Filed under: 2008 Election, Breaking, Conservatives, Iraq, Senate | Tags: 2008, Campaigns, Candidates, DNC, George W. Bush, Iraq, John McBush, John McCain
John McCain and George W. Bush’s Iraq war: 5 years down, 95 years to go.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: 2004, 2008, Business, Cindy McCain, IOKIYAR, John Kerry, John McBush, John McCain, Media, Wealth
Surprise surprise, one of the wealthiest men in the Senate has a lot of money:
For 2006, Senator McCain paid $72,771 in federal income, alternative minimum, and self-employment taxes (LINES 57 and 58) on taxable income of $215,304 (LINE 43), which is a 33.8% tax rate. View
For 2007, Senator McCain paid $84,460 in federal income, alternative minimum, and self-employment taxes (LINES 57 and 58) on taxable income of $258,800 (LINE 43), which is a 32.6% tax rate. View
McCain earns upwards of $200,000 a year, putting him far above what most Americans make. In fact, John McCain’s taxes are higher than most American’s yearly salaries.
And that’s just his own income–McCain’s wife Cindy is an heir to the Anheuser-Busch brewing fortune, worth well over $100 million. The McCains have eight homes together, and John often flies around on private jets. In other words, this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to John McCain’s wealth.
In 2004, the media savaged John Kerry for his wife’s wealth, portraying him as an upper-crust, out-of-touch aristocrat. Will they apply the same standards to John McCain, or will this be another sad, shameful case of IOKIYAR?*
* “It’s OK If You’re A Republican”
UPDATE: Also keep in mind that Cindy McCain hasn’t released any of her tax returns, so we don’t know exactly how much wealth she has (or where she invests it). But there’s no question that John McCain might not have even had a political career–let alone a Presidential run–without his wife’s inheritance:
Nearly 30 years before John McCain became the Republican presidential nominee, he worked in public relations at his wife’s family company.
Within a few years of marrying Cindy Hensley, the daughter of a multimillionaire Anheuser-Busch distributor, John McCain won his first election. He was new to Arizona politics and fundraising in the 1982 House race, and his campaign quickly fell into debt. Personal money — tens of thousands of dollars in loans to his campaign from McCain bank accounts — helped him survive.
Anheuser-Busch’s political action committee was among McCain’s earliest donors. Cindy McCain’s father, James Hensley, and other Hensley & Co. executives gave so much the Federal Election Commission ordered McCain to give some of it back. McCain’s campaign used Hensley office equipment such as computers and copiers, and Cindy McCain personally paid some of the campaign’s bills.
The campaign gradually reimbursed Hensley for use of its equipment and Cindy McCain for her expenses. The loans — described initially by John McCain as coming from him and his wife — caught the eye of the FEC, which repeatedly questioned him about them; spouses are held to the same donation limits as everyone else.
John McCain owes his Presidential campaign and–most likely–his entire political career to his wife’s money. Without it, who knows whether or not he would have even gotten elected, let alone become a Presidential candidate.
Kerry got attacked for benefiting politically from his wife’s money, even though he became a Senator long before he married Theresa Heinz. So why isn’t McCain being attacked for benefiting politically from his wife’s money, especially since it’s an intrinsic part of his entire political career?
Just wondering.
Filed under: 2008 Election, Conservatives, Economics, Government, International, Media, Senate | Tags: Earmarks, Government, Incompetence, International, Israel, John McBush, John McCain, Military, Spending
Recently, John McCain has promised to eliminate all Congressional earmarks, no questions asked.
Sounds like a good plan to eliminate wasteful spending, right? Wrong. As it turns out, there are some important programs that are paid for with earmarks.
Like military aid to Israel and Egypt:
Some observers define earmarks in a more limited way, identifying only provisions that direct spending for items not requested by the Administration or in excess of levels proposed for activities or countries. Although many Foreign Operations earmarks fall within this more narrow definition, congressional directives specifying spending amounts that are the same as shown in the Administration’s illustrative listing for country distributions also are regarded as earmarks. Annual earmarks for economic and military aid to Israel and Egypt are examples of such directives.
Earmarks also pay for military housing:
The Congressional Research Service analysis counts not only the [military] family housing units added by Congress as earmarks but also those requested by the Pentagon and the White House.
CRS identified $6.6 billion in spending in the 2005 Military Construction Appropriation bill associated with earmarks. This included 205 units at Fort Huachuca at a cost of $41 million and 250 units at Davis-Monthan Air Base at a cost $48.5 million—both in McCain’s home state of Arizona.
So either McCain is going to cut aid to Israel, military housing, and other important programs that are funded by earmarks (all to pay for his corporate tax cut), or he’s going to break his campaign promise.
As Politico’s Ben Smith says, “That’s one thing about spending cuts: Much harder when you get to the details.”
McCain can’t even be bothered to read his own plan–how is he supposed to be President, again?
Filed under: 2008 Election, Breaking, Conservatives, Media, Progressives, Right-Wing Noise Machine, Senate | Tags: 2008, David Brock, George W. Bush, John McBush, John McCain, Media, Paul Begala, Progress Media USA, Republicans
Progress Media USA–the independent progressive organization headed by Media Matters for America’s David Brock and Democratic strategist Paul Begala–is out with their first ad, called ‘Out Of Touch’:
More from Talking Points Memo:
The ad, called “Out of Touch,” will be running on cable beginning tomorrow and can be seen in D.C. on CNN and MSNBC — which is to say, it’s a small buy aimed at an insider audience of potential future donors, political operatives, and the like.
With the Democratic primary dragging on, progressives are going to have to tell the truth about McCain on their own. Personally, I’m glad groups like Progress Media USA are out there to set the record straight.
Filed under: 2008 Election, Conservatives, Iraq, Senate, Terrorism | Tags: Congress, Incompetence, Iraq, John McCain, Mahdi Army, Moqtada Al-Sadr, Senate
So, since John McCain has all that foreign policy experience, what does he think of the recent violence in Iraq?
McCain ‘Surprised’ by Iraq Developments
[...]
As he launched a tour here designed to highlight his family’s long tradition of military service, Senator John McCain said Monday that he was surprised by the latest turn of events in America’s current war in Iraq.
“Maliki decided to take on this operation without consulting the Americans,’’ Mr. McCain said on his campaign bus as it rolled through downtown Meridian, saying that the move showed independence but that he had expected the military to focus on Mosul.
“I just am surprised that he would take it on himself to go down and take charge of a military offensive,’’ he said. “I had not anticipated that he would do that.’’
You have got to be kidding me.
71 years old. 25 years of Washington experience. 5 trips to Iraq. And John McCain couldn’t have predicted that the government’s crackdown on Mahdi Army members would lead to the collapse of their tenouous, self-imposed ceasefire? Especially since the Mahdi Army is known for starting violent insurrections against the government?
McCain didn’t even entertain it as a possibility? Even I–a 21-year-old college student–considered what would happen if Al-Sadr’s ceasefire ended, all the way back in December.
So John McBush has no judgment and his much-touted experience doesn’t seem to be worth anything. What, then, makes this guy fit to be our next President?
