John Cole on the emerging meme of John McCain as a jerk - and why it’s a problem for the McCain campaign.

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Thinking back on the debate last night, I think it’s fair that most sources are calling it a tie. Both candidates did fairly well, sticking to their respective scripts; not a whole lot of winging it. It’s sort of a drawback of our over-scripted democracy that it’s hard to really get at a candidate’s thought […]

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McCain’s pissed. Petulant. You can tell he doesn’t respect Obama at all. He won’t even look at Obama - while Obama’s taking it right to McCain. And, Sen. McCain, you said this… right to him. McCain seems to be reluctant to try and land a punch directly. He speaks to the air. Won’t even turn […]

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Wow! Maybe this is why McCain tried to bail on the debate - why waste your time when you’ve already won!

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So John McCain flies into Washington to get the negotiations for the bailout bill back on track.
Wonders Josh Marshall:
But every news report I’m seeing says they were moving along smoothly until John McCain showed up and they fell apart.
Who can help me here?
I can: This was a pure publicity stunt, designed by John Wayne McCain […]

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Hilarious. Slate.com makes the predictions:
1. Returns to Vietnam and jails himself.
2. Offers the post of “vice vice president” to Warren Buffett.
3. Challenges Obama to suspend campaign so they both can go and personally drill for oil offshore.
4. Learns to use computer.
5. Does bombing run over Taliban-controlled tribal areas of Pakistan.
6. Offers to forgo salary, sell […]

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Ah, I see we have another bank failure. Biggest in history, actually, by a long shot.
Meanwhile, we got Congressional Republicans telling Teh Leader to go stuff it - they ain’t on board with the bailout plan:
Even for a party whose president suffers dismal approval ratings, whose legislative wing lost control of Congress and whose presidential […]

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Well, no. It’s just that Katie’s a little more important than Dave:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XFw-_e1ZckI

Check out James Fallows, too, raising some pertinent questions:

The senator with (understandably) one of the lowest actual-attendance rates at the Capitol in the last two years, and who has played little role in crafting legislation recently, suddenly needs to be nowhere but Washington — […]

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These things that are pleasing you can hurt you somehow:
McCain advisors say they will do all the debates but the schedule is up in the air.
 They also deny that there is a political calculation in this and say without action the country could slide into a Depression by Monday and added “we’ll see 12 percent unemployment” […]

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…why don’t you come to your senses…
What a farce.
The consensus, rightfully, is that McCain’s “Times are too serious to debate!” business is a gimmick. Of course times are serious - which is exactly why the American public needs to hear you spell out what you would do about it, this Friday night, and contrast it […]

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On account of the economy.
Isn’t this the time when our prospective presidents should be talking about this, in public? What better time for a debate than now?
Or is McCain afraid that he’ll get slapped around by Obama because the issue of economics is not something he’s understood as well as he should?
Update: Josh Marshall:
What’s changed today in […]

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Eeeeeen-teresting:
If Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain doesn’t vote for the Bush administration’s $700 billion economic bailout plan, some Republican and Democratic congressional leaders tell ABC News the plan won’t pass.
“If McCain doesn’t come out for this, it’s over,” a Top House Republican tells ABC News.
As Steve Benen notes, the GOP is playing this game […]

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My friends, this is what the McCain campaign would have you believe constitutes “change”:
One of the giant mortgage companies at the heart of the credit crisis paid $15,000 a month to a firm owned by Senator John McCain’s campaign manager from the end of 2005 through last month, according to two people with direct knowledge […]

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McCain spokesman hits bottom, digs:
Meanwhile, Marc Ambinder gave Randy Scheunemann another bite at the apple after it became clear that McCain said precisely the opposite in April of what Scheunemann says he intended to say yesterday. Saith Schuenemann …
In this week’s interview, Senator McCain did not rule in or rule out a White House meeting […]

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And then you realize, this guy’s got a shot at becoming the leader of Teh Free World:
yesterday John McCain was interviewed on the Florida affiliate of Spanish radio network Union Radio. And in the interview McCain appeared not to know who the Prime Minister of Spain was and assumed he was some anti-American leftist leader […]

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Bingo:
The Bush administration, the Fed and Congress, meanwhile, continue to focus on the immediate crises, with little attention to the underlying reasons that the economy has gotten into this mess — a stagnation of incomes, an explosion of debt and a decidedly outdated, and limp, approach to government oversight. Remarkably, the presidential campaign has gotten […]

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…and John McCain, apparently, invented the Blackberry.
Update: Hilarious:
John McCain is so out of touch with America his economics adviser says he deserves credit for creating the Canadian company that invented the Blackberry.
But can Sarah Palin see Canada, and all its Blackberries, from her house?

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McCain: “Nobody can name” issues on which I’ve flip-flopped:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpmfBzz4Ay4

Actually, Steve Benen can name 76 of them.

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The McCain campaign: Scummy.
But sure. As if the Republicans were going to play it any way but this. Scummy is what Republicans do - and no one does it better.
Obama responds:
“This happens every election cycle. Every four years. This is what we do. We’ve got an energy crisis. We have an education system that is not […]

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So, the McCain camp is crying now because Obama said something that McCain himself said just a year ago?
Ah, but I see, it’s different because… Palin wears lipstick. Or something.
Meanwhile:
We’re fighting multiple wars; our oldest and most established financial institutions are on the verge of collapse; we’ve fundamentally transformed and then dismantled our constitutional framework […]

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