Biden: Look Him in the Eye and Say It

MSNBC’s First Read:

Joe Biden echoed the campaign’s response to continued Republican efforts to highlight Obama’s past associations, adding a personal touch to the idea that McCain wasn’t willing to make the attacks in person.

“All of the things they said about Barack Obama in the TV, on the TV, at their rallies, and now on YouTube … John McCain could not bring himself to look Barack Obama in the eye and say the same things to him,” Biden said this morning. “In my neighborhood, when you’ve got something to say to a guy, you look him in the eye and you say it to him.”

That might make folks at The Weekly Standard happy. They headline, McCain Goes There, from Waukesha, Wisconsin:

In response to a broad question about how Barack Obama “got here” — presumably got his lead — John McCain didn’t name Bill Ayers but spoke of him directly. McCain said “We don’t care about an old washed up terrorist and his wife” who said earlier this decade that he wished they were more successful. (Several in the crowd chanted: “Yes we do!”)

McCain noted that Obama had referred to Ayers as “just a guy in his neighborhood,” and said “we know that’s not true. We need to know the full extent of that relationship to know whether he’s telling the truth to the American public.”

They update that with a quote from “a black McCain supporter”:

“I doubt that anyone has taken, pardon me, the ass-whoopin’ I have taken for doing [everything possible to ensure a McCain victory].” He then implored McCain to go after Barack Obama at the next debate and asked him to raise ACORN and Reverend Wright. “I am begging you, sir,” he said, as the crowd stood and applauded.

McCain said he would.