Sunday, April 20, 2008
Mean old Boston Globe
Today they take a look at the Old Fart's freshly polished image as a maverick and piss all over it.
McCain insists he has never budged from his lifelong belief in less government and less taxation. But whoever wins the Democratic nomination will surely argue that behind McCain's antipolitician label, he has always been cozy with the agents of the special interests he rails against.Later in the piece, the Globe considers his claim to be a reformer. It amounts to little more than heavy use of the word "reform" when talking about his policies. Pity poor Brian Mooney of the Globe, he has written himself out of any future McCain barbecues.
The policy shifts are evident: He abandoned comprehensive immigration reform last year as it threatened to sink his candidacy and is supporting tax cuts for the wealthy he had criticized for years and twice voted against in the Senate. And he has all but ignored the signature issues that framed the 2000 portrait of a maverick: campaign finance reform and a crackdown on the tobacco industry.
Compared with his 2000 insurgency, a doomed high-wire act that was short of money, staff, research, and policy papers, the McCain campaign of 2008 also has come under fire for its reliance on elite Washington lobbyists - 66 by one recent tally - who work for or are helping his campaign. News stories in recent weeks have questioned McCain actions that benefited political supporters or clients of friendly lobbyists.
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