Today's burning question, will John McCain pulling out of the Larry King interview force CNN back in line?

Republicans are sort of like that strange creature found on the floor of the Mariana Trench. Alien, leading a life so strange, so foreign you cock your head to one side as you view it, wondering how in the hell they got they way. You shrug your shoulders, knowing it must work for them, must be what they have to do to get by every day, yet agog in puzzlement. Obviously not the sort of creature you'd find the remotest common ground with. You can't even imagine sitting at the same dinner table, let alone sharing enough of a common outlook and vocabulary to tackle problems. They're a strange, twisted failure of evolution, people frozen in time, denizens of some dark age in human development before books and education, before science and rational thought overtook superstition. Objects of both pity and scorn, equally deserving of both. Sadly they'll always be with us, an anchor on our society and our progress toward becoming more advanced, learned and compassionate beings.

It was an exceptionally dour event, IMO.

Lieberman was asked on MSNBC whether Palin was ready to be president -- even he couldn't say yes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OHQ8PIjKhz4

One of the worst things McCain has done is to cheapen the legacy of military vets. I found myself wanting to jeer during Thompson's fawning speech going on and on about beatings and broken arms and beatings ad nauseum and then I felt ashamed for wanting to jeer and then I wanted to jeer again. The thing is we should esteem military service, especially during a time of war, but this seems to be all he's got, as he reminds us everytime we turn around.

Noun.Verb.POW...indeed...

It pains me to say it was painful to watch. I'm looking forward to hearing Palin speak.

As so eloquently spoken on Kos, "Thanks to McCain, POW is now a verb."

"Today's burning question, will John McCain pulling out of the Larry King interview force CNN back in line"...

Ron, great question! My hope is that the rethugs/mcc will push back a little to far and the press will finally give them the ol bronx cheer and start doing their job (if only to get back at the smarmy SOB)...oh, well, I can dream.

Were the speeches good television? How were the ratings? Will any one be moved to join McCain?

ugh, just painful to watch and listen to -- bullshit out in full force. even the applause & yells seemed to be coming from a machine.

other than the palin & mccain speeches i think i'll get my rnc updates here.

There seemedto be an icky, dingy film over the whole thing. It was musty. At the Democratic convention "change" was spoken of in fresh, exciting terms. At the Republican convention "change" sounded like pouring a can of Cream of Mushroom soup over rancid left overs.

The cheers at the Democratic convention were exuberent and enthusiastic. At the Republican convention the cheers seemed fueled by rancor and resentment.

And I didn't here a word about the economy.

Last night they had a sitting President, their favorite turncoat Democrat and a star from Law and Order. What else do they have to offer other than McCain and Palin that would make tonight and tomorrow night an improvement? Romney? Giuliani? Pawlenty? I don't think it gets qualitatively better, you either buy into their relentless fear-mongering negativism and think last night was wonderful or you never will buy it.

Can anyone guess what the press coverage would have been like if HRC had run an alternate convention in Denver? Ron Paul's gathering is like a tree falling in an empty forest.

Furthermore, wtf is up with that fawning NYT piece on Todd Palin. It wouldn't have been more cliched if it had been written by Karl Rove. Is this outdoorsman not the one who was being cc'ed on all sorts of state business including firing without cause more than one state official?

But I forgot this is the LIBERAL media.

I hope the Obama campaign has planned news events for each day this week the way McCain did during the DNC. Obama cannot let the stench of the RNC permeate the news cycle. He just made the 50% mark in a recent Gallop poll. He needs to stay there.

steve duncan, right on!
they are like aliens & we can't help but watch them move & talk as though we've never seen anything like it before.
I've always wondered if being a devout repug means you lack a fundamental gene in your dna? seems whatever makes one compassionate is the first to be found missing among them.
ah, another day of msm bs at the rnc all over my tv.

But I forgot this is the LIBERAL media.
Posted by: Buffalonian

Damn straight.

