McCain's character

Ragman wrote:

You confuse me: if someone cheated on their wife, then they had sex and that IS after all what you are objecting to; however, that is a digression.

We discussed this issue already ..and your point just is not valid. There just is no correlation to upholding marital vows and maintaining an oath in the political office.

There might be that criteria in your mind. Feel free to vote as you wish based on this criteria, but be aware that not many of the better Presidents at least in this century have maintained their marital vows 100%. Truman and Nixon and possibly Gerry Ford might be the exception.

A person can have sex outside of marriage with the approval of their spouse, it happens all of the time. What confuses me about you position is that you are saying that inability or unwillingness to uphold a commitment to a spouse is totally unrelated to the expectation that the person we chose will uphold their commitments to the people, to the positions that that person took while seeking our vote. If a person cheats on a spouse on what basis can I expect the candidate not to cheat on me after they get elected, by not feeling some compulsion to do in office what they said they would do? It all boils down to trust and character. Your view that a person of low character in relationships can be trusted to act with character in his public life is naive. They have already demonstrated a willingness to take the easy road over the right road, this is who they are.

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Facts are facts. The majority of Presidents have cheated on their wives for most of this century.

I give up.

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Ragman wrote:

Facts are facts. The majority of Presidents have cheated on their wives for most of this century.

According to my math, you are saying Bush 43 has cheated on Laura.

Confused

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I don't know about Bush's fidelity, but history will undoubtedly show that won't qualify as one of the above-avg or even avg Presidents. In fact, he might be placed near the bottom.

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Ragman wrote:

Facts are facts. The majority of Presidents have cheated on their wives for most of this century.

I give up.

We know that very many have been sexual outside of marriage, the question would be how many cheated. Having a mistress that the wife knows all about, or knows exists but does not want to know the details of, has at times been very common. This is no problem for me. My reading of accounts is that McCain cheated though.

For instance, I have seen accounts that Mrs Kennedy could not help but to have known that her husband was sexual outside of the marriage, what we don't know is to what degree she signed off on it. Hillary could only not know about Bills cheating by way of willful ignorance. By not being willing to face his behaviour she enabled it, she is not a complete innocent. These women have been possibly cheated on, but not fully, since they participated in allowing it.

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This thread is beginning to sound like a country western ballad.

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Clearly, whether or not they have cheated with or without their wife's knowledge, it does not make them a bad President or a good one. Nothing you have written is definitive proof of that.

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Ragman wrote:

Facts are facts. The majority of Presidents have cheated on their wives for most of this century.

I give up.

I don't agree with this statement. I think Harry was faithful to Bess, As was Jimmy to Ros. Bush 41's infidelity is suspect as was RR's when he was married to Jane Wyman and courting Nancy, and who knows what 43 was doing when he was busy being AWOL from defending Texas from Oklahoma. However, in retrospect I consider this topic a hoots mess in the long run, lots of noise and fluster but little consequence.

As for 43's legacy---history will show that in comparison Nixon was not the crook that 43 is. In 200 years he'll only be remembered for Fillmoring the 2000 election with dire result.

Rap

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Ragman wrote:

Clearly, whether or not they have cheated with or without their wife's knowledge, it does not make them a bad President or a good one. Nothing you have written is definitive proof of that.

Right, cheaters can be good Presidents. And I suppose those with generally low character could turn out to be good as well. 20/20 hindsight makes it all clear. But do we want to take the chance?

McCain has a long public record to go on as well, however the political record has problems as well. Not only the Keating Five history but also his constantly changing political stripes over the last decade, as well as his obvious pandering to the conservative base of the GOP.

Can this guy be trusted? I think generally yes, but he is no angel.

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raprap wrote:

I don't agree with this statement. I think Harry was faithful to Bess, As was Jimmy to Ros. ...
Rap

If you read back a few comments, I had written that.

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Ragman wrote:

I don't know about Bush's fidelity, but history will undoubtedly show that won't qualify as one of the above-avg or even avg Presidents. In fact, he might be placed near the bottom.

The same thing was being said about Reagan near the end of his second term.

yawn

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You won't catch me disagreeing with that. Of course, onset of Alzheimer's will do that to a body.

