In just the latest blow to his tattered maverick myth, the McCain camp is signaling its man will perform yet another about-face on abortion. Eight years after attacking George W. Bush's defense of a Republican platform which called for banning all abortions, even in cases of rape, incest and to protect the life of the mother, John McCain too will kowtow to the GOP's radical right. As it turns out, that surrender follows Mr. Straight Talk's earlier reversal on overturning Roe v. Wade.

During the 2000 campaign, John McCain ripped into then Governor George W. Bush for supporting a GOP abortion ban plank at odds with his stated position recognizing exemptions for rape, incest and the life and health of the mother. Just last year, the Arizona Senator reiterated that he wanted to revise the Republican platform to recognize those exceptions.

Alas, that was then, this is now. Already walking a tightrope between his party's conservative base and independent voters his campaign is now trying so hard to woo, John McCain is having yet another born-again experience on the issue. Facing threats from the likes of the Family Research Council's Tony Perkins (who claimed McCain would be "aborting his own campaign"), McCain backer Senator Sam Brownback (R-KS) made clear the Republican nominee would likely abandon his earlier position. As ABC reported:

Despite McCain's support for changing the platform in 2000 and 2007, Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., the co-chairman of McCain's Justice Advisory Committee, significantly downplays the possibility that McCain would revise the party's call for a nationwide constitutional ban on abortion with no exceptions.

"I don't think that's going to happen. I think you're going to see a platform process that is going to maintain that plank," said Brownback, a leading abortion rights opponent who endorsed McCain after ending his own White House bid.

"There are going to be a number of people supporting his nomination that want that plank left exactly as it is," he said. "They're going to be a strong majority."

Such a reversal would constitute John McCain's second major flip-flop on reproductive rights in 18 months, all in the cause of assuaging the Republican Party's suspicious social conservatives.

McCain in the run-up to his '08 presidential bid reversed course on the issue of overturning Roe v. Wade. In 1999, the supposed maverick was supposedly concerned about the health and safety of American women:

"I'd love to see a point where it is irrelevant, and could be repealed because abortion is no longer necessary. But certainly in the short term, or even the long term, I would not support repeal of Roe v. Wade, which would then force X number of women in America to [undergo] illegal and dangerous operations."

But by 2006 with his knee-bending to Jerry Falwell and others now well underway, McCain announced to ABC's George Stephanopolous that he not only wanted to see Roe overturned, but supported a constitutional amendment banning abortion as well:

STEPHANOPOULOS: Let me ask one question about abortion. Then I want to turn to Iraq. You're for a constitutional amendment banning abortion, with some exceptions for life and rape and incest.

MCCAIN: Rape, incest and the life of the mother. Yes.

STEPHANOPOULOS: So is President Bush, yet that hasn't advanced in the six years he's been in office. What are you going to do to advance a constitutional amendment that President Bush hasn't done?

MCCAIN: I don't think a constitutional amendment is probably going to take place, but I do believe that it's very likely or possible that the Supreme Court should - could overturn Roe v. Wade, which would then return these decisions to the states, which I support.

STEPHANOPOULOS: And you'd be for that?

MCCAIN: Yes, because I'm a federalist. Just as I believe that the issue of gay marriage should be decided by the states, so do I believe that we would be better off by having Roe v. Wade return to the states. And I don't believe the Supreme Court should be legislating in the way that they did on Roe v. Wade.

Ever since locking up the Republican presidential nomination, John McCain has been trying to run away from both his party and his president and towards the middle of the road. On Sunday, his senior strategist Charlie Black engaged in some wishful thinking, labeling his McCain "slightly right of center." But when it comes to the abortion issue, as Jennifer Blei Stockman, the co-chairwoman of Republican Majority for Choice put it, "the word 'moderate' is going to disappear from any description of McCain."

In the Times piece on McCain and Obama strategies for the fall campaign, the GOP lobbyist extraordinaire and enthusiastic Moonie Black made it clear his man would be undergoing an extreme makeover, faux moderate edition.

Mr. McCain's advisers said they would present him as a senator who frequently stepped across the aisle, while portraying Mr. Obama as a down-the-line Democratic voter who is ideologically out of touch with much of the country.

"We believe America is still a slightly right-of-center country, and that is what McCain is," said Charlie Black, a senior adviser to Mr. McCain. "If you look at Obama's base and his record, he is a pretty conventional liberal."

Sadly, Black's centrist label for the supposed maverick is wishful thinking belied by McCain's voting record and policy positions. And that rebranding comes after months of John McCain's efforts to sell himself as a "true conservative" to right-wing Republican primary voters.

During the height of his battle with Mitt Romney to capture the GOP nomination, John McCain was desperate to claim the mantle of Ronald Reagan and assuage social conservatives worried about his commitment to their cause. The result was an ad titled, "True Conservative" which McCain campaign ran heading into the decisive Super Tuesday primaries in early February:

McCain: "I enlisted as a foot soldier in the Reagan revolution."

Announcer: "Guided by strong conservative principles, he'll cut wasteful spending and keep taxes low. A proud social conservative who will never waver. The leadership and experience to call for the surge strategy in Iraq that is working. John McCain: The true conservative. Ready to be commander-in-chief on day one."

McCain's conservative street cred is backed up by his record in the Senate. Congressional Quarterly gave McCain a 90% score for "party unity," making him an even more reliable GOP water-carrier than fellow Arizonan John Kyl, the #2 ranking Republican in the Senate. The Washington Post similarly gave him a score of 88.3%, tying him with South Carolina's Lindsey Graham ahead of 29 other Senate Republicans.

Analyzing his Senate voting record since 1999, the Arizona Republic found that John McCain rarely strayed from the Republican Party line. As the Republic details, when the going got tough, McCain got in line. When it mattered most in the closest votes, Senator McCain since 1999 sided with his GOP colleagues. As it turns out, McCain "almost never thwarted his party's objectives." It is for good reason that Keith Poole, a political scientist at the University of California-San Diego, concluded:

"He is a conservative who votes conservative on most issues. By no means is he a liberal or even a moderate."

And it's no wonder that back on January 23, 2008, Charlie Black confidently predicted that movement conservatives would be firmly in the McCain fold once he secured the nomination:

"All these conservative leaders will be for him in two weeks when we lock up the nomination."

Just in case, Black insisted, President Bush is "a political asset" for McCain in his bid to reassure the Republican right. To be sure, McCain's embrace of virtually the entire Bush agenda helped. As his quest for the GOP nomination heated up, McCain veered hard to the right in an effort to appease his party's conservative base. As I noted last month, McCain changed positions on:

The Bush tax cuts, Jerry Falwell and the Christian right, immigration reform, overturning Roe v. Wade, whether Justice Samuel Alito is a model for the Supreme Court, and France-bashing, just to name a few.

But that was then, this is now. Given the staggering unpopularity of his party's platform and president, John McCain is now running away from both. John McCain needed to be a "true conservative" to win the Republican nomination. To win the White House, he now needs to be "slightly right of center." At least, that is, according to Charlie Black.

What do Mothers' Day and global warming have in common? Both, as it turns out, are essential ingredients in John McCain's "character" campaign for the White House. That is, given the staggering unpopularity of his party's platform and president, John McCain is now running away from both. From here on out, the McCain campaign will be about the character of the man.

