The best part is this line, “generally accepted policy of America’s multilateralism.”

I guess the “generally accepted” part excludes radical extremists like Al Queda who issued a Fatwa against the United States for “Occupying the Holy Lands” and “Sanctions against the Muslim people” and “The bombing of Iraq” back in 1996.

McCain in NH: Would Be “Fine” To Keep Troops in Iraq for “A Hundred Years”

The United States military could stay in Iraq for “maybe a hundred years” and that “would be fine with me,” John McCain told two hundred or so people at a town hall meeting in Derry, New Hampshire, on Thursday evening. Toward the end of this session, which was being held shortly before the Iowa caucuses were to start, McCain was confronted by Dave Tiffany, who calls himself a “full-time antiwar activist.” In a heated exchange, Tiffany told McCain that he had looked at McCain’s campaign website and had found no indication of how long McCain was willing to keep U.S. troops in Iraq. Arguing that George W. Bush’s escalation of troops has led to a decline in U.S. casualties, McCain noted that the United States still maintains troops in South Korea and Japan. He said he had no objection to U.S. soldiers staying in Iraq for decades, “as long as Americans are not being injured, harmed or killed.”

After the event ended, I asked McCain about his “hundred years” comment, and he reaffirmed the remark, excitedly declaring that U.S. troops could be in Iraq for “a thousand years” or “a million years,” as far as he was concerned. The key matter, he explained, was whether they were being killed or not: “It’s not American presence; it’s American casualties.” U.S. troops, he continued, are stationed in South Korea, Japan, Europe, Bosnia, and elsewhere as part of a “generally accepted policy of America’s multilateralism.” There’s nothing wrong with Iraq being part of that policy, providing the government in Baghdad does not object.

In other words, McCain does not equate victory in Iraq—which he passionately urges at campaign events—with the removal of U.S. troops from that nation. After McCain told Tiffany that he could see troops remaining in Iraq for a hundred years, a reporter sitting next to me quipped, “There’s the general election campaign ad.” He meant the Democratic ad: John McCain thinks it would be okay if U.S. troops stayed in Iraq for another hundred years…..

More McCain here:  http://www.motherjones.com/mojoblog/archives/2008/01/6735_mccain_in_nh_wo.html

PS - I’m sure that strategy won’t piss off the people living in Iraq. Are you kidding me?  If some country was planning on occupying HERE for 100 years what would you do???

Cyrena

There was no massive cannibalism.  The practice was highly ritualistic and infrequent.  With the sacrifice there would be the ritual of communion by eating the flesh of the sacrificed one, who was probably a surrogate for one of the deities/spirit.

We can flog the white guys, mostly descended from the british ilse for rape pillage &etc;..  Buffalo slaughter is a great example of man “having dominion”.

Enjoy your stay in Egypt!

Amen. You said it all.

Thanks Purplewolf,

This sums it up quite well. Christian Conservatives are Stingy, mean, and bigoted…

That would be the antithesis of Christian, which makes them the biggest hypocrites on the planet as well.

So, it’s impossible to be both - a TRUE Christian, (if we’re talking about following the teachings or ideology of Jesus Christ, as it is written in the book that they love to reference) and also be a TRUE Conservative.

They are polar opposites.

Going to war and being a POW doesn’t make you an admirable politician. John McCain is a delusional old coot.

Ah Gee Village Elder,

I hate thinking that part of my ancestors were willing to indulge in cannibalism, (although the human sacrifice part may be undeniable).

Still, are you SURE that it wasn’t after the white guys killed off all of the buffalo? I mean, I’ve been led to believe that hundreds of thousands of them died off, just because they ran out of buffalo meat, and didn’t realize that the plentiful fish around, were just as edible.

Now you’re telling me they were cannibals. I’m gonna stay in denial on that part.

Ron Paul is going to be on Bill Moyer’s Journal WITH Dennis Kucinich this Friday which should be interesting.

Here is Ron Paul on Bill Moyer’s NOW back in 2002:

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/blog/2008/01/bill_moyers_rewind_ron_paul_20.html

I can’t believe people don’t support this guy.

