Did McCain Have Moral Epiphany, Or Is He Locked In His Bush-Rove Campaign Prison?

Was it a moral epiphany or yet another mercurial image from an erratic campaigner? Has McCain, like the character Gollum in Lord of the Rings, still a shred of goodness inside, even through he has been affected by the Ring, er, I mean the Rove for a long time now?

The Seattle Times reports today John McCain on Friday moved to calm rising anger among his supporters at rival Barack Obama, describing him as a "decent person and a person that you do not have to be scared of as president of the United States."

McCain was booed after the conciliatory words about his Democratic foe.

The move by McCain at a town-hall meeting in Lakeville, Minn., came after days of rising tensions as the Republican presidential candidate and his campaign repeatedly attacked Obama as a friend of a 1960s radical they call a terrorist.

Growing angry about Obama's increasing lead in polls, supporters of McCain and running mate Sarah Palin have responded with loud cries of "terrorist" and "traitor."

At one rally this week in New Mexico, McCain winced when his mention of Obama's name was greeted by the shout of "terrorist," but the candidate said nothing.

Supporters at Friday's town-hall meeting pressed McCain to get tougher on Obama.

But when one man said he was scared to raise his unborn child in a country that might be led by a President Obama, McCain disagreed.

"I have to tell you, he is a decent person and a person that you do not have to be scared of as president of the United States," McCain said to boos and groans from supporters.

"If you want a fight, we will fight," McCain said. "But we will be respectful. I admire Senator Obama and his accomplishments. ... I don't mean that has to reduce your ferocity; I just mean to say you have to be respectful."

At one point, McCain grabbed the microphone from a woman who had begun to say she didn't like Obama because he is an Arab. "No, ma'am. No, ma'am," McCain said. "He's a decent family man, a citizen who I just happen to have serious differences with on fundamental questions."

His comments came a day after an angry Wisconsin crowd shouted epithets about Obama, pumped fists angrily and catcalled repeatedly when Obama's name was mentioned. Outside, many flipped their middle finger at a media bus.

McCain was less conciliatory at that rally. When a visibly angry supporter in Waukesha told McCain "I'm really mad" because of "socialists taking over the country," McCain stoked the sentiment. "I think I got the message," he said. "The gentleman is right."

But even while McCain tried to quiet the boos Friday, his allies and advertising unleashed a flurry of attacks on his rival's ethics, touting Obama's ties to Vietnam War-era radical Bill Ayers, who was radical four decades ago, but a senior citizen professor now.

McCain's campaign released a national TV ad that asserts Obama worked with a "terrorist" when it was politically convenient and then lied about their relationship.

Ayers, now a professor of education at the University of Illinois, Chicago, hosted a 1995 candidate event for Obama and was involved with two mainstream charitable groups in which Obama also had been active. Chicago Mayor Richard Daley has praised Ayers as a leading citizen who helped shape the city's innovative schools program.

In the late 1960s and early '70s, when Obama was a child, Ayers belonged to the Weathermen, a radical anti-war group that advocated violence and placed bombs at the Pentagon and the Capitol. There's no evidence that the two men are close or that Ayers has any connection to Obama's presidential campaign.

What will it be? Will MCCain pull the ads? Or does he really control his campaign? The Bush operative led Republican campaign is in full gutter mode now, responding to Obama’s hopeful vision for America with low blow attacks and outright lies. As Senator Joe Biden said yesterday, “I've heard some pretty unspeakable things in the past few days -- deeply offensive smears that we'll hear over and over again until Election Day. John McCain and Governor Palin are setting a new low in presidential politics with their dishonorable campaign.”

Biden continued, “After Tuesday’s debate, it's clear why John McCain doesn't want to talk about the issues facing ordinary Americans -- especially the economy, which his own advisers admit he can't talk about without losing."

So what's to come from the McCain campaign? Biden sees more negative attacks and lies. And it's even worse from some of the well-funded outside groups supporting McCain, have a sole purpose is tearing Barack Obama down with smears. Instead of focusing on the issues that really matter,

So it is that McCain and Palin and their hench-people are doing everything they can to encourage this toxic atmosphere. They do not want folks to see that it was a type of McCain’s own Keating economics that got us in this financial mess. Witness Sarah “Not Ready to be a Heartbeat Away” Palin, and her hateful rhetoric, and all the lies McCain has approved in his multitude of false, misleading ads.

Palin is a falsehood machine gun. She is not just telling lies; she's telling lies that have been exposed as lies, and that have gotten a lot of attention. Assuming she does not actually want to lose, she must assume that her audience either doesn't know that she's lying, or that her audience doesn't care. In either case, it's deeply cynical, and deeply insulting, and starkly tragic.

What has the McCain-Palin gutter brigade chosen to do? Viciously attack Obama's good character with recycled lies and distortions, all in an effort to distract us from important issues like the economic crisis. The same tactics they used against Dukakis, Clinton.Gore and Kerry. Character assassination with lies -- and the real truth does not matter, since it is the opposite from what they are saying,

You would think that someone like McCain, who was viciously attacked and smeared by Bush-Rove in 2000, and who was grievously wounded in those attacks--wouldn't turn around and in 8 years do it to another candidate. But he has surrounded himself with Bush operatives.

What a hypocrite! He has bought into the Republican-Rove-Bush way of winning – by hook and by crook. BUT THEY DO NOT KNOW HOW TO GOVERN! Witness the last eight years!

Did McCain have an epiphany or was the better John McCain of eight years ago trying to send a message from this detestable Rove-Bush prison he finds himselfin?