McCain v Trump? Hero v Buffoon? Only Americans can judge.
G
3
McCain was mercurial and with a legendary temper. And, for the life of me, I can't understand how a person who went through what he did could be a hawk. You'd have thought he would have done anything possible to make sure our young men and women in the military wouldn't end up a POW, as he did.
His one major plus was this: You could talk to, reason and negotiate with him. That's nearly impossible with most of the Republicans in the House and Senate these days. His party and our country are worse off without him.
RIP, Senator McCain.
13
McCain lost me at "100 years in Iraq". He and all the war mongers like him can go exactly where John wound up this week. I mean all of them, Bush, Obama, and now Trump.
6
The alternative assessment of John McCain should at least be given an airing in the NYT:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SierMkPXNEM
3
Mr Leonhard - What a poor thin dissertation on John McCain. Damned with faint praise. Change your snarky condescending tone.
As to the current state of the Republican party, local commentator Bradley Gitz had it right: "The Republican problem is a nut in the Oval Office; the Democratic problem is a party chock full of nuts."
4
The fact that McCain's death is taking up much of the news is music to Trump's ears. Everyone already knows his views on the Senator. His backers do not care. They feel much the same way. His detractors cannot think any less of him. You could hardly find a mention of Cohen or Manafort in the papers today. The surprise was that he even bothered to have the flag at the White House lowered for even a few hours. In his mind, raising it so soon was another way to slap his "enemy" in the face. That was Trump's final message. He just does not give a damn.
9
“Today’s Republican Party is the biggest threat to the country that McCain served and loved.” I respectfully disagree. The biggest threat is the Left/Democratic Party. Their platform: No God, no free speech, no love for the country, no respect for the anthem, no representation for the American citizen, but fights for the “rights” of illegals, wages war on the traditional definition of the family.
The John F. Kennedy beloved Party has ceased to exist. Today he would be viewed as a Reaganite extremist. Sad.
3
@MariaMagdalena
Mass shootings of innocent people in FL ought to keep your attention closer to home. I don't know what your definition of "family values" is; however, a lot of your fellow American citizens place the right to live high on our list of "rights". In fact, the "stand your ground" legislation doesn't appear to be keeping your fellow Floridians alive longer than people who live in CA, NY, NJ et al. I would feel safer on the streets of NYC than in Miami.
12
You were right about one thing 'John McCain was no moderate' he was liberal and a RINO. I'm sorry for his families loss but I'm not sorry he is gone from the GOP and the Senate. I'd rather have a Democrat hold the seat then a RINO. McCain was an embarrassment to the GOP.
2
Here's a good working definition of a hero: anyone who knowingly risks his life on behalf of strangers qualifies.
Every time McCain climbed into the cockpit he was a hero. We might never have noticed had he not been captured, but that doesn't matter. This is the man who climbed into the cockpit, risking death for all of us, and twice refused offers to go home early, something he did in solidarity with his fellow prisoners.
While McCain was hanging from the ceiling by his elbows, which were tied behind his back, permanently damaging his body, Trump, was enjoying a deferment for bone spurs that appeared when he needed them to and disappeared when the war ended.
When Trump said he preferred someone who did not get captured, he missed the point. It's not whether you're killed or captured. It's whether you're willing to risk it that matters.
McCain, a hero, did.
Trump, a coward, did not.
28
@Norwester "Every time McCain climbed into the cockpit he was a hero" Except that time on the Forrestal. Before you even say that was debunked, look deep into the incident. It was officially denied and covered up by him and the Navy.
3
"But the sum total of his career still represents a meaningful alternative to Trump, McConnell and the rest of today’s Republican leadership. "
Most democrats have been speaking for decades the way McCain is now being lauded for speaking.
How come the media pays no attention to that?
How come the media calls McCain- style speaking Democrats as not having a vision or unity or standing for anything?
Also, why does the media call someone a "maverick" when he votes 95% of the time with his party?
11
@Paul
Correction to above. McCain voted 91.7% with his party.
We regret the error.
Best balanced article on McCain I have heard or read since Saturday. Republicans could do worse than to emulate him more.
12
This is hilarious considering the fact that the New York Times hated Sen. McCain's GUTS when he was running against the Times' candidate in 2008.
When how a news outlet treats a man changes 180-degrees simply because of a political campaign, can you honestly call that outlet anything remotely related to a newspaper?
The National Enquirer is more consistent in its opinions of people than the NY Times.
1
Oh please!
"John McCain was everything America stands for ... "
John McCain was known principally for NOT being willing to compromise with the other party. It's different now that he's died, of course, though I never thought I'd see the NY Times write a good word about John McCain. I expected the NYT would simply say nothing.
Obama utterly crushed McCain in the 2008 election. That may have been inevitable, but I remember the final nail in McCain's coffin that year: When some reporter asked McCain how many houses he and his wife owned, McCain replied that he was "unsure" but that he'd have his staff get back to the reporter on that. I remember thinking that most Americans know how many houses they own, if any, without having to check with their staff.
I'm sad to hear McCain has passed away, but Democrats always said bad things about him UNTIL he voted "no" on the proposal to repeal Obamacare. That, and that alone, transformed John McCain into a good guy.
Trump should never have said that he preferred soldiers who, unlike McCain, were not captured. I don't blame McCain for getting captured. On the other hand, I've never thought that McCain was a "war hero" simply because he'd been captured, nor did I ever feel that he deserved credit for not accepting preferential treatment from Hanoi because he was the son of a famous admiral. Had he been sent home because he "pulled rank," there would have been, rightly so, a loud cry that unfairness had occurred.
4
@MyThreeCents
Nearly as many Americans died in the Hanoi Hilton as survived it. John McCain, like most POWs held in that horrific dungeon, knew they had a very high chance of dying there. Their misery was unimaginable.
John McCain refused the North Vietnamese offer to be released three or more years earlier than he would have been, to allow others captured before him to be released and to live. He did that because he was a man of honor, who loved his fellow POWs and took his military oath seriously.
In my book , there is not enough credit to bestow upon him. McCain was a hero if "only" for that sacrifice.
11
@MyThreeCents
Doing one highly honorable thing in one's lifetime is more than many can speak of. To do several is quite admirable, I should think.
As a life-long Democrat, I can still see a good deed in anyone who tries, regardless of his or her politics.
10
Donald Trump hugs the flag to show patriotism.
But John McCain served his country, was a Navy fighter pilot held prisoner during the Vietnam War in the hideous Hoa Lo Prison, nicknamed "The Hanoi Hilton" by its prisoners,
---and served as a United States senator for many years.
McCain's distinctive moral courage is in very short supply in the Republican Party, and in the Trump White House.
Trump refused to comment on John McCain's legacy today. And sat in stone cold silence when asked.
26
@One More Realist in the Age of Trump
I disagree. Donald Trump didn't hug the flag to show his patriotism -- instead he raised the flag by ordering it not to fly at half-staff in honor of John McCain's passing...SAD.
4
@One More Realist in the Age of Trump
I submit that Trump is not qualified to comment on John McCain; T's cowardice and inner corruption should not soil the name of a real American.
9
@One More Realist in the Age of Trump
And, negative PR forced him to lower the flag in honor of McCain. As usual, he overestimated his popularity among the general public. He never remembers he lost the popular vote by 3M. Trump dodged the Vietnam draft with fake "bone spurs". He never forgot that McCain served, and survived years of a brutal imprisonment before he finally broke. Trump comes from a family of draft dodgers; McCain came from a family of those who served.
7
And the Peril to America's Greatness is, beyond the shadow of a doubt: The Party of the Bad Part, Donald "The Con" Trump, a.k.a. MAGATweet, The Jerk, American Idiot......and SO&SF.
9
Senator McCain was not perfect and he was the first to admit that. But who of us is? He was too far to the conservative side for my taste, but what sets him apart from the great majority of his Republican colleagues was his character and courage to try to work in a collaborative manner with Democratic politicians for the greater good and to put the interests of our nation above partisan interests. We need a 100 (nay, 500) John or Jane "McCains" in the Congress to turn our government to one of probity, decency, and compassion.
12
Bless you, John McCain for your incredible service to our country. And for your efforts to keep decency in our politics. Your passing is yet another reminder of how the current Republican "leadership" falls short. May you rest in peace for a job well done!
10
American greatness is not at risk. It has already been damaged significantly. I have recently been in several countries where there is a consensus that the USA is no longer the leader of the free world. History will be merciless on the silence of Congress and the Senate.
36
McCain had the courage to do whatever he thought was right without worrying about the consequences. Most politicians do whatever they think is necessary to save their jobs or whatever their party says. Courage is the difference.
15
In the end, John McCain was out of sync with the times - but not necessarily because he represented a kinder, gentler type of politician. At a time when people were desperately looking for solutions, when the two parties visions of the way forward were increasingly divergent, McCain chose "None of the above". No on healthcare reform and no on repeal. No on Trump and no on Hillary. He refused to abandon his party and caucus with the Democrats even when Republicans shamelessly embraced Trump and overlooked his lies and refusal to be transparent about his income.
His heroism as a POW in standing up to the Vietnamese captors did not translate into political heroism.
Magnanimous on a personal level, but his belief in small limited gov't (at least domestically) meant he was not inclined to support meaningful legislation that is needed to ensure Americans can live with dignity, and that can address issues such as global warming. Starving gov'ts of funds is the surest way to erode faith in gov't, and he helped play a role in that.
9
I, too, disagreed with many of his policy beliefs, but no one can doubt he loved his country and usually put his country above his self-serving interests.
18
@FanieW Please McCain in the end only thought of himself and not the country. In his early life that may have been different but not in the last 10 years.
These are nice sentiments and an honor to McCain...but the GOP leaders have proved decidedly and repeatedly that they are cowards. Any semblance of heroism and ethical leadership has vacated this Party. A few limp instances here and there of push-back, but mostly they tied themselves to the lower realms because as I have always said about their party - the ends always justify the means. Their tax cut was an acceptable sacrifice of their abandoned principles of balanced budgets, non-debt, etc. their embrace of tariffs, a racist, misogynistic scape-goating Leader, not to mention their abandonment of allies, etc. This is now the party of Sarah Palin, Steven Bannon and Ann Coulter and Fox News. Tragedy and country in peril, indeed.
15
@Nicky
This is the Party which refused to give a legitimate sitting President the right to appoint a moderate Superior Court judge to the SC. Merrick Garland was approved by Republicans for a Superior Court; suddenly he was not fit to serve on the SC, after the likes of Scalia and Alito? He was "unfit" as compared to a corporate shill, Gorsuch? McConnell held that seat open for over one year. Working people will now learn to live with less, unemployment benefits with early end dates, less health coverage, less funding for the schools their children depend on, fewer mortgages available from corporate investment banks.
4
McCain came from a family of service to America as ardent and passionate as ever have served professionally any nation. It is the families of every nation with such traditions that will lay down their lives for their flag saying it is our flag and without it we are nothing to honor.
9
The choice for America’s tomorrow is: John McCain’s vision of an America for all of us or Donald Trump’s distopian nightmare that will divide Americans and crush democracy. We shall elect one or the other.
7
@Tacitus But McCain's "vision" allows for so much acceptance of inequality. What you seem to say is that our next leaders will be Republican in some form. Dems have variable visions for America, and some of them are worth considering.
9
John McCain long remained a link in the chain between moderate Republicanism and today's morally corrupt, extremist GOP. Most recently that was captured by his voting down the AHCA and yet supporting the Tax bill that currently afflicts us. This is the mixed legacy that David Leonhardt captures very well in his column.
7
Nothing honours a man's life more than the manner of his leaving it,in so doing John McCain deserves all the eulogies and honour bestowed on him and in contrast to the aberration that presently inhabits the White House brings nothing but shame and dishonour to the office of the Presidency of the United States,surely to-day's decision to raise the flag at the White House should leave all decent minded people with feelings of disgust and opprobrium with regard to the coward and disgusting so called human being that is Donald Trump,God help America and let us all remember and honour the passing of a GOOD MAN,John McCain.
10
I am both saddened and frightened by John McCain's death. Saddened because of the stark contrast between the way he lived his life in service to our country and what we now have in the White House. He was imperfect, as he often acknowledged, but in the main he did what he believed to be the right thing. He is everything that people are attributing to him, including courageous, kind, intelligent, honorable and decent. He treated others with respect, and I will never forgot his example on the campaign trail when he was brave enough to correct his supporters. Compare that with what we are putting up with from the current occupant of the White House and it literally makes me sick to my stomach.
I am frightened because it is voters who are sending mental and moral midgets to work for us in Washington. Look at the three Republican nominees from Arizona; if they don't make your stomach churn in disgust, you are not paying attention.
Until Americans honor their democratic right to vote by insisting upon leaders who have integrity, decency, intelligence and knowledge, we will be stuck with the corrupt simpletons who are lining their pockets as America declines. I hope I am wrong about our future, and I hope everyone who is eligible will vote this fall. We deserve better only when we honor our civic duty and insist upon it.
God bless you, John McCain. We honor you and will miss you.
20
I was tempted to mention this article mistakenly stated the Republican party is a threat to democracy, and actually meant the democrat party is the actual threat to democracy. Or is this only another childish Orwellian semantic tactic to mislead? Regardless, both parties, criminally corrupt deep state bureaucrats, the ruling class are terrified their era of dominance could end, they could lose control of political power and the wealth it guarantees them. Thankfully, it appears thinking people have finally figured out who the enemy is. Rest assured, it is not beloved President Trump..
2
@Screenwritethis Is this satire? I cannot tell.
But if it is not, I am puzzled by your last two sentences. Please tell me who is the "enemy?" I honestly cannot figure out your meaning.
6
John McCain loved Hemingway’s books and used the title of one as his signature inspiration in life. The line comes at the end of a seventeenth century poem by John Donne--a poem most of us read in school. In a very real way, it became McCain's last message to us: that we are all together in this beautiful boat we call life.
'No Man is an Island'
No man is an island entire of itself; every man
is a piece of the continent, a part of the main;
if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe
is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as
well as any manner of thy friends or of thine
own were; any man's death diminishes me,
because I am involved in mankind.
And therefore never send to know for whom
the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.
21
@Connie Conway
Thank you. Just love the intelligent commentary of most NYT readers. This former Literature teacher appreciates you.
3
Now that our Senate has lost the presence of John McCain to provide it grace, patriotism, judgement, respect for the process of bipartisan compromise, and recognition for the people he represented, we would be well served if Governor Ducey would appoint a successor with those same qualities. How about allowing us all the privilege of welcoming Cindy McCain to the Senate to succeed John?
3
The governor of Oregon from 2003 to 2011 was Ted Kulongoski. He wasn't great. None of our leaders are great. But, he did give us a new state park a year, like he promised. That's great enough for me.
I admire everyone who runs for public office, whatever their party, (except for this last election).
3
I didn't agree with John McCain politically but he was a fine, decent human being. I read and believe when he said our country is in peril because of the divisiveness. and Trump. Seeing the Republican party moving more toward Trumpism makes me shudder. How can these people who admired John McCain turn toward Trump? John McCain was everything America stands for and Trump stands for nothing but himself.
15
Perhaps, with the passing of Senator McCain, the GOP will finally find its courage and backbone, and stand up for what McCain stood for. Perhaps the GOP will finally realize that the deal they have made with the devil has devoured their souls. If McCain's passing accomplishes this, then I would imagine that he is smiling, at the thought of his beloved Country, starting to heal itself and get back on the right course.
John McCain was the sort of man who proved that, while all humans are flawed, we all have within us the power to do what's right, despite the cost.
God speed Sir. This old Army Vietnam Vet salutes you, and thanks you for your lifetime of service to our Nation.
12
As is always the case, Democrats and Liberals (but I repeat myself) always celebrate a Republican after he dies. Many of us felt in 2000 and again in 2008 that McCain, though a flawed candidate, would have made a fine president. He was above all a constitutionalist who would have avoided the flawed leadership style of Obama, thus avoiding the slide into raw, even more coarse, abuse of state power which we are seeing with Trump. Trump is not sui generis --- he emerged due to profound dissatisfaction with the style and substance of elitist leadership (both Dem and GOP). And now we have Mr Leonhardt among others appropriating McCain as their hero, when they vilified him during his run for POTUS. Trust me, all we will need to have happen is Romney's passing for the Left to soil itself proclaiming the passing of yet another Republican exemplar whom we shall all miss. And no Mr Leonhardt the GOP is not the greatest threat to liberty ---it's the corrupt Deep State, the expansive administrative state whose absence until recently was the real evidence of American Exceptionalism.
1
@JMR "-it's the corrupt Deep State"
Barking mad.
3
@JMR - Two words for you in connection with the McCain presidential candidacy: ‘S-A-R-A-H’ and ‘P-A-L-I-N’.
Thomas Jefferson himself could have run on the Republican ticket - that millstone around his neck would have tanked it.
4
@JMR "Deep State" (i.e. the latest replacement for the "Military-industrial complex" of the 60s and 70s). Conspiracy theorists always need something "deep" and "hidden" to conjure the boogie men. They vilify faceless groups because an uncontrollable and faceless enemy makes people feel powerless and afraid. And since the group is faceless and has no organizing concept, anyone can be a participant - from the dog catcher to the head of the FBI. It's a very flexible construct for building fear and division. Glad you've bought in!
5
Mr. Leonhardt emphasizes Sen. McCain's good qualities without lionizing him. McCain was a product of his conservative upbringing as a third generation military officer, from which he culled many admirable traits. Yet he also found room to grow. This was reflected, among many other ways, in his support of normalizing relations with Vietnam, a country in which he was held prisoner and tortured for 5.5 years. It is worth noting that the Vietnamese Ambassador found room in his heart (unlike the current Occupant of the White House), to express his condolences on McCain's death. This from a country that suffered the deaths of 2 million civilians, 1.1 million North Vietnamese and Viet Cong fighters, about 250,000 South Vietnamese soldiers (britannica.com), and an unfathomable number of injured. This was largely the result of the American intervention in this ill-conceived Western war that eventually was repudiated by the American public and led to the failure of Pres. Lyndon B. Johnson to seek a second full term as President.
12
Sorry, but ‘our greatness’ is not ‘in peril.’ It’s a figment of the imagination. By any measure, the quality of life of the average American lags well behind many other nations.
You can’t eat jingoism. ‘Strong borders’ will not make a perceptible dent in 30,000 deaths by gunfire and more than that by drug overdose per annnum.
$730 billion worth of military spending a year won’t make health care affordable and available, provide child care for working families or make it possible for our young people to attend college without incurring crushing debt.
Enormous tax cuts for the wealthy, resulting in exploding deficits, will not allow working Americans to take ample vacation and family leave, retire with a modicum of financial security, or breathe clean air, drink clean water, share the benefits of improved infrastructure, or enjoy the land formerly held in trust for everyone that soon will be plundered for corporate profit.
Nope. American greatness was a beautiful dream; a beacon that drew tens of millions of immigrants to our shores in the 20th century, that defeated the global scourge of fascism and created the American and Western European economic miracle after World War II.
Sixty million Americans voted to toss that dream in the trashbin out of rage, fear, spite, greed, hypocrisy, primitive superstition (a/k/a ‘Christian evangelism’) and ignorance.
The rest of the world watches in horror as the American dream becomes a nightmare that threatens the entire planet.
31
For anyone who's been watching, we didn't need John McCain to tell us that our 'Greatness' is in peril -- that much became evident when racist and misogynist was put into the White House by the very same party that he was part of.
So, no. I'm not ready to jump onto the 'How-Great-Was-John-McCain-now-that-he's-dead' train.
Even though his one vote on the Senate floor managed to save what's left of the Affordable Health Care Act, it was still his party that ravaged it in the first place.
And then there's the unforgivable fact that he was the one who unleashed Sarah Palin and her brood on the political stage, just so that he could court the Conservative vote.
No way he could ever walk that one back, no matter how often he tried to stand up for Obama against the rising tide of the Birther Movement which ultimately paved the way for Donald Trump's road into the White House.
The rest is history.
And while Senator McCain has moved on to higher ground, we as a nation are still left struggling with this other side of his legacy.
So yes, our 'greatness' is in peril. But it will take more than McCain's final message and Donald Trump's promises to make it great again.
7
John McCain risked his life to fly missions over Hanoi, only to be shot down, beaten, tortured and held captive for 5+ years, then continued to serve his country honorably and ably in the senate.
Remember, that's who John McCain was.
Donald Trump avoided the draft through lies, and was enough of a sleazy low-life to say he 'likes heroes who don't get captured."
Never, never, forget. That's who Donald Trump is.
22
If you never met a war you didn't support, or a adversary you didn't want to invade, and you supported occupying Iraq for "maybe a hundred years," then John McCain was definitely your man.
5
@Thomas C.
Fair comment.
3
John Mccain wanted to deny Americans the same health insurance that the government paid for him. He got caught trying to bomb civilians and crashed his plane because he was a bad pilot and only got to where he was because of his family name. He was a warmonger and voted in line with Trump the vast majority of the time. I'm sorry he suffered and my condolences to his family, but if this is what you consider "great" for the Republican party, then I am scared to death.
4
@J. Ó Muirgheasa
If you served for 20 years in our Military, regardless of rank, you and your spouse would have the same health care system as McCain and me. It is known as TriCare. I was part of the target selection process for North Vietnam targets 1966–67, using a then classified Air Force weather satellite to ensure weather conditions would allow the pilot to find the target. This was before precision guidance. All targets were selected based on military significance. North Vietnam possessed a very sophisticated defensive system. I knew many top notch pilots who became POWs. I am ultra liberal and your comments are far off base.
2
@James S Kennedy everyone deserves the same health care that McCain had and that you have, regardless of whether they were in the military or not.
Read about McCain - he was reckless and crashed three planes. Graduated almost last in his class of 800.
America’s would-be Nero
Has no good word for America’s hero.
12
The high point of McCain was when a woman said to McCain at a town hall meeting in Lakeville, Minnesota in October 2008.
“I can’t trust Obama. I have read about him, and he’s not, um, he’s an Arab”
McCain grabbed the microphone from her, cutting her off.
“No, ma’am,” he said. “He’s a decent family man [and] citizen that just I just happen to have disagreements with on fundamental issues, and that’s what the campaign’s all about. He’s not [an Arab].”
At the same event, according to a Politico report from the time, he told a supporter who said he was “scared” of Obama that the senator was a “decent person” and one who “you don’t have to be scared of as president of the United States.”
No wonder McCain let it be know that he did not want President Trump at his funeral.
21
His real “measure” was refusing release ahead of others held longer. That was a “Navy Cross” moment.
4
McCain had the decency to admit when he was wrong. Trump, who never served a day in his life had the audacity to mock his time as a POW; what a loser we are stuck with! I am both ashamed and angry that my beloved country has devolved to this, leaving our morality and decency behind. Hold on, we're in for a big fall. Uncle Karma will get us!
20
I don't know what rabbit hole I fell into. First its scientifically proven alcohol no matter what quantity or form is not a health food. Then the nytimes prints someone who isn't saint, that is someone who doesn't fit into your political views could be a hero.
Oh, you're just trying to get at Trump. Never mind.
1
I had the great privilege of going to Hanoi with Senators McCain, Kerry & Smith in 1993 as they sought to put the POW/MIA issue behind us. I never agreed with John on a single political issue. He was tough and a hothead. Almost as full of himself as I was. And he was 10 times the man I've ever been. I will remember him, admire him, and be inspired by him for the rest of my life.
John was right about this: Our nation is in peril. Never have I seen such a cabal running our nation so rife with corruption, greed, mendacity, venality and cowardice. I fear we are on the brink...
81
Your past president insulted my service.
Your past candidate called me deplorable.
Your supporters call me names daily.
The free press as you like to call yourselves is so one sided you are nothing more than a propaganda network.
And all the while you are wondering why Trump’s supporters refuse to abandon him.
If you're referring to the guy who screamed at John McCain for being a POW or screamed at parents of a solider who died in battle or yanked the committment we'd made to granting citizenship to immigrant soldiers or ran McMasters out of the Army, why, that guy's still President.
Otherwise, who the heck are you talking about?
14
I wonder how the Vietnamese, Cambodians, Laotians, Iranians, Iraqis, Libyans, and Yemenis feel about John "Bomb bomb bomb bomb bomb Iran" McCain.
7
Does the democratic party establishment that stood by while pretending to be "liberal" CEO's and economists pillaged and destroyed our economy in 2008, then allowed Obama to install a 'Wall Street' government ... a party that advocates for "open borders" in direct defiance of the majority will and interest and then Stalin-like terrorizes anyone who dares to question this anything goes globalization shoving of Americans into poverty with accusations of racism, xenophobia, anti Semitism et al put us in any less "peril" than the republican establishment that in broad strokes does the same flat-earth, "shut up you ignorant dispicables" thing?
Does saying exactly what Trumpists say, in the same way that Trumpists holler, with about the same level of knowledge as a Trumpist, make somebody who thinks they're a lefty anything more than another type of Trumpist who's just screaming at a different list of enemies?
1
@winthrop staples
Obama rescued our economy.
10
"The absolutism and radicalism of today’s Republican Party is the biggest threat to the country that McCain served and loved."
David, remove "Republican" and insert "Democratic" and we have a statement that is equally true! How about accepting your role in this mess?
Look at the institutionalized dependency created by the "Democratic" party's welfare state. Consider the efforts of Democrats to wreck the US Court system by leaving nearly 200 courts without a judge as they insist on slow-walking appointments in the Senate (Thx Sen Schumer!). Yes, we are a land of immigrants -LEGAL immigrants, but Dems refuse to consider that option. In case after case it's "absolutism and radicalism" on parade as politicians insist on 'playing to their base' rather than doing what's right for the nation!
Way too many 'players' and way too few Patriots!
@Phil
"Consider the efforts of Democrats to wreck the US Court system by leaving nearly 200 courts without a judge as they insist on slow-walking appointments in the Senate (Thx Sen Schumer!)."
Wow, Phil.
Lest we forget, those court vacancies were created by none other than Senate Majority Leader McConnell, who refused to proceed with the replacement process back when we had a real president.
11
“that the president of the United States might be vulnerable to Russian extortion.”
A fact that Trump supporters have accepted with glee. So, what does that say about the republican party of today?
10
@Mac
It says what a Trump supporter at a rally said: "I would rather be Russian than a Democrat." The sublime ignorance of that statement is what comprises a majority of Trump's cult voting base. The man who said he would rather be a Russian did not know that Putin recently absconded with the Russian treasury. Or, maybe he knew and approved. Trump and his greedy family are doing whatever they can to take money from the Treasury, starting with the Trump hotel in D.C. with a lock on housing foreign dignitaries in violation of The Emoluments Clause. I wouldn't bet on any strident Trump supporter knowing what that Clause is, or why it matters. Now Trump the incompetent grifter is trying to denigrate an honorable former Marine; Trump is like a cornered rat, lashing out, scratching and biting. He can raise or lower the WH flag; nothing he does will erase his draft dodging with fake "bone spurs". Nothing will erase his insult to the family of the platoon leader who sacrificed his life to save his men. Nothing will erase his 25M settlement for his Trump U fraud. His Cabinet is now in jail or under indictment. That says much in a town where most do serve in government. Not this government; not this Administration; not this dishonorable Congress.
2
Accolades poor in from all sides for a great American hero and Patriot. Can someone please explain to me how nearly one-half of American voters still avidly support the embodiment of everything that McCain was not? Why are we here? What are the reasons for this blind adoration of a visibly corrupt demagogue? What can be done to truly make America great again?
10
@Disillusioned - The reason: race
7
@Steve Singer: until we stop with this nonsense of greatness there is little hope that we will get anywhere. There is no great nation anywhere and there has never been one. There are decent human beings who try to live their lives in a way that is dictated by personal ethos. Out of those, ones like Spinoza left something eternal behind. We are lucky because of that. For those who lived good lives and left good will behind, we are grateful. The rest is empty rhetoric: Great Nations, called great by its semi-educated, semi-blind inhabitants.
4
@Blunt
There are those survivors of the Holocaust who might disagree with you; they recently honored the "Righteous" who sacrificed to hide Jews from Nazis in The Netherlands. You might not honor Churchill and the British who fought under him, and those who set off in the "small boats" to rescue their boys from Dunkirk. You might not honor the Norwegians who rescued downed British pilots and got them home on merchant ships. You might not honor our own Merchant Mariners who kept Britain supplied with food and weapons by crossing the Atlantic from the Caribbean; I worked for one who retired from that service; his ship was torpedoed and he had one crippled hand. He said there was no choice; we had to keep Britain going. Trump would never understand that level of courage and sacrifice.
1
It is sad that the only voice who had the courage to criticise Donald Trump is no more. One shudders to think what will happen in future with all other spineless Republicans Senators who have lost all the moral courage by kowtowing to the authoritarian and an unpredictable leader.
The unreliability of Trump's leadership is forcing all US allies to gravitate towards Russia and China. The US is sadly losing its heady past by antagonizing all its friends. The way the US president has come in support of Kim Jon Un, who has been responsible in silencing all his detractors does not bode well for the future of the United States.
7
Mr. Leonard, you are wrong! Our “greatness” has never been in danger but our basic values!
What do the American conservatives and the Saudi Wahhabis have in common?
Both sects invoke the tradition as much and often as they could but their actions and values are in direct negation of the historic facts.
The Wahhabis cited the Quran in defense of their terrorism, ethnic cleansing and banning different religions, but the original implementation of their Holy Book was deprived of hatred and violence, inclusive and tolerant, because the true faith is always personal and voluntary, never mandatory or forced.
At least the Wahhabis are twisting the facts that are 14 centuries old while the conservatives are doing the same with the most recent history, excellently recorded and easily available.
One would think listening to the Limbaughs and Hannitys of this world that the Founding Fathers prescribed America acting as the mad world policeman, equated the money, the bribes and the global corporations with the freedom of speech, that they stood up for the free trade and exploitation of the rest of the globe for their personal profitability, that they envisioned the colossal national debt, meaning that somebody else should pay for their perks and lavish profits...
For God’ sake, the American Revolution was waged against such a kind of world order.
The question is who should have told you this - Senator McCain or somebody else?
2
I think Senator McCain was the last Republican who cared more for his country than his party or his own re-election.
Our "Greatness" passed about 1970, better stated as our "exceptionalism." We are now adolescents lost in a dark forest with competitors looking to take our place. And our gridlocked political system, mountainous public debt, and private "wealth" based on notional money in the Finance rackets, could not be more engineered to lead us to collapse. Prepare for it.
9
McCain didn't say it, but I will. I like Presidents whose "best people" are not felons.
14
Though I disagreed with several of his political stances, I still felt like I had an honorable Senator in Washington DC. In fact, with his vote on the repeal of Obamacare, I was very proud of my Senator. Unfortunately, his replacement will likely not have similar spine.
I just wonder what carnival freak show stunt Trump will pull on the day of McCain's funeral as a last slap of disrespect.
