Expectations

Ezra identifies another cause for the disconnect between my assessment of the debate and the reaction of the pundits and the public: I don't respect McCain's foreign policy skills because I don't think he has any. Therefore, I wasn't "surprised" when Obama "held his own" in a debate with McCain. I expected Obama to come off looking good by comparison because Obama's ideas are just so much more superior to McCain's.

But for those who really do believe in "McCain: foreign policy super star", holding par would be a surprise. A surprise to Obama's  benefit.

McCain says "horsesh*t" on live TV (or not?)

Crank up the volume and listen. McCain clearly mutters "Horse..." something. I'm not sure if he completed the thought, but I think he really did start to verbalize an internal thought and then caught himself. And then look at his eyes afterwords as he checks the see if anyone heard him.

Maybe this is what those undecideds saw that I and others missed? The body language from McCain seems to be saying, "I'm John McCain dammit! I shouldn't have to stand here and take this horseshit from this youngster!"

Update: Okay. On further viewing it could be reasonably argued that McCain was mumbling something like "of course not".

Is McCain damaged goods?

Todd Beeton:

Are we being too generous to John McCain?

I'm beginning to think so. I went into this debate with a conscious decision to try and NOT see McCain through my partisan eyes. I actually thought he did pretty good. He certainly seemed more on the ball then in almost every appearance I have seen of him since Obama got the nomination. He was tough, but he didn't seem particularly mean to me. He was in command if his stuff and he didn't stumble in his presentation (Obama, love the man, has a rather annoying stutter).

Yet, according to this polled linked by Marc Ambinder, undecideds gave the debate overwhelmingly to Obama.

40% of uncommitted voters who watched the debate tonight thought Barack Obama was the winner. 22% thought John McCain won. 38% saw it as a draw.

I saw several other left bloggers give similar assessments of McCain, saying that at worst it was a draw (which was still good for Obama, because McCain needed a knockout). The TV pundits appeared to have had a similar assessment.

But early polling appears to suggest that Obama really swamped McCain. So the question is, what did these more casual viewers see that I and others did not? Were we, as Todd suggests, being to generous to McCain? Were we trying to be to clever in determining how people would read McCain's demeanor?

Or is it possible that the public in the last couple of weeks has swung so strongly against McCain that they were predisposed to give him a thumbs down to him as long as Obama held his own? Has his brand been so damaged by his poor campaign and his reaction to the finance crisis that no amount of good showing by him could possibly help him?

I'm beginning to wonder.

Sarah the slack-jawed yokel

I think rural/small town voters are often portrayed unfairly in this country as nothing more than hicks and hayseeds. I understand completely the resentment that comes in response to that portrayal. I'm a Democrat and I hate being portrayed as nothing more than a red book wielding dirty fucking hippie.

I have to constantly remind Democrats that it is really stupid and petty to talk about rural voters as if they need to be lead out of the dark valley of ignorance by benevolent liberals. It's just really bad politics.

Having said all that...

If rural/small town folk ask themselves why it is that the image of the hick and hayseed is so prevalent in this nation, perhaps they should take a closer look at Sarah Palin. If you don't want to be seen as a hick and hayseed, it might help if didn't put forward as your representative someone who acts like a hick and hayseed.

Just saying.

Had a dream

Was listening to the radio when a news report came on saying Obama was preparing for his inauguration tomorrow.

Started dancing.

Then I woke up.

Crap.

Just shoot me

COURIC: You've cited Alaska's proximity to Russia as part of your foreign policy experience. What did you mean by that?

PALIN: That Alaska has a very narrow maritime border between a foreign country, Russia, and on our other side, the land-- boundary that we have with-- Canada. It-- it's funny that a comment like that was-- kind of made to-- cari-- I don't know, you know? Reporters--

COURIC: Mock?

PALIN: Yeah, mocked, I guess that's the word, yeah.

The word you are looking for is caricature. And there's no need to make one of you Sarah because you are the dictionary definition of one.

The source of my nausea

This campaign has sickened me.

I used to think most of my nausea came from the fear that the crap the McCain campaign has pulled might actually work and he would get elected. But I've since come to realize that his antics are so pathetic that they are probably hurting any real chance he had to win. The more ridiculous he is the better for Obama.

Yet I still feel sick every time McCain pulls another stunt. Why?

I think it's because his stunts are bad for America regardless of whether he wins or not. He is making a joke out of our deliberative process. He is demeaning the whole idea of Democracy by treating it as nothing more than a 24 hour game of "what can I do today to keep the spotlight on me?"

I love this country. I love Democracy. I love the sacrifices that so many have made to keep that Democracy alive. And John McCain starts every day thinking, "What can I do to turn America into an even greater joke."

John McCain shouldn't just lose this election. He should be exiled.

Listen to the man

Shorter NY Times editorial: a pox on all them

Slightly longer but still shorter NY Times editorial:

1. Bush had nothing to offer in his speech but fear itself.

2. McCain has been flailing and here are several examples that show it.

3. Obama has been better. He's been clearer. He recognizes the real problems. But he hasn't actually fixed anything yet, so he's just as bad as the other two.

Seriously, 90% of this editorial is about how bad Bush and McCain have been. Only one paragraph is given to a "damn with faint praise" criticism of Obama. Therefore, they are all equally bad.

Balance is such an overrated concept in journalism.

Thought for the day

If John McCain's proposal was seriously based on a desire to remove politics from the discussion of the Wall Street crisis, and not a desire to one up his opponent, then he would have talked with Obama about the idea before he announced it.

Wooosh!

That is the sound of the point going right over David Sirota's head.

Yes, we have a serious financial crisis. Yes, we need serious people to spend some serious time working out the serious solution to this serious problem.

No, there is no way either candidate for president could ever really suspend their campaigns and return to Washington to work on this problem without completely derailing the process and turning it into, as Harry Reid says, just another photo op.

Suspend the election!

Ezra has the details

Struggling

(source)

Kind of reminds me of this

Go away John

Harry Reid has it exactly right:

I understand that the candidates are putting together a joint statement at Senator Obama's suggestion. But it would not be helpful at this time to have them come back during these negotiations and risk injecting presidential politics into this process or distract important talks about the future of our nation's economy. If that changes, we will call upon them. We need leadership; not a campaign photo op.

We have the most serious financial crisis in decades occupying the time of all the great (cough-cough) minds of Washington and John McCain's solution is to swamp the process with all the baggage of "The Most Important Presidential Election Campaign Evah"?

McCain has to have an inflated sense of his own self-importance if he thinks that he really has anything to contribute. He's a presidential candidate for fraks sake, not the president! As much as we may laugh and cry about Bush, he, Reid, Pelosi, Dodd, Franks, et al. are the one who actually have the power to address this situation. McCain coming back to D.C. would just muck it up even if his proposal was not the desperation ploy it obviously is.

McCain reformed the wrong finance system

Digby points to this comment by Jonathan Alter:

JONATHAN ALTER: [Y]ou remember the Keating Five scandal that he was a part of, which, by the way, it's crazy but there's been very little about it in the press in the last few weeks. And McCain thinks he's getting a hard time, he's really getting a free ride on the fact that he was in the middle of the last great financial scandal in our country. But his reaction to that, you would have thought, would have been more regulation of the financial services industry. Instead he moved forward on campaign finance reform after being caught in that scandal, but did nothing – nothing – to try to prevent another savings and loan crisis from happening down the road. He was missing in action when it came to even learning the basic lessons of a scandal that he said taught him all kinds of things that he would never forget.

McCain's image as a reformer has its foundation in the Keating Five scandal. When people think of McCain the reformer they think of a Senator who got caught in a compromising position, did a mea culpa, and as his penance passed legislation to reform the system. The problem is that the reform he passed was entirely in the area of campaign finance. It was not in the area that was at the core of the Keating Five scandal: the financial system of the country itself.

This is classic McCain: when criticized for something, respond to the criticism by making a lot of noise about something related but ancillary to the thing you are being criticized about.

The Death of Irony

The other day a bizarre Q&A appeared on Roger Ebert's site that purportedly was a straightforward set of answers to questions about creationism. The post was bizarre because it appeared to give serious answers in favor of creationism. Yet anyone who has followed Ebert through the years would know that he is not a creationist.

