The New York Times and John McCain

When John McCain was running for the Republican Presidential nomination, the mainstream media gave him mostly neutral coverage—they didn’t fawn over him (as they did over Mike Huckabee), but didn’t attack him much either. In fact, many left-leaning newspapers endorsed McCain. Certainly, the media didn’t blatantly and unfairly smear him.

Now that he has the Republican nomination, though, the media has no qualms about smearing McCain. Today’s New York Times article about McCain is an example—it implies a Clintonian style affair with a lobbyist. The evidence provided? A couple of anonymous disillusioned ex-McCain staffers say that some people thought there might be a romantic relationship between McCain and his lobbyist friend. And out of that insubstantial bit of evidence, a New York Times story is born.

The article has more than just accusations of sexual improprieties. It accuses John McCain of long-running corruption. It refers to the admittedly ugly Keating Five scandal as a “formative scandal”, implying that it was the first of many for McCain. However, McCain’s efforts against corruption are simply a “new chosen cause”, suggesting that McCain simply pretends to oppose corruption as a smokescreen.

John McCain has his faults, but corruption is probably not one of them. This very piece could have run in December, before McCain had won the nomination. However, in what is probably a pure coincidence, it happens to run a few weeks after McCain wins the nomination. McCain deserves better, and the New York Times is again revealing its anti-conservative bias.