{"id":16392,"date":"2008-07-28T16:00:09","date_gmt":"2008-07-28T20:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/16358.html"},"modified":"2008-07-28T16:00:09","modified_gmt":"2008-07-28T20:00:09","slug":"mccain-flips-on-affirmative-action-or-does-he","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/mccain-flips-on-affirmative-action-or-does-he\/","title":{"rendered":"McCain flips on affirmative action — or does he?"},"content":{"rendered":"

In John McCain’s interview<\/a> with George Stephanopoulos yesterday, McCain was asked about an issue that he rarely talks about.<\/p>\n

STEPHANOPOULOS: Opponents of affirmative action are trying to get a referendum on the ballot here that would do away with affirmative action. Do you support that?<\/p>\n

MCCAIN: Yes, I do. I do not believe in quotas. But I have not seen the details of some of these proposals. But I’ve always opposed quotas.<\/p>\n

STEPHANOPOULOS: But the one here in Arizona you support.<\/p>\n

MCCAIN: I support it, yes.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That McCain answered by talking about his opposition to “quotas” was, of course, ridiculous. “Quotas” and “affirmative action” are not the same thing, as McCain knows (or, at least, after 26 years in Congress, should<\/i> know). But just as importantly, McCain’s position comes as something of a surprise, given that he used to take the opposite position, even having described ballot initiatives like the one this year in Arizona as “divisive<\/a>.”<\/p>\n

OK, so McCain flip-flopped. That’s hardly a shock; he does this all the time<\/a>. What’s interesting, though, is that McCain may not actually know his own position on the issue.<\/p>\n

After the interview aired, and Barack Obama expressed his “disappointment” with McCain’s response, CNN followed up with the McCain campaign directly. McCain’s spokesperson, Tucker Bounds, told CNN via a written statement, “John McCain has always been opposed to government-mandated hiring quotas…. He has long stood for the protection of civil rights and equal opportunity for all Americans.”<\/p>\n

CNN’s report added<\/a>, “But pressed about whether McCain indeed supports the Arizona initiative, the campaign would not answer.”<\/p>\n

It’s not a trick question. In fact, this should be an easy one.
\n
\nMcCain just told a national television audience that he supports a ballot referendum in his own home state. Just 24 hours later, McCain’s campaign isn’t willing to say whether McCain articulated his own position properly, or even if that is<\/i> his position.<\/p>\n

What makes this especially interesting is the campaign’s recent track record<\/a> on the disconnect between what McCain says out loud and what McCain’s position is.<\/p>\n

This isn’t the first time that McCain campaign has indicated that the senator’s public statements about policy may not be his actual policy. After the Tax Policy Center released a report showing a $2.8 trillion gap between Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) public economic proposals and his advisers’ private assurances, top econ adviser Douglas Holtz-Eakin told Slate that just because McCain says something publicly about a policy, “that doesn’t mean it’s official.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Got that? If we want to better understand John McCain’s policies, we should overlook what John McCain says about his policies. McCain’s “official” positions don’t always come from McCain.<\/p>\n

And how are voters to know the difference? When McCain announces a position, how is the public to know whether it’s “official” or one of the policies he doesn’t really mean?<\/p>\n

That’s unclear, but I’m sure the McCain campaign will let us know.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In John McCain’s interview with George Stephanopoulos yesterday, McCain was asked about an issue that he rarely talks about. STEPHANOPOULOS: Opponents of affirmative action are trying to get a referendum on the ballot here that would do away with affirmative action. Do you support that? MCCAIN: Yes, I do. I do not believe in quotas. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16392","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16392"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16392\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}