22
@jack dancer Here's the link I mentioned: https://nyti.ms/2z6Wn15
I'm a little tired of the deification of John McCain, who was little more that a lockstep Republican with a big mouth. A Republican friend of mine once described him as a "loose cannon". As David notes, he foisted the unbelievably incompetent Sarah Palin on us. The Confederate flag is the banner of the worst traitors to the United States ever. There is no equivocating on it for true Americans. He was a war hero for his suffering at the hands of the VC, but his numerous training accidents would likely have "washed him out" if he wasn't an Admiral's son. He is praised for his "thumbs down" to ACA repeal, but when it came time to stand up against the tax heist for the 1%, McCain went along with conservative GOP dogma, as he had most of his political life. He had any number of reasons to oppose the law - morally: that it hurt everyday Americans and rewarded the already rich and powerful; economically: that it would blow up the deficit which Republicans like him so hypocritically complain about whenever a Democrat is in the White House; procedurally: he could have turned thumbs down on the bill because its hasty preparation and rapid passage without sufficient discussion violated his precious adherence to senate procedure. But all that didn't matter in the end - he just rubber stamped Trump's will, hardly the action of a principled conservative. That McCain passed for one in today's America tells you all you need to know about his lying, hypocritical, racist dog-whistle party.
10
The Republican Party of today is only a business. It’s goal is to betray the ideals of the country to maximize personal gain, and the fact is that few realize it.
However, betraying the country and your oath of office for personal gain is a crime.
The people have entrusted people like Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan with the country’s future, and they are the equivalent of embezzling financial officers.
While John McCain often enabled these crooks in “Party over country”, he had a greater sense of patriotism than those people ever had.
Country was important to him, despite his flaws.
He refused to be part of the swamp that is destroying our country.
5
@Grove
Na.... with Pallin Inc as his mouthpiece he morn only embraced the swamp but wanted to be its CEO. N
Leonhardt is pretty amusing but probably doesn't realize why. He says in his second and third paras that McCain believed in a pluralistic America and that he was willing to accept defeat when his side lost.
If only Leonhardt and the left would accept that there are people different from you who live in America and voted for Trump. And for that they are deemed deplorables.
And which side is still re-litigating the 2016 election, hoping against all reason that Mueller or someone will bring Trump down.
Perhaps the left can learn a few lessons from McCain.
@Ralphie
Wow. You folks really don't get it. This isn't about who the president is. This is about whether the president got there by legitimate means. No matter your party, you ought to be concerned about that. Putin is playing you like a useful idiot.
5
Any death should make us pause to see what we have lost and what we have become; the difference between McCain and the current occupant of the White House is stark--will we rise to our better selves or stay mired in the muck?
38
Thank you for a thought-provoking examination of John McCain and his legacy. The McCain of the 2000 presidential campaign was someone I could respect, though as a self-described liberal, I would not be casting a vote him. I was incredibly disappointed when he choose Sarah Palin as his running mate in 2008, it seemed to be a complete abdication of his principles. He could be pragmatic and maddening and yet his experiences informed his choices. His honor and character will be missed.
12
@Lostin24
The McCain who ran in 2000 was someone I might have voted for. But by 2008 McCain had sold his soul to the far right wing of his party as must all serious GOP presidential contenders. Ronald Regan, whom they all claim to revere, wouldn't have stood a chance of being nominated by today's GOP. That said, McCain repeatedly demonstrated that he was one of the very few members of his party who would sometimes hold country above party.
9
To me the greatest difference between Senator McCain's brand of Republicanism and that of the current GOP leadership's is that he recognized that in a Democracy history must forward to survive.
When first elected to the Senate, McCain functioned as a rock ribbed Goldwater Republican who would fight open immigration, use the coded words for racism as a political weapon, question global warming and promoted an American aristocracy as the best way to assure cultural consistency and economic growth. As he matured however McCain increasingly began to adopt the more Liberal view points of his opponents on these matters as more practical, effective and conducive to the continued progress that a Democratic way of life demands.
In his book the 'Restless Wave' McCain finally even admitted that the most frustrating and concerning thing he saw in his lifetime occurring in his beloved Republican Party was the inability for the GOP leadership to even consider an alternative view of what it meant to be an American. And that McCain considered this weakness to perhaps be an epochal and crippling shift in the ability for our nation's to be able to adjust to the changes all nations must go through during their history.
McCain's last request for both a former Republican President and a Democratic President to present his eulogy (while completely excluding the sitting Republican President) put an exclamation point on his concerns for the current direction he saw the GOP taking.
12
In October 2016 John McCain said that if Hillary Clinton became president the Republicans should block any nominee she made for the supreme court. John McCain was for the most part just as extreme and undemocratic as his other partisan fellow Republican in the Senate and the House.
13
I would endorse pretty much all of this although Gopnik's characterization of de Gaulle couldn't be more wrong. He certainly wasn't a doctrinaire conservative and was hated by the extreme right in France who tried to whack him no less than 30 times. To this day he's reviled by the extreme right wing Le Pen FN.
He defied labels really largely because he saw himself (not entirely correctly) as floating above faction. In many ways he was radically progressive which explains his appeal to much of the moderate left. His only really strong belief, religion almost, was in the state as the source of security, order, progress, stability and tolerance.
The biography Gopnik was reviewing btw is outstanding. Deserves to be the non fiction book of the year.
2
"inequality, alienation, climate change and a global drift toward autocracy" are Leonhard themes. Now he adds authoritarianism to show his fear that President Trump is one seeking to avoid a U.S. experiment in making socialism able to solve all of the problems above.
Has our President indicated in some way that besides draining the swamp, he is guilty of wanting more than two terms to help all understand that most of us are good Americans not limiting excellence and prosperity to any sub-group David chooses to define? To most of us equality of opportunity does not mean all value must be surrendered for socialists to skim and disburse the remnant equally; nor does it mean that we need to alienate any group willing to be friendly and fair; or think that we need to rule the Sun and the Earth's variable pathway around it to match somebody's notion of what our climate must be at every GPS.
Autocracy ala Venezuela and Cuba is not desired by President Trump or most others except for those that see human nature as being better if managed by socialists is not a workable answer.
David is right in agreeing with McCain's desire for a working Democrat party in Congress, to be a loyal participant, not just a obstructionist group led by two authoritarians- one in House and one in Senate.
1
@Richard
Trump clearly admires autocratic rule, and Democrats seeking to address economic inequality aren’t seeking to replace our capitalist economy with a socialist one. Why claim otherwise?
6
@Richard
Um, huh?
"President Trump is one seeking to avoid a U.S. experiment in making socialism" - surely you jest. You can't possibly imagine that Trump would (could) even entertain that construct in his head.
"or think that we need to rule the Sun and the Earth's variable pathway" - is there enough straw in the world to build that strawman?
"Autocracy ala Venezuela and Cuba is not desired by anyone except Trump for the purposes of having enemies to rally his low info base." There, fixed it for you.
And, the best for last..."besides draining the swamp..." - I expect no particular comment is needed on this last absurdity.
5
New lows of fantasy, deceit, and hypocrisy for a commenter who had already apparently hit rock bottom.
Hmmm - unemployment at record lows, employment at record highs, jobs coming back to the U. S., companies brining their cash back to the U. S., stock market at all time high, bad trade deals being redone to better favor U. S. workers, border laws being enforced. Looks really great to most of us.
4
@TMD It's probably not a good idea to speak for "most of us". But at least some of us recognize this economy as the product of recovery policies put in place by GW Bush and B Obama; and fear the overheated economy is just another bubble, ready to burst at any moment. Let's hope you're right that it's not "fake prosperity". But it wouldn't hurt to prepare for the crash, nonetheless.
26
@TMD
Deficit spending papers over a lot of ills. It allows the Obama recovery to continue, perhaps past its natural life. When it crashes, and it will, the crash will be all the bigger.
If the Republicans hold the House, we will see a renewed focus on balancing the budget. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, public funding of infrastructure programs (roads, airports) will all be put on the table for serious cuts.
While trade deals have been put in play, I haven't seen any results. What makes you think they will be better for US workers? Border laws have always been enforced.
Actually, most of us see government corruption and income inequality as bigger issues, and they have regressed.
26
The environment looking good to you? The country’s deficit? The total refusal to examine events by looking at the data?
11
USA as Camelot progressed to USA as the shining city on a hill. Now, the regression to Gotham City and Commissioner Gordon just died........
7
So much contrast:
One man who was gracious in his failure to be President; another who lied, trash-talked, and conspired, and continues to.
One who served in the military, with distinction; the other who developed magically disappearing bone spurs and said he prefers soldiers who didn't get captured.
One who recognizes Russia as our greatest enemy; the other who sees Russia as a business opportunity, colluded for campaign dirt, allowed himself to be compromised by Putin, and refuses to stand up to all the wrong Russia does.
One who worked to accomplish politically; the other who can't accomplish much but continually claims "the greatest __ ever".
One who tried to limit money's influence on politics; the other who thinks politics is a way to make money, and that wealthy people and corporate exec.s should run the government.
One who often reached across the aisle; another who doesn't like either side and only reaches out to his base with sound bites so they'll cheer for him.
One who has standards; the other doesn't know what the word means.
I support McCain in not wanting Trump at his service. Bush and Obama are gentlemen. Trump would have just used it as another platform to trash-talk people like he did at the Boy Scouts Rally. Trump had an opportunity to be gracious yesterday, along with the rest of the country, but just couldn't bring himself to be so.
Can we elect Mr. McCain posthumously to be President? If he does nothing, that's better than Trump.
28
I read your piece, Mr. Leonhardt, with pain in my heart.
Eisenhower! Oh my goodness! When is the last time ANY Republican--anyone at ALL mentioned Dwight D. Eisenhower? Shades of the 1950's. When I was in elementary school.
"I am an Eisenhower Republican," declared Bob Dole, running for president in 1996. "I believe government CAN do good things--constructive things."
He said it once. He never said it again. I cannot find it online. But I know he said it.
I saw a movie once--"The New Leaf." Came out years ago. With Walter Matthau. As a playboy who squandered all his money. I am thinking of a scene where, sitting in a banker's office, he berates the guy 'cause a check bounced.
"I'm trying to explain it to you," the man expostulates. "Your money is GONE. There's no money to cover the check. You're BROKE, Mr. Blank. . .you're BROKE. . .."
I am waiting, Mr. Leonhardt--oh HOW I am waiting. . .
. .. for the American people to stand up and speak these words to the present-day Republican party.
"You guys--morally and intellectually. . .
" . .are BROKE. You have nothing to offer ANYONE. . ..
". . .except the Koch brothers.
"Get out!. . ..GET OUT! . . . ..
" . . .good-bye!. . . .
.and good riddance!"
Mr. McCain might have foreseen this moment.
He may hoped for it.
I sure do.
9
Ya gotta be pretty awful for someone to tell you that you are unwanted at their own funeral.
23
"We knew John McCain.
And you're no John McCain!...
Not Trump
Not Trump's family and advisers
Not most of Trump's cabinet
Not Trump's House and Senate GoP leaders
Not Trump's congressional backers
Not Trump's Evangelical supporters
Not Trump's constituency and dedicated Fox News watchers
Not Trump's bigoted, racist, misogynst, xenophobic, hyper wealthy constituents
Not the pro-Trump candidates running in Arizona and elsewhere.
Mot Trump's friend Putin and autocrats everywhere.
Maybe you can live with that while proclaiming your american bonafides.
We knew America
And you're also not American. America is hope, morality truth, equality, compassion, tolerance and good works. You are none of these things.
Let us hope that saying goodby to John McCain does not plunge us deeper into the abyss of 'not John McCain'.
We knew John McCain
And you're no John McCain!...
13
@Jordan it's so sad when people can't see their own reflection.
1
Hatred, fear, lies and anger worked for the GOP in 2016. It is time Democrats started playing hardball. Disgust with Trump and the lapdog Republicans is a winning strategy to get Democratic voters energized.
2
This Sir is a superb assessment of this important man. You got the good right, the flaws properly assessed and his importance woven into the fabric of the country that he loved and served honorably. BRAVO!!
14
The author writes “He came to reject racism as a political strategy. And in his dying months,…”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/11/AR200810...
“Yesterday, civil rights leader John Lewis, a Democratic congressman from Georgia, became the latest advocate to excite the racial debate, condemning Sen. John McCain for "sowing the seeds of hatred and division" and accusing the Republican nominee of potentially inciting violence.”
“Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the Republican vice presidential nominee, said Obama was "palling around with terrorists," a reference to his association with the 1960s radical William Ayers, and a turn of phrase that critics said was racially loaded.”
Sarah Palin, the political mother of Trump
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/sarah-palin-the-political-mother...
“….Palin’s nomination didn’t crack the door for Trump. It birthed him. Palin is, politically, the Mother of Trump.”
11
I agree
1
All the paeans...the 'fun' guy...the hero...the Maverick...Please tell that to the victims of the NRA supported Senator who also wears the title -per the NYT- of the number one recipient of NRA campaign contributions.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/10/04/opinion/thoughts-prayers-...
6
Donald Trump has successfully strong-armed all the decent conservative voices in this country to either keep quiet or abandon the Republican party. This has left a moral vacuum in the party that doesn't seem like it will be filled anytime soon. Instead of Republican candidates choosing to speak for those conservatives who still care about law and order, family values, and fiscal responsibility they are embracing the racist strong-man tactics of bullying and racial blow-horns that seem to have gotten Trump into power. This was all before we learned how much Russian collusion and porn star hush payments may have been what actually won him the presidency.
The only remedy for this continued spiral down the drain for the Republican party, as well as our nation itself, is to hand at least one house of Congress to the Democratic party. Only then can we begin serious investigations into Trump and his alleged crimes, and take action to push back against his repugnant behavior that has already lowered our country's standing in the world.
8
To the "New Republican party" it's good riddance to John McCain. Let's get the new guy in here quick and stack the SCOTUS.
Republicans, enamored with their minority hating Criminal-in-Chief, can't wait to impose their unilateral will upon all Americans. McCain stood for the now quaint idea of bi-partisanship and compromise. They blame him for whatever tattered vestiges of the ACA remain to help middle class Americans.
Republican congress critters now roll their eyes towards heaven and bombast in affectionate terms for the man they wish had died before the ACA vote.
Republicans disparaged McCain by electing the draft dodging buffoon that denied McCain's hero status and continued his juvenile tantrum even as McCain lay dying. Republicans couldn't wait for McCain to be dead so they can get on with the Trump agenda.
Yeah McCain wasn't perfect but surviving a Vietnamese prison camp and choosing not to be released early is the unequivocal evidence of his hero status. He choose conviction over having a broken body for tbe rest of his life. He had more strength in his little finger than Trump, who wets himself in the presence of Putin, can even imagine.
And there he goes, a man who could still admire without malice the man who defeated him for tbe presidency even though he was >gasp< black. Hating minorities, especially Obama, is the basis for everything Trump and the new Republicans do.
RIP John. The last great Republican Senator. God help us all.
11
John McCain dropped bombs on little people.
1
The GOP needs to extract the the cancer of Slave State Neo-Confederates who have infected the party with their malignant racism, a policy of dis-enfranchising blacks and Hispanics, Culture War nonsense, and above all, Evangelicals.
6
@UTBG That's the ticket. tho' I would extend that to All 50 States Neo-Confederates. (I have seen more people flying that stupid flag openly way up north than in my neck of the woods; in fact, it is a rarity round these parts.
1
David Leonhardt states that McCain hated autocracy....well
now...if conservatives like McCain hated autocracy then he
should have known that the Republican Party as well as the
Democratic Party are being held hostage by the billionaires
who fund their campaigns through SuperPacs permitted by
the nefarious law known as Citizens United...and none of
these legislators are crying foul when they are the pawns of
their paymasters.
It is the undemocratic and evil which has put the worst
President and his cronies in the White House and in his
cabinet....Citizens United has cancelled the votes of millions
of US citizens.
Go analyze this Mr. Leonhardt...and never mind conjecture.
Just do the math...and find out how many billionaires are
controlling the House and the Senate as well as the rest of
the government offices...Citizens United decided by the John
Roberts Court is robbing us all blind and giving us a Mob Boss
for President and his very unworthy sidekicks...dig deeper
and get real Leonhardt...do some real muckraking for a change.
3
Our "greatness" is in peril?
"Greatness"? How about, "our nation is in peril"?
A traitorous Fifth Column is loose in our land intent on seizing power that it plans to hold indefinitely. Once, we called it "Communism". Now, we call it "Republicanism" because it calls itself that despite it being far removed from social and political values most Americans associate with "Republican".
It's an anti-democratic (small "d") reactionary authoritarian political movement also anti-intellectual. It rejects science and is nativist when not white-supremacist. Many openly approve of Putin, Russia's corrupt despotic leader. They embrace Trump because they see him as a similar kind of despot.
They detested President Obama for his moderation, discounting or ignoring his personal honesty and integrity and how well his family embodied traditional Republican "family values". They hated him for his humanism, for his being an intellectual, and for his race. That a Black family lived in the White House appalled many.
They love Trump because he's everything Obama wasn't: an abusive bully; anti-intellectual; corrupt; a serial philanderer; a pathological liar; indifferent to others' suffering and, of course, not just white but "Aryan". They hated Sen. McCain because he rejected and rebuked them. Many celebrate his passing.
This Fifth Column would destroy our republic given half-a-chance; their incoherent passions harnessed by a wealthy few who use them as useful idiots to advance their agenda.
28
@Steve Singer: until we stop with this nonsense of greatness there is little hope that we will get anywhere. There is no great nation anywhere and there has never been one. There are decent human beings who try to live their lives in a way that is dictated by personal ethos. Out of those, ones like Spinoza left something eternal behind. We are luck because of that. For those who lived good lives and left good will behind, we are grateful. The rest is empty rhetoric: Great Nations, called great by its semi-educated, semi-blind inhabitants.
1
So well said!
Let the memory of John McCain and what he has stood for year after year in Congress, burn into the brains of the many Republicans in Congress who wouldn’t have the testicular fortitude in three lifetimes, to equal the strength of John McCain in a single year, any single year of his life.
Even in death John McCain is speaking to us, and explaining to us the disaster of the presidency that is Donald Trump‘s. He is sending a message to us by indicating that he does not want Mr. Trump at his funeral. If only the other Republicans would have learned a lesson from the example of Mr. McCain.
And why are some people heroes by nature , while others remain perpetual cowards?
8
"And why are some people heroes by nature , while others remain perpetual cowards?"
"The answer, my friend, is blowing in the wind..."
An unskilled young laborer had a wife and children and was doing his best to keep them fed, sheltered, clothed and cherished.
His job required him to sort agricultural implements into two piles: pass and defective. The goods in the defective pile were shipped to Third World countries.
The laborer's friend wrote in outrage to a wise elder and asked what could be done about this. Mount a strike? Quit the job? Threaten the company with public exposure?
The wise elder wrote back:
Not all men are called to be heroes.
I respect John McCain as a true hero. Today is my birthday, at age 82, making me three days older than John. Like John, I served in Vietnam and we both retired as Military pay grade O-6’s, Navy captain for John, Air Force colonel for me. Unlike John, I was a techno-geek in Vietnam, not flying extremely hazardous bomber missions. I attended Air War College class of 1974, which started in July 1973, which was augmented by about 30 American POWs, who were repatriated in February 1973, and became familiar with with most of them. As far as they knew, they were in prison for the rest of their lives facing daily torture. It took great heroism just to maintain the will to live. Trump should burn in Hell for his awful statement about those who were captured.
As it turned out, Sen Goldwater addressed our War College class. I didn’t agree all of his views, but he certainly didn’t mince words. He may have had typical Republican values, but he made it very clear to us that he had very little use for far right Bible thumpers, whom he termed “dumber than dirt”.
12
@James S Kennedy Happy Birthday, and thank you very much for your service. :)
2
The pessimist McCain never truly understood America's greatness. He was a swamp republican, entrenched in DC's corrupt cesspool for over 30 years. His prescriptions of castor oil and big government made American;s gag to the point where they chose a novice community organizer over him. How fitting that his last vote confirmed that the socialist monstrosity of Obama care would continue to saddle Americans for years to come. Now America is finally back. Trump has made it so. A bigger man would have acknowledged Trump's successes. But McCain was bitter to the end. His ego could never set aside that Trump said he was a war hero because he was captured. Too bad.
1
@Steve you win the ultimate irony award of the day. Congrats!
3
Now that McCain has died and been canonized, let us not forget that he committed the single most craven political act in my lifetime — the choice of Sarah Palin to be his running mate — just one step away from the presidency!!! This disgraceful shameful act led directly to Donald Trump — the greatest threat to the future of this country. This, and this alone, is what John Mc Cain should be remembered for. Period!
6
@Don
He chose Palin because he thought the dissed Hillary fans would flock to his camp.
@Don Sir, I will never understand how Sen McCain let Palin on the ticket, and I will not forget it. However, McCain the man was more than that election. I will always respect his sacrifice for our country.
The Palin episode should be viewed as the first time the GOP was bought and paid for by crazy billionaires and were ready to sell out the country to win at all costs. Disgusting. The Government Owned by Putin (GOP) is putting our greatness in peril, despite their stupid red hats.
3
You imply in your title that you are quoting McCain, but you are not. You are putting words in his mouth that you want to put forward.
“ Our greatness is in peril “. Sir, our greatness slipped out the backdoor, along with the White House silver and best small, portable artwork. A den of thieves, Liars and incompetent boot lickers. And that’s just the appointees, not Dirty Donnie and his
“ Family “. WE have one chance to stop this crazy train. VOTE on November 6th. Independents and moderate Republicans, VOTE Democrat. Make America SANE Again.
8
John McCain - a Giant!
Donald Trump - a small person, very very small.
9
Oh no! On the other hand, greatness and $3.50 will buy you a chai latte.
1
I wish Senator McCain gave me a call. We would have been stronger as a team and accomplished the things none of us could do on our own…
Do you know the Arab world for the attempts to make self the better person – more honest, tolerant, peaceful, just, brave, educated, hardworking and independent from the tyrants?
Jihad…
That’s the true meaning of that word - the original interpretation…
You can’t destroy the terrorism and the Al Qaeda by invading Afghanistan and Iraq but by undermining and reforming their system of values. You cannot accomplish this objective by the guns and the swords but by a pen and the words.
Why did the 9/11 attacks happen? Because there was a radical Saudi Wahhabi priest issuing a fatwa (a religious dogma) that such a kind of violence is allowed by the Quran.
All the fight against the terrorism dwindles down to proving that fatwa wrong. You deplete infamous fatwa from the Quranic backing and it’s just a dead letter on a paper.
You accomplish this objective by finding the Quran verses prescribing what I explained to you at the beginning of this post.
Basically, Bin Laden and his terrorists blamed America for having the incompetent and corrupt local leaders incapable of correctly implementing the Quran. Instead of reforming and improving themselves, they killed the civilians at the opposite end of globe, again a kind of behavior strictly banned by the Quran.
Deprive the terrorism of the perceived Quran backing and you will destroy it instantly.
1
Is is just me, or has everyone gone just a bit overboard with the McCain encomiums?
7
Sorry Mr Leonhardt,
McCain's parting message was quite selfish.
He knew (we all knew) he couldn't possibly serve out his full term in the Senate . Yet he did not resign in time and allow for a November 2017 election by the people of Arizona.
He even could have endorsed someone running to fill his seat.
I don't ever question his love for our nation, but he put that to the test too when he chose a moron like Palin to be a heartbeat away from being leader of the free world.
Sometimes, I have a very difficult time singing McCain's praises.
8
@c
Again, I feel he chose Palin because he thought the dissed Hillary fans would flock to his camp. Didn't work apparently.
Personally I think McCain’s biggest flaw was his over estimation of the limited talent and intellect he possessed. He should have espired to be the mayor of Scottsdale or some other backwater city. Maybe he could have run his wife’s dads brewery and been on the city council. But decision making for a country of this size, nope. Nonetheless RIP.
4
While I find it hard to write something critical about a man who just died, I am amazed at the amount of good will towards John McCain that comes out in these pages.
John McCain was a loose cannon at best. An inconsistent, narcissistic person who was not bright enough for his own and our own good. Just to pick Sarah Palin as his running mate suffices to make the point.
While it is true he fought bravely on an unjust war (of course he could refused to if he had chosen to do so like Ali did) and was captured and tortured by the “enemy.” No question about all that.
Yet, from his dumping of his first wife for a wealthy new one, to the endless back and forth in the senate on all sorts of straight forward issues for a decent man to vote for, he never impressed me as a person to fashion the “new” GOP after.
I guess it shows what hard times we fell into for David Leonhardt to suggest it as a minimax solution.
7
McCain's death comes at a time when the contrast between this noble, brave, man and the sleazy one, now running and running our country is so sharp that it takes your breath away.
11
Trump’s favorite word is “disgraceful”. He ought to know.
His comments about McCain showed the true stripes of this vain and petty man.
That Colorado has a senator glued to this creep is pathetic and embarrassing.
4
In the end, McCain knew that his political party had morphed into something akin to a personality cult run by a mob boss.
7
God bless your soul Senator McCain and you left behind a brave and caring legacy of loving and serving your country your entire life. Thank you.
1
trump's republican party would vote for Duncan Hunter Jr. before they would vote for Senator McCain. The democrats have more respect for Senator McCain's service than republicans.
12
I think I have a more honest appraisal of John McCain. As a man, Mr. McCain was no worse or better than any of the rest of us. He genuinely cared for the people around him. He always did his best to make positive things happen. He had one moment of character test thrust upon him....when he was shot down, captured, and tortured by the enemy. He demonstrated his inner strength by refusing special treatment, as the son of a US Navy Admiral. Since that moment in time, John McCain approached life as if he deserved Senatorial compensation for his service. Senator McCain became nothing...if not self serving. While he posed as a "maverick" and gave speeches about "high standards of morality".....it was always an attempt at self-promotion. McCain's big reveal, when he lost the public's respect, came in late Sept 2008,,,,when he announced his union with his opponent, Barrack Obama, to vote FOR a 800Billion Dollar Bailout...instead of allowing US Bankruptcy Court to sort the mess out.....he gave in to Panic......and lost the election.
1
@Wherever Hugo
Remember, the bailout plan was originated by Bush and Paulson, not Obama, who then
saw fit to let it ride because he could envision a more serious Depression by tossing it all at the bankruptcy courts.
Don't lay this one at Obama's feet.
2
I wish John McCain would have won the Presidency in 2000. I think he would have done a stellar job. It is interesting to compare McCain's forthright nature to Donald Trump's. McCain could be crusty, but never vicious. McCain's words toward Trump are regarding character and conduct. Trump's toward McCain are insulting and unnecessary. I saw on comments sections on various sites that some Trump supporters seem to think that Trump can't win whether he speaks kindly now of McCain or says nothing. But Trump put himself into that pickle by his previous terrible remarks.
McCain, at least, could admit he was wrong. And that is why McCain had real leadership skills, whether you agree with his choices or not.
6
The essence of John life is that he was human ... a flawed human ... just like any of us. However, what distinguished him from most other people is that he could keep the issue separate from the person with whom he had issue. Such ability allowed him to value every person he dealt with as a human without any bias.
41
I carried a rifle and fought in Vietnam. Soldiers like me were not taken prisoner by the enemy. The North Vietnamese did not care who our fathers were. Our actions there, heroic or not, are forgotten and those who came home quietly resumed or made lives for ourselves. We are not heroes. Neither was John McCain whose career will be examined by historians.
As to his prophecies and posturings I would simply pause and ask who made the current mess the country and world are in? Was everything great before Trump? To be honest it was a rapidly deteriorating mess. Did Trump make that mess or was it the establishment including McCain? It was, if we can face the truth, the rotting establishment that is now so relentlessly attacking Trump. They destroyed our economy, built the surveillance state, ruined public education and promoted cultural rot. Like silk robed eunuchs in besieged Byzantium they will not acknowledge the truth and will continue to ignore reality until the enemy is inside the gates. Their wealth and power is all that matters to them. It is they who represent the greatest threat to our freedom and our future.
28
@antonio gomez Senator McCain always maintained that he was not a hero, but we need someone to look up to, and look to the Senator as a hero because of his conduct. The Republican party has been sliding into a shadow of what it was but Trump has accelerated this process to the point where he is the party and demands loyalty to himself at the expense of the country.
2
@antonio gomez you have a rather defeatist view of our country. I don't share it. I see us doing great things. I see the people who work at my companies being great people who want to live a good life and provide good service. I see a country where we can enjoy the fruits of our labor more than anywhere else.
Yes, i see a political system bought and paid for by special interests. But I've seen Trump's lip service to this while at the same time having the EPA pass regs allowing our air and water to be damaged more.
I like my country. I like my hard working fellow citizens. But I don't like racism and people thinking there is a dream world in the past to which we need to return.
1
@antonio gomez The enemy is already inside the gates & people like you have opened the door. To think that "cultural rot" will be eliminated by a life-long degenerate is the height of delusion. Criticizing pursuit of wealth & power while supporting a men who has lived for nothing more (except serial womanizing) is just hypocritically ludicrous.
2
So true. We have lost a man who could be stubborn but also compromising. A strong man who was a true maverick. I look at the Republicans (and many Democrats) in congress and I see weak individuals who are there to fulfill their own personal goals and financial gains (like the president), and care little about our country. What worries me the most is that this may become a trend. Sigh.
This is as good a summation of John McCain`s legacy as you are liable to find. It captures the true man.Especially the idea of a pluralistic democracy; NOT an autocracy!He recognized and spoke out on things most republicans screamingly ran away from as fast as they could run. Racism, a election system dominated and rigged for the rich, opposing torture, finding a humane solution to the immigration problems, and finally having the guts to denounce and stand up to Trump. Not a word from that low life since John`s passing. Yes McCain could be at times inconsistent; most human beings are at times; but he did far more good then most. Every Republican should be "forced" to read this column; and decide once and for all what their party will stand for. Trump or McCain? It cannot be both. For the common good choose wisely. Or go down in history as the sycophants you have become.
4
McCain had a moral compass with a true North for him. Whether you agreed or disagreed, you knew he tried to stand for what he believed was truly right.
1
When someone shows you who they are, believe them.
-- Maya Angelou
Applies to McCain, also applies to Trump.
11
McCain was imperfect but always courageous. Unfortunately, most of his Republican colleagues in Congress are cowards. Their failure to rein in Trump has already diminished our greatness, and will continue to do so until they are voted out of office.
3
We lost a hero and are stuck with a zero.
6
He was ok but his voting record was pure party line. Maverick??? Not!!! Just that he was less bad than a lot of others, so by comparison...
7
Monday morning 8/27/18: US government flags are again flying FULL STAFF at the White House because President Trump was too petty and vindictive to issue a proclamation of John McCain's death, thus authorizing a period of mourning. Despicable.
12
There is something distasteful and conceited about using McCain's death to denigrate the morality of all those who share his political party. But that is the norm nowadays.
@Chris
The comparison is inevitable. The Republican party is hopelessly corrupt and compromised. McCain occasionally, but too rarely, made this obvious.
3
McCain was indeed a moderate - at least when placed in juxtaposition with the more extreme elements of the modern-day GOP.
His death is symbolic. With him, I believe, will go the party of Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt and Dwight Eisenhower. I don't say this with any degree of schaudenfre, but with a real sense of sadness.
It used to be the party of Abraham Lincoln. It has morphed into an organized criminal enterprise. Pathetic.
http://www.tomdegan.blogspot.com
Tom Degan
Goshen NY
4
How does “McCainism” differ from “Bushism?”
If there’s no significant difference, will the media be as quick with the hagiographies when Bush Sr. and GW pass?
My guess is probably not. Unlike the Bush’s, McCain lost. So he’s the best kind of Republican.
I think it’s good too that McCain passed when he did because that Mollie Tibbits stuff was getting AWKWAARD! Now we on the left have a dead person to swing around of our own, and ours has more star power. So there!
1
I am more than a little dismayed at the fawning smarmy praise heaped upon the man, John McCain, who, while alive attracted nothing but howls of ridicule and mockery from the press corps. And I think the Press Corps needs only to read its own eulogies to John McCain to finally appreciate how much most of America Hates the press corps. Its all sounds disingenuous. Hollow Praise. Typical.
The Republican party is now the party of Trump and a bastion of irrationality and reactionary, reductive thought. The Trump stain is indelible. It should be indelible.
Reasonable people can still debate and compromise regarding America's future, but they will do so in the Independent and Democratic arena. The GOP will be a grotesque vestigial organ consigned to the lunatic fringe.
2
If only the Times et al. were as even-handed in their opinions of this great public servant when he was running for President.
McCain and Goldwater shared something else: Lives of receiving government paychecks and taxpayer funded health care. And then denying ordinary Americans the latter. Typical Republican hypocrites.
Having vented, I do honor both men as putting America first, no matter how flawed - in my opinion - their real world was.
Giants among cingressional midgets.
4
Another try:
While I find it hard to write something negative about a man who just died, I am amazed at the amount of good will towards John McCain that comes out of the paper today.
John McCain was a loose cannon at best. An inconsistent, narcissistic person who was not bright enough for his own and our own good. Just his pick of Sarah Palin as his running mate suffices to make the point.
While it is true he fought bravely in an unjust war (of course he could refused to if he had chosen to do so, like Ali and many others did), was captured and tortured by the “enemy.” No question about all that.
Yet, from his dumping of his first wife for a wealthy new one, to the endless back and forth in the senate on all sorts of straight forward issues (qualified as “maverick” a meaningless word), he never impressed me a person to fashion the “new” GOP after.
I guess it shows what hard times we fell into these days for David Leonhard to suggest it as a minimax solution.
5
John McCain was a complex, heroic, 'get the job done' American. His legacy is yet to be fully appreciated. The tributes pouring in from across the globe are testimony to the character of the man. This will be remembered long after the current, pathetic, petulant occupant of the Oval Office is 'relegated to the ash heap of history'.
Rest in Peace Senator McCain as you hear the words: "Well done good and faithful servant, enter into the joy of your Lord!"
4
I hope Senator McCain's dieing message does not fall on deaf Republican ears.
2
Your sentence Mr. Leonhardt:
"Imagine how different our politics could be if even some Republicans__________."
Fill in the blank. That says it all these days.
3
Silly me, I naively thought an article titled "John McCain’s Parting Message" would actually have some final message from John McCain himself, dated within the last days or weeks, not David Leonhardt's imagined conception of what it might be with only four fragmentary quotes of 3-8 words apiece, none of them from this calendar year!
3
Ever since McCain’s passing, I have asked myself this: right now, today, how close to the norm in the Republican Party is the Trump version of politics or the McCain version?.
We know the answer of course. Even in McCain’s beloved Arizona there are crackpot tinhorns like Joe Arpaio who expressed satisfaction with McCain’s death. To such cretins, stamping out McCain’s sometimes reasonable positions constitutes an authoritarian “cleansing” of the GOP’s soul. In its place, what, besides hate, demagoguery, and blind obedience to authoritarian rule.
This is the lesson surrounding McCain’s passing. He was by no means ever a moderate. He was the heir to Barry Goldwater, for god’s sake. Yet he could put aside partisanship. He could hold the tide against extremism. Some of his best personal friends were Democrats! He could battle like a honey badger, but move on without harboring thoughts of vengeance.
Are there any such Republicans left? The only one I can identify is Ben Sasse from Nebraska. Perhaps he should take on the cancer in the White House in 2020, and put these competing versions and visions of the Grand Old Party up to the test: principled conservatism versus divisive, revenge-driven, white only hate for the Constitution and the Rule of Law.
Someone from within the Party must take up McCain’s mantle. Someone from within the Party must put duty and nation first.
8
By all means honour Mr McCain but stop talking about "our greatness." It makes you ridiculous. USA may have been great during the early post WWII period. But was not great when fighters like Mr. McCain indiscriminately bombed the Vietnamese people. Neither was America when it invaded Irak with the support of Mr McCain and co, thus precipitating the present catastrophe in the Middle East. It is because this narcissistic approach that America ended in the present "America first" nightmare. If this is the "greatness" you see it in peril, then the whole world may thank God that the USA is loosing is no more great. Europe, Canada and Japan, once freed from the American influence, will perhaps become the pillars of a new world order capable of containing and neutralizing USA egotism and bullying. A year and a half has passed since the USA became the a country dominated by a lawless president and their people still seems unable to address the damage a false, hypocrite missionary zeal and America´s sense of exceptionalism has brought to the world, America itself included. Have you ever heard a German speaking about German greatness? Germany is now one of the most civilized countries on earth but German would avoid talking about greatness. They know why.
6
Sadly, those that most need to heed these messages won't read them or hear them...the messages come from sources they hate and fear.
The most dangerous elements of our political infrastructure and electorate only get their talking points from Fox & Friends and other extremist outlets. Only when F & F, etc. start to recognize the damage they are doing to our democracy, will their viewers "see" the light as well.
Long live the best ideals, integrity, morality & sacrifice of John McCain.
3
With John McCain’s death our nation has lost a politician who evidenced great integrity, authentic patriotism and unconquerable courage. He was a maverick who put the national interest above lock-step party loyalty. He was a statesman who educated his own supporters when they had obviously been manipulated and victimized by radical right-wing propaganda.
What do we read concerning the response to McCain’s death in his home state of Arizona?
In the New York Times: “Senator John McCain’s death this weekend laid bare the long-simmering Republican tensions over who will be appointed to fill his Arizona seat, pitting the pragmatic wing of the party that Mr. McCain represented against the ascendant, hard-line forces loyal to President Trump — and hostile to the late senator.”
In the Washington Post: “In most of the country, McCain is being lauded as a hero. On Arizona’s GOP campaign trail, he’s a pariah.”
Friends in the Phoenix area tell me they are surrounded by Trumpublicans with whom they cannot conduct a rational, fact based and respectful political discussion.
John McCain remained a loyal and conservative Republican right up to the end, but as John Boehner clearly stated: “There is no Republican Party.” The GOP has devolved into the pseudo-populist, thoroughly plutocratic, borderline kleptocratic and authoritarian personality cult that is Trumpublicanism.
Senator John McCain, along with the notion that politics is the pragmatic art of compromise, will be sorely missed.”
7
It'd sure be nice if a NYT columnist could use English correctly, for Pete's sake. "One of the only" (as in "McCain was one of the only Republicans to oppose President Trump not just with his words, but also with his vote") does NOT mean "one of the few," the author's intention for that phrase notwithstanding. I could be "one of the only" people to drink water and breathe air. See what I mean? Honestly.
2
Scary times that we live in. Scary.
Vote DNC in November, just around the corner.
RIP, John McCain, RIP. Your service will send you
to the Heavens sooner than most,
i have always had huge respect for McCain ever since he kissed the tarmac on his return. As a lifelong Democrat I wanted to vote for him for president. However with crazy as a running mate it just did not happen.
He was one of the good guys and he believed in our nation as a good nation. RIP Senator McCain, you have earned it and thank you for all your service.
5
So the war hero has died, is a hero someone who drops cluster bombs on innocent people America dropped 250 million cluster bombs and still lost the war and 58000 young American lives for what? No hero of mine.
1
@James How do you feel about dropping atomic bombs on Japan? Would you prefer the huge number of casualties that would have resulted from an invasion of the islands? If you are in the military, you serve your country, and war is never measured in what is fair. Don't forget that Senator McCain never claimed to be a hero. He said the names of the heroes were on the Vietnam memorial.
1
The Republican party is the biggest threat to the country. True that.
6
John McCain had a quality of fundamental decency that Donald Trump utterly lacks.
6
Exactly. The rest is hyperbole.
It's unpatriotic to kneel during The National Anthem to protest too many shootings of unarmed men by under-trained police, but The White House can't honor a Navy pilot who did not break after 5 years of torture and raises the flag over the same house after a day?
8
@Jtati McCain would be the first to tell you that he did "break", he signed a confession. He was ashamed. This is not a criticism of McCain, but we need to stick with the facts. The point is: do not make people who may be in that position feel as if they are the only ones to "break", rather than holding out as far as they could.
John McCain was many things. Most importantly he served and suffered for his country all his life. He acted as honorably as he could in the face of the mean spirited republican agenda.
He gave us the Palin brood who contaminated the airwaves for years, but he also named the extremists in his party whack jobs, which evened things out just a bit.
A good man, flawed like the rest of us; he never stopped trying his best.
Rest in Peace, Senator McCain.
3
Noam Chomsky also said that the US Republican Party was the World's most dangerous organization.
5
Well, McCain did accept nutbaguette, drill-baby-drill reality scandal fambly tv queen Palin as his running mate, so his legacy is severely tainted on that account. He also was duped into believing that the American war against Vietnamese people was to bring forth Democracy in Viet Nam, when in fact is was to maintain colonial control over the people of Viet Nam, in spite of Ho Chi Minh's requests to Europe and the USA to support free, democratic elections in Viet Nam. In Viet Nam, Mr. McCain was just another hapless, high-elevation, mass murdering kid in a bomber they were lucky enough to shoot down and prevent the deaths of thousands more innocent people. But I will miss Senator McCain, as damaged, misguided and compromised as he often was. He was still a genuine conservative and in his heart cared about Democracy and understood its delicate nature-- in contrast to the current Republican party of hard core fascists, grifters, indicted criminals and sellouts. He was one of the last Republicans to stand up to the psychotic little prince and his junta that Russia appointed to rule our nation. A sad passing, indeed.
What would a Republican Party more in the mold of Sen. McCain look like? Easy answer. One that loses the majority of elections. This is why Liberals hold him up as an the ideal Republican. He's a a politician who's easy to beat. I mean no disrespect to Sen. McCain who served this country with honor & distinction. But we don't need anymore elected officials who think Gov. Palin is presidential timber. In the 2008 POTUS election the American voters were given a choice. They decisively rejected McCain's idea of leadership. He lost to President Obama by 10 million votes, & an even greater margin in the electoral college: 365 to 173. I would describe McCain as conservative but not a conservative. In other words inconsistent, politically all over the place. Leonhardt is being disingenuous when says McCain was a champion of the little guy. He could show bad judgement in critical situations. McCain was one of the Keating Five. These senators were accused of improperly intervening in 1987 on behalf of Charles H. Keating, Jr., CEO of the Lincoln Savings & Loan Association, which was the target of a regulatory investigation by the FHLB. The FHLBB subsequently backed off taking action against Lincoln. Lincoln collapsed in 1989, at a cost of $3.4 billion to the federal government (& thus taxpayers). Some 23,000 Lincoln bondholders were defrauded & many investors lost their life savings. I liked Sen. McCain's passion. But it's important to be honest about his flaws as well as his virtues.
3
@Bill Brown
Palin was a travesty, but Trump is an unmitigated disaster and Republicans think he is presidential timber. Winning is all they are about. Governing is not in the GOP playbook.
1
McCain's death comes at a time when the contrast between this noble, brave, man and the sleazy one running and ruining the country is so stark that it takes your breath away.
2
Mr. McCain's greatness lies in one simple fact. He was a moral man.
10
@dudley thompson: That's hard to argue when you consider the way he dropped his first wife Carol. She was the voice that kept the imprisonment of John alive in congress. She was the person who helped secure his release. Yet, when John McCain returned home, he dumped her because a life threatening auto accident had left her as scared and broken as John's torture had left him. That's NOT moral.
2
Lindsey Graham abandoned his old friend and genuine hero, John McCain, deciding instead to support "bone-spur" Trump. Strange, indeed! When the Russians hacked Lindsey Graham's email in 2016, it would appear they got some really good stuff!!
3
Take note, McConnell.
1
While I find it hard to write something critical about a man who just died, I am amazed at the amount of good will towards John McCain that comes out in these pages.
John McCain was a loose cannon at best. An inconsistent, narcissistic person who was not bright enough for his own and our own good. Just to pick Sarah Palin as his running mate suffices to make the point.
While it is true he fought bravely in an unjust war (of course he could have refused to if he had chosen to do so like Ali did) and was captured and tortured by the “enemy.” No question about all that.
Yet, from his dumping of his first wife for a wealthy new one, to the endless back and forth in the senate on all sorts of straight forward issues he never impressed me a person to fashion the “new” GOP after. I guess it shows what hard times we fell into for David Leonhard to suggest it as a minimax solution.
6
@Blunt I disagree. Senator McCain was from a military family,and there are expectations that you will follow in the footsteps of your family. He was in the Navy at the time and went to war because it was his obligation. There have been many unjust wars and people go off to fight them because they are in the armed forces and are ordered to do so.
2
The man is dead. Whether you agree or disagree with his politics, McCain spent his life in service to America. He deserves to be remembered in that way. It is to me shameful that his death will be politicized as another factoid in the Trump wars. Sadly nothing is sacred.
33
@AR Clayboy
That is the way Republicans wanted it: no Political Correctness. You got Trump, you got incivility. You demanded it.
@AR Clayboy He was a politician and should be remembered as such.
1
This columnist does not understand the bottom line: Trump is a winner and McCain was a loser. Trump handily defeated Obama/Clinton - McCain lost badly to Obama, an unaccomplished "community organizer" and ultimately a total failure as a president. Nothing else matters in today's world. Winners rule - losers do not.
1
@RGV
Trump lost the popular vote by over 3 million. It now appears he won the Electoral College vote through illegal means, depriving Hillary of many more votes. 3rd Party votes didn't help the Left.
2
@RGV
When George Washington was told by a senior officer of a plan to make Washington king (this in 1782, prior to the Constitution), Washington replied: "[Y]ou could not have found a person to whom your schemes are more disagreeable . . . . [I]f you have any regard for your Country, concern for yourself or posterity, or respect for me, . . . banish these thoughts from your mind." [Letter to L. Nicola, May 22, 1782] What would Donald have said? Who is the real winner? The real loser?
1
David, John McCain was a unique individual and a patriot in his own right. Your attempt to use McCain to promote a view that the Republican Party would be better off if it just became like the Democratic Party is unfounded.
We don't need the GOP to become a mild version of liberal beliefs. It is (or should be) the party of smaller government, less taxes, a balanced budget, more individual freedom & economic opportunity for all, controlled borders and a strong defense of ourselves and our allies. The Democratic Party agrees with none of these issues. In fact, it believes entirely the opposite: Bigger government, more taxes, deficit spending, more government control over the individual and the economy, open borders and a limited defense budget to give funds to more social programs popular with Democrats.
On all of these issues, John McCain was a strong Republican who believed fervently in the tenants of the GOP. So, don't eulogize McCain as some kind of pseudo-democrat. He was not.
2
Senator McCain chose two former Presidents to deliver eulogies -- one Republican, one Democratic. One white, one black. This is his final message to us: stay together, even when we disagree. Do not let this great experiment in self government ooze into the slime. Rise above, remember dignity and honor. He gave great personal sacrifice during a contentious war, in the belief that our country is a noble enterprise, worth our loyalty. Will we give up on the country he believed in? He has chosen two speakers, one from each side of our divide, to implore us not to. The best tribute we can give is to listen to them and emulate him. By perservering and fighting. And not giving up.
130
totally agree.
1
The contrast between John McCain and Donald Trump is so revealing. Similar to that of The Special Counsel. I hope character, honesty and integrity are still of some value in Washington.
An edited quote:
It is discouraging in these days of Trump how few people and shocked by deceit and how many are shocked by honesty.
Noel Coward
1
Like many, I didn't agree with McCain on a lot of issues. I lean left on many issues, but I am also a veteran. The criticisms and attacks against McCain that I am seeing from both the right and the left are sickening. The way the Bernie Sanders base has responded Alexandria Ocasio Cortez’s classy statement about McCain is every bit as deplorable as the president’s remarkably un-presidential behavior and the vitriol his base is hurling at McCain, and regularly hurls at other distinguished veterans, like Mueller. (BTW, I am wearing a Cortez t-shirt right now because, while I don't agree with all her views, I support her moxie and want to see more young people and women run – regardless of party affiliation.) John McCain was not always right, but when he was wrong he owned his mistakes – very much unlike the current "I didn't do it" Bart Simpson (i.e., bratty child) excuses and throwing of others under the bus we get from Trump and his GOP supporters. McCain was willing to reach across the aisle. He put country first. The man endured hardships most people cannot fathom, and that would have rendered most people permanently mentally damaged. Agree with him or not, he embodied a resilience, a selflessness and a bi-partisan spirit that we should all aspire to. Rest in peace, John McCain, and thank you for your service.
13
McCain's character came through during the Presidential campaign when an angry woman stated her support for him by calling Barack Obama a "Muslim," saying "Muslim" as if it were a slur. Even through the TV you could see McCain's face change. He seemed to register the situation, its meaning for the campaign and for the election. And then he said with softly but with distinct firmness: "No mam, he is a decent family man...a Christian..." He didn't turn away. He didn't equivocate. He stated the truth...when a lie might have increased his vote. My estimation, gleaned only from newspapers and TV, jumped 17 fold that moment. This man, who fought in Vietnam and refused to leave his fellows in an enemy internment camp, served his country again that day. He was clearly a man of honesty and honor, and the shaky faith of at least one American TV viewer was at least temporarily affirmed.
76
@Cathryn Actually, this ignoramus did not refer to Obama as a muslim, but as an "arab." While McCain's response was adequate, it did not go as far as it should have, i.e., he should have said, "Arab Americans, of which Obama is not one, are as American as you are," and he should have omitted the reference to Obama being a Christian, as the act of labeling Obama a good guy because of his religious identity diminishes all of us.
1
McCain was a flawed and complicated man. Capable of doing the right thing when it was needed but also being a total panderer when politically expedient. One of his low points was choosing Sarah Palin as his running mate in 2008, his better side showed when he reminded that bigoted but ignorant woman that Obama was a good man and not an ‘Arab’ during the 2008 campaign. Also, being the vote to turn back republicans misguided attempt to overturn the Affordable Care Act. But then he voted for the treasury robbing Trump tax cuts even though he he was a fiscal conservative.
The Republican Party has become a morally hollow party and especially so since Trump became president. It is time for the party to get its comeuppance.
42
@Sarah Bent: complicated? He was a narcissistic loose cannon who was given a place in West Point and managed to come out last. Dumped his first wife opportunistically to marry a rich one who would fund his lifestyle and politicizing from her inherited fortune. He always voted his pocket book and showed his basic lack of judgement by picking Sarah Palin. That he fought in an unjust war and fell prisoner (and was tortured) is hardly a redemption.
2
@Sarah Bent Candidate McCain had the right idea; choose a woman as his VP candidate. He just chose the wrong woman.
In honor of my friend Senator McCain, I’m going to tell the Republicans what they need to hear, knowing that they will not listen. They have become a disgrace to the nation, a clearing house for bigotry and idiotic conspiracies, a symbol of domestic greed and international negligence, a poison to American idealism. But they know this, in what remains of their withered hearts they know this to be true, but will ignore their rotten culpability. The one fact that they will not be able to avoid will be the conspicuous absence of their mob boss at a great man’s national funeral.
5
In 1964 I campaigned for Barry Goldwater while entertaining in Atlantic City during the Democratic Convention. In 1967, myself and my singing partner Errol Sober flew with Bobby Kennedy to Binghamton NY where he announced his candidacy for President. Errol and I sat with the senator and sang and talked with him on our bus trip back to Syracuse to fly back to NYC.
Why do I bring this up? Because I had the opportunity to witness first hand what political greatness really looked and felt like.
Within the next few days, our governor will be appointing someone to fill his shoes until at least 2020. My choice? Cindy McCain. Why? Because Cindy knows his soul and has the “Right Stuff” to keep our country moving in a positive direction. Anyone other than Cindy is rolling the dice.
3
John McCain compared to an infectious microbe like Donald Trump appears to be a titan. But McCain next to soaring mighty American Eagles like George Washington, Abraham Lincoln and Dwight Eisenhower is a mere flashing flitting hummingbird.
Washington gracefully surrendered the Presidency while warning about the dangers of partisan political parties and foreign entanglements. Lincoln's 2nd inaugural address and his final public speech recognized the hypocritical danger of black African enslavement and separate and unequal black African lives to American survival. Eisenhower warned about the danger to our divided limited power constitutional republic of united states where the people were sovereign of the growing power of the military-industrial complex.
MAGA?
3
It will be disastrous to interpret McCain’s warning of American greatness in peril merely because of Trump.
It's largely due to the decadency, cultural, moral, and spiritual disorder of the Donald Trump in large swath of the Americans . Nothing else can explain his nomination and election despite his outrageous contempt towards women. This speaks of the alarming decay of political discourse.
Undoubtedly Americans are paying terrible cost with the most erratic, egocentric and compromised US president ever to hold office.
As a well known commentator puts it "Trump will leave key government institutions weakened or corrupted, America’s foreign-policy establishment sharply divided, and America’s position in the world stunted. An America lacking confidence, coupled with the rise of undemocratic powers, populist movements on the right and left, and failing states, is the kind of world few Americans remember".
Clearly the checks and balances have failed. Perverse mix of irresponsibility and greed dominates.
A clear indication of the downfall of the America. May be the citizens wouldn't be able to stop it no matter how hard they tried. But they aren't even trying!!
4
The present Republican Party, or more accurately the Trump Republican Party, is impervious to any positive McCain ideals, principles, norms, and influences. It has become the Party of Complicity, having forged an abusive and destructive relationship with its corrupt and criminal Leader. There is no going back to moderation, normality, or even sanity at this point. How can the body endure when the head will soon destruct?
4
Have you ever met somebody strong and powerful that grew up pampered, fully protected, spoiled, entitled, and with a silver spoon in their mouth?
It’s exactly the adversities and troubles that improve us, toughen us up, develop us to our full potential and make us what we could be…
When you handover to your children the enormous accumulated wealth you just mess up their lives.
Why would anybody work hard if you don’t have to?
It’s the difficulties that provide us with the motivation and opportunities even when we are not looking for them…
John McCain had been raised in the family of an admiral but wasn’t shielded in some back office in Washington D.C. during the Vietnam War…
3
@Kenan Porobic I think this comment smacks of class envy. Robert Mueller and Donald Trump were both born with silver spoons in their mouths. Mueller could have easily wriggled his way out of serving in Vietnam like Trump did, but he volunteered for the most dangerous of duties – leading an infantry platoon in combat. John Kerry is another example of a "rich kid" who served with distinction. How about John Kennedy? George H.W. Bush? There are many examples of American "elites" who have served selflessly, and this is part of the reason Trump doesn't fit in and has gone through life with a colossal chip on his shoulder. A true “gentleman” of privilege is expected to serve. Being born rich or poor does not make our character – how we are raised does.
8
Senator McCain was a Republican leader; a conservative politician that hated extremism; he was always ready to work across the aisle for what he believed it was meaningful legislation for all Americans. During his many years in Congress, he learned to know people; where they came from and where they were going to. He knew Donald Trump wasn’t a truthful candidate. He knew something was going on between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, the President of Russia; the man that interfered in the 2016 presidential elections that got him elected President. To Senator McCain it was considered a crime; a betrayal to our democracy.
Donald Trump knew Senator McCain represented a great threat to his presidency. Thus, in an effort to diminish the Senator’s service to his country; he said that didn’t like men that got caught in the war. How dare you Mr. President; when back in 1968 you were a healthy young man eligible for military service but decided to excuse yourself with your studies and created an illness that deferred you 5 times from being drafted and sent to Vietnam.
Words have meanings Mr. President and this is just one of the many reasons Senator McCain has excluded you from attending his funeral rites at the Arizona Capitol; the U.S. Capitol Rotunda as well as his burial in Annapolis. Furthermore, former presidents George W. Bush and President Barack Obama would be giving the eulogies. What a fiasco for you Mr. President; a man so absorbed in himself.
2
John McCain lived a life well-lived. Many many years later, after he and John Kerry had helped bring about reconciliation with Vietnam, I stood in the Hanoi neighborhood where his plane had crashed down long ago. Whatever else you think about that awful war, you couldn't help but to admire the courage and the inner strength the young McCain, with two broken arms and a broken leg, had demonstrated not only as he was surrounded by North Vietnamese at the crash site but also the incredible fortitude to honor his fellow soldiers and voluntarily remain in prison as a POW cruelly tortured beyond comprehension.
While he had some great -- and not so great -- moments in the rest of his life, perhaps only two of them truly befitted the young Navy airman. His standing up for Obama at a campaign rally against hatred and bigotry, and his realization that we had made progress, real progress, on health security, and to take that away -- solely so that the most immoral, corrupt, venal, scofflaw of a President, could declare some sick type of victory -- would be unconscionable.
If only Senator McCain had lived all the rest of his life like the greatness of those two moments. But what two moments. Many thanks for your heroism.
Rest in peace Senator.
4
When McCain was sill with the Navy as a liason after the Vietnam War, he would escort Senators on foreign trips. He had an incredible personality and quickly made friends with peers and those above him.
John McCain was a crank, a right-winger extraordinaire, a loud voice for many things I hate about America. But it is true that the man represented dignity, the single word that has been most left behind in the current administration. Even George W had infinitely more dignity than the current president, and I keep it small p on purpose. McCain also represents one of Trumpf's lowest anti-dignity moments of all, when he, a draft dodger, said he preferred heroes who weren't captured. Had McCain beaten Obama in 2008, it would have been disastrous for the country, and for his own image. It worked out better for him this way - because he does now stand as the eminent outsider, the man who stands for principle over politics. It has been a time in which the military has become a left-wing force, as the Republicans have become the party of attacking our national security institutions they have fled to the shelter of a party of some reason and thought. John McCain, we didn't love you enough when we had you, but we have reached a point in America where basic decency and dignity is enough to make you a hero again, where showing any kind of caring for fellow human beings who don't make you money or give you power directly, actually have value to you, where power is not the only value that matters. If anyone is inspired by that to do better, then you have done a great job, and thank you.
13
Apparently .... rural America is happy having a game show host as our leader .... maybe some TV network will give him a late-night show so his followers can watch him tweet in real time.
2
Hopefully the republicans will take Senator McCain’s warning about his own party to heart in the coming weeks and months.
Our democracy is indeed fragile. McCain knew this, and spent all of the energy he had to talk to the nation about the danger it faces in this administration.
Let us redouble our efforts to resist and defeat the criminal tyrant who squats in the White House who sought to advance his corrupt agenda by insulting a true American hero, John McCain.
6
"He was willing to accept defeat when his side lost a political battle."
Take note, Democrats.
How sad that Mr. Leonhardt wades into the current political imbroglio under the guise of paying tribute to John McCain, one of the true American heroes of the last 50 years. Even the death of a hero gets compromised in the Age of Trump. Commentators like Mr. Leonhardt are just as guilty for failure of civility as the current president.
1
The Republican Party of the 1960's, post-IKE, liked to think of itself as a button-down, smart, hip bunch who were deep like William F Buckley, but also kinda cool, with a progressive streak that went back to Teddy R. Not any more. Starting with Nixon's 1968 Southern Strategy to woo Dixiecrats away from LBJ/Humphrey, they expanded their power base to include not just reasoned conservatism, like McCain, but their own id embodied by candidates who preach hate and division.
Now that tail wags the dog. The shift from coded language and mixed policies (Nixon created the EPA) to open racism and 'deep state' paranoia is there for all to see, along with selling out their own working and middle-class voters to the interests of the ultra-rich. All now gleefully orchestrated by President Id. This is not the party of Bill Safire and Kissinger, of discussions of economics and reasoned policies. It is people with red caps and even tiki tourches yelling about building walls and locking up defeated opponents. Not brains, just id.
11
@Tom Jeff well said!
He has to share some of the blame fir Trump though. He picked Palin after all as his running mate. Palin and Trump live in a fact free, personality driven idea of government in which corruption is paramount.
3
The Republicans lost their way when they started to deify the disaster that was Reagan. To keep the myth alive they need to embrace ignorance and hate.
3
Trump Republicana party don't represent a threat to the future of the US. There'll be more elections, Trumpism will eventually be voted out. He'll rage but in the end no one will listen.
The threat to this country comes from the left. The left insists on shutting down anyone who opposes it and calls them racists. You can no longer offer an opinion which differs from the standard view without being called names. YouTube blocks any video they disagree with. YouTube blocked a Prager video explaining the causes of the Korean War! Right wing speakers on college campuses are regularly shouted down. When was the last time a left wing speaker was shouted down? Never happens.
The use of enraged mobs to silence people is called fascism. 200 people were arrested protesting Donald Trump's election, none were arrested protesting Obama's.
McCain was a gentleman. That's why he lost in 2008. He chose a woman as a running mate but never argued the nomination had been stolen from HRC, which it was. Instead, Obama used questionable campaign financing (he chose public financing, then changed his mind) to destroy both of their characters, attack their families, and call them racists.
McCain and Romney's high road losses led to the vicious uncouth unpresidential behavior of Trump. Guess what, fighting back works.
We'll miss McCain, but the Democrats proudly calling them socialists means McCain's decorum is dead. The real threat is Socialists never relinquish power willingly.
Nice to see some bipartisanship from a source where it’s rare. On this day, especially, the Times is hardly “failing”.
In his honor I will henceforth categorize myself as a McCain conservative. With all his flaws, his views more closely reflect mine than most other GOPers.
Most admirable he had the Keynesian capacity to change his views according to the facts.
3
It is indeed a sad state of affairs when the American People cringe at the very thought of the POTUS issuing a coherent statement regarding anything.
In this instance, all that was necessary was a simple acknowledgement of the value that John McCain brought to our nation. A paragraph of civic appreciation.
That this oaf was unwilling to even attempt that gesture is shameful, particularly considering the bi-partisan outpouring from the nation that Hisself is charged with managing.
7
Before I write, I want to first say that Mr. McCain — like all people on Earth — deserves to lie in peace. I wish I could just leave it at that. Unfortunately, our culture and inane press have a tendency to put people on pedestals.
What is it to be a maverick among appeasers? A man living in a ghetto in a 3rd world country can be considered wealthy if he owns a bicycle.
What I mean to say is that Mr. McCain’s daring leadership is only so in light of the vacuum of leadership. How principled was he? Sometimes, yes. Sometimes, no. Let’s not pretend he was a noble person. Look at the record and tell me how many times he voted with McConnell and Ryan. Sure, he had a famous thumbs-down vote. But, those are rare events. For the most part, he — like other “independent-minded” Republicans, such as Susan Collins — march with the herd. Was he principled when Obama nominated Gorsuch?
