John McCain vs. John McCain

[Nbadan]

Straight talk (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ioy90nF2anI)

[whottt]

Shouldn't you be devoting energy to someone that has a legit chance of winning?

I don't see it happening for McCain, at least not right now....and I have predicted the winner of the popular vote in every election since 1980.

I still think it'll come down to Clark VS Guilianni, and if only one of them runs, that's the one that will win. If they go up against each other I think Guilianni will win....

[Nbadan]

There are still a couple of McCain lovers out there.

[ChumpDumper]

If he continues to suck social conservative dick, McCain might get the nomination.

[atxrocker]

and here i thought mccain was the liberal conservative

[exstatic]

I think Guiliani will have a hell of a time getting the nom, but I think he's electable if he does. He's got that Mitt Romney I'm not really for gay marriage anymore stench about him that is going to drive social cons away, and considering it's all about momentum, I think he's going to have a hell of a time cracking either Iowa or NH for a win. He'll get the moderate vote, such as it is, some who like him because he married his cousin, and a few admirer votes for being on his 3rd wife, seemingly a GOP pre-req.

McCain is hamstringing himself with his whole support for the war. His only impediment with the social cons is that he won't actually come out for an amendment to ban gay marriage. He's not for it, but thinks the states should decide. I think he'll probably get the nom, but not win.

[boutons_]

"McCain is hamstringing himself with his whole support for the war."

euphemistic. He's committing political suicide, and one less hard right/radical Repug is always an advance for civilization.

[JMarkJohns]

As an Arizonian all my life, I can tell you there's no bigger oxymoron than opening a thread on McCain and reading "straight talk" with reference to his politics.

By and large, he goes whereever the prevailing wind blows except in matters of war.

[boutons_]

The only reason a McCain could be considered liberal to any degree is that he is just slightly towards center compared the hard-core radical right controlling the Repug party.

[boutons_]

Looks like McCain is girding himself for bitter,vicious, slime-spewing campaign. Repugs and right-wingers love that gratuitously pissed off, smash-mouth nastiness. Real Repug Men are eternally pissed off.


=============

February 4, 2007

New McCain Team Made Attack Ads He Once Faulted

By JIM RUTENBERG

WASHINGTON, Feb. 2 — Senator John McCain, intent on succeeding where his freewheeling presidential campaign of 2000 failed, is assembling a team of political bruisers for 2008. And it includes advisers who once sought to skewer him and whose work he has criticized as stepping over the line in the past.

In 2000, Mr. McCain, Republican of Arizona, said the advertisements run against him by George W. Bush, then the governor of Texas, distorted his record. But he has hired three members of the team that made those commercials — Mark McKinnon, Russell Schriefer and Stuart Stevens — to work on his presidential campaign.

In 2004, Mr. McCain said the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth advertisement asserting that Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts had not properly earned his medals from the Vietnam War was “dishonest and dishonorable.” Nonetheless, he has hired the firm that made the spots, Stevens Reed Curcio & Potholm, which worked on his 2000 campaign, to work for him again this year.

In October, Mr. McCain’s top adviser expressed public displeasure with an advertisement against former Representative Harold E. Ford Jr., Democrat of Tennessee, that some saw as having racist overtones for suggesting a flirtation between Mr. Ford, who is black, and a young, bare-shouldered white woman, played by a blond actress.

The Republican committee that sponsored the spot had as its leader Terry Nelson, a former Bush campaign strategist whom Mr. McCain hired as an adviser last spring. In December, just weeks after the Ford controversy broke, Mr. McCain elevated Mr. Nelson to the position of national campaign manager.

Taken together, the moves provide the strongest indication yet that Mr. McCain intends to run a far tougher campaign than the one he ran in the 2000 primary. And they come as he transitions from being a onetime maverick to a candidate seeking to gather his party around him and create an air of inevitability about his prospects for winning nomination.

As Mr. McCain assembles his team, he is also making it that much harder for his Republican challengers by scooping up a significant circle of the party’s top talent.

In recent years, Mr. McCain has made a concerted effort to mend fences with Mr. Bush and reassure the Republican base that he is a reliable conservative. But his moves have focused new attention on the extent to which he may risk sacrificing the image he has long cultivated of being his own man, driven by principle rather than partisan politics.

