Despite the fact that just one week ago John McCain declared that he understands the impact of blogs on American politics, he told Conan O’Brien Friday night that Americans are tired of them:
Another pearl of wisdom from the the guy who last week also said…
“I am learning to get online myself, and I will have that down fairly soon, getting on myself.”
John McCain…Building a bridge to the 19th century.
We are learning much about Sen. John McCain as he continues to reveal more of his “straight-talking” personality in the course of his presidential campaign. For instance, how many of us knew what a transcendent[al] wit he possessed? The following is just a brief selection of his classics:
That’s right. McCain, who describes himself as being older than dirt with more scars than Frankenstein, has not even shied away from jokes about age, for which he now condemns others.
That last one was directed at his own presidential aspirations way back in 2000. So he is not only humorous, but prescient. With talent like this it is surprising that he is wasting his time in politics. He could be a contestant on The Last Comic Wheezing.
After generating much scorn for publishing an over-the-top satire of Barack Obama and his wife Michelle on the cover of the magazine, I thought I would help the New Yorker out by offering them this artwork with John McCain for the cover of next month’s issue:
I’m sure they will be more than pleased and will take no offense. After all, editor David Remnick responded to the Obama controversy by saying…
“It’s clearly a joke, a parody of these crazy fears and rumours and scare tactics about Obama’s past and ideology. And if you can’t tell it’s a joke by the flag burning in the Oval Office, I don’t know what more to say.”
This McCain cover is also a parody and a joke. Well, it’s a parody – McCain is the joke.
Ratings for the second quarter of 2008 are in and it has ceased to be news that Fox is the slowest growing cable news network:
| 2nd Quarter 2008 vs 2007 – 25-54 | |
| Network | % Gain/Loss |
| MSNBC | +46 |
| CNN | +22 |
| Fox | -2 |
Far more interesting are the trends that point to long term viewing patterns. While the 25-54 demo is most prized by advertisers, it is not a static metric. As people age they grow into and out of that demographic group. So which networks are poised to benefit over time as audiences mature?
An analysis I did last month showed that only 22% of primetime Fox viewers were in the 25-54 demo, compared to 31% for CNN and 38% for MSNBC. The quarter-end numbers for the first half of 2008 further illustrate the aging of Fox News. In the ranking for cable news networks in the 18-34 demo, MSNBC is first with about 35% more viewers than CNN and Fox who are virtually tied.
These 18-34 year olds are the next generation of 25-54 year olds, and they are establishing their viewing habits now. At this point in time they are expressing a notable preference for MSNBC’s brand of news and analysis. So while Fox News has been trending down for a couple of years, the composition of the audience is forecasting even more downside for Murdoch & Co.
Fox viewers and John McCain have something in common besides a hard-right leaning network. They are also precisely the same age. What remains to be seen is if the demographic dead weight that is dragging down Fox News will do the same to candidate McCain.
On Face the Nation this weekend, Gen. Wesley Clark made the obvious observation that John McCain’s captivity in a North Vietnamese prisoner of war camp was not a qualification to be president. McCain’s ordeal was certainly horrific, but not leadership training. Clark’s comments will no doubt be controversial, but the reality is that living in a hut for five years, far removed from any management or policy development responsibilities, does not prepare one for executive leadership positions. McCain has other experience to promote, like his tenure in the Senate, but if he is considered to be qualified to be president solely on the basis of his time spent in jail, then Martha Stewart is qualified to be his Attorney General and Snoop Dogg his Secretary of State.
McCain’s response to the matter is to set up a “Truth Squad.” Leaving aside for the moment that nothing Clark said was untrue because it was merely his opinion, there are serious problems the new McMod Squad. The principle members include folks like Orson Swindle and George “Bud” Day.
Lt. Col. Swindle has a long and infamous resume. He is the McCain campaign’s veterans liaison as well as a board member of Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW), an independent advocacy group that has long backed McCain. CAGW has also been associated with unethical, if not illegal, activities on McCain’s behalf, and is tied to convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Swindle himself is also a Senior Policy Advisor at the big DC lobbying firm of Hunton & Williams. All of these duties violate McCain’s own policy of not allowing people working for “independent entities” from serving on his campaign staff.
