Memo to Democrats: McCain's War Service Is Off Limits

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He claims to know how to win wars and that his mettle in dealing with national crises has been thoroughly tested. But how many wars has he actually won and what national crises has ever faced?
Would he have been admitted to the Naval Academy if both his father and grandfather hadn’t been influential alumnae? And given the fact that he graduated fifth from the bottom of his class, how much did he actually learn about the art of warfare?
He had been serving in Vietnam for only three months before his plane was shot down, and then was held prisoner for five years. So how could he have known what was taking place on the ground, where the war was being fought? What was the extent of his actual combat experience?
Those injuries to his arms and legs, where they inflicted under torture by his North Vietnamese guards, as is commonly believed, or were the injuries sustained when his plane crashed? And once his captors realized he was the son of an important admiral, a prized propaganda asset, would they have risked subjecting him to the same ordeal as an ordinary prisoner?

Carlos Navarro of NC 8:12PM November 02, 2008

Why is no major press following up on what appears to be real evidence of McCain's questionable actions while a POW? I found this while trying to figure out what was going on: http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article20835.htm
There is a lot of semi hysterical stuff out there, but this seems to document and be written by a credible journalist. So my question is, if McCain is using his war record as his major credential, isn't it fair to research this credential?
There has to be some reason he has been so obstructionist in any investigations, bills or anything else to do with this topic. Why do the veterans hate him so much? I'm not able to find convincing evidence either way, but I know there are people who can, even with the government blocking, as they appear to be. Please, I really want a news organization to take this on.

Jane of PA 2:00PM October 05, 2008

http://abcnews.go.com/video/playerIndex?id=5442129
ABC's sam Donaldson on McCain's "Tough Week"
Its Hysterical !!!
Sam Donaldson is Clearly Showing Us how Mccain has Lost his Bearings !!
Sam Donaldson is in Rare Form as he Disects McCain's Hard Week, in the Political Trenches.

Omaar of GA 2:57PM August 01, 2008

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HR0eFIOEIY8
McCain has really done his "Surge" Platform the Worse kind of Wrong !!
Its a Sad Pathetic Hodge Podge of Verbage, that Goes Absolutely Nowhere and leaves you saying to yourself....
Dementia...Definitely
That or McCain is either Blatantly Lying to the Press and the American People.
I'm Thinking a little of.. BOTH !!!
Dementio & Lying !!
Enjoy McCain's Explanation Regarding "The Surge"

Omaar of GA 2:42PM August 01, 2008

The Anbar Awakening Happened in (2006) way ahead of the "Surge" McCain has no "Experience" Read Onward....
The Major Sunni sheik who John McCain said was protected by the surge and subsequently helped lead the Anbar Awakening, was actually assassinated by an al-Qaeda led group in midst of the surge.
On Tuesday evening, McCain falsely claimed that the downturn in violence in Iraq's Anbar province was a result of the surge, when in fact the surge began months afterward. Moreover, he said, if it weren't for the work of U.S. forces, the major Sunni figure leading that awakening wouldn't have had the protection he needed.
"Colonel MacFarland was contacted by one of the major Sunni sheiks," said the Senator. "Because of the surge we were able to go out and protect that sheik and others. And it began the Anbar awakening."
The Arizona Republican's campaign went further the next day, claiming that the major figures that turned around Anbar province would have been killed had the surge policy not been in place. "If Barack Obama had had his way, the Sheiks who started the Awakening would have been murdered at the hands of al Qaeda," said spokesman Tucker Bounds.
Sadly, that murder took place even with the surge underway. In September 2007, Abdul Sattar Abu Risha, the sheik widely credited with persuading Sunni leaders to turn against al Qaeda in Iraq, died in a bomb attack in Anbar. His work, prior to then, was held as a major effort in transforming the province from one of Iraq's deadliest areas into one of its safest.
It was in a September 2006 interview with UPI, when U.S. Army Col. Sean MacFarland first spoke about Sattar's efforts. "Some of the sheikhs have begun to step forward and some of the insurgent groups began to fight against al Qaeda," he said. His reference was Sattar, according to a Reuters article published upon the sheik's death.
Below is more from the Reuters article on Sattar's death:
"When U.S. Army Col. Sean MacFarland, working in his Pentagon office last Thursday, heard that a tribal leader had been killed in Iraq's Anbar province, his first reaction was: "Please don't let it be Sattar."
His fears proved well-founded. A bomb had killed Abdul Sattar Abu Risha, the founder of a movement of Sunni leaders who turned against al Qaeda in Iraq, who are also Sunnis, and transformed Anbar from one of Iraq's deadliest areas into one of its safest.
MacFarland is in a unique position to offer insights into the movement Sattar led and how it may develop without him. As a brigade commander in Iraq, he was present at the alliance's founding and worked closely with Abu Risha for months.
"I owe him a lot," MacFarland said. "He was a young guy with a great vision of the future and he was a fast friend of the United States."

