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McCain’s new form of viral marketing — lies!

Who says that McCain doesn’t understand the Internet. Well, come to think of it, he doesn’t. But he seems to have found a new way to get free airplay for his political ads. Simply fill them with lies about your opponent!

Then the liberal blog-o-sphere will endlessly analyze your ads, your opponent will have to respond to them, morning shows will titter about them, and so on. This pushes them out to many times more viewers than originally saw them on TV, and at no cost. After all, a candidate who has to hold a campaign event in a German restaurant when his opponent is giving a speech to 200,000 people in Germany probably has to settle for running ads in the late night slot on minor cable channels.

McCain lies
© From 23/6

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Late Night Humor

“Yesterday, Barack Obama was in the Fatherland. John McCain was in Grandfather Land.” -Jay Leno

“Barack Obama is in France today. And again, McCain doing everything to compete with him. Like today, he ordered the French toast combo at IHOP.” -Jay Leno

“You know, Barack Obama the last ten days was traveling overseas campaigning in Europe and everywhere. It was so successful, campaigning abroad, that he is actually thinking about campaigning here in the United States.” -David Letterman

“Barack Obama’s upset. Did you hear about this? He’s angry, ’cause the other day in Israel, someone revealed the contents of a private prayer that Obama inserted into Jerusalem’s Western Wall. It’s supposed to be private, and someone opened it up and revealed it, yeah. Experts say it’s even worse than the time the Washington Post printed President Bush’s letter to Santa.” -Conan O’Brien

“Did you hear about this? The Dalai Lama had a near-death experience today. He met with John McCain.” -Jay Leno

“You see where John McCain met with the Dalai Lama? That was pretty amazing. Yeah, the man millions believe goes back to the seventh century standing next to the Dalai Lama.” -Jay Leno

“Poor John McCain. The media is so in love. They’re all over Barack Obama. And McCain can’t get any media attention. Did you see what McCain did today? He kept getting in and out of his limo today with no underwear on, just to get the photographers.” -Jay Leno

“It is tough seeing your old flame with someone new. John McCain and the media had a very hot fling back in the summer of 2000. They even had cute little nicknames for each other. The press called McCain ‘maverick,’ and McCain called the press any time he wanted favorable coverage.” -Stephen Colbert

“Yesterday, federal immigration officials arrested 43 illegal immigrants from Mexico in Hawaii! In Hawaii! How lost were they? Boy! And today, President Bush called for building a fence around Hawaii.” -Jay Leno

“And in Puerto Rico, it is Constitution Day. It is Constitution Day in Puerto Rico. So, that’s where the constitution went. I knew we weren’t using it anymore.” -Jay Leno

“They said on the news earlier tonight that this political campaign has only 100 days left. Only! Anybody complaining that this thing was dragging out? Oh, not quick enough? … Only 100 days left. Oh, God! 100 Days. I don’t know what’s less likely, Barack Obama getting enough experience in 100 days, or John McCain living another 100 days.” -Jay Leno

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Oops, he did it again!

McCain’s latest attack ad against Obama equates him to Britney Spears, but new evidence has surfaced that proves that it McCain who is a Britney wannabe. Don’t believe it? Just watch!

UPDATE:
Pat Bagley
© Pat Bagley

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McCain’s Double Dare!

R. J. Matson
© R. J. Matson

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The Too-Partisan System

Jeff Parker
© Jeff Parker

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Ohio Gov. Strickland speaking at McCain Economic Forum

economics
From In One Ear… Out the Other

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Bush’s legacy surge

Pat Oliphant
© Pat Oliphant

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McCain’s instant payback from big oil

Last month, candidate McCain did a complete flip-flop and is now supporting expanding offshore oil drilling in the US, even though he used to oppose it. He claims that his change of heart is because of the high price of oil. He even has a TV ad attacking Obama for opposing the expansion of offshore oil drilling. But even the government says that expanding offshore oil drilling would not decrease the price of gas for at least 20 years, if at all.

So what is the real reason for his change of heart.  As they say, follow the money. McCain just reported that last month, the oil industry contributed $1.1 million to his campaign, which is four times what they contributed the month before that, before he changed his mind. In fact three-quarters of that $1.1 million came after he gave his June 16 speech announcing his change.

Besides, the oil companies are not drilling on 80% of their current offshore oil leases. Why would they, when today’s supply crunch is resulting in the highest oil company profits in history?

