McCain Town Hall

[nativetexan]

So I went to the McCain townhall here in New Jersey yesterday. It was interesting to say the least. I liked the platform he set up to have the audience randomly ask questions. Though not the best speaker, he said a few things that kind of opened my eyes to my own mentality. The one thing he touched on was bipartisanship in order to get things done. At first I was kind of skeptical, and still am a little because of his history, but we can only believe what he says until the action comes later. He took plenty of shots at Obama, especially at the fact he wouldn't join him in the townhall platform.

He did make the comment: I would rather lose an election, than lose a war. Which drew a huge uproar from the crowd. I'm still thinking on that one...

There was a large "pro-Hillary" turnout, which I knew was going to happen. One lady even had a Hillary sign, with a McCain sticker on it...What can I say, its New Jersey.

At the end, he said one of the main reasons he is doing the townhalls is because he wants to hear from the people. He took notes on people's concerns. It wasn't a fire and brimstone type speech but more down to earth, very laid back, and he often joked with people in the crowd. Which I think was what people needed to see.

Among the players there were: Former NJ Gov Tom Kane, Senator Lindsey Graham, Senator Joe Lieberman (who introduced him), Rep Jim Saxton (which pretty much saved McGuire AFB, Ft. Dix, and NAS Lakehurst from the chopping block), and several other local members of govt from the community.

All in all it was pretty cool to go to. There were some hecklers once it was over, and there were protesters (about 8, and were gone when we left) coming in at the entrance to the parking lots. Notably, one group of 3 college kids who at the end, stood at the top of the bleachers and held a banner up that said "Down with Imperialism!" They looked to be about 18. I turned to my buddy and said, I bet if we asked them the definition of imperialism that we would get their own interpretation instead of the actual definition. I was also really surprised at the amount of parents that brought their school age children. It was good to see. One funny thing to see was the people driving by honking on the highway shooting the bird to the protesters. I'm kind of a member of the school of thought that thinks "I am not going to change my mind because you held up a sign and yelled like an idiot at my candidates rally"

Anyway, if you guys can attend one of these, I highly encourage it. I was able to actually get the whole story from his mouth and not cut up little tidbits from a biased media. Which he mentioned had happened several times already.

[OJR]

I think this is a great format for him to use because he does pretty good one-on-one with a crowd! Obama doesn't do good at all with this setting!

[stevebeilgard]

i thought he did pretty well, from what i saw. i'm not a mccain guy at all, but may have to swallow my tongue and vote for him. it would help a bunch if he chose romney for vp, but i think it will be lieberman.

[nativetexan]

I have a feeling it might be lieberman also steve. It really doesn't matter because I sure as heck ain't voting for the other guy, and I want to retain my "complain about the government" right. Because I believe that if you don't vote, then don't whine. We still have a say so, even if it is the lesser of two evils. But i don't really see McCain as evil.