Financial Times reporter Edward Luce has found another sign of trouble for the McCain campaign: he's turning up the noses of the "cocktail party circuit" inside Washington, D.C., which is "swelling with disaffected Republicans."

I kid you not.

From Luce's page 4 October 24 article, "McCain's troubles highlight party rift":

The more trouble John McCain's campaign encounters, the more it highlights the cultural divide between the "real America" the Republican candidate says he represents and the Washington "cocktail party circuit" that largely disdains it.

That circuit is swelling with disaffected Republicans. Some complain about Mr McCain's selection of Sarah Palin, whose appeal to "Joe Six-Pack" may have been dented by revelations this week that she has spent more than $150,000 (€117,000, £93,000) of other people's money on her wardrobe. Others are upset at the negative tone of the campaign.

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But all point to concerns about Mr McCain’s allegedly impulsive temperament. Citing the candidate’s story of how, as a child, his parents would put him in a bath full of iced water to calm his volcanic temper, Christopher Buckley, the novelist and son of the late conservative icon, William Buckley, said Mr McCain continued to display the same traits at 72.

“I have known McCain since 1982 and what has always stood out is his temperament,” said Mr Buckley, who endorsed Barack Obama last week. “Having observed him during the campaign and in the debates with Barack Obama I think he needs to be doused in another bath of cold water.”

Besides Buckley, who has actually announced he'd vote for Obama, Luce went on to cite "[s]taunch Republican commentators, such as Charles Krauthammer and David Brooks" who "have come close to endorsing Mr. McCain's rival." Of course as NewsBusters has repeatedly documented, Brooks is far from being a solid, reliable conservative voice.

Luce closed his article by scoffing that while "[d]etractors accuse Mr McCain of dividing America" that "the most acute cultural divide his campaign is exposing is within the Republican party itself."

—Ken Shepherd is Managing Editor of NewsBusters