John McCain keeps on flogging the N.C. GOP for this ad featuring Rev. Wright and Barack Obama. This morning McCain said on CBS's Early Show: "I'll do everything in my power to make sure not only they stop it but that kind of leadership is rejected." And he said on the Today show: "They're not listening to me because they're out of touch with reality and the Republican Party. We are the party of Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan and this kind of campaigning is unacceptable."
Jim Geraghty wrote yesterday that McCain is being shrewd, but now that a TV station has refused to air the ad, is it possible McCain is too clever by half? Sure, McCain shouldn't lead on the Wright connection, but he's coming very close to making any talk of Wright beyond the pale. This is a legitimate issue--just as John Kerry's slander that his band of brothers were a bunch of rapists and murderers was a legitimate issue in 2004. I would commend this advice from Chris Cillizza to the McCain campaign:
Stop Criticizing Outside Groups: McCain may not like all of the outside money coursing through the system but in an election where he is likely to be badly outspent by the Democratic nominee and his (or her) allied groups, McCain needs some third party spending on his side as a counterweight. McCain has made his disdain for 527s and 501(c)(4)s clear over the past few years, and the donors who fund these groups know it. Republican strategists worry that if McCain is too tough on these conservative aligned groups the donors may take their money and walk away, a situation that many GOP operatives would equate to fighting the general election with one hand tied behind their backs.
