Story at Gawker cites players’ impressions:
“In the end, [chief strategist] Steve Schmidt, architect of the McCain campaign’s wildly shifting meta-narratives and stunts, was smart enough to realize that his hail-mary VP stunt had backfired, terribly. And so his relationship with Palin, a paranoid narcissist, suffered.”
“The Joe The Plumber narrative was the Republicans’ secret weapon — the last chance to put a chink in Obama’s seemingly impervious armor.”