He was making himself into a false hypothetical Very possibly so, but so what? He wasn't on a witness stand on oath, he wasn't a journalist with a duty to tell the truth, or a politician with a similar duty (not always observed in either case, and rightly denounced when this turns out to be the case).

Why he may have told a few porkies is his own business. Maybe he was genuinely confused - not everyone keeps accurate figures about their income in their head. I never have more than a vague notion of my financial status, I rely on my wife to know that stuff, and she does.

More likely perhaps he was dreaming about what he'd like to do, or hoped he might be able to do in a few years. Or maybe he was just trying to make himself sound a bit more successful than he actually was, sort of vanity. Doesn't everyone do that on occasion? Nothing criminal or shameful in that.

Or perhaps he was indeed "making himself into a false hypothetical in order to discomfit Obama" - but there's no reason why Obama should have been "discomfited", and he clearly wasn't.

There are no doubt people in the situation Joe described - what difference does it make whether he was one of them or not so far as asking Obama the question? It might even be easier for Obama to answer the question in the form it was given than it would have been if it had been asked as a open hypothetical. Clearly he had no difficulty with it, anyway.

Sniping at this bloke is just a distraction, and it plays into the hands of the one person in all this who does deserve to be criticised, McCain; and it serves to let him off the hook.