-I wasnt sure if this was a convention for AARP or John McCain. It was really lackluster.
-If he hadnt picked Sarah Palin would anyone have tuned in at all?
-From the delegates reaction, the ticket should be Palin/McCain.
-Do they have any "new" economic ideas besides drilling?
-We really need a POWs Against McCain. IMO, he is abusing his POW status. His campaign is becoming an entitlement program.

Coral, I had a similar thought, but not so much about the convention proper. I wonder if the Obama campaign has something for Friday to—if not match—deflate any boost that Hon. Sen. McCain might get coming out of Thursday. I hope that they do, but I'm hard pressed to imagine what that might be. Perhaps some announcement on a cabinet designee or the like.

Steve and Hilzoy have said this is different words, but I think that two aspects of the non-vet of Gov. palin that should be made explicit, even if we take the McCain campaign at their word, are:

a) If Senator McCain knew all of these things, this was the poorest example of media management ever. We're supposed to believe that Mr. McCain knew all about these potentially negative items and instead of paving the way for the press to quickly get them out of the way (to the extent possible), they ignore them until it becomes a big story for days? I agree with Hilzoy that the daughter's pregnancy is receiving way to much press, but Mr. McCain couldn't both be in his right mind and believe that ignoring the issue was the best way to handle it.

b) The excuse that Mr. McCain et alii are giving for a vetting process that, if it wasn't incomplete (as they preposterously proclaim), didn't include many Alaskan sources that could have been consulted was that the politics of the big surprise announcement might have been compromised. So their argument for considering them competent is that they perceived the possibility of not finding damaging information about their nominee to be less important than the sheer politics of the announcement itself. Nice.

I'd also like to note the absence of Mr. Mai Van On from Sen. Thompson's McCain bio, just for the record.

This VP search process has to be compared to the pre-war intelligence gathering process. Find out what you want to hear. Ignore any contrary evidence. Allow politics to dictate everything.

Am I pushing this analogy too far?

Am I pushing this analogy too far? - Buffalonian

One of the best I've heard so far.

Nobody ever bucks orthodoxy so much as when they recant their former beliefs in public.

You nailed it Steve. Contradictions galore and no substantive reason to back McCain other than his war record. We never learned what exactly the entrenched interests were, for example, that he defied.

But what could the speakers do? To run against Washington now means running against the Republican Party and this is the Republican convention. The crowd gamely played along at yelling "four legs good, two legs better!" But their heart was only in it when Thompson launched into the catechism of liberal demonology. I think we saw Republican Orwell fatigue last night, when Joe asked them to clap for Clinton.

You nailed it Steve. Contradictions galore and no substantive reason to back McCain other than his war record. We never learned what exactly the entrenched interests were, for example, that he defied.

But what could the speakers do? To run against Washington now means running against the Republican Party and this is the Republican convention. The crowd gamely played along at yelling "four legs good, two legs better!" But their heart was only in it when Thompson launched into the catechism of liberal demonology. I think we saw Republican Orwell fatigue last night, when Joe asked them to clap for Clinton.

Hey, Steve, you shouldn't ask a group of Dems what we thought of the convention so far. It's like asking a group of Republicans what they thought of OUR convention.

Anyway, I could barely watch. Or, if I did, it was basically with the "mute" button firmly pressed.

The most interesting thing I took away was in the "wrapup" on MSNBC, when someone, possibly Buchanan, finally brought it all together for me.

He said, "this election is turning into a vote on 'social issues', with the inclusion of Sarah Palin, a noted 'hard-liner' on the ticket".

And I thought, "Okay, maybe that's what it SHOULD be about. Get those issues out in front and finally have a vote on them. 'Pro-choice vs Pro-life', the NRA, gays, prayer in school, evolution vs 'Intelligent Design'. Let's see where America really stands."

Did anyone else get the same feeling?

"Changing Washington" is really just Republican code for "get rid of all Democrats" - this is why it is not contradictory for them to both attack Washington and be the party in power at the same time.

I can't tell if the reporting on the convention reflects how the rest of America thinks of Palin or if they are just making her sound better because of the narrow representation. Unfortunately, I think her staunch anti-abortion views are going to rally the evangelicals to the ticket - I had been hoping for a lackluster response all the way to election day.

