McCain Mimics Bush with Iran Jokes, Bin Laden Boasts
Just one month after airing an ad declaring "only a fool or a fraud talks tough or romantically about war," John McCain once again joked about creating carnage in Iran. On the stump Tuesday, McCain added killing Iranians with cigarette addiction to last year's musing about "bomb bomb Iran." Whether he's yukking it up over conflict with Tehran, following Osama Bin Laden to the "gates of hell" or just being the "worst nightmare" of Al Qaeda and Hamas, John McCain sounds more and more like the man he seeks to replace.
McCain's latest less-than-presidential performance came in response to a question about rising U.S. exports to Iran. Informed that those shipments include $158 million in cigarettes:
McCain said, "Maybe that's a way of killing them." He quickly caught himself, saying “I meant that as a joke” as his wife, Cindy, poked him in the back.
In his defense, McCain claimed he was merely being ironic "as a person who hasn't had a cigarette in 28 years." Needless to say, the ironies don't end there. Despite his failed 1998 effort to advance anti-smoking legislation opposed by the tobacco lobby in the Senate, John McCain brought on Big Tobacco lobbyist Charlie Black to lead his campaign. (That might also explain why McCain backed off supporting Ted Kennedy's bill to have the FDA regulate tobacco and voted against raising cigarette taxes by 61 cents a pack to fund an expansion of SCHIP.) And despite John McCain's call for global divestment from Iran, the lobbying firms of top McCain aides Black and Rick Davis include clients doing business with Tehran.
The bigger irony, of course, is that John McCain is undermining his own effort to put distance between himself and George W. Bush. McCain's June ad was a dig at Bush's "cowboy way" typified by belligerent, teenage age taunts like "dead or alive," "bring 'em on," "I'm a little envious," "kick ass" and "we're smoking them out." Yesterday's pathetic episode was just another invitation to voters to view John McCain and President Bush as two peas in a pod.
Ultimately, even the perpetually unapologetic George W. Bush recognized that "using bad language like, you know, 'bring them on' was a mistake" which raised doubts about his presidential temperament. As for John McCain, who giggles about bombing - or at least smoking out - the Iranians, we're still waiting for a similar acknowledgement.
Until then, expect more messages like the one John McCain delivered last October to workers at a small arms factory in New Hampshire:
"I will follow Osama Bin Laden to the gates of hell and I will shoot him with your products."
Just three days after his calamitous "green screen" speech, John McCain today released his first general election ad, one which may prove similarly damaging. Declaring "only a fool or a fraud talks tough or romantically about war," McCain invited Americans to revisit his still-jaw dropping "bomb bomb Iran" joke during an April 2007 town hall meeting.
As you'll remember, McCain in April 2007 famously responded to a question about when America would "send an air mail message to Tehran." Singing to the tune of the Beach Boys' hit "Barbara Ann," McCain laughed and broke into song:
"Bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran."
McCain's war-is-fun antics didn't end there. As ThinkProgress noted, his campaign featured the song at subsequent events, playing "Barbara Ann" as McCain approached the stage. Asked about the episode at another campaign stop in December, McCain jokingly snarled to laughter from his audience, "no thanks for reminding me, you jerk." Despite his insistence that John Kerry apologize for his "botched" 2006 joke about military service, McCain with no sense of irony told critics of his "bomb bomb Iran" moment:
"Please, I was talking to some of my old veterans friends. My response is, Lighten up and get a life."
Of course, that was then and this is now. And now John McCain is asking Americans to join him in a moment of selective amnesia and forget his gests about igniting a regional conflagration with Iran.
"Only a fool or a fraud talks tough or romantically about war...I was shot down over Vietnam and spent five years as a POW...I hate war. And I know how terrible its costs are. I'm running for president to keep the country I love safe. I'm John McCain, and I approve this message."
Ultimately, rather than achieving his intended goal of creating space between himself and President Bush, McCain's sorry spot and even sorrier singing about Iran instead invites Americans to view him and the man he would replace as two peas in a pod. George W. Bush's own foolish belligerence, after all, includes "dead or alive," "bring 'em on," "I'm a little envious" and "kick ass." By drawing attention to his shockingly inappropriate - and irredeemably unpresidential - "bomb bomb Iran" embarrassment, John McCain is only confirming what more Americans are concluding every day. He's a fool and a fraud.
UPDATE: A reader recalls McCain's tough talk about Al Qaeda and his repeated promises to "follow Osama Bin Laden to the gates of hell."
McCain, Like Romney and Cheney, Runs Afoul of Iran Divestment Pledge
Addressing the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) today, Republican presidential nominee John McCain called for a global campaign of divestment from Iran. He might want to start with his own campaign manager, Rick Davis, whose work on behalf of Ukrainian mogul Rinat Akhmetov included business dealings with Tehran. As it turns out, John McCain is following Mitt Romney and Dick Cheney as just the latest hard-line Republican to run afoul of his own plans for Iranian disinvestment.
McCain used his wide-ranging address to target Iran for the kind of worldwide sanctions regime applied to apartheid-era South Africa. (Unsurprisingly, the self-proclaimed "foot soldier in the Reagan revolution" neglected to mention his hero's opposition to South African divestment.) Monday morning, McCain declared:
"We should privatize the sanctions against Iran by launching a worldwide divestment campaign. As more people, businesses, pension funds, and financial institutions across the world divest from companies doing business with Iran, the radical elite who run that country will become even more unpopular than they are already."
Sadly for McCain, that sweep would net his long-time adviser and campaign manager Rick Davis. As Talking Points Memo detailed just this past Friday, Davis' extensive lobbying operation prominently features clients doing deals with the Iranian regime. At the same Davis was heading up John McCain's so-called Reform Institute, his firm was representing the Ukrainian oligarch Akmetov and its businesses in Tehran:
Davis Manafort was helping Akhmetov's conglomerate, System Capital Management Holdings, to develop a "corporate communications strategy" between the beginging of 2005 through the end of summer 2005, the company said.
The company's subsidiary, Metinvest, a steel company, has one of its 11 offices in Tehran. And another subsidiary, Khartsyzsk Pipe Plant, sells large pipes to Iran.
As of Friday, the McCain camp was pleading ignorance. According to TPM, "a McCain aide told us Davis did not work on that account while he was heading up the firm. And he was unaware of the company's ties to Iran."
Of course, McCain's looming discomfort over his team's ties to Tehran pales in comparison to Mitt Romney's divestment fiasco in 2007. His high-profile crusade lasted about three days, or about as long as it took for revelations that his former employer was in deep in Iran.
In his much hyped - and short lived - effort in early 2007, the former Massachusetts Governor and GOP White House hopeful called on state pension funds (in Democratic states) to divest their holdings in companies doing business with Iran. On February 22, Romney sent letters to Democratic leaders including New York Governor Eliot Spitzer, Senators Chuck Schumer and Hillary Clinton as well as state comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli urging a policy of "strategic disinvestment from companies linked to the Iranian regime." But as the AP quickly discovered, Romney's former employer (Bain & Co.) and the company he founded (Bain Capital) have extensive links to recent Iranian business deals.
Bain & Co. Italy, described in company literature as "the Italian branch of Bain & Co.," received a $2.3 million contract from the National Iranian Oil Co., in September 2004. Its task was to develop a master plan so NIOC -- the state oil company of Iran -- could become one of the world's top oil companies, according to Iranian and U.S. news accounts of the deal.
Bain Capital, the venture capital firm that Romney started and made him a multimillionaire, teamed up with the Haier Group, a Chinese appliance maker that has a factory in Iran, in an unsuccessful 2005 buyout effort.
