McCain Stacks Fox News 'Town Hall' With Supporters

Tonight was the first in a much-hyped series of 'town hall' forums scheduled by John McCain's campaign, in which Barack Obama had been challenged to show up to discuss the issues directly with the GOP nominee.

Except, as Fox News reported, McCain's campaign misled the public about the nature of the event. The forum was "billed by the McCain campaign as a town hall with independent and Democratic voters," but Fox News noted at the end that the audience was actually "made up of invited guests and supporters," the Democratic National Committee said in a statement.

Here is FNC's Shepard Smith breaking the news:

SMITH: "I reported at the top of this hour that the campaign had told us at Fox News that the audience would be made up of Republicans, Democrats, and independents. We have now received a clarification from the campaign and I feel I should pass it along to you. The McCain campaign distributed tickets to supporters, Mayor Bloomberg, who of course is a registered Republican, and other independent groups."

DNC Chairman Howard Dean issued the following statement:

"Once again John McCain's campaign is trying to mislead the American people. Senator McCain should understand that after seven years of a President who has divided Americans and pursued a scorched earth policy full of misleading propaganda campaigns, we need a leader who understands he is the President for all Americans not just his supporters. Copying the Bush campaign model of stacking events with his prescreened supporters is not the transparency Americans are looking for. If that is Senator McCain's idea of straight talk, the American people are in for a long and disappointing campaign season."

Comments

[plooger]

Fox News should now air an equal-length Obama town hall or campaign appearance, to insure they remain fair and balanced.

Chortle.

[JiminNC]

Did I hear they shot a Depends commercial during the town hall??

[wanj]

I am realling loving the new Democratic party especially Dean and the DNC. They don't waste time putting McBush on "check mate". How can McSenile stage a town hall and then throw his little hands up with, "Look Obama is too scared to do these townhalls with me so the American people can judge for themselves who has better policies". You mean who can stage the townhall better with their supporters?

Keep it Dems. No more propaganda and swift boating this time around..

[JiminNC]

Meanwhile, the lapdogs are on MSNBC now making out like McDoink is going out before the general public. If I were Barack, I would tell him to hang his "town hall meetings" in his butt. Let's go to CSPAN.

[KarlRoves3rdchin]

No one should be surprised by this. These phony town hall meetings are staged and choreographed by Karl Rove. Rove has been working for McCain for months in the same campaign capacity as he did with Bush. This is EXACTLY what Karl Rove set up for Bush before he was appointed in 2000 and has continued to do it throughout his Presidency. This is just one of MANY of the deceitful tactics Karl Rove, the RNC, and the GOP uses.

All people who go to these phony town halls are asked to sign an pledge or oath to the GOP and they are 'given' the questions ahead of time. It's pathetic. This is what they have to do to give the appearance that they have many supporters -when in fact, they have very few.

[MaracaKabob]

It will take weeks to get that old person smell out of the seats.

[AFPISCES]

ROTFLMAO!!!!

[WireDolly]

I think McCain's first (dumped) wife, was probably not among his "supporters" at this so-called "town meeting":

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1024927/The-wife-John-McCain-callously-left-behind.html

Read this and weep, John. Or maybe just continue collecting welfare for the rich from your beer-queen wifey, who's paved the way for you. The McCain economic plan: marry up!

[Sparty1]

If I were McCain, I wouldn't want to debate Obama either.

[RRIDLEY100]

I think someone needs to really look at what McCain says carefully. He, like most humans, will give away their position if you listen carefully enough.
He said that we would be in Iraq for 100 years. then he tried and somewhat successfully backpedaled from that
He said at a town hall meeting when he was heckled, that he would 'NEVER SURRENDER IN IRAQ, MY FRIENDS, I WILL NEVER SURRENDER IN IRAQ. Its odd no one caught that one.
He said that its not important when the troops come home.

Start listening, he is telling you bit by bit exactly what he means.

[Razz]

This is exactly what lying Bush did when he was running for office.
These moves are the hallmark of a pig of a human Rove; it’s nothing new.

[olivia]

Any debates should be hosted on C-Span.

The MSM has botched the opportunity to bring us information via debates, much too often.

[bygollymissmolly]

If O'bama agrees to a joint town hall type meeting with Mc'Cain he will insist that the event be "first come first served" and that questions will be asked at random from the attendees. It will be fun to see what Mc'Cain does when someone stumps him on a question.

I think Mc'Cain thinks that he can sucker O'Bama into town hall type events rather than a real debate. He's scared spitless of debating O'bama.

[mystic]

No, sorry. There are too many loopholes and McCain will inevitably find a way to stack the audience his way regardless. F* him. Who cares if he looks bad in debate? He looks bad any which way he talks anyway. All Obama has to do is decline the Town Hall trickery and work out some other way, maybe unmoderated debates so you don't have a Stephanopolous sabotage either. The latter munchkin deserved a slap n the face the way he treated Obama with Hillary the tricksteress..

[starboymikey]

I think Mc'Cain thinks that he can sucker O'Bama into town hall type events rather than a real debate. He's scared spitless of debating O'bama.
______________________________________________________

I think Obama would do just fine in town hall type events, provided they can come up with a fair way of determining who the audience will be. And certainly Obama should not allow Fox to host it.

Loaded questions do not allow voters to determine which candidate is better informed and which might better represent them. Stacked debates and town hall meetings only tell you about the politic al leanings of the people asking the questions.

[BannedFromCommenting]

Their names are McCain and Obama.. there are no apostrophes in them. They are not Irish.

[DemMD]

I used to laugh off this man's gaffes, and chalk it up to his being "senile." But it's painfully obvious now, the man is a SNAKE. Why in the world is anyone considering a vote for this evil man?

[mystic]

Many Americans are stupid, because they vote for the Republican Party even if it is against their own interests and pocketbook. I don't know any other country in the world where people do this knowing they are hurting themselves but somehow a vote for the Democratic Party means gays will rule the world or something like that.The book "What's The Matter With Kansas?" tried to explain this paradox. It spells doom for this country either way. I am an Obama supporter, but somehow feel the Repugs will win, using a combination of fraudulent measures including Diebold. Either that or a false flag with suspension of the elections.

[1099]

Gimme a break - You think if Obama had a town hall meeting there would be any Republicans there to ask questions? It's not worth it for the campaigns to risk having their candidate look bad being that the media covers every second of their activities.

[pogoman11]

It also looks like there will be no town hall debates between Obama and McCain: http://www.thepoliticaljerk.com/

[TotobiAyokoh23]

What a synthetic derivative of the human race!