It looks as if the staffers on the Overreaction Desk at McCain HQ are working overtime. First, they tried to make a controversy out of a Barack Obama throwaway line. Talking about his readiness to combat smears and negative attacks, Obama last Friday said, "If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun." That prompted this reax from the McCain camp: "Barack Obama's call for 'new politics" is officially over....[He] said that if there's a political knife fight, he'd bring a gun." Obama was merely quoting the Sean Connery character in The Untouchables: "You wanna know how to get Capone. They pull a knife, you pull a gun." Citing Connery is not going to be a loss for a presidential candidate. Now, how would the McCainers respond, if Obama said, "Go ahead, make my day"?

On the more substantive side, McCain's team also pounced on Obama for a statement he made regarding apprehended terrorist suspects:

Let's take the example of Guantanamo. What we know is that, in previous terrorist attacks -- for example, the first attack against the World Trade Center, we were able to arrest those responsible, put them on trial. They are currently in U.S. prisons, incapacitated. And the fact that the administration has not tried to do that has created a situation where not only have we never actually put many of these folks on trial, but we have destroyed our credibility when it comes to rule of law all around the world, and given a huge boost to terrorist recruitment in countries that say, 'Look, this is how the United States treats Muslims.' So that, I think, is an example of something that was unnecessary. We could have done the exact same thing, but done it in a way that was consistent with our laws."

What's wrong with that quote, if anything? Well, the McCain-bangers say that it shows that Obama wants to use only law enforcement techniques in going after evildoing terrorists--and that would place every single American family at risk, for the only way to deal with radical Islamic terrorists is to hunt them down in military fashion without being bogged down by the due process niceties of police work. But is that what Obama actually said or implied? A fair reading seems to be that he was referring to what happens to terrorist suspects after they are captured. In fact, as the McCain people well know, last year, Obama said he would be willing to strike al Qaeda targets inside Pakistan unilaterally. How's that for being a global Dirty Harry?

So the McCain gang was trying a bit too hard to stretch Obama;s remark about the treatment of detainees into proof that Obama is a weak-kneed defeatist who cares more about the rights of the 9/11 perps than preventing them from hitting the U.S. again.

But on a McCain campaign conference call on Tuesday--during which campaign aides and advisers--tried to brand Obama as soft on terrorism, the McCain squad did latch on to a developing meme on the right. Referencing Obama's support of the recent Supreme Court decision that said that Gitmo detainees have a right to habeas corpus, the McCain surrogates--responding to a question from Stephen Hayes of The Weekly Standard--said they'd like someone to ask Obama if he believes that Osama bin Laden ought to be allowed to submit a writ of habeas corpus to a U.S. federal court if he is captured by U.S. forces. You can expect voices on the right to echo this talking point--until the question is indeed put to Obama. In the meantime, wouldn't it be nice if we really did have to worry about what to do with a captured bin Laden?

UPDATE: That didn't take long. About two hours after the McCain conference call, the Obama campaign held its own call to respond. During the first question, Bill Sammon of the Washington Examiner asked if Obama believes that bin Laden, if apprehended, should have the same rights as detainees in Gitmo. Senator John Kerry, speaking for Obama, said that the Supreme Court has decided what rights all Gitmo detainees must be awarded--and that McCain would have to abide by this, should he become president. The McCain team, Kerry said indignantly, is engaged in Karl Rove-style politics by claiming that Obama and the Democrats are legalistic and weak when it comes to terrorism, noting that the Democrats voted to support military action in Afghanistan. "This is typical of the Republican playbook," he said.