RKMBs Forums .::Important::. Politics and Current Events McCain in 08?

Wow. Sort of like the Clinton administration.

By the way, whomod, using your logic, Barack Obama is a "drug addict," too.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22226198/

I never thought I'd say this, but Michael Jackson makes a good point.

G-man sides with the pedophile.
there's a shocker.

doesnt disagreeing with whomod cancel that out though?

is that really the best you can come up with? one partial statement taken completely out of context? I'm surprised we ever expected any better of you.

So much for the attack on Michelle Obama's patriotism.






C'Mon right wingers!!! Attack McCain's patriotism now!!!!






I guess Cindy McCain is going to have to go back on Good Morning America and rebuke her husband now.

perhaps in the wonderful world between your ears you're absolutely correct. out here it looks a lot like you're reaching pretty desperately on this one. not that I find that unusual or anything.

perhaps in the wonderful world between your ears you're absolutely correct. out here it looks a lot like you're reaching pretty desperately on this one. not that I find that unusual or anything.

weak
weak.
weak.




As you can see from the clip, the statemnt was provided COMPLETELY in context. How is this any different from what Michelle Obama said? Mrs. Obama said that for the first time in her adult life she was really proud of our country. McCain said that he never loved our country before the age of 31. At least Mrs. Obama was proud of our country before, and she always loved our country. McCain not so much - let's face it, if John McCain didn't love America as an adult, he most certainly wasn't proud of her. And another thing. Michelle Obama is the candidate's WIFE. John McCain wants to be commander in chief of a country he didn't love.

Sammitch not making a substantive argument? Just obnoxious insults?

This is a new one on me

John McCain's stance on the war is unambiguous: He voted for it, supports the current enhanced U.S. troop presence in Iraq and vigorously opposes any timetable to withdraw.

The public's stance on the war is as equivocal as McCain's is not: A strong majority of Americans oppose it and believe it was wrong in the first place, but more find McCain better suited to handle Iraq than his Democratic presidential rival, Barack Obama.

"He's more experienced militarily," said Ann Burkes, a registered Democrat and retired third-grade teacher from Broken Arrow, Okla. "And I don't know if I agree with stay-the-course (policy), but I think the good probably outweighs the bad with him, experience-wise."

Burkes illustrates the conflicted voter, one who is as likely to be influenced by McCain's policy positions as by his personal biography as a former Navy pilot who spent more than five years in a North Vietnamese prison.
Independents believe McCain would handle Iraq better

For McCain, there is a major complication. Not all those voters who perceive him as stronger on Iraq say they will vote for him for president.

Unlike the 2004 presidential contest, this is not shaping up as a national security election. Neither the war nor terrorism is foremost in the public's mind. The economy and energy prices are the pre-eminent issues of the day. And on those, Obama has the edge.

Still, this hate-the-war, love-the-warrior strain runs through the American electorate. In a new Associated Press-Yahoo! News poll, more than one out of five of the respondents who said they opposed the war also said they support McCain for president. The sentiment does not discriminate by gender or by age. Most significantly, it splits independent voters in favor of McCain.

Respondents said McCain would do a better job in Iraq than Obama by a margin of 39 percent to 33 percent. Undergirding that response is a strong sentiment that McCain would be a better leader of the military than Obama. One out of three respondents said that description matched McCain "very well," whereas only one out of 10 said the same of Obama, who did not serve in the armed forces.

The Iraq findings track McCain's advantage on the issue of terrorism. Of those surveyed, more than twice as many believe McCain can better handle terrorism than Obama. As such, McCain is emerging clearly as a candidate of national security, a conventional role for a Republican.

The public's views about Iraq are especially notable because many voters appear to separate McCain's past record of support for the war from their perception of his performance as a military leader. What's more, it points to a potential Obama vulnerability.

Only 6 percent of those who say they will vote for Obama say McCain would do a better job on Iraq. But among "weak" Obama supporters, that figure rises to 15 percent. Moreover, among undecided voters, McCain is preferred 25 percent to 15 percent over Obama on Iraq.

Leeann Ormsbee, a registered Democrat from Waterford, Pa., believes the United States rushed to war, but now does not believe troops should simply withdraw. The 29-year-old self-employed house cleaner says she has never voted for a Republican. She might this time.

"I do believe that he will do better in Iraq," she said of McCain. "Because he's served in the military and he has said we can't just pull out. ... I think we're just kind of stuck with it now and we have to finish."

Republican pollster Neil Newhouse calls these voters "nose-holders."

"They don't like the fact that we're over there, they don't think the decision was the right one, but they understand that if we simply withdraw our troops it would leave things worse off," he said.

Aware that national security is one of McCain's strongest features, Democrats and their allies have tried to portray his Iraq stance as a mere continuation of President Bush's policy. They have seized on his comments earlier this year when he speculated that U.S. troops could remain in Iraq for 100 years. Though he was talking about a presence of non-combat troops akin to those in South Korea, the remark has been used against him in television commercials.

Earlier this month, McCain kicked off his general election advertising campaign with an ad that featured his and his family's military service and his years in captivity but cast him as a man with a distaste for war.

"Only a fool or a fraud talks tough or romantically about war," he says in the ad.

McCain supported the resolution in 2002 that allowed Bush to use force in Iraq. He later criticized then-Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld for his management of the war and went on to become one of the Senate's leading advocates of last year's buildup of troops. He has said he could envision troops withdrawing around 2013 but has refused to fix a date.

"We were losing in Iraq; now we're winning," he has said.

