COLUMBIA, S.C., Jan. 17, 2008
McCain Fights Back Against Attacks In S.C.
Washington Post: Aides And Allies Say They Are Better Prepared Than They Were In 2000
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Play CBS Video Video Republicans Spar Before S.C. The South Carolina primary is infamous for being rough and tumble. The 2008 race is shaping up to be no different, and the leading GOP contenders are preparing for a tough fight. Nancy Cordes reports.
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Video Worst Advice: McCain In the CBS News special series "Primary Questions," Katie Couric asks Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., about the worst advice he's ever given and received.
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Video Republicans Fight For Lead GOP candidates fight for the lead in a race that doesn't yet have a foreseeable outcome. Romney says voters are choosy because the candidates are "all pretty good." Bill Whitaker reports.
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Republican presidential hopeful Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., speaks Tuesday night in Charleston, S.C. (AP)
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Photo Essay John McCain Some call him a hero, some a maverick. Will Americans call him Mr. President?
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News Tools Campaign Calendar The latest list of primary and caucus dates as states continue jockeying for position.
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As Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) campaigned in South Carolina yesterday, he confronted crudely produced fliers attacking his war record and a blitz of robotic phone calls twisting his position on abortion, attacks he said were reminiscent of the political kneecapping he endured in the state eight years ago.
A group calling itself Vietnam Veterans Against McCain circulated the leaflet accusing the presidential candidate of collaborating with the enemy during his years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam. Another group called Common Sense Issues, which has financial backing from supporters of rival GOP candidate Mike Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor, paid for 1 million automated telephone calls in South Carolina describing McCain as a proponent of medical tests on fetuses and amnesty for illegal immigrants.
"It's the same kind of appalling stuff that was done in spades in 2000," said Orson Swindle, 71, a Marine veteran who spent two years as a prisoner of war in a cell with McCain. "It's being done for an obvious reason. It's being done because last time it worked."
In 2000, after McCain won the New Hampshire primary, his effort to deny George W. Bush the GOP presidential nomination effectively ended in South Carolina. McCain came under withering attack in a state with a tradition of religious conservatism and hardball political tactics, with opponents using "push" polls and e-mails to spread falsehoods about both his legislative record and personal life.
As the fresh attacks began to land this week in advance of Saturday's GOP primary, McCain's campaign aides and allies said they are far better prepared this time. The campaign deployed a "truth squad" of high-profile supporters to try to bat down the attacks. At a rally in Greenville on Wednesday, McCain sought to assure voters that he is ardently opposed to abortion, which he has not previously highlighted in his speeches.
"I have a strong pro-life record running 24 years," McCain said, adding that "we know there are phone calls being made that I am pro-choice."
Richard Quinn, a South Carolina political consultant who worked for McCain in 2000 and is advising him again this year, said he is confident the campaign is prepared to deflect the attacks and noted that many in South Carolina political circles who backed Bush eight years ago are supporting McCain.
"I don't know how nasty it can get in three days, but I have confidence that if it does get bad, it will backfire," Quinn said. "It's a different environment. A different time."
While the McCain camp sent out e-mails immediately decrying the flier and the phone calls, his opponents questioned whether the senator's true intent was to bat down the attacks or if he is more interested in garnering sympathy and attention.
Warren Tompkins, a consultant to former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney who had worked on Bush's efforts in the state, said he was discussing McCain's vocal response to the attacks with other Romney supporters as they traveled with their candidate on a bus trip across South Carolina.
"None of us can understand their obsession with reliving the 2000 campaign," Tompkins said. "They need to let the ghosts and goblins go."
Tompkins also questioned how many people would have even seen the flier had McCain's campaign not drawn so much attention to it.
The author of the attack, a North Carolina political activist named Ted Sampley, said in an interview yesterday that he has long tormented McCain and also worked to discredit the war record of Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) during the 2004 presidential campaign. Sampley said he mailed the leaflet to 80 news outlets in South Carolina and was pleased with the coverage it received.
