DownWithTyranny!: McCain Is A Crook And He Always Has Been

Americans love a redemption story. But they love it when it's real. It never was with John McCain. McCain bought his way into office with his father-in-law's money and influence. One of the family friends, who became a key donor ($112,000) for McCain's early years in the House and then the Senate was crooked banker and embezzler Charles Keating. McCain was the only one of the crooked senators involved in that massive bank scandal who was an actual close friend of Keating's. He's also the only one still in politics, having done a major p.r. job to repackage himself as a reformer and as a straight talker and Mr. Clean-type. It was a masterful p.r. job... but it didn't correspond to reality.

And McCain is still up to his old tricks, and running one of the most corrupt campaign operations, staffed with scores of lobbyists-- a polite phrase in Washington to say "crook"-- who are bringing in millions and millions of very shady dollars. Yesterday's NY Times painted a sordid picture of corruption and have us a glimpse of what 4 more years of Bush-Cheney-Abramoff would be like if McCain were to be elected. Large sums of money are being injected into the campaign illegally, some of it from overseas interests eager to make sure Republican policies stay the course.

The Jordanian business partner of a prominent Florida businessman, who has raised more than $500,000 for Senator John McCain, appears to be at the center of a cluster of questionable donations to his presidential campaign.

Campaign finance records show Mr. McCain collected a little more than $50,000 in March from members of a single extended family, the Abdullahs, in California and several of their friends.

Amid a sea of contributions to the McCain campaign, the Abdullahs stand out. The checks come not from the usual exclusive coastal addresses, but from relatively hardscrabble inland towns like Downey and Colton. The donations are also startling because of their size: several donors initially wrote checks of $9,200, exceeding the $2,300 limit for an individual gift.

On Wednesday, an article in the Washington Post said the donations were collected by Harry Sargeant III, a Florida businessman who has also raised money for Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Giuliani.

It appears, however, that Mr. Sargeant, the finance chairman of the Florida Republican Party and the part-owner of a major oil trading firm, International Oil Trading Company, did not actually solicit the donations from the Abdullahs and their friends.

That task fell to a longtime business partner, Mustafa Abu Naba’a. Mr. Sargeant said in an interview that he has known Mr. Abu Naba’a for more than a decade and has worked with him on commercial ventures, including a contract with the Pentagon to supply fuel to the military in Iraq.

Through Mr. Abu Naba’a’s connections, Mr. Sargeant has raised more than $100,000 in contributions from several dozen Arab Americans in California, including the Abdullahs, for four candidates: Mrs. Clinton, Mr. Giuliani, Mr. McCain and Charlie Crist in his successful campaign for Florida governor in 2006. Mr. Crist is a close friend and college fraternity brother of Mr. Sargeant.

Michael Luo updated that story late last night after McCain, caught like a rat in a corner, raised the white flag and agreed to return the illicit money. Needless to say, the old crook will skate again, chalking this up to some low-level "mix-up." McCain's life has been one "mix-up" after another.

Senator John McCain’s presidential campaign will return all of the contributions solicited by the Jordanian business partner of one of Mr. McCain’s most prolific fund-raisers.

The decision caps a frenetic two days in which both the Washington Post and the New York Times published articles scrutinizing a cluster of more than $50,000 in unusual contributions from a single extended family, the Abdullahs, in California and several of their friends.

Several of the contributors, who seemed to be unusual major donors to a political campaign, expressed in interviews indifference or even hostility to Mr. McCain’s candidacy.

And this morning the Times slams him and his crooked associates again, coming as close as they're likely to calling them an unethical and corrupt pack of turds, unfit for public office-- or at least letting a group of progressive stalwarts, Accountable America, do it for them.

Nearly 10,000 of the biggest donors to Repug candid- ates and causes across the country will probably receive a foreboding “warning” letter in the mail next week.

The letter is an opening shot across the bow from an unusual new outside political group on the left that is poised to engage in hardball tactics to prevent similar groups on the right from getting off the ground this fall.

...The warning letter is intended as a first step, alerting donors who might be considering giving to right-wing groups to a variety of potential dangers, including legal trouble, public exposure and watchdog groups digging through their lives.

The group is also hoping to be able to respond if an outside conservative group broadcasts a television advertisement attacking Senator Barack Obama, or another Democratic candidate, by running commercials exposing the donors behind the advertisements.

UPDATE: McCAIN- "A POSTER BOY FOR CORRUPTION"

How corrupt is McCain really? Amy Silverman knows. As an Arizona reporter, she's covered him longer and in more depth than all the Inside the Beltway shills combined. Her New Times piece yesterday should be read by every American who cares about an honest, clean government. It is the definitive John McCain biography and it goes way beyond taking money from Jordanian bundlers and giving it back when he gets caught.

I've been a writer and editor at New Times for 15 years. For much of that time, I wrote about Arizona politics, which is to say that I wrote about John McCain. It's still odd to see the guy in the spotlight, because for quite a while, I was pretty much the only one covering him.

I never did fall for him in the way reporters fall for politicians, probably because he wasn't much to fall for back in the early 1990s. In those days, McCain was still rehabilitating the image he'd later sell to the national media. He was known then for cavorting in the Bahamas with Charlie Keating, rather than for fighting for campaign finance reform and limited government spending.

No one seems to remember Keating much, anymore. Amazing. McCain and his fellow Arizonan, Democrat Dennis DeConcini, were hauled before the Senate Ethics Committee along with three other senators to explain their actions on behalf of Keating's Lincoln Savings and Loan.

Keating gave the senators hefty campaign contributions, then called on them to meet with bank regulators to pressure them to go soft on an investigation of Lincoln. There were two infamous meetings. McCain attended both.

It's true that McCain was the first to back off when the appearance of impropriety became obvious, and the ethics committee was easier on him than most of the others, partly because some of McCain's actions on behalf of Keating took place while he was in the House, and therefore not under the purview of the Senate Ethics Committee.

More important, what often gets lost in the retelling is McCain's close personal relationship with Keating. McCain took trips with Keating, including to his retreat in the Bahamas, and reimbursed him only after the fact was made public.

It was also revealed that Keating had a business relationship with Cindy and her father, Jim Hensley, who ran a very lucrative Anheuser-Busch distributorship in Phoenix.
Most shocking, perhaps, given McCain's image today, is that McCain took more than $100,000 in campaign contributions from Keating and his employees, between 1982 and 1988.

You may be surprised to know that in 1987 and 1988, McCain voted against federal legislation reforming the campaign finance system. It was only in 1990, in the aftermath of Keating and the shadow of an upcoming re-election campaign, that he started supporting reform. Ditto for his efforts to cut government spending.