Pigs, Plagiarism, and Pollsters

The media and the internet are in an uproar over Barack Obama's "lipstick on a pig" statement yesterday:



The Right says it's a slam on Sarah Palin, after her Hockey Mom joke mentioned lipstick (about 3:30 into this video):



(HT: Flopping Aces, via Sparks from the Anvil for both videos)

The Left says, no, Obama was talking about McCain's policies. I kinda think they're both right. It's a campaign, for Pete's sake! Both sides are going to slam the other, and the slammee will cry, "Foul!" and the slammers will say, "We didn't mean it that way," ad novemberum.

But there's an interesting side note, over at Confederate Yankee, that Obama may have plagiarized an editorial cartoon in his remarks right before "lipstick on a pig."

Obama has already been accused of stealing lines from Deval Patrick, Mario Coumo, and Cesar Chavez, and chose a Vice Presidential candidate with his own history of oratory theft. If Barack Obama once again appropriated someone else's words, he is going to have some trouble finding credible people to explain it away this time.

Plagiarism is bad, but I'm willing to cut him some slack on this one, because it could possibly be a serious case of Group Think in the Left-wing bubble. Of course, that doesn't excuse Biden's past plagiarism and doesn't speak well of Obama's judgment in choosing a serial plagiarist to be his running mate.

But the real point in the election is not the slams and the offended howls. It's the issues. And that was brought home to me last night by a phone call I got.

A man called me and said he was polling for some non-partisan group that I didn't think to write down. He focused on the state (California) and spent about 15 minutes asking me various questions. Did I think Arnold was doing a good job as Governor? No. Did I think the legislature was doing a good job? WAY No. What did I think was the most important issue for the state? Getting more energy, like allowing drilling and building more nuclear power plants. (He had to go find that one to mark it off for me.)

Then the talk turned to the national stage.

Did I approve or disapprove of the job the following people are doing (he didn't allow me to select "mildly approve" or "strongly approve," just "approve"):

President Bush? Approve (mildly).
Congress? Disapprove.
Nancy Pelosi? Disapprove.
Dianne Feinstein? Disapprove.
Barbara Boxer? Disapprove (strongly).
My Representative (Darrell Issa)? Approve.

Who did I think will do a better job of handling these issues, McCain or Obama:

The economy? McCain.
The War in Iraq (I can't remember the exact words he used for this)? McCain.
Education? McCain.
Health care? McCain.
Immigration? Umm... McCain is slightly less bad than Obama, so I pick McCain.
Abortion? McCain.
Foreign policy? McCain.

There were more issues than I can remember right now, and for each one my answer was, "McCain." At the end, the pollster asked if I'd be willing to be interviewed by a reporter about my answers. I gulped and said yes. We'll see if anything happens...

When it comes down to it--pigs with lips and hens with teeth aside--McCain may not be great for our country, but he's far, far better than Obama would be, and that's the only question that needs answering.