The Young Turks

John McCain has invented and invested into a new set of wins. People who support McCain say proudly that he is a war hero, a proud member of the people against the Iraq War, and the perfect candidate. However, they do not know the real facts about John McCain. Let us delve into the negatives of John McCain, Republican nominee.
 
He is, frankly, hypocritical. People say I am flabbergasting against him, spewing lies. Let me show you that I am not wrong. Back in 1983, after Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, his fellow men and women pushed with newfound strength for a day in their fallen leader’s honor. The bill went through, and passed with the Senate. However, John McCain thoroughly opposed it. Now, he goes hypocritical during the April 4^th of 2008, on the campaign trail, where he claims he supported the holiday. He did say that he supported it later, but in Memphis, Tennessee; he said that he supported it all the way. And that is plain lying.

Now, we move on to one of his latest saga of hypocritical shenanigans. He has been known to speak out heavily and thoroughly against torture- one may think it is from his past recollection of being ‘tortured’ by the North Vietnamese during the Vietnam War- and he spoke out against it in the You Tube preceding of the Republican debates. Senator McCain outspokenly criticized Mitt Romney, who was believed to not know about one of the illegal techniques- which, by the way, are being implemented by the FBI, and the CIA against people who most likely have no reason to be tortured- called ‘water boarding’.

However, he helped push and push President W. Bush to veto a bill that would have made it illegal for the CIA to torture, thus allowing torture to continue. I have to ask is one thing: Why go with something that you at first were against? Senator John McCain preformed a full and utter ‘flip flop’, as some many may remember a childish accusation against 2004 presidential candidate John Kerry was made on the Iraq War. As well, John McCain has also pushed to pass a bill that allowed the FBI to begin their own torture rights, which is still, no matter what bill is engaged, and is against the law.
 
Many know John McCain as a man who will not give up on Iraq, which has proven to be a fools goal, in which the quarters to play again are our soldiers and Marine’s lives. Back in 1993, in the Somalia crisis, Senator John McCain addressed the Senate on the issue of American troops.
 
“Mr. President, there is no more reason for the United States to stay in Somalia. The American people want them home, I believe a majority of Congress wants them home, and to set an artificial date of March 31^st or even February 1^st is, in my point of view, is not acceptable. The criteria should be to bring them home as rapidly and as safely as possible. An operation I believe that can be finished in a matter of weeks.” ~Senator John McCain, (R) Arizona, 1993, speaking to the United States Senate.
 
An interesting word from John McCain. If he said this today, people would be relieved beyond all stature. However, that is not the case. He is now one of the most vocal supporters of staying in Iraq, a war, that you, the reader, must know is a suicide mission for our brothers, sisters, uncles, fathers and cousins. And, what many people less know, is that Senator John McCain helped author the increase buildup of soldiers in Iraq, which is bitterly known as the Surge. Thanks to him and his helping hand of ‘foreign policy’, Senator John McCain has helped a peddling backwards of progress, while getting, which is now the number of April 19, 2008, 4,000 Americans killed, as well as thousands of Iraqi civilians dead. Seventy to eighty percent of America is nearly begging for an end to the Iraq War, but Senator’s like John McCain keep silencing them, begging them for ‘six more months, all we need is six more months, and we will be done’. We have given you ten sets of six months. Where’s my progress you promised, Mr. McCain, Mr. Bush, Mr. Cheney?
 
Oh, wait. It’s being back-peddled like a circus act with a blindfolded trapeze artist with nowhere to go but down, as we see that even more battles with Muqtada al-Sadr with his Shiite militia of the Mahdi Army, as they wage war against the so-called ‘Iraqi Government’, which is no more then a militia that we back, led by the trigger-loose-cannon Nouri al-Maliki. John McCain was asked that if he had a chance to call for Iraq again, would he do it? He answered a full-hearted ‘yes’. Another yes to death, to destruction, to economic turmoil and the lose of life, family, friends, and meaning to an illegal war.
 
There is more to add to McCain’s hypocrisy on the Iraq War. In 1994, John McCain addressed a similar issue about another conflict, in Haiti, where our soldiers were stationed during a crisis there. Here is a quote from his speech on the floor of the Senate,
 
“The right course of action is to make preparations as quickly as possible to bring our people home.” The quote will continue on, “It does not mean… as soon as order is restored in Haiti, it doesn’t mean as soon as democracy is flourishing in Haiti, it doesn’t mean as soon as we establish a viable nation in Haiti, as soon as possible means as soon as we can get out of Haiti, without losing any American lives.” ~Senator John McCain, Arizona, (R)
 
He says this in 1994, but now in 2008, Senator McCain is nearly pleading with the American people to ‘give us more time, we need to build a viable nation’. He will not leave Iraq until a nation is built out of the ruins we created, and he was nearly pounding his fist on his Senate table to convince his fellow men and women to vote to bring our soldiers out of Haiti “as soon as possible”. We have lost hundreds, thousands, and he says give us more time, we are trying to build a nation.
 
