Why I want to vote for John McCain.....but can't.

If there's anyone in Congress who personifies the American hero and statesman for the 21st century, it's Senator John McCain, R-AZ. His military service during the Vietnam War is well-known to many Americans. On October 26, 1967, while we were just concluding the so-called "Summer of Love," McCain's fighter jet was shot down by anti-aircraft fire over Vietnam. He was first beaten and spit upon by villagers, then stabbed in the groin and foot with a bayonet. His shoulder was crushed by a rifle butt. To this day, McCain cannot lift his arms over his head. He was taken to the Hoa Lo Prison, also known as the Hanoi Hilton, to be interrogated and beaten until he was unconscious. But this is the part that amazes me, to the point that I still have trouble believing it. John McCain's father, John II, was an Admiral in the U.S. Navy, and because of this, McCain was offered a chance to return home after a few months. He turned them down. He did so knowing full well that he would likely die in Vietnam. He did it because he refused to leave his comrades behind, and because he wanted no special treatment from the Vietnamese. Five more years. John McCain spent five more years taking crippling beatings from his captors because he refused to leave his buddies behind. Now that's a hero. I recently saw an MSNBC documentary containing footage of McCain shot in Vietnam by a French documentary crew. His pain and misery are palpable as he tries to communicate with his home country, and I urge you to seek it out if you want to see what torture can do to someone. (The President might do well to watch it too, if you catch my meaning.) There are many other things that this Democrat likes about McCain, some of which include his acknowledgment of the reality of global warming, voting against the Federal Marraige Amendment, aligning with Senator Ted Kennedy, D-MA, to create a guest worker program for illegal immigrants, and his participation in the "Gang of Fourteen" Senators that worked out a compromise on judicial nominees. He has also stood firm against the Bush Administration's use of torture on detainees in the War on Terror with the McCain Detainee Amendment to the Defense Appropriations Bill of 2005. All of this is excellent, and I agree wholeheartedly with his stands on these issues. But the problem I have is that he refuses to acknowledge that the war in Iraq may be already lost. He is on record as supporting the President's "surge" of 21,500 more troops to Iraq. He has been pushing for more troops almost since initial combat operations ended. He seems committed to a strategy of victory at all costs, and this worries me. He, like almost all Republicans from the President on down, refuses to ask the question, "What if we can't win?" The President, especially before the recent Congressional elections, made this question out to be unpatriotic, a question that emboldens the enemy. But I would suggest that we should have asked it years ago, before the war was even started. George Bush Senior asked it before deciding not to topple Saddam Hussein's government. Barack Obama asked it while serving in the Illinois Congress, and John Kerry asked it in the 2004 Presidential election. Since then, we have made little progress in tamping down the violence in Iraq, particularly in the capitol city of Baghdad. (That's if you believe the newspapers and TV news. I have been accused of being foolish to trust the traditional media outlets, but then again, I'm old-fashioned.) The elected officials who have doubted and questioned our strategy and justification in fighting this war have been mostly Democratic, and they have been proven right time and again, while hawks such as John McCain have had to offer the "not enough troops" excuse. Here's my question for Senator McCain, as well as the President's administration. What if it was just a bad idea to begin with? While I admire and respect the Senator, and may have voted for him in peacetime, I must instead vote for a Democrat who will bring this war to a merciful end. I'm tired of watching people die. For a related article, click below.

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