This was grabbed off of politico which in my view is usually very pro Obama.

"McCain never actually went so far as to call for a century-long occupation. Rather, in response to a New Hampshire town hall questioner who asked about President Bush’s statement that U.S. troops could be in Iraq for 50 years, McCain interrupted and said, “Make it 100.”

“We've been in South Korea...we’ve been in Japan for 60 years,” he continued. “We’ve been in South Korea for 50 years or so. That would be fine with me. As long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed, that’s fine with me. I hope that would be fine with you, if we maintain a presence in a very volatile part of the world where al-Qaeda is training, recruiting and equipping and motivating people every single day."

He said it and I think it is an honest answer. I suppose we do not like honest answers. We have bases all over the world and even Obama acknowledges that we will have troops in that region. I think McCain by nature like to give sort of cocky answers which this is but one example. But to keep pounding on this issue is no different than those who harp on his middle name, the 57 states he visited, or his wife saying she never was proud of America.

All of them are dishonest in my view. Hey we are going to have an embassy there with guess what, soldiers. So face facts we will have soldiers there beyond 2010.

Two points:

1. Those nations wanted us there.

2. We did not invade these nations for their oil and occupy their nation for American Interest only.

McCain said it, I beleive it, thats it.

Respectfully,

wdp

Here's his problem with the "100 years of war" thing...

he said "100 year 'presence'"....but can't define "victory" in Iraq or how we get it down to that "South Korean model" of just a few thousand troops who are "not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed,"

He says we've "succeeded in Iraq"...but we can't leave (as in most combat troops) in 16 months as Obama plans or we'll "lose".

Okay, John....so if we've succeeded, then no more troops will be killed (just like "South Korea") and we can reduce the troops to SK levels (no more than a few thousand) QUICKLY...can't we?

wdp:

Two points:

1. Those nations wanted us there.

2. We did not invade these nations for their oil and occupy their nation for American Interest only.

McCain said it, I beleive it, thats it.

Respectfully,

wdp

Are you comedy writer? I don't think Japan wanted us? I mean,,,you know,,,1945........just tossing that out there,,,,,,we occupied the country,,,,,,,,,,ohhh hell you don't care about facts anyway.

I will leave you guys with this one very simple thought, anyone who beleives that McCain wants us in Iraq in a active combat role for the next century is one of two things.

1) Clueless

2) Partisan asshole

This whole week has been an excersize in the theatre of the absurd. The mere notion of Obama now strutting around Iraq proposing timetables (which Malki is longer then 16 months by the way is dictated by the situation and not on a certain date) is ridiculous. The fact is if we had taken Obama and the Democrats advice and pulled everyone by March of 08 the country of Iraq would look vastly different.

Obama has mastered the art of "fence straddling", he is not leader, and in a time when we are in fact fighting a war he is not worthy of a vote. This entire week has been a farce.

1. The differences between our purposes in maintaining troops in Korea, Japan and Germany to any possible continued occupation of Iraq make the comparison silly.

a) we did not invade South Korea. The South Korean government needed us to stay to avoid the probable re-invasion from the North and, in fact, the South pays at least part of the costs of our troops who are on their border with the North. We have no troops patrolling their cities.

b) we did invade Germany because they declared war on the US. We did patrol the streets of German cities for probably a year after the war was over. As German police forces were reconstituted those patrols ended. There was no insurgency. The German people universally supported our troops there because they saw the very likely occupation by Soviet troops if we left.

c) we did occupy Japan after they had attacked us and started a war that killed millions of people. We encountered no resistance in Japan. We probably patrolled the streets of their cities for even less of a time than we did in Germany. Remember that we had not fought our way across Japan as we did in Germany, but Japanese civil security forces were not destroyed as they were in Germany. Our military presence in Japan had nothing at all to do with fighting against an insurgency.

McCain's comment about 100 years was not about the usual contingent in an embassy. The Bush administration wants to have permanent bases. McCain's reference to it being ok as long as Americans aren't being killed is silly. They are being killed. We will always be an army of occupation, as long as we have combat troops there. The Maliki government has to bring the Kurds and Al-Sadr into the government to end the fighting. That will happen when it becomes clear to Maliki that we are leaving. The evidence of that is that the largest Sunni block just announced that they will rejoin the government (just last week).

McCain and his surrogates refer to Islamic extremists in Iraq. Which group in Iraq would that be? The republicans say we are fighting them there so we don't have to fight them here. Which group, fighting in Iraq today, is it that are extremists? The Kurds? The Mehdi army? The Badr group? The awakening council militia? Which of these groups will send terrorists to attack the US? The correct answer, in my opinion, is none. We are there to basically stop fighting between two groups of Iraqi Shiites.....the fight is between crooks over oil. Not worth the life of an American soldier and we have bases in lots of places and don't need any where we aren't wanted.

<link>

I surrender. I guess this is just one of those issues where objectivity is dead. He never said we would stay no matter if they wanted us or not. If groups fighting and killing each other is reason not to have a base in that country then I think we need to move out of the US. That goes on every day here too.

