Where in the World is John McCain?

John McCain got more press this week for something he didn't do than something he did do. Yes, he announced his campaign on Letterman, but there was probably more attention paid to the fact he didn't attend the CPAC conference where all the other major GOP candidates spoke. So where was he? Bob Novak has the answer:

While the other Republican Presidential candidates were attending the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Washington beginning Thursday, Sen. John McCain was launching a nationwide fund-raising campaign.

McCain was at a Salt Lake City lunch Thursday and a Phoenix reception Friday. His money-raising schedule calls for subsequent stops in Grand Rapids, Mich., Detroit, New York City, Charlotte, N.C., Sacramento, Calif., La Jolla, Calif., Irvine, Calif., Riverside, Calif., Beverly Hills, Calif., San Francisco and Philadelphia.

A footnote: McCain’s campaign staff did not mention these fund-raising commitments when it turned down CPAC’s invitation. It said the senator’s conservative record was known to everybody without him going to CPAC, but this decision was made only after heated debate within the McCain campaign.

Meanwhile, Newsweek's latest poll has Rudy Giuliani up 25 points over McCain:

Republican presidential hopeful Rudolph Giuliani, virtually tied with John McCain in a January poll, held a 25-point lead over the Arizona senator in a Newsweek magazine survey released on Saturday.

Among registered Republicans, 59 percent said they backed the former New York City mayor and 34 percent said they favored McCain, who announced on Wednesday he would seek the presidency in 2008, Newsweek said.

"Most registered Republicans are not familiar with Giuliani's positions on key social issues," the magazine said, listing his support for abortion rights and gun control as examples.

"When asked about whether Giuliani's views on these same issues would be enough to prevent them from supporting him, few registered Republican voters said it would," it said.

That's bad news for McCain. Not only is he trailing, but GOP voters don't seem to care that much that Giuliani differs with them on some issues. They're going to support Rudy anyway.

Back at CPAC Mitt Romney won the straw poll with 21% of the vote to Giuliani 17%, Brownback's 15%, Gingrich 14% and McCain 12%. Captain Ed suggests that this is worse news for Romney than it looks, since his team had recruited a lot of young people to attend the event, and better news for McCain since he didn't even show up and still got 12%. It's hard to say what these kinds of polls really mean this far out.

Another interesting development was the panel discussion on Special Report Friday night. After discussing McCain's absence from CPAC and the current poll numbers which show McCain down quite a bit, all three panel members, Fred Barnes, Mort Kondracke, and Charles Krauthammer, still feel McCain is the frontrunner. They must be seeing something I'm not.