Monday, August 11, 2008

NYT, how about reporting all the facts about McCain?

John Aravosis (DC), AmericaBlog.com: Fair enough, the NYT mentions John McCain's gaffes, but then wraps them in this "fatigue" argument, unquestioned:
Mr. McCain has made a number of verbal gaffes in recent months, including referring three times to Czechoslovakia, a country that has not existed since 1993. In his comments on the plane, Mr. McCain did not address whether his gaffes had anything to do with fatigue, but he seemed to suggest that they might have. “If I put in three or four 18-hour, 20-hour days in a row, then I’m not sharp,” Mr. McCain said. “It’s just a fact.”
The issue is sensitive for Mr. McCain, 71, who would be the oldest person elected president if he wins. Although Mr. McCain sometimes looks tired on the campaign trail, his aides say he has more energy than they do as they run the grueling marathon of this long presidential campaign. On Friday, Mr. McCain started at 8:30 a.m. in Cincinnati, made campaign stops in Iowa and Arkansas, and ended more than 16 hours later in Las Vegas.
Here's the problem - there have already been reports from the media itself that McCain doesn't regularly do 18 and 20 hour days. On the contrary. He has the lightest schedule of anyone running for president that these reporters have ever seen. And as for the fatigue argument, the other argument is that John McCain is turning 72 this month and may be showing cognitive problems relating to his age, not to fatigue. That's an obvious point to anyone who's ever met someone over the age of 70, but one that Newsweek seems afraid to mention. We get it. You like him. Now get over it and do your freaking job. Let me reprint a recent excerpt from Rolling Stone:
LSB: Did I read that right? NYT: “If I put in three or four 18-hour, 20-hour days in a row, then I’m not sharp,” Mr. McCain said. Doesn't McCain disqualify himself from being our "wartime" President?

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