Election Postmortem II

Of course, we all know that the Obama campaign was built upon the theme of Hope and Change. The Audacity of Hope, the Change We Can Believe In.

Worked like catnip amongst Democratic primary voters.

But once out of the primaries, Hope and Change were put on notice.

Whether it was nominating Jim Johnson to head his VP selection committee that signaled his departure from Change (not to mention the assinine VP selection himself, the consumate unchanging Washington insider of consummate assininity), or the entire atmosphere at the Democratic National Convention in Denver that showed his abandonment of Hope, Obama made clear that his primary strategy of Hope and Change in the primaries would take a secondary role in the general election based on Politics as Usual.

But. Now Obama has won. Whatever we may have made of his strategy, it is his strategy that has prevailed.

But whatever happened to the Hope and Change from the early Obama campaign?

Buried.

RIP, Hope and Change

Not that many Obama supporters mind, really. Being lied to in the name of electing Obama is a small price to pay, Hope and Change be damned.

Thanks to the incomparable Ann from the JustOneMinute comments community for the pic!

Goldman Sachs Loves Obama

[UPDATE 10/6/2011: Well whaddya know...an Instalanche! One interesting note - Sharyl Attkisson who filed the report for CBS quoted below from October of 2008 is the CBS reporter who recently came under fire from the Obama administration for her reporting on Fast and Furious in which officials at the White House and DOJ screamed and yelled at her (I unintentionally misspelled her name as Cheryl Atkisson at the time because I was transcribing the video, but have now fixed it). Let's just say that Attkisson has been doing good work for years against the tide of the media in general - I have seen some blogs and commenters suggest that a willingness to report something negative about Obama must be something new to her. It's not.]

And Obama loves them back.

Hot Air points us to a CBS report on Obama's fundraising. Ed Morrissey notes:

However, they did a good job in reporting the fact that Obama likes to rail about Wall Street greed but uses bundlers right out of Goldman Sachs. The disparity in fundraising between McCain and Obama with these well-connected Wall Street firms is eye-opening.

Indeed.

Let's go to the effort to do a little transcription work on that CBS video at Hot Air:

Sharyl Attkisson, CBS Correspondent: Like McCain, Obama's corporate donor list reads like a who's who of the Wall Street collapse, only some are giving more to Obama. Lots more.

Sheila Krumholz, Center for Responsive Politics: The Obama campaign has just vacuumed up the money in this cycle. Specifically from Goldman Sachs, Obama has received over $740,000 as compared to McCain's $220,000.

Attkisson: Not to mention that the former head of Goldman Sachs, Robert Rubin, is Obama's chief economic adviser, and two current executives are bundling for him. Bundlers are mega-fundraisers who critics say get special access.

Well. Here we are again. First we had Obama railing about McCain being in the pocket of Big Oil -- and then found out about Obama taking in more campaign donations from Exxon employees than McCain. So we made the logo.

You know where this is heading, right?

Of course you do. It's not a trick question.

Obama has been a model of transparency.

He's transparently phony.

Obama-Biden: Flip Flops Sold Separately

Remember this billboard? We posted it a couple of weeks ago:

We did you a disservice, dear reader, by by not giving you the full context:

Obama-Biden: Flip Flops We Can't Afford

The man of hope and change rhetoric in the primaries was a doctrinaire liberal. Well, Obama did change. Obama became the man of politics as usual in the general election having flip flopped to the center on a number of issues. It's quite a feat, actually, when you think about it.

But who is the real Obama? When elected, how will he govern and what will he do? Do we look at his completely liberal record, or his completely malleable rhetoric?

Obama is most certainly selling his flip flops.

Dan McLaughlin had some ideas about Obama's flip flops back in August.

McCain-Obama Presidential Debate: Word Up

OK, stats and graphics from last night's final Presidential debate between Obama and McCain at Hofstra University, using this transcript.

We'll roughly follow the same format as we did for the VP debate.

So, how many words did each candidate speak in the debate?

