Presidential debate numero dos

I caught part of it on the radio and part of it on T.V. In all I thought it was actually pretty uneventful. Both candidates did fairly pitifully. One person asked a question about the energy crisis and global warming. McCain had a decent answer about a focus on nuclear power. Obama responded with something like uh... wind... solar... 5 million new jobs. For being a big issue, it was an amazing poor answer. The same goes for McCain on Social Security and Medicare. His answer came down to, hey I'll reach across the aisle... I'll pull in the smartest people... I have no plan right now, but give me a shot and I'll have smart people come up with one. Weak at best. Obama ducked the same question, just so that he didn't have to explain that he didn't have an answer. Nice.

Oh, by the way, HATED McCain's mortgage bailout idea. Since when does the government have the power to re-negotiate private contracts?

Ugh. I'm watching the global economy slip into the abyss and Obama is rambling on about expanding the Peace Corps to reduce the burden on our military. Huh?

Really? These are the two best guys for this EXTREMELY important job?

Can we go back to the primaries real quick?

This scene came to mind a couple of times last night. Classic.

Change... really?

One of Senator Obama's biggest campaign promises and favorite lines on the trail is that he is going to "cut wasteful spending." Really?

The Council for Citizens Against Government Waste a nonprofit, nonpartisan group just finished their analysis of the 2007 congressional record concerning earmarks, otherwise known as pork barrels, or "wasteful spending". Governor Palin isn't on the list because she is not a member of congress and so doesn't appropriate federal funds. McCain, Obama, and Biden are on the list.

In all fairness Senator McCain has also pledged to "cut wasteful spending," he has even gone so far as to pledge that he will veto any bill that has pork in it. Pretty bold pledge.

So, based on past history which is our only possible means of predicting future performance, who will keep their word?

Let see how they ranked.

The CCAGW broke it down by 2007 and then to be fair, they included a life time rating.

Obama - for 2007 - 10% Meaning that 90% of the time he voted for pork.
Biden - for 2007 - 0% Meaning that he voted for pork 100% of the time.
McCain - for 2007 - 100% You get the idea, he NEVER voted for pork in 2007.

Now for pretty much all of 2007, all of these candidates were running for president. So lifetime averages...

Obama - 18%
Biden - 22% (evidently 2007 was a very porky year for him)
McCain - 88%

So what do you think? Who really will "cut wasteful spending"?

H/T: MM

Qualified?

The first thing that the talking heads started saying when McCain picked Palin was that she was very inexperienced and that by picking her McCain had taken the experience issue out of the race. I find this quite amusing. The more amusing thing is that Obama is getting questioned about whether he has more or less experience than Palin and his answer is REALLY amusing.

“My understanding is that Gov. Palin’s town, Wassilla, has I think 50 employees.
We've got 2500 in this campaign. I think their budget is maybe 12 million
dollars a year – we have a budget of about three times that just for the month,”
Obama responded.

That’s classic. Evidently running for president is Obama’s strongest example of the experience that he needs to BE the president. Now, maybe the Obama camp is different (NOT) than any other campaign I have ever heard or read about but usually the candidate is not the one running the campaign. That’s what campaign managers are for. The candidates have to focus on their speeches, their delivery, how to connect with the audience, come up to speed on current national and local issues so that they can speak intelligently about them. From his own defense, Obama’s campaign manager is better qualified to be president than he is! Ouch.

Also notice that he went back to her time as mayor for the comparison versus her time as governor. For an apples to apples comparison wouldn't he have to reference his time as an IL State Senator. I guess when he crunched the numbers of his campaign vs. her time as governor of Alaska, they didn't fall so well in his favor.

That’s not even addressing the HUGE, OBVIOUS point that he is having to defend his experience against the VP selection of his opponent. Of course, he isn’t running against the VP selection of McCain, he’s running against McCain.

I think this whole thing really takes Obama down a notch… or four.

I’ve never been a big McCain fan, but I have to hand it to the guy. Old or not, he has shown himself to be one BRILLIANT politician through this campaign.

Am I forgetting something?

I keep feeling like there is something I've forgotten, or overlooked... like maybe something that happened last night.

I think for sure that the McCain camp accomplished mission number one for this morning. They kicked Obama's speech OFF the top of EVERY major news site.

Well done.

Here comes the VP and...

well, she's pretty. Never thought I would say that about McCain's VP choice, but... she is.

Alaska Governor Sarah Palin.

I have to say I really don't know much about the governor. I've heard some things about her over the last year, mostly positive, with a definite conservative slant to her. She's young, she's attractive (former runner up for Ms. Alaska). She's the mother of five children, three girls and two boys. The oldest boy goes off to Iraq in September and the youngest was just born in April.

Wow.

I'm really not sure how this is going to go over. It was pretty widely hoped by the pundits that he would choose someone who was "safe". Palin doesn't really qualify on that one. It will be very interesting to see if this is seen as a stunt, an act of desperation, or recognizing a competent, qualified, and talented woman.

Man, this election is tiring.

But fun. :)

Almost brought a tear to my eye

McCain disagreed with the Supreme Court decision about the Gitmo detainees. I was actually very surprised since he has been in favor of closing Gitmo and has been critical of the Bush administrations stance on the prisoners. It smacks a little of inconsistency, but if he is going to move, then I strongly feel that this is the right direction.

Two of the most intelligent judges to ever sit on the bench (in my humble opinion), Roberts and Scalia wrote very powerful (and long) dissenting opinions in this case. McCain was right to chime in, just kind of surprising that he did.

Way to go JCM! For a brief fleeting moment you have your conservative base swooning. It almost brings a flicker of hope (not the BO kind, but the REAL kind).

It's time

There are several pieces out there right now talking about Hillary and what she is doing in the next couple of days. This talk revolves around a few key things. #1 the primaries end Tuesday night with Montana and South Dakota voting. #2 the big meeting over the weekend to discuss Florida and Michigan. #3 Hillary plans to spend Tuesday night in NYC. Kind of strange since she would normally be at celebration speeches in the states that she will win on Tuesday. #4 Bill mentioned that this might be the last day that he is involved in a campaign like this.

All of the indicators are leaning toward throwing in the towel, or rather conceding that she has exhausted all options. There was a little talk from the Clinton camp bashing Obama about not being able to win the Hispanic vote, but... that comes on a landslide victory for Clinton in... Puerto Rico... where they can't vote in the general election. It was interesting that she beat Obama 70/30.

Funny, before this whole thing, I thought for sure she would be the nominee. I have to admit I was a little frightened by Obama and his flaming liberal record combined with empty speeches and meaningless phrases. I think the alternative media has been doing a bang up job beating him up and I think it will continue.

Personally I am hoping that McCain plays nice and sweet until the debates and then unloads on him with both barrels. His economic policies are a joke. He is a MORON (not to sugar coat it) when it comes to foreign policy. And he has literally ZERO experience on anything of substance considering he has been campaigning for president his entire term as a Senator.

The bell is ringing... the big fight is on.

Great post from the American Thinker

Great bit of history here and a glimpse into the life and suffering of John McCain. More importantly it gives you a glimpse into the philosophy of Obama. Not a new hope, or change that we can believe in, but rather an old, tired, and never good to begin with, philosophy of appeasement.

Should B.O.'s new name be Neville-lite?

Is this racist?

John McCain denounced this ad as "racist". Huh? What is racist about it? It doesn't talk about race at all, in fact it doesn't say anything about it! What it does bring up is the judgement of Moore and Perdue, something very pertinent to this election. It points out that Obama associates and surrounds himself with questionable (at best) and radical people. Bill Ayers, Bernadine Dohrn, Tony Rezko and Jeremiah Wright, all people that are completely out of touch with the rest of the country, maybe even with reality itself.

The problem with bringing up the issue of race is that it becomes a hot button. If you get any where NEAR it sensors go off and everything blows up. Why go there? You don't have to. Take the high ground, trust me, it's WIDE OPEN TERRITORY. John McCain should have said, "It just sounds to me like they are questioning Obama's associations and the judgement of Moore and Perdue in endorsing him, which are two issues that the people of North Carolina really need to consider."

I know McCain is tough. He's been tough on conservatives for years now! I wish he would show his Democratic challengers the same kind of "love" that he's been showing us.

Soros: the biggest Democrat supporter of them all

It's no secret that conservatives (me included) aren't the biggest fans of John McCain. Not because he is a bad guy, and I will absolutely be voting for him come November, but he has been on the wrong side of several issues. Not necessarily wrong motives, just missing the boat on the execution.

Having been in Washington for a couple of decades and seeing the corruption that is there, McCain made a push to "get the money out of politics". Sounds great, but the premise was all wrong. His thought was that most politicians were good people but when they got to Washington, or got into politics they got tempted to the dark side by money from special interest groups and influential people. It isn't that they were bad people, it's that the money was bad.

Hmm... didn't like that premise from the beginning because it makes it sound like money (an inanimate object) is evil, not the men who crave it and give into temptation. Personal accountability should be demanded of everyone, especially our leaders in Washington.

Let me continue. He along with Senator Russ Feingold came up with the now infamous McCain/Feingold Campaign Finance Reform Bill to accomplish McCain's mission of getting money out of politics. Well, unfortunately it has been a total failure, because it puts restrictions on free speech for everyone accept the media and opened the spill way for money to pour into politics, unchecked and unlimited through the 527 groups.

Now 30 days before a primary and 60 days before a general election, non-party groups cannot run media campaigns that identify a candidate. That’s right, if you were part of a group that found out 59 days before a general election that a candidate for president had bribed a judge who let him off and sealed court records after he raped an underage girl who became pregnant and used campaign contributions to pay for her abortion (wow, quite the hypothetical), you could not run a national campaign to expose this information. Your only hope is to take this to a media outlet who might or might not release the information (remember by their OWN admition 70% of those in the media identify themselves as LIBERAL). Of course it doesn’t have to be THAT much dirt, it could be anything, it could be video of them yelling at a Starbucks barista. The point is that your right to reveal this information, a right expressly guaranteed in the Constitution, is gone.

Of course infringing on free speech was only part of the bill. The other part is new limits on campaign contributions. Now, any student of history and more importantly anyone who understands ANYTHING about people will realize that most people are basically good, however, they will also act in ways that promote their own self interests. So, if you limit them in some way, they will try and find another way around those limits. This is absolutely true when it comes to money and politics. The 527 organizations were ready to hit the ground running as soon as McCain-Feingold was signed into law. The beauty of these is that contributions to the organizations are not limited. That’s right, unlimited. So, if you were say, a BILLIONAIRE, you could give as much money as you wanted to influence an election. If your name was George Soros you would do just that. This man is the money behind half a dozen 527s, which I previously mentioned here. A great example of this is the $40 million dollar campaign that he will be running against McCain. That’s right, all of the money that McCain has been able to raise legally can be swamped by ONE person, in ONE advertising campaign.

Let’s not forget how Soros made his money either. Keep in mind that this article is from the NYT, where they actually like (and probably fear) Soros. Ask the Brits and the Thais what they think of Soros, considering a good chunk of his money was made crushing their economies for his own personal profit. As you can read in that article he wants to crush the dollar too. This is a man who thrives on power and influence. His life’s goal has been to be noticed and have influence over world affairs. This man is frightening. This man is financing the liberal agenda. Unfortunately for McCain, he handed Soros not just a bullet, but a box of ammo to fire back at him.

You can never get the money out of politics. If the John McCain legacy teaches us anything, it should be that. So instead of getting it out, we just need to shed light on it. Don’t try to stop it, just make it obvious to everyone where it is coming from.

You've GOT to be kidding me

Congrats to ABC news they found the dozen or so people in the military who are going to vote for Obama or Clinton.

Pa-lease!

I can't wait to see the post election results and see how the military voted. I can't imagine that it will be ANYTHING other than a landslide for McCain.

One of the talk show hosts pointed out the speech that McCain gave yesterday. He started it off by saying, "My fellow veterans..." He's the only candidate right now who can say that.

Vision vs Pandering

There is a great piece at HumanEvents.com talking about what Obama should have done to distance himself ideologically from Rev Wright and the ills and evils of Liberation Theology(read Marxists hiding a gun behind a picture of a Bible).

It really supports something that has been bothering me for quite some time and was echoed in a section I read from The Downing Street Years last night. In the book PM Thatcher talks about Jimmy Carter, not that I have been thinking about Jimmy Carter, but rather look at Carter as the quintessential mold of a naive liberal. I am amazed at how perceptive she is and how insightful her views into American politics are. Her impression of President Carter was that he was a very kind and genuine person, she actually liked him a lot. However she was disappointed at his lack of vision for his own country. Rather than knowing where he wanted to take the US he was more concerned with fighting fires and dealing with individual issues. This is a huge contrast to PM Thatcher and her clear goals when she came into office. Truly everything she did and all of her interactions as the PM of England were based on her vision for where her country needed to go. It was inspiring.

It emphasizes what we AREN'T hearing from the candidates right now, particularly on the left. All we hear is pandering. It's all about what they are going to do for this group, or that group, or for EVERYBODY! The speech that McCain made yesterday comes the closest to someone actually trying to cast their vision for the country. Unfortunately I didn't like all of what he was trying to envision. But, at least he seems to have A vision.

The Budget Mess

This is a shining example of what is headed our way if we fail to get out and vote this November.

There are three very important things that have influenced me to absolutely support John McCain for president.

#1 He is BY FAR (as Romney would say the BIG DOG) the best qualified of the three remaining candidates to be our commander in chief.

#2 He has pledged to USE his veto pen and purge the PORK! ABOUT TIME!

#3 He has pledged to appoint constructionist judges on the order of John Roberts.

However, even if you choose not to vote for McCain (as some conservatives have pledged), you still need to get out and vote for conservative Senators and Representatives. Send a message that we are tired of the politicians using our tax dollars like it was free money.

The Liberal congress is already at it, striking down tax cuts that have boosted the economy. Granted our economy has some major problems right now, not because of tax cuts, but because of an attempt to micromanage the market.

What is going to happen now is that, as the market softens and corporate sales go down, they will have to cut back on their work force to cut costs. Then you throw on tax increases and what will happen... they can't just ABSORB this extra cost like it was nothing, they have to compensate for it some how. Higher prices(which is VERY tough in a soft market) and/or reduce costs (i.e. cut jobs).

This whole thing is a recipe for a disaster.

If you want to increase revenue to the federal government you CUT taxes rates. It gives people and companies more money to invest. Companies re-tool, expand, higher more workers and upgrade. More people have jobs and are getting taxed less, so they go out and buy the things they've been wanting. The whole things builds on itself. Tax revenue actually INCREASES because the market is healthier and people are buying more stuff and making more money. The revenue to the government DOUBLED in the 8 years that Reagan was president. Revenue to the feds was a RECORD amount last year. Of course our elected officials acted like they just won the lottery and handed it out like drunken pirates, but that's beside the point.

What congress REALLY needs to do right now is make the current tax cuts PERMANENT. Look for ways to cut taxes on companies who KEEP factories in the US, make it pointless for companies to move their head quarters off shore. Demand a 20% decrease in all federal government programs across the board (except the military). The president needs to smack the federal reserve in the head and put some different people in charge who will stop acting like the economy is their own little puppet show that they THINK they can control. Move out of the system and let the market run itself. Watch the dollar come back up. Yes, interest rates will also come back up but that will ENCOURAGE investment in American dollars (hello!). Demand responsibility and ACCOUNTABILITY from ALL Americans. Mortgages are PRIVATE contracts that the government has NO BUSINESS involving themselves in. If we don't take a market correction now and get our hands out of it, then we will be looking at an all out meltdown.

Wow... sorry, I didn't even have my french press coffee this morning. Just think if I had!

Questions for Obama

NRO has some substantive questions that Obama needs to answer.

Good stuff. Read it here.

Right now Rush is pulling for Republicans in Texas and Ohio to hold their noses and vote for Hillary in the primaries. His reasoning is that Hillary is willing to beat up on Obama and that's good for us. Unfortunately John McCain's camp has already said that they will not pursue an attack campaign against Obama. Great.

How about a question campaign? How about pressing him for real answers?

You don't have to sling mud, but you should definitely push him for solutions and real math to explain the payments for those solutions. Hope, change, unity, leadership... they are all great, but lets talk nitty gritty here.

Fiscal Conservative McCain comes out

This was actually one of my favorite topics in the Republican debates and I am very curious why you NEVER hear anything substantive about this in the Democratic debates.

Earmarks. Pork barrel spending.

They are strangling us.

McCain hits the nail on the head when he says, “We lost in 2006 not because of Iraq but because spending got out of control.” Amen.

When Republicans stop acting like conservatives and start spending tax money like it was theirs to spend, they lose elections. If McCain can rally Republicans around this point, he will bring in a good portion of the conservative base.

