Spin Cycle

As we predicted yesterday, Obama's decision not to visit wounded troops in Germany has inevitably turned into an imbroglio.

What seems clear is that Obama made arrangements to visit. Then, the Pentagon reminded his office that he could visit as a Senator but not as part of a campaign. Then, Obama decided to cancel the visit.

The Obama campaign says the Pentagon said -- or implied -- that any visit would be viewed as political, even if he left the press behind, because he's on a campaign trip, and didn't have a Senate aide on the trip to go with him. The Pentagon says it reminded him of the rules, but didn't tell him not to come -- and was actually prepared to take care of the press while Obama visited the hospital.

The Obama campaign says he decided not to go because he didn't want to be seen as taking advantage of wounded soldiers. Republicans are saying that he didn't care about the soldiers if he couldn't get a photo op out of it. Reports here and here and here.

Using some common sense, on this carefully planned trip it seems kind of unlikely that a man running for president would decide to give the finger to wounded soldiers, doesn't it? And it also seems kind of likely that he would have been criticized either way by the GOP, doesn't it?

Here's an NBC report on the mess, tilting a bit to the Obama version: