I would make a post about this, but TPM is basically all over it. Check out their coverage. I believe, as I did when this started, that these guys really are ignorant of the forces they're dabbling with. I don't think they actually believed that their crowds would start to actually resemble a mob. Also, sometimes things look worse when you see them on TV, than when you're in the moment. That said, I also believe, as I said earlier, that ignorance ain't an excuse. They need to cut the shit.
I don't think pushing the Ayers line is so bad, as in, arguing that Ayers is a despicable guy who Obama didn't distance himself from. I don't buy that line, but I'm not supposed to, I'm an Obama supporter. But when you start accusing homeboy of "palling around with terrorists," you've gone too far. Think about it logically--terrorists caused 9/11. And we basically believe that they are worthy of death. From that perspective, what do we think should happen to people who are friends with them? From that perspective, what do we think should happen to Barack Obama? Think there aren't some crazies out there who are connecting those same dots. These guys need to watch what they say.
The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood 
Copyright © 2009 by The Atlantic Monthly Group. All rights reserved.
Call me when the pitbull is back on her leash. I'm not buying a walkback yet. McCain has a debate next week to prepare for and I'm not convinced this isn't simply to give him something to toss out if he's asked about the anger at the rallies.
their, you betcha! and also Reagan.
It strikes me that the McCain campaign is now pulling the hole in after it. The attacks are so extreme and so obviously preposterous that the ultimate outcome will be a ferocious backlash among independents and moderate conservatives, the annihilation of McCain as a political force, and the implosion of Palin as a credible part of the national stage. All good things for the future. With luck, they might even deliver 60 Senate seats if they play the whack-job card hard enough. Let them keep trying this game - for they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind. I am not afraid of anything these two pathetic excuses for human beings can do, and i don't think most Americans are either.
these guys, yup-yup! i don't think pushing.
Or making another twist of the screw, what if a nutball concludes that McCain isn't man enough to defeat Obama (shakes his hand, talks rationally with him, etc.) but Sarah Palin is (sic)? The life that you save by walking it back may be your own.
right on the money, ploeg. I read on Michelle Malkin's site yesterday a number of whacko comments asking how they could get rid of McCain and "pair Sarah up with a god fearing strict constructionist." As if Sarah Palin has an effing "strict constructionist" view of the Constitution..
I don't think they actually believed that their crowds would start to actually resemble a mob.
Seriously, Ta-Nehisi? I don't buy that for one second. They know what these people are capable of, and McCain enjoyed stoking the flame. It's only because conservatives are calling for them to calm the fanatics that he's distancing himself.
They know what their base is capable of.
Ta-Nehisi,
I think McCain should get some credit for this, because as you say, it can look different on TV than when you are in the middle of it. These two guys are fighting to be the most powerful man in the world, lines will be crossed. But it is good to see a bit of the old McCain coming through.
On a side note, keep up the blog work - I truly enjoy reading your stuff. Your article on gaming and going back to it was funny read, it was so much like my own experience. (I am a little older, so for me it was D2, not WoW)
I'm no McCain fan, but I say about damn time. I honestly think he looks more comfortable here than he has in a while.
Good for Johnny, too bad his campaign has been striking the flint all week. Earlier today his campaign said...
"Barack Obama's attacks on Americans who support John McCain reveal far more about him than they do about John McCain. It is clear that Barack Obama just doesn't understand regular people and the issues...
So which is it? Are these McCain supporters misunderstood regular folks or are they misguided, ill inform people clinging to hatred and bigotry?
I believe, as I did when this started, that these guys really are ignorant of the forces they're dabbling with.
This is generous to a fault. This is so generous it's blind.
Think of 2002-2003. Anyone - including members of Congress - who dared suggest that the rush to war might be, well, a bit rushed, was immediately accused of being a terrorist sympathizer, a quisling, a commiepinkofag. I mean, I personally had the experience of receiving hate mail after the local paper published my anti-Bush letter-to-the-editor.
Since Nixon, Republicans have made a science out of understanding how to tweak the Yahoos. Bush & co. have not exactly been loathe to advance the art. By now it's in their blood.
Be open minded. But not so open minded that your brains fall out.
A bit OT, and not to suggest that Ayers & co were justified, but I think that we tend to be somewhat inconsistent about terrorism.
- Terrorism, or attacking non-combatants, is certainly not wrong if it is commanded by God.
- For the reality-based, terrorism is wrong only if wrong is wrong. That is, only if all of us have a duty to be ethical in all of our conduct. Not selectively, not self-interest masquerading as morality.
- For the ethical, terrorism is only one of many wrongs. Cruelty, greed, hatred, discrimination, theft and exploitation are some others.
