Gee Nobody Saw The Backfire On This Coming

TPM Muckracker reports that the latest round of Palin slime attacks may have boomeranged overwhelmingly back on McSame's campaign to the point where today Palin abandoned the attack. But I think Greg Sargent has hit upon the real truth of the tactical reversal:

Palin's non-mention of Ayers is only the latest sign that the McCain team is all over the map on Ayers right now. This morning, The Politico quoted McCain advisers saying McCain wouldn't focus on the former Weatherman going forward. But the McCain campaign also blasted out a statement from John Murtagh, who says his house was bombed by the Weather Underground when he was nine, hammering Obama's ties to Ayers.

In other words, the McCain campaign wants Ayers to be discussed in the press, but doesn't want McCain -- and now also Palin, perhaps -- associated with such a slimy attack at a time when voters want solutions to the economic crisis.

Now that Palin has started the ball, it looks like McSame is counting on talk radio, wingnut pressers and 527 groups to continue the fight for them...not from them. This has been McSame's SOP since the general election has begun. He's careful to keep his nose clean here. It's the best of both worlds: Ayers remains in the news and McSame can say "Some of these attacks go too far! I'm a maverick and I oppose these ads! Why won't Obama denounce all his many, many, many, many attack ads like me? I'm the good guy here!"

And there's plenty of surrogates out there to fling the poo so Johnny and Sarah don't get their hands dirty. Good plan. Patently obvious and transparent as hell, but what do they have left at this point?