Date: Mon Nov 1 04:24:55 1999 From: boone@TIMA.COM (Michael Boone) Subject: Arizona Republic To: AZRKBA@asu.edu
XXXXX DRUDGE REPORT XXXXX SUNDAY, OCTOBER 31, 1999 00:29:08 ET XXXXX
ARIZONA REPUBLIC QUESTIONS MCCAIN'S FITNESS TO BE PREZ
In a shriek Sunday editorial, the home state newspaper of Arizona Senator John McCain says there is "reason to seriously question" whether the war hero candidate "has the temperament, and the political approach and skills, we want in the next president."
The conservative newspaper ARIZONA REPUBLIC, which has backed McCain in all of his Senate bids, opens its only Sunday editorial by saying "it is time the rest of the nation learned about the John McCain we know in Arizona."
The ASSOCIATED PRESS reported in am cycles that the newspaper decided to run the editorial "partly out of frustration that the American electorate is not getting the complete McCain story from the national media."
The editorial details news reports describing McCain's "volcanic temper that appeared in the last week in both the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal's editorial page. It calls McCain's angry reaction to the articles "hogwash" and says his comments were "not an untypical McCain remark: unfounded, sarcastic and condescending."
The AP carries a response from McCain spokesman Dan Schnur who says "voters ought to decide for themselves if they want a candidate who gets angry when they see an injustice, or would they rather have someone who rolls over and hides."
The REPUBLIC editorial has stunned political observers, who can't recall a state's major paper ever being so critical of a favorite-son presidential candidate in the primaries.
Developing...