John McCain: "if I was in charge, I would nuke Iraq to teach them a lesson"

[Better Believe It]

September 23, 2008
The Bully in Fiji
My Holiday with McCain
By ANASUYA DUBEY

It was just before John McCain's last run at the presidential nomination in 2000 that my husband and I vacationed in Turtle Island in Fiji with John McCain, Cindy, and their children, including Bridget (their adopted Bangladeshi child). It was not our intention, but it was our misfortune to be in close quarters with John McCain for almost a week since Turtle Island has a small number of bungalows and their focus on communal meals force all vacationers who are there at the same time to get to know each other intimately.

.... He waxed on during one meal about how Indo-Chinese women had the best figures and that our American corn-fed women just couldn't meet up to this standard. He also made it a point that all of us should stop Cindy from having dessert as her weight was too high and made a few comments to Amy, the 25 year old wife of the honeymooning couple from Nebraska that she should eat less as she needed to lose weight.

.... Needless to say I was irritated at his large ego, and his rude behavior towards his wife and other women, but decided he must have some redeeming qualities as he had adopted a handicapped child from Bangladesh. I asked him about this one day and his response was shocking –"Oh, that was Cindy's idea – I didn't have anything to do with it. She just went and adopted this thing without even asking me. You can't imagine how people stare when I wheel this ugly, black thing around in a shopping cart in Arizona. No, it wasn't my idea at all."

I actively avoided McCain after that, but unfortunately one day he engaged me in a political discussion which soon got us on the topic of the active US bombing of Iraq at that time. I was shocked when he said "if I was in charge, I would nuke Iraq to teach them a lesson". Given McCain's personal experience with the horrors of war I had expected a more balanced point of view. I commented on the tragic consequences of the nuclear attacks on Japan during WWII – but no, he was not to be dissuaded. He went on to say that if it was up to him he would have dropped many more nuclear bombs on Japan. I rapidly extricated myself from this conversation as I could tell that his experience being tortured as a POW didn't seem to have mellowed out his perspective but rather had made him more aggressive, and vengeful towards the world.

My final encounter with McCain was on the morning that he was leaving Turtle Island. Amy and I were happily eating pancakes when McCain arrived and told Amy that she shouldn't be having pancakes because she needed to lose weight. Amy burst into tears at this abusive comment. I felt fiercely protective of Amy and immediately turned to McCain and told him to leave her alone. He became very angry and abusive towards me, and said "don't you know who I am" and I looked him in the face and said "yes, you are the biggest asshole I have ever met" and headed back to my cabin. I am happy to say that later that day when I arrived at lunch I was given a standing ovation by all the guests for having stood up to McCain's bullying.

Please read the entire article at:

http://www.counterpunch.org/dubey09232008.html

[gcomeau]

1. This is the kind of garbage that loses us support.

It stinks. It absolutely reeks of being fakery. Hell, even if it's TRUE no moderate will believe it, will conclude it's the most vile kind of personal smear, and be repelled. They're idiots for publishing it without hard evidence it occured. If you don;t have something like this on tape you pass it over.

[Better Believe It]

2. Garbage? I Believe Her And It Doesn't Shock Me At All

Do you require a video recording proving any and all negative experiences that people had with McCain?

Are you also calling former Vietnam POW, Phillip Butler, a liar guilty (in your mind) of "fakery" when he wrote about his personal experiences with John McCain?

Well, if you want to defend John McCain (and Sarah Palin too) who are the poor victims of a horrible smear campaign I suppose you can.

Where do you want us to send our money to fight these terrible anti-McCain smears?


-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Why I Will Not Vote for John McCain
by Phillip Butler

About Phillip Butler

Doctor Phillip Butler is a 1961 graduate of the United States Naval Academy and a former light-attack carrier pilot. In 1965 he was shot down over North Vietnam where he spent eight years as a prisoner of war. He is a highly decorated combat veteran who was awarded two Silver Stars, two Legion of Merits, two Bronze Stars and two Purple Heart medals.

After his repatriation in 1973 he earned a Ph.D. in sociology from the University of California at San Diego and became a Navy Organizational Effectiveness consultant. He completed his Navy career in 1981 as a professor of management at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California.


As some of you might know, John McCain is a long-time acquaintance of mine that goes way back to our time together at the U.S. Naval Academy and as Prisoners of War in Vietnam. He is a man I respect and admire in some ways. But there are a number of reasons why I will not vote for him for President of the United States.

