Back in 2000, in South Carolina, the robocalls–and calls to local right-wing talk radio shows–were about John McCain’s “interracial child” and Cindy McCain’s drug addiction. They were a craven, disgusting tactic by the George W. Bush campaign. McCain was, rightly, outraged by them. Now McCain’s campaign is making robocalls distorting Barack Obama’s non-existent relationship with [...]
At least, not officially: HOLLAND, Ohio – Joe the Plumber said Thursday he doesn’t have a license and doesn’t need one. Joe Wurzelbacher, better known as Joe the Plumber, the nickname Republican John McCain bestowed on him during Wednesday’s presidential debate, said he works for a small plumbing company that does residential work. Because he [...]
Here’s what it looked like to Craig Duff and me…
You remember Iraq. I’ve been guilty–a classic journalistic (and U.S. governmental) sin–of letting my attention slip as violence has waned, Afghanistan has ramped up and we’ve been having this slightly interesting presidential election this year. But here, via the excellent Matt Duss, is the latest from AP about the continuing internecine squabbles–this time between the [...]
It’s a draw. This from the University of Wisconsin Advertising Project: Prof. Ken Goldstein, director of the Wisconsin Advertising Project, issued the following statement: “Analysis from the Wisconsin Advertising Project of Sen. John McCain’s television advertising for the week of September 28 to October 4 shows, in fact, that all McCain campaign TV advertising did [...]
Joe the Plumber was not the only person who got a shout-out last night. This from Jeff Chu as Fast Company: It wasn’t a surprise that both candidates, who have used the words “reform” and “change” about a million times in an effort to be seen as forces of reform and change, tried to align [...]
From TIME’s Massimo Calabresi: In the nearly sixteen thousand words uttered last night in the debate between John McCain and Barack Obama, one was noticeably absent: God. The deity got not a single mention, not even a perfunctory “God Knows,” or “Good God,” or “God Bless America”. In fact, in the three presidential debates, McCain [...]
I’ll have more to say about the debate in my print column, which releases later today. But I did want to say a few things about my colleagues–in general, no names–and the coverage of the campaign this year. Pundits tend to be a lagging indicator. This is particularly true at the end of a political [...]
From TIME’s Amy Sullivan: In politics it is generally not considered a good sign when voters are laughing at you, not with you. And by the end of the third and last presidential debate, the undecided voters who had gathered in Denver for Democratic pollster Stan Greenberg’s focus group were “audibly snickering” at John McCain’s [...]