- It’s understandable that non-state terrorism has become the obsession of the ‘haves’. It’s one of the few wrongs that afflict them. The 'haves' tend to benefit from the other wrongs.
- It’s also understandable that some of the ‘have-nots’ will prioritize wrongs differently than the ‘haves’.
If Uncle Sam wants to establish his bona fides on terrorism, he could start by apologizing for the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
I'm a little more scared of these people and not all that concerned with Mccain. I know they represent just one segment, but this is ridiculous. This level of fear is ridiculously cynical to his own ends. To think we are just trying to when an election by producing these emotions in these weak people...
Ta-Nehisi
It's difficult for me to think that no one knew where this would end up, but maybe McCain himself didn't realize it initially. Now he definitely knows and I am glad he is finally trying to calm this down. If the unthinkable happened, especially in the current state of America, the impact would be beyond devastating for everyone.
Not to be too cynical about this, but maybe they have found in the ACORN issue a more promising line of attack? "Voter-fraud-election-is-being-stolen-by-the-other-guy" makes a more compelling argument for undecided voters than "the-other-guy-is-practically-a-terrorist-so-vote-for-me", methinks.
And in order to sell the ACORN issue, the campaign has to regain some credibility and not look like they are advocating riots or something. I guess the grown-ups in RNC and the campaign has finally spoken.
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2008/10/10/mccain_campaign_calls_for_inve.html
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-acornoct11,0,1168347.story
I think this is definitely the new line of attack, definitely more palatable to middle America than unsubstantiated allegations about pallin' with terrorists. Wasn't this ACORN thing also an issue in some of the midterm elections in 06? There were some lawsuits by Republican candidates I think. I don't understand why Democrats have not found some ways to neutralize the issue based on the 06 experience.
On a completely unrelated note, you've gotta be jealous that your colleague thought of this headline before you did:
http://marcambinder.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/10/ds_nuts_acorns_legal_troubles.php
Sarah, you're not being cynical enough. ACORN isn't a different topic. ACORN is the next step on the same topic. You go from "OMG the other guy is a terrorist" to "OMG the terrorist is conspiring to cheat his way to a win". The whole point is to delegitimize the other guy's win so that it isn't clean. Open things up for another Florida 2000 if you can, obstruct and hamstring any initiative the other guy takes by all possible means if you must.
ACORN issue, the campaign has to regain some credibility
What a load of crap, it's racism in whitewash.
Steel7,
I disagree. He looks embarrassed and humiliated. In some ways, he looked more pathetic today than he did when he was intoning his who-is-Barack-Obama BS.
ploeg, please, I want to at least be able to pretend to myself that McCain isn't that much of a slimeball. (Yes, yes, I was one of those people who believed, like Michael Kinsley, that McCain is the best Republican presidential nominee in my lifetime).
Let me keep my delusions, please, at least until the moment McCain himself opens his mouth and utters the word "voter fraud". Which probably would be first thing tomorrow. You know, right after he contritely apologize and say how sorry he was about almost inciting riots. "Hey, I don't really mean it that Obama is almost equal to a terrorist, I'm just saying he's trying to steal this election and subverts democracy."
Whoever wins this thing, I guess this is going to be our third President in a row to come into office hated by almost half of the country. It seems like people have been saying that "the country has never been more partisan, ever!" since forever. That has to stop being true at some point, right? We can't always be "most partisan ever!" continously. At some point, it has to come down, right? The laws of physics really need to do a better job at applying to politics.
I'm going to break with my fellow commentors and agree with this:
I believe, as I did when this started, that these guys really are ignorant of the forces they're dabbling with. I don't think they actually believed that their crowds would start to actually resemble a mob.
I think the repeated invocations of "Who IS Barack Obama?" were supposed to get people in the voting booth to think "Who IS Barack Obama, anyhow?" and vote for McCain as the safety choice. Maybe in bars it could boost a little of that Manchurian candidate stuff among friends. It was not supposed to have crowds screaming for his assassination. Their fans were supposed to know enough not to shout that in front of the candidate and a television camera simultaneously.
That said, they should have known. Ignorance is no excuse, and the first ugly shout should have been met. Let's see if McCain keeps it up, at the risk of disappointing his crowd. Let's see if Palin plays along. But if the end of this campaign has these people muttering to themselves again rather than screaming at rallies, I'll take that as a preferable last 3 weeks.
Marc has an interesting set of e-mails with Scherer, in which S. argues that they're serious about the Ayers stuff because they want to change the subject from the economy. The mind boggles. You can't change that subject, you can only address it. The news of the past week that's bubbled around the economy has been this ugliness and conservatives deciding they won't be mistaken for McCain rally supporters and are letting him go down on his own.
