Tag: John McCain

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Trump White House Aide On John McCain: “It Doesn’t Matter, He’s Dying Anyway”

Sen. John McCain

White House communications aide Kelly Sadler demonstrated yesterday the Trump Nation disdain for being “politically correct” by offering a distasteful assessment of Sen. John McCain’s opposition to Trump’s nominee for CIA director, Gina Haspel.

Said Sadler of McCain, “It doesn’t matter, he’s dying anyway.”

From The Hill:

Special assistant Kelly Sadler made the derisive comments during a closed-door White House meeting of about two-dozen communications staffers on Thursday morning.

“It doesn’t matter, he’s dying anyway,” Sadler said, according to a source familiar with the remarks at the meeting.

The White House did not deny the account of Sadler’s remarks, which came amid a discussion of Haspel’s nomination and McCain’s opposition to it.

For those who may not recall, McCain served his country in the Air Force, was a prisoner of war in Vietnam for years where he was tortured, spent decades in Congress and was the 2008 Republican presidential candidate.

Whether you agree or disagree with his political positions, few have dedicated their lives to the U.S. as McCain has. Surely in a White House meeting a little more decorum could be found?

But no. That would be “political correctness.”

#MAGA

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With No Re-Election Worries, John McCain Now Feels Free To Speak His Mind, Vote His Conscience

Sen. John McCain

In an excerpt from his new book, The Restless Wave, Sen. John McCain admits that, in light of his cancer diagnosis and his leaving public office at the end of this year, he now feels free to speak his mind “without fearing the consequences.”

McCain also takes a swipe at Donald Trump for caring more about “a reality show facsimile of toughness” than American values.

From CNN:

“This is my last term. If I hadn’t admitted that to myself before this summer, a stage 4 cancer diagnosis acts as ungentle persuasion,” he wrote in his book, “The Restless Wave,” according to the excerpt published on Apple News on Monday. “I’m freer than colleagues who will face the voters again. I can speak my mind without fearing the consequences much. And I can vote my conscience without worry.”

Referring to President Donald Trump, McCain wrote, “He has declined to distinguish the actions of our government from the crimes of despotic ones. The appearance of toughness, or a reality show facsimile of toughness, seems to matter more than any of our values.”

For much of McCain’s career in politics I’ve admired him as a self-styled “maverick.”

But, unfortunately, this admission doesn’t sound like the maverick we once knew. “Voting his conscience” and “speaking freely” is what folks wanted from McCain all along.

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John McCain: “We Are Doing Putin’s Job For Him”

Sen. John McCain (R-AZ)

While Donald Trump continues to whine about “fake news” and “fake investigations,” and his followers all fall in behind him, Republican Sen. John McCain issued a statement that gets to the very heart of the Special Counsel’s investigation.

What’s important for Americans to understand is that our Intelligence agencies all agree Russia interfered in our 2016 election. Whether it was specifically to get Trump elected or not, the disruption that continues today was the point.

Russia is succeeding and Donald Trump is so busy screaming “no collusion” he’s not doing anything to protect future elections.

As McCain writes below, Trump’s continued protests against our own intel organizations only serves Putin’s interests.

Via press release:

“In 2016, the Russian government engaged in an elaborate plot to interfere in an American election and undermine our democracy. Russia employed the same tactics it has used to influence elections around the world, from France and Germany to Ukraine, Montenegro, and beyond. Putin’s regime launched cyberattacks and spread disinformation with the goal of sowing chaos and weakening faith in our institutions. And while we have no evidence that these efforts affected the outcome of our election, I fear they succeeded in fueling political discord and dividing us from one another.

“The latest attacks on the FBI and Department of Justice serve no American interests – no party’s, no president’s, only Putin’s. The American people deserve to know all of the facts surrounding Russia’s ongoing efforts to subvert our democracy, which is why Special Counsel Mueller’s investigation must proceed unimpeded. Our nation’s elected officials, including the president, must stop looking at this investigation through the warped lens of politics and manufacturing partisan sideshows. If we continue to undermine our own rule of law, we are doing Putin’s job for him.”

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Sen. John McCain Will Miss Crucial Tax Reform Bill Vote

Sen. John McCain of Arizona

CNN is reporting Sen. John McCain has announced he is heading home to Arizona to continue recovering from the side effects of chemotherapy for a brain tumor and will not be in Washington for the tax vote this week.

The Republican senator was admitted into the hospital on Wednesday after missing a third straight day of votes in the Senate. McCain suffers from a type of brain tumor called a glioblastoma. He was diagnosed with the tumor following surgery to remove a blood clot in July.

The final vote on the Republican tax bill is expected to take place early this week.

According to Donald Trump, McCain told him he would return to Washington DC if his vote became necessary.

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McCain On THE VIEW: “I’ve Faced Greater Challenges” Than Attacks By Donald Trump

Appearing on The View today, where his daughter Meghan is a new co-host, Sen. John McCain was asked if he was “afraid” of retaliation from Donald Trump after some of McCain’s public statements about Trump.

McCain proceeded to laugh for a solid 15 seconds before shrugging, “I’ve mentioned that I’ve faced greater challenges.”

McCain also took another veiled swipe at Trump’s “bone spur” deferments from the Vietnam War, as well as Trump’s attacks on Gold Star families and accusations that Barack Obama was not born an American.

Watch the clips below.

(h/t Boy Culture)

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John McCain To Donald Trump: “I Have Faced Tougher Adversaries”

Sen. John McCain

Last night in Philadelphia, six-term Republican Sen. John McCain was honored with the National Constitution Center’s Liberty Medal for a lifetime of service and sacrifice to the country.

In accepting the award, McCain spoke of his two decades of military service including his 5+ years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam. He also addressed the current fractured political landscape today in Washington.

“To abandon the ideals we have advanced around the globe, to refuse the obligations of international leadership for the sake of some half-baked, spurious nationalism cooked up by people who would rather find scapegoats than solve problems,” he said, “is as unpatriotic as an attachment to any other tired dogma of the past that Americans consigned to the ash heap of history.”

Clearly the “half-baked, spurious nationalism” was a jab meant for Donald Trump.

Trump being Trump, the president felt the need to slap back this morning during a radio interview with WMAL in Washington saying, “I’m being very, very nice but at some point, I fight back and it won’t be pretty.”

McCain, having survived over five years as a prisonoer of war in Vietnam and currently facing brain cancer, had a simple response to the president: “I have faced tougher adversaries.”

FTW!

Trump and McCain have had a long history of acrimony going back to the last presidential campaign when Trump claimed McCain was not a war hero because he was captured in Vietnam.

This past summer, it was McCain’s “no” vote in the Senate that torpedoed Trump’s last try at repealing Obamacare.

On the other end of the class spectrum, Barack Obama – who faced McCain in the 2008 presidential election – congratulated McCain on being honored:

(source)

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Donald Trump Rants At Sen. John McCain Over Healthcare Vote

Donald Trump went on a morning Twitter rant attacking Sen. John McCain for his “no” vote on the currently proposed Cassidy-Graham bill to “repeal and replace” Obamacare.

McCain announced yesterday that he opposes the legislation because it wasn’t going through the Senate via normal order with hearings and committee meetings. He voted against the last version of healthcare reform for the same reason.

McCain has said publicly that he wants to see Democrats and Republicans work together on healthcare legislation so they can “get it right.”

Along the way, Trump also took some swipes at Republican Sens. Rand Paul and Lisa Murkowski. Paul is a confirmed “no” on the legislation while Murkowski appears to be leaning “no.”

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Sen. John McCain Is A “No” On Latest GOP Healthcare Bill

Sen. John McCain

Sen. John McCain has just announced he cannot “in good conscience” vote for the GOP’s latest attempt to “repeal and replace” Obamacare.

Via CNN:

“I cannot in good conscience vote for the Graham-Cassidy proposal,” the Arizona Republican said in a statement. “I believe we could do better working together, Republicans and Democrats, and have not yet really tried. Nor could I support it without knowing how much it will cost, how it will (affect) insurance premiums, and how many people will be helped or hurt by it. Without a full CBO score, which won’t be available by the end of the month, we won’t have reliable answers to any of those questions.”

McCain has said for weeks that he would not support health care legislation that had not gone through “regular order,” meaning Senate hearings, an amendment process and a rigorous floor debate.

McCain voted “no” on the last health care proposal in July for the same reason. McCain’s dramatic floor vote, which happened just weeks after he was diagnosed with brain cancer, came in the early morning and was captured as one of his most “maverick” moments in the Senate.

With Sen. Rand Paul already a “no” vote, this brings the Republican Senate majority down to only 50 “yes” votes.

Additionally, it’s looking more and more likely that Sen. Susan Collins of Maine will be the vote that kills the bill.

“I’m leaning against the bill,” Collins said Friday according to the Portland Press Herald.

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Sen. John McCain: We Don’t Answer To Donald Trump

Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona, in an op-ed for the Washington Post, makes it clear he is DONE with Donald Trump.

An excerpt:

Our entire system of government — with its checks and balances, its bicameral Congress, its protections of the rights of the minority — was designed for compromise. It seldom works smoothly or speedily. It was never expected to.

It requires pragmatic problem-solving from even the most passionate partisans. It relies on compromise between opposing sides to protect the interests we share. We can fight like hell for our ideas to prevail. But we have to respect each other or at least respect the fact that we need each other.

That has never been truer than today, when Congress must govern with a president who has no experience of public office, is often poorly informed and can be impulsive in his speech and conduct.

We must respect his authority and constitutional responsibilities. We must, where we can, cooperate with him. But we are not his subordinates. We don’t answer to him. We answer to the American people. We must be diligent in discharging our responsibility to serve as a check on his power. And we should value our identity as members of Congress more than our partisan affiliation.