I've been staying out of this

[ericcoleman]

At least in my own journal. But some things need comment

This was on the Sacramento county GOP website.



There is an article here

The important quote is from chairman of the Sacramento County Republican party, Craig MacGlashan. “Some people find it offensive, others do not. I cannot comment on how people interpret things.”

Comments

[billroper]

I disagree.

But there's Obama preemptively accusing Bush and McCain of making a racist appeal. Not an Obama surrogate, not an anonymous Obama supporter, the candidate himself.

Unless Obama doesn't speak for the Obama campaign...

[ericcoleman]

I disagree.

Ok, why?

We have established that it was not preemptive. It had already started.

And wasn't just the other night that McCain said that he would repudiate any of the dirty campaigning, yet the next day this started showing up during dinner time

"I'm calling on behalf of John McCain and the RNC because you need to know that Barack Obama and his Democrat allies in the Illinois Senate opposed a bill requiring doctors to care for babies born alive after surviving attempted abortions -- a position at odds even with John Kerry and Hillary Clinton. Barack Obama and his liberal Democrats are too extreme for America. Please vote -- vote for the candidates who share our values. This call was paid for by McCain-Palin 2008 and the Republican National Committee at 202 863 8500."

and

"You need to know that Barack Obama has worked closely with domestic terrorist Bill Ayers, whose organization bombed the U.S. Capitol, the Pentagon, a judge's home, and killed Americans. And Democrats will enact an extreme leftist agenda if they take control of Washington. Barack Obama and his Democratic allies lack the judgment to lead our country."

But of course, McCain didn't actually say them himself, so they have nothing to do with him at all.

[billroper]

Barack Obama did vote against such a bill in the Illinois Senate. He even voted against one particular version of the bill that contained the particular language that he said was required in order to safeguard a woman's right to abortion.

In the latter case, one can argue as to the exact meaning of the word "closely". However, we've already discussed "card check" and the fact that George McGovern thinks that it's a bad idea. Quite reasonably, one might say that's part of an extreme leftist agenda, because I don't think one can characterize McGovern as "not liberal".

So I must ask, how is this dirty campaigning? What you see here -- with the possible exception of raising Obama's ties to Ayers (and Obama raises McCain's ties to Bush constantly, so I'm thinking that's not a forbidden tactic) -- is a discussion of specific issues that might influence voters.

If the McCain campaign is forbidden from discussing the candidate's past voting history and his positions on the issues, what is it allowed to discuss? How wonderful a president Barack Obama would be?

[ericcoleman]

What I find funny is that just a day or so ago you were bemoaning such things as avoiding the real issues. Now you are all for them.

As for McCain's connection with Bush

"I have voted with President Bush 90% of the time". Which is not true. it was 95% according to factcheck.org. For the record Obama voted with the President 40% of the time. So who is reaching across the aisle?

Obama said, "It's not change when John McCain decided to stand with George Bush 95 percent of the time, as he did in the Senate last year." and continues to use that tactic. So, is voting for McCain "CHANGE" as his banners say? Must be that 5%.

So, which is the correct one? Questionable "close" ties to a college professor who used to be a nutjob (and may be still), or the fact that McCain has supported Bush's policies 95% of the time. And why are you against McCain being compared to the President who, I assume, you voted for twice? Isn't that a good thing? Being compared to the sitting President?

You said just a day or so ago that we should get to the real issues. Which one is a real issue?

As you have said (and I do agree with you on card check, from the little I know about it, I need to research a bit more) the RNC should be campaigning on the issues. But all they seem to have is Bill Ayers. So what does that say about Obama. That the RNC doesn't think they really have anything else to go on except innuendo? While Obama talks about what McCain has done as recently as during the last year, McCain talks about someone who Obama knew and was on a board with 15 years ago. How much of the RNC ads have been about Ayers?

And as for the Illinois Senate bill, go look again, I don't think he voted against it.