They're Not Giving McCain Money Because They Think He's an Asshole

Really, how much more simple is it than that?

Few House Republicans have contributed to Sen. John McCain since he clinched the Republican nomination at the end of February.

McCain, Arizona’s senior senator, has had a far warmer reception in the upper chamber. At least 22 Senate colleagues have contributed to McCain’s campaign, including Sen. Joe Lieberman (Conn.), an Independent who attends Democratic caucus meetings. [out of 49!]

Only 21 House Republicans have given to McCain from their personal campaign accounts since he became the presumptive GOP nominee four and a half months ago, according to an analysis of House fundraising reports made public Wednesday. [out of 199!]

In addition, eleven House Republicans who did not give from their personal campaign accounts this year contributed from their leadership political action committees (PACs), according to fundraising reports covering the election cycle through the end of May.

So while nearly half the Senate GOP conference has given to McCain, less than 20 percent of House Republicans have pitched in.

How is it that ALL of them have not given the nominee of their party any money? I mean, a hundred bucks. Fifty bucks. Here you go. Perfunctory and obligatory, there's your money, now go run for President and lose. Ten bucks? Five?

Here's the answer you won't find in the Mancrush Media--a startling number of the members of the House and the Senate think John McCain is a self-centered, heavy-handed flaming asshole. They have, repeatedly and consistently, been saying as much since the day McCain got to the Hill. The people who have glommed onto McCain don't like him--they want things from him. He engenders little or no camaraderie with people beneath him and probably had more friends on the Democratic side of the aisle than on the Republican side--like Lieberman (who used to pretend to be a Democrat) and ex-buddy John Kerry. Good luck finding anyone who has the guts to write that--they are few and far between.

Update: Case in point. "McCain's Humor Often Backfires."

McCain's political allies also sometimes feel the sting. He has jokingly threatened staffers with waterboarding (a practice he condemns as torture). After former Texas Sen. Phil Gramm, a close McCain adviser, dismissed talk of a bad economy as mere psychology, McCain told reporters he planned to make Gramm — who had been seen as a prospective Treasury secretary — ambassador to Belarus.

--WS