Is benefitting... or thinks they could benefit from it? The polls have so far not shown any movement since Clark's comment.

I think the appropriate response from the Obama camp, after three days of discussing such nonsense, should be: "When does John McCain want to talk about the issues?"

Barnacle, don't you know McCain's response to the issues is to be more like John McCain.

Lack health care? In Vietnam McCain had to endure torture so how bad could it be for you?

Unemployed? Hey, it is better than being tortured which was his job for 6 years.

Losing your home? Whereever you go will be better than the Hanoi Hilton.

Now for you penance, say 3 Hail Johns, and 10 Our Father McCains. Let us all genuflect again at McCain's heroism, America is not worthy to vote for him.

John McCain is such a hero he shits marble and farts ivory.

McCain obviously thinks a lot of things which have little to do with actual reality. The only points he's gaining are with the hard-liners; AFAIK, the voters McCain is trying to add to his tally either 1) realize exactly what Clark said and why it was not an insult to McCain's patriotism, or 2) don't give a shit because "patriotism" not an issue for them, or 3) don't care because the Republicans have spent so much time on the "patriotism" meme between '01 and '05 that its lost anything resembling a credible line of discussion.

I think this is just another one of those instances where we can honestly conclude McCain has lost his bearings. ;P

Question: Does McCain really believe that "riding in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to be president"? If so, there are other American aviators who have been shot down more than once; surely McCain should cede the nomination to one of them.

The correct response from McCain would be, "Wes Clark is right -- getting shot down is not a qualification to be president. But a lifetime spent in service to country, in uniform and in Congress, is." Or somesuch. Because as much as the rightwing likes to fetishize the military, the plain fact is that since Baby Boomers came of voting age, every time but once that a military hero has run for president against someone with less distinguished service or no service, the former hero has lost. The only exception was George HW Bush in 1988. McCain may think there's hay to be made playing up the "war service equals presidential material" angle, but the more he plays that up, the more he looks like he's running on biography instead of issues, and the more he looks like John Kerry or Bob Dole.

Since when did military service mean automatically you're a good president?  There have been some great military men who made great presidents (Washington), and some that were absolute disasters (Grant).  Some of the greatest presidents never were in the military (Lincoln, FDR).  So what is the big deal?

"Since when did military service mean automatically you're a good president?"

Whenever the Republican nominee has military service, silly!

Actually, I thought getting shot down was discouraged. Also crashing your plane in training, having deadly rocket accidents on the flight deck, etc. But, anyway, Obama has been and no doubt will continue to play this one just right. We HONOR John McCain's service. And John McCain. It's the best way to beat him.

An excellent side benefit of this deal in my view is to once again reveal what a creep Wes Clark is, if more revelation was needed. He should be kept as far away as possible from any position of influence, or even suggestion of influence. This is the guy who, among other things, told rookie CIC Clinton that he could gratuitously take ground troops off the table in Kosovo, thereby causing an avoidable humanitarian catastrophe and letting virtually all the Serb armor off the hook.

It's win-win. Obama praises McCain's heroism, and Clark, the bad cop, says the truth in a clumsy way, everyone piles on him, and the issue of whether or not what he said was actually correct - well, all agree that it was correct, but bad on him for the way he put it.

Take home: The POW thing doesn't qualify McCain to be President, and Clark is mean for pointing that out and will never be VP.

When Ann Coulter made her remarks a couple years ago about how triple-amputee fmr. Sen. Max Cleland's service should not be celebrated because he "fell on his own grenade" Democrats rightly howled with anger about Coulter's latest crass and despicable attack line.

I don't care if Cleland was playing hackey-sack with his grenade. And I don't care if John McCain crashed his plane because he push a red button marked "Do Not Ever Push -- Will Crash Plane." In terms of both politics and decency you don't go after the service record of someone who was tortured for five years.

Every day that the nation talks about McCain's military story is a good day for an otherwise struggling campaign. To have the impetus be a loud mouth former military commander who most top Pentagon brass regard as an elitist jerk and whose own record as a commander is spotty at best only makes the matter worse.

Clark was a lousy campaigner in 2004 and he has been a lousy surrogate since for both the Clintons and now for Obama. He's smug and arrogant, and in terms of politics and policy he has reason to be neither. Wes Clark should stick to what he does best: Self-promotion of how great Wes Clark is. Don't let him speak for the campaign again.

"Every day that the nation talks about McCain's military story is a good day for an otherwise struggling campaign." I disagree if it is McCain and his people who keep bringing it up. I admire what he did but at some point sooner rather than later people are going to say, fine we get it, enough, as you say issues please..

I agree Democrats shouldn't but McCain is hampered the say way in that he can't go after Barack's strongest suit as a post racial candidate.

Barnacle,

You're not representing what truly happened. Wes Clark, a good American, merely stated that John McCain's Vietnam experience, in and of itself, does not qualify him to be president.

That's all he said.

He did not "go after" McCain's record. He did not come up with a "crass and despicable attack line."

He said that McCain's experience in Vietnam, in an of itself, does not qualify him to be president.

That's it.

Period.

I agree.  Clark did not "go after" McCain's record.  All the outrage is FAKE.  Slow news cycle.