HAMOCRACY.

In recent weeks, McCain has suggested that Hamas is rooting for an Obama victory and blasted Obama for supporting negotiations with Hamas -- something which Obama doesn't actually support. It's low stuff. And as Jaime Rubin explains today, it's actually contrary to John McCain's previously expressed views:

Two years ago, just after Hamas won the Palestinian parliamentary elections, I interviewed McCain for the British network Sky News's "World News Tonight" program. Here is the crucial part of our exchange:I asked: "Do you think that American diplomats should be operating the way they have in the past, working with the Palestinian government if Hamas is now in charge?"McCain answered: "They're the government; sooner or later we are going to have to deal with them, one way or another, and I understand why this administration and previous administrations had such antipathy towards Hamas because of their dedication to violence and the things that they not only espouse but practice, so . . . but it's a new reality in the Middle East. I think the lesson is people want security and a decent life and decent future, that they want democracy. Fatah was not giving them that."

"We are going to have to deal with them." Two years ago, that was John McCain's position on Hamas. It is, as Michael Cohen points out, a stance that goes considerably farther than Barack Obama's position. Now McCain travels the country blustering that he will be Hamas's "worst nightmare." As a position -- it doesn't even make sense. We've already cut off Hamas's funding and avoided a diplomatic relationship. The next step, presumably, would be a bombing campaign. But McCain isn't going to bomb the Occupied Territories. He's just blustering, and lying, and pandering, and fear-mongering in order to win an election.