John McCain's Daily Bald-Faced Lie

McCain has a new campaign ad out attacking Obama. It's getting a lot more attention in the media than he's paid for, as it is only running in a few markets:

“Barack Obama never held a single Senate hearing on Afghanistan,” the ad’s announcer says. “He hadn’t been to Iraq in years. He voted against funding our troops. And now, he made time to go to the gym, but cancelled a visit with wounded troops. Seems the Pentagon wouldn’t allow him to bring cameras. John McCain is always there for our troops. McCain: Country first.” It concludes with the candidate’s voice: “I’m John McCain and I approve this message.”

Of course, Obama has attended more Afghanistan subcommittee meetings in the last two years than McCain.

Both McCain and Obama have voted against troop funding bills that contained provisions they didn't like.

It was McCain came out against the new GI Bill and its increased educational benefits for veterans, then didn't bother to vote when the final bill passed, while Obama made a special trip in from the campaign trail to vote for increased funding for veterans.

McCain voted against improved health care for disabled veterans.

McCain is against the very concept of VA healthcare and wants to shunt veterans into the private healthcare system where they will stand in line with (or behind) the rest of us.

Obama only canceled the hospital visit at the last minute after the Pentagon said at the last minute that he could only go with Senate staff (nothing was said about cameras, and Obama had visited wounded troops a couple of weeks ago at Walter Reed -- with no cameras present.). Since Obama was on a campaign visit and traveling with campaign staff, that was impossible.

(And on a related note, when John McCain was in Europe in March, he didn't go to the hospital in Landstuhl either, even though he was just as close to the hospital as Obama was.)

On the whole, the lowest point yet of a very low campaign.

hat tip to
Carpetbagger Report: When the going gets tough, McCain gets disgraceful where I got a lot of these links.

An actual truthful headline from the corporate media: New McCain Ad Bashes Obama for Not Visiting Troops Using Footage of Obama Visiting Troops (credit where credit is due, it's Jake Tapper of ABC News).