Are beach flip-flops (the foot kind) from John McCain a smart idea?
This morning, aboard John McCain's Straight Talk Express jet, one of the Arizona senator's favorite traveling companions -- Steve Duprey, who co-chaired McCain's Republican primary effort in New Hampshire and has been hanging around ever since -- handed out little customized bottles of McCain sunscreen.
News reporters on the plane also received yellow-and-blue flip-flops printed with the message "McCain ... Another Day at the Beach."
Certainly the sunscreen -- SPF 30 -- is an excellent idea for McCain, who still bears the faint scars of surgery for melanoma on the left side of his face.
But flip-flops?
Isn't that a rather dangerous form of footwear for a senator who has been accused by some in his own party of changing his positions on issues such as immigration reform and tax cuts?
Back at the 2004 Republican National Convention in New York City, certain enterprising capitalists had trouble keeping one popular item in stock: John Kerry flip-flops.
On the other hand, as The Ticket reported Sunday California's Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is among the many who think flip-flops (the speaking kind) are good for society because they show growth and learning.
-- Robin Abcarian
Andrew Malcolm's immigrant parents repeatedly stressed the importance of active participation in a democracy. Early lessons included learning the alphabetical list of states by watching televised roll calls of national political conventions. That childhood exposure led to a lifelong fascination with politics, including 40-plus years of covering them and a brief stint practicing them as press secretary to Laura Bush in 1999-2000. A veteran foreign and national correspondent, Malcolm served on the Times Editorial Board and was a Pulitzer finalist in 2004. He is the author of 10 nonfiction books and father of four.
Johanna Neuman is a veteran Washington correspondent for both The Los Angeles Times and USA Today, having covered presidents and politics as far back as Ronald Reagan. A former president of the White House Correspondents Assn., she authored a book on media and foreign policy, “Lights, Camera, Wars.” Most recently she was co-author of the 
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Interesting... the KING OF THE FLIP FLOPPERS calls Obama a flip flopper. But hasn't that always been the way the GREEDY OIL PARTY plays it? Attack what you do most yourself.
Posted by: jcopp | July 14, 2008 at 06:09 PM