T

he thinking’s a tad convoluted and not too clear on the American system, but a password-protected al-Qaeda-linked Web site gave John McCain an endorsement yesterday, nonetheless. And, even more interesting, the endorsement is predicated on a terror attack on our soil before the election.

AP reports that the al-Hesbah Web site “welcomes” such an attack because it would improve the chances that the “impetuous” McCain would seek revenge, continuing the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq – all part of al-Qaeda’s master plan to exhaust the US militarily and economically. [Insert evil villain laugh here.]

AP provided this quote from the site, translated by the SITE Intelligence Group :

“This [exhausting of our resources] requires presence of an impetuous American leader such as McCain, who pledged to continue the war till the last American soldier. Then, al-Qaida will have to support McCain in the coming elections so that he continues the failing march of his predecessor, Bush.

“If al-Qaida carries out a big operation against American interests, this act will be support of McCain because it will push the Americans deliberately to vote for McCain so that he takes revenge for them against al-Qaida. Al-Qaida then will succeed in exhausting America till its last year in it.”

An interesting, but flawed, proposition. First, McCain has never pledged to fight until the last American soldier; he’s pledged victory. Second, America wouldn’t let him fight that fight. Third, a lot of folks have thought they could out-fight and out-last us, but if America stands by its military, it’s never happened. Vietnam, the Left’s glorious victory in forcing an American defeat, is fueling the dreams of al-Qaeda.

Al-Qaeda would lose fewer fighters and accomplish more with an Obama victory. Iraq would re-open to them without a shot fired, and Obama is certain to tire of a real fight in Afghanistan before long. His position on Afghanistan as the real war is merely window dressing – when he made it, Afghanistan looked like an easy win, and Iraq looked like a long, tough slog. He’s definitely anti-long, tough slog and his supporters know it and like it. They favor a big, money-filled government teat to suck on, and long, hard slogs get in the way of that.

Al-Qaeda is overlooking one other thing, too: Its total victory over ignoble Spain. There a major bombing spree days before the election resulted in a surrender vote, Spain’s withdrawal from the War on Terror, and an al-Qaeda victory.

Would a major terrorist event just before the election rally America for more war? Look at the Teflon popularity of Obama, who’s whole campaign is predicated on the wisdom of his vote against Iraq and whose supporters aren’t likely to stick with him for long if he begins to adopt an LBJ persona.

AP admits that the suspected author of the post, Muhammad (Muhammed?! Knock me over with a feather!) Haafid, would not be privy to al-Qaeda planning and does not speak officially for the group. So it’s pretty much just blog-fodder.

That being the case, here’s an appropriate blog-thought. They plan an attack. McCain gets wind of it and wipes them out single-handedly, Jack Bauer-like, wrapping it up with a gravelly whisper, “C’mon now, you didn’t think you could whip my America, did you?”

Landslide McCain.

3 Comments »

N

othing the Democratic party does surprises me any more, as long as it’s something nasty. They’ve shown their worst ugliness in their response to Joe the Plumber and millions of straight-thinking Americans are very angry – as the polls show.

To tap this anger and shame the Democrats, I offer up for free this ad for a conservative 527′s consideration. It features Joe the Plumber in the same setting that made him famous, his front yard, cut with insets of Obama talking about him at rallies:

Hi. I’m Joe the Plumber. As you know, I recently had the opportunity to ask Barack Obama a question about the economy that was very important to me. Boy was that a mistake.

Since then, Obama and Joe Biden have been mocking me at campaign rallies and people there have been booing me. Democratic operatives have been digging through my personal life, and the media is investigating me like they never investigated ACORN or Bill Ayres.

Despite all that, I still have one more question to ask: Why would you vote for a party that would attack a guy like me for just asking a question?

3 Comments »

“It is astounding that Joe Biden, the self-adulated ‘everyman,’ can’t believe that an American making less than $250,000 a year might still be opposed to socialism.” – McCain campaign spokesperson Ben Porritt

P

orritt was responding to Joe “Foot in Mouth” Biden’s attempt today to trash Joe the Plumber.  Here’s what Biden told a national TV audience this morning:

“We’re worried about Joe the guy who owns the gas station, the barber, the grocer.  Ninety-eight percent of the small business people in America make less than $250,000 a year, and they’re going to get a real break under our plan. Joe the plumber, whose making over $250,000, is not going to get any more additional tax cuts with us.” (ABC)

Yeah!  That’ll teach that SOB plumber to be successful!  That’ll teach him to employ people!

Despite the rantings from the left (read the comments with the link above for a hefty dose), Joe the Plumber (and Joe the Plumb-Crazy) have been a big net loss for Obama and his Robin Hood tax plan.

