This is nothing like swiftboating. Even in his post he didn't criticize McCain's service, just pointed out that there were hundreds of others and that the treatment improved after 69.
He felt the experience added to the issue of his age but we already know he is old.
The temper isn't a new issue and he talked about that as something that was already part of him, he isn't blaming it on war or POW years. It is John. It is known, but evidently not well enough.
The other issues were unrelated to service, they were about his views and shifting views.
This is opinion and fact, not distortions or attacks. In his article he even said he acted honorably as a POW.
Reminds me of people saying Clark swiftboated him. No he didn't. It's true that crashing a plane or being a POW is not related to being a good president.

Posted at September 2, 2008 2:00 PM in response to New Movie Quotes Fellow McCain POW Saying McCain Not Fit To Be President

The complaints go way back. That doesn't make it a good thing, it just makes it his norm.
Here is a Washington Post article from January 28, 2008. The title tells the tale. Interesting, he says they will do corrections but don't spin events to press, unusual.
Team Obama Is Courting Everybody But the Press

Mitchell was complaining so much about access the first few days but at the same time she was saying what a horrible position Obama was putting the military in since they don't want to look like part of a campaign.
Did she think letting press in as he met with troops would make it less like campaigning, be less intrusive?
Before the trip it seemed like all the media talk would be how serious a gaffe would be. hen he didn't make big mistakes we heard about how presumptuous and arrogant this trip might make him appear. By acting dignified and appropriately? First he was going to be in trouble by looking bad, now by looking to good. I know the complaint about a loving media but he is not pampered by them at all;

I've heard complaints that he is punishing some of the press by not including them but the 40 press seats are full. Would those included feel punished if they were excluded instead? That's a hard call...if he left 10 seats empty I'd be more worried.

I am surprised but glad to hear the campaign was sweet to the press later. It's not the worst idea.

By the way I try to forget that seal, good that they got rid of it.

Posted at July 26, 2008 1:59 AM in response to Too much of a good thing for Obama?

Well nice job Desidero. Obama has a fine sense of humor, he just isn't that funny. Big ears, bad bowling, healthy eating, how far can that go?

This joke is not mine.

Tony Snow arrived in heaven and soon was let into a room of his dreams. There was John Kennedy talking to Reagan, Tim Russert laughing with George Washington.... Tony was looking around the full room in delight when suddenly everyone stopped talking and looked to the door attentively.

Tony looked and saw that it was Barack Obama that had just walked in. Tony turned to his guide and said "Why is he here? He was alive and healthy...". His guide stopped him and said "Oh that's God, he just thinks he's Obama"

Posted at July 22, 2008 8:53 AM in response to An Obama Joke, at Last!!!

The sites like that one or No Quarter do not represent the vast majority of those who voted for Clinton but they are not comparable to this site or Kos. I use to think we were sometimes ruder than needed about Clinton until I stumbled onto a thread at NQ one day and I learned what hate was, learned what smears were.

Most who voted for Clinton did not loathe Obama though some do for their own reasons. However much of what you hear from Dems who say they will vote for McCain were said by the Clinton campaign for a long time, often by Hillary herself.
For instance she has compared Obama to a Blank Screen, to bush, to rove, compared his experience unfavorably to McCain, often said he has done nothing, he gives good speeches. She brought up Farrakhan and Hamas, made Ayers and bombs sound close and dangerous and like he was lying about it...
Repeated many times that while he was good at words he didn't keep his word.
Oh...and that she was the real winner who they kept trying to force out.

People should know this is just negative campaigning, just the style she chose to use but a lot of people believe what she said about him, they repeat it. They dislike Obama and are angry at the party and the media
She endorsed him, good. I heard her and I thought her avid folks would get angrier that she was "forced" to do that...and that is indeed what they say. I know she can't really say "Oh that unqualified, empty, dishonest, dangerous stuff...just kidding"

That doesn't compare to what the campaign did behind the scenes. I like to hope she'd tell hillary44 to cut it out but her official site linked to No Quarter that is a pure hate site. (Don't know if it still does)
That is the bad part about negative campaigning within your own party. There are consequences and we are seeing them.

Posted at June 15, 2008 1:37 AM in response to Hard-Hearted Hillary Hardcore: What is Wrong with these People?

That's a good idea! Her 18 million (No idea where she got that number though) might need to send her $2.00 each though, not sure what her final debt is. (I wonder what her priority in paying them is. The small businesses she owes would feel the pinch most but it is the debt to herself she is limited in paying back after the nomination.)

