Do you trust Steve Schmidt on his attacks on John McCain

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Yes I do.

There was always something fishy about the 2007-2008 campaign, McCain's primary operation, the selection of Palin and the incompetence of the whole campaign pause and such forth.

A crooked campaign manager, being retained only because he kept the lid on a bunch of McCain's dirty laundry makes all of the other things seem more reasonable.

McCain never should have been the nominee. His image was largely that of a media fabrication and this showed on the Lehman brother's collapse. The guy was great at playing Moderate Hero, eating up accolades by the media for it and accruing his own following of devotees (Remember, he only became the nominee because of Fred Thompson and Rudy falling on their swords at just the right time to help him out, and Huckabee only beat Romney in Iowa because Brownback dropped out. Also Lindsay Graham, before he was kowtowing to Trump was doing likewise for McCain.)

I said Romney was the proto-Trump on the shift towards nationalism on immigration and to some extent trade. But McCain very much was essential to Trump's rise, both in the bases anger at him, but also thanks to the Palin pick. Also reading that litany of campaign turbulence reminded me a lot of Trump's in 2016 (taken up to 11 because everything is bigger with Trump).

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Schmidt is a shady character, that's all I'm going to say (he said he'd register with the Democratic Party but is currently registered with the far-right, Wallacite American Independent Party - though in fairness it's possible he mistook registering for the AIP for registering as an Independent). There's likely some truth and some lies in whatever he's saying about McCain and the gang.

Its kind of like Trump and his line about "hiring the best people".

Most everyone that surrounded McCain was some version of scum, terrible, crooked or a sycophant. Rudy and Graham were such for both McCain and Trump.

Certainly I have been vocal hostile to the whole of the Lincoln Project crew going back years for turning everything they touch into crap and I would certainly agree with your assessment, but if we are setting up some kind of dichotomy where because the LP crew are shady, it means that McCain is vindicated, then that is the same as Trumpists using his fixer's corruption as vindication for Trump himself.

Remember, they are all crooks.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Yes. Most politicians are very sh**tty people.

Most certainly.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Yes I do.

There was always something fishy about the 2007-2008 campaign, McCain's primary operation, the selection of Palin and the incompetence of the whole campaign pause and such forth.

A crooked campaign manager, being retained only because he kept the lid on a bunch of McCain's dirty laundry makes all of the other things seem more reasonable.

McCain never should have been the nominee. His image was largely that of a media fabrication and this showed on the Lehman brother's collapse. The guy was great at playing Moderate Hero, eating up accolades by the media for it and accruing his own following of devotees (Remember, he only became the nominee because of Fred Thompson and Rudy falling on their swords at just the right time to help him out, and Huckabee only beat Romney in Iowa because Brownback dropped out. Also Lindsay Graham, before he was kowtowing to Trump was doing likewise for McCain.)

I said Romney was the proto-Trump on the shift towards nationalism on immigration and to some extent trade. But McCain very much was essential to Trump's rise, both in the bases anger at him, but also thanks to the Palin pick. Also reading that litany of campaign turbulence reminded me a lot of Trump's in 2016 (taken up to 11 because everything is bigger with Trump).

This hits the nail on the head as Mr.X said, but I’d like to add some of my remembrance from Gamechange, the original pick was Lieberman but it seems like this was leaked by someone early on in the process so it had to be scraped, next were Pawlenty Romney and a few others. Palin interestingly enough wasn’t a though until a few days before the announcement I think they did all the “vetting” with Palin in less than a week.

At the time I was pleased with the Palin pick because all I knew was she had kicked the teeth in to the Murkowski (Frank) - Stevens - Young Cartel that dominated Alaska politics at the time and was to that point the most popular Governor in the country, trading places with Joe Manchin and John Hoeven a couple of times.

Schmidt implied that Graham leaked the Lieberman pick in one of these tweets.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

What he's saying is probably true but, as fun as it might be to see the McCains get dragged, Schmidt is still an HP grifter so who care.

This. What's the most fun is that he's making serious allegations about a deceased statesman who's very highly regarded by most of the general public--the greater Atlas community's generally critical view of John McCain is the definition of a "high-information" position that would seem strange to most people who only casually follow politics--yet he's doing so in the format of hours-long personal-beef Twitter tirades against that person's politically irrelevant daughter.

Sounds like peak Atlas to me.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I didn’t mind Schmidt and sometimes even liked him. But saying he covered up “all of McCains filth” is a little strong. So what, he banged a lobbyist. Who cares. He gave enough to this country where I think that can be forgiven

Its never about the sex itself, but what actions were taken to keep that secret and what impact did those have.

This has always been my issue with these philandering politicians.