The Real McCain Record
Obstacles in the way of conservative support.By Mark R. Levin
There’s a reason some of John McCain’s conservative supporters avoid discussing his record. They want to talk about his personal story, his position on the surge, his supposed electability. But whenever the rest of his career comes up, the knee-jerk reply is to characterize the inquiries as attacks.
The McCain domestic record is a disaster. To say he fought spending, most particularly earmarks, is to nibble around the edges and miss the heart of the matter. For starters, consider:
McCain-Feingold  the most brazen frontal assault on political speech since Buckley v. Valeo.
McCain-Kennedy  the most far-reaching amnesty program in American history.
McCain-Lieberman  the most onerous and intrusive attack on American industry  through reporting, regulating, and taxing authority of greenhouse gases  in American history.
McCain-Kennedy-Edwards  the biggest boon to the trial bar since the tobacco settlement, under the rubric of a patients’ bill of rights.
McCain-Reimportantion of Drugs  a significant blow to pharmaceutical research and development, not to mention consumer safety (hey Rudy, pay attention, see link).
And McCain’s stated opposition to the Bush 2001 and 2003 tax cuts was largely based on socialist, class-warfare rhetoric  tax cuts for the rich, not for the middle class. The public record is full of these statements. Today, he recalls only his insistence on accompanying spending cuts.
As chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, McCain was consistently hostile to American enterprise, from media and pharmaceutical companies to technology and energy companies.
McCain also led the Gang of 14, which prevented the Republican leadership in the Senate from mounting a rule change that would have ended the systematic use (actual and threatened) of the filibuster to prevent majority approval of judicial nominees.
And then there’s the McCain defense record.
His supporters point to essentially one policy strength, McCain’s early support for a surge and counterinsurgency. It has now evolved into McCain taking credit for forcing the president to adopt General David Petreaus’s strategy. Where’s the evidence to support such a claim?
Moreover, Iraq is an important battle in our war against the Islamo-fascist threat. But the war is a global war, and it most certainly includes the continental United States, which, after all, was struck on 9/11. How does McCain fare in that regard?
McCain-ACLU  the unprecedented granting of due-process rights to unlawful enemy combatants (terrorists).
McCain has repeatedly called for the immediate closing of Guantanamo Bay and the introduction of al-Qaeda terrorists into our own prisons  despite the legal rights they would immediately gain and the burdens of managing such a dangerous population.
While McCain proudly and repeatedly points to his battles with Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, who had to rebuild the U.S. military and fight a complex war, where was McCain in the lead-up to the war  when the military was being dangerously downsized by the Clinton administration and McCain’s friend, former Secretary of Defense Bill Cohen? Where was McCain when the CIA was in desperate need of attention? Also, McCain was apparently in the dark about al-Qaeda like most of Washington, despite a decade of warnings.
My fingers are crossed that at the next debate, either Fred Thompson or Mitt Romney will find a way to address McCain’s record. (Mike Huckabee won’t, as he is apparently in the tank for him.)
Hannity looks nicer in person
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Fred does just that, through McLames’proxy, Huckabee. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73iQpIATiVE
We are allowing the MSM to define who has conservative credentials and whom we should be allowed to vote for. Ridiculous! McCain is a proven liberal with a track record like no other. Huckabee is out of the closet and cut from the same cloth.
Can you imagine if Thompson, Romney and Giuliani were Democrat candidates that espoused conservatism and were supported by the MSM as decent and proper liberals? Yet that is exactly the way we are being treated!
There is no one that offends and disgusts me more than McCain especially since he betrayed the principle of Conservatism from the inside. That is exactly why he is so loved and cherished by the MSM.
Lets remember McCain’s energy bill, I actually think that is recent and floating through congress. His bill will add energy taxes to gasoline, which will add costs in the grocery store, and etc.. He said yesterday that in his view he believes global warming is human caused. McCain, as someone else said is the republican Al Gore.
Senator McCain has shown time and time again that he is more enamored with the media spotlight than having any personal creed that even resembles conservatism. He is an ego driven left leaning moderate at best and falls far short of the qualities essential for national leadership. Mark Levin lays out the worst of McCain’s claims to fame, missing from the list is his sprint to the airwaves to condemn John O’Neil and the Swiftboat Vets.
Hard to argue with any of this. If I have to vote for him in a general election, I certainly will……..but I hope it doesn’t come down to that. Huckabee would undoubtedly be worse, but that’s no feather in McCain’s cap.
Sure isn’t, ScottT.
At this point, I for one am optimistic/hopeful that both of them will flame out along with RuPaul. If it got down to Fred, Mitt, and Rudy, then things would be in better focus-and they couldn’t really ignore Fred anymore. JMHO…
I have a residence in FL where my wife resides for the winter with her mother. I was speaking with my neighbor who flew in WW II, the Korea War and in Vietnam. He was on Oliver North’s War Stories since he headed a well-known squadron in Vietnam and set the high altitude record for a jet aircraft in Korea. Obviously he knew of McCain. In no way can he understand or sympathize with any of McCain’s political positions. There is not a scintilla of political similarity between these guys who have the exact same military background. Compared to this airman McCain sounds like the Manchurian candidate.
It is his pro war politics along with his Vietnam experience and the fact that he is a registered Republican for which he gets all this attention. What else is there? His Senatorial record is abysmal on every count. What has he done that bespeaks conservatism? He is a liberal and he is not just a moderate liberal; he is a far left liberal. If Thompson, Romney or Giuliani had ever taken McCain’s position and successfully engineered a bill that endangered free political speech, espoused amnesty, defeated the nuclear option, crippled interrogation techniques, opposed tax cuts or been involved with Keating they would be toast. Finished. Yet this guy is the proverbial Sphinx. Never have I seen such a disconnect between perception and reality. How can you juxtaposition his record next to his rhetoric and not request that the guy be tested for hallucinatory schizophrenia.
ML and Limbaugh have taken him on. It is overdue. Thompson did an excellent job when challenging and debunking Huckabee’s conservative credentials. He or someone needs to do the same to McCain. Huckabee could not defend himself on the basis that criticism was anti-Christian and neither can McCain defend himself using his war record. Losing to a liberal Democrat candidate is one thing but losing to a liberal Republican candidate is even worse. Such an event moves the party to the left and gives credibility to moderation. Furthermore he is not a moderate. Agreeing with Kennedy, Feingold and Lieberman is not bipartisan; it is surrender. When Lieberman agrees with us on the war he has taken on a conservative position. He did not compromise. When McCain makes deals with the hard liberal left it is not compromise; it is defeat for conservatism. He agrees with their position. If we are to lose let it be to the enemy that we all know and recognize and not because of an enemy from within. As Shakespeare said: “Et tu Brute.â€Â