McCain Myths

MYTH: John McCain opposes gay marriage, and Obama favors it.

REALITY: Both McCain and Obama believe that marriage should stay between "one man, one woman." At the same however, John McCain twice voted against the propsosed Federal Marriage Amendment.


MYTH: John McCain supports "Don't Ask Don't Tell," so he is therefore opposed to gays in the military.

REALITY: To start with, "Don't Ask Don't Tell" was signed into law by President Clinton, a Democrat who is for some reason admired by many gays and lesbians for his supposed support of gay rights. Also, if McCain truly did not want gays in the military, he wouldn't want them keeping quiet. He'd want the gay servicemen to admit it so they could be get kicked out.


MYTH: Because John McCain is pro-life, he will appoint a justice to the Supreme Court who will provide the fifth vote necessary to overturn Roe versus Wade and make abortion illegal.

REALITY: It's simple math. You need to have four votes before you can get a fifth. Right now there are only two. Also, you can bet that Ruth Bader Ginsburg would sooner be wheeled into the courtroom in gurney than give up her seat to a pro-life judge. Besides, overturning Roe would not make abortion illegal anyways, contrary to the common misperception. It would simply give individual states the OPTION of doing so.


MYTH: Just because McCain was a POW in Vietnam, he is qualified to be the President.

REALITY: I suppose there is some truth in this, as the fact that McCain was a POW does not in and of itself make him qualified for the presidency. However, it proves that he truly loves his country, something Obama has yet to demonstrate (particularly when he refuses to renounce his long-held ties with William Ayers, leader of a domestic terrorist group that was setting off bombs in the US during the same years McCain was held captive in Vietnam). Furthermore, John McCain has shown he is qualified to lead our country by serving in Congress for 25 years, earning the repect of Arizona's Democrats and Republicans alike. I'm from Arizona originally, and every time McCain ran for reelection as Senator, he won by a landslide.


MYTH: John McCain's honesty and integrity should be questioned because he was one of the infamous "Keating Five" senators.

REALITY: I'm surprised that more Obama supporters haven't brought this up, but it's probably because they know that in the end, this scandal showed McCain to be a man of the utmost honesty and integrity, not being afraid to admit responsibilty and also respond proactively to make ensure that furture members of Congress didn't make the same mistake he did prior to the S & L collapses in the late 80's. Indeed, John McCain did accept political contributions from disgraced financier Charles Keating, with the expectation that McCain would influence government regulators to make special exceptions to the rules for the Savings & Loan that Keating owned. The Senate Ethics Committee cleared McCain of wrongdoing, finding his involvement in the scandal minimal, but nonetheless scolded him for using "poor judgment." In 2002, McCain authored the bipartisan campaign finance reform bill (aka McCain-Feingold Act), largely intended to prevent other legislators from making the same types of mistakes.