John McCain is not a war hero!

“Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump criticizes US senator John McCain for getting captured during the Vietnam war. Speaking at the Family Leadership Summit in Iowa on Saturday, Trump says he supported McCain in the 2008 presidential elections, but questions his status as a war hero. Trump is currently running at the top of most Republican polls.”

President Trump still continues to be criticized for that statement and few in the general public ever took the time to investigate and find out if what President Trump said is true.  John McCain is no hero in fact he may have been a traitor.  The only mistake President Trump made was to say “for getting captured during the Vietnam war.”

John McCain flew ground-attack aircraft from carriers in the US Navy. He was shot down over North Vietnam in 1967 and spent the next six years as a prisoner of the Vietnamese, whom he alleged tortured him. His mission when he was shot down was the bombing of a light bulb factory, a civilian target prohibited under international law. This means that rather than a “war hero” John McCain is in fact a “war criminal.”  Many will say he was only following orders and that is true he did not select the target.  But, the liberals did not give the Army and Marine Infantry soldiers the same break.  They called them MURDERS!

McCain didn’t just carry out such illegal orders himself, he willingly voiced support for them, specifically during the 1999 war against Yugoslavia when “water systems, power and heating plants, hospitals, universities, schools, apartment complexes, senior citizens’ homes, bridges, factories, trains, buses, radio and TV stations, the telephone system, oil refineries, embassies, marketplaces and more were deliberately destroyed by U.S./NATO planes in a ruthless 10-week bombing campaign.”

McCain is often called a “war hero”, a title adorning an unlovely resume starting with a father who was an admiral who graduated fifth from the bottom at the US Naval Academy, where he earned the nickname “McNasty”.  McCain flew 23 bombing missions over North Vietnam, (Air Force Pilots were required to fly 100 missions before rotating back to the States). each averaging about half an hour, total time ten hours and thirty minutes. For these brief excursions the admiral’s son was awarded two Silver Stars, two Legions of Merit, two Distinguished Flying Crosses, three Bronze Stars, the Vietnamese Legion of Honor and three Purple Hearts. US Veteran Dispatch calculates our hero earned a medal an hour.  McCain was shot down and parachuted into Truc Boch Lake, whence he was captured by Vietnamese, and put in prison.

On that gray morning more, McCain was knocked unconscious briefly when he ejected from his damaged bomber. Both his arms were broken, his right knee was shattered, and when he splashed into the middle of Truc Bach (White Silk) Lake, his 50 pounds of flight gear kept him from reaching the surface.  His arms and right knee was shattered because he did not follow proper procedures when ejecting from the plane.  In other words he SCREWED up.

Why did Senator McCain oppose releasing documents and information about American prisoners of war in Vietnam and the missing in action who have still not been accounted for.  His staunch resistance to laying open the POW/MIA records has baffled colleagues and others who have followed his career.  His anti-disclosure campaign successfully shut down the release of these documents. Literally thousands of documents that would otherwise have been declassified long ago have now been legislated into secrecy.  What was and is Senator McCain afraid may come out if these documents are released?  Is he afraid that if some of these returned prisoners debriefings were released they may reveal Senator John McCain was a traitor? Many former POWs, MIA families and veterans have suggested there is something especially damning about McCain that the senator wants to keep hidden. 

In 1989, 11 members of the House of Representatives introduced a measure they called “The Truth Bill.” A brief and simple document, it said: “[The] head of each department or agency which holds or receives any records and information, including live-sighting reports, which have been correlated or possibly correlated to United States personnel listed as prisoner of war or missing in action from World War II, the Korean conflict and the Vietnam conflict shall make available to the public all such records and information held or received by that department or agency. In addition, the Department of Defense shall make available to the public with its records and information a complete listing of United States personnel classified as prisoner of war, missing in action, or killed in action (body not returned) from World War II, the Korean conflict, and the Vietnam conflict.” 

