How McCain can bring up Ayers at the debate tonight.

[ProfJohn]

A LOT of people on the right want McCain to bring up Ayers tonight.
At this point McCain has nothing to lose.

McCain should simply ask:
"Why did you work with a man who built bombs that killed people? How could you work with a man with blood on his hands? How can you claim to fight the war on terror when worked besides terrorists yourself?"

And then leave Obama to defend his own actions.
If Obama can some how spin the question into a positive then he wins.
But there is a chance that Obama gets stuck and can't defend his association with the guy. Or he attempts to avoid the question entirely.

The best hope for McCain is that we get a moment similar to the Saddleback debate question about when life begins where Obama answered "That is above my pay grade."

Let Obama answer with his "I was only 8" and then throw it back in his face.
"You worked with the guy a few years ago. Did you know he was terrorist then? Did you still work with him knowing that?"

Again, McCain has nothing to lose at this point. He is on the path to losing. He can try something like this and hope it works or he can lose with honor. Although with everyone accusing him of being racist there isn't much 'honor' left. In other words: the media is not going to like him no matter what he does so stop trying to win the media over and start trying to win the election.

 

[jman19]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
A LOT of people on the right want McCain to bring up Ayers tonight.
At this point McCain has nothing to lose.

Except his dignity.

 

[shocksyde]

I think bringing up Ayers will be a big mistake. You KNOW Obama's camp has a pimp-slap answer ready to go.

 

[Vic]

"Take it to Obama!"

 

[Red Dawn]

Originally posted by: shocksyde
I think bringing up Ayers will be a big mistake. You KNOW Obama's camp has a pimp-slap answer ready to go.

Probably something similar to what member Don Vito Corleone posted in another thread

Senator McCain, I have tried to keep this campaign about the issues. You yourself said in 2000 that "I just have to rely on the good judgment of the voters not to buy into these negative attack ads. Sooner or later, people are going to figure out if all you run is negative attack ads you don't have much of a vision for the future or you're not ready to articulate it." Now, in 2008, according to a recent study by the University of Wisconsin, virtually all of your campaign ads are negative, and you have been unable or unwilling to articulate a clear or consistent vision for how this country can dig itself out of its current financial mess.

I do know Bill Ayers, though I haven't spoken with him in years. He and I served together on the board of a charitable organization working on children's education in Chicago that was funded by Walter Annenberg, a longtime Republican philanthropist who served as Ambassador to England under Richard Nixon. The Bill Ayers I knew was a tenured college professor, not a bomb-throwing radical. I know he did some horrible and foolish things in his past, when I was 8 years old, and I have always condemned those actions in the strongest possible terms.

Now, while I prefer to keep this campaign positive, you have made that impossible by falling into the same kinds of dirty tricks campaigning that President Bush ran against you 8 years ago. With that in mind, Senator, let me point out that only one of this on this stage has been reprimanded by the US Senate for taking hundreds of thousands of dollars and tropical vacations from Charles Keating, who was trying to block investigation into the sames kinds of financial abuses that created our current financial crisis, forcing the last huge bailout of financial institutions by the federal government. That person is you. And only person running for vice president has been found by independent investigators to have abused her authority and violated state ethics regulations by trying to fire a cabinet official for personal reasons. That person is your running mate, Governor Palin.

Now, let's put all this nonsense aside. What the American people care about is the issues. Let's focus our attention on helping them, not on tearing each other apart.

 

[Arkaign]

Hint to ProJo, which I'm sure McCain largely already knows. Other than the die-hard (R) base which will pull the (R) lever regardless, Americans DO NOT CARE about Ayers. The story has been non-stop flooding on the right-wing radio sites and Fox News, but there is zero traction on it.

People are far more interested in the economy ATM. Even if the economy was roses, there are about a million more important things to worry about than Ayers. Even Palin's troopergate is a largely a non-issue, as it pales in comparison to the public's interest in pocketbook issues.

 

[Bitek]

What is this, the master plan to sink McCain's #'s even further? Are you a consultant on the McCain campaign, because you've done a heckuva job.

Yeah, great plan to go on comparing who has the shadiest past connections meanwhile the economy is still cratering and people want to hear the solutions.

