ABC News quotes Senator Obama during a recent public appearance:
"You know, you can put lipstick on a pig," Obama said, "but it's still a pig."The crowd rose and applauded, some of them no doubt thinking that he was alluding to Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's ad lib during her vice presidential nomination acceptance speech last week, "What's the difference between a hockey mom and a pit bull? Lipstick."
"You can wrap an old fish in a piece of paper called 'change,'" Obama continued, "it's still gonna stink after eight years.A partial video clip of the comment is also available for those who might wish to watch; the full thing may be out there somewhere, but I haven't found it; nor have I looked very hard, because the words which caught the public eye are in the text quoted above and in the short video. Those are the words which matter. True, Senator Obama may not have had reference to Governor Palin's lipstick comment during her speech at the Republican Convention, and has claimed that he had no such reference in mind. Only he knows for sure. The crowd who attended his speech seemed to think the pig reference was to Governor Palin. So did I when I read it. According to an article in The Boston Herald:"We’ve had enough of the same old thing! It’s time to bring about real change to Washington. And that’s the choice you’ve got in this election."
Democrats shot the lipstick line at Gov. Palin on their official Web site last week with a posting entitled "McCain’s Selection of Palin is Lipstick on a Pig" - accompanied by what I’m sure was intended to be a flattering photo of the Alaska outdoorswoman.Unless Senator Obama missed Governor Palin's convention speech, or had a substantial memory lapse, his explanation seems dubious. Besides, not all pigs are bad and ugly — remember the movie Babe, about a very cute, sweet pig? It is possible that some pigs can even fly; it seems equally likely that some comments can "fly" and Senator Obama's pig reference may be one of them.And - coincidence or something more? - the same day Obama made his crack, a Democratic congressman introducing Joe Biden said of Sarah Palin, "There’s no way you can dress up her record, even with a lot of lipstick."
Senator Obama and Senator Biden have slipped rather dramatically in the polls recently, so some exasperation is to be expected. Key Democratic operatives appear to be quite worried. According to Politico, the polls are
stirring angst and second-guessing among some of the Democratic Party’s most experienced operatives, who worry that Obama squandered opportunities over the summer and may still be underestimating his challenges this fall.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - jamminsue
Dan, beautiful prose as usual...You say:
That normality in turn highlighted the courage she showed in being there, on that stage for the first time in her life and under trying circumstances.
I hate to burst your bubble, but she has competed in a state-level beauty queen competion, which is exactly what she looks like and is acting like - a beauty queen candidate. In the 1980's my husband and I provided sound support for the Washington State beauty queen competition, and let me tell you; that competition is a proving ground you can't understand until you've done it.
2 - jamminsue
Dan, here is where you really, really fall down: Is this supposed to be some kind of old style cold war fear mongering?
*Worthy at most of a footnote, Senator Obama has a lead in Russia, where Obama would receive 27 percent support and McCain 6 percent, VTsIOM found, in the September 6-7 poll. Putin got 33 percent backing against 14 percent for Medvedev."
3 - RJ Elliott
Good article, Dan.
Best line:
"Senator Obama is said to have arranged a meeting with former President Clinton to try to figure out what to do. What advice will former President Clinton give? I haven't the foggiest idea. Perhaps his advice on electrifying his campaign will be to stand barefoot in a puddle of water and grab hold of a live wire."
I lol'd.
4 - dee
This is a crappy piece of writing i'm pissed I wasted 10 minutes of my life reading it... you went to Yale? you must have attended the same classes as GWB... how can you make the claim that you know what the people in the audience were thinking? that is absolutely insane! every politician and their mother has used that phrase, mccain has used it on more than one occasion and heck there is also a former McCain adviser with a book out titled lipstick on a pig... i see in your little profile there you spend some time trying to write... trying is right because this piece is nonsense nonsense... the polls are leveling off, and the polls reflect popular vote that you and I both know does not decide the president.. thanks to our electoral system... Palin is a joke, she is redneck from Alaska who is way over her head... makes me think of the current president... she is clueless on so many things and mccain is way too old and out of touch... they will be defeated come November... I can't wait until the debates when the McCain / crazy Palin ticket will actually have to discuss issues (and not lipstick)... we have some serious shit that needs to be addressed in this country, but the republicans do not see a problem and the American citizens will ultimately see a problem with that...
5 - Zedd
Dan,
You've gone potty.
What's this all about?
6 - RJ Elliott
Fun with polls:
Gallup Tracking - McCain 48 - Obama 44
Quote:
7 - Zedd
Dan,
If RJ is complementing your logic, you are in deep kaka.
