I first saw Barack Obama's infamous (now) "lipstick on a pig" quote yesterday morning at the deli as a headline on the auspicious pages of that bastion of journalistic integrity, The NY Post. And I have to admit, I laughed a little bit at it. I've been kinda waiting for Obama to get mad about something, anything that is going on with the Republicans campaign of deflection. And I thought this was it.Then I saw the video that it came from and my thoughts turned to "OK...he is just using a common phrase to outline a serious issue." That he was sick of the McCain campaign claiming they are the real agents of change. Smart people are gonna see that, right?
Wrong.
It did get a good laugh at wherever he was when he made those comments, that is true. Palin's pitbull/hockey mom comparison is still ringing pretty loudly in ears of the American public. So it was probably intentional on the part of the Obama campaign. Use her soundbite to initiate his own.
Was he calling Palin a pig? Um, no he wasn't. He may have turned around her words to point out the deficiencies in the Republicans change message, but I think even John McCain would agree that he wasn't actually calling Palin a pig. That, of course, isn't stopping the Republicans from crying "sexism". Rovian politics, my friends. When you can't defend, attack. Unreasonably, if necessary.
Listen, John McCain has used that same exact phrase just in the past year a few times. On one occasion he used it when talking about Hillary Clinton's health care platform. The crowd he was addressing laughed just as hard as Obama's crowd from the other day. Was McCain being sexist then? Hardly. Smart people know that, and Republicans would have been offended if Democrats had made that accusation. Or campaigned on it.
And McCain isn't the only major Republican or Democrat how uses this phrase in common usage. A bunch of them do, including current VP Dick Cheney. It is especially common on the campaign trail. As a way of attacking spin.
I'd rather that the Republicans address what Obama actually said and maybe try to convince me that he is wrong about their campaign of change. Show me that they really are for change. Don't get mired in rhetoric and deflection. That would be hoping for a lot, I guess.
Oh, and my favorite bit of irony about the entire silly fucking thing? John McCain's former Press Secretary published a book a few years ago. Guess what the name of that book was...go ahead, guess.
And I'm spent.
46 comments:
Bugsy, am I the only sane person in the world that can see Ms Palin will be a major embarrassment if elected VP?
To be honest, here in the UK she has become something of a laughing stock after the announcement that she has sanctioned the go-ahead for her very own action figure dolls. Not to mention the amount of skeletons in her closet which grow by the hour.
I think that Borat O'Balmy was accurate with his comment of " Lipstick on a pig."
I can't help but think any campaign centred around posturing and name calling shows everyone involved up to be a total bunch of twats. Really. The world is chuckling as this goes on.
As an American I really don't give a fuck what the world thinks about American Politics because in the end they are going to get on there knees and lick our feet anyway.
Barak's comment was an obvious ploy at taking a dig at Sarah Palin. If you noticed he also made a comment about an "old stinky fish" as a jab at John McCain's age. After years of the Democratic Party nothing nothing but attacking people instead of talking about the issue it is finally biting them on the ass. The party is fucking scared and has no idea how to handle a strong woman.
The only change Obama brings to the White House is an end to Amaerican Values.
McCain 2008!!
Anonymous people are pussies.
And Obama should be showing that book to everyone possible.
Now, here's Obama's he denied that this had anything to do with Sarah Palin. The problem is the crowd cheered and laughed like crazy. They knew, or they thought, anyway, that it was about Palin, that lipstick on a pig remark, because of this Sarah Palin joke that she has been telling since the convention. One thing we know about Obama's statement for sure, Democrats will tax the pig, they will tax the lipstick, and then they'll say it's okay to marry the pig because it's just a lifestyle choice.
When American women go to vote, they should raise lipstick red middle fingers. That's what they ought to do here because of this pig lipstick comment. Maybe women and men who are the sons, daughters, fathers, brothers of women, you know, Biden's out there insulting women, and here's Obama now directly insulting Sarah Palin. People with pig ears shouldn't throw pig slurs. Politics may have changed forever here, folks, and we've gone now from red states and blue states to red states and lipstick red states.
I've noticed that neither of the commenters who think that Obama was talking about Palin have anything constructive to say about the same statement being said by McCain (about a woman), Cheney, and every other politician in the US.
He did say, "I was talking about McCain's economic plan," but if you listen to what he said in cut one, he didn't just insult Palin, he insulted McCain. He referred to McCain as a dead fish, a dead old fish. Don't forget, this is the guy in a debate with Mrs. Clinton, flipped her off, flipped her the bird by virtue of scratching his face that way, and the audience that saw it laughed. This guy gets a pass at being a sophisticated elitist nice guy, but I mean this guy is a Chicago thug politician as identified by somebody who would know, and that would be Bill Clinton.
So, anyway, there's Obama attacking his base, the media, blaming them for this, for basically broadcasting what he did say. Now, Obama went on to say that he wants to get this campaign back to issues. Obama, you can do it, but you don't have much to say. The problem is he cannot talk about issues because he doesn't have any. He is an empty suit. He is running on platitudes and nothings and so forth.
Maybe if you actually listened to him instead of looking for innuendos and hidden insults where there are none, you'd actually have a valid argument.
Those are valid arguements did you even read the comments or is your head so far up Obama's ass you have to ask for permission to think for yourself. Open your eyes. It was a clear dig at Palin and McCain. I am all for dirty politics but have the balls to man up to it. Hell I might even vote for Obama if he would say what his planes for "change" are. The fact is that he does not have any idea what he is doing.
His plans, just like McCain's, are listed clearly on their websites and on the non-partisan fact-checking and policy websites that litter the Internet. Try doing a little research before sticking your foot in your mouth again.
The Obama rally the crowd actually started chanting, "No more pit bulls!" Pretty sarcastic reference to that lipstick joke that Sarah Palin made at the GOP convention. The same day that Obama makes the "lipstick on a pig" joke and his crowd is out there chanting, "No more pit bull!" So it is very obvious that his crowd knew. They laughed and they applauded his joke. They did not think it was just the standard used political cliche, that is overused by politicians of all stripes. However, his audience -- and this is his problem on this -- his audience laughed. They loved it, and they started shouting, "No more pit bull." It is obvious that this was a calculated move that backfired.
Obama on Education reform.
Obama hasn't made a significant mark on education, that he's elusive on accountability, a staunch defender of the existing public school monopoly. Obama's one accomplishment: Legislation to teach comprehensive sex education to kindergarteners. Learning about sex before learning to read?
Well, let's go back in 2007, on November 20th, Obama spoke at a Planned Parenthood event, and he said this about Alan Keyes, who was his opponent in the Senate race in 2004.
"I remember him, uh, using this in his campaign against me, saying, "Barack Obama supports teaching sex education to kindergarteners." (laughter) And, you know, which -- I didn't know what to tell him. But it's the right thing to do."
Are you fucking kidding me?
By your own logic, then, wouldn't it have made more sense for him to change that tired old truism and say "You can put lipstick on a pitbull, but it's still a pitbull?"
It would be ridiculous to think that you can't use the word "lipstick" and especially the phrase "lipstick on a pig" which is used regularly by PR people, pundits and politicians every day, without now evoking Palin. It was a common phrase way before her ridiculous speech.
Once again, get your facts straight. The bill he supported was to make sex education medically accurate and to address topics that are age-appropriate with young children. Parents who didn't want their kids to learn about their bodies would be allowed to prevent their child from learning without restriction.
It also covered education about what inappropriate touching is - you know, since kids get molested? I think that sounds like a good idea.
i couldnt beleive it yesterday when someone sent me the video of mcain saying it as well... gave me a good laugh...
Yeah but don't forget, there are some things you can't cover up with lipstick and powder. We get the government we deserve. The candidates engage in this level because we respond to it. Then we wring our hands and say how terrible it is. If it didn't work they wouldn't do it. I love my country, deeply, and dearly. But most Americans I know are truly assholes.
