Obama Spokesman On McCain: We Know 'Who Is Erratic In A Crisis'

On today's Morning Joe, Obama flack Robert Gibbs, prompted by a question from Mark Halperin, lashed into John McCain, terming his behavior "erratic." And, indeed, the flipping and flopping has come at a pretty steady pace ever since the markets began their Farandole of Imminent Failure: for and against the AIG bailout, the suspension/non-suspension of his campaign, right up to yesterday's claim from Douglas Holtz-Eakin (after the deal failed) that McCain had been keeping a "low profile"...because that's what you do when you want to keep a low profile: tell the media about your intentions, threaten to scuttle and debate, and anger up the blood of David Letterman. Yeah...that's real stealth! Anyway, Gibbs suggested that "if John McCain's driving, get off the sidewalk," because he's an ageist or something.

Oh, and if you pay really close attention to the cross talk in the following clip, you'll hear Joe Scarborough ask one of those questions that, frankly, should never be asked. The images he's put in my mind today will not soon be erased.

[WATCH]

HALPERIN: Robert, it's Mark Halperin. How are you sir?

GIBBS: Yes, how are you?

HALPERIN: I want to ask you a political question because I know you sometimes move away from your policy hat and deal with politics.

GIBBS: I'm shocked you're going ask me a political question.

HALPERIN: There are people even on this set that believe this election has moved in large part because of the economic situation decisively to your candidate. You've got five or six pollsters at your disposal: do you all believe in terms of the presidential election, not the current crisis, this has caused things to move decisively to Senator Obama?

GIBBS: Well, look, what I do think is in the last 2 1/2 to 3 weeks, including that last debate, that people got a real sense of who is steady in a crisis and quite frankly, who is erratic in a crisis. I think that's probably caused people to have a lot more confidence in Senator Obama's ability to lead this country from the direction it's in now, forward.

SCARBOROUGH: How has John McCain been erotic....erratic

BRZEZINSKI: Erratic.

SCARBOROUGH: That's what I said.

GIBBS: I'm leaving that first one alone.

BRZEZINSKI: Erratic.

GIBBS: How has he been erratic?

SCARBOROUGH: That's what I asked, Robert? You don't want me to ask it.

GIBBS: Look, just yesterday, John McCain said we shouldn't fix blame, took a breath and then fixed blame. He said the fundamentals of our economy are strong and he flip-flopped. He opposed the bailout of AIG and then he supported it. This guy zig-zags. If he's driving a car, get off the sidewalk.

Comments

[ozrox]

12:57 AM on 10/01/2008

I watched Joe this morning for the last time. He spent all morning railing against McCain but when McCain was actually on set he was handled with kid gloves! He had the Dems bent over & was horrid. Mika is a kite, she blows with the wind, no opinion of her own. But she does seem to be giddy over Palin! Hell, I 've had red patent pumps for years!!!

[bakerbee]

11:59 PM on 09/30/2008

Thought I'd share the following account of one woman's impression of J. McMean. Due to the word limit on this site, I will have to post the entire account in several different posts. Pass it on.

***
MY HOLIDAY WITH JOHN McCAIN (Part 6)

Although I have shared my McCain story informally with friends, this is the first time I am making this public. I almost did so in 2000, when McCain first announced his bid for the Republican nomination­, but it soon became apparent that George Bush was the shoo-in candidate and so I did not act then. However, now that there is a very real possibilit­y that McCain could be elected as our next president, I feel it is my duty as an American citizen to share this story. I can't imagine a more scary outcome for America than that this abusive, aggressive man should lead our nation. I have observed him in intimate surroundin­gs as he really is, not how the media portrays him to be. If his attitudes toward women and his treatment of his own family are even a small indicator of his real personalit­y, then I shudder to think what will happen to America were he to be elected as our President.
--
Mary-Kay Gamel
Professor of Classics, Comparativ­e Literature­, and Theater
Arts
Cowell College
University of California , Santa Cruz
Santa Cruz , California 95064
831-459-23­81 (office); 831-429-88­03 (home)
mkgamel@uc­sc. edu

[Solja]

01:01 AM on 10/01/2008

Where is part 4 & 5? I was into what you wrote but it skipped 2 parts.

I'm mad at this:

"She just went and adopted this thing without even asking me. You can't imagine how people stare when I wheel this ugly, black thing around in a shopping cart in Arizona." He needs his face slapped!

[bakerbee]

02:19 AM on 10/01/2008

Parts 4 & 5 haven't been posted b/c theHuffpos­t system said it was being moderated or reviewed, or something to that effect.

This was my first time posting on this site, so I didn't know that posts are sometimes put on hold for review.

[bakerbee]

11:55 PM on 09/30/2008

Thought I'd share the following account of one woman's impression of J. McMean. Due to the word limit on this site, I will have to post the entire account in several different posts. Pass it on.

***
MY HOLIDAY WITH JOHN McCAIN (Part 3)

Needless to say I was irritated at his large ego and his rude behavior towards his wife and other women, but decided he must have some redeeming qualities as he had adopted a handicappe­d child from Bangladesh . I asked him about this one day, and his response was shocking: "Oh, that was Cindy's idea – I didn't have anything to do with it. She just went and adopted this thing without even asking me. You can't imagine how people stare when I wheel this ugly, black thing around in a shopping cart in Arizona . No, it wasn't my idea at all."

