John McCain's new ad paints Dems as wolfpack hunting Sarah Palin

[Belinda]

(CNN) — John McCain's campaign released a new ad Wednesday that portrays Democratic operatives as a vicious wolfpack hunting VP nominee Sarah Palin.
“The attacks on Governor Palin have been called ‘completely false’…’misleading,’” says the female announcer in the 30-second spot, which points to a report from Factcheck.org shooting down many attacks on the Alaska governor. “And they've just begun.”
The announcer cites a Wall Street Journal column that 30 Democratic lawyers and researchers have been “air dropped” Alaska to conduct “dig dirt” on Palin.
That column, by pundit John Fund, cites anonymous sources in reporting that unnamed Democrats have descended on the Alaskan capital of Anchorage. The Democratic National Committee and the Obama campaign have denied sending anyone to Alaska to conduct research into Palin’s past.
“As Obama drops in the polls, he'll try to destroy her,” says the announcer, as images of a wolfpack appear on screen. "Obama's politics of hope? Empty words."
The McCain campaign said the ad would be airing in “key states,” although it did not say where, or how extensive the buy would be.


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[ConstanceSpry]

That BITCH deserves to be hunted (and caught, and ripped to shreds) by a REAL wolf pack!!

[Sasha]

Repukes sure love ads involving wolves. Could it be that they identify themselves with flesh eating predators?

Slate

[kingcap72]

The announcer cites a Wall Street Journal column that 30 Democratic lawyers and researchers have been “air dropped” Alaska to conduct “dig dirt” on Pali

I guess the announcer didn't read the Wall Street Journal article about Palin being full of shit about the Bridge To Nowhere.

[lurkur]

I guess that means they want to do some aerial hunting and shoot down Wolfbama from safely up in the sky.

[ManxMouse]

Originally Posted by lurkur

I guess that means they want to do some aerial hunting and shoot down Wolfbama from safely up in the sky.

Precisely what I was thinking.

But do they really want to risk calling up the image of gunning down wolves?

[Grimmlok]

But the supertruth squad will hunt down Wolfbama with their secret decoder rings and do a care bear-stare on him till he explodes into pixie dust.

[lurkur]

What's aerial wolf gunning, and why does vice presidential Sarah Palin support the practice? - By Samantha Henig - Slate Magazine

Aerial Wolf Gunning 101

What is it, and why does vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin support the practice?

By Samantha Henig
Posted Tuesday, Sept. 2, 2008, at 6:38 PM ET Wolves
Sarah Palin, the governor of Alaska and John McCain's vice presidential pick, is an enthusiastic hunter who has proposed legislation and cash incentives to encourage aerial wolf gunning, the controversial practice of shooting wolves from an aircraft. Do people in Alaska really shoot wolves from planes?
Yes, but only with the government's permission. Aerial shooting yields better results than traditional hunting, since it allows the hunter to cover a lot of ground quickly and track target animals from a clear vantage point. Historically, hunters also used planes to drive animals—polar bears in Alaska and elk in Montana, among others—toward gunmen waiting on the ground. But many hunters found the practice unsportsmanlike, since it violates the "fair chase" ethic, and animal rights activists call it inhumane, since airborne gunmen rarely get a clean (i.e., relatively painless) kill. In response to concerns like these, Congress passed the Federal Airborne Hunting Act of 1972, which made it illegal for hunters to shoot animals from a plane or helicopter.
The federal legislation (PDF) does have a loophole for predator control, permitting state employees or licensed individuals to shoot from an aircraft for the sake of protecting "land, water, wildlife, livestock, domesticated animals, human life, or crops." (This doesn't just apply to wolves; coyotes and foxes are sometimes gunned down from aircraft, especially in Western states.) Since 2003, Alaska has issued aerial wolf-hunting permits in select areas where moose and caribou populations are particularly endangered. The idea is that by killing the predators, the airborne gunmen can ramp up the number of moose and caribou that human hunters can take home for supper.


An aerial wolf-gunning team typically consists of two people—one to fly the plane, and one to shoot the animals. Former crop sprayers tend to make good pilots because they are used to flying close to the ground. Airborne hunters tend to fly single-engine Super Cub planes at very low speeds and at altitudes of less than 100 feet—sometimes swooping down to 10 to 15 feet above the ground. But flying so slow and low can be dangerous, and there have been a number of reported deaths in recent years as a result. Helicopters have the benefit of being able to hover very close to the ground, but they're prohibitively expensive for private pilots. (A small helicopter might cost as much as four times more than a Super Cub.) This past spring, the Alaska Department of Fish and Game lent its helicopters and employees to the predator-control effort.
There are two methods for making a kill during an aerial hunting expedition: Either you shoot the wolf while airborne or you track the animal from above, then land and shoot it from the ground. Legal limits on "land and shoot" hunting have been far less stringent: For many years after shooting from the air was outlawed, anyone with a hunting or trapping license could practice "land and shoot," provided he or she walked a certain distance from his plane before opening fire. Current rules in Alaska require a delay between landing an aircraft and killing an animal: In most cases, hunters must wait until 3 the following morning before they can get started.
Back in the 1950s, Alaska paid government employees and bounty hunters to take out thousands of wolves, but today's aerial wolf killers are unpaid. (They can make some money by selling the wolf pelts.) Palin tried last year to have the state pay $150 for every wolf killed, but the state superior court shot that down as an illegal use of bounty payments, which were outlawed in that state in 1984.

More info: Sarah Palin, predator control, shooting wolves | Salon

[middleground]

Oh please, she's fair game. As is Obama, Biden and McCain.

Awwww, she can't handle the heat grandpa?? Poor baby.

Well, I'll tell ya what, the heat from an atomic bomb is gonna burn a wee bit more if you can't deal with the bullies across the pond.

[gogodancer]

Like they didn't hunt the Clintons and any number of other women and men. Don't dish it out if you can't take it. What a bunch of crybabies.

[Coyote]

Here it is if anyone else is curious what it actually looks like (I was):

YouTube Video

[bychance]

Originally Posted by middleground

Oh please, she's fair game. As is Obama, Biden and McCain.

Awwww, she can't handle the heat grandpa?? Poor baby.

Well, I'll tell ya what, the heat from an atomic bomb is gonna burn a wee bit more if you can't deal with the bullies across the pond.

No, it's sexist.

[ymeman]

Originally Posted by lurkur

I guess that means they want to do some aerial hunting and shoot down Wolfbama from safely up in the sky.

what a good point. She kills moose, likes to drown polar bears, and is all for hunting wolves by helicopter. She calls herself a dog with lipstick, but gets p.o.'d if someone likens her (and McCain) to a pig with lipstick. I guess it's because pigs are smarter than dogs. The animal imagery is not serving her or McCain well. They should probably stick to humans...but they only like the pale ones, and they kill the desert ones for fun and profit. Oh well, maybe they should just stick to dancing fetuses or something. Too bad fetuses (feti?) can't vote.

[maryk]

I saw it last night I guess Minnesota is a 'key state' at least I think it was it was basically saying how Obama sent people to Alaska to find out about Sarah Palin and was hunting for information on her. And it showed wolves for some reason.

[Grimmlok]

Funny, that whole '30 researchers' thing is utterly false. McCain lies again.