From the BarackObama.com team’s ad “Still”:
He admits he still doesn’t know how to use a computer…
Can’t send an email…
The Obama ads cites a New York Times interview where John McCain says:
I use the Blackberry, but I don’t e-mail, I’ve never felt the particular need to e-mail. I read e-mails all the time, but the communications that I have with my friends and staff are oral and done with my cell phone.
Obama’s campaign has a serious bug in their ad. It’s a lie to say Senator McCain said he can’t email, when he only said he doesn’t send them.
Tags: barackobama.com
September 15th, 2008 at 4:40 pm
OK, THE reason McCain cannot use a computer is because he can barely lift his hands high or for long periods of time due to having the $%%@# beat of him as a POW.
The Obama camp knows this, yes they do! This is not only a lie but a very vicious one at that. To twist the truth & make fun of someone because of a serious war injury can’t perform a certain physical function is sick.
September 15th, 2008 at 4:52 pm
That Obama ad is terrible, and I really wish they would stop playing it. The jazz flute and sarcastic tone of the narrator makes it seem like a catty conversation at a cocktail party.
Worst of all, the actual issues are lost in exaggerations. The important thing is not McCain clicks the send button on his emails. What’s important is McCain has admitted to having little to no understanding of technology in a extremely technology-focused world. This is a very important concern, not just with our need to focus on electronic infrastructure to attempt to catch up with the rest of the world, but also the need to address issues like censorship, government eavesdropping, and the stranglehold big business is hoping to tighten on the internet in general.
Obviously a presidential candidate is one man, and can’t be expected to know everything about everything. That’s why it’s important for a president to surround himself with experts in their fields to give good and honest advice. McCain’s tech. advisors include: John Chambers, Cisco CEO; Chuck Fish, former TimeWarner exec who insists there should be no oversight on the telecoms’ discriminatory packet switching; and Michael Powell, ex-FCC chairman who levied the largest obscenity and indiscriminate censorship fines in history, and who now sits on the boards of several tech companies, including Cisco.
This is just another example of the age-old Republican policy of putting the wolves in charge of the hen house. Contrast this with Obama’s technology advisors: Larry Lessig, professor at Stanford who helped found Creative Commons and a board member of the EFF; and Beth Noveck, director of the Institute for Information Law and Policy at New York Law School and writer for Harvard Journal of Law and Technology.
September 15th, 2008 at 4:56 pm
Haha wow! I don’t think even the McCain campaign has tried to stretch his vet status as far as his technology policies. I’m pretty sure McCain doesn’t need to raise his arms above his head to use a mouse.
September 15th, 2008 at 5:44 pm
well, to use a mouse and keyboard for any length of time apparently aggrevates his war injuries. i think you’re being a bit unfair to chide for that. none of us have ever served out country in battle so we have no idea of what he has suffered.
September 15th, 2008 at 6:56 pm
I am in no way chiding McCain for any disability his injuries may have caused, and I think anyone doing so is reprehensible. I hadn’t heard McCain say that before, and his own words on the subject seem to say otherwise:
“McCain, who has referred to himself as a computer ‘illiterate,’ has never cited his war injuries as the reason why he doesn’t use e-mail or never learned other computer skills.” McCain: “I read my e-mails, but I don’t write any. I’m a Neanderthal — I don’t even type. I do have rudimentary capabilities to call up some websites, like the New York Times online, that sort of stuff. No laptop. No PalmPilot. I prefer my schedule on notecards, which I keep in my jacket pocket.”
http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/09/15/1398117.aspx
Either way, it seems like quite a stretch to think that the Obama campaign is trying to make subliminal jabs at McCain for wounds he received in the armed forces. Even if one was so pessimistic and irrational as to somehow believe Obama and Democrats literally hate our troops and take any opportunity to belittle them for their service, surely they wouldn’t shoot themselves in the foot snickering at McCain’s biggest public boon.
And like I said before, I think that McCain’s email usage is really irrelevant here. I’m not expecting a 72-year-old to be all hip on the internets, but I would hope any candidate would surround themselves with who expects in their respective fields, and not just the people who stand to make the most money exploiting a certain field.
September 15th, 2008 at 7:26 pm
well, of course he’s going to say that. you expect him to say “i never learned to use a computer because it hurts my arms.”
September 15th, 2008 at 10:19 pm
I think the point being made is that the man is “illiterate” to the use of technology in a technology based world and that can be a major issue as President. Technology, the computer and Internet in particular, are becoming, if not are already, integral parts of this society and it shines poorly upon someone to be computer illiterate. I feel it would be comparable to hiring ANYONE who doesn’t know how to use a computer. If you can’t use a computer there are many jobs that will hire you outside of manual labor and even farms are using high tech gadgetry these days, so why would being President be any different. Not to say all important jobs require computer usage. And not to say that the man is not mentally capable of grasping the idea of the computer and its many uses. And not to say that anything else anyone one might take offensively and out of context from this post. I mean none of that. I’m only saying, in this day and age, one expects someone in a high position to be relatively knowledgeable when it comes to technology regardless of the title of that position, be it “CEO” or “Commander-in-Chief”.
September 15th, 2008 at 10:20 pm
Excuse my typo: “…there *AREN’T* many jobs that will hire you…” my apologies.
September 15th, 2008 at 10:54 pm
While not specifically talking about email, this Yahoo! piece during the primaries captures Sen. McCain admitting that he is “an illiterate” and relies on his wife for “all the assistance [he] can get.” The Obama ad is misleading (and I dislike the spot in general) but I would hesitate to call it an out-and-out lie. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XNehRSWmvJM
September 15th, 2008 at 11:09 pm
Considering McCain drummed up his POW status on a spectrum of issues ranging from his many homes, to why he cheated on his first wife, to why he’s allowed to bend the rules of debates, it doesn’t seem he’d be modest on this issue if it directly pertained. He has an amazing and inspiring story of courage and sacrifice, and nobody is denying that. The issue is not about his mobility, but his knowledge and ability to lead a technological society as a self-defined technologically illiterate.
September 16th, 2008 at 9:17 pm
This is not a lie.
“Asked whether he prefers a Mac or PC in a Yahoo News/Politico interview earlier this year, McCain admitted: ‘Neither. I am an illiterate that has to rely on my wife for all of the assistance that I can get.’ ”
The quote says he reads email, but can’t send them… exactly what the ad says. He can’t email. His wife does it for him. Hopefully, if becomes president, he’ll have staffers do it for him.
It’s 3AM and the President is emailed, who do you want replying all?
September 19th, 2008 at 2:30 pm
Discussion of McCain’s technology use surely rings of schoolyard taunting. Is that the best that the Obama camp can come up with? So what if McCain can, or can’t send an email? Who cares. He has lots of people around him to take care of that (assuming he can’t email). Come on Obama, talk about what’s really important here. Let’s say your connections with Middle Eastern countries and anti-white ministers. Your views on race are all to obvious. Even though you try to not mention, or disguise them, we see it.
September 19th, 2008 at 5:51 pm
I’m amazed people can actually think a ‘black supremist’, secret muslim, manchurian candidate could not only exist, but be this close to the presidency with no one finding out.
September 20th, 2008 at 1:53 pm
Shame on liecount.com from even printing the inflammatory outright LIES made by someone named “tinfoil”. I can surely understand his/her reason for hiding behind such a stupid pseudoname! I thought this forum was supposed to be a discussion about honesty. Who is this stupid jerk??
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