Arizona Senator John McCain (official)

[CookyPuss]

Originally Posted by MaxBuck

I have no clue why so many right-wingers see McCain as being something other than conservative, because he is pretty much down-the-line conservative. The fact that Rush Limbaugh doesn't care for him probably has something to do with it. That, and the fact McCain doesn't trot out a Bible every time he has a news conference.

Actually, that answer is pretty simple. It is his media driven image as the "maverick." McCain actually has few areas of interest. That is the main reason you see him shifting on many of his positions. It's not that he isn't principled, he just doesn't care and will take the politically convenient position. If you look closely at his record, you can discern the two main areas where he truly has a strong conviction, and both are the results of his experience.

As I mentioned above, McCain seems to have adopted a never capitulate, never surrender, win at all costs stance toward foreign policy from his experience in Vietnam. On the positive side, I think he would have followed the Powell doctrine going into Iraq and we would not be in the same situation we are now. On the negative side, I don't think we needed to go into Iraq in the first place and McCain thought we did. I think he'd be quicker to intervene in Iran than Obama and I'm pleased that Bush seems to be taking North Vietnam off the table. As for Iraq, I think he might push us to make some fast gains, but has the potential to stay much longer than necessary. I really want to know his objectives and if/how he would compromise.. specifically, how does he define success/victory and surrender.

His other major concern is reform. He was strongly influenced by his participation in the Keating Five scandal. Like his experience in Vietnam, this incident moved him to an extreme position. You can see this on his stance on pork spending:

Paul Abrams: FoxNews' Morton Kondracke Outs McCain: "Not White House Material" - Politics on The Huffington Post

The encounter Kondracke describes was a meeting with McCain to ask him to co-sponsor, along with Senator Paul Wellstone, an amendment to write $100 million into the Labor-HHS appropriations bill, for Parkinson's research because NIH had been refusing to increase Parkinson's funding. That is, he was telling McCain that making the appropriation was not enough, Congress needed to direct NIH to do the research.

Kondracke describes McCain as becoming "irate", claiming this amounted to pork (although it was going to the NIH), so Kondracke asked him, "if you believed the United States needed a certain weapon to protect the nation's security, but the appropriations committee had refused to fund it, you wouldn't fight on the Senate floor to get the money?"

McCain said, "that's right. That's pork, I would never do it".

So, Mr. Security himself, John McCain, would not even fight on the Senate floor for a weapon he thought necessary to protect the country.
Kondracke went beyond the substance of the matter to make an astute observation on the nature of McCain: "I decided then that McCain, despite his virtues, was simply too rigid to be a good president." Note also how easily and quickly McCain became "irate".

McCain seemed unable to distinguish a bad fight from a good one, pork (bridges to nowhere to serve a hometown interest) from national policy (improving treatment for a devastating illness that strikes randomly and costs the country billions).

[note: Mort Kondracke is a pretty big conservative on FOX.]

McCain has changed quite a few positions during this campaign from his run in 2000 (abortion, immigration, view of religious right leaders, drilling, etc). However, he as a few issues (war, pork) where he is stalwart to the point of reckless stubbornness. His maverick image seems to be as much due to his tendency to go off half-cocked as it is on his ability to work on bipartisan issues. I think too many confuse "maverick" (which he is) with "moderate" (which he is not).

[brutus2002]

MaxBuck

Thanks for the vote record. I have more time I will actually go through that list an compare nore thoroughly. I have been working 12 hour shifts for a month now. This crap is killing me.

[CookyPuss]

Originally Posted by brutus2002

MaxBuck

Thanks for the vote record. I have more time I will actually go through that list an compare nore thoroughly. I have been working 12 hour shifts for a month now. This crap is killing me.

Loving John McCain
Interesting article on the media influence on McCain's image, here is an excerpt:

Indeed, the effects of past coverage can be discerned in the results of another survey released in May, by the Pew Research Center, which found that most voters described McCain as "a centrist whose views are fairly close to their own." These voters might as well be visiting Casablanca for the waters. McCain calls himself a thoroughgoing conservative, and he's got the statistics to prove it. He has voted with his party almost 90 percent of the time this term, which puts him ahead of twenty-nine other Republicans, including his Arizona colleague Jon Kyl, who ranks second in his party's leadership. According to VoteView, McCain's voting record in 2005-06 would place him second in the contest for America's most conservative senator in the 109th Congress and eighth in the 110th Senate. McCain supported Bush in 95 percent of his votes in 2007 and has managed to achieve a perfect 100 percent score so far in 2008. But voter ignorance in the case of the "real McCain" is hardly the fault of the voters. They are simply consuming news reports from media that refuse to take McCain's politics seriously.

Here is a graphic representation of the VoteView info referenced above. Notice that McCain is about as far right of center as Obama is left of center. Also, notice how almost nobody is in the center. The bimodal distribution shows why there is gridlock in congress. Also, keep in mind that is only a handful of votes that moves someone one way or the other. Most members of congress vote with their party 90+% of the time.

[brutus2002]

Heres a question...Do they graph their votes based on issue? There are alot of votes(platforms) represented in this graph that I feel "less concerned" with than others. I would like to see a graph like the one above that only plots caertain platforms such as Education, War, Healthcare, World Trade...etc. Maybe if the graph was done on a selected group of 10 major issues the difference in their voting may be less.

[sandgk]

And I thought Cindy was loaded (no, not the old drug addiction - I mean cold hard cash) apparently not enough to prevent an oceanfront condo from getting onto the Foreclosure lists.

McCain Cali property in Foreclosure?

Failing to pay taxes being the cause.

Newsweek is set to publish a highly embarrassing report on Sen. John McCain, revealing that the McCains have failed to pay taxes on their beach-front home in La Jolla, California, for the last four years and are currently in default,

The quoted link is to a map for the home - evidently McCain doesn't merit the deep, double secret Google Maps probation accorded Cheney, yet.

EDIT: Boy they covered that quick - though they are still in arrears:

Mrs. McCain, San Diego County Would Like a Word
Suzanne Smalley, Andrew Murr, Mark Hosenball and Nathan Dinsdale
NEWSWEEK
Updated: 3:53 PM ET Jun 28, 2008
When you're poor, it can be hard to pay the bills. When you're rich, it's hard to keep track of all the bills that need paying. It's a lesson Cindy McCain learned the hard way when NEWSWEEK raised questions about an overdue property-tax bill on a La Jolla, Calif., property owned by a trust that she oversees. Mrs. McCain is a beer heiress with an estimated $100 million fortune and, along with her husband, she owns at least seven properties, including condos in California and Arizona.
San Diego County officials, it turns out, have been sending out tax notices on the La Jolla property, an oceanfront condo, for four years without receiving a response. County records show the bills, which were mailed to a Phoenix address associated with Mrs. McCain's trust, were returned by the post office. According to a McCain campaign aide, who requested anonymity when discussing a private matter, an elderly aunt of Mrs. McCain's lives in the condo, and the bank that manages the trust has not been receiving tax bills on the property. Shortly after NEWSWEEK inquired about the matter, the McCain aide e-mailed a receipt dated Friday, June 27, confirming payment by the trust to San Diego County in the amount of $6,744.42. County officials say the trust still owes an additional $1,742 for this year, an amount that is overdue and will go into default July 1. Told of the outstanding $1,742, the aide said: "The trust has paid all bills shown owing as of today and will pay all other bills due."
Dan McAllister, treasurer- tax collector for San Diego County, said that about 3 percent of San Diego's approximately 1 million property owners default on their property taxes each year. The county assesses a 1.5 percent penalty for each month that goes by unpaid and puts houses up for sale after five years. "We do hear an awful lot of excuses for why people don't pay," McAllister said. "Under the law, the property owner is responsible for keeping the address current. We're only as good as the information we are given."

[MaxBuck]

I can tell you that when a person owns as much real estate as the McCains do, it's easy to misplace the tax bills on occasion. They come from many different jurisdictions, and if the bank doesn't forward them, problems can ensue.

I own nowhere near as much real estate as John and Cindy. I'm not in arrears on any of mine. Just wanted everyone to know.

[Wingate1217]

Some on left target McCain's war record - Ben Smith - Politico.com


The highest voltage third rail of this presidential campaign may not be race, sex, or age, but Senator John McCain's military service.

McCain's campaign Sunday issued a pair of outraged statements after retired general and Barack Obama supporter Wesley Clark said he didn't think that McCain?s service as a fighter pilot and prisoner of war was relevant to running the country. Obama has consistently praised McCain's service, and called him "a genuine American hero."

But farther to the left?and among some of McCain's conservative enemies as well?harsher attacks are circulating. Critics have accused McCain of war crimes for bombing targets in Hanoi in the 1960s. Sunday, a widely read liberal blog accused McCain of "disloyalty" during his captivity in Vietnam for his coerced participation in propaganda films and interviews after he?d been tortured.





