Senator John McCain may have been in Bournemouth phsyically, but his speech to today's Conservative party conference seemed to have a least one eye on the pending midterm elections in the US.
With little over five weeks to go before elections for the US Senate and House of Representatives, the man most likely to be the Republican candidate for the presidency in 2008 made two pointed references to affairs back home - attacking George Bush for being a big government conservative and seemingly being deceitful about the course of the war in Iraq.
Both times he accused Mr Bush - without naming him - of "hypocrisy".
"Conservatives came to office to reduce the size of government and enlarge the sphere of free and private initiative. But lately we have increased government in order to stay in office.
"And, soon, if we don't remember why we were elected we will have lost our office along with our principles, and leave a mountain of debt that our children's grandchildren will suffer from long after we have departed this earth. Because, my friends, hypocrisy is the most obvious of sins, and the people will punish it."
Tory rank-and-file members applauded the attack on the US president's profligacy. Starting with a a swipe at parties who "value [their] incumbency more than [their] principles", it ended with this seeming warning above that the Republicans almost deserve to lose the coming elections.
Sen McCain then moved on to criticising the Bush administration's presentation of the conflict in Iraq. In his low rumble, he warned not to "attempt to placate public apprehension with false promises of swift victory and passing dangers".
"They have seen enough of this war, in Iraq, Afghanistan and on our own streets to know better. We have an advantage over some countries. We serve a practical and stouthearted people. They can stand the truth better than they can stand deceit and hypocrisy."
Perhaps just as significantly - either through time or inclination - Sen McCain also dropped a pre-prepared passage criticising the Democrats back home for applauding attempts by Congress to block Mr Bush's attempt to reform social security. The passage was originally intended to read: "When the president in his last state of the union address regretted that Congress ahd declined to confront this critical problem, Democrats applauded. What kind of leadership is that? Not our kind."
That said, Sen McCain made repeated references to his own advanced age, and stopped far short of actually declaring his hand. Indeed, embarrassingly, the Tories showed his original 2000 campaign bid video as build-up.
Mr Cameron sidestepped the seeming swipes at the current Republican president, but gushed "I will be proud to see you as leader of the free world" when he followed Sen McCain onto the podium. Referring to Bill Clinton's flying visit to Manchester last week, the Tory leader joked: "Labour had the last president of the United States, we wanted the next one".
The new centre-right Swedish PM and the likely conservative challenger for the French presidency, Nicholas Sarkozy, have meanwhile pre-recorded fraternal video clips for showing at the Conservative conference. Probably safer all round.
