So There. Nyah, Nyah, Nyah, Nyah

Have you heard McCain's latest bit of ridiculousness? I meant to write someing about it when I first heard it, but it took today's Huffington Post to remind me.

When asked by the ladies of The View about the nastiness of his campaign attacks, McCain exused it by saying:

"This is a tough campaign. I have asked Senator Obama to join me in town hall meetings all across America. I have requested it time after time. And if we had done what I asked Senator Obama to do...I don't think you'd see the tenor of this campaign."

He then went on to reiterate that excuse on MSNBC:

"If you would urge him to come and do town hall meetings with me as I've asked him to do, time after time, the whole tenor of the campaign would change."

The first time I heard this reported, I couldn't believe my ears. Was he really saying that Obama's decision not to do town hall meetings meant that McCain had to get nasty in his campaign rhetoric, had to start publishing lies and half-truths about his opponent?

What rule book is this guy playing by? The 3rd grader's playground handbook? "I make up the rules and if you don't play by them, I'm going to spread lies about you and attack you with half truths whenever I can." How "honorable" is that. How "noble." Is this the action of an "American hero"? Are these the kinds of American values we want to hold up to our kids as a good example of the way to behave in life?

Talk about "blame the victim."

It's not like Obama hasn't agreed to debates. He's agreed to three of them (Huffington Post tells me). That's one more than took place in the last two presidential races. But that isn't enough for McCain. He wants whistlestops across the country and town hall meetings on a regular basis and because Obama hasn't agreed to that, he tries to make people believe that Obama wants to teach comprehensive sex education to kindergarteners.

"Honest--It's not MY fault that I am telling this lie. It's Barack's fault because he won't travel with me and go to dozens of town hall meetings."

Bull-bleep.

The other thing I'm noticing about the McCain campaign is that he's adopted Obama's verbiage. Suddenly during the Republican convention he became the candidate for change. And then after Obama stood up to McCain's attacks and lies and said "ENOUGH!" and was lauded by lots of pundits for finally saying that word, the next day the McCain campaign came out with an "enough is enough" ad. (If one word is good enough for Obama, then three will be three times better for McCain.)

C'mon, John -- find your OWN voice, don't just borrow what's working for Obama and pretend it's your own.

When McCain stood up and said the economy was basically strong and Obama called him on it, in the same day he turned around and said that the economy was in crisis. This guy can't make up his mind what he means. Check this video, if you don't believe me. This guy takes "flip flopping" to new heights.

As for the former Miss Wasilla, there was a rally in Anchorage recently welcoming her back to the state. It drew "hundreds" of people to downtown Anchorage.

BUT, on the other side of town, at the Anchorage public library, was the "Alaskan Women Reject Palin" rally, described by the writer of the linked blog thusly:

Never, have I seen anything like it in my 17 and a half years living in Anchorage. The organizers had someone walk the rally with a counter, and they clicked off well over 1400 people (not including the 90 counter-demonstrators). This was the biggest political rally ever, in the history of the state. I was absolutely stunned. The second most amazing thing is how many people honked and gave the thumbs up as they drove by. And even those that didn’t honk looked wide-eyed and awe-struck at the huge crowd that was growing by the minute. This just doesn’t happen here.

Things like this give me hope, but the poll numbers remain so close that I'm not going to breathe easily until it's all over...and if McCain wins, it will be years before I breathe easily again.