But John McCain is a straight talker!!!!

For reasons known only to the Chris Matthewses of the world, the mainstream media has propagated the perception of John McCain as something of a cross between Elliot Ness and Sergeant York, the incorruptible, ever-candid war hero and every reporter’s favorite Senator. No matter that much of the façade is complete garbage; Tim Russert loves him!

Well, it seems the media has taken a brief respite from its constant and lovingly administered fluffing of McCain to actually investigate a potential conflict of interest and/or extramarital affair. In his blanket denial that anything untoward had occurred, it appears Mr. Straight Talk may not be as forthright as his reputation would indicate. Indeed, he appears to be full of shit. Take it away, Mr. Isikoff:

Just hours after the Times' story was posted, the McCain campaign issued a point-by-point response that depicted the letters as routine correspondence handled by his staff--and insisted that McCain had never even spoken with anybody from Paxson or Alcalde & Fay about the matter. "No representative of Paxson or Alcalde & Fay personally asked Senator McCain to send a letter to the FCC," the campaign said in a statement emailed to reporters.

But that flat claim seems to be contradicted by an impeccable source: McCain himself. "I was contacted by Mr. Paxson on this issue," McCain said in the September 25, 2002 deposition obtained by Newsweek. "He wanted their approval very bad for purposes of his business. I believe that Mr. Paxson had a legitimate complaint."

While McCain said "I don't recall" if he ever directly spoke to the firm's lobbyist about the issue-an apparent reference to Iseman, though she is not named--"I'm sure I spoke to [Paxson]." McCain agreed that his letters on behalf of Paxson, a campaign contributor, could "possibly be an appearance of corruption"-even though McCain denied doing anything improper.

McCain's subsequent letters to the FCC--coming around the same time that Paxson's firm was flying the senator to campaign events aboard its corporate jet and contributing $20,000 to his campaign--first surfaced as an issue during his unsuccessful 2000 presidential bid. William Kennard, the FCC chair at the time, described the sharply worded letters from McCain, then chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, as "highly unusual."

The issue erupted again this week when The New York Times reported that his top campaign strategist at the time, John Weaver, was so concerned about what Iseman (who was representing Paxson) was saying about her access to McCain that he personally confronted her at a Washington restaurant and told her to stay away from the senator.

So not only does it appear that McCain is lying, if Isikoff’s portrayal is accurate, dude is on the take. I will be shocked if the focus remains on the potential bribery (the real issue here), what with a possible sex scandal brewing, but at least for now, maybe people will see that John McCain is just as bought as any other corporate whore on the Hill. It is about damn time.