John Mccain

Hard Call Great Decisions and the Extraordinary People Who Made Them By John McCain with Mark Salter Twelve / 460 pages / $25.99 Eight years ago, in a presidential campaign far, far away, Republican candidate John McCain released his first book, the rightly acclaimed early-years autobiography Faith of My Fathers. Written with the help of aide Mark Salter, Faith was a delightfully profane redemption tale of how an underachieving, hard-living Navy brat was broken, then made stronger, during his captivity in Vietnam.

WASHINGTON -- They come with injuries from tortures three decades old, aches from panicked ejections from burning airplanes, wounds from smacks of a rifle butt, scars from exposed electric wires and trauma from punishments so graphic that years and lifetimes have not quite erased them.The former prisoners of war who flock every year for examinations at the Naval Operational Medicine Institute in Florida -- the military's only outpost for the continuing study of the mental and physical health of ex-POWs -- lay these problems bare to doctors for a rare glimpse into the lasting aftermath of war.Long before Republican whispers about GOP presidential hopeful Sen. John McCain and the suggestion that he suffers from psychological problems because of his experience as a Vietnam prisoner of war, researchers have been fascinated by the depth of the scars left by POW torture and captivity.

WASHINGTON -- When Dan Quayle announced the other day that he was taking the first step toward a campaign for the presidency in 2000, he became only one of a dozen or more Republicans who have shown an open interest in the party's nomination.What is lacking, however, is a dominant figure with the obvious potential to pull the party together in the next two years and offer the electorate some coherent agenda.Mr. Quayle doesn't qualify, though he was vice president for four years. Although he has a core of support among the cultural conservatives of the Religious Right, he's still viewed by many as a lightweight despite his tremendous fund-raising ability.

WASHINGTON -- Sen. John McCain has made a shrewd political move by delaying the official announcement of his candidacy for president because it would not be "appropriate" during the crisis in Kosovo.At the most obvious level, the Arizona Republican understood that no candidate is likely to earn the full attention of either the press or the voters right now. The 2000 election campaign seems a long way off.But Senator McCain also has set himself apart from the other 10 active candidates for the Republican nomination by being willing to do more than simply criticize President Clinton and declare "support" for the troops put in harm's way by his policies.

The Blue Angels flying team had just finished its aerobatics performance above the Naval Academy when James H. Webb Jr. walked into the school's bookstore to find a long line of midshipmen, naval officers and others waiting for him.Most of those in line wanted a chance to shake the hand of a well-known author and have him sign a copy of his latest book, "The Emperor's General."Others sensed something bigger in Webb's return to Annapolis. To the school where he lost a three-round boxing match with classmate Oliver L. North.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. The evening started off with a chat about clothes. Or was it costumes?Warren Beatty, actor and activist, arrived at the Kennedy School of Government in an L.A. laid-back sweater and jacket."

THE debacle in Seattle last week was a defeat for President Clinton. It was also a delay, probably of one year, in forging a world consensus agenda for further lowering trade barriers. Any exultation or damnation that the street demonstrators prevailed, however, is dead wrong.What happened inside the World Trade Organization's conference hall is that the United States deadlocked with most other nations. President Clinton adopted some of the positions of organized labor and the environmental movement as the U.S. initiative.

WASHINGTON -- The disagreeable incense of sanctimony is permeating presidential politics. The principal sanctity-mongers are Sen. John McCain, Bill Bradley and Vice President Al Gore.Mr. McCain, the Savonarola from Arizona, is the favorite Republican of those (e.g. the media) who regret that there are Republicans. Two supposed proofs that he has cornered the market on virtue are his insistence that his campaign-reform legislation is necessary because everyone in politics, himself emphatically included, is corrupt, and the fact that his tantrums demonstrate his authenticity and noble intolerance of sin.I plead guilty, he says in a guilty-plea-as-self-congratulation gambit, to getting angry when I see gross injustices take place such as I see happen quite often in the Congress of the United States.

DES MOINES, Iowa -- Four years ago, Steve Forbes was burning up the presidential campaign circuit.His bespectacled features peered out from newsmagazine covers. Television talk shows vied to put the wealthy conservative on the air. One national poll showed him within seven points of President Clinton in a hypothetical fall election matchup.Today, his "geek chic" is passe, and Forbes seems more goofy than trendy. In one recent national survey, Republican voters ranked him near the bottom of the pack, behind Maryland radio talk show host Alan Keyes.

PRESCOTT, Ariz. -- In most campaigns, a presidential contender tours the nation, introducing himself to voters far from home. John McCain's candidacy has reversed that process.McCain's run for the White House is revealing to Arizonans another side of the man who's been representing them in Congress for 17 years: his tendency to fly off the handle."I was surprised. It wasn't something that anybody talked about," says Norb Wedepohl, clerk of Superior Court in Yavapai County.Interviews around the state this week indicated that McCain's hot temper was not common knowledge until news reports this fall publicized the issue.

