I think what I find funny is that I think MLB is willing to do it in the hopes that they'll have a good lead in and can get better ratings!

sounds like my boss. and yet he's claiming that our lil company is in dire straits because our net profits aren't high enough - *eyeroll*

In reading the comments on cnn to the "Joe the Plumber" issue, I see nothing but condescending, hypocritical arrogance. We have had 8+ years of obnoxious arrogance. Are we going to just be trading one type of arrogance for another? That would really suck.

Well, again I don't think Obama has said anything negative about Joe, so I don't see why these comments would be pertinent to how he runs the White House over the next 4-8 years.

I'm sure many of the comments have been over the line. Having said that, many of the criticisms of "Joe" have been fair game. He presented himself to Obama, and the McCain campaign presented him to the American people, in a manner that was very misleading.

I think social security ought to go away too. But I wouldn't go on TV and talk about it. Unless I was hoping to leverage that as an audition to get a talking spot on some right wing radio station. And even then....not worth putting yourself out there like that to turn into a 15-minutes of fame sideshow.

The comments had little to do with "Joe" specifically but overall tone and attitude about others. Many people linked the right-wing religious and political zealots to Bush, as if he said those things himself. The same should hold true for Obama. The president is only as good as the consent of the govern and if the govern acts like a bunch of condesending, hypocritical asshats, then it reflects poorly on their leader - especially if we are just trading one type of arrogance for another.

As the US presidential campaign enters its final weeks, both the Republican and Democratic candidates are hitting the swing states.

But misconceptions and rumours abound and many voters have their facts about the candidates all wrong. Some believe that Democrat Barack Obama is a Muslim, for instance.

Casey Kauffman talked to some Republican supporters after a rally by Sarah Palin, the Republican vice-presidential candidate, in Ohio.

Absolutely un-fucking-believable. :mad:

"we're not"

heh

At least most of the people in those videos will be dead in twenty or thirty years.

Did he say Al jezeera? :)

MSNBC is showing the Al Smith Foundation dinner in New York tonight. McCain just went and now it's Obama's turn.

Apparently Letterman presses McCain about his friendship with G. Gordon Liddy tonight. It's about fucking time someone asked him that. Can't wait to see what he says.

whoa - that's some quality ignorant racist rednecks there in Ohio. WOW

Obama is laughing at his own jokes. The audience doesn't know what to do...because he's really hitting them hard. All of the absurd stuff that's been said about him...it's like he's really having a good thing.

It's also obvious these guys don't write their speeches for tonight, because it's almost like their engaging the material for the first time.

Nice to see Letterman enter the political arena after his "grilling" of Obama last month with such hard-hitting questions as "Have you ever put lipstick on a pig" and "what's it like to be on the cover of Time and Newsweek".

I'm certainly not claiming that Letterman's unbiased, although him and McCain have gotten along before. It probably wasn't a good idea for McCain to piss Letterman off by outright lying to him earlier.

Either way, don't you think McCain should have to answer questions about his relationship with Liddy?

I don't think a late night host ought to exhibit so much hubris to assume that he somehow has credibility as an unbiased, hard hitting news man. But if it's his show and McCain is going on because he needs all of the free media he can get right now, then he's gotta play ball the way Dave wants to play it, I guess.

I'm guessing if he hadn't blown Dave off a couple weeks ago he would have had similar kid gloves. Now, he has to face the jester's wrath.

I'm not sure if it's already been posted but Sarah Palin will be appearing on SNL October 25.

McCain was great at the Al Smith thing, the Hillary Clinton joke and reference to "that one" got the whole room cracking up, Obama and Clinton included.

That's true, I forgot about the blow-off. After the debacle on the View, it's a shame that political candidates both can't go to late night/morning entertainment shows and let loose a bit. Instead, McCain has had to be "on guard" in nearly every entertainment interview while Obama gets fawned over for being sexy and on the cover of magazines. It just comes down to treated both candidates equally. Either they can both come on and joke, or you grill them both. I'd actually prefer the former but don't really care as long as the treatment is consistent.

as Fidatelo pointed out - I think if McCain hadn't disrespected Letterman he'd have gotten the goofy questions too, but Letterman is of the "i won't be shown up by this guy" mindset. and he's absolutely within his rights. he's entertainment, not news-tv. if he wants to focus on different things with different people that's his right.

who even watches all those late night shows anyways? really??