Omaar of GA 11:50AM August 01, 2008

A declassified DOD document reports an interview between POW McCain and Dr. Fernando Barral, a Spanish psychiatrist who was living in Cuba at the time. The interview was published in the Havana Granma in January 1970.
According to the DOD report, the meeting between Barral and McCain (which was photographed by the Vietnamese) took place away from the prison at the office of the Committee for Foreign Cultural Relations in Hanoi. During the meeting, POW McCain sipped coffee and ate oranges and cakes with his interrogator.
While talking with Barral, McCain seriously violated the military Code of Conduct by failing to evade answering questions "to the utmost" of his ability when he, according to the DOD report, helped Barral by answering questions in Spanish, a language McCain had learned in school.
1973 - McCain was released from the Hilton on March 15, 1973.
Two Former POWs Say They Doubt McCain Was Physically Abused
1999 - March 25, 1999, The Phoenix New Times: Ted Guy and Gordon "Swede" Larson, two former POWs, who were McCain's senior ranking officers (SRO's), at the time McCain says he was tortured in solitary confinement, told the New Times that while they could not guarantee that McCain was not physically harmed, they doubted it.
"Between the two of us, it's our belief, and to the best of our knowledge, that no prisoner was beaten or harmed physically in that camp [known as "The Plantation"]," Larson says. ". . . My only contention with the McCain deal is that while he was at The Plantation, to the best of my knowledge and Ted's knowledge, he was not physically abused in any way. No one was in that camp. It was the camp that people were released from."
Big Note: In 1993, during one of his many trips back to Hanoi, McCain asked the Vietnamese not to Make Public the Records they hold Pertaining to Returned U.S. POWs.

Omaar of GA 11:21AM August 01, 2008

O.K., John McCain's military experience and decades of serving in the Senate does not qualify him to be Commander in Chief, but no military experience and 4 years serving in the Senate qualifies Obama. Let's see that strategy play out.

Roy Etie of TX 2:00PM July 12, 2008

Clearly military service in of itself doesn't qualify a candidate nor does community organization. The point is what Clark said did not need to be said. Anybody that is voting for McCain simply because of his service isn't going to be swayed. It was a nonsensical, petty statement. It came across as vindictive. The Obama campaign was looking for a way to make light of McCain's service and Wesley Clark could do it. Clark was valedictorian at West Point and a decorated soldier. By getting him to do Obama's dirty work, the isue was raised, without the DNC's nominee having to get dirty and it was the impetus for his patriot speech.

The Mayor of Politics of MD 2:51PM July 07, 2008

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4-STAR General Wesley Clark is RIGHT in pointing out that despite John McCain’s former P.O.W. status, it is more important to have good judgment and to be cool and level-headed in order to lead a country.
4-Star General Wesley Clark was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford University, where he earned a Masters Degree in Politics, Philosophy and Economics. During 34 years of service in the United States Army, Wesley Clark rose to the rank of FOUR-STAR General as NATO's Supreme Allied Commander, Europe.
In his final military command, General Clark commanded Operation Allied Force, NATO's first major combat action, which saved 1.5 million Albanians from ethnic cleansing in Kosovo, and he was responsible for the peacekeeping operation in Bosnia.
In previous duty, General Clark was the Commander-in-Chief, US Southern Command, where he was responsible for all US military activities in Latin America and the Caribbean. And from April 1994 through June 1996, he was the Director of Strategic Plans and Policy, J-5, in the Joint Staff, where he helped negotiate the end to the war in Bosnia. His previous assignments include a wide variety of command and staff positions, including Command of the 1st Cavalry Division.
General Clark's awards and honors include the Presidential Medal of Freedom, The State Department Distinguished Service Award; the US Department of Defense Distinguished Service Medal;(five awards), The US Army Distinguished Service Medal(two awards), The Silver Star, the Bronze Star (two awards), the Purple Heart, and Honorary Knighthoods from the British and Dutch governments.
John McCain has shown to be temperamentally unfit to the task of leading the country. His temper and lack of psychological balance are not a good personal foundation in the grave matters of policy making that involve the lives of Americans.

Jimmy Murray of TX 10:01PM July 06, 2008

I don't know why Democratic strategists are making all Democrats shiver in fear of even slightly touching on John McCain's military record when his connection with Charlie Black discredits McCain's national security credibility that he built around his military service.
Black is McCain's senior campaign adviser who has a close connection with some of the world's worst dictators. Black also said that another terrorist attack to the United States would be a huge advantage for McCain. McCain denounced Black's comment only because he was sorry he was caught. Otherwise, McCain would have fired Black. Black is a person capable of working with rogue militant persons who hold anti-democratic, anti-American values. Black may have been hoping to see another 9/11 to help McCain win in November.
McCain's close association with Black makes it legitimate to question McCain's patriotism, his sincerity on the issue of national security and defense, and his willingness not to politicize national security for his own advantage. Don't confuse patriotism with blind submission to the right-wing thugs waving the American flag and singing "God Bless America" while selling America to various corporate interests and letting Americans' hard-earned money slip into America's enemies through their Saudi oilmen friends.
McCain is not trustworthy in national security because Republicans has an 8-year record of doing the patriotism scam that actually weakened our national security. It's time for Democrats to aggressively attack Republicans' national security record. Republicans' irresponsibly macho approach to national security failed for almost a decade. It's time to demand them to take responsibility upon themselves and let the Democrats handle it.
And ask McCain, Sen. McCain, isn't Charlie Black the kind of evil you fought against during the Vietnam War? If Democratic strategists tell people to stay off from McCain's military service, it will have a chilling effect on raising legitimate questions on McCain and national security.

Fourth of July of 12:27AM July 05, 2008