Stockdale & McCain.
Both Navy pilots, both flew A-4 aircraft, both shotdown over Vietnam in combat missions by AA & or SAM, both brutalized while POW.
Pukin Dog, why do you say that? Lots of good, even great pilots get shot down. Was he a bad pilot to begin with? I never heard that he was a BAD pilot, though from all I have read indicates he was a middle of the road pilot. Did you have personal experience with him, or read it somewhere he was an accident waiting to happen?
He was my Commanding Officer in my first squadron, and I never remember seeing him fly, so I cannot comment. I did know he was only two years removed from being a POW, and was in pretty bad shape physically, and often wondered how he got command of a squadron, even though it was just a training squadron. How on earth could he have got flight clearance with his history?
Point is, I have no love for McCain politically. But he did serve his country under difficult conditions. If Stockdalel said he was a good man and served well, I believe him. Doesn't mean I support McCain-Feingold or anything else he stands for politically, but unless someone knows he did something detrimental to our country when he was a POW, I wish they would come out and just tell us what it was.