"We've had a long-running battle with John McCain and his fabricated heroism," Sampley said. "We attempted to get some discussion going by sending out a flier."
The executive director of the group responsible for the anti-McCain phone calls, Common Sense Issues, questioned why McCain is characterizing the phone drive as an attempt to engage in push polling, which typically involves the caller using the guise of a research survey to spread a negative message about a candidate. Patrick Davis said the 45-second calls use special technology that provides a different automated message, depending on how the recipient answers questions.
Moreover, Davis said: "A strict push poll is delivering not-truthful information. Everything we say is factual and backed up."
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Davis said the message about McCain's support for "research on the unborn" relates to his support for stem cell research. He said the amnesty message traces to bipartisan legislation McCain supported that would have provided a pathway to legal citizenship for most of the nation's estimated 12 million illegal immigrants without forcing them to return their home countries. McCain has disputed that the legislation represented amnesty.I don't know how nasty it can get in three days, but I have confidence that if it does get bad, it will backfire. It's a different environment. A different time.
McCain Adviser Richard QuinnThe group behind the calls operates as a nonprofit and is barred from coordinating its efforts with any campaign. They have spent more than $100,000 on the phone operation, hiring ccAdvertising, a Herndon-based research firm that has worked for anti-tax guru Grover G. Norquist, the National Rifle Association, National Right to Life and other conservative groups that have tussled with McCain.
South Carolina political veterans said the attacks are tame compared with the smears that have a rich tradition in the state, which produced Lee Atwater, the legendary operative who helped design the Willie Horton ad that savaged Michael S. Dukakis in the 1988 presidential campaign. Atwater expressed regret about his methods on his deathbed.
Quinn, the McCain adviser, said yesterday he will not let history repeat itself this year, or "let the process be poisoned by these shadowy attacks."
Tompkins scoffed at that notion of McCain as victim.
"There's a group around the senator that just can't let this thing go," Tompkins said.
Staff writer Alec MacGillis contributed to this report.
By Matthew Mosk
© 2008 The Washington Post Company
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Add a Comment See all 25 Comments
- The media have their faves and they are not fair and balanced at all! They don''''t show Romney any love for his wins!
McCain is a scum bag! Meet the real McTooOld on Wikipedia. He CHEATED on his first wife with his current trophy ice princess wife! Some morals, huh?
He brags about things that he can, as a man, not make a personal choice. He has never been in the position to have to consider an unplanned pregnancy. It''''''''s easy, again as a man, to say what he''''''''d do IF he had to make a choice, if he were a woman.
He DID have to make a choice on the moral issue of marriage. He chose to not honor his vows and he admitted to committing adultry several times.
How can true conservatives back him? Besides, will he live long enough to see a term? His mother looks better than he does.
He believes in giving illegals amnesty, so you better get to learnin'''' your espaniol!
He also has a great business background in the Keating Five! - Reply to this comment
- The media have their faves and they are not fair and balanced at all! They don''''t show Romney any love for his wins!
McCain is a scum bag! Meet the real McTooOld on Wikipedia. He CHEATED on his first wife with his current trophy ice princess wife! Some morals, huh?
He brags about things that he can, as a man, not make a personal choice. He has never been in the position to have to consider an unplanned pregnancy. It''''''''s easy, again as a man, to say what he''''''''d do IF he had to make a choice, if he were a woman.
He DID have to make a choice on the moral issue of marriage. He chose to not honor his vows and he admitted to committing adultry several times.
How can true conservatives back him? Besides, will he live long enough to see a term? His mother looks better than he does.
He believes in giving illegals amnesty, so you better get to learnin'''' your espaniol!
He also has a great business background in the Keating Five! - Reply to this comment
- McWaaaWaaa is a whining liar! When Bush tromped him in 2000 all he did was complain and wasn''t he leaving the republican party because of it? What happened there? He cries every time something doesn''t go his way.
He cheated on his first wife with his current ice princess trophy wife. Wake up, voters!
