McCain Plays Defense on Iraq

Following up on what my colleague, Spencer Ackerman, writes about the tight spot in which the McCain campaign finds itself concerning the war in Iraq. During a McCain campaign conference call with reporters this morning, Randy Scheunemann, senior foreign-policy adviser to Sen. John McCain — did indeed fall back on the now-disproved notion that Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s comments to Der Spiegel were misinterpreted. Here is Scheunemann responding to a question about his reaction to Maliki’s statements:

“I