McCain sticks his foot in his mouth--AGAIN!

Yes, that's right--Senator, and hopeful Republican presidential candidate, John McCain stuck his foot in his mouth again. I found this off Carpetbagger, so I went to the original Washington Post source:

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) hasn't spent much time in the Capitol this year as he seeks the GOP presidential nomination. But one of his rare appearances this week provided a pretty salty exchange with a fellow Republican.

During a meeting Thursday on immigration legislation, McCain and Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) got into a shouting match when Cornyn started voicing concerns about the number of judicial appeals that illegal immigrants could receive, according to multiple sources -- both Democrats and Republicans -- who heard firsthand accounts of the exchange from lawmakers who were in the room.

At a bipartisan gathering in an ornate meeting room just off the Senate floor, McCain complained that Cornyn was raising petty objections to a compromise plan being worked out between Senate Republicans and Democrats and the White House. He used a curse word associated with chickens and accused Cornyn of raising the issue just to torpedo a deal.

Things got really heated when Cornyn accused McCain of being too busy campaigning for president to take part in the negotiations, which have gone on for months behind closed doors. "Wait a second here," Cornyn said to McCain. "I've been sitting in here for all of these negotiations and you just parachute in here on the last day. You're out of line."

McCain, a former Navy pilot, then used language more accustomed to sailors (not to mention the current vice president, who made news a few years back after a verbal encounter with Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont).

"[Expletive] you! I know more about this than anyone else in the room," shouted McCain at Cornyn. McCain helped craft a bill in 2006 that passed the Senate but couldn't be compromised with a House bill that was much tougher on illegal immigrants.

Cornyn's office declined to comment on the incident. McCain's camp specifically denied that the senator ever claimed to know more about the immigration issue than other senators, but acknowledged that the two Republicans had quite a disagreement.

"These negotiations can be very tense, and there was a spirited exchange. That's it," said Brian Jones, spokesman for McCain's presidential campaign.

McCain's aides have acknowledged that the senator hasn't been as active in the Senate this year as he's been out campaigning. As Capitol Briefing noted Thursday, McCain hasn't cast a vote in more than five weeks now.

McCain is losing it! As I've stated in Saturday's posting on McCain's absence in the Senate, McCain did not participate in any of the 25 Senate votes during May, and in only 3 of the 21 Senate votes during April. And now as this bipartisan meeting took place last Thursday on immigration reform, McCain decided to waltz into the meeting, thinking he knew everything there was on the issue--even though he's been spending more time on the campaign trail, than working in the Senate. What is more, not only does McCain get into a shouting match with his fellow Republican John Cornyn, but that McCain tells Cornyn to FU! This is not how a presidential candidate, much less a president, should behave to his fellow lawmakers. In the privacy of the Oval Office, McCain can spew as much profanity as he wants. In fact, I don't care if any of the candidates--Republican or Democrat--become complete pottymouths within the Oval Office. But when they are meeting with fellow lawmakers, they have to be on their best behavior--no matter how great the differences are between them, or how heated the arguments can become.

But there is another issue here with McCain. Cornyn is right--McCain has not been involved in the Senate legislation. McCain has been spending too much time on the campaign trail, while failing in his duties as a senator for the Arizona people. He has not been involved in the negotiations on immigration reform, and no amount of staff work in McCain's Senate office can replace the presence of McCain in these meetings, or talking to his fellow senators before or after these meetings. McCain was completely out of line there. This story really shows that McCain can't keep up with the stress and pressures of both the presidential campaigning and his Senate work. And if he can't keep up with either of these duties, then how are we to expect him to keep up with the duties of the presidency, which is a 24-hour-a-day job? If McCain can crack over an accusation of his Senate absence, then what is going to happen when the crap really hits the fan in a McCain administration?