Miami, Fl:

“…just keeping my word.”

Mark McKinnon, staffer, advisor and a well-known fixture on the McCain campaign trail, last year said he would leave the McCain campaign if Barack Obama won the Democratic nomination. He said at the time he did not want to work on a campaign against Obama. McKinnon, today, sent out an email saying he would be stepping down.

McKinnon, and most everyone else in the McCain camp, concluded Clinton lost more than a month ago.

The long time Austin, Texas based Democratic ad man, media strategist and campaign consultant rose to national prominence as an original Bush 2000 insider with then Governor George W. Bush’s start-up team.

In announcing his decision, he tossed out all the one-liners you would expect from a committed McCain supporter in an email this afternoon.

He is still a “1,000 percent McCain man. Just Going off the ad team.”

McKinnon says he is going from linebacker to head cheerleader and he’ll “still be showing up occasionally in my lucky hat.”

The campaign let it be known about a month ago that a top notch team of about half dozen people had been assembled to steer McCain’s media message.

McKinnon’s a Democrat, and will remain loyal to McCain from the sidelines…but will not work against Obama. It’s just that simple.