McCain, Clinton Take Strange Bedfellows
May 12, 2006 — -- The race for the White House in 2008 has already begun, so strange bedfellows and curious political alliances abound.
Case in point: On Saturday morning, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who during the 2000 campaign called the Rev. Jerry Falwell an "agent of intolerance," will deliver the commencement address at Falwell's Liberty University.
It was a heated moment during a vicious primary battle in 2000. McCain was under attack from many in the GOP establishment and, during the South Carolina primary, elements of the Christian Right.
"I reject individuals such as Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell, who take our party in the wrong direction," McCain said then.
Things seem to have changed. "Last September, I called his office and said, 'I'd like to come by to talk with you,'" Falwell told ABC News.
McCain agreed, and the two men -- sans staffers -- buried the hatchet.
"I think the most important thing in life is to not hold a grudge and to put things behind you," McCain told ABC News this week in an exclusive interview.
Many liberals are dismayed at this unlikely alliance, saying such moves make McCain "look like just another politician" (EJ Dionne, The Washington Post) or as if he's "making a pact with the devils of the religious right" (now-liberal blogger Arianna Huffington).
McCain said that he's always been conservative, and that there's a big difference between speaking at a Christian college and selling your soul.
"I don't believe you can change your core principles," McCain said. "Otherwise you will be justifiably accused of flip-flopping." He insists he hasn't.
It can be a difficult line for a politician to walk. What's reaching out and what's selling out? After all, the worst thing you can say about a man who prides himself on his integrity is that he's compromising that which he holds most dear.
"I do think, like any wise politician moving towards a presidential election, he is trying to build alliances," Falwell told ABC News, "and becoming very successful at it."
During that ugly primary battle, McCain also found himself attacked in secretly funded television ads.
It was "the biggest infusion of anonymous money in American politics since that bag stuffed with $2 million was found during Watergate," one good government type told me at the time.
McCain ultimately filed a Federal Election Commission complaint against Texas brothers and Bush allies Sam and Charles Wyly. On the campaign trail, he urged audiences to tell then-Gov. George Bush's "sleazy Texas buddies to stop these negative ads."
Now the Wylys like McCain. This Monday in Dallas, they will co-host a fund-raiser for him.
"I think right now they're going with the person they think can win," said Roll Call political writer Mary Ann Akers.
Falwell, the Wylys -- McCain chuckles about it all. "It shows if you live long enough, a lot of things happen," he said.
The 2008 race for the White House will be the first since 1928 without an incumbent president or vice president running so it is considered unusually wide open and very competitive -- one of the reasons why you may see savvy pols crafting alliances this early in the game.
Another case in point is with McCain's possible opponent in 2008: Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton.
During the throes of the Lewinsky scandal, Clinton decried, "This vast right-wing conspiracy that has been conspiring against my husband since the day he announced for president."
This week comes news that one of the men whom liberals fingered as a key cog in that "conspiracy" -- Fox News Channel chieftain Rupert Murdoch -- will host a $1,000-a-plate fund-raiser for Clinton, saying she's been effective for New York.
In coming days as other wannabes -- Sens. George Allen, R-Va.; Evan Bayh, D-Ind.; Joe Biden, D-Del.; Sam Brownback, R-Kan.; and Govs. Tom Vilsak, D-Iowa; and Mitt Romney, R-Mass. -- gear up and start running for the center, left or right, more strange bedfellows will likely emerge.
ABC News' Mike Callahan, Matt Hosford, Dan Harris and Wonbo Woo contributed to this report.