"Quite true, friend." :D

Dear Ace,

Please actually do some research on the candidates. Joe Biden does not fly home every day, sipping on champagne, eating filet mignon. As stated above, he gets on the cheap train, and rides it from DC to Wilmington, DE every day.

Guess his net worth.

$250,000,000? Bzzt. That's Mitt.

$25,000,000? Bzzt. That's 7 house McCain

$100,000,000? Bzzt. That's outdoorsman Sarah Palin.

$100,000 ding ding ding! Get your stereotypes out of your shed, Ace. Some people sit on their asses in Alaska, and democrats don't sleep on money matresses collected from the masses.

Vote for who you want, but at least be informed.

In fact, Biden had the lowest average net worth in the Senate (from 2006 figures, ranked 108th, which included incoming and outgoing Senators that year, which explains why more than 100).

Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del) - 2006 | OpenSecrets

http://www.opensecrets.org/pfds/weal...?cid=N00001669

McCain has the eighth highest.

John McCain (R-Ariz) - 2006 | OpenSecrets

http://www.opensecrets.org/pfds/weal...?cid=N00006424

but none of these facts will stop the right from making biden into an aspect of the Persecuting Other.
and the fashioning of the Persecuting Other will be central to such success as the right has over the coming months.
watch how they do it.
see if it works.

sheesh?

And here you ask us to consider whether and how THIS idiocy is rubbing off.

Sheesh indeed.

otto--i suppose i should have cross-referenced that last post with the other thread i put up last night which centers on statements from mc-cain's campaign manager concerning the distinction between this campaign and issues/contents....forgot. look there, you'll understand.

Not to return to the topic or anything, but...

I had another thought about this last night, and it was a thought about hypocrisy.

See, right wing social conservatives like Palin REALLY want to tell me how to live my life. If Vice President Palin had her way, birth control would be off limits. God help me if I wanted an abortion--that would be a criminal offense and I'd be locked up for murder. She wants to put her cute little button nose deeeeep inside my personal business and make sure I'm living my life consistent with her values. Nothing about MY life is personal, as far as her policy is concerned. But the minute it's about HER life and HER family, well NOW it's personal and off-limits and I'm a political schemer and general bad person for pointing it out.

My heart goes out to Bristol Palin, honestly it does. I've known pregnant 17-year-olds, and while I can't say I know what she's going through, I've at least been with others while they went through it, and it's a major blessing that she's got the love and support of her family (because it's not always that way). But to say that turn-around is somehow not fair play when it comes to reproductive policy is the very definition of disingenuous.

If you haven't noticed dictating how we live our lives comes from BOTH sides.

Come on, now you're just tagging the thread. If you have something to say, say it, don't just make announcements.

I answered in length at this thread:

http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/tilted-...ml#post2517695

I was going to post in the above reply but did not want to hijack this thread by changing the subject.

We have a winner, but you're too narrow-scoped. It's the whole damned neoconservative branch of the Republican Party (which seems to be 80-90% of the current elected officials).

Remember folks, this is the party who's vice president slammed a fictional Murphy Brown for having a fictional baby out of fictional wedlock on a TV show. They've established for decades now that they are the party of family values. Single parents, children out of wedlock, sex before marriage, all morally reprehensible and all anathema to Republican Party values.

Now they want us to elect a vice president who raised her kid to be, according to them, morally reprehensible?

I ain't buyin'.

I'm not sure I agree, but even if I did, it wouldn't change my observation of the hypocrisy of having THIS personal private matter be personal and private when MINE aren't.

I agree with some of the posts previously put up. If your family's behavior or structure blantantly flies in the face of your stated policies, then some inquiry on those subjects is appropriate. If the Republicans don't think that some evangelicals are shitting themselves over this latest information, they're nuts. Sure, the policy guys in MN might be spinning it as pro-family values YAY!...but every one of them I know in real life thinks it looks really bad for Palin, in light of their shared position on abstenance-only education. I just wish that the level of discussion and inquiry into the matter was of a more intellectual bent, and less salacious. Ask a question about the policy Palin supports, and how she reconciles her daughter's situation to that policy.

In that sense, no I don't think a candidate's family will ever be, or should be off-limits. The type of questions / scrutiny applied is another issue.

QFT

Ok, got it, thanks. I'm not really up on my internet speak so I am unfamiliar with many acronyms.

You actually think Biden's real net worth is $100,000? O.k., it is possible, I read the book "Die Broke" about 10 years ago and the author discussed many strategies on how to control wealth and be "broke".

I exaggerated and no factual basis regarding my comment about Biden and the private plane, I now understand that he takes a train home and is a "regular" guy.
-----Added 4/9/2008 at 11 : 37 : 42-----
Who was #1? John Kerry.
Who was #3? Edward Kennedy
Who was #9? Hilary Clinton

After those three I got bored, but what was your point? Perhaps that Biden and Obama both have problems with saving, investing, living within their means, and generating wealth for their families. Is that it?

{added} O.k., I just looked up Bidden on the Open Secrets Website for 2006. I cut this from the page:

First if his net worth is negative after being in the senate since 1972, am I the only one who whould have a problem with that?
Second, how many Senators do we have?

ace, on behalf of the universe, I officially apologize for the existence of facts that are inconsistent with your world-view. I know, it's very rude.

I don't get it. On one hand I was corrected and I acknowledged my error and my inappropriate comment. On the other hand I questioned information I find hard to believe, but then if true I find the data points to perhaps another concern.

Ace, there are 2 senators for every state. If you look carefully at the table on the page you cite, Open Secrets Net Worth ranking of senators, 2006, Biden is ranked 108 because many senators are tied for 99th position, etc.

Also, if you read the methodology explanation at the top of the page, ... it explains that they included assets and liabilities in their calculations. While I am not up to par on the details of Biden's finances (it could also include debts, such as a mortgage, etc), I think it is clear that he is far from being one of the wealthiest senators out there, at least as of 2 years ago. For me, excessive wealth is more of a problem than the other extreme... and given your earlier criticism of Biden as riding around in jets and living the privileged life (and I appreciate your admitting that you were wrong about that, btw)--I would think you'd agree with me, and not see his low net worth as a problem.
-----Added 4/9/2008 at 12 : 35 : 39-----
rat... c'mon, is that necessary?
-----Added 4/9/2008 at 02 : 04 : 03-----
And here I stand corrected as well...

Well, I have to say that while I'll buy that Joe Biden may not be Pimp-Daddy Mega-millionaire, I have a real hard time believing his net worth is only $100,000. That just seems really hard to swallow to me. It's possible...but I'm smelling tax-shelters and/or S-Corps...something. No, I didn't look it up, and no I don't have time to look it up. I realize this isn't a PUB discussion, so maybe I should look it up, and I'd love to have time to look it up - maybe I'll make time before November. Just chiming in. Regardless, on the OP - I stand by my earlier statement.

Are families of Candidates fair game? They shouldn't be (and I echo Fresnelly's comments from Canada) BUT when the Candidate hauls their kids out to photo op after photo op I have to wonder if the Candidates think they can have their cake and eat it too? If you want to hold yourself up as a paragon of "traditional family" you had better be ready to have your family scrutinized.

Don't want your family in the spotlight? Don't offer them up on a platter.

Family is fair game when the application of the politician's professed policies landed their family members in a predicament. A politician who advocated Abstinence only education yet has a pregnant teenage daughter, to pick a random example, has opened herself up to totally justified criticism. In cases like that the family member's troubles call into question the politician's judgment and sincerity.

Or to pick another one, a politician who crusades against drunk driving, but whose wife is arrested driving drunk after blowing, say, a 1.2, should expect to be crucified, because he's a hypocrite if her helps get her off, a heartless bastard if he doesn't, and pandering if he packs her off to rehab.

Politicians with handicapped children who try to cut funds to handicapped children should expect their children to be discussed.

Politicians who have adopted children not o their race should be able to call those kids off limits, unless they hire the same advisers who dragged their child into the last election to defeat the candidate with a race baiting push poll.

Homophobe politicians' homosexual children are never off limits.

Gun crusaders on either side who have relatives involved in gun crimes or on the receiving end of gun violence should expect them to be dragged out for cross examination.

The less successful family members of those who tout the success of their family members are fair game.

In short, the family is off limits unless the politician brings them into it. They all do sooner or later.