Whether or not the walkback is genuine, this week has still highlighted a huge problem for McCain. Said Sarah Palin to John McCain, "All your base are belong to me!"
From that perspective, what do we think should happen to Barack Obama? Think there aren't some crazies out there who are connecting those same dots. These guys need to watch what they say. Oct 10 '08 Are these confused times in which all people should be careful about that they themselves say? What is politics all about? Is it money, greed, and hypocrisy? Is it wisdom, humility, HONESTY, EMPATHY, and an open, welcoming God or Higher Power? Do supernatural forces LITERALLY exist? Yes? No? Maybe??? Do time machines LITERALLY exist? Can 6 million Jews LITERALLY be brought back to life? Can 7 million Germans LITERALLY be brought back to life? WHAT do the people of America REALLY believe in? What should people really say to each other with empathy and hope for the future? What simple and important questions should people REALLY ask about life, politics, science, religion, and spiritual possibilities?
I agree that Deborah should have her own blog. But the same needs to be said of Dave Brown. This man is a genius.
Isn't this move reminiscent of Nixon's strategy of getting plants at his rallies to say the most despicable, racist things so he would come off as a reasonable moderate in comparison and win back the swing voters?
Man...they need to walk it back real quick...this ain't 1968...the country is a little bit unstable...we are walking ourselves off the cliff....you only need 50K to become a Costa Rican citizen...and they don't have an army.
"these guys really are ignorant of the forces they're dabbling with."
I don't buy it for a second either. I find McCain to be a repugnant man, his history shows it. This backfired. The public, not the media cried out because they found it abhorrent, so he pulled back. Not one decent bone in his body, Just a man who found out this last ditch tactic was backfiring. He sent Palin out to do the dirty work, it spilled over to him, and because he didn't want the gravy on his jacket he did what he did today. The intention was to incite, and you will never convince me otherwise.
I think the issue is conflating "they" with "he." Of course they knew how this would turn out. They didn't care, and frankly still don't. These are the Hewitts and the Hannity's, the Rove's and the Schmidts, mercenary vultures who wouldn't blink if something happened to Barack, or Michelle, or John or Sarah for that matter.
McCain, on the other hand, I'm willing to give the benefit of the doubt. He's never come off as completely comfortable with the whole line of attack. He's never come off as completely comfortable with his whole team. I think he is weak for flushing whatever principles he had down the toilet to follow this pathetic line of attack, fed to him from the same people who ruthlessly tore him apart 8 years ago. Somewhere he knew where it could go. But in his arrogance he hought he could walk a line that frankly, can't be walked.
And while I don't have a whole lot of respect for the man after this campaign, I will give him his due for recognizing what they were doing was over the top and having the balls to say it in in front of the mob.
He will continue to try to walk that line though, becuse in the end he has sold his soul to win. He'll cross it again. I doubt he has the clout to call off the dogs from his party even if he wanted to. So it'll be back on soon enough, but for now, I'll give him a little bit of due.
"Isn't this move reminiscent of Nixon's strategy of getting plants at his rallies to say the most despicable, racist things so he would come off as a reasonable moderate in comparison and win back the swing voters?" Reymond
TR: Despite my preferences I admit this thought has occurred to me. A plan of, "Let's say this Ayers stuff and then we can bring out the right-wing kooks to denounce. Sort-of say 'oh gosh, I didn't know how much anger and hate this would bring out. Now that I know I'll make it clear I'm the only moderate running and that I'm the only sane person who can keep these wackos in check.'" Or something. I hope that's not it though.
I read McCain as sincere in saying something important. I think he'll say it again and make it consistent. My guess is that he'll also get Palin on board and she'll make the point better than McCain can.
The trouble is that I don't think the shift is part of a serious, fully considered commitment of his whole campaign.
First, it's clear that the staff found out he was going to do that when he walked on stage and did it. Up to that minute, they were spinning out sick, slick sorry explanations of how the mob-scenes were just fine and also completely Obama's fault. He did a maverick number on his own employees. He didn't start by telling them the garbage was going to shop and insisting that they roll out his message. That tells me that, instead, they'll continue trying worse and worse things, dropping only those he explicitly forbids.
Second, he's consistently getting crowds with a very high quotient of craziness. That's both cause and effect of more responsible Republicans backing away. What's left are pretty heavily the wild people he got by choosing Palin. They aren't really his supporters, and that makes it harder for him to get them to respect his calls.
