Character

March 22, 2005 3:31 PM

Republican Sen. John McCain, sitting alongside President Bush... Seriously, can anyone explain McCain's character development after what has passed between them in the 2000 primaries?
posted by semmi (40 comments total)

Maybe the issues have changed? Maybe the AARP is actually wrong in his mind? I don't think he sees eye-to-eye with GW on every issue (or even most), but why is it impossible for him to agree on a few things?
posted by thedevildancedlightly at 3:35 PM on March 22, 2005

ugh.
posted by ChasFile at 3:36 PM on March 22, 2005

"Some of our friends, who are opposing this idea, say, `Oh, you don't have to worry until 2042.' We wait until 2042 when we stop paying people Social Security?" the Arizona Republican asked rhetorically at the Social Security event here.

The Social Security trustees have said 2042 is the year when the trust fund will be empty and the program will have only annual payroll taxes to pay benefits.

God, I wish our media were not so terribly inept. 2042 is the year the SS trust fund is projected to only pay out at 80%. That's 80% more than "empty."

And McCain - to think I preferred him over Gore and Bush in 2000, and here he is repeating (and therefore endorsing) the latest Rove-lie.

sigh.
posted by eustacescrubb at 3:38 PM on March 22, 2005

I don't understand half of what John McCain says or does. On one hand, he seems like a rational man, an intelligent man, and one capable of making good decisions. On the other hand, he is constantly making party-line judgement calls that I just can't agree with. When he refused the veep nomination from Kerry, that's when I lost most of my respect for him. I am slowly losing the rest, week by week.
posted by salad spork at 3:38 PM on March 22, 2005

Uh, the 2008 primaries?
posted by ontic at 3:40 PM on March 22, 2005

Ontic wins.
posted by billysumday at 3:41 PM on March 22, 2005

because he's a politician?
because once a good soldier always a good soldier, and he's following his commander in chief's orders?

also, he's always been the liberal's favorite Conservative, but he remains a Conservative. just because he's funny when interviewed by Jon Stewart, it doesn't mean he isn't a politician like any other.

devildance -- torture. he voted for Gonzales. Gonzales says without organ failure there is no torture. McCain didn't experience organ failure in Vietnam, hence according to Gonzales McCain wasn't tortured. McCain voted for Gonzales. that Gonzales vote impresses me more than the anti-AARP thing.

ontic -- he'll be 72 in 2008, and he's already in bad shape
posted by matteo at 3:43 PM on March 22, 2005

I'm with you, salad spork. I used to name McCain as the Republican I respected most, but I have been forced to reevaluate his integrity. I'm not a "the friend of my enemy is my enemy" kind of guy, but I don't respect anyone who sits alongside Bush and lies.
posted by gesamtkunstwerk at 3:44 PM on March 22, 2005

also, those good GOP gentlemen said in 2000 that McCain was insane. did he suddendly get better? is he OK now?
posted by matteo at 3:44 PM on March 22, 2005

I don't understand the man half the time either. He is a smart and rational man but he makes decisions informed too much by politics and personal beliefs - just like any person would.

You can't fault the man, but you can still criticize his actions, there's nothing wrong with that.
posted by BlackLeotardFront at 3:45 PM on March 22, 2005

I like McCain, but according to the gossip mill here in PHX, he is totally and completely insane to deal with on a personal level... (I've not met him, personally, so I can't say.)
posted by ph00dz at 3:49 PM on March 22, 2005

I get the feeling that McCain has just given up and embraced the Dark Side(tm).
posted by clevershark at 3:51 PM on March 22, 2005

I picked up the latest Harper's recently -- it features an article on the Social Security "bailout" -- and the opinion there seems to be squarely that the "bailout" will do nothing except rescue companies that have been woefully underfunding their own pensions plans.

