How’s he going to test foreign leaders as a senator from Arizona?
Multiple choice or essay?
I remember when lately meant more than a month ago. I mean Sept/Oct, amirite?
Anyway, for 5 years McCain couldn’t test foreign enemies.
Politics is serious business. We must never make jokes about it.
By the way, “douchebag peanut gallery” implies an audience of people who heckle douchebags. You may not have intended the ambiguity.
Wait, so when Liberal is objective enough to see beyond his personal beliefs to just how wacko McCain has become, he’s betraying his kind?
Awesome. Let us know if you ever get your head out of your ass long enough to see the real world.
It’s ridiculous that any of you think this is an example of McCain being a wacko or senile or anything. He’s just using a common political rhetorical device (i.e., using your opponent’s words against them) and a common military idea (i.e., the whole “take the fight to them instead of letting them bring the fight to you”).
You may not like it, and you may not like McCain, but saying he will test our enemies is not some crazy far out thing.
Rorshach. If you answer “I see the great jihad coming, I see the infidel burning in his fortresses of corruption, I see an all-consuming fire which shall rid the world of American pestilence, I see the Great Satan cowering into the dust as his buildings crumble in flames and his grovelling jackals are slain by the mighty right arm of Islam! All His enemies shall wail and perish before his wrath! Allahu akbar!” instead of “It’s a pretty butterfly”, that’s a fail.
Perhaps. It is, however, a stupid thing. If you’re engaged in an active bloody war with somebody, being aggressive is not necessarily a bad idea, and may indeed be the best course of action. If you’re having extremely poor diplomatic relations with a country, trying to push them into a war is a terrible idea.
Yeesh. We **are **in an active bloody *something *(“war” or “conflict” or something) with terrorists.
(Also, band name on active bloody something.)
I remember when you were… oh wait, I don’t. who are you again?
Personally I do remember Libertarian/Liberal going back many years. His main views on these things have not changed. What changed are the political realities of US and International politics. I can relate, I used to consider myself a republican, or at least I voted that way, based largely on libertarian views that I felt the republicans represented better than the democrats. I would not consider voting for a republican candidate today. I still disagree with the democrats on most of the same things I did then, but the reality today is that the republicans are a bigger threat to my views. You can add in a lot of republican policies since then that have proven to be failures. In the end though, I feel more like the Republican party left me than the other way around.
Even in my heavily libertarian days though, we all still hated objectivists.
That, my friend, was a thing of beauty. Well wrought, sir, well wrought.
At McCain’s age anyone has been tested for pretty much everything: blood pressure, prostate, arthritis, …
:rolleyes: But we are not at war with Iran, or North Korea, or Pakistan, so trying to provoke them into starting something would be fucking stupid.
Right, and we should take steps to expand this active conflict when diplomacy doesn’t give us %100 capitulation. How’d that work out for us last time we tried it?
Interpreting McCain’s statement as evidencing a desire to provoke those countries into starting something is fucking stupid.
I’ve ben lurking for a while (99 or so).
Mothing I said had anything to do with who Liberal votes for or which party he identifies with. He used to make really interesting and thoughtful posts. It seems that all of his posts now are in that tone of too cool for the room double reverse irony that 'luci does pretty well and lots of other lefties here trý but usually fail to pull off. Witness his recent threads in the pit like “Biden endorses McCain.”
You grip on truth and reality gets more strained every day. Testing them before they test us is an aggressive stance. If they had no intention of doing anything and want good relationships ,it is impossible if you are deliberately taking it to them. It is just more proof of his lack of interest in peace. He wants to be a tough guy. I want a guy who will talk to those who he has strained relationships with. I want them to achieve an understanding and a meeting of minds. I do not want a provoker.
If we do not take the straightforward meaning, then it could mean anything — as when he used “fundamentals of the economy” to mean “American workers”. But speaking for myself, it is no consolation to presume that he speaks in code that only he can understand.
More pertinently, code that only he understands when, at a later date, he pulls an explanation out of his ass to counter the plain interpretation of what he originally said.
For McCain, it’s all about winning the electoral pissing contest, regardless of who wins the election. I can understand his behavior better if I think of it that way.
Exactly. What we absolutely do not need is a President who says something inflammatory, then comes back a week later and says, “I never said that. Oh… you have a tape? Well, here’s what I really meant when I said that.”