Tonight (10/15) is the final Presidential Debate for the 2008 election. The format is kind of a "sit down at the lunch table" talk, with Obama and McCain seated side-by-side across from Bob Schieffer. It is considered by many to be the last gasp for McCain; only a good showing here will keep his campaign alive.
The tenor of the McCain campaign has rubbed many people the wrong way, Democrat and Republican. Failing to address racist comments at rallies in a timely fashion, trying to use William Ayers and ACORN as bogeymen to show how unfit Obama is to be President, and Sarah Palin's apparent inability to read a report that condemns here ethical lapses as "no evidence of wrongdoing" -- these are the kinds of things that make it increasingly clear that the McCain camp has lost its way. As their poll numbers trend downward further, the attacks ramp up, become less substantive but more vicious. If you cannot win on merit, win through fear. Karl Rove must be proud.
So what to expect?
From Obama, more of the same. Through the debates and the slew of negative ads, he has maintained his cool demeanor, showing no signs of allowing the needles and arrows of his foes to penetrate. He stands his ground with utter confidence in his message and his destiny. He will deflect each blow as it comes, pressing back with the surety of a fighter who knows how to allow his opponent to expend his energy fruitlessly, all the while unaware of being backed into a corner.
From McCain, more of the same rhetoric, but with a plethora of new "facts" to throw into the fight. He will stick to his guns on Iraq and the economy, and attempt to paint his opponent as out of touch, as someone who cannot be trusted because he consorts with "bad people." McCain will lunge, and lunge, striking with everything he has in his arsenal because he can leave nothing back. This will be his last opportunity and he will push and press. Ultimately, it will leave him vulnerable, because in his haste to bring down Obama, he will reveal parts of his true self which will paint a bleak picture of a McCain presidency.
Ultimately, I doubt that even if McCain brings his "A-game" he will enough strength to wrestle Obama down over any particular topic. He will resort to the low arts, hurling innuendo like hand grenades in the hope it will do enough damage to keep Obama in striking distance. But if he does this, it will have the opposite effect, highlighting the weaknesses in his current character that have been all too evident of late.
John McCain knows in his heart that this is the last battle. If he fails now, there will be no Presidency in his future. He has reached the zenith of his political career and when he loses the election, the plunge to the nadir will be swift and frightening. That thought will no doubt weigh heavily on his mind as the debate begins.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Ode to Autumn
Nature's green cloak
Rusts and yellows
And falls down
To the cool earth
As she heaves a sigh
And prepares for slumber
Rusts and yellows
And falls down
To the cool earth
As she heaves a sigh
And prepares for slumber
Monday, October 13, 2008
Who is the real John McCain?
Fair question.
Is he the Vietnam hero who survived 5 years at the Hanoi Hilton with the help of some friends?
He used to be.
Is he the man who came home from Vietnam, found out his wife had been disfigured in a horrible accident, and proceeded to cheat on her?
Most assuredly.
Is he the man who married a rich and beautiful woman to show he had not lost his naval aviator chops?
No doubt.
Is he the Senator who got mixed up with Charles Keating and ended up selling out his integrity and got away with it only because the Senate could not dredge up enough evidence to convict him of anything?
You be the judge.
Is he the man who voted to deregulate Wall Street to the point it was able to pull the wool over investors' eyes and profit off of bad debt?
Pretty much.
Is he the man who called his wife a particularly derogatory term in public?
Sure is.
Is he the "maverick" who voted with George Bush 90% of the time?
The evidence is in the Congressional records.
Is he the man who acted at two debates like his opponent was not even in the room?
Obvious.
Is he the man who stood idly by as people made derogatory comments about his opponent at rallies, comments which smacked of racism?
Yes, but not anymore apparently.
Is he the candidate who is watching his poll numbers continue to slip and realizing that the end of the road for his chance is near?
Count on it.
Who is the real John McCain? The public may never really know.
Is he the Vietnam hero who survived 5 years at the Hanoi Hilton with the help of some friends?
He used to be.
Is he the man who came home from Vietnam, found out his wife had been disfigured in a horrible accident, and proceeded to cheat on her?
Most assuredly.
Is he the man who married a rich and beautiful woman to show he had not lost his naval aviator chops?
No doubt.
Is he the Senator who got mixed up with Charles Keating and ended up selling out his integrity and got away with it only because the Senate could not dredge up enough evidence to convict him of anything?
You be the judge.
