So Senator McCain, as part of the now-familiar Pimp My Bio effort, frequently tells the moving story of the cross in the dirt that gave him courage and the will to go on. Funny thing is, this extraordinarily cinematic tale wasn't part of McCain's earliest recounting of his POW experiences. Even funnier? It's very similar to a story told by the greatest man of the previous century, Alexander Solzhenitsen.

Hey. Maybe that's not actually funny.

Andrew Sullivan noted this first. He's now asking a relevant question. When was the first time McCain told this moving biographical anecdote?

Betcha there's some folks digging, and digging hard, right now. And yes, I'm sure it's all true and I'm sure we'll get some kind of confirmation in the next few days because I know Senator McCain would never ever inflate or embellish like that. Any more than he would use his POW experiences as a campaign prop. He's just not that kind of man.

Unless he did, of course. And then...?

Heh.

UPDATE! Speaking of embellishing, hey, if nothing else? It wouldn't be the last time. Here.

BONUS UPDATE! At last night's Saddleback Forum, Pastor Rick made it clear that Senator McCain was in a 'cone of silence' so that he would not reap undue advantage, eg know what questions were coming before they were asked. Senator McCain even joked about trying to listen through a wall. Heh. Except it turns out McCain wasn't even in the church during the first half hour of Obama's hour long segment. Gee. That's not quite an embellishment, but. Oh never mind.

BONUS BONUS UPDATE! The Story of the Cross begins to spread. Hey, remember Senator Clinton and the tarmac? Heh.

It is an article of faith among the faithful that Senator McCain is, unlike his uppity opponent, modest to as fault and never ever one to presume. A simple man who only wants to save America from those who would not-save it. That reputation has taken a couple dents this week, primarily due to the Viagra-like boost the crisis in Georgia has given the senior senator's long dormant Cold War manhood. Daily phone calls to the region, sending his own crack diplomatic team to stand around and get their picture taken. It's all rather, I dunno, presumptuous. And heaven help Barrack Obama had he done anything like this -- as mentioned previously, such actions would have caused a chain of exploding heads in the right wing blogosphere.

Hey. At least he's still modest to a fault, almost heroically so, when it comes to his time as a POW. That too is an article of faith among the faithful. And if his heroic travails have been cited in many of his campaign ads over the years, that's just politics. It has nothing to do with the man.

Anyhoo. When Walter Isascson asked Senator McCain what he was thinking when he cited ABBA as one of his favorite musical influences at the Aspen Institute confab, McCain was quick to answer:

Well played, Senator! Cuz if you're going to pimp your biography it's worth doing so no matter what the context, no matter how innocuous the question. The trick is to get credit for never doing so.

Oh, and by the way. ABBA didn't hit the airvaves until well after the Senator's imprisonment. So it would have been more accurate to say:

Though I'm assuming that part of his bio is something less, uhm, pimped.

Happy Weekend!

(Via Matt Yglesias)

Another day, another excercise in coded juvenilia from the McCain campaign. This one's got lotsa white girls. Mmm. White girls.

Here.

Yeah, yeah, I know. Why so sensitive? It's all in good fun. There's no way the McCain campaign -- the one that hired the Harold Ford ad guys -- would think like that. Get your mind out of the race card gutter!

Sound familiar? It's exactly what the affronted minions in the Clinton campaign said. Funny how the emails and memos that were released after their race was run show a different picture altogether.

Not so funny that the McCain campaign is engaging in the identical strategy.

UPDATE! As noted elsewhere, the McCain campaign has taken down the video in question. Gosh. I wonder why?

Senator McCain is running on his biography. He's a straight talker, he's a Maverick. He's a quirky dude with a downright fun sense of humor. Reporters love him! You should too!!

Amy Silverman has been covering Senator McCain for about 15 years. She does us the favor of taking a brief trip down memory lane. With the good Senator. Among the highlights?

Basically? A man with very little grace. Small, mean-spirited, dishonest, and pissy. And hypocritical. But other than that? Great barbecue!

Read the entire article, here. (Helpful synopsis via Ezra Klein)

So if you were dropped out of the sky -- or relocated from an island where you could not watch broadcast TV -- and found yourself in a bar drinking moderately with two opinionated fellows and gazing periodically at the muted TV screens overhead, those TV screens, yesterday at any rate, would give you the odd impression that Hillary Clinton was still running for her party's nomination and that Bill Clinton had said something inappropriate. Again.

