July 1, 2008, Volume 16 Nr. 12, Issue 243

John McCain: The Candidate Of, For, And By The People. 
He's Just Like You And Me.  Right?

The 2008 United States presidential election is shaping up to be a monumental, earth-shattering event that will determine the future course of the nation, the most important election of our lifetime....yet again.  Where have we heard this before?  We heard it in 2004, and 2000, and 1996, 1992... Oh well, here we go again. 

It is now June 2008, and not since the Great Depression has Wall Street's performance been so dismal.  War with Iran is appearing more and more probable, perhaps inevitable, the closer we come to election day in November.  Making war to influence the outcome of a presidential election has been a long-time tradition in the USA.  The media inform us daily that there are only two candidates: John McCain and Barak Obama, both trying to convince the people that they are, like us, struggling day to day, feeling the pain of our collective economic woes.  Really?  Let's examine John McCain to see if that is the case and discover what a mensch he really is.  John McCain just another salt of the earth is he?

On June 27, 2008, Chris Kelly, writing in Huffington Post, reported that Senator John McCain "kind of stepped in it the other day" during a telephone interview with Martin Wisckol of the Orange County Register.  Mr. Wisckol asked, "When was the last time you pumped your own gas and how much did it cost?"  John McCain, ever trying to relate to the working man that he is not, replied,

Oh, I don't remember. Now there's Secret Service protection. But I've done it for many, many years. I don't recall and frankly, I don't see how it matters.

It doesn't matter to John McCain because he doesn't know.  He is part of the elite, ruling, rich class that includes George Herbert Walker Bush, George W. Bush, Bill and Hillary Clinton, et al.  George Bush, Sr., when running for president back in 1992 did not know the cost of a loaf of bread.  John McCain does not know the cost of a gallon of gasoline.  I'm willing to bet John McCain doesn't know the cost of a Budweiser beer.  Worse still, John McCain would be hard pressed to articulate how many hours the average worker in the U.S. has to work to make enough to fill their gas tank or to put food on their table.  Perhaps, John McCain can ask the folk in his neighborhood near the Biltmore Fashion Park in Phoenix, Arizona.  They should know, don't you think?  In Phoenix, John McCain lives in a $4.72 million luxury condo.  He and his neighbors must surely be very concerned about the rising cost of food as they shop for food at the local supermarket.  No?  But listen to this.  The Huffington Post of June 28, 2008, reports that,

Newsweek has published a highly embarrassing report on Sen. John McCain, revealing that the McCains have failed to pay taxes on their beach-front home in La Jolla, California, for the last four years and are currently in default, The Huffington Post has learned.

Under California law, once a residential property is in default for five years, it can be sold at a tax sale to recover the unpaid taxes for the taxpayers.

The McCains own at least seven homes through a variety of trusts and corporations controlled by Cindy McCain.

Seven homes!  Imagine that.  Don't you own seven different million dollar homes?  Don't you, like John McCain, fail to pay taxes on your home for four years?  Don't you, like McCain, get away with it?  Don't you, like John, get a pass on paying a non-compliance penalty?  John McCain and his wife Cindy are deadbeats.  And John McCain wants YOU to vote for HIM.  But wait.  There is more that shows that John McCain is just a regular Joe like you and me.  

The website, TheHill.Com in an article entitled, "McCains report more than $100,000 in credit card debt" states,

Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona) and his wife reported more than $100,000 of credit card liabilities, according to financial disclosure documents released Friday.

The presidential candidate and his wife Cindy reported piling up debt on a charge card between $10,000 and $15,000. His wife’s solo charge card has between $100,000 and $250,000 in debt to American Express.  

McCain's wife also has a second American Express charge card listed on the senator's financial disclosure that was carrying $100,000 to $250,000 in debt. 

Another charge card with American Express, this one for a “dependent child,” is carrying debt in the range of $15,000 and $50,000.

Not only are John McCain and his multi-millionaire wife Cindy tax cheats for four years, they are elitists living high on the hog.  Why would any hard-working person vote for John McCain?  John McCain, like the buddy that he loves to hug, George W. Bush, doesn't give a flying enchilada about you and me.  John McCain is a corrupt, unethical leech following in the footsteps of George W. Bush.  

In 1997, the U.S. Veteran Dispatch reported that John McCain wanted to be president.  Being married to a multi-millionaire helps very much.  However, the U.S. Veteran Dispatch reports that John McCain's.

...younger and richer wife (she's an heir to Hensley & Co., the second largest Anheuser-Busch beer distributor in the United States) got caught after stealing drugs for two years from a charitable organization of which she was president.

The U.S. Veteran Dispatch article also describes "that the senator's wife and father-in-law invested $359,100.00 in one of Mr. [Charles] Keating's projects in 1986 . . ." The Phoenix Gazette - November 13, 1989.  Media Matters for America reveals that,

...financier Charles H. Keating Jr. The Phoenix resident raised more than $100,000 for McCain. (Keating went to prison in the 1990s for his role in the failure of Lincoln Savings & Loan.)" Yet while noting Keating's role in the Lincoln Savings & Loan scandal, the Times ignored McCain's own alleged involvement; a Senate Ethics Committee investigated allegations that McCain -- along with four Democratic senators, together called the Keating Five -- had exerted improper influence when he met with federal bank regulators on behalf of Keating. The committee found that while McCain didn't break any rules, he "exercised poor judgment in intervening with the regulators."

The relationship of John McCain with Charles Keating is just as interesting as his relationship to the Bush crime family.  It was, after all, Neil Bush, who,

...engaged in conflicts of interest as a director of the Silverado Bank, Savings and Loan Association. Mr. Bush served as an outside director from 1985 to 1988. (NY Times, June 19, 1991)

We really should not be surprised.  Should we?

Lets take a little closer look at John McCain.  John Sidney McCain III attended and graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy.  In other words, he was the beneficiary of a college education paid for by the tax payers.  The TAX PAYERS!  The U.S. Veteran Dispatch in their article, "John  McCain: Unfit to serve as Commander-In-Chief" states that even though McCain "drew so many demerits for breaking curfew and other discipline issues that he graduated fifth from the bottom of the class of 1958" that "because of the influence of his family of famous Admirals, McCain...leap-frogged ahead of more qualified applicants and granted a coveted slot to be trained as a navy pilot."  

As a U.S. Navy pilot, John McCain lost five military aircraft, a huge burden to tax payers who paid for them.  The U.S. Veteran Dispatch states, 

He resigned from the Navy in 1981 and went to work for his father-in-law in Phoenix; where he used the opportunity to make powerful and wealthy friends in Arizona including banker Charles Keating and Duke Tully, the editor-in-chief of the Arizona Republic. Keating was later convicted of fraud, racketeering, and conspiracy and Tully was disgraced for concocting a phony military record of combat in Korea and Vietnam including medals for heroism.

In John McCain's book, Faith of Our Fathers he reveals that when Speaking to the Annapolis Class of 1970, he put a twist onto the anti-war slogan "make love, not war." McCain stated that U.S. naval officers "were men enough to do both."  Touché Senator McCain, you certainly did that.  Now how about being man enough to pay your property taxes and your credit card debt?  How about being man enough to care what the hurting people in the street are paying for gasoline, for bread, for health care, for just staying alive.  Of course, one doesn't have to be "a man" about these issues if one does not shive a git as John McCain obviously does not.

 

In 1982, John McCain was elected to the U.S. House.  In 1987, he was elected to the U.S. Senate.  In other words, since at least 1958, John McCain, the fortunate son of privilege, a multi-millionaire, as a result of his second marriage to Anheuser-Busch heiress, Cindy Hensley, has been on the taxpayer's dole living it up and taking the U.S. public for chumps.  And, John McCain, doesn't pay his property taxes.  What the hell people?  You are going to vote for this guy to be president of the United States?  What is the matter with you?

Et tu, Barak Obama?  Ah, a subject for another issue.

©2008 Jozef Hand-Boniakowski, PhD

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