Regarding the statement itself, I like the concept of this type of response, but in practice, it's still not strong enough. And it's still a response, a defense (though with a little attack thrown in).

I think the sex-ed ad is an excellent avenue for Obama to really hit them hard, and I don't mean in a "how dare he" way. I'd love Obama to say:

"Yeah, I supported that bill, and I'd do it again. I think it's important to teach children how to identify bad touches and sexual predators. I want to know why John McCain wants to help pedophiles? Personally, I think they're sick, but John McCain doesn't want kids to know how to protect themselves from pedophiles. I can only assume that's why he'd attack my support of that bill. Strange position to take for a Presidential candidate."

And while I'm at it, I think it's strange that Governor Palin wants to protect rapists. She supported making rape victims pay for the investigation of the crime. Where I'm from, we don't protect rapists, but that's just how I was brought up. So if they want to help out pedophiles and rapists, that's their choice, but I can guarantee that my administration won't protect help out pedophiles and rapists."

Rick Davis says the election isn't about issues, it's about personalities. Instead of digging into that, the media just plays along.

And then this:
John Feehery, a Republican strategist, said the campaign is entering a stage in which skirmishes over the facts are less important than the dominant themes that are forming voters' opinions of the candidates.

"The more the New York Times and The Washington Post go after Sarah Palin, the better off she is, because there's a bigger truth out there and the bigger truths are she's new, she's popular in Alaska and she is an insurgent," Feehery said. "As long as those are out there, these little facts don't really matter."

Little facts? Don't matter?

Pedophiles and Rapists for McCain/Palin!!

The Associated Press won't get its comeuppance over its Fournier-driven slant towards McCain. But its reach is already diminishing because of a new rate structure that a growing number of newspapers are refusing to accept. (Minneapolis, Spokane, Bakersfield and others have already given notice of cancellation.) The AP also has begun to demand substantial fees for quotations of as few as 10 words by nonsubscribers, which will reduce its echo effect in the blogosphere.

The market may starve a GOP-friendly beast -- nice irony there.

A liberal is someone so fair-minded that they won't even take their own side in a fight.

The Daily Show and the Colbert Report picked one heckuva week to take a vacation.

Blast from the past: Carrell on McCain's butt.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/09/10/flashback-steve-carrell-n_n_125354.html

Powerful stuff on the GOP's fake culture war.

http://www.wsj.com/article/SB122100226859616967.html?mod=hpp_us_inside_today

Key paragraph:
Leave the fantasy land of convention rhetoric, and you will find that small-town America, this legendary place of honesty and sincerity and dignity, is not doing very well. If you drive west from Kansas City, Mo., you will find towns where Main Street is largely boarded up. You will see closed schools and hospitals. You will hear about depleted groundwater and massive depopulation.

And eventually you will ask yourself, how did this happen? Did Hollywood do this? Was it those "reporters and commentators" with their fancy college degrees who wrecked Main Street, U.S.A.?

No. For decades now we have been electing people like Sarah Palin who claimed to love and respect the folksy conservatism of small towns, and yet who have unfailingly enacted laws to aid the small town's mortal enemies.

And just like McCain's 20% rating from the DVA, here's another surprise:

A few days ago I talked politics with Donn Teske, the president of the Kansas Farmers Union and a former Republican. Barack Obama may come from a big city, he admits, but the Farmers Union gives him a 100% rating for his votes in Congress. John McCain gets a 0%. "If any farmer in the Plains States looked at McCain's voting record on ag issues," Mr. Teske says, "no one would vote for him."

Now, Mr. McCain is known for his straight talk with industrial workers, telling them their jobs are never coming back, that the almighty market took them away for good, and that retraining is their only hope.

But he seems to think that small-town people can be easily played. Just choose a running mate who knows how to skin a moose and all will be forgiven. Drive them off the land, shutter their towns, toss their life chances into the grinders of big agriculture . . . and praise their values. The TV eminences will coo in appreciation of your in-touch authenticity, and the carnival will move on.

This country's inability/unwillingness to have a rational discussion about anything of import will be its undoing.

It's not just that the right works the refs, it's that by in large, right wingers are the refs. Editors are on the corporate dole, and spew the corporate line.

And all this panic is laughable. The Republican's had the height of their bounce a day or two ago, and Obama had the height of his a week ago. The best the Republicans can do is tie it. If polls still look like this in two weeks, there's time to panic. But that polls look like this, and polls are a reflection of what people thought 3 days ago and not today, there's really no reason to worry. Christ, you people lose your stomachs far too easy and you wonder why so few people trust liberals to run this country. Even if things stayed exactly like this up until the election, Obama would still have a good shot at winning. I doubt things are going to stay the same as the week after a convention. They never do. Remember how GWB won by 14% in 2004? or 20% in 2000? Neither do I.

When the debates happen between Obama and McCain it will be decided by the Media.
The Media will declare McCain the winner because Obama will be portrayed as the angry Black man if he is confident. If Obama has an intelligent tone, he will be perceived as weak, nuanced. If McCain temper gets the best of him and he blurts out the "N" word, well God Bless America and The GOP!!! Obama/Biden 08

LOL
Welcome to the Clinton Rules; fun isn't it?

Watch this, John McCain uses LIPSTICK ON A PIG against HILARY:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BR8IhMMhe8w&eurl=http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/09/10/pigs/

Transcript

AUDIENCE: I noticed in your speech you avoided any comparison of your plan to HILARY CLINTON's plan. I'm curious, have you or your staff put a price tag on what you see coming out of her campaign on HILARY Care?

JOHN McCAIN: No, but there's many things that concern me about it. It's vaguely, not vaguely but eerily reminiscent of what they tried back in 1993. I THINK THEY PUT SOME LIPSTICK ON A PIG, BUT I'TS STILL A PIG.

The media held Hillary Clinton to the standard that she had to be "ready on day 1". How come it is acceptable then that Sarah Palin gets to be schooled by Bush-McCain advisors before she talks to the media?

Why does Sarah Palin not talk to the media? If she is not ready for the pressure of the media then she is not ready for the pressure of being vice president. If a campaign refuses to let the media hold them accountable then THAT SHOULD BE THE FRONT PAGE STORY. If John McCain is SHIELDING Sarah Palin from the eyes of the media and thus the American people then THAT SHOULD BE THE FRONT PAGE STORY. All John McCain can do is CHANGE THE SUBJECT and REFUSE TO TALK ABOUT THE LAST 8 YEARS and why he has voted with BUSH 90% of the time. Political Mavericks and presidential candidates don't hide from the media; and, it’s a crying shame that the media took the bait and jumped all over this as if they were doing the McCain camps bidding. John McCain is taking the media for a ride straight to the presidency just the way that Bush did in 2000, and if the media lets it happen again then media in this is country are pathetic and it’s a crying shame.

Though I'm Canadian, I'm a voracious consumer of US political news, and I'm always astonished---I mean, baffled---by the triviality and frivolity of the US news media when it comes to political reporting. Is it so silly precisely because the stakes are so high? How does this happen? Federal elections here are usually pretty focused on issues: the track record of the incumbent, the state of the economy, major foreign and domestic policy concerns. I can't say anyone ever discusses the religious persuasion of our candidates, and no-one reports on their family life. In the US, is the process better at the state and local level? Are gubernatorial races less silly?

What an awful, cynical evaluation of the national media. I have been involved in sports for most of my nearly 60 years. Everybody works the refs. But the refs have a responsibility to call the game as they see it. Maybe once in a while, a team gets a "make-up" call; that doesn't mean any ref would turn a blind eye to what amounts to cheating. Because trying to lie and slime and distract your way into the presidency of the United States is a form of cheating. The reporters, anchors and news editors who don't call a lie a lie and a smear a smear are either Rove tools or cowards. Even worse, those who don't insist--insist--on keeping the focus on war, corruption (see today's Dept. of Interior scandal), gigantic budget deficits, crumbling infrastructure, the destruction of New Orleans, thousands of maimed veterans, economic collapse, the housing crisis, and the possible global catastrophe of climate change--those who don't see these issues as the absolutely necessary focus of the next 54 day are worse than terrorists. Terrorists are not citizens of this country. These reporters are traitors.

Just as a ref who knowingly looks the other way when a player is deliberately injured or someone cheats betrays the game.

