FINALLY, the mud-slinging, hate-mongering garbage truck that was the McCain/Palin campaign has come to a screeching halt. The moron that has been destroying this country for the past 8 years must be locked in a room so he cannot inflict any more damage to this country before he slithers out of office on January 20 2009.
Let us give PRESIDENT Obama an opportunity to clean up the mess left behind.
Let the healing and recovery begin...
Republicans clean up your party!!!! Eliminate the fundamentalist element!
Funamendalism is the antithesis of a free democracy!!! Fundamentlaists, be they living in Afghanistan and claiming to follow Islam or living in America and purporting to follow Christ, are dangerous and -- ultimately -- evil and hateful.
Any group of people that believes it is right and everyone else in the world is wrong....any group of people that needs to limit information to forestall deep thinking and questioning...any group of people that desires to enact laws to force others to live according to their ideology and beliefs is a very dangerous group of people. The fundamanetalist co-called Christians are NOT Chrisitans -- they make God and Jesus cry believe it -- and they are a severe danger -- they are the deepest threat and danger to America's constitution and freedom imaginable
THANK GOD -- YES WE DID!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! OBAMA!!!
I have voted Republican before but will never never vote to help put a dangerous fundamentalist in the White House or in any office again.The
Negativity is what best describes the McCain/Palin campaign and they will be remembered for their negative ads, robo calls, hateful rallies and childish, silly gimmicks. Other than the negative ads and slurs they came up with hateful, mean spirited stump speeches, while showing no concern about the real issues at hand. It was more important to parade "Joe the Plumber" on stage than it was to discuss their plan to restore our economy. Rallies seemed to be breeding places for hatred, racist and ethnic slurs, even threats against Obama's life but had little to say about themselves, a platform or issues. John McCain has called himself a Maverick for years but did nothing to separate himself from George W. Bush until the end of his campaign. If he truly was a Maverick and wanted "change" he should have severed himself from the Bush policies from the start of his campaign. Hanging onto the Vietnam era and his POW experience really got old - not that Americans don't care - it made him seem fixed on it and stuck in a decade long ago, out of touch with what we are going through today. I think the selection of Sarah Palin was the worst mistake McCain made - she brought a lot of attention to his campaign but for the most part it was negative and controversial. If John McCain wanted to add a woman to his ticket the Republican Party had many well qualified women he could have picked from - women who have worked hard to bring changes to the American political scene. In the end I think John McCain, as were many of the other Republican and Democratic contenders, from a different time and place, and Barack Obama was the candidate of "hope and change" - change that Americans, America and world is ready to embrace.
Yes, I am gobsmacked to hear some Republicans still singing Sarah Bumbling Plain's virtues!!!
She was the worst choice...besides her extremely shallow entertainment value. People love to laugh at comediennes. That is all she is!
The party needs strong but engaging people who can reach out to the NEW America!
Hope they learn their lesson instead of talking up Silly Sarah!!
McCain ran a despicable campaign centered on character attacks against Obama with very little said on his own political platform. It was one of the lowest campaign ever, from a desperate angry old man. Although his military background is most honorable, he often stated that he knew how to win a war, when the only one he was involved in was lost, and that he was trained to be commander in chief when his experience was that of a lone fighter pilot who never had a command. Sad.
Oh my freaking god. Newsweek does a story on poor White House runs and doesn't discuss Mondale's epic 1984 failure? He won only one (ONE!) state; his home state of Minnesota, which he wone by a scant 3,000 votes. John McCain was like a juggernaut compared to that. And I say this as an Obama voter. It's called homework, Newsweek. Try doing it. If this were a term paper the grade would be "F".
