The revelation that John McCain's campaign manager, Rick Davis, had until last month continued to receive payments from troubled mortgage giant Freddie Mac through a public affairs firm he owns has prompted the Los Angeles Times (among others) to question how much longer McCain's "reformer" image can hold up. As the mortgage industry unraveled and Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac came begging to the government to save their skins, McCain was getting asked about his policy towards bailing out these and other failing institutions while the guy who runs his campaign was taking money from them. "This is a sticky wicket for McCain," said Sheila Krumholz, executive director for the Center for Responsive Politics. "This is a key advisor and manager of his campaign and, from what we're hearing, possibly a hired gun for Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae for years."Mary Boyle, spokeswoman for Common Cause, cautioned that both campaigns "cater to special interests through their relationships with lobbyists and influence peddlers." But she added that "it certainly jumps out when you have a candidate like Sen. McCain, who has made his name as a reformer, dealing with these sorts of problems. He says he's fighting lobbyists and special interests, but we'd hope he'd have higher standards than what we're hearing about." I mean, really. You can't paint yourself as the man to change Washington then fill your campaign roster with lobbyists and fail to disclose that your campaign manager is taking money from the very people you're supposed to be getting tough with. If McCain really wants to suspend his campaign to focus on the economic crisis, perhaps he should start by zeroing in on the members of campaign team that present a huge conflict of interest in trying to resolve that crisis.