John McCain Wants to Win at All Costs, and It Has a Cost

Years back, I got my first big promotion, recommended by my wildly-temperamental boss. Weeks later, he stormed into my office, spewing profanity; he wanted me fired. Though he apologized days after, I was upset but conflicted, since I owed my job to him. In my father's Midwestern good sense, he gave me advice I've remembered - "When somebody says they want you fired, you don't owe them any loyalty."

I've thought of my father's wise words recently The reason is John McCain.

When discussing John McCain, you begin with "noble," "heroic" and "honor." And then add "beyond admiration." John McCain did something most people couldn't even dream of doing. Myself included. His actions 40 years ago define virtue.

But when somebody chooses to jeopardize the safety of his country, twice, you no longer owe him any admiration.

The first and most obvious is ever-present at his side. John McCain can try to contend he always puts America first, but in no rational world is there a rational argument where Sarah Palin can be rationally seen as anything but putting America at risk.

There's little need to repeat the many reasons the American public has made Sarah Palin a laughingstock and given her a negative favorability rating. She showed why all on her own when she finally gave a few vacuous minutes to Katie Couric and Charles Gibson. Claiming that she has foreign policy expertise because her state is close to Russia got a nation to cringe.

(Side note: Anchorage to Moscow is actually 5,200 miles. That's the same distance as Cedar Rapids, Iowa, to Guinea on the West African coast.)

Knowing that he's 72 years old dealing with what was a serious case of melanoma, John McCain's first act as the Republican presidential nominee was to put Sarah Palin a heartbeat from becoming president.

Just 21 months ago, Sarah Palin was in a job that elected her with 616 votes. She's had hands laid on her by a preacher intoning against the spirit of witchcraft. She gave a welcoming speech to the political party that wants to secede from the United States.

And John McCain named her to be a heartbeat from the presidency.

John McCain knows that America is involved in two active wars. He knows that a third war is possible. He knows that America has long been in economic peril.

And yet with America facing grave crises, John McCain knowingly chose to pander to his party's base, and named the most frighteningly-unqualified person ever nominated by a major party to be a heartbeat from being president. In the one job where you must consider country only, he didn't.

That alone is disgraceful enough..

But John McCain has equaled this act of dishonor by his campaign's attempts to demonize his opponent in ways that are reprehensible.

We've seen the radical far right whipped into a fury that finally spilled over the past week. Angst-ridden Republicans crying out "traitor," "treason," "kill him," "off with his head" - and no doubt more - about John McCain's opponent. Literally begging in fear for John McCain to get even more aggressive. Pleading because the McCain campaign has been daily pushing them to.

And the reality is that John McCain knows it's disgraceful. We know this because when meeting Barack Obama face-to-face in debate, he didn't utter a word about a man his campaign has been hinting is traitorous to America.

And we know John McCain doesn't believe his campaign's smears because he finally said so. Because John McCain had to tell his town hall mob that Barack Obama was decent, a family man, and people shouldn't be scared of him. Because John McCain had to take the microphone back from another fevered supporter and explain that Barack Obama was, in fact, a citizen and decent, not an "Arab."

And he got booed for all this. Booed by his supporters. Booed by the furious mob he and his running mate had been whipping up.

Watching John McCain's face as that agitated lady says the word, "Arab," it's as if he is looking in a mirror and seeing himself. It is an expression of realization that he's dug himself into this horrible hole. Because he knows all his supporters have been following his lead.

But the very worst thing about this all is that it doesn't stop with the election.

John McCain knows that the only reason his campaign has been making these disgraceful smears is because he's far behind. Which means he knows that Barack Obama may likely become President of the United States.

And yet John McCain disingenuously chose to whip up his Republican far right base into thinking the future president may be a foreign terrorist. These aren't attitudes that disappear when the election ends. These are attitudes of ignorant fear that are sowed deep into the consciousness, which will only linger through an Obama Administration and create a bitter, deep, national divide. All of which, knowing it's not true, John McCain intentionally created.

So much for him being able to work across the aisle...

Make no mistake, John McCain's effort to quiet his mob was no thoughtful act. John McCain knew he had pandered so shamelessly that he had to protect himself so his soul doesn't go to hell.

John McCain has a noble past 40 years ago. But when somebody decides to disgrace their country and put it at risk, you no longer owe them any admiration. When someone does it twice, the deserve all the dishonor they have earned for themselves.

Comments

[LynnW49]

John McCain is behaving scandalously, and as the article quote above says so well, he is putting his country at risk. My own sense of the man is that he has always been opportunistic enough to, at times, put "Country Second." We are just seeing it most clearly during this campaign. There has been a lot of talk about the distractions of this campaign season, but what we have been distracted from most is the essential John McCain. Setting aside the Palin fiasco, the terrible advice from the McCain campaign chiefs, and the economic downturn, when John McCain stands alone, he is not a larger than life hero, and he is not Presidential material. In short, we have to wonder if he has never been, at the core, a deeply and enduringly honorable man. Honor is not something you lose on your own. It might be taken away from you by events or changing times or really bad people. But when you willingly trade it yourself, it causes doubt about how much of it you had in the first place.

[hgovernick]

Mr. Elisberg,

I agree with the bulk of your observations, but wonder about the title of your article: "John McCain Wants to Win at All Costs..."

Flashback: It wasn't long ago when McCain's run for President had been written off as dead in the water.

Realtime: Since McCain's miraculous (and for me, inexplicable) resurrection, one might wonder if McCain's campaign strategists, corporate totalitarianists, have intentionally guided the campaign in a manner deliberately designed to guarantee McCain's failure.

