Oops!

When you pick a picture off the internet to use as a backdrop for your candidate's acceptance speech, it might be a good idea to check that it's really what you think it is. That's a picture of Walter Reed Middle School, in California, behind McCain, not Walter Reed Army Hospital.

Midway through his speech, someone noticed the error, and replaced the image. Now the campaign is claiming that they planned the whole thing. Right -- your candidate is talking about his support for veterans (see David's post re: McCains veteran support), and you are purposefully showing a picture of a middle school that just happens to have the same name as Walter Reed army hospital. Some mistakes are so obvious that even a political campaign's professional spin-meisters can't weasel out of them, guys.

It's kind of sad that the McCain campaign thinks the average American is dumb enough to believe they used this image on purpose. It's even sadder that most people will probably take them at their word.

Middle schools on Whidbey Island.