And third, I think McCain himself is flailing. He's been throwing anything he can grab. Today, he realized he was endangering something too precious to risk, probably because someone very close to him found a way to get him to see the danger. But tomorrow and the next day and the day after, his staff will bring him new ideas just about as bad, and he won't see the new danger quickly enough to head it off.
He's not fully master of his own ship, and he's not even fully steering the things he himself says and does.
So the words were a real commitment, and they'll make a difference that is truly positive...
..and the campaign will go right on being pretty horrid until the election is over.
reality check here doods and doodettes. who here is 60+ and was involved with and cognizant of the anti-war 'movement' of the '60's?
i was and as i have said in this forum and many others, the weather underground, weathermen, or whatever fookin' name they called themselves were not perceived as 'terrorists.' they were stupid, asshole, bottom feeding criminals. it's a joke to hear them referred to as 'domestic terrorists.' they killed each other playing with explosives, everything they tried to do either got them killed, or in jail. 5-10 years later, a few of remaining wackoze robbed banks, murdered a few brinks guys [one of whom was black], and were shot dead by the police, survivors got long sentences.
ayers, i think, denounced violence against human beings, and was never convicted or tried for anything. all charges were dropped against him. some terrorist.
the weathertrons were a rad group kicked out of sds and denounced by the panthers. they gave the anti-war movement a bad name.
where does all this lead? to nothing. ayers blew up a statue. he wasn't even a pimple on the anti-war movement's ass. it pisses me off that he's being touted by the mindless thugs mcpalin as someone worth attention. it's such a confused and ignorant campaign of disinformation and misinformation that will only come back to bite the dynamicduo. and they have unleashed the rabid dogs who will turn on them in a split second.
good riddance.
I agree with TNC; that said, you'd think that, after yesterday's disaster, or whichever day it was when that one guy started ranting about the socialists, they'd stop doing the town halls. Or at least carefully select questioners. If your supporters look stupid, you look stupid.
He obviously needed to walk it back. It was getting way out of hand.
Politically though, he went a little too far with his admiration of Obama and Obama's accomplishments. That made him look indecisive and weak. Once again, he just stepped on a weeks worth of message and left his supporters scratching their heads. "Ok, so he associates with terrorists, cuts off funding for our troops, bad mouths them while they are in harms way, yet you "admire" him and his accomplishments."
His own supporters are questioning his judgment now. That's very poor leadership.
What he should have said was Obama is not a terrorist. He's a United States Senator. But, we really need to question his judgment for associating with Ayers and his candor in explaining the relationship and ask ourselves if that disqualifies him from being commander in chief. That's the talking point. Its a weak one IMO but if you are going to make it, do it right, and stay consistent.
Now, next week, he's going to come out with Rezko smears after saying this week that he admires Obama and his accomplishments. He's already neutralized his attacks.
Isn't it possible that the guy just realizes that it aint worth it? that he saw Clinton slash and burn to the very end while succeeding at nothing but making herself look like some kind of heartless bigot? that maybe he remembers what happened in 2000 and isnt quite willing to be that guy? that he recognizes that this is his swan song and doesn't want to have his lasting legacy be that of him egging on a bunch of toothless rednecks at a rally in Ohio three days before he lost by 15 points? I dont know, maybe I'm just too willing to give people the benefit of the doubt, but before a few months ago he always struck me as an o.k. guy for a republican and while he has sold out since then, I think at least part him remembers who he used to be or at least who he thought he was.
My call of Bullshit on this whole episode remains. I'm still waiting for the evidence that McCain has been whipping up these rallies into "hate filled frenzies"(to quote an AFP report I read) beyond some people yelling out retarded shit and, horrors!, a few giving the press the finger.
I believe, as I did when this started, that these guys really are ignorant of the forces they're dabbling with. I don't think they actually believed that their crowds would start to actually resemble a mob.
I don't, T, not at all. I spent a lot of time when I was a kid (in the 70's) in my grandfather's black neighborhood, while unfortunately dealing with a white (drunken) ex-navy guy. I guarantee you, that everytime the SOB is debating O, he's thinking something like, 'I can't believe this n***** is beating me!'
So I don't doubt that he knows what's going on when they send out these mailers and crap. Hey, I was paying sharp attention in '88 when it was the widely-considered-to-be-sensible Elder Bush sending out the mailers. They know what they're doing; in this case, however, it's McCain and he's impulsive and it looks bad on TV, and that he cares about. I don't doubt that he'd prefer that they not get noticed by the TV when yelling this stuff, but that ain't because they don't want people thinkin' it.
There are some people who are just unreconstructed haters, and that's all there is to it.
max
['Would that it were otherwise.']
