A McCain campaign Web video accusing Barack Obama of sexist "smears" against Sarah Palin has been pulled from YouTube at the request of CBS, but not before racking up countless views online and on cable news throughout Wednesday. CBS asked that the ad be removed because it included footage from an online commentary by Katie Couric about sexism in the presidential race. In the McCain video, she appears to be accusing Obama of sexism; in fact, she was talking about coverage of Hillary Rodham Clinton’s candidacy in June.

A spokesman for YouTube was unable to say exactly how many times the video had been watched online because the company does not keep track of statistics for videos that have been pulled from their site.