In the wake of the story in the New York Times concerning a close relationship Mr. McCain had with a young woman lobbyist, we should revisit what happened last year when Terry Nelson and John Weaver resigned from his campaign. My colleagues Daniel and Richard have covered this story well, and they’ve got some interesting angles, but this one is the best.

How does a candidate handle it when his aides work hard to quash a story (as McCain staffers and McCain himself allegedly did), yet the story breaks anyway. Heck, I’m on record as noting that this story isn’t going to hurt John McCain in the long run. I even agree to some degree with Will Bunch that the story will help John McCain unite his party behind him. Nothing like a little anger against the supposed liberal media to bring Republicans together, after all.

But at the presidential level of a campaign, it’s all about a candidates ability to organize around chaos, and surround himself with competent people. Here’s the resignation statements of Weaver and Nelson from July of 2007, and of course they’re all nicey nice:

“This morning I informed Senator McCain that I would be resigning from his presidential campaign, effective immediately. It has been a tremendous honor to serve Senator McCain and work on his campaign. I believe John McCain is the most experienced and prepared candidate to represent the Republican Party and defeat the Democratic nominee next year.” - Terry Nelson, Campaign Manager

“As of today, I have resigned my position as chief strategist to John McCain’s presidential campaign. It has been my honor and a distinct privilege to serve someone who has always put our country first. I believe that most Americans will come to the conclusion that I have long known there is only one person equipped to serve as our nation’s chief executive and deal with the challenges we face, and that person is John McCain.” - John Weaver, Chief Strategist

(Richard’s comment: Make sure you click through on the link - there were more bodies being jettisoned from the McCain campaign at the time. Chief of Staff Mark Salter had also resigned.)

There are two issues here that reflect poorly on John McCain, above and beyond the NYT article. First, John McCain is the one who put these people in place in his campaign. He’s the CEO of the campaign, and Weaver and Nelson were his top guys. What does it say that he cans these guys both at the same time, in the midst of his 2007 meltdown? I’m here to say this is an example of incompetence. Yup, and incompetence is what we’ve suffered with for seven years, with John McCain supporting the Bush incompetence nearly every step of the way. Heck, if you can’t even manage your own campaign and inspire trust from your top people, what are we to expect if you ascend to the highest office in the land. Of course, no media is going to cover the angle that McCain’s mismanagement is what led to this bloodletting.

Second, “bloodletting” is the proper term here. There’s no organization in this world that loses three top managers without rampant speculation about what went on behind the scenes. What, it was just a bit ago, in the last two weeks, where Republican Senators were worrying about John McCain’s temper. Without evidence to the contrary, which John McCain did NOT give at the time of the firings, this incident should be interpreted as another example of that rumored hot temper of Mr. Straight-Talker, and his ability to surround himself with competent staff.

And that’s what’s even more concerning than his potential dalliances with lobbyists.

All this said, I wish Mrs. McCain and their family the best. Really I do.