obama faces a challenge in responding to mccain's continually calling him a "celebrity". the problem is that "celebrity" doesn't have the same effect when it's used against obama as when it's used to refer to mccain.

when used against obama by mccain, the focus is on the vapidness of (some) celebrities, the fact that their very celebrity can distract some people from whether the person is really contributing anything of value. however, i fear that if obama responds by associating  mccain with celebrity (SNL, "Wedding Crashers", etc.) the association for some people would be that he is a celebrity for his war heroism - i.e., for being a person of (assumed) substance and character.

so i don't think it works for obama to reply by saying "yeah, but he's a celebrity too". it makes "celebrity" look like a bad word, when the problem is that in the skewed world that is this election it IS a bad word when applied to obama, but NOT a bad word when applied to mccain.

obama is much better off demonstrating his substance and command of the issues, and perhaps reminding people that his "celebrity" is due to millions wanting to take this country in a different direction, not by joking about mccain being a celebrity as well.

the real issue is which candidate has something valuable to offer for america's future. mccain's "celebrity" name calling is just a distraction - obama shouldn't take the bait by pointing out mccain's celebrity. instead focus on the idea that mccain is talking about celebrity because he DOESN'T want to talk about substance and his third Bush term aspirations.