Which Way Today McCain?

Wherever the wind blows...

McCain Pot Calls Republican Kettle Black

Even John "100 years in Iraq" McCain is trying to run away from his and the GOP's legacy:

John McCain's top economic adviser has attacked Congressional Republicans, saying they have brought "shame and disgrace" on the party.

In a BBC interview, Doug Holtz-Eakin accused them of busting the budget with profligate spending programmes.

The comments are part of a strategy by Senator McCain's camp to distance themselves from the Republicans and avoid blame for the economic downturn.

John McCain and his bestest friends forevah brought this economic disaster upon the country... Perhaps McCain could grow up and take responsibility for the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq and multiple economic disasters on the domestic side of policy that are largely responsible for our country's current dismal economic outlook?

Independent Republican Joe Lieberman, John McCain
and bush addresses the Dead Elephant caucus of the GOP.

U.S. army study says Iraq occupation was understaffed

No Kidding?

U.S. army study says Iraq occupation was understaffed
DENVER - A nearly 700-page study released Sunday by the army found that "in the euphoria of early 2003," U.S.-based commanders prematurely believed their goals in Iraq had been reached and did not send enough troops to handle the occupation.

FULL STORY

While bush was claiming that major combat operations had ended:

Planners in the Iraq headquarters said 300,000 troops would be needed for the occupation. Even before the invasion, some planners had called for 300,000 troops to be sent for the invasion and occupation.

...snip...

Some commanders told the authors they asked about plans for making the country stable and got no answers.

...snip...

Its writers said it was clear in January 2005 that the Army would remain in Iraq for some time, the writers concluded.

That was only about 7 Friedman units ago.
Take heart, dear reader, that our fearless leader took his military commanders advice on troop levels and... Oh wait! he ignored the military, never sent in the 300,000 troops they wanted and lied about the Friedmans too.

I would feel used if I didn't know this since the day they sacked General Shinseki for telling them, and us, the truth about needed troop levels.

Retired generals speak out to oppose Rumsfeld:
"In this, Powell echoed former Army chief of staff Gen. Eric Shinseki, who told Congress just weeks before the 2003 invasion that several hundred thousand US troops would be necessary to secure Iraq after the invasion. For this he was publicly contradicted by then Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz. Rumsfeld named General Shinseki's replacement a year before he was to retire and broke custom by not attending his retirement ceremony."
--- csmonitor.com

In case you don't remember exactly what Shinseki said to get pushed out the door by the bush administration:

McCain makes a good point with his "whackamole" comment, but clearly the only other thing that McCain is correct in when he talks about sending 20,000 more troops to Iraq is at the end of the video where he says, "I don't know where the troops are going to come from."

He hasn't a clue that it would take a draft to get enough troops. Firstly, because we already don't have the troops to spare. And, secondly, because you need to be looking at the several hundred thousand pairs of boots on the ground deemed neccessary by General Shinseki, before he was chased out of the military by the neocons for being honest, if you really want to secure Iraq and you get the idea of how wrong McCain is.

“Something on the order of several hundred thousand soldiers, are probably, you know, a figure that would be required. We’re talking about post-hostilities control over a piece of geography that’s fairly significant with the kinds of ethnic tensions that could lead to other problems. And so, it takes significant ground force presence to maintain safe and secure environment to ensure that the people are fed, that water is distributed, all the normal responsibilities that go along with administering a situation like this.” [Sen. Armed Services Committee testimony, 2/25/03]

Now, of course, several years later we have a bush flack in charge named Petraeus. Nothing more than a yes man for the neocons and eternal war. He took over from a reasonable Admiral that stood in the neocons way when it came to attacking Iran.

All they need is to get their warmongering McCain in to the White House and we can be sure to be playing whackamole in Iran for a hundred years too!

Who the heck is Andrew Malcolm?

Almost everybody who Blogs knows who skippy the bush kangaroo is, and certainly they know who the link lovin' Mike Finnigan from Crooks and Liars is, as well. But, honestly, who the heck is Andrew Malcom? Never even heard of his Blog before either... skippy writes:

mike finnigan of crooks&liars responds to andrew malcolm's snide dismissal of skippy's question:

mr. malcolm,

having read your dismissive response to skippy, i'll address you in the tone that you apparently favor. i must say i wasn't surprised by the lack of respect and royal impatience your note conveyed. i guess peons like us should just be damn grateful you deigned to reply to the impertinent skippy. thank you, my liege! the unaccountable arrogance of our corporate press seems to be contagious, even when one of it's members turns to..(cough)..blogging. i'll be sure and see that the over 1 million visitors per week which read crooks and liars get a chance to sample how one of the denizens of our pathological press reacts to a legitimate question, politely posed.

mike finnigan

thanks, mike! we appreciate your time and effort!

Everyone appreciates what both Mike Finnigan and Crooks and Liars do so well. Mike's Blog Roundup also points to his royal heiny's, Andy "blogger wannabe" Malcolm, incompetence and failures:

skippy the bush kangaroo: The impertinent skippy had the gall to write to three journalists, questioning them on why the press corps insisted on framing Obama as “arrogant” in the presidential seal story when McCain’s own senatorial campaign committee did the same thing. Two ignored him, and another reacted the way royalty always does.

Seriously... I'd have never heard of this Andy Malcolm guy, nor his Blog (top of the ticket), had it not been for one of the big national Blogs that pointed to their little "B lister" corner of the internet...

McCains Owed 4 Years of Taxes on Home

According to HuffPo and via ThinkProgress:

The article reports that the McCains had been delinquent in paying taxes until Newsweek inquired about the matter. The McCains then paid off $6,744.42 in back taxes, but still owe more. Newsweek writes:

When you’re poor, it can be hard to pay the bills. When you’re rich, it’s hard to keep track of all the bills that need paying. It’s a lesson Cindy McCain learned the hard way when NEWSWEEK raised questions about an overdue property-tax bill on a La Jolla, Calif., property owned by a trust that she oversees. […]

County officials say the trust still owes an additional $1,742 for this year, an amount that is overdue and will go into default July 1. Told of the outstanding $1,742, the aide said: “The trust has paid all bills shown owing as of today and will pay all other bills due.”

That settles that.

John McCain is the epitome of a
modern day "GOP fiscal conservative."

Trust fund babies that can't balance their own checkbooks, nevermind the budget of a country.

But this raises an even more important issue. In the military little things like unpaid bills and not paying your taxes can lose you your security clearance. It makes you a security risk in as far as the possibility of being blackmailed. I can't imagine the rules are much different for public servants and politicians.

John McCain is a security risk according to military standards.

John McCain and his wife's finances need to be fully investigated to ensure that this is an isolated incident. From the Army Adjudicative Guidelines for Determining Eligibility for Access to Classified Information:

Guideline F
Financial Considerations

The Concern. An individual who is financially overextended is at risk of having to engage in illegal acts to generate funds. Unexplained affluence is often linked to proceeds from financially profitable criminal acts.

Conditions that could raise a security concern and may be disqualifying include:

a. A history of not meeting financial obligations;

b. Deceptive or illegal financial practices such as embezzlement, employee theft, check fraud, income tax evasion, expense account fraud, filing deceptive loan statements, and other intentional financial breaches of trust;

c. Inability or unwillingness to satisfy debts;

d. Unexplained affluence;

e. Financial problems that are linked to gambling, drug abuse, alcoholism, or other issues of security concern.

Conditions that could mitigate security concerns include:

a. The behavior was not recent;

b. It was an isolated incident;

c. The conditions that resulted in the behavior were largely beyond the person's control (e.g., loss of employment, a business downturn, unexpected medical emergency, or a death, divorce or separation);

d. The person has received or is receiving counseling for the problem and there are clear indications that the problem is being resolved or is under control;

e. The affluence resulted from a legal source; and

f. The individual initiated a good-faith effort to repay overdue creditors or otherwise resolve debts.

(emph. mine)His security clearance, as a politician, must demand a full investigation of his family's finances given this news of his and his wife's tax delinquency. For what it is worth, and as far as his security clearance is involved, McCain also filed deceptive loan statements that have resulted in his breaking campaign finance law.

I mentioned earlier today that it was quite a thing to see John McCain denouncing Barack Obama for breaking his word on public financing when McCain himself is at this moment breaking the law in continuing to spend over the spending limits he promised to abide by through the primary season in exchange for public financing. (By the FEC's rules, we're still in the primary phase of the election and will be until the conventions.)

I want to return to this subject though because this is not hyperbole or some throw away line. He's really doing it. McCain opting into public financing, accepted the spending limits and then profited from that opt-in by securing a campaign saving loan. And then he used some clever, but not clever enough lawyering, to opt back out. And the person charged with saying what flies and what doesn't -- the Republican head of the FEC -- said he's not allowed to do that. He can't opt out unilaterally unless the FEC says he can.

Those are two huge red flags as far as John McCain's security clearance is concerned.

[update] oceanstar17 was kind enough to drop these links in comment at dkos:

the key standard for granting security clearances falls under the DCID 6/4. You can read about it here This website also has information about the adjucation process.

Furthermore, if you want to read cases of appeals that have gone up to the DOD, you can read about them here. You can see that applicants are allowed to have negative information about them. The key is how they handled their situations.

I guess I have some more reading to do.

[update deux] More as a matter of curiousity... How does this effect any income taxes John and Cindy McCain may have claimed? From comment at HuffPo:

What exactly do these Trusts and S Corporations involve? Do they earn taxable income? One would think that things like Mortgage interest charges and property tax would be very important when the tax returns are done since they are tax deductable and reduce the amount of taxes owed. Does the failure to pay property tax indicate that they also failed to file tax returns for the trust involved in this little condo? Or they just paid more tax than they owed?
Its clear that mortgage interest and property taxes must be on Cindy's returns because they dont show up on the Schedule A for any of the tax returns that John has released.

Was she claiming tax deductions on these property taxes while not paying the actual taxes? Sounds like the republican way!

Cindy McCain needs to open her books for public scrutiny.