(CNN) -- Some aides to Sen. John McCain say they weren't happy that running mate Sarah Palin went off script Sunday and turned attention back to the controversy over her wardrobe.
The Alaska governor on Sunday brought up the recent reports regarding the Republican National Committee's $150,000 spending spree on clothing and accessories for the Palin family.
Palin denounced talks of her wardrobe as "ridiculous" and declared emphatically: "Those clothes, they are not my property."
"Just like the lighting and the staging and everything else that the RNC purchased, I'm not taking them with me," she said at a rally in Tampa, Florida.
A senior McCain adviser told CNN that those comments "were not the remarks we sent to her plane." Palin did not discuss the wardrobe story at her rally in Kissimmee, Florida, later in the day.
A Palin aide, however, told CNN that the governor clearly felt like she had to say something to defend herself, because "that's really not who she is."
Over the weekend, sources told CNN that long-brewing tensions between Palin and key aides to McCain were on the rise.
Several McCain advisers suggested that they have become increasingly frustrated with what one aide described as Palin "going rogue."
A Palin associate, however, said the candidate is simply trying to "bust free" of what she believes was a damaging and mismanaged roll-out.
What is important to note here is that the McCain campaign's message of why Americans should vote for John McCain and Sarah Palin, is being drowned out by these recent news stories of McCain staffers blaming each other for the eventual McCain loss to an energized Obama campaign, or today's bickering between the McCain and Palin camps. Americans are seeing this self-destruction of John McCain's campaign, and may end up wondering if they really want this man in the Oval Office--especially with the serious problems this country has. No amount of message or spin can deflect the total chaos that is taking place within the McCain campaign.
Of course, the McCain / Palin bickering has taken a new turn. From The American Spectator (via Americablog):
Former Mitt Romney presidential campaign staffers, some of whom are currently working for Sen. John McCain and Gov. Sarah Palin's bid for the White House, have been involved in spreading anti-Palin spin to reporters, seeking to diminish her standing after the election. "Sarah Palin is a lightweight, she won't be the first, not even the third, person people will think of when it comes to 2012," says one former Romney aide, now working for McCain-Palin. "The only serious candidate ready to challenge to lead the Republican Party is Mitt Romney. He's in charge on November 5th."
Romney has kept a low profile nationally since being denied the vice presidential nomination. He is currently traveling for the National Republican Congressional Committee in support of some House members, and has attended events for a handful of other House members who have sought his support, but he has traveled little for the McCain-Palin ticket. "He said the only time he'd travel for us is if we assured him that national cameras would be there," says a McCain campaign communications aide. "He's traveled to Nevada and a couple other states for us. That's about it."
Should McCain-Palin not win next week, Romney is expected to mount another presidential run, though it isn't clear that he has handled himself particularly well since losing the nomination. He failed to support or espouse conservative positions on the economic bailout bill in an effective or meaningful way, and he has turned down opportunities to endorse and work for conservative candidates in House or Senate seats unless they were assured of winning.
The most glaring oversight was Romney's refusal to do a phone recording for Massachusetts Republican Jeff Beatty, who is challenging Sen. John Kerry. "Mitt supposedly cares about Massachusetts, but won't even return phone calls asking for help," says a conservative working for Beatty in Boston. "It's a tough race, but the least he could do is help. He's showing his true colors."
Some former Romney aides were behind the recent leaks to media, including CNN, that Governor Sarah Palin was a "diva" and was going off message intentionally. The former and current Romney supporters further are pushing Romney supporters for key Republican jobs, including head of the Republican National Committee.
Now this is just fascinating. It appears that the McCain aids that are talking trash about Sarah Palin were former Mitt Romney aids, who are trying to both destroy Palin's standing in the GOP, while also improving Mitt Romney's standing in a potential 2012 presidential run. The 2008 presidential election is only nine days away, and both Palin and Romney are maneuvering for the next presidential election. Sarah Palin is "going rogue" in order to assert her own independent self, and a potential national GOP leader, while Mitt Romney is trashing Palin so he could become the national GOP leader. And both are already looking at 2012 for the White House.
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