What are the Key Factors for Victory in the 2008 Presidential Election?

[LowlyPion]

The Evo Child says that when she thinks of McPalin winning that it actually frightens her. I'm frightened too.

I keep telling myself it's just an uneducated, lunatic fringe that refer to themselves as "christians" that are once again making themselves look larger than life by being more vocal, and it's not a significant number of Americans that actually think Palin could be a qualified candidate.

This woman cannot even complete a sentence.

This can't be happening. It can't be real, like John Cleese said, it's something Monty Python would dream up. But it "is" real, this woman is actually up for election to the second highest office and a heartbeat away form being President of this country. Can you imagine?

That thought should get you to the polls then on Tuesday.

That's getting me to the polls I can tell you.

 

[mgb_phys]

Encouraging a Palin write-in is certainly a cleaner dirty trick

Has anyone come up with the conspiracy that Palin is a democrat party plant?
A sort of long term undercover sleeper agent who will slowly rise to the top of the GOP and then overthrow it?

 

[turbo]

My wife and I have already voted. We have been registered variously as Republicans or Democrats so that we can support the candidates that we support in the primaries. This year, we both voted straight Dem - the first time this has ever happened. William Cohen always got my vote, Reagan got my vote the first time out, and I would gladly have kept Margaret Chase Smith in the Senate forever if she didn't get old and die. (She was a lively and charming old lady even in her retirement, and still tough as nails!) This year, my wife and I decided to punish the Republicans as much as possible - we are sick of Bush, Cheney, Rove, and their enablers in Congress and their surrogates down-ticket that work to subvert the workings of our government even at the local level.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Check-out posts numbers 462 [first] and 463. Funny! Tsu and I had already noticed the penguin-like quality. HEHHHHH!
https://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?p=1934945#post1934945

 

[LowlyPion]

Has anyone come up with the conspiracy that Palin is a democrat party plant?
A sort of long term undercover sleeper agent who will slowly rise to the top of the GOP and then overthrow it?

It's not working then.

The only place she's going is back to Alaska. I rather think her future is pretty limited.

If they try to run her again in 2012, Democrats will likely control Congress like an absolute dictatorship. There will be no need to caucus, they can just meet in the chambers of the Houses.

 

[LowlyPion]

MSNBC now reporting that Joe the Plumber has hired a publicist.

Can't buy a business, but he can hire a publicist?

Oy.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Yesterday, we had Joe speaking to foreign policy! He is on the campaign trail with Palin.

Now there's your 2012 ticket! [uh oh, 2012... the Mayans saw this coming!]

 

[LowlyPion]

Yesterday, we had Joe speaking to foreign policy! He is on the campaign trail with Palin.

Now there's your 2012 ticket!

The late night shows would contribute to that ticket.

There is enough ignorance between the 2 of them to occupy several Universities of special educators full time for decades.

 

[LowlyPion]

[uh oh, 2012... the Mayans saw this coming!]

There's a Joe the Plumber pictograph at Chichén-Itzá?

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

My ballot is in! I took advantage of early voting today.

 

[OmCheeto]

My ballot is in! I took advantage of early voting today.

You're an Oregoonian too? Or has some other state stolen our casual approach to voting?

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

You're an Oregoonian too? Or has some other state stolen our casual approach to voting?

Wisconsin has it too :)

 

[OmCheeto]

Yesterday, we had Joe speaking to foreign policy! He is on the campaign trail with Palin.

Now there's your 2012 ticket! [uh oh, 2012... the Mayans saw this coming!]

There's a Joe the Plumber pictograph at Chichén-Itzá?

Is there a thread for voting for those people that make posts that make you pee your pants?

Greg! When are my dues due? I'd like to quintuple my investment in PF.

 

[LowlyPion]

McCain now running Robocalls in Arizona.

Sounds like panic.

