"Honorgate"

I hope that after Obama wins the election, all the current hand-wringing over his faint damning of the GOP slurs and B.S. will seem quaint. "Why did we get so worked up? He mastered it!" I hope, I hope. For my children's sake, I hope.

Until then, though, it's my belief that we must fight fire with fire. We can do so without losing our own integrity, as we need only speak truth (loudly and unrelentingly).

Josh Marshall of TalkingPointsMemo calls it "Honorgate" and it gibes with my own thinking of the last few days. "Swiftboat" attacks are about attacking a candidate's supposedly inviolate "brand attributes." Think back 4 years: John Kerry's a war hero? He led the charge of the swiftboats up the river delta? Let's ATTACK that heroic deed. Seems crazy. Crazy enough to work.

McCain's top brand attribute - "we honor him for his service" - can be his own Achilles' Heel, based on the slimy campaign he's running.

Imagine Obama saying, flatly: "John McCain has disgraced himself. John McCain is no longer a man of honor." The false and flabby "lipstick on a pig" imbroglio would die out quick, eh?

Proof of McCain's lost honor? Oh, sweet jeebus, have you been reading this blog? Did you see his most recent ad, in which he mislabels Obama's vote AGAINST child sex predators as a vote FOR kindergarten sex-ed? (I won't even get into how the ad depicts a "leering" black man juxtaposed with innocent white children!)

McCain has no honor left. He is unfit for office.