- In a similar vein: Oy vey. Turns out a group known as The Republican Jewish Coalition conducted a survey that targeted older Jews and peppered them with questions like the following:
Would it affect your vote if you knew that Obama has had a decade long relationship with pro-Palestinian leaders in Chicago?
...the leader of Hamas, Ahmed Yousef, expressed support for Obama and his hope for Obama's victory?
...the church Barack Obama has attended is known for its anti-Israel and anti-American remarks?
It is groups like this that are responsible for the hard-to-dispel-from-the-minds-of-intractable-middle-state-voter memes like "Obama is a Muslim, he will be sworn in on the Q'uran." This poll is targeting Jews in Florida, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Michigan.
- 527 ads came out swinging today (527s are political groups that do not have fundraising limits placed on them, and don’t have to adhere to Federal Election Commission rules; Swift Boat Vets for Truth and Move On are a couple of 527 groups, for example). Two ads in particular, from both sides of the chasm, are garnering attention: Born Alive Truth’s ad on Obama’s abortion record, and Move On’s attack-style ad pointing out that McCain has surrounded himself with lobbyists.
- An update on JJ’s entry regarding voter suppression in Michigan: Obama and the Democrats are filing an injunction that will prevent the GOP from challenging the registrations from voters whose homes have been foreclosed. Republicans countercharge that this is nothing but a diversionary tactic, natch.
- A look at the Huffington Post’s front page offers a remarkable sight, one that this political junkie still can’t believe has actually happened: A veritable laundry list of items that show McCain/Palin losing their footing with the media. You have a McCain surrogate saying Palin isn’t qualified to run a company; you have McCain losing his temper (not a tantrum, but still) on MSNBC; you have conservative columnists reacting badly to the ABC News extravaganza (both the Palin interview and McCain’s The View outing); and you have reporters going after McCain over his statement about the fundamentals of the US economy still being strong.
The McCain/Palin camp is being forced to dance right now. There’s no guarantee that things will stay like this for the remainder of the race, anything is possible and the MSM is still easily distracted by shiny things. However, for the moment, things are looking to swing Obama’s way.
- This being the case, everyone is saying that it is important for Obama to strike while the iron is hot. It looks like he’s picking up the cue very well:
"Can you afford to take a chance on someone who's voted against the minimum wage 19 times," Obama asked a crowd of thousands under a blazing sun at a rally in western Colorado at the start of a swing through contested Western states. "When it was $4, he was against it, when it was $5 he was against it, when it was $6 he was against it."
--Obama Slams McCain Over The Economy
“So let's be clear: what we've seen the last few days is nothing less than the final verdict on an economic philosophy that has completely failed.”
--How The World Works: Obama's Economic Plan
- Then there’s the following from today’s bit of recommended reading*, “Why Experience Matters.”
“In the current Weekly Standard, Steven Hayward argues that the nation’s founders wanted uncertified citizens to hold the highest offices in the land…I would have more sympathy for this view if I hadn’t just lived through the last eight years. For if the Bush administration was anything, it was the anti-establishment attitude put into executive practice.”
*By no means is this an endorsement of Mr. Brooks' general opinion, the guy is as conservative as they come, and has said some dumb things in his past. However, as an example of how conservatives are essentially abandoning the campaign, this does make for some enlightening material.--TBO
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2 comments:
One might believe in reading the "Why Experience Matters" that though it seems to be directed at Palin, that it might apply to Obama as well (as was pointed out in another posting of this article).
But this is where (according to Brooks) prudence comes into play which he says is aquired through experience. "The prudent leader possesses a repertoire of events, through personal involvement or the study of history"
Now let's face it- no one save former presidents (including the current one) has the experience to actually know how to be an effective president. There is just no way to know what it's like to be in the hot seat 24-7 365 days a year (minus two months at your Texas ranch). But where Obama has substantially more experience is that he has been running for the office for 2 years where Palin is just getting started. Just look at what she has learned about recent American history after just one interview with Charles Gibson (zing!)
Also, his experience as a lawyer almost surely gives him experience a sportscaster does not get.
Ah, yes, the push-poll. McCain probably cottoned on to that tactic's effectiveness when it was used against him in SC in 2000.
Anyone see McCain on ESPN last night. I was soaking my head in vodka at a bar when it came on SportsCenter, but couldn't hear it. That I gotta see.
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