McCain's "Respectful" Campaign

Here's an excerpt from the memo the McCain campaign sent out as soon as he clinched the Republican nomination:

To: Campaign Leadership

From: Rick Davis

Subject: McCain Message

Date: 3/11/2008

John McCain is now the presumptive nominee of the Republican Party. It is critical, as we prepare to face off with whomever the Democrats select as their nominee, that we all follow John's lead and run a respectful campaign focused on the issues and values that are important to the American people.

Throughout the primary election we saw John McCain reject the type of politics that degrade our civics, and this will not change as he prepares to run head-to-head against the Democratic nominee.

John McCain will continue to run on his principles and will focus on the future of our country. . . .

Overheated rhetoric and personal attacks on our opponents distract from the big differences between John McCain's vision for the future of our nation and the Democrats'. . . .

Throughout his life John McCain has held himself to the highest standards and he will continue to run a respectful campaign based on the issues. . . .

It hasn't taken long for that memo to be discarded in favor of the attack politics we've seen this month. Four weeks agao, McCain brought on board disciples of Karl Rove from the 2004 campaign and the Bush White House. McCain has said Obama deliberately wants to lose a war. The campaign has an ad in heavy rotation blaming Obama for high gas prices. McCain and his gang have spent nearly a week pushing a bogus smear about Obama snubbing injured U.S. troops. McCain suggested Obama might be a “socialist.” The McCain campaign even hinted that Obama is weak on genocide. And today comes this tawdry new piece of trash:



As McCain likes to say, "that's not change we can beleive in". . .