Pwned By Bill Ayers, Ferchrissakes

You don't need to respect Bill Ayers' past actions to respect the unbelievable stupidity of the wingnut faction.

[Y]ou shouldn’t believe everything you hear about me, [Ayers said,] you know nothing about me. I said, I know plenty–I’m from Chicago, a conservative blogger, and I’ll post this [...]

Then unprompted he said–I wrote Dreams From My Father. I said, oh, so you admit it. He said–Michelle asked me to. I looked at him. He seemed eager. He’s about my height, short. He went on to say–and if you can prove it, we can split the royalties. So I said, stop pulling my leg. Horrible thought. But he came again–I really wrote it, the wording was similar. I said I believe you probably heavily edited it. He said–I wrote it. I said–why would I believe you, you’re a liar.

He had no answer to that. Just looked at me. Then he turned and walked off, and said again his bit about my proving it and splitting the proceeds.

Unbelievably, a good bit of the wingnutosphere picked this up and ran with it today.

Ayers is messing with conservatives. People he’s duped so far: Jonah Goldberg, his mother Lucianne Goldberg, Tom Maguire, Dennis Byrne, Carol Platt Lieblau, and a bunch of other conservatives, some of whom try to split the difference by suggesting that Ayers is revealing a little bit of truth behind the sarcasm. How embarrassing.

More morons believing that Bill Ayers would just blurt out a wingnut conspiracy theory here. If Confederate Yankee is the smartly suspicious one in this scenario, your movement is bankrupt.

Unified Field Theory of Crazy

I think that this ad does it. What a harmonic convergence!



They missed a chance to lump ACORN, Rev. Wright and Communist Cuba in there with Sotomayor and Bill Ayers, but this is really a fine start. Maybe they should start a groundswell for the Obama to nominate the birther who refused combat duty to Afghanistan because the President isn't a natural-born citizen for Secretary of Defense. That would complete the circle.

Can We Get Letterman To Anchor The Evening News, Then?

It's pretty revolting that the only guy on the media landscape who can ask a decent follow-up question is a comedian.

Letterman questioned him about Palin's claim that Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama "palled around with terrorists," and McCain backed her up, saying his opponent need to better explain his relationship with former Weather Underground activist William Ayers.

"Did you not have a relationship with Gordon Liddy?" Letterman asked about Watergate burglar G. Gordon Liddy.

McCain said he knew him. Then, after a commercial break, McCain said, "I know Gordon Liddy. He paid his debt, he went to prison ... I'm not in any was embarrassed to know Gordon Liddy."

"You understand the same case could be made of your relationship with him as is being made with William Ayers?" Letterman said.

McCain said he has been completely open about his relationship with Liddy.

Letterman appeared to ridicule McCain about the implication that Obama and Ayers had a relationship.

"Are they double-dating, are they going to dinner, what are they doing?" Letterman asked. "Are they driving across country?"

"Maybe going to Denny's," McCain said.

Letterman said that Obama was 8 when Ayers was 29, and McCain appeared exasperated. "There's millions of words said in a campaign. C'mon, Dave," he said.

That, people, is how you interview someone. The idea that you can't ask tough questions because you might offend someone's delicate sensibilities is absurd. And yes, Gordon Liddy is a domestic terrorist.

Media Matters for America has previously noted McCain's ties to Liddy. Liddy served four and a half years in prison in connection with his conviction for his role in the Watergate break-in and the break-in at the office of the psychiatrist of Daniel Ellsberg, the military analyst who leaked the Pentagon Papers. Liddy has acknowledged preparing to kill someone during the Ellsberg break-in "if necessary"; plotting to kill journalist Jack Anderson; plotting with a "gangland figure" to kill Howard Hunt to stop him from cooperating with investigators; plotting to firebomb the Brookings Institution; and plotting to kidnap "leftist guerillas" at the 1972 Republican National Convention -- a plan he outlined to the Nixon administration using terminology borrowed from the Nazis. (The murder, firebombing, and kidnapping plots were never carried out; the break-ins were.)

But he's a radio host, so he's a media member in good standing, I guess.