The bottom line – and McCain/Palin should be saying this at every whistle stop – Obama thinks he’ll be better at spending your money than you’ll ever be, so he wants you to fork it over.  Even in these times of economic uncertainty that are screaming for slashed spending, Obama’s credo is, “Because big spending on government programs hasn’t worked out too well, we’re going to try spending even more and see if that works out better.”

4 Comments »

T

his ad will no doubt join the list of campaign ads Obama classifies as negative in order to maintain his claim that 100% of John McCain’s campaign ads are negative (thanks to Patriot Room for the link):

Effective, yes. Negative, no. Negative ads assassinate character and misstate records. It is not negative to question the qualifications of someone running for office.

But of course Obama flips out whenever anything remotely negative arises to ruffle his carefully layered and oh-so-pretty feathers.

Speaking of the “100% of your ads are negative, John,” baloney Obama espoused last night, does anyone remember this particular McCain effort?

Show me one thing Obama’s done as classy as that. Especially when you consider that Obama broke his promise to use public funding and is rolling in dough, while McCain used up some of his dear public funds to run this ad.

2 Comments »

UPDATED

S

canning the home page of Real Clear Politics this morning, I find 11 references to Joe Wurzelbacher, aka Joe the Plumber. It just might be the most significant news day of the campaign, the day a plumber from Ohio ushered John McCain into the White House.

McCain has been ineffective thus far in his efforts to paint us a picture of the real Obama. He’s terrified of being called racist, so he’s completely backed off from Obama’s 20-year worshipping in Jeremiah Wright’s black liberation church. He’s made Ayers a discussion of associations instead of one on education policy. He has barely worked the Obama-ACORN-Fannie-Freddie association for what it’s worth. It’s not surprising the smiling cypher from Illinois is ahead.

Then along comes one man with the guts to get in Obama’s face like McCain should have, not taking the glib “don’t bother me” answers Obama gives, and pushing, pushing, pushing for the truth until Mr. Smooth finally delivers it: 

“I think that when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody.”

McCain didn’t press as hard as he could or should have, letting Obama slither away from the hard hits, but it didn’t really matter because John had Joe in his corner. Look at that mug! That’s a guy you want on your side: Tough, straightforward, no nonsense.

(By the way, free advice to Joe: Don’t worry about who gets elected; buy the company. After last night, when you rename the company “Joe the Plumber” and put your mug on the side of all the trucks and in all the ads, you’re going to have more business than you can handle.)

Joe has focused America on Obama’s tax and spend big government welfare wet dream in a way McCain has been unable to do, which is why Obama’s minions are scared – very scared – of him.

The NYTimes editorial page somehow managed to conjure up the idea that McCain referring to Joe was “nasty.” Huh?! Heck, you can even buy a “Joe the Plumber for Obama” T-shirt, another leftist lie in immoral service to The One.

Joe is definitely not for Obama, as he told the Toledo Blade last night after the debate:

Mr. Obama didn’t win Mr. Wurzelbacher’s support on Sunday, and he didn’t change his mind last night.He did allow, “Obama, you can’t take away that he’s a damn good speaker.”

Overall, though, Mr. Wurzelbacher was pleased with Mr. McCain’s performance.

“McCain was doing much better this time,” he said.

“McCain came across with some solid points. I like his tax cuts.”

But he said Mr. Obama’s health-care plan scares him.

“It’s just one step closer to socialism,” he said.

According to Nexis, this morning there are 168 MSM news stories this morning about Joe the Plumber and the debate – and that’s not counting most broadcast and all radio outlets. It does include the wire stories that are being read in smaller papers all over the country this morning.  Joe is news.  Joe crystallizes the issues. Joe speaks to America and for America. Let’s hope that he’s OK with having his mug splashed over coast-to-coast TV ads for McCain for the duration of the campaign.

UPDATE:  Ask and you shall receive.

[Back to previous post]

Just one word of warning: You know what the left is going to say next. Uh-huh, you’re right:

Joe the Plumber was the estrella of last night’s debate, with his name being thrown around left, right, and sideways. CBS interviewed the man of the hour, Joe the plumber and it turns out he’s kind of racist, no? I mean I know “tap dancin around an issue” is a figure of speech pero then when he adds the whole Sammy Davis Jr. line into it, no se, it kind of takes it to a different level.

Or as Talk Left hopefully (prayerfully, if they believed in such stuff) put it:

Bye, Joe. I think your 15 minutes are up.

They will try to embarrass Joe into hiding because they know Obama can’t stand up to him. They cannot be allowed to slime and lie and character-assassinate their way out of this one.

(By the way, how many famous white tap dancers can you name?)

1 Comment »

A

gain tonight I participated in the OC Register’s on-line discussion of the debate. Here’s the Q&A:

Do either of these guys give you confidence that they can oversee an economic recovery? If you think one does a better job at it than the other, tell me why.

“Confidence” is an overstatement because I don’t think anyone has a clear vision of how to work us out of this mess. The fact that Obama continues to refuse to answer whether he would cut any of his programs in light of the economic situation, despite prodding by the moderator, shows me that he is stubborn and hasn’t changed his fundamental thinking even though the fundamentals of the economy have changed. He refuses to acknowledge that this is not the time to raise taxes. He refuses to see the importance of stimulating, not taxing, business. So I think McCain’s position is better. Am I confident? No.

McCain has reiterated his plan to spend $300 billion to buy home mortgages that are likely to default. Obama says you can’t pay full price, as McCain has suggested, but should renegotiate them. Who’s on track here?

I don’t think McCain suggested full price; he said “sit down and negotiate.” His proposal is not new money; it’s part of the $700 billion already committed. Myself, I think the negotiating should be on the TERM of the mortgage, not the rate or the premium. Make them 40, 50 or even 100 year mortgages.

What’s the net sum of their discussion about the attacks they’ve made on each other? Is one candidate’s attacks more fair than the other’s?

It’s all so ridiculous. Obama is running on a platform that basically says “trust me, I may not have a record, but I have good judgment.” Then he decrees that ads challenging his judgment are negative. They are not; they are ads about his character and his judgment.

The supporters of Obama have been abominable, saying misogynistic things about Palin and ageist things about McCain. Obama knows this; when McCain tried to bring up some incredibly offensive T-shirts calling Palin the most offensive word we have for “woman,” for no reason whatsoever, Obama began talking loudly over him, drowning out what McCain was saying. McCain had not said anything to attack in the sentence before, so this was a planned, deliberate tactic by Obama to deprive the American people from hearing about how offensive his supporters are.

Who’s playing dirty? It’s obvious.

Do you prefer one of these guys’ health care plan better than the other? Are they explaining them well enough? If you like one better, why?

This has been the most ineffective area of the debate. We’ve been through it three times now and who but a health care wonk really understands what the heck they’re talking about. They are not explaining it well enough.

I believe Obama will move us towards a single-payer plan, despite his protests that he won’t. How is that liberals continue that as a goal even though the consumers of Canada and Britain hate their state-run insurance systems?

Do you think either candidate will pick up votes because of this debate? If so, why? If you’ve been undecided or uncertain, did this debate help get you closer to picking a candidate?

Obama performed exactly as he did in all of the previous debates, including the primary debates. It’s creepy, as if he’s an automaton. His performance may well have convinced some people, but I have to wonder why. If his performance in the first or second debate didn’t move them, what in this performance was different enough to push them over? I heard nothing.

McCain on the other hand was decidedly improved in this debate. He didn’t repeat as many of his old canards and did a better job of illuminating the risks and dangers inherent in voting for Obama. He also did a better job of bringing his programs to the people, explaining them and making them “Main Street,” and rebutting Obama’s excuses and blah-blah explanations. So if someone was undecided going into the third debate, the one candidate who did better, McCain, would be the one who moved them.

For all the participants’ responses, see the OC Register’s Total Buzz Blog.

No Comments yet »

W

hen John McCain attempted to bring up the abhorrent behavior of hate-filled Obama supporters, beginning to mention the T-shirts seen at his rallies that said “Palin is a C***,” Obama immediately began loudly talking over McCain.

The preceding sentence from McCain was non-controversial, so Obama had no pretense to censor out McCain’s statement in a deliberate and planned tactic to deprive the American people from hearing about this incident, which reflects terribly on the mindset of the Obama supporter, a mindset that Obama does nothing to change or challenge.

5 Comments »

O

nce again this evening, I’ll be participating in the OC Register’s live-blogging of the debate, answering questions as they come from Reg blogger/reporter Martin Wisckol. He just posed, and I answered, the first one:

Q: What would you like to see in tonight’s debate that you haven’t yet seen?

A: I would like to see McCain clearly explain the sheer lunacy of Obama’s platform including, most importantly, the devastation that will be caused by his tax program. Obama is not giving tax cuts to 95% of the population because only 70% of us pay taxes. He is proposing to turn the IRS into a giant Robin Hood welfare agency that strips money from the successful who have earned it through hard work and gives it away as checks from the IRS to those who haven’t earned it. That’s anti-American and socialistic, and the extremely costly burden it will place on success and achievement will devastate the economy.

And I would like McCain to drop Ayres – ’nuff said already – and lay into him for his involvement with ACORN, complete with follow-up rebuttals to Obama’s disclaimers and dodges. Facts are facts, and Obama has been closely allied with ACORN, tried to get them goodies through the bailout, and supports the wholesale destruction of the American electoral system if it gets him elected.

Oh, yeah – and I’d like Obama to make some huge, jaw-dropping gaffe, from which he can never, ever recover. And Santa, one more thing …

For those interested – a multitude, I’m sure – Wisckol will be posting at The Total Buzz.

