US 2008 Presidential Campaign/Debate Discussion Thread - The Fifth Installment

[martha]

The funniest thing would be if Sting2 turned out to be right

Never underestimate the fickleness and the idiocy of America voters.

 

[Irvine511]

McCain is enjoying a grace period.

we'll see what happens in the general.

there's no question, he was, by far, the smartest GOP nominee out of that field.

 

[deep]

McCain is enjoying a grace period.

we'll see what happens in the general.

there's no question, he was, by far, the smartest GOP nominee out of that field.

huge learning curve from 2000
to now

I really believe that lobbyist / affair story was a plant

to get him to explode like he did on maria schriver in 2000

the whole rap on him,
that he is fly off the handle wacko
has been put to bed

 

[anitram]

McCain is enjoying a grace period.

If Obama had said this, people would be up in arms over his lack of foreign policy knowledge...

Sen. John McCain, traveling in the Middle East to promote his foreign policy expertise, misidentified in remarks Tuesday which broad category of Iraqi extremists are allegedly receiving support from Iran.

He said several times that Iran, a predominately Shiite country, was supplying the mostly Sunni militant group, al-Qaeda. In fact, officials have said they believe Iran is helping Shiite extremists in Iraq.

Speaking to reporters in Amman, the Jordanian capital, McCain said he and two Senate colleagues traveling with him continue to be concerned about Iranian operatives "taking al-Qaeda into Iran, training them and sending them back."

Pressed to elaborate, McCain said it was "common knowledge and has been reported in the media that al-Qaeda is going back into Iran and receiving training and are coming back into Iraq from Iran, that's well known. And it's unfortunate." A few moments later, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, standing just behind McCain, stepped forward and whispered in the presidential candidate's ear. McCain then said: "I'm sorry, the Iranians are training extremists, not al-Qaeda."

The mistake threatened to undermine McCain's argument that his decades of foreign policy experience make him the natural choice to lead a country at war with terrorists. In recent days, McCain has repeatedly said his intimate knowledge of foreign policy make him the best equipped to answer a phone ringing in the White House late at night.

 

[diamond]

there's no question, he was, by far, the smartest GOP nominee out of that field.

 

[Irvine511]

the whole rap on him,
that he is fly off the handle wacko
has been put to bed

i know people on the Hill who will tell you, in no uncertain terms, that he is wacko. and a press whore. and an asshole.

but as for the media narrative,

you might be correct.

but let's remember,

general elections are between two individuals. it's a choice that people make between two candidates. it's a direct comparison.

all GWB had to do in 2004 was beat John Kerry.

 

[Irvine511]

he was the only electable candidate out of that bunch.

 

[Irvine511]

If Obama had said this, people would be up in arms over his lack of foreign policy knowledge...

remember that market that McCain visited in early 2007, where he was trying to say how calm and lovely Iraq had become? and all the while he was wearing a bullet proof vest? it was very Dukakis-in-the-tank?

that same market was determined to be too unsafe for him to visit on this his most recent visit.

we have a long, long way to go before November.

McCain is out of the spotlight. this trip abroad is barely making news.

 

[deep]

but let's remember,

general elections are between two individuals. it's a choice that people make between two candidates.

we are in agreement
again

I have written in here many times
in November it will be
candidate A or B, only.

 

[deep]

Obama is also the only candidate who a majority of Americans -- roughly 60 percent -- say does not have the right experience to be president

That number is significantly higher than the 31 percent who say the same for McCain.

 

[Irvine511]

and, i'm sure we both agree, who had more "experience" than Dick Cheney and Don Rumsfeld?

 

[deep]

don't shoot the messenger, but what the

majority of Americans

think does have some impact on the outcome of the election.

 

[diamond]

he was the only electable candidate out of that bunch.

you said smartest.

rudy and mitt probably have 25-50 IQ points over McCain.

McCain, may perhaps have been the shrewdist, but not the smartest in the Republican field; although he appears is a tad quicker than Fred Thompson.


And he'll probably be shrewder than the eventual Democratic nominee and win the General, but not smarter than Obama, although saner than Hillary.

