How about regretting getting a loan from a convicted felon to prop up his first campaign (Cindy McAce's dad)

Let's not forget about the former Republican White House aide who led an effort to provide taxpayer money to Central American death squads. He was convicted of trying to cover up the scandal, but his conviction was overturned when his confession was thrown out on the kind of legal technicalities that Republicans scream about when they are used by poor people and people with dark skin.
http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/walsh/chap_02.htm

I can't wait until McCain says, "At least I'm not related to Dick Cheney."

As noted, Bill Ayers got his splendid legal representation and his professorship because of who his father was--the same way that John McCain got his place at Annapolis, his place at Pensacola and his Captain's stripes.

By all means, let's go into this as deeply as possible.

If the media try to claim that the Keating scandal is irrelevant because it's "ancient history", as Tom Brokow agreed with yesterday, it should be pointed out that if Obama was McCain's age, Ayers and Rezko would be ancient history also. Puts the emphasis on the ancient in ancient history.

It's sadly ironic that McCain's campaign has employed a take no prisoners strategy! -Kevo

Boy I wish I had your optimism...but must go back to my favorite bumper sticker...IT'S THE STUPID, STUPID! And, there are a body of folk out there who will be easily enticed by the innuendo put out there about all the Obama connections ...hopefully they are only the "base" (what a perfect word) and have already made up their minds...still it's the "BUT HE'S BLACK" insinuations that are most disturbing because of what it says about this country still...

What about that Alaska separatist party? Wasn't Mr. Palin a member and didn't Sarah hang out with them? They want to secede from the US.

Unfortunately, all the "he did it too" ripostes that Obama could make will be lost in the cloud of accusations. They are known only to political junkies with good memories. Everyone is saying that McCain's character assassinations were totally predictable: but what is the effective response? After all, Dukakis, Gore, and Kerry got killed by such tactics. Drew Westin has suggested some good ways of dealing with these attacks. I sure hope Obama takes his advice, because these are terrorist measures just as dangerous as any suicide bomber's.

My hunch is John McCain is going to come to regret this campaign very much indeed.

Agreed.
He is politically dead going forward. You do not slander one of the most popular Americans to come along in decades and his social movement and live to prosper.

Looks like Air Caribou is jumping face first into the muck too. Goody. I wanted her to politically hang herself. She is obliging.

"Dukakis, Gore, and Kerry got killed by such tactics."

Precisely.

It ends here.

No more taking it without giving back in spades.

Maybe nobody will hire the Rovettes during the next election cycle.

Town hall debate format. Perfect setting for Obama to directly contront McCain on his slimeball tactics. Have you noticed how McCain always responds when dirstly confronted on his dishonest campaign and negative tactics? Alwys the same: Darting eyes, sickly grin, uncomfortable shifting. All Obama needs to do is confront him in person in a reasonable, measured fashion and the picture presented won't be pretty.

Is this really all they have? Don't underestimate the McCain tenacity though, even now he has an army of investigators out there putting the magnifying glass to every moment of Obama's life. By next week I predict that McCain will begin the true focus of his smear campaign when he reveals that "Obama Consorted with Black People."

Town hall debate format. Perfect setting for Obama Saint Zak

Expect McCain to come out with statistical lies tomorrow. They're hard to debate without being vague.

There is a pattern here. Whatever issue could embarass John McCain, he turns around and throws it at Obama. The MSM does their job by picking up the lies, repeating them, thereby making it a truth. Anyone who has no access to information outside of MSM only gets the lie. The issue is neutralized because McCain said it first. Obama, this will only get worse. These folks know there is a lot of money up for grabs and they will not give up.

Ezra: My hunch is John McCain is going to come to regret this campaign very much indeed.

And this time, his inevitable apology after the fact won't be enough to save his reputation.

The GOP has never loved him, and after this year, he'll have the stench of a loser about him.

Any Dems who once respected him will have changed their minds after his Rovian campaign.

The media - his onetime 'base' - has already jumped ship, aside from a few remaining holdouts like Michael Dobbs.

He'll be a pariah in this town. It wouldn't surprise me if he doesn't run for another Senate term in 2010.

Ya know McCain and Palin must be very careful on this "palling around with a terrorist" bit (her reference to Bill Ayers). It would be very easy for someone to say that McCain was very chummy with Communists for over 5 years...ridiculous statement, but perhaps no more so than the crap that the Repliars have started to dish out.

The conclusion to be drawn isn't that Obama is slandered or honest, but that both are corrupt.

One hand washes the other in Washington. Look at illegal immigration. It is a national shame that for PC libs any discussion must be prefaced with 'what part of illegal don't you understand.' Having gotten that out of the way for a lib column, there is no action on illegal migration because BOTH parties are corrupt. There is no action on contractor corruption in Iraq, dollarwise the greatest scandal in the history of mankind, because BOTH parties are corrupt. There will be no action on the causes for the $800,000,000,000 bailout because BOTH parties are corrupt. We need more partisanship in Washington, not sham pillow fights.

I lived through the Sixties. Attended Berkeley, got my head busted in street actions, and went to Vietnam anyway. I could give a fuck less about the Sixties despite.
I want to know what a presidential candidate has planned for now: 2008 and beyond. Seems to me that McCain and Miss Snowmobile don't have a strategy to deal with our problems.
Run against yesterday, Republicans, and we'll take today.

One of my close friends (now in his late 60s) was a young man in the Bolivian air force in 1964, and he took part in the military coup against the democratically-elected government at the time. Later on he moved to the US and went to engineering school. Today, 45 years later, he is a different person and a fine human being.

I also have a friend who used to be in the Hells Angels in the 60s. He's a totally changed person as well. I have other friends with even more unsavory pasts. I'm sure we all do.

Guilt-by-association, whether directed at Obama or McCain or anyone else, is something I've always had a major problem with. We can't do background checks on every person who comes into our lives.

It's sadly ironic that McCain's campaign has employed a take no prisoners strategy!
Posted by: kevo

I prefer to embrace the irony of the situation, in that McCain continues to hand Obama the multitude of weapons with which the Republikanner Beast may be slayed. Now as for Bullwinkle Barbie, I'm curious as to whether wolves, moose, and other members of Alaska's fauna community can be taught to competently load, aim, and fire an antiaircraft gun at low-flying hunters.

There's one thing I think is important to keep in mind. Sure, these types of smears helped sink Gore and Kerry - but remember, they BARELY lost (Gore actually won). They were smeared to high hell, and Bush was only able to eke out the slimmest of victories.

Now I don't know about you, but I'm guessing Obama is about a million times more appealling a candidate than either Gore or Kerry were. Also, he seems to be very adept at this whole campaigning thing.

so let's not worry too much about this stupidity. It'll convince those who are already convinced, and not a person more. Or to put it another way - it's October and they're still rallying the base. I like Obama's chances...I likes 'em a lot!

this is ridiculous, of course, but everyone, everywhere, knew this was coming.

Then I hope the Obama campaign is ready for this. I hope they have the gun loaded to fire back because you ain't seen nothing yet. McCain has betrayed all his principles at this stage, he won't hesitate to go after Obama in the most disgusting, dishonest ways possible.

Shall we compare the number of associates of the two candidates who have served jail time?

My hunch is John McCain is going to come to regret this campaign very much indeed.

McCain can go fuck himself. I hope his career implodes in a spectacular fireball after this. I hope people spit with contempt when speaking his name. He richly deserves it.

and meanwhile....every day sees the diminishment of the balance in my kids' college funds that my husband and I have worked so hard and have sacrificed so much to accumulate. Do these jokers really think I'm in the mood to listen to them sling mud? I don't care about what happened twenty or forty years ago--I care about what's going to happen to my kids.

Americans need to ask themselves if they've ever chosen a running mate for the office of Vice President of the United States who, along with her husband, has been affiliated with a political party that advocated SECEDING from the United States.

This is all fodder for the dittohead base. It isn't aimed at "independent" or "undecided" voters. It is aimed at getting the weak-minded, ignorant mental slaves of Rush Limbaugh to the polls on election day. Because that's all the Palin-McCain campaign has left.

Everyone is saying that McCain's character assassinations were totally predictable: but what is the effective response?

"Why are you afraid to talk about the economy, Mr. McCain?"

My hunch is John McCain is going to come to regret this campaign very much indeed.

I dunno-- I'm worried. These tactics have worked before; combine fear wtih election manipulation, and we're looking at four more years of this nightmare.

"Americans need to ask themselves if they've ...had a convicted felon help buy their house."

McCain is blind to irony, or is relying on the expectation that the press is. He himself has had a convicted felon help buy his houses - not just one, but all of them. His father-in-law, Jim Hensley, was a convicted felon, and not only after McCain became involved with him. It was Hensley's money that bought the houses McCain lives in, along with everything else that makes McCain's career & style of living possible.

At least Obama didn't marry Rezko's daughter and heir.

John McCain is utterly without honor or integrity & devoid of common decency. Sarah Palin is an unprincipled whore who will say & do ANYTHING to win, and who apparently has no problem using thinly veiled racist attacks against Mr. Obama despite her purported evangelical "Christianity". Christian, my ass. Narrow-minded, incurious bigot is more like it.

When is someone who is well-regarded in the media going to take to the airwaves and say that out loud? Who is going to call the McCain/Palin campaign on the carpet and say, "Shame on you!"? Anyone? Anyone?

I am utterly digusted.