Hi Folks,

Just in case you didn’t see today’s Meet the Press, I wanted to let you know about yet another example of mainstream media being lazy and perpetuating the often unwarranted image of McCain as a maverick. Here’s the note I sent to NBC which will likely be ignored:

Hello,
On your 6/29 Meet the Press broadcast, Mr. Brokaw and Mr. Todd were rightfully commenting on Sen. Obama's 'flip-flop' regarding campaign finance and his choice to opt-out of public funds for his campaign. My question is why didn't we hear a more balanced view of Sen. McCain's positions on the flip-flop topic? Mr. Todd was right on point stating that McCain should exploit the Obama flip-flop, but then he went on to highlight McCain's reputation as a candidate who stands up for his beliefs and bucks his party. How can a quality news show miss the follow up on the big issues McCain has clearly flip-flopped on such as the Bush tax cuts (he had opposed them since 2003 and now is a strong supporter of them), torture (he spoke out firmly and often about our need to clearly define our policy to conform with the Geneva commitments we signed and then voted with the Republicans months ago to support the CIA torture loophole), and just a few days ago, McCain pledged his support for offshore US drilling in direct contrast to his previously stated positions.
Sen. Obama deserved to be called out for his finance flip-flop, and Sen. McCain has displayed some maverick, party bucking behavior during his career, though he has voted along party lines about 90% of the time during the Bush presidency and these flip-flops truly should not have gone without comment in your discussion today.

Mike Tierney
Portland, OR

Phone on - phone off, same message either way.

They didn't miss anything.

Wiber ~ Just what we don't need "Old Johnny White Log" . . .

It really doesn't matter if John McCain knows how to use a cell phone or blackberry or even a computer. It also doesn't matter that Barack Obama is comfortable using all three. He does many things well. What really matters is that almost all of the votes now cast in our nation's elections are electronically (secretly) counted and tabulated by one of four major election systems, all of which are owned and operated by outspoken, actively partisan Republicans, with the possible exception of Sequoia, whose current ownership is a national mystery. We are all told that we must "TRUST" the accuracy of the election results provided to the media. I don't want "faith based election results. I want verifiable results." In some parts of the world today, the party in control just murders members of the opposition to prevent them from voting. In the U.S., the party in control of the voting systems is much more civilized. They just remove names from voter registration lists or just make sure that precincts with large numbers of members of the opposition party have too few voting machines or machines that don't work on election day.

It doesn't really matter if John McCain knows what he is doing with his cell phone. What matters is that the conservative Republicans who own and operate the voting systems that secretly, electronically tabulate our votes, do know what they are doing.

They will let us know the election results that they come up with in November, and because those results will include a large number of unverifiable votes, we will just have to trust that they got it right. This presidential election isn't going to be determined by McCain or Obama. It is going to be determined by Diebold, ES&S, Hart InterCivic, and Sequoia election systems,unless congress can muster veto proof numbers to pass urgently needed legislation that will guarantee a transparent and auditable election. My fear is that timely election reform is as likely as news that McCain has mastered use of his blackberry. My hope is that I'm wrong.