Posted by
Sean on Friday, June 13, 2008 4:08:28 PM
This rejection from Obama comes on a Friday, the day every typical politician or corporation uses to sweep issues they don't want to face under the rug.
Then the doulble-talk from Obama's campaign manager:
Plouffe tried to place the blame on McCain for refusing to agree, saying five joint appearances "would have been the most of any presidential campaign in the modern era, offering a broad range of formats and representing a historic commitment to openness and transparency."
If you take Plouffe's statement seriously, all this proves is that McCain is more transparent, more open than any other candidate in history, since he's offered 10 meetings to their proposed 5 -- with only one of theirs being the non-traditional Town Hall debate. The Obama campaign proposed the single Town Hall event take place on the 4th of July holiday -- when nobody is paying attention.
For a candidate who says he wants change, Barack Obama has a strange affinity for old-style structured debates, old-style controlled, choreographed campaign appearances, old-style rhetoric, pandering, and tactics, and a near Nixonian aversion to transparency and criticism.