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Obama's first words at Fridays debate
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"Americans are a strong people!
Our nation was created by innovators
with imagination and freedoms which the founders of
this country had the wisdom and foresight to build into the
very soul and heart of our country and it's people".

"Yet after eight years of a Republican administration, the fundamentals
of our economy are not strong, the republicans have undermined
the American economy which we depend on to make descisions about our futures.
The people who championed deregulation have weakened our economy.
And George Bush, John McCain and Phil Graham are the biggest deregulators in
Washington. As a newcomer to Washington I will change that, and I will change the mindset
That lets those in power call Americans a bunch of whiners".

O Greggy! O I do love this so damn much! I want to go steady with you for posting this!

ROFLMAO!!!!!!

There is only one word to describe the McCain campaign:

Cowards.

Do it McCain, call all the major networks biased Obama propaganda machines. You know you want to.

BUHUAHAHAHAHAH!

There goes today's news cycle for McLiar, and many more to follow.

You daersn't piss off the press in a tight election. This was suicide.

It appears The Bailout is hitting a wall on 3 sides in the House. I vote stop-gap until a Captain returns to the country's Wheelhouse.

It's very clear, Palin does not exist. She is a virtual creation, like that Pacino film where he invents the pop star nobody can see, and holograms her virtual performances to adoring masses.

Sim0ne, I think it was called. She couldn't do interviews either!

There may be a post in this.

... relations between the McCain campaign and the media are approaching a breaking point.  Whether this will materially impact the race is unclear...

They're getting seriously strained, but I think any real breaking point is far away.

McSame & Co. can keep pushing the envelope, backing off ever so slightly when they have to.  The MSM is not gonna pull the plug, despite brinksmanship on both sides.

And the right-wing editorial bias that comes from conglomerate media ownership will continue unabated.

It's completely ridiculous the lack of access the media and thus Americans have had with Sarah Palin. She could be a heartbeat away from being President of the United States, and nobody knows anything about her other than the canned speeches she gives or what the McCain Campaign releases about her. She's not a candidate she is an image.

The election is six weeks away and we now NOTHING about Sarah Palin. Nothing.

She should be having daily press conferences to allow the country to get to know her, to take her measure and to feel comfortable with her. But instead she is hidden away and that is treasonous.

If McCain/Palin is elected we'll know nothing about the vice president. That should chill folks to the bone. The MSM should be shouting from the rooftops for complete, unguarded access to Gov. Palin. Why are they allowing for hand-picked interviews (or infomercials in the case of Hannity) and nothing else?

And then the McCain camp gamed the works for the VP debate to the point where Palin can now speak in campaign bullet points rather than having to venture outside of the campaign bubble and have a real conversation and give her real ideas and show her real understanding.

The way they are hidig her away is dangerous and un-American. I see the cute countdown clocks and such pointing to the lack of Media access to Palin, but that's letting her and the campaign off lightly. This is an outrage. This is criminal.

The McCain Camp knows she isn't ready, so they are doing the only thinkg they can do - hide her. That doesn't mean the MSM has to play along. Palin was a mayor of a town of >7000 people and then after taking for uears off of elected office has been a Governor of an oil rich State of independent thinkers for less than two years. And in both those political offices she was surrounded by missteps and scandals.

I think the MSM could be fooling themsleves, because Palin is talked about so much they are fooled into believing that she is getting covered. They are talking about fluff and garbage. Where are the press conferences, the sit down interviews.

Barack Obama went though 20 or so debates in the Primary, and three in the General Election, numerous press conferences and dozens of interviews by anybody who would ask and folks still say "we don't know him enough" and yet Palin has had one real interview and will have one debate that was gamed in her favor and folks are seemingly okay with that complete lack of access, the complete inability to know who she really is, to get a read of her readiness, to get read if she is somebody you are willing to trust your life, the lives of your children with.

Why is the McCain Camp allowed to get away with this? Why is America seemingly willing to elect a complete unknown? What is wrong with people?

Gallup: Obama 47% McCain 44%

What the fuck is she, the Dave character from that Kevin Kline movie of the same name? Actually, he knew more about stuff than she does. This bubble treatment is ridiculous. Don't ask her questions....change the debate format...no cameras while she meets with world leaders about whom she knew nothing about three weeks ago.

It's one big fucking whine. What a bunch of wussies. McCain tell us he's "taken on guys tougher than this before". Yet he's holding a presser for the first time in four months today and we're not even allowed to ask his running mate a simple question. To steal the standard wingnut line, these guys can't even stand up to the media, how are we suppposed to expect them to stand up to Ahmadinejad, Putin, Chavez, etc.

In other news, new PPP poll has Obama ahead in Colorado, 51-44, after only leading by one a week ago. The difference? Perhaps the economy but that's hard to tell from the numbers. What the numbers do show is a big shift in indie voters and a big change in Palin's fav/unfav numbers, in the wrong direction from the McCain camp's perspective. Looks like the Messiah is a flop in Colorado. But she was supposed to have great appeal in the Western states!

Gallup: Obama 47% McCain 44%

To John McCain: Free Sarah Palin.

You were a POW. You know how terrible it was not to have your freedoms. Let her out of your cell. Please, Let Sarah speak.

Free Sarah Palin!

Frank Rich nails it so many times, my hammer just broke!

