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The
McCain dilemma: a split personality on his wars
Standing up to terrorists, but not Democrat intimidation
Wes Vernon
May 5, 2008
Senator
John McCain the presumptive Republican presidential nominee remains an
enigma. He stands up to those who want us to soft-pedal the source of the terrorist
threat. But he caves to Democrats when they express the slightest displeasure. Go figure.
This is a quiz
All right, class, today's lesson is a multiple-choice quiz:
The terrorists who on 9/11 slammed passenger airliners into the World Trade Center, the
Pentagon, and a Pennsylvania field were identified as:
A-The Beatles; B-The Three Stooges; C-The Red Cross; D-The Chamber of Commerce; E-Radical
Islamists; F-The United Way.
What is the answer? No coaching from the audience, please...You say the answer is
"E?" Corrrrrrrect! You go to the head of the class!
The Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) and similar groups have decreed that we
should never even whisper the word Islam in connection with terror. Shades of the
practice in the old Nazi- and Communist-occupied countries of "redacting"
i.e., blacking out words or whole passages in school textbooks that offended the
occupying powers that be.
Shut up and look the other way
So it
is that a coalition of Muslim groups has demanded that candidate McCain stop using the
word "Islamic" to describe terrorists who want to kill those Americans who fail
to bow down to the "religion of peace."
Muneer Fareed, head of the Islamic Society of North America, has whined to the Washington
Times that "certainly, we should think seriously about just characterizing them
[terrorists] as criminals, because that's what they are."
No, Mr. Fareed. We should not call them "just criminals," because they are more
than that. They are terrorists who in the name of Islam have declared war on
the United States. People who claim to be following the Koran want to kill us. Got that?
Kill us! Not try to convert us if we decline their invitation. Not offer to live with us
in a culture of mutual respect. Not respect the oft-repeated touchy-feely pleas for
"diversity" (a non-existent word, by the way, in countries where they are in the
majority).
No, Mr. Fareed. They want to kill us. Do we have to draw a picture? If you and your
"peaceful Muslim" colleagues would spend as much time condemning, pressuring,
disassociating yourselves from, and hectoring your murderous co-religionists who claim
they're only doing it in your name if you would spend as much time doing that as
you spend telling the rest of us to shut up we might be able to have a different
conversation. Maybe then we could shed our suspicions that your inactions ranging
from weak disclaimers to outright silence are motivated by a fear of retaliation in
the form of a personal jihad. If that's what's going on, we need to get it out in the
open. Some suspect that "honor killings" have taken place on American soil.
Politicians: Ooooh! Mustn't say naughty word
Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama avoid the term "Islamic terrorism," opting
instead for "War on Terror," possibly out of a desire to avoid antagonizing the
terrorist lobby. So too does President Bush himself, perhaps believing that getting the
terrorist bloc mad at him could send his already-meager approval ratings to rock bottom.
McCain to terrorist apologists: Take a hike
Senator McCain frequently uses the term "Islamic" to describe our terrorist
enemies. The Arizonan's media strategist Steve Schmidt says, "Osama bin Laden and al
Qaeda represent a perverted strain of Islam at odds with the great many peaceful
Muslims.... But the reality is, the hateful ideology which underpins bin Ladenism is
properly described as radical Islamic extremism. Senator McCain refers to it that way
because that is what it is."
Imagine that! Calling something what it is!
Then there's the other McCain
While standing up to terrorists, however, Senator McCain has shown a remarkable tendency
to back off when partisan Democrats bear their fangs. At that point, he condemns his own
allies, just as he did during Senate debates of McCain-Feingold, McCain-Kennedy, and
McCain-Lieberman. Coming just as the senator is trying to patch things up with the
Republican Party's conservative base, this is pure poison for Mr. McCain's own efforts to
bolster a disconsolate GOP rank and file.
More importantly, it is wrongheaded on the merits. The latest example of the senator's
unfriendly political fire spotlighted an ad run by the North Carolina Republican Party.
The TV spot showed the widely publicized fiery sermon of Barack Obama's years-long pastor
calling on God to condemn America. It went on to link Rev. Jeremiah Wright with two North
Carolina gubernatorial candidates who had endorsed Obama.
This is no-holds-barred, but well within the bounds of politics as a contact sport.
Senator McCain, who spent five years sassing back his torturers at the Hanoi Hilton,
should understand that this ad by comparison as pure patty-cake.
North Carolina's Republican Chairman Linda Daves a slip of a woman with a backbone
of fireproof steel refused to yank the ad despite McCain's urging. She then drew a
demarcation outlining where the senator's sphere of authority ends and hers begins. She
will run the McCain campaign in her state any way the senator wants her to do. But this
current ad in question dealt with state candidates, is therefore a state matter, and thus
(my words, not hers) none of the senator's business.
Democrats' orders to McCain
Predictably, Democrats viewed McCain's pleas to Daves not as an act of good will or
fair play but as a sure sign of weakness. When there is blood in the water, the
sharks go for the kill.
Intoned Democrat National Committee spokeswoman Karen Finney: "Instead of sending
e-mails [to Daves], Senator McCain could take action to show he's serious by firing the
state party chair from her position with the Republican National Convention and kicking
the Republican Party leaders who helped fund this ad off his campaign steering
committees."
Oh, right. And why stop there? I understand capital punishment is still allowable in North
Carolina.
This is not the first time McCain has indulged himself in this kind of silliness. He also
reprimanded a talkshow host for referring to Barack Hussein Obama by his name, and took to
task a supporter who joked about Hillary Clinton's ad about answering the White House
phone at 3 a.m. The jokester said the only time Hillary would be on the phone at 3 in the
morning would be to ask where her husband is. So now we (1) cannot "insult" an
opponent by calling him by his name and (2) can't take a joke. This campaign needs to
lighten up.
It's time
That in fact may be happening. Senator McCain has since calmed down on the North Carolina
ad kafuffle. Apparently he is beginning to understand that just as it is not a good
idea to kick the soccer ball at your own team's goalposts so too is it not a
winning strategy for a Republican candidate to fire away at fellow Republicans rather than
at Democrats. Surely, a man who stood up to his tormentors in Hanoi and the Islamic
pressure groups here at home would understand that.
Wes Vernon
is a Washington-based writer and veteran broadcast journalist.
© Copyright 2008 by Wes Vernon
http://www.renewamerica.us/columns/vernon/080505
The views expressed by RenewAmerica columnists are their own and do not necessarily
reflect the position of Alan Keyes, RenewAmerica, or its affiliates.
Previous articles by Wes Vernon:
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