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Sen. John McCain accused President Obama of using scare tactics by saying that he cannot guarantee older Americans will continue to receive their Social Security checks if there is no deal to raise the debt ceiling. “The president has now gone from the blame game to the scare game,” McCain said Tuesday in an interview on CNN’s “In The Arena.” “It's really, really unfortunate and it's demagoguery.” The Arizona Republican said he agrees with statements made on the Senate floor Tuesday by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, who said “as long as this president is in the Oval Office, a...

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The US should keep as many as 13,000 troops in Iraq beyond the end-of-year deadline for ending its eight-year combat mission there to help keep the peace around hot spots, according to John McCain, the influential Republican senator. (snip) “I understand the war weariness of the American people ... but I also believe that our interests are our values, for one thing,” he told the FT, adding that he was “puzzled” when people say the US should not act when Muammer Gaddafi, the Libyan leader, has been promising to go house to house and kill Libyans who oppose him. “We...

The American people won’t accept tax increases as part of a debt ceiling increase compromise, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said Sunday.

 In an interview on CNN's “State of the Union” with Candy Crowley McCain said even proposed increases on specific taxes was not something Republicans could agree to. "Well, I think that if we did those small things you're talking about it would have a very small impact but the principle of not raising taxes is something that we campaigned on last November and the results of the election was that the American people don't want their taxes raised and...

Senators John Kerry (D-Mass.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.) are working together to expand the U.S.' role in the Arab Spring, according to The Washington Post. Kerry and McCain traveled to Egypt last weekend with eight Fortune 500 executives to explore how the U.S. can expand economic investment in that country after the fall of Hosni Mubarak. They envision similar plans across the Middle East in the aftermath of the Middle East revolts that would be similar to the U.S.' “Marshall Plan,” in which the U.S. invested billions of dollars in war-torn European nations after World War II.

For 25 years, war has fortified — and nearly destroyed — the ties binding John McCain and John F. Kerry. (snip) Concerned about what they see as an isolationist and fearful drift in both of their parties, Kerry (D-Mass.) and McCain (R-Ariz.) are advocating an even more forceful role for America in the world. (snip) Kerry and McCain are leading the fight in Congress to shore up support for U.S. action in Libya... (snip) The elder statesmen are also hoping to forge something resembling a Marshall Plan for the Middle East... (snip) But the Kerry-McCain partnership was derailed when Kerry...

U.S. Senator John McCain, joined by business leaders on a visit to Cairo, says the U.S. is ready to invest in Egypt. Deborah Lutterbeck reports.

Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said on Thursday the survival of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi's regime could spell the end of NATO. “Logically you can exact that if he [Gadhafi] outlasts NATO, the Arab spring is over,” said Graham. "…He will take it out on his people, I think it will affect the price of oil and would be the end of NATO because NATO taking on Gadhafi and losing -- its going to be very hard for that organization to go off to another war and be taken seriously.” Speaking on the Senate floor, Graham and...

Elevating the fallacy of the false alternative to a foreign policy, John McCain and a few others believe Republicans who oppose U.S. intervention in Libya’s civil war — and who think a decade of warfare in Afghanistan is enough — are isolationists. This is less a thought than a flight from thinking, which involves making sensible distinctions. Last Sunday on ABC’s “This Week,” McCain warned that the GOP has always had “an isolation strain.” He calls it “the Pat Buchanan wing,” which he contrasts with “the Republican Party that has been willing to stand up for freedom for people all...

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It wasn't long ago that the conservative, free-market Club for Growth was viewed by a swath of Republicans as a furtive, well-heeled enemy whose efforts to purge moderates from the GOP had to be thwarted. The club and its agenda are "not representative of the Republican Party," the director of the Republican Main Street Partnership, a group of moderate GOP congressional members, once said, adding: "We raise money on a daily basis to defeat them." When asked this week about the Republican animus the group faced in the recent past, Club for Growth executive director David Keating replied: "That sounds...

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said Tuesday that a resolution he’s spent months crafting on Libya will likely call on the White House to increase its communication with Congress, an addition that could help pick up support for the stalled measure. Last week the Foreign Relations Committee postponed a mark up of McCain’s resolution, written in partnership with Foreign Relations Chairman John Kerry (D-Mass.), fearing the measure would not get enough votes. “I think as the situation has evolved in Libya, and frankly the lack of consultation and reporting to Congress has gone on, then we will be working on more...

LIBERTY COUNTY, Texas -- Dozens of bodies have been found in a mass grave in Liberty County, officials said Tuesday. The Liberty County Sheriff's Office said 25 to 30 bodies were buried at the intersection of County Roads 2049 and 2048 between Hardin and Daisetta. The bodies are those of children, according to preliminary reports. The FBI was called in to assist the investigation.

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R) said he met in recent weeks with Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) as Giuliani mulls a second run for president. Giuliani said on conservative talker Sean Hannity's radio show that he'd met recently with McCain, the 2008 GOP nominee, and come away with the conclusion that it'd be better to focus on primary states if he were to run again.Giuliani's campaign is widely seen to have stumbled because of his focus on the Republican primary in Florida, at the expense of earlier, traditional contests in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina. By the...

WASHINGTON, May 20 (UPI) -- President Obama is repeating a mistake he made at the beginning of his administration with his call for a Palestinian state, U.S. Sen. John McCain said Friday. McCain, R-Arizona, the Republican presidential candidate in 2008, was interviewed by Sean Hannity, the ultra-conservative Fox News commentator. McCain said the president was wrong in his speech on Middle East policy to say that Israel should agree to a Palestinian state based on its borders in 1967. "I think they're making the same mistake that they made at the beginning of the administration," McCain said. "As you may...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Waterboarding and other harsh interrogation techniques were not a factor in tracking down Osama bin Laden, a leading Republican senator insisted Thursday. Sen. John McCain, who spent 5 1/2 years as a prisoner of war in North Vietnam, also rejected the argument that any form of torture is critical to U.S. success in the fight against terrorism.

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said Wednesday he does not believe Congress will act before the May 20 deadline to authorize military engagement in Libya and he does not “recognize” the constitutionality of the War Powers Act that sets the timeline, in any case. “No president has ever recognized the constitutionality of the War Powers Act and neither do I,” McCain said. “So I don’t feel bound by any deadline. It’s pretty obvious there’s no consensus in the Senate or in the Congress now to move forward with a resolution. I respect that.”McCain, the top Republican on the Armed Services Committee,...

The U.S. Senate today overcame a Republican filibuster and approved a former Planned Parenthood abortion business director, John McConnell, as a federal judge in Rhode Island. Senators voted 63-33 to surpass the 60-vote threshold necessary to stop the filibuster and approve the nomination of McConnell’s nomination to the District Court for the District of Rhode Island. his nomination previously cleared the Senate Judiciary Committee recently on a party-line 11-7 vote. Senate Republicans joining all Democrats to end debate included Scott Brown of Massachusetts, Susan Collins of Maine, Lyndsey Graham of South Carolina, Johnny Isakson of Georgia, Mark Kirk of Illinois,...

U.S. Sen. John McCain said Wednesday that he’s “seen this movie before” when it comes to federal claims of a secure border between the U.S. and Mexico. In a Senate hearing, McCain criticized the Department of Homeland Security for not keeping up with escalating drug and smuggling cartel violence that has resulted in mass graves and executions of Mexican officials. McCain, R-AZ, told Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano he remembered the U.S. giving amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants in 1986, “when we said we’d secure the borders.” Today, millions of illegal immigrants enter the U.S. at Tucson. McCain said:...

(snip) "I reminded them that Kuwait and Saudi Arabia reimbursed us after Operation Desert Storm," McCain says. "They said they'd be glad to discuss that.(snip) "They're very good people," he says. "Mainly well-educated, a number of women in the [Transitional National Council] -- very normal, dedicated people." (snip) McCain dismissed concerns that rebel forces include some veterans of al Qaeda. "I'm sure that there may be some element there, but I guarantee you that they didn't rise up because they wanted to be al Qaeda fighters," McCain says. "They rose up because they wanted to throw off the yoke of...