Toothpaste out of the tube
Or so it is according to the Politico’s Jonathon Martin:
John McCain’s inability to name how many homes he owns is spurring him to play the POW card and Obama’s camp to go further on raising questions about the Republican’s age, the latest signs of a race being fought on increasingly personal terms.
Asked again about the matter in an interview with CBS’s Katie Couric, McCain noted: “I spent some years without a kitchen table, without a chair, and I know what it’s like to be blessed by the opportunities of this great nation.”
And this morning, on “Fox News Sunday,” top Obama adviser Robert Gibbs made what a fairly obvious dig at McCain’s age, suggesting he was forgetful.
Anyone who was buying that this would be the first post-partisan general election was high on crack. For all the hand-wringing about negative campaigning, everyone knows it works. And it works, in my opinion, on a basic psychological level. If a candidate shows that he’s willing to do whatever it takes to win an election, voters feel comfortable that he (or she some day) will go to the same lengths to protect the nation and to fight wars when necessary. I know that the GOP will throw the kitchen sink, and then some, at Obama by way of Rezko, Ayers and Rev. Wright, who is still to come and too risky (i.e. black). The question is whether Obama is willing to do the same, i.e. Keating 5, cheated on his wife and then re-married for money and too risky (i.e. old).
I think the Obama camp is willing to go there, but they need to remember one more thing from the Rove playbook - never apologize for negative attacks.
Tags: keating 5, mccain, mccain adultery, mccain old, obama, politico