I think the comment McCain made about not needing to be afraid of an Obama presidency was very revealing. He's starting to realize that he will probably lose, and even McCain is unwilling to see a president attacked and under threat from these wackos. McCain may be an ambitious, even devious and weak, man - but even he would not wish for the possible assassination of a U.S. president.
you can really tell from this video that McCain hates these people's guts. He can't even look them in the eye (one gets the feeling that Palin would feel right at home). Remember, this is the same person who called Falwell and his crew "agents of intolerance" and who was ravaged by the hardcore conservatives in the 2000 primary.
It sad that McCain's campaign has devolved into gigantic hate spewing Palin rallies and small townhall meetings filled by voters McCain can barely stand to look at.
November 4th could not come soon enough.
I can't forgive him for fanning these flames for political benefit the past couple weeks, but I feel bad for him nonetheless.
I'm really feeling max's words up there^
Mac deserves no special credit for putting words against his lynch mob. IMHO it is what should be expected of him. It's his responsibility. I think the reality of his current position motivated his walk back to reason more than his crise de conscience, and that alone. Tell me then that down ballot conservative candidates in contested races would rather disassociate with Mac than go down in his fighting the terrorist on our side flame or whether Mac still has a thread of decency to speak against the madness he uncorked. (See 538's post from last night) He is as much fighting to keep the right side unified and was pulled to ackowledge that O is not a terrorist, even inspite of Mac suggesting that he might be. Methinks that is a taller order than what he's facing in the general elex.
There was a time when McCain thought he could become president on the strength of his so-called "moderate" politics. And during the Clinton years, that was probably a reasonable assumption for a Republican with those aspirations. However, the rise of the Cold War relics reborn as "neo-conservatives" and their taking over the White House in 2000 made McCain's politics irrelevant and unwanted within the GOP. While the neo-cons were riding high, they weren't interested in a guy who would "reach across the aisle" to Feingold and Kennedy. And they don't forget.
To be a player and preserve his hopes for a presidential run, McCain had to take the side of the neo-conservatives and be a cheerleader for their war on terror. And, to get money and support from the national GOP base for his campaign, he has had to denounce and reject whatever was left of his "moderate" politics.
In Arizona, McCain wins his senate elections mainly because Maricopa County (Phoenix) is so red, not because he has strong support from the state's very conservative GOP base. Immigration is one of their key issues, and they did not appreciate McCain reaching across the aisle to Ted Kennedy.
McCain has had a hard time getting support from the GOP base even in his own state. Palin, the gift to the religious right, improved his overall support from the base, but McCain still can't win if the election is about issues, especially the economy.
McCain and Palin are just doing what Republicans do to win elections. They attack and lie about their opponent to distract voters from the issues that the Democrats are talking about. For Obama, they are playing every race card and fear card in their deck. Creating angry, hate filled mobs at their rallies is only a problem if it is not working for them.
McCain trying to calm down the crowd is not McCain realizing that he has done something that is morally reprehensible nor is it McCain being concerned about Obama's safety.
It is McCain recognizing that this is backfiring and could lose votes. Fearmongering will not overcome the dire economic news that gets worse every day.
It is a futile exercise to try to figure out what is in McCain's soul. You can only judge a public figure by his actions. McCain's political career consistently shows that his main concern has been his own ambition.
Re: It's difficult for me to think that no one knew where this would end up, but maybe McCain himself didn't realize it initially.
I can give him that benefit of the doubt because McCain has been isolated in Senator-La-La-Land for a long time. Plus he's rich as God (at least his wife is) and people of his class don't usually come in contact with the trailer trash set. Also, he and Palin both come from states where there isn't much history of violent racism, in fact where there are rather few Blacks at all (To be sure there's plenty of bigotry against Native Americans in both AZ and AK and nativist sentiment against Mexicans has heated up in recent years in AZ)
Re: You can't change that subject, you can only address it.
Imagine if in 1864, after Sherman took Atlanta, McClellan had refocused his campaign against Lincoln by complaining about Mary Todd Lincoln's shopping excesses and visits from psychic mediums. Or in 1940 the GOP had decided to focus attention away from the war in Europe by questioning FDR's disability and health. That's about the territory where the McCain campaign now finds itself. Look up "non sequitur" in the dictionary. McCain and Palin's pictures belong next to the entry.
"I don't think they actually believed that their crowds would start to actually resemble a mob." NO no no no no. mccain has been rolling around in the gutter and he stepped in it. Yesterday he scrapped his $500 loafers on the curb trying to get the stink off. But, today I still smell the stank.
