How many times tonight did McCain say, "I've been to <insert far-flung locale here>" or "I've spent time with <obscure foreign leader here>" to try to show everyone how much more experienced and knowledgeable he is about foreign affairs? He even ended with his whole "I'm ready on day one" schtick.
Really, I lost count.
Did this strike anyone else as a bizarre strategy? Another example of McCain sacrificing the long-term to score quick points?
I understand that he wanted to try to paint Obama as naive and inexperienced, and to highlight all of his own great foreign policy experience going back to the Stone Ages--I mean the Reagan administration.
But every time he did that, the only thing I could think of was Sarah Palin. And I have to believe that I'm not alone. I would love to see polling data on that question.
McCain is going on about how important and wonderful his experience is and how he, unlike Obama, has been to all these far away places most of us can't find on a map, let alone pronounce. How can voters not think, "and this is the same guy who nominated someone who didn't even have a passport two years ago to be VP?" Whose only trip abroad has been to Kuwait? Who thinks she's been on the front-lines defending America from Vladimir Putin's sneaky incursions into our airspace?
Obama showed tonight that he is more than conversant on major foreign policy issues. He even stuck it to McCain on the Sunni-Shia distinction and the fact that Spain is a.) in Europe and b.) our ally. As I mentioned the other day, I thought McCain wanted out of the debate because he knew that it could only enhance Obama's stature. He was forced to go through with it and tried to denigrate Obama--refusing to look at him and generally behaving in a patronizing and condescending manner. But from all the early post-debate chatter, it didn't work.
But one thing McCain did do was call attention to the glaring, gaping, jaw-droppingly obvious weaknesses of his own hand-picked running-mate. The one that even conservatives are now saying is in way over her head and nowhere near ready to be President. How could independents and undecideds not think of her name when he was rattling off all his foreign trips and meetings?
In trying to build himself up and tear Obama down, McCain may have undermined his own VP nominee instead. He's now set the bar so high for her, that she needs binoculars and a crane just to see it. McCain may have stopped the bleeding tonight, but he consolidated all of Obama's long-term advantages.