First Door on the Left

If there was ever any doubt in anybody’s mind that Johnny McCain is running for George W. Bush’s third term, it should be gone now…

McCain Orders Shake-Up of His Campaign

Steve Schmidt

WASHINGTON — Senator John McCain’s presidential campaign has gone through its second shake-up in a year as Mr. McCain, responding to Republican concerns that his candidacy was faltering, put Steve Schmidt in charge of day-to-day operations and abandoned an effort to have the campaign run by 11 regional managers, the senator’s aides said Wednesday.

Mr. Schmidt is a veteran of President Bush’s 2004 re-election campaign and he worked closely with Karl Rove, who was Mr. Bush’s political adviser. His installation at Mr. McCain’s headquarters sharply diminished the responsibilities of Rick Davis, who has been Mr. McCain’s campaign manager since the last shake-up nearly a year ago.

Mr. McCain’s advisers said that Mr. Davis would continue to hold the position of campaign manager, but that Mr. Schmidt had taken over every major operation where Mr. McCain has shown signs of struggling: communications, scheduling and basic political strategy.

The shift was approved by Mr. McCain after several aides, including Mr. Schmidt, warned him about 10 days ago that he was in danger of losing the presidential election unless he revamped his campaign operation, according to two officials close to the campaign.[..]

Mr. Schmidt’s elevation is the latest sign of increasing influence of veterans of Mr. Rove’s campaign efforts in the McCain operation. Nicolle Wallace, who was communications director for Mr. Bush in the 2004 campaign and in his White House, has joined the campaign as a senior adviser, and will travel with Mr. McCain every other week. Greg Jenkins, another veteran of Mr. Rove’s operation, has joined the McCain communications operation.

Mr. Jenkins is a former Fox News producer and a director of Mr. Bush’s presidential advance team that set up political events.

“I think the time has come for Sen. Obama to not just repudiate Gen. Clark, but to cut him loose.” — Johnny McCain, July 1, 2008

Yes, I rather imagine that John McCain is wishing that Barack Obama would “cut General Wesley Clark loose.” It must be terribly embarrassing, not to mention inconvenient, to have somebody on the other side who actually has some military experience and has demonstrated some good judgment in his lifetime.

You really can’t blame Johnny and his surrogates for wishing that General Clark would just go away.

Somehow, I don’t think it’s going be quite that easy…

WASHINGTON (AP) - Retired Gen. Wesley Clark rejected suggestions he apologize Tuesday for saying John McCain’s medal-winning military service does not qualify him for the White House. Elaborating, Clark said a president must have judgment, not merely courage and character.

Courage? Perhaps. (40 years ago.) Character? Debatable.

P.S. It really is fun to watch Johnny McCain and the Republicans crying in their milk like this, isn’t it? If they can’t stand up to Wes Clark (who, by the way, is on our side), how the hell can we expect them to stand up to al Quaeda and all the other bad guys of the world?

Whatever money problems Johnny McCain may have had seem to now be a thing of the past. He just bought himself a brand new airplane. (Well, new to the McCain campaign, anyway. It’s a Boeing 737-400. Boeing delivered the last of this model in early 2000; the first was delivered in 1988.)

The New York Times reports:

The more deluxe accommodations of the plane, which will seat 95 and was paid for by the campaign, will be far different from the less grand Straight Talk bus with alternator problems that the campaign turned to after it nearly ran out of money about a year ago, and even from the Jet Blue charter that his campaign has used in this campaign.

There will be 10 first-class seats up front for Mr. McCain and his guests, as well as a telephone and a fax machine. The journalists who will sit in the back, behind the Secret Service agents, are promised electrical outlets.

And mindful of the lighting issues that have kept Mr. McCain from holding many news conferences on the old plane, the new area will be television-ready. It will be wired for microphones, have specialty lighting and have room for a television camera.

Very nice indeed. Perhaps Johnny and Cindy can keep it and use it to fly between their numerous houses after the campaign is over. (The White House, fortunately for us, will not be one of them.)

Related: McCain accepts government financing.

Is there anybody out there who believes that Johnny McCain would be accepting the government check if the situations were reversed? Rather than spending all this time complaining about Barack Obama not taking the government’s money, why isn’t the right wing busy collecting money for Johnny McCain? I know they can do it. After all, they collected something like $275 million for George Bush Jr. back in 2004.

NBC News reports “McCain to accept public financing.”

Aboard the Straight Talk Express from the airport to the hotel in Minneapolis, McCain said that his campaign has decided that it will accept public financing for the general election. “We will take public financing,” Asked what his thinking was, he said, “Because we decided to take public financing.”

That will enable McCain to spend $84 million after the GOP convention.

There needs to be, I believe, a bit of clarification on this matter. About one a half million members of the public (thus far) have contributed to Barack Obama’s campaign. Senator Obama is going to rely on the public to fund his campaign between the convention and the election. That’s public financing.

What Johnny McCain is taking is not public financing. He is taking is a handout from the federal government. He is going to rely on the government to fund his campaign.

The Republicans are throwing a tantrum because Senator Obama is not going to take the government check. And here all this time I have been led to believe that Republicans were opposed to government handouts. Isn’t self-sufficiency supposed to be a big part of their platform? You live and you learn, I guess.

There’s a website now online entitled “Women for John McCain.”

I can’t decide if it is meant to be satire or if it is for real. Whichever, it truly is amazing.

For example, right there on the main page is this icon:

Really? A wire coat hanger? I don’t think I need to tell you what that represents, do I? Anyway, if you click on it, you are taken to a page where the advantages and disadvantages of plastic hangers, wire hangers, wooden hangers and padded hangers are discussed.

On the page entitled “Choice,” we are privilege to this bit of wisdom…

John McCain has worked closely with the national press to gain his “maverick” reputation - and that’s why women are choosing John McCain! On the complicated issues of womens’ rights and reproductive choices, we need a strong man with years, and years, and years of experience in the halls of Washington to think and speak for us - and that man is John McCain. With John’s record on choice, he’s uniquely qualified to make our most personal, private choices for us as President.

We need a man with years, and years, and years of experience … to think and speak for us … [and] to make our most personal, private choices for us as President. Come on!

Under “Equal Pay…”

When the Equal Pay issue supported by radical leftists Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton came up for a vote in April 2008, John McCain showed his strong support for women by missing the Senate vote to campaign in front of an audience - with women in attendance - in New Orleans, the city that John McCain showed his maverick leadership style by eating birthday cake in Arizona with President George W. Bush on August 29th, 2005 - the day Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans in one of the worst natural disasters in American history - before Bush headed to the Pueblo El Mirage RV Resort and Country Club for a chat with seniors about his plans to privatize Medicare.

“Family Leave…”

John McCain knows that allowing freeloaders who want to take time off to care for their newborn babies, or attend to their children when they get hurt or fall ill, isn’t as important as making sure that compliance would not increase business expenses or provide financial assistance to businesses to cover any related costs. While countries in Europe may offer family and medical leave that goes beyond what most American workers receive, and some employers even allow paid time off for liberals who don’t earn their keep, it’s the “rugged individualism” of leaders like John McCain that reminds us that as Americans, we shouldn’t be afraid to do things differently than what may be the status quo in other developed nations.

Shall I go on? Oh, okay, just one more.

“Teen Pregnancy…”

Teen pregnancy is a serious issue as our nation forges ahead in the 21st Century. And while John McCain’s platform has many serious issues, few are so important to the next generation as the problem of teen pregnancy in our country.

That’s why John McCain voted against an amendment in the Senate’s 2006 fiscal year budget that would have provided 100 million dollars to our schools to reduce teen pregnancy through sex education, use of contraceptives, lower the incidence of unintended pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases, make birth control more affordable, and improve access to women’s health care. Because if our teenagers and young adult daughters remain innocent, if we take a stand as Americans to protect them from sex education and birth control until they’re married, we can stop teen pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases before they start.

Go check out the entire site, then come back and tell me what you think. Is it real or is it Memorex? Whichever, it truly is an amazing piece of work.

This just gets more fun by the day.

From an AP report today:

“The Democrats want to go back to a pre-September 11th view of terrorism … The Democrats, led by Barack Obama, want to go back to being on defense,” Rudy Giuliani, the former New York mayor and top McCain surrogate said Wednesday, a day after McCain’s campaign claimed Obama is naive and “a perfect manifestation a September 10th mind-set.”

So suddenly Rudy Giuliani has become Johnny’s McCain’s top surrogate on national security?

Let’s go back and see what Johnny had to say about Rudy in September of last year…

“I think the nation respects the mayor’s leadership after 9/11, and I do, too, and I think he displayed leadership at a time that Americans needed some steady hand, and I think that his conduct was very laudatory following 9/11,” Mr. McCain said, when asked why so many voters identify Mr. Giuliani with the issue of terrorism.

