Spencer Macke earned Sen. John McCain’s admiration for selling $4,000 worth of yellow ribbons to benefit troops abroad, so the reward for the first-grader and his younger sister was a chance to ask the Republican presidential contender five questions.

“Were you ever in a tank,” Spencer, 6, said, reading from a notebook. “Did you ever use a M-16?”

Five-year-old Piper Macke, like her brother, the daughter of local Fox television anchor Tricia Macke, was similarly curious.

“Is being the president like being a king?” she asked. “What does the president do all day?”

For the record, McCain said he’s never driven a tank.

“In fact, I truly think it would be very dangerous to anyone around,” the former Naval aviator told the siblings after an appearance at Xavier University.

McCain said he had never fired an M-16, the weapon of choice during his time in the Vietnam War, but he flew with a standard combat pistol. He said being president isn’t like being a king because the executive, legislative and judicial branches are supposed to provide equal leadership.

As for what the president does all day, McCain described meetings and foreign travel and how the president should work with Congress to resolve the mortgage loan crisis.

Spencer got the final question. “Did you ever have food when you were a POW?”

McCain chuckled and said, “Yes, but not very good. Sometimes I was not sure what was in the soup.”

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Compiled by Glen Johnson