What's missing from Adam Nagourney's New York Times profile of John McCain? Any indication that this is a bunch of bull:

Mr. McCain's friends said that in raising his profile, he was motivated not by concern at home, but by philosophical differences over the scope of Mr. Obama's health care proposals and spending measures.

“Had they reached out to him in a more genuine way, and not tried to pursue a pretty leftist agenda, I think they might have had a potential ally in John on certain things,” said Senator Jon Kyl, Mr. McCain's fellow Republican from Arizona.

That would have been a perfect place for Nagourney to point out -- or at least quote a Democrat pointing out -- that Obama did reach out to Republicans, making massive concessions during the stimulus debate, in exchange for very little GOP support -- and none from John McCain.

But Nagourney didn't do that; he didn't include so much as a word of rebuttal to the claims that John McCain was ready to work with President Obama, but Obama refused to reach out to Republicans.

A few days ago, Politico did its own State-of-John-McCain article -- and it, too, uncritically quoted claims that McCain was outraged by a lack of bipartisanship by Obama:

Mark Salter, McCain's former Senate chief of staff, ghostwriter and close confidant, said McCain may have responded differently if Obama had governed more from the center.

“You can't expect him to do things that are antithetical to his beliefs,” said Salter, who still talks to the senator multiple times each week.

Discussing Obama's first big initiative, the stimulus, Salter said that his old boss could not get behind what was mostly an infrastructure spending bill.

“If [Obama] had said we're going to do this half my way and half your way, guys like John McCain and others would have been all over it,” he said.

Politico didn't include any mention of the concessions Obama made to Republicans on the stimulus, either.