This Truth Bill was bitterly opposed by the Pentagon, “The Truth Bill” got nowhere. It was reintroduced in the next Congress in 1991 — and again disappeared. Then, suddenly, out of the Senate, birthed by the Arizona Senator, a new piece of legislation emerged. It was called “The McCain Bill.” This measure turned “The Truth Bill ” on its head. It created a bureaucratic maze from which only a fraction of the available documents could emerge. And it became law. So restrictive were its provisions that one clause actually said the Pentagon didn’t even have to inform the public when it received intelligence that Americans were alive in captivity.

Boiled down, the The McCain Bill means that the Defense Department is not obligated to tell the public about prisoners believed alive in captivity and what efforts are being made to rescue them. It only has to notify the White House and the intelligence committees in the Senate and House. The committees are forbidden under law from releasing such information.

Then there is the Missing Service Personnel Act, which McCain succeeded in gutting in 1996. A year before, the act had been strengthened, with bipartisan support, to compel the Pentagon to deploy more resources with greater speed to locate and rescue missing men. The measure imposed strict reporting requirements.  Again what is Senator McCain afraid may come out?  Other than Senator McCain I do not know one veteran of the Vietnam “Conflict” that supports not doing all we can to discover the truth about these MIA.  I was in Vietnam when Senator McCain was shot down.

 One final evisceration in the law was McCain’s removal of all its enforcement teeth. The original act provided for criminal penalties for anyone, such as military bureaucrats in Washington, who destroy or cover up or withhold from families any information about a missing man. McCain erased this part of the law. He said the penalties would have a chilling effect on the Pentagon’s ability to recruit personnel for its POW/MIA office.

McCain has said again and again that he has seen no “credible” evidence that more than a tiny handful of men might have been alive in captivity after the official prison return in 1973.  One is one too many! He dismisses all of the subsequent radio intercepts, live sightings, satellite photos, CIA reports, defector information, recovered enemy documents and reports of ransom demands — thousands and thousands of pieces of information indicating live captives — as meaningless. He has even described these intelligence reports as the rough equivalent of UFO and alien sightings.  Again I ask why would a former POW work so hard and so persistently to keep POW/MIA information from coming out?

Some McCain watchers searching for answers point to his recently published best-selling autobiography, Faith of My Fathers, half of which is devoted to his years as a prisoner. In the book, he says he felt badly throughout his captivity because he knew he was being treated more leniently than his fellow POWs owing to his propaganda value as the son of Adm. John S. McCain II, who was then the CINCPAC — commander in chief of all U.S. forces in the Pacific region, including Vietnam.  Also in the book, the Arizona Senator repeatedly expresses guilt and disgrace at having broken under torture and given the North Vietnamese a taped confession, a confession he could not deny because tapes were available. The tapes were broadcast over the camp loudspeakers, saying he was a war criminal who had, among other acts, bombed a school. “I felt faithless and couldn’t control my despair,” he writes. What about the 32 tapes played on Vietnam radio where he said he was being treated well and that he killed innocent Vietnamese for the United States and if not for North Vietnam’s fine hospitals and doctors he would have never walked again.  John McCain on 32 radio taped broadcast praised North Vietnam and criticized the United States. A war hero I think not!

New York Times: “His (John McCain’s) most striking achievement came when he joined with another Vietnam veteran, Senator John Kerry (another traitor), to puncture the myth that Vietnam continued holding American prisoners.

The press corps, covering the state-by-state primary vote, made an assumption, based apparently on sentiment, that McCain, as the war hero, would capture the significant veterans’ vote by stunning margins. Actually, he didn’t capture it at all. When the states were tallied up, the veterans’ vote went to George W. Bush.

"When I was offered a chance to go home early from prison camp in Vietnam, I put my country first.  And I’ve been doing that ever since.  I had an opportunity at that time, when I was in prison in North Vietnam, to come home early because of the fact that my father was an admiral," McCain said. "And I chose not to, because I put my country first.”  If he had come home early he would have never been elected to any office in the United States.  He would have disgraced not only himself, but his family.  He certainly would not have been mentioned as a war hero.  He did not come home because he would have lost face.  It had nothing to do with loyalty to his country.  As usual John McCain was only interested in himself and his future.

I have far more to say about John McCain the war hero, but I will save that for a later date.

I opposed the war in Iraq at the time - Did Donald Trump?

Donald Trump is being attack by Republican politician’s for saying he opposed the war in Iraq and thinks it was a mistake.  I know this is probably shocking to many Republicans and some Democrats, but there were Republican voters back then who possessed the foresight to know that the Iraq War was going to be something we would regret for many years to come. We stood on street corners in front of Federal Buildings around the country carrying signs protesting our participation in the Iraq conflict. Those who opposed the war in Iraq from the very beginning took no end of abuse for taking that position.  We were booed, threatened and had cigarettes flicked at us by fine upstanding people passing by who believed the lies being told them by politicians. We were often resented by other protesters because we were older, conservative and Republican – we were not one of them.  

It was not difficult for us to figure out that Iraq was about to become our next Iran. We understood that it was a religious dispute among Muslims that had gone on for generations and no outsider was going to fix it or end it. We felt sorry for the weaker Muslims, but were thankful the conflict had not been brought to our shores and knew if we interfered it would cost American lives and accomplish nothing. Saddam Hussein, just as the Shaw of Iran, had not caused us problems the problems in Iraq were internal problems and between Muslims. 

Rightly or wrongly some of us believed the reason for America’s involvement was oil. If that was the reason then China should thank us for getting involved because they benefit from the oil not us. I always believed some politicians feared a return of oil shortages as experienced during the Carter years and the oil corporation’s feared lost profits and assets in Iraq. The oil industry's political donations may have influenced politicians to make bad decisions. 

I agree President Bush was close to gaining a better Iraq, but he or anyone else would have solved the problems within Iraq and outside of Iraq among Muslims. If we would not have gone in to Iraq then Obama would not have had any American troops to bring home. I also agree that Obama made a terrible mistake in withdrawing our troops after we were engaged in the internal conflicts of Iraq. It did not take a Middle East expert to know that Iran would attempt to fill the vacuum when we were gone.

John Kasich, Chris Christie, Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio have all said at one time or another they would not have invaded Iraq in the first place, but that they would not have withdrawn our troops after we were there as Obama did. Rand Paul said the same thing, but that's no surprise. Jeb Bush has even made statements that the Iraq war was not a good idea. Do you remember the Kelly question to Jeb Bush “… if you knew then what you know now would you have invaded Iraq” – it took five days for Bush to come up with a final answer? Trumps mistake in stating he opposed the Iraq war was he made it a personal attack on President “W” Bush to upset Jeb Bush. That would have worked if Trump was running as a Democrat, but he claims to be running as a conservative (progressive) Republican.

 With everything that has happened over the last dozen years, including events of just the last year, it's very hard to say that the invasion was a good idea. Iraq has loomed large over every aspect of US politics and foreign policy for more than a decade.

Republican politicians had moved the debate to the 'surge', where they had a much better argument to make. The ‘surge’ created an opening for a political solution, which never ended up happening and I personally never believed would.

 In the 2008 presidential race, the Iraq 'debate' was largely fought over who was right about the surge. Donald Trump has in 2016 brought the debate back into a territory that the Republican establishment does not want to go – should we have invaded in the first place. 

Public opinion has turned decisively against the Iraq war. But political fights recently have largely been fought over ISIS, whether there should have been a full pull-out from Iraq, chaos in Syria, Libya and Yemen and more. Most American I think would agree we have to stop ISIS and other terrorist groups, but Republican politicians and Democrat politicians, including Hillary Clinton and John Kerry who supported the invasion of Iraq, would like to leave the question if we should have invaded in the first place in the closet never to be revisited again – Donald Trump has opened that closet door.

Would we have the ISIS problem we have today if we had not invaded Iraq – I guess we will never know? The invasion certainly destabilized the Middle East even further. Today we are in such a hellish situation in the Middle East that it is hard to defend the original invasion.  Did the invasion speed up the terror coming to our shores?

I am sorry it is not the ‘hawks’ in Washington that deserve any credit for Iraq it is those politicians who had the good sense to oppose the Iraq invasion from the outset. Iraq is a reality and we now must try to make the best of it and unfortunately that probably means leaving troops in the Middle East for many, many years to come – perhaps forever. It means increasing our military presences which means modernizing and increasing our military. It means it is going to be even more difficult to lower our National Debt. But, most of all we must consider Americans may have died and suffered for nothing.

Yes, some Republican voters were arguing at the time against invading Iraq, on the grounds that Iraq did not pose a threat to the U.S. imminent enough to justify an invasion. Some Republicans and I was one of them were publicly shouting themselves hoarse, pointing out at the time that, at the very least, there were serious questions about whether Iraq really posed the threat the Bush administration and other politicians claimed it did.

Jeb Bush said, "…the focus needs to be on the future." We should always focus on the future, but we should never forget the past. I do not think we should let the present moment pass without acknowledging that those who were most focused on the future during the run-up to the war in Iraq were the ones working to stop it from happening.  

In closing, I would like to give credit where credit is due Vice President Al Gore and Illinois State Senator Obama and twenty-one other Democrats like Teddy Kennedy opposed the Iraq war from the beginning and publicly stated they did at the time – all politicians that I would have never voted for.  Bernie Sanders an Independent who was in the House at the time was against the invasion. I only know of one Republican who spoke out loud and clear against the invasion and it was Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island who is now a Democrat. I have no recollection of Donald Trump saying anything whatsoever in public about invading Iraq before the war began, although I am not sure I even knew who Donald Trump was at that time.

It was not just those in the Bush White House who were responsible for the tragedy, but leading Democrat members of Congress as well, some of whom are now in senior positions in the Obama administration supported the invasion of Iraq. There is enough blame to go around in both parties.

Obama's negotiations did not get our Navy personnel released!

Iran's seizure of two U.S. naval ships and President Barack Obama's response show that Iran the country the president hoped would secure his foreign policy legacy has the ability to hold him hostage.

Obama didn’t mention the incident in the Persian Gulf during his State of the Union speech because Obama and his administration did not consider the boarding of the ships and the seizure of 10 U.S. sailors to be a "hostile act." Instead, the president praised Iran and the diplomatic agreement he had made with them in spite of the fact that the majority of Americans do not support his private deal with Iran.  

Even though Iran quickly released the 10 U.S. military personnel it still shows that despite a nuclear agreement with the West, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps is willing to board U.S. vessels, take American soldiers into custody, and, according to CNN confiscate the crew's communications and GPS equipment.

Secretary of State John Kerry’s call to Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif is not evidence to me that relationships between the United States and Iran have improved. Iran was not influenced by John Kerry or Obama they did exactly what they wanted to do. Iran was looking to humiliate the United States and they did. The Iranian state press reported the sailors had been “arrested” for “snooping”. The Obama administration, as they did in during the Benghazi crisis, lied telling us the boats had malfunctioned. The two boats function the next day without any repairs being made to them.

If the Iranian government respected Obama or the United States it would not have taken several hours before the captured sailors were allowed to make contact with their superiors. If the Iranian government feared any retaliation from Obama and the United States they would have immediately called Washington and advised them what had happen and that they were working to resolve the problem. Instead the Iranian government did nothing until they had their humiliating videos and press releases in place.

The incident is just the latest in a series of Iranian provocations since agreeing to the private Obama nuclear deal in July. In late December, Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps vessels fired unguided missiles near the USS Truman; the U.S. did not retaliate. Also last month, Kerry wrote to the Iranian government to assure it the U.S. government would waive new visa restrictions passed by Congress, after Tehran objected. The U.S. indefinitely delayed imposing sanctions on Iran in response to its tests of ballistic missiles in violation of United Nations sanctions. The United States will remain hostage to Iran as long as Obama is in office.

