uh, he is going to fucking win with the goddamn prison card.

And no one is even going to acknowledge how odious that is.

John, the dead horse: plz to stop beating it. kthxbai.

This prison card.... yes it cheapens the whole concept of sacrifice.

"I was a POW in Vietnam" is the new "subject-verb-9/11". A slogan for morons. Works wonders in Flyover/Jeebus Country.

If time in a Vietnamese prison gives him points is he going to announce Gary Glitter as his running mate? Guaranteed victory!

Afterwards, did Leno give him a handjob?

A noun a verb and POW. What a fuck wad. If he had real leadership he would have escaped.

@1 is right. Why should he stop? He's winning.

@7, no, he isn't, and he won't.

A true POW wouldn't flap his toothless gums about it. At least Bush was smart enough to dodge the draft.

Leno is SUCH a tool. Where did they get that audience from?

@ 8: I hope you're right, but you better fight like an underdog. After 2004, I will never believe Americans are smart enough to elect the right person.

Fucking awesome. More, please.

But, like, Obama is a celebrity.

@11, good point (you can throw 2000 in there, too), but this year feels more like 1992 to me. I do intend to fight but I know we are going to win this time.

I love my country, and I know we're better than this.

@4: you are my new hero.

@4, 15: Well, at least he would get some great campaign songs out of that deal.

So, does he get points for learning how to make a shiv and having uncontrollable anger outbreaks that are only acerbated by his dementia (or is it Alzheimer's - Reagan got his about this age)?

Nuh uh.

Fess up to the fact you work for the top 0.1 percent of America and against the remaining 99.9 percent of us who still believe in our core American values of Truth, Justice, and the American Middle Class way of life, John!

@1 is right. It's all well and good for us to recognize on a blog that McCain's beating the POW horse is bullshit, but someone at that convention needs to say it, and they need to say it a lot in the couple of months to follow.

On the other hand, it's not that easy, is it? Wesley Clark tried to say a while ago that time spent as a POW does not necessarily qualify one to be President of the United States, and half the country blew a gasket.

MSNBC (especially Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow) are all over this. They have come out and said how disgusting it is. I expect that we'll see more of this covered in Newsweek very soon.

it was his second home.

#10, seemed like a standard Leno audience to me.

McCain was never in Prison or a POW cmap.

He spent his Vietnam days lounging by the pool of the HANOI HILTON.

THE HANOI HILTON is not a prison. It's a Five star hotel.

Check out it's website:

http://www1.hilton.com/en_US/hi/hotel/HANHITW-Hilton-Hanoi-Opera-hotel/index.do

http://www.vietnamstay.com/hotel/hilton/

He's really full of it. And did you notice that he never actually answered the question? Never mind your time in prison or how much ass your father-in-law kissed. The question is straight forward: How many houses do you own?

McCain never answers direct questions, @23.

Royalty never has to.

Just ask King George.

The prison card is a compelling, moving story. Not to me, not to you but to those undecided voters in all those places we wouldn't even deign to live in. It makes a connection with the gut--it connects with voters. Hate to intrude with reality into the bubble here.

Why is McCain on fucking Leno so much? And the Daily Show? Thirteen times each! OK, Leno's a giant floating turd, but Stewart's supposed to have a clue. Why do these people kiss his ass SO FUCKING MUCH?

That's a joke, right @22?

The name "Hanoi Hilton" is the army's toungue-in-cheek name for the prison camp at Hoa Lo. It's a pretty infamous place, built by the French in the late 1800's to hold and torture political prisoners. It ain't no hotel and McCain really was there for 5 years. Not that it makes him a good candidate, but I'm sure it did suck.

McCain killed that. Impressively.

Damn.

@18:

Unless it comes out of the mouth of a fellow former POW, and a prominent one at that (former FL Congressman Pete Peterson is the only former Viet Nam POW I can think of on the Dem side), it's not going to carry much weight, and even then it's just going to play as a pretty bald-faced attack; which of course would be exactly what it is.

Even so, there has to be some way around the "I was a POW - I DESERVE to be Preznit!" meme, just as there was a way around Hillary's similarly couched "I'm a WOMAN - I DESERVE it!" meme.

Comte for the win!

There was a time when they said Rudy couldn't possibly overdraw his 9/11 credit. What with it being sacred and whatnot. But this man was so slimy that he actually did it. He made 9/11 into a punchline. Can McCain make POW into a joke too? Yes, he can.

@27 lol.urdense.uberdense.lol.

Something tells me that Biden pulling a "Noun, verb, POW" won't work as well as "Noun, verb, 911" did.

27, PLEASE tell me you know 22 was kidding, and that you were too?

PLEASE!

the correct answer is "none". they all belong to my wife.

he will wear the POW card out. obama doesn't need to call him on it yet. my friends, mccain will be hoist by his own petard.

There are two reasons, just two reasons why I'm not voting for McCain, aside from the gay stuff, the abortion stuff, and the fact I'm vehamantly anti-war.

1. His policies are terrible and out of touch with what the people want. Your average American doesn't give a shit if their neighbor gets an abortion or fucks other dudes. They have more things to worry about. Like how the fuck they'll ever afford to buy a home and get their kids an adequate education and that their parents have affordable health care. Really, I should stop here. The only thing worse than a McCain presidency would be another four years of Bush.

2. Even without the above, I could never, EVER vote for a man who...well, we all know the story about his first wife. And McCain is endorsed by this "Moral Majority?" I would love to sit down some of those assholes and ask, "Excuse me, but WHAT THE FUCK, WHAT THE FUCK, is moral about abandoning your wife because she is no longer a six-foot tall supermodel?"

Those are the questions we should be asking McCain. And we should no longer be accepting "I spent five and a half years in a POW camp" as an adequate answer to EVERY. FUCKING. QUESTION.

34, please tell me that you read 27's response to 22 where she says "It's a joke."

#4 is the only clever one among all ya'll.

#26 Almost all of McCain's appearances on The Daily Show were between 2000 and 2003 when McCain was still likable to liberals. He used to not seem so full of shit. Leibermann also used to do TDS a lot too before he ran as an Independent after losing the Democratic nomination to Ned Lamont.

UGH. So what he is implying is that every man who is imprisoned deserves millions of dollars and around ten houses?

Yes, get right on that one McCain. Even if you only did this for falsely imprisoned men or PoWs you have a LOT of houses and money to give out.