[bakerbee]

11:53 PM on 09/30/2008

Thought I'd share the following account of one woman's impression of J. McMean. Due to the word limit on this site, I will have to post the entire account in several different posts. Pass it on.

***
MY HOLIDAY WITH JOHN McCAIN (Part 2)

Unfortunat­ely this was not his only contributi­on to our mealtime entertainm­ent. He waxed on during one meal about how Indo-Chine women had the best figures and that our American corn-fed women just couldn't meet up to this standard. He also made it a point that all of us should stop Cindy from having dessert as her weight was too high and made a few comments to Amy, the 25 year old wife of the honeymooni­ng couple from Nebraska that she should eat less as she needed to lose weight.



McCain's appreciati­on of the beauty of Asian women was so great that David the American economist had to move his Thai wife to the other side of the table from McCain as McCain kept aggressive­ly flirting with and touching her.

[bakerbee]

11:49 PM on 09/30/2008

Thought I'd share the following account of one woman's impression of J. McMean. Due to the word limit on this site, I will have to post the entire account in several different posts. Pass it on.

***
MY HOLIDAY WITH JOHN McCAIN (Part 1)

It was just before John McCain's last run at the presidenti­al nomination in 2000 that my husband and I vacationed in Turtle Island in Fiji with John McCain, Cindy, and their children, including Bridget (their adopted Bangladesh­i child).



It was not our intention, but it was our misfortune­, to be in close quarters with John McCain for almost a week, since Turtle Island has a small number of bungalows and their focus on communal meals force all vacationer­s who are there at the same time to get to know each other intimately­.



He arrived at our first group meal and started reading quotes from a pile of William Faulkner books with a forest of Post-Its sticking out of them. As an English Literature major myself, my first thought was "if he likes this so much, why hasn't he memorized any of this yet?"



I soon realized that McCain actually thought we had come on vacation to be a volunteer audience for his "readings" which then became a regular part of each meal. Out of politeness­, none of the vacationer­s initially protested at this intrusion into their blissful holiday, but people's buttons definitely got pushed as the readings continued day after day.

[unite4change]

11:46 PM on 09/30/2008

Both McCain and the republican party are erratic and can never be trusted again.

Every American should be angry! This is the republican party at work every American should see this movie about voter fraud everyone should see. Watch it and pass it along to everyone you know.

http://www­.freeforal­l.tv/

[YankeeYahoo]

02:10 AM on 10/01/2008

EXCELLENT movie ... a MUST watch. Thank you.

[PKSSK]

11:05 PM on 09/30/2008

Love Robert Gibbs!!! Obama surrounds himself with great people!!!

[lagumbo]

10:26 PM on 09/30/2008

John Mccain is erratic, but I wish to respond to Joe Scarbough. This man needs to be taken off the TV.
He make Miaka looks like a sitting dog. He tells her shut up, and she acts like she is afraid of him. I wonder what her husband and kids must think of it. He treats her like a dog. I stopped watching
Morning Joe long ago. It hurts me to see Miaka reduced to a dog. You will never see him on Rachel Maddow's show because he is afraid of Rachel. He has tried to pull on Rachel what he does to MIaka. and Rachel shot him down each time. I remember she made him walk off a show one time. I loved it.
Rachel Maddow is his match.

[liberalrebuttal]

09:01 PM on 09/30/2008

"If he's driving , get off the sidewalk"

BEST LINE EVAH !

[PT6]

07:26 PM on 09/30/2008

McErratic has done himself in with Gimmicks, Games, Flip Flops, Zigs and Zags, mistake after mistake, and general Confusion!

He seems like a Four Grader in an EXAM who is constantly looking on Obama's paper and writing on his paper! First he copied Obama's four Principals and today he copied Obama's suggestion that we raise the FDIC insurance from $100,000 to $250,000.

No wonder he graduated "5th from the BOTTOM IN 896 STUDENTS at the Academy." He probably had to copy to even graduate!

[PT6]

07:24 PM on 09/30/2008

McErratic has done himself in with Gimmicks, Games, Flip Flops, Zigs and Zags, mistake after mistake, and general Confusion!

He seems like a Four Grader in an EXAM who is constantly looking on Obama's paper and writing on his paper! First he copied Obama's four Principals and today he copied Obama's suggestion that we raise the FDIC insurance from $100,000 to $250,000.

No wonder he graduated "5th from the BOTTOM IN 896 STUDENTS and the Academy." He probably had to copy to even graduate!

[wagadog]

06:25 PM on 09/30/2008

Their derision sure went quiet when Halperin brought up the facts of McCain's actual position changes.

And their laughter sounded pretty forced after that.

It's obvious they have these little routines and catch phrases worked up to deride their opponents in the absence of substantiv­e debate points.

Typical bullying behavior. Morning Joe is just demonstrat­ing by his own thuggish behavior how the Republican party is actually discrediti­ng itself.

In a time when people feel vulnerable­, they're much more likely to side with the victim than snide with the bully. I predict a drop in ratings for Morning Joe.

[oldfart1]

05:34 PM on 09/30/2008

Actually these days when you're on the sidewalk, you still have to watch out, and not just for John McCain.

[DebbieinPhx]

04:19 PM on 09/30/2008

I was on MSNBC's blogs this morning and a recurring theme through out has been this: "when is MSNBC going to get rid of Morning Joke?"

[doctormark]

04:14 PM on 09/30/2008

McCain acts before he thinks.

Obama thinks before he acts.