( a politician with "principles"? an oxymorn. They'll do WHATEVER, fuckover whomever it takes to win. )

Mr. McCain’s advisers said he was not changing. But they were unapologetic about putting together a group dedicated to doing what it takes to reach the White House and employing lessons from his defeat at the hands of Mr. Bush in 2000.

“This is about winning at the end of the day,” said John Weaver, Mr. McCain’s longtime senior strategist. “I don’t want to be in a knife fight ever again, but if I am, we’re going to win it.”

Mr. McCain’s representatives said he would not provide an interview.

Seven years ago, Mr. McCain charmed the news media and the public with his Straight Talk Express bus tour. He had a lean operation befitting an upstart candidacy, and he regularly spoke out against attack advertising, a quaint notion in retrospect.

In the end, he ran his share of confrontational advertisements, once even leveling the ultimate Republican-to-Republican insult: that Mr. Bush was as dishonest as Bill Clinton. But he was perceived as having been knocked back on his heels by the rougher, tougher Bush campaign.

Now Mr. McCain is building a larger organization, bringing together the heart of the bare-knuckled Bush crew once overseen by Karl Rove while keeping most of the advisers who ran his shoestring effort of 2000.

“It’s like an all-star World Wrestling Federation cage match, except that instead of fighting one another, all of the brawlers are on the same team,” said Steve McMahon, a strategist for the Democratic National Committee. “There are very few people who play this game at the highest level, and on the Republican side these guys are among the best.”

( WWF?, always classy and tasteful, these Repugs :lol )

Mr. McCain has also hired Brian Jones, an adviser to Mr. Bush’s 2004 campaign; Fred Davis, a media consultant for Mr. Bush in 2004; and Steve Schmidt, who oversaw Mr. Bush’s 2004 war room, exploiting any tidbit that could help paint Mr. Kerry as a “flip-flopper.”

The hires are another signal that the 2008 primary campaign could be a combative one all around.

On the Democratic side, John Edwards, the former senator from North Carolina, has wasted no time attacking Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s position on Iraq. And Mrs. Clinton’s team includes strategists who invented the concept of the modern campaign war room for her husband 15 years ago. But Senator Barack Obama of Illinois drew cheers at a party gathering on Friday when he warned his fellow candidates against attacking one another.

Mitt Romney, a Republican and the former governor of Massachusetts, has hired Alex Castellanos, a onetime Bush strategist who also famously produced the 1990 commercial for Jesse Helms, the former North Carolina senator, in which a pair of white hands crumpled a rejection letter as a narrator said, “You needed that job and you were the best qualified, but it had to go to a minority because of a racial quota.”

Given Mr. McCain’s history with some of the people on his team, the evolution of his staff may present an early challenge: How does he stay true to the “Straight Talk” spirit of his 2000 campaign, which helped him win the stature he has now, while also engaging in the political brinkmanship it can take to win?

The Democratic National Committee is already criticizing Mr. McCain for his hires, issuing a statement this week calling them “a testament to how far he’s gone down the do-anything-to-win path.”

Tony Fabrizio, a Republican pollster who is not yet allied with a candidate, said Mr. McCain was running the risk of looking “politically expedient” and of blunting his brand as “Senator Straight Talk.” He said the risk was highlighted by Mr. McCain’s recent suggestions that he may not use the campaign finance system he has long championed.

In 2000, Mr. McCain received money from the system, which gives public financing to candidates who agree to strict fund-raising and spending limits. Mr. Weaver, the senior strategist, said Mr. McCain was keeping his options open because others, including Mrs. Clinton, were planning to work around the system.

As Mr. McCain’s aides often point out, for all its appeal, the McCain 2000 campaign was a losing one. And they said it would be unfair to suggest that because Mr. McCain was augmenting his team he was somehow preparing to change who he was.

“There are no negotiations regarding his principles,” Mr. Weaver said.

( “This is about winning at the end of the day,” is the only principle that's not negotiable )

In an interview on Friday, Mr. Jones, the campaign communications director, said Mr. McCain was not allowing his distaste over the Swift Boat commercials to interfere with his relationship with Stevens Reed Curcio & Potholm, with whom Mr. McCain has his own decade-long association. In addition, he said, Mr. McCain hired Mr. Nelson because of his breadth of experience in national campaigns. “The campaign,” Mr. Jones said, “is not going to let past contests on the battlefield limit how it’s going to go after talent.”

