My husband wrote this diary about how we can help John McCain with his robo-call outreach, since he has a problem with funds right now. We can help spread the word so everyone knows just what kind of campaign he is running and so people know who McCain really is before they go to the voting booth.
(I have permission to post all of this, no fair use for the bride.)
John McCain has a problem --- and you can help.
The problem is money. He's tapped out. Barack Obama isn't. He can spend as much as those pesky 632.000 new donors will give him.
So Obama has TV commercials.
McCain has...robocalls.
John McCain has a problem --- and you can help.
The problem is money. He's tapped out. Barack Obama isn't. He can spend as much as those pesky 632.000 new donors will give him.
So Obama has TV commercials.
McCain has...robocalls.
Robocalls are cheap. They're also inefficient. If you're not home and have no answering machine, you don't get the message. If you don't visit progessive blogs on the Web, you don't get the message. If you don't watch Olbermann or listen to Rush, you don't get the message. And this is an important message --- McCain's last chance to tell you why you shouldn't vote for Obama.
How can we help John McCain?
I have an idea. Actually, screenwriter-director Cameron Crowe did.
Remember that scene in "Say Anything", when John Cusack stands under Ione Skye's bedroom window, a boom box over his head, and plays "In Your Eyes" for her?
Of course you do. We all do. It's the ultimate in inarticulate commitment --- you hold up someone else's iconic message and use it as your own, because you couldn't possibly say it quite so well.
But what if you had a boom box. And, instead of Ione Skye's lawn, you have a public space that tolerates free speech. And instead of Peter Gabriel, you have John McCain's robocalls. You play that boom box, and you're delivering the Republicans' real message, spreading the news about Barack Obama....
What news?
Obama kills babies: "Barack Obama and his Democrat allies in the Illinois Senate opposed a bill requiring doctors to care for babies born alive after surviving attempted abortions." [Listen to it here.]
Obama hangs with terrorists: "Barack Obama has worked closely with domestic terrorist Bill Ayers, whose organization bombed the U.S. capitol, the Pentagon, a judge's home and killed Americans. And Democrats will enact an extreme leftist agenda if they take control of Washington." [Listen to it here.]
Obama's soft on terrorism: "Barack Obama said the threat we face now from terrorism is nowhere near as dire as it was in the end of the Cold War. And Congressional Democrats now want to give civil rights to terrorists." [Listen to it here.]
Obama has terrible priorities: "On the very day our elected leaders gathered in Washington to deal with the financial crisis, Barack Obama spent just 20 minutes with economic advisors, but hours at a celebrity Hollywood fundraiser." [Listen to it here.]
Until this week, McCain let his affiliates create these calls while he pretended he was above this kind of campaigning. Now McCain insists they are "legitimate and truthful."
Polls tell us that these calls disgust voters. Doesn't matter to McCain. More and more, he seems to have decided that the only way he'll beat Obama is to tell us truths the media won't. And as November 4th approaches, it's entirely possible the next series will be even nastier --- overt race baiting and xenophobia. Obama: He's black. Obama: He was schooled at a madrassa. Obama: He really is a Muslim.
You'll want your fellow citizens to be prepared when the real hate comes down, so, please, take this first series of robocalls and share them.
To help people understand why you're playing these robocalls, you might attach a sign to your boom box. My suggestion: I'M JOHN McCAIN AND I APPROVE THIS MESSAGE. But I'd never presume to sit on your creative impulse.
John McCain's message of hate and racism could use some help.
Let's give it to him.
John McCain wants to make sure we go into the voting booth remembering him as a liar and a thug.
Let's be there for him.
Because he won't have a second chance to make a final impression.