But wouldn't her voters listen to her more than to him? She could give a nice speech about how hard she worked for them, ask for two bucks. If he asked for her some would say he was arrogant, condescending or sexist. Or Muslim just for the heck of it.

(The other comments look like they are responding to your headline and not your post.)

Posted at June 5, 2008 2:17 AM in response to Obama: help retire Hillary's debt

A May 14, 2008 survey (margin of error of +/- 2.4) shows some reasons Clinton may not do well on the ticket and who seems to give Clinton the advantage we see.

Answer to the latter,Democrats of course. Although Obama is ahead in surveys of Democrat's preference it is the Democrats who say they won't vote for Obama that makes him look weaker, the percentage of Hillary supporters who say it's her or no Dem vote.
I hope these tables work out, don't see a preview button.
They both beat McCain in this poll. Here is the differential against McCain with each group

Total Rep Dems Ind
Clinton +5 -82 +69 tie
Obama +7 -77 +62 +11

No, it's not those working class white voters we talk about. They broke that group into a category too and here is how they did against McCain within the subgroups of the White Working Class

(I have to use an n for - sign or I get a strike out due to html codes)
white working class

18-44 high sc college men women
Obama +15 n7 n4 n14 tie
Clinton +3 n7 n7 n17 +2

Here is why her addition to the ticket concerns me since he will certainly need all the outside the party votes he can get. Dems REALLY like Hillary. It's the only group where she has a higher favorable than unfavorable. Here is the differential of favorable - unfavorable for each candidate.

Tot Rep Dem Ind Men Women Wht Blk Clinton +3 n60 +48 n1 n5 +11 n2 +35 Obama +16 n37 +43 +32 +11 +20 +7 +74 McCain+14 +70 n28 +20 +21 +7 +23 n38

5% more Democrats rate Clinton favorablely than they do Obama but he has a huge advantage with Independents, not just 33% over Clinton but 12% edge over McCain. He does better than Clinton with men, better than McCain or Clinton with women, better than Clinton with whites and better than either with black voters.

We can guess that some Dems who now say they will not vote for Obama will consider the age and health of the Supreme Cort, consider Iraq, consider health care, consider banking regulations, consider the restoration of balance of power and all the things that supposedly matter to us and will grudgingly vote Obama.

But how many of the Independents and even small number of Republicans who plan to or might vote Obama will decide not to because of their anti-Clinton bias?

Posted at May 28, 2008 1:38 PM in response to Bill Clinton's "Coverup" comment.

I was happy to see the comments to that stupid article told the author it was a stupid article.

Aside from the stupid sexist attacks against Obama you have to love the description of "Axelrod, the Karl Rove of the Democratic Party" Why of course he is, just like Hillary said Obama used Karl Rove tactics. Makes sense in reverse speak. They not only didn't make up scandals against Clinton, they didn't use the very real ones old or new.

People who say Obama's calm composure scare them scare me. Wonder if they ever read article like this one in Salon. They interviewed many experienced military officers and leaders about which of the three candidates they wanted handling an emergency. I heard an interview with the author of this piece, he wanted to just compare Obama and Clinton but his editor insisted on including McCain.The author thought that would ruin the story, they'd all want McCain. Well no, they were sort of scared of him in that role. Imagine, they wanted someone who was calm and composed and got cooler in crisis.

An amusing excerpt for the author of that article to consider

Most recently, Wayne has been studying Clinton's personality. "I just gave a presentation on Hillary's temperament for the presidency. I came to the conclusion that it is not really a good presidential temperament, with one caveat -- if you compare it with McCain's."

I regret that it is not enough to assure the author that Obama can be president without having an affair. Of course if he did it probably wouldn't have been with gabby young girls or women he tried to force and he might not report details of his sex life to her. In fact he looks very familiar to me and people wonder how my son got that tall slim build and is the only left hander in our family. My son also uses a lot of hand gestures, is very calm, composed and gracious and is against dumb wars.

Ms. Welsh doesn't know what a real man is.

Posted at May 28, 2008 9:41 AM in response to Obama: Not "Man" Enough?

I read a complaint recently in a Detroit paper about the way Obama describes that talk with the automakers in his speeches. They agree that he came here and was honest with them and that it took courage. What they disagree with was that he said "Nobody clapped". They said he got some rousing applause and a couple of standing ovations.

I haven't looked for original accounts but it was funny to read.

Posted at May 23, 2008 2:34 PM in response to Obama To Defend Negotiations With Cuba, In Front Of Miami Cuban Audience

Let's look at more swing states
Obama is polling as well or better than Clinton in big blue states NY, CA, NJ, MA, PA.
The big swing states FL (27 EV) and OH(20EV)? She is definitely doing better in Florida,than Obama but only polling a couple over McCain in recent polls. In Ohio she's beating McCain but Obama is just a point or two behind McCain in 2 other recent polls.
But she is up in the two swing states worth 47 EV
The other swing states vs McCain
I'm getting these from http://www.realclearpolitics.com
Wisconsin (10 EV) Obama +5 Clinton -3
Iowa (7 EV) Obama +6 Clinton -3
Minnesota (10 EV) Obama +14 Clinton tie
New Mexico (5 EV) Obama +9 Clinton +6
Colorado (9 EV) Obama + Clinton -14
Michigan (17 EV) Obama +2 Clinton -3
Oregon (7 EV) Obama +10.4 Clinton -0.3
Washington (11 EV)Obama +10 Clinton +1
Nevada (5 EV) Obama -0.3 Clinton -8
So Obama is up in these swing states worth 81 EV

But who's counting.

Posted at May 22, 2008 10:36 AM in response to Polls: Hillary Outperforms Obama Against McCain In Three Key Swing States

There has been extra effort given to giving Jewish voters concerns about Obama. Smearing Obama describes a lot of these efforts of the

e-mails and articles about Barack Obama bouncing around the Internet. They distort Obama's religious faith, question his support for Israel, warp the identity and positions of his campaign advisers and defame his friends and allies from Chicago. The purpose of the smear is to paint him as an Arab-loving, Israel-hating, terrorist-coddling, radical black nationalist. That picture couldn't be further from the truth, but you'd be surprised how many people have fallen for it. The American Jewish community, one of the most important pillars of the Democratic Party and US politics, has been specifically targeted

The Nation article describes some of how it is done and who is behind it and how some of the craziest theories and articles move from smear to something that has an air of respectability.

They name some of the right wingers including both Christian and Jesish right wing that work on the smears(Ed Lasky, a blogger whose articles gets into AmericanThinker.com , Aaron Klein, an Orthodox Jew who is Jerusalem correspondent for WorldNetDaily and others)and how the articles move. Also of note:

Even if the false claims about Obama originally emanated from the neoconservative right, the Clinton campaign has eagerly pushed them. Clinton operative Sidney Blumenthal has e-mailed damaging stories about Obama to reporters, including a recent article by Batchelor. Clinton fundraiser Annie Totah circulated a column by Ed Lasky before Super Tuesday, with the inscription "Please vote wisely in the Primaries." Clinton adviser Ann Lewis falsely referred to Zbigniew Brzezinski, a critic of AIPAC, as a chief adviser to Obama on a conference call with Jewish reporters. "I can tell you for a fact people from the Clinton campaign are calling reporters and asking them to pay attention to things involving Obama and Israel," says Shmuel Rosner, Washington correspondent for the Israeli daily Ha'aretz. The volume of e-mails about Obama in a given state tends to track the election calendar--hardly a coincidence.

Then we have other little helpers. From McClatchy Newspapers earlier this month
Where did the Web rumors about Obama

One practitioner in Virginia, who hates Obama like a dog hates cats, led a reporter through his efforts. Because the man is a retired clandestine CIA officer, identifying him could endanger officers or operations that remain classified, so McClatchy will not reveal his name.

In late 2006, convinced that an Obama presidency would be disastrous for America, he decided to start an anti-Obama operation. He combed the public record on Obama. He used a couple of allies and informants — half-jokingly dubbing his group "The Crusaders" — to learn about Obama's background, especially his Africa connection and how he came to be the editor of the Harvard Law Review.

He assembled a dossier on Obama, including allegations that Obama attended a madrassa, or Islamic religious school, in his youth in Indonesia.

Then the retired spook tried to get Israeli intelligence officials interested in his Obama dossier. They weren't, to his chagrin. He also shopped it to some foreign reporters. Again, no luck.

He wound up posting some of it on a blog — and where it went from there in the vast world of cyberspace is anybody's guess.

We can't make the obvious guess about who this retired CIA agent is because he writes to whoever does and violently denies it but if Obama has more than one ex-CIA agent ho hates Obama like a dog hates cats and obsesses and smears Obama on these very issue, well God help us.

There are some Jewish bloggers who say they can get up to 25 Obama smearing e-mails a week.

So I don't think Jewish voters just get concerned by a black guy with that name, they are barraged with reasons to be suspicious.

Posted at May 22, 2008 10:12 AM in response to Obama To Address Middle East Issues Today, Courting Jewish Voters In Florida