There you have it.

dbs

 

[MrsSpringsteen]

NY Daily News

During rally, Al Sharpton says he's keeping support for Obama quiet

By ADAM SERWER and MICHAEL SAUL
DAILY NEWS WRITERS

Wednesday, March 19th 2008, 4:00 AM

The Rev. Al Sharpton is backing Barack Obama, but he's made the strategic decision to keep his support quiet.

That's the message Sharpton delivered to his flock last Saturday as he boasted of talking to Obama "two or three times a week" - and insisted the Democratic front-runner knows the rev is in his camp.

"I said, 'I'm gonna do whatever I gotta do to help you. Hillary Clinton has never done nothing for us,'" said Sharpton, recounting a conversation with Obama for his followers at his group's weekly rally.

"'I won't either endorse you or not endorse you,'" Sharpton said he told the Illinois senator as the two made their way to a Nov. 29 dinner at Sylvia's Restaurant in Harlem. "'But I will tell you I can be freer not endorsing you to help you and everybody else.'"

According to Sharpton, Obama protested and asked for his public support. "'No, no, no. I want you to endorse,'" Sharpton recalled Obama saying.

Sharpton told Obama that it would be better strategically for him to remain publicly neutral.

"If I endorse you, and they jump on somebody in Jena, you're going to want me not to go because the press is going to ask you what about your supporter," Sharpton said.

"Negroes just [ask], 'What, what's Sharpton gonna do,'" he explained. "If you understand strategy, you get somewhere."

An endorsement from the controversial Sharpton is a double-edged sword, impressing some voters and driving others away.

Sharpton told the Daily News yesterday he has no plans to officially endorse Obama, but admitted he's "absolutely supportive" of his White House bid.

"If people got that impression on Saturday, that is the right impression," he crowed.

Sharpton said one of the reasons he has "started discussing my private feelings is because of the disappointment I've had in the public conduct of the Clinton campaign."

He specifically cited racially tinged statements from former President Bill Clinton, Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell and former vice presidential candidate Geraldine Ferraro as troubling.

Asked to explain his comment that Clinton had "done nothing for us," Sharpton said he was referring to his organization, the National Action Network, not the black community.

A spokesman for Clinton declined to comment, while an Obama spokesman refused to comment on private conversations with Sharpton.

 

[MrsSpringsteen]

Washington Post

John Murtha Endorses Hillary Clinton

By Anne E. Kornblut

LANCASTER, Pa. -- Rep. John P. Murtha has announced his endorsement of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, bringing his clout as a 17-term member of the House and a prominent anti-war Democrat to bear with more than a month until the primary here in his home state.

“Sen. Clinton is the candidate that will forge a consensus on health care, education, the economy, and the war in Iraq,” Murtha wrote in a statement about his decision.

Murtha, who represents the 12th district of Pennsylvania, near Pittsburgh, was an early and sometimes inflammatory critic of the Iraq war. As a retired Marine Corps colonel and the first combat veteran of Vietnam elected to serve in Congress, Murtha’s voice on Clinton’s behalf could prove especially valuable in both inoculating her from anti-war criticism and bolstering her claim that she is the most qualified to serve as commander-in-chief. That message is the backbone of Clinton’s appearances this week.

“Her experience and careful consideration of these issues convinced me that she is best qualified to lead our nation and to bring credibility back to the White House,” Murtha said. He said he “whole-heartedly” recommends Clinton to all voters in his state.

 

[deep]

If there were an election for President of the United States today, and the only two names on the ballot were Republican John McCain and ... Democrat Hillary Clinton, who would you vote for?

48% McCain
46% Clinton
6% Undecided



What if it was John McCain against Democrat Barack Obama?

53% McCain
39% Obama
9% Undecided

 

[deep]

Anderson Cooper:

“How badly do you think this has– has damaged you? Obviously you’ve been taking it very seriously over the last couple days. I mean, you’ve been very available to the media. You made this speech yesterday. How much has it hurt? ‘National Review online’ says, you know, bottom line, will the speech help you win white working-class voters?”