My thing is if this media is so in the tank for Obama, then why aren't they drilling McCain on his own seedy associations? G. Gordon Liddy plotted murders, kidnappings, election fraud, and said to shoot federal agents in the head. McCain calls this guy a patriot, but he doesn't get asked about it? McCain has a lobbyist who previously did lobbying work for Saddam Hussein, but he doesn't get asked about it? McCain announces an endorsement from the wife of William Annenberg of Annenberg Challenge /Obama-Ayers fame, but he doesn't get asked about it? McCain was on the board of the World Anti-Communist League, a group with an anti-semitic history, but he doesn't get asked about it?

I keep hearing about how the media is in the tank for Obama, but that doesn't make sense given their refusal to press McCain on any of these, while asking Obama about every single one of his associations. I'm glad that someone is finally asking McCain about Liddy. Sure, it would be better for a real newscaster to do it, but something is better than nothing.

If they ask about every associations within 6-degrees of a politician, the campaign would last for 17 years and there would be no room to talk about real stuff (if you think what politicians say is worth much). Associations like Wright is one thing, but not Ayers, nor anyone else that happened to have been in the same room together or was a friend of a friend or company/lobbyist connections. Every lobbyist/consultancy/think-tank have done business with every leader and country in the world, whether directly or indirectly. We're not isolationists so if they start playing that game, why not bring up connections to South Africa, Soviet Union or Nazi Germany? Same thing with government connections - everyone knows everyone else because it's a big pie to share. It's all a stupid game, esp. those who feel the need to play it or keep egging it on.

That doesn't really answer the question, though. I'd be happy if none of the questions had been asked. But Obama has been pressed on numerous associations. That's already out of the bag. I'm just wondering why McCain doesn't get asked about any of his associations. That's fine if you want to argue that certain associations don't matter, but McCain hasn't been asked about any of them. And all I hear is that the media is so liberally biased and in the tank for Obama, but that doesn't make sense given their refusal to ask McCain about anything, but pressing forward with all sorts of questions about Obama.

One always hear (or don't hear) what they want. It's a perception game, esp. for those that have an emotional investment in the outcome.

For the record, i haven't brought up any of this previously, except maybe with Wright, don't remember. I don't care what gets asked or not because no one is or will address the real need to reign in the federal government's powers, expenditures and deficits. I just find it comically petty to talk about what is or isn't happening when we only have a tiny exposure to all what is going on or has happened.

Okay, I'm going to call bullshit on that. Sure, I have a bias and I'm invested in the outcome. But I think it's pretty hard to objectively say that McCain's connections have been analyzed as much as Obama's. Maybe someone asked McCain about Liddy and I didn't hear about it. Maybe it didn't get reported by any of the major networks or news organizations or talk shows or blogs (both liberal and conservative) that I follow. I think it's unlikely.

Maybe someone, somewhere asked McCain about Liddy. But it certainly hasn't got the same attention or coverage, and I just don't see how anyone could honestly argue otherwise.

I agree with why Letterman did it. I don't think it was him being biased int he election, it was him still pissed off about McCain not doing his show because he had to rush back to Washington only to stay in NYC for the rest of the day and night. Letterman was pissed the night it happened and went on and on, this was somewhat expected from me and pretty funny to see.

Another stupid move by McCain going back. He shouldve let it die and be on a backburner way far away but instead he scratches the scab off. Stupid.

McCain completely froze on the Liddy question. Dave was nice enough to give him a commercial break so he could come up with a response.

The Al Smith dinner - the jokes sound good. Good to know. :D

Political Punch

The thing with Obama is that he doesn't have much of a track record or established history. Associations mean more when you don't have a 20-year record in the senate to fall back on. There's a great parallel in the McCain ticket with Palin. Palin has been lambasted for these extremely tenuous ties to the Alaskan independent party, her old preacher and other associations (much like Obama has).

If you look closely, Biden and McCain have numerous "bad" associations you can point to over their 20+ senate campaign. Yet, no one touches them because people know these guys. They have a record of votes/bills/activities that shape our opinion. With Palin and Obama, it's the great unknown. So, for the same reason that everyone is excited about Palin and Obama (fresh face, new ideas, young, attractive,...), people are also unsure of who they really are. You may think it's unfair, but I didn't see too many democrats complaining when Obama made his run in the primaries based on the "blank slate" phenomena of him being all things to all people. Now, people are beginning to wonder if he really can be that and it's an opportunity to bring up questions about his prior associations. I don't think the treatment of Palin and Obama has been fair (esp on Ayers and Alaska Indep party), but I can understand why both sides tried these tactics.

