The AP is reporting from a McCain speech in Harrisburg, PA that in response to Biden's comments about presidents inevitably being "tested in a crisis," McCain claims that he has already undergone such testing, and in the exact same context as JFK--the Cuban Missile Crisis. Nothing that McCain has ever said has reminded me more forcefully that he is 72 years old. I can't imagine that reminding voters that the crisis you faced was 46 years ago is a winning argument that will inspire voter confidence.
Republican John McCain told voters in this key electoral state Tuesday he was personally tested by the same kind of crisis that Democratic vice presidential nominee Joseph Biden warned Barack Obama will almost certainly face if elected president.
McCain recalled being ready to launch a bombing run during the October 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, which Biden said over the weekend tested a new President John F. Kennedy and was the template for the kind of "generated crisis" the 47-year-old Obama would face within six months of taking office.
"I was on board the USS Enterprise," McCain, a former naval aviator, said in the capital city of Harrisburg. "I sat in the cockpit, on the flight deck of the USS Enterprise, off of Cuba. I had a target. My friends, you know how close we came to a nuclear war."
As the crowd of several thousand began to swell with cheers and applause, he added with dramatic effect: "America will not have a president who needs to be tested. I've been tested, my friends."
Yahoo: McCain Reminds Biden He's Been Tested in a Crisis (AP)