As Barack Obama rolled through Afghanistan and Iraq, John McCain was left alone in the U.S. to display any new plans or ideas he has for the future of the country if he should be elected the next President of the United States.  Although many of the major network anchors are shadowing Obama’s trip either on the press bus following him or through long distance communications, McCain has been left behind with enough of the top news broadcasters and journalists to have captured some of spotlight, without Obama’s presence to reply immediately.

Obama has undoubtedly been treated with political flare while on the trip, although he is traveling as a senator, not a Presidential candidate.  But, it is hard to separate the two.  For all the reporters trailing Obama on this trip, remarkably little of substance has been reported on the journey.  The trip has been under wraps as far as itinerary for the most part.  Perhaps, once out of the war zones, we will see more on the ground coverage.

One would have thought that John McCain would have used the absence of Obama from American soil to get his campaign rolling, trying to pick up some steam for the straight talk express.  Instead, McCain seems to have fallen off the map this week.  I’m sure he is making some local news somewhere, but he has received no more ground coverage than Obama.

We could accept the idea that the press has ignored the McCain campaign, but I am more inclined to believe that McCain has offered nothing new that deserves coverage.  How many times can we listen to the same old rhetoric?

McCain offered a response to Obama’s Op-Ed piece in the New York Times.  It was rejected by the paper, although we may yet see it if McCain can come up with something to say.  According to CNN

The New York Times has rejected an essay that Sen. John McCain wrote defending his Iraq war policy.

The piece was in response to an op-ed from Sen. Barack Obama that was published in the paper last week.

In an e-mail to the McCain campaign, Opinion Page Editor David Shipley said he could not accept the piece as written, but would be “pleased, though, to look at another draft.”

“Let me suggest an approach,” he wrote Friday. “The Obama piece worked for me because it offered new information (it appeared before his speech); while Senator Obama discussed Senator McCain, he also went into detail about his own plans. It would be terrific to have an article from Senator McCain that mirrors Senator Obama’s piece.”

McCain’s campaign is claiming bias.  That may be true… or not.  But, none of us want to read the same old same old from the candidate and apparently the New York Times is in the business of news, not history. 

For those who are interested in reading McCain’s essay, click HERE for the full essay.  Having read it, I am only reminded of Phil Gramm’s statement about “whiners.”  But, that is my opinion.

Let’s dismiss the essay for a the time.  What has McCain been doing since Obama left the country?

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said “Iraq” on Monday when he apparently meant “Afghanistan”, adding to a string of mixed-up word choices that is giving ammunition to the opposition. 

Just in the past three weeks, McCain has also mistaken “Somalia” for ”Sudan,” and even football’s Green Bay Packers for the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Ironically, the errors have been concentrated in what should be his area of expertise: foreign affairs.

The Huffington Post claimed that the first foreign policy gaffe of Barack Obama’s tour abroad came from John McCain.  That had to be a major disappointment for the McCain camp.  But, I suppose you have to work with what you have.

More and more questions are arising about McCain’s gaffes.  Whether there is any truth to the notion that McCain is too old to become President, or whether he just confuses names while in the midst of a speech, we need to consider the consequences of electing a President who has mixed up the names of just about everything that relates to foreign policy.

A few months ago, while McCain, Lieberman, and Graham were traveling through the mid-East, the press made little of the fact that John McCain confused the Iranian extremists with Al Qaeda, or the Sunni’s with the Shi’as.  In fact the incident was not reported in major press stories until the videos surfaced all across the Internet.  There was no way to avoid it after that.  Yet, little was made of it.

However, as McCain continues, and seemingly with increasing frequency, to confuse names and places, the press has no choice but to take note.  Both candidates have misspoken at one point in time or another.  We have all said one word while thinking another and meaning to say another.  But it seems more and more that McCain is skewing the chart.

According to reports, Obama should be returning to the U.S. in a week or so.  Perhaps, McCain can then regain his focus.  It is just a shame that John McCain and his campaign have not been able to capitalize on Obama’s absence… with the exception of a single negative ad.  Tsk!  Tsk!  Tsk!