Redstate

Posted at 11:58pm on Jul. 2, 2008 What I Hope Will Be The Last Post I Will Have To Write Defending The McCain Service Record

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

Regarding this post once again, note that this piece on which it relies has fatal flaws. One such flaw is discussed at length here. And as this comment points out, the reason that McCain was not up for promotion to Admiral in 1981 was that only two years earlier, he had been promoted to Captain and he was not up for another promotion until 1984 or 1985.

The HuffPo piece notes comments by Gary Hart and Bill Cohen stating that they somehow (it is not revealed how) knew that McCain's career in the Navy was going to end without him achieving flag rank. First of all, the source of their knowledge is not revealed. Secondly, neither Hart nor Cohen were privy to the promotion and selection process in the Navy. While the HuffPo piece quotes from a passage in McCain's book where McCain said that he felt the achievement of flag rank was beyond his reach, the same passage also says that there were people who believed that McCain could achieve the rank of Admiral and who urged him not to retire from the Navy as a consequence.

We, of course, will never know what might have happened. It is entirely possible that McCain would never have achieved the rank of Admiral. But it is entirely possible as well that he could have if he had chosen to stay in the Navy. Instead, two years after becoming a Captain, McCain retired to run for office.

Nothing in either the HuffPo piece or the National Journal piece gives any reasonable person any cause whatsoever to believe that McCain somehow could not have been trusted with the responsibilities of an Admiral. No reasonable reading whatsoever could lead to that conclusion. I am sure that there are people who would like to believe otherwise, but until they inform me that they have achieved the power to travel to an alternate universe where John McCain stayed in the Navy until 1984 or 1985 when the promotional decision for flag rank would have been made, I am not all that likely to take them seriously.

Incidentally--and while we are on the subject--I have yet to hear any reasonable explanation for why Wesley Clark could lavishly praise John Kerry's service and tie that praise to Clark's belief that Kerry would have made an excellent President, but say of McCain that his experience didn't prepare him to be President because McCain never commanded a wartime squadron and because Clark doesn't "think riding in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to be president." About the only good to come out of all of this, of course, is that Wesley Clark showed anew why he lost in 2004 and why he can't be trusted to do a good job as Barack Obama's running mate this year.

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Posted at 5:47pm on Jul. 2, 2008 Strange Women Lying In Ponds Distributing Swords is No Basis for a System of Government

The Obama Campaign Employs 'Monty Python Defense'

By absentee

If you listen to the noise machine on the left, you have developed a picture of John McCain's military service. From a comfortable position, feet up, in the passenger seat of a jet orbiting the earth, John McCain coldly and safely pushed buttons to dispense laser death on unsuspecting Vietnamese civilians. After some sort of emergency landing, John McCain stayed at a Hilton, from which he distributed communist propaganda videos for five or so years. When he returned home, he had an adminstrative authority over a group of planes. Later, he used a racial slur regarding the staff at that Hilton and highlighted the episode to pretend he was in the military.

It was only weeks ago that Max Cleland, in an interview with the New York Times, said "McCain is my friend and brother, and I love him dearly, but I think you learn something fighting on the ground, like me and John Kerry and Chuck Hagel did in Vietnam." They learned something, you see, which you do not learn coasting safely above or in bamboo cages below. The Democrats' service counts, McCain's doesn't. The article Cleland was quoted in, by the way, was about how "some" of McCain's "fellow veterans" thought his "different" Vietnam was responsible for his being so misguided on Iraq. You know, misguided like being right about the surge, supporting the war throughout, visiting the troops, that sort of thing. Obviously, he's out of touch.

How about Senator Jay Rockefeller a few weeks earlier? "McCain was a fighter pilot, who dropped laser-guided missiles from 35,000 feet. He was long gone when they hit," he said. "What happened when they [the missiles] get to the ground? He doesn’t know. You have to care about the lives of people. McCain never gets into those issues." McCain didn't care who he was indiscriminately destroying. He was just some white guy with electronics who likes killing people.

Rockefeller was really just doing exactly what you'd expect a Democrat politician to do: echoing the left media. Remember what Bill Maher said? "We have been the cowards, lobbing cruise missiles from 2,000 miles away. That's cowardly. Staying in the airplane when it hits the building, say what you want about it, it's not cowardly."

Read On ...