Is he the man who voted to deregulate Wall Street to the point it was able to pull the wool over investors' eyes and profit off of bad debt?
Pretty much.
Is he the man who called his wife a particularly derogatory term in public?
Sure is.
Is he the "maverick" who voted with George Bush 90% of the time?
The evidence is in the Congressional records.
Is he the man who acted at two debates like his opponent was not even in the room?
Obvious.
Is he the man who stood idly by as people made derogatory comments about his opponent at rallies, comments which smacked of racism?
Yes, but not anymore apparently.
Is he the candidate who is watching his poll numbers continue to slip and realizing that the end of the road for his chance is near?
Count on it.
Who is the real John McCain? The public may never really know.
Thursday, October 9, 2008
Never Get Involved in a Land War in America
We have passed Presidential Debate 2: The Old Man Strikes Back, and it is becoming increasingly clear that John McCain is losing ground. Now, I am normally suspicious of what a poll actually says the numbers are (sample sizes are way too small and demographics are iffy at best), but I do watch the trends in the numbers, because on the whole, they are fairly accurate predictors. And the polls show Obama's numbers trending up and McCain's numbers trending down.
You can point to a lot of reasons for this. The sudden explosion of the economy was like the asteroid that pushed the dinosaurs to their doom. The bloom is off Sarah Palin's rose, as it became clear from the Vice Presidential debate that Katie Couric and Charlie Gibson could not have done much to make her look bad that she wasn't fully capable of all by herself. The attack ads that McCain's camp have launched have started to become darker and dirtier. McCain's treatment of Obama before, during, and after the debates was the subject of much scrutiny. Even some Republican pundits are beginning to see the warning signs.
This is not good if you are John McCain.
So now he presses the attack. He takes on Obama's character, rails about how we don't know who Obama is or what he thinks, that he's evasive when asked about his record, is lying and hopes that by repeating it often enough people will believe it.
In psychoanalysis, this is called projection -- projecting your own negative qualities onto others rather than identifying them with yourself.
This is also not good if you're John McCain.
Perhaps the most telling thing to happen of late is the appearance at McCain/Palin rallies of people who are decidedly racist. Not just that, but that when incidents occur at these rallies, they elicit no condemnation from the candidate.
It becomes increasingly clear that John McCain is trying to sell his political soul to get that seat in the Oval Office. He is no longer concerned with outward appearances -- he has beat the war drum of his service, his captivity, his maverick nature to the point of drowning out reason and sanity. He is a man acting as if he is owed a term as President of the United States, rather than having to earn it like everyone else has. He is now pandering to the lowest common denominator of the electorate, the seedy underbelly of politics -- those who fear a black man in the White House. By bringing up Obama's tenuous link to William Ayers, and thus by association linking Obama to terrorism, McCain has lost his last shred of decency.
This election is slowly turning into a new Civil War, a war between the status quo of power and privilege (McCain) and a new birth of freedom and democracy (Obama). Unlike the Civil War, where the battle lines were drawn starkly on the map, this battle for the heart and soul of the nation plays out on a constantly shifting field, where attack and counterattack, thrust and parry, underhanded deed and glorious battle are represented in a constant, whirling milieu. The colors shift and dance across the map, and in the end, in this amorphous atmosphere of desperation and hope, one side will triumph. But at what cost.
John McCain has begun the long slow plunge -- here's hoping he does not take the decency of the United States down with him.
You can point to a lot of reasons for this. The sudden explosion of the economy was like the asteroid that pushed the dinosaurs to their doom. The bloom is off Sarah Palin's rose, as it became clear from the Vice Presidential debate that Katie Couric and Charlie Gibson could not have done much to make her look bad that she wasn't fully capable of all by herself. The attack ads that McCain's camp have launched have started to become darker and dirtier. McCain's treatment of Obama before, during, and after the debates was the subject of much scrutiny. Even some Republican pundits are beginning to see the warning signs.
This is not good if you are John McCain.
So now he presses the attack. He takes on Obama's character, rails about how we don't know who Obama is or what he thinks, that he's evasive when asked about his record, is lying and hopes that by repeating it often enough people will believe it.
In psychoanalysis, this is called projection -- projecting your own negative qualities onto others rather than identifying them with yourself.
This is also not good if you're John McCain.
Perhaps the most telling thing to happen of late is the appearance at McCain/Palin rallies of people who are decidedly racist. Not just that, but that when incidents occur at these rallies, they elicit no condemnation from the candidate.
