State of the Election - August 29, 2008

What an exciting week! Well, it did not get too exciting until maybe last night. I'll give Obama his rock star status at his speech last night. I did not view it as I had better things to do at the time, but I heard enough. There is no doubt that that it was a large, energized crowd. There is no doubt that it was a historic moment and that those who viewed it and favor Obama had quite a show. I did hear he gave more details about the "hope" and "change" he plans to bring. I won't critique it since I did not hear it, nor read a transcript. I will say that emotion and passion are fleeting moments. They have an expiration on them and must soon be tapped into with something solid or they are meaningless. The question is - can Obama convert last night into something meaningful?

There is at least one thing about his speech that I find humorous. Just like in his 2004 Convention Keynote Speech, and in his appearance at Rick Warren's Saddleback church in 2006 on World AIDS Day, and at his May 2008 Speech on Race, Obama in his 2008 Convention Speech spoke about being his "brother's keeper". I just am wondering if his $1 a month brother George Obama liked that part of the speech.

In the last few weeks the John McCain campaign has been nothing short of brilliant. The clear drive to increase domestic drilling to relieve gas prices, the challenging picture of Obama's association with William Ayers that drew a panicked response, the classy ad congratulating Obama on his special day, and finally the amazing handling of the VP selection were all brilliant. Thinking back over the last few weeks of announcements regarding the VP selection, the McCain campaign built a superb tension. They used every method to draw out the media into the process - I'm sure Leiberman and Ridge were never on the table, but it sure got the media involved. It sure made many Conservatives nervous. Then there was talk of Romney and Pawlenty that got the Conservatives talking about it. All during this time, Palin was not really hinted at.

The selection and timing were a flawless tag team that succeeded in wiping Obama's speech off the table. When I was reviewing the news, I was amazed at how little there was about last night. The McCain VP pick was splashed all over the place. The Sarah Palin selection in spite of Liberal's weak effort to undermine was a fantastic pick. First, the vacuum created by Hillary Clinton's loss makes a female choice very appropriate. I am not under the delusion that Hillary supporters will flock to Palin, but many less partisan women who wanted to see a woman in the race, will be pleased with the choice. Palin's life story and rise to be Alaska's Governor is very interesting. She has strong core beliefs that will satisfy and energize the base. She will strengthen the theme of Drill Here, Drill Now. All in all, a very good pick.

As an added bonus, the selection of Palin served as a Rope a Dope for the Libs. They immediately jumped on her lack of experience with both feet. It was only after it was too late to take it back, that they realized that she has more Executive experience and more accomplishments than Obama. The ability to underscore that point about Obama will both wipe the smirk off their faces and hit him where it hurts. I for one cannot wait to see the debate between Palin and Biden.

A Comparison of Short Lists

When I look at the short lists for VP candidates, it seems that the DEMs have the opposite problem as the GOP. On the GOP there are several good choices making it difficult to decide which one to pick. When Obama was picking, it seemed like he had to choose who would do the least damage among a very unimpressive list. I'm sure Obama would rather not have had to pick a VP at all because of this. The long delay in announcing underscores his obvious angst at having to make the pick. I can see if there was a really good and exciting candidate, waiting to build good tension and anticipation. When finally announcing such a pick, there would be a climactic reaction. With Biden, it was such an anti-climactic response I cannot imagine the delay was strategic and that Obama was delaying until the last possible moment knowing what a dud it would be.

The Democrat short list was:

Joe Biden
Tim Kaine (of active eyebrow fame)
Evan Bayh

John McCain's short list seems to be:

Mitt Romney (great fundraiser and vote draw)
Tim Pawlenty (who I think would look better the more people knew of him)
Bobby Jindal (great pick, but we need him in LA)
Kay Bailey Hutchison (likeable and a good draw for women)

Every one on McCain's would be an asset that strengthens the ticket. Obama had to settle for Biden and try to spin that he would help in the foreign policy area. Neville Chamberlain had foreign policy experience to be sure, but... In short, if your foreign policy is poor it does not matter how experienced you are at it. Bob Shrum is experienced at Presidential elections, but given his 0-8 record I would not be eager to get his opinion on the subject.

I think the decision to announce the VP pick the day after Obama's speech is fantastic. If he picks Hutchison, the naming of a female VP candidate should eo much to wipe Obama's speech off the front pages. Should. We'll see. Either way, unless McCain falls for the media's bait to name Leiberman or Ridge; the pick should result in good solid results going into the GOP Convention.

Obama the Gaffe Machine

I wasn't posting during the flurry of Obama's gaffes, but had such a fun time reading about them. Here is a list by Michelle Obama from a few months back when the steam finally began being wiped from the window so we could get a good look at this guy.

Since the gaffes keep rolling in, it is hard to find them all in a real-time single list. The next best thing is an Obama Gaffe Blog. The author John Galt blends in more than the gaffes, but within all that commentary are the gaffes. Hope you enjoy reading them as much as I did.

Some are dubbing Obama the Black Dan Quayle. Sorry, but Obama makes Dan Quayle look good. They can dub the Democrat Convention as the Turd Polishing Convention.

State of the Election - August 23, 2008

Since I have written nothing since before the primaries ended, I will back up a bit. I was happy to see Barack Obama win over Hillary Clinton. I think she had more of a chance at winning than Obama. I also am very tired of the Clintons and the Bushes. Only by a remote chance would Edwards have won. Even before his affair came to light, he would have been the easiest to beat. Oh well.

Obama
When Obama clinched the nomination, I knew that the more he became known, the less he would be liked. I thought the Media would do a better job at keeping him less known than they have, but their typical over-reactions to conservatives have coaxed them into keeping stories in the public eye long enough for people to get closer glimpses and they have not been pretty. I knew that Obama was phenomenally arrogant, a dyed in the wool socialist and had quite a number of bad associations. However, even I was surprised at how much of an empty suit he is. He is very shallow, cannot think on his feet and seems to have no core beliefs that he is willing to share with us. With this long election cycle it is amazing how long Obama has been in the Feasibility Stage of his campaign where we know very little about any details beyond "hope" and "change". When a detail does come out it never makes him look good ranging from laughable to downright scary:

- Energy plan = tire inflation + tune-ups + tapping oil reserve + taxing the heck out of Big Oil
- Tax plan = class warfare by soaking the rich + raising the Capital Gains tax even though he admits it will result in less revenue but will simply be fair
- Wants to move translators from Iraq to Afghanistan even though they don't speak the same language
- Foreign Policy plan = have talks with all despots in the world without preconditions
- Position on Russian aggression = Moral equivalence between Saddam's Iraq and Georgia + blame the victim (Georgia must have done something to provoke Russia)

Of course most of the details of his plans are given in some sort of code - "uh, uh, uh, uh, uh..." Has anybody tried to convert his long uuuhs and short uhs into Morse Code to see what he is really saying?

Now Obama has finally picked a running mate - Joe Biden. It is funny that I wrote on LA Sunsett's blog something that a day later Rush Limbaugh said - "Please let it be Biden". I took a look at a variety of blogs to take a pulse on the reaction to his pick and the verdict is that a lot of people are extremely excited about Obama picking Biden. Problem is that they are all conservatives. Even the comments on the liberal blogs about the pick seem only to be obligatory. Somehow they think that Biden's foreign policy experience is going to help Obama. What is he going to do - defer every foreign policy question to Biden? "Uh, uh, uh, I think I'll let Joe answer that one". As a final note on Biden: so far the marketing undertone has been comparing a young, vibrant, good-looking black man that can give good speeches to a tired looking white-haired white guy that can't give speeches as well. So what does Obama do? He picks a tired looking white-haired white guy that can't give speeches as well for his running mate. You can't make this stuff up.

McCain
I would be lying if I said I was thrilled that McCain was the nominee. He is barely GOP, and nowhere near a conservative. When he clinched the nomination, I could only shake my head and silently curse Huckabee and his brain dead following. I went for the first month wondering if I could even pull the lever for him. Since I am a conservative more than a Republican, I wished we had a viable conservative alternative. However, even if I wanted to throw away my vote I certainly have no desire to give it to Ron Paul or Bob Barr. So I basically said silently to McCain, "Convince me". I have to admit he has made progress in that area.

First, McCain has always been the only National Security candidate (notice I say only - not stronger. Obama is totally absent on National Security, not just weak). Second, McCain will at least nominate a Sandra Day O'Conner instead of a Ruth Bader Ginsberg. Both his Presidency and his Supreme Court appointments will only disappoint and anger me some of the time instead of all of the time like Obama's. With the balance of the Court as it is, if Obama is elected you can expect at least 2 liberal justices to retire soon after. We run the risk of several deaths as most are now quite old. A single loss of one of the four conservatives being replaced by Obama will be unrecoverable in the next decade. With the tendency of Leftist justices to make up law out of whole cloth the deck will be stacked in favor of the Left for the next 25 years.

Still, I wanted McCain to convince me about McCain. I have been pleasantly surprised by a few things:

- I truly thought McCain was going to roll over and be a nice guy during the campaign while Obama and his media surrogates beat McCain to a pulp. McCain has a spine on the campaign trail and is willing hit back and hard. Good for him.
- His tax policy does not leave me grabbing protectively for my wallet like Obama's
- While some call it a flip-flop, McCain sees that with gas over $4 per gallon we have to take necessary steps boost supply. Hey, if I refuse to buy a plasma screen TV, but change my mind if the cost is cut in half - am I a flip-flopper? No, you can only be a flip-flopper if the conditions remain the same except for populist belief. The high gas prices are hurting the big and little guy alike.
- McCain has been very strong in his words against Russia. His foreign policy has strength and clarity.

I have issues with McCain, but for the most part the issues that affect me directly I think he is ok. I wish he would change positions on illegal immigration, but he is the status quo. I will never be a cheerleader for McCain, but I believe he has taken some steps to convince me to vote for him instead of merely voting against Obama.

Outlook
I have no predictions at this time. The election can go either way at this point. McCain has shrewdly announced that Obama will get a 15 point bump in the polls from the Democrat Convention. If Obama comes near that, McCain can downplay it as to be expected. If, however, Obama fails to get such a significant bump McCain can paint the convention as falling short of expectations. I doubt Obama will obtain a double digit bump.

The question about the Democrat Convention is whether or not any Obama policy details will materialize or will he continue to attempt to skate on the "hope" and "change" mantras? We have seen that details are poison to Obama, but the lack of them furthers the portrait of arrogance and emptiness.

One thing that will not change much between now and November is the excitement factor. Most of Obama's fanatics will continue to be excited about him regardless of what they do or don't know about him. Excitement for McCain, though, will never materialize. So motivation to get conservatives to the voting booth is going to be an uphill battle no matter what happens between now and then. We can only hope that enough of those planning to vote for Obama that are outside of the screaming rock star fan club will lose trust, faith and support for him and stay home to balance the lack of motivation on the McCain side.

One final thought that may suspiciously sound like a prediction even though I said I wasn't making any. I think that since the strongest support of Obama will come from the metropolitan areas and the true blue states, there is a strong possibility that Obama will obtain the popular vote and lose electorally. If that happens, prepare for the storm.

Wading Back Into the Water

My thanks to everybody for being understanding during my absence. The last year has been difficult for me and in many ways will never be the same. In some areas that is good. I want better than things were and have gained partial success in that area.

Coming back to this blog will represent much to me. Those who know me, know I am not a quitter. "There will be no white flag above my door". However, I previously put too much into blogging and need to keep things in balance. I do not plan daily posts at this time. At most it will be weekly substantive posts. My best opportunity is Saturday morning. So that is my goal for now. Maybe I'll have a few potshots during the week.

I don't know how much my trials will affect my writing. I think it fair to note that while I am still as conservative as always and my faith as strong as ever, inwardly my mindset is now detached in loyalty from any political or religious organization. Sorry, but they have let me down too much to the point of being harmful. I am backing away to a safe distance. Perhaps that makes sense to some. If not, that is all I plan to say on the matter for now.

Hope some of my former readers come back.