McCain Meltdown

Joe,

Were you the one reporter that showed up for his arrival. Just kidding, but I don't think we have seen anything yet. There is more to come from that little temper.

How sad.

You think?

It seems entirely predictable to me. This is what the GOP does and has been doing for the past eight years.

Joe,

Or any commenter,

Okay McCain is attempting to take complete credit for the surge. Was the surge not GW's idea along with his generals? McCain was a supporter yes, but was it his idea?

I had the same reaction.
That's the most dishonorable thing I've ever heard John McCain say. Is he accusing Senator Obama of treason? Sure sounds like it.
He knows it to be false, but he's gleefully suggesting that his opponent is a traitor.

John McCain knows, deep in his bones, that he is the most honorablest person ever. Ergo, anyone standing in his way must be dishonorable.

HE'S JOHN MCCAIN, DAMMIT! All he wants in the world is to be president-- certainly more than he wants any particular policy implemented, given that he's changed all of his policy views a few times.

Is that so wrong?

Thanks for the post, Joe. McCain wanted to get to whine about Obama's coverage, but Lord knows more coverage of McCain isn't going to help the GOP at all. Please stay on this. He's an angry little man with no ideas and no clue.

I can see the debate now. Obama gets in a zinger and McCain runs across the stage saying "come here you skinny little....."

The rest of the media still has a crush on McCain, though. A few scurrilous comments won't put an end to that.

Vet Voice gets email about McCain's comment.

http://www.vetvoice.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=1654

Expect McCain to become angrier and angrier as the campaign goes on.

Welcome to reality, Joe, but McCain has spent the last seven years trying to prove to people like you that he has no character. If you're just now starting to pay attention, well...it's better than nothing.

Sad to say, in the great metaphorical Meet The Press Green Room of Sabbath Gasbags, Joe Klein is the old man's harshest critic.

"During today’s town hall meeting in New Hampshire, McCain says “oil executives” told him we “could see results” from offshore drilling “within a couple of years.”

Well, now that the oil executives have gave their blessing John, I'm all for it.

http://www.crooksandliars.com/

Were those oil executives W and Cheney?

Go to bed Joe Klein. You are simply a reporter who should pass judgment on whether or not your last batch of cookies were edible or not.

This is what our supposed "news" reporters, report today. They report THEIR OPINIONS and leave the truth someplace in the gutter.

And, if you think this is the most "scurrilous statement by a major party candidate" after 9 different campaigns, then you have never covered a campaign. Dear Abby covered campaigns in the past, but does that give her credibility to give opinions on political statements. I think not.

Maybe you need to go write for Dear Abby, Klien, I believe that gig would suit you better.

Amen. If I was Obama I'd punch him in the nose.

Florida,

How dare you, our current oil executives actually know how to make money for their companies.

jeez, a man who calls his wife a cu nt in public; a man who tells a joke about a woman being raped by an ape; a man who told a disgustingly insulting joke about the pre-teen daughter of a president; a man who sings and jokes about the implementing the deaths of untold numbers of iranians.

yeah. hard to see where such a vile comment questioning the patriotism of someone standing in his way would come from.

Let's dissect McCain's statement...if he is correct that Obama would lose a war to win a campaign, then it follows that he thinks that the voters want to lose a war...because presumably, that would lead to victory in a political campaign?

If we follow what McCain is saying to its logical conclusion, John McCain is saying that the voters want to lose the war in Iraq.

He's not just insulting Obama, he's impugning the American people as well because they think there are more important things than fighting a war in which there were no WMD's and no Al Qaeda until we broke the country to let them in.

The Surge, even if successful (and that is being generous), is nothing more than digging us out a hole we should never have dug in the first place.

John McCain is absolutely correct. Obama has master-minded a campaign solely on convincing Americans that the Iraqi War was wrong, and the surge was a waste of our time and resources. Now that the surge is working, he is feebly attmepting to flip-flop yet again and say that "if I had known". Well you should have known Obama, you should have had the insight to have known. You didn't
Obama's belief that the surge would not work, and he wanted a CUT AND RUN resolution to the situation in Iraq at the time the surge was proposed is a clear defeatist ideology.

Obama desparately wanted this surge to not work, and our troops to not be successful. He was betting on failure, and it didn't fail.

RKA,

well said!

Rusty,

I think this video supports all your arguments.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3y3QoFnqZc

Poor Johnny. Still trying to win Vietnam.

When is the last time anyone on teevee called McCain 'Maverick'...seems like a while to me.

Great post. This is SOP for the GOP...however, they usually have a surrogate or 527 doing it, not the candidate. Desperate indeed. He's flailing so badly now I'm not sure his base(the press) is going to be able to hold it together for him. His complaints about the media today seem to have only served to get all the pundits to admit they've been his base all these years.

If Obama's not a leader...why is McCain following him and sniping at the dust in Obama's wake?

I can't remember a more scurrilous statement by a major party candidate.

I don't know if it's impolite to note that I've seen you express a similar sentiment. There were three important differences however. One, you were speaking generically about Democrats, two you weren't running for President and three you thought the better of it and erased it before it did any lasting damage.

I've harped before on the inappropriatness of the terms 'winning' and 'losing' when applied to Iraq, mainly because the terms always refer to an end state. The McCain vision for Iraq doesn't include an end state, so the use of the terms are inherently dishonest.

I wish they were also inherently inneffective but I'm afraid that human nature has other ideas.

Breaking: KO catches CBS news editing out a McCain gaffe about Sunni Awakening and inserting an answer to an other question.

Saw the KO bit too.

Der Spiegel: Maliki’s office approved withdrawal quote before article was published.

