Want to See A Stark Raving Mad Guy Give a Speech
ArchPundit
If it isn’t a campaign event, it’ll run you $15,000. No word on whether there are royalties for his used napkins.
Illinois Senate
The Economist Chimes In
Unfortunately, the Economist saved its biting humor, but offer up a serious indictment of the whole farce:
To make matters even worse for the Republicans, Mr Keyes’s numerous defects as a candidate are only magnified by the comparison with Mr Obama. Mr Obama has spent almost 20 years in Illinois?seven as a state senator?and is married to a woman from the South Side of Chicago. He won an impressive 53% of the Democratic primary vote against six strong opponents. He is optimistic where Mr Keyes preaches Sodom and Gomorrah, and moderate where Mr Keyes is intemperate. He is also a rising national star, with unrivalled support from the national party, while Mr Keyes is a serial failure.
The Republicans’ fatal mistake was to think that the best way to counter a black man was with another black man. The point about Mr Obama?as the Republicans might have realised if they had paid greater attention to his speech in Boston?is that he is a post-racial candidate. Mr Obama is the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas who was brought up by his white mother and grandparents in Hawaii and South-East Asia. He appeals just as strongly to white suburban voters as he does to blacks.
He Writes Songs
?I touch the world with hands too weak, frail as the words that I speak. I hear the sounds, dragging with pain?Nothing to gain, nothing to lose, why should I bother to choose? Mind cannot know, lips shake to spare, but when I sing with my heart you are there..?.-Alan Keyes in a self-written song, ?You Are There?
Assignment Desk: Get me this tape
He went on the Tonight Show and sang. While Bill Clinton played the sax in 1992, and John Kerry played the guitar this campaign season, those were merely cases of showing off. When Keyes went on the Tonight Show, he sang a song he wrote, expressing his own heart about issues of justice and truth. Few political leaders would make themselves so vulnerable in that venue.
The Wasted Line
Of this farce, should be picked up by Dems everywhere:
Obama said he would debate Keyes on issues of private morality, such as abortion and gay marriage, as long as they also debated issues of public morality, like Enron and companies shifting jobs overseas.
Jackson Taunts the Republicans
“He represents the party that recruited him,” Jackson told a conference call Thursday. “There are two parties and two candidates. Let’s see which party is the most committed to supporting their guy.”
Jackson said Bush challenged black Democrats to leverage their vote by supporting Republicans when he addressed the National Urban League in Detroit. He said the president now has the opportunity to campaign for a black Republican in Illinois.
“Mr. Keyes should be the standard-bearer for the Republican Party,” he said. “It’s a great opportunity for Republicans to show their commitment to expanding their base and competing for the vote.”
Calling Karl!
Wow II–First I Thought Jeff Was Just Ranting
But he has a very good point about the Resolution to Fill a Vacancy in Nomination form. It is signed on notarized on August 4th which isn’t too surprising given the Committee and Keyes pretty much were using the time for a press work up, but the address is filled in. Errr….how did that happen? If he was not officially living there this is a real problem.
My Republican Uncle In McLean Just Choked
How is gay marriage a threat to traditional marriage? No procreation- if you can’t “in principle” procreate you can’t get married. He carves it in such a way that infertile people can still get married- that’s “incidental”.
He and my aunt have been married for nearly 35 years and chose not to have kids for a variety of reasons. My uncle was already voting against Lee Newcom in McLean County and I think we can add the Senate race to it too. I may post his reaction when I talk to him over the weekend.
More Thompson
Thompson isn’t quite ready to jump ship, but I think we’ll be seeing it happen in few weeks.
Former Gov. James R. Thompson refused to endorse Republican U.S. Senate nominee Alan Keyes on Wednesday, saying some of Keyes’ stands on the issues made him “uncomfortable.”
“I’d be inclined to vote Republican,” Thompson said. “His views are very conservative. Some of his positions would make me uncomfortable as a voter. I’m willing to give him a chance to tell the people of Illinois what his views are. I have not endorsed him.”
I personally don’t care much about the carpetbagging, though I find it funny Keyes’ view of it. My view is voters can sort that out.
Illinois Times on Keyes
The campaign is going to go through several cycles. The first was the announcement and general background of Keyes with some of the questions any candidate would face including the debt and tax issues. Next would come a flurry of attacks at Obama. Then the press will right itself and get back to exploring the typical issues one would face including the tax and debt issues, but then moving on to Keyes’ record since he hasn’t been vetted.
You can expect the tax and debt stuff over the next few days, but John K. Wilson at the Illinois Times got a jump on the vetting by going through Keyes history.
Pat Robertson anyone?
is rhetoric on the subject has been fairly strident. In a May 7 speech in Provo, Utah, Keyes said the 9/11 attacks, which killed nearly 3,200 people, were a message from God to oppose abortion: “I think that’s a way of Providence telling us, ‘I love you all; I’d like to give you a chance. Wake up! Would you please wake up?'”
More on abortion:
In 2002, Keyes argued that the abortion issue should determine the outcome of every election. “This issue alone, which I believe dominates our moral decline as a people, should decide this and every election cycle,” he said. During a campaign appearance in Bedford, N.H., in 2000, Keyes asked a class of fifth-graders, most of whom were 10 years old, “If I were to lose my mind right now and pick one of you up and dash your head against the floor and kill you, would that be right?” He then went on to tell the children that some courts and politicians think it’s OK to murder 6-month-old children.
Keyes has an apocalyptic view of America’s future unless it repents: “I do stay up at night thinking about what’s going to happen to America. I do stay up at night with a vision of our people in conflict, of our cities in flames, of our economy in ruins.”
He might have a future in post-apocalyptic movies. Maybe the Van Impe’s will bankroll him.
Beam Me Up Scottie!
A fan of J.R.R. Tolkien (The Lord of the Rings) and a Trekkie, he plays classical guitar and even considered a career as an opera singer.
Most amusing is perhaps Keyes use of the race card. The article goes through several examples, but the summation is:
As Kevin Merida noted in the Washington Post in 2000, “How do you explain a black man who regularly uses slavery metaphors to make his points and yet complains he has been racially typecast?”
A bunch more of fun stuff.
Update: Fixed John’s name.
Big Jim’s Avoidance
Nice Dodge–can you use that line up until November 1st?
Thompson told reporters today that he thinks it’s sad that the party could not find someone from Illinois because there were a number of people who were willing to do so.
The popular former governor also says he has not endorsed Keyes or agreed to campaign for him because he does not know enough about his positions.
I think the theme of the Republicans this year is “unfortunate”