OK, I give up, Steve. How many times can you write a thread on this same subject? I guess you can criticize McCain for talking about his time as a P.O.W. too much. Can we criticize you for the same reason? Sheesh. PLay the flip side already.

When even Maureen Dowd can take a break from her busy schedule of character assassinations of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton to notice that McCain is over-playing his POW history, you know he's got a problem. The phrase "a noun, a verb and POW" has been going around for about a week now on the blogosphere. I hope he keeps it up long enough to make himself as big a joke as Rudy Giuliani did -- and not coincidentally, Giuliani will be speaking on the opening night of the Republican convention. Let us all pray for another Pat Buchanan moment for the GOP.

How about "What's THAT supposed to mean?" as a clearing house?

"What's that supposed to mean, Sen. Biden?"
"John McCain is a very rich man who's lost touch with ordinary life."

"What's that supposed to mean, Sen. McCain?"
"This country still owes me for what happened forty years ago."

Steve - Keep it up on the POW meme front. Anyway, can't we get an ad out of this? How about "Did you know McCain was a POW" pulling in all of the quotes he's used in the primaries and election cycle. Then quotes from his smarky comments about Kerry and the press.

McCain - Just like Bush, only older.

The question is-will this gambit by McCain cower the Obama campaign from attacking McCain? Unfortunately initial returns seem to show that the answer is-yes...

He is doing it to the point where there is hope it will eventually backfire. Reporters might ultimately stop giving him a pass for everything based upon this if he over uses it. He also runs the risk that if he attributes enough problems to having been a POW it could backfire. People might begin to wonder if perhaps the old attacks from Bush are true about being unhinged as a result of the experience if every mistake is attributed to having been a POW.

What kind of move could it be besides tactical or strategic?

The most interesting part of the McCain quote over at Matt's place is:

"In my campaign, as you know, I didn’t talk about it [his service during the Vietnam war] because I didn’t need to."

Good! The more McCain grinds away on the same old groove, the more tired people get of hearing about it, and the more grating it becomes. The only people who still welcome the theme and want to hear more about "John's service" - and who find it relevant to his current aspirations - are the people who would eat a turd in Macy's window at high noon before they would ever vote for a Democrat anyway.

If anyone is belittling his service to the nation, it is McCain himself. Nobody doubts that being a POW was a horrible experience, but so is losing members of your family. You don't see Biden insisting he should be considered for public office because he lost members of his family, or using it to excuse misbehavior. That's the part that Republicans can't get - as far as they're concerned, if you criticize overuse or misuse of the POW theme, you are criticizing the service itself.

The sad thing about American politics in the last 20 or so years, and what negative ads have done to it, is that voters are left at the end of it all feeling as if they made the best of a bad choice - that neither candidate is really much of a leader.

Opps. Meant "snarky". Need that second cup of coffee.

Pat wrote:
"OK, I give up, Steve. How many times can you write a thread on this same subject? I guess you can criticize McCain for talking about his time as a P.O.W. too much. Can we criticize you for the same reason? Sheesh. Play the flip side already."

My suggestion would be to put the ol' POW counter on so we can keep a rolling count. I thing the DNC should do the same thing on there website like the RNC did about the days BO had for going to Iraq.

As they say, All's fair in love and war." Or is that in Political Campaining??

What kind of move could it be besides tactical or strategic?

Of course, the fact that these guys think that principles and strategy don't meet is one reason we're in this mess...

Hard to say when you have said enough on this subject...as they continue to bring it up, so should anyone else that is writing about this campaign, I would say the choice is in the McCain camp.

Seems to me that's the ad that should be run. Show McCain in 04 chastising Kerry for talking about his war experiences too much. Then show a montage of the past year, with examples of McCain or his surrogates bringing up his POW status. Then ask the question: Would the 2004 John McCain be proud - OR EMBARRASSED - of the John McCain of today?

I'd like to see us take the next step, too: when McCain says something like, "I know what it's like to be blessed by the opportunities of this great nation," someone should ask, "And what opportunities were those?" I mean, how many Americans get the opportunity to marry an heiress who is willing to serve as sugar mama for our political careers?