Don't be fooled. Now that the Republicans have something to be angry about ("The Democrats and The Media are picking on our vice presidential pick!"), they will mobilize and do it quickly. They have a political machine that has been in place for 12 years. We can't get too excited with how boring the RNC is. And as far as its contradictions (a common theme for the Republican platform anyway), the mainstream voter won't notice.

Come on, Plouffe. Take back the microphone and make Obama the media leader again.

What I found disturbing about last night is the campaign is focusing on "Country First" and "Washington Reform". The irony behind Country First is they want us to believe in service to the country, but I just can't see how bankrupting our citizens and our economy helps our country in any way. The Reform they are playing up is a direct assault on the way Washington has been run for the past 8 years, under a Republican President.

The capper for the night has to be the line that "Sarah Palin can competently field dress a Moose"! Yeah, that will come in handy in Washington.

Is it just me, or am I so synical that

I tuned in via the RNC's convention website in hopes of getting some sense of comparison since that was how I had viewed the Democratic convention.

* Technically, the video quality of the Dems feed was much crisper. They were using HD and on my Mac, the picture was really clean and vivid.

* The "flow" of the Dems coverage was much superior. On the GOP last night, as soon as someone finished their presentation, the picture would continue but the audio would get cut off and at times it would begin acting strangely until someone else came on....often with no introduction.

* Finally...was it me or was the life just totally sucked out of the entire thing. Someone ought to put together a side by side video, but I swear the level of enthusiasm in responses at the GOP event was a quantum step below the Democrats. Granted Obama had a stadium audience about five times bigger for his speech, but overall, I felt the audience energy, and enthusiasm and sheer voice power was much stronger for the Dems.

The GOP event is truly Don Henley's "Tired Old Men in Their Electric Chairs_ - a party without ideas, knowing that it is backing an old man with no clear vision other than wanting to be President because it seems like a good idea to him, and desperate to hold on because otherwise it will lose control, lose its access to the levers of power and could face criminal charges (one hopes but does not expect that to happen.)

Yep. The convention sucks.

But aside from the speakers or themes, I'm actually very surprised by how awful the art direction of the whole place is. It's flacid, with bright overhead lights shining on thousands of pasty white senior citizens who look drunk or scared. It's lit like a fucking rodeo.

I agree with the poster above that you can almost smell a sad musty, mildewy layer over the whole proceeding.

The ironies of this convention abound.

First, there is John McCain, immortalized as a reformer, an independent, "his own man." Yet, in the crucial matter of selecting a running mate, he is forced to curry favor with the Religious Right, leaving it to his sycophants to explain how it can be that someone who has just surrendered the most important decision of his candidacy can possibly be a reform-minded "maverick" ready to take on the Powers That Be.

Second, after eight years at the helm of government, the Republican Party has now discovered that the only thing they can run against is themselves. We have met the enemy, say Republicans, and they are us! Forget "Service" or "America First." The Republican Party's new slogan might well as be: "Elect us so we can clean up the mess we made!"

No wonder Republicans have made such a hash of things in Washington. For the last eight years they had no idea it was actually they who were in charge.

The capper for the night has to be the line that "Sarah Palin can competently field dress a Moose"! Yeah, that will come in handy in Washington.

Whatever happened to Marshall Whittman, anyway?

http://bullmooseblogger.blogspot.com/

"Sarah Palin can competently field dress a Moose"!

Too bad her talents don't include field dressing a few elephants...

Steve Schmidt's appearence for the first time into teh light-o-day (that I have seen) does suggest that the McCain camp is rocked by this Palin stuff. Based on his appearence, probably a good idea that he doesn't come out from under his rock too often. He's got anger issues.

One of the worst things McCain has done is to cheapen the legacy of military vets. I found myself wanting to jeer during Thompson's fawning speech going on and on about beatings and broken arms and beatings ad nauseum and then I felt ashamed for wanting to jeer and then I wanted to jeer again.

