After the 'scandal', the fightback
Updated on 22 February 2008
John McCain's team has been working flat out to turn the New York Times allegations about an inappopropriate relationship with lobbyist Vicki Iseman into a rallying cry for conservative Republicans.
Of course the political right is no friend of the Times and its image as the journal d'habitude of the liberal chattering classes.
So it was perhaps no surprise that the man who was once the darling of the media turned so swiftly on the journalists he believed were trying to bring him down.
An hour after the story first broke, his communications director Jill Hazelbaker was calling it "a hit and run smear campaign".
Conservative talk show hosts hit the airwaves, right wing pundits were block booked on TV political shows, bloggers began dubbing it a 'hatchet job'.
An hour after the story first broke, McCain's communications director was calling it 'a hit and run smear campaign'.
A mass fundraising drive was launched by McCain's aides, to capitalise on any sympathy generated by the whole fuss. The denial press conference was brief and to the point, a 'fact checking' press release was sent out, putting his side of the story across.
A classic lesson, perhaps, in how to jump on a potential scandal and reframe the story in a completely different light - with the media as villains, not the candidate.
It's a message certain to appeal to the Republican base.
Gennifer Flowers may have come out on television to offer advice to Ms Iseman, but this was no Clinton-type sex scandal - not yet, at any rate.
By contrast, it took the NYT until the next day to come out and defend its story. But perhaps the most remarkable thing is that the piece was published at all.
The New Republic details what happened behind the scenes at the paper - which had been sitting on the story for more than three months.
The article claims the paper's executive editor didn't think there were enough concrete facts to nail down the allegations. While he prevaricated, one frustrated reporter left the paper altogether.
In fact the first public version of the allegations appeared on the Drudge report back in December - in a piece revealing that McCain's team were trying to get the story spiked.
Speculation about the piece mounted - until this week, when it finally came out - amid lingering doubts as to whether it really had come up with the goods.
"Nothing forced our hand," the NYT Washington Bureau chief Dean Baquet is quoted as saying. And editors insisted: "we publish stories when they are ready."
But the backlash had also been brewing for months - and the McCain team were far readier that the Times for the fight to come.
Thus far the Times has received more than 2,400 comments from readers - and its reporting team are answering questions online.
And all this from the paper that actually endorsed McCain for the nomination just a month ago, when it was already in possession of the full facts behind its story.
Did the op-ed team really not realise what their investigative colleagues were about to publish?
None of this is likely to stop John McCain becoming the Republican presidential nominee. But the more interesting question is - has he proved his ability to withstand the wider battle to come with flying colours?
And how should his Democratic challenger - be it Obama, or Clinton, plan for that?
