When we get to the general, can we leave the "high road" and "merits" for the people running for 6th

[RB TexLa]

grade class president. In a political campaign you attack and destroy your opponent. I hope that by October John McCain wishes he had never thought about running for president, I want him to think back to South Carolina in 2000 and think Bush and Rove were nice to him. Those of you who feel you can only play on the high road, go ahead, take a mirror so you can look at yourself and tell yourself how high and how oh so mighty you are, but leave those of us who want to get in the gutter and win alone about it.

[O.M.B.inOhio]

1. I remember Kerry saying that the high road is tought, but it gets you to a better place.

Apparently his idea of the better place is Massachusetts, not D.C.

[karynnj]

9. The fact is that he came very close to winning

Given the atmosphere in 2004, had Kerry atypically engaged in an attack campaign he likely would have been slaughtered. He won many people in the middle because he was Presidential, not sleazy, and thoughtful. I know this because I live in a mostly Republican county with many more Independents than Democrats.

You forget that someone on the RW side could make up a lie, have it go to Drudge, and then be picked up - using the same words almost - by all the RW talk people, and from there it when to their cable shows. Do we have that network?

Kerry had a huge challenge in 2004, he needed to make a case that he would be better handling Iraq, but there were many who thought that challenging whether we should be in a war and stating that we were making a mess of it was inappropriate in a time of war. I know 2 very angry still that he repeated often it was not a war of last resort. To them, Catholics in their late 70s, this meant we started an unjust war. Yet, if Kerry didn't challenge on Iraq, he would lose - and he couldn't challenge without pointing out things that were wrong.

What % of the vote do you really thing a politician challenging Michael Moore would have gotten? I belong to a woman's group where we all saw 911 and discussed it. The reaction of this liberal Jewish group? They thought there were too many cheap shots. The connect the dots part depends on people already knowing and believing those links - and the majority of people didn't.

I do think that Obama will attack McCain ON THE ISSUES. He and his surrogates did a great job on that last week when they hit McCain for not knowing that we still had troops levels higher than before the surge. Did it work? Well, it hit a nerve - McCain said Kerry and Obama didn't understand troop numbers. (where in fact - every article I saw agreed that the Dems were correct.) Their next response to attack Kerry - claiming he doesn't care about the troops. The fact still remains that there was media that McCain was wrong.

Should Obama attack McCain's personality or service - no. It would backfire.

[O.M.B.inOhio]

11. I agree, mostly.

When caught calling the reich wing a bunch of liars, he could have explained without sounding like a wimp. "This would have been inappropriate for a speech, but this was a private conversation. But let's look at the facts. In 2000, Bush ran on a humble foreign policy.... He ran on fiscal responsibility... He ran on smaller government.... He talks about rule of law...." Kerry could have fought against the Swiftboat group with facts, including Bush's lack of honorable service. This is neither here nor there. He certainly should have fought for Ohio votes to be counted legally and recounted according to the law. It was not the Green Party's job to prove that there was fraud in the Ohio elections in 2004; it was the State's job to explain the impossible numbers, the "glitches" that all favored the incumbent, and terror threat that expelled election observers, and all the red flags that were way worse than the indications of fraud that got so much attention (and a revote) in Ukraine. I disagree that Kerry almost won: he did win, but it was stolen. The high road for Kerry meant using the traditional toolkit of speeches and paid ads. Bush used the Department of Homeland Security as a campaign tool and "news" channels. To paraphrase a couple of movies: "Isn't that just like a Democrat: brings a knife to a gun fight." We can fight tough without lying. But still call a lie a lie.

[karynnj]

13. Much of that was done

Kerry was FAR stronger on attacking Bush on how Bush was fighting the war than any of the others. He also did go after Bush on all the other issues. The media carried very little of it. He never backed down from his crooks and liars comment.

As to fighting the SBVT with facts, he did. Before the SBVT came out in August, the media already had:
- Over 100 pages of Naval records with glowing fitness reports spanning the entire interval - that no one challenged.
- Doug Brinkley is an academic historian. He interiewed over 100 people there about 2 years before. Many SBVT had no problem with Kerry even then. Kerry had no editorial control and the book backed him 100%.
- Every person ON HIS BOAT when he got any medal backed him 100%
- The Nixon tapes showed they investigated him and he was a clean war hero. This was 2 years after the fact.

