Matt Ortega

Washington Post reporter Dana Milbank noted a recent interview Governor Sarah Palin (R-Alaska) did with conservative New York Times columnist, William Kristol:

McCain had said that racially explosive attacks related to Obama’s former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, are off limits. But Palin told New York Times columnist Bill Kristol in an interview published Monday: “I don’t know why that association isn’t discussed more.”

Did she miss all of March and April?

Besides, perhaps someone in a glass house shouldn’t throw stones about pastors? Nor should someone who, politically, panders to, and personally, “pals around” with, secessionists. Why aren’t those questions being asked?

And, as noted earlier, the kinds of reactions Senator John McCain (R-Arizona) and running mate Sarah Palin are truly appalling, and disgusting.

Worse, Palin’s routine attacks on the media have begun to spill into ugliness. In Clearwater, arriving reporters were greeted with shouts and taunts by the crowd of about 3,000. Palin then went on to blame Katie Couric’s questions for her “less-than-successful interview with kinda mainstream media.” At that, Palin supporters turned on reporters in the press area, waving thunder sticks and shouting abuse. Others hurled obscenities at a camera crew. One Palin supporter shouted a racial epithet at an African American sound man for a network and told him, “Sit down, boy.”

(Hat tip: John Cole, Balloon Juice)

Senator John McCain (R-Arizona) and Governor Sarah Palin (R-Alaska) are attempting to paint Senator Barack Obama (D-Illinois) as the “other” in the presidential race with unseemly code words to scare away rural white voters from the Democratic ticket.

This latest turn by the McCain campaign is the lowest of the low. An obvious last ditch effort that attempts to exploit, in fact is tailored to, discredited online smears of Senator Obama.

McCain rhetorically asked his riled up crowd this morning in New Mexico, “Who is the real Barack Obama?” The question elicited one supporter to yell out “Terrorist!” It was a reaction that McCain’s handlers obviously designed to draw, but it appeared to shake up McCain for a moment (based on his reaction) before he quickly regained his composure and continued to stoke the misconceptions about Obama that have plagued him the entire campaign.

At a Palin rally, while she went through her scripted schtick about this weekend’s New York Times article that, in fact, debunked claims of associations between Senator Obama and former ’60s radical, William Ayers, one man yelled out “Kill him!”

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One of the things we’ve done during this campaign: we don’t throw the first punch, but we’ll throw the last. Because if the American people don’t get the information that is relevant about these candidates and instead in the last four weeks all they are hearing about are smears and Swift Boat tactics that can have an impact on the election. We have seen it before, and this election is too important to be sitting on the sidelines. If Senator McCain wants to focus on the issues then that is what we focus on. But if Senator McCain wants to have a character debate that is one that we’re willing to have.

–Senator Barack Obama
(Huffington Post, 10/06/08)

With one of the most potent offenses in the PAC-10 — granted against teams like the Idaho Vandals ( 1-5, 0-2), Toledo Rockets (1-4, 1-1), UCLA (2-3, 1-1) and the Washington Huskies (0-5, 0-3) — the Arizona Wildcats (4-1, 2-0) received five votes in the latest AP Top 25 rankings, and sixteen votes in the Coaches poll — an improve on their showing in week three. Arizona was ranked 38th nationally before falling to a winless New Mexico in Albuquerque.

This weekend, Arizona travels to Palo Alto and take on the Stanford Cardinal (3-3, 2-1) before hosting unranked California (4-1, 2-0) and #8 USC (3-1, 1-1).

This is embarrassing, even by National Review standards where Jonah Goldberg is the editor, but Kathryn Jean Lopez is a little slow on the uptake.

COINCIDENCE? [Kathryn Jean Lopez]

Question from a reader:

Does the selloff on Wall Street have anything to do with the increasing likelihood that Obama will be our next president?

Note that the two trends — the financial meltdown, despite passage of the bailout, and the solidification of Obama’s lead — are coinciding.  At a minimum, the market’s behavior is not a vote of confidence in an Obama presidency.

10/06 01:03 PM

American voters, by leaps and bounds, believe the economy is the most pressing issue facing the country right now and trust Senator Barack Obama over Senator John McCain on the issue. In the latest CBS News poll, “economy/jobs” was named the top priority almost five times more than the second-place answer: terrorism.

SkyNews in the United Kingdom seems to get it, not sure why Kathryn Jean Lopez or National Review readers are having a tough time understanding trends.

(Hat tip: Whiskey Fire)