Well hey, we can't just have obviously biased and poorly disguised character attacks on just Obama right? Will post something on Hillary too...someday...if I feel like it :/ McCain http://www.kansan.com/stories/2008/feb/25/minster/?opinion When faced with allegations of impropriety, McCain feels it’s easier to ban the talking than to stop being improper. John McCain supports campaign finance reform more adamantly than any other politician because no other politician needs campaign finance reform more than John McCain. He’s found his way to the center of an impressive number of congressional financial scandals. First came his days as a member of the Keating Five, a group of senators accused of corruption in 1989, taking millions in campaign contributions from banker Charles Keating while pressuring regulators to back off the oversight of Keating’s failing savings and loan. Keating and McCain’s wife were business partners, but McCain didn’t see a conflict of interest because his prenuptial agreement divided their assets. Evidently every dinner out for the McCain’s is a Dutch date. Last week we had his flat denial of ever having met Bud Paxson, despite Paxson’s memory of meeting McCain in the senator’s office. McCain says he never spoke with Paxson or any of his associates. However, he used Paxson’s personal jet, took his campaign contributions and then just happened to write two letters urging the FCC to take speedy action on a Paxson business deal. If McCain is wondering why people have been quick to believe these allegations, it might be because they’ve heard this one before. Now McCain denies he posted his eligibility for federal election funds as collateral for a loan, insisting that the real collateral was the idea that he might someday in the future post the federal matching funds. I’d like to say I can personally vouch for the ease of securing million-dollar bank loans on the promise of an idea, but again, I’ve just never experienced many of the hardships of the senator’s career. For instance, I’ve never had issue ads mention me by name within 30 days of a primary election or 60 days of a general election, and now, thanks to McCain, I never will. I’m sure that was rough for the senator, having members of the public talk about him before an election. I mean, that might end up effecting the outcome. Luckily, the Constitution has absolutely no provisions about whether or not Congress can make a law respecting speech. (The Bill of Rights might have said something about it, but it belongs to Omnitouch now.) McCain is like the “good girl” who sleeps over at a different guys house every night and then can’t understand how she got a reputation as a “bad girl.” But when faced with allegations of impropriety, McCain feels it’s easier to ban the talking than to stop being improper. Because, when you’re John McCain, ending the impropriety is the hardest part of it all. http://wonkette.com/358941/john-mccains-long-career-of-sleazy-lies-semi+affairs--total-corruption Betrayal, deceit, corruption and John McCain By Ted Sampley U.S. Veteran Dispatch November 14, 2007 McCain has forgotten his own history of involvement with betrayal, deceit and corruption. When McCain returned to the United States in 1973 after more than five years as a prisoner of war, he found his wife was a different person. Carol McCain, once a model, had been badly injured in a car wreck in 1969. The accident "left her 4 inches shorter and on crutches, and she gained a good deal of weight." Despite her injures, she had refused to allow her POW husband to be notified about her condition, fearing that such news would not be good for him while he was being held prisoner. But, just a couple years later, McCain, while pondering a future in politics, met Cindy Hensley, an attractive 25-year-old woman from a very wealthy politically-connected Arizona family. While still married to Carol, McCain began an adulterous relationship with Cindy. He married Cindy in May 1980 -- just a month after dumping his crippled wife and securing a divorce. he Arizona Republic - October 17, 1989" . . . both in telephone conversations with reporters and on a live radio talk show, the Republican senator was far from calm. He was agitated. Angry. And the way he dealt with unpleasant questions was to bully the questioners . . . 'You're a liar,' McCain snapped Sept. 29 when an Arizona Republic reporter asked him about business ties between his wife, Cindy McCain, and Keating . . . 'That's the spouse's involvement, you idiot,' McCain sneered later in the same conversation. 'You do understand English, don't you?' ". . . Not content with just bullying reporters, McCain tried belittling them: 'It's up to you to find that out, kids.' . . . McCain wasn't talking to liars. He wasn't talking to juveniles. The senator was talking to two reporters." The Arizona Republic - October 17, 1989 -- "McCain, in a radio talk-show appearance last week condemned disclosures of his family's ties to Keating as 'irresponsible journalism.'" The Phoenix Gazette, November 13, 1989 -- "Reporters also 'discovered' that the senator's wife and father-in-law invested $359,100.00 in one of Mr. Keating's projects in 1986 . . ." The Arizona Republic, April 29, 1990 -- "McCain's involvement with Keating . . . when reporters called him with questions last year about previously unknown ties to Keating, an investment by wife Cindy McCain in a Keating shopping center and trips to Keating's Bahamas home, McCain went into a rage." New Republic, Dec. 31, 1990--"The only Republican of the bunch [the five Senators], John McCain of Arizona wins credit for finally drawing the line. After the second of the two April meetings [with Federal regulators] he told Mr. [Sen. Dennis] DeConcini [D-Ariz.] and Mr. Keating that he wouldn't lean on the regulators any more. Mr. Keating called him a wimp. But before the rupture, Mr. McCain and his family were regular guests of Mr. Keating's on trips to the Bahamas. Mr. McCain reimbursed the owner of Lincoln Savings and Loan for only a small fraction of the cost of these holidays. Yet, he never reported the vacations on Senate disclosure forms, or his income taxes. He said he thought his wife had paid Mr. Keating back. This is hard to believe." Economist, Mar. 9, 1991--"Mr. McCain, despite his claims of innocense, was the only one of the five who benefitted personally--family holidays in the Bahamas on Mr. Keating's tab." New Republic, Sept. 9, 1991--Calling McCain part of the "Senatorial Lincoln Brigade," the New Republic reported that Keating, while bankrupting his savings and loan, had channeled $1.4 million to the campaigns or causes of the five senators, who in turn pressured the savings and loan regulators to back off our friend." Regardie's magazine, April-May 1992 issue. "Ultimately, the fall of Lincoln Savings and Loan will cost the U.S. taxpayers $2 billion. It lost $1 million dollars a day from the time Keating bought it in 1984 until its collapse in 1989, and yet he continued to pay off McCain as 'one of his assets.'" The Arizona Republic, August 24, 1994 -- "Cindy McCain, the wife of U.S. Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona, admitted in a series of media interviews Monday that she became addicted to the painkillers Percocet and Vicodin. She said that she used the drugs from 1989 to 1992 and acknowledged that she had stolen some pills from the American Voluntary Medical Team, a charitable organization of which she is president . . . at one point, McCain, 40, was ingesting 15 to 20 pills a day . . . the normal dosage for seriously ill patients is 6 to 10 a day for a short period." The Phoenix Gazette, August 25, 1994 -- "Cindy McCain was investigated recently by the Drug Enforcement Administration for stealing and using Percocet and Vicodin, both narcotic painkillers from her aid organization . . . the county attorney's report provides a window to drug dealings within Cindy McCain's nonprofit corporation . . . Gosinski also alleged that Cindy McCain abused her husband's office and diplomatic privileges by transporting illegal substances overseas. He also claimed, according to her lawyers, that Cindy McCain tried to prevent him from providing accurate information to the DEA." Playboy, July 1999. -- "Ms. McCain admitted stealing Percocet and Vicodin from the American Voluntary Medical Team, an organization that aids Third World countries. Percocet and Vicodin are schedule 2 drugs, in the same legal category as opium. Each pill theft carries a penalty of one year in prison and a monetary fine." However, McCain did not face prosecution. She was allowed to enter a pretrial diversion program and escaped with no blemish to her record. Source: James Bovard, Prison Sentences of the Politically Connected. Mmm...hmm.
Keating Five will definitely be the dirt that sticks. I think he will be ok about his ex-wife because they are in good terms. It can be a problem if they hate each other like Rudy and his ex-wife.
How will Keating Five stick if it hasn't done so for the past 2 decades? He was cleared of those charges by the leading Democrat investigating this. Here is a transcript of what it actually SAID. In its final report (November 20, 1991), here is what the Senate Select Committee on Ethics concluded about McCain's conduct: "Based on the evidence available to it, the Committee has given consideration to Senator McCain's actions on behalf of Lincoln. The Committee concludes that, given the personal benefits and campaign contributions he had received from Mr. Keating, Senator McCain exercised poor judgment in intervening with the regulators without first inquiring as to the Bank Board's position in the case in a more routine manner. The Committee concludes that Senator McCain's actions were not improper nor attended with gross negligence and did not reach the level of requiring institutional action against him. The Committee finds that Senator McCain took no further action after the April 9, 1987 meeting when he learned of a criminal referral. "The Committee reaffirms its prior decision that it does not have jurisdiction to determine the issues of disclosure or reimbursement pertaining to flights provided by American Continental Corporation while Senator McCain was a Member of the House of Representatives. The Committee did consider the effect of such on his state of mind and judgment in taking steps to assist Lincoln. "Senator McCain has violated no law of the United States or specific Rule of the United States Senate; therefore, the Committee concludes that no further action is warranted with respect to Senator McCain on the matters investigated during the preliminary inquiry." So how does that stick?
Obviously he was not legally liable. Otherwise, he would be a goner long time ago. But even he admit that it was a stain in his life to be associated. Having said that, I don't think it will be a big deal these days.
You'd think that, but who knows, what with all the crap being thrown on the other candidates. XD I think it'd stick though. The Republican Party loves to run on image; now the Dems do suck at reinforcing this kind of crap (and maybe that is a blessing in disguise), but given the whole "family values/honor" etc. that seems to shadow every Republican campaign, it would make for at the very least, some thought-provoking ammunition, if it were encapsulated in those adorable "deep voice, creepy music" attack ads.
After reading the opening post, I thought about how thin this "dirt" is when compared to the mudslide known as Hillary Clinton. Sheesh. Let's hope this is a McCain/Obama presidential race where issues will be the defining mantra -- not gutter wallowing like Northside Storm apparently wants.
