Enough with the town hall talk, already.

We get it. John McCain wanted to have a series of of regularly scheduled town hall forums with Barack Obama. They never happened.

And by now we all know the WaPo's dean of centrism was deeply disappointed by that. But four months later does Broder still need to hitting that point? In today's column, it's literally one of Broder's key take-aways from the entire campaign.

The issue has certainly been weight heavily on his mind:

*“That is why a pair of strategy decisions made in the past two weeks could prove troublesome for him. The first was Obama's turning down McCain's invitation to join him in a series of town hall meetings where they would appear together and answer questions from real voters.” [June 22]

*On June 4, McCain proposed 10 town-hall-style debates before screened audiences of uncommitted independent voters across the country. [Aug. 7]

*“The matchup could have come much earlier, but Obama turned down McCain's invitation to join in a series of town hall meetings during the summer.” [Sept. 21]

*“He has been condemned for small-minded partisanship, not praised for his generous and important suggestion that the major-party candidates stump the country together, conducting weekly joint town hall meetings -- an innovation Obama urned down.” [Oct. 30]