What is all this about Obama wanting to tax, tax, tax? It is the Repukelicans that want to continue the tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans (who by the way are the ones that can pay for the Accountants so that they don't pay their fair share to begin with). Obama actually wants to decrease taxes for those making less than $250,000 a year -- which the last time I checked -- was the vast majority of this country. And that will do nothing to alleviate the wealth redistribution that has occurred under the Repukelicans where the gap between the top 1% and the rest of the country has grown to unprecedented levels. You want to talk about wealth redistribution -- in the last 8 years only the top wage earners have not only seen salary increases -- but salary increases at an unprecedented levels -- triple and quadruple salary jumps -- while the rest of us have seen our actual wages drop. All I see Obama wanting is not wealth redistribution... but a return to fairness and to give the average American family a fighting chance to keep their homes and their jobs and their healthcare while attempting to keep their kids educated. Do you really think the predominantly rich, predominantly white and predominantly male party are going to be so unselfish as to trickle their wealth down? It didn't happen in the 1920's. It didn't happen in the 1980's. And it certainly hasn't happened in the past 10 years. What has happened is that our companies have been sold to other countries to the highest bidder. Our jobs have been offshored (and companies have been rewarded for it). All so those top 1% can have more and more material goods -- and to hell with the rest of what were once hard working Americans. The Repukelican’s campaign is sounding more and more like the french with each election -- their slogan shouldn't be about pigs or lipstick or pitbulls -- isn't it more like -- 'let them eat cake.' (maybe that's why there's such an obesity and education problem in this country -- keep them fat and dumb and happy will follow?). Wake up people. How bad do you want crime to get? How many jails do we build? How many kids do you want dropping out of school? How many fewer jobs do we want for our youth? How precarious do you want our Social Security system to be? How much do the vast majority of Americans want to live hand to mouth? How much do we want to destroy our environment because we are too short-sighted to invest in alternative energy… but drill, drill, drill? How much do we want teenage pregnancies to increase? How many families do we watch go bankrupt over healthcare bills? How high do we want our deficit to go? These are the issues that I actually hear Obama talking about. I did not hear any one of these issues even mentioned when Palin spoke. Who the f^%^$ cares about pit bulls or hockey or lipstick? The scary thing is how many people fall for the same hollow tune. Talk about reality TV at its worst.
Wow! I take a few hours off from blogging and my comments go to hell. The name-calling and empty rhetoric that is dominating this campaign is now dominating my blog. Ridiculous!
NMTB/badger - The UK doesn't seem to be doing so badly now, does it.
Anon (Evyl, Smoke or Dan) - spreading the lie that Obama wants to teach comprehensive sex education to kindergarten is just fucking wrong! The sex ed you are talking about was trying to teach our communities kids to stay away from child predators. And it is age appropriate, by the way. You could turn around the current McCain ad and say that he supports Child Molestors if he is against that bill. Or as my brothers at The Savvy, The Extreme and the Idealist like to say "McCain/Palin: Endorsed by NAMBLA"
Avitable - While I do think it is ridiculous for the McCain camp to call Obama and the Dems "sexist" (hello pot, this is the kettle calling...), I also think that Obama did pick his words carefully. He wasn't calling her a pig. He was using her words to point out the deficiencies of the McCain camp on their campaign of change. I think he did it on purpose. If anyone actually listened to the speech they could see that. But he wasn't calling her a pig. I agree with just about everything else that you said.
Slyde - I thought it was funny at first too.
RW - Sad but true.
Dem Anon - Preaching to the choir. I hear ya!
I am ready for change. I hope that the country truly is too...
its time.
"Can't we all just get along ?" LOL !
Wow, look at 'em come crawling out of the woodwork. Do you think they're part of the paid blog-attack squad or just random flavorade drinkers?
So is this reminding anyone of "Survivor" yet? Sitting around the campfire, anticipating the next big challenge (debate) and talking smack about your team mates? I expect a lot more of this in the next 2 months. It is going to get dirty. McCain is an old dog and knows how to fight for an election, Palin is just his pitbull and that is one of the reasons he picked her.
As I mentioned on one of my latest blogs, the two most eye opening films I have watched recently are "Jesus Camp" and "Bush's Brain" (about Karl Rove). After watching these two films, the Lipstick rebuttal by McCain makes perfect sense and "Jesus Camp" will show you just how many people out there are going to be lining up vote for Palin / McCain. It is a scary world we live in these days.
