To follow up on Bill Kristol's report below, it looks like Mark Warner was moved earlier not just to let Deval Patrick bash McCain in prime time--but to get a back-to-back-to-back attack from Democratic governors Patrick, Ted Strickland, and Brian Schweitzer.
Warner's speech was a paean to bipartisan good government, the criticism of John McCain was brief and mild:
Two wars, a warming planet, an energy policy that says let's borrow money from China to buy oil from countries that don't like us. How many people look at these things and wonder what the future holds for them? Their children? Their country? How many?
In George Bush and John McCain's America, far too many.
Let's be fair, some of these challenges were inevitable.
Warner goes on to say that "John McCain promises more of the same. A plan that would explode the deficit that will be passed on to our kids. No real plan to invest in our infrastructure. And his plan would continue spending $10 billion a month in Iraq. I don't know about you, but that's just not right. That's four more years that we can't just afford."
Criticizing McCain on the deficit and spending billions in Iraq was pretty weak compared to what the three Democratic governors who took up the first half hour of prime time said.
Ohio's Gov. Ted Strickland went after McCain personally:
And while families are losing sleep tonight trying to figure out some way to make their paycheck stretch through one more day, John McCain is sleeping better than ever. He's sleeping better than ever because he thinks "Americans, overall, are better off..." thanks to President Bush.
And then there was this Strickland gem: "George W. Bush came into office on third base -- and then he stole second. And John McCain cheered him every step of the way."
Deval Patrick blamed McCain for being in cahoots with the people who "abandoned" Hurricane Katrina victims:
The same folks, with John McCain leading the charge, who say they support seniors, want to privatize Social Security and put corporate pension funds up for grabs. The same folks who call themselves "compassionate conservatives" are the folks who abandoned all those people not only after Katrina, but before that storm.
And the harshest and most personal attack came from Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer:
After eight years of a White House waiting hand and foot on big oil, John McCain offers more of the same. ... Even leaders in the oil industry know that Senator McCain has it wrong. We simply can't drill our way to energy independence, even if you drilled in all of John McCain's backyards, including the ones he can't even remember.
You know how you can tell if a Democrat has been a good attack dog? When Markos Moulitsas muses that he'll be president one day.
