Posted on 10/29/2008 11:56:01 AM PDT by agrandis
Various of my friends and members of my extended family are urging me to vote for Sen. John McCain for President in the rapidly approaching general election. Few of them have much or anything positive to say about McCain himself, but they tell me that the dangers presented by the election of Barack Obama leaves us no alternative but to vote for McCain, thus blocking an Obama presidency. As always, we are told on all fronts that this is the "most important election in history."
For several reasons, I disagree with these friends and family members that our only alternative is to vote for John McCain.
Claim: McCain is the lesser of two evils.
There is not a real difference between the two presidential candidates of the major political parties in philosophy, worldview, or integrity. One is Black, and one is White. One is old, and one is young. I claim that, in spite of the rhetoric, this is where the differences end. In recent sound bites, on the topic of personal liberty and the Constitution, Obama sounds slightly more conservative than McCain. On abortion, McCain sounds a little more conservative than Obama. On foreign policy, McCain sounds slightly more hyper-interventionist than Obama, and neither sound conservative. But when you consider all of the rhetoric, their records, and the practical implications of their stated goals, all the supposed differences melt away, and we are left with another Bush Administration, or another Clinton Administration, with a slightly different flavor, but the same old direction for our nation: rapidly toward more foreign interventionism, more economic interventionism, more suppression of liberty, more complete reliance on government, more tax funding for all manner of evil, including abortion, unjust war, welfare for politically connected multinational corporations, more official corruption, and, eventually, bankruptcy, chaos and/or brutal totalitarianism.
To know how a President McCain would govern in the realm of economics, one only has to remember his actions of a few weeks ago, when he pushed for unprecedented powers for the Secretary of Treasury, and, along with Bush's urging and Obama's help, lead the way for the Senate to pass the infamous bailout bill, which was the exact bill which angry voters had just persuaded the House to reject, only now with over 450 pages of earmarks (pork), tax "extenders," and new powers for the IRS added to it. McCain publicly chided House Republicans for listening to their constituents and stopping the first monstrous bill in the House! Bush and McCain and Obama told us we were all going to suffer financial ruin if we did not pipe down and hand over our children's wallets to the banksters. Now that they have had their way, we have seen dramatic drops in all of the world's stock markets. What better example do we need to see that McCain and Obama are on the same page when it comes to economics?
What about the right to be armed? Surely McCain is better than Obama on that issue? For the answer to that question, I would direct the reader to this web address: http://www.gunowners.org/mccaintb.htm. It is a compendium put together by Gun Owner's of America, of John McCain's gun-control record.
What about immigration? More than even most Democrats, McCain has been a consistent advocate of uncontrolled immigration. In 2007, he was the co-sponsor of the McCain-Kennedy Act, which sought, among other things, to legalize the millions of illegal immigrants currently in the country. This was being pushed during the jostling for position in the primary elections, and was a very unpopular bill among the Republican rank-and-file in an election in which opposition to unchecked immigration was expected to play a huge role. Yet, somehow, John McCain managed to win the primary popular vote. Incidentally, none other than Barack Obama was an ardent supporter of this act, and also a co-sponsor.
The environment? See McCain-Lieberman Climate Stewardship Act.
Free speech? See the McCain-Feingold Act, a famously unconstitutional piece of legislation.
Foreign policy? Both candidates have advocated aggressive interventionism and nation-building. Both support our illogical and immoral policies in the Balkans, and hypocritically support the independence of a Muslim Kosovo, but oppose the independence of South Ossetia from Georgia. Both want to increase and expand our current quagmire in the Middle East.
Abortion, I am told, is where the important difference lies between John McCain and Barack Obama. Barack Obama is famously tolerant of all abortions, any time, any where. McCain, on the other hand, currently claims to be pro-life, and promises to select judges that are "strict constructionists," implying that he would nominate justices to the Supreme Court who would overturn Roe vs. Wade, if given the chance. But John McCain has flip-flopped on this issue, like so many others in his political career, several times. He has made statements in recent years that he does not want to see Roe vs Wade overturned. Also, McCain's role in promoting justice David Souter, the currently important role of Warren Rudman in McCain's campaign, and his voting record for past nominations in the Senate, is an indication of what kind of Supreme Court justices we really would get under a McCain presidency; they are not likely to be justices that would vote to overturn Roe vs Wade.
John McCain has repeatedly stated his support for Federal funding of embryonic stem cell research, and has even implied that it should be increased.
