Mr. McCain said that the relationship was not romantic

Sounds Clintonesque to me…I don’t care if it was “romantic”, I care if it was “inappropriate”.

Was John the “John” in this relationship?

Will someone please ask “John” McCain is his relationship with Ms. Iseman was “inappropriate”? I’d like to hear his answer to that specific question. I can look at pictures of his wife taken Tuesday night vs. Wednesday and Thrursday, and the difference in how his wife looks at him is like night and day. She’s not happy with what he did, but she’s willing to stand behind the story he is telling.

Well, I think poorly of politicians too, but I think we can set the bar just a tad bit higher and have someone clear it.

gekkobear on February 22, 2008 at 3:04 AM

Sanity!

This election is spin, spin and nothing but spin

The current pack of chameleons running for office are right out of Alice in Wonderland

`How doth the little crocodile
Improve his shining tail,
And pour the waters of the Nile
On every golden scale!

`How cheerfully he seems to grin,
How neatly spread his claws,
And welcome little fishes in
With gently smiling jaws!’ -Lewis Carroll

Alice asks what is a Caucus Race?

First it marked out a race-course, in a sort of circle, (`the exact shape doesn’t matter,’ it said,) and then all the party were placed along the course, here and there. There was no `One, two, three, and away,’ but they began running when they liked, and left off when they liked, so that it was not easy to know when the race was over. However, when they had been running half an hour or so, and were quite dry again, the Dodo suddenly called out `The race is over!’ and they all crowded round it, panting, and asking, `But who has won?’

This question the Dodo could not answer without a great deal of thought, and it sat for a long time with one finger pressed upon its forehead (the position in which you usually see Shakespeare, in the pictures of him), while the rest waited in silence. At last the Dodo said, `Everybody has won, and all must have prizes.’ Lewis Carroll

A month ago, the ghey lady endorsed Maverick, and this week they’re hosing him down with the flimsiest of allegations. Is this the genesis of Mav’s campaign management into a lean, mean, chief exec machine?? Forget obama swoon or Rove! the magnificen…

the most honorable man serving in our Senate

Wouldn’t “the most honorable man” serving in the Senate not be a part of the Keating scandal? When the Senate Ethics Committee criticizes you for “questionable conduct” you might not have been really honorable in your dealings.

How does cheating on your wife figure into honor? Or is that ok for an honorable man?

An oath to “defend and uphold the Constitution” (which last I read said “Congress shall not make a law … abridging freedom of speech”), whoops.

How about the name calling of his detractors in the amnesty bill? Honorable?

So, a slandering, philandering, oath bender/oath breaker, who took money from a man convicted of giving bribes for votes is the “most honorable man in the Senate”.

Well, I think poorly of politicians too, but I think we can set the bar just a tad bit higher and have someone clear it.

You never know.

seanrobins on February 21, 2008 at 8:54 PM

And there is no doubt that if Huck or Rudy or Mitt or Fred was the leading candidate the NYT would have some equally thin sourced, made up BS to smear them with.

The fact that McCain was there target left them with far less ammo than some other candidates would have. No doubt the would have gone to town on Rudy or Huck if either one had a chance ofwinning.

But, they would have manufactured some made up crap for Mitt or Fred also.

This is nothing more than the NYT being the biased, left-wing, low quality rag that they are.

I said it before, I’ll say it again.

“Real Conservatives” don’t get chumped by the NYT.

So, are all of the “Real Conservatives” in this thread now going to tell me that they take the NYT as credible, now?

Calm down, now. You get what you pay for. You lay down with dogs, you get up with fleas. And on and on and on…

The fact that McCain may have been really naive in his dealings with the Times and their ilk, does not lessen on teensy tiny bit the scumminess that is the Smelly Old Gray Lady.

“It is a shame that the New York Times has lowered its standards to engage in a hit and run smear campaign

Who says that any of this represents the New York Slime’s lowering of its standards? Can anyone out there think of any evidence that the Times’ standards have been any higher in years?

“Real Conservatives” don’t get chumped by the NYT.

So, are all of the “Real Conservatives” in this thread now going to tell me that they take the NYT as credible, now?

How desperate is your hate for the incredible American that we have for our candidate that you stand by the NYT, Howard Dean and the Daily Kos in attempting to pour slime on the most honorable man serving in our Senate. You stand by these lowlifes, but will not even give Senator McCain the benfit of the doubt.

Shame on you!

McCain may have behaved unethically and cheated on his wife

Um, those are almost positively true.

