McCain is out with his first ad post-Obama's clinching of the Democratic presidential nomination, and it's a strange one.
I don't just mean in terms of substance, although it's a bit strange in that he seems to be taking a shot at George Bush more than anyone else in the ad.
But just in terms of presentation, you have to wonder what the McCain camp was thinking when they released this ad:
Lou Cannon had a very interesting op/ed in the Washington Post yesterday about the dynamics of the GOP primary race in 1976, where Ronald Reagan challenged President Ford, possibly leading to Ford's defeat, and laying the groundwork for his own nomination/election 4 years later, and the parallels that race has to the 2008 Democratic nomination primary race.
It's an inexact comparison for a number of reasons, but there are two major points on which this year's Obama/Clinton race eerily recall those circumstances. Since I haven't seen this article diaried (I'm not a fan of the DKos search feature), I thought I'd toss it out there for your perusal.
(edited: original title was "Broken! Ted kenne....oh never mind...", which was intended as a comment, as I thought I pointed out below, about how we all rush to share the news of the day with our fellow DKos types....but as commenters have pointed out, it comes off as insensitive. I'm the son of a melanoma survivor, so believe me, mocking Kennedy was not my intent. Maybe if i'd put "Broken! Ted Kennedy has canc...oh, never mind" it would have worked better....but maybe not. In some people's minds, I am now the a-hole who made fun of Ted Kennedy's cancer. Furthest from the truth, but....so goes the internet. Took TK's name out of the title...)
In a snarky mood today in general, the last day of the 32nd year of my life....wait, how does that work again? Actually, it is the last day of my 33rd year of life....but it's besides the point, so never mind. But then again I don't really have a point, other than to point out the sense of community engendered by DKos wherein we hear a bit of news, whether it be cool or tragic, as in today's word of Senator Ted Kennedy's brain tumor (a PSA, just in case you missed the other, oh, probably 8 diaries by now that have mentioned it), and we want to share it, and the first thought is to check in on this site and post the news.
And I’m not talking about a certain Canadian band which happens to be my favorite band. I’m talking about the bloviating painkiller addicted gasbag, Rush Limbaugh. See, the last time I was in my car, I was listening to the Wisconsin Badgers play hockey against their arch-rival Minnesota Golden Gophers on 1310 AM here in Madison. When I climbed into my vehicle at 11 AM today, that station was just launching into Limbaugh’s show, a recap of high(?)lights from the week past.
I reached for the radio instinctively, but I stayed my hand for some reason, maybe a desire to get a fair and balanced (HAH!) perspective on politics or whatever. About a minute in, I wished I’d indeed changed the station, as a reference to the ‘Democrat Party’ burned my ears. But I kept listening, and by the time I got to work, I was glad I had. For what I heard, rather than the usual infuriating blend of idiocies and half-informed and misleading blathering, Limbaugh was unusually focused this day. But instead of targeting libruls and Democrats, his ire for the most part was directed towards other (as he put it, pseudo-) conservatives.
In terms of the 2008 Democratic Presidential Primaries, the question must be asked: What happens if Mississippi fails to sort out who will represent the Democratic Party in the November general election on the lines devoted to the Presidential contest?
The reason I ask about Mississippi, specifically, and not one of the various states voting on Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious Tuesday’s megabonanza political wankfest primary day is born out of a glance at the primary calendar. Before Mississippi, there’s a plethora of voting opportunities in various states, and they will come fast and furious, offering a thousand opportunities for spin and re-spin, analysis and meta-analysis. In all likelihood, the Democratic nominee will be known by the time Mississippians get their crack at the ballot box on March 11, 2008. But, there’s another possibility there, one where the identity of who will carry the (D) next to their name is still unknown after that date. What then?
This is not a diary supporting or trying to slam any particular candidate. I’m an Obama supporter, but in writing this, I don’t mean for it to be seen or used as an argument for his nomination. Instead, I thought I might try a snap look into a future in which the candidates for the American Presidency for BOTH major political parties might not necessarily be the ones supported by the true believers in either wing of the body political.
