What sort of person takes a break from taxpayer-funded cancer treatment and flies 2,000 miles to cast a vote that could result in 22 million people losing their health insurance and tens of thousands of them also losing their lives, then makes a big speech about how messed up the whole process is?
Perhaps the same sort of person who relentlessly agitated for an invasion and occupation of Iraq that caused the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and led to millions of others being displaced from their homes?
Or maybe the same sort of person who put personal and party interests ahead of the national interest when he picked the know-nothing, far-right demagogue Sarah Palin, the ur-Trump, as his running mate in 2008?
Meet John Sidney McCain III: veteran Republican senator from Arizona and former GOP presidential candidate, who endured horrific torture and abuse at the hands of the Viet Cong between 1967 and 1973, and who was tragically diagnosed with brain cancer last week — and who has also been a loathsome human being for most of his eight decades on this planet.
McCain, whose nickname in high school was “McNasty,” has a long and well-documented history of temper tantrums and vicious bullying. The victims of his profanity-laden tirades range from his Democratic opponents and their children — “Do you know why Chelsea Clinton is so ugly? Because Janet Reno is her father,” he joked at a 1998 Republican fundraiser — to anti-war protesters (“low-life scum“) to fellow Republican Sens. Charles Grassley (“fucking jerk“) and Peter Domenici (“asshole“).
He once compared the president of Iran to a monkey and still insists on calling his Vietnamese captors “gooks” (the fact that they brutally tortured him does not excuse his repeated use of a crude racial epithet). Then there is his poor wife. As journalist Cliff Schecter recounts in his 2008 book “The Real McCain”:
In his 1992 Senate bid, McCain was joined on the campaign trail by his wife, Cindy, as well as campaign aide Doug Cole and consultant Wes Gullett. At one point, Cindy playfully twirled McCain’s hair and said, “You’re getting a little thin up there.” McCain’s face reddened, and he responded, “At least I don’t plaster on the makeup like a trollop, you cunt.”
None of this, however, seems to matter to his legion of fans and admirers in the press. “It is simply impossible to overestimate the love, bordering on worship, that reporters in Washington long had for McCain,” wrote the Washington Post’s Paul Waldman on Tuesday, “and to a great degree still do.”
Photo: Win McNamee/Getty Images
It is thanks to these friendly journalists — “my base,” as McCain dubbed them — that the Arizona senator has been able to cultivate his image as an independent, a rebel, a maverick. Yet the truth is that McCain has always been a card-carrying conservative.
The former GOP presidential candidate, who proudly calls himself pro-life and a “Reagan Republican,” spent his first decade in Congress voting for tax cuts and trying to block the creation of Martin Luther King Jr. Day. He has earned a lifetime rating of 81.6 percent from the American Conservative Union and, according to a survey by FiveThirtyEight, has voted in line with President Donald Trump — a leader with whom he pretends to disagree — 90.7 percent of the time. (“Never Trump”? Well, I guess 9.3 percent of the time.)
McCain, to quote FiveThirtyEight’s Harry Enten, is a “MINO … or maverick in name only.” He is, perhaps above all else, a brazen hypocrite. Here is a Republican foreign policy hawk who sanctimoniously suggests support for human rights “must be an essential part of our foreign policy” while backing war after war that violate those very same rights. Here is a hero of the neocons who issues pious proclamations about the importance of promoting democracy and free elections while also cozying up to some of the world’s worst dictators.
As ever, his boosters in the media give him cover. In a fulsome if bizarre encomium to the former GOP presidential candidate last Saturday — headlined “What we can all learn from John McCain” — the Washington Post editorial board declared that “all over this world, Mr. McCain is associated with freedom and democracy” and claimed he had “championed human rights with verve and tirelessness — speaking out against repression and authoritarianism, and inviting … both Republicans and Democrats, to bear witness with him on trips abroad.”
This is pure fantasy. What was McCain bearing witness to in 2009 when he offered to sell weapons to Col. Qaddafi at a private meeting with the Libyan dictator and his son Muatassim? According to a State Department cable released by WikiLeaks, “McCain assured Muatassim that the United States wanted to provide Libya with the equipment it needs for its security.” McCain would later support regime change in Libya but the 2009 cable does not make any mention of him raising the issue of human rights with Qaddafi in person — with or without any “verve.”
What was McCain bearing witness to on all those friendly trips to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, where he glad-handed Saudi royals? And where was the championing of human rights last month, when he helped block a bipartisan attempt in the Senate to restrict the sale of arms to Saudi Arabia in order to try and reduce the number of civilian casualties in war-torn Yemen? Oh, and was it McCain’s association with “freedom and democracy” that prompted the Saudis to donate $1 million to the McCain Institute at Arizona State University?
The Post’s editorial also heaped praise on McCain for supporting “victims of repression” and offering them “succor and encouragement in the fight against tyranny.” This must have come as a surprise to the Palestinians, victims of the longest ongoing military occupation in the world. The former Republican presidential candidate is a strong defender of Israel and close ally of Benjamin Netanyahu. In 2014, he defended Israel’s murderous assault on Gaza, and in 2015, he said the U.S. government “shouldn’t be considering” supporting a Palestinian bid for statehood, warning that in the event of the United Nations recognizing a state of Palestine, “the United States Congress would have to examine our funding for the United Nations.” Repressed Palestinians? Screw ’em.
