Biden To Step Up Criticism Of McCain's Record, Tactics
(WILMINGTON, DEL.) - In a speech to be delivered today in Michigan, Democratic vice presidential nominee Joe Biden will unleash a succession of direct attack lines aimed at John McCain, calling him "proufoundly out of touch" on issues concerning Americans and equating his presidency to an extension of George W. Bush's term in office.
Among the lines Biden plans to say: "If you're ready for four more years of George Bush, John McCain is your man. Just as George Herbert Walker Bush was nicknamed 'Bush 41' and his son is known as 'Bush 43,' John McCain could easily become known as 'Bush 44.'"
"There is simply no daylight – at least none I can see -- between John McCain and George Bush. On every major challenge we face, from the economy, to health care, to education and Iraq, you can barely tell them apart," Biden will say, according to excerpts of his speech released by the Obama-Biden campaign.
The statements not only go after McCain for his views on policy, but also heavily criticize political tactics employed by the McCain campaign in the last few weeks. Biden has publically taken particular offense to ads and statements that accused Barack Obama of calling Sarah Palin a pig and suggested he tried to pass legislation that would teach sexual education to kindergarten students.
"When Senator McCain was subjected to unconscionable, scurrilous attacks in his 2000 campaign, I called him on the phone to ask what I could do…and now, some of the very same people and the tactics he once deplored his campaign now employs," Biden will say.
Even former Bush adviser Karl Rove told Fox News Sunday that the McCain campaign has crossed the veritable line, saying they had "gone one step too far in sort of attributing to Obama things that are, you know, beyond the 100% truth test."
Biden press secretary David Wade says Biden will delve into McCain's voting record as a senator on a number of specific issues, adding "There's a whole world that nobody knows about John McCain."
While Biden has previously used several of the speech's lines already on the trail, Wade said tomorrow's speech will lay out the campaign's assessment of what a McCain presidency would mean in a way that is "framed very concretely, very concisely."
"He knows this guy, he likes this guy," said Wade of the relationship Biden has developed with McCain after two decades as fellow senators.
"He just thinks he's dead wrong on the kind of issues people talk about around the kitchen table."