Barack Obama: 7,356
John McCain: 6,642

So it wasn't just our imagination. Obama kept going on and on and on and on. If only we loved the sound of Obama's voice as much as he did.

And how was their speaking level?

Obama:
Flesch Reading Ease: 71.73
Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level: 6.00

McCain:
Flesch Reading Ease: 75.10
Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level: 5.00

Well. If we look back at these scores in the VP debate things are very clear (that post also has a discussion of the Flesch Reading Ease and the Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level scores).

Palin clearly speaks at the highest level, Obama-Biden are mired in mediocrity, and McCain speaks at the level best understood by the electorate. At least that's our spin and we're sticking to it.

Finally, here are word clouds created from the transcript for Obama and McCain.

Obama:

McCain:

You can click on either image to enlarge. Word clouds created with Wordle

Welcome to the party, North Carolina

So, as we’ve already had to admit, North Carolina is a battleground state. The polls are volatile and much closer than most people would have expected at this point.

Of course, this means we will be subjected to relentless campaign ads.

John Hinderaker at Powerline says that Obama may be outspending McCain 7 to 1 in North Carolina. We believe it. Just last night we had the tv on in the background when an Obama ad came on. No big deal, really, campaign ads are so ubiquitous that they rarely pierce our consciousness. Except this time, the ad kept going, and going, and going. So we went back and checked by rewinding the DVR.

Obama made a 2 minute ad purchase at 8pm. Egads. We know he knows that he can’t reach us whether it is 30 seconds or two minutes or four score and twenty years. But there are voters he can reach with that kind of air time, we suppose.

But there is something else that comes with the status of battleground state. As Hinderaker points out his post, battleground states attract the efforts of ACORN, the notorious organization who puts great efforts into voter registration, not infrequently running afoul of the law in those efforts.

Hinderaker points out current investigations of fraud by ACORN in states such as Missouri, Nevada, Connecticut (not a battleground state, but the ramped up efforts there probably reflect fears that Joe Lieberman might have been named McCain's VP, putting the state in play), Ohio, and Wisconsin. Michelle Malkin also points out Indiana. And don’t forget about New Mexico.

And with North Carolina's induction into the club of battleground states, you know what that means.

Welcome to the party, North Carolina. (h/t Freerepublic)

Republican National Committee officials on Friday blasted a group that's registering voters in Durham, calling it "a quasi-criminal, Democratic-affiliated organization" that represents a danger to the electoral process.

The move by RNC Chief Counsel Sean Cairncross and Communications Director Danny Diaz followed a Herald-Sun report that Durham County Board of Elections Director Mike Ashe wants state officials to check about 80 voter registration forms for possible fraud.

The forms came from a group called the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. The group is more commonly known by its acronym, ACORN.

Cairncross said RNC officials "commend the vigilance" Ashe showed, and will continue to monitor the situation. He added that ACORN is "a malignant organization" with a long track record of vote-fraud transgressions. …

Ashe's move this week came after elections officials discovered that ACORN workers had registered a 14-year-old, claiming the youth was born in 1989. The minimum voting age is 18.

They also knew of "less than half a dozen" people who, after receiving a formal notice from the board telling them they'd registered, got in touch with officials to say they'd never filled out a registration form, Ashe said.

In addition, election workers also noticed that ACORN-submitted registration forms so far have included up to 125 duplicate names. It appeared that ACORN registrars -- who are paid and subject to a per-shift quota -- were using the same names repeatedly, Ashe said.

"I got like 15 Brenda Greens," Ashe said. "We're starting to get enough now that the names are looking familiar." ...

Cairncross said ACORN has figured in vote-fraud allegations in past elections in Washington, Missouri and Pennsylvania. Registrars from the group have faced criminal charges in all of those states.

The group's misconduct is "widescale [and] nationwide," he added.

Team McCain's Magic Quadrant

Earlier we had a post showing Team Obama's Magic Quadrant Breakdown of Election 2008.

Now for the Magic Quadrant of the election as seen by the Republicans. The GOP uses the traditional Magic Quadrant definitions for each axis, Ability to Execute and Completeness of Vision, with the overall measure being who can bring reform to Washington (original Magic Quadrants were developed by research and consulting firm Gartner).

