New Obama Ad: "Hands"

I like it:



Now if we can only make some really vicious (but truthful) attack ads.

On Edwards

I don't have much to say, other than it's a damn good thing we nominated Barack Obama instead.

Dear Nikki Tinker

Fuck you.

Brilliant

At TPM, Josh Marshall put together a video of some of McCain's worst moments. They left out a few, like his befuddlement over the Viagra/birth control question, but it is still hilarious:



By the way, sorry for the light posting this week. I'm working on a video project that I hope to unveil next week. I've had to teach myself Final Cut Pro in the process, so it's been a bumpy ride so far.

It should be worth it, though.

Predictions

1. Barack Obama will not announce his VP pick until either the weekend before the convention, or during the convention itself.

2. This will be viewed as a brilliant move politically, because it adds suspense to the convention and provides for lots of Obama/VP news stories in the following week as they begin touring the country together. This will help Obama stay in the news while the Republicans are having their convention.

3. McCain will panic and make his VP pick the day after Obama's convention speech. It will be a Friday in August and won't provide McCain with the attention/bounce he is looking for.

4. McCain will not put enough thought into the VP pick, so while he is in panic mode Steve Schmidt will convince him to select Romney.

5. If McCain loses the election, Republicans will wonder why he didn't pick Romney in early August and at least take advantage of his fundraising abilities when it could have made a difference.

These are predictions pulled off the top of my head, so chances are most of them will be wrong.

McCain Damned By His Own Words

The Obama campaign probably thought they'd have to wait until September or October to start getting vicious towards John McCain. But since McCain took us on the Britney/Paris train, here we are.

Nice to see that the Obama camp is getting progressively more aggressive in their ads. Hopefully by October, they'll match the DNC's awesome attack ads from earlier this year.

Kimmel Gets It

Funny how comedians are able to get to the truth better than 99% of the so-called professional pundits out there:

Obama: "GOP Takes Pride In Being Ignorant"

I love it when he gets fired up like this. We can only hope he's this on when the debates come around:

Paris Responds To The Wrinkly Old Man

What I find rather amusing (or scary, if you look at it another way) is that Paris Hilton is better at reading a cue card than the man who wants to be our next president.

Mrs. Buffalo Chip McCain

Ha! Here is the definitive video on the whole McCain-pimping-out-his-wife matter:

Misogynist McCain Pimps His Wife

What a class act:

If there were any Obama supporters to be found in the vast Buffalo Chip campground, they kept quiet.

Indeed, McCain felt so comfortable at the event that he even volunteered his wife for the rally’s traditional beauty pageant, an infamously debauched event that’s been known to feature topless women.

“I encouraged Cindy to compete,” McCain said to cheers. “I told her with a little luck she could be the only woman ever to serve as first lady and Miss Buffalo Chip.”

Call me crazy, but I can't really see Barack offering to enter Michelle into a topless beauty pageant.

And if he did, I don't think the media would stop talking about it for quite some time. Yet McCain does this and we hear crickets.

[UPDATE]: And in case you are curious, here is some video of the "beauty pageant" that McCain offered up his wife for:



Looks like a real class act. And here is the "pickle-licking contest" that they stage:



OK, aside from being offensive to women, this just looks like a really lame event. As in, the venues seem mostly empty and the MCs keep having to remind the drunk crowd to actually clap. Sad and creepy.

There are more videos out there (the "live orgasm contest" and the "wet t-shirt contest"), but let's just say it's a pretty disgusting event. Spring Break for old, fat, drunk bikers.

Yet Another Obama Ad

I hope he unleashes a new one every day this week. And I'd like to see some that are even more vicious about McCain's record.

Obama's Energy Speech

I didn't read the whole thing, but what I did read was pretty good. Sounds like a very pragmatic, strong plan that emphasizes increased efficiency, more renewables, more investment in public transit.

Here is a 4 minute highlight, where he hits McCain hard:



One thing I've noticed about Obama while following this election is that he is not just smart, but also well-informed and perceptive. He follows the news closely, and is probably better informed about McCain's policies than McCain is.

McCain, on the other hand, is either dumb, senile, or purposely trying to mislead voters on just about every issue under the sun. He lies about his own positions, he lies about Obama's positions, he gets things mixed up, he stumbles on what should be easy questions, and he has become increasingly reluctant to talk with reporters.

I know, I know, I should be scared because the polls are so tight and McCain will bury Obama with Rove-like smear tactics. Sorry, I just can't get up the energy to be so worried. I know the real Obama, I know the real McCain, and come convention/debate time, so too will the vast majority of the voting public.

And once that happens, McCain will be finished.

Obama Hits McCain On Energy

Good ad. Hopefully we'll see many more like it.

