This is not concern trollery, and I'm not hittting any panic button here, but it seems like the Sarah Palin has united the Republican Party, and the Democrats are doing what we always do, going off in 100 different directions, talking about 100 diiferent things. Somebody needs to send a search party out for Joe Biden, or put him on a milk carton because he's fallen off the face of the earth, and the perfect surrogate to fend off all the Sarah Palin nonsense is Hillary, but WHERE is Hillary? She is nowhere in front of a camera speaking on behalf of Obama/Biden. For that matter where is Bill?
While the media lovefest for Palin continues (although it is thankfully waning) the media response to Joe Biden (when he is covered at all) has been anywhere from a collective shrug to negative coverage. Witness these questions for Biden from Meet the Press last week:
But two years ago you were the principal author, along with Les Gelb of the Council on Foreign Relations, of an entirely different kind of plan. You were promoting heavily the idea of a confederation, or a partition.
MR. BROKAW: That is Senator Barack Obama during the primary campaign. He was campaigning in Iowa at the time. In your hometown newspaper this morning, there's a big headline, "Banking on Biden." "As the senator of Delaware's financial institutions find themselves banking on Biden. To some, Joe Biden's makeover as a blue collar warrior is slightly at odds with the blue blood company that he keeps in the corporate state. Not only is Biden a neighbor to wealthy and powerful company titans and DuPont family members, he's thrown his weight behind issues and legislation that benefitted Delaware's big banking interests." This is what The Wall Street Journal had to say about all of this. "Obama's choice of Biden as his running mate is coming under fire from Republicans who are painting him as an old-style insider. They cite his longstanding ties to trial lawyers and lobbyists and a taste for pork-barrel spending...
"Biden ... had collected $6.5 million in campaign contributions from lobbyists, lawyers and law firms since 1989, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics. ..."Biden's candidacy also is bringing new scrutiny to his family's business dealings, especially those of his son Hunter, who is 38 years old." And that's a reference to your son being hired right out of law school by a big company here in Delaware that is in the credit card business, MBNA. He got about $100,000 a year, as I recall. You received $214,000 in campaign contributions from the company and from its employees. At the same time, you were fighting for a bankruptcy bill that MBNA really wanted to get passed through the Senate, making it much tougher for everyone to file bankruptcy. Senator Obama was opposed to the bill. Among other things you couldn't, in fact, claim that you had a problem because of big medical bills. You voted against an amendment that would call for a warning on predatory lending. You also called for--you opposed efforts to strengthen the protection of people in bankruptcy. This has been an issue that you're heard about before. Your son was working for the company at the same time. In retrospect, wasn't it inappropriate for someone like you in the middle of all this to have your son collecting money from this big credit card company while you were on the floor protecting its interests?
Here's the entire transcript of the Biden interview.
Biden on MTP
The questions about his son and the Biden plan for Iraq got Biden on the defensive, but it's more than the tough questions on Meet The Press, it's about what I'm hearing or not hearing from Biden on the campaign trail. No one is covering Biden on the campaign trail, or at least I haven't seen any substancial coverage of Biden since his selection.
Here's what I propose: Every day from now to the election, Biden should sound off on one of McCain or Palin's issue stands, and put it in the form of a snappy 30 second soundbyte, so it makes the news. Biden's only job, as I see it, is to attack McCain and Palin daily and make the attack sharp enough so that it makes the evening news. Palin certainly doesn't have any problem attacking Obama, no matter if the issue is true or not. That's how the Vice Presidential candidate should work, be the attack dog, knock Mcain/Palin off stride, and for God's sake make the media take notice of what you're saying. Biden seems unwilling or unable to do that.
Which brings me to Hillary Clinton, what better person to attack Palin on her issue stands and call them out of the mainstream than Hillary? Hillary should have been standing up there on day one of the Palin nomination, in front of cameras, saying emphatically that Palin is not prepared to be president, and labeling Palin's positions on abortion to book banning to the teaching of creationism as way out out of the mainstream.
Instead we get a weak rehash of her campaign line No way to Mcain/Palin. Hillary is campaigning for Obama in Ohio tomorrow, but clearly Democrats in Ohio are worried.
We had tons of new Democrats who came out to vote for Hillary... Now a lot of those voters are on the fence," said Stephen Madru, Democratic Party Chairman in Ross County in southern Ohio
Madru further states:
"I thought they just wouldn't vote. Now I'm afraid they are going to vote, which tends to change the whole dynamics of the thing," he said. "It scares the heck out of me."
Here's the whole Hillary in Ohio article.
Hillary in Ohio
The point is not that Hillary is campaigning, she always said she would do that. It's her reluctance to say to ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox, 'Put me on your morning shows or your evening news and let me tell you why John McCain and Sarah Palin are bad for this country.' She doesn't need to be asked, Just do it. She hasn't, and as a former Hillary supporter, I'm disappointed. She should be on tv at least once a week from now till Nov, extolling the virtues of an Obama/Biden ticket.
One final point about Hillary, Palin did not hesitate to inject Hillary's name into the campaign again, when she said that Obama regrets not picking Hillary as VP. To stop all this second guessing in it's tracks, Hillary must make a strong case to women why Obama's policies are better for them than McCain's are.
What about Bill Clinton? Much was made about thee lunch between Bill and Barack this week, but all we got from Bill was a vague pronouncement that Obama will win big in November.
"I predict that Sen. Obama will win and win handily," Clinton said when asked his opinion on the state of the race.
The meeting was closed, but here;s what i would say if I were Bill: 'Send me to rural counties all over this country, the ones that Hillary won and let me campaign fo you." Again, Bill Clinton doesn''t need to be asked, he is the finest campaigner in a generation, and he should go to those blue collar areas and tout Obama's economic plans, campare them favorably to his own. No one can make that case like Bill can.
Again I'm not being a concern troll here. I'm asking for a concerted effort from all Democrats to defeat McCain, because we know he will do or say anything to win.
Obama has been great in the campaign trail since the convention, but he can't do it alone. Sometimes I feel like he is alone.He shouldn't have to attack Palin's stands on issues, that should be Biden's job, or Hillary's job. Obama should be left to say where Obama wants to take the country,and where McCain plans to take the country.