As FAIR.org media analyst Adam Johnson has observed, we have been fed a “childlike narrative of McCain as brave truth-teller, rather than predictable champion of war and empire who occasionally makes toothless references to human rights for the purposes of image curation.”
The “image curation” is in full swing these days — as are the repeated attempts to stifle any criticism of the Arizona senator’s awful political record. Yet those of us who heard McCain call for U.S. troops to occupy Iraq for “100 years”; who watched him laugh and sing “bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb” Iran; who listened to him call for an escalation of the unwinnable war in Afghanistan cannot — and should not have to — stay silent because he was diagnosed with cancer last week, or because of his undoubted bravery in Vietnam five decades ago.
We can wish McCain a speedy recovery while also acknowledging that he is nevertheless, to quote Jimmy Carter, an unrepentant “warmonger.” He has the blood of tens of thousands of innocents, in places like Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, and Libya, on his hands. And with his vote to move the Republican health care push forward in the Senate this week, he may soon have the blood of tens of thousands of Americans on his hands as well.
Top photo: Sen. John McCain arrives at the Capitol for a briefing with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., who is releasing the Republicans’ health care bill on June 22, 2017, in Washington.
The author of this article seems to be under the false impression that conservative = the GOP party line, when that is in fact very far from the truth. There’s nothing conservative about needless wars of aggression, and McCain is no conservative by any stretch. He’s just an evil, power hungry fascist who finds the GOP to be a useful conduit for his wickedness and inhumanity.
Something strange about a POW eager to send other young men to war.
His views on foreign policy are not where he developed his reputation as a maverick. Primarily, I believe it came from his willingness to depart from party (and political) orthodoxy on domestic issues.
McCain-Feingold stands out. Despite the bills limitations, I think any critic of McCain would have to acknowledge that it is a serious buck of the party line to recognize the warping influence of donations to the democratic process, let alone move to curtail it. He spent significant political capital to pass the bill. For any naysayers that would diminish this, I’d ask they serious consider how many Senators of either party would do the same, let alone Republicans.
Of his domestic policy issues, the one that stands out to me was his opposition to the Post 9/11 GI Bill. It is a dramatic improvement on the Montgomery GI Bill, and greatly expanded access to higher education to veterans. I certainly would have struggled to attend university without it. He opposed the new package, saying in effect it was too good, and would dis-incentivize enlisted personnel from military careers. He was absolutely right, and equally wrong to hold that position. During the wars, service members were stretched incredibly thin, and after the economic collapse, ground down even further by a DoD that knew the civilian sector was tight and they could afford to demand even more. The reformed GI Bill was a life-line for us that wanted better treatment but couldn’t afford the lost income brought on by separation to attend university, which frankly we more than earned. Fuck McCain for beating the veteran drum and then saying anything is too good for us for our service during elective wars.
I don’t recognize and thank him for “serving his country” in Vietnam. The author Mehdi Hasan neglected to mention the 1,000,000+ Vietnamese people he assisted in killing in a war of aggressive imperialism.
Great article! I was just thinking this while mainstream media was gushing about how great the guy has been. Our media if not fully curropted is assuredly delusional. I hope a day comes where people wake up and get involved with the deterioration of our country by men representing corporation interests. All under the guise of religion, lies, and greed.
My comments aren’t being posted? Am I being censored? If so will someone tell me why?
The Intercept has a pause between submission and posting, likely for human review. Not a bad thing, in my opinion. Keeps the trolls away a bit, unlike Disqus. It’s one of the better features of the NYT.
He must’ve read your article and changed his ways!
Yes, McCain is a veteran and served his country. We should recognize and thank him for that. But then that is all. It ends there. It does not make him right in everything he does from there on. In
Edson also matters, he was absolutely horrible with his first wife and quite rude to the 2nd but she had the family wealth to enforce self-control on McCAin.
People have the same delusions about CrookdClinton: just bc she is a woman, she can do no wrong and always be right! NO!!!
Served his country? By murdering innocents from the air, in a land half a world away? What McCain and his buddies did was a crime. They should not be thanked for it.
To be fair, McCain is far from the only politician to pretend to preach the importance of promoting democracy and free elections while also cozying up to some of the world’s worst dictators. Every administration going back 40 years or more has supported the Saudis, for instance. In fact, they created the Saudis, as well as al Qaida.
A lifetime of crimes against humanity and all other forms of life. A low life rotten two bit tin horn so.b. No disrespect to dogs implied or intended.
I have spent the last 48 years growing closer and closer to living my life by the principle simply stated as “What would Eliot Rosewater do if he was lucid and believed the answer to be important?” The Rosewater fortune is nothing compared to the fortunes funding the activities in support of the dark side. If Eliot’s actions are the stuff of your nightmares, then lighten up while you puzzle over your puzzles. Kilgore Trout was correct that Eliot’s actions were sane and compassionate.
In 1929, Germany had a problem with their business operatng environment. Adolf came along and made some changes – especially to the banking cartel that ruined the country – and the planet.
Today the banking cartel is back and the business operating environment is controlled by a few people, their elected whores, and their media while the people suffer in debt, low return on productivity, illegal wars, and threats of deprivation from the criminal minds of those whores and their backers.
This week we again are reminded how Corporate America screws the workers at every opportunity: GE is shutting down their locomotive factory in one location in America — where the workers are union members — and moving the factory to Ft. Worth, TX, to employ only non-union workers!
Meanwhile, that subsidiary of Corporate America, the US Congress, is doing everything in its power to end health insurance and health care for Americans — and probably enacting some type of Soylent Green program?
As far as America’s Fake News is concerned, that special prosecutor of the moment, Robert Swan Mueller III, is some sort of patrician saint, above reproach and cloaked in utter respectability, yet he still owes the American citizenry $105 million!
The now retired and former intrepid FBI agent, Coleen Rowley who, together with Agent Sinder, attempted to prevent 9/11 but were repeatedly foiled by FBI management, explains this situation quite cogently:
“Long before he became FBI Director, serious questions existed about Mueller’s role as Acting U.S. Attorney in Boston in effectively enabling decades of corruption and covering up of the FBI’s illicit deals with mobster Whitey Bulger and other “top echelon” informants who committed numerous murders and crimes. When the truth was finally uncovered through intrepid investigative reporting and persistent, honest judges, U.S. taxpayers footed a $100 million court award to the four men framed for murders committed by (the FBI-operated) Bulger gang.
Current media applause omits the fact that former FBI Director Mueller was the top official in charge of the Anthrax terror fiasco investigation into those 2001 murders, which targeted an innocent man (Steven Hatfill) whose lawsuit eventually forced the FBI to pay $5 million in compensation. Mueller’s FBI was also severely criticized by Department of Justice Inspector Generals finding the FBI overstepped the law improperly serving hundreds of thousands of “national security letters” to obtain private (and irrelevant) metadata on citizens, and for infiltrating nonviolent anti-war groups under the guise of investigating “terrorism.” ”
https://www.counterpunch.org/2017/06/08/comey-and-mueller-russiagates-mythical-heroes/
We have witnessed the Fake News pontification of that loser, John McCain — whose combat record was less than two hours, having been shot down then captured, giving him one of the shortest combat records in history — with the Faux Media acting as if that loser was the Second Coming incarnate in his return to the Senate for his latest bout of useless political theater.
Brings to mind a wonderfully descriptive sentence from Donald Jeffries’ recently published book, “Survival of the Richest“:
“At all levels of our society, those who have risen to the top are so decidedly unqualified, so distinctively incompetent, and so prone to corruption that it’s impossible to envision an innocent reason for their success.”
The first coffee house on Wall Street was the most aptly named, Tontine Coffee House. The tontine was a suicidal financial instrument — which still exists to this day (!?) — whereby one person creates a contract which designates that any surviving members of the group inherit all the assets of the other members who pre-decease them.
It came from Italy, originally around the 18th century, when the fellow who first drew up the contract with nine others, then hired assassins to knock them off, one by one, thusly inheriting all their assets!
That’s what America appears to be today — just one gigantic tontine!
(Bill Clinton — a k a, the Billygoat — criticized the Bernie Sanders’ supporters during the presidential primary, claiming that they wanted to shoot every third person on Wall Street. Personally, I would be more than satisfied if three out of every three were shot.)
Recommended Summer Reading:
Mrs. Fletcher, by Tom Perrotta
Recommended Serious Reading:
National Security Cinema, by Matthew Alford and Tom Secker
Holy crap! Bravo! Bravo! Pure poetry!
Umm, why did you stop? It seemed you were on a role? I was just getting up to speed reading then it ended..
DROP DEAD TODAY JOHN PATHETIC SORE LOSER MCCAIN!
Ditto!
Approx 3 m innocent people killed by us bombs and chemical weapons in se asia, yet johnboy is today held up as the nation’s conscience because of his participation in it. Shows how debased modern America has become.
I hear you
I have long thought McCain was brain-damaged and now I have proof.
But let’s call this prick an honored war hero for surviving imprisonment in the country he helped bomb and which had every right to execute him as a criminal, yet failed to do the planet that big favor.
Time to retire as an honored member of the war-mongering elite, Johnboy.
McCain’s final thumbs down vote kind of deflated the premise behind this article. He wasn’t a MINO in name only, after all.
I agree with the list of negative things McCain has done, but he’s done some good as well. He was an outspoken opponent of Bush’s attempt to normalize torture. And that’s not all.
But nuanced headlines and articles don’t lead to as many clicks in the current age of online journalism, so a biased piece trumps an objective one from a profit-making perspective.
His vote last night was not about being a “maverick”, it was a about being a Never Trumper. It was his F you based on his self centered position on everything, nothing to do with supporting or improving ACA.
His anti torture stance was the only decent stance he’s taken this century…and that was about legacy and his ‘war hero’ mythology.
Excellent take down of JM. My only quibble is that we don’t need to wish him a speedy recovery, but neither do we need to wish him a quick demise. Why? that Glioblastoma is going to take care of business in short order, no matter how good his publicly funded healthcare is.
I hate that McCain is called a war hero. He was dropping bombs in an illegal war and got shot down. Hardly hero material. More like war criminal who got what he deserved. And now poor John has cancer and all the nasty shit he has done his entire miserable life will be forgotten or glossed over. Good riddance.
Loved it. The McCain Institute is a shadowy organization in itself.
McCain is the perfect turd! He has no honor, he is not a hero and I wish I could provide stitches to his other eyebrow. Hurry up and die!
Apparently one of the things Trump spewed in his campaign was that McCain was no war hero as he was captured bombing the ‘Nam in illegal actions. Occasionally Trump inadvertently utters a ‘truth’ during his rants. The MSM was quick to castigate Trump for uttering such blasphemous statements. On a whole McCain has done so much for “democracy” by supporting the worst despots the US can buy and install. What a fucking hypocrite.
I concur. I wonder how much he pays in Healthcare..
Well McNasty screwed us again. The fix that would actually lower cost on the ACA he does away with it. The insurance companies have been popin corks all night.
“As Cost Of U.S. Health Care Skyrockets, So Does Pay Of Health Care CEOs”
http://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2017/07/26/539518682/as-cost-of-u-s-health-care-skyrockets-so-does-pay-of-health-care-ceos
The only difference between The Make Believe Maverick and Dick Cheney is that Cheney made A LOT more money off the death and destruction. They both belong in hell
This article was not worth my time. Whatever happened to patriotism? Collaboration? Respect? Those questions are for you Hasan.
Patriotism is overrated. Respect? Are you joking? Your comment actually was not worth my time. Forget you.
i’ve never rooted for brain cancer before, but…
I want Obama Care repealed. My premiums and deductibles have doubled for my insurance at work to the point it is almost unusable. I voted for Obama and i am glad they have stopped the insurance companies from blatantly using any excuse to deny coverage but Obama Care has never been sustainable. They flat out lied about our premiums going down and it has turned out to be a huge money maker for big insurance companies while i am being ripped off. If they do not do something to fix it now the AFC will just implode.
The problem with a government waiting for one of its programs to implode is that they don’t run it very well. Even before Trump, the Republicans managed to defund vital payments to health care cooperatives that were starting up a decent alternative to Big Insurance. Now their operatives duke it out with the Republicans so that we can choose between having no insurance or almost no insurance. But yes, an insurance program that doesn’t pay for anything but bean counters to keep track and tell you you’re not eligible for payments yet is not a great program.
Whatever else, thank you Mr. McCain for your opposition vote today.
For all the people watching anxiously, those with medical conditions themselves or who have children or loved ones that they are trying to protect and who the current GOP are all so willing throw under the bus while holding tight to their own privilege, again, thank you Mr. McCain for your principled opposition.
As for the rest, there is no hole too deep to cover their stench.
I agree with you! Maybe McCain is trying to do the right thing as he realizes how important health care really is.
That’s the spirit! Call the MF-er’s out on their bullshit.
I don’t even care that the press at this moment are saying that he voted down repeal. What deal was made to get his vote. That’s what I wish to know. WP should try to enshrine him in bronze for doing what any politician w/a conscience should do, for his own generation.
how’s doha bud? Still killing homosexuals for how they were born?
Thank You
Excellent article. However, one thing I can’t understand is this notion of McCain being a hero during the Vietnam War. The true heroes at that time were those who opposed the war, such as Martin Luther King. I find nothing heroic about participating in a war of aggression in which upwards of three million Vietnamese, most of them civilian noncombatants, perished. And that war was no mistake. It was a supreme crime.
Lets not forget that McCain sold out the US sailors murdered and wounded by Israel in the Israeli terrorist attack on the USS Liberty in 1967. He refuses to even hear them out.
Great article. I have for years wondered how McCain gets by with all this crap and still maintains that image of his. It’s good to see at least once media source isn’t afraid of the truth, brain cancer or not.
The exceptionalism of the United States of America will destroy us all.
reading the comments here the is nothing I would like to add but, sara palin certainly is telling. this jerks “heroic” (try not to vomit) to cast the vote that kept this abomination alive (pense of course is another no-brainer) reminds me of the same stupid stunt he pulled when he “heroically” left the campaign trail to save us from the financial crisis (didn’t this clown sell indian lands to some mining cronies?)
piece of krap comes to mind when this warmongering sob opens his mouth.
a rick perry moment opps. “killed this abomination no other changes”.
The repellent hagiographies are ven being penned by journos here in NZ.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/world/americas/94981467/danielle-mclaughlin-john-mccain-is-proof-there-are-still-heroes-in-america
Utterly sickening. The way to look at it is this. Switch him round and make him a Russian with the same record and he’d be seen as a total psycho by our media.
Judgment? McCain-Palin. There you have it.
Were Senator McCain Canadian, he would be incarcerated.
What a pleasure to read such well-weighted journalism.
McCain is, and always has been, a hard right-winger. Anti-American to his core.
John McCain is evil walking the earth. His death should be a national holiday.
…and the sooner, the better.
for those of us who have long known this, i would like add another absolute hypocrite to this conversation. a person who also is not surprisingly MCCAINS best friend in D.C. LINDSEY GRAHAM.
