The literary critic in me senses certain Godzilla v. Mothra dimensions to the controversy. But good for Joe Klein for taking these folks on.

Rep. Pete Sessions (R-TX), who once bashed Janet Jackson and that Justin guy for their “liberal values” as displayed in the wardrobe malfunction is now holding fundraisers at Las Vegas strip clubs.

Here’s one of the employees at the establishment crawling on all fours wearing a belt and a leather bra. Not that there’s anything wrong with that …

The McCain TV ad falsely attacking Obama over that canceled troop visit in Germany has only run as paid commercial about a dozen times. That and the day’s other political news in the TPM Election Central Morning Roundup.

The House Judiciary Committee just voted to hold Karl Rove in contempt for refusing to testify about his involvement, if any, in the prosecution of former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman.

Can we note that Karl Rove is now working as an outside advisor to John McCain? So shouldn’t McCain be asked about today’s developments?

I note with interest today, John McCain’s new tactic of associating Barack Obama with oversexed and/or promiscuous young white women. (See today’s new ad and this from yesterday.) Presumably, a la Harold Ford 2006, this will be one of those strategies that will be a matter of deep dispute during the campaign and later treated as transparent and obvious once the campaign is concluded.

But what I’m most interested in today is the new meme the McCain campaign has been pushing for the last few weeks that Obama is presumptuous, arrogant and well … just a bit uppity. Ron Fournier picked the ball up early in his reporting for the AP. And John King was pushing it over the weekend on CNN. Is it arrogant or above Obama’s station for him to meet with the Chairman of the Federal Reserve? If I’m not mistaken he is a sitting United States senator and also the presidential candidate of the Democratic party. Such meetings are actually the norm.

Now, I note that the Post, which has generally been in McCain’s camp, has a front page story today that comes about as close as they feel able to confirming that McCain campaign and McCain personally have spent most of the last week peddling what they knew was a lie about Obama’s called-off trip to the US military hospital in Landstuhl, Germany. And there’s also this piece in today’s Times noting ‘concern’ among some Republicans over McCain’s increasing use of personal attacks on Obama with what are often demonstrably false claims. How many demonstrable lies does the McCain campaign have to push before it colors the portrayal of his campaign?

As I alluded to at the top of this post, it is the norm that obvious campaign tactics that are treated as obvious after a campaign is over are nonetheless treated by most reporters as ambiguous or unclear during a campaign. But in this case it would be nice if that were not the case. Because here we have a candidate, John McCain, who is running on a record of straight talk and honorable campaigning running a campaign made up mainly of charges reporters are now more or less acknowledging are lies. But there’s precious little drawing together of the contradiction. What’s more, as everyone will acknowledge after the campaign, the McCain campaign is now pushing the caricature of Obama as a uppity young black man whose presumptuousness is displayed not only in taking on airs above his station but also in a taste for young white women.

So please keep an eye out for references to Obama’s presumptuousness, arrogance, etc., from John King and other reporters. Let us know when you see them and send us in examples — in text or video. McCain gets to run the campaign he wants. Remember, he hired the operative who put together the Ford/Bimbo ad. But I want to keep tabs on which reporters are helping him retail the message.

The Post’s Dana Milbank jumps on the presumptuousness bandwagon and manages to confuse the British Prime Minister (Gordon Brown) with the Leader of the Opposition (David Cameron). (Correct account here.)

Dana, Brown’s the guy who’s been patiently waiting his turn. Cameron’s the young-man-in-a-hurry. He even has a vlog.

Late Update: Todd Gitlin has more.

Dana-RNC Tag Team Update: Greg has more.

Today is a special day for Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK). Not only is it his first 24 hours in ignomy as the first sitting senator in over 20 years to be indicted on federal charges, it’s also the one-year anniversary of the FBI raid on his Alaska home …

High-res version at Veracifier.com.

Kurt Andersen weighs in on the Netherland discussion at Cafe, noting that after 60 years of American dominance of global pop culture, stories about restless, striving, self-reinventing characters are appearing in all sorts of countries and cultures without necessarily seeming “American” at all.

This is definitely inside baseball. But sort of like a person with a devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other, John McCain had his reform/Dem-leaning advisors and others who were more conventionally Republican. John Weaver through most of the last decade was McCain’s inner-Reformer, inner-Dem. I think at some point in the early part of this decade he switched his own party registration to Democrat. In any case, he was dropped in the big house-cleaning McCain did late last year. He’s bitten his lip until now. But apparently, with McCain’s Britney-Paris-Obama ad, he’s finally had enough.