Debunking McCain's Karl Rove Smear Machine

Did you think our politics could sink no lower? Think again. McCain hired the sleaziest political operatives in the country-- the very same ones he once denounced after Bush used them to smear him in the GOP primaries in 2000-- and has set them loose on Obama. Yesterday Ken called everyone's attention to the nonsense Carville was muttering when he said the stuff spewing off the Double Talk Express is so filthy that "an honorable man" like John McCain would never have known about it and that all the slime and lies pouring out of his campaign must be happening without his knowledge. Funny, though-- at the same time Carville was claiming McCain was too honorable to know what sleazemongers his campaign staff was, McCain himself has been telling everyone that he's "out of touch." I wonder if that wife of Carville's is coordinating something... again.

Judging by McCain's truth-challenged appearance on The View this morning, he's part of the team, in fact, the campaign's liar-in-chief. Think Progress calls him out on the whole forked tongue routine, a routine that has become so routine that it is now the entire McCain routine. He asks for specifics of how he's flip flopped on issues to help his election prospects-- and Think Progress was happy to provide them.

Yesterday BraveNewFilms released a short clip focussing on the incredible avalanche of lies pouring out if the Double Talk Express on a daily basis. They put the McCain lies into context that show a shocking pattern of deliberate distortions that presage... four more years of exactly what we've had from Bush and Cheney. Hit the link, watch the clip. And then take a look at one that Planned Parenthood just released that specifically debunks the shameless McCain attack ad about Obama wanting to teach kindergarten children about sex.



UPDATE: NY TIMES: McCAIN IS UNFIT TO HOLD PUBLIC OFFICE IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Actually, they didn't go quite that far yet. But they did say people have begun to notice that his campaign is just a series of outrageous lies and distortions. The Times eats its own relevance by nearly equating McCain's shockingly scurrilous behavior with that of the far more traditional Obama campaign's. Moral cowards.

Harsh advertisements and negative attacks are a staple of presidential campaigns, but Senator John McCain has drawn an avalanche of criticism this week from Democrats, independent groups and even some Republicans for regularly stretching the truth in attacking Senator Barack Obama’s record and positions.

Mr. Obama has also been accused of distortions, but this week Mr. McCain has found himself under particularly heavy fire for a pair of headline-grabbing attacks. First the McCain campaign twisted Mr. Obama’s words to suggest that he had compared Gov. Sarah Palin, the Republican vice-presidential nominee, to a pig after Mr. Obama said, in questioning Mr. McCain’s claim to be the change agent in the race, “You can put lipstick on a pig; it’s still a pig.” (Mr. McCain once used the same expression to describe Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s health plan.)

Then he falsely claimed that Mr. Obama supported “comprehensive sex education” for kindergartners (he supported teaching them to be alert for inappropriate advances from adults).

Those attacks followed weeks in which Mr. McCain repeatedly, and incorrectly, asserted that Mr. Obama would raise taxes on the middle class, even though analysts say he would cut taxes on the middle class more than Mr. McCain would, and misrepresented Mr. Obama’s positions on energy and health care.