Sen. Barack Obama:

“Well, you– you know– one of the things I said early on in this campaign was if– if I was just running the textbook campaign– doing the conventional thing, I probably wasn’t gonna win because Senator Clinton was gonna be much more capable of doing that than I would be. We had tremendous success– and I think we were starting to get a little comfortable and conventional right before Texas and Ohio. And, you know, in– in some ways this– this controversy has actually shaken me up a little bit and gotten me back into remembering that– the odds of me getting elected have always been– lower than– than some of the other conventional candidates…”

what does Obama mean with this?

if I was just running the textbook campaign– doing the conventional thing,
I probably wasn’t gonna win because Senator Clinton was gonna be much more capable of doing that than I would be.

 

[U2DMfan]

I think he means that his broader appeal was linked to those who were tired of the same old slimey politics and that if it became a game of negative attacks, that he'd not fare as well.

Why? I think it's because he truly doesn't want to play that game and thought that he could inspire that change across demographics and it was working.

It was working until the skeleton arrived on the larger national front.

For as admirable as Obama is, he's just as much naiive or idealistic and unfortunately now, because of something largely beyond his control, he's almost inelectable.

If he rebounds from this, I'll be surprised. He's still the Dem nominee in almost all likelihood.

I can see it now, McCain ads full of flags waving and footage of him coming out of the plane returning from Vietnam contrasted with pictures of Obama and Wright arm in arm and clips of Obama saying he wouldn't cast him off (whatever term he used), finished off with a little old fashioned "WE INVENTED AIDS".

This is the political equivalent of box office poison.
Worst of the worst.
He could have said "cracker" 8,000 times and railed against White people nonstop and it wouldn't have stung near as bad as the anti-American stuff.

Obama's fault? No. But for a man who's stacked so much of his campaign on judgement, for being 'right' on day one, this sure makes that judgement look less than spectacular.

I'm a Hillary supporter but I don't take joy in this at all.
I always thought she was more electable because of what we didn't know about Obama. We knew this but I didn't think it would have played this big.

I think John McCain might very well be the next President but there is a long long long way to go.

Dukakis was up by about 15-20 points in late summer 1988 and got SMASHED. Of course that was a different time and ironically it was probably a negative ad that did him in.

Another irony is that Obama will likely face McCain.
Bad in that he's not going to pull much from the middle, not as mnay Reagan Dems but Good because McCain will run as 'clean' of a campaign as any Republican would. That might not say much.

 

[LarryMullen's POPAngel]

Hagel: US May Need New Political Party
ANNA JO BRATTON | March 20, 2008 06:17 AM EST |

OMAHA, Neb. — U.S. Sen. Chuck Hagel writes in a new book that the United States needs independent leadership and possibly another political party, while suggesting the Iraq war might be remembered as one of the five biggest blunders in history.

"In the current impasse, an independent candidate for the presidency, or a bipartisan unity ticket ... could be appealing to Americans," Hagel writes in "America: Our Next Chapter," due in stores Tuesday. The Associated Press obtained an advance copy.

The Nebraska Republican, who announced last year he wouldn't seek a third term or the GOP presidential nomination, had been widely mentioned as a running mate on an independent ticket with New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Bloomberg said last month he wouldn't run.

Hagel said that despite holding one of the Senate's strongest records of support for President Bush, his standing as a Republican has been called into question because of his opposition to what he deems "a reckless foreign policy ... that is divorced from a strategic context."

Hagel, who's been a harsh critic of the war since 2003, writes that the invasion of Iraq was "the triumph of the so-called neoconservative ideology, as well as Bush administration arrogance and incompetence."

The Vietnam veteran said he had hoped the lessons from that war would give the nation's leaders perspective before troops were sent to Iraq.

"To the astonishment of those of us who lived through the agony of Vietnam, these lessons were ignored in the run-up to the Iraq War," he writes.

Hagel said Vice President Dick Cheney and others "cherry-picked intelligence" and used fear to intensify "war sloganeering."

During visits to the Middle East in December 2002, Hagel said, Israel's top security officials asked, "Do you really understand what you are getting yourselves into?"

Hagel said Bush personally assured him that he would exhaust diplomatic avenues before committing troops to Iraq. The senator said he voted for the war resolution based on those assurances, but regrets the vote because it's now clear that lawmakers were presented with lies and wishful thinking.

