John McCain’s New Motto: “It’s NOT the Economy, Stupid!”
“We can't win on the issues. If America’s voters are smart enough to notice the collapsing economy, we’re fucked. Our only chance is to distract the voters with shitsmears and Swiftboat attacks. It’s not my fault; I'm a sleazebucket and that’s what sleazebuckets do.”
The above isn't an exact quote, but the meaning is pretty close. Here's the actual quote from McCain adviser Greg Strimple. He promised “a very aggressive last 30 days” of the campaign, and then said: “We are looking forward to turning a page on this financial crisis and getting back to discussing Mr. Obama’s aggressively liberal record and how he will be too risky for Americans.”
“Turning a page on this financial crisis” — WTF?!?!?! We’re teetering on the edge of the worst financial disaster since 1929. Taxpayers have just handed over $700 billion (or is it $800 billion now?) to the Wall Street criminals who caused this whole catastrophe, and nobody knows whether this massive giveaway will even work.
But according to this dickwad, we’re about to “turn the page” on this little nuisance (it’s just like swatting a fly) and then we can quickly get on with Operation Sleaze. Asshole!
Barack Obama said McCain and his aides “are gambling that he can distract you with smears rather than talk to you about substance. They'd rather try to tear our campaign down than lift this country up. It's what you do when you're out of touch, out of ideas, and running out of time.”
Tens of millions of Americans are scared shitless of losing everything they own. Barack Obama and Joe Biden are trying to come up with solutions. Songbird and Winky are telling everybody “Hey, look over there! It’s the Weather Underground!” “Barack Hussein Obama is a Muslim teeheeheeheehee.”
Will the voters fall (again) for these bullshit Swiftboat attacks? If they do, then Matt Taibbi is right in his scathing indictment of Americans.
cross-posted at Bring It On!
Labels: “turning a page on this financial crisis”, Greg Strimple McCain adviser, Matt Taibbi
posted by Tom Harper @ 4:28 PM
28 Comments:
What amazes me is they come right out and SAY this stuff. It shows a total lack of respect for the American people. I am hoping that this time, for once, they won't fall for this kind of absurdity.
The NY Times recently published a report refuting these claims, the people who want to believe them already do, I can't see this helping out McCain at all.
McCain has already turned his back on Michigan, probably the one state suffering most under the prevailing economic conditions, now he's focusing on the states where this kind of crap sticks.
Mauigirl: Yup, this is about as brazen as anything I've ever seen. They must think the voters are incredibly stupid and gullible. And the scariest part of that is: maybe they are.
Lew: I hope you're right, that the people who believe all that shit (or might fall for it) are already voting for McCain.
They sure are desperate. This is stuff from the old Billary campaign!
"what her candidacy says about America" and the same can be said of McCain.
Yes for seven plus years we have seen this country ran into the ground by Bush and company.
I honestly thought that now, even Republicans could see the mistake and the hack job made by those conservative radio and television host had sold them on a man that had sh#t for brains.
Now here we are looking down a barrel and all that is being slung by McCain/Palin is more sh#t.
What is scary is the fact that most conservatives and evangelicals are eating up every drop.
What is wrong with the people in this country, the ones who seem to have sh#t for brains and need to feed on this mess.
That article by Taibbi was amazing.
I read that when my issue showed up.
Other than Tom Harper, MT is the best political writer working right now.. :)
McSame and Caribou Barbie are out there firing on all cylinders right now, trying to rile the base, show how much Obama hates america, etc..
I guess that works in some places, but I have yet to see ONE smear ad in CA. He wouldn't dare.
You said it Tom....Brazen. These bastards are bought, and paid for. There up making distractions, and speaking riddles while the rest of the retirement's are stolen. Bastards!
United In Peace And Freedom
TH wrote: "But according to this dickwad, we’re about to 'turn the page' on this little nuisance . . .
"
See, it's all about Sen. Flip-flop McPander and what he wants. The man's obviously got an ego in the same size range as George W. Bush's. That ought to be enough to scare the living daylights out of the (now) 74 percent of Americans who think Bush is the absolute pits.
lew scannon, I understand what you're saying. But there are many people who just started really tuning in since the conventions. They never knew, or don't remember, details from candidate forums and debates during the primaries
These folks don't follow politics all that closely when they do tune in. They skim headlines, read the first two or three paragraphs of stories that catch their eye. They see and hear eight-second sound bites. And with that, they consider themselves reasonably well informed.
So, a bunch of them can get a sort of hazy, general impression from McCain and Palin's smears that there's somethingorother not quite kosher about Obama. That's especially so for people already skittish about voting for a black man.
The Willie Horton smear Bush 41's campaign used against Mike Dukakis was an ugly, outrageous distortion of the facts. But it was highly effective.
Candace: Desperate is the word. I hope they'll be as unsuccessful as the proverbial desperate guy at a singles bar.
Let's Talk: We'll have to hope that for once the public won't fall for the same sleazy campaign tactics. If they do, it says something terrible about all of us.
Mike: Thanks for your kind words, but I couldn't hold a candle to MT. His articles are my favorite part of Rolling Stone. Sometimes I'd swear that guy is channeling Hunter Thompson and Sam Kinison.
AHB: They're way too brazen for their own good. If they get away with it again, it's on all of us Americans this time.
SW: That’s the scary part, these people who just tuned in at the last minute. Will they follow the issues or will they fall for the loudest soundbite? Those Willie Horton ads from 20 years ago seem almost quaint now, but that’s where it started. I keep thinking that the public won’t fall for the same shit again and again. Maybe one of these times I’ll be right; or maybe not.
