No word from the McCain campaign yet (and very little interest from our TradMed obsessed by ads blanketing America about Reverend Wright) in response to NEW questions about John McCain’s involvement in leaks from the United States Senate’s investigation into the Keating Five.

What are these newly discovered questions, really?  Senate Ethics Committee private investigator Clark "Bud" Hall explained McCain’s involvement in the leaks of Keating Five investigative secrets: 

Hall arrived with a colleague to McCain’s office, sometime between 1990 and 1991, armed with a letter signed by Heflin and fellow Senator Warren Rudman–which he "carried like a pistol in [his] holster," according to Hall–urging cooperation with the investigation. By the time he reached McCain, Hall had spent three months on the investigation and had already interviewed approximately 60 people, including Senators Bob Dole, Rudman, and DeConcini. "In an investigation, when you have a target that looks good, so to speak … you wait ’til the very end ’til you interview him because you want all the information you can get. Second, you want him to be a little nervous," said Hall.

Hall and McCain had never met, yet soon as Hall entered, he knew McCain was not glad to see him. "He looked at me hard, right in the eyes," said Hall. He believes McCain "felt like he was being forced. … He was there because his attorney told him he had to [be there]."McCain would not respond to any of Hall’s questions about the leaks, but every so often would say, "you’re crazy," "you’re crazy, man, you’re crazy." This went on for about 15 minutes by Hall’s estimation.

"It was one of the strangest things I’ve seen," says Hall. "And as a professional investigator, I’ve interviewed a lot of weird people. … I am a professional investigator and he treated me like some guy off the street. I just came away with a very bad impression." Eventually Hall addressed McCain’s lawyer and told him that because his client was not being responsive to the inquiry, the meeting was over.

The report Hall wrote after his investigation is privileged Ethics Committee information and is under permanent restrictions–Hall himself said he did not have a copy of it, having turned all notes and documents to the Committee, including his interview transcripts, which, according to one source, feature dozens of interviews with McCain associates, family members, and in some cases intimate friends. His final report was formally inconclusive but argued for a strong trail of circumstantial evidence that pointed in McCain’s direction. In our interview, he was emphatic on this point. "There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that McCain made those leaks." 

Additionally, Senate Ethics Committee Special Independent Counsel Peter Fleming conducted a separate, public inquiry into the leaks. His findings were equally damning for the self-serving McCain:

First, Washington Times reporter Jerry Seper told a congressional staffer that he heard a taped conversation between McCain and Paul Rodriguez, his colleague at the Times who wrote many of the stories containing the leaks, and that he had also received independent information confirming McCain as the source of the leaks. This would have been important evidence, except that Seper declined to testify under a subpoena, asserting first amendment privileges. However, Seper, now the chief investigative reporter at The Washington Times, recently told The New Republic about the leaks that McCain "got a walk on that." Seper said, "[H]e did what they said he did, no doubt."

A second episode in the Fleming report that pointed to McCain happened when the senator held his much-publicized "mea culpa" news conference in October 1989 to acknowledge his mistakes during the Keating affair. Even in this moment of contrition, McCain was simultaneously on the attack, releasing – according to the Fleming report — a heavy-handed memo that DeConcini’s office sent to regulators. The next day, the Arizona Republic had two headlines that both benefited McCain: "McCain Meets the Press" and "DeConcini Staffer’s Memo Bared." In his report, Fleming wrote that he had discovered the leaked memo had "come to press from Senator McCain’s office, and the juxtaposition of the two articles is disturbing."

Finally, Fleming concluded in his report that partisanship was the motive for the leaks and that they were designed to hurt DeConcini, Riegle, and Cranston. A Republican spokesman, quoted in the Fleming report, explained the politics: If enough people pressured the Committee into releasing McCain–the only Republican–and Glenn, who still had a heroic aura around him from his astronaut days, from the investigation, then the Keating Five would become the "Keating Three," and the GOP could then use the whole affair against the Democrats. Fleming also concluded that while Glenn "presumably stood to benefit by disclosure[s] … there is simply a total absence of evidence implicating Glenn."

It’s time for the Republican campaign to stop the idiotic focus on Barack Obama’s trip to Hawaii to visit his dying grandmother. It’s time for our So-Called-Liberal-Media to stop talking about the impact of these stupid ads with Reverend Wright. It’s time for the talking heads and cable gasbags to stop asking how John McCain can find a path to victory tomorrow.

It’s time for John McCain to answer these questions about the leaks of the United States Senate’s Keating Five investigation. These are questions that, if answered, could result in his expulsion from the Senate.

Don’t the American people deserve answers to these questions?