And on Mothers' Day this Sunday, that includes a portrait of John McCain as the good son. Appearing in a Hallmark-style TV spot with his 96 year old mother Roberta, McCain will offer Americans a supposedly humanizing moment for the supposed "maverick." (There's another ancillary benefit: the lightheartedly saccharine piece will also provide the one opportunity for McCain to be filmed with someone older than himself.)

After proving the dutiful son, John McCain will continue his post-nomination run to the center with what the campaign is billing as a "global warming tour." Designed to create space between McCain and George W. Bush by highlighting the one substantive issue where they differ, the series of events is design to entrench the media mythical image of McCain the Maverick unafraid to buck his GOP and its current occupant of the White House.

As I've suggested previously, McCain's attempt to convert the 2008 race into a contest of character between himself and Democrat Barack Obama is critical to Republican hopes of retaining the White House. If the GOP has its way, McCain the war hero and Republican renegade will be pitted against the out-of touch, Jeremiah Wright-loving, lapel pin-avoiding, effete anti-American elitist Barack Obama. Given Americans' overwhelming preference for Democratic positions and priorities, the GOP simply cannot win a 2008 election decided on the issues.

And that's just the beginning of the problems for McCain and his Republican allies. Having adopted virtually the entire Bush agenda, John McCain must separate himself from the President if he's going to win this fall. A recent NBC/Wall Street Journal poll showed that 43% of Americans think John McCain is too closely aligned with President Bush. (As MSNBC's Chuck Todd noted, that makes George W. Bush - and not Jeremiah Wright - "the biggest political albatross heading into November.") Given that over 70% of Americans disapprove of President Bush and more than 80% believe the country is on the wrong track, it's no wonder Karl Rove, Lindsey Graham and the coordinated efforts of the McCain campaign and the White House are trying mightily to create the facade of distance between George W. Bush and his would-be successor.

So far, the McCain campaign is enjoying mixed results. A recent Rasmussen survey showed that Americans trust John McCain more than either Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton, even on issues like the economy where the candidate himself has professed his ignorance and voters violently disagree with him. But a subsequent poll released last week revealed that Americans by a 52% to 36% margin believe a presidential candidate's policy positions matter more than his or her character. (Unsurprisingly, Rasmussen found a sharp partisan divide on the question, with Republicans saying character counts most.)

Which is what the Mother's Day ad and the global warming tour are all about for the McCain campaign. Like John McCain's earlier "Biography Tour" and his so-called "Forgotten Places" events, Team McCain is trying to manufacture a kinder, gentler image of their candidate as a "different kind of Republican."

Of course,they have no choice. Because on the issues, John McCain is exactly the same kind of Republican as George W. Bush.

UPDATE: Echoing my language above, the Chicago Tribune describes how "McCain paints Obama's portrait." The Trib Swamp blog's take on McCain's upcoming character campaign?

"Day by day, week by week, McCain has been portraying Obama as inexperienced, self-entitled and effete, a candidate coddled by a loving press corps and lacking the judgment necessary for the highest office in the land."

Four days after Arianna Huffington first reported it, John McCain's 2000 VoteGate has become the election issue du jour. The New York Times, the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times have all run stories confirming Huffington's account that in 2000 a still steaming McCain did not vote for George W. Bush, the man who savaged him and his family during the Republican primaries. But as the fevered denials from his campaign show, the story of McCain's hate-love relationship with Bush is the tale of Mr. Straght Talk's tightrope walk from personal pride to political opportunism.

McCain's past hatred for George W. Bush is the stuff of legend. As Time reported in March 2000, McCain showed a visceral disgust towards Bush and his scorched earth campaign:

But many close McCain advisers think the personal rift between the two men is too wide to bridge, at least in the near term. After all, the last time Bush tried to smooth things over-at a South Carolina debate in early February-the result was less than promising. During a commercial break, Bush grasped McCain's hands and made a sugary plea for less acrimony in their campaign. When McCain pointed out that Bush's allies were savaging him in direct-mail and phone campaigns, Bush played the innocent. "Don't give me that shit," McCain growled, pulling away. "And take your hands off me."

John McCain could certainly be forgiven for his anger, given the painful memories of character assassination, smears and lies the Bush camp dished out during the 2000 campaign. After McCain's upset win in the New Hampshire primary, Bush operatives during the critical South Carolina contest phoned voters with push polls implying McCain was anti-Catholic, his wife Cindy a drug addict, and that he had fathered an illegitimate black child with a prostitute. (In reality, the McCains had adopted a baby from an orphanage in Bangladesh.) McCain even received an early version of the Swift Boat treatment, with allegations that his Vietnam War captivity in Hanoi left him mentally unstable. All of these slurs came as candidate Bush chastised McCain that he couldn't "take the high horse and then claim the low road." It's no wonder he angrily rejected Bush's feigned attempt in 2000 to bury the hatchet.

But by 2004, John McCain was looking towards his next White House run - and life after Bush. McCain's presidential ambitions let him forgive sins past in order to rebuild relations with Bush and the Republican establishment. McCain's long road back began during election 2004. McCain not only stumped for George W. Bush, but joined the chorus of the Swift Boat hacks by stating that "what John Kerry did after the war is very legitimate political discussion." (Only the previous month, McCain himself called the attacks on Kerry "dishonest and dishonorable.") Dana Perino was exaggerating only slightly when she claimed today that "in 2000 and 2004, Senator McCain went on to work his tail off to help this president."

From there, the selling of John McCain's soul proceeded quickly and his Faustian bargain began to pay dividends. At the Southern Leadership Conference in March 2006, McCain McCain asked the delegates to throw their support to President Bush. McCain used the venue to offer a full-throated support of President Bush and his Iraq policy, proclaiming "We elected him, we need him, he needs to do well and the country needs him." McCain turned his vitriol towards the President's critics, claiming that anyone who said Bush lied about WMD in Iraq "was lying." By mid-2006, McCain had secured the backing of much of the Bush financial machine.

The rest, as they say, is history. With the GOP nomination still hanging in the balance, John McCain in February proclaimed, "I would be proud to have President Bush campaign with me and support me in any way that he feels is appropriate. And I would appreciate it." Having adopted virtually the entire Bush agenda in his 2008 run (including an acrobatic flip-flop on making the Bush tax cuts permanent), John McCain in March warmly accepted Bush's Rose Garden endorsement as coming from" a man who I have a great admiration, respect and affection" for.

But with the Republican nomination secured, McCain began the great walk back from George Walker Bush and his record-setting disapproval numbers. On April 1, 2008, McCain laughably claimed, "I'm not running on the Bush presidency." And during his so-called "Forgotten Places" tour, McCain lambasted Bush's response to Hurricane Katrina. (That show of disgust was merely that - a show. As it turns out, his campaign staff is closely coordinating with the White House to create the facade of separation between John McCain and George W. Bush.)

As the general election approaches, the Arizona Senator has completed his fawning courtship of George W. Bush. But in suppressing his burning hatred for Bush in the name of his no-holds barred pursuit of the White House, John McCain may yet pay a price with the American people. As the New Republic's Michael Crowley suggested last August, John McCain is about to learn "you can't un-sell out."