McCain and his cronies talk about serving a cause greater then yourself but then belittle Obama for doing just that. Just so everyone understands, Barack went to work as a community organizer after recieving his bachelors degree when he was 23. He worked on the streets of Chicago helping those that needed help most. He did it for 3 years before being accepted at Harvard Law school where he ended up graduating top of his class and becoming the first black president of the Harvard Law review. He received his degree in CONSTITUTIONAL LAW!
After that instead of going to work for any Law firm he wanted, he went back to Chicago to help the people he had come to love. All of this before moving into politics.
On the other side of the ticket we have two people that only recieved bachelors degrees. McCain from Annapolis where he graduated 3 from the bottom of his class of 850 people. And Palin who went to 5 schools in 6 years to get a bachelors in Journalism. Oh and by the way, her major professor at the University of Idaho said he didn't remember her, she didn't leave any impact on him.
Why is it all the McCain camp can talk about is his Community organizing experience and nobody talks about his education? Why is it that we have stopped valuing an education in this country?

Please wake up people. We need people of integrity, intelligence and a true desire to serve and lead our country. Stop letting the media and the McCain campaign distract you with such obvious BS.

McCain and his cronies talk about serving a cause greater then yourself but then belittle Obama for doing just that. Just so everyone understands, Barack went to work as a community organizer after recieving his bachelors degree when he was 23. He worked on the streets of Chicago helping those that needed help most. He did it for 3 years before being accepted at Harvard Law school where he ended up graduating top of his class and becoming the first black president of the Harvard Law review. He received his degree in CONSTITUTIONAL LAW!
After that instead of going to work for any Law firm he wanted, he went back to Chicago to help the people he had come to love. All of this before moving into politics.
On the other side of the ticket we have two people that only recieved bachelors degrees. McCain from Annapolis where he graduated 3 from the bottom of his class of 850 people. And Palin who went to 5 schools in 6 years to get a bachelors in Journalism. Oh and by the way, her major professor at the University of Idaho said he didn't remember her, she didn't leave any impact on him.
Why is it all the McCain camp can talk about is his Community organizing experience and nobody talks about his education? Why is it that we have stopped valuing an education in this country?

Please wake up people. We need people of integrity, intelligence and a true desire to serve and lead our country. Stop letting the media and the McCain campaign distract you with such obvious BS.

Seitz
I think that's exactly what John McCain wants, then the media will splash the curriculum all over the news. I think some people in America will be shocked. You should take a look at it before you make your recommendation. I'm not sure some of this stuff is appropriate for Kindergarten.
Much less 12 year olds. This ultimately falls on parents. Our public school system is far from the best in the world, when our children are proficient in math, English and science then we can worry about teaching them Sex education.

re: JohnK

The content for the kindergartners was regarding improper attention. You can ask a pediatrition - children should be taught it is not ok to have someone touch them in a private place. And as far as leaving it up to parents, unfortunately many abusers are family members, step parents, parents or other supposedly trusted adults (Catholic priests, anyone?). Children have a right to be safe and not be harmed. John McCain is against THAT? Really?

Tom, KS

I just had the education discussion with my wife, when exactly did an
education become a bad thing?

I have always thought, perhaps erroneously, that part of the greatness of America was attracting bright and educated people to America because of our freedoms. Now educated is elitist, as if keeping ourselves ignorant is something to strive for.

Like many of you I am starting to slam my head against the wall.

The media by and large has made its choice and we are treated to that choice every damn day. I've turned my tube off -- and my radio too. Can't take another minute of the bullshit.

What I see of Obama on the internet shows me someone who's attempting to talk over the media's head (yuck) and straight to the public. I admire him for his dignity and his balls of steel. With so many anxious folks demanding that he go ballistic all over McCain's skanky ass, I'm glad to see him keeping it together and holding his fire. Braveheart maneuver is what I'm hoping for. And that the public will finally get tired of being insulted by both McPalin and the Talking Heads.

Re sex education for children, here's my take on it: Children are not afraid of sex education nor should they be. They need to be taught how to defend themselves from predators. It's as simple as that. Grown-ups who care about their children might think about putting their own hang-ups aside, getting out of the way, and letting some info sink into those little minds.

It's ironic to be lectured to about sex ed by a doddering old goat who selected his VP candidate on the basis of not only her whack-a-doodle dime--dozen views but her obvious if tacky sex appeal. And, oh yeah, someone who appears to be having rather a rough time of it in raising her own children.