He was talking about the future, not today or tomorrow. If Al-Qaeda springs back up in Iraq where will the troops that Obama says he will put back in Iraq come from? Where will they land and set up?

If you read those links in my other post you will see that we supported the Iraqi military in Mosul. It is getting closer to the point where they will not need us. But are we not supporting SK by being up at the border.

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Looks like the violence did not end when the war ended. We still have a base in S Korea.

I am sure that Cuba is happy to have us there. As I recall Panama is not very happy with us either.

The situation in Iraq is changing yet you want to assume that nothing has changed. I have stated many times that I think that there are issues tied to Iraq that are not about Iraq. Just as Middleview has stated that we need to fight the Taliban in Afghanistan because their success would lead to the overthrow of Pakistan. I think an unstable Iraq has consequences that are not good for stability of the region and possible the world. That I think is a reality and something that has to be considered.

As far as oil and US soldiers and what is what worth what. With 70% of our oil being produced outside of the US and that number will rise under Obama for at least 14 years, perhaps oil is a national security issue worth fighting over. The environmentalists may find it pleasant to think about having to run the country without access to oil from that region but I think this country would be a serious fix if that were to occur.

I really think that if you take a step back and look at your logic you have to know it is flawed. My guess you are arguing this point solely for the sake of argument. I think it is an extreme reach to say that McCain is all for continued combat actions into infinity. What about our soldiers in Korea. They are located in an area that technically is still a war zone.

You can continue on with this line of attack for something that McCain said that you have to know is being distorted but how can you be critical of those who attack Obama with the same lines of logic.

I would propose that you stop being critical of Hannity because his approach is no different than yours. He repeats over and over what Obama did and said all with the purpose of convincing his listeners that what they hear has to be interpreted as he implies.

So you accept that his wife never was proud of this country, that he sought the advice and support of a known terrorist, that he took advantage of a crooked deal to buy land, that there are 58 states, that he is unpatriotic because he will not wear a flag pin, that he is a Marxist because he went to a church based on a Marxist philosophy and that he believes that 911 was our own fault, that Iran is tiny and not a threat, and that it is important to use public financing of campaigns.

I think you need to lay off of O'Reilly because he clearly is taking as centrist of a view as he can get away with, I am assuming with the idea of growing his viewership which is already pretty large.

Obama himself talks about the silly season and silly arguments, not sure he says this is one which is why so many will not back down on this one but this argument clearly is very silly.

Oh that commercial that says you cannot have her baby. Guess what that baby would only go into the military if they chose to. So the point is very emotional but wrong.

I think it was wolfe in one of the posts said that this debate is futile for two reasons. I think that a good deal of the negative view of Obama comes from the perception that his followers are willing to parrot anything he says. It really is no different than what happened with W when he ran. He would say something that obviously was based on lies and they would march in lockstep that it was gospel.

Middleview, you have said there are some issues you do not agree with Obama but I have not heard them, and some of your dialog that defends Obama makes it difficult to view you as someone who supports Obama but still maintains some objectivity. There are a few other posters here who present what seems to be valid replies to posters who oppose Obama but they are few and far between. Since it seems to me that you are using more and more rhetoric in your replies it seems pointless to bother posting here.

I believe that virtually all of Obama's positions will lead to results that are vastly different than the better place he is suggesting he will lead us too. More like pigs to the slaughter in my view.

That does not mean I support McCain's views. Listening to some of his comments about Obama in Iraq and what it all means sounds pretty dopey to me.

But, he is not the pure republican that Obama supporters want to present him as. Listen to the right wing newscasters and they are pretty critical of him because he has views that are not conservative enough. Watch Colter and she nearly chokes on her tongue when asked about supporting McCain. I think they will vote for him because a bad conservative is better than a socialist liberal. You may argue votes this and that but his political career is not one where he marched lockstep with his party. If it were the right media would be in love with him and if you ever spend time watching what the enemy is doing it would be clear that many of them will close their eyes, hold their nose and vote for him. If he picks a VB like Lieberman well Obama can spend the rest of the summer up in Chicago because it will be game over. They will just not vote for him or anyone else for that matter.

I might vote for him but not because I support his views or think he has any good ideas or plans. I do know that he will have to play ball with the Dem's since they will hold a sizable lead in both branches of the Congress.

I think McCain as president will be nothing like the statements he is making now. A good deal of that is out of political necessity. I felt the same thing about Hillary. With Obama I feel the same way but think that his current moderate view will be tossed aside for an extreme liberal socialist view. Perhaps Marxist is more correct. I need to research that one.

I mostly write and comment on Obama because I am waiting for someone to post something that provides valid information that supports a position of Obama in its entirety.

Even the arguments about the gas holiday skirted the use of details. The availability of gasoline in this country has been adequate and inventories have generally not changed to a large degree. They bang the drum of supply and demand yet totally disregard elasticity of demand which is as I recall .3. Perhaps this is a poor case to use as it is so heated and both sides arguing different things which were pretty much unrelated. I think there is little evidence presented that prove that when an oil company's costs are reduced that the result is an increase in their profit margin. Do the math it is pretty simple actually. I have asked numerous questions about what I see as negative consequences of Obama's plans and I do not recall a single reply that did anything but parrot what Obama says.

