If they (repugs) continue to make Obamas 16 year association w/ Rev Wright an issue...it's about time the voting public is reminded about McCain's long financial reltionship with Charles Keating and his role in the Keating 5.
Amid McCain's new status, old scandals stir
By Michael Kranish
Globe Staff / February 28, 2008 WASHINGTON - As William K. Black watches John McCain move toward the Republican presidential nomination, he thinks of a day 21 years ago that he considers one of the most troubling of his life.
"I remain very upset that what they did caused such damage," said Black, now a professor at the University of Missouri at Kansas City, recalling how Lincoln's bankruptcy cost the government $3 billion. Moreover, he said he believes McCain intervened partly because his wife had invested money with Lincoln chairman Charles Keating, a campaign contributor who let the McCains use his home in the Bahamas.
The story of how the "Keating Five" senators allegedly pressured regulators to lay off a failing Arizona S&L became a major scandal, and marked a turning point in McCain's life - the near-death of his political career followed by his eventual rebirth as a crusader for campaign finance reform.
The events of 1987, when McCain met with regulators, and 1991, when the Senate Ethics Committee concluded that he used "poor judgment" in the matter, are only dimly remembered by many.
But McCain's emergence as the likely GOP nominee, combined with the rising volume of anti- lobbying rhetoric in the presidential campaign, has brought renewed attention to the Keating Five case, prompting questions about what McCain learned from it, what he's accepted was wrong, and whether he now is stepping back from some of his own scrutiny of his past errors.
McCain also has faced fresh criticism for pushing the Federal Communications Commission to make a decision in a 1999 case affecting another major campaign donor, Paxson Communications. Responding to recent coverage of that case, his campaign issued a statement last week saying the Arizona senator has "never done favors for special interests."
more:
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2008/02/28/amid_mccains_new_status_old_scandals_stir/Chapter V: The Keating Five
By Bill Muller
The Arizona Republic
Oct. 03, 1999 12:12:00<snip>
Keating was far more than a constituent to McCain, however.
On Oct. 8, 1989, The Republic revealed that McCain's wife and her father had invested $359,100 in a Keating shopping center in April 1986, a year before McCain met with the regulators.
The paper also reported that the McCains, sometimes accompanied by their daughter and baby-sitter, had made at least nine trips at Keating's expense, sometimes aboard the American Continental jet. Three of trips were made during vacations to Keating's opulent Bahamas retreat at Cat Cay.
McCain also did not pay Keating for the trips until years after they were taken, when he learned that Keating was in trouble over Lincoln. Total cost: $13,433.
When the story broke, McCain did nothing to help himself. When reporters first called him, he was furious. Caught out in the open, the former fighter pilot let go with a barrage of cover fire. Sen. Hothead came out in all his glory.
''You're a liar,''' McCain snapped Sept. 29 when a Republic reporter asked him about business ties between his wife and Keating.
''That's the spouse's involvement, you idiot,'' McCain said later in the same conversation. ''You do understand English, don't you?''
He also belittled the reporters when they asked about his wife's ties to Keating.
''It's up to you to find that out, kids.''
And then he played the POW card.
''Even the Vietnamese didn't question my ethics,'' McCain said.
The paper ran the story a few days later. At a news conference, McCain was a changed man. He stood calmly for 90 minutes and answered every question.
On the shopping center, his defense was simple. The deal did not involve him. The shares in the shopping center had been purchased by a partnership set up between McCain's wife and her father.
But McCain also had to explain his trips with Keating and why he didn't pay Keating back right away.
On that score, McCain admitted he had fouled up. He said he should have reimbursed Keating immediately, not waited several years. His staff said it was an oversight, but it looked bad, McCain jetting around with Keating, then going to bat for him with the federal regulators.
Meanwhile, Lincoln continued to founder.
In April 1989, two years after the Keating Five meetings, the government seized Lincoln, which declared bankruptcy. In September 1990, Keating was booked into Los Angeles County Jail, charged with 42 counts of fraud. His bond was set at $5 million.
During Keating's eventual trial, the prosecution produced a parade of elderly investors who had lost their life's savings by investing in American Continental junk bonds.
more:
http://www.wmsa.net/People/john_mccain/ariz-republic_chap_V_1999.htm
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