Early this morning, his top economic adviser claimed that he did.
At a briefing for reporters, Douglas Holtz-Eakin held up his BlackBerry in an attempt to prove that his boss has the know-how to fix the nation's ailing economy.
"He did this," Holtz-Eakin informed them. "Telecommunications of the United States is a premier innovation in the past 15 years -- comes right through the Commerce Committee -- so you're looking at the miracle John McCain helped create and that's what he did."
The Obama campaign jumped on the remark. "If John McCain hadn't said that 'the fundamentals of our economy are strong' on the day of one of our nation's worst financial crises, the claim that he invented the BlackBerry would have been the most preposterous thing said all week," said Obama-Biden spokesman Bill Burton.
But in a throw him under the bus response, another top McCain aide, Matt McDonald, told reporters that McCain "laughed" when told of Holtz-Eakin's comments about the birth of the popular handheld device, which is produced by Canadian company Research In Motion.
"He would not claim to be the inventor of anything, much less the BlackBerry. This was obviously a boneheaded joke by a staffer," McDonald said.
The campaign may have learned a lesson from Al Gore, who was widely mocked after he allegedly claimed to invent the Internet, an urban legend that has become ingrained in the popular political consciousness.
And, in fact, McCain does not use the BlackBerry for the primary function that has made it such a success.
In a July 11 New York Times interview, McCain was asked, "Do you use a BlackBerry or e-mail?"
"No," McCain said, but then explained, according to the paper: "I use the BlackBerry, but I don't e-mail. I've never felt the particular need to e-mail."
Of course, the BlackBerry revolutionized communications by allowing people to receive e-mail while in transit, but today's BlackBerrys now provide cellular phone and web-surfing functionalities, as well.
In the Times interview, McCain added: "I read e-mails all the time, but the communications that I have with my friends and staff are oral and done with my cell phone."
He continued: "I have the luxury of being in contact with them literally all the time. We now have a phone on the plane that is usable on the plane, so I just never really felt a need to do it. But I do -- could I just say, really -- I understand the impact of blogs on American politics today and political campaigns. I understand that. And I understand that something appears on one blog, can ricochet all around and get into the evening news, the front page of the New York Times. So, I do pay attention to the blogs. And I am not in any way unappreciative of the impact that they have on entire campaigns and world opinion."
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