McCain Catastrophe. Barack Obama destroyed John McCain in tonite's debate, and McCain's demeanor was, again, bizarre throughout. At almost every moment that Obama was speaking, McCain sat there with a goofy grin on his face, as tho he were retarded or insane. He launched an attack on Obama's 'association' with William Ayers, and Obama crushed him with it, pointing out the absurdity of trying to tarnish Obama's reputation by linking him to a PROFESSOR who was involved in an educational reform committee funded by a Republican that had Republican participants.
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John McCain came off as a petulant, little man — which he is. Obama came off as mature, serious, dignified: Presidential. Obama didn't answer everything he should have, but he did completely deflate some of the dishonest attacks on his tax policies. McCain kept trying to say that a plumber would be penalized for aspiring to the American Dream, and Obama said no, McCain was completely off the mark (and Obama made plain that he meant that McCain was not just mistaken but maliciously misleading). Obama should have said, as I advised here yesterday, that his proposed tax increases on businesses do NOT apply to small businesses. He did say that something like 95% of small businesses would not be affected in any regard by his tax increases, but did not explain why that is: that business income taxes apply only to profits, not gross revenues before nontaxable expenses (like salaries for the employees of "Joe the Plumber"), statutory deductions, and tax credits, so small businesses would not be affected, because any business that makes profits of the level that would see tax increases (or penalties for not providing healthcare to employees) are by definition not small businesses.
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When I reached this point in this draft, Keith Olbermann on MSNBC's Countdown offered results of a post-debate CBS poll that showed that 53% of uncommitted voters felt Obama won the debate, 25% thought it was a tie, and only 22% thought McCain won. As I say: catastrophe.
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Alas, despite what Obama has said over and over again, before and during the debate, the CBS poll shows that 64% of respondents think Obama will raise their taxes; but 50% think McCain will, which isn't exactly a vote of confidence in McCain's assurances on tax policy. It would seem that uncommitted voters are a very distrustful bunch when it comes to the issue of taxes.
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In that McCain was behind in overall polls of committed and uncommitted voters, McCain needed a big win tonite, and instead experienced a big loss. Good. Now, if only the polls are accurate and not completely wrong because of the Bradley Effect, we should have a big change after January 20th. We certainly need it. (I, however, will not be voting for Obama because of his drug past and pro-abortion stance. In that I live in a very blue state, and the national popular vote means nothing given our electoral-college system, my refusal to vote for Obama will have no effect. I do not accept that I am compelled to vote for the lesser of evils. I'm going to vote for Ralph Nader, whom I would much rather see President than either McCain or Obama.)
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(The current U.S. military death toll in Iraq, according to the website "Iraq Coalition Casualties", is 4,183 — for Israel.)




- posted by L. Craig Schoonmaker @ 11:59 PM