The Man With $500 Ferragamo Loafers

I'm not a big fan of targeting politicians for their wealth. I don't begrudge anyone succeeding and admire many fabulously wealthy Americans. But the inheritance - rather than earning - of great riches can rub some the wrong way. George W. Bush is not wealthy because he earned it; his family connections made all the difference. And John McCain, who hails from a very privileged family, married money that most people can barely imagine. If your house just got foreclosed on, or you can't afford the mortgage any more, this is not someone you can easily identify with:

Those real estate holdings include a Sedona ranch with three dwellings, worth $1.1 million; a Phoenix condominium suite that had originally been two units, worth $4.7 million; an $847,800 three-bedroom high-rise condo in Arlington; an oceanfront condo in La Jolla, Calif.; a half-million-dollar loft in Phoenix purchased for their daughter Meghan; another Phoenix condo, worth $830,000; and two beachfront condos in Coronado, Calif, one of which is valued at $2.7 million. The other was purchased just this year, as McCain was lamenting the difficulties that struggling Americans were facing just to make their mortgage payments. Cindy McCain told Vogue magazine the family needed the second condo because the first was getting too crowded as their family grew.

I don't know about you, but this is more distant to me than someone who just earned a bunch of royalties for a book he actually wrote himself.