McCain The Cad: A Study in Republican Hypocrisy and Why Obama Will (or Should) Win the Family Values Vote
Republicans have developed a nasty habit of turning a blind eye to sins that might put them in a bad light. This double standard reaches a new zenith with the right wing/evangelical embrace of McCain. Caligula is in bed with the Church Lady, and the Church Lady is pretending to like it.
If they vote for Senator McCain the evangelical/conservative/Republican base is going to have to reach for a new level of hypocrisy. So are honorable military men and women voters.
In McCain's candidacy the folks who have driven American politics to the sanctimonious moralistic right for 30 years are about to be hoisted on their own petard. As for the military vote, a glaring chunk of McCain's life -- after Vietnam -- is the opposite of honorable.
I am a former life-long Republican, a former evangelical right wing leader. I'm also the proud father of a Marine. In the 70s and 80s, along with my late father Francis Schaeffer, I was a founding instigator of the religious right. I re-registered as an independent out of disgust with Rove, Bush et al. Today I am a dedicated Obama supporter.
It is as a former insider's insider -- I once labored with Jack Kemp, C. Everett Koop and Gary Bauer, the Bush family and the Fords et al., to get evangelicals to vote Republican--that I note that according to evangelical theology and right wing morality, McCain is virtually in a class of his own when it comes to bad behavior. He makes Bill Clinton's moral lapses look benign by comparison.
Here are some well known -- and undisputed -- McCain facts presented by Sharon Churcher (Daily Mail June 8 "The Wife Of US Republican John McCain Callously Left Behind.")
McCain likes to illustrate his moral fiber by referring to his five years as a prisoner-of-war in Vietnam. And to demonstrate his commitment to family values, the 71-year-old former US Navy pilot pays warm tribute to his beautiful blonde wife, Cindy, with whom he has four children.
But there is another Mrs. McCain who casts a ghostly shadow over the Senator's presidential campaign. She is seldom seen and rarely written about, despite being mother to McCain's three eldest children....But when McCain returned to America in 1973 to a fanfare of publicity and a handshake from Richard Nixon, he discovered his wife [Carol] had been disfigured in a terrible car crash three years earlier...
When McCain... was released in March 1973, he told reporters he was overjoyed to see Carol again. But friends say privately he was 'appalled' by the change in her appearance...'I thought, of course, we would live happily ever after,' says Carol. But as a war hero, McCain was moving in ever-more elevated circles. Through Ross Perot, he met Ronald Reagan, then Governor of California. A sympathetic Nancy Reagan took Carol under her wing.
'John started carousing and running around with women,' said Robert Timberg. McCain has acknowledged that he had girlfriends during this time, without going into details... He was also fiercely ambitious....
In 1979 -- while still married to Carol -- he met Cindy at a cocktail party in Hawaii. Over the next six months he pursued her, flying around the country to see her. Then he began to push to end his marriage.
Carol and her children were devastated. 'It was a complete surprise,' says Nancy Reynolds, a former Reagan aide.
...[D]espite his popularity as a politician, there are those who won't forget his treatment of his first wife.
Ted Sampley, who fought with US Special Forces in Vietnam and is now a leading campaigner for veterans' rights, said: 'I have been following John McCain's career for nearly 20 years. I know him personally. There is something wrong with this guy and let me tell you what it is -- deceit.
'When he came home and saw that Carol was not the beauty he left behind, he started running around on her almost right away. Everybody around him knew it.
"Eventually he met Cindy and she was young and beautiful and very wealthy. At that point McCain just dumped Carol for something he thought was better."
"This is a guy who makes such a big deal about his character. He has no character. He is a fake. If there was any character in that first marriage, it all belonged to Carol.'"
...Ross Perot, who paid her medical bills all those years ago, now believes that both Carol McCain and the American people have been taken in by a man who is unusually slick and cruel -- even by the standards of modern politics.
"McCain is the classic opportunist. He's always reaching for attention and glory," he said.
"After he came home, Carol walked with a limp. So he threw her over for a poster girl with big money from Arizona. And the rest is history.."
