Straight Talk and Damage Control Express Sputters Out of Mesa

NEWS & ANALYSIS

McCain’s ‘Straight Talk and Damage Control Express’ Sputters Out of Maricopa County’s East Valley

By Dennis Durband, Editor
August 25, 2005

If Senator John McCain’s foray into the deeply conservative East Valley of Maricopa County tonight can be likened to a military engagement, he identified hotspots of opposition and gauged its firepower, while exchanging in small arms fire with snipers. In order to win the White House in 2008, he must totally ignite the hearts and minds of this vital voting block.

McCain made one concession earlier in the day when he signed on to support the Protect Marriage Arizona initiative, aimed at the 2006 general election ballot. He further alienated the pro-life community during his appearance at Mesa Community College, where he engaged in a verbal tug of war with a wide variety of opponents.

People arriving at the event walked through a gauntlet of McCain’s former supporters. Rob Haney distributed a five-page document making the case of McCain’s leftist politics. Bill Blewster passed out stickers opposing McCain’s 2008 run for the presidential roses. J.T. Ready handed out a flyer in which Paul Rifenberg declares “U.S. Sen. John McCain is no war hero.”

An uneasy tension settled over the room as 250 Republicans found seats in the audience. McCain stood in the corner leaning against the wall during preliminary ceremonies awaiting the formation of a gauntlet. Gotta get that presidential face in full view.

GOP Legislative District 18 chairman Jeff Groscost, the former AZ Speaker of the House and the state director of McCain’s 2000 presidential run, introduced the senator with a qualifier.

“While I don’t agree with the senator on everything he does, but having been an elected official … it’s not easy … but he’s willing to talk to anyone.”

McCain came up and told of a man who said, “You look like John McCain.” “I said yeah.” “He said doesn’t that make you mad?”

The senator began by praising President Bush’s leadership in the post-9/11 era and that earned him his biggest ovation of the night. McCain quickly and briefly mowed through immigration reform, out of control government spending and Iraq before engaging in a lengthy debate Q&A tug of war on the immigration, the sanctity of life, marriage, democracy and other topics.

McCain made an unpopular pitch for his guest worker problem, intimating that it does not amount to amnesty. Someone in the audience took exception and McCain admonished him, calling for courtesy. We need high-tech equipment on the border, McCain argued.

“I’m terribly disappointed with our party for the spending,” McCain said. “When Reagan was president there were 158 earmarks for pork barrel spending in the budget. This year, there were more than 6,000 – the most spending since Lyndon Johnson’s presidency, he said. “We’re leaving our kids a debt that is unconscionable.”

McCain said Iraq is the transcendent issue of our time, and he defended his criticism of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld for the way the war is being run. He said we have to finish it correctly because, unlike pulling out of Vietnam and not having to worry about Ho Chi Minh following us to the States, Middle Eastern terrorists will come to our cities.

Q&A Tug of War

The question and answer period was largely a tug of war between McCain and Republicans for the high moral ground.

The low point of the Q&A tug of war came during an exchange between Shane Wikfors, executive director of Arizona Right to Life, and McCain. Wikfors cited McCain’s June 19^th appearance on Meet the Press, where he advocated federal funding for destructive embryonic stem cell research. Adult stem cells have yielded therapeutic usefulness for 65 diseases, Wikfors said, but embryonic stem cells have yet to result in any positive outcomes.

McCain showed the logic, the reasoning and the debating skills of a first-grader when he replied that Nancy Reagan supports embryonic stem cell research and that Senator Bill Frist changed his mind on ESCR. “I’ve been convinced by a lot of people to fund it, and if the vote were today I would vote for it,” McCain said, drawing light applause from a tiny pocket of supporters and some boos. “I have a 23-year pro-life voting record.” Which is now over.

Ready, a former Marine, considered running against McCain as a write-in candidate last year, but did not do so. He stood for a long time attempting to question McCain’s border policy, and even when McCain called upon Ready, District 22 chairman Bill Norton and Groscost attempted to deny him the microphone. But Ready persevered and got the floor.

“Thanks for coming here,” Ready began. “I served with State Rep. Russell Pearce as a Minuteman on the border because Washington has failed us. We need a realistic solution, not another guess-who’s-here program. We need troops on the border. Will you take that message to the president. I and the Minutemen have bounties on our heads and the MS-13 gangs are threatening our communities.”

McCain thanked Ready for his service and said the Minuteman Project is symptomatic of the government’s failure to control the border.

McCain scoffed at a round-up and deportation of illegal aliens in the States, but argued for more detention space to counter the problem of illegals disappearing after arraignment. Though he said we can’t find all the illegals, he said one cannot find anyone at housing construction projects who is not an illegal. Logic says the government spend a lot of time and effort driving paddy wagons to housing projects. McCain repeatedly insulted the intelligence of the audience by invoking the oft-refuted claim of “doing the jobs that Americans won’t do.” That line may work in Washington, but it doesn’t play in Peoria or Mesa ... or Naco, especially, for that matter.

An unidentified woman in the audience told McCain he is out of touch and asked him why he voted for CAFTA after NAFTA had failed. They engaged in argument and he again used the logic of “others support it.” Which doesn’t win points from high school debate referees.

Tom Horne, the State Superintendent of Public Instruction and a baby Republican (RINO), was quickly given the mike to say he supports McCain, who “provides balance.” McCain's discouraged supporters finally had something to clap about.

Among other remarks: McCain said the Quran isn’t much different than the Bible. ... If we could go after employers we wouldn’t have to allow anchor babies to become citizens. “If you dry that up then you have to deal with the drug dealers and the terrorists … we can’t expect employers to be INS agents.” So it appears the government, in McCain’s view, has its hands tied by anchor babies and that is allowing drug dealers and terrorists to invade unchecked. ... Nancy Salmon asked for McCain to support the federal marriage amendment, but he said he would do so only as a last resort. The news for McCain is that we have arrived at the last resort.

Epilogue

McCain's “Straight Talk & Damage Control Express,” sputtered out of Mesa without making any detectable inroads. McCain doesn't seem to have the will to want to win the hearts of minds of Republican voters in his back yard whom he shares little in common with. He referred to insurgents in the audience as “a few jerks” – a line which will play well in meetings with his Democrat and mainstream media friends. In the end, one leaves this evening with a feeling that McCain came here to stick out his chest and reassert what’s right for him, not what’s good for the people of Arizona.

The Liberal Media's Version:
East Valley Tribune Says McCain 'Calms' GOP Critics at MCC