Desperation & Backfire

Obama is getting hammered by McCain over his lack of substance and his lack of judgement. Obama has not been faring well in the public eye. The polls continue to drop. What to do?

The far left is clamoring for Obama to attack McCain. I have yet to find a single instance where actually listening to the far left seemed like a good idea. To the contrary, the stupidest thing that Obama and the left could do would be to attack McCain on anything other than policy differences. Obama is far too weak a candidate and McCain has far too much experience and far too much character for Obama and the left to start inviting comparisons.

Yet panic and desperation have set in. Obama and the left are now throwing the kitchen sink at McCain, highlighting some of McCain's greatest strengths and putting character and associations directly at issue. Big, big, huge, gigantic, enormous mistake.

Trying to paint McCain as dishonest on incredibly small matters wholly ancillary to McCain strengths is just insane. Yet that is precisely what Obama supporters are trying to do.

McCain spent six years getting tortured in a POW camp. There is nothing whatsoever that Obama or the left can do to spin the substance of what happened to him as a negative. Yet we have a series of folks on the left focusing attention on one incredibly small anecdote from McCain's time in the Hanoi Hilton to suggest that McCain was untruthful - i.e., the cross in the dirt story that some on the left claimed came from Solzhenitsyn's Gulag Archipelego, written in 1973.

McCain did not lift it from Solzhenitsyn's writings since it never appears therein, and McCain's story is verified by other POW's, but that does not matter. If you are on the left, the last thing you want the public dwelling upon is the incredible price McCain paid in the service of our country to score what would be, at most, an incredibly small point.

Then on to another unassailable McCain strength. McCain and his wife adopted a child with birth defects from an orphanage in Bangladesh run by Mother Theresa seventeen years ago. They have raised that little girl to adulthood and nursed her to health. This shows charachter, compassion and a willingness to give and to sacrifice on a level beyond most of us. My God, if you are on the left, why would you want to highlight anything at all about this?

Yet we have Andy Sullivan and others calling attention to this matter, claiming that McCain embellished the story of their adoption of this child by falsely claiming that Cindy McCain actually met with Mother Theresa when she was in Bangladesh. McCain never has, though his wife may have given that impression during one of several interviews during which she was asked about the adoption. But wow, to say that Sullivan and his brethern, in an effort to attack McCain, are missing the forest through the trees on this is an understatement of titanic proportions.

The last thing that Obama himself should do is to start making attacks on McCain's character or associations in any possible form. McCain is not perfect, but he has been thoroughly tested and come out of it on the very positive end of the scale. Obama on the other hand has a history of associations so thoroughly suspect and his own character so untested that inviting comparisons would be insane. Moreover, because there is more than a whiff of corruption, sleaze and quid pro quo to a plethora of major events surrounding Obama's rise in politics, it just raises the downsides for Obama on the character issue exponentially.

Obama's two saving graces on the character issue have been McCain, who has himself largely silenced the right, and the MSM who have played deaf and dumb. Let's face facts. In any other election involving any candidate but Obama, a person with his history of associations would not stand a chance of being elected dog catcher in any locality outside of Berkley. So between the MSM and McCain, Obama has gotten the absolute minimum exposure he could possibly hope for on all of this. These are not just sleeping dogs Obama should let lie, they are viscious sleeping pit bulls with an advanced case of rabies.

Yet the Obama campaign unveiled an ad in Georgia that I blogged about yesterday in which Obama slimes McCain for his association to Robert Reid. The McCain campaign fired a back with a shot across the bow, warning Obama that he did not want to make character an issue, and mentioning Bill Ayers. Obviously the Obama camp did not get the message.

Not only is Obama continuing with the ad, but now they are seeking to paint McCain as an elitist out of touch with the "bitter folk" because he is rich and, in answer to an interview question about the number of houses he owns, McCain answered that he did not know, but his wife Cindy would. It turns out he owns none, Cindy owns seven. Regardless, here is the ad



This is a mistake of just huge proportion. In response, the McCain camp announced today that the "gloves are off." Here is the responsive ad from the McCain camp, highlighting Obama's own very questionable housing problem.



