JOHN MCCAIN, WARTS AND ALL A Look At The Candidate's Mob Ties
By Edward Zehr

As reports filtered in from the precincts in Delaware on Tuesday night it quickly became apparent that George W. Bush had buried the mainstream media's candidate, John McCain, in a two-to-one landslide. The final count was Bush: 51 percent, McCain: 24 percent, Forbes: 21 percent and Keyes: 4 percent. (Don't bother looking for the results in your local newspaper or on network TV -- the mainstream media are treating them as "Most Secret," for their eyes only, not to be disseminated to the proles under any circumstances).

Even McCain's 18-point margin in New Hampshire was dwarfed by Bush's massive 27-point win. Doesn't count, huffed the media. McCain didn't campaign in Delaware. Which of course leads in to the question that the media did not have to answer because they saw to it that it didn't get asked: why didn't McCain campaign in Delaware? The answer should be quite apparent to anyone who is familiar with such things. In Delaware the Republican primary is restricted to Republicans. Democrats masquerading as Republicans are not allowed to pick the GOP candidate as they are in states such as New Hampshire and South Carolina. California will be an interesting test case. At present the law states that "independents" may vote in the GOP primary, but only the Republican votes would count in selecting delegates for the GOP national convention. This has spurred a number of left-wing zealots in the Bay Area to queue-up in order to switch their registration to Republican at the last minute. (They've been at loose ends since the collapse of Communism). But help may be on the way. There is a move underway in the Democrat-controlled state legislature to allow the Democr...er, "independents" to select the delegates to the GOP convention. Some may call it "democracy." I prefer to call it by its rightful name: vote fraud.

Stung by the double digit drubbing he received in New Hampshire at the hands of Democrats voting in the Republican primary for Senator John McCain under the guise of "independents," Texas Gov. George W. Bush hit back hard last week. McCain, says George Dubya, is a big hypocrite for taking contributions from the fat cats even as he denounces the practice as corrupt. McCain responded with a smirk (that went unnoted by the press) that Bush is displaying "a little sign of desperation." No doubt the senator is correct, but how does that answer the charge of hypocrisy? Even CBSNEWS.com was unwilling to give McCain a pass on that one. They noted that his rejoinder "may be true. But it's not a substantive response." Of course, CBS wound up concluding that McCain's decision to say one thing and do another was completely justified on purely pragmatic grounds. What else is one to expect of boomer brats raised on situation "ethics" and "moral" relativism?

The WOW! (Gee) response of the mainstream media puppeteers to McCain's big win was nowhere more obvious than at the New York Times which gushed on and on about the fact that three weekly "news" magazines had placed the senator's mug shot on their covers, as though this were some sort of spontaneous natural phenomena and not part of a well-oiled propaganda campaign to pick the weakest Republican candidate and then bushwack him in the general election.

The last time they (partially) succeeded in this strategy was 1952, when Eisenhower, an outsider, beat Sen. Robert Taft (known at the time as "Mr. Republican") for the GOP nomination, with the help of a media propaganda blizzard. As soon as Ike was nominated the media, which only a few weeks previously had been singing in unison his fulsome praise, turned on him with a vengeance. Ike, after all, was just a big dumb military doofus who didn't understand diddley squat about running a nation, they implied. Some insolent punk kid reporter put a question to the candidate, concluding with words to the effect that, of course, he couldn't be expected to understand the intricacies of politics. Ike fixed him with a look of utter incredulity (the best expression in his repertoire) and asked, using a tone of voice much favored by drill instructors, "How the [bleepity-bleep] do you think I got to be a five-star general?"

Those who cleared the American educational system prior to the Great Dumbing-Down will recall that Eisenhower cleaned the clock of Democratic candidate Adlai Stevenson that year, carrying with him both houses of Congress. However, there is reason to doubt that history will repeat itself with McCain in the starring role this time. For one thing, the only argument the media were able to raise against Ike is that he wasn't very smart (i.e. didn't agree with them). This is a hard sell against a man who had only a few years previously led a rather large American army to

victory in Europe. The case against McCain will be a good deal easier to make, as I will demonstrate. Since all of this is going to be known before November, it would be better to consider its impact now than to walk blindly into the trap being set for us by the left-liberal propagandists of the mainstream press.