“The Azetics and Maya sacrificed folks of all types genders and etc..”

I’m glad to hear that.

Watch Bill Moyers’ Journal where he does a story on John Hagee’s Cornerstone Church in San Antonio where John McCain has given speeches to the “Christians United for Israel” group.  If that doesn’t turn you off from McCain I don’t know what will:

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/11302007/watch.html

McCain is not what he seems to be:

http://therealmccain.com/

Neverending war.                         

I think the majority of Americans are tired of our current foreign policy of empire as evidenced by the last election and will be more evident in this one.

McCain offers more of the same old shit, blindly supporting Israeli agressions, pumping money we don’t have into military expansion and we will be in Iraq, fighting Iran as long as this guy is in office.

Militarists and Zionists will certainly vote for him.

PT

The same Judeo-Christian values practiced by the Pope on Friday the 13th when the Templars were captured, tortured and burned.  A repeat of the values demonstrated when the Pope ordered all in the Cathar communities killed and god could sort them out.  How about those values shown during the Inquisition?

The Azetics and Maya sacrificed folks of all types genders and etc..

Cyrena

The Native Americans practiced religion which was comparable to that of all other stone age tribes around the world.  This would have the possibility of including human sacrifice and ritual cannibalism.

I,Q

The Puritans were only one of the sects who came to “the new world”.  They immediately set up a punitive theocracy as did the other sects.  Maryland was a Catholic Colony and practiced the most religious tolerance.  Our 17th century flirtation with theocracy was worn out and rejected before our constitution was written in the 18th century.

That the real issue.

McCain occupies Goldwater’s seat and if Barry were alive today he would’ve give him a swift kick up his backside long ago!
It’s a wonder that John gets any sleep at all knowing Barry, as I was a friend of this great man, he should haunting with every waking moment if not in his slumber!

Of all the Republicans, who would you rather have, if it had to be one of them?

McCain is at least an honest man. None of the others are.

There is nothing wrong with believing in a god, even the one of the New or Old Testament. And one’s personal beliefs about sex etc. should be repsected and tolerated.

It is when a person feels that he/she must impose his/her beliefs upon all others that we need to be concerned.

The problem with the religious right is that they have been led to believe that their god will punish us all if people who do not believe as they do are living among them.

Their god is a cruel god, one that sends hurricanes and causes strokes and heartattacks, and deals out death on a regular basis.

The reilgious right are deluded, yes, but they are, more so, driven by fear; fear preached into them from their church leaders, and, as we have now seen Huckabee and Romney, and Thompson and Ron Paul (yes, Ron Paul too, despite his ill-informed followers) their political leaders too.

The religious right are uneducated—why would they read about science and history, biology, geology, astronomy, physics, when all they need to know is taught in their bible?

Unfortunately for us, they are also highly organized, especially the craziest among them.

But of all the republicans, let it be McCain if we must have one of them.

Faith, Hope and Charity have now been replaced with One World Religion (their goal), Loathing(for women, the destitute, the poor) and Greed (let’s ignore those in need).

Any why is being a liberal a bad thing when being a conservative is really the the more negative of the two.

The following definition was provided by Webster’s Dictionary:

Liberal; one who is generous, one who favors greater freedom in political or religious matters, one free from prejudice or narrow thinking.
Ant. stingy, mean, bigoted or conservative.

For those who boast that they are Christian conservatives I offer my sympathy.

Is it me or is there something crazy about fighting “Islamic” extremists who preach hate and want to “kill us all” and then the current ruling party in this country talks about the sanctity of life while supporting a war that has killed 100,000 to 1,000,000 Iraqi civilians? Then how they feel about the poor, no money for you, and even how they treat wounded VETs. The Christian Right gives Christianity a bad name and there is no place in American politics for pandering to these hate mongers. We are a secular country not a theocracy.

McCain’s issue isn’t whether or not he is patriotic or Christian enough, its whether or not he can stick to his principles, and the fact that he is not leading the charge against water boarding and impeachment for those crimes says it all to me.

Amen to Purplewolf. (sorry, I couldn’t think of anything more appropriate on the spot)

Still, this is all true. All of what you speak is true. And, there was no ‘religion’ before they brought this thing here, at least not anything that could be identifiable as such. The Indians had nature and common respect for the land as their religion.

And, oddly enough, Andrew Jackson, (the dude on the $20 bill) was known in his day as “The Indian Killer”, and..HE RAN FOR PRES ON THAT PLATFORM! It was his ‘promise’ to get rid of ALL the Indians.

Why does that sound so familiar, so many centuries later? The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Unfortunately for McCain; he suffers the same flaws as Powell:  An unquestioning loyalty to twisted and corrupt criminals in the name of “party loyalty”.  McCain was swift boated by Bush in the first “election”.  He crawled back like the whipped dog he was.  I could have voted for him, but after that; never again, even as dog catcher!  The neo-cons have destroyed many of their own, shame on the destroyed for being so naive! 
“Christian values”?  History should be the judge of that phrase.  The Christians I respect have a quiet belief that denies greed, envy, lust, sloth, etc.  Get religion out of politics or we are finished as a free people.  Religious freedom is the freedom to not believe, with out any consequence.

Being held captive might make you a brave american soldier, but it is no qualification for being president. The way in which he has let his integrity be dismantled brick by brick, standing idly by in support of so many of the Bush blunders—not the least of which being the torture issue—disqualifies him in my mind by a fair yard. Not to mention all of his pandering to these so-called values voters. So much hate and fear coming off of them, that i find it nearly impossible to tolerate their perspective as it is so insistent on undermining my right to have my own free thought and action. With all of the issues affecting the lives of so many people around the wBeing held captive might make you a brave american soldier, but it is no qualification for being president.

The way in which McCain has let his integrity be dismantled brick by brick, standing idly by in support of so many of the Bush blunders—not the least of which being the torture issue—disqualifies him in my mind by a fair yard. i feel i’ve watched his jaw grow several sizes clinching so tightly as he faked smiles through all the Bushit he hoped would carry him back to the threshold of the presidency which he was sadly denied in 2000. i can only hope that it will backfire, since what we needed (and what might have earned him an genuine shot at the office) was a man of integrity. His unwavering faith in “the mission” in Iraq scares the crap out of me too.

i’ll have to look into this Superhighway business, but the last time i checked, i can get on several interstate highways and drive from Mexico to Canada—and the coolest part is that when i get to the border, the road doesn’t end, it actually continues on into these fantastical foreign lands. Give me a plan for a superhighway to the cheap labor in Asia, and i’ll be really impressed.

Also, i wanted to point out that Giuliani, though not a favorite of mine in any respect, so far is the only republican to call up the Constitutional clause of “no religious test.” It might mean something if it was integrity talking and not just a political pas de deux. orld, it is good to know that gay marriage and racism veiled as immigration reform is still at the top of so many people’s voting guide.  Voting Guide at Church! WTF!

Puritans are Christians. They were Biblical literalists who despised the Reformation of the Church of England, and likewise were despised by their contemporaries, and so were compelled to leave to find a new home. Sorry it was already the home of your ancestors.

i wish the new breed of intolerant Christians would leave to find a new planet. That wouldn’t be fair to the indigenous lifeforms though.

What religion were the Aztec Indians practicing when they sacrificed the girls of the tribes that helped Cortez?  Whatever it was, it seems kind of sexist, no?

I agree with Ginny. Just what values do these people think they are talking about? Seems to me and everyone of Native American heritage there was already a religious system established here before the invasion of the “Judeo-Christian Euro Trash who came to this country and stole, lied and massacred the people here for the land. Every underhanded thing that the human mind can dream up was done, and not in a good way. Most of the 10 commandments were broken by these very same J-C’s who claim the founding this nation. If this is their value system it needs to be destroyed.