After all, John McCain isn't merely fabulously well off, courtesy of his wife Cindy's $100 million beer distribution fortune. At almost every turn, the Republican presidential nominee has shown almost a total ignorance of - or yawning disinterest in - the real lives of American voters. From the growing financial hardships of the economic slowdown and the foreclosure crisis to the disintegrating American health care system and the dangers U.S. troops face on the streets on Baghdad, it is John McCain who is truly "out of touch." Yet voters and pundits alike agree that the supposed maverick is treated with kid gloves by the press, an elitist masquerading as a man of the people.

Here, then, are John McCain's Top 10 "Out-of-Touch" Moments:

1. Economic downturn is "psychological." Having on multiple occasions admitted his limited understanding of the economy, Senator McCain instead turned armchair psychologist to diagnose the U.S economic slowdown. In April, McCain told Fox News' Neil Cavuto that "a lot of our problems today, as you know, are psychological." Apparently, four months of job losses, oil at $120 a barrel, record gas prices at the pump, 47 million uninsured and a devastating home foreclosure crisis are merely a figment of Americans' imaginations.

2. "Great progress economically" during the Bush years. If Americans' financial woes are all in their heads, John McCain's assessment of George W. Bush's economic leadership is pure hallucination. Asked by Bloomberg's Peter Cook on April 17 if Americans would say they are better off today "than before George Bush took office more than seven years ago," McCain replied:

"I think if you look at the overall record and millions of jobs have been created, et cetera, et cetera, you could make an argument that there's been great progress economically over that period of time."

Mugged by reality, McCain's firm response to the classic Ronald Reagan question ("are you better off now?") lasted exactly 24 hours. The next day on April 18, the so-called maverick acknowledged Americans are "hurting badly" and concluded, "Americans are not better off than they were eight years ago."

3. eBay is the answer for poverty and recession. During his so-called "Forgotten Places" tour last month, John McCain offered the people of the economically devastated regions in Martin County, Kentucky and Youngstown, Ohio a path out of financial desperation: eBay. "Today, for example," McCain said, "1.3 million people in the world make a living off eBay, most of those are in the United State of America." If that sounds like something McCain's national campaign co-chair and former eBay CEO Meg Whitman might say, it's because she did. In March, she told Lesley Stahl on 60 Minutes, "We have about - around the world, about 1.3 million people make most, if not all, of their living selling on eBay." (It should come as no surprise that President Bush, too, extolled the virtues of Americans' economic futures as sellers on eBay.)

4. "Tear down" New Orleans? McCain kicked off his tour in New Orleans, where he lambasted George W. Bush's handling of the Katrina disaster. (As it turns out, McCain's criticism was choreographed with the White House as part of a coordinated effort to create the facade of distance between McCain and President Bush.) There, McCain would not commit to the future of the city's devastated 9th ward:

"That's why we need to go back to have a conversation about what to do about it. Rebuild it? Tear it down? Ya know, whatever it is."

Just three days later, McCain claimed selective amnesia about his New Orleans comments, saying, "I don’t remember ever saying it." Perhaps John McCain remembers celebrating his 69th birthday with President Bush on August 29, 2005, just as Hurricane Katrina slammed ashore.

5. Irresponsible, undeserving homeowners. In his widely panned March 25th address on the economy, John McCain essentially blamed American homeowners teetering on the brink of foreclosure for their plight, insisting "any assistance must be temporary and must not reward people who were irresponsible at the expense of those who weren't." Facing a backlash, McCain just two weeks later on April 11 rolled out new proposals, claiming his "priority number one is to keep well meaning, deserving home owners who are facing foreclosure in their homes." As the New York Times concluded:

In both tone and substance, Mr. McCain's remarks were something of a departure from a speech the senator delivered last month in California in which he warned that "it is not the duty of government to bail out and reward those who act irresponsibly, whether they are big banks or small borrowers."

6. Work a second job, skip a vacation. In that same March 25, 2008 speech, the Republican nominee made it clear that selling Barbie dolls or Hummel figurines on eBay isn't John McCain's only prescription for Americans facing economic difficulties. The other? Just work harder. McCain encouraged Americans to emulate the 51 million homeowners "doing what is necessary -- working a second job, skipping a vacation, and managing their budgets -- to make their payments on time."

7. "Protect the privacy" of Cindy McCain's tax returns. Asking cash-strapped, over-worked Americans to labor harder is easy to say for John McCain. After all, his beer heiress second wife Cindy has a fortune estimated at $100 million, more than enough to provide the candidate with private jets and still fund the McCain's 8 homes and the charitable contributions funneled to the elite private schools attended by their children.

But asking John McCain to release his wife's tax return is another matter. His campaign claims, "Cindy McCain will not release her tax returns to protect the privacy of her four children; details of their wealth are included in her filing." Of course, in 2004, then RNC chairman and current Bush counselor Ed Gillespie insisted that the content of Theresa Heinz Kerry's tax filings was "a legitimate question." By a whopping 64% to 22% margin, Americans believe that John McCain should make public his wife's tax information.

8. Opposed to SCHIP expansion, McCain speaks at children's hospital. Last October, John McCain joined George W. Bush in opposing the expansion of the State Children's Health Insurance Program (S-CHIP), calling Bush's veto a "right call by the president." Of course, that didn't stop McCain from rolling out his health care proposals last week at Miami Children's Hospital, a Florida medical institution which last fall publicly supported the S-CHIP expansion he opposed. In a further irony, while McCain decried "new mandates and government regulation," 9 year-old Jake Bernard who was spotlighted at the event received treatment for his cleft palate thanks to a statute passed by the state of Florida. So much for McCain's pledge to "work to eliminate the worries over the availability and cost of health care."

9. Baghdad safer than some American neighborhoods. John McCain's isn't merely out of touch when it comes to Americans' real lives at home. He is consistently nonchalant about the dangers – and casualties – U.S. troops face in Iraq.

Wearing a bulletproof vest and guarded by "100 American soldiers, with three Blackhawk helicopters, and two Apache gunships overhead," McCain on April Fool's Day 2007 briefly toured a Baghdad market to demonstrate that the American people were "not getting the full picture."

McCain recently claimed that there "are neighborhoods in Baghdad where you and I could walk through those neighborhoods, today." In a press conference after his Baghdad tour, McCain told a reporter that his visit to the market today was proof that you could indeed "walk freely" in some areas of Baghdad.

In March 2008, Senator McCain returned to a tried and untrue Republican talking point: Iraq is no more dangerous than most major American cities. McCain announced, "There's problems in America with safe neighborhoods as we well know." In this case, at least, even McCain realized his statement was nonsensical on its face and sounded the retreat. "I'm not making that comparison, because it's much more deadly in Iraq obviously," he said, adding, "But it's kind of the same theory." Apparently, McCain's theory applies whether the United States maintains a permanent military presence in Iraq for 100, 1000 or even a million years.

