Kool-Aid Seen Oozing From Senator Graham's Pores

Today is the last round of segments from the Sunday talk shows before election day. Both sides are working hard to promote their candidate, but Senator Lindsay Graham goes above and beyond the call of duty for McCain. Graham is clearly living in a land of delusion where the Kool-Aid flows like cheap beer at a keg party. On CBS this morning, you can see the red sugary stuff seeping out of him in every way possible.

From Crooks and Liars:

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Sen. Lindsay Graham, R-S.C. and John McCain's bosom buddy, today on CBS with Bob Schieffer:

What we've seen in the last two weeks is a very much tightening of the race in the states that matter. I really believe that Senator Obama is the virtual incumbent. And if he's not at 50 percent today in North Carolina, he's not going to win.

We see closing in Nevada, New Mexico and Colorado, Missouri, Pennsylvania, and Ohio. We have him under 50 and in the margin of error. The intensity level in the last couple of weeks has been unbelievable on our side. Senator Obama is being defined for the most liberal senator in the Senate. That's his voting record. Joe the Plumber kind of put Obama policies on a real face. ...

I said in Fayetteville that I would beat Michael Phelps in swimming before Barack Obama wins North Carolina. And I can't swim.

I'm standing by that. I know North Carolina. John McCain will win North Carolina.

Virtual incumbent? How does he come up with stuff like this?

Perhaps him and Tucker Bounds have been sitting at the same bar together long enough to start hallucinating. Graham may be telling the truth with his swimming skills, but I've really got to hand it to him for his acting, which is far superior than Michael Phelps. As for incumbency, the only connection to the current Pretzeldent is had by John McCain, the man that has voted with Bush more than ninety percent of the time.

Barack "Cool And Collected" Obama Vs. John "McCrabby" McCain

Last night the esteemed Hofstra University in Hempstead, NY had the two Presidential candidates spar at their campus. The format allowed for them to ask questions and brought out a highly interactive format. It was also great for McCain because they were sitting and no one had to endure his "townhall" pacing. They both put on great performances (in different respects) but ultimately only came out the winner. John McCain could hit Obama with as many cheap shots as he wanted to but Obama's responses only made him look more Presidential.

First off, the other man in the room besides Schieffer was obviously Joe "The Plumber" Wurzelbacher. He was made out to be an undecided voter due to the question he asked Obama (see one post below) about his plumbing business. The networks swarmed to him afterwards and as we listened to his one and half cents, it was clear that Joe leaned to the right and heavily to the racist.

With all of the different issues addressed no one scored any knockout blows and for Obama, that gave him the victory because he already has the momentum (and 50%+ approval ratings). Ultimately, as TPM says, this things is over. With nineteen days to go, McCain is running short of precious time to sway the voters that he can change the country and all they are seeing is another George Bush (note that McCain tried to combat that in the debate).

The key to the debate wasn't so much the issues. We already know by and large what the candidates stand for, despite McCain's hemming and hawing on everything under the sun. What truly mattered last night was each man's temperment. Barack Obama set out to show that McCain is a mean, nasty old man and John's myriad facial expressions certainly made the case. With every attack on Obama, Barack seemed to shrug each one off with a laugh and delivered his answers to the American people and not back in John's face (for the most part of course, no one is perfect).

One thing I'd like to note is that if you watched it on CNN, the men and women were certainly skewed in different directions. Men favored McCain's responses and women were in Obama's corner. No other time showed that so clearly like when McCain mocked the fact that the health of the mother matters when discussing pro-abortion rights. That was just sick and you could see women dialing McCain down for the callous remark.

So as Colin Powell comes out for Obama shortly and the rest of the nation solidifies their choice in under three weeks, McCain must be getting more and more nervous. Not even the remaining pundits in his corner will save him, especially with the use of snap polls that kill the opportunity to insert media narratives worth less than a certificate of stock from Lehman Bros. With so few days left in the campaign, he is running out of wings and prayers because his ideas and his recent lack of character isn't going to get him back in this race.

"Joe The Plumber" Makes More Than 95% Of America

McCain keeps coming back to Joe the Plumber (so much for Joe SixPack, perhaps Palin trademarked that?) and Obama plays along to a degree. Joe Wurzelbacher makes over $250,000. Most people that are hurting in today's economy make far less. In addition, they've been hurting long before Wall Street went haywire and fell below 12,000 11,000 10,000 9,000 points. So enough about Joe, alright?

This has been quite an interesting debate, with Bob Schieffer helping to cause lots of contention between the candidates. Unfortunately, most of it was about small issues that have nothing to do with the concerns of the American people. Bill Ayers means nothing to the family that can not afford to feed their family or pay for health insurance. What the candidate's roles with ACORN mean nothing and the hurt feelings of McCain and Obama mean squat.

From time to time the issues came up and yet again, McCain lied his ass off. Everything from health care to economic stimuli and talking about his VP choice Sarah "Reformer" "Ethics abuser" Palin was complete garbage. The truth of what he wants to do utterly disgusts people and is exactly why he hates Obama for comparing him to George Bush. He is Bush's third term at the very least. With Sarah Palin a heartbeat away from the Presidency, the situation is that much scarier.

There was plenty more in there and I'll revisit it tomorrow. With the minutes ticking down on the last debate a few miles down the I-495 from here, Obama and McCain had no problem holding onto their supporters tonight. For Barack Obama, that is great news, as the polls clearly show. For John McCain, it is just one more event in a campaign where his ideas have fallen on deaf ears. It is one more stage to show his temper and condescension for Obama that is extremely distasteful to most Americans. McCain can chuckle all he wants, but all the fake smiles in the world aren't going to win over the remaining undecideds.

The Result Of Early Primaries

Bob Schieffer of CBS gives us his take on all of the primaries that have been moved up to February of next year:

Charlie Rangel Slams George Tenet

Congressman Charlie Rangel called out the obvious on George Tenet yesterday with Bob Schieffer. He said the former CIA chief has no credibility and should be investigated. I couldn't agree more. Tenet takes no responsibility for his actions in the book, and the stuff he does mention about the Bush Administration.....why the hell didn't he say something before we went into Iraq? That makes him complicit with George Bush and Dick Cheney et al. crime of starting an illegal war. So go get em' Charlie!

From RawStory:

On CBS' Face The Nation Sunday morning, after a discussion of the impasse between the Democratic controlled Congress and president over the war funding bill, host Bob Schieffer asked the House Ways and Means Committee chairman if he could "switch to George Tenet, the former CIA director whose book came out this week."

"Sometime back, he got the Medal of Freedom," Schieffer continued. "I believe you were quoted somewhere along the way as saying that rather than the Medal of Freedom, he should be looked at by the Justice Department. What do you think about these allegations that he's making now that he was misunderstood when he said it was a slam dunk, that the administration had already made up its mind to go to war? Does he have credibility with you, Mr. Chairman?"

"No," Rangel responded, "I don't think he has credibility with anyone in the United States."

Rangel continued, "For him to have had the information that he had and to tell the president that it was a slam dunk. For the president to mislead the people in the United States in believing that there was weapons of mass destruction, that Saddam Hussein was involved in the attack in 9/11, that he was part of al Qaeda. And for him to have done what he did to my friend, Colin Powell, to have him sitting in the United Nations proclaiming the connection between the two, knowing in his heart that the evidence did not go in that direction. And to accept a medal and then to put out a book -- God knows what he got in terms of an advance -- to me, this warrants an investigation."

If you know that a murder is going to take place and you do nothing to stop it, you are essentially an accessory to murder. If you know that a disastrous war is about to take place, costing thousands upon thousands of lives and the pretenses for it are blatantly false....well then you are guilty of a lot more than just one murder.

As Rangel calls for an investigation, Congressman Henry Waxman has already invited the ex-CIA chief over to the Hill to appear before the House Committee on Oversight and Government reform later this week. As Tenet sells books and makes his trip around the country promoting it, it is more than fair for him to pay a visit to Congress and answer a few important questions.

Murtha Talks About Impeachment

Speaker Pelosi may have said that impeachment was off the table, but that didn't stop Congressman Murtha from talking about it on the Sunday talk shows. He was on CBS with Bob Schieffer talking about the President's impending veto of the bill to support the troops when it came out.

From Crooks and Liars:

Murtha: "There are three ways - four ways to influence a President, and one is popular opinion, the elections, third is impeachment and fourth is-is uh, fourth is the uh-uh the purse."

Schieffer: "Are you seriously talking about contemplating an impeachment of this President by Congress?"

Murtha: "What I'm saying is there are four ways to influence a President -"

Schieffer: "And that's one of them?

Murtha: "One of them is impeachment -"

Schieffer: "That's an option that is on the table?"

Murtha: "I'm just saying that's one way to influence a President. The other way is the purse and the purse is controlled by the Congress who is elected by the public and in the last election the public said we want the Democrats in control."

Murtha may not have come out and said he is willing to do it right now, but you can tell it is on his mind. President Bush has been thwarting the will of the people when it comes to the war and has been directly challenging Congress' co-equal powers laid out in the constitution. It is long past time to kick George to the curb and I am glad to see someone in Congress finally talk about it other than Dennis Kucinich. Murtha has real power on the Hill and it is great to see him use it to influence the mainstream to think about impeaching Bush.

Cheney Has Issues

If I had the time I could probably write a novel on all the issues that Dick Cheney faces. Whether he deals with them or simply ignores the facts, the list is enormous. So for this post we will stick to what came up during his interview on 60 Minutes with Bob Schieffer earlier today. Although any televised conversation with the Vice-President will never yield any hard facts, we can at least get a little humor out of it. Trust me, you won't leave empty handed.

From Crooks and Liars:

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Schieffer: Does this administration have a credibility problem?

Cheney: I don't think so Bob, ummm…I think obviously we've got issues we need to work through. You do the best you can with what you've got obviously and I think on reflection that indeed the record of the President and his administration will stand up well to scrutiny…

Bob also tried to ask him about the aftermath of the Scooter Libby trial. Cheney stood steadfast in saying anything substantive, even going so far as to say that he hasn't spoken to his close friend and former Chief of Staff since the trial. Damn, I wouldn't want to be friends with a guy that wouldn't call me after I got sent to jail for the crimes I committed. Since Cheney has no credibility on answering questions about the Administration's credibility, there really is no point in even trying to talk to the guy. You might as well just leave him to the sycophants at Fox to give him time to bash Democrats for his own failures.

And of course, once a liar gets going there is no way to know where they'll stop. For a man with the power that Dick Cheney holds, there must be outside action to force him to tell the truth or have it told for him and for him to suffer the consequences because of it.