Apparently missing the irony, Romney responded by comically saying that his Iran disinvestment PR scheme did not apply to him:
"This is something for now-forward. I wouldn't begin to say that people who, in the past, have been doing business with Iran, are subject to the same scrutiny as that which is going on from a prospective basis."
Still, that embarrassment did not prevent Romney from six months later calling on the UN to indict Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on charges of genocide when the Iranian president came to address the world body in New York last September.)
Of course, the Iranian divestment follies of John McCain and Mitt Romney are mere footnotes compared those of Vice President Dick Cheney. His former company Halliburton only ended its Iran sanction-busting business in April 2007, five years after the Vice President and one-time CEO denounced Tehran as "the world's leading exporter of terror."
That's a far cry from Cheney's attitude towards his Iran in the 1990's when he ran Halliburton and Bill Clinton ran the United States. As I noted last year, Cheney strenuously argued against Clinton's sanctions regime and expanded Halliburton's business with Tehran. But in 1998, he complained that U.S. firms were "cut out of the action." And back in 1996, Cheney railed against the Clinton prohibitions on Iranian trade and financial activity for American firms:
"We seem to be sanction-happy as a government. The problem is that the good Lord didn't see fit to always put oil and gas resources where there are democratic governments."
In 2004, the CBS newsmagazine 60 Minutes detailed the Iranian business dealings of Cheney's former company, Halliburton. Despite the prohibitions signed into law by President Clinton with his 1995 executive order and the Iran and Libya Sanctions Act of 1996, Halliburton continued to reap the profits of business with Iran through its non-U.S. subsidiaries. While U.S. law bans virtually all commerce with the rogue nations, Halliburton was able to jump through its major loophole: the rules do not apply to any foreign or offshore subsidiary so long as it is run by non-Americans. As CBS documented:
That subsidiary, Halliburton Products and Services, Ltd., is wholly owned by the U.S.-based Halliburton and is registered in a building in the capital of the Cayman Islands -- a building owned by the local Calidonian Bank. Halliburton and other companies set up in this Caribbean Island, because of tax and secrecy laws that are corporate friendly.
Halliburton is the company that Vice President Dick Cheney used to run. He was CEO from 1995 to 2000, during which time Halliburton Products and Services set up shop in Iran. Today, it sells about $40 million a year worth of oil field services to the Iranian government.
Ultimately, Cheney's former company completed its Iranian divestiture in April 2007. Of course, he was no longer running for office.
John McCain, on the other, wants to be President of the United States. The only question now is whether he'll obey his own call for action against organizations doing business with Iran and divest his own campaign manager.
UPDATE:Huffington Post reports that McCain senior adviser and GOP uber-lobbyist Charlie Black's firm represented CNOOC, the Chinese national oil conglomerate, which also happens to have business dealings with Iran. Meanwhile, the Obama campaign notes that John McCain failed to support Iran sanctions legislation sponsored by Obama in 2007, a bill currently rumored to be "on hold" by Alabama Republican, Richard Shelby.
McCain Finally Rejects Hagee Endorsement He Sought
85 days after they shared a San Antonio stage to announce their partnership, John McCain finally rejected the endorsement of end times Texas Pastor John Hagee. After weeks of retreat in the face of Hagee's bigoted comments, McCain surrendered altogether on the day after Hagee's past statements about Adolf Hitler's divinely mandated role in driving European Jewry to Israel became public.
"Obviously, I find these remarks and others deeply offensive and indefensible, and I repudiate them. I did not know of them before Reverend Hagee's endorsement, and I feel I must reject his endorsement as well. I have said I do not believe Senator Obama shares Reverend Wright's extreme views. But let me also be clear, Reverend Hagee was not and is not my pastor or spiritual advisor, and I did not attend his church for twenty years. I have denounced statements he made immediately upon learning of them, as I do again today."
Given Pastor Hagee's high profile that includes prominent books and nationally broadcast TV shows, McCain's Sgt. Schultz defense ("I know nothing. Nothing!") and his campaign's claim that the Hagee endorsement was "poorly vetted" are nonsense. The courtship of Hagee was just another element in McCain's strategic reversal towards the religious right, a journey of opportunism to what Jon Stewart in 2006 deemed "crazy base world." Ever since he stood at a podium with John Hagee on February 27th, McCain has been answering questions and offering feeble "unpologies" for Hagee's slanders towards the Catholic Church and the residents of New Orleans.
By severing ties with Hagee today, McCain no doubt hopes to avoid perhaps the most important question raised by his association with the minister: does John McCain agree with Pastor John Hagee that war with Iran is the fulfillment of biblical prophecy?
Given McCain's shockingly bad judgment in seeking Hagee's support and the obvious dangers of the pastor's view of Iran and Armageddon as foreign policy, today's renunciation should not be the end of the story. Of course, in all likelihood, the American media will declare that it will be.
When it comes to Pastor John Hagee, John McCain and Joe Lieberman have a lot in common. Both men addressed the 2007 convention of Hagee's organization, Christians United for Israel (CUFI). McCain and Lieberman each voiced support for a pre-emptive strike against Iran. But while John McCain aggressively sought Hagee's endorsement, only Joe Lieberman compared the Texas pastor to Moses.
Lieberman's glowing tribute to Hagee came during the Connecticut Senator's speech to CUFI last year (captured on video here):
"He is a Ish Elokim, a man of God and those words really fit him...like Moses he's become a leader of a mighty multitude, even greater than the multitude that Moses led from Egypt to the promised land."
Unfortunately for Joe Lieberman, it now turns out that John Hagee had in mind another modern-day Moses: Adolf Hitler. Hitler, Hagee tells us, was sent by God to deliver the Jews to Israel.
"Then god sent a hunter. A hunter is someone with a gun and he forces you. Hitler was a hunter. And the Bible says -- Jeremiah writing -- 'They shall hunt them from every mountain and from every hill and from the holes of the rocks,' meaning there's no place to hide. And that might be offensive to some people but don't let your heart be offended. I didn't write it, Jeremiah wrote it. It was the truth and it is the truth. How did it happen? Because God allowed it to happen. Why did it happen? Because God said my top priority for the Jewish people is to get them to come back to the land of Israel."
For Hagee, of course, the return of the Jews to Israel is a biblical necessity, a requirement for the Second Coming of Christ and the final battle of Armageddon with, you guessed it, Iran:
"The United States must join Israel in a pre-emptive military strike against Iran to fulfill God's plan for both Israel and the West...a biblically prophesied end-time confrontation with Iran, which will lead to the Rapture, Tribulation, and Second Coming of Christ."
Then and then only then, can the Jews be converted - or massacred - in what Keith Olbermann described as "biblical collateral damage."
As part of his cynical effort to court the religious right, John McCain aggressively sought Pastor Hagee's endorsement. And to date, Mr. Straight Talk has yet to answer the question: does John McCain agree with Pastor John Hagee that war with Iran is the fulfillment of biblical prophecy? (The questions about McCain "spiritual guide" Rod Parsley also remained unanswered.)
But Joe Lieberman's embrace of Hagee seems more heartfelt and less opportunistic than McCain's. Only last week, Lieberman said Hagee "represents a lot of people in this country, particularly Christians who care about the state of Israel."
Of course, two weeks ago Lieberman also vouched for McCain's fitness, mental and otherwise:
"I just want to report that this morning I personally checked John McCain's bearings. He has not lost any of them. They are all in really great shape."