Hey Schieffer, Incorporate Some Breaking News

Waiting on the debate, which I think has about a 50/50 chance of turning into a smear factory. But if it does, it would be nice if Bob Schieffer could work it around to one of today's top stories and see what the Maverick would have to say in his defense:

Early in 2007, just as her husband launched his presidential bid, Cindy McCain decided to resolve an old problem -- the lack of cellular telephone coverage on her remote 15-acre ranch near Sedona, nestled deep in a tree-lined canyon called Hidden Valley.

By the time Sen. John McCain's presidential bid was in full swing this summer, the ranch had wireless coverage from the two cellular companies most often used by campaign staff -- Verizon Wireless and AT&T.

Verizon delivered a portable tower know as a "cell site on wheels" -- free of charge -- to Cindy McCain's property in June in response to an online request from Cindy McCain's staff early last year. Such devices are usually reserved for restoring service when cell coverage is knocked out during emergencies, such as hurricanes.

In July, AT&T followed suit, wheeling in a portable tower for free to match Verizon's offer. "This is an unusual situation," said AT&T spokeswoman Claudia B. Jones. "You can't have a presidential nominee in an area where there is not cell coverage."

If you think this sounds perfectly reasonable, consider that Ted Stevens is facing jail time for pretty much exactly the same thing. Oh, and the McCain campaign's spin is that the Secret Service made him do it - which the Secret Service denies.

"The Washington Post story regarding Verizon providing a cell tower to the McCain Ranch is wrong," (Verizon PR guy) Thonis said. "Verizon received a request from Mrs. McCain, but declined.

"Subsequent to that, the Secret Service made a legitimate request for a temporary tower for its work and Verizon complied as is required by our contract with the agency. The Secret Service request, made on May 28, specifically said it needed the service urgently and requested that Verizon 'explore every possible means of providing an alternative cellular or data communications source in the referenced area and provide any short term implementation of any type as a solution in the interim."

But James Grimaldi, the Post reporter who broke the story, has the Secret Service saying they did not formally request the tower.

Secret Service spokesman Eric Zahren told the paper: "This was something that was being addressed before we were out there."

Just the Verizon flack's protestations are revealing. They confirm that Cindy McCain asked for a cell phone tower for her personal use - and pretty much only the McCain family's use, as there are few other homes in the area. They confirm that the request was in well before McCain took the nomination.

McCain, of course, regulates these phone companies as part of his day job, and mixes with their lobbyists on his campaign staff.

Ethics lawyers said Cindy McCain's dealings with the wireless companies stand out because Sen. John McCain is a senior member of the Senate Commerce Committee, which oversees the Federal Communications Commission and the telecommunications industry. He has been a leading advocate for industry-backed legislation, fighting regulations and taxes on telecommunications services. (he was a past chair of the Commerce Committee, too -ed.)

McCain and his campaign have close ties to Verizon and AT&T. Five campaign officials, including campaign manager Rick Davis, have worked as lobbyists for Verizon. Former McCain staffer Robert Fisher is an in-house lobbyist for Verizon and is volunteering for the campaign. Fisher, Verizon chief executive Ivan Seidenberg and company lobbyists have raised more than $1.3 million for McCain's presidential campaign and Verizon employees are among the top 20 corporate donors over McCain's political career, giving more than $155,000 to his campaigns.

McCain's Senate chief of staff Mark Buse, senior strategist Charles R. Black Jr., and several other campaign staffers have registered as AT&T lobbyists in the past. AT&T Executive Vice President Timothy McKone and AT&T lobbyists have raised more than $2.3 million for McCain. AT&T employees have donated more than $325,000 to McCain campaigns, putting the company in the No. 3 spot for career donations to McCain, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.

I don't know, rather than Bill Ayers, that might be something the public would like to know, Mr. Schieffer.

Or, you could mention the international terrorists tied to John McCain, otherwise known as "anti-Castro Cubans".

Ayers And The Debate

I think people are misreading this. John McCain did NOT vow to raise Ayers in the debate. Listen to the audio. He passive-aggressively leaned on Bob Schieffer to bring it up. He feigns astonishment at Obama saying that he wasn't man enough to talk about McCain to his face, and explains that "it wasn't a topic" that came up in the Brokaw debate. Then he says that "I think that guarantees it will be a topic" tonight.

If McCain answers a health care question with "Bill Ayers bombed the Pentagon," he loses. But if Schieffer raises it, he isn't dinged for bringing it up. They want Schieffer to raise it, and considering Bob's brother is the current US Ambassador to Japan, I think they may get their wish.