Obama’s last State of the Union message was supposed to convey to the American people and the world that we are all safer and more secure because of Obama’s diplomatic achievements. Iran’s flaunting they could take two U.S. Navy vessels without any fear of retaliation did not make me feel safer or more secure.

To my friends in the Philippines if Obama will not stand up to Iran in defense of the United States do you honestly think he will stand up for you against China.

Iran released the U.S. Navy personnel because they knew the American people would revolt if Obama attempted to go ahead with the release of 150 billion dollars while our personnel was still being held hostage. Iran wanted the 150 billion dollars and to show Obama and the United States who is really in charge in the Middle East. They accomplished both!

The Obama’s administration's without knowing all the details immediately began to play down the incident and to seek accommodation with Tehran. That has been Obama’s approach to the Iran deal since its conception even though Iran has continued to escalates tensions with the U.S. and its allies.

Obama’s legacy in my opinion will be that of the first President in my lifetime that did not stand up for the rights of the United States. Iran knows that Obama is looking for the Iran deal to be his crowning legacy and they are playing him for a fool. Obama is in a no win situation and Iran knows that. Obama chose to go to the dance with Iran and as we say in the South, “You have to leave with the one that brought you.” Obama has no choice but stay in bed with Iran or see his legacy go down the toilet.

Something we hear little to nothing about in the media is the upcoming elections in Iran. Iran's parliament and powerful assembly of experts will choose Iran's next supreme leader within a month, which has the ultimate authority over Iran's nuclear program. With a stroke of a pen Obama’s Iran deal can be abolished and they will still have their 150 billion dollars to support more terrorism.

Once again we have been manipulated by our politicians and we have stood by passively as they have done it! Why have we allowed one man, Obama, to negotiate a private deal with a terrorist country that has for more than 35 years wanted to destroy us and our only middle east ally Israel? Will we, the American people, ever have the courage and the guts to take back our country from the Washington elite? 

Note: Iran says seizure of U.S. boats a lesson to ‘troublemakers’ in U.S. Congress,” Iran’s army chief Major General Hassan Firouzabadi said on Wednesday the seizure of two U.S. navy boats and their 10 sailors should be a lesson to members the U.S. Congress trying to impose new sanctions on Tehran. It is reported he went on to say some of the Navy personnel were so frightened they cried.

Climate change is more of a threat than terrorist - really!

Forty thousand delegates from 190 countries, 130 heads of state, were in Paris this week, not to debate the ISIS terror attack that killed 130 people. They were not there to honor the dead, although they did take time to do it. They were there to develop strategies that will defeat the biggest threat the world faces (according to Obama) climate change.

ISIS or Turkey’s shooting down a Russian jet, which puts both the Kremlin and NATO on the road to war are not as important as climate change according to Obama. If we have World War III or cannot contain the terrorist we will not need to worry about climate change. Oh, I know Obama says he has contained the terrorist – I guess he has them contained in Paris, the United States, Somalia, Pakistan, Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Palestinian, Columbia, Thailand, Philippines, Yemen, Russia, France, India or Thailand for all those countries have been attack by terrorist and continue to face terrorist attack as all countries in the world do. We should also note Obama’s own military advisor told Congress this week, “U.S. forces have not contained ISIS in Iraq and Syria. The terror threat is growing.

Fighting climate change seems more like a cult to me and President Obama is its Grand Wizard. He has replaced Democrat Al Gore. Obama and others in his administration have said 23 times over the years that climate change is a grave threat to the world.  In July 2008, Al Gore called climate change a more dangerous threat than terrorism. Al Gore said, “I think that the climate crisis is, by far, the most serious threat we have ever faced.”  I have to cut Gore slack that was in 2008, but Obama continues to say it in 2015.

Secretary of State John Kerry said this about the threat of climate change, “If our military vehicles are unable to move anywhere in the region here or elsewhere because they’re up to their axles in water and all the roads leading into and out of the base here are flooded, that affects military readiness.” If the terrorist continue on the path they are on we will not need to worry about flooding, but according to Kerry we have to solve the climate change problem before we address solving the terrorist problem.

