Professor Bainbridge...on law, politics, religion, culture & food

It has been hard to take Hewitt seriously for years.

McCain is going down and needs to try a hail mary pass.  Why not try straight talk for a change?  What if McCain went into the next debate and pledged to balance the budget within two years and deal with entitlements, and made specific proposals to accomplish these goals, proposals that were not accounting gimmicks and not drops in the bucket, like earmarks.  The current crisis has probaby made a lot of voters receptive to this approach as most people understand there is no free lunch.

"The current crisis has probaby made a lot of voters receptive to this approach “

The American public is totally unreceptive to this approach.  The big ticket items in the budget are fixed entitlements like Social Security and Medicare and no politician would dare to suggest cutting either of them because they know the public isn’t going to buy it, especially now when their opponents can say “Congressman so-and-so found the money to bail out Wall St. multimillionaires, now he wants to recover the money he paid them by taking it out of your social security and medicare.”

Many said this election was a referendum on Obama. To a degree that is correct, however, this is a referendum on George Bush. 

For those Republicans who say McCain betrayed you.  Well, McCain was the only...ONLY...GOP candidate who had a chance.  Romney?  Please.  Huckabee?  I do not think so.  That McCain has managed to keep it competative is amazing. 

Now that much said, a 70/30 spread on the winner is still appropriate.  Obama is just different, not the answer to what we need now.  People also get that McCain is not George Bush.  But both Obama and McCain have flaws and given everything going on everything is breaking for Barack.  So McCain still has a chance, but it is slim. 

So while I am pessimistic on McCain winning now, I am going to welcome our new overlords.  But I am definitely not thrilled with having Dems running the entire show and suspect we are in for a very wild ride. 

As for Bush’s roll, it will improve over time.  But we all know Bush made some massive mistakes.  For all of it though, I do not regret voting for him.  Bush over Gore?  Come on.  Bush over Kerry?  Again, I am good with that decision.

Is there anyone who still takes Hewitt seriously?  I once heard him described as the “Platonic shill”.

Perfect.

One year ago in Hewitt-land it was a certainty that Rudy or Mitt would be the nominee and McCain was referred to as an “awful senator” and “awful Republican”.

PB hit is on the head with the keeping the ratings up.  Hugh will be pro McCain till McCain loses (and in fairness this is still winable for McCain although it is becoming less and less likely), then the ratings focus will switch to Barack Obama which will drive conservative talk radio for at least the next four years (or until the Fairness Doctrine returns to wipe the streets clean of conservatives). 

But all this said, I am seriously worried about what is coming.  Because Obama is decidingly liberal and cannot do the fiscal shift to the right that is needed right now (Bush was a lot of things, but conservative was not one of them).  Of course, McCain probably could not do the shift either, but at least we had a chance with him.

McCain’s only hope was to tell the truth about the incompetence and dishonesty of George W. Bush. McCain has nibbled around the edges, but has never told the truth about Dubya.

McCain pulled out of Michigan, which means he MUST win both Ohio and Pennsylvania to have much of a chance. Not likely, even with strong pro-life communities.

When Ohio and western PA were bleeding jobs Dubya sent his cabinet members out here to tell us to quit whining and get competitive. He never sent the $700B out way.

Dittohead economics is not selling well these days.

Then again PB, the spread on the Cowboys Redskins game was -11.5 against your team.  It ain’t over till it’s over.

I’m an Ohioan, who was considering voting for McCain. I voted for Bush twice. Eventually I’ve decided to hold my nose and vote for Obama. At the very least, he has intelligence and depth of character.

McCain has begun to scare me, especially when he “suspended his campaign” and accomplished nothing, then blamed the debacle on the Democrats. I’m not sure he has it all together. Worse, his VP pick is devoid of substance.

I know many others like me out here. Trust me on this, McCain has lost Ohio.

There is another problem with Hugh’s column. He calls Obama the least experienced candidate in Democratic history.

George McClellan the 1864 never held political office before running for president.

Alton Parker the 1904 nominee was an elected NY appeals court judge.

