The McCain campaign decided some time ago that it couldn't win on issues.

Now it's decided that the Team Maverick^TM brand ain't gonna make it, either, and so it's time to ratchet up the negativity. "There's no question that we have to change the subject here," said one Republican operative.

From an article published ahead of the coming shitstorm: "In his current campaign, however, McCain has become the kind of politician he ran against in 2000...he has reassembled the very team that so viciously smeared him and his family eight years ago...even Rove himself has denounced it, saying that the outright lies in McCain's campaign ads go 'too far' and fail the 'truth test.'"

Comments

[Fred Gregory]

Gotta do what the MSM refuses to do.

[Spag]

Negativity = telling the truth about liberal politicians and their liberal friends that they don't want you to know about hoping that you can be fooled into thinking that they are mainstream.

All the more reason that an Obama victory will lead to a conservative revival in the next two elections after November.

[Dave Ribar]

Sam:

"Telling the truth about liberal politicians?"

Hmm, Gov. Palin said yesterday that Sen. Obama "is someone who sees America, it seems, as being so imperfect, imperfect enough, that he's palling around with terrorists who would target their own country." This is telling the truth?

From the "liberal" Washington Times,

While it is known that Obama and Ayers live in the same Chicago neighborhood, served on a charity board together and had a fleeting political connection, no one has provided evidence to say the pair ever palled around. And it's simply wrong to suggest that they were associated while Ayers was committing terrorist acts.

Nonetheless, Palin made the comments at two appearances in separate states...In addition to Palin's comments at her appearances Saturday, the McCain campaign distributed Palin's comments to reporters.

[scharrison]

"All the more reason that an Obama victory will lead to a conservative revival in the next two elections after November."

If by "conservative revival" you mean putting an end to the influence being wielded by neocons, then God bless and Godspeed. I'll even help you if I can.

[Elizabeth Wheaton]

Anyone else old enough to remember Jesse Helms's "He's one of us" campaign?

Palin seems to be going one step further into the racial divide by telling her very white audiences that Obama "is not a man who sees America like you and I see America."

[Fred Gregory]

Barack Obama has assured his supporters that Republicans will attack him because he's black.

'Let me abbreviate why the AP feels Palin's attack is racist: "Anyone who holds a different opinion ('not like us') than Barack Obama on anything is a racist.'

See your future? "

[Spag]

Ribar, I guess it depends on your definition of "pal'd around". We do know that Ayers had a fundraiser for Obama at his home and Obama was present. We do know they worked together. So maybe they didn't swap wives or anything, but I think most intelligent people understood what Palin was saying.

Schharrison, we agree.

Wheaton, you are off your rocker invoking the tired old "code words" theme. Here's a new one: Anyone who criticizes Sarah Palin hates women. How does that sound?

Fred is right as usual.

Yet another thread that convinces me that the fun has gone out of antagonizing unreasonable people.

[Dave Ribar]

Sam:

The definition that most people will recognize is "OMIGOD, we're going down in flames."

Quick question. How can you tell when John McCain and Sara Palin are lying?

Answer: You can see their lips moving.

[Fred Gregory]

A curious and unusal choice of words by Charles Gibson about Sarah Palin:Toledo Blade 10/05/08

"it's important to expose her"

[eric]

Wow, talk about your gaffes! Though I suppose it is understandable that Gibson would prefer not to "expose" Joe Biden.

[Jonathan Jones]

Looks like the decision to play guilt by association may not have been such a hot one.

www.keatingeconomics.com

[Ian McDowell]

Fred Gregory has said that anyone who refuses free cocaine is a fool, suggesting that not only is he a slavering crusty-nosed cokefiend unrepentant about his own hellish drug habit, but that he has contempt for anyone who doesn't share it. Sam Spagnola is not only a lawyer and as such a member of a parasitic social rightly despised by decent society, but not even a hardworking and industrious one at that. Instead, he's a slacker who spends enormous amounts of time online posting to unsavory blogs, suggesting a lack not only of family ties and meaningful personal relationships, but discretion and a proper American work ethic.

Both men are clearly scum who in any decent society would have been hanged from the nearest lampost years ago. That such abominable miscreants support McCain and Palin is enough to make any right-thinking person have serious qualms about voting Republican.

[Spag]

Uh oh, hate speech! Conservatives are scum! Quick, where are Ed and Roch to condemn Ian! Oh wait, Ian's a liberal and that makes it different.

As to not being "hardworking", you couldn't be more wrong jackass. I stay very busy in my job. Maybe you're just too stupid to do more than one thing at a time.

[Eric]

I'm pretty sure Ian was being satirical. Maybe not very funny satire, but clearly not meant to be taken seriously. Of course, perhaps the same is true of everything Sam writes.

[Elizabeth Wheaton]

Fred & Spag: Your knee-jerk reactions are so predictable. Just like the Helms camp when they claimed--wink wink, nod nod--that "he's one of us" had nothing to do with his opponent's heritage.

