What's McCain's Plan C?

Plan A was emphasizing McCain's experience and dedication to putting "country first."

And Plan B is insinuating that Obama is a dangerous foreigner who wants to see America go down in flames.

But Plan B seems to be going worse than Plan A as the polls and prediction markets just keep tilting further in Obama's favor. That might change. Maybe the vile smears will work. But it doesn't look as though they will.

Here's a snapshot of the IEM today:



And Pollster.com now has 320 electoral votes in Obama's column, 163 in McCain's, and 55 as toss-ups--270 are required to win.

So what's Plan C? It seems the McCain campaign either has to go back to Plan A and just resign themselves to a moderately graceful defeat or just dive headlong into a fully cracked-out, steroid-infused version of Plan B where they give up on insinuation and openly accuse Obama of being a closet Muslim and terrorist sympathizer.

Honestly, at this point, I wouldn't be too surprised either way.

Palin addresses the Couric interview in FL

With a backdrop of a human American flag, Sarah Palin talks to a rally today about the Couric interview.



Not only does Palin refer to Couric as "kinda mainstream media", but the crowd boos Couric. A very odd sequence of events. Palin claims the poor interview was due to impatience with the questions that were not addressing the real issues America wants to hear about.

Religion + Politics = Disaster

As the electoral college landscape keeps getting bleaker for McCain and Palin, their campaign has decided to attempt to revive the Bill Ayers and Jeremiah Wright angles of attack against Obama.

By no means do I defend Wright and his furious craziness, which can be seen here:


(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=36T1fnIafC0)

But McCain and Palin have their own ties to cracked-out religious leaders.

John Hagee is one example:


(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qNi7tPanUA)

And Rod Parsley is another:


(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXZbIGJrDkg)

McCain, as Obama did with Wright, has repudiated these embarrassing nut-jobs. But he was more than happy to accept their endorsements when he thought it would get him votes. In any case, at least neither McCain nor Obama were in attendance at these people's churches when the idiotic statements in question were made.

However, the same cannot be said of Palin and the bat-shit-insane pastor she's associated with. Of course, her church is pretty bizarre overall anyway.

Here's a video of witch-hunting pastor Thomas Muthee blessing Sarah Palin and her political career to protect her from those pesky witch attacks--he then goes on to describe how fundamentalists need to take over every aspect of American society:


(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAWM7E_WMfo)

So what I take away from this is that far too many American politicians are cozy with crazy-ass religious figures. Seriously, can we please elect an atheist or agnostic one of these days? Please?

Also, I highly recommend Bill Maher's new anti-religion movie Religulous. The Daily Iowan's glowing review can be found here.

Keating Economics

Here's the whole video the Obama campaign released a couple of hours ago:


(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IDofbll86dY)

The use of online video and issue or even scandal-specific campaign sites has really only gotten going this election cycle. I'm quite interested to see how these tools evolve by 2012. But I'm definitely looking forward to at least a brief break in the campaigning before then.

Like a Rolling Stone

Rolling Stone issue 1063 - hitting news stands on October 16th - takes on "Country First" maverick John McCain like he's a corporate sellout punk band. The article can be found here if you want to read it before it rolls off the presses.

The video short on the McCain myths is a CliffsNotes version of the 10 page web article. The article mainly cites military officials, former POWs, GOP members, and McCain's own memoirs.

You said you'd never compromise
With the mystery tramp, but now you realize
He's not selling any alibis
As you stare into the vacuum of his eyes
And ask him do you want to make a deal?
--Like a Rolling Stone by Bob Dylan

McCain's new "Dangerous Ad"

From Politico's Mike Allen on August 14, 2007:

Senator Obama's campaign provides the entire quote, and underscores that he was talking about Afghanistan: 'So we've gotta get the job done there [in Afghanistan]. And that requires us to have enough troops that we're not just air raiding villages and killing civilians which is causing enormous problems there. It means that we have enough civilian support, agricultural specialists, people who are engineers, people who are building schools and so forth to help the Afghani government do a better job of delivering on behalf of its people.'

McCain Flashes Knife, Obama Pulls Gun

Politico.com reports:

Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) on Monday will launch a multimedia campaign to draw attention to the involvement of Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) in the “Keating Five” savings-and-loan scandal of 1989-91, which blemished McCain’s public image and set him on his course as a self-styled reformer.

Retaliating for what it calls McCain's “guilt-by-association” tactics, the Obama campaign is e-mailing millions of supporters a link to a website, KeatingEconomics.com, which will have a 13-minute documentary on the scandal beginning at noon Eastern time on Monday. The overnight e-mails urge recipients to pass the link on to friends.

Here's the preview:


(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qsI_0bV2CZo)

As I've been saying for some time, Obama's no wilting flower. He's a vicious political fighter hardened in Chicago-style combat. One would have thought McCain's campaign would have learned this from watching what happened to the Clintons and their machine, but apparently not. Now they're learning it the hard way.