On Sunday, after Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki indicated support for a 16-month U.S. withdrawal, the U.S. military distributed a statement from Iraqi government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh saying Maliki was “misunderstood and mistranslated.” But The New Republic reports that “Maliki actually got a copy of the interview before it was printed and had the option to make any changes.” A writer at Der Spiegel sent TNR the following statement:

The reason the magazine scores so many high level interviews is that the editors agree to allow the subjects to “authorize” the interviews before they go to press. It wasn’t just a slip of the tongue, in other words: Maliki not only endorsed Obama’s plans for withdrawing from Iraq, but his office then explicitly approved the endorsement before it was printed. The denials, then, were doubly facetious.

http://thinkprogress.org/

If this is about publishing an op ed piece, I take a simple view. As a writer my work has been rejected - and published - by many media outlets including the New York Times. Hundreds of submissions in all categories are trashed daily without the courtesy of a form letter reply. In that context, McCain hasn't any more 'right' or entitlement to be published than you or I. If the goal is breaking into print, when an editor asks for a revision, you make it without whining and consider yourself fortunate.

Geez! McCain needs to McRetire from politics effective immediately! ROFL

No GySgt, this is a much better video...please enjoy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8M-kD0QdRJk

Where are your chickens, Mr Obama??

The surge, the surge, the surge. That is all crap. Why were we there to begin with? For what? Pretty shallow war on terrorism. When you're up to your ass in alligators, anything might just work, including, but not limited to vast money payouts to the various primative tribes.

Obama has in fact received more coverage. Just check it out. Goggle McCain and Obama and count the hits. That is not a bad thing.

McCain, bless his heart, will wage war and end it with "honor". Just like in VietNam. The US does not need to be mucking around in other people's business. We have our own business to tend to.

The Republican party will be hit bad this November. And they deserve every hit. They were handed governance of our country and they destroyed it. They did not tend to the economy, to proper relations throughout the world, to the vast middle class which is the basis of the success of our country. They focused on god, guns, gays, and religion. Shallow, petty, irreconsilable issues. I can go on, but I am on a rant and need to stop. Thanks for reading this far.

I agree with Joe 100 percent here. I'm so sick of people using our national security and war as a political pawn. McCain has yet to take the high road. Obama's been keeping it classy, using that "dignity" thing for what it's made for!

Well this does not sound good.

Kurds storm out as Iraqi parliament OKs Oct. 1 elections

BAGHDAD — The Iraqi parliament approved a bill Tuesday that calls for crucial provincial elections on Oct. 1, but the secret ballot alienated Iraqi Kurds and very likely will lead to the postponement of the process until next year, several members of parliament told McClatchy.

Opponents charged that some of the ruling Shiite Muslim parties were trying to delay the elections by forcing the law through instead of negotiating a compromise. They said the bill was almost certain to be vetoed and challenged in constitutional courts.

"We have never had a secret vote in the two years of this parliament," said Mahmoud Othman, one of the Kurdish parliamentarians who walked out. "We don't consider it legal. . . . It is an effort to delay the elections."

Iraqi politics has pivoted this entire year on holding provincial elections. Newly emerged local leaders hoped to win a legitimate role in government, and major political blocs were vying for support among their base. The U.S. has called the process crucial for much-needed political reconciliation.

Some Iraqis think that the offensives that Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki launched in the southern cities of Basra and Amara and the Baghdad slum of Sadr City were to weaken his political rivals, the Sadrists, who controlled those areas.

The possibility of a months' long delay in the elections could fundamentally alter the priorities of local and national politicians.

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/251/story/45171.html

I can't remember a more scurrilous statement by a major party candidate.

Seems like there must be something more scurrilous out there. Maybe I have very high scurrility standards, but this doesn't seem all that scurrilous.

Joe, do you think the MSM will continue to say that McCain owns the foreign policy/national security issue after this week's gaffes? I don't.

More Obama YouTube, enjoy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1ldagmkXt0&NR=1

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Cliff, I agree on the scurrilous scale.

Joe would probably check that in hindsight. Scurrilous is the Obama medrassa terrorists school which is still circulating. Scurrilous is not John McCain prattling on about war with honor and all that crap.

This reminds us when Hillary was so desperate she assured us all the white people would vote for her.

LEAVE JOHN MCCAIN ALOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONE!

You'll make Ana Marie Cox cry.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-SX3f2KmOiI&feature=related

Is it really Obama? or Osama?

You decide!

Rustydog, after Little Bush, I'll take anybody. Can't do any worse.

What's sad? That it raises questions about whether he has the temperament to be president?

NO! That is NOT sad. The more information voters have, the better. If McCain would make a bad president, the press's affection for him should give way to the need for that truth. That's not sad. That's good.

It's sad that it's taken you this long to figure out that the Republicans including St. McCain always do this. There's nothing McCain has said that is worse than what Karl Rove has done over and over for his other candidates.

McCain is temperamentally difficult. But more important, he has chosen as his advisors the same liars and cheats who got Bush installed as president. That it's taken his press buddies so long to start worrying -- and after 8 years almost of Bush-- is REALLY sad. Do you guys have blinders on?

As for McCain being in meltdown mode here's what a supporter said in New Hampshire's Lilac City today:

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/07/22/volunteer-tells-mccain-to-get-new-staff/

And he still isn't talking about himself. Got any ideas of your own, McCain?

Any talking head on FOX can just criticize Obama all day. Do they all deserve to be President?

If McCain has a case for himself, he better start making it. I just see him whining to small crowds in New Hampshire while Obama flies over Baghdad with Gen. Patreaus.

Joe, you and all the rest of the media may try, but we will all determine for ourselves what may appear to be desperate. Maybe in the future, report on the facts and allow for us readers to formulate our own opinions. Flip side, Obama appears to be positioning himself to take credit for troop withdrawals in the future. Amazing as it may seem, he is now also urging troop strength increases in Afghanistan to plug holes in recent Taliban surges there... It's obvious he doesn't know what he wants, with the exception of trying to please everyone, which of course will eventually blow up in his face. I don't know who I will eventually vote for, but you guys make me laugh, soon you'll be right up there in credibility with the weathermen... :)

Joe Klein, if this is not flip-flopping and proves that McCain is correct in his assessment of Obama, what is correct?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2kFrFIFizkU&feature=related

We report, YOU decide!

and here's another shot fired across the Straight talk express's bow.

