When Ed Rendell says that seniors need slots to fill their "very gray lives," it shows that even successful pols slip off the pander-go-round.
When Joe Biden says that his home state of Delaware has so many people from India you can't go into a Dunkin' Donuts "unless you have a slight Indian accent," it shows that even very successful pols get brain-freeze.
I doubt that Palin fans much care what non-words she utters. And neither Rendell's nor Biden's remarks, both said in campaigns, cost them office.
Is Corbett different?
Well, the Republican attorney general leading in the race for governor picked a lousy time to suggest that the unemployed avoid jobs as long as there are unemployment benefits and to offer his view that "the jobs are there."
He said that on July 9, and it hangs around his neck like an albatross, thanks to the relentlessness of Democratic opponent Dan Onorato, extensive news coverage and his own reluctance to re-engage.
Corbett sought to soften the remarks, saying he wasn't insensitive to the vast majority of the unemployed but was merely repeating anecdotal information he'd heard about some unemployed.
Does anyone doubt that some unemployed, a small minority, fit in Corbett's category? Doesn't matter.
He's a GOP candidate in a state where the unemployment rate is 9.2 percent, up a full point from last year (Philly's is 11 percent), while most Republicans in Washington oppose extending unemployment benefits pushed by Democrats.
Bad timing.
Worse, Corbett's campaign curled up in a ball as Onorato aggressively opened fire with ammo, such as saying that Corbett doesn't understand the economy, toes a party line and, according to a new Onorato Web site, cluelesstom.com, is, well, clueless.
It's reminiscent of John McCain in '08 calling the economy "fundamentally sound," which suddenly made Barack Obama's campaign sounder.
