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Guest Voice: John McCain Hates Me

February 1st, 2008
By CAGLE CARTOONS

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This is a Guest Voice column by Michael Reagan, Ronald Reagan’s oldest son, who is also a popular radio talk show host. Guest Voice columns do not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Moderate Voice or its writers.

John McCain Hates Me

by Michael Reagan

Until [Tuesday] night, when I watched the Republican debate, I had no idea how much John McCain dislikes me and just about everybody else but Rudy Giuliani, who if you believe The New York Times is a pretty good hater himself.

As I watched McCain and Governor Romney go at it during the debate at the Reagan Library I was struck by the huge gap that separates McCain — whose contempt for his fellow humans is patently obvious — and my dad, Ronald Reagan, who had nothing but the deepest affection and respect for the American people.

The feeling is mutual between McCain and me. I don’t like the way he treats people. You get the impression that he thinks everybody is beneath him. He seems to be saying, “I was a war hero, and you had damn well better treat me as your superior.”

He has contempt for conservatives who he thinks can be duped into thinking he’s one of them, despite such blatantly anti-conservative actions as his support for amnesty for illegal immigrants, his opposition to the Bush tax cuts which got the economy rolling again, and his campaign finance bill which skewed the political process and attacked free speech.

I am appalled by his contempt for the intelligence of his listeners when he flat-out lies and expects them to believe what he says even when the truth is staring them in the face.

A prime example cited by columnist Robert Novak was McCain’s denial that he had privately suggested that Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito was too conservative, insisting that he recalled saying no such thing, adding that Alito was a “magnificent” choice.

“In fact,” wrote Novak, “multiple sources confirm that the senator made negative comments about Alito nine months ago.”

In last night’s debate, McCain stubbornly defended his charge, false on the face of it, that Romney wanted a deadline for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq.

“I have never, ever supported a specific timetable” for withdrawing troops, Romney said, adding that McCain’s accusation on the eve of Tuesday’s primary “sort of falls into the dirty tricks that I think Ronald Reagan would have found reprehensible.”

What Romney said last April, was merely that U.S. and Iraqi leaders “have to have a series of timetables and milestones that they speak about” in private, which in no way suggests he was in any sense talking about troop withdrawals.

Despite the evidence, McCain charged that “of course he said he wanted a timetable” for a withdrawal, even though he had never said any such thing. It was McCain daring to ask us if we wanted to believe our lying eyes or his demonstrably false allegation.

McCain must think conservatives are dumb enough to allow him to get away with claiming he’s one of them. This is from a man who opposed drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska and who twice voted against President Bush’s tax cuts and sponsored the campaign-finance reform legislation that Romney claimed “took a whack at the First Amendment.”

In John McCain’s eyes, conservatives are the Viet Cong of this generation and he treats us as such. It’s either his way or no way.

I despise his habit of talking down to us, like a wise father to an idiot son. He’s just at a loss to understand why everybody doesn’t grovel at his feet and accept his every word as wisdom handed down from his lofty perch atop Mt. Olympus.

I can’t help it. I know in my heart he hates me, and every conservative. If he gets the nomination the only way he could win against Hillary or Barack Obama would be to be part of a McCain-Limbaugh ticket.


©2008 Mike Reagan. Mike’s column is distributed exclusively by: Cagle Cartoons, Inc..

UPDATE: Talk show host Sean Hannity is also unhappy about McCain — and unhappy about criticism he is getting for opposing McCain:



This entry was posted on Friday, February 1st, 2008 at 8:00 am and is filed under Ideology, Elections, Conservatism, Ronald Reagan, Newsweek Blogitics, Republican Party, Mitt Romney, Guest Contributor, Conservatives, 2008 Elections, Immigration, Talk Radio, Republicans, Politics. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Viewing 26 Comments

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    Michael Reagan is an idiot who had zero crediblity. He is the kind of idiot son who makes Al Gore III look good.

