A final update of the evening on McCain’s uber-gaffe.

There’s some unclarity whether the interviewer was done by a Spanish reporter or a Spanish language reporter Caracol from 1260 in Miami. I suspect they may have had some joint arrangement since they both appear to claim it as their own exclusive. Or perhaps the local station in Miami is working as the affiliate of the Spanish radio network.

That doesn’t change the underlying story. But TPM Reader RC points out that if you go to the Caracol1260 website and scroll down below the fold to the section of audio links on the left under the headline “Hoy por Hoy”, these folks have their own version of the recording. They spliced the Spanish translations in differently. And in the way they did it, you can hear much more of McCain’s actual English. It’s still a bit difficult to hear McCain since the translator is speaking simultaneously. But you can hear most of what he says. It’s pretty clear that McCain doesn’t remember who Zapatero is. And he keeps referring to his approach to Latin America even after the interview keeps pointing that she’s asking him a question a Spain, which is actually in Europe.

(ed.note: Another point about this version of the interview audio, Caracol seems to have completely dubbed out the interviewers voice in exchange for a translator speaking in Spanish. If you listen to the other version from the Spanish radio channel, it’s clear that the original interview was entirely in English. The Caracol version also appears to cut portions of the the exchange. So we still need to hear the unaltered recording of the exchange.)

Spanish Prime Minister Zapatero on McCain not knowing who he is (from Time)…

As for Zapatero himself, the prime minister is apparently taking this latest attack to his ego with characteristic equilibrium. McCain may not know who Spain’s leader is, but Zapatero promised to work with the new administration “whatever it is.”

The original untranslated English version of John McCain’s interview with Radio Caracol Miami has now been released.

Have a listen (the key passage about Spain starts at 2:58 in):

At first it sounds like McCain is taking a hard neocon line against Prime Minister Zapatero, but as the interviewer continues to press the point, it becomes pretty obvious that McCain has no idea who she’s talking about.

His broad, generic answer is clearly meant to cover Latin American leaders generally, known and unknown — sort of a blanket “we’ll stand up to tinpot dictators” — even if they happen to be NATO prime ministers.

Well, we’ve heard the interview now. And John McCain either doesn’t know who the Prime Minister of Spain is, thinks Spain is a country in Latin America, or possibly both.

In case, you haven’t seen our updates from last night, yesterday John McCain was interviewed on the Florida affiliate of Spanish radio network Union Radio. And in the interview McCain appeared not to know who the Prime Minister of Spain was and assumed he was some anti-American leftist leader from South America.

After the interviewer presses him a couple times on the point and tries to focus him on the fact that Prime Minister Zapatero isn’t from Mexico and isn’t a drug lord either McCain comes back at her saying, “All I can tell you is that I have a clear record of working with leaders in the Hemisphere that are friends with us and standing up to those who are not. And that’s judged on the basis of the importance of our relationship with Latin America and the entire region.”

Then there’s a moment of awkward pause before she says. “But what about Europe? I’m talking about the President of Spain.”

McCain: “What about me, what?

Interviewer: “Are you willing to meet with him if you’re elected president?”

McCain: “I am wiling to meet with any leader who is dedicated to the same principles and philosophy that we are for humans rights, democracy and freedom. And I will stand up to those who do not.”

At this point, the interviewer gets tongue-tied presumably because she can’t get over McCain not knowing what Spain is.

Obama has a new TV ad running tying McCain to George W. Bush, the troubled economy, and Bush’s efforts to privatize Social Security, but so far it’s been limited to airing in Michigan. That and the day’s other political news in the TPM Election Central Morning Roundup.

The Washington Post has gotten hold of McCain’s Spain goof. And McCain advisor Randy Scheunemann has sent the Post an email suggesting that McCain knew exactly who Zapatero was and was simply repeating the neocon anti-Zapatero line.

Now, I was away Tuesday and Thursday, so I still want to come back to whether Scheunemann was working with bamboozler Amir Taheri on his made-up Obama-Iraq piece. So we’ll get back to that.