Why this individual wasn't locked up at the Strafford County Jail...

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/07/22/mccain-gets-a-dose-straight-talk-on-iraq-war/

"I had the courage and the judgment to--

CINDY, YOU C---, WHERE'S MY PUDDING!?!?!"

You're right Joe but it's not getting any play yet and is not likely to

What is Obama really saying?

Is it this position? or that one?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LFhpdbXjMCg&feature=related

I'm so confused on what Obama wants to do, and I don't think he even has a clue as to what to do.

Ice,

Joe is presenting a view, and we are all here to discuss it. That is good, and I thank Time for allowing it without a lot of hassle and censorship or delay in posting.

Obama's position on the wars is that the Bush administration diverted resources from Afghanistan to Iraq in an illogical, irrational, and destuctive manner. They meant well. They are just incompetent. They love our country. But they don't know any better.

Again, I thank Time for this blog.

McCain has been saying this since the surge began. I don't think this represents some new desperation.

There is a problem though, when Obama is getting support for his timetable at the same time McCain is saying this. McCain needs to start presenting his views for the future instead of taking every opportunity to insult Obama.

http://www.politicswithagrin.blogspot.com/

I suppose we should be grateful for Joe's "more in sorrow than in anger" hand-wringing; it's certainly a step up from AMC's and MS' non-stop McCain pimping.

Yet it's not as though this is "new" news. Props to Joe for covering McCain, as opposed to AMC and MS and JayCroney covering THEMSELVES covering McCain, but it sure seems like he's late getting to the party.

Had McCain not had the supernatural good fortune to go up against Mitt and Rudy, he would not be disintegrating before our very eyes. Elvis is right: all he wants is to BE president - without a clue as to what he will do when he gets there, except for staying in Iraq and drilling in ANWR.

Listening to Joe Klein talking about McCain is no different or less partisan than listening to Howard Dean talk about McCain. Klein is a far left hack and will get more biased the closer we get to the election.

a more scurrilous statement

What, is it Talk Like a Pirate Day again?

And it's not scurrilous, it's deluded. One, it presumes that Obama has any control over who "wins" and "loses"--as a Senator, he has as much as McCain.

Two, it presumes some definition of "win" etc.

Three, it (hilariously) presumes a direct correlation between war outcomes and election outcomes. Can someone maybe ask McCain why he thinks a "loss" in Iraq correlates with a victory for Obama? Isn't he basically conceding the election?

Four, why are war outcomes and election outcomes mutually exclusive for McCain? If McCain does indeed lose the election, will he still care about who wins the war, or no? For that matter, if he wins the election, but the war is nevertheless lost, will he resign?

Five, why is McCain setting up the election and the war as essentially a tragic choice??? As if choosing to lose an election is basically the less evil of two evils? Am I supposed to be encouraged that McCain knows which bad outcome to choose from, on a scale of one man's political power to hundreds of thousands of lost lives???

Six, is it possible for one person to be so sick and deluded and evil and still be taken seriously?

"Klein is a far-left hack"? Do you live in the same solar system as planet Earth?

Klein has been the Bush administration's b*tt boy on the war in Iraq since forever. He's about as far left as Red Skelton.

I see Rusty has now resorted to dashing into the fray with outlandish clips.

Do you suppose next time he'll have on of himself?

I wonder.

BTW, I have come to really appreciate Joe Klein.

I may not see eye to eye with him on free trade and some other issues, but in general, he is the kind of conservative that most other conservatives should consider emulating.

Thoughtful and with considerable insight. He is the only one of the pundits here that demonstrates a deeper knowledge of world affairs.

My own opinion:

Everyone can recognize a burning building.

It is time to leave...

Whenever I hear outrage like Joe's, I just remember: George. Bush. Twice. All you need to know about winning elections: Fear and Greed. So Joe can prance around in high dudgeon, but McCain is busy winning an election with the right message. All together now: Fear and Greed.

Joe, write it in the print edition.

Sorry, Joe. Beltway perception ain't reality.

Let's just say that even if McCain wore the flag as a diaper and french-kissed Ahmedinejad, real Americans from West Virginia are still going to paint the town red on Nov. 4.

Wish it wasn't that way, but it is, and always will be.

It renews questions about whether McCain has the right temperament for the presidency.

Renews them? Those questions have never gone away in the blogosphere, and yet they've been systematically ignored and suppressed by the corporate media. In neither case were those questions in any position to be "renewed." It's been pretty obvious for some time that John McCain most definitely does not have the temperament for the job. It's just that nobody in McCain's base has dared raise the issue.

Hey, obamish got itself another sockpuppet.

EL, dudgeon has become a popular word here since MS used the word dungeon in it's place.

I am always happy for dudgeon. We all are, of course, dudgeon over Little Bush. Let's send Little Bush to the World Court to put in a dungeon.

McCain is just thorougly unlikeable, sorry. As with Hillary, we shouldn't enjoy watching someone's dream to be president die, but I don't think he ever had a chance. Now he's just shooting blindly,

not much tough talk when you were in Vietnam. so when your temper begins.

Sounding like a bitter old man is not the way to endear yourself to millions of undecided voters, Sen. McCain.

Obama - offers hope and change
McCain - offers bitterness and defeat

Yeah, that's a tough choice there.

McCain is going to be crushed by Obama this fall, and the far right wackos will shriek, "SEE? WE TOLD YOU SO! MCCAIN LOST BECAUSE HE WASN'T SUFFICIENTLY LOYAL TO THE RIGHT!"

And the GOP will tear itself to pieces for the next four or more years, trying to figure out which way it is going to go... further down a far-right neo-con imperialism dead-end alley or back towards the center-right.

Go long on popcorn.

"Wish it wasn't that way, but it is, and always will be."

Well, that's only a few hundred thousand voters. Other "real Americans" don't feel that way.

Like me.

It really does sound like McCain has laid out his campaign strategy.

Didn't realize that a rather faccid implosion was part of it...

Here's the part of the Couric-McCain interview that Olbermann pointed out. McCain gets indignant and claims that the Anbar Awakening which began in 2006 is somehow the result of the surge of 2007.

He gets the facts completely wrong, and CBS decided to cut this bit out. Looks like that nefarious liberal media has struck again.

***************

Couric: Senator McCain, Sen. Obama says, while the increased number of U.S. troops contributed to increased security in Iraq, he also credits the Sunni awakening and the Shiite government going after militias. And says that there might have been improved security even without the surge. What's your response to that?

McCain: I don't know how you respond to something that is such a false depiction of what actually happened. Colonel McFarlane was contacted by one of the major Sunni sheiks. Because of the surge we were able to go out and protect that sheik and others. And it began the Anbar awakening. I mean, that's just a matter of history. Thanks to General Petraeus, our leadership, and the sacrifice of brave young Americans. I mean, to deny that their sacrifice didn't make possible the success of the surge in Iraq, I think, does a great disservice to young men and women who are serving and have sacrificed.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/07/22/eveningnews/main4283813.shtml

Heh, I just turned on CNN, and Anderson Cooper was playing the clip ... with Joe Klein reacting.

oizydoizy:

Sorry, missed the sarcasm.

A full day of debating against these has-beens from the right will do that to you...

rainbow68, McCain is very likeable to me.

I respect and admire him.

I just don't want him for our President.

I would have a beer with McCain in a minute. You couldn't pay me enough to have a beer with Bush, who doesn't drink because he can't handle it anyway. Just like he couldn't handle the Presidency. Not his fault. Just congenital ineptitude.

Desperation implies thought and a plan. Mr. Klein, have you seen any evidence of thought or a plan in McCain's campaign?

My guess is that statement is what happened to pop into his head today. Maybe the lobbyists that are running his campaign placed the thought there, maybe it popped spontaneously.

More direct quotes please, from McCain's lips to our eyes and the print version of Time.

QH/RustyPoodle: sock puppet names aren't required to have 'z' in it. Go nuts.

Anyone seen this clip of Glen Beck on CNN arguing that Abraham Lincoln was a poor public speaker? Pretty funny....Gergen's head almost explodes like a David Cronenberg movie. No link, saw it on Abrams.

53_3,

Your comment engladdens me, but you know what I mean. There are just some voters who, however intelligent they may otherwise be, pull the lever based on low information:

white man vs. black man

after which everything else falls by the wayside. In this respect, I think W. Va may be the tip of the iceberg. Hell, I live THE bluest state, and I hear those "he's a Muslim" comments disturbingly often.

I hope I'm wrong. I'm wrong a lot. But, I think, not this time.

Good job Joe.

Someone needs to make some sense. You're doing it, and you have a big megaphone.

Excellent work.

What Mc Cain uttered my have been said poorly but the truth hurts

53_3,

"Sorry, missed the sarcasm."

No worries. Get some rest. Help prove me wrong!

oizydoizy:

You would be surprised to know that many in the Black community feel that things may not change, and that Obama will either be assassinated or somehow, most White Americans will stick to McCain.

I think they are wrong, though, but this will be a VERY instructive election. By no means does this mean that the racial divide was all of a sudden bridged, it just means that despite hateful Republican rhetoric and mythology re Civil Rights and Black issues, the country has matured despite them.

I will have to differ on whether WV Whites are representative. It's not what I'm seeing out here. There are a LOT of White voters here who like him, and I mean a LOT.

Cincinnatus, I don't have cable, and don't know Glen Beck and all the rest.

But to suggest that Lincoln was a poor speaker?
Maybe. He was a hell of a writer.

Read the Gettysburg Address, and if it doesn't cause your eyes to tear, you need psychiatric help.

Like Little Bush.

I saw Joe on Anderson Cooper. He was visibly outraged over McCain's remark about Obama being willing to lose a war to gain the presidency. Hold the outrage for later, Joe. McCain's just warming up for a stiff dose of "Treason" in his acceptance speech with Romney nodding and grinning in the background.

Is there a link? I would like to watch this...

alas no video yet...here's a Kos diary talking about it:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/7/22/84358/3364/270/555030

Me too. When I flipped to Anderson, I thought the whole show would be on Dolly.

Another thing - there's a lot of talk her in Louisiana about McCain choosing our governor as his veep. I live an hour away from N.O. I had helicopters over my house all day long going off to try and rescue people. Now our governor may bail on us six months after his inauguration to hang out with McCain? You talked about W.Virginia before. Let me tell you, the people of this state - traditionally conservative- will make a beeline to vote against McCain they'll be so mad at Jindall!

Even if McCain had the right temperament--he clearly does not--he is so ignorant of war, economics, geography, policy, and history that he would be as bad as the Chimp.

he didn't just "pop off" Joe. He said it at least 3 times today. It's his new plan. Please stop giving him the benefit of the doubt. He has failed your expectations at every turn.

Here is the video of one instance of McCain's attack today:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09ob6vjS8aY

Good job on 360, Joe.

It was, shockingly, unpresidential.

Delete the commas, dude.

*hic*

Never mention the trenches of Belgium..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-DxHWCOCq0

John McCain accurately stated the obvious when he said: "This is a clear choice that the American people have. I had the courage and the judgment to say I would rather lose a political campaign than lose a war. It seems to me that Obama would rather lose a war in order to win a political campaign."

However, McCain should have also added that Obama not only hopes for America's defeat in war, but Obama also intends for the United States to unconditionally surrender to America's enemies after Obama's dreamed defeat for America. No wonder the Washington press corps is so orgasmic over Obama.

