Still think John McCain is the straight talking reformer of 2000? This week, huge chunks of that facade fell away. His multi-layered lobbying problems sent the reformer chunk tumbling. His one-two rejection of agents of intolerance John "Hitler Was Doing God's Work" Hagee and Rod "Islam is Anti-Christ" Parsley, whose endorsements he actively pursued, revealed the calculation behind his faith-based outreach -- and down came the straight-talk stucco. And his refusal to join the 75 Senators who voted for the new GI Bill (or even show up for the vote), transformed his endless talk of honor, duty, sacrifice, and owing our troops a debt we can never repay into hypocritical dust. No matter who the Democrats nominate, it's increasingly clear McCain's toughest foe in 2008 will be the man he used to be.
Sunday, May 25, 2008
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
John McCain Scuttles the Armed Forces
Brandon Friedman of vetvoice.com details the atrocity
“Yesterday VoteVets.org delivered a petition with 30,000 signatures to the office of Senator John McCain. Through that petition, we asked him to support Senator Jim Webb's new GI Bill. And less than 24 hours later, we have an answer:
"Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, seemed to give a thumbs down to bipartisan legislation that would greatly expand educational benefits for members of the military returning from
The reason for McCain's refusal to support the bill is about the most disturbing rationale one could imagine....Officials in charge of Pentagon personnel worry that a more generous and expansive GI Bill would create an incentive for troops to get out of the military and go to college.”
Some things are so vile and contemptible there is no response to them.
Many years ago I attended a lecture given by Simon Wiesenthal the famous Nazi hunter. Somebody handed out picture postcards. Depicted was an SS Officer posing for the camera his right foot on the neck of a prisoner.
An older man in the audience rose to ask Wiesenthal for one name with an address.
Today, I recalled the emotion with which he spoke.
