McCain vs. Obama: Ayers vs. erratic
Posted: Friday, October 10, 2008 9:27 AM by Mark Murray
The Los Angeles Times reports, “The campaign for president pivoted sharply to character and temperament Thursday as Democrat Barack Obama accused his Republican counterpart of "erratic behavior" and John McCain offered his most public -- if still elliptical -- criticism of Obama's acquaintance with a onetime domestic bomber… Each candidate has tried to characterize the other as the riskier choice for voters, and on Thursday McCain's effort to portray Obama as iffy presidential timber took a page from the 1960s. Campaigning with running mate Sarah Palin at a town hall-style event in Waukesha, Wis., McCain was asked by a participant about Obama and ‘the people that he has hung with.’”
"McCain said Thursday that questions about Democratic rival Barack Obama's association with a former war protester linked to Vietnam-era bombings are part of a broader issue of honesty," the AP writes.
And here’s McCain’s new TV ad on Ayers:
Obama on Ayers: "Ultimately, I ended up learning about the fact that he had engaged in this reprehensible act 40 years ago, but I was eight years old at the time and I assumed that he had been rehabilitated," he told radio host Michael Smerconish. "This guy is not part of my inner circle, he doesn't advise my campaign, he's not going to advise me as president," Obama added, and criticized McCain for focusing on Ayers when the economy is in turmoil, calling the issue a "red herring." "The fact that Senator McCain wants to make this the centerpiece of his campaign is pretty remarkable. We are going through an enormous challenge right now."
Meanwhile, the Dow dropped another 678.91 points yesterday. The market has dropped 23% since two Fridays ago, when the Dow closed at $11,143.13
"McCain's presidential campaign and the Republican National Committee have added a new alleged villain as they try to raise doubts about Democratic nominee Barack Obama in the closing weeks of the race - a community organizing group accused of generating a flurry of phony voter registration cards in a number of states" -- ACORN. "ACORN spokesman Brian Kettenring said that in most cases the bogus registrations were flagged by ACORN supervisors during a review, brought to the attention of the local officials when they were submitted, and ACORN fired 'probably a couple of dozen' employees who fabricated them."
The New York Daily News' Gonzalez: "The Republicans, as they usually do, would have you believe that hordes of poor people, immigrants and felons are preparing to overrun the polls for Barack Obama. Their biggest bogeyman is ACORN, a nationwide grass-roots organization that has registered more than 1.3 million new low-income voters in the last year. Democrats and voting rights groups insist that hundreds of thousands of legitimate voters, many of them poor, black or Hispanic, could lose the chance to cast a ballot. They say those groups will be the main victims of massive and improper purges of voting lists in many states, as part of a Republican campaign to challenge Democratic voters on Election Day."
Transition watch: President Bush signed an executive order yesterday creating a transition board.