Another great article Mr Hasan.
Thank you.
“Maverick” huh? How many planes did he crash…3. 4? No problem though since his daddy was an admiral.
Some of McCain’s worst stuff isn’t mentioned here, the bit about Vietnam POWs and MIAs. To his credit, McCain did take a stand against torture during the Bush II regime.
Not on topic, but the Intercept should hire this guy!
https://www.amren.com/features/2017/01/young-black-man-became-race-realist/
Fake story. Name on mensa certificate is whited out. I wonder why?
Thank you for this report on this horrible person who contributed so much to the ruination of America. He as NOT a here. He is a hypocritical fraud. He gets his healthcare and tells the rest of us to go to hell. Lucky for America, his brain cancer is going to take him away to his own personal hell.
His love affair with military dollars at the expense of LIVING AMERICA is a despicable betrayal of the good life in America that he allowed wallstreet and the MIC to rob US of.
His living lie was the support he continued for his father who betrayed the US in the coverup on the attack on the USS Liberty June 8 1967 where 33 Americans were murdered by israeli citizens – the same type of citizens who now occupy the US congress and who signed an oath of allegiance to israel over America.
Did Allen Dulles and The CIA Murder JFK?
The condition “wet” at the end of this memorandum is code for wet blood…assassination. Many believe that this implicates Dulles & The CIA in JFK’s murder.
According to Mitch Werbell yes he did.
I have not followed Senator McCain’s political history closely. Of course, I am familiar with his Vietnam war experiences. I have, however, always wondered why he has not done more for the Native Americans living in Arizona. It seems that long ago he chose mining rights over the support he could have offered those Native Americans living on the reservations. Support in the forms of housing, water, electricity, internet connections, health access, educational opportunities, job training, job opportunities, marriage counseling, mental health counseling, cultural resources….have I left anything out?
Once I emailed Senator McCain’s office about a question I had regarding mining rights that would conflict with Native American rights. The response I received was the standard, complex type obscuring the real issue.
I am sure Senator McCain will continue to receive superior medical treatments and care, something that should be available to all Americans, ALL Americans.
Your last paragraph pretty well illustrates the kind of man McCain is: someone who, though receiving the best medical treatment money can buy, courtesy the taxpayers, is transported from his sick bed to vote to limit the very same taxpayers’ access to affordable health care. It is a perfect end to his career.
In a debate with Senator George McGovern, a strong opponent of the Vietnam War, Senator McCain blamed the “loss” of the War on the Peace Movement and politicians who opposed the War. Apparently 10 years of war, 58,000 American lives, up to 3 million Vietnamese lives, poisoning the land with Agent Orange and more bombs dropped on North Vietnam than on Germany in World War II was not enough for the Senator from Arizona. He may have been heroic as a prisoner, but the War by the most powerful military in the world against a poor country of 25 million people struggling its way through a civil war, was certainly not heroic.
Is it brave to bomb innocent people in a foreign country or to be tortured for doing so?
Mehdi, is ‘horribleness’ even a word?
Other than my petty quibble with the headline, pretty much a spot on piece. Well done.
The North Vietnamese held McCain in the “Hanoi Hilton” – actually named Hoa Lo prison, not the ‘Vietcong.’ And that was after he piloted a dive bomber running kill raids over Hanoi. What do we call someone who kills lots of civilians, bombing factories, residential areas etc.? Oh, a war criminal. Nothing changes and its unfortunate he was saved that day by an elderly Vietnamese, who if alive any more, McCain would still call a ‘gook.’
“What do we call someone who kills lots of civilians, bombing factories, residential areas etc?” A Coney Island whitefish.
Hard to sympathize with him about any torture he may have encountered. Pretty sure if he had tried that bombing shit on Americans, and then crashed/ejected, he would not have made it to the road. His hero worshippers “give hypocrites a bad name”.
McCain is a war criminal, dropping bombs on people. He is and always has been a right wing asshole, despite his good positions on a very few issues occasionally. Some people drank the Kool-Aid in thinking that McCain represents anything good.
McCain, Lindsey Graham and Hillary Clinton are thicker than thieves.
The fact that the three of them are so “Neocon” tight speaks volumes.
I started early last week, by merely mentioning his selection of Sarah Palin, for which he should forever be deemed irresponsible. Of course, I first wished him well.
After Mr McCain’s loss to GWB, he lost his outward-facing sense of humor.
In prep for his 2010 race, he moved so far right, he lost any charm or integrity.
After his loss to BO, he became fairly intolerable.
I wish him well AND I prefer the truth.
I read the ridiculous article and some comments about Senator McCain in the Washington Post. After reading it, I asked myself: how can the Post praise a misogynist, racist, nationalist, and lover of oppression, domination, and the empire? The answer is simple. This is how an image is created and maintained. It is this kind of discourse and political theater that sustain white supremacy in the US and the empire. Excellent article Hasan!
You’re giving McCain far too much credit by calling him all those things. Him being a “racist” and a “nationalist” or “misogynist” would imply that he actually has deep seated convictions when in reality he has absolutely no principles, no core beliefs, and does nothing other than what enriches John McCain.