It's the Passion of St. John. They've thrown their lot in with the fundies and that's the only play they've got left.

This is looking like one of the most "anti-choice" focused Republican election campaigns ever, which is a little wierd given McCain's ambivalent stance on it. And Pat Buchanan last night on MSNBC said of Barack Obama, "He likes partial birth abortion."

I find it interesting that by choosing Palin, McSame has put the Repub party and winning the election before doing what's right for the country. Someone with so little national experience just a "heart beat away" from the presidency does not seem to be in the country's best interest. Her selection has solidified the base of the party to vote for him, which appears to be one of the major reasons for her selection. So much for the "Country First" theme.

I think that last night's Daily Show, which will rerun all day today, couldn't have been better. They captured the real party-first attitude of the convention's first day.

Republicans love America... they just hate the people living here.

You are going to hear a lot about the surge in Iraq at the Republican National Convention and in the debates to follow. This is not to denigrate the brave work of the American soldiers that performed in the Iraqi surge, but ever since the Congressional leaders announced a timetable calling for the removal of American troops from Iraq by the end of 2010 and supported by nearly 70 percent of the American public, the Iraqi insurgents threw up their hands and said "What's the use of fighting". The Americans are leaving. The insurgents and al-Qaida could no longer enlist freedom fighters just as the surge arrived in Iraq.

President Bush refused to set a timetable for withdrawal stating that the al-Qaida would merely wait it out and then take control of Iraq. Bush's response was to order a military surge, but the American media informed the Iraqi freedom fighters that the occupation was about over. Polls showed this spring that the American people strongly favored a Democrat Presidential Candidate calling for an immediate withdrawal. The Bush team would be gone in 9 months. Bush was right, the insurgents ceased fighting.

The Iraqi's are a proud people and all they want is America to leave. They hate the American occupation just as we would foreign occupation in this country and they hate those that sympathize with the Americans. Once they learned we are leaving, they no longer saw the need to join al-Qaida and they turned against them. The reduction of violence that followed allowed the President to start withdrawing our troops just as predicted and this further confirmed that America is planning to withdraw. President Maliki wants to be certain that it continues and set a deadline for completion.

The al-Qaida and freedom fighters are now focusing on driving the American occupation forces out of Afghanistan. Bush-Cheny and McCain team will claim the surge in Iraq worked and now the war on terror is in Afghanistan. They will contend we need to add more troops there like the Russians did and many people will believe that's the way to win!

Wonder where George ever saw a Vietnamese Communist? Maybe there are a lot of them in Texas.

Reposting from another thread (very early this am, not sure if anyone read it). Some really good quotes from Jesse Ventura (of all people) and DL Hughley (McCain: "dude who's half alive").

