Nash McCabe: Obama's Flag Pin Questioner

McClatchy:

Nash McCabe is the voter from Wednesday night's presidential debate who noted that Barack Obama doesn't usually wear a flag pin and asked, "I want to know if you believe in the American flag."

ABC, which hosted the debate, had tracked her down after she was quoted in a New York Times story about white voters in small-town Latrobe, Pa., revealing her as 52, out of work and against Obama.

Read the whole story: McClatchy

Comments

[nivek]

o'er a pledge pin free lapel the fox hounds nipping at his heels, while the old guards juggernaut grinds another 'neath it's wheels

[jcause28]

Will someone tell me wrong with expecting higher standards for Americans? Why is it that we are forced to lower ourselves down to the lowest common denominator each election cycle. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against this woman, but I am peeved such things as flag pins are offered up as fodder for punditry and debates. I imagine that having a college education will be a fatal character flaw for anyone running for office in the decades to come.

I know this woman has had an extremely rough life, but the issues facing her have nothing to do with flag pins. And it is going to take those with the tools of education and the intelligence to look past these non-issues to begin to fix them.

[MsLiz]

We could mail her some flag pins.

[BetterDeadthanRedState]

In hard times, some people cling to flag pins.

[americanwhocares]

She looks like she forgot to take her Metamucil today. All plugged up.

[SaraPulis]

In summary: "I've had a hard life so I cling to symbols and silly traditions which, in and of themselves, mean nothing and have never directly benefited anybody or anything, especially me." Smart one, lady. Carrying a religious item with you to the Kwik-E-Mart will also help you win the lottery.

[NPRLuvr]

Seems to me Nash is willing to vote against her economic interests and, in so doing, is exactly the type of voter Obama has eluded to on a number of occassions; most recently in San Francisco.

She appears to be hiding behind the issue of patriotism while it's obvious that the REAL issues in her life revolve around healthcare and her economic situation.

How sad.

[purplefishies]

I feel bad for this woman. She is exactly the type of person that Barack would be looking out for. A complete single payer health care system would benefit her more than Hillary's insurance company friendly one.

The sad part is that she is too over worked and over taxed emotionally speaking to realize how stupid her question was in the first place. Instead of asking how Barack could possibly help out her situation, she was one of those bitter people that has latched on to "Patriotism" because she isn't getting anything from her government.

[robeson]

Why isn't she wearing the flag over her face?

[the964kid]

America pay close attention to this incredibly stupid voter: this is how people like George Bush get elected. While she's worried about flag pins Bush has left her Social Security in jeopardy, put the country into record debt, launched endless wars, raided the government treasury to fatten the pockets of cronies on no-bid contracts and much much more. BUT: Bush does wear a flag pin, so it's all good to McCabe.

Once again: these idiots are out there. They are like mindless zombies, but instead of focusing on eating brains, they focus on stupid issues like a flag pin and then vote against their own economic and social well-being. There's enough dumb people like McCabe out there to vote for another 'Bush' level chump in the future.

We urgently need a real change from this mentality.

[mbh78213]

So true. In 2004, one of my students told me that she agreed with Kerry on the issues, but as a Christian she felt she had to vote for Bush. I reminded her that the elections were for the office of President (as in head of a secular government), not High Priest. I don't think I changed her mind.

[oslo]

What a HOG!

[mydogshakespeare]

She looks bitter and sounds bitter. Probably pissed at Obama for rubbing her face in the bitter truth.

[bluepilgrim]

Who was in office when all of these things happened to her? Reagan, Bush41, Clinton, Bush43 -- people who did not look out for the welfare of the people, and yet she doesn't like Obama, who has worked for the benefit of the people. She is badly misinformed, apparantly.

[iluvsummr]

Does anyone think that Ms. McCabe would vote for Obama even if he wore three flag pins from now on? (I don't). Her life has indeed been hard and she seems resentful of his success relative to hers.

I'm an Obama supporter but I see what Hillary is getting at with her dirty tactics and what ABC was trying to amplify with that messed-up "debate." What is the Democratic Party's strategy for getting low information voters in Obama's corner when he gets the nomination? He's going to need additional help because the issue we're skirting here has to do with race (McCabe has no problem with the fact that neither McCain nor Hillary wears the flag pin, or the fact that they are both a hundred times wealthier than Obama; she feels she can relate to Hillary, but somehow doesn't feel she can relate to him).

Several things come to mind when it comes to easing these voters' fears because he needs some of them to win: His choice of VP candidate (perhaps a war veteran); having Hillary go out to campaign for him when he gets the nomination as aggressively as she is fighting against him now; laying out very detailed plans that specify exactly how rural towns that have lost jobs can be lifted out of the economic doldrums; having democratic representatives in those areas present these plans in addition to Obama (they might not hear the message if it's coming from him, sadly). What else?

[Mesaywar]

Precisely.
It's all about time.

All she has to do is stall long enough to ensure an Obama defeat.
Even if Obama could turn water into wine and raise the dead on national TV, the Nash McCabe's of the world would find a reason not to vote for him.

Whether Clinton or Obama were the nominee, Democrats would need extra time to take a whole lot of middle America through a crash course in twenty-first century social enlightenment.

People would have needed time to accept the fact that a woman or person of color could be president, and even then it would have been a crap-shoot, even though McCain is clearly the least factually, tempermentally, and in every other way, qualified candidate.

So, the kind reassurances from Bill and others about how he wasn't even nominee until much later in the process and still won is basically, bull. Hillary is not stupid, she understands numbers better than almost anyone. All she has to do is stall.

[dadw5boys]

PATRIOTISM IS THE LAST REFUGE OF SCOUNDRALS!!!!!!!!!!!

[Earl]

Here's a really nice flag pin!

http://tinyurl.com/6g46jd

[Earl]

When times get tough, the common folk turn to flag pins for comfort.