Last year, Hagel was the only member of his party on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to support a nonbinding measure critical of Bush's decision to dispatch an additional 30,000 troops to Iraq.

"There is no strategy. This is a pingpong game with American lives," Hagel said at the time.


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/03/20/hagel-us-may-need-new-po_n_92512.html

 

[phanan]

I'm surprised Obama is taking such a beating lately.

And I've heard a lot of older people saying they won't vote for him.

The next few months are going to be very interesting.

 

[deep]

During visits to the Middle East in December 2002, Hagel said, Israel's top security officials asked, "Do you really understand what you are getting yourselves into?"

Hagel said Bush personally assured him that he would exhaust diplomatic avenues before committing troops to Iraq. The senator said he voted for the war resolution based on those assurances, but regrets the vote because it's now clear that lawmakers were presented with lies and wishful thinking.

Last year, Hagel was the only member of his party on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to support a nonbinding measure critical of Bush's decision to dispatch an additional 30,000 troops to Iraq.

"There is no strategy. This is a pingpong game with American lives," Hagel said at the time.


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/03/20/hagel-us-may-need-new-po_n_92512.html

Obama constantly uses Hagel

as someone he may include in his cabinet

to show that he is inclusive


well, Hagel verifies exactly what Hillary has always said,

she did not vote for
this Iraq war

but only to give the President the right to take action if it was warranted!

 

[MrsSpringsteen]

I'm surprised Obama is taking such a beating lately.

We build people up only to tear them down. Isn't that always the way? Of course the media has been fairly soft on him until now, so once that door was opened by them..

(AP)McCain aide suspended for relaying video

Republican John McCain's campaign suspended a staffer who sent out a provocative video linking Democratic presidential contender Barack Obama to the comments of his spiritual mentor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

The staffer, a low-level aide named Soren Dayton, sent out a link Thursday to the YouTube video, titled "Is Obama Wright?" on the social messaging Web site Twitter.

The campaign suspended him a few hours later, although it wouldn't say for how long.

"We have been very clear on the type of campaign we intend to run and this staffer acted in violation of our policy," campaign spokeswoman Jill Hazelbaker said. "He has been reprimanded by campaign leadership and suspended from the campaign."

Last month, McCain swiftly denounced the comments of a radio talk show host who, while introducing McCain, repeatedly called Obama by his middle name of Hussein.

The Politico, a Washington-based newspaper, reported that the two-minute video was the work of Lee Habeeb, a former producer of the Laura Ingraham Show, a conservative talk program. In the video, Wright's most incendiary remarks are mixed with snippets from Obama speeches and interviews, which are edited to make the senator seem to be sputtering and unpatriotic.

 

[deep]

[No message]

 

[U2democrat]

Big news day for the Obama camp, are we starting to see a turn from the beating over the last few weeks?

Richardson endorses Obama
Hispanic governor says presidential hopeful a 'once-in-a-lifetime leader'
The Associated Press
updated 9:02 a.m. ET, Fri., March. 21, 2008
SANTA FE, New Mexico - New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, the nation's only Hispanic governor, is endorsing Sen. Barack Obama for president, calling him a "once-in-a- lifetime leader" who can unite the nation and restore America's international leadership.

Richardson, who dropped out of the Democratic race in January, is to appear with Obama on Friday at a campaign event in Portland, Ore., The Associated Press has learned.

The governor's endorsement comes as Obama leads among delegates selected at primaries and caucuses but with national public opinion polling showing Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton pulling ahead of him amid controversy over statements by his former pastor.

Richardson has been relentlessly wooed by Obama and Clinton for his endorsement. As a Democratic superdelegate, the governor plays a part in the tight race for nominating votes and could bring other superdelegates to Obama's side. He also has been mentioned as a potential running mate for either candidate.

No primaries are scheduled until Pennsylvania's on April 22, a gap in time Obama hopes to use for such announcements to assert that he is the front-runner for the nomination.