Presidential politics are rich in fungible allegiances. James A. Baker III ran the primary campaigns of Gerald Ford and the elder George Bush against Ronald Reagan, only to become Mr. Reagan’s chief of staff. This year, David Axelrod is serving as a senior strategist for Mr. Obama; he was a senior strategist to Mr. Edwards in his 2004 campaign.

“You could dissect any campaign this way: this guy did this ad this one time,” said Mr. Schriefer, the former Bush media strategist, who will run Mr. McCain’s advertising team. “There’s a tremendous history of foes becoming allies.”

Mr. McKinnon, who led Mr. Bush’s advertising group in 2004, said he saw no inconsistency in working for Mr. McCain. Mr. Bush was right for 2000, he said, and Mr. McCain is right for 2008. “At the end of the day, the campaign will be won or lost on the character of the candidate and his or her core message,” Mr. McKinnon said. “Of course, I believe that will be John McCain.”

Asked if the senator would avoid the attacks he criticized in 2000, Mr. Jones said that while Mr. McCain had yet to declare his candidacy, any campaign he ran would be “consistent with his beliefs and values.”

==================

With the backdrop of the Repug-lost Iraq and Aghan wars continuing to waste US lives and resources, I expect the desperate Repugs to wage the nastiest, most vile, most slimy, most dishonest campaign that This Great Shining Country of Ours as ever seen.

[jochhejaam]

If he continues to suck social conservative dick, McCain might get the nomination.

Eloquently put CD.

McCain's not the one regardless of whose favor he curries.

[Nbadan]

McCains loss is Giuliani's gain...

In GOP presidential race, McCain slips; Giuliani gains luster

McCain's favorability has dropped below 50 percent for the first time since 1999, presumably over his support for the Iraq war.
By Linda Feldmann | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
WASHINGTON


In polls, the top two contenders for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination have long been Sen. John McCain of Arizona and former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani.

But pundits have tended to discount Mr. Giuliani's chances, given his liberal stands on social issues such as abortion and gay rights. Now, a combination of factors is forcing a new look at both Senator McCain's vulnerabilities, particularly over his steadfast support for an unpopular Iraq war, and Giuliani's potential to overcome weaknesses.

For the first time since October 1999, McCain's favorability rating among American voters has dropped below 50 percent. A Gallup poll taken last month showed him at 48 percent, down 6 points from November, and down from a high of 67 percent in February 2000. Giuliani, in contrast, has held above 60 percent favorability in Gallup polls, most recently at 62 percent. Now that Giuliani has signaled a serious intention to run, stating on Monday "I'm in this to win" as he filed papers with the Federal Election Commission, the comparisons grow in importance.

For Giuliani, winning over enough of the conservative Republican base to secure the nomination has long been seen as a potentially insurmountable task. But now, analysts say, it's possible that Republican-leaning independents could make the difference in the early GOP primaries.

CS Monitor (http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0208/p01s01-uspo.htm)

[Nbadan]

Once a snake...

McCain Will Skip Iraq Vote
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: February 16, 2007
Filed at 3:10 p.m. ET


WASHINGTON (AP) -- Republican presidential hopeful John McCain, a staunch supporter of sending more troops to Iraq, will skip a Senate vote on the war Saturday to campaign in Iowa while other candidates rearrange their schedules.

In control of the Senate, Democrats called the rare Saturday session for the procedural vote. They need 60 votes to advance a nonbinding resolution criticizing President Bush's plan to boost the number of U.S. forces in the nearly four-year-old war.

McCain, R-Ariz., has derided the Democratic move as political trickery. He backs Bush's plan, and his presence or absence would make no difference in the outcome of the vote. So, he plans to stick to his itinerary of three town hall meetings in Iowa, the early voting state in the primary process.

''He thinks it's a political stunt that Harry Reid is pulling instead of having actual open debate on Iraq,'' said Eileen McMenamin, a McCain spokeswoman.

NY Times (http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Iraq-2008.html?_r=1&oref=slogin)

The straight talk express.........

[boutons_]

February 17, 2007

Back at Home, McCain Annoys the G.O.P. Right

By JENNIFER STEINHAUER

SURPRISE, Ariz., Feb. 13 — The chairman of the local Republican Party here in the most populous county in Arizona has in his possession a bright yellow button with a black line slashed through the name McCain.

