"Republicans" Leaving a Sinking Ship?

El_Kabong

New Member
A exodus seems to be under way as Republicans flee from the sinking McCain/Palin ticket:

Bill Kristol
“The McCain campaign, once merely problematic, is now close to being out-and-out dysfunctional,” Kristol writes. “Its combination of strategic incoherence and operational incompetence has become toxic. If the race continues over the next three weeks to be a conventional one, McCain is doomed.”

Newt Gingrich
"He has to make the case that he's different than Bush and better than Obama on the economy," said former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, one of more than a dozen prominent Republicans who in interviews during the past week expressed concern over the course of McCain's bid. "If he doesn't win that case, it's all over, and it's going to be a very bad year for Republicans." Source

Gov.Charlie Crist
Gov. Charlie Crist, who helped deliver Florida for McCain during the primary, said he will be spending more time minding the state's weak economy than campaigning for the Arizona senator in the final weeks before Election Day.

''When I have time to help, I'll try to do that,'' Crist said last week, after he flew around the state with McCain running mate Sarah Palin. Saturday, he skipped a McCain football rally and instead went to Disney World. Source
 

El_Kabong

New Member
The son of William F. Buckley has decided—shock!—to vote for a Democrat.

Let me be the latest conservative/libertarian/whatever to leap onto the Barack Obama bandwagon. It’s a good thing my dear old mum and pup are no longer alive. They’d cut off my allowance.

Or would they? But let’s get that part out of the way. The only reason my vote would be of any interest to anyone is that my last name happens to be Buckley—a name I inherited. So in the event anyone notices or cares, the headline will be: “William F. Buckley’s Son Says He Is Pro-Obama.” I know, I know: It lacks the throw-weight of “Ron Reagan Jr. to Address Democratic Convention,” but it’ll have to do.

...John McCain has changed. He said, famously, apropos the Republican debacle post-1994, “We came to Washington to change it, and Washington changed us.” This campaign has changed John McCain. It has made him inauthentic. A once-first class temperament has become irascible and snarly; his positions change, and lack coherence; he makes unrealistic promises, such as balancing the federal budget “by the end of my first term.” Who, really, believes that? Then there was the self-dramatizing and feckless suspension of his campaign over the financial crisis. His ninth-inning attack ads are mean-spirited and pointless. And finally, not to belabor it, there was the Palin nomination. What on earth can he have been thinking?
Source

David Brooks
[Sarah Palin] represents a fatal cancer to the Republican party. When I first started in journalism, I worked at the National Review for Bill Buckley. And Buckley famously said he'd rather be ruled by the first 2,000 names in the Boston phone book than by the Harvard faculty. But he didn't think those were the only two options. He thought it was important to have people on the conservative side who celebrated ideas, who celebrated learning. And his whole life was based on that, and that was also true for a lot of the other conservatives in the Reagan era. Reagan had an immense faith in the power of ideas. But there has been a counter, more populist tradition, which is not only to scorn liberal ideas but to scorn ideas entirely. And I'm afraid that Sarah Palin has those prejudices. I think President Bush has those prejudices. Source


Matthew Dowd
Dowd, chief strategist for President George W. Bush’s reelection, fingered Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s nomination as a turning point in McCain’s slide.

“They didn’t allow John McCain to pick the person he wanted for Vice President,” Dowd said, referring to Sen. Joe Lieberman, which undercut his experience argument and tethered McCain to the GOP base.

“He knows in his gut he put somebody unqualified on the ballot,” Dowd stressed, “and put the country at risk.” Source

The HITS keep coming!
 

Bavarian

New Member
Christopher Buckley had to resign from National Review for his error of backing BHO.
Kristol forced McCain on us, we could have had a true Conservative and now he, McCain< must pull out all the stops to keep the communist out of the White House.

Why do the dems get upset when we bring up BHO's ties to Wright, Ayers, ACORN, etc. when they keep trying to tie McCain to Bush 43?
 

El_Kabong

New Member
Christopher Buckley had to resign from National Review for his error of backing BHO.
Kristol forced McCain on us, we could have had a true Conservative and now he, McCain< must pull out all the stops to keep the communist out of the White House.

Why do the dems get upset when we bring up BHO's ties to Wright, Ayers, ACORN, etc. when they keep trying to tie McCain to Bush 43?

It might have a lot to do with MCain's claim he voted with Bush 95% of the time and that his campaign team is loaded with Bushies. (A number of Bush Rangers have also funded McCain's campaign... Out of generousity?)
 

This_person

Well-Known Member
It might have a lot to do with MCain's claim he voted with Bush 95% of the time and that his campaign team is loaded with Bushies. (A number of Bush Rangers have also funded McCain's campaign... Out of generousity?)
I believe that's Obama's claim, not McCain's.

I wonder what the percentage is of Obama voting with Reid's policies. Being such a popular guy, Reid would really help out Obama's campaign :sarcasm:
 

cwo_ghwebb

No Use for Donk Twits
I believe that's Obama's claim, not McCain's.

I wonder what the percentage is of Obama voting with Reid's policies. Being such a popular guy, Reid would really help out Obama's campaign :sarcasm:

Well, if his U.S. Senate record is anything like his Illinois Senator record he vote 300 times, 100 votes for his party's policies, the other 200 'present'.
 

El_Kabong

New Member
I believe that's Obama's claim, not McCain's.

I wonder what the percentage is of Obama voting with Reid's policies. Being such a popular guy, Reid would really help out Obama's campaign :sarcasm:

Obama isn't running AGAINST the record of Democratic Party.
There is video of McCain boasting of his 95% Bush/Republican voting record.
 

El_Kabong

New Member
Well, if his U.S. Senate record is anything like his Illinois Senator record he vote 300 times, 100 votes for his party's policies, the other 200 'present'.

Is that better or worse than McCain missing 63% of the votes in the 110th Congress. (Maybe he didn't want to commit.)
 

This_person

Well-Known Member
Obama isn't running AGAINST the record of Democratic Party.
No, he's running on a message of "change", even though half the time he's been there he's been in the majority party, voting with that party virtually 100% of the time he's bothered to show up and vote.

In other words, he's being dishonest in what he's running as. He's running for change, change to the status quo of Reid and Pelosi. Unfortunately, most Americans don't know who Reid and Pelosi are, let alone what they stand for, so he's got that going for him!
 

This_person

Well-Known Member
Is that better or worse than McCain missing 63% of the votes in the 110th Congress. (Maybe he didn't want to commit.)
Worse. McCain has missed too many this year, but overall he's got a pretty good record. Between IL and the US Senate, Obama's got a horrible record overall - one of the worst.
 

vraiblonde

Board Mommy
PREMO Member
Patron
[Sarah Palin] represents a fatal cancer to the Republican party.
That's a very bombastic statement, bordering on hysteria.

The Democrats' ship is sinking as well, but they still hang in there and toe the party line rather than think for themselves.
 

Pete

Repete
I just got my new voter registration. It has a nice, new, shiny R on it. :neener:

Did an ACORN representative pick you up and drive you down to register? Which free gift did you choose, the ham sandwich and a Bud or the Obama / Biden sunglasses?
 

El_Kabong

New Member
Philadelphia talk radio host Michael Smerconish:
"John McCain is an honorable man who has served his country well. But he will not get my vote. For the first time since registering as a Republican 28 years ago, I'm voting for a Democrat for president.

"I may have been an appointee in the George H.W. Bush administration, and master of ceremonies for George W. Bush in 2004, but last Saturday I stood amidst the crowd at an Obama event in North Philadelphia," says the Republican.

The Chicago Tribune, a newspaper that has not endorsed a Democrat for president since it was founded in 1847... From their editorial:
Many Americans say they're uneasy about Obama. He's pretty new to them.

We can provide some assurance. We have known Obama since he entered politics a dozen years ago. We have watched him, worked with him, argued with him as he rose from an effective state senator to an inspiring U.S. senator to the Democratic Party's nominee for president.

We have tremendous confidence in his intellectual rigor, his moral compass and his ability to make sound, thoughtful, careful decisions. He is ready.

...

It may have seemed audacious for Obama to start his campaign in Springfield, invoking Lincoln. We think, given the opportunity to hold this nation's most powerful office, he will prove it wasn't so audacious after all. We are proud to add Barack Obama's name to Lincoln's in the list of people the Tribune has endorsed for president of the United States.
Source
 

El_Kabong

New Member
Huffington Post - Oct. 18, 2008
The Palin Plunge: Voters Sour On McCain VP Pick

The more voters learn about Sarah Palin, the more wary they become. Once the focus of post-convention Republican euphoria, the Alaska Governor is now viewed as a serious liability to the McCain campaign.

As it stands, Palin's polling numbers are daunting: with the unfolding economic crisis, her favorable to unfavorable ratings have switched from a positive 40-30, according to a September 12-16 New York Times survey, to a negative 32-41 in an October 10-13 survey.

Palin is, additionally, costing McCain newspaper endorsements. Editor and Publisher calculated that as of Oct 18, Barack Obama led McCain 58-16 in the competition for the backing of newspapers. Many of the endorsements cited Palin as a factor in their rejection of McCain. The Salt Lake Tribune, which supported George W. Bush in 2004, commented that "out of nowhere, and without proper vetting, the impetuous McCain picked Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate. She quickly proved grievously under-equipped to step into the presidency should McCain, at 72 and with a history of health problems, die in office. More than any single factor, McCain's bad judgment in choosing the inarticulate, insular and ethically challenged Palin disqualifies him for the presidency." The Kansas City Star, in turn, described Palin as "unqualified."
Read the rest
 
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