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Methinks he doth protest too much

Republican Senator Sam Brownback is introducing a resolution protesting actions by China. He is also urging Bush to not attend the Olympic opening ceremonies in Beijing. Why? Because hotels in Beijing (including foreign-owned ones) are being forced to install Chinese government software to monitor Internet use by hotel guests coming to watch the Olympic games, or face “severe retaliation”. Brownback says:

If you were a human rights advocate, if you’re a journalist, you’re in room 1251 of a hotel, anything that you use, sending out over the Internet is monitored in real time by the Chinese Public Security bureau. That’s not right. It’s not in the Olympic spirit.

Can we get any more hypocritical? How dare the Chinese force businesses to spy on people or face retaliation? Would we ever do such a thing? Ummm

The National Security Agency and other government agencies retaliated against Qwest because the Denver telco refused to go along with a phone spying program … USA Today reported in May 2006 that Qwest, unlike AT&T and Verizon, balked at helping the NSA track phone calling patterns that may have indicated terrorist organizational activities. Nacchio’s attorney, Herbert Stern, confirmed that Nacchio refused to turn over customer telephone records because he didn’t think the NSA program had legal standing.

Also note that Senator Brownback voted FOR the “Protect America Act” that allowed “massive, untargeted collection of international communications” (including email and phone) and also voted for this year’s FISA bill that allows our government to directly tap public telecommunications systems to monitor email and phone communications.

Don’t people realize that if we are going to illegally spy, torture, or start preemptive wars, it is going to make it very difficult for us to protest when other people do the same thing. Unless of course, we don’t mind being blatantly hypocritical.

Not to mention that what China is doing is not illegal (either under their laws or international law). After all, they don’t claim to be a free, democratic country.

From Glenn Greenwald in Salon.

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Electronic Voting Machines in Zimbabwe?

Tom Toles
© Tom Toles

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The Commander-in-Chief Test

From Humanitainment, the same people who brought you The Empire Strikes Barack

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Your vote has already been stolen

Ted Rall / Greg Palast
© Ted Rall

Think this is just a comic? Check this out.

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Dumb Bush quotes get head start on 2008

Daniel Kurtzman has collected the top 5 dumb Bush quotes of 2008, and we’re only half way through the year! You can also vote on your top dumb Bush quote of all time there.

“Thank you, your Holiness. Awesome speech!” –to Pope Benedict after he spoke at the White House, Washington, D.C., April 15, 2008 (too bad it wasn’t April 1).

“Wait a minute. What did you just say? You’re predicting $4-a-gallon gas? … That’s interesting. I hadn’t heard that.” –at a news conference, Washington, D.C., Feb. 28, 2008.

“And so, General, I want to thank you for your service. And I appreciate the fact that you really snatched defeat out of the jaws of those who are trying to defeat us in Iraq.” –to Army Gen. Ray Odierno, Washington, D.C., March 3, 2008.

“Goodbye from the world’s biggest polluter.” –parting words to British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and French President Nicolas Sarkozy at his final G-8 Summit, punching the air and grinning widely as the two leaders looked on in shock, Rusutsu, Japan, July 10, 2008.

“I’ll be long gone before some smart person ever figures out what happened inside this Oval Office.” –Washington, D.C., May 12, 2008.

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McCain Captured

Daryl Cagle
© Daryl Cagle

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The Myth of Liberal Media

A new study confirms what most of us have known for a while — that conservative whining about “liberal bias” in the media is baseless.  It was always difficult to believe. After all, the mainstream media in this country is largely owned by large conservative corporations, and cable news channels like Fox News are little more than government propaganda outlets.

But now, the Center for Media and Public Affairs at George Mason University, where researchers have tracked network news content for two decades, and whose studies have often been cited by conservatives, did a detailed analysis of the three television networks (ABC, CBS, and NBC) and concluded that they were much tougher on Obama than on McCain. During the evening news during the first 6 weeks of the general election campaign, of the opinions expressed about Obama, 72% were negative and 28% were positive (over 2.5 to 1 against Obama). For McCain, 57% were negative and 43% were positive (just over 1.3 to 1 against McCain). In other words, the media was twice as negative against Obama as they were against McCain.

What I find especially ironic is when someone from the conservative media (Limbaugh, Hannity, Beck, etc.) complains about liberal bias in the media — the white kettle calling the kettle black!

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