Is McCain Toxic for Britney?

In the midst of all the outcry over the John McCain ad that insists Barack Obama is just as vapid as Britney Spears and Paris Hilton…and, no, I’m not going to link to it. I refuse. Because the ad is the lamest smear tactic in the history of lame smear tactics (which is saying something when the competition is Willie Horton ads and Swiftboat attacks). And besides–you know how to use The Google, right? So go find it yourself.

Now, as I was saying:

In the midst of all the outcry over the John McCain ad that insists Barack Obama is just as vapid as Britney Spears and Paris Hilton, what seems to be getting lost is the damage that this ad could be doing to one person in particular:

Britney Spears.

I mean, think about it. Earlier in the year, Britney couldn’t leave the house without the paparazzi turning the act into a media event. And who could really blame them, what with the spectrum of bizarre behavioral choices she might exhibit at any moment. I can just imagine the photogs crouching outside her house wondering “What’s it gonna be today?” No panties? Head-shaving? Faux British accent? Another weird boyfriend? Another “oops-I almost dropped my kid” moment? Another ambulance ride to the psych ward?

But now she seems to have turned a corner. Daddy’s managing her estate, she looks great, she can visit her kids, and her younger sister seems to be drawing most of the ire of Americans Who Want Celebrities to Straighten Up and Just Be Moral Like the Rest of Us, Dammit.

(And don’t get me wrong. If Britney Spears and the rest of her trainwreck family disappeared tomorrow in a trail of vapor, I wouldn’t be disappointed. But she’s all over the news and I read the news. Plus, I need something to write about, so here we are.)

So girlfriend’s on the verge of getting her life back together, and Grandpa John has to go dragging her into the slimefest that has been his political campaign of late. Seriously. She’s trying to seem sane and McCain goes and airs an ad that basically implies “Do you want a president who’s as vapid and crazy as this chick and her former no-underwear wearing friend? Huh? Do you?”

Britney’s camp (Someday, I want a camp. I want my whole front yard filled with people who work for me, all of them sleeping in tents, issuing statements like “Amy’s camp takes offense at statements made by the press that it’s weird that she has a camp of people sleeping in her front yard.”) has distanced themselves from the ad with a very simple statement, but one has to wonder if they didn’t really want to tell McLame “Thanks, dude. You’ve released what the press is consistently calling a silly, juvenile ad and our girl is front and center in it. Really–we’re so grateful.”

So I really hope that McCain’s reference to her in an attempted smear campaign doesn’t derail this whole improved-lifestyle kick Britney’s been on lately. At the very least, if she holds out for a few months, she’ll be able to turn this whole incident around to a positive and tell people “Hey, remember that ad that compared me to the President of the United States?”