I know places on the internet where the lipstick comment by anyone would be tame and laughable. Send them all to the chans!
Melanie - fingers crossed!
Heff - then when would the talking heads and pundits do? ;)
DG - Anon comments irk me, but I know who one of those guys is. I think. ;)
Lotus - Rove wins, by any means possible. That's why I provided that link.
RW - the chans are a scary, scary place. Or a laugh. Whatever one prefers.
LORD HOWDY!
lot's of long comments here. whew!
Overall, I think the democratics have a certain subtley to their communication. Layers if you will. Like an onion.
The republicans are much more bullet point type speak. There is also a swagger to the talk. People latch on to the short and swaggery.
I think this was why John Kerry didn't get further, he was too wordy and talked like a professor.
But, the comment that Obama made or didn't make got people talking about him for a change.
Change accomplished for now, eh?
:)
Mrs. Hall
Miss Piggy for Veep? makes as much sense ;)
Oink!!!
"Jesus was a community organizer, Pontius Pilate was a governor. And perhaps they should understand the role of a community organizer is to help people in distress."
That was an actually quote from the Obama Camp. Jesus was a community organizer? Pontius Pilate was a governor? Sarah Palin is going to crucify Obama? Is that what we're supposed to take out of this, because Obama is the new messiah? Jesus Christ was the first messiah. Now Obama is taking his place, he's The Messiah, he's the savior. Pontius Pilate was a governor? The only thing Pilate is remembered for is murder. We are comparing the governor of Alaska, who is only qualified, say the Democrats, because she has not had an abortion, which is murder, of murder. Pontias Pilate was a governor? They expect this to play to who? And from this bunch, that just insists on separation of church and state, and it happened on the floor of the House of Representatives yesterday.
I know that alot of people hate Bush but I just want you all to remember something.
"Among the remembrances of the dead and the recollections of seven years ago, not one more attack on American soil has occurred. Remember that."
I am going to elect someone that can keep America safe becuase that is the number one duty as President. Seeing how Obama was scared of Russia during his responce of the Russian attack on Georgia I do not think he is the man for the job.
By the way let's not forget one thing, on this, the seventh anniversary of 9/11: the Reverend Jeremiah Wright from the pulpit of his church in Chicago, saying we deserved it and 'America's chickens are coming home to roost. This coming from a person that Obama knew and shared ideas with for 20 years.
"Just last night Senator Obama finally broke and brought himself to admit what all the rest of us have known for quite some time, and that's: thanks to the skill and valor of our troops, the surge in Iraq has succeeded. Senator Obama said that the surge, quote, "succeeded beyond our wildest dreams. I think," said Senator Obama, "that the surge has succeeded in ways that nobody anticipated." I guess when you turn out to be profoundly wrong on a vital national security issue, maybe it's comforting to pretend that everyone else was wrong, too."
country first said...
'Obama was scared of Russia during his responce of the Russian attack on Georgia'
I've absolutely no wish to defend Russia but hostilities started when Georgia invaded South Ossetia and Abkhazia while the rest of the world was watching the Olympics opening, thus disturbing a truce that had kept the peace for many years. Atrocities happened.
The Russians predicatably over-reacted - instead of just booting the Georgians out of South Osseta/Abkhazia - which would have been fair enough - they kept going for punitive purposes/to take out the Georgian military. More atrocities followed.
Oh dear - it's a bit complex :-O
One thing is for sure - if the Georgians had not launched on their little adventure none of this would have happened.
Maybe the simplistic stuff doesn't help...
Who am I?
I'm under 45 years old, I love the outdoors, I hunt, I am a Republican reformer, I have taken on the Republican Party establishment, I have many children, I have a spot on the national ticket as vice president with less than two years in the governor's office. Who am I?
Teddy Roosevelt in 1900 and Sarah Palin in 2008
Teddy Roosevelt was one of our nations best presidents but Sarah Palin is just a woman and is not tough enough. Think agian.