Next, he has publicly addressed to what most people have on their minds: economics. He says, and admitted, that he has no clue what so ever on economics, and that he doesn’t know how to handle it. Now, he promises after eight long and painful years of the Bush doctrine of tax cuts for the rich, he now wants to make the tax cuts permanent, only for the rich, so the middle class of vast majority of the nation is taking the torrent of vast and indisputable failure in the economy. All of America needs to take on the taxes, no matter how rich they are. However, McCain does not believe in that. In fact, he has a plan that would funnel billions of dollars into benefits for fifty-eight percent would go to the richest of our nation, while the rest is wiped on us, while we would still be struggling to be paying off the massive war debt, that would continue to mount. In our economic woe, we do not need any more mistakes. Oh, how I wish Franklin Delano Roosevelt were still around, he would snap this thing back into order in no time.
 
Now, I look at the polls for popularity and support, and I see that our good old friend George W. Bush is declining- oh, what’s the use. He’s the most unpopular President in our history. And yet, even if he holds a twenty to thirty percent popularity rating, Senator McCain is enjoying leads in polls. How this is fathomable, I cannot see how. John McCain has lobbied for many of President Bush’s ideas, as well as the Iraq War. He even says he would do it again if he had the choice, in the exact same way. McCain is a conservative, or, at least, his policies reflect those of a conservative, and he is now investigating into a possible war with Iran, a war that we definitely do not need in the slightest bit. Two wars is quite enough, thank you very much, Mr. McCain. We don’t want to go into debt over these wars, do we?

Oh, wait. We have. About three to five trillion dollars, as well as the insurmountable loses of thousands of Iraqis, Afghanis, and Americans. He continues to push for these wars, even though even a rock could tell it has gone down the pipes and into San Francisco bay. Even if we lose more American troops to a useless endeavor to fight Al Qaida who are not even based there, and we lose more to Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki’s rough tactics of warfare against the Mahdi army, where we get caught in the cross-fire, he will still go for it. It is unfathomable how John McCain can support an unpopular war and an unpopular president popularly.
 
Now, we have a personality problem for Mr. McCain. He is reported to have an ‘extreme temper problem’. Oh, sure. People may suggest that McCain is only being ‘tough, serious, and committed to being a maverick and a moderate, and is pushing for the laws that we need’, but that is entirely untrue. Mr. McCain loses his temper against political opponents and opponents in his life, such as an occurrence in 2007, when a meeting on immigration legislation, fellow Republican senator John Cornyn objected to McCain, saying



” Wait a second here. I've been sitting in here for all of these negotiations and you just parachute in here on the last day. You're out of line.”
 
McCain, losing his temper, replied hottidly,
 
“Fuck you! I know more about this than anyone else in the room.”

It seems very peculiar why Senator McCain lets this go on, as many note he loses potential political allies with his outburts of rage. Writer Elizabeth Drew has noted in a sentence,
 
“Dealing with John McCain is kind of like dancing with a cactus.”


How would foreign Prime Ministers and Presidents, or even potential dictators like to dance with a cactus? He has even engaged in a match of shouts with a German foreign minister. You see, when Senator McCain gets into a temperment, like must of us will do, he will shut out all disagreements, thinking his words are undeniable, and that he is merely defending freedom. That is what President Bush did when he instigated the War in Iraq. He ignored the warnings and pleads of people that read the intelligence report to not invade Iraq, and look where that has gotten America. We are in an economic turmoil, we are in two wars, soon, maybe three, if we do not stop him or McCain, and we are fighting over pins, clothing, and the American flag. In fact, if we let another tempermental character into the Oval Office, who is possibly even morely short fused then President Bush is, then we are doomed to being invaded to get ourselves under control. If the only superpower is running rough-shot over small nations, a group of medium sized ones will most likely march into the capital and straighten things out. It’s inevitable. People want peace, not a flawed war on terror.
 
Now, on a last note on McCain’s “Unflawed, perfect and huge foreign policy”, he is flawed where we need perfection closest to. He has basically no interest in what is going on in other countries. He basically reads up on what he can on a flight, and he has aids review before the meeting between an important figure in another country, and he goes in, most likely hoping that he will succeed in gaining more support, which he definatelly does not deserve. The only thing worse then having no foreign policy is one where you are flawed in. Senator McCain, recently, has mixed up Sunni and Shiite, claiming that,
 
“Irani operatives are taking Al Qaida operatives into Iran, training them, and sending them back.”

This started a month ago from now, and this is a flat-out lie. Al-Qaida and Iran would never work together, under any and all circumstances. Al-Qaida is Sunni, and Iran is Shiite. Two different sides, and yet John McCain stated several times of this unfound cooperation was true. If this was true, we would have our boots on the ground of Iran and tanks rolling in. Yet, no proof has come forward. This propoganda is all lies to scare us, the American civilians and citizens, to voting for him, a second George W. Bush, into office. We are going through Iraq all over again: A republican group claims for Al-Qaida in a country, and they scare us with threats of nuclear annihlation that even ten years later we are completely unharmed, and we vote for them. I find it impossible to imagine how this is even stomachable.
 
These are John McCain’s bad sides, and even if you do not believe me, look for the clues in his words, or go to www.theyoungturks.com to get more information from the Turkish host, Cenk Uyger.
 
 
-Tyler Sutherland