Originally posted by: ProfJohn A LOT of people on the right want McCain to bring up Ayers tonight. At this point McCain has nothing to lose.

Except his dignity.

 

[Stoneburner]

How come McCain does not repudiate the Annebergs who FUNDED Bill Ayers?

What a fuckin asshat.

 

[OrByte]

imho if McCain brings this up in the debate then he loses automatically. This tabloid stuff isn't the political dialogue no matter how hard the GOP wishes it would be. The economy is issue #1.

The only people that want to hear about Ayers ACORN Wright etc are the people that are going to vote McCain anyway.

I think you will hear Obama say something along the same lines when he addressed an Ayers question in the debate with HRC several months back. He was 8 years old bla bla

and then I think you will hear Obama say that he thinks the American people want to hear how both candidates are going to address the needs of the public. I think Obama will say something along the lines of the need for BOTH candidates to talk about issues that matter, not manufactured tabloid controversies.

At which point McCain can continue to press, and distance himself from the more important issues that Americans care about, or he can abandon the line of attack and get back to talking about things that matter. Knowing that the more he presses, the more chance OBama has to bring up some of McCains skeletons. A man doesnt work in Washington for 26 years and NOT make some poor associations. You think Obama is the only one?

Ultimately, I dont think McCain is going to bring up this tabloid stuff.

 

[Mani]

I don't think McCain will do a good enough job of it. McCain's got plenty of skeletons in his closet that Obama could bring up, and he knows it. McCain's also got a problem being confrontational without looking "mean and nasty" - a turnoff for independent women.

Bottom line - bringing up Ayers won't do sh*t except excite the base - undecideds for the most part don't give a sh*t about it, otherwise they wouldn't be undecided this late in the game.

 

[smashp]

Not Even George Bush brought up the Swift boaters stuff himself. He keep his distance from the slime and let the mindless little bitches of the republican am machine be his little whores.

 

[retrospooty]

Originally posted by: shocksyde
I think bringing up Ayers will be a big mistake. You KNOW Obama's camp has a pimp-slap answer ready to go.

Yup... McCain is treading dangerous water.

 

[OrByte]

Look, bottom line is McCain is still STILL trying to keep his base support to get out and vote on Nov 4th. We are 3 weeks away and he is battling fights on two fronts. One fight within his own party and another fight with Obama.

Palin, (dontcha-know-imasoccermom-joesixpack-youbetcha) for all her popularity and appeal is still running as the sidekick to the main-man. And three weeks from election day that main-man cant hold the party together.

SOO McCain has to tow the line. Continue to appease the base, while attempting to rope in more voters from the middle and the indy's.

Attacking Obama on AYERS ACORN WRIGHT in the middle of the final debate whilst the country is in crisis would be the most stupid IDIOTIC and CALLOUS thing to do. And it will turn him off to a TON of undecideds. McCain knows this, his campaign has seen what the fallout was of the last 2 debates. After both debates McCains favorabilities tanked, while Obama's steadily increased. McCain knows he is driving the nails in his own coffin by going down this line of attack.

But Obama challenged him....and McCain (McFly) isn't a chicken.

I wonder if this was the plan from Obama's camp all along. I was curious why Obama said what he said about McCain not "saying it to his face" now its kinda of making sense.

 

[ProfJohn]

Originally posted by: Red Dawn
-snip

After that speech McCain just says "You still haven't answered the question."

BTW I don't think McCain got a reprimand either.
Plus if Obama gives some speech about how we shouldn't play dirty and turns around and plays dirty it will sort of defeat his purpose, right?

 

[aphex]

Originally posted by: Red Dawn

Originally posted by: shocksyde
I think bringing up Ayers will be a big mistake. You KNOW Obama's camp has a pimp-slap answer ready to go.

Probably something similar to what member Don Vito Corleone posted in another thread

Senator McCain, I have tried to keep this campaign about the issues. You yourself said in 2000 that "I just have to rely on the good judgment of the voters not to buy into these negative attack ads. Sooner or later, people are going to figure out if all you run is negative attack ads you don't have much of a vision for the future or you're not ready to articulate it." Now, in 2008, according to a recent study by the University of Wisconsin, virtually all of your campaign ads are negative, and you have been unable or unwilling to articulate a clear or consistent vision for how this country can dig itself out of its current financial mess.