Col. Day was a member of another organization that misused the word “truth” in their name, the Swiftboat Veterans for Truth. He is now the director and president of the Vietnam Veterans Legacy Foundation, a group comprised of former swiftboaters and the owner of the rights to “Stolen Honor,” the crocumentary featuring the swiftboat liars. It is interesting that McCain now employs Day to speak on his behalf. In 2004 he called Day’s slandering of John Kerry “dishonest and dishonorable.” Apparently those qualities are required by the McCain of 2008.
Now McCain is criticizing Barack Obama for comments made by Wes Clark. Obama has already rejected Clark’s statements, but that hasn’t stopped McCain from demagoguing the character issue. McCain himself, not a surrogate, said Saturday that “Obama’s word cannot be trusted.” Will McCain now condemn himself for engaging in dirty politics?
At a recent campaign rally for Barack Obama, an event volunteer had the poor judgment to tell two women wearing head scarves that they could not be seated behind the stage where Obama was speaking. The concern was that the pictures would add fuel to the false assertions circulating about Obama being a stealth Muslim. Obama apologized to the women publicly and personally, but that did not stop the New York Times from publishing a front page story on the controversy and how it may be affecting his support in the Muslim community. The Times also accused Obama of ignoring Muslim voters:
“While the senator has visited churches and synagogues, he has yet to appear at a single mosque.”
That statement could apply with equal accuracy to John McCain, but the Times has not seen fit to address that. Not surprisingly, Fox News has also weighed in with those worried about the beleaguered voters of Islamic heritage.
This new found advocacy on the part of the media for respect for Muslim Americans is encouraging, if not mysterious. Since when has the press been known to stand up for Muslim rights? Yet here are just a few examples of media outrage due to the Obama campaign’s alleged insensitivity and struggles with Muslim voters:
[Note: The New York Post’s headline actually used all caps and a fabricated quote that appears nowhere in the story]
The New York Times Times article is also not alone in criticizing Obama for not visiting mosques in the course of his campaign. But neither the Times, nor any other major news outlet, has held John McCain to the same standard. How many mosques has McCain visited? So far as I can tell, none.
While the media is awash in analyses of Obama’s support from Muslim Americans, they don’t seem to have the same concern for McCain. Perhaps there is an unstated assumption that Muslims are a more natural fit for Obama than McCain; that an African American candidate with a Muslim father and the middle name Hussein would all but lock up the Muslim vote. But that assumption would require the dismissal of all of the anti-Saddam, pro-Iraq war, Muslims that ought to be flocking to the campaign of the war-mongering architect of the “surge.” It would also demonstrate ignorance of the fact that George W. Bush carried a plurality of Muslims in 2000.
So why is the media curious only about the state of Obama’s relationship with Muslims? Why is there this sudden outpouring of empathy for how Muslims are treated by the Democratic candidate for president, but not the Republican, whose party’s support amongst Muslim’s has cratered in just a few years? Could it be that it allows the media a pretense of tolerance of minorities while they bash the first African American to become the nominee of a major political party?
If the the New York Times wants to question the depth of Muslim support for Obama, they ought to also ask the same questions of McCain. Otherwise it is just an exercise in hypocrisy. And it wouldn’t hurt if both candidates took time from their schedules to visit a mosque or two.
Struggling in recent election polls, John McCain is resorting to the old and familiar Republican campaign motivator – unrelenting fear. When asked in an interview with Fortune magazine what he sees as the gravest long-term threat to the U.S. economy, McCain answered…
“Well, I would think that the absolute gravest threat is the struggle that we’re in against radical Islamic extremism, which can affect, if they prevail, our very existence.”
You have to give him credit for finding a way to evade a question on the economy by turning it into a national security issue. But his answer elevates the destructive force of a band of cave-dwelling fanatics into an awesome superpower capable of annihilating America. Does McCain really believe that Al Qaeda is capable of doing something that Germany, Japan, Russia, and China have never been able to do? Probably not. What he does believe is that terrorism can be used to instill fear in the minds of Americans. His purpose being to distract them from the economic crisis that they currently regard as the most important issue of the day – an issue he has admitted he does not understand – to the frightful specter of imminent doom at the hands of the Islamo-fascists (or whatever he’s calling them this week).
To drive the point home, McCain’s chief strategist, Charlie Black, in the same article, gave a surprisingly candid answer when asked if a new terrorist attack on American soil would benefit McCain’s campaign. Black said…
“Certainly it would be a big advantage to him.”
[Note to idiotic politicians: When asked if a terrorist attack will help your campaign, the answer is always “NO! A terrorist attack will only hurt America and all Americans.”]
Black is saying outright that a terrorist attack would be good for McCain. McCain agrees as he tries to shift the debate from economics to terrorism because he perceives that as an issue that favors him. And while Black’s remarks are disgusting and stupid, the media has all but ignored the remarks of McCain himself. Isn’t McCain the candidate? Why is it appropriate for him to exalt our enemies by declaring that they are powerful enough to threaten “our very existence?” If that’s an example of McCain’s foreign policy expertise, America can do without it.
If you think that this is repulsive, just wait until election day nears and McCain is still trailing. Look for this sort of coordinated message to continue and sink further into the muck.
Dan Abrams has uncovered a video of John McCain saying…
“I really didn’t love America until I was deprived of her company.”
This has the potential to upend this campaign. Given the criticism of Michelle Obama’s remarks about pride, how can the right still press the patriotism of the Democratic candidate’s wife when the Republican candidate himself has made remarks that are arguably much worse?
The quote of McCain came from an interview with Sean Hannity:
Hannity: You spent two years of this five-and-a-half-year period in solitary confinement. What does that do to a person, to spend that much time in solitary confinement?
McCain: I think it makes you a better person. Obviously, it makes you love America. I really didn’t love America until I was deprived of her company, but probably the most important thing about it, Sean, is that I was privileged to have the opportunity to serve in the company of heroes.
Is anyone surprised that Hannity didn’t challenge McCain’s statement?
It doesn’t matter what McCain meant to say in these comments. What matters is that he and his surrogates have to cease their despicable slander of Michelle Obama’s patriotism. After all, If Cindy McCain can get away with saying, “All I know is that I have always been proud of my country,” can’t Mrs. Obama just as rightly say, “All I know is that I have never stolen from a charity to satisfy my drug habit.”
This crap has to stop. And if there is a silver lining to the new McCain dialog, it is that this might lead to the end of these childish attacks.
In what is billed as a major policy speech on energy and the environment, John McCain has introduced a plan that just makes things worse. His proposals only benefit the big oil companies that are amongst his biggest supporters and who are well represented on the staff of his campaign. In the advance text of his speech he says:
“In the face of climate change and other serious challenges, energy conservation is no longer just a moral luxury or a personal virtue,”
I wonder when energy conservation stopped being just a moral luxury or a personal virtue. Last week? Last year? Whenever it was that McCain decided to take up the issue? And is there anyone who has ever referred to in that way other than Vice-President Dick Cheney?
McCain claims that his plan will reduce harmful emissions 50% by 2050. Contrast that with Barack Obama’s plan to cut emissions by 80%. However, a key part of the McCain plan is to increase oil exploration and permit offshore drilling in environmentally sensitive coastal areas. How does increasing oil production lead to emissions reductions? McCain doesn’t say. That doesn’t stop the National Review’s Noel Sheppard from promoting offshore drilling as a campaign issue that he says will help McCain. Sheppard cites a Rasmussen poll that finds that 67% of voters believe that drilling should be allowed off the coasts of California, Florida and other states. There are couple of problems with this poll. First, the actual question asked began with a leading preface:
“In order to reduce the price of gas, should drilling be allowed in offshore oil wells off the coasts of California, Florida, and other states?”
