The Curious Mind of John McCain

Washington Post: Ambition And Emotion Color The Complex Intellect Of The Candidate

(Washingtonpost.com)  This story was written by Robert G. Kaiser in his Washington Sketch column.

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In his 2002 book, "Worth the Fighting For," John McCain offered this confession -- an acknowledgment of a restless mind: "Although I seem to tolerate introspection better the older I am, there are still too many claims on my attention to permit more than the briefest excursions down the path of self-awareness. When I am no longer busy with politics, and with my own ambitions, I hope to have more time to examine what I have done and failed to do with my career, and why."

A telling observation, or so it seems, and refreshingly candid for a public figure. But the words are not John McCain's. They were written by his longtime aide Mark Salter, McCain's literary alter ego. "Worth the Fighting For," like McCain's other four books, is by "John McCain With Mark Salter," as they all say on their covers. This comment on McCain's disinclination to commit introspection was "my surmise," Salter said in a recent interview in his windowless office at McCain headquarters in Crystal City. He explained his technique:

"It's his voice, but I'm going inside his head to speak some psychological truth about him. I'm drawing a conclusion based on my observation of him. I always show him: 'This is what I've written. This is what I think about you. Is this fair?' " No one is closer to McCain than Salter, who has been with him since 1989. Their associates describe a "mind meld" that has created an extraordinarily close partnership. But even Salter sometimes has to guess what McCain might be thinking, particularly on sensitive subjects. "Things go on inside McCain's head that rarely or never come out," Salter explained.

Yet much of what goes on inside McCain's head is neither mysterious nor hidden. There is an elaborate record of the principles and beliefs that govern McCain's thinking about politics and policy in the five books he and Salter have written, scores of speeches they have collaborated on over nearly two decades, and countless interviews, including one last week for this article.

That record reveals a complicated man whose approach to the world cannot be summed up in an aphorism or two. He is a striver and a combatant, often at war with himself, who has conducted a lifelong struggle "to prove to myself that I was the man I had always wanted to be," as he has written. Multiple influences have shaped his thinking, from his famous grandfather and father, both four-star Navy admirals, to his travels and his extensive reading of history and literature.

On many points, the thinking is clear and consistent. For example, McCain believes in a muscular mission for America. As he has put it: "Our nation has a unique place in the world. We are the greatest force for good on earth. We chart history's course. Yes, we must be involved in the destiny of other nations." His favorite president is Theodore Roosevelt, reformer at home, activist wielder of a big stick abroad. He has read Edward Gibbon's six-volume "History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" -- twice. But his favorite book is Ernest Hemingway's "For Whom the Bell Tolls," whose protagonist, Robert Jordan, has been McCain's hero since he was 13.

In the novel, Jordan, an American volunteer on the anti-fascist side of the Spanish Civil War, finds love, then chooses death in service to a hopeless cause he believes in. In last week's interview, conducted in the leather-covered first-class seats of his campaign plane, McCain was asked if he, like Jordan, is a "romantic fatalist." McCain answered quickly and forcefully: "Yes, yes." Salter described his boss's fatalistic philosophy: "Life sucks, but it's worth doing something about anyway."

McCain is a figure from an old-fashioned America that is out of fashion in our most cosmopolitan precincts -- the America of "Gunsmoke" and Gary Cooper, not "The Daily Show" and George Clooney. For McCain, "Duty, Honor, Country" isn't patriotic pablum but a credo to live by. And he has worked out a way to apply the credo to politics. He summarized it in a commencement address at Johns Hopkins in 1999, when he gave the graduates this advice:

"Enter public life determined to tell the truth; to put problem-solving ahead of partisanship; to defend the public interest against the special interests; to risk your personal ambitions for the sake of the country and the ideals that make her great. Keep your promise to America, and you will keep your honor. You will know a happiness far more sublime than pleasure."

"That's what it's all about," McCain said in the interview.

But such high-mindedness can be difficult to sustain, and when he fails to do so, McCain's self-criticism can be devastating.

Within months of delivering that commencement address, McCain was running for president for the first time, and violating his own credo. After losing the 2000 Republican presidential nomination , McCain and Salter wrote "Worth the Fighting For" (the title is taken from a line of Robert Jordan's in the Hemingway novel ), which gave McCain an opportunity to confess his shortcomings:

"I didn't decide to run for president to start a national crusade for the political reforms I believed in or to run a campaign as if it were some grand act of patriotism. In truth, I wanted to be president because it had become my ambition to be president. . . . In truth, I'd had the ambition for a long time."

That ambition led McCain into a moral lapse that appalled him. It involved an ongoing dispute in South Carolina over the tradition of flying the Confederate battle flag atop the state capitol, in Columbia. In a television interview, McCain said the flag was "offensive," and he appeared sympathetic to its critics. His aides were alarmed, fearing the consequences in the upcoming South Carolina primary, and they wrote a damage-control statement that McCain read repeatedly before television cameras. "I understand both sides," McCain said. "Some view the flag as a symbol of slavery. Others view it as a symbol of heritage. Personally, I see the battle flag as a symbol of heritage."

But that, McCain wrote a year later, was "a lie." The flag symbolized both slavery and the South's secession from "the country I love," and "should be lowered forever from the staff atop South Carolina's capitol."

"I had promised to tell the truth no matter what," McCain wrote in the book. "When I broke it, I had not just been dishonest, I had been a coward, and I had severed my own interests from my country's. That was what made the lie unforgivable."

'McCain Is All Emotion'

McCain's harsh self-criticism suggests the emotionalism that colleagues and friends say is typical of him. This was described recently by Gary Hart, the former senator from Colorado and a presidential candidate himself in 1984 and 1988. Hart befriended McCain in the late 1970s, when McCain was the Navy's liaison to the U.S. Senate. "He's a guy's guy, fun to be with," Hart said. When McCain married Cindy Lou Hensley in 1980 (his second marriage), Hart was a groomsman.

"I think his mind is visceral," Hart said, "driven less by thought and more by feelings. This doesn't mean he's totally reactive or without logic or thought processes; it just means he's a fighter pilot. He reacts to circumstances."

A senior official in the Clinton administration who worked with McCain on Bosnia and Kosovo, where McCain defied most of his Republican colleagues to support strong U.S. action against Serbia, agreed. "In the many, many years that I've been in Washington," this former official said, insisting on anonymity to avoid upsetting McCain, "John McCain is far and away the most emotional politician I have ever met."

"McCain is all emotion," the former official continued. "People don't understand that, so they keep talking about his temperament, his temper. He reacts emotionally, therefore unpredictably."

McCain can be impatient with complicated answers to questions he considers straightforward, with gray when he sees black and white. For example, he sees no gray outcome possible in Iraq: "In war," he has said, "there is no such thing as compromise; you either win or you lose." But he has not defined victory in Iraq, and many wars have ended ambiguously.

McCain's commentary on Iraq often echoes his descriptions of the Vietnam War. He can make both sound like classical military confrontations and rarely mentions their political complexities. Asked about this in the interview, McCain said the North Vietnamese won with a tank-led invasion of South Vietnam at a time when President Richard Nixon, hobbled by the Watergate scandal, could not respond by using American air power. "We lost in Vietnam because we lost the will to fight, because we did not understand the nature of the war we were fighting, and because we limited the tools at our disposal," McCain has said, implying that the war could have been won -- again without defining victory.

Is it possible that in both Vietnam and Iraq, "victory" was and is beyond the reach of the United States, because in both cases only locals -- Vietnamese and Iraqis -- could ensure a satisfactory outcome to the conflict by finding a political resolution? McCain is impatient with this argument. In recent days, he has all but declared victory in Iraq: "This conflict has succeeded," he said in the interview. "All I can say is they [the Iraqis] are establishing the rule of law, they're going to be having elections, and I think they're becoming an effective government, which is what our strategy was, thanks to the genius of a guy named David Petraeus."

McCain has repeatedly lambasted Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) for failing to understand the Iraq war. McCain was asked about Obama's warnings in 2002 that a war against Iraq was a bad idea that would require a U.S. "occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences." Wasn't Obama more prescient than McCain, who gave repeated prewar assurances such as "the Iraqi people will greet us as liberators" and "we will win it easily"? McCain replied: "I think that's a legitimate question."

Then he added: "But the fact is, we did win easily. It was terribly mismanaged."

[rlclemm]

McCain is in "celeberty" status since 2000, the actor, the "war hero", must keep things in his head. Like all of us who returned from Vietnam, we came home with post traumatic stress syndrone. We hold mean and nastiy things inside our heads and dread terribly if they are released. Mr. McCain is in denial and has been for years. Like me, more than forty of them. I take the drugs I''m ordered by VA to take so I don''t release those demons, those skletons in my Southeast Asian closet. And I''m no hero.

