comMITTed to Romney!

McCain seeks to calm angry supporters

Here’s a very basic political question for you. Does John McCain know what the hell he’s doing?

Judging from the reaction he is getting from his own supporters, I’d say the answer is no.

We are witnessing the closing weeks of an epic presidential campaign that has seen history made on several fronts. Mitt Romney, the only LDS candidate to run a nationwide campaign for President. My apologies to any other LDS candidate that may have had a presidential campaign, I am just not aware of any others that ran a major national campaign.

Hillary Clinton, the first woman to run a major national campaign for the Presidency. Barack Obama, the first African-American to run for the presidency. Sarah Palin, the first woman to be picked to run as VP for the Republican Party. John McCain the first former POW to run for the presidency.

As much as I admire Sen. McCain for his service to his country, I have to say that I am mystified by his campaign strategy. Writing off Michigan, a swing state with 17 electoral votes. A state that might have been winnable with the right message. A message of how the American auto industry would finally get a level playing field with some of it’s competitors by having a candidate that promoted cutting the federal corporate tax rate, instead of dampening the enthusiasm of his crowds by lecturing them on a bogus civility. I am not advocating running a dirty campaign, but as that old political saying goes: “Politics ain’t beanbag.”

Sen. McCain has found himself in the unenviable position of being booed by his own crowds. I can fully sympathize with that crowd in Minnesota the other day that wanted him to bring the fight to Obama on his association with radical Bill Ayers. Why on earth the McCain campaign let this slide until less than three weeks remaining in the campaign remains a puzzlement to me. Bringing it up now smacks of desperation, not quite the message you want to send to the troops in the field. But if you are not going to hammer Obama on his job-killing tax proposals, dangerous foreign policy proposals and his general affection for leftist solutions to whatever ails the country at any given point in time, at least the Ayers connection is something conservative crowds can relate to.

The reason McCain is so out of touch with conservative crowds is because he is not a conservative. This won’t come as a surprise to most of you, but for those newcomers to politics, they may not have been engaged in the process long enough to remember President Reagan and for the college aged readers of this site, they weren’t even born during his administration. If all they remember is the last of the Clinton administration and Bushes’ two terms, they might not be expected to know a true conservative if they bumped into one in the hallway. So, if anyone is tempted to believe the MSM spin that McCain represents the center-right of the Republican Party, don’t buy it. He is getting booed in the Heartland because we see ourselves going down to defeat, while he preaches on the need to play nice with Obama.

As you may know, I have thrown in the towel on this Presidential election. If my state permits it, I will write in Mitt Romney for president. During the course of my involvement in this election, I have become aware of several candidates that I consider true conservatives, people that I can help promote in the future. People like Sarah Steelman and Dr. Bob Onder here in Missouri. Jason Chaffetz in Utah, Jeff Beatty in Massachusetts and William Russell in Pennsylvania. So, although the outcome of this election looks grim at the moment, a last minute reversal is always possible. So whether we win or lose, the commitment to Gov. Romney, the Free and Strong America PAC and other fine conservative candidates is ongoing.

Let’s all stay engaged in the process because, to quote Pat Buchanan, “You can’t legally, have more fun than a Presidential election!”

~~John Cronin~~

http://embeds.blogs.foxnews.com/2008/10/11/mccain-seeks-to-calm-angry-supporters/

It was a surreal scene during John McCain’s town hall meeting Friday as the GOP nominee was forced at times to defend Barack Obama as he urged thousands of supporters to cool their increasingly vitriolic anti-Obama rhetoric.

McCain sought to calm his raucous audience by lightening his criticism of Obama at times and repeatedly pleading with the crowd to be “respectful” of the Democratic nominee only to be repeatedly booed today. Supporters at recent rallies have shouted out that Obama is a terrorist, traitor and criminal, among other choice words.

“We want to fight, and I will fight but we will be respectful. I admire Senator Obama and his accomplishments. I will respect him,” McCain said to a chorus of boos as he tried to answer a supporter who urged him to engage in a “real fight.”

“I want everyone to be respectful and lets make sure we are because that’s the way politics should be conducted…now I don’t mean that has to reduce your ferocity. I just mean its got to be respectful. OK,” he said.

But for the second day in a row, a McCain town hall meeting felt more like an intervention as staunch supporters repeatedly pleaded with the GOP nominee to attack Obama using his associations with people like Bill Ayers or risk losing in November.

“My wife and I are expecting (a child)…and frankly, we’re scared. We’re scared of an Obama presidency,” one man told McCain asserting that Obama also “cohorts with domestic terrorists.”
“I want to be President of the United States and obviously I do not want Senator Obama to be, but I have to tell you…he is a decent person and a person that you do not have to be scared as President of the United States,” McCain said to additional boos from the crowd. He tried to assuage them by adding, ” if I didn’t think I wouldn’t be one heck of a lot better president I wouldn’t be running,” but received only a smattering of applause.

“Saying the facts about him, and the truth, that needs to come out,” another supporter urged McCain, as yet one other called on him to go to “the mattresses” with Obama at next Wednesday’s debate.

It didn’t stop there. McCain had to literally grab the microphone from one female supporter while she was still asking her question after she called Obama an “Arab.”

“No ma’am. No ma’am. He is a decent family man, a citizen that I just happen to have disagreements with on fundamental issues and that is what this campaign is all about. He is not,” McCain repeated shaking his head.

The new message comes after days of multiple TV and web ads and campaign conference calls attacking Obama’s associations with Bill Ayers, ACORN, Tony Rezko and casting him as an unknown entity who has been dishonest with the American people. Last Saturday, Sarah Palin kicked off the more aggressive message by stating that he “pals around with terrorists” and it escalated with McCain saying Monday that America does not know “the real Barack Obama.”

Though at other times, McCain reluctantly succumbed to the pressure and attacked Obama’s Ayers connection and liberal voting record as farther to the left than socialist Bernie Sanders.

“In order to win this election…you have to talk a little bit, and bring to the attention of the voters, the press is not going to do it for you…some of the associations that have really marred Obama’s life,” former US Senator Rudy Boschwitz recommended during the event.

Noting that he doesn’t care about Ayers or his wife, whom he described as an “old, washed-up terrorists,” McCain said that the bigger issue is that Obama is not being forthright about his relationship with the 60’s radical.

“What we do care about is people telling the truth about their associations with these individuals. That’s what the question is about…Sen. Obama said that Mr. Ayers was a guy in the neighborhood, when in reality, Sen. Obama’s political career was launched in Mr. Ayers living room,” he said to cheers.

But when lobbed a softball question by another town hall attendee to talk about ACORN improprieties McCain punted on drawing the connection between the community organizing group and Obama–a relationship the campaign had been pushing aggressively all day.

While he called for a “a full and complete and thorough investigation” of allegations of voter registration fraud against the group and left it at that.

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