Opinion: John McCain's Double Talk Express

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When the Keating Five scandal first broke, John McCain went ballistic on reporters who questioned his wife's financial ties to Keating lambasting them with his infamous temper. With the press coverage becoming merciless, McCain dialed back the anger and turned up the charm. He later wrote: "I talked to the press constantly, ad infinitum, until their appetite for information from me was completely satisfied. It is a public relations strategy that I have followed to this day."

The Straight Talk Express was born and 'til this day it is an image that McCain has attempted to cultivate. However, during his current run for the presidency the image of a straight talking maverick has come under intense scrutiny. That has not stopped McCain from using that familiar moniker and pointing to his past as a reference to who is truly is.

MCCAIN: I think most people will judge my record for what is it, where I take positions that I stand for and I believe in... I will continue to take positions that I believe in and I stand for. [Meet the Press, 4/2/06]

WHAT MCCAIN STANDS FOR: THEN AND NOW, BEFORE AND AFTER

Lobbyists

THEN
1997: Wrote legislation to ban lobbyists from political campaigns. Said lobbyist fundraisers "clearly represent a conflict of interest."

NOW
2008: Campaign relies on more than 170 lobbyists to raise money and serve as aides and advisers.

Abortion

BEFORE
McCain opposed overturning Roe: It would force women to seek illegal abortions. [San Francisco Chronicle, 8/20/99]

AFTER
McCain wouldn't be bothered by Supreme Court ban on abortion, would sign South Dakota’s abortion ban. [CBS News, 1/25/06; ABC News, 3/29/06; ABC News, 2/26/06; NationalJournal.com, 2/28/06]

Diplomacy

THEN
2000: Favored "normalization of relations" with Cuba.
2003: Called U.S. talks with Syria "appropriate."
2006: Approved of U.S. talking to the Palestinian Authority.

NOW
2008: Said Obama's willingness to meet with enemy regimes shows his "naiveté and inexperience and lack of judgement."

Standing Up to Racism

BEFORE
McCain condemned Bush for failing to denounce racist beliefs at Bob Jones University. [Fox, 2/24/00]

AFTER
McCain endorsed George Wallace Jr., keynote speaker at White supremacist group gathering. [AP, 11/17/05; 6/6/05]

Bush Tax Cuts

THEN
2001: McCain opposed Bush tax cuts. "I cannot in good conscience support a tax cut in which so many of the benefits go to the most fortunate among us at the expense of middle-class Americans."

NOW
McCain Voted For Bush Tax Cuts.
2007: "I will not let the Democrats roll back the Bush tax cuts."
2008: "I think that what we need is more tax cuts."

Immigration Policy

THEN
2006: Wrote McCain-Kennedy bill, which would have given 11 million illegal immigrants a path to citizenship.

NOW
JAN. 2008: In GOP primary debate, was asked whether he would still vote for his own bill: "No, I would not."

Gay Marriage

BEFORE
McCain Opposed Federal Gay Marriage Ban.

AFTER
McCain said he’s willing to support a federal marriage amendment. [Meet the Press, 4/2/06]

October 2006:
Tells Chris Matthews of Hardball: "I think gay marriage should be allowed."
Minutes later he says: "I do not believe that gay marriages should be legal."

Campaign Finance

BEFORE
McCain was a champion for campaign finance reform. [New York Times, 10/22/01]

AFTER
McCain laying the groundwork to opt out of Campaign Finance System For '08 Campaign. [National Journal, 12/17/05; Hotline On Call, 12/16/05]

Two of the most troubling topics of his penchant for double talk have a direct correlation to the economic crisis the United States and perhaps the World is encountering now.

Financial Regulation

In the year before his Senate run, McCain had championed legislation that would have delayed new regulations of savings and loans. As chair of the Senate Banking Committee in the late 1990s, Phil Gramm with McCain's fervent support ushered in a massive wave of deregulation for insurance companies and brokerage houses and banks, the aftershocks of which are just now being felt in Wall Street's catastrophic collapse. McCain also did his part to loosen regulations on big corporations. In 1997, McCain became chairman of the powerful Senate Commerce Committee. All told, executives and fundraisers associated with these firms doing business before this committee donated $2.6 million to McCain when he served as the chairman or ranking member.

THEN
March 2008: McCain told the Wall Street Journal, "I'm always for less regulation." Called for "removing regulatory, accounting and tax impediments" to financial markets.

NOW
Sept. 2008: As Wall Street melted down, declared, "We're going to enact and enforce reforms to make sure that these outrages never happen in the first place."

