McCain’s Brother: We Grew Up Lower Middle Class And The McCain Women Always Handle The Finances
John McCain tripped over a question about how many houses he and his wife own because when he was growing up, his mother — not his father — handled the family finances, according to McCain’s younger brother.
Likewise, John McCain’s wife, Cindy, takes the lead when it comes to the couple’s finances, confirmed Joe McCain after an interview with NewsChannel 8, a Washington 24-hour local cable news station owned by the same company as Politico.
John McCain, who is six years older than his brother, nonetheless can relate to families on a budget, Joe McCain said during the NewsChannel 8 interview, because they grew up “at best middle class,” hop-scotching the country as their father, a high-ranking Naval officer, accepted different postings.
“All the fancy stuff came later, and I think you really think more about what your childhood was like, more than your present,” Joe McCain told NewsChannel 8 hosts Bruce DePuyt and Rebecca Cooper in a Friday evening interview.
The stuff that came later includes eight properties, all owned by Cindy McCain, heiress to an estimated $100 million beer-distribution fortune, her dependent children and the trusts and companies they control.
But Joe McCain said, “it’s important to know that, from the time we could talk until the time he’s at the Naval Academy, we were on allowances like everybody else. We lived in rental housing. We never owned a home. We were taking school busses. We were taking the old streetcars (with) tokens. So that’s the life that we grew up in.”
John McCain was unable to answer a question from Politico about how many homes he and Cindy McCain own because they have an arrangement similar to the one the McCain brothers’ parents had, Joe McCain suggested.
“The person who took care of all the business was my mother,” he said. “My father had no idea about the family business, what oil leases he owned in Oklahoma.”
Joe McCain, who makes his home in Washington’s Northern Virginia suburbs, chuckled when recalling that “one time, she bought a house to remodel” in Southeast Washington while “he was at sea.”
As for John McCain’s inability to quickly say how many houses his family owned — a gaffe Democrats have used to portray McCain as out of touch — Joe McCain said he could tell the question made his big brother “a little bit uncomfortable.”
“Frankly, I think one of the reasons John was embarrassed was mainly because he didn’t really know,” Joe McCain said.
John McCain’s years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam and as chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee also help him “emphasize with the American people” on pocketbook issues, Joe McCain said.
“He relates very well to what people need,” he said.
He also cracked wise about another knock on his brother: that he was a less-than-stellar student who graduated fifth from the bottom of his class at the Naval Academy.
“By the way, that’s a McCain tradition,” he said. “My father and grandfather, both four-star admirals, and they graduated in the bottom fourth of their class, too.”
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Mac’s Wife is Hot!
August 23rd, 2008 at 8:43 amThis must be an Irish thing. My mom always handled the finances and so do I in my family. All six of my brothers’ wives handle their finances as well. Of course it has nothing to do with the Irishmen drinking their hard earned money away. Of course not.
August 23rd, 2008 at 8:47 amIt’s not just an Irish thing, for generations my family has done the same thing. (Could be a Cherokee, Scottish or Dutch thing too I guess)
Hell I’m a financial analyst and have zero issues letting my wife handle the finances at home. My excuse is that I’m tired of looking at numbers all day and don’t want to do it when I get home….truth be told I’m just a lazy bastard and let her have at it.
August 23rd, 2008 at 8:54 amGerman and Australian here and its been the same with my family.
August 23rd, 2008 at 8:57 amIrish-English ancestry, that’s how things run in my house and how my parents ran there business and household
August 23rd, 2008 at 9:00 amSame with the glorious people of polish decent in the greatest country in the world.
August 23rd, 2008 at 10:07 amHaving the wife handle the finances is not typical of any nationality but is typical of a traditional family. Thisis all bullshit that the eltists on the left are grasping at.
August 23rd, 2008 at 10:54 amI’m just plain and proud American and I handle the money for my family also. Hubby hands his check to me. doesn’t even bother to look at it. The bills are paid and the freezer full. Don’t need much more than that.
August 23rd, 2008 at 11:46 amObviously the dems are throwing the envy card into politics without realizing that many Americans purchase second or more homes as investments. Keeps people like me busy, thank you Cindy and John. Lately, the McCains are paying the price for those homes as real estate values seem to be correcting, but I’m glad to see that John doesn’t have to spend time worrying about it.
I feel more sorry for those conned by this tactic and get less focused on the Fathers house, that one that has many rooms in it. But leave it to a democrat to tell you how to spend your money.
August 23rd, 2008 at 11:52 amand what about the homes that odumba’s brothers live in???
August 23rd, 2008 at 11:59 amI did not grow up in a military family, but I have found that in many cases, with career military family men at least, the wife is usually the book-keeper and household financial manager.
Having said that, Is ANYONE else as pissed about this as I am, in the fact that Cindy McCain is being shit-on for being successful and independent of her husband for her livelihood … not only that, but that she has the ability to contribute this amount of strength and finances into their family?
Yeah, she came into her base wealth via family … but she could have blown it all away.
Also, I’ve been wanting to say this all week:
The question to McCain was very unfair in this …
It was a “Gottcha” question. At the moment of formulating a proper answer in his mind to the question of ‘How many houses do you [own]’ … McCain was probably looking at it in a legal sense, and not a ‘I have slippers under the bed at this house, and this house, and this house …”
I feel his answer was WAAAAY closer to truth than he has been given credit for. Besides, we hear all the time about people who have others invest for them.
Had Mac said ‘We own 2 houses’ … someone would have run in and said, ‘Wait up here! What about this apartment building … this condo complex … blah-blah …’ that he and Cindy may never have even seen, but it’s on paper in their holdings. So, his answer reflected a cautious estimation to what a lawyer in cross-examination in a courtroom might have demanded to counter his answer on …
Anyhow, it’s all bullshit.
If THIS is all they got … they got nothing.
They are just trying to “Heinze-Kerry” McCain and it ain’t gonna work …
August 23rd, 2008 at 12:13 pmI see an oppurtunity here.
When asked John Mc Cain was smart to say let me get back to you. The fact is Mc Cain does not own a single home.
Cindy Mc Cain is the regestered deed owner of more than half of the homes and the others are held in trusts of which she is the Primary Controller or Trustee.
Yet this didnt stop the democrats from basically gaffing or lying which ever you prefer when they ran their advertisement and said in it that John Mc Cain owns 7 homes!
The fact is that there are EIGHT homes owned or held in trust by Cindy Mc Cain ! This is so typical of the retarded Obama crowd to spew something so factually incorrect. However this complete lie-gaffe has been either over looked, spiked or ignored by the entire media.
Even conservative talking heads were either too stupid, lazy or cautious to expose the Obama camp’s complete screw up.
I see on a constant basis constant striking points and gaffes and lies being overlooked and not taken advantage of by our side. What he heck is wrong with our media we need to strike while target is vunerable !
August 23rd, 2008 at 4:10 pmAt least they bought them legally and not through a shady, now convicted felon, like Obama The Messiah.
August 23rd, 2008 at 5:57 pm