In choosing Sarah Palin, John McCain has made clear that his overarching theme is one of government reform, trying to steal the rug out from under Obama on "change".

Who has brought about reform in government? Who has worked in bi-partisan ways to bring change? Who has bucked their own party to get things done?

For our purposes here, we will focus on the least known of the candidates, letting Beldar present the case for Palin as an accomplished reformer.

The rigors of spacing

Here's a billboard on our commute to work, near our office.

In fact, you can see it from some of the windows in our building. This picture, however, was taken on our way home from work yesterday. Impressive, don't you think?

[VIMH: Impressive? You think that billboard is impressive?]
No, not the billboard - rather, our ability to multitask at 50 mph, operating both a vehicle and a camera with the absence of crashing and minimal blurring.

The billboard on the other hand? Well, watch that spacing*, folks!

The Emperor Has No Clothes takes on a whole new, and altogether disturbing meaning.

--------------------
*Yes, we've made that joke before, see the "sly commenter" suggestion at this JustOneMinute post. In fact, that was our first ever comment at JOM. We were quite shy then. We've managed to come out of our shell a little bit since.

Not such a good reason afterall

Say, Obama, what was that you said again about why you would be a good president?

Obama, September 22nd on 60 Minutes:

KROFT (voice-over): This week, during the biggest economic meltdown since the Great Depression, the candidates were forced to stop playing politics and to start talking about some of the major issues in this campaign. And 60 MINUTES was with both of them.

(on camera): Why do you think you’d be a good president?

OBAMA: Well, I think that when you think about the challenges we face, these are challenges that require us to look forward and not backwards.

(CROSSTALK)

KROFT: Why you? I mean, why do you think you would be a good president?

OBAMA: Well, I was going to get to that.

KROFT: Go ahead.

OBAMA: You know, I’m a, I’m a practical person. One of the things I’m good at is getting people in a room with a bunch of different ideas who sometimes violently disagree with each other and finding common ground and a sense of common direction.

Yes He Can!

Or, uh...

Obama, September 30th on ABC:

"I don't think me calling House Republican members would have been that helpful, I tend not to be that persuasive on that side of the aisle," he said.

Oh.

So, THE reason he gives Steve Kroft as to why he would be a good president … goes under the bus.

No He Can’t!

So, Obama, were you lying to Steve Kroft and to us on 60 minutes? Or is it just that the events of last week have brought about this new revelation?

Of course, it is possible you are lying to ABC and to us now. But somehow we find you utterly believable when you tell us you are no bipartisan savior.

Biden and pit bulls, part four

Biden, on what makes a leader:

"Part of what being a leader does is to instill confidence is to demonstrate what he or she knows what they are talking about and to communicating to people ... this is how we can fix this," Biden said. "When the stock market crashed, Franklin Roosevelt got on the television and didn't just talk about the princes of greed. He said, 'look, here's what happened.'"

Now we would hate to say that Biden doesn't act the part of a leader and instills no confidence.

But he leaves us no choice.

Roosevelt, the stock market crash and televisions? Captain Ed helps demonstrate that Biden does not know what he is talking about.

And away we go...

You know what they say the difference is between a pit bull and Joe Biden?

One has a diet consisting of dog food.

And the other dines consistently on his size 12 loafers.

Previously…

One is by nature a creature that needs to be kept on a very tight and short leash.

And the other licks its own privates.

...

One is a relentless attack dog who can be trained to take out your enemies.

And the other is a six term Senator who can be counted on to bite the hand that feeds him.

...

You need a muzzle to shut one of them up.

And the other you need to let outside to go poop.

Biden is no pit bull, part three

Here’s Biden’s latest:

Biden was asked by a voter: "Wind and solar are flourishing here in Ohio, so why are you supporting clean coal?"

Biden replied: "We're not supporting 'clean coal.' Guess what. China's building two every week. Two dirty coal plants. And it's polluting the United States. It's causing people to die. ... China is burning three hundred years of bad coal unless we figure out how to clean their coal up. Because it's going to ruin your lungs and there's nothing we can do about it. No coal plants here in America. Build them, if they're going to build them over there make 'em clean because they're killing you."