Your article hit a number of excellent points, but, in my opinion, missed a couple more. First, the McCain campaign was not just negative, it was ugly and insulting. For someone who tried to convince us his campaign would provide "straight talk," in reality we got everything but. The McCain/Palin folks intentionally lied, "misspoke," twisted and mangled the truth in more ways than I can remember. Second, the fact that McCain used so many old, has been, red vs. blue, us vs them, "real" America vs. unreal (?), trash talk, showed that he and his sidekick were stuck in the past. It just reinforced the fact that McCain is old, and Palin's type of politicking is old too. I do not think I am alone in being "so over" that divisive hate mongering. Americans have had far too many jingoistic sound bites in the last eight years - we understand what that hides - lack of ideas. In my opinion John McCain lost the election because he lost people's respect and because he showed very clearly that he and Palin represent the nasty history of America. Fortunately, while they were trying to divide us, we moved on to the hope of a united future, As Bob Dylan said, "the times, they are a-changin'."
Excellent article Julian! McCain said he would run a clean campaing but ended up running a fear and smear campaign. His choice of extremist Sarah Palin did more to energize people behind Barack than anything else. My 37 year old Daughter was for Hillary but was rather apathetic about politics before the Palin pick, afterwards she was energized against McCain/Palin like I've never seen her. She kept sending me negative news about "Sinner" Sarah and she became a rabid Obama supporter.
Clinging to a jerk like Joe the Deadbeat Taxpayer was the final nail in the coffin as he epitomized everything that has been wrong with our country over the past 8 years.
McCain's campaign died on 9/15/08 - the day he said the economic fundamentals were strong at 9AM and then as the markets crashed he was crying crisis two hours later. His disorganized antics afterwards of falsely suspending his campaign to fix the crisis and then saying he wanted to postpone the first debate just showed voters how erratic he was. He never understood it was the economy stupid! He kept clinging to his old Cold War national security concerns which are no longer relevant.
McCain didn't just lose the election Barack won the day by having a great unified message of Change and his marketing was second to none. His "Yes We Can" slogan was a real winner. He displayed a cool, calm intelligent persona which is what the voters really wanted. His campaign staff was brilliant in their picking the proper message and knowing how to stage political spectaculars. The way they displayed Obama for his convention acceptance speech and again last night with the Grant Park Victory Spectacular will go down as examples of political showmanship fo the first order.
Obama has become the P.T. Barnum of Politics and his campaign will be the model for all winning campaings to emulate in the future. Now we see that the politics of hope is what Americans wanted in this time of peril!
I sat on the couch with my girlfriend last night watching Obama's speech and found myself again believing that there could be hope for a better future. It's sad that McCain's vision didn't have that same "hopeful" feel to it. I consider myself very much Republican, but felt let down by McCain when, like this article stated.....negative and fearful campaining replacing a vision and ideas, the questionable and pandering Palin pick, stumbling through the economic issues, and the whole "Joe the Plumber and Maverick" sales job. I don't know if Obama is going to deliver all he promises, but at least I can see a glimmer of hope and feel that maybe, just maybe, there is a future that looks brighter than it has in the past several years under Bush. Obama reminds me of JFK standing before Congress and stating his desire to see a man on the moon before the end of the decade. That simple vision and ideal sparked the American strength that just seems to have been forgotten or lost in the past several decades. Great article!
EXCELLENT. WELL WRITTEN AND COGENTLY ANALYTICAL. YOUR SECOND POINT WAS RIGHT ON TARGET! REPUBLICANS HAVE GOT TO TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR ALLOWING MCCAIN'S CAMPAIGN FOR BRINGING OUT THE ABSOLUTE WORST IN PEOPLE AND PLAYING TO THE LOWEST COMMON DENOMINATOR.
We have a new chance another promise to take America at its full promise.
To reflect about what was wrong with the past 8 years and learn from it!
We can move forward as leaders of the free with with our minds and hearts leading the way- no more arbitray fist swinging! The nations equity has been left bare but we can go forward. I was taken by the Senators victory speech - the promise , humility and thoughtfullness he acertained to the public. A far cry when Bush spoke during his two speeches about " his political capitol and how he saw fit to do with it as he wanted!" Already the difference between the two men is awe inspiring!
It's quite...Too quite...
haha
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