McCain's marriages:Campaign fodder? Christian group injecting marital histories into campaign debate

McCain's marriages: Campaign fodder?

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The committee maintains it is attempting to portray the positives about a candidate whom it views as not only a staunch family man, but also right on the issues, such as health care.
Yet Kirbyjon Caldwell, a Methodist pastor from Houston who officiated at the wedding of the president's daughter, Jenna Bush, was quick today to point out what he sees as a particularly strong contrast between Obama, married and a father of two, and McCain, who has several children from two marriages and divorced his first wife and married his second nearly 30 years ago.

"These smears on John McCain's character and faith expose the utter hypocrisy of Barack Obama's claim to represent a new kind of politics,'' Brian Rogers, a spokesman for the McCain campaign, said today. "It's disgraceful. The American people know that John McCain's faith and character were tested and forged in ways few can fathom."


Caldwell, senior pastor at Windsor Village United Methodist Church in Houston, said today during a Matthew 25 conference call with reporters that part of the goal in promoting Obama is dispelling some of the myths about him:
"There is a huge information gap that exists today between who Barack Obama is and who the voting public believes him to be.... He is not a Muslim, as you know, with all due respect to Muslims... He is a stout, straight- up Christian and he is very happy and proud about that.''

Pastor Caldwell also said this: "I think it's important for us to celebrate the fact that Sen. Barack Obama is an upstanding, fabulous family man... He is a wonderful husband and a great dad. And at times like these, when the institution of marriage is under attack.... a candidate who has extremely sterling credentials as a family man speaks volumes.''

We asked Caldwell if he was attempting to draw a comparison with McCain on this question of marriages.
"His marital history has been duly recorded,'' Caldwell said of McCain. "I think the data speak for themselves.... At the end of the day, I think the American public deserves a full revelation of the candidates' character and competencies... Whatever questions should be asked that would give the voting public a fair indication of who they are and what they've done, I think is fair game.''

Mara Vanderslice, founder and director of the Matthew 25 Network, said that, while the group's intent with its TV ad is to portray a positive image of Obama: "Many in the Christian community have not forgotten what happened with Sen. McCain marrying his second wife one month after leaving his first wife... It has not been forgotten by many in the Christian community..
"Our intention is to issue a positive ad for Sen. Obama,'' Vanderslice said, "but those facts about Sen. McCain are still in the background.''

McCain married his second wife, then-Cindy Hensley of Phoenix, in May 1980. He filed for divorce of his first wife, Carol Shepp of Philadelphia, in February 1980. McCain, still serving in the Navy then, had met Hensley in the spring of 1979 at a cocktail party in Hawaii, and has maintained that he was separated from his first wife before he started dating his second-to-be. But in the divorce suit that McCain filed on Feb. 19, 1980, he stated that he and his first wife had "cohabited'' until Jan. 7 of that year.

McCain's former wife is supporting his campaign, and Cindy McCain is actively campaigning for him.
The group says it will air its ad supporting Obama during CNN's broadcast of the Saddleback church appearances of the two candidates, who will be interviewed by the Rev. Rick Warren.

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