Clay Burell's Library tagged mcain → View Popular

Filter:
All
Annotated

23 Oct 08

Palin's Wardrobe Saga Exposes McCain's Flaws: Margaret Carlson

Palin's $150,000 campaign wardrobe - paid for by campaign money, thus taxpayer-funded - another example of REDISTRIBUTING THE WEALTH and REPUBLICAN SOCIALISM?

Jeez, let's put this campaign out of its misery. It's an embarrassment in the eyes of the world.

www.bloomberg.com/...news - Preview

elections08 mcain palin

At the very moment Palin was
celebrating herself as ``your average hockey mom'' in her
convention speech, she was wearing a $2,500 silk jacket by
Valentino.
Palin parading around like a Project Runway extra will take
far less heat even though the bill she sent the committee makes
Paris Hilton look like a Target shopper. With her $1.2 million in
assets and six-figure salary, Palin could have footed the bill
for whatever extreme makeover she felt was in order.

It's not a victimless crime. That $150,000 comes from funds
that a respected incumbent like New Hampshire Republican Senator
John Sununu -- struggling not to be dragged down by the McCain-
Palin ticket -- desperately needs.

Earlier it came out that Palin had charged the government
for $17,000 in per-diem payments for 300 days she spent in her
own house. Now we find she charged the state for trips that
resemble vacations if not junkets.
2 more annotations...
- A stunning 55 percent now think her unqualified to be
  president. Even as more people find her unsuited to the job,
  she's enlarging it. She says that as vice president her duties
  would include being ``in charge of the U.S. Senate.'' The RNC
  should have spent its money for a tutorial on the Constitution.
  
  In choosing Palin, McCain ignored the old rule to pander to
  your base in the primary and break their hearts in the general
  election. Palin was a gift to the already committed. A hunter-
  gatherer from the last frontier with a large family and knockout
  good looks, she even turned an out-of-wedlock pregnancy that
  could have put off evangelicals as an example of lax childrearing
  or Hollywood ethics into a story of teenagers in love doing the
  right thing.
- What she does well is
  hardly enough to compensate for what she does poorly.
  
  In the short run, she made McCain happier than he'd been in
  months and served to remind people of his maverick side. But in
  the end his impulsive choice proved more reminiscent of the
  impetuous young McCain who hated authority, amassed demerits at
  the Naval Academy and ticked off colleagues as a grandstanding
  hothead.
  
  The errors we make that hurt the most are the unforced ones.
  Palin cost McCain his standing with many Republicans and lost him
  the endorsement of his friend, Colin Powell, the man he called
  his ``favorite living hero.'' On ``Meet the Press'' last Sunday,
  Powell said Palin raised doubts about McCain. ``I don't believe
  she's ready to be president of the United States, which is the
  job of the vice president.''
  
  For all the experience 72 years has brought McCain, it
  hasn't brought him good judgment. We didn't know that before
  Palin. We know it now.
  
  (Margaret Carlson, author of ``Anyone Can Grow Up: How
  George Bush and I Made It to the White House'' and former White
  House correspondent for Time magazine, is a Bloomberg News
  columnist.

11 Oct 08

McCain tussles with Palin over whipping up a mob mentality - Times Online

Dissension between McCain and Palin - Palin positioning herself for 2012 presidential run.

www.timesonline.co.uk/...article4926283.ece - Preview

mcain palin elections08

“Sarah Palin is no fool. She sees the same thing and wants to salvage what she
can. She is positioning herself for the future. Her best days could be in
front of her. She wants to look as though she was the fighter, the person
with the spunk who was out there taking it to the Democrats.”
A McCain official confirmed that there was dissension in the campaign. “There
is always going to be a debate about the costs and benefits of any
strategy,” he said.

“After November 4, the feelings of individuals will come to light. It is only
natural and will be expected.”

Palin’s frustration with McCain has led to clashes over strategy. When she
learnt he was pulling resources from Michigan, an industrial swing state
leaning heavily in Obama’s favour, she fired off an e-mail saying, “Oh come
on, do we have to?” and offered to travel there with her husband Todd,
four-times winner of the 2,000-mile Iron Dog snow-mobile race.

She also told Bill Kristol, the conservative New York Times columnist, that
she wished the campaign would make more of Obama’s 20-year association with
the Rev Jeremiah Wright, his controversial former pastor, who said, “God
damn America”.
3 more annotations...
- McCain’s allies responded by suggesting that she had her own pastor problems,
  such as the African minister who prayed to Jesus to protect her from
  witchcraft when she was running for governor.
- A spokesman for McCain denied he and Palin had fallen out over her aggressive
  attacks. “Vice-presidential candidates are typically the tip of the spear
  and further out in front than the candidate for president. This is pretty
  standard fare,” he said.
  
  However, Palin is no longer helping to attract women and independent voters to
  the Republican ticket. A poll for Fox News last week showed that while 47%
  of voters regard the Alaska governor favourably, 42% now have an
  unfavourable opinion of her.
  
  Palin remains far more popular than McCain with the Republican party base. He
  regularly has to endure the spectacle of members of the audience leaving for
  their cars when it is his turn to speak at joint rallies.
  - So sad for McCain. - on 2008-10-11
  Add Sticky Note
- In Wilmington, Palin’s many admirers were in no doubt that she should run for
  president next time. Nancy Ross, a hairdresser, 45, said if the Republicans
  lost the election, she would be cheered up by the thought of Palin as the
  2012 nominee.
  
  “I would absolutely love her to run in four years’ time. By then most of her
  kids will be grown,” she said. “I’d like her to run against Hillary
  [Clinton]. She would squash her. She is a real person and we need people
  like her in Washington.”
  - Can somebody get Muthee to pray for my protection from a Sarah Palin presidency in '12? I hear he's good at magical warfare with witches. - on 2008-10-11
  Add Sticky Note