Jackson Free Press

One of the surprises in Friday night's debate was Sen. John McCain blatant gaffe about Pakistan being a "failed state"—ironically in a moment when he was trying to show that Obama is the "naive" one. From McClatchy News:

John McCain and Barack Obama clashed repeatedly over foreign policy in their first presidential debate Friday night, crossing swords on Iran and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

McCain made the most notable misstatements and stumbled over the names of the leaders of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose name he couldn't pronounce, and of Pakistan, referring to the latter as "Qadari" instead of Asif Ali Zardari.

McCain incorrectly asserted that former Gen. Pervez Musharraf rescued Pakistan from being a "failed state" when he seized power in a 1999 coup.

"The problem with the strategy that's been pursued was that for 10 years we coddled Musharraf. We alienated the Pakistani population, because we were anti-democratic," Obama said.

"There was a failed state in Pakistan when Musharraf came to power," responded McCain. "Everybody who was around then and had been there and knew about it knew that it was a failed state."

Though Pakistan was wrestling with problems like tensions with India and serious poverty when Musharraf took power in an October 1999 coup, it had a democratically elected government and was far from being a "failed state" — a country in social and economic collapse where the government no longer exercises authority.