Political Irony

A reader points out two interesting tidbits in the Obama half-hour “infomercial” that aired just before the election. I didn’t get either of these, but I wonder if other people noticed them.

One was the story of a retired “elderly” couple where the man had to go back to work at the age of 72 (and take a loan on their house) because of his wife’s medical bills (video here). The man complains “I’m 72 years old, and things are changing.” The tidbit is that McCain is 72. Coincidence?

The other is Obama talking about his mother, who worked full time, waking him up early to study so he would understand what it means to be an American. “She’d wake me up at 4:30 in the morning. We’d sit there and go through my lessons and I used to complain and grumble. You can imagine an 8-year-old kid having to wake up at 4:30” (video here). The tidbit is that McCain and Palin accused Obama of “palling around with” terrorist William Ayers, but at the time that Ayers was in the Weather Underground, Obama was 8 (and doing his American studies).

I tend to believe that nothing is left to chance in political ads.