One thousand one hundred seventy-three pages chronicling John McCain's past eight years of health records stamp the Republican presidential hopeful with a clean bill of health: no cancer, strong heart, and cholesterol levels kept in check with pharmaceuticals.

The documents, officially released today (though the Associated Press managed to rush through 'em to deliver some preliminary finds already) aren't just part of McCain's push to prove he's well enough to run the country, but also, according to one theory, a way to slight the New York Times.

The documents, spanning 2000-08, originally said to be 400 pages, were released to all five major TV networks (CBS, ABC, NBC, CNN and Fox) as well as the AP, Reuters and Bloomberg, and the Washington Post and the Arizona Republic. They were handed over at the Mayo Clinic, in Scottsdale, Ariz., and while no independent doctors were allowed to evaluate them, many of the media's medical correspondents, some of whom are M.D.s, flew in to see them. The files were not allowed to be copied or kept. [Wash Times]

Interesting, though, that the New York Times was not on the list of press outlets invited to review the health records.

The McCain campaign will blame space limitations and privacy concerns ("We had to do it at the Mayo Clinic and the doctors there probably didn't want 200 reporters running around," says a McCain aid), but conspiracy theorists suggest the doc block against the Grey Lady is restitution for its article that tied McCain to lobbyist Vicki Iseman. [HP] Because it's such a reward to have to read about the removal of squamous cell carcinoma and benign colon growths.