That seems pretty much in line with the rest of the Administration's actions -- enrich the corporations on the back of the common folk.
posted by clevershark at 3:54 PM on March 22, 2005

Does this answer your question, Semmi? Isn't this more of an AskMe question?
posted by Arch Stanton at 3:55 PM on March 22, 2005

eh, it was wishful thinking on our part in the first place to think that he would, like, you know, think for himself and not fall back on the pack like all sick wolves do.

so someone explain to me why we need political parties. isn't there a way for this whole thing to operate without the chummy club antics that come with having a two-party (or any party) system?
posted by plexiwatt at 4:02 PM on March 22, 2005

McCain used to have some teeth to go with those jowls. Now he's just another GOP lapdog with no more integrity than a bowl of porridge.

He's playing ball so that his party will allow him another run at the presidency. He won't ever make it though because its readily apparent that he's a little bitch. Maybe he's a reincarnated Shih-Tzu?

plexiwatt, without political parties, how would all those rednecks know they were right?
posted by fenriq at 4:07 PM on March 22, 2005

I think McCain woke up with Jim Jeffords' head in his bed one morning...
posted by nicwolff at 4:11 PM on March 22, 2005

Bush definitely has something dirty on McCain and blackmails him with it constantly. How else to explain his silence in the face of the Swift Boat Vets and the torture memo?
posted by fungible at 4:15 PM on March 22, 2005

Or McCain's just a whore. A principled person would have said "fuck you!" to Bush and Co. during the 2000 primary and never spoken to them again. Bush maligning anyone's military service is ludicrous.

But McCain is not a principled person.
posted by Mayor Curley at 4:23 PM on March 22, 2005

How else to explain his silence in the face of the Swift Boat Vets and the torture memo?

Because he is a dishonest, hypocritical, cowardly little fuck. Even if he is slightly less vile than some of the bastards in Washington, he is still happily polishing the turds that Dubya & Co. pop out on a regular basis. I hope he gets his ass handed to him during the 2008 primaries.
posted by weretable and the undead chairs at 4:27 PM on March 22, 2005

I'll have to agree with the something-is-fishy crowd. I can understand McCain supporting this particular issue, and I can understand him supporting a fair portion of Bush's policies what with the general ideology. However, I'd have expected McCain to be hard pressed to even be civil to Gonzales.

When you're tortured as a POW, and then some little jackass gets a personal hand up repeatedly from a bunch of chickenhawks and has the gall to say that what you went through wasn't even torture, I don't see how you could be anything short of furious. Accepting this man as Attorney General just told me that McCain doesn't have any of the integrity many people thought he did.

It doesn't matter what your personal stance on the issues is, being personally told that months of torture you went through was something that a free nation you fought for should be allowed to do just because they want to... How anyone could put up with this, I do not understand.
posted by Saydur at 4:28 PM on March 22, 2005

45. John McCain:
Survived years of torture in Vietnam only to become a bend over buddy for a
sheltered rich dunce. McCain could have bolstered his largely unearned air of
credibility this year had he stood against Bush, but instead chose to show us
all that no principle is too fundamental to humanity to be overlooked in
the name of party loyalty. We can only hope that they’ve got something on him,
something big.
posted by airguitar at 4:39 PM on March 22, 2005

Can't just accept the fact that the man is very conservative and married to the party?

Er, no on #1 and yes on #2. No one who was "very conservative" would sign on to Bush deficits and corporate welfare. But while the Bush M.O. is all all about having things on people it doesn't fit the facts. If Bush -- or rather Rove -- had had anything on McCain he wouldn't have needed the contemptible lies of 2000. Of course, back then he didn't have the kind of unlimited access he does now so maybe things have changed.
posted by George_Spiggott at 4:44 PM on March 22, 2005

Look up his voting record. He's very conservative socially too.

This is true, but somewhat beside the point. Conservative/liberal has nothing to do with integrity and what not. McCain was someone I disagreed with on everything, but at least in passing in 2000 it seemed like he was someone I could respect.

