McCain: Mr. Straight Talk? Common theme is press calling BS on McLame's smears and distortions.

[jefferson_dem]

McCain: Mr. Straight Talk?
Posted: Friday, September 12, 2008 9:17 AM by Domenico Montanaro
Filed Under: 2008, McCain

If there’s a common theme today, it’s the press taking McCain’s campaign to task for running a series of ads distorting Obama’s record and positions.

AP's Babington writes, "Even in a political culture accustomed to truth-stretching, McCain's skirting of facts has stood out this week. It has infuriated and flustered Obama's campaign, and campaign pros are watching to see how much voters disregard news reports noting factual holes in the claims. McCain's persistence in pushing dubious claims is all the more notable because many political insiders consider him one of the greatest living victims of underhanded campaigning. Locked in a tight race with George W. Bush for the Republican presidential nomination in 2000, McCain was rocked in South Carolina by a whisper campaign claiming he had fathered an illegitimate black child and was mentally unstable."

The Los Angeles Times’ Rainey: "News organizations and these admirable truth-squadding outfits, including PolitiFact.com, do not collaborate. But in independent news reports and commentaries this week, they seemed to reach a consensus to say ‘enough’ to the McCain camp's efforts to demonize Barack Obama. I'm not saying that Obama hasn't told a few whoppers -- like suggesting McCain's proposed corporate tax breaks are tailored specifically for oil companies or that his opponent seriously believes anyone making under $5 million is middle-class. But it's McCain and his foot soldiers who have really fouled the election airwaves in recent days, provoking the first flickerings of a backlash from the media."

Paul Krugman also gets into the act. “But I can’t think of any precedent, at least in America, for the blizzard of lies since the Republican convention. The Bush campaign’s lies in 2000 were artful -- you needed some grasp of arithmetic to realize that you were being conned. This year, however, the McCain campaign keeps making assertions that anyone with an Internet connection can disprove in a minute, and repeating these assertions over and over again.”

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http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/09/12/1382169.aspx