[Roch101]

"he's a slacker who spends enormous amounts of time online posting to unsavory blogs, suggesting a lack not only of family ties and meaningful personal relationships, but discretion and a proper American work ethic."

Gee, I dunno, Ian. That ad hominem attack could apply to a lot of people around here, although I find this particular blog rather savory.

[Tony Wilkins]

Ed, any comments on why you would allow such mean spirited comments from Ian and yet you ban Bubba?
Without Spag and Fred here you guys would be like a boring bunch of mountain gorillas beating on your chests, slapping each other on the back and enjoying other gorilla like behavior.

[Ed Cone]

I try not to get involved in flame wars, in part because they are so very dull. Ian is satirical much of the time, he doesn't spam the site with constant posts, and he tends to mess with people who like to mess with others.

That said, thanks so much for the input. I need to spend more time telling people how to make their personal sites more to my liking.

[Tony Wilkins]

Sarcasm noted, lol. I'll just keep my mouth shut as I should have before I posted.
I'm here almost on a daily basis. I may be a closet masochist and not even know it.

[Ed Cone]

In all seriousness, I do value the input of my readers. But comment policy has been pretty consistent here over the course of many years and tens of thousands of comments, and I don't make those decisions lightly.

[Fred Gregory]

Flame war? Not hardly! It was a naked, unprovoked and unilateral personal attack ( not returned). It is your blog but the next time I.M. calls anybody scum ( or some other similar insult ) here and gets away with it, I am calling BS on the sarcasm excuse.

[Fred Gregory]

Elizabeth,

You are trapped in the past. Wake up and smell the bias. Ask yourself why the MSM has fixated on Palin while ignoring,
Biden's Fantasy World

"Closer to home, the Delaware blarney stone also invited Americans to join him at "Katie's restaurant" in Wilmington to witness middle-class struggles. Just one problem: Katie's closed in the 1980s. The mistake is more than a memory lapse because it exposes how phony is Mr. Biden's attempt to pose for this campaign as Lunchbucket Joe".

I am informed that you wrote a book and going in you you had one notion and completely changed it before you were finished. Thus I assume that you must be aware that
Journalism has lost its way

"Today the profession of news journalism has lost its way. Opinion has leaked beyond the editorial pages to the rest of the newspaper. “Newsmen” publish unconfirmed rumors that support their stances and ignore inconvenient facts that don’t. Outside the office, they openly display their political preferences; there’s no attempt to maintain even the appearance of objectivity.

{'Yet when Obama emerged from a curtain on stage, the audience of more than 2,000 [minority journalists] bolted to its feet, cheered and whistled. His remarks drew repeated applause throughout the 30-minute broadcast, which CNN and Time Inc. sponsored.'}

Reporters, if you want to be an advocate, do both yourself and journalism a favor. Leave. Go to Madison Avenue. The pay’s better."

[Fred Gregory]

Just a guy who lives in my neighborhood. A hechuva lot more than that: Mark R. Levin

"As someone who has written critically of John McCain on a host of issues, including the Keating Five, none of it compares to the life that Barack Obama has led and his belief system. Obama is not merely associated with domestic terrorists, Palestinian radicals, Marxists, and black liberation ideologues — he was their favorite candidate. They groomed him. They befriended him. He befriended them. He socialized with them. In other words, these people saw Obama as representing their views and aspirations and he saw them the same way. I am not among those who raise Obama's associations but add "of course, it doesn't mean Obama shares their views." Oh really? These miscreants include Obama's former pastor, political mentors and allies, and friends. Obama attempts to downplay and distance himself from his own circle of allies now that he is running for president. But he is one of them. Obama is getting a pass that no other candidate in my memory has ever received. "

[Ed Cone]

I don't think most voters believe that Obama is an unpatriotic radical. I don't.

We've got some very serious problems facing our country, and McCain isn't even talking about the problems anymore.

It's a sad moment for a McCain, and for America.

[Fred Gregory]

Sad ? No, I'll tell you what is sad. It's the Associated Press with analysis ( another word for opinion masquerading as news) like this:
Palin's words may backfire on McCain( original headline before revision, " Palin's words carry racial tinge")

Within the article is this gem from a Democrat hack:

"It's a giant changing of the subject," said Jenny Backus, a Democratic strategist. "The problem is the messenger. If you want to start throwing fire bombs, you don't send out the fluffy bunny to do it. I think people don't take Sarah Palin seriously."

Well ( H/T to LGF )
remember, not all fluffy bunnies are as harmless as they seem.

[Ian McDowell]

The whole guilt-by-assocation thing isn't as much fun when you're on the receiving end, is it?

Yes, the intent was satiric; hence the inflated and old-fashioned language. Had I been serious, I would have called you assholes (as I have mentally while reading your posts), not "abominable miscreants." Please tell me you're not so thick as to think I was seriously advocating lynching, something I wouldn't wish on Stuttering Willie, Greensboro's most obnoxious crackhead and the local scumbag I hate the most (he's currently doing time and I won't shed a tear if someone from the Aryan Nations or the Outlaws shanks him while he's in the joint).