There is nothing in my life I could prove more throughly than this. But that wasn't all, when the SBVT came out with their book, the Kerry people proved their links to Bush and gave the media 36 pages of probable lies in the book. The media had all this from Kerry's side - what did they have from the SBVT as proof? Nothing, everything was unsubstantiated. The truth is that the media - perceived as neutral - abetted a character assassination in 2004 and then, with the Clinton people, followed it up with a second swiftboating saying Kerry did not fight back. Yet compare that list to how Bill Clinton fought back on the draft question or Genefer Flowers. His goal was simply to get any response out within the news cycle - but that is a list of very strong proof backing Kerry the media had before the SBVT even appeared. In addition, Kerry did refute the charges before the firefighters and it was labeled as the campaign's response. The media which gave the SBVT millions of hours, for the most part ignored it.

As to Ohio, there is STILL no "take to court" proof that Kerry won and that was what was needed. Ukraine was different - they had outside countries backing their claim that the election was a fraud - including the US. Without proof, there was nothing Kerry could have done - without destroying the party.

[BlueJac]

2. High road.....

There was no other way for Obama to play it, any other way he would of been bashed for being sexist and every other lame excuse. Now it will be man on man, take your sixth grade remark back to your classroom. It's over!

[RB TexLa]

3. It's over? You think McCain has already won? WTF?

[napi21]

4. I agree with you. I don't want to make stuff up like Shrub did to

McNut in 2000 (illigitimate black child, etc), but I strongly believe in the old addage "you don't take a knife to a gunfight. That was the ONE thing about Obama that worried me and had me undecided all the way to the moment I walked up to the voting machine! I ultimately DID vote for Obama, but I'm still very uneasy about his apparent unwillingness to get really tough!

So far, his campaign has done a good job at instantly responding to McNut's nasty statements, but I fear that the Pubs will get MUCH NASTIER before this is all over. I sure hope my fears are proven unnecessary!

[Liberal Gramma]

6. There is ample evidence that the Republicans can go lower than any Democrat

would want to. That's all they have to run on, everything else is in our favor. Obama has done a great job of responding immediately to attack, and I'm sure he'll keep it up.

[RB TexLa]

7. Well to win, you don't just respond, you attack and you dig deep and find a way to go lower

[Liberal Gramma]

8. I'm no strategist but I disagree, at least for this election cycle

I think we have all the issues on our side: an unpopular war, an unpopular president, an economy in the toilet, climate change issues. Unlike some elections, where the issues were of minor interest, in this one they are important to most people, and we can win on the issues. You have to respond to the dirt, and point out the hypocrism, but we don't have to go on the attack on personal issues. I for one don't want to see sly emails about McCain's "black baby" or his "prison camp betrayals." We have enough ammunition in his policies to win against him.

[napi21]

10. I don't wanat to see email about mader up stuff like black babies

or McNut's prison camp torture, but I sure wanat to see & hear ads showing:

McNut's voting record really was ALWAYS WITH SHRUB!

His campaign advisors are ALL lobbyists!

His mis-speaks about the Sunni/Shia, troops back to pre-surge levels, etc.

A video of his statement "I don't know much about the economy and I need educated!"

Pictures of him huggung Shrub.

A video of him & Shrub celebrating McNut's b-day while NO was being stormed by Katrina.


THAT'S the kind of dirty fighting I'n talking about!

[Liberal Gramma]

14. I'm all for that!

That kind of fighting attacks his positions, not his character. Perfectly admissible, IMO

[WeDidIt]

5. Barack Obama will fight the GE the way it's supposed to be fought

When it comes to the dirty tricks, though, he'll let McCain get in the first lick.

Then, unlike in the primaries where what you have is essentially a family fight, the flood gates will open.

Obama cut his teeth in politics on the South Side of Chicago. He'll go bare knuckle and McCain will never know what hit him

[apocalypsehow]

12. Spot-on - I get tired of the lectures from those who think this is a Sunday School get-together.

Folks who are "too good" to get into the gutter and fight are the ones who end up knee-capped - and that's never so true as in politics.

K & R. :thumbsup: