The New York Times smears John McCain in tomorrow's paper, accusing him of ethics violations and insinuating that he had an affair with a lobbyist. What is most striking, though, if you actually read the story, is how thin it is. It's mostly about the Keating Five scandal, which dates to the late 1980s. The "news" that gives the story a hook has to do with McCain's friendship with a pretty blonde lobbyist that apparently ended in 2000. As for the purported affair, the Times offers zero evidence. This line sums up, I think, the absurdity of the paper's attempt to cobble together an anti-McCain story out of these widely-separated elements:

It had been just a decade since an official favor for a friend with regulatory problems had nearly ended Mr. McCain’s political career by ensnaring him in the Keating Five scandal.

Just a decade! Every ten years, McCain does something that the Times can unfairly paint as inappropriate. For what it's worth, when the Keating Five scandal was unfolding, Barack Obama was in law school. I guess making oneself vulnerable to two negative stories in forty years is the price of a lifetime of public service.

On Fox News tonight, Bob Bennett, who is representing McCain with respect to the Times story--that doesn't mean that he will sue the newspaper, as that is impossible under current law--said that the Times had lowered its standards by printing this rather absurd smear. That is incorrect, of course. The Times is a mouthpiece for the liberal wing of the Democratic Party, nothing more. Its smear of McCain--not the last, to be sure--is entirely consistent with the editorial policies it has maintained for many years. Tomorrow's story is just one more reminder of why no sophisticated person takes the Times seriously as a news source.

UPDATE: Scott has more here.

FURTHER UPDATE: The Times story quotes John Weaver, a former senior aide to McCain, who met with the lobbyist, Vicki Iseman. The Times says that Weaver met with Iseman "to ask her to stay away from the senator." Weaver has now given the Washington Post more details on that meeting:

The New York Times asked for a formal interview and I said no and asked for written questions. The Times knew of my meeting with Ms. Iseman, from sources they didn't identify to me, and asked me about that meeting. I did not inform Senator McCain that I asked for a meeting with Ms. Iseman.

Her comments, which had gotten back to some of us, that she had strong ties to the Commerce Committee and his staff were wrong and harmful and I so informed her and asked her to stop with these comments and to not be involved in the campaign. Nothing more and nothing less.

I responded to the Times on the record about a meeting they already knew about. The campaign received a copy of my response to the Times the same day, which was in late December.

From the day I first approached John about running for President in 1997 and through today, I have always wanted John to be president. The country needs him at this perilous time. From the moment I left the campaign until today, not one day -- not one --has gone by that I haven't reactively or pro-actively talked with the campaign leadership, with state leadership about how the campaign and how to win. To suggest anything else is wrong, a lie and meant to do nothing but harm.

ONE MORE: A follow-up on the Times' reporting on the controversy over its story is here.

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Posted by John at 9:17 PM  |    |