The Osterley Times: Lipstick on a pig. (Updated)

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Lipstick on a pig. (Updated)

Here's what John McCain said of Hillary's health care plan:

McCain criticized Democratic contenders for offering what he called costly universal health-care proposals that require too much government regulation. While he said he had not studied Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton's plan, he said it was "eerily reminiscent" of the failed plan she offered as first lady in the 1990s.

"I think they put some lipstick on a pig, but it's still a pig," he said of her proposal.

Here's what Obama said regarding McCain and Palin as the new agents of change:

Obama poked fun of McCain and Palin's new "change" mantra. "You can put lipstick on a pig," he said as the crowd cheered. "It's still a pig."

"You can wrap an old fish in a piece of paper called change. It's still gonna stink."

"We've had enough of the same old thing."

The McCain camp are now, rather pathetically, attempting to claim that Obama has called Palin "a pig".

This has got to be one of the most dishonest elections ever ran by either major party. Anita Dunn has spoken out on behalf of the Obama campaign:

Enough is enough. The McCain campaign’s attack tonight is a pathetic attempt to play the gender card about the use of a common analogy – the same analogy that Senator McCain himself used about Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s health care plan just last year. This phony lecture on gender sensitivity is the height of cynicism and lays bare the increasingly dishonorable campaign John McCain has chosen to run.

McCain promised an election about the issues but he has played every low card that he can find. It seems to me that the McCain camp are actually becoming emboldened the more they realise that the mainstream media are not going to call them out when they resort to blatant falsehood.

That's two false charges in one day. McCain has lied about Obama's stance regarding sex education and now he pretends to be outraged by the use of a phrase which he himself as previously used towards Hillary Clinton.

McCain is becoming more dishonorable by the day.

UPDATE:

It's official. McCain is a scum bag.

He's now producing commercials which are pushing the "Obama called Palin a pig" story and ending them with Katie Couric talking about sexism in US elections.

This is is beneath despicable. Obama was discussing the McCain's promise to deliver change, not Palin; but the truth no longer matters to the McCain team.

UPDATE II:

Obama responds:

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama on Wednesday accused Republican John McCain's campaign of using "lies and phony outrage and Swift-boat politics" in claiming he used a sexist comment against vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin.

Calling it "the latest made-up controversy by the John McCain campaign," Obama responded to the Republicans' charge that he was referring to Palin when he used the phrase "lipstick on a pig" at a campaign stop Tuesday.

"I don't care what they say about me. But I love this country too much to let them take over another election with lies and phony outrage and Swift-boat politics. Enough is enough," he said.

"What their campaign has done this morning is the same game that has made people sick and tired of politics in this country. They seize on an innocent remark, try to take it out of context, throw up an outrageous ad because they know that it's catnip for the news media," Obama said.

UPDATE III:

Sullivan sums it up perfectly:

For me, this surreal moment - like the entire surrealism of the past ten days - is not really about Sarah Palin or Barack Obama or pigs or fish or lipstick. It's about John McCain. The one thing I always thought I knew about him is that he is a decent and honest person. When he knows, as every sane person must, that Obama did not in any conceivable sense mean that Sarah Palin is a pig, what did he do? Did he come out and say so and end this charade? Or did he acquiesce in and thereby enable the mindless Rovianism that is now the core feature of his campaign?
So far, he has let us all down. My guess is he will continue to do so. And that decision, for my part, ends whatever respect I once had for him.

That's exactly how I feel. When people attacked Palin's daughter, Obama swiftly asked them to stop. But McCain has actually run a TV commercial on something which he knew to be untrue. I'm sorry, but those are the actions of the scummiest scum.

UPDATE IV:

The video of McCain's disgraceful advert has vanished from YouTube and we are instead given this message: