Nice dissection by Slate’s Fred Kaplan of the McCain and Missus Palin mantra about his preparedness to handle security because he’s been “tested” in battle. Or, as McCain put it to a campaign rally in Pennsylvania, speaking about the Cuban missile crisis:
My friends, you know how close we came to nuclear war. Americans will not have a president who needs to be tested. I’ve been tested, my friends.
Which raises three questions:
One: Don’t you think it’s time to knock it off with the patently false bonhomie of “my friends?”
Two: Do you really believe that many of the “friends” who come out to your rallies know enough about the Cuban Missile Crisis to realise how close it came to a nuclear war between the USA and USSR?
And,
Three: Really, should you be reminding an electorate that is already leery about your great age, that you were old enough to fly planes forty-six years ago?