Ambinder: Who Needs Obama When The McCain Campaign'll Run Against Itself?

[villager]

Who Needs Obama When The McCain Campaign'll Run Against Itself?

17 Sep 2008 05:00 pm

There shouldn't be a debate about it: the McCain campaign has made a hash out of the first three days of the week, and most of the forks were manufactured in Arlington.

# The adviser who insisted that McCain tout the fundamentals of the economy. After saying the same thing 15 times and getting digned for it 15 times.

# The direct but awkward pivot to a (admittedly much better) populism that angered professional conservatives

# Reaping what they sew; even though the campaign had, it turns out, more evidence for their claim that Obama supported sex-education for kindergartners, it took the campaign a week to lay out the case, and when they did, no one was inclined to believe them because they'd just spent the past week questioning the notion of truth;

# The shoddy briefing given to McCain about the financial system, leading to a few days of confusion.

# The adviser who bragged about McCain's inventing the Blackberry.

# The political vetting of Gov. Sarah Palin continues to reap dividends for the Democrats, and the professional conservative class is beginning to grumble.

# Carly Fiorina's honest assessment of her candidate's qualifications, and her subsequent self-recusal.

This summer, when John McCain called Barack Obama a celebrity, he was confirming, in real time, an image that wasn't entirely fictitious. When Obama's campaign claims that, on the economy, McCain is simply out of touch, weeks like this reconfirm, in real time, that notion for voters. McCain can make these type of mistakes on national security and he'll get a pass for them, much to the consternation of Democrats. On the economy, errors, mistakes, gaffes -- they're deadly.

http://marcambinder.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/09/who_needs_obama_when_the_mccai.php