The McCain campaign seems to handle each piece of bad news the same way, regardless if it is against them or Obama.

The sports analogy is a knockout punch. This forces them to go to great lengths to deny or minimize anything against them, or for instance, point out how the bad Obama news proves that Obama isn't fit to breath air or take up space.

Probably the correct analogy is more like baseball. For McCain, every pitch is a potential strikeout, even on a 3-0 count. Obama is playing to get into the World Series with a team capable of winning it. McCain seems more inclined to deliberately hit the batter and force in the winning run for the other team.

Hypocrisy is not considered a character defect in our national Republican Party; it's a core competency.

All these companies, everyone so upset, this is all very confusing. That well groomed young man with the swarthy complexion that was on TV the other night seemed to understand, is he running for President?

What I want to know is the identity of the "senior McCain advisor" who "said the entire flap could have been avoided if the campaign had resisted attacking Barack Obama for his ties to two former Fannie Mae executives, which prompted the media to take a second look at Davis. 'It was stupid,' the adviser said. 'A serious miscalculation and an amateurish move.' Still, this adviser said, McCain's faith in his campaign manager remains unswerving."

Suuuuuuuuure seems to me like that's Rick Davis himself speaking -- after all, there really are only two "senior McCain advisors" (Davis and Steve Schmidt), and Schmidt's moronic Rovean win-the-daily-news-cycle/attack-your-opponent's-strengths-to-hide-your-own-weaknesses tactics have been ascendant lately.

Are you fucking kidding me?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5tZc8oH--o

McCain (i.e. the McCain campaign) knew the Davis - Freddie Mac information was going to come out, and they were araid of it being a big deal. THAT is why they went on the offensive airing the Obama - Fannie Mae exec charges. (Why they didn't keep the sole focus on the one legitimate connection, I have no idea.) They were araid of the fallout stealing a news cycle and crippling the campaign, so they figured if they aired charges too then the media -- especially cable news -- would treat it as "accusations of both candidates having ties to the mortgage giants."

Thus, a net draw rather than a damaging allegation that the average Joe will realize stinks of hypocricy.

two words

"deferred compensation"

Thank you, I was hoping this story wasn't going away. This is big ammunition to basically raze the defensive position McCain has been standing on to the ground (when it comes to economy). This needs to make big headlines across all major media outlets. This would pretty much secure an Obama victory in mind.

On a side note, my brother-in-law, a staunch Republican, confessed he was thinking about voting for Obama tonight after a few drinks. It's the first time I've heard this type of talk come from him... this of course was mentioned after he said he restructured his investments into more stable vehicles. I think his lost a shit ton of money. It takes a financial meltdown in the markets to make the staunchest republican cross party lines.

Are you fucking kidding me?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5tZc8oH--o

Interesting video, someone is putting a lot of effort into a pushback. The storyline is obviously bullshit; no one held a gun to the heads of the players in the market, everyone loved this stuff until a week ago. Plus, um, like, why didn't, um The Hammer do something about this when, um, he and, um, Jack Abramoff basically, um, like, you know, owned Congress?

You can get a flavour of what the legislation is about from the following excerpt, drawn from the case they cite, on which Obama was one of the attoreys (courtesy of Lexis-Nexis):

The [...] data provided by both parties indicates that in 1992 and 1993, the percentage of loan applications approved by Citibank was far lower in areas where the racial composition of the neighborhood was predominantly African-American than it was in areas where the composition of the neighborhood was predominantly White. In 1992, for example, Citibank denied refinancing loans to only 19% of upper-income applicants living in areas with less than 10% minority populations. In that same year and income bracket, Citibank denied refinancing loans to 42% of the applicants in areas with an 80-100% minority population. Plaintiffs allege that this data "strongly suggest(s) that African-American home loan applicants and applicants from largely African-American neighborhoods are discriminated against by Citibank in significantly large numbers even though some African-Americans receive loans."

But to return from the brink of race war, this video grossly misrepresents reality, and can be fairly described a piece of shit.

While this is certainly unseemly, the amount of compensation is quite low. Certainly very low for someone like Davis. It looks more like a basic retainer fee (which raises its own questions). The real question is where's the rest of his money coming from? He doesn't seem like a guy who would live on only $180K per year. So from whom does the other million come? And more importantly, what are their interests?

This is apparently a way to keep opposition lobbyists occupied in Washington. You're paying them not to work for the other guy, although I don't know what constitutes "the other guy" for the FMs. It's like calling all the divorce lawyers in town for a consultation so they'll have a conflict of interest when your wife goes looking for a lawyer.

Forget the Freddie/Fannie angle for a minute. McCain not only surrounds himself with lobbyists, but in Davis' case, he literally hired the firm to lobby and raise money for him. You simply cannot argue that Davis is a former lobbyist, when you're paying the firm for his services.

