The Biggest Ball Drops of '08

Do read CMR's entire list of the greatest fumbles of 2008. Love the wry humour.

1) THE MEDIA - The media in this election year fell just a teensy bit short of its responsibilities. Their coddling of Barack Obama was a disgrace for which they are now seeking a repayment in the form of a bailout from the government. From completely ignoring the cesspool of Chicago politics to sending hundreds of reporters to Wasilla Alaska. From Chris Matthews and his tingling leg to the sycophantic NY Times turning down an editorial from John McCain just days after publishing one by Obama, the media has proved that they are as biased as we all feared. Put it on their gravestone. The mainstream media died in 2008.


3) Rod Blagojevich - C'mon. How could he not be on the list?

5) The McCain campaign - Ha! Where do I start? For not making any clear distinction between Obama and himself they should win an award for incompetence. For not pinning the responsibility for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac square on the shoulders of the Dems they should win an award for stupidity. But mostly their 2008 ball drop is for their handling of Sarah Palin. By hiding her away from the media for so long they raised the stakes on her network interviews so high that it was almost impossible for her not to fail. She should've been out on the lines talking to reporters where she could control the environment. The McCain campaign threw her to the wolves and expected the wolves to be nice. Idiots.

6) John Edwards - Former presidential candidate John Edwards' political future and reputation were fumbled away when he admitted having an affair with campaign videographer Rielle Hunter and fathered a newborn baby...oh yeah, he did all that while his wife was battling cancer.

8) "Conservative" columnists who forgot they were conservative. Peggy Noonan, Kathleen Parker, and Christopher Buckley all praised Obama in one form or another while attacking the heck out of Sarah Palin. I mean, they savaged her. What made it worse was that they all complained about how mean conservatives were being to them and patted themselves on the back for speaking truth to power while they were actually just parroting what every one of their friends in the media believed. Coincidentally, Noonan and Buckley were both trying to sell books at the time. Parker's motives are still unknown but a lobotomy is a possible explanation.

9) President George W. Bush - President Bush essentially forgot or declined to bring us all along in his thinking on anything. He absolutely abdicated his responsibilities to communicate with the American people and thus damned the Republican party for years to come.

10)Doug Kmiec - This guy's amazing logical inconsistencies captivated a nation. And he seemingly loved every second of it. Kmiec, a Mitt Romney supporter, turned around after his guy didn't get the nomination and endorsed pro-abortion Barack Obama. Kmiec then attempted to convince Catholics that voting for a radically pro-choice candidate is actually a pro-life decision? He didn't just say it might be. He tried to make the most radically pro-abortion Presidential candidate in history sound like the best thing to happen to babies since pacifiers?