Moe Lane

This Breitbart article about McCain’s 2008 campaign team is infuriating me far too much for me to write coherently about it for very long, so let me be brief: speaking professionally, I agree with it.  The faction of Team McCain represented by Steve Schmidt and Nicolle Wallace should not be allowed anywhere NEAR a Republican Presidential campaign for the rest of their lives.

And I mean it: the main campaign was a collection of professional political malpractice that seemed content to merely put up enough of a fight to satisfy honor, then lose gracefully. While I like and respect most of the people who were directly involved in handling New Media aspects for McCain, it became incredibly clear by the end of the 2008 election cycle that the McCain campaign essentially treated those people with about as much respect as they did us; which is to say, none at all. The campaign would have happily ignored us completely, if they thought that they could get away with it; as it was, they made sure that we knew that our inclusion was both grudging and resented – and literally muted whenever possible.

How bad was it?  Let me put it this way: I’ve already gotten more out of Romney’s campaign than I ever have out of McCain’s – and Mitt Romney isn’t even the official nominee yet.  The bottom line is that it turned out that John McCain wanted to be the nominee a heck of a lot more than he ever wanted to be the President, and while I’m sure that McCain feels that his  team acquitted themselves well in the 2008 general election the rest of us are… somewhat unpersuaded. (more…)

Matt Lewis thinks that he knows the answer: it’s because McCain gave access to the blogosphere and the rest of the New Media, and Romney largely does not.

I think that Matt has a point, here. I will give McCain this: his campaign was always ready to talk with us. They never listened to a damn thing that we told them – to their sorrow – but they at least returned our calls. And why is this important? Matt explains further:

(more…)

(H/T: Hot Air Headlines) I don’t care how many memos, deep background revelations, and/or surreptitious back-scratchings take place: former McCain adviser Steve Schmidt’s name will continue to be mud to the activist base of the Republican party.  Hire him for your campaign, and watch enthusiasm for said campaign go off quietly to a corner, cough up a pint of blood or two, and straightforwardly die.

Hey, I’m just the messenger.

Moe Lane (more…)

…to scream “I told you so!” over and over again at this realization.

…ultimately I have to admit that my thinking has changed. I wouldn’t want President McCain in office, but having seen the damage that President Obama has done, we’d have been better off without him in office. In short, I should have voted for McCain, despite my serious reservations and dislike of the man. I was wrong.

Because screaming is not helpful.
Screaming is not helpful.
Screaming is not helpful…

Moe Lane

(H/T: Instapundit)

Who is Meghan Cofield? Well, she’s a Ohio worker who lost her job, and it’s all John Kasich’s fault!

No, wait, it was all John McCain’s fault!

Yeah. That was an ad from 2008 – same person, and even some of the same footage – when Barack Obama was pretending to be hating on NAFTA (needless to say, that promise came with an expiration date: also needless to say, Strickland has no intention of bringing that up with the President). Which leads me to the next question: just why is Meghan Cofield so depressed? She seems to be developing quite the career race-baiting the Chinese.

Moe Lane (more…)

Because of the Democrats’ decision to make immigration a priority.

Sen. Lindsey Graham’s (R-S.C.) decision to walk away from Senate talks on climate change and energy legislation – at least for now – has prompted the measure’s remaining architects to scuttle Monday’s planned unveiling of the bill.

[snip]

Graham is upset over Democratic plans to take up immigration legislation this year – he accuses Democratic leaders of pushing forward immigration “haphazardly” and calls it an election-year political gambit.

Of course, it’s an open question about how broken up Senate Democrats really are to not have to take up that particular piece of pandering to religious fanaticism just quite yet. It will be also interesting to see how this will affect the immigration bill debate: considering that even John McCain is sounding like he’s had a Road to Damascus (or road to the Arizona primary) moment, it is going to be very weird if Graham ends up supporting the immigration bill. (more…)

You are not a beautiful and unique snowflake.

Background: Hot Air (Allahpundit), Hot Air (Ed Morrissey), The Weekly Standard, ConsiderThisNews (Pat Hynes), The Politico

Since everybody else is piling on, let me add my own comment to the fray.  If you were one of the people who participated in that Vanity Fair hit piece, and we find out your name, you will be a net drag on any national campaign for the rest of your professional career.  Not because you helped the Left go after Governor Palin, but because you are an untrustworthy sneak who is dedicated to propping up the elitist system in DC, not fixing it.   Any candidate that hires you will have to overcome the base’s natural reluctance to work with a campaign that would hire someone like you.  This can be done; but it’s much easier to hire people with your skill set and a name for basic party loyalty.

If you are a McCain staffer who did not talk to VF, I suggest that you find some way to demonstrate that you aren’t one of the people in the first paragraph.  Because until we know who talked, the default assumption is going to be that you may have talked.  This will not wreck your career, but it will blight it if the base has anything to say about it.  On the bright side, a simple and declarative denial will do; of course, if your denial is a lie and we catch you at it, brush up on your typing skills.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

Gird your loins.

Question: What do these two stories have in common?

Iran Unrest Reveals Split In U.S. on Its Role Abroad

[snip]

Obama’s approach to Iran, including his assertion that the unrest there represents a debate among Iranians unrelated to the United States, is an acknowledgment that a U.S. president’s words have a limited ability to alter foreign events in real time and could do more harm than good. But privately Obama advisers are crediting his Cairo speech for inspiring the protesters, especially the young ones, who are now posing the most direct challenge to the republic’s Islamic authority in its 30-year history.

[Via The Campaign Spot]

US says hot dog diplomacy still on with Iran

WASHINGTON (AFP) — The United States said Monday its invitations were still standing for Iranian diplomats to attend July 4 celebrations at US embassies despite the crackdown on opposition supporters.

President Barack Obama’s administration said earlier this month it would invite Iran to US embassy barbecues for the national holiday for the first time since the two nations severed relations following the 1979 Islamic revolution.

[Via Weasel Zippers, via Hot Air]

Answer: Both demonstrate that the administration’s only real focus on any issue is its effect on domestic policy. (more…)

I’m thinking that they may need to get the camera out for this one.

Obama Reaches Out for McCain’s Counsel

WASHINGTON — Not long after Senator John McCain returned last month from an official trip to Iraq and Pakistan, he received a phone call from President-elect Barack Obama.

As contenders for the presidency, the two had hammered each other for much of 2008 over their conflicting approaches to foreign policy, especially in Iraq. (He’d lose a war! He’d stay a hundred years!) Now, however, Mr. Obama said he wanted Mr. McCain’s advice, people in each camp briefed on the conversation said. What did he see on the trip? What did he learn?

[snip]

Over the last three months, Mr. Obama has quietly consulted Mr. McCain about many of the new administration’s potential nominees to top national security jobs and about other issues — in one case relaying back a contender’s answers to questions Mr. McCain had suggested.

Mr. McCain, meanwhile, has told colleagues “that many of these appointments he would have made himself,” said Senator Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican and a close McCain friend.

(more…)