He also has no intention of securring the borders. He wants amnesty for all illegals that are able to get here! Is he really the best we''ve got? - Reply to this comment
- He was outside and now he''s inside? Inside-outside leave me alone...inside-outside no where is home! [THE WHO circa 1970]...McCain is a freakin'' Reptillian. [read: Dinosuar.]
- Reply to this comment
- These calls are an epidemic and are invading the privacy of All American Voters.
Our members are taking a stand and saying enough is enough at the National Political Do Not Contact Registry at StopPoliticalCalls.org.
Here is a quote from a member this morning:
"I find it very frustrating... I tend to get calls at the WORST time. I have a one year old daughter, and it NEVER fails that the phone will ring when I put her down for a nap or for bed. Also my vote is PRIVATE... so who do you think you are calling with a survey to find out who I am voting for!!! Stop calling me."
Regards,
Shaun Dakin
CEO and Founder
http://www.stoppoliticalcalls.org - Reply to this comment
- Who needs attack ads? It is enough simply to say that the Republican candidates are Republicans, and that the Republicans are protecting Bush and Cheney. They cannot deny that.
- Reply to this comment
- bdribus,
I don''t doubt that Huckabee has suffered unfair attacks but that''s not a rational for launching them.
All the candidates need to show leadership by reigning in their sleazy surrogates. The best way to determine which of these candidates(in both parties) is capable of leading the country in a more positive direction and bringing Americans together is to look at who is in control of their own campaign and is raising the level of discourse.
Preacher Huck needs to clean this up! - Reply to this comment
- My apologies, I thought this was another article.
McCain, along with Thompson are two of my secondary options. I prefer Hunter, but will consider McCain... - Reply to this comment
- Back DUNCAN HUNTER
- Reply to this comment
- Ridiculous. Huckabee is the one who has been suffering unfair attacks.
Posted by bdribus
HAHAHA huck is the ultimate brainwasher!!!!! - Reply to this comment
- "A group calling itself Vietnam Veterans Against McCain circulated the leaflet accusing the presidential candidate of collaborating with the enemy during his years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam."
The same group touted George Bushit''s and Darth Cheney''s war records. "These heros charged into battle with no thought for their own person safety. Bushit personally threw himself on 3 or 4 hand grenades, and Cheney took out a Vietcong machine gun nest singlehanded armed only with a double barrel shotgun. And Don Rumsfeld personally disarmed a rogue nuclear device that was hidden in the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in Rome." - Reply to this comment
- What a $hithole SC is--where is General Sherman now that we need him? He took particular delight in trashing South Carolina.
- Reply to this comment
McCain Fights Back Against Attacks In S.C.
McCain can fight back?
That''s a story in itself.- Reply to this comment
- Ridiculous. Huckabee is the one who has been suffering unfair attacks.
- Reply to this comment
- "What is the worst piece of advise you have ever given another person?" Katie
"The worst advise that I''ve given myself was..." McCain
Typical politician avoiding the actual question to promote his own platform. He is nothing more than the shadow of Bush/ Cheney. God help us if he becomes president. - Reply to this comment
- All the slimy little operators out there. Please be advised America''s Veterans are watching your sorry rear ends. You really NEED to cover your tracks THIS TIME.
- Reply to this comment
- All the slimy little operators out there. Please be advised America''s Veterans are watching your sorry rear ends. You really NEED to cover your tracks THIS TIME.
- Reply to this comment
Republicans couldn''t get elected to be dogcatcher without dirty tricks.- Reply to this comment
- "...leaflet accusing the presidential candidate of collaborating with the enemy during his years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam..."
...the ghost of Karl Rove still linger. - Reply to this comment
- "Vietnam Veterans Against McCain"
Formerly known as "Swiftboat Veterans for Truth"
CAUTION! GOP LIARS AT WORK!
IT"S CALLED THE BUSH/CHENEY LEGACY!!
LOL - Reply to this comment
