I was around, and following congressional politics rather closely (by which I mean professionally) when McCain first popped up on the political radar screen in 1986 during the so-called Keating Five scandal. In exchange for various regulatory favors, Keating, a wealthy and politically, um, generous, S&L executive, turned himself into the special friend of a bipartisan group of sleazebag Senators, with five in particular, including McCain, reaping most of the benefits. By modern standards (i.e. Jack Abramoff's and Ted Steven's standards) it was actually pretty tame stuff, but it was considered a big deal at the time.)In a sense, the scandal marked the birth of the McCain "brand," because unlike the other four of the Five, he stood up in the Senate and more or less admitted he was guilty (not nearly as guilty as the others, he hastened to point out – but still, he felt bad about what he had done.) This went over really big with the media ("Senator admits guilt" outranking even man bites dog on the news-o-meter.)
Now, if you go back and look, you'll see that if Keating didn't comp McCain as generously and vigorously as he did the other four, it was probably because McCain was a very junior senator at the time, with relatively little influence to peddle. But it wasn't because Honest John was shy about accepting the favors that were offered him. If John McCain had a problem with the way lobbying (i.e. legalized prostitution) was being done in Washington, you definitely won't find it in the record of the Keating investigation. McCain's fit of Puritan self-righteousness (or political calculation, depending on your view) came after the fact, once he'd already been caught. And yet, from that single Senate speech sprang the shoot that eventually grew into the sturdy tree of John McCain's media image.
You have to admit it was a neat trick: Happily accepting the naughty goodies while they were being handed out, but then winning brownie points for admitting he took them – after the world had already found out he took them. But that's precisely what McCain did. He's never looked back since.
Yesterday, John McCain delivered an unhinged anti-Obama diatribe in New Mexico, and when he posed a rhetorical question -- "Who is the real Barack Obama?" -- someone shouted, "A terrorist!" McCain paused momentarily, but did not comment on the remark.
Also yesterday, Sarah Palin repeated one of her unusually stupid attacks, rehashing the nonsense that Obama "pals around" with terrorists. One man in the audience, responding to Palin's smear, shouted, "Kill him!" Palin also did not comment on the remark.
At the same Florida event, Republicans shouted abuse at journalists, hurling obscenities. The Washington Post reported, "One Palin supporter shouted a racial epithet at an African American sound man for a network and told him, 'Sit down, boy.'"
And just to top things off, last night, the Republican Party of Pennsylvania announced its belief that Obama is "a terrorist's best friend."
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