Barack Obama is running a new ad mocking McCain for being unable to use a computer:
An AP story has some background:
John McCain is mocked as an out-of-touch, out-of-date computer illiterate in a television commercial out Friday from Barack Obama as the Democrat begins his sharpest barrage yet on McCain’s long Washington career. . .
“Today is the first day of the rest of the campaign,” Obama campaign manager David Plouffe says in a campaign strategy memo. “We will respond with speed and ferocity to John McCain’s attacks and we will take the fight to him, but we will do it on the big issues that matter to the American people.”
The newest ad showcasing their hard line includes unflattering footage of McCain at a hearing in the early ’80s, wearing giant glasses and an out-of-style suit, interspersed with shots of a disco ball, a clunky phone, an outdated computer and a Rubik’s Cube. . .
Obama spokesman Dan Pfeiffer said the campaign was not making an issue of the 72-year-old McCain’s age, but the time he’s spent in Washington.
“Our economy wouldn’t survive without the Internet, and cyber-security continues to represent one our most serious national security threats,” Pfeiffer said. “It’s extraordinary that someone who wants to be our president and our commander in chief doesn’t know how to send an e-mail.”
McCain has said he relies on his wife and staff to work the computer for him and that he doesn’t use e-mail.
ASIDE: Not making his age an issue? Please, that doesn’t even pass the laugh test. (Frankly, I think his age is a legitimate issue.) Also, is whether McCain can send email really one of “the big issues that matter to the American people”? But anyway. . .
Why do you think that McCain never learned to use a computer? Jonah Goldberg has a good theory. This Boston Globe story sheds some light on the matter:
McCain gets emotional at the mention of military families needing food stamps or veterans lacking health care. The outrage comes from inside: McCain’s severe war injuries prevent him from combing his hair, typing on a keyboard, or tying his shoes. Friends marvel at McCain’s encyclopedic knowledge of sports. He’s an avid fan – Ted Williams is his hero – but he can’t raise his arm above his shoulder to throw a baseball.
(Emphasis mine.) Hard to use a computer when you can’t use a keyboard, isn’t it?
I think this will prove to be a major unforced error by Obama. The rebuttal ad writes itself, and how many chances does one get to rebut an unfair attack while simultaneously highlighting your war record? This is much better material than the lipstick business.
UPDATE: Goldberg’s post is on Drudge now.
UPDATE and BUMP: Instapundit has been rounding up comment on this, and finds a fair amount of evidence that, notwithstanding his inability to type, McCain actually is pretty internet savvy. Plus, this comment at Ace of Spades:
I think they spent months trying to figure out how they can position Obama as better qualified than McCain, and basically came up with the fact that Obama can type.
Heh.
UPDATE : It gets worse; there’s not even a shred of truth to the attack. An eight-year-old Forbes story reported:
In certain ways, McCain was a natural Web candidate. Chairman of the Senate Telecommunications Subcommittee and regarded as the U.S. Senate’s savviest technologist, McCain is an inveterate devotee of email. His nightly ritual is to read his email together with his wife, Cindy. The injuries he incurred as a Vietnam POW make it painful for McCain to type. Instead, he dictates responses that his wife types on a laptop. “She’s a whiz on the keyboard, and I’m so laborious,” McCain admits.
(Via the Corner.)
UPDATE: Worst. Rebuttal. Ever. In an effort to contradict Goldberg, the Huffington Post points out that McCain can use a Blackberry and a cell phone. Not only does it fail to contradict Goldberg’s defense — since injuries that keep you from using a keyboard effectively would not necessarily keep you from using a Blackberry or a cell phone — but it eviscerates the entire point of the Obama ad. Bravo.
(Via Perfunction, via Instapundit.)
Internet Scofflaw 