The truth is that you didn't like Obama and have been looking for a reason to rally against him.
Have you no price man! Palin??? Okay, she's cute but goodness gracious..... Pull yourself together.
The Reps suck and have messed up. Own it and move on. Don't loose your rep over this foolishness.
8 - Clavos
jamminsue,
Dan, beautiful prose as usual...You say:
That normality in turn highlighted the courage she showed in being there, on that stage for the first time in her life and under trying circumstances.
Not to take anything away from Dan's always fine writing, but the quote you cite above was actually by Peggy Noonan, as Dan indicates in his story.
Further, by saying "on that stage," Ms. Noonan is specifically referring to the national political stage, so the reference in fact, is true; the acceptance speech was Palin's first time ever "on that stage."
9 - RJ Elliott
More fun with polls:
Hotline Tracking - McCain/Palin 46 - Obama/Biden 44
Quote:
More info:
McCain 57-37 Favorable/Unfavorable +20
Palin 50-30 Favorable/Unfavorable +20
Obama 53-39 Favorable/Unfavorable +14
Biden 45-31 Favorable/Unfavorable +14
10 - Clavos
Did i not predict howls, Amigo?
11 - RJ Elliott
From comment #7:
"If RJ is complementing [sic] your logic, you are in deep kaka."
Actually, I wasn't complimenting his "logic," but his wit. Please fail some more.
"Don't loose [sic] your rep over this foolishness."
I do believe Zedd is in meltdown mode. This should be entertaining. ;-)
12 - Dave Nalle
Jasminsue:
Republicans are offered two choices this year.
Reform from within their own party which will get rid of the bad of Bush and keep the good. Or socialism and more bureaucracy from Obama and the left.
Why would you expect Republicans to be desperate enough to support Obama when they can solve the Bush problem and still stay on a more positive track?
Dave
13 - RJ Elliott
Could the McCain-Palin ticket stunt Democrat gains in the Congress?
Maybe:
Democracy Corps - 07/24/2008 - Dems 50, GOP 42
Democracy Corps - 09/10/2008 - Dems 50, GOP 45
USA Today/Gallup - 08/23/2008 - Dems 51, GOP 42
USA Today/Gallup - 09/07/2008 - GOP 50, Dems 45
CNN/Opinion Research - 09/07/2008 - Dems 49, GOP 46
The Dems are gonna pick up a couple Senate seats, at least. And probably a few House seats, at minimum. But that's a helluva lot better than what was expected just a couple months ago: The Dems picking up half a dozen or more seats in the Senate, and a dozen or more seats in the House.
No wonder The Left has gone batshit insane over the Palin pick. I'd be concerned, too!
14 - Ruvy
Aha! We seem to be approaching the real "issue" in this "campaign" - the polls.
The polls will change and go up and down over the next 50 days or so. Pollsters and political advisers who make their living following these ephemera always worry themselves sick - usually for nothing.
I wonder if any of the candidates has ever read "The Passion of Molly T" a novel about a "woman's lib" type who makes the sex war a conflict of real bullets. It makes interesting reading - particularly the very last two pages.
G-d gives vision to authors that they usually do not realize they have. There is a scary prescience to the book's end.
Dan, I found your piece entertaining as usual, but in all truth, I think you place too much attention on ephemeral polls. There is a far more reliable poll. I think it is called the "popcorn" poll, or something of that sort, that seems to call elections with an unerring accuracy that well-paid and overfed pollsters just cannot match. Folks buy popcorn in the shape of an elephant or donkey and you tote up the number of each sold.
15 - Ruvy
All of you probably know my take on this election. I support Obama - not because I think he is good, but because he will enrage reservists so much here with anti-Israel behavior that they will throw out the American puppets in Jerusalem.
But on an e-mail list I participate in, the question was asked by a foreigner "what would you look for in a president?"
Looking at this through my "American" lenses, this is what I wrote:
If I were voting in Minnesota for a president, something I did when you first became acquainted with me, I would be torn between who to vote for. First of all, I'd be voting for an American president, not the president of Israel. It wouldn't take me long to see that neither candidate has a realistic or workable program to pull the United States out of the mess it is in world-wide. Ideologically, I would be in favor of the Democratic candidate. While I don't like them much, their philosophies are closer to the syndicalist socialism I believe in. But frankly, both of them are as strong as weak dishwater, and worth even less.
Unfortunately, the solutions to pulling the United States out of the mess it is in lie in going to war. Because the States are broke, this war would have to be fast and cheap.
Fast - nuking Riyadh and destroying the stranglehold it has on oil.
