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McCain turns on media about Palin inquiries

 

Frank Cotolo
3 Oct 2008

 

Republican presidential candidate John McCain was not jocular with journalists while defending running mate Sarah Palin's experience.

 

"He was downright irritable and at times sarcastic," said a journalist who once listened to a joke about a rabbi, a priest and a coffee salesman from McCain.

 

McCain was meeting with journalists on one of his campaign stops. Even after Mrs. Palin made a good showing in the Vice-President candidates' debate, McCain was asked again why he picked Alaska-governor Palin, who doesn't have any national or international political experience.

 

Journalists present said McCain bit his lip before saying: "I disagree with everyone on on Palin's lack of experience. The fundamental principle here is that no one has seen her do anything political outside of Alaska. She was a PTA member, city council member, mayor and governor and she could have had those positions in Munich, London, Moscow or Baghdad. So there."

 

"McCain's eyes turned red," said a reporter who loved McCain the most when the senator did guest shots on The Daily Show. "There was spit on the left side of his lips. Not sweat kind of spit, that angry spit that develops when you want to cuss someone out."

 

Then a reporter suggested that Palin's lack of experience was losing votes and McCain "turned sarcastic."

 

"Really? I haven't counted the votes yet, have you?" McCain said while he made two fists and clenched them by his sides and tapped his foot rapidly. "Do you know these people whose votes are being lost? Huh? Is one of them your mama," he said.

 

Later, another journalist swore that McCain went to his hotel suite and rammed a chair into the bathroom door, though there were no complaints from people staying in nearby rooms.

 

The Obama camp was told of the incidents and one of the spokesmen said that in the interest of not being partisan, "Barack gets mad at reporters, too, even though most of them adore him and will probably vote for him. Just last week Barack scowled at a reporter for stepping on his retort to an unusually complex question relating to an intellectual approach to the politics of Russia and the dress code of former KGB agents. You could see in Barack's eyes that he was pissed but hey, wouldn't you be upset?"

 

But McCain's temper is legend in the senate and his lack of patience shows often. And privately, a person close to his campaign said that McCain is sick and tired of the Palin questions.

 

"It certainly is your opinion," McCain told a reporter recently, "that Mrs. Palin is a lightweight and I respect your opinion, but it's not a fact "I strongly disagree with your assertion and I do so strongly enough to put my fist through a pane-glass window and bleed profusely to emphasize it."