THE DEATH OF THE MYTH OF THE HERO
Ted Sampley is a former Green Beret and a veteran of the Vietnam War. He has long been a political activist who, according to the Wilmington, NC, Morning Star, "has never shrunk from a fight, even when his allies were few and his enemies numerous..." He once even received an accolade for his reporting in the "Darts & Laurels" column of the Columbia Journalism Review, a remarkable achievement in view of his political orientation relative to theirs. Sampley, who maintains the U.S. Veteran Dispatch Web site, broke the story that the "unknown soldier" from the Vietnam War was quite well known to Army authorities and had been for years. The Army was obliged, with much embarrassment, to hand over the remains to the dead soldier's family, who had not been properly notified until Sampley blew the whistle. More recently Sampley has been exposing Sen. John McCain's intemperate, and at times vicious, attacks upon his fellow former POWs whose only "offense" would seem to be that they have tried to assist the families of American POWs who have been callously abandoned by their government to years of hellish torment. McCain has repeatedly slandered authentic war heroes such as "Red" McDaniels, whose boots he isn't fit to shine, and even had the Justice Department investigate organizations whose sole purpose was to get an accounting of the fate of family members, with a view to bringing criminal action against them. According to Sampley "He accused the activists of fraud because in some of their fund-raising literature they claimed that the U.S. government knowingly left U.S. POWs behind after the Vietnam War and that some remain alive today." The JD could find no grounds for such action, indeed they would have stirred up a hornet's nest had they brought indictments, because all indications are that the government did, in fact, knowingly leave POWs behind. Why then has Sen. McCain been so vindictive in going after these groups? What possible political benefit could he hope to gain thereby? Perhaps more to the point, why has he been so diligent in playing Little Sir Echo to the government of Vietnam by seconding every demand on their wish list? And if, as he recounted in his book, "Faith of My Fathers," his captors had strung him up by his fractured arms, causing him hours of excruciating agony, why did he hasten to embrace the Grand Inquisitor, Col. Bui Tin, on the occasion of the latter's visit to Washington to testify before a Senate committee? Surely he must have been aware that Bui Tin was responsible for the torments suffered not only by himself, but by his fellow prisoners at the "Hanoi Hilton." It is difficult to believe that the senator's great show of affection for his former tormentor was entirely genuine. Could he have been influenced by the knowledge that Col. Bui Tin was in a position to turn his interrogation records over to the committee, and had already discussed the possibility of doing just that? To characterize this man as a "war hero" seems an exaggeration, to say the least. If one examines the record it is clear that McCain had little control over the things that happened to him. Was he tortured? Yes, but so was everyone else at the Hanoi Hilton. It wasn't run like an airline -- that is, newcomers were not shown a chart of the accommodations and asked, "Which do you prefer, tortured or non-tortured?" Getting batted around by the staff was a regular part of the room service at the Hanoi Hilton. McCain implies in his book that he was singled out for "special attention" because his father was an important Navy admiral. Yet foreign press accounts published at the time indicate that it was McCain himself who called the attention of his captors to his father's important position.

One vet observed sardonically, "He [McCain] used his celebrity, his father was Adm. McCain, to gain special treatment for injuries received. Although everyone has a breaking point his was amazingly low! He has referred to POW/MIA families as "whiners and vultures, and lunatic fringe."