From Larry King 9/2 midnight show,
transcript at http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0809/02/lkl.01.html
Here are a few of the better quotes:
ROBERT GIBBS, SENIOR ADVISER, OBAMA CAMPAIGN: The Joe Lieberman you heard tonight wasn't the same Joe Lieberman that called Barack Obama in 2006 and asked him desperately to come to Connecticut and campaign for him.
And you know, tonight the big lie that Senator Lieberman said which, I got to tell you, is just really disappointing to hear from anybody -- you know, he -- he said that Barack Obama didn't have a record of real accomplishment reaching across -- reaching across the party lines to get things done.
Barack Obama's reached across party lines to work with Dick Lugar of Indiana to keep nuclear weapons out of the hands of terrorists. He's worked with Senator Tom Coburn to open up our budget process and to end no-bid contracts that dominated after Katrina hit New Orleans when the Bush administration was busy handing out contracts to their political contributors.
And he worked across party lines to make sure that lobbyists couldn't give senators gifts and hand out free meals like they've been doing for many, many years.
So, you know, Joe Lieberman ought to be ashamed for himself for some of the things that he said tonight, not as a Democrat but as an American.
~~~
KING: So you didn't see any of the speeches of Mr. Lieberman or Senator Lieberman or Fred Thompson or anybody -- George Bush?
JESSE VENTURA: No. Didn't want to. Don't need to. Already know they'll promise everything and deliver nothing.
~~~
KING: And in New York is the very funny D.L. Hughley, the actor and standup comic, one of the original kings of comedy. He is a Democrat but has not endorsed a presidential candidate.
Why not, D.L.?
D.L. HUGHLEY, ACTOR, NOT ENDORSING CANDIDATE: Well, no, that isn't true. I'm going to vote for Barack. I think that...
KING: Oh OK.
HUGHLEY: I'm going to vote for Barack. But to me, I'm just a -- I'm a very cynical guy. I think all politicians lie. And it's a choice between the dude who's half black and a dude who's half alive.
~~~
KING: Yes, wasn't that surprising, Jesse, even though you didn't see it, that the theme was "we're the patriots"?
VENTURA: Well, you know, the Republicans have been pushing really Hermann Goering on us, the Nazi, since 2001. I mean, you know...
KING: Hermann Goering?
VENTURA: Yes. He said that it's easy to take a country to war. You have to convince them they're under attack. Denounce the pacifist for being unpatriotic and also for putting the country into danger. And yet, Thomas Jefferson said dissension is the greatest form of patriotism.
I like to follow the teachings of Thomas Jefferson a little bit more than Herman Goering.
KING: D.L., are you...
HUGHLEY: To follow...
KING: I'm sorry.
HUGHLEY: To follow up on what Jesse was saying, it did remind me -- I promise you, the first thing I thought when I saw those "Country First" signs, it reminded me of Nazis. It really -- I mean they just seemed so, you know -- that seemed to be a country that I don't recognize.
It seemed to be -- it didn't look that way. It looks very exclusionary. It looked very specific. I didn't see anything that looked -- you know everybody looked like they were -- had the same experience, had the same kind of process.
It seemed like that -- I felt more like I was looking -- I mean, peering into something that wasn't necessarily invited to. So I didn't -- I can't see anybody would watch them and think that those people would be, you know, open to anybody with a different experience.

You say that the day was awash in contradictions like it's a bad thing.

I say it proves that getting the Party faithful to fully doublethink has been doubleplus success!

I am wondering why nobody seems to have picked up on the fact the "right" was energized by the Sarah Palin pick. This seems to be prove, factually, that the "right" was not excited about the Maverick himself. Doesn't that say to you that the by picking Palin, the Repub platform has now shifted strongly to the right, leaving a void in the middle? Could this be why Obama got a bounce in the polls since the Palin pick?

You would think the Dems and the media would be all over this.

I thought Thompson and Lieberman were good speakers, and that the convention didn't seem to have lost anything by skipping over Monday. Maybe it's just me --- for some reason the first days of the Democratic convention didn't find me tuning in, and I realize that Michelle Obama really needed to presesnt herself as something other than what was on the New Yorker cover, but--! Just found myself thinking that our own convention maybe had too much lag time, too many speeches by people who weren't great at speaking. And wondered if it was ours going first that somehow got me more focused and ready --- and perhaps curiosity about the Republicans that ranged from the stuff on Palin, the hurricane, to what Lieberman might say --- that in some odd way got me more pumped for viewing. Hope the numbers don't reflect my own habits. And I know McCain's final day can't top Obama's (though personally I still like better to hear Obama speaking in a more oratorical, sermon-like manner), but I'm worried that everyone will love whatever speech they've prepared for Palin --- as if she had anything to do with it. Any country that can elect Bush president is certainly one that will be willing to be charmed by Palin. I was hoping their convention would be a mess, and yet they can have stuff like this Palin controversy and I'm betting sail right through it.
Life's not fair.

I was struck by the lack of excitement on Tuesday night's Republican event. They tried, but just no enthusiasm. The speakers didn't help. I'm grateful to know that Palin and Teddy Roosevelt know how to dress out a moose. And, Joe LIEberman finally took off the sheep's clothing to reveal the true wolf (my apologies to wolves everywhere). It was a night of nothing.