Of course, that’s not exactly on message in terms of Obama's clean coal position. Of course. Of course. It's Biden afterall.

OK, so this list will undoubtedly grow by leaps and bounds should Biden continue to be allowed to access to a microphone … so we are going to keep a running list.

You know what they say the difference is between a pit bull and Joe Biden?

One is by nature a creature that needs to be kept on a very tight and short leash.

And the other licks its own privates.

Previously…

One is a relentless attack dog who can be trained to take out your enemies.

And the other is a six term Senator who can be counted on to bite the hand that feeds him.

…

You need a muzzle to shut one of them up.

And the other you need to let outside to go poop.

Fall in line, Joe

Biden with Katie Couric:

Asked about the negative tone of the campaign, and this ad in particular, during an interview broadcast Monday by the "CBS Evening News," Obama's running mate, Sen. Joe Biden, said he disapproved of it.

"I thought that was terrible, by the way," Biden said.

Asked why it was done, he said: "I didn't know we did it and if I had anything to do with it, we'd have never done it."

A momentary lapse by Biden, of course. Biden was quickly reminded that he doesn’t have to fall in love with Team Obama ads, he just has to fall in line:

[I]n the statement issued by the Obama campaign, Biden said he had never seen the ad and only read press reports of it.

"Having now reviewed the ad, it is even more clear to me that given the disgraceful tenor of Senator McCain's ads and their persistent falsehoods, his campaign is in no position to criticize," Biden said in the statement.

We paraphrased Sarah Palin’s pit bull joke last week in the football fan post. We tried to be generous and speak generally of politicians, rather than singling out Joe Biden.

But we simply cannot cover for him any longer. So…

You know what they say the difference is between a pit bull and Joe Biden?

You need a muzzle to shut one of them up.

And the other you need to let outside to go poop.

We could probably also add another line of thought…

One is a relentless attack dog who can be trained to take out your enemies.

And the other is a six term Senator who can be counted on to bite the hand that feeds him.

Moving toward a post-racial view of the election?

From Ed Lasky at American Thinker, we have some really amazing breaking news from the campaign:

"Obama's name and his African heritage are obstacles to the party's chances of capturing the White House, party activists are finding," Dave Davies reports in the Philadelphia Daily News. "I'm hearing a lot of people saying, 'He's too young, he's too inexperienced,' " said Philadelphia AFL-CIO President Pat Eiding. "What they're really saying is, 'He's black.'

Taking a look back at our depiction of Team Obama's Magic Quadrant Breakdown of Election 2008, we are reminded that Palin and Obama share the same lower left quadrant on the measures of age and experience. Our point was that Team Obama uses different descriptors of that quadrant...for Obama it is “Untainted and Vigorous Agent of Change and Deliverer of Hope”. For Palin, it is “Lightweight Neophyte”.

But now, if young and inexperienced really means black...well...

You know what it means when this is Team Obama’s first reaction to Sarah Palin’s selection:

Today, John McCain put the former mayor of a town of 9,000 with zero foreign policy experience a heartbeat away from the presidency.

What Team Obama Is Really Saying Is, ‘Sarah Palin Is Black’.

Not only that, but 'Palin' is a funny name, and she certainly doesn’t look like the other Presidents on the dollar bills.

Surrogates gone wild

Ruth Marcus in the Washington Post takes up the cause of ending the Surrogate Wars:

Both candidates should declare a surrogate cease-fire. Surrogates are the loose nukes of political campaigns, except more likely to detonate. To be precise, more likely to detonate themselves. Campaigns are the collateral damage. The toxic fallout wafts over cable shows for days. Surrogates create an atmosphere of Mutually Assured Embarrassment -- without the deterrent effect.