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/21/opinion/21rich.html?_r=1&em=&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&adxnnlx=1222189839-sTxG++7Eb7rA9UJSxxeNxQ

It's completely ridiculous the lack of access the media and thus Americans have had with Sarah Palin. She could be a heartbeat away from being President of the United States, and nobody knows anything about her other than the canned speeches she gives or what the McCain Campaign releases about her. She's not a candidate she is an image.

The election is six weeks away and we now NOTHING about Sarah Palin. Nothing.

She should be having daily press conferences to allow the country to get to know her, to take her measure and to feel comfortable with her. But instead she is hidden away and that is treasonous.

If McCain/Palin is elected we'll know nothing about the vice president. That should chill folks to the bone. The MSM should be shouting from the rooftops for complete, unguarded access to Gov. Palin. Why are they allowing for hand-picked interviews (or infomercials in the case of Hannity) and nothing else?

And then the McCain camp gamed the works for the VP debate to the point where Palin can now speak in campaign bullet points rather than having to venture outside of the campaign bubble and have a real conversation and give her real ideas and show her real understanding.

The way they are hidig her away is dangerous and un-American. I see the cute countdown clocks and such pointing to the lack of Media access to Palin, but that's letting her and the campaign off lightly. This is an outrage. This is criminal.

The McCain Camp knows she isn't ready, so they are doing the only thinkg they can do - hide her. That doesn't mean the MSM has to play along. Palin was a mayor of a town of >7000 people and then after taking for uears off of elected office has been a Governor of an oil rich State of independent thinkers for less than two years. And in both those political offices she was surrounded by missteps and scandals.

I think the MSM could be fooling themsleves, because Palin is talked about so much they are fooled into believing that she is getting covered. They are talking about fluff and garbage. Where are the press conferences, the sit down interviews.

Barack Obama went though 20 or so debates in the Primary, and three in the General Election, numerous press conferences and dozens of interviews by anybody who would ask and folks still say "we don't know him enough" and yet Palin has had one real interview and will have one debate that was gamed in her favor and folks are seemingly okay with that complete lack of access, the complete inability to know who she really is, to get a read of her readiness, to get read if she is somebody you are willing to trust your life, the lives of your children with.

Why is the McCain Camp allowed to get away with this? Why is America seemingly willing to elect a complete unknown? What is wrong with people?

I love how the media behave like a dog beaten by their beloved master. Instead of saying "screw this" and getting fully critical to McCain they continue to beg for his loving gaze on them (getting access to Palin).

From MSNBC:

According to the CNN producer who was let into Karzai's hotel suite with the photographers just before noon, Karzai was talking about his son. Palin was nodding, and asked what his name is. Karzai replied his name was Mirwais and explained that it means light of the house.

The media were escorted out after about 40 seconds.

So much for "relenting."

As Andrew Sullivan has been saying/mocking Deference Please

When will the MSM realize that McCain is plying them like a fish? If they don't fight, they're gonna be dinner! I would be delightfully pleased if they just stop, altogether, pandering to his whims. Act as if Obama is the only candidate running for office. That would leave McCain only Fox, WSJ, and New York Post as his only major avenues to get his message out. Of course, they don't have the coverage he needs, but that's his problem.

She was booed in New York City:

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/09/23/palin-arrives-in-new-york/

New Yorkers are not so much partisan as they are haters of any inconvenience.

I'm not buyin' it. CNN relented, not McCain. They sent in the cameras and got 29 seconds of video. Nothin'.

test

40 days and counting. Wheres Sarah?

I think this is why they pulled all her fundraisers.

The sad fact is ,...she will perform perfectly in the debates.
They won't call her out. Biden will have to stand there in frustration and she will win the "question and answer portion" of the Americas next top model V.P. debate.

The press nedds to "really" Boycott.

The conservative mindset of us vs. them seems to conflict with a the idea of a critical objective body, such as the press.

Republicans attempted to demonize and discredit the press among those who were inclined to vote for them because some very smart people high up in the campaign posited they stood more to lose than to gain from unfettered media access.

It is disturbing to have such a large faction of people so opposed to the basic American tenet of free and open examination vying for control of the executive branch.

CNN showed integrity.
I hope the rest of the MSM catches on, and the media need to get a lot tougher in drawing 'bright lines' and refusing to be used as tools.

The McCain-Palin campaign is daring the press (and the Dems) to "insult" Palin, her lack of expertise, her lack of skill, her lack of experience. They're all about Victimology -- they're always convinced they're the victims. They need 'pseudo, manufactured conflict' and they need it urgently -- particularly given the economic news of lawless, deregulated gambling that McCain was essential in helping to create in previous years on the Commerce Committee.

The fact that the McCain-Palin campaign has kept her under wraps tells us what we need to know -- she's not qualified, and they know it and they're scared shitless. Their 24/7 'Message Control' needs to be exposed as a desperate attempt to foist an unqualified ideologue on this nation (and the world).

However, judging from the post, it looks like the McCain campaign actually got what it wanted -- visuals, not words. It wants her to 'LOOK' Presidential, and whatever she says when she opens her mouth puts that at great risk.

Next time, the media need to pull together. If the print reporters aren't allowed in, the video folks need to join them. Otherwise, the McCain campaign plays them all for tools.

Where do I go to give CNN kudos for this first step in insisting on some basic integrity in the campaign election process...?