Bring up Wright?

ANOTHER fucking stupid thing for McCain to do....

Does Davis recognize that if McCain only has 50 million supporters he's going to lose the election by 20 points?

A couple of comments:

1. By saying they might bring up Wright, they are bringing up Wright.

2. They probably won't go beyond the threat. It's not clear it will buy them much as you say. I think they are just trying to show how restrained they are in their negativity. After the election they'll say "What do you mean we ran a negative campaign campaign, Hillary ran a much more negative campaign by bringing up Wright"

On this issue, McCain himself almost seems to have a conscience. There's a little cricket in his pocket, battered and bruised to be sure, telling him that it would be the wrong thing to do to bring up Wright. Time will tell whether the cricket is heeded or squashed under heel, but if it's the latter, it will have serious repercussions for McCain. After all, Obama now has on his side Dave Letterman, the only media celebrity with the 'nads to confront McCain with the hard facts about his own associations.

At this point, bringing up Wright is basically saying, "Look! Scary angry black man! Boogedy-boogedy-boogedy!" It's so transparent it's laughable.

What PW said in #1.
It will just whip up the loonies even more, leading to more violence, intimidation, etc.

fortunately most people recognize a dead horse when they see one.

I will nearly guarantee it will come up. McCain is VERY desperate to be the President, what does he have to lose? In fact, one of Powell's confidants says that McCain's over-ambition is another factor in Powell's decision, but that he has too much class to call McCain out on it.

Expect to see Wright 24/7 on FoxNews (although I would prefer you not to turn that channel on ... it just gives them ratings). I think and hope the response will be sharp and quick ... the clip of McCain saying that he doesn't think Obama agrees with those views should be helpful.

(possibly)This just in from McCain/Palin website:

Obama, the Wright Stuff. John McCain, the Right Stuff.
**************

I am resigned to the possibility that Wright will drown out Joe The Plumber as John lurches once again into the thrilling rant of yesterday.

The Wright Stuff is the wrong stuff for America.

The latter could be used by both campaigns!

Wright, Joe, Drill Baby Drill, Country First, palling around with terrorists, tax-raiser, "that one".

Get your flags waving folks, John and Sarah are gonna be in the whitehouse gosh darn. Git used ta it.

Rick Davis said: "... Congressman Lewis calls John McCain and Sarah Palin and his entire group of supporters, 50 million people strong around this country, that we're all racists and we should be compared to George Wallace and the kind of horrible segregation and evil and horrible politics that was played at that time ..."

Congressman Lewis said exactly nothing about the Palin-McCain ticket's "entire group of supporters", 50 million strong or otherwise.

And to the extent that Congressman Lewis said that Palin and McCain were as bad as George Wallace, he was wrong. They are worse.

When all you've got is a flyswatter, all you can do is swat at flies.

The McCain campaign is sinking into eighth-grader-with-zits-and-braces-waiting-for-an-
invite-to-the-Sadie-Hawkins-Dance desperation.

And THAT's desperate!

I'm sensing a recurrent theme in the McPhailin campaign. I have given this theme a title. It is:

The Meanie Liberals Made Me Besmirch My Honor, Integrity and Morals by Being Terrible Meanies

Thus, for example, John McCain wouldn't have gone negative way back in July or whatever it was if the Meanie Liberals hadn't been Terrible Meanies and rejected his plan to hold 437 town hall meetings.

Or, today, John McCain wouldn't be considering running new ads about Jeremiah Wright if the Meanie Liberals hadn't been Terrible Meanies and used a George Wallace analogy.

I'm sure there are other instances of this theme, I just can't think of any more.

McCain knows he's going to lose, so the question is really how badly and at what cost to his reputation. The Hail Mary passes look increasingly desperate and make him look like a more certain loser. On the other hand, maybe there is a hidden cache of voters willing to be persuaded by the specter of an angry black guy yelling stuff. Once again.

Wright will be used not because he changes anything but because racism is central to the GOP's basic electoral strategy. It's the strategy that underwrote the party's ascent to power. It's the strategy that will accompany the party's decline into irrelevance. They started out playing with fire and are now forced to watch their house burn to the ground.

I think you missed some points here, Mr. Benen.

As SecularAnimist noted, Davis is intentionally mischaracterizing what Lewis said. Not to mention that Lewis already "clarified" his remarks. So for McCain to act horribly offended when Lewis has already backed down from his comment (which wasnt as bad as they claim) is pretty ridiculous.

(By the way, this sounds an awful lot like "The campaign wouldnt have been so negative if only Obama had done the town halls with us.")

