ‘Joe -,’ like when they went after John McCain, when Bush went after him in South Carolina with the scurrilous comments they made about his character, I called him and said, ‘John, where do you want me? I’m an Al Gore man but where do you want me? I will show up anywhere in America to testify to the kind of man you are.’ And he is a good man, he is a good man.”
Ok.
To be fair, he did go on to give Mccain’s policies a very effective going over, so it wasn’t a total love fest. But these testimonials are unnecessary, particularly the thing about South Carolina which does McCain’s work for him by putting distance between him and Bush. I’d be very surprised if we hear that again.
But I kind of liked the ouzo story. It didn’t make a lot of sense, but it sounded like fun.
This is the kind of tone leading Democrats, except Obama of course, need to take:
[T]he Republicans have gone beyond lying. Bush and Cheney have been great liars, really, the best. Rove has made a career, and even a philosophy of lying about everything. But there is a special cold villainy to the way they have taken it to the next level now. “Neither repented they of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts.” Rather than repent, they plan ever more of the same. Knowing that we know what they know, they now tell us we’re crazy, that black is white and cats are dogs and John McCain is a maverick and Sarah Palin is a tax cutter (hear the one about Sarah P. leaving the town of Wasilla with 19 million dollars in long term debt? You did? No, you didn’t, darling. You must be imagining things)
Well, we are crazy if we let them get away with it. The whole world thinks so.
Do I think Biden and Clinton should talk this tough? No. They should be tougher.
So I hear the the Wilson Sisters have told the McCain campaign they can’t use Barracuda and Brooks and Dunn told the Obama campaign that they couldn’t use “Only In America.”
I think this is a pretty good illustration of the tribal divide in this country. I could tell that the people at that convention last night didn’t have a clue about Barracuda and didn’t relate to it at all. Same thing with the Brooks and Dunn tune at Invesco. We all waved our flags in time to the music but it was a little bit incongruous after listening to our own sacred tribal chorus of Stevie Wonder and Cheryl Crow earlier in the evening. It seemed a little bit literal.
The fact that these artists don’t want their songs associated with the “other side” is really telling. They identify with us as much as we identify with them.
I actually like that Brooks and Dunn tune and if using it is Obama’s way of reaching out, then count me in. I’d be willing to share Barracuda with the other side in exchange, although I don’t think they’d like the lyrics if they could understand them:
If the real thing don’t do the trick No, you better make up something quick You gonna burn burn burn burn it to the wick Ooooooohhhh, barra barracuda.
I guess this sweet merging of our ritual hymns is not to be. They’re a little bit country and we’re a little bit rock and roll and never the (Shania) Twain shall meet. So much for post-partisanship.
Let us pray:
Update: Oooops. The report I heard on the radio was incorrect. So sorry. It seems Brooks and Dunn didn’t object after all. I take that to mean they are nothing but bleeding heart liberals who are voting for Obama. (Actually, I guess one is and one isn’t, which mean they are a mixed marriage. Only in America!)
It was still an oddly literal choice for the “Promise of America” speech, especially since it was Bush’s theme song in 2004. But maybe that’s what makes it a true post-partisan anthem.
I would have preferred Melissa Etheridge’s “I Need To Wake Up” which, to me, is the true liberal anthem. She was in Denver and I heard her on the radio the day of Obama’s speech sing it on acoustic guitar in the studio and it made me choke up — again:
And if they wanted country, this one certainly expresses my feelings, although it certainly isn’t post-partisan:
* More than half a million more people watched John McCain’s acceptance speech (38.9 million) than Barak Obama’s the week before (38.4 million).
* Regarding the gender gap, significantly more men (17.9 million) watched McCain’s speech than Obama’s (16.2 million), while more women watched Obama’s speech (19.9 million) than McCain’s (19.2 million).
* More than 5 million more white viewers watched the McCain speech (32.2 million) than the Obama speech (27.0 million). Among African Americans, the reverse was true, with 4.5 million more African Americans watching Obama (7.5 million) than McCain (3.1 million)
For additional political information, please visit our blog.
What does that tell us? You tell me.
Following up on tristero’s post below about McCain keeping Palin away from the press, I’m also hearing a lot of rumbling in the media about the “immorality” of them not having access to Palin.
MATTHEWS: I think, Pat, we have to ask the questions of all the candidates. So let‘s get—let‘s get to the sweet spot. The stock market dropped 3,300 (SIC) points today. What are we going to do about it?
BUCHANAN: Well, 330.
MATTHEWS: No, what are we going to do about it?
BUCHANAN: It‘s 330.
MATTHEWS: What are we going to do about it? Those are legitimate questions. What are we going to do about it? What are we going to do about the…
BUCHANAN: I think those are not only legitimate questions, they‘re valid issues. Why is the dollar sinking? Why is the market going down? Why is—you know, housing, these are all economic…
MATTHEWS: So these are the questions that the candidate for vice president and candidate for president both should submit themselves to on the Sunday talk shows, the weekday talk shows, the radio shows. They should get out there and answer the questions. Pat, I‘m asking you the question.
BUCHANAN: All right…
(CROSSTALK)
MATTHEWS: Is Governor Palin responsible to the public to begin answering those questions or not?
BUCHANAN: What Governor Palin and John McCain ought to do is run the campaign they want to do, communicate in the ways they want to communicate.
MATTHEWS: You‘re not answering the question.
BUCHANAN: I‘m not. They don‘t owe you a damn thing, Chris Matthews.
MATTHEWS: See? That‘s the point! So we can‘t ask any questions…
BUCHANAN: You can ask…
MATTHEWS: … from the candidates!
BUCHANAN: Ask them right into the camera.
MATTHEWS: This is an interesting kind of campaign, that the candidate for president will give a speech which everyone likes and then move on to what, the election? When is there a question put to the candidate, Pat?
BUCHANAN: You can ask her—reporters covering her can ask her questions. You can invite her on this show, “Larry King” “MEET THE PRESS.” But the campaign itself has got the right to decide how they communicate…
MATTHEWS: OK…
BUCHANAN: … to the country that they want them to elect them.
MATTHEWS: So the references to Harry Truman last night about, If you can‘t stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen, are irrelevant.
BUCHANAN: No, you can say it right into the camera. You can say they can‘t stand the heat.
BUCHANAN: But you can‘t order her on this show…
MATTHEWS: Do you think it‘s appropriate for Pat to even suggest that we might have a candidate for vice president of the United States who would skip from the nominating convention to the election booth without submitting herself or himself to tough questioning from the press? Is that even an appropriate concept in a modern American democracy?
BUCHANAN: No, I‘m not suggesting that, I…
MATTHEWS: Well, I remember a campaign in 1968, where the Republicans had Bud Wilkinson (ph), the coach—football coach, asking—of Oklahoma, asking…
BUCHANAN: You know who wrote the questions?
MATTHEWS: You did. I know you did!
(LAUGHTER)
MATTHEWS: Now, that‘s a Pat Buchanan campaign.
BUCHANAN: There were hardball questions…
MATTHEWS: The campaign flack writes the questions for the candidate and has some — (INAUDIBLE) coach, put the questions to the candidate. Boy, is that democracy!
(CROSSTALK)
BUCHANAN: Roger Ailes. Roger Ailes programmed it as a 28-year-old.
Look, Chris…
MATTHEWS: (INAUDIBLE) Pat. Tell me the whole biography of how a campaign should be run.
BUCHANAN: Here‘s what I‘m saying. In the White House, as White House communications director, you‘ve got an obligation to communicate with your people if you want to lead. Like Reagan, his basic format was speaking out, true speeches, and he wasn‘t as good at Q&A. Nixon was terrific at Q&A. He had primetime press conferences. We used those.