McCain was certainly a maverick and I was glad he served, when considering the rest of his party. But, in a more absolute sense, he left a lot on the table.
1
McCain through his life was an example what a politician, American patriot and plain honest man should be. For him the immoral and dishonest behavior was wrong, even if technically legal. As opposed to our current GOP president he understood that in democracy all voices should be heard, even if one does not agree with all. Trump, on the other hand, takes any voice different from his as a personal insult requiring vicious response. This is typical of disturbed young children, but not of adults. In true democracy the vote by the people (demos-in Greek) is the source of power. In fact, ignoring the voice of opposition is dictatorship, not democracy. This said, let us remember that due to the quirk in our Constitution (written to satisfy Southern slave owners) Trump was elected by majority of Electoral College, but Hillary Clinton got majority of people's votes.
13
Nicely stated David.
Since it is gauche to speak ill of the recently departed.
I'll agree with most of your Column and wish the McCain family my sincere condolence.
1
Absolute nonsense. McCain was a warmonger who was not tired of the US flexing it's military muscle around the world. He made crowd pleasing decisions on major issues, even though it did not make any progress to solving the real issue. He was more interested in the optics of his stance than having any belief.
2
The leading Reep stated himself that the Reep's are our greatest threat in other words they are indeed the enemy and don't forget it. They HATE all of us unless you are very wealthy and corrupt period. Everything else is another flat out lie.
It was announced today that President Trump will not be attending the ceremony for the unknown soldier next year "I like soldiers who don't get killed," Mr. Trump tweeted.
2
You just know that when Obama and Bush deliver their eulogies, it will be among the proudest moments of their life.
2
A GOP led by McCainism would have some political pandering, but when it really mattered, we could see a country stand up for democracy around the world. I have come to see that we need a US to lead the world against tyrants. Unfortunately, it took a tyrant-in-chief for me to see that. McCain already knew that. The Post-WWII US world order is under attack from outside and inside. The GOP is better than this, but it must move toward McCainism or something like it, not pure greed.
The bottom line is: Republicans almost to a man and woman, are afraid of their base, and that 40% of it can "primary" any one of them if they "step out of line". And that line is: Supporting anything Trump says or does no matter how ridiculous, anti-democratic (small "d"), or dangerous to the nation, to its economy, its justice system, or its relations with the world.
With John McCain gone how many Susan Collinses and Leonard Lances are there left in the GOP with the guts to stand up to Trumpist fascism?
Even the ones leaving, Corker, Flake and Ryan, don't have the you-know-whats to do what they KNOW is right!
How will our Republic survive if the Democrats don't take back control of Congress and turn over ALL the rocks?
1
President Trump is jealous of John McCain. McCain made the tough choices that Trump rejected. 'President Bone Spurs' took a medical deferment that allowed him to still carry on the playboy life he desired, while shielded from the thing he feared.
2
A wonderful tribute from David Leonhardt. But do John McCain’s many virtues compensate for his designating Sarah Palin as his running mate? I would argue no. Sarah Palin is a Donald Trump with lipstick: a self-dealing, lying, unread, bigoted demagogue, completely unqualified for the vice-presidency. Without Sarah Palin, there would have been no Donald Trump. Without John McCain, there would have been no Sarah Palin.
When McCain was confronted with the choice of country versus his own political future, he chose to put his political future first. In that regard, he is no different from the modern-day Trumpublican.
2
The liberal media began to appreciate McCain when he opposed Trump. That the only thing to be reflected on.
@Dixon Duval Um, no. McCain remains a flawed individual and an inconsistent politician. Yet he held onto his personal integrity, at least some of the time. (Not voting for MLK day, and choosing Palin as his running mate excepted among other major mistakes.) The fact is, the bar for decency and putting the nation first has been set so low, that by comparison he appeared to be a knight in shining armor in today’s compromised GOP.
2
@Dixon Duval
Not true. Read the David Foster Wallace article in Rolling Stone from the 2000 election campaign.
Mr. Leonhardt writes, "The absolutism and radicalism of today’s Republican Party is the biggest threat to the country that McCain served and loved." But he overlooks the true threat. It isn't the Republican Party that is to blame. It is Trump voters. Republican politicians are in the game to win votes, and they understand that crossing Trump would be a political death sentence for them.
Trump voters do not want the kind of greatness that America once stood for and aspired to. Instead, they want a hateful, bigoted nation in which they, as whites, are on top, and everyone else is a second-class citizen.
The notion that Trump voters stand for anything other than racism and bigotry is ridiculous. We have had more than eighteen months of the most unfit, mentally unstable man who has ever sat in the Oval Office. He has destroyed international alliances that it took our country decades to cultivate. He has made our nation an international laughing stock at best, and a pariah at worst.
And yet Trump's voters love him because he's delivered on the one thing they wanted from him -- that they could be unabashedly racist, hateful people, and that our Constitutional protections mean nothing for their browner skinned neighbors. As long as Trump tells his rabid hordes that they are the "real" Americans, they will let him do literally anything to stay in power. Trump voters -- and only Trump voters -- are the cause of this nation's demise. They should be ashamed of themselves.
2
McCain was right. In addition to having an anti-intellectual, fraudulent and authoritarian occupant of the office of president, there remain NO checks and balances, balances which are the pillars of our democracy.
Worse still polling companies are being pounded by hackers and bots, producing nonsense polls. Yet the polling results are still insecure, wrong and still shared!
Our voting machines and vote tallies remain naked, as the Russians and other countries succeed through hacking, to hold the Senate and House for Trump.
Yes, it is bad. It is worse than we think.
We are engaged in the latest frontier of war, CYBERWAR. And America is still using the equivalent of throwing rocks at ongoing and vicious cyber devastation of our electoral process.
It is awful.
6
The presidential travesty of the one man who can fix Washington alone, needs an entire village of colluding Republicans to destroy it all.
"Today’s Republican Party is the biggest threat to the country..." So who is the true enemy of the people?
2
The appalling Donald Trump succeeds because, outside of leftist urban enclaves and the media that serve those areas, the nation rejects the divisive identity politics Democrats have forced upon us and even more rejects the character assassination by Democrats of any who don’t toe their party line.
@EGDyeH, The Adams are entirely responsible for the mad King!
the Dems, not the Adams (thanks Siri)
And yes, by all means, let’s blame the Dems for all Trumpism and all other ills while we’re at it. The GOP is the true party of the people!
Calling yourself great enough times leads you to believe what you are saying. If you truly believe you are the greatest you have no need to improve. Our arrogance has got us to the point where the other guy is always wrong and we are always right, The Republican Party is now a victim of its deeds. The Right has so demonized the opposition that any kind of cooperation on anything major will be considered treasonous. Constructive critisim of Trump by The Right can only be done by those not seeking office again.It could be time we stop calling patting ourselves on the back about greatness and really be great. Great nations do not cage children and deport their parents.
3
"He offered an alternative", but—
The worst mistake that crazy-quilt "maverick" Senator McCain made, undoubtedly, was choosing Sarah Palin as a running mate.
People are still shaking their heads. Where was his judgment?
And such an important decision must make one wonder what kind of a president he would have been, and if elected and the brain cancer had come upon him 8–10 years earlier, what would have happened with a "President Palin".
I hope that wasn't part of the "alternative" McCain offered.
1
As flawed as McCain was...he was still greater than any current Republican in congress...
8
Keep dreaming. The GOP has no interest in reinventing itself.
With Trump, the Republican Party has ended the transparent charade of religious piety, fiscal conservatism, and fake morality to reveal its true inner core: greedy, immoral, unprincipled, with a sole agenda of enriching the wealthy at the expense of literally everyone and everything else.
Nothing more, nothing less. They don’t believe in education. They don’t believe in national security. They don’t believe in law and order. The don’t believe in ethical behavior at home, the workplace, or in government. They certainly don’t care about the environment. They are the party of corruption and self-dealing. They’re not seeking to reinvent any of that. It’s who they are.
3
I voted for John McCain. I doubt that David Leonhardt did. So where does he get off appropriating McCain for his own political ends?
I did not vote for Trump, and I won't forgive Trump for his insults about McCain in the last election campaign.
But even harder to forgive has been the behavior of Leonhardt and the New York Times toward Trump since the election. Spare us the uplifting sermons about American ideals of pluralistic democracy when you have never accepted the outcome of America's last democratic election.
The Times' animus toward Trump has distorted everything it has said about him and his policies. Leonhardt has charged that Trump is trying to destroy the West. OK, it wasn't pretty, but NATO needed a kick in the pants. Trump's confrontational tactics have done more to get the Europeans to take responsibility for their own defense than twenty years of diplomacy.
A deal to denuclearize the Korean peninsula is still only a glimmer. But it is closer than it has been in 50 years.
Our world trading system is being grossly abused by China -- even some of our allies. It's gamble, but Trump's hard line stands a chance of reinvigorating free trade.
It is infamous for Leonhardt to insinuate that Republicans condone racism. Which party plays the race card? As Mark Lilla noted, at campaign stops Clinton used to call out to "African-American, Latino, L.G.B.T. and women voters." Never the white working class. They didn't leave the Democratic party. It left them.
1
Like the final scene from the Cary Grant movie People Will Talk Trumps attacks on Senator McCain only made Trump seem so much smaller in comparison...........
1
"McCain’s final message for his country was a warning: Our greatness is in peril."
As much as I admired McCain's civility and courage, he too put the country's greatness in peril when he nominated Palin and hepled unleashed the forces of ethno-nationalism that trump exploitied pefectly to get to the wh.
1
"He pushed for an election system not dominated by the wealthy." And yet, McCain was one of the top 10 career recipient of NRA funding. Number one in fact, with $7,740,521. And that is only one lobby, who else did he receive funds from?
See: Thoughts and Prayers And NRA Funding.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/10/04/opinion/thoughts-prayers-...
1
I watched in disbelief as “CBS This Morning” showed the White House flag flying at full height next to a Capitol flying half-mast, for a POW and 30 year member of Congress. In a fit of curiosity I switched over to “Fox and Friends”who did not mention John McCain, but we’re going on about Mr. Ohr. My dad served in Vietnam and I am cringing that John Kelley hasn’t walked out yet. SAD....
118
@DC The Republican Party is now led by a classless, petty, vindictive little man who disgraces the office & the country every day.
1
@DC As a Vietnam veteran of the Marine Corps, it sickens me that Kelley and Mattis continue to sit in the same room with cadet bone-spurs while he trashes a genuine American hero....flawed admittedly, but one who served this country his entire life.
1
Any thinking adult in the U.S. will agree with and disagree with positions of individual politicians. John McCain held and expressed positions on almost all important topics. Some of these positions one could agree with and some one could disagree with. Perhaps his most important position/comment was at the end of his life when he warned that his country is in danger of failing. Many great people rise above the fray when faced with a momentous situation, in this case imminent death, and put forth a comment that is especially important for all to hear. This is the case for John McCain. His statement reminds me of Dwight Eisenhower's statement at the end of his presidency when he warned U.S. society to beware of the emerging military/industrial relationship. For some of us, this was a warning that should have been heeded, but was not. Perhaps we as a people will do better with John McCain's warning.
2
Yes, McCain did vote against repealing Obamacare. But the way he went about it totally cheapened his act.
First, he voted in favor of allowing a vote on the repeal bill. Then he insisted he had not decided for or against the bill. Having then gotten the world's attention to how he was going to vote, he rode into town like a White Knight and voted no. It was brilliant political theatrics, but it was also John McCain focused as usual on John McCain.
He was simply NOT the great and fearless leader he pretended to be. Personally, I cannot respect him as a politician. I strongly suspect he knew as a POW that if he accepted early release, that act would follow him forever in any election campaign. So to ensure his political future, he acted the hero in Hanoi. I see no reason to trust his motives.
5
Do you think that you would be thinking about your political career while in a prison camp? Really? Life is not a convenient movie plot where the storyline has to unfold to reach an exciting conclusion. McCain was surviving and, from all reports, in that survival retained his dignity. Wish our current president knew something about dignity in the face of adversity.
1
Plutocracy. If there's a fear to dominate the thinking about our republic, Senator McCain was right to include it among his most profound. If not already a plutocracy, we're perilously close to it.
Senator McCain recognized the perils of a republic dominated and controlled by a moneyed class. Among other things, he was a student of history (and of Gibbon), and the glaring example of ancient Rome was in his mind.
If we wish to honor his memory, the most effective thing we can do is to clamp down on the influence of our plutocrats before we wake up one day and find that their control is complete.
2
White Christian men are an election away from being led by liberals to concentration camps.
This ridiculous premise lies at the heart of what is left of the Republican Party I once respected.
I will never forget Senator McCain's gracious concession speech in 2008.
It hurt to lose -- no question. But, not hurting our country meant more -- its place in history -- its place in the world as a beacon of democracy.
Honor. Integrity. Courage. Humility. Loyalty. Prudence. Fortitude.
All come to mind when I think of Senator McCain.
Not a single come to mind when I think of President Trump.
9
@Didier: I will leave fortitude aside but honor, integrity,courage, humility,LOYALTY,PRUDENCE: this is a man who dumped his old wife for a new rich young one, picked Sarah Palin as a running mate and fought in an unjust war.
1
I respected JM and what he stood for but his or the RNC’s choice of his VP was weak.
He was a true leader, in reality, battle, but life is politics, battle for the weak and unfortunately, JM could not surmount that.
We have a President now who has no battle experience, disrespects true leaders, and is leading this country far from what made us what we were, the worlds leader, not great, just a pillar of democracy.
3
the usa's constant bleating about its own greatness and misguided beliefs that it's the only country in the world that seems to be worth anything, reminds me of why trump is potus.
the man constantly talks about how great he is, how smart, how he's an expert in everything, a scratch golfer, the best baseball player in ny, the only person who understands what has to be done.
maybe the country and the man are bragging so much to cover up doubt and insecurity.
8
Nicely worded commentary. Above everything else, Mr. McCain was a human being, not a saint, and another lesson he taught us was that principled respect for everyone, including one-time enemies, is a foundation stone of the temple of humanity.
5
@Richard Luettgen:
We are going to get Medicare for all, free post-secondary education, universal pre-K and an even better than European welfare state.
After all we got rid of slavery, our people can sit next to someone in the bus of whatever color and urinate in the same public toilet. Just wait a little.
3
It's not just American greatness that's in peril; it's the greatness of all humankind. For thousands of years, we have operated on a system of beliefs and fixed values that has finally caught up with us. All the unnecessary suffering and deaths of humans can be traced back to our beliefs and manufactured values. In the near future, we will program the human abstract thought process in the computer, and this will be based on a "survival" algorithm. Only then will be have proof about how we have tricked this survival program with our ridiculous beliefs about just exactly is supposed to survive. Only then can we begin the long journey back to reason.
See RevolutionOfReason.com
I am sorry to disagree . I agree that McCain was better for the country than today's Republican Party,
But what a low bar!
By supporting the theft of a Supreme Court seat alone, he demonstrated a lack of character needed by a US Senator. It is clear from the record that Everett Dirksen and Bob Taft would have been horrified at such behavior.
8
@Len Charlap Yes, the Supreme Court business was yet another reason that McCain deserves NO respect.
3
Palin was his biggest mistake. Lieberman would have shown bi-partisan and possibly a win. He saved the ACA but then voted for major tax cuts for the wealthy. Complicated man. Certainly a war hero and exceplemtry man. Asking Obama to speak at eulogy was as patriotic as when he told a woman during the campaign that "Obama was not an Arab". Hey, white house, lower the flag!
9
Thank you for this opinion piece. He may not have been a moderate but he was open at important times to work with the other side. No matter which side of the aisle that you might be on in Congress John McCain seemed to focus on what was best for the country and no always blindly voting the party line. I may not have always agreed with his opinions or decisions but I had respect for the man and having differing opinions and being CIVIL about it;that is what our country is about. I live in Virginia and receive the printed Washington edition of the NY Times and was disappointed that there was not an acknowledgment of John McCain passing. Thank you for your recognition.
3
Well said. McCain was far from perfect, stumbled badly sometimes, but had the integrity to admit his errors. Though way too conservative for my tastes, a GOP more in his mold would go a long way to helping restore this country to what it should/could be.
104
While I disagreed with McCain on many policy issues I had respect for him. But I believe the republican party has now died along with Senator McCain. He was the last senator to have a sense of decency and a moral compass that extended beyond his own personal self interest. Yes the country is now in deep peril.
6
When the network pool camera pans to close-ups of faces at Senator John McCain's funeral, take note of the glum looks from Republicans who will populate the pews. The usual suspects will be there; I needn't name them in advance because you know who they are.
They are, Mr. Leonhardt, the very movers and shakers in the Republican Party who will move heaven and earth to more deeply forge the party in the image of Donald Trump. They all know that he is toxic but they have, like Faust, thrown in their lot. Faust made one mistake and the Republicans will, too: the devil doesn't honor his bargains. Who can make him?
As a scion of military gentry (if you will), John McCain, a "bad boy" at the Naval Academy and a Tom Cruise-type (from "Top Gun") on the tarmac at his various stations, was indeed a maverick. He tested the limits of the chain of command and his aircraft. While barking and snarling at orders and officers, he nevertheless took it upon himself to improve his aviator skills.
As he became more mature, he realized that his service to his country carried with it and larger world view: North Vietnam was an enemy, but so were other countries. He had to do his part--as his father and grandfather had before him--to keep the flag upright around the world.
John McCain was a conservative before it became the pejorative term it now is for racism and greed and exclusivity and small-mindedness.
You'll see their faces at his funeral. The commander-in-chief won't be one of them.
1
If the Republican party is to find an heir to John McCain's legacy, it will have to look far and wide. No elected Republican senator or representative in Washington today meets the criteria.
Nebraska's Ben Sasse has occasional flashes of Mccainish independence and pragmatism, about once a year by my count, after which he blends back into the woodwork, silent when not acquiescent.
Lindsey Graham alternates between scolding (but hardly scalding) Trump and acolytic lickspittle. Flake and Corker have pulled their tails between their legs and tucked them into their belts. Facing near-certain rejection at the polls, they abandon any pretense of standing up and speaking out for their principles.
Those listed above are the only sort of nationally known names of wannabe curmudgeons in the mold of John McCain. (Yes, curmudgeons can be happy warriors; the two are not incompatible. Andy Rooney was a joy to listen to.) You will note not a single member of the House is named, for reasons that should need no exposition.
David's belief that the Trump phenomenon is self-limiting is not assured, and most certainly not one to bet the farm on. Racism in America is generations deep, too ingrained in society, and will not be cured by an election. Current income and wealth disparity make the Gilded Age look almost Sovietly socialistic. The Republican who can bring the GOP back to any semblance of DDE's Party (Lincoln's is ridiculous to even hope for) will require immaculate conception.
2
One does not have to agree with John McCain's politics to know that he was a principled and ethical man. He did put serving his country as public servant first. The greatest Americans are always known as iconoclastic patriots. That is precisely why he was often at odds with his own party, which over time, and catalyzing with the election of the current president, has turned itself not into people who serve the interests of Americans as a whole, but into self-serving opportunists & smiling sycophants. (The discussion of the Democratic party could take a similar turn).
It is worth recognizing that the current president is not a Republican: he has nothing to do with this party's history. The current president does whatever he wants in his own self interest, and John McCain will be remembered for being the opposite: a man of principles.
2
Sure, McCain had plenty of personal flaws but he seemed to have a redeeming and solid sense of decency... while today (Sunday) Trump displayed, again, his complete lack of moral integrity by hitting the golf course and sending out a series of Tweets attacking people he considers enemies.
Kindness and goodwill (even phony) are not a part of the Trump personality; bluster and swagger are what define him, perhaps as compensation for deep-seated insecurity.
Yet this terribly unstable, severely damaged man enjoys seemingly unalterable support from his party's grassroots. As such, it's unlikely that the party's ills will be self-correcting. What's desperately needed for the survival of our democracy (and perhaps the Republican party) is series of massive, electoral defeats for Trump and his enablers, beginning this November. Any result short of this may very well leave our nation deeply, dangerously imperiled.
3
Living here in a social democracy as an American expatriate is enormously relieving.
All these basic humanitarian arguments were fought over years ago in europe resulting in national health care as well as most other social democratic programs.
Most Americans have no clue how advanced western European countries have become since WW II. All they here about are inaccurate and stereotypical heresay that has no semblance to reality.
The strong economy in America is a trap for many voters leading them to think the country is on the right track. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Not until Americans wake up and smell the rot of authoritarian Trumpism will America finally reinvent itself as the advanced democracy it should be!
5
His face always reminded me of Brian Lamb, from C-Span.
I think that of the two, I like Brian Lamb more, but I suspect that Brian Lamb would tell me that McCain was not that bad a guy.
The nation needs more people like the both of them, and less people like McConnell. People like McConnell are the real problem.
People like Trump are just completely “off the charts”, in a bad way, but there’s no value in talking about that, because if it wasn’t for people like McConnell, Trump would be powerless.
1
“I expect the Trump presidency to end poorly for Republicans, in some combination of disgrace, unpopularity and defeat.”
America can do this the easy way or the hard way. The easy way is for America to vote out the Republicans in November. The hard way is to wait until Trump utterly demolishes the American economy, Alliances and Trade Relationships. If Trump prevails, America will ultimately fail. The consequences will radically reorder the world geopolitically and economically. And it won’t be to America’s benefit. By that time America won’t have any friends or alliances left. Trump will see to that.
3
McCain did not employ a scorched earth political agenda. His efforts with John Kerry to normalize relations with Vietnam and actually meet with his former captors is a lesson in magnanimity. He wore the mindless attacks against him by candidate Trump as a badge of honor and until the end, was unafraid of Trump.
The Republicans in Congress are Lilliputians compared to John McCain.
5
Mr. Leonhardt
Please speak to the failure of the trump White House to honor John McCain.
The loss of basic civility in our political process is evident today as it was at the 1968 democratic national convention.
Obviously the White House is the ‘people’s’ house not trump’s. His continued self-serving disrespect for all the electorate and tarnishing of our collective American brand must be reprimanded and reversed.
AN unimpeachable offense of disrespecting an honorable senator is the final straw that should crater this presidency and let us begin healing his callous wounds.
The names McCain and Trump should, henceforth, never be used in the same sentence. John McCain was a husband, a father, a Senator, a war hero and an honorable, good and decent man. His place in history is assured. He will be remembered for his integrity and his service. The other person named , will be remembered as an unfortunate accident.
1
It's not our greatness that's in peril, it's our liberal democracy. John McCain was a conservative Republican who supported most of the legislation that has put liberal democracy in in peril. A maverick? Maybe once in a blue moon but mostly not.
Death always brings on the flowery eulogies. No kudos from me.
2
He would have investigated “that the president of the United States might be vulnerable to Russian extortion.” Yes! And also that Trump's opponent would be investigated for her various obvious malfeasances. You are demonstrating the kind of bias you're deploring.
McCain was a flawed candidate, because of his choice of Palin. He was sandbagged by what should have been his usual Deep State support, because they realized that after 8 years of Bush no Republican could win so they supported the Democrat. We thought Obama was an excellent, independent Democrat which proved to not be the case.
However, what happened in 2016 was that we were presented not with one, but two totally incompetent and unacceptable candidates. The shrill screams from both winner and loser have divided and devastated us as a nation and made blind partisanship the death of our democracy - such as it was..
What we have lost as a country is the ability to debate with passion but not hate. McCain stood up for his opinions but did not disparage others. This is a rare attribute in politics today. I often disagreed with McCain but I never doubted his good intentions. As opposed to others, I feel Trump should stay quiet as anything he would say would be the ultimate in hypocrisy and would inevitably leave an oily smell.
5
Out of respect for the Senator, I wish that the press would cease any and all references to the President. We should continue to focus on the ideals and example for all legislators/americans that he set. Every time I read or hear a conversation about this great American's life and Trump's name comes up it sours the experience. Besides, nothing would gall Trump more than is not having his name in the headlines.
However controversial at times, McCain revealed he could understand the value of placing himself in the shoes of the opposite side of an argument, woefully absent in the current republican rigidity in trying to find solutions to problems that are universal, and beyond petty and narrow partisan interests. Trump and his misfits in government lack imagination, and are irresponsible in their decisions to help others; and willfully forget that politics, the discipline they chose to be, is the art of the possible.
Sorry But not enough of an alternative. Senator McCain was a hero. But in the end he could’ve saved this country, by switching to the Democratic Party. He did not.
3
There certainly is a lot to be admired in Sen. McCain's career but also much that is disturbing. A blind adherence to the anti-abortion crowd. Complaining about the mess that is military procurement; then never doing anything about it. My list could be lengthy but it would be respectful. He was a true American hero.
But the only way out of the stinking rotten mess we have gotten ourselves into is to vote for Democrats at any and all levels of government. To but it another way we tried the CONservitive way and it has failed us completely. A true face-down-in-the-dust failure. The nation needs to try another way; the liberal progressive way. It always works better and spreads prosperity more widely and fairly. So for heavens sake Vote this November for any Democrat on the ballot. It's the only way out of the national disgrace we have become. It may be the last chance you get. Resist.
2
"McCain’s final message for his country was a warning: Our greatness is in peril." But not, evidently, when McCain and his team hailed Bush for going full guns into Iraq. And not when McCain and Clinton pushed Obama to topple the leaders in Libya. And not when McCain was pressuring Obama to send troops into Syria or to double our forces in Iraq, or to reoccupy Afghanistan. And what of Mr. McCain's hysteria over Ukraine or Georgia or Latvia? Yes, it's fine to praise McCain, who had many fine traits, but we gain little by forgetting that McCain had been the leader of the hysterical War Party for 20-some years, and if he had had his way we would now be at war with Russia. We want to see him as the opposite of you-know-who and therefore without faults, but the fact is that this fine man if elected would have done his best to lead us into World War III.
3
McCain was flawed. Yes. But he was flawed in a peculiarly Republican way: Flawed in that he tolerated a misanthrope for President because it served his ends: it opened the door to a remaking -- nay -- a "reshaping" of the GOP into The Party of tolerance albeit to a point: where it would rail and rail and yet be principled, driving it's points home, but always listening to and adapting where it could unify, thereby opening doors on both sides of the ailes to creative bipartisanism.
Only...
The party's hardliners had already reshaped their electorate to accept only bi-cameral totalitarianism: chest-thumping, finger-pointing, distortions that created and fed the antediluvian tendencies of a long-ignored segment of our population: the blue-color, calloused-handed working folk.
Thus have we a President who blatantly cheats on his wife and lies with nary a tinker bell ringing in his head to call him back to decency and tolerance, if he ever possessed it.
1
Yes that. But not only. He reportedly rejected the ACA bill because the appropriate procedures were not followed, not on its merits.
But that is just the point - following the rules set up to protect the country. Had the House had time to consider the bill and timely information, it surely would not have passed anyway. Foiling his party members in their con artist trick of rush to folly was the right thing, regardless of his beliefs.
The first time I heard McCain when he announced his run for the presidency A woman asked him how he stood on abortion. He admitted to be against it, then he said that decisions or influence on abortion or questioning decisions of the courts was not in his purview or his authority. That's the rules. It is the political antidote to pandering to the specific desires of any demographic.
I am still unconvinced that if he had won the election we would be worse off, considering all that has followed. Nor am I convinced that we we would be, but considering how much of Obama's good work has been destroyed and how effortlessly the government has continued slipping down the slimy slope created after Clinton, I simply wonder.
Could have run off with the bit between its teeth, if the junior members would have followed his standards rather than clinging to the mob?
Conscientious leadership, even by someone with whose ideas you do not agree, must lead to positive results.
1
He was a man of bold contradictions. McCain ran a on a platform of cap and trade to deal with climate change and at the same time brought in Palin- a know nothing and as such he opened the door to that brand of alternative facts politics.
1
John McCain was an admirable and courageous senator. The GOP obviously abandoned him.
The GOP is now the paranoid white, pro-plutocratic and anti-science party. It is now the Trumpuglican-authoritarian personality cult. The party’s paranoid biases are expressed as an all out assault on truth and common sense. This assault is grounded in “free”-market fundamentalism and in “Christian” fundamentalism—both of which prop up traditional hierarchies of wealth and power. Trumpuglicanism is all about tribal purity (socialism bad, Islam bad) and the preservation of the “established” order.
Authoritarian leaders and those willing to be led by them--and the Trumpuglican Party has a surplus of both--feel threatened by complexity, ambiguity and "Others." The simplicity of President Trump’s message consoles those who cannot tolerate complexity and ambiguity. His attacks on the “Others” reaffirm the xenophobia of the Trumpuglican base. With Trump in place, his persistently loyal followers assume they have much to cheer and far less to fear. They are oblivious to the dangers posed by America’s disunity, diminished credibility and loss of international prestige. They revel in tribal celebrations and evidence no awareness of the extent to which they are being manipulated.
The “silent majority” of voters—actually a 35-40% minority—steadfastly believe that President Trump provides a “true” voice for their grievances and outrage; hence turmoil roils our nation.
McCain will be sorely missed.
2
If he was really upset about the way the country was going, McCain would have resigned before he died so that a replacement could have been chosen by voters in a special election. Instead, the Trumpist governor will no doubt appoint someone with similar reactionary politics (not that McCain’s were much different). Can we point to any actual lasting legislative accomplishments by the Senator that merit such lavish eulogies?
1
Isn't it ironic that the former hostage and eternal hero, in his final days, has managed to leave only one hostage in the entire country for the next week -- in the White House.
From one former Navy officer to another, I salute you, Senator McCain.
1
A true American hero, in spite of the party he belonged to.
3
He recognized that politics, American-style, has to be a great game, played for high stakes, but always by the rules. Like a big sporting event, you have vigorous competition, but you have rules of the game, and you have referees. You respect them and play by them, because if you don't, it ceases to be a game and becomes a war. We have had civil war in our past, and we should have learned that we are all losers when we don't play by the rules and abide by the outcome. Cheating, in other words, is not an option. He was, in the final analysis, an honorable man and an honorable opponent.
1
John McCain understood that partnering with the lowest among us - white supremacists and others who traffic in hatred - might win elections, but it would lose our collective soul. And we've seen these past 2 years how right he was. Even as his end was near, he stood in the line of fire for us - dismissing Trump's personal attacks and speaking out loud and clear about Trump's attacks on our democracy.
The last of the great lions has gone to rest.
3
"I expect the Trump presidency to end poorly for Republicans, in some combination of disgrace, unpopularity and defeat." I agree but only if the Democrats pick moderate, middle of the road candidates having broad-based appeal to carry their banner forward. If they do not, what will happen is anyone's guess.
2
Throughout the Trump presidency, people in general, including this very newspaper, have hoped that something will happen for the better. That something will occur to make republicans rethink their position in protecting a lying, insulting, bigoted autocrat.
From the beginning it was always a forlorn hope. That long-sought, wretched hope has now come to its culmination with the White House's callous refusal to even acknowledge a revered American war hero who served this nation to his very end. That decision is despicable beyond all belief and human comprehension.
As bad and pitiful as is this willful, cowardly act, from a bitter little man, jealous of others efforts, it will still have no impact whatsoever on the vast number of republicans in Congress. Nor will it have any effect on the current worrying direction of this country. That part is solely up to the voters. And if Americans can still vote for Trump after his latest insulting display against a deceased McCain, then there is no honor or hope left for America. Even enemies on a battlefield show respect for one another after the war is won.
Trump has proved himself less than a child. A cry baby in the midst of a 4-year tantrum.
5
Fed up with the Grotesque Old Party of Trump ?
Conservative and reasonable ?
Conservative and patriotic ?
Conservative with a sense of civic duty ?
Conservative with a sense of conscience and decency ?
Conservative and honest ?
Conservative with pre-existing health conditions ?
Then start a brand new Conservative Party and work with the Democrats to make America great again.
3
I agree with said about Mr. McCain. I totally disagree that the Republican party isn't getting things done. In a very undemocratic way they have forced the majority of Americans into a political "reservation", underhandedly limiting the ability of minorities to vote and rearranging the political map in their favor at the expense of the majority. They make up the rules, much like the ethics of being a politician, and so they cannot be accused of breaking them. They complained "no one would listen to them". And their response to that was not to compromise with the majority. They didn't lose their power because no one would listen to them. They lost their power because the majority wants something different. They have embraced whatever comes their way: lying, cheating, stealing, misogyny, racism, breaking the law, embracing autocracy, and bullying to get what they want. It no longer is "politics" in the sense of the good old back room deals between politicians. It now is organized criminal activity to take control of the neighborhood. The day is coming, however, for the right to have to face themselves in the mirror. They will be confronted with what they have become and what they have done to other people. And I, for one, will not feel empathy for "We never thought they (he) would go that far". They own this. They should not delude themselves into thinking there won't be a price to pay.
1
From selling greed and corporate domination with "small government" platitudes to routinely promoting the bombing of non-white civilians ("bomb bomb bomb Iran"?), McCain would stand as an idol in no other industrial democracy.
Here, of course, he was beloved by the press and seen as a beacon of truth-telling, for occasional candor and lapses from right-wing orthodoxy.
How starved are we for decent principled leadership, that we're obliged to see in this reckless, cruel and unthinking man, one who ran a disgraceful presidential campaign, such great promise for the future?
2
Congress, as McCain said last year, is “getting nothing done.”
I disagree.
The Republican led Congress, in it's complicity with a corrupt, unstable, authoritarian, is getting plenty done … if your goal is to severely weaken the worlds strongest democracy. And all for the perceived short-term party and personal gains of craven Republican politicians who profess respect for John McCain but in practice make a mockery of his bravery.
Imagine that America's foreign adversaries, without the benefit of hindsight, didn't know they could get the U.S. to elect such a destructive un-American candidate with no more than a little push, but instead could have guaranteed Trump's election at a great cost. How much would an adversary with a long-term perspective pay to put such a man in the White House? How much is Trump worth to Russia and China and other anti-democracy regimes to help counter the hundreds of billions of dollars more that we spend on defense. They can just sit back and read twitter and enjoy the "show".
Republican's continued support and refusal to attempt to slow-down this decent in Trumpian madness is a near priceless gift for the enemies of a robust American democracy. Getting nothing done? The Republican led Congress has done more than enough damage. "Friends" of John McCain like Lindsey Graham who are willingly helping Trump attack the rule of law and our norms of democracy should hang their heads in shame.
4
"The absolutism and radicalism of today’s Republican Party is the biggest threat to the country that McCain served and loved. It has left the United States impotent to deal with our greatest challenges — inequality, alienation, climate change and a global drift toward autocracy."
Inequality is engineered wider and wider all the time, faster and faster. Alienation is a natural consequence of increasing inequality. Climate chaos is not even acknowledged, must less being prepared for. There is no 'global drift' towards autocracy: it is being navigated towards.
The Hon. McCain was the last light left in a depraved GOP. You did the best you could, and more than the rest. Rest in peace, Sir.
2
There was a day years ago when I used to sleep well at night and not worry whether we had a Democrat or Republican in the White House or controlling Congress. I may have been happy or sad that the policies I cherish would either be enacted or ignored, but I never questioned that a majority of politicians serving us were patriots and decisions of an absolutely critical nature would be handled correctly in a bipartisan way.
Sleeping poorly began with the heist of the 2000 election by the Republican, George W. Bush. It continued when he was asleep at the wheel and allowed terrorists to attack our country. Clinton had a bead on al Qaeda before leaving office to the extent that he launched missiles against bin Laden. Bush was unqualified for the job. It then continued with purposefully manipulating intelligence information as false pretense for attacking Iraq and forever upsetting the balance in the Middle East with the loss of many precious lives. A Republican inspired financial collapse due to massive fraud committed by the most privileged Americans capped off the Bush nightmare.
Obama reignited my faith in America somewhat, but racism prevented him from reaching his true potential. Now we have a Republican monster in the White House who defrauded the U.S. and colluded with a hostile foreign power to seize control.
The only solution to restore this country is for Republicans to be made extinct in the political realm, beginning with the impeachment of Donald Trump.
15
John McCain saw America's greatness in her principles; Mr Trump sees it in her power over others. The latter only arises due to the former; something Mr Trump will never understand.
8
McCain was a conservative on policy and a moderate on process. In Fisher and Ury’s famous book on negotiating, “Getting to Yes,” they encouraged being “hard on the problem, but easy on the people.” It appears that McCain embodied that. However, Trump is exactly opposite. He barely seems to understand the problem or his preferred solution and cannot advocate for it, and he is absolutely abusive of the people. It is incompetence combined with insecurity masquerading as strength.
3
John McCain was well loved because although, as this author states, he was often flawed, he was also real, and kind and brave. He treated all Americans with respect, did not bad mouth Americans he disagreed with, and was able to do meaningful work with those who had different opinions. Imagine what we could get done if there were other republicans willing to emulate John McCain. We are truly worse off without John McCain in the Senate.
6
There is a historical weight to this moment that "feels" different from the recent deaths of other public figures. The tributes and eulogies force us to confront the fact that the same party that nominated McCain, also elected the current occupant of the White House. They came from the same generation and yet, one man was a life-long public servant who believed in honor, decency and self-sacrifice, and the other man only serves himself and will believe in whatever is convenient at the time.
Hopefully, McCain's greatest legacy will be that his passing marked a turning point in our nation's history by reawakening the public's conscience and reminding voters that what makes America's greatness comes from its ideals not the stock market.
1
A decent man, I hope he rests in peace!
1
It is naive to point at Trump and suggest he is the anomaly among republicans.
He is a republican in a way that he resonates more with Americans than any other republican. What on earth was McCain talking about, so as to suggest that Trump is a threat - when he is the best example of today's republican. For uneducated rurals and rust-belt unemployed - I can see the dread and loathing of minorities and non-Norwegians. But the Trump's brand is super popular among suburban white republicans too. And the most potent common denominator of all republicans in America today is a toxic mix of fear and loathing of non-Norwegian non-christians, and cleverly disguised and semi-palatable forms of white supremacy. That is it.
All the talk of low taxes, conservation and conservatism, rugged individualism, freedom from government is just talk. Republicans want to make sure that they criminalize everyone non-white and non-christian; and are doing a very good job of it.
I get that McCain was a maverick, a patriot, and not a supremacist at all. In fact, he was a hero. But he was screaming into the wilderness given that his party is hostage of guns, bible, and white supremacy.
4
How about people try not to divide up the goods and the bads they perceived about John McCain for a couple of days. Show the man some respect. Ask yourself these questions about him: 1) Could you trust him with your car keys? 2) Could you trust him to watch your kids? 3) Could you trust him to challenge dishonesty and spurious behavior in government? 4) Was he a man of his word? 5) Could you trust him with your life?
The operative words here are trust and honesty. I could be wrong but I believe the vast majority of people would answer all 5 questions , yes. That would be across the entire political spectrum. Allow the man some grace in death. If you want to tear apart his record, give it a few days.
8
@richard wiesner On #3, I have to answer with a huge NO, he could not be trusted.
It wasn’t much of a spine but he was the only spine the Senate had.
5
@Mr Ed That's sure a LOW BAR! Too bad for us.
1
It is with great hope that I wish the Republican Party to self-destruct. I also hope that something better will rises from its ashes.
McCain would have approved.
3
The United States today requires statesmen of stature!
But McCain did not fully measure up to the required stature with his history of support to the Iraq war and other cowboy style muscular approaches to reaffirm the American viewpoint!
Many people now remember his latter day belated responses to current policy but this was part of his quixotic inconsistency!
May his soul Rest In Peace.
2
John MCCain was a good man.
He also was the largest recipient of contributions from the NRA than any other Senator in history.
He'll be missed, but his support of guns won't.
3
I didn't vote for McCain, however I still admired him. I didn't agree with some of his policies, but I still admired him. He at least worked with democrats and republicans and when he made a mistake he admitted it. He tried to do what he thought was right and for that I believe he was someone I would have been proud to work with, regardless of party.
I can't help but wonder what he is thinking now when looking at his good friend Lindsey Graham who has sold his soul to the devil himself - DJT and his merry band of Russian paid democracy destroying GOPers.
1
I am a Democrat but I largely respected McCain. He was an old school conservative who was willing to work across the aisle in an effort to create laws and govern.
Sadly today's frightened Republicans-- even though they control the three branches of government-- have demonstrated how ineffectual they are in in helping the American people. One of McCains final pleas was for his Republican colleagues to work across the aisle; it fell on deaf ears.
2
How long ago was it that the hate monger Limbaugh was declared the soul of the republican party? Thanks to Trump, have we forgotten the war criminal duo Bush/Cheney who famously declared we were either with them or against...what? the USA, critical thinking, honesty and the truth? The republican party has been swimming in the swamp for over twenty years. To ask them to disown their donor base, American corporations, is like asking them to address the needs of the poor, the sick, the homeless, the immigrant. Where's the money in that? It's not going to happen. The idea of America can only hope to survive the republican party if the Mueller inquiry becomes a teaching experience for the duped minority of voters who have, against their best interests, supported the republican party.
2
John McCain has been, for me, an example of courage in the face of fire. He has stared down captors, torturers, and cancer; he has stood up for his beliefs. He stood his watch to the last.
John McCain is a reminder that heroic men do not need to be perfect in order to be incredible; they can have failures, they can make excessive compromises, they can have flaws. People exist on a spectrum of greyscale, and how they navigate that spectrum, according to their own morals and values, dictates their impact on the world.
People like John McCain raise the quality of their entire country. All people will have flaws. But how they negotiate those flaws, how they withstand their greatest trials, that is how history will hopefully remember them.
I'm sorry for your loss, America. This was a noble man, who worked for his country until the last. You're a better place for having had people like him serve you.
1
Part of what made McCain different was that he was different. D. Leonhardt very simply makes the point that McCain was not a stereotypical right winger. In some ways this Republican was a democrat. He favored the people of all stripes and pluralistic democracy, while strongly supporting small government, anti-abortion and gun rights positions. John McCain suffered through extraordinary circumstances as a POW, thereafter committing himself to public service and spreading the cheer.
What we mostly do when we eulogize is "eulolie."
Alas, Senator McCain joins "The Founding Fathers," "The Constitution," "Liberty," "Democracy," "the Greatest Generation," and an endless ellipsis of virtues, in being "All-American." It's "all Americans" now in charge. Are we not able to deduce that something more is required of us?
(I may understand it, but I will never accept Americans' willingness to be invisible expanding zeroes.)
1
John McCain was a courageous GOP conservative, exemplary patriot and sometime maverick. McCain never left the Republican Party—as members of his 2008 campaign staff such as Steve Schmidt and Nicole Wallace have done—but the GOP clearly abandoned him.
There is no Republican Party. It has been replaced by the brutish and authoritarian Trumpuglican personality cult.
President Trump plays golf (and perhaps strikes business deals?) while on yet another one of his all too frequent weekend getaways.
Even in this period of national mourning, Trump is wholly incapable of approximating anything like civility.
Trump and his Trumpuglican supporters stay the course proclaimed by Thrasymicus in Plato’s “Republic”: Justice is aiding one’s friends and harming one’s enemies.
Has their ever been a more self-centered and mean spirited president in U.S. history?
The “people” have never turned back a nation’s drift toward authoritarianism. Only political parties have done so—and they have done so only when a conservative party, recognizing the threat from the radical right, has joined with a liberal party to counter a rising authoritarian tide.
Where are those with the political will to reform the GOP and counter its authoritarian Trumpuglican turn?
Senator McCain, perhaps the GOP’s last portrait in courage, will be sorely missed.
5
John McCain transcended politics, party and pettiness.
John McCain, regardless of his more commonplace affiliations, was a true patriot whose decency, dignity, loyalty, courage, humility, perseverance (and countless other laudable attributes) are rarely found in America today.
Perhaps John McCain's most fitting legacy for all of us should be to exemplify his character.
I cannot respect a man who spent his political life saying one thing and then voting for the exact opposite. He could have stopped any number of the horrific republican policies over the years - with a single vote. His famous vote not to abolish Obamacare was a joke. He could have supported the program years earlier but instead voted against it every time. Not how I would define integrity.
5
@Sbaty He did not have integrity. He had a finely tuned sense of how to best promote John McCain!
First and foremost, John McCain was probably a good and decent man. But this column addresses his political contributions. That said, here goes.
John McCain should not be mentioned with Eisenhower or Teddy Roosevelt. Sorry. He didn't lead; he did not champion a single idea. He had no definable core. He sponsored a mere handful of legislation over the course of a generation. (Orin Hatch introduced and passed over 750 laws; McCain introduced and passed 17).
McCain blew the greatest opportunity of his life to stand up for decency when he joined the New York Times in adopting the obscene and unforgivable term "harsh interrogation" when confronted what the United States, United Nations, numerous international treaties, and most of history always recognized as torture.
He was no lion.
2
Though McCain did not represent my viewpoints, he was representative of the government that I knew for most of my 71 years. I have been racking my brain for anyone on either side of the aisle who might count among their attributes the gravitas and veritas (as well as the unabashed patriotism and admiration he exhibited for our nation) that he embodied. His departure is leaving a black hole that may take generations to fill. Obama had that gift also, whether or not we embraced everything he did or said. So it is possible for someone without military service to properly serve public office. But whatever Trump and his band of unqualified cabinet head do not fit the bill.
It is very telling that McCain chose to have GW Bush and Obama present the eulogies at his funeral. He understood bipartisanship...something our current Congress seems to have abandoned.
2
There was a time, long ago, when men elected to be our Representatives did just that. They did not view each other and their views as treasonous and unpatriotic. Together they crafted some very good laws, laws that were jointly supported and enacted.
Slowly over decades, we have lost our way and our Representatives have morphed into men that must please their donors and tow the party line first and foremost while destroying and denying the opposition party. The culmination was Gingrich who was the last nail in the coffin of Democracy. McConnell and Ryan also aided and abetted this fiasco that became the current Republican Party leading to the tawdry election of the most incompetent of all trump, a first- class grifter.
Together they all placed adherence to the will of their donors and party before the very Constitution they vowed to uphold and support.
2
It's not just "our greatness [that] is in peril;" it's our very Constitutional democracy, the very source of our greatness, that is in very grave peril. John McCain may have been very conservative (and way too conservative for this progressive Democrat), but he firmly believed in the American project and was a staunch defender of the Constitution. His death symbolizes the end of the Republican Party. Now, we are left, as you implied, with a Trumpublican Party that does not support the very Constitution that Sen. McCain served with dedication and honor in times of war and in times of peace. we are facing a new Civil War with a white nationalist party that is racist, misogynist, and anti-immigrant to the core and is working relentlessly to undermine our "rule of law" that is the great gift of our Constitution and to replace in with an authoritarian "rule of Trump" aided and abetted by his Congressional Trumpublicans. John McCain gave his very life serving out nation and cried out against the darkening shadow cast over America by Donald Trump and his quest for autocratic rule. If we want to honor him and his legacy, no matter our personal politics, we need to stand with him as patriots and defend the Constitution when we vote this November. Let's all hope that John McCain did not live and die in vain.
1
I guess what is said can be true: We humans are meant to change in our attitudes for the better, evolve, and hopefully - if we are open to it - become wiser with age. Even though my politics are for the most part on the opposite end of the spectrum from Senator McCain's, I, a septuagenerian, have grown to not only like this fine man but also to respect him. With each year, especially now with an apparently corrupt, amoral president and a spineless, self-gratifying Republican Congress, my perception of what one individual is capable of doing to bring dignity and honesty to a political entity has indeed evolved. All of us ultimately are defined and judged by our innate characters. Senator McCain was more than a politician. He had courage, and the courage of his convictions. He had a moral compass directed toward service of family and country. So now we Americans have lost one shining hope of a "GOP" that has gone astray. If there is anyone to date who can fill his shoes, please let this commenter know because the McConnell's and his ilk can not begin to travel on the same path as John McCain. They are cowards who prefer living the lies of their president. How disheartening...
3
The Republican Party should honour their departed senator by introspection and by clearly thinking through the consequences of their current stingy and selfish ideology of cutting taxes to the bone. These tax cuts are benefitting the wrong people, people who do not need tax cuts. Taxes are needed to build roads, bridges, and airports, to build new hospitals, to provide services to the needy, to provide adequate police force to maintain law and order, to maintain adequate defence capability against foreign invaders, to pay for the numerous Federal and State Agencies to run a modern State, to provide universal healthcare, to build more medical and nursing schools, to provide free education to those who meet certain minimum standards, to offer paid apprenticeships to those who want to follow a blue collar career. None of this is happening because the foolish political mantra of cutting taxes, which unsurprisingly always wins. Raise taxes and provide the needed services like other civilized countries do.
1
McCain should be remembered as an American hero not as a Republican. Today’s Republicans sullied the reputation of the country and will be remembered throughout history for their lack of patriotism and common decency.
1
As I am sure John McCain would agree:
As soon as the House and the Senate regain their moral authority investigations into how such a man as Trump ever became President of the United States are first in order, with the express intention of laying down regulations, background checks, qualifications and ethical standards. The Justice Department, FBI, CIA and other security agencies must be recharged to handle such a task. The current state of affairs was entirely predictable and yet there was no will or way to stop it.
The Republican Party needs to be broken by a massive majority to do this. Get out the vote, awaken the young, ride the revulsion toward gun violence, racism, sleaze and lies.
Such an investigation will inevitably find the fact free GOP, Fox News, the Russians, vote denial and suppression, and the Base certainly helped give us Donald J Trump. But this floundering con was elected mainly by the people out there who didn't vote. If you don't exercise your privilege you are undermining democracy.
It is the duty of all legitimate media to send this message, day in day out: no more tyranny of a minority in America. Get the vote out!
3
I don't want to live under a government that's "great", i want to live in a society where the citizens are great.
The former is like an anthill in which individuals are sacrificed for the good of others, the second promotes human flourishing.
5
The well-being of our country cannot and must not hinge on a single individual. Collectively, the Republicans in Congress have gone astray. Their betrayal of democratic values and abandonment of any checks and balances on Trump's corruption and incompetence are tragic and dangerous. To regrow a spine and come to their senses, Republicans need a major whipping in the next election. Voters must deliver this to save this country.
1
Our greatness is in peril said John McCain. With the passing of Senator McCain, a voice of moderation and a symbol of decency the American greatness he referred to is in even greater peril.
The once unthinkable election of Donald Trump has diminished the United States to the point where even the pretense of patriotism, the rule of law and the norms of civility have all but disappeared among members of the Republican party. That Trump has essentially ignored the passing of John McCain without any meaningful dismay from his party is telling and ominous.
Just as so many military and intelligence officials have spoken out against Trump's behavior as Commander and Chief, the United States Naval Academy should call out in writing Trump's disrespect towards one of the Academy's modern day heroes, public servants and role models for the sake of its future graduates. One of them is my nephew who I would like to think will pattern his life more like our nation's heroes and not its scoundrels like Trump.
1
Yes! "Today's Republican Party is the biggest threat to the country".
As a former Goldwater Republican, I came to Washington in 1966 to work on air pollution control in the U.S. Public Health Service. I learned the hard way that I was wrong to support Republican policies. I documented what I learned about harmful violent (mostly Republican) policies at https://www.legalreader.com/republican-racketeers-violent-policies/
2
For surviving 5 years of torture and going on to continue to serve his country, McCain deserves my utmost respect. He also deserves the respect of the current president for his service in Vietnam and in government. trump proves himself to be less than human and disgraces the office of the president once again.
2
The last visible shred of honor and integrity left the Republican Party with the passing of McCain.
1
Although I disagreed with many of his positions, and thought he was extremely foolish to choose Palin as his VP candidate, John McCain always seemed honest in his desire to make America better. The fact that he was known as a Maverick attests that he did not care about his personal popularity. Too bad that there are so few Republicans like him.
The only radicals are left wing dems. They are the only ones muzzling free speech and telling people how they should think.
2
Years ago, I watched Senator McCain pin a medal on my dad for his service as a POW in WWII. The Senator knew what honor and valor meant, and lived his life (with a few bumps in the road) in a way that proved it. Despite having little in common with him politically, I will miss him terribly.
1
Trump may be the most dishonorable person to ever set foot in the White House, let alone sit behind the desk in the Oval Office. Word is that his staff wrote a eulogy of McCain for him to deliver to the American people, and he nixed it. If he ever does deliver it, he will alienate the tens of millions of lemmings in his cult, who, taking a cue from their Leader, have come to hate whomever they are told to. Senator McCain was one the greatest conservatives to ever serve our country. And, yes, he was right. Our Republic is in peril.
Senator McCain was a flawed politician - such as those enumerated in this column - but which politician was not a flawed person? We should honor him for his service to the country, for his refusing to break by his captors in N. Vietnam while the liar-in-chief was claiming, among other things, bone spur to avoid serving and fighting his "own Vietnam", in his words, to avoid catching VD while sleeping around. In that sense, I think it is fitting that the liar-in-chief did not utter a word on McCain's passing.
Yet was McCain a pure patriot. I doubt it. If his trying to avoid the moneyed class to dominate our politics, he could have, and would have, voted against the trillion dollar give-away to the rich and the Corporations. But he didn't. To me that is a big flaw in one of his final acts.
2
JOHN MC CAIN's life embodied heroism. He, perhaps more than any other member of Congress currently, survived years of unspeakable, inhumane torture that would have broken a person of lesser valor. He knew that he could pull rank and get out earlier than some of the other prisoners, he refused to do so out of his sense of honor and fairness. It was not until one of his torturers found out that John McCain was an officer that he received medical treatment. Fortunately it was not too late for him to heal. He exemplified the American of sticktoitiveness, a quality that is all but disappeared in our times. John McCain was quick to acknowledge mistakes that he made, showing himself to be a gentleman possessed of a strong sense of decency. We are afflicted in these times by leadership that is cowardly, self-serving and incapable of either empathy or remorse, traits which were alien to John McCain. He was a traditional conservative in the best sense of the word, calling out others in Congress for substituting obstinacy and sabotage for determination and grit. A grateful nation will pay its respects to a great American as he lies in state. He asked that George W. Bush and Barack Obama deliver his eulogies. McCain had no truck with Trump whom he had dumped. He made it clear to all that he abominated and execrated Trump's infantile, ruinous style. Trump, truly the Caligula of our times, was at his lowest when he ridiculed John McCain for having "let himself" be captured!
4
Let's call it for what it is. President Trump indecently failed to recognize John McCain even in death.
Trump fought his staff to not publicize a statement honoring Senator McCain. At the White House, the flag is no longer at half mast this morning. How petty is Donald J. Trump??
Trump specifically avoided Vietnam with 5 deferments and has no singular valor. He once claimed he would have rushed into the Florida school during a shooting massacre to save students. A ridiculous statement easily delivered by reality television's apprentice president. No grace, no decency, no valor.
8
In a few days, McCain's passing and his legacy of heroism and 'maverick' Republicanism will be replaced in the news media by yet another stupid act, statement or "tweet" by the Narcissist-in-Chief, or another gun shooting, or some other "tragedy" brought down by a conservative policy that McCain ultimately either voted for or did so little enough about to make no difference in the outcome. A great man and solider, but a marginal senator at best. Arizona has been represented by conservatives not much different from the Deep South.
10
Leonhardt- you must be joking. I will readily admit that Republicans have not been very effective in recent years, a development that you undoubtedly take great pleasure in. However, characterizing the party as the country’s greatest threat is pure hyper partisan ranting. It is not the Republicans who want open borders, the dismantling of ICE and the establishment of a sanctuary nation, essentially destroying the notion of national sovereignty. It is not Republicans who want to empty the prisons. It is not Republicans advocating for universal basic income, an idea that would bankrupt the country and demolish the work ethic. It is not Republicans who want gun owners put in jail. It is not Republicans who want to criminalize speech that is not politically correct. It is not Republicans who vilify all white Christian males. It is not Republicans who want to scrap the Constitution and replace it with empathy. Republicans in Congress are not doing their job very well but at least they believe in America.
1
Thousands of citizens ought to diplomatically apply pressure to Lindsey Graham to denounce Trump in honor of John McCain.
Shaming him to do the right thing could create a break through.
Promise clemency tell him what his old mentor McCain used to tell him. Buck up! Time to be a hero John McCain would admire.
1
There is an old saying, "do not speak ill of the dead". When it comes to Mr. McCain, however, I'll make an exception.
Least we forget, the road to Trump was paved with the past 50 years of the Republican Party that he was an integral part of. From Goldwater, Nixon, Reagan and onward, the Republican Party's unabashed exploitation of hate, ignorance, lies, greed, injustice, and hypocrisy in its pursuit of power, that McCain was an integral part of, is what has made our nation fertile ground for the likes of Trump.
Like the aged sinner who tries to buy his way into heaven with a few acts of kindness and large donations near the end, McCain's vote to save Obamacare and infrequent acts of humanity - which often had their own self-serving end - does not now make up for a political lifetime of exploitation driven politics or get him through the gate.
If you are coming now to seek absolution on his behalf you have come to the wrong place.
1
@zb Least I forget, his military service and sacrifice will always be honored, but as for his political service that is an entirely different matter that I can easily done without.
@zb
Did you forget McCain-Feingold? Explain that.
I also don't agree with most of McCain's positions. But at times, he did go against the grain. And, at least, he was willing to work with liberals and not call them enemies. Sure, he was deeply flawed, but he was a patriot. Unfortunately, he is a vanishing species in the current Trumpublican party. So, it is with no irony that I plead
VOTE OUT ALL REPUBLICANS
2
He voted for that obscene tax cut. That's all I need to know.
1
Why should we be surprised that the White House only kept our flag at half=staff for a few hours to honor the passing of John McCain. When will "t" understand that this is not his house, it is OUR house and he is just a temporary resident. "t" is a disgrace to our country, while Senator McCain was a national treasure, a real American hero and he would have made a great Democrat.
3
As a Canadian, and living next door to the most powerful country on earth means being curiousabout your government and how it functions. With John McCain's passing it seems that any bridge between the parties will be buried with him and that divide will only grow wider.
In Canada, it is country over party, yet we are susceptible to dividers but
2
Aren't you happy that McCain's principles did not include voting against the Gorsuch nomination? You know, the fruit of the poisoned tree and all that nonsense? Aren't you glad that McCain's principles did not include voting against the so-called tax reform bill? And, I personally am overjoyed that McCain's principles allowed him to stand quietly by while McConnell obstructed for the sake of obstruction.
Making saints of politicians seems like a bad idea. And, it just shows how so many people are willing to accept without much question an image of a senator carefully constructed over the years. So happy to read all the idolizing comments here.
2
Could we please get over ourselves and our "greatness"?!
To read and to hear our political leaders, existence for a U.S. citizen is one big exercise in self-congratulation. Humility: let's get some!
14
In the light of day, with all the vindictiveness of the current administration, we have the passing of a great American ,something that our president is not & never will be. It is true that those that who serve & submit themselves to our country offer their love & devotion to our democratic republic. It is a shame that the America John McCain so loved ,along with his party ,are so corrupt ,self serving & destined for the ash heap. He will be dearly missed in this our America. He is neither a liberal nor a conservative ,but a progressive, understanding the Preamble to the Constitution, "...in order to form a more perfect Union." And so he did. I celebrate his being with us as long as he could. My Prayers & love for him & his family. God Bless America.
Today's Republicans, although they would never say so aloud, are excited to envision a Putin or Xi style gov't for the U.S.
3
How about the AZ governor appoint someone in John McCain's mold to succeed him...to do otherwise will be the greatest rebuke & insult to a great American.
1
We can only hope, and work albeit on the premise, that it is not too late - already.
24
America, despite Trump's assertions to the contrary, is a great nation. However, like all nations, we are made up of people and people are flawed.
The rise of groups of absolutists who like to draw distinct boundaries between them and us are growing all over the planet. There is a move towards nativism disguised as nationalism with the intent to rid each nation of "the other."
Of course absolutism has one huge flaw, the boundaries can only get smaller-and-smaller and the most minor differences between you and me get amplified. The mantra from "Highlander" - "There can only be one" describes all absolutist movements perfectly. There is no room for other people, other ideas, anything that distinguishes you from me is suspect to the point of making everyone but me a legitimate target and subject to summary execution.
Yes, we have problems in our nation. History teaches us that we consistently manage to come to compromise solutions and move forward. The biggest problem is that there is always a minority that cannot accept the compromise.
I would hope that the upcoming election would focus on making decisions that will resolve many of our deep-seated problems and bring us closer together. Unfortunately, the way the campaigns are shaping up, the goal is to make the divisions wider.
I'm sure that we will eventually be drawn back together but it will have to wait for something so catastrophic that I really don't want to live through it.
3
As an agnostic, and liberal Democrat, I just emailed Senator Jeff Flake, whom I admire for his honest words about Trump and the state of politics today. I urged him to put action to his words in his final months in the Senate, and either pledge to vote with the Democrats, or better yet, change his affiliation to the Democratic party. That act would certify him as even more of a maverick than John McCain.
4
A leader is someone who has a vision and works to encourage others to embrace change. John McCain was a leader in campaign finance reform and immigration reform. He showed us how a public figure should have the courage of his own convictions. He could speak truth to power. As a country, we were fortunate to have his public service.
10
Dignity. That is a single word that sums up the life of John McCain. Agree with him or not he acted with dignity and he treated others with dignity.
Dignity is what the Republican Party sorely lacks. Dignity is what Trump has never had, nor ever will.
34
@jabarry
"Dignity is what Trump has never had nor ever will"... he have integrity, honesty, kindness, responsibility, courage, discipline or intelligence.
1
Let's face it: Republicans are the problem. Not their conservative politics necessarily. Their party. The domineering nature of their political infrastructure is the problem. What good is representative governance when politicians are demanded to follow party orthodoxy 90 percent of the time? There is no way Republican constituencies support 90 percent of Republican policy on everything. "Party over country" is the cliche. However, the truth is Republican representatives do not represent anything but the views of party leadership. They *misrepresent* their own voters not to mention the nation as a whole. You can't have a representative debate on policy issues when one party will only speak with a signal voice. Republicans have silenced the voice of the public and therefore the voice of America. That's why our greatness is in peril.
19
@Andy The Republican Party is selling what their voters want and if it seems not in their best interest, well, your spoon isn’t scraping the bottom of the barrel.
