Oh, and by the way, he was a POW

Clearly, McCain does not want the fact that he was a prisoner of war to be the key communications aspect of his campaign.

Nicolle Wallace, a spokeswoman for Mr. McCain, said on Sunday night that Mr. McCain had not heard the broadcast of the event while in his motorcade and heard none of the questions.

“The insinuation from the Obama campaign that John McCain, a former prisoner of war, cheated is outrageous,” Ms. Wallace said.

Outrageous, indeed.