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New Material for McCain’s Campaign Ads

Last week the Straight Talk Express metamorphosed into the Swift Boaters’ Express by launching at least three shameful attacks on Senator Barack Obama; attacks that had absolutely nothing to do with the issues or with the fitness of Senator Obama to be president.

Regrettably, the “latest barrage of ads” that included a blatantly false smear on the Senator’s patriotism and concern for the troops (The “Landstuhl incident”), compared him to Britney Spears and Paris Hilton, etc., are only the beginning of what promises to be one of the dirtiest campaigns in recent years, reminiscent of the infamous attacks on Senator Kerry’s patriotism in 2004.

I say this because, last week, the co-author of the Republican bestseller “Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry,” a book that contains numerous attacks on Sen. John Kerry’s patriotism and military service, has now authored a new book—one that also promises to become a Republican best seller: “The Obama Nation: Leftist Politics and the Cult of Personality.”

Oliver Willis says, “Jerome Corsi’s ‘Obama Nation’: Like Clockwork, Swift Boating Begins.” He is correct, right on cue, Corsi’s new book, all 384 pages, “scrupulously sourced with more than 600 footnotes,” promises to be a gold mine of material for innumerable inspiring and noble campaign ads by the new, re-invigorated McCain’s Swift Boaters Express. Stay tuned.

See also:

John Avlon: “McCain’s Negative Ads Could Lose Independent Voters” by our Editor-in Chief,Joe Gandelman, and

“McCain setting his own trap with celebrity gambit” by ELROD

  • elrod
    I've seen reviews of it and nothing in 't seem particularly new. Some of the points are actually already outdated - like calling talks with Iran treason. Seems that Bush has already gone that route.

    Jerome Corsi was a bit too late this time.

    Talk of "swift boating" is just panic garbage. The swift boaters did not defeat John Kerry. Fearmongering after 9/11, Kerry awful personality and Rove's superb GOTV campaign beat John Kerry.
  • superdestroyer
    Unless the swiftboaters catch SEnator Obama in bed with a live boy or a dead girl, there is nothing they can do that will keep Senator Obama from being elected.

    Of course, this is just one of about ten daily posting at The Moderate Voice about the horse race aspects of the presidential election. Even energy policy is defined in terms of the horse race instead of in terms of whether either candidate is making sense. Maybe someday, someone will actually begin to review the policy proposals and see who the winners and losers will be.

    LIke I have said before, look at the election from a fund mangers point of view. Where should anyone invest their retirement money with the policy proposals of Senator Obama?
  • Neocon
    What I find funny is that Barak obama the other day said, John McCain sure is talking about ME a lot lately. Maybe he needs to talk about the issues and we can discuss whats on peoples minds.

    Now the bloggers are obsessing with McCain and what he is doing and what he is going to do next. Poor Obama he can't win for losing. Its all about McCain and his adds.

    Free publicity. Think how many times they get played for free over and over again.
  • elrod
    Neocon,
    That's sort of true, but besides the point. Everybody wanted to know what Obama was going to do in response to these trash ads.

    McCain has BECOME his ad campaign. That's why for you to say, in another thread, that McCain is unlike Bush, is wrong. He is a full-on Rove disciple now. His old maverick schtick was either little more than a media fabrication, or if it was real, is now gone. The real John McCain is a pathetic, desperate, old man whose sole reason for running for the Presidency is that he was a POW 40 years ago.
  • christoofar
    I think Thursday's "Daily Show" pretty much hit the nail on the head with their piece on McCain.
    http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?v...
  • JSpencer
    Here's my take on it: If people are going to be as easily fooled by the swiftboating techniques this time around, then they will get the crappy government they deserve. By now they've had more than enough opportunity via facts and records to tell what is in the countries interest and what is in the far right's interest - anyone who has been paying attention knows they are most certainly not one and the same. 4 years of Obama will not make the monsters all go away and cure the economy, but it just might be enough to put the brakes on. 4 more years of the neo-GOP will almost certainly continue the downward trends we've experienced in recent years. Will the electorate be swayed by massive smearing from the right? I reckon we'll find out cuz the McCain folks appear determined to take the lowest road they can find.
  • DLS
    "Where should anyone invest their retirement money with the policy proposals of Senator Obama?"

    Government bonds? Make them federal bonds, because someday the feds will get so desperate for money they will no longer permit state and local bond income to be tax-free. (Actually, no government bond income should be tax-free; this is "cheating" by governments to lower their debt expenses by engaging in unfair competition with open, free market resources.)

    Given the reality about who is easily fooled, Obama's people may reduce the deficit from 400-500 billion to somewhere around 200-300 billion and declare a Great Victory. The deficits will involve spending on the "right" things and all will be well, we'll be told (and the fooled ones will nod their heads and sit down, on cue).

    * * *

    John Kerry's being a Massachusetts liberal doomed John Kerry from the start.
  • JSpencer
    You're right DLS, the current administration (which we all know McCain would be a continuation of) is taking the country exactly where it deserves to go. Pardon me if I sounded as though I believed otherwise.
  • DLS
    Another day, another non sequitur to what I post. Oh, well. [sigh] It actually would not be surprising if you were totally serious in the latest beliefs you expressed above.
  • Rudi
    Elrod points out the shallowness of McCain's "maverick" image. In a great post by the paleocon Daniel Larson finishes the "maverick" myth.
    http://www.amconmag.com/larison/2008/08/01/mcca...
    ...
    Of course, the “fiercely independent” McCain spent the bulk of 1999 and the early months of 2000 (and many years after that) trying to please other people. The difference then was that Ignatius and other members of the Washington press corps were the ones he was trying to please and unironically, accurately referred to members of the media as his base. During the 2000 campaign, he referred to the GOP establishment as the “evil empire,” which seemed perfectly fair and satisfactory to his boosters in the press because they thought this was simply a description of reality and not a slur. Pretty much every “maverick” episode in McCain’s career has involved staking out a position in opposition to his party in the interests of attracting good press and cultivating a reputation as one of the “good” Republicans–the “noble, tolerant” McCain that Conason refers to in his piece–and he has done this by adopting a haughty, self-righteous tone as a champion of reform fighting against the forces of corruption (campaign finance) and bigotry (immigration “reform”) within his own party. By endorsing the worst prejudices about his party held by his party’s political opponents (while enabling some of their genuinely worst attributes in his warmongering), he became renowned for his integrity, just as Republicans have been lauding Joe Lieberman for his character and courage for denouncing liberals, his own party and that party’s nominee in terms that perfectly fit GOP talking points.
    ...
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