WASHINGTON - Two weeks ago John McCain was on a roll, rising in the polls in the aftermath of his daring pick of the down-home Sarah Palin as his running mate and seemingly successful in his attempts to convince Americans he was not a George W. Bush clone.
And then the U.S. economy started to implode.
Since then, McCain's standing in the polls has slid as he's been roundly derided, even by his usual cheerleaders on the right, for his confused handling of the crisis. An ABC-Washington Post survey released Wednesday had Democratic nominee Barack Obama ahead of his Republican rival by a margin of 52 per cent vs. 43 per cent.
Meanwhile, McCain's erstwhile saviour, Palin, has been cloistered away from the media in ways that have prompted the Republicans to be accused of sexism for behaving as if they thought she couldn't handle tough questions.
On Wednesday, the latest bit of bad news confronted McCain: his campaign manager, Rick Davis, was linked financially to one of the giant mortgage firms the U.S. government recently bailed out.
Davis's lobbying firm reportedly received $15,000 a month from Freddie Mac until the latter was taken over by the government. McCain insisted on Sunday that Davis hadn't had any financial ties to Freddie Mac for several years.
The McCain campaign denied the New York Times report, which cited two people "with direct knowledge of the arrangement."
The Associated Press also reported on the story. Speaking on condition of anonymity, a person familiar with the contract told AP the $15,000 a month in payments to Davis's firm started around the end of 2005 and continued until the past month or so.
"As has been previously reported, Mr. Davis separated from his consulting firm, Davis Manafort, in 2006," the McCain campaign said in a statement just a few days after it accused the Times publicly of biased reporting.
"As has been previously reported, Mr. Davis has seen no income from Davis Manafort since 2006. Zero. Mr. Davis has received no salary or compensation since 2006. Mr. Davis has received no profit or partner distributions from that firm on any basis -- weekly, bi-weekly, monthly, bi-monthly, quarterly, semi-annual or annual -- since 2006. Again, zero."
But the Obama campaign was hammering away at the story.
"It is now clear that both John McCain and Rick Davis did not tell the truth about Davis's continuing financial relationship with Freddie Mac," read a statement on the Democratic campaign's website.
"It's troubling not only that Davis's firm -- with which he is still associated and which the McCain campaign paid directly last year -- continued to be compensated by Freddie Mac until as recently as last month, but that the firm did little work and apparently was being paid simply to provide access to the McCain campaign."
The controversy is just the latest example of how hard the U.S. economic woes are hitting McCain, just days before the first in a series of critical debates between the presidential candidates.
"As long as the focus remains on the financial crisis, John McCain's at a real disadvantage," Stephen Hess of the Brookings Institute said Wednesday.
But Hess, once a staffer in both the Dwight D. Eisenhower and Richard Nixon administrations, suggests McCain's legendary tendency toward high-stake political gambles might come into play as congressional hearings continue into the federal government's proposed US$700 billion bailout of the country's struggling banks and financial companies.
"He could change the focus because he's basically a gambler, a high-risk gambler ... that's his history," Hess said.
"I don't know where he's going to come out on the bailout, but if he came out against the president of his party at a time when the polls show that the bailout is not popular on Main Street, that would have repercussions. And when he's been in a corner before, he's rolled the dice."
Obama and McCain square off for the first time in Mississippi on Friday night on foreign policy and national security, with many observers saying their performance during the showdowns could influence the millions of undecided voters who will determine who wins the White House in November.
McCain heads into the debates as his campaign is also battling the national media on the Palin front.
New organizations have been assailing his campaign for refusing to let reporters anywhere near Palin, especially on her visit to New York, where she's meeting with international leaders this week. Reporters have been banned from asking the Alaska governor any questions amid repeated accusations from McCain strategists that much of the nation's media is "in the tank" for Obama.
"I have had enough of the sexist treatment of Sarah Palin," CNN anchor Campbell Brown said. "I call on the McCain campaign to stop treating Sarah Palin like she's a delicate flower that will wilt at any moment .... Free Sarah Palin. Free her from the chauvinistic chains you are binding her with."
