How much of this do you actually buy?

His opponent has direct ties to 2 terrorist organizations (weather underground and the PLO).

By that logic, McCain also has "direct ties" to several felons and terrorist organizations himself. (Far more than 2.) Just as with Ayers, several convicted felons have held fundraisers for McCain. Other than being a bulletpoint in McCain's speech, what makes Ayers special for you? How is he different than the numerous convicted felons that raised funds for McCain? (I'm assuming you're smart enough to not fall for the "working for the same chairty" line.)

His opponent has a close personal friend and 'spiritual mentor' who is on tape saying 'God Damn America' and calling this country the 'USofKKKA', in addition to blaming us for creating AIDS.

Do you really want to look at who McCain's "close personal friends" are? We could start with Keating, if you like.

His opponent was on record demanding we surrender in Iraq, claiming the surge would be a failure and that the war was lost.

And McCain is on record claiming we would be greeted as liberators. You know, flowers and all that.

His opponent has close ties to ACORN (in fact he first ran for office as an ACORN candidate), a group now being investigated nationwide for voter fraud.

As does McCain. Also, ACORN is guilty merely of hiring lazy workers (and arguably having insufficient oversight of said workers). I sincerely doubt that the person who registered to vote 20 times will be allowed to vote 20 times, just because s/he has 20 voter registration cards. If it was that easy, I'm sure they'd just be able to use the same voter registration card 20 times.

His opponent has ties to the former heads of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac…

As does McCain…

…he is the biggest receiver of donations from Fannie Mae…

Not true. He has received no money from them. He has received money from their employees, as private citizens. As Obama has raised much more money than McCain overall, from many more people, it's no surprise that if you pick a random company, more of its employees will have donated money to Obama.

he supported the legislation (backed by ACORN) that directly caused the sub prime meltdown and destroyed the world financial markets

That's one perspective. Another is that McCain supported the legislation that removed the regulations (Glass-Steagall) designed to prevent this meltdown.

In short he is running against the most liberal candidate since McGovern, a man with no experience and radical views, and he is losing.

As has every Republican candidate who has ever run. I challenge you to find a Democratic candidate for President who wasn't called the most liberal.

This is not to say that it's OK for Obama to do something just because McCain did it. I don't believe that. However, most (if not all) of your accusations are based on such flimsy connections that they could be applied to almost any political candidate.

Or could it be that a majority of the American people have heard it and said. . . Not this time. We are not buying innuendo dressed up as facts.

And you are right McCain has run a terrible campaign, because rather than say why he would be better all he has done is say why Obama would be bad. And more to the point he couldn't even stick with on narrative on why he would be bad.

...once you’ve made a narrative choice, you do have to stick with it - you can’t just keep bouncing around, or people become confused. If you are telling the story of a scary vampire, you can’t decide in chapter 2 that he’s also 500 feet tall and radioactive and bent on destroying Tokyo, in chapter 3 that he is actually a giant man-eating shark, and in chapter 4 that he is all this and a super-terrorist trying to plant a nuclear bomb in Los Angeles. All of these things are, indeed, scary, but taken together they add up to a muddle.

Rather than addressing Mr. Clever Bulldog's rant, which is as tiresome as it is oft repeated, I will merely say that it is sad to me how impossible it is for one side to understand and respect the other. We come from different world views that have been subsequently reinforced by different experiences and we have enforced our prejudices with differing sources of information.

I love my brother, but we cannot talk politics because there's no basis of understanding. He thinks abortion is the only issue that matters. If I point out that it is a ploy that the conservatives use very successfully to get support, so successfully that they never actually DO anything about it because that would lose them a wedge issue, my brother becomes unhappy with my argument, but it doesn't change our relative stances and beliefs.

So, I'm sorry for you, Clever Bulldog, because you have chosen to believe a smear campaign that doesn't hold up when subjected to impartial scrutiny. You will never admit you're wrong, but will continue to filter every positive report about President Obama through your extremely slanted view of the world.

I would venture to say that even if President Obama manages to be a very good manager of our national crises in an extremely difficult time, he will get no credit from his opposition, no admission that their beliefs were incorrect, based on lies intended to provoke passion.

CleverBulldog,

Do you really believe that Palin is competent to be vice-president? President? To my knowledge, you have never answered this query.

Excellent piece on Politico about media 'bias', pretty much sums it up.....factually! Have you read it?

And have you considered the others who were involved in the Annenberg Challenge board, et al. and also served with Ayers? Supporters and friends of McCain!

What about McCain's former compatriot who has been arrested for voter fraud?

Interested in your reply.

Thanks.