McCain Pitching In The Bottom Of The 9/11th

While Obama and Karzai were busy bonding yesterday, McCain headed off to Yankee Stadium with Giuliani.  (To stay in the game, McCain has to drive home the point that Obama — bopping around in these threat zones — doesn’t know what he’s doing and is therefore dangerous — especially if something really nasty goes down.)

On one hand, McCain can almost evoke the fear meme just by standing next to Rudy, who — at this point, as Biden so aptly put it — is essentially his own walking 9/11 analogy.  To put more spit on the ball, though, what Team McCain chose to do was set up a photo op in the stadium’s famed Monument Park in front of the 9/11 Monument.  (Don’t feel bad if you didn’t know about this pinstripe-free commemorative, I didn’t either.)

Besides leveraging off the patriotic value of America’s pastime, the McCain team tried to score on a mixed metaphor — tying New York Yankee legendary “boys of summer” heroes like Mantle, DiMaggio, Gehrig and Ruth together WITH New York’s 9/11 heroes, WITH the specter of, dare someone say it, of another terrorist attack.

All that said, thumbs up — to the “boy’s only” audience — feels like “bring it on.”

(Photo from AP Photo by Carolyn Kaster. July 20, 2008.  Yankee Stadium)