Falling in a Hamas ditch, the McCain campaign keeps digging

May 17, 2008

When evidence surfaced yesterday that John McCain advocated at least some kind of diplomatic relationship between the United States and Hamas, I assumed the McCain campaign would just say the senator has since changed his mind. After all, the Presidential Candidate McCain frequently bears no resemblance to Senator McCain, and the two routinely take the opposite position on key policy disputes.

But that’s not what the McCain campaign decided to do. Instead, in true Bush-like fashion, the McCain gang denied reality altogether.

Step 1: Don’t believe your lying eyes.

The first spin out of the McCain campaign is that there is no contradiction here. “There should be no confusion, John McCain has always believed that serious engagement would require mandatory conditions and Hamas must change itself fundamentally – renounce violence, abandon its goal of eradicating Israel and accept a two state solution. John McCain’s position is clear and has always been clear….”

In other words, McCain believes, if certain diplomatic conditions are met, the U.S. should engage diplomatically with Hamas group. McCain also believes we must never engage diplomatically with Hamas, and to do so would be a “grave and dangerous mistake.” This, as far as McCain is concerned, is not a contradiction.

Step 2: Pretend context helps.

Yesterday afternoon, the McCain campaign sent an email to reporters with the subject line: “Jamie Rubin lied.” It showed additional footage from the 2006 interview, and included McCain saying, “I think the United States should take a step back, see what they do when they form their government, see what their policies are and see the ways we can engage with. If there aren’t any, there may be a hiatus. But I think part of the relationship will be dictated by how Hamas acts, not how the United States acts.”

But how is this exculpatory?

Even with the additional context, McCain said just two years ago that engagement with Hamas was a distinct possibility. Jamie Rubin didn’t lie about anything, and the context didn’t change the substance at all.

Step 2: Let’s play semantics games over the meaning of plain words.

In the 2006 interview, McCain said of Hamas, “They’re the government; sooner or later we are going to have to deal with them, one way or another, and I understand why this administration and previous administrations had such antipathy towards Hamas because of their dedication to violence and the things that they not only espouse but practice, so … but it’s a new reality in the Middle East. I think the lesson is people want security and a decent life and decent future, that they want democracy. Fatah was not giving them that.”

The meaning of McCain’s words were pretty transparent — we may not like Hamas, but if they’re the government, we’ll have to engage them diplomatically. We had “antipathy” towards Hamas before, but now everything’s different.

Yesterday afternoon, McCain foreign policy adviser Nancy Pfotenhauer appeared on MSNBC to argue that when McCain said “deal with,” he might have been referring to “bombing” Hamas. Watching the video, Pfotenhauer’s claim is rather embarrassing, and obviously false. Besides, does the McCain campaign really want to debate the meaning of the word “deal”?

Step 3: Blame the messenger.

The McCain campaign settled on blaming Jamie Rubin, a former assistant secretary of state, the State Department’s chief spokesman during the Clinton administration, and an active supporter of Hillary Clinton’s campaign, for manufacturing this mess. Rubin explained very well why this is McCain’s mess, not his.

There they go again. The old John McCain would just admit he changed his position and move on. But the new John McCain campaign is incapable of that. Instead, they are reverting to an attack on the messenger. […]

I remember at the time being struck by how unusual his response was for an American politician. European politicians say that sort of thing all the time. And that’s why I dug out the question and answer after McCain declared that Hamas is rooting for Barack Obama and that he would be their nightmare.

The reality is that in Davos Senator McCain was expressing the views of the realist camp in the Republican Party. Former Secretary of State Colin Powell, a close friend of the Senator, has said directly that we should engage with Hamas in an interview with National Public Radio last year. In Davos, we saw the charming maverick that the Washington Press Corps are so fond of. But last week we saw the other McCain, the one who would attack Senator Obama in a crude and unacceptable way. When called on it, instead of admitting that he changed his mind, the McCain campaign is determined to continue the politics of personal destruction.

There is a war going on in Iraq. This fall’s election will be a virtual referendum on the war. That is a real issue. Instead of debating that, President Bush and Senator McCain are determined to attack the character of their political opponents. As a Democrat, I am tired of having our patriotism attacked. Yesterday, the Democratic Party leaders were unified in denouncing these kinds of attacks. Senator Hillary Clinton, Senator Joe Biden and the Majority Leader Harry Reid all spoke in unison to defend Senator Obama.

So I say to the McCain campaign, just admit the truth, either he made a mistake or he changed his mind, then let us return to debating the issues as Americans.

