We will leave it up to the reader to determine whether
Sen. John McCain has made serious errors in veracity and judgment. Sen. McCain has
seemed to support a Moderate Christian position especially when it comes to Church and
State issues. It is apparent from the data collected though, that Ethical Values and
the first amendment may be in danger from his past and future actions.
John McCain's office like others we called, stated that
his position is that no religion but Christianity is a "Real"
religion." Are you pandering to the Christian Right Senator McCain? What
is a real religion, Mr. McCain? What you have been practicing? Then it should
be made illegal. Read the following and remember: "By their Works may
they be known." This is a summary of information collected from several sources
about Sen. John McCain.
John McCain is a maverick senator, Vietnam veteran and
former prisoner of war for 5 years in North Vietnam. In 2000, he nearly beat George W.
Bush by being an outspoken, even honest politician, which stunned everybody. He also is
known for crafting bipartisan approaches to issues such as smoking and campaign reform.
This time around though, at 71, he apparently decided
"now or never" and seems to have sold his soul, suddenly adopting a bunch of
boilerplate conservative positions he was brave enough to resist 8 years ago. Now,
conveniently, he's even claiming to be a Baptist instead of an
Episcopalian.
It didn't look like anyone was buying it for a while
there, but danged if he hasn't come back and pretty much sewed up the Republican
nomination. McCain went from front runner to 3rd or 4th in various polls, spent all of his
huge pile of cash and lost most of his staff, and worked his way back into a dominant
position.
(Remember it is best to investigate on your own
when looking at allegations about anyone. Don't believe us, think for
yourself and investigate for yourself! And remember, the Religious Freedom Coalition
does not represent any political party nor do we recommend any political candidate, nor
are we involving ourselves in the political process. This information is only for
students of Sen. John McCain)
Excerpted from an Article in the Huffington Post, by
Jayne Lyn Stahl
April 30, 2008
While Barack Obama is said to be outraged about the
latest sound bites coming from his former minister, Reverend Jeremiah Wright, where is our
outrage at all the nonstop coverage of this nonsense, and the egregious efforts to abort
the First Amendment guarantee of separation between church and state?
Now that we know everything we ever wanted to know about Reverend Jeremiah Wright, and
more that we didn't, now that ballistics test show the efficacy of weapons of mass
distraction when it comes to news delivery vehicles, maybe it's time some chickens come
home to roost for those who have gotten a free ride from the mainstream media. Forget
about how many people can name even one Supreme Court justice. How about -- how many
people can name John McCain's position on abstinence-only HIV/AIDS funding? Roe v.
Wade? Gun control? Iran?
Who cares, after all, anyway? Why interrupt a politcal lynching to interject substance
into an otherwise vacuous campaign. After all, who can forget when the senator from
Arizona numbly repeated "We do not torture" while on a recent visit to Europe.
I'd like to ask Senator McCain if the Justice Department will look any different under him
than under his predecessor, George W. Bush, or if we may expect to see the FBI look the
other way when the CIA engages in interrogation techniques that violate Geneva, and the
Eighth Amendment proscription against cruel and unusual punishment. But, why challenge him
when nobody else is.
Why, after all, would anyone question the current
dangerous liaision between Hillary and McCain -- both claiming that Obama is out of touch
with "ordinary Americans" while benefiting from millions raked in by their
significant others, both pushing for a reprieve from the pump.. Oh, and excuse me, but
does anyone really believe that the Clintons earned over $100 million, over the past seven
years, from book sales and lectures? But, who cares the truth when fiction is so
compelling.
Like the truth that both Hillary Clinton and John McCain want to move us from supply side
economics to "bandaid "economics, to a place where we'll be happy with the
meager 18 cent saving on gas tax while the capital gains tax continues to be reduced, and
corporate America gets to gorge itself on even more tax credits and tax write-offs. Who
cares if, as Obama suggests, reducing the cost of gas, for the summer, is only a
"short-term, quick-fix,", and doesn't solve the problem. Who wants to solve the
problem anyway? What for? After all, isn't that what a second term is for?
