McCain: Obama link to ex-radical is honesty issue

Source: Associated Press

By PHILIP ELLIOTT, Associated Press Writer

WAUKESHA, Wis. - Republican presidential candidate John McCain said Thursday that questions about Democratic rival Barack Obama's association with a former war protester linked to Vietnam-era bombings are part of a broader issue of honesty.

In his strongest personal criticism since his faltering campaign began casting Obama as an unknown and unacceptable candidate, McCain told supporters that Obama had not been truthful in describing his relationship with former radical William Ayers. The Arizona senator also said Obama himself has "a clear radical, far-left pro-abortion record."

McCain and the Republican National Committee also launched new Web and TV ads about Obama and Ayers.

(snip)

On Friday, the Republican National Committee will start running a TV ad in Indiana and Wisconsin that links Obama to Ayers and other Chicago figures. "The Chicago Way. Shady politics. That's Barack Obama's training," the ad says.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081010/ap_on_el_pr/mccain_30;_ylt=ApAosYUTcJxrQ_tdqIFd4blh24cA

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:grr: If you want to get REALLY mad, read the whole article.

"Look, we don't care about an old, washed-up terrorist and his wife," McCain said. "That's not the point here."

"He's a terrorist!" a man in the audience screamed without making clear to whom he was referring.

"Are Americans having an opportunity to ask all the questions and are we receiving straight answers from our opponent?" Palin asked. The crowd shouted, "No!"

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They're not gonna stop with this crap, people. They're gonna use hatred and anger and fear because they have nothing else and they're desperate, they're like a wild animal backed into a corner. It's just gonna get worse and worse from now to Election Day so be prepared.

it's beyond ridiculous.. McCain is absolutely full of it

Remember St. Raygun's "San Francisco Democrats" crack? (Translation: All them Demmycrats ain't nuthin' but a bunch of ho-mo-sesshuls. :sarcasm: )

Now anything connected to Chicago is apparently doubleplusungood, from the Cubbies :( down to celery salt on hot dogs. :eyes:

Meet Sarah Palin’s radical right-wing pals
Extremists Mark Chryson and Steve Stoll helped launch Palin’s political career in Alaska, and in return had influence over policy. “Her door was open,” says Chryson — and still is.

Editor’s note: Research support provided by the Nation Institute Investigative Fund. For Salon’s complete coverage of Sarah Palin, click here.

By Max Blumenthal and David Neiwert

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Read more: Alaska, Politics, News, 2008 election, Sarah Palin



Video: Interview with former Alaskan Independence Party chairman Mark Chryson
Oct. 10, 2008 PALMER, Alaska — | On the afternoon of Sept. 24 in downtown Palmer, Alaska, as the sun began to sink behind the snowcapped mountains that flank the picturesque Mat-Su Valley, 51-year-old Mark Chryson sat for an hour on a park bench, reveling in tales of his days as chairman of the Alaska Independence Party. The stocky, gray-haired computer technician waxed nostalgic about quixotic battles to eliminate taxes, support the “traditional family” and secede from the United States.

So long as Alaska remained under the boot of the federal government, said Chryson, the AIP had to stand on guard to stymie a New World Order. He invited a Salon reporter to see a few items inside his pickup truck that were intended for his personal protection. “This here is my attack dog,” he said with a chuckle, handing the reporter an exuberant 8-pound papillon from his passenger seat. “Her name is Suzy.” Then he pulled a 9-millimeter Makarov PM pistol — once the standard-issue sidearm for Soviet cops — out of his glove compartment. “I’ve got enough weaponry to raise a small army in my basement,” he said, clutching the gun in his palm. “Then again, so do most Alaskans.” But Chryson added a message of reassurance to residents of that faraway place some Alaskans call “the 48.” “We want to go our separate ways,” he said, “but we are not going to kill you.”

Though Chryson belongs to a fringe political party, one that advocates the secession of Alaska from the Union, and that organizes with other like-minded secessionist movements from Canada to the Deep South, he is not without peculiar influence in state politics, especially the rise of Sarah Palin. An obscure figure outside of Alaska, Chryson has been a political fixture in the hometown of the Republican vice-presidential nominee for over a decade. During the 1990s, when Chryson directed the AIP, he and another radical right-winger, Steve Stoll, played a quiet but pivotal role in electing Palin as mayor of Wasilla and shaping her political agenda afterward. Both Stoll and Chryson not only contributed to Palin’s campaign financially, they played major behind-the-scenes roles in the Palin camp before, during and after her victory.

Palin backed Chryson as he successfully advanced a host of anti-tax, pro-gun initiatives, including one that altered the state Constitution’s language to better facilitate the formation of anti-government militias. She joined in their vendetta against several local officials they disliked, and listened to their advice about hiring. She attempted to name Stoll, a John Birch Society activist known in the Mat-Su Valley as “Black Helicopter Steve,” to an empty Wasilla City Council seat. “Every time I showed up her door was open,” said Chryson. “And that policy continued when she became governor.”

more:http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=7390292&mesg_id=7390292

Or, at least, no beneficial effect for McCain. As the vitriol intensifies, most people just tune McCain out and stop paying attention. The reason is obvious and the Obamas know this: McCain's "message" contains nothing of interest to voters. It isn't saying anything about our problems. Instead, it amounts to nothing more than, "he's a bum!" I think these attacks will just drive more people away from McCain, and the polls seems to reflect that.

While it is tempting to play smash mouth, Obama is wise to stay above the fray and keep repeating that what Mcbush is doing is avoiding the serious problems the country faces.... problems Mcbush had a hand in creating.

My son in Denver just decided tonight to vote for Obama, because McCain's camp was calling Obama a terrorist - clearly a disgusting lie. All my work to get him to vote for Obama.... and then McCain does it all by himself! Yeah!!!

"Can you really trust a black man?" is the message being sent.

I personally think we should hit them with both barrels on the Alaska Independence Party NOW and not wait any longer.

He's proud of his association with a repulsive war criminal. That concerns me far more than caring about who Obama had minor dealings with.

I will have the pleasure of voting against. I no longer respect you in any way, shape, or form. You are a disgrace to mankind. You wouldn't know honesty if it bit you in the ass. Your entire campaign has been filled with one lie after another.

Your campaign can be summed up in three words: Fears, smears, and sneers.

Go cheney yourself, and then drag your lame ass back to the desert.

The Republicans do not honestly give a shit about anything to do with Ayers. This irrelevant fart of a talking point has been squeezed to death and all possible questions answered redundantly, and they know it. They do not care, because they know that if it matters then the Keating Five and everything unsavory that Republicans have ever accidentally bumped elbows with matters just as much -- which is NOT A FUCKING BIT. They know this. They are just flinging this crap around because they have absolutely nothing else but a Hail Mary that some bozos who like to bellow incoherently at rallies will convince the rest of the voting public that something terribly important is going on.

They. Will. Lose.

to STFU or face a lawsuit.

I'd think his employer should do the same thing.

I'm no fan of Ayers, and I think Obama was truthful about their relationship. But if Ayers doesn't want to hurt Obama's candidacy, its better for him to be quiet and let it all play out. Ayers isn't exactly known for his diplomatic speaking abilities.

n/t

Hey John...your pants are on fire.

:rofl:

By ELISABETH BUMILLER and PATRICK HEALY
Published: October 9, 2008
WAUKESHA, Wis. — Senator John McCain joined in the attacks on Thursday on Senator Barack Obama for his ties to the 1960s radical William Ayers, telling an angry, raucous crowd in Wisconsin that “we need to know the full extent of the relationship” to judge whether Mr. Obama “is telling the truth to the American people or not.”

Mr. Obama, in turn, condemned Mr. McCain’s plan for the government to buy bad home loans as a “bailout” for risk-taking banks and lenders, and he told several thousand voters in Dayton, Ohio, that Mr. McCain’s approach to the financial crisis was “risky” and “erratic,” a word Mr. Obama used twice.

The language and tone indicated that both men would continue their negative campaigning in the final weeks before Election Day, even as voters say they want solutions to the worsening economic conditions rather than back-and-forth blasts from the stump.

But what has been most striking about the last 48 hours on the campaign trail is the increasingly hostile atmosphere at Mr. McCain’s rallies, where voters furiously booed any mention of Mr. Obama and lashed out at the Democrats, Wall Street and the news media.

“I’m really mad!” shouted a man in the audience in Waukesha, where Mr. McCain and his running mate, Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska, were conducting a town-hall-style meeting. “And what’s going to surprise you, it’s not the economy. It’s the socialists taking over our country.”

more:http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/10/us/politics/10campaign.html?ref=us

in which his own campaign officials clear Sarah Palin of wrongdoing in Troopergate. HE's the one with the honesty issue--unless it's actually a sanity issue.

:headbang:
rocknation

and can't say this to Obama's face.

What exactly? What kind of issue is that exactly?

Oh..that's right....the people McCain is making his racists appeals to cheer clinic bombers and murderers. So that association is OK.