Ripping On Dowd

This is funny. As you may know, NY Times columnist Maureen Dowd has a bizarre obsession with Barack Obama's diet. In her mind, the fact that he eats, you know, healthy food somehow makes him weird or foreign to her. Not sure how anyone can actually think like this, especially after 8 years of a disastrous peanut butter-and-jelly president, but so be it.

Anyway, on the occasion of Obama's 47th birthday, he served cake to the reporters in the back of his plane. And check out this snippet:

When a reporter turned down his offer of birthday cake (not this reporter), Obama joked, "No cake? Maureen Dowd will write a story about you not eating cake! Don't want to be an elitist now!"

Happy Birthday, Barack. You are now only 24 years younger than McCain...at least until August 29th.

Factoid Of The Day

An interesting fact that I realized the other day. Both of our presidential candidates lived in Southeast Asia for at least 4 years in the late 1960s/early 1970s.

John McCain in Hanoi from 1968-1973.

Barack Obama in Jakarta from 1967-1971.

Of course, they were there for very different reasons. And Barack Obama was a young child, McCain a thirtysomething Navy pilot. But it is an interesting coincidence nonetheless.

In addition, I find it ironic that Obama has reams of criticism and smears over where he lived as a kid, while McCain's five years of torture and psychological damage during his adult years are pretty much swept under the rug.

The Dish Returns

Andrew Sullivan, who has long been a huge fan of John McCain, just returned from a two week vacation.

Unsurprisingly, he isn't impressed with where the McCain camp has taken this race.

The arrogant-celebrity meme is a variation on the usual Rovian fare: empty of actual policy substance but evocative of playground loyalties and resentments. Basically, McCain called Obama a girl, to appeal to the jocks, and then called him arrogant to flatter the nerds.

Paris Hilton is a two-fer. Choosing a female celebrity is integral to the usual attempt to feminize the Democrat. I could see nothing racist whatever in the message, mind you, but it was, as Weaver noted, pretty asinine.

Less asinine was McCain's two-pronged lie that Obama would rather lose a war than a campaign and that he snubbed injured troops in Germany. The former is repulsive and you can tell McCain knows it because he has a weird habit of saying it and then grinning broadly and humming a little to himself as a semi-laugh. He doesn't own the statement even as he says it. The charge itself is about as uncivil as it is possible to be, close to calling Obama treasonous, right? And the troop snub jibe is simply, demonstrably untrue, as the McCain camp was forced to semi-concede.

So McCain's main moves these past two weeks have been either childish or disgusting, and both times he has signaled he didn't really believe his own message.

He doesn't seem like a serious president to me.

McCain's campaign is accomplishing two things right now: ruining McCain's independent maverick straight-talker image, and painting Obama as a trendy overconfident empty suit.

We all know there are three major events left in this presidential campaign. The VP picks, the conventions, and the debates.

McCain can redeem his mavericky straight talk image with a very moderate VP pick, which he won't do. He could do it by somehow sounding moderate and gracious in his convention speech, but we all know it's gonna be a full bore attack on Obama (and not a very good one, I'm thinking). Or he can redeem himself in the debates, but if McCain's gaffe problem continues I just don't see how that happens.

Obama, meanwhile, has a much easier road. His VP pick will either bolster "change" or "experience", maybe even both. If he picks a centrist like Bayh or Clinton or Biden, he gets experience chips, whereas a governor like Kaine or Sebelius would emphasize the change route. My preferred choice out of these options would actually be either Biden or Sebelius. Biden can be a great attack dog, and he has more experience than McCain. Sebelius would please progressives, women, and those who want to see a true "change" ticket.

Next, Obama has his convention speech. If history is any guide, the guy is going to knock it out of the park. The only potential blunder would be running a gooey positive convention ala 2004, which fails to go after McCain. If Obama's speech has substance and bite, and maybe even a new proposal or two, it could really dispel some of these childish attacks coming from McCain about how unprepared Obama is.

Finally, Obama has the debates. It can't be overstated how critical these are. But they present many more dangers to McCain than to Obama. McCain is gaffe prone, he's built himself up at Mr. Experience, and by this point voters will think Obama is all style and no substance. So if Obama stays sharp and McCain is Mr. Angry Gaffe Machine, the millions of dollars spent on Britney and Moses ads will promptly be flushed down the toilet.

McCain had better hope he has a 5-10 point lead coming into the debates. I don't see how that's possible, but it's what he needs.

Otherwise, he's in big trouble.

Stumbling Old Coot

Obama should accept more debates immediately. McCain has mentally deteriorated badly in the last few years.



Remember, this is an issue that McCain's campaign brought up. Yet McCain can't even figure out a clear response. Is the guy going senile in front of our eyes?