My point exactly. McCain is what I call a foot soldier or errand boy for the rich and corrupt. By the way, McCain is not a nationalist; he is a white supremacist.
This man has done many bad things while senator. To add to author’s “war” countries is Syria and Ukraine. In both cases he encouraged civil war to achieve goals of America Imperialism. Thousands die and people treat this guys as a “hero”. I don’t wish him to suffer, but he is going to hell for sure.
He is a monster, a gleeful mass murderer, and extreme warmonger, who was loathed by his fellow POW’s as a traitor, pulling his daddy’s rank to get better treatment. There is nothing remotely heroic about him. The Vietnamese should have let him drown 50 years ago. The world would be a far better place.
https://www.counterpunch.org/2008/10/31/giving-aid-and-comfort-to-the-enemy/
https://www.counterpunch.org/2008/06/13/mcnasty/
https://www.democracynow.org/2008/10/23/report_mccain_suppressed_info_on_fellow
Here is some vague indication of him going on napalm bombing runs
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/…
I’m with Chris — handing away publicly owned land with one of the finest copper mines in the world on it to a private corporation in exchange for some unmentioned scraps of land they wanted to get rid of, while in the process ignoring Apache claims to the sanctity of their adjoining holy site now to be the skirt of a mining operation — that was the very lowest.
That said, a lot of this stuff with speech outbursts I must ignore (a) because I hate “gotchas” that reward careful surveillance and opposition research, and (b) because a guy who turned out to have a brain tumor has a fucking iron clad good excuse that you can’t possibly argue with.
I was always a bit skeptical of McCain’s Vietnam experience. I mean, I remember reading in one article – though I never found it since – that he said he “kept track of” what he was telling the Vietnamese by taking all the real numbers and multiplying them by three. If you can find that you should trumpet it to the world, because that’s very telling. I mean, he might as well have just sat down with them and gone over the tech specs willingly – I very much doubt it took long for them to figure out what he was doing!
That’s always the problem with McCain. Even when he has his heart in the right place, he just doesn’t have good enough sense to avoid being somebody’s stooge. And so, he has been a Republican.
I am a staunch conservative who willingly voted for Bob F’en Dole! Yet, I thank the author for an honest account of the maverick.
Most importantly he left out the fact McCain after returning home from a Vietnamese prison left his poor wife that waited for him and suffered everyday. Left her for a younger sexy blonde rich women to bankroll his political aspirations.
Whats hilarious about this is the author just validated everything President Trump was saying about John McCain. Yet I am sure with a high level of probability the author attacked Trump relentlessly for doing the same thing.
The author and Jimmy Carter also left out that Hillary and other top Democrats like Charles Schummer, Joe Biden, and John Kerry voted for the same wars. So most too Democrats must have the same warmongering blood on their hands yet Carter ignores this and the author fails to point that out!
As for Saudi Arabia and enabling them Barack Obama left them do whatever they wanted forntheblast 8 years without any serous challenge to their evil ways. Also Hillary and nearly every top Democrat has done the same thing. Most have made numerous visits to that nation just like McCain did yet why does the author fail to mention this. Instead he implies that McCain is unique in this terrible decades long capitulation to Saudi Arabia. Every president and major member of congress from both parties is as guilty of enabling Saudi Arabia as John McCain is. Most of them from both parties are equally warmongers.
We know most prominent Republicans are warmongers the media makes sure if this. Yet, the fact is Democrats are the same thing .so long as they are in power. Doubt that? Consider JFK and LBJ gave us Vietnam. Bill Clinton had no problem bombing the hell out of people. It’s arguable and believed by many that Clinton did this as moly to drum up popularity during an election.
Anyone informed knows the bloody history of the Obama years despite the media blackout. Just ask those in Afghanistan, Libya, or Syria. Ask those in the nations Obama and Hillary gave the Arab spring and tore apart with civil war. Or you could just ask Muhamar Gaddafi! Wait a min, I forgot you can’t do that because Hillary came an he died!
I am extremely grateful for this read on a cherished hypocrite. McCain is an arrogant clown who had the smarts years back when campaigning for the Presidency to invite the Press to join him in his campaign bus while he travelled the country spouting off his accomplishments(sic) to his captive audience..
Given the Press’ craving to want to be part of a winning team along with the freebies that came with it, those bus trips served to boost McCain’s and their egos. They had after all been invited to become disciples of an imagined prophet, if only they would help his cause and trumpet his infallibility in their columns.
That he got beat by a guy, a novice with a glib tongue, and Hussein for a middle name, must have kept him awake many a night scratching his thinning haired skull in disbelief
McCain is the chief of the Republican wing of the US “democracy promotion” organisation, IRI. The chief of the Democrat wing, Madeline Albright.
That says all you need to know about the supporting democracy canard.
Benjamin Franklin was somewhat disappointed that so many
wanted the national symbol to be a bald eagle because he knew that the bird
is an opportunistic thief and is not above vulture-like behavior even as it
is a remarkably skillful predator. In the photo at the top, McCain looks to
be doing his most ardent impersonation of the eagle.
However, as is the case with the vast majority of the delusionally
“exceptional” corporate capitalists in the faking U$A,
there is a great deal of Foghorn Leghorn mixed in.
For real progress, it might be helpful to look at McCain and his predatory
“bipartisan” colleagues as cartoonish impersonators who need to be kept
away from any positions of power so that they might, someday, somehow
find some beneficial humanity within themselves.
THANK YOU. Finally. I am so tired of hearing everyone say we should thank him or be respectful or not call him out on his horrible policy stances because he was a POW and has cancer. Seriously? I mean what kind of a person who is DYING chooses to spend his remaining days to take away healthcare from millions of people instead of reflecting on his pathetic life. What kind of a person does that?Sociopaths and people like John McCain the media and society at large have trained us to respect and not call out, casue they are old and served and their fragile white wealthy privileged men egos cannot handle it.
To insist on respect and sympathy for someone who does not deserve it, who has not earned it, who has consistently caused harm in his capacity as legislator, whose actions will get people hurt and killed, reeks of misplaced and questionable priorities. They did it with Scalise too. No one was allowed to say anything but great things about him because he was hurt. We cant talk about him having for the past 8 years diligently voted to undo the ACA or his ties to a white supremacist organization and his other questionable and right out cruel policy choices, cause he was shot. Heck, the Democrats literally gave him a trophy.
And then people wonder why got Trump and why things wont get better. As long as we care more about respect and decorum than about calling out cruelty and just bad ideas, this is how it will go.
Very well said Ellen!
As usual,
EA
question: What kind of a person does that?
answer: asshole
Sadly, Mr. McCain seems to embody exactly what America has been becoming for a while. Empty marketing.
Celebrating marketed heroes simply distorts what an actual hero is. Welcome to America’s world-renowned meritocracy where the truly great rise to the top. John McCain & Sara Palin for example…
And Mr. Trump is a new phenomena, out of the blue..? Right…
His maverick reputation, as best I can tell, started in the 2000 primary when he ran against George W Bush as the non-establishment GOP candidate. And the most mavericky thing he has done since then, was to vote against some of the Bush tax-cuts.
But that’s really all you have work from, he’s a garden-variety Republican otherwise.
John McCain was NOT born in America.
It doesn’t matter for this piece. I just like pointing out the utter hypocrisy of this country sometimes.
He was born on a US base.
What is your point?
Barack Obama was born on Hawaii. I’m pointing out the blatant hypocrisy of demonizing Obama while lauding McCain for pretty much the same thing -where they were born.
Also, how is an imperialist military station the US? I know, I know, it’s because the guys with the guns say so, but it’s an interesting philosophical point. And it points even more to the hypocrisy that is US politics.
It was worse with Obama, as many didn’t know Hawaii was a state!!
I am a very different person with not much in common with or shared experience or opinion with John McCain. However, choose between McCain and cancer? I know cancer well and wish some of the new immunotherapy he may receive cures him and in doing so lights a path to save many more. Who knows maybe in a couple of decades his treatment might save more than lost to his policies.
Best “We are here article” on Immunotherapy, not over hyped but just right. doses of hope, double dose caution.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/04/cancer-the-final-frontier/478962/
what?- no mention of the Keating 5?!- and whats up with the snowflake cursing critique?- do u, Mr Hasan, not cuss?!- u know what they say about people that dont cuss…
I don’t see anything wrong with offering to sell arms to Khaddafi, he had gone along with everything “the international community” wanted, including the $8billion to the Lockerbie victims, but he wouldn’t play footsie with Israel and kept sending aid ships to Gaza.
He then gave a rambling speech at the UN, criticizing Israel, being quite honest and unrestrained due to brain damage from end stage syphilus.
But I’m sure McCain was aware that we’d invade and that would leave more arms for the staged uprising until we could get IS there.
McCain is a shameless self promoter who pretty much owes everything he got in life from the actual courage of his father.
Why do other Senators treat McCain with respect? It’s certainly not because he actually deserves it. It’s because of some arcane idea that that’ the “custom”. What are they? In the 1860’s?
If we have single payer, that will improve the chances of survival for ALL cancer patients. Including McCain. Does this occur to him? No. Does he care? No. Instead, vote for Trump Care, which is genocide. All McCain cares about is his tax cut.
Mcain is a war hero? No he’s not. A war hero doesn’t scream at the family and friends of missing POW’s and say their wanting to search for possibly alive prisoners is a huge fucking waste of time. He has cancer. But he’s still an idiot that only cares about himself.
What a terrible person. Out of his hospital bed just so that he can deny millions of Americans medical insurance and care. It must be nice to have his cadillac health care plan. I hope he suffers the fires of hell (if there is such a thing.)
I had a close friend die of this type of brain tumor two years ago. He had surgery, chemo and the best care money could buy.
He died a horrible death a year from diagnosis.
I have a hunch that Sen. McCain will have his Hell right here on Earth.
I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised to learn that certain Republicans in Arizona are quietly doing “the circuit” now like so many vultures circling an injured beast in the Arizona desert hoping they will get the nod to take his seat.
I’ll betcha he has already decided who he would like to finish his term. Cindy maybe??
That’s too bad about your friend.
I’m wondering the same thing about who Arizona will put forward.
I heard him mention Doug Ducey, the Governor, several times when talking about healthcare..err repeal of healthcare.
He was with his favorite little partner in mass murder advocacy…Lindsey Graham.
Very good and timely article. Spreading democracy is just another term for invasion and murder and chaos.
Someone very influential, not sure if that’s the best word, told me that a person being a prisoner of war does not make them an expert or even credible on foreign policy.
As far as the schmooz job from the editorial board of WaPo, it goes to show how much worse it has gotten under Bezos.
I have not only stopped subscribing and clicking on links, I have stopped using Amazon for anything.
For anyone else with a problem with WaPo’s propaganda and stunning amounts of corrections and retractions…once the talking point is out there on the lips of cable news talking heads and politicians, that’s when they retract or correct..damage has been done; so anyone else that feels or views WaPo as not much more than National Enquirer…then don’t buy from Bezo’s companies.
A little late, but I meant to say someone in DoD said the above about McCain.
I was younger and the comment made a big impact.,
Also, don’t forget how McCain and Jeff Flake screwed the Apache tribe out of sacred land at Oak Flat.
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/29/opinion/selling-off-apache-holy-land.html
AND, if things weren’t tense enough between N. Korea and the U.S., McCain referred to Kim Jong Un as “the crazy fat kid that’s running N. Korea”.
McCain is SO past his sell-by-date. Please people of Arizona, stop voting for that clown.
McCain is a star in the US American circus.
Borrowing from a statement attributed to Bette Davis regarding Joan Crawford – “only speak good of the dying” – John McCain is dying, good.
Republicans abused Strom Thurmond by dragging his body out for votes right up to his 100th birthday despite having a very small amount of cognitive thinking left.
Amen.
I agree, but good thing he left out is how greedy the “Maverick” really is, anyone here remember this… The Keating Five scandal… funny how republicans forget and forgive stuff like this in their own party, but Democrats pay..https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keating_Five
“he picked the know-nothing, far-right demagogue Sarah Palin, the ur-Trump, as his running mate in 2008?”
This was a cheap pussy statement that you made Hasan. Are you a Muslim? You are an A-hole whatever you are.
Spoken like Trump himself, little comments-in-training-for-Twitter acolyte. You should be proud, defending a bombastic, fame obsessed idiot like Palin. Although, if you’re going to go full-on bigot in the second sentence, why bother contracting “A-hole” in the last? Let that inner deplorable out!
Whatever you may think of Palin, she is one of the most dim witted people to have entered a presidential race.
You can only perfume a pig, so long with Neiman Marcus clothes, winks, smiles and “you betcha”s, before the stench comes through.
Despite any judgements on McCain’s general character and values, I wish more journalists would point out the fact that him voting to debate the health care bills did not contradict what he said in his speech. Before McConnel was a Senate leader, it was ‘regular order’ to grant unanimous consent to debate regardless of any senator’s stance on the bill(s).
Hilarious! The “gooks” pulled him out of the water when he crashed.
Admiral’s kiddy with shitty parents.
I disagree with McCain on most things. I probably agree with the Mr. Hasan on most things. I have appreciated his writing for the Intercept. McCain’s V.P. choice in 2008 is his worst failing and she keeping on detracting from this country even now. McCain is just one of 100 senators and has many others to share the results of his failings and wrongheadedness. This sounds too much like a demonizing piece I would not have written but I applaud the passion of Mr. Hasan and Mr. McCain. Donald Trump I would write about with more demonizing intent if I were a writer. It is a very unpopular position where I live.
I hate how writers even when criticizing Insane McCain seem to feel compelled to pay homage to his supposed bravery in Vietnam. He was a pilot raining death from above. Hardly a hero in my opinion. He’s an evil scumbag and he’s lucky the Vietnamese didn’t kill him as they had every reason to do.
They should have.
He was an a-hole on the decks of the ships from which he took off.
As I recall he was called on the carpet more than once for dangerously gunning the plane prior to take off by throwing fire out of the jets. I believe some were injured by him.
Anyone who knows me knows which side I’m on in the battle between brain cancer and Gramps McCain.
He’s 80, been in Congress for 35 years; WTF!? Speedy Recovery?
Here’s some of my favorite Platitude’s for ya,
such is Life..C’est la vie..and my worst favorite..it is what it is..
sadly in America
Most Politicians do not work for those that elect them
based on the lies they told the voters while trying to buy those voters faith
they do not give one shit about other humans
I do not know how these scumbags sleep at night
Zombie programming?
There are many accounts of John McCain’s behavior and activities during his short career in the Navy. From avoiding the truth on the USS Forrestal to a shady reputation in Hanoi. Mary Hershberger wrote an essay for Truthdig that may be helpful in this regard.
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20081007_investigating_john_mccains_tragedy_at_sea
Not inclined to wish him a speedy recovery. I don’t wish to see him suffer, even though he himself has and will contribute to the suffering of millions, perhaps ten’s of millions of others. But a speedy recovery? One step too far, methinks.
Exactly. When has getting brain cancer at the age of eighty ever been considered a “tragedy”? Also, this brief history left out McCain’s pathetic role in the Savings and Loan scandal of the late 1980’s. He should have gone to jail back then.