McCain on Hamas (2006) and on smearing Obama (2008)

My initial assessment of the McCain campaign's response to Jamie Rubin's op-ed was a bit too sympathetic. In my defense, it was a reflexive sympathy after seeing new video that added context to his answer, but now that I've had some time review all the video, it's seems to me that rather than supporting the McCain campaign's defense, it actually undermines their case.

While it's true that McCain did make some tough remarks about Hamas (notably to CNN), he also embraced talks without setting conditions. He's flip-flopped between then and now, but he also flip-flopped back then -- telling three different stories in two different interviews on the same day.

To review the facts:

• Jamie Rubin argued that John McCain had flip-flopped on Hamas, saying that he supported negotiations in 2006 and now not only opposes negotiations, but is using the words of Hamas to smear Barack Obama.
• The McCain campaign said "Jamie Rubin didn’t tell the truth" because he did not include McCain's response to a follow-up question in which McCain equivocated on his earlier openness to negotiations without pre-conditions.
• McCain also answered a third question about Hamas that day from CNN. In that answer, he was very clear that he would not support engaging Hamas in negotiations until they met certain conditions, such as recognizing Israel's right to exist and renouncing violence.

Here's why I think these response undermines the McCain campaign's case:

First, there's no question that in one of McCain's three answers on Hamas from Davos, he supported negotiating with Hamas without preconditions. ("They're the government and sooner or later we're going to have to deal with them.")

This is a flip-flop from his current position, which is that he would be the "worst enemy" of Hamas.

Second, in the two other answers, McCain suggested there would be conditions for talks with Hamas. In the Sky News interview, he was not specific, but on CNN, he was very clear about the conditions Hamas would need to meet.

On the one hand, this supports the McCain campaign's claim that he supported conditions back in 2006. The problem is, he also supported no conditions.

In fact, on the same day in 2006, he supported three different positions on Hamas negotiations.

There's an eerie similarity between his hedging and dodging in 2006 and what he's doing now with Obama. Out of one side of his mouth, he is promising to run a smear-free campaign, and he's saying that Obama shares nothing in common with Hamas. Out of the other side, he's saying the American people should investigate why Hamas -- a foreign terrorist agent -- made positive comments about Obama (there was no "endorsement").

If were to fault Rubin with anything -- and it's just a small quibble -- I wish he would been able to dig up the CNN interview as well as the second answer, because combined, the three different statements from McCain on that day present a powerful case for how he tries to be all things to all people.

But I think his core allegation is absolutely correct -- McCain has flip-flopped and he hasn't been straight with voters.

That's McCain's modus operandi -- he says what he thinks people want to hear and calls it straight-talk -- but really, it's double-talk. Either that, or he just can't keep his story straight.