That is just a small taste of what lies behind the floodgates for Obama.

And with the gloves off, there is this from the Atlantic:

A group called the American Issues Project said it launched a 2.8 million television ad buy highlighting Obama's ties to Ayres. The group calls itself "an organization representing a coalition of activists committed to raising conservative issues both during and after the election." It includes longtime Republican activists like Ed Failor, Jr. of Iowa. Failor was a McCain adviser in the state. The ad will air in Ohio and Michigan. Here's the script:

Narrator:

"Beyond the speeches, how much do you know about Barack Obama?
What does he really believe?

Consider this:
United 93 never hit the Capitol on 9/11.
But the Capitol was bombed thirty years before -


By an American terrorist group called Weather Underground that declared 'war' on the U.S. -

Targeting the Capitol, the Pentagon, police stations and more.

One of the group's leaders, William Ayers, admits to the bombings, proudly saying later:

'We didn't do enough.'
Some members of the group Ayers founded even went on to kill police.

But Barack Obama is friends with Ayers, defending him as, quote,
'Respectable' and 'Mainstream.'
Obama's political career was launched in Ayers' home.
And the two served together on a left-wing board.

Why would Barack Obama be friends with someone who bombed the Capitol...and is proud of it?

Do you know enough to elect Barack Obama?

American Issues Project is responsible for the content of this ad."

Obama stands a real chance of winning this election if he concentrates solely on shoring up his weaknesses and engaging McCain on policy. But that isin't going to happen. Its panic time for the One. And the advice he is taking is clearly not of divine inspiration.

Update: The Battle of Elitisma. This is hilarious.

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Interesting Posts From Around The Web - 4 August 2008

I am making an effort to provide a short daily link to some of the blogs around the web that hold my interest. Some of the linkfests will be themed – the anglosphere, milbloggers, jihad, psych and crime, history and culture. The rest will be just a review of some good blogs that I unfortunately only get a chance to hit about once every ten days. So, at any rate, here is today’s general linkfest.
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Art: The Lady of Shalott, John Waterhouse, circa 1900

In the Mel Brooks movie, Blazing Saddles, there is a hilarious scene where the black Sheriff, played perfectly by Cleavon Little, draws in a couple of hooded clansmen by jumping from behind a rock and asking them "Where ‘de white women at?" Baseball Crank has a similarly themed – and satirical - post in his Racist Campaign Ad Watch.

At American Digest, it’s Obama Panties and the Adoration of the Magi.

Blonde Sagacity, who just runs a great blog up in Philly, is having a caption contest for the following photo:


My own caption – ". . . and I hope that I can count on both your votes in November."

Simply Jews responds with appropriate sarcasm to a question in the Guardian from a British Parlimentarian, to wit: "Are the Israelis who demand an attack on Iran, which - repulsive though its government undoubtedly is - has never invaded another country and possesses no nuclear weapons, the same Israelis who have launched successive invasions of Lebanon, with much slaughter and huge damage, and possess 200 nuclear warheads?

Dave Freddoso’s book, The Case Against Barack Obama, has just been released. More on it here.

At Betsy’s Page, a very good post on Obama and his "rather condescending attitude towards average Americans. They're always getting fooled by some nefarious "they" who causes them to do or think things against their best interests." And at Blue Crab Boulevard, its Obama’s ego out of control.

A brilliant post from Confederate Yankee commenting upon the Pelosi interview that I blogged on here: "But then, Pelosi isn't trying to save the planet, she's trying to drive up prices. She and other liberal democrats are hoping to force us to concede to their desire for funding more R&D into alternative energy sources that do not yet exist. In effect, she wants us to put a substantial amount of our eggs in a basket that hasn't been built yet, and starve for years to come while it is being constructed, and hope that it works. And they say Democrats don't support faith-based initiatives."

