The St. Petersburg Times frolics in the tank (for Obama)

In addition to smearing Sarah Palin, the mainstream press has stepped up attacks on supposedly false ads from the McCain campaign. Thus we get the following byline-less editorial from the Times:

This nation is facing real challenges on the economy, health care, jobs and the ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. There are significant differences between how Sen. Barack Obama and Sen. John McCain would address them. But McCain's recent campaign ads suggest the most vital issues are whether Obama wanted to teach sex education to kindergarten children and whether he derided the Republican's running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, by talking about lipstick on a pig.

Interesting that the Times weighs in on the issue with its own lie. How would the ads suggest that those specific issues were the most important? Each contributes to the picture of Barack Obama, a man presenting himself as an agent of change, the man who transcends old politics and yea, the symbol of America returning to its best traditions. The McCain campaign is continually releasing ads. Is it the least bit fair to single out two as narrowing the scope of relevant campaign issues?

When I first heard the McCain ad concerning Obama's support for a sex education bill including kindergarteners, I was dismayed and suspected that the ad was a misrepresentation. But it turns out that the ad is fundamentally accurate even if it does play on viewers' fears in a manner that might exaggerate the truth--but that is normal in political advertising, for better or worse. Byron York has the skinny on that ad over at National Review.

The mainstream media have gone overboard with credulity in refusing to believe that Obama could have had Palin in mind as a subtext when he talked about putting lipstick on a pig. The analysis at PolitiFact (associated with the Times) puts that credulity on full display. The author notes the public buzz regarding the Palin line about the difference between a hockey mom and a pit bull and then proceeds to analyze the Obama remark as though that cultural meme was nonexistent. It is likely that Obama meant the comment to cue his listeners to think of Palin, and his subsequent reference to an "old" fish wrapped in newspaper was probably meant to cue his listeners to think of McCain. Obama's handlers are probably chuckling to themselves over the gullible media defense they've received.

You can still view the McCain ad here, at least for a time (YouTube has taken it down), and I take down the PolitiFact judgment on Obama's "lipstick on a pig" comment here.