History is Happening Now

Does Republican presidential candidate John McCain secretly want to wage a religious war against Muslims?

I know, I know: it sounds like a crazy question. It sure seemed crazy when it first popped into my head about six months ago. That’s when I discovered that McCain was making a big deal out of the endorsement of Ohio televangelist Rod Parsley. McCain had even called Parsley a “spiritual guide.”

Parsley, whose World Harvest Church in Columbus has a 400-person staff, had said this about America and Islam:

I cannot tell you how important it is that we understand the true nature of Islam, that we see it for what it really is. In fact, I will tell you this: I do not believe our country can truly fulfill its divine purpose until we understand our historical conflict with Islam. I know this statement sounds extreme, but I do not shrink from its implications. The fact is that America was founded, in part, with the intention of seeing this false religion destroyed, and I believe September 11, 2001 was a generational call to arms that we can no longer ignore.

Of course, it would be quite hypocritical for me to assume that John McCain shares the views of his “spiritual guide” Rod Parsley about the relationship between America and Islam. After all, I certainly don’t believe that Barack Obama shares all the views of his ex-pastor, Jeremiah Wright, the ex-Marine and divinity school graduate who famously said those three horrible words, “God Damn America.” And to be fair, McCain has since buckled under pressure from the media and has rejected Parsley’s support.

Setting aside the issue of fairness, it’s just hard to believe that McCain sees Islam itself as the enemy of America. It’s hard to believe that a man smart enough to be a Republican nominee for President of the United States could even consider holding such a delusional, self-destructive view of the world. And it’s hard to believe the Republican Party – which is, after all, the party of Dwight Eisenhower, James Baker and George Bush Sr. – could nominate someone who would believe things about America that wouldn’t even pass the laugh test with the vast majority of the nation’s fifth grade social studies teachers.

On the other hand, John “Straight Talk” McCain wouldn’t call Parsley a “spiritual guide” if he didn’t have at least some rough understanding of what Parsley thinks of America, right? (Although anyone following McCain’s campaign in recent weeks would have to assume the straight-talking McCain died a few years ago. Did you hear McCain said he’d balance the federal budget by the end of his first term in office? Don’t worry: this blog will still be here when you’re done rolling on the floor in laughter.)

Anyway, McCain’s endorsement of Parsley bothered me, but I was ultimately willing to let the question drop. I figured the chances were slim that McCain thinks of the “War on Terror” as a Christian war on Islam.

But the issue surfaced again today while I was listening to a podcast version of The Rachel Maddow Show, which airs daily on Air America radio. The great Ms. Maddow played an excerpt from a recording she’d obtained, a recording of an interview with retired U.S. Air Force Colonel George E. “Bud” Day. I’ll say up front I think Day is an impressive man and I sincerely believe he deserves our respect, just as McCain deserves our respect for his service and sacrifice in the military. According to Wikipedia, Day won the Congressional Medal of Honor, and is “often cited as being the most decorated U.S. serive member since General Douglas MacArthur.”

But there’s no sugar-coating it: Day’s politics are disgusting. In 2004 he was a member of Swift Vets and POWs for Truth, the organization that launched the famous “swift boat” smears attacking 2004 Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry’s military record, calling Kerry “the Benedict Arnold of 1971.” The McCain campaign describes Day as an “old friend” of McCain’s, and used Day as a campaign surrogate to rebut retired General Wesley Clark’s recent remark that getting shot down in a fighter plane isn’t a qualification to be president.

Here is what Bud Day had to say recently in a conference call with reporters arranged by the Republican Party of Florida:

People forget out in the press, out in the public, that we are at war. Right now, we don’t have any choice. The Muslims have said either we kneel, or they’re going to kill us. … I don’t intend to kneel and I don’t advocate to anybody that we kneel and John doesn’t advocate to anybody that we kneel.

Once again, McCain is comfortable associating himself with people who want to kill Muslims. So I’m just wondering: Is that what McCain thinks? Does McCain think “the Muslims” are our enemy? It sounds crazy, but it might just explain his ideas about foreign policy, which seem more focused on “winning” wars with Muslims and provoking wars with Muslims than on keeping Americans safe.

I try to imagine how I’d feel if I were a hard-working, law abiding, tax-paying Muslim, and I heard that McCain’s old friends and spiritual guides were telling people we need to kill Muslims. I figure I’d be pretty nervous.

At some point I’m sure McCain will tell us what he really thinks about how to keep America safe, and then I’m sure the American Muslims will be relieved. I’ll be relieved.

I’m waiting…

The right-wing blogosphere is aflame with discussion of the “news” that the NYT has rejected an op-ed by John McCain, which his campaign submitted in response to Obama’s 7/14/08 op-ed.  This is clear proof, “conservative” commentators crow, that the NYT is horribly biased against McCain in particular and Republicans in general.  I’m not really interested in whether the NYT is biased against McCain and Republicans.  I tend to see the mainstream media’s biases in very different terms, but I am willing to grant the NYT’s so-called “bias against conservatives” for the sake of argument.

What I find more interesting is the tacit contradiction in the “conservative” backlash against the Times.

I believe that the NYT should run the McCain op-ed–however unpersuasive it is–because I also believe that the major mainstream media have an obligation to serve the public, an obligation to inform us of the policies of our presidential candidates (major and minor), an obligation to give these candidates direct opportunities to publicly stake out their positions.  However, if you are a “conservative” who believes in the pristine infallible virtue of American “free enterprise”–who argues for the moral superiority of unregulated markets and promotes the nigh-miraculous homeostatic balance of unrestrained capitalism–then you must necessarily also believe that the NYT has no obligation to serve the public.  None at all.

As a free-market “conservative,” you must believe that the New York Times Company (a publicly-traded corporation) has a right to publish pretty much anything it wants in its nineteen newspapers and that consumers and advertisers will “vote with their wallets” by buying or not buying, supporting or not supporting these papers.  On what basis, then, can you complain about the NYT’s “bias”?  On what basis are its editors obligated to be “balanced” or “fair”?  If you make your enraged argument by exploiting the public’s latent sense that newspapers have an obligation to be evenhanded, then you are making your argument by reinforcing an anti-market logic, a nakedly contradictory move.  The most consistent answer you can give is that the NYT indeed has no obligation to do anything (beyond its legal obligation to earn money for its shareholders) and that you are therefore merely trying to damage its reputation as the “newspaper of record.”  A truly weak argument on which to base your furious “conservative” rage, if you ask me.

     Republican presidential candidate John McCain recently wrote an Op-Ed piece for the New York Times about the war in Iraq. The Times’ editors read it and said: Sorry, this isn’t good enough. Try again.

     The Times’ decision to reject McCain’s submission (reported on The Drudge Report) naturally prompted a round of loud complaining by McCain supporters, who apparently think that since the Times published Obama’s Op-Ed, “My Plan for Iraq,” the newspaper is now obligated to print anything McCain writes in response, no matter how meaningless.

     Having read McCain’s proposed Op-Ed, I fully support the New York Times’ decision to send it back for a rewrite. McCain’s Op-Ed isn’t good enough because it doesn’t say anything meaningful about protecting America, nor does it actually respond to the most important and most basic points Obama made in his Op-Ed of July 14. For people like me, who read and understood Obama’s Op-Ed, McCain’s reply is just frustrating spin and empty rhetoric.

      To make my point, I’d like to pull out three simple sentences from Obama’s Op-Ed.

      1. Since the war in Iraq began, “Nearly every threat we face — from Afghanistan to Al Qaeda to Iran — has grown.”

      2. ”Ending the war (in Iraq) is essential to meeting our broader strategic goals, starting in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where the Taliban is resurgent and Al Qaeda has a safe haven.”

      3. In originally opposing the war in Iraq, “I believed it was a grave mistake to allow ourselves to be distracted from the fight against Al Qaeda and the Taliban by invading a country that posed no imminent threat and had nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks.”

     Obama’s opposition to the war in Iraq is clearly based on his belief that America should make it a top priority to win the war against Al Qaeda and its ally, the Taliban. (For those of you too lost in a haze of Bushian propoaganda to recall, Al Qaeda is a terrorist group that started the War on Terror when it highjacked airplanes and flew them into the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001.) 

     Obama’s position on Iraq is also based on his belief that we’re losing ground in this important war against Al Qaeda, in large part because we’re spending almost all our energy — nearly $1 trillion and more than 4,000 American lives so far – on “winning” the war in Iraq. 

    This all makes sense to me. It makes sense to most Americans, including those who read the New York Times and expect to see more than pointless drivel in the Op-Ed section.

     So here are some follow-up questions for McCain if he decides to work on a second draft.

     Won’t America be safer if we defeat Al Qaeda? Shouldn’t that be our top priority? Or is eliminating the threat of Al Qaeda not really all that important compared to ”winning” the war in Iraq? If so, why?

     If our primary goal is to destroy Al Qaeda (thereby demonstrating to our nation’s enemies that attacks against the United States will not go unpunished), is the war in Iraq doing the trick? Or is the war in Iraq merely a “distraction,” siphoning off resources, as Obama says?

     The only reference to Al Qaeda in McCain’s Op-Ed comes when he speculates about about what might happen if Obama withdrew the troops, writing, “The danger is that extremists supported by Al Qaeda and Iran could stage a comeback, as they have in the past when we’ve had too few troops in Iraq.” 

     A “comeback?” What does that mean? What makes “the danger” so dangerous? Why is preventing this “comeback” worth our blood and treasure? Why is it more important than the lives of our volunteer soldiers? 

      The word “comeback” makes it sound like we’re playing football. But this isn’t a game to be won for the sake of winning, for the sake of bragging rights. McCain writes, “I am also dismayed that (Obama) never talks about winning the war — only of ending it. But if we don’t win the war, our enemies will. A triumph for the terrorists would be a disaster for us. That is something I will not allow to happen as president.”

     McCain’s extensive experience with war is often talked about, but his Op-Ed makes him sound like a five-year-old who is just now grasping the concept of conflict. “If we don’t win the war, our enemies will.” What an insight! Thanks, Senator. He writes, “A triumph for the terrorists would be a disaster for us.” Next, he’ll tell us the sky is blue. The point isn’t that Obama and the millions of Americans who support his candidacy want to “lose” the war in Iraq. What we want, above all, is to protect this country.

     McCain’s empty rhetoric may be gratifying for those who care more about the Bush legacy than they care about protecting America. But ordinary Americans (readers of the New York Times, for example) want to know: Is Obama correct? Have the threats to our national security actually worsened since the war began? If so, isn’t this “a triumph” for the terrorists? Isn’t this “a disaster” for us?

      Strangely, disturbingly, McCain’s Op-Ed doesn’t say. In fact, America’s national security seems entirely irrelevant to McCain’s Op-Ed, which focuses almost exclusively on questions of how best to “win the war” in Iraq.

     If Obama is correct — if the threats to our national security have indeed grown since we invaded Iraq in March 2003 – then maybe we should start thinking about changing our strategy to make these threats go away? This is Obama’s fundamental point, and it’s a point McCain is utterly unwilling to discuss in his Op-Ed.

     Unsubstantiated fear has always been the primary tool used by hawks to gin up support for the war in Iraq, and McCain is no different. He tries to frighten his readers with talk of “the danger,” and the “failed state” that might be left behind in Iraq if the U.S. leaves.

     I’m not afraid of losing a war that isn’t worth winning. I’m more afraid of another terrorist attack on the United States. Obama clearly intends to prevent such an attack by bringing the full weight of America’s military might down on Al Qaeda. Obama wants us to stop fighting a war that won’t make us safer so we can fight a war that will make us safer.

     What do you think of that, Senator McCain? (And can you answer in 1,000 words or less, please?)

     Regaring McCain’s Op-Ed, all I can say is nice try. But the Times isn’t going to waste paper on a mindless campaign commercial. Come back when you have a plan to keep us safe.

    – Ian