This is just breathtaking in the McCain campaign's audacity to continue lying, even as they have been continually exposed to their lies. Andrew Sullivan writes:
I'm in two minds whether John McCain has lost his mind or never had a soul. But I have to say I am surprised by the barrage of lies and distractions his campaign is throwing out. The farce of the Palin candidacy is one such distraction - but the lies about sex education, the lies about Palin's pork record, the lies about "tiny" Iran, the lies about the lipstick-pig nonsense, the lies about the bridge to nowhere, the lies about the oil pipeline ... I mean, what is going on?
Some believe this is just GOP hardball. But it actually isn't. They're usually not this stupid. If you are going to broadcast a series of outrageous, demonstrable lies to smear your opponent, you tend to to that in the last two weeks of a campaign, so the lies can actually stick before they are debunked. But in September?
I know many people believe that the American people - especially the under-informed swing voters - are too dumb to know when they are being lied to. But these lies are so obvious that this cannot be true. And the sheer viciousness of the personal attacks on Obama make Rove's attack on McCain in 2000 seem mild.
Here's what I think. I think McCain is out of it. I think he checked out of his own campaign and handed it over to Schmidt and his fellow Rovians. This does not mean he does not have total responsibility. John McCain is now for ever a despicable and dishonest and dishonorable man. He has destroyed his reputation. But he is also trying to do what he can to win this election. My view is: if this is how he intends to win this election, he has mis-timed his lies.
I'm not sure if John McCain knows that he is lying, doesn't care that he is lying, or is too senile to realize that he is lying now. I think that in the beginning of the campaign, McCain was willing to sell his soul, his morality, and his ethics, to be elected president. He reversed his "maverick" position on the issues to march in lockstep with the hard-lined conservatives in the Republican Party. McCain was certainly willing to say anything, lie about anything, if it would advance his goal of getting elected into the White House. But something has gone completely wrong with the McCain campaign. Sullivan notes that this type of hardball lying usually takes place two weeks before the election--not two months before the election! There is a disconnect between John McCain the man, and John McCain the campaign, with John McCain going through the motions of campaigning like a sock puppet being controlled by his Rovian masters. And since the Rovian masters may have realized that they cannot campaign on a Bush Third Term that Americans have overwhelmingly rejected, they are forced into a campaign of lying and vicious character assassinations two months earlier than expected. What is more, the Rovians may have realized that John McCain may not live through his first term in office, and probably selected such an unknown, inexperienced, Alaskan governor, who has a hard-lined, extremist, conservative views that could be controlled by the Rovians if she succeeds McCain in office. I wonder if it is not just the stupidity of the Republican's part in engaging in such a nasty, vicious campaign, but rather a deep-seated fear within the GOP of seeing the American public reject the eight years of Bush administration disasters and failures for a Democratic control of Congress, and the White House. Karl Rove's dream of a one-party majority control of the federal government could result in the Republican Party's complete shut-out within the government, for perhaps a very long time.
The Republicans may be afraid of such a shut-out. Since all they can offer is the same failed policies of the Bush administration, then all they can do is campaign on lies and vicious, negative attacks against Obama.
And John McCain? He has become that sock puppet for the Rovian masters of his campaign. You could say that this election isn't about John McCain running for office, but rather Sarah Palin running for president. John McCain may become the caretaker to the Oval Office, as the Rovians educate Sarah Palin for their continued control of the White House. In other words, a McCain administration will be nothing more than a capstone for John McCain's career, as John McCain enjoys the trappings of the Oval Office, while the lobbyists and the Rovians control the McCainless political agenda. And wait for John McCain to pass the political power of the White House over to Sarah Palin. The Rovians' use of the McCain campaign lies become another means of instilling fear and control upon the American public--vote for McCain/Palin because we will make you safe from terrorism, from liberals, from black power, from the Democrats, from whatever else you fear. This election has become a game of control, a game of accumulation and retention of political power. John McCain's lies has become another means for the Rovians, and the GOP's, retention of political power.
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