It is getting harder and harder to say that I still respect this political bisexual for his former service to our country.
I have been chided by some of my friends and relatives for overconfidence about this upcoming election, and I know that after 8 years of Bush Jr. we can't afford to be complacent. But I laugh my ass off at McCain the candidate. It's a riot.
My cautionary friends warn that McCain appeals to the mushy middle, those fickle, shallow swing voters that are so important. But the swing voters are only important if you are working from your base, not against it. And McCain is working against his base.
Here is is, trying to pander to them. Here is is, going back on one of the only principles that separates him from Bush (though he violated it before by supporting Gonzo the Torturer). Here is is, making mockery of his war record and his supposed honor.
Why? Because he's playing to Limbaugh and Coulter and Hannity, and trying to stop them from calling him a coward. They won't stop, of course. Those fuckers don't change their tune about people. But he has to play to them anyway, because they're the base, goddamn it, and you can't win without the base no matter how much dubious popularity you have with "moderates."
It hurts him with the moderates. It won't help him with the base.
Watching the GOP rip itself to shreds is like a big karmic slice of premium chocolate cake. Every bite is so damned good.
McCain is a war hero.
McCain is also crazy, loony, nuts.
McCain right now is supported heavily by AIPAC and the "lets go to war with Iran" people.
That's code for AIPAC+Xtian fundies y'all.
OT: hey clinton doners hope you like spam and junk mail...wow they sold you personal info for 80k. i knew the clintons could be bought...i didnt know they where so cheap
that critics say is a form torture
It is a form of torture. People have hung for it. Fcuk this objectivity, equal time crap!
Imagine if the MSM had been around during the 1930's..........."Critics say that Hitler does indeed hate Jews. However, his spokesman said tonight that any solution would not be final."
By now it should be crystal clear that any of McCain's deeply-held maverick principles can be violated as necessary, so long as it furthers his political ambitions.
Not that the MSM will care. They loves 'em some Stern Daddy McCain. And for all of his "maverick" rep, he's a Villager Just Like Them.
people are tired of being told "Be Afraid!" and the way that McCain is out there, trying to combine the worst parts of Ghouliani, Mittens, and Ron Paul, in an effort to appeal to "the base" is not working.
The guy survived YEARS of actual, brutal torture by the Vietnamese -- and came out with his head high. I can't say that I would choose to stay in the Hanoi Hilton, rather than get an early out as a political chesspiece, but he did.
In 2000, I was ready to vote for him. Since then, it's become more and more clear that what he needs is to retire, and get a lot of help.
We don't need his finger near the button, his hand on the football, finger near the trigger, or anything like that.
Go home, John, and get some rest.
The Vietnamese *did* break him. Brutally and repeatedly. This makes his "no" vote even more even more disgusting...
As for McCain and torture.......... his memory must be going if he's all for it.
The eternal war and torture party is in for a historic defeat.
John McCain: Poster child for the Stockholm Syndrome.
And I'm not talking about his relationship with the Vietnamese.
Oh, please. Stockholm syndrome, my ass.
John McCain wants to be President. Full stop. He was brave in 1968, he's brave now.
But he's also full of it. His ambition is unlimited (which, when you think about it, applies to just about anybody insane enough to run seriously for President).
He'll say anything, do anything, to win the election. And it won't work. That's all there is to it.
John McCain sold his soul long ago.
Remember the Keating Five?
His subsequent career has been a slow sell out of his remaining ethics in pursuit of power with occasional illuminating flashes of the character that allowed him to resist the torture inflicted on him during Vietnam.
Looks like the sale is at last complete.
Don't remind the Republicans of the Keating Five. There was another group he was the only Republican in...
Pay close attention to who McCain chooses for his Vice President because that person will end up President in the first term. Can you imagine what is going through Preacher Hucklebee's feverish dreams right now?
oh oh ..... did is stumble into fdl where the string are modified to support The Candidate?
