McCain seems to frequently wake up on the other side of the bed...

There is much talk about John McCain's temper, as he is frequently known as "Senator Hothead" from numerous publications. He is also known for his famous quotes: "F*** you" (directed towards Texas Senator John Cornyn), "Only an a****** would put together a budget like this," (directed towards Senator Pete Domenici), and "I'm calling you a f****** jerk!" (directed towards Senator Chuck Grassley).  He has also been seen lashing out at his fellow citizens, as he called a high school student a jerk after he was claimed too old to be president (ABC News).   There are also numerous video clippings of McCain's 'freak outs'. Here are some examples:

Temper Tantrum 1

Temper Tantrum 2 (Where he makes a lady cry!)

Plus many other YouTube videos with examples, search "McCain Temper".

These videos also contain examples of McCain cursing excessively. 

Yet both John and Cindy McCain's reasoning for his temperament is simply because McCain feels so passionate and concerned for his country, and that many just happen to confuse McCain's strong passion for quick temperament. Many citizens of the US find his temer to be very crude and disrespectful, while others believe that McCain just represents the common man, and that his temper is equivalent to the average person (New York Times). 

I  guess it all depends on the citizen, whether they prefer the common man, who is  erratic and willing to freak out on anyone who comes in his way. Or a more calm and collected Barack Obama, who is willing to hold back such unnecessary 'freak outs'.

Ayers and Obama: CNN Reports, You Decide

New Dangers in Speaking Truth to Power

Imagine you are sitting at home minding your own business. There is a knock at the door, a presidential candidate is there, asking for your vote. In return for this privilege you ask him a question that reveals, to many in the country, a new perspective on his candidacy. For this you are subject to myriad of investigations,insults, your livelihood is threatened,and your dreams are belittled. This is the story of Joe Wurzelbacher, a regular citizen whose attentive questioning brought into question the nature of Senator Obama's tax plan.



No he doesn't yet make 250,000 dollars, he hopes too. No he doesn't have a plumbing license, he does residential work so he doesn't need one. Yes has a tax lien, but so does Obama's treasurer, a fact which has never been trumpeted with such vigor by the media as all of the little pecadillos of poor Mr.Wurzelbacher, an ordinary citizen whose only crime was to question Orthodox political thought. Here is a man who hopes to work hard, save, and achieve, slandered.

p.s. the idea that McCain's campaign needs to vet people who ask Obama tough but illuminating questions strikes me as a trifle absurd.

Also, Another American paying the price for his Heterodoxy.



Update, Quotes from the Plumber in Question:

"Hopefully they'll have me to thank for it as far as telling people to get out and find their own answers," Mr. Wurzelbacher said. "That's where I hope they go with it."

"It actually upsets me," Mr. Wurzelbacher said. "I am a plumber, and just a plumber, and here Barack Obama or John McCain, I mean these guys are going to deal with some serious issues coming up shortly. The media's worried about whether I paid my taxes, they're worried about any number of silly things that have nothing to do with America. They really don't. I asked a question. When you can't ask a question to your leaders anymore, that gets scary. That bothers me."

Warm Up for the Last Debate: Thoughts from the First

Thoughts from the first debate or
"Between the idea and the reality ...lies the shadow. " - T.S. Elliot

Just around the point when Obama was fumbling with that mystic talisman that would seemingly prove his righteousness in demanding his form of peace, the bracelet of sergeant Jopek, the Senator from Illinois said "No U.S. soldier ever dies in vain because they’re carrying out the missions of their commander in chief. And we honor all the service that they’ve provided." It was an odd turn of phrase, perhaps the fault of a man unused to speaking in terms appropriate to military service, but did the Senator mean to suggest that the value of our soldier’s sacrifices was proportional to their fealty to the orders of their ultimate commander? That sort of sentiment seems more at home in an autocracy, where, as a representative of the will of the people or as a reflection of personal over institutional loyalty, soldiers swear their allegiance to their leader rather then to their homeland. American soldiers fight for "their country", for “the republic”, for “freedom”, or more simply, for the "folks back home" or "for the man next to them." They do not fight for the whim, or desires, of their leader, not as the legions fought for Caesar, and not even as the British fight for their Queen. Ours is a republic, our soldiers fight, or are said to fight, for the maintenance of our democratic institutions and our freedom. And the "we" used in the second sentence, does Senator Obama presume to speak as the embodiment of the nation, in the monarchicial plural, as a prince would?
Now, I would have left these phrases alone (one doesn't like to parse, and it should be said that the words of any man can be taken out of context) if they didn't speak to the duality of the Obama phenomenon. On the one hand we have Obama the avatar of change, the light worker, the capsule of hope for a nation that yearns to end division, to bring about righteous change and to be loved, again, among the countries; On the other their is the man, of flesh and blood; the enigma, the sphinx, a community organizer who accomplished nothing, a lecturer who never wrote, and a Senator who never voted. His plans are ever shifting, ephemeral; does anyone soberly imagine that he can bring his health care through? Some of his plans are at best at best cheap bribes, 500 dollars to each taxpayer. But then there is that awesome pride, the fake presidential seal, the acceptance among roman columns looming out over 60,000 eager acolytes, and the already placed transition team. "We are the change we have been waiting for" meaningless, except if "he" is that change. One of the great dangers democracies have always faced is that of the demagogue, whose paltry record, clear voice and deep charisma lacerate the people into believing that they are electing more then simply a politician.
Remember, you may vote for the dream on November 4th but it will be the man who takes office on January 20th.

To Follow Shortly: More sober reflections on the third debate. The second one need not be spoken of.