How McCain and Palin communicate—they‘ve got an obligation—is their own decision based on how they best win the presidency of the United States. You and I can say anything about them we want. We can ask questions…
MATTHEWS: But I‘m asking about if the American people have a right…
BUCHANAN: The American people aren‘t demanding it. You are.
MATTHEWS: Well, I‘m asking this. Do the American people have a right to see candidates for president and vice president submit themselves to tough questioning by objective journalists?
MATTHEWS: Yes or no. Do they have…
BUCHANAN: Do they have the right to have that kind of performance by the candidate, demanded of candidates?
BUCHANAN: I don‘t think it‘s the law of the land, no.
MATTHEWS: But do you think they have a right as—as people who vote in a democracy, to have the candidates submitted to tough questioning?
BUCHANAN: I think they can look at her and say, if she‘s not answering or he‘s not answering tough questions, I‘m concerned they don‘t know anything. I may not vote for them. But there‘s no moral obligation on them to…
MATTHEWS: Is there a political obligation?
BUCHANAN: No. No, there‘s not. You run a race to win.
MATTHEWS: This is extraordinary! This is extraordinary. But you were saying if Barack Obama were to run for president and not go on any show where he might face adversarial questioning, you wouldn‘t find a problem with that?
BUCHANAN: He just went on “O‘Reilly” for the first time today. They‘ve been begging him to come on Fox. The Democrats don‘t even go on Fox. You‘re scared to death of them!
Funny. As if submitting to Chris Matthews’ questions ever told voters anything meaningful about the candidates.
They are going to work themselves into a frenzy over this. And the right will hold Palin off just long enough for the outcry to become deafening. And then Palin will appear in front of a gargantuan television audience (again) on something like 60 Minutes — and do quite well. They are already working the media hard to make sure they don’t go for the jugular — and they won’t.
People need to get over the idea that Palin’s some kind of Britney Spears bimbo. She’s a professional politician and from the looks of it, a pretty good one. She’s not going to fall on her face on TV. They will build the expectations accordingly.
A week ago, most Americans had never heard of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin. Now, following a Vice Presidential acceptance speech viewed live by more than 40 million people, Palin is viewed favorably by 58% of American voters. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 37% hold an unfavorable view of the self-described hockey mom.
[…]
Perhaps most stunning is the fact that Palin’s favorable ratings are now a point higher than either man at the top of the Presidential tickets this year. As of Friday morning, Obama and McCain are each viewed favorably by 57% of voters. Biden is viewed favorably by 48%.
There is a strong partisan gap when it comes to perceptions of Palin. Eighty-nine percent (89%) of Republicans give her favorable reviews along with 33% of Democrats and 59% of voters not affiliated with either major party.
She earns positive reviews from 65% of men and 52% of women. The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll shows that Obama continues to lead McCain among women voters while McCain leads among men. The Friday morning update, the first to include interviews conducted after Palin’s speech–showed the beginning of a Republican convention bounce that may match Obama’s bounce from last week.
Fifty-one percent (51%) of Americans believe that most reporters are trying to hurt Palin’s campaign, a fact that may enhance her own ratings.
The Palin pick has also improved perceptions of John McCain. A week ago, just before he introduced his running mate, just 42% of Republicans had a Very Favorable opinion of their party’s nominee. That figure jumped to 54% by this Friday morning. Among unaffiliated voters, favorable opinions of McCain have increased by eleven percentage points in a week from 54% before the Palin announcement to 65% today.
Fifty-one percent (51%) of all voters now believe that McCain made the right choice when he picked Palin to be his running mate while 32% disagree. By way of comparison, on the night after Biden gave his acceptance speech, 47% said that Obama made the right choice.
Eighty-one percent (81%) of Republicans say that McCain made the right choice while just 69% of Democrats said the same about Obama.
Among unaffiliated voters, 52% said that McCain made the right choice for his running mate and 45% said the same about Obama.
Forty percent (40%) now say that Palin is ready to be President, if necessary. That’s up from 29% last week. Forty-nine percent (49%) say the same about Biden.
