Did I Say "Shameless"? Shameless!

In a previous post I commented upon this photo that was released to the Drudge Report by Clinton aides in an effort to "smear" him as a closet Muslim. Of course the campaign says it was a rogue staffer and that they would never approve of these sorts of tactics. On Morning Joe this morning, Clinton supporter and adviser Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones (D-OH) had this to say about Obama's clothing:

"His native clothing"? "The clothing of his country"?! HE'S AMERICAN!!! He was born in Hawaii! He couldn't run for president if he wasn't! Sorry about that but I just can't believe the obvious disdain for the intelligence of the American people by the Clinton campaign. Sadly though, these kinds of tactics usually work; if you throw enough slime against the wall something will eventually stick.

But if you thought that Clinton was the only one with allies pulling dirty tricks using talking points then you haven't seen this video of John McCain supporter and local conservative talk radio host Bill Cunningham introducing McCain at an Ohio town hall meeting today:

One could look past the obvious and overplayed right wing talk radio tactic of using his middle name (one of the most common in the Muslim world) when talking about him if this wasn't an official McCain rally but they knew what they were getting when they asked this idiot to be there. Aside from calling Obama a "hack, Chicago-style politician", in the past Cunningham has also referred to him as "Barack Mohammed Hussein Obama", has falsely claimed that Obama "was raised in madrassas in Indonesia" and falsely accused Obama's church of being "black separatist" and "black racist".

To his credit, McCain issued an apology before reporters could ask him about it but I just don't know. As I've said, this guy Cunningham has a history of this kind of thing and it's not like McCain didn't know exactly who he was; he campaigned for McCain in 2000 and 2004. I do think that an Obama-McCain race will be one of the more clean and honorable contests in my lifetime but in order for that to happen they're going to have to make sure to keep a good distance from these types of contemptible individuals.