Posted in Election 08 | 7 Comments

7 Responses to “The Ministry of Truth”

1. jacob Says:
   September 9th, 2008 at 5:39 pm

   that was in ‘94 with mccain wanting to get rid of the department of edu, kind of a weak shot at him i think. especially considering there’s SO much more to nail him on. his whole tax breaks argument against obama is an outright joke, namely because it requires blatantly lying. but that’s old hat for this old man. lying, and doing so repeatedly, wins elections these days.

   the obama campaign seems to be following a carefully planned trajectory, much like they did in the primary which proved effective. i do wonder though whether obama’s supreme belief in the intelligence of american people will ultimately prove to be his downfall. mccain and palin are gonna work hard to pull the wool over the electorate and make this another likability/cuture wars election (how many times will they get middle class people voting against their own economic self interest?).

   my question is… can the obama campaign stray from their plan and improvise strategy in order to reassert a narrative focused strictly on policy issues? if it gets back to those policy basics they win. but obama can’t wait for those voters to ‘arrive’ on his side, he’s got to grab them somehow.

2. ian Says:
   September 9th, 2008 at 6:09 pm

   there is no way Obama can focus the narrative to “strictly policy issues”. Obviously if it was about issues, we would win. Even McCain has pretty much given up hope on the issues. The idea he mentioned most in his acceptance speech was “Change”. They have ceded the argument. They won’t let this be about the issues because they know they will lose on the issues, and the establishment media doesn’t want to be bored. That’s 2v1.

   The problem is also that Obama’s campaign already has a hard enough time controlling the daily narrative. Add on top of that changing the makeup of the press and forcing them to cover policy issues all day…i think Matthews head would explode.

   This election is, and will be, about exposing John McCain as a dishonorable, hot-headed extremist. Palin plays into this as McCain obviously picked her at the last minute and for political reasons. She also reinforces his foe “maverick” creds, as pretty much everything she says is a lie.

   The problem is that McCain has extremely high favorable/unfavorable for someone that voted with Bush 90% of the time. He needs to be taken down. Showing that he wanted to abolish the Department of Education is not a cheep shot. That’s what he said. That’s who he is. His foreign policy team is comprised of Neo-Cons that think Bush has lost his way. No joke. He also voted against MLK day when he was 50 years old. He also cheated on his first wife, and maybe his second. He also called an 18 year old Chelsea Clinton ugly…

   …Let me say though, I honor his service as a POW.

3. ian Says:
   September 9th, 2008 at 6:56 pm

   If you’re wondering, I’m pissed off :-)

   The last straw was the trashing of Community Organizers. At that moment, this election became crystal clear to me.

4. jacob Says:
   September 10th, 2008 at 8:19 am

   well i gotta think there is a way to goad mccain into trying to explain how actually he represents change. maybe it’s something that comes out in the debates.

   but really, the mccain campaign backed themselves into a corner with their switch to the ‘change’ mantra… the narrative worth asserting by the obama camp should be: “REALLY? HOW DO YOU REPRESENT CHANGE? TELL ME, EXPLAIN IT TO ME.” but i guess we know that won’t elicit any real response right now. they’re too busy saying the black man wants sex education for kindergartners. how terribly predictable, and pathetic.

5. Beetlejuice Says:
   September 10th, 2008 at 3:32 pm

   If Obama was so smart he’d probably be ahead in the polls right now. I think Obama should talk to his people instead of reacting to McCain.That’s how he came on the scene w his own message to the people,he’s lost that part.(I think) The Dems are on pure defense.

6. jacob Says:
   September 10th, 2008 at 4:05 pm

   i totally agree mr. b. they do need to be more proactive, not reactive. running a successful campaign definitely takes a certain type of intelligence, and i give the republicans major credit for possessing effective ‘tactic’ smarts. it’s just too bad for all of us they don’t know how to govern when they get in.

   i again think though that there’s a part of him (obama) that doesn’t want to ‘lower’ himself to that level of attack politics. he sees it as beneath him, as well as the country. on moral grounds, it should be beneath all of us… but morality has nothing to do with winning elections. it’s time to bitch slap that old fucker.

7. Beetlejuice Says:
   September 11th, 2008 at 6:46 pm

   That’s funny and true.

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