Filmmaker Eugene Jarecki - whose documentary "Why We Fight" won the top prize at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival - writes on The Huffington Post about how, when the movie was released in 2006, he was hit full-force by the attack-machine of Sen. John McCain.

In the movie, which traces the history of the military-industrial complex and how corporate pressures have influenced how and how often the United States wages war, McCain was one of the most cogent and forthright interview subjects. His outspoken comments about U.S. foreign policy and defense-contractor corruption were true to McCain's "maverick" label.

McCain is also prominent in one of the movie's few funny moments. During the interview, McCain suddenly gets a phone call from Vice President Dick Cheney - and McCain quickly stands up to take the call, as Jarecki leaves his camera on McCain's empty chair.

Jarecki then describes how McCain's chief of staff, Mark Salter, reacted when the movie was released in theaters in January 2006:

When McCain's office voiced their concern about [the Cheney phone call], I expected, if anything, they might fear the suggestion of uncomfortably close ties between McCain and Cheney. When Salter instead declared to me that I was "making it look like John McCain was critical of the Vice-President," and that "Vice-President Cheney has nothing to do with Halliburton," I realized that what he was objecting to was not that McCain might have appeared too close to Cheney but rather not close enough. Mr. Salter demanded that I send him a transcript of the Senator's interview, not just the parts that appear in the film. Since none of the film's more than twenty other interviewees had been provided such a thing, and since I valued the film's independence from political pressure, I told Mr. Salter I would seek advice from other journalists and get back to him.

Salter next resorted to threats, saying that, unless I complied, he would smear my name in the media and exert pressure on the film's principal funder never to work with me again. I said I thought the BBC would be unlikely to welcome such pressure from an irate chief of staff to a senator. Salter then changed gears, appealing to my sense of fairness. "When Senator McCain sat down to talk to you," he explained, "he thought he was talking to a television crew from the BBC." I said that that was true, but that the film had then gone on to win Sundance and secure a theatrical release. But then something troubling about his remark dawned on me.

"If you don't mind my asking," I said, "are you suggesting there are things Senator McCain will say to a British audience that he isn't comfortable saying to the American people?" Needless to say, this didn't help matters. But I wasn't trying to be snide. My question was just the logical extension of what Salter had intimated. But it clearly touched a nerve. He became enraged and, after hanging up, sought to make good on his threat to tarnish my name and career.

Jarecki then extrapolates how the behavior of McCain and his staff then is playing out in the campaign now:

I sense that all the problems of managing McCain's public image are ultimately a reflection of a profound division in McCain's own soul as he runs for the presidency. His awkward manner, his sidekick's rogue behavior, his campaign's erratic relations with the press and public - all this radio static speaks volumes about the deeper insecurity and unresolved persona of the man himself - qualities so glaring no amount of lipstick or campaign theatrics can hide them.

Labels: John McCain, Sundance