The question intentionally leads the respondent into a supposition that such drilling would reduce gas prices. There is no evidence to that effect offered by the pollster – or by economists. The survey results would have been very different had they prefaced the question by saying, “Despite having no impact on reducing the price of gas…”
Secondly, this is a national poll. It would have been more enlightening to include survey results of just the residents of California and Florida, who will bear the brunt of the policies under discussion. Before assuming that this is a winning issue for McCain, Sheppard might want to take into account that the voters of a swing state like Florida are overwhelmingly opposed to offshore drilling. And nationally voters give Obama a 20 point lead on the question of who will better deal with high oil prices.
McCain’s other big energy initiative is his proposal for a gas tax holiday. The absurdity of this as an approach to lowering either prices or pollution is glaringly evident. Oil companies will quickly fill the gap made by any temporary tax break. In fact, the price of gas has already increased by a larger amount than the federal tax in just the days that have transpired since McCain first proposed his holiday. What’s more, Saudi oil producers have come out in favor of tax cuts for petroleum products. Surprise! They know that lower prices will stimulate sales that fatten their wallets. And more sales produces more use which produces more pollution. It also exacerbates dependency on fossil fuels.
It ought not to be surprising that McCain is articulating the philosophy of his advisers, at least fifteen of whom have lobbied for Big Oil. McCain is firmly on the side of the Bush administration and the Saudi oil barons on matters of conservation, climate change, and petronomics. If Republicans want to make this a campaign issue, I say bring it on.
John McCain held a town hall meeting in New York City this evening. It was part of a series of gatherings he has proposed for himself and Barack Obama.
This program, which Obama did not attend, was to be broadcast on Fox News under an unusual agreement that would have Fox provide the cameras, while the McCain campaign would produce the event. On the surface that is a peculiar arrangement because it puts Fox in the position of airing a candidate production. But beneath the surface it got even more peculiar.
At the outset it was announced that the audience would be a politically diverse group that McCain sought to portray as ordinary, undecided voters. But at the conclusion, Fox anchor, Shepard Smith, went on air to reveal that McCain had mislead the network in a rather significant way.
Smith: “I reported at the top of this hour that the campaign had told us at Fox News that the audience would be made up of Republicans, Democrats, and independents. We have now received a clarification from the campaign and I feel I should pass it along to you. The McCain campaign distributed tickets to supporters, Mayor Bloomberg, who of course is a registered Republican, and other independent groups.”
Stop for a moment and take in the magnitude of this deception. John McCain felt it was necessary to lie to Fox News, the propaganda arm of the Republican Party, in order to pull off this charade. Imagine the lengths to which he would go to deceive a network that he did not regard as friendly.
The dishonesty of McCain’s actions put Fox News in the awkward position of having misinformed their audience, something they do with relative frequency anyway, so maybe that’s not too big a deal. Then they had to swallow hard and set the record straight by disclosing the McCain deceit. But by this time considerable damage had been done to McCain’s credibility. He is still trying to persuade Obama to join these forums. Early on in the meeting, McCain made another plea for just that:
“I think this town hall meeting tonight would have been a little bit more interesting tonight if Senator Obama had accepted my request,”
Indeed it would have been more interesting, and not just because McCain by himself is a total snooze-fest. It would have been an ambush where Obama would have encountered an audience that was secretly stacked against him. Certainly Obama would have been able to hold his own in a room full of McCainiacs. But after an evening of questioners who were snuggling up to McCain while putting Obama on the defensive, it could have left the impression that this assembly of supposedly neutral citizens found Obama unappealing.
This revelation of McCain’s brazen untrustworthiness should be weighed by the Obama camp in any consideration of future candidate encounters. Under no circumstances should the McCain crowd be permitted to manage, unsupervised, any portion of the event. And the media should also apply a stricter level of scrutiny when negotiating press availabilities with McCain and his Double Talk Express.