Today’s Topic: McCain’s Inability to Lead
As a Vet, I still applaud John McCain’s service to this country, both in his military career and his political service on Capitol Hill.
But I have some serious problems with his views and his statements on Meet the Press today, and they justify my concern.
Essentially, since I don’t know how to take shorthand, he brought up the thought that he alone has the experience and the knowledge of how to run the war in Iraq, even as he is espousing the same rhetoric as George W. Bush.
As much as I don’t like the idea of somehow being seen as a McCain basher, I’d just like to say that there is NOTHING in John McCain’s history, either as a Navy pilot nor a prisoner of the North Vietnamese, or even as part of the American political institution which suggests that he knows or has experience in directing a war.
His claim to fame from his Viet Nam service comes from being held prisoner for 5 years, which doesn’t give one a lot of experience in tactics nor strategy. Even prior to being a prisoner, he was simply a pilot amongst a number of pilots, all of whom had orders to fulfill based on tactics developed by others under a strategy developed by people even more remotely attached to the war.
Senator McCain talked about his view of history in response to a question from Tim Russert, the answer of which flies in the face of the reality of history. Specifically, after hearing a statement by an Army General about insurgents historically never being beaten on their own territory, Senator McCain likened the insurgency in Iraq being left to the Iraqis as a neighborhood being assaulted by gangs and drug dealers. His statement represents his own lack of knowledge of just how America works, because historically it has been the neighborhood who has fought to bring their neighborhoods back. No amount of outside intervention has ever proven successful without the expressed approval and direct involvement of the neighborhood.
History has given us a high level of exactitude in the facts, and the facts are that no one can be freed unless they themselves are involved with that fight for freedom. Whether it is a drug or gang infested inner city neighborhood with people trying to live their lives on their own streets, or whether it is the concept of an insurrection born of the same type of inner city neighborhoods in Iraq under the perceived oppression of an invasive military force.
When added to his statements about knowing more about what is at stake than his constituents, the polls of which support withdrawal of our troops, then one has to question whether he is showing leadership, or failing to recognize that a leader only has the ability to lead when there are people willing to follow.
And speaking of following, if anyone is following John McCain’s performance in the Senate of late, one will notice that he has missed somewhere around 43% of the votes.
Yet somehow he seemed to find the time and the ability to come up with high dollar tickets for the Mayweather/De La Hoya fight on May 5th, sitting one row behind front and slightly off to the side of Chris Matthews.
Now I admit that anyone with the wherewithal to afford front row or at least ringside seats at the most touted boxing match in history is up to those people willing to pay. Chris makes his money via his not uncluttered work schedule yet still seems to get his job done. How McCain came to be ringside and yet still finds ways to be absent for 43% of his Senate votes is beyond me.
If you boil it down to the condensed version then John McCain isn’t doing the job he was elected to do almost half the time. The other point is that he obviously isn’t paying attention to over half of his current state constituents nor his improbable future national constituents. I don’t see where John McCain is doing his job at all, much less the claims for his credentials to become the President.
The Straight Talk Express is neither this time around.
11:47:27 AM 
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