And that would appear to be the sticking point with many former POWs; why has McCain been so disrespectful, not to say abusive, to the families of POW/MIAs? They come to Washington in desperation, seeking help to locate their loved ones only to be subjected to a torrent of abuse by the terrible-tempered senator, who then goes so far as to sick the Justice Department on them. This sort of behavior by an elected official requires some explanation, but none has been forthcoming. (Needless to say, McCain's bootlicking toadies in the mainstream press would never dream of asking him such awkward questions). Instead we are offered boilerplate endorsements by pro-McCain veterans who, for all their impressive decorations, seem a bit shell-shocked by it all.

J. Thomas Burch Jr., chairman of the National Vietnam and Gulf War Veterans Committee in supporting George W. Bush had attacked John McCain's record on veteran's affairs, alleging that the senator had neglected legislation dealing with Agent Orange and Gulf War Syndrome and had done virtually nothing to assist families of POW/MIAs still missing in Vietnam. That is putting it almost too charitably -- in pushing for an investigation of "malfeasance" by MIA activists, McCain said, "The people who have done these things are not zealots in a good cause. They are the most craven, most cynical and most despicable human beings to ever run a scam." Yet, when Mr. Burch suggests that the senator was not as supportive as he might have been, the whole kneejerk- liberal, mainstream media propaganda apparat goes into high dudgeon. Mr. Burch would seem to have touched a nerve. Ignoring the senator's scurrilous and unfounded allegations against the families of POW/MIAs, the McCain campaign issued the following announcement regarding charges leveled at their brave lad:

"Distinguished POWs and Medal of Honor recipients have publicly repudiated these offensive, shameful statements. Perhaps the most absurd statements came from a veteran named Tom Burch, who, while appearing with Governor Bush, said, McCain came home (from 5 years as a POW in Vietnam) and forgot us (veterans)."

Speaking of offensive, shameful statements, I wonder how McCain's flacks would characterize his statement that Navy Capt. Eugene "Red" McDaniel (Ret.) is "a fraud and a dishonorable man who preys upon the families of those still unaccounted for in the war." McDaniel, who has been characterized by journalist Monika Jensen-Stevenson as "one of the most tortured Americans in the history of war" (and who, in contrast to Sen. McCain, did not break), had committed the unpardonable offense in McCain's eyes of drafting a letter, signed by fifty of his fellow POWs, urging that our government not lift the embargo on Vietnam until they provided a full accounting of all American POW/MIAs. The McCain campaign document featured statements by Congressional Medal of Honor recipient and Vietnam POW, Colonel Bud Day, U.S. Air Force (Ret.) and Lieutenant Colonel Orson Swindle, U.S. Marine Corps (Ret.), also a Vietnam POW, who lauded McCain "for his service to our nation and to the welfare of our veterans." Don't get me wrong, the country owes a debt of gratitude to anyone who wears the Congressional Medal of Honor and to those who underwent the extreme rigors of captivity in Vietnam. While their statements are chock-a-bloc with fulsome praise of the senator and run through the usual laundry list of goodies that most any politician would offer veterans: "reforming the military health care system; improving veterans health care, and eliminating federal income taxes for military service members who are deployed or stationed overseas," etc., McCain's defenders are a little short on specifics as to why the senator invariably seemed to place the interests of Vietnam above those of American POW/MIAs. For example when the Missing Service Personnel Act of 1996 came up on the Senate Floor for debate, Senator McCain characterized this legislation as "un-necessary" and "burdensome." Nevertheless, this "unnecessary and burdensome" legislation was backed by the man who wore a POW bracelet for McCain throughout the years of his captivity, then-majority leader Bob Dole.

The McCain campaign statement cites the senator's support for "legislation requiring disclosure of classified POW/MIA information and improving accounting methods, McCain has devoted considerable time and energy to seeking the fullest possible accounting of our POW/MIAs..."

Promises, promises. How is it then that a full accounting has never been made? (In order to understand that we must read the fine print).

... and to providing that all information concerning their fate be subjected to full public scrutiny, so long as the declassification of this information does not violate the privacy of POW/MIA family members or compromise U.S. intelligence sources and methods.


