Then and Now

It seems that back in 2005 John McCain understood how dumb John McCain's current position on Iraq is:

Host Chris Matthews pressed McCain on the issue. "You've heard the ideological argument to keep U.S. forces in the Middle East. I've heard it from the hawks. They say, keep United States military presence in the Middle East, like we have with the 7th Fleet in Asia. We have the German...the South Korean component. Do you think we could get along without it?"

McCain held fast, rejecting the very policy he urges today. "I not only think we could get along without it, but I think one of our big problems has been the fact that many Iraqis resent American military presence," he responded. "And I don't pretend to know exactly Iraqi public opinion. But as soon as we can reduce our visibility as much as possible, the better I think it is going to be."

Kudos to Sam Stein for writing this up. Checking the record by using Nexis doesn't count as "reporting" under the fairly arbitrary rules governing "real journalism" but it sure can be valuable.

Comments

You're missing the point. This only proves that McCain is such a maverick that he's even willing to take positions that are unpopular with his past self.

...

Note that this is entirely different from being a flip-flopper.

Posted by Khaled | April 29, 2008 11:42 AM

Are you telling me that none of the oppo research shops at the other Republican campaigns didn't come up with this during the primary?

Posted by Marshall | April 29, 2008 11:48 AM

The press will use this quote to say that the Dems really are taking this 100 years comment out of context and that he really does, deep down in his heart, want to take the troops out. I mean, he said so.

Posted by jj | April 29, 2008 11:51 AM

Well, Marshall, none of the GOP candidates wanted to talk about the Iraq occupation except in broad strokes and bromides. They all wanted "victory," that much we knew. Whether that meant occupying it for 100 years, carpet bombing it tomorrow, or whatever, they didn't want to say.

Posted by Elvis Elvisberg | April 29, 2008 11:57 AM

Are you telling me that none of the oppo research shops at the other Republican campaigns didn't come up with this during the primary?

Why would they? They were all trying to out-hawk McBush(except Ron Paul, obviously).

Posted by Joe Klein's conscience | April 29, 2008 11:58 AM

The pungent, intoxicating smell of maverick-ness exuding from McCain's pores is so strong I can practically taste it.

When are we going to get the 15:00 min video of McCain being such a maverick that he disagrees with basically every position he took in the last 10 years.

McCain is like the weather in Seattle. If you don't like his political position, wait five minutes.

Posted by afferent input | April 29, 2008 11:59 AM

Why would they? They were all trying to out-hawk McBush(except Ron Paul, obviously).

Well, there are two reasons they would bring this up. For one thing, this makes McCain looks like a surrenderer of the highest treachery (in Republican political code), and second, it makes him a flipflopperer in GOP-speak.

Posted by Marshall | April 29, 2008 12:02 PM

So McCain has a position now on the most important issues of our time that is 180 degrees different from his position three years ago? Oh, pish posh! I am so tired of this gotcha journalism!

Posted by bobbo | April 29, 2008 12:34 PM

I tend to agree with Marshall on this. Remember, the Party Line among the right wing on McCain was that he was a liberal traitor to the One True Faith of what they call "conservatism". It wasn't only Limbaugh and Coulter et al who said that -- Romney spent how many millions claiming that he was the "true conservative" and McCain a phony.

These kind of statements would seem absolutely ideal fodder for that kind of attack.

Posted by Pesto | April 29, 2008 12:37 PM

For it to actually qualify as "journalism," Stein would have had to dig up a story (true or not) in which it is alleged that both Obama and Clinton have reversed course on their position on baby panda paté.

Posted by Thomas Allen | April 29, 2008 12:43 PM

The man (now) believes that we can be in Iraq for 100 years without casualties. You know, because it worked out so well when we were in Lebanon.

The guy is a putz. He can't even remember the difference between Sunni and Shiite, and he's going to tell us what is possible in Iraq? Yeah. Right.

Posted by LFC | April 29, 2008 12:46 PM

Re: bobbo
Thank Grid that Andy Hiller isn't allowed to question Saint John on things like his knowledge of economics ("Can you tell me what the 'law of supply and demand' means?") or his integrity ("After George Bush's operatives smeared your family in 2000, what caused you to hug and French-kiss him shortly thereafter?") or any other quality allegedly important in a Preznit. That would *really* be "gotcha" journamalism.

Posted by SFAW | April 29, 2008 12:51 PM

Hey, SFAW, don't forget his passionate embrace of Jerry Falwell.

Posted by LFC | April 29, 2008 1:00 PM

The important key to Democratic victory is to keep McCain talking: those vague ellipses aren't due to impatience, my friends.

Posted by Jeffrey Davis | April 29, 2008 1:23 PM

I just read about McCain's association with one Richard Quinn, a high profile southern racist. Actually, he's been a senior political advisor of McCain's since 2000.

Sooooo, since John thinks that William Ayers is fair game, maybe it's time to talk about his associations with a known loudmouth racist.

Posted by LFC | April 29, 2008 1:49 PM

Everybody's wasting their time with this stuff.

McCain is running on one thing and one thing only: "I'm a war hero. You can't criticize me about ANYTHING because I was tortured (even if I did crack and collaborate with the North Vietnamese.)"

Destroy that legend or watch him get sworn in next year as President.

It's that simple.

And the upcoming Iran war is going to give him a war bounce neither Obama nor Hillary will be able to deal with.

We just sent another carrier to the Gulf and the Pentagon has been ordered to draw up yet another set of plans to attack Iran.

We will be at war with Iran within the next three to six months tops.

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | April 30, 2008 4:09 AM

Checking the record by using Nexis doesn't count as "reporting" under the fairly arbitrary rules governing "real journalism"

Reporting and real journalism must consist of uncovering or revealing information to describe a story that informs the public.

Whether this revelation comes from people who know the information or public records that contain the information, I assure you that it is real journalism.

Posted by mere mortal | April 30, 2008 6:22 AM