White House Defends Rumsfeld from McCain Criticism

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House defended Donald Rumsfeld on Tuesday from criticism from Republican Sen. John McCain (news, bio, voting record) that he was one of the worst U.S. defense secretaries ever for his handling of the Iraq war.

McCain, one of President George W. Bush's key allies in the U.S. Congress on Iraq, is running for his party's nomination to be president in 2008.

"I think that Donald Rumsfeld will go down in history as one of the worst secretaries of defense in history," the Arizona senator and former Vietnam War veteran said on the campaign trail in South Carolina on Monday.

The White House backed Rumsfeld but was careful not to criticize McCain in doing so.

"We think Donald Rumsfeld was an enormously consequential and effective secretary of defense and somebody who led to the transformation of the Department of Defense. Senator McCain holds a different point of view," said White House spokesman Tony Snow.

Rumsfeld, the second-longest serving defense secretary, was widely blamed for the U.S. failure to bring stability to Iraq amid growing public discontent over the war.

"And just so you know, I think McCain is a hero and a patriot."

Some patriot......he takes a dump on our First Amendment (McCain/Feingold) which is a direct violation of his sworn oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States of America. He is a disgrace and a traitor.

Sure are a lot of naysayers here at Free Republic.

Free Republic Opinion Poll:
According to a posted article entitled "McCain Starts Planning for 2008 Run" Senator John McCain is considered the front-runner for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination. Would you be for or against McCain?
Member Opinion
against 92.4% 2,989
for 7.6% 247

McCain is the republican version of Hillary. And, at that, a republican in name only, who has never missed an opportunity to attack the president when he most needed support. I hope and pray that the primaries send McCain back home, so that other candidates with real patriotic credentials can hold the stage.

I have two objections to McCain getting the nomination:

1. I believe he is emotionally unstable and would self-destruct during the general campaign. I do not think he would win, and I think that if by chance he DID win, he would be an unsafe person in the Oval Office. All we need to see is a president doing a "Death Star" impression or ranting like Captain Queeg.

2. For some time I have been seeing hints that the media and democrats WANT McCain to be the nominee. I can offer numerous examples, but Ellen Ratner, notorious Marxist, is one which springs to mind. She said one Saturday morning on Fox that she just LOVED John McCain and hoped that he would be the nominee.

I asked myself, why? And the only answer I could come up with is that Ratner thought that McCain was an easy opponent. And then I realized that the only way this would be true is if the media was ready to pounce on him should he get the nomination. I think they are loaded for bear and will commence firing the minute he gets the nomination. We will hear over and over about his first marriage, his current wife's drug problems, his less-than-stellar record at Annapolis, his membership in the Keating 5, etc. etc. I haven't even counted all of the unguarded comments he made to the press on that "Straight Talk Express" which are sure to resurface once the campaign is underway.

If McCain gets the nomination, I will support him, but I am very afraid for him to get it, since I don't think he will make it through the campaign.

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