Sen. John McCain, American war hero and admired political maverick, as well as presumed Republican nominee for president, had a message for Elisabeth Bumiller, the venerated New York Times reporter, along with the rest of the media assigned to travel with him the week of July 20.
“What do you want, you little jerks?” McCain said to Bumiller and those behind her, as the press surged forward on the “Straight Talk” Boeing 737 on July 21.
No one ever accused the Arizona senator of not being blunt. But he had come a long way from the media-friendly, boyishly charming, brazenly honest, free-wheeling McCain that so many in the media had come to love during the 2000 Republican primary. That man was now gone. Vanished.
…
It’s hard to believe that McCain was championed in 2000 as the man who could bring balance to the Republican Party, not plunge it into further darkness. He had entered the 2008 Republican race as its front-runner, as the man who stood up to George W. Bush and the party’s more extreme elements. In the 2000 campaign, McCain had repudiated Bush’s visit to Bob Jones University in South Carolina and called out the late Jerry Falwell as one of the “agents of intolerance.” He had apologized for not taking a firm stand against the Confederate flag flying high above the South Carolina capitol dome and continued to press for bi-partisan efforts like comprehensive immigration reform, including some path to citizenship for the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants in the United States.
But most of that was before McCain’s apparent slide into the dark side.
There’s a lot more. Basically it’s a confirmation of McCain’s well known anger problem.
If McCain already thinks he’s getting bad coverage, I’m not sure how he expects to get better coverage by bashing on the press, unless he thinks that they’ll kneel in front of him and kiss is fingers to get back on his good side (which, sadly, wouldn’t shock me).
