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In wooing these delegates, what becomes fair game? Anything?
Yeah, I have to admit, anything. Probably illegal. Part of the tactics you've got to use is figuring out what resonates with each person. It's something different from everybody, a commitment for a ship or a veterans' hospital. You can go deep into each of their personal lives to really see what everybody wants. What do you want? You can have it. What do you want? You can have it. In 1976, it got so bad that Henry Kissinger accused me of giving away his entire foreign policy—and he was right, I did! Because we didn't want any ideological divide on the floor of the convention. I knew then the heart-and-soul types would take over.

What about planning the details of the convention? Could the little things like choosing the keynote speaker sway it one way or the other?
That's a whole separate game that's played all the time. You can have a committee chairman who plays it straight down the line, or one who leans toward one candidate and can make key appointments beneficial to that candidate. But the party apparatus isn't as strong as it was years ago. The PACs, lobbyists, political consultants have a lot more influence on the process.

Are you planning to get involved, or are you keeping out of it?
Been there, done that. It's a young man's game. Let them worry about all the problems I worried about for 40 years.

© 2008

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Member Comments

  • Posted By: Radicalgranny @ 02/10/2008 11:40:06 AM

    I as a registered Republican will not be voting this election. McCain is nothing but a Liberal in Republicans clothing., I don't care what he says. As far as I am concerned now the Nation can go down the Socialist path if that is what the people want. Who am I to stand in their way. I am not alone in this feeling.

  • Posted By: eddiebtc @ 02/09/2008 8:33:57 PM

    Like I said earlier, I'm a democrat. I find it hilarious, the way Rush and Hannity are practically conceding the election to the democrats.
    There is one thing I don't get though. They are very fond of invoking the name of their god, Ronald Regan, when dissing McCain. Especially when they talk about his team-up with Ted Kennedy on immigration.
    Wasn't Regan's solution to the problem in the "80's a real amnesty?
    If your ancestors came from anywhere but North America (and there are only a relative few of them left) then who are you to talk? My great grandfather came through Ellis Island in 1899. Thank God Americans weren't as prejudiced against Italians then as they are against Mexicans now.

  • Posted By: eddiebtc @ 02/09/2008 8:21:26 PM

    I'm about as conservative as a democrat gets. When will the candidates talk about the capital gains tax?
    Why is income from investments put classified differently than wages?
    I don't care where it comes from. Whether you get it from investments, wages, or inherit it from your family. Income is income.
    That's the real difference between the Republicans and Democrats.

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