Dean: Land Deals for Donors Show McCain's Real Priorities, Blatant Hypocrisy

[madfloridian]

The DNC research team is organizing pages of research about John McCain. They have done a great job of this, and trying to get ads running against McCain while being hurt moneywise as the campaigns roll on.

Land Deals for Donors

On the same day John McCain gave a speech aimed at repositioning himself as a "moderate" for the general election by claiming to be a "conservationist," the Washington Post highlights Senator McCain's true priorities. According to the report, Senator McCain reversed himself and backed legislation resulting in a land swap that allowed one of his biggest donors to develop federal park land despite concerns from forestry officials that the deal would short-change taxpayers. Senator McCain "became a key figure in pushing the deal through Congress after the rancher and his partners hired lobbyists that included McCain's 1992 Senate campaign manager, two of his former Senate staff members (one of whom has returned as his chief of staff), and an Arizona insider who was a major Senator McCain donor and is now bundling campaign checks."

While Senator McCain claims voters should trust him to not put his special interest friends ahead of the public good, today's story is the latest in a string of scandals that highlight his pattern of casting aside the public interest and his own principles to benefit his campaign contributors and favored lobbyists. Senator McCain helped steer a $35 billion dollar defense contract to a European defense contractor that hired three of Senator McCain's top campaign officials, weighed in on the sale of a Pittsburgh TV station after meeting with a campaign contributor involved in the deal, and has loaded his campaign with lobbyists from the telecommunications companies he was responsible for overseeing as chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee.

Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean today issued the following statement:

"Senator McCain can cast himself as a friend of the environment all he wants, but the only friends he really stands up for are the donors and lobbyists running his campaign. Senator McCain thinks he can simply say 'trust me' and the American people will turn a blind eye to his disturbing pattern of putting his special interest friends ahead of the public good. The voters know that Senator McCain's campaign rhetoric on the environment means nothing when he's willing to give his donors sweetheart deals and appoint right wing judges bent on gutting environmental regulations. Senator McCain's hypocrisy on ethics and lobbying reform is one more reason he is the wrong choice for America's future."

Here's the John McCain research page at the DNC.

John McCain research page