No GySgt, this is a much better video...please enjoy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8M-kD0QdRJk

Where are your chickens, Mr Obama??

Posted by Rustydog

So...

You're defending the mind-bendingly self-serving, condescending, insulting comments from McCain himself about Obama, by posting the mind-bendingly stupid comments of... not Obama... not about McCain...

But of an Obama associate, long since repudiated by the candidate, about just crazy nonsense. (Not to mention mirrored by numerous bigots on McCain's side...)

That's you're defense? By proving McCain is a bigger jerk than the repudiated jerks Obama used to know?

I love it.

The Republican Party - For all your cognitive dissonance needs.

However, McCain should have also added that Obama not only hopes for America's defeat in war, but Obama also intends for the United States to unconditionally surrender to America's enemies after Obama's dreamed defeat for America. No wonder the Washington press corps is so orgasmic over Obama.

Posted by texte

I hadn't realized Swampland does really bring out the lunatics in the feverswamps.

You think that the man running for president, backed by an historic publicly-supported campaign, with the willing compliance of the media...

... wants to turn over the United States to America's enemies?

Are you satire?

And who would America's enemies be, exactly?

Cause from where I'm standing, the lunatics are already in power, and there appear to be plenty of other tools ready to spread the most ridiculous, conspiratorial, nutcase, bigoted lies in order to maintain that power.

And Joe...

Popping off? C'mon.

This is becoming routine. Drop the old narratives and deal with what is staring all of us in the face.

John McCain is simply out to lunch.

Doesn't know what's going on, whether its economics or those fancy computers or maintaining a position for more than a weekend or controlling his growing string of grumpy "senior moments". John McCain just wants the damn kids to get off his lawn so he stand in the middle of his yard and yell at passing clouds.

Why do you guys constantly excuse him? Emphasis on "constantly".

It's not like the guy is Roosevelt with polio.

To Mr Klein, I have some scurrilious statements.

Obama said McCain didn't care about the troops in Iraq. He said this while McCain's 19 year old son had just come back from Iraq.

Here's another during the height of the floods in the midwest Obama blamed McCain for the floods. All McCain did was vote to prioritze the levees so they would get first priority over earmarks like a museum in mississippi.

McCain said yesterday we can withdraw within 2 years but it must be based on conditions on the ground.

Obama in January 2007 said the surge would have the opposite effect and increase sectarian violence. Now he is saying he always knew the troops would help reduce violence.

Obama wanted to leave when the madhi army still was killing people in basra for selling liquor.

Obama wanted to leave when basra was mess, when iraq military didn't have a presence in sadr city and mosul had worse violence.

McCain has said he will bring home troops as iraqis take over. That is McCain's victory.

I went to a McCain town hall meeting.

He said he would bring our troops home and turn the areas over to the iraqis and they would have to deal with whatever insurgency was left.

McCain's whole point of the surge was to allow the security to improve so Iraqis can take over and our troops could come home.

McCain is a navy man so he is based on results. He is for turning areas over to the iraqis and bringing our troops home not like Obama who picks a date out of thin air. The media and Obama have used McCain saying he will bring our troops home based on conditions as saying he wants to stay in iraq forever that is a lie.

And with that 100 year quote. Right before he said that quote he said he would return all combat troops. He was talking about non combat troops helping train iraqis. Obama said he would keep troops at our embassy and training iraqis.

The media is coming at McCain in waves.

Obama got 114 minutes in prime time compared to McCain's 48 in June.

There was also a study in the primaries that Obama got 70 percent positive coverage compared to 43 percent positive coverage to Obama.

The MSM is more close to Russia than a fair democracy in how they pick sides in election coverage.

I never saw such horrible election coverage in my life.

Tonight on CNN breaking news headline about some gaffe about when the sunni awakening took place in anbar province.

Obama calls Maliki the president of Iraq no CNN headline.

McCain has talked about going to the tribal areas on the afghanistan/pakistan border many times and visiting the pakistan leaders. But when talking to Diane Sawyer McCain tripped over his words and said Iraq instead of Afghanistan. He had been going back and forth talking about afghanistan and iraq.

Obama did the same thing today he tripped over his words saying that Israel's will always be friends with Israel. He meant to say United States. The media didn't have a whole day firestorm like when McCain made the mistake.

The coverage of this election is a joke.

Great column, Mr. Line. Loved it!

And who would America's enemies be, exactly?

Why that would be texte....

Oh, and also, I love your style, Mr. Line. You are a great pundit and a feather in Time's cap. Why they don't make you the editor of this magazine I don't understand. You clearly have all the qualifications, not to mention your awesome writing abilities!

And you're absolutely, right. McCain is such a joke, Mr. Line.

If you watch the unabridged CBS interview with Couric, it is even worse. She actually asked him if Obama was frustrating him since he seemed upset. I watched drop-jawed as a major candidate spun out of control. Evidently they cut it out of the broadcast, but is viewable online. McCain is mentally ill and cannot be allowed to become president. The GOP needs to replace him.

Rev Wright's protege can't be allowed to be president.

Someone that calls an anti semite like Father Pfleger his moral compass.

Someone that nodded as America was bashed for 20 years.

A reporter saw Obama nodding as America was bashed.

That crook Obama got 300 grand off his home while Rezko was being investigated and the media whores don't talk about that.

Someone that went to a church that full of anti semitism and hamas loving and zionism is racism.

Obama is friends with palestinian activists who love hamas.

To moondancer Obama who calls ICE agents terrorists because they arrest illegals.

Here is the video of Joe on AC360 tonight, laying the smackdown on McCain. I wish there was more scrutiny of CBS' complicity in editing the interview.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wouAxX66nGM

"Someone that went to a church that full of anti semitism and hamas loving and zionism is racism."

Hands down, the funniest comment in the history of the Internet. God help us if the anti-semites and zionists join forces. Really.