“I don’t wear it out very often,” said the chairman, Lyle Tuttle of the Maricopa County Republican Committee, in a slightly sheepish coda to a 20-minute vituperation about the state’s senior senator, served up from his living room chair.

“I think those who do not support Senator McCain,” Mr. Tuttle continued, “if they could just get the word out and help people to understand what has happened with him, we could have an impact.”

No doubt about it, Sen. John McCain, the Arizona Republican who would like to be president, is a popular man in his state, having won re-election in 2004 with about 76 percent of the vote.

But a vocal slice of the state’s most conservative Republicans, reflecting concerns about Mr. McCain held by some conservatives nationwide, are agitating against him in a way that they hope might throw off his incipient presidential campaign.

In a recent telephone poll by Arizona State University, 54 percent of the state’s Republican voters who were queried favored Mr. McCain in a presidential primary next February, a small enough majority to incite his critics and encourage some Republican rivals.

“Arizona is one place where we are very well organized,” said Kevin Madden, a spokesman for the presidential campaign of Mitt Romney, the Republican and former Massachusetts governor.

“We think we can go out there and make the case on pro-family issues, on fiscal issues and on strong borders,” Mr. Madden added.

Meanwhile, disgusted with Mr. McCain’s position on proposed changes to immigration laws (he advocates legalization that would not require illegal immigrants to leave the country), with what some see as wavering on the issue of gay marriage (he lent his name to a state ballot initiative to ban it but did not support a constitutional amendment), and with the campaign finance act that bears his name, some Arizona Republicans are making trouble for Mr. McCain.

They have elected local party leaders whom he opposes, criticized his policy positions and thrown early support to other potential primary candidates — all in the hope of tripping up Mr. McCain on his own doorstep.

“They can make trouble for him,” said Bruce D. Merrill, an Arizona State University political scientist and polling expert. “It is too early in terms of voting to tell, but it certainly could potentially affect people’s decision to give him money.”

The senator’s supporters are quick to write off the detractors as a fringe of the raucous state party that will be flattened like pita bread once primary day arrives next year. As a practical matter, Mr. McCain’s supporters point out, Arizona’s large swaths of independent voters can vote in the Republican primary, which will be a boon to Mr. McCain even if he loses some votes within his own party.

“When I was a little kid, I was really into western movies,” said Matt Salmon, former chairman of the Arizona Republican Party, who resigned with the intention to work for Mr. McCain’s presidential campaign. “In one of those, the cavalry was outmanned by attacking Indians, so they put a bunch of branches on the backs of horses, who then kicked up a lot of dust to make it look like there were a lot more people than there were. These guys drag around a lot of branches and kick up a lot of dust.”

Outnumbered or not, Mr. McCain’s critics now hold leadership positions in Maricopa County, the state’s most Republican enclave and biggest media market, which includes Phoenix. Their passion about the immigration issue, their flirtations with other candidates and their persistent harping underscore the skepticism about Mr. McCain that already exists among many hard-line conservatives here and around the nation.

They have been angered by Mr. McCain’s opposition to tax cuts backed by the White House; by his immigration position, which places him on a collision course with other Republicans; by his moves to close a loophole on gun purchases; and by his vote for the fetal stem cell research bill.

The Maricopa County Republican Party recently conducted a straw poll that depicted Mr. McCain as losing badly to Representative Duncan Hunter of California, a conservative unknown to the majority of Arizona voters, then touted it with unmasked glee. The poll was derided as a sham by Mr. Merrill, the political scientist, and others who questioned the methodology.

Among some Republicans here, Mr. Romney, a Mormon who may benefit from his faith’s strongholds around the state, is also mentioned as a viable alternative to Mr. McCain. Mr. Romney is supported by Joe Arpaio, the Maricopa County sheriff, among others.

Mr. McCain “can’t just take it as a given that he is going to win here,” said Randy Pullen, the new chairman of the Arizona Republican Party, who got the post by narrowly defeating a more moderate Republican backed by Mr. McCain. “He is going to have to work.”

In some ways, Mr. McCain’s troubles here reflect a fracas within the state party that has pit its more centrist members, long the stronghold of its leadership, against its most hard-line factions who call Mr. McCain “elitist.”

For several years, various critics have complained that he has been aloof, that he has a brittle temper and that he has made missteps on key conservative issues.

