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McCain, John (1936–)

48-49
10-13
June 25, 2008The Supreme Court determined that child rapists should not be sentenced to death if their crime “did not result, and was not intended to result, in the victim's death.” John McCain disagreed with that ruling and suggested that by executing those found guilty of “the most heinous of crimes” the United States could protect the innocence of its children, while Barack Obama suggested that the rape of a small child, “six or eight years old,” could be punished by death without violating the Constitution.
Source:

AFP

June 19, 2008Breaking an earlier vow, Senator Barack Obama announced that he will opt out of the public campaign-finance system, in order to be able to spend unlimited amounts of money in the last two months of his presidential campaign, rather than merely $84 million, the amount to which Senator John McCain will be limited under public-funding laws. “It'll be like George Steinbrenner's Yankees in the 90s,” Democratic consultant Chris Lehane said of Obama's campaign, which could spend as much as $500 million, “against the 90s Kansas City Royals.”
Source 1:

ABC

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NYT

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IHT

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Politico

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AP via MSNBC

June 18, 2008Ex-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld declined to endorse McCain, who has called him “one of the worst secretaries of defense in history.”
Source:

The Hill

June 14, 2008The Supreme Court ruled 5–4 that detainees held as “enemy combatants” by the United States in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, have a constitutional right to challenge their detention through habeas corpus petitions in federal courts. “Liberty and security can be reconciled...within the framework of the law,” wrote Justice Anthony M. Kennedy in the court's decision. “The Framers decided that habeas corpus...must be...a part of that law.” Dissenting, Chief Justice John Roberts asked, “So who has won? Not the detainees. The Court's analysis leaves them with only the prospect of further litigation.” Defense lawyers for the detainees moved to establish that their clients have the right to other constitutional protections and sought to halt ongoing military-commission trials, which permit hearsay and evidence gained from torture. John McCain called the ruling “one of the worst decisions in the history of this country.” Barack Obama said, “I think the Supreme Court was right.”
Source 1:

New York Times

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New York Times

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cnn

June 14, 2008 Obama, who admitted to smoking cigarettes in recent months, told supporters that he anticipated a “brawl” with McCain and the Republican National Committee: “If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun.”
Source 1:

ABC

Source 2:

Politico

June 4, 2008 Senator John McCain delivered a speech to a crowd of a few hundred in Kenner, Louisiana, in which he tried to rebuff Obama's charges that a McCain presidency would be a continuation of Bush policies. “That's not change we can believe in,” said McCain repeatedly. Pundits were surprised by McCain's clumsy rhetoric, by his lack of teleprompter skills, and by the fact that he stood in front of an ugly green backdrop. “Content better than delivery,” said Karl Rove. “John McCain,” said Mort Kondracke of “Roll Call,” “sounded old.”
Source 1:

New York Times

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Talking Points Memo

May 1, 2008At a town-hall meeting in Iowa, Baptist minister Marty Parrish asked Republican presidential nominee John McCain whether it was true that he had called his wife, Cindy, a “cunt” in 1992. “You know,” McCain replied, “that's the great thing about town-hall meetings, sir, but we really don't, there's people here who don't respect that kind of language. So I'll move on.” Parrish was then escorted from the meeting by the Secret Service and local police.
Source:

The Huffington Post

April 28, 2008All three candidates taped messages for World Wrestling Entertainment's “W.W.E. Raw”: Clinton declared herself “ready to rumble” for the American people; Obama, echoing former wrestler Dwayne “the Rock” Johnson, asked, “Do you smell what Barack is cooking?”; McCain, speaking with a surly tone, equated the Iraq war with a wrestling match and said that Americans “do not watch wrestling because we're 'bitter,'” but rather because “wrestling is about celebrating our freedom.”
Source:

New York Times

April 24, 2008 John McCain's campaign received a $1,000 discount on the rental fee for a public space for a fundraiser in Homewood, Alabama, along with $100 worth of free labor from the inmates of a local jail.
Source:

Birmingham News

April 6, 2008 Hillary Clinton and John McCain accused Barack Obama of elitism after Obama commented on the bitterness of working-class people in a speech at an expensive San Francisco fund-raiser. “They cling to guns,” said Obama, “or religion, or antipathy toward people who aren't like them, or anti-immigrant sentiment, or anti-trade sentiment, as a way to explain their frustrations.”
Source 1:

AFP

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NBC11

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BBC News

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Zombie Times

March 30, 2008 McCain asked mortgage lenders to provide voluntary aid to homeowners, recalling that General Motors had offered no-interest car financing after September 11. Senator Hillary Clinton suggested consulting former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan. While Clinton conceded that Greenspan helped cause the current crisis, she claimed that he has a “calming influence” on Wall Street. “Don't ask me why,” she said, “because I never understand what he's saying.” Senator Barack Obama gave a stirring speech, invoking the history of American finance from Hamilton and Jefferson to the present day, and Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson, Jr. proposed the largest reform of the American financial system since the Great Depression.
Source 1:

LAT

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LAT

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NYT

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WP

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Attytood

Source 6:

NYT

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Boston Globe

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WP

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WSJ

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Businessweek via Der Spiegel

Source 11:

NYT

Source 12:

WP

March 19, 2008Senator John McCain visited Jordan and told reporters that it was “common knowledge and has been reported in the media that Al Qaeda is going back into Iran and receiving training and are coming back into Iraq from Iran.” Senator Joe Lieberman was seen whispering into McCain's ear, after which McCain apologized. “The Iranians are training extremists,” he explained. “Not Al Qaeda.” Later, in Jerusalem, a fistfight among photographers, soldiers, police officers, and tourists erupted at McCain's Western Wall photo shoot, resulting in damage to several pairs of sunglasses.
Source 1:

Washington Post

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New York Times

February 24, 2008 Ralph Nader, who is older than John McCain, announced his fifth run for the presidency.
Source:

Meet the Press

February 22, 2008 Congressman Rick Renzi (R., Ariz.), one of McCain's campaign managers, was indicted for conspiracy, wire fraud, money laundering, insurance fraud, and extortion, but mostly for using his office to promote a swap of federal land to collect on a debt owed by a former associate.
Source:

AP via Yahoo News

February 21, 2008The New York Times published an article insinuating that John McCain had an affair with a lobbyist a decade ago.
Source:

New York Times

February 21, 2008The League of Conservation Voters said that McCain had the worst environmental record of all 535 members of Congress for 2007 and had missed more crucial votes than members who died in the middle of their terms.
Source:

The Trail

February 14, 2008Senator Barack Obama beat Senator Hillary Clinton by huge margins in primaries in Virginia, Maryland, and the District of Columbia, and Senator John McCain beat former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee. The close Democratic race worried party superdelegates, who will play a decisive role in choosing a candidate. Nancy Larson, a lobbyist and superdelegate from Minnesota, characterized superdelegates in general as “big schmucks.” Alaskan superdelegate Cindi Spanyers received a call from former president Bill Clinton, who recalled his wife's work on a fish cannery slime line there, and Obama was endorsed by the fishing village of Obama, Japan. McCain was endorsed by former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney and ex-president George H. W. Bush.
Source 1:

New York Times

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Washington Post

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Los Angeles Times

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Washington Post

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AP via Fort Worth Star-Telegram

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Los Angeles Times

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Star Tribune

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Anchorage Daily News

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Guardian

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LAT

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AP via Google

February 7, 2008In the G.O.P. primaries on Super Tuesday, John McCain emerged as the likely Republican presidential nominee after winning California, New York, New Jersey, and other “blue states”; Mike Huckabee won states in the South, and Mitt Romney won states in which he has owned a home. Romney later announced the end of his presidential campaign to an audience that moaned and cried “No, no!” “Size,” explained Romney, referring to the number of delegates pledged to McCain, “does matter.”
Source 1:

Talking Points Memo

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National Post

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Breitbart

January 8, 2008 John McCain and a tearful Hillary Clinton won the New Hampshire primaries.
Source:

NYTimes.com

October 27, 2007Senator John McCain promised workers at Thompson Center Arms, a small-weapons factory in Rochester, New Hampshire, that he would “follow Osama Bin Laden to the gates of hell” and “shoot him with your products.” McCain also promised that if he were elected “the background music would be ABBA in the elevators all over the White House” and proposed “Take a Chance on Me” as his campaign song.
Source 1:

Boston Globe

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Austin American Statesman

September 4, 2007A high school student in New Hampshire asked John McCain if the senator was too old to be president. “Thanks for the question, you little jerk,” McCain replied. “You're drafted!”
Source:

AP via Yahoo News

July 12, 2007 John McCain, whose campaign was collapsing, was suspected of violating both Senate ethics rules and criminal law by making a fundraising call from the Republican cloakroom in the Senate.
Source 1:

Washington Post

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NYT

May 15, 2007 Jerry Falwell died. “Dr. Falwell,” said Senator John McCain, “was a man of distinguished accomplishment.”
Source 1:

The New York Times

Source 2:

The Hill

April 19, 2007Senator John McCain entertained a crowd at a campaign rally in South Carolina by singing “Bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran” to the tune of “Barbara Ann” by the Beach Boys.
Source:

Georgetown Times

April 15, 2007Senator John McCain assessed the situation in Iraq, saying “I have no Plan B . . . If I saw that doomsday scenario evolving, then I would try to come up with one.”
Source:

NYT

March 1, 2007On The Late Show with David Letterman , Senator John McCain confirmed that he is running for president. Candidly discussing the war in Iraq, he said, “We've wasted a lot of our most precious treasure, which is American lives.” In response to Democrats who scolded him for using the word ”wasted,” McCain replied, ”I should have used the word 'sacrificed'.”
Source:

CNN

November 19, 2006Senator John McCain said that American troops in Iraq were “fighting and dying for a failed policy”; Henry Kissinger said that he didn't believe a military victory in Iraq is possible.
Source:

The New York Times

September 3, 2006A spokesman for the Republic of Georgia confirmed that a surface-to-air missile had been fired at a helicopter carrying U.S. Senator John McCain.
Source:

Azcentral.com via the Drudge Report

July 29, 2006 Senators Hillary Clinton and John McCain held a vodka-drinking contest.
Source:

New York Times

June 22, 2006 Senator Rick Santorum insisted the United States had in fact discovered weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and Senator John McCain said the U.S. had two options there: “Withdraw and fail, or commit and succeed.”
Source:

The New York Times

May 13, 2006In Lynchburg, Virginia, at Liberty University (which fines its students $500 if they engage in witchcraft), Senator John McCain (R., Ariz.) stood next to Jerry Falwell and spoke in support of the Iraq war.
Source 1:

The New York Times

Source 2:

Liberty University

December 16, 2005 President Bush was forced to approve the McCain Amendment, which will ban “cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment of terrorism detainees.”
Source:

AP

February 22, 2005 Senator John McCain called for permanent U.S. military bases in Afghanistan.
Source:

The Guardian

December 14, 2004Senator John McCain said he had no confidence in Donald Rumsfeld.
Source:

New York Times

November 21, 2004Senator John McCain called for up to 50,000 more troops in Iraq.
Source:

AFP

December 11, 2003The United States Supreme Court upheld the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform law, which bans unlimited political contributions to political parties. The majority concluded that "it was not unwarranted for Congress to conclude that the selling of access gives rise to the appearance of corruption."
Source:

New York Times

November 5, 2002 The Democratic and Republican parties established state organizations to circumvent the ban on soft-money donations enacted by the McCain-Feingold campaign-finance reform law.
June 25, 2002 The Federal Election Commission issued rules interpreting the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law in such a way that soft money, the main target of the law, was not really banned after all.
June 5, 2001Senator John McCain, a Republican, spent the weekend with Senator Tom Daschle, a Democrat; rumors of McCain's imminent defection were denied.
August 22, 2000Senator John McCain had two malignant melanomas removed.
NULL 0, 2000John Goodyear, whom Senator John McCain had chosen to manage this year's Republican convention and who once managed public relations for the Myanmar junta, stepped down, and one in four Republicans voted against McCain in primaries in North Carolina and Indiana.
Source 1:

Newsweek

Source 2:

Politico

AUGUST 2008

THE WRECKING CREW
How a Gang of Right-Wing Con Men Destroyed Washington and Made a Killing
By Thomas Frank

THE MANDARINS
American Foreign Policy, Brought to You by China
By Ken Silverstein

JACK
A story by Marilynne Robinson

Also: WILLIAM H. GASS on Henry James