McCain - Just like Bush, only older.

... and stupider
... and more senile
... and a worse fighter pilot

-Z

I guess McCain got over his disgust, because he seems to talk about little else now.

John McCain is fast becoming the Walter Sobchak of this election.....

I agree. I don't want to hear pow again. But think about this.
Change,Change,Change,Change,Change,Change,Change

Are we going to hear that for two more months?

Is McCain in the throes of Alzheimer's? Some seem to think so.

“High level Republican associates here are talking about the latest ploy on the part of the State of Israel to gain complete control of the United States government. Their idea is to offer the diseased McCain unlimited support from their papers and television stations in return for his putting Joe Lieberman on the ticket as vice president. As McCain is known to be seriously ill and will soon be unable to function, the plan will be for him to retire “for reasons of health� and then Joe Lieberman, loud and persistent Israeli supporter, will step into the Oval Office and America will have her first (unelected) Jewish president. And a firmly dedicated Zionist at that! Many GOP people say putting Lieberman on the ticket will ruin any chance McCain has at the White House. Why? His obvious mental confusion? No, the American public is becoming seriously anti-Semitic and anti-Israel and if McCain attempts to support a universal draft (as he is dead set on doing) and has a rabid Zionist as a running mate, his fall will be great and he will drag the shattered remnants of the Republican Party with him. Thank God!� TBRNews.org, Voice of the White House

Recent examples of McCain's confusion -- McCain recently talked at length about problems on the "Iraq/Pakistan border" – the countries are a thousand miles apart. Asked how to deal with Darfur, he mused about "bringing pressure on the government of Somalia". Uh – it's Sudan, Senator McCain. And he keeps expressing his desire to build up US relations with Czechoslovakia, a country that hasn't existed for 15 years. "
And, we all know by now McCain cannot remember how many houses he owns or even what kind of Car he Drives!

We, the American people, cannot afford to be fooled again with a President who does not have the intelligence and fortitude to shed light and bring real solutions to the many problems facing us today. We were fooled into a war which should have never been waged and will pay dearly for years to come. We have to be on guard this time and demand more, much more from our media, something they did not do after 911.

Does this mean that if he becomes president and predictably is eager to jump into the international bluster game (as we saw with Georgia), eager to start world war III, eager to use nukes as he tries to emotionally replay Vietnam (this time we'll have VICTORY dammit!), we will hear: "You know, for 5 1/2 years, he didn't have any control over any weaponry. He didn't have any nukes at his disposal. How dare you challenge his experience! He was a POW, fer gawdssakes!"

Slappy Magoo, perhaps your punchline should be somthing on the order of, "John McCain has changed and that's not change we can believe in."

the American public is becoming seriously anti-Semitic and anti-Israel...

I can't disagree more. If anything, the US public is becoming even more philo-Semitic, as opposed to anti-Semitic.

And, despite consistent media attempts to portray Israel as the baddie in all things- look at the coverage of a suicide bombing, and there will probably be more sympathy given to the bomber and his/her family than to his/her Israeli victims- US public opinion tends to be strongly pro-Israel. People still remember that, after 9/11, there was general mourning in Israel, + celebration in the Palestinian territories.

-Z

Are we going to hear that for two more months?

I'd say you're going to be hearing from Obama pretty much non-stop until January 2017. Get used to it.

Gotta love neo-Nazi posters w/o the guts to identify themselves.

-Z

When are we going to see interviews with the other residents of the Hanoi Hilton who have, well not nice things to say about Prince Songbird. How long does he get to say he was a "hero" for turning down an early release, when to do so would have violated military regulations - and while he could never be courtmartialed given his family connections had he done so anyway - he certainly would have been buried deep in the service.

This is a poster boy "out of touch blogger" moment. Apparently Steve thinks it's a plus for Obama if he continually brings up the McCain P.O.W. thing. For the vast majority of Americans, of course, it's not a negative. It's a huge positive. Not even close. And pointing out that McCain's talking about it "too much" not only reminds them of it, it also makes Democrats look petty and unpatriotic. For most regular people, there is no "talking about it too much."