I can’t imagine why the McCain gang, confronted with this evidence, doesn’t just flip-flop. McCain does it all the time. Why not do it again? It would sure beat this embarrassing display.

Republican Damage Control 101

Step 1: Blame someone connected to Clinton.

Step 2: Repeat step 1, louder as necessary.

  • McCain has definitely lost his bearings and it has nothing to do with his age.

  • I can’t imagine why the McCain gang, confronted with this evidence, doesn’t just flip-flop. McCain does it all the time. Why not do it again? It would sure beat this embarrassing display.

    Because he just spent two weeks tying Obama to Hamas and saying that talking equals appeasement.

    Question on Obama: when Obama says he will ‘talk’ to Iran, is this ‘talk’ different than negotiation? It seems to me that Obama is really suggesting an ice-breaker as a prelude to actual negotiation, not as the final act in a long series of low-level talks.

    I also don’t understand the talking point of meeting with a tyrant elevates or legitimizes the tyrant. It seems to me that these folks thrive on isolationism. If they actually meet with foreign leaders, it does more to delegitimize their home grown attacks on the Western World. Since Obama probably has no interest in demonizing the Enemy, he has no need to keep a distance from foreign tyrants, his meeting with them would not delegitimize his public statements.

  • 1) You have 2 Step 2s.

    2) So part of McCain’s explanation is that he now might want to engage in military action against Hamas? WHAT??? I mean, it’s not that surprising come from Mr Bomb Bomb Iran, but wouldn’t that be a pretty huge change to American policy in Israel/Palestine?

  • I’ve figured it out: there are two John McCains.
    One is St. John the Maverick, presidential candidate who always says the right thing.
    Then, there is “Jon” McCain, a democratic operative from the left wing dirty trick squad who even has the capability to go back in time and contradict statements St. John has made.
    The two are so amazingly alike that even Joe Lieberman cannot tell them apart.

  • McCain’s experience and foreign policy expertise have taught him nothing if not that he has always been wrong.

  • Here’s something Bush said in a speech recently:

    I’m focusing on, you know, protecting America, and succeeding in Iraq, and dealing with the North Korea, and dealing with the Iranian, and dealing with the issues around the world where we’re making a difference in terms of keeping peace. I want to get this in as good as a position as possible so that when John McCain is the President — and he will be — he can deal with these issues in a way that yields peace.

    I guess that’s a good summary, though it’s hard to see how bombing yields peace.

  • A couple of months ago the Altercation website (Eric Alterman) posted results of a poll done in Israel that 64% of the Israeli population favored their government negotiating with Hamas. Does anybody know anything about that? Israelis routinely debate issues like this that in the U.S. are for some reason verboten. An American politician can’t even hint that he/she will talk with Hamas but Israeli politicians do it all the time. My take in all this is that when it comes to Middle East Policy, Israel has a ring through the U.S. nose. Many of our politicians, most obviously and outrageously, Joe Lieberman, are simply representing Israel in the U.S. Congress. Under Bush, instead of Israel being our “Fifty-first State,” the U.S. has become Israel’s “extra” province. They own us. Their spies steal our military secrets. Their military agencies steal our military technology. And apparently many high ranking Pentagon Officials routinely give away the farm to Israeli counterparts. Yet Hillary makes the absurd threat that if Iran (which doesn’t have nuclear weapons) attacks Israel, (which has hundreds of nukes and the cutting edge U.S. delivery systems to deliver them) she would “annihilate” Iran. Are we now an Israeli colony?

  • tomj @ #4: You’re quite right. Not talking to these people actually makes them stronger. Bush has already learned that the hard way once. Early in his administration he was always talking tough about North Korea. “I’m not going to talk to them, because that would *reward* them for what they do.”

    So Bush turned his back on them for three or four years. The result? NK succeeded in creating at least a prototype nuclear bomb and set it off in a bomb test. And that forced Bush to finally go back to the table. Once he did, NK gave up their nuclear program pretty easily.

    The fact is, refusing to talk to nations like NK or Iran strengthens them and weakens us. We only have leverage against them if we engage them. No engagement guarantees no leverage, so they’ll just ignore us and do whatever they want. Obama, and Powel, and Reagan, and so many others are absolutely correct that we need to keep diplomatic access open even to the countries we hate.

  • McCain was caught in a lie, and tried to wiggle out of it! IOne of his surrogates was on MSNBC yesterday saying “dealing with Hamas, may include anything from bombing to sending them roses”. She could not keep a straight face when saying this either.

  • Keep this up Mr. Carpetbagger…
    You may not win a web-Pulitzer…
    But… You sure the hell should………..

    RE this:

    when McCain said “deal with,” he might have been referring to “bombing” Hamas.

    That’s got to be the funniest weasel imitating a slug aping a hangdog I’ve ever seen.
    Crickey…

    The genome of the platypus is no match for the chimerical fancies oozing out of Camp McCain. Talk about stitched together bullshit! This guy is reinventing the genre.

  • Yesterday afternoon, McCain foreign policy adviser Nancy Pfotenhauer appeared on MSNBC — CB

    It all depends on what the meaning of “is” is, no? What struck me in her “anything from bombs to a bed of roses” was that “bombs” came first, possibly giving us a glimpse of McCain’t’s foreign policy priorities.

    The “bombs and bon-bons” idea also, inescapably, brought I-wreck to mind. We were told to expect bon-bons there too (flowers and chocolate) and got bombs instead…

  • #8- Sure bombs give us peace, we bombed the hell out of North Veitnam and now we are at peace with them

  • Hey, Hilter never did anything personally against me – Musallini, Stalin, Kim Jung Il, etc. Why can’t we all just get along. President Jimmy Carter Obama will talk to these guys. All you lefties will have “peace in our time”.

  • We’ve spent 7 years not “talking to our enemies,” resulting in N. Korea having at least 1-3 nuclear weapons, Iran and Syria stronger then ever, and the utter failure to help resolve the Israel/Pakistan issue. So McCain’s solution is to continue what we’ve been doing for 7 years. McCain, Bush and all their supporters need to tell the American people exactly what they’ve accomplished with this kind of “foreign policy.” But, of course they can’t.

  • What was most illustrative about Matthews takedown of James was the whole question of… what’s wrong with talking? Seriously. Do you care if Churchill and Hitler made a phone call? I don’t. I care if Hitler talked him into handing over the Czechs. Talking doesn’t harm anything. It’s only a problem if you let yourself get duped or strike a bad deal, give away info or sell out your side.

  • why does the mccain campaign keep digging? because there are no republican operatives around who know any other way than lying and smearing.

  • As Mr. Pencil mentions above, there “are” two Step Twos. On the surface, this could be viewed as a typo of CB’s part, but ironically, it fits perfectly with the McCain modus operandi. McCain has consistently demonstrated the ability to say one thing, while his campaign says something completely different—and “both versions” tend to occur almost simultaneously.

    I can’t wait until the general election gets under way—with those “10 regional campaign managers” he’s got, I can envision 11 separate messages at the exact same time. Of course, only the one that the press likes the best will be played nationally; all the rest will be Obama’s fault.

    January 20—the Great Evil GOPer Hunt and Hurt begins. It’ll be like shooting fish in a barrel!!!

  • When I heard McCain say, “deal with,” I just assumed he meant some sort of military action. This is the guy that sang “Bomb Iran.” This is the party that attacks first and lets it up to others to wonder why. Got adversaries? Just kill ’em, politically or literally. I mean, with God and righteousness on your side, what could possibly go wrong?

  • As a British citizen living temporarily in the US the comparisons to Britian in 1997 and Tony Blair are uncanny.
    Barack Obama is Tony Blair – with the difference that Barack Obama has better judgment and DID NOT approve the
    war in Iraq – other than that the similarities are uncanny.

    Today in America is Christmas 1996 in the UK – the Republicans are losing special elections equivalent to British
    by-elections. It is ‘time for a change’.

    Obama is attacking the Republican’s on what they deem as their home ground – Foreign policy.
    Obama is not afraid of the fight in fact he is keen for it. He hits Bush\McCain with their failures –
    No WMD, no end in sight of the month long war that is now in its sixth year, lots of US dollars
    and a stronger Iran.

    Of course Obama is happy to debate Bush\McCain his arguments are unassailable.

    The Republicans will be out of power for ten to twenty years, they need to get used to that
    because that is their future.
    When they eventually return to influence they will have lost (thankfully) their superiority complex
    The new young people will be in power.

    People that understand that the battle of influential and privileged against rest is lost and it is

    ‘how we treat the least of us among us that defines a nation’
    that heath and education are basic rights.
    By the end of Obama’s terms no one will doubt this.

  • “The significant problems we face cannot be solved by the same level of thinking that created them.”
    — Albert Einstein

    If ever there was a quote that summed up this year’s general election, this is it. It would be tempting to pass off Obama’s line that McCain is running for George Bush’s third term as mere political posturing if there didn’t seem to be daily confirmation that it’s true.

  • I’ll take Lew Scannon’s theory (above) one step further.

    I think McCain should start blaming his evil twin. It would make more sense.

    • Comments are closed.