IT ALL MAKES SENSE NOW

CNN:

McCain camp to propose postponing VP debate

McCain supporter Sen. Lindsey Graham tells CNN the McCain campaign is proposing to the Presidential Debate Commission and the Obama camp that if there's no bailout deal by Friday, the first presidential debate should take the place of the VP debate, currently scheduled for next Thursday, October 2 in St. Louis.

In this scenario, the vice presidential debate between Joe Biden and Sarah Palin would be rescheduled for a date yet to be determined, and take place in Oxford, Mississippi, currently slated to be the site of the first presidential faceoff this Friday....

Is that the whole point of this pathetic stunt? To give Gidget a few more days (weeks?) to cram, or possible spare her a debate altogether? In my last post, I speculated that that might be a reason, but is it the reason?

Shouldn't the Obama campaign be asking that question out loud?

****

UPDATE: As it turns out, I wasn't completely crazy to suggest in the previous post that this bizarro campaign suspension by John McCain was an attempt to draw attention away from the Palin interview by Katie Couric -- not only did McCain choose today to suspend his campaign, he gave an exclusive interview to Couric, which led her broadcast and relegated the Palin interview to secondary status. (And he blew off an appearance on David Letterman's show to do that.) I'm not sure the Palin interview was that bad, but it sure seemed as if McCain thought it was, and desperately wanted it not to be the lead story of the evening, even on one network.

The transcript is here; the video follows:



Best moment: Palin gives a prepared answer to a question about the relationship of Freddie Mac to the firm run by McCain's campaign manager, Rick Davis, then is pressed on the subject by Couric. She is struck speechless for four long, agonizing seconds, with a grimacecof pain on her face (this is at 0:53) -- then gives the same answer again, although the answer in this case degenerates into word salad.

It's relatively smooth sailing until the end:

Couric: I'm just going to ask you one more time -- not to belabor the point. Specific examples in [McCain's] 26 years of pushing for more regulation.

Palin: I'll try to find you some and I'll bring them to you.

There's an Obama ad just begging to be made.