You’re mistaken. That’s whee he keeps the polonium.
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If anything “hated by Republicans” is one of his best saving graces, not an indication of how terrible he is.
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Yeah, the Republicans are actually an amazingly reliable indicator of truth, justice, decency, etc… it’s generally precisely 180° from wherever they’re facing.
Mind you, I’m not sure they deserve any credit for that, since they also tend to be pretty close to 180° from the values Democrats pretend to stand for.
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Dems stab you in the back while Republicans stab you in the front. Comparison checks out.
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And my point, that I didn’t quite articulate, was that the Vile Old Party’s platform has degenerated to basically ‘whatever liberals deem unconscionable’.
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Is McCain not a conservative?
Not really. There is still a large degree of common ground between the elites of the two parties.
The GOP are not just reactionary idiots. They have an ideology, and they work tirelessly in the pursuit of that ideology. They’re militaristic, imperialistic, hypercapitalist white supremacists…which places them squarely in the historical American mainstream.
The leadership of both parties agree on imperialism, both parties agree on capitalism, both parties value the stability of the white supremacist status quo more than the meaningful pursuit of justice. The key difference is that the GOP are recklessly aggressive and overt about it, while the Dems are cautious and sneaky.
OTOH, neither party represents the majority of the population. The American people are not the same as the American ruling class.
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True to certain extent. But that doesn’t mean the American people don’t themselves embrace some of the worst aspects of the ruling class’s ideologies, and the ruling class rely on appealing to and cultivating the hate of the people for one another. Establishment politics is often the art of getting people to turn on each other and anyone the leaders can paint as outsiders, be they Muslims, Russians, Chinese, ethnic Jews or any other convenient group. And now people increasingly believe there’s no factual reality beyond their personal feelings, which is a bonanza to the ruling class. America is feeding the Enlightenment into the shredder, and while the majority of Americans aren’t helping the ruling Establishment do it, they’re largely standing by and allowing themselves to be gaslighted.
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By liberals, I meant people who consider themselves liberal, not the Dems.
I thought my earlier post conveyed clearly enough that I’m aware of the difference…
I see your point - well how about if I restate it? Those who hate him on the left hate him for being a scumbag. Those who know him well on the right hate him too. But apparently, if you really wanna meet people who hate him, then you wanna meet people who have worked for him.
But the ugliest vitriol isn’t coming from the people who worked for him. It’s coming from Republicans who are furious that he occasionally put principle over party.
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Yes. I doubt Rob has a ton of love for McCain’s politics, either. Rob just doesn’t like the way McCain is being treated by his own party.
I wasn’t trying to criticize Rob or offer some criticism of his post. I thought it was a pretty scathing and accurate description of what’s going on. Conservatives haven’t given us a lot to like, lately.
My perspective is that McCain is objectively a war hero. Based on his experiences getting involved in another country’s civil war, it’s hard for me to understand McCain’s subsequent hawkish politics.
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Regardless of his politics (and I do not agree with most of his votes or politics) he was a genuine hero.
After two years in a prison camp -
“In mid-June, Major Bai, commander of the North Vietnamese prison camp system,[140] offered McCain a chance to return home early.[138] The North Vietnamese wanted to score a worldwide propaganda coup by appearing merciful,[136] and also wanted to show other POWs that members of the elite like McCain were willing to be treated preferentially.[138] McCain turned down the offer of release, due to the POWs’ “first in, first out” interpretation of the U.S. Code of Conduct:[141] he would only accept the offer if every man captured before him was released as well.”
Yes, he sang, yes, he broke, yes, he signed a confession, but he declined release until others were released before him.
I wonder if this person who spoke this way about him could endure what he did.
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Now you mention it, the Trumpers would have been happy to have McCain killed if he wasn’t dying (to avoid any ambiguity that was a bad taste joke). But then, he did pay for the peculiarly effective oppo research done by Fusion GPS. Had very little if any effect on the election but its been in the news ever since. The Trump “insider” I know claims to have hated McCain for years and that to know him is to hate him. But maybe you are right. Cooperating with Mrs Clinton is not well received in Trump supporting circles. He doesn’t have to have done anything else wrong.
Agreed. I’m not a big fan either. But for me the issue here isn’t whether it’s Red-on-Red politics, but that they’re mocking a torture survivor.
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And not they’re not only mocking him for being a torture survivor, they’re mocking him for being a torture survivor who is dying of brain cancer.
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Only if your standards for heroism are extremely low.
He was an unexceptional attack pilot, bombing targets of questionable legitimacy in pursuit of an unjust war. After being shot down, he was treated poorly, as were pretty much all POWs taken by either side in that conflict. Neither the North or South Vietnamese regimes were overly concerned with Geneva standards.
His conduct while a POW was mixed. His much-lauded refusal of early release was a matter of him following standard policy, as did pretty much all the other officers; he’d have been pilloried by the military if he’d accepted. His torture-induced pro-North “confession” was blameless but not heroic. Overall, his conduct while a POW seems to be not dissimilar to that of other captives.
If you want to argue that all POWs are heroes, you can. I wouldn’t.
Which is in poor taste, but is still an utterly microscopic offence when compared to the crimes of McCain himself. He has enough blood on his hands to drown an army.
I fully intend to loudly and publicly celebrate once that evil old bastard is dead.
Once again,
- He’s being attacked because he’s taken a stand against torture.
- He’s being mocked because his imminent death will remove the last prominent anti-torture voice in the Republican party.
This isn’t really about how virtuous or how flawed John McCain is. In this particular case, he’s 100% in the right and the White House is 100% on the side of evil.
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Yes, and how willing about 1/4 of Americans are to accept and emulate this behavior.