I think Obama's supporters are playing a dangerous game here. Unless some individuals that has served with McCain come out and verify some of the things the left spouts this could backfire..... After all the man won the CMH (I believe?) and they just don't give those out to anybody. Now if it can be proven that he received that award and he shouldn't have then that is a different story.





But most of the attacks on McCain's war record are now coming from the left. In a Huffington Post blog, a former editor of Mother Jones magazine, Jeffrey Klein, called?in tones reminiscent of right-wing attacks on Kerry in 2004?on McCain to release elements of his Navy record that the candidate has not made available to the public or the press.




I agree McCain should release the records. If everything is on the up and up then it should put the matter to rest......





"I wouldn't characterize anybody who fought in Vietnam as a war hero," said Medea Benjamin, a co-founder of the theatrical anti-war group Code Pink. "In 23 bombing sorties, there must have been civilians that were killed and there's no heroism to that." "Anyone who can't look back and admit how wrong it was to be in Vietnam and be killing civilians deserves to be challenged," she said, though she stressed that her group is more focused on McCain's present support for the war in Iraq than on his past.




Some people will never get it.....

[generaladm]

John McCain did not win the Congressional Medal of Honor. He earned many military honors, including the Silver and Bronze Stars and Distinguished Flying Cross. The CMH is the highest honor bestowed on soldiers. A few years ago, I read an article in Life or Time recounting the stories of several recipients, they were truly amazing. I remember one where a soldier single handedly fought off an entire platoon of Nazis after the rest of his unit had been killed or wounded. It is often awarded posthumously.

[BuckeyeMike80]

Code Pink will never get it. But then again, it's not like people are flocking to join those nuts in the first place....

And yes they are on the same level as the Fred Phelps gang....

['BusNative]

WESLEY CLARK, JOHN MCCAIN: Wesley Clark says John McCain's military record doesn't necessarily qualify him for presidency -- chicagotribune.com

Wesley Clark: John McCain's military record doesn't necessarily qualify him for presidency

Tribune wire reports 7:57 AM CDT, June 30, 2008

Retired Gen. Wesley Clark, a former Democratic presidential candidate now supporting Barack Obama, said Sunday John McCain's military service does not automatically qualify him to be commander in chief.

Underscoring during a national television appearance a position he has been expressing for several weeks, Clark said performing heroic military service is not a substitute for gaining command experience.

"In the matters of national security policy making, it's a matter of understanding risk," he said on CBS' "Face the Nation." ''It's a matter of gauging your opponents and it's a matter of being held accountable. John McCain's never done any of that in his official positions. I certainly honor his service as a prisoner of war. He was a hero to me and to hundreds of thousands and millions of others in the armed forces, as a prisoner of war.

"He has been a voice on the Senate Armed Services Committee and he has traveled all over the world, but he hasn't held executive responsibility," Clark said. "That large squadron in the Navy that he commanded -- that wasn't a wartime squadron...

[CookyPuss]

Originally Posted by 'BusNative

WESLEY CLARK, JOHN MCCAIN: Wesley Clark says John McCain's military record doesn't necessarily qualify him for presidency -- chicagotribune.com

Clark makes a fair point, but I don't see how it helps Obama. I think it is kind of typical that the media has generally characterized this as a "criticism" of McCain's service. I don't see a criticism there, but a critique of his credentials. Anyways, about all this does is knock Clark off the VP list. Of course, the McCain folks blew their chance to make a stink about it by trotting out one of the Swift Boat guys to the defense. Dumb move. McCain Uses Swift Boat Vet Bud Day To Rebut Wesley Clark

[sandgk]

MuckFich06 - you are spot on in saying this takes Clark down the list of potential Veeps. Great attack dog bit in his eyes I'm sure, but very lousy timing. It made Obama's speech today, focussed in part on patriotism, seem like a response to the Clarke vs. McCain spat, which was not Barack's intent at all.

[sandgk]

Bump for humor:

McCain vows to Replace Secret Service with His Own Bare Fists

[generaladm]

McCain likes to roll the bones. Link from www.thewizardofodds.com

Mac Daddy McCain rolling dice in Las Vegas - The Jed Report

[CookyPuss]

Straight talk in Spanish?

FactCheck.org: Errors en Espa?ol

McCain's new radio ad, in Spanish, aims to show Florida would benefit from the Colombia Free Trade Agreement, which he supports. But every number in the ad is wrong, except one, a prediction of job gains taken from a group favoring the trade deal. And even that number is rounded upward so generously as to flunk third-grade arithmetic.