Posted on Monday, January 5, 2004 - 9:58 pm:

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The American Prospect published an articile this week openly questioning whether the Bush campaign is engaging in a whispering campaign intent on scoring political points from John McCain's meeting in November with the Log Cabin Republicans.

GOP Presidential candidate and Texas Gov. George W. Bush told Tim Russert on Meet the Press that he would "probably not" meet with the Log Cabin Republicans, the gay Republican group that John McCain had met with only a couple weeks earlier. In a widely repeated statement, Bush said such a meeting would create "kind of a huge political, you know, nightmare for people."

The Prospect supposes that part of Bush's reluctance to meet with the gay Republican group stems from Bush advisers who think using the meeting as a wedge issue against McCain might be useful -- especially if Bush does poorly against McCain in the New Hampshire primary.

The Prospect notes that Bill Kristol, who publishes the arch-conservative Weekly Standard, was the first to publicly connect Bush's answer on Meet the Press to future efforts aimed at using the gay meeting against McCain. Kristol first mentioned it on ABC's This Week and later on another of Tim Russert's shows on CNBC.

"If McCain wins New Hampshire," Kristol quoted Bush strategist Ralph Reed as saying, "Pat Robertson will come out for Bush in South Carolina...And not only will he come out for Bush, he'll go negative on McCain on campaign finance reform." Kristol then said he believed the Bush campaign was already trying to curry favor with South Carolina conservatives by getting out the word about McCain's meeting with Log Cabin Republicans.

The Prospect notes that roughly a week after McCain's meeting with the gay group on November 9, a series of anonymous letters appeared in the mailboxes of 23 South Carolina state representatives who endorsed McCain's run for the Republican nomination. Clipped to a copy of a Nov. 10 Washington Times article which read in part, "Sen. John McCain is going after the homosexual Republican vote as no other serious presidential nomination contender has in his party in recent memory," were typed notes that said, "So this is the candidate you're supporting?"

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