McCain is Really Reaching

John McCain has released three negative ads in a row (after having strongly promised to run a clean, issues-based campaign), and most of them have been demonstrably false or at the very least, misleading.

But there are two examples that really make me wonder what he's thinking.

First, there's been a lot of play recently over the McCain ad slamming Obama for having cancelled ONE of his trips to see troops while overseas. Never mind that in the ad itself they show footage of Obama visiting with troops earlier in the same trip, and never mind that the trip was canceled when the military decided at the last minute to inform Senator Obama that he could only bring Senatorial staff, not campaign staff, with him, after the senatorial staff had all left. And never mind that Obama had not planned to bring any press with him on the visit, even as McCain claims he decided not to go "when he learned he couldn't bring cameras with him".

What's interesting is that it turns out the McCain campaign was all set with another script, slamming Obama for politicizing the military by making the visit, had he gone.

From Business Week: What the McCain campaign doesn't want people to know, according to one GOP strategist I spoke with over the weekend, is that they had an ad script ready to go if Obama had visited the wounded troops saying that Obama was...wait for it...using wounded troops as campaign props. So, no matter which way Obama turned, McCain had an Obama bashing ad ready to launch. I guess that's political hardball. But another word for it is the one word that most politicians are loathe to use about their opponents--a lie.

What this teaches us is that we can't really believe anything McCain says, because he'll spin anything Obama does in the most negative fashion. Just politics, you say? Yes, but still, if the pre-ordained result of ANY action that can be undertaken is that it will be spun as something the candidate did wrong, it calls into question every assertion of wrong-doing by the candidate.

The second recent "huh!" moment for me was the McCain camp reaction to an Obama line that he's been using for months. Several articles have referred to the line being one he's used "since June", but I clearly remember hearing him say it when I heard him speak here in NH, back before our primary. That line is "You know what they're campaign is going to say. He's got a funny name. And he sure doesn't look like all the other Presidents on the front of our money".

Suddenly, lacking anything of any real substance to say, John McCain and his campaign have decided that this is "playing the race card" and feigning disgust. In a televised interview, McCain was asked Was that a fair criticism, for [McCain spokesman] Rick Davis to say 'The Obama campaign is playing the race card.'?

McCain responded, in the most solemn voice he could muster It is. I'm sorry to say, but it is. It's legitimate. And we don't... there's no place in this campaign for that. There's no place for it, and we shouldn't be doing it."

You have to see the video, the tone McCain takes is so somber it's like Obama had sold his own mother to al Qaeda militants in order to finance his campaign.

Once again as in the Democratic primary, we have one candidate trying to stay positive and on the issues, and the other candidate projecting their own bad behavior onto the well-behaved candidate.

And it really makes me wonder, does McCain have anything at all? His policy statements are a mess, a combination of "psychological" plans that won't have any real effect (such as the "gas tax holiday"), unfunded spending (if he does everything he's promised and doesn't raise taxes, he'll make the Bush deficits look like the Clinton surpluses) and flip flops (he no longer supports the "McCain Kennedy bill", which he now refers to as "the Kennedy bill", and his position on new taxes is absolutely there won't be any if you ask about taxes, but payroll tax increases are on the table if you're talking about fixing social security).

The choice between these two could not be more clear, no matter what your politics. At this point, given that these are the only two viable options, the choice absolutely could not be more clear.

Liam.

P.S. The biggest laugh of the week had to be when Rick Davis, campaign manager for McCain (in response to being asked about McCain's statement that raising the payroll tax to fix social security was still on the table) "John McCain does not speak for the McCain campaign." No, seriously, he said that.