That may or not be the case, but increasingly it appears that it is Joe Lieberman who has lost his bearings. No doubt, generations of political science, history - and psychology - graduate students yet unborn will author dissertations asking of Al Gore's 2000 running mate, "what happened to Joe Lieberman?" As Lieberman said last week in response to that same question posed about Al Gore, "damned if I know."
In the meantime, Joe Lieberman himself can answer the simple yes/no question: do you still believe John Hagee is Moses?
McCain Defended Reagan, North During Iran-Contra Scandal
Just 48 hours after jumping on the Bush appeasement bandwagon, John McCain is probably regretting his leap. First, it was revealed that the tough-talking Republican presidential nominee was for negotiating with the Hamas government in the Palestinian territories before he was against it. Then Americans learned that in 2003, Mr. Straight Talk favored engagement with the terror-sponsoring state of Syria. Now in his accusations against Democrat Barack Obama, John McCain conveniently forgot Ronald Reagan's dealings with Tehran during the Iran-Contra scandal. Given his defense the Reagan administration at the time, McCain's selective amnesia comes as no surprise.
On Thursday, McCain tried to back up his appeasement charge against Obama by citing the mythical resolve of Ronald Reagan.
"Yes, there have been appeasers in the past, and the president is exactly right, and one of them is Neville Chamberlain. I believe that it's not an accident that our hostages came home from Iran when President Reagan was president of the United States. He didn't sit down in a negotiation with the religious extremists in Iran, he made it very clear that those hostages were coming home."
Sadly, Ronald Reagan did in fact negotiate with those very extremists during the Iran-Contra scandal of 1986 and 1987. Desperate to secure the release of American hostages held in Lebanon by Iranian proxies, the Reagan administration concocted a convoluted - and illegal - scheme to sell weapons to Tehran and then funnel the proceeds to the Nicaraguan Contras in violation of U.S. law. (The stranger than fiction plot included national security adviser Robert McFarlane's clandestine trip to Iran bearing gifts, among them a cake and a bible with handwritten verse from President Reagan.)
During his March 4, 1987 address to the nation, Ronald Reagan admitted then what John McCain would not now:
"A few months ago I told the American people I did not trade arms for hostages. My heart and my best intentions still tell me that's true, but the facts and the evidence tell me it is not. As the Tower board reported, what began as a strategic opening to Iran deteriorated, in its implementation, into trading arms for hostages."
While Senator McCain "criticized the administration's handling of the Iran-Contra affair" and claimed the Administration's assertion that the Sandinista military campaign was a threat to the United States was ''not credible," during the Congressional Iran-Contra hearings McCain nonetheless defended his party's president.
As joint Congressional hearings into the Iran-Contra affair commenced in May, 1987, McCain downplayed the impact of the looming inquiry. As the New York Times reported:
''I detect no electricity in the air and no surge of anticipation,'' said Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, who has criticized the Administration's performance in the case. ''Maybe people think the whole story has been told, which is not so, or maybe they're tired of scandal.''
During the 2000 presidential campaign, the New York Times noted McCain's defense of Reagan in highlighting his conservative credentials in the GOP nominating race against then Governor George W. Bush:
"Unlike the governor, he does not support federal financing of the arts. And he voted to convict President Clinton, is strongly pro-military, defended Ronald Reagan during the Iran-contra inquiry and has a long history as a deregulator."
A March 2006 profile in Current Biography revealed both McCain's attitude toward Ronald Reagan's Iran-Contra scandal and his empathy towards one of its key perpetrators, then Lt. Colonel and now Fox commentator Oliver North:
He criticized the administration's handling of the Iran-Contra affair (in which officials had illegally diverted to the Contras money from the sale of arms to Iran), though he blamed both Congress and the White House for failing to work more closely on a coordinated foreign policy, and he empathized with his fellow Vietnam veteran Oliver North, a central figure in the scandal. "Some of these people like Ollie North," he explained to Michael Killian for the Chicago Tribune (July 29, 1987), "who saw their comrades and friends spill blood and die on the battlefields in a war that they believe the politicians wouldn't let them win--I think that leads to a mind-set which could rationalize deviating from the established rules and regulations."
Of course, neither Barack Obama nor John McCain is an appeaser. But John McCain is a revisionist historian and a bad one at that. He once believed in precisely the type of diplomatic flexibility and nuance he scoffs at now. And no doubt, John McCain the self-described "foot soldier in the Reagan revolution" stood by his hero Ronald Reagan during the Iran-Contra crisis he now seems to have forgotten.
After Hagee Apology to Catholics, McCain Still Silent on Armageddon Views
Facing increasing scrutiny over his statements describing the Catholic Church as "the great whore" and a "false cult system," Texas pastor and John McCain endorser John Hagee today issued a letter of apology to his "Catholic brothers and sisters in Christ." But while Hagee's chosen candidate previously distanced himself from the minister's slurs towards Catholics and residents of New Orleans, on the topic that may matter most, Mr. Straight Talk has remained silent. Does John McCain agree with Pastor John Hagee that war with Iran is the fulfillment of the biblical prophecy of Armageddon?
Back on March 9th, McCain offered a conditional apology for Hagee's slanders "if they are anti-Catholic or offensive to Catholics." Today, Hagee himself tried to help dig McCain out of the hole he created among America's 80,000,000 Catholics. As the Wall Street Journal reported, Hagee sought to make amends:
"Out of a desire to advance greater unity among Catholics and Evangelicals in promoting the common good, I want to express my deep regret for any comments that Catholics have found hurtful," Hagee wrote, according to an advanced copy of the letter reviewed by Washington Wire.
In the letter, addressed to Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League and one of Hagee's biggest critics, Hagee pledges "a greater level of compassion and respect for my Catholic brothers and sisters in Christ."
But while McCain "categorically" repudiated Hagee's anti-Catholic bigotry and labeled as "nonsense" Hagee's assertions that Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans as divine retribution for the city's "painful sin" of a "homosexual rally," the Arizona Senator has yet to reject Hagee's End of Days vision for war with Iran.
On February 27, 2008, Senator McCain shared a stage with the End Times minister and declared, "I am very proud to have Pastor John Hagee's support." As it turns out, John McCain not only actively sought Hagee's endorsement. In 2007, McCain addressed Hagee's organization, Christians United for Israel (CUFI), which just happens to believe the final biblical battle against the Anti-Christ will be fought by the United States - against Iran. During the annual CUFI conference in July 2006, John Hagee bluntly described his vision of Armageddon as foreign policy this way:
"The United States must join Israel in a pre-emptive military strike against Iran to fulfill God's plan for both Israel and the West...a biblically prophesied end-time confrontation with Iran, which will lead to the Rapture, Tribulation, and Second Coming of Christ."
On January 29, 2007, Hagee emailed a "Newflash" to CUFI members about a meeting he held that day with McCain. While noting that he did not "want to put the specifics of our conversation in this update" because "I don't want to read it in the media tomorrow," Hagee crowed about the future Republican presidential nominee:
"Senator McCain's comments concerning Israel are on target! He gets it!"
But what exactly is that McCain "gets?" During an April 2, 2006 interview by Tim Russert on Meet the Press, McCain gave a hint. Discussing Tehran's nuclear program and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's inflammatory rhetoric towards Israel, John McCain sounded as much preacher as president:
MR. RUSSERT: So we could have two wars at once?
SEN. McCAIN: I think we could have Armageddon. But I think that, that if we handle this right, and our European allies stand with us, and the Russians and the Chinese stand with us, sanctions might do the job. And I am confident that this administration will exhaust every effort before contemplating seriously a military option.
