A Thinking Reed

"Man is but a reed, the most feeble thing in nature, but he is a thinking reed" – Blaise Pascal

John McCain

  • Final (thank you, Lord) debate

    I think Obama mopped the floor with Sen. McCain. But I would say that, wouldn’t I? (I’m wearing my Obama/Biden t-shirt as I write this, as it happens.) Obama’s answer on the Ayers/ACORN (OMG! ACORN is destroying the fabric of democracy!!!) stuff seemed pretty effective to me. And, while I remain a squish on what Read more

  • You don’t need a weather man to know which way the wind blows

    The Nation has re-posted a story it ran on the Obama-Bill Ayers connection when the Clinton campaign tried to make hay out of the same issue during the primaries. What’s completely baffling to me is what inference the McCain campaign thinks we should draw from Obama’s (tenuous) connection to Ayers. That Obama is a secret Read more

  • Veep blogging

    I don’t know that I have any unique perspective to add to the Biden-Palin debate. I think the c.w. is more or less correct that Palin avoided disaster–largely by sidestepping the questions and sticking to McCain campaign talking points (tax cuts! victory! maverick!). Probably not enough to turn the campaign around, but it may have Read more

  • Half-@$$ed debate blogging

    OK – I only watched the first hour; I turned it off when it became a competition about who could sound “tougher” on Iran. Things like this make me feel like a crazy Chomskyite left-winger. I have a hard time putting myself in the mindset of that mythical beast the undecided or “persuadable” voter, so Read more

  • Why I won’t vote third party

    Looks like Ron Paul, whom some of his supporters hoped would make a third-party run for president, is urging people who are sick of war, assaults on civil liberties, and, er, the Fed to vote for a third party–any third party! I appreciate the arguments that the two major parties and their candidates are either Read more

  • What the–?

    Is this for real? Good golly. Read more

  • Perspective

    I continue to be mystified by the Sarah Palin love-fest and the Sarah Palin hate-fest. Clearly, she’s touched a nerve with the conservative grassroots and set off at least some lefty bloggers and commentators. To my mind this doesn’t change anything. But then, I wasn’t the target audience for this move. McCain is still McCain, Read more

  • Cheap dates

    Reading National Review‘s “The Corner” and some comment threads at Rod Dreher’s place, I was puzzled to see so many conservatives gushing about McCain’s choice of Alaska governor Sarah Palin as his running mate. From what little I’ve read she seems to be an admirable lady with strong convictions, but how does this alter the Read more

  • Who’s got the messiah complex now?

    Good analysis from Chris (of Lutheran Zephyr) on McCain and Obama’s answers to Rick Warren’s “Does evil exist?” question at the Saddleback Church forum. Obama’s response–noting that only God can ultimately defeat evil and that the potential for evil lurks in our own hearts and in our best intentions–was very Niebuhrian. Read more

  • Put not your trust in princes, the continuing series…

    Andrew Bacevich writes that we need a wholesale repudiation of the Bush legacy in foreign policy – preventive war, “enhanced” interrogation, the metastasizing national security state, the black hole version of the executive that draws all power to itself, etc. McCain, with minor modifications, represents a continuation of the Bush legacy. It falls, then, to Read more