Neato bit:

The question in this election is not “Are you better off than you were four years ago?”  We know the answer to that.  The real question is, “Will this country be better off four years from now?”

Marc Ambinder has a full transcript.

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William Timmons, the Washington lobbyist who John McCain has named to head his presidential transition team, aided an influence effort on behalf of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein to ease international sanctions against his regime.

The two lobbyists who Timmons worked closely with over a five year period on the lobbying campaign later either pleaded guilty to or were convicted of federal criminal charges that they had acted as unregistered agents of Saddam Hussein’s government.

After being annoyed for weeks by people trying to place guilt on Barack Obama for the actions of William Ayers, with whom he served on an education board, I’m reluctant to try to make this into a big deal for McCain.

But let’s be honest, for just one minute.  Ayers is in no way involved in Mr. Obama’s campaign, nor to our knowledge, his life.  McCain, on the other hand, has made a conscious business decision to make a fundamental part of his campaign this person, who was paid by Saddam Hussein, and whose coworkers in that endeavor are now in prison.

Again, does this mean McCain is sympathetic to dictators and terrorists?  No, not any more than meeting Ayers does for Obama.  But McCain did actually hire a man who was formerly hired by Hussein to make American politicians sympathetic to dictators and terrorists. Obama just took a job with several other highly respected figures, one of whom happened to be Bill Ayers.

So, you do the math.

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This was, I think, a mauling: a devastating and possibly electorally fatal debate for McCain. Even on Russia, he sounded a little out of it. I’ve watched a lot of debates and participated in many. I love debate and was trained as a boy in the British system to be a debater. I debated dozens of times at Oxofrd. All I can say is that, simply on terms of substance, clarity, empathy, style and authority, this has not just been an Obama victory. It has been a wipe-out.It has been about as big a wipe-out as I can remember in a presidential debate. It reminds me of the 1992 Clinton-Perot-Bush debate. I don’t really see how the McCain campaign survives this.

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There’s no doubt what the public will think. Anyone watching CNN on a hi-def TV could see the dial focus group of a bunch of Ohio undecided voters. And throughout the night, it often seemed that Obama would break the darn meter, his ratings going through the roof. McCain, on the other hand, was the king of the flatline. I swear, you could see the downticks every time McCain said “my friends” — a tell to the audience that he was about to serve another heaping dish of b.s. It was painful. According to the Republican pre-debate spin, McCain was supposed to use “humor” to soften the blow of his mighty attacks, but 1) did any of his attacks connect? and 2) can anyone say, in all seriousness, that McCain delivered a single effective laugh line?

And here’s what struck me:  Why in the world did McCain get so damn close to the questioners, at times awkwardly poking at them with his paws while he used a sappy sweet “happy man” voice? At times, he stepped up so close, the camera couldn’t even get an angle on him and we had to watch him nearly from behind.

Shoulda done a green screen.

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But my reaction? YAAAWWN!

I never would’ve thought I’d be longing for the days of Bush vs. Kerry, but here I am today, almost putting myself to sleep trying to write about last night’s debate. Don’t get me wrong — I like substance, and substance is kind of what we got. But whether it was McCain somehow still tripping over endless regurgitations from his stump speech (”I’ll veto spending and be famous!”), or Obama taking way too much of his own time responding to McCain’s consistent attacks, I can only think of one word to sum up the debate: repetitive.

• Obama’s strengths: Civility, bipartisanship, calm.
• Obama’s weaknesses: Being baited into responding to McCain’s attacks, not spending enough time on his own plans
• McCain’s strengths: Staying on-message, attacking Obama with every single answer
• McCain’s weaknesses: He appeared contemptuous, angry, old and bitter. He was highly partisan.

According to post-debate polls, people are just loving Obama. I don’t totally get it, but I approve of it. I think he did, in fact, have the better debate. His answers were more appealing to everyday folks, and he had more specifics about his plans. McCain only seemed to offer specifics about Obama, and hardly any about himself.

