Some Straight Talk on McCain

No Compromises ^ | Jan. 16, 2008 | ThoughtRogue

[Jefferson Paine]

A Character Portrait

What in the heck were the good people of New Hampshire thinking the other night when they cast the plurality of their votes for John “The Maverick” McCain – or were they thinking at all? Isn’t it eminently clear that John McCain has staked the success of his 2008 presidential bid on the ignorance and short memories of the electorate??

The liberal media, who have long dallied with him in an on-again-off-again love affair, have endowed him with the ‘endearing’ moniker Maverick because his political cannon frequently becomes loose, lurches unfailingly toward the Right, and goes off - maiming his fellow partisans and innocent bystanders on the right-wing. These casualties of the Right, over the years, have had some other choice adjectives for this man other than ‘maverick’ – such as, perhaps, strident, unfaithful, intemperate, petulant, or foolhardy.

Let’s take an important stroll down memory lane, sketching a character portrait of this man by examining his improbable career.

The Warrior

John Sidney McCain III was born August 29th, 1936 in the Panama Canal Zone (long before one Jimmy Carter gave away our vital strategic asset) to a U.S. Navy Admiral, who was himself the son of a U.S. Navy Admiral of the same name. Should Mr. McCain be elected President of the United States in 2008, he would the oldest person ever to assume the Office.

Given his lineage, he attended various schools as military assignments caused his family to move about frequently. Not a good student academically, he developed a quick temper and the desire to aggressively compete and to prevail – becoming a skilled boxer and wrestler in school. He graduated from the top private Episcopal High School in Alexandria, VA in 1954, and subsequently entered the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, MD.