Today, a voter had the audacity to ask a question the media doesn’t have the gumption to. Though poorly worded, the baptist minister directly asked McCain if he, in fact, publicly called his wife a “c*nt.” A recent biography, The Real McCain, cites that name calling as McCain’s response to his wife teasing him about his thinning hair.
As you hear, McCain dodged the question.
McCain: Now, now. You don’t want to… Um, you know that’s the great thing about town hall meetings, sir, but we really don’t, there’s people here who don’t respect that kind of language. So I’ll move on to the next questioner in the back.
Yeah, Senator McCain, “there’s people … who don’t respect that kind of language,” and they wouldn’t refer to their wife or any woman by that term. But by not responding to the question and flat out denying that you would ever call your wife such a pejorative, you’ve essentially confirmed the report of this past incident. In a society that alleges equality, we do not need the leader of the free world to be someone who refuses to address his own accusations of misogyny.
Further more, if the bat phone rings at 3am, I want a calm and collected President answering the phone, not someone who will bomb first and ask questions later because he’s upset his 6 hours of sleep were interrupted.
May 1, 2008 at 7:14 pm |
It is better than a president that would do nothing when our ships are sunk and our barracks is blown up and our marines are kiilled. GO Mc Cain..she probably deserved being called a cunt.
May 1, 2008 at 7:19 pm |
Wayne, please come back and tell us under what circumstances that word is ever justified. It’s an unforgivable word that should be removed from our vocabulary entirely.
May 2, 2008 at 6:03 am |
[...] Andrea Zak Bio McCain Dodges the Question [...]
May 2, 2008 at 10:01 am |
Though I see your analysis as a way of “leading” to the answer of yes that he called her that. I also feel that those generations that came before us are more mature and squirmy about things like that the older they are, or the longer back from today’s standards that they have lived. So in fact he could very well just have wanted to avoid the conversation all together so that the word and/or total subject matter were not discussed at length making people, especially women, feel uncomfortable. The deal with McCain right now is that those on the left are desperately searching for his faults because of the attack on the leftist candidates right now, your analysis of his “old age”, even if it was a joke, or this unverified slur at his wife. Now, if there is a recording or if she came forward and said that he said it in a serious tone OR joking manner as EVIDENCE would change my mind and I would side with you.
The facts that are hard to swallow for the left right now is that there is SO MUCH evidence out there in the form of audio and video against Obama and Clinton that it has a frantic search on to crucify the other side to balance. I think that as long as there is evidence, both parties should lay it out on the table and discuss it, I want to know who my leader really is.
This all being said, I do have a relevant story to all of this. I was a waiter at Cracker Barrel for 6 years before graduating college and getting a job. Back when Clinton was running for the senate, I, of all people now, thought to myself “good for her, she would even make a good President (based purely on the fact that she always wore the pants in the Clinton relationship anyway)”. Anyway, one day a couple came in and we got to talking and this person said that they worked for the secret service as protection for the Clintons during Bill’s Presidency. I immediately said “Oh, that must have been interesting, what do you think about Hillary?”, no lie, they said that Hillary is the most two faced person out there and whenever was given the chance to scold any female staffers would refer to them as “cunts”, she said that Hillary did this all the time. I don’t lie, I honestly would love for someone to do interviews with past staffers on this issue. Either way, that completely changed my mind on her and watching her since then has only re-enforced that comment through her actions and lies. That added with all of Kerry’s shanninigans and lies got me deep into politics and is when I finally realized that my party affiliation was conservative, but up until that point I thought of myself as middle ground independent. Long story, but I am being openly honest about where I stand and what I heard.
May 2, 2008 at 10:26 am |
“I also feel that those generations that came before us are more mature and squirmy about things like that the older they are, or the longer back from today’s standards that they have lived. So in fact he could very well just have wanted to avoid the conversation all together so that the word and/or total subject matter were not discussed at length making people, especially women, feel uncomfortable.”
What McCain doesn’t seem to understand is that it’s no longer 1950, young people today are willing to have dialogues about uncomfortable issues. Accordingly, our leaders need to be able to do the same to do the best job.
The two other character-defining anecdotes in Schecter’s book have been confirmed. McCain denied both of those stories before people came forward to corroborate them.
Cindy wants to be first lady, she’d never say mum about her boo, but he got the story somewhere, so other people heard. It’s just a matter of time.
Biographers do their best not to make up information; they’re usually trying to maintain their credibility for when they’re inspired for their next biography.
Clinton isn’t perceived to be a stand up, honest citizen. The majority of people polled don’t find her trust worthy. She’s been called out on her lies repeatedly. McCain on the other hand is a media darling, and mainstream media won’t call him out on conflicting beliefs/quotes/anecdotes in his past. There needs to be equal time given the backgrounds of the candidates.
They’re not playing the $25,000 Pyramid; they don’t get to pass when they don’t like the question.
May 2, 2008 at 10:27 am |
For anyone else commenting, please refrain from reiterating the c-word that I find so offensive. I’m on notice as planning to delete comments going forward that aren’t at least slapping an asterix in there.
May 2, 2008 at 11:28 am |
Like I said, I will agree with you when the evidence is there, but it isn’t, so you are stretching for something here for the time being.
McCain is a media darling? I agree a little but as a presidential candidate he is far from the liberal media darling. Obama has been getting a pass on absolutely everything with the media. Somehow he did the “right thing” by denouncing Wright as his pastor after his pastor just reaffirmed what he has already said, NOTHING NEW, but that just figures when a poll the night after by the Obama campaign showed that he needed to. That is fine though, once the whole Wright thing dies down (which it won’t because soon you will be seeing Wright’s reaction to Obama) then you will just start hearing about his connections to the Weather Underground with William Ayers and THEN his participation in the million man march where Lewis Farrackhan was a speaker.
Sorry, back to the topic, YES, once again if there is evidence I COMPLETELY AGREE WITH YOU that he should answer the question. There isn’t evidence, the crowd was noticably uncomfortable, it is obvious that McCain’s audience is older like himself with those old fashion beliefs where something like that shouldn’t be said! So NO, he shouldn’t have answered it then with no evidence against him.
May 7, 2008 at 3:26 pm |
Look, zak, I wasn’t meaning to facebook with you at Jon’s; was simply trying to say, in an oblique way: please stay out of politics. You. Yourself. Avoid it. You are too good for it.
Write about it, rouse the rabble, serve the commonweal—by all means—but don’t work with or for politicians, and don’t be one. It’s a damned dirty business, in the most unspeakably banal way imaginable.