McCain wants to take the high road and the low road at the same time. He will not bring up Bill Ayers unprompted. He will wait for the question to be fed to him by Bob Schieffer. And Schieffer is subtly giving away his punch.

The veteran "Face the Nation" host won't telegraph what he will ask. But he said he will be seeking more details about their potential presidencies than have been evident so far.

I say he goes for it.

Schieffer, you recall, is the guy who couldn't fathom how being shot down in a plane over Vietnam wasn't a qualification for the Presidency. If there's anyone who's willing to save McCain's honor, it's Schieffer.

Barack Obama Just Doesn't Understand Ordinary American Racists

Barack Obama had a few words today for the increasingly eliminationist tone of McCain campaign rallies.

I think that folks are looking for something different. It’s easy to rile up a crowd by stoking anger and division. But that’s not what we need right now in the United States. The times are too serious. The challenges are too great. The American people aren’t looking for someone who can divide this country – they’re looking for someone who will lead it. We’re in a serious crisis - now, more than ever, it is time to put country ahead of politics. Now, more than ever, it is time to bring change to Washington so that it works for the people of this country that we love.

So the McCain campaign tries to pivot into some backlash politics as a response, but it's an awkward flail that pretty much makes no sense at all:

"Barack Obama's attacks on Americans who support John McCain reveal far more about him than they do about John McCain. It is clear that Barack Obama just doesn't understand regular people and the issues they care about. He dismisses hardworking middle class Americans as clinging to guns and religion, while at the same time attacking average Americans at McCain rallies who are angry at Washington, Wall Street and the status quo.

"Even worse, he attacks anyone who dares to question his readiness to serve as their commander in chief in chief. Raising legitimate questions about record, character and judgment are a vital part of the Democratic process, and Barack Obama's effort to silence and shame those who seek answers should make everyone wonder exactly what he is hiding."

They actually had American media's punching bag, Tucker Bounds, trotting out this message today.

I mean, this is just pathetic. Obama responds to calls to "Kill him" and instances of rally mobs yelling "Terrorist!" and "Treason," and he's attacking them? Also, it's kind of hard to imagine McCain claiming that Obama "doesn't understand regular people and the issues they care about" when his own aide thinks the stock market dive isn't worth talking about:

McCain didn't talk about the stock market yesterday, and didn't put out a statement on it, while Obama did both, and McCain campaign manager Rick Davis was asked about that on a conference call (about Acorn!) this afternoon.

"There’s very little a candidate for president can say and very little the president can say about what’s happening in the stock markets except hope that they correct themselves," Davis said, adding that McCain's mortgage plan could be an "elixir" for the financial crisis [...]

The campaign, he said, shouldn't become a "CNBC news show on the stock market."

People aren't worrying about their life savings dropping into the toilet, after all, they're far more concerned about Weather Underground bombings in the late 1960s.

I guess that McCain tried to calm the masses today, but you can't put the genie back in the bottle. He unleashed these forces and he's ultimately responsible for them.

But then something weird happens: He acknowledges the "energy" people have been showing at rallies, and how glad he is that people are excited. But, he says, "I respect Sen. Obama and his accomplishments." People booed at the mention of his name. McCain, visibly angry, stopped them: "I want EVERYONE to be respectful, and lets make sure we are."

The very next questioner tried to push back on this request, noting that he needed to "tell the American the TRUTH about Barack Obama" -- a not very subtle way, I think, to ask John McCain to NOT tell the truth about Barack Obama. McCain told her there's a "difference between record and rhetoric, and I plan to talk about his record, respectfully... I don't mean that has to reduce your ferocity, I just mean it has to be respectful."

And then later, again, someone dangled a great big piece of low-hanging fruit in front of McCain: "I'm scared to bring up my child in a world where Barack Obama is president."

McCain replies, "Well, I don't want him to be president, either. I wouldn't be running if I did. But," and he pauses for emphasis, "you don't have to be scared to have him be President of the United States." A round of boos.

And he snaps back: "Well, obviously I think I'd be better. " [...]

UPDATE: Indeed, he just snatched the microphone out the hands of a woman who began her question with, "I'm scared of Barack Obama... he's an Arab terrorist..."

"No, no ma'am," he interrupted. "He's a decent family man with whom I happen to have some disagreements."