If you will, please follow me into a November 2008 featuring a tussle between Hillary Clinton and John McCain.
However you like it, I just figured I’d fire up the Great Orange Satan today and find multiple paeans to the start of the last year of the madness of King George III (works if you count Mr. Washington). But other than a few comments in the open thread, I didn’t see any such items (watch someone sneak one in while I'm scribbling this out).
I’ve been out of the loop the last few days, so maybe everyone’s expressed their excitement about the idea, maybe they’ve already discussed their ideas for the 1/19/09 parties, or maybe it’s just been a orgy of whatever kind of internecine nastiness seems to be referred to in multiple diaries this morning. Either way, it’s a "Deserves to be explicitly noted" date, and as such, I am duly noting it.
A couple of weeks ago, Howard Kurtz put a piece up on the Washington Post web site talking about how inaccessible Hillary Clinton is to the national press reporters and journalists tailing her campaign. Reading though it, I had a couple of mixed emotions running through my head, and I thought I’d throw them out here, and let you folks help me sort them out. The nutshell version of this dilemma is a basic one: By employing a variation on the old, "bypass the press and speak directly to the people," strategy, is Hillary doing herself a favor in terms of getting her message out to local outlets, unfiltered by said national press/punditry, or setting herself up for a difficult campaign where she gets to face not only her Democratic (and potentially GOP) opponents, but a hostile press angered by an aloof candidate?
So, ol' Joementum, he of the negative loyalty ratings (in our minds, if not by any special interest groups' scorecard), went and endorsed John McCain for President. So not only is he siding with Republicans on the most visible matters of the day, and not only does he have basically no interest in doing his job, he's actually going out and actively supporting a GOP candidate for president. So why not show him the door out of the Democratic and Democratic-leaning congressional caucus, perhaps with a gentle boot to the backside on his way out that door?
This is totally off the cuff, so I'm not claiming to have put much thought into this, and it could well be a crock upon further review, but...
The AP put out a story earlier today about how John McCain will "respect" Hillary Clinton, and not go after her on a personal level the way Rudy Guiliani and Mitt Romney are supposedly doing. Of course, this follows on the heel of the 'bitch' question that he just laughed off, and then fundraised upon following legitimate criticism, just last week, so how well he follows through on this pledge remains to be seen.
But the most interesting part of the piece comes towards the end, when the writer relates a story about an audience member who questioned one of McCain's assertions about Iranian President Ahmadinejad. McCain's original comment, as well as his response to the questioner, reveal a dangerous and short-sighted ignorance about topics which will be central to the Presidential race, as well as the next President's foreign policy.
I use the word greats in quotes because Exhibit 1 contains the likes of of Saddam Hussein, who died in close conjunction with the likes of James Brown and former President Gerald Ford. So perhaps "notables" would be a more appropriate word here, so as not to become an exhibit on an unhinged right wing site.
Be that as it may, today, July 30, 2007 saw the passing of a trio of folks who do qualify, each in their own way, as greats of the 20th Century.
Join me after the fold, as I celebrate briefly the lives and accomplishments of Bill Walsh, Ingmar Bergman, and Tom Snyder.
Troy Davis may well be executed on Tuesday, despite the fact that 3 of 4 witnesses against him at his trial for allegedly shooting an off-duty police office have signed statements that say they were wrong about the shooter's identification, and others who testified to hearing Davis confess now say they lied about it under police pressure.
Christmas morning was going well enough, until I got the paper out of its little orange bag and got a look at the top, above the fold headline. Apparently, while no one was looking, the 109th Congress had been fulfilling some of its investigatory duties after all. But, why, might you ask, would that put a damper on Christmas? Isn’t that a good thing?
It would be, had the investigation subject been, say, no-bid Iraq contracts, or flimsy excuses for war. Instead, while we weren’t looking, Dana Rohrabacher and his band of merry men on the The House International Relations investigative subcommittee were steadily pursuing the case of the performance of the FBI and Department of Justice in the wake of the Oklahoma City bombing.
