Axelrod: If these are the people who are running his campaign, who's gonna be running his WH?"

[flpoljunkie]

Video from Axelrod on a recent Fox News Sunday appearance with Chris Wallace:

Axelrod: McCain says he's going to 'shake up the lobbyists, tell the special interests it's over, and that he can't wait to introduce Palin to the lobbyists, and pork barrelers."

Axelrod then says, "Just look around. All he has to do is convene a meeting of his senior staff. Almost everyone of them is a major Washington lobbyist." Then follows later with, "if these people run his campaign, who's gonna run his White House?"

Media, what are you waiting for? Ask the damn question!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nHLfaZG7sbA

(And, below, from the Washington Post. Guess all these uber-lobbyists are just looking for 'good government.' Or, as Barack Obama said yesterday, "They must think you're stupid!" Of course, if the media fails to note this gaping inconsistency between what McCain says and who he is, they just might get away with it.)

The Anti-Lobbyist, Advised by Lobbyists

By Michael D. Shear and Jeffrey H. Birnbaum
Washington Post Staff Writers

Friday, February 22, 2008; A01

For years, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) has railed against lobbyists and the influence of "special interests" in Washington, touting on his campaign Web site his fight against "the 'revolving door' by which lawmakers and other influential officials leave their posts and become lobbyists for the special interests they have aided."

But when McCain huddled with his closest advisers at his rustic Arizona cabin last weekend to map out his presidential campaign, virtually every one was part of the Washington lobbying culture he has long decried. His campaign manager, Rick Davis, co-founded a lobbying firm whose clients have included Verizon and SBC Telecommunications. His chief political adviser, Charles R. Black Jr., is chairman of one of Washington's lobbying powerhouses, BKSH and Associates, which has represented AT&T, Alcoa, JPMorgan and U.S. Airways.

Senior advisers Steve Schmidt and Mark McKinnon work for firms that have lobbied for Land O' Lakes, UST Public Affairs, Dell and Fannie Mae.

Even before McCain finished his news conference, uber-lobbyist Black made the rounds of television networks to defend McCain against charges that he has been tainted by his relationship with a lobbyist. Black's current clients include General Motors, United Technologies, JPMorgan and AT&T.

Of all the lobbyists involved in the McCain campaign, the most prominent is Black, who has made a lucrative career of shuttling back and forth between presidential politics and big-time Washington lobbying. He has worked for the campaigns of former congressman Jack Kemp (N.Y.), former president George H.W. Bush and former senators Phil Gramm (Tex.) and Robert J. Dole (Kan.), all Republicans.

"I've spent a fair amount of my life as a lobbyist, but I've spent a majority of my adult life running Republican political campaigns," Black, 60, said.

His relationship with McCain, for whom he is a senior adviser, goes back more than two decades, from the time McCain first came to Washington. They got to know each other well during Gramm's 1996 presidential run; Gramm, now an investment banker, is a major supporter and adviser to McCain.

But even as Black provides a private voice and a public face for McCain, he also leads his lobbying firm, which offers corporate interests and foreign governments the promise of access to the most powerful lawmakers. Some of those companies have interests before the Senate and, in particular, the Commerce Committee, of which McCain is a member.

Black said he does a lot of his work by telephone from McCain's Straight Talk Express bus.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/21/AR2008022101131_pf.html

[The_Casual_Observer]

1. THese are all high minded nuanced arguments. Meanwhile, palin

is talking about motherhood & guns. Axelrod seems to be a lightweight when it comes to smash mouth national politics.

[flpoljunkie]

2. Ad:If big time Washington lobbyists are running McCain's campaign, who do you think will run his WH?

Point taken. Obama needs to tell the American people just who John McCain is, because the media damn sure aren't going to tell us.

[justiceischeap]

4. They have a similar one but your idea is more to the point.

http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/09/08/1364411.aspx

[flpoljunkie]

6. Have seen the ad. One of the lobbyists shown is none other than neocon Randy Scheunemann.

Obama needs to do another ad on Randy Scheunamann:

"If neocon, Committee to Liberate Iraq's Randy Scheunemann is McCain's chief foreign policy adviser and spokesman, will neocons be running his White House? The American people have a right to know, John McCain."

[flpoljunkie]

8. Or, 'If you like the endless war in Iraq, you'll love John McCain 'bomb, bomb, bombing Iran!"

It is advisers like Randy Schenemann and Likudnik buddy Joe Lieberman who are itching to do just that. For Lieberman and the neocons it's all about keeping Iran from developing nuclear weapons, not by smart, tough diplomacy--but by dropping bunker busting bombs on a country with a million man army.

Not that's beyond "stupid!"

[elkston]

7. Those voters aren't the focus. Its the "smart" independents we want.

The racists and gun nuts are out of the picture.

[me b zola]

3. K&R

[Overseas]

5. K&R -- One more for the pile of Republican hypocrisies. //nt