These Christian people stole the children of the indigenous peoples and prostituted the girls and used the boys for slave labor in the name of Christianity all the while claiming they were teaching them about GOD. Women were mutilated by these Christian soldiers, who referred the Indians hostiles, having their uterus’s cut out and worn ad souvenirs. The women, children and elders were often targets of mass slaughter(most often noted by Custer) while the men were hunting for food. Food sources purposely destroyed and the forbiding of hunting for food, claiming the new invaders would feed the Indians, who they actually starved to death. Housing was destroyed often keeping people from fleeing their deaths. Underhanded methods used to steal the land from the original peoples. Forced assimilation, using Indians to hunt their own people promising them their freedoms, which was reneged on as soon as the goal of the invader was achieved.

These are just a few of the “CHRISTIAN VALUES” that these ignorant people claim that this country was founded on. I see nothing to be proud about, let alone to be bragging about it. It is obvious that these people running for president of this country never studied the “TRUE” history of America in all of it’s glorious and unglorious past. Besides, it was the Puritans who invaded this country before the Christians, who were the second group of religious nutjobs who invaded America.

Anyone running for office who professes these “Christian values” needs to be drummed out of the race as they already have proven they are unfit to serve as president of America. We already have had enough bloodshed in this country, if the religious zealots get into office will they force their “Religion” onto all the people and if we do not accept, will they then kill us as is done in other “Religious” nations?

Ah but RAE,

Herein lies the dichotomy and the pain of it all…

You write:

•  Just as soon as anyone drags out the Bible or God to support claims/arguments, I leave the room because I know they haven’t a clue what they’re talking about.

Well, I’ve done this myself of course, (just left the room) in many cases, if only to save or protect my own sanity.

BUT, what about that responsibility you mentioned earlier?

•  One of the first lectures I received at university included the admonition that EDUCATED PEOPLE HAVE A RESPONSIBILITY TO SPEAK OUT AND LEAD/TAKE CHARGE WHENEVER THEY ENCOUNTER NONSENSE ISSUES IN THEIR COMMUNITIES.

Educated people DO have that responsibility, and it means being able to recognize and incorporate the intelligence of those who might not be ‘formally’ educated, but are still ‘educated’ by experience and have that same foundation of reason and logic.
But, all too often, when educated people DO attempt to do this, all they get are the same responses that we see from the moron in this article, (and from a few posters on this site) accusing them of arrogance and the like. And then they whip out a argument based on the bible, or something else that doesn’t exist, and that’s when we have to leave the room.
It’s more than a little frustrating, because it has little to do with ‘arrogance’ when some of us attempt to combat ignorance. It has far MORE to do with (IMHO) elevating the WHOLE (community) because we are ALL dependant on each other for common knowledge. REAL knowledge…the kind that allows us to survive THIS life, (not the flippin’ ‘afterlife’ that nobody knows even exists!)

So, it’s a dilemma. Do we leave the room, and allow them to continue to believe this 10,000+ year old book with dubious authors, or the latest myth of a yellow brick road from Mexico to Canada, (sounds like a damn CARTOON) or do we somehow try to insert basic reason and logic, where there seems to be a determined effort to wipe it out?

Admittedly, I do vacillate, if only…as I mentioned…to save my own sanity.

Years ago, McCain correctly termed monsters like Falwell as “agents of intolerance.” Now it seems he panders to them. I resent it that the right wing wackos call themselves “Christians”. They much prefer the paranoid genocidal entity of the old testament who got his jollies by smiting and slewing. When will a politician accuse the jesus-freaks of redneck bigotry and un-Christian hatred?

Being caught between a fundamentalist preacher and a Morman must seem surreal to John McCain.

McCain is an angry old man who is married to the status quo in America.  He would continue our entangling foreign alliances and enable Israeli aggression on a greater scale than present.

He simply doesn’t have the necessory demeanor for the job.

As Cyrena has aptly pointed out McCain’s retro agenda should dovetail with the religious right.  But he doesn’t sing “what a friend we have ...” in the right key so they don’t want to play.

McCain’s rep for “straight talk” came when he had less coverage and better sound bites.  In some respects he reminds me of Pat Buchanan, the first part sounds sensible but by the end you know he’s wacked.

“So let’s see, those arrogant judges think they know so much that the rest of us. Humm, I wonder if it might be because they study the stuff for years and years, reading opinions, writing opinions, burying themselves in case law…

If they weren’t so arrogant and full of themselves, they’d just whip out the Bible, and then they would be as stupid as everybody else, and the righties would be happy.”

One of the first lectures I received at university included the admonition that EDUCATED PEOPLE HAVE A RESPONSIBILITY TO SPEAK OUT AND LEAD/TAKE CHARGE WHENEVER THEY ENCOUNTER NONSENSE ISSUES IN THEIR COMMUNITIES.

This does NOT mean that “educated” people are always correct and/or without a goodly amount of “nonsense” in their baggage as well. It DOES mean that “educated” people have a responsibility to use REASON and LOGIC and FACTUAL INFORMATION upon which to base OPINIONS, not PURE FICTION (eg the Bible) and/or “God spoke to me”-type supporting evidence.

Some judges are NUTS and clearly shouldn’t be on the bench. Same applies to some barbers, bankers, bootleggers and bandoliers.

But MOST judges have had access to far more factual information on some issues than does the “madding crowds.” The Bible does NOT contain “factual information” by any stretch of the imagination (which it requires in copious amounts).

“The people” can be 100% WRONG… and often are.

Just as soon as anyone drags out the Bible or God to support claims/arguments, I leave the room because I know they haven’t a clue what they’re talking about.

Comment on the last part of you question, the same reason Bush can tell bold face lies and still be in office.  Not good for the slob on the street is it?

I think the NAFTA Super Highway got its start from lil Rickys’ plan to build a massive toll road from OK to Mexico through the center of the State. It would include right of ways for trains, utilities, and pipelines.
The cost of such a project as envisioned by him would be borne by the Private Sector. But getting the railroads, pipeline companies and utility companies to relocate their existing networks hasn’t been addressed.
As for religion playing any part in a Presidential or any other election, what happened to separation of Church and State? If it is illegal to display the Ten Commandments at a Courthouse, how can candidates espouse their so called religious qualifications as a reason to vote for them?

Yes, it does not take much to fool the ignorant, Hukster may be case in point.

•  “… Again we see that the judges view themselves as arrogant aristocrats who know so much more than the rest of us. ...  In recent years, Biblical standards are almost completely abandoned and ignored…”

This is like reading a horror story. Reminds me of the Exorcist. I had to keep closing my eyes and plugging my ears.

So let’s see, those arrogant judges think they know so much that the rest of us. Humm, I wonder if it might be because they study the stuff for years and years, reading opinions, writing opinions, burying themselves in case law…

If they weren’t so arrogant and full of themselves, they’d just whip out the Bible, and then they would be as stupid as everybody else, and the righties would be happy.

Now on THIS: Well, it sent me to my room.

•  He supports repeal of Roe v. Wade, opposes ratification of the Kyoto treaty as well as extension of federal hate crime laws to include sexual orientation.  He is even against a proposal that exists so far only in the minds of paranoid ultraconservatives—a “NAFTA superhighway” running from Canada to Mexico.

Yes indeed. I went back to this NAFTA superhighway link, because I’d never heard of this thing. (well, because it doesn’t exist). Now, it’s really lengthy piece, but it’s from the Nation, and so I thought…it’s gotta be a good read. I didn’t realize that my subscription had run out, until I saw the date, and wondered why I hadn’t read it before.

Well…once you get through THIS, you’re either gonna think somebody slipped you a mickey, or you’re gonna think you NEED one. We’re talking yellow brick road stuff FIRST. And then, when you get to the REAL stuff, you’ll be even MORE amazed at the reaction.
Talk about parallel universes and alternative realities. This beats them all. You’ll think you’ve fallen into a facility for advanced stage Alzheimer’s patients, with NO staff.

And, McCain BELIEVES it!!!