 

[mathwonk]

i have a question for more savvy minds about campaign financing. for decades i have watched, consigned to the fact that repubs always had more money than dems, assuming this the price for their candying up to big business. this was accepted as natural, and an obstacle to be overcome.

this year it seems to me obama has been so universally appealing to ordinary people that he has shaken loose mounds of money never before dreamt of by democratic candidates. i myself who never gave more than 5 bucks, have given a hundred times that, because there is no price too high, within reason, worth preventing another era of disaster like that wrought by the ***** currently in office. indeed, anyone not having given the maximum last time, surely feels guilty for the reign of the worst president since reconstruction...ever?, and the havoc he has brought to the entire world.the odd part is now i am hearing a steady refrain that somehow the system is broken because obama has inspired more donations for once than the republican candidate. is it just assumed that whenever the repubs do not have twice the funds of dems that the system is broken?

indeed even now i believe the repubs as a party still have more money than the dems, and that is verified by the lying disgusting ads now being run by saxby chambliss here in georgia. for those outsiders, he is the guy who won the georgia senate race by running an ad accusing max cleland, a triple amputee vietnam vet democrat, of being soft on terrorism, and superimposing osama bin laden's face on the ad. this ad was described as despicable by even perhaps john mc cain. but it worked.

i am equally disgusted by the ads run lately by the democratic senatorial campaign here. i gave money to them in good faith, and now they are spending it to run lying misleading ads for democratic candidates that are not much better than the lying ads run by the repubs. have they no shame? i do not want to fund democrats who are willing to lie like republicans to win.

to be quite honest, i was very disappointed by obama's message tonight. it seems he feels he has sewn up the votes of intelligent people and was going now after the votes of idiots. it leaves me feeling bad, but nowhere near as bad as the unrelentingly offensive campaign of mccain palin.

 

[LowlyPion]

...another era of disaster like that wrought by the ***** currently in office.

Gee that's much pithier than I can manage for censored words to describe
that ******-******* ******** *** ** * *****.

 

[mathwonk]

so much for censorship, at leAST i think i got some of that.

 

[LowlyPion]

so much for censorship, at leAST i think i got some of that.

I meant that in the nicest possible way of course.

 

[physics girl phd]

to be quite honest, i was very disappointed by obama's message tonight. it seems he feels he has sewn up the votes of intelligent people and was going now after the votes of idiots. it leaves me feeling bad, but nowhere near as bad as the unrelentingly offensive campaign of mccain palin.

I'm okay with that focus. Education of Americans 18 and over (via 2007 US census data for the US census website): ~15% don't have a HS education. 50% are HS graduates, and may have had some college but no degree. That leaves about ~35% with degrees... including associates degrees! (for curiosity, 8% have associates degrees (occupational or academic), 17% have bachelors, 6% have masters, 1% have professional and 1% have doctoral).

Being in the upper echelons, I'm just glad Sen. Obama is running an almost impeccable "national campaign": focusing on on the issues important in battleground states and all the groups, but not neglecting this nation-wide opportunity to give shout-outs to people he could have in his pocket regardless (like Massachusetts)... or has perhaps no chance of (Kansas). He needs to keep showing the nation he can be presidential... even fire-side chatty.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

i have a question for more savvy minds about campaign financing. for decades i have watched, consigned to the fact that repubs always had more money than dems, assuming this the price for their candying up to big business. this was accepted as natural, and an obstacle to be overcome.

this year it seems to me obama has been so universally appealing to ordinary people that he has shaken loose mounds of money never before dreamt of by democratic candidates. i myself who never gave more than 5 bucks, have given a hundred times that, because there is no price too high, within reason, worth preventing another era of disaster like that wrought by the ***** currently in office. indeed, anyone not having given the maximum last time, surely feels guilty for the reign of the worst president since reconstruction...ever?, and the havoc he has brought to the entire world.


the odd part is now i am hearing a steady refrain that somehow the system is broken because obama has inspired more donations for once than the republican candidate. is it just assumed that whenever the repubs do not have twice the funds of dems that the system is broken?

Same here. We gave about 150 times more than I have ever contributed. And I was considering giving the maximum of $2300, if needed [not that we can afford it right now].

The public financing bit is a joke when the RNC can fund as many commercials as they want. But Obama is unique. I think campaign fundraising has been forever changed, but I also suspect that the enthusiasm, hence the total of donations that we have seen, is a once in a lifetime event.

Yes, it has been amuzing to listen to the Reps cry and moan when for once they were faced with a financial circumstance not heavily weighted in their favor. The sad thing is that, were Obama a white guy named John Smith, he would probably be twenty points farther ahead, given the same amount of money.

 

[LowlyPion]

For the first time I heard today the McCain campaign saying it has been targeting smaller pockets of voters with targeted messages and this is why his events are not as large as Obama's.

This is apparently the equivalent of the size doesn't matter, it's how you use it argument.