Mr. McCain Goes to Washington

Last Wednesday, John McCain threw the political and media establishments on their ear by announcing he was planning to suspend his presidential campaign and return to Washington, D.C. to help broker a deal that would stave off the seemingly imminent collapse of our financial infrastructure.

The next 24-72 hours of McCain's campaign may well turn out to be among the most disastrous of his political career. Consider:

• McCain cancelled his appearance on The Late Show with David Letterman. Letterman invited outspoken McCain critic Keith Olbermann on in his stead and then spent the vast majority of the program raking McCain over the coals. A YouTube clip that distills Letterman's assaults has been viewed over 2.3 million times.

• Rather than head straight back to D.C., McCain stayed in New York, gave an interview to Katie Couric, spent the night, then spoke at the Clinton Global Initiative on Thursday morning.

• The 24-hour delay between his announcement and his arrival in D.C. proved costly, as it allowed the Dems to get their ducks in a row and turn McCain's plan against him in the following ways:
  

• Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) and the ranking member on the House Financial Services Committee, Barney Frank (D-MA), seemed to ink a compromise deal with enough support before McCain showed up, leaving the Arizona Republican to look less like the cavalry riding in to save the day than a superfluous attention-seeker whose only way to remain relevant was to throw the deal off track.

  
  

• When it came time to meet with leaders from the two parties and President Bush at the White House, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) handed over role of lead negotiator to Barack Obama, who then pressed McCain to choose between siding with the conservative base in the House that had revolted against the original bailout on the one hand, or with the bipartisan agreement supported by Dems, Bush and Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson. Reports indicate that McCain would not respond to Obama's repeated requests for him to say which plan he supported. Eventually, the notoroiously tempermental McCain left the meeting a few minutes early, erasing any chance for the big bi-partisan presidential photo-op with him, Obama, Bush and other congressional leaders.

• When McCain announced he was suspending his campaign, he also indicated he would not attend the debate if a deal had not been reached. Because he took so long getting to D.C., he wasn't part of brokering a deal but of breaking the deal. With no agreement in place, McCain had to find a way to justify attending the debate without losing face. The answer from his campaign: Senator McCain believes progress is being made and he will return to D.C. immediately after the debate and remain there until a deal emerges.
  

• McCain's running-mate Sarah Palin's disastrous interview with Katie Couric meant she continued to be hidden from the press, allowing Joe Biden to make the rounds in the hours after the debate while McCain's VP was conspicuously MIA.

• McCain's temper seemed to show in the debate, in which, despite maintaining that he likes to reach across the aisle, could not even look across the stage at Obama. This bit of body language has featured prominently in post-debate coverage and will likely result in an awkward bit of over-compensation in the second debate.

• With no deal in place, and McCain having sworn he'd return to D.C., the Maverick spent all day Saturday holed up in his Arlington, VA condo. This will have some repercussions, to be sure. With only five weekends left before the election, weekend events allow candidates opportunities to draw the largest possible crowds while also ensuring that they don't have to compete with other news. For instance, instead of trying to maintain the appearance of putting country first, Obama hit the trail in the battleground state of North Carolina, where he hammered McCain on the economy in front of 20,000 people in Greensboro.

All in all, not a great couple of days for the Straight Talk Express.

And They Say Obama Flip-Flops...

I can understand why candidates "flip-flop" in most cases. Opinions change as time goes on. Let's be honest, who didn't support the War in Iraq when it first began? But a lot changed between then and now, and it's unfair to condemn someone who previously supported the war but no longer does. But I digress...

Anyways, this interesting article written by Jennifer Harper of the Washington Times caught my attention. The story is mostly about how many feminist organizations such as EMILY's List are urging women not to vote for the McCain-Palin ticket (EMILY'S List newest slogan proclaims, "Read my lipstick: I am voting Democrat"). However, there is a tiny tidbit of information in this article that really says a lot about the Republican party:

The transformation of Republicans into energized Palin fans was quick. Shortly before Mr. McCain announced that Mrs. Palin was his running mate, the Pew Research Center surveyed 2,300 voters, asking, "Do mommies or daddies make better candidates?"

At that time, only one in five Republican respondents said they would support a candidate who was the mother of school-aged children; 53 percent of Republicans said working mothers were a "bad thing for society." Among Democrats, a third supported mother-politicians, while 38 percent did not favor working mothers.

You really can't get much more hypocritical than that. You can't go from saying that working women are bad for America one day and then the day after say that a working woman should be the next Vice President of the United States. If a "Hypocrite of the Century" award existing, there would be a clear winner in the Flip-flopublican Party.

Really, how do they sleep at night?

September 11 for the Candidates and Its Significance

Despite the last two weeks where the Democratic candidate, Barack Obama, and the Republicans' candidate, John McCain have been sparring against each other on the issues facing citizens in the upcoming election had a one assumed cease-fire today as both men visited the remains of the World Trade Center; giving their respects to those who died in the attacks. After both men walked up to a reflection pool at the top of a long ramp, they each picked up one flower: Obama a pink one and McCain a yellow one; stood on the side of the pool and placed both flowers in. They then took a few seconds in silent remembrance.

Barack and John then spoke to members of the fire and police departments and then after a small discussion with others at the site, they left. A person close by is quoted to have heard Barack say to John, “All right sir, see you soon.” Even as both men are in a close race for the Presidency, it shows that they still have civility to each other; something most Op-Ed writers say has vanished once Obama received the nomination. While this is good, it also brings up the issue of terrorism that seems have to have gone into the back of voter's minds as of late, September 11th will always be remember in the hearts and souls of Americans.