Although Mr. McCain was ultimately victorious in the 2000 presidential primary, Gov. Jane Dee Hull of Arizona, a fellow Republican, took the unusual step of endorsing his opponent, George W. Bush, who was then Texas governor.

In 2001, two unsuccessful recall movements arose against the senator. In 2005, some groups around the state that advocate a strict deportation policy for illegal immigrants wrote letters of censure or displeasure attacking Mr. McCain for his stance. “The grass roots are burning mad,” said Gary Watson, former chairman of the Mohave County Republican Central Committee. “We want to defend our borders. We don’t want them to have citizenship.”

So who would be better for Arizona?

“I am real excited about Rudy Giuliani,” said Mr. Watson, even though the former New York mayor has a more liberal record on abortion rights, gun control and gay rights than Mr. McCain. “The social issues are a little bit looser than what I appreciate,” Mr. Watson said. “But he is stronger than McCain on the border issue, and the border issue is so immense to deal with.”

While much of the rumbling against Mr. McCain is among party leaders, they have managed to leave an impression among some voters.

“I could be persuaded to vote for someone else,” Kathleen Hall, 60, a Republican who supported Mr. Bush in 2000, said as she sipped coffee in a Scottsdale outdoor mall this week. “McCain is not my favorite candidate. He would just as easily tomorrow turn into a Democrat.”

Mr. McCain, who was elected to Congress from Arizona in 1982 and who succeeded Barry Goldwater in the Senate in 1986, does not appear to be shivering.

“Folks recognize that he is a principled and committed conservative who has delivered for his constituents,” said Danny Diaz, a spokesman for Mr. McCain’s presidential exploratory committee.

And plenty of people think it is a fool’s errand to try to prove otherwise.

“Anybody who thinks John McCain wouldn’t win a Republican primary in Arizona is not living in the real world,” said Mr. Merrill, the Arizona State University political scientist.

That does not mean they won’t try.

“He would do a lot better in the general here than he would do in the primary,” said Jack Hustead, who chairs the Apache County Republican Committee, “because in a primary, there are other options.”

[Nbadan]

http://images.ucomics.com/comics/tmjoh/2007/tmjoh070221.gif

[Nbadan]

Feb 23, 9:25 PM EST
McCain Says Iraq Could End His Career
By CURT WOODWARD
Associated Press Writer


SEATTLE (AP) -- Republican presidential hopeful John McCain said Friday that British Prime Minister Tony Blair has sacrificed his career to support the Iraq war, and the Arizona senator acknowledged that he could face the same fate.

McCain, a staunch defender of President Bush's new Iraq troop deployment strategy, said he worries that a cutback of British troops in southern Iraq announced by Blair this week could lead to stronger control by "Iranian-backed Shiite" forces. But he said Blair and the British deserve gratitude for their efforts.

"He has literally sacrificed his political career because of Iraq," McCain said during an appearance before the World Affairs Council and the City Club of Seattle. "That is a great testament to his political courage."

Asked later by a reporter if he was in danger of making the same sacrifice, McCain responded, "Sure."

AP (http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/O/ON_THE_2008_TRAIL?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2007-02-23-21-24-31)

Wasn't he going to commit suicide if the Demos won in the fall?

[Spurtacular]

:lmao

2008 Chump vs. 2009 Chump


I don't consider it a true thing.

Bush said he doesn't think about Bin Laden anymore, so why should I?


That was McCain. He said it was a secret plan (to capture/kill Osama) and apparently it is staying a secret because he didn't get elected.... does McCain just hate America?

[Pavlov]

:lmao

2008 Chump vs. 2009 Chump:lol You've really lost your mind over me.

[ducks]

Republican presidential hopeful John McCain, a staunch supporter of sending more troops to Iraq, will skip a Senate vote on the war Saturday to campaign in Iowa while other candidates rearrange their schedules.



TRAITOR!

[ducks]

Once a snake...

[B]McCain Will Skip Iraq Vote
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: February 16, 2007
Filed at 3:10 p.m. ET



NY Times (http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Iraq-2008.html?_r=1&oref=slogin)

The straight talk express.........skipping lots of votes still

[SnakeBoy]

Would be sweet if he rode into DC and made putting Amy Coney Barrett on the court his last act.

[Spurtacular]

skipping lots of votes still

He's entitled. It's not like the American people expect him to do his job.