Meghan McCain Gets Schooled in History

Meghan McCain uses her youth as a crutch. Youth is supposed to be a positive, not an excuse not to know history. She appears to have a shallow understanding of most worldly things and like her dad, isn't up on the economy either. She doesn't know enough to be the voice of the moderate republicans. Anyone else?

Limbaugh's More UnPopular Than Ayers

Apologies to Bill Ayers, who has reformed himself to do good, while people like Limbaugh spread their nastiness on a daily basis, doing harm, essentially, to everyone.

The democrats are gleeful that Rush Limbaugh is popping out of his bubble to stir things up. Even David Plouffe has piled on.

While republicans see no harm (they are largely out of touch), democrats know this: Americans don't like Rush.

Sure, he has 20 million listeners (I think a good chunk of them are people who like to hate Limbaugh, and I'm skeptical about that number) but the bulk of Americans find him gross because somewhere along the way we've heard him say something racist (most recently he said he wasn't going to agree with Obama just because he's black) or something despicable.

We all heard Rush wish failure upon Obama's policies. Rush Limbaugh would rather be right at the cost of America. 
Democrats have done polling: 

Politico: The seeds were planted in October after Democracy Corps, the Democratic polling company run by Carville and Greenberg, included Limbaugh’s name in a survey and found that many Americans just don’t like him.

“His positives for voters under 40 was 11 percent,” Carville recalled with a degree of amazement, alluding to a question about whether voters had a positive or negative view of the talk show host.

Paul Begala, a close friend of Carville, Greenberg and White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, said they found Limbaugh’s overall ratings were even lower than the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Obama’s controversial former pastor, and William Ayers, the domestic terrorist and Chicago resident who Republicans sought to tie to Obama during the campaign.

Then came what Begala called “the tripwire.”

“I hope he fails,” Limbaugh said of Obama on his show four days before the president was sworn in. It was a time when Obama’s approval ratings were soaring, but more than that, polls showed even people who didn’t vote for him badly wanted him to succeed, coming to office at a time of economic meltdown.

McCain's Uphill Battle

artwork at obamaartreport.com

McCain's done for.
We can't take that for granted (McCain is a nasty man) but that's the conclusion, given the analysis on the morning political shows.

On Meet the Press this morning, Chuck Todd showed that Obama could win in a landslide, according to the electoral map.

Guests were republican strategist Bob Shrum and democratic strategist Paul Begala. Shrum says McCain has lost his way and needs to connect with voters. Shrum said Palin was a bad choice. She was a base pick and this isn't the year for that, he said. McCain's a liar when he says he puts country first (I said that).

Tom Brokaw asked if the Ayers thing could hurt Obama and Begala says the guilt by association thing isn't going to work and then he brilliantly mentioned mcCain's service for the U.S. Council for World Freedom, some wack group in the 1980s that McCain was associated with. (Begala needs to speak on behalf of the Obama campaign more often. He's more effective than John Kerry, who always seems to be out there.)

Of course, there's McCain's Keating scandal. What about yachting on his birthday with convicted felon? Guilt by association works both ways.

During the roundtable, Gwen Ifill says the McCain camp is going to try something new every week to distract. She said she herself was one of those distractions leading up to the debate. McCain's camp said she couldn't be fair because she was writing a book that they said was pro-Obama. She's writing a book about the new generation of black politicians.

Chuck Todd says McCain is just using a series of tactics -- not strategy. That's because McCain doesn't know the difference between strategy and tactics (me again).

On the Chris Matthews show, Kathleen Parker said there really is no republican party. There is a lack of confidence. They're not for McCain. They're voting against Obama. (I guess this is why they're spewing so much hate). Parker is the conservative columnist who came out against Palin. She said she did so to preserve her journalistic integrity. Love it. All these weasels still defending McCain's stupidity will lose credibility, except for a small audience who wants to only hear good things about McCain. 

Parker said Palin was like a windup doll during the debate. She spoke so fast because she had to answer questions before she forgot. She said that Palin will be kept in a bubble for the remaining days.

NPR's Michele Norris said of the debate: You saw in Joe Biden a wise old hand, who could handle a crisis and you also saw someone who was allergic to complexity.

Morning Joe dude, a conservative, said that once the bailout is behind us, people will stop talking about the economy. What? This is the out of touchness that McCain has as well. When you don't really care about people who are suffering because you don't really have an answer for them, you don't really care. It's a vicious circle.

Morning Joe said that the McCain strategy here on out is to focus on getting out the conservative vote, it's base. Palin won't be on any news shows and she won't be sitting down for interviews, he said. She'll be campaigning.

For the upcoming town hall debate, Norris said Obama will use his youth and athleticism to work the stage and may take off his jacket and roll up his sleeves like he does in the town hall.

Tom Brokaw, moderator of the debate, apparently is going to ask mostly substantive questions during the debate Tuesday night.

Norris said Obama still could lose the campaign. Will the people of Appalachia vote for the white guy or will they vote their interests? I happen to think the youth vote will more than compensate for the racist vote.

Here's a video they played on Meet the Press. McCain gets testy when asked about Palin's competence (about 1.26 mins in)

Meet the Press roundtable