It's very easy to become angry - even enraged - at the tactics that John McCain and Sarah Palin are using right now in a desperate bid to reverse their sliding poll numbers and give themselves a chance, albeit a very slight one, to win this election.
The central "issue" which McCain is trying to leverage is Obama's association with William Ayers, but we have also seen McCain retreat from his unwillingness to use Obama's middle name, and we may yet see another appearance by Rev. Wright. In fact, I would bet money on it at this point. It is quite clear that nothing - and I do mean nothing - is off the table, even Obama's admitted youthful drug use.
Over the past couple of days, we've seen some polling that suggests that McCain's attacks are resulting in a backlash. But McCain's created a whole new set of problems for himself with this line of attack, and they go well beyond the mere fact of him resorting to them.
In a nutshell, John McCain should have just gone where he is now going back in June.
There is a lot of talk that the reason that McCain hasn't pulled Ayers/Wright/Hussein out of his bag before now is because it isn't who John McCain really is, that he's really quite uncomfortable with launching attacks like these, that he's an honorable man forced by circumstances to do something less than honorable in an attempt to save his political career.
I think that the people who are saying that have it exactly backwards. We are now seeing exactly who John McCain is and who he has been all along, with the mask ripped away out of necessity. All of McCain's lip service about honor and patriotism and straight talk were just that - talk. You don't launch these kinds of despicable, untrue attacks, edging into territory where you're arguably inciting violence amongst your political base, unless that is the kind of person you are. The John McCain of 2000 and the John McCain of earlier this year would never have condoned these kinds of attacks.
The truth is that John McCain didn't change. The circumstances changed, which required McCain to reveal his true self to the country. Fortunately for us and for Barack Obama, he decided to keep the mask on for too long.
If McCain had used Ayers/Wright in June to define Obama just as Obama was coming off a brutal primary fight with Hillary Clinton, we might be in real trouble now. But McCain allowed Obama to define himself as the agent of change, and McCain allowed that to continue through two nearly flawless debate performances where Obama was able to reassure voters that not only did he agree with them on the issues, but also had the thoughtfulness, bearing, and gravitas to be President.
A big part of McCain's problem is his impulsiveness. Having failed to define his opponent before the conventions, and having continued to resist doing so prior to the debates, McCain decided just prior to the second debate to go all in on the nastiness. He didn't get it working on all cylinders until after the second debate, and so the issue of McCain's nasty attacks didn't become a major issue until just afterward, which kept McCain from having to bring it up, but also allowed Obama and Biden to subsequently suggest that McCain was a coward for failing to bring up in the debate what he apparently thinks is a hugely important issue, certainly more important than say earmarks or energy or mortgages, all of which McCain discussed.
The bottom line is that McCain should have waited until next week after the final debate to start in with this. Does anyone think that Barack Obama isn't going to force the issue with McCain to his face after all that's happened this week, after Obama's appearance with Charlie Gibson?
Having boxed himself in with a strategy of using misleading, character-based smear attacks on Barack Obama, he is now a sitting duck going into the third debate. He is going to have to go into the final debate exposed as a nasty smear artist, and defend lines of attack that the entire world knows are untrue, unfair, and launched out of politically-motivated desperation. It gives Obama his best opening yet to push McCain's buttons and try to elicit a display of McCain's legendary temper.
Frankly, I'm salivating at the prospect of what the third debate might offer. How does McCain change the game now with the economy tanking and when all he's been offering this week is a nonstop barrage of sewerage?
Obama has a golden opportunity not merely to close the deal with America, but to send the career one of the most odious political figures of the past half-century spinning off into ignominious irrelevance. Given the campaign he's run and the debate performances he's put in already, I have every confidence that he'll accomplish the former. But I'll also be watching and cheering for him to accomplish the latter. It couldn't happen to a nicer guy.
Update: Andrew Sullivan, half an hour ago:
There was always going to be a point of revolt and panic for a core group of Americans who believe that Obama simply cannot be president - because he's black or liberal or young or relatively new. This is that point. As the polls suggest a strong victory, the Hannity-Limbaugh-Steyn-O'Reilly base are going into shock and extreme rage. McCain and Palin have decided to stoke this rage, to foment it, to encourage paranoid notions that somehow Obama is a "secret" terrorist or Islamist or foreigner. These are base emotions in both sense of the word.
But they are also very very dangerous. This is a moment of maximal physical danger for the young Democratic nominee. And McCain is playing with fire. If he really wants to put country first, he will attack Obama on his policies - not on these inflammatory, personal, creepy grounds. This is getting close to the atmosphere stoked by the Israeli far right before the assassination of Rabin.
For God's sake, McCain, stop it. For once in this campaign, put your country first.
I have nothing to add except that I'm sad to say I agree with him.