Wow, that is not how Obama should have followed up on John McCain’s poignant and personal story about a mother of a soldier killed in Iraq, who asked McCain not to let her son’s death be “in vain.” I’ve got to believe that sound bite did not sit well with many people listening- pro-mission families who’ve lost loved ones in Iraq, many soldiers currently in the region, or Vietnam vets who identify with McCain’s regrets about defeatism in that conflict and don’t desire to repeat it. It characterized most of the discussion about Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, which had McCain sounding like a smart statesman and Obama sounding rather petulant and stuck in the past. He has repeatedly seemed the teacher to Obama’s student by talking about Iraq’s impact on the rest of the region, claiming the success of the surge and the fact that it is now the same strategy (that Obama once opposed) that will work in Afghanistan. The discussion of Pakistan came with a direct scold about Obama’s position on carrying out attacks within Pakistan:
