The Only NYC Paper's Endorsement McCain's Gonna Get...

I forget to mention yesterday, it wasn't really a surprise, but still nice to see...there's a reason I pick up the Post with my coffee and ham, egg and cheese bagel at Bagel World each Saturday morning, and it's not because of Page Six. (Although the great Mets coverage doesn't hurt)

"THE Post today enthusiastically urges the election of Sen. John S. McCain as the 44th president of the United States."

Team McCain Favors the Yankees?

Oh dear. It's really really a good thing that McCain brought Palin in when he did, or else this, combined with his stance on immigration, could have been the final nail in his coffin in terms of my vote...

from BusinessWeek, via the Corner

The Palin Bounce

Palin/McCain lead, 50-46% among likely voters, according to Gallup

It's hard not to feel excited about this, the first substantial lead for McCain, although there's certainly a long long way to go. The campaign needs to keep Palin out there and visible, let her shoulder a lot of the load for McCain, keep pressing the experience angle, and start hammering the Dems on economic and energy issues. At this point, it would seem that the race is McCain's to lose, although with the electoral college shaped the way it is, it's still a very, very tight race.

McCain's Veep

As I mentioned briefly earlier this morning, I would have very little problem with John McCain selecting someone like Rudy Guiliani or even Joe Lieberman as his VP candidate. If the election was a lock, if McCain was up by fifteen points in every poll and somehow had California, New York, and Texas assured, than by all means, pick a Bobby Jindal or Fred Thompson, get them out there, pave the way for the next election.

But the way November is shaping up, McCain is going to have to do everything he can in order to keep the White House in Republican hands, and if that means bringing someone on board who can shore up support among independents, centrists, and even some on the left, then he's gotta do what he's gotta do.

Lieberman has been bandied about recently as a possible Veep pick, and despite his liberal stances on many issues, he is certainly someone that many on the left, and in the middle, respect. In the eight years since he lost as Al Gore's VP, Lieberman, perhaps more so than any other Democrat out there (maybe Zell Miller beats him), Lieberman has shown that he is willing to stand up for his beliefs and to say what he thinks, rather than what the opinion polls tell him to do. For the most part, despite the left's constant claims of a Cheney-run White House, the VP still has little actual power or influence, and if bringing a centrist on board is what it is going to take to keep Obama out of the White House, than I can live with that. I'm already going to holding my nose when I pull the lever for McCain, and I can't really pinch it any tighter.

McCain Up by 5 in Zogby Poll

Reuters/Zogby Poll: McCain Makes a Move, Takes 5-Point Lead Over Obama

Granted, this should be taken with a large grain of salt, since it's a Zogby poll (or just because it's a poll in general), but regardless, it's nice to see. To this point, Obama has been much closer than he "should" have been, but McCain has always seemed unable to actually surge ahead, or open up any kind of lead of his own, possibly indicating that Obama's smaller than expected lead was due largely to his base's dissatisfaction, instead of any kind of support for McCain, and that when it came down to brass tacks in November, the left wing would hold their noses (like so many Republicans will be doing with McCain) and vote Obama. McCain needs to start converting some undecideds, and that's one reason I have no problem with him possibly choosing a centrist as a VP. But that's a separate issue.

But this item also brings to mind another item that's been on my mind for a while now.

Republicans, and I certainly include myself in this group, often seem very akin to the "uncool" kid in high school, outwardly dismissive of the affection of his better-looking, more popular, more athletic peers, seemingly content to exist as an outsider, waiting for the day when the real world will take over and success and popularity will instead be determined by wealth and intelligence and hard work.

Republicans generally are content to be dismissive of the mainstream media, of European opinion, of polls, and particularly of Hollywood, content to believe that our policies are best, that we'll be ultimately be proven right when the real world sets in, and this is often the case. However, there also seems to exist an inclination on the right to fall all over ourselves when finally someone from the popular crowd shows us any sort of affection.

As much as we tend to look down upon the Hollywood crowd and (rightfully) ridicule them when they spout off on things about which they apparently know nothing, whenever one of them comes out and says something that could remotely label them as a fellow right-thinker, we seem to go out of our way to embrace them, to hold them up as some sort of proof of acceptance, like the AV kid that somehow ends up at the same prom table as the star athlete. If it doesn't matter (and it really shouldn't) what David Mamet or Robert Downey Jr. thinks about politics or foreign policy when they're towing the liberal party line, then it should hold equally little water when they "convert."

But hey, it's nice to feel liked :)

Putting McCain's "Cross in the Dirt Story" in Perspective

Great, impassioned rant at Riehl World View on the contrast between John McCain and Barack Obama, and the depths to which the left is willing to sink in order to trash an American hero, one of the few we've got left.

I Honestly Can't Believe I'm Reading This

What is quite well known beyond ANY shadow of a doubt is that Senator John McCain spent five years in captivity for serving his country during which time he was brutalized to such a severe extent that he still carries the scars and handicap from that captivity.

What is also well known beyond any shadow of a doubt is that Senator Barack Obama had some form of long-standing tie to an unrepentant domestic terrorist - but we can't know the extent of those ties because the Richard J. Daley Library of the University of Illinois at Chicago is blocking access to the records of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge.

And all Andrew Sullivan and a significant number of new media members on the Left care about is whether or not a North Vietnamese prison guard drew a cross in the sand with a stick some 40 years ago?

Sorry, but are you people f~&/ing insane? Do you not have any sense of what country you actually live in today? Do you really not understand why America has rejected your presidential candidates at the ballot box in so many elections over these last forty or so years?

Read the whole thing (there's not much beyond what I've quoted) except for the opening, which quotes Andrew Sullivan and provides the spark for what follows. On a side note, I remember back when I first became interested in politics, back when W was running against Gore, I was in college, interning in the House of Representatives, and I began reading and following a number of blogs, trying to learn everything I could about politics and our country and the men who were leading it.

One of the bloggers that I read religiously was Andrew Sullivan. His writing was incisive, well-reasoned, and largely free from hyperbole and generalization, all the traits that seem to seperate writers (particularly bloggers) on the right from those on the left. His change of heart and mind since that time has been depressing to witness, to say the least. I completely understand that people's world views change, particularly when a major aspect of one's life (his sexuality) is seen as abnormal or wrong by a fair number of those you're working with.

It must have been extremely difficult to maintain his relatively conservative stance in the face of those in the gay community and on the left who called him traitor, and much worse, and his courage at the time was one of the things that drew me to his writing, but the drastic shift in the quality of his thinking and writing since his "conversion" to the left has been remarkable, and tough to watch.

The National Enquirer Scoops Everyone

Edwards Admits Sexual Affair; Lied as Presidential Candidate from ABC News

How is it possible that this story stayed under wraps in the mainstream media for so long after the National Enquirer first broke it? Is it at all possible that a similar allegation about a Republican politician would have been blatantly ignored for this long?

You'll recall, back in February, the New York Times ran a front-page story that all-but accused John McCain of having an affair with a female lobbyist. The story has yet to be proven accurate, in any sense of the word, and yet that didn't stop the "paper of record" from splashing it all over their front page.

Meanwhile, a former relative front runner for the Democratic nomination for President is all but caught with his hand in the proverbial cookie jar, and the Times, and the vast majority of the rest of the media is silent.

The Paris Hilton Response "Ad"

It's everywhere by now, but I like Ann Althouse, so I'll credit her - not that anyone's following my links, but hey, a guy can dream...

See the video at Althouse's site, or at FunnyorDie.com

I though Paris did a great job. Obviously I have no idea how much of this, if any, was her doing, but at least she demonstrated that she can at least read, and has a decent sense of comic timing, unlike, for instance, her co-star in the original McCain ad, Britney Spears.

Not to go off on a tangent here, but as a big fan of How I Met Your Mother, Britney's much ballyhooed recurring guest spot was one of the single most unfunny bits of an otherwise consistently hilarious show. I understand the girl has gone through some tough times and whatnot, but she was really bad. Really bad. And then afterwards, Yahoo! or some other fake news source had an article or two that I didn't read talking about how Britney was upset that she didn't get nominated for Best Guest Performance at the Teen Choice Awards or some other fake awards show. Or maybe it was the Emmys. Which is also pretty meaningless, particularly in the Best Guest Performance category.

