Who IS John McCain

The important question for people leaning toward John McCain is:

Who is John McCain?

It seems he is, and can be, many people. Today he is most certainly no liberal and not even a moderate. He is a retrograde ultra-conservative carved out of the same mold as George W. Bush. Isn't he?

Well, yes. On some issues, McCain has been consistent. But like a chameleon, John McCain has the ability to change his appearance when needed to achieve his political goals.

Consider these issues:

Abortion and Sex Education - Here's he's been fairly consistent, although there are indications that he really doesn't know what he believes. So he looks to Senator Tom Coburn, R-Oklahoma, for guidance. That's not good. Coburn thinks abortion providers should suffer the death penalty.

According to Cristina Page at the Huffington Post, McCain "has consistently voted against the right to a legal abortion and he has also consistently voted against contraception. McCain voted to end the Title X family planning program which is the only way millions of Americans have been able to plan their family. Title X has also been heralded as having prevented more than nine million abortions in the past two decades...

"McCain voted against legislation that would have required insurance coverage of prescription birth control and would also have provided more women with prenatal health care ... It's also worth noting that in 2004, McCain ranked among the 25 worst Senators for children, scoring 38 percent, according to the Children's Defense Fund Congressional Score Card."

That's not all. McCain has fought to maintain what now is a failing program - abstinence only sex education. "He voted against making 'abstinence-only' programs medically accurate ... He also wanted to take $75 million from the Maternal and Child Health Block Grant to launch an abstinence-until-marriage program that prohibits sexually active teens from learning about birth control."


On some issues, McCain has flip-flopped (which isn't always a negative, except in McCain's case - it is most definitely bad!).

For example, in 2001, McCain voted in favor of the Patients Bill of Rights which allowed what Greg Palast calls "claims against butchers with scalpels."

In 2005, McCain flipped so hard he almost hurt himself. He voted to undo his own 2001 Patients Bill of Rights by voting to limit suits to enforce it.


In 2001, the Senator said of Bush's tax cuts, "I cannot in good conscience support a tax cut in which so many of the benefits go to the most fortunate among us at the expense of middle-class Americans." Now, McCain vows that if elected, he will make those tax cuts permanent!


McCain voted nay to Bush's energy plan in 2003. "But," says Mr. Palast, "this week, following Exxon's report that it sucked in $40.6 billion in earnings last year, the largest profit haul in planetary history, McCain failed to join Clinton, Obama, most Democrats and some Republicans on a bill to require a teeny sliver of industry profit go to alternative energy sources."


And then we have the problem of cozying up to big money. Can anyone explain what really happened between McCain and Paxson of Paxson Communications? According to the McCain camp, nobody from Paxson discussed with McCain anything about the FCC and a transfer of a Pittsburgh public TV station.

But...actually McCain himself said in a sworn deposition that he had talked with Mr. Paxson about this issue. He said, "I'm sure I spoke to [Paxson]."

McCain's staff now says "I[t] appears that Senator McCain, when speaking of being contacted by Paxson, was speaking in shorthand of his staff being contacted by representatives of Paxson."

Sure.

The latest is that Paxson is now telling Wapo that he did in fact meet with McCain.

(Thanks to Mickey Kaus at Slate Magazine for the above information)


Gotta love this - from PBS Newshour: David Brooks, the McCainiac columnist claims that it's just fine that McCain is depending upon lobbyists to run his campaign as he does not pay them.
"A lot of them work for no pay."

It would seem to me that is a stupid argument. If they work for no pay, McCain's got to owe them big-time!


On the issue of torture, McCain has flipped 180 degrees. He was agin it and now he's for it. In fact, he's so for it that he wants Bush to veto the bill that bars the CIA from using waterboarding and other harsh interrogation methods.


I have said before McCain will sell his soul to become president. He has sold his soul to the Christian Right. He has moved from that famous statement that Christian Right leaders like Falwell and Robertson and Dobson were "agents of intolerance" to crawling hand-in-hand, begging for their support.

The scene is revolting. But it's working. Even such religious horrors as Louis Sheldon and his daughter, of The Traditional Values Coalition, have endorsed him! McCain just recently crawled to Ohio where he appeared with Rod Parsley, the ultra-right kook pastor of the World Harvest Church (which is more of a Republican breeding ground than a church). McCain said Parsley is "a spiritual guide." Parsley said McCain is a "strong, true, consistent conservative."

Worse than that, however, is McCain's sucking up to John Hagee, the end-times freak who frantically pushes for war with Iran so that Armageddon will come and Jesus will return! Hagee is also one of those who said blamed Katrina on the sins of the people of New Orleans. They had it coming to them! "Hurricane Katrina, was, in fact, the judgment of God against the City of New Orleans."

If one is known by one's friends, McCain is in some pretty bad company.


One last issue to consider - Iraq. McCain, the warrior, says we can "win" the war. He says he'll keep troops in Iraq for 100 years or longer, if necessary. He's become a "rah, rah" supporter of that monstrous mess.

Someone needs to help him here. No one "wins" in a war. Everybody loses. The one who comes out on top usually loses the least, but not always. The question for McCain is this: Why do you insist on continuing this battle that has no end in sight, that is destroying thousands of our young men and women, that is eating away our financial stability, that has crucified America's reputation on the altar of Bushdom, that has absolutely no benefits of any kind for the United States?


A vote for McCain is a vote for another Bush administration. We won't survive another Bush administration!