McCain doesn't know how many homes he ownsFollow

I could only dream of spending that much on groceries. Between the whole family (including wife, two kids, the dog and me) we dumped almost $800. With my son being 8 years old and daughter 3, the majority of that $800 was spent on Apple Jacks and fruit snacks.

ETA: Yes, it was pretty pathetic that McCain couldn't say how many houses he owns...and I am a Republican. It still won't make me vote for Obama though.

Edited, Aug 22nd 2008 11:01am by shadomen

You're also not married to a wealthy woman with a pre-nuptual agreement that separates your finances and a non-disclosure agreement between the two of you so that you can't commit an act of conflict of interest as a US senator.

You did know that he's legally not allowed to know her finances, right? He can't know what investments she has or what properties she owns (aside from their own personal homes presumably). He's used that fact in the past to protect himself from potential conflict of interest charges. We can certainly debate the degree to which he does or does not really know about his wife's business, but if he were to rattle off an exact number of homes, including investment properties, that would call in question the degree to which he's sticking to that non-disclosure and therefore his claim that he's not influenced by her finances when making decisions as a Senator.

And that just gives legs to any dredging up of the Keating incident. He's much much better off having people think he's a bit out of touch financially then thinking that he's been lying about his lack of knowledge of his wifes finances for the last 20+ years.

Even though I hate Gbaji and wish he was dead, here is what they could have done: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postnuptial_agreement



Got a cite for this? It seems that is a pretty stupid way to shield against a conflict of interest. Full transparency better lends itself to avoiding such conflicts. If there are conflicts, one would then just say "hey I can't know about that so it's not a conflict."



The argument is that he doesn't know because he is so rich. Argue all you want what is his or not or what he should or shouldn't know about, but it doesn't matter. He is rich and he is living that lifestyle.

We can certainly debate the degree to which he does or does not really know about his wife's business, but if he were to rattle off an exact number of homes, including investment properties, that would call in question the degree to which he's sticking to that non-disclosure and therefore his claim that he's not influenced by her finances when making decisions as a Senator.


Again, property holdings are public record. I can find out how many properties anyone owns with a title search. If they use holding companies, it's slightly and I do mean slightly harder. There's no way for him to claim he's required not to know what property she owns. If she has a blind trust, and I have no idea if that's the case, neither of them would know where it was invested, not just him. The idea that she'd know but keep it secret from him and that would meet the ethical standard is ******* insane.

I've heard this from a number of sources, but this is probably the most direct mention of it I could find on short notice. Note, it's a hatchet piece on McCain, so we can assume this isn't coming from someone trying to help him in anyway. The relevant paragraph is here:




You're free to do your own research, but my understanding is that he regularly signs some sort of "I don't know my wifes financial interest in this, and don't benefit myself" statement when doing any sort of funding or tax legislation and has for a long time. In the specific example quoted, it's why he wasn't charged with a crime in that case. If he were too easily able to recall the exact numbers of properties that his wife owned at any given time, it would certainly call into question his repeated insistence that he doesn't know about her finances. And yes. I realize that he could certainly find out if he wanted Smash, but that's not the point. If she's telling him that, or he's finding it out on his own, why should we assume he's not in the know regarding other aspects of her finances as well?

It's not that it's directly illegal, but presumably he's signed many documents over the years in which he's declared that he doesn't know this information. That makes him subject to potential legal action if there's evidence that he does. Fraud charges at the very least.


So yeah. Given the circumstances of his situation regarding his wifes finances, it's not unusual at all that he'd consciously *not* pay attention to things like how many properties she owns. He has to just to be sure not to even raise the suspicion that he might be cheating. It would be akin to someone on probation for drug dealing being able to tell you exactly how many drug houses are currently in operation in the local area. Sure. It doesn't prove that he's dealing drugs, but it certainly is very suspicious...

You're looking at it backwards IMO. Because he has a prenuptial agreement, when he joined the Senate, this meant that his wife's financial benefit was not directly *his* financial benefit. Which was convenient on the one hand, but dangerous on the other. He can't put her money in a blind trust for example, because he can't legally make her do that. While he can't be charged for doing something that directly benefits him, he can still be investigated for it, and if it can be shown he knowingly took an action as a member of Congress designed to benefit his wife (and therefore their children), he could still get into some serious trouble.

After the Keating 5 incident McCain began taking much greater pains to distance himself from her finances. In a way, he treats her finances just like a "blind trust" in that he swears that he doesn't know where her money is, thus absolving him of any possibility of a conflict of interest. It's fundamentally the same thing. However, since there's no third party involved in handling the money, he has to be diligent himself at making sure he doesn't know anything about where her money is invested.


In that context, knowing exactly how many houses she owns would indicate that he knew something about her finances. If he knows that much, how much more does he know? It would open him up to investigation right before the election. I suspect that's exactly why the question was asked in fact. Some smart Journalist realized that by asking that question he gets a "win win" answer. If he rattles off the information, you write a story about how suspicious it is that he knows this information and imply that he might have been lying all these years about his lack of involvement or knowledge of her finances. If he doesn't, you get a story about how out of touch he is with the average Joe.


It's a good setup question really. And as much as some are trying to bash him on this, what his answer really shows is that he doesn't pay attention at all to her finances. The counter logic is also true. If he can't even say how many houses they own, it's pretty unlikely that he's going to know how much she's got invested in which ventures and where. In the sense that the question could be seen as an honesty test, he passed with flying colors...

That completely failed to state that McCain wasn't allowed any knowledge of his wife's properties. All it said was that some specific real estate deal didn't benefit him.

In fact, the Vogue article I quoted before has Cindy explicitly saying that she discussed with John buying another condo because the one they had now by the beach had too many family members visiting. That doesn't sound too much like a wall of silence to me.Well, I'm free to assume that you're full of shit when you declare that McCain can't legally know about her properties and then back it up with something that doesn't address that assertation at all. That doesn't take any research at all.Ahh... your "understanding". Right. You've been so credible in these things before that now I feel much better.

Making false statements on signed legal documents is illegal.

If McCain has *ever* signed a form affirming that he has no knowledge of his wife's financial interest as a way to cover for a conflict of interest in any matter facing him as a member of Congress (and I'm betting he has, dozens of times at least), he's subject to criminal charges if at any time it becomes known that he did know that information.


I thought that was clear the last 5 times I made essentially the same statement. Do you understand now?

In a way, he treats her finances just like a "blind trust"

Is it the same way that you apply logic? Sure seems like it.

You mean how many Cindy has?" His answer, stuttered as it was, indicates that

He forgets things. Like where Pakistan is. Or what a Sunni is.

I mean we all know that stormin Jack McCain knows these things, he's just prone to forgetting. Like most people who should be in nursing homes.

Being a PoW emeritus is hard work, Joph.