Not to go off on a tangent from my original tangent, but from what Paris is showing here, she would have done a helluva better job than Britney. How hard is it to be funny, with the writers they've got on that show, acting opposite the brilliance that is NPH for the majority of your scenes? Her timing was horrible, her delivery was stilted and forced...I'm still upset. The best part was when the brilliance that is grown up Doogie came out immediately afterwards and basically said that the show didn't need guest stars, particularly Britney Spears. Good stuff.

Anyway...Paris was good, the ad was funny, I don't know whether or not it was pro-McCain, as Ann Althouse claims, but it certainly wasn't anti-McCain, and I can definitely see how it could be interpreted as anti-Obama. Up front, Hilton dismisses Obama as "that other guy," and then basically parrots much of his energy plan. If McCain fails to refer to Obama's plan as "the Hilton Plan" by mistake in an upcoming debate, he'll be missing a great opportunity.

And, no matter what you think of her as a person (some suggestions: trashy, disgusting, vacuous, everything that's wrong with Western Civ., etc.) she's easier on the eyes than say, any politician out there. Except maybe the governor of Alaska.

This was quite tangent-filled, sorry.

McCain Running On All Cylinders

McCain visiting motorcycle rally, nuke power plant
via headline on Drudge

As his opponent continues to struggle, reversing himself on issue after issue, John McCain seems to be hitting his stride, riding the momentum of a strong week and a tie in the polls. He's visiting nuclear power plants, attending motorcycle rallies, calling out Congress for taking vacations, and hanging with Def Leppard and Lynyrd Skynyrd. He also had a couple great lines reported in the above article, including:

"As you may know, not long ago a couple hundred thousand Berliners made a lot of noise for my opponent. I'll take the roar of 50,000 Harleys any day."

and

"My opponent wants to set a date to come home. I want us to come home with victory and honor so we will never go back again."

Good, solid stuff. Obama seems to be reeling a bit, his press cover is faltering, and McCain now has a number of issues on which he can continue to hammer the golden boy. Keep it up.

New poll shows Obama losing support among young, women

Good news for McCain, for what it's worth - polls are always suspect, but if this is true, it means that McCain is cutting into what has been one of Obama's strongholds, younger voters. I have nothing to base this on beyond my personal feelings as a young voter (and at 28, do I even count as one of those still?), but I'd like to think that this is at least partially a reaction to the events of the past couple weeks, the scene in the House with the GOP staying behind, McCain's recent Moses ad, the increased general feistiness of the McCain campaign.

Speaking for myself, again, hopefully as a "younger" voter, I'm tired of seeing things run in Washington the way they have been my whole life. I'm tired of corruption and the status quo, and right now, despite all of Obama's talk of change, McCain is the candidate who is actually shaking things up. Right now, Obama is following McCain's lead on energy and on Iraq, trying desperately to somehow get to his right, angering his base in the process. Meanwhile, McCain and the GOP members in the House are able to sit back and gently mock Obama and Nancy Pelosi, inject some fun, some excitement into politics. Most importantly, McCain and the GOP are conveying the sense that things are actually getting done. This isn't politics as usual, this is members of the House of Representatives setting up webcams, using Twitter in the absence of CSPAN. Who knew energy policy could be exciting? Certainly not young voters, but they're starting to find out.

McCain Goes on the Offensive

I love the direction that the McCain campaign seems to be heading in with their latest ad/tactics.

Humor has been too long absent from politics, a subject particularly worthy of ridicule and mockery, but between the excellent (not perfect, but I'll take what I can get) "Moses" ad and McCain's recent fundraising proposal/ridicule of Obama's Tire Pressure Energy Plan, the GOP seems to be shrugging off the mantle of the staid old gang without a sense of humor, and none too soon.

Americans have always loved the scrappy underdog, it's time for the Republicans to start acting like one.