Unh-hunh. Notice how the real kicker, the "compromising" of U.S. intelligence has been mixed in with "the privacy of POW/MIA family members" in order to muddy the issue. "National security" has been the last refuge all along of the scoundrels responsible for covering up the unspeakably shameful abandonment of American POWs held captive in Vietnam. And John McCain, for reasons he seems reluctant to explain, has played right along with their dirty game. It is time for the senator to stop hiding behind recipients of the Congressional Medal of Honor and answer direct questions on this issue put to him on behalf of the REAL heroes he has slandered. People such as Maj. Mark Smith, former Green Beret and POW, and Capt. "Red" McDaniel. Advocates of the POW/MIA families whom the senator has viciously slandered have made the serious allegation that he has attempted to impede their every effort to get a full accounting. It is disheartening to see people of the caliber of Orson Swindle and Bud Day used in a political charade by a politician who is unwilling to confront his accusers face to face.

It is less surprising that five senators who served in the military during the Vietnam era would come to McCain's defense. The fact that four of them are Democrats is further confirmation that McCain is the Democrat's favorite Republican candidate. You can draw your own conclusions about their motives, which seem obvious enough to me.

The point of all this is that the smiling image of the senatorshown to us by the mainstream media is not the real man. So whois the real John McCain?



ALL IN THE FAMILY
McCain dumped his first wife after she had been disabled in an auto accident. Although this woman had worked tirelessly to get him released from captivity, he did not hesitate to betray her with other women upon finding her crippled when he returned home. In fact, McCain has racked up quite a reputation as a womanizer. This time he was determined to do it right. Since he had no fortune of his own, he acquired one through his second marriage. Sampley writes that the senator's net worth is "possibly as much as $1.2 million or more, excluding personal residences . . . McCain listed his [second] wife, Cindy, as the source of most of his assets. . ." According to the Phoenix Gazette of May 19, 1987, "the bulk of McCain's assets consisted of stock in the Glendale firms -- Hensley & Co., a beer distributorship headed by his father-in-law; Western Leasing Co., which leases trucks and equipment; and Eagle Enterprises, which invests in real estate and stock."

In fact, the senator married the daughter of one of the richest men in Arizona. It seems that McCain got more than just a wife in the bargain, he married into a family that already had quite a reputation in that state. Since family ties are always somewhat convoluted and difficult to track, I have prepared a chart to assist the reader in following the narrative.

JOHN McCAIN FAMILY PORTRAIT

Kemper Marley, Sr.---------------+
land & liquor baron |

| |

| |

| |

+----------+-----James Hensley |

| | Eugene Hensley ----------+ |

| | (managers for Marley) | |

|daughter | | |

| +-->Rich Scheffel 5 yrs. in<--+ |

| lobbyist for prison for |

Cindy Hensley----+ Anh.-Busch skimming |

| | | scam |

|wife | |$ |

| | | |

+----JOHN McCAIN | politicians |

| /| | | |

| | favors | Max Dunlap<--???--+

| contrib. | | |

| | | | |contract?

| | / | |

| +--Charles Keating | John Adamson

| | | | Jimmy Robison

| | shopping ctr.<--+investment |

| | | |murder

| +-------+ | |

| | | Don Bolles

+---->free trips<----+ Arizona Republic

| reporter

| who

| wrote about Marley

Stole drugs from<---+ causing him to resign American Voluntary appointment to Ariz.

Medical Team to Racing Commission

feed her drug habit.