But he went on to say: “I don’t think it translates, necessarily, into foreign policy or national security expertise. I know of nothing in his background that indicates that he has any experience in it, with him or Romney.”

And we know of nothing, Senator McCain, that would indicate that you have any experience in it, either. Unless, of course, four and a half years spent in a prisoner of war camp count as national security experience. We think that’s laudatory and all, but it does not quite translate.

On another note, is it just me or is it becoming more and more obvious that Mr. McCain is having difficulty remembering what he said in the recent past? Either his memory is slipping or he’s a lying political opportunist. In either case, I don’t think we want to entrust him with the highest office in the land… particularly after we are just finishing up with another lying political opportunist in that position.

Most of you, I am sure, are familiar with David Letterman’s “Great Moments in Presidential Speeches.” A few of us were talking the other night and somebody mentioned that, gods forbid, should Johnny McCain win this election at least Letterman will have material for that segment for at least another four years.

Great minds think alike.

Today I noticed that Jed of The Jed Report is starting something he calls “Your Daily Moment of McCain.” Here is the first one:

Jed says he plans to try to have them posted by 6:00 a.m. his time each morning and reports that he has enough material for at least a couple of weeks. Who knows? Maybe the Letterman folks will end up buying the segment from him. Let us pray they won’t have the need to do so.

Let’s put these people in charge of the country: McCain, wife owed $225,000 in credit card debt

Cindy and Johnny McCain

Senators John McCain and Barack Obama released their Senate financial disclosure statements on Friday, revealing that Mr. McCain and his wife had at least $225,000 in credit card debt and that Mr. Obama and his wife had put more than $200,000 into college funds for their daughters.

The bulk of the McCains’ obligations stemmed from a pair of American Express credit cards that are held in Cindy McCain’s name. According to the disclosure reports, which present information on debts in a range rather than providing a precise figure, Mrs. McCain owed $100,000 to $250,000 on each card.

Another charge card, held by what was described as a “dependent child,” had also accumulated debts of $15,000 to $50,000. In addition, a credit card held jointly by the couple was carrying $10,000 to $15,000 in debt, the filing indicated, at a stiff 25.99 percent interest rate.

Maybe they’re just trying to fit in with the rest of the country.

Johnny McCain held a town-hall meeting last night. It was broadcast exclusively on the Fox News Channel. Here’s their story: “McCain Fights Iraq Criticism at Solo Town Hall Appearance.” It now appears that the McCain campaign duped Fox News into believing that a mixed crowd (Republicans, Democrats and Independents) would be in attendance. The fact is that they only handed out tickets to invited guests and supporters. (The Jed Report has more.) McCain’s folks got an hour of free advertising on the Fox News Channel, which hardly matters because the only people who watch the Fox News Channel are right wing Republicans anyway.

While Johnny pretended to chastise Senator Obama for not showing up last night (see Fox story linked above), the truth is that no agreement has been reached between the campaigns with regard to town hall meetings…

McCain, Obama fail to agree on town halls

WASHINGTON (AP) - Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama on Friday rejected Republican rival John McCain’s proposal for 10 joint town-hall appearances, offering instead to have just one on the July 4 holiday.

Obama campaign manager David Plouffe said he offered to meet McCain in five joint appearances between now and the Nov. 4 election. But only one of those was a town-hall meeting, plus three traditional debates and an in-depth debate on foreign policy.

The McCain campaign said Obama’s offer was to hold the single town hall on Independence Day - which likely would have resulted in less attention while Americans are on holiday. McCain told reporters traveling with him in New Jersey that was “a very disappointing response.”

McCain had said the more intimate town-hall format, a give-and-take between a candidate and the audience, would allow real interaction with voters and would be more revealing than formal televised debates. Town halls are also McCain’s favorite style of campaigning and would allow him to get free media attention alongside the better-funded Obama. (emphasis added) [..]

Plouffe tried to place the blame on McCain for refusing to agree, saying five joint appearances “would have been the most of any presidential campaign in the modern era, offering a broad range of formats and representing a historic commitment to openness and transparency.”

“It’s disappointing that Senator McCain and his campaign decided to decline this proposal. Apparently they would rather contrive a political issue than foster a genuine discussion about the future of our country,” Plouffe said.

It hardly matters, anyway…