House Teabaggers Don't Fear McCain's Pending Attack... Not Even A Little

No one in the House Republican caucus thinks the man who befriended Muammar Qaddafi and lolled away his evenings at the Qaddafi family ranch, is any kind of threat to their political careers.

Beltway Republicans expect McCain to blow any minute now-- and that the target of his wrath will be the far right of the House Republican caucus this time-- teabaggers, Know Nothings and the blatantly racist end of the party. But they're laughing at the 2008 presidential candidate. His opposition-- the louder and more vitriolic, the better-- makes them stronger with an electoral base that gets all its information from Hate Talk Radio and Fox News. He's mad because the right-wingers are blocking immigration reform again and letting their anti-Hispanic/anti-Asian freak flags fly one more time. McCain worries that they're leading the party into a ditch so deep they'll never recover-- sort of like what happened to the California Republican Party when it went off on a racist jihad against Hispanics and turned itself into a sad, toothless rump. Still, Molly Hooper at The Hill, perhaps looking for some political news during the long, sweltering July 4th weekend, predicts that McCain is "on a collision course with House conservatives" (although she means House reactionaries or House fascists. McCain is a conservative. John Barrow. Lindsey Graham, John Boehner and Walter Jones are conservatives. Steve King and Louie Gohmert and Steve Stockman and racists, fascists and, if you want to be polite, reactionaries).

Throughout his Senate career, McCain has clashed with House Republican lawmakers over high-profile issues, including campaign finance reform, detainee interrogation techniques, earmarks and tax cuts. This year, McCain has ripped Republicans in the lower chamber for not agreeing to enter into a budget conference with the Senate.

Some political observers believe it’s just a matter of time before McCain aggressively goes after House GOP members for not voting on the Senate-passed immigration measure.

The five-term senator has stopped short of criticizing Speaker John Boehner’s (R-Ohio) vow to move immigration reform only if a majority of House GOP lawmakers are on board. Yet, McCain made a pointed comment last weekend that suggested he would only bite his tongue for so long.

“I really don’t feel it's appropriate for me to tell [Boehner] exactly how he should handle this. But I think Republicans realize the implications for the future of the Republican Party in America if we don't get this issue behind us,” McCain said on Fox News Sunday.

Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa), who strongly opposes the Senate bill, took issue with McCain’s warning, but said he expects the 2008 GOP presidential nominee to continue challenging conservatives on the airwaves.

“Most of what [McCain] will do, in my anticipation is through the media. … He likes to drop a little bomb and watch how people will react, and he’ll do it again,” King said in an interview with The Hill.

King said McCain “should have learned his lesson” when he tried to pass immigration reform with the late Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.).

You can imagine how frustrating it is for a mainstream conservative like McCain when he finds himself on a team with people talking about, as Louie Gohmert recently did (video below) about people who have "a love for an animal" and want to get married-- a well known and long-standing problem in the east Texas district he represents.



Do you miss Michele Bachmann yet?

Cranky, Angry Old John McCain Wants Obama Off His Damn Lawn

The McCain campaign puts clips up on YouTube because they want people to watch them and come away thinking what a great candidate their man is. This morning I saw McCain on CNN, angry, hateful and desperate, lying his ass off about Senator Obama. I was fascinated... waiting, even after I had finished getting dressed and wanting to go downstairs, to see if he would start screeching that Obama is a damn nigger who didn't deserve the White House. McCain feels it's his due for being tortured in Iraq and being tortured again when he was caught taking bribes from family friend and crooked banker Charles Keating and for being tortured again when he had the presumption for running against George W. Bush. McCain is a tortured and angry man, filled with hatred, pent up violence and a sense of entitlement. I haven't been able to find the CNN clip today. It's filled with the mean old codger using the psychological technique of projection-- blaming Obama for all his own many failings. McCain who has always used war and the military as his political raison d'etre and used his captivity as a club against all opponents at all times, keeps accusing Obama of politicizing the Iraq War. Obama is a liar; Obama doesn't understand the war in Iraq; Obama is a flip-flopper; Obama's son learned from daddy how to profit from getting mixed up with shady banks...

Anyway, this is a clip I found on McCain's own website. It's just a straight forward stump speech-- McCain lying his ass off about Obama, what he does all day every day. It's all the campaign is about. It's why longtime GOP operative Mark McKinnon quit McCain's dishonorable and disgusting campaign and watched Rove take over and make it more dishonorable and more disgusting.

