RERUNS: THE MMTP ARCHIVE

Episode 23: Will the Real John McCain Please Stand Up?

By Lee Molloy

John McCain

For our reality series Make Me the President, we scoured the country to find the most power-hungry, Machiavellian and downright unattractive people in the United States of America (“The Greatest Nation On Earth” ™) to find the person who could raise the most money, be willing to break the most promises and offer the most bland reason to become — The President.

This week on MMTP:

Sen. Hillary “Nottie” Clinton finally gave her blessing to Sen. Barack “Hottie” Obama and advised her fans to support Obama’s bid to win MMTP ’08.

Meanwhile, Sen. John “Maverick?” McCain tried to woo Clinton’s fans over to the dark side of the force: “As the father of three daughters, I owe her a debt for inspiring millions of women to believe there is no opportunity in this great country beyond their reach,” he said in Louisiana last week. “I am proud to call her my friend.” So, then why, when one of his fans asked him on the campaign trail, “How do we beat the bitch?” did he not tell the questioner that one doesn’t talk about his friends that way, instead of saying, “That’s an excellent question”?

In a blatant attempt to attract the kids, McCain gave his weird speech against a green backdrop. And his parody of Obama with the self-satisfied “and that’s not change we can believe in” zinger really amused the white folks in the audience, which was, effectively, everyone in the audience.

The thing about McCain is he sounds a lot better if one is not distracted by the visuals of a tired old man with wooden delivery and an incredibly insincere smile. Seriously, he does; just don’t look at the screen. As they say in show business, “He has a great face for radio.”

Anyway, a recently released CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll found that if Obama does not choose Clinton for his veep, 22 percent of her fans would stay home during the general election and another 17 percent would vote for McCain.

So, considering Clinton has come out firmly on the side of Obama, and both the Team Democrats contestants agree there is hardly any difference between them, why would a fan switch allegiance to a Team Republicans contestant? Is McCain really a maverick that Team Democrats fans could accept? Let’s take a look:

“I will keep fighting to give the government back to the people; to keep our promises to young and old alike by paying our debts, saving Social Security and Medicare and reforming a tax code that benefits the powerful few at the expense of the many,” McCain said at the suspension of his MMTP 2000 campaign. Which is a noble sentiment to be sure, and one that he reiterated during a Senate floor speech regarding the Bush tax cuts on May 26, 2001: “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 who most need tax relief.” But, as MMTP has said before, McCain 2000 is not McCain 2008, which is apparent in a recent radio campaign ad claiming, “I’ll make the Bush tax cuts permanent.” And that, like in the days before he discovered Viagra, makes him a little bit flip-floppy.

Speaking of flip-flopping, in 2003 McCain said that ethanol “does nothing to reduce fuel consumption, nothing to increase our energy independence, nothing to improve air quality.” Then, while campaigning in Iowa in August 2006, he described ethanol as a “vital alternative energy source, not only because of our dependency on foreign oil, but its greenhouse reduction effects.” Then, on the trail in February in Massachusetts, he reverted to his anti-ethanol position. So, to totally disrespect the words of Bob Dylan, McCain’s answers, my friends, are blowing in the wind, his answers are blowing in the wind….

Because many of the Clinton fans who speak of supporting McCain are women, MMTP producers decided to look at McCain’s opinions on women’s reproductive health.

“I’d love to see a point where Roe v. Wade is irrelevant and could be repealed because abortion is no longer necessary,” McCain told the media in 1999. “But certainly in the short term, or even the long term, I would not support repeal of Roe v. Wade, which would then force women in America to [have] illegal and dangerous operations.” OK, that seems a reasonable position for a conservative to take, but again, that was then; this is now, and now JohnMcCain.com clearly reads: “John McCain believes Roe v. Wade is a flawed decision that must be overturned, and as president, he will nominate judges who understand that courts should not be in the business of legislating from the bench.”

In March 2007, the New York Times reported the following conversation in Iowa:

Reporter: “What about grants for sex education in the United States? Should they include instructions about using contraceptives? Or should it be Bush’s policy, which is just abstinence?”

Long pause.

McCain: “Ahhh. I think I support the president’s policy.”

Abstinence? So, kids raging with hormones should practice abstinence and not be told about safe sex. Is he kidding? And, furthermore, this comes from the man who can’t keep it in his own pants, as evidenced by the fact that he had previously admitted to cheating on his first wife. What a bunch of BS!

Now, we all know that McCain isn’t that smart a guy — he graduated 894 out of 899 students from the Naval Academy at Annapolis, which is the bottom 1 percent of the class for heaven’s sake. Then he told the Wall Street Journal on Nov. 26, 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.” Therefore, especially in this terrible economic climate, would Clinton fans really prefer another intellectually subpar person in the White House over a Harvard-educated college lecturer? Somehow we doubt it.

Having been through a war and served his country with heroism and honor, McCain’s patriotism is above reproach. He reached the rank of captain in the Navy and served as the naval liaison to the U.S. Senate, so, there is no doubt he knows about the military and has the best interests of its men and women at heart. This is why during the Somalia conflict he said on the Senate floor on Oct. 14, 1993, “For us to get into nation-building, law and order, etc., I think, is a tragic and terrible mistake.”

Then why does he now see things so differently with Iraq and support the president’s policy of nation-building? Has he changed his mind on the role of the military, or has his macho posturing to “never surrender” really clouded his judgment so badly? Whichever it is, it is difficult to believe that fans of Clinton will defect to this man.

Tune in next week to see if Clinton fans are willing to stand next to Obama fans and stop McCain fans from getting their boy the executive office aboard Air Force One.

Hail to the Chief!