Tough beans, John. You lost your honor quite a while ago. No redemptions.

The Descent Into Madness

Dan Balz looks like a complete idiot for trying to balance the character attacks from the Barack Obama campaign and John McCain campaign, as the crowds of screaming hordes at McCain rallies sink deeper and deeper into the sewer.

"He promised higher taxes on electricity," McCain charged at the event in La Crosse, Wisconsin. "He voted for the Democratic budget resolution that promised to raise taxes on people making just $42,000 a year." At that point, the woman yelled "traitor," and both McCain and his wife Cindy appeared to look in her direction.

The Arizona Senator continued with his stump speech without referencing her.

There is nothing ingenuous about this. McCain and the RNC are raising the Bill Ayers issue every chance they get, and top surrogates are calling Obama "a guy of the street". The ugliness is widespread and the demonization is palpable.

Thursday's debate took place in front of a highly partisan crowd in the GOP stronghold of Middle Georgia.

Chambliss supporters waved "Saxby" signs and offered up a sustained "boos" when Martin mentioned Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama.

"Bomb Obama," one woman hollered.

I don't buy the hand-wringing from the McCain campaign for one minute. They're trying to make this a question of Obama hiding his true self, but given that he failed to disclose his own ties to the radical right-wing US Council for World Freedom, given that Sarah Palin has deep roots with secessionists and radical extremists in Alaska, given that Charles Keating, who bilked the US government out of billions, wrote a mash note to McCain in the 1980s pronouncing "I'm yours until death do us part," the idea of secrecy and character is one of true projection. Not to mention the fact that linking Obama to Ayers is ridiculous, so says THE PROSECUTOR OF THE WEATHER UNDERGROUND.

They are trying to make Obama illegitimate and unfit, and doing it in the nastiest, most dangerous way, practically inciting his supporters to riot. It's got saner people lamenting this lynch mob mentality.

"People need to understand, for moral reasons and the protection of our civil society, the differences with Senator Obama are ideological, based on clear differences on policy and a lack of experience compared to Senator McCain," Weaver said. "And from a purely practical political vantage point, please find me a swing voter, an undecided independent, or a torn female voter that finds an angry mob mentality attractive."

Republicans with a shred of honor are backing away from McCain with speed:

He endorsed John McCain in the presidential primary, but now former Republican Gov. William Milliken is expressing doubts about his party's nominee.

"He is not the McCain I endorsed," said Milliken, reached at his Traverse City home Thursday. "He keeps saying, 'Who is Barack Obama?' I would ask the question, 'Who is John McCain?' because his campaign has become rather disappointing to me.

"I'm disappointed in the tenor and the personal attacks on the part of the McCain campaign, when he ought to be talking about the issues."

Including William F. Buckley's son.

It's not just a dangerous path that McCain is walking down, it's one devoid of honor. And if he winds up with blood on his hands, may he never forget it.

And Again And Again And Again

McCain's campaign touts Obama's association with Bill Ayers: then his endorsement list includes the President of the Annenberg Foundation, the originator of the board where Obama and Ayers sat jointly.

Sarah Palin calls Obama un-American and his associations troubling, and then it turns out the secessionist party where she spoke and to which her husband belongs has a virulently anti-American streak and ties to Iran.

McCain and Palin criticize Obama for talking about US troops causing civilian casualties in Afghanistan when McCain did the same thing with respect to Bosnia.

McCain says you need to speak softly and carry a big stick in foreign affairs and yet he's the guy who sang "Bomb Iran" and called for the annihilation of North Korea and a quick commencement of war with Iraq.

Conservatives get peeved at Obama's correct pronunciation of the word "Pakistan," when... oh geez, where do I begin?

This is getting ridiculous now. It's become a campaign of projection. They criticize Obama while implicitly criticizing themselves. And it's all substance-free, as they have no use for ideas.

[Sarah Palin] represents a fatal cancer to the Republican party. When I first started in journalism, I worked at the National Review for Bill Buckley. And Buckley famously said he'd rather be ruled by the first 2,000 names in the Boston phone book than by the Harvard faculty. But he didn't think those were the only two options. He thought it was important to have people on the conservative side who celebrated ideas, who celebrated learning. And his whole life was based on that, and that was also true for a lot of the other conservatives in the Reagan era. Reagan had an immense faith in the power of ideas. But there has been a counter, more populist tradition, which is not only to scorn liberal ideas but to scorn ideas entirely. And I'm afraid that Sarah Palin has those prejudices. I think President Bush has those prejudices.

The only thing wrong about that is the notion that the Republican Party was ever a party of ideas in the first place (sorry, Barack, they weren't. They were about hiding behind the fig leaf of "ideas" to promote profit-taking for the rich).

...This is brilliant, by the way.

Said Obama: "I am surprised that, you know, we've been seeing some pretty over-the-top attacks coming out of the McCain campaign over the last several days, that he wasn't willing to say it to my face. But I guess we've got one last debate. So presumably, if he ends up feeling that he needs to, he will raise it during the debate."

This will make McCain mental, since he can't say it to his face or all the remaining independent support will wither. McCain is boxed in and now he's being called out as a coward. Great strategy.

Immolation

There's a story out today that the Presidential campaign has somehow "shifted back" to the economy because John McCain didn't run out last night and tell Barack Obama to his face that he was a Muslim terrorist. And the Politico got these very nice little quotes from McCain staffers that "proved" this.

After days of attempts to persuade voters that Obama’s ties to ‘60s radical Bill Ayers are a crucial character issue, McCain didn’t mention Ayers’ name during the 90 minutes of Tuesday’s forum. His top aides suggested afterward that, going forward, the candidate wouldn’t focus on the former domestic terrorist nor invoke the name of Obama’s controversial pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

Nicolle Wallace, a top McCain adviser, hinted McCain would not bring it up. “If asked about it, of course [he’ll talk about Ayers],” she said.

McCain’s chief strategist, Steve Schmidt all but said the controversial pastor remained off-limits.

“What Sen. McCain has said is that it’s not an issue he intends to talk about in the race,” said the aide, though he did note that Obama himself had called Wright 'fair game.'

But Schmidt did say without prompting: “You’ve not seen Sen. McCain advertise on [Wright]."

Apparently, the institutional memory of the Washington press corps has been erased. These things aren't meant to be frontal assaults - George H.W. Bush only brought up Willie Horton in a debate in 1988 after Dukakis approached the subject first. These things happen in the background, over email, through whisper campaigns, and once they're in the ether they don't need to be hyped again and again. It's "out there."

But McCain's campaign isn't as deft as those in the past, for a particular reason which I'll get to in a moment. As for the idea that the McCain campaign's given up on the character attacks, um, no:

ARLINGTON, VA -- Today, John M. Murtagh made the following statement on Barack Obama's relationship with William Ayers:

"When I was 9 years-old the Weather Underground, the terrorist group founded by Barack Obama's friend William Ayers, firebombed my house. Barack Obama has dismissed concerns about his relationship with Ayers by noting that he was only a child when Ayers was planting bombs at the Pentagon and the U.S. Capitol. But Ayers has never apologized for his crimes, he has reveled in them, expressing regret only for the fact that he didn't do more [...]

"Barack Obama may have been a child when William Ayers was plotting attacks against U.S. targets -- but I was one of those targets. Barack Obama's friend tried to kill my family."

John McCain has a problem. He isn't trusted by the base and so he must appeal to their darkest instincts, but every time he does so he turns off independents. Indeed, during the debate, every time he launched an attack, such as they were, the dials plummeted. But without his base he's sunk and he has no ground game, so attack he must. That's why Sarah Palin is taking the Agnew role and whipping crowds into a frenzy (and Joe Biden is right to call her on it), but McCain is backing away and hedging. That's why his campaign is taking tentative steps in the water with the Ayers and Rezko and Wright stuff but never full steps. They know they must take the campaign into the gutter, but every time they do they destroy this carefully cultivated "honorable" brand, which was never true in reality, but also the only way he could ever win in a down Republican year.

The further problem is that the tentative steps are ugly enough to provoke anger and distaste. And of course, these are ill-suited times for the Republican playbook of smear and fear. Heck, even the racists are undecided.

An Obama supporter, who canvassed for the candidate in the working-class, white Philadelphia neighborhood of Fishtown recently, sends over an account that, in various forms, I've heard a lot in recent weeks.

"What's crazy is this," he writes. "I was blown away by the outright racism, but these folks are f***ing undecided. They would call him a n----r and mention how they don't know what to do because of the economy."