10. "I'm not running on the Bush presidency." On April 1, 2008, John McCain offered Americans another April Fool's joke, proclaiming "I'm not running on the Bush presidency." McCain might want to check his campaign's position papers. After all, in his eternal quest for the Republican nomination, McCain has adopted virtually the entire Bush agenda, often reversing long held positions and compromising supposed core principles. From Iraq, tax cuts for the wealthy, broken promises on the deficit to opposition to SCHIP, tax credits for health care, overturning Roe v. Wade and a right-wing Supreme Court, John McCain represents a third Bush term. It's no wonder Mr. Straight Talk said in February:

"I would be proud to have President Bush campaign with me and support me in any way that he feels is appropriate. And I would appreciate it."

So would we.

(Note: I originally posted this piece at Crooks and Liars.)

Today, John McCain's wife Cindy declared she would never release her tax returns. Unfortunately, the McCains are bucking the tide of public opinion regarding her income and $100 million fortune. The American people by lopsided margins overwhelmingly believe presidential candidates should disclose their tax returns. And as they showed four years ago in the imbroglio over Theresa Heinz Kerry, the leading lights of the Republican Party and the conservative movement used to agree.

The polling data is clear. Last week, a Rasmussen survey reported that "sixty-four percent (64%) believe that Presidential candidates and their spouses should be required to release their tax returns," with only 22% supporting secrecy.

Virtually the entire Republican brain trust and its amen corner in the media agree. Or at least they did four years ago, when the subject was Democrat Theresa Heinz Kerry and her vast fortune. Despite eventually releasing a two-page summary of her 2003 income, the Kerrys were pilloried by the same conservative machine that is silent now.

Ed Gillespie, then Republican National Committee Chairman and current counselor to President Bush, is a case in point. As the New York Times reported:

Ed Gillespie, chairman of the Republican Party, said Mrs. Heinz Kerry's finances were relevant to the campaign, especially because Mr. Kerry borrowed $6 million against the equity in a Boston town house they jointly own to keep his campaign afloat earlier in the year.

''It seems to me that that's a legitimate question,'' Mr. Gillespie said.

The right-wing National Review, too, deployed its attack dogs in force. Editor Andrew Stuttaford was unsatisfied with the Kerrys' limited disclosure:

"Could it be, who knows, that Teresa was a little stingy last year, or could it be, perhaps, that she gave to some charities that might prove a little embarrassing in an election year?

Baseless innuendo? Very possibly. But there's an easy way to show that these suggestions are completely unfair. Disclose the full form, Teresa. Privacy? Oh, come off it. How can disclosure of any part of Mrs. Kerry's personal 1040 relate to her children, all of whom are now in their thirties?"

Meanwhile, NRO's Donald Luskin declared Mrs. Kerry "filthy rich" and asked "Mrs. Kerry is filthy rich. Why is her taxable income so small?" Suspecting something fishy in Mrs. Kerry's "miniscule" $5million in income on an estate estimated to top at least $1 billion, Luskin insisted:

"Voters of both parties should demand immediate and full disclosure of Teresa Heinz Kerry's holdings and tax returns. There is ample precedent: In 1984 the husband of Democratic vice presidential candidate Geraldine Ferraro made his tax returns public in response to pressure from voters. Today the stakes are greater in every way. Mrs. Kerry's disclosure should be no less."

Earlier that year, Matthew Continetti penned a Weekly Standard piece, titled "Kerry's Wife: Above Suspicion?" in which he demanded to know "why won't Theresa Heinz Kerry release her tax returns? Inquiring minds like Continetti's wanted to know more about their theory of Theresa as Sugar Mommy:

"Making Heinz's tax returns public would confirm that she's Kerry's sugar daddy (sugar mommy?). It would also strike a blow against Kerry's populist rhetoric by detailing the lavish lifestyle he and his wife enjoy: the vacation home in Nantucket, the ski chalet in Ketchum, Idaho, the estate outside Pittsburgh, the Georgetown manse. Not to mention the red-and-white Gulfstream jet. And the tax returns could embarrass the Kerry campaign further if it's revealed that Heinz has contributed to independent organizations working to unseat President Bush."

Fast forward four years. Today's GOP and its allies among the conservative chattering classes have no intention of pressing Cindy and John McCain for details about her massive financial assets which fueled both their lavish lifestyles and his political career.

The same factors that drove Republicans to fury over Mrs. Kerry - riches, a foundation, a private jet, a stable of elegant homes - produce silence when it comes to Mrs. McCain. After all, John McCain's beer heiress second wife has a fortune estimated at $100 million, more than enough to provide the candidate with private jets and still fund the McCain's 8 homes and the charitable contributions funneled to the elite private schools attended by their children.

Back in 2004, Theresa Heinz Kerry argued, "What I have and what I receive is not just mine, it is also my children's, and I don't know that I have the right to make public what is theirs." In almost identical language the McCain campaign now argues, "Cindy McCain will not release her tax returns to protect the privacy of her four children; details of their wealth are included in her filing." And today, Cindy McCain herself claimed, "This is a privacy issue."

Meanwhile in the right-wing media, there is only the sound of silence.

On Wednesday, John McCain's home state Arizona Republic did some good excavation work in the ongoing demolition of the GOP nominee's maverick myth. Analyzing his Senate voting record since 1999, the paper found McCain rarely strayed from the Republican Party line. But that's only a small part of the unraveling of the McCain maverick fable. As I previously detailed, John McCain in his eternal quest for the GOP nomination has repeatedly reversed long-held positions and compromised core principles to curry favor with right-wing Republican primary voters.

As the Republic details, when the going got tough, McCain got in line. When it mattered most in the closest votes, Senator McCain since 1999 sided with his GOP colleagues. As it turns out, McCain "almost never thwarted his party's objectives":

The presumptive Republican nominee arguably cast the decisive vote 14 times since 1999 to ensure Republicans got their way, and he had five other close cases where his vote may have made a difference, Senate records show. By comparison, McCain effectively handed Democrats a win on roll-call votes four times in the same period. On one of those occasions, Republicans could still have won if Vice President Dick Cheney had cast a tie-breaking vote.

That voting record is just another feather in John McCain's conservative cap. Congressional Quarterly gave McCain a 90% score for "party unity," making him an even more reliable GOP water-carrier than fellow Arizonan John Kyl, the #2 ranking Republican in the Senate. The Washington Post similarly gave him a score of 88.3%, tying him with South Carolina's Lindsey Graham ahead of 29 other Senate Republicans. It is for good reason that Keith Poole, a political scientist at the University of California-San Diego, concluded:

"He is a conservative who votes conservative on most issues. By no means is he a liberal or even a moderate."

The Arizona Republic also unearthed more evidence for McCain's iron law of right-wing pandering. That is, McCain's closeness to the GOP party line is directly proportional to the proximity of Republican presidential primaries:

During the 10 years The Republic examined, McCain crossed over to vote with Democrats 19 times in 82 close votes. He did so just once in the four years he was running for president: 1999, 2000, 2007 and 2008. All 12 of the close votes he missed happened in those years, too.

Even so, in 59 of the 82 close votes, Republicans got what they wanted regardless of McCain's position. In those 59 cases, McCain broke with his party 16 times.

