I think I have to dissent from David’s view that Obama didn’t bring his A-game to the speech this morning. I was only able to listen/watch out of the corner of my eye because I was on deadline for something else. But my sense was that the tempo and tenor was suited to the occasion. The kind of stirring delivery he’s made a trademark of in his victory celebrations would not have been appropriate for the moment.
From the Post …
Speaking to reporters in Amman, the Jordanian capital, McCain said he and two Senate colleagues traveling with him continue to be concerned about Iranian operatives “taking al-Qaeda into Iran, training them and sending them back.”
Pressed to elaborate, McCain said it was “common knowledge and has been reported in the media that al-Qaeda is going back into Iran and receiving training and are coming back into Iraq from Iran, that’s well known. And it’s unfortunate.” A few moments later, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, standing just behind McCain, stepped forward and whispered in the presidential candidate’s ear. McCain then said: “I’m sorry, the Iranians are training extremists, not al-Qaeda.”
Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, a big Hillary backer, tried hitting up George Soros for money to fund a do-over vote in Michigan, TPM Election Central has learned. Soros declined.
For two years now, we’ve been chronicling Alaska Rep. Don Young’s (R) efforts to be involved in every major political corruption scandal of the last decade. And now that the political waters are rising around him back in his home state, he’s gone on the attack. So here in today’s episode of TPMtv, we bring you some of the choice mouth-foaming moments …
High-res version at Veracifier.com.
I was working on a longer post about John McCain this afternoon, which I’m hoping to post tomorrow. But I just noticed that this goof where McCain got confused about whether Iran was training al Qaeda operatives or not didn’t just happen once. McCain apparently said the same thing several times, in a couple different venues – not just in the press conference, where Joe Lieberman of all people finally had to correct him, but earlier on the Hugh Hewitt show.
(I’m assuming that no one noticed on Hewitt’s show. They said Saddam had nukes and bio weapons but left them in a safe deposit box in Damascus. So by those standards thinking the Iranians run al Qaeda isn’t that big a stretch.)
What if you throw a national reconciliation conference and key players don’t even show up?
That’s Iraq, five years on. But it’s not dampening President Bush’s celebratory mood today.
We’ve got reactions to Obama’s big speech yesterday still coming in at TPMCafe. For your reading convenience, we collected links to some of the more noteworthy posts here.