Bill Kristol’s column reporting his phone interview with Sarah Palin could only be a satire of some sort:
As for the campaign, Palin made clear — without being willing to flat out say so — that she regretted allowing herself to be overly handled and constrained after the Republican convention. ...No, not overly handled and constrained at all.
Since she seemed to have enjoyed the debate, I asked her whether she’d like to take this opportunity to challenge Joe Biden to another one.
There was a pause, and I thought I heard some staff murmuring in the background (we were on speaker phones). She passed on the notion of a challenge.
Kristol prodded her to attack Obama about Rev. Wright without ever asking her about her own witch-hunting pastor. Will no one ever ask her if she believes in witchcraft?
But then today was the day for the Roveian tactic of accusing your opponents of having your own faults. McCain made a speech (the quotes below are from the prepared remarks. There’s a 5-minute excerpt airing on C-SPAN as well. That smile after he thinks he’s gotten in a good one does not serve him well, does it? He also kept having his timing thrown off by the howls from the audience.)
He accused Obama of being too close to Fannie and Freddie, of flip-flopping on issues, of taking illegal foreign campaign donations (as has McCain, in larger amounts), and of being... wait for it... touchy and angry. “whenever I have questioned his policies or his record, he has called me a liar. ... My opponent’s touchiness every time he is questioned about his record should make us only more concerned. ... But ask such questions and all you get in response is another barrage of angry insults.” So if you don’t want a touchy, angry president, vote McCain.
He said that unlike Obama, “I didn’t just show up out of nowhere”. Well, I know Chicago isn’t the metropolis that Wasilla is, but it’s hardly nowhere.
WELL THANKFULLY HE HAS NO NEED OF ANY IMPROVEMENT IN THAT REGARD: “I don’t need lessons about telling the truth to American people. And were I ever to need any improvement in that regard, I probably wouldn’t seek advice from a Chicago politician.”
He accused Obama of having a cunning plan to socialize medicine: see, the fines he would impose on companies that fail to provide adequate health coverage wouldn’t really be intended to force them to provide adequate health coverage but would actually be so small that it would make more economic sense for them to drop health coverage altogether, leaving their employees “only one real option: government run health care.” Oo, that Man from Nowhere is soooo sneaky.
(Update: Larry Rohter of the NYT fact-checks the speech.)
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