So, what happened? Had Ebert gone through a sudden conversion? Was his website hacked? Or was it just an attempt on Ebert's part to satirize creationist viewpoints?

The answer is the latter. Unfortunately, Ebert's piece fails as satire. I'll leave it to PZ Meyers to explain why:

[Ebert] presented a plain statement of creationist beliefs with satirical intent, but that intent cannot possibly be scene (sic) in a world where millions say exactly the same things with sincerity.

I think this is why the Obama as a Muslim cover on Vanity Fair a few months back also failed as satire. It failed because nothing in that cover was in any way out of the mainstream of belief for a significant percentage of the populace. The quotation marks around that cover were as invisible as the ones around Ebert's attempt at satire. But in a world where the bizarre is increasingly put forth as reasonable opinion, those quotation marks are getting harder and harder to see.

Is that a failure on the readers part? Or is it a failure on the media's part for allowing all ideas to be presented as if they had equal validity? If you are going to rail about the death of irony then be sure to correctly identify the culprit.

Celebrating the failures of racism

I agree with the sentiment that a major reason why the presidential race is as close as it can be blamed on racism. There is a not-insignificant minority of people out there who simply won't vote for a black dude no matter what he says or does.

However, I prefer to see this whole question in a more positive light. 40 years ago people publicly celebrated the lynching of black men. Today, we are one step away from putting a black man in the White House.

That is huge!

So, instead of bemoaning the fact that racism may be keeping this race close, let's congratulate ourselves for taking seriously the idea of a black president.

Racism sucks, but the way to eventually kill it is to celebrate its failures.

Grand Unified Theory of Libertarianism

I got into a discussion over at reddit about libertarianism (I know, I know. Bad idea.) I casually mentioned that I had my own theory of why techies seem so enamored of libertarianism if anyone was interested.

Someone took me up on it. So, here it is.

---

I'm a techie. I've been a techie since the 70s. I was a techie while going through puberty. I have seen a lot of other techies go through puberty. One thing I have seen recur over and over among techies going through puberty is an attempt by said techies to come up with a technical explanation for why they can't get laid. This usually involves asking, "Why are girls so irrational?" and, "Why don't girls want to f*ck a guy who is smart enough to see how irrational they are?" The great success of this strategy often leads to some grand unified theory of the universe that blames it all on the fact that the world doesn't work the way their computers do (push button A, get result B) and that wouldn't the world be so much better if it just followed some really simple rules?

Of course, the world doesn't follow simple rules (or, at least not the ones they come up with), so this produces two results: either (1) they grow up, let their hormones relax and eventually they do meet someone nice and they get laid, or (2) they develop an even larger grand unified theory of why the world is fucked up and how it would be better if everyone just did what I think it should do and oh god why can't I get laid?

Actually, a lot of people fall into this trap, not just techies. For instance, I suspect that much of the rise of the Islamist movement in the Middle East can be blamed on the fact that none of the girls would dance with Sayyid Qutb in college.

While Qutb went on to create grand unified theories based on passages from the Koran, a lot of techies often end up creating theories, like libertarianism, that gives them the cold comfort of believing that, if people just acted the way they think they should, then everything would work out great, everyone would be rich and they could get laid.

Okay, it's not all because they couldn't get laid. I'm sure there are plenty of libertarians who have plenty of success with the ladies. This is, naturally, a simplified explanation of my own grand unified theory of why a bunch of hapless dudes spend so much time sitting around creating grand unified theories. The truth is I think grand unified theories of any variety suck and advocates for them should just go away and leave me alone.

And yes, I'm married, have two children and am quite content.

Of course, I'm not a libertarian.

Cynicism works

It may be cynical Andrew, but it often works. In fact, I would say that this would be the only smart political move Republicans could make if the Paulson "give me all the money and shut your trap" proposal goes through.

Fortunately, it looks like it won't. So there goes the "God given opportunity". I'd love to see Republicans vote against this plan.

Update: okay, maybe not.

better than shit ain't roses

I think John Cole is right on one key point. If the main selling point of the Dodd bailout proposal is that it is better than the Paulson bailout proposal then it should be considered just as dead in the water.

Saying something smells better than shit does not mean it smells like roses.

Frankly, I think everyone in Congress should just go home for a week and calm the fuck down. Yes, things are scary right now, but it is foolish to rush in to put out the fire before you know where the fire is.

Proposed "if I were king" rule: no legislative action is allowed within seven days of a crisis. Any system that can't operate for seven days without new legislation is a system that is fundamentally flawed to begin with.

John Cole has the appropriate response

WATB

Burn

Ben Smith scorches McCain's aides for their incompetence.

The karma check for John McCain is going to be a huge one.

"You are in the tank"

So the McCain campaign, fed up with being called liars, holds a telephone press conference in which they proceed to attack the press for not exploring negative stories about Obama. But, in the process of describing these negative stories, they make the mistake of embellishing the details.

Here we see the end result of the McCain camp's decision to go with the flat-out-lie strategy. Would the press have been so willing to highlight these embellishments if they had not gone through several months of outright lies from the McCain team? Not likely.

More likely is that the press corps, tired of being used as McCain's bitch, has decided that McCain deserves none of the usual benefit-of-the-doubt hedging that we used to see.

And what is the McCain campaign's response to once again being called out on embellishments?

Asked about the series of errors, McCain aides could not provide evidence to back up Schmidt’s assertions.

One McCain aide, Michael Goldfarb, said Politico was “quibbling with ridiculously small details when the basic things are completely right.”

Another, Brian Rogers, responded more directly:

“You are in the tank,” he e-mailed.

Trust me guys, after years of experience seeing the way the press responds to criticism, I've learned that the last thing you want to do is accuse them of being "in the tank" for anyone. Even if it's true, they will just double down in response.

Early visionaries

Did you know the Internet was invented in 1934?

(okay, I know some will quibble about the term "invented" in this context. But still, its refreshing to see great thinking outside the box.)

0% think the economy is getting better

Wow! I don't think I've ever seen a poll that registered zero on a question. There's always a few loonies out there who are completely disconnected from reality. But if even the loonies see things are bad then we really have to worry.

I know my fears are justified

...when Bill Kristol makes essentially the same argument I made that McCain could undermine Obama if he were to just come out strongly against the Paulson bailout proposal.

Of course, Kristol thinks this would be a good thing if McCain does it.

Obama: "no blank check"

Okay. This makes me feel better.

As of now, the Bush Administration has only offered a concept with a staggering price tag, not a plan. Even if the U.S. Treasury recovers some or most of its investment over time, this initial outlay of up to $700 billion is sobering. And in return for their support, the American people must be assured that the deal reflects the basic principles of transparency, fairness, and reform.

First, there must be no blank check when American taxpayers are on the hook for this much money.

Second, taxpayers shouldn’t be spending a dime to reward CEOs on Wall Street.

Third, taxpayers should be protected and should be able to recoup this investment.

Fourth, this plan has to help homeowners stay in their homes.

Fifth, this is a global crisis, and the United States must insist that other nations join us in helping secure the financial markets.

Sixth, we need to start putting in place the rules of the road I’ve been calling for for years to prevent this from ever happening again.

And finally, this plan can’t just be a plan for Wall Street, it has to be a plan for Main Street. We have to come together, as Democrats and Republicans, to pass a stimulus plan that will put money in the pockets of working families, save jobs, and prevent painful budget cuts and tax hikes in our states.

You know what worries me?

I mean, beyond the general shittiness of this whole enterprise.

What worries me is NOT that Obama will hesitate to take leadership on this by saying, "No blank checks" because he will worry about the potential political blowback of being accused of wanting the financial system to collapse.

No. That doesn't worry me. Well, it doesn't worry me as much as this...

What really worries me is that McCain will get clever and pull a "Nixon goes to China" move and HE will be the one to come out first with a, "No blank checks" demand.

I tell you, if McCain does that, he will win this election. Guaranteed.

How do I know this? Because if he does, and Obama doesn't, then I might have to seriously consider voting for McCain.