Flashforward: An Obama Presidency doing the best it can to rebuild, almost from scratch, the United States of America, now a poverty-stricken, third-world nation of which no self-respecting Republican would wish to be Commander-In-Chief.

Endgame: McCain was in on the scheme from beginning to end. He was therefore free to make any outlandish (and dangerous) choices he felt might keep the game interesting, knowing he was not in reality putting his country at risk, while giving us all one of the greatest sporting events in our country's history.

Of course, my remarks sound more like a bad plot for a Hollywood "B" movie, and I really don't believe the musings of my imagination. But as much as I really, really, REALLY do not like John McCain, I have a hard time believing he's as dumb as he seems.

[robbie44]

Their is no place for entitlement in the position of president of the united states.And since when are you only worthy if you spent five years as a P.O.W. in north Vietnam.A wise leader would have never sent McCain to suffer in a war half way around the world that was none of our business to start with.we don't need a maverick in the white house
we need a leader and we need him now.

[betabeta]

What does it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his own soul? John should reflect on that.

[IndependentTogether]

John McCain, you can lose with honor, or you can lose with dishonor. But you're going to lose.

[respectingothers]

he lost his honor awhile back. don't see him getting it back

[egal]

Sadly, McCain never was an honorable man, not by military standards. If today's soldiers performed as badly as he did in flying, we would be grounded. If we chose to give soundbytes to those who imprisoned us, particularly anything bad about American and wonderful about our imprisoners, we would face court-martialing.

Nor was he honorable by political standards. Only standing up for his principals until he wanted something badly or had the chance to help out allies is the behavior of a coward with delusions of nobility and honorable character that couldn't stand up agains the reality of his ambitions. Continuing to champion behaviors that he knew would bite the nation on the rear because they already had is either stupid or so tunnel-visioned that "the Titanic" seems to best sum up his economic politics.

Perhaps he is merely an old, selfish man who thought he could be better and tried but continues not to live up to his best intentions; or perhaps all the reformer and maverick images are just steps on his path to the power he seeks. Most likely, he meant well and fell horribly short and now can't even see how low he's fallen.

[respectingothers]

Exactly, when he sidled up to GW after GW's campaign said those things about his daughter, people could easily see all he cared about was becoming POTUS. Blind ambition. ambition without honor. with everything he's said and done since then he just continues to show his true colors. I don't have words enough to describe my disgust for the man.

[PennP]

Well thought and well said. Thank you.

[LynnW49]

Thanks for having the guts to say this.

[rmreddicks]

It seems that you cannot speak to the idea of war crimes (committed by JSM) or else moderation will be your fate.

Should this pass the moderators let it be known that McCain is no honorable man. No matter the histrionics and it's associated syndrome of himself and the infantilism of his campaign.

[KSMullins]

The real question regarding McCain is why did he try so hard to win the lunatic right instead of trying to win the hearts and minds of the independents and left of center folks who would have supported him in 2000??

This is the mystery of John McCain. He tried to be appealing to people who, he has nothing in common with. These uneducated right wing guns and Bible folks are going to vote the way their churches and the NRA tell them too. McCain doesn't have their affection...he has their disheartened acceptance as the lesser of two evils offered up to them for President.

But McCain had a real chance to win Independents and some other Liberals by being the "straight talking" guy that so impressed in 2000.

Instead...he got Roved again...

[MathIsTruth]

I used to believe "Once a hero, always a hero."

And I still believe that it's true 99.99% of the time.

But John McCain has taught me about the other 0.01%.

Sad and tragic.

[apoyo]

And if McCain wins how would his presidency go if he leaves a "foreign terrorist" as a sitting U.S. senator? Obama has a day job, he is a United States Senator. If he loses this election he will go back to his day job. How will President McCain explain to his supporters that he is allowing Senator Obama to continue being a senator? Will he hold a press conference and tell the people that he lied in order to get elected?

Another corner that McCain has painted himself into.

[mmgbizgirl]

"The Rules of Conduct" were thrown out the window just like every banking regulation that kept our pensions and investments safe from those who (without blinking) would gamble away every dime of the American Taxpayers hard earned $$$.

Turn the page people...

[UKlondongal]

I just can't believe he has done this. There will always be people who believe in him and what he says long after the fact (just like there will always be Hillary supporters) and so he has tried to insinuate a cancer into the next President's administration - just to satisfy his own naked ambition.
This takes sour grapes to a whole new and much more frightening level. I really hope his career is over after 4 Nov. Don't you dare go back to the Senate after this MC!

[MikaS]

John McCain's one ambition is to be president. Before his selection of Sarah Palin, he had a good chance of winning this election. He could have claimed the maverick title he so desperately desires if only he had picked Liberman as his running-mate. They have a great relationship and oodles of experience. By selecting Palin, he insulted the intelligence of a nation. As for the hate there is no excuse. John McCain no longer deserves our respect or the title of senator.

[rmreddicks]

The horror. The horror. McCain/Lieberman. Same or worse, McCain/Palin

[JNail]

Well put. 3 weeks from now and McCain can go back to the Senate and Palin to AK and face her very angry constituents...and the end of her political career hopefully

[demfriend]

That McCain has litterally sold himself to a bunch of lobbyists and advisors which at one point did to him what he is doing to Obama is something McCain will live his life out remembering. The choice he made for Palin is another piece he will always blame someone else for as he will never take responsibility for it, never. He wanted Joe Lieberman and when denied that by the GOP he had his hand forced and that is all he will remember not that he made the choice for the one who might be part of what brings him completely down. When John McCain stands before the Senate or before those who elected him to the Senate he will have to answer for these things he has done and I have no doubt he will never accept the blame. Heros act like heros.