However, following the Wednesday night speech, voters are fairly evenly divided as to whether Palin or Obama has the better experience to be President. Forty-four percent (44%) of voters say Palin has the better experience while 48% say Obama has the edge. Among unaffiliated voters, 45% say Obama has better experience while 42% say Palin.
Fifty-eight percent (58%) of voters say that Palin’s speech helped McCain’s chances of becoming President while only 10% believe it hurt those prospects.
She is their “star.” And as much as they tried to turn that into a negative for Obama, they know that it has power in our culture. They want to manage it and control it. But they don’t want to kill it. All they have to do is keep it going for 60 days.
And anyway, what I’m really puzzled about is McCain. Why in the world did more people watch that speech that Obama’s? I confess, I really didn’t expect that. Why would so many people want to watch another speech from that guy? Was that part of the Palin effect?
You can sneer all you want about the hypocrisy and cynicism of the McCain campaign, but the effect to the average American will be a contrast between smooth-talking, glib, in-control Republicans contrasted with sloppy, gaffe-prone Democrats.
And no, people, if properly done, not even sophisticated watchers of the media are likely to be immune from the effects of this kind of media control, let alone the average viewer. The Republicans will look in control, because they will be – marketing-wise – and that is a very, very powerful visual message.
Will the Democrats scream bloody murder about this outrageous attempt to run a presidential campaign without the opportunity actually to question one party’s candidates in a frank manner? We’ll see.
Well guess what? Sara A. Carter writes in the Washington Times: “U.S. ground forces crossed the border from Afghanistan and attacked suspected al Qaeda targets in Pakistan on Wednesday as part of an aggressive new strategy to kill or capture Osama bin Laden before President Bush leaves office, U.S. officials said. . . .
“‘I know the hunt is on; they’re pulling out all the stops,’ said a Defense Department official with knowledge of the situation who asked not to be named. ‘They are leaving no stone unturned. They want to find bin Laden before the president leaves office and ensure that al Qaeda will not attack the U.S. during the upcoming elections.’ . . .
“A U.S. counterterrorism official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that ‘finding bin Laden has always been a priority’ and that targeting al Qaeda bases is based on actionable intelligence. However, he added that the November elections in the U.S. have renewed a sense of urgency to capture the terrorist leader. ‘Any period of transition, like the upcoming election, can be seen as a potential vulnerability,’ he said.”
Far be it for me to suggest that the Republicans would pull an October Surprise. It’s been years since they used the power of the government to manipulate events to swing an election.
The problem is that the Bush administration is so incompetent that it’s highly unlikely they can pull it off. Worse, their attempts at such things often inspire the kind of blowback that results in airplanes flying into buildings.
I’ve been getting swamped with this email, purporting to be quotes from Sarah Palin. It’s a joke, which can be easily traced to this site. (I think it got some currency because a google search takes you to an MSNBC page that sort of looks like it might be a real story if you don’t know what you’re looking at. It’s a comment…)
Anyway, here’s the email. Don’t be a schtupid, be a smahtie, come and join the reality based pahtie.
Subject: more Palin To: Date: Thursday, September 4, 2008, 7:43 AM
How many of these quotes did she use in her speech last night?
Quotes by Governor Palin during a series of interviews by the Anchorage Daily News in 2006 when she was running for Governor…
On Creationism:
The simple yet elegantly awkward moose proves God’s creation and not evolution is the source of all life. How could something as oddly shaped and silly looking as a moose evolve through so-called “natural selection?” Is evolution a committee? There is nothing natural about a dorky moose! Only God could have made a moose and given it huge antlers to fight off his predatory enemies. God has a well known sense of humor, I mean He made the platypus too. *********************************************************** On oil exploration and drilling in the ANWR:
God made dinosaurs 4,000 years ago as ultimately flawed creatures, lizards of Satan really, so when they died and became petroleum products we, made in his perfect image, could use them in our pickup trucks, snow machines and fishing boats.
Now, as to the ANWR, Todd and I often enjoying caribou hunting and one year we shot up a herd big time, I mean I personally slaughtered around 40 of them with my new, at the time, custom Austrian hunting rifle. And guess what? That caribou herd is still around and even bigger than ever. Caribou herds actually need culling, be it by rifles or wolves, or Exxon-Mobil oil rigs, they do just great! ********************************************************** On Alaskans serving overseas in Iraq:
Well, God bless them, and I mean God and Jesus because without Jesus we’d be Muslims too or Jewish, which would be a little better because of the superior Israeli Air Force. ************************* God help us!
Here’s the problem. People who will read this and believe that Palin called the dinosaurs “Lizard of Satan” and openly disparaged Muslims and Jews in the Anchorage Daily News — and still got elected Governor of a state — will also think those quotes make good solid sense. You’ve got to know your audience.
Chain emails are a clever kind of whisper campaign but I don’t think pulling jokes off the internet, (which can be debunked in less than five minutes) is exactly the way to get it done. The email I posted a couple of days ago was much more effective.
Tristero wondered below what big event or story Obama has cooked up to step on McCain’s speech is going to be. I don’t think he needs one:
Jobless rate spikes to 6.1%, pressuring candidates to address economy
A sharp and surprising jump in the unemployment rate reported Friday makes it likely the economy will remain front and center in a hotly contested presidential campaign just entering its final stage.
The unemployment rate in August jumped to 6.1 percent, the highest level in five years, from 5.7 percent in July, the government reported. Businesses cut 84,000 jobs — the eighth month in a row of shrinking payrolls.
The economy already was the No. 1 issue for voters, but the increase in the psychologically important jobless rate ensures both Sens. John McCain and Barack Obama will have to continue to address the nation’s economic troubles as they stump for votes over the next two months.
You’ve got the maverick and mayor out there today campaigning on the flag and blastocysts while unemployment, health care costs, gas prices and foreclosures are surging.
People may love their country, but they love their families more.
To a man, everyone on the liberal blogger side of the aisle was stunned that the McCain campaign would allow the TV shot to go out to the world on his big night to be him in front of a lime green background. Cottage cheese and lime Jello, in the vernacular of the blogosphere. Surely they WATCHED the shot through a monitor and knew that it would make him look sickly.
But that’s not the only head-scratcher with the RNC staging, which the set designers had months to organize. The giant screen was useless outside of the room, always putting the speaker at the podium behind monochrome, or worse, in the East River (in Rudy Giuliani’s speech). Putting the seats for dignitaries along the side of the stage was OK, but the white line across the boxes designating them looked to the TV angle like the seats were empty, in a wide shot. And then there’s this, which is absolutely amazing.
A lot of people were asking tonight: what the hell was that mansion up behind John McCain tonight during the first part of the speech? As I noted below, the TV close-ups only showed McCain’s head against the grass in the picture, which made it look like he was reprising his famed green screen performance. And when they panned out, it looked like McCain was showing off one of his mansions.
Well, several readers have written in to tell me that the building is actually the main building on the campus of the Walter Reed Middle School in North Hollywood, California. And sure enough, this page on the school’s website makes it pretty clear that they’re correct.
Could this be? Could the producers have wanted a shot of Walter Reed Army Medical Center, and they farmed it off to the intern who picked Walter Reed MIDDLE SCHOOL? I mean, is that possible? None of the consultants and muckety-mucks charged with picking the backgrounds know what Walter Reed looks like? As Josh Marshall says, “is this the RNC or a scene out Spinal Tap or Waiting for Guffman?”
You know, it wasn’t so long ago that these guys were the pros at this. Say what you will about Mission Accomplished Day, putting Bush in that flight suit was brilliant theater. Where did those people go?
Surely the Democrats have some major announcement today to remove the spotlight that’s been shining on the viscous mass of white ooze that infested St. Paul. The couldn’t be so stupid as not to have planned a major rebuttal to the lies, distortion, and stupidity on display this past week.
We’re gonna hear about something big from Barack today. Right? RIGHT????