Today McCain will be on his Hogwash Express motoring across Ohio, making stops in small towns hoping to get out the vote there by repeating the same empty rhetoric he has been shoveling recently. Doesn't he know they have TV in Ohio? And they will have heard his repetitive shtick before?

 

[Astronuc]

McCain camp trying to scapegoat Palin
http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20081030/pl_politico/15073

John McCain's campaign is looking for a scapegoat. It is looking for someone to blame if McCain loses on Tuesday.

And it has decided on Sarah Palin.

In recent days, a McCain “adviser” told Dana Bash of CNN: “She is a diva. She takes no advice from anyone.”

Imagine not taking advice from the geniuses at the McCain campaign. What could Palin be thinking?

Also, a “top McCain adviser” told Mike Allen of Politico that Palin is “a whack job.”

Maybe she is. But who chose to put this “whack job” on the ticket? Wasn’t it John McCain? And wasn’t it his first presidential-level decision?

And if you are a 72-year-old presidential candidate, wouldn’t you expect that your running mate’s fitness for high office would come under a little extra scrutiny? And, therefore, wouldn’t you make your selection with care? (To say nothing about caring about the future of the nation?)

. . . .

Unbelieveable! This does not sound like a winning campaign.

Compare that to this:

Obama says would include Republicans in cabinet
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20081030/pl_nm/us_usa_politics_obama_transition

SUNRISE, Florida (Reuters) – U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama said on Wednesday he would include Republicans in his Cabinet if he wins the election.

Obama, a Democratic senator from Illinois, also said he had "some pretty good ideas" about people he might tap for senior government jobs, though he emphasized he is focused for now on the final days of the campaign and takes nothing for granted.

"There is a transition process -- that I'm not paying attention to on a day-to-day basis -- but that has been set up," Obama told ABC News in an interview.

Obama said he "absolutely" considered it important to have Republicans in the Cabinet but he sidestepped a question on whether he would ask Defense Secretary Robert Gates to remain in his job. There has been speculation that either Obama or his Republican rival, John McCain, might ask Gates to stay on.

"I'm not going to get into details," Obama said, but he added that national security policy, in particular, should be nonpartisan.

Other people mentioned as possible defense secretary picks in an Obama administration include former Navy Secretary Richard Danzig and Sen. Chuck Hagel, a Republican senator from Nebraska.

. . . .

I wonder if George H. W. Bush will vote for Obama, especially after McCain has trashed his son?

 

[lisab]

For the first time I heard today the McCain campaign saying it has been targeting smaller pockets of voters with targeted messages and this is why his events are not as large as Obama's.

This is apparently the equivalent of the size doesn't matter, it's how you use it argument.

Today McCain will be on his Hogwash Express motoring across Ohio, making stops in small towns hoping to get out the vote there by repeating the same empty rhetoric he has been shoveling recently. Doesn't he know they have TV in Ohio? And they will have heard his repetitive shtick before?

Hogwash Express ... ...I'm so stealing that, LP!

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

it seems he (Obama) feels he has sewn up the votes of intelligent people and was going now after the votes of idiots.

Don't feel bad. Assuming your IQ is over 100, most people are not as smart as you are, and the candidates have to appeal to most people. The price of democracy is eternal mediocrity.

 

[Evo]

Hogwash Express ... ...I'm so stealing that, LP!

No kidding. All right LP, what size shoes do you wear?

 

[LowlyPion]

No kidding. All right LP, what size shoes do you wear?

Whatever size is big enough for my feet.

 

[LowlyPion]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20081030/pl_nm/us_usa_politics_obama_transition

... Obama said, but he added that national security policy, in particular, should be nonpartisan.

In addition to Chuck Hagel I'd think Colin Powell. He didn't rule it out when he said he would vote Obama.

 

[LowlyPion]

The price of democracy is eternal mediocrity.

I thought that just applied to network TV.

 

[jal]

Will this affect the elections?
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/4e402dec-...uid=f2b40164-cfea-11dc-9309-0000779fd2ac.html
Cuba to triple oil refining with Venezuelan ally
HAVANA, Oct 28 - Revolutionary allies Cuba and Venezuela will pour billions of dollars into downstream oil projects in Cuba with the goal of tripling its refining capacity to 350,000 barrels per day (bpd) by 2013, Cuban state-run radio said on Tuesday, citing the country’s Basic Industry Minister.