McCain shows no tendencies to stop the over $1 billion of Federal funds that go to the Planned Parenthood Federation of America every year, and under a McCain presidency, funding for this and other abortion "services" would likely increase, as it has under the Bush Administration. Until those of us who are pro-life get away from the distraction of the fight for the Supreme Court, and trying to Federalize laws against a certain kind of murder, and instead focus on the right of a state to protect the lives of its citizens without Federal interference, and, more importantly, insist that those politicians who call themselves pro-life do all they can within their sphere to stop the taxpayer funding of abortions and pro-abortion propaganda, we will never make any political ground against the Culture of Death. It's easy to call oneself pro-life, but it's another thing to stand for life consistently.
Although conservatives today have chosen to support nearly all wars waged by the Federal government, and believe any and all justifications for these wars, unjust and needless wars are also the taking of innocent lives. In other words, it is state-sponsored mass murder. Why do we rightly speak out against the evil slaughter of millions of babies through abortion, but tolerate and even support the needless slaughter of hundreds of thousands of babies in other countries in wars that are based on government falsehoods and flimsy justifications?
Claim: McCain has better character.
Others will admit that there is no essential difference between the politics of McCain and Obama, but that Obama is a man of bad character, and associates with bad eggs, while McCain is a war hero.
While I, too, am very disturbed by Obama's personal and political associations, and do think his character is a relevant and important topic, I am equally disturbed by the associations of John McCain. Disturbingly, there is even some overlap in the nefarious associations of the two men. In the interest of space, I will leave it to the reader to investigate for themselves the following partial list of associations with John McCain: The regime in Libya, the regime in Georgia (the country, not the state), mob boss Joe "Bananas" Bonano, Charles Keating (how can we forget that?), George Soros, and Juan Hernandez (McCain's Director of Hispanic Outreach).
As for the designation of John McCain as a war hero, it is indisputable that he was shot down on a bombing raid, and that he spent over 5 years as a Prisoner of War (POW) in North Vietnam. However, what happened to him as a POW is disputed. Many Vietnam veterans, including some of his fellow POWs, claim that McCain cooperated with his communist captors without undergoing the torture he claims was administered. They claim that he was given special treatment by the North Vietnamese, because of his special status as the son of an Admiral, and because of his willingness to cooperate in producing propaganda with them.
These men who make these claims are also veterans, and were also held captive by the enemy as POWs, so there is no reason to automatically discount their claims, or to say they are less credible than McCain because of McCain's status as a war hero. Two things give credence to their claims, in my view. One is the frequency with which John McCain lies today (he has been caught in too many blatant and public lies to itemize here), proving that the truth is not something he finds to be important. Secondly, John McCain, as a US Senator, has doggedly stonewalled attempted investigations into the fate of the many POWs and MIAs left in Southeast Asia. The surviving loved ones of the many missing US Servicemen have been publicly belittled by McCain, and have been the recipients of displays of his famous violent temper, for simply wanting to know the truth about the fate of their missing family members. Further, McCain stated that no POWs in Vietnam were interrogated by Soviet agents. We now know through evidence and testimony that has since come to public light that this statement is not true, and also that McCain had to have known it was not true, based on his seat in the Senate. The demeanor of McCain toward these surviving family members of POWs and MIAs and their advocates, and his tireless efforts (teaming up with Senator John Kerry) to block their searches for answers, seems incongruous with his claims regarding his years as a POW.
John McCain's military career before being shot down in Vietnam was spotty, at best. He was known as a party animal, and lost five aircraft, including the one shot down over North Vietnam. Only two of these crashes could be considered combat-related, including a fiery explosion on an aircraft carrier that killed 134 sailors.
While I'm writing about character, I will mention the fact that McCain left his first wife after she was in a car wreck that left her confined to a wheelchair, for a younger, much richer woman who has better political connections. He may repudiate the foolishness of his youth, and one need not be perfect to advocate virtue, but the abandonment of his first wife does understandably cast doubt on his character, and does not put him on strong moral ground to advocate family values.
Claim: McCain's no good, but his VP pick is:
Some argue that I should vote for John McCain because of his running mate, Sarah Palin. They agree that there is no difference in the character or policy views of McCain and Obama, but that McCain is old, and may die in office, and the true conservative Palin will take his place. But leaving aside doubts of the stories about her fighting corruption within the GOP in Alaska, and whether her professed feminism is good or bad for her family and our society, Sarah Palin shows her true colors by even being willing to be the running mate of John McCain, and being willing to promote him and his politics. She has embraced McCain's politics, and has already been willing to compromise her past views. If she is half the woman her supporters think she is, she will be somehow removed by the current corrupt GOP leaders, or she will remove herself.