And, who cares about credibility? So what if John McCain has more faces than the legendary
Greek goddess, Janus, all sharing one common denominator -- they aim to please. So, if you
don't like this side of McCain, he's got another, and yet another. John McCain has more
sides than your average garden variety cineplex, but nobody in the mainstream media is
going to let his many inconguities interfere with their insatiable urge to vomit sound
byte invectives from the mouth of Obama's retired minister. Rather sinister the treatment
the Arizona senator gets from those whose job it is not merely to cover, but to uncover,
the news; almost as sinister as a one size fits all nightmare.
How can we resist photo-ops from the presumptive Republican presidential nominee? Shots of
McCain retracing the footsteps of another president, Lyndon Johnson, in Kentucky, talking
about how he plans to help those who suffer through no fault of their own. And, oh, how he
likes to help those who suffer effortlessly -- like those who lost their homes, as long as
they didn't buy those homes for investment purposes, and those who are jobless because
they are looking for work, but can't find it. Can it be that his Party is setting it up so
that only those in the upper one percent have the opportunity to see profit from anything
they do? And, where are the sound bytes for that one!
Yes, watch Johnny venture forth into New Orleans where he assures us that, like his
compassionate conservative brothers, he will never allow another "failure in
leadership" like Katrina while, at the same time, virtually guaranteeing a projected
budget shortfall of $400 billion. Indeed, this is responsible leadership with a capital
"R" -- as in "recession."
Oh, and all this noise about suspending the tax on gasoline, for the summer, so that
people can not only drive more, and vacation, but spend more of those tax rebates that are
in the mail. Gas tax relief is not unlike the Bush rebate -- yes, folks, both shining
examples of bandaid economics. Neither Clinton nor McCain is atttacking the gaping hole
that lurks in America's driveway -- the one that threatens to consume us all while making
the oil barons richer, with their spend until you mend ethos. Oh, and let's not increase
the corporate gains tax, people, let's decrease corporate income tax, and enhance the list
of things businesses get to write off while one in five children in America goes to bed
hungry
Remember, too, McCain announced Tuesday a proposed $5,000 tax credit for health insurance,
and his so-called free market approach to health care. How remarkably like Bush's approach
to social security reform. So close, we won't feel a thing after the inauguration. In
fact, we may not feel a thing for years to come. The idea of privatizing social services,
and leaving it up to the individual to find their way out of hardship, especially at a
time when 40 million Americans are uninsured, is not merely reckless, it's downright
neanderthal.
So, who is the Republican nominee-in-waiting trying to
kid when he says he wants to fight a war on poverty. Isn't that kind of like a war on
terror -- except it costs a lot less? Just how many of the millions of those without
health insurance will benefit from the tax credit to choose your own health care provider
McCain proposes? You can bet many more who go to his country club will benefit from his
suppport for capital gains cuts, and tax breaks for the wealthy. And yet the mainstream
media so fixated on the hyperbole of Reverend Wright? Are we witnessing, yet again, media
complicity in a campaign of distortion and disinformation in the name of boosting
corporate revenue?
Yes, and what about that very public face McCain put forward in Kentucky when he said that
Barack Obama is out of touch with America's poor? How can anyone claim to care about
poverty and hunger while, at the same time, striving to ease the tax burden on those who
least suffer from tax burdens?
Let's not forget, too, the side of Senator McCain that just voted against a Senate bill
which would ensure gender equity with respect to wages.
Irony of ironies: the John McCain we saw in New Orleans
is the same one who didn't think Martin Luther King's birthday should be a national
holiday, and the same McCain whose parody "Bomb Iran" exploded all over the
world wide web; yes, the same one who suffered painful, lifelong injuries at the hands of
his captors while a prisoner of war, and who wants to send our sons and daughters back for
another hundred years all in the name of bigger profits for Halliburton and friends.
Yet, with all this focus pocus on the excesses of one Democratic candidate's former
Baptist preacher, John McCain remains largely impregnable. He 's getting away with not not
talking about his stand on Roe v. Wade, gun control, stem cell research,
withdrawal of troops from Iraq, how it is that the oil companies are making record profits
when, by his own admission, his tax proposals will cost taxpayers close to $200 billion
annually. He's getting away with economic policies that virtually guarantee college, and
cars, are possible only for the very rich.
Not only can we not look forward to an exit strategy with
respect to Iraq from the Republicans. It's clear they have no exit strategy for recession,
either.
