A companion piece to his predictable whine this afternoon that it’s fearmongering to wonder whether a guy whose “judgment” seems always to lead to negotiation without precondition no matter how repulsive the actor is willing to use force if the situation requires. One of the left’s savviest rhetorical ploys the last few years is to rule ads like Hillary’s out of bounds, as if even to suggest that someone willing to meet personally with Ahmadinejad or Chavez might be squeamish in the face of aggression is some sort of breach of campaign politesse. Oddly enough, they’re willing to extrapolate from McCain’s “100 years” comment that he is and will be a crazed hawk in any and all situations; to conclude the opposite about the Messiah, that he’s a wilting peacenik who’ll sell the country away, is naturally the height of unfairness. Even more oddly, Hillary and he are similar enough on policy matters that the same worries should surround her as a prospective C-in-C — and yet my sense is they don’t. Could it be that His Holiness is actually being judged on his pronouncements as opposed to some knee-jerk wingnut tendency to dismiss all liberals as irretrievably soft on terror?

Here’s the first predictable parody ad, too. Weak tea, in my opinion, but “Strangelove” fans may enjoy it.