Mr.Coates,
How can I think Obama is serious about the war on terrorists and terrorism if he likes to hang out with a terrorist?
I guess he rationalizes it by saying that Ayers is not a Muslim terrorist...
How can I think Obama is serious about the war on terrorists and terrorism if he likes to hang out with a terrorist?
If you really believe Obama "likes to hang out with a terrorist" then his foreign policies are a moot point; you obviously don't believe he's eligible to be President in the first place.
So vote for McCain.
"It is a futile exercise to try to figure out what is in McCain's soul. You can only judge a public figure by his actions."
Liza, Amen to that! I am getting sick and tired of the parade of journalists trying to "explain" McCain's motives, whether or not he is really "serious" about the Ayers attack, as if by being "unserious" about somehow excuses him from responsibility, all these talks about his "reluctance" to go this way, how he is must be hurtin' and weepin' on the inside, how he is forced! - forced! I say - to go down this route because Obama refused to do 10 town hall debates.
It's ridiculuos, just as it was ridiculous when Bush, after his first meeting with Putin said he gazed into Putin's soul or something and saw a good man. Good soul and good intentions cannot govern a nation.
CB,
Because this isn't a "war on terrorism", that's nothing but a dumb slogan. Nor is it a war on Islam. It's a war against a couple of specific Muslim insurgent groups that have committed attacks against U.S. citizens.
How can I think Obama is serious about the war on terrorists and terrorism if he likes to hang out with a terrorist?
I am not voting Obama, but I have no doubt he is serious about fighting terrorism. Even if I assign a bunch of far right stereotypes against him, in the end, he has to get reelect in 2012. He has to be tough on terror to be taken seriously.
I know most people here love to beat up on conservatives, but I thought one of the most awful statements was by Robert Wexler when he tried tying Palin to Nazis. It was made even worse because Wexler was flat out lying about Palin endorsing Buchanan, but he got to float the Nazi word to try to scare Jewish voters. Many liberals probably don't see anything wrong with that though, because a fair share use terms like Bushitler or Mittenfuhrer.
McCain's biggest problem with his campaign is that the Republican reform movement is in it's infancy. No, make that an embryo. The Republican reform movement is an embryo, at best.
The GOP ruling elite has moved so far to the right in the last eight years with Cheney and his neo-cons that they are unable to understand what is happening within their own base.
McCain probably won the nomination because he is perceived as a moderate by a significant number of Republicans and right leaning independents. He does not, however, appeal to the religious right and that explains why Huckabee was getting so many votes. It also explains Palin.
Nonetheless, what should be apparent to the GOP elite is that a significant part of their base as well as their right leaning independent supporters are ready to move left. But the GOP elite doesn't get it, apparently believing that character assassination and voter disenfranchisement is still enough to win.
Make no mistake about their wanting to win. They will be the minority party in the senate and the house. If they lose the presidency, they also lose the Supreme Court.
McCain's problem is just simply bad timing. The base is asking for a moderate and they are inching toward a reform movement. So they elect McCain, but the GOP elite wants to run the election like 2000 and 2004, and they are forcing McCain to essentially become George Bush whose approval rating is at 25%.
McCain is conflicted, to be sure, but not morally. He and Palin can't decide whether to be conservatives, mavericks, reformers, or lynch mob leaders. They can't figure out how to get the moderate independents to vote for them, and that seems to be the crux of their problem.
"Politically though, he went a little too far with his admiration of Obama and Obama's accomplishments. That made him look indecisive and weak."
I'd agree with that. I'd assumed he'd said something like "You don't need to be afraid of Obama because as poor as his judgment is he's basically a decent man and the country is strong enough to survive even the most inexperienced of men" or some such. McCain kind of seemed to come too close to just saying "Obama will be an okay President", which is not want you want to say of an opponent.
I do think McCain should criticize various political things Obama has done in his career as Obama would do likewise with McCain. I do hope this recent reaction means backing off the Hannity/Coulter type stuff though.
I wonder if size matters.
When Obama's campaign wants a crowd of many thousand, they have staff on the ground who can quickly tap connections: college students, unions, elected officials who smell a victory, huge lists of volunteers and donors.
When McCain's team wants a crowd, I bet they have to send in an advance team with only a couple of days to make it happen. They've got far fewer connections, and elected leaders are backing away from the scent of defeat.
To get a big group fast, it seems to me that McCain's people would almost have to reach out the most intense, most conservative groups they can find.
McCain still has moderately conservative, sensible supporters left, but it's far harder to get them to show up in big numbers.
If they booked smaller venues or could tolerate empty seats, they wouldn't have to call out so many wild-eyed supporters. That's an option McCain actually does have for the remaining days of the campaign.
"I am not voting Obama, but I have no doubt he is serious about fighting terrorism."
Indeed. He might, even if unlikely, be open to angering the one Muslim nation we know has nuclear weapons in order to get Osama. That takes guts or pandering.
Sigh, if only McCain had ran a better campaign. I think the lameness, and overly personal, nature of his attacks bothered me more than attacking itself. Attacking, in some sense, is just when you do when you're behind. My main problem as a McCain voter is his attacks weren't very honest, responsible, or relevant to the issues of the day.
Hector,
So what are we doing in Afghanistan if there is no war on terrorism? Should we get rid of the Department of Homeland Security while we are at it?
Or are you one of those liberals who thinks we should pull out of Afghanistan?
Man, are you part of Code Pink?
DougEFresh,
I hope you are right.
Tessa,
Yes, I find his foreign policy stances questionable.
Wanting to meet with world leaders with no preconditions, especially ones that dont believe the holocaust occurred, are you serious?
You dont have "dialogues" with people like that...
Thomas R
Yes, all of these attacks by McCain are acts of desperation...
And so was picking Palin...
If Romney had been the vp pick, the race would be much different...
@Thomas R: In the spring Obama said that McCain would be a better president than W, and took heat for it from Dems. "No no no we have a McBush meme! You have to say he'd be even worse." And he dismissed that as a pretty silly requirement for discourse.
And @CB: The problem with the "war on terrorism" line is that it's a war against a tactic and thus cannot be won. Terror was used by the anarchists 100 years ago, too, and they were not beaten back by declaring war on a stateless political movement (anarchy) or a tactic (assassination). I'd rather be at war with Al Qaeda and its allies, except I think that gives them too much legitimacy. Treat them as something to be dealt with by international policing, not by the army. When you have a great army as a hammer every problem looks like a nail...
Yes, I think we should be in Afghanistan. At the start of the Iraq war I feared that it would take resources and, more critically, attention from Afghanistan, and that came to pass. (I had no idea Bush et al would be so nuts as to have no post-invasion plan, or I would have opposed it on those grounds too.) One reason I was drawn early to Obama was that he wanted to withdraw from Iraq to give more resources to Afghanistan, where bin Laden and his supporters still operate. To the extent that the attacks of 9/11 were an economic attack, drawing us into spending 700 billion on a war with Saddam, who had nothing to do with those attacks was a good outcome for al Qaeda. Plus of course the inevitable Muslim casualties are good for recruiting jihadists. Let's elect someone who doesn't take bin Laden's word as to where we should fight him.
The McCain post convention campaign strategy has been to dominate news cycles and keep out the issues that Democrats want people to be thinking about on election day.
Giving the VP position to Sarah Palin worked really well for them, but the global financial meltdown has brought the economy front and center and it isn't going away. Do you have a vague memory of "lipstick on a pig?" Seems like such a long time ago.
This latest GOP stunt of, "Let's get the low lifes at our rallies to get angry and call Obama a Muslim terrorist" is a failed attempt to dominate the news cycle and distract from the issues.
The real issues have become very dire and they dominate over McCain's latest stunt, but McCain does not have another strategy.
McCain can't re-invent himself in time for the election. There will be more of the same in the weeks ahead, but it won't work.
The only really dramatic thing he can do to dominate a news cycle again is to get rid of Palin, but I don't think he will do that because of the religious right.
"that McCain would be a better president than W, and took heat for it from Dems. 'No no no we have a McBush meme! You have to say he'd be even worse.' And he dismissed that as a pretty silly requirement for discourse."
Well he rejected the idea of saying he's worse, but I haven't seen him go against the idea he'd be little or no different. At the debate Biden compared him to Bush in about every other sentence. Obama does that a bit less, but a fair amount. (I'm nervous saying that as I know Coates is an Obama supporter and I don't want to sound callous to him)
I'm not really blaming him for that as it's effective and not personal. It's what every Democratic candidate would be doing and he'd almost be a fool not to do it. I just don't know if it's entirely fair or as elevated as you're indicating. Also Obama lately seems to be moving to things more specific to McCain.
On McCain's side this election for months was basically touted as Obama vs himself. Newspapers were discussing how the election was a "referendum on Obama" and some essentially said McCain was irrelevant to the election or that process. Before Palin the only time he dominated the news cycle was the "celebrity ad" deal. Politicians generally don't like to feel ignored for understandable reasons. So he's started overreacting in big and weird ways trying to get attention whether it's good or bad.
