Lord A'Mighty...
On Sunday, in an interview with CNBC and The New York Times, Mr. McCain responded to a question about Mr. Davis’s role in the advocacy group through 2005 by saying that his campaign manager “has had nothing to do with it since, and I’ll be glad to have his record examined by anybody who wants to look at it.”
Does the old fart really not know the quality of low lifes he's surrounded himself with? Well... He does now:
Such assertions, along with McCain campaign television ads tying Mr. Obama to former Fannie Mae chiefs, have riled current and former officials of the two companies and provoked them to volunteer rebuttals. The two officials with direct knowledge of Freddie Mac’s post-2005 contract with Mr. Davis spoke on condition of anonymity. Four other outside consultants, three Democrats and a Republican also speaking on condition of anonymity, said the arrangement was widely known among people involved in Freddie Mac’s lobbying efforts.
As president of the Homeownership Alliance, Mr. Davis got $30,000 to $35,000 a month. Mr. Davis, along with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, have characterized the alliance as a coalition of many housing industry and consumer groups to promote homeownership, but numerous current and former officials at both companies say the two mortgage companies created and bankrolled the operation to combat efforts by competitors to rein in their business. They dissolved the group at the end of 2005 as part of cost-cutting in the wake of accounting scandals and, at Freddie Mac, a lobbying scandal that forced out its former top Republican lobbyist.
On Monday, the McCain campaign accused The New York Times of bias for reporting the payments to Mr. Davis for the alliance work from the mortgage giants. Mr. Davis said that he had worked not for the two companies but for the advocacy group, which included other nonprofit organization as well, and was focused only on promoting homeownership.
After the Homeownership Alliance was dissolved, Mr. Davis asked to stay on a retainer, the people familiar with the deal said. Hollis McLoughlin, who was chief of staff to Richard F. Syron, Freddie Mac’s chief executive, arranged for a new contract with Davis & Manafort, at the reduced rate of $15,000 a month, they said. Mr. Syron lost his job in the government takeover this month. Mr. McLoughlin, who through a spokeswoman declined to comment, was a former chief of staff to Treasury Secretary Nicholas Brady in the first President Bush’s administration, and has longstanding Republican ties.
Mr. Davis was hired as a consultant, not a lobbyist, the officials said. Davis & Manafort in recent years has filed federal lobbying reports for a number of companies but not Freddie Mac or Fannie Mae.
Later in 2006, Mr. Davis was working on Mr. McCain’s emerging presidential campaign, as chief financial officer. The only thing that Freddie Mac officials could recall Mr. Davis doing for the company was the October 2006 pre-election forum with mid-level and senior executives who contribute to Freddie PAC, the company’s political action committee.
An electronic invitation to the employees, read by an official to the New York Times, said “Please join us for political food for thought” with Paul Begala, a longtime Democratic consultant, “and Rick Davis, former 2000 presidential campaign manager and current advisor to Senator John McCain.” Mr. Begala, who also was a paid consultant to Freddie Mac until this month, confirmed that the event took place.
At least two other people associated with Mr. McCain have ties to either Freddie Mac. The lobbying firm of the Republican that Mr. McCain has enlisted to plan his transition to the White House should he be elected, William Timmons Sr., earned nearly $3 million from Freddie Mac between 2000 and its seizure, federal lobbying records show. Mr. Timmons is founder of Timmons & Co., one of Washington’s best-known lobbying shops. The payments were first reported by Bloomberg News.
Mark Buse, Mr. McCain’s chief of staff for his Senate office, also is a Freddie Mac alumnus. He and his former lobbying employer, ML Strategies, registered to lobby for the company in July 2003, and received $460,000 before the association ended after 2004.
Mr. McCain and his advisers have argued that whatever connections Mr. Davis and other McCain campaign officials have had to the mortgage giants, Mr. McCain in the Senate has been an advocate for reforming them. And they have suggested that Mr. Obama is linked to the companies through donations from their employees ties to former officials there, including James Johnson, another former chief executive of Fannie Mae who was the head of Mr. Obama’s vice presidential search team until stepping aside after coming under criticism for getting a mortgage on favorable terms.
Since his first campaign for the Senate in 2004, Senator Obama has received about $126,000 in contributions from employees of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, while Senator McCain, over the last decade, has received about $22,000, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
nytimes.com
Hmmm... I wonder... Could I get a job on the Straight Talk Express?
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