Between 1982 and 1987, McCain received approximately $112,000 in political contributions from Keating and his associates. In addition, McCain's wife, Cindy, and her father, James Willis Hensley, a wealthy Anheuser-Busch distributor, had invested $359,100 in a Keating shopping center in April 1986, a year before McCain met with the regulators.
McCain, his family and baby-sitter made at least nine trips at Keating's expense, sometimes aboard the American Continental jet. After learning Keating was in trouble over Lincoln, McCain paid for the air trips totaling $13,433.
Eventually the real estate venture failed, leaving many broke. Federal regulators ultimately filed a $1.1 billion civil racketeering and fraud suit against Keating, accusing him of siphoning Lincoln's deposits to his family and into political campaigns. The five senators came under investigation for attempting to influence the regulators.
In the end, none of the senators was convicted of any crime, although McCain was rebuked by the Senate Ethics Committee for exercising "poor judgment" in intervening with the federal regulators on Keating's behalf. On his Keating Five experience, McCain said: "The appearance of it was wrong. It's a wrong appearance when a group of senators appear in a meeting with a group of regulators, because it conveys the impression of undue and improper influence. And it was the wrong thing to do."
The question that this blogger has, however, is whether McCain can survive this newest scandal. No matter how hard his campaign tries to play it down, it's not going to go away any time soon.
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Volume III, Number 12
Copyright 2008, Skeeter Sanders. All rights reserved.
McCain, his family and baby-sitter made at least nine trips at Keating's expense, sometimes aboard the American Continental jet. After learning Keating was in trouble over Lincoln, McCain paid for the air trips totaling $13,433.
Eventually the real estate venture failed, leaving many broke. Federal regulators ultimately filed a $1.1 billion civil racketeering and fraud suit against Keating, accusing him of siphoning Lincoln's deposits to his family and into political campaigns. The five senators came under investigation for attempting to influence the regulators.
In the end, none of the senators was convicted of any crime, although McCain was rebuked by the Senate Ethics Committee for exercising "poor judgment" in intervening with the federal regulators on Keating's behalf. On his Keating Five experience, McCain said: "The appearance of it was wrong. It's a wrong appearance when a group of senators appear in a meeting with a group of regulators, because it conveys the impression of undue and improper influence. And it was the wrong thing to do."
# # #
Volume III, Number 12
Copyright 2008, Skeeter Sanders. All rights reserved.
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