Yeah, just iamagine if a sloppy and lazy media buts this loose cannon in the White House.

What --urk --fun!

McCain is a navy man so he is based on results.

Rev Wright's protege can't be allowed to be president.

Posted by Jamesryan

Jamesryan, I don't know you, of course. I assume you love our country as much as I do. But you leave me speachless with your vacuous, meanless statements.

I will not be terribly disappointed if McCain is elected President. Not near the disappointment I have felt with Bush.

I ask you to please pause and think about what you think and say. It does not really make sense.

Joe, you and your buddies in the media coddled Obama during the primaries. You declared any criticism of him racism. He was treated with kid gloves.

Hillary was told don't you dare criticize our Messiah.

Hillary was gang raped by the media and she did not have her own media outlets to fight back.

It is going to be different with McCain. The GOP has its own media to fight back and Obama's groupies in the media will not be able to shield him from criticism like that they during the primaries.

ok, meaningless statements, before somebody corrects me and makes a big deal out of nothing...

I need to go to bed now.

The illogic of jamesryan has been eclipsed by DonB11. I can't take anymore for tonight.

Not to be picky, but and inside straight draw is a pretty poor hand alone. More apropos might be a four flush or open ended straight draw...

...jus' sayin'

Hey! Klein stole my word!

JamesRyan - I want to thank you for posting your opinions here on this thread. I can think of nothing that helps Barack Obama more than for more people to know the full extent of the panty-wetting cowardice and unsupported nonsense that passes for conservative thought nowadays.

Seriously, thank you for helping Barack Obama.

james - arguing with Jamesryan is fruitless, it's like arguing with a conveyor belt. He'll just keep pouring on the simple sentences full of McCain adulation.

Are the GOP convention delegates bound by anything, or do their rules allow them to consider a do-over? It might be their only chance.

Kudos to Joe Klein for this post and for calling this out on CNN.

I've gotten so used to Republicans calling Democrats traitors that I hardly even notice it any more.

After 8 years of Bush, the idea of presidential gravitas seems almost quaint, but maybe we can get back to it.

McCain: "..I had the courage and the judgment to say I would rather lose a political campaign than lose a war. ..
1) Does the senator wish to propose that the 'winning' and the 'losing' depended entirely upon him?
Or does he wish to take credit for it all?
2) Many Senators voted for the war. Did they have similar considerations regarding their (re)elections?
Were McPlander's legislative actions and initiatives strongly driven by perceived benefits (and bragging rights) at election time? Probably so - considering his desperate flip-flops and craven pandering depending on the sentiments of the audience of the moment.
3) Sen Hillary Clinton - who voted for the ill-advised war of aggression in Iraq - probably issued the same or similar statement. Many suspect that she hoped her vote for the war would shore up her hawkish "tough on crime" persona perceived by the voters during the primary campaigns.

And you know what, craven McNasty, it didn't play out so well: Her effort came out as bad as Obama's effort at the bitter people's game of bowling.

"It was, shockingly, unpresidential."

Geez, Joe, clutch your pearls to your chest and head to the fainting couch, and we'll get you some smelling salts.

I can't believe that you're actually shocked about this, given what everyone knows about McCain and his history of losing his sh#t in public. I haven't covered any campaigns as a reporter, but I have studied many of them in academic settings, and personally I'm totally unsurprised that McCain would go off the rails like this. It's 100% in character for him.

And for what it's worth, I'd wager cold cash that pretty much no one on his staff will have the courage to tell him he screwed up.

Donut,

McCain's staff is so busy cleaning up stuff he says they probably have a fill in the blank form now where they just change the date, subject line and attached it to an email.

Late to the thread. But two things.

1) The Serious People are still planning on a permanent occupation. (30-50000 "residual" soldiers. This is just what Cheney said the occupation would be in 2003.(

2) Obama didn't draw to an "inside straight." Only an idiot, like Suck. On. This. Tommy, would have entertained the idea that a representative Iraqi government would ally with the US and Israel and against Iran.

Oh, come on, he didn't pop off. He said the same thing twice yesterday. This was a calculated, careful thing that he did, and it happened because his campaign is running scared. They know they're doomed, so they've got nothing to lose by throwing everything at the wall in the off chance that something will stick. It's the same thing we saw from the Clintons in the primary.

panty-wetting cowardice

It really is remarkable, isn't it? After decades of portraying democrats as girly-men, to see the come out in their pusillanimous glory is really quite striking. You can look back in their lives, realizing they were trotting the towels or playing the piccolo rather than leading the blocking on their high school football team.

chokora fukara

You know, you're right about that. It's another completely incoherent statement. if he were president, running for reelection, it would make sense. But it makes no sense at all for someone running for the seat for the first time. Losing the election can't win the war.

FlownOver - You wrote: "Are the GOP convention delegates bound by anything, or do their rules allow them to consider a do-over? It might be their only chance."

This is an interesting question in light of the actions of Ron Paul delegates during the GOP state conventions. The Paulites have been using the rules of the state's conventions in order to have Paulite delegates sent to the National Convention. This has been extremely contentious and has resulted in shouting matches and the shut down of the state conventions by the Establishment Republicans. The Nevada GOP convention was even disbanded because the Paulites had gained to much control of the process.

This is unprecedented for either national party but it is jarringly strange for the Republicans who are usually able to subvert their individual desires for the Greater Good of the Party. Despite the media's affection for the 'Democrats in Disarray Narrative, the actual self-destruction of the Republican Party is ignored so that everybody can believe that we have an actual race. We do not have an actual race - Obama is running very strong in the state races. Elections are not determines by national polls - they are won in the individual states.

The GOP is self-destructing. All they have left are worn out appeals to fear and greed. The GOP is about to become a Southern regional party whose only goal is to stop any form of legislation from passing which is appropriate because conservative philosophy has proven that it lacks the tools, flexibility and competence to govern. In other words, it will be as it has always been, but is not now.

jayackroyd - "...pusillanimous glory..."

If I were drinking coffee at the moment that I read that I would have sprayed it out of my mouth in a highly comedic fashion.

They really are just a bunch of pusillanimouses.

:)

This is unprecedented for either national party but it is jarringly strange for the Republicans who are usually able to subvert their individual desires for the Greater Good of the Party.

This is how Goldwater, and, in the next cycle, Nixon, got the nomination.

Whew. I can see this site is void of any useful intelligent dialogs. Given the repetitive postings by some, TIME is going to have figure out how to filter these useless posts or render this site as one of the worst.

Hey, everyone, don't you just love Mr. Line's honesty!

Going by Obama's bill that he introduced in January 2007, it's apparent that he would rather lose a war. He proposed a unilateral pullout when Iraq was in its darkest hour.

Only in politics can Obama get away with this. As a friend of mine said, a withdrawal by May 2010 is not the same as a withdrawal by March 2008. In the business world or the sports world, being wrong by a margin of more than two years is called "being wrong."

Obama's own ambition speaks for itself.

I saw you on Anderson Cooper last night, Joe, and you looked really angry. No objectivity at this site. The Obama bedazzlement is set in concrete.

Why did CBS edit out McCain's misstatement on the Anbar Awakening? And then, to make things even worse, CBS allowed McCain to make one of the most reprehensible statements ever made by a Presidential candidate, accusing him of losing the war to win the election without any challenge to that cowardly charge. That was disgusting.

Katie Couric telegraphed that she would be attacking Obama in advance when, bowing to the McCain pressure that he was getting too much press, she said she would be tough on him in the questioning.

I thought CBS might have enough journalistic integrity to ask serious questions, not be a surrogate for McCain's attacks. I guess I was wrong. Ed Murrow must be rolling in his grave.

This adds yet another reason why CBS News has become the worst operation in the business.

Joe is just angry that the Mets bullpen blew up last night and handed the Mets a backbreaking loss.

Don't worry Joe I'm pissed too, but please calm down a bit.

Plus Joe, Obama has been said that McCain doen't care about the troops when his own son is in active duty.

I dind't hear you getting all redfaced over that.

Many people were angry that he had not gone to Iraq. Senator McCain - a very angry man who has been showing his temper as of late - made a huge issue of it. Now that Barack Obama is making the trip, many, and especially John McCain, is hopping mad again.

I'm so very impressed at all this indignant anger. Just think what kind of president John McCain will make, getting mad at world leaders when they don't do what he wants, and then getting even angrier when they do. What special kind of disposition you must have to be able to vent your anger so often, barely keeping it hidden at times behind that teeth-gritting smile.

M. Dowd said it best today "The Angry One can try to paint The One as having bad judgment. But who is being advised by Kissinger, the man who helped keep us in Vietnam and get us into Iraq?"
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/23/opinion/23dowd.html?ex=1374552000&en=d50bd6a21626e039&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink

Obama 08!

Charles:

Joe Klein is so brain-washed with the Obama madness he will see anything as "This is the ninth presidential campaign I've covered. I can't remember a more scurrilous statement by a major party candidate. It smacks of desperation".

But now dear Joe is attempting to retract his statement by saying that it was out of "frustration" that McCain has called Obama a defeatist. I for one do not see anything wrong with calling the current situation exactly what it is.

Obama was against any surge post invasion. The new spin is "Awakening" is the real reason for the current successes. However, the American people know that the surge has worked. The surge is the base for the success we are seeing, and yes Joe Klein, it is why we also saw the Suni Awakening as well.

Here ya go Joe Klein, this is a "scurrilous" campaign tactic. Remember 1964?

The advertisement begins with a little girl (Birgitte Olsen) standing in a meadow with chirping birds, picking the petals of a daisy while counting each petal slowly. (Because she does not know her numbers perfectly, she repeats some and says others in the wrong order, all of which adds to her childlike appeal.) When she reaches "nine", an ominous-sounding male voice is then heard counting down a missile launch, and as the girl's eyes turn toward something she sees in the sky, the camera zooms in until her pupil fills the screen, blacking it out. When the countdown reaches zero, the blackness is replaced by the flash and mushroom cloud from a nuclear explosion.

As the firestorm rages, a voiceover from Johnson states, "These are the stakes! To make a world in which all of God's children can live, or to go into the dark. We must either love each other, or we must die." Another voiceover (sportscaster Chris Schenkel) then says, "Vote for President Johnson on November 3. The stakes are too high for you to stay home."

As soon as the ad aired, Johnson's campaign was widely criticized for using the prospect of nuclear war, as well as the implication that Goldwater would start one, to frighten voters. The ad was immediately pulled, but the point was made, appearing on the nightly news and on conversation programs in its entirety.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daisy_%28television_commercial%29

I am thinking Joe wet his pants when he viewed that commercial back in 1964, and now suffers from PTSD as a result. Anything said by a candidate must now seem "scurrilous".

Put on a pair of depends Joe, it will be alright after November 2nd.

mr. albany - "Obama has been said that McCain doen't care about the troops when his own son is in active duty."

Citation, please. Or just shut the #$%^ up.

Mr. Klein, I think besides this scripted line of losing the war to win an election, it's more scurrilous that John McCain told a Pittsburgh radio station just a few weeks ago that he gave the names of the Pittsburgh Steelers' defensive line to his captors in Vietnam, which directly contradicts his own statements in his own book that he gave the names of the Green Bay Packers' defensive line.

No matter how McCain would choose to spin this, should it ever be picked up by anyone with any amount of influence in the Press, it's a bald-faced lie to the people of Pittsburgh, the people of Green Bay, and/or the people of the United States of America. It's hard to spin your way out of lying and pandering to such a calculated degree. Of course, his campaign said it was due to a faulty memory. How extraodinarily coincidental though, no?

