Kerry and McCain, Redux
Judging from Memeorandum, there’s already quite a bit of reaction on this non-story from Fox New’s Tony Snow program: Transcript: McCain on Kerry. The money ‘graph:
SNOW: Now John Kerry, is it true that John Kerry asked you to be his vice president?
McCAIN: Uh, no. No, it was never offered.
SNOW: It was never offered. So, it may have been discussed elliptically, but never flat out request.
McCAIN: Never was an offer, no.
SNOW: When you had conversations, did you think it was a little weird that he̢۪d be calling you, even in general terms about this sort of thing?
McCAIN: Well, he and I have been friends for a number of years because of our efforts on POWs and MIAs which was a very hot issue back in the early 90̢۪s, a lot of people have forgotten about it, but it was a- and we worked together to try to resolve that issue and I appreciate the work that he did on it. And, so it̢۪s not unusual for us to have conversations.
SNOW: Right. But, so- I want to just lay to rest once and for all: never approached you, never hinted that he wanted to talk to you about being vice president. All that kind of stuff was made up.
McCAIN: Well, I cannot attest to that. All I can tell you is my conversations with him were private conversations, but he never offered it.
So, Kerry broached the subject, McCain let him know he would not accept the job if offered, and he wasn’t offered it. And now McCain is declining to rub his friend’s nose in that fact.
Why this would require a retraction of reports that Kerry offered him the job is unclear.