And even if we ignore that, where is their logic? Lewis, by their flawed telling, called them segregationists. In response to that claim, they're going to flog Obama's former pastor for supporting Black Liberation Theology or whatever? Doesnt that do more to prove Lewis' alleged point than disprove it?

All they have to do is say they will bring it up, and the talking meatsticks on cable will jump at the chance to play clips of the crazy black preacher again.

walt -

McCain knows he's going to lose, so the question is really how badly and at what cost to his reputation.

I disagree completely. If McCain knew he was going to lose, he'd back off and start running a more statesman-like campaign. At the very least he could get his name out of the muck with his friends in the press corpse so that when they need someone to speak badly of the President in the next four years, they can call on the guy who lost to him "with honor and dignity."

McCain is playing to win. He's doing what he thinks he needs to do to win. It may be that he's right and that if he's going to win, the only way it'll happen is if he rolls in the muck with the pigs. It may be that he's completely wrong and he's stuck in an echo chamber of bad advisors (remember - this is a guy who was taking advice from Bill Kristol - "bad" doesn't even start to describe it IMO). Regardless he thinks he can win it, and he's doing what he thinks it will take to do it.

I hope he's wrong. I hope he's actually out of the running entirely and there's no way he can pull it out. For all of our sakes.

I love the smell of flop sweat in the morning.

Even if McAint will 'NOT' bring up Wright: now that they have brought up the topic for their shills, those shills will pick up the ball and run with it!

Someone, anyone, should use a giant tube of PREPARATION H on McEvil ... that would solve the whole problem because he has become nothing other than a giant fucking hemmoroid on the asshole of Lucifer himself........

If McShame and Barbie want to go there, I say -- Bring It On. Then we'll have a nice little conversation about nutjob Pastor John Hagee and his close ties to The Maverick, followed closely by some scrutiny of Sarah Failin's relationship with that lesbian-purging witch doctor. Yeah, Rick, let's go there!

I don't think I've read these queries anywhere:

If Obama had a minister from a Christian church, how could he be a Muslim terrorist?

Did he abandon Christianity after Rev. Wright's tirade?

Is the McCain campaign so cynical that they would try to dupe the public coming and going?

For what it's worth, I think if McCain reverses course on this now, it's likely to backfire.

1) Backfire as in bullets going astray in a melee.

2) McCain will prove Lewis's very point.

3) Rather than see the country torn to bits, more republicans will jettison McCain-Palin.

Which is all to say: I agree it won't work.
But it will have toxic effects on the body politic.
And McCain will live on in infamy...

He's a muslim! He's a socialist! He's a churchgoing...ummmm ....He's a darkie, doncha know?

If McCain isn't already in solid race baiting territory, he'll get there yet with Wright.

Steve and JMM have called McCain's campain sleazy, which doesn't begin to do it justice. Vulgar is a better word for it.

Someone, anyone, should use a giant tube of PREPARATION H on McEvil ... that would solve the whole problem because he has become nothing other than a giant fucking hemmoroid on the asshole of Lucifer himself........

Oh Lord that was funny.

Mnemosyne: "At this point, bringing up Wright is basically saying, 'Look! Scary angry black man! Boogedy-boogedy-boogedy!' It's so transparent it's laughable."

It is laughable, indeed, if it wasn't so tragic. For all his faults, Rev. Wright is a patriot who loves his country, and he criticizes America because he knows its potential to be far better than what it currently shows. If he didn't love America, he would not have served several tours of duty in both the Navy and the Marines during the Vietnam War, which is a helluva lot more than most of his critics can say about their own service to our country.

And to the extent that Congressman Lewis said that Palin and McCain were as bad as George Wallace, he was wrong. They are worse.

Now come on. I bow to no one in my distain for this wretched campaign, but in no possible way — none — is McCain worse than George "Segregation now. Segregation Tomorrow. Segregation Forever!" Wallace as a political force for evil.

And John Lewis has shown more courage, determination and dignity in his life than John McCain ever has. And that includes 5 and a half years of imprisonment, so McCain and Davis can go fuck themselves.

I'm with Fred up above on the # of McCain supporters. With 50 mill, Davis seems to be setting the bar awfully low, in a campaign that keeps sinking lower and lower.

Apparently the profound thinkers behind the McCain campaign reason that if the first 18 stunts don't work, maybe the 19th one will.

So I guess the upshot is they only have to slightly revise the usual paroxysm of "Obama is a Marxist/elitist/bad bowler/follower of Bill Ayers/arugula-eater/Muslim/terrorist/n**ger/child molester/flag burner/disliker of Joe-the-tax-cheat-unlicensed plumber/community organizer" accusations that define every single McCain campaign event, by simply tacking on Rev Wright to the tirade.