[patwal-2009]

McCain Defended Opposition Of Federal MLK Holiday By Saying He Supported Arizona%u2019s State Holiday. During a press availability in Panama City, Florida, John McCain said, %u201CI have supported hundreds of pieces of legislation, which would help Americans obtain an equal opportunity in America. I am proud of that record, from fighting for the recognition of Dr. Martin Luther King%u2019s birthday in my state to sponsoring specific legislation that would prevent discrimination in any shape or form in America today.%u201D [McCain Press Availability In Panama City, Florida, 8/1/08]

FACT: McCain Supported Republican AZ Governor%u2019s Decision To Rescind MLK Holiday. In January 1987, the first act of Arizona%u2019s new governor, Republican Evan Mecham, was to rescind the executive order by his predecessor to create an MLK holiday. Arizona%u2019s stance became a national controversy. McCain backed the decision at the time.%u201D [ABC News, 4/3/08]

FACT: McCain Voted Against Creating Martin Luther King Holiday. In 1983, McCain voted against a motion to suspend the rules and pass a bill to designate the third Monday of every January as a federal holiday in honor of the late civil rights leader, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. The motion passed 89-77. [HR 3706, Vote 289, 8/2/83; CQ 1983]

Funny way he had of "fighting" for the MLK holiday. Seems MCain is losing his "curious" mind

[tbweb]

Posted by tbweb at 11:49 PM : Aug 01, 2008

Whatta bunch of krap both of you are putting out!

Neither ONE of you realize that you are doing the exact same thing that you are accusing others of doing? Bunch of hypocrites!

Posted by WellHell3 at 03:39 AM : Aug 02, 2008,,,

What are you talking about? The debate is about McCain`s curious mind, which is a good title by the way because McCain`s mind `is` curious when comparing McCains mind to when he ran in 2000 with his mind of 2008! The debate is also about comparing McCain to Obama and discussing these 2 candidates. In my view when discussing McCain and Obama who are both Americans, U.S. Citizens and both elected U.S. Senators there is no need to discuss race, age or any other discriminatory reference in a negative context because once someone does that I will label them a racist or a discriminator because doing so negatively is meant to inflict emotional harm and to be derogatory and negative, something people do when they can`t win arguments making valid points, they instead become degrading in some way. Also, once someone injects racial hatred I tune them out! Pointing out a racist is not being a hypocrite or doing the same!

[trbundro1277]

But that, McCain wrote a year later, was "a lie." The flag symbolized both slavery and the South''s secession from "the country I love," and "should be lowered forever from the staff atop South Carolina''s capitol." *** Amnesty Mccain admited that he lied! Everyone should remember that Mccain''s ancestors fought in the Confederacy! Amnesty Mccain is the biggest flip flopper i''ve ever known! Unless Amnesty Mccain is embarrased by his ancestors, maybe they also fought against his Mexican friends!

[trbundro1277]

John & Obama are great guys,but no one can ever fix the mess we are in-why they want the job is beyond me.
Posted by babooph at 11:02 PM : Aug 01, 2008
*** John Edwards and Barak Obama are great guys, however if you are talking about John Mccain, you are truely mistaken if you think he is a great guy! Amnesty Mccain flip flopped more than Senator Kerry every has! They would want the job for pride, or whatever other selfish reasons!

[trbundro1277]

Hate isn''''t that curious for a republican, the only thing curious about McCain is that he is overflowing with it.
Posted by mummblemouth at 03:49 AM : Aug 02, 2008
*** And yet he wants to let over 12 million illegals get amnesty so Spanish will be able to become the number one language spoken in the use within the next few years! I hate amnesty mccain! Mccain is overflowing with neocon hate, and I am overflowing with hate towards Amnesty Mccain!

[trbundro1277]

If Sen. Obama wipes his asz with the wrong toilet paper he gets hammered! lol
Posted by tbweb at 11:49 PM : Aug 01, 2008
*** I would recommend for him to use the "new yorker" as toilet paper, since that magazine is garbage!

[mummblemouth]

Hate isn''t that curious for a republican, the only thing curious about McCain is that he is overflowing with it.

[trbundro1277]

But that, McCain wrote a year later, was "a lie." The flag symbolized both slavery and the South''s secession from "the country I love," and "should be lowered forever from the staff atop South Carolina''s capitol." **** And this is the candidate that South Carolina voted for in the SC primary????? Anyone in South Carolina that likes the rebel flag, better not vote for Mccain, or else you are a hypocrite! I hate the rebel flag personally! Which is why I am voting for obama! Obama is completely against the confederate flag just as I am, and My great great great grandfather that fought in the Union army to get rid of that stupid rebel flag forever! If you are for freedom, vote Obama, if you are for rebel flag, vote for Bob Barr! If you are a complete idiot, I guess you will be voting for Amnesty mccain!

[hegelfan]

MCCAIN PLAYING THE AGE CARD

NeoConservative Kaiser cites McCain saying %u201E...examine what I have done and failed to do with my career...%u201C McCain is a loser and McCain%u2019s pseudo-critical self-contemplation is just the ridiculous game of an old confused man playing the AGE-CARD.

NeoCon Kaiser: %u201COn many points, the thinking (of McCain) is clear and consistent%u201C - You have only to confront this ridiculous praise to McCain%u2019s actual confusion in one of his most famous sentences about the %u201ASurge%u2019. %u201EThe surge SUCCEEDED, the surge HAS SUCCEEDED, The surge IS SUCCEEDING, The surge WILL SUCCEED, The success IS FRAGILE%u2019 etc. etc. to be frightened about this confused old man who never gets a tough and insisting question by the press who in fact is a bunch of McCain bootlickers.

It was one of those famous town hall meetings a few days ago in Aurora, Colorado which showed that McCain is now unable to articulate his owns thoughts. He literally has to read his opinion from a piece of paper which is located on a high desk in front of him to his left side. Even when the camera zoomed and showed only his face it was all too visible that Mr. McCain had to cling to his textbook so he wouldn%u2019t have to miss a word of his neocon hatred speech.

McCain clinging to a script is like a metaphor of his whole campaign: it is the clinging of a confused old man to a corrupt outdated neoconservative draft.

[trbundro1277]

McCain believes in a muscular mission for America. As he has put it: "Our nation has a unique place in the world. We are the greatest force for good on earth. We chart history''s course. Yes, we must be involved in the destiny of other nations." His favorite president is Theodore Roosevelt, reformer at home, activist wielder of a big stick abroad. He has read Edward Gibbon''s six-volume "History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" -- twice. **** Then if mccain knows so much about the decline and fall of the Roman Empire, he should know that AMNESTY FOR Over 12 MILLION ILLEGALS would ruin this country the same way that the Visogoth Germans ruined Rome! The Visogoth Germans slowly moved and populated different areas within the Roman Empire the same way the Illegal Mexicans are coming in our country! Giving amnesty to the illegals is the worst thing that can possible be done, yet that is what Mccain stands for! ARGG I hate Amnesty Mccain so much!

[wellhell3]

Posted by tbweb at 11:49 PM : Aug 01, 2008

Whatta bunch of krap both of you are putting out!

Neither ONE of you realize that you are doing the exact same thing that you are accusing others of doing? Bunch of hypocrites!

[tbweb]

Some of you people are simply amazing. We just lived through 8 years of the worst, most corrupt and hated adminstration ever, years of an unjust war and no telling what else was done. After listening to what McCain has to offer...I can not fathom why anyone would want to vote for him and have a repeat of the same old tired policies all over again...but then again..an angry old, no issue white man is better than a much more dynamic leader. AMAZING!!!!

Posted by vegassoul at 06:59 PM : Aug 01, 2008,,,

Because Americans are once again showing just how stupid, gullible and ignorant they are! The Republicans who for all the reasons you cited above can`t run on any real issues dress Sen. Obama and his wife up as Muslim Terrorist, put them on the cover of a major magazine and distribute it Worldwide, in addition, anyone Sen. Obama associates with who has done or said anything controversial will now be treated as if Sen. Obama himself said or done it, not the actual person! When all else fails hate and mud slinging works like a charm! If Sen. Obama wipes his asz with the wrong toilet paper he gets hammered! lol

[wellhell3]

http://www.midwestoilgas.com/OFFSHORE.htm

Bull ***** class dismissed, Form....WOW, more rigs!

[babooph]

John & Obama are great guys,but no one can ever fix the mess we are in-why they want the job is beyond me.

[wellhell3]

Even as more land is opened for leasing, it%u2019s questionable whether the industry has the resources to explore it. The Cheney task force concluded that very few new onshore oil drilling rigs have been built since the mid-1980s, because of price volatility in the oil field supply and service sectors.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/
5111184


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Posted by formrusmcsgt at 10:55 PM : Aug 01, 2008

ROFL! And *** Cheney according to you people is a TOTAL LIAR! And now because he supports your tom fool ideas all of a sudden he''s totally to be blieved!

Now that''s hilarious! That''s you''d quote *** Cheney to me!

[formrusmcsgt]

Class dismissed, WellHell3.

I''m calling it a night.

[formrusmcsgt]

Even as more land is opened for leasing, it%u2019s questionable whether the industry has the resources to explore it. The Cheney task force concluded that very few new onshore oil drilling rigs have been built since the mid-1980s, because of price volatility in the oil field supply and service sectors.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5111184

[wellhell3]

What''s it got? Two freaking golden cheeked warblers on it?

[wellhell3]

What environmentally sensitive land?