David Sirota,
 
OK, I don't mind a writer taking a candidate to task on a factual basis, but when I see the long knives of character assassination come out to do a hit piece on the only candidate of character in the current presidential election, I am compelled to counter what are likely to become liberal talking points.

You started out by quoting the Washington Post as if it were an unimpeachable source of facts. This immediately lost you credibility, as most thinking people look at the Post like they do the rest of the mainstream media, like they see Dan Rather, in the tank for the Democrat party. I actually don't know what Senator McCain's policies regarding lobbyists are, but I do know that it is laughable to hold up a Democrat candidate such as, oh, say senator Hillary Clinton as a paragon of virtue when it comes to relations with lobbyists. If you were a real journalist you would go do a story on the Clinton's business relations with foreign governments. You know how much money they made, now go find out where it came from, do some real investigative reporting, see if there is a conflict of interest with a potential future president of the US instead of nit picking at McCain for perfectly legal fund-raising. And if he is such a suck up to the lobbyists, I'd have to say he's pretty much a failure at it, because compared to your two he's hasn't raised squat from lobbyists. And how about those earmarks (we used to call it pork) McCain has written since his senate debut, pretty pathetic compared to your 2 outstanding citizens, right? Why don't you report those numbers, you twit! I would think you Dem's would want to keep your mouth shut when you're talking about candidate corruption, just so voters don't make the obvious comparison. Better you should talk about how old he is, or how awkward his arms are when he tries to lift them, or how his voice doesn't make a thrill run up your leg. Best not talk about his laugh though, it might invite unwanted comparisons to the forced cackle of one of your two champions.

If McCain is now for drilling in ANWR that means he has evaluated our situation and believes it is now in our nations best interest to begin decreasing the national dependence on foreign energy sources. And I approve that message because his opposition to drilling in ANWR and off our coasts was one of the things on which I disagreed with him. I don't mind a candidate flipping on a subject when they have a principled reason for it.
 
You may be too young to remember McCain's involvement in the influence-peddling scheme nick-named the Keating 5, but if you really wanted to practice journalism you would have dug deep enough to find out that McCain was the token republican thrown under the bus by the investigating committee (mostly Dem's) because the other 4 were democrats. There was no substantive evidence of wrongdoing by McCain. The whole thing was so traumatic to the Senator that it prompted him to get involved in campaign finance reform and author the McCain-Feingold act, with what I believe were unintended consequences. As far as Congress writing new regulations for Wall Street, you obviously don't understand that Congress was the problem in the first place, with the Dem's jawboning the industry to lower lending standards so that "these poor underprivileged people could get loans". And the solution is to keep the government out of it, the market is fixing it, the industry has already quit writing shaky loans to illegal aliens. I understand that liberals think the government is the solution to every problem, but in reality the government is most of the problem, as McCain understands.
 
McCain wasn't my first choice of candidate, but compared to the two dorks you guys are putting up he's a prince in shining armor! One of yours is a pathological lier, and so slimy you have to wash your hands after watching her on TV, the other has learned to control most of his lying, but is working extremely hard to keep voters from learning that he's just another empty suit pol on the take (now there's an investigation for you, Obama and Rezko, at least as important as the Keating 5, might get your merit badge on that one), and cuddling up to an America hater to boot! This country doesn't need that and deserves better! And when the media comes out from under the spell of his melifluous voice and asks him how he's going to solve this problem or that problem, it's always "I'll raise taxes", occasionally varied by the ever popular "I'll raise taxes on the rich". I'll bet the subtext of that line is "but not the famous, because they feed our campaign coffers, and they make such great anti-war movies". Both your candidates are socialists, and while you might dance a jig to see another one in office, it wouldn't do much for the average joe to see a stagnant economy go on for the entire time they were in office. Because that's what socialism does, just look at Cuba and the old Soviet Union for proof. Pay some attention to Hugo Chavez's Venezuela too, for a look at an incipient societal meltdown.
 
The fact is, David, that ever since a bunch of Muslims operating on a perverted version of their religion carried out a plan to murder 3000 innocent Americans on 9/11/2001, the economic cornucopia that is the US has been pumping out resources faster than we can replenish them. So if the Dem's get in office and do what they say they are going to do, our economy is going to pretty much grind to a halt. Both your candidates have expressed enmity to big business and industry, and offered to run the economy single handedly (for which they are both eminently qualified?). Not to mention their commitment to the Al Gore scam of global warming. Yes I know McCain has said "what can it hurt?", that's another disagreement I have with him. What it can hurt is our economy! The governor of Washington state (or at least the Seattle area), has unilaterally signed the provisions of the Kyoto treaty into law in Washington. I'm not sure all our residents understand what that's going to cost them since she didn't put it up to a vote of the people. And wait until we get the bill for the isolation dome over the state to keep everybody else's greenhouse gases out of here!
 
I'm not a journalist, I'm just a dumb old guy with too much time to think on my hands. So if I can figure out who your two clowns are, don't you think most of the rest of the voters can too? So my challenge to you is to do some real reporting, investigate these claims, then write a rebuttal to your column. Be the first Dem on the block to view the big picture and help sink the SS Minnow for the second time. You might even feel good for a change, and if you do I'll buy you a nice dinner!
 
Curt Greer
Marysville, WA