Apparently it's impossible for the Russians to think anything attributed to John McCain could possibly be parody. They could well be right.
via RFERL
The Russian government’s official daily newspaper appears to have been duped by a satirical report stating that U.S. Senator John McCain supports American “military action” against FIFA after Switzerland this week arrested seven officials with global soccer’s governing body on corruption charges.
In a May 29 op-ed published by Russia’s state-owned Rossiiskaya Gazeta, the author states as a fact that McCain “has decided to sic the Pentagon” on FIFA after the officials were arrested in Zurich on May 27 based on a request by U.S. prosecutors.
“It seems the time is not far off when McCain will demand that American forces invade the UN headquarters,” writes the author, Vladislav Vorobyov.
The kindling for Vorobyov’s rage, however, was a parody piece by the well-known American satirist Andy Borowitz that was published May 28 on the website of the the U.S. magazine The New Yorker.
Borowitz’s piece, titled McCain Urges Military Strikes Against FIFA, clearly lampoons the U.S. senator’s reputation as a security hawk whom critics -- including top Russian officials -- regularly portray as dangerously supportive of deploying the American military to solve international crises.