Horace Greeley was a Newspaper editor who spent exactly 3 months as a member of Congress.

You could even add William Jennings Bryan to the list, a two-term congressman from Nebraska. Bryan was the nominee in 1896, 1900, and 1908.

Hugh went to Harvard, I got a 4 on the American history AP exam and spent 10 years in the Navy. Should be a mismatch, but I won this battle.

Bill

The Florida Masochist--I am not particually for defending Hugh Hewitt on his excesses, but his hyperbole is not that far off in this case. 

McClellan was the commanding general in the Union Army, so that was his qualification. That is more substantial than Barack Obama’s qualifications.  He was not a particularly good general so he lost the election (as opposed to former General Presidents like George Washington or Ulysses Grant or Dwight Eisenhower). 

Parker was an experienced New York trial and appeallate judge who was run against popular Teddy Roosevelt and as a Democratic alternative to Bryant who is also on your list.  Parker had a different type of experience but in years as much experience (if not arguably more) than Barack Obama (although granted not on a federal level). 

Greeley was really not a Democratic Party nominee, he was the creater of the Liberal Republican Party which ran against Grant.  The Dems not wanting to run a candidate threw their support to Greeley.  Saying Greeley is not as qualified as Obama is like saying Ralph Nader is not qualified as Obama.  It is true I would prefer Obama to win over Nader (if that were the choice), but it is not so much qualifications as just the choice between the two. 

The same argument as Greeley goes with Bryan.  Although I will give you that Bryan was less experienced than Obama the first time Bryan ran (there are a lot of similarities between them).

Great, we can blame the party that had greater control during this period. Of course, the “statistics” are not that sound coming from an insignificant sample of events, McCain is the anti-Bush, and Obama is a socialist--and we know what socialism led to.

Then again, some will throw in the hat after a blip of bad polling and a perverse media environment that contorts a complex topic for every ounce of partisan advantage, lies be damned, full speed ahead.

We could just say, to hell with it all. But, as long as I am here fighting for you in Iraq, you will not. No more sorry sobbing. It is inexcusable for a soldier and it is inexcusable for you. Stiffen that spine! This is not an inconsequential election and I will not have my hard work and those of my comrades lost due to wobbliness in the homefront.

Iran is about to get the bomb and will get it if Obama is elected. There are consequences that will count million-fold to this election. If you don’t think so, know now that I told you.

Iran will get the bomb anyway. As energy gets tighter, they can just buy one from China or Pakistan. I have really hated the way this administration has abused the military in which I served for so many years. Military excellence cannot compensate entirely for political incompetence.

McCain has embraced most of bush’s policies. His choice of VP candidate indicates to me that he has thrown in with the hard right. More preemptive wars, more borrow and spend loom ahead. I cannot in good conscience leave such a legacy to my children.

Steve

To quote: I’ve decided to hold my nose and vote for Obama. At the very least, he has intelligence and depth of character.

Orwell speak in the above sentence. Obama is the opposite of both depth and character; [ ask his mother, grandmother, step brother, priest of 20 years, partners in (ahem) ethical enterprise, ( Ayers and Rezko) and anyone else that has ever been associated with him that he is just waking up and realizing had extremist views about his both depth and character].Of course the matter may come to a head when he is elected and they and their irrational views are part of his governance.

It’s going to be real tough. Not impossible but tough. He is down about 6-7 points in the polls. Basically, that means he has to convince about 4% of the voting public to switch from Obama to him.

My thinking is that he has to drop his individual tax cut proposals (two rate plan) and come up with something else. Maybe exempt unemployment insurance from tax and extend benefits.

It would also help if Bush would withdraw more troops from Iraq.

He has to really emphasize offshore oil drilling in the debate and the jobs that it will create now. He needs to state that the 35% corporate tax rate is real and is paid and is costly for businesses.

He needs to come around on ANWR.

He needs to discuss immigration and state he will not provide citizenship to those who are going to need to be supported by the public. That could be a key issue.

He needs to stress his opposition to huge increases in educational spending that Obama proposes. Such programs are wasteful.