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Do you consider Sen. John McCain a war hero?
Decatur Daily ^ | 7-20-2015

Posted on 07/20/2015 4:43:20 PM PDT by Citizen Zed

Freep this poll...


TOPICS: Chit/Chat
KEYWORDS: benedictarnold; mccain
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To: gundog

What an irrational answer! I don’t recall Trump ever claiming to be a hero.


81 posted on 07/20/2015 5:36:07 PM PDT by publius911 (If you like Obamacare, You'll LOVE ObamaWeb.)
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To: freedumb2003

But for his integrity in staying imprisoned with his brothers in arms when offered a walk-out. THAT was heroic.................................. I wonder if Admiral Stockton may have had something to do about that? McCain was a VIP POW and maybe he was told “you better stick with the guys, we either go as a group or we don’t go”.


82 posted on 07/20/2015 5:37:22 PM PDT by Bringbackthedraft (2016 The RNC better come up with a Winner this time. Run some one like Cruz and Go for Broke!)
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To: ErnBatavia

How about this.

I won’t be voting (Republican nominee or not) for Trump, but anyone who goes over to the middle east and is filmed arranging arms and training for Jihadis but not arranging protection for Christian enclaves in the same area through arms or troop deployment at the same time is and jack ass and an Islamist collaborator. So are the people who defend that person.


83 posted on 07/20/2015 5:39:04 PM PDT by MrEdd (Heck? Geewhiz Cripes, thats the place where people who don't believe in Gosh think they aint going.)
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To: ErnBatavia
I'm FReeping quite a bit less these days until that phockhead flames out.

Isn't it wonderful to have absolute freedom of choice?

84 posted on 07/20/2015 5:39:31 PM PDT by publius911 (If you like Obamacare, You'll LOVE ObamaWeb.)
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To: douginthearmy
I would call describe his surviving the cruelty of the Vietnamese communists as very admirable, highly commendable.

That said, today he is an enemy of my homeland and of my children's future. He seeks to end the USA in favor of an open borders merged state with Mexico. His political tools towards this end are deceit, dishonesty and betrayal.

So today, in 2015, I would call him a loathsome traitor...with an admirable distant past.

85 posted on 07/20/2015 5:39:39 PM PDT by Dagnabitt (Islamic Immigration is Treason)
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To: Theodore R.
I think we need to see the evidence of his heroism; there are many who are skeptical considering his abysmal public record in the Senate.

This is my point too. If someone has heroism in them, then it's in them. If it's in them, then it would certainly be evidenced often over a 40 year career. I've seen zip zero nada of that in McCain's entire Senate career, which I've followed pretty closely since 1992.

86 posted on 07/20/2015 5:40:04 PM PDT by C. Edmund Wright (WTF? How Karl Rove and the Establishment Lost...Again)
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To: publius911

And why in the world would he? I just learned that Sarah Palin called him one. Filters, people....


87 posted on 07/20/2015 5:40:27 PM PDT by gundog (Help us, Nairobi-Wan Kenobi...you're our only hope.)
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To: cva66snipe

I stand corrected. Having trained in Naval aviation I should have thought before I posted. I watched films of pilots screwing up and killing people.

With that said, I don’t think McCain would ever have commanded a ship.


88 posted on 07/20/2015 5:41:06 PM PDT by VerySadAmerican (I'll never vote for another rino and it sickens me that I voted for McCain.)
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To: douginthearmy
McCain has earned the anger of conservatives for consistently undermining our causes. But McCain is a genuine hero and people who say otherwise are blinded by anger. Here is a clue. McCain can be both a war hero and wrong politically.

Exactly like this man.

War is just a racket. A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of people. Only a small inside group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few at the expense of the masses.

I believe in adequate defense at the coastline and nothing else. If a nation comes over here to fight, then we'll fight. The trouble with America is that when the dollar only earns 6 percent over here, then it gets restless and goes overseas to get 100 percent. Then the flag follows the dollar and the soldiers follow the flag.

I wouldn't go to war again as I have done to protect some lousy investment of the bankers. There are only two things we should fight for. One is the defense of our homes and the other is the Bill of Rights. War for any other reason is simply a racket.

There isn't a trick in the racketeering bag that the military gang is blind to. It has its "finger men" to point out enemies, its "muscle men" to destroy enemies, its "brain men" to plan war preparations, and a "Big Boss" Super-Nationalistic-Capitalism.

It may seem odd for me, a military man to adopt such a comparison. Truthfulness compels me to. I spent thirty- three years and four months in active military service as a member of this country's most agile military force, the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from Second Lieutenant to Major-General. And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle- man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism.

I suspected I was just part of a racket at the time. Now I am sure of it. Like all the members of the military profession, I never had a thought of my own until I left the service. My mental faculties remained in suspended animation while I obeyed the orders of higher-ups. This is typical with everyone in the military service.

I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. The record of racketeering is long. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912 (where have I heard that name before?). I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested.

During those years, I had, as the boys in the back room would say, a swell racket. Looking back on it, I feel that I could have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.

Was this man a hero? Yes. Was he wrong politically? Yes.

89 posted on 07/20/2015 5:41:40 PM PDT by cva66snipe ((Two Choices left for U.S. One Nation Under GOD or One Nation Under Judgment? Which one say ye?))
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To: Citizen Zed

No, but hell no. Anyone that gives 32 propaganda statements to the enemy is a traitor. He should have charged with treason the minute he was released.


90 posted on 07/20/2015 5:42:40 PM PDT by NKP_Vet
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To: douginthearmy
...McCain is a genuine hero and people who say otherwise are blinded by anger.

He is no such thing and YOU don't know what you are talking about!

91 posted on 07/20/2015 5:46:37 PM PDT by Bigun ("The most fearsome words in the English language are I'm from the government and I'm here to help!")
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To: Bigun

>>Not by me and a great many others he wasn’t!<<

You will have to regale us all with your volunteered status as POW and the associated 5 years of torture.

I am sure your arms can’t reach above your shoulders, either.

I am sure it will make great reading.


92 posted on 07/20/2015 5:51:02 PM PDT by freedumb2003 (When things are rightly ordered, man is steward of God's gifts and civil law enables him to do so.)
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To: Bigun

McCain is not the first “Hero” that should come to mind.

He’s probably the last “Hero” that should be remembered.


93 posted on 07/20/2015 5:51:29 PM PDT by o2bfree (Note to GOP Establishment Liberals: No more continuing budget resolutions!!!)
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To: Citizen Zed

A hero to me is someone who performs significantly above the average under difficult circumstances. So, in McCain’s case, probably not. Is there a category just below “hero”?


94 posted on 07/20/2015 5:52:33 PM PDT by captain_dave
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To: Citizen Zed
He is equal to any man or woman who volunteers. No more. If they are all hero's, then he is a hero. But he is certainly made no better a man than they just for being captured. If it was by his own mistake, then he is a lesser soldier, but no less a hero.

I think this is Trump's point. If your business is taken down by the competion ... are you then, a 'business hero'???

McCain is no more a 'war hero' than my good friend who drove convoy's for 3 years - a hero for defending us, for risking his life. My friend is a hero. But he is not a 'war hero.' What action did McCain CHOOSE that was heroic, brave, courageous, above and beyond all the men who weren't catprued? Is he better than them? MORE of a hero? No.

So I think Trump was pointing this out. If you want to elevate ALL soldiers to war hero, because they volunteered, then do so. But to Call McCain more heroic than the soldier next to him who wasn't captured, that doesn't make any sense. If anything, the one next to him who wasn't captured is quite possibly and even probably simply a better soldier. McCain's standing as last in his class combined with being captured, you have to wonder if he was an effective soldier at all.

But he volunteered, so, we can respect him as much as anyone who volunteered.

All that said, volunteering for something once in your life is not a moral blank check for the rest of your life, certainly being captured and living through it is not either. He has my gratitude just as much, but no more, than my friend ... for the act of volunteering.

Everyone would be better off if he wasn't captured. He'd get to skip the misery, and the country could skip the misery of the political career he cashed it in for.

95 posted on 07/20/2015 5:54:20 PM PDT by tinyowl (penguin in transition)
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To: freedumb2003

Not a hero and never claimed to be one! Did my duty, do not regret it, and don’t have a daddy admiral and a granddaddy admiral to protect me! (The family name you know!)


96 posted on 07/20/2015 5:56:28 PM PDT by Bigun ("The most fearsome words in the English language are I'm from the government and I'm here to help!")
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To: Citizen Zed

86% NO

14% YES

7:57PM CST


97 posted on 07/20/2015 5:57:05 PM PDT by RitaOK ( VIVA CRISTO REY / Public education is the farm team for more Marxists coming)
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To: Bigun

>>Not a hero and never claimed to be one! <<

But willing to denigrate one whose shoes you have not worn.


98 posted on 07/20/2015 5:59:35 PM PDT by freedumb2003 (When things are rightly ordered, man is steward of God's gifts and civil law enables him to do so.)
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To: Citizen Zed

A hero in that he flew missions that could have and did result in his being shot down and captured. Sure. Absolutely.

The rest of his political life tends to negate all that.


99 posted on 07/20/2015 6:00:53 PM PDT by CodeToad (If it weren't for physics and law enforcement I'd be unstoppable!)
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To: tinyowl

>>All that said, volunteering for something once in your life is not a moral blank check for the rest of your life, certainly being captured and living through it is not either. He has my gratitude just as much, but no more, than my friend ... for the act of volunteering.<<

IMHO, he doesn’t get a pass for being a pretty awful pilot (as I said upthread, Gomer Pyle) nor for his terrible record as democrat party senator (and now doddering fool).

But that is not the question on point.


100 posted on 07/20/2015 6:03:13 PM PDT by freedumb2003 (When things are rightly ordered, man is steward of God's gifts and civil law enables him to do so.)
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