Sen. John McCain makes a complete ass-hat of himself at Chuck Hagel confirmation hearing

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

Neocon war monger Sen. John McCain is one of the architects of the Iraq war. He was the Washington, D.C. patron of Ahmed Chalabi and the Iraqi National Congress, and was advocating for war with Iraq as early as the Iraq Liberation Act of 1998, advocated for by his friends at the Neocon Project for the New American Century. Chalabi and the INC fabricated the intelligence that the Bush-Cheney regime used to justify the unnecessary war in Iraq, at a substantial loss of American lives and treasure, as well as the substantial loss of Iraqi lives. John McCain has blood on his hands for which he should be held to account, but he never will, because the media is "his base" and always treats him as a demigod.

If it were up to John McCain, there would still be more than 160,000 American combat troops in Iraq, and more than 140,000 combat troops in Afghanistan — and their deployment would be permanent. Recall that McCain tried to instigate a war on the side of Georgia against Russia during his 2008 campaign. He would have ordered U.S. combat troops into Libya and Syria, and to any other hot spot in the world. He is a militarist who believes in PNAC's Pax Americana Empire through U.S. military invasion and occupation. The American people have rejected this Neocon "Bush Doctrine," but McCain believes he he knows better than the American people.

So it was disconcerting to watch this Neocon war monger demand that his former senate colleague Chuck Hagel genuflect before him and to praise "Senator Surge" as a demigod (his media sycophants were unavailable?) Chuck Hagel refused, insisting that Iraq was "the most dangerous foreign policy decision since Vietnam." Good for him. Chuck Hagel is right, and John McCain is wrong. Hagel Takes On McCain: Calls Iraq War ‘Most Fundamentally Bad, Dangerous Decision Since Vietnam’:

John McCain, an ardent supporter of the Iraq War from the start, began his
questioning of Hagel by asking about the latter’s past statements
regarding the so-called “surge” of forces into Iraq in 2007. Hagel, by
then a vocal critic of the war, came out strongly against
adding additional troops to the conflict soon after the policy’s
announcement — just like President Obama, Vice President Biden and
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had — calling it “the most dangerous
foreign policy blunder in this country since Vietnam.”

Hagel didn’t back away from previous statements, saying “Senator, I
stand by them, because I made them.” When McCain continued to push
Hagel, refusing to allow him to offer a nuanced response to the question
of the surge, the Nebraska Republican shot back, noting that the surge
tactic took place in the wider context of the most “dangerous decision
since Vietnam”:

MCCAIN: Are you going to answer the question? Were you
right or wrong? That’s a straightforward question. Answer whether you
are right or wrong and then you are free to elaborate.

HAGEL: I’m not going to give you a yes or no answer.

MCCAIN: Let the record show he refuses to answer the question. Please go ahead.

[…]

HAGEL: I’m not going to give you a yes or no. It’s far more complicated than that. I will defer that judgment to history. As
to the comment I made about the most dangerous foreign policy decision
since Vietnam, that was about not just the surge, but the overall war of
choice going into Iraq. That particular decision made on the surge, but
more to the point, our war in Iraq, I think was the most fundamentally
bad, dangerous decision since Vietnam.

Watch their exchange here:

“Aside from the cost that occurred to blood and treasure, what that did to take our focus off of Afghanistan, which in fact was the original and real focus of the national threat to this country. Iraq was not. I always tried to frame all of the different issues before I made a decision on anything,” Hagel continued. Hagel’s response is a continuation of his previous assertions that the war in Iraq is one of the “great blunders” of American history.

Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL) picked up on Hagel’s critique in his
questioning, referring to Iraq as a war that never should have taken
place. “I always ask the question is this going to be worth the
sacrifice, because there will be sacrifice,” Hagel said in response. “In
the surge in Iraq, we lost almost 1200 dead Americans and thousands of
wounded. Was it required? Was it necessary?” Over four thousand Americans total lost their lives during the Iraq War.

Hagel is also in the right, of course, that the surge can’t be viewed as
the only cause for a reduction of violence in Iraq. CAP Senior Fellow
Larry Korb and Policy Analyst Matt Duss today published an op-ed in Politico making clear that Hagel’s stance on Iraq was essentially correct:

While historians will of course continue to debate the
actual impact that the addition of 20,000 U.S. troops made on the war’s
outcome, a rough consensus has developed that recognizes that while the
addition of troops did make some positive impact, it did so mainly by facilitating
events that were already underway, such as the revolt by Sunnis in
Anbar province against al-Qaeda and the decision by Shia leader Muqtada
al-Sadr to stand down his Mahdi Army militia.

The argument between McCain and Hagel marks the latest low point in a relationship between two previously close friends. In 2000, during his first run at the presidency, McCain cited Hagel as a potential Secretary of Defense should he take the White House.

Sen. Chuck Hagel is not the one who should be answering for his judgment (he supported the war in Iraq at the beginning, as did the overwhelming majority of Congress and the American people, but he soon saw that it was another quagmire, like Vietnam, and turned against the war).  It is John McCain who should be answering for his judgment. He is an unrepentant war monger who would send American troops into harm's way today in pursuit of his Neocon dream of a Pax Americana Empire.