The situation in Arizona was, for a long time, reminiscent of that line in "Memphis Blues" that goes, "Mistah Ed Crump, he runs this town." Only "The Man" in Arizona was named Kemper Marley, beer baron extraordinaire, player with real estate and other lucrative ventures too numerous to mention. At the time of his death in 1990, Marley was said to own "5 square miles of Carefree -- the highest priced real estate in Arizona," according to left-wing columnist Brian Downing Quig. Sort of like having hotels on Boardwalk AND Park Place, in addition to a monopoly on booze -- but of course that's the name of the game. Right after the Second World War Kemper Marley had a monopoly on liquor distribution in Arizona, which is every bit as good as having a license to steal. In 1948 his company, United Liquor, ran afoul of federal liquor laws -- fifty-two of his employees went to jail, including Jim Hensley who is presently the father- in-law of Senator John McCain. Some say that Hensley took a fall for Marley. Hensley was general manager of Marley's firm at the time. Be that as it may, when Hensley re-emerged from the slam, Marley rewarded him with a Budweiser distributorship which is now said to be worth $200 million, even though Hensley was prohibited from working in the liquor industry for the remainder of his days. And who stands to inherit this? John McCain and his devoted spouse, who else?

But Marley was more than just an entrepreneur. Quig writes that for forty years "Marley bankrolled Harry Rosenzweig who doled out Marley's great wealth to a slate of Republican candidates who were almost universally successful in obtaining high political office."

But that isn't all -- it seems that "Marley was able to control the Democratic party as well. Every congressman and every senator in Arizona currently owes his position to the Marley machine." So you see, it's sort of like W.C. Handy said: "Mistah Ed Crump, he runs this town." Crump controlled the Tennessee Democratic Party from his stronghold in Memphis, and ran the state's Republican Party as a sort of sideline, using a venerable old gentleman named Perry Howard as his front man. (In those days the Republicans were the "colored man's party" in Tennessee). But that was years ago. Unfortunately, we seem to have made little progress in the interim.

Anyway, is the plot beginning to make sense? Can you see the broad outlines of John McCain's strategy taking shape here? Do we really need a diagram to understand how he got his start in politics? Clearly he has had his eye on the prize for some time now, and is completely unsentimental as to how he attains it. Oh, say the senator's partisans, his former wife remains completely loyal to him. Yeah. I'll leave that part of the scenario to the reader's imagination.

Richard Scheffel, a lobbyist for Anheuser-Busch, is said to have boasted that Sen. McCain's father-in-law used him as a conduit to funnel money to politicians. Sampley quotes an Arizona newspaper as saying that, "Cars, homes and bank accounts of 18 people, including eight state legislators, were confiscated in a civil racketeering lawsuit that paints a portrait of lawmakers eager to sell their influence for as little as $660 and as much as $750,000." Although Scheffel was not targeted in the civil suit, he is said to have been paid $20,000 to approach legislators who showed an interest in selling their votes for hard cash, as part of an apparent sting operation, according to the Phoenix Gazette of February 6, 1991. The same newspaper identified Jim Hensley as "a financial godfather to hosts of lobbyists" in a story that appeared on March 16 the same year.

It would seem that Sen. McCain has not always been such an ardent advocate of campaign finance "reform." A Phoenix Gazette editorial published on December 8, 1987 asked:

"So why has Sen. McCain, R-Ariz., gone to unprecedented lengths to block reform of the Senate campaign finance system? Why does he oppose letting this important matter even come to a vote? Perhaps it's because he is a prime beneficiary of the special interest funding of congressional elections. McCain raised over $2.5 million for his 1986 election . . . more than $760,000 of his campaign funds came from political action committee (PACs) . . . especially disturbing are the contributions to McCain's campaign coffers from PACs outside of Arizona."

Ah, but that was then. As soon as the opportunity opened up for him to curry favor with the mainstream media by backing the "reform" measure he had so steadfastly opposed all along, the scales fell from his eyes -- McCain saddled up and went galloping down the road to Damascus (as H.L. Mencken used to say of such miraculous political conversions, an allusion to St. Paul). Let's face it folks, that boy done SEEN the light.

