Pat Buchanan on John McCain

I respect the man, but the truth must be told.

Pat Buchanan Writes:

No one around has the prestige or media following of McCain.

And the cause he championed, compulsive intervention in foreign quarrels to face down dictators and bring democrats to power, appears to be a cause whose time has passed.

When 9/11 occurred, America was united in crushing the al-Qaida terrorists who perpetrated the atrocities. John McCain then backed President Bush’s decision to invade Iraq in 2003, which had no role in the attacks.

During Barack Obama’s presidency, he slipped into northern Syria to cheer rebels who had arisen to overthrow President Bashar Assad, an insurgency that led to a seven-year civil war and one of the great humanitarian disasters of our time.

McCain supported the expansion of NATO into Eastern Europe and the Baltic, right up to Russia’s border. When Georgia invaded South Ossetia in 2008, and was expelled by the Russian army, McCain roared, “We are all Georgians now!”

He urged intervention. But Bush, his approval rating scraping bottom, had had enough of the neocon crusades for democracy.

McCain’s contempt for Vladimir Putin was unconstrained. When crowds gathered in Maidan Square in Kiev to overthrow an elected pro-Russian president, McCain was there, cheering them on.

He supported sending arms to the Ukrainian army to fight pro-Russian rebels in the Donbass. He backed U.S. support for Saudi intervention in Yemen. And this war, too, proved to be a humanitarian disaster.

John McCain was a war hawk, and proud of it. But by 2006, the wars he had championed had cost the Republican Party both houses of Congress.

In 2008, when he was on the ballot, those wars helped cost him the presidency.

By 2016, the Republican majority would turn its back on McCain and his protege, Sen. Lindsey Graham, and nominate Donald Trump, who said he would seek to get along with Russia and extricate America from the wars into which McCain had helped plunge the country.

Yet, while interventionism now has no great champion and has proven unable to rally an American majority, it retains a residual momentum. This compulsion is pushing us to continue backing the Saudi war in Yemen and to seek regime change in Iran.

Yet if either of these enterprises holds any prospect of bringing about a more peaceful and prosperous Middle East, no one has made the case.

While the foreign policy that won the Cold War, containment, was articulated by George Kennan and pursued by presidents from Truman to Bush I, no grand strategy for the post-Cold War era has ever been embraced by a majority of Americans.

Bush I’s “New World Order” was rejected by Ross Perot’s economic patriots and Bill Clinton’s baby boomers who wanted to spend America’s peace dividend from our Cold War victory on America’s homefront.

As for the Bush II crusades for democracy “to end tyranny in our world,” the fruits of that Wilsonian idealism turned into ashes in our mouths.

But if the foreign policy agendas of Bush I and Bush II, along with McCain’s interventionism, have been tried and found wanting, what is America’s grand strategy?

What are the great goals of U.S. foreign policy? What are the vital interests for which all, or almost all Americans, believe we should fight?

“Take away this pudding; it has no theme,” said Churchill. Britain has lost an empire, but not yet found a role, was the crushing comment of Dean Acheson in 1962.

Both statements appear to apply to U.S. foreign policy in 2018.

Read more at Pat Buchanan’s site

While John McCain was a great man, he was a neocon war hawk. This cannot be denied.

 

Senator John McCain RIP

Via the NYT:

A great man, has passed.

John S. McCain, the proud naval aviator who climbed from depths of despair as a prisoner of war in Vietnam to pinnacles of power as a Republican congressman and senator from Arizona and a two-time contender for the presidency, died on Saturday at his home in Arizona. He was 81.

According to a statement from his office, Mr. McCain died at 4:28 p.m. local time. He had suffered from a malignant brain tumor, called a glioblastoma, for which he had been treated periodically with radiation and chemotherapy since its discovery in 2017.

 

I’ve disagreed with him at times; But, I did respect the man. God-speed John.

Others: The Moderate Voice, New Republic, Taylor Marsh, Power Line, Townhall, Associated Press, Chicago Sun-Times, NPR, Refinery29, Outside the Beltway, Boing Boing, CBS Pittsburgh and Washington Monthly 

Via Memeornadum

Mixed feelings about Donald Trump’s comments about John McCain

First what “The Don” said: (via Youtube)

https://youtu.be/Jz0Vgpr8sWg

Now, the reactions:

Montel Williams:

Jazz Shaw at HotAir:

I will not pretend to know what’s been up with Donald Trump from the beginning of this road show he’s currently on. Perhaps he truly wanted to be President. Perhaps it was all part of his ongoing circus. Only the man himself can know which when he looks in the mirror each day. But this is one gigantic bridge too far. Whether he said that out of ignorance, a desire to cause a stir or – and I pray this isn’t true – because he really feels that way, I am done with him. Completely and absolutely done. Anyone who can allow those words to pass their lips is not fit to command our armed forces and is either too stupid, too oblivious or just too unamerican to serve as President of these United States.

Speaking only as one veteran who survived absolutely nothing compared to Senator McCain, I will close with a simple message. Goodbye, Mr. Trump. Your little show has been entertaining to say the least and, in your own way, you spurred some aspects of the national debate which needed a boost. But the sooner you exit the stage the better. You shall have no vote from me in any election, primary or general.

Now Trump is trying to save face, Via Fox News insider:

Okay, here is how I feel about all of that. As smart of a man as Donald Trump is; he should know, that in politics, the third rail is to insult members and former members of United States Military. It simply does not fly, especially in the Republican Party and in Conservative circles.

Now, as for John McCain? I happen to agree with Donald Trump’s comments about his performance in the Senate and as a Republican and a Conservative. It is true, he did lose the 2008 election, because of his picking of Sarah Palin. My own Mother was willing to vote for him; but because he picked that stupid Alaskan hick Fem-Nazi; she decided against it.

The problem here is this; Donald Trump in his attempt to poke John McCain on his senate record and his record on his handling of veteran affairs, Donald Trump ended up besmirching John McCain’s military honor and service. In Conservative and especially in Republican politics; that is a fatal move and I think Donald Trump either needs to really make a serious apology or leave the race or run as an independent.

Update: Even Joe Cannon at Cannonfire, who I have had issues with in the past; he even says that Trump was out of line. Joe Cannon is also a vet as well.

Update #2: Rupert Murdoch chimes in: (via NewsMax)