In a similar vein of religion and oil, the Glittering Eye speaks to Obama about the idiocy of tapping the strategic petroleum reserves, urging him to "avoid the snares of the Demon Rum, Demagoguery! Put down that bottle! Get thee behind me, Satan!"

Stop the ACLU blogs on Obama’s "tire gauge" energy policy: "Barry is suggesting that properly inflated tires will almost completely solve our automobile energy crisis. Now THAT is funny. The delusional "WTF are you talking about?" type. The kind of laugh you get when your bud knocks the cooler over into the pond, or barfs onto the floorboard of your classic Corvette."

Deleware Curmudgeon looks back to Nixon’s plan for energy independence and asks, what the hell happened?

At Discriminations, a jaundiced view of Obama as anything but a "post-racial" candidate.

Conservative Beach Girl makes the argument for an end to 44 years of reverse discrimination in affirmative action plans.

A real laugher at the Daily Kos – a video comparing Reagan to Obama, making the mindless argument that Reagan was an "inexperienced celebrity" who challenged a person – Jimmy Carter – with military experience. Just as a reminder, Reagan’s experience before becoming President was two terms as California governor and he had enlisted in the Army Reserves in 1937 but was prevented from overseas deployment in WWII because of his vision. That is a bit more experience than "The One."

At Vocal Minority, a post on how homelessness has declined under Bush and how the MSM is at pains to limit his credit.

Callimachus at Done With Mirrors runs a good post on the death of Alexander Solzhenitsyn. More on his passing from a personal acquaintance at the Brussels Journal. And Ron Coleman writes on how Solzhenitsyn impacted on him personally.

Colleen at Facing The Sharks waxes poetic on her pro se law suit.

At the Gay Patriot, Obama is living truth of Lincoln’s adage that you can’t fool all of the people all of the time.

Some very sage thoughts on guns and self defense from Rough Diamond.

At Grandpa John’s, a review of a handful of Americans in the 1930’s "who understood the evils of American culture and capitalism to follow their ideals of hope and change by emigrating to the Soviet Union during the depression." There’s that hope and change theme again.

Dutch Concerns has the latest Pat Condell video – topic, Islam is not a victim.

At Pirates, Man Your Women, the candidate for change changes his mind yet again, this time on the separation between church and state.

If your tastes run to the Libertarian, the Whited Sepulchre a list up of the top Libertarian sites and blogs.

Red Alerts asks whether Britain can survive multiculturalism? I do believe that the answer is no, with the only question being whether Britain will put an end to the socialist madness or whether it will end Britain.

Robert at Seraphic Secret has some advice for would-be writers. But apparently, I had best reverse my plans to send him my screen play for collaboration.

I am amazed and utterly disgusted at the tolerance that the West shows for what is occurring in Gaza, particularly as to how the cult of death and hatred is being taught to children. It is fundamentally intolerable. Yet it passes by without condemnation. Soccer Dad has the story of Hamas summer camp.

One of the themes you will see discussed at my blog is the failure of our government to be forthcoming with our nation as to what exactly it is we are fighting in the "War On Terror." Faultline has their own take on that issue this week. I do not agree with the conclusion, because what we are at war with are some very specific strains of Islam, but the post itself is very thoughtful.

Political Insecurity has the latest video on the new First Lady of France. In support of international relations, I highly recommend it.

A sage question from Soob: Was George Orwell writing fiction or phrophecy?

At the American Jingoist, a very good post on the Axis of Idiots.

Villagers With Torches is one of the most intelligent blogs on the net. The most recent post looks at Pakistan’s snakepit of an intelligence service, the ISI, and our alternatives in dealing with Pakistan.

Woman Honor Thyself has a very good tribute to two of our fallen, Army Spec. Alex Jimenez and Pvt. Byron Fouty. Do visit this one.

The Common Room posts a list of books read in July along with short blurbs on each. It is an interesting mix.

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