You could come out tomorrow and show that Biden or McCain sat on a board with some nazi extremist and no one would really care. These guys are old fossils who's character was established back when Palin and Obama were learning their ABCs. But, if it came out that Palin or Obama sat on a board with a Nazi extremist, it would be very damaging as we just don't have much to go on in the form of track record.

Arles hit the nail on the head.

If I am interviewing a candidate for a job, and I get a recommendation from an employee that I work with, how that employee performs is going to have some weight on the decision. If the guy is a total jackoff, it is going to hurt. If the recommendation comes from my best employee, it is going to carry significant weight.

Two parts Cool, and 8 parts WTF.. someone decided to recast this election into.. the 60's Batman show....

http://www.iheartchaos.com/wp-conten...ll41195415.jpg

Might have something to do with this making the rounds before the last debate on a few political sites.

You make good points, but none of that really addresses what I was talking about. I keep hearing that the media is in the tank for Obama, but they've given McCain plenty of room to air his attacks on Obama, without going after him for connections that are at least as odious as the Ayers thing. I guess my argument is that if they're in the tank for Obama, then they're doing a really bad job of it.

Furthermore, even if they don't ask McCain about all of those connections, I think the Liddy one is at least pertinent since it is a comparable situation to Ayers, which McCain's campaign continues to bring up. And the way McCain thinks of Liddy is certainly very different from what Obama thinks of Ayers.

Yup. Great that this is the face of America we are showing the world, no?

I give them credit for having the guts to attach their faces to their comments.

Doesn't change the stuff that came out of the people's mouths - although it does make you question whether they represent anything more then 4-5 nutjobs...

That was my thinking as well when I heard "al jezeera". If you're looking to present Americans in a bad light then it woulkdn't take much to come up with half a dozen nuts. I think the source of that video means you should take it with a certain amount of scepticism.

Just to be fair..they also endorsed Clinton, Gore and Kerry..

Al Jezerra English

Not sure if anyone caught Saturday Night Live last night, but I thought this was priceless:

The opening item of the "Weekend Update" newscast had Amy Poehler summarizing the current presidential race thusly:

"Last night marked the third and final debate between Joe Cool and Yosemite Sam."

I've never seen SNL on here and it sounds like a great show. What network is it on and do they upload the shows to the web?

But then again - to balance out that scepticism - it is Ohio - the cesspool of the country (still :rant: at Ohio).

NBC.com

Here's a story in Hawaii that's relevant to the current Presidential campaign promises. Hawaii is ending their universal child health care program after only 7 months. The main reasons were budget overruns due to many people dropping their privatized health care (that they could afford) in favor of the free government-provided health care.

FOXNews.com - Hawaii Ending Universal Child Health Care After 7 Mos. - Politics | Republican Party | Democratic Party | Political Spectrum

This goes to the basis of the main problem with any government provided health care. Anyone who believes that Obama will be able to create a bill to provide health care for everyone without major abuse and cost overruns is living in a fantasy world. It's a wonderful idea in principal, but there are millions of Americans that are going to say 'Me too!'. FWIW, I don't think there's any way Obama could justify the increased spending anyway given the economy, so it's probably not a situation that will even occur.

Cost control would be a much better target of the government. There's all kinds of wasted expenses by both government and consumers that could easily be brought under control if someone really wanted to do so.

Here's an interesting poll number from the AP: Obama with a 2-3 point lead. But that's not even the interesting part. Obama holds that lead with a party weight of the following: 40/27/21 (Dem/Rep/Ind). That's just nuts. Obama should be winning by a bigger margin than that at that party weight. Something's funky here........

http://l.yimg.com/a/i/us/nws/electio...ine_101308.pdf

Obama's doing the smart thing here. He's got to make sure his supporters don't take the current lead for granted........

Obama warns Democrats mistakes could still bring 'defeat'

Here's an article that discusses some of the things that we've discussed this week regarding the weighting of polling data and how much trouble polling firms are having finding the right balance........

Some Surveys Indicate Tighter Presidential Race - WSJ.com