In a dramatic error yesterday, John McCain told Katie Couric that it’s “just a matter of history” that Bush’s “surge” policy “began the Anbar awakening.” That, of course, is backwards.
Today, thanks to some efforts by the Obama campaign, the media started picking up on McCain’s bizarre confusion on his signature national security issue, most notably with coverage from the AP and CNN.
As of this earlier afternoon, the best the McCain campaign could come up with was this: “Democrats can debate whether the awakening would have survived without the surge … but that is nothing more than a transparent effort to minimize the role of our commanders and our troops in defeating the enemy.”
Got that? If you think 2006 came before 2007, you’re somehow showing disrespect for the troops.
The McCain campaign then got a little more creative.
“Senator McCain is correct,” McCain campaign spokesman Tucker Bounds said today. “As General Petraeus has made clear, the surge is the reason why the Anbar Awakening was so successful in tearing up al Qaeda.”
This one’s more interesting, so let’s unpack it a bit.
Here’s the new McCain campaign rationale for his obvious screw-up: the surge, for all of you calendar-lovers, may technically have come after the launch of the Anbar Awakening, but it doesn’t matter because were it not for the surge, the Awakening would have failed miserably. The influx of U.S. troops may have come after the Awakening, but it made the success of the Awakening possible. That, in a nutshell, is the new argument.
As spin goes, that’s pretty creative. But that doesn’t make it right.
First, the McCain campaign is making a case that’s supported by practically nothing. The vast majority of the troops involved with the surge went to Baghdad, not Anbar, the latter of which saw one U.S. brigade. Did the presence of this brigade make the surge successful? It can’t be disproven, but it’s hardly the accepted consensus, either.
Second, and more importantly, the latest spin is disconnected to what McCain, you know, actually said. McCain insisted that the surge “began the Anbar awakening.” It didn’t. In fact, to hear McCain tell it, the only Awakening the surge happened — not succeeded, but happened — is the surge, which is clearly false. All the after-the-fact rationalizing won’t change this obvious mistake.
It’s likely reporters would have had a few more questions for McCain about his latest confusion at his press conference this afternoon, but around the time the AP story about McCain’s error hit the wires, the campaign cancelled the press conference. Was the cancellation connected to the desire to avoid questions about this? Your guess is as good as mine.
And what about CBS News, which conveniently helped cover up McCain’s mistake? The network issued a statement this afternoon:
“As all news organizations do with extended interviews, last night’s Obama and McCain interviews were edited to fit the available time and to give viewers a fair expression of the candidates’ major differences. The full transcript and video were and still are available at cbsnews.com.”
This isn’t especially helpful. McCain’s confusion wasn’t especially lengthy; there was plenty of time to air it. Considering it was arguably the most important mistake either candidate has made all year — which, of course, makes it newsworthy — you’d think CBS would choose to make time for it.
For that matter, the statement doesn’t explain why CBS aired Couric’s question in full, but spliced the interview together to air a different, less-embarrassing answer to a different question.