McCAIN, REJECTED BY HIS SENATE COLLEAGUES, VICIOUSLY LASHES OUT AT SENATOR OBAMA

The overwhelming veto-proof approval of the bipartisan GI Bill is being looked at by the media as a slap in the face for Bush. And it was. But a far worse message was delivered-- by his Republican colleagues-- to John McCain. He was close to psychotic today when he found that the final tally, 75-22, had more Republicans voting with Obama and Clinton than with him. He had personally appealed to the Senate caucus to hold together on this and not let the Democrats make him look like an idiot. With the exception of a bunch of Bush Regime dead-enders and his own yippy-yappy gay South Carolina lapdog, the Republicans in the Senate caucus abandoned him in droves-- especially the ones who are up for re-election in November. They have all seen the value of his coattails writ large after the special elections in Illinois-- where he staked all his prestige on Oberweis-- and in Mississippi, where every single Republican household got an automated phone message from McCain. When Obama gently criticized McCain for trying to force fellow Republicans into filibustering a popular measure to give veterans a fair shake, McCain exploded in paroxysms of venomous psychosis. Before we go over his mental breakdown, here's what he was reacting to:

"I respect Senator John McCain's service to our country. He is one of those heroes of which I speak. But I can't understand why he would line up behind the president in opposition to this GI bill. I can't believe why he believes it is too generous to our veterans. I could not disagree with him and the president more on this issue. There are many issues that lend themselves to partisan posturing, but giving our veterans the chance to go to college should not be one of them."

McCain treated that like a declaration of war, which is exactly how he treats anyone disagreeing with him about anything. On a day when all the newspapers were talking about how his campaign is overrun with crooked lobbyists whose sleazy clients are paying them to get his favors, and on a day when McCain denounced the religious right again and severed his relationships with Reverend Hagee and Reverend Parsley, two avatars of modern day Republicanism, and on a day when the Senate voted overwhelmingly against him on an issue he (quite disingenuously) claims to be an expert on, McCain just lost it, lashing out at Obama and showing the two-bit thug side of his personality he is always trying to keep under wraps.

"It is typical, but no less offensive that Senator Obama uses the Senate floor to take cheap shots at an opponent and easy advantage of an issue he has less than zero understanding of... Both Senator Webb and I are united in our deep appreciation for the men and women who risk their lives so that the rest of us may be secure in our freedom. And I take a backseat to no one in my affection, respect and devotion to veterans. And I will not accept from Senator Obama, who did not feel it was his responsibility to serve our country in uniform, any lectures on my regard for those who did. Perhaps, if Senator Obama would take the time and trouble to understand this issue he would learn to debate an honest disagreement respectfully. But, as he always does, he prefers impugning the motives of his opponent, and exploiting a thoughtful difference of opinion to advance his own ambitions. If that is how he would behave as President, the country would regret his election."

UGLY! I wonder how many Republicans who have to run with him on top of the ticket are starting to feel some buyer's remorse about now. Many senators were embarrassed and one GOP solon said it was the most vicious personal public attack he had every heard in his 18 years in the U.S. Senate. McCain seems to be coming apart-- the campaign hasn't really even begun and he's already unhinged. But everyone knows, especially his wife (who he publicly called "a cunt") that he's on a hair-trigger.

As usual Obama was cool, calm and collected in his response to McCain's personal nastiness.

"I am proud to stand with Senator Webb and a bipartisan coalition to give our veterans the support and opportunity they deserve. It's disappointing that Senator McCain and his campaign used this issue to launch yet another lengthy personal, political attack instead of debating an honest policy difference. He should know that this is not about John McCain or Barack Obama-- it's about giving our veterans a real chance to afford four years of college without harming retention. Senator Webb's bipartisan bill will do this, and the bill that John McCain supports would not. These endless diatribes and schoolyard taunts from the McCain campaign do nothing to advance the debate about what matters to the American people."

JOHN W. McCAIN-- YES, EVEN WORSE THAN GEORGE W. BUSH

One of the impressions I walked away with after a briefing at the DNC where polling data was shared with journalists and bloggers was that most Americans have vague impressions about McCain but that the "maverick" and "moderate" hype hasn't sunk in, regardless of how heavily pushed it has been by his allies in the Inside-the-Beltway media. Sycophants like Broder and Tweety can swoon over him all they like, but most Americans are still wondering who he is. An extensive page one story in today's Washington Post, one that was apparently kept away from Broder, goes a long way towards helping at least their readers to understand who the real John McCain is.

The Post writer, Michael Leahy, could have saved himself a lot of time and effort by reprinting Cliff Schecter's brilliant new book, The Real McCain: Why Conservatives Don't Trust Him-- and Why Independents Shouldn't, but fortunately he used enough of Schecter's research and ideas to make the piece worthwhile. He starts with a well-documented scene of an angry and obviously deranged McCain attacking Iowa Republican Senator Charles Grassley at a Senate committee meeting. This particular time it only amounted to the much disliked McCain-- disliked by his Senate colleagues (except pathetic bottom feeders like Lieberman and Miss Lindsey)-- cursing, pushing and shoving, ever the high school spoiled bully. Later Leahy gets to Schecter's revelation about how McCain and fellow Arizona wingnut, Rick Renzi, actually got into a punch out (although, here too McCain's lobbyists swear up and down that it was just pushing and shoving and that no punches were thrown; witnesses say otherwise).

