Its easier to destroy your opponent when there are only two-parties on the ballot. No surprises there.

As long as we cling to the 18th century winner-take-all system, we're going to relive this national shame-fest every 4 years (and more).

he's going to run a very negative campaign in which he hammers on Obama as (a) naive about foreign policy, (b) unqualified to command the military, and (c) ready to surrender to al-Qaeda and squander the sacrifices of thousands of brave American soldiers.

Apparently "very negative" is a euphemism for "very accurate". B. Hussein Obama has no foreign policy experience, no military experience, and has expressed an intent to unconditionally surrender to Al Qeada in Iraq if elected.

Apparently "Al" is a euphemism for partisan hack.

Oh this is going to be slime-o-riffic. They are going to do everything short of yelling "N***er! N***er! N***er!" But that's what they'll really mean.

Just like our local election races the only tactic the GOP has left is lies and smears.

I suppose when your stated policies have completely failed then you must either concede outright or lie, smear, and mislead and hope no one notices.

Why can't the GOP just steal it like last time? All he has to do is get within 10%. Voter suppression and fraud will take it from there.

Yes, it's pretty stupid. Ohio is dealing with horrible economic conditions. I love it that McCain will completely ignore Ohio's biggest problem in order to win over Ohio's voters.

As the Guinness men say: "BRILLIANT!"

Steve-- Presumably, the voters in Ohio more concerned about the economy than terrorism will decline to vote for the candidate who will raise the taxes of working people and redistribute them to queens and bucks on welfare.

Al: queens and bucks on welfare.

Attention all Hillary supporters threatening to vote for McCain: Welcome to your future if you get your way.

Please, please, please. Think again.

"McCain seems likely to make this into a pretty ugly campaign."

Well, do we quote Claude Rains ("I'm shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here") or Gomer Pyle ("Surprise, surprise, surprise, Sgt. Carter).

and redistribute them to queens and bucks on welfare.

The inner Republican id = fear of a black penis^D^D^D^D^D planet.

Good grief.

I love it when delusional, self-assured critics try to take my words and twist them.

"BRILLIANT!"

Besides bombing people, what foreign policy experience does the Senator from Arizona have?

Mac's campaign so far has shown a knack for amazing mis-steps. This will be another.

...he hammers on Obama as (a) naive about foreign policy, (b) unqualified to command the military, and (c) ready to surrender to al-Qaeda and squander the sacrifices of thousands of brave American soldiers.

It dovetails so nicely with the "McSame" or "McBush" meme from the Dems.

Go ahead St. John. Fire away.

The inner Republican id = fear of a black penis^D^D^D^D^D planet.

What?? Why did you make this about race?

Tigershark-- Aside from being a veteran, he also serves on the Armed Services Committee. That's much more useful than being a street organizer in Chicago.

Just me, or did anyone else take "bucks" to imply black men?

Why can't the GOP just steal it like last time? All he has to do is get within 10%. Voter suppression and fraud will take it from there.

This time, the Ohio Secretary of State is a Democrat.

Al-

You include that quaint, unmistakable racial slur in your comment, but Tigershark is making this about race?

You're not one of the classier trolls to grace this site.

"in which he hammers on Obama as (a) naive about foreign policy,"

Which is true, you know. That Obama thinks we should negotiate with the Sunnis...er, Shiites...no, wait! Get Lieberman over here.

Just me, or did anyone else take "bucks" to imply black men?

Al tried to fool people into thinking he wasn't a racist troll by talking up Obama during the primaries. Everyone knew he'd revert to type for the general, but we kept quiet so that we could continue laughing at him.

SteveL writes: "Ohio is dealing with horrible economic conditions. I love it that McCain will completely ignore Ohio's biggest problem in order to win over Ohio's voters."

that's not entirely true. mccain hit youngstown on his "forgotten places" poverty tour and did address the economy by telling the few remaining workers at the factory he visited that "free trade" was the ticket and that they should consider selling stuff on ebay.

I quote "Today, for example," McCain said, "1.3 million people in the world make a living off eBay, most of those are in the United State of America."

This is of a piece with the strategy that worked so well for Greg Davis in MS-01. He thought all he had to do was run ads linking his opponent to Obama; McCain thinks all he has to do is run ads linking Obama to whomever, Ahmadinejad or bin Laden or whatever their creative minds can come up with.

Basically it's just a declaration before the American public that they have nothing else to run on and their track record is indefensible. It might "convince" the 30% of the electorate that would never vote for Obama anyway.

Will the Republicans be stealing votes again this year? It's a strategy that has always helped them.

Just me, or did anyone else take "bucks" to imply black men?

Black men and ("queens") gays.

Dear Ohio,
Please don't be gullible this time.

Your friend,
America

You guys are all nuts. Obama has a zero.zero percent chance of winning Ohio. Cincinnati is about the most segregated city outside the confederacy. McCain need only run ads that say "He's black, you're not" and the race is over.

Let's focus on Virginia, which we can actually win.

As a former resident of the Queen City, I agree with you about Cincinnati. However, there are other places and people in Ohio. With big AA and youth turnout and the right running mate, Obama can win it on economic issues.

Wow, if the comments to this point are any indication, Kevin is bang on that this is going to be a very ugly campaign.

My take on that, though, is that Obama is perhaps the best-positioned candidate in a long while to confront a negative campaign without stooping to the same tactics. He's very carefully kept his language positive, even soaring, and he is pointedly critical of political business-as-usual, which I think everyone would agree includes negative campaigning.

That's not to say fighting fire without fire is a sure winner, but if progress to date is any indicator, the Obama campaign has a lot of room to maneuver before responding in kind.

If Sen. Clinton had won the Democratic nomination, the McCain campaign would be using veiled sexist attacks against her, just like they will use veiled racist attacks against Obama. There are many people in Ohio who will not vote for a Black person, yet there are many moderate Republicans who could not vote for Sen. Clinton but will vote for Obama. Hopefully these two groups cancel each other out at the polls and Obama prevails.

>"Dear Ohio, Please don't be gullible this time."

Never under-estimate the stupidity of the American Electorate. Lots of them voted for Bush... twice.

As a "buck"...where is my f*^king money!

What do you mean you gave my money to the loser over @ Bears Stearns. Now aint that some shit!

-Hugh Jorgan

"Basically it's just a declaration before the American public that they have nothing else to run on and their track record is indefensible. It might "convince" the 30% of the electorate that would never vote for Obama anyway."

***

That's right. That 30% is hopeless. But the republicans will once again perform their election year Linda Blair ritual in hopes that it will mesmerize voters one more time. That's all they can do.

And when they do, the dems need to borrow Ronald Reagan's "There you go again" to remind voters that all the repubs will ever have to show for their "War on Terror" battles are some recent videotapes from Osama bin Laden, a worn "Mission Accomplished" banner, and a bloated new Department of Homeland Stupidity."

I'm the pessimist and see all this racist crap from people like Al and get so worried about all the idiots that think Obama is a Muslim, that he's not American, that whites should stick with whites, etc.

But my husband is an optimist, and he says McSame is only close in the polls cuz "independents" (read "couldn't care less") won't pay attention until October, and that Obama has time to become known for who he is.

I just keep trying to listen to his optimism and put my fingers in my ears and go "la la la la la" when farging iceholes like Al spew their hatred in the media.

Will BHO be the one surrendering to terrorists? I think not. McCain gave his speech last week in front of a green background. Everyone knows that green is the color of Hamas. Applying the paisley-scarf-equals-support-for-terrorism logic, it is irrefutable that McCain was sending a message to Hamas that he supports them and wants their support.

Backgrounds do not happen by accident. The speech had been planned for weeks. At the moment of Obama's victory, McCain was telling Hamas that HE is their candidate.

It is sad to see a former patriot sell out this way.

"farging iceholes"

Haha! A "Johnny Dangerously" reference!

alibubba,

The 25% who still approve of Bush are authoritarians, which means they'll vote the way their leaders tell them and generally uphold whoever gets it unless their leaders tell them otherwise.

If the Limbo's and Dobson's and other slimy authoritarian leaders do not support McCain he will lose big time. My guess, though, is those leaders will play the 'a Democrat would be worse" card and when push comes to shove support McCain.

Getting the authoritarian leaders to NOT support McCain would be huge but I doubt it will happen.

Well, now, this is interesting. The original "Al" left here a couple of years ago because he got tired of being parodied (and even more tired of the fact that we couldn't tell the difference between the parody and the real thing). The "Al" who's been posting here for the past two years usually posts just one mindlessly partisan post at the top of each thread and then leaves and has been commonly perceived as a drive-by parody.

So now we have an "Al" who's posting mindless partisan drivel but who actually responds to another comment. Could the original "Al" have returned or are we still dealing with a parody? Enquiring minds want to know.

Backgrounds do not happen by accident. The speech had been planned for weeks. At the moment of Obama's victory, McCain was telling Hamas that HE is their candidate.

It gets worse. His lapels were brazenly naked. Not one single star or stripe to be found anywhere. The man won't rest until the caliphate is restored.

PLUS, Hamas unendorsed Obama late last week...obviously because they shifted support to McCain on the QT after receiving "Al Cainda's" secret message.

Is it allowed t talk about the voting hijinks last time and what form they might take this go 'round?

Is it allowed t talk about the voting hijinks last time and what form they might take this go 'round?

Is it allowed t talk about the voting hijinks last time and what form they might take this go 'round?

Are we afraid Obama is a pussy who can't handle pressure?

a pussy who can't handle pressure?

you're not too familiar with how pussies are constructed and what they go for, are you, son?

Enquiring minds want to know.

Posted by: PaulB on June 9, 2008 at 2:21 PM

I agree PaulB. We need to get to the bottom of this fake Al/real Al conundrum.

Kevin asks: "WINNING OHIO....So how does John McCain win Ohio?"

Diebold?

I think a better strategy for McCain than Hate 3.0 would be to actually be a "maverick" and acknowledge what hasn't worked with the GOP. Hey, American knows that, and might appreciate "straight talk" that doesn't come from someone who kept their mouth shut until they'd got out of the administration. He could talk up McCain Feingold, etc. etc. He could horn in on Obama's post-partisan narrative with crowing about his actual experience working with Dems.
If he just keeps on with the old GOP rhetoric I don't know if enough people (who already know how much of it is bullshit) will be willing to take a chance on it being not quite so bad under McCain.
He could make the most of how all the rightists disowned him...but he seems to be sucking up to them instead. Mistake.

the undiscussed reality is massive vote fraud.

brad friedman at bradblog discusses it in great detail, but i have observed that very few want to deal with that salient feature of amerikan elections. mark crispin miller feels the same way.

why is it that so many prefer to ignore the reality of amerikan elections? prefer to ignore the falseness of the results?

Once Senator Obama hits the flip-flop factor, McNeoCain (I do like that) will HAVE to attack things like readiness and authenticity and experience because he will not be able to do so effectively on actual issues. He'll have to utilize the Smear. He'll have to be a Republican, which means he'll have to turn to the Dirty Underhanded Sneakery Team.

And once you owe THEM a favor....

McBush will probably try to win Ohio the same way they won it in 04; massive disenfranchisement of urban black voters (see Kucinich on impeachment.)

"I don't think it'll work, but it's pretty obvious that this is the direction things are going. McCain seems likely to make this into a pretty ugly campaign."

That's where his experience with his opponent in the primary will pay off so handsomely. And this time he won't have to tread lightly because he's competing against a woman.

Last sentence above should probably read: That's where his experience with his opponent in the primary will pay off so handsomely. And this time he won't have to tread lightly because he's not competing against a woman.

Should post pre-coffee.

I'm an Ohio transplant, and caught a McCain ad on TV the other night. He went on and on about how he's from a family of warriors, and war is bad. Or coming home from war is bad. Or something.

No mention of occupying Iraq for a hundred years.

McCain's half right: unnecessary war is terribly bad. Unfortunately, McCain is also on tape rooting on this terribly unnecessary war, and confused about who is resisting our occupation and why.

"...he hammers on Obama as (a) naive about foreign policy, (b) unqualified to command the military, and (c) ready to surrender to al-Qaeda and squander the sacrifices of thousands of brave American soldiers."

This is the usual. Notice how it doesn't engage substantively. This is just smearing the other guy. Usually it devolves into some sort of mental instability or blinding hatred for all things normal.

The best way to confront these attacks is to push for specifics, and try to keep the conversation there.

Of course, we should also be on offense, pointing out how McCain is unqualified, ready to surrender, etc. (The good news is we actually HAVE the goods to back these claims up!)