*by the way, nice to see you (read you?) T-Rex @9:32. Hope your sojourn is as you wanted it to be. Looking forward to seeing you again at your TreeHouse.*

The next time he does this, someone should respond, Yes, and John Edwards is the son of a millworker!

And while McCain was "spending some years without a kitchen table," his seriously injured wife was at that very table, trying to hold the family together. Then he came home and dumped her for an heiress.

And while McCain was "spending some years without a kitchen table," his seriously injured wife was at that very table, trying to hold the family together. Then he came home and dumped her for an heiress.

And not only that, but the united McCains, Mom McCain and Cindy proceeded to sue Carol for "belongings". Of course, McCain doesn't remember the suit, claiming it was *unintentional*.

I would suggest that Bush's '04 use of "But.... 9/11!" as a response for everything and Giuliani's '08 less successful use of "But... 9/11!" for everything may give us useful information about where the tipping point is.

Pat, please explain for us how McCain's time as a POW has anything remotely logical to do with being so insanely rich that he doesn't know how many houses he has, or completely failing to comprehend (or alternatively, blatantly lying about) how social security works. If he's going to use it as a catch all excuse for everything, the opposition has every responsibility to respond "that has nothing to do with what we're discussing, and you're lying when you pretend you don't use it for political advantage."

Slappy Magoo, perhaps your punchline should be somthing on the order of, "John McCain has changed and that's not change we can believe in."

Posted by: AK Liberal on August 25, 2008 at 10:13 AM | PERMALINK
______________

Not a bad idea, except I think the McCain campaign already co-opted "that's not change we can believe in" in one of their awful-but-snarky anti-Obama ads already, and it only gives them ammo to say Obama's ripping off them...ripping off Obama.

"I am grateful for the fact that I have a wonderful life," McCain said. "I spent some years without a kitchen table, without a chair, and I know what it's like to be blessed by the opportunities of this great nation."

Let's not forget that the only people sitting around the McCains' (multiple) kitchen tables are their servants and cooks toiling away in the kitchen -- the McCains are at the dining room table, waiting to be served.

To anon @10:34 see the article by Doctor Philip Butler at
http://www.military.com/opinion/0,15202,164859_1,00.html
for a good example. (Butler was a POW for 8 years, not 5 1/2, and had lived on the same floor at the Naval Academy.)

As I've said, repeatedly, print this off and hand it to your friends when they start using the POW thing.

Apparently Steve thinks it's a plus for Obama if he continually brings up the McCain P.O.W. thing. For the vast majority of Americans, of course, it's not a negative. It's a huge positive. Not even close.

No, for the vast majority of Americans it's now the punchline to a joke.

And pointing out that McCain's talking about it "too much" not only reminds them of it, it also makes Democrats look petty and unpatriotic. For most regular people, there is no "talking about it too much."

If there was one thing the 2004 campaign proved, it's that all this talk of Americans honoring military service is pure malarkey. After the vile and yet consequence-free attacks on Max Cleland's and John Kerry's wartime heroism and sacrifice, it's plain that American voters will tolerate smearing someone's military service just fine.

Now we didn't write the rules of this game, or even agree with them -- but damn straight we're going to play, and play to win.

The real test -- and I mean this seriously -- is when Leno and Letterman and SNL start using it in their monologues and skits.

It is a touchy subject to handle, but once McCain has made it into a joke, we can use it.

Whether you think he talks about it too much is certainly up to you. And it seems to be a nice easy post subject (three posts, actually, by my count in as many days) in Steve's new position here at the helm of WM. But the miltary service / POW history is an immense positive for McCain, the polling proves it, and frankly, it's why he was first elected. Anyone who thinks otherwise is (respectfully) spending just a leetle too much time in the liberal echo-sphere. But hey, if you think it's a winner for Obama, knock yourself out. But I'm pretty sure Obama and Axelrod don't agree with you, either.

It's important to remember HOW it worked for McCain when he got elected the first time.

