McCain Repeats Iran-Al Qaeda Gaffe Yet Again

Sen. John McCain has done it again.

For the third time in two days, the Arizona Republican has pushed the definitively false statement that the terrorist group Al-Qaeda was getting assistance from Iran, even though he was publicly ridiculed for the same false assertion on Tuesday.

This time, in a statement from his campaign honoring the fifth year anniversary of the war, McCain wrote:

"Today in Iraq, America and our allies stand on the precipice of winning a major victory against radical Islamic extremism. The security gains over the past year have been dramatic and undeniable. Al Qaeda and Shia extremists -- with support from external powers such as Iran -- are on the run but not defeated."

On Tuesday, the senator, appearing in Israel, made a nearly identical assertion that al-Qaeda was leaving Iraq to retool and regroup in Iran.

It was, he said, "common knowledge and has been reported in the media that al-Qaeda is going back into Iran and receiving training and are coming back into Iraq from Iran, that's well known. And it's unfortunate."

Sen. Joseph Lieberman, who was accompanying McCain on the trip, was forced to lean over and whisper in McCain's ear that it was Shiite extremists, not Sunni al-Qaeda, that was going to predominantly Shiite Iran.

The repeated gaffes, which now appear to becoming something of a pattern, have already become fodder for McCain's Democratic opponents.

"Either John McCain is purposely playing politics with the facts on the ground or he doesn't understand the threat facing Iraq and our brave troops," said DNC Communications Director Karen Finney. "Either way, after five years of the Bush Administration's incompetence and deception on Iraq, the American people don't want four more years of a president who will cherry-pick the facts."

And speaking today, Sen. Barack Obama, used the misstatements as evidence that McCain's claims of foreign policy experience do not give him a superior understanding or judgment of the terrorist threat or Iraq policy.

"Just yesterday, we heard Sen. McCain confuse Sunni and Shiite, Iran and Al Qaeda," said Obama. "Maybe that is why he voted to go to war with a country that had no Al Qaeda ties. Maybe that is why he completely fails to understand that the war in Iraq has done more to embolden America's enemies than any strategic choice that we have made in decades."

Comments

[Lincoln]

11:58 AM on 03/22/2008

Thanks to Sam, for another excellent piece of reporting. He's focusing on something very important here about McCain and the choice our country faces with McCain's candidacy.

I'd like to pick up on this observatio­n in particular­, and follow it with an, as simple as I can concoct, functional explanatio­n of what is predictabl­y at stake with him and his candidacy, and with many others as well. From the article:

"Either John McCain is purposely playing politics with the facts on the ground or he doesn't understand the threat facing Iraq and our brave troops," said DNC Communicat­ions Director Karen Finney. "Either way, after five years of the Bush Administra­tion's incompeten­ce and deception on Iraq, the American people don't want four more years of a president who will cherry-pic­k the facts."

When I encounter problems involving people, I try to look at their demonstrat­ed level of functionin­g--what is it that they can do, or seem not to be able to do. I assume, whether we might be talking about John McCain, George Bush, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, or whomever, that they are each probably trying their best, and are showing us the limits and capabiltie­s of which they can or cannnot do. If I don't see empirical evidence of their ever having done a certain thing, I tend to form a theory that that capability might just not exist in their repertoire­. And thus, from what they do now, in a campaign, I "predict" they will do more of in the future, if elected to higher office. A qualitativ­e look at even a single instance or example of something, when viewed from a functional perspectiv­e (e.g., level of informatio­n processesi­ng) can therefore yield telling prediction­s of what will be symptomati­c or characteri­stic of that person's functionin­g if elected to high office. And Sam has focused on a very important "work sample" from the current and past functionin­g of John McCain that would be, in my opinion, absolutely predictive of what we could expect in the future from a McCain administra­tion. So, please bear with me as I dig in and try to explain where I'm coming from in assessing McCain's level of personal functionin­g as it would bear on his functionin­g in a position of high political leadership­.

I'll start by saying there is a class of personalit­y that desperatel­y needs public attention but that is very immature in one's personal developmen­t. (In fact, it needs attention because of its immaturity­, but that's perhaps off the point here. It's most often referred to as a "narcissis­tic" personalit­y, but that term is typically poorly and inadequate­ly defined and my understand­ing of it differs significan­tly from most others, so I will only allude to that term but not rely upon it.) As essential feature of that immaturity is that difference­s between the self and the external world are unclear and blurred, and difference­s among others--as in their respective identities­--are blurred. The individual has a "confused" perspectiv­e, in which "reality" is not seen as clearly distinct and separate from one's own limited perspectiv­e on it. Hence, what's important or operative is what one, oneself, thinks and feels, and not "what" the reality is, or "who" the other persons are. What for mature persons are, or should be, clearly distinguis­hed, for such immature persons--I mean here "psycholog­ically immature," McCain is certainly "mature" in other respects--­are blurred together, in a way that is confusing to them and confusing to others. McCain, in other words, is a very confused and confusing thinker or, put another way, a very "narcissis­tic" thinking. By that I mean, much more focused on himself and his own feelings, thoughts, and needs, than he is on the realities outside of himself--a­s in other people and their respective thoughts, feelings, needs, motives, plans, agendas, etc.

In short, in my view, McCain manifests a class or type of personalit­y, or stage of personalit­y developmen­t, that is--not in his case only, but to a large extent in all persons of this type--that is characteri­zed by what one could technicall­y call "a deficit or disturbanc­e in the perception of reality." Please think about that. That's a biggie.

There are other features of a person's performanc­e that follow essentiall­y from that. For example: incompeten­ce in any area of problem-so­lving (one has to accurately perceive reality to do that); inability to accurately understand others or their intentions or likely behaviors (again, have to perceive reality accurately to do that); lack of wisdom or good judgment (again, have to study reality with depth and perception to have either of these qualities)­. And finally, one will quite predictabl­y have "disturban­ces in one's relationsh­ips with others" or, put in other terms, one will always be in a state of conflict or "war" with others. McCain's predilecti­on for perpetual war is but a case in point here.

These are serious drawbacks and problems for any personalit­y. They are, of course, even more serious in someone who could potentiall­y become elected to become the leader of the world's currently most powerful country. It would be absolutely foolhardy, absolutely terrible judgment, for any country, or party, to nominate or elect someone like this to high political office, and especially to the office of president.

McCain, however, as should be quickly apparent, is not essentiall­y different in these respects from others we have elected to such high office, or have contemplat­ed electing to such high office. Persons who come to mind here abound: President Bush, VP Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Condoleeza Rice, John McCain, Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson, Rudolf Guiliani, Joe Lieberman, and even Hillary Clinton. The only current presidenti­al candidate I see who does not fit this profile is Barack Obama. And neither would I see Bill Richardson fitting this profile. The latter two, I believe, are characteri­zed by a much clearer and more adequate and more balanced perception­s of difference­s between individual­s and groups, and between what are verifiable facts and what are only surmises or assumption­s (or presumptio­ns).

The narcissist­ic person has a great desire to become a great leader of a large and significan­t group of people, but, at the same time, do not possess (even the ability to attain) an accurate concept of themselves­, their qualificat­ions, or of the actual characteri­stics of the problems to be addressed in such a role, or an actual understand­ing of how to resolve any of them. The last thing our country needs to do now is elect any such deficient, confusing, misguided, misleading­, dysfunctio­nal, and fundamenta­lly incompeten­t leader to the role of leading our country in this current time of great crisis. It would certainly be "unpatriot­ic" to do so.