McCain/Hillary 2008 
McCain is a war hero. Yep. Then he allowed gwbush to dis him in a way NO man, or woman for that matter, would ever tolerate. That was it for him. No respect left. None. He could have prevented this entire goddam bush fiasco with a pair. But he did NOT. He took it for the insanity of bush and there you see him givin' the luuuuurve up for bush the younger. NO DEAL. NO SALE. FUJM.
I've found that a lovley NO W sticker works well, turned upside down for NO M.
He's my fucking senator .... FUJM.
Hubris...... da big lurrrrve fer this post. 
McCain threw bombs on civilians from thousands of feet in the air.
Then he got shot.
He's no hero, he's a war criminal.
And since he's for waterboarding he was never tortured, right?
"John McCain wants to be President. Full stop. He was brave in 1968, he's brave now."
No, he was brave up until about this time 8 years ago, when he was also running for President against a lesser man. It was then that he began embracing his tormentors, Bush and Cheney, in an effort to maintain a chance (just one ... more ... chance) to have "his turn" in the Oval Office.
Look at what's become of his publically stated values since the neoCon Republicans "took him hostage" in 2000. Campaign finance reform? Screw it. A sane military and foreign policy? Fuck that. Physical torture like he himself endured? Peachy keen, cause Mistah Bush says so!
Does that strike anyone as brave?
If any of his captors from Vietnam are watching St. McCain's fawning submission to criminals who ran roughshod over him and his family, they must be wondering what dark arts Bush and Cheney have that they, with all their punji sticks and tiger cages, didn't.
Y'know, every damned time I see the picture at the head of this post, the following passage comes to mind (Quoth the Orwell):
"O cruel, needless misunderstanding! O stubborn, self-willed exile from the loving breast! ...(I)t was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Big Brother."
in point of fact, mcCain did, indeed break under torture. everybody does. that's the point of torture. he signed a canned confession that the north vietnamese had prepared for him. he even gave a filmed "interview" where he said the things they told him to say. everybody does. there was no dishonor in that. the tortures he endured were horrific, brutal, and had he held out longer would have quite possibly killed him. as it is, he endured to the point of permanent physical damage.
thing is, that mcCain had actual, real, knowledge of things like how the gulf of tonkin incident did not actually happen. he was in the air at the time in the area. he was in a position to see that the events he observed on the ground had nothing to do with what the radio traffic was describing. he didn't give that up. he didn't have to, because, like all torturers the north vietnamese were only interested in getting him to say what they wanted him to say. they didn't want real information, or the truth they wanted the pilots and other POWs to spout the bullshit they felt they needed to justify their actions to the world.
just like the bastards at guantanamo and the secret gulag system.
that mcCain caved on this issue is beyond shameful. he knows that there is no possible way to torture a path to the truth.
bastard.
That picture of McStain hugging Bush makes my skin crawl. Publicly groveling & debasing himself before the nasty little Caligula-esque creep who made him eat shit and like it. Ech. "Brave" McCain indeed.
John McCain really is the most worthless creature alive, isn't he?
Well, I see where bush has shocked the world by "endorsing" McCain.
"Alright. Y'all lookyhere. I have come to realize that John McCain is the best candidate "to go forward with my policies". (His actual words, guys...:o) ) and therefore, I've decide to make an honest buttboy out of him."
(Bush smiles broadly and bobs his head in that manner that we've come to know and love...)
"Seven years ago, after me'n Karl got done cornholing him for the entire duration of the South Cackalack republican primary like we wuz all trying out for a Broadway revival of "Deliverance", we figured that a month-long political fist-fucking would have cooled his jets for, pardon the expression, pressing the flesh.
Boy were we wrong!
Turns out ol' John has staying power, and would cut his own mother up for catfood for a chance to run for the whole enchilada.
Y'all heard of pantysniffin'?
Check out the photo of John gettin' a residual whiff of the oval office from my sweaty armpit. :o)
See that facial expression? We're talking Nirvana here...I mean, Krishna tapping into the universal Lingam, like a 17 year old high school boy with his first all-the-way girlfriend.