A good one from Redstate

Redstate has a great piece on the Top Ten Reason Republicans Shouldn't Fear Barack Obama in November.

They make some great points. Number 9 is my favorite: "9. The Barack Obama is My Shiny New Bicycle." Classic.

I am very interested to hear how Obama will do in a debate with someone when it is about issues and there is a difference between himself and his opponent. As I was watching Hillary fall to pieces in a whiny fit the other night in a pointless debate about the differences in HER massive healthcare tax burden and HIS massive healthcare tax burden went on and on for 16 minutes, I couldn't help but scream (to myself since the other five members of my family were sleeping) WHAT ARE YOU PEOPLE THINKING! WE CAN'T AFFORD THIS AND DON'T NEED IT!

I can only hope that McCain shows JUST ENOUGH of his rough side in the debates to make Obama look like the starry-eyed little fifth grader that he is... no offense to fifth graders.

That's the man's name!

If the man doesn't like his name, then he, like the rest of us, is welcome to change it. However, currently his name is Barack Hussein Obama.

So what is wrong with saying it?

If McCain is going to go out there and apollogize for saying the man's name, he better get ready because the people actually fighting this campaign (which evidently doesn't include John McCain) are going to say much harsher things than that.

And like his name, they will be factual things.

Part Two

Part Two
Reagan made all kinds of excellent points, because he was a very clear, very principled thinker who knew how to win because he knew how to lead. The ideas and principles of conservatism are alive and well today. The reason most Republicans are having a hard time with the current candidates is because none of them are what people have been calling “real conservatives”. However, remember what the Gipper use to say:
- Who is the most conservative person we have that can be elected?
- Someone who agrees with me 70% of the time is my friend not my enemy.

So based on that let’s look at those who are electable.

Unfortunately from what I can see there are only two left that really have a shot and they are McCain and Romney.

So let’s look at McCain:
Social Conservatism:
- Good record for being pro-life. However, he has made several public statements saying that Roe v Wade should not be overturned. This is disturbing at best. His record of “reaching across the aisle” also disturbs me on this one. Quite frankly the main thing that we need from a president on this one is someone who will nominate strict constructionist judges who will uphold the original intent of the constitution. McCain was a leader of the “Gang of 14”. As one of the seven Republicans he negotiated a deal with Democrats. Now, this deal did get us Roberts and Alito, but it left the UNCONSTITUTIONAL practice of filibustering judicial nominees intact. I give him a mixed review on this one, though leaning toward the positive.

Fiscal Conservatism:
- Again, somewhat of a mixed review. He traditionally resists pork and has vowed to veto any bill with pork in it. This is a good first step. He has also said that he will cut spending in the federal government. All sounds good. However he voted against the Bush tax cuts that were desperately needed and backs the global warming movement that could be very dangerous to our economy and is based on emotion rather than scientific fact. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t research alternative fuels. I think that’s a great idea for businesses to do. But it’s not the job of the federal government and restrictive environmental policies are damaging to our economy. He also voted against environmentally friendly development of oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, that would help to alleviate our dependence on foreign oil. Again, a pretty mixed review.

National Defense Conservatism:
- Still a mixed bag, although I have to give McCain a lot of credit on this one. He knows what is at stake in the war on terror and in Iraq and Afghanistan. I just don’t know how his very loose border policy can be good for national defense when terrorists can just march across. He has listened to the people (at least a little) on this one and is saying that he will build a fence and beef up security first. This is a lot better than the failed immigration bill last summer.

Over all:
- McCain is a war hero. He suffered terribly for this country over years. He had the opportunity to come home at one point, but refused to leave without his other brothers in arms and continued to suffer because of his decision including horrible injuries and multiple broken bones. He is a very straight talking person for the most part, despite over two decades in Washington. He will do what he thinks is right, no matter what the implications are. That is the sign of a leader and McCain is definitely a leader. He has supported some bad stuff over the years. McCain-Feingold hid more of the money in politics instead of getting it out. The McCain-Kennedy amnesty bill last summer was a disaster. I’m not sure how great he would be for the Republican Party or the conservative cause. But, I do know he would be better than ANY of the Dems who would all take us further toward secular socialism, bigger government, higher taxes, pro-abortion judges and a destroyed healthcare system.