McCain Mocks Idea Of Presidential Talks With Enemies, Despite Fact That Majority Of Americans Favor It
McCain Mocks Idea Of Presidential Talks With Enemies, Despite Fact That Majority Of Americans Favor It
Speaking at the America Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) meeting today, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) derided the idea of direct talks with the Iranian leadership, as favored by Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL), mocking “the hope that we can talk sense into them“:
[W]e hear talk of a meeting with the Iranian leadership offered up as if it were some sudden inspiration, a bold new idea that somehow nobody has ever thought of before. Yet it’s hard to see what such a summit with President Ahmadinejad would actually gain, except an earful of anti-Semitic rants, and a worldwide audience for a man who denies one Holocaust and talks before frenzied crowds about starting another.
McCain has compared negotiating with Iran to Neville Chamberlain and the appeasement of Hitler prior to World War II. Last month, he insisted Obama “ought to explain to the American people” why he wants to negotiate with Iranian leaders.
It turns out Americans don’t require much explanation. A new poll shows that a majority of Americans favors direct presidential meetings “with leaders of foreign countries considered to be enemies of the United States”:
The poll found that about six in 10 Americans favor direct presidential talks with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad specifically. “Both positions enjoy broad popular appeal, with majorities of men, women, younger and older Americans, and those from different regions of the country all saying direct presidential-level talks with Iran and other enemies are a good idea,” Gallup reports.
McCain has said that “the American people want a president who is prepared to lead our country in a dangerous world.” Apparently he hasn’t listened to how they want that president to lead the country.
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61 Responses to “McCain Mocks Idea Of Presidential Talks With Enemies, Despite Fact That Majority Of Americans Favor It”
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The reich-wing GOPigs, always on the wrong side of every issue.
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:25 pmWho says President Obama will be talking with Ahmedinejad anyhow? He'll more likely be talking to his successor after the Iranian people boot Mahmoud (aka Iran's Bush) out of office in the summer of 2009.
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:28 pmThe old man needs to prove he isn't senile now, which is likely impossible. Hard to imagine anyone voting for someone suffering from dementia, cancer, torture, PSTD. This is all the thugs can front for president?
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:29 pmKinda scary that Johnny Boy is turning out to be just as stubborn (and stupid) as Dubya.
Guess it is those inbred Repug genes at work again!
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:30 pmIt's hard for McCain to see:
benefits to diplomacy and talking to our enemies
benefits of a revised GI-Bill
waterboarding as torture
an exit strategy for the occupation of Iraq
any further than Bush's backside
It's hard for me to see:
McCain as President
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:30 pmThe poll found that about six in 10 Americans favor direct presidential talks with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad specifically.
The Iranians are so sick of Mamoud's mouth that he's likely to become or in the process of becoming irrelevant by the time Obama becomes President.
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:33 pmSomeone should ask mcbush if he was against nixon talking with the Vietnamese so we could bring him home.
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:37 pmAddressing the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) today, Republican presidential nominee John McCain called for a global campaign of divestment from Iran. He might want to start with his own campaign manager, Rick Davis, whose work on behalf of Ukrainian mogul Rinat Akhmetov included business dealings with Tehran. As it turns out, John McCain is following Mitt Romney and Dick Cheney as just the latest hard-line Republican to run afoul of his own plans for Iranian disinvestment.
For the details, see:
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:40 pm"McCain, Like Romney and Cheney, Runs Afoul of Iran Divestment Pledge."
Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer.
Sun-tzu
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:41 pmChinese general & military strategist (~400 BC)
Obama needs to answer these challenges directly. He should start with the fact that the Iranians marched in the street in support of the US after 9/11 and cooperated with the US in turning over suspected AQ members. Obama should note that Iran had a moderate president with a lot of popular support. True, the clerics still run the country, but this was a good step in the right direction.
Then Obama needs to speak about how the "cowboy", "bring-it-on" mentality of George Bush made our job far tougher in Iraq. Bush included Iran in its Axis of Evil. Instead of expanding cooperation between the two countries in the fight against terror, Bush made it clear that we wanted regime change. No wonder why nationalism and support for the clerics grew to new heights. No wonder why a new, radical president was elected. No wonder why Iran now feels the need to support various militias in Iraq to gain influence with the eventual permanent government.
This is what happens when you fail to use diplomacy with those who (can I say enemies - pre9/11 and immediately post 9/11 they were not enemies) may oppose some of you policies to act in cooperation where goals are shared and eventually defuse them as a threat or turn them to your way of thinking.
