AndrewKrause

It’s been a while since I’ve sat down and spilled some thoughts. The latest news is that I’ve bought a house - my first foray into home ownership. Thus, any spare time I’ve had has involved me, tools and the house. I’m loving it.

That’s not to say I stopped having opinions. First… I’m driven by principal to point out the obvious: Bush is right. The way to make oil economical again is to exploit our own natural resources. The proof of this is in the pudding. Bush rescinded the ban on offshore drilling his father put in place nearly two decades ago, and the market reacted. Oil futures have plunged nearly $25 in the last week, even though a congressional ban on offshore drilling remains in effect! This first salvo in the energy war, fired by the Bush administration, has had more impact on the price-at-the-pump than years of rhetoric from Congress and the left. If the Democrats in Congress end their blockade against American oil, allow offshore drilling and safe exploration in ANWR, we could very well see the days of $2.00/gallon gasoline again.

Then there’s Obama. Just as a side note, I had a conversation with a Democrat friend of mine, and she inadvertently confused “Osama” and “Obama”. How’s that for a name recognition problem. And in spite of the patently obvious infatuation of the liberal media (and conservative media) with Barrack Hussein Obama, the empty calories of his message are starting to leave people hungry for something else. It has not gone unnoticed that he is campaigning for President in ever foreign country that has been an issue for the last 8 years, which ought to be a slap in the face to the American voters whom he should be pandering to. It is starting to catch up to him that - without awesome speech writers and sufficient rehearsal, this man should not be allowed near a camera or tape recorder. His stuttering buffoonery when the teleprompter goes dark or he goes off script makes Dubya look like a high caliber orator. His shifting, floundering, flip-flopping policy statements are leaving his own supporters confused as to who they’re supporting. His statements ahead of his Iraq visit this last week may very well have cost him the good will of the anti-war crowd who were already badly burned by Pelosi/Feinstein/Schumer’s retreat from retreating from Iraq. And the blue-collar vote that he worked hard to get back after his “clinging to religion and guns” comment was effectively lost this week when he passed up visiting injured troops in German in favor of a Berlin shopping trip. Guys, the Obama express is about to run out of steam and fall off the track in a derailment more spectacular than Hillary.

Which is good for McCain, because right now he has all the gravitas of a salted slug. It’s not that he’s doesn’t have an effective campaign, the problem is that he’s not being an effective personality at the head of that campaign. The job of your camp’ is to energize your base, rally support and win votes. Your job as the candidate at the head of that campaign is to draw attention to yourself. McCain’s nice-guy, get along with the opponant strategy is failing miserably. By the time McCain took the gloves off, the media decided there was no story there. If we learned anything from Edward’s slide into anonymity during the Democratic primaries, it’s that you don’t say anything nice about your opponants, and you don’t agree with them. You don’t want to be disagreeable, but you have to disagree to be seen as an alternative.