'Once-in-a-lifetime leader'
"I believe he is the kind of once-in-a-lifetime leader that can bring our nation together and restore America's moral leadership in the world," Richardson said in a statement obtained by the AP. "As a presidential candidate, I know full well Sen. Obama's unique moral ability to inspire the American people to confront our urgent challenges at home and abroad in a spirit of bipartisanship and reconciliation."

Richardson's endorsement also could help Obama pick up support among Hispanics, who are the nation's largest and fastest-growing minority.

Clinton has been the favorite of Hispanics in primaries and caucuses, according to exit polls. She won the New Mexico caucus in early February with a nearly 2-to-1 advantage among Hispanics.

Richardson backed Obama despite his ties to Clinton and her husband, the former president. He served as ambassador to the U.N. and as secretary of the Energy Department during the Clinton administration. Last month, Richardson and former President Clinton watched the Super Bowl together at the governor's residence in Santa Fe.

Clinton a 'distinguished leader'
Richardson praised Hillary Clinton as a "distinguished leader with vast experience." But the governor said Obama "will be a historic and great president, who can bring us the change we so desperately need by bringing us together as a nation here at home and with our allies abroad."

Richardson was a roving diplomatic troubleshooter when he was a congressman from New Mexico, negotiating the release of U.S. hostages in several countries and meeting with a rogue's gallery of U.S. adversaries, including Saddam Hussein and Fidel Castro.


"There is no doubt in my mind that Barack Obama has the judgment and courage we need in a commander in chief when our nation's security is on the line. He showed this judgment by opposing the Iraq war from the start, and he has show it during this campaign by standing up for a new era in American leadership internationally," Richardson said.

Obama said he was "deeply honored" to have Richardson's support.

"Whether it's fighting to end the Iraq war or stop the genocide in Darfur or prevent nuclear weapons from falling into the hands of terrorists, Gov. Richardson has been a powerful voice on issues of global security, peace and justice, earning five Nobel Peace Prize nominations," Obama said in a statement.



© 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23740104/

And potentially more explosive:

2 fired over Obama passport breach
Third employee at State disciplined over accessing candidate’s records
NBC News and news services
updated 9:19 a.m. ET, Fri., March. 21, 2008
The State Department says it is trying to determine whether three contract workers had a political motive for looking at Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama's passport file.

Two of the employees were fired for the security breach and the third was disciplined but is still working, the department said Thursday night. It would not release the names of those who were fired and disciplined or the names of the two companies for which they worked. The department's inspector general is investigating.

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said that for now it appears that nothing other than "imprudent curiosity" was involved in three separate breaches of the Illinois senator's personal information, "but we are taking steps to reassure ourselves that that is, in fact, the case."

'Outrageous breach of security'
It is not clear whether the employees saw anything other than the basic personal data such as name, citizenship, age and place of birth that is required when a person fills out a passport application.

Bill Burton, a spokesman for Obama's presidential campaign, called for a complete investigation.

"This is an outrageous breach of security and privacy, even from an administration that has shown little regard for either over the last eight years," Burton said. "Our government's duty is to protect the private information of the American people, not use it for political purposes."

"This is a serious matter that merits a complete investigation, and we demand to know who looked at Senator Obama's passport file, for what purpose and why it took so long for them to reveal this security breach," he said.

Dealt with at the office level
The breaches occurred on Jan. 9, Feb. 21 and March 14 and were detected by internal State Department computer checks, McCormack said. The department's top management officer, Undersecretary Patrick Kennedy, said certain records, including those of high-profile people, are "flagged" with a computer tag that tips off supervisors when someone tries to view the records without a proper reason.

The firings and unspecified discipline of the third employee already had occurred when senior State Department officials learned of the breaches. Kennedy called that a failing.

"I will fully acknowledge this information should have been passed up the line," Kennedy told reporters in a conference call Thursday night. "It was dealt with at the office level."

In answer to a question, Kennedy said the department doesn't look into political affiliation in doing background checks on passport workers. "Now that this has arisen, this becomes a germane question, and that will be something for the appropriate investigation to look into," he said.

The department informed Obama's Senate office of the breach on Thursday. Kennedy said that at the office's request, he will provide a personal briefing for the senator's staff on Friday. No one from the State Department spoke to Obama personally on Thursday, the officials said.

