Latest (angry) McCain ad: (Black guy) Obama doesn't care about hispanics.

For any reporters interested in digging. Remember that Times story back in February about whether Sen. McCain did special favors for Lowell Paxson and his lobbyist Vicki Iseman? Someone needs to ask some questions about whether McCain threatened to block the reappointment of one of the then-commissioners if Paxson didn't get his way.

Barack Obama says John McCain's campaign aren't racists -- they're just being cynical. That and other political news in today's Election Central Saturday Roundup.

Stop what you're doing and read this article. Very acute take on the latest turn of the campaign.

From the ChiTrib ...

Ed Rollins, a longtime Republican strategist, said McCain sometimes appears frustrated and angry when he talks about Obama, especially when complaining that the press does not treat him fairly. "John needs to be the deliberate, experienced veteran and not the grumpy old man," Rollins said. "If he's the grumpy old man, angry that the media is not in love with him anymore because they're in love with Barack Obama, that's not going to play well with the public."

I guess it falls to someone like Ed Rollins to cut to the quick of this. As a number of articles have reported over the last few days, there's a palpable sense of contempt for Obama within McCain campaign -- one that positively drips out of this new run of commercials. Not that we expect presidential campaigns to like each other; the intensity and stakes make that almost impossible. But in his affect and words, the message from McCain is more like, "Why do I even have to run against this guy?" That anger and frustration that someone like Obama might be overshadowing him is his achilles heel in this campaign.

"McCain for President: Because You Know He Should Be"

I'm amused to hear the McCain camp's deep sense of "grievance" over any suggestion that McCain is running a xenophobic and often race-tinged campaign against Barack Obama. It's amazing how you can be pushing a message that your opponent is in league with foreign terrorists and comparing him to twenty-something white women best known for their 'behind the music' episodes and so many people can get the wrong idea.

McCain camp aggrieved over being called on racialized campaign message. From the Post ...

the sense of grievance over this issue within McCain's high command is deep and palpable. Those emotions led to the decision to have Davis call out Obama on Thursday with his extraordinarily provocative statement: "Barack Obama has played the race card and he played it from the bottom of the deck," he said. "It's divisive, negative, shameful and wrong."

Before all this happened, McCain advisers believed that the Obama campaign successfully pinned a racist label on Bill Clinton during the during primaries -- for comments that drew protests from some leading African American politicians -- and were determined not to let the same happen to McCain. Also, they take personally any suggestion from the Obama campaign that they are part of a campaign that would play the race card and are indignant about it.

Ironically, the McCain camp's celebrity ad comparing Obama to the vapid pair of Paris Hilton and Britney Spears drew some criticism as a subtle attempt to play the race card in the same way Republicans did against Harold Ford in the 2006 Senate race with the ad that concluded with an attractive young blonde woman saying, "Harold, call me." McCain advisers are as incensed over those suggestions as Obama advisers are over Davis's charge.

To hear the accepted account, John McCain was with the surge from the beginning, not just after violence started to decline in mid-2007. Actually for most of the first half of the year, he was hedging his bets, saying he doubted it would work because there weren't as many troops as he said there should be. In other words, he was having it both ways.

Late Update: TPM Reader LD isn't sure ...

You Say Desperation

But I just watched ABC Nightly News with incredulity. They said the McCain campaign said it had a "great week." The anchor turned to Stephanopoulos and said "Is that true?" George said, "Yes it is. The McCain campaign drove the debate." Oh and they played the "The One" ad with no irony or commentary to the effect that it was the fourth straight negative ad.

Chris Hayes: What will happen to MoveOn after Bush?

Let's see how this works. McCain runs his Britney/Paris ad on the alleged but improbable basis that they're the #2 and #3 celebs in the world, according to Rick Davis. McCain camp seizes on Obama statement that Obama has made multiple times before, accuses him of playing "race card". Now McCain repeats Race Card, Race Card, Race Card a hundred times.

McCain has made the strategic decision that he can only win the election on the basis of Obama as friend of terrorists, unpatriotic suspicious outsider and radical, black guy who's really more a flashy showbiz star (call it playing the Diddy card) than someone with the heft to be president. He's probably right. That's his only chance. And it may work.

ABCNews is now running a handline that reads: "Obama Camp Admits Playing Race Card"

Ron Fournier officially appointed AP Washington bureau chief.

John McCain has a big ego. And if there's one thing John McCain prizes it's the high regard many prestige Washington reporters hold him in. Or did. People like Joe Klein, who now says he was wrong to think McCain was an "honorable man." Now he has a new post about McCain with the word "scum" in the title. Klein's out in the lead on this. But he's not the only one-time McCain fan thinking the same thing. And you're already starting to see some editorials in regional dailies calling him sleazy and a liar. So given McCain's temper, when can we get some questions posed to him about that?

The group of former lobbyists* running the McCain campaign includes a guy who has lobbied extensively for the softening of U.S. sanctions against Cuba -- a stance at odds with McCain's own publicly stated position on the issue.

TPM Election Central reports the details.

*Ed. Note: "Former" only in the sense that they were lobbyists before the campaign and will be again afterwards, unless McCain wins, in which case they may pass through the revolving door into government for a while before resuming their lobbying practices.

John McCain gets full swing into his campaign's new "Country First" slogan with a country music concert tonight. That and the day's other political news in the TPM Election Central Morning Roundup.

TPM Reader YF shares his thoughts ...

I think the whole "McCain's going negative" snit is a really defensive and weak position for the Obama camp. Sure- mention that McCain went negative, contrary to all his stated values- "All it take is a little dip in the polls for John McCain to cast aside his values." But it seems to me there is very simple way to turn this around on McCain, and be on the offensive: "How bad does John McCain want to avoid talking about real issues? He's running ads with Britney and Paris. Is that what American's are concerned about? Britney and Paris? Do you want to know how we are going to right the ship of our economy? Or do you want to hear about Britney and Paris? Want to talk about how we are going to extract our troops from Iraq? Or do you want to hear about Britney and Paris?" Just pound away at this. This is what John McCain wants to talk about. Point out how frivolous it is to even spend any time developing this ad when there are so many important issues to address. Bitching about it being unfair or over some imaginary line that Karl Rove can't even see is going to get them nowhere.

And what was the logic of choosing Britney and Paris again? Yet more ..

All it took to set off a full 24 hours of cable news hysteria was one quote that the Washington Post's Dana Milbank attributed to Barack Obama - secondhand, unsourced, out of context, and eventually widely disputed. Nice work, everybody ...

High-res version at Veracifier.com.