    However, Michael Reagan demonstrates one of the multitude of problems that the Republicans face. Instead of trying to develop the next generation of leaders, the Republicans keep looking to the idiot children of other Republicans.
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    There's still a chance Jeb Bush will run this year for President. (GOP desperation)

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    What's funny isn't that people who should know better would be fooled into believing McCain is a conservative, but there are people on the far left who actually believe such silliness already. It shows you how far left they are and how detached they are from reality.

    McCain is a business-as-usual, make-no-waves-in-DC Washington fixture.
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    McCain would be a decent Republican nominee if it weren't for his fanatical support for the Iraq war. He wouldn't be a great president, but he would suffice.
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    DLS - We agree on Reagan non-savant son, at least his half brother isn't as blatant in using his dead father's ghost.

    Forget about Jeb, he isn't all that loved in Florida. He stayed out of the endorsement game, but his pandering to Mittens wouldn't help anyway. Florida is now just right of center after JB reign of Schiavo.
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    What amazes me about this guest post is that M. Reagan has the audacity to think that talk radio voices are the voices of the Republican electorate. Romney seems to think so, too. In his call with reporters today he said:

    "When Sean Hannity says he’s voting for me, when Laura Ingraham says she’s endorsing me…

    Rush has been going after McCain pretty aggressively. Michael Reagan has been pretty aggressive. The world of conservatism is pretty solidly behind my effort."

    No, Mitt, the world of conservatism is not behind you. A few people with bullhorns are behind you. The "world of conservatism" (if it's defined by conservative voters) are apparently behind McCain. At least so far.
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    DLS- If you are on the far left, McCain is conservative by comparison. He has a fairly conservative voting record on the war, abortion and gay marriage, and believes in fiscal discipline.

    The GOP needs to stop looking for a Reagan imitation. No president ever performed well as the cheap imitation of another one. Bush tried to imitate Reagan, and ended up being a disaster. Even Reagan himself wouldn't know how to defeat the Islamic extremists, which is why he pulled the marines out of Lebanon. All of these pundits and candidates who claim to know what Reagan would have said or done are bypassing opportunities to solve real problems and resorting to useless conjecture in order to attract the conservative base. Its a total waste of time.

    BTW, I agree that MICHAEL Reagan is an idiot, who is just capitalizing off his dad's reputation. Otherwise, who would care what he has to say?
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    DLS- Jeb Bush would have no chance. The GOP was ready to anoint him or George Allen as the heir apparent, but Jeb's chance was ruined by W, and George self-destructed. I don't think Romney would be hard to beat. The best bet is McCain.
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    "The best bet is McCain."..................without a modicum of doubt.

    He is much more competitive with the D's in the head to head than Romney. Why, I don't know, but he is.

    So, for the life of me, I cannot figure out why the radio-cons would effectively prefer the notion of President Clinton over President McCain.
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    "Forget about Jeb, he isn't all that loved in Florida."

    For the record, I would not be impressed by a run by Jeb Bush, and yes, I would suspect the GOP of desperation if they got him to run. (An interesting related question on many people's minds, I suspect, is what Dubya has done to Jeb's future chances of election.)

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    "M. Reagan has the audacity to think that talk radio voices are the voices of the Republican electorate."

    It is an unwise assumption for Reagan to make. Non-liberals, and even conservatives, are hardly monolithic.

    "No, Mitt, the world of conservatism is not behind you."

    Hugh Hewitt, a Romney cheerleader, is reminded of this time after time if you read the reader remarks to his web log entries at Town Hall, the conservative Web site.

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    "If you are on the far left, McCain is conservative by comparison."

    HA! If you think he is conservative, you are on the far left!

    "The GOP needs to stop looking for a Reagan imitation." ... "The best bet is McCain."

    At this point, McCain seems to be the likely nominee and a real conservative will just have to be selected as McCain's VP if this continues.
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