Like I said earlier, that is exactly how W's followers were and while Obama is different in point of view, I think W proved that a president that takes office on the backs of those who do not question a thing he says is a bad thing. Very Bad. Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely. Old cliché but I think it has a lot of merit.

When I see Obama's followers questioning his policies and discussing the merits or lack thereof perhaps I might feel different but for now it seems as if Obama is the Shepard and his followers are all sheep.

raptor5618:

I surrender. I guess this is just one of those issues where objectivity is dead. He never said we would stay no matter if they wanted us or not. If groups fighting and killing each other is reason not to have a base in that country then I think we need to move out of the US. That goes on every day here too.

Well, you've got my vote. I'm a big Obama fan, but I agree with you 100% here. Anyone who's honest has to admit that McCain did not mean 100 years of fighting like the years we had in 2004-2006.

The people arguing over whether Iraq is comparable to Japan and Korea are missing the point. The point is that McCain MEANT to say they could become comparable and did NOT mean to say we should have 100 years of war in Iraq. You may disagree with this analysis, but it's dishonest to act as if McCain was arguing for 100 years of war.

That said, it was absolutely retarded of McCain to use the phrase "100 Years" because any jackass could have told you it would be twisted and replayed over and over again. Politically dumb as dirt.

raptor5618:

I think McCain as president will be nothing like the statements he is making now. A good deal of that is out of political necessity.

So McCain is LYING right now about what he'll do as President, just to get elected?

Ziggy Tosh---" but it's dishonest to act as if McCain was arguing for 100 years of war."

No, it's not...look at McCain's logic-

1. We MUST stay in Iraq UNTIL the violence subsides and key political and security elements are accomplished.

2. If they ARE accomplished, we stay in Iraq with a "presence" for 100 years.

3. If they are NOT accomplished, we stay in Iraq UNTIL they are...with no set time-table for EVER getting out, if that never happens.

So....if things improve in Iraq, we stay for 100 years.

If things DON'T improve in Iraq, he offers NO alternative troop removal time frame by which even HE would pull out....

so 100 years is still in play.

The only reason I'm voting against him is I can't stand his foreign policy advisers, guys like Kagan and Scheuneman. The sooner the Executive branch is purged of the fucking Neocons, the better for the Republic.

Ziggytosh said "That said, it was absolutely retarded of McCain to use the phrase "100 Years" because any jackass could have told you it would be twisted and replayed over and over again. Politically dumb as dirt."

I totally agree. I do not know if it is the people who are running his campaign or just that he has this need to say these outrageous things. But, he sure works hard to make sure that he gives the oppositions plenty to use against him.

I am sure that many die hard Republican's are banging their heads on a wall wondering how they ended up with McCain.

As far as the other posts. Yes I think McCain is either lying or at least being dishonest. Can you seriously say that Obama is not doing the same thing. There is a litany of positions he has shifted on from the primary. I see that some here want to say that these new positions were the ones he always held but be serious.

I posted a link from one of his speeches that said we will be out of Iraq in 09. Not around 09 or I hope or would wish we could be out by then but "we will be out in 09". Was that a lie or is his 16 months a lie.

I admit he is very good at laying a fuzzy line out so that he can go all over the place but he most certainly has changed the presentation so that those he is speaking too are sure to have certain beliefs about where he stands.

When he went from Iran is no threat to where Iran is a serious threat in the course of a day or two how can you say that in both cases that was his position. That is one I want to hear.

They both are saying things that fit what the audience wants to hear. Neither is fully honest. So is Obama the extreme liberal of the primary or the moderate he is presenting now. The same can be said about McCain.

I think McCain is more moderate than he is selling now and Obama is more liberal than he is selling now. You probably disagree but I think in the fall you will see lots of ads showing both of them saying things that are in direct contradiction to things they also said. They are pitching us for our vote and both are willing to do whatever it takes. Our society's memory is very short so even with a full reversal of their position it will be quickly forgotten if the new position fits what we want to hear.

"Since it seems to me that you are using more and more rhetoric in your replies it seems pointless to bother posting here."

I'm just glad you avoiding rhetoric when you posted

I believe that virtually all of Obama's positions will lead to results that are vastly different than the better place he is suggesting he will lead us too. More like pigs to the slaughter in my view.

and

Obama is the Shepard and his followers are all sheep.

When I said rhetoric I meant that the replies are becoming more and more a repeat of what Obama and his campaign is saying.

I do not think that any of my comments come from the McCain campaign as I for the most part have not paid that much attention to him. For one he gets almost no coverage so you really have to go looking for it.

I still have seen almost no specific detail that supports Obama's positions.

by all means point out any of my posts that echo something from the Obama campaign.

In any case, look up the meaning of the word rhetoric and tell me how your fairly silly statements about being led to slaughter would not qualify as meaningless political statements.

As far as no coverage.....McCain is on CNN now and uttering more of the crap that basically says that Obama wouldn't mind losing a war.