John McCain and Jack Abramoff

McCain accepted five grand from Jack Abramoff.

Jack Abramoff, a political operator extraordinaire, was finally caught and taken down, in spite of his connections in high places. A new report published today indicates that the White House lied again about Abramoff's access to people and places in the Bush administration. It turns out, that in spite of all the denials, Abramoff met with Bush in person on at least a couple of occasions and was a welcome figure in the West Wing.

We'll hear more about that in the coming days.

Meanwhile, back a couple-three years ago, John McCain was chosen to "investigate" Jack Abramoff. In his book, The Real McCain, Cliff Schecter reveals that "McCain held a closed-door meeting with nervous GOP lawmakers during the hearings in 2005 ... [and] assured them that while his investigation would root out corruption, their ethics would not be one of the matters he would look into. In other words, his investigation was much like O.J.'s search for the real killer."

Buzzflash.net, in an article posted today, claims that relative to the Abramoff investigation, "McCain's role was to limit the disclosures and the political damage that still threaten to destroy the GOP's foreign funding base and the party' hopes of ever regaining control in Washington. McCain was chosen by GOP leadership to oversee the Abramoff investigation and to cover up the malfeasances of his fellow senators by withholding most of the evidence received in response to his broad subpoenas."

Before his indictment, Abramoff was involved in some rather shady foreign money deals which involved "al-Qaeda bankers, ... Russian intelligence officers, ... a South Asian leader involved with rogue nuclear programs."

Buzzflash says that "As a career cover-up specialist for the foreign influence-peddling and financial frauds of the Republican Party, McCain managed to cover-up the larger picture of the political work Abramoff did for his clients, some of which was clearly contrary to the U.S. national interest."

Jeez. I thought these guys were all patriots ... you know, just making a little money on the side, expressing their American ingenuity...?