When I was a Plebe (4th classman, or freshman) at the Naval Academy in 1957-58, I was assigned to the 17th Company for my four years there. In those days we had about 3,600 midshipmen spread among 24 companies, thus about 150 midshipmen to a company. As fortune would have it, John, a First Classman (senior) and his room mate lived directly across the hall from me and my two room mates. Believe me when I say that back then I would never in a million or more years have dreamed that the crazy guy across the hall would someday be a Senator and candidate for President!

John was a wild man. He was funny, with a quick wit and he was intelligent. But he was intent on breaking every USNA regulation in our 4 inch thick USNA Regulations book. And I believe he must have come as close to his goal as any midshipman who ever attended the Academy. John had me "coming around" to his room frequently during my plebe year. And on one occasion he took me with him to escape "over the wall" in the dead of night. He had a taxi cab waiting for us that took us to a bar some 7 miles away. John had a few beers, but forbid me to drink (watching out for me I guess) and made me drink cokes. I could tell many other midshipman stories about John that year and he unbelievably managed to graduate though he spent the majority of his first class year on restriction for the stuff he did get caught doing. In fact he barely managed to graduate, standing 5th from the bottom of his 800 man graduating class. I and many others have speculated that the main reason he did graduate was because his father was an Admiral, and also his grandfather, both U.S. Naval Academy graduates.

I'm disappointed to see John represent himself politically in ways that are not accurate. He is not a moderate Republican. On some issues he is a maverick. But his voting record is far to the right. I fear for his nominations to our Supreme Court, and the consequent continuing loss of individual freedoms, especially regarding moral and religious issues. John is not a religious person, but he has taken every opportunity to ally himself with some really obnoxious and crazy fundamentalist ministers lately. I was also disappointed to see him cozy up to Bush because I know he hates that man. He disingenuously and famously put his arm around the guy, even after Bush had intensely disrespected him with lies and slander. So on these and many other instances, I don't see that John is the "straight talk express" he markets himself to be.

http://www.military.com/opinion/0,15202,164859_1,00.html

[gcomeau]

4. And you're a moderate right?

That's why you're here on DU? Because you're an independent undecided voter of the type who is going to decide this election one way or the other?

Read. My. Post.

Moderates are not going to just read this and believe it. If they were already inclined to believe the worst of McCain they'd be freaking decided by now. They're going to read it, look for the proof, find none, and conclude it's a despicable smear job and react in the opposite direction.

[Better Believe It]

7. So You Think This Article Should Be Hidden From View?

I don't think anyone that I'm aware of has proposed making a TV commercial or publishing a campaign flyer for mass circulation of this e-mail.

In fact, even if this article and the events described in it are proven to your satisfaction, I don't advocate the Obama campaign do a TV ad or publish campaign material regarding the events.

Leave that up to other organizations and discussion boards such as this one to circulate such documentation.

The MSM would not ignore it.

[gcomeau]

9. They will.

I don't think anyone that I'm aware of has proposed making a TV commercial or publishing a campaign flyer for mass circulation of this e-mail.

This takes off at all (and it's not just an e-mail] and I would wager money it does become at least part of a commercial. For McCain. Pointing out the depths to which those nasty liberals will go to smear and defame him and oh how horrible they are to attack his relationship with his dear innocent adopted daughter and how dare they drag a defenseless child into this with their baseless unfounded attacks, and on, and on... and it will immunize him against other more substantive attacks because people won't want to hear it anymore. And they'll use it to immunize Palin by utilizing it to reinforce the message that attacks on her are just meanspirited sniping and smears as well. And entirely legitimate well supported negative information about them will have it's effectiveness blunted.

Reports like this are counterproductive. They should not be spread. Not without substantial corroborating evidence.

[hedgehog]

3. When someone tells you of something you didn't personally witness,

you measure it against other information you have. Does any of this contradict the image of the take-charge mavrerick who speaks freely? Not in my opinion. I look at the photos of Carol McCain and wonder where the notion that she was ever overweight came from. now I know. I think John McCain is a bully who recognizes that most white American women are unsure of their body image. It's his way of controlling the women in this life.

[gcomeau]

5. Are you joking?

.... Needless to say I was irritated at his large ego, and his rude behavior towards his wife and other women, but decided he must have some redeeming qualities as he had adopted a handicapped child from Bangladesh. I asked him about this one day and his response was shocking –"Oh, that was Cindy's idea – I didn't have anything to do with it. She just went and adopted this thing without even asking me. You can't imagine how people stare when I wheel this ugly, black thing around in a shopping cart in Arizona. No, it wasn't my idea at all."

If you don't think that is at odds with the public image McCain projects to moderate, independent voters you're out of your mind. It will not be believed without corroborating evidence. It will be written off as libel, and they'll close ranks with him over it.

[Better Believe It]

6. Until This Article Has Been Refuted It Sure Sounds Authentic To Me

From The Daily Kos:

A Holiday With McCain (reposted with more verification)
by dank2484
Mon Sep 22, 2008 at 05:47:53 AM PDT

I am reposting a story that I originally decided to delete, because I now have more evidence to support it. As I said initially, this comes from an e-mail forwarded to me by my mom. It is not just some crazy viral e-mail, but an e-mail that was originally written by a trusted colleague and friend of my mom's. We checked with my mom's friend and here is what she said:

and I know and she is reliable and evidently some of the other guests are willing to publically back up the story, but I don't know how far it has gone. Of course such things are always open to some interpretation, but the facts are true as well as they can be when you just hear them from someone else.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/9/22/84013/3649

------------------------------------------

The following New York Times verifies that McCain actually took the Fiji vacation in 1999 as referenced in the email story.

The Jan 3, 1999 article says, “Back home in Phoenix after a Fiji vacation, the usually unequivocal Republican equivocated about what should happen to Mr. Clinton.”

Here's the link:

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E0DE6DD1F3FF930A35752C0A96F958260

----------------------------------------

I’m totally not in to politics and I believe all candidates are devious and actors to some extent. That being said, I received a letter from a distant cousin who heard Ana tell the account of the Fiji Island vacation two years ago. She was given “the letter” recently and can vouch that she knows Ana told her the same story 2 years ago. She gave me permission to copy and send you her paragraph she sent her relatives as she forwarded “the letter” account of the vacation at Fiji Island. Here it is:
From Lucy Sperlin:
I don’t forward political ‘stories’ usually, but I have first hand knowledge of this one. It is written by an Indian woman named Ana, who lives in San Francisco. She has been a good friend of my niece since childhood. Ana’s dad is an Indian diplomat, once ambassador to Peru, (Brinda is Ana’s mom, -a good friend of my sister who is married to an Indian and lives in Delhi). So Ana is world traveled and very well educated. I was visiting my niece (a Dr. at Santa Clara Valley Hospital) one time a couple of years ago, and Ana and her husband came to visit, and I heard this story directly from her at that time. I had thought of it many times recently, wishing I could remember the details better. Then here, lo and behold, my brother-in-law has sent it to me in writing! So it is absolutely legitimate and real. The story speaks for itself.

Lucy

Posted by Lois Whitehead | September 21, 2008, 3:08 am

#

Thanks to Lois for putting me on to this blog site which I had not seen prior to forwarding Ana’s story to some friends, one of whom was my second cousin who is Lois’s dad, who forwarded it to her. I’m amazed at the buzz about this story which was, indeed, written by Ana Dubey. I understand the scepticism –of course if you didn’t know what I do you’d be skeptical. But rather than repeat what I said that Lois has forwarded to you, I’ll just say that it is real, Ana is real, and I was one of those people she told the story to in the last few years. I was visiting my niece, in the S.F. Bay Area. Ana and her husband came to visit one evening. At that time it just seemed to be an icky story of an egotistical and unpleasant politician from another state exhibiting a tendency toward psychological abuse that makes one cringe at a real life portrayal of the ‘ugly American’.
But in recent months it has kept coming back to my mind. I didn’t know Ana had put it in writing until my brother-in-law sent the written account to me a couple of days ago. The forward included a note from Ana’s mother who sent it to him. She has been a long time friend of he and my sister.
So, am I real or just cooking up a story? I’m a 71 yr. old woman with white hair whose ancestry goes back to the 1600s and 1700s in America. I spend most of my time doing volunteer work that is not political (CASA, Historic Preservation and archival work, and UU Church). League of Women Voters is about as close to politically active as I get and my comfort zone is Leagues non-partisan appproach to decision making on issues. I’ll admit to supporting Obama, partly because I believe he is not only incredibly bright, but has an international sensitivity and savvy, and an inherent decentness and caring for people in their life struggles. I believe Ana’s story is abundantly telling about the other candidate.

Posted by Lucy Sperlin | September 21, 2008, 2:39 pm

http://www.tellingthoughts.com/us-politics/my-holiday-with-mccain

[Faygo Kid]

8. Interesting to Google Anasuya Dubey. Not discredited yet, but I am skeptical.

The truth will come out, but until this is verified, I have to dismiss it. An earlier poster noted that McCain is alleged to have called his daughter "an ugly black thing." That doesn't pass the smell test.

I don't think this will amount to much. We don't have maniacs like Hannity on our side screaming about every unsubstantiated rumor for months at a time.

[cali]

10. not this stupid email again.

it has the ring of... idiocy.