02/21/2008
New York Times Hints at McCain Affair with Lobbyist
Late yesterday, the New York Times dropped a damaging story on John McCain and his potentially damaging relationship with lobbyist Vicki Iseman.
NYT: "The lobbyist, a partner at the firm Alcalde & Fay, represented telecommunications companies for whom Mr. McCain’s commerce committee was pivotal. Her clients contributed tens of thousands of dollars to his campaigns. Mr. Black said Mr. McCain and Ms. Iseman were friends and nothing more. But in 1999 she began showing up so frequently in his offices and at campaign events that staff members took notice. One recalled asking, 'Why is she always around?'"
No doubt Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani are gnashing their teeth and wringing their hands that the Times, which has endorsed McCain, chose to hold this story until McCain clinched had clinched the nomination, considering they leaked it to Matt Drudge back in December.
The lede: "Early in Senator John McCain’s first run for the White House eight years ago, waves of anxiety swept through his small circle of advisers. A female lobbyist had been turning up with him at fund-raisers, visiting his offices and accompanying him on a client’s corporate jet. Convinced the relationship had become romantic, some of his top advisers intervened to protect the candidate from himself — instructing staff members to block the woman’s access, privately warning her away and repeatedly confronting him, several people involved in the campaign said on the condition of anonymity. When news organizations reported that Mr. McCain had written letters to government regulators on behalf of the lobbyist’s client, the former campaign associates said, some aides feared for a time that attention would fall on her involvement. Mr. McCain, 71, and the lobbyist, Vicki Iseman, 40, both say they never had a romantic relationship. But to his advisers, even the appearance of a close bond with a lobbyist whose clients often had business before the Senate committee Mr. McCain led threatened the story of redemption and rectitude that defined his political identity."
McCain's Communications Director Jill Hazelbaker issued the following statement: "It is a shame that the New York Times has lowered its standards to engage in a hit and run smear campaign. John McCain has a 24-year record of serving our country with honor and integrity. He has never violated the public trust, never done favors for special interests or lobbyists, and he will not allow a smear campaign to distract from the issues at stake in this election. Americans are sick and tired of this kind of gutter politics, and there is nothing in this story to suggest that John McCain has ever violated the principles that have guided his career."
For McCain, Self-Confidence on Ethics Poses Its Own Risk [nyt]
More Analysis
The McCain Story [talking points memo]
How The Times Fucked Everyone With Its John McCain Story [gawker]
McCain and the lobbyist: the final straw for the GOP Base? [pams house blend]
Posted 8:18 AM EST by Andy Towle in Election 2008, John McCain, News | Permalink
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And nowhere in the statement from the campaign do they deny that an affair took place. And yet the Republicans are the party of morals. Creeps.
Posted by: John | Feb 21, 2008 8:28:20 AM
John McCain: He's Only 10 in Dog Years! (from Rude Pundit)
Posted by: Gary | Feb 21, 2008 9:02:11 AM
I'm listening to him live on WNYC right now. McCain is sounding like a boy that got caught with his hands in the cookie jar.
Posted by: Gary | Feb 21, 2008 9:03:50 AM
Is this Huckabee's miracle?
Can Romney un-suspend his campaign and say "sike"on the freeing his delegates to vote mccain?
Posted by: jimmyboyo | Feb 21, 2008 9:10:55 AM
So much for their incessant whining about the "sanctity of marriage" between a man and a woman, more hypocrisy from the right wing haters. Even this old man couldn't keep it in his pants.
Posted by: Sebastian | Feb 21, 2008 9:49:46 AM
Shocker. The New York Times drops a sensationalist bomb on the Republican nominee for president. I'm sure they'll find some dog he ran over 45 years ago, too. I don't believe this any more than I believe anything else that piece of toilet paper prints.
Posted by: Cyd | Feb 21, 2008 9:54:55 AM
Jimmyboyo, my thoughts exactly. What a sad reinforcement it would be for Fuckabee.
Okay I'm calling this a conspiracy. Right now. It's a conspiracy!
Posted by: justincredible | Feb 21, 2008 10:16:04 AM
I hate when Republicans whine about how papers are unfair for printing...THE TRUTH. In this case, had the story been about an affair, I don't think the NY Times would have published it, and people would not have been interested. As it is, the sex angle probably helps him with swinger voters (I mean swing) because it's a stupid kind of, "Hey, that's unfair, poor guy!" thing.
But this relationship is about the political, more than the sexual, favors.
If you heard him speak and have an ounce of objectivity, you'd have to say: He's a damned liar.
The party of family values, the candidate who's a "maverick" and so against lobbyists...it all makes perfect sense.
In the end, Obama is going to be the Democratic candidate and will beat McCain, and it will be less about McCain's many and varied shortcomings than it will be about Obama's many and varied strengths.
Posted by: Matthew Rettenmund | Feb 21, 2008 10:27:46 AM
No less true than Bill and Monica, is my guess. Is it our business?
Who cares who these men are doing -- as long as they can balance the budget and end the war.
Posted by: Bernie | Feb 21, 2008 10:34:47 AM
Justincredible
:-)
Bernie
Well, mccain isn't going to end the war so he fails your test.
I agree wholeheatdly that a person's personal life is just that, BUT these are the "family values" repubs we are talking about. The base who already disliked mccain is probably experiencing head explosions right about now.
Posted by: jimmyboyo | Feb 21, 2008 10:56:29 AM
QUESTION TO BE LEFT ON JIM RUTENBERG’s VOICEMAIL at NEW YORK TIMES: (202) 862-0408.
“If you report a story about McCain and a non-confirmable affair that both he and the woman deny, and use anonymous sources, why are you ducking the story that has exploded on the internet relating to allegations by Larry Sinclair involving Barack Obama’s alleged cocaine use, infidelity, and lies.”
Posted by: Christopher | Feb 21, 2008 10:56:30 AM
I care, Bernie, because those men are the ones that say nobody else is allowed to do it. We call it reaction formation, and if the allegations are true, some Repooplicans need a serious Freudian bitch slap
Posted by: justincredible | Feb 21, 2008 10:59:08 AM
Cyd,
The Times new about this story since December but did run it until AFTER McCain won the nomination. Get it? They deliberately held back from releasing information that would have damaged his chances of securing the nomination, which he has secured.
Other journalist are asking why did the Times hold of on releasing this information as long as it did.
Therefore, going on some conservative rant against the Times after it's done McCain a HUGE favor makes no sense. Again, the Times did not release the story until after McCain locked up the delegates he needs for the nomination.
Posted by: noah | Feb 21, 2008 11:28:39 AM
Well, just because you're an honorable old man doesn't stop you from being a horny old man. But his wife is gorgeous. Was he married to her at the tim...having a gorgeous wife doesn't mean a thing, does it? Ah, these hetero guys, they'll never learn: couchee is expensive--in one way or another. Ask Hillary's old man. Now that she's not going to win the nomination, she can get rid of that couchee hungry husband.
Posted by: Derrick from Philly | Feb 21, 2008 11:40:22 AM
Noah,
Another way of looking at it would be that the Times held the information until it was certain McCain would be the Republican nominee, then let loose in an obvious attempt to aid the Democrats.
Maybe they also have dirt on Huckabee and Romney that we would be seeing right now if either one of them had clinched the nomination.
Just playing devil's advocate here.
Posted by: 24play | Feb 21, 2008 11:46:52 AM
Derrick, yes he was married to her
The thing is, she herself is the other woman. McCain was married before the current wife and cheated on then wife with current wife.
LOL
Posted by: Jimmyboyo | Feb 21, 2008 11:53:22 AM
I don't believe this any more than I believe anything else that piece of toilet paper prints
Yeah, right [insert 1000 eyerolling emoticons here]. I'm sure when the Times printed their hit pieces, erm, stories about Whitewater and the non-existent WMD that was instrumental in making a case for a disastrous war, you were hanging on every word.
You Rethuglicans are going down big time in November, so enjoy the next 9 months before you spend 8 years, at a minimum, in the political wilderness.
Posted by: Henry Holland | Feb 21, 2008 12:01:05 PM
People, this story is not problematic from the sex angle. It's problematic from the influence angle! McCain is supposed to be Mr No Special Interests, yet there he was all buddy buddy with pretty lobbyist. The tv media outlets are covering this soooo foolishly. It isn't and shouldn't be about sex - who cares what that old teeth talker is boinking! - it should be about influence and contradictions. Like Hillary getting the most $$ after Santorum from Big Pharma and Barack not firing every idiot who brought that "ex-gay" fluzzy McClurkin on board for that tour.
Posted by: Ben | Feb 21, 2008 12:16:27 PM
Didn't Bill have his Bimbo Eruption during the primaries too? Do I see a 60 Minutes interview in the future for Johnny?
Posted by: anon | Feb 21, 2008 2:02:59 PM