Republicans have been winning elections by appealing to a holier-than-thou sense of American goodness. One plank is the anti-gay and anti gay marriage agenda. In McCain they have a leader who represents the antithesis of family values. In fact McCain is sort of man who got horsewhipped by irate fathers on behalf of wronged daughters in Victorian novels. He's what used to be called a cad.
The idea of the folks who uphold the "sanctity of marriage" joining forces with this man is mind boggling. They choose divorce and abandonment over commitment. So much for consistency. Talk about straining out the gnat and swallowing the camel!
For the record, I don't think it's appropriate to measure public service by personal sexuality and/or private behavior. But the Republican Party should be judged by its own pro-family standards. As it has judged others, so let it be judged. (Disclosure: I actively supported McCain in 2000, because I figured W. Bush was worse. Now, with Obama, I am supporting someone who I think will be a great president, not as a best of a bad alternative, but as the most inspiring candidate in my lifetime.)
The Democratic Party (unlike the Republican's evangelical base) is not selling itself on personal moral rectitude. But the fact is that Senator Obama and his wife Michelle are the model of traditional morality.
Evangelicals and other members of the right are in a strange position. The candidate representing their "Christian values" is a disaster, while their "godless" opponent -- variously described as "a Muslim," "unpatriotic," "hates America," and "pro-abortion," etc., etc., walks the walk of bedrock America.
By contrast McCain has not only broken the rules of decent family conduct, by tossing over his wife in her hour of need--a wife who loyally waited for him and raised his children -- but he has broken his much vaunted military moral code of honor too.
McCain says he belongs to the fraternity that "never leaves a man behind," much less a wounded comrade. But that is exactly what he did to his wounded and disfigured wife.
One reason Obama will win is because evangelicals are going to have trouble swallowing the jagged chunk of awkward moral hypocrisy that is John McCain. They are also going to have a hard time hating Obama, whose personal life mirrors their values, who's religious beliefs are sincere and humbly and devoutly Christian and who's family devotion is authentic.
Frank Schaeffer is a writer and author of CRAZY FOR GOD-How I Grew Up As One Of The Elect, Helped Found The Religious Right, And Lived To Take All (Or Almost All) Of It Back
Follow Frank Schaeffer on Twitter: www.twitter.com/frank_schaeffer
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What's the big deal? Evangelicals and the rest of the right wing weirdos who pander to them have always ignored "family values" when it comes to themselves and those they already have been convinced to like. Remember Reagan (divorced)? Howzabout Newt Gingrich, who threw his wife away while she was sick? Cheney, with anti-gay words and a Lesbian daughter? And naturally, remember all those fallen preachers - Maggard, Bakker, Swaggert, etc. It makes no difference to them if the folks they vote for and pray under are little Satans.
The real mark of wingnuts is not only that they've swallowed horse poop, but once they've swallowed it, they defend its nutritive value. (Present company excepted - but you're the exception, not the rule.)
The evangelicals will vote for McCain even if it comes out that he's currently screwing a billionaire to replace his millionaire -and the billionaire is a filly.
That article in The Mail exploited Carol McCain. She agreed to sit down with them to make it known that she supports John McCain and that they are friends. Anyone who tries to spin this in any other fashion should be ashamed of themselves.
Who am I kidding, none of you Obama supporters care what Carol McCain has to say, if her statements don't suit your agenda you will disregard it any way.
True.
She still loves him even after he cheated on her.
I'm sure he takes care of her financially, with his Senate salary,
full military pension,
100% disability (!!),
and uh, uhm, his current wife's (and former mistress') income.
If he lacks integrity in his personal life, what makes you think he would be a paragon of virtue as President? Where does one leave off, and the other begin?
Carol McCain willingly put the information out there - how people choose to interpret his behavior is their choice and not yours to enforce.
This story just makes me sad. I'm a cancer survivor and during our chemo sessions several of us ladies discussed how Newt Gingrich left his wife after her cancer diagnosis. These things DO happen and not just to the wives of public figures.
I agree, how people choose to interpret is their choice. But she thought the article was going to be about her feelings toward John and her supporting him, and it was not.
It is a sad story because they both went through so much during those 5 1/2 years and it would have been a wonderful thing if they had lived happliy ever after. But life doesn't work that way.
I'm happy to hear you beat your cancer. Here is a story to tell your friends. My brother was diagnosed with non-Hodgkins lymphoma about 10 years ago. Shortly after, during a break in his treatment he was sent to Korea for 2 weeks (Army). When he got back his lovely wife had moved all his stuff out into the carport, she had moved her boyfriend in. She said she just couldn't handle watching him die, she needed him to take care of her. He had a chance of survival at that point, but lost hope after he lost her and his 3 sons. You can't live without hope.
My point is that it's not only men who leave their wives, women do it too.
By your standards then some woman who is brutally beaten and tortured by her husband, but still claims she loves him and he loves her, should be left alone. That we shouldn't say that man is complete scum that needs to be locked up? Because that's exactly what you are saying.
John McCain dumped his wife the minute he saw she wasn't a beauty queen anymore, it may have taken a few years for him to make it official but he checked out the moment he saw her. The fact that she is still in love with him doesn't excuse the way he treated her. In my opinion, it only makes it worse.
That is absolutely not what I said. Carol McCain sat down and gave an interview and the paper took the story in an entirely dofferent direction than she was led to believe.
John did not dump his wife the minute he saw her.
Oh, why bother.
DECEIT
Perfectly put Frank.
Thank you once again for a great article
As long as McCain isn't a gay abortionist, the GOP faithful will follow like the sheep that they are. Yes, Obama clearly follows the teachings of Christ more faithfully, but to follow Conservatism, one must ignore the teachings of Christ altogether. It isn't a problem.
McCain may be perceived as a war hero and honored for his military service to this country but that does not qualify him for POTUS. All he knows is military and is the same as George Bush. He is right and everyone else is wrong. Won't admit his mistakes, and has a hair trigger temper.
I'm glad the general election has started and hope John McCain gets equal scrutiny. This is just the beginning. It's going to be fun to watch.
Those of us who are old enough to remember..
WOW!!!!!
If I were mccain supporter (it hurts just to say that), this alone would make me revisit my decision.
That's because you are not a McCain supporter. Those of us that are have know the real story behind his first marriage for a long time now. And you know what it really says about John McCain? That he is human just like the rest of us. He has admitted his responsibility for the failure of this marriage. He has strived to continue a friendly relationship with Carol and done his best to heal the wounds this caused to their 3 children.
How many of you have remained friends with your ex's?
Funnily enough Deomocrats have fewer divorces, so have fewer exes.
And I suppose you feel the same way about Bill Clinton and the Lewinsky scandal. He is, after all, only human, too, right? He deserves to be forgiven too, right?
Mr. Schaeffer is correct when he says the religious right should hold McCain up to the same standards to which they hold democratic candidates, compare him to Obama, and vote accordingly if they want to stay true to their values.
I personally don't think McCain's "cadness" should be held against him in measuring his ability to be President either. But we don't live in a perfect world. And politics being what it is, I hope the manner in which he left his first wife haunts his campaign. It would be poetic justice and a nice comeuppance for the Republican Party.
He is human just like the rest of us? What a crock of bull, only a desperate soul could come up with such a lame excuse as that, especially one who believes in the public morals of the republican party.
Do you have as much understanding for the rape victim who desires an abortion?
Do you have as much compassion for the drug addict looking for a clean needle?
Do you have as much love for those who cheat on their spouses and work it out?
Do you have as much respect for a man who loves a man? or woman who loves a woman?
Me thinks you have a terrible case of do as I say not as I do disease. Take two hammerblows to the forehead and call me in the morning.
Mr. Schaeffer you make a lot of sense and I appreciate your honesty.
Honesty? That would mean telling the truth, and he has not done that.
HuffPost's Pick
So, tell us what statements are untrue.
