MCCAIN’S STRAIGHT TALK & SUPPORT FOR THE MILITARY
McCain’s Straight Talk & Support For the Military
While the traditional media is tardily starting to take John McCain’s straight talking image with increasingly large grains of salt, his base isn’t quite primed to give up on their favorite son. Jonathan Alter’s bizarre defense of McCain after he was caught telling an outright lie, dead captures that reluctance:
…it’s a learning curve for him to get up to speed, to discern he’s living with newborn rules.
We live in a society where the media salivates over “gotcha” moments, where we are subjected to 24/7 news of media-created outrage, still John McCain, in his hunt to circularize discover George Bush’s third term, contradicts himself on issues bounteous and diminutive and somehow manages to escape the level of investigating given to expensive haircuts and botched jokes. Throughout the instruction of this statesmanly crusade season, we’ve watched McCain pander for the evangelical vote, vary himself on issues ranging from tax cuts to immigration, call himself the anti-lobbyist politician while surrounding himself with lobbyists, vilify special interests despite his history of brokering deals for big-money contributors, denouncing 527 groups as he parrots their message, every while streaming as fast as he crapper from George Dubya even as he embraces a stay the instruction X 100 Iraq policy.
The lowermost line is, associating the text “straight talker” with John McCain is null brief of laughable. Volumes could be cursive on the issues that he has flip flopped on, or the positions he has embraced in an effort to supply to a portion voting bloc, but today let’s focus on the John McCain whose devotion to the men and women of the military is unquestionable.
During McCain’s first separate for semipolitical duty in 1982, after declaring that:
One of the things I’ve never tried to do is exploit my Vietnam support to my land because it would be totally inappropriate to do.
…he proceeded to do just that, responding to charges of existence a carpetbagger with, “”Listen, pal. My father was in the Navy and we moved around a lot. So today that I think about it, locate I’ve lived the longest is Hanoi,” and in the ensuing 26 eld he has continuing exploit that experience, culminating with his first ad for the general election. You might stir your head over the idea that McCain doesn’t use his individualized experience for semipolitical gain, but he honorably served and suffered for his land in ways that most of us cannot even fathom, so even if he erst thought that doing so was inappropriate exploitation, it’s his story to tell as he sees fit. But when he uses that support as a talisman against criticism, it is a problem. Time and again we are told that his support for the men and women bringing in our military is unwavering and unquestionable, and that as someone who has sacrificed for his country, to discourse him somehow dishonors his possess service. But as the locution goes, “facts are pesky things,” so instead of relying on McCain’s rhetoric, let’s look at some of those facts:
- McCain has repeatedly voted against amendments in the senate that would have…covered such important services as improving tending at veterans’ hospitals, providing mental health services to soldiers with post-traumatic stress disorder and substance abuse problems. [2006 senate Vote #7, 2/2/2006]
- In 2006, McCain voted against the Kerry amendment that would eliminate increased fees and co-payments for veterans in the TRICARE health tending information by upbringing the discretionary spending limit by roughly $10 billion. The viands would have been fully equilibrize by eliminating creating joint tax breaks. [2006 senate Vote #67, 3/16/2006]
- McCain was digit of exclusive 13 Republicans to vote against an amendment that additional over $400 million for inpatient and outpatient tending for veterans. [2006 senate Vote #98, 4/26/2006]
- McCain voted against increasing funding for veterans health tending by $2.8 1000000000 in 2006. [2005 senate Vote #55, 3/16/2005]
- McCain joined his leader senate cohorts in anti exempting every military organisation and veterans from means testing in insolvency cases. [2005 senate Vote #13, 3/1/2005]
- McCain anti an amendment that would turn from 60 to 55 the geezerhood at which destined members of the National Guard and Army force could obtain withdrawal benefits. [2004 senate Vote #136, 6/23/2004]
- Senator McCain anti $322 million in funding for “battlefield clearance and country equipment for U.S. troops in Iraq.” A change in Iraqi recollection funds would have funded the additional endorsement for troops in the battlefield. [2003 senate Vote #376, 10/2/2003]
- McCain voted against an amendment that would increase spending on the veterans health tending information TRICARE by $20.3 1000000000 over 10 eld to members of the National Guard and Reserves. The increase would be equilibrize by a change in tax cuts. [2003 senate Vote #81, 3/25/2003]
- McCain anti an amendment that would have increased veterans spending by $13 1000000000 from 1997-2002 to be equilibrize by approaching joint tax preferences and reinstating expired taxes. [1996 senate Vote #115, 5/16/1996]
The actuality and the bunk of John McCain are at rank odds, still the fact that McCain is a endorse of the military is the unchallenged, customary wisdom in the traditional media. Which brings us to McCain’s more past contestant to Senator Jim Webb’s G.I. Bill of Rights (pdf), a calculate that provides actualised educational benefits for veterans and that enjoys overwhelming nonpartisan support. McCain’s objection? That providing the men and women who have risked their lives in Afghanistan and Iraq with the means to listen college when their support is rank might hurt possession rates in the military. All of this cuts correct to the heart the difficulty with the media’s unwillingness to meaningfully contest McCain on his issue…Iraq and his questionable support for the troops.
