Comments on: McCain Lobbies For Taiwan Arms Sales After Taiwan Signs Lobbying Contract With His Adviser’s Firm

By: MapleStreet

MapleStreet — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 22:23:01 +0000

I’m missing something here. We’re kissing up to China who is demanding Taiwan. So if we sell arms to Taiwan but support China, aren’t we egging both sides on ?

Sounds like that lobbyist who took money from the Indians only to lobby against them.

By: wiley

wiley — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 22:00:01 +0000

The work would probably be outsourced to China anyway.

By: Max-1

Max-1 — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 17:58:00 +0000

Divestment of Lobbyist ties begins…
… NEVER?

By: theswan

theswan — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 17:49:53 +0000

The bush / mccain military industrial complex just goes on and on. And what will be the consequence? McCain may think more jobs, but I might see mainland China asking to for hundreds of billions of dollars that the US owes them in return. Sort of a trade. When republicans up the ante they better have the resources to back themselves up. But bush / mccain have spent all their capitol, remember? Or can they request another bailout from the American taxpayer to build more weapondry to shoot up in smoke? So is now the time to start trade-offs of more military might? As bush loves war so may the whole world if mccain steals the election.

By: squidbilly

squidbilly — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 16:49:12 +0000

The “Maverick” and his team in action – Sounds very “Washington politics” to me.

The sad thing is McCain isn’t totally bad (he really is bad on economics and the resolution of Iraq situation), but he has been “jello molded” into the republican platform and the far right wingers agendas – he just looks very uncomfortable in it.

His body language in last night’s debate was a sure sign (stiff shoulders, looked tired, no eye contact, leaving the debate site without mingling with the audience).

By: Doc Rock

Doc Rock — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 16:27:01 +0000

Corrupt and unprincipled, that’s our opportunistic candidate John McCozy.

By: christopher wiwi

christopher wiwi — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 16:25:55 +0000

So much for reforming, Mcwars will continue to say and do anything probably after the election too.

By: Leftside Annie

Leftside Annie — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 15:54:51 +0000

Awwww, now, isn’t that just cozy…?

By: Peter C

Peter C — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 15:48:10 +0000

I wish we’d give up on the idea that we should find global hot spots and make sure that they are as militarized as possible. I see why this benefits our domestic military industrial complex, but it feels like insulating around your stove, furnace, and fireplace with dynamite – not a smart way to keep your house at a comfortable temperature.

Taiwan is a VERY sensitive issue to China. That LAST thing we need are more cowboys ‘shooting from the hip’ to help out their crony-friends in the defense industry.

By: The Republic of Stupidity

The Republic of Stupidity — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 15:30:13 +0000

Gee, no conflict of interest in any of that, huh?

Move along, move along… nothing here to see… look… something shiny!!

By: DidHeJustSayThat

DidHeJustSayThat — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 15:24:34 +0000

He’s admitted access is influence. That he came to Washington to change it and it changed him.

You’d think he wasn’t speaking English when tells the country he’s corrupt.

McCain being McCain, give ‘em a pass!

By: 5th Estate

5th Estate — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 15:11:48 +0000

Sven Ortmann… thanks sven, I wasn’t sure about the state of US conventional sub construction, but I was sure I hadn’t heard of any diesel-electrics coming out od the US yards for years.

And now of course the new thing is the Air-Independent subs which the US has no expertise in either, nor any advances in electrical propulsion.

In a ‘free-market’ Taiwan could buy from anyone other than the US, but no doubt the US will try to bully them into buying American.

By: shoeless

shoeless — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 15:06:57 +0000

John McCain is such a Maverick that he doesn’t care about stated U.S. foriegn policy!

By: misshusseinmolly

misshusseinmolly — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 15:06:26 +0000

If we elect McCain, we can just look forward to four more years of foreign policy crafted around the needs of political cronies. And we see how well the Halliburton foreign policy has worked so far, haven’t we?

The only people McCain knows are lobbyists. They will be the only people his administration will serve.

By: 5th Estate

5th Estate — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 15:04:58 +0000

“These sales — which could translate into tens of thousands of jobs here at home — would help retain America’s edge in the production of advanced weaponry and represent a positive sign in these difficult economic times.”

Firstly an order for, say 40 f-16’s and 2 or 4 subs would mean that current job holders would get to keep their jobs, but it wouldn’t create any jobs ( as McCain is implying ) or even recover any jobs previously lost.
Nor would such an order actually involve “tens of thousands”, not even indirectly.

Secondly at least as far as F-16’s go, they are not “advanced weaponry” in the current sense being close to 30 years old now–though they are still very effective planes when fully optioned.

McCain will surely use this exaggeration in his campaign ( just has he claimed that the saved the US billions on the USAF Air Tanker when in fact the contract is being re-written, apparently in Boeing’s favor, after EADS/Airbus won the contract partly by default due to Boeing’s bribing of the procurement officer. McCain happens to have been given campaign contributions by EADS/AIRBUS.
After Boeing cried “no fair” the whole thing is back to square one, the current USAF tanker fleet is creaking along and absolutely NO money has been saved.

By: hussein toasterhead

hussein toasterhead — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 15:01:59 +0000

Also – isn’t this in violation of stated U.S. foreign policy and the 1982 U.S.-PRC joint communique?

By: liberal traitor

liberal traitor — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 14:57:22 +0000

See, what you Libruls don’t understand is that this is the genius of McCain. He really is a maverick because he has a strategy to fight the corrupt lobbyist culture of Washington.

Scheunemann and Davis and all the rest being so intertwined with McCain’s campaign is simply part of his strategy of nullifying them. After all, you keep your friends close and your enemies closer, right? He’s just cozying up to all these lobbyists in order to lull the rest of them into a false sense of security until he brings the hammer down.

The hammer comes down when he magically wins the Iraq War, the Afghanistan War, the (coming) Iran War, fixes the economy, fixes health care, AND lowers taxes on EVERYONE at the exact same time.

SUPER MCCAIN TO THE RESCUE!!!

By: Sven Ortmann

Sven Ortmann — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 14:57:18 +0000

The problem with the SSK (submarine) promise was and IS that U.S. shipyards (there are only three to speak of) have no experience in conventional submarine construction, let alone modern SSK construction. There was no U.S. conventional submarine (SSK) design since the 50’s.
That’s also why the USN isn’t really prepared against SSKs and had to exercise with a Swedish one for some months to understand SSKs.

The SSK export market has been dominated by Germany (Typ 209, Typ 214), Russia (Kilo class family) and France (marketing the Scorpène class now) since about 30 years.

By: BearCountry

BearCountry — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 14:54:17 +0000

Are any of mccain’s lobbyist advisors fighting with each other yet by lobbying on opposite sides of the same question? mccain’s talk of not having lobbyists running things is, of course, hollow like everything else he says.

By: hussein toasterhead

hussein toasterhead — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 14:52:44 +0000

Oh, THAT’s a good idea, McCain – let’s just piss off China right before we go asking them for a few hundred billion more dollars…