A few words about John McCain’s concession speech Tuesday night: classy, touching, pitch-perfect, and just what you’d expect from the honorable senator (if not the angry candidate he sometimes appeared to be). McCain’s closing words bear repeating: “I wish godspeed to the man who was my former opponent and will be my president. And I call on all Americans, as I have often in this campaign, to not despair of our present difficulties, but to believe, always, in the promise and greatness of America, because nothing is inevitable here. Americans never quit. We never surrender. We never hide from history. We make history.”
Rep. Nancy Boyda (in photo), D-Topeka, shouldn’t have told the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee last summer to “get the heck out of my race.” Boyda was unseated Tuesday by state Treasurer Lynn Jenkins, whose credentials as a certified public accountant may have fit the times in voters’ minds. The Kansas 2nd Congressional District race was a rare bright spot for the GOP, one of only four House districts in the nation in which Republicans ousted first-term Democrats. But Boyda’s loss will allow Gov. Kathleen Sebelius to appoint a Democrat to fill out the two years of Jenkins’ term as state treasurer.
One question hanging over the election, and seeming more pressing with every economic report, is what would possess anyone to want to be president this year. George W. Bush took over when the economy was hale, the budget had a surplus, and the nation was at peace. Now, as NBC’s Tom Brokaw put it this week, a “line that’s been going around is that the candidate who wins is going to wake up and demand a recount.”
This is why they called it the YouTube election. Obama Girl, Iraq veteran Joe Cook, Sarah Silverman, Paris Hilton and a McCain-Obama dance-off rated places among Politico’s “10 most viral videos of the campaign.”
President Bush is far smarter, more articulate and less ideological than his plentiful detractors scream, and, ultimately, he will be judged by history. Bush is a man for whom the long-term success or failure of democracy in Iraq will determine his place in history. He may end up a victim of his own tough choices, but the cheerleading for his demise when Iraq’s outcome is yet determined has hurt America and possibly set up the next president for the same appalling partisan response. The fact that the United States has not been attacked since Sept. 11, 2001, far exceeds the most wishful expert predictions of the time. I don’t think Albert Einstein could have devised an equation to guide the leader of the free world during the wildly tumultuous post-9/11 realities without a modicum of help from the opposition party and the vast majority of the print and electronic media. – Andrew Breitbart, Washington Times
If this contest proves anything, it’s that the electorate is sick of George W. Bush and eager for someone very different. They might even prefer the candidate they elected in 2000. The one who promised to be “a uniter, not a divider.” Who said he would “call for responsibility and try to live it as well.” Who said the United States should be “a humble nation.” Who faulted Al Gore for plotting to enlarge the government. That candidate soon became famous for exploiting divisions, refusing to hold himself or his subordinates accountable, letting expenditures soar and making America synonymous with arrogance in much of the world. Whatever Americans hoped Bush would provide, it’s safe to say that an open-ended war, an assault on the Constitution and an economic panic were not among them. – Steve Chapman, Chicago Tribune
A few words about John McCain’s concession speech Tuesday night: classy, touching, pitch-perfect, and just what you’d expect from the honorable senator (if not the angry candidate he sometimes appeared to be). McCain’s closing words bear repeating: “I wish godspeed to the man who was my former opponent and will be my president. And I call on all Americans, as I have often in this campaign, to not despair of our present difficulties, but to believe, always, in the promise and greatness of America, because nothing is inevitable here. Americans never quit. We never surrender. We never hide from history. We make history.”
