Getting Dirty - Fox McCain

It has become evident this week that the McCain-Palin camp has decided that they need to pull out all the big guns and get dirty for the last few weeks of campaigning. Falling polls numbers, due to the big hit McCain took on economic issues, have made this weeks campaign message not about policy or reform but about putting doubt in people's minds about Barack Obama's character. It will not be John McCain you see doing the Obama bashing, it has been and will continue to be his sweet and folksy running mate, Sarah Palin. During the last few days it has become much more clear why Sarah Palin was chosen as McCain's potential VP. Palin has a very special way of attacking Barack Obama that makes it seem truthful and honorable. Her personality and manner of attacking makes one think she is really just looking out for the American people, she wants them to know the truth about out potential next President because gosh darn it she just loves America. Palin has been attacking Obama on his connections to radical Bill Ayers. Bill Ayers was the leader of a group responsible for many bombings during the Vietnam Era, when Obama was only a child. Obama and Ayers served on a charity board together in Illinois. Obama has denounced all of Ayer's radical views and has stated that they barely new one another, although the did live in the same neighborhood. In a speech over the weekend Palin made the extreme claim that Obama "paled around with terrorists." I was pleasantly surprised with the Fox News coverage on the comment, the program I watched had many commentators both Republican and Democrat discussing the comment and labeling it as a complete exaggeration.
Fox News also went on the criticize Palin for bringing up Jeremiah Wright in a campaign speech in Florida Monday morning. McCain has said in past interviews that he wants to " disassociate himself from that kind of campaigning," when it comes to bashing Obama on his pastor.
In a New York Times article released on Monday, when pressed about Wright, Palin stated,
"I don't know why that association isn't discussed more, because those were appalling things that that pastor had said about our great country."

Fox News reporters went on to talk about Palin being used as a mudslinger when she should be trying to prove herself as a competent leader. Fox News has been spending a good amount of time discussing McCain's messages of the week, which by default gives the messages some form of legitimacy. However, the station has been rejecting many of the actions and messages of the campaign as rhetoric that is not needed at this stage of the game. I was pleasantly surprised by the journalistic integrity of the reports in exposing the truth and dismissing rumors for what they are worth.