Brand Extinction

Well, now, this is an interesting bit of ostensible synergy on energy:

In a briefing with bloggers in House Minority Leader John Boehner’s office August 5, Representative John Shadegg, R-AZ, said he would “love to have McCain come speak on the floor” as part of the protest. He said he believes inviting a senator to speak on the House floor would not violate House rules and challenged House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-CA, to stop it.

 

“Yes, I think it is something he [McCain] could do. I mean, technically, we are trying to abide by the rules of procedure for the House,” Shadegg said. “[W]e begin with a prayer, the pledge and we are speaking from the well — with one exception, we’re not taking questions from the gallery, but we are trying to accord ourselves normal decorum from the House floor.”

Sound like a no-brainer?  Ensign Ed seems to think so:

There are no down sides to a McCain campaign visit to Capitol Hill.  He’d get great press, he would underscore Democratic obstructionism on energy, he would demonstrate party unity, and he would put pressure on Obama to respond with something other than tire gauges and cuts in electricity.  Any campaign events he has to postpone couldn’t have a fraction of the impact this appearance would have, both for himself and the GOP.  Someone on Team McCain should be redirecting the jet now.

There is, however, at least one reason why Darth Queeg will not do any such thing: it might just constitute....consorting with the enemy:

Let's see: the spot not too implicitly shits on President Bush, even though Sailor has ostensibly and belatedly endorsed the Bush tax cuts and promises more to come on the corporate side.  It rattles off a litany of legislative atrocities that any Democrat would be proud of, including aping Obama's and Nancy Pelosi's demonization of "Big Oil," despite McCain calling for drilling on the OCR and in the nation's interior.  And what can possibly explain the timing?  When Obama is apparently sagging in the polls, reeling from another race-baiting backfire, making a complete ass of himself touting tire inflation as national energy salvation, proving over and over and over again that he is NOT "ready to lead," Maverick chooses NOW to remind everybody, including the estranged Republican base he's been painstakingly reeling back in, that he's, well, a "maverick" who is just like Barack Obama after all?  Is this senility or has John Sith McCain lost his mind?

Former Clintonoid mastermind Dick Morris wonders why McCain has been "pulling his punches," and believes that now is the time for the Arizona senior senator to seize control of the campaign by ratcheting his media offensive up to DefCon-1 with a focus on foreign policy and taxes, and how Obama is going to get us all killed in the former via his proclaimed appeasement-at-all-costs policy and plunge us into an indefinite economic depression via the latter.  These, along with energy, ARE areas of acute BO vulnerability, where the public SHOULD fear his election, and the RINO nominee should go for those jugulars without delay and with everything he's got.

Needless to say, the "original maverick" spot stomps that advice squarely in the nuts.  But Team Sith has released another ad that makes a tentative swipe in that direction:

VERY tentative.  How about some detail on the "higher taxes" and "more government spending," Lord Queeg?  It's not like his "Emergency Economic Plan," just for starters, hasn't been taken apart in the five days since he unveiled it.  Thirty seconds isn't too long to throw in some numbers, explain which taxes he wants to raise and by how much, and which spending he wants to jack up, and by how much.  If you're pressed for space, you can take those damned windmills out of the spot.  I doubt the people whose votes you need the most will miss 'em all that much.

But those aren't the voters he's looking for.  If "Original Maverick" communicates anything to me, it is that he thinks the Right is sufficiently terrified of an Obama presidency that he can resume taking conservatives for granted and spend the remaining three months of the campaign fighting it out with Lucifer for the hearts and...well, the hearts, anyway, since they sold their souls long ago - of the Democrat core.

If that becomes McCain's new direction, and he follows that up with a Lieberman or one of his RINO cronies as his running mate, expect his unexpected competitiveness with the Chicago Cherubim to rapidly become a thing of the past.