McCain goes negative, makes up bogus attack on Romney
For a variety of reasons, it looks like the political world is far more interested in disputes surrounding Democratic presidential candidates, most notably Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. It’s not too big a mystery — the Dems are better candidates, with more interesting arguments, and with broader questions about race and gender that the media likes to explore.
But let’s not forget that the increasingly two-man race for the Republican nomination is generating some noteworthy clashes as well. John McCain, for example, had vowed, repeatedly, to stay positive, and refrain from going negative against any of his GOP rivals. Apparently nervous about his standing, McCain threw that promise out the window over the weekend.
Senator John McCain stepped up his attacks on his Republican rival Mitt Romney on Saturday, accusing him of once wanting to withdraw from Iraq and likening him to Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton in his approach to the conflict.
In response, Mr. Romney lashed back, saying Mr. McCain was being “dishonest,” and demanded that he apologize.
Mr. McCain’s comments marked the second straight day of going on the offensive against Mr. Romney, and they came as polls showed the two men locked in a tight race in Florida, where the Republican primary will be held Tuesday. […]
“If we surrender and wave a white flag like Senator Clinton wants to do and withdraw as Governor Romney wanted to do, then there will be chaos,” Mr. McCain said to reporters in Fort Myers on Saturday morning.
At a town-hall-style meeting later in Sun City Center, a retirement community, Mr. McCain reiterated his accusation. “My friends, I was there — he said he wanted a timetable for withdrawal,” Mr. McCain said.
I’m hardly inclined to go to bat for a Republican presidential candidate, least of all Mitt Romney, but McCain’s attack not only violates his positive-campaigning pledge, it’s just flat wrong.
That McCain feels the need to lie about Romney’s record — usually, Romney can lie about his record quite well on his own — suggests a level of anxiety for the senator that’s almost surprising. If McCain’s in the lead, and he’s confident that he’ll win, why bother making up bogus attacks?
As for the facts, Time’s Michael Scherer notes why McCain’s attack is a “misleading low blow.” The NYT also does a little fact checking in its piece.
The charge appears to be misleading. The McCain campaign pointed to remarks Mr. Romney made last year in which he said he believed that President Bush and Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki of Iraq should have “a series of timetables and milestones” that they discussed among themselves but did not announce publicly.
But Mr. Romney has not called for setting a date for withdrawal. Mr. Romney has said he supports the president’s current strategy, although he has said he anticipates more and more American troops moving into a support role in Iraq in the next year — similar to what Gen. David H. Petraeus outlined in his testimony before Congress last year.
As for the broader political context, the National Review’s Rich Lowry highlighted what he described as McCain’s “rank dishonesty.”
How will this play? If there’s one thing we know about late-breaking events in this primary season, it’s that it’s impossible to know how they’ll play. But I wouldn’t be surprised if it back-fires on McCain. The attack succeeded in the sense that it tipped the conversation back toward Iraq, but at a potential cost to McCain. His most important political asset is his political character, his reputation for truth-telling and honorable politics. This dishonest low-blow — if it continues to get attention in the closing hours — could chip away at that asset.
Tipping “the conversation” was almost certainly the point. The more the campaign focuses on the economy, the more lost McCain appears. So, he made up a bogus attack regarding Iraq, and sure enough, it shifted attention away from the economy — and towards McCain’s dishonesty.
For what it’s worth, Mike Huckabee is taking McCain’s side in this flap, despite the fact that McCain is objectively, demonstrably wrong. The former Arkansas governor might as well campaign while wearing a sandwich-board: “Dear John, please let me be your running mate. Love, Mike.”
Uh-oh. So even Rich Lowry is beginning to doubt that naming your bus the “Straight Talk Express” guarantees honesty?
What was bogus about what Senator McCain said? I mean slick Mitt did support secret timetable plan, sound like withdraw to me. What is really going on is that the media is trying to push for Mitt to be the Republican nominee, because they know he can’t win.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LVkftphrdsw
I think this latest shot by McCain may boomerang and reveal in the process that McCain is not bulletproof – and if he loses some of his standing on the war, I don’t think he has anything else.
It’s obvious that McCain needed to change the conversation away from the economy and back to the war, but I think the longer and harder McCain fights to do that, the greater the chances that someone’s going to knock him off the high horse he’s sitting on. So far, he’s managed to perpetuate the lie that he was the only one speaking truth to power on Iraq, but I fully expect Romney to hit that and hit it hard. McCain thinks that withdrawing from Iraq would have resulted in a terrible loss of blood and treasure – Romney should ask him what he thinks the toll would be over the next 100 years that McCain seems to think would be fine for our occupation to last, and how those losses would be somehow less painful. The other candidates should try prefacing their own remarks with, “maybe Senator McCain forgot what he said about…” or “I think the Senator is confused about” – it will highlight his age, which should be an issue.
It will be interesting to see how McCain does in this first closed primary, without the independents and Lieberman Democrats to boost his numbers.
And…I see where there are whispers about a McCain-Condi Rice ticket. Oh, the horror…
John McCain: “I’d say that we’re going to remain in Iraq until the sun explodes, but that might give the terrorists ideas. So let’s just say we ain’t leavin’. No way, no how.”
“I’m hardly inclined to go to bat for a Republican presidential candidate, least of all Mitt Romney…”
I’m not so sure about that Mr. Benan. Just this weekend you were giving Mitt some kudos.
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/14368.html
He is only saying that mac was being negative because this is a Romney supporter site and if it’s Romney they have got to whine about something. Worried about his standings that is wishful thinking on your part the only ones nervous is you bunch of Romney supporters and with good reason heis being exposed for the fake flake that he is. We need a president not a car salesman. Check out any of the Romney fiasco’s at http://colecurtis-colecurtis.blogspot if you want to see what that economic genius did for Massachusettes while he was governor other than almost bankrupting Massachusettes with 700 million dollars of debt he also introduced same sex marriage to the United States and allow highschool kids to have gay marches against their parents wishes just to name a few of the wonderful things that Romney did. It is all documented and a matter of public record so there is nothing that Mac has ever done or will do that can add up to that idiots record.
So which is it Steve, are you a McCain supporter like Jr. implies, or a Romney supporter like Vicki says? 🙂
Just like the Clinton attacks on Obama, such tactics from McCain are unnecessary and counterproductive.
This is especially unnecessary for McCain. I suspect that in a real debate over issues McCain could easily establish himself as the stronger candidate on foreign policy. (Sure he is nuts for talking about staying in Iraq for 100 years, but this is a debate before Republican voters.)
Just as there has been outrage by Democrats about the tactics of the Clinton campaign, I am happy to see Republicans complain about McCain distorting Romney’s views in this manner. Maybe we are finally reaching a point where people will no longer put up with this type of stuff.
I don’t have the software to watch a youtube video, but my recollection is that Romney’s remarks about a timetable were in a response to a question that sounded like, “do you support a timetable for withdrawl.” I also recall that Romney’s defense was that he “didn’t support a date certain.” If I’m right, I think they are both parsing the truth.
In respect to straight talk, McCain said yesterday that, yes, we can fix the economy, but first we have to make the Bush tax cuts permanent. Is there a link here? or is it just a matter of priorities.
Finally, what does it mean that Liz Cheney is endorsing Romney. Isn’t she the one who has basically become the Doug Feith of the Iran project? You remember Doug Feith, the head of Office of Special Plans, the one who politicized the DIA and pushed to keep the Uranium from Africa argument in the public case for the Iraq war.
“… broader questions about race and gender that the media likes to explore.”
You mean “shallower questions”.
Incidentally, last time I looked the print media still seem to explore less superficial issues. You know: war, diplomacy, science, technology, medicine, Asia, Africa, Latin America, travel, fashion.
It’s only TeeVee, which is to say America, which can’t seem to get beyond race and gender.
“If we surrender and wave a white flag like Senator Clinton wants to do and withdraw as Governor Romney wanted to do, then there will be chaos,” Mr. McCain said
And he should know.
Does everyone forget how America was an absolute wreck beyond recovery in 1974 after we waved a white flag and pulled out of Vietnam?
Pinko surrendercrats! If we’d stayed just six more months, Vietnam would have been a solid ally loaded with US military bases we could have threatened China with. Or something else really, really good.
McCain was there.
It’s starting to seem like Mitt Romney has a blog patrol like Ron Paul. Whenever his name is mentioned here, Romney supporters we have never heard from before seem to fall out of he sky.
Watch out, McCain, Romney’ll call you the L word…
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/01/27/caught-on-tape-romney-ac_n_83465.html
This post reminds me of some confusion on my part about what “negative campaigning” means. Is it merely pointing out true things about your opponent that people won’t like or is it being dishonest about your opponent in a negative way
(Rep candidates themselves are dishonest about themselves in a positive way.)
I agree with toowearyforoutrage, if we had stayed in Vietnam we’d be within 6 months of winnning that war by now.
OkieFromMuskogee said:
It’s starting to seem like Mitt Romney has a blog patrol like Ron Paul. Whenever his name is mentioned here, Romney supporters we have never heard from before seem to fall out of he sky.
Mos def! CB needs to do a post like this:
Romney bad. Paul bad. Scientology bad. Ayn Rand bad.Romney bad. Paul bad. Scientology bad. Ayn Rand bad.Romney bad. Paul bad. Scientology bad. Ayn Rand bad.Romney bad. Paul bad. Scientology bad. Ayn Rand bad.Romney bad. Paul bad. Scientology bad. Ayn Rand bad.Romney bad. Paul bad. Scientology bad. Ayn Rand bad.Romney bad. Paul bad. Scientology bad. Ayn Rand bad.Romney bad. Paul bad. Scientology bad. Ayn Rand bad.Romney bad. Paul bad. Scientology bad. Ayn Rand bad.
He’ll get a million comments.
“…he former Arkansas governor might as well campaign while wearing a sandwich-board: “Dear John, please let me be your running mate. Love, Mike.”
Sorry Mike, Lieberman has that position all tucked away.
McCain’s memory is going alright. He only partially remembers something about being a senator once about 8yrs ago before he started running for president. Thank god we will never have to worry about him ever being president. (He did a great job of being senator for Arizona though as there actually is a bank or a church on every corner in Phoenix)
Thanks Anne…”…And…I see where there are whispers about a McCain-Condi Rice ticket. Oh, the horror…” The mere thought almost made me throw up.
Ahaha!
Comments #5 & #6 are so perfect, taken together.
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