I'm from Philly and I know Fishtown, and that rings very, very true.

The end result is that you get this lurching, haphazard, erratic campaign. Last night we saw the "compassionate conservative" asking for the government to buy out struggling mortgages (an idea that is far less than meets the eye - he would buy homes at full face value instead of what they're actually worth - a huge payoff to the banks). In the same breath, by the way, he calls for a spending freeze on all but the most vital programs. And by this morning, there are Ayers attacks and new ads calling Obama "secretive". There's no rhyme or reason to any of it because of the enormous self-generated bind, having to please the wingnuts and simultaneously cut them off, having to strike a populist tone and simultaneously please his corporate paymasters and lobbyist staff, having to play to win while every attack hurts his own image.

McCain is running a self-negating campaign.

Is There Anyone Worse Than Alan Colmes?

Here Robert Gibbs is going along with the perfect response to Sean Hannity's Ayers obsession, asking if Hannity is an anti-Semite because he had a known anti-Semite as the centerpiece of his smear job show on Barack Obama, and Alan Colmes throws the lifeline:



Hannity is bobbing and weaving, knowing that he's caught, hiding behind this idea that he's a "journalist" and he talks to a lot of people with whom he disagrees, which is completely besides the point because he made this Andy Martin guy the centerpiece of the show and completely agrees with his thoughts about Obama... and along comes Colmes, saying "Sean is not an anti-Semite."

That's not the point, Alan. The point is how guilt by association is simply idiotic. And the thing is, I've heard Colmes use the same kind of logic on his radio show. But I guess Hannity was feeling too much heat, and somebody in the booth zapped Colmes and told him to do his duty as the Fox News "liberal" lickspittle.

Pathetic.

Smear Campaign Follies

Boy, the media is making a hash of these smear jobs and attempts to segue the campaigns into irrelevancy. The first problem is that they're covering this stuff so intently in the first place. Reporters do not have to be conduits for oppo research if they don't want to be. They keep talking about whether these stories will be a "distraction" while reporting them, making the distraction themselves. The second, more glaring problem, and why the first problem is so important, is that they don't know how to cover these things responsibly.

I saw this on CNN early this morning. John Roberts was talking about the smear campaign, trying to do the equivalency dance, and actually said (I'm paraphrasing) "Obama is trying to tie McCain to the Keating Five". Now, maybe I'm wrong, but isn't that like saying John Lennon was "tied" to the Beatles? He was a Beatle! John McCain WAS one of the Keating Five.

The media doesn't have a relevance or salience filter. A question raised about Bill Ayers=a question raised about Charles Keating. But the two aren't equal, nor are they equally relevant. Similarly, what the candidates are saying in their defense/explanation of these stories is also not equal. John Dowd flat-out lied to reporters yesterday in claiming that John McCain never knew about his wife's investment in a Keating strip mall. He ASKED THE QUESTION during the ethics committee hearings, fercryinoutloud. On the other hand, Republicans in Illinois consider smearing Obama with the Ayers connection to be ridiculous.

Because they are simply terrible at determining facts in the face of spin, and because they prefer to act as detached observers rather than the vital editors who decide what does and does not get covered, reporters should just stay away from this toxic stuff entirely.

Associates

The McCain campaign is headed directly into the gutter. Their Vice President is acquainting audiences with William Ayers, and their latest ad basically implicates Obama in murdering the troops:



(By the way, air-raiding and bombing civilians IS why Afghanistan is going so poorly.)

Even Reverend Wright is starting to get mentioned.

McCain's campaign desperately wants to turn the page on the economy, as if everyone's pockets will be magically filled with money over the next 30 days. The country remains in a serious crisis, and McCain is out there talking about random people like William Ayers.

Now THAT'S disrespectful.

But if you want to go down this road, fine. We can discuss Phil Gramm, for instance:

Gramm was always Wall Street's man in the Senate. As chairman of the Senate Banking Committee during the Clinton administration, he consistently underfunded the Securities and Exchange Commission and kept it from stopping accounting firms from auditing corporations with which they had conflicts of interest. Gramm's piece de resistance came on Dec. 15, 2000, when he slipped into an omnibus spending bill a provision called the Commodity Futures Modernization Act (CFMA), which prohibited any governmental regulation of credit default swaps, those insurance policies covering losses on securities in the event they went belly up. As the housing bubble ballooned, the face value of those swaps rose to a tidy $62 trillion. And as the housing bubble burst, those swaps became a massive pile of worthless paper, because no government agency had required the banks to set aside money to back them up.