Despite a six-year history of being wrong on Iraq, wrong about current troop levels, wrong about the difference between Sunnis and Shiites, and his incessant claims that things are going well, McCain is accepted as the foreign contract candidate. And when McCain, ignoring the actuality of our overextended military, blithely said that staying in Iraq for 100 years was “fine” with him, and more recently, when he said it was “not too important” to alter the troops home, he defended the remarks by locution he meant exclusive if the troops weren’t existence attacked or killed. And the media reacted. They dutifully reportable the remarks, the Democratic denouncements, and of instruction McCain’s clarifications of what he really meant, but they never asked the all-important question:
Exactly how many eld is John McCain willing to let U.S. troops be attacked and killed in Iraq?
Source: feeds.feedburner.com
Why is immunodeficiency Prevention Being Blocked By Republicans?
There’s more to open health than pandemic preparedness. On an international scale, for example, there’s HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria (being afraid about digit thing doesn’t mean ignoring the others). So, here’s an interesting story.
President Bush’s information to fight HIV/AIDS is thoughtful by Republicans and Democrats like to be digit of the unvarnished foreign contract successes of his presidency.
So why has panoptic nonpartisan legislation hunt to more than triple the program’s funding to $50 1000000000 caused such a rancorous fight?
Ask Sen. Tom Coburn, M.D.
Why indeed?
Now, let’s give some background. The senate calculate in discourse is S. 2731: Tom Lantos and Henry J. Hyde United States Global Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria Reauthorization Act of 2008 and it’s equivalent in the House is H.R. 5501: Tom Lantos and Henry J. Hyde United States Global Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria Reauthorization Act of 2008. The House calculate passed with 100% of Dems and 60% of Republicans supporting it. The senate calculate is thoughtful “in committee” and not still brought to a vote. That’s because Tom Coburn and sextet another GOP Senators have closed it from existence voted on, or even discussed.
What the calculate does is reauthorize the President’s Emergency Plan for immunodeficiency Relief (also known as PEPFAR), “a five-year, $15 1000000000 dweller Government initiative to conflict the global HIV/AIDS epidemic.” That is the digit foreign contract initiative that this brass has nonpartisan championship on.
As Avenging Angel diaried on Friday
As Politico detailed, Coburn and a group of sextet another socially standpat GOP Senators have settled a hold on the reauthorization of one of President Bush’s few favourite initiatives, the Emergency Plan for immunodeficiency Relief (PEPFAR). Enjoying panoptic nonpartisan in Congress, the senate has planned boosting funding to $50 1000000000 over five years. But the senate calculate would do absent with the previous requirements “that 55 proportionality of the HIV/AIDS incorporation be spent on treatment and drugs and that about 30 proportionality of hindrance funds be allocated to abstinence education.”
In another words, the legislation would:
- Authorize $50 1000000000 to conflict HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis during the incoming five years.
- Provide treatment for at least three million immunodeficiency patients.
- Prevent 12 million newborn HIV infections.
- Provide tending for five million immunodeficiency orphans.
- Train and support 140,000 newborn health professionals.
- Authorize $4 1000000000 for the treatment and hindrance of tuberculosis.
- Authorize $5 1000000000 to fight malaria.
Now, what could mayhap be criminal with that? It’s that “abstinence education” thing. Politico spells it discover quite clearly:
The Oklahoma Republican, along with sextet another social conservatives, has place a hold on the calculate in the Senate, unless a supplying is additional to direct most of the spending toward treatment for HIV/AIDS kinda than toward hindrance and another priorities. Otherwise, Coburn said, “the vast majority of the money is going to get exhausted by those wanting to help grouping with HIV, kinda than [by] grouping with HIV.”
Coburn argues that treatment of HIV/AIDS-affected individuals usually drops their viral load to the saucer where they will not infect another people, and thus, it’s “the No. 1 hindrance prescript we have.”
But many another Republicans and Democrats, as well as correct open health experts and immunodeficiency charities, dispute Coburn’s math. With the program, titled the President’s Emergency Plan for immunodeficiency Relief, ordered to expire in September, they are very concerned.
“Most experts concord that treatment is exclusive digit diminutive conception of the hindrance agenda,” said Denis Nash, director of monitoring, evaluation and investigate at the International Center for immunodeficiency Care and Treatment Programs at river University.
