Carroll County Times: Shedding light on candidate myths by Ann McFeathers

Carroll County Times: Shedding light on candidate myths by Ann McFeathers

Shedding light on candidate myths

By Ann McFeatters, White House Watch

Tuesday, September 09, 2008

ST. PAUL, Minn.

So, it's up to us, folks

The balloons are popped, the fireworks are spent, grand acceptance speeches have been made. The elaborate Hollywood-type sets have been struck, the flags and strange hats are packed away, the country music CDs silenced. The conventions are over.

As good citizens who want to make our votes count, we must sort through the verbiage, spin, disinformation, wild promises, clever attacks, innuendo, sexism, racism, classism and religiosity to pick the next president and vice president on the basis of substance, critical issues, vision, quality of experience and gut instinct.

This will not be easy.

Because of the unpopular war in Iraq and the weak economy, both blamed on President Bush, Barack Obama should be ahead in the polls. He's not. Statistically, he and John McCain start the general election campaign about even.

No astute person denies that Democrats will gain House and Senate seats, but it's impossible to say whether McCain or Obama will win. Flat predictions are based on emotion, gut feelings or wishful thinking. Swing voters are still deciding.

This is my scorecard of the smokescreens and false arguments we should avoid from both parties:

Read the rest of her column here: Shedding light on candidate myths

Scripps Howard New Service columnist Ann McFeatters has covered every national political convention since 1976. E-mail her at amcfeatters@ nationalpress.com.

http://www.carrollcountytimes.com/articles/2008/09/09/news/opinion/opinion/opinion514.txt

20080909 Shedding light on candidate myths by Ann McFeathers