JOHN MCCAIN'S BASE

John McCain's base

By Michelle Malkin

The Maaaverick is not going to the Conservative Political Action Conference, which begins tomorrow.

But he did have time to tape his announcement on the David Letterman Show. Video at Hot Air.

Interesting priorities.

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Ed Morrissey weighs in on McCain's absence from CPAC:

McCain has argued that he has the most solid conservative record of all the major contenders, and with some cause. Yet it is hardly a secret that the Senator has a rocky relationship with conservatives in the Republican Party. After the McCain-Feingold assault on political speech, his work with Ted Kennedy on immigration, the Gang of 14 rebellion that allowed the Democrats to filibuster judicial nominees for appellate assignments for the first time in American history, and a generally hostile attitude until just recently towards social conservatives, McCain has more work than most to convince conservatives to support him.

That's why his absence makes little sense. If he wants to win conservatives, he needs to make an effort to meet them -- literally. CPAC provides a golden opportunity to do so. It's one of the oldest conservative forums in existence, and it gathers opinionmakers on the Right from across the country. If he can't be bothered to go out of his way to face conservatives there, where exactly does he plan on addressing them?

Not on the David Letterman show, that's for sure...