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John McCain has died

nytimes.com

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Re: John McCain has died

#191

Post by dragonwriter »

tooltalk wrote: post #169
js2 wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

McCain was treated terribly by his own party in the 2000 primary.

McCain was in the wrong party.

No, McCain was very much a Republican by policy positions; sure, he wasn't completely lockstep, but outside of rhetoric he'd usually fall into the standard Republican position in substance. His notable maverick positions weren't mostly in between the typical R & D positions but instead things that were controversial in both parties.

Yeah, post-Trump he may seem to have been in the wrong party, but post-Trump even much of the conservative establishment is questioning the Republican Party (George Will encouraging conservatives to vote for Democrats in the midterms, for instance.)

Re: John McCain has died

#192

Post by eclectic »

ikeyany wrote: post #155
BoysenberryPi wrote: post #4

John McCain did somethings that I disagree with but the one thing I will always remember is when during the 2008 election there were multiple times during town halls and rallies that people would verbally attack Obama and McCain always shut them down without fail.

He was truly one of our last great Republican leaders.

Romney was also great at losing to Democrats.

Re: John McCain has died

#193

Post by eclectic »

gbacon wrote: post #54
liquidise wrote: post #26

America lost a publicly principled man today. RIP sir. As a related meta-analysis of the response to his passing, i am surprised how many comments here include disclaimers to the appreciation offered. "I didn't agree with him but...". Have we become this partisan as a people? Our semi-anonymous respects for the passing of a prominent figure must be disclaimer-ed with political editorials. A worrying trend.

Because admitting political sympathies other than progressive around here draws harsh responses from the HN hivemind.

Bingo!

Re: John McCain has died

#194

Post by tozeur »

mortdeus wrote: post #183
arcticbull wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a genuine question, I'm not leading here. Do you think this has to do with anti-intellectualism, jealousy or is there more at play here? I wouldn't want an average joe to run the country, I want someone truly extraordinary. Better suited to the role, more experienced, smarter, better dressed and showing it. I don't want the stereotypical truck stop waiter/waitress, you know? It's not fair as they may be just…

The reason politicians try to dress down is that they want to give off the impression that they can relate to the experiences of most Americans. The general idea being, "How could this person ever promote policy that benefits me, if they don't understand what it's like to be me?" The irony is that most successful people in the world were rarely ever born with a silver spoon in their mouth. Kerry was actually one of t…

Those candidates were more “hip” to older demographics because those people actually lived through those wars and knew what it meant to serve in those wars.

Re: John McCain has died

#195

Post by jabl »

war1025 wrote: post #127

My dad died from the same cancer about a year before McCain was diagnosed. Terrible, terrible thing to go through. I feel bad writing it out, but it gives me a bit of comfort to know it isn't something that could have been managed with the added resources of someone on the national stage like McCain. The first surgery is pretty amazing because they can get almost all of the cancer out, and all the weird behavior just…

Lost my mother to the same. Doctors gave her a year, but in the end she died less than 5 months from the diagnosis. She was 62.

Re: John McCain has died

#196

Post by mnm1 »

myrandomcomment wrote: post #153
mnm1 wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If he was drafted, you might have a point. Yet he willingly joined a war that even back then everyone knew was unjust and pointless. I don't see how that makes anyone a hero, no matter what they do in said war. People in this country sure have a really fucked up conception of what a "hero" is.

I am glad in hindsight your understanding of the situation was so clear. I promise you at the time things where not a black and white. Also he joined the military as a graduate of the Navy Academy way before the war in Vietnam was a real thing. He was a brave, honorable man deserving of our respect. It is easy to sit back after the fact and make grand judgments. “John McCain and I were members of different generation…

There's nothing respectable or heroic about any war. The longer we keep pushing this narrative about soldiers being heroes, the longer we get stuck in this mentality that it's somehow justified or reasonable to start wars, of which we have started so many it's almost impossible to count at this point. Despite his experiences in war and being tortured in Vietnam, he still supported torture and other hideous practices. If that's the kind of man you want to respect and call a hero, go ahead, but don't ask the rest of us to respect someone like that simply because he was a POW. I'm not sure what your definition of hero is, but mine is about as opposite of McCain as one can get.

Re: John McCain has died

#197

Post by bdhess »

arcticbull wrote: post #178
LanceH wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I maintain this was a major reason for Bush defeating Kerry. I saw news stories on both of them one night and they were both in jeans. Kerry looked like they were purchased so he could dress down as the people do. The jeans looked like they had never been worn, maybe a dress shirt tucked in. Bush on the other hand was at Camp David casually talking to the press outdoors while his dog happily circled him. It's not rea…

This is a genuine question, I'm not leading here. Do you think this has to do with anti-intellectualism, jealousy or is there more at play here? I wouldn't want an average joe to run the country, I want someone truly extraordinary. Better suited to the role, more experienced, smarter, better dressed and showing it. I don't want the stereotypical truck stop waiter/waitress, you know? It's not fair as they may be just…

> I want someone truly extraordinary. Better suited to the role, more experienced, smarter, better dressed and showing it.

I think someone who’s truly extraordinary shouldn’t have to try very hard to look “relatable”. JFK comes to mind immediately— he didn’t dress or act like a man of the people, but you still got the sense that his family life was like what your family life would be like if you had a lot more money.

Kerry in jeans simply felt inauthentic. Nobody had any idea what his life was actually like behind closed doors.

Re: John McCain has died

#198

Post by Nitramp »

dopeboy wrote: post #24

I got to live in Iowa in the summer of 2007 for an engineering internship at Rockwell Collins. One bonus of that was getting to go to all the rallies. I went to a McCain rally and an Obama rally. I remember the energy of the room when Obama came in. The crowd was young and loud. Obama got up and gave his usual stump speech and then went around to shake hands. I shook his hand and got a word or two in but I could tell…

> I got to live in Iowa in the summer of 2007 [...] One bonus of that was getting to go to all the rallies.

Unrelated to Mr McCain, but living in California during the Clinton/Trump election, this struck me as extremely odd.

With California being essentially pre-decided due to the majority vote system, I saw zero campaign ads. Except for the news papers, the election simply didn't happen in California. What a weird system, where huge parts of the population get no representation.

Re: John McCain has died

#199

Post by [deleted] »

leolll wrote: post #33

"Bomb-bomb-bomb, bomb-bomb Iran" -McCain That's what I remember him for. He later said he was just joking. As if joking about killing thousands of people is somehow better.

[deleted]
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