1 Comment »

A

lmost lost in our own election (and economic) news is this news from a country that suffered the rule of Liberals for nearly its entire history:

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper led his Conservative Party to victory Tuesday, but fell short of the majority in Parliament he sought in calling elections last month.

The Conservatives won or were leading in races for 143 seats, state-elections agency Elections Canada reported on its Web site. That would represent a gain of 16 seats. The Liberals, meanwhile, had 76 seats, which would be a loss of 19. A majority requires 155 seats.

The vote was another loss for the Liberals, who led Canada for most of the nation’s 141 years until a scandal four years ago rocked the party, and the Conservatives took over in 2006. (WSJ)

Harper was the target of the same sort of nastiness from the left that McCain and Palin are suffering today, and was not popular with the liberal Canadian media.  He was accused of being another Bush (hence the stencil above).  He got sideswiped by the global economic crisis and a statement which, like McCain’s healthy fundamentals comment, was ridiculed.  (In Harper’s case, he was guffawed for saying the falling Canadian stock market presented buying opportunities.  It will, of course, but it’s still about $3,500 below where it was in early September and it fell further today.)

Oh, and the main gripe about Harper’s Liberal opponent, Stephan Dion, was that he lacked the experience necessary to run the country.

Oh #2:  Voter turnout was low because Canada – which apparently lacks an active ACORN motor-voter lobby – recently implemented much stricter voter ID requirements.

Is this a warm wind for the GOP blowing out of the north?

2 Comments »

B

oth candidates came out swinging today, with new speeches honed over the weekend, designed to speak to a new America that’s much more nervous than the America they’ve been speaking to thus far in the campaign.

Both speeches focus on the economy. Both re-hash old proposals and introduce a few new ones. Both end with wrap-ups meant to inspire.

And they couldn’t be more different. (Thanks to RCP, here’s McCain’s speech, and here’s Obama’s.)

Let’s start with the most basic of differences: word count. McCain’s speech has 1,469 words; Obama’s is over twice as long, at 3,012. McCain has needed to slow down and explain his position for some time now, but he still rushes his speeches, giving bullet points not details, and this hurts him quite a lot. Here, for example, is the portion of the speech in which he rolls out five key new elements of his economic recovery plan:

I’m not going to spend $700 billion dollars of your money just bailing out the Wall Street bankers and brokers who got us into this mess. I’m going to make sure we take care of the people who were devastated by the excesses of Wall Street and Washington. I’m going to spend a lot of that money to bring relief to you, and I’m not going to wait sixty days to start doing it.

I have a plan to protect the value of your home and get it rising again by buying up bad mortgages and refinancing them so if your neighbor defaults he doesn’t bring down the value of your house with him.

I have a plan to let retirees and people nearing retirement keep their money in their retirement accounts longer so they can rebuild their savings.

I have a plan to rebuild the retirement savings of every worker.

I have a plan to hold the line on taxes and cut them to make America more competitive and create jobs here at home.

Got it? I hope you understand all the nuances of those plans and, more importantly, why they’re better than what Obama is proposing, because that 175 words is all you’re going to get. “McCain” may rhyme with “explain,” but his speeches have become bumper stickers.

By contrast, Obama lays out new initiatives designed to protect and expand the job market. He just spends 240 words on these five initiatives, but because he puts it in context rather than bullet points and provides at least a modicum of detail, we feel we understand his programs much better:

We’ve already lost three-quarters of a million jobs this year, and some experts say that unemployment may rise to 8% by the end of next year. We can’t wait until then to start creating new jobs. That’s why I’m proposing to give our businesses a new American jobs tax credit for each new employee they hire here in the United States over the next two years.

To fuel the real engine of job creation in this country, I’ve also proposed eliminating all capital gains taxes on investments in small businesses and start-up companies, and I’ve proposed an additional tax incentive through next year to encourage new small business investment. It is time to protect the jobs we have and to create the jobs of tomorrow by unlocking the drive, and ingenuity, and innovation of the American people. And we should fast track the loan guarantees we passed for our auto industry and provide more as needed so that they can build the energy-efficient cars America needs to end our dependence on foreign oil.

We will also save one million jobs by creating a Jobs and Growth Fund that will provide money to states and local communities so that they can move forward with projects to rebuild and repair our roads, our bridges, and our schools. A lot of these projects and these jobs are at risk right now because of budget shortfalls, but this fund will make sure they continue.

Five proposals well presented are more effective than McCain’s four edited-to-the-bone proposals.

Of course both speeches present more than this on the economy. Obama’s speech is focused entirely on the economy, spending paragraphs on programs that go to family finances and what he will do to protect our pocketbooks. McCain has more stuff to rush to (which isn’t all bad, as you’ll see), but on the subject of personal finances, McCain’s shorter, broader speech definitely loses to Obama’s longer, more carefully detailed one. Continue Reading »

No Comments yet »