Sarah Palin chose a slow news day before a holiday to shake up the political world, saying she will step down as governor of Alaska but leaving open the question of her political future. "We've got to put first things first. I love my job, and I love Alaska. I am doing what's best for Alaska," Palin said Friday at a televised news conference in her hometown of Wasilla. Palin said she hoped people would not be disappointed by the decision, which she said she had contemplated for some time.

TED SAMPLEY, 62 Vietnam veteran, activist for POWs Ted Sampley, a Vietnam War veteran and former member of the Green Berets who was a persistent activist for American prisoners of war and missing servicemen, and who later led smear campaigns against presidential candidates, died Tuesday at the VA Medical Center in Durham, N.C., of complications from heart surgery. Mr. Sampley was a founder of Rolling Thunder, the annual motorcycle caravan that raises money for POW/MIA causes. In 1994, he presented evidence that the Vietnam-era remains in the Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery were not anonymous after all. By painstakingly analyzing service records and maps, he concluded that the remains were those of a missing pilot, Air Force Lt. Michael Blassie, who was shot down in 1972.

To understand how angry and disappointed many Democrats are that Barack Obama has invited evangelical preacher Rick Warren to give the invocation at his inaugural, imagine if a President-elect John McCain had offered this unique honor to the Rev. Al Sharpton - or the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. I know, it's hard to picture: John McCain would never do that. Republicans respect their base even when, as in Mr. McCain's case, it doesn't really return the favor. Only Democrats, it seems, reward their most loyal supporters - feminists, gays, liberals, opponents of the war - by elbowing them aside to embrace their opponents instead.

I warned them, but they didn't want to believe me. I understand the feelings of the people who consider themselves liberals or progressives and thought that electing Barack Obama would mean the establishment of an administration to their liking - replete with the appointments of actual liberals/progressives to top spots in his incoming administration - and who now are beginning to suspect they've been snookered. Welcome to the club of the politically disenchanted. I joined a few years back when it became apparent that the actuality of the Bush administration would be extremely different from the one promised.

ATLANTA - Jim Martin was never supposed to be this close to a U.S. Senate seat. A relative unknown in Georgia politics, the former head of the state's Department of Human Resources had to survive two primaries before securing the privilege of receiving what promised to be a whomping at the hands of Republican incumbent Sen. Saxby Chambliss. After all, this isn't some swing state such as Ohio or Florida. This is Georgia, where John McCain topped Obama by five points and President George W. Bush won by 17 points four years ago. In 2002, Chambliss was able to unseat a decorated Vietnam War veteran, Max Cleland, in part by questioning his patriotism.

A poisonous brew of revenge, ideology and personal ambition leaves former Republican Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. and his party reeling. With Mr. Ehrlich's assistance, the GOP lost half its already diminished representation in statewide public office. Any notion that he could be a kingmaker - or re-establish his own credentials - seemed mere fantasy after the ballots were counted. Going into Election 2008, Republicans had a pair of House members. In the recent past it had four, and in the 1980s a U.S. senator.

A final repudiation of Bush's leadership The long dark night of President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney was repudiated on Tuesday ("It's Obama," Nov. 5). They weren't on the ballot, but make no mistake, it was they whom the people vanquished, not the stand-in surrogates of Sen. John McCain and Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin. Sen. Barack Obama has come to the rescue, and not a moment too soon. With his eloquence and inspiration, he has brought hope, as plainly seen in the tears of the throngs of people that we witnessed Tuesday night in Chicago's Grant Park - and not just to them but to people everywhere in this country and all around the world.

A post-election postscript offers a chance to pick up where we left off on critical players in this historic election: Mac is back: In defeat, Sen. John McCain was a politician of striking grace and generosity. His warm tribute to President-elect Barack Obama recalled the John McCain who achieved success on tough issues such as campaign finance reform with compromise, respect and reaching across the aisle. His leadership will be needed in the new Congress. The Buffett factor: Despite Senator Obama's intention to raise taxes on the wealthy, 52 percent of voters earning $200,000 or more supported him, according to exit polls.

WASHINGTON - America turned a page yesterday. Barack Obama broke through the racial barrier to the Oval Office, becoming the first African-American to gain the presidency. And his electoral landslide delivered a powerful message about a new generation of American leadership. The young and minority voters who helped lift the 47-year-old Democrat to the White House are now the foundation of a new majority in U.S. politics. Their emergence likely brings to a close the era of conservative dominance that began with Ronald Reagan's election almost three decades ago. Obama's campaign, perhaps the most brilliantly run in the modern era, reflected the multicultural diversity of 21st-century America.

By 10 p.m., the networks had finally given up the game of not calling the election for Democrat Barack Obama out of deference to West Coast voters. "It is looking as if it is getting more and more difficult - if not impossible - for John McCain to find a way to victory, isn't it?" CBS anchorwoman Katie Couric said to analysts Bob Schieffer and Jeff Greenfield at the top of the hour. "Impossible is a good word," Greenfield said. "We want to remind folks to go vote," Schieffer quickly added, sounding the broadcaster's civic-duty mantra.