Fast - moving American troops from Iraq to Arabia to control all the oil fields on the western side of the Persian Gulf.
Cheap - exploding three thermonuclear bombs high over Russia, China and Iran (EMP's over all of Eastern Europe and Asia) to destroy the command and control systems there to prevent a nuclear attack from any of them.
Fast - destroying the Iranian nuclear centers with bombers, destroying them in about 1,000 concerted sorties, using blockbuster bombs and whatever else it took.
Cheap - let the damned Israelis handle the Arabs. Give them a free reign to annex what they wanted so long as they put the bastards down and kept them down.
Cheap - pull out of the UN and kick them out of the United States.
Cheap - make the Europeans arm for war against Russia if they expected American help - the hell with their social welfare states - boycott them if they refused and seize European properties in the United States.
Cheap - Pull out of Afghanistan and let them rot on their own drugs - but execute any drug smugglers on our soil, and put a $20,000 bounty on every dead drug smuggler hauled into the DEA with drugs on him. Double the bounty for members of organized crime.
None of this would be done with any warning, except to tell the Israelis that the chokehold was off and they could take any Arab land they wanted.
That kind of policy, carried out over two or three months, would assure that there was only one world power, the United State, and that world power would be able to cancel the Chinese and Arab notes of debt and bully most others to cancel notes of debt they had against America. America would again be a creditor nation, even if it were accomplished at the point of a bayonet. Arabs would piss in their pants before daring to mess with America.
Now.
Name me the American politician with the balls to pull that off, and you have the president I would follow through hell and high water.
16 - Ruvy
Oh yes. I forgot one thought.
Ship B. Hussein Obama off to Kenya, make him president there and let him initiate change all he wants. All of his skills as a community organizer will be called upon to keep the non-Luo from murdering off the Luo, and he could appeal to blacks from America to "Come home to Africa" and rebuilt the continent with the American know-how and capital they could bring with them.
He could start with providing decent housing for his half-brother.
17 - Dave Nalle
But Ruvy. Almost all of that nuking and invading and securing could be avoided if we just nuked Israel...
Dave
18 - Ruvy
But Ruvy. Almost all of that nuking and invading and securing could be avoided if we just nuked Israel...
You think so, Dave? The Saudis would still be chewing a hole in everybody's wallet with their "cheap" oil, they would still be financing madrassas to kill the likes of you, you filthy infidel, your country would still be threatened by Russia and China, especially China, holding all that American mortgage debt.
Killing us (throw in all the American Jews just to get rid of socialist liberal nuisances like Mark Schannon and Lisa Warren) would reduce the burden on the planet's population a bit - but who could your fundies convert to drag Jesus out of his hidy-hole in heaven? Who could the Arabs blame for all of their troubles? That would be you Americans, old boy. They'd be after your asses in a New York minute - and you'd still have to bomb the SOB's.
Nah - be reasonable. Do it my way.
19 - Dave Nalle
The fundies would still have european and ethiopian and american jews to convert. There's really no shortage.
And once we nuke Israel the whole world will love us again, or so the left keeps telling me.
Dave
20 - Clavos
And once we nuke Israel the whole world will love us again, or so the left keeps telling me.
That's it! Let's just nuke the left and be done with it.
21 - Ruvy
That's it! Let's just nuke the left and be done with it.
But you gotta round 'em up first - that costs money, even to pay for the goons and give them intelligent directions. So it ain't cheap anymore. But on the other hand, you got all those empty prisons and camps that pricks with black uniforms are guarding. Also, that's what Guantanamo and Abu Ghreib are for. Maybe you could stick them in an island near Venezuela and get rid of a whole bunch of Russkies at the same time?
Whattya think, eh?
22 - Christopher Rose
Ruvy, thanks for providing definitive proof that you really are absolutely hopeless at politics, understand nothing about human nature and that you are just a tiny bit absolutely fucking bonkers!
23 - Lisa Solod Warren
Very odd logic, Dan Miller. You might try reading today's times.... McCain's bump is a bump, and his lies are so easily disproved... plus his ugly ads shall slip into oblivion.
It ain't over 'till it's over.
They counted out McCain months ago.
We shall see.
And Ruvy, you truly are a one-note wonder. Enough.
24 - Daniel Miller
Here is a link to Peggy Noonan's commentary today, in which she says, among other things,
Just after Governor Palin was nominated, Ms. Noonan expressed the view that the nomination was a mistake. Now, she seems to feel that the Democratic Party and media attacks on Governor Palin have backfired, big time.Dan(Miller)
25 - Clavos
#23 is redolent of Mrs. Warren whistlin' past the graveyard...