I do know Bill Ayers, though I haven't spoken with him in years. He and I served together on the board of a charitable organization working on children's education in Chicago that was funded by Walter Annenberg, a longtime Republican philanthropist who served as Ambassador to England under Richard Nixon. The Bill Ayers I knew was a tenured college professor, not a bomb-throwing radical. I know he did some horrible and foolish things in his past, when I was 8 years old, and I have always condemned those actions in the strongest possible terms.

Now, while I prefer to keep this campaign positive, you have made that impossible by falling into the same kinds of dirty tricks campaigning that President Bush ran against you 8 years ago. With that in mind, Senator, let me point out that only one of this on this stage has been reprimanded by the US Senate for taking hundreds of thousands of dollars and tropical vacations from Charles Keating, who was trying to block investigation into the sames kinds of financial abuses that created our current financial crisis, forcing the last huge bailout of financial institutions by the federal government. That person is you. And only person running for vice president has been found by independent investigators to have abused her authority and violated state ethics regulations by trying to fire a cabinet official for personal reasons. That person is your running mate, Governor Palin.

Now, let's put all this nonsense aside. What the American people care about is the issues. Let's focus our attention on helping them, not on tearing each other apart.

:thumbsup:

 

[DAPUNISHER]

I think that story I saw posted here about Mac being in attendance at a meeting, that included an abortion clinic bomber and/or shooter, would make a good reposte.

f that tells us anything, what does August 30th, 1993 tell us? On that day, McCain attended a fund-raiser for the Oregon Citizens' Alliance. He can't claim he wasn't warned going in 30 protestors picketed him for endorsing the anti-gay group.

Prior to McCain's appearance there, a Republican senator, a colleague of his, Mark Hatfield, warned Senator McCain not to do it. McCain's own staffers called it "The invitation from hell," the Oregonian newspaper reported. An Arizona newspaper column previewed the speech with this headline, quote, "Hate Group Finds Friend in McCain."

And yet, McCain went, sat silently, offered no rebuke during or after the remarks of this woman, Marilyn Shannon, who praised a local woman who had just shot a doctor less than two weeks earlier. A doctor who was a former Navy flight surgeon, a sonogram pioneer, was shot in both arms because he performed legal abortions.

Unlike Ayers, who did not endorse terrorist activities during his meetings with Obama, this woman, Shannon, said of the shooter, as McCain sat there, quote, "She's a fine lady." A judge later sentenced this "fine lady" for a campaign of, yes, bombing women's clinics said, quote, "Though, I am loathed to call anyone a terrorist, you are a terrorist."

And Marilyn Shannon, who defended that terrorist, who later said her praise did not mean she approves of others doing what that terrorist did, as McCain renounced her even, she was a Bush delegate in 2004, seen here with a purple heart bandage, mocking the American combat veteran, John Kerry. This year, last month, she was a delegate for John McCain.

touché?

 

[Red Dawn]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn

Originally posted by: Red Dawn
-snip

After that speech McCain just says "You still haven't answered the question."

BTW I don't think McCain got a reprimand either.
Plus if Obama gives some speech about how we shouldn't play dirty and turns around and plays dirty it will sort of defeat his purpose, right?

Wrong, that speech would bury McCain with the undecideds and Moderates.

 

[dbk]

You should remind yourself that Obama has encouraged McCain to bring it up because we all know it'll be suicide for him. The key for McCain now is to attract the undecided and the independent who, as the polls have shown, decry negative attacks. It's only the base of the Repub party who want all this negativity.

 

[eleison]

Originally posted by: dbk
You should remind yourself that Obama has encouraged McCain to bring it up because we all know it'll be suicide for him. The key for McCain now is to attract the undecided and the independent who, as the polls have shown, decry negative attacks. It's only the base of the Repub party who want all this negativity.

Gotta bring it up. That's the only thing left. If McCain doesn't bring it up, he will definitely lose the election (if he hasn't already).

 

[Robor]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn

Originally posted by: Red Dawn
-snip

After that speech McCain just says "You still haven't answered the question."