Since the beginning of McCain's public life, the many witnesses to his temper have had strikingly different reactions to it. Some depict McCain, now the presumptive Republican nominee for president, as an erratic hothead incapable of staying cool in the face of what he views as either disloyalty to him or irrational opposition to his ideas... Former senator Bob Smith, a New Hampshire Republican, expresses worries about McCain: "His temper would place this country at risk in international affairs, and the world perhaps in danger. In my mind, it should disqualify him... "I've witnessed a lot of his temper and outbursts. For me, some of this stuff is relevant. It raises questions about stability... It's more than just temper. It's this need of his to show you that he's above you-- a sneering, condescending attitude. It's hurt his relationships in Congress... I've seen it up-close."

And, then of course, there are the Lieber-men and others hoping to benefit from a McCain presidency, the ones who will say anything to cover up for him no matter how dangerous his instability and vindictiveness could be for America. Of course when is the last time anyone with a bit of credibility claimed that Lieberman gave a crap about America (or for Connecticut; Lieberman is all about Lieberman... and the Likud Party).

That temper has followed him throughout his life, McCain acknowledges. He recalls in his writings how, as a toddler, he sometimes held his breath and fainted during moments of fury. As the son of a naval officer who was on his way to becoming a four-star admiral, McCain found himself frequently uprooted and enrolled in new schools, where, as an underappreciated outsider, he developed "a little bit of a chip on my shoulder," as he recalled this month.

During a campaign stop at Episcopal High School in Alexandria, the most famous graduate of the Class of 1954 opened a window on what swirled inside him during his school years. "I was always the new kid and was accustomed to proving myself quickly at each new school as someone not to be challenged lightly," he told students.

"As a young man, I would respond aggressively and sometimes irresponsibly to anyone who I perceived to have questioned my sense of honor and self-respect. Those responses often got me in a fair amount of trouble earlier in life."

He defied authority, ridiculed other students, sometimes fought. The nicknames hung on him at Episcopal mocked his hair-trigger feistiness: "Punk" and "McNasty." Hoping to emulate his father and grandfather, also an admiral, he went on to the Naval Academy, where his pattern of unruliness and defiance continued, landing him near the bottom of his class. "I acted like a jerk," McCain wrote of the period before he righted himself to become a naval aviator, a Vietnam POW and eventually a career politician.

The trajectory of his temper, studied ever more intently as his White House ambitions took shape, includes incidents from his years in the House and in the Senate, leading up to the early days of his current presidential campaign. In 2007, during a heated closed-door discussion with Senate colleagues about the contentious immigration issue, he angrily shouted a profanity at a fellow Republican, John Cornyn of Texas, an incident that quickly found its way into headlines.

The ugly truth that no one in the media wants to get into, though, is what this temper and anger and feeling of being unfettered by the rules that govern the rest of us has led to one catastrophe after another in McCain's life, including half a dozen "accidents" involving plane crashes, one of which killed over 100 American sailors and destroyed tens of millions of dollars in planes. There is always, always, always an excuse, no matter how many times he would screw up-- and he was never to blame, even if the only constant in every single instance was... John McCain, the guy who didn't follow any rules. McCain: "In all candor, as an adult I've been known to forget occasionally the discretion expected of a person of my many years and station when I believe I've been accorded a lack of respect I did not deserve." Always the self-righteous asshole.

The Inside-the-Beltway media has always excused McCain's outrageous behavior and, in fact, tried to help him turn it to his own advantage, painting him as a kind of "Im-Angry-As-Hell-And-I'm-Not-Gonna- Take-It-Anymore kind of guy. Leahy is right on cue: "McCain has built much of his appeal, especially with independents, as the fiery maverick willing to defy both parties. His tempestuousness has girded him in high-stakes confrontations, especially against Republican conservatives who regard his occasionally moderate stances as proof that he has sold them out." And no one ever mentions, even when they report the facts, as Leahy does today, that McCain's howling angry and bully-boy attitude is very frequently directed towards women. He's the Senate's worst misogynist, especially if he senses he can frighten a woman into backing down.

Anyone who wants to see if it's possible for a worse president than George Bush-- with a possibility for even worse outcomes, ought to seriously consider voting for his political heir, John McCain. Everyone else... well, start by watching this new ad from our friends at the DNC: