From his op-ed in today’s WSJ Opinion-journal:

As Russian tanks and troops moved through the Roki Tunnel and across the internationally recognized border into Georgia, the Russian government stated that it was acting only to protect Ossetians. Yet regime change in Georgia appears to be the true Russian objective.

Imagine that — invading a country with the objective of regime change. Simply unprecedented.

So low even the Post’s Howie Kurtz can no longer ignore it.

McCain’s Ad Formula Employs Lowest Common Denominator

By featuring Paris Hilton and Britney Spears in an attack ad against Barack Obama, the senator from Arizona has risked charges of silliness to draw attention to his frequently overshadowed campaign. And on one level, it has worked: Television, with its love of pop culture, has replayed the spot hundreds of times, and the NBC, MSNBC and Fox morning shows had aides to McCain and Obama debating it Thursday.

At the same time, analysts questioned what message McCain was sending by interspersing footage of his Democratic opponent before a huge crowd in Berlin with that of two socialites famous for their irresponsible antics.

Fairly tepid stuff — compare it to Bob Herbert’s scathing analysis (”Spare me any more drivel about the high-mindedness of John McCain. . . . Both ads were foul, poisonous and emanated from the upper reaches of the Republican Party. “) in the Times — but for Howie talking about a Republican, them’s close to fighting words.

“McCain Charge Against Obama Lacks Evidence” = “John McCain is Lying his ass off”

McCain’s latest attack ad accuses Obama of trying to turn a visit to troops into a media circus — despite the fact that Obama planned to visit troops in Germany unaccompanied by reporters, cameras, or campaign staff. So how does the press report the untruthfulness of McCain’s scurrilous attacks?

McCain Charge Against Obama Lacks Evidence

For four days, Sen. John McCain and his allies have accused Sen. Barack Obama of snubbing wounded soldiers by canceling a visit to a military hospital because he could not take reporters with him, despite no evidence that the charge is true.

The essence of McCain’s allegation is that Obama planned to take a media entourage, including television cameras, to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany during his week-long foreign trip, and that he canceled the visit when he learned he could not do so. “I know that, according to reports, that he wanted to bring media people and cameras and his campaign staffers,” McCain said Monday night on CNN’s “Larry King Live.”

The Obama campaign has denied that was the reason he called off the visit. In fact, there is no evidence that he planned to take anyone to the American hospital other than a military adviser, whose status as a campaign staff member sparked last-minute concern among Pentagon officials that the visit would be an improper political event.

“Absolutely, unequivocally wrong,” Obama spokesman Tommy Vietor said in an e-mail after McCain’s comments to Larry King.

There’s plenty of evidence, however — the problem is the evidence all points to the fact that McCain is lying and — like his honorless predecessor — is using the troops as political pawns. Even after the “lack of evidence” to support the allegation, i.e., the falsity of McCain’s attack, has become clear, the word from the McCain camp is:

McCain’s advisers said they do not intend to back down from the charge, believing it an effective way to create a “narrative” about what they say is Obama’s indifference toward the military.

Got that? Johnny McStraightalk’s campaign believes that lying to the American People is an effective way to create a narrative.

At least the New York Times is starting to notice:

Like Mr. Bush, Mr. McCain confuses opposition to an unnecessary war with a lack of spine and an unwillingness to use force when the nation is truly in danger. Obviously, Mr. Obama is untested as a commander in chief and his trip was intended to reassure voters. But Mr. McCain is as untested in this area as Mr. Obama, and it is hard to imagine a worse role model than the one Mr. McCain seems to be adopting: President Bush.

Many voters are wondering whether a McCain presidency would be an extension of Mr. Bush’s two disastrous terms. If the way Mr. McCain is running his campaign these days is an indication, Americans don’t have to wait until next January for the answer to that one.

Though early in the campaign, McCain is reaching the very lows Bush strived for, in terms of loathesomeness and dishonesty. I wonder how McCain’s illegitimate mulatto love child feels about that?

Even as John McCain makes lowers himself to an elevated level of scumbaggery by falsely accusing Obama of putting politics above national security, it is now manifestly clear that John’s asshole buddy, President Bush, whose campaign tactics McCain is apparently emulating, purposefully put Republican gain over National Security interests by appointing less experienced, less qualified, and less competent lawyers in charge of prosecuting terrorist crimes — because the more experienced, qualified, and competent prosecutors may have had ties to *gasp* Democrats.

And this, mind you, is not in the opinion of the campaign staff of an aged, desperate and mealy-mouthed politico with anger management issues, but according to the inspector general assigned to investigate the whole mess:

Former Justice Department counselor Monica M. Goodling and former chief of staff D. Kyle Sampson routinely broke the law by conducting political litmus tests on candidates for jobs as immigration judges and line prosecutors, according to an inspector general’s report released today.

Goodling passed over hundreds of qualified applicants and squashed the promotions of others after deeming candidates insufficiently loyal to the Republican party, said investigators, who interviewed 85 people and received information from 300 other job seekers at Justice. Sampson developed a system to screen immigration judge candidates based on improper political considerations and routinely took recommendations from the White House Office of Political Affairs and Presidential Personnel, the report said.

And this:

And in another case cited by the inspector general, Ms. Goodling blocked the hiring of an experienced prosecutor for a senior counter-terrorism position because his wife was active in Democratic politics. The candidate was regarded as “head and shoulders above the other candidates” in the view of officials in the executive office of United States attorneys, but they were forced to take a candidate with much less experience because he was deemed acceptable to Ms. Goodling.

Bear this in mind the next time some sanctimonious, angry, white-haired, lying son of a bitch approves of an ad which accuses your Democratic candidate of playing politics with our nation’s security, and point out who really fails to take law enforcement and prosecuting terrorists seriously.

Is he senile, insane, or has he lost the ability to comprehend simple English? Or maybe he’s gotten used to the media overlooking any batshit crazy thing he happens to say, and he’s just careless.

McCainWorld (via Think Progress): “We were greeted as liberators”

Reality: Over 4,000 killed, tens of thousands wounded, many maimed for life. Between 400-1600 attacks against US and coalition forces every week, for the past 240 weeks — but we’re talking about attacks against US and coalition troops numbering in the hundreds of thousands. And McCain calls this. . .

. . . being “greeted as liberators.

McCain seems to inhabit a fantasy world where words mean only what he says they mean, and where reality too is supposed to bend to whatever he happens to say at the time.

So Barack Obama gives a speech in Berlin, and 200,000 enthusiastic people show up to hear his speech and cheer him.

