I interviewed Mike McGavick about the war last May. Given how tricky it is to talk about the war, I was deliberate and precise with my questions, and McGavick was deliberate and precise with his answers. It was a satisfying interview. Here’s what he told me: “I support the war in Iraq, and I would have voted for it. I believe removing Saddam Hussein was important in the war on terrorism.”

He did not qualify his answer with any footnotes about WMD. That is: he didn’t say anything like he believed removing Sadaam Hussein was important in the war on terrorism when he believed Iraq had WMD. In fact, I asked him: Even if he knew then what we know today (about the chimerical WMDs) would he have voted for the war? This question is what prompted him to say, “I believe removing Saddam Hussein was important in the war on terrorism.”

Yesterday, however, with Sen. Majority Leader Bill Frist in town, McGavick saw an opportunity to play up his bipartisan campaign shtick, and so, he tried to distance himself from Frist.

The Seattle Times took the bait. Indeed, in a Seattle Times article headlined “Frist backs McGavick, but not all his views”—they write:

“I would have done exactly what we did,” Frist said. “I would have taken Saddam Hussein out. He used chemical weapons on his own people, killing thousands and thousands of them. He’s invaded two sovereign nations, he’s a mass murderer, a brutal dictator. Diplomacy, I believe, would not have worked.”

But [McGavick] told reporters he would not have gone to war without a real threat that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. “If I had been in the Senate then and we did not think that he was in active pursuit or imminent pursuit of weapons of mass destruction, I would have wanted diplomacy to be given a longer chance,” he said.

Not only did McGavick’s campaign stunt contradict what he told me last May, but it also bucked his own recent fatwa against second guessing the war while our troops are still in harm’s way. I saw McGavick on the campaign trail in eastern Washington last month. Here’s a snippet of my report:

“We have learned things—since being there—that turned out not to be true,” McGavick admits after a lone Democratic community-college student sitting in back brings up the war. “But it’s inappropriate to have those debates until our troops are out of harm’s way. “

Once again, McGavick’s position on the war didn’t come with any footnotes. That is: he didn’t mention anything about, “Well, it’s okay to put our troops in harm’s way if I can score some campaign points by sparring with Sen. Frist.”