Yesterday, John McCain appeared on the CBS morning show and called for arming the rebels in Libya who are fighting against Moammar Gadhafi.

But what he really did was dish up a triple helping of hypocrisy and irony.

McCain twice called for the ouster of Gadhafi because the Libyan dictator has “American blood on his hands” — referring to the Lockerbie bombing that was carried out by a Libyan agent 1988. There’s just one problem. Just two years ago, McCain led a contingent of US Senators to Libya to discuss the delivery of defensive military equipment to Gadhafi. In fact, up until a few weeks ago, Republicans considered Gadhafi a reformed man. Bush removed Libya from the list of terrorist sponsors in 2006, and in 2008 signed a settlement that had Libya compensate the families of the Lockerbie bombing victims.

So which is it? Did Gadhafi have American blood on his hands in 2009, when McCain held a friendly visit with him? Or didn’t he?

But the real whopper happened when the CBS interviewer asked McCain this question: If the US arms the Libyan rebels, how confident are we that these same rebels are not part of some terrorist organization that could later turn on the US?

McCain: Well, what we know of them so far obviously are that the former justice minister and others — and a government has been formed, part of that government. But Gadhafi is a proven quantity. The blood of Americans is on his hands because he was responsible for the bombing of Pan Am 103. He has been involved in other acts of terror. And by the way it does take time, as it did during the period of the Russian occupation of Afghanistan. But we were able to provide them with some weapons and wherewithal to cause the Russians to leave Afghanistan. So we can do it.

Is McCain serious? Has he completely forgotten that those rebels that we armed in Afghanistan included Osama bin Laden and the Taliban? Holy blowback!

Of course, we don’t have any reason to believe that the same thing could happen in Libya. Or do we? Just because some of the now Libyan rebels recently fought against us in Iraq, why would McCain worry about that?

And I thought that Sarah Palin was the idiot. I am so glad he is not our president.