McCain staged an upset win in the February 2000 New Hampshire primary, capitalizing on a message of political reform and "straight talk" that appealed to moderate Republican and independent voters and to the press.

"[3] Potential weaknesses of a McCain candidacy included his senatorial accomplishments skewing towards the maverick side rather than those that would appeal to the party core, a lack of funds and of fund-raising prowess, and an unpredictability of personality and temperament.

[1] National polls showed McCain with low name recognition, but once voters were asked about a hypothetical candidate with a similar military biography, the numbers improved dramatically.

[7][8] On March 31, three American soldiers were captured by Yugoslavia;[9] the next day, McCain canceled his planned roadshow, stating "this is not an appropriate time to launch a political campaign.

[12] McCain's co-authored, best-selling[13] family memoir, Faith of My Fathers, published in August 1999, helped promote the new start of his campaign.

"[8] He further said he was staging "a fight to take our government back from the power brokers and special interests and return it to the people and the noble cause of freedom it was created to serve.

[2] Rick Davis was the campaign manager for the McCain effort, while Mike Murphy was the overall strategist and John Weaver the chief political adviser.

[18] Greg Stevens was the media adviser and Mark Salter was the chief speechwriter (and credited co-author of McCain's books).

[19] Davis wanted a larger role in campaign strategy, and eventually differences between the two factions escalated to attacks made via the press.

[19] There was a crowded field of Republican candidates, but the big leader in terms of establishment party support and fundraising was Texas Governor and presidential son George W.

[20][21][22] Indeed, by the time of McCain's formal announcement, top-echelon Republican contenders such as Lamar Alexander, John Kasich, and Dan Quayle were already withdrawing from the race due to Bush's strength.

[26] By early November, stories about McCain's temper problem were frequent enough that Washington Post media critic Howard Kurtz wrote a survey article about them.

[34] Bush finally did participate in the December 6 debate from the Orpheum Theatre in Phoenix, by which time McCain was so busy campaigning in New Hampshire that he had to join via a video linkup.

[35] Following political consultant Mike Murphy's advice,[36] McCain decided to skip the initial event of the nomination season, the Iowa caucus, where his long opposition to ethanol subsidies would be unpopular[24] and his late start and lack of base party support would hurt him in the grassroots organizing necessary for success in the state.

[38] By skipping Iowa, McCain was able to focus instead on the New Hampshire primary, where his message held appeal to independents and where Bush's father had never been very popular.

"[39] McCain traveled on a campaign bus called the Straight Talk Express, whose name capitalized on his reputation as a political maverick who would speak his mind.

In visits to towns he gave a ten-minute talk focused on campaign reform issues, then announced he would stay until he answered every question that everyone had.

[14] An unidentified party began a semi-underground smear campaign against McCain, delivered by push polls, faxes, e-mails, flyers, audience plants, and the like.

[14][54] These claimed most famously that he had fathered a black child out of wedlock (the McCains' dark-skinned daughter Bridget was adopted from Bangladesh; this misrepresentation was thought to be an especially effective slur in a Deep South state where race was still central[49]), but also that his wife Cindy was a drug addict, that he was a homosexual, and that he was a "Manchurian Candidate" traitor or mentally unstable from his North Vietnam POW days.

[56] But McCain's stressing of campaign finance reform, and how Bush's proposed tax cuts would benefit the wealthy, did not appeal to core Republicans in the state.

"[59] He also made an off-the-cuff, unserious remark on the Straight Talk Express that referred to Robertson and Falwell as "forces of evil", that came across as angry hostility to many Christian conservatives.

[67] His overall loss on that day has been attributed to his going "off message", ineffectively accusing Bush of being anti-Catholic due to having visited Bob Jones University[68] and getting into a verbal battle with leaders of the Religious Right.

[24] When the 2000 Republican National Convention began in Philadelphia at the end of July, McCain took his Straight Talk Express to meet with his delegates and supporters before formally releasing them to Bush.

[14] This Stage IIa instance on his temple required extensive surgery that removed the lesion, surrounding lymph nodes, and part of the parotid gland.

[82] The final pathology tests showed that the melanoma had not spread, and his prognosis was good, but McCain was left with cosmetic aftereffects including a puffy cheek and a scar down his neck.

"[87] Once Bush was declared the winner and inaugurated in January 2001, McCain's battles with him would resume,[47][86] with a significant amount of lingering bitterness between the two men and their staffs over what had transpired during the course of 2000.

[49][91] In contrast, in 2004 National Review's Byron York would try to debunk many of the South Carolina smear reports as unfounded legend.

[14] When McCain ran for president again in 2008, South Carolina again proved crucial, in his battle with former Governors Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee and former Senator Fred Thompson.

This time, McCain had the support of much of the state Republican establishment[94] (although Rush Limbaugh and other talk radio figures were still lambasting him),[95] and aggressively moved to thwart any smear campaign before it got started.

"[97] The New York Times described McCain's win as "exorcising the ghosts of the attack-filled primary here that derailed his presidential hopes eight years ago.