To tell you the truth, it's a little scary, but if he wants to mix it up in the general with 4,000 dead American troops hanging around his neck, against a guy who doesn't have a drop of blood on his hands, and who, without even trying too hard, has been kicking republican ass like he was born for it, then I figure, who am I to put the quietus on that kind of enthusiasm?
So, John, here's the Papal finger wave for you; you are hereby annointed.
Just don't get the big head; I'm a kindhearted guy, and I'd do the same for a goat that we were about to barbecue up, down on the ranch.
Which, come to think of it, is a pretty good angalogy.
Err...alangogy...
Fuck it...
a COMPARISON!
Anyway, you all know what I'm talking about; we patriots need a man who's willing to stand up in the middle of my gigantic clusterfuck and say that he's down with a hundred more years of it.
That little get-out-of-jail-free-card you laid on my desk, won my heart, and, incidentally, my endorsement.
But now it's time to unwrap your tongue from around my prostate gland. I think you're going to need it in the general election.
:o)
Amuseinc:
"Can you imagine what is going through Preacher Hucklebee's feverish dreams right now?" :o)
Let me take a shot at it:
A half a dozen 4 foot Timber Rattlesnakes like in a Disney cartoon, dancing up to the edge of a flat earth, looking over the precipice into the smiling face of a handsome CAUCASIAN and MALE Jesus, and singing, in dulcet harmony with da lovely Lennon sisters:
"SEEEEEeeeEEE? We told you soooOOOOooooo!!!"
(Note: Versions of this are being cross-commented in the major current political threads --jwe.)
Everyone, LISTEN UP...
Stop accusing each other of lying. Stop calling each other names.
Right now.
I'm not playing games. I'm not fooling around.
I will start tossing people off this board, and I don't give a hoot how many of you go. THIS CRAP STOPS NOW.
We will have a safe space here without personal attacks if I have to personally ban half of you.
A full post on this will show up eventually. Till then, KNOCK IT OFF.
I refuse to be the bad guy who walks around with a big stick keeping discipline. It isn't my nature and makes me cranky.
I expect everyone to behave as you would if you were talking to someone's mother... Be polite. Be nice. Be professional. Feel free to attack ideas. Attack people and you are GONE.
THIS IS A WARNING TO EVERYONE. It is NOT directed at any one person or any one offense. Ignore what I'm saying at your own risk. Give me any crap about this at your own risk.
GNB from day one has been designed to be a safe space. During primary season, things have got out of hand. That stops right now. It is safe here and it is going to stay that way. If someone attacks you, leave it alone. Feel free to briefly and without attacking them, point out they are attacking you personally and we don't do that here, but do NOT attack them back or both of you will get tossed. "Inciting to riot is not an excuse to riot." Don't get suckered into throwing the second punch.
We bloggers won't catch everyone every time because we can't see everything, and as I say, we're not in the business of being enforcers. But if someone is recurrently making personal attacks, we'll catch them. If not that time, eventually. Do not participate, including don't keep writing "personal attack, personal attack, personal attack, personal attack." Let them be the bad actor, not you.
Someone is going to test us on this. Obviously some fool will come in and do it. That's fine. But some regular will do it just because that's who they are, or even some regular will forget him or her self and test us. We'll miss them; for about ten minutes.
What happened this week where a blogger was attacked (in this case, me but it could have been any of us because you never truly know when you're going to write the post which brings the storm down on you) and where in the threads, some of you continue to bash each other over which candidates you support, calling each other liars and other names, casting aspersions on each other based on where people come from.... all that is never, ever, ever happening again. We are all going to be nice to each other at GNB. If you want to attack people, there are plenty of boards where that is acceptable. This is not one of them.
Again, a post on all this will show up eventually. Till you get full details, be nice. Pretend you're talking to someone's mother. Argue ideas... do not attack someone personally. Don't even come close.
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