don't worry barry will join the 20% approval club soon enough. Having taken the heat from the left for eight long years and even a good portion of his own party (which he did earn in his second term with RINO tendencies he start to show), show how to stay motivated should be easy for him. I expect Barry to hang himself due to all the hurtful remarks that the left can dish out, but can't take it. He and his cronies attacks on their critics show a high level mentality level.
Bush sr known and credited for starting the dirty, mud slinging campaigns we have today..
You may want to read up on your history a bit. Mudslinging has gone on in every presidential election that has ever taken place in this country. I would say Nixon was perhaps the worst of the bunch.
Bush sr took it to whole new level... Check into it.. I even remember it mentioned on the history channel awhile back lol
"Bush, occasionally criticized for his lack of eloquence when compared to Reagan,[21] delivered a well-received speech at the 1988 Republican National Convention.[34] Known as the "thousand points of light" speech, this described Bush's vision of America: he endorsed the Pledge of Allegiance, prayer in schools, capital punishment, gun rights, and his opposition to abortion.[34] The speech at the convention included Bush's famous pledge: "Read my lips: no new taxes".[35]
The 1988 presidential electoral votes by stateThe general election campaign between the two men has been described as one of the nastiest in modern times.[35] Bush blamed Dukakis for polluting the Boston Harbor as the Massachusetts governor.[12] Bush also pointed out that Dukakis was opposed to the law that would require all students to say the Pledge of Allegiance,[11] a topic well covered in Bush's nomination acceptance speech.[34]
Dukakis's unconditional opposition to capital punishment led to a pointed question during the presidential debates. Moderator Bernard Shaw asked Dukakis hypothetically if Dukakis would support the death penalty if his wife, Kitty, were raped and murdered.[36] Dukakis's response of no, as well as the Willie Horton ad, contributed toward Bush's characterization of him as "soft on crime."[12]
Sounds pretty low to me.
It wasn't Bush Sr. It was going on LONG, LONG before that. If you want to blame someone, blame the pollsters, because they basically showed that with a good negative ad, all the money spent previously on saying positive things about yourself got pissed away.
I think what you did see with the 1988 campaign was a LOT more ad time being purchased, and a target rich environment.
I wasn't denying that Bush Sr was hard on his opponent, my comment was refuting the statement that he was "credited for starting the dirty, mud slinging campaigns we have today" because that just isn't true. Nixon had a paid staff just to employ his dirty politics. It goes way back even further as well. Jefferson handed out pamphlets filled with incriminating or embarrassing information about his political opponents. It is nothing new and certainly not attributable to Bush Sr.
And I was no fan of Bush Sr.
neither was I, but dirty politics have been around for thousands of years and since the early years of our own elections.
Dont argue with me, just read about it.. *shrugs* i'm to lazy to look up the facts for ya like normal right now :)
He was, read a few political history books on the subject. lol
:edit: maybe i should say modern mudslinging so people dont try to bring up things from the 1800's lol *eye roll*
http://www.google.com/archivesearch?hl=en&safe=off&rls=com.microsoft:en-us:IE-Address&rlz=1I7RNWN_en&q=political history created mudslinger&um=1&ie=UTF-8&scoring=t&ei=eaDnSsuFFJKEMrH8pa4I&sa=X&oi=timeline_result&ct=title&resnum=11&ved=0CCAQ5wIwCg
Notice that huge jump in the 80's...
In "Mudslingers: The Twenty-Five Dirtiest Political Campaigns of All Time" Bush rated in the top 3, next to some election in the 1800's and George Wallace.
That huge jump couldn't have anything to do with the huge proliferation of news reporting, could it? Nor the increase in the 90s and 2000s due to the rise of the internet, then the rise of the blogging reporters? Seriously, even modern mudslinging is merely the current implementation of attacks that go back to at least the Roman Empire and probably much earlier. To blame them on any current politician is insanity laid bare.
So.. There was a huge spike in journalism in the 80's? 90's and 00 would be a better chance on the net, but i would think a door opened and people took advantage.. In the end though, i am speaking from political scientists (could be massive liberal conspiracy right?) and articles they have done.. Blame them, not me.
So.. There was a huge spike in journalism in the 80's?
Actually, I think it was the 70s when it started, because of the increase in embedded reporters in Vietnam (this was a bit before my time, but I remember hearing how the increased news reporting led for a push to end that war). It would also probably be better to phrase it as an increase of TV journalism penetration into the common American household.
...but i would think a door opened and people took advantage.
You definitely wouldn't hear any disagreement from me on that point.
In the end though, i am speaking from political scientists (could be massive liberal conspiracy right?) and articles they have done.. Blame them, not me.
But you are repeating the articles, claiming them as fact with no supporting evidence to back up your claims, so you bear some responsibility for those actions at a minimum.
This is perfect... he can get on stage and simply say, "Hey. Things are looking up! I'm not in office anymore!" and people will give a standing-O!
fOx
There are plenty of people willing to pay to hear him speak. 
Z3 is totally correct. Bush 41 waged a very tough, and nearly real-issue free campaign, but it was far from outside the norm for presidential campaigns. He is also correct that Nixon was the modern extreme in this category with a shadowy group of dirty trickers who were known by the charming hardball-politics nickname, "Ratfuckers." (You can look this up in Woodward and Bernstein's "All The President's Men", which while controversial in its day, has been vindicated to be very accurate)
The dirty tricks they used were morally repugnant, but effective. A common one was to steal leaderhead stationary paper from the office of a dem candidate, then write a smear letter accusing a different democrat of all kinds of scandalous behavior, marital infidelity or even homosexuality. They would then sit back and watch the fun as the two totally innocent campaign operations went crazy over each other.
By the way, one of the head guys at FOX NEWS was one of those guys.
I don't want to beat up on Dubya now that he is out of office. Most MVers know what I think of his performance as president anyway, but I don't understand his new role as a motivational speaker. This sounds like a rather lame SNL skit idea rather than something in the real world.
So I will ignore this development and just go back to being happy that some of our international prominence and some of the US economy has survived his two terms in office.
I don't want to beat up on Dubya now that he is out of office.
AAAAHHHHHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA takes breath AAAHHHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH
Look, the guy pissed me off with his nearly incoherent speech, his Herbert Hoover economics, and his backward views on nearly everything, but now that he is just a private citizen, I don't have much interest in him anymore.
My beef now is with the revisionists who are insisting that the things he did in office never happened and that instead some other, different stuff was going on. Beacons of freedom and democracy, that sort of thing, rather than the unnecessary war and the torture and the illegal wiretapping, etc.
I just hope that The New Guy can do better.
I just hope that The New Guy can do better.
Ain't lookin' so good.
Look how the revisionists have painted Clinton dirty politics as being a good o' boy.
And Gramps before you say that Clinton was not that bad .. you should read the book Sell Out written by a staunch democrat (Shippers) who was the chief investigative counsel for the Clinton impeachment.
It does not paint a very nice picture of American politics .. and no it is not just about Clinton it is how the Repubs sold out as well to keep the establishment going .. that same establishment is as strong as it ever was today. I got the book from the library and read it not to long ago.
Sell Out
Maude_Lynne
Along with General Colin and Dr. Robert... LOL