 

[LowlyPion]

Et tu Neil Cavuto?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nWiJSJkS48c

 

[turbo]

McCain's getting pretty desperate. This morning, he held a rally in Defiance, OH in front of 6000 people. The trouble with that is that over 4000 of them were school children bused into provide a crowd. Hmmm... Also, Joe the Plumber stiffed him.

http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/10/30/1616435.aspx

 

[mgb_phys]

McCain's getting pretty desperate. This morning, he held a rally in Defiance, OH in front of 6000 people. The trouble with that is that over 4000 of them were school children bused into provide a crowd. Hmmm...

Have they thought of just using mirrors?

 

[turbo]

Have they thought of just using mirrors?

School-kids are cheaper, they want a day off from school, and they can line themselves up on the bleachers, and walk out under their own power when the gig is over. Saves a lot of set-up and production money.

 

[LowlyPion]

McCain's getting pretty desperate. This morning, he held a rally in Defiance, OH in front of 6000 people. The trouble with that is that over 4000 of them were school children bused into provide a crowd. Hmmm... Also, Joe the Plumber stiffed him.

http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/10/30/1616435.aspx

I watched that. You'd think he would have made sure Joe was actually there before exposing his senility any more than necessary.

Too bad the kids didn't break into a chant of Obama Obama Obama. That would have been just too sweet for words.

But as the Republicans are saying now "It's not how big the crowds are. It's how they use them."

Was it good for you?

 

[Astronuc]

What if? An interesting analysis.

McCain, Obama: White House or bust?
http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20081030/pl_politico/15101

The loser of the looming Barack Obama-John McCain contest is entitled to a consolation prize: an all-expenses-paid, one-way ticket back to the United States Senate.

An Obama loss would shake American politics to its core, but the candidate said Wednesday that he’d adapt to life as a high-profile foot soldier in the Senate’s Democratic majority.

McCain hasn’t said whether he’d return to the Senate if he loses his White House bid — and his campaign is bristling at the very suggestion.

“McCain doesn’t plan on returning to the Senate,” McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds said Wednesday. “He plans on winning the election because he’s absolutely qualified to be president of the United States.”

But friends and GOP insiders who’ve taken a sober look at the polls expect to see McCain back at the Capitol come January — and maybe even as early as a lame-duck session scheduled to start two weeks after the election. They’re just not sure what role he will play there.

“I think John will return to the Senate,” says a longtime friend of McCain’s. “The question is whether he’ll return to be a constructive force or whether he’ll be embittered. Only John can answer that.”

Operatives in both parties say that Obama’s defeat would have a tectonic impact outside of Washington — setting off a massive wave of angry soul-searching among Democrats who turned self-flagellation into an art form after a pair of losses to George W. Bush.

Yet Obama’s return wouldn’t greatly change the political order of the Senate. Still a freshman, the junior senator from Illinois would join Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) and John F. Kerry (D- Mass.) in the We-Were-Almost-President Caucus, and he’d still have to abide by the dictates set by a stable Democratic leadership which seems certain to pick up seats regardless of Obama’s fate.

Asked about a possible return, Obama told ABC’s Charles Gibson Wednesday: “I’m a relatively young man. You know, they say there’s no second acts in politics. But you know, I think there are enough exceptions out there that I think I could envision returning to the Senate and just doing some terrific work with the next president and the next Congress.”

McCain, by contrast, would have the potential to be a much bigger player in a much smaller, more troubled caucus.

“McCain is going to return to a shattered party,” said Republican strategist John Feehery, who was a senior aide to former House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.). “But he’ll still be the biggest name in the Senate and the biggest name in Republican politics, and I think some people will rely on him to be the voice during these times… It’ll be up to him on whether he gives up or helps re-brand the party.”

“The problem is way bigger than John McCain,” said a top Republican staffer who has worked in both houses. “We don’t have any ideas, and we need ideas to connect” with independents.

But just because McCain has pushed a “maverick” reform agenda as a presidential candidate doesn’t mean his GOP colleagues in the Senate will let him do the same for them. Senior Republican aides say McCain’s willingness to challenge party leaders on immigration and earmarks has made him unpopular — and that losing the presidential election wouldn’t do much to burnish his reputation.

“Like John Kerry, who came back and went underground, McCain will likely return to Washington to find that he’s not the leader of his party,” said one top GOP Senate aide.
. . . .

I guess we'll see next Wednesday. Only 6 more days to find out who the next president is.