After days on the campaign defensive, Democrat Barack Obama accused rival Hillary Rodham Clinton on Monday of leveling criticism straight from the Republican playbook and said even so, he will win the White House over John McCain and an “out of touch” GOP.
*******
Hillary Clinton today opened fire on Barack Obama.In one of her sharpest attacks of the 2008 race, Clinton blasted two mailings Obama’s campaign has put out criticizing Clinton’s views on health care and trade, accusing him of “using tactics that are straight out of Karl Rove’s playbook.“
More on Karl Rove’s Playbook. I have an autographed first edition of Karl Rove’s Playbook (“The Necroneocon”) in used but excellent condition. Will consider any serious offer.
Meanwhile, McCain plans campaign swing through “Forgotten Parts of America.” Will he become the first candidate in living memory to visit the Islets of Langerhans?
nice callback there.
Interesting that they can’t criticize each other from the James Carville playbook. Does that make them each So Far Left that the only way to criticize them is from the right?
They are making this So Easy for McCain.
God, I wish somebody would give McCain Karl Rove’s playbook.
The Necroneocon? Okay, I laughed out loud at that one!
Now wouldn’t it be nice if there were a Republican in the race?
hahahahahahahahaha.
Dan, you should consider charitable donation of the said book to the start up political novices…
Now wouldn’t it be nice if there were a Republican in the race?
I hear you, man, but be happy for small… no huge effing favors.
Now wouldn’t it be nice if there were a Republican in the race?
You don’t get it: there is, and that’s the problem. The GOP isn’t the party of Reagan, it’s the party of Arlen Specter. Reagan just took it on a better path, briefly.
I am confused by the twisted attempt at logic here by the Democrats. Every time one of them says something awful about the other (or, most of the time, something true about the other) they accuse them of acting like a Republican, and condemn Senator McCain. So if I hit Bob, he turns and says “you’re acting like Jack here,” then hits Jack? Huh?
I think McCain is just letting them beat up on each other. Why should he interfere? The time will come when that will change, but I think he is handling it the way he should right now.
Karl Rove’s Playbook
Yes, yes. Good, good.
Say, what are all these little X’s and O’s.
You know, Dan, in keeping with your earlier post, you should call it Mutually-Assured Unelectability.
Pass the porncock! I mean popcorn!
We’ve got to stop bashing McCain. Is he my ideal candidate? No, but he looks like a friggin’ beauty queen next to Hussein and Billary.
Larry, McCain wins just by being the one that’s not a lawyer.
We’ve got to stop bashing McCain.
No bashing happening here, Larry.
I hope McCain is tactically aware enough to keep quiet ’til after the Democrat Party Convention. It’s clear his peops aren’t.
We’ve instituted a de-bashifcation policy, you see.
I’m not bashing McCain. I intend to vote for him as many times as necessary for him to beat the Left–even if I have serve time. Right now, he stands as a very god in my eyes. I just pray he doesn’t out-perform Obama in the ‘Is This Thing Loaded?’ category before November.
Too bad that this is so subjective a thing that we can’t honestly bet on it.
So I’ll get way too specific with my imaginary wager:
McCain, valuing
ruling-class solidaritySenatorial collegiality and the favor of the press over what Republican voters want, attacks only “through” surrogates acting in his electoral interest but against his expressed wishes (and actual political will), all of which surrogates he then fires and condemns in the same terms in which he regularly condemns Republican voters — this while he himself, only and always, over and over again until every Republican voter wants to see him die on live television, kisses his opponents’ butts from c to shining a; however, the press still blames him, personally, by name, “the McCain campaign,” for all these (and other, others’) attacks, over and over again, until he flips way the fuck out on them on endlessly looped Super-Dean-Scream TV and is forced to drop out of the race; then he spends the rest of his life teaming up with Senator(s) Clinton and/or Obama to make sure that the Senate never does anything Republican voters want, because, those fucks, it’s their fault he’s not President.$5
Ai! Ai! Cthulhu F’taghn!!
Oh, wait.
Wrong book.
Drat.
@ #15
And it’s clear I didn’t read McCain plans campaign swing through “Forgotten Parts of America.â€Â
So, him neither.
Damn,I’m good.
Excellent. All is proceeding as I have foreseen. Soon the power of this fully operational playbook will destroy their pitiful little band.
Hey, Darth? Say “darrrrk siiiide” again. The way you say it gives me goosebumps.
We’ve got to stop bashing McCain.
“McCain’s problem also has to do with the fact he authored the law bearing his name that is among the most, if not the most, anti-freedom, anti-participatory legislation of the modern era â€â€- the McCain-Feingold “Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act.” The simple truth is, when your ability to convince voters of the validity of your message is hampered by the very law you authored, you have no one to blame but yourself.”
http://www.bobbarr2008.com/articles/12/conservative-cred-elusive-for-mccain/
I’ll vote for him because of the freakin war, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it. Its a good thing that people on Wallstreet don’t vote, or we migh be hearing about McCain’s little gaffe. It’s every bit as bigoted, opportunistic and cynical as Obama’s was.
Oh, they do vote? Well, don’t I feel sorry for them then when the party that’s supposed to be for rich people wants to heap the ills of the country on their shoulders, and turn a blind eye to how our politicians are running it into the ground.