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Posted at 4:55pm on Jul. 1, 2008 "Sing Goddess, Sing Of The Fury Of Kleiman . . ."

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

Responding to this post--a cross-post of this one--Mark Kleiman has decided to unleash all of the rage and anger in his possession at me for deigning to take issue with his treatment of John McCain's military record. Kleiman, of course, does not link to my post and therefore does not allow his own readers to judge for themselves what I wrote and why I wrote it.

Kleiman's post is more filled with personal insults directed towards me than it is with an actual rebuttal but I'll try to take his "points" in turn. Readers will, I hope, forgive this digression but I, at least, feel it important to set the record straight on certain matters.

Read on . . .

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Posted at 9:55pm on Jun. 30, 2008 And So It Goes

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

Whatever one's views concerning the race for the Presidency, I would have thought it beyond dispute that John McCain served his country nobly and honorably while he was in the military. But appallingly, even that simple truth is being challenged by writers who value the slime and smear over any standards of honesty.

To wit:

The highest-voltage third rail of this presidential campaign may not be race, sex or age, but John McCain's military service.

McCain's campaign on Sunday issued a pair of outraged statements after retired general and Barack Obama supporter Wesley Clark said he didn't think that McCain's service as a fighter pilot and prisoner of war was relevant to running the country. Obama has consistently praised McCain's service, and called him "a genuine American hero."

But farther to the left -- and among some of McCain's conservative enemies as well -- harsher attacks are circulating. Critics have accused McCain of war crimes for bombing targets in Hanoi in the 1960s. A widely read liberal blog on Sunday accused McCain of "disloyalty" during his captivity in Vietnam for his coerced participation in propaganda films and interviews after he'd been tortured.

"A lot of people don't know ... that McCain made a propaganda video for the enemy while he was in captivity," wrote Americablog.com's John Aravosis. "Putting that bit of disloyalty aside, what exactly is McCain's military experience that prepares him for being commander in chief?"

"Getting shot down, tortured and then doing propaganda for the enemy is not command experience," Aravosis wrote in the blog post, titled "Honestly, besides being tortured, what did McCain do to excel in the military?"

This is, of course, sickening. If Aravosis went through even five minutes of the torture McCain went through for five and a half years, he would sell out his country, God, motherhood, apple pie and his closest relatives in a heartbeat just to make the physical pain subside a little. McCain, of course, was offered the chance to be freed before POWs who had been imprisoned longer . . . and refused.

But what does Aravosis know about any of this? His life has been one of creature comforts. He couldn't possibly understand the depth of sacrifice and heroism that McCain went through readily and bravely.

Of course, the Politico story also points out the attacks launched at McCain's service record by people like Senator John Rockefeller and Senator Tom Harkin. I think that I have the routine fairly well down; Democrats and their surrogates slime and smear and then the Obama campaign goes out and pronounces that they are displeased and that they, of course, are above this whole thing.

Andrew Sullivan--as fervent an Obama fan as any--labels these attacks as "swiftboating" and denounces them. The fact that the attacks are actually denounced offends the likes of Josh Marshall, who would be more than glad to see the slime and smear tactics continue unabated. The Obama campaign's decision to distance itself from these attacks also upset Mark Kleiman, who is fully in the throes of McCain Derangement and whose attack against McCain consists of trying to remind people that McCain was never an admiral in the United States Navy. As I have written before, coming from Kleiman--who never served at all--the hypocrisy of the attack is stunning beyond belief. I have to wonder how he writes his posts with a straight face.

Between Clark's vicious attacks, those of Rockefeller and Harkin and the netroots' own slime and smear campaign, I have to wonder what is going on. I thought that this was the year when all of the fundamentals were in favor of the Democrats taking back the White House. I am, of course, disgusted to see the attacks on McCain's service record but I am also surprised by the sense of desperation behind those attacks. It's almost as if the attackers don't think they have anything better to do or to discuss than ways to lie about John McCain's service to his country.

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Posted at 10:41pm on Jun. 29, 2008 The Ability To Self-Correct Is One Of The Best Things About The Blogosphere . . .

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

So let's see if some of the usual suspects Patterico names self-correct their statements concerning John McCain and pumping gas. I expect next to nothing from Think Progress in terms of honesty regarding this issue and John Cole will likely disappoint at the end. That leaves Sullivan and Joyner to redeem my faith in Blogospheric honesty.

Come on, guys. Don't let me down.

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Posted at 10:39pm on Jun. 29, 2008 Hmmm . . .

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

I see that Wesley Clark is criticizing John McCain because he says that the Senator doesn't have any executive experience and that in wartime, he didn't command "a wartime squadron" or order "the bombs to fall."

One searches the news report in vain for any claims that Senator Clinton--who Clark initially supported--had executive experience, commanded "a wartime squadron" or was responsible for ordering "the bombs to fall." One searches in vain as well for similar observations concerning Senator Obama. Indeed, one cannot help but wonder why Wesley Clark would make the arguments he makes about Senator McCain, given that they apply with a hundred times more force--at least!--to Senator Obama.

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Posted at 9:48pm on Jun. 20, 2008 A Memo To MoveOn.org

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

The New York Times calls shenanigans on your latest ad. Take note and surprise us by doing the right thing and retracting it.

With an apology for trying to mislead voters, while you are at it.

Posted at 10:04pm on Jun. 17, 2008 At What Point Does The "Reality" Portion Of "Reality-Based Community" Kick In?

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

I ask because of misleading and appallingly over-the-top ads like the one discussed here. The following is key in debunking the ad:

Since the spot brings up McCain's "100 years" comment, it's worth noting again that among those who have said it is unfair to imply that McCain wants the war in Iraq to continue for years to come is the non-partisan FactCheck.org. It has called that a "serious distortion" of what McCain has said.

Not that seriously distorting the truth stops the supposed "reality-based" crowd. See also this, which rightly ridicules the ad.

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Posted at 10:00pm on Jun. 17, 2008 How Funny

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

Mark Kleiman--who never served in the military--is throwing stones at the service record of John McCain, who served heroically.

Hey, if people like Kleiman could, for so many years, rely on the odious "chickenhawk" argument to slime those who don't agree with them politically, I can point out basic facts. John McCain doesn't need lectures on how to serve the country in wartime. He certainly never needed them from Mark Kleiman, who cannot possibly fathom what McCain has been through.

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Posted at 3:55pm on Jun. 13, 2008 The Huffington Post Should Learn To Get Its Facts Straight

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

Contra this nonsense, there is no evidence whatsoever to indicate that the McCain campaign "stacked" its townhall meeting. Mayor Bloomberg is a registered Independent, not a registered Republican and both Mayor Bloomberg and other independent groups--in addition to people who (gasp!) support Senator McCain--got invitations. "Stacking," this ain't.

Incidentally, there is plenty of evidence to show that the McCain campaign welcomes disagreement and debate at its events. Here is one such bit of evidence:

And another:

There are a lot of other instances that we can cite, of course, but McCain didn't gain a reputation for being very, very, very good at town hall meetings by "stacking" his meetings. Quite the contrary; he's gotten his reputation by taking tough questions and answering them very well.

You know, between this and the lies that McCain wants to keep a war going on in Iraq for 100 years and the lie that McCain doesn't care at all about the welfare of the troops, this is all getting pretty disgusting. I think it is high time that more than just the Blogosphere call shenanigans on the efforts of the Obama campaign and its surrogates to regularly misstate and mislead when it comes to McCain's actions and statements. It would also be nice if someone could ask the Huffington Post, the Obama campaign and Howard Dean why it is that they seems to think that the only way to beat John McCain is to lie about him.

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Posted at 2:12am on Jun. 12, 2008 Tempest, Meet Teapot

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

Evidently, there is a campaign focused on taking tiny little snippets of statements John McCain has made and making McCain look utterly cruel and heartless as a result of those snippets. This game must be amusing for about five minutes--seven, tops--but after a while, one wonders what is to be gained by it. Other than misleading the electorate, of course.

The latest would-be kerfuffle involves Democrats howling over McCain supposedly saying that "it's not too important" when American troops come home from Iraq. Problem is that these charges utterly and completely misses the context of the McCain statement:

McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds said: "The Obama campaign is embarking on a false attack on John McCain to hide their own candidate's willingness to disregard facts on the ground in pursuit of withdrawal no matter what the costs. John McCain was asked if he had a `better estimate' for a timeline for withdrawal.

The exchange that has Democrats licking their chops began when co-host Matt Lauer asked about the surge strategy in Iraq: "If it's working Senator, do you now have a better estimate of when American forces can come home from Iraq?"

