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Joe Perry, the legendary rock guitarist and co-founder (with Steven Tyler) of Aerosmith, was on Capitol Hill Thursday, where he met with Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and performed onstage at a Rock Stars of Science conference promoting the health sciences and scientific research. Perry endorsed the Arizona Republican last fall in McCain's failed bid for the presidency, and he was very impressed with the senator when he met him Thursday. "I felt better about politics in general after meeting [McCain]," Perry told The Hill. "He's a war hero, and they're the most genuine heroes. Anyone who does what [soldiers in...

DALLAS - Dallas FBI agents arrested a Jordanian citizen Thursday afternoon for attempting to bomb a skyscraper in Downtown Dallas. According to the bureau, 19-year-old Mosam Maher Husein Smadi was arrested and charged for attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction. Smadi had been under continuous FBI surveillance and was arrested after he allegedly placed and tried to detonate an inactive car bomb near Fountain Place, a 60-story glass office tower located at 1445 Ross Avenue, the FBI said.

Americans believe Washington squanders half of every tax dollar. BY STEPHEN MOORE If you want to know why Americans are so fearful of a government takeover of the health-care system, take a look at the results of a new Gallup poll on government waste released Sept. 15. One question posed was: "Of every tax dollar that goes to Washington, D.C., how many cents of each dollar would you say is wasted?" Gallup found that the mean response was 50 cents. With Uncle Sam spending just shy of $4 trillion this year, that means the public believes that $2 trillion is...

Here is a short clip of Glenn Beck in his usual quirky and odd fashion telling Katie Couric that McCain would have been worse for the country than Obama. I have actually said this and maybe even written it as soon as Obama got elected. On it's face, a progressive hardcore leftist like Obama is dangerous especially in conjunction with the likes of Pelosi and Reid. However, McCain would have been very dangerous for the same reason Bush was dangerous to the right. To truly appreciate what I think Beck is trying to say hinges on the understanding of America's...

Sen. John McCain has signed a letter for the Environmental Defense Action Fund, in which the Arizona Republican emphasizes the group's support for his bill that aims to place "the first-ever national cap on global warming pollution." Mr. McCain, in his letter, mentions no specific type of "pollution," although carbon dioxide has been the main target of anti-global-warming lobbyists. Carbon dioxide is produced in large part by human breathing and cattle flatulence. The Environmental Defense Action Fund sent out the mailing, including Mr. McCain's letter, in which it asked for contributions and for recipients to sign and mail a prewritten...

THERE IS NOW a broad consensus in this country, and indeed in the world, that global warming is happening, that it is a serious problem, and that humans are causing it. The recent report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concluded there is a greater than 90 percent chance that greenhouse gases released by human activities like burning oil in cars and coal in power plants are causing most of the observed global warming. This report puts the final nail in denial's coffin about the problem of global warming. In addition, the US Fish and Wildlife Service has identified...

Republican presidential candidate John McCain said today that global climate change is real and Americans must deal with its effects. "Climate change is a fact," the Arizona senator told a crowd this morning gathered under a large tent outside the Iowa Machine Shed restaurant in Davenport. McCain argued for a system that would cap emissions but allow individual companies to trade credits, within that cap, to put greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. A similar type of arrangement took place in the 1990s to battle acid rain. Several Democratic presidential candidates also approve of such an approach. "We can have an...

Link only, per FR copyright and excerpt rules

Link only, per FR copyright and excerpt rules

ORO VALLEY — U.S. Sen. John McCain told a friendly crowd of about 800 Friday that the health-care plan touted by President Obama is ailing as a result of the swelling opposition at town hall events across the country. Six months ago, the Republican said he was resigned to the fact that the Democrats in Congress had the numbers and momentum to push through a bill. But that was before politicians started hearing from seething folks in their home districts. "I would argue this is one of the most difficult times in the history of this country," McCain said, noting...