Not any more. Bush and Rove tried to get people to think his adopted daughter was a bastard child out of wedlock in 2000. Sorry, you don't ever sit next to, let alone hug, the motherfucker that does that to you kid if you have even one shred of integrity.
posted by teece at 4:45 PM on March 22, 2005

I think McCain's still holding out hope for getting the SecDef post once Rumsfeld gets pushed out/retires/dies (hey, he's pretty old).
posted by clevershark at 4:56 PM on March 22, 2005

Leave it to a Republican to flip flop on the issues. So which is it, John McCain?
posted by Hildago at 5:03 PM on March 22, 2005

I wish I can remember where I read this but I cannot. One of the major newspapers, as best i can recall.
Its a joke Bush told from the dais at some fundraiser, not longer than a month ago or so:

I have this great new puppy and he does whatever I tell him to, but only half the time. I named him John McCain.
posted by Fupped Duck at 5:05 PM on March 22, 2005

teece: don't forget black... or at least black enough... and, you know, out of wedlock and stuff.
posted by basicchannel at 5:08 PM on March 22, 2005

I like to believe that Bush & Co. threatened to ruin McCain or kill his family or strangle his puppy or nuke his house if he didn't toe the party line. Wild conspiracy theories are so much easier to deal with than crushing disappointment.
posted by Anonymous at 5:09 PM on March 22, 2005

Here's the article that references the joke (bottom).
posted by clevershark at 5:11 PM on March 22, 2005

Maybe McCain just got the memo about the "new" no-dissent, top-down Republican Party...

Well who cares. About the only thing most of us agree on is that his "maverick status" has been hugely overhyped and just didn't stand the test of time.
posted by clevershark at 5:12 PM on March 22, 2005

The dark side of the Force is a pathway to many abilities, some considered to be unnatural.

Is it possible to learn this power?

Not from a Democrat
posted by antron at 5:26 PM on March 22, 2005

he'll be 72 in 2008, and he's already in bad shape

(see Reagan, Ronald)
posted by postmodernmillie at 5:34 PM on March 22, 2005

Once, a long time ago, I thought McCain was a true-blue American Hero. Oh, well.
posted by snsranch at 5:51 PM on March 22, 2005

It's simple. The John McCain we knew has been replaced by an animatronic double. It says what it's programmed to say.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 5:59 PM on March 22, 2005

Wow. That is a mean joke. Still, McCain is Bush's bitch right now, so I guess it fits.
posted by graventy at 6:09 PM on March 22, 2005

He's running and he hopes by helping out Bush, he'll curry favor with the social conservatives, who hate him, and the Bush money people. I can't imagine either warming to him though.
posted by CunningLinguist at 6:25 PM on March 22, 2005

#1 Super-Easy-Fix-All for Social Security:
Get rid of the $90,000/year income cap.

Currently anyone making over $90,000 only has to pay Social Security on the first $90,000 of their income. So while I (and most of us) are paying Social Security on 100% of our income, someone making $900,000 is only paying Social Security on 10% of their income.

Getting rid of the cap will fix Social Security and it will have plenty of money long past 2048.
posted by potuncle at 6:26 PM on March 22, 2005

CunningLinguist; Who is running for what?
posted by snsranch at 6:27 PM on March 22, 2005

I like McCain... heck, I voted for him. People that make him out to be some kind of lapdog to Bush don't get it -- he's all about The Party, same way that Goldwater was. He really is, in a lot of ways, the spiritual heir to the Goldwater legacy... and when you think about it from that perspective, it all kinda makes sense. (Goldwater's impact on AZ politics is almost impossible to overstate.)

At any rate, McCain was hardly silent on the swift boat thing... perhaps we hear more about him on a day-to-day basis in AZ, but he was pretty outspoken on that particular issue. He stood up for Kerry and called him a "friend" many times, for whatever it's worth.

The Republican party is very much in flux right now. McCain has a choice -- basically, he could bow out, go to war against Bush, and basically give up his dream of becoming president... or, he can hang in there, be realistic about what's going on, and take over in 2008.

Unfortunately, he's running out of time... and that's a darn shame. America really lost out on that one, I guess. I still can't believe that people would've rather had a Bush Jr. than McCain.
posted by ph00dz at 6:31 PM on March 22, 2005