But on this, nice try, Randy. I don’t doubt that Scheunemann and his neocon pals still have it in for Zapatero for pulling his troops out of Iraq. I admit it is difficult to believe that McCain either doesn’t know who Zapatero is or doesn’t know which continent Spain is currently a part of. And we can question the wisdom of a major party presidential candidate suggesting that a major NATO ally might be part of his Axis of Evil — along with Hugo Chavez. But Randy’s attempted save here does not add up. If McCain knew who Zapatero was, why did he repeatedly refer to him as a Latin American leader? Spain is not in Latin America. I’m certain of it.

I mean, maybe McCain did know exactly who he was talking about and just got confused about Spain being a country in Latin America. But I’m not sure that’s much better.

Read the transcript or listen to the interview. The most logical explanation of this gaffe is that McCain got asked about Zapatero right after being asked about Chavez, Castro and Morales. Not remembering who Zapatero was, he assumed he must be some other Latin American tinpot dictator and answered the question accordingly. We could be generous and assume he was just upping the ante on the normal neocon line. But by repeatedly referring to Spain as a country in Latin America, McCain just doesn’t make that interpretation tenable for any fair-minded reader.

Face it, he got confused.

Late Update: We’re getting a flood of good emails interpreting what happened here. The most generous interpretation we’re hearing is that McCain couldn’t understand what the interviewer was saying — she’s a native Spanish speaker speaking in an accented English, though she says repeatedly she’s talking about Spain. Rather than ask her to clarify he decided to wing it, assuming she must be talking about some other Latin American bad guy. I think there’s a good chance this is what happened. (I don’t think that if you actually walked up to McCain today and asked him whether Spain is in Europe or Latin America that he wouldn’t know. But on the fly he did seem to get confused.) But I don’t think this puts him in a very good light. And, needless to say, this interpretation is entirely inconsistent with Scheunemann’s suggestion that McCain knew exactly who he was talking about and just wanted to stick it to Zapatero. Whether he got confused about who Zapatero was or was too proud to admit he didn’t understand the question, he still shot from the hip and insisted that Zapatero, the Prime Minister of a major NATO ally country, is from Latin America. He’s not ready for prime time.

Check out Sarah Palin last night getting cocky at the first town hall meeting where she was prepared to take questions from the audience: “And if you want specifics with specific policy or countries, go ahead and you can ask me. You can even play stump the candidate if you want to!”

Specific countries? Now that’s some grasp of foreign policy:

It should be noted that McCain quickly stepped in after this and Palin was not subjected to a quiz.

Good first question: Which continent is Spain on?

TPM Reader EM …

Enough. John McCain should not get a free pass on this one. On a cynical level, can you imagine if this had been said by either Obama, Biden–or for that matter, Palin?

I’m astonished by the amount of rationalizing and excuses being put out there on this “gaffe.” Yeah, I suppose the possibility of being confused by the line of questioning, the accent is plausible for you and me but for the potential POTUS–I don’t think so. Furthermore, Spain was attacked by the same terrorist group that orchestrated 9/11. Does pulling the troops out of Iraq trump that? Honestly? Our relationship with this European ally is that precarious.

Scheunemann ratcheted up the bravado. I say we call them on it. He and his campaign have reminded us time and time again of his foreign expertise compared to Obama’s. McCain needs to explain.

Jonathan Martin, who covers the Republican side/McCain campaign for The Politico takes a look at McCain’s Zapatero gaffe and doesn’t seem to be buying the McCain camp’s explanation.

From the NYT:

Editors’ Note: September 18, 2008

An earlier version of this article cited two sources who were said to have been briefed on a conversation in which John J. Mack, chief executive of Morgan Stanley, had told Vikrim S. Pandit, Citigroup’s chief executive, that “we need a merger partner or we’re not going to make it.” On Thursday, Morgan Stanley vigorously denied that Mr. Mack had made the comment, as did Citigroup, which had declined to comment on Wednesday.

The Times’s two sources have since clarified their comments, saying that because they were not present during the discussions, they could not confirm that Mr. Mack had in fact made the statement. The Times should have asked Morgan Stanley for comment and should not have used the quotation without doing more to verify the sources’ version of events.

Ouch.