Political Irony

On a McCain campaign conference call Thursday morning, Republican Senator Sam Brownback of Kansas accused Obama of being all talk and no action when it comes to working across the aisle:

John McCain’s a maverick. He’s fought for a bipartisan fashion. I think that the biggest thing I’ve seen from Barack Obama is a willingness, aggressiveness, to talk bipartisan and yet to vote the hard left — most liberal member of the United States Senate.

The Obama campaign rapid-response team quickly responded with an email listing the projects on which Obama worked with Brownback, including bills that Obama co-sponsored with Brownback.

As CQ Politics notes, there is a valuable lesson here: Before you say Barack Obama never worked across the aisle, make sure he never worked with, for example, you.

I also find Brownback’s quote interesting as a Republican framing exercise — the repeating of the tired and discredited notions that McCain is a maverick and Obama is the “most liberal” member of the Senate.