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blue bits. red rocks.
Monday 15 September 2008

McCain’s plans have been the most nutzoid right-wing proposals: end employer-paid health care, permanent bases in Iraq, tax cuts for the rich, and head-in-the-sand about energy. They’re big juicy targets. But so far, Obama has been incompetent about going after them. Whenever his ads begin talking about issues, they suddenly switch into policy-wonk mode and begin using so many long words that even I don’t understand what he’s going on about. And when they criticize John McCain they just seem like they’re making stuff up. To win, Obama’s ads will have to make the issues sexy — he’ll have to find a way to make talking about policy entertaining. Crazy as that sounds, it isn’t impossible. There’s real substance to these policy disagreements — they’re genuinely interesting. John McCain, for example, thinks the big problem with health care in America is that people have too much of it. Employers buy health care in bulk for all their workers, whether they need it or not. Instead, he thinks each American should pay for health care on their own. That’s crazy, but it’s substantive crazy. Aaron Swartz

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