The CFMA also prohibited government regulation of the energy-trading market, which enabled Enron to nearly bankrupt the state of California before bankrupting itself.

The problem with this exercise, of course, is that Gramm's relationship to McCain is not comparable to the relationships that Ayers or Wright have with Obama. The idea that either Ayers or Wright would have any impact on the workings of an Obama administration is nonsensical. But Gramm and McCain do have an enduring political and economic alliance. McCain chaired Gramm's short-lived presidential campaign in 1996; Gramm is co-chair of McCain's current effort. McCain has not repudiated reports that Gramm is on the shortlist to become Treasury secretary if McCain is elected, even after Gramm labeled America "a nation of whiners."

And we can talk about Charles Keating.

The current economic crisis demands that we understand John McCain's attitudes about economic oversight and corporate influence in federal regulation. Nothing illustrates the danger of his approach more clearly than his central role in the savings and loan scandal of the late '80s and early '90s.

John McCain was accused of improperly aiding his political patron, Charles Keating, chairman of the Lincoln Savings and Loan Association. The bipartisan Senate Ethics Committee launched investigations and formally reprimanded Senator McCain for his role in the scandal -- the first such Senator to receive a major party nomination for president.

At the heart of the scandal was Keating's Lincoln Savings and Loan Association, which took advantage of deregulation in the 1980s to make risky investments with its depositors' money. McCain intervened on behalf of Charles Keating with federal regulators tasked with preventing banking fraud, and championed legislation to delay regulation of the savings and loan industry -- actions that allowed Keating to continue his fraud at an incredible cost to taxpayers.

When the savings and loan industry collapsed, Keating's failed company put taxpayers on the hook for $3.4 billion and more than 20,000 Americans lost their savings. John McCain was reprimanded by the bipartisan Senate Ethics Committee, but the ultimate cost of the crisis to American taxpayers reached more than $120 billion.

Unlike Ayers and Wright, Gramm and Keating have a DIRECT connection to the type of deregulation and free market fundamentalism that has led us to the current economic crisis. There is a through-line there that is undeniable, and you can easily see how McCain's Presidency would be guided by the same forces. Hell, Gramm could be the Treasury Secretary just given all those expansive powers.

You can see a long documentary on McCain and Keating at Keating Economics after noon ET today.

These are more serious times, but the Obama campaign can play the guilt by association game if that's where McCain wants to go.

Palin' Around

So Sarah Palin thinks Barack Obama is a scary terrorist-lover who doesn't view America the same way "regular people" do. For proof, she cited a strategically placed New York Times piece and claimed that the paper of record is hardly ever wrong, and considering that the article says that Obama and Bill Ayers "do not appear to be close," maybe she's right. The Obama campaign mentioned this as well:

"Governor Palin's comments, while offensive, are not surprising, given the McCain campaign's statement this morning that they would be launching Swiftboat-like attacks in hopes of deflecting attention from the nation's economic ills. In fact, the very newspaper story Governor Palin cited in hurling her shameless attack made clear that Senator Obama is not close to Bill Ayers, much less 'pals,' and that he has strongly condemned the despicable acts Ayers committed 40 years ago, when Obama was eight. What's clear is that John McCain and Sarah Palin would rather spend their time tearing down Barack Obama than laying out a plan to build up our economy," said Obama-Biden spokesman Hari Sevugan.

Interesting that the McCain campaign turns on a dime in promoting New York Times articles a couple weeks after calling them "an Obama advocacy group" and "no longer a viable news organization."

Obama's already pre-butting the attacks on the air.



(On the YouTube page, Obama's campaign has a contribute link through Google Checkout. They are light-years ahead of anyone online.)

And of course, it's beyond crazy to have Sarah Palin give voice to the charges that Obama is somehow un-American, when her own husband belonged to a political party that advocated secession from the United States.

...and the John McCain relationship with convicted felon G.Gordon Liddy ought to merit a mention, although conservative thieves and prisoners are always rehabilitated, of course.

Low Road

And this would be different how?

Sen. John McCain and his Republican allies are readying a newly aggressive assault on Sen. Barack Obama's character, believing that to win in November they must shift the conversation back to questions about the Democrat's judgment, honesty and personal associations, several top Republicans said.

With just a month to go until Election Day, McCain's team has decided that its emphasis on the senator's biography as a war hero, experienced lawmaker and straight-talking maverick is insufficient to close a growing gap with Obama. The Arizonan's campaign is also eager to move the conversation away from the economy, an issue that strongly favors Obama and has helped him to a lead in many recent polls.

"We're going to get a little tougher," a senior Republican operative said, indicating that a fresh batch of television ads is coming. "We've got to question this guy's associations. Very soon. There's no question that we have to change the subject here," said the operative, who was not authorized to discuss strategy and spoke on the condition of anonymity [...]

"We are looking for a very aggressive last 30 days," said Greg Strimple, one of McCain's top advisers. "We are looking forward to turning a page on this financial crisis and getting back to discussing Mr. Obama's aggressively liberal record and how he will be too risky for Americans."

That's not just ridiculous, it reveals a crucial lack of understanding of the situation we're in. The financial crisis isn't going anywhere. The plan has been approved but not has to be implemented, and that could easily go awry and very quickly. Wall Street is already making noises that $700 billion isn't enough, and car dealerships are operating under such narrow margins that a whole bunch might go under. There is no "snap your fingers" moment here, and people witnessing a nation on the brink aren't likely to pivot and give a flying crap about Bill Ayers.

Not that the New York Times isn't trying to help any way they can, of course. But the low road isn't likely to be smooth terrain this year. Doesn't mean that Obama can safely ignore it. But it feels like flailing.

And it's hardly an October surprise - they've been doing this for 30 years, and McCain lost his honor in this campaign a long time ago.

"This Will Be A Respectable Campaign"

John McCain is going into the gutter six months early:

During the debate, Barack Obama once again refused to condemn former President Jimmy Carter- who publicly supports Obama- for holding talks with the Hamas terrorist group, a group supported financially, politically and military by Iran.

Barack Obama's foreign policy plans have even won him praise from Hamas leaders. Ahmed Yousef, chief political adviser to the Hamas Prime Minister said, "We like Mr. Obama and we hope he will win the election. He has a vision to change America."

We need change in America, but not the kind of change that wins kind words from Hamas, surrenders in Iraq and will hold unconditional talks with Iranian President Ahmadinejad.

Damn Obama, not using that mind control we all know he can use, and stopping random people from making positive statements about him!

This continued today, with McCain using the opportunity provided by Boy George Stephanopoulos (thanks, George!) to dredge up the William Ayers smear.

"I'm sure he's very patriotic," McCain said of Obama. "But his relationship with Mr. Ayers is open to question."

McCain added: "He became friends with him and spent time with him while the guy was unrepentant over his activities as a member of a terrorist organization, the Weathermen."

Message received: Obama is a terrorist. That's really where we're ending up. And it's wholly unsurprising that McCain's claims to want "a respectable campaign" are falling to the wayside with a series of flailing attacks. I just didn't think it would happen this early.

The 11th Day Of September Happened On 9-11!

I think the most despicable moment in last night's debate was Boy George Stephanopoulos' Hannity-fed question about William Ayers, and particularly the "look what he wrote in the New York Times on 9-11" remark. Please. I know you can't read, Boy George, but the thing is that newspapers come out early in the morning, meaning that Ayers wrote what he wrote on 9-10, and the correlation is nothing more than incidental.

That Clinton parroted this, referencing 9-11 with an alacrity that would rival Rudy 9iu11iani, is quite disgusting. She's really crossed over into a full Republican campaign mode. Her TV ads are almost totally negative, and her justification is that "The Republicans will bring it up in the fall," apparently allowing her to... campaign like a Republican. This has an impact. I had a discussion with my Hillary-supporting dad last night and I might as well have been talking to Bill O'Reilly.

It's I guess comforting to know that if Hillary is behind in the fall she'll fight dirty, but of course this campaign in ensuring that if Hillary does pull out the nomination by a miracle, she'll be well behind in the fall.

UPDATE: I don't want to leave Charlie Gibson off the hook, his believe that $200,000 is a middle-class salary and that the most important challenge facing the nation is THE CAPITAL GAINS TAX just portrays how out of touch these stufed shirt media types are.

UPDATE II: This is pretty damn funny.