*headdesk*
yeah, there’s noone left running against him to exploit that. and I doubt the Dems would touch it. ever.
yeah, there’s noone left running against him to exploit that. and I doubt the Dems would touch it. ever.
Oh no, cause it’s straight out of their playbook, which is what makes it stunning to hear it coming from a Republican’s mouth. I guess if Hillary is promoting the Second Amendment now, we shouldn’t be surprised to hear Republicans deploring greed on Wallstreet. It’s revealing though. We have a class of politicians for whom choosing a party is more like choosing a DND character class. They’re not interested in ideas, they just want to accumulate power and loot.
“I’m a ninth level Republican State Representative!”
“So, I’m a twentieth level Democratic US Senator with a +10 microphone of bloviating!”
Munchkins.
“There has to be a modification of the greedy behavior of some of these people,” he said, using the word “greedy” repeatedly …
That tears it. There is no way in hell I am voting for that pandering, populist old prick. Fuck the whole bunch of them.
That tears it. There is no way in hell I am voting for that pandering, populist old prick. Fuck the whole bunch of them.
I hear you, but go find some quotes from Hillary and Obama about how we need to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory in Iraq before you make your final decision. My bottom line is what kind of C-in-C am I going to give our troops?
…go find some quotes from Hillary and Obama about how we need to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory in Iraq before you make your final decision.
I don’t believe either of them is stupid enough to do that, it would be much more expedient for them to find a way to take credit for a free and victorious Iraq. I am becoming more concerned with the damage all of them are planning with their wars on greed, global warming and the rest of that populist horseshit. The only reason I would vote McCain is if I thought he might appoint decent Supreme Court justices, but I don’t see him doing anything but bending over and taking another one up the ass in the name of fairness.
I don’t believe either of them is stupid enough to do that, it would be much more expedient for them to find a way to take credit for a free and victorious Iraq.
Whoever is president is going to have to deal with Iran. Obama’s has stated his intention to speak with Ahmadjihad in order to work out our differences. Do you think he’ll fight when Iran hits us, as they most surely will?
The invasion of Iraq changed the rules, and it has taken Iran some time to figure out exactly what they can get away with. They have a pretty firm notion now that they can attack us in Iraq all day long, and we won’t go beyond Iraq’s borders to retaliate. They’re going to keep pushing the envelope, though, to establish the boundries. What they want is to be able to maintain a continuous level of violence against us at a level that won’t provoke fullscale war on their own soil. As soon as the new president is sworn in, they will launch an attack somewhere to see what his response will be. What would Obama do? Launch a diplomatic blitz? Stand in the rose garden wringing his hands? What can we expect from him? The man is a cipher, and I don’t want to gamble on him.
I feel like McCain is a known quantity, both good and bad. The domestic part is going to be a nightmare, but I think he will do much better on foreign policy.
There is a Republican; his name is John McCain. It may surprise you but in a very large party there will be people who represent different points of view. Some people’s will coincide very closely with yours, some people’s will coincide only partially with yours. That’s the way large coalition parties are.
I realize you don’t like that, but that’s reality. But don’t worry; the Democrats are having an even more difficult time acknowledging reality.
What gaffe?
Who are you, and what have you done with the real Ardsgaine. Yes, he doesn’t like Wall Street, neither did Teddy Roosevelt. He was better than Parker, and immeasurably better than Bryan
Mikey is right. You repubs are at a bit of a low point. But we dems have taken an advantageous situation and managed to sink far lower.
Sigh. Arianna Huffington said this morning that McCain should go on vacation and relax a while because Hillary Clinton is doing his job beautifully for him. She is not only trashing Obama, but a fuckload of Democratic past and future candidates. I guess her tactic is “if I can’t head this party, I will squash it like an errant cockroach”. Maybe our party will rise like Phoenix from the ashes one day, but I suspect that we will roll over, fart and stay dead.
Lisa, that’s the ‘Sampson Option’. You bring the whole temple down on yourself and your enemies. Of course, you only squish those enmies that are in the temple.
Both parties have some serious coalition rebuilding to do – not necessarily in changing the groups, but in changing the pecking order of the groups. Some groups may migrate away to the other party, but at this time I’m not sure which ones would do that. Again, I think the biggest change will be in the reordering of the pecking order in the parties. Each of the two main parties are coalitions of different groups, and some have more influence than others – due to numbers, due to available donations, due to having a message that resonates outside of the party, due to holding key psotitions in the party because of past (though now waning) influence, etc.
These orders are going to be revisited, some groups are going to be very disappointed as to where they find themselves afterwards. I think this is long overdue. The Republicans have a pecking order that comes from Reagan’s first run; that was almost thirty years ago; that cannot be sustained any longer and has to be revised. The Democrats have a coalition that was put together in about 1972, (adjusted in 1992), and a full reordering is overdue.
Should be interesting to see what the next four years hold.
And we Republicans are just trying to avoid taking unfair advantage.
McGee that should read: We are trying to avoid being SEEN taking unfair advantage. ;-)
Mikey:
It will be fascinating indeed.
I like Lisa, even though I think her party’s ideals, and presumptive nominee, would be disasterous.
Ty JD. You are pretty cool too, though I have had enough of Republicans running the asylum (though if Clinton wins, we will get Nurse Ratchet running the asylum…which might send more than a few of us around the bend for good).
Dang, you’re sharp. Curses!