All Men Are Liars – Installment #49,653

Everyone’s fave pundit, Thomas Friedman, says that conservative white men are liars. (Ya don’t say?) That they went into the private parts of the voting booth and checked the box for Obama… after telling their cronies all along at the country club Men’s Grill, presumably over a rare steak and a scotch-rocks, that they were, of course dude, for McCain.

That buried deep in their lying, tiny, twisted hearts, the motivation that they “wanted to honor their kids” prompted them to suddenly morph to Spike Lee upon walking in the door of their local voter precinct.

Bit of a stretch, eh? Especially when you know what conservative white men are really like deep down, but Friedman even brands this lying white men phenomenon “the buffet effect.” (As opposed to the Bradley effect, of course.)

You can decide for yourself in the video here, which I must say is pure pundit nirvana: Huffington, Hitchens, Friedman… all together for your punditry pleasurin’ at the BBC on election night.

As the scoffing cynic, I must note with a vague wave of some Blanche Dubois hankie to fairness, that my right-of-Buchanan, Citadel-bred dad did scour all of Cobb County, Georgia (High Newt Country) for hours yesterday, the day after our history-making election on Tuesday, trying to find just one extra newspaper. Not for himself, but for me.

Only One Printing Available Before Christmas!

Order your copy of Paranoid Nation: The Real Story of the Fight For The 2008 Election now, because there will be only ONE printing available before Christmas. And you sure don’t want the paranoid political junkies on your shopping list to be left-out. Then they’ll, of course, blame you for everything whacked in their life!

Pre-order from Amazon here now. Or click-on the above photo. Video to tell you all about what you’ll find in the book is here.

HINT: Paranoid Nation is full of great political news, gossip, and poll analysis. My personal fave is a whole new story about Zell Miller I assure you you’ve NEVER heard before! Perfect for regaling folk at that office Christmas party with. If your office is having a Christmas party this year that is. If not, think of that old dude on the bar stool next to you. He’ll surely appreciate a good Zell Miller tale for Christmas.

And yes folks, you have been reading a WaySouth Media, Inc. promotion.

McCain Supporters At Ohio Halloween Day Rally. Scary Stuff.

At a McCain rally on Halloween Day, ANP reporters asked people one question: “If Obama is elected president, what will this say about America?” Their answers are in the video.

Georgia’s In Play

Very latest IA/PP poll says Georgia is a “toss-up” state. For the presidential and Senate races. Whatever happened to being a “swing” state? Or “battleground” state? Guess that was soooo last week.

10/24/08 – A new InsiderAdvantage / Poll Position survey shows Georgia is a toss-up state in both the U.S. Senate and presidential campaigns.

In the presidential race, Barack Obama has a slight edge over John McCain, although it is within the margin of error. In the U.S. Senate race, Saxby Chambliss has a 2-point edge over Jim Martin, although it, too, is within the margin of error.

The two polls were conducted last night, each with 615 registered, likely voters. The margin of errors for both is plus or minus 3.8 percentage points.

Full story/poll results here. Still, anyone holding their breath for the South to rise again on Nov. 4 had better look to the situation in South Carolina. There’s whisperin’ goin’ on though that’s fer sure. SC wants their Obama appearance bad.

McCain Supporters Say No To Intolerance

This is the most hopeful thing I’ve seen in months – conservatives refusing to drink the Rovian-esque Kool-Aid! Amazing video of McCain supporters as they (some Muslim some Christian) shut down anti-Obama protesters at a recent Virginia McCain rally. It’s all here from the equally amazing ANP, American News Project. ANP has been doing the best street-level political reporting. And they’re on a reality roll now.

UPDATE: CNN’s Rick Sanchez led with the above video today on the 3pm show. They had ANP’s Davin Hutchins, live by phone, explaining what had gone down, and the Muslim VA Maryland McCain staffer standing-by to go on-air too, but the McCain campaign put the kabash on their VA Maryland Muslim staffer (seen in the video here) going on CNN live. The McCain campaign hates Rick Sanchez after this little number last week.

