Whereas I would honor any of our men and women who have ever served our country, McCain's tenure as a POW should disturb everyone with respect to his mental capacity to be President. In order to mentally survive torture, assault and physical abuse, whether at the hands of parents, rapists or, in this case, your captors, the human mind pretty much has to compartmentalize what's going on -- allowing the "real" person to retreat from reality in order to maintain sanity and separate from what is being done to them.
McCain obviously suffered severe physical torture. No one knows what it did to his mind. Post-traumatic stress syndrome is not something that goes away or resolves easily. I remember a friend whose husband came back from Viet Nam and would never talk about his experiences. However, any time a car backfired on the street outside the home, he would instinctively throw himself on her or the kids to protect them.
McCain was a womanizer before he went to Viet Nam and obviously afterwards. He has been extremely disrespectful to his first and second wives (calling Cindy a C___ in public for teasing him about going bald, wet T-shirt contest, etc.) and is on record as not supporting a single so-called woman's issue that he has ever had a chance to vote on.
He got into Annapolis on the basis of his father's and grandfather's ranks as Admirals (which McCain was passed over for years later). He ranked about fifth from the bottom of his class of 900. Learned a lot about military history and tactics, did he? However, he clearly sees the world through the eyes of a warrior, as his first response to a political probelm is to destroy the enemy.
His temperment and inability to control his temper are well-documented.
He is a compulsive craps player and has had to be pulled back by staff from the gaming tables in Vegas lest someone get the wrong (right) idea. Craps is a game of pure chance and epitomizes the rush of the gambler.
His so-called Maverick appeal has been more attention-getting behavior or political positioning than anything else.
So let's see, he is not particularly intelligent, he survived five years in captivity at an unknown cost to his psyche, he is disrespectful of women in general, he has never held a private sector job (other than as a beer distributor, presumably for Cindy's father), he is a compulsive craps player, a political opportunist of the worst kind and his first impulse is to attack a problem militarily in a world of complex nuances. Did I mention that he was a POW?