Legal Commentary

McCain Thinks First Gulf War Was a Mistake (But Still Supports This One)

By Professor University of Miami School of Law

John McCain famously supports the war in Iraq. Today he said that the war in Iraq was about oil. Even CNN recognized this for the huge gaffe that it is — you just can’t say that in the US, especially if it might be true. So they called his campaign and offered McCain a chance to explain/retract. And explain it he did: making it much worse.

See the clip for yourself.

McCain’s explanation? Despite the context which pretty clearly refers to the current Iraq War, McCain now says he meant the First Gulf War—when the US came to the rescue of Kuwait after Iraq invaded it.

In other words, McCain’s explanation is that what he was saying is that in a world where the US had energy independence he’d use that freedom to abandon allies like Kuwait if they were invaded, but would support a policy of attacking and occupying countries like Iraq when they don’t invade their neighbors.

I. Am. Not. Making. This. Up.

In any rational media ecology this would be a million times worse than something your ex-pastor said. Can I at least hope for a little box on page one promoting the article on A24?

Full post as published by Discourse.net on May 02, 2008 (boomark / email).