AIG Bailout

THEN
Sept. 16th, 2008: "I do not believe that the American taxpayer should be on the hook for AIG."

NEXT DAY
Backed bailout: "There were literally millions of people whose retirement, whose investments, whose insurance were at risk here."

WAR ON TERROR AND INVASION OF IRAQ

Iraq Invasion

And after 9/11, he took the lead in agitating for war with Iraq, outpacing even Dick Cheney in the dissemination of bogus intelligence about the threat posed by Saddam Hussein.
During an appearance on Hardball on September 12th McCain stated: "It isn't just Afghanistan. We're talking about Syria, Iraq, Iran, perhaps North Korea, Libya and others."

A month after 9/11, with the U.S. bombing Kabul and reeling from the anthrax scare, McCain told David Letterman that, "The second phase is Iraq.....Some of this anthrax may — and I emphasize may — have come from Iraq."

On Larry King, McCain raised the specter of Saddam's weapons of mass destruction before he peddled what became Dick Cheney's favorite lie: "The Czech government has revealed meetings, contacts between Iraqi intelligence and Mohamed Atta. The evidence is very clear. . . . So we will have to act."

On Nightline, he again pushed the Czech story and cited Iraqi defectors to claim that about Hussein, "there is no doubt as to his avid pursuit of weapons of mass destruction and the means to deliver them. That, coupled with his relations with terrorist organizations, I think, is a case that the administration will be making as we move step by step down this road."

In January 2002, McCain made a fact-finding mission to the Middle East. While he was there, he dropped by a super carrier the USS Theodore Roosevelt. On board the carrier, McCain, while standing on the flight bridge watching as fighter planes roared off, en route to Afghanistan where Osama bin Laden had already slipped away, he called Iraq a "clear and present danger to the security of the United States of America." and later exclaimed "Next up, Baghdad!"

Over the next 15 months leading up to the invasion, McCain continued to lead the rush to war, and in September 2002, McCain assured Americans that the war would be "fairly easy" with an "overwhelming victory in a very short period of time." On the eve of the invasion, once again on Hardball host Chris Matthews asked McCain:

Matthews: "Are you one of those who holds up an optimistic view of the postwar scene? Do you believe that the people of Iraq, or at least a large number of them, will treat us as liberators?"

McCain: "Absolutely. Absolutely."

Later, however, McCain insists that he predicted a protracted struggle from the outset. In August 2006 he said: "The American people were led to believe this could be some kind of day at the beach, which many of us fully understood from the beginning would be a very, very difficult undertaking."

McCain also claims he urged Bush to dump Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, except that he didn't. Not once that I can find. During a January primary debate he said:

"I'm the only one that said that Rumsfeld had to go."

However, as late as May 2004, in fact, McCain praised Rumsfeld for doing "a fine job."

THEN
McCain had "no confidence" in the Bush Administrations handling of Iraq. [Associated Press, 12/13/04]
The U.S. Made "serious mistake" which led to insurgent victories in Iraq. [ABC News, 2/26/06]

NOW
McCain said Bush Administration "earned our trust" in the 'War On Terror'. [McCain Senate release, 2/21/06]
McCain said Iraq was "on the right track" [MSNBC, 3/1/06]

NSA Wiretaps
BEFORE
McCain thought NSA Domestic Spying Program was illegal. [FOX News, 1/22/06]

AFTER
McCain backed off claim that wiretap program was illegal. [NBC News, 1/25/06]

Torture (Specifically water boarding)

THEN
2007: "It was used in the Spanish Inquisition, it was used in Pol Pot's genocide in Cambodia, and there are reports that it is being used against Buddhist monks today....It is torture."

NOW
2008: Voted against bill that would prevent water boarding by requiring all U.S. interrogators to comply with legal standards imposed by the Army Field Manual.

This is extremely troubling in light of McCain's own mistreatment during his years as a POW in Vietnam.

Pursuing Al Qaeda in Pakistan

THEN
February 2008: Called Obama's insistence that America can track down and kill Al Qaeda in Pakistan the "confused leadership of an inexperienced candidate."

NOW
September 2008: Voiced no objections when Bush ordered U.S. special forces to invade Pakistani territory in pursuit of Al Qaeda militants.

Port Security

BEFORE
McCain criticized the Bush Administration for not doing enough on Port Security. [NationalJournal.com, 5/16/03]

AFTER
McCain called questions over the Dubai Port Deal a "misplaced priority" [ABC News, 2/26/05]

There are many more instances of his duplicity and there are serious issues about his overall career in general. But we should all take another measure of the Republican candidate as Election Day draws near.