International Herald Tribune: Obama gets pop star reception in Berlin

Senator Barack Obama stood before a sea of people here Thursday evening and issued a call for cooperation, imploring America and Europe to bridge differences and rekindle old alliances in an effort to restore global stability and better confront existing and unforeseen threats.

~~~

Obama, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, who is on a weeklong international tour, delivered his address at the base of the Victory Column in the Tiergarten, a sprawling park in the center of the city.

He looked out toward the Brandenburg Gate, where President Ronald Reagan implored the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev to “tear down that wall” and end the Cold War, and spoke to crowd that the German News Agency DPA estimated at 200,000 people.

The response to Obama has been so warm that the coordinator for German-American relations in the Foreign Ministry here, Karsten Voigt, has tried to scale back expectations. He reminded Germans in interview after interview that Obama would have to support positions unpopular with the German public, like a stronger presence engaged in more fighting for the Bundeswehr, the German army, in Afghanistan.

First and foremost, Obama is popular because he is not Bush, who is wildly unpopular in Germany. Asked why they support Obama, his opposition to the Iraq War usually comes up first.

The excitement in Germany over Obama has grown steadily through the Democratic primaries, reaching its peak with his address herwe Thursday in the Tiergarten, Berlin’s equivalent of Central Park. Obama’s photograph was splashed across the front pages of German newspapers. Leaflets advertising the speech with quotes from Presisent John F. Kennedy — who came to this divided city at the height of the Cold War and urged those who did not believe in freedom: “Let them come to Berlin” — fluttered in the street.

Reaction from Grumpy McCain:

“”Well, I’d love to give a speech in Germany … a political speech or a speech that maybe the German people would be interested in. . . ” “But I would much prefer to do it as president of the United States rather than as a candidate for the office of the presidency.”

Or, shorter John McCain:

Hmmmmpph!

If I were Senator Greenscreenspeech, the last thing I would do is draw attention to Senator Obama’s speeches.

After claiming teh Surge, which was announced in January 2007 and implemented beginning in March 2007 was responsible for the Anbar Awakening which was already a marked success 7 months earlier, John McCain explains that “he knew that” the surge didn’t really take place until months after the Awakening, but claimed that “components” of teh Surge were implemented before its architect was assigned command, and before the surge itself was conceived, announced or implemented, and that these precocious “components” were still somehow responsible for the Awakening:

McCain asserted he knew that and didn’t commit a gaffe. “A surge is really a counterinsurgency made up of a number of components. … I’m not sure people understand that `surge’ is part of a counterinsurgency.”

Actually, the “Surge” is short for “Troop Surge,” the decision to send additional combat brigades to Iraq in 2007. And the Penatagon just announced, with the withdrawal of the last additional combat brigade, that “the Surge is over,” making it clear that the surge refers to increased troop levels implemented in 2007, not any “counterinsurgency” strategy implemented in 2006, as McCain tries to dissemble. Unless, of course, McCain contends that we are no longer conducting a counterinsurgency in Iraq. In which case, our troops can leave now.

One of the least appealing and most ruinous facets of Bush’s Presidency is his inability to admit any mistake, no matter how obvious the mistake or unavoidable the admission. McCain seems to share this mania for claiming perfection, bristling at any suggestion that he is in error or out of touch, no matter how erroneous or out of touch he is. Four more years of errors unaccompanied by any capacity for self-reflection or acknowledgment of mistakes is hardly a blueprint for repairing the damage done by Bush, or the errors of his policies.

McCain, of course, apparently doesn’t recognize those errors or the damage caused by them, which is hardly a comfort either.

Steve Benen:

I don’t doubt that this is terribly embarrassing for him — the surge is his signature issue; presumably he should know what the surge is — but by trying to retroactively redefine the meaning of unambiguous words, he makes an embarrassing mistake a humiliating scandal. The smart move would be to admit the error and move on. But not this guy — he’s fallen in a hole and keeps on digging.

~~~~

And where does that leave us? McCain’s argument effectively boils down to this: “The surge is whatever I say it is, on any given day.”

Indeed, McCain’s quibbling attempts to deny his mistake seems curiouser and curiouser the more one delves into it.

“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said, in a rather scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less.”

“The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.”

“The question is,” said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master - that’s all.”
– Through the Looking Glass

MORE: Obisidian Wings also greets its readers with Carrollian analogies — great minds and all that. (via Balloon Juice)

John McCain has his own Mission Accomplished Moment:

The comments come a day after the Arizona senator appeared to make a rhetorical shift in how he described conditions the war-torn country, telling reporters aboard his campaign bus that “we have succeeded in Iraq.”

“I repeat my statement that we have succeeded in Iraq. Not ‘We are succeeding.’ We have succeeded in Iraq,” he said Thursday.

Naturally, victory will take the form of spectacular attacks in Iraq:

“I predict that they will make an attempt as we get in to the election season to make more of these spectacular kinds of attacks which they’re still capable of doing,” he said. “The suicide bombers, et cetera, would not surprise me and we’ve already found out that they’re going to try and step up their attacks and try and do things in a more spectacular fashion so that they can erode the support of the Maliki government.”

As a not-so-great man once said:

Damn:

A Times/Bloomberg Poll says that in a two-man contest, 49% of respondents favor Barack Obama, while 37% support John McCain. With Ralph Nader and Bob Barr added to the mix, Obama holds 15-point edge.

Those aren’t good numbers for McCain. And there’s more:

Moreover, McCain suffers from a pronounced “enthusiasm gap,” especially among the conservatives who usually give Republican candidates a reliable base of support. Among voters who describe themselves as conservative, only 58% say they will vote for McCain; 15% say they will vote for Obama, 14% say they will vote for someone else, and 13% say they are undecided.

Eroding and lukewarm support. And we haven’t seen any more of those contrast-and-compare speeches like the night Obama wowed 20,000 while McCain stumbled through the Green Screen fiasco.

Thankfully, McCain won’t be able to read this article until tomorrow, when they take it from the magick internets (of which McCain is aware, but doesn’t use) and print it in tomorrow’s edition.