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10 things to know about McCain
For all the coverage this week of Senator John McCain's background, there are some important things you won't learn about him from the TV networks. His carefully crafted positive image relies on people not knowing this stuff—and you might be surprised by some of it.
Please check out the list below, and then forward it to your friends, family, and coworkers. We can't rely on the media to tell folks about the real John McCain—but if we all pass this along, we can reach as many people as CNN Headline News does on a good night.
Click here to tell us how many people you can pass it on to—and to see our progress nationally:
http://pol.moveon.org/mccain10/
10 things you should know about John McCain (but probably don't):
John McCain voted against establishing a national holiday in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Now he says his position has "evolved," yet he's continued to oppose key civil rights laws.1
According to Bloomberg News, McCain is more hawkish than Bush on Iraq, Russia and China. Conservative columnist Pat Buchanan says McCain "will make Cheney look like Gandhi."2
His reputation is built on his opposition to torture, but McCain voted against a bill to ban waterboarding, and then applauded President Bush for vetoing that ban.3
McCain opposes a woman's right to choose. He said, "I do not support Roe versus Wade. It should be overturned."4
The Children's Defense Fund rated McCain as the worst senator in Congress for children. He voted against the children's health care bill last year, then defended Bush's veto of the bill.5
He's one of the richest people in a Senate filled with millionaires. The Associated Press reports he and his wife own at least eight homes! Yet McCain says the solution to the housing crisis is for people facing foreclosure to get a "second job" and skip their vacations.6
Many of McCain's fellow Republican senators say he's too reckless to be commander in chief. One Republican senator said: "The thought of his being president sends a cold chill down my spine. He's erratic. He's hotheaded. He loses his temper and he worries me."7
McCain talks a lot about taking on special interests, but his campaign manager and top advisers are actually lobbyists. The government watchdog group Public Citizen says McCain has 59 lobbyists raising money for his campaign, more than any of the other presidential candidates.8
McCain has sought closer ties to the extreme religious right in recent years. The pastor McCain calls his "spiritual guide," Rod Parsley, believes America's founding mission is to destroy Islam, which he calls a "false religion." McCain sought the political support of right-wing preacher John Hagee, who believes Hurricane Katrina was God's punishment for gay rights and called the Catholic Church "the Antichrist" and a "false cult."9
He positions himself as pro-environment, but he scored a 0—yes, zero—from the League of Conservation Voters last year.10
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Sources:
1. "The Complicated History of John McCain and MLK Day," ABC News, April 3, 2008
http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2
"McCain Facts," ColorOfChange.org, April 4, 2008
http://colorofchange.org/mccain_facts/
2. "McCain More Hawkish Than Bush on Russia, China, Iraq," Bloomberg News, March 12, 2008
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=2
"Buchanan: John McCain 'Will Make Cheney Look Like Gandhi,'" ThinkProgress, February 6, 2008
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/02/06/buch
3. "McCain Sides With Bush On Torture Again, Supports Veto Of Anti-Waterboarding Bill," ThinkProgress, February 20, 2008
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/02/20/mcca
4. "McCain says Roe v. Wade should be overturned," MSNBC, February 18, 2007
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17222147/
5. "2007 Children's Defense Fund Action Council® Nonpartisan Congressional Scorecard," February 2008
http://www.childrensdefense.org/site/Pag
"McCain: Bush right to veto kids health insurance expansion," CNN, October 3, 2007
http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/10/03/m
6. "Beer Executive Could Be Next First Lady," Associated Press, April 3, 2008
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5h-S1s
"McCain Says Bank Bailout Should End `Systemic Risk,'" Bloomberg News, March 25, 2008
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=2
7. "Will McCain's Temper Be a Liability?," Associated Press, February 16, 2008
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory?i
"Famed McCain temper is tamed," Boston Globe, January 27, 2008
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articl
8. "Black Claims McCain's Campaign Is Above Lobbyist Influence: 'I Don't Know What The Criticism Is,'" ThinkProgress, April 2, 2008
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/04/02/mcca
"McCain's Lobbyist Friends Rally 'Round Their Man," ABC News, January 29, 2008
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=4
9. "McCain's Spiritual Guide: Destroy Islam," Mother Jones Magazine, March 12, 2008
http://www.motherjones.com/washington_di
"Will McCain Specifically 'Repudiate' Hagee's Anti-Gay Comments?," ThinkProgress, March 12, 2008
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/03/12/mcca
"McCain 'Very Honored' By Support Of Pastor Preaching 'End-Time Confrontation With Iran,'" ThinkProgress, February 28, 2008
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/02/28/hage
10. "John McCain Gets a Zero Rating for His Environmental Record," Sierra Club, February 28, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/blogs/environmen
But not as much as this link of the "killer" wiener dogs.