The troop expansion, which is about to end, has left Iraq safer and given Iraqi forces greater responsibility for security. But Pentagon and congressional reports issued this week also warned that the gains are delicate and could be reversed.
Democrats split on who would handle terrorism better

McCain's Iraq advantage could evaporate if violence and chaos resurface and U.S. casualties mount. Conversely, even greater successes in the country could make withdrawing troops more palatable.

Obama has argued that the troop buildup has not helped resolve Iraq's political problems. He wants to remove all combat brigades from Iraq within 16 months of becoming president. But he has said that if al-Qaida builds bases in Iraq, he would keep troops in the country or in the region to carry out "targeted strikes."

"As the American people get to know Obama and McCain better, they will see that the difference is Obama's desire to fundamentally change American policy in Iraq and John McCain wants to continue George Bush's policy," Obama spokesman Bill Burton said.

Democratic pollster Anna Greenberg said the evidence of improvements this year presents a double-edged sword for McCain and Obama.

"Obviously, people don't like the war in Iraq; they want it to be over and they don't like all the money we're spending there," she said. "On the other hand, people also don't want to retreat or lose. ... In 2006, (the public's view of the war) was much more clearly a net positive for Democrats. I think the landscape has changed."

At the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, which has also polled on Iraq and the presidential candidates, associate director Michael Dimock said the public has a perception that McCain "is not completely on board with Bush."

What's more, he said, Obama faces lingering concerns about his experience, about not being tested and about not having foreign policy experience -- themes Hillary Rodham Clinton pushed during their prolonged primary contest.

"What you see is that Americans themselves are conflicted about Iraq," he added. "They are very hesitant to say that we need to get out now. They understand the complexity of this situation."

By Senator John McCain

Two of our greatest statesmen, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, took their last breaths on July 4, 1826, exactly 50 years after they presented America with our Declaration of Independence. They had been fellow revolutionaries, the closest of comrades, who went on to become bitter political rivals. Then, as the new era of the 1800s dawned, they reconciled, reminded of their old friendship and the momentous history they had made together. "Who shall write the history of the American revolution?" Adams asked Jefferson in one of the 158 letters they exchanged after they'd rediscovered their bonds. "Nobody," responded Jefferson, suggesting that while writers could understand the facts, they might never grasp the sacrifices.

We cannot know for certain, of course, if any later historian ever did succeed in writing a history of our revolution that would have impressed two of the greatest authors of the event. But more important to Adams and Jefferson was the question of whether future generations would prove worthy of the sacrifices our Founders had made to create this Republic. America's many accomplishments in the 182 years that have passed since their deaths, our rise as the most powerful and prosperous nation in history, would have, perhaps, exceeded their expectations. But would they still see in the spirit of our own age the same devotion to the ideals of our revolution? Would they find that love of country was just as strong in the hearts of today's Americans?

I believe they would. Patriotism is deeper than its symbolic expressions, than sentiments about place and kinship that move us to hold our hands over our hearts during the national anthem. It is putting the country first, before party or personal ambition, before anything. It is the willing acceptance of Americans, both those whose roots here extend back over generations and those who arrived only yesterday, to try to make a nation in which all people share in the promise and responsibilities of freedom.

I've spent a lot of time listening to veterans, talking to them, and also serving with them when we were young and at war. After their tours end, these soldiers, sailors, aviators, and Marines almost always return to the hard times, times of pain, suffering, loss, violence, and fear. They remember where they risked everything, absolutely everything, for the country that sent them there. It gives their lives special meaning. And it is the sacrifices of so many Americans, at home and abroad, in times of peace and times of war, that give meaning to all of us. We are blessed to be Americans, and blessed that so many of us have so often believed in a cause far greater than self-interest, far greater than ourselves. It is this belief that has sustained me as well, from a combat aircraft to a Vietnamese prison cell to the Senate floor or the campaign trail.

Today, politics is derided for its self-interest, combativeness, duplicity, and triviality. But such failings are not unique to our age. Both Adams and Jefferson lamented them in their own time. But that's the great beauty of our form of government, which they helped to create; it accounts for the vices of human nature as much as it hopes for our virtues. This blessed country remains a place of limitless horizons, a country where ideals, where a love of liberty and self-reliance still check the excesses of both government and man.

In return, the gift we can give back to our country is a patriotism that requires us to be good citizens in public office or in the community spaces where government is absent. We should, by all means, argue with each other, as did Adams and Jefferson, about the policies of government and the history we hope to make tomorrow. But it should be an argument among friends, who agree more than they disagree, each of us united in a cause larger than our individual interests, honestly debating the best means to serve that cause, and intent on finding some common ground upon which to overcome together the many challenges before us. To love one's country is to love one's countrymen. And if we are to replicate the spirit of our founding age, if we are to be genuine patriots, we must remember also that we are patriots because we love the countrymen we will never know, who will be born after we are gone.

he would be the Rochester to McCain's Jack Benny.....

Here's the thing that makes Kerry a first-class asshole in this situation: He could have endorsed Obama without stabbing his "friend" in the back. All he had to do is say something along the lines of "John McCain is my good friend and he's a good man. However, our nation requires a new vision and different outlook than what the Republican Party currently provides. Barack Obama has that vision and outlook. Therefore, while John McCain remains my friend, I heartily endorse Barack Obama as the better man to hold the office of President."

But Lurch couldn't do that. Just as he did with his fellow Vietnam vets during his treasonous, false, testimony on Capitol Hill over thirty years ago, and just as he did two years ago when he called the troops in Iraq stupid, he chose to gratuitously stick a knife into a fellow veteran.

He is truly a scumbag. No wonder his fellow vets put out those "swift boat" ads.