For all his experience, what has John McCain done?

[Wetzelbill]

I would like to see his supporters name one major piece of legislation that John McCain has passed and then not turned his back on later? Sure, he has McCain-Feingold, for example, but that doesn't count when you turn your back on it because you want to be president. He said he's against it now.

In fact, I'd like to know what major legislation has he even TRIED to pass, like his immigration proposal with Ted Kennedy, that he hasn't turned his back on. McCain's against that bill now too.

So basically, you have a guy running for president supposedly on his experience, yet everything he has ever done he now disavows.

[whistle]

1. Blocked all access to POW files, records and tapes forever

[jmowreader]

2. I can name one! I can name one!

He sponsored a bill to require automatic tire inflation monitors in new cars!

[BOSSHOG]

3. A recent one which has pissed me off

He opposed Senator Webb's new GI BILL because the fucking GI'S MIGHT ACTUALLY WANT TO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF IT.

I know that isn't exactly on topic but mccain really pisses me off even though he is a shipmate of mine.

[Wetzelbill]

7. yeah and presented his own BS bill

as a replacement. McCain is like that, his record on military issues is horrible.

We you on the same ship as McCain?

[BOSSHOG]

8. I never

served with him but I consider all current and former members of the United States Navy as my shipmates. Its kind of a fraternal thing. And if I meet an old retiree in a bar we are sure to spend hours lying to each other. However, I don't think I'd want to have a beer with Captain McCain.

[Wetzelbill]

9. yeah that's what I thought you meant

Figured I'd just ask to make sure.

I have heard McCain is a down to earth guy, nice to talk to. One of my American Indian studies professors met him before. He said they got along great, talked about Vietnam etc. My professor was a Marine, he saw lots of combat in Vietnam, as you would expect. Maybe he was in the Army... well either way he served in Vietnam. But he's as liberal as you and I are too. He'd vote for McCain right about the time he sawed his arm off with a spoonhandle. I don't think I'd like to have a beer with him either, I suppose if I somehow was somewhere and he showed up I might talk to him, I am interested in the POW stuff, but other than dumb luck, no thank you.

My professor's name is Tom Holm, he wrote a book on American Indian veterans who served in Vietnam, something you might be interested in. He's a wealth of information on PTSD and vet's policy issues. He's an expert in warfare too, like correlating Native American warfare to modern warfare etc. Fascinating stuff. We get along famously too.

[polichick]

4. His surrogates can't even answer that.

[bobd0]

5. McCain has supported torture while claiming to oppose torture

That's quite an accomplishment, isn't it?

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/04/27/mccain/index.html

In 2005, McCain led the effort in the Senate to pass the Detainee Treatment Act (DTA), which made the use of torture illegal. While claiming that he had succeeded in passing a categorical ban on torture, however, McCain meekly accepted two White House maneuvers that diluted his legislation to the point of meaningless: (1) the torture ban expressly applied only to the U.S. military, but not to the intelligence community, which was exempt, thus ensuring that the C.I.A.—the principal torture agent for the United States—could continue to torture legally; and (2) after signing the DTA into law, which passed the Senate by a vote of 90–9, President Bush issued one of his first controversial "signing statements" in which he, in essence, declared that, as President, he had the power to disregard even the limited prohibitions on torture imposed by McCain's law.

McCain never once objected to Bush's open, explicit defiance of his cherished anti-torture legislation, preferring to bask in the media’s glory while choosing to ignore the fact that his legislative accomplishment would amount to nothing. Put another way, McCain opted for the political rewards of grandstanding on the issue while knowing that he had accomplished little, if anything, in the way of actually promoting his "principles."

A virtual repeat of that sleight-of-hand occurred in 2006, when McCain first pretended to lead opposition to the Military Commissions Act (MCA), only thereafter to endorse this most radical, torture-enabling legislation, almost single-handedly ensuring its passage. After insisting that compelled adherence to the anti-torture ban of the Geneva Conventions was a nonnegotiable item for him, McCain ultimately blessed the MCA despite the fact that it left it to the President to determine, in his sole discretion, which interrogation methods did or did not comply with the Conventions' provisions.

Thus, once again, McCain created a self-image as a principled torture opponent with one hand, and with the other, ensured a legal framework that would not merely fail to ban, but would actively enable, the President’s ability to continue using interrogation methods widely considered to be torture. Indeed, by casting himself as the Supreme Arbiter of torture morality, McCain's support for this torture-enabling law became Bush and Cheney's most potent instrument for legalizing the very interrogation methods that McCain, for so long, flamboyantly claimed to oppose.

And then this year, McCain voted to oppose a ban on waterboarding, claiming that it was unnecessary given that waterboarding is already considered illegal by the Bush administration -- an assertion about which he later admitted he had no real knowledge and which is, in any event, simply untrue.

[Wetzelbill]

6. exactly you only see embarassments like this on his record

[blondeatlast]

10. He leads as the "most likely not to show up for work" in the Senate. Now that's leadership!

The wrong kind, but he's the best at it.

As you, WB, must know, even McSame supporters get pissy when it's discussed.

[Wetzelbill]

14. That's the best comeback when they bring up

Obama's present votes, lol.

[kurtboss]

11. Experience Means Jack Shit

Incumbents and political press just repeat it. Political office isn't meant to be about experience, it's just who's most popular.

[zulchzulu]

12. I hear he is a very good singer...he sang a lot in Vietnam n/t

[TheDonkey]

13. sponsored bills that he now opposes.... eom

[Wetzelbill]

15. exactly.

[Raineyb]

16. He got himself involved in the S&L scandal along with the rest of Keating's flunkies.

And voted against the MLK holiday.

You weren't specifying good things were you?

Regards

[City Lights]

17. He married a buffalo chip.

Nothing tops that.

[Wetzelbill]

19. Cindy didn't really look like she knew what to think on that one

:)

[DeeDeeNY]

18. He invites the mainstream press to his barbecues

And evidently that's all the "experience" he needs.