My only question is, what will they use *after* that? Really, that's the only droopy arrow they have left in their slime quiver.

Has anyone else run across the background campaign going on about Obama's birth certificate - AGAIN!!! Supposedly some ex-Democrat from PA is suing Obama because he thinks he has some anecdotal evidence that Obama's mother went to Kenya just before his birth and was forced to stay and that means she had to have given birth there, yada, yada, yada. The gist is that Obama should "tell the truth".

When I confronted the person who sent me the link to the video put out by Illuminati films over this suit, she told me she also saw on TV last night that he was born in Indonesia. Fox news???? Can't they be sued for liable over this crank stuff? Maybe we all should get together and sue over every BS issue they bring up and tie the network up in knots...

Has anyone else run across the background campaign going on about Obama's birth certificate - AGAIN!!!

Stoopid relatives.

Um, a person born of an American citizen IS an American citizen, no matter where that birth was.

Why do they announce what they're going to do? It seems ridiculous. Doesn't it telegraph how desparate and cynical they are? Isn't that a turn-off to the voters?

I am not surprised that they're going to do it, but I am surprised that talking about their strategy is somehow going to help them.

I'm really curious about this - is there any plus side to airing their strategy that anyone can point to?

So I guess the upshot is they only have to slightly revise the usual paroxysm of "Obama is a Marxist/elitist/bad bowler/follower of Bill Ayers/arugula-eater/Muslim/terrorist/n**ger/child molester/flag burner/disliker of Joe-the-tax-cheat-unlicensed plumber/community organizer"

You forgot orange-juice drinker and Ghetto Thug.

Might it now be the time to break out the secret weapon, and publicly align the McCain/Palin political scary-thing with those who represent the most evil of evils visited upon America---the blending of Political Fascism and Theocratic Fundamentalism---the "Fascimentalists?"

Is the McCain campaign so cynical that they would try to dupe the public coming and going? -- jeffreyleonard, @ 17:19

Going -- maybe (though I'm not sure where to). Coming -- definitely not, or, at least, not for the female contingent. Cynical campaign or not, Scarahcuda would not stand for elitist ideas like that. Sex is for procreation, not enjoyment.

So it turns out that the 'October Surprise' is that the McCain campaign is completely out of ideas.

Not too much of a surprise to me, I have to say.

And Fourth:
Everytime a smear comes at Obama with the words "Pastor" and "Church", it undermines the "closet muslim" theme. Can't have your smears both ways...

I'm sure you're right that it will backfire. What has the campaign done that has NOT backfired? Not a single one of McCain's Great Pronouncements has NOT backfired. Granted, the Letterman appearance, the white-tie dinner thingie made him more likeable, but those didn't seem to me to be campaign machinations so much as McCain himself puttin' on the abashed. Otherwise, "d'oh" moment after "d'oh" moment. Truly-really.

The campaign is no longer about winning; it's about delegitimizing Obama's first term. This is the extension of the Senate Republicans decision to make sure the Senate passed nothing, and then run against the do nothing Congress.

If the McCainiacs put a Wright commercial on TV, then the Obama folks should respond immediately with a commercial starting with Sarah cheerily giving a hello to this year's AIP convention, followed with audio recordings of AIP founder Joe Vogler's bizarre and unhinged anti-American rants, ending with this question: "Sarah Palin: why do you and your husband love an America-hating political party?"

"Everytime a smear comes at Obama with the words "Pastor" and "Church", it undermines the "closet muslim" theme. Can't have your smears both ways"

In a truly inspiring display of Orwellian doublethink, today's Republicans consistently display an amazing ability to believe two completely contradictory things at the same time, and to believe each thing fervently, without hesitation or awareness. John McCain chose Palin for just this ability, which complements his own significant talents in this arena.

how many people who do not agree with their pastor on issues like Patriotism, stay?

I'm sorry, did you just say that a Navy veteran and former corpsman to Lyndon B. Johnson that you don't happen to agree with politically is unpatriotic? I guess it's perfectly fine for our soldiers and sailors to fight and die for this country as long as they don't dare to disagree with you. Once they do that, suddenly they're un-American traitors.

Which branch did you serve in? My guess -- none. So STFU.

Heh. Troll went bye-bye, I guess. But he can still click my link if he's confused about how Rev. Wright has served his country and earned his right to criticize it if he pleases.

McCain is going to prove Lewis right.