Maybe even:
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
Obama is running the WRONG campaign.
McCain has run circles around him, proving he will make a much better President.
The well-telegraphed running against Bush misses a few basic realities:
Pelosi and the 230 Democratic congress-critters in the House that voted her Speaker and the Reid-led Democrat Senate majority are on the ballot. Not Bush.
She promised lower oil prices in 2006 and delivered ... higher oil prices. Bush got ‘blamed’ for it, but Pelosi and the drill-nowhere do-nothing Congress are the REAL problem. (Hence their attempts to at the last minute ‘do something’ with fake half-measures on drilling, they are desperate to get the target off their backs.)
She and the Democrats promised to get out of Iraq ... they opposed the surge that WORKED and proposed alternatives that would have led to defeat, had we not gotten lucky enough to see the incompetent Congress fail to get their way. Bush is still unpopular, maybe, but the confidence about Iraq has had a tremendous turnaround - and why not. Bush and the Surge have finally succeeded in Iraq. Victory is at hand, and men like McCain called it right, while Biden and Obama and Reid and the Dems were calling it a ‘failure’ only 12 months ago.
Bush=Iraq is the real Dem playbook, and as long as Iraq was a failure, running against Bush was smart. Now that Iraq has turned around and Bush has suceeded in winning via the surge, the argument fails. Obama has waffled his way to a position that in terms of troop deployment, is barely distinguishable from what McCain has advocated.
Meanwhile, for every problem the Democrats have proposed spending more and taxing more.
The Democrats are trying to run against the status-quo by running against Bush, but thats hardly an inspiring campaign. The Bush-bashing DNC convention missed the whole point. If it’s change you want - “What will you do differently?” not differently from Bush “What will you do differently from the Republicans running on the ballot now?”
McCain has brilliantly stolen the playbook, while the Dems are stuck fighting the last war (2006). I believe that when a candidate or a party tries to win based on false premises, they usually lose and deservedly so. The “change” message of Obama is a hollow one, he promises a continuation of the current failed Congressional policies, not change. Obama deserves to lose so long as he fails to be honest and acknowledge that Obama and McCain are just different brands of ‘change’.
The voters are not all dumb. (”You can fool some of the people some of the time, but not all of the people all of the time ...”) Candidates are dumb for thinking they can win on false hype. The more Obama campaigns, the more hollow and flawed a candidate he becomes. Change is coming, either via far-left inexperienced junior Senator Obama or the center-right bipartisan reformer McCain. Who can deliver a better future for most Americans?
We are back to a more real and more honest set of choices: What will we do in the next 2 to 4 years. The Congressional Republicans can run on the same themes of Real Change (kudos to Gingrich who saw this well before others) - drill now for energy independence, keep the tax cuts for economic health, say no to earmarks to reduce the sway of special interests, fight and win the war on terror and return with honor from Iraq ... oh and defend families, marriage, personal responsibility, and the unborn.
In other words, a conservative center-right issues campaign, with a dash of populism, is a winning campaign. Bush-bashing and liberal elitism will win New York and Hollywood, but not the Presidential election. Sure the Dems can run on some things, spend more on SCHIP, giveaways for College kids, but their very panders telegraph that they cannot also talk fiscal responsibility. They cant add.
McCain’s election to lose if he starts focussing on that future and what good things he will try to deliver in the next 4 years: Complete the mission in Iraq and bring the troops home honorably while fighting to win against terrorism; move to energy independence and post-fossil-fuel economy; end earmark and corporate welfare; advance the ‘Real Choice’ agenda - school choice, health care choice, retirement choice. That plus a ‘real-world’ perspective to appeal to the ‘small-town clingers’ will win the election.
In the end, this election is not about a lame duck President, its about America’s future.
Maybe even:
