The RNC is up with this ad. It has multiple messages: Barack Obama was wrong on Iraq, he is changing but won’t admit it and he’s flummoxed about what to do and how to say it. The process by which Obama is shifting has proved more troublesome for him than the fact of the shift itself, which nearly all observers agree is necessary. Obama is being pummeled by the mainstream media (which is starting to sound like the harshest conservative critics).

At the very least I think the free ride from the press is over. And it makes McCain’s latest ad — which explicitly contrasts his own record of sacrifice with “beautiful words” — that much more biting. If the McCain camp were firing on all cylinders the ad would have said “empty words” or ” promises with a half life of a month.” That’s a theme the MSM has leaped on, and the McCain camp would be wise to hammer that point.