Gee, I wonder how all this happens…

OK To Cheat On Your Wife IF You’ve Been Beaten and Tortured

This whole Who’s Affair Is Valid And Who’s Is Not stuff is getting… almost as bad as the shenanigans at the AJC!

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Waking-Up To John McCain

I gotta tell you, waking-up to John McCain (on Morning Edition of course) was not half bad. Not that some Cheshire cat grin spread across my face with morning, uh, recall of the night before. But hearing his voice on the Renee Montagne interview talking about the situation in Russia/Georgia was a decent reassurance that we have a Republican out there with a strong brain wave on foreign policy. (McCain said we might be needing to readjust our relationships with Putin. Ya think?)

In other words, I didn’t lunge for the OFF button as I inevitability have over the last eight years… given the unfortunate circumstance, always a possibility, of waking-up to the idiot babble of George W. Bush on a morning news program.

Once McCain started talking about non-foreign policy though, he started regressing into utter bullshit, saying, when pressed by Montagne, that his campaign was surely NOT going negative over Obama. That’s just total crap, and McCain knows it, and he’s the worst bullshitter on the planet.

That’s why pointy-head NPR listeners (and reporters too) such as moi have always LIKED McCain. Because he was such a great non-bs’er. A sharp, silver-tongued, intelligent and humorous voice of reason… with some excellent banter served-up on the side.

Such as when he told the audience this morning to turn-off their computers for a minute and go outside and get some fresh air. Now that’s the old McCain we’ve grown to know and like over his many years of service; not afraid to tell his audience to go to hell and back, if that’s indeed where he feels they need to be directed.

But this New McCain makeover the RNC has given him, the one that has him spouting utter bs we don’t believe, such as ludicrous statements about how his campaign isn’t going negative, is moreorless botched plastic surgery, making him sound the way Priscilla Presley currently looks. Like, uh, not so great, eh?

What’s so freakin’ hard about letting McCain just be McCain, Repugs? When you take a genuine straight talker and have him all tied-up in bullshit and spin, guess what? We notice! And we’re reminded, yet one more time, about how we really don’t want to be in the same bedroom, bar, ktichen, hallway, boardroom, classroom, freeway, highway, war room… ANYWHERE… listening to, let alone voting for, a lying, phony Republican ever again.

Nor do I care to wake-up to one either. At least not a phony one who feels he’s so powerful and on-message and omnipotent, and that we the public are such dupe-able clueless sheep, that we’ll believe any line he tries out on us.

Listen here to McCain on Morning Edition.

Obama and McCain – A Genuine Horse Race

While NPR spoke of Virginia as a battleground state this morning on Morning Edition (ME) while they visited the VA Obama and McCain campaign offices, Matt Towery of InsideAdvantage says Obama isn’t “stalling out” in the Presidential campaign at all; rather, this is a genuine horse race with good, measured momentum for the Obama campaign.

And not only is the South’s Virginia in serious play to go blue, but North Carolina and Georgia too, as much as that concept is consistently poo-poo’d by Republicans.

Towery’s far more interesting, knowledge-based perspective and explaination, as opposed to the not-terribly-with-it rambling of some Joe in a Virginia McCain campaign office (found in the ME story) is here. And yes, political conventions might be awful on TV, but they are a complete blast to attend.

Note to self: dig-up old ’88 conventions photos and scan them. (Yep, that’s how long it’s been since I’ve been to one. Hell, with the Olympics going on then the conventions coming-up right after that, I am feeling woefully like a media left-behind here in the ATL. Whine.)

Is It Really A Surprise?

McCain doesn’t know the price of a gallon of gas. Ahhhh those mavericks. I’m sure he used to know the price of gas. Used to drive his own car. But he’s now living totally detached from the people he wishes to govern.

It happens to ’em all though. I hear Obama’s people are keeping him away from the roving, snarly press packs. (Meaning they will allow press access only to a favored few.) Bad things always happen to leaders when they become isolated and removed from America. Cases in point, Bush’s NOLA/Katrina fly-over (a Rove decision no doubt). The “You’re doing a heck of a job, Brownie” moment. Pity really.