In conclusion, I believe that a John McCain presidency would be at least as bad for our nation and our families as an Obama presidency, and perhaps even worse, since he would be falsely viewed as the conservative choice of the voters, though he would run the country in no appreciably different way than would Barack Hussein Obama. (I use the phrase "run the country" because thanks to the Congresses and the Administrations of the last 20 years, the President of the United States is for all practical purposes a dictator.) As we have seen with George W Bush, a Republican President gets support from much of the conservative portion of the population when he does things that would incite near riot by the same people if he were a Democrat. Therefore, perhaps it is better for a Democrat to hold that obscenely powerful position for now, with the hope for some popular resistance to his actions, and some unity in the opposition among conservatives.
Each election, conservatives reluctantly vote for someone for President who is more progressive, more socialistic, and less Constitutional than the candidate in the previous election. When will it end? When will we say "no more?"
I have decided to vote for Chuck Baldwin, of the Constitution Party. I urge all Americans who are tired of the lawlessness, corruption, and increasing totalitarianism of our current government to vote with me for Chuck Baldwin, or to vote for another Third Party, or to write in someone else, or to not vote for President at all. Don't throw away your vote! Why choose between drowning and hanging? Why choose between Benito Mussolini and Vladimir Lenin? This election, let's not give these nihilistic demagogues our consent to govern us. Just say no to Ocain and Mcbama!
Thanks for reading...
Dan Jacobson
You are worried about the wrong possibility. Palin will not run in 2012 if she and McCain are defeated now.
And considering how actually being in the Oval Office ages a person, John will be fortunate if he manages to complete his first term. I don't think he would choose to run for a second term. As "proud" as he says he is of Sarah Palin and her political savvy, I think he would realize he could better help her launch a potential presidency by turning the role over to her at the end of his first term.
At least I agree with you in one regard; I wasn't enthused about this election until Governor Palin was nominated for the VP slot.
Chuck Baldwin wasn’t on the ballot in that state. Cynthia McKinney was. Kind of tells you all you need to do about the influence of the CP.
Chuck Baldwin wasn’t on the ballot in that state. Cynthia McKinney was. Kind of tells you all you need to do about the influence of the CP.
So what's wrong with that answer? Did you want him to say to the reporter publicly that he'd never even consider a SCOTUS justice who was once, or is currently, pro Roe v Wade? It's political suicide to answer that question any other way.
There is abosolutely no comparison whatsoever between the infanticidal Obambi and the pro-life McCain. I am very tired of assholes like you. Get lost.
Well, in that case, let me just say that anybody who thinks there is no difference between Barack Obama and John McCain has shit for brains.
You rebuild the party the old fashioned way, from the bottom up, courthouse by courthouse. Working before and during the primaries.
That’s an effective way to bring change, between elections. We’re in the general election now.
Electing Obama does nothing but reward socialist.
Obama is a Muslim communist. I really have never liked McCain.
He is not a Muslim communist.
Pick and choose folks. We can rise against McCain, you will never get the chance with Obama and a democrat Congress.
It will be over for many years. Too late.
I'll answer your question for you. Rush will being doing it the most and his blind sheep will still listen to his babbelings. He did far more harm to the GOP this election cycle than hundreds of Rockwell articles combined could have done with his stupid voting in the DEM Primary idea. Thanks Rush and Obama thanks ye also /sarcasm.
As for Ron Paul? He'll continue to go after both wrong sides of the two wrong parties. Had Bush and congress listened to Ron Paul the taxpayers would be nearly a Trillon dollars less in debt today than listening to George W Bush the other Johnson Democrat POTUS from Texas. Remember it was George W Bush himself who told the nation that he and Mr Gore were not that far apart on most issues. Do tell :>{ To that he has been true.
His website is www.lawsonforcongress.com
YOU should go and make a donation RIGHT NOW! (smile). Seriously. People like him, Bobby Jindal, Sarah Palin are the only political hope for the party and nation.
No. I'm a real conservative who can still think for himself. It's for the enthusiasm of so many "conservatives" to follow after whatever pile of crap the GOP puts up with the passion of a spaniel after a bit*h in heat that the GOP is known as the stupid party.
Wow, without FR we would not know what this Obama fraud is all about.
You are indeed an idiot. Such an idiot it is senseless to even discuss anything with you. So I won't except to tell you that anyone who thinks that Obama and McCain are anywhere near the same must think Pamela Anderson and Helen Thomas are twins.
I appologize for my earlier posting. I tell my kids that you need to put your impure thoughts into pure words and I failed that. Thanks for reigning me in.
Well, thanks, but I don't deserve this compliment today.
See you tomorrow!
You can only have a fair fight with an honorable opponent.
Did you think the Willie Horton ads were over the line?
Well the GOP did the exact same thing for the past eight years which is why Obama is such a threat. Bush loyalist would not listen to reason of Constitutional restraint the founders placed on the office of POTUS and tried to make him our king or rather an out of order GOP majority in congress did. Anyone raising objection was immediately given you are either for us or the terrorist spewage as an answer.
The gutting of the Constitution {or That Damned pice of paper as one man calls it} and abuses of Executive Branch Powers began under Lincoln who in effect abolished States Rights triggering a Civil War in doing so. The Constitution lost. Next in the 1930's the nation falls into economic meyhem created by greed. Along comes Mr Roosevelt who nearly became the crowned king of the United States. The man started us on the path to socialism and is credited {wrongfully so} for ending The Great Depression via the New Deal. WW2 ended the Great Depression not FDR.
Next in line was a Democrat from Texas who was sworn in as POTUS as a result of JFK's death in office. He continued and expanded FDR's agenda with The Great Society. TGS put many a nail in the coffin of what was once family values telling men the government would support their families for them while they fathered as many children in a out of wedlock as possible with zero accountability. Next came Carter with the Department of Education.
Not to be outdone the Republican Party had their own man with a plan to help create Great Society Part 2 which was more of the same. No Child Left Behind & Faith Based Programs are two areas the FED has no business being there. Folks, there were many of us who warned that the expansion of government under Bush would come with a very heavy price but nobody wanted to hear it as long as a Republicican was in office. Well if he wins next week Obama will dictate your churches doctrine and sermons that is if it was foolish enough to take a cent of Caesars money under Faith Based Programs. The wiswer churches saw it for what it was and said NO. Next to consider is more bad precedents set by Bush. The Patriot Act, The Department of Homeland Security, the governments department of whoever in government feels a need databases wanting among other things yur health records and yes even your surfing habits. Obama will have them and the GOP will be the one who set the precedents for it. Are you listening to us now? If not then when?
Obama if elected will be a crisis because government overstepped it's Constitutional authority especially in the past 8 years all in the name of the War on Terror. Curse the DEMs all you wish but almost not one single thing mentioned was the work of the DEMs but rather the Majority GOP. What were you thinking Republicans? Did you think that when the DEM's got back in they would not have their turn at it also? Many Conservatives citizens and elected sounded this alarm only to be labeled wingnuts, loons, fringes, and even traitors, for daring to disagree with the expansions of power Bush was promoting.
Thomas Jefferson said it best in his day and it's still true today. "That government is best which governs least". Four years of Obama and maybe even the Neocon Fad talking heads everyone adores will even be saying it. Yes even one of them bares some blame for the Obama mess. Yet some think a man or woman who by conscience decides to voted their convictions for a third party will destroy the nation?
If McCain wins we are still in very deep trouble as the Liberal path the GOP has been on will continue unchecked making it easier for the DEMs to put one even far worse than Obama in office. At best McCain will be a lighter version of Obama's agenda but the same general direction we've been on since 1989. When the GOP moves center or left of center the Democratic Party reacts and moves even further left reslting this time in Obama. Wake up Republicans you are your own worse enemy as your policies destroy you from within. Had the GOP abided by working within in the Constitution and actually upholding it since taking over congress in 1994 Obama even if elected would not have never been a serious threat nor would anyone else.
Good work.
I just contributed to Lawson.
Maybe we can also get more organized here on FR and help each other on local level to build the party where it needs to be.
thanks.
>>I appologize for my earlier posting. I tell my kids that you need to put your impure thoughts into pure words and I failed that. Thanks for reigning me in.<<
And this, my FRiend is why you have class.
Many a FReeper would get defensive and smarmy. You did it right. Anyone can get caught in the moment and we don’t have an edit feature here.
Where were you between January 2 and today?
I work third shift and still have enough time to wander by.
You wouldn’t happen to be trolling now, would you?
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