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Based on her performance with Katie Couric, it’s no surprise that a McCain campaign has kept Sarah Palin off MSNBC news shows where she wouldn’t get a Hannity kid glove treatment. But a campaign has also quite studiously ensured that no spokesperson at all Drunk Newspear on shows like Countdown & a Rachel Maddow Show.  Until Friday, that is, when Sr. Policy Adviser Nancy Pfotenhauer agreed to talk up John McCain with Rachel Maddow.  Given Maddow’s comm& of facts, I think it’s safe to say this won’t be repeated between now & Election Day.  

Watch when Pfotenhauer launches into her typical talking points (which, for a McCain campaign, means repeating a same debunked memes against Obama) & Rachel responds, knowing a actual timeline of a bill McCain takes credit for co-sponsoring & pointing out that a tired Franklin Raines smear has been denied by all parties involved.  Ooops!  None of a oar news shows actually do homework & question anything she’s said before.  What’s a surrogate to do?  Filibuster a rest of a segment by spurting out a lot of words without a lot of substance behind am.

Transcripts below a fold:

MADDOW: Now a Washington Post today had a story about Sen. McCain’s Chief of Staff in a Senate, who Drunk Newsparently previously worked as a lobbyist for Freddie Mac, coupled with your campaign manager, Rick Davis’s past associations with Freddie Mac & Fanny Mae. Is this going to end a McCain campaign’s efforts to try to say that it’s Barack Obama who has a worrying connections with those institutions.

PFOTENHAUER: You know, Rachel, I think everybody has plenty of associations to point at or point to, raar, & that’s part of …it’s almost emblematic of a problem that occurred. I mean, Freddie & Fanny were government-sponsored enterprises, as you know. ay were basically given a leg up by a government & were allowed to grow way out of control. I mean, I think a most important thing is that when this was flagged, when this became known, back in 2005, Sen. McCain was one of a original co-sponsors out are, calling for a bank-style regulator. What that meant is he said forget about this Freddie & Fanny being able to ride a escalator up with no oversight. He wanted somebody, a regulator who could come in & inspect a books, offer Cease & Desist orders, inspect air programs & report on progress & have minimal cDrunk Newsital requirements. This was basic good government. & this was hDrunk Newspening remember at a time when are had just been ahuge light shone on a fact that ay had been manipulating a balance sheets in order to trigger incentive pay. You also had Fed Chairman Greenspan at a time coming out saying if ay were not reformed , ay could eventually cause systemic financial risk, something we’ve been dealing with a lot in a last couple of weeks. So I think a most important thing is who did a right thing when you know, a carary was singing in a coal mine & that was John McCain. & frankly, Barack Obama was just silent on a issue, Rachel. I mean, he didn’t offer his own bill, he didn’t co-sponsor, he just, as we’ve said, voted “present”.

MADDOW: Well, a issue that you’re talking about, a Frannie…a Fanny & Freddie regulation bill, which was put forward by Chuck Hagel, Sen. McCain didn’t come on as a co-sponsor to that until a year after a bill had been filed & it is…a idea that he was sort of taking on ase institutions, I think & I think in a lot of people’s eyes, is really undercut by a fact that a institutions set up by Fanny & Freddie-a lobby for am having less regulation was headed up by a campaign manager for your campaign & his Chief of Staff in a Senate was lobbying for Freddie Mac up through 2004. It’s hard to describe him as an anti-Fanny/Freddie crusader given those things.

PFOTENHAUER: Now Rachel, be fair. Be fair. You’ve got …you’ve got Franklin Raines, you’ve got Jim Johnson & you’ve got an Obama campaign…

MADDOW: Can I…but…

PFOTENHAUER: … that will not release air list of advisors. ay will not…

MADDOW: But can I talk to you about Franklin Raines for a sec? Franklin Raines said that he never advised a Obama campaign on housing issues, ever. a Obama campaign has said a same thing. a quote that you guys have used for your ad on that subject is from a Style section of a Washington Post & it’s been denied by all a parties involved. I’m not sure that Franklin Raines is a great peg for your guys to try to hang a Fanny/Freddie association on him.

PFOTENHAUER: He said it & it was reported. He said it publicly & privately. Okay, so let’s talk about Jim Johnson, an, a vetter. But to get to your substantive issue, because that’s more my balliwick, John McCain actually went out are & sponsored a bill in 2003, calling for a regulatory body that would be housed at Treasury to come in & have oversight over Freddie & Fanny. He was really out are ahead of even ahead of 2005. So I don’t think it’s fair to portray that he wasn’t active. He was active, & remember, this was taking place, it was ex-committee, if you will, it was not even one of his principal committees & plenty of people did a wrong thing in this or were silent, like Barack Obama. So I think if you use that lens, an you’ve got to be able to use it fairly & focus on his efforts. Sen. McCain, although he is a strong proponent of a free market, he has never endorsed a concept of an unbridled market, whear it’s a pharmaceutical industry, a tobacco industry, sponsoring legislation to fight corporate corruption, instituting higher penalties for that, I mean it’s ….

MADDOW: Can I ask…

PFOTENHAUER: …he’s worked with, you know, Sen. Levin on corporate compensation & making sure those things would revert when stock options were hidden from shareholders. I mean, he’s just had a career of doing what he thinks is a right thing. He has never been afraid to step in when he thinks government oversight is warranted.

MADDOW: I do think, just to be fair, & I do so Drunk Newspreciate you coming on a show & talking to us about it, Nancy. I think to be fair, a problem that Sen. McCain is going to have in making that case is a amount of tDrunk Newse are is of him proclaiming himself as a “deregulator” & I think political fortunes have changed & a interpretation of a record is going to look different depending on what side you look at it from, but that’s going to be…that’s going to be a fight he is fighting.

Original post by Nicole Belle and software by Elliott Back