1
This is a man who though Sarah Palin would make a good president. Enough.
7
@HmmmNo hmmm. he didn't. Sarah was selected for him by the powers that be, they also vetted her in what has been caled a seriously flawed process. He had to work with what he was given. There are some great articles on this as well as a documentary, another movie and verious other sources. Why not look at them before you talk?
6
@lastcard jb
What you're saying is that McCain decided to be manipulated rather than stand strong as a political leader. No, he later confessed that he would rather have Joe, "Party of One" Lieberman as his VP. Lieberman backed by his CT health insurance contributors was responsible for diluting Obamacare.
Courage, yes; judgment, NO.
@lastcard jb
odd comment....McCain's rep was as a straight shooter and independent thinker.
he was also the republican nominee for potus.
he could've said, 'seriously!?' instead of debasing the ticket and foisting that incredibly inappropriate incompetent choice on the usa.
he didn't.
The Trump administration has revealed, stunningly and finally, that the GOP is the party of fraudulent ideas, corruption and hateful fantasies. That's it. That's all. And the crash is coming.
20
SECOND TRY
I voted for John McCain. I doubt that David Leonhardt did. So where does he get off appropriating McCain for his own political ends?
I did not vote for Trump, and I won't forgive Trump for his insults about McCain in the last election campaign.
But even harder to forgive has been the behavior of Leonhardt and the New York Times toward Trump since the election. Spare us the uplifting sermons about American ideals of pluralistic democracy when you have never accepted the outcome of America's last democratic election.
The Times' animus toward Trump distorts everything it writes about him and his policies. Leonhardt has charged that Trump is trying to destroy the West. OK, it wasn't pretty, but NATO needed a kick in the pants. Trump's confrontational tactics have done more to get the Europeans to take responsibility for their own defense than 20 years of diplomacy.
A deal to denuclearize the Korean peninsula is still only a glimmer. But it is closer than it has been in 50 years.
Our world trading system is being grossly abused by China -- even some of our allies. It's gamble, but Trump's hard line stands a chance of reinvigorating free trade.
It is infamous for Leonhardt to insinuate that Republicans condone racism. Which party plays the race card? As Mark Lilla noted, at campaign stops Clinton used to call out to "African-American, Latino, L.G.B.T. and women voters." Never the white working class. They didn't leave the Democratic party. It left them.
2
@Ian Maitland the agreement by NATO countries to expand their defense spending to 2% of GDP was agreed to when Obama was president. Trump had nothing at all to do with this agreement.
5
@Ian Maitland
I don't see the logic of your first paragraph. Why should it be necessary to vote for someone to use him as a positive example?
1
@Harvey Wachtel
I didn't say "necessary." It is SLY.
Leonhardt tried to appropriate the affection and respect the country holds for John McCain -- a man whose philosophy he despises -- to serve his own agenda. To do that, he cherrypicked McCain's positions on issues, gave short shrift to his philosophy, and he did all of that when McCain was unable to set the record straight.
McCain's senatorial excursions to the point of the spear to review troops under fire probably burned more jet fuel than all of Trump's gallivanting.
1
@Steve Bolger
It's not the "wasted" jet fuel that irks Americans about tRump's gallivanting. Rather it's his view of the presidency as a part-time gig (3 day weekends, 11 - 4 pm work day including "down time") and the shameless shovelling of taxpayers i.e. your money and my money, into the tRump-owned properties to accommodate him and his entourage.
1
I am also an admirer of McCain's final positions, and agree with the writer that the Republican party can learn from his approach. However, I am concerned that this article, as well as most of the NYT's reporting on McCain, glosses over or omits entirely McCain's role in the Keating 5 banking scandal that sent the nation into a savings and loan crisis where many Americans lost their savings and investments. The reason this should be included is that is another important example of how McCain admitted a flaw and learned from it. McCain's reaction to the Keating scandal represents a relevant teaching moment for Trump and the Republicans: McCain learned the hard way---and acknowledged---that corporate titans are not automatic angels; that "doing favors" for moneyed interests comes at the expense of fiduciary responsibility in national leaders. Please NYT---no need to "fake" the reporting on McCain at his death. He would not want you to not tell the truth about Keating and what cautionary tales he learned from it.
6
@Sierra
While I agree with you, are you suggesting that Trump can be taught? Putting this mobster in the same room reduces the rest of us to his level.
@Sierra Yup, true, he was cleared of any carges and basically scolded in the Keating 5 scandal.
@Brujos
I see your concern. If Trump can not be taught, hopefully his errors can at least be contrasted with a more decent individual. I am hoping that the Republicans who did support McCain can be enlightened.
However, I will be the first to concede that you are most likely right. Congress does not seem to learn from history.
We share the low opinion of Trump's morality.
"I’m well aware that McCain could be maddeningly inconsistent and flawed. He equivocated about the Confederate flag in 2000. He too often acquiesced to Mitch McConnell’s torching of Senate norms. For goodness sake, McCain decided Sarah Palin should be vice president. As he himself admitted, he should have done much more to fight Republican extremism."
All true. Still, at his core, John McCain was a true patriot...unlike the current president. And unlike the base that supports the current president. All Trump wants is power...for himself. The heck with the constitution. The heck with the rule of law. The heck with truth. The heck with United States of America.
McCain was wise to insist that Trump serve no part in his funeral. Trump would find a way to make it all about himself. Everything is about Trump...or it has no value. And the base has bought into and help create the cult of Trump.
One of the Trumpublican candidates for senate in Arizona, Kelli Ward, complained on Facebook that the announcement from McCain's family that he was stopping treatment was timed to interfere with her campaign. Seriously. How Trumpian of her.
Trump is a cancer on the brain of the United States. Here's hoping we do better than John McCain did with his cancer.
VOTE OUT ALL REPUBLICANS
23
@rumpleSS A true patriot does not equivocate about the battle flag of the rebellion, the flag of slavery for Africans. A true patriot can stand.
@Here we go
Reread the first sentence of the quote. I believe McCain was a true patriot, but with some deep flaws. Those flaws resulted in McCain not understanding the core of some issues and defending the wrong side. Most people are not all that logical. Most people do not seek the truth, but rather, seek to justify what they believe.
So yes, McCain blew it with the confederate flag. And McCain blew it with the tax cuts for billionaires. But McCain's biggest mistake was probably Sarah Palin. Those flaws were large and I'm glad McCain did not become president. Still, I regard McCain as a patriot.
23
Imagine that! A flawed politician who most of the time knew he was flawed, a conservative Republican who had friends like John Kerry and Ted Kennedy; A Senator who had life experience that set him far apart from the typical Senate mold of today and who seemed quite content to serve his country and his fellow citizens rather than gorge himself at the political trough; a senator who screwed up now and again and still tried to do the right thing most of the time.
McCain had his good and bad points, but he spared no words when he described today's Republican Party and its so-called leader. McCain's graceful, dignified exit shines a bright light on the state of his party---its flabbiness, its lack of fitness to govern, its self-centered-ness, and its unwillingness to see and correct the cultural, social, and economic mess that the current Republican administration and its thief-in-chief are responsible for.
26
John McCain was a patriot of great personal character. He was also a conservative. But he was not afraid to buck his own party when his conscience demanded it. A great example was in the aftermath of 9/11, when his Republican Party couldn’t get enough of waterboarding Muslims. His own personal five-year hell as a POW in Vietnam caused him to oppose torture, a position that left him often fighting alone against his party and a Republican White House.
McCain gets many kudos for his 2017 vote against the ACA. But nobody really knows why he did it, after originally voting against the ACA.
Could it have been that he was beginning to see the financial burden of fighting the cancer that would eventually take his life and felt sympathy for those who didn’t have his resources?
Or possibly that, out of principle, he couldn’t see repealing the ACA when his party had offered zero alternatives to it?
Or, could it be that after being belittled and bullied by Trump, a draft-dodging, narcissitic, small-minded despot who declared that McCain was no hero because he got captured, McCain simply decided that he didn’t serve our country and suffer through five years of broken bones and internal injuries to take crap from this petty toad?
McCain valued service, character and human decency. Even if he only voted against the ACA repeal due to his hatred of Trump because Trump stood for none of those values, that would only make McCain human. And an even greater hero to the rest of us.
11
Our greatness is in peril, but it isn't Trump who is threatening it. Have you been paying attention to the Chinese, in Africa, in the east? They have bypassed us in technology in just the past ten years, since Obama was elected. They are taking over Africa. They uncovered and killed off our spies. They hacked into the OPM data base and have ALL of the investigative records of millions of federal employees with security clearances. The government isn't saying much about that now because it's so damn damaging and embarrassing.
The Mexican border was a serious security problem before Obama's kids were enrolled in private school in Washington. That so-called opioid crisis is fueled by drugs from south of the border. They have declared war on the USA. And those incidents of contaminated food that make thousands sick and kill a few people. Where does that food come from?
And Russia, they aren't our enemy. They are pretend "enemies" to fool the ignorant public, and the boneheaded liberal media.
Brennan, an ex-official no longer an employee of the government, had his security clearance revoked because he was a security risk. Omarosa was fired because she was a security risk.
Wake up liberals. Trump isn't the problem. Quit the obsessive navel gazing.
@Aristotle Gluteus Maximus Wow, so I guess a foreign nation who interferes with our electoral sovereignty is not a danger to our county and therefore not an enemy. That is as long as they fraudulently get their man elected.
I don't think we are the one's who have to wake up.
4
@Aristotle Gluteus Maximus "That so-called opioid crisis is fueled by drugs from south of the border." No, it's fueled by your dear family practitioner and osteopathic "physicians" prescribing pain medications for people right in your community.
4
@JCX
No they aren't. They don't prescribe fentanyl for dental work or muscle pain. They don't mix fentanyl with illicit cocaine which is responsible for increasing numbers of overdose deaths.
It is hard to express my respect and admiration for Mr. McCain. I spent a year in Vietnam, while he spent more than five years in the Hanoi Hilton. He had a chance at release from that hell hole,, but in one of the greatest acts of courage of his time he turned it down in deference to other American prisoners. He might have been elected President had he not corrected a woman at a town hall meeting about her view on President Obama. (And I might have voted him had he not accepted Sarah Palin as his running mate.) While it is hard to express my respect and admiration for Mr. McCain, it is even harder to find another member of Congress who has his decency, righteousness and integrity. God speed, Sir.
11
What I wouldn’t give to see more of this flawed greatness in Congress. The lions are extinct, there are only jackals and jackasses now.
10
Greatness is not an innate characteristic of any person or nation. Greatness must be won and affirmed over and over. The greatness America achieved was crafted by forward-looking individuals who understood the flow of history. When Europeans first came to the New World, they found it sparsely populated by peoples who were easily pushed aside by the more advanced weapons of the New Westerners. A vast cornucopia lay before them. How much better if they could harvest that cornucopia with cheap labor? And there we have the original sins of the original settlers: theft of land and theft of bodies and labor, both involving great injustice that has not yet been expiated. Greatness is a relative term. Asia was a teeming hell-hole of despots, we were told. Europe was old, we learned, and despoiled. The spoils had been grasped by men of violence whose offspring preached their divine, sword-given, right to rule. In America, we learned, such iron-bound hierarchy did not exist, and the majority strove for justice. Now, not so much. Now, many whites behave just like their European forebears, insisting on some God-given right to rule. The GOP may actually have the courage of their convictions, but those are the convictions of bitter dead-enders wedded to philosophies of selfishness. They remind me of the game we played as children: “I’m the king of the castle. Get down you dirty rascal!”
6
What is far too often missing from articles on social, economic and political subjects is commentary, which incorporates human values, behavioral character, emotional maturity and/or psychological awareness/consciousness.
The reasons why John MaCain was a great person and we will miss him from our national discourse is not because of his beliefs about war in the Middle East, but because of his character, more often than not missing-in-action among his colleagues!
He wasn’t an ideologue, an immature child, a sociopath, a synchophant, or any number of other negative traits too often associated with our national life! He was a person tempered by hardship, open to other’s realities and sympathetic to those with whom he had policy disagreements.
He was, in short, an imperfect, but highly praiseworthy man; hardly like the character-truncated legislators for whom his poingnant messages about our country’s future now apply.
10
We can honor the man without honoring his party or his politics. That alone is remarkable and a testament to John McCain.
In this dark time of an American Caligula surrounded by partisan enablers who make pigs feeding at the trough look like paragons of formal dining etiquette, McCain was the incandescent illumination of political decency.
Like all men he had flaws, with the worst having names like Charles Keating, Sarah Palin, Lindsey Graham.
Defining moments -- a single act, remark, look, a gesture -- are the foundations of legacy, the final strokes of a life that will mean as much in the far future as it does now.
I won't forget the throng of Senators milling about the Senate Bill Clerk's desk on the chamber floor, each approaching the Clerk to declare their vote on the "skinny repeal" of Obamacare.
McCain enters unnoticed and is immediately intercepted by Sen Cornyn, the Majority Whip. A brief conversation ensues, ending when McCain's name is called and he strolls over to the Bill Clerk, leans in and says something, smiles and as he walks away he turns and signals thumbs down and defiantly hands Trump a searing defeat on his signature vendetta against Obama.
There's satisfaction knowing McCain hung on -- while his Republican colleagues dithered and colluded -- until the first Trump convictions.
Judge someone not by how far they go but how far they see. For a blind Republican Party, McCain was the one-eyed king.
13
McCain was a true patriot. His passing is a great loss to our Democracy. The Republican Party has moved out of the mainstream and into the cold. My take is that its wayward path that has unfolded has its genesis in the current Majority Leader of the House. Mitch McConnell - our Machiavellian champion - has taken up over 9 years to bring us gradually to this point in History. Trump is simply a sickening symptom of a greater wrong. Time to turn the Ship of State around. Vote. Flip the House and Senate, and reverse trends we see at the State and Local level. The filled septic tank is not just in Washington DC.
3
Those screaming "MAGA" loudest are those who vilified a true American hero who made America great.
2
We are probably overdoing it, as we always do when someone famous dies, in lionizing John McCain.
The basic truth is there, and it is enough for us to speak that truth about McCain. A flawed and inconsistent man, John McCain demonstrated the extraordinary difference in character between him and the self-absorbed, greedy and gratuitously cruel Donald Trump.
We Democrats should want a Republican Party to survive the nightmare of Trump, because the two-party system serves the nation well. It is vital, however, that not only must Trump be banished, so too should the venal enablers in the Senate like McConnell, Hatch, Graham, Porter, Rubio, Grassley and others.
Any politician for whom patriotism means only flag-waving politics is a phony who should not find a home in any party. John McCain, whether you liked him or not, was not a phony.
5
@sdw I'm not so sure I agree that our two-party, winner-take-all system has been serving America well, but I don't see any way to get to a parliamentary system that gives all constituencies a proportional voice and that encourages, no, requires, compromise. It looks like we're stuck with the steamroller-or-gridlock situation we have for the foreseeable future.
1
@sdw
We Democrats would do well to clean up our own act. 30-40% of independent-minded Americans have been left in the lurch. It's high time we citizens assert ourselves at the local and state levels via the Tenth Amendment. Deep blue California with its nation state-of-mind should not only declare its identity in traditional terms but as "California-Americans".
Perhaps someday an equally eloquent and fair obituary will be written for the Republican Party. It is gone. Replaced by the Trump Nationalist Tribe.
Today's feckless "leaders" will be forever haunted whenever they are asked "Where were you when Trump ran rampant?" We've given up asking that question when posed in the present tense. Justifiably so.
1
Sadly, our greatness is a thing of the past. It might seem unfair to some, but I really do blame the Republicans. They've been selling out this country and the American people for decades, just to get another tax break. Shame won't work. They just don't care anymore.
VOTE BLUE BY A BIG MARGIN!!A
3
Truly tragic that John McClain did not win over George Bush in 2000. It was his moment. We may have avoided the catastrophe of the Iraqi war and all the death and destruction that resulted. We may also have avoided the radicalization of the Republican Party. And most unfortunately he chose Sarah Palin, which ushered in the crazy clown car of the Republican Party. Welcome Donald Trump.
I only wish at the end he would have more clearly owned up to the criminality of the Republican Party and he would leave the party in protest. That would have been heroic.
7
The author states that "The absolutism and radicalism of today’s Republican Party is the biggest threat to the country that McCain served and loved." No, the lack of a spine is the greatest threat. The radicals are a minority in the party, but, like Trump, they get a disproportionate, uncensored share of voice because the neutered, spineless, unprincipled mainstream Republicans like McConnell and Ryan only care about winning. There is no one even close to a John McCain in the party.
9
I don't know what pleases me more, the fact that this great man only wanted great men at his funeral and requested Trump not appear, to which Trump huffed "I didn't wanna go anyhow.", or the fact that Trump's eulogy could have been that "have you no decency" moment we've all been waiting for. "I knew him when he was an ex-captured guy who might be able to help me win the presidency. And he ended up not helping but we won it anyway. Do we have an Electoral map laying around? The thing I liked about John was that he liked me. What can I tell you, everybody likes me. He stood for dignity, independence, intellect, courage and selflessness. Then I tipped that statue over and my supporters crawled out. Well I didn't think I'd be able to fill 5 minutes talking about..him, but I did better than I thought. Two for one drinks at the "Trump Hotel" in DC for all mourners. How about another hand for ..him. It's been a pleasure talking to you, but I'll be honest, you haven't been a rally for me." Trump couldn't shine ..his boots.
2
Today, the day after Sen. McCain's death, we are all in mourning together. It is a type of national wake. You can see the evidence on Twitter where an occasional joke is added to help people stop from crying and lighten the mood. Mc Cain lead a good life and we all our contemplating his legacy today and mourning the loss of this hero whether Democrat or Republican.
My condolences to the Senator's family and friends. He will be missed.
1
As a liberal social democrat I believe US government spending should be about 35-40% of GDP (and that's after significantly reducing American spending on defence). If that was the state of play, I would recognise the right of those on the conservative side of politics to suggest it should be 30-35% of GDP. That's the bounds of argument for "smaller government" and "lower taxes" I recognise as legitimate. Beyond that you're an extremist and an ideologue, a traitor and a misanthrope in my view.
That even someone as reasonable and generally sober as John McCain could not see the limits to "smaller government" or "free market" fetishism, says nothing good about the culture of the United States in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. Donald Trump would not be in the White House if there was more respect for the benefits of being a mixed economy in the US of A.
6
Who now will speak against the autocratic worshipping of Trump and his ilk? I sincerely hope that his passing will jolt some otherwise decent people into realizing their unwise bowing and cowering to Trump is a horrible idea and they are abandoning the virtues they once aspired to in their hearts and minds.
I'm afraid it will take the voters in November to jar the Republicans in Congress back to honoring basic decency. We are now far from anything that resembles those ideals. Trump's attacks on the Justice Department, war heroes, and our allies are of a treasonous nature to which Senator John McCain would play no part. He was a true American hero and patriot who was seriously concerned with the well-being of the nation he fought for and loved. May it not be in vain! Thank you sir!
5
A brave and honorable soldier during his captivity indeed and a maverick politician to boot (from taking a chance on putting S. Palin some cancer cells from the presidency to, with some more gravitas, “fighting for campaign-finance laws to reduce the influence of plutocrats” like him).
That said, in this century alone, Senator McCain’s legacy concerning America’s manifest destiny as a global power (“our greatness”) consists of him being among the chief promoters of the Iraq invasion, the Libyan regime-change, the Iranian nuclear incitement campaign (chanting “bomb, bomb, bomb” Iran) and a jingoist policy towards North Korea. As to superpowers’ relations, he was a relentless advocate of confronting Russia globally (not excluding military means) and encroaching on China in the South China Sea (military means on the table there too) – all in the name of freedom in our time. They don’t make them more Neocon than that (with the exception of Cheney, perhaps).
1
Under Obama greatness was expressed as a hope and a wish but now it is seen as a reality - and yes, thanks to Trump, the "Ugly American" has come back to live.
2
The strength of the reaction, both in the US and abroad, to the death of Sen. McCain is interesting. While his memory is rightly being honoured, it's hard not to think that something else is being mourned here: namely, the demise of an ideal.
However rebarbative and egregious he may be, Donald Trump is not the cause but a symptom of a deeper malaise, and one which long predates his presidency. The response to Sen. McCain's death somehow feels like an outpouring of grief for ourselves too: for our societies, and for a time past in which we could believe - or at least hope - that such values as honour, dignity, civility, integrity, political bipartisanship and selflessness in public life still obtained.
Whether that was ever truly the case can be argued; the point is that many of us firmly believed that such things mattered, and that our lawmakers could and should be measured against those standards. Politics in the age of President Trump feel very different; and it is a moot point whether those older, more civilised ideals can ever be restored to our public discourse. Perhaps, in part, we grieve for this too.
18
It may be easy to assume that McCain's ultimate vote supporting Obamacare was born out of spite. However, at the time he was dealing with the medical issues and procedures that turn us into "a patient." Conservatives, who advise shopping around for low price treatments (from the ambulance?) must have never been in that position. His excelent health insurance from the Senate, and his considerable wealth, did not blind him to the need of comprehensible health insurance. For the American people.
7
Very well put. Politically McCain was a mixed bag but at bottom he adhered to basic standards of decency, civility and patriotism and overcame an ordeal that most of us would never wish to experience. How unlike the cowardice, immorality and corruption that characterizes the Trump administration and is endorsed by the Republican party to its eternal shame.
De Gaulle famously said he had "A certain idea of France" the same certain idea of America almost certainly animated McCain's life and career.
20
@John, his finest moments were his lectures to voters who dehumanized other people.
“McCain believed in the American ideals of pluralistic democracy.”
It’s a depressing thought that we now look towards the judiciary to confirm or enforce principles of fairness that should be the purview of Congress, which has abdicated any interest or accountability to engage in any actions that benefit the country instead of validating their party ideology.
Many of our representatives are disconnected from their “base” in favor of appeasing the president’s “base” for fear of retribution. Their focus is job preservation, not constituent representation. The institutionalization of a professional political class is inherently at odds with pluralistic democracy, as the latter is predicated on representing public interests while the former values personal interests.
Unless or until this changes true representative democracy is impossible, and political polarization will destroy any incentive to “reach across the aisle” to create policies for the common good rather than special interests.
9
The reason for the lauding of Senator McCain now that he has passed is a wistfulness for a Republican/Conservative--ANY Republican/Conservative--who might actually, if only occasionally, put the interests of the country and the many people in it above those of a tiny group of politician buying oligarchs.
McCain was able to do that--again, only occasionally. But the rest of the party is unable to do that at all.
Ironically, part of the reason Trump won is his rhetoric bamboozled significant sections of the population into believing HE could be that type of Republican ("drug companies are getting away with murder", "I'll give you health care that will be better and cheaper", etc.) Of course, those of us familiar with his bluster were not fooled; we knew that while he criticized elites, he believes he should be running the clubhouse, and that, moreover, he only said such things to win--and winning is the only thing he wants, along with anyone he dislikes losing.
The contrast between McCain and other Republicans was not THAT wide. But in a Trumpian atmosphere, it looks like a chasm.
7
"Our Greatness Is in Peril"
It surely is, particularly when you lose a Patriot like John McCain. He's up there now debating vigorously with Ted Kennedy, his opponent and dear friend.
And both are looking down on us to see where we as a Nation want to head. Forward with greatness or spiraling down into the whirlpool of peril and doom.
We voters have a defining moment ahead of us this November, and I hope we make the right choices, if not.....spiraling down.
9
The only time I flirted with voting Republican was when I heard the story, Trump would later mock, of a POW, with an influential father, who would not leave before the other prisoners were released. Now, keep in mind, nobody knows whether that's gonna be two years or twenty, and John McCain says I'll stay with the others, and he suffered everyday because of that decision. I know I'm preaching to the choir, you all know the story, but maybe there's someone out there who doesn't know how John McCain earned the epitaph, hero. He did it the old fashioned way, he earned it. Before you latch onto one or two things in his life that drove you crazy, take the time to reflect that he was forged by a fire most of us could not withstand.
10
As a Tibetan Buddhist, I have to remind and inform the non Buddhist world that when such a man passes from living to the next life, it is a transition that is not like turning off a light bulb.
There is no immediacy in death as their is in birth. It takes nine months about 270 days to begin awakening but in death, it is more like forty or forty-five days of a journey to somewhere else.
And only the Tibetans have operating instructions, provided in the Tibetan Book of the Dead.
I have been crying for John McCain for so many reasons.
Firstly, as a child who grew up during the Vietnam War, whose every boyfriend, boy classmate, and future boyfriend was drafted, enrolled, and pushed into combat voluntarily or not, Vietnam is a thing that is still healing within me.
Everyone who lived during the Vietnam War in America experienced the Vietnam War. We were with the soldiers in the fields, dying, perishing, languishing, agonizing.
John McCain is one of the few Americans who brought total illumination on the whole war, to make our nightmares tolerable, to make our war pain disappear.
The Vietnam War changed American consciousness forever. John McCain put strength into that consciousness.
"March or Die, March or Die"
You won't have to march anymore Mr. McCain, death is just a phase. We will dearly miss him.
3
With very few exceptions like Senators McCain,
The GOP found the smallest among them to sit in the highest office in the nation, and took the low road to gain that highest office.
14
If the Republican party is to remake itself out of the ash heap Trump has made of them, they will need to figure out a way to distance themselves from the media marketers of hate and fear that have fueled the party’s recent electoral success. Fox, Rush, Alex and the like, are media personalities educated and expert in nothing, but skilled at motivating a conglomeration of groups susceptible to hate and fear messaging. It will take courage and commitment to democratic principles, which has been absent from recent Repubican leadership, to reject this ready made and motivated mob of hate and fear and return to statesmanship that characterized McCain’s career. I did not always agree with Senator McCain, but there was no way one could not respect him if one valued our democratic processes. I have little hope that any of the present leadership of the Republican party are capable of saving it from Trump—they have recently proven to be gutless and without moral and ethical principles.
4
Like all, Senator McCain was a flawed person in any number of ways as the op-ed cites. But as we mourn his recent passing as we should, we must remember he has provided us with an equal number of valuable caveats - get 'big' money influence out of politics; compromise for the good of all is not a sin; racism is still a stain on the American soul and we need to constantly work on eradicating it; and this experiment in democracy is still quite fragile and needs our constant focus lest we fall victim to our own innate prejudices and political camps.
Yes, I too fear the loss of his now silenced Senate voice and moral compass. Who is going to fill that void, not only in Arizona, but for the entire nation? Departing Senators and Representatives, few of whom have found some modest spine, are clearly not a solution. Indeed, we are a nation in peril on many levels, and a scan of the current political landscape to the horizon does not give me any comfort.
And if one doubts his parting message, just reflect on one of his dying wishes - that the current POTUS NOT attend his funeral. That in and of itself should be a deafening warning.
8
The reason Mr. McCain turned out to be a distingushed Senator is primarily because he knew the difference between right and wrong and he didn't let his personal interests to interfere with that awareness.
It is sad that I can't think of another Republican Senator like him, with the exception of Senator Flake who is leaving the Senate.
Trump has infected the GOP with a virus for which the only vaccine seems to be a vote for Democrats in November 2018.
3
David Leonhardt gives his views of the greatness of John McCain.
I didn't share John's politics but i did admire one great aspect of his philosophy: he didn't believe in vengeance. His greatest action, to me, was when he went to Hanoi (with Kerry, I believe) to promote RECONCILIATION.
And his position was accepted by the nation even as our service people had suffered so dreadfully in our war with the Vietcong. I realize that by that time, the nation had found that war not a glorious one, but McCain had suffered great pain , yet was willing to find friends in our previous enemies.
What a contrast with the almost seventy years of enmity to the Cubans, who have not committed atrocities to our citizens and whose main sin is to have a different political system to ours.
We need more McCains!
2
No doubt, Mr. Mcain's perceived life and his "actual" life do not entirely align...Nevertheless, it is safe to say that he was a person who tried (and failed) to live up to a set of principles, "Duty, Honor, Country". He publicly lived these principles, defending Barack Obama to an early MAGA supporter who claimed that he was a "muslim" (assumed to be a bad thing); along with the infamous "thumbs down", followed by "we are getting nothing done, my friends".
There is not a shred of duty and honor in Donald Trump. It is not difficult to account for the absurd actions of one person, but it is perplexing to account for the actions of apparently 90% of the Republican Party. What are they thinking?
Hopefully, when we look back on this time, when Mr. Trump is in the ash heap and Mr. McCain is in the pantheon, we will recognize the qualities that made our flawed country what it has been and what, hopefully, those qualities that will prevent it from becoming what it was designed not to be...
1
In all this greatness ,it's regrettable he did not step down and live out the last year in peace.the senate would have benefited greatly with a working representative instead of one being terminally ill. Outstandingly resentful of having lost the Presidential election he continually flaunted one who could win,by playing the hardball tactics he never used.Voting no because of personal prejudice against the President he brought great damage to the GOP agenda. Yet nearly a Republican in name only Mc Cain tragically pushed and shoved to invade Iraq and Libya each ending in catastrophic results lasting well into the future.Democrats followed him more than anything ,in his and their wars and in his conflict against his own party.
1
McCain was long my favorite pol, mostly because of his moderation and honesty relative to other pols. He could admit his faults and biases and stand by principles to his own detriment. His patriotism, ability to cross the aisle or effectively do battle in his own party was almost unparalleled. I thought that he had grown petulant and almost vengeful, as many other pols have. Maybe it is unavoidable after so many years.
I have avoided watching the lionization of him by those who cut at him during his life. They love him now - or at least praise him gingerly - b/c they don't have to deal with him anymore. It's safe when the deceased cannot use your words of praise in a campaign anymore. It is like the outcry of sympathy and admiration for a hated candidate who cedes the contest. During his life, Ds loved him - when he voted with them - and detested him when, as usual, he did not. Rs were as fickle. He was the RINO when he was too moderate for them - i.e., voted against him.
But, he also bought into the system. He could have been president running as an independent in 2000 or 2008. Both the Rs and the Ds would have hated him more but, perhaps there was still a plurality of moderate/independents who'd have voted for someone dedicated to ending the D/R oligopoly. His hero, TR, tried and failed. Perhaps McCain would have too. The limits on individuals giving to a candidate which he supported can prevent independents from being well funded.
I grow weary of the adulation of McCain. I have yet to hear, from the Times or any mainstream media, of how McCain is really the one who brought us to the "reality TV show Presidency." He betrayed all his principles for power in the '08 campaign. He was almost entirely complicit at Republican obstructionism when Obama was president. Yet all we hear is how wonderful this man was. The irony? Well, The Times, which consistently bemoans Trump has McCain to thank for him!
1
McCain was a great man. I disagreed with some of his ideas (Sarah Palin???) but he gave of himself relentlessly for our welfare and freedom. He was a hero. Rest in peace.
10
One of McCain's greatest acts in life was one that occurred 10,000 miles from American shores. He refused early release as a POW in North Vietnam when it was offered to him; instead, he stayed there with the other captives until the bitter end, enduring torture, isolation and very poor health care.