But it is true that I don't like you, or at least don't like your online personas, which I find as obnoxiously slap-worthy as I do Mitch Johnson, Robbie Perkins, John Hammer, James Hinson, Julius Fulmore and Diane Bellamy-Small. There's a streak of puritan authoritarianism in me that wouldn't mind seeing the lot of you in the stocks.

[Fred Gregory]

Ian, you, no doubt, hated your parents and they must have despised the day they created you. It should have been a headache night but providence willed , unfortunately, otherwise.

[Big L]

For someone who loves to stalk me on this website and insist that I'm a fake, Ian uses language and threats that go far beyond anything that I've been accused of.

All the spinning and lies for Hussein really takes it out of someone.

By the way, as to the point of this post, you are who you associate yourself with. If your friends are thugs, you are a thug. If your friends are criminals, you are a criminal. If your friends are terrorists, then YOU ARE ALSO A TERRORIST.

Try to remember some of the lessons you were taught in you're single-parent homes. If you were taught any.

[Roch101]

"Try to remember some of the lessons you were taught in you're single-parent homes." -- Big L

Like spelling?

[Timbo]

@Big Lunkhead -
Ian's mom died when he was in elementary school. Thought you would want to know so you might cram one of those big meaty caveman hind paws of yours in your slack-jawed gob.

"If your friends are terrorists, then YOU ARE ALSO A TERRORIST." By the same logic does that mean all of your friends are demented assholes?

@Spamola -
"Uh oh, hate speech! Conservatives are scum!" No, trolls are scum. Witness: "Yet another thread that convinces me that the fun has gone out of antagonizing unreasonable people." Seems you admit the charge of trollery. A lot of people don't take what you say seriously. It is interesting that you don't either.

@Fwed Gwegowy, et al, -
You ARE thick if you don't instantly recognize what Ian was doing was parodying the exact sort of Bizzaro world twisting of fact that the McCain campaign is doing now to Obama. McCain isn't just losing this election, he is lost the respect of a lot of people, including myself, who saw him being above the gutter-level politics he is now employing.

[Ian McDowell]

Fred, my relationship to my parents is quite loving. If you'd care to discuss it face-to-face, I can be at Cafe Europa after 10pm this Thursday. Just don't try to sell me any cocaine in the bathroom.

For all my sins, I've done nothing so heinous as Big L's al-Qaeda-ish approval of suicide bombing. The anonymouse's ungrammatical last sentence reads like a clumsy attempt at redneck speak, which hasn't been part of its persona before. It should try to keep its charade consistent.

Speaking of "Big L," Spag's disinclination to distance himself from that creature's white supremacist views is one of the reasons I dislike him so much. He's called me a liberal, which speaks ill of his reading comprehension, but let's pretend for a moment that I am one. I've repeatedly praised conservatives like Jeffrey Sykes and David Wharton and once accused poor Roch, a true liberal and someone who's paid me very gracious compliments, of acting like a jerk in one argument with Dr. Wharton. I've also been critical of liberal reporter Jordan Greene, for which Brian Carey politely but firmly took me to task. Yet I've never seen Spag depart from his party line nor noticed him criticizing anyone who attacks liberals, no matter how vile or stupid the attacker's other views or how clusmy his rhetoric. Talk about being the poster boy for weasely lawyer stereotypes.

[Ian McDowell]

Roch, this blog was the "unsavory" one I was referring to, as it's clearly a hive of liberal scum and villainy. I leave it you to discern how serious I was.

[Fred Gregory]

Ian,

You bringing your smoke pole along ?

[Ian McDowell]

No, Cokie, I am not.

[Beelzebubba]

Roch: Since Sarah P has twice the lips to move than the other 3, she could potentially be the biggest liar. This gives her an advantage which I hope to see exploited. Thank you baby rambo jesus..amen.

[mick]

Quite the shit hole this thread has become. Nice job guys. Thanks.

[Ed Cone]

Maybe people thought the title of the post was a suggestion.

[Roger Greene]

"

"Try to remember some of the lessons you were taught in you're single-parent homes." -- Big L

Like spelling?

Roch101"

Nope. Government schools most likely.

So, from reading this thread it appears that either A.) Obama is a neo-terrorist bent on destroying white America and socializing the country, or B.) He's a disloyal friend who used all those ne'er do wells to propel his career, but is now disowning them for his own gain. Swell.

[Roch101]

Roger, yes public schools teach spelling. What's your point? That Big L must have been home schooled?

To the rest of your post, add C: People who can't articulate a rational thought are against Obama.

[Roger Greene]

No Roch. My widowed mother who raised me had to send me to public schools where I developed a sense of humor and an eye for sarcasm. Tight ass know-it-alls make easy targets. I actually laughed at Ian McDowell. Imagine that.

[Roch101]

I asked a question about Big L and you answer about yourself. Are you getting your monikers confused?