John McCain still can't keep his story straight

So John McCain is trotting out a familiar argument today, slapping Barack Obama with the "surrender" label for supporting a timetable in Iraq:

For him to talk about dates for withdrawal, which basically is surrender in Iraq after we're succeeding so well is, I think, really inexcusable.

This is the same John McCain who supports a timetable of his own. In a speech describing what America would be like at the end of his first term, he said:

By January 2013, America has welcomed home most of the servicemen and women who have sacrificed terribly so that America might be secure in her freedom

McCain says that the problem with Obama's appoach to Iraq is that if we withdraw our combat forces, the country would descend into chaos, and we would be forced to return.

But if he believes that, wouldn't his plan present same problem? Like Obama, he plans on leaving some troops in the country, but not in combat roles.

McCain has actually addressed this question in the past, albeit indirectly. After attacking both Obama and Clinton for supporting timetables, he said that he would guarantee that our soldiers would never have to fight another war for oil in the Middle East because he would develop a new energy policy.

His campaign furiously tried to backpedal from his assertion that we are fighting the Iraq war for oil, but none of their explanations made any sense. It was, on McCain's part, a gaffe in the truest sense: he accidentally said what he really believes.

I just can't wait for this campaign to really get heated -- McCain is having enough trouble keeping his story straight now. Under the pressure of a 24x7 general election, he's going to implode, big time.

Original here