BTW I don't think McCain got a reprimand either.
Plus if Obama gives some speech about how we shouldn't play dirty and turns around and plays dirty it will sort of defeat his purpose, right?

Uh, assuming he responds with Don Vito's quote, yeah he did...

I do know Bill Ayers, though I haven't spoken with him in years. He and I served together on the board of a charitable organization working on children's education in Chicago that was funded by Walter Annenberg, a longtime Republican philanthropist who served as Ambassador to England under Richard Nixon. The Bill Ayers I knew was a tenured college professor, not a bomb-throwing radical. I know he did some horrible and foolish things in his past, when I was 8 years old, and I have always condemned those actions in the strongest possible terms.

And the response would be, 'John, I answered your question and I'm not going to play your game. Please keep this debate focused on the critical issues that face this nation'.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Originally posted by: eleisonGotta bring it up. That's the only thing left. If McCain doesn't bring it up, he will definitely lose the election (if he hasn't already).

He throws that jab, he is going to get crumpled with a body shot. He'd better find a clear message and plan on the economy, one he can share with us tonight, or he is most assuredly, an also ran.

 

[Farang]

As per wikipedia:

Bill Ayers and Barack Obama at one time lived in the same neighborhood in the city of Chicago, and both had worked on education reform in the state of Illinois. The two met "at a luncheon meeting about school reform."[41] Obama was named to the Chicago Annenberg Challenge Project Board of Directors to oversee the distribution of grants in Chicago. Later in 1995, Ayers hosted "a coffee" for "Mr. Obama's first run for office."[42] The two served on the board of a community anti-poverty group, the Woods Fund of Chicago, between 2000 and 2002, during which time the board met twelve times.[42] In April 2001, Ayers contributed $200 to Obama's re-election fund to the Illinois State Senate.[41] Since 2002, there has been little linking Obama and Ayers.[42] The senator said in September 2008 that he hadn't "seen him in a year-and-a-half."[43] In February 2008, Obama spokesman Bill Burton released a statement from the senator about the relationship between the two: "Senator Obama strongly condemns the violent actions of the Weathermen group, as he does all acts of violence. But he was an eight-year-old child when Ayers and the Weathermen were active, and any attempt to connect Obama with events of almost forty years ago is ridiculous."[41] CNN's review of project records found nothing to suggest anything inappropriate in the non-profit projects in which the two men were involved.[44] Internal reviews by The New York Times, The Washington Post, Time magazine, The Chicago Sun-Times, The New Yorker and The New Republic "have said that their reporting doesn't support the idea that Obama and Ayers had a close relationship".[45]

Obama has truth on his side. I'm looking forward to McCain bringing up Ayers, Chicago's 1997 Citizen of the Year.

 

[MagicConch]

I hope he doesn't bring it up and Obama doesn't bring up the Keating thing but both will likely be brought up.

 

[ayabe]

Whatever McCain's transition team is headed up by a guy who lobbied on behalf of Saddam in order to try to get sanctions lifted.

"William Timmons, the Washington lobbyist who John McCain has named to head his presidential transition team, aided an influence effort on behalf of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein to ease international sanctions against his regime.

The two lobbyists who Timmons worked closely with over a five year period on the lobbying campaign later either pleaded guilty to or were convicted of federal criminal charges that they had acted as unregistered agents of Saddam Hussein's government."

Text


So yeah, why is McCain palling around with friends of Saddam?

 

[Xavier434]

If McCain brings it up then it will add fuel to the fire when it comes to McCain's die hard supporters, will make the die hard Obama supporters roll their eyes and say something along the lines of "here it comes...." as they expect the next 5 min to be a boring waste of time, and it will make those sitting on the fence more likely to turn more blue than red just like we have been seeing the past few weeks.

In other words, McCain bringing up Ayers should only prove one thing. The man does not learn from him mistakes and he is anything but flexible with his opinions and how he approaches things. Not good. If he cannot reform his campaign to produce what he considers desirable results then how exactly am I supposed to expect him to reform this country?

However, if Ayers is brought up by the moderator then it might turn out to be a topic which will probably not sway the public either way since you KNOW Obama is prepared for it. It will be a match that gets lit for a minute at best and then fizzles out to nothing.