Palin
McCain Defends His Rabid Crowds
The McCain campaign is defending crowd members at its recent rallies who have called Obama a terrorist, accused him of treason and even screamed "kill him" when his association with former Weather Underground member Bill Ayers has been broached.
"Barack Obama's attacks on Americans who support John McCain reveal far more about him than they do about John McCain. It is clear that Barack Obama just doesn't understand regular people and the issues they care about. He dismisses hardworking middle class Americans as clinging to guns and religion, while at the same time attacking average Americans at McCain rallies who are angry at Washington, Wall Street and the status quo," reads a statement from spokesman Brian Rogers. "Even worse, he attacks anyone who dares to question his readiness to serve as their commander in chief in chief. Raising legitimate questions about record, character and judgment are a vital part of the Democratic process, and Barack Obama's effort to silence and shame those who seek answers should make everyone wonder exactly what he is hiding."
Earlier on Friday, Barack Obama had criticized John McCain recent campaign appearance saying it was "easy to rile up a crowd by stoking anger and division."
"I think that folks are looking for something different," he said. "But that's not what we need right now in the United States. The times are too serious."
In responding to this charge, Rogers attempted to deliberate simplify and obscure some of the rhetoric that has recently come from McCain supporters. Videos taken of people heading into McCain-Palin rallies have shown individuals who label Barack Obama as a terrorist, a communist and a threat to the well-being of the country. At a town hall meeting in Wisconsin on Thursday, several attendees urged the Republican nominee to attack his opponent on the Ayers issue and Reverend Jeremiah Wright, who McCain himself has said should be off limits.
The rabid nature of the scene has startled longtime political observers and even former associates of McCain himself.
John Weaver, the Senator's former top strategist, has said McCain is making a tactical mistake by letting abusive hecklers have their voices heard during his forums. David Gergen, a longtime Washington strategist, has warned that the rhetoric from these attendees could "lead to some violence."
Veteran Republican Congressman Ray LaHood criticized Sarah Palin in particular, saying her rhetoric did not "befit the office she's running for."
AFL-CIO President John Sweeney denounced the recent campaign stops as dangerous and expressed alarm that the top of the Republican ticket would not protest the crowd's language.
"Sen. John McCain, Gov. Sarah Palin and the leadership of the Republican party have a fundamental moral responsibility to denounce the violent rhetoric that has pervaded recent McCain and Palin political rallies. When rally attendees shout out such attacks as "terrorist" or "kill him" about Sen. Barack Obama, when they are cheered on by crowds incited by McCain-Palin rhetoric -- it is chilling that McCain and Palin do nothing to object."
Veteran reporter Dan Balz has opined that "McCain's tactics are over the line, with no restraint in sight, and threaten to provoke reactions among partisans on both sides that will continue to escalate."
And Frank Schaeffer penned a solemn and critical column (first published in the Baltimore Sun) personally addressed to McCain himself: "If your campaign does not stop equating Sen. Barack Obama with terrorism, questioning his patriotism and portraying Mr. Obama as "not one of us," I accuse you of deliberately feeding the most unhinged elements of our society the red meat of hate, and therefore of potentially instigating violence."
McCain, through Rogers' statement, is gambling that the voices of caution don't matter as much as the sentiments of the people. But he is also implicitly arguing that even the vilest rhetoric sent Obama's way is fair game when chalked up to concerns about the Illinois Democrat's past associations and judgments. And he's acknowledging that he won't lift a finger to dissuade the raging tempers.
Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/10/mccain-defends-his-rabid_n_133710.html
McCain-Palin Rally Attendees: "Obama Is A Terrorist"
File this one under the "give 'em enough rope" column. A pro-Obama blogger in Ohio caught McCain-Palin supporters as they streamed into a rally and asked some of the most salient questions of the day. Like, "is Obama a terrorist?"
Check out the responses:
Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/09/mccain-palin-rally-attend_n_133240.html
To Palin: Don't Throw Stones When You Live in an Ice House - MUST SEE VIDEO
Wake the "F" up people!!!
Palin raises Rev. Wright
From CNN Associate Political Editor Rebecca Sinderbrand
(CNN) – Sarah Palin has increasingly embraced the attack dog role on the Republican ticket - but in a new interview, she seems to endorse a line of attack John McCain had distanced himself from earlier this year.
The Republican VP nominee told Bill Kristol of the New York Times that Obama's long-time relationship with minister Jeremiah Wright should be a bigger issue on the campaign trail. "I don't know why that association isn't discussed more," she said.
"Because those were appalling things that that pastor had said about our great country, and to have sat in the pews for 20 years and listened to that — with, I don't know, a sense of condoning it, I guess, because he didn't get up and leave — to me, that does say something about character," said Palin. ".I guess that would be a John McCain call on whether he wants to bring that up."
When the North Carolina Republican Party launched a television ad this spring taking aim at Obama's ties to Wright, McCain first repudiated the attack. "I've said again and again, I do not believe that Sen. Obama shares Rev. Wright's extremist views which he has stated, whether it be the United States Marine Corps or the flag or what," McCain said. "I am leaving that issue to a dialogue between Sen. Obama and American people."
