McCain Lies…Again.

In an interview with Newsweek, Senator McCain was asked bout his comment that the media has ignored some of the positive attributes of Senator Clinton and McCain interrupted the interviewer to say:

“I did not-that was in prepared remarks, and I did not-I’m not in the business of commenting on the press and their coverage or not coverage.”

Unfortunately for Senator McCain, there is video of his nationally broadcast speech where he said just that.

His comment about Senator Clinton is about 50 seconds in.

John McCain’s “Family Values”

Senator McCain loves to tell the story of how McCain dreamed of his wife and children while he was a POW in Vietnam. Most people assume that Cindy McCain is the wife in question. However, he would have actually been thinking of his first wife, Carol McCain. She was a successful swimwear model when she became Mrs. John McCain back in 1965.

When McCain returned from Vietnam in 1973, he found out that she had been disfigured in a car crash. Doctors were forced to cut away portions of her legs and she went from 5′9″ to 5′4″. Instead of standing by his wife, Senator McCain divorced her and 18 months later married Cindy McCain who was of course the heir to a beer fortune. He promised to pay Carol’s medical bills for life as part of their divorce, but that doesn’t make up for the fact that he abandoned his wife. When he returned, he said that he was happy to see his wife, though his friends say that in secret, Senator McCain was “‘appalled’ by the change in her appearance.”

In 1979, Senator McCain cheated on Carol with his current wife Cindy McCain. One of Carol’s friends explains how she rationalized his infidelity:

‘Carol didn’t fight him. She felt her infirmity made her an impediment to him. She justified his actions because of all he had gone through. She used to say, “He just wants to make up for lost time.”’

Another friend points out that:

‘He was very generous to her in the divorce but of course he could afford to be, since he was marrying Cindy,’

His marriage to Cindy not only gave McCain a beer fortune, but also gave him even greater political connections which enabled him to become Senator McCain. Ted Sampley, who fought with the US Special Forces and campaigns for veteran rights explained Senator McCain:

“I have been following John McCain’s career for nearly 20 years. I know him personally. There is something wrong with this guy and let me tell you what it is – deceit. When he came home and saw that Carol was not the beauty he left behind, he started running around on her almost right away. Everybody around him knew it. Eventually he met Cindy and she was young and beautiful and very wealthy. At that point McCain just dumped Carol for something he thought was better. This is a guy who makes such a big deal about his character. He has no character. He is a fake. If there was any character in that first marriage, it all belonged to Carol.”

Ross Perot, the Texas businessman and former Presidential candidate paid for Carol’s medical bills while McCain was a POW weighed in with his thoughts about McCain:

“McCain is the classic opportunist. He’s always reaching for attention and glory, after he came home, Carol walked with a limp. So he threw her over for a poster girl with big money from Arizona. And the rest is history.”

Yet he’s widely believed to be the candidate who represents family values rather than Senator Obama who is married to his first and only wife with two children.

Bigotry Poses A Problem For Obama

Now that the General Election is underway, people are wondering about whether or not Senator Obama will be able to win over the more conservative Democrats. Interviews with some Pennsylvania voters who supported Senator Clinton may provide some insight and if they’re accurate, it’s disturbing for anyone who hopes this country can over come its racist past.

First, an interview with Doug Richardson, a 62 year-old contractor who is a self-described conservative:

“His middle name bothers me a lot.”

Obama’s middle name is of course Hussein. However, the idea that having an Arabic middle name automatically makes you a terrorist is ludicrous and xenophobic. All that Hussein means is “good” or “handsome.” The only reason the name bothers anyone is because one of America’s enemies happened to have it. It’s as silly as being afraid of anyone named Robert after the Civil War just because one of America’s enemies was Robert E. Lee or being afraid of anyone named John because of John Walker Lindh.

Of course, as I mentioned Robertson is a conservative who likes McCain, so Obama wasn’t likely to win his vote anyway. However, similarly xenophobic statements have also come from registered Democrats in Pennsylvania such as Rose Iezzi who said Obama was “a snake-oil salesman” and “too slick and smooth” before adding:

“He just doesn’t appeal to me, and not because of race, definitely,”

The AP notes that they hadn’t brought up race. Her comment makes her appear racist, however her comments are nothing compared to 72 year old Robert Miller, who lives in government subsidized housing who said the Constitution should be amended to:

“not let any colored people run for the White House.”

To be fair, Mr. Miller is very old and not sure who he has voted for since Eisenhower, but it is still a more blatant version of the implication that is within comments like those above. More educated places have progressed greatly in terms of race relations, but we still have places where it definitely hasn’t and these ‘problem voters’ are something that Obama will have to overcome. The bigotry also isn’t just limited to race as shown by 71 year-old Dixie Pebley:

“black doesn’t bother me, but Muslim does.”

The AP reminded her that Senator Obama is a devout Christian who has attended church for 20 years. She quickly found another rationalization:

“He was born Muslim and raised Muslim, that’s enough for me. He just scares me to death.”

Of course, Obama wasn’t born Muslim and wasn’t raised Muslim. He was born secular and raised secular, only to find Christ later in life. However, that doesn’t matter because to the people who are going to fall for the lie that he is a “secret Muslim” the fact that Senator Obama is different from them is enough. This point was made in the article by retired bank director, and Democratic activist, Richard Atkers:

“‘He doesn’t wear a flag pin.’ It seemed like code for ‘He’s not one of us.’”

Not everyone who supported Senator Clinton is like this though. Many of her supporters can see that while Obama wasn’t their first choice, he’s far better than McCain. Some of these are Susan Szymanski and Roxane Uhrin who were eating with Rose Iezzi. Szymanski explained it succinctly:

“I don’t want a third term of George Bush,

Another Clinton supporter who now supports Senator Obama is James Antoniono, a Greensburg lawyer and long-time Democratic activist. He posits that many of the Clinton supporters who said they wouldn’t support Obama in the heat of the moment will end up voting for him:

“It’s one thing to come out of the voting booth and say that, it’s another thing when you’re faced with a choice in the general election.”

I hope he’s right because much like Susan Szymanski, I don’t want a third term of George Bush.

The Clinton Endorsement

“Today as I suspend my campaign, I congratulate him on the victory he has won and the extraordinary race he has run. I endorse him and throw my full support behind him and I ask of you to join me in working as hard for Barack Obama as you have for me,”

Of course, the big story over the weekend was that Senator Hillary Clinton did the right thing by suspending her campaign and endorsing the presumptive Democratic nominee, Senator Barack Obama. Some were wondering whether or not she would fully endorse Obama, but it always made sense to me. Senator Clinton’s causes are ones that can only be furthered by a Democratic President, as Republicans object to things like Universal Health Care. This is a point that Senator Clinton made in her speech:

“The way to continue our fight now to accomplish the goals for which we stand is to take our energy, our passion, our strength and do all we can to help elect Barack Obama, the next president of the United States,”

At the beginning of her speeech, some of Senator Clinton’s supporters booed her when she complimented Senator Obama, but by the end she seemed to have won most of them over. Of course. those boos symbolically represent the fact that the Democratic Party may still have some wounds. This is furthered by a recent poll which reflected that in addition to the standard hatred that Senator Clinton receives from Republicans, only around 50% of Democrats want her to be Obama’s VP. Of course, it seems like in all likelihood Obama will pick someone else for VP and will at most promise Clinton another position in his administration.

It will be very interesting to see what effect her endorsement has had on her more hardline supporters.