Russert, of course, did not follow up to clarify with McCain what he meant when he said "we could have Armageddon." Was he literally speaking of the final conflagration involving the mass conversion and killing of the Jews described in the Bible? Does John McCain believe, as Pastor Hagee clearly does, that American foreign and national security policy should be governed by the Book of Revelation?
During an April 2007 campaign event, John McCain joked about confrontation with Tehran, singing "bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran." But as tensions with Iran continue to rise, the end-times views of McCain supporter Hagee are no laughing matter. So 76 days after they shared that stage in San Antonio, the McCain-Hagee Armageddon watch continues. When will the American media ask John McCain the question he must answer: does John McCain agree with Pastor John Hagee that war with Iran is the fulfillment of biblical prophecy?
Obama Disavows Wright; McCain Still Silent on Hagee, Armageddon and Iran
Barack Obama in no uncertain terms today made a clear break with his incendiary former minister, the Reverend Jeremiah Wright. But despite Obama's disavowal of his one-time pastor's outrageous statements, the media spotlight continues to shine on Wright. Meanwhile, John McCain has maintained his silence on the dangerous vision of Armageddon and Iran held by his own pastoral supporter, John Hagee.
In the wake of Wright's erratic grandstanding at events on Sunday and Monday, Senator Obama made it clear he had enough of the minister's continuing affronts:
"I gave him the benefit of the doubt in my speech in Philadelphia explaining that he's done enormous good...But when he states and then amplifies such ridiculous propositions as the U.S. government somehow being involved in AIDS...There are no excuses. They offended me. They rightly offend all Americans and they should be denounced."
But 62 days after he declared himself "very proud" and "honored" to the have the endorsement of the End Times Pastor John Hagee, Republican John McCain still has not answered - or even been asked - the question that should concern all Americans:
Does John McCain agree with Pastor John Hagee that war with Iran is the fulfillment of the biblical prophecy of Armageddon?
When John McCain on April 2, 2006 said of possible simultaneous conflicts with Iraq and Iran that "I think we could have Armageddon," was he literally speaking of the final conflagration involving the mass conversion and killing of the Jews described in the Bible? Does John McCain believe, as Pastor Hagee clearly does, that American foreign and national security policy should be governed by the Book of Revelation?
Despite his assurances to the contrary, John Hagee's 2006 address to his organization, Christians United for Israel (CUFI), left no doubt where he stands on Israel and war with Iran as the fulfillment of biblical prophecy:
"The United States must join Israel in a pre-emptive military strike against Iran to fulfill God's plan for both Israel and the West...a biblically prophesied end-time confrontation with Iran, which will lead to the Rapture, Tribulation, and Second Coming of Christ"
On February 27, 2008, John McCain stood on a San Antonio stage with Pastor Hagee. When will John McCain say where he stands on Hagee's most dangerous - and apocalyptic - beliefs about Iran?
UPDATE 2: In an editorial Wednesday, the New York Times notes that "Senator John McCain has continued to embrace a prominent white supporter, Pastor John Hagee, whose bigotry matches that of Mr. Wright." Still nothing about the end-of-times conflict with Iran.
On Sunday, Barack Obama appeared on Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace and marked an end to the right-wing network's 772-day "Obama Countdown Clock." Meanwhile, another clock, this time for Republican John McCain, keeps on ticking. 61 days after accepting his endorsement, the media has not asked - and John McCain has not answered - whether or not he agrees with Pastor John Hagee that war with Iran is the fulfillment of the biblical prophecy of Armageddon.
On February 27, 2008, Senator McCain shared a stage with the End Times minister and declared, "I am very proud to have Pastor John Hagee's support." As it turns out, John McCain not only actively sought Hagee's endorsement. In 2007, McCain addressed Hagee's organization, Christians United for Israel (CUFI), which just happens to believe the final biblical battle against the Anti-Christ will be fought by the United States - against Iran.
During the annual CUFI conference in July 2006, John Hagee bluntly described his vision of Armageddon as foreign policy this way:
"The United States must join Israel in a pre-emptive military strike against Iran to fulfill God's plan for both Israel and the West...a biblically prophesied end-time confrontation with Iran, which will lead to the Rapture, Tribulation, and Second Coming of Christ."
On January 29, 2007, Hagee emailed a "Newflash" to CUFI members about a meeting he held that day with McCain. While noting that he did not "want to put the specifics of our conversation in this update" because "I don't want to read it in the media tomorrow," Hagee crowed about the future Republican presidential nominee:
"Senator McCain's comments concerning Israel are on target! He gets it!"
But what exactly is that McCain "gets?" During an April 2, 2006 interview by Tim Russert on Meet the Press, McCain gave a hint. Discussing Tehran's nuclear program and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's inflammatory rhetoric towards Israel, John McCain sounded as much preacher as president:
MR. RUSSERT: So we could have two wars at once?
SEN. McCAIN: I think we could have Armageddon. But I think that, that if we handle this right, and our European allies stand with us, and the Russians and the Chinese stand with us, sanctions might do the job. And I am confident that this administration will exhaust every effort before contemplating seriously a military option.
Russert, of course, did not follow up to clarify with McCain what he meant when he said "we could have Armageddon." Needless to say, no one in the mainstream media has, either.
Ironically, on the very day Barack Obama stopped the countdown clock over at Fox, John McCain attacked Obama over his association with a minister of his own, Jeremiah Wright. In the wake of Wright's appearance before the NAACP, McCain made him an issue, declaring "I can understand why people are upset about this" and concluding of Wright's comments, "it will probably be a political issue."
As tensions with Tehran continue to rise, the views of McCain supporter Hagee are also increasingly a vital issue in the presidential election. So the Armageddon watch continues. When will the media ask John McCain the question he must answer: does John McCain agree with Pastor John Hagee that war with Iran is the fulfillment of biblical prophecy?
McCain, Hagee and the Media's Missing Question on War with Iran
In New Orleans as part of his so-called "Forgotten Places" tour, former Navy airman John McCain found himself evading incoming flak over the most recent comments of Pastor John Hagee. Coming just days after George Stephanolous lobbed him a Hagee softball, McCain faced questions over Hagee's assertions that "God's hand" was behind Hurricane Katrina because New Orleans was a "sinful city." But still absent from the media discussion about John McCain and his supporter the End-Times Pastor Hagee is the question of conflict with Iran. Given his own tough talk toward Tehran, does John McCain agree with Pastor John Hagee that war with Iran is the fulfillment of biblical prophecy?
While McCain has parried questions about Hagee's bigotry towards Catholic and gay Americans, he has yet to face scrutiny over his past association with the Texas Pastor. McCain, after all, didn't merely seek Hagee's endorsement. In 2007, he addressed Hagee's organization, Christians United for Israel (CUFI), which just happens to believe the final biblical battle against the Anti-Christ will be fought by the United States - against Iran.
As I wrote back in May 2006 ("Bush, Iran and the Second Coming"), key figures in the radical religious right see Israel and end-of-times conflict with Iran as the fulfillment of biblical prophesy contained in the Book of Revelation.
But it is Hagee who is at the bleeding edge of a Christian Zionist movement seeking to accelerate the Second Coming of Christ and the final battle in Israel. Since the 1990's, Hagee and his group CUFI (Christians United for Israel) has tried without success to breed the "red heifer," the perfect calf that will signal the Second Coming." As Sarah Posner wrote in the American Prospect, "for Hagee's new project - agitating for war with Iran - his influence over Washington is less important than his influence over his audience." His book Jerusalem Countdown sold over 500,000 copies. And as Posner reported, Hagee is not alone:
Hagee calls pastors "the spiritual generals of America" an appropriate phrase given his reliance on them to rally their troops behind his message. The CUFI board of directors includes the Reverend Jerry Falwell, former Republican presidential candidate and religious right activist Gary Bauer, and George Morrison, pastor to the 8,000-member Faith Bible Chapel in Arvada, Colorado, and chairman of the board of Promise Keepers. Rod Parsley, the Ohio televangelist who is rapidly becoming a major political figure in the Christian right, signed on as a regional director.
Just how much influence the likes of Hagee have over President Bush and his foreign policy team is open to debate. But as Max Blumenthal and Bill Moyers each reported last year, Pastor Hagee counts Washington's hardest of hard liners among his friends and CUFI allies. In October, Moyers described CUFI's annual summit in DC featuring Hagee's friends in high places:
At the recent annual CUFI summit in Washington, D.C., prominent politicians were present to pledge support for this growing movement, including Senators John McCain, Joseph Lieberman, House Minority Whip Roy Blunt, as well as former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay. Lieberman particularly sang Hagee's praise:
"He is a Ish Elokim, a man of God and those words really fit him...like Moses he's become a leader of a mighty multitude, even greater than the multitude that Moses led from Egypt to the promised land."
CUFI considers its defining issue to be the growing challenge of radical Islam, particularly as relates to the security of Israel and the United States. CUFI is incresingly concerned by Iran and its potential nuclear threats. Hagee often alludes to Nazi Germany in order to underline what he believes to be the gravity of the situation:
"Ladies and gentlemen, we are reliving history. It is 1938 all over again," Hagee explains in a 2007 speech. "Iran is Germany. Ahmadinejad is Hitler. And Ahmadinejad, just like Hitler, is talking about killing the Jews."
"The United States must join Israel in a pre-emptive military strike against Iran to fulfill God's plan for both Israel and the West...a biblically prophesied end-time confrontation with Iran, which will lead to the Rapture, Tribulation, and Second Coming of Christ."
In February, Senator McCain shared a San Antonio stage with Pastor Hagee and declared "All I can tell you is that I am very proud to have Pastor John Hagee's support." Since then, McCain offered a feeble apology to those offended by Hagee's comments about the Catholic Church being a "false cult system" and "the Great Whore." Today, he "categorically" rejected Hagee's slurs directed at New Orleans.
But on the subject of Hagee's agitating for conflict with Iran, the American media and John McCain alike have been silent. Just two weeks ago, Hagee announced a $6 million contribution to help fund the expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank, a policy McCain claims to oppose. And while John McCain jokes about "bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran," the press does little to learn more McCain's association with a group dedicated to doing just that.
John Hagee's anti-Catholic and anti-gay hatred should be enough for Americans to question John McCain's character and judgment. But is on the subject of Iran and his vision of Armageddon as foreign policy where Pastor Hagee is most dangerous. And from John McCain and the mainstream media - not a word.
For this and others questions the media won't ask Mr. Straight Talk, see:
In their testimony before Congress today, General David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker began painting a picture of American progress in Iraq. But even as the United States faces a diminishing threat from Al Qaeda thanks in part to former Sunni insurgents the U.S. has largely co-opted, American forces find themselves increasingly engaged in an intra-sectarian Shiite conflict in which Iran is seemingly backing all sides. And with General Petraeus calling for an indefinite pause in the drawdown of U.S. troops after July, President Bush's so-called "return on success" has apparently once again been postponed.
Here, then, are five questions for Petraeus and Crocker:
1. Did Iranian personnel play a role in the recent fighting in Basra? If so, on whose side(s)?
The Sunday Times this weekend wrote, "Iranian forces were involved in the recent battle for Basra, General David Petraeus, the US commander in Iraq, is expected to tell Congress this week." But in the three-way Shiite battle for Basra in which Iran was said to back all sides, the issue becomes which forces Tehran supported in the fighting.
No doubt, Moqtada Al Sadr's Mahdi Army militia has received logistical help from Iran. (Prime Minister Maliki's own Dawa Party also has direct ties to Tehran.) But the largest Shiite military-political force in Iraq, the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council (SIIC) and its associated Badr Brigades, is the biggest beneficiary of Iranian largesse:
Ray Takeyh of the Council on Foreign Relations noted the ISCI "was essentially created by Iran, and its militia, the Badr Brigade, was trained and equipped by the Revolutionary Guards" - which the Bush administration calls a "terrorist" organization.
Journalist Gareth Porter added the Badr militia is the "most pro-Iranian political-military forces in Iraq." In fact, ISCI leader Abdul Aziz al-Hakim "met with [Iranian Revolutionary Guard] officers to be his guests in December 2006, apparently to discuss military assistance to the Badr Organization."
Nonetheless, SIIC's leader Abdul Azziz al-Hakim was warmly greeted by President Bush at the White House in December 2006. Just last month, Vice President Cheney visited Hakim at his Baghdad compound.
As Senator Jack Reed (D-RI) pointed out on March 30:
"The Iranians have close associations with all the Shia communities, not only with Sadr but also Hakim...The notion that this is a fight by American allies against Iranian-inspired elements is not accurate."
2. What is the status of Al Qaeda in Iraq? Is it on the brink of defeat? If so, is the primary rationale for a continued American presence evaporating?
Back in October, the Washington Post reported that the Pentagon believed it had dealt "devastating and perhaps irreversible blows to al-Qaeda in Iraq in recent months."
As Karen de Young and Thomas Ricks (author of Fiasco, perhaps the defining military analysis of the invasion of Iraq) detailed, the drop-off in Al Qaeda attacks and the improving alliances with Sunni tribal leaders in Anbar province were leading some American military leaders to advocate a "declaration of victory":
Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, head of the Joint Special Operations Command's operations in Iraq, is the chief promoter of a victory declaration and believes that AQI has been all but eliminated, the military intelligence official said. But Adm. William J. Fallon, the chief of U.S. Central Command, which oversees Iraq and the rest of the Middle East, is urging restraint, the official said. The military intelligence official, like others interviewed for this report, spoke on the condition of anonymity about Iraq assessments and strategy.
Senior U.S. commanders on the ground, including Gen. David H. Petraeus, the head of U.S. forces in Iraq, have long complained that Central Command, along with the CIA, is too negative in its analyses. On this issue, however, Petraeus agrees with Fallon, the military intelligence official said.
Given that Al Qaeda in Iraq over the past two years has been responsible for only a small fraction of the attacks against U.S. forces and Iraqi civilians, is there not a Catch-22 for President Bush? That is, does the very dissipation of the Al Qaeda threat in Iraq remove his primary rationale for extending the American presence there?
As de Young and Ricks asked, does a declaration of the defeat of Al Qaeda "fuel criticism that the Iraq conflict has become a civil war in which U.S. combat forces should not be involved?"
3. Can the Sunni "Sons of Iraq" be trusted? Might they come to pose a threat to the Iraqi government in Baghdad?
There's little question that the creation of U.S. funded Sunni "Awakening Councils" have played a critical role in reducing violence against American troops and in beating back Al Qaeda in Iraq.
