Last night McCain began with... 2 falsehoods

Hat tip to Attytood, the best Philly blog, for this one.

Last night, McCain began his opening statement during the debate with two blatant falsehoods that stand up to scrutiny for about three nanoseconds.

To wit:

MCCAIN: But there's also the issue of responsibility. You've mentioned President Dwight David Eisenhower. President Eisenhower, on the night before the Normandy invasion, went into his room, and he wrote out two letters. One of them was a letter congratulating the great members of the military and Allies that had conducted and succeeded in the greatest invasion in history -- still, to this day, and forever. And he wrote out another letter, and that was a letter of resignation from the United States Army for the failure of the landings at Normandy. Somehow we've lost that accountability.

I've been heavily criticized because I called for the resignation of the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission.

We've got to start also holding people accountable, and we've got to reward people who succeed.

First of all, in Ike's second letter that turned out to be nothing more than a historical footnote, he didn't write that he was resigning - he was writing to take full responsibility for the failure of the invasion. I know it's a minor quibble, but as Will Bunch over at Attytood correctly wonders, isn't this stuff checked ahead of time?

Secondly, and I mentioned this last night, McCain did not call for the chairman of the SEC, Christopher Cox, to resign; he said that he would fire him, a power that the president does not have. Oops - for a candidate claiming to be so competent, "ready to lead on day one," it looks like McLame has to hit the books and do some studying, just like Sarah Palin. And his gaffes weren't limited to talking about the economy last night, either, but more on those in a bit.

Thanks for the "straight talk," McSame.