I know Ciara loves her chihuahua, but I can agree that it deserves a place at the top of the list -- but according to this study, Pit Bulls are #6 and BEAGLES are #7??? Jake has only ever been aggressive to a sausage left on someone's plate as they look away.
On a related topic, I give you Bonzi's Bakfiets Ride!
I GOT A wii!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I went to best buy... armed with a $150 gift certificate from my company... and saw they had a stack of 'em in front of the check lanes. So on impulse, I bought one!!! YAY ME!!!!!
So I'm up having a snack because the low blood sugar alarm thingy on my pump was going off...
I'm reading Wonkette; and the comment posted by the following picture made me laugh out loud:
"I believe that is a bloodstained adult diaper stolen from [John McCain's] Straight-Talk Express. Obama displays it prominently to keep reminding himself what he's really up against."
The People - Everyone is so fucking important, much more important than you, which is the first lesson you learn living in Fairfax County. Especially women with children. They are more important because they have brought forth life, which apparently they are the first to have EVER done, so that means that they can pretty much do anything they want. When we first moved here, we were at Giant getting groceries, and this woman came up to me and said "I need to go in front of you, I have children." I just stood there and said "okay??" and she said "I was just over there looking at magazines" and she proceeded to move my cart aside so she could get through with her basket of cottage cheese, heavy-flow tampons and diuretics. Daily, I hear conversations where tits talk about what they have, and how much it costs. Who fucking cares? The people in this area are a bunch of soulless cunts, so what good is your $400k wardrobe or your spiffy car when you're dead and gone and your children are left to bury your silicone-implanted, over-tanned, leathery-skinned ass? The one thing I will say is that all of the people who I have met, and actually can stand or like, aren't from this area. Most of them aren't even from this country. People are so fake here, they'll use you when they need you and then talk shit behind your back. The closest thing I can compare it to is when you try to save someone who is drowning, and they push you underwater to try to get above the surface. Now imagine 2 million people in the same pool, all tripping over each other and gouging each others eyes out -- and for what? To be the cunt on TOP of the fetid shit pile? I told Luke a couple of weeks ago that now I'm so used to unfriendly, impolite service that I'm now wowed when someone doesn't scowl at me, kick me in the nards or spit blood in my face. Sometimes you just stand there, wanting someone to thank you for patronizing their establishment, but you in turn just get a look from Raja or whoever is working there that basically says "the fuck do I owe you something?" Last night at Wegmans, this annoying woman in a ratty skirt with warm-up socks on was blaring her conversation on her cellphone while loading her items onto the conveyer belt behind me. At one point, she decided she didn't want her mushrooms so she reached in front of my face, lobbed the mushrooms onto the magazine rack and moaned "I'm not taking these" at the cashier, who had been talking to me, all without removing her cell phone from her face. During the same time, she repeatedly jammed her cart into the back of me, either telling me to move up so she could fit her stuff on the conveyer belt or just because she is more important (which, if you recall from earlier, either means she probably has two tow-headed children named Morgan and Madison outside in her 700 class BMW). Cunty cuntalicious cunt.
Here is a cool video I shot - it's a beautiful desert sunset - 50 minutes of video condensed down to 30 seconds now on youtube:
congratulations, uno!
it's about time that beagles got the credit they deserve!
- Mood:
amused
1) i registered while getting my driver's license so the accuracy of the registration should have been verified by the department of motor vehicles
2) with all of the hoops the dmv in the commonwealth of virginia makes you jump through to prove your residency, you would think they could key the shit in accurately!
3) it would have been nice to get a letter or a post card from the state election board about my application being denied.
4) i got a letter from arizona stating that they did receive my request to cancel my registration in pima county.
so i ended up voting with a provisional ballot. the chief stated that he had never used a provisional ballot before. so after reading through the instructions i filled out my ballot (i didn't get to use a privacy booth but rather used a table while the chief shielded his eyes) and put it in the envelope. he then told me that the fairfax county election board meets tomorrow at noon (during which time i work) to review the provisionals and i can go appear in person to let them know why i think my vote should be counted. so since i cant make it for this meeting, my vote probably wont be counted. this bothers me because how do i know how objective the people on the voting board are going to be? i'm going to be writing a letter to my senator about this. i don't usually do that, but this is a primary where single votes are making all the difference and i want mine to count.
- Mood:
angry
well, according to a cnn story, two tunisians and a dane were arrested for plotting a "terror-related" assasination against the cartoonist, kurt westergaard. ok, idiots... let's think this through...
1) a drawing offends you - westergaard states (and has stated from day one) that the cartoon was supposed to depict the exploitation of mohammad to legitimize terror. people pissed off by the cartoon states that the koran forbids the depiction of the prophet. ok that's fine - don't depict it yourselves. but you live in the big world with other people who don't read or live their lives by the koran (especially in, shock, denmark?) and whatever happened to "sticks and stones may break my bones but
2) you think it's wrong to depict mohammad as a terrorist - okay thats fair. i'd be slightly perturbed to see an image of jesus as a terrorist, but it wouldn't make me want to go out and blow things up.
3) in your mind, the only way to show your indignation against such "images of terror" is to go out and COMMIT ACTS OF TERROR? - um, yeah, that will show the world that you aren't crazy. that would be like a vegetarian going out to show their support of the cause and the lifestyle by sitting down for some barbeque ribs at sugarfoot's.
i guess i just don't understand the thought process... you depict a figure, important to my faith, as a terrorist -- it offends me, i go out and commit acts of terror, and that is supposed to prove you WRONG? i know that the media only presents skewed versions of the muslim faith (in typical us-american style), and i know MANY muslims that i have worked with even spent time with in social settings and none of them have been anything but kind, respectable people. in fact, if more people were like the muslims that i know, then this would be a much nicer place for all of us to live in. but c'mon people... if you don't want the rest of the world to think you're all kookoo bananas, then you're going to have to stop trying to blow people up and kill people everytime someone does something that offends you. people have the right to expression (at least here, and in denmark), and you have the right to not read the morgenavisen jyllands-posten. i mean, after all, it's not like they were talking about your "all-but-the-eyes-shrouded wife who has to ask for your permission to travel or have surgery?
- Mood:
confused
I transferred again in October, although this time 1) on my own volition and 2) much closer to home. I am now working in Dulles, VA, which is about 15 miles from my house. It's really not a bad commute. I am working a ton more hours though, because I am with all new bosses and really trying to prove myself. So far, it seems to be working. I am currently trying to get promoted, and hopefully it will happen.
I bought a new car in October, after 6 months of schlepping off of others. I love my baby, its a black 2004 Acura TSX. It is a 6-speed (aka speeding ticket waiting to happen), with black leather interior and a navigation system. It's really nice, and I love driving it hehehe.
In other news, my little sister, Ciara, is now pregnant. She took a few tests a couple of weeks ago and they all said go but now she has had her first sonogram and it is showing a little baby Jellybean Simula. So congrats to my sister, and congrats to me for being an uncle for the first time yay!!
We are currently planning two trips to the Buckeye state, one more for sure than the other. For Christmas Eve, we will be going to see Luke's parents near Pittsburgh. We will only be there for 2 days so will not be going to Columbus. I have taken a whole grip of time off at the beginning of January to go to Columbus, but I am holding off to see about the promotion before I make any definite plans. If I get the promotion, I will probably postpone until February. It wouldn't seem right to take a new job for 3 days and then jet for 2 weeks. So that's that.
Well, Jake is bothering me to take him outside so he can whizz and drop nuggs, so I will see y'all later. Have a great Holiday season.
Oh and PS - COLD IS NOT A MOOD DAMMIT!!
- Location:Centreville
- Mood:
cold - Music:Pop the Glock - Uffie
I am not going to go into detail with what David will be doing over there, although he is serving alongside the Army in the combat areas.
I wish them both luck. They both have friends and family back here in the states that want them home safely. I will never vote for anyone who was not steadfast against this war the minute it proved to be a laughable failure.