But what the Republic's analysis didn't address is John McCain's litany of gymnastic contortions and just-in-time flip-flops during his run for the Republican nomination. As his quest for the GOP nomination heated up, McCain veered hard to the right in an effort to appease his party's conservative base. As I noted last month, McCain changed positions on:

The Bush tax cuts, Jerry Falwell and the Christian right, immigration reform, overturning Roe v. Wade, whether Justice Samuel Alito is a model for the Supreme Court, and France-bashing, just to name a few.

The Arizona Republic piece is a hopeful sign that perhaps, at long last, the American media will reconsider the crown of maverick wrongly placed on John McCain's head. (The story comes just a day after MSNBC's Tim Russert agreed with a recent New York Times survey showing that Americans believe the press has been too easy on McCain.) Perhaps the untold story of campaign 2008 - John McCain's transformation from maverick to political prostitute - will now be told.

Speaking at Wake Forest University today, Republican presidential nominee John McCain reassured his party's conservative base that he has adopted George W. Bush's judicial philosophy hook, line and sinker. The same John McCain who once expressed doubts about judges in the mold of Samuel Alito today extolled him as a model for the Supreme Court, all the while chanting the right-wing battle cry against so-called judicial activism.

Given his past flip-flop on Roe v. Wade (he now supports overturning the decision after stating in 1999 that "I would not support repeal of Roe v. Wade"), it's no surprise McCain's address completely omitted any mention of Roe or abortion. But John McCain's hard right turn extends well beyond reproductive rights. Throughout the 2008 campaign, he has gone to great lengths to calm conservatives that President McCain would put their kind of people on the Supreme Court.

Today was no exception. Decrying "abuses by the courts" which "fall under the heading of "judicial activism," McCain echoed hard line conservatives from Justice Sunday events past:

"For decades now, some federal judges have taken it upon themselves to pronounce and rule on matters that were never intended to be heard in courts or decided by judges."

The answer, McCain insisted, was for more judges along the lines of John Roberts and Samuel Alito, President Bush's two appointees each opposed by Democrats Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton:

"I have my own standards of judicial ability, experience, philosophy, and temperament. And Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito meet those standards in every respect. They would serve as the model for my own nominees if that responsibility falls to me."

Of course, John McCain hasn't always felt this way. But as in so many areas, the supposed maverick had a conversion on the way to the Republican nomination.

During the 2005 "up or down vote" controversy over Bush judicial nominations, McCain earned the wrath of conservatives for his membership in the so-called Gang of 14. McCain, after all, was one of the leaders of the bipartisan group of 14 Senators seeking a middle ground between the Democrats' filibuster threats and Majority Leader Bill Frist's nuclear option.

(It is worth noting that some on the right, such as the National Review's Adam White and Kevin White, now laud McCain precisely because he protected the ability of Republicans to filibuster future Democratic judicial nominations. "When that moment arrives," they wrote, "conservatives will call on the Republican minority to utilize every tool in the Senate minority playbook to thwart those nominations--especially the filibuster.")

Still, McCain's greater act of apostasy came on the types of judges he himself would support on the Supreme Court bench. Earlier this year, McCain faced a firestorm of right-wing criticism when John Fund, writing in the Wall Street Journal, claimed McCain was opposed to the nomination of a hardline conservative like Justice Samuel Alito:

More recently, Mr. McCain has told conservatives he would be happy to appoint the likes of Chief Justice John Roberts to the Supreme Court. But he indicated he might draw the line on a Samuel Alito, because "he wore his conservatism on his sleeve."

In a fiery January 2008 column titled, "Is McCain a Conservative?" Robert Novak backed up Fund's account:

"Wouldn't it be great if you get a chance to name somebody like Roberts and Alito?" one lawyer commented. McCain replied, "Well, certainly Roberts." Jaws were described as dropping. My sources cannot remember exactly what McCain said next, but their recollection is that he described Alito as too conservative.

Aware of the consequences with the conservative movement, McCain was quick to proclaim his fealty to their far-right judicial ideals. As he told the National Review's Byron York:

"Let me just look you in the eye," McCain told me. "I've said a thousand times on this campaign trail, I've said as often as I can, that I want to find clones of Alito and Roberts. I worked as hard as anybody to get them confirmed. I look you in the eye and tell you I've said a thousand times that I wanted Alito and Roberts. I have told anybody who will listen. I flat-out tell you I will have people as close to Roberts and Alito [as possible], and I am proud of my record of working to get them confirmed, and people who worked to get them confirmed will tell you how hard I worked."

So in North Carolina today, Mr. Straight Talk in essence gave Americans a chance to meet the McCain Supreme Court. Same as the Bush Court.

Mrs. Bush's prepared remarks and responses to reporters' questions showed why the White House concluded that the safest course for President Bush was to stay away. Had she issued these statements in September 2005, observers would have assumed the First Lady was criticizing her husband:

"It's troubling that many of the Burmese people learned of this impending disaster only when foreign outlets -- such as Radio Free Asia and Voice of America -- sounded the alarm. Although they were aware of the threat, Burma's state-run media failed to issue a timely warning to citizens in the storm's path.

The response to the cyclone is just the most recent example of the junta's failure to meet its people's basic needs."

This exchange about the Burmese government's response - and responsibility - for the staggering cyclone death toll of 22,000 is particularly telling:

Q: Why do you think that the government didn't allow the state-run media to post those warnings?

MRS. BUSH: I don't know. I have no idea.

Q: Quick follow on that. Do you think that they have blood on their hands for that lack of warning?

MRS. BUSH: Well, I just think it's very, very important -- that we know already that they are very inept; that they have not been able to govern in a way that lets their company -- country, for one thing, build an economy. This is a country that's rich in natural resources. Their natural resources are being depleted as they sell them off, as far as we can tell from the outside, for the financial benefit of the regime itself and not for the good of the people. We know that.

Of course, the parallels between the Bush and Burmese preparation for and responses to Hurricane Katrina and Cyclone Nargis aren't perfect. On August 28, 2005, New Orleans Mayor Ray Hagin issued a mandatory evacuation order for his city. That afternoon, the National Weather Service published a dire advisory for the category 4 to 5 storm, warning "most of the area will be uninhabitable for weeks, perhaps longer" and "at least one-half of well-constructed homes will have roof and wall failure," while concluding "water shortages will make human suffering incredible by modern standards."

President Bush knew all of this. Video footage of a briefing Bush received the day before Katrina hit revealed that the President was warned that "that the storm could breach levees, put lives at risk in New Orleans' Superdome and overwhelm rescuers." As CBS News reported:

Bush didn't ask a single question during the final briefing before Katrina struck on Aug. 29, but he assured soon-to-be-battered state officials: "We are fully prepared."

Four days later on September 1, 2005, George W. Bush issued the statement that defined his administration historic bungling of Hurricane Katrina:

"I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees."

At Monday's press conference, no reporter asked the First Lady why her husband wasn't there himself to address the Burmese crisis. (There were, however, several probing questions about her daughter Jenna's wedding in Texas this weekend.) This is as close as the American media got to inquiring about the President Bush's glaring absence:

Q: Mrs. Bush, why such an historic interest? This is a first, for a First Lady to come to this podium and talk about a cyclone. Why such a historic interest?

