It’s not exactly a shocking revelation that John McCain’s budget numbers don’t add up. Presidential candidates’ numbers are often rather pie-in-the-sky, and political observers have been conditioned to give campaigns at least a little leeway and wiggle room.

But from time to time, it’s worth keeping in mind that McCain’s budget promises aren’t just wrong, they’re spectacularly ridiculous.

McCain recently told NPR, for example, “I can eliminate $100 billion of wasteful and earmark spending immediately — $35 billion in big spending bills in the last two years, and another $65 billion that has already been made a permanent part of the budget.” He told George Stephanopoulos almost the exact same thing: “You do away with those, there’s $100 billion right before you look at any agency.”

This magical savings, McCain has said, allows him to make promises about eliminating the deficit altogether in four years, and making Bush’s tax cuts permanent, and passing new tax cuts of his own, and keeping U.S. troops in Iraq indefinitely.

The WaPo’s Michael Dobbs took a closer look at McCain’s inability to do arithmetic.

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People are for the war, but as the audience points out--refuse to fight in it. Glenn Greenwald wonders what the heck McCain is talking about. So do I.

McCain complained that Matthews' line of questioning meant that his "bias is starting to show." Apparently, if one demonstrates that McCain's Plan for Victory is based on absurd fantasy, that is "biased." A reporter should only sit by and heap praise on McCain as the responsible, serious Leader that he is.

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So, John McCain's bold, straight-talking Plan for Victory in Iraq is to wait for Rich Lowry, Jonah Goldberg, Peter Beinert and Glenn Reynolds to realize how Western Civilization Hangs in the Balance in Iraq and that only more troops can save us. And once they realize that, they are going to stand up bravely and risk their lives in combat in Iraq -- waves and waves and waves of them -- and that will fortify our military presence there and we will win. Waiting for a big thunderbolt from the sky to strike down the Insurgents seems like a more probable and rational plan...read on

Transcript

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In another sign of the media's sheepish acceptance of the Barack Obama "elitist" story line, the New York Times on Tuesday described the Illinois Senator as "tagged as elitist." But just as disturbing as the Republicans' apparent success in establishing the "out of touch" narrative as a fixture in campaign coverage is John McCain's seeming inoculation from it.

After all, John McCain isn't merely fabulously well off, courtesy of his wife Cindy's $100 million beer distribution fortune. At almost every turn, the Republican presidential nominee has shown almost a total ignorance of – or yawning disinterest in – the real lives of American voters. From the growing financial hardships of the economic slowdown and the foreclosure crisis to the disintegrating American health care system and the dangers U.S. troops face on the streets on Baghdad, it is John McCain who is truly "out of touch." Yet voters and pundits alike agree that the supposed maverick is treated with kid gloves by the press, an elitist masquerading as a man of the people.

Here, then, are John McCain's Top 10 "Out-of-Touch" Moments:

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Eight years ago, then Governor George W. Bush revealingly joked about his backers at the 2000 Al Smith Dinner. "This is an impressive crowd - the haves and the have-mores," Bush said, adding, "Some people call you the elites; I call you my base." With his own quip Saturday night that "$5 million" is his definition of rich," John McCain made no mistake that he is Bush's natural heir.

Now, there is nothing wrong with being happily rich and utterly detached. Nothing, that is, unless you make criticizing your political opponent as "elitist" and "out of touch" a centerpiece of your campaign. Which is why McCain beat a hasty retreat in an interview today with the Politico. (In that same interview, McCain with no sense of irony called lobbyists "birds of prey.") Without naming a number, McCain said:

"I define rich in other ways besides income. Some people are wealthy and rich in their lives and their children and their ability to educate them. Others are poor if they’re billionaires."

Of course, by any accounting, the $100 million McCains are fabulously well-off (see the gold-plated details below the fold). But John McCain's staggering detachment from the real lives of the American people can truly be measured in dollars – and sense.

For starters, McCain in April declared that there had been "great progress economically" during the Bush years. On more than one occasion, he diagnosed Americans' concerns over the dismal U.S. economy as "psychological." (Phil Gramm, McCain's close friend and adviser supposedly excommunicated over his "whiners" remarks, was back with the campaign last week.) McCain, a man who owns eight homes nationwide, in March lectured Americans facing foreclosure that they ought to be "doing what is necessary -- working a second job, skipping a vacation, and managing their budgets -- to make their payments on time." And when all else fails, McCain told the people of the economically devastated regions in Martin County, Kentucky and Youngstown, Ohio, there's always eBay.

In his defense, McCain's shocking tone-deafness may just be a matter of perspective. When you're as well off as he is, anything below a $5 million income (a figure exceeding that earned on average by the top 0.1% of Americans) seems middle class by comparison.

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Considering how worked up John McCain gets if anyone confronts him with his “100 years” comments on Iraq, it's odd that he continues to articulate a policy of indefinite war. The Jed Report highlighted this clip from last night’s NBC Nightly News:

In other words, McCain’s policy for Iraq is to stay the course, indefinitely, with as many troops and resources as required. Oddly enough, that was also his policy in 2003, and 2004, and come to think of it, 2005, 2006, and 2007. Just keep doing what Bush has been doing, and wait for it to work. Every step of the way, when asked, just say that the policy is either “working” or “winning,” and hope no one looks too closely to see if that’s right.

Of course, this isn’t a policy; it’s a joke.

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The DNC’s “100 years” ad targeting John McCain drew the predictably ire of the Republican Party this week, with McCain allies arguing that McCain doesn’t want to keep the war going through 2108, he’s just willing to leave U.S. troops in Iraq there indefinitely to help maintain the peace.

Now, as I noted the other day, McCain has changed his mind on multiple of occasions about whether this is realistic, but for now, he seems to sincerely believe that Iraqis would not only allow the United States to maintain a Korea-like presence in Iraq for decades to come, but that such a presence is actually necessary.

This strikes me as a pretty ridiculous policy, but let’s take it a step further. McCain is willing to leave troops in Iraq for up to a century after the war ends. Got it. But how long do we keep U.S. troops in Iraq during the war? As it turns out, that’s indefinite, too.

As Ron Brownstein explains, it’s incumbent on McCain to go into more detail.

First, if McCain doesn’t envision a 100-year American front-line combat presence in Iraq, how long is he willing to keep U.S. forces in that role? So far, all he has said is that the United States should withdraw only if it concludes that the Iraq mission is unachievable or when it has achieved success, which he defines as the establishment of “a peaceful, stable, prosperous, democratic state.” […]

McCain has not said when, but he has pledged that Iraqi units will eventually assume the major combat responsibility. That prompts the next question McCain should address: What would then become the mission for the U.S. forces he wants to maintain in Iraq?

McCain hasn’t been able to answer either question. He hasn’t even tried.

Democrats seem to have found the one criticism that gets John McCain angrier than anything else — bring up his comments about keeping U.S. troops in Iraq for “100 years.” Every time a high profile Dem (Clinton, Obama, Dean, et al) mentions this, he becomes enraged and insists his comments have been mischaracterized.

It’s true that McCain did not, as a point of fact, indicate that he wants to see the ongoing war continue until 2108, but rather, he envisions thousands of American troops “maintaining a presence” in the country for 100 years, after some semblance of stability has been established. They’re not, to be fair, the same thing.

As far as the McCain campaign is concerned, this realization should effectively end the controversy. Joe Klein argues that McCain’s confused about this, too.

The problem with John McCain’s 100 years in Iraq formulation isn’t that he’s calling for 95 more years of combat — he isn’t — but that he thinks you can have a long-term basing arrangement in Iraq similar to those we have in Germany or Korea. That betrays a fairly acute lack of knowledge about both Iraq and Islam. It may well be possible to station U.S. troops in small, peripheral kingdoms like Dubai or Kuwait, but Iraq is — and has always been — volatile, tenuous, centrally-located and nearly as sensitive to the presence of infidels as Saudi Arabia. It is a terrible candidate for a long-term basing agreement.

Quite right. I’d just add, however, that McCain already knows this. In fact, he’s admitted as much.

The point seems to have been largely forgotten, but back in November, after months of insisting that Korea could be a model for a long-term troop presence in Iraq, McCain abandoned this position, saying he doesn’t want to use Korea as a model, and adding that the “nature of the society in Iraq” and the “religious aspects” of the country make withdrawal inevitable.

Soon after, McCain went back to his original position again, saying that a Korean model is entirely appropriate. So, for those keeping score at home, McCain 1) endorsed a multi-decade presence in Iraq; 2) denounced a multi-decade presence in Iraq; 3) re-embraced his first point; and 4) blasted those who agreed with his second point as being incompetent.

At the risk of sounding impolite, this guy is starting to make Bush look like he’s engaged and knowledgeable.

Ctblogger sent me the video of Hagel's speech today during the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He was as passionate as I've ever seen him before.

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Downwithtyranny: "After killing Dodd's bill to actually prevent the escalation, Biden mustered a majority (12-9) for his silly nonbinding symbolic thing that Bush already announced he would ignore. The full Senate will debate it next week...read on"

TPMMuckracker supplies the transcript:

I don't know how many United States senators believe we have a coherent strategy in Iraq. I don't think we've ever had a coherent strategy. In fact, I would even challenge the administration today to show us the plan that the president talked about the other night. There is no plan. I happen to know Pentagon planners were on their way to the Central Com over the weekend. They haven't even team B'ed this plan.

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Vanity Fair:

Cindy McCain('s first night of Republican National Convention outfit)

Oscar de la Renta dress: $3,000
Chanel J12 White Ceramic Watch: $4,500
Three-carat diamond earrings: $280,000
Four-strand pearl necklace: $11,000-$25,000
Shoes, designer unknown: $600
Total: Between $299,100 and $313,100

Wow. That's about 60 times the health care credit McCain proposes to give families for a year. And according to Huffington Post, George W. Bush helped cover the expense:

According to an analysis by the Center for American Progress Action Fund, the McCains have received $313,413 thanks to George Bush's tax cut.

If John McCain were President, she might have been able to add a bracelet to the ensemble. According to the same study under McCain proposed tax cuts they would have received tax breaks of $367,788.

Maybe it's that level of elitism that caused CNN to flash a chyron saying that McCain had officially won the Democratic nomination.

John Kerry swiftboater Jerome Corsi is at it again. After writing a book back in 2004 which sought to sink John Kerry's Presidential hopes by calling into question his heroic Vietnam service, Corsi has now set hs sights on Barack Obama. With all the secret-Muslim/unpatriotic/radical-black-liberation-theologist smears already circulating, you might think his job would be easier this time around.Well, if every news outlet is as "fair and balanced" as CNN was last night in covering the book, Corsi and his ilk might be in a bit of trouble. Watch while MediaMatters' Paul Waldman, author of the book Free Ride: John McCain and the Media, dismantles every single one of Corsi's lies in rather humiliating fashion. In this clip,Corsi gets slammed for claiming "700 footnotes" while refusing to acknowledge that one of his sources is a widely discredited anti-semitic right-wing blogger.

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WALDMAN: He talks about how many footnotes he has and how many sources he has. Well, if you actually look at them, there are dozens and dozens of citations to right-wing Web sites and blogs. One of the people that he cites as a quote/unquote source is a man named Andy Martin, who is an anti- Semitic right-wing blogger who once called a judge a dirty Jew and filed so many frivolous lawsuits that he's now no longer allowed to file lawsuits.

So my question to Mr. Corsi is, since you cite Andy Martin multiple times as a source, are there any other anti-Semitic right- wing bloggers that you also use as sources or is he the only one?

CORSI: All right. This is what Media Matters does. They frame questions that you...

WALDMAN: This is what we do. We look at what you wrote.

CORSI: [...] If you'd like to talk, I can just sit here. The book has close to 700 footnotes in it. The footnotes are of primary sources. There must be 100 books cited in that. I did interviews. The interviews are cited. There's newspapers included...

KING: Well, respond to the question about Mr. Martin.

CORSI: Well, I quote -- I can remember one quip I quote from him -- and it's just a quip, which is -- where he basically is saying if Obama will lie about his background and his family, he'll lie about anything. And this was in reference to the way Obama presents his father in the autobiography, which I write about extension extensively."

MediaMatters has the entire segment here as well as a thorough debunking of Corsi's book here.

The Dems have an email campaign going called: Get the Truth Out About Jerome Corsi. Please sign up and help us to expose this fraud.

UPDATE: The Obama campaign has released an exhaustive 41 page rebuttal to "fringe bigot" Corsi titled "Unfit for Publication." Read it and learn it here.

Full transcript below the fold.

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