Obama was born in Hawaii and lived in Indonesia for several years as a child before returning to the United States. As a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, he has traveled to the Middle East; the former Soviet states with Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind.; and Africa, where in 2006 he and his wife, Michelle, publicly took HIV tests in Kenya to encourage people there to do the same.

Obama's father was born in Kenya, and the senator still has relatives there.

Previous incident
The disclosure of inappropriate passport inquiries recalled an incident in 1992, when a Republican political appointee at the State Department was demoted over a search of presidential candidate Bill Clinton's passport records. At the time he was challenging President George H.W. Bush.

The State Department's inspector general said the official had helped arrange the search in an attempt to find politically damaging information about Clinton, who had been rumored to have considered renouncing his citizenship to avoid the Vietnam War draft.

The State Department said the official, Steven Berry, had shown "serious lapses in judgment."

After a three-year, $2.2 million probe, a federal independent counsel exonerated officials in the incident, saying that while some of the actions investigated were "stupid, dumb and partisan," they were not criminal. The independent counsel also said that Berry and others who were disciplined for their involvement were treated unfairly.

Doug Hattaway, a spokesman for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, the former first lady who is challenging Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination, said of the current breach: "It's outrageous and the Bush administration has to get to the bottom of it."


Kennedy and McCormack said it was too soon to say whether a crime was committed. The searches may violate the federal Privacy Act, and Kennedy said he is consulting State Department lawyers.

The State Department inspector general's power is limited because two of the employees are no longer working for the department. McCormack said it was premature to consider whether the FBI or Justice Department should be involved.

McCormack said Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was informed of the breaches on Thursday.



The Associated Press contributed to this report.
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23736254/

 

[deep]

Even with a re-vote in Florida and Michigan

I believe Obama likely would have the most delegates

So why not have a vote?

Clinton: Legitimacy of nominee at stake

Posted: Thursday, March 20, 2008 2:45 PM by Mark Murray


From NBC/NJ's Athena Jones
TERRE HAUTE, IN -- Clinton kept the pressure on Obama for another day, urging him to sign on to a re-vote in Michigan and saying not re-doing primaries there and in Florida would call into question the legitimacy of the ultimate nominee.

"I went to Michigan yesterday because I feel so strongly that it is not in the best interests of our party or our chances for victory in November to deny the rights of the people of Florida and Michigan. I do not see how two of our largest and most significant states can be disenfranchised and left out of the process of picking our nominee without raising serious questions about the legitimacy of that nominee," she told reporters after a roundtable at a diner. "So again I would call on Sen. Obama to join me in supporting the rights of the people of Michigan and Florida to have their voices and their votes counted."

She said she would support finding a way to seat the two states' delegates regardless of the outcome. "I would be in favor of fixing this problem no matter what my position," she said. "I have been consistently in favor of it. Remember, I'm the one who kept my name on the ballot. I had no idea what the outcome would be. I did not run advertising in Florida. I abided by the rules and did not campaign in Florida. I didn't know what the outcome would be."

Clinton suggested Obama was afraid to have a re-vote. "For the life of me, I don't understand why Sen. Obama seems to be afraid of letting there be a re-vote in Michigan," she said.

 

[diamond]

Are all these not birds of a feather?:

Dysfunctionality at it's finest; the *hopefully* new accepted norm in America -NOT.

dbs

 

[Irvine511]

^ either no one put any thought whatsoever behind that post,

or it's art.

 

[diamond]

I see 3 psychologically abused spouses; one has moved forward; another is stilled trapped in a her relationship; and one has sacrificed her dignity in a quest for power, inadvertently making her gender tolerate more of the same; therefore universally amd unwittingly bringing her gender down.

In all, all 3 have been abused in one way or another.

dbs

 

[Irvine511]

I see 3 psychologically abused spouses; one has moved forward; another is stilled trapped in a her relationship; and one has sacrificed her dignity in a quest for power, inadvertently making her gender tolerate more of the same; therefore universally amd unwittingly bringing her gender down.

In all, all 3 have been abused in one way or another.

dbs

you know that James Gandolfini and Edie Falco are actors, right?

 

[diamond]

not relevant.