Why did Sen. McCain help Mr. Charles Keating fight off those federal regulators who had become so inquisitive about the way he had been running Lincoln Savings and Loan? What's this -- a twinge of deja vu? (Here's to you, Jim McDougal, wherever you are). The Arizona Republic reported on October 8, 1989, that "John McCain contends there was no conflict in his helping Keating battle federal regulators." And yet, in the same article we are told, "Documents show that Sen. John McCain's wife, Cindy, and father-in-law, James W. Hensley are the largest investors in Fountain Square Shopping Center. Their partnership is managed by subsidiaries of American Continental Corp., run by Charles H. Keating, Jr."

That's not a conflict of interest? The senator's wife and father-in-law, the source of all his wealth, are the biggest investors in a business enterprise run by the man he is helping to keep federal investigators at bay, but the senator sees no conflict here? The newspaper reported that "when an Arizona Republic reporter asked him about business ties between his wife, Cindy McCain, and Keating," the senator snarled, "That's the spouse's involvement, you idiot." Gosh, I'm sure glad he cleared that up. Wouldn't do to have anyone think there's something shady going on.

But, of course the mainstream press just can't under-STAND why Arizona newspapers keep saying all those mean, hurting things about their fair-haired boy. "You do understand English, don't you?" McCain explained in the same conversation. The Republic article continued, "Not content with just bullying reporters, McCain tried belittling them: 'It's up to you to find that out, kids.' . . . McCain wasn't talking to liars. He wasn't talking to juveniles. The senator was talking to two reporters." Isn't that what the mainstream newsies have been saying about the senator of late -- he knows how to talk to reporters? Got that, George Dubya? They like it when you treat 'em rough. But investments were not the whole story. The Arizona Republic reported on October 8, 1989 that:

"Sen. John McCain had more than a constituent relationship with Charles H. Keating, Jr. prior to 1987 . . . the McCains -- sometimes with their daughter and baby sitter -- made at least nine trips at Keating's expense from August 1984 to August 1986 aboard either Keating's American Continental Corporation's jet or chartered planes and helicopters owned by Resorts International. Three of the trips were for vacations at Keating's luxurious retreat in the Bahamas." But shucks all get-out -- dudn' mean a thing. The senator would do as much for anyone. Why he's just as helpful as can be -- unless you happen to be the relative of a POW/MIA. The Arizona Republic reported on August 24, 1994, that Sen. McCain's wife, Cindy, had admitted in a series of interviews with the media that she had been "addicted to the painkillers Percocet and Vicodin" from 1989 to 1992 and admitted to stealing the drugs from the American Voluntary Medical Team. She had used her position as president of this charitable organization to continue her habit of taking 15 to 20 pills a day. The normal dosage for a seriously ill patient would be 6 to 10 pills per day, and only for a short period of time. On the following day, the same newspaper carried an article that revealed one of the former employees of the medical team had "accused her of demanding that he commit perjury in adoption proceedings for her daughter, Bridget."

What were the consequences of all this? Apparently nothing much. Rank has its privileges and privilege has its perks, as John McCain, the admiral's son, well knows. The mainstream media who were so outraged at the thought that George W. might have snorted coke 27 years ago (he gets away with it while ordinary people go to jail) have been strangely silent about this episode.


THE OTHER SIDE OF THE FAMILY
But what role does Kemper Marley play in John McCain's extended family? I think that we could reasonably assign him the role of "godfather." It is difficult to believe that McCain would ever have made it to Congress without Marley's approval. Apparently nobody from Arizona made it to Congress without his approval -- and that includes Barry Goldwater. Do you begin to see why these smelly situations never get exposed? Back in the days when I was walking a precinct for Goldwater -- some time back before the Flood -- an acquaintance, who happened to be a Democrat, told me that my candidate had been seen from time to time in the company of "Jewish gangsters." I dismissed this out of hand. Not only was the guy nuts, he was clearly an anti-Semite. The following quote regarding a crook named Gus Greenbaum is from Brian Quig:

