Tonight’s Debate: McCain Vs. Palin

John McCain and his running mate are on opposite sides of which direction to take in tonight’s Hofstra University debate.  McCain’s advisers and his VP choice are urging him to bring up his ties to Reverend Jeremiah Wright, but according to Mike Allen at Politico, McCain, to his credit, is resisting, fearing this would reek of desperation and racism.

With McCain unlikely to budge, GOP officials are hoping groups outside of the campaign will finance an ad attack on Obama-Wright ties. It is unclear if any conservative group has the cash to bankroll a serious effort, however.

“Wright is off the table,” said one top campaign official. “It’s all McCain. He won’t go there. His advisers would have gone there.”

McCain believes that attacking Obama on this level shows racial insensitivity. However, most prominent in the divide on which direction McCain should take is Sarah Palin, who wouldn’t show the same level of concern in this area.  She told Bill Kristol:

“To tell you the truth, Bill, I don’t know why that association isn’t discussed more, because those were appalling things that that pastor had said about our great country, and to have sat in the pews for 20 years and listened to that – with, I don’t know, a sense of condoning it, I guess, because he didn’t get up and leave – to me, that does say something about character. But, you know, I guess that would be a John McCain call on whether he wants to bring that up.”

But McCain had this to say to my television partner, Sean Hannity during a recent interview:

“I think that when people support you, it doesn’t mean that you support everything you say. Obviously, those words and those statements are statements that none of us would associate ourselves with. And I don’t believe that Sen. Obama would support any of those. … I do know Sen. Obama. He does not share those views.”

I’ve always believed that John McCain is a good, decent man.  But his campaign isn’t being run that way, given the ads they’ve put out.  The campaign is not speaking in McCain’s voice.  Perhaps if it did, he’d be doing much better in the polls.  When you hear the words, “I’m John McCain and I approve this message,” it’s obvious that, unlike the “Saturday Night Live” skit, he was nowhere near those recording sessions.

By: Alan

Alan Colmes is the publisher of Liberaland.