Seriously, how can we most effectively spread the meme that the Republicans are the party of whining bedwetters. Christ.

I'm almost starting to think that Obama played this right all along, and is just happy to watch McCain descend in a single, campaign long, temper tantrum.

I am totally loving that answer from Obama! Perfect! This is a total win for him if he can wash his hands of it and completely turn it into a Clark & Webb v. McCain fight.

Also, I can't believe the McCain camp has the huevos to jump on his answer after McCain's lame response to the question yesterday about Obama's patriotism.

Clark and Webb seem to be thoroughly beating McCain's ass on this issue. No point in Obama jumping in.

Instead he makes the novel argument that as a candidate for the most powerful post in the world, he's got other, more important things to think about...

Shoulda said that YESTERDAY instead of trotting out Bill Denounce and Reject Burton with his prepared response, canned for whenever McCain rings the damn bell

What a place for Hillary's recycled Trumanism ("If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen") -- this time with a worthy target!

I'm just curious. Does the McCain campaign send out those comments to everyone? (everyone = political reporters) If so, at what point do all the objections start to look, well, a bit hysterical to the reporters?

And stemper? Dead on.

I know others will dismiss this out of hand, but I think the reason Clark's comments got such an irate reaction from McCain is because of the deep strain of anti-Semitism in the McCain family (Clark of course is part Jewish). It is certainly well-known although seldom discussed that his father was an intense Jew hater. I am uncertain why the press has avoided the subject of the elder McCain (like it avoided the pro-Nazi history of the grandfather Prescott Bush of the Miserable Failure.

I keep getting this feeling ever since the general election started, that Obama is already president. It's because he acts like it. I really like it. He manages to convey that to me, anyway, without seeming arrogant, just matter of fact.

I really like it.

Perfect response:

Meh. Who cares about that? Next question.

Let the McCain folks get all twisted around the axle on this. Barack's rightful place is above the fray.

Obama hasIraq Problem , says Andrea Mitchell, and I'm bemused and amused.

What junk these people invent to keeo the 24/7 mill going.

Am at work w/o speakers today, so unfortunately cannot hear the audio, but I really hope this puts a damper on the left's hand-wringing over Obama's handling of this issue. Was ready to shoot myself yesterday with nearly everyone pitching such a fit.

Actually, George Packer says Obama has an Iraq problem, and Andrea was "trying" to analyze Packer's argument.

Not a Mitchell apologist, but I disagree with Packer, and want credit (or discredit) to go where it belongs.

All the people thinking that this line of attack from clark is awesome should watch race to the whitehouse. Clark keeping this in the forefront is bad news for obama, 4 zip. Not one person defended clark. One of the commentators had a funny. He ran into dole on capital hill and asked him if mcbush really had a chance in this election. Dole's response was "If clark keeps talking he does." Funny line and true.

So Webb is awesome and Clark is pitiful? Don't look now but your double standard is showing.

Perfect answer, perfect attitude. Well done!

Yup. Very crafty response--straight to McCain's glass jaw.

Well done. Round 1 yesterday was McCain's, thanks to the MSM's hyperventilating and a too-whimpering apology from Obama's staff.

Round 2 today was Obama's. Just the right move--like flicking off a nettlesome fly. Let McCain seethe, rage, and simmer.

I've flip-flopped on the issue.

I'm thinking that Obama needs to get tough with the media on this; they are acting like over grown school children. Apologizing, and explaining only seems to fuel the fire storm. It's as if they're testing him.

It's has to be done just right, though.

Yesterday: "As he's said many times before, Senator Obama honors and respects Senator McCain's service, and of course he rejects yesterday's statement by General Clark," said Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton.

Today's campaign buzzword: "inartful".

It's one or the other. I'm not inclined to applaud Obama for this transparent about-face. His gutless initial reaction spoke volumes, and of course was SOP for the democratic party. Clark merely uttered a simple truth. He naturally refused to disavow it. Surprisingly, that caught Obama flat-footed, and The Candidate was forced to think again. I'll grant it is an adroit pivot, but it should never have come to that. Never. Obama inexcusably threw a principled, articulate political ally overboard when confronted by the GOP's attempt to undermine Clark's credibility. It was disgraceful, and no amount of tap dancing by his supporters will ever change that fact.

If McCain's military service qualifies him to be president, let's see McCain's military records and the leadership evaluations he would have received on his climb to Squadron Commander.