"Greenbaum was a Phoenix socialite seen at all the society balls in Phoenix, usually in the company of the Barry Goldwaters and Harry Rosenzweigs. In 1958 Greenbaum and his wife were found dead in their bed -- their throats cut. This inaugurated a series of grisly gangland-style slayings." Yes, I know that Quig is a left-wing ding-a-ling, but that doesn't make his information wrong, does it? Would that it did. (Actually, Goldwater's acquaintance with Greenbaum is well established). John McCain, like a lot of others, made his Faustian bargain in order to have a career in politics. It wasn't the first he had made, nor was it his last. If we continue to put such people at the head of our government, in time the entire country will become as rotten as Arkansas and Arizona already are. On second thought, a country that would abandon its sons to endless torment in Communist captivity as this country has done under the tutelage of the bureaucracy and the mainstream press, is pretty far gone already.

Kemper Marley, the Arizona godfather, certainly didn't lack for connections. In 1948, when so many of his employees were sent to prison, Marley had a slick mouthpiece who kept him in the clear. The lawyer's name is William Rehnquist, who is presently the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Mind you, I'm not suggesting that there is anything shady about lawyers keeping their clients out of prison -- that, after all, is their job, even if the clients are guilty. The point is that Marley was very well connected with the power elite.

Marley was often seen on the periphery of scandalous or illegal activity, but was never directly implicated in any of it, although strong suspicions persist even to the present day, particularly with regard to the murder of an Arizona Republic reporter named Don Bolles. According to Michael Wendland, who belonged to a group of journalists known as the "Investigative Reporters and Editors" that set up shop in Arizona to investigate the slaying, the group concluded that Marley was behind the killing of the Don Bolles.

It seems that Marley had arranged his own appointment to the state's racing commission by then-Gov. Gov. Raul Castro when Bolles began writing a series of articles about him detailing his checkered past. Bolles' expose forced Marley to resign from the commission. One of the revelations involved Eugene Hensley, the brother of McCain's father-in-law, who had done five years in a federal prison for skimming profits from a business venture. This is a well-known tactic used by organized crime figures. Bolles also mentioned that the Hensleys had sold their dog track to an individual connected with Emprise Corp., a mobbed-up dog track interest. Sen. McCain has been seen in the company of the principals of Emprise, according to Sampley. Quig notes that Bolles' motives in writing the articles may not have been entirely pure -- he appeared to have been living beyond his means and had been dealing with certain underworld figures. When he testified before the House Organized Crime Committee, Bolles had asked for and was given immunity.

Bolles was killed when a bomb was detonated beneath his car. He lived long enough to gasp, "They finally got me. The Mafia. Emprise. Find John (Harvey) Adamson." The police arrested Mr. Adamson who admitted placing the bomb, but maintained that it had been detonated by Jimmy (The Plumber) Robison. (It seems that Robison actually was a plumber who only did such odd jobs as a sideline). Tom Fitzpatrick of the Phoenix New Times wrote in an article dated February 10, 1993, that Phoenix police believed Marley wanted revenge against Bolles and sought the help of a local contractor named Max Dunlap who owed him a favor. Marley had once loaned Dunlap a million dollars and later told him that he needn't bother paying it back. All of which brings to mind that line mumbled by Marlon Brando in his portrayal of The Godfather, "Sometime, maybe nevah, I ask for a favah in retoin." The state prosecuted Dunlap for allegedly hiring Adamson to carry out the murder of Bolles, and Adamson, in turn, is alleged to have hired Robison to assist him. All three were convicted and sent to death row. Robison was subsequently acquitted in a retrial which he was granted on appeal. Dunlap remains in prison. Both he and Robison maintain that they are innocent. Marley was never arrested. He died in 1990. According to Quig, the Phoenix police prepared a profile of Marley about a week after the murder of Bolles. It showed that at one time Marley had been directly connected with the Capone mob operating the Transamerica Wire Service, used by bookies throughout the country. It was established for Capone's successors in 1941 by Gus Greenbaum. Another member of the "Arizona Project" as the journalist's task force was known, a reporter named Don Devereux, thinks they may have been taken in by local authorities. "We accepted very uncritically their scenario. In retrospect, we were very naive to get led around," he said later. "It really isn't something that we should be running around congratulating ourselves about," After most of the reporters had departed, Devereux stayed on and continued to dig into the Bolles case as a reporter for the Scottsdale (Ariz.) Progress. It was largely on the basis of his reporting that Dunlap and Robison were granted new trials. Robison was acquitted and Dunlap was convicted again. Just to illustrate how the political fix works in Arizona, Democratic Sen. Dennis DeConcini was in big trouble when he came up for re-election in 1990. He had been caught creaming $5 million in an Arizona land deal on the basis of his inside information as a senator. The Arizona machine which controlled both parties in the state did not want to lose DeConcini's seniority, so they talked the Republicans into putting up their weakest candidate -- sort of like the corrupt political machine that seeks to run this country is attempting to do right now with John McCain's candidacy. Their choice to run against DeConcini was a hapless individual named Keith DeGreen who was such a red- hot Republican he hadn't even bothered to vote in the previous two elections.

