McCain going to delegate-free Munich

By Sasha Issenberg, Globe Staff

BOCA RATON, Fla. -- Regardless of the results of the February 5 megaprimary, John McCain is headed to delegate-starved Bavaria.

The weekend after the bicoastal bonanza, McCain has already booked a trip to the Munich Conference, a high-profile national-security confab he has attended for years. McCain often brings up past conferences when boasting of his relationships with world leaders, good and bad: he proudly recalls a time he said Russian President Vladimir Putin looked him directly in the eyes while disparaging U.S. foreign policy.

The detour from the campaign trail will be a brief one, says traveling companion and former Navy Secretary John Lehman: a quick weekend turnaround with barely 36 hours on German soil before the return to Andrews Air Force Base. The blitzkrieg will feature little time for the excesses documented in a recent film romanticizing congressional travel, according to Lehman.

"That's a typical John McCain trip," he said. "He's no Charlie Wilson."