Posted on 04/05/2008 2:37:35 PM PDT by charles m
One evening last July, Senator John McCain of Arizona arrived at the New Hampshire home of Erin Flanagan for sandwiches, chocolate-chip cookies and heartfelt talk about Iraq. They had met at a presidential debate, when she asked the candidates what they would do to bring home American soldiers — soldiers like her brother, who had been killed in action a few months earlier.
Mr. McCain did not bring cameras or a retinue. Instead, he brought his youngest son, James McCain, 19, then a private first class in the Marine Corps about to leave for Iraq. Father and son sat down to hear more about Ms. Flanagan’s brother Michael Cleary, a 24-year-old Army first lieutenant killed by an ambush and roadside bomb.
No one mentioned the obvious: in just days, Jimmy McCain could face similar perils. “I can’t imagine what it must have been like for them as they were coming to meet with a family that ...” Ms. Flanagan recalled, choking up. “We lost a dear one,” she finished.
Mr. McCain, now the presumptive Republican nominee, has staked his candidacy on the promise that American troops can bring stability to Iraq. What he almost never says is that one of them is his own son, who spent seven months patrolling Anbar Province and learned of his father’s New Hampshire victory in January while he was digging a stuck military vehicle out of the mud.
His son’s departure for Iraq brought him the same worry that every military parent feels, friends say, while the young marine’s experiences there have given him a sustained grunt’s-eye view of the action and private confirmation for his argument that United States strategy in Iraq is working.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
I am with you. I did not know about the USMC connection of the son. I was going to write in “Mickey Mouse” on my ballot. Now I gotta vote for McCain. SF
I like McCain. I admire him when he talked about his POW experience. Within 9 months of his captivity in 1967 he was offered to go back home but he refused because he didn’t want to be used as propaganda by the NV. He stayed in the POW camp until Operation HomeComing.
That took courage but the Republican Purist don’t want anything to do with him even though he is pro-life, pro-gun and pro-American.
The Republican Purist don’t get it. We live in dangerous times and we need real leaders in dangerous times.
Reality is....majority of voters are Swing Voters. Its not about being Democrat or Republican...Swing Voters look for Centralist.
We HAVE to WIN the WOT and not look like paper tigers to our enemies.
If Obama becomes president he will remove our troops from Iraq ASAP.
He plans to dismantle our military.
Imagine leaving Kim Jong Il, Mullahs and al Queda afflilated terrorist groups unfettered?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dl32Y7wDVDs&feature=related
If Obama becomes president he will install two ultra liberals to the Surpreme court. Imagine what the ultra liberals will do to our laws concerning partial birth abortion and gun ownership?
The Republican Purist don’t get it and they’re staying home because they didn’t get their way.
I just gave McCain $100 to his campaign.
Money well spent.
And you sound like a petulant baby who can't entertain the thought of being wrong.
It seems to be a trait found in most McCainiacs.
Those of us who don't have McCain on a pedestal are more likely to be ultra-conservative than those who do, like you.
Obviously the walk didn’t do you any good.
McCain’s son is based here in San Diego with the 1st Marines
I have no idea what you said or what I was originally thinking you said. It seems like the Times takes a shot at McCain and you wanted sympathy for him. If that’s not what you said, then never mind.
Nope, I still retained my integrity, still refuse to participate in the RINO Anschluss.
Put this girly man picture in the dumpster.
It's not that the fact his son was in Iraq makes McCain entitled to the Presidency. It's the fact that not only does it lend credibility to McCain's instilling of a love of the military to his son but that it completely negates the asinine requirement pushed by the left that one needs to, or children, need to have been involved in the military to talk of the military and the ongoing war. Of course those same liberals don't push such requirements on the likes of Bill, Hillary or Obama and on down. Politically it also allows McCain, with his own service and imprisonment as well as his son's, to tell the likes of Cindy Sheehan to stuff it.
VETS PLEASE UP ON OUR ROLL CALL ROSTER AT:
http://Vets4McCain.com
McCain is really lagging behind in the campaign contributions....I wonder if people are waiting for the democrat candidate outcome?
Soon as they know its going to the Ultra Left Winger Obama...maybe people will start donating to McCain’s Campaign.
Obama really scares me...more than Hillary.
At least she was in the White House as a First Lady.
If we withdraw from Iraq....we will get attacked again.
We don’t have the will to carry out a mission without withdrawing.
Our enemies see this as a weakness.
They don’t see Democrats or Republicans but as Americans.
If Obama gets elected and withdraws the troops from Iraq...will we have to withdraw from Afganistan?
What will happen if Obama sends humanitarian aid to Dulfer? Will the Islamic-Facist say were are harming their Muslim brother and sisters? We just get attacked again.
Somalia was a humanitarian operation under the Clinton Administation but we got attacked.
“From Saddam’s point of view the possibility of an American invasion verged on nonsense. Afterall, America ran away from Vietnam in complete disarray after suffering only slightly more than 58,000 killed in action. Iraq had suffered as many dead in a single battle on the Fao Peninsula during the war with Iran. More recent events only confirmed Saddam’s conviction that lack of will made America a “paper tiger”....
Page 15
http://www.foreignaffairs.org/special/iraq/ipp.pdf
“....your most disgraceful case was in Somalia....when tens of your solders were killed in minor battles and one American Pilot was dragged in the streets of Mogadishu you left the area carrying disappointment, humiliation, defeat and your dead with you. Clinton appeared in front of the whole world threatening and promising revenge , but these threats were merely a preparation for withdrawal. You have been disgraced by Allah and you withdrew; the extent of your impotence and weaknesses became very clear...”
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/terrorism/international/fatwa_1996.html
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