MRS. BUSH: Well, you know I've been interested in Burma for a long time. It started really with an interest in Aung San Suu Kyi and reading her works and just the story of a Nobel Prize winner who's been under house arrest for so long,

It's true that Mrs. Bush has emerged as something of a spokesperson for the White House when it comes to the causes of human rights and democracy in Myanmar. But that's not why she was at the podium on Monday. The day before George W. Bush was to award Aung San Suu Kyi the Congressional Gold Medal for her courage, he was too cowardly to face the media and relive his own historic failure over another horrific storm three years ago.

Challenge accepted.

As it turns out, John McCain in his eternal quest for the Republican presidential nomination has adopted virtually the entire Bush agenda. In so doing, the supposed "maverick" McCain has repeatedly reversed long-held positions, compromised core principles and swallowed his pride in order to curry favor with both the leading lights of the conservative movement and right-wing Republican primary voters. No doubt, Americans are right to view a John McCain victory in November as a third term for George W. Bush.

Permanent American presence in Iraq. Of course, McCain's perpetuation of a third Bush term starts with Iraq, but hardly ends there. Both have argued for an extended U.S. military presence, which in McCain's telling could last 100, 1000 or even a million years. At a January 2008 town hall meeting, McCain showed his commitment to upping Bush's ante in Iraq:

Q: President Bush has talked about our staying in Iraq for 50 years - (cut off by McCain)

McCAIN: Make it a hundred.

Making the Bush tax cuts permanent. No area of policy foreign or domestic reveals John McCain's transformation in the second coming of George W. Bush than in his gymnastic flip-flop on the Bush tax cuts. Despite twice voting against Bush's tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans who need them least ("I cannot in good conscience support a tax cut in which so many of the benefits go to the most fortunate among us at the expense of middle-class Americans who need tax relief"), McCain now wants to make them permanent. Worse still, an analysis by the Center for American Progress shows the McCain tax plan wouldn't merely blow a $2 trillion hole in the U.S. budget; it is even more regressive than his predecessor's.

Broken promises on the deficit. Like George W. Bush, John McCain has been quick to abandon his promises to slash the federal budget deficit. On track to produce a $400 billion deficit this year, President Bush has stopped talking about his bogus 2004 pledge to halve the deficit by 2009. Self-proclaimed "deficit hawk" John McCain likewise has already given up on his February 2008 promise to offer a balanced budget by the end of his first term. It's no wonder Douglas Holtz Eakin, McCain's top economic adviser, declared in April, "I would like the next president not to talk about deficit reduction."

Health care redux. Last week, McCain unveiled what is essence a warmed version of the Bush health care plan, one which was dead on arrival. As the Miami Herald noted, both put health insurance tax credits at the center, "Bush proposed tax credits of up to $3,000, but they were never enacted. McCain has upped the ante to $5,000." Like Bush, McCain would end the employer health care deduction. And like President Bush, John McCain would leave most of America's 47 million uninsured without coverage and those with pre-existing conditions in jeopardy.

Opposed the expansion of S-CHIP. President Bush vetoed the expansion of the effective - and wildly popular - State Children's Health Insurance Program (S-CHIP). And John McCain was with him, calling the veto a "right call by the president." Of course, that didn't stop McCain from making an appearance at a Florida children's hospital last week, a hospital that happened to support the S-CHIP expansion he opposed.

Social Security privatization. Social security privatization may rank among President Bush's greatest failures, but that hasn't stopped John McCain from adopting it as his own. In March, McCain confirmed for the Wall Street Journal that "As part of Social Security reform, I believe that private savings accounts are a part of it - along the lines that President Bush proposed."

Conservative Supreme Court Justices. Desperate to quell an insurrection among the GOP's hard right, John McCain made it clear he would follow George W. Bush's lead on appointing only the most conservative judges to the Supreme Court. Having previously expressed misgivings about Samuel Alito, McCain in January 2008 told the National Review's Byron York:

"Let me just look you in the eye. I've said a thousand times on this campaign trail, I've said as often as I can, that I want to find clones of Alito and Roberts."

Overturning Roe v. Wade. McCain also removed any ambiguity about his preferred future of Roe v. Wade. Having declared in 1999 that "I would not support repeal of Roe v. Wade," John McCain by November 2006 told ABC's George Stephanopolous that he joined President Bush both in wanting Roe overturned and in backing a constitutional amendment banning abortion.

These and countless other examples demonstrate that, to paraphrase Lindsy Graham, John McCain has made himself George W. Bush.

Which is a huge problem for McCain and his Republican allies. A recent NBC/Wall Street Journal poll showed that 43% of Americans think John McCain is too closely aligned with President Bush. (As MSNBC's Chuck Todd noted, that makes George W. Bush - and not Jeremiah Wright - "the biggest political albatross heading into November.") Given that over 70% of Americans disapprove of President Bush and more than 80% believe the country is on the wrong track, it's no wonder Karl Rove, Lindsey Graham and the coordinated efforts of the McCain campaign and the White House are trying mightily to create the facade of distance between George W. Bush and his would-be successor.

Let's make sure they don't get away with it. Take the Lindsey Graham's McCain challenge ("Good luck making him George Bush") today.

UPDATE: In the latest example of McCain's transformation, Arianna Huffington asserts - and the McCain camp denies - that John McCain told her "I didn't vote for George Bush" in 2000. Presumably, McCan will also deny rejecting George W. Bush's embrace during a 2000 South Carolina debate, telling his future mentor, "Don't give me that shit. And take your hands off me."

From the outset of the Iraq war, Republican leaders and their amen corner in the right-wing media have sought to calm squeamish Americans by favorably comparing the violence there to life in U.S. cities. Now, John March, a developer planning (believe it or not) a "Disneyland-style" theme park in Baghdad, says the carnage in the Iraqi capital is no different than the "drive-bys" in Southern California. But while grotesque, the analogy is not novel: it has already been repeatedly deployed by the GOP's best and brightest, including presidential nominee John McCain.

As ThinkProgress reported this morning, March's company Ride and Show Engineering is hoping to build the "Baghdad Zoo and Entertainment Experience." Fast-tracked by the Pentagon, the amusement park would be a showpiece of a $1 billion "zone of influence" designed as a buffer around the new $700 million U.S. embassy.

Downplaying the risks of being gunned down while waiting in line for the Tilt-a-Whirl or running over an IED while driving a bumper car, RSE's March declared:

"Well, you live here in Southern California and there's drive-bys and everything else. So there's danger everywhere, and I think the key thing is this will be tremendous for Baghdad."

If it seems like contractor John March sounds like an anchor for Fox News, that's because he does. Back on August 26, 2003, Fox's Brit Hume reassured his viewers that liberal California was a much more dangerous place for Americans than occupied Iraq:

"Two hundred and seventy seven U.S. soldiers have now died in Iraq, which means that, statistically speaking, U.S. soldiers have less of a chance of dying from all causes in Iraq than citizens have of being murdered in California...which is roughly the same geographical size. The most recent statistics indicate California has more than 2,300 homicides each year, which means about 6.6 murders each day. Meanwhile, U.S. troops have been in Iraq for 160 days, which means they are incurring about 1.7, including illness and accidents, each day."

In Hume's defense, he was only parroting the line of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, for whom Baghdad in June 2003 was a cake-walk compared to Washington, DC:

"You got to remember that if Washington, D.C., were the size of Baghdad, we would be having something like 215 murders a month. There's going to be violence in a big city."

