It’s over, Debbie.
October 8, 2008 by Laura | Trackback URI
My husband and several other people I know were furious last night that McCain didn’t hammer Obama more than he did. While a spittle-flecked O’Blowhard style diatribe would have been immensely satisfying for the base, to the rest of the country it would have made McCain look like a geezer screaming, “Stay off my lawn!” I believe he did a pretty good job and confronted Obama as much as was feasible, considering that the fix was in.
It’s easy for political junkies who read blogs to forget: most people think ACORN is what a squirrel hides. Sure, they’re being investigated, but most people won’t hear of it.
They hear that tax breaks are coming. They don’t know that half the country doesn’t pay taxes at all. To them, a “tax break” is income redistribution free money! Whoohoo!
They hear that Obama supports Israel. The steady drip, drip, drip of his radical Arab/anti-Israel connections goes unnoticed.
They’re told to overlook Obama’s close ties to an unrepentant terrorist. Failure to do so is unforgiving and unAmerican. Don’t we believe in redemption? (Somehow the repentance part of that process is helpfully glossed over. I will at least give Ayers credit for not issuing a false apology.)
Somehow, in the debate last night they couldn’t hear the resemblance between Obama’s and Carter’s energy policies. Fill your tires. Turn down your thermostat. Weatherstrip your home. Wear a sweater. If they do notice, so what? Carter’s a good guy. He builds houses for the poor. What’s not to like?
They don’t notice how carefully their opinions are being shaped. Memory hole? What memory hole? Move along, prole. Do not criticize The One. Don’t question how a Constitutional scholar can be so wrong on so many Constitutional issues. Radical? Obama? Whyever would you think so? Measure and parse your words, lest you expose yourself as the racist you certainly are. Steal an election? Don’t you know that it’s the Republicans who do that?
We asked for this. All of it. The financial crisis, the socialist creep, the nanny state. At some level, people want it; they want to be “cared for” by their government instead of enjoying adult freedoms and responsibility. The Age of Obama is upon us, even if McCain does somehow win in spite of himself. There was a lot less light between McCain and Obama last night than the GOP would like to admit. But he may yet do it, and if he does, that will at least slow things down. Next election we can do better.
We’re being told it’s over. Not just the election, but the ideals that have characterized America since our beginning - freedom and responsibility. Independence. We should just accept a culture of dependence and nanny-statism - not unlike the “peace” of submission to Islam. But it isn’t quite over yet. We can still turn it around, and we must.
More debate reax here.
Except for his new mortgage bailout proposal — which I imagine some moderates/liberals will like — I thought McCain did superb. He answered every question, and he provided a great deal more passion than in the first debate (and he was already pretty decent at the first debate). He also went on the offensive a good bit, so much so that Obama tried to break the rules in order to respond and made himself look stupid.
On top of that, Obama rambled in quite a few of his answers, and a couple of Obama’s answers were practically incoherent. I really don’t buy the spin that McCain “lost the debate.” Far from it.
And that Obama gaffe you mentioned about the Sudan no-fly zone…I’m surprised I didn’t notice that mistake when I first heard it — you’re absolutely right. The people doing the massacre are riding around on horses, for the most part, not planes. That gaffe really needs to be played up.
Like Palin in the last debate, McCain could not have done much better. And just as McCain’s poll support has gone up since the Palin debate, I hope it goes up even further now.