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On Friday's Countdown, Keith Olbermann noted the appearance of George Bush at CPAC and his speech, which stopped short of endorsing the presumptive Republican nominee John McCain, a slight reiterated officially by the White House press office. Air America's Rachel Maddow joins to discuss the curious balance that must be struck between being perceived as riding the coattails of a failed and extremely unpopular administration and continuing those same failed and extremely unpopular policies.

MADDOW: John McCain is probably going to run on war. On the Iraq war and on his hopes for an Iran war. And so he may make the mistake of having Bush out there as kind of a war trinket on the campaign trail. I think it would be dumb because people don’t think of just war when they look at George Bush. They think of war monger and that’s something that John McCain should probably avoid.

OLBERMANN: Plus shoot the economy to hell and the Constitution and several other things that he brings along as baggage.

Rachel, Keith: shhhhh. Let McCain go with this strategy. We don't need Mr. "100 years in Iraq" in office.