The story Dana says Obama staffers are mailing around may be stupid, but at least the target of the story is McCain's phoniness in using his daughter's car as a campaign prop. The McCain campaign, on the other hand, is emailing reporters a story about Ashley Biden getting in an argument with a cop, ostensibly because "families are off limits". It's hard to imagine as banal a take as the one offered by James Oliphant yesterday:
Call it Palin Payback.After Sarah Palin's daughter, Bristol, her teenage pregnancy, and her high school boyfriend were run through the media wringer last week, Republicans are now pointing to Joe Biden's daughter, Ashley, to make the case, ostensibly, that no candidate has produced perfect children.
Republican sources have been circulating a 2002 news story (from the Tribune) that reported Ashley Biden was arrested for obstructing a police officer in Chicago in August 2002 after getting into a verbal spat with a cop in a late-night nightlife district. The charges were dropped after she apologized to the officer involved.
So the McCain campaign is trying to "payback" the Obama campaign for Bristol Palin getting pregnant by attacking Joe Biden's daughter? How are those two things even remotely related? How exactly is the Obama campaign responsible for the behavior of Sarah Palin's children, or the campaign's decision to issue a press release letting everyone know their business?
In other words, the attack on Ashley Biden isn't remotely justified, but no one wants to say that. And let's be real: most parents would rather their teenage daughters get in an argument with a cop and have to apologize than get pregnant before they're 20, so I don't know why Republicans are taking this tack in the first place.
--A. Serwer
