McCain: One false move and I’ll help you

Mickey Kaus Columnist
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Ruthless: John McCain threatens to keep helping Romney unless he’s offered a speaking slot at the GOP convention … In Newsweek, for example, the losing 2008 GOP nominee helps the current GOP nominee by tellling a reporter either a) Romney’s doing it all wrong (e.g. in not endorsing U.S. strikes in Syria) or b) Romney took McCain’s advice (e.g. on immigration)–which has the effect of making the actual candidate look weak. … McCain is positioning himself as the easy go-to interview for MSM reporters who want to undermine Romney while pretending they’re letting Republicans have a voice. …

P.S.: At least Obama is smart or desperate enough to let Bill Clinton get his moment of attention. …

P.P.S.: Howie Kurtz writes–

the domestic arena has drastically changed, and McCain bears part of the responsibility. It was his gamble with Palin—they still stay in touch—that helped unleash the hard-right tide that swept moderates and traditional conservatives from Capitol Hill, and turned the Republican primaries into a panderfest.

Huh? Does Kurtz really think that the Tea Party surge would have been significantly different if McCain hadn’t picked Palin as his running mate? … How many hundreds of thousands of dollars is Jane Harman Barry Diller paying Kurtz again? At least the teenagers who write Newsweek blurbs –today they’ve inserted the gratuitous, alternate-reality notion that Romney’s candidacy is “ailing”–are cheap. …

Update: Howard Fineman tweets (in support of HuffPo‘s new weekly magazine, “Huffington”)–

I know all about newsmags: I was at Newsweek when it was tops.

Is he trying to tell us something?

Mickey Kaus