McCain’s Forthcoming Memoir: Words of a Dying Patriot and National Icon
Newsweek, 1 May 2018, SENATOR JOHN MCCAIN: I’M RETIRING SO ‘I CAN SPEAK MY MIND WITHOUT FEARING THE CONSEQUENCES’
Extract: “This is my last term,” McCain wrote in an excerpt of his upcoming book The Restless Wave, that was posted Monday on Apple News. “If I hadn’t admitted that to myself before this summer, a stage 4 cancer diagnosis acts as ungentle persuasion.”
“I’m freer than colleagues who will face the voters again. I can speak my mind without fearing the consequences much. And I can vote my conscience without worry.”
McCain added: “I don’t think I’m free to disregard my constituents’ wishes, far from it. I don’t feel excused from keeping pledges I made. Nor do I wish to harm my party’s prospects. But I do feel a pressing responsibility to give Americans my best judgment.”
McCain wrote that Trump has “declined to distinguish the actions of our government from the crimes of despotic ones. The appearance of toughness, or a reality show facsimile of toughness, seems to matter more than any of our values.”
McCain also addressed his illness and battle with brain cancer. “‘The world is a fine place and worth the fighting for and I hate very much to leave it,’ spoke my hero, Robert Jordan, in For Whom the Bell Tolls,” he wrote. For more, please see the hyperlink below:
Washington Post, 30 April 2018, McCain: Trump more interested in appearing tough than in the nation’s values
Extract: McCain calls himself “a champion of compromise in the governance of a country of 325 million opinionated, quarrelsome, vociferous souls.”
“There is no other way to govern an open society, or more precisely, to govern it effectively,” the senator writes.
He proceeds to offer some “unsolicited advice” to voters.
McCain says that the kind of candidate who should be president is someone who “modestly promises to build relationships on both sides of the aisle, to form alliances to promote their ideas, to respect other points of view, and to split differences where possible to make measurable progress on national problems.” For more, please see the hyperlink below:
Daily Beast, 30 April 2018, John McCain in New Book: I’m Freer Now to Speak My Mind
Extract: Describing the political environment overall, the Arizona Republican writes that he is dismayed by the “scarcity of humility in politics these days.”
“I suspect it’s never been in abundant supply in most human enterprises. … And I don’t mean modesty. Any politician worth a damn can fake modesty. Humility is the self-knowledge that you possess as much inherent dignity as anyone else, and not one bit more. Among its other virtues, humility makes for more productive politics.”
McCain writes of his desire “to see our politics begin to return to the purposes and practices that distinguish our history from the history of other nations.” Before he “leaves,” he added, “I would like to see us recover our sense that we are more alike than different.”
“We are citizens of a republic made of shared ideals forged in a new world to replace the tribal enmities that tormented the old one,” McCain writes. “Even in times of political turmoil such as these, we share that awesome heritage and the responsibility to embrace it.” For more, please see the hyperlink below:
https://www.thedailybeast.com/mccain-in-new-book-im-freer-now-to-speak-my-mind
NPR, 1 May 2018, John McCain Makes An Appeal For Civility And Humility
Extract: McCain points out that a big reason for gridlock in Washington is partisanship more broadly.
“We are secluding ourselves in ideological ghettos,” McCain writes. “We have our own news sources. We exchange ideas mostly or exclusively with people who agree with us, and troll those who don’t. Increasingly, we have our own facts to reinforce our convictions and any empirical evidence that disputes them is branded as ‘fake.’ That’s a social trend that is going to be very hard to turn around.”
“I regret things that I did that brought embarrassment to myself, my family, friends of mine who have been very big supporters, where I said, ‘Hey, that was a self-inflicted wound,’ ” he said on MSNBC in January. “I screwed up.”
McCain, though, does not solely blame Trump, his staff or even other politicians for the political climate in the country.
He also blames voters.
“Paradoxically,” McCain writes, “voters who detest Washington, because all we do is argue and never get anything done frequently vote for candidates who are the most adamant in their assurances that they will never ever compromise with those bastards in the other party.”
He ticks through several political reforms that could make things better, namely getting rid of the practice of gerrymandering and a more open campaign finance system that gets dark money — money that can’t be traced back to a donor — out of politics.
But it’s going to take more than that, McCain notes:
“As always, more important than any political reforms is the discernment of voters. Here’s my unsolicited advice to the American voter: If a candidate … pledges to ride his white horse to Washington and lay waste to all the scoundrels living off your taxes, to never work or socialize or compromise with any of them, and then somehow get them to bow to your will and the superiority of your ideas, don’t vote for that guy. It sounds exciting, but it’s an empty boast and a commitment to more gridlock.” For more, please see the hyperlink below:
https://www.npr.org/2018/05/01/607193169/john-mccain-makes-an-appeal-for-civility-and-humility
Foreign Policy & Domestic Politics 