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COLUMBUS, Ohio—John McCain on Friday moved to calm rising anger among his supporters at rival Barack Obama, calling him a decent man and at one point taking the microphone away from a woman who had called Obama an Arab.
Their anger apparently still at flash point, McCain’s supporters then booed him for his conciliatory words about Obama.
The abrupt move from McCain at a town hall meeting in Minnesota came after days of rising tensions as McCain and his campaign attacked Obama as a friend of a 1960s radical they called a terrorist.
Increasingly angry, supporters of McCain and running mate Sarah Palin have responded at rallies with loud cries of “terrorist” and “traitor.”
At one such rally earlier this week in New Mexico, McCain visibly winced when his mention of Obama’s name was greeted by the shout of “terrorist,” but the candidate said nothing about it and went on with his speech.
Supporters at the Minnesota town hall meeting pressed McCain to get even tougher on Obama.
But when one man said he was scared to raise his unborn child in a country that might be led by a President Obama, McCain disagreed.
“I have to tell you, he is a decent person and a person that you do not have to be scared of as president of the United States,” McCain said to boos and groans from his supporters.
“If you want a fight, we will fight,” McCain said. “But we will be respectful. I admire Senator Obama and his accomplishments. . . . I don’t mean that has to reduce your ferocity, I just mean to say you have to be respectful.”
Later, another supporter told McCain, “I don’t trust Obama.... He’s an Arab.”
McCain stood shaking his head as she spoke, then quickly took the microphone from her.
“No, ma’am,” he said. “He’s a decent, family man, a citizen that I just happen to have disagreements with.”
Campaigning in Ohio hours before, Obama defended his character against the mounting attacks, daring McCain to run as negatively as he wants in the final weeks of the race while predicting that, in light of the financial crisis, “it will not work.”
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics/AP/story/721688.html
]]>What she didn’t tell worshippers gathered at the Wasilla Assembly of God church in her hometown was that her appearance that day came courtesy of Alaskan taxpayers, who picked up the $639.50 tab for her airplane tickets and per diem fees.
An Associated Press review of the Republican vice presidential candidate’s record as mayor and governor reveals her use of elected office to promote religious causes, sometimes at taxpayer expense and in ways that blur the line between church and state.
Since she took state office in late 2006, the governor and her family have spent more than $13,000 in taxpayer funds to attend at least 10 religious events and meetings with Christian pastors, including Franklin Graham, the son of evangelical preacher Billy Graham, records show....
“Politicians are entitled to freely exercise their religion while in office, but ethically if not legally that part of her trip ought to not be charged to taxpayers,” said Walker, executive director of the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty. “It’s still fundamentally a religious and spiritual experience she is having.”
The Palins billed the state an additional $10,094 in expenses for other multi-day trips that included worship services or religiously themed events, but also involved substantial state business, including the governor’s inaugural ball and an oil and gas conference in New Orleans.
Palin also submitted $998 in expenses for a June trip to Anchorage that included a bill signing at Congregation Beth Shalom synagogue, the only non-Christian house of worship she has visited since taking office, according to the McCain campaign.
In response to an AP request, Comella provided a list showing that since January 2007 the governor had attended 25 “faith-based events,” including funerals and community meetings held at churches. Many did not appear on the governor’s schedule or her travel records.
Palin has said publicly her personal opinions don’t “bleed on over into policies.”
[Ask her employees busy harassing the Alaska troopers over her sister’s child custody vendetta about that last sentence!!]
]]>Tony Gentile would be Governor of Louisiana or in the U.S. Congress, at this time.
]]>--Faux Bobby Jindal
]]>]]>n other cases, Mr. Obama’s requests benefited political supporters.
His campaign’s list said the senator had secured $1.3 million of an $8 million request in 2006 for a high-explosive technology program for the Army’s Bradley Fighting Vehicle. The list said the program was overseen by General Dynamics.
One of Mr. Obama’s top supporters, James S. Crown, serves on the board of General Dynamics, a military contractor. Mr. Crown is a member of Mr. Obama’s national finance committee.
Mr. Obama also secured $750,000 of a $3 million request for renovation of a space center named for Mr. Crown’s grandfather, Henry Crown, at the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago.
]]>Senator Barack Obama on Thursday released a list of $740 million in earmarked spending requests that he had made over the last three years, and his campaign challenged Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton to do the same.
Sen. John McCain called a statement by a Georgia congressman Saturday, which compared the feeling at recent Republican rallies to those of segregationist George Wallace, “a brazen and baseless attack.”
Rep. John Lewis, D-Georgia, who has been praised by McCain in the past, issued his statement after several days of headline-grabbing anger aimed at Democratic nominee Barack Obama from some attendees at campaign rallies of McCain and running mate Gov. Sarah Palin.
“What I am seeing reminds me too much of another destructive period in American history. Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin are sowing the seeds of hatred and division, and there is no need for this hostility in our political discourse,” Lewis said in a statement.
“George Wallace never threw a bomb. He never fired a gun, but he created the climate and the conditions that encouraged vicious attacks against innocent Americans who were simply trying to exercise their constitutional rights. Because of this atmosphere of hate, four little girls were killed on Sunday morning when a church was bombed in Birmingham, Alabama,” wrote the Democrat.
McCain has written about Lewis, praising his actions in Selma, Alabama, during the civil rights movement. The Republican nominee even said during a summer faith forum that Lewis was one of three men he would turn to for counsel as president.
But the Arizona senator blasted Lewis’ remarks, and called on Obama to repudiate them.
“Congressman John Lewis’ comments represent a character attack against Gov. Sarah Palin and me that is shocking and beyond the pale,” he said in a Saturday afternoon statement released by his campaign
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/10/11/mccain.lewis/index.html#cnnSTCVideo
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