The McCain campaign is trying to take the Ayers connection beyond mere association to an issue of judgment and trustworthiness, which is one step closer to whether you can trust Obama on issues like the economy. On the trust issue, the Obama campaign seems willing to oblige McCain. After first denying and downplaying Obama’s connections with the unrepentant terrorist, even in the NYT’s estimation, the line from the Obama camp became that he didn’t know of Ayers’ radical and violent past (and presumably his unrepentant present) when he was over at Ayers’ house in 1995. That seemed an odd defense considering he never deployed the “this is not the Bill Ayers I thought I knew” excuse back in April when he was first confronted with the issue, and considering he would have had to avoid all local media during their association to have missed that Ayers had a yen for American government, exploded. It also became irrelevant today, when the evolving Obama defense ran up against the inevitable question: “When exactly did he figure out who Ayers was?” Today Robert Gibbs of the Obama campaign has been asked three times about Obama and Ayers, and it’s apparent he doesn’t know what he should know and what he can safely claim he doesn’t: He’s most forthcoming with Mark Halperin: