Campaigning in WV, IA, NH, WI, MN. What do these states have in common? A miniscule black population. The McCain campaign has decided the only way to win is to wedge white voters to not vote for the black guy. These states provide fertile ground for that strategy. We'll see how far they're willing to go with this approach. So far it hasn't gone anywhere, but we haven't seen the worst.

Uh, I seriously doubt McCain is gambling on a racist strategy in states with few blacks.  Even if McCain was a racist he's not suicidal, and such a strategy would be tantamount to pissing away several other states.  I'm guessing he just wants to concentrate on one region of the country, honing his message there.  Save money on travel, maybe?

Oh, who the hell knows.  The McCain campaign has been so utterly bizarre this year he could try anything.  Maybe he'll suspend his campaign again.  Or make a sudden fact-finding trip to the Ukraine or Afghanistan.  Or roam Wall Street swinging a baseball bat with a nail in it, looking for greedy traders to pulverize.  Or jump Snake Canyon.  It really doesn't matter at this point, people are just tired of the strange person who used to be a statesman.

Wait a second, isn't McCain famous for loving to be an underdog? Why, they should be ecstatic at McCain's headquarters because when McCain is down he has consistently come back, so they should hope that they become even bigger underdogs.

The McCain Campiagn is becoming painful.  The list of prominent conservatives  and moderates who have been carying water for McCain for years and have been publicly ashamed at his campaign keeps growing.

If McCain were at least going around calling for immigration reform and all the other things he had to drop to win the nomination at least he could go out with his head held somewhat high, instead sinking beneath a torrent of bitter ads and spiteful rallies

Is it just me or is this looking a lot like February?

Seriously, when was the last time we saw as complete and total domination of a presidential race this late in the game? Reagan in 84? its been at least a generation...

And speaking of generations: it is too bad for the McCain campaign that this isn't a months long primary that can afford him the luxury of waiting on voters to inevitably ask themselves (again) who is this guy I'm voting for?

I am under the impression that a large swath of Obama's support(ers) comes from people that are not so much for "him" as they are for the change and hope that he represents...which is a wonderful and powerful thing, but it carries with it a bit of peril.

The first risk is that they might get an earlier than expected tinge of buyer's remorse and his numbers will start to get too close for comfort. The second risk is that IF Obama is elected there will be for many of those that voted for him an expectation for a swift and mighty turnaround that nobody could pull off. This would at best make it incredibly difficult to govern (a la Clinton 1994-1996) or at worst bring forth the cries of a Carter Redux.

If I'm the Obama campaign, I lay off, as much as possible, on the specifics of what you will do to turn the economy around, keep repeating that its going to be difficult but we can do it, repeat McCain = Bush as needed and see if there is any way to get the election moved up ASAP.

Did Nate just call Sarah Palin a fat lady?

In an Obama counter-intuitive move, a series of medium-sized meetings and rallies in places like WV, KY, and southeast PA would be worth the effort -- someone on here a few months ago put it very well:  Obama saying to those who remain uneasy or hostile, "you may not be with me at this moment, but I want to you know that I'm with you."

I just watched video of McCain telling supporters who were afraid of him that Obama is a fine Amercian and would make a great president.  Is this a campaign strategy, or is he starting to think about how he can remain effective as a Senator after Obama becomes president?

The Obama campaign is ahead in the polls.  But it is by no means sure that it can win an honest election.  

That's why it is supporting ACORN's widespread campaign of fraudulent voter registration.

"The Obama campaign is ahead in the polls.  But it is by no means sure that it can win an honest election.  

That's why it is supporting ACORN's widespread campaign of fraudulent voter registration."

If Obama wins in a landslide, I almost wouldn't mind if there was some minor fraudulence that enraged conservatives.  Just to rub it in a little bit.

Come on, you guys can wander around city streets in house robes muttering "Acorn.... Acorn....".  It'll be fun!

Ahhhhhh, the ACORN Mythology.  Let me explain it to you, Bulbman.   First, ACORN wants to register voters.  However, such registering is a time intensive process, involving knocking on doors, getting people in the streets, etc.  So, to gather a force large enough to make progress, they provide canvassers with a monetary incentive.  Relying on an all volunteer group for so massive an undertaking would be nigh impossible.  Unfortunately, this sometimes attracts people who see an easy way for a cheap buck, so rather than do the leg work they just register the starting lineup of the Dallas Cowboys, or some other random list of names.  This doesn't mean Tony Romo and Felix Jones are going to show up in Cleveland to vote Obama, it just means ACORN got conned.  Not some grand eeeeeeeeeevil conspiracy to steal an election, just the natural result of the compromise inherent in providing a monetary incentive.  It's the price they pay by paying people to register.  

Laughably absurd, Bulbman. Go spin your fucked-up conspiracy theories on Mars or Uranus.

Pulling Away

www.newsweek.com/.../163339

Obama - 52

McCain - 41

[Obama appears to have broadened his coalition of support and made inroads with groups that have not reliably embraced him over the course of the long presidential campaign. He now leads McCain among both men (54 percent to 40 percent) and women (50 percent to 41 percent). He now wins every age group of voters—including those over 65 years of age, who back him over McCain 49 to 43 percent. Supporters of Hillary Clinton, as many as a fifth of whom had at one point told pollsters they'd support McCain over Obama, now back the Democratic nominee 88 percent to 7 percent.]

McCain losing ground with working-class whites

ap.google.com/.../ALeqM5j4OJ-sk9KxZorzn0FxIi9dAkHXgAD93NME480

["I don't know that there's anything I particularly like about him (Obama), but I dislike McCain, and I dislike the way the country is, and Republicans need to change," said lifelong Republican Ruth Ann Michel, 64, a retiree shopping in a market in Butler on a recent day. She said her vote for Obama would be her first for a Democratic presidential candidate.

While talk in these parts is mostly about the economy, a prominent - if not unspoken subtext - is race. A study of the impact of racial attitudes on the election conducted by The Associated Press with Yahoo News and Stanford University found that whites without a college education were much more likely to hold negative views of blacks than those with a college education.

Democratic Gov. Ed Rendell says a drowning man doesn't care what color the person is who throws him a life preserver.]

What Crock1701 said (to Bulbman), reinforced by evidence of past investigations into ACORN's alleged fraud show that most irregularities are caught by local and state registrars, which routinely check ballots and weed out nearly all of false registrations by the time votes are actually counted. This is old news, despite the fact that the same accusations have repeatedly been made by the Repubs, who hate having poor people vote. Duh.

Is it too early to call the election of Obama/Biden?

It isn't, and I am.

Bulbman, now I see what nutters like you are going to be reduced to.  You're all mentally fallling apart.

Now that the enitre ideological infrastucture for your entire psyche - which has told you and your brain dead ilk exactly what to think like any other fundamentalist - is coming crashing to the ground, you're becoming positively psychotic like the rest of the nutters.  

The economy is on flames beacuse of your ideology, we're at record levels of debt because of it, our military is in grave distress because of it, we're bogged down in two wars because of it, the rest of the world has no respect for us because of it, our environment (oh he horros of that word for you children) is dying because of it  - you people have destroyed everything you have ever touched and have no shame, no ability to reflect, no humility.  Instead, you fall in love with the latest brain dead fascist your party barfs forth and yammer on in the wilderness about terrorists and ACORN.  YOU ARE SICKENING.

Hopefully the Republican Party will find some maturity somewhere (there has been none evident for years) and stop giving in the the least among them and find their Bill Clinton.  If they think Sarah Palin is the future, then God Bless them in one way - she is almost universaly loathed except by the nutters - and has no appeal to the independents, even most of her party is humilated by her.  America is clearly fed up with Rovian nonsense and won't fall for it again, and its basically all she has.  You will go down in flames again if you go down this path, America is telling you this loud and clear.  Are you mature enought o listen? To grow?

Wake up Republicans - you have become a cancer on this country and are mercifully dying in your current form.  

Are you ready to create something of value in its place? Something that values governing rather than simply creating divsion and hate and bullying?  Are you even able to?

You have betrayed your beliefs for power and now you are losing even that.  What wil you chose to become? Statemen or continue on your path of promoting incompetent hatemongers who destroy rather than create?  Who are only capable of titillating and bullying? Who think showing respect is weakness when the exact opposite is true?  Bullies are weak, fragile things.  Stop and look in the mirror, focus on how you plan on evolving.  

Right now, with the Ayers and Acorn embarrassment, you look like nothing less than toddlers holding their breath and stamping their feet.

GROW UP.

fwslusser said:

I just watched video of McCain telling supporters who were afraid of him that Obama is a fine Amercian and would make a great president.  Is this a campaign strategy, or is he starting to think about how he can remain effective as a Senator after Obama becomes president

_______

McCain is playing lip service to Obama now in an attempt to restore some dignity to his campaign.

He's attemptiong to defelct the backlash he's been receiving on his failure to condemn members of his previous rallies yelling things "Treason" and "Kill Him" in reference to Obama.  The Wisconsin rallies have exposed an ugliness in America the likes of which I've never seen in my 39+ years of life. And if I had even a shred of respect for McCain before these rallies, I had nothing but disgust for him watching him (and Palin) revel in the anger of these ugly people (both physically and mentally, I might add).  Many on the Left and RIght have expressed disgust that McCain has stood among these people without once attempting to calm their fury or condemn their bullshit.

So now that McCain is taking a whippin' from both sides of the aisle for allowing this bullsh*t to go on.  (Not let it go on, but egg it on, in some instances.)  He's now lauding Obama in an attempt to show that he is an honorable man who doesn't need to stoop that low in order to win the presidency.  He is attempting to establish himself as a man of dignity.  His big honorable deed at a rally yesterday was to take the microphone out of the hands of an angry whacko and correct her when she stated that Obama is an Arab.  He's expecting a pat on the back from the more dignified among us for that simply act.  (Which my husband and I laughed our asses off, because McCain couldn't take the logic one step further and say, "And not all Arabs are terrorists, Betsy."  (But hey, the bar is so low, we didn't expect that much anyhow.)

McCain has shown that he is willing to compromise his dignity and integrity in order to win this election.  But it is October 11, with one debate to go, and I find it hard to believe that McCain is capable of re-inventing himself by November 4th.  Only a maverick could do something like that.

Aaron:

"Obama - 52

McCain - 41"

It's self-evident that these polling results are skewed by ACORN's polling fraud strategy.  In an honest polling effort, a nig-, I mean, a terrorist-palling Rezko-friending Wright-pastoring "Senator" could never have the support of 52% of the American people.  No doubt the pollsters were calling up the Dallas Cowboys lineup.  

Crock: To us up here in Canada, this whole thing looks bizarre.  We are atuoamtically registered to vote when we pay taxes or when we get our driver's licenses.  We have canvassers hired by Elections Canada (a government body) who go around and knock on doors to make sure every one really is registered and those who are not, are captured.  Their monetary incentive?  Their pay.  Other incentives?  Civic duty.  That ACORN is actually needed is the scandal, not that some people conned it into giving them money for false registrations.

Bulbman: the issue has been in the news and has been amply explained (the Cowboys thing was the best).  In principle, it shouldn't have taken Crock to explain it to you at this stage.  That you still churn out this drivel means 1) you're lying; 2) you're too ignorant/stupid to understand the difference between voter fraud and registration fraud; and/or 3) you have been engaged by the enemies of the United States to undermine the democratic process in the country by maligning it with false and racist accusations.

Your choice.

Bulbman's obsession with ACORN just illustrates the right's intellectually dishonest atttempt to clothe Republican voter suppression efforts with a patina of respectability.  Suppression of voting by members of groups suspected of leaning Democratic has long been a key component of Republican electoral strategy, as any one of a number of recently-fired United States Attorneys will attest.

B-man and his freeper compatriots will have the next 4 years to fulminate.  The rest of us have bigger things to worry about.

Expect the ACORN protestations from the right to increase between now and November 4, followed by claims that "Obama stole the election."  It's how these people think.

Wandreycer1, you are smoking!  Those are the best fire-breathing rants I've seen in a while, and I'm on board for every word of them.

sorry, I am angry - thanks hewstino.  These people cannot even say "I'm sorry" or "let's look at ourselves" or even "maybe we were wrong" when they demonstrably wrong about almost every major issue of the last ten years (that "almost" is for someone else to figure out exactly what they were right about).  This narcissim is destroying our country.  I can't find it in me to be polite, I'll leave that up to Obama. Not me.

Wandreycer1:

It's time I just came right out and admitted this.

I am a very happily married to an incredible man, but I think I'm developing a platonic girl crush on you.  

wandreycer...

hee, hee...seems that folks here are learning what some of us talk backers have long known: you are one righteous, ballsy woman. If I weren't already married....with two young'ins...

You did hit upon a key psychological point: The GOP is now falling back into a very familiar psychological perspective: Victim and preyed upon. I watched Larry King with my boys last night and I saw that fat germ Jonah Goldberg and he sort of encapsulated this victim stuff: Newsweek's poll is "in the tank for Obama", these ACORN allegations are "connected to the Obama campaign", the msm is "has always favored Obama." Now, posters on this thread are preparing for their November 5th  blues by saying that Obama can only win a crooked election.

I can never figure out why the predominantly white GOP feels so marginalized and harbors such feelings of resentment and victimhood. Hell, they ran the Executive branch for 8 years, they have plundered our national economy, they ran the Congress for 12 years, they have permanently installed a conservative majority on the Supreme Court.  I mean, in the cut throat business of brutal power, they have been winners. Now, faced with the prospect of paying the piper for the consequences of their incompetence and the prospect of being beaten by Obama and Biden, two better men, and one who is of color...

their only excuse is not personal responsibility but conspiracy.

But, I must tell you, I have seen all my professional career. I have left a very long trail of angry, bitter, excuse making white dudes along my professional arc.  

And the vitriol and hatred and border line fang bearing, snarling criminal psychosis that we are seeing at the McCain and Palin rallies - more often at the nitwit Alaskan's - is characteristic of all this.

Note of caution: I will be celebrating on November 4th but remember, these frustrated haters will be a huge thorn in Obama's side and governing will not be easy.

But, that is for another day. For now, I say....f this haters and enjoy the thoroughly deserved ass whuppin' that Obama/Biden will inflict on McCain/Palin...

hear that jacob?  Eos, you too...

It is pretty clear that short of some unexpected catastrophe, this thing is over. I hate to say it as I am still haunted by the memory of the 2002 world series; but it is true. And while after these last 8 years, there is a very strong temptation to gloat (a justifiable one if you ask me), we should take a cue from Obama himself and display dignity and class in these last few weeks. There will be a time to celebrate, but with the polls the way they are, there may finally be an opportunity to bring a majority of Americans together. As a former Clinton supporter, it now gives me great joy to say that I was wrong about Obama. He is the man, and even with the great many obstacles we face, i look forward to the next 4 years.

Poor, poor Republican babies, just because *you're new-voter suppression tactic* was caught by us, and we nixed it, you are so so mad. Have a pacifier cuz you suck.

I am fully available for polygamy with this astonishly patient and brilliant crew.  

Jaunty is always the voice of reason, but I think I might qualify as unhinged.  I am so fed up with these people and their antics, I need a permanent IV of tequilla until they are

GONE BABY GONE!!!

Jaunty - you win in the name calling department too: fat germ and the mummy will go down in history.

Lyn -  you're outdoing me half the time in theballsy broad department - I'm imPRESSED!

If John McWar needed a last nail in his political coffin (I think its already been sealed with crazy glue!) the Palin ruling in Alaska for state ethics violations is it. The Alaska GOP managed to get the news of it released to the media at 9pm EST on a Friday night, hoping that maybe nobody would notice........WROOOOOONGGGGGGGGGGG!!  Har har har, gufaw gufaw!

The GOP ticket now has a new name:  McPHALIN.

Mack2 - McPhalin is pretty accurate.  i wanted to trump it with McPhallus - but that's entirely inaccurate.  

I have cringed througout both presidential debates.  For a variety of reasons, but mostly because I wanted Obama to deliver at least one swift kick to Pow Pow's ass.  And Obama has missed a few opportunites to get some zingers in.  Though I did appreciate this: "You know, Sen. McCain, I think the Straight Talk Express lost a wheel...."

But The Bullshit  Idiot Express has devoted the past week getting hillbilly, racist, haters riled up.  And, in some instances, egging them on.  And pretending not to hear those who were shouting:  KILL HIM (in reference to Obama).  Did they hear those chants?  You betcha!!!  And the non-stop bullshit about Ayers and Jerimiah Wright.  They heard it all, and nodded yes.  Yes.  

