Can't a guy just get some old fashioned falsely imposed balance?

I almost feel bad for John McCain.  About a week ago, his campaign began a new strategy centered around an attack on Barack Obama's character.  For the most part these attacks have been carried out in the form of speeches and rallies, where Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin call in to question Obama's experience and his past affiliations (Palin has done much more of the latter, consistently speaking of Obama's affiliation with Bill Ayers, or a she prefers to call him, a domestic terrorist.)  

These rallies, which have taken place in key battleground states, have gotten ugly at times, with the crowds raining down boos at the mention of Obama's name and by some reports yelling racially insensitive remarks (i.e. a crowd member telling a black camera man to "Sit down, boy!" at a recent Palin rally).  The media has picked up on this and these overzealous crowds (Democratic congressman John Lewis has compared them to those of the George Wallace rallies of the 1960s) have gotten as much media attention as the Obama-Ayers connection, maybe more.  

I say I feel bad for John McCain because the man must feel like he was duped.  He was around in 1988 when George H.W. Bush used the 'Willie Horton" incident to smear Michael Dukakis, and the press stood by idly and played the ads and speeches nonstop.  He was obviously paying attention four years ago when the media's love affair with Swiftboat-Mania sunk John Kerry.  When John McCain opted to launch this strategy he probably figured the media would end up devoting endless specials to William Ayers, the Weather underground's terrorist activity, or Obama's past, in general.  While the mainstream media has done a decent amount of this, some of the coverage regarding this situation has actually been quite good.  Look at this piece from the latest Time Magazine.  I think it is an accurate, well-researched piece.  It details the history of the Weather Underground, Ayers specific involvement in the organization and Obama's affiliation with Ayers (which it notes is minimal at best).   On the other hand, the media has devoted a lot of effort to analyzing the near-fanatical crowds at McCain's rallies.  The Arizona Senator has, as a result, had to conduct a complete about face so as not to alienate undecided voters.  This can be seen in the Senator's recent attempts to to defend Obama to his own supporters (somethng that resulted in McCain being booed at his own speeches.)  The video of this can be seen below.



 Josh Marshall offers some really interesting commentary on this at TPM.   All of this could not have come at a worse time for McCain.  He is doing horrifically in the polls and Republicans are panicking.   Sarah Palin is being booed at hockey games and violating the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics act.  The worst part of all this?  The mainstream media have actually noticed and they have all but declared the election over (something that also needs to be watched ... but I'll touch on that another time. )  But you can see why I feel bad for poor ol' John McCain.  The man was just asking the media to do what they have done for the past twenty years or so - fail the American public.  Where do they get off reporting things accurately?  If this keeps up I'll have nothing to critique - I guess there's always FOX news.