This is McCain's rewritten essay for the NYTimes. We got an advanced copy from a source close to Sen. McCain.
How did this happen to me? I am the war hero. The Maverick. In January 2007, when General David Petraeus took command in Iraq, he called the situation "hard" but not "hopeless." I alone supported him in the "surge" strategy. Today, 18 months later, violence has fallen by up to 80% to the lowest levels in four years. The situation now is full of hope. Hope!. Obama is getting all credit. They didn't even take me on the class trip. My essay got rejected by the teacher. My friends, Gramm was right. We have become a nation of whiners. And I am the top whiner. Boo-Hoo. There is media bias against me.
Both of us started out as war candidates. I was for it. He was against it. Obama saw ahead where the rest of the world will be and proposed a 2010 deadline to withdraw. He smiled a lot and stayed firm on Iraq as he subtly changed himself into the economy candidate. I am left all alone, even Bush is for Timelines now. Maliki stabbed me in the back. I am fucked.
By hanging my fate on Iraq, I put myself at the mercy of cutthroat Iraqi politicians. I was conned by Ahmed Chalibi into supporting the Iraq invasion. And now Maliki has conned me into being for an occupation that nobody wants. He slipped the knife in when he said he was for timeline. We got him to retract that. Then he plunged the knife deeper by endorsing Obama's plan totally out of the blue. And gave it a nice twist by leaking the audio of the statement he retracted to the Grey Lady. I am fucked. What am I to do now?
How can you do this to me, Andrea Mitchell? I thought you loved me. You were my base. I am the dashing maverick. Did I mention I am the war hero? How can you fall for that guy with no military experience? I was an early advocate of the surge at a time when it had few supporters in Washington. Senator Barack Obama was an equally vocal opponent. How did he screw me over?
The success of the surge has not changed Senator Obama's determination to pull out all of our combat troops. Doesn't he see that you have to stay in Iraq because the surge worked? Just as we had to stay when it didn't work. My friends, it is simple. You have to stay in whether it works or not.
And that reminds me of a joke. See, this woman got raped by a gorilla. And when people came to help her she asked" where is that magnificent ape?". My friends, women like to be raped. Just thought I would slip in a joke to lighten the mood. I am so funny.
He makes it sound as if Prime Minister Maliki has endorsed the Obama timetable, when all he has said is that he would like a plan for the eventual withdrawal of U.S. troops at some unspecified point in the future. Oh, you got audio of Maliki speaking? So what? I don't speak Iraqi. I mean Arabic. Hell, I barely speak English. I assume no one else can understand Maliki either. So we can translate it any way we want. What do you mean you have your own translator? We will declare him an enemy combatant and send him to Guantanamo. We decide what Maliki said.
Rejection hurts. I skipped writing classes at the Academy, like all classes. Graduated 894 out of 899. I guess writing is not my forte. Or speaking. Or making jokes. Come to think of it what is my forte? War. Endless war. And now Obama has taken war also away from me.
In hindsight what he did was very simple. He figured out early on that the Iraq war was dumb. That it is not the central front of the war on terror. That it never was. The central front was the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. Where Bin Laden hides. Where Jawahiri still operates. Where the Taliban rules. He knew that as the surge worked, Iraqis would think of us as occupiers and not protectors. So all he had to do was to repeat that we must withdraw at some arbitrary date (2010). The Iraqis would join in eventually. And since I and Bush had said that we would withdraw if the Iraqis asked us to, we would be totally screwed when it happened. He is just lucky that it happened when he was on this media tour circus. So the whole world can see my humiliation. He is so lucky. Or did he plan all this?
You want answers, Mr. NYTimes Editor? You can't handle the truth. We live in a world with wars and those wars have to be fought by men with guns. Who is going to do it? Obama, in his elegant sunglasses?. You, Senator Liebermann? I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. You clap for Obama and you curse me. You have the luxury of talking of withdrawal. You have that luxury because I made the surge work. My existence, while grotesque, and incomprehensible to you, saves lives. You can't handle the truth because you want me in the Senate floor standing up for war. You need me on that floor. We use words like war, surge, maverick. We use these words as the backbone of a life spent defending war at all cost. You use them as a punch line. I have neither the time nor the inclination to mirror Obama, who lives under the protection I alone provide. And then question the manner in which I provide it. How about a simple thank you? Or you pick up a weapon and stand opposed. I challenge you to a duel. We will meet at dawn behind the Washington monument. Otherwise stand aside.
You are damned right we will never leave Iraq. You are god-damned right we won't. We will never leave. We will kill every last one them, man woman and child. In order to save them. We will nuke those brown bastards.
What, what did I say? Why can't I say that? What do you mean war crime? I don't understand. Don't take me away..What is the white van for? I am not sick...
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