Seriously? I know not all networks covered the campaign using the split screen to show the reactions but CNN (clearly they are the ‘best political team on television’ because all their commentators had laptops) did. I am no mind reader but I swear I could tell what John McCain was thinking, and it went something like (clear the kids out of the room, profanity is about to be served) That little fucker. I spent five years in a POW camp to have to run against this guy? He shouldn’t even be allowed to be here. I have proved I love my country. What has he done that makes him so great? Oh, he went to Harvard. Oh he can move his arms. Oh, his ideas inspire people. Oh, he’s going to make people believe again. What a crock. I hate him. Back in my day we worked for a living and when we walked 10 miles up hill – each way – barefoot in the snow, we liked it!!!

As I predicted, I did not win the lottery, nor was I struck by lightning and no, John McCain refused to take the high road that I thought would lead him and his campaign back to some sort of honor. He looked so peeved to be anywhere near Barack Obama that taking the high road was clearly never an option. That is too bad. John McCain has done a lot of things that make him deserve our respect but he just looks old and mean. Bob Dole had the same problem in 1996. Then a bigger problem was that President Clinton was really popular and it seemed the GOP ran Dole because it was ‘his turn’ not because he could win. We all got to know the Senator Dole that I saw around the Hart Senate office building back when I worked there. He had a sense of humor. I didn’t agree with him on anything but that’s never what you expect in this business. He was not the stiff, bitter, pissy old man his campaign let us think he was. And as someone who worked for President Clinton’s reelection, I thought it was unfair to him. The problem here is that the McCain campaign isn’t making McCain look bitter, he is. And I don’t think it’s a simple cosmetic thing, I think it is how he is. Ronald Reagan was a bad president, in my opinion. Just because he is dead does not mean I have to like him but he understood that to win people over to the idea he was able to govern was not to look bitter and pissy but to use humor. He did it well.

Then again, if members of my own party were leaving me like rats leaving the Titanic I might be bitter about it, too. Check this out: http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2008/10/et_tu_gop_the_conservative_bet.html

First I read about Christopher Buckley endorsing Barack Obama and then basically resigning from the National Review, which is only, the conservative magazine his father started. That cannot feel good to McCain. Then you have the ever growing list of conservatives and Republicans who don’t think McCain can win and many have said not only is Sarah Palin a disaster but she should ‘put country first and remove herself from the ticket.’ And to think he really wanted Lieberman. I am not sure he even knows that much about Sarah, did anyone else catch that he said ‘Sarah certainly knows about autism.’ Why? Because her child has Down ‘s syndrome? Yes, all these developmental problems are the same.

Oh, and while I am feeling frisky, what’s up with the ‘Joe the plumber?’ If he was not a plant at that rally I will eat a hat. His story fit just a little too neatly into the sweet spot of Obama’s economic plan. As for ‘spreading the wealth around’ you know who knows a little something about that. You sure do. Her name would be Sarah Palin where they do have lower taxes and one of the state’s main income supplier is the federal government. I’d bet dollars to doughnuts that the $1200 she sent everyone in the state came from those of us living in the lower 48. To the rest of the world that’s called ‘income redistribution’ and if a Democrat did it, they would be called a communist. As it stands, Alaska’s system looks more socialist than France (read “Letter from Alaska by Philip Gourevitch, www.newyorker.com, when a liberal mag like that calls you socialist, you probably are.

Back to ‘Joe’ – who was probably watching the baseball game if he was watching TV. I have come to hate the anecdotes candidates use. Usually because they are made up crap that I think wastes everyone’s time. This may not have been that but could John McCain have been more condescending to Obama and well, anyone whose head has not been up their butt for the last eight years? No, Mr. McCain you aren’t President George W. Bush (I so wished Obama had said, How long have you been waiting to use that line?). You are worse than Dubya. Sure he lied when it came to nation building and uniting the country but on most things his intentions have been clear from the get go. I don’t like him. History will judge him as one of the worst presidents ever but McCain is worse. He’s worse because he had a long record of not being a wishy washy, say-anything guy and he opted to run as someone else. That’s too bad, too bad for him anyway.

And kudos should go to Barack Obama. No politician wants to tell the public that they bear some responsibility in anything. It’s not OUR fault. We haven’t been asked to do anything really. The only people who have given anything up for the ‘war on terrorism’ – and those that have lost something have lost a lot – are the military fighting it and their families. The rest of us were told to shop. Right. Every time you spend a dollar, God kills a member of al Qaeda. Obama said that some of the current economic crisis was caused by people who live beyond their means. It was the first time in a long time that I have heard that and I hope he has more of it coming. Thank you Senator Obama.

So the debates are over and we are left to nothing more than crappy stump speeches and even worse political advertising. I don’t know who these ‘undecideds’ are, I just hope they decide to vote for Barack Obama.