Surrogates have always played a campaign role, but the 24/7 news cycle of cable TV amplified by the Internet has made them more ubiquitous, and therefore more dangerous, than ever. How many times during this race have candidates’ messages been forced off-track by a surrogate gone astray? As with weaponry, the question becomes: are they worth the risk? Can a rational campaign safely bet that its surrogates are more likely to hit the target than the other sides’?

The 2008 Surrogate Wars suggest not. ...

Yes, I hear you saying, pitifully naïve. Given a choice between having a serious discussion about state regulation of insurance and Carly casually mentioning Viagra, we in the media are going to go for the Viagra every time. So out with the appeals to elevated discourse; in with the argument for enlightened self-interest. Campaign managers: You get antsy about outside groups weighing in on their side because it interferes with your message. Well, your surrogates are doing the same. Force cable to focus on what your candidate is saying (not that he’s always on message) or dredge up another “strategist” no one’s ever heard of. Ditch the surrogates.

We took a look at surrogate follies back in August (”Speak for yourself”), agreeing with a Huffington Post writer that the surrogate battles are out of control.

And we agree with Marcus today.

Our suggestion back in August, or really our lament, was that Town Halls between both candidates could help reduce the 24/7 media’s reliance on surrogates to fill airtime, allowing more direct coverage of the candidates directly engaging one another.

But of course, for every town hall or debate, the 24/7 media coverage would rely on surrogates to battle it out over who can spin their candidate’s performance as being superior. So maybe town halls wouldn’t solve the problem.

And really, even if formal campaign surrogates were to be banished, we would still be left with the overwhelming presence of Obama’s informal network of surrogates, the media themselves.

So what to do?

Joint town halls are still the answer. As is any other venue in which Obama can be presented with an opportunity to speak without a teleprompter.

There's a flag on the play

Obama fumbled the ball here:

Barack Obama has put the Pennsylvania Republican delegates here in stitches over getting the name of the Penn State University mascot wrong today.

Not what you want to be doing in a state where the GOP is hammering you hard for being out of touch.

To most sports fans, they're the Nittany Lions.

Obama, during a stop in Pennsylvania today, called them the "Nitally lions" as he called on someone during a question-and-answer session.

But no matter, football fans would still rather catch a game with Obama than McCain:

WASHINGTON - People would rather watch a football game with Barack Obama than with John McCain — but by barely the length of a football.

Obama was the pick over McCain by a narrow 50 percent to 47 percent, according to an Associated Press-Yahoo News poll released Friday that generally mirrored each presidential candidate's strengths and weaknesses with voters.

This is good news for Obama. No doubt. It is very similar to the “who do you want to have a beer with” criteria that we have pointed out a number of times. Any time you can connect with voters on this kind of personal level (though a sleepover is a little too personal), you’re doing good.

Not being an Obama fan, we find this disturbing from an election standpoint.

But honestly they really had to come up with a new category because the beer comparison is unfair in this election. Cindy McCain owns a beer distributorship. Seriously, who wouldn’t want to have a beer with the candidate whose wife could hook you up with free beer for life?

Then again, and maybe this is just us, but what football fan wouldn’t want to catch a game with the candidate whose wife could hook you up with free beer for life?

Oh, right. Upon further review, “football fans” may be a stretch:

"With McCain, I have such an age difference," said Smith of the Arizona senator, who is 72. But with Obama, 47, he said, "If things went well with the conversation, the football game would be forgotten. There'd be a lot of back and forth."

Sounds like we’re really talking about non-football watching ninnies who wouldn’t know a Nitally from a Nittany who would be willing to use football as an excuse to cozy up to the political celebrity. And of course the feeling is mutual … Obama is a politician who would use football to cozy up to voters. Not that that is unique to Obama. In fact...

THE REAL FOOTBALL FAN IN THE RACE: Like any big football fan, Joe Biden can’t make up his mind who his favorite team is. Right? Real football fans are big fans of lots of teams? (h/t Hugh Hewitt)

Although Biden said he was a Steelers fan in a meeting with the team's coach Mike Tomlin on August 29, he later said in a September 8 visit to a Green Bay bar outside of Lambeau Field that he'd been a Packers fan since grade school.

Today he added three more favorites to the list -- the Eagles, the Colts and the Giants.

As he looked at the jersey of former Philadelphia Eagle Reggie White, Horrigan said he had heard Biden was an Eagles fan.

Biden said yes, adding, "I used to be a Colts fan before they moved to Baltimore."

The loquacious Blue Hen said he stayed up late to watch the Monday night football game between the Eagles and the Dallas Cowboys.

"My wife is a die-hard Eagles fan, so we watch every Eagles game," Biden said. "Matter of fact, I was really tired Tuesday morning."...

But Biden then whispered, "I'm not allowed to say this, but I also like the Giants."

You know what they say the difference is between a pit bull and a political candidate claiming to be a football fan?

You need a muzzle to shut one of them up.

And the other you need to let outside to go poop.

Team Obama's Magic Quadrants

How does Team Obama see the race?

McCain is old and out of touch (never mind that Biden has been in the Senate longer than McCain).

Palin is inexperienced and not ready (never mind that Obama has zero executive experience and less than two years more as Senator than Palin as governor).

Or to put it in pictures, Team Obama's Magic Quadrant Breakdown of Election 2008:

in Him there is no flaw

Remember this moment from the debates in the Democratic primaries?

Obama poked fun at John Edwards and Hillary Clinton for their response to the “what is your weakness” question at the MSNBC debate. Obama said that he answered the question as an “ordinary person.”

"Folks, they don't tell you what they mean!" exclaimed Obama.

“I thought that they meant 'what’s your biggest weakness?!' So I said 'well you know I don’t handle paper that well, you know, my desk is a mess, I need somebody to help me file and stuff all the time.'”

“So the other two they say well my biggest weakness is 'I'm just too passionate about helping poor people.' I am just too impatient to bring about change in America.'”

Obama joked, “If I had gone last I would have known what the game was. I could have said 'well you know I like to help old ladies across the street. Sometimes they don’t want to be helped. It’s terrible.'”

Poor Obama got caught giving an honest answer instead of playing the game.

It seems Obama learned his lesson – don’t admit weakness! – giving this flawless answer in response to a question from Katie Couric:

Katie Couric: What one personal flaw do you think might hinder your ability to be president?

Sen. Barack Obama: I don't think ... there's a flaw that would hinder my ability ... to function as president. I think that all of us have things we need to improve.

Well, ok, the title of our post may be unfair. He didn’t claim he was without flaw. He admitted there was room for improvement.

Which further proves he’s learning to play the game.

Because no matter what he really and truly thinks, he shouldn’t admit he really believes himself completely flawless and perfect, without blemish or defect.

(h/t Jennifer Rubin)

Something they have in common

They seem so different. Male/female; black/white; liberal/conservative; big city/out in the boonies; Ivy League educated/small non-prestigous colleges (five of them for her undergraduate degree!).

Apart from both breaking new ground in a presidential election (first African-American presidential nominee/first female nominee on a Republican ticket), is there anything they have in common?

Maybe so...this is from a Field and Stream interview with Barack Obama:

LICATA: Do you have a favourite piece of public land?

SENATOR OBAMA: One of my best memories as a child was the first time I went to Yellowstone. You know, I was 11 years old, and I went with my grandmother and my mom and my sister, and we spent almost a week. And just driving along a road, and then suddenly coming across just a herd of elk wandering through, or seeing a moose peering out of the woods, out of the marshes: It was magic.

See...Sarah Palin loves moose too!

Well, shot, processed, and served in a bowl of stew, that is. But it's something.

Oh and yeah, mmmmm, moose.

Leave Barack alone - he needs it

Don’t fault him for trying, because he’s really been trying…

According to several Democrat political consultants presumptive Democrat presidential nominee Barack Obama spent part of his Hawaiian vacation working on weaning himself from a heavy dependence on teleprompters. Even in what are staged as "town hall" events for Obama, remarks are scripted or formatted into bullet points that scroll on teleprompter screens. Obama has had several embarrassing events where the teleprompter either malfunctioned or the screens were not fully visible.

"He just locks down and can't get the words out," says one political consultant. "For such a fine speaker, it's really quite remarkable that he's had issues."

But he’s just not there yet:

September 15, 2008
Obama's teleprompter hits the trail

(CNN) — It appears Barack Obama's teleprompter is hitting the campaign trail.

The Democratic presidential nominee has never tried to hide the fact he delivers speeches off the device, though normally he doesn't use one at standard campaign rallies and town hall events.

But the Illinois senator used a teleprompter at both his Colorado events Monday — making for a particularly peculiar scene in Pueblo, where the prompter was set up in the middle of what is normally a rodeo ring.

Don’t worry, Obama. Not everyone is cut out for extemporaneous speaking. You read the teleprompter very well, and let’s face it, not everyone can even do that.

And we know what can happen without the teleprompter. You are making a wise choice in continuing to rely on your crutch. You need it. And it takes a big man to admit when he is not good enough to make it on his own.

You can't get enough of enough is enough

The hot new catch-phrase in the campaign: Enough is enough.

Obama, responding to Team McCain saying Obama’s “lipstick on a pig” remark was sexist and/or generally insulting:

“They seize on innocent remarks, try to throw them out of context, throw up an outrageous ad because they know that it’s catnip for the news media,” Obama said before delivering remarks about education to a small group of supporters gathered in a high school library. “I don’t care what they say about me but I love this country too much to let them take over another election with lies and phony outrage and swift boat politics. Enough is enough.”

McCain, responding to the current financial crisis:

“Enough is enough. We are going to reform the way Wall Street does business and put an end to the greed that has driven our markets into chaos. We will stop multimillion dollar payouts to CEO’s who have broken the public trust. We will put an end to running Wall Street like a casino. We will make businesses work for the benefit of their shareholders and employees. And we will make sure that your savings, IRA, 401k and pension accounts are protected.”

While McCain's version seems to be of the "Kick the bums out!" variety, Obama's is more "Stop lying about my record!"

Obama '08
Not just running against John McSame and George W. Bush.
Now we're taking on George H.W. Bush too!
...as Bob Dole

It's not just McCain's age

We were amused that on the day when Obama's campaign manager David Plouffe said they were going to make the campaign about the big issues, that Team Obama, because they had yet another pair of gloves to take off, went straight for McCain's age, with the punchline that McCain doesn't even know how to send emails.

We weren't outraged, we were amused.

But now seeing this Jonah Goldberg post, we are reconsidering:

Yep. The day after 9/11, as part of its "get tough" makeover, the Obama campaign is mocking John McCain for not using a computer, without caring why he doesn't use a computer. From the AP story about the computer illiterate ad:

"Our economy wouldn't survive without the Internet, and cyber-security continues to represent one our most serious national security threats," [Obama spokesman Dan] Pfeiffer said. "It's extraordinary that someone who wants to be our president and our commander in chief doesn't know how to send an e-mail."

Well, I guess it depends on what you mean by "extraordinary." The reason he doesn't send email is that he can't use a keyboard because of the relentless beatings he received from the Viet Cong in service to our country. From the Boston Globe (March 4, 2000):

McCain gets emotional at the mention of military families needing food stamps or veterans lacking health care. The outrage comes from inside: McCain's severe war injuries prevent him from combing his hair, typing on a keyboard, or tying his shoes. Friends marvel at McCain's encyclopedic knowledge of sports. He's an avid fan - Ted Williams is his hero - but he can't raise his arm above his shoulder to throw a baseball.

We're going to go back to that Plouffe quote again:

But as Barack Obama said earlier this week “enough is enough.” This election is too important and the challenges too big to spend the next 54 days talking about trivial non-issues…

Yeah. Because a completely healthy McCain sending emails or not actually is a trivial non-issue.

But, because of the genius that is Team Obama, McCain being attacked for not sending emails when he can't do so precisely because of the injuries he sustained as a prisoner of war has boosted this issue to headline-grabbing, non-trivial status.

There's a mole in the Obama campaign. There simply must be.

That or basic campaigning is simply above Obama's pay grade.