One of my favorite conservative columnists recently started a
column with the words, “Back before the Republican Party was
saddled with John McCain as its nominee…” How was the Republican
Party “saddled” with him when more Republicans voted for him than
for anyone else running in the Republican primaries and caucuses? I
was one of those who voted for John McCain in the California
Primary, and did it with enthusiasm. As someone as conservative as
the columnist, of course I have had disagreements with Senator
McCain on some issues, but all the issues of disagreement are
secondary to winning the war in which our nation’s survival is at
stake, as well as the survival of civilization as we know it. I am
convinced that John McCain was born to be Commander in Chief in
this war. Foreign policy and the military are in his blood. That is
not true of the Democrats’ choice.
Early in 1961, President Kennedy invited former Vice President
Nixon to the Oval Office to discuss world affairs. Former Vice
President Nixon was seated on a lounge chair while President
Kennedy was pacing the floor as they discussed Cuba, Berlin, the
Congo, Laos, Vietnam, India, Pakistan, Indonesia, and the U.N.
President Kennedy stopped pacing and said to former Vice President
Nixon, “This is the stuff of Presidents! I mean, who cares if the
minimum wage is $1.15 or $1.25?” He meant, of course, that the
minimum wage “is the stuff” of Congresses.
Voters, whether they are Republicans or Democrats, generally
believe that Presidents establish both foreign and domestic
policies. They don’t. Presidents can advocate domestic policies but
Congresses generally decide them. President Clinton advocated
National Health Care. The Congress killed that one. President Bush
(43) advocated Social Security Reform and Immigration Reform. The
Congress killed both of them. It is different when it comes to
foreign affairs. Clinton sent our armed forces to Bosnia, Somalia,
Haiti, and Kosovo. Bush sent our armed forces to Afghanistan and
Iraq. Throughout our entire U.S. history our Congresses have only
committed five declarations of war, while there have been some 234
foreign military engagements ordered by presidents with or without
congressional approval. Since World War II, with little exception,
no matter the domestic policy pursuits of presidents, it has been
foreign affairs that have taken center-stage of their
administrations from the Atom Bomb to the Korean War to the Cuban
Missile Crises to Vietnam and Cambodia to the Iranian Hostage
Crisis to “Tear down this Wall, Mister Gorbachev!” to the
liberation of Kuwait.
On April the 10, 1975, President Ford made an impassioned plea
to a Joint Session of the Congress to give the funds for aid we had
promised South Vietnam in the Paris Peace Accords of January 27,
1973. The Congress refused. One week after President Ford’s
rejected plea, Cambodia fell, and before the end of the month South
Vietnam fell. Shortly after that I asked former President Nixon
what he would have done had he still been president with the
imminent surrender of Cambodia and South Vietnam while Congress
denied the funds to prevent those surrenders. He answered, “I would
have bombed the blazes out of Hanoi and Haiphong.” Then he added,
“I would have been impeached but so what? We would have saved
millions of Southeast Asian lives.” In short, presidents are
commanders in chief.
In 2004 John McCain publicly advocated sending a surge of more
troops to Iraq. He stuck with it until his surge was implemented by
the President last year. Whether it is remembered or not, it was
not that Senator McCain only supported the surge; he was the author
of that policy.
When I hear the recitation of issues that are used against John
McCain by any conservative, I can’t help but answer that we are in
a war against those who announce their objective is “Death to
America!” They mean it. Wars are either won or lost. If we lose,
then all the second-tier issues will be decided for us by an
Ayatollah, an Imam, or a Mullah.
The primary season is long-since over and the luxury of 2008’s
inter-party debates should be history. John McCain does not need to
reach out to us. We need to reach out to him. He ran. He won. He is
our candidate while the Democrats are “saddled” with Obama.
Without the base of a political party solidly behind their
candidate, the party’s candidate loses and the opposition’s
candidate wins. As a conservative, as a Republican, and most of all
as an American, I believe there is no contest in determining who is
most capable of leading the United States: John McCain. His mind,
his heart, and his blood are filled with the stuff of
Presidents.