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:41 pmWell, McStyoopid, what are we to do? Oh...bomb bomb bomb bomb bomb Iran...
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:42 pmIt's obvious, my friends, that McCain doesn't want to talk one-on-one with Ahmadinejad.
I mean, you've seen how 'with-it' McCain is about foreign affairs in general, his knowledge of the middle east, number of troops fighting, Iran's government structure, who is being trained where and by whom, who-hates-who-and-why, etc. (Picture Lieberman whispering into Johnny Mac's ear.)
Ahmadinejad would eat his lunch.
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:43 pmGrampy McSame says: Kill 'em all and let Allah sort 'em out.
Um, Grampy...?
HELL NO.
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:45 pmhttp://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=080602124328.f6eyi8y1&show_article=1
What is the acceptable number of dead Jews? That would be the starting point of negotiating with no preconditions.
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:45 pmIf Obama becomes president AIPAC would have him killed in no time. Washington's strongest lobby would really hate to see a black man with muslim roots as president.
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:45 pmLOL, I honestly don't know who is worse. Dictator Bush himself or his "mini me" McBush who is actually thinking he has a chance in this presidential race. LOL this is too funny!
JJ
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:46 pmOnline Privacy when it Counts
VA Voter Says:
What is the acceptable number of dead Jews? That would be the starting point of negotiating with no preconditions.
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:45 pm
_______
Are you proposing a cap-and-trade system for Jew-killing?
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:50 pmDaTruth Says:
Washington’s strongest lobby would really hate to see a black man with muslim roots as president.
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:45 pm
______
I guess we'll never have a black President, then.
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:54 pmActually, McCain has a point. If (god forbid) he was elected president, I wouldn't want him talking to world leaders at all, especially anyone he viewed as an enemy. I don't want a US president screaming and throwing things at another country's president, cursing them and threatening to blow them up because they jingled their keys in their pockets.
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:56 pmHey, VA Voter - ask PASTOR freaking HAGEE about the acceptable number of dead Jews, why don'tcha????
Moron.
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:57 pmI’m saying that if one side staring point is to destroy Israel and kill all the Jews in the world, and our side wants all Jews to live, then what you would be negotiating is the acceptable number of dead Jews. So Negotiating with that type of evil is pointless.
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:57 pmHmmm.... amazing how something as basic as diplomacy is no longer on the table for the right wing....
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:04 pmDiplomacy is not off the table. Our State department should talk to our enemy's state department.
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:07 pmNot only will McCain never speak with any leader of any country that doesn't leave lip prints all over our butt, but he will do his best to inflate them into the largest boogeyman imaginable in the eyes of the American people, and then if he's successful at that, he'll bomb them.
This is basically the system our current leadership has been using for the past several years, and McInsane is even crazier than Bushco in this department. The problem is that this system produces short-term fear in the populace (making them easier to control), and it keeps Israel happy. The long-term effects, however, are...well, take a look at Iraq as a model.
Personally, I'd rather have a president who sees the world in a more realistic light than the skewed perspective of the neocons. And a president who understands the difference between "talking" and "appeasement".
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:07 pmMcPander Bear is out of touch with reality. Why can't he see that Americans will not tolerate another President who Believes it's his duty and privilege to make decisions for us?
Here's a newsflash Skippy: running on a platform built on how one intends to defy the will of the American People serves to display the utter unsuitability of a candidate. Please don't change a thing.
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:09 pmVA Voter Says:
So Negotiating with that type of evil is pointless.
Actually, trying to communicate to dumbass trolls like you with anything more than monosyllable words and grunts is what is pointless
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:10 pmI’m saying that if one side staring point is to destroy Israel and kill all the Jews in the world, and our side wants all Jews to live, -V V.
But Hagee [your side] doesnt want all the Jews to live, hes a dispensationalist.
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:11 pmWayne:
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:18 pmHave you tried simple words like "fair" and "tax" yet?
Correction, Xisithrus - Hagee and his Rapture-ready pals only need 144,000 Jews to live. You know, so they can convert to Christianity?
The rest are ...disposable, just like the rest of us heathens.
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:19 pmI don't care about Hagee. He isn't trying to build nukes.
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:19 pmGREAT! Keep it up, McIIIrd! Keep pandering to the forty percenters... Great job! Hold the line, stiff upper lip!
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:20 pmI thought nukes were good deterents or is that just the explaination for ours?
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:23 pmI don’t care about Hagee. He isn’t trying to build nukes. -V V
Great non-response.
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:25 pmI wasn't gonna do it, but, hey VA Voter. You seem to be trapped by the misconception that we are, by definition, the good guys. The last time I checked, Iran hasn't ever taken direct military action against Israel. In fact, despite the rhetoric of some of their more radical voices, they haven't proved to be a credible threat to anyone in modern times. The U.S. on the other hand has killed countless innocent Iraqis and Afghans while blathering about saving them from tyranny. I would guess that candidates in foreign countries don't win any points for being willing to talk to us.
Now, here's a question for you.
How many lives, including "enemies", would have to be saved to call direct talks with Iran, or anyone else for that matter, a success?
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:28 pmWouldn't pretty much any enemy of Israel want nukes, to offset the threat of annhilation from Israel? And why does Israel need us to help protect them, seeing as how they've got a coupla hundred of these bad boys ready to smoke?
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:28 pmI don’t care about Hagee. He isn’t trying to build nukes.
Try looking at a map sometime, moron. How many Muslims would die from an Iranian nuke detonation in Israel?
Hundreds of thousands, more, if the wind shifts. Would Iran really nuke Israel, if it meant Egypt, Syria, Palestine, and all the surrounding muslim-dominated countries, would be irradiated as well?
Christ, how do you get out of bed in the morning with such a profound lack of intelligence?
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:41 pmRepublicans use fear as a political manipulator.
That, by definition, is terrorism.
It follows then, that Republicans ARE terrorists.
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:42 pmHagee doesn't need to cover the expense of developing nukes. If he gets his way, his Republicriminal buddies will nuke anyone he hates in an apocalyptic wet dream. Which is exactly why any legitimate candidate would treat him like the marginal nutbag he is.
And just to counter the inevitable trollish crap, after researching both reverends fairly extensively, I've never heard Rev. Wright call for violence against anyone while Pastor Hagee does little else. One can have legitimate issues with either one, but, the words/beliefs of the two are so fundamentally different that direct comparison is ridiculous.
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:43 pmHow is bombing them any better than at least trying to talk to them first?
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:45 pmHow is bombing them any better than at least trying to talk to them first?
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:45 pmHow is bombing them any better than at least trying to talk to them first?
Because bombing worked so well against the USSR...
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:47 pmoctamethyl Says:
How is bombing them any better than at least trying to talk to them first?
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:45 pm
_______
The Pentagon doesn't sign $2.9 billion contracts for talk bombs.
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:49 pmVA Voter Says:
I don’t care about Hagee. He isn’t trying to build nukes.
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:19 pm
______
Neither is Iran. What's your point?
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:50 pmhttp://www.examiner.com/a-1419425~Peter_Schweizer__Conservatives_more_honest_than_liberals_.html
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:55 pmForget about VAVoter (just another AIPAC neocon POS tool). Let's not even get into the fact that Iran's president NEVER ONCE stated that he wanted to kill all the jews. This fool is against dealing directly with Iran but I somehow get the feeling that it had no problems with Ronnie Raygun giving them all those arms back in the day. I bet all those weapons were going toward peaceful solutions, right?
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:57 pmHey VA, found a map yet, idiot?
June 2nd, 2008 at 2:59 pmOooooooh, Peter Schweizer! Another research fellow at the Hoover Institute! How impressive, a right wing neocon Israel azzlicker writes a story about how honest the Right Wing is. This guy spins faster than a supercharged laser powered draidel.
June 2nd, 2008 at 3:03 pmOne of the scariest parts of the fear & smear tactic used the last 7 years is how many idiots buy into this shit.
We've got a host of Trolls appear daily, wallowing up to their red necks in this manure.
We've got mainstream media parroting every talking point of (R)'s.
We've got ex-officio members, (Rove, Snow, Fleischer, Wolfowitz, Feith, etc.), appearing now as 'expert' talking heads, changing their stories daily.
We've got Senators, (LIEberman, Graham, McCain, Imhofe, etc.) altering or fabricating facts to replace lies & distortions.
We've got Bush & Cheney still proclaiming bald faced lies daily.
But! We've got McLelland trying to tell the truth. Thanks, Scotty. We may find intelligent life yet under this administration.
June 2nd, 2008 at 3:04 pmGrampy McSame says - My friends back in the day we would never consider talking to Amenineedajob, oh no, that would never do, why would Americans want to do that, no, no, why that would be bad, how could we just make up stuff about him and Siria (Joe Liberman whispers in McSames' ear) er ah, Iran, we Americans know we are always right about stuff we know nothing about, and how can we trust Americans to make the right choice anyway, just look what the last 8 years has gotten us, prosperity and peace, and lots of surging and stuff, why everyone one I talk to is real happy with things, all my servants say that that are happy....Beans and bacon in my pants makes me do a happy dance.
Grampy, you got nothing, if you don't talk to them, how are you going to discover that you are wrong? Oh, that's right, repukes are never wrong, I their mind, that is.
June 2nd, 2008 at 3:06 pmGo, Grampy, go, Grampy, go Grampy, GO!! ;o)
June 2nd, 2008 at 3:40 pmFrom the NYT article:
Right tougher sanctions to pressure a hostile regime to fold?
Now didnt we try that with some other country not too long ago? How did that turn out? Oh yeah it strengthened the regime and only punished the civilian population. And when sanctions didnt work a moron US president decided to start a war causing even more death and destruction.
Also a bit ironic McCain talking about pressuring Iran like the South African apartheid-regime, in order to protect another apartheid system in the Palestinian territories.
June 2nd, 2008 at 3:45 pmC&L
Michael Ware of CNN said, “Senator McCain has been here, what, more than half a dozen times,” Ware said. “And we’ve seen him get assessments of Iraq terribly wrong. So I wouldn’t be hanging my hat on the fact that your opponent has only been here once.
“And let’s not forget what do American officials get to see? Well, they get to see the rooftops of a lot of Iraqi houses as they chopper over them or across vast expanses of desert. They get to see rooms in the inside of U.S. bases in the Green Zone, both of which are divorced from reality. And they’ll get inundated with military briefings.”
This is consistent with what Sen. Jim Webb (D-Va.), a decorated combat veteran and a former Secretary of the Navy, said when he called visits from congressional delegations “dog and pony shows.”
So visiting Baghdad and buying 5 rugs for $5, doesn't tell you much about the status of the war and the country?
June 2nd, 2008 at 4:06 pmVA Voter Says:
I’m saying that if one side staring point is to destroy Israel and kill all the Jews in the world, and our side wants all Jews to live, then what you would be negotiating is the acceptable number of dead Jews. So Negotiating with that type of evil is pointless.
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:57 pm
______
You're absolutely right. Negotiating with that type of evil is indeed pointless. However, since we're not negotiating with some cartoon supervillain, your point is moronic.
Your premise is simply false. Iran's "starting point" is not to destroy Israel and not to kill all the Jews in the world, or they certainly would have started with the 55,000 Jews who live in Iran.
June 2nd, 2008 at 4:13 pmMcCain forgets Iran-Contra.
June 2nd, 2008 at 4:16 pmReagan negotiated the elimination of nukes in Europe with Gorbachev at a time when they had thousands of nukes targeted at the United States, our enemy then. Reagan was a foreign policy hero for negotiating with the enemy.
McCain HAS to reach back to the time of Hitler to make his revisionist history work.
June 2nd, 2008 at 4:21 pmDo those of us on the left not realize the religious nuttiness that is heavy in this argument concerning Iran and Israel?
It think it's strange that we are so out for freedom of religion (which I support wholeheartedly) that we seem incapable of calling people out for the fact that their wacko views are patently religious ones and without merit. Especially when those views are held by those who are ready to kill each other over them.
I think we should be calling out ALL of these people for their dumb views.
Sorry to be off topic.
June 2nd, 2008 at 4:35 pmMr.Bungle Says:
It think it’s strange that we are so out for freedom of religion (which I support wholeheartedly) that we seem incapable of calling people out for the fact that their wacko views are patently religious ones and without merit.
June 2nd, 2008 at 4:35 pm
________
Wacko religious views? Pah! Religion is merely the decorative floral detail on the icing of the Greater Middle Eastern conflict-cake. Sure, there may be a few Rapture-Ready ruminants cheerleading the upcoming Iran War to satisfy their Revelation fantasies, but otherwise religion is almost completely irrelevant.
If Iran weren't sitting on 90 billion barrels of crude and 23 trillion cubic meters of natural gas, we wouldn't be having this discussion.
June 2nd, 2008 at 4:47 pmthe awful truth
June 2nd, 2008 at 5:02 pmReagan negotiated the elimination of nukes in Europe with Gorbachev at a time when they had thousands of nukes targeted at the United States, our enemy then. Reagan was a foreign policy hero for negotiating with the enemy.
McCain HAS to reach back to the time of Hitler to make his revisionist history work. -- Xisithrus
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Damn...you beat me to it. Exactly the point that I was going to make.
However, as long as we're on that tack...what about the SALT -- Strategic Arms Limitations Treaty -- talks that Presidents Nixon (SALT I) and Carter (SALT II) had with Leonid Brezhnev? Hell, I'm not forty yet but I remember the SALT II Talks and know that I had at least some understanding of what they were about even though I was only twelve or so at the time. I know that I have a better memory than a lot of people but it surely can't be that much better -- unless that fact that I don't drink has something to do with it -- and at McCain's age, if he can't remember the SALT Talks or glasnost, it's not a good sign (or am I the only person who's been struck with the thought that perhaps McCain's gaffes could potentially be a sign that he's already in the early stages of Alzheimer's?)
June 2nd, 2008 at 9:30 pmFrom the May 16, 2008 Wall Street Journal, "Recently, Libyan strongman Col. Moammar Gadhafi wrote a letter to President Bush, asking: Where are we going with our relationship? Five years ago, the Bush administration helped persuade Libya -- for decades one of the world's leading sponsors of terrorism..."
June 3rd, 2008 at 12:54 amWhat's this about talking to our "enemies." Bush did it (gee, do you think maybe he did something right?!?) It seems much better than starting more wars and killing more innocent people.
Wacko religious views? Pah! Religion is merely the decorative floral detail on the icing of the Greater Middle Eastern conflict-cake. Sure, there may be a few Rapture-Ready ruminants cheerleading the upcoming Iran War to satisfy their Revelation fantasies, but otherwise religion is almost completely irrelevant.
If Iran weren’t sitting on 90 billion barrels of crude and 23 trillion cubic meters of natural gas, we wouldn’t be having this discussion. -- Hussein Toasterhead
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Exactly. After all, North Korea is one of the countries which Bush included among the "Axis of Evil" back in the 2002 State of the Union address -- and at least in the earlier years of the Bush administration, the North Korean government seemed to be sending clear signals of an active nuclear weapons program:
1) In 2003, they withdrew from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty -- allegedly over failure on our part to uphold our end of the Agreed Framework, an agreement which we signed with them in 1994...
2) In early 2003 -- allegedly in response to the collapse of Agreed Framework -- North Korea expelled United Nations inspectors, removed the inspectors' monitoring equipment, and resumed reprocessing of spent fuel rods
3) In 2004, a Pakistani scientist by the name of Abdul Qadeer Kahn (acknowledged as the founder of their nuclear program) admitted that he had provided North Korea with information potentially enabling them to begin an enriched uranium program in exchange for missile technology -- a confession initially confirmed by President Musharraf but recently retracted by Dr. Khan...
4) In 2006, North Korea announced that they had completed a successful nuclear test -- and seismographic activity recorded by both the United States and Japan at around the time of the alleged test lends at least some credibility to this claim...
5) North Korea is known to have short-range missile technology which allows them to strike Japan and South Korea as well as parts of China and Russia. Long-range missile technology is under development which could theoretically reach Alaska or even the West Coast -- however, a test in 2005 was a failure.
So what happened -- or rather, why did nothing happen? Why did we never launch attacks against North Korea -- or even rattle our saber towards them nearly as often towards them as we did towards Iraq and are currently doing towards Iran? Granted, it's quite possible that China was a major deterrent -- it's a historical fact that China assisted North Korea during the Korean War and still provides support in terms of food aid, so it seems somewhat unlikely that China would have reacted well had the United States launched attacks against a sometime ally (never mind one right across their own border). Under pressure from China, North Korea eventually agreed to multi-lateral talks with the United States and China with the additional cooperation of Japan, Russia, and South Korea (and someone explain to me -- if you can!-- why this doesn't qualify as "negotiating with the enemy"). However, it's equally if not even more plausible that oil is the primary rationale. Iran and Iraq are reportedly among the world's top five countries in terms of proven oil reserves -- the other three being Saudi Arabia (naturally), Canada, and Kuwait -- but North Korea has little if any resources to speak of that we need, which is probably why we haven't done anything to them. The United States is, after all, proud of its image as a defender of democracy -- but the fact is that the image is not entirely deserved. We're quite capable of defending democracy when it suits our purposes to do so, but also quite capable of turning a blind eye to injustice and tyranny if it doesn't. We're even quite capable of subverting democracy when it suits our purposes to do so as well...Operation Ajax, anyone?
June 3rd, 2008 at 3:36 am