Glad that you're finally seeing through John McCain.

Charles Bird:

The hubris of wingnuts knows no bounds. You want to start accusing Obama of "being wrong" on Iraq? Excuse me, but since when does your opinion carry any weight?

There isn't a single strategic, tactical, political, philosophical, or economic issue regarding Iraq where the Bush Administration hasn't massively, embarrassingly, and tragically screwed up. "Being Wrong" defines the Bush Administration and its wingnut sycophants.

I could go on for days listing all the screwups they made: The rationale for the war, the cost of the war, the existence of an insurgency, Chalabi, Abu Ghraib, body armor, de-Baathification, de-Shiitization, re-Baathification, re-de-Baathification, and finally, trying to double down on Iran when screwing in Iraq gets boring, etc., etc., etc.

Please spare us your opinions about "being wrong."

McCain is being really jerky here because he knows Obama isn't going to call out McCain when he's overseas. Obama already said he wouldn't attack McCain personally while on this trip.

McCain just sucks so bad this week. He freaking lying. On purpose. He's no longer Mr. Integrity, that's for sure.

Surprise, surprise. You surround yourself with Rovians and you get a Rove-esque campaign.

I'd suggest that, the next time Obama is on the floor of the Senate with McCain, Obama back him into a corner like he did with Lieberman and explain reality to the old man.

BTW, I'm sensing the new wingnut defense is that Obama was wrong about the surge but McCain was right (thanks, Joe).

A couple of points. First, McCain was wrong about the surge. He wanted far more troops. Second, the reduction in violence, such as it is, has been as much due to non-military factors (e.g. bribery, ethnic cleansing, and refugees fleeing Iraq) as to "the Surge."

You want to start accusing Obama of "being wrong" on Iraq? Excuse me, but since when does your opinion carry any weight?

When does yours, space? The surge strategy is working. The graphs don't lie, and Obama has been against the strategy from Day One. The Anbar Awakening happened because Col. MacFarland started his counterinsurgency ahead of Petraeus, but it was the same strategy, and it couldn't have succeeded without it.

I don't disagree that Bush & Co. screwed up many a thing over the years, but picking Petraeus to run things in Iraq wasn't one of them. BTW, it was McCain, as early as November 2003, who said that we needed more troops AND a counterinsurgency strategy to help turn things around. It was Bush who finally came around to McCain's thinking. That's just a simple fact.

As soon as the ad aired, Johnson's campaign was widely criticized for using the prospect of nuclear war, as well as the implication that Goldwater would start one, to frighten voters. The ad was immediately pulled, but the point was made, appearing on the nightly news and on conversation programs in its entirety.

Goldwater's running mate? Curtis LeMay, who advocated the use of nuclear weapons against the Soviets during the cuban missile crisis.

Sorry, Bird, but my opinion carries weight because I have a track record of Being Right on Iraq.

See the difference? People who have consistently Been Wrong do not get that credibility.

The Anbar Awakening happened because Col. MacFarland started his counterinsurgency ahead of Petraeus, but it was the same strategy, and it couldn't have succeeded without it.

Not according to McOld. According to him, the Surge paved the way for Anbar. Another senior moment?

So, McCain believed in the need for the surge since 2003, but put no pressure on the administration to implement it? I'll remind you that Rumslfeld denied the very existence of an insurgency for years. That sounds suspiciously like McCain refusing to try to win the war because crossing the administration would harm his political chances in 2008. Remind me again when McCain was willing to lose a political campaign to win a war?

which directly contradicts his own statements in his own book that he gave the names of the Green Bay Packers' defensive line.

The story in the book is at least plausible. Everybody knew the Packer line up. Their offensive guards were famous for leading the Packer sweep, for heavens sake.

Steelers in the mid sixties, not so much. But you're right. It's telling that he would come up with such an obviously pandering lie on such a trivial matter. It's his MO.

Billie Cat-

I would like to provide you with a citation but unfotunately i don't remember what interview i saw it at and since i am at work i don't have time.
I only post to bust joe's oversensative liberal balls.

The point is all politicians say dunb things they don't mean all the time, Mr. Klein however is simply now jumped to the Obama bandwagon now that Hillary is out of the race.

You really don't have to get so upset. billiecat I actually voted for Obama in the ny primary and may do so in this election ( i actually like both candidates). Being told to shut the #*&$ up by his supporters doesn't really helpl his cause.

You people all really need to calm down some and go back to work

Space, how can you say you're right about Iraq when you're completely wrong about the surge strategy? Sorry, doesn't wash. Nobody has batted 1.000 when it came to Iraq. But in the very most important decision since 2003, Obama chose poorly. He outright rejected the COIN strategy, and he's on the wrong side of history. I agree that the surge in troops didn't pre-date the Anbar Awakening, but the strategy did. You would've seen that, had you bothered to read MacFarland's essay.

Oh, and McCain applied no pressure? Read the timeline. Outside of Hagel, McCain was the only Republican in Congress who criticized Bush for his poor prosecution of the war and he specifically took Rumsfeld to task as well. Read the timeline. McCain consistently brooked his party and his president for the lapses and mistakes.

I suppose Senator McCain is just playing catch up with all of his lapses and mistakes, too. He's got big shoes to fill, after all.

Charles Bird conveniently forgets this:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/sadr-calls-sixmonth-ceasefire-to-prevent-civil-war-463540.html

which is significantly MORE responsible for the reduction in casualties than the troop increases.

The Surge® is was and remains a marketing ploy. Everyone remember "wait until Gen Petraeus gives his report in August" which effectively shut down all debate about our continued occupation.

He also conveniently forgets that our continued occupation is no longer welcomed by the sovereign Iraqi government. If he has any regard for Democracy, Freedom and Self-Determination, he will be forced to conclude that the McCain plan for a permanent occupation is untenable and illegitimate or in short, WRONG!