Federal Elections Fines McCain $80,000

From seeingredinaz:The latest news is that John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign committee has been fined $80,000 by the Federal Election Commission (FEC) for accepting contributions that exceeded federal limits.The hometown fish wrap known as the Arizona Republic doesn’t regard this important enough for the front page or even back placement in the front section.  Nope.  McCain’s admitted violations of the law rate page three in the Valley and State B section.His campaign acknowledged incorrectly reporting the dates the contributions were received. Additionally, the required 48-hour disclosure notices for 169 contributions totaling $240,700 that it received prior to the general election was ignored by the McCain-Palin Compliance Fund Inc. and John Schmuckler, the treasurer of both.In this conciliation agreement with the FEC, McCain’s campaign admitted violating the law by accepting $377,657 in contributions that exceeded legal limits; failed to report correctly the original dates on which $22,257,684 in contributions were received by its joint fundraising representatives; and failed to correctly report re-designations made to the compliance fund.Were he less reprehensible, it might be tempting to cut the guy some slack. After all, his memory has failed him often, as embarrassingly evidenced here and here. When asked during his presidential race McCain couldn’t even remember how many homes his beer heiress wife, Cindy, owns — and he gets to live in. He hesitatingly told a reporter, “I think….I’ll have my staff get back to you.”