I cannot believe all the reporting that is going into the brouhaha and no one is bringing this up. If McCain and the Republicans want to use this... open up the records and let's see what they say.

OPEN UP YOUR RECORDS MCCAIN or SHUTUP about your service, because being shot down and surviving horrible torture as a prisoner of war shows extreme mental toughness and valor, but in itself is not a qualification to be president and we need to evaluate your entire military career.

So what if you got a few bad reviews... that was years ago... someone must have had something good to say about you... non?

Michael, this is a reply to your questions for me.

Yes, they should have been better prepared yesterday. But sheesh, it's only one day later. And even Chris Bowers is content with today's statement, for crying out loud. At some point you have to let this one go and move on.

"At some point you have to let this one go and move on".

Agreed. Still, Clark is hardly a run of the mill political ally, is he? And it was such a egregiously chickenshit thing for Obama to have done, that, for these few days at least, he deserves all the unrestrained criticism he gets. If he's as brilliant as advertised, such criticism might even make him a better candidate in the long run.

Whenever the McCain camp goes on one a faux-aggrieved bender I want to vomit. They sound like babies. I'm biased, but I just don't see how anyone other than the most hardcore partisan won't be put off by a campaign that is becoming perpetually petulant.

As Glenn Greenwald notes, its been quite a few weeks Obama. As he noted today:

"... The choices Obama makes about how he campaigns and the positions he takes are extremely consequential in how political issues in this country are perceived. In the last two weeks alone, Obama has done the following:
*intervened in a Democratic Congressional primary to support one of the worst Bush-enabling Blue Dogs over a credible, progressive challenger;
* announced his support for Bush's FISA bill, reversing himself completely on this issue;
* sided with the Scalia/Thomas faction in two highly charged Supreme Court decisions;
* repudiated Wesley Clark and embraced the patently false media narrative that Clark had "dishonored McCain's service" (and for the best commentary I've seen, by far, on the Clark matter, see this appropriately indignant piece by Iraq veteran Brandon Friedman);
* condemned MoveOn.org for its newspaper advertisement criticizing Gen. Petraeus;
* defended his own patriotism by impugning the patriotism of others, specifically those in what he described as the "the so-called counter-culture of the Sixties" for "attacking the symbols, and in extreme cases, the very idea, of America itself" and -- echoing Jeanne Kirkpatrick's 1984 RNC speech -- "blaming America for all that was wrong with the world";
* unveiled plans "to expand President Bush's program steering federal social service dollars to religious groups and -- in a move sure to cause controversy . . . letting religious charities that receive federal funding consider religion in employment decisions," a move that could "invite a storm of protest from those who view such faith requirements as discrimination" -- something not even the Bush faith programs allowed...".

The beauty of all this is watching how tired and played the MSM's and McWhiner campaign's foaming at the mouth is. It's like watching a gigantic SUV spinning furiously in the mud but making little progress as it splatters its own windows. Times have changed, y'all, thank Shiva. The right-wing echo chamber is as stale as last month's milk.

Asked whether he felt he owed McCain an apology, Clark responded, "I'm very sorry that this has distracted from the message of patriotism that Sen. Obama wants to put out."

(This is a pearl! I love it!)

This was fairly consistent with Obama's previous M.O., don't waste a lot of energy running around stamping out sparks, give it some time and if necessary try to douse it with a measured response.

Also, important to remember that McCain is preaching to the choir. Nobody with a lick of sense (unfortunately that excludes many in the media) is buying into his narrative. Plus, nobody cares. In 2000, the Bushies really DID slander McCain and suffered no backlash.

oh, NOW Republicans are all bent out of shape about "swiftboating" (in fact, a perhaps "inartful" but rather innocuous statement as opposed to a campaign of lies megaphoned by the MSM) ... oh well :-)

So let me get this straight... Faux Neus, or the GOP's media arm, thinks that making lies up about a Democratic candidate is fair game, but pointing out a logical fallacy of a Republican's campaign is "outrageous, disgraceful, and swiftboating?"

Who knew?

Clark said McCain didn't get executive training in the military, but said it in such a way that let the conservative side of the MSM act like they were third graders enjoying their first outdoor recess of the spring.

It is as if all the correspondents on CNN, Fox, and MSNBC suddenly became Emily Litella for a day. They explosively launched their scripted mis-interpretation meme to propagate well into the upper mediasphere using acutely raised voices in beautifully choreographed cacophany, repeating the talking points chant numerous times on each network and radio station to make it all indelibly truthy.

