"Thump, Thump" -- "Mind the Tires, Carly"

I pointed out just last night Carly Fiorina's rather silly gaffe about the qualifications of her own ticket to run a large company. It wasn't too hard to predict that the McCain campaign wouldn't take too kindly to her comments, but the reaction came even faster than I expected:

A top McCain official contacted by CNN said, on condition on anonymity, "No big deal, but not how you get on the surrogate all-star team. Very Biden-like."

“This campaign source said Fiorina would be discouraged from additional media interviews.

Another top campaign adviser was far less diplomatic.

"Carly will now disappear," this source said. "Senator McCain was furious." Asked to define "disappear," this source said, adding that she would be off TV for a while – but remain at the Republican National Committee and keep her role as head of the party’s joint fundraising committee with the McCain campaign.

Fiorina was booked for several TV interviews over the next few days, including one on CNN. Those interviews have been canceled.

As with Palin, the key point that intelligent observers should take from this has nothing to do with Carly Fiorina and everything to do with John McCain: it's all about his judgment and his decision-making process. If John McCain can't even run a tight ship on his election campaign, how can he expect Americans to believe he will run a tight ship in a presidential administration?

My personal opinion: Carly Fiorina's biggest problem is that she's simply too honest to be on John McCain's campaign. I also wouldn't be surprised if she felt a bit resentful at being passed over for the VP pick by McCain, given that -- whatever her faults -- she is likely far more ready to be president than Sarah Palin. (But then again, who isn't?)

Carly Fiorina Shows Off Her Expertise in "Not Knowing How to Run a Company"

As mentioned earlier, Carly Fiorina did a great job today of shooting herself and John McCain in the foot. Appearing on a radio show, Fiorina was asked if she thought Sarah Palin had the experience to run a major company like Hewlett-Packard (which Fiorina led). Her response:

No, I don't. But you know what? That's not what she's running for.

...followed by a nervous chuckle.

Oh, okay. So she's not ready to run HP, but she's ready to lead the most powerful nation on earth. Gotcha, Carly.

Fiorina likely caught some flak for this gaffe, so she then went on to MSNBC, where she was asked about it. She replied not by pulling her foot out of her mouth, but rather by sticking the other one in, saying that none of the four candidates currently running would be able to run a major company.

Don't get me wrong: I agree with her basic point that running a company and being president or vice-president are not the same. But she screwed up in three major ways here.

1. While the jobs of CEO and CiC are not the same, they are similar, and coming right out and saying Palin was not able to run one will naturally make people wonder about her ability to run the other.

2. Saying flatly that she also doesn't think McCain could run a big company hurt both her and McCain -- she weakened Mccain and made herself look out of touch with his campaign. Whether it's true or not, you don't say something like that.

3. The fact that she said the same about Obama and Biden doesn't excuse problem #2 -- people expect a McCain surrogate to attack the opposition, so they won't put nearly as much weight on a Fiorina criticizing them as on her playing down the credentials of her own team.

In short, Fiorina's performance illustrated nicely the old saw: "With friends like these, who needs enemies? After all, if anyone knows how not to run a major company, it would be her...

McCain's Golden Parachute Rhetoric Malfunctions

Boy, doesn't it seem like it was not so long ago that McCain and Palin were firing on all cylinders and everyone was questioning Obama's campaign strategy? Of course, that was back when McCain and his Wunderkind Bobblehead VP didn't have to deal with anything of substance. Now that they do, we get a daily dose of this sort of stuff:

"We will stop multimillion dollar payouts to CEO’s who have broken the public trust. We will put an end to running Wall Street like a casino. We will make businesses work for the benefit of their shareholders and employees. And we will make sure that your savings, IRA, 401k and pension accounts are protected,” McCain said.

Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, echoed McCain's comments almost verbatim as she campaigned on her own in Golden, Colo., Monday.

"John McCain and I we're going to put an end to the mismanagement and abuses and on Wall Street that have resulted in this financial crisis," Palin said Monday. "We are going to reform the way Wall Street does business and stop multi-million dollar payouts and golden parachutes to CEOs who break the public trust."

And then later in the same article:

McCain's top economics adviser Carly Fiorina, a McCain campaign surrogate who made the rounds on the Sunday morning talk shows this past weekend and appeared on CNN Monday speaking for McCain, herself benefited from a multimillion dollar payout.

Fiorina was dismissed as the CEO of Hewlett Packard in 2005 after a merger with Compaq floundered, stock prices plunged 50 percent, and 20,000 people were layed off. Fiorina walked away with a $21.4 million severance package.

I've never understood why McCain picked Fiorina as a surrogate in the first place. Was it just another example of cynical gender-pandering? I don't think it's really that impressive to have a female CEO speaking for you when she is widely considered to have been a poor female CEO. Does he really not understand this? And Fiorina herself has on more than one occasion made embarrassingly stupid remarks on the trail... more on that in a bit.