Did anyone besides Underpants READ that Times article...

[TreasonousBastard]

about McCain? The article was actually a pretty good account of McCain's personal wrestling with integrity issues through most of his career.

And, the article clearly says that the affair allegation came from two ex-staffers who "became disillusioned" with McCain, and that the gossip was confirmed, not the affair.

Mountains... Molehills... par for the course.

[Midlodemocrat]

1. Yup.

[L. Coyote]

2. OLD NEWS: Kurtz Carried McCain's Link to Lobbyist Rumor Last December

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x2900473

[MADem]

3. I read it. It smelled like trouble...for anyone buying it. Like BAIT, almost.

The National Enquirer sources articles better!

Some lawyer went over that thing with a fine-toothed comb...

[TreasonousBastard]

8. What about a simple editorial decision to...

lead with that allegation since it's already out there and might get people to read the article?

(Yeah, I know, the first paragraphs are supposed to lead with the important stuff that gets filled in later, 5 W's and all that, so maybe it gets people to buy the paper when word gets around.)

And, come on now, you know unnamed sources are the meat of good reporting. Deep Throat, anyone?

[MADem]

25. Deep Throat talked about a cancer in the heart of the presidency, not

a candidate getting a little swerve from a lobbyist.

This wasn't the NYT's finest hour. Why they did it, though, is very unclear.

They should have found one person to go on the record about the accusations of a sexual relationship. The fact that they didn't makes the piece very problematic.

Maybe some righties on the editorial board ARE trying, as some suggest, to give McCain some "street cred" with the conservatives. You aren't a true conservative, they think, unless you've been 'hatcheted' by the NYT.

This whole imbroglio accomplishes two things for McCain--it makes him more appealing to conservatives, and it makes him appear younger, because, in order for this story to be true, his dick would have to work....

[TreasonousBastard]

26. Feh. Nobody wants to go on record for gossip, but now...

that it hit the first page of the Gray Lady everyone wants to talk about it. Heard interviews with staffers on NPR today.

The only thing I don't get is leading a good story with the gossip. They're not stupid and knew perfectly well that's all anyone would talk about. They endorsed McCain and then sandbagged him with that-- wassup?

And they've been talking to McCain and his staff for a couple of months about this story. Those rightwing assholes on the radio didn't see it coming?

Rather than put on layers of tinfoil and see grand plans to engineer the primaries, I suspect it's more internal powerplays in the newsroom. The Times is rather famous for that.

[MADem]

30. Well, the early news reporting about this article went along the lines of

"Saint John of McCain valiantly pushed back against vicious, unsubstatiated rumors designed to impugn his integrity, put forth by lefty bastards who never tell the truth about anything!"

Not quite that obvious, but pretty damned close.

The article is just....stupid. They might as well have pulled Katie Couric's "Some people say..." out of their asses. It's stripped of any "juice" because it's just an allegation with no decent sourcing. When even people with an interest in seeing the guy fall on his ass read the thing and say "Eh, wait a minute," it just won't hunt.

They need to find someone who pretty much saw the deed or at least some nasty assgrabbing. And who will go on the record.

[shraby]

4. I'm waiting for the next shoe to drop.

The NYT certainly wouldn't have published an 8 year old story if there wasn't more to come, and it wouldn't have been a "newsflash breaking story" if the media didn't think so too.

[napi21]

5. Yes I read the article last night. My biggest question is what made

the NYT release this NOW? Or perhapse a better question...WHO convinced them to do it NOW? Apparently this story has been drifting around in the shadows for several months. It was once on Drudge, and McCain responded to the allegations back in Dec. I believe the NYT either has a lot more proof than they've published OR they're being extremely irresponsible! Time will tell which is right.

[TwilightGardener]

6. Please. After all the RW orgasms over Michelle Obama's little gaffe, I'm not giving McCain

the benefit of the doubt--WHY was he traveling with a lobbyist, whose clients' business was before McCain in the Senate, on far-away campaign trips? You've got to be kidding me, if you think there's nothing here. Oh no, I will make a stink about this, and I hope my fellow Dems will too. What would the RW do with this story if it was on OUR side?

[Ivote]

7. Do You suppose it might have to do with this?

Well isn't this a cozy little group: Obama, Exelon, and their consultant, Obama's main man David Axelrod. A partnership made in heaven for the nuclear giant Exelon, which has given "at least $227,000" to Obama's campaign that eventually got them legislation from the Illinois Senator written with their best interests in mind. If this was a story about Clinton rewriting legislation to benefit one of her biggest campaign contributors, who also happened to be Big Nuke, there would be blaring headlines across the web. That it revolves around nuclear leaks and helping provide cover for Exelon, a big biz corporate contributor for Obama, against the best interest of a community, is not a small issue either. You cannot buy this type of free pass from the traditional media. They have to be willing to be complicit in it, because any way you slice it this is a huge story.

