From me - ignore all this. I supported you in the primary (was a precinct captain) and really want to support you in the general. Following this advice will be the most likely way to make me voe the other way. During the primary I was drawn to your message of “let’s work together to get past partisanship and do what’s right regardless of party”. If you bathe in partisan decisiveness, you will just be another politician that cannot rise above the fray and is willing to further divide the country in the quest for power.
I was dissapointed by the Joe Biden pick. I respect his record, and his foreign policy experience, and his pro-labor positions, but his reputation as an attack dog is exactly the opposite of what we need as a country right now. I feared his nomination was signalling an embrace of the nastiness of the past.
Debate and disagree on politics, qualifications and policy. Support your position with vigor. But a scorched earth policy is, imho, placing the campaign over the country. I have had enough, and hope you are better than that. In the end, you will need to lead everyone, including those who opposed you.
Legitimate and aggressive criticism is not the “low road.” The OP isn’t calling for lies, the OP is calling for the Obama campaign to show the negative side of McCain and Palin.
That’s not only not the low road, it’s a valuable and important part of the debate. If Barack Obama wants people to vote for him it’s incumbent upon him to explain why they shouldn’t cast their ballots for the one viable alternative. If McCain and Palin would make poor Presidents, say so, and explain why. What’s wrong with that?
I’m not calling for the low road, just that he fights back. (The Larry Flynt and Goody Palin stuff is our swiftboat/venting, not an actual suggestion.)
Obama just sent me a P.M. and agrees. (He asked me not to reveal his username though.)
You guys have completely gone around the bend. What is it about this woman that rouses such mouth-frothing viciousness? Seriously, the Witch from Wasilla? Can we not keep this debate about policy differences? There are pundits out there bitching about her hair, for Christ’s sake. Is this the best your side can come up with?
On second thought, never mind. I’m staying out of these threads from now on because, quite frankly, it saddens me greatly to see Dopers I normally admire and eagerly await their next post turn into such partisan loons.
See you after the election…I’ll go hang out in Cafe Society.
She’s a religious nut. I can’t speak for anyone else but that’s what did it for me. I was on the fence (admitedlly leaning towards Obama but honest to goodness undecided) but it’s no question now. I’m terrified of this woman having any kind of authority.
Or, at the very least, “I’m sorry that Sarah Palin feels the need to say such false and negative things about my wife. I had thought she would have understood how hard remarks like that can be on those whose only transgression is to have a close family member running for office.”
Personally I’m rather disappointed in both VP candidates. I thought McCain and Obama were keeping it remarkably polite compared to previous elections, but Biden and Palin have brought out the sewage firehoses almost immediately. Tsk.
Why do I hate her? Lesseee…
Fundamentalist Christian hypocrite
She began her campaign with viciousness and lies about her opponents
Her record indicates that she wanted books banned from a library and fired the librarian who wouldn’t comply
She says that until we’re all right with God all is for naught including her job (YouTube it)
She took a plane for 8 hours after leaking amniotic fluid with a special needs child (who she’d been carrying when she took a demanding hike that she boasted “thrashes your guts and lungs”)- the woman’s judgment and or sanity is lacking
and there’s more, a lot more, but I’m convinced she could strangle a nun on nationwide TV and McCain supporters would talk about how their mom used to strangle nuns just like that.
Obama needs to get McCain into townhall meetings. Obama’s writers need to feed him questions and comments that are guaranteed to set off the McCain temper. Provoke him until he reveals what all those years in the Hanoi Hilton did to his mind.
Biden needs to get Palin into townhall meetings. Her personality can’t overcome her lack of knowledge and experience in foreign affairs and national security. He can pick her to pieces at will, without seeming to be beating up on a “poor soccer mom”, which she definitely is NOT. Her nickname in high school was “Sarah Barracuda”, and it’s an apt description.
If the Dems want to win this, the gloves have to come off. Not in a personal attack way, but in trench warfare that demands answers to the mess that Bush has created. A prime question for both of them: As a strict constructionist, how do you intend to restore to Americans the constitutional rights that have been abridged over the last eight years, such as freedom of speech, right to due process, suspension of habeus corpus, right to privacy, etc?
I am sad for her little baby. They kept showing close ups of him last night, and the way I hear people talking about him makes me uncomfortable. As if he is some sort of mascot.
The Down Syndrome baby! As if he is not a real individual child.
Although, the shots of her youngest daughter (Piper? Willow? Palm Tree?) grooming him like a cat during her speech (licking her palm and running it over his hair) had me laughing pretty hard.
I wish people (not in this thread, in general) would stop questioning her ability to be VP because she is a mom though. I hear/read a lot of “she needs to be home with her kids.” Obama has little children too but no one is saying that about him. If she was a man people would not say “he should not be away from his kids so much.” If she has the support of her husband, go for it. It makes me defend her when people say things like that, and I don’t really want to defend her.
Attack her for her policies and politics, there are plenty of things to go around.
I don’t feel sorry for her and can’t work up a tear about the mother/job comments. The Republican party has ALWAYS gone on the attack when it comes to mothers in business. They crucified Hillary Clinton for her “cookies” comment and despise her for being an in-your-face, intelligent, educated brawler who takes no shit from any man, instead of being a good mommy and staying home to produce another brat every year. Look at the hatchet job they did on Kerry’s wife. Look at every single Republican president’s wife or presidential candidate’s wife: they are expected to sit and grin like idiots, make no comments to the press, and fawn over their husbands’ every word like good little Stepford wives. While I would prefer that the Dems not take that particular route, for the Pubs to complain about comments concerning Palin is just pure hypocrisy, and you shouldn’t buy into it.
Townhall meetings are a McCain strong point and he’s been advocating them all along. Obama’s strong point is delivering speeches. He doesn’t do well when he gets off point.
I know. I hate when they do it too. (I am voting Obama, just for the record.) I guess I am just frustrated with the whole “women in politics” thing. I wish it could just be qualified candidates, or not. I know that is not the real world, and this is a historical race for many reasons, and people are talking about sexism and racism in a way that needed to be done, and I am happy there are women even being considered blah blah blah. It is disheartening to me to hear some people’s real thoughts on this and it reminds me how far we (as a country) still have to go. I am glad that Obama has said for the record that Palin’s daughter is not a concern to him. At least he is trying to set an example.
I find all the conventions a little too mob-mentality after a while. The people on both sides freak out and go into hysterics over their candidate. It is like watching people at a concert or football game (on both sides). Nothing about the crowds there scream “rational, objective thinkers” to me. I don’t like that us vs. them mentality that our country has. I personally think both parties have many flaws and some strengths and I think most people agree with that, but during an election year everyone has to join a side and it looks like everyone on each side thinks the same about everything, and it sucks.
The whole point of getting McCain into an unstructured forum is that he could easily be prodded into losing his famous temper, thus showing to the world how unfit for office he is. The substance of the meeting is secondary to that goal, IMO.
That would be a good strategy except it’s not Obama’s best format. He does not do well when he gets off-point and it manifests itself in a lot of tonque tripping. Unlike Bush, who invents new words when he gets into trouble, Obama grinds to a halt and stumbles around. It’s one thing when you’re surrounded by supporters at a rally but in a live debate that would be death. It’s probably why McCain was pushing hard for more town hall debates.
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Well said.
This damn election is the reason I’ve stayed away from here lately. I’m only here now, because the free posting has brought back some favorite posters.
I’m not on either side, (used to be on the left). However, I would love to see a similar thread about Michelle. Except there’s not anything funny about her, just creepiness.