But there are increasing signs that the "Sons of Iraq," now numbering 90,000, may themselves become a source of instability. In November, Sami al Askari, a Shiite lawmaker who speaks to Prime Minister Maliki daily, worried, "When the U.S. leaves, what we'll have are two armies; one who's loyal to the government and one not loyal." In Diyala province, the Sons of Iraq recently split into two factions. And as the Washington Post reported on March 31, Col. Michael Fuller, chief of staff of the Multi-National Security Transition Command-Iraq, "said he expects the Baghdad government to incorporate about 20 percent of them into the Iraqi security forces over time." In an April 4 in a piece titled "Iraq's Sunni Time Bomb," former First Calvary Division political advisor Matt Sherman wrote:
"Failure to find a new role for the Sons of Iraq, however, will result in the deterioration of government authority, an inability to draw down our own forces, and a return to militia rule for much of Iraq."
General Petraeus has said they will stay loyal to the American cause "as long as it is in their interests." Is there a still a convergence of interests? Or only as long the Sons of Iraq are paid by the American people?
4. Who is the enemy for the United States in Iraq? Do the United States and the Maliki government share common foes and common friends?
The fiasco in Basra again raises the question as to whether the United States and the Maliki government in Baghdad really share common objectives and common enemies. As I noted in November:
More and more, President Bush's strategy in Iraq resembles an M.C. Escher illustration. Like the hands drawing each other or the elegant depiction of stairways that cannot possibly meet, the military progress of the U.S. surge is producing an image of a future Iraq that, while glorious to behold, can never be built. The very American alliances with Sunni tribal leaders that are reducing sectarian violence and the threat from Al Qaeda also threaten to undermine the Shiite majority government in Baghdad. And the "enduring" U.S. presence announced by President Bush may serve only to protect the Maliki government from its domestic enemies, not its friend and American foe Iran. If anything, the surge may be making the prospect of Iraqi national reconciliation even more remote.
As American forces battle the Mahdi Army in the streets of Sadr City, analysts increasingly view the Maliki assault in Basra as an effort to crush the Sadrists in advance of October provincial elections in which his Dawa party and its ally the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council will lose seats. More importantly, the SIIC seeks to promote a nine-province Shiite regional government in the south, a move opposed by Sadr and his followers. Such a development would seem to run counter to stated American positions.
Meanwhile, as the fighting rages in Baghdad, Iraq faces an ominous deadline as Moqtada al Sadr responds to the Iraqi government demand to disarm the Mahdi Army or face a ban from political participation. Should Sadr choose to stand and fight, will the United States be at the forefront? Will the U.S. demand that other militias currently allied to Maliki, including Hakim's Badr Brigades and the Kurdish peshmerga, also disarm? Will the U.S. press the Maliki government to absorb the Sunni "Sons of Iraq" into the Iraqi security forces, as it has done with 10,000 of the Badr Brigades?
5. Are the Iraqis "Standing Up?"
President Bush has famously (or infamously) argued that "as the Iraqis stand up, we'll stand down." In the wake of Prime Minister Maliki's offensive against the Mahdi Army is Basra, are we any closer to that happening?
No doubt, that the Iraqi security forces were able to mount the operation at all represents some progress over its past cut and run performances. But the assault on Basra, launched without prior coordination with the United States quickly ground to a halt. News accounts report at least 1,000 Iraqi personnel abandoned their units, including two high ranking officers. Ultimately, U.S. forces and air strikes were needed to help secure Basra. In addition, the British, who had earlier rejected American requests for a surge back into Basra, played a much larger role in backing the Maliki forces than was initially reported. (In the wake of the fighting, the planned British pull-out from southern Iraq has been put on hold.) Worse still, the carnage in Basra was halted only after Iraqi lawmakers traveled to Iran, where a general of the Qods Force (labeled a terrorist organization by the United States) brokered a deal with the Sadrists.
Since September, President Bush replaced his "we're making progress" talking point with the mantra of "return on success." That is, as the situation improves on the ground in Iraq, more American troops will be coming home. But with General Petraeus' announcement that U.S. force levels will be indefinitely maintained at 140,000 troops following the last planned drawdowns in July, there is apparently no return on success. And negotiations for a new strategic framework agreement between the U.S. and Iraq may codify that open-ended commitment.
While President Bush declared two weeks ago that "normalcy is returning back to Iraq" (a point John McCain echoed Monday when he claimed Iraq was returning to "something approaching normal"), the grim reality in the ground still raises the questions. When can the American people expect to receive the return on success? When can U.S. troops stand down?
Events on the ground in Iraq continue to defy the Bush's administration's ongoing misrepresentation of the Iranian threat there. Just one day after Republican Senator Lindsay Graham wrongly claimed Iran was backing just one of the three Shiite forces in Basra comes word that Tehran brokered a deal aimed at halting the carnage there.
As McClatchy, USA Today, the New York Times and others are reporting, Iraqi lawmakers traveled to Qom where a general of the Iranian Qods force helped negotiate the agreement to try to end the fighting between the Maliki government, his allies in the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, Basra's Fadhilla party and Moqtada Al-Sadr' Mahdi Army. (Sadr has been pursuing his religious studies in the Iranian city.) As McClatchy reported:
There the Iraqi lawmakers held talks with Brig. Gen. Qassem Suleimani, commander of the Qods (Jerusalem) brigades of Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps and signed an agreement with Sadr, which formed the basis of his statement Sunday, members of parliament said.
Ali al Adeeb, a member of Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki's Dawa party, and Hadi al Ameri, the head of the Badr Organization, the military wing of the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, had two aims, lawmakers said: to ask Sadr to stand down his militia and to ask Iranian officials to stop supplying weapons to Shiite militants in Iraq.
All of which suggests the complexity of the American position in Iraq, one which President Bush and his allies can't - or won't - acknowledge . Contrary to McCain ally Graham's statement about Sadr's Madhi Army ("The militias that we are fighting are backed by Iran"), Iran is providing arms, training and logistical assistance to all of the Shiite factions involved in the recent fighting. (And the Qods force is recognized as a terrorist organization by the United States.) As ThinkProgress noted Sunday, no Shiite military/political group is a bigger beneficiary of Iranian largesse than the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council of Sayyed Abdul Azziz al-Hakim. And Hakim isn't merely an ally of Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki. He also happens to have had high-profile meetings with both President Bush and Vice President Cheney.
Regardless, the agreement is fragile, to say the least. An unnamed Iraqi official worried, "I will not be surprised if the whole thing collapses." Osama al Nejafi, a legislator from an Iraqi parliamentary committee created to address the Basra crisis, concluded, "Iran was part of the problem and an effective part of the negotiations."
Back in Washington, no doubt, the Bush White House only heard the first part Nejafi's assessment.
UPDATE: As I noted above, the Iranian Qods force is on an American list of terrorist organizations. McClatchy is now reporting that Brig. Gen. Qassem Suleimani mentioned above appears by name on U.S. Treasury and United Nations terrorism and nuclear materials watch lists.
Four Strikes and You're Out: McCain on Al Qaeda and Iran
If the contest for the White House followed the rules of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire," John McCain would be going home empty-handed. At last four times in the past month, George W. Bush's would-be Republican successor sounded the alarm over a non-existent Al Qaeda-Iran alliance in Iraq. But for a lifeline from Joe Lieberman, McCain would have been booted off the stage by now.
As ThinkProgress detailed this morning, McCain's confusion over friend and foe began at least as far back as February 28th. During an appearance at the Baker Institute for Public Policy in Houston, McCain warned:
"But Al Qaeda is there, they are functioning, they are supported in many times, in many ways by the Iranians."