Not Everyone Should Vote

Will Wilkinson and Jason Brennan discuss why some people shouldn't vote:


(http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/14923?in=00:00&out=63:43)

Pakistanis back McCain; Afghans lean Obama

The Agence-France Presse ("AFP") reports that much like the American public, Afghans and Pakistanis are largely divided over their support for Barack Obama or John McCain. While neither believe much will change in U.S. foreign policy when a new administration takes office next year, Pakistanis favor McCain and Afghans prefer Obama. The split stems from Obama's recent debate comments regarding a tough stance on Pakistan's harboring of extremists, although Palin's recent comments seem to have gone unnoticed. Afghans applaud Obama's hard stance on Pakistan and focus on the origin of extremism in the region, while Pakistanis understandably hope to avoid military operations in their country.

"One candidate is African (-American), who is not only against Pakistan but all Muslims. The second is white, about him we can only hope that might be a little bit better."

The right-wing talk radio and blogging nation would be shocked to hear that Obama is not an Arab; moreover, that he is against the entire umma rather than a Muslim interloper trying to destroy our Christian nation. It's only a matter of time until Obama is portrayed not as the Messiah (read: Antichrist?) by his opponents, but as just another Zionist-Crusader enemy of the jihadi Islamists. Just because your middle name is Hussein, doesn't mean that extremists won't murder you simply because you were born an American.

Guilt by Association

Evidently, when the "gloves come off" the McCain/Palin ticket, the renewed charges of "terrorist" association by Obama are the equivalent of body shots. The Republican spin machine has Palin proclaiming Barack doesn't "see America like we see America; we see America as a force for good in this world," to audiences in Colorado and California despite the only connection between Bill Ayers and Barack Obama is that they sat together on a charity board from 1999-2002. As the polls show Obama and Biden pulling away, the Republicans hope to wear down the Democrats by offering body shot after body shot of pseudo-issues and red herring talking points.

Palin has the gall to stand in front of a sign that says "Country First" as she spreads lies and attenuated counterpoints in an effort to get into the White House and further her own personal political ambitions. Nothing says "I value America more than my career" like a campaign of spreading naked lies, hate, and arguments that were debunked when the Clinton spin-machine argued them six months ago.

The 2008 Presidential Tickets As Trains

(Via Bleeding Heartland.)

Apparently, Pornography Is Worse Than Torture

Glenn Greenwald reports:

On Friday in Tampa, Florida, Paul F. Little was sentenced by a federal judge to 3 years and 10 months in a federal prison after being convicted of the grave and terrible crime of distributing pornography "over the Internet and through the mail" -- films featuring only consenting adults and distributed only to those consenting adults who chose to purchase them.

...

Because the films which Little produced included scenes involving sadomasochism, the Bush DOJ alleged, and the federal court found, that the films were not merely pornographic, but also "obscene," and thus illegal (Little's lawyers argued, unsuccessfully, they were intended primarily for distribution in Europe, where such films are legal). Ironically, Little's defense to the obscenity charges was quite similar to the defense which the Bush DOJ itself, years earlier, had embraced in order to claim that Bush officials were not engaged in "torture" when subjecting helpless detainees to gruesome treatment: namely, because the acts in question didn't involve the infliction of severe pain, they weren't illegal.

...

So, to recap, in the Land of the Free: if you're an adult who produces a film using other consenting adults, for the entertainment of still other consenting adults, which merely depicts fictional acts of humiliation and degradation, the DOJ will prosecute you and send you to prison for years. The claim that no real pain was inflicted will be rejected; mere humiliation is enough to make you a criminal. But if government officials actually subject helpless detainees in their custody to extreme mental abuse, degradation, humiliation and even mock executions long considered "torture" in the entire civilized world, the DOJ will argue that they have acted with perfect legality and, just to be sure, Congress will hand them retroactive immunity for their conduct. That's how we prioritize criminality and arrange our value system.

Is this the day?

Are we going to wake up November 7th and look back at today as the day the wheels completely came off the straight talk express?

We've had an Obama/McCain debate, now it's time for the hockey mom and the punchy old statesman to have at it. It's possible Palin may have a decent outing, seeing as expectations are so incredibly low, it might not take much to salvage a modicum of respect. On the other hand, it's also very much more likely that that modicum will be so much smudge and detritus smeared all over the heel of Joe Biden's shoe.

Palin needs to stick to substantive policy points and avoid discussing her history in Alaska or her (not so) extensive knowledge of Supreme Court decisions. She needs to stay away from talk about foreign leaders (there are others besides Putin, evidently) and dodge questions regarding the bridge to nowhere. She should brush past any personal attacks and leave be any questioning by Biden that she's incredibly underqualified and thinks about as well on her feet as Bush on acid in a dark room filled with mousetraps.

She should just not go, actually. That'd be easier.

Then again, there's a reason why they have these things. We'll see how it plays out.

Now Something Funnier and Less Horrible: Lil' O'Reilly

(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-teM03FPUow)

(Via Slog.)

"The Horror, the Horror"

(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NrzXLYA_e6E)