We all know John McCain has lived up to his high ideals by canning a bunch of lobbyists in the last couple weeks, folks who were highly influential in the McCain campaign and also lobbied, for instance, on behalf of anti-democracy types in places like Ukraine. Now John McCain has another policy that he’s going to have to live up to, but I bet he isn’t enough of a straight talker to do so. Here’s John McCain’s new policy concerning 527 groups, from moresoftmoneyhardlaw.com:

No person with a McCain Campaign title or position may participate in a 527 or other independent entity that makes public communications that support or oppose any presidential candidate.

Of course, that source, More Soft Money, Hard Law, thinks McCain is safe because he’s got a couple minor loopholes. He’s got “wiggle” room or something. But the problem is that McCain has already gotten rid of a campaign staffer based on those words of policy his campaign wants to stand by. According to the Politico more than a week ago:

John McCain’s campaign asked a prominent Republican consultant, Craig Shirley, to leave his official campaign role Thursday after a Politico inquiry about Shirley’s dual role consulting for the campaign and for an independent 527 group opposing the Democratic presidential candidates. The campaign also released a new conflict-of-interest policy barring such arrangements.

Shirley, a conservative public relations veteran, doubled as a consultant to McCain and to Stop Her Now, a 527 group barred from coordinating its activities with presidential campaigns. He is not currently on the McCain campaign’s payroll but will also step down from his role on McCain’s Virginia Leadership Team said McCain spokesman Brian Rogers.

I suppose there’s going to be arguments that Vets for Freedom, which has run ads against Barack Obama, is not actually working against a candidate in this race, but if McCain decides to trot out that little bit of “wiggle room,” he’s far from the straight talker he pretends to be. (Oh, yes, I’m fully aware that with McCain the straight talker thing is all a game of pretend. He’s like a four year old playing Superman with a red tablecloth, and that would be cute except that John McCain is OLDER than Superman!) Here’s “Vets for Freedom” and their supposed nonpartisan campaign — lots of video goodness! And here’s the Board members of the organization, including Lindsey Graham, Joe Lieberman, and Max Boot, McCain’s foreign policy advisor.

So, when is John McCain going to disown Joe Lieberman, Lindsey Graham and Max Boot? My bet is never, though that would be in direct contradiction to his stated policy. McCain, if confronted about this issue, will issue some weasly responses and whiney excuses instead of doing anything close to straight talking. It’s time we ratchet up on this issue, as DailyKos has. As they note, Graham is McCain’s National Co-Chair, and Lieberman is Co-Chair of the McCain Campaign for Connecticut. Let’s get the media to ask the right questions of John McCain and make him live up to his own policies.