John Sidney McCain's Fake Press Conference

By GottaLaff

True to form, he's getting to be more like the Chimpenfuhrer every day:

Welcome to the new John McCain press strategy.

Avoid them.

McCain today held a 10-minute press conference, complete with podium, microphones for the questioners, network-quality audio and a camera for a local television station, which allowed CNN to carry it live.

And where was the national press corps?

Sitting on the runway 27 miles away, having been ferried to McCain's charter plane, totally unaware that a press availability was about to take place until one of the handful of "pool reporters" sent an e-mail alert.

And this surprises the press? They expected John Sidney McBushClone to be kind to them? Oh wait, that's right! J Sid is the media's bestest friend ever! Wake up, sleepyheads. The honeymoon's over.

The reporters frantically fired up their cellular modems and logged on to CNN.com to catch the end of the press conference, unable to ask any questions. The handful of reporters there asked about the FISA terrorism bill, Iran and about McCain's pledge to balance the budget.

Hmm, McDodgy wants to protect the telecoms' sacred immunity, he's practically soaking his Depends with anticipation about singing another refrain of Bomb Bomb Bomb Iran, and he can't balance his own statements on the budget, let alone balance it. No wonder he's ducking his former pals.

McCain's schedule for Wednesday included a note about a "gaggle" with the pool reporters, but nothing indicated a live press conference. The tactic was a first for the McCain campaign, which basically shrugged when asked about it.

The Duck and Run Express: Brain child of Karl Rove:

The new approach may reflect the growing influence of the newly-powerful Steve Schmidt, a top adviser and protege of Bush political guru Karl Rove, who was famous for his desire to control the press's access to his candidate.

Schmidt now has operational control of the day-to-day activities of the campaign and is no doubt responding to criticism about a lack of message discipline by the McCain campaign.

I have a feeling that this kind of message discipline won't get him no respect.