Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) used his report to clobber Grover Norquist, and Norquist rebutted by calling McCain a "liar" and "delusional."

Oh, but this wasn't the first time. This is namecalling with a history -- dating at least back to the 2000 election, when Norquist mounted an ugly effort to defeat McCain.

McCain suddenly found himself with the upper hand in 2004, so the story goes, when the Abramoff investigation landed in his lap at the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, where he was chair. He had all sorts of damning emails at his disposal.

Back in March, Ryan Lizza wrote in The New Republic where things went from there...

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Norquist found the time to talk with conservative news site Newsmax.com about the recently-released McCain Report, which highlighted numerous transactions between Jack Abramoff, Norquist's nonprofit, and various recipients, including organizations tied to former Christian Coalition director Ralph Reed.

"When McCain claims this was something other than an annual contribution, he is lying," Norquist said of the report, which found that ATR frequently pocketed several thousand dollars off the top of the "pass-through" amounts Abramoff funneled through ATR to needy Republican causes:

"McCain has misused his chairmanship of the Indian Affairs committee for two years to attack me and Ralph Reed because he thinks we beat him in South Carolina," Norquist said, referring to McCain's primary battle for the presidency. "He has told people I personally spent $12 million to defeat him in South Carolina. He is delusional[.]"