But what I'm most curious about is whether McCain will leave his balls at home for the upcoming Wednesday debate.  Seems to me POW POW doesn't have the scrotum to talk like this to Obama's face. He attends these rallies and acts like he's a fighter, then shows up at the debates wandering around like McGrampa and isn't even capable of holding his own on Foreign Policy issues? Oh, the maverick.

Say it to his face, McCain. Show the nation your cowardice in a national forum, for all to see.

Obama, being the kind of guy who diligently prepares and does his homework, will be ready for the Ayers bullshit.

Bring it, McPow.  I'm wasn't a mean person until June, and now I have a relentless desire to see both McCain and Palin humiliated and suffering the consequences of their unconscionable behavior.

(My husband says I have to take a Xanax and a nap now.)

Sure looks as if it's going to be a wild night in old DC town on the 16th as Wandrey meets up at the TNR gig with everyone (of both sexes) who's in love with her.

Now, I'm even sorrier that I just can't be there!  I guess I'll just stay at home and work up my resentful victim/loser profile.  Lots of good models out there these days . . .

To everyone here who's sure Obama has it in the bag: don't bet on it yet.  I for one refuse to 'pop the cork' in celebration.  This one ain't over by a long shot.

I've been an Obama supporter for a while now.  When I saw his DNC speech in 2004 I thought to myself "this man will be president some day".  I got ridiculed for saying that out loud.  I got derided last fall when I sad he would be the nominee and others around me said that I was crazy he would win the nomination over Sen. Clinton.  I've given hundreds of dollars to his campaign, so I did put my money where my mouth is.  Obama has been 'my man' for a while now.

But still, something inside me says "it ain't over yet" by a long shot.  Perhaps it's the engineer in me coming out, which tells me that Murphy (of "Murphy's Law) will  rear his head.  We engineers know too well if something can go wrong it will.  With these loonies stoked in Palin's rallies  and the 'kitchen sink' strategy we're seeing from the McSleaze campaign, my inner lizard says it'll work somehow, just as it has in the past.  Maybe I've lived in NC too long, and the ghost of Jesse 'may he rot in hell' Helms infects my psyche too much.  I've seen pubes down in polls before too often who go harshly negative and win the end (remember Harold Ford Jr.?).  I just hope the Obama campaign leaders / staff assume they're 10 pts. behind and won't let up.  I do know that the press is being kind to McSlime, telling everyone about their rallies, lies and all with little to no filter.

One thing I still wish I'd see is Obama throw a 'knockout punch', and he just doesn't seem to do that.  I hope I see it in the next debate.  For now, I refuse to get too excited and assume that it ain't even remotely in the bag for Obama.

Wandrey,

I sure wish I could have made it next Thursday, As I said earlier, if it was on a Saturday - hardly a possibility at a synagogue - I would have taken the red eye on Friday after work and been there.

Can you take notes, names, and pictures. I would give teppy's left nut to have real photos of people some talk backers. If you can find kirchick as he makes his coffee runs and keeps the exits clear, give him a kick in the shins and tell him that I asked you to do it.

And igive jacksondyer  a Bugs Bunny to Elmer Fudd smacker and tell him I asked you to do that...

This whole thing is playing out like a Terry Southern script from 1969 or something, the kind of movie that makes me go, "the extreme level of satire in this movie dates it to this little 1968-73 patch of history where stuff was just way over the top and all movies ended in a bloodbath, like 'If'." And this isn't a movie. No bloodbaths, I hope. Or maybe everyone left in the McCain campain will enter a swimming pool full of filth to grab at floating money, like the end of Magic Christian [IIRC - I haven't seen it since I was 8].

But ok, my ACORN take: That's the most pathetic conspiracy stab I've ever read, and if it were true, then FINE. Makes up for the last TWO elections - yeah, Bulbous, I said it! You want a piece of me? Go watch "Stealing America: Vote by Vote" - That's got a whole lot of better evidence than this ACORN stuff.

And hooray for eweiss!

Let us all join hands, "Freaks" style, and chant "google goggle one of us, we accept you we accept you, one of us one of us, google goggle google goggle" with eweiss in the middle.

Cookie: I would certainly have gone, but am organising an international law conference up here (how quaint).  Agree with pics and profiles :-).