McCain's troubles started in earnest during his much-hyped Middle East tour this week. Apparently lacking the playbill or even crib notes, McCain on Monday told right-wing radio host Hugh Hewitt:
"As you know, there are al Qaeda operatives that are taken back into Iran, given training as leaders, and they're moving back into Iraq."
But it was during his startling Tuesday press conference in Jordan when McCain failed to understand that when it comes to Iran and Al Qaeda in Iraq, the enemy of our enemy is not our friend. As the Washington Post reported, it took that lifeline from his ersatz Democratic sidekick Joe Lieberman to save McCain from himself:
He said several times that Iran, a predominately Shiite country, was supplying the mostly Sunni militant group, al-Qaeda. In fact, officials have said they believe Iran is helping Shiite extremists in Iraq.
Speaking to reporters in Amman, the Jordanian capital, McCain said he and two Senate colleagues traveling with him continue to be concerned about Iranian operatives "taking al-Qaeda into Iran, training them and sending them back."
Pressed to elaborate, McCain said it was "common knowledge and has been reported in the media that al-Qaeda is going back into Iran and receiving training and are coming back into Iraq from Iran, that's well known. And it's unfortunate." A few moments later, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, standing just behind McCain, stepped forward and whispered in the presidential candidate's ear. McCain then said: "I'm sorry, the Iranians are training extremists, not al-Qaeda."
Finding itself in a hole, the McCain campaign decided to keep digging. On Wednesday, McCain's team issued a written statement perpetuating its error:
"Al Qaeda and Shia extremists -- with support from external powers such as Iran -- are on the run but not defeated."
Seeing the distress of its man McCain, a candidate whose entire claim to the White Houe is premised on his supposed national security credentials, the right-wing amen corner rushed to his defense. The Weekly Standard and Powerline fought a rear-guard action, citing incidents of "cooperation" pre-dating the 9/11 attacks to justify McCain's repeated claims of Tehran's backing for Al Qaeda in Iraq. By Thursday, the McCain campaign itself was echoing their claims:
But while the McCain campaign is backing away from the specific claims about Iranian training of Al Qaeda, it is asserting that Iran collaborates with Osama bin Laden's organization.
Mr. McCain's national security adviser, Randy Scheunemann, told The New York Sun, "There is ample documentation that Iran has provided many different forms of support to Sunni extremists, including Al Qaeda as well as Shi'ia extremists in Iraq. It would require a willing suspension of disbelief to deny Iran supports Al Qaeda in Iraq."
Scheunemann might have wanted to check with the candidate before making that statement. During an interview Wednesday, John McCain told NBC's Kelly O'Donnell he simply misspoke:
"I don't claim that I won't misspeak on occasion, but I will correct it immediately."
"To think that I would have some lack of knowledge about Sunni and Shia after my eighth visit and my deep involvement in this issue is a bit ludicrous."
Given McCain's repeated demonstrations that he doesn't know his ass from his elbow about the players in Iraq without a scorecard, the concerns are far from ludicrous. All of which raises the question: why is John McCain getting Al Qaeda-Iran alliance wrong?
I'll offer three theories, each as disturbing as the next. The first is simple ignorance: McCain simply can't track all the moving pieces in the sectarian conflict in Iraq. Second is that this foot soldier in the Reagan revolution is displaying some of the same creeping cognitive shortfalls as the Gipper himself. But just as likely is that the statements are intentional. McCain, like President Bush and the supposed leading lights of the Republican Party, is pursuing the rhetorical strategy of conflation. That is, McCain like his possible running mate Mitt Romney is fear mongering by hyping an "Islamofascism" which conflates all Muslims - Sunni and Shiite, friend and foe, guilty and innocent, and especially Tehran - into a single unified threat.
In that same interview Wednesday, McCain himself offered support for all three theories.
"Al Qaeda is military. Al Qaeda is killing Americans as we speak. Islamic extremists are being trained in Iran and they are being sent back into Iran, I mean into Iraq."
No doubt, John McCain's endless errors would get him kicked off "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire." But judging by recent polls, his mistake filled, five-year record on Iraq has not yet led the Americanpeople - and certainly not the American press - to conclude John McCain is unfit for command.
Wrong Again: McCain Proclaims Al Qaeda-Iran Alliance
As I documented just two day ago, John McCain has been wrong from the start about virtually every aspect of the Iraq war. From Ahmed Chalabi and Saddam's WMD to the prospects of Americans troops being greeting as liberators and the certainty of a "rapid" U.S. victory in "three weeks," John McCain had it wrong at every turn. Today in Jordan, the Republican presidential nominee made a much fundamental - and shocking - mistake. Would-be commander-in-chief John McCain literally doesn't know who we're fighting in Iraq.
McCain's feeble grasp of the complexities on the ground was apparent during a meeting with Jordan's King Abdullah. Amazingly, McCain portrayed Sunni Al Qaeda as the ally of Shiite Iran. As the Washington Post reported, it took a worried whisper from his ersatz Democratic sidekick Joe Lieberman to save McCain from himself:
He said several times that Iran, a predominately Shiite country, was supplying the mostly Sunni militant group, al-Qaeda. In fact, officials have said they believe Iran is helping Shiite extremists in Iraq.
Speaking to reporters in Amman, the Jordanian capital, McCain said he and two Senate colleagues traveling with him continue to be concerned about Iranian operatives "taking al-Qaeda into Iran, training them and sending them back."
Pressed to elaborate, McCain said it was "common knowledge and has been reported in the media that al-Qaeda is going back into Iran and receiving training and are coming back into Iraq from Iran, that's well known. And it's unfortunate." A few moments later, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, standing just behind McCain, stepped forward and whispered in the presidential candidate's ear. McCain then said: "I'm sorry, the Iranians are training extremists, not al-Qaeda."
For a man whose candidacy is solely premised on his national security credentials, confusing friend and foe in Iraq is all the more startling. Al Qaeda, after all, is a bitter enemy of the two leading Shiite movements in Iraq (SCIRI and Muqtada Al Sadr), each of which receives material support from Iran. In a region in which "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" is often accepted as a guiding principle, it would be helpful if John McCain understood that Al Qaeda is the enemy of Iran, and neither is a friend of the United States.
The mobius strip that is the Bush strategy endorsed by McCain in Iraq is almost infinitely complex. It is an extreme understatement to say that is problematic for John McCain, a man who like the man he would replace deals only in simple certainties (in March 2003, McCain said Americans troops would "absolutely, absolutely" be greeted as liberators). As I wrote late last year:
More and more, President Bush's strategy in Iraq resembles an M.C. Escher illustration. Like the hands drawing each other or the elegant depiction of stairways that cannot possibly meet, the military progress of the U.S. surge is producing an image of a future Iraq that, while glorious to behold, can never be built. The very American alliances with Sunni tribal leaders that are reducing sectarian violence and the threat from Al Qaeda also threaten to undermine the Shiite majority government in Baghdad. And the "enduring" U.S. presence announced by President Bush this week may serve only to protect the Maliki government from its domestic enemies, not its friend and American foe Iran. If anything, the surge may be making the prospect of Iraqi national reconciliation even more remote.
Given the evident misunderstanding on display in Amman today, John McCain seems wholly unable to grasp the very strategy he has sworn to perpetuate.
And yet, a new poll from CNN/Opinion Research shows the American people overwhelmingly prefer John McCain over either Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton when it comes to national security issue. It is bad enough that as the American economy stands on the brink of a financial meltdown, John McCain has acknowledged "the issue of economics is not something I've understood as well as I should." Now, it's clear that the man who admits he doesn't know his ass from his elbow about the economy also doesn't know s**t from shinola about the realities on the ground in Iraq. As McCain himself put it back in 2005:
"I'm going to be honest: I know a lot less about economics than I do about military and foreign policy issues. I still need to be educated."
Given today's colossal gaffe, John McCain doesn't exactly inspire confidence that he is ready to be commander-in-chief on Day One.
UPDATE 1: As ThinkProgress, CNN and others have reported, this is not the first time McCain has gotten the players wrong in Iraq. On Monday, he told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt:
"As you know, there are al Qaeda operatives that are taken back into Iran, given training as leaders, and they're moving back into Iraq."
Sadly for McCain, the presidency does not come with a playbook.
UPDATE 2: On Wednesday, the McCain campaign yet again managed to perpetuate the mistaken Al Qaeda-Iran connection, this time in a written statement:
"Al Qaeda and Shia extremists -- with support from external powers such as Iran -- are on the run but not defeated."
UPDATE 3: ThinkProgess documents that McCain offered up the erroneous Al Qaeda - Iran nexus during a February 28th appearance at the Baker Institute for Public Policy in Houston:
"But Al Qaeda is there, they are functioning, they are supported in many times, in many ways by the Iranians."
Over the past week, Democrat Hillary Clinton has proclaimed her potential Republican rival John McCain to be the gold standard of wartime presidents. But lost in Clinton's fierce barrage against Barack Obama's national security experience is the inescapable conclusion about John McCain's own suitability as Commander-in-Chief. McCain's mistake-filled record, questionable judgment, calamitous misreading of history, nonchalance about American casualties and notorious short fuse all combine to make him a dangerous choice to lead an America at war. Simply put, John McCain is unfit for command.
Hoodwinked by Chalabi
John McCain was certainly not alone in his enthusiastic support for the invasion of Iraq, perhaps the greatest American strategic debacle since the end of World War II. But as ThinkProgress detailed, McCain was an early and vocal advocate beginning in the 1990's for Ahmed Chalabi, the charlatan and pitchman for the Iraqi National Congress:
One of his key backers has been John McCain, who was one of the first patrons of Chalabi's grand-sounding International Committee for a Free Iraq when it was founded in 1991. McCain was Chalabi's favored candidate in the 2000 election since Chalabi knew that he would be able to free up the $97 million in military aid plus millions pushed through in Congress and earmarked for Chalabi's exile group, the Iraqi National Congress, but held up by the Clinton State Department.
Indeed, McCain was a Chalabi backer long before President Bush took power. In 1997, he tried to pressure the Clinton administration into setting up an Iraqi government in exile.
Despite Chalabi's past sentencing in absentia in Jordan to 22 years in prison for embezzlement and bank fraud, McCain declared in 2003, "He's a patriot who has the best interests of his country at heart." Still, don't expect to see Ahmed Chalabi at President McCain's State of the Union address in 2010.
No doubt, John McCain was hoodwinked by Chalabi, the charismatic frontman for a self-serving exile group out of touch with the people - and reality - on the ground in Iraq. But with exile figures and dissident groups - and their questionable intelligence - set to play a critical role in the American approach to Iran, the United States can't afford any more of John McCain's judgment and experience.
Failing History 101
To be sure, Americans cannot trust John McCain to safeguard the nation's future because he does not understand its past. Nowhere is McCain's confusion more on display than in his repeated (and misguided) comparisons of Iraq to South Korea and his commitment to keep American troops there for 100 years.
Here, McCain traveling down the well-trod path of President Bush. Last June, then White House press secretary Tony Snow described Bush's "over the horizon support role" for the United States in Iraq as comparable to the American presence in Japan, Germany or South Korea:
"The Korean model is one in which the United States provides a security presence, but you've had the development of a successful democracy in South Korea over a period of years, and, therefore, the United States is there as a force of stability."
The analogy, of course, is laughable. Germany and Japan unconditionally surrendered to Allied forces in World War II and were occupied by U.S. troops after those nations' total devastation. Each subsequently became allies in the Cold War, and featured a large - and perpetual - American military presence as part of strategy to contain the Soviet Union. In South Korea as well, U.S. troops provide a guarantee against the external threat posed by the North. There, American troops serve as a trip-wire intended to trigger a massive U.S. response in the face of any aggression by Pyongyong.
In none of those places is the U.S. an occupying power, propping up a government against domestic threats or trying to limit a civil war. In Iraq, the United States is part referee trying to prevent the death spiral of sectarian conflict among Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds and part enabler, backing both the Shiite dominated Maliki in government in Baghdad and independent Sunni security councils opposed to it. While the fight against must Al Qaeda continue, the U.S. with its installations around the Persian Gulf does not need permanent, forward operating bases in Iraq.
And yet John McCain mimics the Bush administration's shockingly erroneous Korea model. In June, McCain echoed the White House, proclaiming, "We have had troops in South Korea for 60 years and nobody minds." By January 2008, McCain said "it would be fine" with him if the American forces remained in Iraq for "a hundred years:"
Q: President Bush has talked about our staying in Iraq for 50 years - (cut off by McCain)
McCAIN: Make it a hundred.
Q: Is that... (cut off)
McCAIN: We've been in South Korea...we've been in Japan for 60 years. We've been in South Korea 50 years or so. That would be fine with me.
As David Corn reported, McCain was only too happy to extend the American timeline in Iraq to "a thousand years" or "a million years." One month later, McCain nonchalantly claimed, "The U.S. could have a military presence anywhere in the world for a long period of time." Facing criticism for those comments, McCain on February 28th just dug the hole deeper:
"No American argues against our military presence in Korea or Japan or Germany or Kuwait or other places, or Turkey, because America is not receiving casualties...But the key to it is American casualties, America's most precious asset, and that is American blood."
McCain's centuries-long commitment in Iraq is more than a little ironic. After all, in January 2003, McCain confidently predicted of the American invasion, "I think the victory will be rapid, within about three weeks."
Casual with Casualties
It's also ironic that John McCain would claim "the key to it is American casualties." McCain, after all, has repeatedly downplayed the dangers U.S. troops face, all in the name of helping sell the ongoing war in Iraq.
One of the more comic moments in McCain's cheerleading came on April 1, 2007. (Literally April Fool's Day - you can't make this stuff up.) Wearing a bulletproof vest and guarded by "100 American soldiers, with three Blackhawk helicopters, and two Apache gunships overhead," McCain briefly toured a Baghdad market to demonstrate that the American people were "not getting the full picture." As ThinkProgress detailed:
McCain recently claimed that there "are neighborhoods in Baghdad where you and I could walk through those neighborhoods, today." In a press conference after his Baghdad tour, McCain told a reporter that his visit to the market today was proof that you could indeed "walk freely" in some areas of Baghdad.
And just this past weekend, Senator McCain returned to a tried and untrue Republican talking point: Iraq is no more dangerous than most major American cities. Speaking to an audience on Saturday, McCain announced, "There's problems in America with safe neighborhoods as we well know." In this case, at least, even McCain realized his statement was non-sensical on its face and sounded the retreat. "I'm not making that comparison, because it's much more deadly in Iraq obviously," he said, adding, "But it's kind of the same theory."
Hothead with a Short Fuse
No doubt, presidential temperament is a critical ingredient to a successful commander-in-chief. During the Cuban Missile Crisis, a calm, cool and collected John F. Kennedy walked the world back from the brink of nuclear conflagration while ending the Soviet nuclear threat just 90 miles away. Huddling with the diverse group of advisers making up his Executive Committee, Kennedy resisted the urge for the massive str
