Look at it from their perspective, though: It’s not like any fourth-grader with a passing acquaintance of copyright law could have seen this coming, especially after being burned once before.

That would take at least a fifth-grade education.

The re-edited ad’s already back up; you’ll find it below, sans the “Wayne’s World” snippet at the end. Presumably the campaign expected this, decided to use the footage anyway on the off chance that no one would bug them about it, and figured that even if someone did, the ad would already have long since gone viral before they’d be asked to act on it. Mitigating factor: For the moment, at least, Jake Tapper seems to think it was the scrutiny the ad got from nutroots idiots for its supposed racism that pressured McCain into taking it down. Exit question: Will Tapper now argue that because Maverick didn’t address the left’s criticism by editing out the bits with white women while he was revamping the ad for the copyright claim, he’s essentially validated the racism charge retrospectively? Damn it, there has to be some racism here somewhere.