He added that all he could do, "in as visible way as possible, is disassociate myself from that kind of campaigning."
But McCain soon signaled that he might have changed his position on whether state Republican parties or downballot GOP candidates should exploit the Wright issue in local campaigns, suggesting that he had shifted his stance after Obama told an interviewer that the controversy surrounding his ex-pastor was "a legitimate political issue."
"As I said before, I am of the belief that Sen. Obama does not reflect the extremist statements that Rev. Wright has given," McCain told reporters. "I have no comments on it, but I also understand why millions of Americans may, as Sen. Obama said yesterday, view this as a political issue."
Still, the issue has not been major fodder on the trail since McCain himself dealt with fallout from the endorsements of headline-grabbing pastors this spring. Reports of controversial statements by evangelical leaders John Hagee and Rod Parsley ultimately led him to reject the backing of both men.
Source: http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/10/06/palin-raises-rev-wright/#comments
Religion and Palin:
- Seriously? Palin Once Blessed to Be Free From 'Witchcraft':
http://teamsugar.com/user/dreamsugar/blog/2083499
- CNN Examines Palin's Faith- Palin's words regarding Iraq war: "Task from God":
http://teamsugar.com/user/dreamsugar/blog/1950721
Palin is a LIAR! Fact Check: Is Obama 'palling around with terrorists'?
The Statement: Republican vice presidential candidate Gov. Sarah Palin said Saturday, October 4, that Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama is "someone who sees America, it seems, as being so imperfect that he's palling around with terrorists who would target their own country."
Watch: Is Obama a terrorist's pal?
Get the facts!
The Facts: In making the charge at a fund-raising event in Englewood, Colorado, and a rally in Carson, California, Palin was referring at least in part to William Ayers, a 1960s radical. In both appearances, Palin cited a front-page article in Saturday's New York Times detailing the working relationship between Obama and Ayers.
In the 1960s, Ayers was a founding member of the radical Weather Underground group that carried out a string of bombings of federal buildings, including the Pentagon and the U.S. Capitol, in protest against the Vietnam War. The now-defunct group was labeled a "domestic terrorist group" by the FBI, and Ayers and his wife, Bernadine Dohrn — also a Weather Underground member — spent 10 years as fugitives in the 1970s. Federal charges against them were dropped due to FBI misconduct in gathering evidence against them, and they resurfaced in 1980. Both Ayers and Dohrn ultimately became university professors in Chicago, with Ayers, 63, now an education professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago.
Obama's Chicago home is in the same neighborhood where Ayers and Dohrn live. Beginning in 1995, Ayers and Obama worked with the non-profit Chicago Annenberg Challenge on a huge school improvement project. The Annenberg Challenge was for cities to compete for $50 million grants to improve public education. Ayers fought to bring the grant to Chicago, and Obama was recruited onto the board. Also from 1999 through 2001 both were board members on the Woods Fund, a charitable foundation that gave money to various causes, including the Trinity United Church that Obama attended and Northwestern University Law Schools' Children and Family Justice Center, where Dohrn worked.
CNN's review of project records found nothing to suggest anything inappropriate in the volunteer projects in which the two men were involved.
Obama campaign spokesman Ben LaBolt told CNN that after meeting Obama through the Annenberg project, Ayers hosted a campaign event for him that same year when then-Illinois state Sen. Alice Palmer, who planned to run for Congress, introduced the young community organizer as her chosen successor. LaBolt also said the two have not spoken by phone or exchanged e-mail messages since Obama came to the U.S. Senate in 2005 and last met more than a year ago when they encountered each other on the street in their Hyde Park neighborhood.
The extent of Obama's relationship with Ayers came up during the Democratic presidential primaries earlier this year, and Obama explained it by saying, "This is a guy who lives in my neighborhood … the notion that somehow as a consequence of me knowing somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago — when I was 8 years old — somehow reflects on me and my values doesn't make much sense."
The New York Times article cited by Palin concluded that "the two men do not appear to have been close. Nor has Mr. Obama ever expressed sympathy for the radical views and actions of Mr. Ayers." Other publications, including the Washington Post, Time magazine, the Chicago Sun-Times, The New Yorker and The New Republic, have said that their reporting doesn't support the idea that Obama and Ayers had a close relationship.
The McCain campaign did not respond Saturday to a request for elaboration on Palin's use of the plural "terrorists."
Verdict: False. There is no indication that Ayers and Obama are now "palling around," or that they have had an ongoing relationship in the past three years. Also, there is nothing to suggest that Ayers is now involved in terrorist activity or that other Obama associates are.
Source: http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/10/05/fact-check-is-obama-palling-around-with-terrorists/
McCain: Obama lead growing because “life isn’t fair”
(CNN) – John McCain said Thursday that Barack Obama’s poll numbers are rising as the economy seems to sink "because life isn’t fair.”
“He certainly did nothing for the first few days,” McCain told Fox News Thursday. "I suspended my campaign, took our ads down, came back to Washington, met with the House folks and got on the phone, and also had face-to-face meetings.”