I really do not know what part of the world Kerry is talking about when he speaks of flooding. I have visited eleven different countries in the last fifteen years all countries I had visited previously when I was younger and frankly I did not witness any changes in their weather. I certainly did not witness any great floods in the Middle East.

I think the craziest statement made about climate change in the past six months was made by Bernie Sanders an Independent running in the Democratic primary election – he believes climate change CAUSES terrorism! Dear old Bernie agrees with Obama that it is the greatest problem the United States and the world faces. Dear old Bernie even repeated his claim the day after the latest terrorist attack in Paris. I guess Bernie does not know that ISIS killed more in Paris on that day than Hitler’s troops did when they occupied Paris in 1940.

The world temperate has raised about 1 degree and to combat that 1 degree increase Obama has spent 90 billion dollars of tax payer’s money on green jobs and he spent 5 billion dollars on electric cars. The Federal Food Stamp program costs an estimated 75 billion per year that is 15 billion less than Obama has spent on companies that have gone bankrupt trying to encourage green job industries in the United States. That should tell you where Obama and the Democrats priorities really are. They are more interested in their cronies that want to open green job industries than the poor.

No one can deny that Obama knows how to waste tax payer’s money. He is the King of Waste. It is estimated 175 billion dollars a year could end world hunger. Obama has increased our welfare food stamp budget to 75 billion dollars a year and we still have people going hungry in the United States. Just one more failed Obama program.

Do you remember in 2008, Obama Said adding $4 trillion to the National Debt was "Irresponsible" and "Unpatriotic” - shame on you President Bush? Obama had a program to reduce the National Debt, but in 2012, four years, not eight, he had raised the National Debt by 5.4 trillion. In 2009 Obama presented a program that was supposed to, "Cut the Deficit in half by the End of [His] First Term in Office.” I don’t think that happen, but I could be mistaken. Just one more failed Obama program.  Obama presented a plan that would Prevent 7 to 9 million families from foreclosure. Currently 5.6 million residential mortgages are either 30 Days delinquent or in foreclosure. Now I have to admit they claim Obama did help save 2 million from foreclosure. OOPS! Another failed Obama program. I am not going to waste time talking about ObamaCare. That is obviously a failure – you cannot keep your doctor, insurance is not cheaper, you have to pay for service you do not need or want and if you choose to opt out you have to pay nearly $1000 a year in fines and penalties. Obama was going to reduce college cost, but the cost of college is currently at "an all-time high." Nationally, the cost of a full credit load at a state college has passed $8,000. Throw in room and board, and the average cost for a state college now runs more than $17,000 a year. His education programs have failed. President Obama had a program to solve the energy crisis once and for all. His failed plan was to invest in clean energies like solar, wind, and biodiesel. Obama had a plan to restore America's standing in the world. Bowing to the Saudi King did not work! His plan included once again leading the world not just militarily, but diplomatically and economically. Maybe I have missed something, but I do not think any of the three happen. Need I say more?

We can rest easy though because all these failures do not matter much because our only major problem according to Obama is climate change.

I am beginning to wonder if climate change is not being used by some  in powerful places to prevent them from having to address the terrorist problem. It's as if the terrorist problem may be part of their agenda to reach a goal.  What could possibly be their goal  could it be- too weaken the Christian faith, too keep the economy weak, to bring about confusion among the people, to distract the people from what is happening in government, to create an energy problem or too start a major war or is it all of these things or a combination of them.

I have noticed that when the American Stock Market takes a nose dive it is not the upper 1% that gets hurt. It is the middle class that have their pension funds invested in the market. The upper 1% buy depressed stock  and make a hefty profit when stocks go up again.

It just does not make sense to me that powerful nations like the United States, Russia, China, Japan, Germany, England and France cannot wipe out a bunch of thugs in Syria, Iraq, Iran, Africa and Afghanistan.