In both 2015, as well as 2016, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” published profiles of the U.S. Senator from Arizona, John McCain, who is now serving in his sixth term in office. We ran an exhaustive timeline on, doing our best to give the man his due where he could, before we raked him over the coals, going all the way back to his earliest days serving in the House, when he found himself a member of the Keating Five. We covered his prolific flip-flopping on issues, whether changing his mind over the Confederate flag flying on state grounds within 72 hours, or reversing position on same sex marriage on Hardball with Chris Matthews within 11 MINUTES of coming out in favor of it. While those reversals were jaw-dropping in their suddenness, Sen. McCain’s reversal on immigration policy from a would-be reformer in 2006, to his “Fix the Danged Fence” ad in 2010 make more sense, when you consider he changes positions out of convenience depending on which party looks like they’ll do better in that election year. McCain was pilloried during the 2008 presidential campaign for voting for the Iraq War, which back in 2002, he described the upcoming conflict would be “easy” (so easy it went on for about a decade and we’re still fighting ISIS there fifteen years later). His hawkish nature knows no bounds, as he spoke in New Hampshire in 2008 about keeping our troops in Iraq for up to a “hundred” years, and it would be fine because there were “no casualties there” (when they were approaching four thousand) and he gleefully discussed conflict with Iran by way of singing a parody of the Beach Boys tune “Barbara Ann”. McCain immediately called for the United States to send our armed forces to both Syria, and then Ukraine at the first sign of diplomatic strife within a few months of each other in 2014. Shockingly, McCain voted against banning “enhanced interrogation” techniques in 2008, as well, in spite of having endured torture himself. He has proven clueless on any number of issues, being stumped by reporters when asked if condoms or other contraceptives could help prevent HIV (which might explain why he joined the rest of the GOP in trying to defund Planned Parenthood in 2015), and declaring the “fundamentals of our economy are strong” in the midst of the 2008 Wall Street meltdown. In recent years, he has whined about the Obama administration “politicizing the death of Osama bin Laden” while, simultaneously claiming that the deaths of four Americans in Benghazi, Libya was “a worse scandal than Watergate”. He’s become so bitter that he even voted against the nomination of former Republican senator and fellow Vietnam veteran Chuck Hagel for Secretary of Defense, calling him an “unimpressive candidate”, and called President Obama a “lame duck” with a full year left in his term when it came time to find a new Supreme Court Justice to replace Antonin Scalia. Oh, yeah, he also picked Sarah Palin as his running mate in 2008, foisting her upon the American consciousness. That’s something he’ll definitely never live down. Oh, and don’t forget that on April 28th, 2016, a long time John McCain fundraiser and aide was arrested in Phoenix for running a methamphetamine ring out of her home, where her two children also lived. The suspects arrested were also found to be in possession of LSD, cocaine, and heroin and McCain’s spokesman was as quick as can be to respond, and report the termination of the fundraiser from his staff.
McCain himself is one of the Republicans over the past year twisting themselves in knots over Donald Trump, at one minute reversing his stance on torture (again) to explain why Drumpf’s suggestions on the subject are “disappointing”, but then turning around and telling folks that Trump could be a “capable leader” if elected president. Which is amazing, considering Trump attacked McCain’s reputation as a war hero because “he was captured”, a slight that it seems Sen. McCain has not forgotten. If there’s anything encouraging coming from the GOP, it’s that John McCain has been willing to slag on Cheeto Mussolini over the past several months, reminding us of the Maverick who was one of our country’s most beloved politicians back around say 2005, and he’d talk trash about the Bush administration. Check it out:
- August 1st, 2016: John McCain openly chastises Donald Trump for his attacks upon Khzir and Ghazala Khan, a Gold Star family, adding that Humayan Khan was “an example of American greatness” and that we are a greater country because of them.
- October 8th, 2016: After the Access Hollywood footage of Donald Trump bragging about committing sexual assault emerges, Sen. McCain unendorses his support for Trump for president.
- January 29th, 2017: John McCain joins Lindsey Graham to criticize Donald Trump’s Muslim Travel Ban, calling it “a self-inflicted wound” in our war on terror.
- February 18th, 2017: Sen. McCain responds to Donald Trump calling the American media “the enemy of the people”, saying that such talk is “how dictators get started”.
- March 12th, 2017: McCain calls on Donald Trump to prove his claims that President Obama did the “wire tapps” to him, or retract his claim.
- April 10th, 2017: John McCain says the Trump administration was “partially to blame” for the chemical weapons attack carried out by the Assad regime against the Syrian people.
- May 16th, 2017: Sen McCain gives the gross understatement that the Trump/Russia investigations were “reaching Watergate size and scale”.
We’re still not fooled, mind you, by Sen. McCain’s Republican on Republican aggression. Because you see, what he says in a sound bite might make everyone think he’s opposing Trump’s plans at every turn… but then you can look and see that he voted for every single nominee in Trump’s Cabinet of Horrors. EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. Oh, and while he might have warned against using the nuclear option to get Neil Gorsuch appointed to the Supreme Court, McCain still went and backed the move anyway when Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell went for it.
Translation: He’ll still pretend to be moderate on the Sunday morning shows whenever possible, but he’s still a bitter old conservative, to his core, itching to have a good war to help his buddies in the military industrial complex who donate money to his campaign because he’s on the armed services committee and can help them get their bread buttered.
Even more bizarre? The friendly-fire moment where Sen McCain was in the middle of debate over adding Montenegro to NATO, and Sen. Rand Paul was arguing against it… so John McCain just straight-up accused Rand Paul of throwing in with Vladimir Putin. (It… makes sense for people to accuse Trump campaign or Trump transition or Trump administration people of this… but Rand Paul? Seriously? We think he’s a wingnut kook, and all, but that’s not Rand’s bag.)
Or there also mind-boggling moment during James Comey’s testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee last week when McCain stumbled through an attempt to try and paint a double standard between how the Clinton e-mail investigation, and the investigation into Russians interfering in our elections. No one could even figure out what the hell what point he was trying to make for either party, or for the country there, and the answer may have just been, “he’s an octogenarian, and gets confused…”
We really, really want to like Sen. McCain. We still really do. But when we look at the big picture, it’s pretty clear he’s only looking out for himself, and anything else is pretense.