“behaved unethically”? He took money form a man convicted of bribing Congressmen for votes, and he voted the same way. Now, he may have had other reasons for his votes, but that’s going to be a hard one to call anything but “unethical”.

“cheated on his wife”? That’s one of the reasons they got divorced. She stayed with him through his time as a POW, and then he went chasing skirts while she was injured in a car accident.

… reads the article…

Oh, a new incident, without this level of proof. Hmm, its plausible, but I’d need more proof.

A 71 year old man linked to 40 year old woman? Kudos, McCain.

Well, when he was 40(ish?) he re-married a 25 year old heiress with the resources to let him run for office. So that makes her 55ish? Yep, a younger woman; still keeps the story plausible (but unproven).

So, from my opinion… probably, almost certainly false. And still problematic because McCain’s past makes it too plausible for this sort of thing to be true.

I don’t like John McCain a whole lot, but an unverified and unsourced NYT smear-job might just get me to support him. If they don’t like him, there must be something worthwhile about his candidacy — the enemy of my enemy, etc., etc. I’m only s…

John Weaver has issued a statement that exposes the New York Times story on John McCain as a hack job. Part of their supposed corroboration of the gossip about an allegedly budding romance between McCain and lobbyist Vicki Iseman was his alleged intervention to stop it. Weaver, who no longer works for the campaign, says he told the Times that his intervention had nothing to do with an affair:

Iseman had bragged about her connections to the committee in order to expand her client list. Weaver heard about it and told her to knock it off, or she’d get frozen out. Lobbyists collect clients by making themselves appear influential, and apparently Iseman got a little too hyperbolic about her connections.

That’s the extent of the supposed “intervention” — and the Times knew it.

Opinksy also said that the Times use of the phrase “associates” to describe their McCain sources suggests that the leak may not have come from his campaign staffers at the time.
“There was only a handful of us [working on the campaign in 1999],” Opinksy said. “We never had a staff meeting to address any of this.”

Asked who was behind the story, Opinksy said: “Lobbyists tell a lot of tall tales.

“What’s behind this is money. There were a bunch of lobbyists in town who knew that if John McCain became president they were going to have a hard time.”

http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/017061.php

Some folks have tried to claim this will hurt McCain among the evangelicals and conservatives, but I think they are intelligent enough to not countenance such baseless claims (and they are baseless, it seems). If anything, this prompts sympathy for M…..

linlithgow on February 21, 2008 at 1:42 PM

After watching Bob Bennett, I would say McCain was a victim of politics as usual. As for McCain plalying with the Dems, remember “No Child Left Behind”, Bob Wilson, and “Read My Lips”? Seems reaching out to the Dems is a common Republican mistake.

One question: why do folks hate McCain? Reagan didn’t just support Amnesty for Illegals, he granted it. Bush, Sr. did not cut taxes, he increased them. Congress will keep McCain in check on certain issues. The biggest issue should be the war. And right now our country needs a President that truly understands the military. To me that is reason enough to vote for McCain.

He was in the Senate for decades, played footsie with Dems, was part of the Keating 5 (No matter how you may want to dismiss that), and if you believe Drudge, (who has a pretty decent track record IMHO), McCain was trying to quash this story, and was begging them to not publish it.

The NYT waited on this until after McCain basically sewed up the nod, knowing that another ding in McCain’s tarnished armour would make him even more unpalatable to us. That part of the right that had convinced itself he was the only candidate that could beat the Dems might not pull the lever for him and the GOP *might* have ended up with a REAL conservative who was erudite and bright, who had a chance of winning. The NYT couldn’t have that! So they sat until the lib wing of the GOP pushed Romney out and now they’ve set Mr. Burns’ attack dogs on McCain.

As for McCain’s first marriage, it’s true we don’t know what went on in it, but McCain said the breakup was his fault, as does his first wife. FWIW.

I agree with those who say McCain shouldn’t have used the word never. Can you remember everything that happened to you over the past 20 years? Mark Furman’s stupid choice of words helped get OJ off. Saying never is just asking someone to prove you wrong.

I mentioned that the story is based on innuendo only and both women said they’re sick of this kind of thing and sick of the campaign already. I guess if the NYT thought they’d turn the public against McCain with this story it didn’t work for the three of us.

Not to me !!! We sure wouldn’t be having “inappropriate relations” scandals with Mitt.

stenwin77 on February 21, 2008 at 9:37 AM

True. Mormons are pretty strict.