A health care town hall in Oro Valley today (Friday, Sept. 18) and hosted by Sen. John McCain was more of a love-in than shouting match. About 800 people, most of them demonstrative McCain supporters, attended the event at the Oro Valley Church of the Nazarene.

While guest hosting The View last week, the subject of Tyra Banks appearing on her show without a weave or a wig came up during the Hot Topics segment. I have long been a huge Tyra fan and consider her an inspiration to young women, including me. The idea of her being seen without fake hair was another awesome moment of Tyra bridging the gap between reality and television. The conversation soon turned to our own hair—real and otherwise. Sherri Shepherd admitted that when she was little she wanted “Marcia Brady hair” like I had. For that matter, I said,...

The blogging, tweeting, one-woman sensation is cutting a wide swath across the media landscape. BY JAMES RAINEY (snip) More importantly, we should abide Meghan McCain, at least for now, because she has tried to do some good, and tell at least a few small truths, on her initial orbit through the media firmament. Giddy girl-gab notwithstanding, McCain is one of the few voices in the Republican Party to speak out against the extremists who lately have been spinning out dark conspiracy theories about the fate of the nation. She has called for a more civil public discourse. (snip)

Saying she was "alarmed about the direction our nation is headed," former Lt. Gov. Jane Norton officially launched her bid today as a Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate. Surrounded by hundreds of supporters in a ballroom at the Marriott Tech Center, Norton, who has been serving as the executive director of the Denver Police Foundation, said she wanted to stop what she saw as an out-of-control government in the nation's capital. "At every turn, Washington's giant hand seems to be grabbing everything in sight," said Norton, who served as lieutenant governor under former Gov. Bill Owens. "Seizing control of...

CHARLESTON (AP) – Republican U.S. Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham said Monday that President Barack Obama should act quickly to send additional troops to Afghanistan for the war against the Taliban. McCain, of Arizona, told reporters after a town hall meeting on health care at the military college The Citadel that the president knows what's needed and he should make the decision immediately. "Then we'll work with him to sell it to the American people who are understandably weary of the conflict," McCain said.

The First Amendment, as rewritten under the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law: "Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, except if it is funded by a corporation, unless it is a media corporation, or if the speech occurs just prior to an election, unless it is in the form of a book, which, even though the law covers books, too, the Federal Election Commission would never apply that law to books because we say so, though we said something entirely different a couple of months ago." In an apoplexy of righteous indignation over...

The latest dust-up over President Barack Obama's health care-for-all mission — Rep. Joe Wilson, R-S.C., angrily calling Obama a liar during a nationally televised speech — underscored conservatives' fears that illegal immigrants would benefit from efforts to expand coverage. Obama insisted that the legislation would not give government subsidies to the nation's millions of undocumented residents. But if immigrant-rich California is any indication, considerable numbers of undocumented immigrants participate in taxpayer-supported health plans. Although most federal benefit programs bar those who cannot prove their citizenship, California has been more generous than other states. Its taxpayers contribute more than $1 billion...

As climate change reemerges as an issue in the national policy debate, it may help define the legislative legacies of two men who once vied for the White House: Sens. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.). Both men have championed the issue of global warming for years, including when they served as their party's presidential nominees in 2004 and 2008, respectively. But, for the moment, McCain is barely engaged in the issue beyond criticizing the climate bill passed by the House, while Kerry has emerged as one of the chamber's leading dealmakers. The fact that the two no...

U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham and his close ally Sen. John McCain will appear in Charleston at 9 a.m. Monday for a Town Hall meeting at The Citadel. The meeting is open to the public, and both Republican senators will take questions about health care and other topics.

The ladies on ABC’s The View were unanimous on Thursday: the Republicans were rude to President Obama. Sitting in Elisabeth Hasselbeck’s chair was Meghan McCain, who said Rep. Joe Wilson’s shout "makes all Republicans look bad." Joy Behar said the Republicans were "pretty disgraceful," Sherri Shepherd boasted she "stayed up all night," pestering Wilson’s office for an apology, and Whoopi Goldberg said it was "incredibly disrespectful," just like opponents of the president’s "State of the Child address" to schools. Barbara Walters was milder, decrying how Obama should be met across the aisle, a nonpartisan peacemaker pleading like a political version...