But surely all of this amounts to guilt by association. You bet it does -- with a vengeance. A man who aspires to be President of the United States has no business consorting with known criminals. But how can John McCain avoid this? He married into the family. Does that help to put the following news clip from the January 17, 1995, Arizona Republic into perspective? "About 300 guests turned out Saturday night to celebrate the 90th birthday of Joseph 'Joe Bananas' Bonanno, retired boss of New York's Bonanno crime family. He retired to Tucson in 1968. . . John McCain, R-Ariz., and Gov. Fife Symington sent their regards by telegram."

Fife Symington was too crooked even for Arizona -- he was forced to resign as governor of the state after being convicted on six counts of fraud in connection with his corrupt real estate dealings. He was subsequently sentenced to two and one-half years in prison. Symington and McCain had been thick as thieves (so to speak) for years prior to the governor's little run-in with the law. They even shared attorneys and political consultants. John McCain has never been known to play on a level field, he always has to have a leg-up. As a junior officer in the Navy he avoided being washed out of flight school despite his dearth of ability because his father was a high-ranking admiral. As soon as he saw his opportunity to score big in political and financial circles in Arizona, he dumped the disabled wife who had worked so tirelessly for him while he was a POW and married into the crime-family that ran the state at that time. He played off his father's position while he was a POW in order to get special treatment.

When the "mainstream" (left-wing) media came knocking at his door with a proposition to support him in the presidential primaries in return for his backing of campaign finance "reform," McCain jumped at the opportunity. Never mind that this legislation would deprive his own party of the capability to be heard in future political campaigns and give the leftist media a monopoly on political discourse in the country, thereby undermining the democratic process.

Such treachery comes naturally to McCain -- selling out and stabbing his former friends in the back is his preferred tactic. Ask the families of the POW/MIAs who enthusiastically backed McCain when he first ran for Congress only to be dry-gulched by him when he no longer found them useful. As a gratuitous sadistic flourish, McCain even had them investigated by the Justice Department on trumped-up charges. The fact that they were exonerated on all counts has yet to make an impression on McCain's airhead supporters who continue to trumpet the phony charges in deceitful neo-McCarthyite fashion. John McCain is an abysmal mediocrity who would never have made it on a level playing field. He was fifth from the bottom of his class at the Naval Academy. He racked up three life threatening "Dangerous Downs" at flight school -- the last one for flying his aircraft into the sea while asleep -- enough to get anyone without his political influence bounced down the back stairs. As for his record as a senator, can anyone remember a single significant thing this man has accomplished in more than a dozen years as a member of that august body? Anything other than sell out the POWs and promote the interests of Communist Vietnam, that is. To those who have recently determined that we just HAVE to have this man as our next president, I pose the following question: why?

Edward Zehr can be reached at ezehr@capaccess.org
Published in the Feb. 14, 2000 issue of The Washington Weekly

Copyright 2000 The Washington Weekly (http://www.federal.com)

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