It becomes increasingly clear that John McCain is trying to sell his political soul to get that seat in the Oval Office. He is no longer concerned with outward appearances -- he has beat the war drum of his service, his captivity, his maverick nature to the point of drowning out reason and sanity. He is a man acting as if he is owed a term as President of the United States, rather than having to earn it like everyone else has. He is now pandering to the lowest common denominator of the electorate, the seedy underbelly of politics -- those who fear a black man in the White House. By bringing up Obama's tenuous link to William Ayers, and thus by association linking Obama to terrorism, McCain has lost his last shred of decency.
This election is slowly turning into a new Civil War, a war between the status quo of power and privilege (McCain) and a new birth of freedom and democracy (Obama). Unlike the Civil War, where the battle lines were drawn starkly on the map, this battle for the heart and soul of the nation plays out on a constantly shifting field, where attack and counterattack, thrust and parry, underhanded deed and glorious battle are represented in a constant, whirling milieu. The colors shift and dance across the map, and in the end, in this amorphous atmosphere of desperation and hope, one side will triumph. But at what cost.
John McCain has begun the long slow plunge -- here's hoping he does not take the decency of the United States down with him.
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Debate Prep
For all of you out there who feel like tonight (10/02) will be Sarah Palin's comeuppance as Republican Vice Presidential candidate, I have bad news for you: don't count on it. I know, I know, the interviews do not lie -- she is pretty clueless about things most of us have at least a passing knowledge of and is counting on her 10th grade debate skills to get her through. And it will be live -- no rocks to hide behind or Straight Talk Express to hop into and lock the door. Which is why she is being as well prepared as the McCain camp can make her.
And the preparation will probably pay off, if they concentrated not on what she would say but how she would say it. I think they might have programmed her to keep the answers simple and straight-forward and to not flounce around too much verbally if caught off-guard. There's literally no way they could pump enough foreign policy information into her to allow her to take on Joe Biden on even close to equal footing.
No, I see this as a less-is-more kind of debate, because as many of us know, Joe Biden has a gaffe problem of his own. I don't see him going at her tooth-and-nail the whole debate, but letting her stand there and talk, then get in and make his own cogent remarks. I think he will every so often needle her with something he knows she can't possibly pull out of her hairdo, but over all will not want to come off as being too aggressive. Biden stands to lose as much from this debate as Palin.
And in the end, I very much doubt, unless there is a major flub, that this debate will change much. Vice Presidential debates seldom do. They're pretty much having this debate to give the main contenders a breather and to generate new ad material. If Palin does poorly, it will be blamed on sunspots, the "liberal media," Vladimir Putin, anything but Palin herself. If she does well, she will do no more than match Biden, and as such won't look bad, but won't look overly impressive either, given that Joe won't be going after her full bore. I honestly think Joe Biden may just coast through this, to avoid being seen as attacking Palin "because she's a woman."
So look for it to be pretty boring, with occasional moments that will either make you scratch your head or laugh out loud. In the end, there will be no massive bump for either Obama or McCain, only a breather between the Wall Street meltdown and their next debate.
And the preparation will probably pay off, if they concentrated not on what she would say but how she would say it. I think they might have programmed her to keep the answers simple and straight-forward and to not flounce around too much verbally if caught off-guard. There's literally no way they could pump enough foreign policy information into her to allow her to take on Joe Biden on even close to equal footing.
No, I see this as a less-is-more kind of debate, because as many of us know, Joe Biden has a gaffe problem of his own. I don't see him going at her tooth-and-nail the whole debate, but letting her stand there and talk, then get in and make his own cogent remarks. I think he will every so often needle her with something he knows she can't possibly pull out of her hairdo, but over all will not want to come off as being too aggressive. Biden stands to lose as much from this debate as Palin.
And in the end, I very much doubt, unless there is a major flub, that this debate will change much. Vice Presidential debates seldom do. They're pretty much having this debate to give the main contenders a breather and to generate new ad material. If Palin does poorly, it will be blamed on sunspots, the "liberal media," Vladimir Putin, anything but Palin herself. If she does well, she will do no more than match Biden, and as such won't look bad, but won't look overly impressive either, given that Joe won't be going after her full bore. I honestly think Joe Biden may just coast through this, to avoid being seen as attacking Palin "because she's a woman."
So look for it to be pretty boring, with occasional moments that will either make you scratch your head or laugh out loud. In the end, there will be no massive bump for either Obama or McCain, only a breather between the Wall Street meltdown and their next debate.
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