This is how slippery the slope is for John McCain: He has ceded the moral high ground to Paris Hilton's mom.

Kathy Hilton, mother of the oft-photographed socialite, issued a statement to the left-leaning blog The Huffington Post on Sunday, offering her first reaction to the McCain campaign's ad that knocks his Democratic opponent Barack Obama - using images of Paris Hilton and Britney Spears - for his celebrity status:

It is a complete waste of the money John McCain's contributors have donated to his campaign. It is a complete waste of the country's time and attention at the very moment when millions of people are losing their homes and their jobs. And it is a completely frivolous way to choose the next President of the United States.

An AP story mentions that Kathy Hilton and her husband Rick donated $4,600 to the McCain campaign earlier this year.

McCain's increasingly negative and snarky campaign ads - like an online ad that suggests Obama is comparing himself to Moses - were all the buzz on the Sunday talk shows.

Mike Murphy, McCain's 2000 campaign manager, called the Spears/Hilton ad "clumsy, juvenile, and a mistake" on NBC's "Meet the Press." And David Gergen, who has worked in both Republican and Democratic White Houses, was particularly stinging on ABC's "This Week":

I think the McCain campaign has been scrupulous about not directly saying it, but it's the subtext of this campaign. Everybody knows that. There are certain kinds of signals. As a native of the south, I can tell you, when you see this Charlton Heston ad, 'The One,' that's code for, 'he's uppity, he ought to stay in his place.' Everybody gets that who is from a southern background. We all understand that.

One thing about McCain's attacks on Obama: According to the latest polls, they're working.

Labels: Barack Obama, John McCain, politics