McCain Hasn’t Examined 21st Century G.I. Bill

by David Safier

Democratic Senator Jim Webb and Republican Senator Chuck Hagel are cosponsoring a bill that would update the G.I. Bill so its educational benefits cover today’s tuition and living expenses. More than 50 Senators have signed on, Democrats and Republicans. Both Obama and Clinton are among them.

But Arizona’s own war hero John McCain? Not so much.

“I have not had the chance to examine it carefully,” he said. “It seems to me that it is a good thing to do. But I haven’t examined it with the care that it needs. But we obviously need to do something along those lines.”

Hasn’t examined it carefully. Hmm, now why does that sound familiar today, the 40th anniversary of Martin Luther King’s assassination?

Ah, I remember. McCain was one of a few Senators who voted against creating a Martin Luther King holiday in 1983, and continued his opposition for number of years. His explanation?

“I had not really been involved in the issue. I just had not had a lot of experience with the issue. That’s all.”

McCain was 47 at the time. It was 10 years after he returned from being a prisoner of war. But he says he hadn’t thought much about King, which means he hadn’t thought much about racial issues in the U.S. He may not be as dumb as Bush, but he shares the man’s total lack of curiosity — if he’s telling the truth. Maybe the Straight Talkin’ Maverick, who was a freshman Senator at the time, was worried that voting for the holiday would be unpopular back in his home state.

The real story about McCain hesitating to sign on to the new G.I. bill is, he’s waiting to get a signal from the Bush administration. They seem to think the bill would make higher education look so good to G.I.s, they might decide to leave the military instead of reenlisting. We can’t have our brave soldiers selfishly thinking of bettering themselves when they could be fighting and dying in Iraq, now can we?