Well its less than a month to go until the next President of the United States is elected, and I cannot wait until the result is announced. Even here in South Korea amongst the few foreigners in my area, we have a good mix of Independents, Republicans and Democrats. Keeping an eye on the polls these last few days…I walked up to my Republican friend and issued the following statement:
I can’t wait until Senator Obama wins the election…
I must admit, that statement is a fair bit arrogant but I was feeling pretty good given that the current economic situation heavily favors Senator Obama. Today I spoke to my older brother who works within the London financial sector, he told me the scariest aspect of the next few months as far as the global economy is concerned is that we are heading into the realm of theoretical economics.
What this means is that no one knows what is going to happen next, not Bernanke or any other egghead employed by any company in the world. This lack of knowledge heavily favors Senator Obama despite him knowing about as much about the situation as anyone else. The problem is that Senator McCain knows he would lose an Obama/McCain economic fight therefore he is stirring up all this trouble with regards to Senator Obama and terrorism.
This strategy is disgusting if not despicable and I cannot wait until Senator McCain gets what he deserves. Therefore at this juncture, I will call the election as a slim victory for Senator Obama and Senator Biden.
Going into my 3rd week in South Korea, I have to say my schedule has not gone the way I planned . I am still sort of disorganized at work which is why I haven’t started to post at least once a day which was my original goal this past week. This past weekend was choo-sook which is kind of like the Korean thanksgiving so there was lots of sales in the stores and people running around shopping for their respective families. I tried to get all my work done on Friday so I could enjoy the long weekend which happened for the most part however I just didn’t feel like answering emails or doing much of anything. I just wanted to “veg” for lack of a better word and I can say I have achieved that feeling of slowing down. That feeling is something I have desired for the last two weeks due to my constant rushing around at work.
Tomorrow is another day, and another week at work in which I hope to finally establish that all important feeling of “I know what I am doing” at work. Once this is all set, I expect to be back to blogging full time. For the moment here are some photo’s I have captured of the surrounding area:
Senator McCain is in the lead, nationally, according to many pollster’s which is a bit disturbing but I am going to take on this news with a positive spin. A MoveOn advert a few months ago stated that even if Senator Obama maintained his lead, his differences in the polls would have been very close to Senator Kerry in 2004 and might have cost him the race. The race is still close but with Senator McCain in the lead, it allows the Obama team to play the “under-dog” card which Senator McCain has been played on his numerous television appearances.
This card can be played slowly so that a torrent of support can build up behind the proverbial Obama levees and when the moment is just right they should be unleashed to take the election. Again, this is all speculation but if the Obama campaign’s raised total in August tells us anything, it indicates that the democrats and Obama followers have been feeling the pressure. Quite a few posts ago, I used the Pollster.com front page poll to illustrate the strength of the democratic position, now I am going to use it again to illustrate how the race has narrowed:
There have been alot of suggestions thrown around by various bloggers and media personalities, what the right choice is, no one knows, except Senator Obama’s campaign manager.
The following is a combination of two posts written over the last 48 hours concerning the trumped up “lipstick on a pig” statement made by Obama, which was presented by the McCain campaign as an attack on Sarah Palin despite the fact that Obama was talking about John McCain and the difference between his rhetoric and his policy positions at the time. This has been cross-posted from The Left Anchor…
John McCain’s team is now trying to make some big deal about Obama using the common expression, “lipstick on a pig,” when referring to John McCain’s political and rhetorical shifts over the course of the campaign. Though her name is never mentioned, the McCain camp did a fantastic job of portraying this as a sexist attack on Sarah Palin. Here is the clip in question:
There is simply no way to view that as an attack on Gov. Palin. Moreover, John McCain’s used that same expression himself in regards to Hillary Clinton and her health care plan. And pretty well everyone born in the South during the last hundred years has used that very same expression. The point of the expression isn’t to insult the physical appearance of the target in question, but rather, to highlight that what a person is presenting themselves to be is not always what they are.
It never ceases to amaze me just how stupid John McCain thinks the American public is. Luckily for him, his supporters don’t seem to care how big an ass he makes of himself, or how ridiculous his charges become. It’s as if a significant segment of our population actually prefer to be thought of as morons and rubes.
And so again I say, “Good luck, Sen. McCain, if this is the type of bullshit you wish to run your campaign on.”
And now, Pt. 2 of this pathetically hilarious, yet depressing story…
So, yesterday, the McCain campaign along with the news media decided they’d waste the public’s time with a ridiculous hopped up story about Barack Obama calling Sarah Palin a pig. Forget that he was using a common expression as old as dirt, as well as the fact that he was clearly referring to John McCain’s politics, not the Alaskan Governor; the American media decided that was what we should all be talking about yesterday.
Today, Obama took the first few minutes to take both John McCain and the media to task for their irresponsible and reckless behavior.
What world are McCain’s supporters living in? The man continues to prove how little he thinks of the American voter every single day. His own campaign manager stated quite clearly that this campaign is “not about the issues.” And every day these circus freaks put on another show, they prove themselves right, but the American people deserve better than this.
One more day before I am off to Korea and I am getting a little bit more anxious, but last night’s speech took my mind off of traveling onto the amazing week the Democrats have had. I am really impressed and I can say that Senator Obama hit exactly the right notes using a mix of issues and rhetoric while telling people why we cannot afford another 4 - 8 years of Senator McCain. This speech was aggressive while maintaining a message of hope and change that has resonated with so many Democrats. This speech, I believe, will be the catalyst to propel the democrats into a victory in November. Even though I will be further away from America in the coming months, I know Senator Obama will be the next President of the United States:
John McCain’s campaign has been hitting a constant theme in his most recent attacks, stating that Senator Obama is going to increase the size of the federal government. This theme resonates with conservatives who believe that a larger government is inefficient and wastes the tax payers money. The problem with this theme is that Senator McCain is wrong once again as stated by Politifact.com:
John McCain’s campaign is trying to paint Barack Obama as a big spender. In a new radio ad, an announcer says Obama wants to implement “$863-billion in new government programs - a 23 percent increase in the size of government.”
The percentage-increase claim is so far off base that we’re going to grant McCain several questionable assumptions - and then show that he’s still way off.
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And lastly, how can McCain argue that an increase in discretionary spending is the same as an increase “in the size of government”? Here’s what Pounder had to say about that: “By size of government, we are referring to government spending outside of mandatory spending. It’s the argument that outside of mandatory spending, this is the most immediate way that Barack Obama will have an impact on government spending and when you include his spending proposals it accounts for a 23 percent increase.”
That’s the equivalent of saying, “By size of government, we are referring to a government with no Social Security, no Medicare, no Medicaid, no food stamps, no federal employee retirement benefits and no interest on the national debt.”
Senator McCain’s 2nd mistake this week is to continue to mislead his base with attacks against Senator Obama’s tax plan however as I have stated in numerous posts, Senator McCain’s tax plan spends more money in his first term not to mention maintains the tax cuts for the richest Americans rather than those who need it the most:
Lastly the Sunlight Foundation is an organization that keeps track of politicians wealth, do you want to guess how elite Senator McCain is? $36,431,099 in 2006 according to Senator McCain’s personal disclosure forms. Senator Obama for that same year was worth just shy of $800,000. For those of you who think Senator McCain understands what it means to be in the middle class or that his policies help middle America, think again.
