Support the Troops, Bushie Style 4
(Aside: By the way, my father was a POW in WWII. No one called him a hero and he was ashamed of having been captured until the last couple of decades of his life, even though his unit had been completely overrun in the dead of night, despite reports from Military Intelligence that there were no enemy troops in the area. He was captured by the Germans and was not mistreated–he told me that, even when he wasn’t getting much food at the end of the war, the American POWs were no more deprived than their German guards. Shame that the persons we the Bushies have captured can’t make similar statements.)
From Michael D. at Balloon Juice; I think his comments are unduly harsh, but not out of the ball park–my thoughts below:
(Michael D. quotes the news):
McCain has repeatedly voted against amendments in the Senate that would have…covered such important services as improving care at veterans’ hospitals, providing mental health services to soldiers with post-traumatic stress disorder and substance abuse problems. [2006 Senate Vote #7, 2/2/2006]
In 2006, McCain voted against the Kerry amendment that would eliminate increased fees and co-payments for veterans in the TRICARE health care program by raising the discretionary spending limit by approximately $10 billion. The provisions would have been fully offset by eliminating creating corporate tax breaks. [2006 Senate Vote #67, 3/16/2006]
McCain was one of only 13 Republicans to vote against an amendment that added over $400 million for inpatient and outpatient care for veterans. [2006 Senate Vote #98, 4/26/2006]
(Michael D. comments) . . . Even though I am now becoming more left leaning than I have ever been, I still had the impression that the media supports Democrats (or gives them a fairer hearing anyway). More and more, I am seeing that this is nowhere near the case. McCain gets a pass because is supposedly “a hero.†I’ve never been sure why he is a hero. He graduated 4th or 5th from the bottom of his class. He wrecked three of his own aircraft (if I remember correctly) and he was captured in Viet Nam. Unless I missed the part where he jumped on a grenade to save the lives of his fellow servicemen, I don’t know where the hero part comes in. But I digress.
Candidate McCain has done no more than hundreds of thousands of others.
Surviving does not make one a hero (though Candidate McCain’s refusal to take the easy way out warrants respect; this would appear to be the only hook on which to hang “hero”), except perhaps in some metaphysical sense that makes all of us who get on with life “heroes.”
And now his idea of supporting the troops is to deny them medical and educational benefits.
June 16, 2008 at 1:54 pm
If you want more of the same VOTE MCCAIN,If your parade needs rain VOTE MCCAIN, If you are totally insane VOTE MCCAIN!
June 16, 2008 at 3:54 pm
You guys are wasting a lot of energy with your McCain paranoia. If he wins, you’ll get pretty much everything you were going to get with Obama, and maybe even more.
If the Dems in Congress are shrewd, they’ll flatter him and he’ll sign anything. Call your bill "The McCain-Pelosi Heath Care Reform Act," and there will be no more private health care in America.
June 17, 2008 at 3:24 pm
Methinks thou dost underestimate the junior Senator from Illinois in much the same way as did Senator Clinton.Â
Is he the second coming? Hardly.
Is he his own man? Very much so.
June 17, 2008 at 4:24 pm
But if McCain wins, you’re going to get the same new programs and entitlements that Obama would have gotten you, and with McCain they’ll have the air of bipartisanship, which will help to entrench them more firmly.