The report in the New York Times is alarming. For one thing, you've got to wonder why he told a whopper in Iowa when the records are so easily revealed. Of course, to win. But when it concerns radioactive leaks and the protection of citizens, we're talking about the morality of personal politics and professional ethics. Guess Obama knows the press has been asleep where he's concerned and counted on that continuing. Oops.

[rodeodance]

12. Obama was not concerned about people's health-more concerned with getting $$ for his election.

[TwilightGardener]

16. What's your agenda here? Hillary's campaign (Penn) is attached to them too, and

she voted for that same legislation. And perhaps Obama had to "rewrite" the legislation so it would actually pass--a compromise, the way all legislators have to compromise to get bills thru Congress. You're suggesting he took a bribe or did a political favor? Oh well--believe whatever you want. Good for you--why don't you make a thread about it? I'm more concerned with bringing down Republicans than Democrats, myself.

[MADem]

33. That's what's wrong with this board. Anyone raising a question HAS to have a nefarious agenda...

McCain has, with this press conference and his wiping the floor with the NYT, "inoculated" himself against fucking 'round charges in the general. And, to a lesser extent, lobbying charges.

His lobbying money, a paltry eighty some odd grand over more than a DECADE, is peanuts compared to most people.

It's not just the compromise, it's the QUALITY of the compromise, and the PERCEPTION of the compromise.

Perception is reality. John Kerry wasn't "really" a Vietnam coward, now, was he? Nor was he a "flip flopper."

If you don't get out in front of the media, the media gets out in front of you.

It's one thing the GOP has down.

It doesn't help to stick your fingers in your ears and pretend you don't hear it, because the uninformed voters DO hear it and act on it.

[calmblueocean]

19. I don't think the NY Times does a very good job of presenting that story.

I wrote about this last night, but I'll just quote the relevant paragraph.

Regarding your link, with respect, I think the author of that piece missed the real story in Obama's work on regulating the nuclear industry. It largely revolves around this sentence near the end: "The revised bill was never taken up in the full Senate, where partisan parliamentary maneuvering resulted in a number of bills being shelved before the 2006 session ended." Obama, while threatening the nuclear industry with regulatory legislation, was in essence pointing an unloaded gun. The bill, because of the makeup of the Senate at the time, was being blocked in committee. Had Obama not revised the bill, it would've been clear that it was moribund. But by revising the bill, there began to seem to the nuclear industry a chance that the legislation might indeed make it to a vote. This threat induced the industry to begin voluntary reporting, even though the bill was actually locked into place by Republicans. The story here was not one of capitulation, but of how smart moves enabled Obama to achieve at least part of his goal, even when he was being shut out.

Obama is no Kucinich. He is a moderate liberal who prefers gradual reform that involves all stakeholders. It's fair to criticize him on those grounds, but it should also be acknowledged when the Kucninch-style approach achieves no results, as it would've here. The real story is one of how a Republican-controlled Senate blocks reform, and how difficult it is to get around that, but it's not as sexy to talk about those kind of procedural issues.

[MADem]

32. Maybe the silence is deliberate. It doesn't help him. He'd be better slapping that down NOW.

Like McCain is doing with THIS latest story....see?

I'm starting to think this whole 'revelation' is a bit DELIBERATE.

[MADem]

31. I know why!!!

McCain made a promise when they changed the "rules" about what sort of aircraft (size/distance) could use National Airport that he would not personally benefit from them and take a direct commercial flight home to Phoenix.

He's kept that promise.

What he'd do instead, though, is take a ride on any handy lobbyist's fancy jet instead, and pay them the coach fare he would have otherwise spent. Such a bargain! And LEGAL.

[no_hypocrisy]

9. I found it hard to believe if only for this:

were this remotely true and subject to authority, Rove would've pounced on this opportunity instead of the drug-addict-wife/daughter-of-his-prostitute bit for South Carolina. I'm sure Rove was bitterly disappointed but went straight to Plan B which worked pretty well and they were outright lies.

Rumors only take you so far . . .

[Virginia Dare]

10. It certainly opens up a lot of questions for McCain to answer..

and it appears as though he's been less than forthcoming about the true nature of his relationships or lack thereof with the lobbying industry. The bottom line is, he's no better than any of the rest of them. He's not innocent of the influence peddling like he would want everybody to believe.

MAVERICK MY ASS

STRAIGHT TALK MY ASS

He's a liar. He's a hypocrite. He's a repub, so no big surprise there.

[blondeatlast]

14. He's Bush III--and just as easily manipulated.

He claims that he honestly didn't realize Charles Keating was trying to influence him?

Give me a fluffing break--that's just too stupid to be President.

[aikoaiko]

11. Unless they have dna or video, the Times may have helped McCain

:shrug:

[blondeatlast]

13. Yes--and what I find glaring is that McCain's judgment is so poor he can't

see ahead of time why his associations are questionable. He honestly claims not to have known that Charles Keating was trying to influence him (that's how it was explained away for his Congressional campaign).