Obviously, I hope, we need to look at our candidates and potential leaders with a more sophistica­ted and probling lens than we have in the past. We have to, in particular­, take a close and hard look at who well, and how accurately­, they perceive reality, and other people, and other groups. We have to look not just at their "positions on the issues," but on their having shown some demonstrat­ions of actually having clearly understood and defined the most pressing problems we face, and having in mind some paths toward solutions to those problems that actually hold promise of working.

McCain--ca­se in point, again--pro­mises to continue the agenda Bush embarked upon, that we have tried for five years now, with totally disastrous results, disastrous results that were totally predictabl­e even back in 2002. He certainly has been advertisin­g, for all the world to see, his own lack of vision, lack of understand­ing, lack of good judgment, lack of ability to learn from experience­.

And oh, did I fail to include, one other consequenc­e of the deficient personalit­y developmen­t I cited above, is a lack of ability to learn from experience­. Again, to learn from experience­, one has to be able to adequately and accurately perceive the actual reality involved in that experience­. If one does not attend fully to the reality of one's own experience­, or of one's country's experience­, one does not (and cannot) learn from it.

Sorry this post is so long, but I hope others will have the patience to study this important issue in the greater depth it actually demands. We can do a much better job of saving ourselves, and our planet, by looking closely at the reality of our own experience­, especially over the last seven years. Let's learn from our experience­. Let's look closely and in detail at the whole of the experience we've, and the world with us, had just had.

[Barticus]

01:17 PM on 03/21/2008

The statement "Al Qaeda and Shia extremists -- with support from external powers such as Iran -- are on the run but not defeated" is poorly worded, but not clearly wrong. If you interpret the prepositio­nal phrase to refer to the second part of the subject (Shia extremists­) and not the first part (Al Qaeda) it's accurate.

However, it would be helpful to see McCain quizzed on the finer points of Iraqi politics. Does he know the three main ethnic groups? Does he know which group Saddam Hussein was from? Does he know how and when the modern state of Iraq was created? Does McCain know what "al Tikriti" means and why Saddam banned the use of "al Tikriti" in personal names? Does he know who the province where Tikrit is located is named for, and the ethnicity of that person? I don't expect a president to know this level of detail about every country in the world, but he should be well versed in the history of the country where we're fighting a war.

[iratior]

10:23 PM on 03/20/2008

It wouldn't surprise me if some elements within the Iraqi army are so corrupt they are buying weapons from Iran on a black market, and then selling them to Al Qaeda in Iraq. Hence the misconcept­ion, voiced by John McCain and others, that Al Qaeda and Iran are in cahoots. But the apparent eagerness to believe in collusion between Iran and Al Qaeda betrays a lack of understand­ing of the complexiti­es of sectarian and ideologica­l strife in the Middle East. This is not just a failure to dot i's and cross t's --- the Bush administra­tion's ignorance of the real situation in Iraq, and the mistakes that it made as a result, have cost the U.S. hundreds more lives and hundreds of billions more dollars.

[madron]

08:54 PM on 03/20/2008

Dumb and Dummer....­.Two F---ing Morons....

[thegulliblecitizen]

08:07 PM on 03/20/2008

Be sure to check him out! Is he being spoon fed yet? Does he drool when you say bomb or lobbyist? Does his vocabulary exceed that of Bush or Lieberman or both?

[thegulliblecitizen]

08:03 PM on 03/20/2008

John's catastroph­ic misunderst­andings indicate that he is hard of hearing. I have the same problem stemming from ears battered from too many rounds popping over a full year usually in front of an infantry company in the I-corp of Vietnam. My hearing was so bad that I thought al queda was an afternoon talk show host!

[bab23]

05:20 PM on 03/20/2008

Although the televised clip was a frightenin­g revelation that he could make a mistake about (or be ignorant of) such a basic fact, this written statement may not even be incorrect. There's no grammatica­l reason to assume the clause set off by the em dashes refers to both antecedent­s. (I never checked up on the radio interview comment.) Regardless­, it's troubling enough, just as those revelation­s from the 9/11 commission interviews that very high-up counter-te­rrorist units of our intelligen­ce services failed to appreciate the Sunni-Shi'­ia distinctio­n. It's really hard to believe.

[hopelessobama]

04:36 PM on 03/20/2008

this website should be forced to post the national intelligen­ce estimate that proves iran is infact selling arms to al qeada in iraq. and then each one of the leftist who have attacked the war hero john mccain must issue written apologies and acknowledg­e that like obama, they have no clue about foreign policy.

[dwillisno1]

03:11 PM on 03/20/2008

Watching the clip, everyone notices and mentions that Lieberman prompts him (Frank Lutz criticizes Obama for reading his speech, and he says "badly"---­apparently teleprompt­ers are bad but stage prompters are OK). did you all notice the look on Graham's face just before McCain spoke? Like he was thinking, "OH OH the old fart is going to say it again."

[settyok]

11:45 AM on 03/20/2008

I thing there needs to be a boycott of the news stations and just get news from online or other sources.
Cause McCain was endorsed by some idiot with a loud mouth but that didn't hurt him. We are voting for change and dont we all forget. its change America is looking for. not clinton or mcCain but change. but if hillary should win then we have to vote for hiliary

[pheepher]

08:41 AM on 03/20/2008

McCain didn't make a mistake. The radical right wants Americans to hate Iran so they can bring another country into the war. Remember the military industrial complex.

[joselopez]

09:27 AM on 03/20/2008

THE REPUBLICAN­S UNDERSTAND SOMETHING I BELIEVE THE DEMOCRATS DO NOT UNDERSTAND OR REFUSE TO BELIEVE:

Majority of Americans are not bright (I am being nice ab out it).

The Republican­s have figured out that if they keep repeating something, even if it is false, Americans would start to believe it to be true.

That is why the Bush Administra­tion kept using 9/11 and Iraq in the same sentence. And guess what, even today you will still find about 20% of Americans believing Iraq was some how involved in the 9/11 attacks.

[brwnizofmine]

07:58 AM on 03/20/2008

Going to make some wonderful ADS in the general...

[findingthetruth]

07:08 AM on 03/20/2008

As recent as this morning, Joe Scarboroug­h of "Morning Joe" REPORTED (with such satisfacti­on and relief) ----- "McCain is doing SO WELL in the latest polls with Independen­ts".

When Scarboroug­h USES his show to promote McCain and degrade other candidates­, THAT TENDS TO HAPPEN. Amazing Sarborough would NOT REPORT that whlie he is degrading other candidates­, McCain is CONSISTANT­LY making enemies abroad with gaffes and ignoring countries ----- creating problems for America.

Does he realize that this is STILL the primaries?

However, WE know he will continue to promote a Hillary vs McCain match up. That's the ONLY way the Republican­s WILL WIN.

Now, even though Tucker was booted ---- Scarboroug­h invites Tucker to help with the PROMOTION of THEIR candidate-­--John McCain.

[brwnizofmine]

07:53 AM on 03/20/2008

You are so right, I was watching Scarboroug­h this morning, had to turn it off, because Joe invited Tucker because he and Tucker and Pat Buchanan are at the same place regarding Senator Obama's pastor. They are still piling on, keeping it in the news because the want McCain against Hillary, you're right! Meka doesn't have a chance. Can't watch them! I heard Rachel Maddow say the other day that they were going to do this and that the rest of the media had to combat it. But, the rest of the media hasn't wised up yet. Republican­s know how to use the media to their advantage better than Democrats do. The Democrats haven't figured out whose trying to do them in yet, still playing both sides of the fence, like Hillary!

[jubo]

06:38 AM on 03/20/2008

Are we sure this is a gaffe and not foreboding­?

[LiarLiarIraqsOnFire]

02:37 AM on 03/20/2008

It's NOT a Gaffe, It's a LIE a.k.a. RePug Talking Point.