It wasn't just the Bush administration extolling the allure of a Baghdad safe haven for America's urban dwellers. The President Republican allies in Congress, too, began chanting the mantra.

For example, on February 9, 2006, Rep. Peter King (R-NY) told an audience of constituents that Baghdad was much like the Big Apple:

"As we go through the city of Baghdad, it was like being in Manhattan. I mean, I'm talking about bumper to bumper traffic, talking about shopping centers, talking about restaurants, talking about video stores, talking about guys selling (inaudible) on the street corner, talking about major hotels.

And so, at that moment, people must be (inaudible) resilient and you would never know that there was a war going on."

In May 2006, it was Iowa Republican Steve King who took up the charge. Appearing on Westwood One radio with reliable right-wing water carrier Monica Crowley, King asked, "What really is the level of violence?" and wrongly concluded it was lower in Iraq than in Washington DC. Echoing King, the conservative blog Red State snarkily argued the next day that it was "time to pull out of Wisconsin":

"There were 28 shootings this past weekend in Milwaukee. After 175 years of occupation, we are seemingly unable to extract ourselves from the quagmire that apparently is Wisconsin. I say it is time America cut its losses and pulled out of Wisconsin NOW."

During an April 2007 visit to Iraq, Indiana Republican Mike Pence grew nostalgic, comparing Baghdad to his Hoosier home state:

"I told reporters afterward that it was just like any open-air market in Indiana in the summertime."

John McCain ally Lindsay Graham (R-SC) concurred with Pence's assessment. The Baghdad bizarre he visited under heavy U.S. guard was not only safe, but offered great bargains for the smart shopper:

"We went to the market and were just really warmly welcomed. I bought five rugs for five bucks."

(A year later, Graham persists in his view that the grass is greener in Iraq. On February 26, 2008, Senator Graham announced that, "The truth is that political reconciliation in Iraq is going better there than it is here at home because of better security.")

Then there's John McCain. McCain, too, praised the serenity of life in Iraq on that same April Fool's Day trip in 2007. Wearing a bulletproof vest and guarded by "100 American soldiers, with three Blackhawk helicopters, and two Apache gunships overhead," McCain briefly toured a Baghdad market to demonstrate that the American people were "not getting the full picture." As ThinkProgress detailed:

McCain recently claimed that there "are neighborhoods in Baghdad where you and I could walk through those neighborhoods, today." In a press conference after his Baghdad tour, McCain told a reporter that his visit to the market today was proof that you could indeed "walk freely" in some areas of Baghdad.

In March 2008, Senator McCain returned to a tried and untrue Republican talking point: Iraq is no more dangerous than most major American cities. McCain announced, "There's problems in America with safe neighborhoods as we well know." In this case, at least, even McCain realized his statement was non-sensical on its face and sounded the retreat. "I'm not making that comparison, because it's much more deadly in Iraq obviously," he said, adding, "But it's kind of the same theory."

John McCain's theory, similarly articulated by the would-be Baghdad theme park developer, is America should maintain a permanent presence there because that the Iraqi capital is no more dangerous than the typical large U.S. city. Hopefully, residents of California, Washington DC, New York, Indiana, Wisconsin and everywhere else in America will tell John McCain otherwise in November.

McCain has been making fun of his age - and telling the same joke - for years. At the November 30, 2006 event with Republican governors in Florida, McCain offered up his now standard septuagenarian punchline:

"I am older than dirt. More scars than Frankenstein."

When asked by Reader's Digest in February 2007 "how are you going to answer the question when people say, 'I just think he's too old?'" McCain trotted out his old reliable response:

"I think I would say that I'm older than dirt. That I have more scars than Frankenstein. That I've learned a few things along the way. Anyone who has accompanied me in the two months before the last election, or while I was hiking in the Grand Canyon or doing many of the things that I do regularly, can attest to the fact that I'm capable of keeping a very rigorous schedule."

The next month, USA Today featured McCain offering the same "older than dirt" rim shot. Then during a December 2007 MTV/MySpace event broadcast live, McCain stumbled and bumbled his way through the joke to a very forgiving youth audience:

"I'm older than Frankenstein. I gotta few scars. I'm older than dirt and I've got more scars than Frankenstein...Screwed up that line."

(The venerable joke appears about two and a half minutes into the video.)

While John McCain has apparently been granted a dispensation to ridicule his perpetual senior moment, the opposition has not been so fortunate. Just last week, DNC research director Mike Gehrke was reprimanded for repurposing online a Jay Leno quip:

"You know what you call someone who digs up dirt on John McCain? An archeologist."

Back in 1984, then 73-year old Ronald Reagan dispensed with the age question by standing it on its head. During a debate with Walter Mondale, Reagan joked, "I am not going to exploit for political purposes my opponent's youth and inexperience." But having already made himself the subject of the punchline, self-proclaimed Reagan foot soldier John McCain has guaranteed the issue of his age (50% of those surveyed in a 2007 Pew poll said they would be less likely to vote for a candidate in his 70's) won't go away.

Politico is reporting that President Bush's former homeland security adviser and current intelligence advisory board member Fran Townsend is joining CNN as a contributor. Joining former White House press secretary Tony Snow as the second Bush sycophant to join the network in the last two weeks, Townsend's addition is apparently designed to help make CNN the "right choice" during its election '08 coverage.

While George W. Bush may be most disliked President in modern American history, his one-time mouthpieces are very popular at CNN indeed. For a taste of the "fair and balanced" reporting to come, here's a look back at some of the greatest hits of Fran Townsend and Tony Snow.

Fran Townsend

"In 1937, the playwright Maxwell Anderson wrote of President George Washington: There are some men who lift the age they inhabit, til all men walk on higher ground in their lifetime. Mr. President, you are such a man."
Fran Townsend, in her resignation letter to President George W. Bush, November 19, 2007.

"So our interrogation program is tough - as it should be - but does not include torture, and the Department of Justice has determined that it fully complies with U.S. law and our international obligations."
Fran Townsend, October 10, 2007.

"So that when the President says that al Qaeda in Iraq are the same people who tried to kill us, it's al Qaeda writ large. The same al Qaeda that killed 3,000 Americans on Sept. 11."
Fran Townsend, July 18, 2007.

"I don't know - I wasn't at that briefing."
Fran Townsend, asked if Al Qaeda had no capabilities in Iraq before the war, July 18, 2007.

"Well, I'm not sure -- it's a success that hasn't occurred yet. I don't know that I view that as a failure."
Fran Townsend, responding to CNN's Ed Henry's assertion that President Bush's inability to capture Osama Bin Laden is "a failure," December 28, 2006.

Tony Snow

"You know, it's 130 degrees in Baghdad in August, I'll pass on your recommendation."
Tony Snow, asked if the administration tried to talk the Iraqi parliament out of taking off the month of August, July 13, 2007.

"I don't know if they're going to do a reprinting of the book to try to get the facts straight."
Tony Snow, on Al Gore's book correctly identifying President Bush's deceptions in the run-up to the war in Iraq, May 23, 2007.

"Trying to take advantage of a sick man. Because he had an appendectomy, his brain didn't work?"
Tony Snow, on James Comey's assertion that Alberto Gonzales tried to coerce John Ashcroft, then bed-ridden with a pancreatic condition following gall bladder surgery, May 16, 2007.

"What do you gain from a transcript?"
Tony Snow, on why Karl Rove and Harriet Miers should not testify under oath with transcripts, March 21, 2007.

"Zip it."
Tony Snow, to Ed Henry of CNN, March 19, 2007.

"Anything's possible, but I don't think so."
Tony Snow, on whether President Bush suggested U.S. attorney firings, March 16, 2007.

"At this juncture, people have hazy memories."
Tony Snow, March 16, 2007.

"Well, I don't know."
Tony Snow, asked whether Osama Bin Laden is the head of Al Qaeda, March 1, 2007.

"We didn't create the war in Iraq."
Tony Snow, March 1, 2007.

"It is interesting to me that it seems that some politicians maybe are trying to protect Iran."
Tony Snow, February 18, 2007.

"I'm not sure anything went wrong."
Tony Snow, asked what went wrong in Iraq, February 15, 2007.

"The Iranian people are more pro-American than any American university faculty."
Tony Snow, January 26, 2007.

"It's like looking in a drawer full of diamonds."
Tony Snow on President Bush's 2007 State of the Union address, January 22, 2007.

"I'm not playing the game anymore."
Tony Snow, asked whether the U.S. is winning in Iraq, December 18, 2006.

"What complaint do you have with a man who has been so successful?"
Tony Snow on UN Ambassador John Bolton, November 11, 2006.

"It's a silly question."
Tony Snow, asked whether President Bush had many any mistakes in handling the North Korea crisis, October 10, 2006.

"I hate to tell you, but it's not always pretty up there on Capitol Hill. And there have been other scandals, as you know, that have been more than simply naughty e-mails."
Tony Snow, on the Mark Foley scandal, October 2, 2006.

"It's not really a reversal of policy."
Tony Snow, on the Bush administration decision after the Hamdan ruling to apply Geneva Conventions to terrorist detainees, July 11, 2006.

"Because he wanted to."
Tony Snow, on why Transportation Secretary Norm Mineta resigned, June 23, 2006.

"I don't want to hug the tar baby of trying to comment on the program."
Tony Snow, May 16, 2006.

"It's a number."
Press Secretary Tony Snow, on President Bush's reaction to U.S. death count reaching 2,500 in Iraq, June 15, 2006.

"George Bush has become something of an embarrassment."
Tony Snow, Townhall.com column, November 11, 2005. (Note: Townhall.com removed Tony Snow's columns from its web site.)

UPDATE: Meanwhile, DNC chairman Howard Dean appeared on Fox News this morning and told Chris Wallace his network is "shockingly biased." Now all Dean needs is a term to describe CNN's infusion of loyal Bushies.

On the same screen where a young John McCain, recently freed from captivity in Vietnam, salutes smartly, Kevin Drum details McCain "shoveling the bullshit once again." Drum details McCain's contortionist act Friday, a failed attempt to extract himself from his claim that the Iraq War was in essence fought for oil:

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) clarified his comments Friday after suggesting the Iraq war was motivated by U.S. reliance on foreign oil. His explanation: He was talking about the 1991 Persian Gulf War, not the current conflict.

...."No, no, I was talking about that we had fought the Gulf War for several reasons," McCain told reporters.

Of course, this wasn't a helpful week for John McCain when it came to his pronouncements on Iraq. On Thursday, McCain marked the five year anniversary of President Bush's "Mission Accomplished" in Iraq by claiming, "I thought it was wrong at the time." Unfortunately, McCain's gambit was interrupted in the form of a June 2003 interview with Fox News' Neil Cavuto, in which McCain responded to Cavuto's assertion that "many argue the conflict isn't over" by firing back, "Well, then why was there a banner that said mission accomplished on the aircraft carrier?"

All in all, McCain's Iraq troubles this week were probably unavoidable, given his staunch commitment to a permanent American presence there and his unbroken reign of error about the war itself. But advertising on one of the most widely-read liberal blogs is one misstep the McCain camp could have spared itself. McCain idiocy watch, indeed.

(Note: The image above was slightly modified so that the McCain ad itself and Drum's "McCain Idiocy Watch" piece could be displayed in a single crseen shot. When I originally viewed it, the McCain ad started at about the half-way point of Drum's blog entry.)

John McCain's presidential campaign has apparently found help to battle its extreme case of Bush separation anxiety. Desperate to distance the Republican nominee from the most unpopular president in modern American history, the McCain camp is closely coordinating with the White House to create the facade of separation between John McCain and George W. Bush.

As ThinkProgress reported yesterday, senior McCain advisor and GOP lobbyist extraordinaire Charlie Black detailed a close working relationship with President Bush's staff. Acknowledging that George W Bush and John McCain "have an excellent relationship," Black at a lunch hosted the Christian Science Monitor:

"...was clear that Bush's White House team is helping the presumptive Republican nominee at every turn of the campaign.

Black said the White House got a 'head's up' earlier this week before McCain called out Bush for his poor handling of hurricane Katrina in 2005."

As the Politico and Reuters recently detailed, manufacturing the appearance of distance between President Bush and his would-be Republican successor is essential if John McCain is to have any hope of capturing the White House. Over 70% of Americans disapprove of President Bush, while more than 80% believe the country is on the wrong track. And with John McCain having adopted virtually the entire Bush agenda on everything from Iraq, tax cuts for the wealthy and health care to the Supreme Court, overturning Roe v. Wade and nurturing the religious right, Americans have good reason to view a McCain presidency as a third Bush term.

So, in fits and starts, the McCain and Bush camps helped start the "Great Walk Back" for the Arizona Senator.

On Thursday, for example, Senator McCain criticized President Bush's appearance five years earlier before a banner proclaiming "Mission Accomplished" in Iraq. McCain this week in Cleveland claimed, "I thought it was wrong at the time." (Unfortunately, McCain's gambit was interrupted in the form of a June 2003 interview with Fox News' Neil Cavuto, in which McCain responded to Cavuto's assertion that "many argue the conflict isn't over" by firing back, "Well, then why was there a banner that said mission accomplished on the aircraft carrier?")

The Bush administration's calamitous bungling of the response to Hurricane Katrina, too, provided McCain an opportunity to symbolically create some space with the current occupant of the Oval Office. At a stop on his recent "Forgotten Places" tour in New Orleans, McCain branded Bush's leadership "disgraceful" and doing his best Elie Wiesel impersonation, declared "never again." (Sadly, there too, McCain ran into trouble, and not merely because he publicly pondered what to "tear down" in New Orleans. As it turns out, as the city was being devastated by Katrina in 2005, John McCain was being feted on his 69th birthday - by President George W. Bush.)

And so it goes for John McCain. The same man who during a 2000 South Carolina debate rejected George W. Bush's embrace by angrily saying, "Don't give me that shit and take your hands off me" by March 2008 warmly accepted Bush's support by proclaiming the President " a man who I have a great admiration, respect and affection" for. And the same John McCain who said "I'm not running on the Bush presidency" doesn't merely now advocate Bush's policies foreign and domestic. Mr. Straight Talk