McCain repeatedly interrupted Obama and the moderator, PBS’ Jim Lehrer, often raising his voice and speaking over them until they gave up, which could take up to 30 seconds of crosstalk, just like on Bill O’Reilly’s godforsaken show. This was one of the more annoying traits I’ve seen in a debater.

Other than that, next time bring out the fireworks, boys! Try to convince us that you have at least some passion for the job. (Note: McCain getting angry about Obama’s record does not count. Negativity doesn’t win debates, and the Independents polled proved that.)

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She was elected mayor of a backwoods town in Alaska, and then governor of the state, which is a notoriously arch-conservative electorate, filled with burly woodsmen and a citizenship influenced by traditional frontier “values” more than anything else — or at least wannabes, trying to imitate the above.  I’m not going to say it’s entirely unlikely that such a culture would elect a female as its leader, but it can be difficult to pull off.

Most importantly, there’s plenty of evidence to suggest that Palin knows how to game the media in her favor.  Just before she was officially announced as the Vice Presidential choice of John McCain, her Wikipedia page was scrubbed of anything that might reflect poorly on her by a user going by the name of “Young Trigg,” which happens to be the name of her son.

For analysis and giggly conjecture, check out the NPR audio of the story.

For a list of the changes made, when, and by whom, the most comprehensive piece I’ve seen is this Daily Kos diary.

So while the cable news talking heads fabricate their “you can’t discuss the pros and cons of a woman” storyline, the woman in question appears to be one step ahead of them.  And hey, so are most people — but I suppose the talk shows have to do something to keep the debate over this strikingly bad choice of a VP from turning into a bloodbath.

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It’s a controversial move, because in a questionnaire he filled out months and months ago, he said he’d like to see both party nominees seriously consider going the public money route. Public money means that they use tax dollars to finance their campaign, and they can’t accept certain kinds of money. In general, it means less money for the candidate, but also a “cleaner” sort of money.

McCain has been calling for Obama to accept public money, because it will mean Obama can’t out-raise him by tens of millions of dollars this summer. Now, they’ll be attacking Obama’s claim that he’s a straight-talking, “different” kind of politician on this basis, and they won’t be totally wrong. Obama’s camp claims that they spoke to McCain’s people about the pros and cons of their decision before making it, but the McCain campaign denies it.

But honestly, if you were shattering fund raising records, and doing it in a “different,” shockingly grassroots kind of way — gaining millions from literally millions of small donors, donating ten or twenty dollars at a time, as Obama has… would you forsake all of that historic momentum just so you could *appear* noble?

I’d say that would be the actual political ploy.

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Talk about fiscal responsibility. Way to stimulate that economy!

It’s not as though they’re going bankrupt — they have millions in Budweiser cash — but I still think it’s funny. And according to this graph I just found on Google, credit card debt tends to increase with age, so maybe that’s the issue (thanks, I’ll be here all week.)

Barack Obama, by contrast, has no debt and he and his wife have put away over $200,000 dollars for the college education of their two young daughters.

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How about: painfully obvious code.

Clinton’s speech tomorrow, the media has *somehow* found out (I wonder how) will feature her saying things like she’s prepared to do “whatever it takes” to get a Democratic victory in November. Brilliant analysts at CNN have deduced that the phrase is a secret code for Hillary’s desire, or at least willingness, to be Barack Obama’s Vice President.

First, it’s no secret: that’s what the last two months of “no one can win but me!” have been all about. And second, CNN knows exactly what she’ll say, and exactly what she means, because CNN’s employees also double as Clinton employees.

This has been covered ad nauseum on this site.

But will Obama take the bait? He can do whatever he wants and not make a wrong decision — her message conflicts with his, and she represents ‘the old way.’ But also, her supporters would be soothed by her VP role — something which remains appealing, even though most of them have come home to Obama.

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