While I fully understand the needs of candidate high security in this terrorist-laden world of ours, if McCain could just access the Internet, he could find out in one or two clicks what the price of gas is in whatever town he’s in. Avoid those out-of-touch answers to softball questions, that line of simplistic questioning that can tank a candidate in the media. Too bad he can’t operate a computer.

NOTE: I addressed this whole Leaders-Who-Can’t-Operate-A-Computer media/PR issue right after Katrina in September of 2005 on the Spacey Gracey Review. And it’s gonna keep biting candidates in the ass until they walk into a local Starbucks (frenzied press pack in tow), order a latte, sit down, fire-up a laptop, and start blogging. At least just power-up their personal laptop and click-on something! Anything. That one photo op along would signal to a very in-touch voter-base… “I’m connected too. I’m in touch too. Just like you.”

“John McCain is Aware of the Internet”

“From Personal Democracy Forum 2008: During the internet campaign directors’ plenary, Mark Soohoo of the McCain campaign and Tracy Russo of the Edwards campaign argued about how important it was for the next president to understand the internet.” (Ed. note: “Steel Ovaries” Russo kicks Soohoo’s ass every which way to Sunday.)

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Republicans – Losing Their Religion

Boy, if anything is more in need of some good old-fashioned inspiration these days, it would be Republicans. As I was trained-up long ago in the ways of impartiality and journalistic neutrality, I went to hear Ralph Reed talk at the Atlanta Press Club about his new novel, Dark Horse, and all the “new politics” going on around us since Reed last held political court.

I thought it would be a hoot to have him sign my copy of the book. Which he did, although he wasn’t terribly engaging, no breezy banter with the ladies that most socially-inclined men would engage in at such a function, obviously looking beyond me for someone he recognized.

Seems Reed doesn’t read Peach Pundit; the nom de plume “SpaceyG” rang zero bells of recognition for him, although it set-off some odd, squirrelly behavior in the person behind me in line, who claimed to have once been a Peach Pundit front pager, but then refused to tell me the name under which he had once so boldly opined. What a bunch of social weirdos Republicans are, but I digress…

Reed is slight, small, well-tailored and smart looking. Attractive and telegenic. As someone once said, he looks doll-ish. Not a terribly big crowd came out to the Press Club for Reed. The ones who did were mostly, ummm, long in the tooth as they say. A handful of blacks and Repug political hopefuls with obnoxiously loud mouths. A couple of photogs from some media outlet, and one AJC political reporter, the one with the blog that gets 5K views a day, or so I hear.

The APC couldn’t get a sponsor for Reed’s book signing event. No one would touch him. No Atlanta media or business, which I thought was rather sad given that he is a prominent Georgia boy. A sign of the times I suppose. As one person said, “He’s toxic. And so is his party.” In Georgia? Yes, even in Georgia.

The saddest part was watching Reed trying to be a good party cheerleader while still maintaining his religion. At one point he talked about how McCain was going to need every bit of the religious-conservative (evangelical and pro-life Catholic I assume) base of the party he could get to ever get elected, especially if Dems were going to register and turn out the anticipated large numbers of young, inspired, new voters.

At that point, I had to ask the question, “How can McCain, who’s notoriously allergic to religion, possibly inspire and motivate religious conservatives then?” To which Reed answered by saying that McCain was really a religious person (oh sure), and that someone he knew, a name I didn’t recognize so it was probably an evangelical preacher-type, had once “talked to McCain about his religion.” Reed thought that McCain worshiped at some church in Arizona, but he didn’t seem to know exactly what the denomination was.

When pressed for examples of how McCain has ever inspired the religious-conservative masses, Reed just said, “He’s just going to have to be himself.” Well ok then. Fine by the secular humanist in me, but if that’s supposed to satisfy, let alone “inspire and motivate” the evangelical masses to the polls, then I might as well be Pastor Rick Warren’s next prom date.

Think I’ll just go read the book now.

“He Was Catatonic”

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