Like Sergeant Hulka in Stripes. IT IS ALIVE.

This bugs me. It's as if everyone -- and by everyone I mean the MSM -- has decided to agree that 18 million women are standing in ranks, holding hands, and demanding that their candidate be honored and honored well while singing hymns to what was but can never be but might be again someday soon. Like in two weeks.

This of course is crap. Most of those Clinton voters, by which I mean the vast majority, have done what voters usually do when their candidate fails to win a nomination. They moved on. In most cases, they're watching the campaign unfold, checking their tire pressure, and not really giving the Clintons all that much thought. And while the various cable and network outlets seem to believe that shaky phone video showing Senator Clinton addressing a handful of supporters in someone's back yard is proof positive of a still-fervid movement that demands our constant respect and attention? I say Feh. And double Feh.

But beyond the Feh? How about some numbers. Okay. Approximately 12 percent of the Democrats polled say they're going to vote for McCain. Approximately 12 percent of the Republicans polled say they're going to vote for Obama. In other words, there's no there there no matter how many times Charlie Gibson tries to tell you otherwise. (And his own network is the outfit responsible for the listed numbers.)

Despite, you know, reality, it seems as though we'll be treated to two weeks of coy statements regarding Senator Clinton's plans, whether or not her name will be put into nomination, whether there will be a roll call, etc. (Call me crazy, but I'm guessing there will be nothing along these lines interrupting the GOP's convention.) And then, of course, wild-eyed speculation about what she'll say on Tuesday, or what Bubba will say on Wednesday. In other words, despite losing the primary, right now everyone is doing what the Clintons want them to do. They're talking about the Clintons.

Myself included. Sigh.

Bonus history note. The Sabine women were not raped, but kidnapped.

Well, heck. We had the Hess Oil money grab, complete with the most generous office manager in the history of office managing. But hey, when you have a chance to be a cut-out for a true Maverick? It's hard to pass up the opportunity.

Now comes the story of Harry Sergant III, a Florida -- of course, Florida -- businessman who has raised big buckets of cash for Senator McCain (and as a bonus, buckets for Rudy Giuliani and Hillary Clinton in the past). Sergeant was aided in his McCain money-raising by business partner Mustafa Abu Naba'a -- they suckle together on the Pentagon teat, naturally -- who managed to wring large donations out of several dozen Arab American in California, including 50k from the members of a single extended family, the Abdullahs.

Say. Looks like the extraordinarily generous office manager from Queens has some competition!

Even better? One of the generous citizens was located by reporters and insisted that yes, he gave the cash, but...

Bonus Nugget! This regarding Sergeant and Naba's Pentagon contract:

Well at least we know how the good Senator can afford those $520 shoes*. (As always, imagine the GOP/MSM tizzle if Senator Obama was similarly shod.)

*Yes, I know. That's not why he can afford the shoes. He can afford the shoes because he dumped his crippled wife in order to marry a beer heiress. Which seems harsh. But, you know. True.

There's really not much to add to the offered link. It's funny!

Here.

Usually quid pro quo doesn't work quite this neatly or this quickly, but this is a special year with special candidates. Anyhoo, turns out that only days after reversing his previous position on off-shore drilling, the joint RNC-McCain fundraising committee was rewarded with ten, count 'em, ten $28,500 donations from various senior executives at the Hess Corporation, as well as a couple members of the Hess family. Nine of the contributions came on the same day.

But that's not the fun part.

Turns out a Hess office manager and her husband, an Amtrak worker, chipped in $28,000 each too. The amazingly generous couple rent their home in Flushing, Queens. They are amazingly generous. And will, I suspect, get some phone calls from interested reporters in the days to come. Who are, you know, following the money.

This fits rather neatly into Obama's first big attack ad, released just this week. About the ways in which Senator McCain is in the pocket of big oil. You can see the ad, here.

In which...

He seems to forget where he is.
Then lies about the Obama campaign making a retraction.
Then lies about supporting a holiday celebrating Martin Luther King.

Enjoy!

And this from Jon Alter. Hey. A Mother should know.

Just a couple quick hits today. First, from Business Week's marketing and advertising correspondent David Kiley: