What Took So Long?

Apparently the biggest line of Wednesday's presidential debate between John McCain and Barack Obama was when McCain's all but said "I know President Bush, I am a friend of President Bush, and Senator, I am no President Bush."

While McCain phrased the line a little differently, his intent was to distance himself, the current GOP nominee, from the current GOP leader, which somehow is supposed to be a good thing. After all, who wants to be compared to the leader of your party?

While throwing the current leader of his party under the bus may have comforted millions who have seen their country suffer under the potentially worst president in American history, one has to wonder why it took McCain so long to figure out Bush was a dud.

If anything the American people should be upset at McCain for his efforts on the Bush-Cheney 2004 campaign. If McCain were truly a "Maverick" and willing to go against his party he would have supported John Kerry. Instead he worked hard to elect possibly the worst president in American history.

For that reason alone, Obama's comparison of Bush and McCain is worthy. Also if the McCain campaign wants to complain about people Obama "pals" around with, the Obama campaign should point out that it is far more truthful to say that McCain pals around with Bush than Obama pals around with William Ayers.

Perhaps this year voters are actually going beyond cheap applause lines and look at the facts and that is why Obama currently has such a large lead. McCain's over the top accusations are not sticking, and in what probably was actually the best line of the night, Obama noted that it has gotten to the point where even Fox News is now disputing McCain's claims and Obama added "that doesn't happen very often when it comes to accusations about me."

While conservatives may have been energized by McCain's attacks, early post debate polling showed it didn't play well with the American public. CNN and CBS polls both showed the public thought Obama won the debate, giving the Democrats a clean sweep of the debates. It's so bad that after the debate McCain could be heard telling Obama what a good job he did.

Maybe even John McCain has figured out Obama is better than four more years of the same. Why did it take so long?