And if he'd picked Romney he might be doing better in Michigan, but he'd have the downside of running with a very rich white guy who may remind America of Wall Street at the worse possible time. Also, to be blunt, Romney's a Mormon. That could've hurt him in states where people were leaning McCain because they don't "relate to Obama." The people who don't "relate to Obama" mostly don't relate to millionaire Mormons any better. (The "Mormon states" of Utah and Idaho would probably be in the bag for McCain even if he'd selected RuPaul as his running-mate, so that those two places would relate to Romney more than Obama doesn't really matter)
CB,
You're a bloody fool. We are not at war against 'terrorism' as a tactic, and it isn't (or shouldn't be) our concern whether some Nigerian militants want to blow up an oil rig or too. What is our concern is the expansionist pretensionists of Islamic Jihadism. Not all Muslims as a group, just those that want to expand the house of Islam by force. That is who we are fighting in Afghanistan, Iraq, and perhaps soon in Pakistan as well.
Deborah's point about the 'war on terror' is well taken, other than that I don't think policing is the way to solve the problem.
Thomas R., you should come read my new blog one of these days! I would appreciate your historical knowledge and thoughtful comments.
During the 2004 Presidential race, in August and early September when Kerry looked to have a strong chance of winning*, I heard a few right-wing talk-show hosts start to push the "voter fraud" button. (*Thanks, Dan Rather, thanks, Rove was laughing for months.)
I was always sure that that the Republicans would try to leverage Obama's organising years against him, as that's part of the Rovian "destroy their strong points by distortion" strategy. Mostly, that strategy has shown up as the deprecation of being good with words and rational thought, but now they're zeroing in on "community" (heh) organising. I was convinced they'd find some Willie Horton figure, someone who benefitted from the work and then did something apalling later, but it looks like the best they could find was an organisation.
I don't think it will work, since most of their base are afraid of sub-human dark people who will leech off their hard (and hated) jobs, rape their women, u.s.w., rather than of scheming clever Maoist dark people who coddle poor people by acting as if they had rights, which really should only belong to good Merkins like you and me. Now if A.C.O.R.N. were run by Ivy-League Jew-equivalents straight out of "Mallard Fillmore", that would fit better into the Dirtball Book of Knowledge that was good-enough for my born-fightin daddy, goddamnit, and better be good enough for you, faggit.
You may believe McCain's base is white-supremacists, but at the very least it's not people who are consciously white-supremacist.
A big part of why I'm not as upset about "outsourcing" as Obama is that I think it might actually be a good thing if American companies are bringing jobs to "darker skinned" people who revere Vishnu or Guru Nanak. Maybe it's not helping them, but I think poverty has gone down in India and Indian poverty is usually worse to live under than ours. And part of why I'm kind of tough on North Korea is because up to a third of their people live in re-education camps where they face beatings.
I do fear I have some unconscious biases as I've lived in a mostly white world, but I've tried to go against them as best I can. In college I associated with a fairly diverse group and I've never put anyone of another race at a disadvantage so far as I can recall. Two of my nephews are half-Chinese. My sister had a biracial (black father/white mother) foster-child that I considered to be practically a nephew for a time. I'm not saying "I'm so great", but I think there's probably more Republican-leaning people like me than you'd believe. We just don't go to rallies or whatever.
"Think about it logically--terrorists caused 9/11. And we basically believe that they are worthy of death. From that perspective, what do we think should happen to people who are friends with them?"
Yeah Mr Coates, I'm so glad you were so out front in denouncing those people who throw around "Bush administration" and "war criminals" in the same paragraph, much less sentence. Because you know how we string up war criminals, if they don't manage to chew some cyanide first. We gotta be civil, right?
“Yeah Mr Coates, I'm so glad you were so out front in denouncing those people who throw around "Bush administration" and "war criminals" in the same paragraph, much less sentence. Because you know how we string up war criminals, if they don't manage to chew some cyanide first. We gotta be civil, right?”
To the extent that they authorized, ordered and orchestrated the torture of hundreds of detainees, certain members of the Bush Administration, (most apparently Dick Cheney and John Yoo), are war criminals. Any sort of a discussion concerning possible punishments should wait until formal charges have been issued and, of course, should only be levied after a guilty sentence has been handed down following a proper trial. If they want to kill themselves now though, well, that’s their business. I would much rather have the trial personally, let the truth come out.
Anton:
"Yeah Mr Coates, I'm so glad you were so out front in denouncing those people who throw around "Bush administration" and "war criminals" in the same paragraph, much less sentence. Because you know how we string up war criminals, if they don't manage to chew some cyanide first. We gotta be civil, right?"
Please do expand upon your impassioned defense of habeus corpus.