That said.
The media lies, but they are not all-powerful. McCain campaigned non-stop. Even when he was out of money, he'd fly himself coach. I never cared for McCain, but I'll give him credit. He worked his ass off for the nomination.
Thompson's 'bad rap' as a lazy campaigner was largely deserved. He took too long to get in, and he simply didn't campaign as hard as the other guys. The media may have exaggerated it, but that's the kind of story that's easy to defeat if it's not true.
Actually the Fred Thompson story was one that the media cooked up and liberals repeated it often enough to where even conservatives, well actually republicans just parroted it to other conservatives that he had no fire in the belly and had no chance to win so when the primaries started they voted for dopes like Romeny and hucklesby