I have often wondered if I would have been able to make the same choice, particularly as he was, a young man with a life to anticipate ahead of him. We all like to think we could be heroes, that we could look potential death in the eye and make the decision to stay with others or to take maximum risks, but we never really know until we are faced with such a choice. Thankfully, most of us don't get the opportunity he had in the darkness of a prison cell.
McCain knew what it was like to have that choice and to make the right decision. For Trump to have implied that McCain was not a hero should have disgusted every citizen from coast to coast, one of his most dastardly acts filled with others almost daily.
For myself, I would never arrogate a belief that I would have made the choice McCain made. We weren't there. I might have tried to convince myself it was more important to go than stay.
McCain did not fit in the Republican party, circa 2018, a party of brutality and ultimate nihilism that screams with joy as Trump savages decency, consideration and a sense of cooperative national identity, factors that hold us together as a nation instead of just individuals out for ourselves.
7
Realizing the important difference between being a right-wing Trump sycophant and a principled conservative, John McCain understood that character matters. Sadly, many of my fellow Republicans have forgotten this important, first principle.
3
The foreign policy of Senator McCain is often too hawkish to have my support. However, I admire him for his firm stand on torture and on opposing autocrats and dictators world wide. It is sad how far GOP and America have fallen. Trump has all the instinct of an autocrats challenging all the democrats institutions constraining him while legitimizing all the dictators abroad. Trump, an arm chair warrior, even thinks that torture is ok. We will miss Senator McCain's voice in the senator.
10
The only decent Republican in recent memory to have a soul. He made big mistakes (Pallin) but recovered through honesty and courage against a clear and present danger.
This American is worthy of the highest respect and honour his country can give him.
10
We can honor John McCain without honoring his party or politics. That alone is remarkable and a testament to him.
In this dark time of an American Caligula and partisan enablers who make pigs feeding at the trough look like paragons of dining etiquette, McCain was an incandescent illumination of political decency.
Like all men he had flaws, with names like Charles Keating, Sarah Palin, Lindsey Graham.
Defining moments -- a single act, a gesture, a remark, a look -- are the foundations of legacy, the final strokes of a portrait that will mean as much in the far future as it does now.
I won't forget the throng of Senators milling about the Bill Clerk's desk on the chamber floor, each approaching to declare their vote on the "skinny repeal" of Obamacare.
McCain enters and is immediately intercepted by Sen. Cornyn, the Majority Whip. A brief conversation ensues, ending when McCain's name is called and he strolls over to the Bill Clerk, leans in and says something, smiles and as he walks away he turns and gestures thumbs down and defiantly hands Trump a searing defeat on his signature vendetta against Obama.
There's satisfaction knowing McCain hung on until the first Trump convictions.
There's a Chinese saying, Judge the young by how far they go; judge the old by how far they see.
When it counted, McCain saw right through Trump to the fate of the nation and signaled thumbs down.
In his memory we should all do the same.
192
@Yuri Asian - How would you describe the flaw that prompted McCain to support the theft of a Supreme Court seat?
Democrats always like the last generation's Republicans. Perhaps they should look ahead. Someday they will be saying, that Trump, he wasn't really so bad after all.
9
@Mike Livingston
Actually, Trump has ranked steadily within the 10 worst Republican presidents in US history. Overall, he's in the running for dead last. Everyone knows Trump is terrible. We know this in real time. The only question is why won't Republican lawmakers grow a spine.
5
@Mike Livingston
Right.
Jesse Helms. Tom DeLay. Newt Gingrich. Phil Gramm. Jim DeMint. Dennis Hastert. Etc.
Democrats just love those guys.
4
Mike,
A day in the future where Trump is generally approved and "not so bad" could only exist in a distopian and cruel realm in which the EAGLE is emaciated and dying on it's perch, with the Constitution lining it's cage.
David,
Senator McCain never believed that we were great. That’s a sign of weakness.
It implies that we are insecure and have a compulsive need to compare to the others and feel somehow bigger and better than them. The truly great people only compete with themselves and try to be the best they can.
Their reward is to wake up every morning and be proud of what they did with their lives.
Such a strength comes from the right system of values, not from the wrongful notion of personal greatness and superiority toward the rest of globe…
By the way, do you happen to know anybody else in the politics who believes to be the greatest and that the entire world economy would collapse without him?
1
I wish that the military, active and veteran, could come together in a parade / march / gathering in honor and memory of McCain, to give him a variation of the military parade that is eluding Trump. No hardware, just people. And, though I have no personal close military connection and certainly not a Republican, I would stand in solidarity at that time.
8
Compromise and sacrifice says it all. Without those qualities we are no longer better as a whole.
11
Just like our sun, billions of stars in the heavens burn the hydrogen they contain, releasing the light we see as they fuse the hydrogen into helium, starting the cascade to elements higher in the periodic table.
But the stars we remember are those which burn ever so much brighter in the brief time they become supernovas just before their deaths. With their cataclysmic explosions they hurl all the materials they created throughout the universe where it is recycled into, well, everything.
As Neil DeGrasse Tyson tells us, we are all stardust.
In John McCain's final months, he spread his message of American greatness and resilience widely and highlighted our widening chasm between what we can become and where we are going.
He was clearly a star and in many ways a supernova at the end of his days.
While we shall miss his voice, he will still be with us just as the heaviest elements in the firmament came to be on our small blue planet.
13
David Leonhardt, our greatness is in peril but so is our democracy.
Rather than provide Republicans a way out by following McCain principles of multiparty legislating; humility; ,and adherence to the constitution, why not
focus on what McCain could have done had he not left us:
Respond to more of Trump's exaggerations and lies
Offer solutions for political cowardice and call others out when they see it
Recognize that Trump's crusade against immigration is as economically self defeating as many of his other policies
Remind the country every day by word and deed that America has jug re e goes
its greatest guiding principles currently hijacked for the protection of Donald Trump.
Trump is no ordinary president and McCain was no ordinary Senator.
Without his voice , we all should read more, think more and do more to right our listing ship of state.
11
A great man. A real American and a great American.
5
A very good tribute , and one that makes me rethink my feelings towards McCain, until I read this :
"And even if you disagreed with McCain on as many issues as I did, imagine if the Republican Party ultimately came to resemble him more than Trump."
It was then I realized , that though all you wrote above it is true and makes laudable McCains career, it was was his final decade, of bitterness and self absorption that will forever define it for me; because by choosing Palin , and again recently reaffirming that choice , that I realize that the trump party is the logical conclusion from Palin. The Republican Party, McCains Republican Party , is of a kind with trumps. They are one and the same.
18
David,
Welcome back. Excellent article on a great American who I also disagreed with on a regular basis. It will take a monumental loss by Republicans to “reinvent” themselves and then it will probably be a ruse.
19
'With whom I also disagreed with' is better. Unfortunately, our written language has been rapidly deteriorating in the USA these last several years. What is taught in our schools???
2
@barefoot, gun control, LBGT, and other points of the left agenda.
“He was willing to accept defeat when his side lost a political battle.”
Advice Democrats should heed but do not, and proof that it is easier to give advice than to take it.
6
@Ed, There's nothing more intellectually insulting than living in a radically malapportioned nation of lies, having one's nose constantly rubbed in one's disenfranchisement. Nobody is more obnoxious to me than exploiters of all the unfairness rooted in slavery that is the essence of US politics.
1
Like Republicans did for eight years, right? So gracious (as a feral cat!).
1
@Ed
America is still waiting for Mitch McConnell to accept Obama's 2 terms as POTUS.
2
John McCain not only admitted his mistakes, he learned from them.
He would be a good role model for Congressional Republicans to follow.
23
John McCain deserved respect. He earned it in no small part because he gave respect where it was due. Contrast that with a President who dials back a message from his aides which would have praised McCain in favor of the off-the-shelf "our hearts and prayers." I have never been a Republican, nor a conservative, but I could respect McCain and it not only baffles but also troubles me that 46% of the public seems in favor of someone like Trump who offers so little respect to anyone but himself and a couple of despots.
58
@Jerry MeadowsThe 46% scare me because they seem to be willing to accept a dictator without question. This gives very little room, 5%, to hold on to our Democracy.
John McCain was a Republican. But he was also exemplar of a type of legislator we see disappearing in Washington: one who understood that regardless of how strongly he held his political beliefs, millions of Americans nevertheless disagreed with him. David seeks to use that quality to demonize only one side by its increasingly notable absence, when BOTH sides are equally guilty and Democrats are every bit as clueless about how to make our politics work again as Republicans are.
You’re simply not going to get Medicare for all, endless taxes, stifling and excessive regulation that throttles commerce, free post-secondary education, universal Pre-K and a European welfare state that they could just barely afford while we paid to defend them. If you accept that for a moment, then the obvious political questions are “IF I can’t get all that, what CAN I get?”, “How can I productively dicker with my opponents to get SOMETHING I wish?” and “What messages are needed to attract the votes needed to empower OUR champions?”
Instead, this column simply attacks adversaries you’ve repeatedly failed to rout, blaming conservatives for not being liberals. Try accepting that this is not going to happen – ever – and start looking for political qualities in your leaders that allow incremental but steady change.
Instead of Nancy Pelosi, Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, look for more Joe Liebermans and Ted Kennedys. We’ll tend to looking for more John McCains.
17
We had a politician that governed our nation in a steady, incremental way. His name is Barack Obama. He brought us out of the worst economic event since the Great Depression. His nominee for the Supreme Court was revered by Republicans. His healthcare plan came from the Heritage Foundation. Instead of trying to work with this very reasonable man to better this country, Republicans spent their time trying to get the American people to believe conspiracy theories about his birth place, and religion, among other things.
20
@Richard Luettgen
You know, I'm not really looking for a rout of all republican ideas. I will gladly settle for a compromise after a free exchange of ideas, something the republican side has pointedly refused. The reality is the majority of the population is struggling financially and would benefit from a government able to act in response to their needs. I don't see that happening from republicans. At least since Nixon's southern strategy on, I see a party that uses wedge issues to divide working class people, throw them a few sops on church and patriotism, then rule in a brutal, winner take all manner that benefits the wealthy and leaves everyone else out in the cold. You've gotten what you deserve with trump (we all have, really), who I hope will finally lay bare the vicious venality of the current republican ethos. So give me Pelosi, Sanders, Warren, Ocasio-Cortez et al. They will give voice to the ideas that need to be heard for our country to right itself. Those ideas can then be debated and moderated if we can get back to a politics based on RESPECT for all sides, rather than the win at all costs and trampling of long held norms that we have been living through for decades now. The blame for which I can't help but lay at republican's doorstep. (Thanks Newt Gingrich!(and all the rest))
5
@Richard Luettgen Joe Lieberman was a spineless turncoat. And no, I will never stop fighting for, voting for, and believing in all of the things you've listed because I know they're the right policies for our country. We alreday have high taxes, we just spend them on mostly the wrong things, while the rich pay less and get more (incidently, why do republicans think that's a great idea?). And as usual, describing necessary rules and regulations to keep businesses honest as "stifling" is just nonsense. The Age of Enlightenment did, in fact, happen, so your 'Law of the Jungle' is considered cruel and uncivilized to most of us. Get over it, and please try to stop misrepresenting what we stand for, Straw Man is an old, tired trick.
3
Amen. The Trump Republicans are our greatest peril. Senator McCain, however, was loyal to our values and our aspirations. He compromised and negotiated. He modified his positions. He made mistakes. He humbly accepted failure. In short, he showed us how to carry out the hard work of keeping this democracy. This was true whether or not one agreed with his positions. Mostly I did not. McCain was in broad terms the antithesis of a Trump Republican. Accordingly, his "final message for his country was a warning: Our greatness is in peril."
34
@Robert
And yet we have McCain to thank for the path to Trump--Remember the whole Pallin thing? I really don't get the collect amnesia about this!
1
@Bret
Thanks for your reply. I don't disagree. Palin was a mistake. A great big one. She wasn't the first such great big Republican mistake. Quayle was just as bad, and he was elected. Does he get a pass because of his gender?
I admired McCain for his military record and the way he could fight as a maverick. However, I find all this RIP hagiography tiring: he made the right sounds, but the bottom line is that he more or less went along with the nasty way that the GOP has developed for 45 years. It wasn't good enough.
73
I didn't see any signs whatsoever that McCain stood up against the theocratic judicial appointees hand-picked by the Federalist Society to expand "state's rights" and unequally protective laws.
4
If you actually look at his record, he was a run-of-the-mill republican.
I find it hard to hold up any person who supported the GOP Tax Scam that is soon to be felt in our economy as as serious person concerned with the interests of the United States regardless of claimed ideology. That multi trillion Dollar gift to the wealthiest individuals and huge corporations is Trumpism in it’s purest form: it will enrich those already holding great wealth at the expense of everyone else.
Mark my words: unless the GOP Tax Scam is repealed, it will be used as a cudgel to eviscerate Social Security, Medicare and other programs that benefit the American people broadly. In the end it will hurt countless tens of millions of our fellow Americans while enriching those at the very top. No person who truly put country first would do such a thing.
I understand the Beltway media class and their cousins in New York were enraptured with Senator McCain, but history will not treat him kindly. He was mostly a doctrinaire NeoCon with good PR.
85
@David Gregory
Thank you! And let us also not forget how complicit he was to Republican obstructionism throughout Obama's presidency and how he paved the way for somebody like Trump by bringing Palin to the spotlight.
3
In today's environment, where heroism is defined more palpably than it traditionally has been, and flaws can be tolerated, John McCain without question is a true, and even a great, American hero.
McCain certainly has exhibited inconsistencies; his acceptance of Sarah Palin as his shrill sham of a running mate against his better judgment arguably being his gravest, his vote for the 2017 Tax Cut disaster being another, his strongest consistency has been to stand on principle and put country squarely before party. His was a proud example for all Americans to look to at a time of unprecedented partisan priority over our country's interests.
By these standards, Mitch McConnell certainly does not qualify as an American hero, nor does Paul Ryan. Some noteworthy leaders credibly have labeled Donald Trump as a traitor; while this may be argued, it nevertheless is an eminently plausible charge. McCain, on the other hand, while unquestionably faithful to his conservative underpinnings, managed to find common ground with liberal principles when he found it was in his country's best interest to do so. Unlike McConnell and Ryan, McCain's life of service to his country's people stands as an example to be admired and emulated, while Trump's is one to be avoided at any cost.
Whether liberal, moderate, or conservative; Democrat, Independent, or Republican, every American has compelling reason to stand tall and proud for the lessons John McCain has taught us and the legacy he has left us.
27
@Peter G Brabeck
I think the "lessons" are exaggerated. McCain was pretty darn partisan in his last years. And if he ever wasn't, he traded those principles for power when he gave Palin the nod. People forget how big of a deal that was. And the REALITY is that simple nod to Palin paved the way for somebody like Trump. The GOP realized how powerful demagoguery is, how mesmerized their supporters would be by such a person, no matter how dumb. McCain continued down that path, supporting Republican obstructionism while Obama was president and letting his neocon heart show chanting "bomb bomb bomb Iran" to a beach boys tune. This was not an exemplar, and that the fact we call him one is really just another ironic and said tale of the fate of American politics.
1
Yes, Mr. McCain’s “life of service to his country”, indeed. He gave more to this country in five minutes than the lily-livered, yellow, coward imposter squatting in the Oval Office can ever hope to accomplish in whatever time he has left in office. I can just see The Great Imposter now, surrounded by greasy cheeseburger wrappers, jumping up and down, screaming “I won! I won!” at the news of McCain’s passing. And without further ado, goes off to play his 12,568th round of golf since he bumbled into office more than 18 months ago. SAD!
2
Mr. Leonhardt, I must ask. why would the Republicans have the slightest interest in compromising with Democrats? McCain didn't believe in universal healthcare. He worked mightily to destroy the ACA. Americans have shown they want a one party, right wing government. Until they vote otherwise, we are a one party country and that party is hard right.
McCain may have been more civil about destroying progressivism but he sure was a willing soldier.
17
@goofnoff I disagree we are a one party rules system. Republicans have lost the popular vote in the previous two Republican wins. And the majority of Americans don't vote. Partly because the rules have been stacked against them. Americans don't "vote" Republican. They don't vote. And at least some of those that don't vote have been underhandedly prevented from doing so. If every eligible voter in America who could vote, did vote, Republicans would never have the majority. Republicans go to the fight at the OK corral with a fully loaded pistol. They snuck into their opponents house and removed the bullets from their gun and then they stand up and call it a fair fight. There is absolutely nothing that would invoke more fear in Republicans than to go to their polling place and see lots of disenfranchised voters show up to cast their ballots. In short, Republicans biggest fear is a functioning democracy. Democrats should spend their time making those fears a reality instead of running attack ads.
14
@Walking Man... great opinion, not much substance.
@goofnoff
" He worked mightily to destroy the ACA. " ????
Did you miss McCain's famous thumbs down vote in July of 2017 ? That vote saved the ACA.
My fervent hope is that McCain's passing will encourage McConnell, Ryan and other Republican leaders to take a look at what they have become. Trump vetoed a message honoring McCain's life and instead tweeted out a photo of himself without a single nice work about an icon of the Republican Party, or at lest the party it used to be. Republican leaders need to look at that petty, vindictive act and ask themselves if this is who they want to be, if this is what their Party stands for.
50
@Ken Get real, Ken. Republicans will not look at themselves. They have and will continue to sell their souls to stay in power. Winning is everything to them. Their hubris will be their undoing. And if they think they were ignored before, just wait and see. The majority will eventually find the way through the maze Republicans have created. What goes around, comes around works both ways. Republican's problem is they aren't subtle about what they are doing. The smart Republicans will be the ones who admit to themselves when payback comes around "We went too far and had this coming". Thinking that day will never come only makes it more likely it will.
3
@Ken
Unfortunately McConnell, Ryan and many other elected Republicans will never take a look at what they have become. That is because they do not care about anything other than slashing the social safety net & packing the federal courts with extreme conservative judges. They have sold their souls to the devil himself Donald Trump. I did not agree with most of McCain's
positions but at least he had a degree of integrity and
a backbone.
@Ken, Ryan and McConnell have already answered the question of what the GOP stands for by their actions. Sorry, no soul searching there. Just business as usual. Setting up their cushy retirements in business and industry by catering to their monied cronies. Nothing will change unless we vote them all out.
1
Those working to undermine democracy decided to start dismantling America's in our Supreme Court with the disastrous Citizens United decision. They won - and won big. Democracy cannot survive when the corrupting influence of money is present before one even takes office. The GOP is no longer conservative, and too often, Democrats also remain silent or immobile as their bread and butter depends on it. America's democracy is in serious jeopardy. Unless the money is removed from the political process, there will be no more McCains, and our democracy will not survive.
52
Thank you, David Leonhardt.
As a Democrat, becoming more of a social democrat as age brings a wider vision, I disagreed with Senator McCain on most issues.
He was a worthy opponent. We will not see his like in my lifetime.
I grieve for that.
47
It seems like the columnist had to struggle and grasp at whatever straws were available to stick to a positive view on Senator McCain.
McCain was against the Affordable Care Act all along and why he saved it in the end remains a mystery. Did he really care, or was it just a grand way of giving a big non-thumb digit gesture to Trump?
McCain's opposition to Trump only seemed to really surface after his diagnosis, just as Senators Corker and Flake have only criticized Trump seriously and publicly after they decided not to run for re-election.
It takes a heroic effort to put a positive spin on the state of the state, but that such heroism is needed at this moment tells us the state of things isn't very good at all.
41
@The Poet McTeagle McCain did not vote for Trump in 2016. I cannot think of another instance where a sitting Senator broke with his/her party on a presidential vote. He was a man of extraordinary mettle, which revealed itself vis a vis Trump long before his cancer diagnosis.
I think engineers call it the angle of repose; the angle at which debris comes to rest. And that is all that may change in November. A slight shift, a steadying, a buttressing of some desperate sort and then the building of something stronger can begin. But only that. We can't rebuild what was. That is gone. It failed. We failed. And it's pretty much a certainty that the worst is yet to come because there really isn't anything
in place but the machinery of things past which now is part of the debris.
What matters now are the next steps taken
on uncertain ground. My humble suggestion is that we start with language. That is, after all, what brought us to this unbelievable and dark moment.
25
In my opinion, there are three or four takeaways from this commentary and from various actions on the ground I have seen since 1981:
1) End the two party stranglehold, it does not make sense anymore. Is this not obvious, why not a multiparty system? or a parliamentary democracy? it can't be worse than what we have now...
2) Limit the Supreme Court judge (I deliberately use judge with a small j) to a limited one term, not more than 8 years. We need new blood, anyone with ability to see right from wrong can interpret the constitution. No explanation needed here.
3) Limit politicians serving in government, at the local, state and federal levels beyond two terms and no "upgrading" to a different branch. A politician can only go two level, i.e from local to state or from state to federal. No more, do your service for the people and go home and make room for others. We should legislate strict enforceable rules against lobbying and put it into law.
The revolving door adds insult to injury when politicians who hang on to office beyond their capabilities or usefulness, go outside and cause more harm.
4) Finally no one above 60 runs for political office. They never get to pay the bills for their financial profligacy.
19
@Gary Valan
"1) End the two party stranglehold, it does not make sense anymore. Is this not obvious, why not a multiparty system? or a parliamentary democracy? it can't be worse than what we have now..."
Oh yes, start voting for 3rd party candidates like Jill Stein, who dines with Putin. That'll put even more Republicans in office.
Unless there is proportional representation, there will not be any multi-party European like system in the U.S. Voting is not about your personal principles or views. (sounds incongruent but it's true.) Voting is about deciding who occupies the Oval Office, that Senate or House seat.
I'm mostly on the other side of the political divide from McCain, but he's the kind of person who you want in to have in public office. There are so few of them now of which that can be said in any state or any office. Unfortunately, there don't appear to be anyone in that category in Arizona today to take his place. Voters now seem to want the *least* qualified and dedicated people to represent them.
22
I'm from AZ. You are talking about the new trump republicans trying to take over. I'm hoping that these new republicans have gone a little too bonkers for AZ's tastes. Maybe the fact AZ has been republican for so long is that we've had traditional republicans like McCain in office that kinda shielded us from the nuttiness the party has been going on the last two decades, and especially since Trump opened Lemarchand's box. I'm glad these new republicans are putting "Trump candidate" on top of their campaign signs, or talking about "strong borders"; it makes it easy to know who not to vote for. I can for sure tell you that I'm nervous I'm not sure which direction or state is going in. There's plenty of people driving around my region with "Redneck and proud" or "fake news" stickers on their fossil fuel-supporting oversized pickup trucks. I know AZ has earned a bit of reputation of being a bit Yosemite Sam, but I never thought it'd go as far as having candidates as nutty as the Southern states.
1
It does seem as though today's Republican Party is the biggest threat to the stability of our democracy, but it's not just because of the reasons mentioned in this column.
We must all remember that the passage of Citizen's United has resulted in the huge increase in donations to Republican politicians by corporations, organizations and wealthy individuals. We are talking about many millions of dollars funneled into the campaign chests of most Republicans, with donors who expect something in return for their investment.
John McCain himself mentioned this disturbing phenomenon as the greatest threat to our democracy over a year ago. He was right!
66
@Elizabeth Bennett
Yes, yes, but everyone has forgotten that the rush to money, big, big money, began in August of 2011 when Obama announced out of the clear blue sky that he had an unheard of Billion Dollars available for the 2012 election campaign. The Republicans, of course, replied in kind.
@Elizabeth Bennett - do you realize that Democrats have raised more money than Republicans in the last several years. Citizens United has helped the left more than the right.
McCain was mostly above all else: selfless. He served and suffered in Vietnam while others saved themselves by avoiding service.
While there is much to disagree with respect to some of positions, he embraced the concept of a greater common good for the country and the value of a pluralistic democracy. May he Rest In Peace and lets hope we honor the best of his legacy.
34
@Ted A
So...you think his presidential run in '08 was "selfless"? It seems to me he sacrificed a lot (all of his principles) for power at that point...
1
While it's understandable to be sentimental and nostalgic for Republicans of who served before the Tea-party revolution (or before the Gingrich revolution for that matter), and to be complementary about them, I think that future generations will judge them by what they did in the face of their party's unraveling and its abject failure to address the central issues of their generation - inequality, alienation, climate change and a global drift toward autocracy.
Republicans lied about the ACA and lied about having better solutions. Health care costs are becoming an ever larger expense for Americans.
Republican tax breaks increase inequality.
Republicans have waged war on climate change science.
Republicans stood behind a know-nothing con-man with autocratic tendencies who demonizes the media.
So what did McCain do? He was no political leader. His influence was minimal even when he was their candidate for President. He gave us Sarah Palin, a poorer more telegenic version of Donald Trump. He stood with the tea-party against Obama.
He not only failed to take a courageous stand against Trump by endorsing Clinton , he helped give Trump his first big political win by voting for the tax package.
I recall reading how McCain and Clinton were good drinking buddies, and had regard for one another, but when it came to election time, McCain, along with many other Republicans stuck to their party. Their reputations deserve to suffer accordingly.
84
@DebbieR
Wrong - he tried and tried to limit campaign contributions.
Why denigrate a man who has just passed away? I doubt you lived during the Vietnam War. My generation did not have heroes from that War.
John McCain had integrity.
For a few days at least, Senator McCain is robbing trump of the spotlight he craves, and his life story - for all its human flaws - stands as a rebuke to trump so pointed that that people can't help but notice it.
In death, the Senator is getting the last laugh on his grubby adversary.
110
@mancuroc A small but still sweet victory.
RIP John McCain. May all the heartfelt tributes from around the world surrounding his passing give people everywhere a moment's pause to reflect upon the priceless value to society of good character in any individual which is something that can't be faked since it's revealed at any given moment by one's degree of courage, kindness to others, and refusal to compromise when it comes to defending and upholding honourable principles, in both word and deed.
24
@Leigh ΜcCain is being lionized because of who is in office now, because he could work across the aisle, and because of his impressive record as a POW.
But before asserting that the entire world mourns him, let's also remember that he never met a bombing campaign he didn't like.
"Tax cuts for the rich and nothing for everyone else". My heart reels for the one person in the ruling party who truly understood the paradox in this seemingly main focus of today's GOP.
15
@Jack- There were tax cuts for everyone. Are you not aware of that?
@Jack-
Worse than nothing, actually. “Everyone else” will be paying the bill; for generations.
2
Thank you for a beautiful eulogy to a great man, and for the warning that you in a most subtle way are given those in power and their supporters. I hope that none of us will look at your piece years from now and lament the failure to listen to your warning.
17
Trump represents all that McCain does not. Hatred and bigotry start the list. In the end we must find a reasonable person to lead our country and a group of Congress Representatives who really put country over self. We have a chance by using John McCain's character as a model for Senators and would be Presidents. Our time is now short and we must consider how our Congress and the next real President should look and act. Let's do it right in November.
39
Senator McCain had a great spirit. He was right about the central issues, and he had the courage to stand for them and speak out for them whether it was for immigration reform, and as you say, for a multiracial country, seen in his own family. He spoke against torture, knowing its horror in the deepest fibers of his own body. He was for campaign finance reform, recognizing the corruption that would follow its erosion. He may have equivocated about Confederate symbols, but he went back to re-address this issue with clarity. When he gave the thumb's down to the repeal of the ACA, he literally saved the healthcare of more than 20 million Americans.
This was a man with a great spirit, and probably the last great Republican. Trump is a little man, petty in his grievances, malicious in his vendettas. Even the fact that he tweets constantly shows how little and spiteful he can be.
One was a hero who suffered greatly on behalf of his country; the other is someone embroiled constantly in scandal and corruption, and who even more seriously compromises national security.
As McCain said, the president of the USA may indeed "be vulnerable to Russian extortion."
But where are any other Republicans who take a stand for America and its national security? Off to Moscow for the Fourth of July? Playing golf with Trump?
Senator McCain was a great man. He will be missed. With him passes a party that once had honor. No more.
57
@smb
No doubt Senator McCain knew what a few million of us outside the Beltway know. Trump owes Russian oligarchs a lot money: 250M past loan, documented by a reporter for New York Magazine; 95M recently delivered to The Trump Organization in FL via an unmarked plane. That adds up to 345M. Loans show up in tax records and bank deposits. We have not seen Trump's recent tax returns; we have not seen loans made to Trump/The Trump Organization by Russian oligarchs. We have not seen the records of Deutsche Bank. This is not fake news; this is a factual financial history. I believe Mueller will unearth these loans and deposits, if he is allowed to do his job. Trump gave the GOP permanent large tax cuts for billionaires; those tax cuts can cost the GOP the House. Trump lost the popular vote; he is not popular on any level outside a hard core cult base. We are not a third world Banana Republic; we are a first world leader of the free world with a President who is somehow in thrall to two-bit autocrats, a first for the WH.
1
One of my favorite John McCain quotes was when he referred to the press as "my base." He always seemed at ease bantering with reporters, and made himself available to journalists. Senator McCain appreciated the role of a free press in our democracy and never demonized the mainstream media as somehow being a political obstacle. He certainly never acted like it was beneath him to answer reporters' questions.
Boy, do we ever need leaders with more of McCain's relationship towards journalists.
73
@NM -- Senator McCain always put America first. While world leaders and Americans mourned his death over the weekend, the president went golfing rather than to show any sign of respect for the late Senator. His message of comfort to the McCain family without any reference to the Senator rings hollow. His pettiness during a time of national mourning shows his lack of character and his unfitness for his office.
1
John McCain saw the American government as a force for good and an institution to treat with reverence. Whatever one makes of McCain's complete legislative record, and all his campaigns, he was undoubtedly a responsible and respectable political leader.
44
David,
Your well-written eulogy to Senator McCain makes a strong case for Americans to turn-out this November and cast a vote for Democratic candidates.
I was struck with the extraordinary insight of this paragraph,
"The absolutism and radicalism of today’s Republican Party is the biggest threat to the country that McCain served and loved. It has left the United States impotent to deal with our greatest challenges — inequality, alienation, climate change and a global drift toward autocracy. Congress, as McCain said last year, is 'getting nothing done'."
I would expand on your thesis that "threats to American power and interests grow."
We have been wrong-headed to assume that building a strong military capability, only, would be sufficient to quell growing threats to our standard of living. The U.S. is missing a great opportunity to lead the World in developing technologies that will make it possible for the World to adapt to the huge socio-economic changes required to make the transition from fossil fuels to alternative energy sources. Clearly, this challenge must be met.
To his credit, Senator McCain recognized the threat to national security in global warming, but he did not insist that the Republican caucus allow our great Federal science and technology resources to give priority to this challenge.
Some of the older members of the Congress can remember when the US recognized the challenge and we obviously need to return the Congress to that political state.
25
John McCain was the Republican Party. Donald Trump IS the Republican party.
How the mighty have fallen.
That is the reality that the press and the Democrats need to make clear to the public. The people must grasp that a vote for a Republican, ANY Republican, is a vote for Donald Trump and every low thing that he is.
124
@tombo
John McCain IS the Republican Party. Remember Palin? Remember his support of the Tea Party? Remember his vote for the tax cut?
I just don't get it--what is going on with this collective amnesia about this man?
The threat is not the Republican Party, but the absence of rational discourse. It is not a group, but the absence of the willingness, and therefore, the capacity to craft solutions to vexing problems.
John McCain was a political practitioner - we need more of those in national office if we are make progress.
17
peterV,, no the GOP refused to even consult with Democrats on either health care legislation or tax reform. In stark contrast to Obama care in which Dems met with Repubs for over a year trying to fashion the ACA. Neither Boehner nor Ryan ever violated the Hastert rule which required the GOP only to move bills in which enough Republican members could provide the majority.
6
A comforting if inaccurate thought.
Yes, of course, the R party is the threat. There are many people in this country willing to engage in discourse and practice politics. They have no one to do either with now.
@peterV Good points, really. But it is easy to fall trap to the military industrial cesspoo's red scare of the day, l as McCain did in his belief in bombing innocent people to smithereens for the rubber, offshore oil resources and geopolitical real estate of SE Asia. Democracy for Viet Nam, as was wished by Ho Chi Minh, be damned. McCain was a willing pawn in the USA's drive to prevent Democracy in countries that American corporations wished to rule privately. He never completely recovered from his misguided trajectory as an idealistic young dupe of the military industrial cesspool, and his years of torture at the hands of the monsters who took over in the vacuum of the American War's failure to win hearts and minds through mass murder of the Vietnamese. Were Iraq or Afghanistan in a sub-tropical area, the stench of hypocrisy and death would be identical. John McCain suffered much and cared greatly and was not a bad guy, but he learned little from history.
The Republican party will be forced to re-organize even if Trump doesn't completely destroy it. Republicans who believe in free trade, environmental protections, law and order and politicians who don't lie to the people, will have to find a new party.
52
@Ronny That means their best chance is to vote Democrat. And that's not saying much.
90% of Republicans still support Trump. That just blows my mind. How could a party I once strongly disagreed with but respected and understood have come to this?
I hope McCain’s passing triggers a period of deep reflection among Republicans about the track which the party is on.
None of the traits for which McCain was lauded and universally respected (integrity, honesty, ethics, civility, decency, selflessness) would anyone attach to Trump.
Trump has destroyed the GOP, and Republicans will live to regret it.
194
@Andrew
Trump could not even mention McCain's name in his legislation. Trump insulted McCain who served in Vietnam, as opposed to a draft dodger who escaped that war with fake bone spurs. Too many Democrats stayed home; too many fell into Bernie's "purity" cult of the young. Politics has always been the art of the possible wherein the perfect is always the enemy of the good. FDR, Truman, Eisenhower knew this. George Marshall knew this as he took the job Eisenhower gave him. Bob Dole knew this. McCain knew this. We have seen the disgraceful performance in Helsinki; we watched a weak compromised President fawn over a murderous thug; we watched a U.S. President salute the No. Korean leader responsible for the torture and murder of U.S. prisoners. Caskets containing what? Real cremains scooped from the dirt in which they were originally buried? McCain and Kerry came together as veterans of the Vietnam war and did the right thing. McCain and Kerry gave President Clinton support in what he needed to do in No. Korea. Trump is not capable of that level of political purpose. He is a small narcissist who poses a real danger to his own country.
@Andrew The Republican party is just as responsible for destroying their party through silence and full agreement with his agenda.
1
@Andrew Where do you get your statistics? Maybe 90% of Trump supporters still support Trump. I doubt 90% of republicans support him...
Whether you agreed with McCain's politics or not, McCain recognized that Trump is a vulgar bigoted narcissist unfit for the office of President. He knew that country always comes before Party. That a majority of people who call themselves Republicans still support Trump is beyond rational comprehension. We can only hope that somewhere somehow they will more fully come to understand the honor and dignity of a real patriot and an honest Republican, John McCain
152
"Absolutism and radicalism" may apply to the Democratic Party as well as the Republican Party. When Bernie Sanders kneecapped Hillary Clinton over the central American immigration issue in 2016 he showed that he was just as willing as Donald Trump to throw his party under the bus. How did he think the American people would react to the storming of the border by untethered teens? Obviously, Bernie had other things on his mind.
Both parties need our permission to pursue their agendas. Neither party has that.
6
@caveman007 -- both Republicans and Democrats need to rethink. Do they want to be the mouth-piece of big business, or do they want to represent the voters. It seems that representing business is much, much more profitable. So, do not expect change. We are heading toward third-world-country status.
8
@caveman007
Bernie is an old style FDR Democrat who wants to reduce economic inequality by empowering labor and progressive taxation plus regulation of the financial sector. These things were a big part of the New Deal and gave us 70 years of prosperity. The GOP detested the New Deal and President Clinton joined them in trashing what was left of the New Deal. The "New Democrats" stopped being the Party of FDR. Bernie Sanders criticised Hillary Clinton for her actions re Honduras, which put a Right Wing Party in power that created a huge number of refugees. Bernie thought the interference in Honduras was wrong. The USA shouldn't be complicit in creating refugees then attack the refugees without punishing employers that depend on them for cheap labor. The GOP used to be for punishing employers of "illegal immigrants" until their donors, who employ them en masse, put an end to that. You should do research on the issue.
19
@caveman007: "When Bernie Sanders kneecapped Hillary Clinton over the central American immigration issue in 2016 he showed that he was just as willing as Donald Trump to throw his party under the bus."
Wrong. When Hillary won the nomination, Bernie got behind her and begged his followers to do the same. I can't imagine Trump doing likewise.
"Imagine how different our politics could be if even some Republicans — à la T.R. — occasionally took the side of the little guy against corporate behemoths."
Actually, that was the promise of Trump, and why he beat the the best of what the Republican Party had to offer. Granted, it wasn't hard to see through the promise to the grifter beneath, and indeed it was empty.
The sad thing is that so many of "the little guy" hallucinate that Trump actually *is* on their side.
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Mr. Leonhardt writes that "The absolutism and radicalism of today’s Republican Party is the biggest threat to the country that McCain served and loved. "
I would suggest, as a corollary proposition, that the greatest threat to our democracy is the increasingly unrepresentative nature of our elected officials. A majority of the Senate now represents only 18% of the population. Gerrymandering, voter suppression tactics, and even the Constitution's own provisions for representation in the Senate are permitting our country to be governed by a minority, mostly white and rural. That cannot end well. The Constitution is not likely to be amended, but we need courts that will do something about the other problems. The current Supreme Court has refused to do anything about political gerrymandering and has gutted the Voting Rights Act. We need a Democratic majority in the Senate to put the brakes on the nomination of conservative ideologues to the bench. The next step is to take back the White House in 2020.
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Mr.McCain was great because he was unpredictable.He would examine his conscience and take a principled approach to an issue.He did not parrot the party line which probably drove Republicans crazy but endeared him to the rest of us.Once McCain fought for an issue he was vociferous and effective.My favorite campaign of his was the McCain/Feingold campaign reform act.It demonstrated that he would work across the aisle to improve democracy for the American people.
41
Unpredictable can also describe unprincipled rats. McCain was predictably following his conscience, and that means trying to be just every day.
The best I can say about McCain is that he was one of the "least bad" Republicans. But it is disheartening to hear the carefully selected snippets of his bi-partisanship, while ignoring the many examples where he did not raise his voice to object to crass partisanship. One can point to the maneuvering to ensure Obama did not get a last Supreme Court pick. More recently, there was the recent tax cut that defied any semblance of fiscal conservatism, ensured that only the wealthy gained, and left the country with decades of debt. Perhaps a biographer can make sense of when McCain spoke or voted for the common good, but I see an erratic politician at best.
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@HN -- well, he was a lot better than the far left-wing Democrats who exclude regular working class Americans.
Of course I wish there were more John McCains in the GOP. But if I get to make that wish, I also get to pick McCain I am wishing for.
In my case it would be the John McCain prior to losing the nomination to Bush in 2000. After that defeat, the maverick side of McCain was hard to find.
Yes he lost gracefully and held himself to higher standards than most of his present day Republican members of Congress. But by the time of his passing, even he knew that it took no great effort to stand out in his party.
I will miss all versions of Senator McCain, but the one I admired most of all left us a long time ago.
43
He was the one Republican male who, with two females, saved the health insurance my son with Type 1 diabetes relies on for the insulin that keeps him alive. I don't know what motivated him to cast that brave vote. Maybe it was a protest against McConnell's trashing of "regular order," writing the Republican healthcare bill in closed-door sessions excluding all Senate Democrats and most Republican members. That's a good motivation in itself. But I would also like to think his own illness made him more compassionate for those millions who are not as fortunate as he and his family who also face life-threatening illness. Compassion is the character asset most threatened by Republicans in power today.
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@abigail49 -- yes, I agree that his own illness made him more compassionate. May his soul rest in peace.
Compassion is something that is now longer present in this country. We are vastly turning into a third world country with a thin upper and vast underclass.
MAGA? Start with a new president!
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@Don Juan
We have now reached a level of inequality not seen since the Gilded Age. Permanent tax cuts for the richest among us, passed in the middle of the night behind closed doors with no Democrats in attendance. Students exploited by big bank lenders, in debt for the rest of their lives. Trump in debt to Russian oligarchs as will be shown if Mueller gains access to his tax returns and the records of Deutsche Bank. Affordable Health Insurance with premiums jacked up to the point where subsidies are necessary for coverage, other than disaster coverage. Non-negotiable drug prices. Public lands at risk to appointees like Zinke. The EPA at risk. Jobs with good wages and benefits no longer a part of the social contract. A "gig" economy will not sustain this complex society; a basic level of revenue is needed to maintain our infrastructure, our public education system, and our inter-State highway system. I do not want to pay tolls to the Saudis who also gave us 9/11.
1
@abigail49
We cannot know what is inside a person's mind. Just because an illness might make a person more aware of other's pain during illness and need for relief, it does not make him necessarily enlightened.
I think John McCain was a pragmatist and did not believe in greed, and excessive income.
1
trump could find nothing good to say about John McCain, an American patriot who made great sacrifices for his country, yet constantly says plenty of nice things about Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un.
Even further back, during the 2000 South Carlina presidential primaries, Karl Rove circulated a race-based whisper campaign about some of McCain's family members.
As such, I've sometimes wondered how McCain stayed a Republican, but figured he had his reasons, one being his military training and the sense of loyalty it imbues.
Nevertheless, I am glad that in his later years he managed to push back on some of the ills of his party.
Would that he could have remianed with us longer. RIP.
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@Where are the babies, Trump
I also think that if Karl Rove had not been so nasty and done the whisper campaign McCain could have become the President and we may not have gone to war.
McCain remained a Republican because Arizona is a solid red state.
He voted w the GOP caucus 95% of the time.
He voted AGAINST background checks for gun purchases..esp at gun shows. Arizona sells a LOT of guns which end up in drug cartels in Mexico.
Even after the first graders were slaughtered in Newtown he stood up for the NRA not for our children.
I’m a vet and widow of a vet so I don’t see how being military kept him in the GOP?
My late spouse, friends in all branches are Dems.
McCain stayed Republican because you can ask ANY member of congress what their #1 job is...and it’s getting re-elected! He was no different!
1
"Our greatness is in peril", because we can't agree on what has made us great. We can't even agree on the democratic principles that form our Constitution. I suppose if we have to start somewhere, the question should be asked and polled, which kind of government do you prefer, a democracy or an authoritarian dictatorship? If we can't establish that the majority of our country would prefer a democracy over Trump's authoritarian regime, then more than "our greatness is in peril". Our very country's existence is in danger. As Lincoln stated, "A house divided against itself cannot stand". What most people respected about Senator McCain is his indomitable love of our country, even if they disagreed with him. Where is that country we love? The Republicans allowed Trump to steal it away and are holding us hostage to their whim of terror in destroying our air, water and ground, revoking healthcare for millions, deporting those we viewed as neighbors and wreaking havoc in the world by refusing our allies support and cozying up to the dictators, giving themselves a tax cut while leaving us peasants to fend for ourselves. It is interesting to me that the same folks who want to deprive folks of a safety net are the ones giving themselves thousands more that they don't need. The day of reckoning is coming. Justice will be served.
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@GraceNeeded - It would be nice if Democrats loved the country, but that is not to be. They would prefer that we turn into a third world nation, where nearly everyone is poor.
@GraceNeeded Wonderful comments. We must VOTE, VOTE, VOTE in November to save our democracy which is "in grave peril."
A Republican Party in the mold of John McCain would not be on the verge of being turned inside out by voters in November. McCain was a throwback to the GOP of the fifties and sixties, the party of morals and values that defined the party, unlike today's Republicans who've lost their way. McCain's final act of note, a defiant and emphatic thumbs down to preserve the ACA, was also a farewell gesture to a party that he no longer recognized. In that one moment, McCain reprised his heroic military service to his country.
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I always believed that McCain wanted to do what was best for our country. I didn't always agree with that platform, but I never once thought he was cynically using power.
I was most frustrated with McCain on the issue of immigration because, after his bipartisan efforts at comprehensive reform, he took a sharp right turn and dropped it. I always believed that he knew better, but I don't blame him for that so much as I blame the GOP. No single Senator can compensate for a party of ideologues.
15
@silver vibes You have to go back a long ways before the fifties and sixties. Maybe back to eighteen fifties when the Republican party was the party of abolition and the Democratic party was the party of slavery. Otherwise, the Republican party was always the party of big business and the oligarchy. True, Eisenhower. But he ruled under the umbrella of the Roosevelt era, whose reforms were still in place.
1
Wait....what?
You don’t blame him for his hard right turn against immigration because the GOP did?
His job was country over party! I too was in Vietnam where two million Vietnamese were killed.
He should have understood refugees running from Southeast Asia esp from Pol Pot.
We were responsible for those deaths along w Russia and China.
Here in Hawaii the Vietnam War is called the American War.
1
"If it does, at least some Republicans will be looking for ways to reinvent their party. They will want an antidote to Trumpism, a set of ideas that manage to be conservative and anti-Trump."
Trump already reinvented their party.
The Republican party is now an anti-immigrant party. Everything else is secondary. Immigration is the core issue that bonds them together and anybody who is not on board with stopping immigration is a RINO.
22
The R party is not anti-immigrant. Trump says folks from Norway are more than welcome.
It’s anti-brown immigrant.
1
Republicans, Democrats, Independents, each and every citizen of our United States of America, should look to the character, integrity, honor and sacrifice of John McCain as we tred through these perilous times.
We have much to learn from his life. Lessons that many either never learned or have forgotten. That the interests of our country should always come before that of ideology, that trust is sacrosanct, that truth is paramount, that courage and integrity are revered and that the common good ultimately puts us all in good stead.
His was a life very well lived.
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As Steve Schmidt said, "In 2008, no matter who won the Presidency , the country still won."
Unfortunately, McConnell kept America from winning.
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So if Sarah Palin took over for an ill McCain we would have won???
Steve Schmidt was McCains campaign manager! What else do you think he’d say?
Reflecting on John McCain's reverence for constitutional American pluralism, it is all too easy to draw "compare and contrast" analogies with President Trump.
In doing so, we tend to forget Mitch McConnell and other pre-Trump GOP leaders who have hoisted their obsession to turn the nation permanently into a one-minority-party state pulling all the national levers of power without serious oversight or challenge.
From the results of total Republican domination over all the organs of the federal government, it is now clear that the Party is driven to win solely for the sake of winning, with neither a clue nor an interest in the substance of governance or the moral imperative of effective leadership.
Unless we accept massive ballooning deficits and tax breaks for those who least need them as serious economic policy, institutional bigotry for national security and wall-to-wall corruption as a placeholder for leadership, we shall need to find representatives who seek political victory to govern rather than simply to sustain a winning streak.
To John McCain, politics served the constitutional governance of his country, which he held dear enough to warrant enormous personal sacrifice.
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@John LeBaron
This is one of the best evaluations of today’s GOP job performance that I’ve seen in the NYT comments sections.
You are exactly correct. The one thing you did not include though, was that a large portion of the US population has accepted lying, showmanship, and race/class baiting as alternatives to the truth about the hard work and unity needed to get ahead in a world full of capable competitors who are just as deserving of, and hungry for success as we are. The world of the future will NOT be US winning and all other countries behind us. American exceptionalism (read: White exceptionalism) is a lie which will be dismantled under its own weight; “MAGA” is a corollary to that assertion, also destined to fail.
The only way forward is rowing together in the same direction to move this great vessel forward: Therein lies the promise of True American Greatness. The GOP ‘s myopic view and divisive political slogans are mere junk food: tasty in the short term, deadly in the long.
1
Conservatives used to rail against "liberal moral equivalency." McCain wasn't perfect, but at least he had integrity in how he comported himself. Now the party of moral equivalency is the GOP, hardly deserving of association with McCain.
46
Mr. McCain lived through an era of government where conservative social mantra was always balanced against the omnipresent tax cuts.
Usually the ''compromise'' was for republican lite Representatives and Senators (''moderates'') to forego human rights for all to hold the line on other government social programs not being cut, while keeping those tax cuts for the rich and corporations coming.
The rubber finally hit the road at the end of Mr. McCain's political tenure where no longer could human rights for all be denied, and no longer could there be tax theft. (cuts)
The republican party in the last decade has moved so far fanatically and radically right that the party left Mr. McCain. (demonstrated from his thumbs down to taking away health care from tens of millions of Americans)
We can only wish their were more mavericks ''left'' within the republican party, but alas the final one has left us.
The end of an era.
111
John McCain was a great man, and even though I disagree with many of his positions, I have nothing but respect for the man and his legacy.
But no, the Republican party is not the greatest peril our country faces. Rather, the greatest peril is extreme partisan-ism. McCain was willing to use the strength of his party to advance his positions, but he wasn’t blind, and he was willing to buck the party when he felt the need. Few Washington politicians have that strength, and even fewer op-ed columnists understand the concept.
As dysfunctional and irrational as the the Republican party appears today, I’m actually more concerned about the damage the Democratic party will inflict when it inevitably regains control.
10
@Rick
You are concerned about damage from Democrats? Are you referring to the right to vote? Support for paper ballots? Are you referring to the perversion of the 2nd Amendment meant to protect Americans from a possible British return? Are you referring to the NRA's outsize influence on our domestic gun policies which have put combat style weapons in the hands of any civilian for purposes vague at best. Are you concerned about the 22M insured Americans under the Affordable Care Act? Apparently a conservative Senator McCain believed that should remain in place. Are you concerned about wars of choice, e.g. Iraq? Are you concerned about the ongoing investigation into the Trump campaign's finances, and links to Russian oligarchs in London?
If I were a Republican my concern would be Duncan Hunter, Trump family financial concerns dictating foreign policy, as in Saudi Arabia, and Iran. "Power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely" Take heed, GOP.
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@Rick If I were you, I would be more concerned about the destruction of our Republic right before our eyes today...from the nihilistic Trump and the cowardly false Republicans in the House and Senate.... as one respected international newspaper recently wrote " The United States is now an international pariah ." How has this calamity happened?
10
@Rick Of course, Rick.....it's not as though Republicans chant "lock her up."
6
Today’s comments and Twitter have turned into a hagiography.
Sen McCain voted No on Obamacare back under Obama.
The most recent repeal vote that Trump is still angry about McCain made this grand entrance into the Senate, hesitated then made a THUMBS DOWN. Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins were two Republicans who voted NO also without the theatrics--in fact the two had to talk McCain into a No.
McCain with his ten houses didn’t care about the common man. He came from ROYALTY. Legacy at Annapolis as dad and granddad were 4 star admirals. He consistently voted in lock step for GOP presidents and voted NO on just 22 nominations. He went along with Trump about putting an active duty 3 star Marine General in as Sec’y of Defense..first time. We need civilian balance as Bob Gates and Leon Panetta were under Obama.
What I really don’t understand is how McCain could back Trump for POTUS after saying that ALL POWs were not heroes--they were captured...something that Trump has been saying for FIFTEEN YEARS before directing that at McCain.
Anyway the guy NEVER understood what it was like stretching a paycheck over a month. He was not even liked in the Navy.
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@Nuschler
As a Democrat, John McCain is one of the few Republicans for whom I had any respect. I didn’t often agree with his politics but I knew he came by his conservative principles honestly and that he did what he thought was best in the interests of all Americans not just his party. That’s more than I can say for the rest of the GOP. I will never forgive his acceptance of Sarah Palin as a running mate. He wanted Joe Lieberman, who at that time still had some scruples left, but was rebuffed by party leadership. Sadly, Palin paved the way for Trump.
McCain didn’t hesitate when he voted thumbs down on the repeal of the Affordable Care Act, he made McConnell, the most partisan Majority Leader ever, sweat as he stood arms crossed feet from McCain demanding complete and total obedience. McCain in one very satisfying moment wiped that ugly smirk from Mitch McConnell’s face and replaced it with a scowl, ol’ Mitch’s alternative resting face. Never was I more proud of McCain than his gentlemanly concession speech to then President-elect Obama. Trump could learn a thing or two from McCain if he were capable.
I can’t explain why he endorsed Trump after the POW remark other than, McCain never saw himself as a hero, only an American who did his duty to country by serving in the US Navy.
When Trump showed his disrespect to women as depicted by the Access Hollywood tape, McCain withdrew his endorsement of Trump. Better late than never.
John McCain, may you RIP.
@Nuschler And don't forget McCain's execrable choice of Palin for VP, and his virtual disappearance during the depths of the financial crisis in 2008. McCain believed he could be a "foreign policy" only president and, even in the domain of foreign policy, he had too much of the posturing, strutting military cockerel to him. Remember the "bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran" "joke"?
1
@Nuschler –– He's dead. You're supposed to say nice things about people when they die. It's just, you know, decent.
You underestimate the human spirit and the human imagination when you say those born to privilege cannot possibly feel for and want to better the lives of those less fortunate.
How ill-tempered of you.
One thing I liked about John McCain was that he was 'maddeningly inconsistent." I believe he had a sincere sense of goodness and decency and tried to live up to that standard. I'm mostly liberal, but I appreciate and agree with the conservative position on several issues, and, as much as I dislike politicians, I do like the ones that show some independence. Loyalty is a questionable virtue. Integrity, decency, decorum, and fortitude are, to me, far superior and I think John McCain demonstrated all of these.
29
Though certainly not their own territory, Senate Republicans have always claimed the high ground of principle. With John McCain gone, they not only lost their last exemplar of principle, they lost their last member with courage enough to call a lie a lie and a fraud a fraud.
John McCain was as often wrong as any of us. What made him a great American was the courage to stand and endure not just against the crowd, but against his own self-interest. John McCain knew there were things greater than himself and never shirked duty when it came time to defend them, no matter the price he had to pay. Let us hope he was not the last of his kind.
55
I truly liked who John McCain was, his clear honorableness, but as you say, he was maddeningly inconsistent. He cast the deciding vote to keep Obamacare, which preserves the health safety net for millions. But he also voted for the recent tax cut which vastly increases the deficit in order to provide tax cuts for billionaires. And perhaps most unfortunately, he cavalierly almost subjected the country to Sarah Palin as Vice President. Sad to say, if he's the best we can hope for in a Republican, ther's not a lot of hope there.
86
"But the sum total of his career still represents a meaningful alternative to Trump, McConnell and the rest of today’s Republican leadership."
Will "I was better than Trump" be the words inscribed on John McCain's tombstone?
Talk about a backhanded epitaph.
If his Senate seat is now handed over to a Trump acolyte of the likes of Joe Arpaio, Martha McSally, or Kelli Ward, it would be an appropriate one.
John McCain should have resigned his seat in time for Arizona voters to have been able to decide its fate in November, not in 2020.
38
Fifth, the Republican Party would cease trying to get rid of the Affordable Care Act, which insures millions of people and prevents them from dying, literally, in numerous cases.
John McCain took credence in believing he did the right thing for life, for helping, for making policies that would be long lasting for justice and fairness. And he proved that when he voted against repealing the Affordable Care Act, and thus, it was upheld by the vote of this wonderful, thoughtful, and right man.
How shameful that his party would literally try to snatch medical treatment benefits from constituents all across this nation. The party should have worked across party lines to help make the Act more affordable, giving it more ability to assist more people, not less. This party did everything it could to eliminate what Barack Obama did to give people a chance if they had no access to other coverage. This party literally celebrated when the House voted to leave human beings without opportunity to receive reimbursement through healthcare insurance, their vote to ditch the ACA.
I walked hospital halls during the recession when people lost their jobs and their health insurance. As a hospital RN Case Manager I heard first hand story after story of fear, confusion, the unknown - and all because people were sick and had no access to insurance.
Seeing John McCain vote to give people life, medical treatment, a chance, will be remembered, to me, as one of his most heroic/right events.
354
John McCain voted AGAINST the ACA in 2012 when it really mattered!
We needed a bipartisan push for single payer!
Instead he took the side of insurance companies! He didn’t even want Medicaid expansion, the individual mandate or protection for pre-existing condition!
ONE robin does not a summer make.
His one last second grandstanding vote against the repeal of the ACA hasn’t stopped the GOP from dismantling healthcare!
He did NOTHING to stop all the EOs reversing clean air.
So many folks here have forgotten that McCain batted for the wrong team and Medicare and Social Security HAVE to be slashed to make up for that trillion dollar tax cut!
15
@MIMA
John McCain was always a warrior and he knew that healthcare would be a life and death battle for all of us at some point. Very grateful for his legacy in this arena. It will define his last days.
Sarah Palin was of course, his greatest mistake. But I get it. He was trying to balance one era with another.
A lifelong democrat, I can recommend Faith of Our Fathers as a beautiful read, a story of sacrifice and courage the likes of which are all too rare in this era.
John McCain, what a patriot you’ve been, a faithful servant to all that is good about America. Thank you and we will not disappoint you.
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@Njlatelifemom
Disagree. There was no "balancing" with Palin. McCain was trying a "Hail Mary pass" to resurrect a failing campaign, and he was willing to risk the nation's well-being to do so. Imagine, God forbid, that Palin had become president at some point.
1
I don't think Palin was a miscalculation on McCain's part, I think he was subject to the same parasitic consulting industry that gave us Clinton's billion dollar debacle. These highly paid entrail readers determined, on whatever grounds, that Palin would be a good match and McCain defaulted to the trope "If I'm paying these people so much, they must know something." It was laziness if nothing else.
We also find these words on McCain from Jonathan Chait enlightening:
" When he ran for president in 2000, McCain gained traction with the electorate by opposing George W. Bush’s plan to give tax cuts to the rich, bringing the wrath of the party Establishment down on his head.
The aftermath of that episode left McCain completely, if temporarily, unmoored from party doctrine. Not only did he vote against both the 2001 and 2003 Bush tax cuts, but McCain joined the Democrats on every major domestic dispute of the Bush era: a patients bill of rights, auto-emission standards, reimportation of prescription drugs, closing the gun-show loophole, forcing disclosure of executive compensation, federalizing airport security, and requiring the regulation of greenhouse-gas emissions. McCain was identifying himself as a “Theodore Roosevelt Republican” — a pointed contrast to the staunchly pro-business cast of the Bush-era party — and came within a hair of leaving the GOP altogether and caucusing with Democrats as an independent. "
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/10/john-mccains-final-act-is-w...
A complicated person, but not someone who always parroted the GOP'er line.
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@R. Law And yet he was unable to vote for Hillary Clinton.
It always infuriated me when Barack Obama's rhetoric would morph into Teddy Roosevelt's whenever campaign season rolled around, only for his policies to instantly revert back to Richard Nixon's once it was over. Now, out of office, he can snap selfies with the billionaires he's obviously most comfortable with. Whatever prescription you offer for the Republicans could apply just as well to the corporatists that rule the Democratic Party. The reason there are no independent thinkers in Congress is because they are all paid stooges of one powerful entity or another. There isn't a mensch among them, which is why we all are trying so desperately to laud McCain.
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@stan continople
You are right in many ways but don't exaggerate. Obama was a Blue Dog Democrat, not an FDR Democrat and he lost a huge opportunity for reform due to lack of conviction. But he wasn't Nixonian. Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders are reformers with convictions and their followers are Progressives. Student activists who survived the Parkland Shooting are standing against sitting and watching High School students get shot are not brainwashed - a great hope for the future.
1
stan continople writes, "Whatever prescription you offer for the Republicans could apply just as well to the corporatists that rule the Democratic Party."
And "thinking" like this is why Trump is president. Everyone is the same and will do the same things in Congress or the White House. BALONEY.
One only has to look at the mess Trump has made compared to Obama to realize just how stark the difference are. What is the one big legislative achievement or the Trumpublicans...the tax cut for billionaires. Would Obama have signed on? Would Hillary? Not in a million years. Where is the great health plan Trump promised us? Where is the infrastructure legislation?
Furthermore, Mitch McConnell did everything possible to stop Obama...but "somehow" Stan missed mentioning that in his comments.
What I'm sick of are people who nit pick anything a democrat does while giving a huge pass to all the egregious activities of the modern republican. People like Stan are the reason this country is a mess.
VOTE OUT ALL REPUBLICANS
6
Your post looks to me a lot more like a guy who thinks he's a leftist yacking a lot like Trump because he desperately needs an alibi for having helped elect Trump. But by all means, let's see you get out there and profile in courage.
1
I think the take-home point here is that politics well played is all about compromise. Understandably neither side will view the end result as perfect, but we move forward as best we can.
John McCain represented that worldview — namely that of Republican party of my late father who believed in hard work, fiscal conservatism and a moral center. He and I disagreed on many issues but like Senator McCain he believed in fairness, justice and the bedrock principles on which this country was founded.
My father would be utterly mystified by the direction the current GOP has taken and I wonder what he, and all Republicans of that era, would make of it… how would he vote if he were able?
There is one thing I know we would have no trouble agreeing on today: whatever forces have brought us to this point is not important. What is important is to reclaim what the GOP of old stood for and, if at all possible, to get back to the days when politicians of different stripes could make deals on the floor of the House and Senate and then, compromise in hand, enjoy a drink or a round of golf with their political rivals.
49
@gsteve "politicians of different stripes could make deals on the floor of the House and Senate". That possibility went away when the Supreme Court decided to bypass Congress and make laws itself.
Suppose the Republicans were to say to Democrats, "We will give you single payer health care and in return you give us strict limits on abortion."
The Supreme Court would say, "Sorry but that decision is up to us." So there could be no bargain.
Abortion is becoming legal in Ireland. But note that that decision was made by the Irish themselves. By contrast Roe v Wade was not a decision made by us Americans, and neither was Citizens United.
When the Supreme Court undermines democracy, bargains become impossible.
35
@gsteve
The best thing for Eisenhower-type Republicans to do now is join that party the comes closer to their ideals. Become Democrats. Vote for every Democrat in sight this November, and replace our current President with a Democrat in 2020. The Republican Party will change only if it is soundly defeated.
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@gsteve
Thank you for your call for compromise. However, I disagree with your assertion that "whatever forces have brought us to this point is not important."
I think what brought us here is the root of the problem. IMO, the conservative doctrine of tax cuts for the wealthy and the false belief in trickle down economics is exactly what brought us to this point. (https://www.forbes.com/sites/thomasdelbeccaro/2018/01/04/trickle-down-ec...
I think this is time to push back with everything we have and NOT compromise on more tax cuts and more money in politics.
16