McCain replied: "No, but that's not too important. What's important is the casualties in Iraq, Americans are in South Korea, Americans are in Japan, American troops are in Germany. That's all fine. American casualties and the ability to withdraw; we will be able to withdraw. General [David] Petraeus is going to tell us in July when he thinks we are.

"But the key to it is that we don't want any more Americans in harm's way. That way, they will be safe, and serve our country and come home with honor and victory, not in defeat, which is what Senator Obama's proposal would have done. I'm proud of them. And they're doing a great job. And we are succeeding and it's fascinating that Senator Obama still doesn't realize that."

(Emphasis mine.) As the quote makes clear, McCain's concern is to ensure the safety of the troops--an objective that is far more important than any specific timetable for withdrawal.

Bizarrely and offensively, however, the Obama campaign and its surrogates have decided to try to portray McCain as not caring about the welfare of the troops. This is both entirely inaccurate when one considers the context of the McCain statements and entirely offensive when one considers McCain's wartime heroism and the fact that his life experience alone has caused him to care more about the state of the military and the welfare of the troops than most of his peers in public service. War heroes deserve--if nothing else--the benefit of the doubt on these kinds of issues and McCain's public life has made clear that he takes a backseat to no one in his concern for the troops.

So much for this "New Tone" I keep hearing about. And in a just world, when people think that the only way they can win a Presidential election is by deliberately misconstruing John McCain's statements, it should say more about McCain's would-be critics than it does about him. The actual facts surrounding McCain's comment are crystal clear even if their portrayal by the Obama campaign and its surrogates is not.

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Posted at 9:59pm on May 18, 2008 And Now, For Another Shout-Out To The "Reality-Based Community"

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

If you guys want to live up to your community name, you really shouldn't countenance having phony soldiers slime and smear real war heroes.

Just saying. Of course, "reality-based community" has become one of the most laughable monikers in recent memory but fellas, try to live up to it from time to time.

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Posted at 6:38pm on May 17, 2008 Look Who Owns The Noise-Machine Now

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

We should be appalled by now that the contretemps involving President Bush and Senators Obama and McCain has lasted as long as it has. By now, cooler heads should have prevailed and forcefully responded to Senator Obama that a plain reading of the language of President Bush's speech before the Knesset makes clear that Senator Obama was in no way implicated in the President's comments concerning the appeasement of dictators and terrorists. Indeed, White House officials have said on background that if anything, the comments were directed at Jimmy Carter in the aftermath of his recent meeting with Hamas and the only politician who was directly criticized in the oft-repeated quote from the President's speech was Republican Senator William Borah, who was apparently never disabused from the notion that if only he could have met with Hitler, Borah's powers of eloquence alone would have been sufficient to stop World War II from ever having broken out.

But of course, we are still in the midst of the contretemps and still dealing with the blasts of outrage and fury from Team Obama and its allies in the aftermath of the President's speech. It is one thing to campaign with a chip on one's shoulder, but after a while, this gets rather tiresome, does it not?

It should. But shockingly enough, the controversy appears to have kicked into second gear now, with Team Obama and its allies now claiming that if President Bush wants to slam appeasers, he should start with his own Defense Secretary and Senator McCain, who allegedly have adopted Senator Obama's negotiating strategy in toto.

Read on . . .

Posted in 2008 | In The Tank for Barack Obama | Paging Mr. Godwin | Smearing And Sliming John McCain — Comments (15)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 5:17pm on May 15, 2008 Think Progress fails history

By Soren Dayton

ThinkProgress notes a passage from John McCain's speech today in which McCain warns of the dangers of appeasement:

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.

Think Progress proceeds to fail history 101:

McCain’s praise of Ronald Reagan is wholly misplaced. To recap, during the Iran-Contra affair in the 1980s, hostages were not released because of Iran’s fear of Reagan, as McCain suggested. In reality, Iran released them after Reagan administration officials infamously sold arms to the country, which were transfered to Ayatollah Khomeini. As a result, 11 Reagan officials were convicted of crimes.

They are so laughably, ignorantly wrong. The hostages were released on Reagan's inauguration day. Recall that these guys recently accused McCain of plagiarism when someone had actually stolen the lines from him.

Hacks and clowns

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