Have you heard that McCain voted with Bush 90%-95% of the time? I've heard it so many times my eardrums are ready to burst. Of all the talking points in the Obama campaign, I think it is probably Point Number One.

I hadn't really given much thought to looking into the details, although it did occur to me that some of the votes had to have been of an either bipartisan or non-controversial nature, or on matters arrived at after compromise which represented some sort of consensus. But it never occurred to me that the figure itself was wrong, and I figured the McCain people would jump all over them if it was.

So I was genuinely surprised by the title of this post by Jim Geraghty -- In 2007, McCain Voted With Bush More Than Obama... By an Entire 13.45 Percent Geraghty looked at the percentage of times the two were in attendance, and found that because "McCain was only in attendance for 39 percent of them," "he actually voted the president's way 37 percent of the time."

Amazingly, Barack Obama voted with the president 40% of the time, but because of his 59% attendance record, his total vote percentage with the President is cut down to 23.6%.

37 versus 23.6

Concludes Geraghty,

last year, the difference between the two men in terms of how they actually stood in the Senate and voted was all of 13.45 percent.

In the debate this week, my opponent felt the need to inform me that he's not President Bush. And in fairness, I don't blame Senator McCain for all of President Bush's mistakes. After all, he's only voted with George Bush 37 percent of the time.

I, on the other hand, voted with the president only 23.6 percent of the time!

The voters would be scratching their heads all the way to the polls.

(Yes, the number in the title is rounded off. Obama's actual number is 23.6. Rounding off numbers is a scorekeeper's sacrosanct prerogative!)