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My point is that although D's derided Reagan to the very end as a 'dunce' and 'one of the worst presidents' , he was anything but.

His administration saw the West put the Soviet system to shame and ultimately to death.

His policies stopped the economic ravages of the Carter debacle.

His buildup of the US military allowed the US to be at the ready when , less than 12 months after he left office Iraq attempted to grab a large share of the world's oil in it's invasion of Kuwait.

Reagan was probably among our top 5 presidents, but many D's to this day haven't the honesty to admit it.

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real life wrote:

My point is that although D's derided Reagan to the very end as a 'dunce' and 'one of the worst presidents' , he was anything but.

His administration saw the West put the Soviet system to shame and ultimately to death.

His policies stopped the economic ravages of the Carter debacle.

His buildup of the US military allowed the US to be at the ready when , less than 12 months after he left office Iraq attempted to grab a large share of the world's oil in it's invasion of Kuwait.

Reagan was probably among our top 5 presidents, but many D's to this day haven't the honesty to admit it.

Reagan's accomplishments should include the Beruit debacle that contributed heavily to the feelings that the US would cut and run when faced with controversy in the Middle East, the violations of national autonomy in Central and South American, and the Iran Contra spectacle, or the contribution to deficit spending that will be paid by our children and grandchildren. I'll agree that Reagan was a success as a President---but he isn't one of the great presidents. As for the failure of the Soviet Union, that started with Truman and Eisenhower who showed we wouldn't back sown, with Kennedy who challenged directly with the Cuban missile crisis, with Nixon who played China off of the Soviets, and even Carter who showed that the US was a nation of morals (human rights and 1980 Olympic Boycott). Granted Reagan did ultimately break the Soviet bank with the increased military spending and the brilliant SDI bluff I think you're giving him much too much credit without recognizing any of the failures.

BTW In many cases Carter supposed economic debacle (along with the hated 55mph speed limit) was inherited from the hyperinflation of during the of Gerald Ford (remember the first oil crisis and Whip Inflation Now). My opinion of Carter was that he was a poor chief executive because he micromanage and was too honest. Something that I don't think Reagan was ever guilty of, not that that is a presidential flaw in all cases.

As for Bush (43), I feel sorry for anyone who has the honor of succeeding him. If I was a diehard single ticket Republican, I hope the next President was a Democrat, a Libertarian, or Nader. That way I would have a justification to blame someone other than Bush (43) and Florida.

Rap

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Quote:

His policies stopped the economic ravages of the Carter debacle.

He ran up truly gigantic deficits. And raised taxes far more then Republicans seem to recall.

Cycloptichorn

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real life wrote:

His buildup of the US military allowed the US to be at the ready when , less than 12 months after he left office Iraq attempted to grab a large share of the world's oil in it's invasion of Kuwait.

Actually Iraq's invasion of Kuwait was in August(?) 1990, while Reagan left office in January 1989. George H. W. Bush did, however, invade Panama in December 1989.

Quote:

Reagan was probably among our top 5 presidents, but many D's to this day haven't the honesty to admit it.

Unfortunately Reagan didn't live up to his promises or his potential. Winning the Cold War is the only one of his achievements that will have any lasting effect and with China on the rise, this will be marginal at best.

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hanno wrote:

In McCain's case - he was more or less upfront about it, got an amicable divorce, no squabbling,

By some accounts McCain's children refused to have anything to do with him or his 2nd wife for several years after the divorce. That's not an amicable divorce.

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Foofie wrote:

The reason why I believe this continued concern with who is, or is not, an adulterer, is based on ignoring one fact. Some of us are monogamous, some of us are polygamous. Just like the animal kingdom.
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If you are an animal you can justify anything. By your standards any man who rapes a little girl is just an animal so it is natural to him. Ken Lay was just an animal so whatever he stole was justifiable. Adolf Hitler was just an animal, so it was natural for him to kill 6,000,000 in cold blood.

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Ragman wrote:

We discussed this issue already ..and your point just is not valid. There just is no correlation to upholding marital vows and maintaining an oath in the political office.

Why not? Explain.

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Ragman wrote:

Facts are facts. The majority of Presidents have cheated on their wives for most of this century.

Care to document this fact? Which presidents are you talking about?

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McCain's character

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