According to CeCe Connelly on MSNBC. I haven't found a copy of it, YET!

(snip) SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: Well, I thought the president is eloquent. I thought he had a lot of passion. (snip) MCCAIN: I hope he gets a bill. I hope we can sit down together and do the things that all of us agree on. And there are a number of things that are -- that we can agree on. And I think the American people, obviously, want that. I don't know what the administration and the Democrats will insist on. Facts are stubborn things. The bills so far have had no bipartisanship associated with it. They were drawn...

WASHINGTON (AP) – President Barack Obama is including a proposal from his Republican rival last year as part of his health care reform plan. . . . . . Amid applause from his colleagues, McCain smiled and gave Obama a thumbs-up.

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Democratic leaders are calling on Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.) to apologize for heckling President Obama as a liar. Wilson shouted to the president "you lie" after Obama said illegal immigrants would not benefit from health insurance coverage from the reform bill. Obama glared disgustedly in the direction the remark came from, as did Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Vice President Joe Biden. House Democratic Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.) called Wilson's outburst "embarrassing," while McCain said it was "totally disrespectful" and that there was "no place for it in that setting or any other." McCain said...

(snip) McCain also spoke about the raft of national spending bills over the past year, including the $787 billion financial bailout of 2008, $700 billion for the stimulus plan and the $83 billion rescue of the auto industry. Taken with other measures, the spending would saddle the country with as much as $9 trillion of debt future generations would have to pay, the senator said. "What I'm wary about is that we're committing an act of generational theft," McCain said.(snip) He advocated for reforms of Medicare, saying the system likely would go broke within seven years if Congress and the...

The Supreme Court considers government controls over speech. The Supreme Court is hearing arguments today regarding Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. The case could decide what political speech is prohibited by federal campaign finance laws. To put it simply, campaign finance laws constrain free speech. This showdown provides the high court with an opportunity to make clear that it's not the proper role of government to limit how much is being spent on campaigns or by whom. The controversy of the day is over a film released during the 2008 presidential campaign. "Hillary The Movie" didn't expressly advocate that...

The selective muzzles applied by the McCain-Feingold law. BY DAVID N. BOSSIE The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution provides that "Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech." The Framers' clear intent was first and foremost to protect political speech. Today, in a rare summer session, the Supreme Court will hear arguments as to whether it should overrule two previous, and in my opinion incorrectly decided, rulings on political free speech. Namely, the justices will decide whether or not to allow Austin v. Michigan State Chamber of Commerce and a significant section of McConnell v. Federal...

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) late Tuesday told reporters on his first day back in the Senate that the death of Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) last month will affect him and the Senate deeply. The 2008 GOP presidential hopeful, who attended Kennedy's funeral in Boston on his Aug. 29 birthday, "I miss him every day," McCain said."We had a very, very congenial and enjoyable relationship. He had a great sense of humor. Obviously there's no one else like him."

The Daily Beast’s Meghan McCain joins Barbara, Whoopi, Joy, and Sherri on the couch this week as a guest host. Here, she reflects on what the show means to women of all ages and backgrounds. This week, on Wednesday and Thursday, I will be returning to The View as a guest host. I’m honored to be asked back, along with a handful of other women who will be filling Elisabeth Hasselbeck’s seat while she is on maternity leave. Over the years, I’ve loved the show for many reasons but above all because it’s one of the first programs to allow...

The Supreme Court on Wednesday will hear arguments from campaign finance reform advocates and opponents in a case many insiders say will be the most significant decision in more than 35 years. The case the court will hear, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, has the potential to overturn key elements of campaign finance law that prevent corporate spending on elections, a move that would open the door to millions of dollars that could not be spent previously. “This is the biggest case in campaign finance law, really, since Buckley v. Valeo in 1976,” said Rob Kelner, a partner at...

Boy the things some people put on Twitter! Senator John McCain's daughter the now famous blogger Meghan McCain (which some people misspell as "Megan McCain")just tweeted this: my hotel has this amazing pool but I've been too paranoid 2 use it cause I don't want any pics of my juicy booty in a bikini on the internet

(snip) Listening to Sen. McCain's elegy, however, I found myself increasingly bothered. "We disagreed on most issues," McCain said at one point, "but I admired his passion for his convictions ... ." Really? Kennedy was the farthest-left liberal during nearly five decades in the U.S. Senate. McCain, just one year ago, campaigned for president, proclaiming his conservative convictions. And without doubt, Kennedy's wholehearted support of Barack Obama helped to torpedo McCain's campaign. Perhaps one moment disturbed me most: "When we worked together on the immigration issue," McCain recalled, "we had a daily morning meeting with other interested senators. He and...

(snip) There is some Republican support for reform. Obama, Napolitano and Sen. John McCain share virtually the same immigration views. The president and McCain reportedly have been speaking in private on the issue. The Arizona Republican has been a leader for comprehensive reform, and with the improvement in enforcement, he now has all the political cover he needs to return to the ramparts.(snip)

Sen. John McCain blasted Democrats' plans for a health-care overhaul Friday in Oro Valley at the annual conference of the League of Arizona Cities and Towns. In a generally jovial mood at the Hilton El Conquistador Golf and Tennis Resort, before an adoring crowd that gave him two standing ovations, he joked: "Every place I go, everybody says, 'I voted for ya,' 'I voted for ya.' I'm about to demand a recount." . . . . . On whether he would vote for health-care reform if the public option were removed:"It would have to depend on the legislation. There are...

"I have not seen anything like this in the years I have been a member of Congress. It's a peaceful revolution but I think it is a revolution we're seeing," Arizona's senior Senator John McCain says after a series of health care town halls. McCain was in Oro Valley to deliver the final address to the annual conference of Arizona's League of Cities and Towns. When asked what was the one thing that surprised him most about the town halls he replied, "the anger." McCain believes that anger is being displayed not by professional protestors but by people who are...

A mysterious YouTube member named, conveniently, “megwhitmanonvanjones,” has uploaded a May 2009 San Francisco Chronicle video of 2010 GOP California gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman, in which the former CEO of eBay and former adviser to Mitt Romney and John McCain gushes about suddenly controversial green jobs czar Van Jones. There’s a guy over in Oakland, I think his name is Van Jones. And he and I were on a cruise last summer in the Arctic, on climate change. And I got to know him very well. And a lot of the work he’s doing to enfranchise broader communities I’m a...

A mysterious YouTube member named, conveniently, “megwhitmanonvanjones,” has uploaded a May 2009 San Francisco Chronicle video of 2010 GOP California gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman, in which the former CEO of eBay and former adviser to Mitt Romney and John McCain gushes about suddenly controversial green jobs czar Van Jones. "There’s a guy over in Oakland, I think his name is Van Jones. And he and I were on a cruise last summer in the Arctic, on climate change. And I got to know him very well. And a lot of the work he’s doing to enfranchise broader communities I’m a...

Nearly a year after the presidential race came to an end, it's a subject Arizona Sen. John McCain still can't avoid: Sarah Palin. Appearing on the Tonight Show With Conan O'Brien Wednesday, the former presidential candidate was asked, as he has been several times before, whether he was shocked Palin chose to resign her post as governor of Alaska two months ago. "Yeah I was because she didn't call me ahead of time," McCain said to laughter in the audience. "We all have families, we all have challenges, we all have issues in our lives. She did have huge legal...

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) — An odd couple of Republican senators have hit the road, arguing for a go-slow approach to President Barack Obama's push to revamp health care. Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky and 2008 presidential nominee John McCain are headlining the GOP's answer to the raucous town hall meetings of August in which congressional Democrats had to shout over angry constituents about health care, growing deficits and the increasing role of the federal government. . . . . . Political recovery is an issue for McCain, too. . . . . . Health care also offers McCain a...

Link only, per FR copyright and excerpt rules

Sen. Mel Martinez will hold a health care forum tomorrow in Hialeah with Sen. John McCain and Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell. “This is going to be a frank discussion with health care providers, patients, and other stakeholders to air concerns about the current system and what steps Congress should take to address the problems," the retiring Martinez said in a statement.

Like many Americans, I watched as Senator Ted Kennedy was laid to rest over the weekend after his year-long battle with brain cancer. The day marked not only the end of the Camelot era, but seemed to signal the final passing of many things politically. I certainly didn't agree with Senator Kennedy's politics on many issues, but as I listened to his friends, family, and Senate colleagues—including my father—tell stories of the man they knew, what was so evident was that Ted Kennedy always believed you could find compromise on the really important matters. I remember meeting the senator around...

KANSAS CITY, MO - Three Republican senators came to Children's Mercy Hospital Monday to meet with health care professionals. Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell said we should focus on only the problems that need fixing and not revamp the whole thing. Senator McConnell joined Senators John McCain and Kit Bond before an invited crowd of mostly health professionals on Monday. "We have committed an act of generational death by laying on our children, grandchildren these multi-trillions of dollars," Sen. McCain said. "All of it, it strikes me argues once again for a much more targeted, incremental approach to health care...

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) -- Former Republican presidential candidate John McCain is coming to North Carolina to speak about health care alongside two other GOP senators. McCain will join North Carolina Sen. Richard Burr and Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell at event in Charlotte on Tuesday morning. McCain and McConnell are traveling around the country to discuss health care and take questions from those involved in the debate.

Sen. John McCain has endorsed Illinois Congressman Mark Kirk (R-10th) in his run for the U.S. Senate.

Republican Senator John McCain has denounced the use of torture on terrorism suspects during the administration of former president George W. Bush. "I think the interrogations were in violation of the Geneva Conventions and the convention against torture that we ratified under President Reagan," said McCain. In an interview with CBS News on Sunday, the Arizona senator said that the enhanced interrogation techniques also helped al Qaeda recruit additional members. "I think these interrogations, once publicized, helped al Qaeda recruit. I got that from an al Qaeda operative in a prison camp in Iraq,” said McCain, who added that he...

August 30, 2009 (GLENVIEW, Ill.) (WLS) -- Republican Congressman Mark Kirk received a big endorsement Sunday in his bid for the U.S. Senate. Former presidential candidate and current Arizona Sen. John McCain was in the Chicago area to help give Kirk's campaign a financial and political boost. Kirk is among more than six people who have announced their candidacy for the February 2nd GOP nomination, all hoping to take the seat that will be given up by appointed Democratic Sen. Roland Burris. The Senate seat is one Republicans want badly. So, voters are likely to see the national Republican Party...

WASHINGTON - U.S. Senator John McCain, a torture survivor from his days as a captive during the Vietnam War, says his private comments about harsh interrogation methods were misrepresented by the Bush Administration in a recently released legal document intended to justify a six-day-long course of sleep deprivation for one CIA detainee in November of 2007. The newly declassified memo by the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel mentions a secret briefing McCain and other members of Congress received sometime before October 17, 2006. The memo says the lawmakers were told about six CIA interrogation techniques, including prolonged sleep deprivation....

Says Abuse of Detainees Helped al Qaeda Recruit Terrorists, But Opposes Investigation into "Enhanced" Interrogations. BY MICHELLE LEVI Senator John McCain (R-Ariz.) said he thinks it is a "serious mistake" for the administration to focus on the past when investigating the interrogation techniques of the CIA under President Bush on "Face the Nation" Sunday. "For us now to go back, I think, would be a serious mistake. "I believe that the president was right when he said we ought to go forward and not back. I worry about the morale and effectiveness of the CIA. I worry about this thing...