Conservative commentators joyfully have something to milk, the basis for this indignity fest, for the next few months, and very little work was involved! The script was written years ago. They only had to add the morning talking points and then get in front of cameras an microphones en masse.

When the camera lights turned on, spin meisters leaped onto the comment as if they had been starved for material since "Gore invented the Internet," not quite a decade ago.

They piled on, and piled on, and piled on, to wax on what "they thought" they heard. What they pretended they heard.

You can see it has remarkable force. Premeditated political opportunism, triggered by only a very few words.

Many of the people watching these shows will take their word for it. They will never hear and see Clark saying what he said, and will never try to interpret for themselves. The McCain Stream Media will say it to these people for him. They won't get on the net and click on the stream to see for themselves.

Do you see how they use the talking points from the last go-round as weapons for this campaign? The Swift-Boat was their baby, and now any time they have the opportunity to employ a full court talking points attack, Swift Boat is always mentioned as the reason why they are reacting so venomously, thus demonstrating to the voting world that They Always Were the SwiftBoat Victims.

The only way to counteract such a meme when the choreographed say it in the media is to tell them point blank that what they say is false, is a Lie, is baloney, is absurd. You tell them Clark didn't say what they heard because he said something different, and you stick to your guns. They're attacking when their opponent is off guard, and they know that, that's why their attack is coordinated and scripted, so they can get their meme out before you can regroup and answer their false meme with the appropriate remedy. They attacked when Clark wasn't on those same shows to defend himself.

Troll: person who says what others don't want to hear. Or, person who apparently is excluded from the rights extended by the First Amendment. Or, person who has a different take on things. Or, person who LOOKS different from you. Or, person you just don't like.

Whatever, it is the last recourse of a community empty of conviction, strength, loyalty, trust, self-respect, rationality, all those good things, to call the person described above a "troll" and to try to exclude that person from the community. It's the death of culture. That Obama is your leader is all we really need to know about him.

think the "subtext" we need to be working on is that McCain does a whole lot of whining about stuff that's not very important.

(To belabor the topic): The "subtext" to which you refer was set up like a clay pigeon with a 12 gauge shotgun to its beak, and Obama refused to pull the trigger. It's over and done with, OK. That there remains a need to work on anything, however, is no one's fault but The Candidate's. And goddamnit (while I'm belaboring), he stabbed a formidable ally in the back in the process. His behavior was inexcusable.

Let us speak no more of it forever.

"Let us speak no more of it forever."

On the contrary, Jim Bo. It needs to be autopsied. We need to know who this guy is. Apparently, we're about to elect him. We'd better have him well in our sights, so that we can make the best of what may be a very bad situation.

If hordes of kids can elect the guy, the same hordes can bring him to heel. Or we can wait for whatever his Iraq will be, and then have to live with it until we can kick him out, chewing on the crow we've so determinedly insisted was not there.

This is beautiful, wonderful political theater. Music by Barack Obama, lyrics by Wesley Clark. We should definitely do this more often.

Man, if we are seeing the best of what the freeper trolls have to offer, this episode is even better than I thought.

The MSM pinheads were still continuing to pimp this story this morning. I caught a little bit of MSNBC and good 'ol bobble-head Mika asked an Obama campaign manager is they were planning on "cutting Clark loose". She handled it fairly well by saying that there was nothing to "cut loose" because Clark is not part of their campaign. My only grievance is that she joined in with their Clark is a "loose cannon" pun [chuckle, chuckle]...disgusting.

Poor John McCain and his silly act of righteous indignation at being asked how this experience at being a POW shows how he be a good leader? Why did McCain sit there inside his POW encampment for SIX freaking long years? I mean, isn’t it standard training for a US airman to try and escape from would be POW imprisonment? McCain looks like he was merely await rescue as the son of wealth man, that is much like Bush's cowardly guard service back in the good ole US during the Vietnam era.

What qualities of leadership was McCain showing sitting there in as non-resistant type prisoner situation, because the words untested, unproven and showing a severe lack of personal initiative of the part of John McCain AS A soldier is what comes to my mind.

Where is this Hart’s War type of a story here, because I'm not see it? I mean, God knows there were some real hero’s in the war in Vietnam – how does sitting around as a POW for as long McCain did, show initiative or leadership? McCain may not like it, but someone really should ask he, "McCain, did you even EVER contemplate trying to escape from your predicament in those 6 long years. Surely it is relevant here, wasn't McCain suppose to be doing that?