Dear Avatible and B.E. Earl (discussing Obama on Se Ed of Kindergarten)
"But it's the right thing to do." We've got Obama saying it. He is not talking about teaching kids what there private places are. Which should be an issue and discussed between children and parents not an issue with the Government. If you had kids you would understand this. Now, there's even more on this. You want some issues? You have come to the right place.
I have a summary here of McCain's ad and of Obama's response and then I've got a news article that ran September 27, 2007, on the Fox News website after a Democrat debate. An excerpt from that article reporting on the debate says this: "A fairy tale about two princes falling in love sparked a backlash -- and a lawsuit -- against a teacher and a school last year when it was read to a second-grade class in Massachusetts. But the three front-runners in the Democratic presidential race suggested Wednesday night at their debate in New Hampshire that they'd support reading the controversial book to children as part of a school curriculum. ... Obama agreed with Edwards and revealed that his wife has already spoken to his 6- and 9-year-old daughters about same-sex marriage." This was said by Obama in a debate in New Hampshire last November that a book about two princes falling in love should be read as part of the education curriculum to school kids.
I don't want my children taught this in school.
Crazy Dan (I'm assuming that's who you are) - I'm glad you found a pulpit for you view here in the comment section of the Bug-Eyed Blog. I disagree with just about everything you say, but I guess you have the right to say it. I mean, I could just go ahead and delete everything you posted. But that wouldn't be right, would it?
Oh, and the whole point of my original post was that I don't think Obama was actually calling Palin a pig. If asked, I'm sure John McCain would agree. Sure, he used her bumper sticker ad of a pitbull with lipstick to drive home his own point about the Republicans being the party of change, but that is all.
Like I said, it's good to hear your opinions. Makes me even more sure of my own. Thanks!
One more quick note.
As for having respect for the lost on this gravest of days, I most certainly do. There was nothing in my post that was mean-spirited or vitriolic or America bashing. I was merely talking about the subject of lipstick that came up yesterday and the McCain campaign's response to it.
All that other shit came up here in the comments section. On 9/11. From you.
Sorry, one last thing.
I assumed Crazy Dan's last comments about Obama and sex education were his own. And I honestly wanted to read about this book that Obama supposedly wants taught to 6 year-olds. So I googled "a fairy tale about two princes falling in love" and the I found that those words from Crazy Dan's last comment were actually said by Rush Limbaugh. An almost word for word transcript from his radio program. Just enough changed to make it look like he said them himself, of course.
You can read the actual transcript from yesterday's Rush Limbaugh show
here, if you would like.
As for the argument itself, one of the comments Obama made in that Democratic primary debate was "One of the things I want to communicate to my children is not to be afraid of people who are different. …. One of the things I think the next president has to do is stop fanning people’s fears. If we spend all our time feeding the American people fear and conflict and division, then they become fearful and conflicted and divided.” True words. Still, I'm okay with parents who aren't happy with this being taught in school. Totally within their rights as parents. But the bill Obama sponsored had nothing to do with this. His bill was aimed at keeping pedophiles away from our kids by teaching them about what isn't appropriate. In an age appropriate way. Period.
Back to your regularly scheduled programming.
I can assure you that I never make anonymous comments. So any assumptions on that score are far off base.
Evyl - yeah, I knew it wasn't you. Sorry for the inclusion. My bad.
I am so ready for this election to be over.
Wow i'm exhausted just reading through these comments!!!
I think i shall leave it at that b.e.!
b.e. you still rock in my book and i have many books!!!
Michelle
Girly - tell me 'bout it.
Michelle - Don't you love it when the comments are longer than the post? ;)
New to your blog here...love the entertaining comments. I agree wholeheartedly with your post. You know what I object to? Some of the media calling Palin a MILF. Come on now...for who...80 year old men?
MerelyMe - not the usual content around here. The post or the comments. It was weird day, I'll tell you that. As for Palin, I'm 41 and I think she is attractive. I wouldn't say MILF because that would imply I would want to have sex with her. Which I don't.
Well I don't agree with her politics at all but I would still spank her! Then again, that voice is really starting to get annoying.
The Trailer Of Love
Wil - Tina Fey did a perfect impersonation tonight. Perfect.
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