The fact is, Obama is vulnerable (as Peggy Noonan pointed out) to the perception that he isn't actually "from" anywhere. He is a Senator from Illinois, was a community organizer in Chicago -- but he's not FROM Chicago, his parents didn't work for Daley, nor fight against him, either; Slats Grobnik wouldn't have recognized Obama if they sat next to each other at the counter of John Belushi's uncle's diner. (That's where the 'cheeburger cheeburger cheeburger' skit came from: Royko was a regular.)

In his actual biography, Obama talks about Kansas, but he never lived there; he spent some time in Indonesia, grew up in Hawaii, went to elite schools on scholarships -- but you can't say he is from anywhere, the way Biden is from Scranton.

McCain had the same problem when he ran the first time. His opponent rightly pointed out that McCain had thin ties to Arizona.

So McCain thought about it, and said in a debate, well, gee: he's right. I was born in the Canal Zone, and lived all over with my Dad's Navy assignments, but never longer than two years or so. I lived in dorms at the Naval Academy, then I lived on an aircraft carrier. Come to think on it, the longest I lived at any one address was...
the Hanoi Hilton.

THAT is why he keeps bringing it up, folks. I'm not saying it's gonna work, but I am saying what it IS -- for McCain, talking about the POW thing is not about HIM -- it's about Obama.

McCain wants Democrats to be dumb enough to repeat the mistake that got McCain elected to the Senate the first time.

I think Dave in Austin's suggestion of a count in the corner of the blog for each mention of POW is fabulous. Sort of a carry-over of the Olympic metal madness.....

Dave in Austin's suggestion is excellent. Every liberal blog should have a POW alert number, a carry-over of Olympic medal madness.

Or, we could just count Jen's repetitive, slightly reworded, posts. Here's a hint, Jen: Any suggestion by someone who identifies themselves as "Name in Austin" or "name in Ann Arbor" or "Name in Takoma Park" probably isn't the right national strategy for Barry at this point.

Pat said:

Steve thinks it's a plus for Obama if he continually brings up the McCain P.O.W. thing...For most regular people, there is no "talking about it too much."

You might want to check with Rudy Giuliani if there's a tipping point where honorable service becomes cheapened by constant usage of it for crass political gain.

I suspect that in a true warrior society, getting captured alive and living to tell about it, doesn't qualify for automatic hero status. It's the very fact that we don't live in a warrior society, but one that values empathy and intelligence at least as much as toughness, that McCain gets unquestioned respect for his ordeal.

So far as I can figure out from watching the clip---Question: How could you not know how many houses you own? Answer: I was a POW---McCain is saying that his experience as a POW affected his memory and his ability to retain the information. That's the only interpretation that makes sense, and it's at least consistent with what we see.

Everyone who writes on this blog sucks! I can't stop reading it! You're all wrong all the time! Every prediction I've made about this campaign has been wrong and no one will show me any respect! I'm so fucking mad every minute of every day!

Potty mouth.

Okay, that was funny. Your first time! Son, we're so proud of you!

The theme seems to be that John McCain should be elected president, and therefore given the keys to the kingdom, to repay him for his lost years while imprisoned. That sounds an awful lot like pity to me. are you really going to elect a man president because you pity him? More to the point, are you really going to pity a multimillionaire who can't keep track of all his properties?

To be fair, I think McCain quite likely knows exactly what he and Cindy own for properties. He wasn't so much a confused old man as he was a man who desperately wants to be president and who didn't want to answer the question, because he didn't have a rehearsed answer ready, and Joe Lieberman was nowhere around. He couldn't run all the possible ways the answer might be interpreted fast enough to answer the question, so he dodged it.

Anyway, John McCain certainly doesn't need to be placed in the White House on a groundswell of pity. It's not like he'll have to live in an alley inside an old refrigerator box if this last bright chance slips through his fingers; he'll be quite all right. If you size him up for the job based on his merits in areas where he claims to be an expert - like foreign policy, at which he is possibly more inept than Bush - he falls far short.

Then again, if the voters chose their leaders based on their merits, negative ads would never gain any traction.