Information is often the first casualty of arbitrary power, and there is nothing more
tenacious than arbitrary power. In a culture of rabid narcissism, how refreshing to see a
candidate take time out to split himself into as many parts as necessary to make sure that
he wins as big a chunk of the election pie as humanly possible. The question isn't so much
who is pulling McCain's strings as who has been in bed with him throughout the process, as
well as who is helping the Republicans "politicize" Reverend Wright to sabotage
a candidate who has been consistently ahead in pledged delegates, and popular votes. If
the phenomenon that is Barack Obama is larger than Obama, the McCain factor is larger than
anything McCain himself could ever have imagined.
I guess the good news is that nobody can suggest this election was stolen. The Democrats
are giving it away.
John McCain's Misstatements About The
Iran/al Qaeda Connection
3-21-2008 Bill Maher’s New Rules went hard after
John McCain for his repeated misstatements on the Iran/al Qaeda connection on Friday’s
episode of Real Time:
New Rule: Old soldiers never die, they
get young soldiers killed. This week John McCain said for the third time in two days, that
Iran, a Shi’ite stronghold was training al Qaeda a militant Sunni organization.That the Hatfields of the Muslim world would be working with the McCoys is so not
true even Dick Cheney hasn’t said it. Now the press, which loves McCain because he feeds
them BBQ, dismissed this as just one of those senior moments. Not to worry, he’s only
going to have his finger on the nuclear trigger.But it’s not just a
‘gaffe,’ it’s what McCain really thinks. And therein lies the paradox of this
campaign: McCain’s strength is really his weakness. He’s a warrior who’s dumb about
war.Whoever read The Art of War, chapter three of The
Art of War says, “Know thy enemy.”And John McCain plainly
doesn’t.He thinks the solution is our presence in the Middle East.No, the problem is our presence in the Middle East.That’s
why I don’t care if John McCain is better than Bush on global warming or torture or
campaign finance, because he’s exactly the same as Bush on the war.They
both don’t get the same thing.As long as we’re setting up shop in
the heart of the Arab world, we’re not keeping America safer.Bin
Laden goes ballistic over cartoons in Danish newspapers, and Goober and Grandpa want to
put up a Hooters in Fallujah. They don’t “hate us for our freedom,” they hate us for
our fiefdom.Winning the War on Terror comes down to this: what will
make us safer from pissed off Arab teenagers who are willing to die?There
are a number of good answers to that question, but occupying their land for the next 100
years is not one of them.
Some people look at McCain and see a
tough guy who is going to protect us from the “Islamofascists.”I
look at him and see a walking Tom Clancy action figure who is going to get us all killed.And yet a new poll shows that a majority of Americans believe John McCain is the
candidate best qualified to answer when that red phone rings at 3:00 a.m., because he’d
be up anyway, trying to pee.Yes, 55% of Americans think it’s McCain
who should answer that phone, because they know John McCain is a warrior.He
will not waver or hesitate.He will answer that phone and give the
order that sends men to die and it will turn out to be a recording asking him if he’s
happy with his mortgage.
Big Mac's Blazing Saddle Diplomacy
March 27, 2008
John McCain went before the Los Angeles World Affairs
Council yesterday morning to showcase his foreign policy credentials and convince
Americans that he is the only candidate experienced enough to take that 3am telephone
call. While Clinton and Obama are distracted by a pre-Pennsylvania primary food fight,
McCain's address constituted a dress rehearsal for a future national security agenda that,
at its very core, resembles nothing more than discredited cowboy diplomacy. It is
essentially fermented old failed warrior wine in new bottles...camouflaged unilateralism
gussied up in a Potemkin village of storefront global engagement.
Democrats should not ignore the content of McCain's
speech while our internal bout continues, or remain passive at the free ride McCain will
enjoy from a fawning media lauding the speech's "presidential" character and its
perceived break with Bush/Cheney/Rice foreign policy catastrophes.
To remain impervious to McCain's attempted act at
presidential statesmanship risks cementing in the minds of voters a dangerous perception
that McCain will chart a new, more responsible and appealing foreign policy course that
represents a break with neoconservatism orthodoxy.
Caveat Emptor: read between the lines!
First and foremost, McCain reasserts his ominous
commitment to an endless engagement in Iraq. He justifies his bottomless pit commitment by
arguing that a "premature" withdrawal will lead to a wider Middle East war
because Al Qaeda will be able to turn Iraq into a cauldron of sectarian strife. This, he
argues, will ultimately embolden Iran to confront Sunni Arab states and Israel, and lead
to a regional war that will surely force the United States back into a wider conflict that
it will have to wage against adversaries far stronger than they are today. In other words,
the domino theory of Middle East extremism lies at the core of McCain's endless summer in
Iraq.
McCain would like to convince voters they face the choice
of accepting his Churchillian "never surrender" approach, or a dangerous
Democratic "cut and run" alternative. In other words, leave Iraq and America
will be in more danger and have to fight a more bloody and costly war later on many Middle
East fronts, or stay the course in Iraq (courtesy of McCain's surge policy) and vanquish
Al Qaeda and quell the sectarian tensions between Sunni and Shiites and we will be
marginalize the threats arrayed against us throughout the region.
The trouble with this set up is that McCain's core
premise is dead wrong. By our own senior commanders' accounts, Al Qaeda is but a minor
player in Iraq, and there is no way the U.S. presence, surge or not, that will keep a lid
on sectarian tensions. Just look at what is going on in Iraq at the very tragic milestone
of 4,000 Americans killed: the worst sectarian violence in months has broken out with
hundreds of lives lost despite a McCain's surge that he continues to tout as the fire
extinguisher that will stop sectarian strife from igniting once again.
How inconvenient timing just when McCain keeps claiming
that the surge has succeeded.
McCain's black and white version of the Middle East is
what I find so troublesome. There is absolutely no redemption possible for adversaries
such as Iran and Syria and no room for creative diplomacy other than his beloved surge
strategy. In a nutshell, we must stay in Iraq to contain regional threats or risk engaging
in a fool's errand by resorting to defeatist diplomacy.
I just don't buy that equation, and neither should the
American people.
Moreover, McCain claims that an unending presence in Iraq
can be legitimated by a new "League of Democracies" (a.k.a. a new Coalition of
the Willing) that would conveniently marginalize those pesky international institutions
such as the United Nations that seem to always stand in the way of American unilateralism
or the McCain version "semi-unilateralism."
Creating parallel international organizations composed
solely of "acceptable" democratic states would create a 21st century version of
a new bi-polar world: A U.S./European Union plus India, Israel, Japan and other
democracies lined up against Russia and other authoritarian governments. Democracies
banding together to set a new global course has that soft, sweet appeal to our patriotic
virtuosity, with every other undemocratic nation outside the McCain's democratic tent left
to create their own mischief from the stage of the UN General Assembly, or create their
own "anti-democratic" alliances and competing anti-democratic groupings.
What is so strikingly and inherently wrong with McCain's
world vision is that America's global leadership will not be restored by ignoring
adversaries that, left to their own devices, may further challenge and undermine America's
national security.
Democrats should not permit McCain to gain further
traction by falsely asserting he is charting a new foreign policy course that will restore
America's image, global leadership, and reduce the threat posed by Al Qaeda and its
spinoff terror groups. Despite McCain's assertion that he no warrior at heart, he is no
prince of peace either. Any national security policy that, at its core, leaves America
stranded in Iraq with hundreds of thousands of troops fighting whatever enemy we can
conveniently label is a calling card for extremists and ultimately risks creating stronger
adversaries. It is nothing more than a continuation of the failed Bush/Cheney/Rice status
quo. The surge that McCain is so proud of will, by most impartial assessments, fail to
stop the very civil strife that it is designed to prevent.
Sadly, there is nothing in McCain's speech that will
convincingly steer our ship of state back on a truly righteous course that will undo the
damage that the past seven years of failed national security policies have wrought. McCain
is offering America nothing more than more of the same, and more of the same is what got
America into this mess in the first place.
In December of last year, Matt Drudge reported that John McCain -- who was then in the
midst of a surprising comeback in the Republican presidential race -- was desperately
trying to convince the New York Times to kill a story about "charges of giving
special treatment to a lobbyist," and that McCain had hired a prominent attorney to
work on his behalf. For the Arizona senator, who has built a good part of his reputation
as a straight talker on his efforts toward campaign finance reform and cleaning up the
lobbying culture in Washington, D.C., such a story could theoretically prove quite
damaging.
Well, apparently we'll see just what kind of harm the
story will do to McCain's campaign, as on Wednesday evening the Times published the article on its Web site. The Times piece, written by a team of
reporters, suggests not just special treatment for the lobbyist in question -- Vicki
Iseman, 40 -- but the possibility of a romantic relationship between the two,
beginning in 1999.
"Convinced the relationship had become romantic,
some of [McCain's] top advisers intervened to protect the candidate from himself --
instructing staff members to block [Iseman's] access, privately warning her away and
repeatedly confronting him, several people involved in the campaign said on the condition
of anonymity," the Times reports.
Both McCain and Iseman deny that their relationship was
romantic. But the Times describes McCain's campaign at the time as being very worried
about appearances when it came to the two. In February of 1999, the Times says, Mr.
McCain and Ms. Iseman attended a small fund-raising dinner with several clients at the
Miami-area home of a cruise-line executive and then flew back to Washington along with a
campaign aide on the corporate jet of one of her clients, Paxson Communications. By
then, according to two former McCain associates, some of the senator's advisers had grown
so concerned that the relationship had become romantic that they took steps to intervene.
A former campaign adviser described being instructed to
keep Ms. Iseman away from the senator at public events, while a Senate aide recalled plans
to limit Ms. Iseman's access to his offices.
In interviews, the two former associates said they joined
in a series of confrontations with Mr. McCain, warning him that he was risking his
campaign and career. Both said Mr. McCain acknowledged behaving inappropriately and
pledged to keep his distance from Ms. Iseman. The two associates, who said they had
become disillusioned with the senator, spoke independently of each other and provided
details that were corroborated by others.
The Times also reports on a meeting at D.C.'s Penn
Station between Iseman and a former top strategist for McCain, John Weaver. Weaver
told the Times that the conversation between himself and Iseman was about "her
conduct and what she allegedly had told people, which made its way back to us," but
did not provide further details. The Times says Iseman confirmed she met with
Weaver, but disputed his account of what was said during it.
The Times' report is about more than just romance -- it
also raises ethical questions. "In late 1999, Ms. Iseman asked Mr. McCain's staff to
send a letter to the commission to help Paxson ... Mr. McCain complied. He sent two
letters to the commission, drawing a rare rebuke for interference from its chairman,"
the Times says.
Unrelated to Iseman, the letters provoked a small
controversy at the time, leading McCain's campaign to disclose four flights McCain had
taken on jets owned by Paxson -- but not the flight he'd taken with Iseman.
As for Drudge, as might be expected for the conservative
media guru, he's questioning the Times' timing; his banner headline on the article reads
in his characteristic all caps manner, "NOW THAT HE'S SECURED NOMINATION: NYT
DOWNLOADS ON MCCAIN."
Update: McCain's campaign has responded to the story.
Communications Director Jill Hazelbaker issued a statement that reads:
It is a shame that the New York Times has lowered its
standards to engage in a hit and run smear campaign. John McCain has a 24-year record of
serving our country with honor and integrity. He has never violated the public trust,
never done favors for special interests or lobbyists, and he will not allow a smear
campaign to distract from the issues at stake in this election.
Americans are sick and tired of this kind of gutter
politics, and there is nothing in this story to suggest that John McCain has ever violated
the principles that have guided his career.
If John McCain and Vicki Iseman were having sex, I say
"bully for them." If more consenting adults would have more sex, the world would
be a better place. But it's none of our business and does not belong on the front page of The
New York Times, regardless of timing. What's more, the sex gets in the way of what is
really important about McCain's behavior and why, in so many ways, the man is a complete
fraud, however much the MSM may love every last wrinkle on his impressively active
seven-decade-old body. For instance, we learn (as summarized by the AP):
In late 1999, McCain twice wrote letters to the Federal
Communications Commission on behalf of Florida-based Paxson Communications -- which had
paid Iseman as its lobbyist -- urging quick consideration of a proposal to buy a
television station license in Pittsburgh. At the time, Paxson's chief executive, Lowell W.
"Bud" Paxson, also was a major contributor to McCain's 2000 presidential
campaign.
McCain did not urge the FCC commissioners to approve the
proposal, but he asked for speedy consideration of the deal, which was pending from two
years earlier. In an unusual response, then-FCC Chairman William Kennard complained that
McCain's request "comes at a sensitive time in the deliberative process" and
"could have procedural and substantive impacts on the commission's deliberations and,
thus, on the due process rights of the parties."
McCain wrote the letters after he received more than
$20,000 in contributions from Paxson executives and lobbyists. Paxson also lent McCain his
company's jet at least four times during 1999 for campaign travel.
From the Times:
Mr. McCain promised, for example, never to fly directly
from Washington to Phoenix, his hometown, to avoid the impression of self-interest because
he sponsored a law that opened the route nearly a decade ago. But like other lawmakers, he
often flew on the corporate jets of business executives seeking his support, including the
media moguls Rupert Murdoch, Michael R. Bloomberg and Lowell W. Paxson, Ms. Iseman's
client. (Last year he voted to end the practice.)
If you read Robert Bennett and Charlie Black's comments,
as well as Drudge, it's clear that the unproved sex allegations will allow McCain to avoid
the conflicts-of-interest stories that really ought to be at the heart of this issue. They
will also use the Times' misleading reputation as a "liberal newspaper"
to give them cover, as will most of the media's never-ending love affair with McCain,
which is smartly documented in Ryan Lizza's terrific report here.
In the meantime, ask yourself: Why are these corporations
spending hundreds of thousands of dollars of their shareholders' money to ferry McCain
around the world? And does McCain think he's entitled to these trips without giving
something in return. (And what would the children say about this?)
That
New Time Religion- Or Religious Shopping!!!John McCain grew up Episcopalian. He went to an
Episcopalian high school. For at least 15 years, he has been listed as an Episcopalian in
authoritative directories such as the Almanac of American Politics and Congressional
Quarterly's Politics in America 2008. He told a reporter from McClatchy News Service in
June 2007 that he was an Episcopalian.
Suddenly, in September 2007, he's campaigning in South
Carolina, the heavily Baptist state where George W. Bush barely managed to stop McCain's
presidential campaign 8 years ago. And guess what? McCain tells a reporter "By the
way, I'm not Episcopalian. I'm Baptist."
When pressed, he said he's attended the North Phoenix
Baptist Church in Arizona for more than 15 years, though he has never been baptized in
that church. Now see, that's exactly the problem. Baptism is kind of a big thing in the
Baptist Church. (That's how they got the name.) No baptism, not Baptist.
Anyway, details aside, this is one very clear indication
of how McCain has changed. Now, he's just another hungry politician, happy to pander if it
helps him win. Which eliminates the very reason people were excited about him in 2000 --
his honesty.
McCain "Proud" of Endorsement
From John Hagee Who Calls Catholics "The Great Whore." Where's Tim Russert Now?
February 29, 2008 | 02:14 PM
(EST)
Tim Russert, in front of millions of Americans on Tuesday
night, was quick to force Barack Obama to denounce Louis Farrakahn repeatedly until he
worded it to Russert's satisfaction (evidently "unacceptable and reprehensible"
didn't quite get the job done). Despite the fact that Obama never sought Farrakhan's
endorsement, Russert felt this line of questioning was appropriate given Farrakhan's
intolerant remarks about Jews in the past.
Okay, fair enough. But if that's the case, then why isn't
he pressing John McCain about radical religious extremist uber-nut John
Hagee?
Mr. McCain, who has been on a steady search for support
among conservative and evangelical leaders who have long distrusted him, said he was
"very honored'' by Mr. Hagee's endorsement. Asked about Mr. Hagee's extensive
writings on Armageddon and about what one questioner said was Mr. Hagee's belief that the
anti-Christ will be the head of the European Union, Mr. McCain responded that "all I
can tell you is that I am very proud to have Pastor John Hagee's support.''
Notice the "been on a steady search" part. If
Obama had actively sought Farrakhan's endorsement, his campaign would be over. McCain is
downright proud of this Hagee endorsement.
Hagee was, if you'll remember, the guy who said that
Hurricaine Katrina was God's revenge for a gay pride parade. He thinks war with Iran is
essential so as to bring about Armageddon (when you can say bye-bye to the Jews). But as Glenn Greenwald
says, he's a white Christian evangelical bigot, and therefore entitled to respect from
the pundit class:
White evangelical Ministers are free to advocate American
wars based on Biblical mandates, rant hatefully against Islam, and argue that natural
disasters occur because God hates gay people. They are still fit for good company, an
important and cherished part of our mainstream American political system. The entire GOP
establishment is permitted actively to lavish them with praise and court their support
without the slightest backlash or controversy. Both George Bush and Israeli Prime Minister
Ehud Olmert sent formal greetings to the 2006 gathering of Hagee's group.
By contrast, black Muslim ministers like Farrakhan, or
even black Christian ministers like Rev. Jeremiah Wright, are held with deep suspicion,
even contempt. McCain is free to hug and praise the Rev. Hagees of the world, but Obama is
required to prove over and over and over and over that he does not share the more extreme
views of black Ministers.
How come Tim Russert -- in all the times he sits and
chats with Lieberman, McCain and various high Bush officials -- never reads all of the
inflammatory, disgusting, crazed "Rapture-is-Coming/ All-Jews-will-Burn/
Kill-All-Muslims/ Hurricanes-are-Punishment-against-Gays" pronouncements from John
Hagee and James Dobson and Pat Robertson and demand that John McCain and George Bush and
Joe Lieberman "denounce" those views and "reject" their support?
What's the difference, exactly?
Enter...Bill Donahue.
Yes, Mr. Catholic League/Chocolate Jesus himself, who is
(justifiably) miffed that Hagee refers to Catholics as "'The Great Whore,' an
'apostate church,' the 'anti-Christ,' and a 'false cult system.' Glenn Greenwald interviewed
him yesterday:
Donohue was particularly insistent that McCain's behavior
would severely harm his standing with Catholic voters -- the group of voters which Karl
Rove maintains is the key group for enabling the GOP to win: "This thing seems to
be to be blowing up in his face. McCain has stepped in it big time."
It's significant that this is not a partisan issue, both
sides of the political spectrum are in agreement that McCain should be forced to account
for this. Even the National
Review is applauding Glenn Greenwald's efforts on this front.
It's going to be hard for Russert to garner an audience
to address this matter that is quite as big as he did in a Presidential debate, so I'm
going to make a suggestion here that I never thought I would...
(*sharp intake of breath*)
...he needs to have Bill Donohue on Meet the Press.
Back in the old days, defendants in famous trials
got numbers -- the Chicago Eight, the Gang of Four, the Dave Clark Five, the Daytona 500.
McCain was one of the "Keating Five," congressmen investigated on ethics charges
for strenuously helping convicted racketeer Charles Keating after he gave them large
campaign contributions and vacation trips.
Charles Keating was convicted of racketeering and fraud
in both state and federal court after his Lincoln Savings & Loan collapsed, costing
the taxpayers $3.4 billion. His convictions were overturned on technicalities; for
example, the federal conviction was overturned because jurors had heard about his state
conviction, and his state charges because Judge Lance Ito (yes, that judge) screwed up
jury instructions. Neither court cleared him, and he faces new trials in both courts.)
Though he was not convicted of anything, McCain
intervened on behalf of Charles Keating after Keating gave McCain at least $112,00 in
contributions. In the mid-1980s, McCain made at least 9 trips on Keating's airplanes, and
3 of those were to Keating's luxurious retreat in the Bahamas. McCain's wife and
father-in-law also were the largest investors (at $350,000) in a Keating shopping center;
the Phoenix New Times called it a "sweetheart deal."
In 1995, McCain sent birthday regards, and regrets
for not attending, to Joseph "Joe Bananas" Bonano, the head of the New York
Bonano crime family, who had retired to Arizona. Another politician to send regrets was
Governor Fife Symington, who has since been kicked out of office and convicted of 7
felonies relating to fraud and extortion.
McCain has a reputation as a politician who
has difficulty keeping his pants zipped, according to Republican sources. He acknowledges
that his adultery broke up his first marriage. His second wife Cindy, the daughter of a
wealthy Budweiser beer distributor, was addicted to prescription narcotics and even stole
hard drugs from a medical charity that she ran. McCain acknowledges that she didn't want
him to run, and only agreed once he promised that she doesn't have to go to New Hampshire
or Iowa.
There
have been visitors to this page
since January 1, 1998
For information on all individuals
and organizations listed in this website, or the name of a contact person in your area
that can give you further information on the Religious Freedom Coalition of the Southeast,
or the First Amendment Coalition, contact us at rfcse@hotmail.com
. Let us hear from you!
You may call
also call us at 000-000-0000 If you access our voice mail, we will call you back
collect if long distance.
Or, you can write to us at: RFCSE, P.O. Box
672125, Marietta, GA 30006-0036