Does anyone else see this sequence of events?

1) McCain Campaign attacks Obama with misleading ads regarding Fanny mae/Freddy Mac
2) The next day, the money paid to Davis starts hitting the news
3) the day after, McCain pulls the "go to Washington and save the country" stunt, pushing the Davis news off the papers.

Now the Davis story is back, along with the Time's gambling piece. But the larger question for me is this: Did Rick Davis hatch the bailout stunt ONLY to get his name out of the news? Judging from how the campaign seems to have no concerns past the 24 hour news cycle, it seems a possibility.

I think McCain isn't running his show at all. A hint of what his presidency might be like.

Easch day John grows additional warts.

This whole thing has become a "circular logic" shell game. Davis and Manafort are tied directly to Freddie Mac; they're also tied to this false-front, fly-by-night startup, 3eDC, which in turn links to an outfit called Management Alliance---whose business is "Indian Casino development"---but with no actual filings under any government agency, but supposedly exists through a "rent premium" paid to the McCain campaign headquarters landlord, Charles E. Smith Real Estate Services (in Virginia).

And McCain has no credibility in denying any of this---it was in the Wall Street Journal, on July 23rd.

By the way--that's "July 23rd, 2007"---14 months ago.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118515181783374359.html

The culture of corruption is alive and well in the form of John McCain---35 days before the election. If this were played to its full extent; if it were to go viral in the MSM, McCain would be looking at a defeat worthy of Goldwater's 1964 thrashing....

Jassalasca Jape, I just watched that video. I wonder that if all that's supposed to be facts, you know, the truth, then it stands to reason McCain's campaign ought to be using that info every single day to bring down Obama's rep.

It sounds like conspiracy theory hogwash, as usual, and highlights a serious misunderstanding of the CRA.

Further, Rick Davis' involvement with Freddie is far more damning than any YouTube video, which, by the way, is probably using all that music without permission. Ironically, many of those artists would no doubt declare their disgust with McCain and the GOP.

I have no doubt lobbyists will court any politician they view sympathetic to their cause (R or D), but for one group to constantly accuse the other of doing something they themselves are up to their necks in is hypocrisy.

Had to just make a small point here: one of the folks said; "Obama is playing to get into the World Series with a team capable of winning it. McCain seems more inclined to deliberately hit the batter and force in the winning run for the other team."

These two men are already in the "World Series" at this point in the election process we are already in the 7th game...

Had to just make a small point here: one of the folks said; "Obama is playing to get into the World Series with a team capable of winning it. McCain seems more inclined to deliberately hit the batter and force in the winning run for the other team."

These two men are already in the "World Series" at this point in the election process we are already in the 7th game...

The fact that Davis didn't receive any "salary" from 3eDC is a red herring. 3eDC is a limited liability company. LINK Davis could have received member payments which are not salary but rather a return on the investment. Regardless of what the payments are called they are considered taxable income.

Reporters need to ask the McCain campaign more general questions. Next time they need to ask if Davis received any payments from 3eDC. It is difficult to parse such a general question. Although I am sure the brain trust at the McCain campaign will try.

Insulation

The GOP strategy if there are skeletons in the closet is to level those charges against the opponent. When the skeleton is exposed, the GOP makes the claim "they all do it".

Of course it is false equivalency but it meets the MSM standards of equal time.

isn't this what is commonly known as rove strategy?

attack your opponent on your own weakness?

by making an essentially false attack against obama, mccain's own damaging ties are obscured in the water's muddied by the argument that "mccain is falsely attacking"?

the truth about mccain's ties now lie almost invisible at the bottom of a muddy pond.

Under the assignment of income doctrine, I believe that any compensation earned by Rick Davis but paid to a third party is, by law, taxable to Mr. Davis. I wonder if he declared this income on his tax return.

Proving once again that McCain is every lobbyist's "pet senator on a leash".
McCain has always been used to cover up the activities of shifty people in government...he even bragged about getting all the Abramoff materials under the control of his committee by subpoena so he could "protect congressional republicans and keep their names out of the investigations" by controlling the investigations. Even subpoenas couldn't get the materials "buried" in McCain's committee without his specific approval. Revenge, corruption, blackmail, bribery...these have followed McCain in all his activities. Only a special prosecutor with subpoena power would be able to connect the dots legally...sound familiar. It is this nature that attracted a Palin pick...a willingness to use the law to break the law.

McCain commented that a lot of republicans should be grateful for his handling of the Abramoff Indian Affairs scandal...that he protected a lot of their jobs. Now add the Keating scandal, "troopergate" and the Georgian crisis to all the lobbyists double dealing in the McCain campaign and you'll see just what McCain is good for. He's earned the title every lobbyist's "pet senator on a leash"