The Presidential Race 08

[Majikku]

If you support Obama, you are a Muslim. Duh.

lol of course!
What are you doing for Ramadan Mort?

[Darkbeer]

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com...ndorse-mccain/

Lynn Forester de Rothschild, a prominent Hillary Clinton supporter and member of the Democratic National Committee’s Platform Committee, will endorse John McCain for president on Wednesday, her spokesman tells CNN.

The announcement will take place at a news conference on Capitol Hill, just blocks away from the DNC headquarters. Forester will “campaign and help him through the election,” the spokesman said of her plans to help the Republican presidential nominee.

Forester was a major donor for Clinton earning her the title as a Hillraiser for helping to raise at least $100,000 for the New York Democratic senator’s failed presidential bid.

In an interview with CNN this summer, Forester did not hide her distaste for eventual Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama.

“This is a hard decision for me personally because frankly I don't like him,” she said of Obama in an interview with CNN’s Joe Johns. “I feel like he is an elitist. I feel like he has not given me reason to trust him.”

[cinder]

I'm just saying go ahead and link. Just don't post links without some commentary from you! Otherwise it's boring information we can search anywhere for.. I think we all know how to search the internet.

Great words, Mort. Hint, hint, hint.

[Mortimer]

Well, the Palin bounce has officially ended as more and more inquiries on her lack of experience and questionable character take effect. I think McCain's outright lies about Obama and negative attack ads are starting to effect him as well.

Obama is back on top in the polls...

http://www.gallup.com/poll/110446/Ga...McCain-45.aspx

[Chavez Ravine]

Well, the Palin bounce has officially ended as more and more inquiries on her lack of experience and questionable character take effect. I think McCain's outright lies about Obama and negative attack ads are starting to effect him as well.

Obama is back on top in the polls...

I think the McCain attacks have been the bigger effect.

Ultimately the election does come down to McCain v. Obama. Palin's effect will diminish as we get closer to the election.

[Sir_Cliff]

McCain does seem to have run a pretty grubby campaign and I do think that the increasing questions about Sarah Palin will matter. More importantly, though, the economy is beginning to come back into play as perhaps the big issue of campaign. If it continues to remain the big issue then I really think McCain has given the Obama/Biden ticket the gift of appearing the most grounded and able team to handle the issue by appointing Palin as his running mate with the circus that has ensued.

[Chavez Ravine]

Since the conventions I don't think either side has run a particularly efficent campaign. Before the convention I thought this would be a fairly clean campaign since it ties into the message of change. My feeling is that America doesn't want a partisan dirty campaign. I think it hurt Obama when he was going after Palin directly after the campaign and I think it's hurting McCain now.

However, both campaigns have been slow to get on the economy issue ultimately I think it's because neither side is knows what to do other than point fingers and yell we need to change. I thought McCain was running a brilliant campaign but I feel he's slipped in the past 10 days. His attacks on Obama have been too frequent and largely baseless. The "lipstick" comment I think could have stuck if it was by itself but with all the other attacks it became obvious that this is just one of many. Sometimes less is more. It's ironic that I felt that Obama made that same mistake against Palin and it cost him (temporarily).

Anyway, both candidates don't know what to do with the economy. Maybe that's ok, In reality I don't really think the president has much blame in it. Congress could take some blame...maybe but the problem really is based in corporate greed and the "keeping up with the jones" consumers.

At this point in time, Romney would have been a very strong candidate for the Reps. Even the 3rd party candidate would have been great, Ross Perot with his charts and economic doom forecast would have played very well to our current state.

[Lacrosse Boy]

I do think that the increasing questions about Sarah Palin will matter.

At this point, I am confused about what the increasing questions are? They seem to be silly attacks.

That her daughter is unmarried and pregnant?
That her son smokes weed?
That Palin was only chosen because she's a woman?
That she's pro life?
That she's pro gun?
That she's pro drilling?
That she's pro tax cuts?
That she's pro God?
That she's inexperienced?

All the media hysteria around Palin are about scandals, fit for printing along with Nemo's National Enquirer posting.

Palin actually gave a reason for conservatives to choose the McCain ticket: because she's conservative!

I don't even see the controversy when she said "In what respect" to the question about the Bush Doctrine. That was a logical question to ask, as he was purposely ambiguous on such a broad topic.

[Sir_Cliff]

However, both campaigns have been slow to get on the economy issue ultimately I think it's because neither side is knows what to do other than point fingers and yell we need to change. I thought McCain was running a brilliant campaign but I feel he's slipped in the past 10 days. His attacks on Obama have been too frequent and largely baseless. The "lipstick" comment I think could have stuck if it was by itself but with all the other attacks it became obvious that this is just one of many. Sometimes less is more. It's ironic that I felt that Obama made that same mistake against Palin and it cost him (temporarily).

Yes, Obama seemed to be doing quite well immediately after the convention by highlighting how little attention the Republicans paid to the economy but then seemed to get sidetracked. To be honest, though, I think that if the economy is what is most on people's minds when they go to vote it will be Obama who wins. McCain seems to have the hardest time putting out a clear message on what he would do differently in terms of economic policy going forward.

At this point, I am confused about what the increasing questions are? They seem to be silly attacks.

That her daughter is unmarried and pregnant?
That her son smokes weed?
That Palin was only chosen because she's a woman?
That she's pro life?
That she's pro gun?
That she's pro drilling?
That she's pro tax cuts?
That she's pro God?
That she's inexperienced?

I'll give you the last one, but what I was referring to were the questions about her hiring and firing practices as governor and mayor in Alaska. This is the problem with picking a virtual unknown who hasn't been (to use one of the most over-used phrases of the campaign) properly vetted. Now everyone is finding out about every questionable move she's made in her entire career during the last 7 weeks of the campaign. There's even an ongoing investigation into the firing of a state trooper that Republicans are obviously worried about as they're working hard to discredit and halt it.

She has the social conservatives. For everyone else, people don't have much time to make up their mind as to what they think of all of these claims that are now emerging. Whether true or not, they make it look as though she's running her own old boys network up in Alaska which nullifies her main appeal to independents and Democrats as someone who will change how Washington works.

[club33az]

Anyway, both candidates don't know what to do with the economy. Maybe that's ok, In reality I don't really think the president has much blame in it. Congress could take some blame...maybe but the problem really is based in corporate greed and the "keeping up with the jones" consumers.

Unless the President can jump us ahead in time to say a year from now, there's nothing any President can do. The thing that drives me mental is that when the economy does come around and is good again (and it will), whoever the President is will get the credit for it and you'll be sure to see it in his re-election campaign. Even though he had zero to do with the recovery.
That's why, when anyone asks what did Bill Clinton do that was so terrific, they invariably point to "He presided over one of the biggest economic expansions in U.S. history." Um, yeah, that was called the "dot com" revolution. It had ZERO to do with who was President at the time. But I really do wonder why he didn't get the blame when the balloon popped.