I know the Right’s M.O. is hyperbole, rah-rah patriotism, and smears, but it never ceases to anger me as if it’s the first time I’m hearing it.
How can these fucks not be smart enough to make the economy and the war the two most important issues of their campaign? If they took a fraction of the money and effort they’re using on smears and bullshit, and re-focused it on coming up with real solutions and real answers they’d have a better chance of winning this thing….come to think of it, I’m glad they’re too fucking stupid to realize how important that shit is ;-)
$850 billion plus and it's all straight in the toilet.
As for the sheep factor, it's grown year by year not lessened. The sheeple I know that refuse to talk about it during "non election" periods tell me they don't have time, but they have time for all the sports you can view, all the purses you can shop or shoes you can drool or whatever - even kids sports. refusing to understand that the stuff they make time for is ENTERTAINMENT.
I feel a Blog coming on.
Carlos: It works that way with me too. Every time I read about another rightwing asshole coming up with another gutter tactic, I get just as pissed off as if I was reading about this for the first time. It's like the 1988 Willie Horton ads all over again.
If you really want to get pissed off, check out Michael Moore's newest article. I don't have a link right now but I'm sure a Google search would bring it up. He says the 400 wealthiest Americans have made about $700 billion in profits over the last few years. Are you thinking what I'm thinking?
1138: You're probably right that this money is all down the toilet. I don't know enough about economics to know whether this bailout will work or not. I suspect Congress only passed it because they were afraid not to, and because their corporate donors ordered them to.
1138 wrote: "The sheeple I know that refuse to talk about it during 'non election' periods tell me they don't have time . . ."
Americans have to be the most distracted people on Earth. If you don't think so, note how often you see someone driving through a busy intersection with a cell phone to his ear, a cup of coffee in the hand he's steering with, and his radio blaring. People have TV's, radios and such in practically every room in the house and out on the deck or patio. When today's families travel, their kids don't take in the scenery. Instead, they watch movies on DVD players mounted on the back of the front seats.
All that wouldn't be so bad if the media that saturate our lives, in the relatively skimpy time and effort they devote to reporting and seriously analyzing news and politics, were of the quality we had 40 years ago. But they're not. Nowadays, it's nearly all about personalities, gotchas, innuendo, smears and attack ads.
It would be a huge improvement if the cable networks would quit presenting the candidates' latest attack ads as news or discussion fodder. All that does is encourage more and sleazier attack ads. Some of the ads are only created because the campaigns know they'll get free air time to show them; the campaigns don't actually buy commercial time to show them.
It's a mess and I don't see a good way out because the ones who would have to demand and hold out for something better are the very mass-audience people who are so distracted. But as long as we continue on this way, we'll go from crisis to crisis, bad leader to bad leader, until maybe, like now, it gets so bad people finally have to pay attention.
SW: Here's hoping that the public will finally start paying attention, now that they're in danger of losing their SUVs with on-board DVD players, their plasma TV sets and even their homes.
They are already crying "TERRORIST!" As if that's a dog whistle that will summon us all to mindlessly follow and vote for McCain. The trick is stale. People want their money, terrorists are on the back burner.
BTW, if the smeer stuff starts, let them bring up that idiot Rev.Wright because we can come back with things like..........
THIS!!!
http://www.americablog.com/2008/10/sarah-palin-just-called-herself-anti.html
Ricardo: Unfortunately those dog whistles have worked in the past. "Gay Marriage!" "Soft on Terrorism!" -- and millions of dunces snap to attention and go to the polls and vote Republican. But now that everyone is scared shitless about the economy, I think that'll be first on everybody's mind. I don't think either side will score points with "character" issues right now.
Thanks for the link. If it comes to smear attacks, we've got plenty of ammo against McSame and Winky.
And don't forget Tina Fey. We have her too.
Ricardo: She's great. She was my favorite part of SNL; I'm glad she's back temporarily. Even though she looks sort of like Sarah Palin anyway, she still does a brilliant job of mimicing her voice and mannerisms.
Ahhh, the slogans... they do love those, don't they. People like a slogan, and they make decisions based on them because the slogans take away the necessity of thought. Most people in America are too distracted to spend much time thinking about the country and what makes it work or not work. Lots of people don't even want to talk about it during an election year... they're too busy doing other things. Ask them why they think the Dems are "soft on terror" and a lot of them probably won't be able to give specific reasons.
Snave: Yup, slogans and soundbites for people who are either too dim or too pre-occupied to pay attention to what's going on. Hopefully, the urgency of this economic crisis will bring people out of their stupors. If not, we might as well hang it up.
Same old Republican trick, but this time it's a little more obvious, and partly because this crisis is a bit bigger than usual and harder to ignore and for all of Obama's faults at still not being left-wing enough, at least he hasn't done a Kerry and fallen for the Republicans game.
snave, you are absolutely right, about slogans! and many people love smear campaigns because it gives them the feeling of superiority and then they don't have to admit and think about what's really going on. they can sit back a say yeh, that guy's a real dirt bag. meanwhile their dollar is going right down the toilet.
Benjamin: Yeah, I think this economic crisis is too immediate and really hits everybody right where they live. This could be the first presidential campaign in eons that actually gets decided on a real issue, rather than who's soft on terrorism or who's old and senile.
Belinda: I miss the old days (if they ever even existed) when candidates campaigned on the issues instead of using slogans and personal attacks. Maybe for this election campaign, the election will be decided by the economy and not by the candidate who comes up with better slogans.
Fuld is fuld of shit.
Snave: So fuld it's coming out of his ears.
God only knows. And God help us all...please. [sigh]
Miss Kitty: We sure do need help from somebody.
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