Regarding the meeting that strated it all:

By early 1987, though, the thrift was careering toward disaster. Mr. McCain agreed to join several senators, eventually known as the Keating Five, for two private meetings with regulators to urge them to ease up. “Why didn’t I fully grasp the unusual appearance of such a meeting?” Mr. McCain later lamented in his memoir.

When Lincoln went bankrupt in 1989 — one of the biggest collapses of the savings and loan crisis, costing taxpayers $3.4 billion — the Keating Five became infamous. The scandal sent Mr. Keating to prison and ended the careers of three senators, who were censured in 1991 for intervening. Mr. McCain, who had been a less aggressive advocate for Mr. Keating than the others, was reprimanded only for “poor judgment” and was re-elected the next year.

Some people involved think Mr. McCain got off too lightly. William Black, one of the banking regulators the senator met with, argued that Mrs. McCain’s investment with Mr. Keating created an obvious conflict of interest for her husband. (Mr. McCain had said a prenuptial agreement divided the couple’s assets.) He should not be able to “put this behind him,” Mr. Black said. “It sullied his integrity.”

Mr. McCain has since described the episode as a unique humiliation. “If I do not repress the memory, its recollection still provokes a vague but real feeling that I had lost something very important,” he wrote in his memoir. “I still wince thinking about it.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/21/us/politics/21mccain.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&hp

That's just monumnetally stupid--and he wants to be President?

[TreasonousBastard]

23. It's legitimate to question his judgment, but...

how many Presidents have we had who had these sorts of associations?

Even Presidents we liked?

At the risk of accusations of being an apologist for McCain, I'd say that some of this stuff isn't much worse than some things Clinton (either one) Obama, Johnson, Truman, JFK or FDR were involved in. And, unlike the present Pantload-in-Office, Nixon, and a few others, he at least recognized the problems.

Keating? Maybe that's the worst of it. I'd call it naivite rather than corruption, and, yeah, that's something you don't want in a President.

No, I still don't want him in office, but the hyperventilating over sex rumors is obscene in itself.

[blondeatlast]

28. The excerpt I quoted though is concerning his going hell-bent into questionable

situations and playing dumb when he realizes he's been caught in an ethical bind. doesn't matter if it's a K street hooker (all K streeters are that, IMHO--gender moot) or a filthy rich powerful banker and land developer. Everyone has some innate ethical sense--except, apparently, John McCain.

I couldn't care less what he did with any consenting adult--but the fact that he seems to have no inner sense of what is inappropriate and then plays dumb to excuse it is alarming--especially in a possible President.

[Hell Hath No Fury]

15. Yes, I was shocked at all the ...

breathless, "breaking news" coverage over what was essentially gossip about an alleged affair. :eyes:

I'm no hypocrite -- I hated it when they did this to Clinton, and I hate that they are doing it to McCain.

When there is some actual "beef" there -- like lobbiest influence -- then I might be interested in this shit.

[gratuitous]

17. I missed the memo

Did the rules change again, now that it's a Republican stepping on his johnson? I get so confused anymore. See, I heard it was a really big deal that a young Barak Obama might have attended a madrassa when he was seven years old. Similarly, I heard that the fate of the nation hung in the balance over whether Hillary Clinton wore her hair long while going to Wellesley, and that sometimes she says she's a Cubs fan and other times she says she's a Yankees fan.

But something like McCain's dubious record of ethical conduct is a molehill and something that we voters shouldn't worry our pretty little heads about. Thanks for clearing that up.

[Justitia]

18. Amen. I'm with you. -eom

[TreasonousBastard]

21. Missed the point, too.

[underpants]

20. Wow thanks

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=2900964&mesg_id=2900964

Yes it is an enclusive look at this entire career of "Ooops did his money end up my wallet?" O8)and"Oh I will try to better next time"

total lying BS.

[kentuck]

22. Yes, I read the article.

I thought it was a rather fair reading of John McCain's legislative history. Some thought he got off light in the Keating 5 Scandal. He probably did. After that ordeal, he supposedly got religion about campaign finance reform, and that was going to re-new his image. Then these reports of special deals with telecoms and free rides on corporate jets seem to be in conflict once again with the image he was attempting to re-create? The "sex" part was just a small side story to the bigger picture, in my opinion.

[NNN0LHI]

24. Then why did McWalnuts deny having an affair today then?

Why deny something not alleged?

Is that normal?

Don

[TreasonousBastard]

27. Because half the known universe is assuming...

he's been boinking the bimbo.

Both have been denying it since the stories started bubbling up last year, but they have to deny it again

and again

and again

and...

[CTyankee]

29. He was asked point blank by a reporter, so he had to respond yay or nay.

But he looked and acted like he was guilty as hell...