New CNN/Time/Opinion Research Corporation polls of several key battleground states released Wednesday found Obama has made gains across the board – either taking statistically significant leads, or erasing McCain advantages – over the past few weeks. Since the financial crisis began in mid-September, Obama has taken and held a lead over McCain in the national CNN poll of polls.
But the Republican nominee said the economic anxiety-fueled poll swing was likely a blip. “Well first of all, you know very well that these are temporary things," he said on MSNBC’s Morning Joe. "The focus was on the fiscal crisis we were facing. I understand that. I understand there are going to be ups and downs in campaigns. I'm happy where I am…
“I'm the underdog. I love being the underdog…. We're going to be up late on election night,” he said.
Running mate Sarah Palin is also facing an unfair disadvantage as she heads into the debate tonight, McCain told Fox. “Frankly, I wish they had picked a moderator that isn’t writing a book favorable to Barack Obama. Let’s face it,” he said. “But I have to have to have confidence that Gwen Ifill will handle this as the professional journalist that she is… Life isn’t fair, as I mentioned earlier in the program.”
PBS journalist Gwen Ifill, the moderator of Thursday’s vice presidential debate, is writing a book about Barack Obama and a new generation of black leaders that is slated to be released in January 2009.
Source: http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/10/02/mccain-obama-lead-growing-because-%e2%80%9clife-isn%e2%80%99t-fair%e2%80%9d/#comments
CNN: Liar, Liar pants on FIRE - Sarah Palin Has Never Seen Russia From Alaska
Just when you thought the whole "I can see Russia from Alaska" thing couldn't get any funnier...CNN's Gary Tuchman delivers the goods: it turns out that Sarah Palin has never seen Russia from Alaska.
Tuchman went up to the part of Alaska from which you can actually see Russia, a remote island called Little Diomede located just 2.4 miles from it's Russian twin, Big Diomede.
It turns out Gary Tuchman's trip to Little Diomede sets him apart from Sarah Palin -- because she's never actually been there, nor has she set eyes on its neighbor in Russia.....
More and VIDEO at the source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/01/cnn-sarah-palin-has-never_n_130752.html
McClatchy: Palin's Approval Ratings Tumble -- In Alaska
NEW YORK Since she was picked for the Veep spot, the press has often noted that Sarah Palin has "80%" approval ratings in Alaska. Just yesterday, John McCain told the Des Moines Register editorial board that she is "the most popular governor in the United States." But that may be outdated.
McClatchy reports today that her approval rating in her home state has tumbled to 68% -- still high but surely not the country's best. The poll by a local firm that works for both parties was taken Sept. 20-22. McClatchy writes: "Palin’s popularity has swooned as new information about the local abuse-of-power investigation known as Troopergate has trickled out, and as national and local media pick over her track record as a governor and small-town mayor....
More at the source: http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003856855
Congressman, McCain Bundler On Palin: I Would Have Picked Someone Else
On Monday, John McCain dismissed the notion that there was dissension among conservatives over his choice of Sarah Palin as vice president.
"Really," he asked the Des Moines Register editorial board. "I haven't detected that. I haven't detected that in the polls. I haven't detected that among the base... so again, I fundamentally disagree."
If McCain is truly unaware of Republicans souring on the Palin choice, then he's not paying attention.
In fact, around the time that McCain was speaking to the Des Moines Register, a Republican congressman and McCain surrogate and bundler was unwilling to say that Palin was qualified to take over the presidency on moments notice.
Rep. Mark Kirk of Illinois told the Chicago Tribne that had he been the Republican presidential candidate, "I would have picked someone different" for VP.
Pressed whether she was qualified to be one heartbeat away from being Commander in Chief, Kirk replied: "Quite frankly, I don't know."
More at the source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/01/congressman-mccain-bundle_n_130867.html
The Sarah Palin pity party
Everyone seems to be oozing sympathy for the fumbling vice-presidential nominee. Please. Cry me a freaking river.
By Rebecca Traister
Sept. 30, 2008 | Is this the week that Democrats and Republicans join hands -- to heap pity on poor Sarah Palin?
At the moment, all signs point to yes, as some strange bedfellows reveal that they have been feeling sorry for the vice-presidential candidate ever since she stopped speaking without the help of a teleprompter. Conservative women like Kathleen Parker and Kathryn Jean Lopez are shuddering with sympathy as they realize that the candidate who thrilled them, just weeks ago, is not in shape for the big game. They're not alone. The New Republic's Christopher Orr feels that Palin has been misused by the team that tapped her. In the New York Times, Judith Warner feels for Sarah, too! And over at the Atlantic, Ta-Nehisi Coates empathizes with intelligence and nuance, making clear that he's not expressing pity. Salon's own Glenn Greenwald watched the Katie Couric interview and "actually felt sorry for Sarah Palin." Even Amy Poehler, impersonating Katie Couric on last week's "Saturday Night Live," makes the joke that Palin's cornered-animal ineptitude makes her "increasingly adorable."
I guess I'm one cold dame, because while Palin provokes many unpleasant emotions in me, I just can't seem to summon pity, affection or remorse.
More at the source: http://www.salon.com/mwt/feature/2008/09/30/palin_pity/
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