A modest proposal indeed, announced on Drudge:
MCCAIN CHALLENGE TO OBAMA: TEN JOINT TOWNHALLS
Wed June 4, 2008 11:56:11 ET
June 4, 2008
The Honorable Barack Obama
Obama for America
P.O. Box 8102
Chicago, Illinois 60680Dear Senator Obama:
In 1963, Senator Barry Goldwater and President John F. Kennedy agreed to make presidential campaign history by flying together from town to town and debating each other face-to-face on the same stage. In Goldwater’s words, those debates “would have done the country a lot of good.” Unfortunately, with President Kennedy’s untimely death, Americans lost the rare opportunity of witnessing candidates for the highest office in the land discuss civilly and extensively the great issues at stake in the election. What a welcome change it would be were presidential candidates in our time to treat each other and the people they seek to lead with respect and courtesy as they discussed the great issues of the day, without the empty sound bites and media-filtered exchanges that dominate our elections. It is in the spirit of President Kennedy’s and Senator Goldwater’s agreement, in the spirit of the politics of change, and to do our country good, that I invite you to join me in participating in town hall meetings across the country to discuss the most important issues facing Americans. I also suggest we fly together to the first town hall meeting as a symbolically important act embracing the politics of civility, and that in the course of each meeting we smoke no less than 10 (ten) thinly rolled marijuana cigarettes between us so as to ensure the American people have the best opportunity to peer into our respective souls…
Go to Drudge to read the rest.
Some liberties were taken with the quote there at the end, but be that as it may I think the Ten Joint Townhall is a fabulous idea and one which I wish I had thought of. Such a format undoubtedly would have kept Jimmy Carter out of the White House, because Americans could never elect a President they had seen in the fetal position, and would have brought Ross Perot victory in a landslide because he would have had HW Bush and Clinton cowering like freshmen in pledge week. Perot MUST be a total type “A” stoner.
While I would not hazard to predict how the Obama-McCain Ten Jointer will go, my guess is that Obama can’t finish a sentence but hugs McCain and uses the phrase “you’re a good white man” A LOT, while McCain just giggles incessantly while trying to get beyond “My friends … he he he … my friends …”
Depends on what sort of weed they have, of course, but with McCain’s warm ties to Mexico they’ll probably have the really good sh*t.
Word is the deal is sealed and Obama is happily taking him up on it.
Then let the fumigation begin.
I think from what I read Obama’s campaign would rather it be in the style of Lincoln-Douglas. That’s a lot of hot air from either side, if you ask me. But maybe McInsane will look less like a puppet if he doesn’t have to read from the cue cards and pose fake grins and winks. I’m sure that was the point.
They (McCain’t) will set the ground rules that Osama-bama will not adhere to. Then when Bore-rock trounces with his syruppy oration on all manner of issues, dumb-founding McCain’t so that his appearance is now in line with his brain, old John will just “reach across the aisle” to Bore-rock and ask, “Can I be your Veep?” at which Bore-rock will reply “you know, for a white honky cracker, you ain’t half bad but since I could never get you into my church, I will have to just say no!”
I think Kevin is correct, McCain is much better off the cuff, despite his occasional outbursts. I think Obama will be horrible, have you ever heard him hemm and hawww during a question he does not know the answer to? It is embarrassing. Having said that, who knows, anything can happen.
Obama seems to have no energy or passion except when he’s delivering a prepared speech. McCain just has no energy. The other night it looked like he didn’t give a s— about anything he was saying. That goes double for his teeny-tiny audience.
I’ve seen McCain speak very compellingly off the cuff. Not too often, but I have seen it. And he delivered a good prepared speech at the 2004 GOP Convention. But lately he’s been awful. The forced laughing the other night was some of the weirdest TV I’ve seen since Twin Peaks. Luckily for him, as Tom notes, probably nobody saw it.
Twin Peaks though had a plot, convoluted as it was. What is McCain’s plot? He seems to be running without any raison d’etre. Bush in 2000 was about restoring honor and dignity, Clinton in 92 was the economy stupid. What is McCain’s message? He can’t really have one, because he seems to offend everybody-you guys hate him as much as us pinkos over at Digital Camel. He’s a failure candidate for conservatives, and a fraud to liberals with his sly attempts to appear progressive.
Tom,
I object to the statement “and a fraud to liberals..”. I don’t think he is a liberal fraud at all. You can say progressive (as in Hilly) or moderate (which isn’t conservative at all) but he truly is liberal. And that is how he is going to take many Dem votes because the ones that don’t like Osama-bama know that they will get much more from McCain’t as a “liberal” then they would from a real conservative republican. Heck, that is why I don’t like this fool…because he IS liberal!!!!
Oh dear, ACTor, the world has finally turned topsy-turvy. McCain the liberal?! And TOM! We all know Twin Peaks didn’t have a point! Did you see the finale? In and out of red curtains for the whole freak’n episode. And ghosts? Really? Best tv you ever seen, though, I will say that. Next to Lost.
Presumably 10 foot will stop by and answer the question, because he is the key McCain supporter I know.
The main theme I have heard is “he ain’t the other guy”, as in “Imagine the sort of Supreme Court justices Obama would appoint: Bill Ayres and Ayman al-Zawahiri.” As your basic vanilla Republican, that was good enough for me.
Of course, it was the argument we heard all through 2006. When the GOP legislators were about to be taken to account for their blasphemous support for pork and expanded government, the main campaign theme I can remember hearing from all the empty suits was “Imagine a ‘Speaker of the House Pelosi’”.
Well, guess what, we got the Speaker of the House Pelosi.
So I think Tom’s question is a pretty good one. If all McCain is telling America is “I ain’t the other guy” and “It’s my turn,” we’re probably going to get exactly what they are warning us about.
I saw on another blog the suggestion that if McCain would announce John Bolton as his Sec of State, he would quiet a lot of conservative murmuring. Makes sense to me, at least it would be a start.
I guess I must be off the charts if John mcCain is a liberal.
No plot on Twin Peaks? Come now, Kevincito! The finale was forced because ABC canceled the show, although it makes more sense if you see “Firewalk With Me”. But for at least the first ten episodes the show clearly was all about who Bob was, and why did Laura die.
Obama is a fraudulent progressive. His appearance before the warmongers of AIPAC show that it’s politics as usual when it comes to Mossad-ville. It’s times like this when I wish I was still brzen enough to vote for Nader.
This post re: McCain’s speech, from Izzy at Mod Lang (modlang.blogspot.com), pretty much captures it:
Hooo boy, that did not look good. Forget the comparison with the dynamic Obama or the impassioned Clinton, just watch the thing for what it is. An extremely uncomfortable man giving a leaden, awkward speech. The weird thing is, I don’t believe the speech was badly written. McCain just seemed incapable of delivering it in a convincing manner. The refrain “That’s not change we can believe in,” should have been a rallying cry, a phrase with some anger or at least determination behind it. McCain treated it like a punch line in a weak joke, plastering on fake smile every time he repeated the line. I thought maybe he was trying to go for a Reagan-esque, “there you go again,” genial feel; but it totally didn’t fit the material.
An odd, uncomfortable and weak performance it was. If he keeps this up, he all the town hall meetings in the world are not going to save him.
Well, it looks like Obama will be running ass the incumbent in 2012. Where is ol’ 10 proof? I want to here how this is all okey dokey.
jacob, I believe we spell “here” as “hear” in the usage you suggested.
And this is far from over. There is still 5 months in which Obama’s life is about to be fileted. You need to learn to play chess, friend. Your angst tends to support a short game in checkers…and you really need to master Chess to play with the big boys. All your drivel does is bifurcate the Party.