McCain Campaign Co-Chairman Suggests Obama Is “Of The Street” And Raises Drug Use

This isn’t just the kitchen sink: Republican presidential candidate John McCain’s campaign seems to be throwing in the bathtub, shower, all the backyard shrubs, and the house cat, too. And it doesn’t just come from some marginal surrogate but from McCain’s campaign co-chair:

Former Oklahoma Gov. Frank Keating, a McCain campaign co-chairman, edged up to an explicitly racial attack on Barack Obama on Thursday, describing the Illinois Senator as a “guy of the street” before raising his youthful drug use.

Appearing on Dennis Miller’s radio show, Keating charged that the Democratic nominee was covering up his “very extreme” record, and urged Obama to be more honest with Americans. “He ought to admit,” Keating said, “‘You know, I’ve got to be honest with you. I was a guy of the street. I was way to the left. I used cocaine. I voted liberally, but I’m back at the center.’”

Keating began to address Obama’s former pastor Jeremiah Wright — a topic that John McCain himself has said should be off-limits — but Miller interrupted him to return to the discussion of cocaine.

Keating’s comments are basically a way of making the charge in a way so he can claim he himself never really raise the issue in a way to make a charge. It provides plausible deniability (even though its intent is clear).

Two things: a) This will go down as one of the dirtiest campaigns in modern history and b) McCain will have problems if he wins with these kinds of tactics — and will have lost far more than just the election if he loses. It’s one thing if comments such as this came from Howard Schmidlap talking off the cuff in Rhode Island. It’s another if it’s a McCain campaign co-chair.

UPDATE: The Atlantic’s Andrew Sullivan weighs in on this latest quote:

This election really is a classic battle between fear and hope. All Palin and McCain are offering right now is more fear: fear of a black man, fear of terrorism, fear of the other, fear of Iran, fear of the future, fear of Islam, fear of the truth. And above all: fear of defeat. On that last one, they’re rational. Which side are you on?