Nash, whose impact includes studying the efficacy of PEPFAR programs, said that while anti-retroviral medication does substantially turn the viral load, fewer than 10 proportionality of the 33 million grouping infected with HIV are receiving treatment.
“The hindrance effect of treatment is not likely to be anywhere nearby the magnitude of hindrance through prevention,” including safe-sex education and safe distribution, said Mead Over, grownup fellow at the Center for Global Development.
It’s that “safe-sex education and safe distribution thing” that has the standpat Republicans every screwed up. See, the conservatives don’t like safe use, even though it has proven effectiveness. They like abstinence, even though it’s incomplete by itself, and has been remarkably controversial when practical to PEPFAR. So, they gin up objections that have no grounding in science. Here’s Lancet on the topic:
“Many more lives will be ransomed if safe use is heavily promoted alongside messages to abstain and be faithful.”*
* “HIV hindrance contract needs an urgent cure”, The Lancet 367(9518), 15-21 Apr 2006
And that’s where Tom Coburn comes in. He and his buddies are so far discover on this they even have Republicans like Michael Gerson upset.
How much do heptad members of the U.S. senate weigh?
Eyeing them — Tom Coburn, Jim DeMint, Jeff Sessions, Saxby Chambliss, David Vitter, Jim Bunning, Richard Burr — I’d guess they belike become in at about 1,300 pounds. These are the Republicans who have subscribed a hold letter, preventing state on the reauthorization of the President’s Emergency Plan for immunodeficiency Relief (PEPFAR).
Now, how much do 3 million HIV-AIDS-infected grouping — the treatment goal of a reauthorized PEPFAR — weigh? This is a more difficult calculation. Adults with modern forms of the disease crapper weigh about 60 pounds. Children with immunodeficiency are like shadows falling on a scale. Maintaining weight becomes difficult with vomiting and diarrhea, with tuberculosis and fungal infections, with cancers such as Kaposi’s sarcoma and lymphoma.
Part of Gerson’s moral ire is focused on my disputable stance that immunodeficiency treatment dollars be spent on treatment. I want to preserves PEPFAR’s example formula that sends at least 55 proportionality of every dollars to immunodeficiency treatment so widows and orphans and actualised patients, not information officers and consultants, will be the direct beneficiaries of the program.
It’s not just Gerson that’s ticked, it’s also Richard Luger and 13 another Republicans who think this calculate needs to get passed. There’s are another consequences of not reauthorizing PEPFAR in a timely manner, including losing the ability to persuade another nations in the G8 to work and be generous with their possess funding. More importantly, there are grouping who will die for lack of hindrance and treatment.
What’s scary about Coburn is not just how criminal he is (see the comments above from Denis author and Mead Over; they are open health experts, which Coburn is decidedly not), and how far discover of the mainstream he is, it’s that he’s John McCain’s chief medical adviser and functions as a medical authority for Republicans (like Bill Frist on the Terri Schiavo debacle, Coburn is way over his head on this but Republicans turn to him anyway). John McCain in portion relies on Coburn to tell him what to do about medical issues (this reference is about condoms and AIDS):
Q: “But you would concord that condoms do stop the spread of sexually transmitted diseases. Would you say: ‘No, we’re not going to distribute them,’ knowing that?”
Mr. McCain: (Twelve-second pause) “Get me Coburn’s thing, communicate Weaver to get me Coburn’s essay that he just gave me in the last pair of days. I’ve never gotten into these issues before.”
and despite having a assemblage to feature “Coburn’s thing”, on this issue said:
“I’ll be glad to assist. I’m sorry to tell you I’m not that familiar with the impact of this legislation.
making Coburn’s function – correct or criminal – all the more influential.
Be that as it may, the issue on the table is reauthorizing PEPFAR and action lives, millions of them. The senate needs to do what’s necessary to get this calculate to a vote (it will transfer overwhelmingly, just like in the House where it passed 308-116).
This is a story we will move to follow. And if you want to do something about it now, you crapper sign this petition. While we get to vote in Nov for grouping that understand public health and science, some things can’t wait until November.
Update [2008-6-15 15:39:18 by DemFromCT]: For clarification, Coburn’s main stated resistance is remotion of fixed portion for funding treatment (55%) in favor of local flexibility. The Institute of Medicine has advisable against fixed portion because it does not support sustainability. My possess suspicions of standpat objections remain, but the open effort will be over the allocations provision.
Update [2008-6-16 0:20:15 by DemFromCT]: More on condoms.
The heptad standpat Republicans are grave of the program’s higher spending level and hindrance programs that include safe content
Source: feeds.feedburner.com
Tags: greek politics, constructivism theory and politics, real politics, does persuasion influence the curriculum, american politics