Divorce is pervasive, and we shouldn't crow about that fate in anyone's personal life, but let's not defend John McCain's character or honor because the divorce worked out. Let's face it; a 42-year-old married man doesn't hook up w/ a 24-year-old heiress because heaven ordained them as soulmates.
The fact that McCain's ex-wife is not embittered is more a testament to her character, not his.
The more we learn about the real John McCain, the easier it becomes to understand how and why he would sell his soul to the Dark Side. Pre-2000 a lot more folks - especially middle-aged boomers - hewed to Mr. McCain's apparent idealism. Watching him yield to W. and the tactics of NeoCon scum has been hard.
Let's hope his moment in history is gone.
Do you have support for your position? Why in the world should anyone believe you over the author of this posting - a man who knows his words will be carefully scrutinized by mcinsane's followers?
I think you do see the truth in Mr. Schaeffer's words and you just can't come to terms with that because it flies in the face of everything you've been led to believe. Why else would you have posts in nearly every one of his articles? If you're so repulsed why can't you look away?
I'm sure this will be commented on extensively, as all but the few lurking trolls get themselves all in a lather about what a cad this decrepit Cassanova once was. But I don't think it's going to register big with most voters, and I don't think it's going to matter.
While reporting the truth about his past personal behavior does not amount to character assassination, I would suggest that we leave this sort of anti-McCain campaigning to blogs and 527's. Obama has got him on the issues, and that's where we should focus our attention: Iraq, Iran, tax breaks for billionaires, tax kickbacks to big oil, the meltdown of the mortgage and credit markets, housing values, $4+ gas, rising inflation and rising unemployme
I understand your point, but - um - isn't THIS a blog? :-)
Actually, I only partly agree. Your are absolutely correct that we *** should *** be focusing on the real issues. On the other hand, the Repubs see no shame in using "family values" nonsense to wipe out their opponents - and if we keep to the high road and don't emit similar blather, we may miss many voters. Unfortunately, the voting public loves dirt and hates substance, and I suspect that if we don't get down in the mud with the Repubs, we'll lose the election. Again.
If they are going to play dirty, then we should play dirty, too.
"If they are going to play dirty, then we should play dirty, too."
No! Never argue with an idiot, as passers by can't tell who's who. Obama has gotten where he is by staying on target with issues. His "new politics" approach is resonating with many including the usually disaffected young voters. IF he can continue bringing this group to the voting booths his victory is assured. Remember this country has been selecting a president with only a small portion of eligible voters participating. A new influx of voters will have a major impact and the elephantine party has a brand problem that will prevent any influx of voters. Actually they have the opposite problem because McSame doesn't excite the party of Lincoln and they will have a voter turnout lull due to a lack of interest. The real problem is the infighting that the success ALWAYS brings to Democrats. Since they have a larger tent, they have a wider range of views to support and THAT is where Democrats have always fallen in the past. My only hope is that Obama can magically overcome this problem. Part 1
To do so his VP is going to have to be a bulldog, a tireless fighter who is going to have to be willing to metaphorically throw themselves on the grenade of the old politics fights and be merciless with anyone who stands in the way. Someone who can get the party of Jefferson to focus their efforts on the problems at hand and solve the problems that threaten to overcome us as a nation and a planet. I personally don't like the conclusion that this line of reasoning(?) leads to but the facts are the facts and Hillary is the best person for the job if she is TOTALLY committed to Team Obama's Objectives. I think Obama would get elected with or without her but to get his agenda passed in Congress he will need a tough, respected VP who when set with a task will have the tenacity to get it done!
I agree that the repugs always talk about family values but then you find out all the skeletons they have in their closets and you are amazed. How many scandals have broken recently from these people who always want to try to look down on others.
It amazes me how someone can have the strength and courage to withstand being tortured for five years but not have the strength and courage to stand by his wife.
The general populace will never put any credence in McCain's bad boy behavior. He's too old, and it was too long ago. It's too unbelievable that he was ever sexually promiscuous, regardless of the facts on the ground.
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