In one of its more misguided moments, the McCain campaign decided to attack Obama for having close ties to former Fannie Mae officials. The basis for the attacks:
— Obama had initially picked Jim Johnson, former chairman and CEO of Fannie Mae, to vet vice-presidential candidates
— Former Fannie Mae chief executive Franklin Raines has been advising Obama on mortgage and housing policy

But here’s the thing. One, McCain’s vice-presidential candidates were vetted by Arthur B. Culvahouse Jr., a former Fannie lobbyist. Two, the McCain campaign has much broader and deeper ties to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac than the Obama campaign does:

… one of McCain’s top policy advisors, Charlie Black, was lobbyist for Freddie Mac for 10 years, while his campaign manager, Rick Davis, lobbied to help Fannie and Freddie steer clear of additional federal regulations (which, obviously, would have been pretty helpful in retrospect).

But wait, there’s more. Tom Loeffler, who served as McCain’s campaign co-chairman, also lobbied for Fannie Mae. Aquiles Suarez, a McCain economic advisor, was a Fannie Mae executive. Dan Crippen, a McCain advisor who helped craft the campaign’s health-care policy, lobbied for Fannie Mae (and Merrill Lynch). Arthur B. Culvahouse, who helped lead McCain’s VP search committee, also lobbied for Fannie Mae. In all, McCain has 19 people who are either advisors or fundraisers who lobbied for either Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac.

Morover, Raines has never advised Obama, and the McCain campaign knew this before they made the claim:

Obama’s campaign says Raines is not an Obama adviser and that McCain’s campaign knows it because Raines said so in an e-mail earlier this week to Carly Fiorina, a top McCain adviser. Obama’s campaign provided The Associated Press with a copy of the e-mail.

McCain’s hypocritical attacks had the effect of incensing several people who had reason to know from the inside how thoroughly dishonest the attacks were. Some of them were not shy to speak up.

William Maloni, Fannie Mae Senior Vice President for Government and Industry Relations (1983-2004), wrote a letter to the NYT:

Yesterday, Senator John McCain released a television commercial attacking Barack Obama for allegedly receiving advice on the economy from former Fannie Mae CEO Franklin Raines. From the stump, he has recently tried tying Senator Obama to Fannie Mae, as if there is some guilt in the association with Fannie Mae’s former executives.

It is an interesting card for Senator McCain to play, given that his campaign manager, Rick Davis, was paid by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac several hundred thousand dollars early in this decade to head up an organization to lobby in their behalf called The Homeownership Alliance. …

I worked in government relations for Fannie Mae for more than 20 years, leading the group for most of those years. When I see photographs of Sen. McCain’s staff, it looks to me like the team of lobbyists who used to report to me. Senator McCain’s attack on Senator Obama is a cheap shot, and hypocritical.

Then there’s this lovely little explanation from the NYT for why Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac found it worthwhile to pay Rick Davis $35,000 a month for five years:

Incensed by the advertisements, several current and former executives of the companies came forward to discuss the role that Rick Davis, Mr. McCain’s campaign manager and longtime adviser, played in helping Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac beat back regulatory challenges when he served as president of their advocacy group, the Homeownership Alliance, formed in the summer of 2000. Some who came forward were Democrats, but Republicans, speaking on the condition of anonymity, confirmed their descriptions.

“The value that he brought to the relationship was the closeness to Senator McCain and the possibility that Senator McCain was going to run for president again,” said Robert McCarson, a former spokesman for Fannie Mae, who said that while he worked there from 2000 to 2002, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac together paid Mr. Davis’s firm $35,000 a month. Mr. Davis “didn’t really do anything,” Mr. McCarson, a Democrat, said.

Doesn’t get any blunter than that. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac just wanted to buy themselves access to McCain’s ear. And they sure got it, didn’t they? That’s the beautiful thing about lobbying. Sometimes you do get exactly what you’re hoping to buy.

*** Update, 6:11 am ***

Another McCain-Freddie Mac tentacle:

The lobbying firm of William Timmons Sr., who John McCain tapped to run his presidential transition team, “earned more than a quarter of a million dollars this year representing Freddie Mac, one of the companies McCain blames for the nation’s financial crisis.” Timmons himself has been personally “registered to lobby for Freddie Mac from 2000 through this month.”